Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again Part 4

"Among all these there were no birds or beasts of prey: none that destroyed or molested another."

All this may be very beautiful poetry, such as one might expect from the "fine frenzy" of a loving, lawless genius, but it is not Scripture, nor is it science or philosophy. We have not a doubt but that G.o.d made all things _right_,--that all His works were very _good_; the Scriptures tell us that very plainly: but they do _not_ tell us that the things named by Wesley const.i.tuted their goodness. _He_ thinks that the earth could not be good if it had on its surface rough or rugged rocks, horrid precipices, huge chasms, or dreary caverns, with impa.s.sable mora.s.ses, or deserts of barren sands. _We_ think _otherwise_. _We_ think the earth is all the _better_, and even all the more _beautiful_ for rough and rugged rocks, for horrid precipices, huge chasms, and dreary caverns. So far from regarding the rough and rugged rocks as deformities, we look on them as ornaments. So far from appearing to us as an evil, they appear a good. Even the impa.s.sable mora.s.ses, and the deserts of barren sands may have their use. If man had met with nothing in the state of the earth that stood in the way of his will or pleasure; if he had met with nothing in the shape of difficulty or inconvenience, it would have been a terrible calamity. All man's powers are developed and perfected by exertion; and without exertion,--without vigorous exertion--he would not, as at present const.i.tuted, be capable of enjoying life. Man cannot be happy without work. We therefore believe that it was wise and kind in G.o.d, independent of Adam's sin, to make impa.s.sable mora.s.ses, and barren deserts, &c., to exercise man's powers of mind and body in _draining_ the mora.s.ses, and _fertilizing_ the deserts. We believe that the earth was very good; but we believe that the rough and rugged rocks, the horrid precipices, huge chasms, dreary caverns, with the deep impa.s.sable mora.s.ses, and the deserts of barren sands, were _parts_ of the earth's goodness,--were manifestations both of the wisdom and goodness of G.o.d.

Wesley thinks there _were_ mountains on the earth before sin was committed, but that their sides were not _abrupt_ or _difficult of ascent_; that they rose and fell by almost _insensible degrees_. This pa.s.sage also goes on the false supposition, that whatever things would be likely to render great exertion necessary on the part of man, would be an evil; whereas such things are among man's greatest blessings.

Wesley farther tells us, that there were no agitations within the bowels of the earth, no violent convulsions, no concussions of the earth, no earthquakes, no eruptions of fire, no volcanoes, or burning mountains.

There is proof however, that there were _all_ these things, not only _before sin was committed_, but _before man himself was created_.

Nor do we regard earthquakes and volcanoes as evils. They are calculated even at the present to answer good ends. They tend to make men feel their absolute dependence upon G.o.d, and thus lead them to obey His law.

They are sinking revelations of G.o.d's power, and perpetual lessons of piety. And they have other uses.

He says, "If Vesuvius, Etna, or Hecla, existed before sin was committed, they were covered with a verdant mantle from the top to the bottom." But is a mountain either better or more beautiful for being covered with a verdant mantle from the top to the bottom? Is it either better or more beautiful for having no abrupt sides, difficult of ascent,--for rising and falling by almost insensible degrees? We think the contrary. The variety of scenery presented by mountains in their present state, is most beautiful. The abruptness of the sides of mountains contributes infinitely both to the beauty of the mountain, and to the beauty of the earth in general; and the toil of climbing up the steep ascent of a mountain is one of the blessings and pleasures of life. We should be sorry if there were no hills so steep as to be difficult of ascent. We should be sorry if the earth had no mountains with abrupt sides, and black, and brown, and rugged faces. We should be very sorry if the face of the earth were covered with one unvaried mantle of green. Green is very pleasant, and it is well that the greater part of the earth is covered with green; but variety also is pleasant; and green itself would cease to be pleasant if there were nothing else but green.

Wesley adds, that there was probably no sea on the surface of the earth in its paradisiacal state, none until the great deep burst the barriers which were originally appointed for it; and he adds, that there was not then that need of the ocean for navigation which there is now, as every place yielded all that was necessary to man's welfare and pleasure. We answer. The idea that the ocean was given to facilitate communication between different nations, makes us smile. Suppose there had been no ocean, should we have had a long way to go to get into the next country, the country nearest to us? Just the contrary. If there had been no ocean, there would have been land in its place, and we should neither have had to cross water nor land to get to it. It would have come up close to our own country. We have all the same travelling in order to have communication with the inhabitants of other countries when we have crossed the ocean, that we should have had, to obtain communication with neighboring countries, if there had been no ocean at all. The ocean was intended for _other_ purposes. The use of the ocean, one of its _princ.i.p.al_ uses at least, is to temper the climates and seasons of the earth. If the earth were one unbroken continent, the summers would be intolerably hot, and the winters would be intolerably cold, and the changes from winter to summer would be so violent, and work such fearful havoc, as to render the earth uninhabitable. By means of the _ocean_, those intolerable inconveniences are avoided. The sea, which is never so cold in winter as the land, tempers the air as it blows over it, and thus moderates the cold of the land. The sea also, which is never so warm in summer as the land, tempers the air again, and breathes coolness and freshness over the heated land. Neither heat nor cold affects the sea so suddenly or so violently as it affects the land. A few days of summer heat are sufficient to make the solid earth quite hot,--so hot, in many cases, that you cannot bear your naked hand upon it long. Yet this same amount of summer heat will make scarcely any perceptible difference in the waters of the ocean. Then again, in winter, a few days severe frost will make the solid earth, and especially the stones and metals, so cold, that they would blister a delicate skin, if pressed against them; while they make scarcely any perceptible difference upon the waters of the ocean. The ocean sits on its low throne like the monarch of this lower world, controlling the elements, tempering the heat and the cold, and thus preserving the earth and its living inhabitants from harm.

Wesley tells us farther, that before the sin of Adam, "The air was always serene and always friendly to man." Now the air is still always _friendly to man_. Even when it comes in the form of hurricanes and tempests, it is so. It is doing work, even then, _good work_, which gentle breezes are _unable_ to do. It is carrying away dangers which gentler currents of air would not have the power to carry away. And even when they cause destruction in their course, they are still performing friendly offices to man. They are inspiring him with a livelier consciousness of his absolute dependence upon G.o.d, and of the folly of resisting His will. They are exercising his intellectual powers, by leading him to devise means for his protection from their fury, and obliging him also to exert his bodily powers in carrying out the devices of his intellect. They are, in fact, contributing to make him a wiser, a stronger, a better, a happier, and in all respects, a completer, and a diviner being than he otherwise would be. We agree therefore with Wesley that the air before Adam sinned was always _friendly to man_; but we do not agree with him in his notions as to what _const.i.tuted_ its friendliness; nor do we agree with him in the notion, that since the sin of Adam the air has _ceased_ to be friendly, or even proved to be _less_ friendly, to man. We believe that the air is as friendly to man now as it ever was,--that it does him as little mischief, that it contributes as much to his well-being and comfort, as it ever did.

Wesley further says, the sun was situated at the most exact distance from the earth, so as to yield a sufficient quant.i.ty of heat, neither too little nor too much, to every part of it. Ho further intimates that there was at first no inclination of the earth's axis, and that the seasons and the degree of heat and cold were, in consequence, the same all the world over, and all the year round. All these statements seem erroneous in the extreme. The supply of heat to the different parts of the earth does not depend altogether on the distance of the sun from the earth, as Wesley intimates, but on the motions of the earth around the sun and upon its own axis. Wesley seems to imagine that if the axis of the earth were not inclined, or elevated at one end, the earth would receive from the sun the same quant.i.ty of heat through every part; whereas nothing could be farther from the truth. If, as Wesley expresses it, "This oblique globe had not been turned askance," some parts of the earth would have received from the sun scarcely any heat at all; they would have received neither light nor heat, except in such slight measures as to be altogether useless. The arctic regions and the antarctic regions must have been alike uninhabitable. That turning of the oblique globe askance, which Wesley represents as the cause of extreme heat and cold, was the very thing to _prevent_ those extremes, or to reduce them to the lowest possible point, and to secure to every part of the globe, as _far as possible_, an _equal_ amount of light and warmth. I say _as far as possible_; for to secure to every part of the earth exactly the same amount of light and heat from one sun, is impossible. Place a little globe in what position you will with respect to a neighboring candle, and fix the axis of that globe as you please, and move that globe; give the globe a motion upon its own axis, and another motion round the light near which it is placed, and you will find it impossible to secure to every part of that globe exactly the same amount of light and heat. By inclining the axis of the globe, or as Wesley expresses it, turning it askance, as the axis of the earth is inclined or turned askance, you may secure the _greatest possible equality_ of light and heat to every part; but still that greatest possible equality will be a considerable _inequality_. So far, therefore, from the polar regions being made colder or darker by the globe being turned askance, they are indebted to that very obliqueness of the earth's axis, and that apparent irregularity of its motions, for the chief portion of that light and heat which they receive. How Wesley came to speak so erroneously on this subject, I am at a loss to know, as he must, one would think, have understood the first elements of geography and astronomy. Yet his words are at variance with the first elements of those popular sciences.

But it would take up too much room to notice all the unauthorized statements of Mr. Wesley on this subject. We have said enough to show how the most conscientious and best-intentioned man may err on theological subjects, and what need young Christians have to be somewhat critical and careful in adopting and testing their religious opinions.

There are other sermons of Wesley which are as much at variance with Scripture as the one we have had under notice. I have not his sermons at hand just now, but if I remember right, his remarks on the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, in his sermon on that subject, are quite at variance with the statements of Christ.

And Wesley was one of the best, one of the most honest and conscientious, one of the most single-minded men on the face of the earth. No man, I imagine, was ever more anxious to be right,--no one was ever more desirous to know and teach G.o.d's truth in all its purity, and in everything to do G.o.d's will and bless mankind. And he knew and chose the right standard of truth and goodness, and honestly endeavored to conform to it both in thought and deed and word. Yet he could err in this strange and wholesale way. What then may we expect from other theological writers? Many of the theologians whose writings influence the Church were _not_ very good men; they were selfish, ambitious, proud and worldly. Some were idle, dreamy, careless, G.o.dless. And others, who were piously disposed, never deliberately adopted the Bible as their rule of faith and practice. They never set themselves to conform to it, as the standard of truth and goodness. They adopted or inherited the faiths or traditions of their predecessors, never suspecting them of error, and never inquiring whether they were true or not. The idea of testing or correcting either their way of thinking or their way of talking on religious subjects, by the teachings of Christ, never entered their minds. They lived at ease, dreaming rather than thinking, and talking in their sleep, and filling great folios with their idle utterances. What kind of thoughts, and what kind of words were we likely to find in the writings of men like these? Robert Hall is reported to have described the works of the celebrated John Owen as "A CONTINENT OF MUD." There are others whose writings might be justly described as volumes of smoke. Mere wind they are not, but foul, black, blinding smoke. And writings of this description are published or republished in great quant.i.ties to the present day. And people read them, and fill themselves with wind and filthy fumes, and wrap themselves in smoky, pitchy clouds, and go through the world in a spiritual darkness thick enough to be felt.

This smoke, this blackness and darkness, I could not endure. I was anxious beyond measure to free myself from its bewildering and blinding power, and to get into the clear fresh air, and the bright and cheerful light, of simple Christian truth. And hence the freedom and eagerness of my investigations, and the liberty I took in modifying my belief.

It may be said that many of the doctrines which I have set down as unscriptural, are of little importance; and that is really the case. We ought, therefore, to be the more ready to give them up. Why contend for doctrines of no moment? But some of them _are_ important. They are revolting and mischievous errors, and when they are regarded as parts of Christianity, they tend to make men infidels. And in many cases they stagger the faith, and lessen the comfort, and injure the souls of Christians. And even the less important ones do harm when taken to be parts of the religion of Christ. You cannot make thoughtful, sharp-visioned men believe that Jesus came into the world, and lived and died to propagate trifles. Trifles therefore are no longer trifles when set forth as Christian doctrines. And we have enough to believe and think about without occupying our minds with childish fancies. And we have things enough of high importance to preach and write about, without spending our time and strength on idle dreams.

And the apparently harmless fictions prop up the hurtful ones. And they lessen the influence of great truths. And they make religion appear suspicious or contemptible to men of sense. They disgust some. They give occasion to the adversaries to speak reproachfully.

And if you tolerate fictions at all in Christianity, where will you stop? And if you do not stop somewhere, Christianity will disappear, and a ma.s.s of worthless and disgusting follies will take its place. The new creation will vanish, and chaos come again.

And again. A large proportion of the controversies of the Church are about men's inventions. Christ's own doctrines do not so often provoke opposition as the traditions of the elders; nor do they, when a.s.sailed, require so much defending. They defend themselves. "The devil's way of undoing," says Baxter, "is by overdoing. To bring religious zeal into disrepute, he makes some zealous to madness, to persecution, to blood.

To discredit freedom he urges its advocates into lawlessness. To discredit Christian morality, he induces some to carry it to the extreme of asceticism. To discredit needful authority, he makes rulers of the State into despots, and persuades the rulers of the Church to claim infallibility. To discredit Christianity, he adds to it human inventions." Wesley has a similar sentiment. "If you place Christian perfection too high, you drive it out of the world." And it is certain, that an infinite amount of hostility to Christianity is owing to the folly of divines in supplementing its simple and practical doctrines, by speculative and unintelligible theories. "The one great evidence of the divinity of Christianity," says one, "the master-evidence, the evidence with which all other evidences will stand or fall, is Christ Himself speaking by His own word." But if you add to His words foolish fancies, or revolting absurdities, or immoral speculations of your own, you destroy that evidence. You make men infidels.

There are mult.i.tudes at the present day to whom you must present religion in an intelligible and rational, and in a grave and commanding light, if you would induce them to give it their serious attention. You can no more interest them in mysteries and nonsense, in speculative and unpractical fictions, than you can change the course of nature. The time for theological trifling is gone by. The time has gone by for any form of religion to make its way which does not consist in solid goodness, or which teaches doctrines, or uses forms, that do not tend to promote solid goodness. If religion is to secure the attention of the world,--if it is to command their respect, their reverence and their love,--if it is to conquer their hearts, and govern their lives, and satisfy their souls,--if it is to become the great absorbing subject of man's thought, and the governing power of our race, it must be so presented, as to prove itself in harmony with all that is highest and best in man's nature, with all that is most beautiful and useful in life, and with all that is beneficent and glorious in the universe.

In a word, old dreamy theologies with their barbarous dialects and silly notions, must be dropped and left to die, and the Church and the ministry must live, and act, and talk as men who are dealing with the grandest and most interesting and important realities.

CHAPTER VII.

FURTHER INVESTIGATIONS AND THEIR RESULTS.

As my readers will have seen before this, the changes in my views were rather numerous, if not always of great importance. And the cases I have given are but samples of many other changes. The fact is, I pared away from my creed everything that was not plainly Scriptural. I threw aside all human theories, all mere guesses about religious matters. I also dismissed all forced or fanciful interpretations of Scripture pa.s.sages.

I endeavored to free Christian doctrines from all corruptions, perversions, or exaggerations, retaining only the pure and simple teachings of Christ and the sacred writings. I accepted only those interpretations of Scripture, which were in accordance with the object and drift of the writer, with common sense, and with the general tenor of the sacred volume. I paid special regard to the plainest and most practical portions of Scripture. I paid no regard to doctrines grounded on solitary pa.s.sages, or on texts of doubtful meaning, while numerous texts, with their meaning on their very faces, taught opposite doctrines. I would accept nothing that seemed irrational from any quarter, unless required to do so by the plain unquestionable oracles of G.o.d. I could see no propriety in Christians enc.u.mbering their minds and clogging religion with notions bearing plain and palpable marks of inconsistency or absurdity. And if a doctrine presented itself in different religious writers in a variety of forms, I always took the form which seemed most in harmony with reason and the plainest teachings of Scripture. Some writers seemed to take pleasure in presenting such doctrines as the Trinity, the Atonement, Salvation by Faith, Eternal Punishment, &c., in the most incredible and repulsive forms, straining and wresting the Scriptures to justify their mischievous extravagances.

Other writers would say no more on those subjects than the Scriptures said, and would put what the Scriptures said in such a light as to render it "worthy of all acceptation." As a matter of course, the latter kind of writers became my favorites. Indeed the Scriptures seemed always to favor what appeared most rational in the various creeds. The Scriptures and common sense seemed always in remarkable harmony. The doctrines which clashed with reason seemed also to clash with Scripture: and I felt that in rejecting such doctrines I was promoting the honor of G.o.d and of Christ, and rendering a service to the Church and Christianity.

I was sometimes rather tried by the unwarranted and inconsiderate statements of my brother ministers. Take an instance. A preacher one night, in a sermon to which I was listening, said, "How great is the love of G.o.d to fallen man! Angels sinned, and were doomed at once to everlasting d.a.m.nation. No Saviour interposed to bring them back to holiness and heaven. No amba.s.sador was sent with offers of pardon to beseech them to be reconciled to G.o.d. Man sins, and the Deity Himself becomes incarnate. All the machinery of nature and all the resources of Heaven are employed to save him from destruction. One sin shuts up in everlasting despair millions of spiritual beings, while a thousand transgressions are forgiven to man."

Now this doctrine, instead of reflecting peculiar glory on G.o.d, seemed to me to savor of blasphemy. It is no honor to be partial or capricious; it is a reproach. A father that should be tenderly indulgent to one of his children, and rigidly severe to the rest, would be regarded with indignation. The doctrine of Divine partiality shocks both our reason and our moral feelings. And it is not scriptural. The Bible says nothing about G.o.d dooming the rebellious angels to perdition for one sin, without any attempt to bring them back to obedience; but it does say that G.o.d is good to all, and that His tender mercies are over all His works. I accordingly rejected the doctrine. There was quite a mult.i.tude of _doctrines_ which entered into the sermons of many of my brother ministers, which never found their way into mine. And there were doctrines which entered into my discourses, which never found their way into theirs. And the doctrines which we held and preached in common, we often presented in very different forms, and put into very different words. They could say a mult.i.tude of things which I could not say; things which I could find no kind of warrant for saying. When we met together after hearing each other preach, we had at times long talks about our different views and ways of preaching. I was free in expressing my thoughts and feelings, especially in the earlier years of my ministry, and our conversations were often very animated.

In some circuits, I induced my colleagues to join me in establis.h.i.+ng weekly meetings for mutual improvement in religious knowledge. At each meeting an essay was read, on some subject agreed upon at a former meeting, and after the essay had been read we discussed the merits both of the sentiments it embodied, and of the style in which it was written. When it was my turn to prepare an essay, I generally introduced one or more of the points on which I and my colleagues differed, for the purpose of having them discussed. I stated my views with the utmost freedom, and gave every encouragement to my colleagues to state theirs with equal freedom in return. When my colleagues read their productions, I pointed out what I thought erroneous or defective with great plainness and fidelity. I was anxious both to learn and to teach, and it was my delight, as it was my duty and business, to endeavor to do both. I was not, however, so anxious to change the views of my friends as I was to excite in them a thirst for knowledge. And indeed I did not consider it of so much importance that a man should accept a certain number of truths, or particular doctrines, as that he should have a sincere desire, and make suitable endeavors to understand all truth. It was idleness, indifference, a state of mental stagnation, a readiness carelessly to accept whatever might come in the way without once trying to test it by Scripture or reason, that I particularly disliked; and to cure or abate this evil, I exerted myself to the utmost.

When I was stationed in Newcastle in 1831, I met with Foster's Essays, which I read with a great deal of eagerness and pleasure. One of these Essays is "On some of the Causes by which Evangelical Religion has been Rendered Unacceptable to Persons of Cultivated Taste?" Among his remarks on this subject, he has some to the following effect:--

1. Christianity is the religion of many weak, uncultivated and little-minded people, and they, by their unwise ways of talking about it, and by their various defects of character, make religion look weak, and poor, and unreasonable. And many receive their impression or ideas of the character of Christianity more from the exhibitions given of it by the religious people with whom they come in contact, than from the exhibition given of it in the life and teachings of its great Author, or from the characters and writings of His Apostles. An intelligent and cultivated man, for instance, falls into the company of Christians who know little either of the teachings of Christ, or of the wonderful facts which go to prove their truth and their infinite excellency--Christians who never trouble themselves about such matters, and who look on it as no good sign when people show a disposition to inquire seriously into such subjects. He hears those Christians talk about religion, but can find nothing in their conversation but strange and, to him, unintelligible expressions. The speakers give proof enough of excited feelings, but show no sign of mental enlightenment. If he asks them for information on the great principles and bearings of Christianity, they tell him they have nothing to do with vain philosophy.

2. The man of taste and culture hears other Christians harping eternally on two or three points, adopted perhaps from some dreamy author, and denouncing all who question the correctness of their version of the Gospel, as heretics or infidels, while all the time their notions have little or no resemblance either to the Gospel or to common sense; but are at best, only perversions or distortions of Christian doctrines, which have no more likeness to the religion of Christ than a few broken bricks have to a beautiful and magnificent palace.

3. In many cases the Christians with whom he meets have not only no general knowledge of religious subjects, but no desire for such knowledge. The Bible is their book, they say, and they want no other.

And they make but a pitiful use of that. They do not go to the Bible as to a fountain of infinite knowledge, whose streams of truth blend naturally with all the truths in the universe, but merely to refresh their minds with a few misinterpreted pa.s.sages, which ignorance and bigotry are accustomed to use to support their misconceptions of Christian doctrine. They use the book not to make them wise, but to keep them ignorant. They dwell for ever on the same irrational fancies, and repeat them for ever in the same outlandish jargon.

4. He meets with other Christians who read a little in other books besides the Bible; but it is just those books that help to keep them from understanding the meaning of the Bible. And the portions of the books which they admire most and quote oftenest, are the silliest and most erroneous portions. They put darkness for light, and light for darkness. The man of culture speaks to them, but they cannot understand him. His thoughts and style are alike out of their line, or beyond their capacity. If at any time they catch a glimpse of his meaning, they are frightened on perceiving that his thoughts are not an exact repet.i.tion of their own.

5. Another cause which has tended to render Christianity less acceptable to men of taste and culture, is the peculiar language adopted in the discourses and writings of its _Teachers_. The style of some religious teachers is low, vulgar. The style of a still greater number is barbarous. Men soon feel the language of the _Law_ to be barbarous. They would feel the language of theology to be as barbarous, if they were not accustomed to hear it or read it so constantly. The way in which the greater number of evangelical divines express themselves is quite different from that in which men generally express themselves. Their whole cast of phraseology is peculiar. You cannot hear five sentences without feeling that you are listening to a dead or foreign language. To put it into good current English you have to translate it, and the task of translation is as hard, and requires as much study and practice, as that of translating Greek or Hebrew. The language of the pulpit and of religious books is a dialect to itself, and cannot be used in common life or common affairs. If you try to apply it to anything but religion, it becomes ridiculous, and a common kind of wit consists in speaking of common things in pulpit phraseology. A foreign heathen might master our language in its common and cla.s.sical forms, and be able to understand both our ordinary talk and our ablest authors, yet find himself quite at a loss to understand an evangelical preacher or writer.

Even if our heathen understood religion in its simpler and more natural forms, he would still be unable to understand the common run of religious talkers and writers. If he had religion to learn from such teachers and writers, he would have a double task, first, to get the ideas, and then to learn the uncouth and unnatural language. This peculiar dialect is quite unnecessary. The style of a preacher or a religious writer might be, and, allowing for a few terms, _ought_ to be, the same as that of a man talking about ordinary affairs, and matters of common interest and duty. The want of this is one great cause of the little success, both of our preachers at home, and of our missionaries abroad. They hide beneath an unseemly veil, a beauty that should strike all eyes, and win all hearts. Their style is just the opposite of everything that can instruct, attract, command. And it is vain to expect much improvement in the present generation of religious teachers. They could not get a good style without a long and careful study of good authors, and for this many of them have neither the taste nor the needful industry. They would have to begin life anew, to be converted and become as little children, before they could master the task. They cannot _think_ of religion but in common words. They cannot think there can be divine truth but in the old phrases. To discontinue them, therefore, and use others, would in their view, be to become heretics or infidels. In truth, many of them seem to have no ideas. Their phrases are not vehicles of ideas, but subst.i.tutes for them. If they hear the ideas which their phrases did once signify, expressed ever so plainly in other language, they do not recognise them, and instantly suspect the man who utters them of unsoundness in the faith, and apply to him all the abusive terms of ecclesiastical reproach. For such the common pulpit jargon is the convenient refuge of ignorance, idleness and prejudice.

6. Speaking of certain kinds of religious books, Mr. Foster calls them an acc.u.mulation of bad writing, under which the evangelical theology has been buried, and which has contributed to bring its principles into disfavor. He adds: A large proportion of religious books may be sentenced as bad on more accounts than their peculiarity of dialect. One has to regret that their authors did not revere the dignity of their religion too much to surround it and choke it with their works. There is quite a mult.i.tude of books which form the perfect vulgar of religious authors.h.i.+p,--a vast exhibition of the most inferior materials that can be called thought, in language too grovelling to be called style. In these books you are mortified to see how low religious thought and expression _can_ sink; and you almost wonder how the grand ideas of G.o.d and Providence, of redemption and eternity, the n.o.blest ideas known, can s.h.i.+ne on a human mind, without imparting some small occasional degree of dignity to its train of thought. You can make allowances for the great defects of private Christians, but when men obtrude their infinite littleness and folly on the public in books, you can hardly help regarding them as inexcusable. True, many of those worthless and mischievous books are evermore disappearing, but others as bad, or but little better, take their places. Look where you will you will meet with them. What estimate can a man have of Christianity who receives his first impressions of it from such books?

7. There are other religious books that are tolerable as to style, but which display no power or prominence of thought, no living vigor of expression; they are flat and dry as a plain of sand. They tease you with the thousandth repet.i.tion of common-places, causing a feeling of unspeakable weariness. Though the author is surrounded with rich immeasurable fields of truth and beauty, he treads for ever the same narrow track already trodden into dust.

8. There is a smaller cla.s.s of religious writers that may be called mock-eloquent writers. They try at a superior style, but forget that true eloquence resides essentially in the thought, the feeling, the character, and that no words can make genuine eloquence out of that which is of no worth or interest. They mistake a gaudy verbosity for eloquence.

9. The moral and theological _materials_ of many religious books are as faulty as their style, and the injury they do the Gospel is incalculable. Here is a systematic writer in whose hands all the riches and magnificence of revelation shrink into a meagre list of doctrinal points, and not a single verse in the Bible is allowed to tell its meaning, or even allowed to have one, till it has been forced under torture to maintain one of his points. You are next confronted with a prater about the invisible world, that makes you shrink away into darkness; and then you are met with a grim zealot for such a revolting theory of the Divine attributes and government, that he seems to delight in representing the Deity as a dreadful king of furies, whose dominion is overshadowed with vengeance, whose music is the cries of victims, and whose glory requires to be ill.u.s.trated by the ruin of His creation. One cannot help deploring that the great ma.s.s of religious books were not consigned to the flames before they were permitted to reach the eyes of the public. Books which exhibit Christianity and its claims with insipid feebleness, or which cramp its majesty into an artificial form at once distorted and mean, must grievously injure its influence. An intelligent Christian cannot look into such works without feeling thankful that they were not the books from which he got his conceptions of the Gospel. Nothing would induce him to put them into the hands of an inquiring youth, and he would be sorry to see them on the table of an infidel, or in the library of his children, or of a student for the ministry.--_Foster's Essays._

These sentiments answered so astonis.h.i.+ngly to my own thoughts, that I read them with the greatest delight. I laid them, in substance, before my brethren. I explained them. I ill.u.s.trated them by quotations from books and sermons. I gave them instances of the various faults pointed out by Foster, taken from their favorite authors, and in some cases from the discourses of living preachers. I wrote several essays on the causes of the slow progress made by Christianity, in which I embodied and ill.u.s.trated many of Foster's views. I wrote essays on "_Preaching Christ_," in which I embodied and ill.u.s.trated Wesley's views on the subject, including his condemnation of what, in his days, was falsely called "_Gospel Preaching_." I wrote quite a large volume on these subjects, and read the contents, so far as opportunity offered, to my colleagues at our weekly meetings. I was badly requited for my pains. In some cases my colleagues listened to me and stared at me with amazement.

They thought I "brought strange things to their ears." One, who is now dead, said I should be really an excellent fellow, he believed, if I could only get the cobwebs swept out of my upper stories. Everything beyond his own poor standing common-places was cobwebs to him, poor fellow. The remarks on this subject in the LIFE of the preacher referred to, show that my ideas and plans at that time are not yet understood by all his brethren.

Travel, they say, frees men from their prejudices. The more they see of the wonders of other countries, and of the manners of other nations, the more moderate becomes their estimate of the marvels, and of some of the views and customs of their native land. And it is certain that the more a man travels through good books by men of different Churches from his own, the less important will some of the peculiarities of his own denomination appear. As ignorance of the world is favorable to blind patriotism and home idolatry, so ignorance of Churches, and systems, and literatures different from our own, is favorable to bigotry and sectarianism. And as free and extended intercourse with foreign nations tends to enlarge and liberalize the mind; so the more extensive a Christian's acquaintance is with different branches of the Church, and with their customs, and writings, and manners, the more likely will his sectarian bigotry and intolerance be to give place to liberal views and to Christian moderation and charity.

But just in proportion as he becomes the subject of this blessed transformation, will he be regarded with suspicion and dread by those who still remain the slaves of ignorance and bigotry.

It was so in my case. I travelled through extensive regions of religious literature different from that of my own Church, and I did so with an earnest desire to learn what was true and good in all. The consequence was the loss of many prejudices, and the modification of many more. I lost my prejudices against all kinds of Christians. I could believe in the salvation both of Quakers and Catholics, and of all between, if they were well disposed, G.o.d-fearing, good-living men. I could believe in the salvation of all, not excepting Jews, Turks, and Pagans, who lived according to the light they had, and honestly and faithfully sought for further light. I believed that in every nation he that feared G.o.d and worked righteousness was accepted of Him. I believed that honest, faithful souls among the pagans of old would be found at last among the saved. I regarded the moral and spiritual light of the ancient pagans as light from heaven, as divine revelation. I looked on all mankind as equally objects of G.o.d's care and love, as His children, under His tuition, though placed for a time in different schools, with different teachers, and with different lesson-books. I came to believe that G.o.d was as good as a good man, as good as the kindest and best of fathers, and even better, and I felt a.s.sured that He would not permit any well-disposed soul on earth to perish. I believed that some who were first in privileges, would be among the last in blessedness; and that some that were last in privileges would be among the first in blessedness.

Yet I believed in missions. I believed that it was the duty of all to share their blessings with others; to give to others the light that G.o.d had bestowed on them,--that though _pagans_ might be saved without Christian light, if they lived according to the light they had, _Christians_ could not be saved if they did not, as they had opportunity, _impart_ their superior light to the pagans.

I respected the good moral principles, and the portions of religious truth that I found in the ancient Greek and Roman authors, just as I lamented and condemned the moral and religious errors that I found in Christian books.

"I seized on truth where'er 'twas found, On Christian or on Heathen ground,"

and made it part of my creed: and I warred with error though entrenched in the strong-holds of the Church. I respected what was true and good in all denominations of Christians; and even in all denominations that _called_ themselves Christians, whether they came near enough to Christ to ent.i.tle them to that name or not. If I saw anything good in the creeds or the characters of other denominations I accepted it, and tried to embody it in my own creed and character.

And I did, as I thought, see good in every one that I did not see in others. I could see things in some Protestants, which I thought Catholics would do well to imitate; and I could see things among Catholics, which I thought Protestants would do well to imitate. I could see things in Quakerism, which it would have been to the honor and advantage of other Christians to imitate; and I could see good things in other Churches which Quakers would have done well to copy. I could see even among Unitarians of the older and better cla.s.s, an attention to matters practical, a naturalness of style, and a freedom from certain anti-christian expressions and notions, which it would have been well for orthodox Churches to have made their own; and I could see where Unitarians had both gone too far through their dislike of orthodox error, and fallen short of truth and duty through dread of orthodox weaknesses or imperfections. And I had an idea, that it would be well in all Churches, instead of avoiding, or scolding, or abusing one another, to study each other lovingly, with a view to find how much of truth and goodness they could find in each other, that they could not find in themselves, and how much of error and imperfection they could find in themselves, that they did not find in others. I saw that no Church had got all the truth, or all the goodness, and that no Church was free from anti-christian errors and defects. I saw that to make a perfect Christian creed, we should have to take something out of every creed, and leave other things in every creed behind; and that to secure a perfect exhibition of Christian virtue, and a perfect system of Christian operations, we should have to borrow from each other habits, customs, rules and machinery in the same way, and leave parts of our own to fall into disuse.