420 ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 



that hate you,&quot; etc., &quot;that ye may be the children of your 

 heavenly Father, who sends his rain upon the just and the 

 unjust.&quot; 4 Which words are more than human 



&quot;Nee vox hominera sonat&quot; 5 



and go beyond the light of nature. So the heathen poets, 

 especially when they speak pathetically, frequently expos 

 tulate with laws and moral doctrines (though these are far 

 more easy and indulgent than divine laws), as if they had 

 a kind of malignant opposition to the freedom of nature 



&quot;Et quod natura remittit 



Invida jura negant&quot;; 6 



according to the expression of Dendamis, the Indian, to the 

 messengers of Alexander; viz., &quot;That he had heard, indeed, 

 somewhat of Pythagoras, and the other wise men of Greece, 

 and believed them to have been great men ; but that they 

 held a certain fantastical thing, which they called law and 

 morality, in too great veneration and esteem. 7 We cannot 

 doubt, therefore, that a large part of the moral law is too 

 sublime to be attained by the light of nature: though it is 

 still certain, that men, even from the light and law of nature, 

 have some notions of virtue, vice, justice, wrong, good, 

 and evil. 



We must observe, that the light of nature has two sig 

 nifications; 1, as it arises from sense, induction, reason, and 

 argument, according to the laws of heaven and earth ; and 2, 

 as it shines in the human mind, by internal instinct, accord 

 ing to the law of conscience, which is a certain spark, and, 

 as it were, a relique of our primitive purity. And in this lat 

 ter sense, chiefly, the soul receives some light, for beholding 

 and discerning the perfection of the moral law; though this 

 light be not perfectly clear, but of such a nature as rather 

 to reprehend vice than give a full information of duty; 

 whence religion, both with regard to mysteries and morality, 

 depends upon divine revelation. 



4 Matt. v. 44, 45. B JSneid, i. 332. 



6 Ovid, Metam. x. 330. Strabo, xv. 



