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CHAPTER III.

God the Supreme Good, and the only Standard of Good. It must have been so to Christ and to Adam.-The case of Adam.-Adam's Moral Perfection -first, by his nature-secondly, by the gift of the Presence of God, as a Supreme Rule actually. Our fallen nature differs, first, in the withdrawal of that gift; secondly, in disturbance and insubordination of faculties. Still, as a matter of each man's experience, and also of History, God is the Law and Standard of Moral Good to the Natural Man.

HAVING gone so far as to define that "God is the Supreme and Absolute Good, and the sole measure of Good," the question at once comes up, "But is not God afar from nature and from us, ruling us by law, and Himself absent, so that we cannot make of him the measure of Good, or discern its likeness to him?"

To this we answered in the last chapter, "Thy nature is of God and good, made in his image, and although fallen, still not brutal or fiendish, but in his image, although that image be impaired. Still, then, thy nature has a feeling for good, and applies the image as a measure of it. The Bible, and that is the Word of God the Church of God, and that is his organization-and lastly, the Spirit of God, all these thou hast, or canst have, and all these are nearer to thee, bring the being, and will, and feeling, and nature of God, closer to man than any other fact can come; so close, that none in truth ever disbelieved the being and attributes of God; they that say so are only self-deceivers or vain boasters, trying to deceive others, not Atheists."

But perhaps, in addition to this, our answer to objections, we had better enter a little more closely into the centre of this matter, and view it in another light. We have seen that there is an Animal Nature, one perfectly indifferent. Again, we see that a nature perfectly evil is possible. And neither of these natures is that which man has.

Now it is manifest, that a perfect Human Nature would be that which did good consciously and perpetually, and never did or had even the experience of an act of evil. This consciousness of doing good constantly, and of not knowing by self-experience what evil is but by its effects upon others, this is manifestly the character given of our Saviour, as shown in the whole of the New Testa

ment. It is as manifestly the character given of Adam, our first father, in Paradise.

And as manifestly it is the ideal image of perfection, after which each man is led by his nature to aspire. It is manifest, that in this aspiration we desire not an animal nature which is not good or evil, but indifferent; nor a mere innocent nature, whose quality is doing good unconsciously, but one that does good consciously, and that consciously abstains from evil. It is also manifest that this desire of our moral nature is no desire purely imaginary, no image of perfection that never was realized, but one that of itself has had two actual and real exemplars in our LORD JESUS CHRIST, and in Adam in Paradise, the father of the human race.

To examine, therefore, these exemplars of perfection in reference to that which is the Highest Good of man is to bring the definition we have given of Good, and of the Highest Good, to the actual test of historical experience, and both to confirm it, and also to hold out the very highest model, not as imaginary, but as realized. And we beg the reader to pay a close attention to this part of our discussion, inasmuch as the examination of these models not only will illustrate the nature of Moral Good, but also the nature of man, both as fallen and as in Paradise.

Now, with regard to our LORD-HE was a man; this is fully and plainly manifest. Human Nature cannot, therefore, be morally indifferent in the same condition as the beasts are, or fiendish essentially, else God could not have taken it; but it must have been Good in its nature.

Again. He was Morally Perfect from birth to death. He did no sin in thought, word or deed: for thought is action, word is action, deed is action. Now seeing that manifestly, therefore, we must call him perfect, what is the idea of Moral Good presented to us by Him as the perfect man?

Manifestly it may be put in not sinning, that positively our blessed Lord, as a man, in everything did that which is according to the will of GOD, and negatively he abstained from doing that against his will.

This is the plain fact, both from his own words and the account we have of his life; for of all other men, whatsoever height of character they have attained, it is an historical fact, there are none who have not been faulted for sin, either positively or negatively, and that He alone was uncensured both by his friends and

cotemporaries, and by all since then. That, therefore, by which he was perfect morally, must be the Highest Good, and that which he counted Good must have been Good, and his method of attaining to it the method. And no definition of Moral Good, or of the Highest Good, or of man's supreme rule in life, by whatsoever philosopher it be brought forward, is true but this, that "God is the Supreme Good, and the Supreme Law of man His Will, and the Supreme Happiness and Perfection of man a resemblance unto him."

It is manifest, that to our Lord, the exemplar and model of Perfect Humanity, the Supreme Good was God the Father. His perfection was in his being "the express image of God." And the highest and completest object of his existence to do the will of God. And we can see that he fulfilled the notion of a perfect. Humanity, a Human Nature of itself Good, and consciously doing no evil, but all good.

But we see that he was aided towards this; the Human Nature was, as it were, upheld and enabled to effect this, and to be raised to its highest possible perfection, by the union of the Divine Nature with it.

But it will be said, "to Him this was the Highest Good, because being God the Word, the will of the FATHER was immediately known to him, but to us that can be no true standard."

To this we may at once say, "He is the express image of His person, the manifestation of His glory;" and "he that hath seen him, hath seen the Father also."

But we go on to another consideration, which will be found to tell upon this part of the subject in a very important way; that is, to consider the moral condition of the other perfect man, Adam; and this we shall find to give us great light upon the

matter.

Now, when we look at the situation of Adam, we find enough to lead us to consider that as our nature is good, even although it is injured by the Fall, so was the nature of Adam good, without that injury.

Next we find that Adam, as Christ, continuously thought, and spoke, and did no evil, and that not as a mere innocent, or as a righteous animal, barely without consciousness, but consciously and knowingly. This is expressed by the declaration that God made Adam in the image of God, in the image that is of GOD the

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WORD, as St. Athanasius interprets it, which implies that his nature, as a moral nature, was complete and perfect. i

And secondly, he possessed the endowment of a direct supernatural communication with the ALMIGHTY, whereby man's nature, "the image of God," should reflect God's attributes. So should man's Will directly be under the influence of the FATHER; man's Higher Reason, of the WORD; man's Conscience, of the SPIRIT.

So that thereby his being in the image, this consisted of these two parts: first, the Moral Nature, and secondly, the supernatural endowment corresponding to that nature. This the Supernatural Gift, consisting plainly of the Presence of God with Adam, not as God was present with our SAVIOUR, perpetually united with his Humanity, but as capable of being withdrawn. Which gift the Catholic Church has accounted to be the HOLY SPIRIT dwelling in a nature, 1st, unfallen, 2d, perfectly free, and 3d, untainted from the beginning with any speck of actual sin.*

This is the account of the First Man and his condition, which seems to have been drawn from the Scriptures by the Universal Reason of the Church. And we can see that it agrees most exactly with the various passages of the Scriptures that concern Adam, or speak of man in general, whether they be historical or doctrinal.

Now, this manifestly implies, with regard to Adam, the same we have shown to be the case with respect to CHRIST, our most Blessed Lord ever to be adored, that His Supreme Absolute Good was God; the measure and standard unto him of all moral good whatsoever. That of his own nature and actions, their good was a similarity in them to God, and that God's will was his law. And that Adam was not then good of himself, and of his own reason, with no connection with God except that of natural mind, understanding of its natural ability, that which is good, and then of that natural ability doing it. But Adam was good in a twofold way; first, of his nature, so made and constituted; and secondly, of the Supernatural Gift; the Spirit, thus bringing close to him that GOD WHO in HIMSELF IS THE ABSOLUTE GOOD.

This is the moral doctrine with regard to the position of our first father, which the thought of the Church has wrought out;

* Upon the State of Adam before the Fall, and especially upon the "Supernatural Gift," Bp. Bull's fifth discourse may be read.

and this we shall see, and this only will satisfy the descriptions given us of man's nature in Paradise, that is, of man perfect, and the demands of our Human Nature, that is, of man imperfect; and of the nature of GOD and of CHRIST.

There are, I would also remark, from these conclusions, with regard to Christ our Lord, and with regard to Adam, many inferences that concern our present life and future state of perfect being, which are of the most interesting, and to this age that has forgotten the Church, the fountain of all wisdom, of the most novel and startling kind, upon which I would gladly enlarge, but that my limits prevent it. It is, I hope, sufficient to suggest "that as He is, so shall we be also," to enable others to draw these inferences, and thus leaving this to Christian meditation, we may pass onward to our task.

It will, however, be said, "while we acknowledge with regard to Christ and with regard to Adam, what is here laid down, to us it cannot be so. We are not as our Lord, who was God the Word Incarnate, and to whom, therefore, God,' the 'Will of God,'

the Nature of God' were laws."

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We are not, it will again be said, as Adam, who was in the Image of God," and with whom the Supernatural Gift of God's HOLY SPIRIT, the third person of the Trinity, ever dwelt, and being of himself "Very God," revealed to Adam, the "Nature," the "Will," "the Law" of God, and thus made all these his standard of Moral Goodness and his Supreme Law of Action. "But we are alone," say they, "and therefore we must find out for ourselves some other standard."

I might have given a sufficient answer to this, first, by saying that it is a heathen objection, one that supposes not that "in Him we live, and move, and have our being," but that he has departed and left other powers to rule the world, that in themselves have no moral and spiritual energies, but blind force. Secondly, I . pointed out that our nature being itself good, although fallen, the "Bible in the Church," the Affections as brought forth in the Family, and the Natural Sense of Justice and Equity, as brought forth in the Nation, all these are revelations of God, all these are such that of Him we have more evidence and clearer knowledge than we have of any one of the objects of the senses.

These answers were enough for objections; but as my object is

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