should prove an injury to himself, and an injustice to others, he must bring with him to the discharge of this duty, the greatest vigilance, and the most intimate and practised acquaintance with the interpretation of the Law, in order to be able to pronounce according to this divine rule on every omission and commission; and that, as the Apostle says, he teach sound doctrine, [1] doctrine free from error, and heal the diseases of the soul, which are the sins of the people, that they may be "acceptable to God, pursuers of good works." [2]
In discharge of this duty of instruction, the pastor will propose to himself and to others such considerations, as may be best calculated to impress upon the mind the conviction, that obedience to the law of God is the duty of every man; and if in the Law there are many motives to stimulate to its observance, there is one which of all others is powerfully impressive it is, that God is its author. True, it is said to have been delivered by angels, [3] but its author, we repeat, is God. Thus, not only the words of the Legislator himself, which we shall subsequently explain, but also, innumerable other passages of Scripture, which the memory of the pastor will readily supply, bear ample testimony. Who is not conscious that a law is inscribed on his heart by the finger of God, teaching him to distinguish good from evil, vice from virtue, justice from injustice? The force and import of this unwritten law do not conflict with that which is written. How unreasonable then to deny that God is the author of the written, as he is of the unwritten law.
But, lest the people, aware of the abrogation of the Mosaic Law, may imagine that the precepts of the Decalogue are no longer obligatory, the pastor will inform them, that these precepts were not delivered as new laws, but rather as a renewal and development of the law of nature: its divine light, which was obscured and almost extinguished by the crimes and the perversity of man, shines forth in this celestial code with increased and renovated splendour. The Ten Commandments, however, we are not bound to obey because delivered by Moses, but because they are so many precepts of the natural law, and have been explained and confirmed by our Lord Jesus Christ. But it must prove a most powerful and persuasive argument for enforcing its observance, to reflect that the founder of the Law is no less a Person than God himself - that God whose wisdom and justice we mortals cannot question - whose power and might we cannot elude. Hence, we find that when by his prophet, he commands the Law to be observed, he proclaims that he is "the Lord God." The Decalogue, also, opens with the same solemn admonition: " I am the Lord thy God;" [4] and in Malachy we read the indignant interrogatory: " If I am a master, where is my fear?" [5] That God has vouchsafed to give us a transcript of his holy will, on which depends our eternal
