THE religious mind loves mysteries. Conscience has always been set down
as a mystery by religious people. It has been called "the still small
voice," and we have been taught that it is a supernatural kind of sense
by which man is guided in his knowledge of good and evil.
Now, I claim that conscience is no more supernatural than is the sense
of smell, and no more mysterious than the stomach.
If conscience were what religious people think it is--a kind of heavenly
voice whispering to us what things are right and wrong--we should expect
to find its teachings constant. It would not chide one man, and approve
another, for the same act. It would not warn men that an act was wrong
in one age, and assure them in another age that the same act was
right. It would not have one rule of morality for the guidance of an
Englishman, and another rule of morality for the guidance of a Turk.
It would not change its moral code as the man it is supposed to guide
changes his beliefs through education and experience. It would not give
such widely different men of the same age and nation.
If conscience were really a supernatural guide to right conduct it would
always and everywhere tell man what is eternally right or eternally
wrong.
But conscience is changeable and uncertain. It is a magnetic needle that
points North at one time and South at another time; that points East on
one ship and West on another ship; that points all round the compass
for all kinds of travellers on life's ocean; that has no relation to the
everlasting truths at all.
Sceptics have pointed out that "conscience is geographical"; that it
gives different verdicts in different countries, on the same evidence.
But I shall show that conscience is: