tion, then, the specific idea of moral excellence and
obligation is lost. All questions of duty are merged into a calculation
of profit and loss. There is no sense of God; reason or society takes
his place, and an irreligious, calculating cast of character is the
inevitable result. This is counteracted, in individuals and the
community by various causes, for neither the character of a man nor that
of a society is determined by any one opinion; but its injurious
influence may nevertheless be most manifest and deplorable. No man can
fail to see the deteriorating influence of this theory of morals on
public character both in this country and in England. If we would make
men religious and moral, instead of merely cute, let us place God before
them; let us teach them that his will is the ground of their
obligations; that they are responsible to him for all their acts; that
their allegiance as moral agents is not to reason or to society, but to
the heart-searching God; that the obligation to obey the laws of the
land does not rest on their consent to them, but to the fact government
is of God; that those who resist the magistrate, resist the ordinance of
God, and that they who resist, shall receive unto themselves damnation.
This is the only doctrine which can give stablity either to morals or to
government. Man's allegiance is not to reason in the abstract, nor to
society, but to a personal God, who has power to destroy both soul and
body in hell. This is a law revealed in the constitution of our nature,
as well as by the lips of Christ. And to no other sovereign can the soul
yield rational obedience. We might as well attempt to substitute some
mechanical contrivance of our own, for the law of gravitation, as a
means of keeping the planets in their orbits, as to expect to govern men
by any thing else than the fear of an Infinite God.

FOOTNOTES:

[258] In the _New York Independent_ for January 2, 1851, there is a
sermon delivered by Rev. Richard S. Storrs, Jr., of Brooklyn, Dec. 12,
1850, in which his opposition to the fugitive slave bill is expressly
placed on the injustice of slavery. He argues the matter almost
exclusively on that ground. "To what," he asks, "am I required to send
this man [the slave] back? To a system which . . . no man can contemplate
without shuddering." Again, "Why shall I send the man to this unjust
bondage? The fact that he has suffered it so long already is a reason
why I should NOT. . . . . Why s