The laws of God, in regard to voluntary action, are those invariable arrangements in mind and matter by which happiness or pain are connected with certain feelings and actions.
Thus it is an invariable arrangement that pain shall be connected with touching fire, and pleasure with seeing the light. So in regard to the intellect; pleasure is invariably connected with the exercise of wit and humor, and disgust with folly and fatuity. So the moral sense is invariably pleased with truth, justice, and integrity, and pained by the opposite.
Whenever, therefore, we discover what invariably affords pleasure or pain, we discover one of the laws of God.
To discover these laws, and to believe in them, is as indispensable to the right action of mind as light is indispensable to perfect eyes in order to see.
The first lesson of every new-born spirit is to discover the laws that relate to its own enjoyment. Whenever a child chooses any thing which secures enjoyment without harm to itself or to others, it is acting as its Creator designed, and this action is therefore right. And whenever it chooses what will cause needless pain to itself or to others, it acts wrong. Most of the choices of a little child are of what is right as giving enjoyment without harm.
The grand law of God, as learned by experience, is that every mind must sacrifice the lesser for the greater [pg 146] good in gratifying its own desires. When the interests of others are not concerned, the child must always choose not what it desires the most, but what is best for itself. It is the first labor of the educator to make a child understand and obey this first part of the law of sacrifice.
But where the feelings and interests of others are involved, the law of God is, that the lesser good of the individual shall always be sacrificed to the greater good of the many. Each mind of the great commonwealth is to act, not to make self-gratification the first thing, but to make the greatest possible happiness with the least possible evil for the whole commonwealth the predominant purpose. And such is the system of the Creator that whatever is for the best good of the whole is for the best good of each individual.
Thus it appears that obedience to the laws of God, physical, intellectual, social, and moral, is to be chosen as the ruling purpose of each mind. And this is the mode by which all rational beings are to promote the end or design for which all things are made, (i.e.,) happiness-making on the greatest possible scale for the great commonwealth.
Now it is very certain that no human mind is able, by its own solitary investigations, to discover all the physical, intellectual, social, and moral laws of God.
Many of these laws we can learn by experience, but for the greater portion we are dependent on the instruction of others. Therefore truth on the part of educators, and faith on the part of the learners are as indispensable to the right action of mind as is light to the right action of the eye in seeing. Not a “dead,” [pg 147] merely intellectual belief, but a “saving faith” that controls the feelings and conduct.
We now are enabled to define the kind of inability as to obeying the laws of God, which inevitably attends every mind that commences its existence in this world. As yet there have never been perfectly true educators of young minds, while perfect faith, that is to say, “saving faith,” in the teachings that are true is as much wanting. The young child can not be made to understand, and therefore can not believe, or have faith in many of the laws of God and the penalties connected with them. This no one will deny.
There are several classes of moral actions. The first class includes those which in all cases destroy the best good of man. Of these are wanton cruelty to helpless creatures, and ingratitude in returning needless evil for good. In regard to such the mind, by its very constitutional impulses, revolts from them and feels them to be wrong without any process of reasoning. So also all those actions that in all cases cause enjoyment without evil, are instinctively felt to be right without any reflection.
But there are many actions that are entirely dependent on circumstances for their moral character. Thus to punish a little child in one case would be cruel and wrong, in another it might be benevolent and right. To take a woman, when not married to another, for a wife is right, but wrong if she is married. And so with thousands of other actions.
Again, some actions that do no harm to any individual at a given time, are wrong because they would [pg 148] be destructive to general happiness, if generally allowed; or, in other words, they are wrong in tendency. Thus, in a given case, a lie might do a great deal of good and no immediate harm. And yet it would be wrong, because leaving it to every man's discretion when it was best to lie would in the end destroy all confidence in human testimony.
Again, many of the laws of God can be discovered only by long experience of many communities. As soon as experience has shown that any practice will do more harm than good, then the law of God is discovered and it becomes obligatory. Thus the question of polygamy has been settled. Thus, too, the vending of alcoholic drinks has been decided to be wrong as a general practice.
Here comes up the distinction between wrong choices that deserve blame and punishment, and those that do not. In the natural system of the Creator all violations of law are followed by the natural penalties without any reference to the motives, knowledge, or ability of the agent. All questions among men, as to blame and retribution, have reference to the adding of other penalties and rewards in the present or future state. It is only in regard to such that the questions of blame, of justice, and of mercy are to be debated. Without revelation we have no evidence that the natural penalties of law are ever suspended, either as a matter of justice or mercy. In the case of great crimes and wrongs, that additional penalties are to follow in a future state is what all men fear, and this it is which induces self-inflictions to secure pardon for sin.
Now these are distinctions existing in all rational minds, and are continually referred to in every-day [pg 149] life. But it is impossible for any but an omniscient being to decide on all the motives that regulate the actions of others, while even our own motives are often so hidden and complex that we are blinded as to their true character.
The language of common life does not always recognize these distinctions. When a wrong action is done the actor is called a wrong-doer, and is blamed for the deed. And the fact that he believed that he was acting right, and even that he practices self-denial in performing what is imagined to be a duty, though it palliates, does not ordinarily end all displeasure. For in multitudes of cases the ignorance of duty results from pride or selfish neglect of inquiry. And few are competent to decide how far the ignorance is a misfortune and not a fault.
It is owing to this fact that most of the language of life assumes that all violations of law are blamably wrong, and are to be punished here or hereafter. In the most common use of the term, “sin is the transgression of law.” At the same time men recognize the distinction between sins of ignorance and willful sin.
The preceding, then, warrants the definition of sin as “the transgression of law,” whether known or unknown. The question of the rectitude of penalties added to the natural consequences of violated laws, is confined to those sins which are attended by a knowledge of law and ability to understand and obey.
These distinctions and definitions are important because a large class of theologians maintain that sin is [pg 150] the voluntary transgression of known law, and make this definition the foundation of their assertion that all men have power to be perfect in conformity to all law, meaning by this all the laws of God that they know and believe. On this theory sin is the transgression of known law, and not of that which is unknown. And on this theory one way to keep children from sin would be to keep them in ignorance of God's laws.
The writer maintains that this limited use is not the common meaning. Mankind do not stop to settle the question whether men were ignorant of what was right, before they decide that they sin. Often such ignorance results from an unwillingness or indolence that prevents attention, and few can decide how far our ignorance of law results from guilty neglect. It is true that when a perfect and innocent inability to know law is proved, the added penalties of statute law are remitted. But still the natural penalties are unremitted.
The word holy in its original use signifies set apart or consecrate to the special service of some deity. Thus the vessels of a temple, the priests and the building are called holy in this sense. In reference to moral acts or choices, this term is used as recognizing the fact that a mind may be voluntarily consecrated or devoted to the service of God by right action, or obedience to his laws. God himself is called holy on the supposition that there are rules of right and wrong in the nature of things, independent of his will, and that his will is conformed to these rules, while men are called holy in reference chiefly to the will or service of their Creator.
In the Creator holiness signifies perfect voluntary conformity to that which is for the best according to the [pg 151] eternal nature of things. In men perfect holiness is perfect conformity of will to the laws or will of God, both absolutely and in motive or intention. A mind is consecrated to God when its ruling purpose is to obey him in all things. In this use of the term holiness in man, is what can not be created, as it is a voluntary act of his own mind.
The question whether Adam was created with “a holy nature,” while his posterity begin existence here with an “unholy nature,” must be settled by a clear definition of the words employed.
If the term “nature” refers to the construction of the mind itself as made by God, a holy nature must signify that organization and combination of the natural powers of mind, which is the best possible for a mind in its appointed place in the best possible system.
If, on the contrary, the term “nature” refers to that character of mind consequent on its own volitions, then a holy nature can be caused or created only by man himself as the sole producing cause of his own volitions, God being the author or cause of this nature only in the sense in which men are causes of voluntary action in other minds, viz., occasional causes by the use of motives or objects that excite desires.
In a former chapter we have noticed the analysis of the principle of love. It is needful to refer to this [pg 152] again, as intimately connected with the question of the right moral action of finite minds.
We have seen that love is a complex exercise, its first element being agreeable emotions in view of certain qualities and actions. Combined with these emotions co-exists a desire of reciprocated regard, that is to say, a desire to be the cause of similar agreeable emotions to the one loved. These are constitutional impulses not at all consequent on any volition or choice, and as the involuntary element of love, are properly called involuntary love. Such love can not be justly demanded except where those qualities are, or can be, perceived which naturally awaken agreeable emotions. In cases where the qualities exist that would naturally awaken affection if noticed, and the want of it is owing to inattention, a proper regard to such qualities can be justly demanded. But this is the only particular in which involuntary love can be made the subject of law and penalties.
But the main element of love, as practically estimated among men, is such a desire of good to the one loved as involves the good willing or voluntary effort to please and gratify. If a friend simply is pleased with our good qualities, and wishes to please us with his naturally agreeable traits in return, it is of little value in comparison with the truer love which is shown in voluntary efforts to please and make happy. This last is the main element of true affection, and properly is called voluntary love or good willing. Theologians express this distinction by the terms the love of complacency and the love of benevolence.
Thus we have gained these definitions:
Involuntary love toward God and toward men consists [pg 153] in agreeable emotions in view of admirable qualities.
Voluntary love toward God and toward men consists in good willing, or the voluntary effort to please and make happy.
To “love our neighbor as ourselves” must refer solely to voluntary love, for we have no regard to our own agreeable qualities in the love of self. Self-love is simply the desire and will to please and gratify self. This then is the kind of love that can properly be demanded of all. Each one can justly be required to will or choose to please and gratify others the same as we do ourselves. Each can be required to estimate the happiness of every other mind as of the same value as his own, and to exercise good willing for others as we do for our own enjoyment. From this primary principle necessarily results the law demanding that the good of the commonwealth shall always take precedence of any individual concern. If we are bound to value the happiness of each mind as equal in value to our own, the inevitable result is that we are to estimate the happiness of many minds as of more value than our own, so as always to make our own enjoyment and wishes subordinate and secondary to the general good.
Still more are we to regard the feelings and wishes of our Creator and Supreme Lord. He has infinite susceptibilities of enjoyment and suffering, and thus whatever retards or promotes his wishes and plans must be of as much more value as his powers of enjoyment and suffering are greater than ours. The love of good willing then should have first reference to God as the one whose will and wishes are of more [pg 154] value than any other being in this relation alone. Still more are we bound to regard his will and wishes as first in value, because his chief end and aim is the most possible happiness to all the creatures he has made. To will to please God as the chief end of our existence is the same as to choose to make the most possible happiness, not only to him, but to all his creatures.
Involuntary love is valuable as rendering it easier and more agreeable to labor for the welfare of others. Those whose interesting traits please us; those who, as children or friends, contribute to our enjoyment, and those who in any way give us pleasure, it is far easier to will for their enjoyment than it is to do so for those who do nothing to please us, and perhaps only give us discomfort, anxiety or disgust.
This exhibits an indirect way of securing the love of good will toward those who neither please us by their agreeable qualities, nor are causes of enjoyment to us in any way. Involuntary affection may be so strongly excited toward one whose qualities or conduct cause delight to self, that the desire to please that friend may become more animating than the desire for any personal gratification. Should such a friend be deeply interested in the happiness of his children, or of any other persons, whose character and conduct may in no way please us, still the desire to gratify such a friend may lead to good willing to those whom he loves, for his sake, in order to please and gratify him.
Thus it is that love to parents tends to produce “peace and good will” among children, who, in their [pg 155] little broils, are restrained by the desire to please their parents, when love to each other fails.
Here we have a view of the importance of right conceptions of God's character, in order to secure the perfect action of finite minds, especially in the first stage of existence.
It has been shown that the rules of right action are to be gained, in many cases, only by long experience and by a course of reasoning. Often, too, general rules (such, for example, as that we are never to lie, even to save life, or for any reason,) must be obeyed when a person can see immediate evil, and no good to self or to any one by obedience. Now it is impossible for a rational mind to choose pure evil. There must be some good in an object to excite desire, or it is impossible to choose it. But pleasurable emotions toward an all-wise Creator, whose benevolence and wisdom excite love, delight, and confidence, may be such that to please him gives abundant motive to obey the rules of right he enjoins when no other good can be perceived except that obedience will please him. And the more we perceive in him that excites admiration, love, and gratitude, the more strength of motive is gained.
It has been shown that a choice or act is virtuous in all relations, when it absolutely is best for all, and when it is done in reference to a rule of rectitude, or because it is right. The motive or reason of a choice decides whether or not it is virtuous.
Now as the Creator's will and the rules of rectitude are the same, when we say that any act, in order to be virtuous, must have reference to God's will, the question comes up, is an act virtuous because it pleases God, or does it please God because it is virtuous? i.e., [pg 156] because it conforms to those rules by which his chief end in creation is secured, and which rest on the eternal nature of things.
The last is the principle here assumed. God's great end is the highest happiness of his creatures. Obedience to his laws is the mode for securing this end; his own actions are right as they conform to this end; and the actions of all his creatures are right only in the same relation.
So God's “glory” consists in the highest happiness of his creatures, which can only be secured by their obedience to his laws.
This makes it clear that choosing as our chief end to obey all the physical, social, and moral laws of God, as learned by experience, is the same as loving God with all the heart, and our neighbors as ourselves. It is also living for God's glory as the chief end; and it is being a truly righteous, virtuous, and pious man.
This distinction between voluntary and involuntary love enables us to discover certain dangers that result for want of such discrimination. Men may conceive of the Creator as desiring to be loved, admired, and glorified, just as selfish conquerors, like Alexander and Napoleon have done. In this view all their aims would be to excite agreeable emotions toward God by the contemplation of his various attributes. And thus they might be so absorbed in the indulgence of such delightful emotions as to become entirely heedless of the wants and the wishes of those around them. This kind of experience would cultivate selfishness instead of benevolence.
On the contrary, choosing to obey all God's laws for happiness-making on the largest scale, and viewing [pg 157] the lovely and glorious attributes of the Creator as means to this end, would induce the only true virtue, while it is the true mode of pleasing our Maker and increasing his enjoyment.
The preceding furnishes the mode of harmonizing a great variety of expressions that may properly be given in answer to the great question, “what must we do to be saved?” as we gain this answer independently of revelation.
The first answer is, “believe in God's teachings—or have faith in God.” This means, take the laws of God as revealed by reason and experience, and obey them, and you shall be saved. It is a practical and not a mere intellectual belief that constitutes this “saving faith.”
The next answer is, “repent,” or “repentance toward God.”
The word repent is used to signify, sometimes, simply remorse or pain for wrong-doing. In another sense it signifies that sorrow for wrong-doing which includes reformation. It is ceasing to disobey law and commencing a life of obedience. It is in this sense that men are saved by repentance.
Another answer is, “thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbor as thyself.” This has been shown to signify, thou shalt choose as the chief end of life to make happiness the right way, that is, by obeying all the physical, social, and moral laws of God. “This is the love of God, that we keep his commandments.”
Another answer is, “make it thy chief end to glorify God.” Inasmuch as God's glory consists in the exhibition of his character as a benevolent being, all [pg 158] who promote his chief aim by making happiness according to his will, are living to glorify God.
Another answer is, “live a truly virtuous life.” It has been shown that true virtue consists in obedience to the great law of sacrifice by which the lesser personal good is sacrificed to the greater good of all concerned.
Thus faith, repentance, love to God and man, making it our chief end to glorify God, living a virtuous life, all signify one and the same thing, (i.e.,) choosing to find out and to obey all the physical, social, and moral laws of God as our chief end or ruling purpose.
The righteous are those who have formed such a purpose, and who exhibit its results in their daily life.
The wicked are those who have not formed such a purpose, and do not exhibit it in their daily life.
In the common language of every-day life, when a person is intensely interested in any pursuit, it is said to be “his life.” And when a man changes from a vicious to a virtuous course he is said to “begin a new life.”
Thus it would be in agreement with the ordinary use of language to call a new-formed purpose to obey all the laws of God the commencement of a new life. And as the beginning of natural life is the commencement of a life of impulsive choices unregulated by law, the commencement of a life of obedience to law would, by a figure of speech, very naturally be called “a new birth.”
We have seen, in previous pages, that the formation of a ruling principle or governing purpose is sometimes the result of a slow process of educational influences, and sometimes it is a marked and sudden change. In [pg 159] the history of mind we find, as a general rule, that it is the slow process of educational training that secures a virtuous character in childhood, while the more sudden and marked changes are incident chiefly to more advanced life.
The term “regeneration” is used by theologians as meaning the formation of a ruling purpose to love and obey God, by man himself. By some, this change of mind is regarded as in all cases instantaneous, by others as sometimes a gradual and sometimes an instantaneous change.
The preceding still farther exhibits the fact that the whole foundation of religion and of morals rests on the answer to the question, what is true virtue or right voluntary action?
From the preceding it appears that the more our race advances in civilization, the more numerous and complicated are the laws of God which must first be discovered and then obeyed.
By advance in civilization is signified increase in the capacities of the human mind for varied enjoyments, and increase in the appropriate supply of these capacities. The early history of the race resembles the early period of individual life, when the chief enjoyments are those of the senses. The refined and varied pleasures of taste are but little attained except [pg 160] by cultivation. So also the higher pleasures of the intellect and of the moral nature are dependent on culture.
As every new avenue to enjoyment is opened, and every new capacity developed, there are inevitably resulting difficulties and temptations which, experience soon shows, must be regulated by laws and penalties. From this results the endless multitude of civil and statute laws, in addition to the various domestic and social rules enforced in the family, the school and the neighborhood.
All these laws and rules will be found to be only specific applications of the great law of sacrifice which demands that, in all cases, every mind shall choose what is best for self and best for the whole. The great democratic principle that the majority shall rule is but one mode of applying this general law of sacrifice.
In this aspect we can perceive how it is, that every attempt to develop any faculty of enjoyment in any created mind, and every effort to provide aliment for such developed capacities is right, as in agreement with the grand end designed by the Creator; provided it is done according to the great law of sacrifice disclosed by reason, viz., that individual enjoyment be made subordinate to the general good, and that no greater good be sacrificed for a less, either for self or for the commonwealth.
In this light, music, drawing, painting, sculpture, architecture, the drama, poetry, laughter, all things that impart enjoyment to any mind are right, provided no higher good is sacrificed in enjoying them. Nay, more; all these modes of imparting enjoyment may [pg 161] become positive duties, in cases where they do not interfere with some higher good.
This view of the subject still further illustrates the nature of that inability which exists in all finite minds in discovering and obeying the laws of God.
There are only two conceivable modes by which we can learn these laws; one is by the experience of finite beings; the other is by revelation from the Creator. To learn what is right and wrong by experience involves not only the certainty, but the necessity, as it respects the absolute right, of wrong-doing; for no one, however right the motive or intention may be, can discover what will cause more or less good or evil but by experiments in which the evil as well as the good is detected by experience.
To learn what is right and wrong in all the thousand and million complications of life by revelation, would involve the necessity of a direct revelation every hour of every day, to every individual of the race. But the only conceivable mode by which revelations from God are possible, is by miracles and prophecy, which are interruptions of the ordinary uniformity of nature. It is the fact that the laws of nature are uniform that alone makes miracles possible, so that incessant revelations by miracles would destroy such uniformity, and thus destroy the only conceivable mode of communication from the Creator.
This being so, the only possible method by which mankind can discover what is right and wrong in the greater portion of their actions is by an experience involving, more or less, wrong-doing as a part.
There are general rules of right and wrong which can be communicated both by God and man, but these [pg 162] rules are to be applied by men to the numberless and ever-varying circumstances of life, involving still the same necessity of experience of evil in order to detect the relative amount of good to be gained in the varied courses offered for pursuit to which these rules are to be applied.
Now the grand difficulty, as it respects both God and man, as before shown, is the positive inability of undeveloped mind to understand much of what is right and wrong. This difficulty meets the mature mind as really as it does the infant's; for while many of the general rules evolved by reason and experience are clear, and easily perceived, there are endless varieties of cases in which the application of these rules is a matter of uncertainty. For example, that men are to be honest and speak the truth, are rules universally appreciated. But then come the questions whether this and that thing is honest, or whether in this or that emergency it may not be right to say what is false. The higher men advance in civilization, and the more means and modes of enjoyment are discovered, the more complicated become the questions of right, and the more frequent the temptations to wrong.
All that can be done is to cultivate the conscience and train the reasoning powers of mankind, so that by means of the experience of life, as developed by individuals and communities, regard to the rules of right and wrong shall keep pace with the increasing civilization.
With these distinctions in the mind, we can perceive that sin, in its widest sense, including transgression of unknown law, is inevitable in a perfect system of finite minds, while in the limited sense, as transgression of known law, it is not so.
[pg 163]So also we can see, that without the intervention of the Creator to teach us, it is an impossibility for any human being to live without sin; so that this intervention is impossible except to a limited extent, without an entire change in the eternal nature of things to which God's own will is conformed.