Law of man

“ It is in fact the representative in each man of the universal, immutable, and divine moral law, the {101} law of nature, in conformity with which is the only true freedom and citizenship of the world. ”

“ In a world composed of vanishing forms, I am to vindicate the imperishability, the majesty of law, and to show how man proceeds in his social march in obedience to it," (Ibid. p, 16.) This sounds well; but, unhappily, he has told us that communities and nations, like individuals, are under the control of physical conditions, and therefore of law. If therefore of law, then under the law of physical conditions, and consequently of a physical or physiological law. He dwells on the grandeur of this conception, and challenges for it our deepest admiration. ”

“ But with the 250 apprehension of the Ideal and of the Divine law, three things follow, incentive to progress. Every man has a rule to guide his individual actions; men of good will will associate their efforts for a common end; and they can appeal to a supreme, positive law against those who break it. "In the consciousness of your law of life, which is the law of God, stands the foundation of your morality, the rule of your actions and your duties, the measure of your responsibility." ”

“ The moral law was a reason inherent in human nature, prescribing what men should do, and forbidding what they should not do: human laws were but appendages of it. [391] In this sense man was a “citizen of the world.” ”

“ In vain do we seek freedom under the power of the laws. The laws! Where is there any law? Where is there any respect for law? Under the name of law you have everywhere seen the rule of self-interest and human passion. But the eternal laws of nature and of order exist. ”

“ But, allowing that mankind hath the rule of right within himself yet it may be asked, "What obligations are we under to attend and follow it?" I answer: it has been proved, that man by his nature is a law to himself, without the particular distinct consideration of the positive sanctions of that law ”

“ Thus, we feel, in the bottom of our hearts, that these rules are just and reasonable; that the law of God commands nothing but what is consistent with the real interests of man; that nothing is more consonant to the reasonable creature than gentleness, humanity, temperance, modesty, and all the virtues recommended in the Gospel; that the passions prohibited by the law are the sole source of all our troubles ”

“ In the conscience of man, the process had three principal stages, called by Vane the natural, legal, and evangelical conscience. The natural conscience was the light of those who, having not the law, were by nature a law unto themselves. It was the source of ordinary right and obligation. ‘The original impressions of just laws are in man’s nature and very constitution of being.’ These impressions were at once the source and the limit of the authority of the magistrate. The legal conscience was the source of the ordinances and dogmas of the christian. ”

“ As we are, so we do; and as we do, so is it done to us; we are the builders of our fortunes; cant and lying and the attempt to secure a good which does not belong to us, are, once for all, balked and vain. But, in the human mind, this tie of fate is made alive. The law is the basis of the human mind. In us, it is inspiration; out there in Nature, we see its fatal strength. We call it the moral sentiment. ”

“ It is obvious that here the moral law which is above all relative duties must prevail; and that law depends on no social relation or conception of duty but on the awakened inner perception of man, the moral being. ”

“ The conception of an all-wise, all-good, and all-powerful personal Creator, in whose nature the eternal law is based, not being clear to their minds, so neither was the conception of sin, as the infringement of that law. The law of physical necessity took the place of the eternal moral law: that which man did he did by virtue of the physical constituents out of which he was composed. ”

“ What was the Law of Duty to the Moral Man, is to him the inward movement of the One Life directly revealed as Life; what is the Law of Nature to others is to him the unfolding of the outward and apparently dead substratum of that One Life. ”

“ Then these said, 'Rua talked sense in those days.' I saw there were two laws in the world—one, God's, the other, man's; the law that came from the Spirit, and the law that comes from man's mind. But it is God's law that should direct man. ”

“ Viewed as an object not in man, justice is the constitution or fundamental law of the moral universe, the law of right, a rule of conduct for man in all his moral relations. Accordingly all human affairs must be subject to that as the law paramount; what is right agrees therewith and stands, what is wrong conflicts and falls. Private cohesions of self-love, of friendship, or of patriotism, must all be subordinate to this universal gravitation towards the eternal right. ”

“ The obligation of either to the soul would destroy its free agency. God has made man intelligent, and thereby adapted his nature to a rule which he understands. Man has a will and a conscience; but he must understand the rule in order to will obedience, and he must believe the sanction by which the law is maintained before he can feel the obligation upon his conscience. A law, therefore, adapted to man's nature, must be addressed to the understanding, sanctioned by suitable authority, and enforced by adequate penalties. ”

“ A law by which every claim of right may be immediately adjusted as far as the private conscience requires to be informed; a law, of which every man may find the exposition in his own breast, and which may always be observed without any other qualifications than honesty of intention, and purity of will. ”

“ The moderns, understanding, by the term law, merely a rule prescribed to a moral being, that is to say intelligent, free and considered in his relations to other beings, consequently confine the jurisdiction of natural law to man, an the only animal endowed with reason. ”

“ What that is in man by which he is naturally a law to himself, is explained in the following words: which shows the work of the law written in their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts the meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another. ”

“ Why are we thus loyal to law? First, because we make the laws ourselves, and for ourselves; and next, because the laws actually represent the conscience of the people, and help them keep the laws of God. The value of human laws is only this—to conserve the great eternal law of God ”

“ It possesses its authority, therefore, in the fact that it is the discernment of something higher than our will or ourselves, a principle transcending our personality and appearing as supreme law for our life and conduct. And the law connotes a lawgiver and a judge. The conscience thus puts us in the presence of One who has sovereign and absolute right to rule in us and over us. ”

“ Law’s doctrine, and I conceive it to be this: that it is admirably suited for the contemplative but not for the active life of man, inasmuch as it does not bring the outward man into entire subjection to the inner man, for man has two lives, or two beings, in his very best state while on earth.’... ”

“ So the moral objective of every law is the same, viz., to bring out and develop the spiritual in man. To accomplish this great end it is necessary that the evil principles of a carnal, or fleshly nature, should be restrained by the penal sanctions of law, and the principles of man's higher nature brought out by its motives of good. Such being the nature of principles, and the facts of law, Paul says, “We know that the law is spiritual.” ”

“ I will write my laws on their hearts;—hence the prayer, Lord have mercy upon us and write all these thy laws on our hearts we beseech thee? The first law wrote on the heart is the moral law; this is sent home to shew us our sin and danger, to point out our state, and make us feel our guilt. By the law is the knowledge of sin; I had not known it but for the law; under this tuition we are, till Jesus proclaims liberty from its curse and bondage, then we are at liberty to serve him as sons and not as slaves, in imputed righteousness, in the spirit of holiness and in filial fear. ”

“ The duty to serve the divine cause of humanity in its entirety, that of my people in particular, was the law of my life,—the supreme law, whose voice stilled my passions, my desires, in short, my weaknesses.... ”

“ This classification of duties is not arbitrary. It is founded on truth and nature. Men have relations to God, as their Creator, Upholder, Governor, Redeemer, and rightful Judge; and they are bound to recognize these relations, and feel and act accordingly. Men hold relations to one another, as parents, children, citizens, rulers, and subjects; and they are bound to recognize these relations, and feel and act accordingly. Such is the will of God. Such is the law of God. There can be no holiness in man aside from conformity to the will of God in this thing. ”

“ For when we effectively observe the law, with true moral adhesion and in thorough sincerity, the law becomes part of ourselves, and our actions are the direct results of our convictions,—of the necessity of our convictions. ”

“ For any laws but those which men make for themselves, are laughable. If I put myself in the place of my child, and we stand in one thought and see that things are thus or thus, that perception is law for him and me. ”

“ The Law would remain a dead letter,—a thought of Intelligence,—an abstract speculation,—ineffective because impractical. Therefore, when we speak of a Supreme Moral law, we speak of a Supreme Moral Will; an idea we sometimes express by true Being, or true Personality. ”

“ The decisive element in seventeenth-century thought as to contract was the idea of natural law; the idea of deduction from the nature of man as a moral creature and of legal rules and legal institutions which expressed this ideal of human nature. ”

“ Again, tenth, men have thought of law as a [Pg 66] system of principles, discovered philosophically and developed in detail by juristic writing and judicial decision, whereby the external life of man is measured by reason, or in another phase, whereby the will of the individual in action is harmonized with those of his fellow men. ”

“ But this fearless assertion of the rights of conscience necessarily involved the right to sit in judgment upon all human laws and the powers that ordained them, and to determine for themselves whether the law was lawful. ”

“ It is in the constitution of these particular rules of life, suggested by reason and prudence, and put forth by competent authority, that human law, properly so called, consists, binding all citi- zens to work together for the attainment of the common end proposed to the community, and forbidding them to depart from this end; and in so far as human law is in conformity with the dictates of nature, leading to what is good, and deterring from evil. ”

“ Of course it is possible to undertake to regard the moral law, or such objects as justice, in the same light in which we have just been viewing the facts that result from social law and from convention. ”

“ Did all the moral lawgivers who have reformed the world break the law of thought, when, going behind the phenomena of human conduct, with their relations pointing to one idea of right and wrong, they conceived the idea of a new and a better rule of life? ”

“ The Law had said, ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength;’ and could men have lived by law, ‘which is the strength of sin,’ verily righteousness and life would have been by that law. ”

“ It is one which might readily occur to any one as a name for a supreme moral principle.
"Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is become guilty of all." [59] The law is the expression of one and the same principle—love ”

“ Indeed the consciousness that what is law for me is law for others, and that they are judging as well as I, is one of the forms in which we realise that duty descends upon us all, from some august and holy source. ”

“ Moral Laws are set as a curb and restraint to these exorbitant Desires, which they cannot be but by Rewards and Punishments, that will over-balance the satisfaction any one shall propose to himself in the breach of the Law. ”

“ Now he learned what law and order and truth are, what consent and harmony mean; how the individual may find his own end in a higher end, where law and freedom mean the same thing, and the purest certainty exists without the slightest constraint. ”

“ I may here, in passing, and for the sake of illustration merely, express the fundamental principle of morality in the following formula: “So act that thou mayest look upon the dictate of thy will as an eternal law to thyself.”
The ultimate vocation of every finite, rational being is thus absolute unity, constant identity, perfect harmony with himself. ”

“ But the moral sense, the sense of right and wrong, of good and evil, which shows law in its true guise as the benignant representative of order rather than the terror of disorder, is a higher guide, a truer teacher, and a more humane and lasting power. ”

“ It 'binds heavy burdens, and grievous to be borne,' upon men's consciences, but puts not forth 'the tip of a finger' to enable men to bear them. And this is true about law in all forms, whether it be the Mosaic Law, or whether it be the law of our own country, or whether it be the laws written upon men's consciences. ”

“ First, it is a voice forever sounding across the centuries the laws of right and wrong. Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral law is written on the tablets of eternity. ”

“ that when they see Law can discover sin, but not remove, Save by those shadowie expiations weak, 290 The bloud of Bulls and Goats, they may conclude Some bloud more precious must be paid for Man, Just for unjust, that in such righteousness To them by Faith imputed, they may finde Justification towards God, and peace Of Conscience, which the Law by Ceremonies Cannot appease, nor Man the moral part Perform, and not performing cannot live. ”