St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans: A Practical Exposition. Vol. IIGore, Charles
Religion
St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans: A Practical Exposition. Vol. II
Gore, Charles
Bible. Romans -- Commentaries
Further, it is a theory that cannot account for the facts--viz. for the
existence of the universal sense of responsibility; and the application
to human action of moral blame and praise, which penetrates the whole
of thought and language, and which holds too large a place in human
life to be a delusion. We are not ashamed of a physical accident, but
we are ashamed of telling a lie. And this difference is fundamental
and based on reality.
(2) The Christian assumption may be stated as follows: granted that we
cannot increase the sum of force which passes from external sources
into our system, and passes out again in manifold forms of human
action, yet within certain limits we can direct it for good or
evil--i.e. the 'voluntary' part of a man's action may be determined
from below, so to speak, by purely animal motives, or by rational and
spiritual motives. In the latter case, the action is of the proper
human quality, and stamps a rational and spiritual character upon all
that falls within its range. In the former case, it may be truly
regarded as a survival of the physical instincts of animal progenitors,
and no doubt it emerges as a part of the physical order of the world.
But, considered as human action, it represents a lapse, a culpable
subordination of the higher to the lower in our nature, a violation of
the law proper to manhood[5]. This is the point. St. John says, 'All
sin is lawlessness,' and (by the exact form of expression which he
uses) he implies also that all lawlessness is sin. Here, and here only
where voluntary action begins, do you see violation of law, and
therefore, within limits, a disturbance of the divine order--something
which ought to have been otherwise.
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(3) The belief that the moral evil of our nature does not properly
belong to our nature but is its violation, and that if once the will be
set right it can be remedied, has been the secret of the moral strength
of Christianity. Christianity has said to all men, However corrupted
your nature, the corruption does not essentially belong to you. Give
your wills to God, and, if slowly, yet surely, if not fully in this
world, then beyond it, all can be set right. 'According to thy faith
be it unto thee.' And the practical power of this appeal, shows its
agreement with reality.
(4) On the other hand, it cannot be claimed that the theory is contrary
to any real scientific _knowledge_; for biology confesses that it knows
very little as to the actual methods by which force is redistributed in
human action. It is contrary only to some large and unverifiable
assumptions--assumptions which ignore the abstract character of
biological psychology, as of other sciences.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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