20 
lity distin- both Aristotle and St. Paul remind us, discerns 
g unshed. among laws, which are the good and which bad. 
Whether, however, the law be good or bad, the Responsibility 
for obeying it is such that the law-breaker must abide the 
consequences of his resistance. This is Political Responsibility, 
or Social, or Domestic. Of course all societies of men ought 
to conform their laws to the highest ideas of the good and 
the right; and in that case the political or social responsibility 
would assist the purely deontological or moral. But the 
ideas would still be distinct — of responsibility to obey Law, 
Examples of and responsibility to do Right as such. Good men 
ttns. have thought it right at times to break a bad law ; 
but they incur all the responsibility of so doing. We can 
conceive of a man coming under the extremest penalties of 
laws, either evil or not understood, and yet having our 
sympathy or compassion, as the case might be. The martyr 
of liberty may perish beneath some tyranPs law, and win all 
our approval. The philanthropist may unsuccessfully with- 
stand some wrong custom of society ; but will eventually 
obtain the applause of the human conscience. The votary of 
science, involved at times in accidental suffering’, 
of Sfpureiy finds the goodwill of his fellow-men may attend 
Smty Respon " i n disaster. But let us only be told of one 
who has been overtaken by law in the midst of 
some deed of cruelty or injustice, and we do not feel that this 
ought not to be, but, just the reverse, our conscience records 
its approval. 
To incur the consequences of our actions and feel that it 
ought to be so — to be subject to a high law, and/eeZ it to be 
right , this is Moral Responsibility. 
36. But the great deontological problems as to individual 
Mutual reia- duty become, as we now advance, more complex. A 
tionsofrespon- multitude of responsible agents living together on 
sibie agents. earth, in widely differing conditions, with ex- 
tremely varying powers, all of them still bearing a nature which 
has a certain conscious relation to the perfect, the absolute, 
the always-true ; — how can they work together ? The Respon- 
sibility of each is in fact held to be individual ; yet it is in- 
cluded in that responsibility, that men are influenced by each 
other. They are intended for this : their whole nature bears 
the marks of it. It is a fact. 
37. Nor is this influence regulated in one fixed way; for then 
it would be mechanical, or material, and not responsible, in any 
moral sense. Each agent will in some degree influence some 
others, and the influence may be either good or evil. Suppose 
it to be evil, then the influencer may be highly culpable, and 
