The Moral System by J. H. W.

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jun 16, 1863

The Moral System.

By J. H. W.

(Continued.)

V. VOLUNTARY SUBSTITUTION

1. Recognizes the claims of law. I have supposed substitution wherein all parties are satisfied—all conflicts reconciled. But if the law were unjust, if the accused were not really guilty of a wrong, the act of condemning would be tyrannical. There could then be no satisfaction either to justice, or to the condemned, or his substitute. Hence to obtain the desired result, there must be acquiescence in the justness of the proceeding, which is a recognition of the justice of the law which condemned.

2. It honors and maintains the government. I have shown that every infringement on the claims of law, every departure from strict justice is a violation of common rights, and endangers the government. Whatever honors and vindicates the claims of law and justice, tends to maintain the government; and of course to vindicate personal rights under it. This voluntary substitution does, as has been shown.

3. It dispenses mercy; which could not otherwise be offered consistently with the great principles of right and justice. Hence all the objects of government—justice and mercy—truth and love—meet in this arrangement. This is precisely what I understand by an atonement. Not a thing to be deprecated, as some have vainly imagined; but to be loved and esteemed, as a certain vindication of right and justice, and a beneficent dispensation of love and mercy.

We notice here that the atonement affects our relation to the government in two respects, looking to the past and to the future. To the past, in that it frees from condemnation for past offenses; and to the future, in that it recognizes the claims of the law, thus binding us to future obedience to the law.

But some affect to discover no harmony between these objects; though it is plain that a proposed atonement which should lose sight of either of these would fail to unite justice and mercy: it would leave the sinner condemned or dishonor the government. It may however be noticed further.

VI. AN ATONEMENT IS NECESSARY.

1. Future obedience will not justify the guilty. To argue this seems hardly necessary, as it has been shown that justice and mercy meet in no way, but by an atonement. But some deny the use, by which I suppose they mean the necessity, or justness, of obeying a law which will not justify the guilty. But the difficulty lies only in their own oversight. They make no distinction between justifying the innocent and the guilty. The innocent are justified by law; the guilty cannot be. But the innocent are justified by law only if they remain innocent; that is, if they continue to obey. While the transgressor, already condemned, is not freed from condemnation of past offense by future obedience.

In this I only claim what is settled as a principle of action in legal and even in commercial transactions. He who killed last year cannot offer in justification that he has not killed this year. The judge has no right to listen to the plea of the thief, that he has not recently stolen, while the evidence of his past guilt is clear. It does not release a man from a past debt to pay for what he buys to-day. Present justice and present morality simply answer a present demand, leaving the past unsettled. But, query, for those referred to in the beginning of this paragraph. If the law condemns a thief, and he can only be cleared by pardon, does the granting of a pardon release him from obligation to keep the law, leaving him free to steal thereafter?

2. We have no ransom to bring. The demand of the government is obedience; and the duty is perpetual. Any cessation or suspension is a break in the chain which we cannot restore. We cannot on one day perform the duties of another, in such a manner as to suspend obligations on that other day. And the idea I wish to enforce now is this: no substitute for obedience can be accepted. Hence the transgressor could not save himself, even though he retained all his original strength to obey; but the following truth is well-known.

3. We are incapacitated by immoral practices. In this I appeal to the consciousness of every candid, reflecting mind. We all acknowledge ourselves to be subjects of temptation, and often find in ourselves a proneness to do that which our convictions forbid. If we allow ourselves to do wrong these feelings become still stronger, and we are less able to resist the temptation. Wrong doing becomes a habit, hard to resist or overcome. Thus, he who has a moderate desire to drink ardent spirits, will find that desire greatly strengthened by indulgence: and it will finally, if indulged too far, bring him completely under its control. This is the tendency of all wrong-doing. But we all feel conscious of having done more or less wrong; and it is but reasonable to say we have done more than we are conscious of, inasmuch as we have not been sufficiently tenacious of the right, nor very watchful to observe our own wrongs. And according to the plain truth herein stated, we have become weak according to the wrong we have done; and so much the more need the assistance of a third party to set us right with the power we have offended.

An Atonement must not only unite justice and mercy, and reconcile the transgressor to the law; but the perpetuity and stability of the government should be the first consideration, as they are first in importance in our relations and duties, because on them the perpetuity of all private relations and rights depend. We all assent to this, that public good should be held paramount to private interest. But these only come in conflict, when we place ourselves in opposition to the government. Hence, if our interest conflicts with the government, which is the conservator of general rights, it is proved to be a selfish interest. For, had we honored and sustained the government in our lives or actions, it would justify or sustain us; but if our rights are forfeited by disobedience, wherein is the government to blame? Because the transgressor has sacrificed his own rights, it is not therefore reasonable to ask that justice be dishonored, and the rights of others sacrificed for his benefit. As right should be the first consideration in all transactions, the interest of the government, which is right, should certainly be held paramount to the good of the transgressor, who is wrong. Therefore in making an atonement the upholding of law—the maintaining of governmental authority should be held as of the first importance. This is, indeed, the only manner in which an atonement can honor the government in behalf of which it is made.

By a single violation of law we forfeit our rights and privileges; but by persisting in such violation, or inducing others so to do, and thus disregard the authority of law, we take the rank of rebels or traitors against the government. Let us examine this subject briefly. The following propositions are plain:

1. Treason is the highest crime. He who commits murder takes a life, but he who seeks to subvert the law, seeks the destruction of life's safeguard; of that which is to protect life by preventing and punishing crime. Hence it is the aggregation of all crimes.

2. The Government has the sole right to free therefrom. By this I mean that the government has the sole right to dictate the terms or conditions by which the rebel may be restored to citizenship. This is true also, in regard to all crimes for which pardon is desired. And this right, government ought to exercise. No one who has any regard for violated rights, for down-trodden justice, for the sacred principles of law and order, could be willing to see the traitor unconditionally restored to place and favor. No government would be safe pursuing such a course; neither could it command respect.

He who will not accept the conditions is a traitor still. If the government has the sole right to dictate terms to rebels which all must allow, then the transgressor can only change his relations to the government by accepting those terms; and if he refuses to accept them, he of course persists in maintaining his position in rebellion. Or to substitute terms of his own would be no better; but rather an insult to the government, a denial of its right and authority. If a traitor were to dictate how crimes should be treated, government would be a farce, and become the contempt of honest men. Therefore two things must be required of a transgressor or rebel, which only can be accepted, to wit:
Unqualified submission to the laws which have been transgressed, and,
A hearty acceptance of the plan or conditions offered for his restoration.

Pardon granted on any other terms tends to iniquity, violating the principles of right and justice, and subverting government.

It is unnecessary to argue, but well to mention, that a substitute, to render satisfaction to justice, must be free from condemnation in his own life; he must be innocent in the sight of the law, or free from its transgression. For one criminal to offer his life for another would not be any satisfaction to justice, seeing his own was already forfeited.

RIGHTS OF SUBJECTS.

While advocating the claims of the government, I would not lose sight of the truth that the subjects have claims on justice also. As very much is due from the subjects to the government, so something is due from the government to the subjects. It is expected of a government to establish its laws, and of the subjects to obey them; but it should be able to present tangible and substantial claims to obedience. We notice, then,

1. The government must plainly reveal its laws. It is recorded of a certain tyrant, that he caused his laws to be posted at such a height that they could not be read, and then punished those who did not keep them. This was injustice—it was indeed tyranny. It is law that defines our duty; and in order that obedience may be justly enforced, such declaration of duty should be clear and distinct: not left to supposition or to doubtful inference. We have before considered that a moral government, a system above nature, is acknowledged; but what is due to that government our consciousness or moral sense does not inform us. On this point our opinions, if not guided by revelation, will be as various as our impulses, our interests, or the difference of our circumstances and education.

But if our duties be left to our own judgments, with our conflicting feelings and interests, our determinations will be so various, that confusion and anarchy must unavoidably be the result. It would be in truth, no law—no government. Was ever a government known that proclaimed no laws, but left all actions entirely to the choice of the subjects? No! there could be no government under such conditions. Shall we then admit that God, the Creator of heaven and earth, is a moral Governor, and this we do by admitting a Moral System, and yet deny his justice, his wisdom, and in fact his very government, by denying the revelation of his will, or law to man? Such a denial is too unreasonable for me; it involves conclusions too absurd and derogatory to the divine character. It is really sinking Deity below our ideas of a human governor.

But again: as it is the prerogative of the government to ordain its laws, so it is its sole prerogative, as we have seen, to determine the means whereby a rebel may be restored to citizenship, and as the law must be plainly revealed to serve the purposes of justice, so,

2. The government must plainly reveal the conditions of pardon. The right to ordain conditions being exclusively in the government, the subjects or offenders can have no means of ascertaining them, except by direct revelation. If left without this they can never be restored, for it would be absurd to leave the offenders to devise their own means. That would be to place the dearest rights of the government into the hands of criminals: a thought unworthy of consideration. In all this we plainly see that one demand of justice, is a written revelation. And so reasonable is this, so consistent with the plainest principles of justice, that, instead of objecting to a written revelation, every one that is capable of reasoning correctly should expect such a revelation, as strictly necessary to the moral government of God.

CONCLUDING REMARKS AND QUESTIONS.

1. If God has instituted morals, he is a moral Governor, and has a moral law; for there can be no government without a law. If there is a moral law it must be the only rule and standard of morality; and it follows that we can only determine a man's character in a moral point of view, by comparing his life with the law of God—the moral rule. And whoever has violated that law has lost his moral character by such violation, as surely as that morality consists in obedience to moral law. But we are all conscious of having violated the principles of right and justice; most of our race in a most glaring manner. All around us are evidences that man has ruined himself by sin. How may he be acquitted and restored?

2. We have considered that the government has the sole right to dictate the terms whereby man may be restored to favor. We trace a plain distinction between the systems of nature, and morality; but in neither, can we discover the measure of obedience due to the divine government, or the method or means, whereby we may be reconciled to our Creator. How shall we obtain this information?

3. We have seen the utter inability of man to save himself from the penalty of his transgressions, and his imperative necessity of a mediator to atone for us, and to vindicate justice in our pardon. And our fellow men are all in the same condition, as helpless and unworthy as ourselves. Who shall act as our mediator?

My dear friend! turn not hastily away from these thoughts; pause and reflect. You have talked of reason; boasted of reason: "Come now and let us reason together." Can you deny or invalidate the positions taken in the preceding pages? If not, as I believe you cannot, can you answer the three questions above? Can you tell me to a certainty what duty you owe to your Creator? or on what principle you expect to be justified before God? or by whom or by what means you may be restored after offending? Can you tell me how and where we may learn all this? Is it in Nature? Do you not need a written revelation?

Again, would it not serve the cause of justice, and the true purpose of government, to have the laws of our lives, moral laws, published for the benefit of those amenable thereto? Surely it would. So far from being astonished at the idea of a written revelation,—a publication of the Divine laws, we should expect it; justice demands it. And, if we could not produce such a document, would you not esteem it an oversight in the Governor?

Once more: An atonement has been supposed to lead to immorality. But according to what has been proved it is the only possible method of restoring the sinner to favor which does not lead to immorality. I will readily grant that any theory by which the atonement is claimed to have abolished the law, or relaxed its claims, leads to immorality. But can that lead to it, which acknowledges the justice of law, removes rebellion and restores the wrong-doer to obedience? You will see that this objection arises, not from any defect in the system of the atonement, but from the ignorance of the objector as to what that system is. There is as much difference between pardon and license, as there is between liberty and licentiousness; and he who cannot discern the difference is to be pitied.

Now if it can be shown, as I claim it can, that the Bible is in perfect harmony with these principles, and enforces them strictly, there will remain no reasonable objection against receiving it as a revelation from the great "Law Giver." To this we turn our attention.

(To be Continued.)