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Page 9
[Sidenote: Transmission of Evil.]
Surely, the established truths of heredity confirm the doctrine that
man, if not born depraved, is born _deprived_ of tendencies toward good
essential to his own welfare and that of the race. "Where sin has once
taken hold of the race, the natural reproduction of life become
reproduction of life morally injured and faulty. With evil once begun,
the race is a succession of tainted individuals; an organism that works
toward continuance of evil. Not but that good is transmitted at the same
time, for it goes along with evil. Any virtue or value which is strong
enough to live will pass from generation to generation even while evil
is making the same journey."[6]
[Footnote 6: Outline of Christian Theology. Clarke, p. 242.]
[Sidenote: Depravation and Deprivation.]
[Sidenote: Natural Standards.]
[Sidenote: The Decalogue.]
While we hold that this tendency, this natural sluggishness in laying
hold of the things of the higher nature is not in itself guilt, it
becomes so by the voluntary adoption of the lower forces as the guide of
life. Nature has her own decalogue. There is a law written upon our
hearts. The wasting of power by anger, jealousy, envy, covetousness and
the like, and the degradation following their expression in acts of
revenge, concupiscence, and mere rapacity, are known without revelation
by all races which have not suffered the downward evolution. The
literatures prove this back even to the days of Hamurabi. Thus natural
standards of temper and conduct are seen to exist, below which men may
not live without loss, and hence there are natural laws to disobey which
is sin. The table given on Sinai, though given to Moses, was in the
world long before Moses. But higher sanction was given it by the
lawgiver, and the highest by the re-enactment of the Decalogue by Jesus
Christ.
[Sidenote: The Heart Law.]
[Sidenote: Effects of Sin.]
[Sidenote: Characteristics of Sin.]
[Sidenote: Results of Sin.]
Sin is blameworthy because it is born of the human preference and the
human will. The nation which, knowing most of the Divine will, disobeys,
is the most guilty because the most knowing. The proportion of guilt
depends on the measure of knowledge and the measure of opportunity.
Hence there is some guilt among those who know only a part of the truth,
and if a man perceives, without the aid of revelation, a law in nature
and a penalty, and breaks that law, then is he a sinner. Some of the
physical consequences may apparently be avoided by future obedience. But
the inner and spiritual consequences of sin are the worst--these things;
namely: In the weakening of the will; in the hardening of the
conscience; and, later, in the recklessness as to consequences,
indicated by that terrible indictment by Paul, "Who, being past
feeling, have given themselves over." The consciousness of sin is
practically universal. It is no invention of Christianity, though
brought to its greatest force by Christianity. Religions, governments,
literatures,--all and everywhere,--treat of sin as a fact. It is more
than dominion of body over spirit; more than an incident of growth; more
than a result of undeveloped judgment, tinged with emotion, and applied
to questions of motive and conduct. Sin is the abnormal; sin is a
variant from standard; sin is self-will and selfishness throttling duty.
Where men accept a God, it is opposition to His law and government.[7]
If no personal God be believed in, then sin is willful opposition to the
course of nature and to law, as proved by experience. So, in every case,
it is unworthy, injurious, and guilty, and must be repented of and
atoned for. The doctrine of sin will never be essentially disturbed.
[Footnote 7: Cf. Clarke. Outline of Theology.]
* * * * *
[Sidenote: A Supernatural Event.]
[Sidenote: Lacks Scientific Proof.]
[Sidenote: An Old Fallacy.]
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