Note 1 — ISAIAH. (continued 2)

The argument which the fatalist bases upon organisation is self-annihilating when applied to the common relations of life. The fatalist himself does not believe in his own doctrine; in speculative reasoning he is eager to charge moral crime upon organic defect; yet, in practical magistracy, he arraigns and condemns the criminal to punishment. But how monstrous an outrage is this upon his own creed! The criminal was compelled through stress of organisation to commit the crime, yet the fatalist punishes him for doing what he could not help! Let the principle of the fatalist be admitted, and there is an end to all legislation—an end, indeed, to the social compact itself. All associated life is regulated by a system of restraints; but restraint implies self-control, and self-control is directly opposed to fatalism. Let a criminal plead that he could not help committing a certain crime; and if the judge allow the plea, he will at once treat the criminal as a lunatic, and instruct the officers of justice accordingly. Magistracy proceeds upon the principle that men can “help” committing crime. All human legislation assumes a man’s power of self-regulation, and grounds itself on the grand doctrine of man’s responsibility to man. At this point, upon the same principle in relation to God, Theology says, You hold yourselves responsible to one another on all social matters, you punish the criminal, you ignore the plea of fatalism on all questions of property, order, and security; now go further, heighten your own social base, carry out to their logical issues your own principles and methods, and you will reach all that God requires of man. If it be urged that God gave the criminal his organisation, the objection does not touch the argument. The argument is, that in human consciousness the plea of fatalism is ignored on all practical matters; away beyond all written statutes there is a conviction that man can regulate his actions, and ought to be held responsible for such regulation. Man himself thus, by his own conduct and his own law, acquits God of all charge upon this matter; the very recognition by the magistrate of man’s responsibility is itself a direct acquittal of God from the accusations of fatalism. God need not be interrogated upon the subject, for the magistrate himself, faithful to the consciousness of universal humanity, treats the fatalistic theory as an absurdity.—Joseph Parker.