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nising Him as the Creator, and there branch out of our relationship to Him 
the duties that devolve on us with regard to each other. We see that these 
duties of religion are expounded in the Mosaic Law in the first four command- 
ments, out of which come the duties that devolve on us in relation to our 
fellow-creatures. If we take each one of the commandments separately — 
say the fifth, or sixth — we cannot understand why there is any duty devolving 
upon us towards our parents, except because of some primordial and original 
constitution in society, which is in the majority of cases sufficiently plain, 
certainly. Persons are trying to find out some other principles, but I do not 
think they will find any that will set aside or render superfluous those that 
are involved in the Mosaic law. With regard to the law of murder, one 
speaker has said it involves the preservation of one’s own life, which, of 
course, is perfectly true. We cannot take another person’s life, because he 
has the same right to his life that we have to ours ; and the injunction is 
mutually operative to protect our own lives, as well as to protect the lives of 
others. We are safe, because that which prohibits us from injuring others, 
also prohibits them from injuring us. That is the constitution of our nature. 
You may probe as deeply as you like, and you cannot get at any other result 
than this constitution of nature, which is, of course, an indication in nature 
of the work of God. With regard to a much more difficult subject — such, 
for instance, as that alluded to by one of the speakers, the relations involved 
in the Seventh Commandment— I do not know how we are to answer any 
question relating to that commandment, if we do away with the sanctions 
given in nature and confirmed by the Mosaic law. (Hear, hear.) It seems 
to me that the ultimate reason for morals and ethics — the only ultimate 
reason we can arrive at — is to be found in something in the constitution of 
our nature as God has made us which is in strict accordance with the moral 
law, the moral law being proved to be Divine, because of its exact accordance 
with the ultimate constitution of nature. (Applause.) 
Rev. Flavel Cook. — I thoroughly agree with all that Professor Stanley 
Leathes has said as to the supremacy of the word and law of God — a perfect law 
which, like a crystal, true in every face and every angle, fits the whole of our 
personal nature in spirit, soul, mind, and body. Still, what we have to do with 
Mr. Herbert Spencer’s argument is, not to show that the word of God is 
superior, but that the ground taken by Mr. Spencer is, on his own showing, 
not maintainable— that it breaks down — that it does not provide for the con- 
ditions of human nature — that there is a quality in man and a craving in 
man for something higher than physical organization will supply. This 
spiritual craving demands something more than Mr. Spencer offers, it 
breaks through all artificial restraints and theories, and asserts itself ; and 
when it does this, what provision has this propounded theory of perfect 
human nature to offer ? I will here relate a striking story w 7 hich I heard a 
few days ago. There was an old man in China who had for years worshipped 
the sun, moon, and stars, and invoked them to help him remove the load 
which oppressed his spirit. It happened that a man who had come from 
