St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1893-03-06
Archbishop Ireland Talks Of
Divine Laws Governing
Mankind.
No Moral Freedom From Re-
spect for Them Implied
by Great Gifts.
The Power to Protest and Re-
sist Makes the Obligation
Greater.
Fullness and Harmony Of Be-
ing Realized Only by
Obedience.

Archbishop Ireland preached to a
large congregation last evening at the
cathedral, taking as basis for his re-
marks the words, 40 All Divine Laws
| There Is Sanction" He spoke in SUBJ
stance as follows:
God reIgning above us, man depend
ent upon God,we are by nature His sub
Jects, responsible to Him in our acts,
amenable to His judgments. Being
| God all-wlse and all-provident. a God
of supreme order, He necessarily has
imposed upon us laws when are in their
ultimate analysis nothing but the cOndi-
tons OF our own well-being and of our
| fultillment Of the purposes for which we
exist. Physical laws belong to unthink-
ing creation; moral laws, to that part
| of creation which is intelligent and self
! determining. Because the subject is so
| highly endowed as to have conscience
| of its obligation, and to be able, if it
| chooses, to protest and resist, no moral
| freedom from the law is accorded. The
obligation, measured by the dignity and
| the favors received, is the more impera-
tive. The laws Of the Creator observed,
there Is fulness of being, realization of
destiny and the harmony of being, which
results in peace and fruition. The laws
violated. there is incompleteness, unrest,
suffering. In other words, to all the
divine laws there is a sanction.
Sanction TO Physical Laws.
The sanction to physical laws is plain
to all eyes. 1t is destruction. The
planets of the armament escaping from
their normal course encounter one an
other and break to pieces. The tree,
the flower, misdfrecting roots, miscar-
rying sap, wither and decay. The human
body regardless OF laws, dies. What of
man within the wide range of moral
obligations, Of moral accountability?
Dire disaster must follow rebellion and
wrong-dolng.
Man, by his reason and free will, so
nearly approaches the divine life, and
mirrors the divine PROJECTIONS, that he
is OF immensely greater Importance in
the mind Of the Creator than all IRA
been allotted to him. Other beings play
their parts in time; man is in his spirit
ual soul immortal, as reason itself
teaches, and revelation makes absolutely
sure. Laws, propOrtiOned to his eleva-
ton, have been read out to him, and, we
may assume at once. sanctions CORE
spOndingly weighty, affixed to these
laws.
Sanction TO Moral Laws.
Laws being conditions of complete
life, the violation of them leaves the
subject in a state of incompleteneSs,a and
this, III conscious being, means suf-
fering. The legislator that does not
add sanction to his law abdlcates his
majesty, and invites upon himself the
Seern and contempt of undutiful in
ferlors. Human lawmakers give sane
| tons to their enactments. Is the divine
| laWmaker less wise, less potent? In
| deed, the absence of sanctions, the grant
| OF lmDunlty puts premium upon viO-
| latlonS, temptS to vice. We must con-
| slider the nature of our moral obliga-
| tons. While reason approves them,
| and conscience imperlously demands
| their observance, the lower, baser ele-
ments within us dislike them, and i'm
| pei us in contrary pathways.
Man is a strange admiXture. The
| Pagan poet, Ovid, and the Christian
apostle, Paul, have in almost similar
words told Of the two men in each one
| of us; the one saying. L will; the other
| tiercely shouting, l will not. Alas! how
| violent the war between the two; and,
| how often, the n0bler man Borrowing,
| the yller one triumphS and bends the
| immortal soul, Gods own image and
| likeness, down into the mire of beastly
| passions! A God declaring Himself in-
| different to the issue of the struggle,
smiling with equal complacency upon
virtue and vice, would implicitly APP
| prove of vice, and throw into the scales
| IN nj rh yhNl
weight of His authority. GOD is the God
OF order, the God who has traced upon
our souls indelible characters of ethical
| prescriptions, and, consequently, He is
being Himself supremacy ethical, de-
| handing that men do right and Shun
wrong, blessing and rewarding right
doing, hating and Furnishing wrong-do-
| ing.
God is no Indifferent observer of the
two men, the one conscious OF the law
! OF righteousness, tearing amid agony
| ineXplissible his being In twain, to hold
| the immortal above the reach of passion,
to guard the immaculate from the I'M
clean touch of the wild waves of sin
! the other, burying the soul, for the sake
Of animal enjoyment, in the depths of
shame. and blotting out from its brow
| the grace and beauty of its divine ORR
| gin. Let us know that there Is sane
| ton to Gods enactments, and sanction
we'll proportional to the greatness Of
the cause in issue and to the tierceness
of the battle which it engages.
Value of the Ethical World.
The serious misfortune is that we do
not apprehend the value Of the ethical
| world. The material world overshadoWs
for us all else. We know how vitality
important 1t Is that the sun give out
heat and light, that the earth revolves,
that the seasons come IN at marked
| periods. Physical evils, menacing our
bodies, alright US. War and pestilence
| alarm us. Conditions leading up to
| fever or cholera must at all cost be elm
| mated. But sin moves us not.
4 Pride and impurity and dishonesty
awaken slight protest, except SO
/ far as they injure our temporal
interests. Insults to God, rebellion
against His DEGREES, the cOntemptuous
| neglect Of His rights, are of no concern
| to us. The death otsouls to His grace
! is of slightest moment. o. men, blind
ed to truth and justice, know you that
| the Almighty values an immortal soul
! above earth and planets; that the viola
| ton of an ethical law by a free, intelll-
gent evil is an evil far more heinous in
! His sight than the blottlng out of the
whole armament?
| The world is made for man, not man
for the world, and mans soul is the
man, not the body. The evil of evils is
when rational being, knowing God
and knowing Gods law, profits of the
free will accorded to 1t, rises in the
presence Of the Sovereign Master and
| eXclaims, 81 will not serve" The evil
| Of evils is when the moral order is vio-
lated, when man, Gods choicest Great
ure, Is degraded, and the Omnlpotent is