extremes the human mind may be carried when abandoned to ita own guidance. He begins with certain axioms, or, as he calls them, truths of the reason, and from these he draws conclusions which are indeed logical deductions, but which shock the moral sense, and proye nothing but that his premises are false. His fundamental principle is that ability limits obligation. Free will is denned to be " the power of choosing, or refusing to choose, in compliance with moral obligation in every instance." \ " Con- sciousness of the affirmation of ability to comply with any requi- sition, is a necessary condition of the affirmation of obligation to comply with that requisition." 2 " To talk of inability to obey moral law, is to talk sheer nonsense." 8
But it is acknowledged that man's ability is confined to acts of the will, therefore moral character can be predicated only of such acts. The acts of the will are either choices or volitions. " By choice is intended the selection or choice of an end. By volition is intended the executive efforts of the will to secure the end in- tended." 4 We are responsible, therefore, only for our choices in the selection of an ultimate end. " It is generally agreed that moral obligation respects strictly only the ultimate intention or choice of an end for its own sake." 6 "I have said that moral obligation respects the ultimate intention only. I am now pre- pared to say, still further, that this is a first truth of reason." 6 " Right can be predicated only of good-will, and wrong only of
selfishness It is right for him [for a man] to intend the
highest good of being as an end. If he honestly does this, he cannot, doing this, mistake his duty, for in doing this he really performs the whole of duty." 7 " Moral character belongs solely to the ultimate intention of the mind, or to choice, as distin- guished from volition." 8
The end to be chosen is " the highest good of being." " Good may be natural or moral. Natural good is synonymous with val- uable. Moral good is synonymous with virtue." 9 Moral good " is only a relative good. It does meet a demand of our being, and therefore produces satisfaction. This satisfaction is the ulti- mate good of being." 10 "I come now to state the point upon which issue is taken, to wit : That enjoyment, blessedness, or mental satisfaction, is the only ultimate good." n "Of what value
1 Lectures on Systematic Theology, by Charles G. Finney, edit. Oberlin, Boston, and New York, 1846, p. 26.
2 Ibid. p. 33. 8 Ibid. p. 4. * Ibid. p. 44. 6 Ibid. p. 26. « Ibid. p. 36. ' Ibid. p. 149.
8 Ibid. p. 157. » Ibid. p. 45. i° Ibid. p. 48. " Ibid. p. 120.
10 pari m. Ch. xv.— regeneration.
is the true, the right, the just, etc., aside from the pleasure or mental satisfaction resulting from them to sentient existences."1
It follows from these principles that men perform their whole duty, and are perfect, if they intend the happiness of being in general. There is no morality in emotions, sentiments, or feel- ings. These are involuntary states of the sensibility, and are in themselves neither good nor bad. " If any outward action or state of the feeling exists, in opposition to the intention or choice of the mind, it cannot by any possibility have moral character. Whatever is beyond the control of a moral agent, he cannot be responsible for."2 " Love may, and often does exist, as every one
knows, in the form of a mere feeling or emotion This
emotion or feeling, as we are all aware, is purely an involuntary state of mind. Because it is a phenomenon of the sensibility, and of course a passive state of mind, it has in itself no mora] character." 8 Gratitude, " as a mere feeiing or phenomenon of the sensibility, .... has no moral character." 4 The same is said of benevolence, compassion, mercy, conscientiousness, etc. The doctrine is, " No state of the sensibility has any moral char- acter in itself." 5 The love which has moral excellence, and which is the fulfilling of the law, is not a feeling of complacency, but " good-will," willing the good or happiness of its object. Should a man, therefore, under the impulse of a benevolent feel- ing, or a sense of duty, perform a right act, he would sin as really as if, under the impulse of malice or cupidity, he should perform a bad act. The illustration is, that to pay a debt from a sense of justice, is as wicked as to steal a horse from acquisitiveness. A man " may be prevented [from committing commercial injustice] by a constitutional or phrenological conscientiousness or sense of justice. But this is only a feeling of the sensibility, and if re- strained only by this, he is just as absolutely selfish as if he had stolen a horse in obedience to acquisitiveness." 6 " If the selfish man were to preach the gospel, it would be only because upon the whole it was most pleasing or gratifying to himself, and not at all for the sake of the good of being as an end. If he should be- come a pirate, it would be exactly for the same reason
Whichever course he takes, he takes it for precisely the same reason ; and with the same degree of light it must involve the same degree of guilt." 7 To feed the poor from a feeling of
1 Lectures on Systematic Theology, by Charles G. Finney, edit. Oberlin, Boston, and New York, 1846, p. 122. « Ibid. p. 164. 8 Ibid. p. 213. . 4 ibid. p. 278.
« Ibid. p. 521. 6 ibid. p. 317, 318. 1 Ibid. p. 355.