kill him.' I suppose it is plain to the Judge of the
Circuit Court that this kind of murder, killing the new-born
infants, is against 'the will of God;' but it is a matter of
record that it was according to 'the law of man.' Suppose
the Hebrew nurses had come to ask Judge Sprague for his
advice. He must have said, 'Obey both!' His rule is a
universal one.

"Another decree was once made, as it is said in the Old
Testament, that no man should ask any petition of any God
for thirty days, save of the king, on penalty of being cast
into the den of lions. Suppose Daniel--I mean the old
Daniel, the prophet--should have asked him, What is to be
done? Should he pray to Darius or pray to God? 'Obey both!'
would be the answer. But he cannot, for he is forbid to pray
to God. We know what Daniel did do.

"The elders and scribes of Jerusalem commanded the
Christians not to speak or to teach at all in the name of
Jesus; but Peter and John asked those functionaries,
'Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you
more than unto God, judge ye.' Our judge must have said,
There is no 'incompatibility;' 'obey both!' What 'a
comfortable Scripture' this would have been to poor John
Bunyan! What a great ethical doctrine to St. Paul! He did
not know such Christianity as that. Before his time a
certain man had said, 'No man can serve two masters.' But
there was one person who made the attempt, and he also is
eminent in history. Here was 'the will of God,' to do to
others as you would have others do to you: 'Love thy
neighbor as thyself.' Here is the record of 'the law of
man:' 'Now both the chief priests and the Pharisees had
given a commandment, that, if any man knew where he [Jesus]
were, he should show it that they might take him.' Judas, it
seems, determined to 'obey both,'--'the law of man' and 'the
will of God.' So he sat with Jesus at the Last Supper,
dipped his hand in the same dish, and took a morsel from the
hand of Christ, given him in token of love. All this he did
to obey 'the will of God.' Then he went and informed the
Commissioner or Marshal where Jesus was. This he did to obey
'the law of man.' Then he came back, and found Christ,--the
agony all over, the bloody sweat wiped off from his brow
presently to bleed aga