CHAPTER VIII.
OBLIGATION PREDICABLE ONLY OF THE WILL.
SECTION I.
THE Will, as I have already said, exists in a trinity with the Intelligence and Sensibility. In respect to the operations of the different departments of our mental being, I lay down the two following propositions:
1. Obligation, moral desert, &c., are directly predicable only of the action of the Will.
2. For the operations of the other faculties we are accountable so far forth only as the existence and character of such operations depend upon the Will. In other words, it is for voluntary acts and states only that we are accountable. This I argue because,
1. Obligation, as we have seen, consists only with Liberty. All the phenomena of the Intelligence and Sensibility, in the circumstances of their occurrence, are not free, but necessary. Accountability, therefore, cannot be predicated of such phenomena. We may be, and are, accountable for such phenomena, so far forth as their existence and character depend upon the Will: in other words, so far forth as they are voluntary, and not involuntary, states of mind.
2. The truth of the above proposition, and of that only, really corresponds with the universal conviction of the race. This conviction is expressed in two ways.
(1.) When blame is affirmed of the operations of the Intelligence or Sensibility, it is invariably thus affirmed: "You have no right to _entertain_ such thoughts or sentiments. You have no right _indulge_ such feeling's." In other words, praise or blame is never directly predicated of these operations themselves, but of the action of the Will relatively to them.
(2.) All men agree, that the moral character of all actions, of all states of mind whatever; depends upon _intention_. In no point is there a more universal harmony among moral philosophers than in respect to this. But intention is undeniably a phenomenon of the Will, and of that exclusively. We must therefore admit, that moral obligation is predicable of the Will only, or deny the fundamental convictions of the race.
3. The truth of the above propositions is intuitively evident, the moment the mind apprehends their real import. A man, as he steps out of a warm room, amid the external frosts of winter, feels an involuntary chill over his whole system. We might with the same propriety attribute blame to him for such feelings, as for any other feelings, thoughts, or perceptions which exist alike independent of his Will, and especially in opposition to its determinations.
4. If we suppose all the voluntary acts and states of a moral agent to be, and always to have been, in perfect conformity to moral rectitude, it is impossible for us to impute moral guilt to him for any feelings or thoughts which may have risen in his mind independently of his Will. We can no more conceive him to have incurred ill desert, than we can conceive of the annihilation of space. We may safely put it to the consciousness of every man whether this is not the case. This renders demonstrably evident the truth, that moral obligation is predicable only of the Will.
5. With the above perfectly harmonize the positive teachings of Inspiration. For example. "Lust, when it is _conceived_, bringeth forth sin." The involuntary feeling does not constitute the sin, but the action of the Will in harmony with that feeling.
6. A single supposition will place this whole subject in a light perfectly conspicuous before the mind. We can readily conceive that the Will, or voluntary states of the mind, are in perfect harmony with the moral law, while the Sensibility, or involuntary states, are opposed to it. We can also with equal readiness make the opposite supposition, to wit, that the Sensibility, or involuntary states, are in harmony with the law, while the determinations of the Will are all opposed to it. What shall we think of these two states? Let us suppose a case of no unfrequent occurrence, that the feelings, or involuntary state of the mind, are in perfect harmony with the law, while the action of this Will, or the voluntary states, are in determined opposition to the law, the individual being inflexibly determined to quench such feelings, and act in opposition to them. Is there any virtue at all in such a state of mind? Who would dare to say that there is? Is not the guilt of the individual aggravated in proportion to the depth and intensity of the feeling which he is endeavoring to suppress? Now if, as all will admit, there is no virtue at all, when the states of the Sensibility are in harmony with the law, and the determinations of the Will, or voluntary states of the mind, are opposed to it, how can there be guilt when the Will, or voluntary states, are in perfect harmony with the law, and the Sensibility or involuntary states, opposed to it? This renders it demonstrably evident that obligation and moral desert of praise or blame are predicable only of the Will, or voluntary states of mind.
7. We will make another supposition; one, if possible, still more to the point. The tiger, we well know, has received from his Maker, either directly or through the laws of natural generation sustained by the Most High, a ferocious nature. Why do we not blame the animal for this nature? The answer, perhaps, would be, that he is not a rational being, and is therefore not responsible for anything.
Let us suppose, then, that with this nature, God had associated Intelligence and Free-Will, such as man possesses. Why should the animal now be held responsible for the bare existence of this nature, any more than in the first instance, when the effect, in both instances, exists, alike independent of his knowledge, choice, and agency? A greater absurdity than this never lay upon the brain of a Theologian, that the mere existence of rationality renders the subject properly responsible for what God himself produces in connection with that rationality, and produces wholly independent of the knowledge, choice, and agency of that subject.
Let us suppose, further, that the animal under consideration, as soon as he becomes aware of the existence and tendencies of this nature, holds all its impulses in perfect subjection to the law of love, and never suffers them, in a single instance, to induce a voluntary act contrary to that law. Is it in the power of the Intelligence to affirm guilt of that creature? Do we not necessarily affirm his virtue to be great in proportion to the strength of the propensity thus perfectly subjected to the Moral law? The above illustration renders two conclusions demonstrably evident:
1. For the mere _existence_ of any constitutional propensity whatever, the creature is not and cannot be responsible.
2. When all the actions of the Will, or voluntary power, are in perfect harmony with the moral law, and all the propensities are held in full subjection to that law, the creature stands perfect and complete in the discharge of his duty to God and Man. For the involuntary and necessary actings of those propensities, he cannot be responsible.
It is no part of my object to prove that men have not derived from their progenitors, propensities which impel and induce them to sin; but that, for the mere _existence_ of these propensities, together with their necessary involuntary action, they are not guilty.
SEC. II. DOGMAS IN THEOLOGY.
Certain dogmas in Theology connected with the subject above illustrated here claim our attention.
MEN NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THE SIN OF THEIR PROGENITORS.
I. The first that I notice is the position, that creatures are now held responsible, even as "deserving God's wrath and curse, not only in this life, but in that which is to come," not merely for their own voluntary acts of disobedience, nor for their involuntary exercises, but for the act of a progenitor, performed when they had no existence. If God holds creatures responsible for such an act, we may safely affirm that it is absolutely impossible for them to conceive of the justice of such a principle; and that God has so constituted them, as to render it impossible for them to form such a conception. Can a being who is not a _moral_ agent sin? Is not _existence_ necessary to moral agency? How then can creatures "sin _in_ and _through_ another" six thousand years before their own existence commenced? We cannot conceive of creatures as guilty for the involuntary and necessary exercises of their own minds. How can we conceive of them as guilty for the act of another being,--an act of which they had, and could have, no knowledge, choice, or agency whatever? How can intelligent beings hold such a dogma, and hold it as a revelation from Him who has declared with an oath, that the "son shall not bear the iniquity of the father," but that "every man shall die for his own sins?"
CONSTITUTIONAL ILL-DESERT.
II. The next dogma deserving attention is the position, that mankind derive from our first progenitor a corrupt nature, which renders obedience to the commands of God impossible, and disobedience necessary, and that for the mere _existence_ of this nature, men "deserve God's wrath and curse, not only in this world, but in that which is to come."
If the above dogma is true, it is demonstrably evident, that this corrupt nature comes into existence without the knowledge, choice, or agency of the creature, who, for its existence, is pronounced deserving of, and "bound over to the wrath of God." Equally evident is it, that this corrupt nature exists as the result of the direct agency of God. He proclaims himself the Maker of "every soul of man." As its Maker, He must have imparted to that soul the constitution or nature which it actually possesses. It does not help the matter at all, to say, that this nature is derived from our progenitor: for the laws of generation, by which this corrupt nature is derived from that progenitor, are sustained and continued by God himself. It is a truth of reason as well as of revelation, that, even in respect to plants, derived "by ordinary generation" from the seed of those previously existing, it is GOD who "giveth them a body as it hath pleased him, and to every seed its own body." If this is true of plants, much more must it be so of the soul of man.
If, then, the above dogma is true, man, in the first place, is held as deserving of eternal punishment for that which exists wholly independent of his knowledge, choice, or agency, in any sense, direct or indirect. He is also held responsible for the result, not of his own agency, but for that which results from the agency of God. On this dogma, I remark,
1. It is impossible for the Intelligence to affirm, or even to conceive it to be true, that a creature deserves eternal punishment for that which exists wholly independent of his knowledge, choice, or agency; for that which results, not from his own agency, but from that of another. The Intelligence can no more affirm the truth of such propositions, than it can conceive of an event without a cause.
2. This dogma is opposed to the intuitive convictions of the race. Present the proposition to any mind, that, under the Divine government, the creature is held responsible for his own voluntary acts and states of minds only, and such a principle "commends itself to every man's conscience in the sight of God." Present the dogma, on the other hand, that for a nature which renders actual obedience impossible, a nature which exists as the exclusive result of the agency of God himself, independently of the knowledge, choice, or agency of the creature, such creature is justly "bound over to the wrath of God, and curse of the law, and so made subject to death, with all miseries, spiritual, temporal, and eternal," and there is not a conscience in the universe which will not reprobate with perfect horror such a principle. The intuitive convictions of the race are irreconcilably opposed to it.
3. If mankind, as this dogma affirms, have a nature from which voluntary acts of a given character necessarily result, to talk of real _growth_ or _confirmation_ in holiness or sin, is to use words without meaning. All that influence, or voluntary acts, can do in such a case, is to develope the nature already in existence. They can do nothing to confirm the soul in its tendencies, one way or the other. What should we think of the proposition, that a certain tree had formed and confirmed the habit of bearing particular kinds of fruits, when it commenced bearing, with the necessity of bearing this kind only, and with the absolute impossibility of bearing any other? So the soul, according to this dogma, commences action with the absolute impossibility of any but sinful acts, and with the equal necessity of putting forth sinful ones. Now, Necessity and Impossibility know and can know no degrees. How then can a mind, thus constituted, generate and confirm the habit of sinning? What, on this supposition, is the meaning of the declaration, "How can ye, who are _accustomed_ to do evil, learn to do well?" All such declarations are without meaning, if this dogma is true.
4. If God imputes guilt to the creature, for the existence of the nature under consideration, he must have required the creature to prevent its existence. For it is a positive truth of reason and inspiration both, that as "sin is a transgression of the law;" that "where there is no law, there is no transgression;" and that "sin is not imputed where there is no law," that is, where nothing is required, no obligation does or can exist, and consequently no guilt is imputed. The existence of the nature under consideration, then, is not and cannot be sin to the creature, unless it is a transgression of the law; and it cannot be a transgression of the law, unless the law required the creature to prevent its existence, and prevent it when that existence was the exclusive result of God's agency, and when the creature could have no knowledge, choice, or agency, in respect to what God was to produce. Can we conceive of a greater absurdity than that? God is about to produce a certain nature by his own creative act, or by sustaining the laws of natural generation. He imputes infinite guilt to the creature for not preventing the result of that act, and inducing a result precisely opposite, and that in the absence of all knowledge of what was required of him, and of the possibility of any agency in respect to it. Is this a true exposition of the Government of God?
PRESENT IMPOSSIBILITIES REQUIRED.
III. The last dogma that I notice is the position, that the Moral law demands of us, as sinners, not what is now possible to us on the ground of natural powers and proffered grace, but what would be possible, had we never sinned. It is admitted by all, that we have not now a capacity for that degree of virtue which would be possible to us, had we always developed our moral powers in harmony with the Divine law. Still it is maintained, that this degree of virtue, notwithstanding our present total incapacity to exercise it, is demanded of us. For not rendering it, we are justly bound over to the wrath and curse of God. In reply, I remark:
1. That this dogma, which is professedly founded on the express teachings of Inspiration, has not even the shadow of a foundation in any direct or implied affirmation of the Bible. I may safely challenge the world to adduce a single passage of Holy Writ, that either directly or indirectly asserts any such thing.
2. This dogma is opposed not only to the _spirit_, but to the _letter_ of the _law_. The law, addressing men, enfeebled as their powers now are, in consequence of sin previously committed, requires them to love God with all their "mind and strength," that is, not with the power they would have possessed, had they never sinned, but with the power they now actually possess. On what authority does any Theologian affirm, when the law expressly makes one demand upon men, that it, in reality, makes another, and different demand? In such an assertion, is he not wise, not only _above_, but _against_ what is written?
3. This dogma is opposed to the express and positive teachings of Inspiration. The Scriptures expressly affirm, Rom. xiii. 8, that every one that exercises love, "hath fulfilled the law," hath done all that the law requires of him. This would not be true, did the law require a degree of love not now practicable to the creature. Again, in Deut. x. 12, it is positively affirmed, that God requires nothing of his creatures but to "love him with all the heart and with all the soul," that is, with all the powers they actually possess. This could not be true, if the dogma under consideration is true.
4. If we conceive an individual to yield a voluntary conformity to moral obligations of every kind, to the full extent of his present capacities, it is impossible for us to conceive that he is not now doing all that he really ought to do. No person would ever think of exhorting him to do more, nor of charging him with guilt for not doing it. We may properly blame him for the past, but as far as the present is concerned, he stands guiltless in the eye of reason and revelation both.
5. Let us suppose that an individual continues for fifty years in sin. He is then truly converted, and immediately after dies. All admit that he enters heaven in a state of perfect holiness. Yet no one supposes that he now exercises, or has the capacity to exercise, as high a degree of holiness, as he would, had he spent those fifty years in obedience, instead of disobedience to God. This shows that even those who theoretically hold the dogma under consideration do not practically believe it themselves.
The conclusion to which our inquiries lead us is this: Holiness is a voluntary conformity to all perceivable obligation. Sin is a similar violation of such obligation. Nothing else is or can be holiness. Nothing else is or can be sin.