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By Same Author. 
 
 GOD IN HUMAN THOUGHT; 
 Or, Natural Theology Traced in Literature, Ancient and 
 Modern, to the Time of Bishop Butler. With a Olosing 
 Chapter on the Moral System, and an English Biblio- 
 graphy from Spencer to Butler. By Prof. E. H. Gillett, 
 of the N. T. University, author of "Life and Times of 
 John Huss," etc. Two vols., 8vo, cloth. $5.00. 
 Sent by mail en receipt of price. 
 
THE 
 
 MORAL SYSTEM, 
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL INTRODUCTION. 
 
 HAVING SPECIAL REFERENCE TO BP. BUTLER'S "ANALOGY." 
 
 i!DestigneJ> as a Q^ext !3ook» 
 
 ACADEMIES AND COLLEGES 
 
 :.-^^ 
 
 By E. H;>^GILLETT, 
 
 PROFESSOR IN THE UNIVERSITY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK ; AUTHOR OF " LIFE AND TIMES 
 OF JOHN HUSS " ; " GOD IN HUMAN THOUGHT," ETC, 
 
 -■; . ^ i^-''4£L ^ JO' ' 
 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 SCRIBNER, ARMSTRONG & COMPANY, 
 
 1874. 
 

 Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1874, ty 
 
 E. H. GILLETT, 
 
 In the OlBce of the Librarian of Congress at Washington, D. C. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 My object in this work is to present a comprehensive hut 
 concise view of the Moral System. We have treatises in 
 abundance on the order and laws of the different departments 
 of the material system, nor have mental and moral philosophy 
 failed to receive that degree and amount of attention which 
 have resulted in the preparation of numerous and able text- 
 books. But the order and laws of the providential govern- 
 ment of the world, although of paramount and personal inter- 
 est, have rarely been discussed, except in connection with 
 revealed dogmas, and there are few works which ever pretend 
 to set forth any thorough and connected view of what has 
 been termed the moral Jtosmos. The best known and most 
 able in English literature, is undoubtedly Bp. Butler's "Anal- 
 ogy of Religion, Natural, and Revealed," and this has been 
 extensively used as a text-book in the higher schools and col- 
 leges ; but the very title indicates that his object was not to 
 present anything like a complete or connected scheme of the 
 moral constitution of the world, but only such features of it 
 as were exposed to the same criticisms as the scheme set forth 
 in the Christian Scriptures. On other grounds, also, which 
 will be manifest as we proceed, his work is unsuited not only 
 to the wants of students in a course of education, but to the 
 prevalent type of modern thought, which finds the gravest 
 difiiculties where Butler found none, and often refuses to ad- 
 mit without proof what he was content to assume. 
 
 My own experience of the use of Butler as a text-book, in 
 the university with wliich I am connected, has compelled me 
 so far to modify his arrangement, and supplement or qualify 
 his arguments — especially with a view to interest and instruct 
 classes of young men, many of whom are repelled rather than 
 attracted by Butler's style and method — that in my instruc- 
 tions I have really substituted for Butler lectures of my own, 
 retaining what was essential in his thought, and remolding it, 
 in connection with new matter, so as to constitute the present 
 volume. The advantages of the method which I have pur- 
 sued have been obvious in several respects. A class of minds 
 has been reached and interested — such as are to be found in 
 every large institution — who would have regarded the study 
 
 (3) 
 
4 PEEFACE. 
 
 of the text of Butler with repugnance, but who have thus 
 been attracted to a more systematic and comprehensive sui-vey 
 of the Moral System, with its constitution and laws, as an 
 organic whole. 
 
 Indeed, grave objections, and by no means groundless, have 
 been taken to the "Analog;^" as a text-book, some of which will 
 be noted in the Introduction to this work. But it is enough 
 to say it is unwise to thrust upon the attention of students, in 
 a repulsive form, such truths as Butler presents. Yastly im- 
 portant, they should not be divested of their attractiveness to 
 thoughtful minds by the language or method in which they 
 are set forth. Tet Sir James Mackintosh has remarked of 
 Butler, " !N"o thinker so great was ever so bad a writer. . . . 
 How general must the reception have been of truths so certain 
 and momentous as those contained in Butler's discourses — 
 with how much more clearness must they have appeared to 
 his own great understanding, if he had possessed the strength 
 and distinctness with which Hobbes enforces odious falsehood, 
 or the unspeakable charm of that transparent diction which 
 clothed the unfruitful paradoxes of Berkeley ! " 
 
 It is manifest to any one who has paid attention to the 
 subject, that a liberal education should be, as fiir as possible, 
 symmetrical and comprehensive, as well as thorough, within 
 the limits necessarily assigned. No important department of 
 knowledge should be altogether overlooked. Yet there has 
 of late been a strong tendency to allow physical science to 
 encroach upon the sphere of moral, even while under the 
 broad and proper sense of natural^ the physical and moral are 
 both included. The study of the laws of mind is, to say the 
 least, as important as the study of the laws of matter, and the 
 distinction between right and wrong is as real, though im- 
 palpable to sense, as any that is drawn by the mathematician 
 or chemist. It is paying but an equivocal compliment to any 
 scheme of education to say that it unfolds to the student the 
 operation of such laws as those of gravitation or chemical 
 affinities, but is silent as to the constitution of his own moral 
 being, and the relation Vv^hich it sustains to the moral order 
 of the world. 
 
 l^iebuhr has remarked in his lectures (I. 146), that " as the 
 consideration of nature shows an inherent Intelligence, which 
 may also be conceived as coherent with nature, so does his- 
 tory, on a hundred occasions, show an intelligence which is 
 distinct from nature, which conducts and determines those 
 things which may seem to us accidental ; and it is not true 
 that the study of history weakens the belief in a divine provi- 
 dence. History is, of all kinds of knowledge, the one which 
 tends most decidedly to that belief." 
 
PESFACB. 5 
 
 .But history can be most profitably studied, only wlien, in 
 connection with the unfolding and regulated order of its 
 events, we are prepared by the previous study of the Moral 
 System, to see that it is pervaded by a plan which gives unity 
 to that scheme of things whose sequences history records. 
 
 In like manner the study of the Moral System, m connec- 
 tion with other branches of science, is commended by its 
 utility; but apart from this coiisideration, its intrinsic claims 
 to investigation are paramount. If the laws of health con- 
 cern our physical well-being, and if they demand recognition 
 in the science of physiology, there are also laws of moral as 
 well as mental health, which should not be overlooked, and 
 if the order of the planetary and stellar worlds invites our at- 
 tention, the order which is seen to pervade the Moral System 
 will especially demand our recognition. Yery justly has Wil- 
 liam Archer Butler remarked {Aug. Fhil, II., 56) : " With all 
 our admiration for the energetic labors of the great naturalists 
 of our day, and for the advances which the physical sciences are 
 receiving through their combined exertions, v/e cannot refuse 
 to see — and in all quarters the conviction is gaining strength 
 among thoughtful men — that the spiritual world (except as 
 far as practically presented by the preachers of religion) is in 
 proportion eclipsed. It is, as it were, tm represented in the 
 Parliament of Philosophy. This huge material universe, with 
 all its labyrinth of laws, seems to fetter and entangle us ; 
 and v/e are so overwhelmed by weight and motion, that mat- 
 ter and being become equivalent terms, and we cannot allow 
 the existence of a world to which these material attributes are 
 ■not attached." 
 
 Such a grave practical error as this needs to be corrected, 
 and it should be corrected at the very source in which it origi- 
 nated. We are .not unwarrantably intruding into the relig- 
 ious sphere, or introducing sectarian elements into education, 
 when we simply call attention to facts as obvious and indis- 
 putable as any that physical science reveals, and put upon 
 them an interpretation justified by the laws of scientific 
 method. To a certain extent we follow a track of thought, 
 neither exclusively Pagan or Christian, but common to both, 
 a track which runs parallel, indeed, only to a certain extent 
 with that of revealed truth, but which constitutes the line 
 which any consistent theory of obligation, whether of ethics 
 or religion, must recognize. 
 
 In all ages of intellectual activity, the most profound stu- 
 dents have found themselves constrained to note, and to en- 
 deavor, at least, to interpret those great facts lying along 
 the path of human experience, which indicate a superintend- 
 ing providence and human accountability. Indeed, a very 
 
6 PREFACE. 
 
 large portion of ancient literature lias been shaped and colored 
 by views of the relation of the human to divine, which, though 
 conjoined with many errors, were yet expressive or suggestive 
 of valuable truth ; and if, instead of accepting its guidance, 
 we subject its teachings to criticism, availing ourselves of the 
 clearer light of reason which belongs to a Christian age, we 
 may hope to attain results in advance of any goal which it 
 was able to reach, and to discern how solid is the basis upon 
 which the fundamental truths of theology, natural and re- 
 vealed, repose. 
 
 It is proper to add, that the closing chapter of my work on 
 " God in Human Thought ; or, Natural Theology Traced in 
 Literature," is included also in this volume, for which it was 
 originally prepared. 
 
 At the close of the treatise, I have appended questions de- 
 signed to facilitate its use as a text-book, and these questions 
 cover the Historical Introduction as well as the main body of 
 the work. As the Introduction is a very concise summary of 
 the course of speculation anterior to the time of Butler, and 
 as much of it has special reference to his "Analogy," the 
 teacher can, at his discretion, use such portions of it only as 
 he sees fitting, or omit it altogether. Many of its facts, how- 
 ever, should, in the latter case, be given by the teacher, by 
 way of illustration, in connection with lessons on " The Moral 
 System." 
 
 I had intended to include in the work a bibliography ex- 
 tending from the time of Butler to the present, but even the 
 somewhat incomplete one which I had prepared, would have 
 very materially increased the bulk and cost of the volume, 
 and I have been compelled to content myself with giving a 
 quite meagre list of the leading works belonging to this 
 period, which have followed in the line of Butler's specula- 
 tions. They will be found in a note at the close of the His- 
 torical Introduction. 
 
 New York, September 29, 1874. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. Testimony op CiiAssic Literature, . . 9 
 
 II. Nemesis. The ERiiinsrYES. Fate, . . 19 
 
 III. Teachings op Kevelation. Christian Fathers ; 
 
 AiiGAZEL, Hooker, Herbert, Grotius, . . 26 
 
 IV. HoBBES, Cumberland, Parker and others, . 30 
 V. Locke, Toland, Collins, Tindal, . . .35 
 
 VI. Pope's "Essay ON Man," ... 41 
 
 VII. Butler's immediate Predecessors and Con- 
 temporaries, . . . . .45 
 Vin. Butler's "Analogy," . . . . 58 
 IX. Merits and Depects op Butler's Method 
 
 Considered, . . . . . .77 
 
 THE MOEAL SYSTEM. 
 
 I. Its Scientipic Claims and Relative Impor- 
 tance, . . . . . .85 
 
 II. Complex Elements of Man's Nature in their 
 
 Mutual Relations, .... 88 
 
 III. Man's Relations — Physical, Intellectual and 
 
 Moral — to the External World, . . 93 
 
 IV. Social Organization as Related to the Moral 
 
 System, ...... 98 
 
 V. Man's Relations to Social Organization and 
 
 TO Society, ...... 104 
 
 VI. Time as a Factor in the Moral System, . 115 
 
 (7) 
 
8 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER TAG'S 
 
 VII. Man's MoRAii Nature, .... 121 
 
 VIII. Objections to a Morax System Considered, 131 
 
 IX. The Being and Character of the Author of 
 
 the Moral System, .... 136 
 
 X. The Future Life. The Negative Argument, 142 
 
 XI. The Future- Life. The Positive Argument, . 148 
 
 XII. Probation, ...... 157 
 
 XIII. Severity op Present Trial, . . . 166 
 
 XIV. Ketribution, ..... 173 
 XV. Invalidity of Objections to the Moral System, 180 
 
 XVI. The End Designed in the Moral System, . 185 
 
 XVII. Divine Interposition Actual or Probable, . 194 
 
 XVIII. The Fact op a Kevelation Considered, . 202 
 
 XIX. Revelation and the Moral System, . . 208 
 
 XX. Summary and Conclusion, . . . 213 
 
Historical Introduction. 
 
 I. 
 
 TESTIMO]SrT OF CLASSIC LITEEATTJEE. 
 
 Tpie System of ligature, in tlie proper sense of the phrase, 
 includes not merely the matter, but the constitution and laws 
 of the entire universe. The idea of system is the placing to- 
 gether of things in orderly or established relations. There 
 may be system where we cannot discern the evidences of it, 
 and manifold and extensive analogies compel us to assume its 
 existence where these evidences are wanting. On this ground 
 we feel warranted to employ the phrase — System of Nature — ■ 
 and to infer that there is system throughout nature ; in other 
 words, that it is universal. 
 
 But the universal system of nature includes moral as well 
 as physical elements. The latter have often been termed 
 natural as distinguished from moral, but the foriner as well 
 as the latter, are natural. They belong to the great whole of 
 being. Their existence does not admit of dispute or question, 
 and they stand together in established relations, whether the 
 fact be recognized or not. Experience and observation assure 
 us of it, insomuch that we speak, and must speak, of moral 
 as well as physical laws, of intellectual, social, emotional, as 
 well as material forces. 
 
 As the Sidereal System is made up of subordinate systems, 
 which yet in mutual connection constitute a grand imity, so 
 the System of Nature is composed of minor constituent sys- 
 tems, articulated or interwoven together ; yet in such a way 
 that each may be considered by itseK, as well as related to the 
 others. We may investigate the system of vegetable or of 
 animal life, or, with Cudworth, discuss the " Intellectual Sys- 
 tem " of the universe, but we do so by abstracting from the 
 
 (9) 
 
10 THE MOEAL SYSTEM NATURAL. 
 
 whole a certain class of elements, possessed of distinct charac- 
 ters and relations, and considering these apart by themselves. 
 If, in this way, we take up the constitution of man as a moral 
 agent, and the laws which assert their authority over him as 
 such, visiting him with reward or penalty, or plying him with 
 motives appropriate to his nature, we have, under th6 System 
 of ISTature, and included as an essential part of it, what re- 
 quires a distinctive term, and to this the name Moral System 
 is appropriately applied. 
 
 This moral system is thus seen to be natural. It is a com- 
 ponent part of the system of nature, interwoven with and an 
 integral portion of it, and distinguished from it only in our 
 thoughts for purposes of investigation. It is included under 
 the phrase constitution and laws of nature, and, although we 
 might suppose a material universe, exclusive of moral ele- 
 ments, yet the actual universe embraces them, and cannot 
 properly be understood, explained, or appreciated without 
 them. Indeed, it may be that in them we shall find — apart 
 from revelation — the fittest key to the interpretation of na- 
 ture ; hints to explain the significance of material things and 
 arrangements, which the things or arrangements, in them- 
 selves, do not afford. The Moral System, therefore, is in the 
 highest sense natural, and the contrast is not between natural 
 and moral, but between moral and physical. 
 • But a moral system must be distinguished from moral gov- 
 ernment. The latter is more directly suggestive of the ele- 
 ment of personal administration or supervision, not that the 
 former excludes, or does not imply it, but it leaves it more in 
 the background. "With this exception, the term Tnoral system 
 is more comprehensive in its significance than moral govern- 
 ment. It includes, or may include, much more than the mere 
 administration of law, with a view of swaying men to obedi- 
 ence by means of reward and penalty. Reformatory disci- 
 pline, remedial provisions for transgression, moral influences 
 infinite in their variety, as well as trial and probation, includ- 
 ing the temporary arrest of judicial processes, are all consist- 
 ent with a perfect moral system, while they would imply an 
 imperfect, or rather, incomplete and modified moral govern- 
 ment. The evidence that would fail to prove a. perfect moral 
 
geeek; weitees. 11 
 
 government, miglit be fully adequate to prove tlie existence of 
 a moral system, and a moral system tliat included many ele- 
 ments of moral government. All that would be required would 
 be to adduce facts indicative of the operation of laws plainly 
 designed to produce certain moral results, or discourage from 
 certain courses of action, objectionable on moral grounds, 
 showing at the same time that these facts are of general signifi- 
 cance, and that these laws, however tardily, are yet systemat- 
 ically applied and enforced. 
 
 It is not surprising, therefore, that from the earliest period 
 of recorded human thought, we should find the existence of a 
 moral system assumed. It may be grossly apprehended. Ap- 
 parent incongruities or imperfections connected with it may 
 even seem to imply an imperfect administration, or furnish 
 some plausible ground for ascribing the phenomena of the 
 moral order of the world to opposite principles, or a variety 
 of divinities. In some cases there will naturally be a disposi- 
 tion to harmonize or solve these incongruities from a Theistic 
 standpoint ; in others, they will be accepted as inexplicable 
 mysteries, or as proofs that the sphinx-like riddle of human 
 existence is quite insoluble. But in most cases there wiU be 
 some recognition of superhuman forces acting with design, 
 concessions of a providence that exercises some hind of con- 
 trol, whether capriciously, or wisely and beneficently, over 
 the affairs of men. 
 
 Throughout ancient classic literature, we trace an under- 
 current of thought of this kind, and sometimes it comes dis- 
 tinctly to the surface. In Solon's counsel to Crossus, to count 
 no man happy till he is dead, we recognize, in connection with 
 his repute for wisdom, his convictions of a providence that 
 may make the splendors of wealth and power illustrate the 
 supremacy of the great unseen power of justice, that deter- 
 mines finally all human allotments. No careful student of 
 Herodotus has failed to notice as a leading characteristic of 
 his work, its almost constant recognition of a providence that 
 exults to abase the proud, and defeat the designs of the might- 
 iest ruler, who, like the Persian monarch, could seek to ciT.sh 
 a free and enterprising people. Anaxagoras breaks loose from 
 the precedents of a materialistic philosophy, to declare that the 
 
12 PYTHAGORAS. PLATO. 
 
 origin of creation, with its establislied order, is inexplicable, 
 without an informing mind, Pythagoras, in his famous let- 
 ter Y, draws the picture of the branching paths of virtue and 
 vice, " the broad and narrow ways," one strait and difficult, 
 but with its rich revi^ards ; the other smooth and easy, but 
 with its terrible sequel of retribution. The doctrine of the 
 immortality of the soul he is said to have received from 
 Pherecydes — said to have been indebted to the secret books 
 of the Phoenicians — or to have derived it from Egypt, 
 while, amid the vagaries of Polytheism, he attained, with his 
 theory of numbers, to the conception of the One. Empedo- 
 cles recognized the dependence on the Gods of " the creature 
 of a day," and the stern law of retribution that would follow 
 its blood-stained victim for "thrice ten thousand years." His 
 idea of the Deity is that of " a holy infinite Spirit, not pro- 
 vided with limbs, th5,t passes through the world with rapid 
 thoughts," while the power of necessity seems by him identi- 
 fied with " the ancient decree of the Gods." 
 
 Democritus, although the Ilobbes of his age, and making a 
 prudent egoism the corner-stone of his ethics, called the com- 
 mon notion of chance a cover for human ignorance. Socrates, 
 repelled by the scepticisms of the sophists and their ethics 
 of selfishness, apprehended with unprecedented clearness the 
 leading truths of the moral system ; arguing the divine exist- 
 ence from design in nature ; making virtue the highest inter- 
 est of man ; acknowledging an overruling providence ; assert- 
 ing the punishment of sin, in sin itself ; and in his own ex- 
 ample illustrating a sublime integrity that would accept the 
 fatal hemlock sooner than seek to escape penalty by anything 
 unworthy of himself ; and on his trial before his judges, and 
 with his friends around him in his prison, giving evidence of 
 being supported by that hope of immortality which assured 
 his spirit of a final home with good men and with the Gods. 
 
 In Plato we meet with the most remarkable thinker of the 
 ancient heathen world. "With much that is crudely theoretic or 
 fanciful, there is much that excites our admiration and com- 
 mands our assent. A supreme mind, an overruling provi- 
 dence, stern laws of duty, personal responsibility, the immor- 
 tality of the soul, the depraved tendencies of human nature, 
 
AEISTOTLE. HOMEE. 13 
 
 the high, and inspiring prospects of virtue, the impartial se- 
 verity of final judgment, stern and inevitable retribution— 
 these are among the most important topics on which he lav- 
 ishes the wealth of his genius, while he reveals his own loftj 
 conception of the possibilities of human existence. Aristotle, 
 more cool and cautious, is theoretically a pure Theist, and to 
 him Cicero has ascribed an argument which anticipates, in a 
 very impressive manner, modern arguments for a creating 
 mind from the design evinced in creation. He speaks of the 
 future destiny of the soul in conditional phraseology, but in 
 his l^icomachean ethics, he brings forward clearly and em- 
 phatically the fact of moral distinctions, and displays those 
 features of the moral system with which virtue harmonizes, 
 and vice is at issue. Later Greek philosophy was content to 
 copy from its great masters of the Platonic age, refining 
 upon their speculations only to give them a false development ; 
 although sometimes, as in the sublime hymn of Cleanthes, 
 rising to apprehensions of the Divine being and providence, 
 not unworthy of the finest conceptions of Plato himself. 
 Notwithstanding the pictures he gives us of the disgraceful 
 quarrels and vulgar huijian passions . of the rulers of Olym- 
 pus, Homer re]3resents Zeus as the moral governor of the 
 world. He is king of gods and men, the sovereign adminis- 
 trator over all human interests. The good or evil from the 
 two urns before him, are dispensed by his hand. His provi- 
 denpe is universal, and the retributive forces of the universe 
 cooperate v/ith his designs to maintain the moral order of 
 the world. The fearful Erinnyes " represent Law in action." 
 Mure remarks, in his " Critical History of Greek Language 
 and Literature " (I. 1Y2), with reference both to the Iliad and 
 'the Odyssey, " The general scheme of divine management in 
 both poems is consistent and well-imagined. The supreme 
 first cause or cflicient unity of the Deity, is Fate or Destiny. 
 Zeus always steps in between contending powers as the Sav- 
 iour God, and invariably turns the scale in favor of virtue." 
 Thus, the doctrine of a superintending and controlling provi- 
 dence is ever kept in view. Strength, Vvdsdom, and courage 
 are the gifts of the Gods. They hear the prayers of mortals 
 and mete out their lot ; Law is recognized as of universal obli- 
 
14r HESIOD. PINDAU. GEEEK TEAGEDIANS. 
 
 gation. Invisible, but resistless forces execute it. Conceptions 
 of them, evidently traditional, and accepted by Homer, are 
 impersonated in Dike, Themis, !Nomos, or Nemesis, some- 
 times the one and sometimes the other; but ever the same 
 idea of justice or retribution — ever sitting at the right hand 
 of Zeus, and acting as his judicial associates or consessors. It 
 is especially in that dread word, Nemesis^ which Homer trans- 
 mitted to the later Greek literature, that we recognize the 
 idea of inevitable justice, and to this Fate sets the seal. 
 
 In Hesiod, the Gods, " invisible, are ever nigh." Man has 
 ten thousand unseen guardians, commissioned from on high, 
 who rove the world. Eternal justice has her mansion in the 
 sky, and her place at the feet of Zeus, where she presents her 
 plaint, till retribution comes upon guilty nations. Wicked- 
 ness wounds itself, and in the end its seeming prosperity is 
 vain. The two paths of Hesiod are substantially identical 
 with the two of Pythagoras. 
 
 Pindar exhibits a firm 'belief in a superintending provi- 
 dence. " The whole of his poetry is impregnated with a lively 
 sense of the divine in the world." "ISTo Greek writer ex- 
 . presses himself, in reference to the certainty of final and 
 exact retribution, more confidently than Pindar." The Gods 
 give victory, but " they enjoin duties, and humility, gratitude 
 and moderation are obligatory." 
 
 ^schylus is the Milton of Greek poetry. ISTearer than any 
 of his rivals does he approach the terrible and impressive sub- 
 limity of the Hebrew prophets. ^Nemesis, the Fates and the 
 Furies, are with him impersonated forces. Zeus is the chas- 
 tiser of arrogance and overbearing thoughts. Crime can never 
 escape final retribution. The invisible curse threads its way 
 along the ages, and through generations, till the guilt is expi ■ 
 ated. IsTothing is accidental. The moral system stands as 
 firm as the throne of its Eternal Ruler. 
 
 Sophocles, coming nearer to our human sympathies, and 
 with more of harmony and sweetness, is by no means less 
 lofty in his ethics. ISTo one has drawn more exquisitely the 
 beauty of virtue when subject to trial. ITo one has invested 
 " the eternal unwritten laws " of God with a more impressive 
 majesty. Over these a sleepless and resistless providence pre- 
 
CICESO. 15 
 
 sides. To guilt, however hedged with power, there is no pos- 
 sibility of escape. Fate is resistless, and there is a " mighty 
 Zeus " in heaven. Wilful wrong-doing challenges his wrath 
 and its own doom. The soul is immortal, and retribution 
 reaches beyond the grave. In Euripides, the influence of the 
 age of the Sophists is distinctly to be traced. Instead of look- 
 ing upward to the majestic heavenly hannonies, his eye is 
 turned do^vnward to the earth. He sees the world, if not a 
 vale of tears, a moral labyrinth, and his tragedies reflect the 
 puzzling mazes and confused scenes of a moral system in 
 which inexplicable problems are involved. 
 
 It would delay us too long to trace the views of providence 
 involved in such works as the " History of Thucydides," and 
 the "Orations of Demosthenes." Yet the narrative of the 
 one, and the appeals of the other, indicate a prevalent popu- 
 lar sentiment that the Gods favor justice, and that their 
 providence superintends the affairs of men. 
 
 The two great sects of Epicureans and Stoics were rivals, 
 and yet each bore testimony to fragmentary portions of the 
 moral order of the world. The foimer, leaving the Gods to 
 their eternal repose, still admitted that human happiness was 
 subjected to certain flxed conditions, and that wisdom required 
 the study of these. The Stoics, eulogizing and almost deify- 
 ing virtue, made the good man who possessed it invincible by 
 suffering or calamity. They vitalized the universe, and filled 
 it with a providence, however crudely conceived. Their phi- 
 losophy appealed strongly to the admiration and sympathies of 
 those who had inherited a regard for the old Eoman ideal of 
 virtue. But a sceptical element had been transmitted by the 
 Academics, and we see its operation in the mind of Cicero as 
 he discusses " The INTature of the Gods." Epicurean, Stoic, 
 and Academic are alike allowed a hearing, and in the Tuscu- 
 lan questions, we have the speculations of the most gifted of 
 Koman orators and philosophers, on the immortality of the 
 soul. Cicero accepts, with qualifications of doubt and uncer- 
 tainty, most of the doctrines transmitted from Plato. He 
 gives in his adhesion to the theory of a divine providence 
 over human interests. He accepts and amplifies the concep- 
 tion of the eternal unwritten law. He magnifies the beauty 
 
IG SENECA. PLUTAKCn. 
 
 and claims of virtue, declining to conceal his abhon'ence of 
 
 mere utilitarian ethics. As to the immortality of the soul, 
 his confidence wavers ; while he reads Plato his doubts vanish, 
 hut onlj again to reappear when he has laid the book aside. 
 
 This is true also of 'Seneea, and yet in his writings we find 
 the recognition of moral duties and relations, which are held 
 up to view, as a check, if possible, upon the depravity of the 
 age. Of human nature, his picture is far from flattering ; 
 but he manifests a high appreciation of the excellence and 
 beauty of virtue, while few ancient writers go beyond him in 
 the sublime conception of an universal providence. He m.ay 
 use, like his contemporaries, such terms as fate or fortune, 
 but he hai'monizes them with his theistic scheme, and leaves 
 nothing to chance. The Stoic ideal of living " according to 
 nature," commends itself to his approval, but this nature is to 
 be consistent with the supremacy of reason. 
 
 Plutarch is more thoroughly human and genial, an Eclec- 
 tic in his philosophy, but with strong stoical leanings. He 
 believes that " the art of a great understanding produced the 
 world ;" that the condition of man, without a presiding Intel- 
 ligence, would be pitiable ; that Providence is wise and benef- 
 icent ; that man, in whom we see the ripe fruit of the Crea- 
 tor's plans, has an immortal destiny before him, and is not to 
 be blasted or extinguished in a moment and forever ; that the 
 hope of immortality is needed to sustain the soul ; that virtue 
 is ordaiued to be closely allied to blessedness, and vice to mis- 
 ery ; that happiness does not consist in what is external, but 
 the soul itself may become its own bitterest tormentor ; that 
 for guilt there is no escape, while wealth and power cannot 
 afford it ease or security. It is true, as set forth in De Sera 
 Ifnminis Yindicta, that deserved retribution is tardily in- 
 flicted, but this shows that God does not punish in haste and 
 anger, while swift penalty might involve the innocent with 
 the guilty, or out off chosen instruments of Providence before 
 their time, or deny merciful opportunities for repentance. 
 The visitation of the iniquity of parents upon children makes 
 a more lasting and salutary impression. Lingering justice 
 allows also for moral discipline. Submission to unavoidable 
 evils is a duty. "We come into being, not to prescribe our 
 
ANTONmuS. EPICTETUS. 17 
 
 own lot, but to accept what is given, and obey tlae Gods that 
 govern the world. Future retribution is accepted and held 
 in Plato's sense. Moral distinctions are not conventional, 
 but eternal. Self-examination and introspection are the part 
 of every wise man. I^ature is not void of reason, but full of 
 God. 
 
 The "Meditations" of the imperial philosopher, Marcus 
 Aurelius Antoninus, set before us the highest Stoic ideal. 
 He reverences the power of Gods who exist, although, like 
 his own soul, unseen. A wise Providence has established 
 and guards the moral order of the world. The " Universal 
 jN^ature " — Pantheistic as the phrase may sound — is at once 
 resistless, intelligent, and just. Fate is the necessary connec- 
 tion or consequence of causes, as related to events. There is 
 no real evil in the world. Nothing happens ; all is pre- 
 ordained, yet the governing intelligence has no malice toward 
 any. There is a moral order of the world, a mutual adjust- 
 ment, as of squared stones in a wall or pyramid. Soul and- 
 body have different destinies. For the former, there may be 
 a life hereafter, but if otherwise, it has reached its port ; it is 
 released from the body that enslaved it. It will be absorbed 
 in the universal soul, for in its origin, it is an efflux from 
 God. Man's duty here, is to live " according to nature," to 
 follow reason, the great law of the universe ; to keep the soul 
 within unpolluted, and follow its dictates as those of a god. 
 Stoic virtue will teach how to endure, and take their sting 
 from the unequal allotments of life. 
 
 In Epictetus we meet with ethical teachings and concep- 
 tions, which, for loftiness and beauty, are unsurpassed among 
 heathen writers. The Poman slave, subject, with his feeble 
 frame, to more than ordinary hardships, is a more genuine 
 philosopher than his imperial rival. The purity of his doc- 
 trine, and his own virtuous example, have warranted the epi- 
 thet bestowed upon him, of "the great ornament" of the 
 Stoic School. His recognition of the moral order of the 
 world is habitual. He dwells impressively on the Omnipres- 
 ence of God. The nature and reason of man indicate his 
 duty. " A rational creature," he says, " I must sing hymns 
 to God." To Him belongs the a-oodness of a father, and the 
 2 
 
18 EOMAN POETS AND HISTORIANS. 
 
 authority of a ruler. As His subject and cMlcl, man is to seek 
 to know and please Him. To do this, constitutes the struggle 
 and the duty of Hfe. It is a task, a discipline, a warfare. If 
 the trial is severe, it has its uses. If the soul shrinks from it, 
 it is false to its trust, and must expect retribution. If faith- 
 ful, it will be approved, for God's smile is on the good, 
 whether living or dead. Unlike Seneca, Epictetus does not 
 approve of suicide. One is to stand, like the soldier at the 
 post assigned him, until discharged by his commander. Of 
 the immortality of the soul, although frequently implied, Epic- 
 tetus has little to say. Virtue and vice, however, must be 
 attended by their proper results, reward or penalty. 
 
 In the Roman poets and historians we meet with numerous 
 passages and expressions, sometimes setting forth their own, 
 and sometimes reflecting the popular view of different and 
 isolated features of the moral system. Singular as it may 
 seem, they are frequent in Horace and in Ovid, and the trib- 
 ute paid by the former to the power of conscience in the 
 
 memorable lines, 
 
 "Hie murus aheneus esto, 
 Nil conscire sibi, nulla pallescere culpa," 
 
 for force and beauty, has rarely been surpassed. The deprav- 
 ity of the age, and the debasement to which human nature 
 gravitates when left to itself, as well as the fearful retribu- 
 tions, even on earth, of unscrupulous vice, are impressively 
 presented in the satires of Juvenal, and in the pages of Taci- 
 tus. The portrait which the latter gives us of the combined 
 infamy and misery of Tiberius, is one of the most memorable 
 things in ancient literature. Even in Csesar, we find that when 
 he deals with the Galhc tribes,and while such a sceptic himself, 
 he labors to impress upon them the lesson, that the delay of 
 divine retribution is only to the end that when the blow falls 
 at last, it may come with the more crushing weight. Livy 
 reflects a conviction, if not popular, at least widely prevalent, 
 that the decadence of the Roman empire, or of its inherited 
 glory and prestige, in his day, was due to the lack of that 
 primitive piety in which the foundations of the nation were 
 laid. He seems even to suggest that theory of the prospec- 
 tive dissolution of the vast empire, which Augustine, in his 
 
OEIENTAL rniLOSOPHY. PHILO. 19 
 
 De Civitate Dei, has so eloquently presented. It is signifi- 
 cant that for generations after the founding of Rome, idolatry 
 was unknown ; and that ISTuma, the prophet - lawgiver and 
 organizer of the nation, is so disposed to nurture and employ 
 in the support of his institutions, that instinctive sense of a 
 superhuman providence and justice, which is the attestation 
 of the human conscience to the existence of the moral system. 
 
 II. 
 
 NEMESIS. THE EEINNTES. FATE. 
 
 Chkistianitt had already begun to exert its powerful modi- 
 fying influence upon the world's thought, when Seneca, Plu- 
 tarch, Epictetus, and Marcus Am'elius Antoninus flourished. 
 It spoke with a tone of authority unlike that of all the schools 
 of ancient philosophy. Its influence, long before the time of 
 Constantine, had been deeply and widely felt. Accepted by 
 thoughtful minds educated in the Platonic philosophy, it was 
 received often by them as a philosophy as well as religion. 
 The attempt was made in repeated instances, to harmonize 
 Platonism with Christianity, and friends and foes alike were 
 disposed to call in the pupil of Socrates as their ally. 
 
 But an Oriental element, distinct from both the others, was 
 pressing for recognition. It is seen in Philo, and some of the 
 leading members of the Alexandrian school. In connection 
 with Christianity, it gave birth to the various forms of Grnos- 
 ticism, which essayed to trace the creation of matter back to 
 ^ons or a Demiurgos, that no dishonor might be imputed to 
 the transcendent Intelligence, who was supposed to exist inde- 
 pendent of all relations that would impHcate him in the evil 
 or imperfection of the world. 
 
 It is impossible to trace minutely, and in its various direc- 
 tions, the influence of this element upon the speculation of 
 the age. It was resisted at times by heathen philosophers 
 and Christian teachers alike. As both called Plato to their 
 aid, it was impossible that a new interest should not be awak- 
 
20 NEO-PLATONISM. NEMESIS. 
 
 ened in regard to the writings and speculations of the Greek 
 philosopher. ISTeo-Platonism was the revival, not by any 
 means in their identity or purity, of points that Plato had 
 taught and held. Powerfully modified by the new religion 
 which it opposed, it strove to intei'pret Greek philosophy in a 
 sense which was defensible by reason, and acceptable to the 
 age. We are not surprised, therefore, to find a semi-christian 
 sense given to heathen dogma, or heathen terms vindicated 
 from the objections of Christian critics. 
 
 Among the terms of great moral significance, which had 
 found a place in Greek literature, were those of Themis, 
 Dike, ITemesis, the Erinnyes, and Fate. At an early period 
 justice ceases to be an abstract quality or attribute; and 
 Themis, as we have seen, becomes the consessor or counsellor 
 of Zeus. 
 
 Of K"emesis, we may say, that in studying the application 
 and use of the term, we find it expressive of a most exalted 
 conception, that of the pervading element of distributive and 
 exact justice, in accordance with law. There is nothing too high 
 for it to reach ; nothing too low or mean for it to overlook, 
 provided it has in it any moral element, any ground for praise 
 or blame. Its impersonality is uniformly, if not always pre- 
 served, as if its purity or perfection would be soiled by con- 
 tact with any element or attribute of personal character. " JSTe- 
 mesis is to Hesiod the key-stone of the universal order ; if 
 that be removed, all will be dissolved and go to wreck. . . . 
 Neither in the Iliad, nor in the Odyssey, is JSTemesis a deity, 
 nor even a personified moral quality. . . . We are compelled 
 to recognize beneath this garb a true consciousness of God, a 
 sense of his actual presence in human affairs. . . . Nothing 
 less than the sanctity of a moral energy which had the idea 
 of JSTemesis as the centre of men's inward religious feeling, 
 could have revealed to the Greek his Epos and Drama, and 
 conducted both in his hands to the summit of perfection." 
 Tet this idea pervades the universe like an atmosphere. It 
 encompasses thrones, and exists changeless and eternal through 
 all the ages. The very apprehension of it, as a controlling 
 element in the order of the world, makes that order moral. 
 All material changes, and all operations of physical laws, and 
 
THE ERmNTES. 21 
 
 all puttings forth of hnman will or energy, must be in volun- 
 tary or enforced submission to its behest. 
 
 Mm'e (iv. 368) remarks : " Every act of signal folly, espe- 
 cially "when committed in the face of some sacred warning, is 
 represented as the object of a special Kemesis ; and as visited 
 sooner or later on the guilty person himself, or his descend- 
 ants, with its proper meed of retributive vengeance." 
 
 Of the Erinnyes, it may be said, that while their office is 
 discharged in the interests of justice, that justice is so stem, 
 so unrelenting, so disposed to extort the uttermost farthing, 
 that they are consistently represented as clothed in personality. 
 They are rather prosecutors than judges. They have Nothing 
 to do with tolerance or equity, but only press the shai"p letter 
 of the law, from which not one jot or tittle must ever pass 
 away. Of mercy they know nothing. Of virtues commingled 
 or associated with vices, they take no notice. The ounce of 
 flesh nearest the heart — according to the strict terms, as of a 
 contract — they must and will have ; and in pursuit of it, un- 
 less restrained by superior authority, they would press into 
 the very penetralia of the sacred temple. Mere human au- 
 thority might relax its severity at the sight of suffering. 
 Mere human justice might feel itself disarmed by the calam- 
 ity of its destined victim, but the Erinnyes feel no compassion, 
 and experience no compunction. The Orestes of Greek Trag- 
 edy illustrates this feature of their character, as well as the 
 sphere they are supposed to fill. Their presence in the moral 
 system represents its vindictive element. It sets forth its 
 most terrible and impressive features. If we are tempted, in 
 view of the human weaknesses of the Gods of Olympus, to 
 despise their character or slight their authority, the Erinnyes 
 come in to abate our confidence or rebuke our presumption. 
 It matters not whether their personality was helieved in ; the 
 conception of them gives a peculiar aspect to the moral order 
 of the world. 
 
 It must be admitted that the word/afe, had diverse signifi- 
 cations as employed by classic writers of different ages. But it 
 is equally plain that in some instances it was used in the sense 
 of what we should denominate the established order of things. 
 In his work on " Divination," Cicero represents his brother, 
 
22 FATE IN HOMEE. 
 
 Quintus, as saying, "Eeason compels us to admit that by 
 fate all things take place ;" and then adds, " By fate, I mean 
 that which the Greeks called elfiapiievi], that is, a certain order 
 and series of causes — for cause linked to cause produces all 
 things ; and in this connection of causes consists the constant 
 truth which flows through all eternity." In some cases, espe- 
 cially among the earlier Greek writers, the idea of fate was, 
 in some more or less definite way, associated with a presiding 
 will. In others we may regard it as the necessary resultant 
 from the aggregate of all natural laws and moral forces, as 
 well as the accumulated influences of human action working 
 out their inevitable issue. 
 
 Another distinction of the senses in which the term was 
 employed, is noted by Cicero in his treatise on "Fate." 
 " The ancient philosophers," he says, " are divided into two 
 parties on the doctrine ; some of whom maintain that fate 
 works all in all, and that it exerts a necessary and compul- 
 sive force over all agents; of which opinion were Democ- 
 ritus, Heraclitus, Empedocles, and Aristotle ; while others 
 asserted that fate had no influence whatsoever over the volun- 
 tary acts of the soul. Between these two opinions, Chry- 
 sippus, as an honorary arbiter, held a middle course ; but he 
 seems to approach nearest to those who believe the acts of the 
 soul to be free from necessity." 
 
 In Homer the precise relation of fate to the will of Zeus 
 cannot consistently be defined. Sometimes it seems to stand 
 for a power that may be considered apart from that will, and 
 at others, for the solemn and irrepealable decree in which it 
 finds expression. Bunsen remarks :* " The relation of Zens to 
 Destiny has been often falsely conceived. Zeus stands in an 
 ordered universe ; to this Kosmos it appertains before all, 
 that all beings abide within the law of their ovsoi existence. 
 Thu^ man, the noblest of them all, must die ; this is his des- 
 tiny ; but it is part of the order established by Zeus : whose 
 essence is at one with this thought. He who invokes the 
 Gods against this order, sets himself up in opposition to the 
 father of the Gods, and falls a prey to madness. Zeus is not 
 bound to Moira as to. a blind destiny; he is,j?er se^ the law 
 
 * Bunsen's "God in History," II. 103. 
 
AKCIENT VIEW OF FATE. 23 
 
 of the world and of all beings, and maintains that law invio- 
 late." 
 
 The difficulty of rightly apprehending the relation of Zeus 
 to fate, which we meet in Homer, occurs elsewhere, also, in 
 Greek literature. Cicero represents one of the Greek poets 
 as asserting, " that the Supreme Jupiter cannot prevent that 
 which is decreed to come to pass," Herodotus says, "It is 
 impossible for God himseK to avoid the destined fate ;" and 
 again, " God himseK is the servant of necessity." The ex- 
 planation of this seeming subordination of the Deity to a 
 power outside of himself, is given in the assertion that God 
 governs himself by the same reason by which he governs the 
 world. Consistent with this is the language of Pindar, quoted 
 by Plato, that " the law (of Providence) iniles over all, both 
 mortal men and the immortal Gods," as well as that of Simon- 
 ides, " the Gods themselves do not resist ^Necessity," that is, 
 the uncontrollable laws of Divine Providence. God himself 
 is determined invariably to sustain the eternal order, to act in 
 accordance with it, and so may be said to be bound by and 
 to obey his own laws, as being most wise and perfect. 
 
 That what the ancient philosophers meant by Fate is not 
 inconsistent with the freedom of human actions, has been 
 elaborately and learnedly argued by Jackson, the chronolo- 
 gist.* He cites the interpretation put by A. Gellius on the 
 words of Homer : 
 
 " O! how do mortal men accuse us Grods! 
 They say their Evils all proceed from us ; 
 But they, not Fate^ bring mischief on them.selves 
 Thro' their own voluntary wickedness." 
 
 The concurrence of the Platonic and Aristotelian philoso- 
 phy in this matter, notwithstanding the assertion of Cicero as 
 to the latter, is said to be asserted by Hierocles, who speaks 
 with contempt of those w^ho pretended they disagreed, and to 
 their common notion of fate, he professes himseK to adhere, 
 viz : " That it was not the senseless necessity of the for- 
 tune-tellers ; nor the Stoical compulsion, but that it was the 
 judicial operation of the divine power, effecting events accord- 
 * A Defence of Human Liberty, 1725. Second Edition, 1730, 
 
24 FATE AND PKOVIDENCE. 
 
 ing to the laws of providence, and determining tlie order and 
 series of our circumstances in tlie world according to the free 
 pui'poses of our voluntary actions." 
 
 After remarking upon numerous citations on the subject 
 from ancient authors, Jackson concludes : " From the preced- 
 ing observations, we learn what was the true opuiion in gen- 
 eral, both of the Platonics and Stoics, concerning Fate ^ 
 namely, that it was no other than the Laws of Divine Provi- 
 dence^ whereby all things are governed according to their 
 several natures ; and, therefore, particularly in respect of 
 men, it was understood to be the rules and decrees of Divine 
 Providence, determining the events of human life, and dis- 
 pensing rewards and punishments according to the natm-e of 
 men's voluntary actions. They thought that God governed 
 the world by His sovereign will^ which they called Provi- 
 dence ; by which he made fixed and unalterable laws for the 
 administration of the whole universe, and that he determined 
 men's conditions, and their happiness or misery, whether here 
 or hereafter, according as their actions freely chosen, and 
 done voluntarily, should be. So that Fate in reality was no 
 other than Providence, or the immutable law and rule of 
 God's government of the world ; and which was called JSTeees- 
 sity . . . because it was the necessary law of all nature ; and 
 the external effects of it, or the events produced by it, by a 
 series of antecedent causes, in consequence of men's voluntary 
 actions, were unavoidable and necessary." 
 
 That this was the very generally accepted notion of Fate, 
 is evidenced by the language of numerous writers. Chrysip- 
 pus says, " Fate is the Reason of the world, or th3 law of. 
 Providence by which all things in the world are governed." 
 Gicero, in the person of Yelleius, represents the stoical notion 
 of Fate to be, " That all events proceed from the eternal truth 
 and connection of causes." Diogenes Laertius defines their 
 opinion — " That Fate is the connection of the causes of things, 
 or that Peason by which the world is governed." Seneca says, 
 " Fate is nothing else but the connection of causes." He identi- 
 fies it with ITature, and, also, with Providence, as the working 
 energy of the universe. Tacitus, speaking of the Stoics, says : 
 " They attribute, indeed, a fatality unto things ; but not as pro- 
 
SEKSES OF THE WOED FATE. 25 
 
 ceecling from the motion of tlie planets, but from the princi- 
 ples and connection of natural causes ; and yet they leave the 
 conduct of our life to our own choice, which being chosen, a 
 certain order of events, they think, follows." Alcinous, in com- 
 menting on Plato's opinion of Fate, says : " He understands 
 Fate to be this : that if any person chooseth such a sort of life, 
 and will do such and such actions, such and such consequences 
 will follow. But the consequence of its action will be effected 
 by fate." Fate, Hierocles asserts, " is the judicial operation 
 of the Deity, effecting events according to the laws of Provi- 
 dence, and directing human actions in the order and course 
 that is suitable to their free purposes and voluntary actions." 
 
 The sense in which the term is used is defined by his rea- 
 soning. " If," says he, " bodily and external events fall out 
 fortuitously and by chance, what becomes of the superintend- 
 ency of God, to judge and recompense every one according 
 to his deserts." He asserts that we ought not " to ascribe all 
 things to the unintelligent and undirected circumvolution of 
 the universe, there being a mmd that presides over all things, 
 and a God who is the author of the world." Evidently, by 
 Fate is understood that fixed constitution of things, which 
 excludes the idea of chance or fortune. Chalcidius asserts 
 Fate to be "the decree of Providence, comprehending our 
 voluntary actions, as the precedent grounds of it ; compre- 
 hending, also, the recompense of our deserts. Punishment 
 and approbation, which are by fatality, and all those things 
 which happen fortuitously or by chance, are the consequents 
 of it." Commenting on Plato, Chalcidius says, that Fate, 
 " in his PhcBclrtLS, is an unavoidable decree ; in his Timoeus, 
 the laws which God endited to celestial beings concerning 
 the nature of the universe." 
 
 In their notion of Fate, the Stoics are asserted to be in sub- 
 stantial agreement with the IN^ew Platonists. Heraclitus styles 
 the substance of Fate, that reason which pervades the substance 
 of the universe. Chrysippus is said to have identified Fate 
 with Jupiter, or " the power of that perpetual and eternal 
 law which is, as it were, the guide of our life and director of 
 our duty." According to Diogenes Laertius, God and mind, 
 and Fate and Jupiter, were one and the same. According to 
 
26 CHRISTIANITY AND THE MORAL SYSTEM. 
 
 Alexander Aphrodisms, tlie Stoics held that Fate, and K'a^ 
 ture, and Reason, by which the universe is governed, is God. 
 Admitting the strong temptation of the ]^eo-Platonists to 
 put the least objectionable sense upon the terms of heathen 
 philosophy and mythology, it is quite obvious that they had 
 in numerous cases, not only plausible but satisfactory grounds 
 on which to rest their intei'pretation of the word Fate. As 
 impersonal, it must necessarily express some blind force with- 
 out intelligence, of which the mind can form no distinct con- 
 ception, or it must have a meaning nearly synonymous with 
 the order of Providence. In all probability it was often used 
 in an indeterminate sense ; and yet, in many instances, as by 
 Plato, Seneca, and many of the Stoics and ]!^ew Platonists, the 
 idea involved in it must have been equivalent to that of Provi- 
 dence, or the divine ordering of the world through the estab- 
 lished relations of cause and effect. A candid view, therefore, 
 of the terms in frequent use by the ancient writers, to which 
 we have refeiTed, will lead us to the conclusion, that how- 
 ever indefinite their apprehensions on many points, the more 
 thoughtful of them did accept the leading doctrines of a moral 
 system. 
 
 III. 
 
 TEACHINGS OE REVELATION. CHRISTIAN FATHERS. ALGAZEL. 
 HOOKER. HERBERT. GROTIUS. 
 
 So far as the leading truths of the Moral System are con- 
 cerned, Christianity simply accepted them as an inheritance 
 from the Jewish Scriptures. In these, the outlines of that 
 system are clearly and conspicuously presented. We are never 
 allowed to lose sight of God as the Creator, Sovereign, and 
 Judge of the universe ; controlling all things by an omnis- 
 cient and omnipotent providence ; administering law with a 
 wisdom which man's short-sightedness may not impeach, and 
 rewarding and punishing in accordance with his scheme of 
 moral government, and the ends of human probation. 
 
 Man is exhibited as accountable and responsible ; a moral 
 
HEBREW SOKIPTURES. 27 
 
 agent, subject to moral law ; tried by temptation, tbat lie may 
 have the opportmiity to resist, and attest his fidelity ; with 
 the assurance that on his present conduct, his future blessed- 
 ness depends. 
 
 In the Book of Job, we have a dramatic expression of the 
 Moral System, at once impressive and sublime. In the pro- 
 gress of the drama, the problems of suffering innocence and 
 successful iniquity, necessarily invite solution. They are not 
 allowed, however, to obscure the great truth of a Divine 
 Providence, and human doubts and scepticisms are confront- 
 ed with the infinite majesty, and the ineffable wisdom of 
 Jehovah, while the sequel is a triumphant vindication of 
 unmurmuring faith in Him who sees the end from the 
 beginning. 
 
 in the Book of Proverbs, we have, embodied in concise and 
 antithetical maxims, the intuitions or experiences of Hebrew 
 sages, with relation to the existence and administration of the 
 Moral System. While of this, there is no connected or con- 
 tinuous exposition, there are constant flashes of striking and 
 profound thought, which reveal its prominent, even though 
 isolated features. As we pass from proverb to proverb, we 
 witness what is revealed by a new turn of the kaleidoscope, 
 and discover new features of the laws and constitution of the 
 moral world. To some extent this is also true of some of the 
 Apocryphal Scriptures — the Book of Wisdom and Ecclesi- 
 asticus. 
 
 But it is in the writings of the Hebrew prophets that we 
 meet with the clearest enunciation of God's providential 
 moral government, and the immutable principles on which it 
 is conducted. In their pages, we see empires and monarchs, 
 dynasties and nations, priests, people, slaves, and prisoners, 
 subject to an invisible control, and working out, often uncon- 
 sciously, the vindication of an overruling justice, or incurring 
 the inevitable doom of their guilt. Under their guidance, a 
 pathway through the mysteries of the divine procedure is 
 opened up, lighted sometimes to an intense and lurid glare 
 by the blaze of sudden or lingering retribution. War, famine, 
 pestilence, the fury of the invader, or the captivity of the 
 vanquished, appear as the mysterious and almost incarnate 
 
■28 CIIKISTlAJSr TEACHERS. 
 
 agents of a justice that may linger, but never slumbers, and 
 can never be finally defeated. 
 
 Lessons so impressively tauglit became the fundamental 
 assumptions of the Christian system, into which, by a divine 
 adjustment, was fitted the scheme of redemption, ivlany of 
 the parables of Christ himself, are simply gi'aphic delinea- 
 tions of the nature of that " kingdom of heaven," Avhich, in 
 certain of its main features, is identical with what we denomi- 
 nate the Moral System. 'No teacher, before or since, has ever 
 set forth so impressively and vividly, the conditions and laws 
 of human duty, or the necessary connection between guilt and 
 its penalty. If, for a moment, we could suppose them the 
 utterance of uninspired wisdom, the majestice force and grand- 
 eur with which they are characterized, would compel assent to 
 the truths they embody, as lucid and indisputable in their 
 own seK-evidencing light. 
 
 With the spread of Christianity, these tniths went abroad, 
 and were accepted as a part of the Christian faith. But the 
 peculiar features and doctrines of revelation provoked an an- 
 tagonism which concentrated upon them a somewhat exclu- 
 sive attention, and led their champions to depreciate what 
 claimed support from the light of nature, as a disparagement to 
 the superior light and merits of revelation. Theologians, zeal- 
 ous to vindicate the vital truths of the gospel, or perhaps, 
 more frequently, their ecclesiastical dogmas, which derived 
 feeble countenance from the natural laws and order of the 
 Moral System, neglected these, or abandoned them to the 
 speculations of men who were disposed to pursue them in the 
 interests of a Pagan or sceptical, rather than a Christian, phi- 
 losophy. Each party was swayed more or less by prejudice, 
 and, almost as a necessary result, the Moral System was re- 
 garded with an undue measure of indilference, if not of hos- 
 tile prejudice. 
 
 This is manifest in the writings of some among the Chris- 
 tian Fathers, and their successors in later centuries. There 
 were, however, marked exceptions. Among the early cham- 
 pions of Christianity, there were some who had been educated 
 in Greek philosophy ; and who, even after their conversion, 
 retained their prejudices or predilections in its favor. Justin 
 
CHEISTIAN FATHERS. 29 
 
 Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen, were among 
 those who did not despise the suffrage of human reason in 
 their attempt to vindicate revealed truth, and St. Augustine's 
 admii'ation of Plato is freely avowed. 
 
 In collision with Gnosticism, Manicheism, and especially 
 Mohammedanism, Christian writers were led to discuss suc- 
 cessively some of the fundamental truths of natural theol- 
 ogy. Among these were the relation of God to the material 
 universe and to His intelligent creation, and the immateriality 
 and immortality of the soul. Mohammedan writers took up 
 the discussion of these topics, and among these Algazel de- 
 serves prominent mention. His "Alchemy of Happiijess" 
 repeatedly reminds us of Bp. Butler's " Analogy." The uni- 
 versahty of Divine Providence ; the imperfection of human 
 knowledge ; the delusive nature of the world ; the relation of 
 the present life to the future ; the duties and hazards of pres- 
 ent probation, — these are the leading points upon which he 
 insists, sometimes with a lofty eloquence. 
 
 The Scholastics did not fail to pay attention to these same 
 topics ; some of them aiming to vindicate the truths of revela- 
 tion by the testimonies of reason and experience ; others wast- 
 ing their ingenuity upon frivolous or curious questions, lead- 
 ing to no satisfactory results. The overthrow of Constantinople 
 scattering the remains of Greek literature over Europe, was 
 contemporary with that reviving zeal for classic studies, which 
 it powerfully contributed to develop;' and among its results 
 was the revival, in Italy especially, of the study of the Pla- 
 tonic philosophy. In connection with this, various questions 
 of natural theology attracted attention, and were elaborately 
 discussed. But in England no great or memorable work pre- 
 ceded the production of Richard Hooker on " Ecclesiastical 
 Lav/." The first book of this treatise, dealing with the Law 
 of ]N^ature, was enriched with the spoils of classic learning. 
 The author, familiar with Cicero and other ancient writerSj 
 copiously adduces their testimony in confirmation of the posi- 
 tions which he maintains. Homer, with his concession to the 
 supremacy of Jupiter's counsel ; Sophocles, with his tribute to 
 " the eternal unwritten laws ;" Laetantius, Augustine, Boethius, 
 and Aquinas, together with the Stoics, are cited to testify to 
 
30 LORD HEKBEKT. GKOTIIJB. 
 
 the Law of ligature, and the moral order of the world involved 
 in it. 
 
 A little more than a quarter of a century passed by when 
 
 (1624) the celebrated work, De Yeritate, of Lord Herbert, 
 the Father of the English Deists, appeared, almost contem- 
 porary with the publication of the famous work of Grotius 
 
 (1625) on the " Eights of Peace and War." The two men 
 were on intimate terms, and Herbert assures us that his work 
 was published with the approval of Grotius. It laid down 
 five principles : among them the existence of God, the im- 
 mortality of the soul, and a future life, as indisputably attested 
 by the light of nature. These were estabhshed on the grounds 
 of reason, and by the universal consent of all ages, and it was 
 left to be inferred that, as they supplied a sufficient basis for 
 natural religion, revelation was superfluous, or was to be ac- 
 cepted only so far as it rested upon them. 
 
 The work of Grotius, designed to establish the rights of hu- 
 manity and justice, grossly trampled under foot by the un- 
 scrupulous warfare of the age, appealed not exclusively to 
 Scripture authority, which might be rejected by one-haK of 
 Christendom, nor to Papal decrees, which might be rejected 
 by the other, but to the testimony of reason in all ages ; to 
 historians, philosophers, and poets ; to the principles of equity 
 embodied in the Roman law, or whatever else could be sup- 
 posed to illustrate and enforce the obligations of the Law of 
 Nature. 
 
 lY. 
 
 HOBBES, CtnVIBEELAJS^D, PAKKEE, KST> OTHERS. 
 
 Opposed to the theory of a Law of Nature, as set forth alike 
 by Hooker and Grotius, stood that celebrated writer who be- 
 longs to the generation that succeeded them, Thomas Hobbes 
 of Malmesbury. Before the civil wars of England had com- 
 menced (1641), he gave evidence of what was regarded by 
 many, as his dangerous speculative tendencies. A few years 
 
HOBBES ATSTD HIS OPPONENTS. 31 
 
 later, his " Leviathan " followed, and created such alarm that 
 hosts of writers came forward to defend the principles which 
 he was therein supposed to assail. With him may be said to 
 have originated the two-fold controversy, political and theo- 
 logical, which, in some of its phases, continued down to the 
 time of Bishop Butler, and is traceable in some of the discus- 
 sions of his " Analogy." Hobbes denied a Law of I^ature, in 
 the Grotian sense. He made the natural state of man one of 
 mutual hostility, with a right to everything, or rather, with no 
 rights but those of the stronger. From this state of war he saw 
 no way of escape, except after wearisome and fruitless strug- 
 gle, when the exhausted combatants were prepared to concede 
 to the stronger, or some one possessed of power confirmed by 
 their adhesion, authority to regulate and control the social 
 body thus organized as a state. To him belonged the right 
 to legislate and to enforce legislation. He was supreme, and 
 from his decision there was no appeal. To him it belonged 
 to estabhsh a national religious creed and worship, and to 
 tolerate no dissent or divergence from it. Here only the law 
 of nature, or of right reason, found its place, an essential ele- 
 ment of which was the despotism of " Leviathan," the em- 
 bodied organization ruled and guided by the single supreme 
 will. 
 
 Thus was a blow struck at the basis of natural and civil 
 rights, and at the same time at the foundation of natural the- 
 ology and a moral system. Statesmen like Lord Clarendon, 
 and theologians like Cudworth, came forward to confute the 
 obnoxious errorist. They came, almost in crowds, and the 
 more promptly when Hobbes proceeded to put forth more dis- 
 tinctly his views in advocacy of Materialism and JSTecessity. 
 Foremost among his assailants were the leading members of 
 the " Platonic School " of Cambridge, who were prepared to 
 draw their weapons from the stores of ancient classic litera- 
 ture. Their predilection for Plato gave them the name by 
 which they were known, and their aggregate productions, en- 
 riched with recondite learning and original thought, would 
 make a respectable library. There were Culverwell's " Light 
 of l^ature," Glanvill's " Scepsis," and other writings ; Henry 
 More's " Dialogues," " Mystery of Godliness," " Yindication 
 
32 cumbekland's treatise, 
 
 of the Immateriality and Immortality of the Soul," etc. ; Cnd- 
 worth's " Intellectual System," a store-house of recondite learn- 
 ing ; John Smith's eloquent and ingenious " Discourses ;" Bp. 
 Wilkins' "JS'atural Theology;" Whichcote's "Apothegms;" 
 " The Living Temple " of the " Seraphic " John Howe, and 
 publications by Bishops Busk, Cumberland, Bowler, and Bat- 
 rick. Fighting the same battle with them was Bichard Bax- 
 ter, who conceded that the proper method of meeting the 
 infidelity of the age, was to press home upon it those princi- 
 ples of reason and natural law which had been vindicated by 
 ancient classic writers whom he does not hesitate to quote ; 
 and though associated with Oxford rather than Cambridge, 
 Bp. Seth Ward, Dr. Wallis, the Hon, Robert Boyle, and Bp. 
 Jeremy Taylor, must not pass without mention in this 
 connection. "With some of these, especially with Taylor, the 
 Law of ]l!^ature was a favorite topic, and upon it he lavished 
 the treasures of his learning and the wealth of his genius. 
 Sir Matthew Hale came f orv\^ard to participate in the discus- 
 sion, and vindicate the reasonableness of his own Christian 
 faith by considerations which involved a careful study of the 
 constitution and frame of the Moral System. 
 
 ]^ot the least prominent amid this group of writers was 
 Bp. Cumberland, whose noted work, " De Legibus Haiuroi 
 Disquisitio Philosophica,^^ appeared in 1672. In this he 
 traced obligation to its basis in the very nature of man and 
 the constitution of human society, which indicated plainly the 
 intention and will of their divine author, publishing in fact 
 that law of duty to which moral agents are subject. Succes- 
 sive editions of the original work (Maxwell's, with additions, 
 172T; Towers', 1750), and of Tyrrell's abridgement of it 
 (1692 and 1701), gave its views a wide currency, and in these 
 some of the arguments of Bishop Butler are anticipated. 
 
 Confessing his indebtedness to Cumberland, the scope of 
 whose argument he endorsed. Dr. Samuel Parker, in 1681, 
 published his " Demonstration of the Law of ISTature and of 
 the Christian Beligion." The object he had in view was 
 much the same with that of the "Analogy" of Butler, and 
 he pursues a method not dissimilar. In establishing the Law 
 of ]5Tature, he really expounds the moral constitution of na- 
 
paekek's " demonsteation." 33 
 
 ture, tracing it to its divine original, and showing that its 
 laws are invested with a divine authority. His professed 
 object is " to discover that model of government " which God 
 has established, "and those laws that He has prescribed to 
 ns, and those sanctions by which He has recommended them 
 to our practice." He holds that "if the nature of things 
 were made and contrived by a wise and intelligent cause, 
 that proposed to Himself some design in the contrivance of 
 every part, then whatever effects result from the nature of 
 things, as they stand contrived and constituted by Him, are 
 to be ultimately resolved into His providence ;" and again, 
 that " if it can be proved that the Author of nature has signi- 
 fied any certain rules of life to mankind by the very order 
 and frame of nature, and that He has further made them obli- 
 gatory to all the world by making the same necessary con- 
 nection between the duty and the reward, as there is between 
 every natural cause and effect, their obligation will be estab- 
 lished on no weaker grounds or proofs than of certain demon- 
 stration, and we shall have the same assurance that they are 
 designed for the rules of our actions, as we can have that any 
 natural cause was ordained to produce its natural effect, and 
 it will be as manifest from the whole constitution of nature, 
 when it is considered and reflected upon, that G-od intended 
 mankind should govern themselves by such certain principles, 
 as it is the office of the sun to give light to the world." 
 
 The author, in carrying out his design, essays to prove, first, 
 the publication, and secondly, the sanction of the Laws of 
 J^ature. These laws, he contends, are " dravm forth into use 
 and bound upon the conscience, not by any express voice or 
 immediate impression of the legislator, but by virtue of the 
 workings of our own minds and the unavoidable results of 
 our own consciences." Yet " it matters not whether the nat- 
 ural law be written upon the mind of man, or the nature of 
 things." " The best and easiest way to find out the rules 
 and methods of God's government, is to reflect upon the nat- 
 ural order and tendency of things, for that being altogether 
 contrived and designed by Himself, it manifestly discovers 
 to all that arc able to observe the connection between causes 
 and effects, what He principally intends and aims at." 
 3 
 
34: WILKINS AND TILLOTSON. 
 
 The way is thus prepared to show, from the nature and 
 tendency of human actions, the plan of God's natural govern- 
 ment over men, and that the rewards of duty and virtue, and 
 the penalties of wrong-doing and vice, making themselves 
 manifest and palpable to human observation, are a real and 
 most impressive publication of the moral law of nature. 
 
 There are sentences and paragraphs in Bishop Parker's 
 work that, read by themselves, might be mistaken for extracts 
 from Butler's " Analogy." He even goes so far as to say — • 
 following Grotius' line of thought — that " though we should 
 remove the Divine Providence out of the world," still the 
 necessities of men, in their social relations, in the matter of 
 property, for instance, will, through " the natural constitution 
 of things," " direct every man to eoniine his desires," etc. 
 So that, though men should deny a Providence, or even the 
 being of a God, they would yet find themselves under a con- 
 stitution of things that was moral, and which of necessity im- 
 posed moral obligation on voluntary intelligent agents. 
 
 Somewhat similar in scope with the work of Bishop Parker, 
 v/ere some of the Discourses of Dr. Isaac Barrow, Dr. Robert 
 South, Archbishop Tillotson (1671, 16Y8, 1686, 1691), and a 
 work of some note by Bishop Wilkin s, published in 16T5 
 (new editions, 1678, 1683, 1693, 1704, etc.), entitled, " The 
 Principles and Duties of Natural Religion," with a Preface 
 by Archbishop Tillotson. It contained professedly a formal 
 statement of the principles of reason, or natural law, applica- 
 ble to the sphere of religion, while it vindicated" the doctrines 
 in regard to the being and attributes of God, and the provi- 
 dential sanctions of duty, common alike to natural and re- 
 vealed religion. The foundation of these doctrines is shown 
 to be in the nature and reason of mankind, while moral duties 
 are seen to be based upon " natural and indispensable obli- 
 gation." 
 
 In his Preface, Archbishop Tillotson remarks : " Certainly 
 it is a thing of very considerable use, rightly to understand 
 the natural obligation of moral duties, and how necessarily 
 they flow from the consideration of God and of ourselves. For 
 it is a great mistake to think that the obligation of them doth 
 solely depend upon the Revelation of God's will made to us 
 
LOCKE. BLOUNT. 35 
 
 in tlie Holy Scriptures. It is plain tliat mankind was always 
 under a law, even before God had made any external and 
 extraordinary revelation ; else, Iiow shall God judge the world ? 
 ... It is nevertheless very useful for us to consider the pri- 
 mary and natural obligation to piety and virtue, which we 
 commonly call the Law of IN^ature ; this being every whit as 
 much the Law of God as the Revelation of Llis will in His 
 "Word." 
 
 LOCKE. TOLAND. COLLINS. TINDAL. 
 
 Quite a number of writers on ISTatural Religion had been 
 less guarded than Bishop Parker, or even Richard Baxter, 
 going so far, indeed, as to assume that the Law of JSTature 
 was innate, or written upon the heart. The existence of a 
 God was supposed to be one of the truths which might be 
 traced among the ideas which the soul possessed by original 
 intuition. To this view, Locke, in his work on the " Human 
 Understanding" (1689), declared his opposition, and in his 
 rejection of the theory of innate ideas, he was very generally 
 followed, though sometimes with evident reluctance, by subse- 
 quent writers. He did not on this -ground, however, reject 
 the Law of l^ature, but found it where Bishop Parker had 
 done, in the constitution of things manifesting authoritatively 
 the will of its Author. 
 
 A few years later, Locke brought out his work, entitled 
 "Reasonableness of Christianity" (Second Edition, 1696). 
 More guarded than some other writers, he was not disposed to 
 consider the Law of ]^ature sufficient for the necessities of men 
 without a Divine Revelation, He was doubtless led to write 
 his treatise by what he regarded as the dangerous tendency 
 of the " Oracles of Reason," and other writings of the noted 
 deist, Charles Blount (f 1693). Blount adopted the principles 
 of Lord Herbert, as to the sufficiency of the Law of N^ature, 
 and he was able to render his position plausible, by the rash 
 
36 KEASON AND KEVELATION. 
 
 or unguarded utterances of quite a list of Christian writers, 
 not the least noted of whom was Dr. Thomas Burnet, who 
 subsequently sought to recall what he had uttered, when he 
 saw the use that was made of it. 
 
 Indeed, some of the champions of revelation against athe- 
 ism and infidelity, had gone so far in asserting that the Law 
 of ISTature could be " demonstrated," and had so exalted the 
 power of Reason to establish principles which had been 
 called in question by the disciples of Hobbes, as to prepare 
 the way for a reaction, and excite a jealousy of the champions 
 of Revelation,who had called Platonism and ancient philosophy 
 to their aid. "When Archbishop Tillotson, fully justified from 
 his own point of view, could declare that "nothing contained 
 in the Word of God, or in any pretended revelation from 
 Him, can be interpreted to dissolve the obligation of moral 
 duties plainly required by the law of nature;" when Pri- 
 deaux, in his Letter to Deists, appended to his " Life of Ma- 
 homet," at this same date, could throw out the challenge, 
 " Let what is written in all the books of the ISTew Testament 
 be tried by that which is the touch-stone of all religions — I 
 mean, that religion of nature and reason which God has writ- 
 ten in the hearts of every one of us from the first creation; 
 •and if it varies from it in any one particular ; if it prescribes 
 any one thing which may in the minutest circumstances 
 thereof be contrary to its righteousness, I will then acknowl- 
 edge this to be an argument against us, strong enough to 
 overthrow the whole cause ;" wlien Bishop Sherlock could 
 assert that " the gospel was the republication of the Law of 
 ^Nature," that " the religion of the gospel is the true religion 
 of reason and nature " — it is evident that, however guarded 
 or qualified by the context such expressions might be, they 
 seemed even to invite the sceptical feeling of the age to avail 
 itself of the challenge. 
 
 Two books, v/hich reflect quite significantly different as- 
 pects of the controversy, appeared at almost the same time ; 
 one by Locke, already mentioned, the other by John Toland, 
 who claimed to be his friend and to adopt his principles, 
 while in the title of his book he parodied that of Locke. The 
 latter vindicated " The Reasonableness of Christianity." The 
 
LOCKE AND TOLA.ND. 37 
 
 former put forth the proposition, " Christianity not Myste- 
 rious." 
 
 Locke asserted a Law of ^Tature, but did not admit its suf- 
 ficiency, at least, to the extent maintained by soAe who fa-, 
 vored the theory of innate ideas. " Such a body of ethics," 
 he said, of the extreme assertions of some writers, " such a 
 body of ethics, proved to be the Law of Nature from princi- 
 ples of reason, and reaching all the duties of life, I think 
 nobody will say the world had before our Saviour's time." 
 And as to the Law of I^ature itself, he contends that it would 
 scarcely have been expanded and set forth as it had been, but 
 for a light which human reason alone never would have 
 afforded. " Many are beholden -to Kevelation who do not 
 acknowledge it. 'Tis no diminishing to Revelation that rea- 
 son gives its suffrage, too, to the traths Revelation has dis- 
 covered. But 'tis our mistake to think, that because reason 
 confirms them to us, we had the first certain knowledge of 
 them from thence, and in that clear evidence we now possess 
 them. The contrary is manifest in the defective morality of 
 the Gentiles before our Saviour's time. .... Philosophy 
 seemed to have spent its strength, and done its utmost. . . . 
 He that travels the roads now, applauds his own strength and 
 legs, that have carried him so far in such a scantling of time, 
 and ascribes all to his own vigor, little considering how much 
 he owes to their pains who cleared the woods, drained the 
 bogs, built the bridges, and made the ways passable ; without 
 which he might have toiled much with little progress." 
 
 Toland, claiming a friendship w^th Locke, which the latter 
 repudiated, proposed to push the theory of the Reasonableness 
 of Christianity to an extreme, and strip it of everything myste- 
 rious. Lideed, he left it only a modified Deism. So he was 
 understood to do, at least by his contemporaries. The Irish 
 Parliament — he had proceeded to Ireland after the publica- 
 tion of his book — devoted it to the flames, and the odium he 
 had incurred was reflected back upon Locke. The replies to 
 him were numerous. Before 1760, they had amounted to 
 more than fifty. Some of these, however, were directed 
 against his subsequent publications, among which was his 
 PantheistiGon, with his " Pantheist Liturgy," in which 
 
38 COLLINS. 
 
 Cicero's definition of the Law of ITatiire had a conspicuous 
 place. 
 
 In 1707, another ymter, in sympathy with Toland, and 
 who had Treally enjoyed the friendship and confidence of 
 Locke, appeared on the scene. This was Anthony Collins. 
 His book was entitled, an " Essay concerning the use of Rea- 
 son in Propositions, the Evidence whereof depends upon Hu- 
 man Testimony." It was followed in 1713, by his " Discourse 
 on Free Thinking, occasioned by the rise and growth of a 
 sect called Free Thinkers." Assuming Heason to be the stand- 
 ard by which Revelation is to be tried, he indulges in a large 
 latitude of charges and insinuations against the sacred writings, 
 and, although answered by Bishop Iloadly, and convicted of 
 gross misrepresentations and mistakes by Dr. Bentley, under 
 the character of PhUeleutheriis JLi-psiensis, he returned to the 
 attack in 1724, in his " Discourse on the Grounds and Rea- 
 sons of the Christian Religion." He was answered in 1725, 
 by Dr. and also by Bishop Chandler, as well as Sykes, Whis- 
 ton, Sherlock, Lowman, Jeffrey, and others. The controversy 
 was still fresh when (1727-1729) Mr. Woolston brought out 
 successively his six discourses on the " Miracles of our Sav- 
 iour," in which he casts discredit on the narratives of the 
 Evangelists, as full of " improbabilities, incredibilities, and 
 great absurdities." He was answered by Bishops Gibson and 
 Pearce, by Ray, Smallbook, Stevenson, Atkinson, Browne, 
 and others ; but the most memorable works that grew out of 
 this phase of the controversy, were (1729) Dr. Sherlock's 
 " Trial of the "Witnesses of the Resurrection of Jesus," and 
 Dr. Lardnei^'s " Yindication of those of our blessed Saviour's 
 Miracles, in answer to the Objections of Mr. Woolston's Fifth 
 Discourse," etc., both published in 1729. 
 
 The controversy had tended to cover a broader field than 
 had been occupied by Toland and Collins in their first publi- 
 cations. But a new assailant of Christianity now appeared, 
 who endeavored to revive the old claim of the superiority of 
 the Law of iN'ature to any " external " revelation. This was 
 Matthew Tindal, who, adopting the tactics of Toland, gave to 
 the world (1730) his noted work, " Christianity as Old as the 
 Creation." In a more decorous style than Woolston or Col- 
 
TINDAL. 39 
 
 lins, and with great skill in argument, he assumed to prove 
 that, as the Law of IsTature was coeval with the Creation, and 
 that, as the law of God, it is perfect and immutable, it cannot 
 be superseded by Christianity, and that Christianity, coming 
 as a revelation from the same source, cannot modify or repeal 
 that perfect and immutable law. The inference which the 
 author would evidently keep prominent is, that whatever in 
 the Christian System does not accord with reason or the Law 
 of Kature, is to be rejected. 
 
 The plausibility of his argument is seen, when he asks, 
 " When men, in defending their own, or attacking other tra- 
 ditionary religions, have recourse to the nature or reason of 
 things, does not that show they believe the truth of all tradi- 
 tionary religions is to be tried by it, as being that wdiich must 
 tell them what is true or false in religion ? And were there not 
 some truths relating to religion of themselves so evident, as 
 that all must agree in them, nothing relating to religion could 
 be proved ; everything would want a further proof ; and if there 
 are such evident truths, must not all others be tried by their 
 agreement with them ? And are not these the tests by which we 
 are to distinguish the only true religion from the many false 
 ones ? And do not all parties alike own that there are such 
 tests drawn from the nature of things, each crying their 
 religion contains everything worthy, and nothing unworthy, 
 of having God for its author ; thereby confessing that reason 
 enables them to tell what is worthy of having God for its 
 author ? And if reason tells them this, does it not tell them 
 everything that God can be supposed to require ? " 
 
 Tindal was answered by Bishop Gibson in a pastoral letter, 
 by Dr. Thomas Burnet, Dr. Waterland, Law, Jackson, Steb- 
 bins, Balguy (Second Letter to a Deist), Atkey, Foster, Cony- 
 beare, Simon Browne, Leland, and others. Some of these, 
 while leaving the Law of Nature unquestioned, emphasized 
 the fact, that although that lavv^ might answer the necessities 
 of a sinless race, the new condition of things introduced by 
 the apostacy, demanded the revelation of provisions for hu- 
 man recovery, of which the Law of l^ature gave no hint or 
 suggestion. 
 
 Scarcely any work in English literature has been greeted 
 
40 WOLLASTON. 
 
 by a larger number of refutations than Tindal's. The antago- 
 nists of Hobbes and Toland may possibly rival those provoked 
 by " Christianity as Old as Creation." But its popularity, or 
 rather the large measure of public attention which it com- 
 manded, was due doubtless less to its ability, or the plausible 
 insidiousness of its attack upon revelation, than to the circum- 
 stances in which it appeared. It was an able summing up of 
 what had been said in a controversy that had originated in 
 the writings of Lord Herbert and Hobbes, and had now con- 
 tinued at intervals for half a century, in which the Law of 
 ^Nature had been alternately glorified and depreciated, but in 
 which much that Tindal advanced, seemed justified by such 
 writers as Tillotson, Parker, and Clarke. 
 
 But, as if to afford Tindal a new vantage ground for his 
 argument, and indeed, to prepare the way for his work, there 
 had been published in 1724, the very year of the author's 
 death, a treatise which, in the class of writings to which it 
 belonged, commanded an almost unprecedented degree of 
 popularity. This was " The Religion of l^ature Delineated," 
 published anonymously, but which was soon known to be by 
 Wm.Wollaston, somewhat eminent as a scholar, and at one time 
 a clergyman of the English Church. In the course of a few 
 years, ten thousand copies of it had been circulated, the fifth 
 edition of it appearing in 1Y31, and the seventh in 1T50. 
 This work emphasized the precepts of the Law of JSTature, 
 and the obligations of truth, reason, and virtue, while it made 
 no mention of revealed religion. It might even by a partial 
 judgment be considered as an expanded system of that The- 
 ism, of which Lord Llerbert, and Blount after him, had laid 
 down the fundamental articles. Lord Bolingbroke, however, 
 called it a " strange theism, as dogmatical and absurd as arti- 
 ficial theology," and spared no pains to make his assertion 
 good. Unquestionably, it was the most elaborate exposition 
 of the ■" Religion of Hature " that had yet appeared. 
 
POPE. 41 
 
 YI. 
 
 r'a " 
 
 POPE S "■ ESSAY ON MAN. 
 
 It can excite no surprise that Wollaston's " Religion of 
 !N^ature Delineated " proved far from acceptable to a man 
 like Lord Bolingbroke, whose theory of a Providence was 
 scarcely up to the level of Aristotle's, and who found in it a 
 very close approximation to the teachings of revelation. ITot 
 yet prepared to give the world his views over his own name, 
 he instilled them into tlie mind of Alexander Pope, who 
 apostrophized him as 
 
 " My guide, philosopher and friend;" 
 
 and in his " Essay on Man," lent the charm of his mellifluous 
 couplets to a philosophy which was far from being original 
 with himself. 
 
 We can well believe that for some of the better portions 
 of the Essay, Pope was indebted in some measure to the 
 influence of Bishop Berkeley, whose " Alciphron ; or. The 
 Minute Philosopher," was published in the same year with 
 the Essay, and in which some of the same topics were 
 discussed in a style worthy of one who has sometimes been 
 called the modem Plato. Berkeley had recently returned 
 from America, and for several months resided in London, pre- 
 vious to the publication of Pope's Essay. During this period 
 he was on intimate terms with Pope. The two authors must 
 have conferred together on the topics common to their two 
 books, both of which indicate in an almost equal degree the 
 tastes and topics of discussion Vv^hich then prevailed. 
 
 The Essay, indeed, reflects the author's familiarity with 
 the controversy of the day, and, while forfeiting credit for 
 any great originality, is enriched with sentiments gleaned 
 from a mde range of reading. The thoughts, and even the 
 language of WoUaston, appear in it, and Mandeville's " Fable 
 of the Bees ; or, Private Yices made Public Benefits " (Second 
 Part, 1Y28), supplies it illustrations. Its professed object is 
 " to vindicate the ways of God to man." In common with 
 many champions of revelation, Pope insisted that man's 
 
42 pope's " ESSAT ON MAN." 
 
 limited knowledge rendered him an incompetent judge of 
 the methods of a universal providence ; that, 
 
 " Eespecting man, whatever wrong we eaU, 
 May, must be right, as relative to all;" 
 
 that it is man's duty to " hope humblj," to repress his " rea- 
 soning pride j" that general laws, which sometimes involve 
 indiscriminate calamities, are a necessity ; that the " dread 
 order " of the universe requires man to submit to the lot of 
 weakness and imperfection that has been assigned him ; that 
 it becomes him to study rather his own condition and powers, 
 than to scan with presumptuous criticism the secret plans of 
 God ; that in the balanced nature of man, where passion im- 
 pels and reason guides, we find a wisdom analogous to that 
 which in nature gives us calm and tempest, sunshine and 
 storm ; that every state has its satisfactions, and that Heaven 
 makes human vanity and vices — often akin to virtues — con- 
 tribute to the general welfare ; in fact, 
 
 ' ' Building on wants and on defects of mind 
 The joy, the peace and glory of mankind." * 
 
 In his third and fourth Epistles, the poet is quite discur- 
 sive, discussing the origin of society, and the relation of rea- 
 son, instinct and self-love to it, and exhibiting also the rela- 
 tions of happiness to virtue on the one hand, and to general 
 laws on the other ; the result of which is, that man's wisdom 
 and well-being are found in his conformity to the order which 
 Providence has established. 
 
 The Essay, so far as it is connected with the controversy 
 then going on, may be regarded as a vindication of the sys- 
 tem of things in which man finds himself placed by an infi- 
 nite and all-wise Providence. There is much, of course, which 
 is somewhat remotely connected mth what may be considered 
 the direct argument, but there is also much which the Theist 
 — of whatever school — would accept as a plausible, if not 
 
 * It is in this connection that the poet shows that Bernard Mandeville's " Fahle 
 of the Bees ; or, Private Vices made Public Benefits " — the second part published 
 in 1728 — had tended to shape his views. Ho speaks of " one man's weakness " 
 becoming " the strength of all," and then adds, 
 
 " Wants, frailties, passions, closer still ally 
 The comiaon interest, or endear the tie." 
 
OBJECTIONS MET. 43 
 
 fully satisfactory, justification of those dispensations of Provi- 
 dence by which man is subject to weakness, limited knowl- 
 edge, accidental calamity, and apparent injustice. 
 
 The importance of the " Essay on Man," in this connection, 
 is not in any originality or profundity of its views, but in the 
 fact that it reflects on so many points' the current opinions of 
 a certain class then most deeply interested in the general the- 
 istic discussion. Familiar with the publications of the day, 
 and especially of those men, who, like Tindal, called them- 
 selves Christian Deists, Pope scarcely needed the suggestions 
 or teachings of Bolingbroke, to furnish him the materials of 
 an Essay which simply embodied, in elegant rhythm, the 
 most striking thoughts which had been elaborately and re- 
 peatedly presented by the most popular writers on natural 
 law and religion. He met the objections of the Atheist 
 against the course of nature^ sometimes in a most effective 
 and conclusive manner; and as some of these objections — 
 those especially which respected the calamities of human life, 
 and the seeming inequality of the dispensations of Provi- 
 dence — were analogous to objections urged against certain 
 doctrines of revelation, it was natural that the champions of 
 the latter, assuming the vindication of the course of nature 
 to be complete, should be led to maintain that the divine 
 authority of revelation could not be shaken by objections 
 already shattered by such vindication. 
 
 It is unnecessary to cite extensively the passages in which 
 Pope concentrates the force of his argument. His reference 
 to " The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed to-day," prepares the 
 way for the exclamation, 
 
 " O blindness to the future kindly given, 
 That each may fill the circle marked by heaven." 
 
 The adaptation of man's faculties to his sphere, and the 
 futility of the objection that they are not more perfect, are 
 set forth thus : 
 
 ' ' Why has not man a microscopic eye ? 
 For this plain reason, man's not a fly." 
 
 The necessary subordination of individual interest to the com- 
 mon welfare, is illustrated by a passage not the less pertinent 
 
44 pope's CONCLUSION". 
 
 that it may have been suggested by the language of the 
 Apostle Paul, or borrowed from Roman history : 
 
 ' ' Wliat if the foot, ordained the dust to tread, 
 Or hand, to toil, aspired to be the head ? 
 What if the head, the eye or ear repined 
 To serve, mere engines to the ruling mind ? 
 Just as absurd for any part to claim 
 To be another in this general frame ; 
 Just as absurd to mourn the tasks or pains 
 The great directing Mind of all ordains." 
 
 It is thus that Pope reaches the conclusion summed up in 
 the couplet, 
 
 " In spite of pride, in erring Reason's spite, 
 One truth is clear, whatever is, is rig?it." 
 
 A mind less acute than Bishop Butler's, might discover in 
 this conclusion — applicable to the course of nature, as it re- 
 spects man — a vantage-ground on which to base an argument 
 that revealed religion could not be assailed by objections 
 which were already shown to be invalid when urged against 
 the course of nature. The very attempt made by Tindal and 
 other successors of Lord Herbert, to exalt natural religion to 
 a level with Christianity, as well as to establish it on unas- 
 sailable grounds, had really furnished a basis of assumption 
 upon which the champion of revealed religion might rest his 
 argument. He had only to turn the admissions of DeistG, at 
 certain vital points, against themselves, and this was the task 
 so triumphantly executed by Bishop Butler. But during the 
 four years which intervened between the publication of the 
 " Essay on Man " and Butler's "Analogy " (1T36), there appeared 
 a large number of controversial publications, several of which 
 deserve mention in this connection. Among those who re- 
 plied to Tindal, one of the most prominent was the Kev. Dr. 
 James Foster, to whom Pope no doubt was considerably in- 
 debted, and to whom he pays the high tribute, 
 
 " Let modest Foster, if he will, excel 
 Ten metropohtans in preaching well." 
 
 Among Foster's discourses, delivered at this period from his 
 pulpit, we meet such as "' The "Wisdom of God in the Yarious 
 
REPLIES TO TINDAL. 45 
 
 Ranks and Subordinations of Human Life," " The Distinct 
 Offices and Uses of Eeason and Eevelation," " The True 
 Ground of the Argument from Keason for a Future State," 
 not to mention his volumes of " Discourses on all the Princi- 
 pal Branches of ISTatural Keligion and Social Yirtue." 
 
 Other replies to Tindal of special note were published by 
 Conybeare, afterward Bishop of Bristol, where he succeeded 
 Butler; by Bishop Peter Browne, whose "Things Divine 
 and Supernatural Conceived by Analogy with Things I^atu- 
 ral and Human " (1733), must have furnished Butler some 
 suggestions for his work ; and by Dr. John Leland, who had 
 carefully studied the progress of the controversy. Beside 
 these, there were numerous other publications of the day 
 bearing upon tlie same subject, as Law's annotated edition of 
 Archbishop King on the " Origin of Evil" (1732), treatises by 
 Chubb, Jackson, CoUiber, Conyers Place, and Duncan Forbes. 
 It is only by the study of the controversy, as illustrated by 
 this class of publications, that we can be prepared to appre- 
 ciate the task undertaken by Butler in his " Analogy." But 
 incidental to the main controversy, discussions arose on ques- 
 tions which claimed some recognition in Butler's speculations. 
 To these we must now attend. • 
 
 YII. 
 
 butler's nOIEDIATE PREDECESSORS AND CONTEMPORARIES. 
 
 The " Lecture," established by the Hon. Pobert Boyle, and 
 designed to provide for an annual course of sermons in vindi- 
 cation of the fundamental truths of the Christian religion, 
 dates from 1691. It gave occasion, during subsequent years, 
 for the publication of a large number of volumes, some of 
 them of very marked ability, in which the leading religious 
 questions of the time are elaborately discussed. They take 
 up — beside the topics more directly connected with the Deistic 
 controversy — such subjects as the Being of God, the immor- 
 tality of the soul, the wise order of the world, the divine 
 
4:6 TOPICS OF THE BOYLE LECTURES. 
 
 attributes, including tlie vindication of Goodness against tlie 
 cavils of objectors. 
 
 These subjects were not arbitrarily cbosen. The specula- 
 tions of Descartes, Spinoza, Bayle, Malebranche, and Leibnitz 
 on the continent, had excited the attention of English philoso- 
 phers and divines, originating new lines of thought, tending 
 at length to overshadow the importance of Hobbes' peculiar 
 speculations. The Pantheism of Spinoza was adverted upon 
 among others, by John Howe, in the Second Part of his " Liv- 
 ing Temple," and by Dr. Samuel Clarke in his "Boyle Lec- 
 ture Sermons" (1704, 1Y05). Bayle, in his writings, had 
 seemed disposed to revive the Manichean theory of the Origin 
 of Evil, and was met by Leibnitz in his " Theodicy," and by 
 Archbishop King in his " Origin of Evil " (1Y02). Some fifteen 
 years later, the discussion was resumed by Dr. John Clarke, 
 in his " Sermons " at the Boyle Lectures. 
 
 John Locke, distrusting the assumptions of the too zealous 
 champions of natural religion, disputed the existence of innate 
 ideas, and, under the influence of IN^ewton's discovery of the 
 law of gravitation, asserted that it could not be disproved that 
 God might make matter cogitative, or add to it the faculty of 
 cogitation, as he had added the power of gravitation. Bishop 
 Stillingfleet's chaplains, Humphrey Hody (1694), and the 
 learned Richard Bentley (1691) — the first in a work on the 
 "Resurrection of the Body," and the last in his "Boyle 
 Lecture Sermons " — were disposed to contest the principles of 
 Locke, the latter elaborately refuting them, and at length the 
 Bishop himself (1698, 1699) took the field, and several con- 
 troversial letters were exchanged between him and Locke. 
 The latter lost no credit in this conflict with his able and titled 
 opponent, and to his last letter the Bishop made no reply. 
 
 Much attention was drawn to the subject. The result was 
 soon witnessed in the publications of Dr. Coward, who pushed 
 Locke's positions to an extreme, inconsistent with the philoso- 
 pher's admission, that the soul was probably immaterial. He 
 was answered by Turner, Broughton, Assheton, and others, 
 and his books were burned by the common hangman, by order 
 of Parliament. But in 1T06, Dr. Henry Dodwell published 
 his " Epistolatory Discourse, j)roving that the Soul is naturally 
 
DODWELL. THE KOTAL, SOCIETY. 47 
 
 Mortal," and tliat its immortality is secured only by tlie bap- 
 tismal spirit. Dodwell was answered by E. Cbisbiill, Dr. 
 Samuel Clarke, Turner, Whitby, Parker, Miller, l^orris, and 
 others. Clarke was the most famous of these, and Collins the 
 Deist, volunteered to meet him on the side of Dodwell. Sev- 
 eral letters were interchanged, and in the issue, Clarke's supe- 
 riority in the argument was manifest. In the course of the 
 discussion, Clarke laid great stress on that indisGerptibility of 
 consciousness, which Butler has so prominently introduced 
 into his " Analogy." From this time on, the immateriality, 
 or the immortality of the soul, on the grounds of natural 
 religion, was no longer openly called in question. Such was 
 the state of things when Butler prepared his "Analogy." 
 
 Of other lines of discussion converging to the issue met in 
 the " Analogy," may be mentioned those which took up the 
 relation of reason to faith ; those which dwelt upon the evi- 
 dences of divine design in the frame-work of nature and the 
 order of the world, and those which directed attention to the 
 foundation of moral obligation, including the relative claims 
 of moral and positive duties. The first of these were involved, 
 to a large extent, in the Deistic controversy, and need not here 
 specifically be retraced. The second originated in the Royal 
 Society, and the labors of Robert Boyle, the discoveries of 
 Kewton, the studies of naturalists like Grew, Ray, and Dur- 
 ham, and at times seemed to present rival claims to the specu- 
 lations of the Cambridge Platonists. We find their results 
 in the writings of men who devoted their attention, to some 
 considerable extent, to natural theology — Barrow, Bates, Howe, 
 Tillotson, and many others, including some of the " Boyle 
 lecturers." It was in sympathy with these, rather than with 
 the Cambridge Platonists, that Theophilus Gale, Dr. Daniel 
 "Whitby, and Thomas Halyburton depreciated the sufficiency 
 and achievements of human reason, and set forth the incon- 
 gruities and inconsistencies of ancient philosophy. 
 
 Locke's rejection of the long-accepted theory of innate ideas, 
 logically overthrew the foundation upon which a large class of 
 writers had been disposed to rest the Law of l!^ature and 
 moral obligation. It remained to find a substitute. Two 
 tendencies were soon manifest, the cne represented by Lord 
 
48 SHATTESBUET. HUTCHESOjS'. CLAEKE. 
 
 Sliaftesbmy, who, tlioiigli an admirer and pupil of Locke, 
 was not disposed blindly to follow his lead ; and the other by 
 Dr. Samuel Clarke, who presented his views in his discourses 
 at the Boyle Lecture. Shaftesbury, who had constructed a 
 system of optimism (1699) somewhat resembling Leibnitz's 
 Iheodicy (ITIO), wished to find a sanction for virtue, inde- 
 pendent of the rewards or penalties of a future state. These, 
 he maintained, appealed to the selfish principle, and in the 
 obedience which they were instrumental to secure, there was 
 no merit. He sought, therefore, and imagined that he found, 
 in the human constitution a moral sense, which was to give 
 the law to human action. By this, proposed courses of action 
 were to be put to the test, and approved or condemned. 
 Francis Hutcheson, in successive publications (1Y25, 1728), 
 adopting substantially the same view, secured for it wide pub- 
 licity and acceptance. Hutcheson's " Enquiry" was published 
 in 1Y25 (Second Edition, 1726), and immediately excited at- 
 tention. It came in collision with the positions taken by Dr. 
 Samuel Clarke in his " Discourse concerning the Unchange- 
 able Obligations of Natural Keligion," published in 1706, and 
 reaching its eighth edition in 1732. In this discourse, Clarke 
 maintained that "the eternal and necessary different relations 
 which different things have to each other, lay the foundation 
 for the fitness or unfitness of certain actions to these relations. 
 The congruity of an action to the circumstances or relations 
 of the agent is virtue ; its incongruity is vice." He remarks 
 that those who found all moral obligation ultimately in the 
 will of God, must recur at length to the same thing ; only 
 "they do not clearly explain how the nature and will of God 
 HimseK must be necessarily good and just." * 
 
 In 1731, a posthumous treatise of Cudworth, " Concerning 
 Eternal and Immutable Morality," was published by Chand- 
 ler, Butler's predecessor, as Bishop of Durham, and was found 
 
 "• Sir James Mackintosli lias remarked tliat we owe the Dissertation on the 
 Nature of Virtue which Butler annexed to his "Analogy" to the assertion of 
 Hutcheson — " contradicted by erery man's feelings " — that prudence, so long as 
 it regards ourselves^ cannot be moi'ally approved. He adds also : " He is charge- 
 able, like Butler, with a vicious circle, in describing virtuous acts as those which 
 are approved \)j the moral sense, v/hile he at the same time describes the moral 
 sense as the faculty which perceives and feels the morality of actions." 
 
WOLLASTON. BALGUY. 49 
 
 to be in substantial agreement with the positions taken by 
 Clarke. Both were open to a criticism which Puffendorf had 
 made on Grotius, that he alleged "for a proof of the inde- 
 pendency of some of the laws of nature, the necessary agree- 
 ment or disagreement of things to rational and social nature." 
 In this, however, Grotius had but copied Cicero, while he was 
 in agreement with Lord Herbert. 
 
 In 1729, on the publication of Dr. Clarke's " Exposition of 
 the Church Catechism," he came into collision with Dr. Daniel 
 Waterland. His position here was that "the Sacrament of 
 the Lord's Supper and other positive institutions had the 
 nature only of means to an end, and that, therefore, they 
 were never to be compared with moral virtues, nor can ever 
 be of any use or benefit without them," etc. 
 
 The death of Dr. Clarke left the task of defending these 
 positions to devolve on others. Dr. A. A. Sykes replied to 
 Waterland, and there were rejoinders on each side. Thomas 
 Chubb, and Thomas Jackson (editor of Stephen's Thesaurus)^ 
 joined in the discussion, the former on Dr. Clarke's side ; the 
 latter on Dr. Waterland's. Like several other writers of the 
 time, Jackson (1Y31) represented man's chief concern to be 
 " to study the means of his own happiness." The happiness 
 of His creatures is God's object in calling them into being, 
 and to this end a detenninate method was adopted, dependent 
 upon His will. The author then proceeds to refute " the no- 
 tion of Dr. Clarke and his followers," with whom he classes 
 Bishop Butler, quoting from one of his sermons. 
 
 Clarke's view was substantially adopted, not only by deisti- 
 cal writers like Chubb and Tindal, but by many others. "Wol- 
 laston modified it (1T24) by sabstituting " the truth " in place 
 of " the reason " of things, and thus constructed his ingenious 
 theory of the foundation of morals. Dr. John Balguy, Clarke's 
 ablest successor, shortly after the appearance of Hutcheson's 
 "Enquiry" (1Y25), published his first "Letter to a Deist," in 
 which he criticised the views of Lord Shaftesbury, and indi- 
 cated his dissent from Hutcheson, who had largely adopted 
 them. Agreeing on some points with Shaftesbury, he strongly 
 dissented from him on others. He would not allow that re- 
 wards and penalties were not serviceable to the cause of vir- 
 4 
 
50 balguy's teeatises. 
 
 tiie, although he conceded that the merit of an act was propor- 
 tioned to its disinterestedness. At the same time — and this 
 was a year previous to the publication of Butler's sermons — 
 he said, " I can by no means approve of that doctrine which 
 
 resolves all morality into self-interest Are there no 
 
 propensities, no inclinations in our nature, drawing us, as it 
 were, out of ourselves, in behalf of our fellow-creatures, even 
 to the neglect of what we call self -ad vantage ? " Here he ac- 
 corded with Shaftesbury and Hutcheson. For virtue, also, 
 apart from its rewards, he claimed "an intrinsic goodness" 
 that should determine our preference. The "taste" scheme 
 of Shaftesbury, he utterly rejected, and along with it the 
 "moral sense" of Hutcheson, as making morality dependent 
 on the accidental presence, or absence, vigor or weakness, of a 
 somewhat questionable instinct. In 1Y28, he presented his 
 views more fully in "The Foundation of Moral Goodness," 
 in which he aimed to show that virtue could find no proper 
 basis in instincts or affections, however these might sometimes 
 enforce viiiuoas motives. He claimed, also, that moral good 
 might be an end in itself, as well as the natural good, or hap- 
 piness, which Hutcheson favored. In 1Y30, another pamphlet 
 of his appeared, entitled " Divine Eectitude," etc. In this, 
 he resolved all the divine perfections into a single moral 
 quality ; namely, " God's determining Himself by 'moral fit- 
 ness^ or, acting perpetually according to the truth, nature, 
 and reason of things.'''' He accepted the view taken by But- 
 ler in his sermons, then recently printed (1726), of the divine 
 goodness, not as an indiscriminate benevolence, but " a wise 
 regard for what is required by the reason of things, or the 
 ends of government." "With such a view of the divine good- 
 ness, probation harmonizes. He holds it probable, " not only 
 that all men, but all moral agents whatever, are obliged to 
 undergo some kind of probation." It was fitting that the 
 prize to be finally bestowed, should be striven for, nor should 
 the untried be rewarded like those who had been found faith- 
 ful. The very idea of probation removes the objection to the 
 apparently unequal allotments of the present state. 
 
 Balguy's treatise called out a reply from the Kev. Thomas 
 Bayes, F.R.S., in " Divine Benevolence ; or, an Attempt to 
 
EEPLY TO BATES. CONYBEARE. 61 
 
 prove that the principal end of the Divine Providence and 
 Government is the Happiness of his Creatures" (1Y31). To 
 this happiness, all other objects, as those of order and beautj, 
 must be subordinate. Balguy replied in " The Law of Truth ; 
 or, The Obligations of Reason essential to all Eeligion," add- 
 ing remarks supplementary to his previous treatise. He con- 
 tended that those who ascribed perfection to the divine will, 
 must mean that will as " directed, or undirected." H undi- 
 rected, how could a will be said to be perfect ; if directed, by 
 what, except reason and truth? Benevolence, morever, must 
 be rational, as founded' on reason and produced by it, or a 
 natural perfection, distinct from and independent of reason. 
 In the latter case, it could be nothing more than good nature ; 
 but, if guided by reason, it must have respect to the nature 
 and relations of things. " The obligations of religion depend, 
 and are entirely founded, on the obligations of reason," and 
 the relation of positive to moral duties is instrumental, sub- 
 sidiary and subordinate. The rule of truth or reason is to be 
 observed for its own sake. Will, considered simply as will, 
 does not and cannot impose obligation. " God's will obliges 
 us only m virtue of truth." This may be acceptable to some 
 unbelievers, but because they reject revelation, we need not 
 reject reason. H they forsake the gospel rule, we need not 
 abandon the Law of Rectitude. 
 
 Dr. John Conybeare, Butler's successor in his bishopric, 
 put forth in 1Y32 a reply to Tindal, which Warburton pro- 
 nounced " the best reasoned book in the world." Li this, he 
 took extended notice of the controverted question of moral 
 obligation. He could not accept Balguy's views without 
 grave qualification. He would admit the fitnesses of things, 
 and that these fitnesses might be, " in order of conception," 
 anterior to the will of God. To deny this involved difiicul- 
 ties he knew not how to meet. Yet " things are fit because 
 God has constituted their nature in such a way as to make 
 them so," while, in dealing with His creatures, God wills things 
 "because they are fit and proper." But obligation does 
 not arise merely from the fitness of things, nor will inward 
 satisfaction or the good tendency of an act constitute obli- 
 gation. The Law of Nature is the will and command of a 
 
52 law's edition of " oeigin of evil." 
 
 Being to whom we are subject. It is a law to us, because 
 it is the will of One on whom we are absolutely dependent, 
 and we must conform to it on some prospect we have of a 
 suitable reward or punishment. 
 
 Here we approximate to the definition of virtue given by 
 Edmund Law, subsequently Bishop of Carlisle, in a disserta- 
 tion prefixed to his edition of Archbishop King on " The Ori- 
 gin of Evil" (1732). This dissertation, attributed to a Mr. 
 Gay, aims to harmonize the views of divergent theorists and 
 writers, suggesting that if they were interpreted with due 
 candor, their seeming disagreements would almost disappear, 
 and it would be found that acting agreeably to nature and 
 reason coincides with fitness of things ; fitness of things with 
 truth (Wollaston's phrase) ; truth with the common good, and 
 the common good with the will of God. 
 
 Law, therefore, or Gay, speaking in his name, holds that 
 " our approbation of morality and all affections, etc., are ulti- 
 mately resolvable into reason pointing out private happiness, 
 and are conversant only about things apprehended to be means 
 tending to this end." So " virtue is the conformity to a rule 
 of life directing the actions of all rational creatures with re- 
 spect to each other's happiness, to which conformity every 
 one is in all cases obliged," which " obligation is the necessity 
 of doing or omitting any action in order to be happy," and is 
 founded on " ^the prospect of happiness." It need only be 
 added that Paley, whose utilitarian definition of virtue is so 
 well-known, was the chaplain of Law after the latter became 
 a bishop. 
 
 The Dissertation could not bring together extremes like 
 Clark and Warburton, Balguy and Bayes. Before the close of 
 the year, an anonymous pamphlet, " occasioned by some late 
 writings," presumed to review the " Discourse concerning 
 Yirtue and Religion." It defined obligation as " a reason 
 for acting, necessarily arising in the mind of all rational and 
 moral agents, according to their capacities, upon consideration 
 of the true nature and circumstances of it." Rewards and 
 penalties do not constitute obligation, but only its encourage- 
 ment. " The v/ill of God is the only foundation and source 
 of happiness and misery, but the will of God cannot possibly 
 
GEOVE. MOLE. 53 
 
 be the foundation of morality, or the rule of right reason, but 
 tnith only, for truth and reason necessarily oblige the will of 
 God himself." " Virtue is the practice of reason in all our 
 conduct, merely upon account of its being reasonable." 
 
 In 1^34, Kev. Henry Grove, a contributor to Addison's 
 " Spectator," sent forth a small treatise entitled, " Wisdom 
 the First Spring of Action in the Deity." In substantial 
 agreement with Balguy, he dissented from him at some 
 points, and, in animadverting upon Bayes' Essay, sets forth 
 the difficulties which those who reject the idea and law of 
 moral fitness, will find themselves compelled to encounter. 
 The use made of it by Tindal and others does not move him. 
 The fundamental duties of natural religion are founded in 
 reason, and sanctioned by it. Grove does not fail to rebuke 
 the presumption implied in the human ignorance and weak- 
 ness that venture to sit in judgment on the works or com- 
 mands of God. 
 
 Another writer, following, in the main, the line of thought 
 of Balguy and Grove, was Rev. Thomas Mole, supposed to 
 have been educated at the same academy where Butler and 
 Seeker were trained. In 1Y32, he preached a sermon on 
 " The Foundation of Moral Virtue," v/hich he defended 
 against a critical assailant in " The Foundation of Moral Vir- 
 tue Eeconsidered and Defended." 
 
 He states three theories — one which " derives the nature of 
 moral good and evil from the mere will and arbitrary pleas- 
 ure of the First Cause" — a second, which deduces it "from 
 His nature or moral perfections, or from His will, as neces- 
 sarily determined by them " — a third, which makes moral 
 good and evil originally and eternally diflierent in themselves ; 
 naturally and necessarily what they are, independent of aU 
 will or positive appointment whatever. 
 
 Rejecting the first, he examines the second, to find that it 
 must be resolved into the third, which he accepts ; in this 
 adding his suifrage to that of Cudworth, Clarke, Balguy, and 
 Grove. " The nature and reason of things," he contends, " is 
 the foundation, and the will of God the rule, of moral vir- 
 tue ;" and these may be distinguished, though not separated. 
 "With those who, like Bayle, attempt to separate them, Mole 
 
54 • WOLLASTON KEFUTED. 
 
 has no sympathy. Their error in this is no warrant for us to 
 " feed our ignorance in order to nourisli devotion." 
 
 Wollaston, in liis " Religion of Nature Delineated " (1^24), 
 had made truth, or conformableness to it, the test of good and 
 evil. He had ingeniously defended his theory, in which, if 
 he had written ten years later, he might have not inappro- 
 priately accepted justice, or Balguy's " Rectitude," in place 
 of " Truth." His theory was assailed (1Y25) by John Clarke 
 (not a brother of Dr. S. Clarke, as sometimes stated), an emi- 
 nent scholar, and master of the public grammar school in 
 Hull. He was not disposed to allow, that to assert things as 
 they are, or to conform to them as they are, was virtuous, 
 when sometimes it might be quite the reverse. Moreover, 
 Wollaston's assumption — held in common with many others 
 — that nothing is or can be the object of hatred or aversion in 
 itself, or upon its own account, but pain and misery, and that 
 happiness is the ultimate end of all our aims and designs, our 
 wishes and desires, is set against his primary assumption in 
 regard to truth ; for if happiness is the great end, then tmth 
 must be subservient to it. 'Nor does his theory throw any 
 light on the distinction between deeds of greater or less de- 
 merit, so long as they are simply and equally violations of truth. 
 
 This last position is taken also by Francis Hutcheson, in 
 his general reply to Clarke, Balguy, Grove, and Wollaston. 
 In 1728, he published his " Essay on the Nature and Conduct 
 of the Passions and Affections," and in his third edition of 
 this work (1742) he introduced his " Illustrations of the Moral 
 Sense." In this, he endeavors to show that writers who oppose 
 his views, really assume their truth. The very terms they 
 employ imply that Sense of the nature of actions for which 
 he contends. Grove, in his " Moral Philosophy " (1749), 
 gives that broad meaning to the term reason, which ascribes 
 to it, not merely the power of discerning good and evil, truth 
 and error, but satisfaction in the exercise of its power to de- 
 tect truth, in propositions or actions, which makes it include 
 the moral sense of Hutcheson. Butler's use of the temi con- 
 science is similarly comprehensive.* 
 
 * It may not be amiss to add here, that what has been called " the intellectual 
 theory of moral obligation," was again revived by Dr. John Taylor, in "An Ex- 
 
LIBERTY AND NECESSITY. COLLINS. 55 
 
 The chapter in the " Analogy " " On the Opinion of Keces- 
 sitj," has special reference to the discussion begun by Collins 
 in his " Philosophical Inquiry Concerning Human Liberty " 
 (1715), in which he availed liimself of Dr. Samuel Clarke's 
 assertion in his second course of Boyle Lecture Sermons, to 
 the effect that God was necessarily just, and all His volitions 
 and actions were morally necessary. Defeated as the cham- 
 pion of Dodwell in his dispute with Clarke on the materiality 
 of the human soul, or its natural mortality, he ventured upon 
 this new issue, but only to provoke a rejoinder from his old 
 antagonist which, for the time, put the matter at rest. It was 
 revived, however, in 1730, by the publication of " A Y indi- 
 cation of Human Libert}'^, in Answer to a Dissertation on 
 Liberty and ISTecessity, by A. C, Esq.," from the pen of the 
 learned chronologist, John Jackson. The latter had already 
 (1725) discussed the subject in a treatise in reply to " Cato's 
 Letters," and in the line of his argument presented substan- 
 tially the views of Dr. Clarke, for whom Butler manifests 
 great deference, and whose positions he has in the main 
 adopted. 
 
 It is in Butler's " Analogy " that all these various lines of 
 discussion which we have noticed meet. This work had 
 necessarily, from the very scope of it, to take most of them 
 into consideration, and it is memorable especially, that it so 
 ably and satisfactorily harmonizes and disposes of them. The 
 history of literature scarcely presents a parallel to it in this 
 respect. It is the appropriate terminus of several specific 
 tracks of conti-oversy, all more or less kindred or associated ; 
 all springing from the same origin, and nearly all terminating 
 at the same point. 
 
 amination of tlie Scheme of Morality advanced by Dr. Hutcheson " (1759), and 
 by Dr. Richard Price in "A Review of tlie Principal Questions and Difflculties 
 in Morals " (1758). The reassertion, by Taylor especially, of the existence of 
 disinterested affections, in which he followed Shaftesbury, Hutcheson and But- 
 ler, seems to have been with especial reference to the views of Lord Bolingbroke, 
 then recently published, in which he reduced all human action to the level of 
 selfish impulse. According to him, there can be ro innate moral principle. lie 
 argues that all compassion for the distressed, and even the affection of parents 
 for their children, proceed from the love of self, which he affirms to be the only 
 great motive principle of human nature, implanted l)y Providence in the breasts 
 of all men. This he maintains to be a kind of instinct, concerning which he is 
 not very clear. — MacKnight' s Life of Bolingbroke, page 699. 
 
56 SUMMAEY OF THE CONTEOVEEST. 
 
 The political pliase of tlie Hobbesian controversy disap- 
 peared with the Kevolution of 1688. Locke's social contract 
 theory was embodied iu the action of the Convention Parlia- 
 ment that called "William III. to the throne. "Writers like 
 Hoadly and Atterbmy contended over new issues raised by 
 the patriarchal theory of Filmer and his sympathizers, but 
 Tories like Harley and Bolingbroke had as little regard for 
 that theory as for the speculations of the Scholastics. But the 
 theological phase of the controversy was more lasting, and 
 embraced a wider range of topics. 
 
 Eetracing the course of discussion which has been pursued, 
 Ave find the controversy, which substantially reaches its conclu- 
 sion in Butler's " Analogy," separating itself as it proceeds, 
 from the time of Hobbes, into several branches, and these — 
 or nearly all of them — reunited in Butler's work. The specu- 
 lations of Hobbes, together with a reaction among liberally- 
 minded English divines against certain extremes of the doc- 
 trinal Puritans, on the one hand, and High Church intolerance 
 on the other, gave special impulse to the tendency developed 
 in Cambridge Platonism. The extent to which the Platon- 
 ists pushed their speculations provoked a double reaction, 
 in part by the sanction which they seemed to give to the 
 positions taken by Blount and Herbert, the former of Vv^hom 
 reproduced the arguments of Dr. Thomas Burnet, while To- 
 land cited the authority of Dr. Whichcote and others. The 
 -Eoyal Society, with which Oxford was in special sympathy, 
 depreciated Aristotle, and, to some extent, Plato also, in their 
 zeal for the new experimental philosophy represented by Boyle 
 and ITewton, while Gale, Whitby, and Halyburton especially, 
 were jealous of the disposition which elevated heathen phi- 
 losophy almost into rivalry with the claims of revelation. 
 Hence ensued that development of the Deistic Controversy, 
 in which the relative merits of reason and faith were elabo- 
 rately and ably discussed. 
 
 Meanwhile, Locke's denial of the widely-accepted doctrine 
 
 of iimate ideas demanded a new foundation of the Law of 
 
 Nature. Hence an investigation of the foundations of moral 
 
 obligation was necessary. Was it individual happiness, the 
 
 .general good, the eternal fitness and reason of things, the 
 
TOPICS OF CONTEOVEESY. 67 
 
 arbitrary -will of God, the simple excellence of moral good- 
 ness itself, or reward and penalty ; or was it to be sought 
 under the new and more restricted definition of the " Reason " 
 of the Platonists ; or in some taste, or instinct, or moral sense ? 
 All these positions were severally maintained, and, when But- 
 ler wTote, had been freshly presented in the writings of 
 Shaftesbury, Clarke, Fiddes, Hutcheson, Balguy, Bayes, 
 Grove, Law, Jackson, and many others. 
 
 Contemporary with the early period of this branch of the 
 controversy, was that which originated in Locke's assertion 
 that God might make matter cogitative. Bentley and Hody, 
 Stillingfleet's chaplains, as well as Stillingfleet himself, came 
 forward as his antagonists, while Dodweli availed himself of 
 the occasion to modify and refine Coward's Speculations, and 
 to assert the natural mortality of the soul. Numerous writei's 
 now appeared on both sides, Anthony Collins taking the place 
 of Dodweli, and having for his too powerful antagonist Dr. 
 Samuel Clarke. 
 
 Meanwhile, the influence of Spinoza, and the Speculations 
 of Bayle on the Continent, gave occasion for the Optimist 
 Speculations of Shaftesbury, and " The Origin of Evil " of 
 Archbishop King. Connected with this branch of the con- 
 troversy were Leibnitz's "Theodicy," Toland's " Pantheisticon," 
 and Dr. John Clarke's Boyle Lecture Sermons, as well as 
 publications which proposed to settle whether Benevolence, 
 Wisdom, or Rectitude, was " the first spring of action in the 
 Deity," and what was ]3roperly understood or required by 
 Divine Benevolence. 
 
 In establishing his scheme of the fomidation of morality, 
 Dr. Samuel Clarke had asserted, as we have seen, that God 
 was neoessarily just. His old antagonist Collins was too 
 shrevfd not to avail himseK of this assertion, and to put forth, 
 as a new challenge to discussion, his work on " Liberty and 
 Necessity." Clarke replied briefly, but " Cato's Letters," 
 Jackson's treatise, and the productions of other writers, con- 
 tinued the controversy. 
 
 Butler surveyed the broad field, and embodied in a treatise, 
 which never names a champion or antagonist, all the import- 
 ant results that had been reached by his predecessors, or by 
 
58 butler's " ANALOGY." 
 
 liis own acute and profound reflections. The result is a work 
 that stands unique in our literature, and which is memorable 
 as the summing-up of a discussion which had gone forward 
 for three-fourths of a century, and had led to the publication 
 of hundreds, if not thousands, of books and pamphlets. 
 
 Later works on the same class of topics have been issued, 
 some of them of marked ability, but scarcely one which does 
 not confess its indebtedness to Butler. This is due in part 
 to the breadth and comprehensiveness of the field of contro- 
 versy which opened before him, and in part to the ability and 
 effectiveness with which he performed his work. He sketched 
 the course of argument which has since very generally been 
 followed, with more or less originality. But the new age, with 
 its new questions, demands some modification of his method, 
 and a more minute examination of some points which he was 
 content to assume. 
 
 YIII. 
 
 BISHOP butler's "analogy." 
 
 The lapse of more than a century has only confirmed the 
 estimate of Bishop Butler's work, formed by those of his own 
 contemporaries who were best qualified to weigh it in critical 
 scales. Sir James Mackintosh pronounced the "Analogy" 
 " the most original and profound work extant in any language 
 on the philosophy of religion." Bishop "Wilson, one of But- 
 ler's editors, declares it has " fixed the admiration of all com- 
 petent judges for nearly a century, and will continue to be 
 studied so long as the language in which he wrote endures. 
 The mind of a master pervades it. . . Tie takes his place with 
 Bacon, and Pascal, and Kewton — those mighty geniuses who 
 opened new sources of information on the most important 
 Eubjects, and commanded the love and gratitude of mankind." 
 
 Among more recent witnesses we may cite Dr. Chalmers, 
 who, when asked to write something on the leaf of a Greek 
 Testament which had once belonged to Bntler, traced these 
 words : " Butler is in theology what Bacon is in science. The 
 
PEOF. FAEEAE ON BUTLEE. 59 
 
 reigning principle of tlac latter is, tliat it is not for man to 
 theorize on the works of God ; and of the former, that it is 
 not for man to theorize on the ways of God. Both deferred 
 alike to the certainty of experience, as being paramount to 
 all the plausibilities of hypothesis; and he who attentively 
 studies the writings of these great men, will find a marvellous 
 concurrence of principle between a sound philosophy and a 
 sound faith." 
 
 Prof. Farrar has appropriately referred to the controversy 
 with which Butler's work was connected. Of the "Analogy," 
 he says : It " bears marks, if we view it as a work of art, of 
 the most careful elaboration in every part. It gives few 
 references to authorities ; and none but those who are well 
 acquainted with the works of that time, are aware what 
 internal marks it bears of extensive study of other writers, 
 both infidel and Christian ; yet of such a kind as not justly to 
 lead to the depreciation of Butler's originality. His work, 
 wrought out thoughtfully in many years of study, and written 
 leisurely in his retirement at Stanhope, was the summing up 
 of the whole controversy, the final utterance on the side of the 
 church concerning the philosophy of religion, when viewed 
 in reference to the Deistic controversy. The style is obscure, 
 for Butler never possessed a lucid style, in spite of the help 
 which Seeker used to afford him in simplifying his sentences ; 
 but the obscurity of the work, in a great degree, arises from 
 its fullness. It is packed full of thought. Its tone and man- 
 ner of handling are also characteristic of the. age."* 
 
 It is only with the first part of the "Analogy " that we 
 have here to deal. The second part is devoted largely to the 
 subject of Christian evidences, while the first discusses 
 exclusively those features of the moral system with which 
 we are here concerned. Butler's aim is not merely to show 
 that the same difiiculties, or difiiculties of the same kind, 
 pertain alike to the several schemes of natural and revealed 
 religion, but that the objections urged on the ground of these 
 difiiculties to discredit the revealed scheme, are equally valid 
 when urged against the other. If this is the case, our choice 
 must lie — not between revelation on one side, and the Deistic 
 
 * Farrar's " Bishop Butler," in Lect. to Young Men, 1863, p. 353. 
 
60 butler's AEGUltfENT FOR THE FUTUEE LIFE. 
 
 sclieme, whicli Herbert, Blount, Toland, Collins, and Tindal 
 liad advocated, on the other ; but between utter disbelief or 
 atheism, and the acceptance of the Christian faith. 
 
 After his introduction — in which Butler considers the in- 
 dispensableness, and in certain cases, the conclusiveness of 
 probable evidence — states the nature of the argument from 
 analogy, and lays down the plan and scope of his work, he 
 proceeds to discuss the evidence afforded by the light of 
 nature in support of a future life. By selecting this as the 
 first topic of his work, he secured one advantage, but lost 
 another. He availed himself of the concessions of the Deists 
 of his time, who admitted generally, to secm-e larger credit 
 for their scheme, that the immortality of the soul might be 
 evinced by human reason. To have this point established 
 was an important step toward the subsequent positions which 
 Butler was prepared to take. But in discussing the future 
 life, before an examination of the moral system, he v/as 
 necessitated to dispense with the proofs of immortality to be 
 derived from this source. He was at liberty only to adduce 
 what may be called the negative argument, viz., that what 
 now exists will continue *to exist, or we are warranted by the 
 course of nature to presume that it will, unless some sufficient 
 reason can be given why it should cease to be. This argument 
 would imply — as the positive argument from the intention of 
 God manifest in the moral system would not — the continued 
 existence of brutes after death, and to this implication, Butler 
 is prepared, if necessary, to yield. He makes, however, the 
 most effective use of analogy, to show the probability of con- 
 tinued existence under ail changes. The different states of 
 the same being, the transformation of the worm to the butter- 
 fly, the change from the embryo in the egg to the bird, all 
 show that identity of being may continue under very diverse 
 forms. As to death, we know it only from its visible effects, 
 but we cannot assume to know on what the exercise of the 
 powers of the soul may depend. Conscious activity may be 
 entirely suspended, as in sleep or in a swoon, without affecting 
 the integrity of the conscious being. We can trace the pos- 
 session of living powers up to death, but there we simply 
 
THE BODY THE SOUl's INSTEUMENT. 61 
 
 cease to trace them. Wonderful changes we have ah'eadj 
 survived. Diverse states of being we have ah-eadj ex- 
 perienced. The assumption that death annihilates the soul, 
 is the assumption that the soul is material, and as material 
 corruptible. But here Butler falls bach on Clarke's argument 
 of the indiscerptibility of consciousness, and while he does 
 not assert it absolutely conclusive, he asserts consciousness to 
 be a single indivisible power. The decay of the body, the 
 loss of its members, a complete change, and even siiccessive 
 changes of all the particles of which it is composed, do not 
 affect the consciousness of our identity. There is no material 
 atom that can be identified with our living selves. What we 
 have already lost was not ourselves. What we may gain 
 hereafter will not be. All the senses of the body are but 
 organs or instruments. The body itself is but a complex 
 organ. The eye does not explain vision any more than the 
 glass which we use to aid its powers. In dreams, we perceive 
 without organs. In losing a limb, we do not lose the direct- 
 ing power. An artificial limb may take its place and answer 
 its purpose. We may infer, therefore, that when the soul 
 loses its organs, it does not necessarily lose anything of its 
 own proper powers. 
 
 It is true that death, in depriving the soul of the body as 
 its instrument, robs it of sensation. Yet when, through sen- 
 sation, the sonl has been furnished with ideas, it is independ- 
 ent of sensation. Its powers of reason, memory and reflec- 
 tion may remain, and sometimes actually do, when the senses 
 are greatly impaired, if not destroyed. Even fatal diseases 
 do not necessarily impair, much less destroy, the intellect. 
 Why may it not continue still % 
 
 There is nothing nnnatm-al in the change implied in a 
 futm'e life. To go to new scenes and conditions is no more 
 strange than to have entered upon the present. Our know- 
 ledge, however, of what is natural is limited. If it were 
 extended, our objections might vanish. The probabilities, 
 therefore, are on the side of a future life, and, in the absence 
 of counter-probabilities, should be decisive. 
 
62 GOD S NATURAL GOVEENMENT. 
 
 The Author of Mature has established in the world a system 
 of administration by rewards and penalties. It is a matter 
 not of deduction, but of experience, that we are under 
 government. To some actions pleasure is annexed ; to 
 others, pain. The design of this, in very many instances, 
 is plainly discoverable. We can foresee the consequences of 
 our actions, and by all the risks incurred by our mistakes, are 
 impelled to exercise foresight, or prudence, which is a kind 
 of natural virtue. Even rashness or negligence is punished 
 by evils which are beyond remedy. Yet our well-being is 
 largely in our own power. With more or less clearness we 
 are forewarned what course to choose, or what to shun. 
 
 If this be ascribed to the general course of Kature, this is 
 only saying that the Author of Nature exercises a uniform 
 government. Our foresight of consequences is the warning 
 which He gives us how to act. When those consequences 
 result from the observance or violation of natural laws, they 
 are of the nature of reward or punishment. That we are 
 under government is, therefore, not so much a deduction 
 of reason as a matter of experience. That this government 
 acts by laws which execute themselves, without formal inter- 
 position, only proves its perfection. The present course of 
 things, therefore, is an instance of government by reward and 
 penalty, analogous to the general doctrine of religion. 
 
 Pains and penalties here are brought upon men by their 
 imprudence and wilKulness. A great deal of their misery 
 might have been foreseen and avoided. It often follows 
 what at first was pleasurable, and sometimes is long deferred. 
 Apprehension of it dies away, and at last it comes, perhaps 
 suddenly, and with crushing force. Youth may be heedless, 
 but that fact does not arrest the consequences of its mistake. 
 Early habits may in the end prove utter ruin. Opportunities 
 once afforded, pass away and can never be recovered. Seed- 
 time neglected incurs the forfeit of the harvest. Folly and 
 extravagance up to a certain point may admit of remedy, but 
 beyond that point there is no place for repentance. Incon- 
 siderateness is punished, as well as willful vice. Civil govern- 
 ment also is a natural institution, and its penalties must be 
 taken into account. All this is the result of general laws, 
 
GODS MORAL GOVEENMENT. Go 
 
 and a matter of experience, and is so analogous to wliat 
 religion teaches us of the future punishment of the wicked, 
 that the penalty and the method of it may in either case be 
 expressed in the same words. 
 
 Thus the observation of the present state of things is cal- 
 culated to excite apprehensions of future penalty. "When 
 checks, admonitions and warnings have been long disregarded ; 
 when the sad example of others' ruin has been overlooked ; 
 when the long delayed catastrophe suddenly overtakes the 
 transgressor ; when repentance has become vain and can only 
 aggravate distress ; — the result, witnessed in suffering, want, 
 shame, remorse or death, attests the fixed constitution of 
 things, according to which, evil, though it may long enjoy 
 immunity, is at last overtaken by retribution. 
 
 But the government of the Author of nature is also moral. 
 "We see not only prudence or imprudence visited with reward 
 or penalty, but consequences are often proportioned to per- 
 sonal merit or demerit. If it be asserted that God is a beinij 
 of simple absolute benevolence, the assertion should be proved. 
 But benevolence itself is not incompatible with veracity and 
 justice, or with what we see indicating the administration of 
 a righteous governor. The present state may be allowed to 
 be imperfect as it respects an exact distribution of rewards 
 and penalties, yet it may be plainly seen to be carried on to 
 such an extent as to warrant the confidence that it will finally 
 be completed. 
 
 We see, for instance, that virtue has its own rewards, its 
 peculiar satisfactions, of which vice knows nothing. If vicious 
 courses have been pursued, unc^ualified pleasure may not at- 
 tend upon reform. Straggles and restlessness, and habits of 
 old appetites and passions, may make the effort to break from 
 evil more painful than pleasant. So indulgence in evil may 
 at length stifle self -reproof and the sense of shame ; but all 
 this is manifestly exceptional, and is not to be urged against 
 the fact that God's moral government does actually render 
 men happy or miserable by rule. We are warranted by expe- 
 rience to expect that good and evil will continue to be distin- 
 guished by favorable or deleterious effects. Tranquillity, satis- 
 faction and external advantages are the natural consequences 
 
64 VIETTJE AND VICE. DIVERSE EFFECTS. 
 
 of a prudent management of ourselves and our affairs ; virtu- 
 ous actions, in the natural course of things, procure peace and 
 favor, while vicious are actually punished, oftentimes as mis- 
 chievous to society. Even the apprehension they excite in 
 the transgressor is a sort of punishment. It is nature's dec- 
 laration against them. If good actions are sometimes pun- 
 ished, or attended with persecution, this is not necessary in 
 the sense in which it is necessary that ill actions be punished. 
 But, naturally, virtue as such is rewarded, and vice as such is 
 punished. Actions, distinguished from their moral quality, 
 may gratify a taste or passion, and afford pleasure. But if 
 vicious, this element of evil in them is not thereby rewarded 
 or approved. Virtue and vice have immediate and lasting 
 effects upon the mind and temper. "Where ill effects follow 
 certain actions that are reflected upon as wrong, they are at- 
 tended with uneasiness and self-reproach. On the other 
 hand, the exercise of gratitude, friendship and benevolence 
 are attended with inward peace and joy of heart. ISTor can a 
 long indulgence in vice fully di'ive away the fear or appreheii- 
 si on of penalty. 
 
 Good men also befriend one another. Let a man be knowa 
 to be virtuous, and he will be favored often for his charaetci 
 simply. Public honor will be done him. But vice will incur 
 infamy. It will provoke resentments. It will impel even to 
 revolutions. It will ever be exposed to that which flows from 
 a public opinion against injustice, fraud and unfair advan- 
 tages. 
 
 Domestic and civil governments are both natural institu- 
 tions. Yet in the first, falsehood, injustice and ill-behavior 
 are punished, and the opposite qualities commended, while 
 civil government is constrained to repress what would be pre- 
 judicial or fatal to itseK, as vice must necessarily be. That 
 God has given us a moral nature shows that we are under 
 moral government, but that He has placed us where this nature 
 does and must operate is an additional proof of the fact. 
 
 Indeed, the rewards of virtue and the punishments of vice 
 are so uniform as we find them to be, in part from the fact of 
 our moral nature, and in part also from the fact that each has 
 so great power over others' happiness and misery. We are so 
 
TESTDEIS^CIES OF VIRTUE. 65 
 
 made that well-doing brings peace, and ili-doing restlessness 
 and apprehension. We cannot approve vice except when the 
 moral judgment is perverted by evil habits or self-interest. 
 Yice is necessarily odious, infamous and contemptible. It is 
 trae that happiness and misery may seem to be inexplicably 
 distributed. But this may be in the way of discipline. There 
 may be good reasons why our happiness or misery may be, to 
 a certain extent, in another's power. But this does not drown 
 the voice of nature. The passions which nature bestowed, 
 are perverted when this result is brought about. 
 
 Evidently virtue is on the side of the divine administra- 
 tion, and vice is opposed to it. The first has reasons for hope, 
 which the latter has not. The confidence of vice rests on the 
 prospect of eluding the natural processes of retribution. Acci- 
 dental causes may operate to protect evil, for a time, at least. 
 But the tendencies of virtue and vice, so manifest in respect 
 to individuals, are discernable in society. Here virtue, in the 
 long run — ^like reason when, in a conflict with brute force, it 
 has time for precaution and defence — will win the day. Yir- 
 tue will tend to bind to£:ether the elements of the state ; to 
 promote industry, harmony and a regard for the public good ; 
 to increase all the elements through which the state prospers. 
 For this, it must have time to operate, but with tune, the 
 advantages which it tends to secure, will become manifest. 
 Difiiculties, indeed, must be overcome, for virtue is militant 
 here. Sometimes it is neglected and unknown, despised and 
 oppressed, and all this may be for wise ends, and to secure a 
 broader and more generous recognition at last. But the hin- 
 drances are presumably only temporary. On a larger sphere 
 they may vanish. Certainly they are not necessary, and we 
 may conceive a state of things in which full scope shall be 
 given to virtue. The vastness of the material universe sug- 
 gests the boundlessness of the moral, and a scheme of Provi 
 dence proportion ably extended. 
 
 But supposing a state thoroughly virtuous and just, the 
 very picture of it is an argument of the natural advantages of 
 virtue as related to society. Such a state would be devoid of 
 faction. It would be directed by the highest wisdom. Each 
 member, in security, would discharge his assigned duty. In- 
 5 
 
6Q THE PEESENT A STATE OE PROBATION. 
 
 justice and distrust would be unknown. The character of tlie 
 state would command confidence and respect abroad. It 
 would liave a relative superiority to all others less virtuous 
 than itself. It w^ould conciliate those who might desire to 
 become its subjects and enjoy its advantages. It would tend 
 ever to grow stronger and expand, till all nations should flow 
 to it, and the world become subject to its sway. 
 
 Evidently, the Author of nature is not indifferent to virtue 
 and vice. His constitution of things is equivalent to a declara- 
 tion in favor of one and against the other. If, in the issue, 
 it should be found that all are punished according to their 
 deserts, this would exhibit a distributive justice, different in 
 degree, but not in Mnd, from what prevails now. Add to this, 
 the consideration of the tendencies of virtue and vice, found- 
 ed in the nature of things, and hindered at present by arti- 
 ficial and not necessary causes, and then suppose these causes 
 removed in a future state, and the result will be a perfection 
 of moral government not witnessed, but yet suggested here. 
 So that the notion of a moral scheme of government is natu- 
 ral and not fictitious, and there is reason to believe that, how- 
 ever imperfect now, the obstacles to its perfection will be 
 finally removed. 
 
 That the present is a state of probation, may be inferred 
 from the fact of a future life, taken in connection with what 
 we experience, viz., that our future welfare depends on our 
 present prudence. The natural government of God in this 
 world puts us on trial now, and this trial, in which the con- 
 duct of youth determines the character of manhood, is analo- 
 gous to probation for a future life. Men are tempted to what 
 is contrary to their worldly interest, and may in like manner 
 be tempted to what is opposed to their future interest. In 
 both cases, their neglect of the nature of their actions, when 
 they might see what courses lead to good and what to evil, 
 forces them to blame themselves. The result that comes upon 
 them is due, not so much to ignorance as to passion, or a 
 heedlessness that is culpable. In both cases there is proba- 
 tion, arising out of our nature or our condition. The tempta- 
 tion may be extraordinary, or it may be weak in itself, and 
 
PEOOFS OF PEOBATTON. 67 
 
 yet prevail tlirougli the weakness of the will or the eagerness 
 for indulgence. Some persons never look beyond present 
 gratification. Some act even against their present judgment. 
 Some are open and bold in vice. "Vivid apprehensions of 
 future ill fail to arrest them. External influences may also 
 work to their prejudice. Bad example may lend a sanction 
 to their vice. An imperfect education may dispose them to 
 yield where they should resist. Prevalent false opinions may 
 be shared by them, and help to mislead them ; so that negli- 
 gence and folly, as well as vice, may bring on disastrous 
 results. 
 
 Of this, however, we cannot complain. We are not so 
 necessitated to evil or folly, but that we feel that we might 
 and ought to resist. In a more exalted condition, we might 
 have just as good reason to complain that we are not higher 
 and happier, as we have now. 
 
 Thus the present actual state of things is one of trial. We 
 are never allowed to feel for a moment that we are absolutely 
 secure. If an infinitely good being allows this, we cannot 
 argue from his nature that he will not expose us to misery. 
 The misery is no more unavoidable than our deportment, 
 which occasions it. There is constant danger to our present 
 interests, and so there may be to our future. If present en- 
 joyments and honors are not forced upon us, when we miscon- 
 duct ourselves, we cannot imagine that future good will be. 
 
 Why we are placed in such a state of probation, is a prob- 
 lem which we cannot fully solve. If we knew, it might injure 
 rather than help us. In any case, our state is consistent with 
 God's righteous government; and, if it is in order to our 
 being qualified for a better state, it accords with His wisdom 
 and goodness. 
 
 Every creature has its proper sphere of existence. In order 
 to happiness, its nature must be congruous to its circumstances. 
 Hence, a future blissful condition demands specific qualifica- 
 tions for it. These qualifications are attainable, with due fore- 
 sight and attention. We are so constituted as to become fit 
 for new and different conditions. We can acquire ideas, and 
 store them up, and make use of them. We can become more 
 and more expert in any specific kind of action. A settled 
 
68 PKESENT DISCIPLDTE. 
 
 alteration in our tempers is possible to a persistent seK-control 
 and discipline. Repeated efforts and actions result in habits, 
 bodily and mental, by which difficult things become easy, and 
 repulsive things acceptable. Passive impressions, indeed, 
 grow weaker with repetition ; and it is well that it is so, or 
 the sight of distress would always repel the effort to relieve 
 it. The surgeon could not attain the impassive calmness 
 necessary for his humane task. But active exertion facilitates 
 future effort. That effort even becomes pleasurable, though 
 arduous. The inclinations opposed to it grov/ weaker, and 
 the diiSculties in its way diminish. Thus a new character, 
 in some respects, is formed. Probation is possible as to the 
 end it contemplates. In our present state, we are not at first 
 qualified for the duties of mature life. We approach our full 
 use of understanding and powers by an imperfect preparatory 
 use. It would be even dangerous to have them all in perfec- 
 tion at first. We should not know what to do with them. 
 Therefore, as children, we must learn, with powers propor- 
 tioned to our state and frame. We must observe the nature 
 and use of objects. We must conform to the subordinations 
 of domestic and civil government, and the common rules of 
 health and life. Our knowledge may be much of it insensibly 
 acquired, but in the aggregate it costs care and labor, and tlie 
 conquest of our inclinations. 
 
 Of precisely the same kind of discipline for a life to come 
 are we made capable. Even if we could not discern the rela- 
 tion between present discipline and future perfection of service 
 or happiness, this would not be any objection to the fact. We 
 cannot tell how exercise and food develop the child's powers 
 and frame. The child is not even aware that they do. We 
 may, therefore, in spite of our ignorance on many points, 
 infer that man is here and now on probation for a life to come. 
 
 But we are able to discern the connection between virtue 
 perfected into habit, and future happiness. Analogy indicates 
 that our state hereafter will be social. It will need, to its 
 blessedness, the exercise of those virtues, truth, justice, etc., 
 to the exercise of which we are disciplined now. If the uni- 
 verse is under moral government, virtuous character must be 
 a necessary condition of blessedness. 
 
TEIkEPTATIOIT AND UASITS. 69 
 
 But here we find ourselves deficient and liable to go astray. 
 Outward objects allure us to evil. Even when indulgence in 
 tbem is lawful, it may be limited to times, degi'ees, etc., and 
 these must be observed, if the moral principle within us is to 
 be regarded. This piinciple is to be mamtained in its in- 
 tegrity. It is our only security. When strengthened, it les- 
 sens om- danger. By discipline it is streng-thened and made, 
 as it were, invincible. Observing that which is right, instead 
 of yielding to om* preferences, we pursue our true interest. 
 We are saved from the danger attendant upon our propensi- 
 ties and passions. Yii'tue, made habitual by discipline under 
 probation, becomes victorious. It is improved and strength- 
 ened, and leads to happiness. 
 
 It is not enough to account for the fall of an upright being 
 to say he is free. That only makes his fall possible. He 
 must have propensities, and, in order to his perfection, 
 these must be proportioned to his surroundings, his under- 
 standing, and his moral sense. As occasions for the indulgence 
 of the propensities multiplied, the tendency to yield to them 
 might be increased, and at length become effectual. Trans- 
 gression of the moral principle might disorder the moral con- 
 stitution, and render future transgressions more probable. By 
 the repetition of these, evil habits would be formed, and the 
 .character become depraved. On the other hand, by resisting 
 temptation, the moral principle would be strengthened, the 
 propensities would be restrained, and virtue would be secured 
 a triumph. The danger of sinning might ultimately be re- 
 duced almost to nothing, and probation might result in con- 
 firmed hohness and blessedness. This is especially true of 
 fallen beings striving against evil. They would find in a world 
 like this much to help them — ^many warnings, new strength 
 from each preceding effort, warnings from others, lessons of 
 experience and disciphne. 
 
 Indeed, the evils which sm-round us teach us the -odious 
 nature and ill consequences of vice. Our own experience is 
 constantly admonishing us what to seek and what to shun. 
 Every act of self-government strengthens the virtuous prin- 
 ciple within us. Eesolute persistence against violent tempta- 
 tions confirms our integrity in an eminent degree, and is 
 
70 THE WOKLD A SCHOOL OF DISCIPLINE. 
 
 advantageous to us in proportion to the severity of our trial. 
 Perfection, through discipline and improvement, implies the 
 exercise of self-denial. If virtue were not arduous, weak in- 
 clinations might suffice for it, but danger and difficulty rapidly 
 confinn it into a habit. 
 
 It is objected that our moral as well as our physical and 
 intellectual powers may be overtasked. This is possible in 
 exceptional cases, but it is not inconsistent with this world 
 being intended and fitted ^to be a state of improvement. 
 There are sciences, highly improving to the mind, in which 
 some, on account of their difficulty, will not engage. So 
 some, instead of struggling to virtue, yield to vice, but even 
 this makes the world fitted to be a place of discipline for the 
 good. Many ends of the moral system may be unknown, or 
 above our comprehension, but its tendency to exercise and 
 improve virtue, beyond what would be possible in a perfectly 
 virtuous community, is manifest. 
 
 Shaftesbury's objection, though his name is not mentioned, 
 is next met, viz., that there can be no merit in an obedience 
 enforced by hope or fear. But obedience is obedience in any 
 case, and when observed grows into a habit, and habits repress 
 opposite inclinations, while moreover, veracity, justice, etc., 
 are really coincident with self-interest, and each separately is 
 a just principle. A good life begun at the instance of either, 
 and persisted in, leads to the same result. 
 
 Nor can it be said that the present discipline of affliction is 
 not needed for a future state of happiness. Although we 
 may not need the patience, we may need the temper that 
 results from it. "We may be capable of more happiness by 
 having our inclinations^ crossed, or our wills subdued, or 
 habits of resignation formed. 
 
 Kor, again, can it be said that God might have made us at 
 once what we were finally designed to be. What we are to 
 be, is to be the effect of what we do. God's natural govern- 
 ment is not designed to save us labor and trouble or danger, 
 but to fit us to encounter or endure them. "Whether we 
 will improve our powers and opportunities, and be the better 
 for it, or neglect them, and be the worse, is left to our own 
 choice. If this is so under God's natural, why not under His 
 moral government ? 
 
OBJECTION OF THE FATALIST MET. 
 
 71 
 
 But tliis state of probation may be even necessary for the 
 display of character. Not to God, for He is omniscient, but 
 to created beings, that they may know one another, and dis- 
 cern the justice of their final award. Such a result would 
 accord with the scheme of things that has been considered. 
 
 The objection of the fatalist that all things are determined 
 by necessity, does not destroy the proof of an intelligent author 
 and governor of the world. If the theory of necessity be 
 admitted, it applies to the present life. And yet, however 
 applicable, it does not exclude dehberation, choice, preference, 
 and all the conditions of temporal probation. Necessity does 
 not determine whether the world was created by an intelligent 
 author or not, but whether it was created by Him necessarily. 
 His Being must be admitted to be necessary, but it does not 
 follow that everytliing exists by the same kind of necessity, 
 that is, antecedent to design. Necessity accounts for the 
 structure of the world, as it does for that of a house, but no 
 otherwise. There must be an agent, only He is a necessary 
 agent. 
 
 But the practical application of the theory of necessity, in 
 the education of a child, for instance, will illustrate its 
 absurdity. His fancied release from obligation — however 
 inculcated — would soon lead to a practical reductio ad 
 ahsurdum. The assumption that events to come are fixed, 
 and that the harvest will be reaped — if it is so fated — ^is 
 never pushed so far that men neglect to sow the seed. 
 Obviously, the harvest of a future life may be similarly 
 conditioned. We are treated as if we were free. We are 
 subjected to probation as if we were responsible. This is so 
 in all practical matters, and how can it be shown that religion 
 is not a practical matter ? 
 
 Here we are conscious of will. We possess character. The 
 constitution of nature implies that its author has the same. 
 This is consistent with whatever necessity can be predicated 
 either of God or man. This necessity does not relieve an act 
 from the charge of being just or unjust. It does not relieve 
 from just punishment. The punishment is inflicted as if 
 deserved, that is, as if men were free. They are conscious 
 
73 NECESSITY NOT A WOEKING THEORY. 
 
 of right and wrong, of self-approval or self-rebuke. Thus 
 they are made aware of a rule of action to which they are 
 obligated to conform. This rule is forced upon our attention, 
 and it must be ascribed to the Author of nature, so that — • 
 necessity or no necessity — He puts us under obligation to 
 conform to rules which He has given. If, on the other hand, 
 necessity applies as a time theory to human actions, it must 
 apply to all as well as a part, and the result would be that it 
 would set aside, along with freedom, praise and blame, merit 
 and demerit, overthrowing at once all human and divine 
 justice. Here, then, is the direct and practical issue. The 
 Theory of Necessity is not a working theory for human 
 experience, or for the world as it is constituted. 
 
 The doctrine of human freedom is beset with no such 
 absurdities. Experience justifies our assumption of it. Things 
 are actually constituted as if we were free. Even if the doc- 
 trine of necessity were true, it would be utterly inapplicable, 
 and could only mislead. But the proofs of religion remain 
 the same, and just as conclusive, when necessity is supposed. 
 God has still a will and character, as we know that we have. 
 There would still be crime on the part of men, and if criminal, 
 they would be punishable. To assert injustice in punishing 
 crime, is admitting that we cannot rid ourselves of the notion 
 of justice. 
 
 But the fact abides that God rewards -and punishes. He 
 has bestowed upon us the moral faculty by which we approve 
 or disapprove. This implies a rule, and a rule of a peculiar 
 kind, by which we are self-approved, or self -condemned. The 
 dictates of the moral faculty are God's laws with sanctions. 
 We have a feeling of security when we comply with them, 
 and of danger in disobeying them. To this constitution of 
 our being God's government must conform. Hence religious 
 worship, if only the acknowledgment of that government, 
 becomes a duty. 
 
 But natural religion is conformable to the general sense of 
 mankind. It has been essentially professed in all countries, 
 and may be traced through all ages. These facts show that 
 it was either originally revealed, or forced itseK upon the 
 convictions of men. The rude state of inan in early ages 
 
VASTNE9S OF THE MOEAL SYSTEM. Y3 
 
 presumes the former, and it is confirmed bj tlie pretended 
 reTektions of ancient times, wliicli imply either that a real 
 one existed, or that men were prepared to expect one. Facts 
 like these must stand firm against all the objections derived 
 from necessity. Even on the admission of necessity, necessary 
 agents are accountable, and — all prejudices, customs, perver- 
 sions of reason to the contrary — the theory which makes them 
 necessary, is practically false. 
 
 On the supposition of a moral government, the analogy of 
 nature teaches that it must be a scheme, and one infinitely 
 vast and comprehensive. Its parts curiously correspond to 
 each other, and this correspondence embraces all the past as 
 well as future, all actions and events, as well as creatures. 
 1^0 event can be isolated, and yet no finite mind can trace all 
 its causes, connections, and relations, however insignificant in 
 itself. This is true of God's natural, and, it is to be presumed, 
 true of His moral government. Indeed, the two are blended 
 into a single scheme, the natural subservient to the moral and 
 adjusted to it. This adjustment is previously designed, and 
 applies to the periods of trial, the instruments of justice, the 
 forms of retribution. To object to one feature of this system, 
 we ought to know its relations to all the others. In any other 
 sphere but religion, the invalidity of a kindred objection 
 would be confessed. 
 
 To assert that all evils might have been prevented by re- 
 peated interpositions, or that more good might have been 
 eifected by a different constitution of things, is asserting what 
 we cannot prove, and what in some instances we can discern to 
 be false. Apparent disorders in the world may be such simply 
 because of our ignorance. Some changes might be suggested, 
 which, on trial, would be found palpably impossible. To ob- 
 ject against the actual ordering of Providence is a task to which 
 our knowledge and powers are inadequate. Some unknown 
 relation, or unknown impossibility, might determine what was 
 criticised to be not only good, but good in the highest degree. 
 
 In God's moral government, means are necessary to ends, 
 and most desirable ends may depend on very disagreeable 
 means. Our experience shows us often results contrary to 
 
74 OUE KNOWLEDGE LIMITED. 
 
 v/hat we anticipated. "We are thus admonislied to be cautious 
 in our objections. It is not enough that we cannot see hoxo 
 the means are to work out good, or think we can see that they 
 must work out the opposite. They may in fact be not only 
 fitting, but actually best, or the only means. 
 
 But sin has entered the world ; and would not the world 
 be better without sin % Yet pain is in the world ; and health 
 is better than pain, while pains may be curative. General 
 laws are shown by nature to be best, and for all the good we 
 have, or the confidence we feel, we are dependent upon them. 
 Yet by general laws, irregnilarities cannot be prevented or 
 remedied, while direct intei'positions would have bad effects, 
 encouraging improvidence, leaving us no rule of life or basis 
 of calculation, and leading perhaps to distant results working 
 incalculable injury. 
 
 But if so ignorant of a scheme practically infinite, how are 
 we competent to understand the proofs of rehgion ? Our 
 ignorance is not absolute, but partial. We may have evidence 
 of G-od's being and character, without comprehending His 
 plans. Moral obligations, however, remain unaffected by our 
 ignorance of the consequences of complying with or rejecting 
 them. Our incompetence to raise objections in certain cases 
 is manifest, and we know it ; but to credit religion is trusting 
 to experience. 
 
 The present state, then, is a fragment of an immense 
 scheme. "We are connected, if not with all its parts, at least 
 with many — with the present, past and futin-e. This scheme, 
 moreover, is progressive : it is steadily unfolding. It contains 
 what is wonderful, and not less wonderful, though a Creator 
 be denied, or it be asserted that He governs without rule, or 
 by a bad one. But our own nature compels us to believe Him 
 just and good. The world, as it is, was made by Him. He 
 rules it, and has assigned us our lot in it. As reasonable be- 
 ings, capable of reflection, we can hardly avoid reflecting upon 
 our end and our place in the scheme of things to which we 
 belong. 
 
 In the second part of his "Analogy" — with which we 
 are less concerned — Butler treats of the importance of 
 Christianity, and the objections against it, as divinely re- 
 
MORAL AND TOSITIVE DUTIES. 75 
 
 vealed. Its importance is seen in the fact that it is a 
 republication of l^atural Keligion, that it is authoritative, 
 that God saw reasons for making it, that it teaches religion in 
 its purity, and that it brings life and immortality to light. It 
 moreover is attested by n«)iracles, while it makes known what 
 reason could never discover — not only the fact of our fallen 
 state, but the means of recovery. It lays down moral duties 
 as well as positive precepts, which are equally binding when 
 once admitted to be from God. 
 
 The manner in which Butler deals with the vexed question 
 of the relative obligation of moral and positive precepts must 
 be noted. " Moral duties arise out of the nature of the case 
 itself, prior to external command. Positive duties do not, but 
 from external command," nor would they be duties but for 
 the Divine command. Yet they (positive institutions) rest 
 either on natural or revealed religion, and the reason of them 
 in general is very obvious, although why the particular form 
 of them should be enjoined, may be obscure. So far as a rea- 
 son can be seen for them, they are not in contrast with what 
 is moral. But when two precepts — one moral and one posi- 
 tive — enjoined by the same anthority, are supposed to come in 
 conflict, so that only one can be obeyed, "it is indisputable 
 that our obligations are to obey the former, because there are 
 apparent reasons for this preference, and none against it." If, 
 as in Christianity, positive institutions are means to a moral 
 end, " the end must be acknowledged more excellent than the 
 means." Butler, however, does not consider the determina- 
 tion of the question so necessary as it appears to many, 
 although he contends that it has been determined in his own 
 sense, by revelation. 
 
 The presumptions against a miraculous revelation are next 
 considered. Against such a revelation we cannot reason from 
 analogy, so long as we lack the knowledge of facts in regard 
 to worlds similar to ours, on which an analogy may be based. 
 I*^or can we object to the mode in which it is communicated, 
 so long as the same objections might be urged against the 
 modes in which we obtain the knowledge that we need for 
 daily life and practice. The objections against different parts 
 or features of revelation, are in like manner disposed of by 
 
76 OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 
 
 arguments from analogy. The want of imiversalitj in its 
 promulgation, is shown to he paralleled by the various degrees 
 of knowledge enjoyed by the light of nature, in different lands 
 and in different ages. The seemingly incomplete evidence 
 on which it is given, may be considered as an element of pro- 
 bation, while the passions and prejudices of men may be pre- 
 sumed to blind them often to the force of the evidence which 
 actually exists. Miracles, which are in part evidence of the 
 divine origin of revelation, must be accepted on sufficient tes- 
 timony, and that testimony is summarily presented. The sub- 
 ject of prophecy is taken up, and the objections against it are 
 disposed of. The collateral evidences of Christianity are then 
 passed in review, and finally, as a conclusion to the whole 
 work, objections against the argument from analogy are con- 
 sidered. 
 
 One of these objections is, that what is wanted is to clear 
 natural as well as revealed religion of difficulties, and this 
 want is not met by showing that the same difficulties he 
 against both. Butler answers that this objection assumes on 
 our part the right to have God's entire scheme of providence 
 explained to us, but this right we cannot claim. In daily life 
 we have to act, not from a full knowledge of all facts or cir- 
 cumstances, but in the light of inference from such as we do 
 know. Probability is our guide. The physician, for instance, 
 must be guided by it, even when life is at stake. 
 
 It is objected, again, that " it is a strange way, indeed, of 
 convincing men of the obligations of religion, to show them 
 that they have as httle reason for their worldly pursuits." 
 But the rules of prudence are regarded as obligatory, not- 
 withstanding all difficulties and uncertainties in the latter 
 case ; and why should they not be regarded when religion is 
 a practical matter, and has to do with man's highest happiness ? 
 
 It may be said that objections against the Divine goodness 
 and justice are not removed by showing that they are just as 
 valid in the case of natural as revealed religion. Butler re- 
 plies, that all that is required is to show that the tilings 
 objected to are not necessarily inconsistent with the Divine 
 attributes, while the object of the argument from analogy is 
 not designed to solve all difficulties. 
 
btjtlee's "analogy." T7 
 
 That the argument from analogy may leave the mind in an 
 misettled state, Butler in part admits. But he contends that 
 the question is not whether the evidence of revelation is fully 
 satisfactory in itself, but whether it is sufficient to prove and 
 discipline that virtue which it presupposes to exist. 
 
 To assert that, after all, men will not forego present inter- 
 est and pleasure out of regard to religion on doubtful evidence, 
 is little to the purpose. The question is not how men will 
 act, but how they ought to act. The weight of the argument 
 from analogy will be felt by the believer as a confirmation of 
 his faith, while those who do not believe will be led to per- 
 ceive the absurdity of attempting to prove religion false. 
 
 Butler appended to his " Analogy " two Dissertations, one 
 on Personal Identity, the other on the Nature of Yirtue. 
 While criticising Locke's views of identity, he inclines to ac- 
 cept his definition, " the sameness of a rational being," and for 
 proof of identity appeals to consciousness. The second Dis- 
 sertation indicates how carefully Butler had considered and 
 digested the views of his predecessors. 
 
 IX. 
 
 MERITS KSTD, DEFECTS OF BTJTLEr's METHOD CONSIDERED. 
 
 The " Analogy " of Bishop Butler was adapted to the age 
 in which it was written. It was designed to meet objections 
 to revelation that were then current, and its author availed 
 himself of the advantages afforded him by the concessions of 
 his opponents. An acquaintance with the literature of the 
 time shows how extensively it must have moulded and modi- 
 fied the plan of his work. Although it betrays little of the 
 aspect of controversy, and seems to move in a sphere above it, 
 yet every reader familiar with the publications that preceded 
 it, can discern its scope as it respects them, and recognize the 
 opponents with whom its author is brought into conflict. Its 
 calmly earnest, almost judicious tone — the perfect silence 
 which it preserves as to the works it is designed to refute 
 
78 METHOD OF THE " AJSTALGGT." 
 
 — tlie utter absence of all personal allusions and all refer- 
 ence to contemporarj events — might lead one to suppose that 
 it embodied the speculations of a recluse thinker, little con- 
 cerned or involved in the intellectual or religious agitations of 
 his time. All these things add to its permanent value, or at 
 least relieve it of what might otherwise mar the unity of its 
 impression ; but they must not be so interpreted as to with- 
 draw the work from all relation to a great controversy, which, 
 in its vai-ying aspects, had been going forward for more than 
 half a century, and with which it was indeed directly and 
 closely connected. 
 
 The real value of the "Analogy" to us, however, is not to 
 be sought in its effectiveness — great as it was — in bringing 
 the questions in controversy to a direct and final issue. It 
 consists rather in the fact that it embodies an instructive and 
 able exposition of the moral system — ^in some of its most im- 
 portant aspects. It presents the leading facts of God's natural 
 government of the world, and traces, with great justness as 
 well as sagacity, their religious bearings. Without unduly 
 depreciating it, we may yet say that, if in some respects it has 
 gained, in others it has lost, by its relation to the controversies 
 of the age. Its argument is characterized by adaptations and 
 applications affecting its structure, growing out of the cir- 
 cumstances in which it was produced. 
 
 With the object that Butler had in view, it was a great 
 thing gained, if, before entering upon the body of his work, 
 he could have the doctrine of a future life conceded or estab- 
 lished. He would thus be enabled to present what follows in 
 a more convincing light. But the future life was, by most of 
 the party to which he stood opposed, freely admitted. Lord 
 Herbert has classed it among the five leading doctrines of his 
 faith, which, he contended, might be established by the light 
 of nature. Blount, Toland, Collins and Tindal, followed 
 generally, on this point, his line of thought. Butler naturally 
 felt that he had little more to do than to accept their admis- 
 sions, and hence contents himself with presenting merely what 
 may be termed the negative argument for the future life, 
 viz., the presum23tion that the soul will continue to exist, un- 
 less it can be shown that death terminates its conscious being. 
 
WHAT BUTLEE ASSUIVIES. 79 
 
 He thus tlirows tlie burden of proof on liis opponents, omit- 
 ting, of course, the positive argument for immortality derived 
 from tiie consideration of the moral system. 
 
 His method thus had its advantages, considered simply with 
 reference to the circumstances of the time. But it had its dis- 
 advantages also. His negative argument Was as conclusive for 
 the immortality of brutes as of men, and this he freely con- 
 ceded. But, in the changes which have taken place since 
 his day, the doctrine of a future life has been called in ques- 
 tion full as much as any other of the important points which 
 he sought to estabhsh. His argument, lacking the positive 
 element, which could not fitly be introduced, till the basis of 
 it in the moral system was established, tends to weaken the 
 impression of the work, while it fails to do justice to the 
 proof of immortality afforded by the light of natm^e. 
 
 The true method for constnicting a scheme of the moral 
 system is to begin with the positions not merely least dis- 
 puted, as in Butlei-'s case, but most easily and conclusively 
 established. Evidently the future hfe is not one of these. 
 The fact of a moral order of the world lies open to observa- 
 tion, and is constantly affirmed by human experience. This 
 fact, therefore, may be most easily verified by evidence, and, 
 when established, becomes a basis of argument to which we 
 may thenceforth confidently appeal. 
 
 Again, Butler assumes the existence of God. One of his 
 postulates, legitimately such with most minds, and freely con- 
 ceded by his opponents, is that of an Author of I^Tature, to 
 whose will and ordering the entire constitution of nature may 
 be referred. But here again modern scepticism calls in ques- 
 tion Butler's data. The existence of an intelligent Author of 
 IS'ature thus becomes one of the points to be proved. The 
 place for its introduction and proof is obviously after the veri- 
 fication of the fact that a moral order of the world exists — an 
 order which goes beyond the material creation, because fur- 
 nishing evidence, not only of the wisdom and power, but of 
 the goodness and justice of God, 
 
 Another feature of the " Analogy," viewed as containing 
 an exposition of the moral system, must be regarded as a de- 
 fect. It was not such to Butler or his contemporarieSj but it 
 
30 WHAT BUTLEK DID NOT ATTEMPT. 
 
 is to US. He culls out from human experience just tlte facts 
 that were needed to establish certain specific conclusions which 
 he sought to estabhsh, and, for the end he had in view, these 
 facts a-re sufficient and decisive. But when we examine his 
 work, apart from all controversial aspects and relations, that 
 were merely local o'r temporary, we find its value and signifi- 
 cance to be, in the fact, that it unfolds the scheme of God's 
 natural government over men. But there is a vast mass of 
 very material and important evidence bearing upon this, of 
 which Butler has made little use. He did not attempt — and 
 perhaps he was wise in not attempting — ^to take any general 
 survey of the broad sphere of man's relations to moral law 
 and retribution, as illustrated by actual experience. He has 
 not mapped out, or classified, the different departments of 
 evidence in proof or elucidation of a moral system, but has 
 contented himself with selecting from each what suited his pur- 
 pose. And yet it is obvious that if we are to apprehend or 
 appreciate the moral system as it is, we need to examine it on 
 all sides, and in all its relations, so far as human observation 
 or scrutiny can extend. We must not content ourselves with a 
 small, or even a large, number of isolated facts, gathered from 
 a limited sphere, however significant or important these facts 
 may be, in themselves considered. We must overlook no- 
 thing material, which is necessary to a large and satisfactory 
 induction. Our method should be as comprehensive and 
 scientific as that by which we assume to become masters of 
 the order and laws of the physical universe. Only thus can 
 we secure the most solid and reliable basis for our conclusions, 
 and be sure that we have not at some point misintei'preted 
 the isolated facts that have come before us, or that these 
 assumed facts do not clash with other imnoticed facts. 
 
 It is no discredit to Butler that he did not attempt this 
 difficult task. It might — ^for the ends he had in view — have 
 encumbered rather than helped his argument. Yet he has 
 gone so far, that we can only regret that he did not go far- 
 ther. Prof. Farrar, in speaking of the " Analogy," recognizes 
 its merit in this respect. " The real secret of its power, how- 
 ever, lies not merely m its force as an argument to refute 
 objections against revelation, but in its positive effect as a 
 
butler's merit. 81 
 
 philosophy, opening up a grand view of the divine govern- 
 ment, and giving an explanation of revealed doctrines, by 
 using analogy as the instrument for adjusting them into the 
 scheme of the universe. He seems himseK to have taken a 
 broad view of God's dealings in the moral world, analagous 
 to that which the recent physical discoveries of his time had 
 exhibited in the natural. In the same manner as Newton in 
 his '• Princijpia'' had, by an extension of terrestrial mechan- 
 ics, explained the movements of the celestial orbs, and united 
 under one grand generalization the facts of terrestrial and 
 celestial motion, so Butler aimed at exhibiting as instances of 
 one and the same set of moral laws, the moral government of 
 God, which is visible to natural reason, and the spiritual gov- 
 ernment, which is unveiled by revelation." 
 
 It is Butler's merit that he thus led the way in suggesting, 
 and largely in developing, the scheme of the system of moral 
 government established on earth. It is what no one before 
 him — Wollaston, perhaps, excepted — ^had done, or undertaken 
 to do so fully. Many bad obtained glimpses of it. Many 
 had noted isolated features of it. Heathen philosophers, like 
 Seneca and Plutarch, may have even been awed by its 
 grandeur. But their presentation of it is fragmentary. In 
 their most vivid intuitions — and the testimony of these is 
 valuable and weighty — they fail to obtain a comprehensive 
 view of the bearings and relations of the most familiar facts. 
 To some points they bear concurrent testimony. On others, 
 they hesitate or are silent. Even when they harmonize fully, 
 the fact that their views are so limited and circumscribed, 
 deprives them of that support which they might have re- 
 ceived from the presentation of collateral and kindred truths. 
 
 Indeed, to the proper presentation of any single feature 
 of the moral system, it is essential that it should be seen in 
 its connections. It is like one of many pillars of an edifice 
 that support one another. We may compare the established 
 fact of the existence of a moral system to the abutment of a 
 bridge, and each advanced truth growing out of it to succes- 
 sive piers connected by arches, and so connected that each 
 and all are strengthened by the connection. The fact that 
 vii'tue has some peculiar and manifest advantages, and vice 
 6 
 
82 MUTUAL SUPrORT OF DOCTRINES. 
 
 some peculiar disadvantages, harmonizes with the theory 
 of human probation, and supports it. Probation fits into 
 a scheme of partial earthly retribution, and at once explains 
 and confirms it. The immortality of the soul takes its fit- 
 ting place in a scheme which reconciles divine justice with 
 a scheme of things manifestly imperfect, if considered only 
 in its bearings and relations to the present life. But the 
 moral nature of man, by which he is held accountable for his 
 actions, and sits in judgment upon himself — while an indis- 
 j)utable fact — tends to confinn all those features of the moral 
 system to which it is exactly adjusted, thus contributing new 
 evidence and support to conclusions already established by 
 presumptive proof. 
 
 This is, indeed, a most important point. It is a matter in 
 which the proper and orderly statement of separate facts, each 
 probable in itself and harmonizing with all the others, be- 
 comes a chain of evidence, that draws after it a conclusion far 
 more probable than any single fact taken by itself alone. The 
 facts are like points supposed to be located in the circumfer- 
 ence of an undescribed circle, the mutual relation of which, 
 as well as their relation to a common centre, is seen the mo- 
 ment that the circle is described. That common centre is the 
 moral system, itself a comprehensive fact, and when its radius 
 reaches a mass of concentric facts, all alike related to it as 
 well as to each other, we feel that that centre is posited in a 
 probability, the force of which approaches to demonstration. 
 Then, as we gather up the testimony of consecutive ages, and 
 of different or distant nations, we seem to listen to the voice 
 of concurrent witnesses ; only these witnesses are probable 
 truths, mutually supporting each other, and cumulating their 
 testimony, till it becomes well-nigh irresistible. 
 
 Here, then, is at once the excellence and the defect of 
 Butler's " Analogy," considered not as a work of contro- 
 versy, but as an exposition of the moral system — excellence, 
 in that it went so far ; defect, in that it did not go farther 
 — in that it did not marshal and classify facts over a field so 
 broad and rich as that it traversed ; that it did not exhibit 
 them more distinctly in their mutual relations ; that it did 
 not make each point established more directly and effectively 
 
THE FIELD TO BE STUDIED. ' 83 
 
 tributary to the support of otlier points ; and, incidental to all 
 this, that an arrangement of topics was adopted which, how- 
 ever legitimate and fitting, or even necessary at the time, can 
 be no longer followed, if we would advance from the simpler 
 to the more complex, from the most easily established, to that 
 which requires for its proof the elucidation and eviction of 
 antecedent propositions, 
 
 Butler is not to be criticised, or rather blamed, for not hav- 
 ing constructed an argument adapted more precisely to our 
 times. He is rather to be praised and appreciated for having 
 met the necessities of his own time so well, and none can rob 
 him of the merit of having embodied in his analogy the grand 
 conception and the leading outlines of that moral system, of 
 which many before him had obtained inspuing glimpses, but 
 the comprehensive features of which none had ever so clearly 
 grasped, or so distinctly and powerfully portrayed. 
 
 But what Butler, from the very circumstances of his posi- 
 tion, failed to do, remains to be done. It is a task for which 
 another Butler is needed.. But far less than the task of at- 
 tempting it, is that of indicating what must be its method, 
 and what is necessary to its successful achievement. One 
 prerequisite, which is all-essential, is so to map out the field of 
 investigation, that we can be sure of going over it with some- 
 thing like an exhaustive thoroughness, and may thus bo 
 enabled both to see how the several portions of it harmonize 
 in the testimony they afford, and know how to dispose of and 
 classify new facts as they come under our observation. 
 
 Note. — A brief concluding note v/ill allow no more than the mention of a few lead- 
 ing writers who, subsequent to Butler, have discussed the same class of topics 
 which he handled. Dugald Stuai-t, in his Dissertation on the Progress of Meta- 
 phj'sical, Ethical and Political Philosophy ; Sir James Mackintosh, in his Disserta- 
 tion on the Progress of Ethical Philosophy, andWhewell in his History of Moral 
 Philosophy, have gone over portions of the iield. Lcland's " Deistical Writers" may 
 also be prolitably consulted. The works most worthy of note are, Ellis' Knowl- 
 edge of Divine Things (1743) ; Warburton's Divine Legation ; Hume's Essays ; 
 Tillard's Future Rewards and Punishments believed by tlie Ancients ; Abernetliy's 
 Discourses (1743) ; Benson's Ecasonableness of the Christian Religion ; Baxter's 
 Inquiry into the Nature of the Human Soul ; Ramsay's Philosophical Principles 
 (1748) ; Grove's Moral Philosophy ; Lord Kames' Essay on the Principles of 
 Morality and Natural Religion ; Bolingbroke's Worlds ; Bishop Law's Works ; 
 Lucas' Enquiry; Price's Review, etc. (175S) ; Adam Smith's Theory of the Moral 
 Sentiments ; Dr. G. Campbell's Dissertation (1762) ; Tiicker's Light of Nature ; 
 Dr. Thomas Eeid's Inquiry ; Price's Dissertations ; Dr. Seattle's Essaj' ; Riccal- 
 toun's Works ; Priestley and Price on Materialism, etc. ; Paley's Moral Philoso- 
 phy (1785) ; President Edwards on the Nature of Virtue, etc. ; Belsham's Philoso- 
 
84 NOTE. 
 
 phy (1801); Stuart's Outlines of Moral Philosophy (1801, etc.) ; Samuel Drew on the 
 Immortality of the Soul, etc. ; Dr. Thomas Brown's Writings ; Grinfield's Connec- 
 tion of Natural and Revealed Theology (1818) ; fley's Lectures (1822) ; Bentham's 
 Utilitarian Writings; Bishop Hampden's Philosophical Evidences, etc. (1827), 
 and Lectures on the Study of Moral Philosophy (1835) ; Dr. Chalmers' Natural 
 Theology, etc. ; The Natural Theology of Paley, as also that of Fergus, and also 
 of Burnett; the Bridgewater Treatises, on the Power, Wisdom, and Goodness of 
 God, by Chalmers, Kidd, Prout, Bell, Kirby, Whewell, Buckland, and Roget ; 
 Blakey's History of Moral Science (1833); Dick's Christian Philosopher ; Mira- 
 baud's Nature and her Laws ; Posse's Christian Revelation and its Truths ; 
 Parkinson's Rationalism and Revelation ; Gilderdale's Essay on Natural Religion 
 and Revelation (1837) ; Dewey's Moral View of Commerce ; also his Lowell Lec- 
 tures and Discourses on Human Nature ; Brougham's Discourse of Natural The- 
 ology, etc. (1835) ; Notes on Paley's Theology, by Brougham and Sir Charles 
 Bell ; also Brougham's Dissertations on Subjects of Science connected with Nat 
 ural Theology (1839) ; Waj'land's Moral Science ; Cardinal Wiseman's Lectures 
 (1836); some of theWritings of Isaac Taylor; Babbage's Ninth Brldgewater Treatise; 
 Gillespie's a priori Argument (1843) ; Theodore "Parker's Writings ; Allin's Dis- 
 courses on Atlieism ; Godwin on Atheism ; some of the Writings of Robert Owen, 
 James Mill, John Stuart Mill, and Herbert Spencer ; Morell's Philosophy of Re- 
 ligion ; Whewell's Elements of Morals ; Dr. McCosh on the Divine Government 
 (1850) ; also his Typical Forms and Special Ends in Creation (1856), of which it is 
 ]-cmarked by AUibone, that it should be perused after reading Butler's Analogy, 
 and with the works of Currier and Owen ; Chalmers' Prelections on Butler's Anal- 
 ogy (1849) ; Burnett's Philosophy of Spirit in Relation to Matter; Humphry's 
 Hulsean Lectures on the Doctrine of a Future State ; Henry Rogers' Essays, etc. 
 (1850) ; Kerns' Moral Government of God Elucidated and Enforced ; Fourier's 
 Passions of the Human Soul ; George Taylor's Indications of a Creator (1551) ; 
 Miall's Bases of Belief (1853); Sir William Hamilton's Works, Mansel's Lectures, 
 etc.; Calderwood's Philosophy of the Infinite, and his work on Moral Philosophy ; 
 Tulloch's Theism (1855); Ferrier's Institutes ; Tagarton Locke's Philosophy, etc. ; 
 Walker's Philosophy of the Plan of Salvation ; also his Philosophy of Scepticism ; 
 Farrar's History of Free Thought ; W. A. Butler's Ancient Philosophy ; J. 
 Young's Province of Reason ; Evil not of God, etc. ; Lewes' Biographical His- 
 tory of Philosophy ; Bledsoe's Theodicy ; Lecky's History of Rationalism ; 
 Maurice's History of Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy ; Hagenbach's History 
 of Rationalism ; Bain's Mental and Moral Science ; The Duke of Argyle's Reign of 
 Law ; Gladstone's Juventus Mundi ; Gould's Origin of Religious Belief ; Lecky's 
 History of European Morals ; President Porter's Supplement to Ueberweg^s His- 
 tory of Philosophy ; and numerous others of recent date. 
 
 A work well worthy of special notice is Gabell's " Accordance of Religion with 
 Nature," in which he confesses his indebtedness to Berkeley, Tucker, Reid, 
 Stewart, Brown, and others, and presents verj^ clearly and forcibly some points 
 passed over by Butler. Napier's Lectures on Butler reproduce the substance of 
 Butler's argument, with appropriate comments, and were prepared in view of 
 Gabell's suggestions. In a great varietj' of theological works will be found com- 
 ments on Butler, and among the Quarterly Reviews which contain articles on the 
 Analogy, may be mentioned the Am. Bib. Repository, X. 317; Quar. Rev., LXIV. 
 183 ; Chris. Spec, II. 604 (reproduced by the author, Albert Barnes, in his Introduc- 
 tion to Butler's Analogy) ; Meth. Quar. Rev., I. 556 ; III. 128 ; XI. 247 ; Christian 
 Review, IX. 199 ; and recently the Contemporary Review. 
 _ Of writers on the continent of Europe, after the leading German philosophers, 
 since Kant, who need not be mentioned, we have space onlj'to specify Helvetius, 
 Cordillac, Diderot, Burigny, d'Holbach, Voltaire, Vico, Lessing (Wolfen-Buttel 
 Fragments, 1774-'7) ; Spalding, Bahrdt, Reinhard, Herder, Bouterweck, Oken, 
 Schleiermacher, Jacobi, Fichte, Eberhard, Ritter, Bunsen, Wuttke, Rothe, Comte, 
 Jouffray, Constant, Cousin, Feuerbach, NavUle, Vinet, Buchner, and Strauss. 
 This list might be almost indefinitely extended. Indeed, the works which have 
 appeared from the pens of French and German, as well as English writers, during 
 the last twenty years, on topics identical or kindred with those handled by Butler, 
 Avould constitute of themselves an extended bibliography. They indicate a deep- 
 er as well as more general interest than has heretofore prevailed on questions per- 
 taining to the Moral System, and its connection with Revealed Religion. 
 
THE MORAL SYSTEM. 
 
 I. 
 
 ITS SCIENTIFIC CLAIMS AND RELATIVE IMPORTANCE. 
 
 Science is the orderly classification of ascertained facts in 
 the distinct department of knowledge with which it is con- 
 cerned. Of that department it aims to set forth the natm-e, 
 constitution, principles, or laws bj which it is characterized 
 or governed. There are, therefore, as many possible sciences 
 as there are distinct departments of knowledge, the facts of 
 which can be classified, or the laws of which can be ascer- 
 tained. 
 
 1. Among these sciences, that of the Moral System — which 
 treats of the constitution and laws of that moral order of the 
 "imiverse to which man is subject — holds in some respects the 
 highest position. Its vast extent is seen in the fact that all 
 other sciences, through- their relation to man, are tributary to 
 it. Its paramount importance is manifest when we consider 
 that man, his obligations, the conditions of his highest well- 
 being, the rewards or penalties of his conduct, and, in a word, 
 all that he has most reason to hope or fear, are among the sub- 
 jects of which it treats. 
 
 If, in the sphere of universal knowledge, the several sci- 
 ences may be compared to the radii of a circle, the Moral 
 System is the centre in which they all meet. To this alone 
 do they all sustain a common relation, and in this alone do 
 they find their true unity. Each science is important in pro- 
 portion as it relates to man and to human interests, and that 
 is most important which has to do most directly with man 
 highest — that is, his moral and spiritual interests. 
 
 2. All the sciences testify to the supreme place which man 
 holds among all the objects with which they deal. By him, 
 and for him, they may be said to exist. They lay all their 
 
 (85) 
 
86 SUBOEDINATION IlS: NATURE. 
 
 treasures at his feet. Tliej attract his attention ; they invite 
 his study ; they expand liis powers ; they develop his capac- 
 ity ; they increase, and even multiply his resources, and they 
 minister to his comforts. Without him, if they could exist, 
 they would exist in vain, while they enable him to apprehend 
 that infinite art which has so constituted his being and sur- 
 roundings, that universal nature acknowledges his superiority, 
 and waits for him to become its interpreter. The science, 
 therefore, which expounds the laws and constitution of the 
 moral order of things to which man is subject, justly takes 
 precedence in its claims upon our attention above all that deal 
 directly only with fragmentary portions of the universe, and 
 indirectly with man. 
 
 3. But there is a manifest subordination established in na- 
 ture which asserts the natural supremacy of reason ; by means 
 of which human energy is ever, more and more, extending 
 its dominion over material objects. Inorganic ministers to 
 organic ; vegetable to animal ; animal to intellectual and 
 moral. All point upward to man, and they do so from 
 original constitution, and with evident design. Man alone 
 can appreciate Nature's beauties, grandeurs, harmonies. He 
 alone is able to press her forces into his service. For his 
 eye, the universe is pictured over with emblems, rife in 
 analogies, rich in suggestions. For him, its objects, with their 
 hints, lessons, impulses to thought and action, render a mani- 
 fold service. The flower has its beauty and its fragrance, but 
 the botanist, the poet, and the moralist, find each their uses 
 for it. ^Nature is full of types and symbols, and forms for 
 expressing and illustrating human thought. Material things 
 give forth — their richest tribute — spiritual meanings, till lan- 
 guage itseK, in which they are gathered up, becomes the 
 almost exhaustless store-house which thought and feeling lay 
 under contribution, thus exercising that natural sovereignty 
 with which they are invested. 
 
 4. In the constitution of man's own being, there is a kin- 
 dred subordination. His physical structm-e is marvelous as a 
 material organism. Treatises have been written on separate 
 portions or organs of it, and have left its wonders still unex- 
 hausted. But what is it without " the ruling mind ? " And 
 
THE MOBAL SPHERE. 8Y 
 
 yet the mind — mere intellect — may leave its possessor des- 
 picable. Man's greatness culminates in his moral nature. 
 Without this, or with it perverted, he forfeits all respect, 
 and gravitates ever downward to deeper debasement. Only 
 when his moral nature is properly and symmetrically devel- 
 oped, and he conforms to that moral standard which is con- 
 sistent with social purity and justice, are the gifts of nature, 
 the conquests of science, or the attainments of art of any 
 avail, except to illustrate his degradation and his misery. 
 
 The great question, therefore, for him is — to what moral 
 conditions is he subject ? It becomes him above all to inquire 
 whether there is a moral system ; whether, in the established 
 order of the universe, there are fixed and ascertainable laws 
 of conduct, upon which his well-being depends ; and if there 
 are such laws, what are the rewards and penalties that are 
 affixed to them, and what light do all these throw upon the 
 design of the Great Author of the constitution of nature, 
 with respect to man's duty and destiny. 
 
 5. That there is a moral sphere, in which man lives, and 
 moves, and has his being, is as obvious as that there is a ma- 
 terial sphere. The man that professes to believe that he is 
 nothing more than animated or reasoning matter, is moved 
 and controlled, attracted or repelled, blessed or cursed, by 
 the abstractions of his own thought. He lives to a great 
 extent in an ideal world. The great practical questions of 
 life, ever meeting him, concern his emotional and moral na- 
 ture. He cannot confront them without considering moral 
 truths and moral obligation. He cannot make physical com- 
 fort and real enjoyment always synonymous. Something 
 more is wanted than the indulgence of physical appetites and 
 intellectual tastes. It is the moral element of character. 
 
 6. Moreover, the miseries of the world do not spring mainly 
 from material incongruities or physical defects. They origi- 
 nate in the violation of moral obligation. The conditions of 
 human well-being, even for the present state, are mainly 
 moral ; and so long as the possibility of a future existence 
 cannot be denied, the sins and crimes of the present must 
 cast dark shadows of foreboding over all that may be yet to 
 come. Of all sciences, therefore, moral science occupies the 
 
88 SOUECES OF KNOWLEDGE. 
 
 most commanding position, and the moral constitution of 
 the world is of infinitely vaster and deeper interest than its 
 physical. 
 
 7. But, apart from revelation, what resources for the inves- 
 tigation of the laws and constitution of this system, are within 
 our reach ? We have the facts of human experience, as well 
 as those of the constitution of human nature. The relation 
 between thoughts, emotions, actions and courses of action, and 
 their consequences, opens to us a broad and almost exhaust- 
 less field. The conditions of human existence which necessi- 
 tate trial, disciphne, and the development of character, may be 
 studied. The social nature of man, as illustrated by domes- 
 tic and civil government operating to check willfulness and 
 passion ; indeed, the entire constitution of hmnan nature, 
 physical, mental and moral, will reward a diligent search. We 
 have thus ample materials within our reach, and in the broad 
 sphere of analogy, we have suggestions as to their inter- 
 pretation. The moral, throughout the human sphere, is 
 inseparably connected with the physical. Their mutual 
 adjustments and harmonies, or correspondencies, show that 
 they have the same author. The analogies between them are 
 numberless, and it is by the use of reason in the sphere of 
 analogy, that we must endeavor to apprehend and interpret 
 the laws and constitution of the Moral System. 
 
 II. 
 
 THE COMPLEX ELEMENTS OF MAN's NATUKE IN THEIE MUTUAL 
 
 EELATIONS. 
 
 The facts, known or accessible, which serve to illustrate the 
 laws and constitution of the moral system, are so numerous 
 and varied, that, to obtain anything like a comprehensive 
 view of them, we must adopt some method of classification. 
 "Without this, their very multitude may sometimes serve to 
 
CLASSIFICATION. 89 
 
 confuse rather than convince, while we are in danger also of 
 omitting some of the most important. 
 
 Perhaps the simplest and yet broadest classification may he 
 found in considering man's complex nature in its relations, 
 1. to its own elements; 2. to the material universe and its 
 laws ; 3. to society in its various forms and organizations ; 
 while, 4. the moral constitution of man may be reserved for 
 separate consideration. We shall thus, at least, have the 
 broad field of our investigation mapped out before us, while 
 the facts that come under our notice will take their proper 
 place in the comprehensive scheme to which they belong. 
 We commence, then, with an examination of the relations of 
 man's complex nature to the elements which constitute it. 
 
 Man has a physical, mental or intellectual, and emotional 
 or moral nature. These are combined to constitute the in- 
 dividual. Excess or defect of any one part or element, with 
 respect to the others, disturbs the order and mars the sym- 
 metry of the whole. This fact is significantly intimated in 
 the familiar phrase — " a sound mind in a sound body." In 
 any case, excess or defect brings a kind of retribution with it. 
 
 1. Whatever limits the normal control of the mind over 
 the body ; whatever renders the latter an ineffective or imper- 
 fect instrument of the fomier; whatever detracts from its 
 healthful activity, or makes it act with a spasmodic and inter- 
 mittent energy — disturbs that equilibrium of the entire com- 
 posite nature on which healthful enjoyment or happiness de- 
 pends. Yet we know that the ultimate, and sometimes direct 
 effect of vicious indulgence, is to disturb that equilibrium, 
 sometimes transiently, but sometimes permanently. Excess 
 of passion or passionate emotion produces deleterious effects 
 upon the frame, ranging from temporary disability to perma- 
 nent paralysis. Such excess results from the violation of the 
 laws which virtue prescribes, and morality sanctions. It rarely, 
 if ever, takes place except when there is a manifest moral 
 transgression, or sin that challenges its penalty. 
 
 This penalty, in some cases, is so manifestly such, that its 
 retributive character admits of no dispute. Men have been 
 rendered speechless, or even powerless, by the violence of 
 their passion. The limbs, trembling or paralyzed, have ro 
 
90 HUMAN I^TATUEE. MUTUAL EEL,ATIO]SrS. 
 
 fused to perform their office. Deatli even, lias sometimes 
 been the effect of frenzy. The body could no longer bear 
 the intense strain to wbicb it was subjected, and it may be 
 said to have fallen a victim to tlie intemperate passions of the 
 soul. 
 
 There are cases, also, where the retribution comes in the 
 form of physical disease. A morbid state of the physical 
 system is induced by the intensity of the desires, by the rest- 
 lessness of passions that rebel against reason ; and in nervous 
 prostration or exhaustion, in feverish excitement, in restless- 
 ness or depression, the foundation is laid for diseases that may 
 inflict months or years of torture, and, in the end, prove 
 fatal. 
 
 2. The action of the passions or of the emotional nature 
 upon the intellect, or even the entire mental constitution, is 
 next to be considered. A grievance, real, or imaginary, is 
 brooded over ; an object of desire absorbs the thoughts ; a 
 secret grief is indulged beyond the bounds of reason, or there 
 is some other violation of the normal limits of the affections. 
 It may be that avarice, ambition, anger, love or jealousy, is 
 allowed to gain almost exclusive possession of the soul. Here- 
 by, the intellect, or the entire mental constitution, is variously 
 affected. Sometimes its normal action is distm'bed ; or its 
 powers are dwarfed, or act only with an intermittent energy. 
 This may prepare the way for still more disastrous results. 
 Insanity, in some of its countless phases and degrees, may be . 
 one of these. The lunatic — criminal by no civil statute — ^has 
 violated a law of his mental constitution, and, in his pitiable 
 condition, is a victim of the retribution which he has himseK 
 challenged. The rule of reason has been violated, and the 
 penalty of sin comes in the shape of the dethronement of 
 reason itself. It is an awful penalty, the more impressive 
 that it comes without the interposition of any visible or pal- 
 pable instrumentality. 
 
 But it is only in extreme and exceptional eases that such a 
 result is witnessed. An excess of anger — though tenned a 
 short insanity — may disturb the intellect only temporarily. 
 And yet, during the brief period that it prevails, it may bhnd 
 the reason ; it may suppress the voice of prudence and reflec- 
 
EFFECTS OF SENSUAL INDTJLGENCE. 91 
 
 tion, and tlius allow a man to be pushed on to acts of folly^ 
 or, perhaps, of crime. For the time being, the man is brutal- 
 ized. He is intellectually and morally degraded. Dming 
 this period of suspended r.eason, he is left free to commit 
 those acts which will become the torture of his future years, 
 or which may possibly throw their dark shadow over all his 
 prospects. 
 
 And what is true of the e:Sects of anger may be true, to a 
 modified extent, in the case of other passions. As they gain 
 the ascendancy, they rule the whole man, degrading, if not 
 deposing, reason, and violating that sense of right — ^hereafter 
 to be noted — which is one of the most sacred trusts of the 
 human soul. The retribution which they invite is S"wift and 
 sure. There is no escape from it. The sin is, in fact, its own 
 punishment ; it becomes habitual, and dominates the whole 
 nature ; it transforms that nature, and makes of it an intel- 
 lectual and moral deformity. 
 
 3. If we turn now to consider the action of the body and 
 its appetites upon the intellectual and emotional nature, we 
 shall find that physical indulgence, or excess, beyond the 
 bounds assigned by reason and conscience, has its legitimate 
 and inevitable penalty. The physical appetites demand satis- 
 faction, yet there is a limit which must not be transgressed. 
 It is fixed by the constitution of the body, and must be dis- 
 covered by reason. To pass it, as in the case of gluttony, in- 
 temperance, lust, or any sensual appetite, tends to stupefy the 
 intellect, and blunt the moral sense. Its brutalizing effect is 
 sometimes seen in forms so odious as to excite disgust, indig- 
 nant rebuke, or contempt. Manhood is perverted, or even 
 temporarily extinguished. A debased nature emits mere 
 sparks of intelligence, loses all sense of propriety, disregards 
 consequences, is lost to all sense of its ov/n shame, and be- 
 comes a satire on humanity itseK. Every better hope is 
 crushed; every higher aspiration is quenched; and the victim 
 of appetite acquiesces in a degradation, which, once contem- 
 plated, would have filled him with shuddering horror. 
 
 4. But the moral nature is even a more pitiable victim 
 than the intellect. Sensibility to moral distinctions is sadly 
 weakened, if not quite destroyed. "What remains of intellect 
 
92 EEWAED OF VIRTUE. 
 
 is sharpened into activity to prolong an indulgence that has 
 become habitual. The victim may even glory in his own 
 shame. He may exult in his triumph over seK-respect. He 
 recognizes no law but his own appetites and lusts. The 
 exhibition that he makes of himself is but a shameless parade 
 of what all others must regard as a terrible retribution. 
 
 5. But the reward of virtue is seen in the effect upon the 
 intellect and the moral nature, when appetite is kept in check, 
 and the lusts of sense are regulated by sound discretion and 
 subjected to moral restraint. Then the intellect is clear and 
 unclouded. It can put forth its unimpaired and entire 
 energies. It is best prepared to grapple with every problem 
 and every difficulty that comes in its way. The moral nature 
 also asserts its vigor. It is unbiased by sensualism. It discerns 
 clearly what duty is, and is prepared to embrace it. As 
 appetite grows weaker by habitual subjection, virtuous habits 
 grow stronger. The very aspect of a soul, unswerving in its 
 allegiance to its moral convictions, is equivalent to a demon- 
 stration of the superior nature and the rewards of virtue. 
 
 6. It remains, under this branch of our subject, only to 
 consider the relation of the intellect to the physical con- 
 stitution and the emotional nature. The cultivation of the 
 intellect may not be equivalent to a virtue, but the neglect of 
 it, at least, is immoral. We feel instinctively that its demand 
 for knowledge and culture should be gratified, and to deny 
 this demand is a kind of homicide ; it is quenching the very 
 life of reason itself. Looked upon in this light, it is nothing 
 short of a crime, and a crime that invites and insures its 
 retribution. This retribution is seen, not only in the degrada- 
 tion and dwarfing of the intellect, but in the legitimate or 
 natural result of this ; the denying the body that care and 
 provision which only the thoughtful and well-fm-nished 
 intellect will make. There is a criminal ignorance, and with 
 ignorance, indifference as to what actually constitutes physical 
 well-being. There is an ignorance of the laws of health and 
 the means of proper physical development. There is, con- 
 sequently, a constant exposure to conditions that produce 
 discomfort, disease, feebleness, and premature decay. Tens 
 of thousands in pur large cities suffer as the victims of 
 
PENALTIES OF IGNORANCE. 93 
 
 ignorance and the lack of intellectual culture ; and that 
 suffering cramps their energies, affects their health, and per- 
 manently injures their physical development. They are the 
 victims of violated law. They are enduring a penalty whose 
 infliction proclaims the certainty and severity of the retribu- 
 tion they have provoked. 
 
 7. That the moral or emotional nature should sympathize 
 in such suffering, is inevitable. It is dragged downward, 
 and degraded by its physical sm-roundings. But, apart from 
 these, it suffers by evil that is done the intellect in denying 
 it due culture. Those relations, from the study of which the 
 sense of duty is quickened, are feebly and inadequately rep- 
 resented. Superior intellectual discernment may not, indeed, 
 be essential to high moral excellence, but moral excellence is 
 prejudiced by the feebleness of intellectual perception. All 
 other things being equal, increased intellectual culture will 
 help forward moral development, and this development may 
 thus become, in a measure, the reward of a virtuous regard 
 for the claims of intellectual culture. 
 
 III. 
 
 man's relations, physical, intellectual, and moral, to 
 the external world. 
 
 Having noted briefly those facts which are brought out in 
 the study of the mutual relation of the elements of man's 
 complex nature, our next step is to consider the relations of 
 this nature to its physical conditions. Here a threefold 
 classification may be made, and we may inquire how man 
 stands related, physically, intellectually, and morally, to the 
 material universe. Taking first into view man's physical 
 nature, its most prominent relations to the external world are 
 those of adaptation and antagonism. The latter is the first to 
 be apprehended, and that through which individuality is de- 
 fined and developed. 
 
 1. Matter uniformly offers resistance to physical effort. It 
 
94 THE MATERIAL WORLD AND MAN". 
 
 sets limits to human strength as well as will. The child 
 strikes his foot against a stone, and finding how futile it is to 
 discharge his resentment against it, is forced to submit to the 
 conditions of prudence and precaution. His powers are 
 limited, and he must confess it to himself. He cannot grasp 
 the stars, though he may crj for them. His turbulent will, 
 unchecked by domestic discipline, finds a barrier in the 
 material creation that it cannot break over. It cannot snatch 
 and appropriate at its caprice. It is subjected to a relentless 
 and rigid discipline that limits its will, and sternly demands 
 submission. There is no room for teasing or importunity 
 here. ITature's solemn silence gives back no echo to the 
 petulant cry. Here, therefore, at the outset, in the collision 
 of will with physical obstacles, we have a moral discipline 
 that no one can escape. 
 
 2. But we must go a step further. If nature blocks our 
 way with countless absolute impossibihties, there are points 
 where she yields to sagacity, labor, and art. On certain con- 
 ditions she will surrender her treasures, but these conditions 
 must be complied with. Here, the intellect — instead of the 
 body conjoined with the will — comes into collision with the 
 external world. We find ourselves subjected to the necessity 
 of solving the problem — how may we extort from nature 
 the materials and provisions necessary to our comfortable 
 subsistence ? The problem must be solved. The intellect 
 must gi-apple with it. Thus it is forced to study nature and 
 her laws. It is put under an involuntary and inevitable 
 tuition. Under the penalty of starvation and suifering, it 
 must explore and discover, and store up facts, and deduce 
 laws, and then consider how, with skill and toil, advantage 
 may be taken of those laws. Here, therefore, the broad field 
 of natural science is thrown open as a book to be studied. In 
 the study, an order and system are discovered, so surprising, 
 that even the undevout are sometimes constrained to admire 
 it as divine. There is a regularity and uniformity, a breadth 
 and vastness, a " reign of law," so magnificent that the mind 
 contemplates it with awe, and is familiarized with the great 
 idea of an universal dominion, that embraces in its immense 
 sweep, worlds and atoms, worms and men. The apprehension! 
 
THE MATERIAL WORLD AND THE mTELLECT. 95 
 
 may be simply intellectual, but the impression is moral, and 
 tbe grand practical lesson is emphasized by the entire order 
 of nature — that man cannot be exempt from subjection to uni- 
 versal law. He cannot be an anomaly in the universal system. 
 
 3. Meanwhile the intellect is expanded and developed by 
 the task imposed upon it. Eorced to grapple with difficulties, 
 to toil for the knowledge that more than repays the toil, it is 
 disciplined to thought ; it is educated to enlarge the grasp of 
 its comprehension ; it is better prepared to study profounder 
 problems — if such there be — than it has been confronted with 
 hitherto. ISTor is this all. Taste is educated and refined. 
 !N^ature — with its beauties, its grandeurs, its sublime order, its 
 silent eloquence of universal law, its varied music, swelling 
 from the insect's hum to the thunder's peal — is making im- 
 pressions, or putting forth efforts, as it were, at impression, 
 wliich tend to elevate the soul and emancipate it from abject 
 serfdom to sense and passion. In all this, there is something, 
 if not directly moral, at least kindred to moral training, and 
 harmonizing grandly with a scheme that makes man the 
 subject of moral training and discipline. 
 
 4. But while the intellect has performed a portion of its 
 task in mastering certain obvious facts, the structure and 
 laws of the physical universe — not the least important matter 
 in studying the relation of our complex nature to that uni- 
 verse — still remains to be considered. We must use our 
 knowledge. We must avail ourselves of our acquaintance 
 with the laws that have been discovered. We have found 
 that the seed will produce a harvest " after its kind," under 
 certain conditions. We must master those conditions and 
 sow the seed. We have found out the veins of metal in the 
 rock or the mine, and that art is necessary to extract them. 
 We must apply the art. We have discovered the nature of 
 materials, and the uses to which they can be put to construct 
 a ship or a dwelling, and it remains for us to procure and 
 shape and apply the materials. 
 
 5. Here is a call to industry, a summons to break away 
 from idleness and idle habits and the vices they engender, and 
 apply om' energies in spheres of utility and public beneficence. 
 It is in industry, in honest toil, honest workmanship, mutual 
 
9G OEDEE OF THE PHYSIC Ai TJNIVEESE. 
 
 help, grappling in a hand-to-hand conflict to make nature 
 pliant to our will, that character is formed, energy is 
 developed, and the soul, rich in the exercise of disciplined 
 powers, is fitted to become the seed-plot for all moral excel- 
 lence. We should not need to search far in history to find 
 that it has not been under the most genial skies, or on the 
 most luxuriant and fertile soil, but oftentimes where climate 
 was bleak and soil rugged, that the noblest specimens of 
 manhood have been produced. ITot in the lap of ease has 
 the highest virtue been nurtured. Oftenest has it been 
 found in the frame of those kindred qualities that have been 
 schooled in hardship and perfected by endurance. Thus the 
 physical world, meeting men with the sharp admonition — toil 
 or starve — ^has become a stern but beneficent teacher of excel- 
 lences of character, that, if not virtue itseK, are yet akin to it 
 — its natural allies and supports. 
 
 6. The fixed order of the material universe, also, disciphnes 
 man to the habitual recognition of law, and in that recognition 
 there is a moral element. The sun rises and sets with such 
 uniform regularity as to measure out and allot to man his 
 seasons of toil and rest. The regular revolution of the 
 seas(ps, bringing about spring and autumn, seed-time and 
 harvest, imposes upon man the necessity of acting seasonably, 
 and with forethought ; teaching him to observe times and 
 seasons, and avail himself of fit opportunities of effort. 
 Thus he is, as it were, compelled to something like regularity 
 in his habits ; his activities must conform to the conditions 
 imposed by fixed laws, and he must take into account such 
 revolutions of the seasons, of day and night, summer and 
 winter, as his experience soon teaches him to expect. The 
 importance of all this, as an element of moral training, will 
 be seen, if we consider what the effect would be of a suspen- 
 sion of this established order of the material world. Yirtue 
 would scarcely subsist in a state of things where all regular 
 activity, all uniformity of life, all necessity or even possibility 
 of wise and calculating forethought, was suspended. 
 
 II. — 1. But in the relations of man to the external world, 
 those of mutual adaptation must not be overlooked. Some 
 of these have been glanced at already in considering those 
 
ADAPTATIONS OF MATTER TO MES'D. 97 
 
 aspects of the apparent antagonism into whicli man is brought 
 with nature. There are others, however, in wliich an element 
 of moral discipline is involved. 
 
 2. The physical world addresses itseK to the senses, the 
 tastes, the susceptibilities of men, inviting them, as it were, 
 to enjoyment and activity. It calls forth and stimulates the 
 powers both of mind and body, and ministers to their satis- 
 faction. There is beauty for the eye, music for the ear, 
 fragrance for the smell ; there are prizes for invention, 
 rewards for industry, premiums on forethought. Here are 
 countless incentives to healthful activity, the activity that 
 best consists with virtue, and only unnaturally can be made 
 to consist with vice. There are problems of art and mysteries 
 of science, awaiting a solution, and calculated to elevate the 
 thoughts and auns of men from every low, groveling, or 
 sensual sphere. The withdrawal of all these would indis- 
 putably be morally disastrous. Social energy would stagnate 
 or prey upon itself. Yice would have an almost undisputed 
 and vacant field, abandoned to it without a rival. 
 
 3. But the relation of the body specifically to the external 
 world, needs to be noted. That relation, through mutual 
 adaptation, is such that physical comfort, or health and vigor, 
 are made to depend on conformity to physical la^^s. A 
 vitiated atmosphere is poisonous, and must be avoided. 
 Extremes of cold and heat, through sudden exposure, 
 generate disease. There is an almost infinite variety of 
 substances, from the simplest fruits of the earth to the most 
 elaborate mixtures of art, which addi'ess themselves to the 
 bodily appetite, but which must be partaken of seasonably 
 and in moderation. There are fixed laws, limiting in- 
 dulgence, and although physical rather than moral laws, 
 the heedless transgression of them is a moral offense, and 
 incurs inevitable penalty. Here, therefore, man is sub- 
 jected to a moral tuition. He is placed under restraint. 
 He is put under bonds, as it were, thoughtfully to maintain 
 the correspondence between the exercise of his appetites and 
 the laws and nature of material things. His whole life must 
 of necessity become a continuous adjustment, an habitual 
 recognition of the relations in which he stands to the material 
 
 7 
 
98 SOCIAL OKG^VNIZATIOlSr. 
 
 world and its laws. He must respect the laws of gravitation, 
 at the risk of fractured limbs. He mnst respect the laws of 
 healthful respiration and activity, under the penalty of severe 
 suffering, or perhaps fatal disease. He must put limits on 
 the exercise of his powers, on the indulgence of his appetites, 
 on the sequence or intensity of effort with which he pursues 
 chosen objects ; continually bridling his impulses, continually 
 providing for emergencies, studiously taking advantage of the 
 forces of nature, and by forethought converting them into 
 his allies ; and in aE this he is subjected to what — if not 
 moral discipline — is so analogous to it, so in harmony with it, 
 that his relations to the external world constitute a very 
 important part of that moral order of the world to which he 
 is subject. His physical well-being is conditioned on the 
 self-control, the forethought, the industry, and the energy 
 which he may exhibit. For these, there are rewards ; for the 
 lack or disregard of them, there are penalties ; and these 
 rewards and penalties are so sure and inevitable, that they are 
 obvious to even a limited experience, and no man can have 
 any excuse for disregarding them. 
 
 lY. 
 
 SOCIAL OEGAlSriZATION, AS BELATED TO THE MORAL SYSTEM. 
 
 The relations of man to society are numerous and complex. 
 Society, from its very nature, must impose some restraint 
 upon those who compose it. Unrestricted liberty of action or 
 appropriation is impossible. The wrong-doer comes into col- 
 lision with social forces, which, in the aggregate, are over- 
 whelmingly superior to his own. In committing a social 
 offense, in violating a law of the state, he matches his in- 
 dividual strength and resources against the united strength of 
 the community. He exposes himself to the social or civil 
 penalt}'', and that penalty, in the normal condition and action 
 of society, will be in the interests of justice. 
 
 1. And here it is important to note the grounds upon which 
 it can be claimed that the discipline and restraints of social 
 
OKGANIZATION FAVOES VIRTUE. 99 
 
 life are legitimately on the side of virtue. "We may suppose 
 cases where the individual comes into collision with society, 
 in which the right is upon his side, and its triumph over him 
 physically, or socially, or legally, would he the triumph of 
 wrong. But these cases are exceptional. They occur only 
 where social order is perverted, or social obligations and rela- 
 tions are falsely defined. The first point to be settled there- 
 fore, is, what is the moral relation of society, as organized — 
 that is, with the mutual relations and obligations of its mem- 
 bers defined by law or equity — ^to the individual ? Is it such 
 as, from the nature of society itseK, as organized, to favor 
 virtue and justice ? The answer to this will be obvious in 
 view of a fact, which, in itself considered, is of vast signifi- 
 cance, and bears emphatic testimony to the existence of the 
 moral constitution of the world. This fact is, that social or- 
 ganization, regarded in itself, and irrespective of its avowed 
 objects, which may be either good or evil, is always on the 
 side of virtue. It is not virtuous in itself, any more than the 
 architecture of a dwelling is. It is a mechanism, which may 
 be pronounced good or evil in proportion as it is wisely or 
 unwisely constructed to attain its ends, but not good or evil 
 in a moral sense. Yet, as an operative practical mechanism, 
 it must be constructed on principles approximately just, and 
 to some extent it must favor justice, as it aims at'the common 
 secm-ity and welfare. 
 
 2. Human society cannot be permanently maintained 
 without organization. Individual interest or passion would 
 soon work its dissolution or overthrow, unless subjected to 
 some restraint. Those rules of social duty which are abso- 
 lutely essential to social order, must have public and general 
 recognition, and they must become authoritative as the law 
 of the state. But these rules are emphatically moral. They 
 limit violence and passion. They recognize a common good 
 upon which no individual must be allowed to encroach. 
 
 3. But even this does not give adequate expression to that 
 necessity by which social organization is made to represent 
 justice. The combination of the social elements may bring 
 together, we may suppose, nothing but what is, individually, 
 completely selfish. Self-interest, we may freely concede, is 
 
100 SELFISHNESS LIMITINa SELFISHNESS. 
 
 all that impels to combination and organization. Self-interest 
 is that which protects and maintains the organization. And 
 yet, if it is maintained, it is a limitation and check upon self- 
 ishness and selfish passion. It operates in the interests of 
 justice. Each individual, looking only to his own advantage, 
 might wish to have the exclusive privilege of plundering 
 others, but he wants no one else to enjoy that privilege. If 
 we consider the same thing to be true of all others, and then 
 sum up the result, we shall find that a thousand citizens, if 
 there are so many in the social organization, would concede 
 the fatal privilege only to one citizen of the state, and deny 
 it to the other nine hundred and ninety-nine. In other words, 
 the general sentiment is as a thousand to one nearly, on the 
 side of equal rights or public justice. So that social organiza- 
 tion necessarily results in checking the selfishness of each by 
 the aggregate selfishness of the state, and while no individual 
 has any high respect for an abstract justice or the common 
 good, his very selfishness prompts him, for his own sake, to 
 sustain institutions which operate to check violence, and re- 
 press and punish crime. 
 
 4. But, moreover, in the construction of the social organ- 
 ism, the principles of equal justice must be studied and ap- 
 plied. Men cannot be brought to act together to a common 
 end, except by laying aside, for the time, at least, whatever is 
 so mutually repugnant as to repel confidence and co-operation. 
 They must, to some extent, trust one another. They must 
 be true and faithful to the end they have in view, so far as 
 mutual intercourse is concerned. Their constitution, if they 
 have one, must enjoin this. Their laws, if they have them, 
 must punish the lack of this as criminal. Those laws, also, 
 must recognize the rights of the members of the society. If 
 these are questioned, they must call in justice — and substan- 
 tially the same justice that our courts administer — to adjudi- 
 cate them. If there are penalties, these must bear something 
 like a just proportion to their crimes ; and all this would be 
 true, even of a band of pirates and robbers. A society thor- 
 oughly vicious, and vicious in all the mutual relations of the 
 members that compose it, would be — among beings constituted 
 as men are — an impossibility. It would be seK-annihilating. 
 
JUSTICE A FUNDAMENTAL LAW. 101 
 
 It would have neither frame-work or connections. "Without 
 the moral cement of confidence, and a confidence that must 
 have its support in moral elements of character that warrant 
 it, society would be, ipso facto, dissolved. It would be no 
 more than a mere temporary aggregation of selfish sand grains, 
 to be dispersed by the first breath of suspicion. 
 
 5. There is, then, in all social organization an absolute 
 necessity of the recognition of justice, and of the rights of 
 justice. 1S.0 body of men could maintain permanent relations 
 to one another without such recognition. The language of 
 Fisher Ames, in his memorable speech on the faith of treaties, 
 is fully warranted by the necessary laws of mutual confidence 
 and co-operation — " K there could be a resurrection at the 
 foot of the gallows ; if the victims of public justice could 
 live again, unite and form themselves into a society, they 
 would find themselves constrained, however loth, to adopt the 
 very principles of that justice by which they suffered, as the 
 fundamental law of their state." 
 
 That this is so, is also obvious when we consider the neces- 
 sary conditions of success, in case a corporation, or any body 
 of men, conspire to nefarious ends — to plunder individuals or 
 the state. There is inevitably an element of mutual distrust, 
 and yet trust must be reposed somewhere. That trust will be 
 reposed, not indiscriminately, but in that individual, if such 
 an one can be found, who is known to keep his word, to scorn 
 treachery, or to fear an oath. He will be elevated to the 
 place of honor or confidence. , He will be entrusted with the 
 books, the seal, the treasures\ of the community ; for there 
 must be at least something thai can be called " honor " even 
 among thieves. Without this! they would soon betray one 
 another, and be dispersed by th^ir mutual distrust. 
 
 6. We see, therefore, that fecial organization — no more 
 virtuous in itself than parlian^entary rules of order — ^is, con- 
 sidered simply as organization,! on the side of virtue. If a 
 band of gamblers wish to erecl a magnificent structure as a 
 den into which to entice their victims, they must yet conform 
 to certain physical laws, in which the recognition of mathe- 
 matical truth is involved. They will not allow their architect 
 to ignore the law of gravitation, or knowingly use an incor- 
 
102 CONFLICTING ELEMENTS IN VICE. 
 
 rect pinmb-line or a defective measure. They will not allow 
 the multiplication-table to be falsified, so as to imbed a lie 
 in every stone, and a geometrical iniquity in every angle, in 
 order to harmonize their structure with the ends it is designed 
 to subserve. And so a band of unscrupulously selfish men, in 
 forming their compact, even though to an iniquitous end, find 
 themselves constrained to recognize the worth of the moral 
 elements of character, some of which, however associated 
 with perverse principle or practice, they regard as indis- 
 pensable to success. Without something to inspire a measure 
 of confidence, they would pause helpless on the threshold of 
 their enterprise. Indeed, the most absolutely powerless or- 
 ganization of which we can form any conception, would be 
 one composed of elements so thoroughly wicked as to utterly 
 destroy all mutual confidence. It would be palsied by its own 
 iniquity. It wouH be afraid of itself. It could hope to hold 
 together only by means of elements, in a measure, incongru- 
 ous to itself. In its attempts at organization and co-operation, 
 it pays an involuntary homage to virtue. In its final failure, 
 its doom is oftenest the result of its own inherent vice. 
 
 Y. In what has been said, the inherent weakness of vice, 
 and the inherent strength of virtue, have been intimated. 
 This contrast between the two runs through the whole scheme 
 of things. We note it first in the individual himself. Here 
 and there we meet with a character in which one over-master- 
 ing passion predominates. All the energies of body and 
 mind are made subservient to its gratification. But usually, 
 while one passion maintains its superiority, there are, in the 
 evil-disposed, subordinate passions or appetites, which divide 
 among themselves the energies of the soul. The result is 
 that they cannot be concentrated to one end. One passion 
 checks or limits the indulgence of another. By a keen 
 observer of men it was once remarked of another, whose 
 character he had critically studied, that he had been amused 
 to watch the conflict between his ambition and his avarice. 
 Here two passions in the same individual drew him in 
 opposite directions, and as the inequitable result, they, in a 
 measure, counteracted one another. This is ever the case 
 where evil passions impel to diverse ends and gratifications. 
 
THE ENSKGIES OF VIHTUE IIASMONIOUS. 108 
 
 Vice is weakened by its own discords, inseparable from it. 
 This is true in tlie individual, and it is equally true in society. 
 When men conspire for evil, each brings to the conspiracy 
 his own peculiar selfishness. Discord, ere long, is almost 
 inevitable. It is only the element of fear that suppresses its 
 manifestation. If all could unite heartily, and pursue per- 
 manently the one common object, their united strength and 
 resources might prove irresistible. But such union can rarely 
 — we might say never — be achieved. Selfish depravities 
 have their own separate interests. The triumph of one 
 threatens the defeat of another, and must be defeated itself. 
 Hence defection, counter-working, undermining, and con- 
 spiracies within conspiracies. Yice casts the stone amid the 
 harvest host, sprung from its own dragon's-teeth, and the host 
 melts away by mutual destruction. Many is the illustration 
 which history affords of this truth, and every such illustra- 
 tion is a testimony to the inherent weakness of vice. 
 
 On the other hand, the very nature of virtue is such that 
 it can combine and co-operate with whatsoever is virtuous, 
 without any loss or diversion of energy. Good men can act 
 together. The ends they have in view harmonize. The 
 selfish, separating element is ke})t in the background. Each 
 has a regard for the common good which overrides any sense 
 of private advantage. The object to be pursued in common, 
 can be agreed upon. It can be distinctly presented, and 
 exhibited, without disguise or arts of concealment. There 
 can be a thorough mutual understanding as to what it is, and 
 in what manner it shall be pursued. There is by no means 
 any necessary conflict in the mode of pm-suing it, especially 
 when virtue dictates the withdrawal of all selfish objections. 
 'Not is this all. Good men can trust one another. They are 
 not disquieted by fear of being betrayed. They have con- 
 fidence in one another, and for that very reason a gi*eater 
 confidence in themselves, and in their own success — assm-ed 
 as they are of hearty and permanent mutual support. Thus 
 it is that they can act as a unit. They can concentrate their 
 energies. They fear no undermining, no betrayal. Strong 
 in conscious integrity, they are strong also in the assured 
 approval, not only of those who directly co-operate with them, 
 
104 THE INDIVIDUAL AND SOCIETT. 
 
 but of all good men. They have the best elements of pnbUc 
 opinion on their side. This is enough to inspire courage, to 
 strengthen resolve, to re-invigorate energy. 
 
 8. But the aggregate of the social force for good will be 
 increased by individual contributions, that, instead of cancel- 
 ing, supplement each other. As vice is weakened by diverse 
 passions, that can rarely harmonize, virtue is strengthened by 
 diverse, yet ever kindred excellences of character. The ends 
 that the good man seeks may be various ; all of them may not 
 be attainable ; it may be necessary for him to make a selec- 
 tion ; but they are not, like the ends that vice pursues, dis- 
 cordant and mutually prejudicial or destructive, and hence 
 there is nothing to forbid the concentration of his powers on 
 the attainment of his chosen objects. To their pursuit, he 
 may devote the full sti'ength of his being, and what he may 
 do, other good men may do lilvewise. The aggregate result 
 is such that the virtuous state finds in the union of its sub- 
 jects, few elements of weakness or defection, and it may 
 safely calculate on a measure of co-operation and support, 
 which to vice is not merely impracticable, but impossible. 
 
 Y. 
 
 man's relations to social OEGANTZATION, and to SOCIETT. 
 
 Having noted the laws and forces, inherent in social 
 organization and relations, that are arrayed on the side of 
 justice and virtue, we have next to consider what the pre- 
 sumed, if not necessary, effect will be, when the individual 
 comes into connection or collision with social order. 
 
 Passing over what we must consider abnormal in the 
 political sphere — where, for instance, usurped power must 
 be resisted — we direct our attention, iii-st, to the case of the 
 offender against civil justice. He invades his neighbor's 
 rights. He defrauds him, or he assaults him by violence, 
 wronging him in person or property. Here injustice is 
 committed, and the state, by a necessity it cannot evade, 
 must deal with it. There is no absolute certainty, perhaps, 
 
THE CEIMINAL AND THE STATE. 105. 
 
 that the criminal will be detected ; or, if detected, convicted ; 
 or, if convicted, pnnislied. But the presumptions are against 
 his escape. He is one against thousands. He has made him- 
 self the enemj of all. Friends he may have, but he cannot 
 be sure that they will not turn against him. If he temporarily 
 escapes justice, he cannot escape his own fears. He knows 
 that Justice is in pursuit of him. He knows that the attempt 
 to conceal himself, or his crime, is beset with countless diffi- 
 culties, and that the least clew that directs suspicion against 
 him may awake suspicions in new quarters, or memories of 
 old crime, till the chain of adverse testimony has all its 
 missing links supplied. 
 
 2. In case of detection and arrest, the hope of escaping 
 conviction may still be cherished. There are judges that 
 pay slight regard to the claims of justice. They may be 
 approached by bribes. They may be themselves overawed. 
 But against all this, it must be borne in mind, that the judge 
 does not make the law, and that, even against all his inclina- 
 tions, he may be forced to state the law to the jury with an 
 impartiality that will insure conviction. He cannot rule 
 against the plain letter of the law. He cannot ignore pre- 
 cedents. His post of duty makes him a kind of finger on 
 the dial-plate of civil justice, moved by forces independent of 
 his will. Here, again, the result of social organization is seen 
 in the fact that even the unscrupulous judge, by the very 
 circumstances of his position and trust, is sometimes made to 
 pronounce the sentence that breaks up schemes of iniquity, in 
 the gains of which he was himself an accomplice. 
 
 3. Thus, in dealing with the criminal, all the forces of the 
 state are legitimately arrayed against evil, and on the side of 
 justice. The choice must be made between public insecurity 
 on the one hand, and the impunity of the criminal on the 
 other. This results from the constitution of society itself, 
 and this constitution is the result of the natural order of 
 things. It takes its place as an essential element in the moi^al 
 system, and is in full co-operation with it. 
 
 4. Kindred in some respects to civil, is domestic govern- 
 ment. In many cases, indeed, it scarcely deserves the name. 
 Parental vice or profligacy may bequeath a curse rather than 
 
106 DOMESTIC TRAINING. 
 
 a blessing to tlie household. But where this is the case, it is 
 in violation of the legitimate scope and evident design of the 
 family institution. The child is supposed and presumed to 
 be in the hands of its natural guardians, who will seek its wel- 
 fare, and warn it of what is harmful. To this thej stand 
 pledged by manifest duty and natural aifection. But a hmited 
 sagacity and narrow experience on their part, suffice to show 
 them that the child's welfare is identified with purity of life 
 and virtuous habits. Unless grossly false to their trust, their 
 example, influence and teaching will be studiously kept on the 
 side of truthfulness, temperance and virtue. If they exercise 
 discipline, it is to be presumed that it will be to restrain evil 
 and mischievous propensities. If there are differences be- 
 tween those who are equally the objects of their affection, it 
 is to be presumed that they will be settled, as nearly as possi- 
 ble, by the rules of impartial justice. 
 
 Thus, at the outset of hfe, when passions are developing 
 themselves, and are unused to restraint, they are subjected to 
 a loving and wise supervision, and the will that, if left un- 
 checked, would become tyrannic, is subjected to a discipline 
 that is dictated by the common interest of the household. 
 And sometimes, where vice has made the parent its victim, 
 natural affection comes in to shield the child. Many a parent 
 has acquiesced in his own ruin, even while striving to rescue 
 his offspring from the associations of evil in which he had 
 himself become hopelessly involved. This feature of the 
 family institution is a most eloquent testimony, not merely 
 to the superiority of virtue, and the terrible apprehension 
 which vice is calculated to excite, but to the fact, that even in 
 the depth of degradation, a genuine natural affection may be 
 found to co-operate with a virtue from which it is itself 
 estranged. 
 
 5. Nor must we overlook the tendencies inherent in acad- 
 emic training, and the youthful associations it creates. The 
 associations, competitions and rivalries of early years, are not 
 without their moral value. Those who are brought together 
 in sports and studies, are forced, to some extent, to adopt 
 common moral judgments. In their dealings with one an- 
 other, each act, each invasion of another's right, each generous 
 
ACADEMIC DISCIPLINE. 107 
 
 concession, is subjected to a verdict, tlioiigli not formally 
 giren, of a jury of tlieir peers. They are educating one an- 
 otlier, and altliougti often, by example, by speech, by mutual 
 intercourse, leading to evil, yet at the same time constraining 
 one another, in a most effective manner, to the recognition of 
 justice and respect for what is upright, noble or true. 
 
 In the school-room the education goes on. It is not the 
 education of boohs merely. Order must be observed. Merit 
 must be conceded. Kules, that have a moral obligation as 
 well as propriety in them, must be laid down and observed. 
 Lessons of obedience to law, confirmatory of those of domes- 
 tic discipline, must be learned ; mutual relations, and with 
 them, mutual duties, must be defined ; the necessity of dili- 
 gence and application must be enforced ; forethought for the 
 future must be constantly impressed, and while all this may 
 work no reform where vice has preoccupied the ground, it 
 must be conceded to lend all its influence, so far as it is legiti- 
 mate, to the side of virtue. 
 
 6. And here we must consider what may be called the 
 social training of the intellect, or the relation of society to 
 man's mental constitution, taking it up in connection with 
 the academic training of the intellect which precedes and 
 prepares the way for it. In the school, the child is furnished 
 with the text-book ; when he leaves it, his text-book is society 
 itself. In both eases, the training has a moral element, or, at 
 least, is calculated to lead the mind to a recognition at once 
 of a physical and moral order of the world. From the mo- 
 ment that the child learns his first letter, every step makes 
 him familiar with law ; laws of construction, laws of thought ; 
 laws of science ; laws of obligation. Letters combine in 
 words according to invariable laws. Every word takes its 
 place in the sentence in accordance with uniform laws. The 
 rules of grammar, the rules of correct speech, the rules of 
 arithmetic, the rules of geometry, are the lavs^s whose recog- 
 nition conditions progress. Facts are mastered, but facts can 
 not be left to loose aggregation. They must be classified by 
 scientific laws, and indeed they cannot properly be mastered 
 otherwise. Into the confused chaotic mass of fact, law must 
 come to educe order, and create a Kosmos. The intellect is 
 
108 POWER OF SOCIAL INFLIIENCE. 
 
 made cognizant of this. It cannot be educated withont it. 
 It is thus familiarized with the subhme idea of the absolute 
 supremacy and uniformity of law, and the necessity by which 
 man, physically, intellectually and morally, is constrained to 
 conform thereto. 
 
 7. Social influence, in the ordinary intercourse of life, is too 
 important an element of education to be overlooked. How 
 far it enters as an element into the moral order of the world, 
 on the side of what is upright and humane and virtuous, it 
 becomes us to consider. That it may be perverted, and be- 
 come a powerful instrumentality for mischief, does not admit 
 of question. As a matter of fact, this is frequently the case. 
 In some instances, it exercises a power almost irresistible. It 
 sweeps before it the restraints of reason, conscience, law and 
 religion. But even in doing this, it demonstrates the concern 
 which each individual has in public opinion and social usages, 
 and the necessity imposed on all who would save society from 
 wreck, to interpose in its behalf. In other words, it testifies 
 to individual responsibility and individual duty. 
 
 But the legitimate bearing of social influence, is not to fos- 
 ter evil, but to restrain it. A simple fact will illustrate this. 
 A vicious man will often shrink from exposing his o^vn vice, 
 to a companion whom he knows to be fully as unprincipled as 
 himself. He will shrink, in the presence of his comrade, from 
 committing the criminal act for which he is fuUy prepared 
 when no eye sees him. But when his associates, though far 
 from faultless, are yet more upright than himself, he stands 
 in awe of their censure. Low as their standard of morality 
 may be, it acts as a powerful check upon him. Even in a 
 company of villains, the chance that some one may have an 
 element of generosity or humanity, or a sense of justice not 
 wholly perverted, may have more weight with the would-be 
 criminal, than the chances that his crime, when committed, 
 will be detected. 
 
 We see the fear — ^thus excited, and acting as a restraint 
 upon evil — operating upon minds that can scarcely be reached 
 by anything else. There are many bad men who fear nothing 
 so much as to have their deeds published. They would keep 
 their vice or crime out of the public prints. They would 
 
VICES THAT SHUN EXPOSUKE. 109 
 
 voluntarily make great pecuniaiy sacrifices — virtually impose 
 heavy taxes upon themselves — to escape publicity. Society 
 keeps them back from evil by the terror which it inspires, and 
 a terror that is independent of law-courts or prisons. 
 
 A fact kindred to this, illustrates the conscious weakness 
 of vice — an illustration for which we are indebted to social 
 influence. There are some vices that are m.ade disreputable 
 by society, and for that reason seek concealment. They shun 
 observation. They screen themselves in obscurity or dark- 
 ness. These vices are not made disreputable by mere social 
 caprice. The infamy they incur is no accident : it comes 
 about as a result of the necessary nature and constitution of 
 society. It attaches to whatever is prejudicial to social peace, 
 purity and security. In self -vindication, society must resent 
 the invasion of what is vital to its well-being, and hence, not 
 arbitrarily, but of necessity, it brands the invader with social 
 outlawry. His defence is in concealment. There may be a 
 consciousness of guilt producing cowardice — there often is ; 
 but it is enough that society inspires awe, or even terror, on 
 account of what would otherwise excite scarcely a scruple. 
 Yice is too weak, consciously weak, to face its own guilt in 
 the presence of others. 
 
 . But the reverse of this is time of virtue and virtuous action. 
 The good man conceals his deeds only through the modesty 
 of conscious worth. Society would hail with applause, if 
 exhibited, what he keeps in the background. Yet its approval 
 and praise are the proper and appropriate meed of virtuous 
 deeds. Thus it educates and inspires to generous actions. 
 With rarely an exception, as all will admit — without a single 
 exception, as some would assert — the deeds which promote 
 social well-being are morally good, or at least so far as the 
 matter of the act is concerned. As such, they must be, and 
 they will be, praised. The effect of such praise, from the 
 lips of the orator, the pen of the poet, or the testimony of 
 history, is to incite to emulation. Patriotic ardor is aroused, 
 public spirit is kindled, generosity and sjanpathy are excited, 
 and although these may not be accounted virtue in its highest 
 sense, they are alien to all that is low and sordid, or simply 
 vicious. 
 
110 SOCIETY AND PATEIOTISM. 
 
 8. Thus society acts, undesignedly, and by a necessity im- 
 posed upon it by tbe author of nature, in the interests and on 
 the side of virtue. Traits of character that command admira- 
 tion and inspire enthusiasm, are developed by social action and 
 influence. By their position as members of society, men who 
 would otherwise have been hopelessly involved in the pursuit 
 of seMsh schemes, are made acquainted with certain social 
 needs, in which moral interests are involved, and, assured that 
 their generosity will be appreciated, they come forward to the 
 rescue of interests that would otherwise be exposed to suffer, 
 and enrich society and the world by their benefactions. Scores 
 of public institutions, established in the interests of human- 
 ity, learning, good morals or religion, have been endowed by 
 men who owe to society itself the inspiration under which 
 they have acted. 
 
 9. Some of the most admirable deeds which history records 
 have been performed in times, and in the face, of peril, in 
 behaK of society. The story of patriotic devotion, which 
 thrills us as we read, is a tribute to the moral power of social 
 influence. "VYhen the voice of country has called to the 
 rescue, a host has spnmg forth, ready to surrender ease and 
 wealth, or even life itself, for the common welfare ; and in 
 the presence of such devotion, the inherent baseness of vice 
 and selfishness lias been made conspicuous by the contrast. If 
 patriotism is not a virtue, the lack of it is a vice ; and when 
 society brands the vice, it is a volunteer witness to the moral 
 order of the world. 
 
 10. Society has its weaknesses and defects ; it has difficul- 
 ties to be met and problems to be solved. These difficulties 
 and problems it puts in every man's way. To meet or solve 
 these is an education in itself, and an education essentially 
 moral. Sometimes the problem is simply one of want and 
 destitution. It is to be solved by a prompt and generous 
 charity that will feed the stai-ving and clothe the naked. Thus 
 it educates to charity, and the record of that charity becomes 
 one of the brightest pages of history. Sometimes the prob- 
 lem to be solved is aggravated by the combination of vice as 
 its cause, with want as its result. Here are graver questions 
 to be met. But met they must be ; and in forcing men to meet 
 
SOCIETY AST) LIBERALITY, SOCIAL ETHICS. Ill 
 
 tliem, society is forcing upon public attention the great fact tliat 
 individual vice lies at the root of the great mass of the world's 
 misery.- Thus it stimulates intellect and sensibihty at once ; 
 it sets the philanthropist to work ; it sends a John Howard to 
 European jails; it inspires a "Wilberforce to become the 
 champion of the wretched victims of the slave traffic ; it sets 
 a Rom illy and a Mackintosh to the task of humanizing a bar- 
 barous code ; it sends a Livingstone into the heart of unknown 
 African wastes, as a pioneer of civilization and a champion of 
 the oppressed ; it impels thoughtful men to study the philoso- 
 phy of crime, ,to devise remedial schemes for reaching the 
 degraded, to set in operation plans for instructing the igno- 
 rant, and employing the idle, and recovering the vicious and 
 the dissolute. In these, and countless other ways, it tends to 
 diffuse information, to secure the co-operation of the good, to 
 correct 23ublic opinion, to expose pernicious errors, and to 
 make plain the only path along which it is possible for society 
 to advance in steady and continuous progress. This state of 
 things indicates that society is naturally on the side of virtue. 
 
 11. But we must note, at least, the bearing of society upon 
 political ethics and theories. Here, then, is a problem to be 
 solved, and society, in offering it, demands a solution. How 
 can the liberty of the citizen be made to consist with the wel- 
 fare of the state ? How can individual freedom and social 
 justice be combined ? It is not too. much to say that the an- 
 swers that have been given to these questions, sometimes in 
 formal constitutions, sometimes in wise statutes, and some- 
 times in elaborate treatises, constitute one of the most valuable 
 departments of our literature, and furnish materials which no 
 one can peruse without being impressed with the profound 
 conviction, that individual integrity and public justice lie at 
 the foundation of all stable government. It is thus, also, that 
 the nature of vice, as radically destructive of national vigor, 
 prosperity and well-being, is fully exposed, and it is made 
 clear to every student of political science that the public wel- 
 fare is identified with social purity and social virtue. 
 
 12. Society educates, moreover, to that sense of justice, 
 without which it cannot itself continue to subsist. Human 
 intercourse requires constant interchange of thought and of 
 
112 PUBLIC CONFIDENCE ON A MOEAL BASIS. 
 
 commodities. It gives birth to commerce, and all the institu- 
 tions of commerce and exchange. Political Economy is a 
 social science, and there is no truth which it places in a clearer 
 light than that the just and the expedient uniformly corre- 
 spond in all human transactions. If any deed, any policy, is 
 unjust, is false, is fraudulent, promises and does not pay, it 
 may be presumed beforehand to be unprofitable. No fraud- 
 ful art can extract permanent gain from any measure which 
 will not endure a moral as well as a party test. Thus society 
 puts forward Political Economy as a witness in behaK of the 
 moral order of the world. 
 
 But while doing this, it enforces the lessons of justice in all 
 industrial and commercial transactions. It exhibits itself 
 stung and wounded by everything which impairs public 
 credit, or confidence between man and man. It forces upon 
 the mercantile class a re&'pect for integrity, if not integrity it- 
 self. It puts a brand upon the man that falsifies his word, 
 that allows his note to be protested, that supplies a damaged 
 article to the market. It insists upon inviolable truth and 
 fidelity to every engagement. But more than this, it illus- 
 trates the absolute necessity of virtue to the prosperity and 
 extension of commercial transactions. It exhibits to us that 
 most curiously complex and intricate structure of commercial 
 credit, reaching out to distant states and continents, built up, 
 stage after stage, and story after story, on the implied fidelity 
 of distant agents and customers, until the signature of a name, 
 perhaps, becomes the single bolt upon the strength of which 
 the stability of the whole structure depends. And then it 
 shows us how this mutually dependent structure is, as a whole, 
 dependent on public confidence, which a whisper of suspicion 
 may shake, insomuch that it cannot stand without those moral 
 qualities on the part of business men, which invite and justify 
 trust. Back of all the parade of national wealth and prosper- 
 ity, we must go and examine the moral element of society, if 
 we would know whether that prosperity rests on a secure basis, 
 or is merely a pageant. 
 
 But while scarcely apprehensive of this, or of its profound 
 significance, men are educated to commercial truth and justice 
 by their own experience. That truth and justice are de- 
 
SOCIETY A SCHOOL OF MUTUAL HELP. 113 
 
 manded as the necessaiy conditions of success. They are 
 demanded by those with whom they deaL Every mercantile 
 or industrial exchange is a moral transaction. It introduces 
 the question of right, the element of equity. It cannot take 
 place without being watched by others, careful and interested 
 to detect fraud. It calls for frankness, honesty, incomiptible 
 integrity. And when we reflect how universal must be the 
 system of exchange in a civilized community, how all-pervad- 
 ing is the element of mutual trust, how paralyzing and radi- 
 cally destructive is a blow to public coniidence, we may readily 
 perceive on what a grand scale society operates to vindicate 
 the laws and constitution of the world which favor virtue and 
 virtuous action. 
 
 13. If now, turning aside from the broad theatre of public 
 life, we pay attention to the relations which spring up in 
 more retired or obscure associations, we shall see how the 
 social feehngs are educated and trained in favor of humane 
 and generous action. The inequalities of social life are no- 
 torious, and they are beyond the reach of remedial legislation. 
 There must be, if not rich and poor, at least richer and poorer. 
 There will also be the more learned and the more ignorant, 
 the stronger and the weaker. In other words, there will al- 
 ways be the need and call for mutual help. Society is ever 
 presenting to each member of it these diversities of social 
 condition, and asking for them thoughtful consideration. 
 And, to some extent, they must be, and indeed, are consid- 
 ered. The result is, that pity is awakened ; sympathy is ex- 
 cited ; forbearance is evoked. The ravages of disease ; the 
 prevalence of famine ; an injury that prostrates a laborer, and 
 robs his family of the means of support ; a sudden illness that 
 demands watchful attention and kind offices of friendship — 
 all these, and a thousand other incidents that illustrate the 
 relative diversities and dependencies of social life, are actually 
 the occasions for calling forth self-denying virtues, for bring- 
 ing human feelings into exercise, and for lightening the ills 
 and calamities of life by the intei-position of friendly service. 
 Society thus becomes a school for mutual help. The hardest 
 heart is softened by the sight of siiffering which it is im- 
 pelled to relieve. Public sympathy is evoked to extend com- 
 
114 VICE KEPELS SYMPATHY. 
 
 miseration to tliose that need, and public indignation is ready 
 to denounce injustice, while it takes instinctively the part of 
 the wronged. In this way all the gentler virtues of pity and 
 compassion and generous self-devotion are nurtured and 
 strengthened. Society becomes actually a school for their 
 development, and to show how successful it has been some- 
 times in its training, it would only be necessary to mention a 
 few of the familiar names which the civilized world has 
 canonized for their self-forgetting consecration to the cause 
 of humanity and the relief of human suffering. 
 
 14. But while we speak of social sympathy we must not 
 overlook the fact, that it is more readily extended to the 
 virtuous than the vicious. It is difficult to enlist it on the 
 side of the latter. Even those who are little govei'ned by 
 moral principle themselves, will be backward to relieve those 
 whose wrong-doing has challenged the hardships they suffer. 
 There may be even a measure of satisfaction in seeing them 
 forced to struggle with the consequences of their own vice 
 and folly, or with calamities, not of their own procuring, 
 which wear the aspect of just providential inflictions. On the 
 other hand, the good man is sure of respect and sympathy 
 from all that are good, and in the hour of calamity, he wiU 
 not be left to neglect. Not merely those whom he has be- 
 friended, but, in some instances, those who have merely known 
 him by name and reputation, will rush to his rescue, and it 
 may be that the hour of adversity may sm-prise him with the 
 assurance of friendships that he had never known or imag- 
 ined. 
 
 We may thus perceive in how many and various ways, 
 society, and social and civil organization, operate in the inter- 
 est of virtue, and tend to confirm faith in the moral order of 
 the world. In all its relations, hostile or friendly, to human 
 chai-acter or energy, it is naturally, that is, according to its 
 natural and necessary constitution, the ally of whatsoever is 
 good, and the antagonist of whatsoever is vicious or socially 
 injurious. 
 
YI. 
 
 TIME AS A FACTOE IN" THE MOKAL SYSTEM. 
 
 Having considered separately tlie relations of man, with 
 his complex nature, both to the material world and to society, 
 we reach a point where we are prepared to consider these, 
 conjointly with a new element, by which their operation is 
 modified, and by which also the vindication of right and the 
 exposure and punishment of wrong are promoted. This new 
 element, which we must by no means overlook, is — Time. 
 
 Bishop Butler, in his ■" Analogy," draws a striking picture 
 of the commanding position and superior advantages which, 
 in a course of ages, would be attained by a government con- 
 ducted on the strict principles of justice, and maintaining in 
 its intercourse with other nations a reputation for incor- 
 ruptible integrity. It is easy to see that its conduct and 
 policy would inspire confidence and disarm resentment ; that 
 it would give no occasion for the formation of hostile leagues 
 combined to assault it, through apprehension of its ambition 
 or unscrupulous designs ; that in every contest into which it 
 might be forced, it would have the sympathy of all friends of 
 justice ; that oppressed tribes or nations would naturally 
 resort to it for protection, and that, by its own subjects, it 
 would be regarded with a patriotic affection, increased and 
 strengthened by its unsweiwing administration of exact justice. 
 With each succeeding age, such a nation would increase in 
 strength, even while stationary in numbers, and its whole 
 history would illustrate the truth of the inherent strength of 
 virtue. 
 
 The very reverse of this would be the experience of a 
 government conducted in disregard of the rights of its sub- 
 jects, or its relative duties to other governments. It would 
 provoke insurrections from within, and hostile combinations 
 from without. If it indulged in unscrupulous violence, that 
 violence would excite resentment, and invite indignant ret- 
 ribution. The memory of its wrong would be cherished by 
 its victims, who would await the opportunity of revenge. It 
 
116 VIBTUE GAINS AND VICE LOSES BY TIME. 
 
 "would be accounted a dangerous neighbor — its very existence 
 a standing menace to tbe existence of border states. Leagues 
 against it would naturally be formed, and, at the same time, 
 its own maladministration, conducted in disregard of the 
 rights of its subjects or the common welfare, would rob it of 
 the most reliable of all supports — the patriotic sympathy of 
 its subjects. 
 
 This contrast is instructive, but in tracing the several 
 results to their causes, we are led to note not only — what 
 has been already adverted to — the inherent weakness of 
 every vicious compact, but the marked superiority and 
 advantage which virtue reaps from the mere lapse of time, 
 which allows existing tendencies or causes something like a 
 legitimate development. The good and the ill of social life 
 may encoimter one another, and in the immediate issue, the 
 last may appear to triumph. But ere long it is found that 
 there is something more than an immediate issue. Every 
 day's, every hour's, delay is redressing the wrong and restor- 
 ing the balance. The element of tiTne works diversely as it 
 respects virtue and vice. Let these be represented by digits, 
 and it adds its cyphers to them, but in the one case it suffixes, 
 and in the other it prefixes them. 
 
 1. Bishop Butler has compared the relative inferiority of 
 virtue when confronted by the marshaled forces of evil, or 
 gross physical strength, to that of reason when compelled to 
 contend with wild beasts. Give reason time to devise plans 
 and call in its resources, and it may defy the attacks of 
 brutal rage. Taken unawares, by sudden assault, it is com- 
 paratively powerless to resist, and becomes an easy prey. 
 But it has within itself the means of supplying this defect. 
 So, in a somewhat analogous way, it is with virtue. In many 
 cases an innocent man, falsely accused, needs nothing at all 
 but time for his vindication. Time elucidates the obscure, 
 sets facts in a clearer light, softens the bitterness of prejudice 
 or blind passion, allows causes to work out their results, or 
 perhaps the really guilty to make a confession that exculpates 
 the accused. 
 
 On the other hand, vice loses by delay many of its seeming 
 securities and advantages. It is subjected to a suspicious and 
 
EETKIBUTION SOMETmES SLOW. 117 
 
 prying scrutiny. It risks tlie loss of tlie fidelity of accomplices. 
 It is liable to exposure from most diverse and unexpected 
 quarters. It is ever — from its own nature — ^making new foes. 
 Its selfishness is not only forbidding new, but alienating old 
 alliances. 
 
 In this, indeed, we find the relative disadvantage of vice 
 notably illustrated. All its leagues are necessarily temporary. 
 They cannot endure. The chances are ten thousand to one 
 that where several parties are united in one evil scheme, 
 they cannot permanently harmonize their several selfish 
 policies. Give them time, and they are almost sure to fall 
 out. A virtuous association, like a well-constructed arch, 
 will knit itself more closely by time and its own weight. 
 But a vicious compact, in which each aspires selfishly to be 
 uppermost, crushes out its own foundations, and is betrayed 
 by its own supports. 
 
 There can be no adequate explanation of this, except by 
 adverting to those methods by which natural and social forces 
 are made to array themselves finally on the side of truth and 
 justice. It is time that is wanted to marshal them. They 
 are often, simply — as we, perhaps, hastily judge — slow to act. 
 The seed of retribution germinates tardily. It is like the 
 seed that sleeps out the winter in its bed of frost, and gives 
 no signs of life. Passion and prejudice must have time to 
 subside. The excitement of the occasion must pass away, 
 and give opportunity for a cool and calm reflection. Or it 
 may be that the evidence of criminality, like a record written 
 in sympathetic ink, only comes out after some peculiar ex- 
 posure, before which months or years must intervene. 
 
 Thus, we see the martyrs of one age patiently waiting for 
 the next to justify them. Criminals, great and imposing, 
 whom their own generation did not dare to judge, are all un- 
 masked before the tribunal of one that succeeds. The false 
 colors of the present fade out with time. The mortar in- 
 scription to the memory of applauded wickedness, crumbles 
 away, and leaves the granite record of truth finally exposed. 
 Many a slander has been wiped away only when centuries 
 have passed. 
 
 It is equally obvious that in the procedures of civil justice, 
 
118 VICE KEYEALING ITS NATURE. 
 
 time is necessary for perfecting its Work. Give the greatest 
 possible promptitude and efficacy to tlie working of its 
 macliinery, and yet it can only, witli the help of time, ac- 
 complish the desired result. A mistaken national policy may 
 be prosecuted till the public opinion that condemns it has 
 time to form. An iniquity, like the slave-trade, may outlast 
 the generation that first assailed it, bnt a succeeding one will 
 strike it the fatal blow. 
 
 It is thus that justice and virtue, aided l)y time, have 
 vanquished the barbarisms, and cruelties, and intolerant 
 theories and usages of earlier ages. The iceberg melts 
 slowly as it approaches warmer latitudes, and it is time that 
 drifts the icebergs of the past down to where they melt 
 under the breath of the later centuries. 
 
 2. Kor is this all. Vice reveals its own proper nature often- 
 times, only after what seems a tedious delay. At first, it 
 may have youth and beauty, strength and vigor, associated 
 with it. It may be invested v/ith the charm of wit and 
 cheerful spirits, and these may mask its nature, or hide its 
 deformity. But time strips them off. When the sprightli- 
 ness of youth has given place to the feebleness of age or of 
 disease, and beauty has been succeeded by wrinkles, and 
 gayety of spirit has been sobered by the reverses of life, or 
 the weight of its multiplied burdens — then, at the very time 
 when " the hoary head is a crown of glory, if it be found in 
 the way of righteousness " — vice exhibits itseK as it is, in- 
 herently repulsive, nakedly deformed and disgusting. Its 
 borrowed charms are torn from it. The fascination of its 
 earlier associations is lost forever. The varnish of assumed 
 respectability lingers only as a transparent cheat, like the 
 plaster that covers an ulcer, suggesting a hideousness which 
 it scarcely conceals. Such is the operation of time upon 
 vice and injustice, when possessed at the start of all worldly 
 advantages. 
 
 It is scarcely necessary to say that of virtue the reverse of 
 all this is true. It is when all boiTowed or conventional 
 grace has vanished, when beauty of form and feature is gone^ 
 that the virtue of the good man shines forth with a grace and 
 beauty peculiarly its own. Time, that gives the fruit its full, 
 
TENDENCIES, WITH TIME TO OPERATE. 119 
 
 ripe development, and bestows on the waving harvest its 
 golden hue, invests the upright character with peculiar 
 channs, making its very exhibition its commendation, so 
 that every aspect of it pronounces its eulogj on virtue 
 itself. 
 
 3. In calculating the effective value of the retributoiy tenden- 
 cies and forces that we see constantly operative even now, 
 time is a most important factor. Take it away altogether, and 
 every vestige of retribution disappears. Continue it for a 
 limited period — say for a score of years, or three-score years 
 and ten — and as the period is prolonged, we witness a steady 
 approximation toward exact justice. Some evil deeds are 
 like seeds of a slow growth. They reach the matuiity of 
 their harvest only when most of those who witnessed their 
 planting have passed away. More than a single generation 
 is necessary to form concerning them a competent and exact 
 judgment. But let the score of years be multiplied ten or a 
 hundred fold ; let vice have full opportunity to exhibit itself ; 
 let virtue outlive the envy or prejudice or reproach that be- 
 longed only to a peculiar occasion, or peculiar circumstances ; 
 let the veteran in crime be compelled, through successive cen- 
 turies, to confront at once the memories and the consequences 
 of his evil deeds ; let the accumulating infamy of his baseness 
 ever attend him till he becomes the loathing and scorn of all 
 with whom he comes in contact ; let his associates be those 
 who have known him through his whole career, and who have 
 seen the pliant elements of moral character harden into fixed 
 deformity ; and in such a case as this we should have data, 
 such as we do not now possess, for estimating the retributory 
 forces of the moral world. It is even appalling to consider 
 what they must be in circumstances like these. Hidden wick- 
 edness would be brought to light. Moral perversity would 
 betray its essential discord with individual happiness and 
 social welfare. AU the odium due to unprincipled selfishness 
 would be paid to it with interest, till the facts of experience 
 would transcend the fiction of " The Wandering Jew." We 
 can readily suppose that in such a case existence would become 
 a curse, and annihilation be coveted as a boon. 
 
 i. But it is when we allow these tendencies, of which we 
 
120 EIPE EESULTS OF VICE. 
 
 speak, an illimitable scope, so that every deed, everj evil 
 thought, eveiy vile passion, shall work out its legitimate 
 results, yet with no prospect of a termination, that we are 
 forced to feel that we have, actually in existence, and opera- 
 tive now, forces which need no more than time, to vindicate 
 triumphantly the constitution of the moral world. Here the 
 seed scarcely pushes up its germ to the light, and begins to 
 betray its nature, before its further or full development is ar- 
 rested by death or by social changes. But let it grow, and 
 expand, and blossom, and mature its fruit, and who can doubt 
 that under its deep shadow, blighted human hopes would so 
 testify against it, as to visit it with full and merited reproba- 
 tion. A moral nature, perverted and debased by long indulged 
 sin, a memory stored up with all the elements that reflection 
 can make effective for seK-reproach ; thoughts and fancies and 
 imaginations that have all become steeped in vileness ; pas- 
 sions that have run riot in reckless indulgence; affections 
 that have been fixed on perishable objects — all these, combined 
 with enfeebled and failing senses, to throw the soul back upon 
 itself, may well suffice to make consciousness terrible, a kind 
 of imperishable torture-chamber of the soul, from which there 
 is no escape, and for which there is no alleviation. 
 
 And yet to this conclusion are we inevitably brought when 
 we introduce into our calculation of existing tendencies, the 
 element of duration. That element belongs legitimately to 
 the solution of the problem. The nature of many things can 
 be fully known only through the indefinite delay that is neces- 
 sary to their complete working. Let the retributory forces of 
 the world, with which we are familiar, and the existence of 
 which no man can dispute, be judged of in accordance with 
 this rule, and there will be few who will call in question the 
 actual constitution of the moral system, as committed to the 
 side and support of vii'tue and justice. 
 
YII. 
 
 MAJ>f's MOEAL NATURE. 
 
 If all the considerations hitherto offered in proof of the 
 existence of a moral system conld be set aside, there would 
 still remain one which, properly weighed, would be decisive. 
 This is the fact that man is constituted a moral agent. He is 
 possessed of a moral nature, and by the laws of that nature 
 he is actually subjected to moral discipline, and so subjected 
 that it is evident that he was designed to be so. 
 
 It may, indeed, be questioned whether conscience is a dis- 
 tinct faculty, whether it may not be resolved into other facul- 
 ties, or their combination ; but there can be no question whether 
 there is that in the nature of man which answei'S to what is 
 expressed by the term conscience. K we call it a faculty, it 
 is a faculty which asserts for itself a rightful supremacy. The 
 tone in which it speaks is authoritative. It allows of no 
 appeal. Other faculties or qualities of the mind speak in an 
 advisory or persuasive tone. This is imperative. Prudence 
 suggests that it would be well to avoid this measure, or to adopt 
 that. Sagacity urges that such or such an issue, in given cir- 
 cumstances, is probable, and on this ground pleads for a policy 
 accordant with the probability. Passion asserts preference, or 
 resolute purpose ; but conscience, in the most direct manner, 
 says, this must be done, or that must be avoided. It makes 
 no allowance for fear or favor, for profit or loss. It is simply 
 authoritative, and admits no superior or rival among all its 
 kindred faculties. 
 
 Perhaps the intuition of the poet, apprehending the facts 
 of consciousness, throws more light on certain features of our 
 spiritual being than the most profound investigations Of the 
 metaphysician. Certainly the testimony which is borne by 
 our great poets to the existence and power of conscience, is 
 surprisingly uniform and emphatic. Young, in his " flight 
 Thoughts," asks — 
 
 ^' Conscience, what art thou? Thou tremendous power, 
 Who dost inhabit us without our leave ; 
 
122 SHAKESPEAEE. MILTOIJ'. 
 
 And art within ourselves another self; 
 
 A master-self, that loves to domineer, 
 
 And treat the monarch frankly as the slave ; 
 
 How dost thou light a torch to distant deeds, 
 
 Make the past, present, and the future frown ! 
 
 How ever and anon awakest the soul, 
 
 As with a peal of thunder, to strange horrors 
 
 In this long, restless dream, which idiots hug; 
 
 Nay, wise men, flatter with the name of life ! " 
 
 Shakespeare repeatedly gives us glimpses of conscience, 
 both in its smiling and in its frowning aspects. He portrays 
 it at one time as making " cowards of us all/' and again repre- 
 sents one of his characters as saying, 
 
 "I feel within me 
 A peace above all earthly dignities — 
 A still and quiet conscience." 
 
 Milton, repeatedly alluding to the power of conscience, tells 
 us, in his " Comus," 
 
 " He that has Hght within his own dear breast, 
 May sit in the centre and enjoy bright day; 
 But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts, 
 Benighted walks under the midday beam — 
 Himself is his own dungeon," 
 
 In his " Paradise Lost," one of the most terrible pictures is 
 that of Satan, exclaiming " Me miserable ! " and plunged into 
 despair, from deep to " lov/er deep," when he would escape 
 from himself ; and what an apprehension of the power of 
 conscience was required to trace these lines : 
 
 "O, conscience, into what abyss of fears 
 And horrors hast thou driven me ! Out of which 
 I find no way ; from deep to deeper plunged ! " 
 
 In some cases we are tempted to believe that, in depicting 
 the terrors of a guilty conscience, the poet has simply photo- 
 graphed the facts of his own experience. If such is the case, 
 the lines of Byron are peculiarly impressive : 
 
NATUSAL SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 123 
 
 "So do the dark in soul expire; 
 Or live like scorpion girt by fire ; 
 So writhes the mind remorse hath riven : 
 Unfit for earth, undoom.ed for heaven, 
 Darkness above, despair beneath. 
 Around it flame, within it death." 
 
 Gifford, in his "Juvenal," has simply reflected a thought 
 that has poured its lurid illumination over the pages of some 
 of the old classic tragedians : 
 
 " Trust me, no tortures which the poets feign, 
 Can match the fierce, unutterable pain 
 He feels, who, night and day, devoid of rest, 
 Carries his own accuser in his breast." 
 
 l^ov has the importance of the invs^ard approval of con- 
 science, as an element of peace and happiness, been over- 
 looked. Pope teaches us how poor is all v^^orldly pomp or 
 power to supply its absence, since 
 
 "More true joy Marcellus exiled feels, 
 Than Caesar, with a senate at his heels." 
 
 The natural supremacy of conscience is sufiiciently indi- 
 cated by human consciousness, as well as by such citations as 
 these, which reflect with such vividness the facts of human 
 experience. Each man, in spite of taste, or passion, or pre- 
 judice, must confess that he is held in check by a power within 
 him that asserts authority — a power with which his interests,, as 
 he often, though falsely, interprets them, are at feud — and yet 
 a power from which he can never gain more than a j^artial 
 release. In some cases, indeed, he goes deliberately to work to 
 silence or suppress it ; but, in the very act of doing so, he 
 confesses how formidable it is, and how intolerant it is of the 
 evil he loves. 
 
 But, however he may for a time seem to succeed in this 
 effort at moral suicide, his success is at best but transient. It 
 is more apparent than real. Conscience may be habitually 
 disregarded. It may suffer from that intoxication of the soul 
 
124 CO^rSCIENGE SHOULD RULE. 
 
 whicli is produced by the deliriums of exciting pleasure, or 
 the lethargies of sensual indulgence. But in any case, the 
 most tririal incident may serve to rouse it to an unprecedented 
 activity. So little can its secure repose be trusted, that its 
 seeming sleep may prove one of its most alarming attitudes. 
 To this Young refers, when he exclaims — 
 
 "Ah, treacherous Conscience ! While she seems to sleep 
 On rose and myrtle, lulled with syren song; 
 While she seems nodding o'er her charge to drop 
 On headlong appetite a slackened rein. 
 And give us up to license unrecalled; 
 See, from behind her secret stand. 
 The sly informer minutes every fault, 
 And her dread diary with horror fills. " 
 
 If we regard the constitution of man as anything else than 
 the work of chance — supposing the word to have any mean- 
 ing — we must recognize the importance of the fact that the 
 power of conscience, or — if we choose to call it so — the moral 
 sense, is supreme. It may be temporarily overborne by pas- 
 sion ; it may be studiously suppressed by methods devised in 
 order to escape its sentence or its reproofs ; but that it may at 
 any time resume its place and sway — that its temporary de- 
 position may be succeeded by a terrible reactionary vigor of 
 self-assertion — that it is the rightful sovereign of the entire 
 conscious beings — that spiritual peace and the harmony of all 
 the powers of the soul are conditioned on its ascendancy — 
 that when its sovereign control is suspended, all goes wrong, 
 and man becomes a brute in his lusts or a tiger in his rage ; — 
 all this indicates a manifest design in that relation which has 
 been constituted between conscience and the other faculties — 
 a design subordinating the end and scope of these faculties to 
 the conditions of a moral system, of which conscience is the 
 exponent. 
 
 Conceding to the conscience of man the proper place which 
 it claims to hold as related to his whole conscious being, as 
 well as its aims and interests, we are warranted to say that its 
 existence is the proof of a moral system. Its. sphere is co- 
 extensive with consciousness. Its control extends to all volun- 
 
now CONSCIENCE ASSERTS ITS POWEE. 125 
 
 tary action. We may consider it under several aspects, in 
 each of which it asserts its supremacy as authoritative in the 
 moral sphere. 
 
 1. In the first place, it forces upon the individual a sense 
 of his responsibility. Whatever he does, or neglects to do, 
 may be a subject of moral judgment. Conscience holds him 
 fast under law, moral law, and if there were no civil statutes 
 or courts, he would be none the less responsible. Conscience 
 asserts a rule of duty, and impresses upon the soul a sense of 
 its obligation. From this obligation there is no release. It is 
 abiding. It is universal. It does not change with climate, 
 nor waste away with years. From it, there is, and can be, 
 no exemption. 
 
 2. The sphere of conscience extends to a judgment of our 
 relations to our fellow-men. They share with us the same 
 moral natui-e. They hold us responsible for our deeds, and 
 even our thoughts, just as we do them. On this fact, the 
 whole structure of social order and civil government is based. 
 The ultimate appeal, that reaches after a higher and more 
 perfect justice than that embodied in the written statute, is to 
 that equity in which, as its vital air, conscience lives and 
 moves and has its being. In all our social relations, we are 
 spontaneously and inevitably applying rules and tests derived 
 from our moral nature. 
 
 3. Conscience' asserts its power in connectipn with the fears 
 and hopes, the aims and the efforts of man. It makes the 
 good man bold, and the bad man timid. " The wicked* flee 
 when no man pursueth ; but the righteous is bold as a lion." 
 It is through conscience, that guilt is made to excite appre- 
 hension. The concentration of attention and energy becomes 
 sometimes impossible, through those inward rebukes which 
 remind the transgressor of the real character of his acts, and 
 fill him with anxiety not only for real, but imaginary dangers. 
 He knows not in what direction he is secure, or rather, he 
 knows that he is not secure in any. He is forced to feel that 
 he stands alone, that he can have no allies upon whom he can 
 rely, none who are not united to him solely by their selfish 
 interests, that at any moment may come into collision with hia 
 own. 
 
126 EETEIBUTIONS OF CONSCIENCE. 
 
 But tlie reverse is true of the good man. Whether he has 
 human or unseen allies, he is confident that he has them. 
 He knows that he has the hearty sympathy of all that appre- 
 ciate his aims. The approval of conscience is sometimes 
 equivalent to the support of an armed host. It re-assures the 
 spirit. It dispels timidity. It inspires to do and to dare all 
 things to which duty calls. The suggestions of fear, the 
 doubts of success, the whispers of apprehension, are all si- 
 lenced by the convictions of an approving conscience. 
 
 4. But conscience is not merely advisory. Its sphere is 
 judicial and retributory. It is not with impunity that its 
 rules can be transgressed. Unwritten, inaudible, unexpressed, 
 they are recognized by the soul itseK, as supreme above all 
 considerations of ease or interest or gain. Their violation is 
 followed by seK-reproof, self-reproach, and, finally, the agony 
 of remorse. Conscience, when in a state of merely ordinary 
 activity, is a constant source of peace or disquietude. It is 
 through its presence and operation that the thoughts of men 
 are ever " accusing, or else excusing one another." But some- 
 times it exhibits an excej^tional activity, a kind of spasmodic 
 energy which bears down all opposition, and gives it a domi- 
 neering and irresistible mastery over all the fears and hopes, 
 the capacities and sensibilities of the soul. At such times it 
 seems to transform a man, overpowering him with invisible 
 terrors, palsying. his boldest resolutions, forcing him, in the 
 face of his strongest passions, to surrender all the advantages 
 of his crime, to expose his own shame, confess his own guilt, 
 and even offer up, as a voluntary sacrifice, his own life. Its 
 mandates carry with them a resistless authority. They are 
 possessed for him of a moral omnipotence. Before them he 
 shrinks back appalled and helpless. The great prizes of the 
 world's ambitions count as nothing to him. He carries about 
 with him a ceaseless accuser. He is tortured by restless fore- 
 bodmgs. Let him go where he will, to the w^ilderness, to the 
 solitary cave, to the deep darkness in search of a shelter from 
 persecuting thoughts and accusing memories ; it is all in vain. 
 There is no shelter, no place of refuge. He cannot escape 
 his fears. He cannot silence the terrible whisper, heard only 
 in his own soul, of self-accusation. His state of apprehension 
 
CONSCIENCE AND SOCIAL PENALTIES. 127 
 
 is sucli tliat a rustling leaf, a strange foot-fall, an echo of his 
 own words, fills him with affright. Though reason might 
 assure him of safety, and he might know that no minister of 
 human justice was on his track ; that not one of his fellow- 
 beings suspected his guilt ; he could not feel secure ; and in 
 repeated instances, the mere power of conscience has forced 
 such an one to surrender himself into the hands of justice, to 
 he executed upon his own confession. 
 
 It was the knovdedge of such experience as this, undouht- 
 edlj, that led some of the ancient poets to depict as they did, 
 the retributions of Kemesis, or the vengeance of the Furies. 
 They understood, well enough, that in the very nature of 
 man there are those elements out of which self-accusation 
 evokes spectres of guilt, the tortures of remorse, or that intol- 
 erable curse of frenzied apprehension which drives its victim 
 to suicide, in order to escape from himself. 
 
 Such is the retribution which even on earth is sometimes 
 meted out to the guilty by the power of conscience. It for- 
 bids them sleep except in troubled dreams. It follows them 
 behind granite walls, to the interior of palace or prison, to 
 scenes of mirth and revel, through the street to the dwelling, 
 from the dwelling to the grave. 
 
 On the other hand, its benedictions are as beneficent as its 
 curse is terrible. With an approving conscience, men have 
 smiled at torture and death. They have sweetly reposed in 
 dungeons, have borne exile without a murmur, have actually 
 triumphed in the surrender of all that most men hold dearest 
 on earth. Asking no rewards, they have acquiesced in the 
 hardest lot, have faced the gravest dangers, have risked fame 
 and fortmie, content to sink to a state of penmy or scorn, or 
 an unknown grave, if only they could carry with them the 
 peace of their own conscience. 
 
 5. But the retributions of conscience are meted out to the 
 guilty in the moral judgments of -mankind. Even though a 
 man's own conscience be torpid or debauched, this is not 
 the case with the consciences of all other men. Without any 
 formal process, they are, in a sense, his judges. They weigh 
 his -guilt ; they pronounce sentence, and to some extent, they 
 execute sentence. They put upon him the brand of reprobar 
 
128 CX)NSCIENCE AND ETHICAL JUDGMENTS. • 
 
 tion, of moral outlawiy. He must m.eet their contempt, their 
 scorn, their averted looks, their alienated respect. This is 
 often no light penalty. It may even prove crushing, if not 
 fatal. Few men can endure it with equanimity. Some would 
 flee from it to strange lands, where their iniquity is unknown. 
 
 But the experience of the good man presents a marked con- 
 trast. Beside the inward peace of an approving conscience, 
 he is assured of the approval of his fellow-men. So far as 
 conscience prevails with them, they will be his sympathizers, 
 if not his eulogists. They recognize his worth. They regard 
 him with reverence, gratitude and respect. His social rela- 
 tions are made more pleasant and agreeable on the veiy gi'ound 
 of a virtue which the moral sense of those around him con- 
 strains them to recognize. This certainly is of the nature of 
 reward. It is the legitimate result of good deeds in a society 
 constituted of moral natures. 
 
 6. It is to that element in man which is sometimes denomL 
 nated conscience, and sometimes the moral sense, that we 
 turn for the explanation of the fact that certain actions appear 
 beautiful, while others are simply odious. In the daily ex- 
 perience of life there are some deeds that we admire, and 
 some that we reprobate, and this admiration or reprobation is 
 shared by those around us. It is not in our power, while eon- 
 science asserts its supremacy over our moral judgments, to 
 determine capriciously in regard to our own actions, or those 
 of our fellow-men. Some things inspire us with enthusiasm ; 
 others fill us with disgust ; and we cannot, if we would, re- 
 verse the impression of their character. That which is selfish, 
 vicious or sordid, to no pm-pose challenges our admiration ; 
 that which is pure, generous and virtuous, may be depreciated, 
 but it cannot be despised. It is not our moral nature that 
 invests these qualities with what is attractive or repulsive, but 
 it recognizes, and must recognize the fact that they are so 
 invested. 
 
 If any one could have any doubt on this point, he would 
 need only to turn to those characters which figure on the 
 pages of history or of fiction. "We may find heroes of crime 
 there, and they may challenge a sort of admiration. But on 
 reflection we shall find that it is not the crime that excites ad- 
 
ETHICAL JUDGMENTS NOT CAPRICIOUS. 129 
 
 miration, but the rare qualities- — tlie indomitable will, the sur- 
 prising sagacity, the incredible endurance, the exhaustless 
 energy — with which it is associated. If the epic poet seeks a 
 hero, it is one who, if an outlaw, exhibits these qualities ; or 
 higher and nobler qualities, if he ranks with the just and good. 
 No one would think of making a Judas Iscariot or a Benedict 
 Arnold the leading character in a work which was designed 
 to appeal to the deepest and strongest sympathies, or the best 
 and highest aspirations of the soul. A Dives in his purple 
 and fine linen, and amid all the sumptuousness of his feasts, 
 is no better than a human swine, and would rather paralyze 
 the hand than inspire the soul of one who should attempt to 
 draw his portrait. 
 
 It is thus that vice bears about with it a brand like the 
 mark set upon Cain's brow, a manifest seal of reprobation, 
 that all the resources of genius and all the skill of art can 
 never erase. But a good deed, shining out of the rubbish of 
 the past, fixes the admiring gaze. It excites emulation. It 
 kindles enthusiasm. Sometimes it has an inspiring power, 
 lifting men, as it were, out of themselves, and making them 
 forget all selfishness, all low and sordid aims. It need not be 
 associated with rank or station. It may have nothing exter- 
 nal to illustrate or commend it. And yet men, void of prin- 
 ciple themselves, will unite to do it homage. They will even 
 build monuments to its memory. They unite in conferring 
 upon it a fame, compared with which the blazoned achieve- 
 ments of mere strength or courage or animal energy are as 
 dross to gold. 
 
 All this indicates the extent to which, in certain directions, 
 our moral nature asserts itself against mere j)assion or ca- 
 pricious fancy. That, nature compels us to recognize things 
 as they are, to see beauty in virtue and sordidness in vice, to 
 acknowledge the inspiring and ennobling example of the one, 
 and the repulsive loathsomeness of the other. All voluntary 
 actions thus come under the notice of conscience. They are 
 right or wrong, and as such are to be approved or con- 
 demned. 
 
 7. Thus the extended connections and relations of our moral 
 nature spread themselves over the entire constitution of things 
 9 
 
130 , MORAL ADAPTATION. 
 
 to which man belongs. That constitution cannot be properly- 
 understood without constant reference to them. It is adapted 
 to them^ and they are adapted to it. The adjustment is mutual 
 and all-pervading. It is in the light of such considerations as 
 these, that we must intei-pret the present system of things. 
 Of this system, the distinctive and most characteristic feature, 
 is the moral constitution of man. This discriminates between 
 good and evil. This makes every man responsible. This lies 
 at the foundation of all government. This speaks authorita- 
 tively, while it also, in a measure, executes its sentences, in- 
 flicting penalty or bestowing reward. It makes man a sub- 
 ject of moral government, whether that government be con- 
 sidered as limited to the present state or not. It forces upon 
 us those estimates of things and actions which command for 
 virtue enthusiastic approval and admii-ation, and for vice hatred 
 or scorn. 
 
 Thus, if other evidences of the existence and operation of a 
 moral system could be set aside, the fact of man's moral nature, 
 as it comes before us, would be all-sufficient. It alone would 
 reflect the intention of its author. It would show that all 
 men sustain to one another moral relations, that we must all 
 judge and be judged, that a sense of responsibility is insepar- 
 able from our conscious activity, and that, whatever interpre- 
 tation we may put upon the constitution of things to which 
 we belong, it is framed and constructed as if with the evident 
 design to produce the very results that must flow from a moral 
 administration, so conducted, with a kind of deliberate for- 
 bearance, as to allow human actions to develop their proper 
 nature, and await the slow but sure visitation of merited retri- 
 bution. But when this point is reached, where we find all 
 voluntary action possessed of moral character, and actually 
 judged as such by the human conscience ; when we see it sub- 
 jected to retribution or visited by reward, independently of 
 aU civil laws or processes ; when we see that no caprice of the 
 individual or legislation of the state can set aside the laws of 
 our moral nature, and that we must recognize these and their 
 awards, whether we will or not ; — there remains no longer a 
 question whether a moral system exists. It exists, and it is 
 actually exhibited before us. We see it in operation, and in- 
 
OBJECTIONS. 131 
 
 voluntarily confess tliat it is a necessity flovv^ing from tlie con- 
 stitution of our nature. 
 
 YIII. 
 
 OBJECTIONS TO A MOKAL SYSTEM CONSIDEKED. 
 
 The conviction felt by thoughtful minds that a moral system 
 should exist, will scarcely be questioned. Only such a system 
 meets the instinctive demand — springing out of our moral 
 nature — that systematic provision should be made for reward- 
 ing good and punishing evil. When we trace the career of 
 men or nations, even if the story be merely Hctitious, there is 
 a peculiar satisfaction, when we iind that the criminal is ex- 
 posed and exeinplarily punished, and that innocence is vindi- 
 cated and justified. 
 
 Herein we discover the testimony which our own moral na- 
 ture bears to the propriety of a moral system, and, we may 
 add, to the necessity of it, if our own innate sense of justice 
 is not to be violated by indiscriminate allotments. Our con- 
 tinued experience of human life develops and strengthens this 
 conviction of the propriety of, and this demand for, a moral 
 system. We see, sometimes with a kind of shuddering ap- 
 proval, illustrations of what we must admit to be a fit connec- 
 tion between the act, or course of acts, and its sequel. Just 
 as, when the moral follows the fable, we give to it our hearty 
 assent, or when listening to the parable, we accept its applica- 
 tion as the just and true solution of a moral problem ; so, our 
 whole life long, we are coming in contact with the careers of 
 other men, that, when followed out to the issue, have a kind 
 of dramatic unity, and close with a fitting catastrophe. Yf hen 
 Judas, smitten by despair and remorse, falls by his own hand — 
 when Caesar, the triumphant usui^er, sinks under the blows 
 of conspirators — when ITapoleon ends his troublous career of 
 ambition, an exile on the lone rock of the ocean — when the 
 last bigot of the Stuart dynasty in England flees from the 
 lising indignation of an outraged people, to drag out his lin- 
 gering years, 9n ignoble dependent on a foreign comi;; our 
 iimate sense of justice, responding with ever increased and 
 
132 OBJECTIONS. 
 
 strengthening conviction to the propriety of tlie result, is edu- 
 cated to demand that the same principles of retribution shall 
 be applied universally, in other words, that they be reduced 
 to, or embodied in, a system that shall comprehend within its 
 sweep the whole sphere of human activity. 
 
 ITow it is true that this instinctive demand for a moral system 
 — a demand which is provoked within us at eveiy step of expe- 
 rience, by every page of history, by the sight of every act, 
 whether of right or wrong, generosity or meanness — ^does not 
 prove that the system actually exists. But it does prove that 
 such a system harmonizes vdth the instincts of our being — 
 that if it does not exist, there is something wanting to our 
 moral satisfaction which nothing else can supply, and that, 
 supposing it to exist, we have such a mutual adjustment be- 
 tween our own moral nature and the sphere in which it ope- 
 rates, as accords with the analogies of creative wisdom — ^resem- 
 bling, in fact, the adaptation of the eye to the light, and 
 light to the eye, the lungs to the air, and the air to the lungs. 
 So that almost as one might say the eye implies the existence 
 of light, or the lungs the existence of air, so this instinctive 
 demand of our moral nature for a systematic provision for the 
 administration of justice, seems to imply the existence of a 
 moral system, to which our nature itself properly belongs, and 
 in which alone it can fitly live and breathe. 
 
 The facts that have been adduced in proof of a moral sys- 
 tem cannot be set aside, and their cumulative force must be 
 pronounced irresistible. But while the tendencies and forces 
 and laws, which look to discriminating retribution of good 
 and evil, will be admitted, it is asserted, by way of objection, 
 that they are sometimes ineffective — ^that vice actually pros- 
 pers — that virtue is subject to wrong and oppression — that a 
 man's outward condition is no sure indication of his moral 
 worth, and that society itseK is full of these anomalies, which 
 suggest only an inadequate and partial provision for the exe- 
 cution of justice, and leave one still in doubt whether this 
 moral system, admitting it to exist, is not so cumbered with 
 exceptions, as to detract very materially from tiie. conclusive- 
 ness of the proofs of its existence. 
 
ANSWERS TO OBJECTIOIs'S. 133 
 
 To all this, there are se-veral fitting replies. 
 
 1. In the first place, the very instances upon which the ob- 
 jection is based, may turn out in the end, when studied in all 
 their bearings and results, to be rather the proofs of, than ex- 
 ceptions to, the operation of a moral system. They are cited 
 at just that point in their progress where the process is mani- 
 festly incomplete. The wicked man is in the full enjoyment 
 of impunity, rioting in his ill-gotten gains, while the good man 
 is passing through the furnace of trial, and in each case the 
 final issue is unknown. Let it become known — let it be pa- 
 tiently awaited — and the objector may be silenced. As a fact 
 of actual experience, we see the carefully guarded secret of 
 wickedness strangely betrayed. The ill-gotten gain eats the 
 flesh of the possessor, "as it were fire." Contempt and dis- 
 grace follow — however tardily — on the steps of false honor, 
 and the short, splendid triumph of vice is succeeded by a re- 
 verse that derives a more impressive significance from the 
 contrast. 
 
 On the other hand, the good man comes forth from the f ur_ 
 nace of affliction, where he was tempted to despond, or even 
 despair, purified by the fires of trial, illustrious by endurance, 
 and applauded even by those who once, with sceptical indif- 
 ference, cited him as an objection to the conclusive proof of a 
 moral system. In fact, no present immunity of evil, no pros, 
 ent oppression of justice, can properly be considered by itself, 
 isolated and independent. It is only a link in a chain, and 
 must be judged as such. The methods of a surprising and un- 
 anticipated retribution are practically numberless and inex- 
 haustible. The wicked man may have obliterated the track of 
 his guilt, and felt that he could defy pursuit. Justice may 
 find itself bafiled in the vain prosecution of a lost clew, but 
 sometimes, long after all pursuit has been abandoned, the 
 course of events, like an underground river emerging to the 
 light, floats up to full view the buried evidence, and men 
 tremble with awe before a providential vindication of justice, 
 that has suddenly brought out of the dark background of 
 sceptical questionings of a moral system, the blazing testimony 
 to the sleepless justice of God. 
 
 2. The objector is met yet again by the reply that he has 
 
134 WHAT A MORAL SYSTEM MAT INCLUDE. 
 
 no warrant to assnme that lie has before him, here and now, 
 anything more than a fragment of the moral system. The 
 presumption is that he has nothing more. He cannot assert 
 — there is strong reason why he should not assert — ^that to ns 
 the entire moral system is visible. He might make a strong 
 case, if he could prove that the only possible reward or ret- 
 ribution must take place on earth, but so far from being 
 able to prove this, the presumption is all the other way. Of 
 course, an objection that is based upon his assumption, falls 
 to the ground. On the other hand, there is no need of 
 jproving an extension of the moral system beyond the visible 
 limits of our experience. H there is nothing inconsistent 
 with the system in supposing it, we are at liberty to make 
 the supposition, and in that case the force of the objection is 
 lost. 
 
 3. Still another reply may be made. A moral system is 
 consistent with the possibility that other ends are to be gained 
 by it, than an exact and immediate distribution of rewards 
 and punishments. A moral system may include in itself a 
 system, more or less complete, of moral government, and 
 "omething else beside. It may be not only a hall of justice, 
 but a school-room. It may be designed to develop moral 
 character, as well as to mete out retribution to it. There is, 
 as we shall see, the strongest presumption that this is the case. 
 If so, it will necessarily modify the features of a moral sys- 
 tem, and modify them in those very respects in which they 
 will offer occasion for the objections that have been urged. 
 
 For instance, the very idea of probation implies a qualified 
 and temporary suspension of certain processes which might 
 be supposed essential to the perfection of moral government. 
 The immediate infliction of penalty would exclude the oppor- 
 tunity to repent. Moreover, a man confronted with the 
 certainty of unmediate punishment following swift upon 
 transgression, could scarcely be said to be in a state of trial. 
 He would obey — if he obeyed at all — through the influence 
 of terror, rather than from the deliberate strength of his own 
 convictions. To allow him freedom to act and shape his own 
 destiny, and to do it in view of conflicting considerations and 
 inducements which he must weigh for himself, there must be 
 
PHYSICAL COMBINED WITH MOSAL. 135 
 
 an apparent suspension of the processes of justice, precisely; 
 like vv^hat we witness in connection with this moral system, 
 and of which the objector readily avails himseK. His objec- 
 tion, therefore, is directed really not against the moral system 
 itseK, as a system of moral government, but at what is allied 
 with it, and qualifies it. He objects to what is pertinent and 
 necessary to probation, and yet he cannot assert that the 
 anomalies whicb he cites as objections to the moral system, 
 could be dispensed with, without dispensing witii probation 
 also. 
 
 4. Again, it may be replied that in many, if not all, cases 
 where vice seems to be favored or rewarded, it is not the vice, 
 but the energy, the industry, the sagacity, or some other 
 natural gift or advantage, which is connected with it. A 
 man may prosper in spite of his vice, because he possesses 
 and exercises those natural qualities which may be said to 
 merit or assure success. The rewards of virtue, on the one 
 hand, and of sagacity or energy on the other, are not the 
 same. They may properly enough be allied, but they may 
 also be dissociated, and virtue alone may be assured of its 
 proper reward — inward peace and public respect — and yet be 
 compelled to forego the rewards that belong to qualities 
 which it does not itself possess. 
 
 This distinction is noted by Pope, in his " Essay on Man." 
 He exclaims : 
 
 " See, Falkland dies, the virtuous and the just, 
 See God-like Turenne prostrate in the dust; 
 See Sidney bleeds amid the martial strife ; 
 Was it their virtue, or contempt of life ? " 
 
 And again : 
 
 " But sometimes virtue starves, while vice is fed: 
 What then? Is the reward of virtue bread? 
 That vice may merit, 'tis the price of toil. 
 The knave deserves it when he tills the soil; 
 The knave deserves it when he tempts the main, 
 Where folly fights for kings, or dives for gain. 
 The good man may be weak, be indolent; 
 Nor is his claim to plenty, but content." 
 
130 PHYSICAL AND MOEAX. 
 
 The explanation of this is that the moral system is inter- 
 penetrated by, and to some extent combined with, the natural 
 system of rewards for natural, as distinguished from moral, 
 qualities. The laws of each operate within the same sphere, 
 and the result naturally appears confused, unless we carefully 
 discriminate the operation of each. Yet, just as the natural 
 system indisputably exists, notwithstanding the industrious 
 are sometimes cheated of the rewards of their industry, and 
 the indolent are made possibly the heirs of fortune ; notwith- 
 standing that misfortune may be inflicted by the operation of 
 physical laws in such a way as to deprive a man of his power 
 to labor, or to rob him of the proper reward of his industry, 
 so, in like manner, we say that when what may be called the 
 natural system of rewards, with its laws, intrudes into the 
 moral sphere, and confuses the results that follow the opera- 
 tion of intermingling laws, it is no ground for denying the 
 existence of a moral system. That system is to some extent 
 interfered with, and yet its character as a system is not lost. 
 If we would judge it fairly upon its merits, we should note 
 the results of actions, not as they indicate natural capacity, 
 but as they are virtuous or vicious, and by thus separating 
 the moral from the physical sphere, we should see how point- 
 less and feeble are the objections against it, derived from 
 unequal earthly allotments, due not to moral qualities, but 
 natural capacity. 
 
 IX. 
 
 THE BEING AND CIIAEACTEE OF THE AUTHOE OF THE 
 MOEAL SYSTEM. 
 
 If a moral system exists, has it an intelligent Author, a 
 presiding Mind ? Surely, if the argument from design is 
 valid anywhere, it is valid here. The relation of man to his 
 own mental and moral constitution, to society, to nature, with 
 its laws and forces, is such that vice is reprobated and pun- 
 ished, and virtue favored and commended. The relation of 
 man's moral nature to the constitution of things, in which it 
 
HAS THE MORAL SYSTEM AN ATJTHOK ? 137 
 
 finds its fitting sphere, is evidently adjusted by a nice adapta- 
 tion, tliat seems to imply foretlionglit and compreliensive 
 design. Or, if we fall back upon tbe structure itself of man's 
 mental and moral being, with its varied yet mutually adjusted 
 faculties, adapting it to become the subject of moral govern- 
 ment, our observation of it leads us to the same conclusion. 
 There is an evident intention that man shall be made to feel 
 that he is not at liberty to act capriciously, but must govern 
 his com-se by such considerations as are suggested by the laws 
 and conditions of a moral system, which sternly rebukes the 
 evil, and emphatically commends the good. 
 
 "WTiy should any man deny to this system an intelligent 
 author ? It is the simplest solution of the problem ; the most 
 natural inference from an impartial study of the subject. Is 
 anything gained by the denial ? Are the apprehensions of 
 conscious guilt relieved by seeing and recognizing no presid- 
 ing mind directing the laws and forces, the existence of 
 which it is constrained to acknowledge ? These laws and 
 forces are ever visibly at work. Guilt cannot put itseK 
 beyond their reach. There is no line of precautionary en- 
 trenchment which they may not pass. In their operation, 
 they are as stern and unbending as an iron will. In their 
 reach, they are as comprehensive as Omnipresence itself. 
 Human strength and skiU are as vain to resist or evade them, 
 as chaff in the grasp of the whirlwind. They work out their 
 end, often silently, but steadily, surely, and as irresistibly as 
 the fiat of an Omnipotent Huler. They move on, passing 
 and repassing one another — ^mysteriously, perhaps, to us — 
 like the hands on the dial-plate, till the clock of Justice 
 strikes the hour of retribution, and it is the well-studied and 
 well-grounded confidence which they inspire, that teaches 
 philosophy, little instructed by faith, to exclaim : 
 
 " Truth crushed to earth will rise again, 
 . The eternal years of God are hers." 
 
 In any case, under the moral system as it is even now, we 
 witness the most terrible retributions of guilt, enough cer- 
 tainly, if we suppose it continued and extended on, so as to 
 
138 "nattjPvE of things" inadequate. 
 
 ombrace tlie unseen future as well as the present, to inspire 
 the gravest apprehension, to make the criminal feel that he 
 breathes the air of retribution, and that all the elements of 
 remorse and despairing anguish, which others have ex- 
 perienced, are in store for him. He certainly gains nothing 
 by the hypothetical transfer of the control of the laws and 
 forces of a retributive moral system, from the hands of an 
 infinitely wise and controlling Providence, to a mysterious 
 something, a resistless energy which he cannot define, but 
 which he calls, perhaps, chance, fate, or " the nature of things." 
 
 Between this " nature of things," and a Supreme Mind, 
 manifestly the choice lies. The moral system exists, and 
 exists as it does, either by this " nature of things," or by the 
 will and counsel of an intelligent author. Can we resolve it 
 into the former ? Is thei^e anything in this nature of things 
 that necessarily determines this moral system and man's rela- 
 tion to it ? Is such an hypothesis tenable ? 
 
 Plainly there is much which must be conceded to be neces- 
 sary, and this necessity may be traced perhaps as well to the 
 nature of things as to anything else. Tv/o and two make 
 four, The three angles of a triangle are equal to two right 
 angles. Such is the fact, and it cannot be otherwise. But 
 now, from the nature of things^ it is assumed as a necessary 
 result, that vice is attended by contempt, distrust, and other 
 penalties or infelicities. Yet we canaot proceed far in tracing 
 out the process by which the result is reached, before we come 
 upon certain arrangements and conditions which cannot be 
 predicated as necessary, on the ground of anything implied in 
 the nature of things. The connection of a vicious disposition 
 with a physical structure susceptible to the pain that follows 
 vicious indulgence, is by no means necessary in such a sense 
 that from the nature of things it could not be otherwise. The 
 constitution of our moral nature, which fits us to be the sub- 
 jects of a moral system, is by no means necessary in the same 
 sense. There are elements that, for aught we can see, might 
 have been omitted from our mental structure, and the omis- 
 sion of which would have cancelled features indispensable to 
 that moral system which we find existhig, and to which by 
 virtue of our moral nature we belong. 
 
A MIND NECESSAEY. 139 
 
 Leaving, therefore, as broad a margin for the occupancy 
 and operation of the nature of things, as any one can plausibly 
 assert, there is still a broad sphere where we must recognize 
 the presence and working of an intelligent force. The moral 
 system, as it is, could not have been constituted without 
 the determination and adjustment of the elements of our 
 moral nature,^ and the adaptation of these to the various con- 
 ditions of our existence. They must have been adapted to 
 our physical frame and our material surroundings, to our 
 intellectual aptitudes and capacities, to our social condition 
 and relations ; and to assume that there is anything in the 
 7iatuTe of things which determines such adaptation to be 
 necessary, is utterly groundless and unwarrantable. Obvious- 
 ly, such an assumption has no shadow of support in fact, and 
 to admit it would, in logical consistency, require us to proceed 
 further, even to the gross absm-dity of asserting that all 
 evidences of design in the universe, whether from a human 
 or divine source, may be resolved into the operation of the 
 nature of things. In such a case, we should, of course, deny 
 the moral system to have an intelligent author, but we should 
 also go much beyond this. We should logically annihilate 
 the moral system itseK, and all responsibility with it. 
 
 If we shrink from this absurd conclusion, we must admit 
 that the moral system has an intelligent author and a presid- 
 ing mind ; that it is constructed and constituted in accordance, 
 indeed, with the nature of things ; yet with a variety and 
 richness of adaptation which declare the character and purpose 
 of the great Being with whom it originated. It is his work — ■ 
 after all possible concessions to the nature of things — as much 
 and as really as any structure of human art — in which the 
 various quahties of the materials to be employed are predeter- 
 mined — is the Vv^ork of man. To deny it to be his and credit 
 it to the nature of things, would be as presumptuous and as 
 groundless as to deny that any product of man's ingenuity 
 was his, because the material he employed and its diverse 
 properties might be ascribed to nature ; because the wood or 
 metal could be wrought only in a certain way and in certain 
 forms, or was subject to the law that determines the strength 
 and durability of materials. 
 
140 JUSTICE OF GOD. 
 
 If the moral system, then, constructed in accordance with the 
 nature of things, is the work of an intelligent author, it will 
 necessarily, when properly studied, reveal somewhat of his 
 design, and it will serve to exhibit or illustrate his character. 
 We may therefore investigate his character in his work, and 
 see what attributes are involved in the design manifest in its 
 origination, construction and administration. 
 
 1. The most striking feature, perhaps, of the moral system 
 which we have surveyed, is the favor which it extends to 
 virtue, and the reprobation which it inflicts upon vice. This 
 is indeed its distinctive, characteristic feature. It is framed 
 mainly in the interest of justice. If it should be asserted that 
 human happiness is the main object in view — an assertion con- 
 fronted often with manifest failure to attain the object — it 
 must still be admitted that this happiness is conditioned on 
 conformity to virtuous obligation, and that what constitutes 
 the most prominent index of the character of the system, is, 
 its stern repression of wrong, and its subjection of human ac- 
 tion to the terms of inexorable law. There is no happiness, 
 properly, so called, except on these terms. This is the language 
 of the moral system — the language of the author of that sys- 
 tem. The one indispensable requisite is conformity to moral 
 law. Is not this a plain indication of the justice of the 
 author of this system ? 
 
 2. But is not the system also one that indicates benevolence ? 
 True, it has stern features. It emphasizes justice. But it 
 does not therefore exclude benevolence. Benevolence rather, 
 in its broad sense, includes justice. We find in the moral 
 system indeed no ground for ascribing to its author that easy 
 indifference or unconcern which would leave men without re- 
 straint to do evil, or pass over their transgressions with impu- 
 nity. Such an attribute would argue weakness and imperfec- 
 tion, rather than strength or excellence. It might even prove 
 itself practically malevolent, allowing license to vice in the 
 pursuit of imagined pleasure, till the most terrible and tre- 
 mendous penalties overwhelm it. True benevolence will aim 
 at the greatest good of all. It will punish where punishment 
 is necessary to this end. It will never dishonor or depreciate 
 justice, or be indifferent to moral desert. 
 
BENEVOLENCE OF GOD. 141 
 
 Sucli beneyolence is indicated in the moral system, and 
 must be predicated of tlie author of that system.. It is no ar- 
 gument, not even a presumption against it, that wickedness 
 is sometimes overwhelmed by a terrible retribution. The ex- 
 emplary chastisement may be interpreted as a necessary and 
 even benevolent warning, contributing to the common, if not 
 the individual's security. A hand thrust into the flame, feels 
 the torture, and is at once withdrawn. The prompt admoni- 
 tion of the pain is proof of benevolent design. If it were not 
 for the torture, a vital organ of the body might be seriously 
 injured, or even consumed, without the victim being aware of 
 it. So men, knowing indeed the destructive nature of vice, 
 might persist in it, even to a fatal result, the more readily, if 
 the transgression did not bring with it its own torture, the 
 agony of mental remorse or physical suffering. The torture 
 affixed to vice as its penalty is not only in the interest of vir- 
 tue, but of the welfare of all observers ; possibly, unless he 
 has gone already too far, of the transgressor himself. 
 
 The general well-being is certainly dependent upon the 
 existence of a moral system. The disposition to promote that 
 well-being on the part of the author of that system, is evidenced 
 by its actual introduction and administration. He is ben evolent 
 in the highest sense, when He holds out no false promise to 
 happiness ; when He plainly conditions its attainments on con- 
 formity to moral law. We may, therefore, on the ground of 
 what this moral system implies, assert the goodness of its au- 
 thor. The evidence from this source is independent of, and 
 yet in harmony with, that which is derived from the benevo- 
 lent provisions of the natural world. The inward peace and 
 self-approval which follow the performance of a good deed 
 that makes others happy, is an incontrovertible proof that the 
 author of the moral system desires the welfare of those subject 
 to it. It sets the seal of His own approval on an act which 
 diffuses happiness. 
 
 3. There is scarcely need of any elaborate exposition of the 
 evidences which the moral system affords of the wisdom of its 
 author. It is true, the illimitable extent of the system pre- 
 cludes us from doing full justice to this attribute. But even 
 the narrow field open to us, is sufficient for its vindication. 
 
142 . WISDOM 'OF OOD. 
 
 The structure of our moral being, its adaptation to its ap- 
 pointed sphere, the varied provisions by which the ultimate 
 exposure of wickedness is secured, the wonderful connection 
 established between sin and penalty, such that, in the absence 
 of all exterior interference, crime is made to become its own 
 punishment in the consciousness of the wrong-doer — all these, 
 and countless other provisions, indicate a wisdom of design 
 and arrangement, that may possibly be paralleled, but cannot 
 be surpassed in the material frame, or the operations of natural 
 as distinguished from moral law. 
 
 Thus, with the moral system simply in view, we are war- 
 ranted to assert unequivocally the justice, the benevolence and 
 the wisdom of its author. These are the three leading attributes, 
 which may be said to imply others kindred to them, and which 
 constitute what is most essential in the divine character. But 
 they are those in which Vv^e are most directly and personally 
 interested. They are those, morever, which throw the clearest 
 light on our interpretation of man's relations to God, his duty 
 here, and his destiny hereafter. 
 
 X. 
 
 THE rUTIIRE LIFE. THE NEGATIVE AEGTIMENT. 
 
 The argument of Bishop Butler on the Future Life is 
 simply negative. It is conclusive against the objector, who 
 finds the burden of proving a positive thrown upon himself ; 
 but though it may silence his objections, it does not remove 
 doubts. What was lacking in Butler's argument may be sup- 
 plied from those results of the investigation of this moral 
 system, which, by examining that system first, we are now 
 prepared — as by his arrangement he was not — to use and 
 apply. 
 
 The negative argument starts with what may be termed 
 the postulate — that whatever now exists, it may be presumed 
 will continue to exist, unless some sufficient cause for its ceas- 
 ing to be, can be shown. The soul exists, an individual con- 
 sciousness. It has already passed through successive states 
 
BUTLEE ON THE FUTURE LIFE. 143 
 
 and conditions, sometimes very distinct and varied, without 
 losing its identity, and of the future experiences that await it, 
 there is none, unless it be that which we term death, that can 
 warrant the apprehension of its destruction. But of what 
 death is, except in its formal aspects, we have no adequate 
 knowledge, antecedent to experience. We only feel assured 
 that it annihilates nothing — ^not a particle of matter, not an 
 element of force. No such annihilation, by any power or 
 change whatever, has taken place within the sphere of our 
 knowledge in all time past. Forms of matter are dissolved, 
 analyzed, etherealized, but never annihilated. The same is 
 true of immaterial agents. The presumption is that all which 
 constitutes that mysterious identity, the conscious being, will 
 continue to exist, if death does not dissolve or disorganize it. 
 Yet it can scarcely be argued that the change which death 
 may be supposed to effect, can be greater than that which the 
 soul has already undergone. The change in going out of the 
 world can scarcely be greater than that of coming into it, and 
 analogy itself might even suggest that death itseK was but 
 a new birth into another and higher sphere, another advance 
 step that will open a new or broader world to disenthralled and 
 expanded powers. This presumption derives confirmation 
 from the facts of experience. These go to show that the mind 
 is more or less independent of the body ; that it uses it, in 
 fact, simply as an instrument ; that it may continue to exist 
 in the full integrity of its powers while it gives, through the 
 body, no external demonstration of it ; that even when the 
 physical frame is sinking in the weakness of dissolution, the 
 soul, although in close connection and deepest sympathy with 
 it, may give proof of undiminished and mature vigor, or even 
 an unprecedented and triumphant energy. 
 
 These facts, w^hile by no means conclusive of the point at 
 issue, are not without weight. They are especially important, 
 as determining the relations of the soal to the body. Evi- 
 dently it is not the eye that sees, or the hand that wills to 
 grasp, or the brain that thinks. These may be in certain con- 
 ditions of existence necessary organs, but they are instrumen- 
 tal, precisely as a telescope is, or a lever, or the organs of ar- 
 ticulate speech. Yery considerable portions of the brain may 
 
144 THE NEGATIVE AEaUMENT. 
 
 bo removed, without affecting the mental powers. In sleep 
 the exercise of the voluntary muscles is completely suspended, 
 and in a swoon the activity of the mind itself is suspended, 
 and yet the integrity of the soul itseK remains unimpaired. 
 
 All this indicates a great and marked, we may say radical, 
 distinction between the faculties of the soul and the organs of 
 the body. They are not only not identical, but to a consid- 
 erable extent, notwithstanding their close conjunction, inde- 
 pendent of each other. The change that dissolves the body 
 with its organs, need not necessarily disturb the identity of 
 the Spiritual being that had made it its instrument. 
 
 Indeed, we are quite unqualified to define identity, or to 
 show with what changes it may yet consist. Even continuous 
 consciousness is no sufficient test. Radical changes of charac- 
 ter vfill not destroy or even affect it. Much less will any 
 physical change that takes place here and now prejudice it. 
 If all the particles of matter of which the body is composed 
 pass away, or change many times in the course of an ordinary 
 life, the Spiritual being is not dependent on one or all or any 
 portion of these particles. We can scarcely suppose that 
 death itself, annihilating no element of matter or force, will 
 subject spiritual identity to any more severe, or at least fatal, 
 shock than it has experienced already. 
 
 Bishop Butler seems to admit that the conclusiveness of his 
 argument depends upon the indivisibility and indissolubility 
 of consciousness. To prove this indivisibility, he falls back 
 on the arguments of his eminent predecessor, Dr. Samuel 
 Clarke, in his controversy with Dodwell, who maintained the 
 "JSTatural Mortality of the Soul." Dr. Chalmers speaks 
 lightly of Butler's reasoning, more lightly, we may presume, 
 than he would have done if we could suppose him thoroughly 
 familiar with the controversy between Dodwell and Clarke. 
 But we may safely say, that as against Dodwell, who was 
 driven to assume the dissolubility of the soul in support of 
 his conclusions, Clarke has not only the best of the argument, 
 but simply overwhelms his opponent. One must prove the 
 divisibility of consciousness, the dissolubility of the soul, as 
 Dodwell never did, before he is qualified to assert that death 
 can be fatal to spiritual identity. So long as, in all our inves- 
 
THE FUTURE LIFE SUGGESTED. 145 
 
 tigations of the relations of soul and body, we find tliem sus- 
 taining respectively the characters of the originating and im- 
 pelling power and the obedient instrument, we find grave 
 difficulties in accepting the theory that thought or conscious- 
 ness is the result or product of organization, and that with the 
 disorganization of the body it must come to an end. 
 
 Such, in substance, is Bishop Butlei-'s negative argument. 
 It is burdened by the almost necessary collateral inference 
 that brutes as well as men are immortal. It has perhaps some 
 other drawbacks, but still its main and characteristic defect, is 
 that it is simply negative. It silences the objector, but it 
 does not satisfy the doubter. 
 
 It is at this point that we revert to those characteristics of 
 the moral system which indicate the design and character of 
 its author. We have seen that He is at once just, and good, 
 and wise. Of course, we infer that what he does, or what he 
 fails or declines to do, will be in perfect accordance with these 
 attributes. 
 
 But before proceeding to this, which may be considered the 
 positive argument for the future life, there are some other 
 points which may here be considered. 
 
 1. In the first place, the circumstances of our being ai'e 
 such as to suggest naturally to us the thought of a life to 
 come, as if to make it familiar, and habituate us to it. The 
 present state of existence is limited and brief. We cannot 
 contemplate it without noting its narrow boundaries. On 
 either side of the three-score years and ten extends limitless 
 duration, and the soul, gifted with the power of looking be- 
 fore and after, cannot fail to have its own relation to the 
 boundless future, as well as boundless past, suggested shai-ply 
 and often by the bounded present. The frequent experience 
 of human life renews the suggestion — the fading hues of 
 health, the decaying strength, the crumbling frame, the dis- 
 ease steadily encroaching on the vital powers, the prospective 
 separation of those whom love or friendship has long united, 
 the retrospect of many a death-broken association, and withal 
 the countless symbols of decay and death that confront us 
 with the changing seasons and the dying year. I*Tor is this all. 
 We enter on courses of thought, on plans of study that reach 
 10 
 
14:6 CAPACITIES FOB A BROADER SPHERE. 
 
 on in their proper connections and relations beyond all earthly 
 opportunities of application ; and in the enthnsiasm of the 
 mental pursuits in which we indulge, we find our restless en- 
 deavors chafing against the barriers that bound this present 
 state, and impelhng us to ask whether any or what opportuni- 
 ties may lie beyond. 
 
 It is true that this, in itself considered, is no ^roof of a 
 future life ; but the fact that such a life is constantly suggested 
 by the conditions of our being, leads us to ask why it is so 
 ordered if the present state is the soul's only sphere of effort 
 or of hope % We cannot well harmonize it with the fitness 
 of things, or the wisdom of a divine design, or, as Dr. Henry 
 More has noted, with the veracity of God. 
 
 2. Moreover, we have, and are conscious of, powers, which 
 here are at best but partially developed, and perhaps are inca- 
 pable of development, unless in a broadly expanded sphere. 
 We have capacities for a knowledge that is here beyond our 
 eager grasp ; for a happiness which eye hath not seen or ear 
 heard ; for attainments of which we can here only dream ; 
 for a conformity to, and a communion with, the Eternal 
 Spirit, from which we are largely debarred by the limitations 
 of our present sphere, with its material clogs and physical bar- 
 riers ; and the very possession of such capacities as ours, seems 
 to warrant us in regarding them as prophetic intimations of a 
 future to which they shall be more fully and worthily adapted. 
 In the Q^^-, or in the embryo before birth, there are rudiment- 
 ary organs which are simply useless and answer no present end ; 
 but they are prophetic of a sphere not yet realized, in which 
 they shall have full play — a sphere in which the eye shall 
 behold the light, and the lungs shall breathe the air, and the 
 wing shall soar aloft, and each once rudimentary organ shall 
 be expanded to the full capacity of its developed powers. 
 And why may we not regard the slumbering capacities of the 
 soul, liere developing, indeed, but never fully developed on 
 earth, as prophecies of a future in which their largest efforts 
 shall have full scope, and their longing aspirations attain full 
 satisfaction. 
 
 3. Nor is this all. The world is full of what we are accus- 
 tomed to regard as emblems of immortality. They are ever 
 
EMBLEMS OF niMOETALITY. 147 
 
 before our eyes, ever at our side, ever beneath our feet. We 
 see them in the buried germ that wears out the winter in its 
 frozen tomb, to wake with the new spring-time to bloom and 
 vigor ; in the seed that is stored awaj sometimes for months, 
 sometimes for years, sometimes for centuries, with a mysteri- 
 ous hfe folded up m it, that may at any time — if it has been 
 preserved from damaging exposure — give evidence that its 
 long-suspended activity has no identity with death ; in the 
 hidden root, covered up by the dying herbage and the winter's 
 snows, and giving, for a long time, no signs of vital energy, 
 but at length sending up the green blade or the vigorous 
 stalk, and clothing these in bloom and beauty ; in the close- 
 packed bud that forms itself beneath the very stalk of the 
 dying leaf, and enfolds the immortalities of future leaves and 
 blossoms, which it guards safe beneath winter's icy coating 
 for the fruits and harvests of months to come ; in the worm 
 that weaves about it, as with its dying energy, a kind of silken 
 shroud, to emerge, after the long inaction, as it were, of a 
 death-sleep, with all the gaudy beauty and the winged capacity 
 that fit it for a sphere as strange to a worm, as an angel's 
 sphere to us ; in the Anastasis, or, properly interpreted, the 
 resurrection flower of Eastern deserts, swept, withered, and 
 almost crisped by the consuming blasts, far away from its 
 birth-place, and yet, at the touch of moisture in its new home, 
 unfolding its shrivelled leaves, and shooting downward its 
 withered roots, and putting on again all its lost beauty, till it 
 triumphs in a transformation like a resurrection from the 
 dead. 
 
 Here we find beautiful symbols, striking analogies. Do 
 they prove anything ? By the tests of logic, nothing at all 
 concerning man's immortality. But his sensitiveness to their 
 suggestions does prove something. It proves that his nature 
 is such that he grasps at these analogies, that there is a native 
 afiinity between it and a future immortal life. It is this 
 which gives such point and force to the words of the poet — 
 
 " Shall man be left forgotten in the dust, 
 
 When fate, relenting, bids the flower revive ? 
 Shall nature's voice, to man alone unjust, 
 
 Bid him, though doomed to perish, hope to live ? 
 
143 THE POSITIVE AKGUMENT. 
 
 Is it for this fair virtue oft must strive 
 With disappointment, penury and pain ? 
 
 No ! heaven's eternal spring shall yet arrive, 
 And man's majestic beauty bloom again, 
 Safe through the ceaseless years of love's eternal reign. 
 
 XL 
 
 THE FUTUEE LIFE. THE POSITIVE AEGTJMENT. 
 
 We have seen that the justice, goodness and wisdom of 
 God, may be fairlv inferred from the moral system of which 
 He is the author, and we are now prepared to ask, What is the 
 bearing of these conceded attributes upon the great question 
 of a future life ? 
 
 We begin with what to some may appear the weakest point, 
 the consideration of what may be inferred from the wisdom 
 of God. 
 
 1. We assume here only that the same wisdom which has 
 constructed the moral system, has placed man under it with 
 reference to some designed end. From this assumption, which 
 none can deem unwarranted, we infer that the end must be 
 such as will justify the wisdom of the means. For unless 
 this be so we shall have an anomaly in the moral system which 
 dishonors its author and impeaches His wisdom, and makes 
 Him an object of universal distrust. 
 
 Let us, then, for a moment — for argument's sake — assume 
 that there is no future life for man — that the entire period of 
 his conscious existence is included within the narrow span of 
 three-score years and ten. Yet it is in him that all the schemes 
 and provisions of this lower world center. He is the one ob- 
 ject to which they all ultimately refer. Nature, with all her 
 forces, with all her orders of inorganic, vegetable and animal 
 existence, pays tribute to him, and spontaneously acknow- 
 ledges him her rightful lord. Everything around him con- 
 fesses its own subordination and his superiority. He speaks 
 the word, and the answering echoes come back from the hith- 
 erto unbroken solitudes of the tropics, or the poles. He puts 
 
WHAT IS EEQUIEED BY DIVINE- WISDOM. 149 
 
 out Ms hand, grasping only tlie instruments that hand has 
 wrought, and the forests fall before him, and cities rise in the 
 wilderness. He intrudes into the sphere of immaterial forces, 
 summons them from their latent beds, and makes them do his 
 bidding. The lightnings come at his call, and say " here we 
 are." And yet all past conquests seem only the earnest and 
 pledge of greater. 
 
 It is thus that his presence and agency gives a meaning to 
 nature that it could never have had without him. It is for 
 his comfort, his discipline, his development, his perfection, 
 that nature opens her treasure-house, surrenders her secrets, 
 presents her voluntary offerings. Take him away, and all 
 that is left below is Hke the planetary system without its cen- 
 tral sun, the ring without its jewel, the pedestal without its 
 statue. 
 
 And yet, if three-score years and ten constitute his entire 
 existence, constraining him, as he sums them up, to say with 
 the old patriarch, " few and evil have the days of the years of 
 my life been ; " what fitting proportion does this result bear 
 to the varied, countless, costly and elaborate processes by which 
 it was brought about ? Would not any fitting symbol of it 
 seem like a satirical exposure of infinite folly, a provision so 
 disproportioned to the issue realized, as to 
 
 " — resemble ocean into tempests tost, 
 To waft a feather or to drown a fly." 
 
 Should we not have before us something like a huge pyramid 
 erected, so that on its apex there might be placed, soon to 
 crumble to dust and insignificance, a Chinese toy, or a wither- 
 ing flower ? Would there not be something like an elaborate 
 drama, with a catastrophe almost trivial? Can we suppose 
 such a scheme as a moral system — with all its multiplied pro- 
 visions and adjuncts, including in it alb the lavish skill of crea- 
 tioD, all the varied contrivances and adjustments which make 
 the soul's relations to the body, to matter, to thcj daily expe- 
 rience of life what they are — to end only in such a conclusion 
 as warrants the sceptical contempt of those 
 
 " — who hail thee man, the creature of a day, 
 Spouse of the worm, and brother of the clay; 
 
150 WHAT IS EEQTJIEED BY DIVINE GOODNESS. 
 
 Frail as a leaf in autumn's yellow bower, 
 Dust in the wind or dew ui>on the flower; 
 A friendless slave, a child without a sire, 
 Whose transient life and momentary fire 
 Light to the grave his chance-created form, 
 As ocean wrecks illuminate the storm ; 
 And when the gun's tremendous flash is o'er. 
 To night and silence sink forever more ? " 
 
 We may, then, confidently assert that the wisdom of God, as 
 evinced in the existence of a moral system, seems irreconcila- 
 ble with such a scheme of human existence as bounds its 
 hopes and prospects by the grave. 
 
 2. The goodness of God, in like manner, may be made the 
 basis of an argument for the future life. That goodness im- 
 plies a kindly disposition to promote the highest well-being of 
 the creature. It is inconsistent with the infliction of gratuit- 
 ous or unnecessary suffering. It certainly cannot be credited 
 with the design of placing man in a sphere where hope is ex- 
 cited, only to be disappointed, and where the very capacities 
 of the soul become necessarily the instruments of severer tor- 
 ture. 
 
 And yet must not all this be imputed to the divine good 
 ness, if man is doomed inevitably to an existence bounded by 
 this present life ? He is placed where the field of knowledge 
 before him is absolutely limitless — where his three-score years 
 and ten, as diligently employed as they were by a Newton, 
 leaves him, like I^ewton, the conscious possessor of only a few 
 pebbles which he has gathered on the shores of a broad ocean 
 that invites his exploration — where all the education he can 
 hope to attain is little more than mastering the alphabet and 
 spelling out a few syllables from here and there a title-page 
 of the countless volumes of the library of creation — where 
 over his head there is a wonderful universe expanding into 
 immensity — where, on either hand, there is an eternity which 
 his prying thought essays in vain to explore — where the 
 activity of his powers is fettered by the weakness and frailty 
 of his physical frame — where free thought and soaring aspira- 
 tions seem imprisoned, and, like the caged bird, are ever beat- 
 ing their wings against the unyielding wires or bars — and 
 
WHAT IS EEQUIEED BY DIVINE JUSTICE, 151 
 
 where, the moment he recognizes- his condition, he is con- 
 strained to envy the brute that may perish without the con- 
 sciousness of its misery through hmited existence and disap- 
 pointed hope. And with what bitterness of spirit, must one 
 that cherishes the instinctive aspirations toward an immortal 
 destiny, which are rooted in his nature, sm-render all his high 
 hopes, and sinking to the level of the brute or the clod that 
 shall survive him, exclaim " to corruption, ' thou art my 
 father,' and to the wonii, ' thou art my mother and my 
 sister ! ' " 
 
 There can be no question that man is so constituted by 
 Him that made him, that his nature shrinks back instinctively 
 from the thought of annihilation. That thought repels him. 
 It is abhorrent to his sympathies, his sensibilities and his 
 hopes. And yet he is gifted with powers that enable him to 
 apprehend it in all its repulsiveness, nay, which sometimes 
 seem to compel him, even against his will, to contemplate it 
 with a torturing intentness of gaze and a shuddering horror. 
 At such a moment, he might well be tempted to invoke as a 
 boon, the extinction of those superior gifts which render him 
 conscious of a superior misery, and to exclaim with a despair- 
 ing sadness, in view of the gulf of nothingness into wliich at 
 the very instant he may be about to plunge — 
 
 " Cursed be the powers that but divine 
 What we have lost beyond recall ; 
 The intellectual plummet-line 
 
 That sounds the depths to which we fall." 
 
 To attempt to reconcile all this with infinite goodness in the 
 constitution of man's moral nature, is simply preposterous- 
 The admission of that goodness carries with it, by implication, 
 the future life. 
 
 3. And the same conclusion will follow from the admission 
 of the divine justice. "We speak of this attribute with far less 
 hesitation or distrust than of that of goodness. Above all things, 
 the author of this moral sj^stem is, and must be, just. But 
 how can infinite and perfect justice be reconciled with leaving 
 the processes of retribution, begun in this life, forever sus- 
 pended by death ? How can it possibly consist with such a 
 
152 THE TEESENT STATE A FEAGMEISTT. 
 
 fragmentary and interrupted administration of a moral sys- 
 tem as tlie order of this world wonld present, if \drtu8 and 
 vice, crime and innocence, have nothing to fear or hope be- 
 yond what they experience here and now ? "We discern laws 
 and provisions evidently designed to operate in the vindica- 
 tion of justice, hut they are of such a nature that sometimes 
 vice enjoys, for a time, at least, manifest impunity, and the 
 slow process of retribution has, perhaps, only just begun, when 
 death snatches the criminal away from the scene. "We are 
 constrained to ask. Is this the end ? Is the retributory pro- 
 cess broken off forever ? 
 
 Sometimes, in a cemetery, our eyes rest upon a broken shaft, 
 standing among the varied monuments that affection has 
 reared to the memory of the departed. Its significance strikes 
 us at once. It bring-s up before us a life internipted lij a 
 sudden stroke, broken off in the full vigor of manhood, and 
 thus left, as it were, incomplete, the fragment, beautiful as far 
 as it goes, but still only the fi-agment, of a perfect whole. Is 
 there not a somewhat analogous impression made by the study 
 of this present scheme of things, as related to the processes of 
 perfect justice ? Is it not visibly a fragment, that requires a 
 future retribution to supplement it and make it complete ? 
 Is it not to our view, a kind of broken shaft, shooting up to a 
 point where the mists of the future gather over it and around 
 it, so that we cannot trace it farther ? And yet does not its 
 visible incompleteness at least suggest that if those mists were 
 but swept away, we might still discern it shooting upward in 
 all the full proportions of its earlier promise, till upon its 
 rounded summit there rests the vindicating light of an eternal 
 and perfect justice ? 
 
 Or, to present the subject in another phase, are not the 
 foundations laid in the moral system now existing, for a struc- 
 ture which can only be completed in a period which stretches 
 on into the future life, and requires that life for its comple- 
 tion ; and is not the justice of God a pledge that whatever is 
 required in the interests of a perfect justice shall not finally 
 be wanting ? All the objections that are urged against the 
 moral system, as now conducted, derive their force from the 
 unequal distribution of rewards and penalties which we wit- 
 
EELATIONS OF SOUL AND BODY, 153 
 
 ness here, and even our own weak sense of justice seems to 
 demand that somewhere and m some way these inequahties 
 shall be provided for. Innocence, despairing of vindication 
 at the hands of human justice, instinctively appeals to the 
 great hereafter and to the future judge, and its faith that the 
 Judge of the whole earth will do right, is based on the con- 
 viction that a future life will afford the desired opportunity 
 for a rectiiication of the inequalities of present justice. That 
 future life is a necessary factor in the process which alone 
 leads to the conclusion which saves oppressed innocence from 
 final despair. 
 
 On the ground then of the wisdom, the goodness, the jus- 
 tice of God, we rest the positive argument for the future life. 
 To its cumulative force, we add Bishop Butler's negative ar- 
 gument, and the other considerations which have been ad- 
 duced. With the preponderating probability of the validity 
 of our conclusion, we accept the doctrine of a future life, and 
 proceed to test its harmony with some of the recognized facts 
 of human experience, thus securing for it a new confirm- 
 ation. 
 
 1. It accords vfith the view which we are necessitated to 
 take of the mutual relations of soul and body. The body is 
 the soul's instrument, supplying it the organs by which it can 
 take cognizance of, and come in contact with the outer world. 
 Upon this outer world it is largely dependent for the means 
 of knowledge, the lessons of experience, the conditions of 
 progress and development. It is in material foi-ms and rela- 
 tions that the truths with which the soul is to deal, are to be 
 sought. They answer to abstract truths, as the lines and 
 angles of the diagram do to the principles they are employed 
 to demonstrate. Only by means of these material forms and 
 relations — so far as we can see — can the soul arrive at the ap- 
 prehension of the spiritual truths most vital to its well-being, 
 and yet all the lines and angles of the diagram would be in 
 vain if the soul had not at command the means of seeing or 
 coming in contact with them. The body provides these 
 means. In its young vigor its senses are fresh and vivid, and 
 drink in knowledge and fact, using the outer world as its 
 board of diagrams, till the soul has obtained the data for its 
 
154 ANALOGY OF SOUL AND DEED. 
 
 reflection, the basis for its practical conclusions, in a word, 
 the means for its development and progress. 
 
 But when this point is reached, the organs that have per- 
 formed their office, and furnished their quota of contribution 
 to the soul's resources of thought and reflection, begin to give 
 way. They have served their pui-pose. They have laid what 
 tribute they could gather from the material realm at the feet 
 of their imperial sovereign. They have earned, as it were, 
 their discharge. Together with the body, they feel the press- 
 ure of decay, and sometimes, ere death finally sunders body 
 and spirit, the last is so isolated, by the deaf ear and the blind 
 eye, and the deadened feeling, that it is ready and waiting for 
 its release, ripened and perfected for its own proper spiritual 
 sphere. 
 
 So with the living germ of the buried seed. It sends up 
 its stalk, with its fresh leaves, and its multiplied folds that 
 wrap themselves about the forming ear. But ere long the 
 freshness fades. The leaves grow sere. The husks fall apart, 
 or wither in the sun and rustle in the breeze. The change is 
 in the direction of decay, and seems like the steady onward 
 march of death. Why is this ? All the organs of the stalk 
 have perfonned their office. They have earned their dis- 
 charge. They did their duty well till it was no longer neces- 
 sary — till, sheltered within the husks, there were formed the 
 soft milky cells of the new ear, and then the hard kernel, that 
 would remain impassive, though its husks deserted it — the 
 kernel in which a m.ysterious life was folded up, that would 
 endure when stalk and leaves have mingled with the trampled 
 dust, and then become the germ of future, and still future 
 harvests, till time should be no more. Is not this one of 
 nature's parables, richly suggestive? Is not the body the 
 stalk and leaves, and the soul the living kernel, to which it 
 has ministered, and is not bodily decay a kind of prophecy of 
 the future life of that germ, to whose development the body 
 and its organs were simply subservient ? 
 
 2. Again, the doctrine of a future life accords with the 
 inferences naturally drawn from the processes of the soul's 
 education. These processes conduct it from, and through, the 
 material, to the spiritual. It is first the visible with which 
 
FEOM THE SEEN TO THE UNSEEN. 155 
 
 we have to do, but tlie visible symbolizes or interprets to ns 
 tlie invisible, until finally tlie soul, even now, may often be 
 said to live far more in its own ideal world, than in the realm 
 of sense. It is, from the first, subjected to an education that 
 is emancipating it from bondage to sense, and educating it for 
 the invisible. 
 
 The earliest moral lessons of childhood come to it through 
 material forms. Before it knows the meaning of words, it is 
 gathering up the meaning of things. The process by which 
 it rises to apprehend abstract thought, to grasp moral and 
 spiritual truth, is by studying the relations of material forms 
 to one another and to itself. It has to deal first with object 
 lessons, palpably presented. It masters the alphabet, perhaps 
 by block letters, and without knowing their ultimate use. 
 It puts the letters together to make words, and the words to 
 make sentences, without attaining as yet to much more than 
 sensible images. But at length, blocks, spelling-books, gram- 
 mars, are cast aside, for the mind has passed beyond the need 
 of them, and is storing up the ideas and conceptions which 
 they have prepared it to apprehend. 
 
 In like manner, the student of geometry has his attention 
 first directed to diagrams, with their Knes and angles. When 
 he has mastered the problem, when he has attained the im- 
 palpable mathematical truth he was in search of, his diagrams 
 are laid aside, his lines and angles rubbed out. But the 
 whole after-experience of his life keeps up its analogy with 
 that of the child. The transactions of business, converse 
 with men, contracts and schemes of gain — all dealing with 
 material things — are ever evolving moral lessons. The trans- 
 actions are past and forgotten. The actors in them vanish 
 from view, but the principles which they served to illustrate, 
 and the truths of which they were exponents, are indestructi- 
 ble. They are treasured up in memory. They are incor- 
 porated in character. They furnish the moral imagery of 
 the soul, and constitute its imperishable intellectual or spirit- 
 ual wealth. 
 
 Thus it is that the material — when we study its significance 
 in connection with human uses — is forever pointing away 
 from the seen to the unseen, from itself to what it sym- 
 
150 CONGKUITIES OF HITMAN EXPEEIEXCE. 
 
 bolizes or suggests — the immaterial and mortal. "With each 
 new advance in its experience, the soul is creating for itself, 
 hy the aid of visible forms, an invisible world, in which more 
 and more, till the senses fail or the body crumbles, it lives 
 and moves and has its being. What is the meaning of such 
 a training as this ? "Why does the line of development and 
 progress, that begins in sense, reach on to that which reason 
 alone can apprehend ? Why, at the close of all the lessons 
 read to us out of material forms, do we find ourselves eon- 
 fronted with the invisible and eternal ? Is there not a 
 manifest accord between all this, and the proper explanation 
 of it, that the soul is created for a life above sense, and that 
 this life awaits it, when it has been educated, by and through 
 the material, for a spiritual sphere ? 
 
 3. In like manner, it might be shown that the doctrine of 
 a future life harmonizes with the necessities of civil justice, 
 which requires the recognition of penalties beyond any that 
 it can impose — with our social affections, that reluctantly sur- 
 render the hope that reaches to a reunion after all earthly 
 vicissitudes — with the demands of conscience, that stumbles 
 at the suggestion that the author of nature can violate rules 
 of justice that are the axioms of social duty and political 
 science, and, among other things, with the only possible 
 scheme of human existence, that invests it with dignity or 
 entitles it to respect. Such accordance lends new confirma- 
 tion to nature's evidence of a future life. 
 
 Here we pause. Grant the existence of a moral system, 
 with a presiding mind whose character it reflects, and a future 
 life, the proper sequel to present probation, and there will 
 still remain a broad field for investigation in the relations of 
 natural to revealed rehgion. But it is enough for our pres- 
 ent purpose to have shown that the great truths of the moral 
 system have not appeared improbable to human reason ; that, 
 however often denied, they have been as often reasserted, and 
 that, in all time to come, it is to be presumed that they will 
 never lack witnesses in their behalf. 
 
XII. 
 
 PKOBATIOK. 
 
 Admitting tlie probability of a future life, it reflects back 
 upon the present something of its own importance. The 
 term of present existence is, indeed, brief. Oftentimes, also, 
 it can show for itself little more than trifling results and dis- 
 appointed hopes. It is passed for the most part in obscurity. 
 It sometimes becomes intolerably wretched, and seems a bur- 
 den to be thrown off. But, like the pedestal of a statue half 
 buried in the earth, it derives high importance from the fact 
 that it is the pedestal of the soul's immortality. 
 
 Is the present then a state of probation ? Is man here 
 placed upon trial, so that his future experience w^ill depend 
 upon, and be shaped by, his conduct here '( Is he placed in 
 such circumstances that it is largely in his own power to de- 
 termine whether he shall enter upon his future state to find 
 it a scene of blessedness, or have it forced upon him as a 
 sequel of just but severe retribution? This is the idea which 
 we properly attach to probation. It proves a man. It puts 
 him to the test. It subjects him to temptation, which may 
 be yielded to, but should be resisted. 
 
 That the present is a state of probation is rendered prob- 
 able by the analogies of human experience. But before pro- 
 ceeding to show that this is the case, it may be noted that the 
 proof of it will carry with it by implication an argument, ad- 
 ditional to the considerations already presented, for the future 
 life. As will be teen, the two doctrines of probation and the 
 future life support one another. As the system to which we 
 belong is constituted, we cannot conceive of the future con- 
 sciousness, independent of, or unmodified by, the present ; 
 while on the other hand, if probation conducts to certain 
 definite results, these results become insignificant and of no 
 account, without such use of them as is possible only on the 
 condition of a life beyond the present. In other words, the 
 tedious processes of present trial must have some end in view, 
 and what can that end be within the limits of probation itself ? 
 
 1. But for the present assuming, on the ground of what 
 
 (157) 
 
158 THE PEESENT AS BELATED TO THE FUTURE. 
 
 has already been advanced, that a future life is probable, in 
 what relation must the present stand to it ? It must be its 
 introduction. It must give shape to it. It develops con- 
 sciousness. It stores the mind with images and ideas. It cre- 
 ates, as it were, that ideal world in which the soul lives, and 
 moves, and has its being. It surrounds it with the associa- 
 tions that form its tastes, and mold its opinions, and deter- 
 mine its aims. It assigns it the tasks that develop its ener- 
 gies, or provides it the indulgences that dissipate them. It 
 forms those habits which cleave to the soul as a part of its 
 being. It confirms those features of character which exhibit 
 their firmest texture and most rigid lines as death draws on. 
 
 ^N^ow, all this cannot take place here and now, without lay- 
 ing the basis and shaping the prospects of that existence which 
 succeeds the present. Here we have the title-page and preface 
 to which the future record must correspond. The thoughts, 
 w^ords, and deeds of the present cast their shadow, or reflect 
 their light, upon all that is to follow. This is, indeed, inevit- 
 able. It results from the very constitution of the soul and 
 the laws of consciousness. 
 
 This, then, is probation. It follows from the very relation 
 of the present to the future, which cannot but be determined 
 by it. 
 
 2. A strong confirmatory presumption of this may be de- 
 rived from what would otherwise appear anomalous and inex- 
 plicable in the Moral System. Moral system is a broader 
 term than moral government. The latter implies an exact 
 administration of rewards and penalties for human conduct, 
 on the principles of strict justice, with only such delay as is 
 necessary to judicial process. But in the actual system of 
 things, as it has come under our eye, we have seen mysterious 
 delays, opportunities for repentance, apparent though temper 
 rary triumphs of wrong, virtue persecuted and sorely tried. 
 Here is something which may and does co-exist with moral 
 government, but it modifies it by the introduction of foreign 
 and apparently incongruous elements. If we assume that 
 probation, for wise and suflicient reasons, is combined with 
 moral government, the incongruity disappears. The anomaly 
 is no longer inexplicable. 
 
PENALTY DELAYED. 159 
 
 That this combination is actually made, may be proved 
 from the facts of experience. Under a strictly administered 
 moral government, excluding what is so obviously anomalous, 
 probation would be an impossibility. If retribution always 
 followed swiftly upon the evil deed,* if the prize of virtue, 
 ever kept in view, was at once bestowed, man's condition 
 would be reduced almost to that of mechanism. There would 
 be simply enforced obedience. All other motives would be 
 overshadowed and dwarfed by those of terror. Confronted 
 ever by the majesty of justice v/ith its armed sword, the soul 
 would lack those conditions of experience in which alone it 
 can be educated to strength of endurance, to patient, hopeful 
 endeavor, and reliance upon the invisible forces of truth and 
 justice. 
 
 But the actual Moral System is more than this. It is modi- 
 fied so as to allow the necessary elements of probation to 
 come in. While all its forces and tendencies may be discovered, 
 on close examination, to be ultimately on the side of justice, 
 their operation is often retarded or concealed. The subject of 
 government is also subject to trial. He is ever plied by op- 
 posing and conflicting motives, till one side or the other gains 
 the ascendency. If he falls by transgression, the opportunity 
 is frequently given him to recover himself. If, persistent in 
 virtue, he endures persecution, his very trials and afflictions 
 are made to develop new energies of will or a new grace of 
 character. Thus, with the assumption that the present is a 
 probationary state, the Moral System no longer stands in 
 need of that vindication that would otherwise be requisite, 
 and what appeared anomalous is seen to be in harmony 
 with it. 
 
 3. But the fact that we have around us precisely those ele- 
 ments which constitute the conditions of probation, has, inde- 
 pendent of its place in connection with the Moral System, a 
 
 * " Were punislaraent to follow close upon the heels of transgression, and the 
 difference between good and bad made obvious to every eye, it must totally put 
 a stop to offense ; duty would become instinct, and rectitude an object of sense. 
 So we should have no use for habits of virtue or exercises of reason ; which seem 
 growing powers within us, destined to greater services than we can perform with 
 them in those gloomy tabernacles and clumsy bodies we inhabit." — T acker'' h 
 Light of Natn,re, I. 631. 
 
160 PROBATION AS A FACT. 
 
 significance and force of its own. Men are actually put upon 
 trial in this present life, and tliis trial, in its highest degree, 
 is moral. Our present existence is pervaded by the element 
 of probation. Our daily experiences are rife with analogies 
 of a moral probation. Men come into being gifted with pow- 
 ers to be developed, and developed by trial. It is for them 
 to say what they will make of life. All the tyranny of cir- 
 cumstances, and of necessities which they cannot master, 
 does not preclude a measure of freedom which renders them 
 largely responsible for their own acts, their own habits, their 
 own success, or failure in life. 
 
 There is no evading the issue which is thrust upon them. 
 They must fit themselves for their tasks. There must be 
 attention, patience, toil, discipline of the powers and facul- 
 ties, in every sphere of elfort, if failure is to be avoided and 
 success assured. Childhood and youth are a probation for an 
 honored or dishonored, an, useful or an useless manhood. Be- 
 fore it can appreciate its task, the child has its task assigned 
 it. It must study and apply itself, and on that application 
 vast results will depend. It must resist temptations to pas- 
 sionate indulgence, to untruth, to dishonesty, or the alterna- 
 tive is a character that excites distrust, and makes after life 
 torture or tragedy. 
 
 Throughout every department of human activity, this pro- 
 bation is going on. It is not a matter of choice. Every art, 
 every profession, every industrial pursuit, must be laboriously 
 mastered, and on the patience and thoroughness with which 
 it is mastered, success or failure, honor or shame, happiness 
 or misery, depend. Before any one can be allowed to accept 
 of an important trust, he must have given proof of his fit- 
 ness by a probation. Before he can command confidence, he 
 must have endured trial. Even what the world calls success 
 — however incorrectly sometimes — has its stem conditions, 
 and these are of the nature of probation. 
 
 Thus, to a very large extent, each one is made the arbiter 
 of his worldly destiny. It is for himself to say what he will 
 be, and for what sphere he will be fitted. By energy, sagac- 
 ity, and perseverance, he can acquire new powers, or vastly 
 expand faculties which he already possesses. He can open 
 
EESIILTS IN THE PEESENT STATE. 161 
 
 his way to new, higher, and enlarged spheres. Upon this 
 capacity, the whole theory of education is based. We are 
 made familiar with its laws, till they pass as axioms. Thus 
 the idea of probation confronts us everywhere. It is pressed 
 .upon our attention continually. From childhood onwai'd, it 
 is ever becoming more distinct. 
 
 4. But the manifold analogies of probation in common ex- 
 perience, prepare us to understand and appreciate that higher 
 moral probation which is ever going onward in connection 
 with each human life. Wherever questions of right or wrong 
 are involved, and a choice is to be made, the soul is put upon 
 trial. Wherever it is tempted to evil, whether by prospects 
 of pleasure, or gain, or applause, the responsibility to deter- 
 mine its own course is thrown upon it, and it must be met. 
 The inevitable issue is sometimes too vast for calculation or 
 description. A mistake, through ignorance, or heedlessness, 
 or regard for a present and transient satisfaction, often has 
 far-reaching consequences. The whole after life is clouded 
 by a single dark deed of youth. A course of weak indulgence 
 in any one of many forms of vice, is followed by disease, 
 lingering torture, premature decay, self-reproach, or the 
 scorn and contempt of the world. And yet at the time of 
 crisis, in the hour of sharpest temptation, there was no audi- 
 ble warning. The inexperienced eye discerned no cloud, be- 
 tokening the approaching tornado, on the distant horizon. 
 Months and years passed by, and it seemed as though there 
 was, and had been, no trial, no abused probation. Only expe- 
 rience revealed the sad mistake. 
 
 So, where temptations to evil are resisted, there is proba- 
 tion, but probation endured triumphantly and utilized. Often 
 the trial is severe. At the time, it may seem likely to cost 
 more than can ever be repaid. But the results — confirmed 
 habits of integrity, disciplined virtues, inward peace, charac- 
 ter rich in all noble traits — show that there is a close and 
 necessary connection between severe probation, well endured, 
 and the highest rewards, even on earth, of which the mind 
 can conceive. 
 
 We find, therefore, that just as childhood, in its relations 
 to manhood, is probationary, so the whole of the present, as 
 11 
 
162 IS PKOBATION AIMLESS ? 
 
 related to future existence, appears to be probationary also. 
 We might, indeed, anticipate this from what we know of the 
 general scheme of things to which we belong, in Avhich we 
 expect to find substantial harmony and consistent analogies. 
 If the present existence is not in keeping as probationary 
 with this scheme of things, it is an insoluble problem, an 
 inexplicable anomaly. We see a principle pervading the 
 whole scheme, from the earliest moment, and in every de- 
 ]3artment, up to a certain point, and that most important and 
 momentous, to which, indeed, all else is subordinate. We see 
 men familiarized v/ith the idea of probation ; we see it im- 
 pressed upon them pei^etually ; we see them actually forced 
 to accept it in every secular sphere, and yet when it comes to 
 the most serious religious application, unless life is a proba- 
 tion, it is to be abandoned and rejected. 
 
 5. Such a conclusion is m the highest degree improbable. 
 ISTay, it is in conflict with everything within, and up to the 
 limits of our experience. In our ignorance of the future, we 
 can still see that even on earth the moral results of life, con- 
 sidered as a probation, outweigh all others, and that in them, 
 all that is good or evil, blissful or miserable, is involved. 
 These results are registered m the development or modifica- 
 tion of the moral nature. They constitute the soul's insepara- 
 ble property — what it must carry with it to the grave, and 
 beyond. They are seen to be unspeakably precious, or sim- 
 ply despicable. To the man that has well-nigh completed his 
 earthly career, all his material acquisitions must appear of 
 small account. Fame is an empty sound. Honors are an 
 idle show. Wealth is the merest dross, which skeleton fingers 
 can no longer hold. The spirit's frame and character, capa- 
 bilities, sensibilities, and habits, these are all in all. There 
 has been going forward all through the years of life, a process 
 by which this result is reached. What is this process but 
 that of probation ? 
 
 6. And has this process been going forward without a 
 definite and well-considered end in view ? Have there been 
 varieties of acquisition, all manifestly subordinate to the edu- 
 cation, discipline, and perfection of the spiritual nature, and 
 yet, when this nature has reached the development which the 
 
IS DEATH THE LIMIT OF PEOBATION ? 163 
 
 experience of life lias given it, is this the end ? Is there noth- 
 ing beyond? Manifestly, a preparation has been made for 
 something yet to come. Bnt without a fntiire life, what can 
 remain ? And, granting a future life, how can it but receive 
 its impress for good or evil, for weal or woe, from the expe- 
 riences of the present ? 
 
 7. But here the objection meets us — why may we not con- 
 ceive the entire future existence to be a probation like the 
 present? Why should we draw a distinction between two 
 parts of the same consciousness, the one earlier, and the other 
 subsequent ? May not probation extend throughout the soul's 
 entire conscious existence, here and hereafter ? To a certain 
 limited extent, reasoning simply from the light of nature, we 
 may admit that this is possible. But only to an extent ex- 
 ceedingly limited. The fact is, that in thousands of instances, 
 long before death, probation is practically at an end. The 
 great work of life for good or evil has been accomplished. 
 Character has been molded ; and change, to any material ex- 
 tent, is hopeless. Trial has well-nigh accomplished its com- 
 plete Avork. The righteous will be righteous still, however 
 assailed by temptation, and the filthy, filthy still, however 
 plied with motives, and admonitions, and appeals to reform. 
 The earliest period is that in which the processes of probation 
 are most rapid and effective. In a few years they have done 
 their work, and it is a work practically beyond recall. 
 
 8. But why, then, is death made the normal limit of pro- 
 bation, when probation may virtually terminate before it, or 
 when the same consciousness is supposed to continue beyond 
 it ? The answer is, that death effects necessarily a marked 
 change in the condition and relations of the soul, and a 
 change which has a special bearing upon the question of a 
 continued probation. As to the future life, we have no 
 knowledge how far the soul shall sustain relations to material 
 things ; whether its " spiritual body," ii such there be, shall 
 have material elements, and be subjected to material laws; 
 but, however this may be, a great change in certain relations 
 essential to present probation, comes with death. In the pres- 
 ent life, the soul is indebted to its union with the body for 
 certain important elements of moral discipline. Through this 
 
164 WHY IS MAN EST A STATE OF PROBATION? 
 
 union, it is subjected to the necessity of exercising prudence 
 and f orethouglit. It is forced to consider how its condition 
 will be affected by the indulgence or restraint of its passions. 
 It has the means, also, of diverting itself from gloomy 
 thoughts, of evading any direct confronting of its prospective 
 destiny, while, to the last, through the opportunities secured 
 through the bodily senses, the hope of repentance and reform 
 still survives. But Avith the dissolution of the body, all this 
 comes to an end. Probation, so far as its elements are sup- 
 plied by material relations, ceases. Henceforth the soul is 
 thrown upon itself. The prospect of spiritual change or 
 modification, that had before been steadily diminishing, now 
 vanishes almost, if not quite altogether. 
 
 From the several considerations that have been presented, 
 can it be seriously disputed, whether the present is, indeed, a 
 state of probation for a future life ? 
 
 9. At this point the question may pertinently be ashed, 
 why is man placed in a state of probation ? Why is he not 
 so constituted by original creation, as to enter at once upon 
 the spiritual and final sphere of perfect purity and perfect 
 happiness ? 
 
 In respect to this it may be said that, whatever the answer 
 that may be given, it does not change or cancel the fact of 
 Probation, in which we are most deeply and personally con- 
 cerned. It is with the fact that we have to deal, rather than 
 with the reasons for the fact. These reasons — some of them, 
 at least — may be, and doubtless are, beyond the reach of our 
 present faculties. Our probation may have connections with 
 other worlds, or other parts of the divine administration, of 
 which we know nothing, and yet these connections, if once 
 understood, might contribute greatly to explain it. 
 
 But leaving uninvestigated what lies beyond or above the 
 sphere of our present powers, we can see obvious reasons 
 why man should be placed in a state of probation. If there 
 is a future sphere which he is to occupy, and for which he 
 needs to be prepared, the preparation must be previously 
 acquired, and it might naturally be supposed to require pecu- 
 liar conditions ; in other words, a state of probation. This 
 state is necessaiy in order to acquire the requisite experience, 
 
VIRTUE NOT CEEATED, 165 
 
 tastes, and habits. It will scarcely be said that these might 
 have been created with the soul itself. Holy beings might 
 doubtless be created, but their holiness would not be the holi- 
 ness that has been wrought out and perfected through trial — 
 the hohness that is fitted to do its work, and struggle through 
 adverse influences to final triumph. The virtue that has been 
 wrought out through probation, is that which is fortified and 
 strengthened by memories and experiences of the past ; by 
 the consciousness of successful endurance ; by the practiced 
 and ready mastery of the resources at its command. Here 
 are elements that from the nature of the case, cannot be cre- 
 ated. The facts of memory must be realities. On these ex- 
 perience must be based, and without them it is itself a delu- 
 sion, which can no more be created a reality than falsehood 
 can be made truth by the fiat of Omnipotence. Only through 
 probation can that holiness or virtue be attained, which seems 
 to possess an intrinsic and effective superiority over every- 
 thing that is merely connate, born, or created with us. 
 
 10. Again, probation, when successfully endured, gives 
 strength to character and fiiTaness to virtue. It expands and 
 develops the moral nature, knits together and compacts its 
 energies, and fits it for responsible position and enlarged use- 
 fulness. We are familiar with its operation in the experiences 
 of common life. The pilot that will grasp the helm with a 
 firm hand and carry the v^essel through the storm safe into 
 port, is the one who has learned by hard experience to shun 
 the rocks and buffet the blast. The man who can stand firm 
 and self-reliant in the shock of public calamity, or under the 
 pressure of fearful responsibility, is the one who has already 
 learned to bear his own burdens, and to shrink from no issue 
 to which duty may challenge. 
 
 It is in virtue of their antecedent probation that these men 
 are what they are. Probation develops the latent powers, 
 disciplines, and educates, and perfects them. And, in like 
 manner, it is that probation operates upon the moral and 
 spiritual nature. 
 
 11. Again, if the future is a social state, the security of its 
 peace and happiness will be dependent largely on the mutual 
 confidence of those that share it. They must know one an- 
 
166 OTHER REASONS FOE PKOBATIOK. 
 
 other, and so know others as to be assured of tlieir firm loy- 
 alty to truth and duty. But how can the elementary basis of 
 such confidence be possible, unless those who are called upon 
 to exercise mutual confidence, have the evidence that there 
 has been a probation, successfully endured, a probation which 
 has evinced unspotted integrity and unswerving loyalty to 
 truth ? The conditions of future blessedness in a social state 
 seem to require absolutely an antecedent probation. 
 
 There are other reasons which might be adduced, if neces- 
 sary, to vindicate the wisdom of making the present state one 
 of probation. If only through its union with the body, the 
 soul can come in contact with the moral truths that are 
 evolved out of material relations and connections, it is diffi- 
 cult to see how this is possible without constituting some- 
 thing of the nature of probation. 'Nor could responsibilty be 
 brought home to the soul, unless the burden of foreseeing 
 and providing for itself were thrown upon it, and it were 
 made to feel that its destiny was largely in its own hands. 
 No other conceivable state of things in which man could be 
 placed here, seems to address him in tones and language so 
 adapted to his nature, as probation. It summons him to self- 
 consciousness ; to the recognition of his exposure through 
 temptation ; to duty ; to effort ; to all the compliances with 
 virtue and the demands of self-denial which his own con- 
 science enforces, or his future and final blessedness implies. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 SEVERITY OF PRESENT TRIAL. 
 
 TiiE severity of the trial to which vast numbers of the hu- 
 man race are subjected, very properly demands our attention 
 in connection with the subject of probation. Why it is made 
 thus severe is an inquiry to which perhaps no fully satisfactory 
 answer can be given. But when it is urged against a moral 
 system proceeding from a beneficent author, it must be met. 
 
PEKVEESION .OF THE OEIGESTAL PLAJS^. 167 
 
 Properly, however, we have to do with the fact, rather than 
 the reasons for it. The fact mnst be admitted. The trial to 
 which the integrity and moral capacities of men are subjected, 
 is often greater than they can — or at least, actually do — sustain. 
 The result is, the defeat of the great end for which probation 
 is supposed to be instituted. Multitudes are found too weak, 
 or too morally debilitated, to endure the stress of temptation 
 to which they are subjected. They yield to it, and become 
 moral wrecks. 
 
 Indeed, in some cases, there can hardly be said to be such a 
 thing as probation. The result is apparently predetermined, 
 by natural constitution, by early associations, by circumstances 
 over which the victims of them have comparatively slight con- 
 trol. Some, from their very birth, seem fatally doomed. 
 Their first breath is drawn in a poisoned atmosphere, and- they 
 are made the slaves of vice, before they know the nature of 
 their bondage. Every step they take carries them deeper into 
 that abyss of vile habits and depraved indulgence from which, 
 except by some almost miraculous intei-position, they have no 
 hope of escape. The tragic close of their earthly career, with 
 its foreshadowings of a fearful hereafter, is united to its de- 
 praved original, by what seem mdissoluble links. Why is 
 such a state of things, under the name of probation, per- 
 mitted ? 
 
 1. To this it may be answered, in the first place, that this 
 extreme severity of trial does not necessarily pertain to the 
 original scheme of probation. It has been engrafted on it by 
 human perversity. The social depravity which so intensifies 
 it, is a gratuitous and not a necessary element. Take out of 
 the world all the evil influences that flow from corrupting 
 association, from vile example, from the contagious license of 
 bad men ; in a word, remove from probation just what human 
 wickedness, in violation of the laws of the moral system, has 
 introduced hito it, and who does not see how different an as- 
 pect it would present, how its harshest features would disap- 
 pear, how its seemingly cruel severity would vanish. "We 
 cannot make the Author of the moral system responsible for 
 what has been introduced into it, in spite of His warnings and 
 threatenings. 
 
168 HOW TKIAL IS AGGKAVATED. 
 
 2. The simple fact that the severity of trial is often greatly 
 aggravated by parental crime or neglect — a fact which is in- 
 disputable — when viewed in its various bearings, conducts us 
 to certain important conclusions. Eesulting from the constitu- 
 tion of things, it interprets that constitution. It shows how 
 original iniquity may bequeath its curse. It admonishes the 
 parent, through his affections, to beware lest by his own sin, 
 he visit others with exposure to trial too severe to be endured. 
 It suggests the power of that aggregate social mfluence, made 
 up, so to speak, of individual depravities, which is practically 
 irresistible, but which is simply the perversion of energies for 
 good, and v/hich would be found such in the right and proper 
 use of social relations. Let these be what all confess that they 
 ought to be, and probation loses that terrific aspect which it 
 sometimes wears. The prospect of it becomes rather assuring 
 than desperate. Place a youth at schoolor college among a 
 certain class of associates, and he may be more secure against 
 the formation of dissipated habits, than within the circle of his 
 own home. Temptation is shorn of its sudden, overmastering 
 power, and probation is tempered to a point where it scarcely 
 excites a fear or apprehension of the result. 
 
 If, then, we may suppose — and we have a right to the 
 theory for purposes of explanation, so long as it cannot be dis- 
 proved — that through perverted social influences, probation 
 has been aggravated — that this perversion is due to the volun- 
 tary transgressions of men for which they are distinctly re- 
 sponsible — that uniform, upright action on the part of one 
 entire generation would be the almost assured salvation of the 
 next — that the very force of transmitted influence, now so 
 powerful to curse, might have been equally pov/erful to bless, 
 that if all had heeded the admonitions of reason and con- 
 science, those powers of the soul which are legitimately su- 
 preme and authoritative within it, would have had universal 
 prevalence — so that what now renders probation harsh, would 
 have contributed to lighten it in a high degree — if we are at 
 liberty to suppose all this, which seems, however, to be estab- 
 lished on clear evidence, no fault can be imputed to the Author 
 of the constitution of things that probation is so severe. The re- 
 sult is due to the fact that the constitution of thino^s has been 
 
SOCIAL COKETJPTIOS-. 169 
 
 perverted bj tlie debasement of man's moral natiu-e, a debase- 
 ment voluntarily incurred, and for wliieb voluntary action, 
 cumulating its force for evil through, successive generations, 
 must be held primarily responsible. 
 
 3. Thus there is evidence, as Bishop Butler has remarked, 
 that man is a degenerate being. He is not now what he was 
 as originally created. He has in his make, moral elements 
 that are rightfully sovereign, but they have been forced to 
 give way to passion, and wherever the degeneracy began, at 
 the first, the tenth, or the hundredth link in the chain — though 
 its universality would lead us to impute it to the first — the 
 result would necessarily answer to what we witness in actual 
 experience. 
 
 The mischief, so far as the severity of probation is con- 
 cerned, is two-fold. The victim of temptation may be morally 
 debilitated by transmitted traits or tendencies, and at the same 
 time, he may be confronted by an array of influences and asso- 
 ciations that intensify temptation, and arm it v/ith fearful 
 power. But all this serves not as a ground for impeaching 
 the justice, goodness, or wisdom of the Author of that consti- 
 tution of things under v/hich we exist, but rather for exposing 
 that heedlessness, which, in contempt of the law of transmitted 
 tendencies or sensibilities, ventures to introduce into the moral 
 system, new elements at once of aggravated trial and conse- 
 quent woe. It is not for man to arraign the Avisdom of the 
 conditions of probation to which he is subjected, but rather to 
 correct the mistakes of the past, and lighten the burden which 
 must otherwise fall upon those who follow him. 
 
 4. Again, this severity, by being allowed, is calculated to 
 impress upon the individual his personal responsibility for 
 social corruption. He sees that by contributing to it, by ac- 
 quiescing in it, or by making feeble or no eiiort to remove it, 
 he is really an accomplice in the guilt that multiplies its 
 victims. If this conviction were allowed to produce its legiti- 
 mate effect, it would prove a most salutary warning ; would 
 tend to put under arrest those many activities for evil which 
 are rooted in social vice. 
 
 5. Moreover, it may be asserted that there is no absolute 
 necessity that the power of temptation should prevail. The 
 
1^0 EESULTS OF SEVERE PEOBATIOI«r. 
 
 conscience of the transgressor rebukes him for his base sur- 
 render to its influence. He feels and acknowledges the obli- 
 gation to resist and endure, even while he violates it, and 
 though others may justify him, he condemns himself. 
 
 6. To this it may be added that in some instances at least, 
 those whose condition under trial seemed the hardest and 
 most desperate, have been recovered, and have triumphed in 
 the end. This shows what is possible under a moral system 
 like ours, not left without extraordinary instrumentalities, to 
 rescue the exposed, and restore the lost. It forbids us, barely 
 on the ground of severity of probation, to despair of any. 
 
 1. But again, experience attests that, as a general rule, the 
 excellence of the results of probation, will be proportioned — 
 up to a certain point — to its intensity. If a man's virtue is 
 not overcome by temptation, the confirmation and strength of 
 it in the issue, will be proportioned to the severity of the 
 temptation. If he has resisted again and again the bribes of 
 pleasure ; if he has stood firm in his integrity when that in- 
 tegrity was assailed by all the threats or allurements of power 
 or gain ; if he has unwaveringly adhered to his convictions, 
 when those convictions were made the subject of scoff and 
 ridicule, his real worth comes forth out of the furnace of trial, 
 like gold " seven times purified." When the struggle is over, 
 and the triumph achieved, he looks back ■exultant and thank- 
 ful for what he was called to pass through, nor would he con- 
 sent that one feather's weight should have been abated from 
 his burden, or one blow less have been required to win the 
 victor's pi'ize. Having run the greatest risks, he acquiesces 
 in the goodness and wisdom by which they were permitted, if 
 not ordered. 
 
 8. It is the severity of probation to which we owe the great 
 achievements that have lighted up the dim memories or 
 dark panorama of past ages. Their struggles and endurance 
 have been heroic, and it is from the background of their hard- 
 ship, their almost desperate wrestlings with difficulty and 
 danger, that the triumph of good men shines forth with its in- 
 spiring record. By persevering fidelity to their convictions, they 
 transformed reproach into honor, and won the applause of men 
 not prone to sympathize or admire. There is nothing which so 
 
SEVERE TRIAL AND DIVINE BENEVOLENCE. 171 
 
 enkindles in lis a lofty and generous enthusiasm for excel- 
 lence, as the spectacle of their heroism and its reward, and 
 the broad desert tracts of histoiy, impoverished bj the ravages 
 of almost universal selfishness, grow rich once more when 
 sprinkled over with these diamond fields that shine with the 
 illuminating examples of the good, the true and the brave. 
 
 9. But it may be asked, how can the severity of actual pro- 
 bation, so great as to result in the ruin of multitudes, be made 
 to consist with divine benevolence? Remitting to another 
 chapter a more comprehensive answer to this and similar ob- 
 jections, we may yet reply here that it is, first of all, incum- 
 bent upon those who bring this objection, to be sure that they 
 have correct conceptions of divine benevolence. Mere good 
 nature is not benevolence. 'No more is weak indulgence, or 
 indifference to moral distinctions. It is not true benevolence 
 that would grant every wish, and avert all that is contrary to 
 the most common ideals of what constitutes happiness. It is 
 better for youth to be disciplined, than left without, any check 
 or restraint against which the propensities may chafe. True 
 benevolence would not shrink from imposing that discipline. 
 Moreover, benevolence, allied with omniscience, would take 
 into view the ultimate and most enduring blessedness. If 
 that can be reached only by trial, it will impose trial. If that 
 requires that the nature of wrong-doing be exposed and re- 
 buked by its legitimate results, it will bring about that ex- 
 posure. If it implies a comprehensive and general regard to 
 universal well-being, it will never sacrifice the whole to a part, 
 the community to the individual. It will not suffer the latter 
 to escape through pity, while allowing his impunity to 
 seduce others with the vain hope of escaping themselves. 
 
 But the benevolence which some would impute to God, as 
 that with which present probation is inconsistent, must be 
 considered rather a weakness and a defect. It is irresolute, 
 too weak to enforce justice, too weak to infiict penalty. It 
 cannot sustain government. It cannot crush rebellion. It 
 cannot protect the whole at the expense of the guilty. With 
 such a benevolence, probation, even of the weakest kind, is 
 indeed inconsistent ; but with such benevolence on the throne, 
 there might as well be no throne. It would be itself — as re- 
 
172 ACTUAL RESULTS OF PEOBATION. 
 
 lated to the universal welfare — weakness, ineffieiency, and 
 even injustice. 
 
 10. But objections to the reason of a fact do not change the 
 fact. That at least, Vv^itli all its significance, still abides. 
 Probation, within our narrow sphere of observation, is some- 
 times fearfully severe. It begins in light or even trivial 
 things. It proceeds unnoted. It is characterized by falls and 
 mistakes that produce perhaps no immediately calamitous re- 
 sult. But in the end Ave see it assume the most sad and tragic 
 phase. ' The veteran gambler cursing himself for his folly, 
 and expiring in an atmosphere of crime and pollution — the 
 drunkard driven on by the tyrannous force of his vile habits to 
 that point where fatal delirium closes upon him the door of 
 hope — the victim of debauchery parading before the world all 
 that is odious in bloated features and forms of suffering or 
 disease for which medical art knows no remedy — the miserly 
 being whose habitual selfishness has alienated his last friend, 
 and whose profession of repentance would be accounted the 
 new crime of hypocrisy — these men, and scores or even 
 thousands of others, illustrate a fact almost too notorious to 
 need illustration — that there is a point even on earth, beyond 
 which the attempt to arrest the results of a perverted proba- 
 tion, is perfectly vain. The penalty is seen to be a final one. 
 Repentance cannot recall the past. Regrets cannot arrest the 
 retributory process. Excuses and apologies find no accept- 
 ance. Retribution, stern and pitiless, steadily marches on, 
 and crushes the victim of sin, like a worm beneath its heel. 
 
 11. On the other hand, a well-spent j)robation secures re- 
 wards even on earth, which are, in a sense, infinite — so far do 
 they surpass any assignable standard of human conception, so 
 far do they transcend any material or sensual enjoyment. 
 
 And all this comes within the bounds of three-score years 
 and ten. If this be so, and if it consists with the actual 
 justice of God, who can say when the results of a probation, 
 perverted on earth, can ever find an end 1 If the soul con- 
 tinues to exist, it continues with its old being, its old habits, its 
 confirmed tastes. If it made itself once an outcast, self -excluded 
 from hfe and hope, when and how is its exile to terminate ? 
 How is a disease that takes possession of the soul itself, to be 
 
EETEIBDTION. 173 
 
 met and remedied ? There is little liglit on this dark point 
 iji human analogies. Probation in its results, looks to a 
 blessedness that is changeless, or to a wretchedness that can 
 know no relief. 
 
 XIY. 
 
 E E T K I B U T I O ISr , 
 
 Admitting the force of those considerations which lead us 
 to conclude that the present state of existence is one of pro- 
 bation, it naturally follows that the future, as the appropriate 
 sequel of probation, will be one of retribution. Indeed, in 
 our study of the Moral System we discerned those evidences 
 of a disposition on the part of its author to see justice done, 
 virtue rewarded and vice punished, which seemed clearly to 
 warrant the inference, that the unequal allotments of the 
 present will be rectified hereafter. We discerned what cre- 
 ated a strong presumption that perfect and exact justice shall 
 triumph in the end, and that it is intended that it shall tri- 
 umph. But this is possible only as the future is made a state 
 of retribution. 
 
 1. But, though we may be at liberty, we are not com-pelled 
 to suppose in this case, the introduction of any new or un- 
 precedented methods for securing the result. There are laws 
 and forces now at work, which need only to be released from 
 the restrictions which impede their full operation, or hold 
 their tendencies in check, to secure a complete and exact retri- 
 bution for the' deeds of this life. We are not warranted, 
 indeed, in saying that there will not be devised and applied 
 something beside these, some positive retributory element 
 that will more summarily effect the end in view-. 
 
 But leaving this, as a matter upon which reason can urge 
 nothing more than suggestions, we are led to consider what 
 machinery of distributive justice, now at work, must here- 
 after — if left free to act — ^render the future life one of retri- 
 bution. 
 
174 PRESENT MACHINERY FOE EETEIBUTION. 
 
 2. And as to this machineiy of distributive justice, now at 
 work, we have seen that it pervades and largely constitutes, 
 the entire Moral System. The tendencies of things even 
 now, are to an exact retribution. There are some special pro- 
 visions in the constitution of man's complex being, indicative 
 of retributory design. The passions and volitions of the soul 
 not merely disturb its own repose, but derange the order of 
 the physical frame. Bodily suffering and disease are the 
 result of moral transgression. We can see no necessity in the 
 nature of the case that it should be so. But so it is, and this 
 fact must be ascribed to the Author of man's constitution. 
 In like manner the hereditary curse of transgression operates 
 in such a way as to show that the principle of retribution is 
 indissolnbly involved in the established order of things. The 
 iniquity of the parent is, as a matter of fact, visited upon his 
 children. There is a penalty of his transgression which is 
 not inflicted sometimes until he has passed away. It is in 
 some sense a posthumous retribution, whether he is tortured 
 by the foreboding of it, or not. Thus a machinery of retri- 
 bution is inwoven with the structure of man's being. Pen- 
 alty reaches him — whether inflicted by his own perversity, 
 by the resentments of those he has wronged, or by civil jus- 
 tice — through the connection of his soul with its physical 
 frame. Here we have plain intimations of design, harmon- 
 izing with other intimations in the moral and social sphere. 
 
 From the moment an offence is committed, the forces, whose 
 proper scope is to visit it with its just penalty, begin to oper- 
 ate. The conscience of the transgressor protests and rebukes. 
 The angry elements of social provocation, of indignation, or 
 contempt, or retaliation, begin to gather. Distrust is pro- 
 duced, or even abhorrence, sundering the transgressor from 
 the sphere of social confidence and sympathy, and leaving 
 him outlawed or proscribed, to depend as he may, on the 
 poor resources of what has been purchased by his wrong. 
 Even if civil justice does not interfere, and social resentments 
 are not awakened, the moral nature seems to take upon itseK 
 the administration of penalty, and sometimes we are made to 
 feel that a man of selfish schemes and worldly success, exhibits 
 in the height of success, those evidences of restlessness, appre- 
 
PENALTY SURE AT LAST. 175 
 
 hcnsion, self-reproacli, or possibly self -contempt, wliicli make 
 Mm supremely wretched amid all Iiis wealth and honors. 
 His wretchedness may be written legibly npon his features. 
 Or, if the offence is secret, the course of things is such as 
 to tend to bring it to light. Sometimes conscience, unless its 
 power has been deadened by a long course of wrong-doing, 
 will not allow the guilty man to keep his own secret. His 
 looks will betray it. He will excite suspicion by his excessive 
 precaution to keep it safe. Sometimes he will mutter it aloud 
 in his dreams. Sometimes it will become such an incubus 
 upon his consciousness, that he will be forced to disburden 
 himseK of it even by voluntary confession. 
 
 3. But if he is able to guard against self-betrayal, time will 
 ever be threatenmg to bring it to light. H he had accom- 
 plices, their diverse interests may impel them to sell out the 
 guilty secret, or turn State's evidence. The consequences of 
 the crime may be gradually revealing themselves, and, like a 
 track of blood, indicating the locality, or motives, or peculiar 
 circumstances with which its commission is to be associated. 
 Some tell-tale instrument or memorial of the crime may, 
 even after long delay, be discovered, and give new emphasis 
 to the old adage — which demands a broad interpretation, and 
 is endorsed by popular experience and acceptation — that 
 " murder will out." 
 
 Indeed, the modes in which secret crime is brought to 
 light, are practically infinite. If that crime is a mystery, the 
 very fact that it is so, challenges human curiosity to expose 
 it, and a thousand eyes watch for, and a thousand hands are 
 ready to grasp, the clue of discovery. The spark of suspicion 
 is blown to a blaze of exposure. Somewhere, there is an 
 unexplained fact, a missmg weapon, an unaccountable absence, 
 a suspicious flush of m.oney, a stain of blood. It may be that 
 after the lapse even of years, the current of evidence that has 
 been flowing like an underground river, suddenly breaks out 
 in full volume to the light. It is thus that time itself turns 
 against the culprit, and to the last hour of life tortures him 
 with apprehension of the exposure that may come at any 
 moment. 
 
 4. 'Nov is this all. The course of things even now tends 
 
176 PKESENT TENDENCIES CONSmERED. 
 
 not only to the detection, but the punishment of crime. In 
 innumerable instances, the good man fails of his reward, and 
 the bad man evades penalty, because the natural tendencies 
 of things are arrested by what is evidently disturbing and 
 anomalous in the Moral System. The good man's aims or 
 deeds are misunderstood or misrepresented, and he is robbed 
 — not of self-approval, which is inseparable from an upright 
 conscience — but of the praise and honor, or public reward 
 which his conduct merits. So the wicked man is sheltered 
 by his own plausible apology ; or by an accidental relation- 
 ship or compact with men in power ; or by the interests of a 
 party or society which he has served, and brought under obli- 
 gation to himself. 
 
 But all such interferences with the natural course of things 
 are manifestly temporary, and cannot permanently be main- 
 tained. Sooner or later, they must come to an end, and the 
 supremacy of those tendencies which favor justice, will — if 
 time is allowed them to operate — assert itself. If we could 
 suppose the lives of the good and bad continued on here 
 hidefhiitely, without the introduction of any new forces or 
 arrangements other than what would be thus implied, we 
 yet might feel confident that the exceptions to distributive 
 justice which now occur, and attract attention, would be 
 vastly diminished, if they did not disappear altogether. As 
 has already been remarked, if a career of seventy years were 
 extended to ten times that number, it would be next to im- 
 possible that the accumulating forces of retribution should not 
 overtake it. If, in the course of a few score years, the moral 
 nature of the transgressor, by the perverting influences of 
 wrong-doing, becomes such as to be a torture and burden to 
 him, and if in that period the indignation and contempt, or 
 vengeance which his fraud, or violence, or inhumanity have 
 provoked, begins to recoil with terrible and crushing weight 
 upon himself, what would be the result when these scores 
 were changed to hundreds or thousands, and the hatefulness 
 of inveterate depravity, stripped of all the decorations or pal- 
 liations of its hideousness, which the charms of youth or the 
 enterprise of manhood had thrown about it, stood forth, in its 
 naked deformity, isolated from all social sympathy, and in its 
 
WHAT TENDENCIES WILL CONTINUE HEEEAETEK. 177 
 
 hardened perversity, proof against all the kindly essays that 
 might be made for its reform ! Indeed, we are not surprised 
 that, even on earth, guilt sometimes sesks relief in suicide, 
 shrinking from the desperate effort to hear up under the op- 
 pressive consciousness of its own shame or difficulties, even 
 for the near term of natural life as constituted now. 
 
 5. It will thus be seen that a simple extension of probation 
 would go far to ensure retribution. Life often seems to ter- 
 minate, like a premature season, before the harvest of virtue 
 or vice is fully ripe. A few days more in one case, a few 
 years more in the other, might reveal results which would 
 indicate what the matured harvest must be. Frequently, be- 
 fore goodness can attain to the majestic beauty of its normal 
 development, and before wickedness can mature to its shriv- 
 eled hideousness and present itseK in its true aspect to the 
 world, the process of probation, having reached its practical 
 conclusion, is cut short, and men see, only in the bud, as it 
 were, the foresliadowing of what by its exhibition might 
 seem the blessedness of a holy, or the hideousness of an in- 
 fernal sphere. 
 
 6. There can he no reason why this result should not mani- 
 fest itself in a future life, unless with the dissolution of the 
 bodily frame, the action of certain laws by which it is brought 
 about is suspended. The assumption that things can go on 
 permanently there as they do here, so that justice may be 
 evaded, or inequalities and mistakes remain uncorrected, is 
 gratuitous. Even here, there would be, with time, a steady 
 approximation to justice, until finally the retribution was 
 complete. But in the future life, we have no warrant to sup- 
 pose that the action of any laws bearing upon this result will 
 be suspended, or cease to act, with the exception of those 
 which make the body, through its sensibilities, the victim of 
 sin. We must assume that all others will remain as they are. 
 Reason will still discriminate. Memory will retain her treas- 
 ures. Conscience will judge, and approve or condemn. All 
 the elements of mental experience will abide unchanged, and 
 if, as we have reason to believe, the future state shall be social, 
 all the elements of harmonious and pure friendship, on the one 
 hand, and all those of discordant passions and jealousies on 
 
 12 
 
178 MENTAL ANGUISH AND PHYSICAL SUFFEEING. 
 
 the other, will act with a force that may become more vastly 
 effective, when released from the incubus of connection with 
 such a material frame as sometimes burdens the spirit now. 
 
 7. Let it not be said that this would greatly reduce the 
 f earf ulness of retribution ; that by the withdrawal of physical 
 sensibility the main grounds for apprehension or foreboding 
 would be removed. We are not warranted to assert this. 
 We cannot say what new condition of things might supervene, 
 and more than offset the physical sufferings occasioned by 
 vice. But it should be borne in mind, that even now, the 
 keenest anguish of guilt, the torture that drives to desper- 
 ation, that makes all physical suffering light in comparison, 
 is not anything which is derived from nervous sensibility, or 
 the constitution of the body. It is rather the anguish of the 
 soul, the agony of conscious self-accusation, the burning sense 
 of self-reproach, of remorse, of incipient despair. It springs 
 from the consciousness of inexcusable wrong-doing. It is ag- 
 gravated by the sense of wilful self-alienation from all that is 
 good. The soul becomes its own accuser. It loathes and 
 despises itself. It feels itseK everywhere repelled, without a 
 friend from whom it would receive help among the good, 
 without an ally it can trust among the abandoned and the lost. 
 
 This is what is sometimes witnessed on earth. What rea- 
 son can be urged that all this, and whatever more might 
 accompany quickened and disencumbered emotional sensibili- 
 ties, may not attend the soul to the future that follows a 
 wasted probation ? Without borrowing the language of reve- 
 lation to describe it, reason might pronounce it the torture 
 that burns on downward and deeper, with the forever inex- 
 tinguishable taper of the soul's existence. 
 
 8. Of the continuance of the future retribution, reason can 
 only speak from the light of analogy. It will continue while 
 its causes continue ; and what prospect there may be of their 
 arrest, may be inferred from the difficulty of arresting them 
 now. Even his manifestly impending doom will not deter 
 the drunkard from the indulgence of his appetite. The ter- 
 rible risks of infamy and bitter penalty will not stay the 
 criminal in his desperation. With the full knowledge of what 
 they challenge, men defy the operation of all natural, social, 
 
VIRTUE AND THE FUTUKE LIFE. 179 
 
 moral, and divine restraints. Tliey plunge into the gulf that 
 visibly opens before them. The motives that should have 
 paralyzed them at their first step in wrong-doing, lose some- 
 thing of their terror at each successive step, till at length 
 they are scarcely felt. Even when overtaken by the fate they 
 have rashly and willfully invited, their I'epentance is often 
 rather the regret that the law should be vindicated at their 
 expense, than any genuine sorrow for their transgression. In 
 heart tliey are still unchanged, and they bear with them still 
 the same elements of passionate insubordination, of reckless 
 seK-indulgence, of defiant contempt for virtue and its restraints. 
 Of course, in such circumstances, recovery or deliverance 
 from the power of habitual motives, that have long asserted 
 iudisputtible supremacy, is practically hopeless. We cannot 
 see where or how the process of retribution can be arrested 
 by any of the causes by which it has been brought about. It 
 threatens a duration commensurate with the soul's existence. 
 
 9. If now we turn to the rewards of virtue, we can readily 
 see how its entrance upon the future life may be to it the era 
 of final and complete triumph, over all that it once had to 
 struggle with or to fear. It passes from imprisonment and 
 subjection to physical conditions, to spiritual freedom, leaving 
 behind it not only pain, and disease, and the various ills inci- 
 dent to the physical struggle for existence, but the sphere of 
 temptation to which the soul was susceptible through its union 
 with the body, and through which it was subject to perpetual 
 harassment and assault. It may reap now in full measure 
 the fruits of inward peace and outward beneficence. There 
 is nothing to disturb a composure which is grounded on en- 
 lightened self -approval and the consciousness of pure and holy 
 auns. It is no longer inextricably involved, through physical 
 relations, in associations from which it revolts, and if it may 
 have access to its own chosen companionships, and give and 
 take what help they may lend to the aspirations of goodness 
 and virtue, it may, perhaps, be said that it has attained to the 
 full and perfect measure of a gracious reward. 
 
 10. We may conclude, therefore, that as the present is a 
 state of probation, the future must be one of retribution. 
 The seed is sown here for a harvest there. Upon tlie con- 
 
180 OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 
 
 science a course of guilt must accumulate a burden of self- 
 reproach, permanently crusliing. Ilabits of thought, feeling, 
 and character, formed now, will then have become so rigid, that 
 any prospect of change is hopeless, and ia these necessarily 
 abide the elements of a misery as permanent as the depraved 
 affections or tastes in which it originates. Keason can dis- 
 cern no remedial provision in suffering endured, so long as 
 kindred suffering, no matter how intense on earth, is seen to 
 effect no radical or permanent reform. 
 
 XY. 
 
 INVALIDITY OF OBJECTIONS TO THE MOEAL SYSTEM. 
 
 In the study of a field so vast and complex as that presented 
 by the Moral System, difficulties are inevitable. These diffi- 
 culties, however, are not so much in the facts, as in the rea- 
 sons for the facts. Sometimes they consist in our inabihty 
 to harmonize the facts with our preconceived notions, and 
 might be removed if these notions Avere so connected or modi- 
 fied, as to accord with the truth. 
 
 1. But sometimes the difficulty is simply in the inadequacy 
 of our powers to the problem we essay to solve. Such objec- 
 tions as meet us in vindicating human freedom and responsibil- 
 ity, in setting forth in a world of sin and death, the goodness 
 of God, in harmonizing this goodness with the severity of 
 probation, and in other kindred problems, can sometimes best 
 be met by considering how inadequate are all our powers to 
 comprehend even the conditions of the problem to be solved, 
 
 2. With certain obvious facts within the sphere of out 
 experience, we are, to some extent, familiar. But we know 
 that there must be an infinite number of facts beyond the 
 sphere of our observation, the distinct interpretation of which 
 may be to us, circumstanced as we are, impossible. There 
 may be connected relations between the facts we do knov/, 
 and those we do not know, which must be studied and under- 
 Btood before we can assume to be competent critics. But ii 
 
EXTENT OF THE MOEAL SYSTEM. 181 
 
 it were possible for all the facts and relations to be known, it 
 would still be impossible for a finite mind to grasp them in all 
 their number and complexity. For we must ever b)ear in 
 mind, when it is asked of any provision, any. arrangement, 
 any particular feature of a general system, why it has been 
 constituted as it is, that to render a full and satisfactory 
 answer, we may possibly need to apprehend it in tlie various 
 relations which it bears to the entire system, as Vv^ell as the 
 several parts of the system to which it belongs. Some un- 
 noted fact, some far-reaching consequence, some incidental 
 result, might furnish us the key to the mystery, and resolve 
 into light what was utterly inexplicable before. 
 
 3. And no one can question that human probation may be 
 such a feature of God's universal Moral System, that we 
 should be justified in criticising certain aspects of it, only 
 when we had comprehended the system itself in its various 
 parts, and as a symmetrical and combined whole. As it is, 
 we are incompetent to draw any line which we can assert to 
 be the boundary beyond which the influence of a specific fact, 
 law, tendency, or provision does not extend. As there is not 
 a particle of matter in the universe, that does not, through 
 the all-pervading principle of gravitation, exert its influence 
 on every other particle, in every other world, however remote ; 
 so in the moral frame, which is alike universal and infinite, 
 we are not warranted to say that there is an event, or influ- 
 ence, or provision tliat stands isolated, and can be judged by 
 itseK alone. It would be unjust to judge the whole by the 
 seeming defects of a part, when the correct apprehension of 
 that whole would bring the ostensibly obnoxious part into 
 harmony with all the rest, and restore to it all the symmetry 
 of its relative proportions. 
 
 4. If the universe is the work of a single mind, if it is 
 characterized by unity of design, if it stretches beyond the 
 measure of our thought, above and around us, into limitless 
 space and boundless eternity, then does it constitute a scheme 
 so vast, that none but an infinite mind is competent to pass a 
 final judgment upon even a single feature of it in all its pos- 
 sible relations. The sphere of our observation is narrow. Our 
 faculties to observe and discern are feeble. The light of 
 
182 ILLUSTRATIVE ANALOGIES. 
 
 reason or of nature, by wiiicli we see, is dirn, while any frag- 
 ment of tlie vast system may sustain manifold relations, both 
 to the known and to the nnknown, of which we are able to 
 form no adequate conception, possibly no conception at all. Our 
 limited sphere and limited powers impress upon us the lesson 
 of humility. He that, from the standpoint of this atom-globe, 
 and this inch of duration that we call time, should attempt to 
 pass judgment on some minute portion or fragment of the 
 universal Moral System, would exhibit only a practical anal- 
 ogy to the microscopic insect, that after tedious eiforts, emerg- 
 ing to the surface from some cave-like interstice of a minute 
 pebble in a block of stone, deep buried in the foundations of 
 a structure like Solomon's temple, or St, Peter's at Eome, 
 should presume to criticise it on the basis of such informa- 
 tion as his observation could gather up in that secluded nook, 
 where sand -grains become Alps and Andes to bound his 
 vision, and shut out the very possibility of any comprehen- 
 sive conception of the magnificent whole. 
 
 5. So there are even mechanisms, wrought by human skill, 
 which appear inconceivably intricate. They are constructed 
 wheel upon wheel in successive ranks, so that there may be 
 found some among them that seem useless, or that appar- 
 ently do not move at all. If now, upon one of these there 
 should be discovered a seemingly unsightly projection, how 
 might the superficial and hasty critic expatiate on its useless- 
 ness, and condemn the folly of the constructor ! And yet it 
 is not only possible, but it is very strongly to be presumed, 
 that the time will come in the operation of that vast mechan- 
 ism, when not only every wheel will move in its proper time 
 and place, but when that unsightly projection will, in some 
 most exemplary manner, vindicate the wisdom of its insertion, 
 and justify the profound sagacity of the, perhaps, unknown 
 builder. 
 
 But it is easy to see that even such an illustration as this is 
 utterly inadequate to set forth our relation to a system so 
 infinitely complex, so inconceivably vast, as that universal 
 Moral System of which our ov/n sphere might appear to our 
 enlarged vision only as an outlying, minute province. Our 
 questionings of why and wherefore, when we stumble upon 
 
INVESTIGATION DISSIPATES SOME OBJECTIONS. 183 
 
 the investigation of wliat tlie great Maker has ordered ; when 
 we ask, for instance, why probation has been made so severe, 
 or v/hy some retributions seem so final, as w^ell as terrible ; 
 may find the fitting rebuke for the presumption that they 
 sometimes involve, in that awful silence with which the stars 
 look down on our globe, as they sweep past it in their orbits, 
 and eternity swallows up our dead centuries, like drops in its 
 illimitable ocean. 
 
 6. The simple fact, beyond which we cannot pass, and 
 which forms an insuperable barrier to our presumptuous criti- 
 cism, is that this Moral System, though a fragment considered 
 in itself, can be no detached fragment, isolated from the 
 mighty scheme of the universe to which it belongs. By itself 
 it has never been comprehended by human reason, ever forced 
 to shrink back repulsed and bafiied when it has undertaken 
 its exposition. How much less, then, can it be understood in 
 all its countless relations to the universal scheme itself ! And 
 how shall that scheme be so comprehended that we shall feel 
 ourselves competent to define its bearings upon earthly proba- 
 tion and sublunary interests ! 
 
 "We find, morever — and this is to be specially noted as a 
 presumption against hasty objections — that, on investigation, 
 the objections which are urged against certain arrangements 
 in the constitution of the material universe, are seen to be 
 often quite groundless. Plagues have ravaged the world, and 
 men have regarded them as mconsistent with the divine be- 
 nevolence. But when we trace them to their origin, we find 
 them resulting from violations of the laws of nature, while 
 the lessons they so terribly impress are of pennanent benefit 
 to the race. Broad deserts stretch over portions of the globe, 
 and this has seemed like waste or blunder in the scheme of 
 the world's construction. Yet it is now held that the vast 
 African Sahara heats the winds that sweep over the Mediter 
 ranean, and bear to Europe the warmth and moisture that 
 make it habitable and productive. Storms interrupt the 
 peaceful order of nature, and torrents desolate the fields, 
 yet they purify the air, and water the earth. The trees of 
 the forest grow slowly, and wear out the centuries, in spite 
 of man's importunity for the timber they produce ; yet if 
 
184 DIFFICULTIES AND MYSTEEIES. 
 
 trees grew in a day, or the order of nature were disturbed to 
 meet human emergencies, who could count upon that stability 
 of things on which we ground our confidence, and our pro- 
 visions for the future ? 
 
 7. In the sphere of Probation and of the Moral System, the 
 difficulties that meet us are manifold. The sins of the parent 
 are visited upon his offspring. But who can say that the repeal 
 of that provision which ensures this result, would not be an 
 overv/helming calamity in robbing ancestral piety of one of 
 its most cheering rewards, as well as breaking down the re- 
 straints which hold in check the reckless impulses of the 
 profligate parent ? The seeming impunity of notorious crimi- 
 nals, up to the moment when their sudden doom overtakes 
 them, seems inexplicable. But who can say that the final 
 vengeance, more signal for the delay, or the trial of faith 
 thereby occasioned to the good, may not be more than an offset ? 
 The continued existence of whole tribes and nations that 
 curse themselves and the world, century after century, by their 
 turbulence and vice, may appear an insoluble problem. Bnt 
 can we regard it as such, when a regenerated race, tens of 
 thousands of years hence, shall look back at the terrible spec- 
 tacle, and, warned themselves to practical wisdom, shall at 
 once recognize and adore the long-suffering and the justice 
 of God ? 
 
 8. The planets took their name — V\^anderers — from the ap- 
 parent irregularity of their movements. Yet they move in 
 their orbits v.dth a mathematical precision. Are we warranted 
 to say that the seemingly abnormal features of the Moral 
 System are not in like manner reducible to the terms of 
 universal law, both vdse and just? Of two sculptors em- 
 ployed to make a statue for a pedestal, one produces what, 
 seen by itself, appears an incomparable work of art, while the 
 master-piece of the other seems disproportioned, rough, and 
 uncouth. Yet it may be that, w^hen severally placed on the 
 pedestal, the first shall appear dwarfed and misplaced ; while 
 the other shall challenge the v/armest praise as exactly adapted 
 to the position it is to occupy. So we may sketch out our 
 ideal of a more perfect constitution of the Moral System, 
 producing what, if practically applied, v/ould be a pigmy or 
 
DESIGN OF THE MOKAL SYSTEM. 185 
 
 a monstrosity, while yet we may fall into tlie mistake of criti- 
 cising the work of the Infinite artist, which, placed on its 
 proper pedestal, will justly challenge the admiration and ap- 
 plause of the whole intelligent universe. 
 
 XYI. 
 
 THE EKD DESIGNED IN THE MOEAL SYSTEM. 
 
 Assuming, as we are now warranted to do, that a moral con- 
 stitution of things exists, and that the origin and order of it 
 must be ascribed to a Supreme Intelligence, it wiU follow 
 necessarily that this Supreme Intelligence has a design to be 
 accomplished, in reference to man in connection with the 
 peculiar discipline to which he is subjected, and the order of 
 things to which he belongs. 
 
 1. If there is manifest design discoverable both in the con- 
 stitution of nature and of man, and in their mntual adapta- 
 tions, it is proper to inquire what this design is, and what is 
 the end evidently contemplated in man's creation and pro- 
 bation. 
 
 Here we recur to what has been said already as to the uni- 
 form and concurrent testimony of all the revelations of science 
 as to the position occupied by man in the order of nature. 
 The relations in which he stands to the entire material and 
 animal creation, show that it is, and was meant to be, tribu- 
 tary to him. The flower is beautiful and fragrant in itseK, 
 but not for itself. It is man alone that enjoys it. For him 
 the earth yields its fruits. For him, too, the animal creation, 
 brought into subjection by his superior reason, lives and dies. 
 The bird may be happy in its own song, but it warbles for the 
 ear of man. The beast may excel in its strength, but it is the 
 genius of man that utilizes it. He is gifted with powers that 
 are denied their proper sphere, when they are not allowed to 
 control the forces of nature within certain limits, and to retain 
 the mastery over them. Without him, the visible creation 
 would be like a pedestal witliout its statue — like a house with- 
 
186 MECHANISM OF PEOBATION". 
 
 out an inliabitant. To know the divine design we must study 
 the statue. We must investigate something more than the 
 brick and mortar of the building. 
 
 2. Design is manifest throughout nature. It is evidenced in 
 the moral system ; but it culminates in man. Without him, 
 all the marvellous arrangements and adjustments of the 
 material world, with its beauties and its grandeurs, are but the 
 exquisite frame waiting for its portrait. Yet the portrait 
 must be worthy of the frame. The nature, capacity and rich 
 endowments of the human soul are such that by proper mold- 
 ing and discipline, it may supply such a portrait. Here then 
 is the end, plainly kept in view throughout the whole scheme 
 to which it belongs. This end is to make man as perfect as 
 his nature will allow ; so to de^^lop and educate his being as 
 to make the best that can be made of it ; expanding his pow- 
 ers, and harmonizing them in a willing subjection to the high- 
 est — that is, the moral — law of his being, so that he shall be 
 seen to justify the wisdom lavished in providing his rich 
 endowments and his favored lot. 
 
 This is no groundless assumption. We have here the visi- 
 ble and invisible, but by no means obscure, mechanism of 
 probation, operating constantly upon human life and charac- 
 ter. Studying its results, we find them various. They range 
 from the line of admiration to that of contempt. There is 
 the high and the low, the beautiful and the base, with all the 
 intermediate gradations. By which of these shall we proceed 
 to judge of the end in view for which a Moral System was 
 established, and probation ordained ? 
 
 3. In studying any human mechanism, to find out what 
 kind of thing it was meant to produce, we do not interpret it 
 by its manifest failures, or its imperfect results, unless these 
 are invariably unifonn, and do not admit of improvement. 
 We do not accept a defective and imperfect casting as author- 
 izing us to set forth the molder's design ; but we select that 
 which is most perfect, that which comes nearest to the full 
 standard of the mold. So under this divine constitution of 
 things, we infer the design of the author, not from those 
 results which bear evidence of being abnormal, through un- 
 favorable circumstances, or through the perversity of human 
 
IDEAL RESULT OF PKOBATION. 187 
 
 will, but from those which seem most worthy of the lavish 
 expenditure and wonderful provisions of the Great Designer. 
 
 What are these ? Evidently the best possible development 
 and structure of life and character attainable under the terms 
 of a probationary Moral System. "What this is, does not ad- 
 mit of question or doubt. Just as readily as we can distin- 
 guish the metal from the dross, the diamond from the mass 
 of gravel or earth in which it is hnbedded, or the wheat from 
 the chaff in which it is buried, so readily can we distinguish 
 the triumphs of probation from its failures. When tempta- 
 tion prevails over virtuous aims, we see what we instinctively 
 pronounce odious or contemptible; but when temptation 
 simply tries, tests, and confirms that devotion to righteousness 
 which it has failed to subdue, we witness a result, compared 
 with which beauty of feature, sprightliness of genius, or bare 
 intellectual symmetry lose their charm. There is nothing 
 more beautiful than a pure and noble life ; nothing more 
 repulsive than the dregs of a probation that has sunk to the 
 level of selfish or sensual vice. 
 
 To argue a point like this, is like attempting to prove an 
 axiom. It appeals for its truth to the universal intuitions of 
 the race. The end in view in the constitution of the Moral 
 System is to produce the perfection of human life and charac- 
 ter ; all, and more than all,which the old philosophers meant by 
 the phrase, " living according to nature." " Whatsoever things 
 are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are 
 of good report " — all go to constitute, in their measure, that 
 perfect ideal— often suggested, yet never but once realized on 
 earth — which may be pronounced the most complete type of 
 humanity, the faultless result of probation. 
 
 4. It matters not to our argument that the attainment of 
 this is so rare — that it constitutes the exception rather than 
 the rule. A mechanism that produces but a single perfect 
 fabric out of a thousand, reveals in that, more than in all the 
 others, its own, and its author's design. ]^or is the world so 
 poor in virtue, that out of its schools of trial, hardship, self- 
 denial, or temptation, it has not sometime produced lofty 
 characters, great 'and good men, who need no other eulogium 
 than the sim]>le narrative of what they were and did. In 
 
1S8 NECESSITY OF TOIL OBJECTED. 
 
 tiem, even while they often humble themselves as consciously 
 imperfect, we recognize elements wrought out evidently in 
 accordance with the divine scheme of probation, which show 
 Avhat it was meant to produce. 
 
 5. But in this moral development and perfection of the 
 individual, a scheme that extends to the whole race is implied ; 
 a scheme that would conduct each successive generation to even 
 higher positions, in progress toward perfection. The race, as 
 well as the individual, is subject to probation, and no reason 
 for the discipline of one can be offered, which does not apply 
 to all. The mere suggestion of the steady or persistent ad- 
 vancement of the race, as the normal result of this present 
 scheme of things, carries its commendation, if not the assur- 
 ance of its truthfulness with it. There is a peculiar fascina- 
 tion in the thought that at each new step of human experience, 
 the new lessons learned shall help the race onward, till, in 
 its progress, it has left behind it all its dross, and become 
 relined to bear more and more perfectly " the image of the 
 heavenly." 
 
 With such considerations, then, in our favor, how can we 
 but conclude, on strongly probable grounds, that the moral 
 system is not only constituted with an end in view, but that 
 this end is the perfection of the individual soul, and, through 
 it, the progressive regeneration of the race ? Or, rather, how 
 can we reach any other conclusion ? Is there anything to 
 shake this, or to render it improbable ? 
 
 6. It may be said, perhaps, that man is doomed to toil, and 
 that his physical necessities chain him to tasks which leave no 
 room for intellectual development and moral progress. To 
 sustaui physical life and energy, he must therefore be a dnidge. 
 But is this true ? Does such a necessity exist ? There are, 
 doubtless, cases where it seems to be so, but in most of them 
 there has been some original mistake committed ; or society 
 itself, failing to improve its opportunities, has become de- 
 generate and corrupt, and so stands in the way. But there is 
 nothing in the original scheme of things which requires this. 
 By proper forethought and industry, one may make all suitable 
 provision for the body, and yet have time' and opportunity 
 left for moral training and discipline. 
 
SLOW PEOGKESS OF THE EACE. 189 
 
 But more than this, toil itself and the necessity of it may 
 be made tributary to moral ends. The active energies are 
 developed and strengthened by it. Man comes in contact 
 with physical nature, to learn the conditions of success ; to 
 find his path of exjDerience strewn with emblems of moral 
 truth ; to discover that what a man soweth, that shall he also 
 reap ; to understand that what is worth striving for, demands 
 effort. Meanwhile, the necessity of toil wards off the danger 
 that flows from the vices which idleness engenders. It impels 
 to the study of the laws of nature, to devising means for 
 taking advantage of them, to recognize rights of labor, rights 
 of exchange, mutual obligation and the measure of it, inso- 
 much that even before we have fully explored its sphere, 
 reaching on to social arrangements and relations, we find that 
 toil itseK lies directly in the line of moral training and moral 
 progress. So far from being an objection to the truth of the 
 theory that man's proper end, according to his Maker's 
 design, is moral perfection, it rather tends to confirm that 
 truth. 
 
 7. Is it said that the history of the race gives no encourage- 
 ment to hope that a scheme for man's moral perfection can 
 be realized, or that a study of the past concludes against its 
 possibility in the future ? It is, indeed, a sad truth, that Vv^here 
 such a scheme has been cherished by some lofty and enthusi- 
 astic minds, the}'' have often been doomed to disappointment. 
 Their cherished plans have been wrecked upon the rock of 
 human depravity, and often they have been compelled to sur- 
 render their task in despair. Thus, for long periods, we see 
 little progress made toward the desired result ; or, it may be, 
 temporary progress is succeeded by reaction and degeneracy. 
 The eye rests on gloomy tracts of history, ages of darkness 
 and debasement, of violence and lust, of effete civilizations, 
 and crumbling or dissolved empires. The impression which 
 such a survey, apparently, is calculated to make is one of utter 
 despondency as to the possibility of any brighter future. 
 
 Yet, a conclusion of this kind is not altogether just or 
 warranted. We see, on closer observation, something beside 
 repeated failure and the collapse of effort. Out of the very 
 ruins of these there are springing up, like verdure from 
 
190 KEAL ACHIEVEMENT. 
 
 decay, hopes of better tilings. There are irrepressible out- 
 bursts of reforming energy ; aspirations after an unreached, 
 but imperishable ideal ; actual attainments, however partial or 
 transient, that challenge admiration; possibilities and even 
 actualities of virtue, which inspire a renewed enthusiasm, and 
 give assurance that the scheme for the moral perfection of the 
 race is not altogether a mere romantic dream. It is not too 
 high or distant for human contemplation. It is repeatedly 
 suggested. It lies directly in the pathway of our serious 
 thought, and when once recognized, it is found often to 
 possess a charm that fascinates the soul. 
 
 Still more, all the failures and disappointments of the past 
 do not bring about its final abandonment. Thoughtful minds, 
 wrought upon by humane affections, refuse to relinquish it. 
 Reformers are springing up — often in httle sympathy with 
 the methods prescribed by revelation — who are bound, under 
 some modified phase, to revive the scheme of the moral per- 
 fectibility of the race. It cannot be buried so deep as to be 
 beyond the hope of resurrection. Can we believe that a 
 scheme that is so forced upon our attention, that is made so 
 familiar to human minds, is strange and alien to the divine 
 thought ? If the moral system is established for a designed 
 end, what can that end be other than what has been desig- 
 nated ? 
 
 8. But has there not been some actual progress, however 
 feeble or intermittent, toward this end? Has all the past 
 been uniformly disappointment and defeat ? Has it exhibited 
 nothing but the collapse of exhausted effort ? Far from it. 
 Some things have been achieved of permanent value. !Names 
 have been gained for the record of virtue that the world " will 
 not willingly let die." Examples have been held up for imi- 
 tation that are worthy of it, and that have been an educating 
 power for after-generations. Laws have been made more 
 just, usages more humane, and social and national morality 
 has been elaborated in codes that have gained widening 
 recognition. Even history, with all its dreary wastes, will 
 not, when rightly read, tolerate the theory that the world is 
 unprogressive, that through all the past there has been no 
 pennanent gain, and that the human race must ever keep to 
 
WHAT MAT BE ANTICIPATED. 191 
 
 its tread-mill task, never advancing, thongh. ever toiling. 
 There has been actual progress, and progress in moral as well 
 as other respects. The old pagan civilizations have perished, 
 but something better has succeeded them. As the rubbish of 
 the Roman empire decayed, the germs of Christianity sprang 
 np through it. Europe felt the powers of a new life. It j)ut 
 by its old barbarisms ; it adopted new usages ; it submitted 
 to culture ; until now it presents itself at many points in con- 
 trast, intellectually and morally, with what it was a few cen- 
 turies ago. 
 
 9. It is not necessary here to inquire into the causes of this 
 progress. It is immaterial to the present argument whether 
 it has been brought out exclusively by the ordinary operations 
 of human energies, or by these impelled or supplemented by 
 divine interpositions. If the latter are recognized, the whole 
 matter in question is conceded, and we see the end to which 
 a Divine Providence is visibly working. If it be denied, yet 
 Christianity must take its place as a resultant in some way of 
 natural forces that find their original in the Author of the 
 moral system, and thus enters as a component and distinctive 
 element in the divine scheme. 
 
 Thus, we must concede that there has been actual progress, 
 however limited or unsatisfactory, toward what reason sug- 
 gests as the end for which the moral system was constructed. 
 "We find no facts in human experience or history in conflict 
 with the theory. We infer, inasmuch as no plausible rival 
 theory has been or can be suggested, that this theory must be 
 true. And yet, if true, we are forced to admit that human 
 progress has been very slow, and that the end in view is, as 
 yet, far short of attainment. 
 
 10. In these circumstances, what are we warranted to 
 anticipate as the course of divine procedure ? Here is a 
 moral system, complexly constructed, a system, too, of "pro- 
 bation, calculated to discipline and educate a race, and the 
 obvious end in view — the only conceivable one worthy of the 
 Great Author of the system — is the moral and spiritual per- 
 fection of the race. That object is but partially attained. In 
 some way — we are not required to state how — human per- 
 versity has come in to frustrate its general attainment. 
 
192 A STKONG PKESUMPTIOK. 
 
 Looked at, so far as the broad, eompreliensiye end in riew is 
 concerned, the moral system appears to be a failure. Taking 
 the past together, the scene is a dismal one. We see the 
 result of probation apparently calamitous to the great and 
 overwhelming majority. Ten fall where one stands fast. 
 Impurity and vice and selfish greed are the rule ; their oppo- 
 sites the exception. Such has been the process that has been 
 going on for thousands of years, and during these years there 
 have been periods when the prospect of anything better was 
 utterly hopeless, when it seemed as if — conceding the end in 
 view in the divine design to be what we have found it — 
 nothing remained but the frank confession that it had been 
 utterly and hopelessly defeated, and that the prolonged con- 
 tinuance of the moral system would be only the allowance of 
 continued degeneracy, a steady relapse from bad to worse. 
 
 11. Why, then, has it been continued ? Evidently because 
 it is not, even yet, and is not meant to be, a complete failure. 
 Its continued existence is the strongest presumption, if not 
 proof, that it has an end to subserve. We cannot, we dare 
 not, impute to its Author an utter indifference to what looks 
 like a deliberate, cherished plan, elaborately constructed and 
 continued on for centuries upon centuries. We cannot re- 
 concile its abandonment with wise and far-reaching design. 
 
 There is a manifest and strong a priori presumption that, 
 at some point, where an interposition becomes necessary, in 
 order that the end in view may not be utterly frustrated, such 
 interposition will take place. Let us suppose — -and the sup- 
 position is simple historical fact — that, after the lapse of a 
 long period, it had become increasingly manifest that the 
 race, instead of advancing toward perfection, is obviously 
 degenerating and becoming more corrupt ; that it is darken- 
 ing the little light it had ; that, in its highest artistic culture, 
 it is yet going more and more astray ; might we not presume 
 that by some intei-position, through natural or supernatural 
 means, this retrograde movement w^ould be arrested, and this 
 tendency, in some measure at least, counteracted ? 
 
 But this supposition does not come up fully to the facts of 
 history. What are these ? The Apostle Paul has concisely 
 summed them up in a single sentence — " The v/orld by wis- 
 
FACTS OF THE CASE. 193 
 
 dom knew not God." At tlie very height, and in all the 
 splendor of its intellectual attainments, it was, and remained, 
 morally debased. That in the streets of Athens, the " eye of 
 Greece," there should stand " an altar to the unknown God ; " 
 that the Avisest of heathen teachers should humbly confess his 
 own ignorance and inability to solve the problem of man's 
 destiny, and bid his inquiring friends to wait for a teacher 
 from heaven ; that in the writings of Plato, Cicero, Seneca, 
 and Epictetus, where we meet with sentences that seem almost 
 instinct with a divine wisdom, and indicate a profound study 
 of natural law, we should lind conjoined with them doubts 
 about fundamental trutlis, or false maxims in morals, remind- 
 ing us at once of the greatness and weakness, the nobleness 
 and the degradation of the loftiest intellects ; that these 
 should, by silence at least, implicitly indorse gross supersti- 
 tions and idolatries ; that, after having excited wonder and 
 admiration by their genius, they should vanish like meteors, 
 and leave no permanent light, but only the memory of their 
 transient blaze ; that, on their disappearance, the race should 
 resume again its career of degeneracy — that can scarcely be 
 said to have been arrested by them — and that the course of 
 speculation should turn back upon itself, and sink in the 
 decrepitude of age at the cradle of a blind superstitious faith 
 from which it sprung ; that, meanwhile, vice and violence, 
 crude religious notions, and barbarous rites should resume 
 their sway — all these things, repeated again and again, in some 
 measure, in human experience — prove the incapacity of man, 
 Mdthout aids beyond his own reason, to attain a permanent 
 moral elevation, to make real and absolute progress, or to 
 elaborate any ethical or religious system which could solve 
 the problem of his destiny, disperse his doubts, calm his fears, 
 inspire his hopes, or give lasting peace to his soul. 
 
 12. If this is our conclusion from a survey of the condition 
 of people intellectually most favored — teachers of after-ages 
 in eloquence and art — what shall we say of the case of less 
 privileged nations ? How pitiable seems their state, whether 
 of intellectual helplessness or moral perversity ? Are the 
 generations that are interminably to follow them to be left to 
 grope their way in darkness, and no provision to be made for 
 13 
 
194 CONCLUSION. 
 
 their relief? If the great end of a moral system is not 
 abandoned, shall there be no manifest effort or interposition 
 to revive the possibility and prospect of a brighter future for 
 the race ? Are these ages of moral weakness, ignorance, and 
 degradation to be perpetuated ? Can we imagine an Infinite 
 Mind, the Author of the moral system, framing it for the 
 specific end of perfecting man in moral excellence, and 
 elevating the race to a recognition of its near relation to 
 Himself, comprehending at the same time fully the difficulties 
 occasioned by human perversity, and the hopelessness of un- 
 aided reason to grapple with them, thus measuring at a glance 
 the whole problem, and discerning how near His own plan 
 approaches to final defeat — can we imagine such a Being 
 indifferent to the result, continuing the race, after all sufficient 
 reasons for its continuance have ceased, and leaving it with 
 utter unconcern to abide as the monument of His defeated 
 designs ? 
 
 This is, indeed, incredible. "We must anticipate powerful 
 interposition of some kind. We must look for some divine 
 rectification of the manifest evil, the introduction of some 
 method to arrest the tendencies and forces that threaten the 
 final defeat of a great design. 
 
 XYII. 
 
 DIVINE INTEEPOSITION ACTUAL OE PROBABLE. 
 
 It may be said, perhaps, that we have had as yet so suf- 
 ficient evidence of human degeneracy, inasmuch as the moral 
 starting-point of the race may have been so low and degraded, 
 that its subsequent career indicates marked and absolute, as 
 well as relative, progress. Assuming this to be a fact, it may 
 be argued that, with sufficient time and opportunity, the grand 
 design of man's creation may be attained by his own proper 
 resources, directed by sagacity and the accumulated wisdom 
 of the past. 
 
 1. If this be the view proposed, it can be met only by the 
 
ANCIENT THEISM. 195 
 
 evidence of facts. Putting sacred history aside, that onr in- 
 vestigations may be unbiased by what assumes the point at 
 issue, we inquire, "What are the facts ? Amid the obscurity 
 that covers the earlier history of the race, and the long periods 
 that intervene before the human record becomes distinct and 
 reliable, we must often grope our way and accept surmises 
 and probabilities as approximations to the truth. Yet there 
 are very strong indications that the moral and religious start- 
 ing-point of the human race was far different from that of a 
 debased feticism or idol-worship. 
 
 The study of the comparative history of the religions of the 
 most ancient nations with which we are acquainted, indicates 
 a progressive debasement of the religious ideal with which 
 they started. We are not, perhaps, fully warranted to assert 
 that they all derived, by inheritance from a common original, 
 that approximately pure Theism of which we find them pos- 
 sessed at a very early period. Yet there can be no question 
 that several of them did possess a Theism which embodied the 
 main truths of l^atural Theology, associated and incorporated 
 with which were views of the character, attributes, and provi- 
 dence of God, which well accord with the simplicity and 
 spirituality of a religious worship that had not as yet degene- 
 rated into idolatry, or into those grosser fonns of polytheism 
 which subsequently prevailed. 
 
 2. Among the Chinese, for instance, we find what good 
 scholars have regarded as conclusive evidence that they pos- 
 sessed at a very early date — more than a thousand years before 
 the Christian era— a knowledge of the One God, which was 
 subsequently lost. AVhile civilization and the arts progressed, 
 religious knowledge and purity as steadily declined, till to 
 later generations the language in which their ancestors spoke 
 of God conveyed no adequate meaning. Of Egypt, we know 
 that it was early famed for wisdom ; that a supreme Deity, the 
 Judge of the dead, was recognized by those who reared its 
 earliest monuments, and left their religious thought pictured 
 on walls or sculptured on pillars. The unity of the Supreme 
 God and the immortality of the soul were fundamental points 
 of the Egyptian creed at the earliest period of which any 
 decisive trace survives, and this " Supreme God of Egypt 
 
196 HOW TO BE ACCOUNTED FOE. 
 
 was, indeed, sucli as Jamblicus has described. Him — One, self- 
 existent, eternal, and the Creator of all that is." In the case 
 of India, Assyria, Persia — and of Greece also, if the facts 
 asserted as to the Dodonean cultus can be maintained — we 
 find the earliest worship the purest, as if nearest to the foun- 
 tain-head of truth ; and with the progress of ages, we see it 
 transformed, encumbered, and overlaid with idolatries and 
 superstitions that almost disguise its identity. 
 
 3. We may account as we please for this singular fact. But 
 whatever theory we adopt, the conclusion is substantially the 
 same. If we assume an original revelation, the common in- 
 heritance of all these ancient nations, and suppose this revela- 
 tion to have conferred upon them the knowledge of the One 
 Supreme God, and kindred truths, we find " that where they 
 knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were 
 thankful, but became vain in their imaginations, and their 
 foolish hearts were darkened. Professing themselves to be 
 wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incor- 
 ruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and 
 to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things" — the 
 manifest proof of a steady and sad degeneracy, which no form 
 or exercise of reason was sufficient to arrest. The only marked 
 instance of its arrest is the case of the Jewish nation, and all 
 will concede that only by peculiar institutions and peculiar 
 teaching — not philosophical, but religious, and which they 
 uniformly credited to divine and supernatural origin — was 
 this arrest afEected. 
 
 If, on the other hand, we assume that this early Theism was 
 reasoned out ; that, independent of the traditional wisdom of 
 ages, the human intellect grasped for itseK, and by itseK 
 alone, the simple yet sublime and comparatively pure doc- 
 trines of natural theology, by what process was this early 
 treasure lost or corrupted ? How does it become overlaid and 
 buried under cumbrous mythologies, that multiply fancifid 
 deities, and identify them with idols, or the images of de- 
 praved men, or even brutes ? Such progress as this evinces, 
 is progress in the wrong direction. It is progress backward 
 and downward, to the unreasonable, the incongruous, and the 
 absurd. 
 
EELIGIOUS DEGENERACY. 197 
 
 4, In either case, therefore, the original Theism of ancient 
 nations was in advance, so far as pnritj and simplicity are 
 concerned, of their later religious cultus. If this was due to 
 an original revelation, we have that very interposition which 
 seemed necessary to start the race upon the career which 
 might answer the end of its creation. If it was the result 
 of reason, then reason, deteriorated with the ages, became in- 
 adequate to keep what it had gained, and gave full evidence 
 that, if left to itself and its own resources alone, it could 
 never advance to any fit apprehension of man's condition, 
 relations, or destiny. In such a case it must be crashed, as it 
 were, under the superstitions which it had admitted or toler- 
 ated, and the great end for which human probation was in- 
 troduced must necessarily be frustrated. The only condition, 
 at least, of escape from this would be some sort of interposi- 
 tion from a superhuman source, to revive lost truth, represent 
 it with new vividness, and enforce it with new emphasis. 
 
 5. But the very fact that there has been so extensively 
 progress in the right direction, constitutes the basis for a 
 strong presumption that there has been interposition to some 
 extent. In no other way can it be accounted for. This is 
 especially true in the case, already referred to, of the Jewish 
 people. They possessed no marked intellectual superiority 
 to other nations. In some respects they were inferior to the 
 Egyptians, in others to the Syrians, and in others to the 
 Greeks. Yet, while these other nations are becoming more 
 gross in then* idolatries, the Jews, with alternating periods of 
 degeneracy, are advancing to that confirmed Theism which 
 almost startles the Koman general, when, pressing into the 
 Holy of Holies, he finds there no visible embodiment of the 
 object of worship. 
 
 This is the more singular, when we find that as early as 
 from 1500 to 2000 years before Christ, the original Theism 
 was undergoing a rapid process of deterioration. The differ- 
 ent attributes of Grod are separately deified. They are iden- 
 tified with the powers of nature, or the mysterious forces 
 which manifest themselves in the economy of the world. 
 They are symbolized by animals. They are fashioned accord- 
 ing to human tastes. Human fears, fancies, and passions in- 
 
198 A CHEERLESS PKOSPEOT. 
 
 vest simple spiritual trutlis witli features and drapery of their 
 own, until a Pantheon is constructed and an Olympus peopled 
 with the creatures of a mythology which outrages reason and 
 violates the sense of propriety as well as morality. 
 
 The result -is an utter debasement of the religious ideal, the 
 destruction of any conservative or elevating influence upon 
 society. Villainy and lust are furnished with divine prece- 
 dents, and the awful idea of God is dragged down to a human 
 level. This is substantially true, not of one people, but of all. 
 The evil is spreading contemporaneously over the globe. 
 Everywhere — with a single exception — and that, at times, is 
 scarcely an exception. Where is there any hope of improve- 
 ment ? The original light is sadly obscured, and steadily be- 
 coming more and more dim, till it flickers to extinction. If 
 the breath of some reformer, more sagacious or pure-minded 
 than those about him, fans it to a flame, it proves little more 
 than a transient flash, expiring with the breath that kindled 
 it. There is gross ignorance, or unreasoning credulity. Rea- 
 son enters but a feeble protest, contemptuously disregarded. 
 Age after age, while art and eloquence and brave deeds illus- 
 trate heathen history, the moral darkness thickens, until the 
 Eoman world, having subdued the nations, sinks under the 
 load of its acquisitions, settling down from its height of gran- 
 deur to a moral level, lower, possibly, than that of the banditti 
 to whom its origin was ascribed. 
 
 Contemporary literature reflects the almost universal de- 
 spondency of the age, as well as its wickedness. Hope seemed 
 dead. And well might this be. There was a deadly disease, 
 as well as alarming symptoms. The doom of Sodom could 
 scarcely furnish a more pointed moral than the fate of ITer- 
 culaneum and Pompeii, buried, with the still-extant memorials 
 of their hideous vice, under the volcanic shower. But if their 
 fate was exceptional, their depravity vf as not. It was a tide- 
 wave, not a river. It rolled on over the world, and no human 
 power could stay it. All things seemed to be sinking in uni- 
 versal decay. Learning and wisdom had toiled and spoken in 
 vain. IsTo prophet's tone could be recognized in the voices of 
 the time. An Epicurean or a Stoic philosophy might flash 
 out brilliant apothegms, but to anxious, burdened, struggling 
 
THE ONLY GEOUND OF HOPE. 199 
 
 souls, they were rather like the gleam of the meteor than the 
 steady beam of the light-house to the tempest-tossed sailor. 
 
 6. Heathenism could not hft itself out of its own darkness 
 and degradation. The power of a Csesar, with victorious 
 legions, could not arrest the progress of moral decay. No 
 orator, no philosopher, no moralist, no priest, can be found to 
 utter the word that shall call a dead nation back to life. This 
 sad tnith runs through history. A conservative moral element 
 is needed, but can nowhere be found. Nations may escape 
 the blow of conquest, but it is only to fall under the stroke of 
 their own vice. We pass on from age to age, as if over a 
 fruitless, treeless waste — a Sahara of barrenness and death. 
 If we meet with some stunted shrub amid the parched sands, 
 or reach some possible oasis, it only serves to intensify the sad 
 contrast. 
 
 7. To suppose such a state of things to be continued on in- 
 definitely, while presided over by such a Being as we have 
 seen that the Author of the moral system must be, is incredi- 
 ble. It is still more incredible that His original design should 
 be abandoned — that design which is manifest in human pro- 
 bation. "We can well conceive the wisdom of allowing human 
 reason to demonstrate its own insuflSciency, to exhibit to the 
 world the need of divine help, but we can discern no sufiicient 
 ground for leaving the history of the world to become one 
 uninterrupted record of tragic crime and depraved indulgence. 
 We turn away from the appalling prospect, as one that im- 
 precates the swift vengeance of a merciful as well as just 
 annihilation, or some interference to help and save. 
 
 8. Only in this last is there ground for hope. A race that 
 has progressed in corruption as it has in art ; that has dimmed 
 the light it had, and chosen darkness rather than light ; that 
 is proved to have exchanged truth for fables, and rehgion for 
 mythology ; that has only put forth spasmodic and uniformly 
 abortive efforts to recover itself ; that has cherished dreams of 
 blessedness and perfection, till they are found confessedly to 
 be nothing but dreams — ^how shall it be brought up out of its 
 self -wrought degradation, and put upon a new track ? This 
 is a great, and, so far as reason is concerned, an unanswered 
 question. For, surely, experience has shown that, of all pro- 
 
200 SELF-EECOVEET IMPOSSIBLE. 
 
 jects, there is none more disheartening tlian that a degenerate 
 people or race should recover itself hj its own unaided ener- 
 gies, voluntarily relinquish its errors and vices, and spontane- 
 ously resume a position of purity in thought and life, from 
 which it has once receded. The thing has never occurred. 
 It cannot occur. There is no lever to raise such a people. 
 There is nothing to rest it on. There is no power to work ifc 
 in reason alone. The theory of its possibility is simply pre- 
 posterous. One might as w^ell propose to gather up the shat- 
 tered or water-logged hulk and splintered spars of a dismantled 
 wreck, and attempt to restore its decayed iihre and its lost 
 beauty, and send it forth again to battle with the waves, or do 
 brave service in the fleets of commerce or of war. He might 
 as well propose to re-erect and replace the prostrate shattered 
 columns and decayed temples of ancient oriental capitals, in 
 order therewith to revive the long-vanished splendors of dead 
 dynasties. As well might we cherish the hope that out of 
 their cindered rubbish and fractured sculptures, the splendor 
 of those old palaces in which kings once feasted and reveled, 
 could be brought back, as imagine that the spent energies and 
 demoralized life of nations can be reinvigorated by their own 
 efforts, or that out of the pit of their degradation, into which 
 they have fallen or plunged, they can lift themselves up by 
 any means or resources of their own devising. 
 
 9. What, then, are we to expect ? The swift vengeance 
 that might have been apprehended, has not overtaken the 
 race. It has not been flung aside like a broken vase, or re- 
 jected as dross. Judgment is, as it were, kept back. Indeed, 
 while degeneracy has been the rule, there has also been 
 enough of exceptional progress to encourage the hope that a 
 better issue of the grand experiment of probation, as a whole, 
 may be expected. To what has this partial progress been 
 due ? In each instance, to what has the appearance of Provi- 
 dential interposition, and to what has been claimed as such. 
 The original Theism of the nations can be explained satisfac- 
 torily only by an original revelation, or an original pui'ity and 
 strength of reason, which in the lapse of ages fell into decay. 
 In one case, interposition must have taken place ; in the other, 
 it is called for as a pressing necessity. Again, how is the 
 
ANALOGIES IN NATUKE. 201 
 
 pure theism of tlie Jewish people to be explained ? While 
 the rest of the world sinks into idolatry and gross mythologies, 
 they possess a religions literature sublimely simple, and rich 
 in outbursts of the grandest conceptions of the divine govern- 
 ment, and the Providential order of the world. We can 
 understand this — if their claims are just — if the founder of 
 the nation and his descendants were under the direct training 
 and guardianship of God. Otherwise, it remains an unsolved 
 and insoluble problem. 
 
 Again, when the old Roman world was sinking to decay ; 
 when the force of Greek wisdom and art had expended itself, 
 and left none to bear up its banner ; when in morals there 
 was no character but that of satirist which authors could fitly 
 assume ; when each successive age was sinking under the load 
 of new vices and crimes, — this downward tendency was ar- 
 rested by a new form of rehgion grafted upon the old Jewish 
 stock, and that result was witnessed, in part described, and in 
 part prefigured, in that gi'andest of prose epics, Augustine's 
 De Civitate Dei. It was Christianity, at first as unobtrusive 
 as the leaven hidden in the meal, that slowly, but steadily, re- 
 molded society, built up again — what had never been done 
 before — a new fabric out of old ruins, and for the first time 
 made a new and permanent civilization possible. Does not 
 this look like divine interposition in the world's history ? 
 
 10. Now, is this interposition to carry out a specific design, 
 without analogy in the natural government of the world ? 
 When the heat would become too fierce and intolerable, does 
 it not call up the breeze and storm ? When winter's cold 
 would, if continued, destroy life, does not the sun turn back 
 to rescue it ? When the law that bodies generally are con- 
 densed by cold would operate on our rivers and lakes to carry 
 the ice to the bottom, and make them glaciers that the sum- 
 mer's sun could not thaw, is not that law suspended in this 
 case of necessity ? When a Roman empire sinks in its own 
 effete civilization, is not a hardier race called from northern 
 forests to replace it with a new vigor ? When Liberty is 
 writhing in the old world in dying spasms, is not the wilder- 
 ness of the new made the sheltered home of Freedom, regu- 
 lated by law ? 
 
XYIII. 
 
 THE FACT OF A REVELATION CONSIDERED. 
 
 If the probability" of some superhuman interference — to 
 prevent the* otherwise assured and certain failure of the Moral 
 System to answer its designed end — ^be conceded, a probabil- 
 ity strengthened by the, at least, plausible assurance that in- 
 terference has taken place, we are prepared to press another 
 inquiry of no little importance. What sort of an interference 
 do the circumstances of the case require, and what are the 
 attainable objects which it must keep in view ? 
 
 1. The evils to be met and remedied are manifold. The 
 first of these is man's ignorance or uncertainty with respect 
 to his condition and duty, his relations to other beings and to 
 his Maker, and the terms of the trial to which he is subjected 
 here. If there be a divine interposition, it must, therefore, 
 take the form of a revelation, either restoring the lost truth 
 in its original purity, or setting forth new truth in advance 
 of the old, and truth applicable to the condition of man as a 
 degenerate, or we might say, apostate being. Old errors must 
 be, expressly or implicitly discarded. Mythological obscuri- 
 ties and fungi must be swept away. Yital truths must be set 
 forth in such a way that they may be popularly apprehended, 
 reaching the understanding of not merely the favored few, 
 like the pupils of ancient wisdom, but the great mass of 
 nations, sunk in ignorance and indifference. 
 
 2. This restatement of truth must be accompanied by what 
 is applicable also to the new conditions of a race enervated 
 by past degeneracy, and needing more than a general presen- 
 tation of its exposure and its duty. We look for something 
 which, while it accords generally with the highest wisdom of 
 the best men of the past, far transcends it in distinctness and 
 emphasis ; embodying a purer morality, a loftier ideal of 
 perfection ; setting forth practical methods for realizing that 
 ideal, and abounding in those more powerful motives by 
 wliich the hearts and consciences of men may be impressed 
 or inspired. 
 
 (302) 
 
THE EEVELATION EEQUIKEI). 203 
 
 3. "We may look, also, for some provision that shall be per- 
 manently operative — that shall preserve the memory of truth 
 and perpetuate its influence — that shall secure for it a recog- 
 nized championship and trustworthy guardians — or, in lack of 
 these, shall secure a permanent record, to be transmitted from 
 age to age. 
 
 4. How such a revelation, as the nature of the case requires, 
 shaU be made, reason is silent. We are not warranted to say 
 in what circumstances, or in what way, it shall be communi- 
 cated — whether by the lips of inspired men or angels, or 
 by articulate voices from heaven — v/hether once for all, or 
 through successive ages — whether to one people, to many, or 
 to all — whether by words only, or by words, institutions, and 
 signs conjoined. The truth that is sufficient to instruct, to 
 com-mand attention, to impress, to regenerate and save — this 
 is all that is required, and nothing less will answer. 
 
 5. Has a revelation of this sort been made ? There is but 
 a single affirmative response among many, that is entitled to 
 recognition and respect. A revelation is announced, and 
 the Bible claims to be that revelation. In most respects it 
 has no competitor. It is true that there have been many dif- 
 ferent forms of professed revelation, enough to show the gen- 
 eral sentiment — and we might even say, anticipation — of 
 mankind that some revelation was to be expected. But 
 among the systems which presume to rival that of the Bible, 
 Yie find that most carry the condemnation of their claims 
 upon their face. The polytheisms of past ages we dismiss at 
 once. The religion of Mohammed, with its bloody intoler- 
 ance and its sensual paradise, forfeits all title to our respect. 
 'No one would seriously propose to improve Christian ethics 
 by any substitution or supplement from Buddhism. The • 
 question, then, is narrowed down to this. Is the sole claimant 
 to the character of a revelation entitled to our respect ? 
 
 6. We have noted the presumptive evidence of an original 
 revelation, as necessary to explain the comparatively pure 
 Theism of the ancient nations. We pass on then to the time 
 when idolatry threatened to overspread the world, and we 
 ask, By what means was its progress arrested among the Jews 
 alone ? Certainly not by their superior reason or superior 
 
204 JUDAISM AND CHKISTIAJSriTT. 
 
 genius. Their professedly sacred writings fnrnisli the only 
 sufficient or satisfactory explanation. They were taught by 
 prophets inspired of God. They were disciplined by provi- 
 dences which deeply imprinted th^istic lessons on their hearts. 
 "Holy men of old spake" as they were divinely moved to 
 speak. So it was asserted. So it was admitted by contem- 
 porary thousands, as well as assumed and professed by those 
 that spake. 
 
 If this be so, this peculiar exception to the religious usages 
 and systems of the world is explained satisfactorily. We can 
 account for it in this way, but in no other. Admit the ex- 
 planation, and it concedes a revelation. Reject it, and some 
 other is called for, and must be given if a revelation be 
 denied. 
 
 7. Again take the system, engrafted on the Jewish sacred 
 writings — that of the gospel in the ISTew Testament — and see 
 what the presumptions are that it is what it claims to be. 
 It has proved itself the mightiest moral element in the world's 
 history. Some most significant facts in regard to it are ob- 
 vious almost at a glance. From the very first it has been 
 scrutinized jealously, assailed vigorously, reviled, caricatured, 
 persecuted often in the persons of its adherents. It had all 
 the prestige of ancient mythology and philosophy opposed to 
 it. It had to hold its own, or make its way against national 
 prejudice, and power, and imperial sanctions, while its friends 
 and allies were the weak and despised. But all combinations 
 failed to crush it. ^Sij, rather it crushed them. It did more 
 than the wit of a Lucian to make the old classic mythologies 
 weak and ridiculous. It silenced forever the heathen oracles. 
 It emptied the Pantheon. It robbed the temples of their old 
 worshippers or filled them with its own. It broke or banished 
 every idol in the Roman Empire. It reached kings on 
 their thrones, and peasants in their hovels, and bowed them, 
 oblivious of human distinctions, at the same altar. It leavened 
 legislation, and tempered and molded public justice. It took 
 possession of the schools, and educated nations. It shaped 
 philosophy, and created a literature of its own, the most ex- 
 tensive and elaborate that the world has ever known. The 
 most inspiring heroisms of history have been born of it. It 
 
PRESUMPTIONS IN FAVOE OF CHRISTIANITY. 205 
 
 has had for its cloud of witnesses, " the noble army of the 
 martyrs." 
 
 8. Its triumphs have been signal and numberless. It has 
 pioneered all permanent progress. The slave, the prisoner, 
 the outcast, the beggar, have been the objects of its compas- 
 sion. In the most humane and charitable provisions of legal 
 codes, in the triumphs of legislative reforms, may be traced 
 its autograph. Despotism has never found any antagonism 
 so persistent as that which it has originated. Philanthropy 
 has found no alliance so effective as that which it has offered. 
 'No other moral or spiritual force has ever exercised such a 
 transforming power over man's social condition' and prospects 
 as it has possessed. 
 
 All this creates a strong presumption that there is some- 
 what divine in it. It lies entirely outside of what might be 
 considered the natural course of human progress. And if we 
 add to this the fact, that the agents which it has employed have 
 been won over by it, changed from enemies to friends, sur- 
 rendering what they prized most, to accept reproach, or hard- 
 ship, or self-denial, or even bitter persecution, the presump- 
 tion is vastly strengthened. 
 
 9. With this much conceded, we ask what internal evidence 
 of its claims is afforded by this so-called revelation. The docu- 
 ments which constitute it are derived from many different 
 sources, and date from diverse ages. Their authors could not 
 have conspired, and yet the result is a nnity — a complete and 
 coherent system of religious truth, in which part answers 
 to part, pillar to pedestal, foundation to cap-stone. The re- 
 sult is as marked as the completion of some of the great 
 mediaeval cathedrals of Europe, that were ages in building. 
 Successive generations carried on the plan of the original 
 architect, and when the work was complete, the shadow of 
 spire and turret swept over the graves of those who had 
 toiled at their tasks centuries before, and never exchanged 
 views or counsels with their predecessors or successors. 
 
 10. That this is no exaggerated representation of the grand 
 unity of Christianity as a religious system, will be disputed 
 by no one who has fairly studied it. Its leading doctrines 
 are almost universally admitted. They follow one upon an- 
 
200 ITS SYSTEM OF DOCTEINE, 
 
 other, or iit into one another, with an apparently unstudied, 
 but logical sequence. Man's creation in God's image, vv^ith 
 capacities to know, love, worship, and serve him ; his original 
 uprightness ; his lamentable apostacy ; his depraved nature, 
 in which conscience and feeling, reason and passion, are ever 
 at strife ; his alienation from his Maker, and his exposure to 
 the consequences of his willful transgression ; his need of 
 clearer light ; of the help of divine grace ; of an atonement 
 for his sin, on the ground of which he may hope for forgive- 
 ness and peace ; the actual provision of a Redeemer, long 
 foretold, in whom the divine and the human met, who spake 
 as never man spake, lived as never man lived, died as never 
 man died ; the sufficiency of this redemption for all the neces- 
 sities of an apostate race, as verified by the experience of 
 more than eighteen centuries ; the organization of a church, 
 of the nature of a witness to the truth it is appointed to 
 guard, against which human malice and "the gates of hell" 
 should never prevail ; the duty and possibility of a moral 
 change in man, so great as to be called regeneration, wrought 
 without violation of human freedom by a divine energy work- 
 ing in and through the truth, by which the subject of that 
 change is made one with his Redeemer in hope, and sympa- 
 thy, and spiritual brotherhood ; the fact of a probation, by 
 which the future destiny of the soul is determined ; the glori- 
 ous and yet gi-acious rewards of obedience, transcending all 
 that eye has seen or imagination can portray; the fearful 
 retributions of transgression imaged forth by terms whose 
 meaning we vainly seek to fathom, as " the outer darkness ;" 
 " the second death ;" the consummation and triumph of the 
 divine design in man's creation through the glorification of 
 the redeemed, and the assurance of their perfected purity and 
 bliss forever ; — these are but a portion of the leading truths of 
 the Christian system, which harmonize so wondrously, that, 
 like the stones of an arch, you cannot tear one away unless 
 all the others fall with it. 
 
 Such a system must have had an architect, for its structure 
 implies it, and its professed end declares it ; and that Archi- 
 tect could not but have been divine. Of all whose writings 
 have contributed to it, no one ever claimed the honor of it. 
 
POWEK OF CHEISTIANITY. 207 
 
 Moses, David, Isaiah, Paul, Jolm, and we scarcely know how 
 many others, never allowed that they were anything more 
 than instruments in working out a design they did not fully 
 comprehend. But in the midst of them, among them, but 
 not of them, there is One who, with a tone of divine authority, 
 says, " I am the v/ay, the truth, and the life," and to His 
 claims they all do homage. Who will venture to impeach 
 either His integrity or His superiority ? 
 
 11. But the full claim of this system cannot be weighed, 
 without considering the actual power which it has exerted 
 upon the human soul, when brought into competition with 
 the most energetic of all opposing influences. It has repeat- 
 edly vanquished them all. It has routed them, Hke a defeated 
 army. It has disarmed inveterate passions. It has wrought 
 the cheerful surrender of the most cherished plans. Curios- 
 ity, avarice, ambition, thirst for revenge, aspirations for ease, 
 or honor, or fame, have given way before it. It transformed 
 a persecutor into an apostle. It has made the ambitious 
 scholar more than willing to become the obscure missionary. 
 It has taken their terror from prison, exile, torture, and the 
 flames. Out of timid souls, it has made heroes and martyrs. 
 
 12. And if we look to more commonplace and every-day 
 experience, we find that in all literature, ancient or modem, 
 there is nothing whatever like the Bible, to illustrate " the 
 power of a book." The secret is not in its age, or its style, 
 or its grand simplicity, or its poetic beauty, however remark- 
 able these may be. It lies deeper. It is in the truth it re- 
 veals, and the motive power which this truth develops. By 
 these its hold upon the heart is oftentimes, so far as there is 
 any human measure of it, simply omnipotent. Some have 
 gone so far as to call this hibliolatry, but that term demands 
 explanation. So far as there is any truth in it, it carries us 
 back to survey that long process by which the soul has come 
 to be knit to what it regards as dearer than life itself. Then 
 it is seen how wondrously adapted, like a key to a most com- 
 plex lock, is the truth of this book to the nature and v/ants, 
 fears and hopes, of the human spirit. It tits itself alike to all 
 ages, all races, all grades of thought and culture. It stoops 
 to childhood, and fascinates it by narrative and vision, and 
 
208 REVELATION AND THE MOEAL SYSTEM. 
 
 ideas so grand and solemn, as to overshadow or illuminate the 
 whole horizon of its future. In maturer years, it has the most 
 satisfactory response to be found on earth, to questions of 
 human destiny, and when age comes with its burdens and 
 shadows, it is the only thing in the whole realm of reality 
 that promises to lighten the one or illuminate the other. 
 
 The question whether such a production may be considered 
 simply human, must be asked in view of the presumption 
 that revelation might be expected ; in view of the fact of its 
 admitted necessity ; in view of the design in accordance with 
 which this Moral System is constructed, and in view of what 
 this revelation is in itself, and what it has accomplished. To 
 it there can be properly but one answer. It constitutes a 
 superhuman element in God's providential government of the 
 world. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 EEVELATION AND THE MOEAL SYSTEM. 
 
 Accepting as indisputable the conclusion that some divine 
 interposition was called for, if the end for which this moral 
 system was evidently established was not to be defeated 
 through human debasement ; and also admitting the strong 
 presumption that the tendencies implied in this debasement 
 have been checked, by what purports to be revelation or 
 divine interference, we are prepared to inquire whether, in 
 the scope of this assumed revelation, there is anything that 
 necessarily conflicts with the moral system as already ex- 
 pounded, and on what points revelation and the conclusions 
 we have reached in regard to the moral system, harmonize. 
 
 1. One main objection to a revelation is, that it is encum- 
 bered by miracles. Eut this objection loses much of its force 
 when it is considered that revelation itself, though communi- 
 cated through human instrumentality, is itself a miracle. It 
 lies outside the line of what the course of human history 
 teaches us to expect as the result of unaided human develop- 
 ment. Men, left to themselves, form theistic conceptions 
 
THE SrPEENATIIEAL IN EEVELATIOK. 209 
 
 after the pattern of their own sensual imaginations or per- 
 verted tastes. Thej lack, in themselves, that original impulse 
 which is necessary, at once, to elevate their conceptions and 
 bring them up to the moral and spiritual level, which in ex- 
 ceptional cases, as in the instances of the ancient Jews and 
 the early Christians, they actually attained. The moral con- 
 trast between Greek and Hebrew literature, as between 
 Greek and Hebrew religion, cannot be explained on the 
 principles of natural reason alone. 
 
 But, if a supernatural element must be called in connection 
 with this exceptional moral and religious development, the 
 revelation, or succession of revelations, which is thus intro- 
 duced, is of the nature of a continuous miracle. If the reve- 
 lation is supernatural, the methods by which it is communi- 
 cated or confirmed may well be also. The difficulty is not in. 
 the repetition of what is miraculous, so much as in its occur- 
 ring at all. The presumption against miracle is destroyed the 
 moment it is admitted that actual history presents us facts 
 which are explicable alone on the theory that miracle — or that 
 which transcends the unaided powers of man — has taken 
 place. 
 
 But, in the sphere of human experience, we are constantly 
 coming in contact with a will-force that controls and modifies 
 the action of physical laws. We may call this will-force 
 natural or supernatural, but, in the one case, we enlarge the 
 sphere of the natural, so as to take in what is quite excep- 
 tional and overruling, so far as physical laws are concerned ; 
 and in the other, we admit expressly that an intelligent will- 
 force must be recognized as super-sensuous and inexpKcable 
 on the principles of natural philosophy. It is in no case con- 
 trary to analogy to suppose the uniform operation of the 
 ordinary laws of nature to admit of arrest or modification 
 through the action of the will, and with reference to ends 
 important enough to warrant such arrest of modification. If 
 the great end of Probation requires for its attainment such 
 interference as may be pronounced miraculous, the minor end 
 of the uniformity of physical law may well give way to it, on 
 the presumption of a will that has the capacity to set it aside. 
 "We conclude, therefore, that in the presence of such an end 
 U 
 
210 PEOVIDENCE m HISTOET. 
 
 as probation has in view, tlie miraculous element in revelation 
 is what not only may be expected, but is actually necessary. 
 The incredibihty of the miracles will attach to them not as 
 miracles — in themselves considered — but in their specific 
 character only. The presumption against them is set aside 
 both by the ascertained fact of a revelation and by the exist- 
 ence of an actual will-force in the human sphere, that tran- 
 scends and controls physical law. 
 
 2. The doctrine of a Divine Providence, as taught in the 
 Scriptures, harmonizes with design as implied in this moral 
 system. That Providence must extend not only to the 
 general plan of the system which it conducts, but to all its 
 parts. The moral system, like the material, is one. As there 
 is not a world, not an atom, that is not connected with the 
 entire universe, so there is not an event of human history 
 that stands isolated and alone. A general providence implies 
 a particular providence. A mechanism is incomplete where a 
 single wheel, or pin, or cog, is wanting, and nothing is more 
 obvious than that many of w^hat are called the great events of 
 history have hinged on small events or occasions. A most 
 trivial incident, apparently, has changed the career of men 
 and nations, and no one can intelligently accept the doctrine 
 of a general providence, and make it less comprehensive or 
 minute than that which revelation ascribes to the Omniscient 
 and Eternal Mind. 
 
 3. Read in the light of revelation, history is a continuous 
 commentary on an overruling Providence. The events of 
 time, introducing new scenes, opening new prospects, and 
 these suggesting a steady progress toward the regeneration of 
 the race, move along with a dramatic order and unity, and 
 their very confusions and incongruities harmonize as they con- 
 tribute to the evolution of a plan which connects the begin- 
 ning and progress of this scheme of things with a predeter- 
 mined end. Thus, the calling of Abraham ; the special 
 rehgious training of the Jewish nation ; the laws and types 
 of its worship, foreshadowing fuller revelations, as the Paschal 
 Lamb prefigured Him who is called " The Lamb of God ; " 
 the tuition of bondage and captivities, preserving the chosen 
 people from surrounding idolatries ; the sublime lessons that 
 
HTJMAK DEPEAVITT. 211 
 
 fell from tlie lips of the prophets ; the advent of the " Desire 
 of all nations," when His way was prepared ; the nnity and 
 peace of the old Roman world, when His Gospel was to be 
 published ; the crystallization of medigeval Christianity in a 
 hierarchy which preserved the truths fatal to itseK ; the out- 
 burst of reforming energy, when the discovery of the new 
 world, and of the printing-press, and the diffusion of the old 
 classic literature on the fall of Constantinople, had prepared 
 the way for it ; the planting of a Christian civilization in this 
 then Western wilderness, and all the wonderful events which 
 have since inspired the hope that all nations — as prophecy 
 long ago foretold — shall be regenerated ; — all these are but the 
 great land-marks of that history of the world which elucidates 
 the scope of a divine design, and evidences the continuous 
 presence of an overruling Providence. 
 
 4. But, when we turn to the subject of man's individual 
 relations to God, we iind that revelation inculcates some doc- 
 trines which may be examined on their own merits, and in 
 the light of their own specific analogies. 
 
 Among these, one that is never lost sight of, and is funda- 
 mental to others, is what is termed human depravity. This 
 does not deny man's moral sensibility, or his possession of 
 capacities for generous and noble efforts. It does not imply 
 the lack of a conscience that upbraids him for wrong-doing, 
 or the necessary absence of a high moral ideal. It does im- 
 ply, however, a native tendency to alienate himseK from God, 
 to make self-interest his law, to prefer ease or comfort or 
 pleasure to the claims of duty, and in the indulgence of pas- 
 sions which usurp the place of reason and conscience, to be- 
 come worse instead of better. 
 
 But what are the analogies of human experience ? "What 
 means the universal distrust felt toward those with whom 
 men deal, if they have not proved their truth and honesty ? 
 What, according to all writers on government, is government 
 itself but the check of individual selfishness by the combined 
 selfishness of society, forced in self-defence to appeal to justice 
 and that natural law which is inscribed ineradicably in the 
 constitution of man and of society itself ? 
 
 5. The manifest opposition of this depravity to natural law, 
 
212 ATONEMENT. 
 
 to the moral code wliicli has God for its author, subjects it to 
 deserved condemnation. Man is a transgressor of that lav/. 
 He fails in that supreme love and perfect service ""vhich he 
 owes to God. The sense of this forces him to ascetic and 
 superstitious rites. Heathen sacrifices, self-inflicted tortures, 
 costly ransoms, grew out of it. The need of expiation or 
 atonement is confessed. The conscious burden of guilt rests 
 on the soul, and no rhetoric or logic of mere reason can re- 
 move it. Revelation accepts the fact of this burden, this 
 exposure to law, this condemnation, and it makes known what 
 is called an atonement. It represents Christ as that Lamb of 
 God, foreshadowed bj the Paschal Lamb of Jewish history, 
 who offers Himself as a sacrifice, an atoning sacrifice, for the 
 sins of men, with whom He identifies Himself by assuming 
 their nature. 
 
 Here we have the statement of what, by no possibility, can 
 find any perfect analogy on earth or among men. But is the 
 principle of it v/ithout analogy? Why have patriots laid 
 down their lives ? Why have martyrs been content to die ? 
 Why have philanthropists worn themselves out to benefit 
 ungrateful and unappreciating thousands ? History would be 
 poor, indeed, in great and inspiring examples, if you took out 
 of it the element of voluntary vicarious sacrifice. What is 
 Redemption itself, according to revelation, but the crowning 
 illustration of the principle implied in such sacrifice ? And, 
 if this be so, who can deny the substantial harmony of an 
 Atonement with corresponding features of the moral system ? 
 
 6. Take up, now, the doctrine of " Original Sin " — as it is, 
 not very felicitously, called — the apostacy of the race in its 
 first progenitor. Of course, there is and can be no perfect 
 analogy of it within the sphere of our observation. But can 
 we, with human experience before us, deny the fact of trans- 
 mitted depravity, the vitiation of nature working out a hered- 
 itary curse ? The sins of the fathers are visited upon the 
 children, not only through the infiuence of example, or as the 
 consequences of parental indolence and vice, but by that con- 
 stitution of things by which the perverted faculties and tastes 
 and appetites of the parent descend to his offspring. This 
 may be termed an injustice, but, before that tarm is applied, 
 
EEGENEKATION. 213 
 
 it sliould be asked on whom the responsibility rests for the 
 perversion of an order of things by which, if man had never 
 depraved himself, only good results would have followed. 
 
 There is another analogy, where a faithless trustee sacrifices, 
 by his folly or wickedness, the interests of those he represents. 
 He may be at the head of a corporation or a government ; he 
 may be the trusted agent of a company or a state ; but he 
 acts in a federal or representative capacity. Hundreds, per- 
 haps, or thousands, or possibly, future generations, innocent 
 of the original transgression, suffer through his fault. The 
 position of Adam necessarily gave him such a relation to the 
 race, as their progenitor and representative both, as no other 
 one could possibly occupy, and may not the results be cor- 
 respondent ? 
 
 Take another prominent doctrine of Revelation, the neces- 
 sity of such a change in man's nature and disposition, in his 
 views and practice, as the Great Teacher denominated being 
 " born again." Who, when he considers the relation of a de- 
 praved human nature to the holiness of the divine, can for a 
 moment question this necessity ? And is it not in analogy 
 with other moral changes, so far as these extend, in the matter 
 of appetites, tastes, and aspirations ? And can any one ques- 
 tion the fact of this change having often taken place, and that 
 in so marked a manner that the result seems to be not only a 
 reformed life, but a new nature — the drunkard becoming 
 sober ; the violent, gentle ; the persecutor, an apostle ; the 
 revengeful, forgiving ? 
 
 1. Then, take the natural constitution of this moral system, 
 as already exhibited, and lay it alongside the moral system of 
 Revelation. The correspondence is perfect as far as it extends. 
 In both, God is legislator and administrator. In both — virtue 
 corresponding to holiness — the advantages of wickedness are' 
 temporary ; the triumph of goodness, in the end, assured and 
 eternal. In both, the elements of retribution are alike in- 
 volved. In both, law is sovereign, and the arrest of its 
 execution is but transient and readily explained. , In both. 
 Probation is a leading feature, modifying the administration 
 of moral government, and adapting it to a state of trial in 
 which evil is left free to evince its nature, and virtue is sub- 
 
214: [ VAUIOUS ANALOGIES. 
 
 jected to a discipline which, though it seems harsh, operates 
 to confirm virtuous purpose and give fixedness to character, 
 and development and strength to its every grace. 
 
 8. In the natural government of the world we meet with 
 that invariable sequence of cause and effect whi<^h gives a 
 plausible aspect to the theory of necessity. And we meet 
 also with facts that demonstrate, that whether allowed or 
 denied, that theory does not set aside the fact of personal 
 responsibility. So, in revelation, we meet with the opposite 
 poles of the eternal designs or pui^oses of God, and the free- 
 will of man ; and however plausible the argument of the man 
 who says, " All is fixed ; I cannot change it " — ^he is con- 
 fronted with the assertion of personal accountability, " What- 
 soever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." 
 
 9. In the natural government of the world, again, we have 
 to deal with fragmentary parts of a universal system, to us 
 practically infinite. We are incompetent to criticise, as a 
 whole, what is manifestly a part ; and our judgment is to be 
 held in check or abeyance by the consideration of our ignorance 
 and limited powers. But does not revelation present the same 
 system, only with portions more minutely portrayed, while it 
 asks, Whoy by searching, can find out God ? — while it teaches 
 us expressly that here we see, as through a glass, darkly ? 
 Could there be a more perfect correspondence in the nature 
 of the case ? 
 
 10. As to the results of Probation, are not those which are 
 foreshadowed in the moral system of nature precisely such as 
 are distinctly asserted in Revelation ? There some are final in 
 their fatality. There is no place for repentance. There is no 
 possible recovery of the past. Does not this exactly express 
 the aspect in which Revelation exhibits the issues of proba- 
 tion ? Is there not here also a fixed point, where the chmax 
 of probation is reached, beyond which the triumph or the 
 failure is final ? 
 
 11. Thus does the system of Revelation coincide with the 
 moral system of nature. It cannot be confuted, though ob- 
 jections may be raised to it. But most of these objections 
 are almost precisely the same that may be, and sometimes 
 have been, urged against the moral constitution of things 
 
SUMMAJJT. 215 
 
 wliicli exists before our own eyes. In denying many of the 
 leading doctrines of Revelation, we must logically deny many 
 corresponding facts of the Moral System. 
 
 XX. 
 
 - SUMMARY AND CONCLTISION. 
 
 The course of our argument, from premises to conclusion, 
 has been along the stepping-stones of fact. A Moral System 
 exists, with its constitution and laws. It must be recognized, 
 and it is recognized, as a fact of actual experience. Man's 
 moral nature — such that he is forced to be a law to himself ; 
 his complex being, which becomes a chaos or a torture- 
 chamber unless the moral authority of conscience is para- 
 mount; social retributions, domestic and civil government,- 
 with their rewards and penalties, — all these are indisputable 
 facts, uniting with others to constitute the complex fabric of 
 a Moral System. 
 
 This system indicates constructive design. Accident, or 
 " the nature of things," cannot explain it. Its penalties would 
 be impossible if the body were not so constituted as to allow 
 it to suffer through mental transgression — if it were not so en- 
 dowed as to be made a medium of suffering through social re- 
 taliations or ancestral guilt. But this, instead of being a neces- 
 sity of " the nature of things," is evidently designed. We 
 can suppose it to have been otherwise, so that, in being what 
 it is, it conforms to conditions which must be presupposed 
 and predetermined, in order to bring about these results, by 
 which the seal of approval is set to virtue, and that of repro- 
 bation affixed to vice. Here, too, we stand on the solid basis 
 of fact. 
 
 Again we say, and have the right to say, that the character 
 of the Author is reflected in His system. The design mani- 
 fest in it is His. We infer His character from this manifest 
 design. We say He is wise, just, and good — wise because all 
 the arrangements and adjustments of the Moral System imply 
 
216 SUCCESSIVE STEPS OF ARGUMENT. 
 
 it ; just, because these arrangements are plainly intended to 
 favor justice ; good, because even where pain is inflicted, it is 
 in most cases plainly salutary or monitory, while, in count- 
 less instances, enjoyment is actually provided for. Here we 
 deal with facts. 
 
 Om' next step simply asserts that man's existence is com- 
 prehended in the scheme of Him who is wise, just, and good. 
 There is no evading this. It follows, then, that the scope of 
 man's being cannot be inconsistent with the pei-fect wisdom 
 that must be justified in it : it cannot be inconsistent with the 
 justice that will ultimately assure virtue its exact reward, and 
 vice its exact penalty : it cannot be inconsistent with perfect 
 goodness, which we can scarcely suppose engaged in bestow- 
 ing conscious powers by which man is exalted only to the 
 misery of appreciating what a destiny annihilation is. On 
 these grounds — obvious facts — we base the plain presumption 
 of a future life. 
 
 Again, we assert that this present life is a probation. In 
 some respects, it is confessedly so. It is so up to the close of 
 what is visible here, although in a steadily decreasing ratio. 
 But it cannot be, without implying that the present existence, 
 as the preface to a future, is probationary. What we see of 
 its results confirms the conclusion. Here are facts, with the 
 least possible element of presumption. 
 
 Once more, we assert that the future state must be one of 
 retribution. It cannot but be so, if the laws and tendencies 
 that affect the spirit now continue to operate. Continued 
 conscious existence on earth would ever more and more ap- 
 proximate to perfect retribution. The dissolution of the body 
 must, on the whole, if it leave the soul to itself, expedite 
 the operation of retributory forces. 
 
 We take our stand again on the ground of conceded fact, 
 when we assert that man, in his present state, only exception- 
 ally at best, attains the end worthy of creation and probation. 
 He bears evidences of having degenerated from the original 
 state in which he was made. Heathen aiithors have insisted 
 on what is equivalent to the fact of human depravit}-. There 
 is a call for interposition. Man cannot restore himself, or, at 
 least, has rarely, if ever, made any serious effort to do so, 
 
INCEEASING FOKCB OF THE AKGUMBNT. 217 
 
 except in cases where lie was plied by motives that he ac- 
 counted supernatural. The recovery of the mass of men, 
 without more powerful motives and clearer knowledge than 
 human reason affords, is evidently hopeless. 
 
 We have the right to infer, therefore, that in a system con- 
 stituted like ours, if the design of it is not to be defeated, 
 there will be supernatural interposition. The disordered ma- 
 chine will never right itself. It must be set right by its 
 Author, or He must supply the means to this end. It is not 
 for any one reasonably to call this in question. 
 
 Again, there are strong grounds for asserting that interpo- 
 sition has taken place. The early Theism of ancient nations 
 antedates their idolatry and Polytheism. They exchanged 
 spiritual for idol worship through a process of degeneracy. 
 They wandered farther and farther into darkness. In some 
 cases, this wandering was arrested. It was, by what was as- 
 serted, and what purported to be, divine interposition. The 
 Revelation in which the assertion is made is unlike all other 
 human productions. Its manifold phases ; its complex struc- 
 ture ; its substantial and wonderful harmony in itself ; its un- 
 rivaled power in literature ; its unprecedented triumphs ; its 
 superhuman ideas — all unite to attest its divine original. Here 
 we stand upon admitted facts, and simply assert their most 
 obvious and natural explanation. 
 
 Each new position, as we advance, is thus seen to be in 
 itself probable, and in some cases, such as scarcely to admit 
 of dispute. But each new position, as it is itseK substanti- 
 ated, strengthens all the others. From the firm buttress of 
 the bridge — the Moral System — we advance pier by pier — the 
 whole structure gathering to itseK mutual support as new 
 additions are made- — till we reach the last pier, and find it to 
 be the well-supported buttress that extends its strength back 
 to all that had gone before. In other words, all the leading 
 truths of the Moral System, which have their correspondencies 
 in the asserted facts of revelation, are not so much links in a 
 chain, where, if one is broken, all coherence is at an end, as 
 pillars in a common structure, where each not merely rests 
 upon its own foundation, but lends support to every other, 
 and to the entire edifice. 
 
218 CONCLUSION. 
 
 The result is tliat the Moral System takes its place in the 
 broad and comprehensive scheme of things, as that to which 
 all else is subordinate. What the body is to the soul, physi- 
 cal nature is to the moral realm. Science, throughout all her 
 departments, pays tribute to the spiritual supremacy of man. 
 ETature must be interpreted by its relation to its ultimate end, 
 and that end is revealed in the divine design manifest in man. 
 
 Thus read, the universe, with all its mysteries that remain 
 unsolved, is no longer the sphynx-riddle that puzzles and 
 confounds humanity, sinking to despair, "With Lord Bacon, 
 we recognize the fact that "this universal frame of things is 
 not without a mind." With Locke, we confess the inadequacy 
 of human reason to discover that which, when revealed, ap- 
 proves itself to reason, and thus with him subscribe to the 
 '' Keasonableness of Christianity." With Milton, we soar above 
 the ruins of human apostacy, to discern beyond a " Paradise 
 Lost," the hope of a "Paradise Regained." Life has a mean- 
 ing, and it may have a beauty and a destiny worthy of that 
 Divine tuition by which it is in training for an immortal 
 sphere. The development of the race is under the guidance 
 of One who sees the end from the beginning' and who can 
 make future ages of perfected humanity, the contrast to that 
 introductory period of darkness that has gone before. 
 
 To recognize the existence and laws of the Moral System 
 is the obligation by which reason is bound. To conform life 
 to its conditions is that practical wisdom that leads to the 
 highest blessedness, here or hereafter, which man can hope to 
 enjoy. The laws of duty are as real, as changeless, and as 
 abiding as the relations — constituted by the great Maker — 
 out of which they spring. We can suppose the material 
 frame-work of the universe dissolved, reduced to primeval 
 fire-mist, or even annihilated, but we cannot conceive that 
 truth and falsehood, holiness and sin, can ever change their 
 nature, or that over a violated conscience, or through the tor- 
 tuous paths of transgression, man can pass onward to the goal 
 of his perfected being. He is the subject of a Moral System, 
 which reflects the love of a Father and the authority of a 
 God. To the terms of that system he must conform, or hfe 
 becomes at once a rebellion and a curse. 
 
QUESTIONS. 
 
 HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION, 
 
 I. What is system ? How extensive is it ? What two classes of 
 elements does it include ? Why may moral elements be said to 
 be natural ? What is the Moral System ? How is it natural ? How 
 is it to be distinguished from moral government ? May a moral 
 system be proved by evidence that would not establish a perfect 
 moral government ? Why has the Moral System been variously 
 apprehended ? What is a leading characteristic of the History of 
 Herodotus ? What was the doctrine of Pythagoras as to virtue 
 and vice ? What other doctrine is he said to have held ? What 
 were the views of Socrates ? What were the leading views of 
 Plato ? Was Aristotle a Theist ? What doctrines of a moral sys- 
 tem are presented in Homer ? What other Greek writers support 
 similar doctrines ? What are the peculiarities of ^schylus and 
 Sophocles ? What view did the Epicureans take of the Moral Sys- 
 tem ? What were the pecuUarities of the Stoics ? What was 
 Cicero's position ? What did Seneca hold ? What did Plutarch 
 teach on lingering retribution ? What view did Marcus Aurelius 
 Antoninus take of Fate ? What was the character of the ethical 
 teachings of Epictetus ? What Roman poets and historians are 
 mentioned as bearing testimony to the Moral System ? 
 
 II. What three elements were combined to produce Gnosticism ? 
 What did Gnosticism essay to do ? What was Neo-Platonism ? 
 What terms in Greek literature are of great moral significance ? 
 Of what is Nemesis expressive? What is the character of the 
 Erinnyes ? Is Fate used in different senses ? How in Homer ? 
 How is the sense of the word in Herodotus to be exijlained ? What 
 does Hierocles maintain ? With what does Jackson assert that 
 Fate was synonymous ? By what writers is he sustained ? Is 
 Fate generally used in a sense consistent with human responsi- 
 bility ? 
 
 III. What leading features of the Moral System are conspicuous 
 in the Jewish Scriptures ? In what portions of these are they 
 most strikingly manifest ? What may be said of many of Christ's 
 parables ? How came the study of the Moral System to fall into 
 partial neglect ? What exceptions to this were there among the 
 early Christian Fathers ? What questions of natural theology 
 were early Christian writers led to discuss ? Did Mohammedan 
 writers take up similar topics ? What had Scholasticism to do in 
 this connection ? What was the first great English work to dis- 
 cuss the Law of Nature ? What other two works soon followed ? 
 
 IV. What eminent English writer stood opposed to the views of 
 
 (319) 
 
220 QUESTIONS. 
 
 Hooker and Grotius ? What controversy originated with him ? 
 What were his views as to the Law of Nature ? What two classes 
 of opponents did he meet ? Mention some of his leading assail- 
 ants, of the Platonic school ? To what did Bishop Cumberland 
 trace obligation ? How does Bishop Parker hold that the obliga- 
 tion of rules of life may be demonstratively established ? What 
 two points does he urge ? Does he hold that a moral constitution 
 must be admitted, even by Atheists ? Does Archbishop Tiliotson 
 make the obligation of moral duties to depend on revelation ? 
 
 V. What was Locke's position as to innate ideas, and a Law of 
 Nature ? By whom, and how, was the power of reason exaggerat- 
 ed ? What was Locke's position as to the relation of the Law of 
 Nature to Revelation ? What was Toland's aim ? What Deistic 
 writers followed Toland ? AVhat was the plausibility of Tindal's 
 argument ? What noted work gave Tindal an advantage to pre- 
 sent his views ? 
 
 VL To whom is it probable that Pope was indebted in his prep- 
 aration of his " Essay on Man ?" What is its professed object ? 
 What does he insist upon as man's duty ? What is the character 
 of his third and fourth Epistles ? How is the Essay related to the 
 controversy going forward at the time ? On what grounds is it 
 important ? What are some of the more noticeable points that 
 he makes ? How could Bishop Butler make use of the grounds 
 on which Pope rested his argument ? What were some of the 
 more noted replies to Tindal ? 
 
 VII. What was the aim of the "Boyle Lecture ?" What topics 
 did it discuss ? What foreign writers influenced English thought ? 
 What did Locke assert as to matter ? Who followed him ? What 
 was Dodwell's aim ? How did the phrase " indiscerptibleness" of 
 consciousness come into the discussion ? What other lines of dis- 
 cussion converged to the issue met in Butler's "Analogy ?" What 
 was the bearing of Locke's rejection of innate ideas upon the ac- 
 cepted view of a Law of Nature ? What two tendencies were soon 
 manifest, and by whom Avere they represented ? Who followed 
 Shaftesbury in the main ? What was Dr. Clarke's view ? What 
 posthumous work of Cudworth substantially agreed with it ? Who 
 accepted Clarke's view ? What was said as to resolving all mo- 
 tives into self-interest ? Were Balguy's views accepted withaut 
 opposition ? Who called them in question ? How is virtue de- 
 fined in Law's edition of " King on Evil ?" What was the position 
 of Grove ? What other writer agreed with him in the main ? 
 What was peculiar to Wollaston's speculations ? How was he 
 criticised ? To what discussion has the chapter on Necessity in 
 Butler's " Analogy," special reference ? What was the fate of the 
 political phase of the controversy originating with Hobbes ? 
 What lent impulse to the development of " Cambridge Platonism?" 
 Did this produce a reaction ? What were the different views as to 
 the foundation of moral obligation ? What other lines of discus- 
 sion converged in the "Analogy?" 
 
 VIIL What recent writers have expressed their high appreciation 
 of Butler's '' Analogy ?" To whom does Dr. Chalmers compare 
 Butler? What does Professor Farrar say of the "Analogy?" 
 What is Butler's aim in it ? Is his argument for the future life 
 
QUESTIONS. 221 
 
 positive or negative mainly ? Why ? "What is the argument, in 
 substance ? What evidence have we that a system of administra- 
 tion by rewards and punishments is established here ? Can the 
 course of Nature be ascribed to anything but the Author of Na- 
 ture ? What facts go to show a system of rewards and penalties ? 
 Do present events excite apprehension of penalties yet to come ? 
 How is it seen that the government of the Author of Nature is 
 moral ? Are the proper rewards of virtue possible to vice ? What 
 apparent exceptions are there to the rule of equal distribution of 
 rewards and penalties here ? Are these exceptions inconsistent 
 with a moral system ? How can we explain the fact that gratify- 
 ing results sometimes follow evil deeds ? How do civil and do- 
 mestic government bear upon vice ? What reason may be given 
 for the unequal distribvition of happiness or misery, apart from 
 personal desert ? How do virtue and vice stand related to the 
 divine administration ? What would be the ultimate condition of 
 a perfectly virtuous state ? Can we suppose the Author of Nature 
 indifferent to virtue and vice ? What shows that the notion of a 
 moral scheme of government is natural ? From what may we in- 
 fer that the present is a state of probation ? How is it seen that 
 v/e are on trial now ? Is this consistent with goodness ? Can we 
 know why we are in such a state of probation as the present ? 
 Can a happy condition be ensured here without provision ? What 
 can we do to secure it ? What is the effect of habit ? How are 
 we qualified for the duties of life ? Is the discipline requisite to 
 the present state the same in kind with that which we must sup- 
 pose requisite for the future life ? What will future happiness re- 
 quire as conditional to it ? What security can we have against 
 the constant liability to go astray ? How can evil be successfully 
 resisted ? What accompanies the progress of this resistance ? 
 What circumstances here encourage resistance ? What is to 
 be said to the objection that here our powers may be over- 
 tasked ? What to Shaftesbury's objection that there is no 
 merit in obedience enforced by hope or fear ? May present afflic- 
 tion be necessary ? Why ? Under God's natural government are 
 we made at once what we were designed to become ? What is 
 the inference from this ? What is left to our choice ? Can charac- 
 ter be displayed and known without probation ? Does the ob- 
 jection of the fatalist destroy the proof of an intelligent governor 
 of the world ? Supposing the theory of necessity true, mnst it 
 apply to the present life ? Does it apply ? What would be the 
 effect of the practical application of this theory ? Are we treated 
 as free ? What is the testimony of consciousness ? Is necessity 
 consistent with merit or demerit ? Does experience justify our 
 assumption of the theory of human freedom ? Is it a fact that re- 
 ward and penalty are meted out as if men were free ? What does 
 the general acceptance of natural religion among men show as to 
 its introduction among them ? How does this acceptance consist 
 with necessity ? 
 
 If there is a moral government, on what sort of a scale must it 
 be constructed ? What is requisite in order to offer vahd objection 
 to any one feature of it ? Can we prove that more good or less 
 evil might have resulted from a different constitution of things ? 
 Do we find means operating contrary to our expectations ? Are 
 general laws best ? What effect would direct interpositions to 
 hinder their operation have ? Is moral obligation affected by our 
 failing to discern all the results of complying with, or rejecting it ? 
 
222 QUESTIONS. 
 
 As reasonable beings, can we regard without concern our relation 
 to the present state as one of probation ? By what is the impor- 
 tance of Christianity evidenced ? Does Butler place moral and 
 positive duties in contrast ? Wliat course is best when they are 
 supposed to come in conflict ? Can we reason from analogy 
 against a revelation ? Can we against its mode ? Can we against 
 its limited publication ? Can we against incomplete evidences of 
 it ? Do we have demonstrative evidence to act upon in daily life ? 
 What essays does Butler append to his "Analogy ? " 
 
 IX. How was the "Analogy" related to the age in which it was 
 written ? What gives it permanent value ? Is its value to us the 
 same precisely that it was to Butler's contemporaries ? What is 
 to be said of his commencing his "Analogy" with the argument 
 for a future life ? What disadvantages does this method have ? 
 What is the better and true method, if we wish to construct the 
 scheme of the Moral System ? What leading truth did Butler as- 
 sume, that we may not assume now ? Where does the proof of this 
 properly come in ? What other peculiarity of Butler's work is un- 
 satisfactory to us ? If we are to apprehend the moral system pro- 
 perly, what course must we take ? To what does Professor Farrar 
 attribute the real secret of the power of the "Analogy?" To 
 what remarkable work of science does he compare it ? In what 
 respect is he superior to most of his predecessors ? How had 
 they discussed the Moral System ? How are the different features 
 of the Moral System related to one another ? Illustrate this. What 
 is the effect on the entire argument of estabhshing each position, 
 separately ? What is the escellence, and what the defect of the 
 "Analogy?" What merit must be conceded to it? What is 
 pre-requisite to a proper presentation of the Moral System ? 
 
 THE MORAL SYSTEM. 
 
 I. What is Science ? What should any science do ? How many 
 sciences are possible ? Among these, what position does that of 
 the Moral System hold ? How is its paramount importance man- 
 ifest ? In the sphere of universal knowledge, what is the place of 
 the Moral System ? How is the importance of each science to be 
 estimated ? What do all the sciences testify as to man ? Which 
 among them all must take the precedence, and why ? Is there a 
 manifest order of subordination in nature ? To what do all point 
 upward ! What kindred subordination is there in the constitution 
 of man's nature ? ^Yhat is supreme in it ? As the result, what is 
 the great question for man to consider ? Why cannot the exist- 
 ence of a moral sphere be denied ? How is this shown by the 
 miseries of the world ? What resources have we at command for 
 the investigation of the Moral System ? 
 
 II. What method must be adopted to obtain a comprehensive 
 view of the facts of the Moral System ? Why ? What is the 
 simplest and broadest classification ? What is the threefold con- 
 stitution of human nature ? Will excess or defect in one part af- 
 fect all ? 1. What relation must the body and its appetites sus- 
 tain to the mind ? If this relation is violated, what is the result ? 
 2. How is the intellect affected by passionate excess ? 3, 4, 5. How 
 does physical indulgence affect reason and conscience ? 6. How 
 
QUESTIONS. 223 
 
 is neglect of educating the intellect visited with retribution on 
 other parts of our nature ? 7. What is the relation of intellectual 
 culture to moral development ? 
 
 III. In what three relations does man stand to the material 
 ■universe ? 1. What disciplinary result follows from the relations 
 of his physical nature to it ? 2. How does the intellect come in 
 contact with the external world, and with what results ? 3. How 
 is the intellect affected by this ? How the taste ? Is there any- 
 thing directly moral in this ? 4. What remains to be done after 
 knowledge of the material world has been acquired ? 5. In doing 
 this, wliat are the moral results ? Plow have the highest virtues 
 been nurtured ? 6. To what are we disciplined by the fixed order 
 of the material universe ? How is this seen ? What other relation 
 beside that of apparent antagonism, does the material universe 
 sustain to man ? 2. How does this tend to draw forth and stimu- 
 late the powers of mind and body ? 3. What necessities, having 
 moral results, are imposed, through the relation of the body 
 specifically to the external world ? As a result, what must his 
 whole life become ? On what is his physical well-being condi- 
 tioned ? 
 
 IV. What are man's relations to social life ? Do they impose 
 moral restraints ? 1. What point must be established to create a 
 presumption that the discipline and results of social life will be 
 legitimately on the side of virtue ? In cases of collision between 
 society and the individual, which, as a general rule, is right ? 
 What is the moral relation of society, as organised, to the indi- 
 vidual ? Is social organization, considered as a structure, virtuous 
 in itself ? 2. What is requisite if society is to be permanently 
 maintained ? What will this require ? How are these rules 
 essentially moral ? 3. How will the common self-interest hold in 
 check individual selfishness ? Give an illustration of this in a 
 case when selfishness is universal. 4. Can society be organized 
 without recognizing the principles of equal justice ? What moral 
 qualities are requisite, if men are to combine and act together ? 
 How must the law deal with a lack of these qualities ? What 
 proportion must penalties bear to crimes ? Would this be true 
 among wicked men associated together ? Could a thoroughly 
 vicious state of society among men continue to exist ? Why not ? 
 
 5. What necessity is absolute in all social organizations ? What 
 was the remark of Fisher Ames ? How is the truth of this obvious ? 
 
 6. How- does social organization, considered in itself, stand relat- 
 ed to virtue ? Is there an analogy between the difficulty of ignor- 
 ing physical, and that of ignoring moral laws ? What analogy is 
 there between the law of gravitation in physics, and that of mu- 
 tual confidence in society ? 7. What is the efi'ect of diverse vicious 
 elements in individual character ? How do they afi'ect each other ? 
 What is their eft'ect in society ? Has this often been illustrated ? 
 What contrast to this is presented by virtuous qualities among 
 men ? 8. How do the ends that the virtuous and the vicious re- 
 spectively have in view, contrast in their practicabiUty, and why ? 
 
 V. 1. In case of injustice, is it at the option of the State to pass 
 it by unnoticed ? Is punishment certain ? What can the oflender 
 not escape ? 2. What may be said over against the fact that 
 judges may be bribed or overawed ? 3. In dealing with the erim- 
 
^24 QTJESTIOKS. 
 
 judges may be bribed or overawed ? 3, In dealing with the crim- 
 inal, what is the rule as to the position occupied by the forces of 
 the State ? 4. What is the operation of domestic government in 
 the moral spbere ? What does a care of the child's welfare imply 
 on the part of the parent as to recognizing moral distinctions, and 
 making the training moral ? What is the action of natural affec- 
 tion, even in some cases where the parent is vicious ? 5, What 
 moral element is found in academic training and associations ? 
 6. How does social influence train the mind to the recognition of 
 law ? Where is the moral element in this ? 7. How does social 
 influence impress a sense of individual responsibility and duty ? 
 Does it operate as a restraint on vice ? Will evil men exercise a 
 restraint upon one another ? How ? How are vices made dis- 
 reputable ? What is necessarily the character of those acts which 
 society must applaud ? What is the effect of this applause ? 8. 
 How does social influence operate to produce acts of Mberality 
 and generosity ? 9. Is patriotism developed by social influence ? 
 Is it a virtue ? 10. What problems to be solved does society pre- 
 sent ? What is the result of the effort to solve them ? What illus- 
 trations of this that history presents, may be mentioned ? Does 
 this show that society is naturally on the side of virtue ? 11. What 
 political questions, implying the study of ethics, does society oc- 
 casion ? In what form have answers to these questions been given ? 
 What conclusion as to the nature of vice results from the study 
 of national well-being ? 12. What social science shows that the 
 just and the expedient correspond in human affairs ? What moral 
 lessons are enforced by industrial and commercial transactions ? 
 How is virtue essential to commercial credit ? How does every 
 mercantile exchange involve a moral element ? 13. To what vir- 
 tues do the inequalities of social life give rise ? In what way ? 
 14. What class has the readiest claim to social sympathy ? What 
 will usually be the experience of the good man in time of ca- 
 lamity ? PAGE 104 
 
 VI. Wliat additional element tends to vindicate right and expose 
 wrong ? How does Butler represent the advantages of an upright 
 government ? What would be the experience of a government 
 disregarding the rights of its subjects, and its duties to other 
 states ? Why is the contract more striking between the two states 
 after a series of years ? 1. What analogy does Bishop Butler draw 
 between vu^tue and reason ? Are there cases where time alone 
 will secure the ends of justice ? What are they ? What contrast 
 is there between the prospects of leagues of vice and of virtu- 
 ous alliances ? How is this explained ? Have martyrs and crim- 
 inals ahke illustrated this ? How ? Can the machinery of justice 
 operate effectively wi thou fc some delay? How is a mistaken na- 
 tional policy exposed ? How have the cruelties and intolerant 
 usages of the past been abolished? 2. What is the contrast be- 
 tween the earlier and later results of vice ? How is it with virtue ? 
 3. What would be the natural effect of giving evil deeds time to 
 expose their own proper results ? 4. With sufficient time to oper- 
 ate, what must we infer would be the result of tendencies which 
 we now discern around us ? Can we properly judge of retributive 
 forces and tendencies without taking time indefinitely extended 
 into our calculation ? page 115 
 
 VII. How is it manifest that man is subject to moral discipline ? 
 
QUESTIONS. 225 
 
 How that he was designed to be ? Does it make any difference, 
 so far as the assertion that man has a moral nature is concerned, 
 whether we make conscience a single faculty, or resolve it into 
 others ? What position does the power it represents hold to other 
 faculties ? How is tliis illustrated by the poets ? Is their intui- 
 tion entitled to respect ? What does consciousness testify as to 
 the inward check exercised over the soul ? Is this check due to 
 any mercenary consideration ? Can conscience be permanently 
 disregarded ? Can its power be finally suppressed ? What states 
 of mind are conditioned on its ascendancy ? What is the result 
 when its power is suspended ? How far does it go to prove a 
 moral system ? How extensive is its sphere ? 1. What is its re- 
 lation to a sense of responsibility ? 3. How is the power of con- 
 science evoked in our social relations ? 3. What is its effect upon 
 the minds of the good or the evil ? What is the proper effect of 
 the approval of the conscience ? 4. What is the result, in oases 
 of exceptional activity of conscience, on the mind of the guilty ? 
 What terms used by the ancient poets illustrate their sense of 
 this ? What have men cheerfully endured with an approving 
 conscience ? 5. How is it that social judgments on wrong-doing 
 are formed ? What are the penalties of these judgments ? What 
 are their rewards ? How can we explain it that some actions ap- 
 pear beautiful, and others repulsive ? What is the general char- 
 acter of these respectively ? How is this illustrated in history ? 
 In poetry ? Are good deeds admired by good men only ? What 
 does this indicate ? What is the most distinctive and characteris- 
 tic feature of the Moral System ? In what marked ways does it 
 operate ? What conclusions, evidencing a moral system, flow 
 from the fact of man's moral nature ? With what evident design 
 is that nature framed and constituted ? What facts of its experi- 
 ence show a moral system in operation ? . . . page 121 
 
 VIII. Are we so constituted as to feel that a moral system. 
 should exist ? In what cases do we find special satisfaction in 
 historic accounts of noted men ? If this does not prove a moral 
 system, v/hat does it prove ? To what is this mutual adaptation 
 of the moral sense and the experience of fitting results, analogous 
 in the physical sphere ? What leading objection is urged to a moral 
 system ? 1. What is the first reply to this ? 2. What second re- 
 ply may be made ? 2. What third reply ? What does the very 
 idea of Probation imply ? 4. What fourth reply may be given ? 
 What English poet notices this ? How is this explained without 
 prejudice to the Moral System ? page 131 
 
 IX. Does the Moral System indicate design? In what way? 
 What is the alternative of denying the Moral System an intelligent 
 author ? What is gained by this ? Supposing the system to have 
 no intelligent author, does it operate to encourage the hope of im- 
 punity to evil ? Can the order of the Moral System 1t»e resolved 
 into, or fully explained by " the nature of things ?" How does the 
 fact of our physical structure and moral constitution conflict with 
 any such explanation ? Are there elements of our being, essen- 
 tial to retribution, that might have been omitted ? Would the 
 nature of things necessarily prevent such an omission ? How 
 wide is the range of adaptation manifest in the Moral System ? 
 What would be the logical result to the Moral System and to hu- 
 man responsibility, in making all depend upon a necessity m the 
 
 15 
 
226 ' QUESTIONS. 
 
 I 
 nature of things ? "What must we admit then ? Wliat will the 
 Moral System reveal as to its Author ? 1. If it is framed to favor 
 justice, what is the necessary inference? 2. Vv''hat will benevo- 
 lence, in the broad sense, include ? What evidence have we of 
 this in the Moral System ? What benevolent provisions are seen 
 in connection with pain and its uses ? 3. How does the Moral 
 System give evidence of wisdom ? page 136 
 
 X. What is the scope of Bishop Butler's argument for the future 
 life ? What term expresses its defects ? With what postulate 
 does his negative argument start ? How does this apply, suppos- 
 ing conscious being to be indivisible ? Can death be supposed to 
 be a greater change to the conscious being than those changes 
 which it has survived ? What do the facts of experience show as 
 to the relation which the body sustains to mind ? What inference 
 will this warrant, in case the body is dissolved ? Can we define 
 identity ? Does it continue independent of the changes in the 
 body ? How extensive are these changes ? Whose reasoning does 
 Bishop Butler endorse in asserting the indivisibility of conscious- 
 ness ? With what is Butler's negative argument burdened ? 1. 
 Is there anything in the circumstances of our being to suggest 
 naturally to us a future life ? What ? What weight is this sugges- 
 tion entitled to ? 2. Have we capacities apparently adapted to a 
 broader sphere than the present ? What is the significance of 
 rudimentary organs, which are evidently designed for a sphere not 
 yet attained in the case of the animal ? 3. Are they prophetic ? 
 Are we surrounded by what are regarded as emblems of immor- 
 tality ? Do they prove anything ? Does m.an's sensitiveness to 
 their suggestions prove anything ? .... page 143 
 
 XI. 1. Must we assume that the same wisdom that framed the 
 Moral System, subjected man to it ? How will this create a pre- 
 sumption of a future life ? Can the divine wisdom be vindicated 
 on the assumption that man's existence ends with death ? Why 
 not ? 2. What would the idea of Grod's goodness logically warrant 
 us to infer in regard to hopes in man suggested by nature ? 
 What would have to be charged upon the divine goodness, if man 
 is placed in a limitless field, to perish without the opportunity to 
 explore it ? How is the idea of annihilation necessarily regarded ? 
 Is the gift of powers that make us sensitive to it consistent with 
 goodness, if there be no future life ? 3. Can the justice of God be 
 vindicated while future retribution is denied ? Does the present 
 state bear raarks of being a coraplete system in itself ? What 
 would be the effect upon virtue and innocence of the denial of 
 future awards ? 1. How does the doctrine of a future life accord 
 with the relation of the spirit to a perishable body ? What an- 
 alogy is thei'e between the body and the husks of the grain ? 
 2. Starting with material things and the images of them, toward 
 what do the processes of education conduct the soul ?■ How is 
 this seen in the process of intellectual training, from childhood 
 on ? Illustrate this. 3. How does the doctrine of a future life 
 harmonize with the necessities of civil justice ? . . page 148 
 
 XII. What judgment must we form of the present life, in view 
 of the soul's immortality ? What is meant by a state of probation ? 
 What is the mutual relation of the two doctrines of a future life 
 and of probation ? 1. In what relation, simply as preceding it. 
 
QUESTIONS. 227 
 
 must the present state stand to the future ? From what does 
 this result ? 2. Frora what do we derive a strong confirmatory 
 presumption that the present is a state of probation ? "Wliat is 
 the difference between moral system and moral government ? 
 How can we explain what is sometimes objected to as an incon- 
 gruity in the Moral System ? What would be the effect, if retribu- 
 tion always followed wifchout delay upon transgression ? Is the 
 Moral System actually modified ? How far ? 3. Are the elements 
 of probation met with in actual experience ? Can it be evaded or 
 avoided ? How extensively does it prevail ? How is it illustrated 
 in education ? 4. What illustrations may be given of actual 
 moral pi'obation now going on- ? Is there a manifest analogy be- 
 tween childhood, as related to manhood, and present existence, 
 as related to the future ? 5. Can the supposition that this analogy 
 is inteiTupted by death, be regarded as probable ? Why improb- 
 able ? 6. Must we consider probation as a process , that has an 
 end in view ? 7. Why may we not suppose the entire future ex- 
 istence to be like the present, probationary ? 8. Why is death 
 assumed to be the normal limit of probation ? 9. Can we answer 
 fully the question why man is placed in a state of probation? Y/hat 
 reasons for it can be given ? May a distinction be made between 
 created and acquired holiness? 10. What is the effect of the success- 
 ful endurance of probation ? 11. If the future is a social state, on 
 what will the security of its peace and happiness largely depend ? 
 What other reasons for probation may be given ? . page 157 
 
 XIII. Can a full answer be given to the question why probation 
 has been made so severe ? If we cannot answer the question, 
 m.ust we admit thafact ? What is the fact ? 1. AVhat is the first 
 reason that may be given for this state of things implying severity 
 of trial ? 2. How can the severity of trial which originates in an- 
 cestral crime or neglect be explained in consistency v^^ith divine 
 wisdom and goodness ? 3. What evidence is there that man is in 
 a degenerate or fallen state ? What twofold aggravation of the 
 severity of probation results ? 4. What important lesson is this 
 permission of the severity of trial calculated to teach ? 5. Hov/ 
 is it seen that, severe as temptation may be, there is no absolute 
 necessity of yielding to it? 6. What fact forbids us to despair of 
 the final triumph of those who may be subjected to severe trial ? 
 7. What may be said of the results of probation sometimes when 
 most severe ? Is its severity always to be regretted ? 8. What 
 light is thrown on this subject by the history of past struggles 
 and endurance ? 9. When severity of trial is made an objection 
 to divine benevolence, what must first be considered ? What is 
 the correct view of benevolence as a divine attribute ? 10. Are 
 obj.ections against the reason of a fact valid against the fact ? 
 What is the notorious fact as to the frequent result of probation, 
 visible by us ? 11. If the present brief period of existence pro- 
 duces results so surprising, must we suppose their effect to con- 
 tinue hereafter ? What is the bearing of analogy on this point ? 
 
 PAGE 166 
 
 XIV. What is necessary in a future state, if the unequal allot- 
 ments of the present are to be rectified ? 1. Must we suppose the 
 introduction of any new elements, beyond what we have know- 
 ledge of now, in order to secure retribution ? Why not ? May 
 there be new positive elements introduced ? 2. What can we say 
 
228 . QUESTIONS. 
 
 of the machinery of distributive justice now at work ? What evi- 
 dences do we see in man's physical and moral constitution that 
 reveal retributive design here on earth ? Is there anything that 
 may be regarded as posthumous penalty under the present system ? 
 When do retributive forces begin to operate ? How is this seen ? 
 3. In case there is no self-betrayal on the part of the guilty, what 
 risks of detection does he incur ? 4. To what are we to ascribe 
 the good man's failure- to meet his due reward, and the wicked his 
 due penalty here ? Is it because of the natural tendencies of 
 things, or because those tendencies are temporarily arrested ? 
 What would be the result if life here were indefinitely prolonged ? 
 5. What may we infer from this that would go far toward insur- 
 ing retribution ? 6. What alone would interfere with the continu- 
 ed operation of retributive forces in the future life ? What must 
 we assume would remain in the future just as at present ? 7. Is 
 it to be supposed that the loss of physical sensibility, with the 
 dissolution of the body, Avould seriously detract from the fearful- 
 ness of retribution ? Why not ? 8. What light does analogy throw 
 on the continuance of future retribution ? Has penalty here a 
 reforming power to any considerable extent ? What is the usual 
 character of repentance under penalty ? 9. How must we suppose 
 the prospect of the rewards of the good to be affected by relief 
 from subjection to physical conditions and hardships ? 10. To 
 what conclusion are we brought by the foregoing considerations ? 
 
 PAGE 173 
 
 XV. In a field so vast and complex as that of the Moral System^ 
 what is to be expected ? In what do the difficulties we meet, con- 
 sist ? 1. How must a certain class of difficulties — such as the vin- 
 dication of human freedom and of the divine goodness — be met? 
 2. What proportion do the facts we know bear to those we do 
 not know ? If the latter could be known, what difiiculty would 
 remain ? 3. What would be requisite to justify us in criticising 
 certain aspects of probation ? Is human probation to be judged 
 as an isolated fact or system ? 4. What relation does the sphere 
 of our observation bear to that of the scheme to which probation 
 must be supposed to belong ? 5.' What illustration of our incom- 
 petence to criticise the Moral System is found in connection with 
 human mechanism ? Is this an adequate analogy ? 6. Can we 
 suppose our Moral System to be a detached fragment ? What is 
 the inference then ? What has become already of many objections 
 that have been brought against the wisdom and goodness of Grod 
 in creation ? 7. What problems in the sphere of Probation and 
 the Moral System, does history present, and how may we suppose 
 them to be solved ? 8. What analogy, illustrative of this point, 
 do we find in the planetary system ? What in the sphere of art ? 
 
 PAGE 180 
 
 XVI. What will follow from our ascribing the order of the moral 
 constitution of things to a supreme intelligence ? Must man's 
 creation have been with reference to some end to be gained by it? 
 1. By what process do we investigate the design manifest in the 
 constitution of things ? 2. Where is design most strikingly mani- 
 fest ? What must we assume to be the design in man's creation ? 
 From what class of the results of probation, should we select the 
 materials that evidence its design ? 3. How do we proceed in the 
 Btudy of a human mechanism, to find out what it was meant to 
 
QUESTIONS. 229 
 
 produce ? Can we discern this better from the inferior results of 
 probation ? On what ground can we decide what is the better ? 
 What phrase of tlie ancient philosophers expresses their ideal of 
 perfect manhood ? 4. If the attainment of this is rare, does it af- 
 fect our arguoient ? Why not ? 5. Can the scheme for perfecting 
 man's nature be limited in its scope merely to individuals ? How 
 has the idea of the progress of the race been regarded ? 6. What 
 objection may be urged against the assumption that the moral 
 perfection of man and of the race, is the designed end of the 
 Moral System ? What reply may be made to the assertion that 
 man is necessarily a di-udge ? Is the necessity of toil inconsistent 
 with moral progress ? What is the ministry or use of toil ? 7. 
 Does history foi'ce us to conclude against the possibility of the 
 moral progress of the race ? Have enthusiastic minds been dis- 
 appointed in their cherished plans ? Why do we not conclude 
 that those plans are merely romantic dreams ? Have past failures, 
 however repeated or disastrous, led to their abandonment ? 8. 
 What view are we to take of progress in the past ? 9. Is it essen- 
 tial to the argument to determine to what causes progress has 
 been due ? Why not ? What are we, then, to conclude ? 10. 
 What are the circumstances of the Moral System, in which we ask 
 what will be the probable course of divine procedure ? 11. Why 
 must we suppose the Moral System, after apparent failuie, to be 
 continued ? From the continuance of the system, after apparent 
 failure, what are we to. infer ? What is the conclusion forced 
 upon us in regard to the powers of reason, from the survey of an- 
 cient learning and philosophy ? 12. How will this conclusion be 
 modified by looking at the condition of less cultured nations? 
 
 PAGE 185 
 XVII. On what ground might it be asserted that, with time and 
 opportunity, man might attain the end of his creation without di- 
 vine aid ? 1. How is this objection to be met ? What evidence 
 is there that the moral and religious status of the race at a very 
 early period was higher than in later times ? 2. What are the 
 facts as to China, Egypt, and other ancient nations ? 3. By what 
 two theories may this be accounted for ? Does either theory i-e- 
 lieve the difficulty ? Why not ? 4. ^Vhat is the inference if the 
 earlier Theism was reasoned out ? What is admitted if this The- 
 ism was by means of an original revelation ? 5. What is necessary 
 to account for the advance actually made by some portions of the 
 race ? When do we find the purest Theism ? How early do we 
 find a marked religious degeneracy in progress ? How widely 
 does the evil extend ? Is it arrested by progress in art and intel- 
 lectual culture ? What was the moral condition of the Roman 
 empire at the height of its grandeur ? 6. Did Heathenism give 
 evidence of any power to lift itself out of its degraded state ? 7. 
 Is the permitted continuance of such a condition of things cred- 
 ible ? What is more incredible ? 8. In what is the only ground 
 for hope ? Can reason discover any resource ? Has self-recovery 
 of nations from moral degradation ever occurred, without foreign 
 help ? 9. What expectation does the continuance of the race in 
 such circumstances, encourage us to cherish ? How can the partial 
 and local progress of the race morally, be explained ? How the 
 original Theism ? How the Jewish Theism ? How was the pro- 
 gress of decay in the old Roman world arrested ? 10, Is there any 
 analogy for this in the natural government of the world ? 
 
 PAGE 194 
 
230 QUESTIONS. 
 
 XVIII. If a diyine interposition is to take place, what form must 
 it assume ? 1. Why ? 2. With what must a re-statement of the 
 lost truth be accompanied ? 3. Must there be some provision to 
 perpetuate the truth or its influence ? 4. Can reason teach us be- 
 forehand, how such a revelation must be made ? 5. What answer 
 has been given to the question, has a revelation been made? 
 What do the various professed revelations that we meet with in 
 the past, indicate ? Is there any among them that can plausibly 
 be represented as a rival of Christianity in its claims to respect ? 
 6. What does the Old Testament assert as the explanation of 
 Jewish Theism ? 7. What support of the claims of the New Tes- 
 tament is found in the changes it effected ? What was the char- 
 acter of these changes ? 8. What may be said of the triumphs it 
 has achieved ? What presumption does this warrant ? What 
 strengthens this presumption ? 9. What may be said of the docu- 
 ments on which Christianity is based ? Do they leave the impres- 
 sion of unity of aim ? Could there have been a conspiracy on the 
 part of their authors ? 10. What internal congruity do the doc- 
 trines of Christianity manifest ? What are the principal of these 
 doctrines ? Has any one Biblical writer claimed the honor of 
 originating Christianity ? 11. How do the motives of Christianity 
 compare in moral power with those with which it has come in con- 
 flict ? 15. In what are we to look for the secret of the power of 
 the Bible ? Will style or poetic beauty explain it? What, then, 
 m.ust be conceded with regard to it ? . . . . page 202 
 
 XIX. 1. What is one main objection to revelation ? What de- 
 tracts from the force of this objection ? Is the difiaculty in the 
 repetition of what is miraculous ? In what then ? What do we 
 constantly meet in the sphere of human experience ? Does it make 
 any difference in the result, whether we call this will-force natural 
 or supernatural ? Why not ? Does the doctrine of a Divine Prov- 
 idence, as taught in the Scriptures, harmonize with what we 
 must infer concerning it, from the study of the Moral System ? 
 Why must we consider Providence as universal ? 3. How does 
 history illustrate an overruling providence ? 4. What is implied 
 in the doctrine of "human depravity ?" What testimony in hu- 
 man experience confirms it ? What necessity occasioned by this 
 depravity is man conscious of, and how has he sought to meet it? Is 
 there anything in human experience strictly analogous to what, 
 in the Scriptures, is represented as the Atoning Sacrifice of Christ? 
 Is the principle of it — vicarious suffering for the benefit of others — 
 without human analogies ? 6. What is understood by the phrase, 
 " Original Sin ? " What approach, in experience with which we 
 are famihar, have we to an analogy of it ? Do the facts of the 
 Moral System throw light upon the Scripture doctrine of the ne- 
 cessity of "regeneration?" What moral changes do we have 
 knowledge of, somewhat analogous to ic ? 7. What features of the 
 Moral System in operation, correspond to the system revealed in 
 the Scriptures ? 8. How do the Moral System, and the teachings 
 of the Scriptures, stand related severally to the theory of neces- 
 sity ? 9. How does the extent of the Moral System, as contemplat- 
 ed by reason, compare with its extent as set forth by revelation ? 
 10. What do the Moral System and the Scriptures alike testify as 
 to the frequent results of probation ? 11. What may be said of 
 many of the objections urged against Revelation ? . page 208 
 
QUESTIONS. 231 
 
 XX. On what evidence does the existence of the Moral System 
 rest ? In what way does this system indicate design ? What may 
 we infer from the character of a system, that reveals design ? What 
 attributes of God do we infer from the Moral System ? On what 
 grounds do we infer a future life ? On what grounds do we infer 
 that the present state is probationary ? On what grounds do we 
 assert that man, left to himself here, fails as a rule to attain the 
 proper end of his being ? On what grounds do we feel warranted 
 to anticipate divine interposition ? On what grounds do we assert 
 that interposition has taken place ? What is the effect of estab- 
 lishing each new position as we advance ? What is the result as 
 to the position which the Moral System must take in the realm of 
 science ? To what cheering view are we led by the study of the 
 Moral System ? What necessity does the existence of the Moral 
 System impose upon man ? page 215 
 
COMPLETION OF THE NEW TESTAMENT SECTION 
 
 Kdlted with Additions by E. R. Craven, D.D., of Newark, N. J. TransIjLbon by M!ss 
 
 KVELINA Moore. With an Index of Topics and of Greek Words 
 
 covering the New Testament volumes, by J. H. Woods. 
 
 Under the general editorship of Dr. PHILIP SCHAFF. 
 
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 commentators, are so carefully summed up in it that it must stand for years without a 
 rival ; indispensable alike to the clergyman, the educated layman, and all students of the 
 Bible who wish to arrive at the precise interpretation of the Sacred Word. 
 
 The Volumes j>reviously published are : 
 
 . OLDTESTAMENT.— I. GENESIS. II. JOSHUA, JUDGES, AND 
 RUTH. III. FIRST AND SECOND KINGS. IV. PSALMS. 
 V. PROVERBS, SONG OF SOLOMON, ECCLESIASTES. VI. 
 JEREMIAH AND LAMENTATIONS. VII. MINOR 
 PROPHETS. 
 
 NEW TESTAMENT.— I. MATTHEW. II. MARK AND LUKE. 
 III. JOHN. IV. ACTS. V. THE EPISTLE OF PAUL TO THE 
 ROMANS. VI. CORINTHIANS. VII. GALATIANS, EPHESIANS 
 PHILIPPIANS, COLOSSIANS. VIII. THESSALONIANS, TIMO- 
 THY. TITUS, PHILEMON, AND HEBREWS. IX. THE EPIS- 
 TLES GENERAL OF JAMES, PETER, JOHN AND JUDE. 
 
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ANOTHER GREAT HISTORICAL WORK. 
 
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