By JOHN YOUNG
If we attempted to run a machine while ignoring the maker’s instructions, we could expect to end up with a badly damaged machine. Everyone realizes this. Likewise with the human body. Whether one is a theist, an atheist, or an agnostic, there is general agreement that smoking or overeating can damage the body.
This is an acknowledgment that we must treat things according to their nature. But that realization ceases when it is a question of ethics, at least regarding many vital issues. Certainly there is general agreement that we should be kind to people, that we shouldn’t steal (at least from individuals), that society should be just.
There is no awareness that, even as a society, we should worship God. There is skepticism about unchangeable moral laws: laws that apply in all circumstances. Particularly in the area of sexual morality confusion is increasing.
Quite apart from divine Revelation, reason shows that sex is ordered to procreation, and that the union of one man and one woman for life is the way to happiness and to the welfare of children. Reason also shows that homosexual behavior is a grave disorder.
But these obvious truths are being increasingly denied today, despite being part of the natural moral law. Even to defend these truths can make one a target for vilification, for loss of employment or even for criminal charges.
A largely forgotten truth is that there is a natural moral law to which we must conform our actions if we are to be truly happy, both individually and as a society. This law is knowable even without divine Revelation; it is accessible to human reason.
A great pagan, Cicero, expressed it beautifully. “True law is right reason in accordance with nature; it is of universal application, unchanging and everlasting….It is a sin to try to alter this law, nor is it allowable to attempt to repeal any part of it, and it is impossible to abolish entirely.
“We cannot be freed from its obligations by Senate or people, and we need not look outside ourselves for an expounder or interpreter of it. And there will not be different laws at Rome and at Athens, or different laws now and in the future, but one eternal and unchangeable law will be valid for all nations and all times, and there will be one master and ruler, that is, God, over us all, for He is the author of this law; its promulgator and its enforcing judge.”
The Ten Commandments are part of divine Revelation, but they express truths accessible to human reason, truths which are part of the natural moral law. So we find at all periods of history and in all cultures an understanding that parents should be honored, and that theft and murder are wrong.
C.S. Lewis, in his little book The Abolition of Man, gives many examples of moral norms upheld by different cultures and at different periods in history, which shows they are based in human nature and human reason. He gives examples of laws of kindness, of duties to parents, elders, and ancestors, to children and posterity. There are laws of justice and honesty and mercy.
Of course history and our current experience show how drastically these rational laws can be corrupted and denied. A rational animal can be very irrational.
As Cicero says in the above quote, God is the Author of this law. As both divine Revelation and human reason show, the very intelligibility found in things derives from the fact that God is their author. Just as an artist may use a mountain as the model for his painting, God is the exemplar of all created things: He modeled them on Himself, each thing having a resemblance to Him.
That is why things are intelligible, why they make sense. Because of this, we live in an ordered universe, each thing having its part to play in the overall design, each contributing to the harmony of the whole.
Because of his intelligence and will, man cooperates freely in the promotion of this harmony, and therefore in gaining happiness for himself and for others. However, free will also makes it possible to rebel against the divinely instituted order, and therefore to cause unhappiness to ourselves and to others.
Unlike Cicero, the modern intelligentsia reject the truth that all things are ordered by a Supreme Intelligence, opting instead for blind evolution as the ultimate explanation. So the notion of “one eternal and unchangeable law” makes no sense to them.
The result is pragmatism, each situation being judged without invoking unchanging principles, and with pleasure as the ultimate aim. The push for euthanasia is an example: the individual person is thought of as autonomous, having no moral obligation to preserve his life, and with pleasure and pain as the criteria in making a decision.
Happiness can only be achieved by obeying the natural moral law, the law written in our hearts, the law that shows how we must live in order to be truly happy. Ironically, society can’t really get away from law; when good laws are forgotten their place is taken by bad laws.
As G.K. Chesterton says, when we break the big laws we don’t get freedom; we don’t even get anarchy; we get the small laws. This is clear today with the petty laws and regulations imposed by governments.
Because the unhappiness in society and in individuals results from violations of the natural moral law, it can only be overcome by obeying that law, which is the fundamental condition for leading a happy life.
To continue the quote from Cicero. “Whoever is disobedient is fleeing from himself and denying his human nature, and by reason of this very fact he will suffer the worst penalties, even if he escapes what is commonly considered punishment.”
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