ARTICLE II.-VIRTUE, FROM A SCIENTIFIC
STANDPOINT.

THE term virtue is used in two slightly different senses: (1), As a quality of a mental exercise or state. (2), As a mental exercise or state itself. Using the word in the latter sense, I propose to enquire what is virtue, or what state or exercise of the mind does the word represent-a question which though much discussed is still unsettled, and to-day divides theology into two great schools.

Moral exercises-such as are virtuous or the opposite-" are such," says the great Edwards, "as are attended with the desert or worthiness of either blame or praise." "A moral action," says Prof. Cochran, "is (1) one of which it may rationally be said, it ought or ought not to be done; or one which a moral being may justly be required to do, or forbear doing (2) One for which the agent is blame- or praiseworthy, and therefore deserving reward or punishment." In other words it is an exercise to which obligation pertains, or one which accords or discords with Moral Law.

Virtue then is identical with love, the great imperative of that law. "All virtue," says Edwards, "may be resolved into love for others, God, or his creatures." "All virtue," says Dr. Dwight, "is summed up in the fulfillment of these two commands: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and thy neighbor as thyself." "Love," says Dr. N. W. Taylor, "is the sum of God's requirements, as it fully meets and satisfies the claims of God upon men." "On these two commands," says the great teacher, "hang the whole law and the prophets." "Love is the fulfilling of the law," is the declaration of the inspired apostle. Love and virtue, then, I shall use as interchangeable terms, and my enquiry is, what is their exact scientific import?

Mental phenomena are divided into two classes, free and necessary. An exercise is free when the agent could, at the time and in the circumstances, do otherwise; necessary, when

at the time and in the circumstances he could not do otherwise. This distinction is perfect. Every exercise of the human mind is either free or necessary. No one can be both.

In which of these classes resides the moral element? "In both, but primarily in the latter," answers the hyper-Calvinist, putting, as he does, moral character into something back of the will, and making sin and holiness entities which may be created and transmitted. The question is a vital one-What does God require and forbid, and for what does he call the sinful soul to repentance ?-one in reference to which no Christian teacher should remain in doubt.

Do we find the moral element in necessary phenomena? Are exercises which could by no possibility be avoided either good or ill deserving? Is a child justly punished for remembering the experiences of yesterday, or for the prevalence of the Asiatic cholera, or for any event in which it had neither choice nor voluntary agency? By definition, a necessary act is one the agent could not in the circumstances avoid; to say he ought is saying he ought to perform, not a miracle, that is thinkable, but an impossibility, that to which infinite power is inadequate. If there be a first and self-evident truth, challenging the assent of all minds, and never questioned outside the domain of theology, it is that ability is commensurate with obligation, that men are responsible for only such exercises as they could avoid. "Ask," says Prof. Stuart, "all courts of justice from the highest to the lowest. . . . . Ask all legislative bodies who have any sense of justice, whether they make laws which render guilty those who never voluntarily transgress them, and they give but one answer. Indeed, there never has been, is not, and from the nature of the case there never can be any difference of opinion on this point of personal guilt." "No man," says Prof. Harris, "can blame or praise himself, or feel reponsible for any event which is in no way dependent on his own free will." I will not insult the intelligence of my readers by fortifying a position so obvious, but will assume, as an axiomatic truth, that only free exercises can be either right or wrong, sinful or holy.

To what department of the mind do free exercises belong? *Bib. Rep., 1839. + Phil. Basis of Theism, p. 366.

Is freedom an attribute of the intelligence? Is perceiving, thinking, believing, remembering, knowing, or any other mere intellection a free exercise? Let us test the question: The agent, we will suppose, stands with open eyes, gazing into the cloudless sky. In these precise circumstances can he avoid perceiving it to be blue? The act of gazing and that of perceiving are distinct. The former is admittedly free; is the latter? Evidently nothing is more necessary. In the full possession of his powers he remembers what occurred yesterday. Is there any more freedom here? Certainly not. With his present knowledge he believes the earth is round. Can he believe otherwise? He knows the whole is greater than a part. Can he avoid knowing this, or cease knowing it, as he can cease talking or writing? Is any intellectual exercise free? No; our cognitions, no sane man can doubt, fall into the category of the most iron necessity. Therefore they do not, and cannot involve the moral element.

We control, to a limited extent, it is readily admitted, the conditions of these intellections. We can gaze into the sky or decline doing so. We can turn attention to or away from truth, and render ourselves indirectly responsible for perceptions and opinions, but to attach moral character to anything beyond voluntary complicity with them, would indicate a great lack of discrimination.

Is freedom an attribute of the sensibility? That feelings are helpful or hurtful, that they are a pretty accurate index of moral character there is no doubt, but do they fall into the category of free and moral phenomena? The word love, I am aware, is used, used correctly, to designate emotions of fondness, attachment, etc. The mother, as she presses her babe to her breast, says, "I love it." She does love her darling, but are these emotions of the nature of virtue? Are they the kind of love the moral law requires? If exercised supremely toward God, and equally toward men, would they satisfy its claims?

Let us apply the test: I put my hand into the fire. The act is free, is the feeling of pain which results also free? In the precise circumstances in which I suffer, can I avoid suffering? Certainly not. No event more clearly falls into the

category of necessity. Consequently, whatever may be said of the act, the feeling can be neither right nor wrong. I turn my attention to some object of suffering, and feelings of pity result. Is not the relation here between the act and feeling precisely the same? I call to mind some wrong to which I have been subjected, and feelings of indignation are aroused, plainly by a law just as necessary. I look upon some object of beauty or deformity and feelings of admiration or aversion instantly arise, and as the current of thought changes, so changes the current of feeling, with as little fealty to my will as the flow of the river from its source. I can put into operation causes, doubtless, which will arrest or increase these feelings, as I can causes which will divert the current of the stream, but certainly moral character can be ascribed to nothing but the voluntary act.

So fixed and necessary is this relation between thought and feeling, the skillful artist can sit down and play upon the strings of another's soul, evoking from that wondrous instrument melody or discord, as he can from his cathedral organ, but the emotion and the music are equally devoid the free, consequently the moral element.

The drunkard is indirectly responsible for his appetite, for it is the result of his own conduct; but it is in the conduct exclusively the moral element resides. When the intoxicant is swallowed, the whole guilt is incurred. Were the Divine Hand at that moment to interfere, and set aside the effect, his ill desert would neither be increased nor diminished. As well call the fire the incendiary kindles sinful as the drunkard's appetite, or any other appetite or feeling human beings experience.

But are not anger and envy, revenge and hate wrong, and fortitude and patience, and complacency in goodness right? They are desirable or undesirable, and therefore it is right or wrong to cherish them, as it is to harbor stolen property. Many of these passions also involve the voluntary element. Revenge, e. g., is a purpose as well as a feeling, but it is to the former only moral character attaches. We look in vain for the voluntary or the moral element among the phenomena of the intellect or of the sensibility. Our intellections and emo

tions are in the circumstances necessarily what they are, and can be neither good nor ill-deserving.

May not feeling enter as an essential element into virtue? Is not the love which fulfills the law the blending of the emotional and voluntary factors? This is the generally accepted view. "Loving God supremely," says Albert Barnes, "is fixing the affections supremely upon him." Here are both factors, and as they are so inseparably allied perhaps no praetical harm comes of this definition. Still it is scientifically

incorrect, and attended with insuperable difficulties.

(1.) As feeling is in itself a necessary phenomenon, and as no combination can change its nature or invest it with the moral element, it is difficult to understand how it can become a constituent part of virtue.

(2.) This definition makes moral character of all things the most unstable and fluctuating. It comes, and goes, and changes, as the ever restless feelings change. The cloud on the sky and the spray on the river are not more obedient to every surrounding influence.

(3.) Feeling, if an essential element of virtue, must be present in every virtuous act. An honest purpose to obey God, if they are absent, is not obedience. The tired and worn spirit, incapable through exhaustion or paroxysms of pain, of any particular emotions, is incapable of virtue, or any exercise acceptable to God.

(4.) If emotions are essential to love, it is not always easy to exercise this virtue. Can any one tell us how to love our enemies, if this be the meaning of the word; or how to put forth any feeling worthy the name, toward the traducer, the evil doer, or the "evil one;" or how the hardened sinner, or the dying impenitent, whose half delirious thought can hardly reach the idea of God, can exercise toward him gratitude or affection? Would any intelligent man urge him to attempt it? Yet God requires of him supreme love even then and there, and his destiny depends upon rendering it.

(5.) We are required to love God with all the heart and mind and might. This certainly implies feelings, if they are an essential part of love, up to the very verge of one's capacities a degree which would unfit him for the ordinary duties