aws of nature. Such phraseology as this is inapplicable to the
relation that exists between the world of matter, and the system of
material laws, because, in this material sphere, there has been no
revolution, no rebellion, no great catastrophe analogous to the fall of
Adam. The law here was ordained to life, and the ordinance still stands.
And it shall stand until, by the will of the Creator, these elements
shall melt with fervent heat, and these heavens shall pass away with a
great noise; until a new system of nature, and a new legislation for it,
are introduced.

But the case is different with man. He is not standing where he was, when
created. He is out of his original relations to the law and government of
God, and therefore that which was ordained to him for life, he now finds
to be unto death. The food which in its own nature is suited to minister
to the health and strength of the well man, becomes poison and death
itself to the sick man.

With this brief notice of the fact, that the law of God was ordained to
life, and that therefore this disparaging phraseology of St. Paul does
not refer to the intrinsic nature of law, which he expressly informs us
"is holy just and good," nor to the original relation which man sustained
to it before he became a sinner, let us now proceed to consider some
particulars in which the commandment is found to be unto death, to every
_sinful_ man.

The law of God shows itself in the human soul, in the form of a _sense of
duty_. Every man, as he walks these streets, and engages in the business
or pleasures of life, hears occasionally the words: "Thou shalt; them
shalt not." Every man, as he passes along in this earthly pilgrimage,
finds himself saying to himself: "I ought, I ought not." This is the
voice of law sounding in the conscience; and every man may know, whenever
he hears these words, that he is listening to the same authority that cut
the ten commandments into the stones of Sinai, and sounded that awful
trumpet, and will one day come in power and great glory to judge the
quick and dead. Law, we say, expresses itself for man, while here upon
earth, through the sense of duty. "A sense of duty pursues us ever," said
Webster, in that impressive allusion to the workings of conscience, in
the trial of the Salem murderers. This is the accusing and condemning
_sensation_, in and by which the written statute of God becomes a living
energy, and a startling voice in the soul. Cut into