ple was exhibited, but in a
more strange and perverted manner. The homage there given to
self-denial, self-sacrifice, was this--that the highest form of
religion was considered to be that exhibited by the devotee who sat in
a tree until the birds had built their nests in his hair--until his
nails, like those of the King of Babylon, had grown like birds'
talons--until they had grown into his hands--and he became absorbed
into the Divinity.

We will take another instance, and one better known. In ancient Sparta
it was the custom to teach children to steal. And here there would
seem to be a contradiction to our proposition--here it would seem as
if right and wrong were matters merely conventional; for surely
stealing can never be anything but wrong. But if we look deeper we
shall see that there is no contradiction here. It was not stealing
which was admired; the child was punished if the theft was discovered;
but it was the dexterity which was admired, and that because it was a
warlike virtue, necessary it may be to a people in continual rivalry
with their neighbours. It was not that honesty was despised and
dishonesty esteemed, but that honesty and dishonesty were made
subordinate to that which appeared to them of higher importance,
namely, the duty of concealment. And so we come back to the principle
which we laid down at first. In every age, among all nations, the same
broad principle remains; but the application of it varies. The
conscience may be ill-informed, and in this sense only are right and
wrong conventional--varying with latitude and longitude, depending
upon chronology and geography.

The principle laid down by the Apostle Paul is this:--A man will be
judged, not by the abstract law of God, not by the rule of absolute
right, but much rather by the relative law of conscience. This he
states most distinctly--looking at the question on both sides. That
which seems to a man to be right is, in a certain sense, right to him;
and that which seems to a man to be wrong, in a certain sense _is_
wrong to him. For example: he says in his Epistle to the Romans (v.
14.) that, "sin is not imputed when there is no law," in other words,
if a man does not really know a thing to be wrong there is a sense in
which, if not right to him, it ceases to be so wrong as it would
otherwise be. With respect to the other of these sides however, the
case is still more distinct and plain. Here, in the