» A. H. Smith, Chinese Characteristiei, 228. * Mrs. Norton.
GENESIS IV. 9 135
consoiousness of self-degrading fault ? "I am not responsible ; this tendency to evil, intemperance, gambling, impurity, is the burden of heredity. I might as well blame myself for the shape of my head or the colour of my eyes as for the inevitable dis- positions which determine my conduct. I am not responsible." And all the while we are proving the falseness of the excuse we urge. Wfjy the need to urge an excuse if, indeed, we are not responsible ? Did we ever find ourselves compelled to seek such excuse for the shape of our head or the colour of our eyes ? Whence, then, this necessity here, where morality is in question, when our own behaviour is at stake ? The parallel, in truth, is demonstrated to be a false one by the very process of its assertion. This plea of necessity is but a "refuge of lies" to which the guilty fly; for "conscience does make cowards of us all."
2. The second part of Cain's answer, "Am I my brother's keeper?" was an insult. To what a shameful pitch of pre- sumptuous insolence had Cain arrived when he could thus insult the Lord God. A man may blaspheme and blaspheme frightfully, but it is usually because he forgets God, and ignores His presence. Cain, however, was conscious that God was speaking to him. He heard Him say, " Where is Abel thy brother?" and yet he dared, with the coolest impertinence, to reply to God, " I know not : am I my brother's keeper ? " As much as to say — " Do you think that I have to keep him as he keeps his sheep? Am I a shepherd as he was, and am I to take as much care of him as he did of a lame lamb ? " The cool insolence of Cain is an indication of the state of heart which led up to his murdering his brother; and it was also a part of the result of his having committed that terrible crime. He would not have proceeded to the cruel deed of bloodshed if he had not first cast off the fear of God and been ready to defy his Maker. Having committed murder, the hardening influence of sin upon Cain's mind must have been intense, and so at last he was able to speak out to God's face what he felt within his heart, and to say, " Am I my brother's keeper ? "
3. Thus, first with a lie, and then with an insult, Cain replies to God's question. But the question is not a negative one, and it
136 AM I MY BROTHER'S KEEPER?
cannot be answered negatively. Men often urge the innocence of their conduct : they say, they are sure that they have never done any one any harm. The excuse is a salve to the conscience of careless people, who are using their lives here for mere pleasure and frivolity. Almost all such persons will tell you that they are doing no harm ; and this is not to be wondered at, because every one who does what is foolish and shortsighted must have some way of justifying himself, otherwise he would hardly act in a foolish and shortsighted way ; and this plea that he is doing no one any harm is the simplest and most plausible that can be set up. But is it likely to be true that a man — even the best of men — has never hurt his neighbour by word or deed ? Many men think so, and there is much to strengthen them in their belief ; it is the commonest thing in the world to hear the most loose and ungodly lives excused upon this plea, that such an one was after all a good kind of man and never did any one any harm. Look closely at this notion of doing no one any harm and see what it is worth. How far will it bear examination ? Is it not really a repetition of the old excuse of Cain, " Am I my brother's keeper ? " If we spend all our time taking the weeds out of our garden, we shall certainly not gather any flowers ; so, if we never get beyond the principle of doing no harm to our neighbour, it is just as certain that we shall do him no good. The question is a positive one, and in some way or other — each man's conscience knows best how — God expects from each one of us the positive answer, / am my brother's keeper.
^ The chief assertion of religious morality is that white is a colour. Virtue is not the absence of vices or the avoidance of moral dangers ; virtue is a vivid and separate thing, like pain or a particular smell. Mercy does not mean not being cruel or sparing people revenge or punishment : it means a plain and positive thing like the sun, which one has either seen or not seen.^
IT Cain lives to-day, and the blood of Abel still cries to God. And there is the Cain spirit in every man who does not accept his responsibility for his brother; living it out honestly and earnestly in everything through the whole seven days of the week. There are dead men and women and children crying with an awful cry. How these cries go up to God. Men who go far up in balloons tell us that they reach a height where the silence