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ART. III. CHRISTIAN MORALITY: ITS ESSENTIAL AND DISTINCTIVE PECULIARITIES.

IN

SECOND PAPER.

YN respect to the peculiar characteristics of Christian morality a few words fall naturally, in the first place, to be spoken about the ground or source whence this morality arises. No distinction is here to be made between Christian, Jewish, and what we may call natural morality. The law written upon the heart of man-the ten words of Moses, and the precepts delivered by Christ in his Sermon on the Mount' and elsewhere, are substantially one in nature and origin. The stream broadens and deepens, indeed, as it descends; but it is one, and its fountain one. It should, perhaps, be here remarked that our inquiry leaves out of sight the secondary source of morality (which source ought rather to be called a reservoir of moral force), lying in the will of man instructed by his conscience, since this moral faculty in man is not an ultimate fact; and it is the ultimate fact in morality that we are in quest of. Infidels have disputed about, and even denied the truth of, the Mosaic narrative concerning the giving of the law, regarding it as an altogether human transaction; and so leaving their disciples to infer that Moses was a false and misleading man. We have no further concern, at present, with this old and oftrefuted objection than to observe that, were it possible to believe that Moses hewed the tables and chiselled the characters upon them with his own hands, the inquiry would still arise-Whence did he obtain the matter of the writing-so true, comprehensive, perfect as this is? Moses was not the author of it, because the Gentiles, who had never heard of Moses nor his tables, did, beyond question, 'show the work of the law written in their hearts.' A cautious inquirer would ask, 'Who wrote it there?" If any copying were resorted to, the law was copied from the living conscience unto the tables of stone, and not from the tables of stone into the living conscience.

There are, then, notwithstanding all that Locke and others have written to the contrary, certain moral intuitions' in man, by which he knows, without antecedent instruction, that this is right and that wrong. Whence, we ask, these moral intuitions,' these 'primitive judgments?' Whence the Decalogue, and whence also Christian morality?

Could it be proved that the family institution, the institution of civil society, the idea of God and man's relation to Him had originated in and with man, then we could see how morality also could spring up along with, or because of, such institutions and ideas. In truth, however, man has easily and naturally fallen into such conditions of social life, just because these were pre-arranged

for him ere he had an existence, as those who believe in the Bible are compelled to admit. And the inference is, that the laws by which such institutions and relationship should be governed are as truly divine as the institutions and relations themselves. Either make the institutions and relations human and the morality human, or make them both divine.

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The latter is the only rational conclusion. And here the source of Christian morality reveals itself. Christian morality takes its rise, not from the acquisition of property and the gradation of rank, as all levellers would have us to suppose; nor from the love of praise,' as Mandeville asserted; nor from 'political enactments,' according to Hobbes; nor yet from the fitness of things,' as Clarke and Wolaston affirm. Nor did it spring from the 'moral sense' in man, for which Hutcheson contended; nor from 'the love of pleasure and aversion from pain,' which is natural to all men, according to Locke; and not from the utile and the dulce (the useful and agreeable) of Hume, even as Paley supplemented them by the 'more violent motive,' as he called it, of future rewards and punishments. Hume probably, Paley certainly, meant well; but their system lacked grandeur and depth of motive power; whilst the ends sought to be accomplished by it were too low and selfish. Hume took up a position in the drawing-rooms of the period, and wielded his twin-weapons-the utile and the dulcegracefully, in defence of the refinements he found there; but Paley, armed with these, and also with the additional and weightier weapon, which the doctrine of eternal rewards and punishments furnished, descended into the streets and became the ally of the policeman.

It is not a little surprising that moral philosophers in elaborating their systems of morality, most of which are made to spring from a selfish source, should claim to include the morality taught by Jesus Christ within their own systems. The mention of this, however, is sufficient to ensure the rejection of those claims. Christian morality (for the philosophers above mentioned use the term morality in its generic or universal sense) springs, it is declared, from selfishness. But this system has produced unselfish lives. How is this to be explained? Can the fruit be different from the tree that bears it?--or the stream rise to greater height than the fountain whence it flows? Christian morality is, in its source, divine. You may look for the origin of human systems of morality on the low grounds of social expediency and governmental neccessity; among the utilities and the agreeablenesses of life; but this rises far away among the everlasting hills,' in the righteousness, holiness, and benevolence of God.

The peculiarity of Christian morality is further seen in the comprehensiveness of its requirements. Wesley observes that

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'Christianity begins just where Heathen morality ends.' This is very well as an antithesis, only it is not true. Christian morality includes whatever of good principles or rules of conduct ancient Paganism prescribed or practised. Whatever was taught by heathen moralists that was truly human, or rather divine, was taken up into Christianity and made part of it. Or, to speak more correctly, Christian morality collects her own scattered rays of light from the Pagan world, in order to present them in one focus. 'Do as you would be done unto,' was written over the gate of a heathen Emperor's Palace before the Great Teacher enforced it from the mount of 'Beatitudes; ' but are we to reject it on that account as foreign to Christian morality? The oft quoted phrase of Terence, uttered in the Roman theatre, two thousand years ago, and which was received with ringing applause, 'whatever concerns humanity concerns me,' expresses substantially the same truth, only not in the imperative form, as the command, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. The ancient and civilised heathen were not, it is perceived, altogether without good rules of conduct; these, as we saw before, were written more or less legibly upon their hearts. What they lacked was motive power to make them effective. Horace speaks the language of most enlightened heathens when he says:-I see and approve the better things; I follow the worse.' And it is, perhaps, more to the spirit and conduct of the heathen that Wesley is looking in the words we quoted from him, than to any moral phrases or recorded sentiments of theirs that have come down to us. Hence, he goes on to say:'Poverty of spirit, conviction of sin, the renouncing (of) ourselves, the not having our own righteousness (the very first point in the religion of Jesus Christ), leaves all Pagan religion behind. This was ever hid from the wise men of the world, insomuch that the whole Roman language, even with all the improvements of the Augustan age, does not afford so much as a name for humility (the word from which we borrow this, as is well known, bearing in Latin a quite different meaning); no, nor was one found in all the copious language of Greece, till it was made by the Great Apostle.' We note these facts, but are not surprised at them. That heathen men should not have been acquainted with the length and breadth of Christian morality, is no more remarkable than that the base of a pyramid should be constructed before its apex. Had the moral character of Socrates and of Cicero been equal in purity and beauty to that of James and John, the necessity of Christian morality from the point of view of its comprehensiveness would not have been discernable.

Passing by the heathen, is it not lamentably clear that the Jews in the time of Jesus, and for many years before His advent, had become victims to the dry rot of religious Nominalism? Names,

not things; men, not measures; casuistry, not conscience; pretension, not principle, were the idols before which they fell down and grovelled. The 'religious' among them had forsaken the closet for the street and for the market-place; bartered the smile of heaven for the greetings of men; despised the condition and character of little children,' in their eagerness to be called Rabbi ; and imagined that where the eye of man could not detect the dark stain of greed, adultery, and murder, the eye of God would also be at fault. How authoritatively (not mercilessly) and persistently and thoroughly, the great expounder of Christian morals proceeded in his day to strip from those moral mummies their gaudy wrappages of Pharisaic religiousness, thou needest not, attentive reader, that we should describe. If thou wouldest see the operation with thine own eyes, read the 'Sermon on the Mount,' and other teachings of the same description in the Gospels. Read, and ponder, till the whole scene becomes alive beneath thy gaze. Alas! wilt thou not also perceive, by such prolonged gazing, to thy astonishment, perhaps, that we, in these days, amid much religiousness are falling back into the condition of moral mummyhood; or rather, let us say, into a pitiable, flabby, inveterbrate state. In the presence of open crime, we stand aghast; but with secret sin we are too familiar to betray any signs of alarm at its existence and power within us. The repulsive forms of iniquity we repudiate and abhor; its essence we tolerate in the secret chamber of our souls.

As Christian morality embraces the whole man, so also does it comprehend all men within its claims. There are diversities of rank, temperament, and talent among men. But Christian morality is no respecter of persons. Man often is; hence his readiness to extenuate the moral obliquities of such men as Burns, Byron, and Dumas, on the ground of their genius; and so, instead of holding with the Great Teacher, that 'to whom much is given, of him much will be required,' they affirm the direct contrary, 'that to whom much is given, of him little will be required. Christian morality, again, allows of no pursuits which are dishonourable and immoral. Only let it be fairly and conclusively proved that a calling is of that character, and such calling is at once condemned. When Dr. Johnson, who, with all his faults, was soundly moral at heart, rebuked a man in his day for carrying on an immoral trade, and the man replied, 6 that he must live,' the brave old hater of meanness and vice exclaimed that he did not see the least necessity for that.' Our conviction is that the old man felt and meant what he said, and that he himself, could he not have lived honestly and innocently, would have chosen not to live at all. It is not necessary that a man should live; but it is necessary that if he does live he should live soberly, and righteously, and godly in this present world.'

Christian morality requires that men, and companies of men, should conduct their business upon right principles. Christian morality has no respect for rings'-coal, railway, share, or other. Collective consciences may be convenient things; but the judge of all will know how to apportion to every man his own proper share of responsibility and reward. Do trades' unions and masters' associations heed as they ought the calm, righteous voice of Christian morality? Do masters give unto their servants, when work is slack and labour consequently plentiful, that which 'is just and equal,' and a little human consideration into the bargain? And do servants render to their masters at any time, and especially in these times when work is brisk and labour scarce, a just return for the wages they receive? Do not both parties too frequently act from an utterly selfish point of view? They may not perceive it; yet those who stand apart and watch the unbrotherly struggle can see it very clearly. Would that trades' unions and masters' associations could be got to remember that there is a higher law than that which stands upon their minute books. Men may and do forget that they are, in all the relations and pursuits of life, included in a just and beneficent system of moral law; but they are so included, nevertheless, and cannot altogether escape its action in this world, certainly not in the next. For, as David says, 'Thy commandment is exceeding broad.' 'It is so,' observes John Foster, by the comprehensive applicableness of its grand, simple rules, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and soul, and strength, and thy neighbour as thyself." It is so by the ample order of its special injunctions. Where is there a spot without a signal of the divine will? It is so by laying an authoritative hand upon the first principles and origin from which anything can proceed in human spirit and action; then it reaches to all things that do or can proceed thence. It asserts its jurisdiction over all that the world and each man is about; and over what is not done, but only thought and felt, it maintains its authority and pronounces its dictates and judgments.'

A system of morality so all-comprehending should need to be supported by motives peculiarly strong and lofty. And this we find to be the case. Christian morality teaches that every act, word, and thought has in it a moral quality. It appeals to conscience, and through conscience to the Righteous and Supreme Governor of the Universe. Only when these two dogmas-the existence of a Personal and Righteous Governor of All, and the possession on the part of man of a moral constitution by which he is rendered accountable to God—are admitted and believed, is morality, in any genuine and permanent sense, possible.

Consider for a moment the ancient systems of morality and the