LECT. IV. general subject will be, the Rule of Moral Obligation; and the reservation of it till then will also produce a more convenient division of the two discourses in point of length. I waive it, therefore, for the present, and conclude by simply assuring my hearers, if such assurance be necessary, that I have been anxious to avoid doing any injustice to a writer of such merited celebrity as Dr. Butler; and that if in aught it shall be brought to my conviction that I have, however unintentionally, misrepresented his sentiments, I shall be most happy to retract and erase the error. May God, the only wise, and the source of whatever deserves the name of wisdom to his creatures, "lead us into all truth;" so that "in his light we may see light!"

LECTURE V.

ON THE RULE OF MORAL OBLIGATION.

1 JOHN III. 4.

"Sin is the transgression of law."

In the review which has been taken, in former LECT. V. Lectures, I have left unnoticed various systems of morals, with their respective varieties and modifications, partly to avoid repetition and tediousness, and partly because the applicability to them of the general principles which it was my object to establish, is, without particular illustration, sufficiently apparent.-Let us now see whether we can arrive at any thing more satisfactory.

I must recall your attention to the distinction, stated in the outset, between the principle or foundation, and the rule or law, of moral rectitude. The latter is simply the authoritative direction by which the conduct of the subject of any government is to be regulated; the former is that, whatever it may be, in the prescribed action itself, or in its tendencies and effects, on

Reason for

beginning with the

rule rather

than the principle.

LECT. V. account of which it is that the governor enjoins it. I shall begin with the consideration of the rule or law. To some this may appear somewhat preposterous, the order of discussion not being in conformity to the natural order of subsistence; inasmuch as the principle must precede the rule, and the consideration on account of which a law is enacted, commanding one kind of conduct and prohibiting its opposite, must be prior to the law itself. I prefer this method, however, first, because the law, if I may so express myself, lies nearest to us, and is that with which we have most immediately to do;and secondly, because, by the consideration and satisfactory settlement of this point, we may be the better prepared for ascending to the higher and more abstruse investigation of the original principles of moral rectitude, the primary and essential elements of virtue.-My feeling on this subject is similar to that which I have ever experienced in regard to another, of a different nature-the decrees of God. On that subject, it has always appeared to me our best and our only legitimate course, not to begin with the purpose and reason forward to the event, but to begin with the event and reason backward to the purpose; renouncing all vain and presumptuous attempts to go back in the first instance into eternity, and to read the mind of Deity in its own light, rather to look to what the Divine Being has done, and thence to

ascertain, in all cases in which he has not him- LECT. V. self made them previously known, his everlasting counsels. So, in regard to moral obligation. If, by any legitimate process, we can ascertain the law by which human agency is to be regulated, this may be an assistance to us in our endeavours to trace the eternal principles, if such there be, on which this law is founded. We shall thus pursue a course, not only more becoming the modesty of created intellects, so liable to be bewildered and lost in indefinite abstractions, but at the same time more likely to conduct us to a satisfactory conclusion.

question for

the rule;

be a subject

moral go

With regard, then, to the rule, or standard, by Primary which human conduct ought to be regulated, ascertaining and conformity to which is virtue, it appears to whether man me, that there is one fundamental question, the of God's answer to which leads immediately to its deter-vernment. mination it is the simple question, whether man be indeed a subject of the government of the Deity?—Now, I am not going to enter into any proof, either of the existence of one God, or of his sustaining the character of Moral Ruler of the universe. These are points which I must be permitted to assume, as settled data,

points on all hands conceded by those who enter into any discussions on the nature and obligations of virtue. Yet, if the moral

government of God be granted, and the consequent subjection of man to that government, it evidently follows, as an instant and

LECT. V. unavoidable sequence, without even a single link of intermediate reasoning, that the rule by which

will of the

supreme

Governor

rule.

his conduct is to be regulated must be-THE If he be, the WILL OF The Supreme GovERNOR.—The question with regard to the way or ways in which that must be his will is made known to his subjects-how they are put in possession of the rule or law-is quite a distinct inquiry. As a general and primary principle, it is to my mind axiomatically evident, that the rule or law of the subject's conduct can be nothing else than a declaration, in what way soever imparted, of the will of the sovereign Ruler. The two propositions, indeed, that man is a subject of the Divine Governor, and that the will of the Divine Governor is his law, I cannot but regard as of identically the same import. If there be a God, and if man, as a moral and responsible agent, be the subject of his government, I confess myself unable to imagine any answer but one to the question, What is the rule by which he is to act, and by which he is to be tried?—the answer, namely, which has just been given the supreme will. I have no idea of arriving at this conclusion by a circuitous process of argumentation. The evidence of it seems to me to be involved in the evidence of the divine existence. If there be a God, he must rule; and if he rules, his will must be law. The higher inquiry,-what it is by which that will itself is determined, is not the question for the