This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1838 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER III. Departure from the canons of just interpretation. The moral sense in man, like the eye, requires aids extraneous to itself, to qualify it for performing its office. It is adapted to receive, but not to originate the of our unaided reflection and conscience, our moral being must grope its way in a ...
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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1838 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER III. Departure from the canons of just interpretation. The moral sense in man, like the eye, requires aids extraneous to itself, to qualify it for performing its office. It is adapted to receive, but not to originate the of our unaided reflection and conscience, our moral being must grope its way in a darkness as profound, as that of our physical, when cut off from the light of this world. Our perceptions of right and wrong, of obligation and duty, are the combined result of the moral faculty which belongs to our own nature, and of the means afforded to assist its operations. Of course, they will be clear or confused, according to the amount, or the use we make, of the means within our reach. If our means of knowing religious truth are limited, our moral perceptions will be so too; or if they are abundant, and yet our moral faculty is so diseased, as to disqualify us for using them judiciously, the result will be much the same as if the means themselves were limited. Disease of the visual organ, may as effectually doom us to darkness, as the absence of light. How many, with every means of knowing religious truth, live and die in an ignorance of it as profound, as that of those who are the farthest removed from every such advantage. The reason is, that their consciences are perverted, or they neglect the light within their reach, or it is conveyed to their optics through the medium of prejudice, bad education, or some other means of tinging the celestial ray with unnatural hues. If thrown upon the resources There are two sources, from which religious and moral truth, is reflected upon the human mind, --nature and supernatural revelation. By paying due attention to the tendency of different passions, affections and actions, to produce..
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