History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion Part 21

The history of the means which have been successful in removing doubts lends little support to the opinion which would save the faith by the sacrifice of the reason, or would imperil the truth of religion by throwing discredit on the immutability of moral distinctions, perceived by the conscience which Providence has placed in the human mind; to which the great writers on evidence have been wont to make their appeal; and which they have justly perceived must lie at the basis of the evidences themselves. "If the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!"

The two periods in church history among those here named, which offer most instruction to us in consequence of affording examples of the same cla.s.s of difficulties as those which we encounter, are, the struggle in the early centuries, and that in Germany during the present. The line of argument which was used in the former of these crises is seen in the Alexandrian school of the fathers in the third century, and that used in the latter, in the school of Schleiermacher. The study of the life and mental development of Schleiermacher's disciple, Neander, would be in this view one of the most valuable in history.(1032) He was himself led by the mercy and providence of G.o.d to the knowledge of Christ; his own spirit was rescued from doubts such as we describe; his life was spent in trying to save others from the like difficulties, and to plant their feet upon the rock upon which he himself stood: and it is only the secrets of the great day that will declare the number of the souls that were led by his teaching to find Christ and salvation.

In both these periods the method adopted for recommending Christianity was, to carry out the plan used by St. Paul at Athens,(1033) to lay a basis for the proof of it by developing the moral and philosophical argument.

In the Alexandrian period the method used was, to show that all former religions, all former philosophies, were not unmixed error, but contained the germ of truth, which Christianity gathered into itself; to exhibit Christianity as the fulfilment in the field of history of the world's yearnings, and thus to awaken the response of the heart to the narrative of its message.(1034) Reasons, to which allusion has before been made,(1035) may have lessened the utility at that period of the positive evidence, which proves the fact that a Redeemer had been given; but we cannot doubt that, independently of this circ.u.mstance, a deep philosophical reason suggested the stress which was laid on the moral argument, on account of its suitability for convincing the opponent;-a reason indeed to which the history of some of the fathers gave a personal force in the fact that it was by this manner that they had themselves been led to accept of Christianity.(1036)

In the German period the same method has been adopted, with the corresponding alterations suggested by modern philosophy. Not to mention the instructive attempts of the school of Kant to find a philosophy from the subjective side of religion, in the denial of its possibility if attempted on the objective, and to exhibit the limitations of the human mind in speculating on the subject of religious method; nor again to mention the bold attempt of Hegel, to which we have previously taken exception as opposing the simplicity that is in Christ, to work out this forbidden problem, and find a philosophy for Christianity on the objective side: we allude to that which has marked the disciples of Schleiermacher to find it on the subjective as a life, and fact, and doctrine, which fulfils the yearnings of the individual heart.

In pursuing a method of this kind, the appeal must be made to the inextinguishable feeling of guilt; to our personal consciousness of a personal judge; our terror at the sense of justice; our penitence for our own ill deserts; the deep consciousness of the load of sin as an insupportable burden from which we cannot rescue ourselves; and to the guilt of it which separates between us and G.o.d, as a bitter memory that we are powerless to wipe away.(1037) When these facts are not only established as psychological realities, but appropriated as personal convictions, then the way is prepared for the reception of Christianity.

The heart, by realising the personality of G.o.d, is at once elevated above naturalism or pantheism. It feels that in Christ's incarnation it finds G.o.d near, the infinite become finite, G.o.d linked to the heart of a man; and in his atonement it finds G.o.d merciful. Its deep instinct leads it to reject the theories which would pare down the marvel of that mystery. Its consciousness of guilt tells it of an obstacle which it cannot believe to lie merely in itself, but attributes to the mind of the infinite Spirit which it wants a method for removing. No mere example of majestic self-sacrifice proclaiming G.o.d's love to man suffices to solace its sorrows. Some mighty process, wrought out between the Son and the almighty Father, is instinctively felt to be necessary, as the means by which G.o.d can be just and yet the justifier of the sinful. And when philosophy has thus prepared the heart by its appeal to the yearnings of the soul, and brought it to long for the very remedy which Christianity supplies; then the historic argument can be properly introduced, to afford the solid comforting a.s.surance that the remedy wanted has really been given; that miracles and prophecy are divine evidences, attesting the truth of the claim that certain teachers at a particular period received superhuman aid to reveal certain religious truths. (49)

The work of persuasion however is not yet completed; for, ere the heart can fully trust with adoring thankfulness, there are no less than three questions which must still be answered, if the object be to direct doubt instead of suppressing it, and to lead a sinner to Christ by the bands of love.

The first will be the literary one, as to the trustworthiness of the books of the New Testament, which are the record of this teaching.

The second, the inquiry into the fact whether the books teach, and whether the early church taught, dogmatic Christianity as the church now presents it.

The third, though of such a nature as in a great degree to be suppressed by the claim of authority already conceded to the apostolic teachers, may still rise up to hara.s.s the mind if a further answer be not supplied: it refers to the reason that we possess for believing, that if these teachers a.s.serted such truths as dogmatic Christianity, and especially vicarious atonement, these doctrines were a real verity, and not merely a pa.s.sing form under which the truth presented itself to their minds, to be explained away by after ages into less mysterious and more self-evident truths.

The first of these questions, which concerns the trustworthiness of the books, has been most thoroughly tested by the historical criticism of Germany. The data are thus presented for forming a final decision, which in the opinion of most persons will probably be widely different from that which has been arrived at by critics in that country. Yet, supposing we should meet with a doubter who accepted all the views of the Tubingen school,(1038) there are nevertheless four books of the New Testament, the genuineness of which the most extravagant criticism fully admits; viz. the Epistles of St. Paul to the Romans, to the Galatians, and the two to the Corinthians. These four would be sufficient to establish the main articles of dogmatic teaching as presented in the creeds of the Christian church, and the main outline of Gospel and Jewish history as facts on the reality of which St. Paul and his converts relied, and for which he was staking his life. Suppose the Gospels and the Acts(1039) involved in the historic uncertainty which these critics have attributed to them; yet we possess in the Galatians the outline of the life of Paul, the statement of the reason why Paul accepted a religion which he detested. The incomparable argument of Lyttleton(1040) irrefragably proves his honesty. He cannot have been a deceiver. Let the reader of the Galatians say if he was deceived. The two Epistles to Corinth attest the history of the early church; the Epistle to the Romans its dogmatic beliefs. If there is a doubting heart, thoroughly imbued with the most destructive criticism, unable to find historical standing-ground in scripture, he may surely find it in the study of these four works of St. Paul.

The second question, whether the great features of the dogmatic teaching which we receive, and especially the doctrine of vicarious atonement, are taught in the New Testament, admits of satisfactory settlement. The negative of this position has been a.s.serted, in consequence of the alleged fact that this particular doctrine is rather expressed implicitly than explicitly in the earliest fathers; which is to be accounted for by the tendency, while contending against Jewish monotheism, or heathen theism, to put forward the messiahship and incarnation of Christ, in comparison with other religions, rather than his atoning work.(1041) Careful study will soon decide a question of this kind, if directed first to the text of scripture; and secondly, as is most important in all questions of the history of doctrine, to the fathers, as the historic witnesses at once to the teaching of their day, and to the traditions of the teaching of an older age than their own.(1042)

Supposing however that the authenticity of the books be granted, and the existence in them of dogmatic teaching, as we now hold it, be conceded; how are we to answer the final misgiving which might arise, that a doctrine like the atonement was not merely truth relatively to the age in which it was taught, to be surrendered if it conflict with the moral sense? If indeed miraculous attestation, the authority of supernatural a.s.sistance, be conceded, this doubt will be extinguished in most minds by such an admission; but how is it to be fully met, consistently with our object to point out how a doubter may be directed, who desires not to have the natural revelation in his heart crushed, and yet who does not claim, like the deists, that he must comprehend that which he believes, but only that at least he must apprehend it?(1043)

We concede the authority of the moral sense to check all dogmas that are not shown to be part of the teaching of men supernaturally inspired; and we should feel surprised if there were a direct conflict between G.o.d's voice through the apostles and G.o.d's voice through the human conscience.

Probably it could be shown that no such conflict exists; but if it did, we should be inclined to ask whether the moral sense, infallible in what it forbids, is equally so in what it a.s.serts:(1044) whether it cannot possibly admit of such improvement as would cause the difficulty not to be felt; or, if felt, to be cancelled by one of those mental antinomies,(1045) the existence of which is undeniable: or whether there is not still independent and contemporary evidence, to which appeal can be made, to corroborate the apostles' teaching.

Let us, for example, suppose that we have come to the conclusion, that the apostles taught the doctrine of the atonement; and that our moral sense is puzzled with the justice of the system, of the transfer of merit implied in those a.n.a.logies under which the mysterious verity is unveiled to us, and with its apparent incompatibility with a corrective theory of punishment: the thought of error, or of merely relative truth, in the apostles' teaching in such a matter, is forbidden to the mind of any one who admits the least divine inspiration in them, from the fact that this is the innermost and most sacred truth of their creed. We could imagine the early teachers left unaided in all matters irrelevant to religion; nay, by a stretch of supposition, possibly even in some unimportant things appertaining to religion itself: but a mistake on the work and office of Christ,-the very point which, of all others, they were commissioned to teach;-an ingredient of error insinuating itself here, is utterly improbable. If even the inspired authority were denied, the improbability would be hardly less apparent. For this was not a doctrine of the head, but of the feelings; not a fact coldly believed, but appropriated; the voice of the inmost consciousness. If the story of the apostles be true, that the belief of this doctrine, and the prayers founded upon it, had made them changed men; if too their history testifies to the reality of their professions of extraordinary holiness; we could not, even if we did not know from their writings that they were men who were accustomed to the careful a.n.a.lysis of their own feelings, conceive a fatal falsehood to lurk here, in a point where the mixture of inference with consciousness must have been reduced to a minimum.

In this particular case of the atonement, there is however an independent proof of the correctness of the apostles' teaching, through the corroboration of it which is offered by the Christian consciousness of the church. We have before had occasion(1046) to explain the introduction of this idea in the teaching of Schleiermacher, and to protest against the use which he proposed to make of it as a source of truth, independently of the Christian consciousness of the apostles and first teachers; as the gradual source of doctrinal progress, the oracular utterance to this age, as the apostolic consciousness was to the first age.

But there is a deep truth in it, if we use the Christian consciousness, not to supersede scripture, but as the living corroboration and interpreter of it. The Spirit of G.o.d still works on the hearts of men morally, as upon the apostles of old; not by conferring the intellectual gift of inspiration, but in the moral gifts of penitence, of conversion, of pardon, of holiness. Holy men now feel the Spirit of G.o.d striving with them as the apostles did, and appropriate the excellence of Christianity, and feel its renovating power now as then. Therefore the attestation of these men, such as is collected by an induction founded on their biographies, to the fact that when they a.n.a.lyse their secret feelings with the most exact care, they recognise that the pardon which they receive is through the mercy of Christ; that their moments of most hallowed communion with the Father-spirit are when they approach the throne of mercy through the mediation and intercession of another, Christ Jesus; that the victory vouchsafed to them over temptation, is by His merits; that their heart finds no Father for one moment except through him;-this evidence, if it can be accepted, is an independent corroboration of dogmatic truth. It may be explained away, by denying the truth of their a.n.a.lysis, or by referring their feeling to mental a.s.sociation; but it cannot fail to have a persuasive force for those who have faith in the instinctive utterances of the human soul: and the reliance upon it is not more extraordinary than that on which we depend in cognate subjects like aesthetics, where the taste of practical skill is trusted. Christian consciousness thus becomes a new source of facts in theological study; the living voice of the church for ill.u.s.trating and confirming in some degree the utterance of men of old, who spake that which was revealed to their souls by the inspiring Spirit.

Such are the chief steps which the history of evidences, in the contest with early heathenism, as well as in the recent struggle in Germany, seems to point out as the most likely to lead a doubter to Christ; and such the order in which the philosophical and historical evidences ought to be respectively presented, if our object be to give due heed to the desire which an inquirer evinces to appropriate the truth which he believes. Such too, if the opinion already advanced concerning the future of modern doubt be correct, seems to be the final answer which the church can give.

Without undue compromise, commencing with the internal evidence, we thus lead men to the external, and make philosophy as it were the schoolmaster to lead to Christ.

The third question of those which we enumerated as likely to press upon us, viz. that which refers to the inspiration of the scriptures, requires only a few words; inasmuch as the treatment of it has already, to some extent, been implied.

This question has been elevated, since the Reformation, to an importance which it hardly possessed before. Since the authority of the Bible has been subst.i.tuted for the authority of the church, it has been usual to regard the scriptures as the mode of leading men to Christ, instead of considering the knowledge of Christ received through the ministrations of the church as the clue to interpret scripture. Logically, the scripture is the rule of faith, the ground of the church's teaching; but chronologically, the teaching of the church is the means of our knowing the scripture.(1047)

A caution hence arises, that we should not be willing to allow preliminary difficulties, which a doubter may have in reference to the scriptures, to deter us from leading him straight to Christ, and then allowing him by the light of this teaching to reconsider the question of the scripture. The difficulties will generally be found to have reference to the historical and literary portions, rather than the doctrinal, or those portions of the literature which contain the doctrinal. If indeed they refer to the doctrinal, they must be answered at the outset in the manner already shown. If however to the literary, they will be viewed in a different light, if the doubter has been brought to appreciate the central truths of Christianity, from that which they will bear if wrangled out on the threshold of his approach. In the last century indeed, the comparative importance of the doctrinal parts of scripture over the literary was so perceived, when doubts were pressed on the attention of the clergy by the pertinacity of the deist controversialists, that many of the eminent writers restricted the plenary inspiration of the scripture writers to the appropriate matter of the revelation, the supernatural communication of the miraculous system of redemption; and conceived that it was no derogation from the supreme religious authority of the sacred writers, but rather compatible with the loftiest idea of the providential adaptation of means to ends, to suppose them una.s.sisted in literary matters, such as the transcription of genealogies, the reference to natural phenomena, or the literal exact.i.tude of quotations. The jewel of divine truth did not, in their opinion, sparkle less brilliantly because it was handed down in a frame of antique setting. (50) In the present day there is a strong reaction in religious minds in favour of the opposite view, identical with the one held in the seventeenth century by the Puritans. The reaction is only a special instance of the general movement in favour of authority, political and ecclesiastical, which has taken a sudden advance throughout the religious part of Europe, in opposition to the subjective tendency already noticed in secular literature.(1048) This special view however is dictated by a n.o.ble motive, a watchful fear lest the loss of a single atom may weaken the whole structure. Whether it be true or not is not at present under consideration, but merely the caution which ought to be used in pressing it upon doubters at the outset of an approach to the subject of religion. If the object be really to draw them to Christ, we must become all things to all men; and, while not mutilating the heavenly message, take heed not to repel the weak believer from coming to the Saviour, by interposing unnecessary literary obstacles.

It is very common to hear or to read the dilemma put before the doubter, that he must accept everything or nothing in Christianity and the Bible.(1049) Such an alternative, though dictated by a commendable motive, is likely to prove ineffectual. The Dilemma is a form of reasoning which rarely persuades. Its object is rather to silence than to convince. It is more a trick of rhetoric than an argument of logic. It may make a person pause by showing him his apparent position; but the heart, if not the head, can always find means to escape from an alternative which it dislikes. And in this particular case the use of it involves the risk of overlooking the different degrees of importance which belong to different portions of religion, and the very different degrees or evidence on which different portions of it rest. Though the smallest circ.u.mstances in reference to it are of importance, yet it were less vital to doubt the miraculous inspiration of a genealogy than the authoritative teaching of an epistle; or to doubt the date of a book than its contents. No doubt is unimportant; but it were merely repeating the sophistry of the Stoics, in making all sins equal, to deny gradations of importance in doubts; gradations which however are not here put forward to defend eclecticism, but to enforce the lesson, that, in dealing with a doubter, the consideration of this fact must guide us in the order in which we present the evidence of different parts to his mind. It not unfrequently happens that the perusal of the holy scripture is the means of drawing a soul to Christ; the volume in its solitary majesty telling its own tale: or, to speak more reverently, applied to the heart by the Spirit of G.o.d: but generally, if a doubter's heart be filled with historical and critical doubts, he must be led through Christ to the Bible, rather than conversely, and through the New Testament to the Old. If once he can be brought to the perception of a Saviour for sinful man, his doubts will a.s.sume a new aspect, and will adjust themselves into their true place, or perhaps find their own solution.

Yet, when we have used all methods of argument which the survey of the history has given us reason to believe may prove useful, it were affectation to conceal our belief in the perpetual operation, secret and un.o.bserved, of an invisible monitor and persuader, the blessed Spirit of G.o.d. Though we may look to philosophy to prepare the way, by exciting an appreciation of the wants which Christianity supplies, and an apprehension of the suitability of Christianity as the perfection of our spiritual nature; we must confess that it is to the unseen leadings of the Spirit of G.o.d that we trust, to make the heart feel the truth as well as perceive it, and love as well as appreciate it. If we accept the fact of G.o.d's interference to effect man's salvation, and regard it as His special will to bring men to the knowledge of Christ, and trust His promise of a.s.sistance to the church,(1050) it is not enthusiasm, but the most rational faith, to expect divine a.s.sistance to attend constantly on the efforts made to spread the truth which He has been pleased to reveal; not to interfere indeed with the fixed laws of the rational faculties, but to remove prejudices of the heart which might blind the apprehension, and to hallow the soul into a temple for the enshrinement of His truth.

More especially if it be true, as we have perpetually insisted, that there is a large region for the influence of emotional causes of doubt, in addition to the intellectual, which have been the subject of our special study, we may well believe that here is a field where the Holy Spirit alone can enter, and in which He only has the power to operate. Evidence, as evidence, is apprehended and tested by the intellectual faculties; but whatever is the subtle influence, consciously or unconsciously exercised by the emotions, in a matter where the evidence is probable, not demonstrative, this offers a sphere where the help of an all-loving G.o.d may be hoped for to dissipate the alienation of prejudice or indifference.

Paul may plant, and Apollos may water; but it is G.o.d that giveth the increase.

We have now considered the lessons taught by the history, both as to the moral function of free thought, the forms of it which are most likely to meet Christians in the present day, and the means which seem most useful for guiding a doubter into truth.

The history may teach a final lesson to us as Christian students, not so much in reference to leading others to truth, as in relation to the means by which we can attain it ourselves.

In all the days of peril through which the church has pa.s.sed, the means used by those who have striven to find the truth, and become a blessing to the world, have been,-study and prayer. In the solitude of their own hearts, by quiet meditation, they have sought to understand the utterance of the inspired volume; and to secure by prayer the illuminating influence of the divine Spirit, to cause them to behold wondrous things in G.o.d's law.(1051) And thus in an age of coldness they have kept the flame of divine love burning with unextinguished glory on the altar of their hearts; and in an age of questioning have been able to burst forth from their prison-house of doubt, and gaze with the clearness of unclouded faith on the truth once for all delivered to the saints. If, in the dark night of doubt or sin which has spread its veil over the world, there have been stars that have shown to the pilgrim steadier and clearer light than the other luminaries of the heavens, the cause has been that they have reflected some rays of the Divine glory, which had been concentrated in the sunlike brightness of the apostolic inspiration.

If we have found that the present age offers its peculiar intellectual trials; and if we feel ourselves set in the midst of so many and great dangers; let us not be paralysed by the consciousness of them, so as to deem the search for truth unimportant, or antic.i.p.ate that it will be unsuccessful; but rather be led to increased energy in striving to follow the example of those who have overcome by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony.(1052) Let us realise the solemnity of our position as responsible and immortal beings. We are creatures of a day, soon to pa.s.s into eternity; placed here to prepare ourselves for that unknown world into which we shall carry the moral character that has been stamped upon us here; and capable, whilst we are here, of doing untold good by a G.o.dly example, or of contributing to the ruin of the souls of our fellow men. How important, both for ourselves and others, that we should learn and appropriate that truth which is to be the means of our salvation! how important for ourselves, lest we be castaway! how important for others, lest we help them to build a structure of wood, hay, stubble,(1053) which shall be consumed in the day of the Lord!

Let us strive to use the two methods of finding truth,-study and prayer.

Let us gain more knowledge, and consecrate it to the investigation of the highest problems of life and of religion; especially applying ourselves, by the help of the ripest aid which miscellaneous literature or church history can afford us, to the study of the sacred scriptures. But above all these intellectual instruments, let us add the further one of prayer.

For prayer not only has a reflex value on ourselves, purifying our hearts, dispersing our prejudices, hushing our troubled spirits into peace; but it acts really, though mysteriously, on G.o.d. It ascends far away from earth to the spot where He has His dwelling-place. The infinite G.o.d condescends to enter into communion with our spirits, as really as a man that talketh with a friend. The Saviour of pity will Himself look down upon us, and condescend to become our teacher, and give us the purity of heart which will lead us into truth. Our own trials, our own struggles for truth and holiness, the desire to know Christ and to be known by Him, will excite our deep pity for those who endure the like temptations, and prepare us for effectually ministering to the good of others. And if the struggle in our own hearts be long, and there be moments when we seem to have our Gethsemane; let us cleave the closer, with the more simple trust, to our heavenly Father; still imploring Him to grant us in this world knowledge of his truth, and in the world to come life everlasting; a.s.sured that the clouds shall one day disperse, and the vision of truth be unveiled to us in the bright light of the eternal morning.

I shall be well content that all that I have said to you be forgotten; and when these lectures take their humble place in the series of which they form a part, deriving an honour, not their own, from the great names with which they are a.s.sociated, I shall be willing that they be consigned to neglect; if I can only hope that this final exhortation to prayerful study may remain fixed in the memory of any one of those that now hear these words, or may impress the mind of any chance student who, in traversing the same ground, may hereafter have occasion to peruse them, at a time perhaps when the voice that now speaks shall be hushed in the tomb, and the spirit shall have gone to its account.

The lectures are now ended. May G.o.d forgive the errors, and sanctify any truth that has been uttered to His honour! The faults are mine: the truth is His, not mine. To Him be the glory.

NOTES.

Lecture I.

Note 1. p. 3. Subdivisions Of Historical Inquiry.

A few words may explain the distinctions intended in the text.

History has been properly distinguished by Macaulay into two branches, the artistic or descriptive, and the scientific or a.n.a.lytic. (_Essays_, vol.

i. 2, on Hallam.) If viewed in the former aspect, history aims as far as possible to reproduce what has been, to recover a picture of the past.

Hence it is obedient to the two conditions which rule all art,-precise outline in details, and preservation of perspective in the combination. In the latter, theory in some slight degree steps in, but theory dictated by the instinct of taste rather than by reflection. It is in this branch, in which the historian is the critic, that the border line lies between art and science. For it is hard to measure the precise amount which is due in the appreciation of facts respectively to artistic intuition and to reflective a.n.a.lysis.(1054)

Supposing the facts to be thus given, it is the province of the science of history to ascertain their causes. Two living writers, Mr. Mill (_System of Logic_), and Dr. Whewell (_Philosophy of Inductive Sciences_), have given an account of the logic of science. That of the latter is more suitable to the conception which we are here forming of history; for history is exactly one of the cla.s.s of sciences which he calls "Palaetiological." (vol. i. b. x.) It requires first, that we recover the record of the successive stages of facts, the narrative of the past, before searching for the causes. The causes are then to be sought by transferring backward for the explanation of the past those which are at present operating. The search will probably exhibit three successive stages in the process of examination. First, causes will be found which are the mere antecedents of the events, the mere links which connect the phenomena. Next, a cyclical law of the recurrence of the facts is perceived, such e.g. as Vico's well-known law concerning the development of political society. Such a law as this, supposing it to hold good without exception within the limits of experience, is what Mr. Mill calls an "empirical law." (_Logic_, vol. ii. b. iii. ch. xvi.) Next, this law must be a.n.a.lysed into its causes. Mr. Mill gives three forms which this third stage of a.n.a.lysis may a.s.sume in science. (_Id._ vol. i. b. iii. ch.

xii.) Probably in history it will generally a.s.sume the one of the three in which the complex result is a.n.a.lysed into its simpler component elements.

(_Id._ -- 2.)

This inquiry would complete the study of history as a science. But when we deal with moral as distinct from material relations, we feel that there is a question of philosophy as well as science, one of ethics and metaphysics, which rises above all lower ones. We instinctively wish to measure the responsibility of the moral agents who have contributed to work out the results which have been studied. We turn to the personal and biographical question for the purpose of the ethical lesson. The theist also asks another question. Believing that nature and man are the work, direct or indirect, of a personal Creator and Governor, of infinite power and goodness, he strives to search out the purposes of Providence, hoping to find in the drama of universal history the solution of the plot which he could not expect to attain by the study of a portion of it.