Page:The Message and Ministrations of Dewan Bahadur R. Venkata Ratnam, volume 2.djvu/199

 soul of man. If you listen to it and obey it, it will speak clearer and clearer, and always guides you right; but if you turn a deaf ear and disobey, then it will fade out little by little and leave you all in the dark. Your life depends on your heeding this little voice."

By conscience the Theists mean the divine urge in the human soul, the counsel and guidance from on high, the oracle of God in man. But our good critics would seem to take it in the sense of unillumined human wisdom gathered by personal experience—that sense of prudence and utility which is bred in man by a knowledge of the work-a-day world; and they naturally question the efficiency of the faculty as a spiritual guide. If conscience denoted the frail unaided human reason, it would certainly be suicidal to depend upon so fickle a guide. But conscience is of Heaven, though subject to human capacities or limitations. It is the inward mentor who speaks with authority and enforces his commands. It is Heavens direct-