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greatest good, and whatever seems to us adapted to promote happiness is right, then God and the moral law are lost sight of. Our own happiness is apt to become the chief good for us, as it is for the universe. (4.) It need hardly be remarked that we are incompetent to determine what course of conduct will issue in the greatest amount of physical good, and therefore can never tell what is right and what is wrong. It may be said that we are not left to our own sagacity to decide that question. The law of God as revealed in his word, is a divine rule by which we can learn what tends to happiness and what to misery. But this not only degrades the moral law into a series of wise maxims, but it changes the motive of obedience. We obey not out of regard to the authority of God, but ⚫ because He knows better than we what will promote the greatest good. Besides this, in the questions which daily present themselves for decision, we are forced to judge for ourselves what is right and wrong, in the light, of conscience and of the general principles contained in the Scriptures. And if these principles all resolve themselves into the one maxim, that that is right which promotes happiness, we are obliged to resort to the calculations of expediency, for which in our short-sighted wisdom we are utterly incompetent. (5.) Besides all this, the theory assumes that sin, and the present awful amount of sin, are the necessary means of the greatest good. What then becomes of the distinction between good and evil? If that is good which tends to promote the greatest happiness, and if sin is necessary to secure the greatest happiness, then sin ceases to be sin, and becomes a good. Then also it must be right to do evil that good may come. How, asks the Apostle, on this principle, can God judge the world? If the sins of men not only in fact promote the highest end, but if a man in sinning has the purpose and desire to coöperate with God in producing the greatest amount of happiness, how can he be condemned? If virtue or holiness is right simply because it tends to produce the greatest happiness, and if sin also tends to the same result, then the man who sins with a view to the greatest good is just as virtuous as the man who practices holiness with the same end in view. It may be said that it is a contradiction to say that a man sins with a truly benevolent purpose; for the essence of virtue is to purpose the greatest good, and therefore whatever is done in the execution of that purpose, is virtuous. Exactly so. The objection itself shows that right becomes wrong and wrong right, according to the design with which it is committed or performed. And therefore, if a man lies, steals, or murders with a design to promote the

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good of society, of the church, or of the universe, he is a virtuous man. It was principally for the adoption of, and the carrying into practice this doctrine, that the Jesuits became an abomination in the sight of Christendom and were banished from all civilized countries. Jesuits were however, unhappily not its only advocates. The principle has been widely disseminated in books on morals, and has been adopted by theologians as the foundation of their whole system of Christian doctrine. (6.) If happiness be not the highest good, then benevolence is not the sum of all excellence, and selfishness as the opposite of benevolence, cannot be the essence of sin. On this point, again, appeal may be safely made to our own consciousness and to the common consciousness of men. Our moral nature teaches us, on the one hand, that all virtue cannot be resolved into benevolence: justice, fidelity, humility, forbearance, patience, constancy, spiritual mindedness, the love of God, gratitude to Christ, and zeal for his glory, do not reveal themselves in consciousness as forms of benevolence. They are as distinct to the moral sense, as red, blue, and green are distinct to the eye. On the other hand, unbelief, hardness of heart, ingratitude, impenitence, malice, and enmity towards God, are not modifications of selfishness. These attempts at simplification are not only unphilosophical, but also dangerous; as they lead to confounding things which differ, and, as we have seen, to denying the essential nature of moral distinctions.

The doctrine which makes all sin to consist in selfishness, as it has been generally held, especially in this country, considers selfishness as the opposite of benevolence agreeably to the theory which has just been considered. There are others, however, that mean by it the opposite to the love of God. As God is the proper centre of the soul and the sum of all perfection, apostasy from Him is the essence of sin; apostasy from God involves, it is said, a falling back into ourselves, and making self the centre of our being. Thus Müller,1 Tholuck, and many others, make alienation from God the primary principle of sin. But dethroning God necessitates the putting an idol in his place. That idol, Augustine and after him numerous writers of different schools, say, is the creature. As the Apostle concisely describes the wickedness of men, by saying, that they "worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator." But Müller argues that as it is self the sinner seeks in the creature, the real principle of sin consists in putting self in the place of God, and in making it the highest end of life and its gratification or 1 Lehre von der Sünde, vol i. pp. 134-158. 2 Von der Sünde und vom Versökner, p. 32.

satisfaction the great object of pursuit. It of course is not denied, that selfishness, in some of its forms, includes a large class of the sins of which men are guilty. What is objected to is, the making selfishness the essence of all sin, or the attempt to reduce all the manifestations of moral evil to this one principle. This cannot be done. There is disinterested sin as well as disinterested benevolence. A man may as truly and as deliberately sacrifice himself in sinning, as in doing good. Many parents have violated the law of God not for their own benefit, but for the benefit of their children. It may be said that this is only a form of selfishness, because the happiness of their children is their happiness, and the sin is committed for the gratification of their parental feelings. To this, however, it may be answered, first, that it is contradictory to say that what is done for another is done for ourselves. When a mother sacrifices wealth and life for her child, although she acts under the impulse of the maternal instinct, she acts djsinterestedly. The sacrifice consists in preferring her child to herself. In the second place, if an act ceases to be virtuous when its performance meets and satisfies some demand of our nature, then no act can be virtuous. When a man does any good work, he satisfies his conscience. If he does an act of kindness to the poor, if he devotes himself to the relief of the sick or the prisoner, he gratifies his benevolent feelings. If he seeks the favour and fellowship of God, and consecrates himself to his service, he gratifies the noblest principles of his nature, and experiences the highest enjoyment of which he is susceptible. It is not necessary therefore, in order that an act, whether right or wrong, should be disinterested, that it should not minister to our gratification. All depends on the motive for which it is done. If that motive be the happiness of another and not our own, the act is disinterested. It is contrary, therefore, to the testimony of every man's consciousness to say that selfishness is the essential element of sin. There is no selfishness in malice, nor in enmity to God. These are far higher forms of evil than mere selfishness. The true nature of sin is alienation from God and opposition to his character and will. It is the opposite of holiness and does not admit of being reduced to any one principle, either the love of the creature or the love of self.

§ 3. The Doctrine of the Early Church.

The theories already considered are called philosophical, either because they concern the metaphysical nature of sin, or because

they are founded on some philosophical principle. The moral or theological doctrines on the subject are so designated because they are founded on what are assumed to be the teachings of our moral nature or of the word of God. So far as the early Church is concerned, the doctrine respecting sin was stated only in general terms. In almost all cases the explicit and discriminating doctrinal affirmations received their form as counter statements to erroneous views. So long as the truth was not denied the Church was content to hold and state it in the simple form in which it is presented in the Bible. But when positions were assumed which were inconsistent with the revealed doctrine, or when one truth was so stated as to contradict some other truth, it became necessary to be more explicit, and to frame such an expression of the doctrine as should comprehend all that God had revealed on the subject. This process in the determination, or rather in the definition of doctrines was of necessity a gradual one. It was only as one error after another arose in the Church, that the truth came to be distinguished from them severally by more explicit and guarded statements. As the earliest heresies were those of Gnosticism and Manicheism in which, in different forms, sin was represented as a necessary evil having its origin in a cause independent of God and beyond the control of the creature, the Church was called upon to deny those errors, and to assert that sin was neither necessary nor eternal, but had its origin in the free will of rational creatures. In the struggle with Manicheism the whole tendency of the Church was to exalt the liberty and ability of man, in order to maintain the essential doctrine, then so variously assailed, that sin is a moral evil for which man is to be condemned, and not a calamity for which he is to be pitied. It was the unavoidable consequence of the unsettled state of doctrinal formulas, that conflicting statements should be made even by those who meant to be the advocates of the truth, not only different writers, but the same writer, would on different occasions, present inconsistent statements. In the midst of these inconsistencies the following points were constantly insisted upon. (1.) That all men in their present state are sinners. (2.) That this universal sinfulness of men had its historical and causal origin in the voluntary apostasy of Adam. (3.) That such is the present state of human nature that salvation can be attained in no other way than through Christ, and by the assistance of his Spirit. (4.) That even infants as soon as born need regeneration and redemption, and can be saved only through the merit of Christ. These great truths, which lie at the foundation of the gospel, en

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tered into the general faith of the Church before they were so strenuously asserted by Augustine in his controversy with Pelagius. It is true that many assertions may be quoted from the Greek fathers inconsistent with some of the propositions above stated. But the same writers in other passages avow their faith in these primary Scriptural truths; and they are implied in the prayers and ordinances of the Church, and were incorporated at a later period, in the public confessions of the Greeks, as well as of the Latins. Clemens Alexandrinusi says: τὸ γὰρ ἐξαμαρτάνειν πᾶσιν ἔμφυτον καὶ κοι νόν. Justin says, Τὸ γένος τῶν ἀνθρώπων ἀπὸ τοῦ Ἀδὰμ ὑπὸ θάνατον καὶ πλάνην τὴν τοῦ ὄφεως ἐπεπτώκει, although he adds, παρὰ τὴν ἰδίαν αἰτίαν ἑκάστου αὐτῶν πονηρευσαμένου. Origen says, 3 " Si Levi "Si Levi . . . . in lumbis Abrahæ fuisse perhibetur, multo magis omnes homines qui in hoc mundo nascuntur et nati sunt, in lumbis erant Adæ, cum adhuc esset in Paradiso; et omnes homines cum ipso vel in ipso expulsi sunt de Paradiso.” Athanasius says, Πάντες οὖν οἱ ἐξ Ἀδὰμ γενόμ ενοι ἐν ἁμαρτίαις συλλαμβάνονται τῇ τοῦ προπάτορος καταδίκη — δείκνυσιν ὡς ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἡ ἀνθρώπων φύσις ὑπὸ τὴν ἀμαρτίαν πέπτωκεν ὑπὸ τῆς ἐν Εὔᾳ παραβάσεως, καὶ ὑπὸ κατάραν ἡ γέννησις γέγονεν. Ambrose says, " Manifes tum itaque in Adam omnes peccasse quasi in massa: ipse enim per peccatum corruptus, quos genuit omnes nati sunt sub peccato. Ex eo igitur cuncti peccatores, quia ex ipso sumus omnes." Cyprian says: "Si... baptismo atque a gratia nemo prohibetur ; quanto magis prohiberi non debet infans, qui recens natus nihil peccavit, nisi quod secundum Adam carnaliter natus, contagium mortis antiquæ prima nativitate contraxit? qui ad remissam peccatorum accipiendam hoc ipso facilius accedit, quod illi remittuntur non propria, sed aliena peccata." Again he says: "Fuerant et ante Christum viri insignes, sed in peccatis concepti et nati, nec originali nec personali caruere delicto." These writers, says Gieseler, taught that through Christ and his obedience on the tree was healed the original disobedience of man in reference to the tree of knowledge; that as we offended God in the first Adam by transgression, so through the second Adam we are reconciled to God; that Christ has freed us from the power of the devil to which we were subjected by the sin of Adam; that Christ has regained for

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1 Pædagogus, III. 12; Works, edit. Paris. 1641, p. 262, c.

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2 Dialogus cum Tryphone Judæo, 88; Works, edit. Cologne, 1636, p. 316, a.

8 In Epistolam ad Romanos, lib. v. sect. 1; Works, edit. Wirceburgi, 1794, vol. xv. p. 218.

4 Expos. in Psalmos; in Ps. 1. (li.), 7.

5 In Epistolam ad Romanos, v. 12; Works, Paris, 1661, vol. iii. p. 269, a.

6 Epistola Ixiv. edit. Bremen, 1690; p. 161, of third set.

7 Kirchengeschichte, edit. Bonn, 1855, vol. vi. p. 180.

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