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as to the development of conscience are of consequence in comparison with the reality and character of conscience as it now appears, and stands related to the actual universe, and is eloquent of authority which is that- for us at least of the Author of nature? May we not claim it as right to affirm that in this great and significant fact of conscience we have a far greater obstacle to atheistic triumph than anything that can be presented by intellect? The Power not ourselves which seems to be making for righteousness, in midst of the apparent presence of moral law in the world and the imperative voices of conscience in the human breast, has been always more distinctly seen. to be quite raised above the powers of the physical world to be by no possibility any other, in fact, "from worlds not quickened by the sun," than God as Absolute Founder of that moral law which claims

such absolute authority over us. Dr Chalmers was able, when treating of "Natural Theology," in words still significant to ask-" Had God been an unrighteous Being Himself, would He have given to the obviously superior faculty in man so distinct and authoritative a voice on the side of righteousness? Would He have so constructed the creatures of our species as to have planted in every breast a reclaiming witness against Himself? Would he have thus inscribed on the tablet of every heart the sentence of His own condemnation?" Recent theistic philosophy appears to have become more deeply im

pressed with the fact that this august authority of the moral law is not set up by man himself, but is, originally at least, imposed from without quite independently of him, and conditions his moral life without his consent—even against his will. Yes, for it is a "practical commander" rather than a "theoretical instructor." How much of this was already present to Erskine of Linlathen may be inferred from the way in which he wrote: "When I attentively consider what is going on in my own conscience, the chief thing forced on my notice is, that I find myself face to face with a purpose—not my own, for I am often conscious of resisting it, but -which dominates me and makes itself felt as ever present, as the very root and reason of my being." And he goes on to add that this is his first firm footing in the religious region, and that the Divine Purpose so impressed within him is an unmistakable indication for him of the Divine Character of Him Who so imposed it.

The theistic philosophy of religion finds no potencies to have been as yet discovered by science in virtue of which the origination of moral idea and righteous imperative can be explained. It takes the ethical law operative in conscience, with its ideal of moral perfection, to point us to the Perfect Personality in Whom all ethical ideals are supremely realised. It views the moral administration, which extends over all history and experience, as indicative of the presence and purpose

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of a moral Lawgiver and Governor. The venerable Dr Martineau, in his own forceful manner, once said: "No ethical conceptions are possible at all, except as floating shreds of unattached thought, without a religious background; and the sense of responsibility, the agony of shame, the inner reverence for justice, first find their meaning and vindication in a Supreme Holiness that rules the world. Nor can any one be penetrated with the distinction between right and wrong without recognising it as valid for all free beings, and incapable of local or arbitrary change. His feeling insists on its permanent recognition and omnipresent sway; and this unity in the moral law carries him to the unity of the Divine Legislator. Theism is thus the indispensable postulate of conscience; its objective counterpart and justification, without which its inspirations would be illusions, and its veracities themselves a lie.” In the second volume of his 'Study of Religion,' Dr Martineau puts the case for conscience strongly, saying that the revelation of God to us through conscience is not less real and direct than is the revelation of an external world by means of senseperception. "The dualism of perception, which sets ourselves in the face of an objective world, and the dualism of conscience, which sets us in the face of an objective higher mind, are," he holds, perfectly analogous in their grounds." If it should be thought that his argument, power

R

ful in its presentation of "the externality in the one case, the authority in the other, the causality in both," fails of proving the Divine Existencethat He, the One Infinite Spirit, is there can be no manner of doubt as to the luminous way in which it shows of what sort He is, Who is God of righteousness, if haply we have found Him. That which here concerns us is the moral character of the God with Whom we have to do: other questions, such as those of His personality and self-consciousness, are to be separately dealt with. May we not just as well recognise that, though we grant full claim of the moral consciousness, yet from the line of our moral ideals, metaphysical proof for the Divine Being there can be none? Must not the true path and course for our philosophy of theism lie in taking conscience to be a moral power or capacity pertaining to the human spirit, as such, and for which a true ground must be sought in the one eternal and Infinite Spirit Who gives us being? Must not the very concept of morality be taken by us as possible only under acceptance of such self-activity of the human spirit? Must we not say that the course lies for our moral argument, with its promise and presentiment of a Judge of all the earth, not in seeking a retribution yet to come, but in the recognition of the demands of retributive justice here and now? And must we not say that while our self-activity persists before the mechanism of an

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all-devouring Nature, it is yet from the religious, rather than the moral, needs, that the advance to a personal God must be made? Yes, for there can be no doubt that the range of Kant's practical reason is ethical rather than religious. Conscience, with him, was concerned with duty, to which the categorical imperative impelled. But religion calls us to devotion to that which is personal. All the same, we must hold fast to the Absolute Moral Ideal which we find in God, without Whom we have no adequate goal for our earthly and imperfect morality. We cannot conceive that the Divine Being who planted conscience or the moral faculty in us can be Himself other than One Who is righteous in all His ways and holy in all His works. His moral nature makes it impossible that He should do otherwise than what is perfectly right. No such original and self-dependent being is man, who feels and knows that he is neither ground nor law to himself. The fact that this argument or aspect of theistic truth has sometimes been overpressed in recent times must not be allowed to detract from what worth or value it may bear. This undue stress has been conspicuous in the Netherlands, where the tendency has been described by Professor Bavinck, of Kampen, in these terms: "Even though we should be able to reach, by means of reason, God as the Absolute, yet this Absolute would not be the God which our heart stands in need of. Creation does