KNOWLEDGE WITHOUT CONSCIENCE, OR, THE WAY OF CAIN

KNOWLEDGE WITHOUT CONSCIENCE, OR, THE WAY OF CAIN

Man in innocence knew nothing but as he was instructed of God. Now when the serpent was listened to, it is clear another line of instruction came in, and man in yielding to this evil line, and eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, learned evil, by committing it; and here conscience entered. I have the sense that there is a better ^[p. 98] line that I am to act up to, and that I yield to one I do not approve of. Hence it is plain that from the fall there were two lines of instruction: one, which addressed the conscience, asserted the claims of God, whether declared by the works of creation, or heard of by revelation. The other, as contributing only to man. Soon, alas, it became general that man did not like to retain God in his knowledge; he preferred what ministered to his own self-exaltation, and the conscience was neglected and despised.

Let us examine, and seek to discover how, and when, we are carried away in the acquisition of knowledge without conscience. We get in the first recorded act of Adam and Eve a use of their newly acquired knowledge which did not reach to the conscience. They sewed fig leaves together to make themselves aprons. Their sensibilities demanded this. It is not that it was not perfectly right and proper to do so. Nay, the very demand for it as the only proper thing, sets forth distinctly that there can be knowledge, the most necessary, and this without conscience, without any sense of God’s claim; hence, when the voice of the Lord God is heard in the garden in the cool of the day and conscience is acted on, the aprons are not deemed sufficient, they hide themselves behind the trees of the garden. Knowledge, with conscience, carries one much farther than knowledge without conscience; and the latter, however excellent, can exist without the other. Many pious people are carefully scrupulous to avoid and repudiate everything which would offend against good moral taste; and yet I have found when this was carried to an extreme, and when there was consequently an outward appearance very commendable and attractive, there was such a lack of conscience, that the holder of false doctrine, though known, was tolerated because he did not disseminate it.

I call attention to the fact that knowledge may be confined in its claims to what suits man, so that man’s advance, in mind and manner, is the one aim. It is then ^[p. 99] a lower standard, however right and good; for, were the true standard, God’s claim, insisted on, all that was proper for man’s moral sensibilities would be secured and a great deal more, because what God required would be insisted on.

Now for another example of which we are warned in Scripture. They went in the way of Cain. Cain was the founder of natural religion. He labours assiduously and brings an offering of the fruits of the earth; he was guided in his act by what he judged in his own mind would meet the mind of God. There was no sense of what was due to God from one under the penalty of death. The judgment of God in His holiness he entirely disregards, or does not see. He let his own mind dictate to him how he was to restore himself to God; he was not ignorant that there was a distance between God and man, and he carefully and laboriously set himself to recover it; wherever he got his knowledge, or whatever the extent of it, it was not knowledge of God. There is a great deal apparently to commend in a man making it the first object of his life to repair his relation with God. He was sensible of the distance as a matter of fact, but not as it was according to God. The fact he knew, and he would remove it, as man regarded it, but not according to God. There is knowledge of the state of things in part, but instead of seeking God’s way of removing it, man consults his own mind, and obtains great credit from himself and others for his well intended work: but yet this very man, when instructed from the mouth of God how to act and really repair the distance, not only scorns it, but kills his brother who had acted according to the mind of God. The man most earnestly set on removing the distance between himself and God, when following his own mind, is so opposed to God’s way of effecting it, that he kills the one who accedes to God’s way of reaching it. This is a dreadful instance of knowledge without conscience. It might be alleged that Cain was acting up to his light when he offered up the fruits of ^[p. 100] the earth, but when the mind of God as to it, was fully declared to him, his conscience is not touched, he does not alter his course, but opposes it in the most violent, wicked way; this proves incontestably that he had knowledge of the mind of God without conscience. Could there be a fuller or a more dreadful disclosure of the enmity of man’s heart, than that a man who, at great sacrifice, had sought to secure happy relations with God according to his own mind and judgment, yet when clearly and fully instructed by the words of God, instead of accepting it, as one groping in the dark, and looking for light, would gladly accept a light, he determinedly opposed it, and killed the one who had acted according to it?

As the world began, so will the world close. There is a great interval between Adam using his knowledge to relieve human sensibilities, and Cain refusing to act above the religion of his own mind, for that which suited God. Had there been conscience he would have yielded to what was due to God. Now in this interval there are many gradations. Man uses his enlarged knowledge either to mould things to his enlightened sensibilities, or he descends, step by step, until he prefers his own religion to God’s revelation, and declares it by open hostility to the people of God. In the first case the conscience was not at all addressed, in the other, it was that man’s mind presumed to control it, and resented, with fierce and deadly violence, the marvellous intervention of revelation to liberate and truly direct it. From the very first, man did not like to retain God in his knowledge; but the saddest thing is, when the knowledge, even true knowledge, can be accepted and sought after, but with the predetermination not to allow it to carry one beyond a prescribed system or order of things. Thus the word of God is made of none effect, and the typical character of the last days is, A pharisee received Him into his house, or, the men of Judah insisting on carrying the prophet Jeremiah into Egypt. There is an acceptance ^[p. 101] and an entertainment of the highest truth, when there is no action of the conscience before God, because of it; the desire to possess it, but not to act up to it. The language of the morally deposed king Saul describes their one desire or care for truth. He desired the countenance of Samuel. “Honour me now”, cried he, “before the elders of my people”. The most unworthy and deadliest school in the present day is the one which encourages and promotes the acquisition of the most advanced biblical knowledge, but with the secret determination of not yielding to any of its directions, beyond an approved religion. This school may seek to vindicate itself that they are not going in the way of Cain, that is, that they have accepted the true way of salvation according to the word of God. They are entitled to the full benefit of this plea, and it is a relief to know that many are in the faith that saves; but while it is a cheer to charity that they have believed unto eternal life, yet it is very grievous to the Spirit of God that real partakers of the grace of life should persistently refuse to be led by the light of God, or beyond a certain pre-arranged limit. I can understand an unconverted Saul of Tarsus, listening unmoved to the burning words of the first martyr, Stephen, but what shall I say of the Marks, or the Demases, of the Agrippas, the Phygelluses, and the Hermogeneses; who though they had not received the truth from Paul, with any preconcerted intention of limiting its action, yet practically did so, and refused to be in conscience led by it. Their knowledge thus works positive damage, for if “the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!” Do I reject or object to the circulation of truth, and the introduction of books and tracts, setting forth plainly and strikingly the truths of revelation in contrast to the misty interpretation of man? Certainly not; but I deplore and I denounce in every way I can, the school or system which proposes and advocates the acquisition of truth of the highest order, with the reservation that it shall not lead one beyond a certain ^[p. 102] human arrangement and line of things, previously determined upon. If teachers accept this rule what must their pupils be? It is, be assured, of the spirit of Cain: knowledge without conscience, and with this there will ever be a bitter deadly enmity towards any who, led of God, step outside of the approved religion in faith in His word, through the power of the Holy Spirit.