pleaſed, at ſundry times and in divers manners, to diſcover and enforce it’s laws by an immediate and direct revelation. The doctrines thus delivered we call the revealed or divine law, and they are to be found only in the holy ſcriptures. Theſe precepts, when revealed, are found upon compariſon to be really a part of the original law of nature, as they tend in all their conſequences to man’s felicity. But we are not from thence to conclude that the knowlege of theſe truths was attainable by reaſon, in it’s preſent corrupted ſtate; ſince we find that, until they were revealed, they were hid from the wiſdom of ages. As then the moral precepts of this law are indeed of the ſame original with thoſe of the law of nature, ſo their intrinſic obligation is of equal ſtrength and perpetuity. Yet undoubtedly the revealed law is of infinitely more authenticity than that moral ſyſtem, which is framed by ethical writers, and denominated the natural law. Becauſe one is the law of nature, expreſſly declared ſo to be by God himſelf; the other is only what, by the aſſiſtance of human reaſon, we imagine to be that law. If we could be as certain of the latter as we are of the former, both would have an equal authority: but, till then, they can never be put in any competition together.
Upon theſe two foundations, the law of nature and the law of revelation, depend all human laws; that is to ſay, no human laws ſhould be ſuffered to contradict theſe. There is, it is true, a great number of indifferent points, in which both the divine law and the natural leave a man at his own liberty; but which are found neceſſary for the benefit of ſociety to be reſtrained within certain limits. And herein it is that human laws have their greateſt force and efficacy; for, with regard to ſuch points as are not indifferent, human laws are only declaratory of, and act in ſubordination to, the former. To inſtance in the caſe of murder: this is expreſſly forbidden by the divine, and demonſtrably by the natural law; and from theſe prohibitions ariſes the true unlawfulneſs of this crime. Thoſe human laws, that annex a puniſhment to it, do not at all increaſe it’s moral guilt, or
