Christian Classics
‹ Christian Ethics. Volume II.—Pure Ethics.
Contents
Note of Translator.Introduction.Section L. Classification of Christian EthicsSection 51. The GoodSection LII. The Moral.Section LIII. The Moral. (Cont’d)Section LIV. The Moral. (Concl’d)II. Relation of Morality to Religion.Section 56. Scientific Classification of Ethics.Section LVII. Scientific Classification of Ethics. (Concl’d)Chapter I. The Moral Subject.Section LIX. The Individual Moral Subject, Man.Section LX. The Cognizing Spirit.Section LXI. The Volitionating Spirit, Freedom of Will.A. Man as a Spirit. · Section LXII.Section LXIII. The Feeling SpiritMan as to His Sensuously-Corporeal Life. · Section LXIV.Man as to His Sensuously-Corporeal Life. · Section LXV.Man as to His Sensuously-Corporeal Life. · Section LXVI.Section LXVII. The Stages of Life.Section LXVIII. Temperament and National Peculiarities.Section LXIX. The Sexes.II. The Community-Life as Moral Subject.Section LXXI. God as the Ground and Prototype of the Moral LifeSection LXXII. God as Holy Will.Section LXXIII. God as Prototype of the Moral.Section LXXIV. God as Upholder of the Moral World-Government.Section LXXV. God as Holy Law-Giver.I. The Revelation of the Divine Will to Man.(a) The Extraordinary, Positive and Supernatural Revelation.Section LXXVII. The Inner Revelation.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · Part 1Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXIX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXXI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXXII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXXIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXXIV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXXV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXXVI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXXVII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXXVIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION LXXXIX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XC.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XCI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XCII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XCIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XCIV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XCV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XCVI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XCVII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XCVIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XCIX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION C.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CIV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CVI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CVII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CVIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CIX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXIV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXVI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXVII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXVIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXIX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXIV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXVI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXVII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXVIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXIX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXXI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXXII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXXIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXXIV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXXV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXXVI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXXVII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXXVIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXXXIX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXL.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXLI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXLII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXLIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXLIV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXLV.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXLVI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXLVII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXLVIII.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CXLIX.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CL.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CLI.Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION CLII.General Index to Vols. I and II.

Adolf Wuttke · 48 of 107

Section LXXVIII. The Inner Revelation and the Conscience. (Concl'd) · SECTION XCIV.

As morality is the free fulfilling of the divine will, hence moral love is primarily always love to God, and the love to created things is moral only in so far as it springs from the love to God,—considers created things as the work of God, and loves them in him. The God-consciousness, as developed into a moral love of God, is piety (εὐσέβεια); hence all morality rests on piety. All non-pious love is immoral, and hence also all love to the creature as such, taken in itself without connection and interpenetration with the divine love. But all love to God rests on our consciousness of God’s love to us; love is produced only by love; all moral love is, in its essence, reciprocal love; a non-loving creature can be loved only in so far as God’s love is reflected to us from it; and for this very reason moral love to persons seeks indeed their love in return, but does not need it.

As rational thought finds the unity of its thought-world only in the thought of God, so also moral love finds its rest and its unity only in love to God; it is not content with the semblance thereof but only with the truth; and all things have their truth only in their relation to God. As that love is higher, truer, and mightier which loves, in a person, not merely the earthly but also the soul, so is that love higher, truer, and mightier which loves in man, not merely the creature but also the image of God, and, through it, God himself. Love is the more genuine the higher its object; he who sees in creatures the trace of God, and loves God in them, he alone loves with the whole might of love. The proper love to the creature rests on the consciousness that “the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof” [1 Cor. x, 26]; this does not lower the creature in the eyes of the love, but elevates both its worth and the love for it. Thus also Christ presents the precept of love to God as “the first and great commandment;” and “the second is like unto it,” that is, it is already implied in it, though it does not absolutely coincide with it,—it is in fact the reflection of our love to God back upon our neighbor; our love for our neighbor is erroneous, when it does not rest upon love to God. Hence Christ says: “He that loveth father or mother more than me, is not worthy of me” [Matt. x, 37]. To the natural man this sounds hard and severe; but from a Christian stand-point, nay, even from a religious stand-point in general, no other view is possible than in fact, that a love for the creature without the higher divine love, or with one that prevails over the latter, is sinful. By this relation of all love to the love of God, this love is preserved also from one-sided narrowness,—clings not, in irrational caprice, to isolated objects,—but extends itself to all that is created, though indeed different degrees of such love are possible, from the fact of the differing peculiarity of the object and of the loving person.

This true mutual relation of our love to the creature and our love to God, appears still more striking when we attentively consider the relation of human love to the divine love. As human thinking is only a reflection of the divine thought, so also is human love only a reflection of the divine love. All that is true and good in the copy is enkindled by the true and the good of the prototype; “He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love” [1 John iv, 8]. Man could not love God, and hence could not love morally at all, were he not loved of God. God’s love is a love of ; man’s love is a love of gratitude,—the answering love of a child. Love cannot love any thing else but love [Psa. ciii, 1 sqq.; Col. iii, 17; 1 Thess. v, 18; 1 John iv, 11, 19]. For this reason there is no pain so great as where love remains unrequited. But to the pious heart it is not unrequited; such a heart finds the love which it seeks; Christ says: whatsoever “ye have done unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me;” and where, against the loving one, the heart of man coldly closes itself, there the love of God comes in its place.