As accuser, it pursues the guilty everywhere, into the innermost recesses of the thoughts.
It sees clearly, it knows all the circumstances, it declares with unhesitating voice both what is the nature of the sin, and what is the condition of the sinner. Thus to the office of accuser it unites that of witness, presenting itself ever before the accused, with unshaken testimony. It has seen all; it has seen all as it is; and it has forgotten none of the circumstances.
As judge, it is enlightened with Divine illumination that pierces through all the mists of prejudice and clouds of passion, and nothing escapes from its vigilance.
As judge it is also severe, not easy and indifferent, for it has not its own law or humour to obey, but the divine law, which it interprets and administers.
It is just, for it stands in that position that it is between God, the Lawgiver, on one side, and man, who breaks that law, on the other. If it be inclined to over-leniency, if it be unjust, then Conscience is itself corrupted. But we are not now speaking of Conscience degraded, cajoled, bribed, and dishonest, but of the true Conscience as divinely illumined and divinely directed to judge aright. And as just and enlightened Conscience passes its judgment, and then takes up the office of executioner. “If,” says S. Paul, “we would judge ourselves we should not be judged.” That is to say, if we suffer our Consciences to perform their proper function here in the time of life, to pass sentence upon us justly, and execute the sentences passed, then there would be no second judgment for us at the last. That judgment is needed only because so many people refuse to permit Conscience to perform its divinely-ordained work here in this life.
Then consider Conscience as the executioner. It punishes man here, to work out his amendment. But if Conscience be not suffered to perform its divinely allotted task here, then it will do it in eternity when the time for amendment is over. That is the worm that dies not, that the fire that is never extinguished. Conscience is given to us as our executioner here in order to improve us, not to torture us unprofitably. It punishes us to work in us repentance. These are the two operations of Conscience as executioner.
First Saturday in Lent.
THE OBLIGATIONS OF CONSCIENCE.
1. As Conscience is a gift of God we are responsible to Him for the use we make of it. Conscience is the moral faculty; as the eyes are organs of the faculty of sight, the ears of the faculty of hearing, so has Conscience the faculty of seeing and knowing and distinguishing right from wrong. As God has given us sight and hearing we exercise these faculties, and, what is more, cultivate them. So, as God has given us the moral faculty, we exercise it, and cultivate it, if we desire to fulfil the ends for which God has created us. God gives us eyes to see our way, and not strike against walls, and fall into pits. So God has given us Conscience to see our moral way, and not run into temptations, and to avoid moral dangers.
2. As Conscience is that interior judgment which God has planted in us to dictate to us what to do, and what to avoid, on special occasions, then, to disobey the voice of Conscience is to disobey the Voice of God. Not only so, but, as Conscience points out to us that a certain course is one to which duty calls us, and we refuse to follow the indication of Conscience, this is a revolt of the will against God, and when the will, knowing what is right, deliberately chooses what is wrong, it commits mortal sin. It was so with Adam and Eve. They knew the Commandment of God, and wilfully went against His Commandment, consequently they had turned away from their proper end, and turned themselves into the camp of rebels against God.
3. When S. Paul says, “Whatsoever is not of faith is sin,” he is speaking of the eating of meats offered to idols; and he shows how that Conscience is the rule as to whether a thing is sinful or not. Idols are naught, so that the things offered to idols are not actually polluted by the oblation; nevertheless, if the Conscience refuses to admit this, and argues that, as a meat has been offered to an idol, the partaking of it is participation in idolatry, then to eat of the meat that has been offered brings guilt on the soul. “He that doubteth is damned if he eat.” (Rom. xiv. 23.)
4. From this we may draw a practical conclusion that it is always well to follow Conscience, even when Conscience, ill-instructed, may be in error; that if Conscience disapprove of a course of conduct, and yet may not understand clearly on what grounds it utters its disapprobation, it is safest, indeed it is right, to obey Conscience, and not take advantage of its hesitation.
That a Conscience may be ill-taught, and therefore in error, that a Conscience may be perverted, we shall see presently; but what appears to be abundantly clear is that it is advisable always to obey Conscience in all things; but then we must be careful to have the Conscience well-instructed, clearly illuminated, so that it may not be hesitating, confused, and liable to direct us wrongly.
5. When Conscience hesitates, and is doubtful between two courses, it is right to seek advice from such as are experienced in the direction of Conscience.
Moreover, the Holy Spirit must be invoked to open the eyes of the understanding, and guide into truth. When hesitation and doubt still remain, then the safest course to adopt is that line of conduct which is likely to entail most trouble, likely to cost us most, least likely to attract notice from others; also, generally, if not always, the simplest and most natural line is the right one; but self-interest, or a disturbed moral sense, may incline one to take another line that is not absolutely wrong in itself, but is less right because less natural, and simple, and direct, and common-place than the other.
First Sunday in Lent.
CAUSES OF DIFFERENT KINDS OF CONSCIENCE.
1. Conscience as given by God to man is sound, vigorous, and direct. It sees clearly what the truth is, and distinguishes at once good from evil.
Whatever God gives is good, and God gives this faculty of distinguishing between good and evil to man for a purpose, essential to man, that he may follow his course, and attain to that end for which God made him. Therefore, God certainly gave to man, originally, a sound, sturdy, and clear-seeing Conscience, to be the pilot of his vessel, the driver of his chariot, the legislator of his state. That we may—indeed, that we must acknowledge. God Himself set man in the world to accomplish a certain work, and He furnished him adequately for the fulfilment of the task allotted to him.
2. But, man’s Conscience is not what it was when God first made man; it has been debilitated, it has been vitiated by original sin. The first sin of Adam, and the sin that has issued from that original fault, has formed a habit of sin in the human race, that infects, weakens, in some cases paralyzes, the Conscience. So that it no longer sees as clearly what is right and what is wrong, as at first; it has no longer the same unhesitating voice; nor has it the same power of influencing the will as at first, for the will itself has become distorted. The unsettlement of Conscience has allowed the will to become impatient of restraint, and to incline to follow other impulses than that of the moral faculty. The will is also inclined to evil through the poison of sin which has passed into the nature of all men since the fall, and though, by Baptism, the antecedent guilt of original sin is put away, yet its deteriorating effects are not all removed. God receives us by Baptism into a state of grace, in which state that which has been marred by the fall can be restored; but the fact of Baptism does not at once restore, it only sets us in a condition in which restoration is possible.
3. There are several causes operating on our Conscience which tend to vitiate it:—
(a) Ignorance of the Divine Will, and of the law of