OBSERVATIONS ON SOAME JENYNS'S VIEW OF THE INTERNAL EVIDENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION; ADDRESSED TO ITS ALMOST-CHRISTIAN AUTHOR, BY W. KENRICK, LL. D.
I would to God that not only thou, but also all that hear me this day, were both
almost
and
altogether,
Christians.
PAUL TO AGRIPPA.
LONDON: PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR; AND SOLD BY T. EVANS, PATER-NOSTER ROW, AND G. CORRALL, CATHERINE-STREET, STRAND. M DCC LXXVI.
TO SOAME JENYNS, ESQ.
SIR,
APOLOGIES, for the liberties we take with individuals, when the interests of all mankind are at stake, are as frivolous as they are impertinent. I shall make none, therefore, for such as are taken in the following
Observations
on your late
View of the Internal Evidence of the Christian Religion.
—The subject, indeed, is of such high debate, and its design of such superior dignity, that even the decency of decorum requires the banishment of unmeaning ceremony.—
St. Paul,
tho a prisoner and in bonds, stood upon none, even with
King Agrippa
on his judgment-seat; when, on the presumption of that princely personage's being
almost
a Christian, he wished that not only he, but all his hearers, were
altogether
such.
Whether my arguments are sufficiently forcible, or are properly calculated, to be in any degree instrumental to the accomplishment of a similar wish, must be determined by their influence on my readers; among whom, I presume, Sir, you will be one of the most respectable. Whatever be the result, therefore, I shall add to the other liberties I have taken, that of congratulating you, who once confessedly
believed as little as others,
on the promising progress you have already made, in becoming
almost,
what I confidently trust you will, thro superior influence, sooner or later,
altogether
be, a CHRISTIAN: as far as is consistent with which character,
I am, Sir, Your most obedient, Humble Servant, W. KENRICK.
ADVERTISEMENT.
THE extraordinary demand, for the
Appendix
to the third volume of the
London
Review, in which a
slight sketch
of the following
Observations
was first printed, having suggested to the author that their republication, in a more commodious form, would be acceptable to the Public, he was led to a more considerate revisal of the tract, which gave rise to them. The slips and inadvertencies, which appeared, on such revisal, to have escaped him in the hurry of composition, acquiring consequence from the importance of the subject, urged also a kind of necessity for such republication.
The desire of atoning, for the defects of that hasty critique, induced him, therefore, to enlarge on the more interesting parts of the
View,
and to digest the whole of his
Observations
on it, into a more methodical and regular form.
The
Observer
was the more readily induced to this, by an apparent deficiency of method in Mr. Jenyns's tract; though professedly calculated for the perusal of "the
Busy
and the
Idle,"
who may be comprized under those who have but little time to read, and those who read but little at a time; for whose convenience, therefore, the matter is here so managed, by a proper subdivision of the subject, that the reader, be he as
busy
or as
idle
as he will, may take up or lay down the book at pleasure, without running any risk of losing, without recovery, the thread of its argument.
CONTENTS.
SECT I.
On the subject, scope, and design of the writer's argument in general,
viz.
To prove the
truth,
by demonstrating the
divine origin
of the Christian Religion,
—
The most convincing proofs pretended to, amount but to a mere probability.
Page 1
SECT. II.
On the definition of the subject, and division of the argument into four propositions.— The first
"That there is now extant a book entitled the New Testament,"
shewn to be futile and frivolous.
Page 22
SECT. III.
On the second proposition,
viz.
That from this book may be extracted a system of religion entirely new, both with regard to the object and the doctrines, not only superior to, but unlike every thing, which had ever before entered the human mind,
—
This proposition shewn to be very obscurely illustrated, inconsistently explained, and even of little consequence to the general argument, were it capable of being proved.
Page 27
SECT. IV.
On the third proposition.
That from this book may likewise be collected a system of Ethicks, in which every moral precept, founded on reason, is carried to a higher degree of perfection, than in any other of the wisest philosophers of preceding ages; every precept founded on false principles is totally omitted, and many new precepts added, peculiarly corresponding with the new object of this religion.
—
This proposition shewn to be very exceptionably illustrated; affording at best rather a proof of the sublimity and purity of Christian morals, and of the
advantages,
rather than the
truth
of the Christian religion.
Page 44
SECT. V.
On the fourth or conclusive proposition.
That such a system of religion and morality could not possibly have been the work of any man or set of men: much less of those obscure and illiterate persons, who actually did discover and publish it to the world; and that, therefore, it must undoubtedly have been effected by the interposition of divine power, that is, it must derive its origin from God.
—
This proposition shewn to contain only corollaries of the preceeding propositions; and, though true as to fact and therefore admitted
ex gratia,
still problematical in argument.
Page 83
SECT. VI.
On the writer's general conclusions and his notions concerning the essential objects of the Christian faith.—Till these objects are precisely determined, the determination of the question respecting their divine origin of little importance.
Page 101
SECT. VII.
On the objections, that have been made to the divinity and veracity of the Christian religion: and particularly to objection the
FIRST,
viz.
That divine Revelation is incredible because unnecessary, because the reason, which God has bestowed on mankind is sufficiently able to discover all the religious and moral duties, which he requires of them; if they will but attend to her precepts and be guided by her friendly admonitions.
—
This objection shewn to be neither properly stated nor satisfactorily removed.
Page 113
SECT. VIII.
On his reply to a second objection,
That the Old and New Testament cannot be a revelation from God, because in them are to be found errors and inconsistencies, fabulous stories, false facts and false philosophy; which can never be derived from the Fountain of all Truth.
—
This objection shewn to be rather enforced by the author's concessions, than removed by his conclusions.
Page 125
SECT. IX.
On his reply to a third objection.
That a wise and benevolent Creator should have constituted a world upon one plan and a religion for it on another.
Under the term
religion
in this objection, the author is shewn to include
morals
also; but the purity of the Christian morals is shewn not to be calculated for the constitution of this world, and therefore not required of Christians in their present state of probation.
Page 129
SECT. X.
On his reply to a fourth objection,
That if this revelation had really been from God, his infinite power and goodness could never have suffered it to have been so soon perverted from its original purity, to have continued in a state of corruption through the course of so many ages; and at last to have proved so ineffectual to the reformation of mankind.
—
The manner, in which this objection is attempted to be removed, shewn to reflect the highest indignity on the divine Author of the Christian religion as well as on that religion itself.
Page 142
SECT. XI.
On his reply to the fifth objection,
The incredibility of some of its doctrines, particularly those concerning the Trinity, and atonement for sin by the sufferings and death of Christ; the one contradicting all the principles of human reason, and the other all our ideas of natural justice.
—
This objection shewn to be rather evaded than solved; the author not having fairly and fully stated the difficulties it really contains.
Page 147
SECT. XII.
On his reply to the sixth objection.
That, however true these doctrines may be, yet it must be inconsistent with the justice and goodness of the Creator, to require from his creatures the belief of propositions, which contradict, or are above the reach of that reason, which he has thought proper to bestow on them.
—
This objection answered by denying that genuine Christianity requires any such belief.—The nature of the Christian faith investigated and its latitude defined: Christianity, as it requires nothing
impracticable,
to be
performed,
so it requires nothing
impossible
to be
believed. Page 160
ECT. XIII.
On his reply to the seventh objection.
That the whole scheme of Revelation is partial, false, fluctuating, unjust, and unworthy of an omniscient and omnipotent Author.
Page 199
SECT. XIV.
General Reflections on the whole argument, and conclusion in favour of universal candour, in judging of the faith and morals of others, or the exertion of Christian charity toward all mankind.
Page 203
OBSERVATIONS ON A VIEW Of THE INTERNAL EVIDENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.
SECT. I.
On the subject, scope, and design of the writer's argument in general,
viz.
To prove the
truth,
by demonstrating the
divine origin,
of the Christian Religion,
—The most convincing proofs pretended to, amount but to a mere probability.
AMONG the many attempts, to recommend and accommodate the profound mysteries of
divine wisdom
to the shallow comprehension of the
human understanding,
the present is by no means the least promising or plausible. But the
Impossible,
necessarily includes the
Impracticable,
and all attempts, to reconcile objects, that are in their very essence irreconcileable, must ever be ineffectual.
In pride, in
reasoning
pride, our errour lies;
All quit their sphere and rush into the skies:
Aspiring to be gods if angels fell,
Aspiring to be angels, men rebel.
Hence nothing can be more reprehensible, than the arrogance of our modern
Rationalists,
in cavilling at every thing in
Revelation,
that is not reconcileable to
Reason,
and in denying every thing to be
religious
that is not
rational.
Tenacious of the
name
of
Christians,
as they are of the
principles
of
Heathens,
they want to newmodel the system of
Christianity,
by expunging all those doctrines, which they cannot reconcile to their newsangled scheme of
Rationality.
But, alas! their reasoning faculties are too confined, to soar above
—this visible, diurnal sphere;
so that, after all, they must sit down content with a religion, which entitles them to no better an appellation than that of honest heathens, or give up even their
nominal
title to Christianity, and honestly confess themselves real
Infidels.
Let them
chuse;
but the time seems to be approaching when they must make their choice. The Christian world is no longer to be deceived by these wolves in sheep's cloathing; these believers in the
name
of a
Saviour,
whose
power
of
salvation
they openly deny.
There is so much disingenuousness and sophistry in the practices of these
minute philosophers,
that we are particularly sorry to see them kept in countenance by the misapplied abilities of more ingenious and ingenuous writers.
It has, indeed, been publicly hinted, that this little work is a mere controversial bubble, blown up to amuse well-meaning Christians, in order to impose on their credulity, and raise a sneer at the expence of their simplicity and sincerity.
For our own part, we have a better opinion of the author, than to give credit to such a suggestion. His rank and reputation in life, as well as in literature, forbid our entertaining a thought so derogatory to his character, as a man of sense, honour, and probity. For his
Christianity,
it is true, we have hitherto given him
credit;
but, as he now professes himself religiously solvent, we shall take the liberty of investigating the terms of payment, by a particular and impartial review of his present performance.
Before we begin this investigation, however, it may not be amiss to enter a caveat, against the reader's giving credit to the argument merely on the authority of the writer. The good faith of the latter, respects himself alone, the validity of his, reasoning only respects the reader.
Should his work, he says, ever have the honour to be admitted into such good company as the
busy
or the
idle,
they will immediately determine it to be that of some enthusiast or methodist, son beggar, or some madman. "I shall, therefore," says he,
beg leave to assure them, that the author is very far removed from all these characters: that he
once perhaps believed as little as themselves,
This intimation of our author's, puts us in mind of old
Gresset,
one of the
beauxesprits, esprits,
and, as he long affected to be thought the
esprits-forts
of France, having outlived his
passions,
and almost his
vanity,
(which is saying a great deal of a Frenchman) he retired in disgust to a monastery, and turned enthusiast; alledging, as the strongest proof of the propriety of his new creed, the impropriety of his former infidelity.—
but having some leisure and more curiosity, he employed them both in resolving a question which seemed to him of some importance, —Whether Christianity was really an imposture founded on an absurd, incredible, and obsolete fable, as many suppose it? Or whether it is, what it pretends to be, a revelation communicated to mankind by the interposition of supernatural power? On a candid enquiry, he soon found, that the first was an absolute impossibility, and that its pretensions to the latter were founded on the most solid grounds: In the further pursuit of his examination, he perceived, at every step, new lights arising, and some of the brightest from parts, of it the most obscure, but productive of the clearest proofs, because equally beyond the power of human artifice to invent, and human reason to discover.
That the
brightest lights,
and
clearest proofs
Should arise from the
most obscure
parts of scripture, is as singular as is the reason given for it; viz.
because they are beyond the power of human artifice to invent, and human reason to discover.
But, may we not ask here, how our author could assign so notable a reason, without having himself, carried human
artifice
and human
reason
to their utmost extent of
discovery
and
invention?
How else should he find this discovery and invention to be an
absolute impossibility?
—If, indeed, he meant to infinuate that he hath carried the powers of investigation so far as
this;
well and good! The improvements of
art,
the
progress
of
science,
are at an end!— But we must have stronger proof of the fact than a mere ipse-dixit, in a matter of so much importance.
That it is of consequence to the reader to know, that the author is not an
enthusiast
or a
madman,
we admit; but why we are told he is not a
methodist
or a
beggar
we do not readily conceive. Is any doctrine the less true because it is taught by a methodist? Is any argument the less valid because it is urged by a beggar? Or would the same doctrine be more true if maintained by a metropolitan? Or the same argument more valid if urged by a Nabob?—Our Saviour and his apostles were men of eminence neither in church nor state. They were neither high-priests nor lords of trade; neither men of credit nor men of fortune. Nor do we see any incongruity in a very credible man's being a methodist and a very sound reasoner's being as poor as Job.
It is more to the purpose that we are told, the author is
not
an
enthusiast
or a madman. But who tells us this?—The very man himself.—And who ever took a man's own word for his not being in a state of insanity or intoxication?—"I drunk!" says drunken Cassio in the play,
No, Sir, — This is my right hand and this is my left
—at the same time mistaking one for the other.
We do not say, this is actually the case with our author; but, we say, that his own asseveration merely cannot be admitted as evidence to the contrary. From his own confession it appears, he is a convert from
infidelity:
now all converts are apt to run into extremes and from excess of incredulity to become too credulous. From doubting and disbelieving what is probably true, they affect to believe what is palpably false. Nay, from denying almost every thing, they come really to believe almost any thing.
New Converts,
we say, are apt, thro' inordinate zeal, to give into excess of credulity: a conduct, which, however pious, certainly borders on Enthusiasm. Indeed, we cannot help thinking our author betrays a
little tincture
of it in his paradoxical observation, respecting Divine Revelation in general; when, he says, all circumstances considered,
if it were in every part
familiar
to our
understandings,
and
consonant
to our
reason,
we should have great cause to suspect its
divine authority;
and, therefore, had this revelation been
less incomprehensible,
it would certainly have been
more incredible.
—
That is, in plainer terms,
If we
understood
it
more,
we should be apt to
believe
it
less.
—Is not this on the plan of
Credo quia impossibile est?
[I believe it because it is impossible.] And does our author give this, as a proof that he is in
no degree, touched
with
enthusiasm
or
insanity?—Credat Judoeus Appella!
—We say not
haud nos,
because Charity, though it
feareth
all things,
hopeth
all things.
To prove the truth of the Christian religion
, says he,
we should begin by shewing the
internal marks
of Divinity, which are
stamped upon it
Should not a stamp
upon
a thing be rather called an
external
than
internal
mark?
, because on
this
the credibility of the prophecies and miracles
in a great measure
depends: for if we have once
reason to be convinced
that this religion is derived from a supernatural origin; prophecies and miracles will become so far from being incredible, that it will be
highly probable,
that a supernatural revelation should be foretold, and inforced by supernatural means.
Not that our author professedly, means to depreciate the proofs of the truth of the Christian religion arising from either
prophecies
or
miracles.
They both, have, or ought to have, he says, their proper weight. Let us weigh them then in his own ballance.
Prophecies,
he says, are
permanent miracles,
whose authority is sufficiently confirmed by their completion, and are therefore solid proofs of the supernatural origin of a religion, whose truth they were intended to justify; such are those to be found in various parts of the scriptures relative to the coming of the Messiah, the destruction of Jerusalem, and the unexampled state in which the Jews have ever since continued, all so circumstantially descriptive of the events, that they seem rather histories of past, than predictions of future transactions; and whoever will seriously consider the immense distance of time between some of them and the events which they foretell, the uninterrupted chain by which they are connected for many thousand years, how exactly they correspond with those events, and how totally unapplicable they are to all others in the history of mankind; I say, whoever considers these circumstances, he will scarcely be persuaded to believe, that they can be the productions of preceding artifice, or posterior application, or can entertain the least doubt of their being derived from supernatural inspiration.
Now, this is so far from being true, that we ourselves, and we dare say many others, have seriously considered all these circumstances; and, notwithstanding the pains ingenious interpreters have taken to develope, conciliate and harmonize them, we do still look upon them (taken in a mere
rational view
) to be so imperfectly ascertained and so doubtfully applied that, judging of them merely from reason, they do not strike us with any thing like that force of conviction which they appear to carry with our author.
As to the miracles, recorded in the New Testament to have been performed by Christ and his apostles, he says,
they were certainly convincing proofs of their divine commission to those who saw them; and as they were seen by such numbers, and are as well attested, as other historical facts, and above all, as they were wrought on so great and so wonderful an occasion, they must still be admitted as evidence of no inconsiderable force.
Here again this writer either equivocates or sins against the truth. The miracles performed by Christ and his Apostles were
not
certainly convincing proofs of their divine mission to
many
of those who saw them. Witness our viour's dreadful denunciation to whole cities of impenitent unbelievers, to Choraizin, Bethsaida and Capernaum; in which his mighty works had been displayed: unless, indeed, we are to suppose their
impenitency
not the consequence of their
unbelief;
but that they were so much worse than the devils, who believe and tremble, in that
they
believed and trembled not. But, with the Scribes and Pharisees; who, seeing him work miracles, immediately consulted to destroy him and said, he cast out devils, through
Beelzebub,
the prince of devils; were those miracles, we say, convincing proofs of his
divine
mission to
them?
It even appears that our Saviour wrought his miracles and preached his doctrines, in the sight and hearing of many who were never intended to be convinced by them. This our author himself observes, in accounting for that
want
of irresistible evidence of their truth, by which they
might
possibly have been enforced:
quoting from the Evangelist Mark the following declaration of Jesus to his desciples. "To you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God; but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables, that seeing they may see, and not perceive, and hearing they may hear and not understand; and left at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them."
What weight or degree of force, then, doth our author give to the evidence of miracles? Surely, no considerable weight, if he thinks, as he says that
they must now depend, for
much
of their credibility, on the truth of that religion whose credibility they were at first intended to support.
How! are the
religion
and the
miracles
to be made reciprocally the criterion of each other? Are the pillars of support, on which the truth of Christianity hath so long rested, to be now themselves supported by the strength and symmetry of its superstructure? This is making the whole hang by
Geometry
indeed!—
The internal marks of the divine origin of Christianity, are to give a credibility to the prophecies and miracles; which
they,
in turn are to reflect back on Christianity, to do credit to its divine origin. If this be not reasoning in a circle, and beating round the bush of argument to no end, we, at least, see no end to such a mode of argument. It is like that of the world's being supported by an elephant, the elephant by a tortoise, the tortoise by another elephant, and the other elephant by another world!
In regard to the prediction of prophecies and the working of miracles, it may indeed be justly objected, as it has often been, that the completion of a prophecy or the performance of a miracle, taken merely as a fact, however wonderful, does not necessarily infer the interposition of a
supernatural
agent.
Think not, Lorenzo, Nature strays
Whene'er the world is in amaze:
For, say that miracles there be,
May'nt they be only such to thee?
So many links conceal'd remain,
Which form the complicated chain,
True causes and effects between,
In Nature's providential scene!
EP. TO LORENZO.
We shall take the liberty, in the course of this critique, to refer the reader more than once to the
Epistles to Lorenzo;
not to indulge the vanity of an author in quoting from himself, but to shew that the critick is
no new convert;
being much of the same opinion respecting these matters, after upwards of twenty years expence and reflection, as he was of, so long ago, and at a very early period of life.
But, granting that it did, and that such completion of the prophecies and performance of miracles are as well attested as other historical facts. Such attestation they may have; and yet, if they have no more, they cannot lay claim to more than a mere moral probability of truth.
The difficulty of ascertaining the truth of probable and ordinary facts, which happen daily almost under our immediate observation, is so notorious, that it is a sufficient caution against the putting implicit faith in the historical relation of facts improbable and extraordinary, which are said to have happened at such a considerable distance of time and place.
The weight or degree of force, therefore, which our author gives to the evidence of prophecies, must, notwithstanding he stiles it
not inconsiderable,
be little worth consideration.
The utmost that he proposes indeed, is, a
high
probability; and even this depends on our having other
reasons to be convinced
that Christianity is of divine origin. A foundation itself far short of the necessary proof in some cases; for men may often have reason to believe what is, nevertheless, not actually true.
Even the
internal evidence,
this writer attempts to investigate, appears hence to amount to a mere
probability;
so that, by adding
this
evidence to
those
of both prophecies and miracles, he is at best only adding one probability to another.
SECT. II.
On the definition of the subject, and division of the argument into four propositions.—The first
"That there is now extant a book entitled the New Testament,"
shewn to be futile and frivolous.
WHAT pure Christianity is (says this writer) divested of all its ornaments, appendages, and corruption, I pretend not to say; but what it is not, will venture to affirm, which is, that it is not the offspring of fraud or fiction: that however fraud and fiction may have grown up with it, yet it never could have been grafted on the same stock, nor planted by the same hand.
This our author undertakes to shew by stating the following plain and, as he stiles them,
undeniable
But if
undeniable,
why all this trouble to state and explain them?
propositions.
First, that there is now extant a book intitled the New Testament.
Secondly, that from this book may be extracted a system of religion intirely new, both with regard to the object and the doctrines, not only infinitely superior to, but unlike every thing, which had ever before entered into the mind of man.
Thirdly, that from this book may likewise be collected a system of ethics, in which every moral precept founded on reason is carried to a higher degree of purity and perfection, than in any other of the wisest philosophers of preceding ages; every moral precept founded on false principles is totally omitted, and many new precepts added peculiarly corresponding with the new object of this religion.
Lastly, that such a system of religion and morality could not possibly have been the work of any man, or set of men; much less of those obscure, ignorant, and illiterate persons, who actually did discover, and publish it to the world; and that therefore it must undoubtedly have been effected by the interposition of divine power, that is, that it must derive its origin from God.
Such is this writer's plan, as exhibited by himself; on which we beg leave first to observe that, the terms, in which it is laid down, are too vague and the style too metaphorical for a logical essay; the form of which it affects to assume.
One would imagine that a casuist, so rigid as to think it necessary to offer
the mere existence of a book entitled the New Testament
, as a formal proposition, would have been strict enough to set out with as formal a definition of the enthymeme, or object itself in contemplation.
The design in view is professedly
to prove the truth of the Christian religion,
and yet
what pure christianity is, divested of all its ornaments, appendages and corruption, the writer will not pretend to say.
Does our logician then predicate nothing of his subject?—Yes, though he will not pretend to say
what
pure christianity
is,
he will venture to affirm
what
it
is not.
His affirmation, how ever is not even a negative predicate of its essence or property, but an assertion relative to its derivation
it is not the
offspring
of fraud or fiction.
—
Fraud and fiction may have grown up with it, yet it never could have been grafted upon the same stock, nor planted by the same hand.
—These metaphorical expressions, we say, are ill adapted to the subject in hand; which requires simple, unequivocating and precise terms, not liable to misconception or mistake. We cannot help thinking it, also, extremely illogical to undertake to prove what any thing may be imputed to, as its cause, without being able to give some definition of the thing itself, as an effect. To affirm positively
what
and shew
whence
it is
not derived,
without pretending to know what IT
is,
is certainly not a very philosophical, however popular, mode it may be of theological controversy.
But to accommodate our
Review
to the
view
itself. As to this proposition the
first,
very little, as the author hints, need be said. It is a plain fact, which cannot be denied, such writings do now exist: the less need, therefore, as before observed, to give it the formality of a proposition, either to be proved or granted; we pass it over therefore as futile and frivolous.
SECT. III.
On the second proposition,
viz.
That from this book may be extracted a system of religion entirely new, both with regard to the object and the doctrines, not only superiour to, but unlike every thing, which had ever before entered the human mind,
—This proposition shewn to be very obscurely illustrated, inconsistently explained, and even of little consequence to the general argument, were it capable of being proved.
MY
second
proposition, says our author, is not quite so simple, but, I think, not less undeniable than the former, and is this: that from this book may be extracted a system of religion entirely new, both with regard to the object, and the doctrines, not only infinitely superior to, but totally unlike every thing, which had ever before entered into the mind of man: I say extracted, because all the doctrines of this religion having been delivered at various times, and on various occasions, and here
only historically recorded,
no uniform or regular system of theology is here to be found; and better perhaps it had been, if less labour had been employed by the learned, to bend and twist these divine materials into the polished forms of human systems, to which they never will submit, and for which they were never intended by their Great Author. Why he chose not to leave any such behind him we know not, but it might possibly be, because he knew that the imperfection of man was incapable of receiving such a system, and that we are more properly, and more safely conducted by the distant, and scattered rays, than by the too powerful sunshine of divine illumination.
Our author expresses himself here, also, in terms very vague and equivovocal.
A system of religion, he says, may be extracted from the New Testament infinitely superior
[superior in what respect?]
to every other; and yet no uniform or regular system of theology is to be found there: and it had been better perhaps if the learned had never attempted to form such systems; being
probably
incompatible with the divine oeconomy respecting mankind.
Here is a
probability
suggested that is very
high
indeed! He might almost as well have suggested that the divine oeconomy itself is not systematical.
Equally paradoxical with a
former
illustration
See Page 7.
also is the
present.
As, before, the
brightest lights
arose from the most
obscure
parts of revelation, so here we are to be more safely conducted in the
dark,
than we should be in the
brightest sunshine
of divine illumination!
There is likewise a palpable inconsistency on the very face of the proposition itself. How can a system of religion be extracted from a book, in which no such system is to be found? —Or means our author only that the
form
of that system is not to be found there? But, what of that? Every doctrine that is
sound
must be
systematical,
whether the declaration or explication of it be formally so or not.
It is customary for writers, either from literary incapacity, or to save themselves trouble, to deliver their sentiments, however consistent and connected with each other, in a loose, unconnected and desultory manner. Historians
Now, I readily acknowledge, says our author, that the Scriptures are
not revelations
from God; but the
history
of them. See
View,
page 123.
in particular, must, from the very nature of their composition, blend doctrinal precepts with practical narration. But, if the precepts, thus interspersed in the course of the narrative, are inconsistent in themselves, or incompatible with each other, they can neither be truly doctrinal nor doctrinally true.
Men may
write
as loosely and desultorily as they please; but, if they
think
justly they must think consistently, and, of course, systematically. Nor do we see the least reason (except that of our author's desire to accommodate things, at any rate, to his own system) for supposing that mankind are, through any imperfection more incapable of receiving doctrines in a systematical form than they are of receiving them in no form at all. As good a logician and as good a Christian as our author, tells us
the best way to learn
any science
is to begin with a
system.
The late Dr. Watts.
As to this author's metaphorical allusion to the rays of light, it elucidates nothing. That a moderate portion of light is better adapted to weak optics than an excessive blaze of it, is undoubtedly true; but the supposition, thence deduced, of our seeing better by means of distant, scattered rays, than by a regular emanation, is a rhetorical flourish altogether inconsistent with sound logic and true philosophy.
In regard to the bending and twisting of the materials of divine revelation
into the
polished
forms of human systems, to which they never will submit;
the attempt so to twist and bend them is certainly an unjustifiable violence, which it might have been better the learned had never made: but this is no reasonable objection to their forming a plain,
unpolished
system; such as is really contained in the Scriptures.
Whether any
system
of scriptural
thinking
already reduced to
form in writing,
be in all respects unexceptionable, it is not our business here to enquire. But if there be not, it is in this particular we trace the source of imperfection: it lies in the incapacity of men to form such a divine system, to connect detached and desultory doctrines into a regular and consistent theory; and not to their incapacity of comprehending such a theory, had it been formally digested and in such form first given them.
In respect to the total
novelty
and unheard of singularity of the doctrines of revelation when first promulgated, our author
affirms
that those doctrines are equally
new with the object; and contain ideas of God, and of man, of the present, and of a future life; and of the relations which all these bear to each other totally unheard of and quite dissimilar from any which had ever been thought on, previous to its publication.
"But," continues he,
Whether these wonderful doctrines (which he enumerates) are worthy of our belief must depend on the opinion, which we entertain of the authority of those who published them to the world; certain it is, that they are all so far removed from every tract of the human imagination, that it seems equally impossible, that they should ever have been derived from the knowledge or artifice of man.
Now to
us
there
seems
no such impossibility. Even granting, in opposition to the Son of Wisdom, that there is any thing new under the sun, and that there is nothing in the tract entitled "Christianity as old as the creation;" admitting, we say, that the Christian religion, when promulgated by our Saviour, was as
new
and
strange
as our author represents it, we think little stress of argument is to be laid upon such singularity or novelty.
We shall not go about to enquire whether the extravagancies of the Pagan Mythology, many of which certainly bear
some
resemblance to the sublime mysteries of Christianity, were of later or earlier origin. Yet, wonderful as are the latter and firmly as we believe them derived from God, being in their
execution
superior to human comprehension, and totally incompatible with human reason; we do not see any thing, merely in the
idea
or
design
of the sublimest of them, so far superior to the powers of human invention or dissimular to its sublimer conceptions. On the contrary, man hath made to himself so many inventions, human genius hath soared so high into the region of impossibilities, that nothing which can come within the association of the most incongruous ideas, can in our opinion be justly said to exceed the artifice of the human imagination
And yet this appears to be all the
superiority
suggested,
Both the object and the doctrines,
says the author,
are not only infinitely superior to, but totally unlike every thing, which had ever before
entered into the mind
of man
. And again,
the doctrines of this religion contain ideas &c. quite dissimilar from any which had ever been
thought on,
previous to its publication.
—Thus it appears to be in the
thought
and not in the
deed
of the mystery of salvation, that, according to this writer, the superiority, contended for, consists.
.
To attend, however, a little to the author's mode of proving his proposition. "To say the truth, says he, before the appearance of Christianity there existed
nothing like religion
on the face of the earth; the Jewish only excepted: all other nations were immersed in the grossest idolatry."
At this time Christianity broke forth from the east like a rising sun, and dispelled this universal darkness, which obscured every part of the globe, and even at this day prevails in all those remoter regions, to which its salutary influence has not as yet extended. From all those which it has reached, it has, notwithstanding its corruptions, banished all those enormities, and introduced a more rational tional devotion, and purer morals: It has taught men the unity, and attributes of the supreme Being, the remission of sins, the resurrection of the dead, life everlasting, and the kingdom of heaven; doctrines as inconceivable to the wisest of mankind antecedent to its appearance, as the Newtonian system is at this day to the most ignorant tribes of savages in the wilds of America: doctrines, which human reason never could have discovered, but, which when discovered, coincide with, and are confirmed by it; and which, though beyond the reach of all the learning and penetration of Plato, Aristotle, and Cicero, are now clearly laid open to the eye of every peasant and mechanic with the Bible in his hand. These are all plain facts too glaring to be contradicted, and theresore, whatever we may think of the authority of these books, the relations which they contain, or the inspiration of their authors, of these facts, no man, who has eyes to read, or ears to hear, can entertain a doubt; because there are the books, and in them there is this religion.
Doubtless all this is well said. It is pity it is not all quite so true. But the truth is, that these plain facts which our author says are too glaring to be contradicted, are glaringly contradicted every day.—It is not only denied that the doctrines of the Christian faith
coincide
with, and are
confirmed,
by
reason,
but it is denied by many that the
devotion actually introduced
by Christianity is
more rational
or the
morals purer
than those professed and practised by some people who never heard of Christianity
If we believe
modern
history, (for which we have certainly as good authority as for the ancient) there have been found
savage
nations (if so we may call them) whose simplicity and purity both of religion and morals have been remarkable.
The plain
Peruvian,
pure in heart,
Strange to the guile and guilt of
art,
Unaw'd by tenet, text or tale,
Erects his temple in the vale,
Sacred to th' universal mind,
The guardian-God of human-kind!
No firstlings here affront the skies,
No clouds of smoaking incense rise;
No hypocrite with doubtful face,
No convert, tortur'd into grace,
No solid skull, in wisdom's cowl,
No hooded hawk, nor solemn owl,
Nor blind nor ominous invade
This spotless consecrated shade:
But, like the native of the spray,
Man hails his Maker, with the day;
By nature taught, Heav'n asks no more,
In
spirit
and in
truth adore!
EP. TO LOR.
.
We urge nothing against the purity of those morals now in practice throughout Christendom, nor compare them with those of other nations now existing, who have not embraced Christianity. —The comparison might be looked upon as too severe a libel on the good Christians of the age! But might not an able casuist, and as good a rhetorician as our author, as plausibly declaim in favour of the conquerors, legislators, and moralists of unenlightened paganism, to the shame of the immorality of professed Christians.
Might he not exhibit a picture of horror, faithfully drawn from the history of Christianity and the propagation of our holy religion, still more shocking to humanity, and contradictory to its divine precepts, than is afforded from that of the most horrid aera in the annals of heathenism?
Hath the savage fury of hostile barbarians, the avarice of insatiable tyrants, or the boundless ambition of
heathen
conquerors been the cause of more blood-shed or greater cruelty, than the zeal of religious fanatics, the phrenzy of pious enthusiasm, or the pride and avarice of
Christian
priests?
Might not an artful declaimer, we say, very reasonably pretend that a religion, whose professors have been guilty of so much wickedness, could not possibly merit the epithets of
divine
or, holy? Would he not rather derive it from Hell, as its most natural source, than from Heaven, the declared fountain of mercy and goodness?
Declamations of this kind, prove nothing.
We shall proceed, therefore, to the consideration of the author's
third
proposition; leaving that of his farther
proof
of the
second,
till we come to his solving of objections; where indeed, much of it would have with more propriety found a place.
SECT. IV.
On the third proposition.
That from this book may likewise be collected a system of Ethicks, in which every moral precept, founded on reason, is carried to a higher degree of perfection, than in any other of the wisest philosophers of preceding ages; every precept founded on false principles is totally omitted, and many new precepts added, peculiarly corresponding with the new object of this religion.
—This proposition shewn to be very exceptionably illustrated; affording at best rather a proof of the sublimity and purity of Christian morals, and of the
advantages,
rather than the
truth,
of the Christian Religion.
IN proof of this
third
proposition, our author begins by making a distinction, between the moral precepts of Christianity (founded, as he observes, on reason) and those precepts, which, being founded on false principles, inculcate in fact no virtues at all. Under the former he includes piety to God, benevolence to man, justice, charity, temperance and sobriety, with all those which prohibit the contrary vices, and all that debase our natures, and, by mutual injuries, introduce universal disorder, and consequently universal misery. Under the latter he classes those fictitious virtues, which, he says, produce no salutary effects; and however admired, are no virtues at all, such as
Valour, Patriotism
and
Friendship.
The
Monthly
Reviewers, in their critique on our author's work, observe, on this distinction, that they
never conceived that the virtues of
friendship, fortitude,
and
patriotism,
do not form a part of the
moral system
of the
gospel:
much less could they have urged the want of these virtues as a peculiar recommendation of its excellence. They are conspicuously illustrated," say they, "in the character of its author, and it would be easy to produce striking instances in which his courage and friendship, and concern for the welfare of his country, were actually displayed. But this is needless; the advocates of the Christian religion, in answer to Lord Shaftesbury and others, have sufficiently vindicated it in this respect.
These
are unquestionably virtues of considerable importance; and so far as they do not interfere with the general principles of benevolence which Christianity inculcates, they constitute a part of
Christian
morality.
It is well for these distinguishing critics that they bring in the
salvo,
at the at the close of the above paragraph, respecting these popular virtues
not interfering
with the general principles of benevolence, which Christianity inculcates.
This is the very point in question; and, however successfully the advocates for Christianity may have combated Shaftsbury and others, there is some room still left for opposing our author's argument.
Valour,
says he, for instance, or active courage, is for the most part constitutional, and therefore can have no more claim to moral merit, than wit, beauty, health, strength, or any other endowment of the mind or body; and so far is it from producing any salutary effects by introducing peace, order, or happiness into society, that it is the usual perpetrator of all the violences, which from retaliated injuries distract the world with bloodshed and devastation. It is the engine by which the strong are enabled to plunder the weak, the proud to trample upon the humble, and the guilty to oppress the innocent; it is the chief instrument which Ambition employs in her unjust pursuits of wealth and power, and is therefore so much extolled by her votaries: it was indeed congenial with the religion of pagans, whose gods were for the most part made out of deceased heroes, exalted to heaven as a reward for the mischiefs which they had perpetrated upon earth, and therefore with them this was the first of virtues, and had even engrossed that denomination to itself; but, whatever merit it may have assumed among pagans, with Christians it can pretend to none.
There would be some argument in all this, if, because valour be the
occasional instrument
of oppression, it be also the
necessary cause
of it; or if men were always
mischievous
in proportion as they are
bold.
But we presume that this is not the case;
cruelty
being
characteristic
of cowardice, and benevolence of bravery. Personal valour may, therefore, be justly esteemed to have some moral merit; although, as it is allowed to be in a great degree constitutional, it is certainly no farther to be deemed a moral virtue, than it is to be personally acquired. For a virtue, notwithstanding the plausibility of our author's reasoning, we presume it may justly be stiled.
Our author, indeed, says, that few, or none are the occasions in which Christians are permitted to exert their courage or valour. "They are so far," says he,
from being allowed to inflict evil, that they are forbid even to resist it; they are so far from being encouraged to revenge injuries, that one of their first duties is to forgive them; so far from being incited to destroy their enemies, that they are commanded to love them, and to serve them to the utmost of their power.
Surely our author here mistakes the nature of
that evil
which Christians are forbid to resist. It certainly is not the moral evil of
injustice!
Admitting they are not to
revenge
injuries, surely they may exert their valour to
prevent
the execution of them! If not, a good Christian must not resist the violence of a robber, a house-breaker, or a murderer!
But, granting that individuals, anxious to copy after Christian perfection, are justified in thus
submitting
to (though it be in fact
conniving
at) the commission of acts of injustice; valour may be yet a necessary virtue to the support and defence of Christian communities; as we shail shew, when we come to treat of
Patriotism.
But though our author will not admit
active courage
to be a real virtue;
passive courage,
or fortitude, he allows to be consistent with the purest Christian morality.
Passive courage, says he, is frequently, and properly inculcated by this meek and suffering religion, under the titles of patience and resignation: a real and substantial virtue this, and a direct contrast to the former; for passive courage arises from the noblest dispositions of the human mind, from a contempt of misfortunes, pain, and death, and a confidence in the protection of the Atmighty; active from the meanest: from passion, vanity, and self-dependence: passive courage is derived from a zeal for truth, and a perseveranee in duty; active is the offspring of pride and revenge, and the parent of cruelty and injustice: in short; passive courage is the resolutiot of a philosopher, active the ferocity of a savage. Nor is this more incompatible with the precepts, than with the object of this religion, which is the attainment of the kingdom of heaven; for valour is not that sort of violence, by which that kingdom is to be taken; nor are the turbulent spirits of heroes and conquerors admissibleinto those regions of peace, subordination, and tranquility.
This is, on the whole, well said; though we cannot agree that valour or active courage is always the offspring of pride and revenge, or the parent of cruelty and injustice.—Passivecourage may, also, be justly stiled the
resolution
of a
philosopher
and yet active courage be very unjustly called the
ferocity
of a
savage.
Not but that the activity of some men is fierce and ferocious, as the passiveness of others is tame and irresolute.
On
Patriotism
our author declaims thus:
Patriotism,
that celebrated virtue so much practised in ancient, and so much professed in modern times, that virtue, which so long preserved the liberties of Greece, and exalted Rome to the empire of the world: this celebrated virtue, I say, must also be excluded; because it, not only falls short of, but directly counteracts, the extensive benevolence of this religion. A Christian is of no country, he is a citizen of the world; and his neighbours and countrymen are the inhabitants of the remotest regions, whenever their distresses demand his friendly assistance: Christianity commands us to love all mankind, Patriotism to oppress all other countries to advance the imaginary prosperity of our own: Christianity enjoins to imitate the universal benevolence of our Creator, who pours forth his blessings on every nation upon earth; Patriotism to copy the mean partiality of an English parish-officer, who thinks injustice and cruelty meritorious, whenever they promote the interests of his own inconsiderable village. This has ever been a favourite virtue with mankind, because it conceals self-interest under the mask of public spirit, not only from others, but even from them selves, and gives a licence to inflict wrongs and injuries mot only with impunity, but with applause; but it is so diametrically opposite to the great, characteristic of this institution, that it never could have been admitted into the list of Christian virtues.
Without recurring to what other writers may have advanced in favour of the Christianity of patriotism, we shall offer a few reasons, that suggest themselves to us, to shew that the love of one's self and one's country, is not so inconsistent with that universal philanthropy inculcated by Christianity, as this writer here supposes.
True self-love and social, fays the Poet, are one and the same.
Self-love But serves the virtuous mind to wake,
As the small pebble stirs the peaceful lake,
Still from the central point the circle spreads;
And wider grows as still the next succeeds;
Thus father, brother, friend we
first
embrace,
Our country
next, next
all the human race
Rousseau somewhere observes that the universal philanthropy of those cosmopolites who have neither love for their relations, friendship for their neighbours nor partiality for their country, is justly to be suspected; even as he who has no love for himself can hardly be supposed to love
all
mankind. And yet Rousseau was a warm advocate for the purity of the Christian morality.
What philosophy there is in this poetry will appear in the course of our argument.
To the judicious omission of these false virtues,
Valour, Patriotism,
and
Friendship,
our author says,
We may add that remarkable silence, which the Christian legislator
every where
preserves on subjects, esteemed by all others of the highest impotance, civil government, rational policy, and the rights of war and peace; of these he has
not taken the least notice;
probably for this plain reason, because it would have been impossible to have formed any explicit regulations concerning them, which must not have been inconsistent with the purity of his religion, or with the practical observance of such imperfect creatures as men ruling over and contending with each other: For instance, had he
absolutely forbid all resistance to the reigning powers,
he had constituted a plan of despotism, and made men slaves; had he
allowed it,
he must have authorised disobedience and made them rebels: had he in direct terms prohibited all war, he must have left his followers for ever an easy prey to every infidel invader; had he permitted it, he must have licensed all that rapine and murder, with which it is unavoidably attended.
Now, not to dwell on the impropriety in the last sentence of charging, the power, permitting war, with the licensing of all the rapine and murder attending it; we object to the matter of fact, as stated in the whole passage.
Without insisting, with the
Monthly
Reviewers, that the character of our
Saviour
was
conspicuously illustrious
as a
patriot,
we may safely deny that
he has not taken the least notice
of matters of patriotism and civil polity, as our author asserts. His reply to the Pharisees, who tempted him on the subject of paying tribute—
Give unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are of God
—is an irrefragable instance of the distinction he made between religion and politics.
Civil government, national policy, and the rights of war and peace, were subjects, indeed, that appear not to have come directly under his decision. Had they so done, we have no reason to think our Saviour lay under any kind of
impossibility,
to give a very explicit and satisfactory answer.
If he was not explicit, however, in
precept,
respecting the authority of civil government, it must be admitted he was illustriously so in
example,
by his submission to the forms of justiciary trial and juridical condemnation; which surely were not
necessary
to his death, if, no such example was intended to be given, or precept thence to be inculcated!
But had our Saviour himself given neither precept nor example on this head; his inspired Apostles, Peter and Paul, have more than sufficiently done it; by enjoining their disciples to the most unreserved obedience to the municipal laws and civil magistracy of their times; and thence instructing Christians in general to a similar obedience to the reigning powers that be in all times.
In this, however, they have made men no farther slaves in this world than they are
Christians,
whose faith is fixed and whose hopes are centered in another. So far as they are still
men,
and bound to take part in the concerns of this world, while on their journey to the next, they are at liberty to resist oppression, and combat injustice, whether that of a domestic tyrant or a foreign invader.
"Had my kingdom," says our Saviour to Pilate,
been of this world, then would my servants have
fought,
that I should not be delivered to the Jews.
Granting that Christians, therefore, are not to propagate their
religion
by force of arms, or to
fight
for
Christ's kingdom,
which is not of this world, they are not forbidden to fight for their own share in the kingdoms, which are of this world.—If men may not fight for their
religion,
they may fight for their
liberty
and
property;
and, in our opinion, they act the part of brave men and good Christians in so doing.
And yet our author says,
If Christian nations were nations of Christians, all war would be impossible and unknown among them, and valour could be neither of use or estimation, and therefore could never have a place in the catalogue of Christian virtues; being irreconcileable with all its precepts.
Of a piece with this reasoning of our author's is that of
Rousseau,
in his Social compact; where he insinuates that a
Christian soldier
is a kind of a contradiction in terms. But we have here given our reasons for thinking otherwise; from which it follows, that even active valour appears to be a real, and not a fictitious, virtue.
For if a good Christian be a good patriot, he must be, ready to
act,
as well as
suffer,
for his country. He must at least be ready to fight, if necessary, in its
defence;
and valour is as requisite to repel an invader as it is to invade the foe. There is as much active courage required in
defence
as in
offence;
and hence, as loyalty and patriotism are the virtues of a good subject,
valour
must have some merit even with Christians as a moral virtue, at least active courage must be as much a moral virtue as
passive
They are insfact equally constitutional, as above hinted; and, it is presumed are not badly illustrated by the following poetical allusion.
The
Fountain
is thy favorite theme,
That trickles forth, a shallow stream,
In murmurs soft, a purling rill!—
What wilt thou do, to work thy mill?
How wilt thou make to ride, at large,
Thy timber or thy loaded barge?—
As much as purling rills admired
The navigable stream's required;
The stream, whose turbulence abides
The roaring of the swelling tides;
Alike whose raging bosom swells,
And back the threatening tide repels.—
Hence, to the Valiant and the Brave
Giv'n half the world, the rest to save!
EP. TO LOR.
.
But be that as it may, our author certainly falls into an error, in supposing it necessary for a good Christian to renounce his country to become a citizen of the world, a mere cosmopolite!
In regard to the virtue of
Friendship,
our author, either wilfully or negligently imposes a change of terms upon us; reasoning very inaccurately on the subject.—
"Friendship," says he,
likewise, although more congenial to the principles of Christianity arising from more tender and amiable dispositions, could never gain admittance amongst her benevolent precepts for the same reason; because it is too narrow and confined, and appropriates that benevolence to a
single object,
which is here commanded to be extended over
all:
Where friendships arise from similarity of sentiments, and disinterested affections, they are advantageous, agreeable, and innocent, but have little pretensions to merit;
for it is justly observed,
if ye love them, which love you, what thanks have ye? for sinners love those, that love them. But if they are formed from alliances in parties, factions, and interests, or from a participation of vices, the usual parents of what are called friendships among mankind, they are then both mischievous and criminal, and consequently forbidden, but in their
utmost purity
deserve no recommendation from this religion.
In reply, however, to what is here advanced on
friendship
and the text quoted from Luke in support of it, may be opposed the precept inculcated in John xiii. 34. quoted also by our author in favour of that Christian virtue Charity:
A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another; by this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.
— Here we see that brotherly-love, or mutual friendship (which in the former text is represented as of little merit, being the virtue of sinners) is made the test, or criterion of christianity, the virtue one should imaging characteristic of saints.
Christian charity, in its
utmost extent
is certainly something more than mere friendship; but we cannot help thinking that reciprocal affection, or, as our author stiles it, that "benevolent disposition" which is here made the characteristic of Christ's disciples, the test of their obedience and the mark by which they are to be distinguished, is too near a-kin to friendship, to admit of friendship's being with propriety discarded as a fictitious virtue, or as no virtue at all.
Our author, indeed, is far from reasoning accurately on this head. For, after depreciating, as above, the virtue specified, he tells us, he
means not by this to pass any censure on the principles of valour, patriotism and honour.
The attentive reader will here observe that, in this respecification of the spurious or false virtues, our author hath substituted the term
honour
instead of
friendship.
The reason is, that, having changed his ground, he found
that
more pertinent to the state of his argument. Of that phantom modern
honour,
indeed, to which the most solid and substantial
friendships
are sometimes sacrificed, he may say justly, that
a man, who makes this his ruling principle, however virtuous he may be, cannot be a Christian, because he erects a standard of duty, and deliberally adheres to it, diametrically opposite to the whole tenor of that religion.
That the laws of such
honour
are incompatible with the rules of Christianity we readily allow, though we cannot allow that the sirmest friendship for an individual is incompatible with that universal philanthropy, which Christianity inculcates for all mankind. Nay, we do not hold
patriotism
or even
valour
to be such mere
heathenish
virtues as our author would represent them.
"They may be useful," sayshe,
and perhaps necessary, in the commerce and business of the
present turbulent and imperfect state;
and those who are actuated by them may be virtuous, honest, and even
religious
men: all that I assert is, that they cannot be
christians.
—And yet, in a subsequent page of the work, we are expressly told that in the
present state
as enlightened by the gospel,
if we will not accept of christianity, we can have
no religion
at all
.
Surely this is inconsistent!
Ay
and
No
too can never be good divinity.
After degrading the false virtues of paganism, he proceeds to enhance the
true
virtues of christianity. These are poverty of spirit—Christian charity—Penitence—Faith—Self-abasement and detachment from the world.—
Admitting all that is said in favour of most of these, as being founded on scriptural authority, the virtue of
faith,
that which is the most immediately connected with the evidence of the divine origin of christianity demands our more particular attention.
"Faith," says our author,
is another moral duty injoined by this institution, of a species so new, that the philosophers of antiquity had no words expressive of this idea, nor nor any such idea to be expressed; for the word
or
fides,
which we translate
faith,
was never used by any pagan writer in a sense the least similar to that, to which it is applied in the New Testament: where in general it signifies an humble, teachable, and candid disposition, a trust in God, and confidence in his promises; when applied particularly to Christianity, it means no more than a belief of this single proposition, that Christ was the son of God, that is in the language of those writings, the Messiah, who was foretold by the prophets, and expected by the Jews; who was sent by God into the world to preach righteousness, judgment, and everlasting life, and to die as an atonement for the sins of mankind. This was all that Christ required to be believed by those who were willing to become his disciples: he, who does not believe this, is not a Christian, and he who does, believes the whole that is essential to his profession, and all that is properly comprehended under the name of faith.
We see here that, though our author scrupled at first setting out, to say what pure Christianity was, he has reduced it, in this illustration of Faith, to what he calls a
single
proposition. But he cannot be ignorant that this single proposition is sufficiently multifarious and complicated.
He cannot be ignorant that the expression,
Son of God,
is differently understood by different interpreters; that some think it consistent with his being a mere man, while others think it exalts him to an equality with the Deity.
He cannot be ignorant that his atonement by death for the sins of mankind, is controverted and even boldly denied by a considerable number of professed Christians.
To what purpose is it that our author tells us this proposition is the essential creed of a Christian, if other writers of equal authority tell us otherwise. Nay to what purpose is it, we are told that the same proposition is to be found in the Scriptures, whose truth we admit, if they are liable to various interpretation?
It is in vain to say, that "when we are once convinced the Scriptures are of divine original, we have nothing more to do but implicitly believe what they tell us." How many thousand volumes of controversy have there not been written to determine what they do tell us! And is it not still left as indeterminate as ever.
Granting that implicit faith in divine revelation be our duty; by what means are we to trace from the
history
of that revelation, what is really revealed? Surely it must be by the same means as those by which we become convinced of its divine original! And if reason be competent in the one case, it surely must be so in the other.
At the same time, if the operation of
grace
be necessary to impress the true sense and meaning of the scriptures on the mind and heart of the unconverted sinner, why should it be less necessary, as it is evidently equally expedient, to convince him of the divine origin of revelation in general?— We firmly believe that, admitting the reality of our author's conversion to Christianity (of which we have no reason to doubt) he is much more indebted for it to the efficacious and irresistible impulse of divine grace, than to all the pains he has taken, and the ingenuity he has exerted, in investigating the moral proofs of its divine institution.
But we shall in this section confine ourselves, in conformity to the author's method, to the consideration of Faith merely as a Christian duty. The objects of that Faith, with the nature of it, we shall discuss more particularly hereafter.
"Faith," says he,
cannot be altogether void of moral merit, (as some would represent it) because it is in a degree voluntary; for daily experience shews us, that men not only pretend to, but actually do believe, and disbelieve almost any propositions, which best suits their interests, or inclinations, and unfeignedly change their sincere opinions with their situations and circumstances. For we have power over the mind's eye, as well as over the body's, to shut it against the strongest rays of truth and religion, whenever they become painful to us, and to open it again to the faint glimmerings of scepticism and infidelity
when we
love darkness rather than light, because our deeds are evil.
And this, I think, sufficiently
refutes all objections to the moral nature of faith, drawn from the supposition or its being quite involuntary and necessarily dependent on the degree of evidence, which is offered to our understandings.
We cannot pretend to call in question the ductility of our author's
believing organs,
or the power he has over them to enable him to believe what he pleases. But, we must own, with regard to ourselves, we should be happy to be possessed of such power of credulity; so as to be able to believe every thing to be true which best suits our interests, inclinations, and circumstances; even though we should thence be subject to be sometimes disagreeably undeceived. We should get rid of many irksome reflections and enjoy many a happy hour, at the hazard only of being disturbed from our pleasing reveries, and exclaiming with the interrupted visionary;
Pol, me occidistis, amici, Non servastis
ait;
cui sic extorta voluptas, Et demtus per vim mentis gratissimus error.
As it is, we do not perceive ourselves, especially just at present, a whit more disposed to believe, than to doubt the reality of what we wish to be true. We do not think the observation holds good, at least so generally, or in the degree here supposed. The bold and sanguine, indeed, are apt to anticipate their wishes; but the timid and saturnine are as apt to procrastinate even their just expectations. It is as natural for the one to be confident as for the other to be dubious; nay, persons of the same constitution are not always in the same disposition or mood either of doubt or credulity.
That there is some truth, however, in the rule, with respect to its general application, is probable; as faith or facility of Belief is frequently and strongly recommended in the gospel.
But by the faith or easiness of belief, inculcated in the gospel, can surely be meant nothing more than the
pious assent
and submissive acquiescence of human reason to its mysterious and incomprehensible doctrines, agreeable to its gospel signification mentioned above
Meaning an humble, tractable, and candid disposition, a trust in God, and confidence in his promises. See page 71.
, and not that
rational conviction,
which arises from a clear comprehension of a proposition and the evident demonstration of its truth. The futility of recommending the latter kind of faith or facility of rational conviction, we think, is obvious.
Indeed we do not see the necessity of demonstration to produce such an assent, as is here admitted to constitute a
Christian's
Faith. If such Faith be, as our author says, an act of the
will
as much as of the understanding, there are many inducements to such an act that fall far short of demonstration.
If it be, as he observes, "well worth every man's while to believe Christianity if he can," and such belief depends so much on his will, one would think motives of self-interest alone would excite him to shew that he could, in this case, do as he would.
Is it not a sufficient incitement, to faith in Christianity, to ressect that "it is the surest preservative against vicious habits and their attendant evils, the best resource under distresses and disappointments, ill health and ill fortune, and the firmest basis on which contemplation can rest?"—That "it is the only principle, which can retain men in a steady and uniform course of virtue, piety, and devotion, or can support them in the hour of distress, of sickness and of death?"—
The
word
Faith, indeed, our author calls
unfortunate:
It has, says he, been so tortured and so misapplied to mean every absurdity, which artifice could impose upon ignorance, that it has lost all pretensions to the title of virtue; but if brought back to the simplicity of its original signification, it well deserves that name, because it usually arises from the most amiable dispositions, and is always a direct contrast to pride, obstinacy, and self-conceit. If taken in the extensive sense of an assent to the evidence of things not seen, it comprehends the existence of a God, and a future state, and is therefore not only itself a moral virtue, but the source from whence all others must proceed; for on the belief of these
all religion
and
morality
must
intirely
depend.
Here again, we must remind this writer of his having before admitted that men might be
virtuous, honest
and even
religious
men and yet
not
be
Christians:
whereas now he makes not only
all religion,
but
all morality
depend on Christian Faith for its very existence; such faith being here expressly declared not only in itself a moral virtue, but the source from whence all others must proceed.
Wits,
they say, have short memories; but, when they turn logicians, philosophers and divines, they should endeavour to extend their memory, and keep it on the stretch, with the thread of their argument, from one end to the other.
On the whole, with respect to Faith, as a moral duty; there appears to us but very little argument necessary to enforce it. If men can believe or even half-believe what they will, it is so much their interest to do it in believing the truths of Christianity; the man must be either a very great fool or a very great philosopher indeed, who would remain one moment an Infidel.
If, as this writer declares;
Faith
be also the source from whence all other real virtues must proceed, who would not be a Christian in practice as well as theory, without waiting a moment for any rational proof of the internal evidence of Christianity!
SECT. V.
On the fourth or conclusive proposition.
That such a system of religion and morality could not possibly have been the work of any man or set of men: much less of those obscure and illiterate persons, who actually did discover and publish it to the world; and that, therefore, it must undoubtedly have been effected by the interposition of divine power, that is, it must derive its origin from God.
—This proposition shewn to contain only corollaries of the preceding propositions; and, though true as to fact, and therefore admitted
ex gratia,
still problematical in argument.
THIS proposition, or rather two propositions united, our author gives, as corollaries to the three preceding; presuming they are so conclusive as to amount to little short of demonstration. It is, indeed, founded, says he,
on the very same reasoning by which the
material world
is proved to be the work of his invisible hand. We view with admiration the heavens and the earth, and all therein contained; we contemplate with amazement ment the minute bodies of animals too small for preception, and the immense planetary orbs too vast for imagination: we are certain that these cannot be the works of man; and therefore we conclude with reason, that they must be the productions of an omnipotent Creator.
In the same manner we see here a scheme of religion and morality unlike and superior to all ideas of the human mind, equally impossible to have been discovered by the knowledge, as invented by the artifice of man; and therefore by the very same mode of reasoning, and with the same justice, we conclude, that it must derive its origin from the same omnipotent and omniscient Being.
With due deference to this ingenious writer, this, like many other parts of his work, is rather declamatory than argumentative. In contemplating the works of creation, our wonder is excited and our admiration raised, in proportion as human genius is enabled to trace the marks of divine wisdom in the Great Artificer.
The vulgar indeed may gape and stare at what they cannot comprehend; but how limited are their ideas, how low are their conceptions of the power and wisdom of the Deity! Their wonder at the most stupendous instances of both, is like that of a child at the squeaking of a trumpet or the tinkling of a rattle.
The admiration of the ignorant indeed is founded on their ignorance, that of the scientific on their knowledge. It is not from what we
do not
comprehend that we deduce the wisdom and power of the Creator, but from what we
do
comprehend; which, however comparatively little, is the real foundation of our faith in his omniscience and omnipotence.
On the other hand it is, according to this writer, from the incomprehensibility of the scriptures, as well as of the works of nature, that their divine origin is to be deduced.
The manner of reasoning therefore, is not, as this writer asserts, the same in both cases, but totally different. In reasoning from our view of the material world, we prudently reason from what we know, and how shall we reason otherwise. "What can we reason but from what we know?" And yet, in logicising according to our author's mode from a view both of the material world and of revelation we foolishly attempt to reason from what we do
not
know.
Thus, he says, of the former.
It is not in the least surprizing, that we are not able to understand the spiritual dispensations of the Almighty, when his material works are to us no less incomprehensible, our reason can afford us no insight into those great properties of matter, gravitation, attraction, elasticity, and electricity, nor even into the essence of matter itself: Can reason teach us how the sun's luminous orb can fill a circle, whose diameter contains many millions of miles, with a constant inundation of successive rays during thousands of years, without any perceivable diminution of that body, from whence they are continually poured, or any augmentation of those bodies on which they fall, and by which they are constantly absorbed? Can reason tell us how those rays, darted with a velocity city greater than that of a canon ball, can strike the tenderest organs of the human frame without inflicting any degree of pain, or by what means this percussion only can convey the forms of distant objects to an immaterial mind? or how any union can be formed between material and immaterial essences, or how the wounds of the body can give pain to the soul, or the anxiety of the soul can emaciate and destroy the body? That all these things are so, we have visible and indisputable demonstration; but how they can be so, is to us as incomprehensible, as the most abstruse mysteries of Revelation can possibly be.
But, so far are we from having any visible and indisputable demonstration of the union, or even existence of two essentially different and distinct substances in body and soul, that our ablest philosophers deny the possibility of such demonstration.
See Dr Priestley's Introduction to Hartley's Essays on Man.
And, indeed, if our author did not himself confess it, we should hardly be made to believe that he is himself so bad a philosopher, as to take the evidence of
sense
(than which nothing is niore fallible) for demonstration.
It is with propriety indeed he asks if reason can explain the popular system of the solar rays in exhibiting the emanation of light: because that
popular
system is
unphilosophical,
unreasonable, and merely imaginary. Were he acquainted with the real mechanism productive of those phenomena, he might be struck with the amazing display of wisdom and power in the divine mechanism, but he would find no greater mystery tery in it than in the complicated operation of the most simple mechanic powers.
We do readily agree with this ingenious investigator, that we see but a small part of the great Whole; that we know but little of the relation, which the present life bears to pre-existent and future states; that we can conceive little of the nature of God and his attributes or mode of existence; that we can comprehend little of the material and still lest of the moral plan on which the universe is constituted, or on what principle it proceeds.
But we cannot admit ourselves to be quite so ignorant of the mechanism of the material universe or the true principles of natural philosophy, as our author appears to be.
And though with regard to the theological plan of the universe, we should confess our greater ignorance and incapacity of comprehension, we should
not
presume, as our author in fact does, to deduce the internal evidence of its divine origin from that very incapacity. —On the contrary, we think even the best experience and historical information respecting both the works of
nature
and the doctrines of
revelation
equally insufficient to form such a conclusion.
Whether from
Nature's
general law.
The outlines of our creed we draw,
Or think the truth be only given
In
revelation
pure from Heaven,
It matters not, unless we find
Some active index in the mind,
Some ray of
grace,
a purer light,
To point or here or there aright.
EP. TO LOR.
Another argument, adduced by this author, respects the propagation of this religion, which, he says, is not less extraordinary than the religion itself, or less above the reach of all human power, than the discovery of it was above that of all human understanding.
It is well known, says he, that in the course of a very few years, it was spread over all the principal parts of Asia and of Europe, and this by the minlstry only of an inconsiderable number of the most inconsiderable persons; that at this time paganism was in the highest repute, believed universally by the vulgar and patronized by the great; that the wisest men of the wisest nations assisted at its sacrifices and consulted its oracles on the most important occasions: Whether these were the tricks of the
priests
or of the
devil,
is of no consequence as they were both
equally u
likely
to be converted or
overcome;
the fact is certain, that on the preach ing of a few fishermen, their altars were deserted, and their deities were dumb.
Out of veneration for the subject, we shall not place this argument in that ridiculous light, into which it might be thrown. At the same time, having intimated in what a suspicious light we hold historical evidence in general, we shall not enter into any dispute about matters of fact.
The clergy are much obliged to the writer for putting their power on a par, and of course, making them, what they ought to be, a
match
for the
devil.
We might otherwise controvert the
reputable
state of paganism at the commencement of the Christian aera; the immediate dumb-founding of its oracles by the preaching of the fishermen, and the consequent establishment of Christianity in the principal parts of Europe and Asia.
Atleast, if its doctrine obtained a hearing, and for a while a very partial reception, they were soon obscured and obliterated; while religion and philosophy were consigned to oblivion together.
When Minerva could no longer protect her city. it was forsaken by good fortune, and would have lingered in decay, but the barbarians interposed, and suddenly completed its downfal. Athens itself was pillaged by Goths, and. its libraries consumed. Devastation reigned within and solitude without its walls
. A situation in which, according to Dr Chandler, it remains to this day, notwithstanding the successive efforts of Christian emperors, and pontiffs, by croisades and holy wars, to effect its establishment.
The belief of the vulgar in any age reflects but little credit on their religion; and as to the wisest men of the wisest nations of paganism consulting the oracle on important occasions; we can no more infer their really interesting themselves in behalf of paganism, than we can infer a similar conclusion in favour of Christianity from the similar farce which the wisest men of the wisest nations in Europe play now.
Even in this protestant country, do not our patricians, senators, and magistrates, goin procession to church, and pay their formal devoirs on certain red letter days, though they laugh at the institution, and even execrate the occasion? —In polished popish countries, their religious ceremonies are still as much more pompous and solemn, as the occasion or design is still more held in contempt and derision, even by the very persons assisting in their celebration.
That sensible and discerning traveller, Mrs Miller, remarked in particular the arch sneer of the Roman pontiff, while he performed the ceremony of serving at table, and washing the feet, of the poor priests, in the sarce of the holy week.
The fact is, paganism was just in the same
reputable
state in Greece and Rome at that time, as Christianity is in Paris and Rome at this day: so that if political circumstances did not interfere, and Christianity had no better support than the patronage of the Great and the piety of the populace, it might without a miracle be preached out of both cities by a methodist or a mountebank, in much less time than paganism, was formerly preached out of Rome and Athens, by a few fishermen. Our author allows that
neither learning nor sagacity is now able precisely to ascertain circumstances, equally interesting, of still later times;
we wonder, therefore, he should rest on this circumstance alone the divine authority of the fishermen's commission. It is equally surprising, that having so many arguments, and all of them according to him separately irrefragable, he should think it necessary to accumulate others merely plausible.
Of this kind is that paradoxical insinuation that the improbabilities on the other side of the question are so much greater that an infidel must be an unbeliever from mere credulity.
See View, page 107.
Of the same kind is that trite, insinuating,
beggarly
plea (as Lord Shaftsbury calls it) of
what harm could ensue, if Christianity should after all prove a fable?
There may be in some cases great virtue in that
if;
but to
us,
it appears very extraordinary that ever such a supposition should come from a writer, who has laboured so hard, and adduced so many arguments to prove its impossibility.—Suppose! quotha!—
Surely, after all, he does not think there is still
left a loop to hang a doubt on,
that he is so very anxious to
persuade
those he may not
convince!
that he dwells so earnestly on the
saving
pleas of their being nothing to be
lost
and so much to be
got
by believing in Christianity!
See View, page III.
Be this as it may, the whole argumentative part of the author's propositions and inference may be reduced to this:
The Christian system would never have entered into the heads of any persons whatever. It is inconceivable therefore how such men as
did,
could propagate it. —
Ergo,
It must have been conceived and propagated by the immediate and miraculous interposition of the Deity
.—
Such is, in sum and substance, the whole of this mighty argument! in the exposition of which, we have possibly bestowed already much more time and pains than the discerning reader will think necessary.
But, having proceeded so far with our author's
view,
we shall now proceed till we have shewn the vanishing point of his
perspective.
—
SECT. VI.
On the writer's general conclusions and his notions concerning the essential objects of the Christian faith.—Till these objects are precisely determined, the determination of the question respecting their divine origin of little importance.
ADMITTING even this writer's propositions to have been demonstrated and the internal evidence of the divine origin of the Christian religion fully proved; we yet still recur to the question,
What
is
the Christian religion, or what are its doctrines?
We have already observed that even the actual professors of Christianity are, by no means agreed on this head.
See page 74.
Our author himself, indeed, complains, plains, that
some there are, who, by perverting the established signification of words, (which they call explaining) have ventured to expunge
all
the
principal
doctrines out of the scriptures, for no other reason than that they are not able to comprehend them; and argue thus:—
The scriptures are the word of God; in his word no propositions contradictory to reason can have a place; these propositions are contradictory to reason, and therefore they are not there:
But if these bold assertors would claim any regard, they should reverse their argument, and say—These doctrines make a part, and a material part of the scriptures, they are contradictory to reason; no propositions contradictory to reason can be a part of the word of God, and therefore neither the scriptures, nor the pretended revelation contained in them, can be derived from him: this would be an argument worthy of rational and candid deists, and demand a respectful attention; but when men pretend to disprove facts by reasoning, they have no right to expect an answer.
Our author will, therefore, hardly think it worth his while to answer the questions, put to him, on this head, by certain Reviewers; who demand to know where, or by what passages the New Testament inculcates the doctrines he specifies: doctrines, which the
rational
advocates of Christianity, they pretend, are afraid to adopt.
These advocates,
say they,
cannot adopt notions and sentiments, which are founded on ambiguous, sigurative, or sacrificial expressions; and suspect a misinterpretation of scripture, where the doctrine they embrace is far removed from every tract of the human imagination.
This is exactly what our author upbraids them for, their wanting to reduce the extent of divine wisdom to the line of the human understanding.
At the same time, before we can admit our author to have deduced any conclusive argument respecting the internal evidence of the Christian religion, it is requisite he should certify what its doctrines are. The critics lastmentioned suspect a misinterpretation of scripture, where the doctrine they inculcate is far removed from every tract of the human imagination.—The
Monthly
Reviewers say also,
it has not occurred to
them
that doctrines, allowed to be contradictory to reason, are not on this account the less credible.
On the other hand, our author makes their inconsistency with reason, and their being above the flight of human imagination, the very criterion of their divine origin and, of course, their credibility. The scriptures, according to him,
contain ideas totally unheard of, and quite dissimilar from any which had ever been thought on previous to their publication. No other, says he, ever drew so just a portrait of the worthlessness of this world; and all its pursuits, nor exhibited such distinct, lively and exquisite pictures of the joys of another; of the resurrection of the dead, the last judgment, and the triumphs of the righteous in that tremendous day, when this corruptible shall put on incorruption, and this mortal shall put on immortality. No other has ever represented the supreme Being in the character of three persons united in one God. No other has attempted to reconcile those seeming contradictory but both true propositions, the contingency of future events, and the foreknowledge of God, or the free will of the creature with the
over-ruling grace
of the Creator. No other has so fully declared the necessity of wickedness and punishment, yet so effectually instructed individuals to resist the one, and to escape the other: no other has ever pretended to give any account of the depravity of man, or to point out any remedy for it: no other has ventured to declare the unpardonable nature of sin without the influence of a mediatorial interposition, and a vicarious atonement from the sufferings of a superior Being.
Such are the objects of the Christian, Religion according to this author; but it is well known that the most essential of these doctrines are either totally disbelieved or explained away by a very considerable part of the professors of Christianity.
The very Reviewers, above mentioned, in particular, cannot allow with this writer
that the province of reason is
only
to examine into the
authority
of Revelation; and when that is proved that reason has nothing more to do than to acquiesce.
And so far
we
agree with
them
that
Reason
is just as well qualified to judge of the interpretation of particular texts and passages of scripture, as to judge of the authenticity of the whole.
But we deny, on the authority of that very scripture, that unenlightened reason is qualified to judge of either, Our author "readily, as unnecessarily, acknowledges, as before observed, that the scriptures are not revelations from God, but the history of such Revelations;" of whose imperfections and fallibility, therefore, we say, nothing less than the influence of that divine grace, which inspired the revelation itself, can qualify any man to judge.
Hence the moral arguments, and historical evidence, which our author adduces, to prove the divine origin of revelation, appear nugatory.
To deny the probable facts, he says, related in the New Testament, would be as absurd as to deny the probable facts in any other history.—This is true, and yet the joint evidence of all the probable facts, related in any history sacred or profane, amounts to no more than that moral evidence, which will justify the belief of probable (not improbable) facts.
The same may be said of the doctrines of the Scriptures; if their divine authority is to depend on mere
historical
evidence, they should appear to be as
rational
as the evidence, on which that authority is supported, is
probable:
and not the credibility of both facts and doctrines left preposterously to be supported, according to our author's scheme, by the improbability of the one, and incomprehensibility of the other
See page II. Indeed the suggestion that any thing should be credible in proportion to its being incomprehensible, is, in itself, a proof how far the human genius can soar into the mysterious and sublime. Why, therefore, suppose it so incapable of inventing mysterious and sublime religious systems?
Genius, Lorenzo, yours or mine,
Faint image of a power divine;
Endow'd with ev'n
creative
power
To form the Beings of an hour,
To people worlds, to light the skies,
To bid a new creation rise;
O'er all to wield the thunderer's rod,
And act the momentary God!
Ep. To Lor.
.
To ascertain the true system and genuine doctrines of this religion after the undecided controversies of above seventeen centuries, and to remove all the rubbish, which artifice and ignorance have been heaping upon it during all that time, would indeed be an arduous talk, which our author will by no means undertake;
nor is it, indeed, necessary when he can reduce all the essentials as he supposes, into so small a compass.
But it is necessary that these essentials should be agreed on and rendered indisputable, before the proof of their divine origin can be of any use.
With respect, for instance, to one of the most essential:—
That Christ suffered and died as an atonement for the sins of mankind, is a doctrine,
says the writer,
so constantly and so strongly enforced through every part of the New Testament, that whoever will seriously peruse those writings, and deny that it is there, may, with as much reason and truth, after reading the works of Thucydides and Livy, assert, that in them no mention is made of any facts relative to the histories of Greece and Rome.
We are perfectly of his opinion in this respect, and yet it is with astonishing confidence the contrary is maintained by many late writers of pretended candour and undoubted abilities. So that while the doctrines of Christianity are thus in dispute (that is) till it be determined what the essential doctrines of Revelation are, we conceive, as we said before, the determination of the question respecting its divine origin to be of very little importance; even if it were determinable by our author's mode of argument. But, again we say, we can by no means agree with him that men would believe divine revelation in proportion as its tenets were incomprehensible to the understanding.
On the contrary, the inference we should naturally draw from the imperfect state of human science and the insufficiency of unassisted reason to attain any portion of divine knowledge, would be, that nothing but the immediate influence of Grace, the inspiration of the Almighty which giveth understanding, could induce the sceptic to believe either the divine origin of the scriptures or the doctrines, they contain.
SECT. VII.
On the objections, that have been made to the divinity and veracity of the Christian religion: and particularly to objection the
First,
viz,
That divine Revelation is incredible because unnecessary, because the reason, which God has bestowed on mankind is sufficiently able to discover all the religious and moral duties, which he requires of them; if they will but attend to her precepts and be guided by her friendly admonitions.
—This objection shewn to be neither properly stated nor satisfactorily removed.
"IF," says our author,
I have demonstrated the divine origin of the Christian religion by an argument which cannot be confuted; no others, however plausible or numerous, founded on probabilities, doubts and conjectures, can ever disprove it, because
if
it is once shewn to be true, it cannot be false
See View, page to.
.
There is no parrying these
ifs;
but
if
this writer's argument be
not
such as cannot be confuted, there may besomething in the arguments founded on probabilities, doubts and conjectures, that make against it.—It is on that supposition, we imagine, he attempts to refute such objections: as it is on that conviction, viz. that his argument itself is invalid, that we shall proceed to consider how far he has been successful in removing them.
In answer to the first objection
See View, page. 115.
,
That Revelation is incredible because unnecessary, on the plea of the sufficiency of human reason to discover all the religious and moral duties God requires of them.
He observes, that
Reason alone is so far from being sufficient to offer to mankind a perfect religion, that it has never yet been able to lead them to any degree of culture or civilisation whatever;
deducing a demonstration (as
it seems
to him.) from History, that
although human reason is capable of
progression
in science, yet the first foundation must be laid by supernatural instructions.
See View, p. 118.
Now, says he,
As Reason in her natural state is incapable of making any
progress
Does our author make a distinction between
progress in knowledge
and
progression in Science,
that human reason is admitted to be incapable of one and not of the other? Or does he mean by
progression
in Science, of which reason is incapable, the starting
ab initio,
which he confines to supernatural communication? In either case there is an apparent contradiction.
in knowledge, so when furnished with materials by supernatural aid, if left to the guidance of her own wild imaginations, she falls into more numerous, and more gross errors, than her own native ignorance could ever have suggested.
Only think, reader, of the
wild imaginations
of
Reason!
—And yet the
reasonable
suggestions, which our author enumerates, it must be owned, are
wild
and extravagant enough.
"SHE," says he (that is
Reason
)
has persuaded some, that there is no God; others that there can be no future state: she has taught some, that there is no difference between vice and virtue, and that to cut a man's throat and to relieve his necessities are actions equally meritorious: she has convinced many, that they have no free-will in opposition to their own experience: some that there can be no such thing as soul, or spirit, contrary to their own perceptions; and others, no such thing as matter or body, in contradiction to their senses. By analysing all things she can shew, that there is
nothing
in
any thing;
by perpetual shifting she can reduce all existence to the invisible dust of scepticism; and by recurring to first principles, prove to the satisfaction of her followers, that there are no principles at all.
After this curious piece of sophistical declamation, he adds,
How far such a guide is to be depended on in the important concerns of religion, and morals, I leave to the
judgment
of every
considerate
man to determine.
That is, after declaring
Reason
to be a fallacious guide and an incompetent judge, he will leave it to the direction of that very guide and the determination of that very judge, how far such direction and determination are to be depended on!—For what else can he mean by leaving it to the
judgment
of any
considerate
man? Is not this leaving it to Reason, or setting up Reason in judgment on herself?
To do justice to the noblest faculty of the human mind, we will venture to declare that
Reason
never suggested any of the above extravagancies to any man.
Reason
never could persuade any man that "there is
no
God." Indeed the office of
Reason
is not
persuasion
but
conviction,
and no man, capable of conviction, ever yet was even
persuaded
that
second
causes do not proceed from a
first.
No
Atheist
e'er was known on earth,
Till fiery zealots gave him birth,
For controversy's sake their trade;
Damning the heretic they made.
Of the
first cause,
or fools or wise
The pure existence none denies;
Tho' in its
essence
few agree:
For who
defines
INFINITY!
EP. TO LOR.
Reason
never taught any man there is no difference between
virtue
and
vice:
His necessary use of the very terms is a proof of it; as well as the natural sense of justice, implanted in the breast of every humanbeing.
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you,
is not merely New Testament doctrine. It is as old as the multiplication of mankind; it is an universal principle, a law of which (to use the expression of a celebrated, though inconsistent, moralist)
every man may find the exposition in his own breast
The Rambler, No. 8.
.
Reason
never taught any man, there
can
be no future state. The utmost, that reason ever taught, is that we are indebted to
revelation
for the certain knowledge of such state or must depend chiefly on scriptural proof for the evidence of it. Not but that there are even rational
arguments
in its favour, as well of the physical and moral
Setting aside the moral and religious pleas usually adduced in proof of a future state; the strong probability of it is plausibly urged, in the eighth epistle to Lorenzo, on the simplest plea.
To
animals
of every kind
Are their peculiar powers assign'd;
To actuate, strengthen, or restrain;
Nor sense nor instinct giv'n in vain?
Man,
a
mere animal
confess'd,
Is yet distinguish'd from the rest;
His pow'rs, his views, his labours
here,
Presumptive of a
brighter sphere!
Say, why is
knowledge
giv'n, to raise
Our wonder to our Maker's praise?
Why are we taught our God t' adore,
If seen in death his face no more?—
It cannot be.—Of heav'nly birth,
Science,
descending to the earth,
To man hath Jacob's ladder given;
Reaching, an angel's flight, to heaven!
as of the religious kind.
Is it, because we know not why,
So sad a thing for once to die?
Is it so hazardous, my friend,
On God, our maker, to depend?
That God, to whom we being owe,
Our friend and guardian here below;
Who all along the vale of life,
In ev'ry scene of care and strife,
Affords his providential arm,
To raise beneath, or shield from, harm?
Is it for
him
so hard to save
That conscious Being from the grave?—
Secure, Lorenzo, in the power,
That wak'd me at my natal hour,
To me and mine, in life so just,
On him in death I mean to trust;
Safe in the hollow of his hand,
Fearless to fall by whom I stand,
Of whom I kiss the chastening rod,
And bless the
father
in the GOD.
EP. TO LOR:
Reason
never persuaded any man that he hath no
free-will,
in opposition to his own experience.—If she suggested a doubt of his capacity to will or act without a motive, it is a suggestion founded on all experience; as his conviction of not being a mere mechanical machine, actuated by no motives at all, is founded on the same experience.
Reason
never suggested the non-existence of soul or body, of matter or spirit, in
contradiction
to our senses and perceptions.—Neither matter nor spirit are ideas of
sensation,
but of
reflection. Reason
teaches us, indeed, the fallibility of sensation and perception, and the means of correcting their errors; and well for us it is, that she does so: we should else be totally destitute of science; and, for want of the instincts of other animals, should be in a worse situation than the brutes that perish.
From the above specification, indeed, of the supposed absurdities of human reason, it appears to us that, our author hath neither physics nor metaphysics enough to enter on a philosophical discussion of the points in question.— We might, therefore, in like manner, leave to the judgment of our considerate readers to determine, whether the
Reason,
or rather the
Imagination,
of any man, in his senses, ever fell into grosser errors than has here that of our author; in which case, they would likewise determine how far such a guide is to be depended on in the important concerns of religion and morals.
We might, indeed, censure here the superficial and illogical manner; in which this writer has stated this objection;
viz.
his speaking of mankind, as if the human mind was something distinct from, and possessed of, the power of controuling its essential faculties.
But that excellent logician, Mr Harris, in his Dialogue on Happiness, hath illustrated, in the most perspicuous manner, the
reciprocal influence
of
reason
and
passion
in the conduct and composition of the human mind. To such writers, therefore, we refer our author, for the attainment of more precise ideas on this subject than he seems at present to possess, or will ever obtain from the loose and rambling reasonings of those who stile themselves
Christian philosophers
or
rational divines.
SECT. VIII.
On his reply to a second objection,
That the Old and New Testament cannot be a revelation from God, because in them are to be found errors and inconsistencies, fabulous stories, false facts and false philosophy; which can never be derived from the Fountain of all Truth.
—This objection shewn to be rather enforced by the author's concessions, than removed by his conclusions.
HERE our author very readily (and, as we before observed, in our opinion, for his argument unnecessarily) acknowledges that the scriptures are not revelations from God, but only the
history
of them.
The revelation itself,
says he,
is derived from God; but the history of it is the production of men, and therefore the truth of it is not in the least affected by their fallibility.
See View, page 123.
He admits, of course, that the inspired writers were not always under the influence of inspiration; for, if they had, says he, St Paul, who was shipwrecked, and left his cloak and parchments at Troas, would not have put to sea before a storm, nor have forgot himself so much as to leave his cloak behind him.
"But," continues he,
if in these books a religion superior to all human imagination actually exists, it is of no consequence to the proof of its divine origin, by what means it was there introduced, or with what human errors and imperfections it is blended. A diamond, though found in a bed of mud, is still a diamond, nor can the dirt, which surrounds it, depreciate its value or destroy its lustre.
This allusion may be well calculated to catch the simple apprehension of the superficial reader; but, one of the least discrimination cannot fail to discover how totally inapplicable it is to the subject in question.
A fine lady, indeed, may carelessly drop a manufactured brilliant into the kennel, to be accidentally picked up by a gold-finder; but rough diamonds are not originally found there; they have not their native bed in the streets, or on the dunghill; but are dug from mines, prepared by Nature's process for their production: in which state, also, they do not shine with a lustre so greatly superior to the surrounding materials.
We by no means agree with our author, therefore, that his proof of the internal evidence of the divine origin of revelation, does not suffer, by admitting that
the prophecies are all fortunate guesses or artful applications, and the miracles there recorded no better than legendary tales.
See View, page 131.
On the contrary we conceive that such an heterogeneous mixture of truth and falsehood, as he hypothetically admits in the
history,
as he calls it, of revelation, would, if it really existed there, very reasonably bring the truths it contains into doubt.—Nay, we will go so far as to admit that there really do appear so many errors and inconsistencies, in that history, that unenlightened reason cannot reconcile them: the inspiration of
grace
being as necessary to point out these truths and induce a firm belief of them, as it was to direct and enable the inspired writers to record them.
SECT. IX.
On his reply to a third objection.
That a wise and benevolent Creator should have constituted a world upon one plan and a religion for it on another.
Under the term religion in this objection, the author is shewn to include
morals
also; but the purity of the Christian morals is shewn not to be calculated for the constitution of this world, and therefore not required of Christians in their present state of probation.
TO some speculative and refined observers it has appeared incredible
, says our author,
that a wise and benevolent Creator should have constituted a world upon one plan, and a religion for it on another; that is, that he should have revealed a religion to mankind, which not only contradicts the principal passions and inclinations which he has implanted in their natures, but is incompatible with the whole oeconomy of that world which he has created, and in which he has thought proper to place them. This, say they, with regard to the Christian, is apparently the case: the love of power, riches, honour, and fame, are the great incitements to generous and magnanimous actions; yet by this institution are all these depreciated and discouraged. Government is essential to the nature of man, and cannot be managed without certain degrees of violence, corruption, and imposition; yet are all these strictly forbid. Nations cannot subsist without wars, nor war be carried on without rapine, desolation, and murder: yet are these prohibited under the severest threats. The non-resistance of evil must subject individuals to continual oppressions, and leave nations a defenceless prey to their enemies; yet is this recommended. Perpetual patience under insults and injuries must every day provoke new insults and new injuries, yet is this injoined. A neglect of all we eat and drink and wear, must put an end to all commerce, manufactures, and industry; yet is this required. In short, were these precepts universally obeyed, the disposition of all human affairs must.be entirely changed, and the business of the world, constituted as it now is, could not go on.
The
Monthly
Reviewers very justly observe, on this passage, that no serious advocate for Christianity can admit all these contradictions: for, indeed, they militate not less against the practical principles of Christianity than against: those of Common-sense. Our author, nevertheless boldly affirms that
Such is the Christian revelation, tho' some of its advocates may perhaps be unwilling to own it, and such it is constantly declared to be by him who gave it, as well as by those who published it under his immediate direction:
To these he says,
If ye were of the world, the world would love his own;
but
because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out, of the world, therefore the world hateth you
John xv. 19.
. To the Jews he declares,
Ye are of this world; I am not of this world
John viii. 23.
. St Paul writes to the Romans,
Be not conformed to this world
Rom. xii. 2.
; and to the Corinthians, "
We speak not the wisdom of this world
Cor. ii. 6.
." St James says,
Know ye not, that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God
Jam. iv. 4.
. This irreconcileable
disagreement between Christianity and the world is announced in numberless berless other places in the New Testament, and indeed by the whole tenour of those writings. These are plain declarations, which, in spite of all the evasions of those good managers, who choose to take a little of this world in their way to heaven, stand fixed and immoveable against all their arguments drawn from public benefit and pretended necessity, and must ever forbid any reconciliation between the pursuits of this world and the Christian institution.
We have as much contempt as our author can have for those good managers, who choose to take as much of this world as they can with them in their journey to the next. We are also as well satisfied as he can be, that Christian morality in its purity is not calculated for the practice of man in his present state; but inculcated to inspire a proper disposition preparatory to another. But, for the same reasons, we think the observance of it no farther required of us than it is
practicable.
If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men
Rom. xii. 18.
,
says St. Paul to the Romans. The Christian religion enjoins not impossibilities; it imposes not hard and impracticable duties; requiring no more of any man than
lieth in him.
The Scripture expressly declares;
Its yoke is easy and its burthen is light
But are self-mortification, penance, the loving one's enemies, the renouncing one's property and even one's life; are these easy or light?—We believe that, however they may have been required of particular persons on particular occasions, the general imposition of such unnecessary commands have only served to disgust the well-disposed and sincere Christian, and to fill the world with
hypocrites.
.
The several texts, therefore, above adduced by our author, are evidently misapplied.
That a conformity to the vices and follies of the world is prohibited to Christians, is most certain; but where are they forbid to conform to the established customs and necessary duties of society? Are they not, on the other hand, expressly enjoined, to
submit to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake?
—
To pay the most implicit obedience to magistrates and all that are in power; for that the powers, that be, are of God?
Where is it, we ask again, that Christians are required by the Scriptures so to act as to put an end to all commerce, manufactures, and industry; to change the disposition of all human affairs, and put a stop to the business of the world?—
Are these extravagances deduced from our Saviour's sermon on the Mount and the instructions he gave his immediate disciples?—Men possessed of the power of working miracles for their support or defence, might safely indeed leave to-morrow to take care for itself, careless of what they might eat, drink or wear. But setting aside the consideration that many things may be enjoined as particular and personal duties, adapted to time and place, which are by no means required universally; setting aside also the consideration that our Saviour was exhibiting to his disciples a theory of morality, adapted rather to man in a state of perfection than to man in his present imperfect state of probation; it is plain that he had in view the holding up a contrast to the boasted morality of those vain-glorious hypocrites the Scribes and Pharisees; in order to check that overweening pride, with which they exulted in their good-works over the sincere and humble penitence of the publican and sinner.
Our Saviour did not preach the same strictness of morals to
all,
as he did to his
immediate followers.
Behold one came and said unto him,
good master, what good thing shall I do to inherit eternal life?
—And he said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is God: but if thou wilt enter into life keep the Commandments.—He saith unto him,
which?
Jesus said, Thou shalt do no murder, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness; Honour thy father and thy mother: and thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
—
Every one of these commandments, we see, respects the discharge of the
social
duties incumbent on man in the present state of society. Not one is mentioned of a nature purely religious; even the first commandment respecting the very acknowledgment of God is omitted: and yet Jesus says, keep these commandments and thou wilt enter into life.
The unattainable nature of moral
goodness
in this mortal state is also here strongly inculcated, "There is none good but God
This passage has been urged in proof of our Saviour's giving up all pretensions to personal divinity. But the contrary is plain, on the slightest reflection. This Querist, who seems to have possessed all the spirit of the Pharisees, came, forsooth, with his "good master," in opposition to those humble believers, who saluted Jesus by the title of
Lord;
to which they had no need to add the epithet of
good.
—Our Saviour, who read the hearts of men, and never wanted shrewdness of
reply, questioned
him therefore, why, on the presumption he was addressing a
mere man,
he called him
good,
an epithet applicable only to
God.
So far, therefore, is this passage from making against our Saviour's asserting his own divinity, it proves that he did so, in an instance, where, without any impeachment of his title, he might have neglected it.
. "—And yet
so good
was the presuming Querist, that he answered, he had kept all these commandments from his youth up; pertly adding, "what lack I yet?"— Jesus said unto him, "if thou wilt be
perfect,
go, sell that thou hast, give it to the poor and follow me."
This sacrifice of the things of this world, we see, was required of him, not as the conditions of his salvation, but as a proof of that moral perfection to which he pretended, and as a qualification necessary for him to become an immediate follower and disciple of Jesus Christ.
In like manner, we will venture to say, that Christianity, at this day, requires no purer morals in its professors, than as much as in them lies, to live peaceably with all men, to keep those commandments which are essential to the good of society and the peace and happiness of mankind.
Let the sincere Christian do this and we believe he will enter into eternal life, even though he should be somewhat nice in regard to what he eats, drinks and wears; though he should promote commerce, manufactures and industry, yea, though he should, consistently with the laws of his country, resent insults, punish injuries, enter into the civil or even military service of government, draw his sword against the enemies of the state, and even fatally embrue it in blood, to chastise the insolence of unnatural rebellion!
SECT. X.
On his reply to a fourth objection,
That if this revelation had really been from God, his infinite power and goodness could never have suffered it to have been so soon perverted from its original purity, to have continued in a state of corruption through the course of so many ages; and at last to have proved so ineffectual to the reformation of mankind.
—The manner, in which this objection is attempted to be removed, shewn to reflect the highest indignity on the divine Author of the Christian religion, as well as on that religion itself.
IN answer to this
fourth
objection, our author very candidly and very simply replies, that on examination all this will be found inevitable.—We believe it; things could not possibly be otherwise, because such was the general design of Providence, and such the Christian dispensation, which was a part of it.
In reply to this objection, indeed, our author admits the whole force of it; which he endeavours to elude by a very simple expedient: much such another as that, by which he accounts elsewhere for the origin of evil, Necessity! hard necessity; which even the omnipotence of the Deity could not prevent! What is this but making the God of the Christians a mere heathen Jupiter, subject to the controul of superior Fate?
He admits, that after Christianity had had made its way, by means of the preaching of the poor and mean, in holes and caverns, under the iron rod of persecution, till it so far prevailed as to obtain the countenance and protection of princes; when kings became its patrons, and queens its nursing mothers; he admits, we say, that it could no longer withstand the irresistible effects of the natural imperfection of man and the political evils of civil society.
At length the meek and humble professors of the gospel inslaved these princes, and conquered these conquerors their patrons, and erected for themselves such a stupendous fabric of wealth and power, as the world had never seen: they then propagated their religion by the same methods by which it had been persecuted; nations were converted by fire and sword, and the vanquished were baptised with daggers at their throats.
See View, page 149.
Horrid abominations! exclaims our author at the enormities of the poor pagans. But what more horrid abominations could they be guilty of than these? Were any of those, which, our author says, were practised in the pagan world, and vanished at the approach of Christianity, more horrid or more abominable? And yet they were
permitted
it seems, because they could not be
prevented.
They proceeded, we are told, from a chain of causes and consequences, which could not have been broken without changing the established course of things by a constant series of miracles, or a total alteration of human nature.
See View, page 149.
What a pity that a business which had so promising a beginning, should be so soon interrupted by such sinister and unforeseen accidents! For surely they must have been unforeseen, when the course of things was about to be established and human nature first constituted!
To be serious, this is a bungling excuse for a supposed blunder in the first outset of things, unless we seriously adopt the reason, our author deduces from revelation,
viz.
that it could not be otherwise,
because that all men should be exempted from sin and punishment is utterly repugnant to the universal system, and that constitution of things, which infinite wisdom has thought proper to
adopt.
View, page 159.
This may be, but we revere the eternal councils of the great author and disposer of all things too much, to suppose he was ever under the predicament of
adopting
any measure or system of action, that resulted originally from any thing but his own will.
SECT. XI.
On his reply to the fifth objection,
The incredibility of some of its doctrines, particularly those concerning the Trinity, and atonement for sin by the sufferings and death of Christ; the one contradicting all the principles of human reason, and the other all our ideas of natural justice.
—This objection shewn to be rather evaded than solved; the author not having fairly and fully stated the difficulties it really contains.
TO these objections, says our author,
I shall only say, that no arguments founded on principles, which we cannot comprehend, can possibly disprove a proposition already proved on principles which we do understand; and therefore that on this subject they ought not to be attended to.
But this is rather evading the difficulty than solving it. Indeed, with regard to the doctrines of the Trinity and vicarious atonement he bestows on them some little attention. In respect to the former, he observes,
That three beings should be one being, is a proposition which certainly contradicts reason; that is,
our
reason: but it does not thence follow, that it cannot be true; for there are many propositions which contradict our reason, and yet are demonstrably true.
That this is a proposition contradictory to reason, we admit; but we deny, that it is either true or capable of demonstration. There may be propositions contradictory to reason, and yet not demonstrably false; nay, they may be such as, however contradictory to reason, we cannot help believing to be true; but to be demonstrably so, they must be perfectly and evidently consonant to reason; for demonstration is nothing but the result of a compleat process of rational argument.
That propositions
apparently
false are
demon strably
true, is almost too notorious to merit illustration. Instances occur every moment in which the inference of our ill-informed and
immediate apprehension
is directly contradictory to that of a better-informed and
deliberate reflection.
There are propositions, also, that require not only much deliberation, but much instruction, before our reason is qualified to pass any judgment concerning them. This our author elsewhere admits,
See Section XII.
though, under the present head, he proceeds to support his assertion by example; offering an instance of the propositions, which, he says, are
contradictory
to
reason,
and yet
demonstrably true.
One, says he, is the very first principle of all religion, the being of a God; for that any
thing
should exist without a
cause,
or that any
thing
should be the
cause
of its own
existence,
are propositions equally contradictory to our reason; yet one of them must be true, or
nothing
could ever have
existed.
The
Monthly
Reviewers very justly insinuate, that here is a confusion of terms: indeed our author here sadly exposes his want of logical precision. —Not to cavil at his calling
God
a
thing,
his opposing the term
being,
or
existence
(instead of
effect
) to the term cause, is illogical in the highest degree.
All
created beings,
or
things,
are confessedly the EFFECTS of
one first
CAUSE; but we conceive this is the first time, so expert a logician ever made such a blunder as to put the
first
cause on a footing with
second
causes; and assert (as our author, in fact, does) that no
cause
could ever have existed that was not the
effect
of some
prior
cause. If he is not betrayed here into a slat denial of the existence of a God, or
first cause,
we know not what is such.
Our author palpably mistakes the permanent predicament of
existence
and
duration,
for the transitory one of
production
and
succession
In the
former
the terms
being
and
thing
are used with propriety: in the latter those of
cause
and
effect
with equal propriety: but it is a solecism in ratiocination to confound one with the other. For, though, in the order of nature
the existence
of one
thing
becomes the productive
cause
of
another,
the God of Nature, the primary, and efficient cause of all, superier to the work of his hands,
Some writers, indeed, and those of celebrity, have imagined a
scale
of beings, rising up from the meanest of God's creatures to the Creator himself; but we always regarded this as groundless and visionary.
Thy pride, Lorenzo disbelieve;
Let Locke nor Addison deceive.
For tho creation's varied plan
Assigns
degrees
respecting
man;
Yet humbly know, and learn to fear
GOD is beyond this mortal sphere!
Created beings, tho his care,
Doth he with them cteation
share?
Oh! no: the system all his own,
God, the creator, stands alone:
At equal distance all his plan,
The mite, the seraph, and the man!
EP. TO LOR.
is exempted from the laws of subordination; which he has prescribed as the tegular succession of second causes and effects. It is, indeed, in our conception, a kind of metaphysical blasphemy to represent
God
as an
effect
which could not have existed without a
cause,
even though it be sheltered uhder the metaphysical absurdity of supposing that effect the cause of itself.
And yet our author proceeds with his examples;
In like manner, the over-ruling grace of the Creator, and the free-will of his creatures, his certain foreknowledge of future events, and the uncertain contingency of those events, are to our apprehensions absolute contradictions to each other; and yet the truth of every one of these is demonstrable from Scripture, reason and experience.
Here again our author confounds the
absolute
and
eternal
attributes of the
Creator
with the
relative
and
temporary
properties of his
creatures.
That these should be
apparently
contradictory is no wonder: but that they are not, as our author affirms,
absolute
contradictions, is known to every man of sense and scicnce, that hath bestowed sufficient attention on the subject; to whom these seeming contradictions must be easily reconcileable. The over-ruling grace of the Creator is irresistible and positive; the free-will of his creatures resistible and comparative. The agency of man, compared with that of the Deity, is limited, confined, and servile. On the other hand, if compared with the agency of inferior animals, plants, &c. it is liberal and free.—The foreknowledge of the Deity is absolute and indisputable, as the succession of future events is with respect to him, fixed and unalterable; with respect to man, indeed, their contingency is as uncertain as is his want of foreknowledge, or ignorance, of their necessary succession.
All
Nature
is but
Art,
unknown to thee;
All
chance, direction,
which thou canst not see.
But to recur to the author's remarks on the doctrine of the Trinity. It is with propriety he observes, that
the difficulties with respect to our belief in this doctrine arise from our imagining, that the mode of existence of all beings must be similar to our own; that is, that they must all exist in space and time. Hence, says he very justly, proceeds our embarrassment on this subject. We know that no two beings, with whose mode of existence we are acquainted, can exist in the same point of time, in the same point of space, and that therefore they cannot be one: but how far beings, whose mode of existence bears no relation to time and space, may be united, we cannot comprehend: and, therefore, the possibility of such an union we cannot positively deny.
This is philosophical and just, but there is a wide difference between positively denying a doctrine, and absolutely believing it.—Most certain, however, it is, that the doctrine of the Trinity, as it is taught by some of the Athanasians, cannot possibly be believed by any human being.
By nonsense nor deceit misled
The honest heart and sober head;
Some meaning, positive and plain,
A creed believ'd must needs contain:
A parrot else, if none deceive her,
A sound and orthodox believer;
As much convine'd as e'er was yet,
Your Athanasian paroquet!
EP. TO LOR.
Our author reduces this formidable absurdity (for such it is, as some trinitarians represent it) to a mere simple proposition, as easy to be believed as that three equal angles or sides constitute one equilateral triangle. But this is not the case. In the exuberant and rattling eloquence of the famous Dr. Jeremy Taylor, the mystery of the Godhead is thus enigmatically displayed. —
See what was to be taught, a trinity in the unity of the Godhead,
; that is, the Christian arithmetic,
Three are one and one are three.
So Lucian in his Philopatris, or some other, decides the Christian doctrines; see
their
philosophy,
Ex nihilo nihil fit.
—No:
Ex nihilo omnia,
all things are made of nothing; and a
man-God
and a
God-man,
the same person
finite
and
infinite,
born
in time
and yet from
all eternity,
the son of God, but yet born of a woman, and she a
maid,
but yet a
mother;
resurrection of the dead, re-union of soul and body; this was part of the Christian physics or their natural philosophy.
See a Moral Demonstration of the Truth of the Christian Religion, first printed in the year 1660, lately reprinted for Cadell, Page 53.
With due deference to the authority of this eminent divine, as well as to his late editor, Bishop Hurd, all this is merely declamatory. It is also so far sophistical, in that it is the Christian
theology
and not either
arithmetic
or
physics.
—The
mathematics
and
natural philosophy
of the
Christian
and the
Heathen
are the same: nor is it any impeachment to the
divinity
of
revelation,
that it has no place in the
cyclopaedia,
or circle of human arts and sciences.
The case is, these writers do not make a proper distinction between a palpable contradiction in terms and an apparent contrariety in fact. There is also a necessary distinction to be made between the belief of the truth of a proposition (or the believing a proposition to be true) and the belief of the proposition itself: the former being consistent with an imperfect apprehension of its meaning; and the other consistent only with a clear and precise comprehension as well of the predicate as of the subject.
From these distinctions arises a third, equally just and necessary, between the
faith
of the
Christian
and the
belief
of the
philosopher.
But of these distinctions more fully hereafter.
See the following Section.
SECT. XII.
On his reply to the sixth objection.
That, however true these doctrines may be, yet it must be inconsistent with the justice and goodness of the Creator, to require from his creatures the belief of propositions, which contradict, or are above the reach of that reason, which he has thought proper to bestow on them.
This objection answered by denying that genuine Christianity requires any such belief.— The nature of the Christian faith investigated and its latitude defined: Christianity, as it requires nothing
impracticable
to be
performed,
so it requires nothing
impossible
to be
believed.
TO this
sixth
objection, our author answers, "Genuine Christianity requires no such belief."
It has discovered to us many important truths, with which we were before entirely unacquainted, and amongst them are these, that three Beings are some way united in the divine essence, and that God will accept of the sufferings of Christ as an atonement for the sins of mankind. These, considered as declarations of facts only, neither contradict, or are above the reach of human reason: The first is a proposition as plain, as that three equilaral lines compose one triangle
That
any three
lines might do, properly disposed, though
not equal:
indeed this allusion is by no means adequate, and but little pertinent.
, the other is as intelligible, as that one man should discharge the debts of another. In what manner this union is formed, or why God accepts these vicarious punishments, or to what purposes they may be subservient, it informs us not, because no information could enable us to comprehend these mysteries, and therefore it does not require that we should know or believe any thing about them.
How! not
any thing about them!
Surely this is loosely and badly expressed! As a declaration of fact merely, it has been already observed that the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity is not so simple and rational as here laid down; but much more complex and paradoxical.
As to the
quomodo
of the triunion, and the reason why God accepts of a vicarious atonement for the sins of mankind; these are certainly beyond rational investigation, but Christians are doubtless required to believe so much about them, as that the facts are as possible as their declaration is true.
Again, if no information can enable us to comprehend these mysteries, it is not with very great propriety such important
truths
are said to be
discovered
by Revelation. The doctrines as mere declarations, indeed, may be said to be
discovered,
as they were not
divulged
before; but if those doctrines themselves still remain mysterious, they would with more propriety be said to be simply declared or promulgated, than their
truth
to be
discovered.
"The truth of these doctrines," our author owns,
must rest intirely on the authority of those who taught them; but then, says he, we should reflect that those were the same persons who taught us a system of religion more sublime, and of ethics more perfect, than any which our faculties were ever able to discover; but which, when discovered, are exactly consonant to our reason; and that therefore we should not hastily reject those informations which they have vouchsafed to give us, of which our reason is not a competent judge.
By the
truth of these doctrines,
he evidently means the
credibility
of them; but what he means by the
exact consonance
of those which are discovered to our reason, we do not understand. It is from the want of such consonance, necessarily arising from the mysterious nature of such doctrines, that
we
deduce the incompetency of reason to judge of their truth.
But men, as our author justly observes, may very reasonably believe propositions to be true, of whose truth, nevertheless, they are no competent judges. "If an able mathematician," says he,
proves to us the truth of several propositions by demonstrations, which we understand, we hesitate not on his authority to assent to others, the process of whose proofs we are not able to follow: why therefore should we refuse that credit to Christ and his apostles, which we think reasonable to give to one another.
Why? indeed! It is very unreasonable:
they
doubtless deserve our credit.—But still we recur again to the
authenticity
of the
history
of the gospel and the
interpretation
of its doctrines. Admitting, therefore, the propriety of placing the utmost confidence in the veracity of Christ and his apostles, and that what they really meant to inculcate is worthy of all acceptation, still, we say, the cautious and candid Christian may, without the immediate direction of divine grace, remain at a loss what to believe.
As to what genuine Christianity
requires
us to believe; here again we plead for the same necessary latitude in matters of
faith,
as we have before done in
morals
We call it a
necessary
latitude; because, to whatever purity of faith or morals
hypocrisy
may pretend, men always deceive themselves or others, when they affect to have a command, over their
reason
and
passions,
which they can derive from no resource either of Nature or Grace; the only springs of human reflection and action
. Indeed, our author is, in this respect, and very justly, a latitudinarian too: for though he hath reduced the Christian's creed, as before observed, to a very small compass, he hath, by so doing, opened a wide field for scepticism. And yet so far are the dictates of genuine Christianity, even in our opinion, consonant with reason, that, as it requires nothing which is
impracticable
to be
performed,
so it requires nothing, which is
impossible
to be
believed.
But how shall such a short-sighted Being as man know what is, or is not impossible?
—True; he may be conscious of what is
impracticable,
as that regards himself, but he Cannot prescribe impossibilities to God; of whose omnipotence he is no judge. To infinite power every thing is possible, except, indeed, inconsistency or self-contradiction. Every proposition, therefore, respecting the deity, that doth not involve a contradiction in
terms,
however improbable or
apparently
impossible, may yet be really possible, and therefore believed on proper evidence, powerful persuasion, or the influence of divine grace: whereas no kind or degree of evidence, no power of persuasion, no influence human or divine can possibly make any man believe a
contradiction
in
terms.
This is one of those
impracticabilities
which respects himself. Of the
incompatibility
of
facts
he may not be a competent judge; but of the
incongruity
of his own
deas,
he cannot but be sensible. To a direct contradiction-in-
terms,
therefore, he cannot give his unfeigned assent, though to the most egregious falsehood or palpable contrariety-in-
fact,
he may.
This distinction between a
contrariety
-in-
fact
and a
contradiction
-in-
terms,
we conceive, has not sufficiently been attended to. The one is popular, and physical; consisting of natural inconsistency and moral improbabilities; the other philosophical and logical, consisting of artificial inconsistencies and verbal incongruities. Hence, however incompetent human reason may be, to determine of possibilities in nature and probabilities in providence, it is competent to judge of the agreement and disagreement of its own ideas. Words, therefore, being the artificial signs of our ideas,
a contradiction-in-terms
becomes obviously and certainly discaverable, whilst a
contrariety-in-facts
is not.
The greatest falsehoods in fact, hence frequently pass for incontestible and demonstrable truths, on those who would immediately detect a direct contradiction in terms.—To illustrate this distinction by a familiar elucidation. A man as totally ignorant of the Copernican system as even the learned formerly were, might be told that the sun is much bigger than the earth and does not move round it every twentyfour hours, as it appears to do; the earth only moving imperceptibly rounds its own axis and carrying round with it every thing adhering to its surface with great rapidity.
An astronomer, we say, might tell an ignorant man this, who might either believe it, confiding in the astronomer's veracity, although it seemed contrary to the evidence of his senses; or he might disbelieve and even deny it, confiding more in that evidence, he might say,
I cannot be persuaded out of my senses; I can see the size of the sun, and see it goes round the earth, which I also perceive stands all the while stockstill. It is impossible that I and every body about me should be whisked round with such velocity without our perceiving it.
—If therefore, he should believe the astronomer's assertion, however true it be in reality, he would believe, what we call, a contrariety-in-fact, viz. that things really are, as he perceives they are not. The same illustration holds good respecting the existence of soul and body, matter and spirit, of which, it is popularly supposed, we have positive proos or indubitable demonstration; whereas we have nothing more than the imperfect evidence of our sensations and perceptions; which are so far from directly affording us demonstration of any thing, that they are constantly and egregiously deceiving us in almost every thing.
It will follow from the establishment of this distinction that, however justifiable men of discernment may be in their disbelief or denial of
inconsistent
or
self-contradictory propositions,
the very limited extent of their knowledge in the works of nature and the ways of providence, disqualifies them from taking upon them absolutely to deny improbable and even
apparently
impossible facts.
Another distinction, which here offers itself to our consideration, is
that,
between believing the truth of a doctrine (or the believing that a doctrine is true) and the belief of that doctrine itself.
For a man may very properly be said to believe the truth of a proposition (in other words, that such proposition is true) although the doctrine or declaration, it contains, appears doubtful, nay although the terms of such proposition be totally unintelligible: in which latter case he certainly cannot with any propriety be said to believe the proposition or doctrine itself.
The learned and ingenious author of a late plea for the divinity of Christ
Mr Robinson:
, lays down in form, indeed, the following proposition:
The belief of a proposition does not necessarily imply a clear idea of the object of which the proposition affirms any thing.
So that in this case a man may be said to
believe
a proposition he does not
understand.
But to this we cannot subscribe: a
clear
idea is certainly required as well of the
subject
as the
predicate,
though not a
full
or
adequate
idea. The idea entertained of God by a philosopher and that attached to the same term by an ignorant clown, are widely different: the one, magnificent and extensive as human science can teach or imagination conceive; the other mean and confined as ignorance and dulness can dictate. We will yet venture to say they are both equally
clear;
nay, we conceive the confined idea of the clown may be the clearest, as being more definite, in coming nearer the precision of our ideas of material objects. This very precision, indeed, is more destroyed by the effulgence of too much light than by the obscurity attending the want of it; even as the face of the moon is seen clearer than that of the sun.
No doctrine or proposition, therefore, can, in our opinion, be actually believed, unless it be clearly understood; and yet propositions which are not clearly understood, nay not understood at all, may comprehend a truth, or may be true; and "that they do "so," is a proposition that may be believed.
A man may believe, as already observed, a contrariety in fact, a great falsehood, supported by competent evidence or credible affirmation; so may he with equal propriety and on the same grounds believe the truth of a mysterious or even unintelligible proposition; or that such a proposition is true.
But then this is not the proposition he believes; this is quite a new one, viz,
That the said mysterious or unintelligible proposition is true,
which new proposition is neither mysterious nor unintelligible, and therefore may be believed
It has been frivolously objected that
a mathematician, who demonstrates the truth of any proposition, does not
believe
it to be true; he
knows
it to be so.
True, he does not
only believe
it to be true, he does
more,
he also
knows
it to be so; he believes not only the truth of the proposition, but the proposition itself. Knowledge includes belief, though belief does not include knowledge.
.
Thus a magistrate or officer who administers affidavits
ex officio
and knows not the contents, may, on the credit and veracity of the deponent, believe the truth of his deposition, or that the contents of such deposition are true; but he cannot with any propriety priety be said to believe such affidavit itself or the contents of such deposition, because he knows not what those contents are and therefore can believe nothing about them.
These distinctions lead us naturally to a third, which, we flatter ourselves, may tend to conciliate the minds of polemical disputants; or, at least, to abate their rancour, which too often prevails between the orthodox and heterodox in religious disputes: and this is the distinction, before hinted at, between the
faith
of the Christian and the
belief
of the
Philosopher.
The former does not require a rational conviction of the proposition believed; whereas the belief of a philosopher not only requires rational conviction, founded on positive evidence, but it requires also a clear and precise comprehension of all the terms of the proposition laid down, On the contrary the unfeigned assent, or voluntary submission of reason, to the truth of a proposition, whose terms are not even perfectly understood, is sufficient to entitle a Christian to rank among the number of the faithful
Agreeable to our author's description of the nature of faith, See page 79.
. But a philosopher, who makes every thing submit to reason, cannot believe either that which he does not clearly conceive, or that of which he is not as clearly convinced.
Should he, as a man, be induced, by any means or motives, to give up the authority of his reason in matters where human reason is incompetent, he would do this, not as a
Philosopher,
but as a
Christian,
and of eourse be entitled to all the privileges and immunities attached to that character.
Of these our author has given an encouraging enumeration.—Unhappily for unbelievers, they require a proof of the truth of even those advantages, or, what would answer the same end, a belief or persuasion of their reality. There can be no doubt but this would be sufficient to make them immediately adopt an expedient, so admirably calculated to promote their ease and happiness. But whence is such belief or persuasion to be derived? From reason? Surely not; unless the truth of the Christian religion could be much more rationally proved than by, what this writer calls, demonstration.
But what, we ask again, is demonstration? And what is its influence? Intuition is not demonstration; instinct is not demonstration; perception is not demonstration, nor is conceit demonstration; and yet intuitive or instinctive impulse, the force of imagination or firm persuasion, may have equal influence on the mind, with that of the clearest demonstration.
This influence, however, is of another kind; and, though it be not rational, it has often a greater effect over even rational creatures than the most clear and precise of rational deductions. We experience
this,
even in the common concerns of life: in the more
uncommon,
the force of inclination and the power of imagination, are so notoriously known to overpower the strongest of our reasoning faculties, that it were absurd to support the credit of demonstration in cases, where even demonstration itself must give way to prejudice and prepossession.—And if to prejudice and prepossession, surely to the operation of Grace, and the influence of divine inspiration!
That something more than the mere exercise of reason, or even a good-will, or inclination to believe, appears nenecessary from our author's own confession.
"There are people," says he,
who from particular motives have determined with themselves, that a pretended revelation founded on so strange and improbable a story, so contradictory to reason, so adverse to the world and all its occupations, so incredible in its doctrines, and in its precepts so impracticable, can be nothing more than the imposition of priestcraft upon ignorant and illiterate ages, and artfully continued as an engine well-adapted to awe and govern the superstitious vulgar. To talk to such about the Christian religion, is to converse with the deaf concerning music, or with the blind on the beauties of painting: They want all ideas relative to the subject, and therefore can never be made to comprehend it; to enable them to do this, their minds must be formed for these conceptions by contemplation, retirement, and abstraction from business and dissipation, by ill-health, disappointment, and distresses; and possibly by
divine interposition,
or by enthusiasm, which is usually mistaken for it. Without some of these preparatory aids, together with a competent degree of learning and application, it is impossible that they can think or know, understand or believe, any thing about it. If they profess to believe, they deceive others; if they fancy that they believe they deceive themselves. I am ready to acknowledge, that these gentlemen, as far as their information reaches, are perfectly in the right; and if they are endued with good understandings, which have been entirely devoted to the business or amusements of the world, they can pass no other judgment, and must revolt from the history and doctrines of this religion. 'The preaching Christ crucified was to the Jews a stumbling block, and to the Greeks foolishness;'
1 Cor. i. 26.
and so it must appear to all, who, like them, judge from established prejudices, false learning, and superficial knowledge; for those who are quite unable to follow the chain of its prophecy, to see the beauty and justness of its moral precepts, and to enter into the wonders of its dispensations, can form no other idea of this revelation but that of a confused rhapsody of fictions and absurdities.
This is saying a great deal in discredit of a revelation, whose divine origin is so obvious, and whose doctrines are so reasonable as our author pretends. Surely there are no men, of
good under standings,
so
entirely
devoted to the business or amusements of the world, as to be
quite unable
to form any other idea of revelation than that it is a confused rhapsody of fictions and absurdities.
Granting, indeed, it be so, and that the pursuits of this world are so totally incompatible with the things of the next; it surely affords a strong argument that reason is an incompetent judge in
every thing
relative to the system, and that nothing but divine inspiration can effectually inculcate the dictates of divine revelation!
The admitting, that
possibly divine interposition
may be necessary to prepare
some
persons for believing the truths of the Christian religion, is, in fact, admitting that to be true in a degree, and in particular cases, which we contend for altogether and universally.
We are sorry, however, to find such
divine interposition
put on a footing with
ill-health,
disappointment, distress and even enthusiasm.
Not that we conceive the mode of that interposition to be confined to unaccountable impulse or miraculous conversion. Natural means may in this case be made the forerunners of supernatural effects; nay we will not deny that even enthusiasm, or a
false
inspiration itself, may be made the harbinger of the
true.
Through even the
foolishness
of
preaching
were unbelievers formerly converted. Learning and study, also, may be made the concomitant means of grace; but we do not conceive they are essentially necessary to give efficacy to other means or to divine interposition itself. If they were, it would not appear that God had chosen the foolishness of this world to confound the wise. It would rather be the subjecting of divine wisdom to human sagacity, and the excluding from Christianity all but learned divines and profound philosophers.
"And yet," says our author,
if it be asked, was Christianity intended only for these? I answer, No: It was at first preached by the illiterate, and received by the ignorant; and to such are the practical, which are the most necessary parts of it, sufficiently intelligible: but the proofs of its authority undoubtedly are not, because these must be chiefly drawn from other parts, of a speculative nature, opening to our inquiries inexhaustible discoveries concerning the nature, attributes, and dispensations of God, which cannot be understood without some learning and much attention. From these the generality of mankind must necessarily be excluded, and must therefore trust to others for the grounds of their belief, if they believe at all.
"And hence," continues he,
perhaps it is, that faith, or easiness of belief, is so frequently and so strongly recommended in the gospel; because
if men require
proofs, of which they themselves are incapable, and those who have no knowledge on this important subject will not place some confidence in those who have; the illiterate and unattentive must ever continue in a state of unbelief.
Our author here seems to have run away from his argument; the faith recommended in the gospel and therefore
required
of Christians by
God,
may be widely different from that
required
by
men
either of themselves or of others; and, of course, the
requisite proofs
of the doctrines believed, may be different also.
We cannot admit, therefore, this necessity of any man's pinning his faith on his neighbour's sleeve. The most ignorant and illiterate man is no farther removed from God, or incapable of receiving the illuminations of grace, than the greatest philosopher or the most learned divine. So that if men are content with believing only What
God requires
of them, as necessary to salvation, they may safely rely on him and the ordinary means of providence for instruction.
The case is different with those, who, to gratify even a laudable curiosity, are inquisitive about circumstances and doctrines unessential to salvation. The object of that curiosity is a worldly object, and, if attained, must be attained by worldly means. They who possess not the means of original pursuit, therefore, must be content, as a certain author expresses it,
to receive the object of it at second hand: but the faith necessary to salvation is no such
stale bargain,
it is the
immediate gift
of God.
Our author would have the inattentive and illiterate receive this gift at the hands of
man;
and, because uninformed reason is not to be depended on in matters of faith, he advises them to rest their dependence on the information of those, who professedly deduce what they know from the exercise of their reason. "They," says he,
that is the inattentive and illiterate, should all
remember, [what perhaps they never knew
] that in all sciences, even in mathematics
themselves
[
itself
] there are many propositions, which on a cursory view appear to the most acute understandings, uninstructed in
that science,
to be impossible to be true, which yet on a closer examination are found to be truths capable of the strictest demonstration; and that therefore in disquisitions on which we cannot determine without much learned investigation, reason uninformed is by no means to be depended on; and from hence they ought surely to conclude, That it may be at least as possible for them to be mistaken in disbelieving this revelation, who know nothing of the matter, as for those great masters of reason and erudition, Grotius, Bacon, Newton, Boyle, Locke, Addison, and Lyttleton, to be deceived in their belief: a belief, to which they firmly adhered after the most: diligent and learned researches into the authenticity of its records, the completion of the prophecies, the sublimity of its doctrines, the purity of its precepts, and the arguments of its adversaries; a belief, which they have testified to the world by their writings, without any other motive, than their regard for truth and the benefit of mankind.
In a matter of so great importance, we pay no authority even to great names. Without uncharitably questioning, however, either the sincerity or the motives of the several avowed defenders of Christianity, certain it is that
some
of them have been secretly contemners of its doctrines and privately disbelievers of its divine original.
It is, indeed, justly to be suspected that the number of these, is much greater than is generally imagined; for, however widely religious infidelity may have spread itself, moral hypocrisy hath, in the present age, kept pace with it.
Religious masquerading
hath, in fact, become so general and unbelievers so numerous that, they keep one another in countenance, while, with unparallelled effrontery they take off the mask and openly belie the characters they assume. Thus our modish Christians wear the plain face of downright heathens, while they retain the domino, or outward garb of Christianity.
This they do, by explaining away, as our author observes, the plain and obvious meaning of scripture and modelling the articles of faith agreeable to their own imagination. And yet these very underminers of genuine Christianity, who are daily sapping its foundation and preying on its vitals, keep flourishing away with their misrepresentations of its prosperous and flourishing state.
"If Christianity," say certain bold Reviewers, in their critique on the pamphlet before us,
had been an imposture, it could never have maintained its credit for almost eighteen hundred years, or stood the test of the most acute and accurate examinations of friends and enemies, of wits and infidels, critics and philosophers of all denominations; some fundamental defect, some irreconcileable contradiction, or some gross absurdity must have been discovered. But this is so far from being the case, that the more it is considered the more it convinces; every new enquiry produces new light, new evidence, and from every fresh attack it gains an additional triumph.
What an impudent abuse of the good faith of the Christian reader! what an insolent attempt to impose on his credulity!
Do not these very critics themselves pretend to have discovered fundamental defects, irreconcileable contradictions, and gross absurdities in the primitive and orthodox tenets of Christianity? Do they not ridicule the doctrine of the Trinity? Do they not deny the Divinity of our Saviour? Do not they reject the tenets of vicarious atonement, justification by faith, and almost every essential article in the Christian creed? And do they still pretend that the mutilation of its very being, is gaining additional triumphs to its cause? Shame on such baresaced irony
We should not think it worth while to notice here even this gross misrepresentation of things, by
such
anonymous critics; as they are at present sunk deservedly so low in the general esteem of the public: but, as they have heretofore stood in much higher estimation, and persons, ignorant of their degeneracy, might put the same confidence in them as formerly, we think a land-mark should be placed on the accumulating shoal, lest the unwary mariner should suppose himself in a
deep
when he is barely floating on a
shallow.
If any of their old friends are desirous to remain undeceived, we leave them to make their own discovery; in which case they will find themselves much in the situation of Sancho Pancha, when, his ass being stolen from under him, while he was asleep, he waked and found himself mounted merely on a pack-saddle.
!
The real state of the case is quite otherwise: genuine Christianity, notwithstanding the vapouring of these nominal Christians, being never at so low an ebb as it is among our modern rationalists; surviving chiesly among those who are ridiculed as contemned visionaries, enthusiasts and fanatics. The truth is that, so far has pure Christianity been from profiting by the freedom of enquiry, with which its doctrines have of late years been treated, that it has really lost ground among all the advocates for such enquiry.
It is an idle boast that a mere belief in the mysteries of religion will stand the test of ridicule and defy the powers of rational investigation. Those mysteries themselves will undoubtedly do it, because they depend not on the credulity or credibility of men, but on the unchangeable promises of God. But we see daily the most plausible professional characters laughed out of their religion, and even the warmest zealots argued out of their zeal
Ridicule,
though not the test of
truth,
is thus often the test of our adherence to it.
. So that if we were to calculate, to how small a number of people genuine Christianity is at present confined, we shall have no reason to boast, with this author, the extent of its propagation and influence; and still much less to advance it as a proof of its divine original
It must be owned, indeed, that our author does not much boast of its
present
state. Comparing it with the
ancient,
he says,
If it is asked, why should not the belief of the same religion now produce the same effect? the answer is short, because it is not believed:
VIEW page 156. The writer's meaning is plain, though not accurately expressed, unless an
indirect
answer only was intended to the question.
.
Happily for Christianity it hath a much firmer support in the promises of its divine author, than in any rational arguments that can be produced from such circumstances: and happily for real Christians their faith hath a more unfailing resource in the operations of divine grace, than in the most fertile expedients of human reason.
SECT. XIII.
On his reply to the seventh objection.
That the whole scheme of Revelation is partial, false, fluctuating, unjust, and unworthy of an omniscient and omnipotent Author.
THIS objection is conveyed in such diffuse and desultory terms that it amounts to little more than what has before been urged, viz. that the whole is incredible and bears no internal evidence of its divine original.
And, indeed, if we suppose human reason to be a competent judge of the
divinity
of Revelation, and also of what is
worthy
or
unworthy
an omniscient and omnipotent Being, the objection stands in its full force.
But we deny this competence, as indeed does our author, who observes that though
Reason is undoubtedly our surest guide in matters which lie within the narrow circle of her intelligence,
she is greatly deficient when she proceeds farther.
God, says this self-sufficient teacher [reason] is perfectly wise, just and good; and what is the inference? That all his dispensations must be conformable to our notions of perfect wisdom, justice and goodness: but it should be first proved that man is as perfect, and as wise as his Creator, or this consequence will by no means follow
See View, p. 175.
:
But, says our author on the subject of revelation, her province is only to examine into its authority, and when that is once proved, she has no more to do but to acquiesce in its doctrines?—
We have before hinted that we think reason has at least as much to do in the one case as in the other; we shall now, therefore; only observe, on this head, that the
Monthly
Reviewers conceive it to be a very unguarded and dangerous position. "It precludes," say they, "and discourages all rational inquiry
Monthly
Review, for June 1776. p. 472.
.
Doubtless it does and properly, all rational inquiry on a subject that does not admit of rational inquiry.
But, say they,
if it were pursued it would justify the wildest enthusiasm or superstition.
—How! will an
acquiescence,
or the putting an implicit faith, in the
doctrines
of the scripture, lead to the wildest enthusiasm and superstition? Is the human mind, when directed by divine revelation, more apt to err, than when under the simple influence of reason?
These learned and ingenious gentlemen (if indeed any gentleman, ingenious or learned,
still continues
to write in the
Mouthly
Review) seems to think that Reason has still
wilder imaginations
than those imputed to it by our author.
We have already observed that, in our opinion, it is the duty of Christians to submit the dictates of reason, as well with respect to the authority of the scriptures, as the truth of its doctrines, to the influence of divine grace; and it would be but modest, in our rival Reviewers, to leave to the author of the foundation of our faith the care of its superstructure.
They may rest assured that, whatever extravagancies of enthusiasm or superstition men have fallen into, it has not arisen from their putting an implicit faith in the doctrines of scriptures (in other words, from their submitting their reason to revelation) but to their indulging, in the pride of their hearts, the wantonness of their imagination and
trying
their
reasonable practices
on such doctrines.
SECT. XIV.
General Reflections on the whole argument, and conclusion in favour of universal candour, in judging of the faith and morals of others, or the exertion of Christian charity toward all mankind.
HAVING thus assigned our reasons for thinking the human understanding a very incompetent judge either of the mysteries of our holy religion, or of the proof of its divine origin; we shall add only a few cursory reflections respecting the state of the argument in general:
And first let us observe that were we disposed to take away even the slightest prop, on which the popular belief of revelation rests, we might expose to the greatest ridicule those vain boastings of vaunting casuists, who, declaring the truths of christianity to be sit objects of rational investigation, invite the attacks of argument, wit, and ridicule, and boldly bid them defiance. Among these we may particularize, as of late the most eminent and conspicuous, that ingenious and justly celebrated philosopher, Dr. Joseph Priestly and his very able coadjutors in the theological repository.
It was with a very bad grace, also, the celebrated author of the
Divine Legation
made a similar boast and threw out the same defiance against the freethinkers; while the civil power was actually up in arms to crush one of, the dullest, and inoffensive insects of the whole tribe; poor old Peter Annet! It was certainly a glorious triumph over infidelity and a fine proof of the clerical faith in the impregnability of the Christian church, the getting a decrepid dotard of eighty, sentenced to be imprisoned in Newgate, pilloried in the public streets, and condemned to beat hemp in Bridewell for a twelvemonth; and all merely for pushing a few pitiful pellets, out of the pop-gun of his wretched goose-quill, against the credibility, of the Mosaic history of the plagues of Egypt!
Why was not the artillery of the ecclesiastical fortress levelled at some more formidable foe? in their opposition to whom those doughty engineers might have reaped some credit for their valour (if not for their conduct) and have at least escaped the odium, which ever falls on
cowards
for their
cruelty!
They may rest, however, secure: the ashes of poor Peter will remain quiet in his grave. We dare say there was not so much spirit buried with them, as to cause any future disturbance either to him or them!
We are assured that a late Archbishop of Canterbury thought the punishment of this poor man so much greater than his crime, that he allowed him a stipend for life, after he had submitted to, and undergone, the sentence of the law.
The dignisied ecclesiastic abovementioned has been bold enough to say, in some of his prefaces, that the freethinkers (as they are falsely stiled) have had fair-play in the argument? that they have been left at liberty to handle the weapons of offence and defence at pleasure, and yet have been foiled.
But this is not true. The
freethinkers
never had fair-play given them, nor in fact do they deserve it, if it were prudent, in the civil magistrate, to indulge them. They are, in general, as little actuated by candour and the love of truth, as their antagonists are by the detestation of falshood; and it must be owned of the
latter,
they do, for the most part, love a
little deception
DEARLY!
The writer of this critique can as truly aver his sincerity as the author of the pamphlet, which is the subject of it. He can truly say that, with the most ardent desire of reconciling revelation to reason, he long and laboriously attached himself to the study of the scriptures and the reading of the commentators: that, with the most earnest with to find the doctrines of christianity true, and its divine origin morally evident, he attended with the utmost candour, to the authorities of ancient historians and the arguments of modern reasoners.
And yet, though early instructed to pay the most profound reverence and put the most implicit faith in the orthodox doctrines of Christianity, the more closely he applied the criterion of reason the more clearly did that criterion appear to be inapplicable. The farther advances he made in human science the less compatible he found it with divine knowledge.
He felt, by no means, the force of argument respecting the divine mission of our Saviour, either from the completion of prophecies or the effect of miracles. The history of the former seemed too problematical and legendary, while the latter appeared to have had much less effect, than they might reasonably be supposed to have, on the very persons who were eye-witnesses of them.
It appeared to him that the credit of Christianity was so little established, and even the name of its divine institutor so little known, in its very birthplace and infancy, that the magistrates themselves speak of
one Jesus
Acts, xxv. 19. It is true that this depreciating mode of expression is used by Festus, a new governor just come into office; but it does not appear that King Agrippa himself, whom Paul compliments with being expert in all customs and questions then among the Jews, knew any thing more of
this Jesus
than the governour, Paul, indeed, would fain have persuaded him that he knew much more of the matter than he did, or at least would seem to do: he could not persuade him, however, to acknowledge himself a Christian, when he was not. For that seems to be the true meaning of the passage, as it seems the boldness and artfulness of the insinuation, caused Agrippa to get up and walk away.
, as of an obscure and unheard-of stranger; and of his sacrifice on the cross, as a doubtful event.
It appeared to him that if there were any thing supernatural in the propagation of Christianity, it lay in its subsequent progress in opposition to the incredulity of the times, and the inefficacy of the miracles of Christ and his apostles to diffuse a more general and earlier belief. Next to this he conceived the strongest proof that could be brought of the divine origin, and of a supernatural interposition in the establishment of Christianity, is that the enormous wickedness of its later professors, the flagitious, the inhuman methods of propagating it, together with the apparent absurdities, contained in its mysterious tenets, have not been able to bring it altogether into discredit even in the most scientific ages and with the most rational and humane nations of the world.
Here
is,
indeed,
the appearance of something supernatural; the fulfilling of the divine founder's promise to the Christian church that the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. It is to an over-ruling providence and the irresistible power of grace in the completion of this promise, as before observed, more than to the strongest rational arguments, that Christianity owes its permanence and protection.
Depended its sacred mysteries on the force of
reason,
what can be more
rationally
advanced in defence of the incarnation of
Jesus,
than of the incarnanations of
Vistnou?
Depended they on
rational
arguments in favour of their
truth?
What could
reasonably
be said in favour of a
God,
the author of
life,
becoming subject to
mortality?
To his being
born,
of a
woman,
though
not begot
by a
man?
To his
dying
the death of a
sinner
to
atone
for the
sins
of the
saints,
to his descending into hell, and his ascending again to heaven, to reassume, after all, the pristine glory of the Deity!
If there be any thing, in any religion, more revolting to human reason than this, we are unacquainted with the greatest
apparent
absurdities in the known world.
If we are asked then, whether as
mere rational
beings, we can believe such propositions? we frankly answer, no.—And yet, experimentally convinced how short is the line of the human understanding, how inadequate the strongest powers of sense and genius to penetrate the veil of nature and of providence, we can readily submit our reason to revelation, and give our unfeigned assent, as
Christians,
to the truth of propositions, which, as
men.
and
philosophers,
we can neither fully understand nor clearly conceive.—Believing though not on any rational conviction, that
faith,
or as our author properly describes it, an assent to the essential doctrines of Christianity, is a religious duty enjoined every man, who lives under the dispensation of the gospel, we believe, even as
men,
so much of them as we comprehend; persuaded that even what we do not comprehend, would command our belief, if we did, in the same proportion.
We can unfeignedly do this, even while the
truth,
as it is called, of such mysterious propositions appears doubtful, nay while even the terms of such propositions appear in part or altogether unintelligible.
It is a favorite maxim with our modern rationalists (or as some call them
divines
) that
where mystery begins religion ends.
This maxim is, in our opinion, so far from being applicable to the
Christian
religion, that we think the
faith
of the Christian applicable chiesly to its mysteries, with which it begins and ends.
There would, indeed, be something mysterious in the promulgation even of the
morals
of Christianity, if we could be brought to believe the practice of them in their declared
purity
to be in our present state required of us; a practice so diametrically opposite to the gratification of the appetites and passions of human nature, and even to the laws of justice and equity admitted in natural religion.
To submit to every insult, to return good for evil, to love those that hate us, and wish well to them that despitefully use us,
are tenets so contrary as well to our natural impatience of injuries as to our ideas of natural justice, that, however the meekspirited and grace-endowed individual may adopt them in private practice, no community of Christians ever yet dared to admit them into their system of civil policy.
As to the
Faith
of the Christian if it be not exercised on the mysteries of his religion, we see neither use nor merit in his belief. If he believe nothing but what appears rational and probable, nothing but what is evinced by a cloud of witnesses, and carries with it the clearest conviction, in what is it more meritorious than the creed of the skeptic or infidel? for even
they
have their
creed.
"Because thou hast seen me (faith our Saviour to Didymus) thou hast believed blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed."
We think this text perfectly applicable to such as, like our author, are anxious to prove the divine authority of the Scriptures by rational argument: in doing which, we think them just as ill employed as, this writer says, they would be in pretending to accommodate the scriptural doctrines to our natural ideas of rectitude and truth.
The well-disposed reader, therefore, submitting his
Reason
to
Revelation,
and his belief of its divine origin, as well as of its essential doctrines, to a superior mode of conviction, the influence of Grace, would do well patiently to wait the effect of its operation in God's own place and time, and not be importunately anxious for the elucidation of obscurities, which nothing but divine illumination can illustrate.
For, after all, what men generally mean by the
truth
of the doctrines of revelation, is their consonance or congruity with the deductions of commonsense and mere unenlightened reason.
The truly-devout need be under no apprehension of being guilty of a neglect of religious duty, in thus patiently-waiting for that inspiration from above, which only can, make them wise unto salvation.
In the mean time, they should not be surprized nor alarmed at finding their notions of divine truths not exactly to coincide with those of other men, of whose talents, gifts or graces, they may entertain a higher opinion than they do of their own.
As there are few, if any, persons in the world, that either hear, see or feel external objects exactly alike (our nervous systems being as diversified as our features) so there are as few that conceive exactly alike the meaning of any one moral or religious proposition; even divine inspiration itself accommodating its influence to the different faculties of the individual.
This reflection, above all others, should excite us to the exercise of that Christian charity, which, covering a multitude of sins, we should throw, as a veil of universal candour, over the mistakes and errours of the rest of mankind; justly suspecting that, with regard to others more enlightened than ourselves, we may stand in need of the same indulgence.
THE END.
REASON AND GRACE, THEOLOGICAL
LOGUE.
The reader, who has not been offended at the few verses, quoted in the foregoing pages, will not be displeased at the insertion of this apologue, first prefixed to the fourth edition of the epistles to Lorenzo before-mentioned.
DO Christian Heathens still complain,
That
infidels
our creed profane;
Yet harbour doubts so dark and nice
They were in infidels a vice?
Religion,
do they still pretend,
Where
mystery
begins, must end;
And yet affect in
revelation
To trace the means of man's salvation?—
O'er errour let the truth prevail,
The truth, though treated as a tale.
High on th' imperial throne of grace,
Where angels view their Maker's face,
(As, fondly in imagination
Men give him local habitation,
Tho' nature's universal mind
By time and place is unconfin'd)
Through clouds, that canopy his throne,
Seen by the eye of faith alone,
Conceal'd the Christian Deity
Sat veil'd in awful mystery!
With anxious heart and listening ear,
Alternate slave to hope and fear,
Devotion
blind, a pagan bred,
To visionary notions led,
With spirits of fantastic birth
Had pester'd heav'n and peopled earth.
In ev'ry stream, thro ev'ry grove,
Did nayad swim or dryad rove;
On ev'ry whirlwind terrour rode,
And spoke the presence of a god;
His breast with human passions fraught,
As folly dreamt or errour taught;
Till cautious
reason
scarce could tell
The gods of
heav'n
from those of
hell.
'Twas now the one true God, supreme,
Dispersing darkness like a dream,
From heav'n directed
revelation,
Beneath the Christian dispensation,
Those truths to teach; which, left alone
To
reason,
MAN had never known:
For 'tis by different means we trace
The works of
nature
and of
grace;
Degen'rate minds in contradiction
Full oft from rational conviction!
Yet
Reason,
piqu'd with envious pride,
At sight of this transcendent guide,
Affected much to scorn her aid
And scoff'd at the celestial maid;
As if, by simple nature given
The special privilege of heaven;
Whence they, who gospel-truths believe,
The same implicitly receive;
By
grace
intuitively taught,
Without the aid of puzzling thought,
Without the use of studied rules,
Without the logic of the schools;
Without the means, that
art
supplies,
Or
science,
making blockheads wise!
For human wisdom here at fault,
Its solemn forms are set at nought;
While thro the wide world's narrow bounds,
Mere foolishness the wise confounds.
In heaven's own manner, time and place,
Hence Christians wait the call of grace;
Whose operation, from on high,
Nor wit, nor learning can supply.
The
skeptic
yet, devoutly vain
Because he bows at nature's fane,
Tho' ne'er the unregen'rate mind,
May
nature
's GOD behold enshrin'd,
Persists, with scrutinizing eye,
By logic gospel-truth to try;
To make the sapience of the sage
The standard of the sacred page;
And take, for heaven, in worldly pride,
A carnal, for a spiritual, guide.
Hence each, by
reasoning
led astray,
Perversely takes a different way;
T
o' the same chart, they all pretend,
Directs them to their journey's end.
Cease, ye discordant skeptics cease?
The
gospel
is the word of
peace:
Its
myst'ries
taught the human race
Alone by heav'n-inspiring
grace.
The
sophist,
poring in the dark,
Still syllogizes wide the mark;
The
Christian
takes the book in hand,
And where he may not understand,
Nor hesitates, nor blindly pores;
But reads, believe, admires, adores!
The diff'rence then, with me, admit;
Betwixt
divine
and
human
wit:
This
but for this world's purpose given,
That
to direct the way to heaven.
To Caesar pay great Caesar's due,
And take his coin for sterling true;
But dig not Caesar's richest mine,
To mix its ore with gold divine:
Lest worse designing Christian-Jews
The dangerous precedent abuse,
Adulterate with new allay,
And clip and sweat it all away.
It has been objected that this apprehension is groundless, if the scriptural promises respecting the stability of the Christian church, are to be depended on. But this objection is founded on misapprehension. A particular people may forfeit, thro' infidelity, their title to that church, without affecting its general stability or prosperity, as experience hath evinced. There cannot, also, be a more fatal prognostic of Christianity's forsaking any country than its being reduced to a mere
name
among its pretended professors; for such, we presume, is the
paganized
Christianity, as Bishop W. calls it; prevailing in the present day.
ERRATA.
Page 6. Note, line 2. for
France, having,
read
France. Having.
P. 20. Note, line 6. for
expence,
read
experience.
P. 78. line 10. for
dubious,
read
diffident.
P. 83. line 1. for
the man
read
that the man.
P. 97. Note, line 5. for
farce
read
function.
P. 124. line 17. for
mankind,
read
man.
lines 19. and 20. transpose the Comma from
of
to
controuling.
P. 175. line
ult.
for
this
read
that.
P. 213. line 1. for
greatest
read
the greatest.
THE REMARKS, ON MR. JENYNS'S ENQUIRY INTO THE NATURE AND ORIGIN OF EVIL,
Advertised to be annexed to the foregoing
Observations,
will be inserted in the next number of the
London Review.