8. Divine law the measure of sin and duty.
First, the divine law, whereby that law which God has set to the actions
of men,--whether promulgated to them by the light of nature, or the voice of revelation. That God has given a
rule whereby men should govern themselves, I think there is nobody so brutish as to deny. He has a right to do it;
we are his creatures: he has goodness and wisdom to direct our actions to that which is best: and he has power to
enforce it by rewards and punishments of infinite weight and duration in another life; for nobody can take us out
of his hands. This is the only true touchstone of moral rectitude; and, by comparing them to this law, it is that men
judge of the most considerable moral good or evil of their actions; that is, whether, as duties or sins, they are like
to procure them happiness or misery from the hands of the Almighty.
