may lay his error down, it follows, that to obey God never hath an unavoidable dilemma, and never is impossible, so long as the man is in a state and possibility of repentance. Because every error that infers an action, that is formally as well as materially sinful, not only ought, but may also be deposed or laid down; because, in such cases, no man is invincibly abused. No man can ever be in that condition, that to love God shall become a sin to him; because no man can really be ignorant, or properly entertain this opinion, that it is a sin to love God; that rebellion is lawful; that adultery is no sin; that it can be lawful to strike a prince for justice, or to break a commandment to preserve the interest of a sect; that a man may rob God in zeal against idolatry and images. These things are so plainly taught, that an error in these cannot choose but be malicious.

But when the error is in such cases where either it is invincible and irremediable, or where weakness pleads excuse, the action is in that degree innocent in which the error is unavoidable; and if it could be otherwise, then a case might happen, in which, by the laws of God, a man could be bound to that which is intrinsically evil, — and then God, and not man, were the author of the sin.

The sum is this. God is supreme, and conscience is his vicegerent and subordinate. Now it is certain, that the law of an inferior cannot bind against the command of a superior when it is known. But when the superior communicates the notices of his will by that inferior, and no otherwise, the subject is to obey that inferior, and in so doing he obeys both. But the vicegerent is to answer for the misinformation, and the conscience for its error, according to the degree of its being culpable.

It is a greater Sin to do a good Action against our Conscience, than to do an evil Action in obedience to it.

THIS rule concerns degrees only, but is useful in the conducting some actions of repentance; and it is to be under

stood to be true only in equal cases, and when there is no circumstance aggravating one part. Friar Clement, the Jacobin, thinks erroneously, that it is lawful to kill his king; the poor demoiselle Faucette thinks it unlawful to spit in the church: but it happened that, one day, she did it against her conscience; and the friar, with his conscience and a long knife, killed the king. If the question be here, who sinned most? the disparity is next to infinite; and the poor woman was to be chidden for doing against her conscience, and the other to be hanged for doing according to his. Because the friar's error could not be invincible and inculpable, her's might; and in such questions, the effect of which is of so high concernment, because the errors in them are supreme and dangerous, the inquisition ought to be very great where there can be difficulty, and therefore the negligence is always intolerable, and it is malicious where the discovery is easy, as it is in these cases. And therefore, in so different materials, the case can no way be equal; because in one there is a greater light, a more ready grace, a perfect instruction, an evident provision, an open restraint, and a ready command

ment.

But when the effect of the questions is equal, and not differenced by accidents, the rule is certain upon this reason; because a sin done against knowledge is greater than a sin done ignorantly. He that sins against his conscience, sins against all his knowledge in that particular; but if he sins against a commandment which he knows not to be such, he sins ignorantly, and therefore the more excusably. "But I found mercy," saith St. Paul, "for I did it ignorantly, in unbelief."

Upon this account, it comes to be the same kind, and the same degree of crime, to sin against an erring, and to sin against a right conscience in the same instances. He that omits to hear divine service on a festival, when he hath no reasonable impediment, and he who omits it upon a common day, which he erroneously supposes to be a festival, hath equally prevaricated the law of the church, and the analogy of the commandment of God on which this of the church is founded, they being equally against his rule by which he is to walk and this error hath no influence upon the will or choice, but is wholly extrinsical to it. But this is to be

understood in errors of fact, and such as are inculpable, and have no effect, and make no change in the will.

*. And, therefore, in our penitential sorrows and expiations, we need not be curious to make a difference of them which have the same formal malice; and if we be taught to make any, it may have this evil consequence in it, that we may love our ignorance, and flatter ourselves in our irregularities, which we think will not be so severely imputed, by reason of the error. If this be a great crime to disobey our conscience, teaching us righteous and true propositions, it is on the other side also very great to suffer our conscience to be so misled, that a good action shall become criminal by such mistaking; so that, besides the departing from our rule, which is equal in both, they have their own superadded evil to weigh against each other.

It is not lawful to delight in an evil Action (after the Discovery of our Error), which we did innocently in an erroneous Con

science.

a

THE case is this:- Quintus Hortensius received a forged will of Minucius from some hæredipetæ or testamentary cheaters; and, because they offered to verify it, and to give him a share, he defended the forgery, and possessed his part; but when he afterwards perceived the cheat, and yet detained the purchase, he grew infamous : it was innocent till he knew it, but then it was criminal. He should not have pleased himself in it, because he should have restored it. But in this there is no question.

But when the possession or purchase may lawfully remain, there is some difference in the decision of the question. Spurinna, striking a stag, involuntarily and unwittingly kills his brother, and becomes rich by the inheritance. Here the man must separate the effect from its relation, and so proceed: the inheritance was a blessing, the accident was a misfortune; and if he may not rejoice in that, he may not give thanks for it, but as for a cross, But if he pleases himself in the way of his entrance to it, he had a mind ready to have killed

a Cicer. Off. iii. 17, 5. Heusinger, page 704.

his brother if he durst, or at least did secretly wish him dead, that he might openly have his living. In this there is no great difficulty to make the separation. God strikes a man with blindness, and gives him a good memory; he sighs for that, and rejoices for this. A little metaphysics makes this abstraction.

2. But concerning the act, when it is discovered to have been evil, he is to have no other complacency, but because he did it ignorantly. He that suffers nocturnal pollution, if he finds a remedy by it, is to rejoice that himself suffered it involuntarily, that is, he may rejoice that he did not sin; and of the innocence of the joy he can have no other testi mony but by his hating the act in all cases in which it is a sin, and refusing to do it. But the French woman, whom my Lord Montaigne speaks of, who having suffered a rape by divers soldiers, gave God thanks, that, without sin, she had enjoyed pleasure, had a criminal joy, and delighted in the action, for the voluntary entertainment of which she only wanted an excuse.

3. If we consider the whole conjunction of things together, the evil act with the advantageous effect, we are to be indifferent to joy and sorrow, that is, to do neither directly, but to look on it as an effect of the Divine providence bringing good out of evil, and to fear lest a joy in the whole should entitle us too nearly to the sin by the relation of an after-act and approbation; or lest we be so greedy of the effect, that we be too ready to entertain the like upon terms equally evil, but less fortunate.

4. This is also to be understood only in such cases in which we are not obliged to restitution; for if we rejoice in that effect which we ought to destroy, we recall the ́sin from the transient action, and make it dwell with the possession, and then the first involuntary error becomes a chosen rapine.

5. If the action was only materially, and therefore innocently, an error against a human law, and turns to our secular advantage, we are more at liberty to rejoice and please ourselves in the advantage; because human laws make no action intrinsically and essentially evil, but only relatively and extrinsically. And therefore the danger is not so great of polluting the conscience by the contract and

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mingling of the affections with the forbidden action. He that eats flesh in Lent in those places and circumstances where it is forbidden, and did not remember it was Lent, or did not know it, and by so doing refreshes himself well, and does advantage to his health, may not be accused easily, if he delights in the whole action, as it joins the error and the advantage. For, besides the former reason, this also is considerable; that human laws, not being so wise and excellent as Divine laws, do bend more easily and readily, that they may comply with the ends of charity and gentleness, and have in them à more apt dispensation, and almost offer themselves to go away, when a greater good comes in their room. But of this in its due place.

6. In actions materially evil against the Divine laws, if the event cannot be clearly separated from the irregularity, the first innocent error is, by the after-pleasure, turned into a direct sin. Cneius Carbo lay with Lælia unwittingly, supposing her to be his wife Posthumia; but afterwards, having discovered the error, was pleased in the mistake, because he, by the arts of fancy, did, by an after-thought, represent to himself the change and the variety, and then he was adulterous. For to be pleased in the mistake which brings no advantage separable from the sin, is directly to choose the sin for the advantage' sake; and this was Carbo's

case.

RULE VI.

An innocent, or invincibly erring Conscience, is to be obeyed even against the known Commandment of our Superiors. AGAINST this St. Bernard seems to argue earnestly: "Si tantopere vitanda sunt scandala parvulorum, quanto amplius prælatorum, quos sibi Deus coæquare quodammodo in utroqué dignatur, dum sibimet imputat et illorum reverentiam et contemptum?" &c. "If with so great caution we must be careful, that we do not offend any of God's little ones, how much more must we be curious to avoid giving offence to great ones, to our superiors, whom God seems, in some