Justification

“ When the article of justification is lost, nothing remains except error, hypocrisy, godlessness, and idolatry. ”

“ In eo quod solvimus est aliqua ratio meriti.the other, that is, workes, challenge to themselves: the one will aspire no higher, but to be the instrumentall cause of free remission: the other can sit no lower, but to be the matter of Justification, if any cause at all. For if works be accounted to us in the roome or place of exact obedience in free Justification, doe they not supply the place? are they not advanced to the dignity of works compleate and perfect in Justification from justice? ”

“ By affirming that this faith is the term or "condition of justification," I mean, First, that there is no justification without it. "He that believeth not is condemned already;" and so long as he believeth not, that condemnation cannot be removed, but "the wrath of God abideth on him." As "there is no other name given under heaven," than that of Jesus of Nazareth, no other merit whereby a condemned sinner can ever be saved from the guilt of sin; so there is no other way of obtaining a share in his merit, than "by faith in his name." ”

“ Are judges to interpret the law according to the letter, and not the spirit? What right have you to enter into a compact with yourself that you will do thus or so, against the light within you? Is it for you to make up your mind,--to form any resolution whatever,--and not accept the convictions that are forced upon you, and which ever pass your understanding? ”

“ There are cases when, with a clear consciousness of the rectitude of our purpose, and a strong confidence in the justice of our judgment, we must step over all human laws, be the result to ourselves what it may. ”

“ In every judgment there is an act of verification or of contradiction, an approval or rejection, and the standard for these judgments, the idea of truth, must be something external to that on what it is acting. ”

“ Can we discover any characteristic, over and above the mere fact that they are right, which belongs to absolutely all voluntary actions which are right, and which at the same time does not belong to any except those which are right? And similarly: Can we discover any characteristic, over and above the mere fact that they are wrong, which belongs to absolutely all voluntary actions which are wrong, and which at the same time does not belong to any except those which are wrong? ”

“ First, that the conscience, being a complex faculty or power, its particular judgments of duty in particular cases, being judgments of application of the principle of rightness, are reached often through very complex processes, in which the obscuration of imperfect information, or misconception of the relations involved, or the misleading effect of prejudice created by wrong training, or some falsely imagined divine authority, may leave not only a state of doubt as to duty, but throw the decision into error. ”

“ For example, how can it be said that we become just, by doing just things? If we can do just things, in order to acquire the virtue of justice, we are surely just already, and antecedent to the practice of justice. ”

“ To find practical definite methods by which you shall make it somebody's duty to see that the great principles you declare are not violated, by which if an attempt be made to violate them the responsibility may be fixed upon the guilty individual—those, in my judgment, are the problems to which you should specifically and most earnestly address yourselves. ”

“ But most of those who hold that an action can be both right and wrong are, I think, in fact influenced by certain considerations, which do admit of argument. They hold certain views, from which this conclusion follows; and it is only because they hold these views, that they adopt the conclusion. ”

“ Shall I be called to heavy judgment now for an act which, when done, was forbidden by no law, and received no reproach, because in the course of years there is found a set of men whose common sense condemns the deed! ”

“ He learned to pore over law papers, to seek out flaws and errors, to look for any thing that might convey a double meaning, to track the tortuous and narrow paths by which that power which bears the name of Justice reaches the clear light of truth, or falls into the thorny deep of error. ”

“ Does it not seem to you to be rather an anomaly that justice, which in the abstract is impeccable, too often depends on other issues which have no possible bearing on the merits of the dispute itself? ”

“ The point before us is not why we are under obligation to do a right act, but why the act is right. Manifestly the rightness of the proposed action is the ground of the obligation to do it; that is, the obligation is grounded on the right. ”

“ But to determine and approve what use we ought to make of those things which thus happen, is the duty of no other than of that reason within us, i.e., of our own judgment; by the decision of which reason we use the incitement, which comes to us from without for that purpose, which reason approves, our natural movements being determined by its authority either to good actions or the reverse. ”

“ And, perhaps, if it were possible, that a set of beings, seemingly as superior in our judgment, as we are in theirs, should appear amongst us, it might be doubted, whether our natural regard to justice would be able to restrain many from falling into the same error. ”

“ So again with our thoughts: in so far as we can suspend our assent to a judgment, and balance reasons for or against accepting it into the general system of our beliefs, the judgment clearly belongs to the external not-self. ”

“ He holds that what he calls 'reasoning' deals only with abstractions, and is not the faculty on which we rely in forming 'judgments.' These judgments, to which we give our 'assent,' and by which we regulate our conduct, are affirmations of the basal personality. ”

“ The words Responsibility, Guilt, Accountability, are taken, like so many other ethical expressions, from Jurisprudence, or rather they come to us from a time when the distinction between the province of Jurisprudence and that of Ethics had not yet been recognized. That I am made accountable for my action means that I stand as the one to whom reward or punishment for the deed is meted out. For what reason the action is rewarded or punished is a question by itself. ”

“ I am the more culpable, as I entirely agree with you in thinking that all our actions should proceed from the fixed principles we have adopted. I never pay a blind deference to the judgment of any man, or any body of men whatever. ”

“ It will be seen that, on these assumptions, we can raise many questions about right and wrong, which seem obviously not to be absurd; and which yet would be quite absurd—would be questions about which we could not hesitate for a moment—if assertions about right and wrong were merely assertions about men’s feelings and opinions, or if the same action could be both right and wrong. ”

“ Ethics and jurisprudence are liable to the remark in common with logic. Almost every writer having taken a different view of some of the particulars which these branches of knowledge are usually understood to include; each has so framed his definition as to indicate beforehand his own peculiar tenets, and sometimes to beg the question in their favor. ”

“ To call any proposition certain, while there is any one who would deny its certainty if permitted, but who is not permitted, is to assume that we ourselves, and those who agree with us, are the judges of certainty, and judges without hearing the other side. ”

“ Such considerations should be kept in mind, in our judgments on such cases, and it should not be presumed, either in argument or judgment, that such classes of men have not a sense of truth fully up to their perception of moral obligation in its bearing upon those who do, from necessity, the rougher out-door work of life. ”

“ Inevitably, therefore, the doctrine of a particular case 'is not allowed to end with its enunciation and * * * an expression in an opinion yields later to the impact of facts unforeseen.' Jaybird Mining Co. ”

“ If your objects and opinions have been misunderstood, if the measures and principles of others have been wrongfully imputed to you, as I believe they have been, that you should leave an explanation of them, would be an set of justice to yourself. ”

“ All I can do, and all I shall attempt to do, is to put before you that kind of judgment which has been formed by a man, who, of course, is liable to judge erroneously; but, at any rate, of one whose business and profession it is to form judgments upon questions of this nature. ”

“ Our whole natural thinking, as shall be distinctly proved in the body of this work, consists of a series of judgments, each of which involves a mental contradiction,—in other words, controverts a necessary truth or law of reason. ”

“ Why any man, judge or no judge, who wished to prepare an argument on one side of a question should think fit to cast that argument for convenience' sake in the form of a judicial summing-up of both sides is, and must remain, a puzzle. ”

“ And secondly, we often judge that Law as it exists does not completely realise Justice; our notion of Justice furnishes a standard with which we compare actual laws, and pronounce them just or unjust. ”

“ It seems to me that this demand is at the bottom of the philosopher's effort to prove that truth is absolute and of the jurist's search for criteria of universal validity which he collects under the head of natural law. ”

“ Jurisprudence corresponds to physiology, Morality to psychology. The laws of reason regarding jurisprudence and moral theory, when transformed into natural laws, give the principles of physiology and psychology. ”

“ To obviate the prejudices, the injustice, and the waste of time to which the admission of such evidence would lead, and bearing in mind the extent to which it might be carried, and that litigants are mortal, it is necessary not only to adhere to the rule, but to lay it down strictly. ”

“ We are told indeed that justice is a state or disposition of the mind, the disposition to render to everyone his right or, as put by Aristotle, is the disposition to distribute according to desert. It [Pg 28] was this statement that captured the medieval jurists and which they made their text, but it is now regarded as incomplete and even inaccurate. One may have the disposition, the desire, the will, to render to every one his right, but unless he can know what is his fellow's right he may unwittingly fail to accord it to him and thus unwittingly do injustice. ”

“ That becomes the criterion to which every idea or judgment is subjected. All that upholds the established authority is good, and therefore true; all that tends to weaken it is bad and therefore false. ”

“ Thus to bring the propositions to the true basis upon which they rest serves at once, without more, to establish their absolute want of foundation, and to demonstrate the correctness of the judgment below and the duty to affirm it. ”

“ For if it follows that some vices are not greater than others, because no addition can be made to that chief good which you describe, since it is quite evident that the vices of all men are not equal, you must change your definition of the chief good. For we must inevitably maintain this rule, that when a consequence is false, the premises from which the consequence proceeds cannot be true. ”

“ It is an essential point that the two ingredients of a judicial cognisance, the judgment as to the state of the fact, and the judgment as application of the law to it, should, as at bottom different sides, be exercised as different functions. ”

“ It may be held, namely, that, whenever we assert that an action or class of actions is right or wrong, we must be merely making an assertion about somebody’s feelings towards the action or class of actions in question. ”

“ Convictions are permanent, unchangeable ideas: based on facts and supported by satisfactory evidence, they rest on the bed-rock of truth. Few minds indeed, particularly on the larger and fundamental issues, can claim the right to convictions. ”

“ From this it is already evident, why the question respecting the definition of an abstract name is often one of so much difficulty. The question, What is justice? is, in other words, What is the attribute which mankind mean to predicate when they call an action just? ”

“ I failed to keep my word, believing that the interests of the Cause could be better served by what I have here undertaken than by the fulfilment of my primal duty. But we are not allowed the free exercise of our own judgment, else what man could be depended on? ”

“ The sources of objective moral judgment in the world of time and circumstance are also thus laid open to the experience of each mind, in the power to consult the public judgment and to verify or correct the private judgment by it. ”