Phases of Faith Part 11

Morality and Truth are principles in human nature both older and more widespread than Christianity or the Bible: and neither Jesus nor James nor John nor Paul could have addressed or did address men in any other tone, than that of claiming to be themselves judged by some pre-existing standard of moral truth, and by the inward powers of the hearer. Does the reader deny this? or, admitting it, does he think it impious to accept their challenge? Does he say that we are to love and embrace Christianity, without trying to ascertain whether it be true or false? If he say, Yes,--such a man has no love or care for Truth, and is but by accident a Christian. He would have remained a faithful heathen, had he been born in heathenism, though Moses, Elijah and Christ preached a higher truth to him. Such a man is condemned by his own confession, and I here address him no longer.

But if Faith is a spiritual and personal thing, if Belief given at random to mere high pretensions is an immorality, if Truth is not to be quite trampled down, nor Conscience to be wholly palsied in us,--then what, I ask, was I to do, when I saw that the genealogy in the first chapter of Matthew is an erroneous copy of that in the Old Testament? and that the writer has not only copied wrong, but also counted wrong, so, as to mistake eighteen for fourteen? Can any man, who glories in the name of Christian, lay his hand on his heart, and say, it was my duty to blind my eyes to the fact, and think of it no further? Many, alas, I know, would have whispered this to me; but if any one were to proclaim it, the universal conscience of mankind would call him impudent.

If however this first step was right, was a second step wrong? When I further discerned that the two genealogies in Matthew and Luke were at variance, utterly irreconcilable,--and both moreover nugatory, because they are genealogies of Joseph, who is denied to be the father of Jesus,--on what ground of righteousness, which I could approve to G.o.d and my conscience, could I shut my eyes to this second fact?

When forced, against all my prepossessions, to admit that the two first chapters of Matthew and the two first chapters of Luke are mutually destructive,[1] would it have been faithfulness to the G.o.d of Truth, or a self-willed love of my own prejudices, if I had said, "I will not inquire further, for fear it should unsettle my faith?" The reader's conscience will witness to me, that, on the contrary, I was bound to say, what I did say: "I _must_ inquire further in order that I may plant the foundations of my faith more deeply on the rock of Truth."'

Having discovered, that not all that is within the canon of the Scripture is infallibly correct, and that the human understanding is competent to arraign and convict at least some kinds of error therein contained;--where was I to stop? and if I am guilty, where did my guilt begin? The further I inquired, the more errors crowded upon me, in History, in Chronology, in Geography, in Physiology, in Geology.[2]

Did it _then_ at last become a duty to close my eyes to the painful light? and if I had done so, ought I to have flattered myself that I was one of those, who being of the truth, come to the lights that their deeds may be reproved?

Moreover, when I had clearly perceived, that since all evidence for Christianity must involve _moral_ considerations, to undervalue the moral faculties of mankind is to make Christian evidence an impossibility and to propagate universal scepticism;--was I then so to distrust the common conscience, as to believe that the Spirit of G.o.d p.r.o.nounced Jael blessed, for perfidiously murdering her husband's trusting friend? Does any Protestant reader feel disgust and horror, at the sophistical defences set up for the ma.s.sacre of St. Bartholomew and other atrocities of the wicked Church of Rome? Let him stop his mouth, and hide his face, if he dares to justify the foul crime of Jael.

Or when I was thus forced to admit, that the Old Testament praised immorality, as well as enunciated error; and found nevertheless in the writers of the New Testament no indication that they were aware of either; but that, on the contrary, "the Scripture" (as the book was vaguely called) is habitually identified with the infallible "word of G.o.d;"--was it wrong in me to suspect that the writers of the New Testament were themselves open to mistake?

When I farther found, that Luke not only claims no infallibility and no inspiration, but distinctly a.s.signs human sources as his means of knowledge;--when the same Luke had already been discovered to be in irreconcilable variance with Matthew concerning the infancy of Jesus;--was I sinful in feeling that I had no longer any guarantee against _other_ possible error in these writers? or ought I to have persisted in obtruding on the two evangelists on infallibility of which Luke shows himself unconscious, which Matthew nowhere claims, and which I had demonstrative proof that they did not both possess? A thorough-going Bibliolater will have to impeach me as a sinner on this count.

After Luke and Matthew stood before me as human writers, liable to and convicted of human error, was there any reason why I should look on Mark as more sacred? And having perceived all three to partic.i.p.ate in the common superst.i.tion, derived from Babylon and the East, traceable in history to its human source, existing still in Turkey and Abyssinia,--the superst.i.tion which mistakes mania, epilepsy, and other forms of disease, for possession by devils;--should I have shown love of truth, or obstinacy in error, had I refused to judge freely of these three writers, as of any others who tell similar marvels? or was it my duty to resolve, at any rate and against evidence, to acquit them of the charge of superst.i.tion and misrepresentation?

I will not trouble the reader with any further queries. If he has justified me in his conscience thus far, he will justify my proceeding to abandon myself to the results of inquiry. He will feel, that the Will cannot, may not, dare not dictate, whereto the inquiries of the Understanding shall lead; and that to allege that it _ought_, is to plant the root of Insincerity, Falsehood, Bigotry, Cruelty, and universal Rottenness of Soul.

The vice of Bigotry has been so indiscriminately imputed to the religious, that they seem apt to forget that it is a real sin;--a sin which in Christendom has been and is of all sins most fruitful, most poisonous: nay, grief of griefs! it infects many of the purest and most lovely hearts, which want strength of understanding, or are entangled by a sham theology, with its false facts and fraudulent canons. But upon all who mourn for the miseries which Bigotry has perpetrated from the day when Christians first learned to curse; upon all who groan over the persecutions and wars stirred up by Romanism; upon all who blush at the overbearing conduct of Protestants in their successive moments of brief authority,--a sacred duty rests in this nineteenth century of protesting against Bigotry, not from a love of ease, but from a spirit of earnest justice.

Like the first Christians, they must become _confessors_ of the Truth; not obtrusively, boastfully, dogmatically, or harshly; but, "speaking the truth in love," not be ashamed to avow, if they do not believe all that others profess, and that they abhor the unrighteous principle of judging men by an authoritative creed. The evil of Bigotry which has been most observed, is its untameable injustice, which converted the law of love into licensed murder or gratuitous hatred. But I believe a worse evil still has been, the intense reaction of the human mind against Religion for Bigotry's sake. To the millions of Europe, bigotry has been a confutation of all pious feeling. So unlovely has religion been made by it,

Horribili super aspectu mortalibus instans,

that now, as 2000 years ago, men are lapsing into Atheism or Pantheism; and a totally new "dispensation" is wanted to retrieve the lost reputation of Piety.

Two opposite errors are committed by those who discern that the pretensions of the national religious systems are overstrained and unjustifiable. One cla.s.s of persons inveighs warmly, bitterly, rudely against the bigotry of Christians; and know not how deep and holy affections and principles, in spite of narrowness, are cherished in the bosom of the Christian society. Hence their invective is harsh and unsympathizing; and appears so essentially unjust and so ignorant, as to exasperate and increase the very bigotry which it attacks. An opposite cla.s.s know well, and value highly, the moral influences of Christianity, and from an intense dread of harming or losing these, do not dare plainly and publicly to avow their own convictions. Great numbers of English laymen are entirely a.s.sured, that the Old Testament abounds with error, and that the New is not always unimpeachable: yet they only whisper this; and in the hearing of a clergyman, who is bound by Articles and whom it is indecent to refute, keep a respectful silence. As for ministers of religion, these, being called perpetually into a practical application of the received doctrine of their church, are of all men least able to inquire into any fundamental errors in that doctrine. Eminent persons among them will nevertheless aim after and attain a purer truth than that which they find established: but such a case must always be rare and exceptive. Only by disusing ministerial service can any one give fair play to doubts concerning the wisdom and truth of that which he is solemnly ministering: hence that friend of Arnold's was wise in this world, who advised him to take a curacy in order to settle his doubts concerning the Trinity.--Nowhere from any body of priests, clergy, or ministers, as an Order, is religious progress to be antic.i.p.ated, until intellectual creeds are destroyed. A greater responsibility therefore is laid upon laymen, to be faithful and bold in avowing their convictions.

Yet it is not from the practical ministers of religion, that the great opposition to religious reform proceeds. The "secular clergy" (as the Romanists oddly call them) were seldom so bigoted as the "regulars."

So with us, those who minister to men in their moral trials have for the most part a deeper moral spirit, and are less apt to place religion in systems of propositions. The _robur legionum_ of bigotry, I believe, is found,--first, in non-parochial clergy, and next in the anonymous writers for religious journals and "conservative" newspapers; who too generally[3] adopt a style of which they would be ashamed, if the names of the writers were attached; who often seem desirous to make it clear that it is their trade to carp, insult, or slander; who a.s.sume a tone of omniscience, at the very moment when they show narrowness of heart and judgment. To such writing those who desire to promote earnest Thought and tranquil Progress ought anxiously to testify their deep repugnance. A large part of this slander and insult is prompted by a base pandering to the (real or imagined) taste of the public, and will abate when it visibly ceases to be gainful.

The law of G.o.d's moral universe, as known to us, is that of Progress.

We trace it from old barbarism to the methodized Egyptian idolatry; to the more flexible Polytheism of Syria and Greece; the poetical Pantheism of philosophers, and the moral monotheism of a few sages.

So in Palestine and in the Bible itself we see, first of all, the image-wors.h.i.+p of Jacob's family, then the incipient elevation of Jehovah above all other G.o.ds by Moses, the practical establishment of the wors.h.i.+p of Jehovah alone by Samuel, the rise of spiritual sentiment under David and the Psalmists, the more magnificent views of Hezekiah's prophets, finally in the Babylonish captivity the new tenderness a.s.sumed by that second Isaiah and the later Psalmists. But ceremonialism more and more encrusted the restored nation; and Jesus was needed to spur and stab the conscience of his contemporaries, and recal them to more spiritual perceptions; to proclaim a coming "kingdom of heaven," in which should be gathered all the children of G.o.d that were scattered abroad; where the law of love should reign, and no one should dictate to another. Alas! that this great movement had its admixture of human imperfection. After this, Steven the protomartyr, and Paul once him persecutor, had to expose the emptiness of all external santifications, and free the world from the law of Moses. _Up_ to this point all Christians approve of progress; but _at_ this point they want to arrest it.

The arguments of those who resist Progress are always the same, whether it be Pagans against Hebrews, Jews against Christians, Romanists against Protestants, or modern Christians against the advocates of a higher spiritualism. Each established system a.s.sures its votaries, that now at length they have attained a final perfection: that their foundations are irremovable: progress _up_ to that position was a duty, _beyond_ it is a sin. Each displaces its predecessor by superior goodness, but then each fights against his successor by odium, contempt, exclusions and (when possible) by violences. Each advances mankind one step, and forbids them to take a second. Yet if it be admitted that in the earlier movement the party of progress was always right, confidence that the case is now reversed is not easy to justify.

Every persecuting church has numbered among its members thousands of pious people, so grateful for its services, or so attached to its truth, as to think those impious who desire something purer and more perfect. Herein we may discern, that every nation and cla.s.s is liable to the peculiar illusion of overesteeming the sanct.i.ty of its ancestral creed. It is as much our duty to beware of this illusion, as of any other. All know how easily our patriotism may degenerate into an unjust repugnance to foreigners, and that the more intense it is, the greater the need of antagonistic principles. So also, the real excellencies of our religion may only so much the more rivet us in a wrong aversion to those who do not acknowledge its authority or perfection.

It is probable that Jesus desired a state of things in which all who wors.h.i.+p G.o.d spiritually should have an acknowledged and conscious union. It is clear that Paul longed above all things to overthrow the "wall of part.i.tion" which separated two families of sincere wors.h.i.+ppers. Yet we now see stronger and higher walls of part.i.tion than ever, between the children of the same G.o.d,--with a new law of the letter, more entangling to the conscience, and more depressing to the mental energies, than any outward service of the Levitical law.

The cause of all this is to be found in _the claim of Messiahs.h.i.+p for Jesus._ This gave a premium to crooked logic, in order to prove that the prophecies meant what they did not mean and could not mean. This perverted men's notions of right and wrong, by imparting fact.i.tious value to a literary and historical proposition, "Jesus is the Messiah," as though that were or could be religion. This gave merit to credulity, and led pious men to extol it as a brave and n.o.ble deed, when any one overpowered the scruples of good sense, and scolded them down as the wisdom of this world, which is hostile to G.o.d. This put the Christian church into an essentially false position, by excluding from it in the first century all the men of most powerful and cultivated understanding among the Greeks and Romans. This taught Christians to boast of the hostility of the wise and prudent, and in every controversy ensured that the party which had the merit of mortifying reason most signally should be victorious. Hence, the downward career of the Church into base superst.i.tion was determined and inevitable from her very birth; nor was any improvement possible, until a reconciliation should be effected between Christianity and the cultivated reason which it had slighted and insulted.

Such reconciliation commenced, I believe, from the tenth century, when the Latin moralists began to be studied as a part of a theological course. It was continued with still greater results when Greek literature became accessible to churchmen. Afterwards, the physics of Galileo and of Newton began not only to undermine numerous superst.i.tions, but to give to men a confidence in the reality of abstract truth, and in our power to attain it in other domains than that of geometrical demonstration. This, together with the philosophy of Locke, was taken up into Christian thought, and Political Toleration was the first fruit. Beyond that point, English religion has hardly gone. For in spite of all that has since been done in Germany for the true and accurate _exposition_ of the Bible, and for the scientific establishment of the history of its component books, we still remain deplorably ignorant here of these subjects. In consequence, English Christians do not know that they are unjust and utterly unreasonable, in expecting thoughtful men to abide by the creed of their ancestors. Nor, indeed, is there any more stereotyped and approved calumny, than the declaration so often emphatically enunciated from the pulpit, that _unbelief in the Christian miracles is the fruit of a wicked heart and of a soul enslaved to sin_. Thus do estimable and well-meaning men, deceived and deceiving one another, utter base slander in open church, where it is indecorous to reply to them,--and think that they are bravely delivering a religions testimony.

No difficulty is encountered, so long as the _inward_ and the _outward_ rule of religion agree,--by whatever names men call them,--the Spirit and the Word--or Reason and the Church,--or Conscience and Authority. None need settle which of the two rules is the greater, so long as the results coincide: in fact, there is no controversy, no struggle, and also probably no progress. A child cannot guess whether father or mother has the higher authority, until discordant commands are given; but then commences the painful necessity of disobeying one in order to obey the other. So, also, the great and fundamental controversies of religion arise, only when a discrepancy is detected between the inward and the outward rule: and then, there are only two possible solutions. If the Spirit within us and the Bible (or Church) without us are at variance, _we must either follow the inward and disregard the outward law; else we must renounce the inward law and obey the outward_. The Romanist bids us to obey the Church and crush our inward judgment: the Spiritualist, on the contrary, follows his inward law, and, when necessary, defies Church, Bible, or any other authority. The orthodox Protestant is better and truer than the Romanist, because the Protestant is not like the latter, consistent in error, but often goes right: still he _is_ inconsistent as to this point. Against the Spiritualist he uses Romanist principles, telling him that he ought to submit his "proud reason" and accept the "Word of G.o.d" as infallible, even though it appear to him to contain errors. But against the Romanist the same disputant avows Spiritualist principles, declaring that since "the Church" appears to him to be erroneous, he dares not to accept it as infallible. What with the Romanist he before called "proud reason,"

he now designates as Conscience, Understanding, and perhaps the Holy Spirit. He refused to allow the right of the Spiritualist to urge, that _the Bible_ contains contradictions and immoralities, and therefore cannot be received; but he claims a full right to urge that _the Church_ has justified contradictions and immoralities, and therefore is not to be submitted to. The perception that this position is inconsistent, and, to him who discerns the inconsistency, dishonest, is every year driving Protestants to Rome. And _in principle_ there are only two possible religions: the Personal and the Corporate; the Spiritual and the External. I do not mean to say that in Romanism there is nothing but what is Corporate and External; for that is impossible to human nature: but that this is what the theory of their argument demands; and their doctrine of Implicit[4] (or Virtual) Faith entirely supersedes intellectual perception as well as intellectual conviction. The theory of each church is the force which determines to what centre the whole shall gravitate. However men may talk of spirituality, yet let them once enact that the freedom of individuals shall be absorbed in a corporate conscience, and you find that the narrowest heart and meanest intellect sets the rule of conduct for the whole body.

It has been often observed how the controversies of the Trinity and Incarnation depended on the niceties of the Greek tongue. I do not know whether it has ever been inquired, what confusion of thought was shed over Gentile Christianity, from its very origin, by the imperfection of the New Testament Greek. The single Greek[5] word [Greek: pistis] needs probably three translations into our far more accurate tongue,--viz., Belief, Trust, Faith; but especially Belief and Faith have important contrasts. Belief is purely intellectual; Faith is properly spiritual. Hence the endless controversy about Justification by [Greek: pistis], which has so vexed Christians; hence the slander cast on _unbelievers_ or _misbelievers_ (when they can no longer be burned or exiled), as though they were _faithless_ and _infidels_.

But nothing of this ought to be allowed to blind us to the truly spiritual and holy developments of historical Christianity,--much less, make us revert to the old Paganism or Pantheism which it supplanted.--The great doctrine on which all practical religion depends,--the doctrine which nursed the infancy and youth of human nature,--is, "the sympathy of G.o.d with the perfection of individual man." Among Pagans this was so marred by the imperfect characters ascribed to the G.o.ds, and the dishonourable fables told concerning them, that the philosophers who undertook to prune religion too generally cut away the root, by alleging[6] that G.o.d was mere Intellect and wholly dest.i.tute of Affections. But happily among the Hebrews the purity of G.o.d's character was vindicated; and with the growth of conscience in the highest minds of the nation the ideal image of G.o.d shone brighter and brighter. The doctrine of his Sympathy was never lost, and from the Jews it pa.s.sed into the Christian church.

This doctrine, applied to that part of man which is divine, is the wellspring of Repentance and Humility, of Thankfulness, Love, and Joy.

It reproves and it comforts; it stimulates and animates. This it is which led the Psalmist to cry, "Whom have I in heaven but Thee? there is none upon earth that I desire beside Thee." This has satisfied prophets, apostles, and martyrs with G.o.d as their Portion. This has been pa.s.sed from heart to heart for full three thousand years, and has produced bands of countless saints. Let us not cut off our sympathies from those, who have learnt to sympathize with G.o.d; nor be blind to that spiritual good which they have; even if it be, more or less sensibly, tinged with intellectual error. In fact, none but G.o.d knows, how many Christian hearts are really pure from bigotry. I cannot refuse to add my testimony, such as it is, to the effect, that _the majority is always truehearted_. As one tyrant, with a small band of unscrupulous tools, manages to use the energies of a whole nation of kind and well-meaning people for cruel purposes, so the bigoted few, who work out an evil theory with consistency, often succeed in using the ma.s.ses of simpleminded Christians as their tools for oppression.

Let us not think more harshly than is necessary of the anathematizing churches. Those who curse us with their lips, often love us in their hearts. A very deep fountain of tenderness can mingle with their bigotry itself: and with tens of thousands, the evil belief is a dead form, the spiritual love is a living reality. Whether Christians like it or not, we must needs look to Historians, to Linguists, to Physiologists, to Philosophers, and generally, to men of cultivated understanding, to gain help in all those subjects which are preposterously called _Theology_: but for devotional aids, for pious meditations, for inspiring hymns, for purifying and glowing thoughts, we have still to wait upon that succession of kindling souls, among whom may be named with special honour David and Isaiah, Jesus and Paul, Augustine, A Kempis, Fenelon, Leighton, Baxter, Doddridge, Watts, the two Wesleys, and Channing.

Religion was created by the inward instincts of the soul: it had afterwards to be pruned and chastened by the sceptical understanding.

For its perfection, the co-operation of these two parts of man is essential. While religious persons dread critical and searching thought, and critics despise instinctive religion, each side remains imperfect and curtailed.

It is a complaint often made by religious historians, that no church can sustain its spirituality unimpaired through two generations, and that in the third a total irreligion is apt to supervene. Sometimes indeed the transitions are abrupt, from an age of piety to an age of dissoluteness. The liability to such lamentable revulsions is plainly due to some insufficiency in the religion to meet all the wants of human nature. To scold at that nature is puerile, and implies an ignorance of the task which religion undertakes. To lay the fault on the sovereign will of G.o.d, who has "withheld his grace" from the grandchildren of the pious, might be called blasphemy, if we were disposed to speak harshly. The fault lies undoubtedly in the fact, that Practical Devoutness and Free Thought stand apart in unnatural schism. But surely the age is ripe for something better;--for a religion which stall combine the tenderness, humility, and disinterestedness, that are the glory of the purest Christianity, with that activity of intellect, untiring pursuit of truth, and strict adherence to impartial principle, which the schools of modern science embody. When a spiritual church has its senses exercised to discern good and evil, judges of right and wrong by an inward power, proves all things and holds fast that which is good, fears no truth, but rejoices in being corrected, intellectually as well as morally,--it will not be liable to be "carried to and fro" by s.h.i.+fting winds of doctrine. It will indeed have movement, namely, a steady _onward_ one, as the schools of science have had, since they left off to dogmatize, and approached G.o.d's world as learners; but it will lay aside disputes of words, eternal vacillations, mutual illwill and dread of new light, and will be able without hypocrisy to proclaim "peace on earth and goodwill towards men," even towards those who reject its beliefs and sentiments concerning "G.o.d and his glory."

NOTE ON PAGE 168.

The author of the "Eclipse of Faith," in his Defence (p. 168), referring to my reply in p. 101 above, says:--"In this very paragraph Mr. Newman shows that I have _not_ misrepresented him, nor is it true that I overlooked his novel hypothesis. He says that 'Gibbon is exhibiting and developing the deep-seated causes of the _spread_ of Christianity before Constantine,'--which Mr. Newman says had _not_ spread. On the contrary; he a.s.sumes that the Christians were 'a small fraction,' and thus _does_ dismiss in two sentences, I might have said three words, what Gibbon had strained every nerve in his celebrated chapter to account for."

Observe his phrase, "On the contrary." It is impossible to say more plainly, that Gibbon represents the spread of Christianity before Constantine to have been very great, and then laboured in vain to account for that spread; and that I, _arbitrarily setting aside Gibbon's fact as to the magnitude of the "spread_," cut the knot which he could not untie.

But the fact, as between Gibbon and me, is flatly the reverse.

I advance nothing novel as to the numbers of the Christians, no hypothesis of my own, no a.s.sumption. I have merely adopted Gibbon's own historical estimate, that (judging, as he does judge, by the examples of Rome and Antioch), the Christians before the rise of Constantine were but a small fraction of the population. Indeed, he says, not above _one-twentieth_ part; on which I laid no stress.

It may be that Gibbon is here in error. I shall willingly withdraw any historical argument, if shown that I have unawares rested on a false basis. In balancing counter statements and reasons from diverse sources, different minds come to different statistical conclusions.

Dean Milman ("Hist. of Christianity," vol. ii. p. 341) when deliberately weighing opposite opinions, says cautiously, that "Gibbon is perhaps inclined to underrate" the number of the Christians. He adds: "M. Beugnot agrees much with Gibbon, and I should conceive, with regard to the West, is clearly right."

I beg the reader to observe, that I have _not_ represented the numerical strength of the Christians in Constantine's army to be great. Why my opponent should ridicule my use of the phrase _Christian regiments_, I am too dull to understand. ("Who would not think,"

says he, "that it was one of Constantine's _aide-de-camps_ that was speaking?") It may be that I am wrong in using the plural noun, and that there was only _one_ such regiment,--that which carried the Labarum, or standard of the cross (Gibbon, ch. 20), to which so much efficacy was attributed in the war against Licinius. I have no time at present, nor any need for further inquiries on such matters. It is to the devotion and organization of the Christians, not to their proportionate numbers, that I attributed weight. If (as Milman says) Gibbon and Beugnot are "clearly right" as regards _the West_--_i.e._, as regards all that vast district which became the area of modern European Christendom, I see nothing in my argument which requires modification.

But why did Christianity, while opposed by the ruling powers, spread "_in the East?_" In the very chapter from which I have quoted, Dean Milman justifies me in saying, that to this question I may simply reply, "I do not know," without impairing my present argument. (I myself find no difficulty in it whatever; but I protest against the a.s.sumption, that I am bound to believe a religion preternatural, unless I con account for its origin and diffusion to the satisfaction of its adherents.) Dean Milman, vol. ii. pp. 322-340, gives a full account of the Manichaean religion, and its rapid and great spread in spate of violent persecution. MANI, the founder, represented himself as "a man invested with a divine mission." His doctrines are described by Milman as wild and mystical metaphysics, combining elements of thought from Magianism, Judaism, Christianity, and Buddhism. "His wors.h.i.+p was simple, without altar, temple, images, or any imposing ceremonial. Pure and simple prayer was their only form of adoration."

They talked much of "Christ" as a heavenly principle, but "did not believe in his birth or death. Prayers and Hymns addressed to the source of light, exhortations to subdue the dark and sensuous element within, and the study of the marvellous book of Mani, const.i.tuted their devotion. Their manners were austere and ascetic; they tolerated, but only tolerated, marriage, and that only among the inferior orders. The theatre, the banquet, and even the bath, they severely proscribed. Their diet was of fruits and herbs; they shrank with abhorrence from animal food." Mani met with fierce hostility from West and East alike; and at last was entrapped by the Persian king Baharam, and "was flayed alive. His skin, stuffed with straw, was placed over the gate of the city of Shahpoor."

Such a death was as cruel and as ignominious as that of crucifixion; yet his doctrines "expired not with their author. In the East and in the West they spread with the utmost rapidity.... The extent of its success may be calculated by the implacable hostility of other religions to the doctrines of Mani; _the causes of that success are more difficult to conjecture_."

Every reason, which, as far as I know, has ever been given, why it should be hard for early Christianity to spread, avail equally as reasons against the spread of Manichaeism. The state of the East, which admitted the latter without miracle, admitted the former also.

It nevertheless is pertinent to add, that the recent history of Mormonism, compared with that of Christianity and of Manichaeism, may suggest that the martyr-death of the founder of a religion is a positive aid to its after-success.

[Footnote 1: See Strauss on the Infancy of Jesus.]

[Footnote 2: My "Eclectic" reviewer (who is among the least orthodox and the least uncandid) hence deduces, that I have confounded the two questions, "Does the Bible contain errors in human science?" and, "Is its purely spiritual teaching true?" It is quite wonderful to me, how educated men can so totally overlook what I have so plainly and so often written. This very pa.s.sage might show the contrary, if he had but quoted the whole paragraph, instead of the middle sentence only.

See also pp. 67, 74, 75, 86, 87, 125.]

[Footnote 3: Any orthodox periodical which dares to write charitably, is at once subjected to fierce attack us _un_orthodox.]

[Footnote 4: _Explicit_ Faith in a doctrine, means, that we understand what the propositions are, and accept them. But if through blunder we accept a wrong set of propositions, so as to believe a false doctrine, we nevertheless have _Implicit_ (or Virtual) Faith in the true one, if only we say from the heart: "Whatever the Church believes, I believe."

Thus a person, who, through blundering, believes in Sabellianism or Arianism, which the Church has condemned, is regarded to have _virtual faith_ in Trinitarianism, and all the "merit" of that faith, because of his good will to submit to the Church; which is the really saving virtue.]

[Footnote 5: [Greek: Dikaiosune] (righteousness), [Greek: Diatheke]

(covenant, testament), [Greek: Charis] (grace), are all terms pregnant with fallacy.]