S. Baring-Gould

“ Sin hath no more dominion over us. We are no longer under sin, but under grace. By nature we were in bondage to Satan, who held men in hard servitude, with no power of escape from it, but by Christ’s redemption we have been brought out of the Egypt of bondage, and set in the glorious liberty of the children of God. We are, as S. Paul says, “made free from sin.” We are, by the merits of Christ’s atonement, placed in the same position in which Adam was before he fell. And if we fall after we have been placed in a state of grace, we fall by our own fault. ”

“ If man does, he sins, he is wasting a precious gift of God, and the light that is in him is darkened, he becomes a prey to superstition, ignorance, stupidity. The life of his mind becomes stunted and extinguished. Sin acts on the mind as well as on the body, it distorts its perception of the truth, narrows its view, and leads it to mistake falsehood for truth. ”

“ It is a bit of self-delusion for anyone to suppose that he is fulfilling the law of his being if he merely abstains from those things prohibited. We have positive obligations laid on us, and these positive obligations the enlightened and healthy Conscience points out to us. Not only must we abstain from anger, but we must cultivate love. Not only must we avoid revenge, but we must do good to them that despitefully use us and persecute us. [16] Not only must we avoid gluttony and drunkenness, but we must cultivate self-denial. ”

“ It is only when the will is free that it can act so as to make what is done guilty or innocent.
Take the converse. A man may speak the truth, or give a large sum in charity, because he is forced to do this, not because he wishes to do it. He acts against his intention and desire. The act is good, but there is no merit in what he has done, for it is done under constraint. So it is possible that an act in itself wrong may be done under such overwhelming compulsion that all exercise of freedom and determination is impossible. ”

“ We are of course bound to be ever on our guard against temptation; but that sin into which we have fallen unintentionally does not carry with it the same guilt to the soul as if it had been done with deliberation. “Be not high-minded, but fear,” says the Apostle. The Evil One is ever on the watch to entrap us when [71] unprepared into sin. And though a sin committed inadvertently may not be mortally sinful, yet it may, and probably will, carry with it the temporal consequences just the same as if it had been committed deliberately. “Watch and pray lest ye enter into temptation.” ”

“ We have seen that Conscience, enlightened by Divine Revelation and assisted by Understanding, obtains a clear knowledge of God’s Will, and its application to the several conditions in which man is placed in his course through life.
We have seen how that it is not sufficient for man to know what is to be done, he must also know how it is to be done, and this is where Prudence is needed.
But Prudence is not enough. Prudence may be so timorous as to dissuade from action altogether, and may neutralise the effect of the promptings of Conscience. Prudence sees dangers, and it may magnify dangers. ”

“ Conscience advises when there is a choice between two ways, each good, but one more good than the other. In that case it points to the higher and nobler course of action, that which, perhaps, costs more to us, is more arduous, and most painful. It does not require us, under pain of condemnation, to take the higher course, it merely recommends it as the superior, and shows that there is no sin incurred by choosing that which is inferior. ”

“ We are surrounded by God’s good things of creation, but we must look up through nature to God Himself, not let nature arrest our attention. So with human beings, we should love them indeed, but not let love of them take off our hearts from the supreme love of all, that should be given to God. We are guilty of loving the creature above the Creator whenever we allow our love for men, or for things of this world, to make us give up religious duties, cease to care for things spiritual, and to engross our thoughts. ”

“ Reason, moreover, assures us of the existence of Original Sin. In the first place, we know that God is good, and we cannot understand that a good God should have created man, the noblest of the works of creation, to suffering and misery. We feel assured, if we recognize God as good and loving to all His works, that He did not make man to be what he is, full of infirmities, ignorances, narrownesses, liable to suffering intensely acute, to continuous trouble, to decay, to diseases most painful, distressful in every way, loathsome, and finally to complete dissolution. ”

“ Ignorance conceals from the will the inherent evil of a course of action proposed. A Conscience that is not keenly alert to duty, and has not been disciplined in right, sees a course of conduct before it, and sees that it will conduce to great advantage, but is too blunt or gross to be able to distinguish any right or wrong in it. It acts in obedience to the impulse to gain a promising temporal end, without perception of the true nature of the act. ”

“ As Conscience is a gift of God we are responsible to Him for the use we make of it. Conscience is the moral faculty; as the eyes are organs of the faculty of sight, the ears of the faculty of hearing, so has Conscience the faculty of seeing and knowing and distinguishing right from wrong. As God has given us sight and hearing we exercise these faculties, and, what is more, cultivate them. So, as God has given us the moral faculty, we exercise it, and cultivate it, if we desire to fulfil the ends for which God has created us. ”

“ Avarice is a sin when we desire the good things of this world inordinately. “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.” ”

“ Bad habit encourages the will to consent to evil by recalling the pleasure or advantages obtained by past yielding to temptation, and invites it to a continuance. Moreover bad habit blunts Conscience, and removes all sharpness of perception as to the right or wrong of an act. Bad habits are easily acquired, and when once they get hold of a man are eradicated with difficulty. Everyone therefore should be watchful against the beginnings of a habit that may be bad, that is not assuredly good, for what may be bad will in the long-run become actually bad. ”

“ Having seen what Original Sin is, we come now to Actual Sin. Original Sin, we have seen, was a partial paralysis of man’s better nature, a confusion of his faculties, and a rendering him incapable of, by himself, attaining a recovery. It is a passive state of inability towards good, and of subjection to evil. Actual Sin is quite other—it consists in sinning voluntarily. ”

“ The imagination represents in lively colours to the will [55] the charms, the delights of some action which the Conscience recognizes as forbidden. Not only so, but the imagination exaggerates these charms, these delights, so as to form a most alluring picture which the will has a difficulty in rejecting. ”

“ The transgression of God’s Law affords them no gratification, the prospect of transgression holds out to them nothing but a deepening of their woe; nevertheless, their wills have become so set in opposition that they hate what is good, and love what is evil, simply because good is good and evil is evil. The more any man suffers his will to deflect from the Will of God, and he allows himself consciously to choose evil, the nearer he approaches to this condition of rooted and hopeless antagonism [79] to God, and separation from the source of life, light, and happiness. ”

“ Desire the good things of this world for the sole gratification they yield to our senses, when they minister to our luxury. When we love them for a selfish reason, and value them only as they minister to the comfort, ease, indulgence, and pampering of self. ”

“ Man is sent into this world to do some good to others, to fill some social gap, and to educate his mind, discipline his body, and cultivate his soul. But luxury bids him distract his mind from serious pursuits, and seek distraction as an end. Luxury, instead of bracing, enervates the body, and it neglects the soul, if it does not cover it with stains. ”

“ Conscience, in the order of religious life, is that which the Court of Justice is in the order of public life, a court that has been instituted by the legislature to keep discipline and well-being in the State, to protect the individual in his person, his property, and his repute.
Thus Conscience takes the general laws of God and explains them in their bearings on our own conduct, and applies them to our several cases. Also, Conscience sees to the execution of the law—that it shall be obeyed as well as acknowledged. Also, Conscience punishes every infraction of the law. ”

“ As God is the author of unity, so is Satan the source of all schism. God brings men together, and inspires to the sacrifice of their individual caprices to the general good; the Evil One, on the other hand, urges to the undue exaltation of the individual self, so as to procure separation. He is the cause of discord in families, of the sapping of the principles of unity in the State, and to heresies and schisms that rend the Church. ”

“ Sin is a violation of the Commandments of God, and as such is incited to either by the Devil, who is the enemy of God, or by the carnal nature which desires its own ends regardless of what conduces to the exaltation of the superior nature, or by the world, which desires to lower the general moral tone of men to a vulgar and easy level. It is therefore a dereliction from God’s Law, a turning away from God’s Order, a choosing of what is either against His Will, or not wholly in accordance with His Will. It is therefore always evil, and always deserves punishment, and always leads to suffering. ”

“ The weakening of the human will. The will is not only inherently weakened by having given way to evil, but it is continuously weakened by the uncertainty it is in how to decide, by the darkening of the understanding, so that duties are not always clear, nor consequences certain. The will to do what is right is by no means strong, since Adam and Eve turned their will away from God; the human will has acquired a bent that inclines it not always to follow the right. ”

“ When the moral sanction is certain, prudence is not called in to alter the conduct essentially, only that it may order it so as to be carried out advisably; but when an opinion is probable, and not certain, then the eye of the reason may be, and ought to be, directed to the future consequences, and the judgment formed, not only on the antecedent probabilities, but also on the probable consequences, good or evil. As prudence can only judge future probabilities, it may not countermand what has certain sanction. ”

“ Sin causes a stain or scar on the soul. But this stain or scar is not to be regarded as having a positive existence, but to be a privation. A stain is a deficiency in whiteness, as a scar is a defect in healthy smoothness. We are restored as far as guilt goes, by our Baptism, to a state of innocence before God, the infirmity and liability to Sin remains in us, but no condemnation before God. Our souls are white and sound, white as bleached linen, sound as an untorn garment. ”

“ As long as the spiritual life is healthy, man’s moral life is also healthy, for indeed the moral life is only another aspect of the same divine life in man. But if man delivers himself up to Sin, then this moral power in him is weakened, it ceases to speak distinctly, it becomes confused, and finally ceases to speak altogether.
It is possible by continuance in sin to extinguish the spiritual life altogether. If the mind be not employed, then it sinks into inertness and death of the rational and intellectual faculties, and unless the soul be allowed to grow and expand, it also will languish. ”

“ The Scrupulous Conscience is a niggling Conscience that vexes itself about inconsiderable matters, and magnifies trifles into things of importance.
The Scrupulous Conscience is that which has no sense of proportion. In a large number of cases it is vastly particular over matters of indifference, and supremely indifferent about matters of importance. It is a Conscience that never goes back to first principles. ”

“ Where there is complete ignorance of the nature of the act, so long as that ignorance is not voluntary, there the guilt of the act is not mortal, though the act itself may be a grave offence. So also the manner in which the will gives its consent materially aggravates or lessens the guilt of a sin. If the act be known beforehand to be forbidden, and yet the will consents to it, it violates Conscience, and the guilt is grave; but when a transgression is the result of unpremeditation, a surprise, and the will has not had time given it to act, there the guilt is slight. ”

“ By Jealousy men are excited the one against the other. They envy each other the place, the wealth, the respect, that they have obtained. All men cannot have the same position, the same wealth, and the same respect; there must be difference among the members of the community, as there are differences among the members of the body. Sin is an attack on Society when, through envy, it stirs up class jealousies, and stimulates hostility between different members of the social body. ”

“ Pride is the love and estimation man has for himself beyond measure. Every man should have a proper pride in himself as a creature of God, an heir of everlasting life, and so maintain his dignity and self-respect, not degenerating into buffoonery, and making himself a laughing-stock to men. ”

“ We must respect the persons, the property, and the good name of our neighbours. Our duties to ourselves are to educate and develop all those faculties, physical, mental, and spiritual, God has put in us, to keep our bodies in temperance, soberness, and chastity; to cultivate our reason and our intelligence—the reason so as to be able to form just judgments, and the intelligence so as to be able and eager to acquire knowledge ”

“ It is because all will not accept His redemption; they refuse the benefits He offers, reject His precious blood, and will have nothing to do with His salvation. Brought, may be, out of darkness into light, they go back into thraldom to the Evil One, trample on God’s mercy, and wilfully resist Him. Grace and pardon are offered to all, but all will not receive.
No man, not even the heathen, is lost eternally, except by wilful opposition to what he knows to be the truth. ”

“ It sometimes happens that in spite of efforts made to attain to a right Conscience, it remains in the same distorted and false condition as before. Either the mental faculties are insufficient to rectify it, the judgment is cramped, and habit or prejudice has obtained too strong a hold to be overcome. In such a case the Conscience is invincibly wrong, but nevertheless, its promptings must be obeyed. God, Who sees all things, and is full of mercy, will make allowances, only not for disobeying the mandate of Conscience. ”

“ We have considered the first and most terrible Sin, that of the Revolt of the creature against the Creator. We might indeed consider all transgression as a rebellion of the will against the Divine Will, but it is not always so. It is not a rebellion of the will altogether, and consciously against God as Ruler, but it is a transgression of a single command, either through stress of temptation or through carelessness. ”

“ There is no sin in the feeling of the heart when we are sad or wrath at persons obtaining advantages which they do not deserve. This is Indignation, and springs out of a wounded sense of justice. But such indignation must not prompt us to disparage, backbite, and injure those who have succeeded without just cause for success. ”