T Chalmers - Natural Theology

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C>BL 181 .C54 1850 v.lChalmers, Thomas, 1780-1847 JOn natural theology


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ON

NATU UA L TH i-:0LOG Y.

THOMAS CHALMERS, D.D. & LL.D.l-ROFESSOR OK THEOLOGY IN TWii: UMVEllsiiy OF EDINBURGH,

AMD COKRXSPONOING MEMBER OF THE ROYAL INSTIfUTK OF FRAMCBi

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOL. I.

NEW YORK:ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERSNo. 285 B R O A D W A V

1850.


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PREFACR

The Science of Theology in its most generalmeaning, as comprehensive both of the Naturaland the Revealed, might, in respect to the orderof its topics and propositions, be presented to thedisciple in two different waysso as, if not to affectthe substance of its various arguments, at least toaffect the succession of them. According to thefirst way, a commencement is made, as if at thefountain-head of the whole theme, with the beingand the constitution and the character of Godand then from this point of departure, a demonstra-tion is carried forward in the footsteps of thehistory of the divine administration, from the firstpurposes of the uncreated mind to the final issuesof His government in eternity.. This most fre-quently is the course of those Christian writers,who attempt the construction of an entire systemof Theology. They descend from the heights ofthe eternity that is past ; and, often, it is not tillthey have bestowed their treatment on such ante-mundane topics as the mysteries of the divineessence and the high pre-ordinations of God, that

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n PRBFACB.they enter on the development of these in thecreation of a universe and its moral history onwardto the consummation of all things. One cannotperuse the successive titles of the chapters in thesystematic works of our best and greatest authors,without observing how much the arrangementproceeds in the chronological order of the history,of the divine governmentso that, after the estab-lishment of the initial lessons which we have nowspecified, we are very generally conducted alongsome such series of doctrines as the following-^the formation ofman; his original state of innocence;the introduction of moral evil at the fall, and theconsequent guilt and depravation of our species;the remedy for this universal disease in the ap-pointment of a Mediator ; the atonement made byHim, so as to release his followers from the penaltyof sin; the doctrine of a regenerating Spirit todeliver them from its power ; the free overtures ofthis reconciliation and recovery to the world ; thegreat moral change experienced by all who acceptthem; their duties in the present hfe, and theirblissful prospects of another: on the other handthe fearful doom of all who reject the Christianmessage ; the judgment to which both the obedientand the rebellious will be summoned at the end ofthe world ; and the destinies which respectivelyawait them, in that everlasting economy which is


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PREFACE. Tilto succeed after the present economy of thingsshall hre passed away.

Now such an arrangement, proceeding as itdoes in the chronological order of the divineadministration, and which quadrates too with thegreat successions that take place in the collectivehistory of the species, has peculiar advantages ofits own. But there is another arrangement, havinga distinct principle, attended too with its own distinctbenefits, but of another sort. Instead of treatingTheology in the order of the procedure of thedivine government, and with general respect there-fore to the whole Universe of created InteUigencesor at least to the whole of the human family, itmay be treated in the order of those inquirieswhich are natural to the exercised spirit of anindividual man, from the outset of his religiousearnestness when the felt supremacy of consciencewithin tells him of a Law and tells him of aLawgiverwhen his own sense of innumerabledeficiencies from a higher and a holier standard ofrectitude than he has ever reached, first visits himwith the conviction of guilt and the dread anticipa^tion of a coming vengeance. This would giverise to an arrangement differing from the former,having a different starting-post or point of de-parture, and, though coinciding in some places,yet reversing the order of certain of the topics;


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vm FRBFACB.and, more especially, transferring to a far ulteriorpart of its course, some of those initial matters inthe first arrangement, which, when discussed at soearly a stage give an obscure and transcendentalcharacter to the very commencement of the science.By the first arrangement we are made to descendsynthetically, from principles which have theirresidence in the constitution and character of theGodhead, and which transport us back to pasteternityas in those systems of Christian Theo-logy, where the doctrines of the Trinity andPredestination take the priority of all those themesw'hich are within the reach of human conception,or bear with immediate application on the desiresand the doings of man. By the second arrange-ment, we are made to ascend in the order ofman's fears and of his efforts to be relieved fromthem^beginning, therefore, with that sense o2 Godwhich is so promptly and powerfully suggestedto every man by his own moral nature ; and pro-ceeding, under the impulse of apprehensive andconscious guilt, to the consideration of what mustbe done to escape from its consequences, and whatis the remedy if any for the sore disease underwhich humanity labours. It is obvious that withsuch a commencement as this for our System ofTheology, the depravity of man, along with themoral character and government of God, and the


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PREFACE.requisitions and sanctions of His law, would find anearly place in it ; and, whereas in the atonementmade known by a professed Revelation there is aremedy proposed, it were most natural to passonward to the claims and credentials of this pro-fessed embassy from Heaventhence, under thepromptings of a desiVe for relief, from the consi-deration of our danger to the consideration ofthe refuge opened up for us in the Gospelthence to the new life required of all its disciplesthence to the promised aids of a strengthand grace from on high, for the fulfilment of ourdue obediencethence to the issues of our repen-tance and faith in a deathless eternitythence,finally, and after the settlement of all that waspractical and pressing, to the solution of difficultieswhich are grappled with at the outset of the formerscheme of Theology ; but which in the latterscheme would be postponed for their more scien-tific treatment to that stage, when, leaving thefirst principles of their discipleship, the aspirantsafter larger views and more recondite mysteries goon unto perfection.By the former method Theology is capable oi

being presented more in the form or aspectof a regular science, with the orderly descentand derivation of its propositions from the highestprinciples to which we can ascend ; but when the

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X PREFACK.departure is made from the primeval designs of theGodhead, or the profound mysteries of his nature

^this gives more of a transcendental, but more atthe same time of a presumptuous and a prioricharacter, to the whole contemplation. Thesecond method, by which departure is made fromthe suggestions and the fears of human conscience,has the recommendation of being more practicaland, if not in the order of exposition, is more atleast in the order of discovery. Even NaturalTheology, taken by itself, is susceptible of boththese treatments; and may be either studied asthe Theology of academic demonstration, or tracedto its outgoings as the Theology of Conscience

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from the first stirrings of human feelings or humanfancy on the question of a God, to the fullestdiscoveries that can be made by the light of Naturewhether of His existence or His character or KQsways. In the following treatise we do not rigo-rously adhere to any of these methodsthough wehold it incumbent upon us, to clear away the inju-rious metaphysics, in which certain disciples of thefirst school have, even in their earhest, their initiallessons on the subject, shrouded the science ofTheology ; and we have also endeavoured to showwhat those incipient, those rudimental tendenciesof the human spirit are, under the guidance ofwhich the disciples of the second school are carried


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PREFACE. XIonward in the path of inquiry. In the executionof these tasks we have occupied the first Book,having the title of PreUminary Views ; and wouldnow bespeak the indulgence of our readers forwhat some might deem the superfluous illustrationof its two first, and others might feel to be thehopeless and impracticable obscurity of its twosucceeding chapters. The latter complaint shouldbe laid, we think, not on the Author, but on thenecessities of his subject. To the former howeverhe must plead guilty; for, even though at theexpense of nauseating those of quick and powerfulunderstanding; and whose taste is more for theprofound than the palpable, however importantthe truth inculcated may be and however desirableto have the luminous conception and mtense feehngof ithe should rejoice to be the instrument, andmore particularly at the outset of their rehgiousearnestness, of giving the most plain and intelli-gible notices of their way even unto babes.We shall not be so liable to either of these

extremes in the subsequent Books of which thistreatise is composedand the perusal of whichindeed might be immediately entered on, althoughthe first or preliminary Book were to receive thetreatment that is often given to a long and weari-some preface, that is, passed over altogether. Womust confess however our desire for the judgment


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XU PREFACE.of th6 more profound class of readers on the fourthchapter in this department of the work, and whichtreats of a pecuhar argument by Hume on theside of Atheism.' The truth is that we do notconceive the infidelity of this philosopher to havebeen adequately met, by any of hi^ opponents;whether as it respects the question of a God or thequestion of the truth of Christianity. In themanagement of both controversies, it has beenthought necesbary to conjure up a new principle forthe purpose of refuting his especial sophistriesand thus to make two gratuitous, and we thinkvery questionable additions, to the mental philo-sophy^in the shape of two distinct and originallaws of the human understanding, which, anteriorto. the date of his speculations, never had beenheard of ; and probably never would, but for theservice which they were imagined to render in thebattles of the faith. We hold ourselves independentof both, these auxiliaries ; and it is our attempt toshow on the premises of the author himself, or atleast with the help of no other principles than theuniversal and uniform faith of men in the lessonsof experience, now of his atheistical, and afterwardsof his deistical argumentthe one grounded on thealleged singularity of the world as an efiect, theother grounded on the alleged incompetency ofhuman testimony to accredit the truth of a miracle


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PREFACE. Xmwe hope to show that there is a distinct fallacy ineach, and at the same time a contradiction betweenthe fallacies in itself destructive of both ; and whichmust either have escaped the penetration, or beenconcealed by the art of this most subtle metaphyst-cian and reasoner.

After having disposed in the first Book of all thatis of a prefatory or general character, we in thesecond Book enter on the consideration of proofsfor the being of a God in the dispositions of matter.The third Book is occupied with proofs, not for thebeing only, but for the being and character of Godas displayed in the constitution of the mind^fromwhich department it has been strangely affirmed oflate, that little or no evidence has yet been collectedfor the defence or illustration of Natural Theology.The object of the fourth Book, is to exhibit addi-tional evidence for a God in the adaptation of Exter-nal Nature to the Mental Constitution of Man.And in the fifth, which is the last Book, we endeavourto estimate the amount as well as the dimness anddeficiency of the hght of nature in respect to itspowerof discovering either the character or still less thecounsels and the ways of God. In this concludingpart of the treatise, beside recording the efforts whichPhilosophy has made, and to what degree she hasfailedin resolving thatmosttremendous and appallingof all mysteries, the Origin of Evil, we attempt to


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MV PREFACE.reconcile both the doctrine of a Special Providenceand the efficacy of prayer with the constancy ofvisible nature. It is well to evince, not the suc-cess only, but the shortcomings of Natural The-ology ; and thus to make palpable at the same timeboth her helplessness and her usefulnesshelplessif trusted to as a guide or an informer on the wayto heaven ; but most useful if, under a sense of herfelt deficiency, we seek for a place of enlargementand are led onward to the higher manifestations ofChristianity.

Edikburgb, nth Dte,t 16S6.


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CONTENTa

BOOK IPRELIMINART VIEWS.

PAQBCba?. T. On the Dlstincii


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XVI CONTENTS.PAOS

Chap. II. Natural and Geological Proofs for a Commence-ment of our present Terrestrial Economy, . . 228

III. On the Strength of the Evidences for a God in thePhenoraeaa of Visible and Bxtemal Nature, . 258

BOOK III.PBOOfS FOE THE BEING AND CHARACTER OF GOD IN THB

CONSTITUTION OF THE HUMAN MIND.Chap. I. General Considerations on the Evidence aflForded

by the Phenomena and Constitution of theHuman mind for the Being of a God, . . 280

n. On the Supremacy of Conscience, SOSIIL On the inherent Pleasure of the Virtuous, and

Misery of the Vicious Affections, . 352IV. The Power and Oprai&ba of Kabit, . 868


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BOOK I.PRELIMINARY VIEWS.

CHAPTER I.On the Distinction between the Ethics of Theology and the

Objects of Theology/.

1, Our first remark on the science of Theology is,that the objects of it, by their remoteness, and bytheir elevation, seem to be inaccessible. Theobjects of the other sciences are either placed, asthose of matter, within the ken of our senses ; or,as in the science of mind, they come under a nearerand more direct recognition still, by the faculty ofconsciousness. But no man hath seen God at anytime. We " have neither heard His voice nor seenHis shape." And neither do the felt operationsof our own busy and ever-thinking spirits imme-diately announce themselves to be the stirrings ofthe divinity within us. So that the knowledge ofthat Being, whose existence, and whose character,and whose ways, it is the business of Theology toinvestigate, and the high purpose of Theology toascertain, stands distinguished from all other know-ledge by the peculiar avenues through which it isconveyed to us. We feel Him not. We behold Himnot. And however palpably He may stand forth


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18 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.to our convictions, in the strength of those appro-priate evidences which it is the province of thisscience to unfoldcertain it is, that we can take nodirect cognizance of Him Uy our faculties whetherof external or internal observation.

2. And while the spirituaUty of His nature placesHim beyond the reach of our direct cognizance,there are certain other essential properties of Hisnature which place Him beyond the reach of ourpossible comprehension. Let me instance the pasteternity of the Godhead. One might figure afuturity that never ceases to flow, and which hasno termination ; but who can climb his ascendingway among the obscurities of that infinite which is^behmd him ? Who can travel in thought along thetrack of generations gone by, till he has overtakenthe eternity which hes in that direction ? Who canlook across the milhons of ages which have elapsed,and from an ulterior post of observation look againto another and another succession of centuries ; andat each further extremity in this series of retro-spects, stretch backward his regards on an antiquityas remote and indefinite as ever ? Could we byany number of successive strides over these mightyintervals, at length reach the fountain-head of dura-tion, our spirits might be at rest. But to think ofduration as having no fountain-head; to think oftime with no beginning ; to uplift the imaginationalong the heights of an antiquity which hath posi-tively no summit ; to soar these upward steepstill dizzied by the altitude we can keep no longeron the wing ; for the mind to make these repeatedflights from one pinnacle to another, and instead


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ETHICS Of THEOLOGY. l^of scaling the mysterious elevation* to lie baffledat its foot, or lose itself among the far, the long-withdrawing recesses of that primeval distance,which at length merges away into a fathomlessunknown ; this is an exercise utterly discomfitingto the puny faculties of man. We are called onto stir ourselves up that we may take hold of God,but the "clouds and darkness which are roundabout Him" seem to repel the enterprise as hope-less ; and man, as if overborne by a sense of little-ness, feels as if nothing can be done but to makeprostrate obeisance of all his faculties before Him.

3. Or, if instead of viewing the Deity in rela-tion to time we view Him in relation to space, weshall feel the mystery of his being to be alikeimpracticable and impervious. But we shall notagain venture on aught so inconceivable, yet thereality of which so irresistibly obtrudes itseK uponthe mind, as immensity without hmits ; nor shallwe presume one conjecture upon a question whichwe have no means of resolving, whether the Uni-verse have its terminating outskirts ; and so, how-ever stupendous to our eye, shrink by its veryfinitude, to an atom, in the midst of that unoccupiedand unpeopled vastness by which it is surrounded.Let us satisfy ourselves with a humbler flight.Let us carry the speculation no further than oursenses have carried it. Let us but take accountof the suns and systems which the telescope hasunfolded ; though for aught we know there might,beyond the furthest range of this instrument, bemyriads of remoter suns and remoter systems.Let us, however, keep witliin the curcle of our


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20 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.actual discoveries, within the limits of that scenewhich we know to be peopled with realities ; andinstead of trying to dilate our imagination to theinfinity beyond it, let us but think of God as sittingin state and in high sovereignty over millions ofother worlds beside our own. If this Earthwhich we know and know so imperfectly form sosmall a part of His works-what an emphasis itgives to the lesson that we indeed know a verysmall part of his ways. " These are part of hisways," said a holy man of old, " but how little aportion is heard of Him." Here the revelationsof Astronomy, in our modern day, accord with thedu*ect spiritual revelations of a former age. Inthis sentiment at least the Patriarch and thePhilosopher are at one ; and highest science meetsand is in harmony with deepest sacredness. Sothat we construct the same lesson, whether weemploy the element of space or the element oftime. With the one the basis of the argument isthe ephemeral experience of our httle day. Withthe other the basis of the argument is the con-tracted observation of our little sphere. Theyboth alike serve to distance man from the infinitethe everlasting God.

4. But it wUl somewhat dissipate this feltobscurity of the science, and give more of distinct-ness and definiteness to the whole of this transcen-dental contemplationif we distinguish aright be-tween the Ethics of Theology, and the Objects ofTheology.

5. To understand this distinction let us con-ceive some certain relation between two individual


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 21menas that for example of a benefactor to adependant, or of one who has conferred a kindnessto another who has received it. There is a moralor ethical propriety that springs out of this relation.It is that of gratitude from the latter of these in-dividuals to the former of them. Gratitude is theincumbent virtue in such a case, and a benefactoris the object of that virtue.

6. Now to make one feel the truth of the ethicalprinciple, it matters not whether he has seen manyor few benefactors in the course of his experience.Nay, it matters not whether there are many orfew benefactors in the world. The moral pro-priety of gratitude is that which attaches to therelation between a benefactor and a dependant; andit equally remains so whether the relation be seldomor often exemplified. Nay, gratitude would bethe appropriate virtue of this relation, althoughactually it were never exempHfied at all. The ethicalprinciple of the virtuousness of gratitude does notdepend on the existent reality of an object for thisvirtue. Let a benefactor really exist ; and thengratitude is due to him. Or let a benefactor only besupposed to exist ; and then we affirm with as greatreadiness that gratitude would be due to him. Theincumbent morality is alike recognisedwhetherw^e behold a real object, or only figure to ourselvesa hypothetical one. The morality, in fact, doesnot depend for its rightness on any such contm-geucy, as the actual and substantive existence ofa proper object to which it may be rendered.The virtuousness of gratitude would remain astable category in ethical science ; although, never


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22 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.once exemplified in the living world of realities, wederived our only notion of it from the possibilitieswhich were contemplated in an ideal world ofrelations.

7. It is thus that whether much or little conver-sant with the objects of a virtue, there may of thvirtue itself be a clear and vivid apprehension. Apeasant, all whose experience is limited to the home-stead of his own Uttle walk, can recognise thevirtuousness of gratitude and justice and truth withas great correctness, and feel them too with as greatintenseness, as the man of various and ample in-tercourse, who has traversed a thousand timeswider sphere in human society. By enlarging thefield of observation we may extend our acquaintancewith the objects of moral science; but this doesnot appear at all indispensable to our acquaintancewith the Ethics of the science. To appreciatearight the moral propriety which belongs to anygiven relation, we do not need to multiply theexemplifications or the cases of it. The one is nota thing of observation as the other is, and thereforenot a thing to which the Baconian or inductivemethod of investigation is in the same manner ap-phcable. Our knowledge of the objects belongs tothe Philosophy of Facts. Our knowledge of the.Ethics belongs to another and a distinct Philosophy^

8. There has been too much arrogated for thephilosophy of Lord Bacon in our day. " Quidest?" is the only question to the solution of which itis apphcable. It is by observation that we ascer-tain what are the objects in Nature ; and what are,or have been, the events in the history of Nature.


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 23But there is another question wholly distinct fromthis, " Quid oportet?" to the solution of which weare guided by another hght than that of experience.This question lies without the domain of the Induc-tive Philosophy, and the science to whose cogni-zance it belongs shines upon us by the light of itsown immediate evidence. There may have been ajust and a luminous Ethics, even when the lessonsof the experimental philosophy were most disre-garded ; and, on the other hand, it is the office ofthis philosophy to rectify and extend physical, butnot to rectify and extend moral science.*

9. On this subject there is an instructive ana-logy taken from another science, and which illus-trates still more the distinction now stated betweenthe objects and the ethics of Moral Philosophy;!

We mean not to deny the legitimate application of the Bacon-ian Philosophy to mental sciencea distinct thing from moralscience. The philosophy which directs and presides over theinvestigation of facts has to do with the facts and phenomena ofmind, as well as those of matter ; and though the sanguine anti-cipations of Reid and Stewart, of a vast coming enlargement inthe science of mind, from the call which they had sounded for thetreatment of it by the inductive method, have not been realizedit is not the less true that the philosophy which has for its objectthe determination of the Quid est throughout all the departmentsof observational truth, has to do with the facts of the mentalworld, as well as with those of the material world, and with theclassification of both. But the feelings and purposes of the mindviewed as phenomena, present a different object of investigationaltogether, from those feelings and purposes viewed in relation totheir Tightness or wrongness. The lattei is the object of moralscience. And when we say that the office of Lord Bacon's philo-sophy is to rectify and extend physical, but not to rectify moralscience, let it be understood that the physical includes phenomenaand facts wherever they are to be foundmore especially the pheno-mena of man's spirituiJ and intellectual nature, the physics of thewind, the mental physiology of Dr. Thomas Brown, the pneuma-tology of an older generation.

f Moral Philosophy is here understood in its most generic


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24 ETHICS OF THEOLOGYthat is, the distinction between the mathematics andthe objects of Natural Philosophy.

10. The objects of Natural Philosophy are thefacts or data of the science. The knowledge ofthese is only to be obtained by observation. Jupi-ter placed at a certain distance from the sun, andmoving in a certain direction, and with a certauivelocity, is an object. His satellites, with then:positions and their motions, are also so many ob-jects. Any piece of matter, including those attri-butes which it is the part of Natural Philosophy totake cognizance of, such as weight, and magnitude,and movement, and situation, is an object of thisscience. Altogether they form what may be calledthe individual and existent realities of the science.And Lord Bacon has done w eU in having demon-strated that for the knowledge of these we mustgive ourselves up exclusively to the informations ofexperience ; that is, to obtain a knowledge of thevisible properties of material things we must lookat them, or of their tangible properties we musthandle them, or of their weights or motions ordistances we must measure them.

11. Thus far, then, do the applications of theBaconian Philosophy go, and no farther. Afterthat the facts or objects of the science have in thisway been ascertained, we perceive certain mathe-matical relations between the objects from whichwe can derive truths and properties innumerable.But it is not experience now which Hghts us onfrom one truth or property to another. The objectsmeaning-, as comprehensive of the duties owing to God in bearen,M well as to our fellow-men upon earth.


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 25or data of the science are ascertained by the evi-dence of observation ; but the mathematics of thescience proceed on an evidence of their own, andland us in sound and stable mathematical conclu-sions, whether the data at the outset of the reason-ing be real or hypothetical. The moral proprietiesfounded on equity between man and man wouldremain like so many fixtures in ethical science,though the whole species were swept away, and noman could be found to exemplify our conclusions.The mathematical properties founded on an equa-lity between line and line would in like mannerabide as eternal truths in geometry, although mat-ter were swept away from the universe, and thereremained no bodies whose position or whose dis-tances had to be reasoned on. It has been alreadysaid that we do not need to extend the domain ofobservation in order to have a clear and a rightnotion of the moral proprieties ; and it may now besaid that we do not need to extend the domain ofobservation in order to have a clear and a rightnotion of the mathematical properties. If straightlines be drawn between the centres of the earth andthe sun and Jupiter, they would constitute a triangle,the investigation of whose properties might ehcitmuch important truth on the relations of these threebodies. But all that is purely mathematical in thetruth would remain, although it were not exempli-fied, or although these three bodies had no existence.Nay, the triangle might serve as the exemplar of aninfinity, of triangles, which required only a corre-sponding infinity of objects, in order that the generaland abstract truth might become the symbol or


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26 ETH.CS OF THEOLOGY,representative of an endless host of applicable andactually existent truths. For the objects of bothsciences you must have inductive or observationalevidence ; but by a moral light in the one science, anda mathematical light in the other, we arrive at theethics of the first science, at the mathematics of thesecond, without the aid of the inductive philosophy.

12. It is interesting to note if aught may havefallen from Lord Bacon himself upon this subject."In his English treatise on "the advancement oflearning," he says, " that in mathematics I canreport no deficience." So that this great authorof the experimental method by which to arrive ata true philosophy of facts, had no improvement topropose on the methods of mathematical investiga-tion. And in his more extended Latin treatise onthe same subject, entitled, " De augmentis scien-tiarum," where he takes so comprehensive a viewof all the possible objects of human knowledge, hesays, speaking of geometry and arithmetic, " Quaeduo artes, magno certe cum acumine, et industria,inquisitoe et tractatse sunt : veruntamen et Euclidislaboribus in geometricis nUiU additum est asequenti-bus quod intervallo tot seculorum dignum sit ;" or" which two arts have certainly been investigatedand handled with much acuteness and industry;notwithstanding which, however, nothing has beenadded to the labours of Euclid in geometry bythose who have followed him, that is worthy of solong a series of ages."

13. The proper discrimination then to be madein natural philosophy, is between the facts or dataoi the science, and the relations that by means of


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 27mathe niLics might be educed from these data. Theformer are ascertained by observationafter whichno further aid is required from observation, whilewe prosecute that reasoning which often brings themost weighty and important discoveries in its train.It is well to consider how much can be achieved bymathematics in this process, and how distinct itspart is from that of wide and distant observationinsomuch that by the light which it strikes out inthe little chamber of one's own thoughts, we areenabled to proceed from one doctrine and discoveryto another. From three distant points in thefirmament, a triangle may be formed to which thevery mathematics are appUcable. that we employupon a triangle constructed upon paper by ourown fingers. Whether they be the positions andthe distances that lie within the compass of a dia-gram, or the positions and distances that obtain inwide immensity, it is one and the same geometrywhich, from a few simple and ascertained data,guides the inquirer to the various and importantrelations of both. After that observation hathdone its office, and made over to mathematics thematerials which it hath gatheredthis latter sciencecan guide the way to discoveries and applicationsinnumerable ; and without one look more upon theheavens, with Sought but the student's concen-trated regard on the lines and the symbols that liein little room upon his table, might the whole mys-tery and mechanism of the heavens be unravelled.

14. Let those things, then, be rightly distin-guished which are distinct from one another. Theywere not the objects of the science which gave the


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28 ETrtics or theology.observer his mathematics. These objects wereonly addressed to his previous and independentmathematics ; and he, in virtue of his mathematics,was enabled rightly to estimate many importantrelations which subsisted between the objects. Nay,it is conceivable that the objects might have re-mained for ever obscure and unknown to him. He,in this case, would have wanted an apphcationj^hich he now has for his mathematics; but themathematics themselves would have been still asmuch within his reach or his power of acquisitionas before. His mathematical nature, if we mayso speak, would have been entire notwithstandingand he have had ^s clear a sense of the mathe-matical relations, and as prompt and powerful afaculty of prosecuting these to their results. Thingsmight have been so constituted, as that every starin the firmament should have been beyond thediscernment of our naked eye ; or what is still moreconceivable, the lucky invention might never havebeen made by which the wonders of a remoterlieavens have been laid open to our view. Butstill they were neither the informations of theeye nor of the telescope which furnished man withhis geometry ; they only furnished him with datafor his geometry. And thus, while the objects ofastronomy are brought to him by a light from afarthere enters, as a constituent part of the science,'the mathematics of astronomy, immediately seenby him in the light of his own spirit, and to masterthe lessons of which he needs not so much as oneexcursion of thought beyond the precincts of hisown little home.


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 2915. Now, what is true of the mathematical may

be also true of the moral relations. We may havethe faculty of perceiving these relations whetherthey be occupied by actually existent objects ornot ; or although we should be in ignorance of theobjects. On the imagination that one of the inha-bitants of the planet Jupiter had the mysteriousknowledge of all my movements, and a mysteriouspower of guidance and protection over me ; thathe eyed me with constant benevolence, and everacted the part ofmy fi-iend andmy guardian I couldimmediately pronounce on the gratitude and thekind regard that were due from me back againAnd should the imagination become a reality, andbe authentically made known to me as such, Ihave a moral nature, a law within my heart, whichalready tells me how I should respond to this com-munication. The instance is extravagant ; but itenables us at once to perceive what that is whichmust be fetched to us from without, and what thatis which we have to meet it from within. Theobjects -are either made known by observation ; or,if they exist without the hmits of observation, theyare made known by the credible report or revela-tion of others. But when thus made known, theymay meet with a prior and a ready made Ethics inourselves. The objects may be placed beyond thelimits of human experience ; but though the know-ledge of their existence must therefore be broughtto us fi'om afar, a sense of the correspondent mora-lities which are due to them may arise spontane-ously in our bosoms. After the mind has gotten,in whate^^er way, its information of their reality


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30 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.then within the httle cell of its own feehngs andits own thoughts, there may be a light which mani-fests the appropriate ethics for the most distantbeings in the universe.

16. We are thus enabled to bestow a certainamount of elucidation on a question which fallsmost properly to be d^cussed at the outset ofNatural Theology. On this distinction betweenthe ethics of the science and the objects of thescience, we can proceed at least a certain way inassigning their 'respective provinces to the light ofnature and the light of revelation. But for thispurpose let us shortly recur again to the illustra^tion that may be taken from the science of astro-nomy.

17. Natural Philosophy has two great depart-mentsone of them celestial, the other terrestrialand it may be thought a very transcendental move-ment on the part of an inquirer, a movementaltogether per saltum, when he passes from the oneto the other. Now this is true ; but only shouldit be remarked in as far as it regards the objectsof the science. The objects of the celestial he ina far more elevated region than the objects ofthe terrestrial ; and it may certainly be called atranscendental movement, when, instead of viewingwith the telescope some lofty peak that is sustainedhowever on the world's surface, we view therewiththe planet that floats in the firmament and at aninconceivably greater distance away from it. Thereis a movement per saltum when we pass from thefacts and data of the one department, to the factsand data of the other. But there is no such move-


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. Siment when we pass from the mathematics of theone department to the mathematics of the other.There is, no doubt, in one respect, a very widetransition ; when instead of a triangle, whose base-line is taken by a pair of compasses from theGunter scale, or even measured by a chain on thesurface of the earth, v^ e are called to investigatethe relations of a triangle whose base-line is tiiediameter of the earth, or perhaps the diameter ofthe earth's orbit. There is doubtless a very widetransition from the objects of the terrestrial tothose of the celestial physics; when, instead ofthree indivisible points on the parchment that liesbefore us, or three signposts of observation thatwave on mountain-tops within sight of each other,we have three planetary bodies that, huge thoughthey be in themselves, shrink into atoms when(ompared with the mighty spaces that lie betweentiiem. The fields of observation are wholly differ-ent ; but it is by the very same trigonometry thatwe achieve theT computation of the resulting tri-angles. And we again repeat that, sublhne as theascent may be from the facts or data of the onecomputation to those of the other, there is nogigantic or impracticable stride in their mathe-maticsthat if able to trace certain curves in thepage which lies before us, we are further able toscan the cycles of astronomy that, widely apart asare the revelations of this wondrous science fromthe conceptions of our first and ordinary experi-ence, yet grant but the facts, and it is by the dintof a familiar and ordinary mathematics, that themind can ascend to them. It is thus that lliough


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32 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.in person we never stepped beyond the humbleglen of our nativity, we may have that within thedepository of our thoughts, which guides us to thecertainties that be on the outskirts of creation.Within the little home of our bosom, there lie suchprinciples and powers, as without one mile of loco-motion are of as great avail, as if we could havetraversed the infinities of space with the plumb4inein our hand, or carried the torch of discovery roundthe universe. It does look a marvel and a mystery,how man is able to climb the steep and lofty ascentfrom the terrestrial to the celestial in NaturalPhilosophy. But it helps to resolve the mystery,when we thus advert to the distinction between thefacts or objects of the science, and the mathematicsof the science. It at least tells us what that is,wherein the transition from the one department tothe other lies; and gives us to understand that,could we in any way ascertain by observation,certain of the motions and magnitudes that belongto the upper regions of astronomy, there is aninstrument within our reach, by which we maycome to the accurate determination of its laws.

18. And as with Natural, so with Moral,Philosophy. The former hath its objects, whoseproperties are found by observation; and theseobjects have their mathematical relations, most ofwhich are found without observation, by an abstractand solitary exercise of mind on the data whichhave been previously ascertained. There is a greatdifference between the terrestrial and the celestialphysics, in regard to the way by which we arriveat the data. On the one field they ai'e near at


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 33hand ; and at all events do not lie beyond the con-fines of the globe which we inhabit. On the otherfield they have place and occupancy at an exceedingdistance away from us. The eye in quest of themmust lift itself above all earthly objects ; and oftenbeyond the ken of our natural vision, they wouldhave been for ever unknownhad not the telescope,that powerful instrument of revelation, fetchedthem to the men of our world, from those far andhidden obscurities in which they had lain for ages.But whatever the difference may be between theterrestrial and the celestial physics, in regard tothe way by which we arrive at their datathere isno such difference in regard to the way throughwhich, by a mathematical process of reasoning,truths are educed from these data. It mattersnot whether they be the elements of some terrestrialsurvey, or the observed elements of some distantplanet that have been committed to a formula, andmade over to the investigations of the analyst. Itwas indeed a far loftier flight, when in the capacityof an observer, he passed from the stations anilthe objects of a landscape below^ to those of theupper firmament. But there was no transition,at all corresponding to thiswhen passmg fromtne mathematics of the one contemplation to themathematics of the other. Even at the time whenhe labours to determine the form or the periods ofsome heavenly orbit, his mind is only in contactwith the symbols of that formula, or with the Hucisand spaces of that httle diagram, which is beforehis eyes. It is enough that the triangle whichcomprehends any portion however small of his

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34 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.paper, hath the same relations and properties withthe triangle which comprehends any portion how-ever large of immensity. It is enough that whatis jM-edicated of the line which extends but a fewinches may also be predicated of the same linewhen prolonged to the outskirts of creation. Andthus it is, that after observation hath done its workand collected what may be styled the facts ofAstronomy, there is a capability in the humanspirit, and upon no other materials than what maylie within the compass of a table, to unravel theprinciples of its wondrous mechanismand in thelittle chamber of thought, to elaborate a doctrinewhich shall truly represent the universe and isrealized in its most distant processes.

19. Now whence were the mathematics by whichhe made an achievement so marvellouswhencewere these mathematics derived? For our pur-pose it is a sulficient answer to this question thathe had not to go abroad for them. They mayhave enabled him to scan the cycles of heavenbut most certainly heaven's lofty concave is not thepage from which his geometry was drawn. Toobtain the necessary mathematics he has not totravel beyond the hmits of his own humble apart-mentand though in person he may have neverwandered from the secluded valley that bounds hishabitation, yet, such is the power of this homeinstrument, that it can carry him in thought throughthe remotest provinces .of nature, and give him theintellectual mastery over them. He needs nothave gone half-a-mile in quest of those conceptionswhich lie in little room within the receptacle of his


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 35bosom. There may have been some obscureJvinitial or rudimental business of observation at tneoutset of his mental history, ere his notions of aline or a number or a quantity were settled ; but itis an observation that might have all been carriedon within a cell or a hermitage : And the importantthing to be remarked is, that these notions, o{homeward growth and origin though they be, areavailable on the field of the celestial as well as onthat of the terrestrial Physicsand that when onceby observation the respective data of each areascertained, the same mathematics are applicableto both,

20. And it is just so in Moral Philosophy. Thisscience hath its objects that are ascertained by-observationand, apart from these, it hath itsEthics, in virtue of w^hich it can assign the moralrelations that subsist between these objects. Thefacts of the science are just as distinct from theethics of the science, as the facts of Natural Philo-sophy are from the mathematics of Natural Philo-sophy. By observation we can know of certainparticulars in the state, or of certain passages inthe history of two human beingsand, not bymeans of any further observation, but by certainethical principles and by these alone, we can pro-nounce on the moral relationship that is betweenthem, and on the proprieties of that relationship.Let us but know of any two men, that the one isa friendly and disinterested benefactor, and thatthe other is a dependant on his liberalitiesor ofthe one that he is the generous lender, and of theothca: that he is the debtor who had promised and


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36 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.is now in circumstances to repayor of the onethat he is an injured party, and of the other thathe IS now a prostrate offender honestly offeringevery reparation, and pouring out fi-om the sincerityof a contrite bosom the acknowledgments and thevows of a deep-felt repentance : these are the factsof so many distinct cases presented to view eitherby our own observation or by the credible testi-mony of others; and it is not by means of anyfurther observation, it is not by the aid of any addi-tional facts that we learn what be the moralitieswhich belong to each of them. Observation, whetherin Natural or in Moral Philosophy, furnishes onlythe data. It is by a mathematics in the one case,and by an ethics in the other that we draw ourconclusions from these data. The gratitude thatwe should render to a benefactor, the fidehty thatwe should observe with a creditor, the forgivenessthat we should award to a penitent : these are notthe lessons of observation any more than the axiomsor the demonstrated truths of geometry. And asin Natural Philosophy we should distinguish be-tween the facts of every question and its mathe-matics; so is there a similar distinction to beobserved between the facts and the ethics of everyquestion in Moral Philosophy.*

* While impressing the distinction between the ethics and theohjects of Theology, it may be asked whence did our knowledgeof the ethics originateand how is it that thev diffet in respectof origination from our knowledge of the objects? We havealready remarked that some rudimental, some obscurely initialprocess of observation, may, for aught we know, have been con-cerned in the first evolution whether of our ethical or our mathe-matioal conceptions ; but that after these conceptions had bejformed, there was no further obsenration necessary od our part


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 572L This helps us to understand what the pre-

cise nature of the transition is, when we pass fromthe terrestrial to the celestial of moral science.We pass to other data; but we have the samefor the completion of the respective systems of these two sciences.It is very likely that had we never been in converse either bytouch or sight with external substances, we might never haveattained our pi'esent notions of position or direction or quantity;and so the principles of our mathematical nature might have lainin dormancy and never been evolved. And it ir. just as likelythat, had we never been m converse with other jentient creatureslike ourselves, we might never have attained our present notionsof equity or of other moral relations; and so the principles of ourmoral nature rnigh* have lain in dormancy too and nevor beenevolved. These principles are ultimate facts in the human con-stitution, not communicated to us from external objects, butcalled forth into actual and sensible exercise by the contact .is itwere and excitement of these objects. It was not thtf observationof things without us which deposited them in our min-Id: though,apart from the observation of things without us, the principles,n hether ethical or matherjatical, might never have been wakenedinto action and have never been recognise ,\ But whether obser-vation gave these principles at the first or only evolved iiiera, ittruly affects not either the reality or the importance of the dis-tinction on which we have been insisting. Enough, that, somehow or other, there he a mathematics in Natural Philosophy,which, without the aid of further observation, can, by a peculiarlight of its own, guide the investigating spirit from one truth anddiscovery to another, and elicit doctrines that admit of applicationto thousands of the known objects in nature, and to an infinity ofobjects thh.t are yet unknown; and it is in like manner enough,that, some how or other, there be an ethics in Moral Philosophy,which, witliout the aid of further observation,^n, by a peculiarlight of its own, guide us from one moi-al d^^-ine to another,applicable aiike to the existent beings that lie within the sphereof our knowledge, and to those, who, though at present withoutthis sphere, may, on coming forth by revelation to our notice, callout the verv regards and moral recognitions that already had long-been familiar to u. The difference established by Dr. Whatelybetween the truths which we receive by information and thosewhich we receive by instruction, so far from being placed iuopposition ic these views, just serves to illustrate and confirmthem. Tbe truths of mere information have no logical depen-dmce, the one upon the other; and each is made known to us on3 distinct and separate evidence of its own. It follov/s not because

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38 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.elhicajust as when in physical science we elevateour regards from the earth we tread upon to thesublime movements of astronomy, we pass to otherdata biit have the same mathematics. He whocan resolve a triangle whose angles are indivisiblepoints on the parchment that lies before him, canresolve a triangle whose angles are planets in thefirmamentand all that he requires to know arethe facts or the objects of the celestial physics, tomake his mathematics as available in that NaturalPhilosophy whose field is the heavens, as he mayhave already made them in that Natural Philosophywhose field is this lower world. In hke mannerhe who can assign the proprieties of that relationwhich subsists between a dependent family andtheir earthly benefactor, can assign the proprietiesof that relation which subsists between our wholespecies and their heavenly Benefactor. For thispurpose he ha? no new ethics to learn; and all thathe requires to know are the facts or the objects ofthere is a Jupiter that there must be a Georgium Sidus; and itrequires an additional and independent act of observation to ascer-tain the existence of the latter. These informational truths, asthey may be termed, form the proper olyects of the InductivePhilosophy; whereas the tniths of mstruclion are come at, not-by separate obseUktions, but by development and deduction fromcertain primary and comprehjiisive propo^-itions wiiich virtuallycontain them; 'but in which they lie wrapped ana uneduced, till,by the processes whether of rixcral or matliematical reasoning-,they are brought out in their own distinct individuality to view.And thus it is, that though it needs a new observation to tell usof that before unknown and existent object the Georgium Sidus

it needs not a new mathematics, to tell either the period of itsrevolution or the form of its orbit. Thus too though it be by analtogether new information that we come to know of the i'xistenvBeing Jesus Christ; it is not by a new ethics that we ctnit; toacknowledge the services which we ou', or the rcvcj-cuco ai.d giv.u-tude which of right belong lo Hihi.


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 39this higher relationshipto make the ethics whichhe already has as available in that Moral Philo-sophy whose field is the heaven above, as he hasalready made them in that Moral Philosophywhose field is the earth below.

22. The celestial physics form a more transcen-dental theme than the terrestrial. But this cha-racter of the more transcendental lies only in thefacts, and not at all in the mathematics. And sothe celestial in Moral Philosophy is a more trans-cendental theme than the terrestrialbut this toolies only in the facts, and not at all in the ethics.To obtain the facts and data of the former science,a new and peculiar mode of discovery was struckout. The telescope was invented. JMany of theobjects were beyond the reach of our natural vision;and nature was provided with an assistanceelsethere had been much of the celestial physics thatwould have remained for ever unknown. Thesame may, perhaps, hold of the celestial ethics also.Perhaps, there are many of its data that nevercould have been ascertained but by a peculiar modeof discovery. Perhaps the unaided faculties ofman were incompetent to the taskand what thetelescope hath done for us in respect of the materialheavens, a living messenger may have done for usin respect of their moral and spiritual economy.It is a very wide transition when wc pass fromthose distances in a terrestrial survey which canbe measured by the chain, or at the farther extre-mities of which we can descry some floating signalthat has been erected by human handsv*'hen wepass from these through the mighty voids of hii


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40 ITHICS OF THEOLOGY.mensity; and across that interval which sepaiatesthe rolUng worlds from each other, can now by theaid of the telescope look on moons and planets thateye had not seen, nor ear heard of, neither had itentered into the heart of man to conceive. Andit is also a v^ ide transition when we pass fromthe terrestrial to the celestial objects of MoralPhilosophyfrom the Hving society around us, tothe Great Unseen who is above us ; and of whomperhaps we could not have known save by the voiceof a messenger from the pavihon of his specialresidence, who in reference to the celestial ethics,hath done what the telescope hath done in re-ference to the celestial mechanics, hath broughtout from the obscurity in which for ages they hadlain, objects of which the world was before un-conscious; but to which when made known sheis already furnished with a morahty by which shecan respond to themeven as when the new factsof astronomy were presented to her view, shealready had the mathematics by which she coulddraw from them the just and important apphca-tions. The telescope gave her no geometry,though it gave her the data of many a geometricalexercise. And thus it is that a teacher fromheaven, even though he should confine himself tothe revelation of such facts and objects as had beenbefore wrapt from human eye in the depths of theirown mysteriousnessthough he should simply liftthe veil from that which was before unseen; or bytlie notices that he brought with him from theI'pper Sanctuary, should bring forward into viewa spiritual landscape, v.hich by its remoteness, was


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 41dim at least, if not altogether invisiblethough heshould not be the expounder of any new morahtyat all, might be the expounder of facts that wouldmeet and call forth a doctrine, or a previous dis-cernment of morality, which had been already inthe world.

23. And thus as the movement from the terres-trial to the celestial, is in Natural, so is it also inMoral Philosophy. By this movement w^e look atother things, and perhaps do so by other instru-ments of vision. In the latter, more particularly,instead of our fellow men, with whom we can holdimmediate converse by the organs of sense, thegreat object is a Being whom no man hath seen atany time ; but whom w^e either see by reflectionfrom the mirror of His own workmanship, or seeby revelation brought down to our earthly dwelling-places through a direct embassy from heaven.

24. And if on earth gratitude to a human bene-factor is not unknown, and it be the universal senseof the species that there is virtue in the emotionif truth, and goodness, and purity, when seen ina fellow mortal, draw an homage from the heart ofevery observerif within the bounds of our world,the obligations of honour and humanity, and justice,are felt among those who live upon it; then let anew object be set forth to us from heaven, or per-haps an object seen but darkly before and now setforth in brighter manifestation^let Him be madeknown as the God whose hands did frame andfashion us, end whose right hand upholds us con-tiiiu^lylet some new light be thrown upon Hischara:ler aiul ways; some new and before unheard


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42 ETHICS OF THCOLOGY. *demonstration given of a holiness that can descendto no compromise with sin, and yet of a love thatby all the sin of His creatures is unquenchablelet Him now stand out in the lustre of His highattributes, with each shedding a glory upon theother, yet mercy rejoicing over them allletthis Being, at once so lovely and so venerable, beexpounded to our view, as the Father of the humanfamily, and as sending abroad upon that worldwhich He hath so plenteously adorned, a voice ofgeneral invitation, that his wandering childrenmight again return to his forgiveness, and He againbe securely seated in the confidence and affectionof them allit needs not that there be superaddedto our existing Ethics, some new principle, in orderthat we may be qualified to meet this new revela-tion which is addressed to us. From the natureof man as he is already constituted, there mightgo back a moral echo to Him who thus speaketh tothem from heaven : and they might only need to lookupon the now manifested Deity, that their heartsmay feel the love, or their consciences may attestthe obedience which are due to Him.

25. And there is nought to baffle our ethics inthe infinity of God, or in the distance at which Hestands from us. Only grant Him to be our bene-factor and our owner ; and on this relation alonedo we confidently found our obligations, both ofgratitude and of service. Just as there is nothing,either in the mighty distance or overbearing mag-nitude of the sun, that baffles our mathematics.The magnitude of quantity does not affect the re-lations of quantity. It only gives a larger result


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 43to the calculation. And the same is true of themoral relations. Though the oe'mg who is theobject of them, be exalted to the uttermostthoughthe beneficence whicli he has rendered outweighindefinitely all that ever was conferred upon us byour fellow-men, there is nothing in this to disturbthe conclusion that we owe him a return. Itonly enhances the conclusion. It only swells pro-portionally the amount of the returnand, insteadof some partial offering, it points to the dedicationof all our powers, and the consecration of all ourhabits, as the alone adequate expressions of ourloyalty. In ascending from the terrestrial to thecelestial ethics, we come in view of more elevatedgifts, and a more elevated giver^but the relationbetween the two elements, of goodwill on the onehand, and of gratitude on the other, subsists asbeforeand the only effect of this ascent upon themorality of the question, is, that we are led thefebyto infer the obligation of a still more sacred regard,of a still more duteous and devoted obedience.

26. Observation may have been the originalsource of all our mathematics. My acquiescencein the axioms of Euclid may have been the fruit ofthat intercourse which I have had with the externalworld by means of my senses ; and but for theexercise of the eye or of the feehngs on visible ortangible objects, I might never have obtained theconception of lines, or of figures bounded by lines.This may be true ; and yet it is not less true thatevery essential or elementary idea of the mathema-tics may be acquired in early life, and with a verylimited range of observation ; and that we do not


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44 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.need to widen or extend this rangenay, that with-out the aid of one additional fact or experience, itis possible for the spirit of man to pass onward fromthe first principles of the science, and traverse allthe fields both of geometry and analysis that haveyet been explored. More particularlywith thatlittle of observation, which for aught we knowmight have been necessary ere we could conceivearight of one trianglewith that, and no more,might we master the many thousand properties ofeach individual in that infinity of triangles thatcould be furnished by the points innumerable ofspaceand so, while passing from one truth toanother in the little diagram that is before me, Imay in fact, and without one particle of more lightbeing borrowed from observation, be storing up inmy mind the truths of a high and distant astronomy.And, in like manner, observation it may be con-tended is the original source of all our ethics,though I should rather say that it supplied theoccasional cause for the development of our ethicalfaculties. But in either way, I must perhaps haveseen an exemplification of kindness from one beingto another, ere I could understand that gratitudewas the emotion which ought to be rendered backagain. But after having once gotten my concep-tion and my belief of the virtue of this pecuHarrelationshipthis will serve me for all the cases ofBeneficence that shall ever afterwards come withinmy knowledge. The moral will admit of as wideand as confident an application as the mathematicaland only grant me to have ethics enough forperceivmg that when between two fellow-men


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 45there is good-will on the one side, there ought to begratitude on the otherand then simply with thsinformation that God exists, and that He is a Godof kindness, the very ethics which told me what Iowe to a beneficent neighbour also tells me what Iowe to a beneficent Deity.

27. We may thus learn what is the precise ascentwhich we make, in passing from the terrestrial tothe celestial in Moral Philosophy. Let us dis-tinguish between the objects of the science and theethics of the scienceand take notice that thesetwo things stand related to each other, as do theobjects of Natural Philosophy to the mathematicsof Natural Philosophy. It is well to understandthat a revelation of new facts might of itself sufficefor this transition from the lower to the higherdepartment of the subjectand that we do not needto go in quest of new principles. We may perhapsfeel relieved from the apprehension of some greatand impracticable mystery in this progressand, atall events, it is most desirable that we conceivearight what be the actual stepping-stones by whichit is accomplished. In Natural Philosophy therevelations of the telescope have been super-addedto the perceptions of the naked eyeand by thisinstrument what was before seen has been mademore distinct, and there has been brought forth tonotice what before was wholly invisible. Perhapstoo in Moral Philosophy, a science which in itsmost comprehensive sense embraces all the disco-verable relations of the moral world, some new andpeculiar revelation hath been super-added to thepowers and the perceptions of Natureand by


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4C ETHICS OF THEOLOGY,which, we both see brighter what before was seenbut dimly, and there may have further been madeknown to us what to the unaided mind of man iswholly undiscoverable. But still they might mainlybe the peculiar facts or peculiar data which consti-tute the peculiarities of the celestial and distinguishit from the terrestrial of Moral Philosophy. It isin the facts and not in the ethics that the pecu-liarity lies.

28. The question then is" What are the facts,and how are they accredited ?" We already havean ethics suited to all the objects that we actuallyknowand that could be adapted to more objectson the moment of their being proposed to us. Bythe mathematics now in our possession, we couldassign orbits corresponding to every possible law ofattraction in astronomy. There is only one suchlaw ascertained by observation ; and the mathema-tical result of it isthe elliptic course of everyplanet that is within the reach of our instruments.Could we be made to know of the fact, that thereis a gravitation of another rate in distant places ofthe universe, we are already furnished with themathematics that would assign the path and perio-dical velocity of all the projectiles which are underit. Should a new satelhte of Jupiter be discovered,the mathematics are at hand by which to assignthe path that he ought to followand, to extend thisremark from the physical to the moral world, shouldI be authentically made sure of the fact that thereis a mystic influence between some certain inhabi-tant of that planet and myself, that in his breastthere is a sympathy towards me, and in his hands


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 47a power over methat he hath an eye upon aUmy movements, and by the charm of some taUsmanin his possession, can read all the feelings and fluc-tuations of my bosomthat, withal, he is my watch-ful and unwearied friend, and that every opportunesuggestion, whether of comfort in distress or ofcounsel in the midst of my perplexities, is but thesecret whisper of his voicethis were a fact utterlybeyond the range of all our present experience, yetif only ascertained to be a fact not beyond the rangeof our present and existing ethicsand the grati-tude I should owe to this beneficent though unseenguardian of my walk is as sure a dictate of ourknown and established morality, as is the gratitudethat I owe to the nurse who tended my infancy, orto the patron who led me step by step along thebright prosperity of my manhood.

29. ^1^0 ascertain then whether there be indeed acelestial ethics we hav to go in quest of facts, andnot of principles. We have no new system ofmorality to devise. There are present capacitiesof moral judgment and emotion within our heart;and for the development of which the world that isimmediately around us is crowded with the objectsto which they respond. The question is, whetherthere are not such objects also out of our world

.

and which when so addrest to our understandingthat we perceive their reality, do not furthermoreso address our sense of duty, as to convince us of asomething which we ought to feel, or of a somethingwhich we ousrht to do.o

30. We are aware, that along with the totaldegeneracy of man, there has been a totaJ darkness


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48 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY,ascribed to him ; but we feel quite assured that inthe vagueness and vehemence wherewith this chargehas been preferred, the distinction between theobjects and the ethics of Theology has not beenenough adverted to. There is no such bhndnessin respect to moral distinctions that there is inrespect to objects placed beyond the domain ofobservation, and holding substantive existence in aspiritual and unseen world. It is true that there Lsdiversity of moral sentiment among men^and that,along with the general recognition of one and thesame morals in the various ages and countries ofthe world, there have been certain special and im-portant modifications. These have so far beenwell accounted for by Dr. Thomas Brown in one ofhis Lectures upon this subjectand what he hassaid on the effect of passion in so blinding ibv a timethe mind that is under its influence as to* obscurei:s perceptions of moral truth, may apply to wholegenerations of men unbridled in revenge or im-mersed in the depths of sensuality. Even theivorst of these, however, will pronounce aright on,he great majority of ethical questionsand shouldi-he power of profligacy or passion be from anycause suspended, if solemnized or arrested by therevelation of new objects from heaven, or (evenvithout the intervention of aught so striking as this)if but withdrawn for a season from those influenceswhich darken the understanding only because theyileprave the affections, it is wonderful with howmuch truth of sentiment virtue is appreciated andthe homage to virtue is felt. A thousand evidencesof this could be extracted, not from the light and


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 49licentious, but certainly from the grave and didacticauthorship both of Greece and Rome. And whilebeyond the limits of Christendom, all those peculiarrevelations of the Gospel which relate either to pastevents or to existent objects are almost wholly un-knownwe are persuaded that bosoms may befound which would do the homage of acknowledg-ment at least, if not of obedience, to its truth andits purity and its kindness and its generous self-devo-tion all the world over *

31. On this distinction between the objects andthe ethics of Theology we should not have ex-patiated so long had we not been persuaded of theimportant uses to v/hich it may be turned inestimating the legitimacy and the weight of varioussorts of evidence for the truth of religion; and,more especially, in helping us to mark the respec-tive provinces which belong to the light of natureand the light of revelation. We sometimes hearof the apphcation of the Baconian Philosophy tothe Christian argument ; and it is our belief thatthis Philosophy so revered in modern times, andto which the experimental science of our daystands indebted for its present stability andgigantic elevation, does admit of most wholesomeand beneficial application to the question between

* It is thus, Uiat tliere is a pervading error in Leland's book oathe Necessity of Revelation. There is not one. trace, from be-ginning to end of it, of that discrimination which we have now beenurgingnor do we remark in it any difference at all between theignorance which springs from moral perversity and that whichspriogs from mere intellectual deficiency. It is a book, however,that is worthy of perusal, though more for the exceeding fukes3of its learned information, than for its just or enlightened principies.

VOL. I.


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50 ETHICS Ol- TiiGLOGY.infidels and believers. But then we must so dis*criminate as to assign those places in the contro-versy where the Philosophy of Bacon is, andthose where it is not applicable. It is of para-mount authority on the question of facts or objects.On the question of ethics again, it is not moreadmissible than on the question of mathematics.And by thus confining it within its appropriatelimits, we not only make a sounder application ofitbut an apphcation of it that we shall find tobe greatly more serviceable to the cause.

32. Our first inference fi'om this argument is,that even though the objects of Theology layunder total obscuration from our speciesthougha screen utterly impervious were placed betweenthe mental eye of us creatures here below, andthose invisible beings by whom lieaven is occupied still we might have an ethics in reserve, whichon the screen being in any way withdrawn, willjustly and vividly respond to the objects that areon the other side of it. There might be a mathe-matics without Astronomy, but of which instantapplication can be made, on the existent objects ofAstronomy being unveiled. And there may be amorals without Theology, that, on the simple pre-sentation of its objects, would at once recognise theduteous regards and proprieties which belong tothem. We often hear, in the general, of the dark-ness of nature. But a darkness in regard to theethics might not be at all in the same proportion ordegree as a darkness in regard to the objects ofTheology. We can imagine the latter to be atotal darkness, while the former is only a twilight


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ETHlCa OF THEOLOGY. 51obscurity; or may even but need a revelation ofthe appropriate facts to be excited into full illumi-nation. There may be moral light along with theignorance of all supernal objects, in which casethere can be no supernal application. But yet, inreference to the near and palpable and besettingobjects of a sublunary scene, this same light mightbe of most useful avail in the business of humansociety. It is thus that we understand the Apostlewhen speaking of the work of the law being writtenin the hearts of the Gentiles, and of their being alaw unto themselves. It at least furnished as muchlight to the conscience as that they could accuse orelse excuse each other. In this passage he con-cedes to nature the knowledge, if not of the objectsof Theology at least of the ethics. There mightneed perhaps to be a revelation ere any moralaspiration can be felt towards God^but withoutsuch a revelation, and without any regard beinghad to a God, there might be a reciprocal play ofthe moral feeUngs among men, a standard of equityand moral judgment, a common principle of refer-ence alike indicated in their expressions of mutualesteem and mutual recrimination.

33. This, we think, should be quite obvious tothose who are at all acquainted with the literatureand history of ancient times. It is true that ereall the phenomena even of pagan conscience andsensibility can be explained, we must admit theknowledge, or at least the imagination of certainobjects in Theology. But it is also true that apartfrom Theology altogether, with no other objects inthe view of the mind than those which are supplied


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52 ETHICS OF THEOLOGV.within the limits of our visible world and by thefellows of our species, there was a general senseof the right and the wrongan occasional exempli-fication of high and heroic virtue with the plauditsof its accompanying admiration on the one handor, along with execrable villany, the prompt indig-nancy of human hearts, and execration of humantongues upon the other. We are not pleading forthe practical strength of morahty in those days,though we might quote the self-devotion of Regulus,the continence of Scipio, and other noble sacrificesat the shrine of principle or patriotism. It is enoughfor our object which is to prove, not the power ofmoraUty, but merely the sense and recognition ofitthat the nobihty of these instances was felt,that the homage of public acclamation was renderedto them, that historians eulogized and poets sungthe honours of illustrious virtue. We are not con-tending for such a moral nature as could achievethe practice, but for such a moral nature as coulddiscern the principles of righteousness. In shortthere was a natural ethics among men, a capacityboth of feeling and of perceiving the moral distinc-tion between good and evil. The works of Horaceand Juvenal and above aU of Cicero abundantlyattest thisnor are we aware of aught more splen-did and even importantly true in the whole author-ship of Moral Science than the following passagefrom the last of these writers. " Est quidem vera.ex, recta ratio, naturre congruens, diffusa in omnes,constans, sempiterna ; quae vocet ad officiumjubendo, vetando a fraude deterreat; quae tamenneque probes frustra jubet aut vetat, nee improbos


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 53jubendo aut vetando movet. Huic legi, nee abro-gari fas est, neque derogari ex hac aliquid licetneque tota abrogari potest. Nee vero per senatum,aut per populum, solvi hae lege possumus, nequeest quaerendus explanator aut interpres ejus alius.Nee erit alia lex Romae, alia Athenisalia nunc,alia posthac ; sed et omnes gentes, et omni tempore,una lex et sempiterna, et immortalis continebit;unusque erit communis quasi magister, et Impe-rator omnium Deus. lUe legis hujus inventor,discepator, lator; cui qui non parebit, ipse sefugiet, ac naturam hominis aspernabitur ; atquehoc ipso, luet maximas pcenas, etiam si cseterasupplicia quae eiFugerit." Such is the testimonyof a heathen to the* law within the breastandarmed too with such power of enforcement, that,apart from the retributions of a reigning and aliving judge, man cannot offer violation to itsauthority without at the same time suffering thegreatest of all penalties in the violence which hethereby offers to his own nature.

34. But though we have thus separated betweenthe Ontology and the Deontology of the question,between man's knowledge of existences and hisknowledge of duties, between the light by which heviews the being of a God and the light by which heviews the services and affections that we owe tohim^let it not be imagined that in conceding tonature the faculty of perceiving virtue, we concedeto her such a possession of virtue, as at all to miti-gate that charge of total and unexcepted depravitywliich the Scriptures have preferred against her.And neither let it be imagined that we even accredit


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54 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.her with such an unclouded perception of Ethics,as to leave nothing for revelation to do, but tosuperadd the knowledge of objectsso that on thesimple information of what is truth, we could in-stantly and decisively follow it up with the conclu-sion of what is duty. We believe that Christianitynot only addresses to the mind of her disciplesobjects which were before unknown, but quickensand enlightens them in the sense of what is rightand wrongmaking their moral discernment moreclear, and their moral sensibility more tender.*But remember that Christianity herself presupposestliis moral sense in nature^not however so as toalleviate the imputation of nature's worthlessness,but really and in effect to enhance it. Had naturebeen endowed with no such sense, all responsibihtywould have been taken away from her. Wherethere is no law there is no transgression ; and it isjust because men in aU ages and in all countries area law unto themselves, that the sweeping condem-nation of Scripture can be carried universally roundamong the sons and daughters of our species.

35. This distinction in fact between the ethicsand the objects of Theology will help us to defendaright the great Bible position of the depravity ofour nature. It will lead us to perceive that theremay be a morality without godliness, even as theremay be a mathematics without astronomy. If wemake proper discrimination we shall acknowledgehow possible it is that there may be integrity andhumanity in our doings with each otherwhile the

* This subject will fall to be more thoroughly dbcussod inChapter on the Interna Existence of Christianity.


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ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 55great unseen Being with whom we have most em-phatically to do, is forgotten and disowned by us.We shall at length understand how along with theplay and reciprocation of many terrestrial moralitiesin our lower worldwe may he dead, and justfrom our heedlessness of the objects, to all tliosecelestial moralities by v> hich we are fitted for ahigher and a better world. We shall cease from atreacherous complacency in the generosity or up-rightness of nature ; and no longer be deceived, bythe existence of social virtue upon earth, into theimagination of our most distant claim to that heaven,from the elevation and the sacredness of which allthe children of humanity have so immeasurablyfallen.

36. So far from the degree of naturallight whichwe have contended for being any extenuation ofhuman depravity, it forms the very argument onwhich the Apostle concluded that all, both Jewsand Gentiles, were under sin. His inference fromthe universal possession of a conscience among menis, *' so that they are without excuse." It is notbecause they are blind that they are chargeablebut it is because they to a certain extent see thattherefore their sin remaineth with them. We in-deed think that the viev^^ which we have given maybe turned to the defence of Orthodoxy, when thelight of a man's conscience and the natural virtuesof his life are pled in mitigation of that deep anddesperate wickedness which is ascribed to him inthe Bible. For it suggests this replyThere maybe a mathematics without astronomythere maybe an Ethics without Theology. Even though the


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56 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.phenomena of the visible heavens are within thereach of human observationyet, if we will notstudy them, we may ^iil have a terrestrial geome-try ; but a celestial we altogether want, nay havewilfully put away from us. And so also, we maybe capable of certain guesses and discoveries re-specting Godyet, if we will not prosecute them,we may still have a terrestrial morals, and yet bein a state of practical atheism. The face of humaisociety may occasionally brighten with the patriot-ism and the generosity and the honour which reci-procate from one to another amongst the membersof the human familyand yet all may be unmersedin deepest unconcern about their common Fatherwho is in heavenall may be living without Godin the world.

CHAPTER II.On the Duty which is laid upon Men hy the Probability or

even the Imagination of a God.

1. We have already seen that even though theobjects of Theology lay under total obscurity, theremight be a distinct and vigorous play of the Ethicsnotwithstanding^kept in actual exercise amongthose objects which are seen and terrestrial, and inreadiness for eventual exercise on the revelation ofunseen and celestial objects. This, however, doesnot accurately represent the real state of naturefor in no age or country of the world, we beheve.


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ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 57did the objects of Theology lie hidden under anentire and unqualified darkness. There is, inreference to them, a sort of twilight glimmering,more or less, among all nationsand the questionis, what sort of regimen or responsibility may thatman be said to lie under, whose sole guidance inTheology is that which a very indistinct view of itsobjects, though with certainly a more distinct senseof its ethics, may suggest ?

2. This brings us to the consideration of theduty laid upon men by the probability or even theimasfination of a God.

3. It must now be abundantly obvious, thatalong with nature's discernment of the ethics, shemay labour at the same time under a comparativeblindness as to the objects of Theological Science.On the hypothesis of an actually existent God,there may be an urgent sense in human consciencesof the gratitude and the obedience which belongto him. But still while this ethicaV apprehensionmay be clear and \ivid, there may be either abright or a dull conviction in regard to the truth ofthe hypothesis itself. We should here distinguishthe things which be distinct from each other ; andcarefully note that, along with a just discernmentof the proprieties which belong to certain moralrelations, the question may still be unresolved,whether these relations be in truth exemplified byany real and hving beings in the universe. WTiatis right under certain moral relations, supposingthem to be occupied, is one consideration. Whatexists in nature or in the univ^erse to occupy theserelations is another. It does not follow that thoughc2


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58 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.nature should be able to pronounce clearly andconfidently on the first of these topicsshe cantherefore pronounce alike confidently on the secondof them. The two investigations are conductedon different principles; and the two respectivesorts of evidence upon which they proceed are justas different, as is the light of a mathematicaldemonstration from that light of observation bywhich we apprehend a fact or an object in NaturalPhilosophy. We have already conceded to naturethe possession of that moral light by which she canto a certain, and we think to a very considerableextent, take accurate cognizance of the ethics ofour science. And we have now to inquire in howfar she is competent to her own guidance in seekingafter the objects of the science.

4. The main object of Theology is God.5. Going back then to the very earhest of our

mental conceptions on this subject, we advert firstto the distinction in point of real and logical import,between unbelief and disbelief. There being noground for affirming that there is a God is a dif-ferent proposition, from, there being ground foraffirming that there is no God. The former weapprehend, to be the furthest amount of the atheis-tical verdict on the question of a God. The atheistdoes not labour to demonstrate that there is noGod. But he labours to demonstrate that thereis no adequate proof of there being one. He doesnot positively affirm the position, that God is notbut he affirms the lack of evidence for the position,that God is. Judging from the tendency and effectof his arguments, an atheist does not appear posi-


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ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 59tively to refuse that a God may bebut he insiststhat He has not discovered Himself, whether bythe utterance of His voice in audible revelation orby the impress of His hand upon visible nature.His verdict on the doctrine of a God is only thatit is not proven. It is not that it is disproven.He is but an Atheist. He is not an Antitheist.

6. Now there is one consideration, which affordsthe inquirer a singularly clear and commandingposition, at the outset of this great question. Itis this. We cannot, without a glaring contraven-tion to all the principles of the experimental philo-sophy, recede to a further distance from thedoctrine of a God, than to the position of simpleatheism. We do not need to take our departurefrom any point further back than this, in the regionof antitheism ; for that region cannot possibly beentered by us but by an act of tremendous pre-sumption, which it were premature to denounce asimpious, but which we have the authority of allmodern science for denouncing as unphilosophical.We can figure a rigidly Baconian mind, of a castso slow and cautious and hesitating, as to demandmore of proof ere it gave its conviction to thedoctrine that there was absolutely and certainlya God. But, in virtue of these very attributes,would it, if a sincere and consistent mind, be atleast equally slow in giving its conviction to thedoctrine that there was absolutely and certainlynot a God. Such a mind would be in a stateneither for assertion nor for denial upon this sub-ject. It would settle in ignorance or unbeliefwhich is quite'another thing from disbelief. The

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T Chalmers - Natural Theology