always and everywhere. An obligation arising out of circum- stances must vary with circumstances. (4.) When it is oblig- atory to abstain from the use of things indifferent, is a matter of private judgment. No man has the right to decide that ques- tion for other men. No bishop, priest, or church court has the right to decide it. Otherwise it would not be a matter of liberty. Paul constantly recognized the right (!|mxrm) of Christians to judge in such cases for themselves. He does this not by implica- tion only, but he also expressly asserts it, and condemns those who would call it in question. " Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not ; and let not him which eateth not judge him that eateth : for God hath received him. Who art thou that judgest another man's servant ? to his own master he standeth or falleth." " One man esteemeth one day above another : another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind." (Rom. xiv. 3, 4, 5.) It is a common saying that every man has a pope in his own bosom. That is, the dispo- sition to lord it over God's heritage is almost universal. Men wish to have their opinions on moral questions made into laws to bind the consciences of their brethren. This is just as much a usurpation of a divine prerogative when done by a private Chris- tian or by a church court, as when done by the Bishop of Rome. We are as much bound to resist it in the one case as in the other. (5.) It is involved in what has been said that the use which a man makes of his Christian liberty can never be legitimately made the ground of church censure, or a term of Christian communion.
Scriptural Usage of the Word Law. The Scriptures uniformly understand by law a manifestation of the will of God. All the operations of nature are ordered by laws of his appointment. And his will is represented as the ulti- mate foundation of moral obligation. In Hebrew it is called rnin, instruction, because it is, as the Apostle says, " the form of knowledge and of the truth." It is the standard of right and wrong. In Greek it is called vopos, custom, and then, as custom or usage regulates the conduct of men, whatever has that author- ity, or does in fact control action, is called vo/xos. In the New Testament it is constantly used in this wide sense. It is some- times applied to a rule of conduct however revealed ; sometimes to the Scriptures as the supernaturally revealed will of God, as the rule of faith and practice ; sometimes to the Pentateuch or Law of Moses ; and sometimes specifically to the moral law. It
266 PART III. Ch. XIX. — THE LAW.
is here to be taken to mean that revelation of the will of God which is designed to' bind the conscience and to regulate the con- duct of men.
How the Law is revealed.
This law is revealed in the constitution of our nature, and more fully and clearly in the written Word of God. That there is a binding revelation of the law, independently of any supernatural external revelation, is expressly taught in the Bible. Paul says of the heathen that they are a law unto themselves. They have the law written on their hearts. This is proved, he tells us, be- cause they do, <£vo-«, by nature, i. e., in virtue of the constitution of their nature, the things of the law. The same moral acts which the written law prescribes, the conduct of the heathen shows that they know to be obligatory. Hence their conscience approves or disapproves, as they obey or disobey this inwardly revealed law. What is thus taught in Scripture is confirmed by consciousness and experience. Every man is conscious of a knowledge of right and wrong, and of a sense of obligation, which are independent of all external revelation. He may be unable to determine whence that knowledge comes. He knows, however, that it has been in him coeval with the dawn of reason, and has enlarged and strengthened just as his reason unfolded. His con- sciousness tells him that the rule is within, and would be there though no positive or external revelation of duty existed. In other words, we do not refer the sense of moral obligation to an externally revealed law, as its source, but to the constitution of our nature. This is not the experience of any class of men ex- clusively, but the common experience of the race. Wherever there are men, there is the sense of moral obligation, and a knowledge of right and wrong.
It is frequently objected to this doctrine that men differ widely in their moral judgments. What men of one age or country regard as virtues, men of other ages or countries denounce as crimes. But this very diversity proves the existence of the moral sense. Men could not differ in judgments about beauty, if the aesthetic element did not belong to their nature. Neither could they differ on questions of morality unless the sense of right and wrong were innate and universal. The diversity in question is not greater than in regard to rational truths. That men differ in their judgments as to what is true, is no proof that reason is not a natural and essential element of their constitution. As there are certain truths of the reason which are intuitive and perceived