Anger, Sloth, Avarice, Gluttony, Lust), see Wetzer und Welte, Kirchenlexikon, and Orby Shipley, Theory about Sin, preface, xvi-xviii.

C. This view accords best with Scripture.

(a) The law requires love to God as its all-embracing requirement. (b) The holiness of Christ consisted in this, that he sought not his own will or glory, but made God his supreme end. (c) The Christian is one who has ceased to live for self. (d) The tempter's promise is a promise of selfish independence. (e) The prodigal separates himself from his father, and seeks his own interest and pleasure. (f) The "man of sin", illustrates the nature of sin, in "opposing and exalting himself against all that is called God."

(a) Mat. 22: 37-39- the command of love to God and man; Rom. 13:8-10-"love therefore is the fulfilment of the law"; Gal. 5: 14-"the whole law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself"; James 2:8-"the royal law." (b) John 5: 30—“my judgment is righteous; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of him that sent me"; 7: 18" He that speaketh from himself seeketh his own glory: but be that secketh the glory of him that sent him, the same is true, and no unrighteousness is in him "; Rom. 15:3 -"Christ also pleased not himself." (c) Rom. 14:7-"none of us liveth to himself, and none dieth to himself"; 2 Cor. 5:15"he died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto him who for their sakes died and rose again"; Gal. 2: 20-"I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I that live, but Christ liveth in me." Contrast 2 Tim. 3:2-"lovers of self." (d) Gen. 3:5-"ye shall be as God, knowing good and evil." ( e ) Lake 15:12, 13"give me the portion of thy substance.... gathered all together and took his journey into a far country." (f) 2 Thess. 2:3, 4"the man of sin. ... the son of perdition, he that opposeth and exalteth himself against all that is called God or that is worshipped; so that he sitteth in the temple of God, setting himself forth as God."

Contrast "the man of sin" who "exalteth himself" (2 Thess. 2: 3, 4) with the Son of God who “emptied himself" (Phil. 2:7). On "the man of sin", see Wm. Arnold Stevens, in Bap. Quar. Rev., July, 1889:328-360. Ritchie, Darwin, and Hegel, 24-"We are conscious of sin, because we know that our true self is God, from whom we are severed. No ethics is possible unless we recognize an ideal for all human effort in the presence of the eternal Self which any account of conduct presupposes." John Caird, Fund. Ideas of Christianity, 2:53-73 -"Here, as in all organic life, the individual member or organ has no independent or exclusive life, and the attempt to attain to it is fatal to itself." Milton describes man as "affecting Godhead, and so losing all." Of the sinner, we may say with Shakespeare, Coriolanus, 5:4-" He wants nothing of a god but eternity and a heaven to throne in.

There is no more mercy in him than there is milk in a male tiger." No one of us, then, can sign too early "the declaration of dependence." Both Old School and New School theologians agree that sin is selfishness; see Bellamy, Hopkins, Emmons, the younger Edwards, Finney, Taylor. See also A. H. Strong, Christ in Creation, 287–292.

Sin, therefore, is not merely a negative thing, or an absence of love to God. It is a fundamental and positive choice or preference of self instead of God, as the object of affection and the supreme end of being. Instead of making God the centre of his life, surrendering himself unconditionally to God and possessing himself only in subordination to God's will, the sinner makes self the centre of his life, sets himself directly against God, and constitutes his own interest the supreme motive and his own will the supreme rule.

We may follow Dr. E. G. Robinson in saying that, while sin as a state is unlikeness to God, as a principle is opposition to God, and as an act is transgression of God's law, the essence of it always and everywhere is selfishness. It is therefore not something external, or the result of compulsion from without; it is a depravity of the affections and a perversion of the will, which constitutes man's inmost character.

See Harris, in Bib. Sac., 18: 148-"Sin is essentially egoism or selfism, putting self in God's place. It has four principal characteristics or manifestations: (1) self-sufficiency, instead of faith; (2) self-will, instead of submission; (3) self-seeking, instead of

benevolence; (4) self-righteousness, instead of humility and reverence." All sin is either explicit or implicit "enmity against God" (Rom. 8:7). All true confessions are like David's (Ps. 51:4)—"Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, And done that which is evil in thy sight." Of all sinners it might be said that they "Fight neither with small nor great, save only with the king of Israel " (1 K. 22:31).

Not every sinner is conscious of this enmity. Sin is a principle in course of development. It is not yet "full-grown" (James 1:15 - "the sin, when it is full-grown, bringeth forth death"). Even now, as James Martineau has said: "If it could be known that God was dead, the news would cause but little excitement in the streets of London and Paris." But this indifference easily grows, in the presence of threatening and penalty, into violent hatred to God and positive defiance of his law. If the sin which is now hidden in the sinner's heart were but permitted to develop itself according to its own nature, it would hurl the Almighty from his throne, and would set up its own kingdom upon the ruins of the moral universe. Sin is world-destroying, as well as God-destroying, for it is inconsistent with the conditions which make being as a whole possible; see Royce, World and Individual, 2:366; Dwight, Works, sermon 80.

SECTION III.-UNIVERSALITY OF SIN.

We have shown that sin is a state, a state of the will, a selfish state of the will. We now proceed to show that this selfish state of the will is universal. We divide our proof into two parts. In the first, we regard sin in its aspect as conscious violation of law; in the second, in its aspect as a bias of the nature to evil, prior to or underlying consciousness.

I. EVERY HUMAN BEING WHO HAS ARRIVED AT MORAL CONSCIOUSNESS HAS COMMITTED ACTS, OR CHERISHED DISPOSITIONS, CONTRARY TO THE

DIVINE LAW.

1. Proof from Scripture.

The universality of transgression is:

(a) Set forth in direct statements of Scripture.

1 K. 8:46 -"there is no man that sinneth not"; Ps. 143: 2-"enter not into judgment with thy servant; For in thy sight no man living is righteous"; Prov. 20: 9-"Who can say, I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin?" Eccl. 7:20-Surely there is not a righteous man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not"; Luke 11:13 "If ye, then, being evil"; Rom. 3: 10, 12-"There is none righteous, no, not one . . . . There is none that doeth good, no, not so much as one "; 19, 20-"that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God: because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight; for through the law cometh the knowledge of sin"; 23-"for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God"; Gal. 3:22-"the scripture shut up all things under sin"; James 3:2-"For in many things we all stumble"; 1 John 1: 8-"If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." Compare Mat. 6: 12-"forgive us our debts "—given as a prayer for all men; 14-"if ye forgive men their trespasses "--the condition of our own forgiveness. (b) Implied in declarations of the universal need of atonement, regeneration, and repentance.

Universal need of atonement: Mark 16:16-"He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved" (Mark 16:9-20, though probably not written by Mark, is nevertheless of canonical authority); John 3:16-"God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish "; 6: 50 — "This is the bread which cometh down out of heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die "; 12:47-"I came not to judge the world, but to save the world"; Acts 4:12 "in none other is there salvation: for neither is there any other name under heaven, that is given among men, wherein we must be saved." Universal need of regeneration: John 3:3, 5-"Except one be born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God. . . . . Except one be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." Universal need of repentance: Acts 17: 30-"commandeth men that they should all everywhere repent." Yet Mrs. Mary Baker G. Eddy, in her "Unity of Good," speaks of "the illusion which calls sin real and man a sinner needing a Savior."

(c) Shown from the condemnation resting upon all who do not accept Christ.

John 3:18-"he that believeth not hath been judged already, because he hath not believed on the name of the only begotten Son of God"; 36—“he that obeyeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him"; Compare 1 John 5:19 "the whole world lieth in [i. e., in union with] the evil one"; see Annotated Paragraph Bible, in loco. Kaftan, Dogmatik, 318—“Law requires love to God. This implies love to our neighbor, not only abstaining from all injury to him, but righteousness in all our relations, forgiving instead of requiting, help to enemies as well as friends in all salutary ways, self-discipline, avoidance of all sensuous immoderation, subjection of all sensuous activity as means for spiritual ends in the kingdom of God, and all this, not as a matter of outward conduct merely, but from the heart and as the satisfaction of one's own will and desire. This is the will of God respecting us, which Jesus has revealed and of which he is the example in his life. Instead of this, man universally seeks to promote his own life, pleasure, and honor."

(d) Consistent with those passages which at first sight seem to ascribe to certain men a goodness which renders them acceptable to God, where a closer examination will show that in each case the goodness supposed is a merely imperfect and fancied goodness, a goodness of mere aspiration and impulse due to preliminary workings of God's Spirit, or a goodness resulting from the trust of a conscious sinner in God's method of salvation.

In Mat. 9: 12-"They that are whole have no need of a physician, but they that are sick "-Jesus means those who in their own esteem are whole; cf. 13-"I came not to call the righteous, but sinners "= "if any were truly righteous, they would not need my salvation; if they think themselves so, they will not care to seek it" (An. Par. Bib.). In Luke 10:30-37 - the parable of the good Samaritan — Jesus intimates, not that the good Samaritan was not a sinner, but that there were saved sinners outside of the bounds of Israel. In Acts 10: 35 — “in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is acceptable to him"-Peter declares, not that Cornelius was not a sinner, but that God had accepted him through Christ; Cornelius was already justified, but he needed to know (1) that he was saved, and (2) how he was saved; and Peter was sent to tell him of the fact, and of the method, of his salvation in Christ. In Rom. 2:14-"for when Gentiles that have not the law do by nature the things of the law, these, not having the law, are a law unto themselves" - it is only said that in certain respects the obedience of these Gentiles shows that they have an unwritten law in their hearts; it is not said that they perfectly obey the law and therefore have no sin - for Paul says immediately after (Rom. 3:9)-"we before laid to the charge both of Jews and Greeks, that they are all under sin."

So with regard to the words "perfect" and "upright," as applied to godly men. We shall see, when we come to consider the doctrine of Sanctification, that the word "perfect," as applied to spiritual conditions already attained, signifies only a relative perfection, equivalent to sincere piety or maturity of Christian judgment, in other words, the perfection of a sinner who has long trusted in Christ, and in whom Christ has overcome his chief defects of character. See 1 Cor. 2:6-"we speak wisdom among the perfect" (Am. Rev.: "among them that are full-grown"); Phil. 3: 15-"Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, be thus minded "— i.e., to press toward the goal - a goal expressly said by the apostles to be not yet attained v. 12-14).

"Est deus in nobis; agitante calescimus illo." God is the "spark that fires our clay." S. S. Times, Sept. 21, 1901: 609 - Humanity is better and worse than men have painted it. There has been a kind of theological pessimism in denouncing human sinfulness, which has been blind to the abounding love and patience and courage and fidelity to duty among men." A. H. Strong, Christ in Creation, 287-290-"There is a natural life of Christ, and that life pulses and throbs in all men everywhere. All men are created in Christ, before they are recreated in him. The whole race lives, moves, and has its being in him, for he is the soul of its soul and the life of its life." To Christ then, and not to unaided human nature, we attribute the noble impulses of unregenerate men. These impulses are drawings of his Spirit, moving men to repentance. But they are influences of his grace which, if resisted, leave the soul in more than its original darkness. 2. Proof from history, observation, and the common judgment of mankind.

(a) History witnesses to the universality of sin, in its accounts of the universal prevalence of priesthood and sacrifice.

See references in Luthardt, Fund. Truths, 161-172, 335–339. Baptist Review, 1882:343*Plutarch speaks of the tear-stained eyes, the pallid and woe-begone countenances which he sees at the public altars, men rolling themselves in the mire and confessing their sins. Among the common people the dull feeling of guilt was too real to be shaken off or laughed away."

(b) Every man knows himself to have come short of moral perfection, and, in proportion to his experience of the world, recognizes the fact that every other man has come short of it also.

Chinese proverb: "There are but two good men ; one is dead, and the other is not yet born." Idaho proverb: "The only good Indian is a dead Indian." But the proverb applies to the white man also. Dr. Jacob Chamberlain, the missionary, said: “I never but once in India heard a man deny that he was a sinner. But once a Brahmin interrupted me and said: 'I deny your premisses. I am not a sinner. I do not need to do better. For a moment I was abashed. Then I said: 'But what do your neighbors say?' Thereupon one cried out: 'He cheated me in trading horses'; another: 'He defrauded a widow of her inheritance.' The Brahmin went out of the house, and I never saw him again." A great nephew of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, when a child, wrote in a few lines an "Essay on the Life of Man," which ran as follows: "A man's life naturally divides itself into three distinct parts: the first when he is contriving and planning all kinds of villainy and rascality, - that is the period of youth and innocence. In the second, he is found putting in practice all the villainy and rascality he has contrived,- that is the flower of mankind and prime of life. The third and last period is that when he is making his soul and preparing for another world,— that is the period of dotage."

(c) The common judgment of mankind declares that there is an element of selfishness in every human heart, and that every man is prone to some form of sin. This common judgment is expressed in the maxims: "No man is perfect"; "Every man has his weak side", or "his price"; and every great name in literature has attested its truth.

Seneca, De Ira, 3:26-"We are all wicked. What one blames in another he will find in his own bosom. We live among the wicked, ourselves being wicked"; Ep., 22-"No one has strength of himself to emerge [ from this wickedness]; some one must needs hold forth a hand; some one must draw us out." Ovid, Met., 7: 19-"I see the things that are better and I approve them, yet I follow the worse.... We strive even after that which is forbidden, and we desire the things that are denied." Cicero: "Nature has given us faint sparks of knowledge; we extinguish them by our immoralities." Shakespeare, Othello, 3:3—“Where's that palace whereinto foul things Sometimes intrude not? Who has a breast so pure, But some uncleanly apprehensions keep leets [meetings in court] and law-days, and in sessions sit With meditations lawful?" Henry VI., II: 3:3-"Forbear to judge, for we are sinners all." Hamlet, 2: 2, compares God's influence to the sun which "breeds maggots in a dead dog, Kissing carrion," that is, God is no more responsible for the corruption in man's heart and the evil that comes from it, than the sun is responsible for the maggots which its heat breeds in a dead dog; 3:1—“We are arrant knaves all." Timon of Athens, 1:2"Who lives that 's not depraved or depraves?"

Goethe: "I see no fault committed which I too might not have committed." Dr. Johnson: "Every man knows that of himself which he dare not tell to his dearest friend." Thackeray showed himself a master in fiction by having no heroes; the paragons of virtue belonged to a cruder age of romance. So George Eliot represents life correctly by setting before us no perfect characters; all act from mixed motives. Carlyle, hero-worshiper as he was inclined to be, is said to have become disgusted with each of his heroes before he finished his biography. Emerson said that to understand any crime, he had only to look into his own heart. Robert Burns: "God knows I'm no thing I would be, Nor am I even the thing I could be." Huxley: "The best men of the best epochs are simply those who make the fewest blunders and commit the fewest sins." And he speaks of "the infinite wickedness" which has attended the course of human history. Matthew Arnold: "What mortal, when he saw, Life's voyage done, his heavenly Friend, Could ever yet dare tell him fearlessly:- I have kept uninfringed

and who treats the wicked as he treats the righteous. The love which the law requires is love for the true God, the God of holiness. Such love aims at the reproduction of God's holiness in ourselves and in others. We are to love ourselves only for God's sake and for the sake of realizing the divine idea in us. We are to love others only for God's sake and for the sake of realizing the divine idea in them. In our moral progress we, first, love self for our own sake; secondly, God for our own sake; thirdly, God for his own sake; fourthly, ourselves for God's sake. The first is our state by nature; the second requires prevenient grace; the third, regenerating grace; and the fourth, sanctifying grace. Only the last is reasonable self-love. Balfour, Foundations of Belief, 27“Reasonable self-love is a virtue wholly incompatible with what is commonly called selfishness. Society suffers, not from having too much of it, but from having too little." Altruism is not the whole of duty. Self-realization is equally important. But to care only for self, like Goethe, is to miss the true self-realization, which love to God

ensures.

Love desires only the best for its object, and the best is God. The golden rule bids us give, not what others desire, but what they need. Rom. 15:2-"Let each one of us please his neighbor for that which is good, unto edifying." Deutsche Liebe: “ Nicht Liebe die fragt: Willst du mein sein? Sondern Liebe die sagt: Ich muss dein sein." Sin consists in taking for one's self alone and apart from God that in one's self and in others to which one has a right only in God and for God's sake. Mrs. Humphrey Ward, David Grieve, 403 ––"How dare a man pluck from the Lord's hand, for his wild and reckless use, a soul and body for which he died? How dare he, the Lord's bondsman, steal his joy, carrying it off by himself into the wilderness, like an animal his prey, instead of asking it at the hands and under the blessing of the Master? How dare he, a member of the Lord's body, forget the whole, in his greed for the one-eternity in his thirst for the present?" Wordsworth, Prelude, 546-"Delight how pitiable, Unless this love by a still higher love Be hallowed, love that breathes not without awe; Love that adores, but on the knees of prayer, By heaven inspired. . . . . This spiritual love acts not nor can exist Without imagination, which in truth Is but another name for absolute power, And clearest insight, amplitude of mind, And reason in her most exalted mood." Aristotle says that the wicked have no right to love themselves, but that the good may. So, from a Christian point of view, we may say: No unregenerate man can properly respect himself. Self-respect belongs only to the man who lives in God and who has God's image restored to him thereby. True self-love is not love for the happiness of the self, but for the worth of the self in God's sight, and this self-love is the condition of all genuine and worthy love for others. But true self-love is in turn conditioned by love to God as holy, and it seeks primarily, not the happiness, but the holiness, of others. Asquith, Christian Conception of Holiness, 98, 145, 154, 207 —“ Benevolence or love is not the same with altruism. Altruism is instinctive, and has not its origin in the moral reason. It has utility, and it may even furnish material for reflection on the part of the moral reason. But so far as it is not deliberate, not indulged for the sake of the end, but only for the gratification of the instinct of the moment, it is not moral. . . . Holiness is dedication to God, the Good, not as an external Ruler, dut as an internal controller and transformer of character.... God is a being whose every thought is love, of whose thoughts not one is for himself, save so far as himself is not himself, that is, so far as there is a distinction of persons in the Godhead. Creation is one great unselfish thought- the bringing into being of creatures who can know the happiness that God knows. . . . To the spiritual man holiness and love are one. Salvation is deliverance from selfishness." Kaftan, Dogmatik, 319, 320, regards the essence of sin as consisting, not in selfishness, but in turning away from God and so from the love which would cause man to grow in knowledge and likeness to God. But this seems to be nothing else than choosing self instead of God as our object and end.

B. All the different forms of sin can be shown to have their root in selfishness, while selfishness itself, considered as the choice of self as a supreme end, cannot be resolved into any simpler elements.

(a) Selfishness may reveal itself in the elevation to supreme dominion of any one of man's natural appetites, desires, or affections. Sensuality is selfishness in the form of inordinate appetite. Selfish desire takes the forms respectively of avarice, ambition, vanity, pride, according as it is set upon property, power, esteem, independence. Selfish affection is falsehood or