SECTION LIV. The Moral. (Concl’d)

As the life of a rational spirit is continuous, namely, a continuous free activity, hence it bears continuously a moral character. Morality is not simply a succession of single moral points, it is an uninterrupted life, and every moment of the same is either in harmony or in antagonism with the moral end,—is either good or evil. In the entire life of man there is not a single morally indifferent moment or state.

Man is God’s image only in so far as he lives this God-likeness, for God is life, and all life is continuous; a real interruption of the same is its destruction,—is death. Sleep is only a change in the manifestation of life, arising from the union of the spirit with material nature, but not a real interruption of the same. Spirit sleeps not; also the slumbering spirit is moral,—may be pure or impure; the soul of the saint cannot have unholy dreams; dreams are often unwelcome mirrorings forth of impure hearts; when Jacob rebuked his son Joseph for his supposed ambitious dream [Gen. xxxvii, 10], his moral judgment was quite correct,—simply his hypothesis was erroneous. Ally assumption that there are morally indifferent moments in life is anti-moral. And that there are;, in fact, in the natural life of man middle states between life and death,—for example, swoons,—is of itself a fruit of depravity, and in the same sense that death is such. Morality is the health of the rational spirit; and every interruption of health is disease. God’s will is incessantly binding; there is absolutely nothing conceivable which would not either harmonize with, or antagonize, it.