4. Man, as an integral part of the world, consists of two ele- ments, or stands related both to the finite and infinite, God and nature. There is in man self-consciousness, or a consciousness which is affected bj the world. He is in the world and of the world, and is acted upon by the world. On the other hand, he has what Schleiermacher calls Gottesbewusstseyn, or God-consciousness. This is not merely a consciousness of God, but is God in us in the form of consciousness.
5. The normal, or ideal, state of man consists in the absolute and uninterrupted control of the God-consciousness, or of God in us. These two principles he sometimes distinguishes as flesh and spirit. But by flesh he does not mean the body ; nor what St. Paul commonly means by it, our corrupt fallen nature ; but our whole nature so far as it stands related to the world. It is tanta- mount, in the terminology of Schleiermacher, to self-conscious- ness. And by spirit he does not mean the reason, nor what the Bible means by the spirit in man, i. e., the Holy Ghost, but the (Gottesbewusstseyn) God-consciousness, or God in us.
6. Religion consists in the feeling of absolute dependence. That is, in the recognition of the fact that God, or the absolute Being,
is the only cause, and that we are merely the form in which his causality is revealed or exercised.
7. The original state of man was not a normal or ideal state. That is, the God-consciousness or divine principle was not strong enough absolutely to control the self-consciousness. That was a state to be reached by progress or development.
8. The feeling which arises from the want of this absolute control of the higher principle is the sense of sin ; and the conviction that the higher principle ought to rule is the sense of guilt. With this feeling of sin and guilt arises the sense of the need of redemption.
9. This redemption consists in giving to the God-consciousness complete control ; and is effected through Christ, who is the normal or ideal man. That is, He is the man in whom the God-conscious- ness, the divine nature, God (these, in this system, are interchange- able terms), was from the beginning completely dominant. We become like Him, i. e., are redeemed, partly by the recognition of his true character as sinless, and partly by communion with Him through his Church.
It is plain that this system precludes the possibility of sin in the true Scriptural sense of the term, —
1. Because it precludes the idea of a personal God. If sin be want of conformity to law, there must be a lawgiver, one wha
140 PART II. Ch. VIIL — sin.
prescribes the rule of duty to his creatures. But in this system tliere is no self-conscious, personal ruler who is the moral governor of men.
2. Because the system denies all efficiency, and of course all liberty to the creature. If the Infinite Being is the only agent, then all that is, is due to his direct efficiency ; and sin, therefore, is either his work or it is a mere negation.
3. Because what, according to this theory, is called sin is abso- lutely universal and absolutely necessary. It is the unavoidable consequence or condition of the existence of such a being as man. That is, of a being with a self-consciousness and a God-conscious- ness, in such proportions and relation that the dominance of the latter can be attained only gradually.
4. Because what are called sin and guilt are only such in our consciousness, or in our subjective apprehension of them. Cei'tain things produce in us the sense of pain, others the feeling of pleas- ure ; some the feeling of approbation, others of disapprobation ; and that by the ordinance, so to speak, of God. But pain and pleasure, right and wi-ong, are merely subjective states. They have no objective reality. We are sinful and guilty only in our own feelings, not in the sight or judgment of God.^ How entirely this view of the subject destroys all true sense of sin; how inconsist- ent it is with all responsibiUty ; how it conflicts with the testimony of our own consciousness and with the teachings of Scripture, must be apparent to all who have not yielded themselves to the control of the pantheistic principles on which this whole system is founded.
The Sensuous Theory.
A sixth theory places the source and seat of sin in the sensuous nature of man. We are composed of body and spirit. Whatever may be the relation of the two, they cannot fail to be recognized as in some sense distinct elements of our nature. All attempts to identify them not only lead to the contradiction of self-evident trutlis, but to the degradation of the spiritual. If the mind be the product of the body, or the highest function of matter, or if the body be the product of the mind, or the external form in which mind exists, in either way the mind is materialized. " It is," says Miiller,^ " the undeniable teaching of history that the obliterating the distinction between spirit and nature always ends in natural-
1 Schleiermacher's Glau>)enslehre. Dr. Gess's Uebersicht uber das iheologische System Schhiermachers. Miiller's Lehre Von der Siinde, vol. i. pp. 412-437. Bretschneider's Bog* matik, pp. 14-38 of Appendix to vol. i. Morell's Philosophy of Religion.
2 Vol. i. p. 363.