ke US ES SS a ee ee 
 
 PUSOUORIGAL semONARY, 
 
 PRINCETON, N. J.~ 
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 SAMUEL AGNEW, 
 
 OF PHILADELPHIA, PA. 
 
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 BT 1101 .M674 1832 
 
 Morison, John, 1791-1859. 
 
 A portraiture of modern 
 scepticism 
 
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 Siews nl i 
 
PORTRAITURE 
 MODERN SCEPTICISM; 
 
 A CAVEAT AGAINST INFIDELITY : 
 
 INCLUDING 
 
 A BRIEF STATEMENT OF 
 THE EVIDENCES OF REVEALED TRUTH, 
 AND A DEFENCE OF THE CANON AND OF INSPIRATION, 
 
 INTENDED AS A PRESENT FOR THE YOUNG. 
 
 tT 
 
 BY JOHN MORISON, D.D., 
 
 &¢ 
 
 AUTHOR OF “ AN EXPOSITION OF THE BOOK OF PSALMS,” ETC. 
 
 “ The Bible is indeed amongst books, what the diamond 
 is among precious stones.”—RogBrerT Boyuz, 
 
 LONDON: 
 FREDERICK WESTLEY AND A. H. DAVIS, 
 
 STATIONERS -HALL-COURT. 
 
 M DCCC XxxIi. 
 
 ¥e 
 
Harjette and Savill, Printers, 
 St. Martin’s Lane. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 IE AEMAGEE coos isrveevaneesentep¥ecancea tenses pass sb@bacbebuers Vv 
 PART I. 
 A PORTRAITURE OF MODERN SCEPTICISM. 
 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS cecsccvccscers Baier eas vicabe bene 1 
 
 Cuar. I. The views of Sceptics respecting the 
 moral character of God........ceeeees ctatimaha beg 
 —— II. Infidels profess to hold the doctrine of 
 the Divine Existence, but neglect all 
 TEMPIOUS: WONSDID) iscaeacncessbessrcsneren LLG 
 —— III. A brief survey of the character of , 
 morality which rasta inculcates 
 
 aC CISplays \Wavaverscuess SOE EAS 
 —— IV. The practical effects of Infidelity. mee ae 29 
 —— V. A contrasted view of Infidelity and 
 
 CHTASUAINGY iccnscseress cos etbenmenenssnee< 33 
 
 —— VI. Anaffectionate appeal to those who have 
 been entangled in the snares of Infi- 
 CONE Rue CeatancsSeaaeassesencsmeriasogenel) | EL 
 
 PART II. 
 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 Cuar. I. The comparative credit due to the con- 
 clusions of Sceptics and Christians... 49 
 
lV 
 
 Cuapr. 
 
 eee TNE Lets 
 
 II. 
 
 Oo — 
 
 Cuar. IV. 
 
 —— 
 
 N: 
 
 Or 69 NO 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 The Evidence of Christianity admits of 
 being brought home individually, with 
 convincing power, to every man’s heart 
 
 A brief survey of those branches of evi- 
 dence which it is proper to urge upon 
 the attention of those who have not as 
 yet yielded up their minds to the 
 divine authority of the gospel ......... 
 
 SECTION FIRST. 
 
 Tue Inrernat Evipence or Curis- 
 DEANIPY 9 occ tock Socctesecocse Was vaateee 
 
 . The moral character of its great Founder 
 . The sublimity of its diction...... Noaaiipiel 
 
 The high standard of its morality ...... 
 The coincidence of Christianity with 
 the character of God and the aetual 
 COMI HON OF A oka seieiibac tos cee 
 
 SECTION SECOND. 
 Tue Extrernat Evipencre or Curis- 
 TIANITY PCTHS CTH SHH SOAR ORT ESE OES SEE EEROELD 
 
 MEIPACTES occas se cinsoobandtesk GaneCastnccatens 
 The Dees of Christ... Rees 
 EE LODHGCY crs saccevicesiob 2 bes scseseducapuda 
 
 . The early success of Cbrctanity aaa aRAr 
 
 The moral and social benefits conferred 
 on mankind by Christianity............ 
 
 On the uncorrupted transmission of the 
 Sacred WG0KS.26. sctsss Seceecoes Seeds naw es 
 
 ‘On the ee of the Holy Scrip- 
 
 CUP CS I anessscslicrctcecchecee eee noel nk 
 
 — VI. Popular Sloias to the full ies 
 
 tion of the Holy Scriptures............ 
 
 Conciuston latMlcloa’a dal tela Galelog hones ca8 oulsab ie tiownceSecceere 
 
 PAGE 
 
 60 
 
 69 
 
 70 
 
 71 
 2 
 85 
 
 106 
 
 113 
 
 114 
 145 
 158 
 178 
 
 197 
 
 210 
 
 225 
 
 253 
 261 
 
PREFACE, 
 
 As the forms of infidelity are constantly chang- 
 ing, it becomes the duty of all good men to 
 watch its versatile movements, and to endeavour, 
 according to their several abilities, to counteract 
 its subtle and pernicious influence. Standing, 
 as we now do, in the full blaze of secular know- 
 ledge, there is the utmost danger, through the 
 depravity of our fallen nature, of our preferring 
 the wisdom of man to the wisdom of God; and 
 if the advocates of revealed truth do not rush 
 into the field of conflict with the enemies of 
 human happiness, there is reason to fear that 
 scepticism will obtain a partial and momentary 
 
 triumph :—I say partial and momentary, for the 
 
vi PREFACE, 
 
 truth of Heaven must ultimately prevail, and 
 every powen. that would silence the voice of 
 ““THE LIVING ORACLES”’ must at last be crushed 
 by the omnipotent energy of the Son of God. 
 I am not afraid for the ark of the Lord; but I 
 regard it as a solemn duty to contribute my aid, 
 however humble, to the defence of revealed truth; 
 and particularly to make my appeal to that por- 
 tion of my fellow men who, either from mental 
 tendency, or association in life, are peculiarly 
 exposed to the desolating and pernicious onset of 
 sceptical opinions. — 
 
 I am aware there is nothing novel or peculiar 
 in the treatise which I now place on the altar of 
 the public; but I am fully satisfied that the 
 position I have taken is sure, and that the stern- 
 est or the most insidious infidelity has no honest 
 argument to oppose to the conclusions I have 
 ventured, with unhesitating confidence, to draw. 
 I have written with the decision which becomes 
 
 him who feels he has truth, and the truth of 
 
PREFACK. vii 
 
 Heaven, on his side ; and I beseech no man, who 
 deigns to examine what I have said, to indulge a 
 sneer, while conscience tells him that he should 
 offer up a prayer to “the Father of lights’’ for 
 wisdom to guide his devious course, and, above 
 all, to rectify his wayward and erring heart. 
 
 If there be any thing requiring distinct specifi- 
 cation in the plan of the following work, it is the 
 order pursued in laying down the series of evi- 
 dence in support of the claims of Revelation, 
 Whether right or wrong, I have wrought my 
 way from the interior to the outworks ; and have 
 made my first attack on the citadel of the heart, 
 by endeavouring to point out the adaptations of 
 Christianity to the known and admitted condition 
 of human nature. In doing so, I flatter myself 
 that I have pursued a simpler and more natural 
 course than those writers upon the same impor- 
 tant subject who have placed an almost exclusive 
 dependence upon external evidence. At the 
 
 same time, I have not dared to overlook any 
 
 % 
 
Vil PREFAOK. 
 
 part of that proof which shews the Bible to be 
 the word of God. 
 
 In the views I have ventured to express, in 
 reference to the momentous subject of Inspiration, 
 I am fully aware that I have exposed myself to 
 the criticisms of some of my friends, eminent 
 for their piety and biblical erudition. But this 
 I cannot help. I have gone where truth led me; 
 and I verily believe, in the fullest sense, that the 
 Scriptures are—The word of God. Should any 
 respectable individual, giving his name, do me 
 the honour to controvert my views of verbal 
 inspiration, I shall, if spared, endeavour to reply 
 to his animadversions. But I will not allow 
 myself to be dragged into the field of contro- 
 versy by any one who treats this awful subject 
 with irreverence. May all my readers be taught 
 of God ! 
 
“PART FIRST. 
 
 A PORTRAITURE OF MODERN SCEPTICISM. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS, 
 
 “THERE IS NO FEAR OF GoD BEFORE THEIR 
 EYES :’’*—Such is the concluding sentence of a 
 description which strips fallen humanity of all its 
 boasted excellence ; which shews, by a most con- 
 vincing train of reasoning, that Jews and Gentiles 
 are alike guilty before God; and which pictures, 
 in vivid colours, the awful depravity into which 
 men sink without the intervention and the vital 
 reception of the Gospel of peace. As the whole 
 race are involved in one common apostacy, 
 there is only one remedy that meets their case, 
 and that remedy is Christianity. Wherever 
 
 this divine catholicon is embraced, it ultimately 
 
 * Romans, iti. 18, 
 
 B 
 
2 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 
 
 effects the cure of man’s moral distempers; it 
 purifies his conscience from guilt, by an applica- 
 tion of “the blood of sprinkling ;’’ it purifies his 
 heart by the operation of a living faith ; and it 
 purifies his life by the all-subduing influence 
 of motives which animate him with the love of 
 God, and with the quenchless desire of being 
 conformed to his moral image. Wherever 
 Christianity is rejected, man remains the victim 
 of apostacy, the child of wrath, the sport of evil 
 passions, and, in the truest sense, “ without God, 
 and without hope in the world.”* Whether we 
 survey a state of pure heathenism,t+ or contem- 
 plate a condition of society in which Christianity 
 is rejected as a fable, we behold, in either case, 
 a soil fertile in every species of wickedness 
 that can insult the divine Majesty, or that can 
 degrade and brutalize the human race. Could 
 we conceive of a community wholly made up of 
 men denying Revelation, and wholly imbued 
 * Eph. ii. 12. 
 
 + It may be fairly questioned, from the practices of all 
 
 pagan countries, whether there be any people in a state of 
 
 pure heathenism. ‘Tradition seems every where to have 
 spread some faint glimmerings of celestial light. 
 
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS, 3 
 
 with the principles and feelings of modern 
 deism, we should haye presented before our 
 minds a scene of moral turpitude and guilt, too 
 fearful to admit of minute examination. In 
 such a community, we should see every social 
 tie dissolved, every virtuous obligation trampled 
 upon, and all the savage passions of the human 
 heart brought into resistless and destructive play. 
 In the creed of an infidel there is nothing what- 
 ever to deter him from the basest actions, pro- 
 vided he can screen himself from the eye of 
 public justice, and from the scorn and derision of 
 his fellow men. He is a man altogether without 
 principle, who denies the legitimate distinc- 
 tion between virtue and vice, who resolves all 
 human motive into a principle of self-love, and 
 who is an equal foe to the laws of Heaven, 
 and to the wise and benevolent institutions of 
 men, A powerful writer, and an acute observer 
 of mankind, has said, that “ modern unbelievers 
 are Deists in theory, Pagans in inclination, and 
 Atheists in practice.”* They profess, indeed, to 
 
 believe in one supreme and uncreated Intelli- 
 
 * Rev, Andrew Fuller. See his Works, vol. i. page 17. 
 
f INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 
 
 gence, infinitely benevolent, and infinitely holy ; 
 but they neither cultivate his benevolence, nor 
 imitate his purity; and as it respects prayer, 
 and praise, and the homage of devout worship, 
 they are as scornfully neglectful of them as if 
 there were no God, and are practically in that 
 state of total irreligion, which shews that verily 
 «There is no fear of God before their eyes.” 
 Though they talk loudly of one God, and pro- 
 fess to pay him homage in the temple of nature, 
 it is most clear that in escaping from the folly and 
 absurdity of the “gods many and lords many’’* 
 of the heathen, they have plunged themselves 
 into a state of reckless scepticism and doubt, 
 which leaves every perfection of the Deity un- 
 defined, which utterly extinguishes his moral 
 government, and which renders even the belief 
 of his very existence a powerless and unin- 
 fluential admission. 
 
 By the aid of Revelation, indeed, they have 
 wrought their way out of the Pantheon; but, 
 standing in the full blaze of celestial discovery, 
 
 they have set themselves to blaspheme “ the 
 
 * 1 Cor. viii. 5. 
 
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 5 
 
 only living and true God.”* Ungrateful return 
 for that light which the God of mercy has shed 
 upon their path, and which was never surely 
 intended to heighten their guilt, or to accelerate 
 their condemnation ! 
 
 What, then, are we to understand by modern 
 infidelity? Not surely that infidelity is a new 
 thing; for since man lost the image of his God, 
 he has, in all the periods of his eventful history, 
 evinced a tendency to discredit his Maker, and 
 even “when he knew him, not to glorify him as 
 God.’+ To provide, in some degree, against 
 this tendency, and to preserve the successive 
 revelations of Heaven from being utterly lost, 
 the Most High selected one family as the depo- 
 sitaries of his truth, and as the ministers of his 
 mercy to the rest of mankind. 
 
 It would be easy to shew, by an induction 
 of facts, that it was infidelity, in days of old, 
 which paved the way for the abominations of 
 polytheism. Men first discredited and opposed 
 
 the true oracles of Heaven, and then they set 
 
 *) Jer: x10, t+ Rom. i. 21. 
 
6 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 
 
 themselves to serve God in their own way, and 
 to prescribe a religion and a worship for them- 
 selves; and because “ they did not like to retain 
 God in their knowledge, God gave them over to 
 a reprobate mind, to do those things which are 
 not convenient ; being filled with all unrighteous- 
 ness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, ma- 
 liciousness ; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, 
 malignity ; whisperers, back-biters, haters of 
 God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of 
 evil things, disobedient to parents; without un- 
 derstanding, covenant breakers, without natural 
 affection, implacable, unmerciful; who knowing 
 the judgment of God, that they which commit 
 such things are worthy of death, not only do the 
 same, but have pleasure in them that do them.’’* 
 It was such infidelity as this, my esteemed 
 reader, which prepared the minds of mankind 
 for all the grossness and all the absurdity of 
 heathenism ; it was such infidelity as this which 
 obtained in Philistia, and Egypt, and Canaan; 
 
 it was such infidelity as this which called forth 
 
 * hom. i, 2e-—o2, 
 
iy 
 4 
 
 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 
 
 the stupendous energy of Omnipotence, in con- 
 founding and terrifying those evil powers who 
 contemned the name of Israel’s God, and op- 
 pressed the chosen tribes; yea, it was such 
 infidelity as this which prompted all the ido- 
 latries of the ancient church, who no sooner 
 forgot the Lord their God, than they set them- 
 selves to worship the gods of the nations among 
 whom they sojourned. 
 
 Infidelity is no new thing. It is a plant indi- 
 genous to the sinful heart of man; it has sprung 
 up in every age; it has more or less prevailed 
 in every nation under the whole face of heaven; 
 it is the palpable exhibition of that secret and 
 deep-rooted unbelief which is unwilling to ac- 
 credit any communication as divine that does 
 not picture the Most High as a being altogether 
 answering to the sinful imaginings of a depraved 
 and apostate heart. 
 
 By modern infidelity, then, we are simply to 
 understand those new forms, and that new 
 energy which scepticism has put on, in modern 
 times, and more particularly since the era of the 
 French revolution; by which it has mightily 
 
 diffused itself among all ranks of society, and has 
 
8 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 
 
 produced a class of writers capable of making 
 their appeal to each separate branch of the com- 
 “munity. It is modern, because those who are 
 yet in middle life can remember the baneful 
 period when it began to exert its giant strength, 
 and when, with a fiend-like daring, it aimed a 
 deadly blow at the thrones of monarchs and at 
 the altars of religion. We can remember all 
 this, and we can trace in the bloody and impure 
 and ruthless steps of infidelity, the hateful cha- 
 racter which belongs to it. It is modern, for it 
 has decked itself forth in a thousand novel 
 aspects,—at one time assuming the air of reason 
 and philosophy; at another, appealing to the 
 most vulgar prejudices of the human mind ;—now 
 weaving itself into the texture of history, and 
 then clothing itself in the maxims of political 
 wisdom;—in some instances, concealing itself 
 beneath the witchery of a well-imagined tale; 
 and, in others, polluting even the very streams 
 of salvation, by infusing a portion of its deadly 
 
 virulence into the theology of the age.* 
 
 * In proof of this, see Professor Milman’s History of the 
 Jews, and many other productions savouring of the Neolo- 
 gical school, 
 
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 9 
 
 It is modern, for where, at any former period 
 in the history of the world, did a thing so worth- 
 less and abominable put on such an imposing 
 air, and give itself forth as an angel of mercy to 
 the afflicted race? Though it has taught men, 
 that “adultery must be practised if we would 
 obtain the advantages of life; that female infide- 
 lity, when known, is a small thing; and, when 
 unknown, nothing ;’’*—that “there is no merit 
 or crime in intention ;’’+—that “the civil law is 
 the sole foundation of right and wrong, and that 
 religion has no obligation but as enjoined by the 
 magistrate ;’’}—that “all the morality of our 
 actions lies in the judgment we ourselves form of 
 them ;”’§—“ that lewdness,” in certain cases only, 
 “resembles thirst in a dropsy, and inactivity in 
 a lethargy ;” ||—that virtue is “ only the love of 
 ourselves ;’’€|—though these are the scandalous 
 lessons which it has unblushingly taught man- 
 kind, yet is it loudly proclaimed as the only sys- 
 
 tem calculated to model and perfect humanity ; 
 
 * Hume. Tt Volney’s Law of Nature. 
 
 t Hobbes. § Rousseau. 
 
 || Lord Herbert, the father of English Deists. 
 q Lord Bolingbroke. 
 
10 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 
 
 as the last and only refuge for the sorrowing, 
 suffering, and unhappy children of men! This 
 it is which is to rescue them from all unworthy 
 prejudices, which is to dissipate the mists of 
 ages, which is to bring back the golden period of 
 wisdom and reason, which is to convert the 
 whole earth into a paradise, and which is to 
 make men happy as angels under its mild and 
 benignant sway!! There is no cant so disgust- 
 ing as that of infidelity. Though most of its 
 advocates have been libertines, though its foot- 
 steps may be traced in the blood which it has 
 spilt, though it has trampled on all the laws of 
 personal property and of individual right, though 
 it pollutes and degrades wherever it touches, yet 
 are its advocates ever and anon boasting of its 
 sublime virtues, and its blessed achievements. 
 One thing we may be quite sure of, that no one 
 will listen to their vain and empty declamations 
 till he has lost a certain portion of self-esteem, 
 and till he wants to find an excuse for his con- 
 
 duct in the laxness and uncertainty of his belief.* 
 
 * ‘The natural bias of the heart is to sin, and conse- 
 quently to infidelity, the excuse and covering for sin.”— See 
 ’ the Rev. Charles Bridge's Life of Miss M. J. Graham, p. 22. 
 
 Se 
 
 ee, 
 
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. ll 
 
 Looking at both the literary and vulgar part of 
 modern infidels, we are constrained to say of 
 them, in the words of the great apostle, “ There 
 is no fear of God before their eyes,”’ 
 
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CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE VIEWS WHICH INFIDELS HAVE ENTERTAINED 
 RESPECTING THE MORAL CHARACTER OF Gop. 
 
 Gop cannot be duly feared, as the proper object 
 of religious homage, where his moral attributes 
 and perfections are lost sight of. If we discon- 
 nect his wisdom and power from his holiness 
 and goodness and justice, it is impossible to con- 
 ceive of him with reverence, or to think of him 
 with complacency. In the Christian Scriptures, 
 God’s natural attributes are invariably repre- 
 sented as the ministers of his benevolence, inte- 
 grity, and faithfulness. They declare him to be 
 “a God of truth, and without iniquity ; just and 
 right’’* in all his ways. They proclaim him to 
 be “the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gra- 
 cious, long-suffering and abundant in goodness 
 
 and in truth; keeping mercy for thousands, for- 
 
 * Deut. xxxii, 4, 
 
 Cc 
 
14 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 giving iniquity, transgression, and sin, and yet by 
 no means clearing the guilty.”* They describe 
 him as “ of purer eyes than to behold evil,’ and 
 tell us that “he cannot look upon iniquity.” + 
 They exhibit him as “ righteous in all his ways, 
 and holy in all his works.”+ They teach us, 
 that he is “not a God that hath pleasure in 
 wickedness, neither shall evil dwell with him.’’§ 
 Such is the God of Revelation ;—a Being infi- 
 nitely wise and powerful indeed, but one, at the 
 same time, “glorious in holiness, fearful in 
 praises, and ever doing wonders;’’|| @ Being be- 
 fore whom the highest orders of created intelli- 
 gences prostrate themselves and exclaim, “ Holy, 
 holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth 
 is full of his glory.’’4] 
 
 How unlike are these descriptions of the eter- 
 nal and immutable God, to the vague, contra- 
 dictory, and even wicked representations of infi- 
 delity.. “We cannot,” says Lord Bolingbroke, 
 “ascribe goodness and justice to God, according 
 to our ideas of them, nor argue with any cer- 
 
 * Exod. xxxiv. 6. + Hab. i. 13. ¢ Ps. exlv. 17. 
 § Psalm v. 4. | Exod. xv. 11. Wf Isa. vi. 3. 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. 15 
 
 tainty about them;’’ and again, “it is absurd to 
 deduce moral obligations from the moral attri- 
 butes of God, or to pretend to imitate him in 
 those attributes.”’ The language held by Boling- 
 broke is common to the infidel school. The 
 entire moral character of God is overlooked by 
 them, unless when they talk of his mercy, which 
 they always do in a manner totally inconsistent 
 with the existence of any such thing as a moral 
 government, Mercy displayed at the awful 
 risk of prostrating the claims of immutable holi- 
 ness, can only be another name for injustice ; 
 and can therefore have no affinity to that infi- 
 nitely benevolent Being who, in all the distribu- 
 tions both of his goodness and mercy, acts in a 
 manner worthy of himself, the source and pat- 
 tern of all the rectitude and purity which exist 
 throughout the universe, 
 
 “The object,” says a distinguished author, 
 “of the Christian adoration is J ehovah, the God 
 of Israel; whose character for holiness, justice, 
 and goodness, is displayed in the doctrines and 
 precepts of the gospel, in a more affecting light 
 
 than by any of the preceding dispensations. But 
 
16 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 who or what is the god of deists? Itis true they 
 have been shamed out of the polytheism of the 
 heathens. They have reduced their thirty thou- 
 sand deities into one, but what is his character i 
 What attributes do they ascribe to him? For 
 any thing that appears in their writings, he is as 
 far from the holy, the just, and the good, as those 
 of their heathen predecessors. They enjoy a 
 pleasure, it is allowed, in contemplating the pro- 
 ductions of wisdom and power; but as to holi- 
 ness, it is foreign from their inquiries: a holy God 
 does not appear to be suited to their wishes.’’* 
 
 After tracing the conflicting views of modern 
 infidels, in reference to the proper standard of 
 morality, the same powerful writer adds,—“ It 
 is worthy of notice that, amidst all the discord- 
 ance of these writers, they agree in excluding the 
 Divine Being from their theory of morals. They 
 think after their manner; but ‘ God is not in all 
 their thoughts.’ In comparing the Christian 
 doctrine of morality, the sum of which is ove, 
 
 with their atheistical jargon, one seems to hear 
 
 * Fuller’s Works, vol. i. p. 11. 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM, 17 
 
 the voice of the Almighty, saying, ‘ Who is this 
 that darkeneth counsel with words without know- 
 ledge? Fear God, and keep his command- 
 
 ments; for this is the whole of man.’ ’’* 
 
 * Fuller’s Works, vol. i. De 2 
 
is A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 CHAPTER IL. 
 
 THOUGH INFIDELS PROFESS TO HOLD THE DOCTRINE 
 
 OF THE DIVINE EXISTENCE, YET THEY REFUSE OR 
 j 
 NEGLECT ALL RELIGIOUS WORSHIP. 
 
 In this feature of their character, they are more 
 inconsistent, and more irreligious too, than even 
 pagan idolators themselves, who evince great 
 zeal and make many sacrifices in the service of 
 their dumb idols. One would imagine, that if 
 there be one great first cause, the Creator and 
 upholder of all things, the benignant source of 
 all the happiness which creatures in any part of 
 the universe enjoy—one would imagine, I say, 
 that if such a Being exist, he is entitled to the 
 devout and spiritual worship of all his intelligent 
 creatures. Such is the dictate even of unassisted 
 reason, as has been demonstrated by a reference 
 to the rudest and most brutalized portions of the 
 
 human race. How astounding then is the fact, 
 
 * 
 
 ee 
 
 a I eT OS Sa ee 
 
MODERN. SCEPTICISM. 19 
 
 that only in Christian countries can men be 
 found denying the validity of stated worship to 
 the Deity ; as if the only use to be made of Reve- 
 lation were to employ it for the horrid purpose of 
 obliterating all our natural feelings of reverence 
 for his awful perfections! In the inspired volume 
 we learn that “God is a spirit, and that they 
 who worship him must worship him in spirit and 
 in truth.”’* This supposes the duty of worship, 
 and prescribes the qualities by which it is to be 
 distinguished. The language of those who know 
 the divine character, and who possess a right 
 spirit, will ever be, “O come, let us sing unto 
 the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the rock 
 of our salvation. Let us come before his pre- 
 sence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful 
 noise unto him with psalms. For the Lord is a 
 great God, and a great King above all gods. O 
 come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel 
 before the Lord our Maker; for he is our God, 
 and we are the people of his pasture, and the 
 sheep of his hand.” Men may boast as they 
 
 * John iv, 24. * Psalm xev. 
 
20 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 please of their belief in one God, but if they do 
 him no actual homage, if they have no stated 
 seasons and places of devotion, they are in a far 
 worse condition than were those benighted Athe- 
 nians, whom Paul beheld prostrate at an altar 
 dedicated to “the unknown God.” It is the 
 temper, the disposition of infidelity, no less than 
 its preposterous creed, which distances it from 
 the spirit of true worship. Devotion cannot 
 grow in a soil on which the inexpressible levity 
 of scepticism has cast its withering blight. Reli- 
 gious awe cannot be felt in a mind that has no ~ 
 sensible hold of God’s moral perfections. Love 
 to God, drawing the soul forth in repeated and 
 habitual acts of grateful adoration, cannot dwell 
 in a heart where worldly lusts and enmity 
 against the moral government of the Most High 
 are struggling for the mastery. 
 
 The very same thing which led men of old 
 to forsake the worship of the only living and 
 true God, and to betake themselves to the abo- 
 
 minations of idolatry, is that which banishes 
 
 * Acts xvil. 23. 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. 21 
 
 from every circle of infidels everything like the 
 semblance of religious homage to the Deity. 
 Is it demanded what this said thing is? I reply, 
 in the language of the Apostle, “they did not 
 like to retain God in their knowledge.’’* They 
 lost all delight in his holy character, and hence 
 they sought relief for their guilty feelings in the 
 exercises of a religion which corresponded with 
 the dictates of their own impure hearts. 
 
 Deists are placed somewhat peculiarly. As 
 they are found only where Revelation has either 
 completely banished the grossness of idolatry, or 
 where, at least, it has shed its benignant rays, 
 they cannot for shame revel in the impurities of 
 heathenism ; but as they take no delight what- 
 ever in the character of that one God whom 
 they profess to adore, they live in the habitual 
 and avowed neglect of his worship. The ances- 
 tors of paganism forsook his worship, “ because 
 they did not like to retain him in their thoughts ;”’ 
 and for the same reason precisely infidelity has 
 
 no temple, no altar, no sacrifice, no avowed, 
 
 * Rom. i. 28. 
 
p47 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 habitual, and well-defined worship to that glo- 
 rious Being, from the near contemplation of 
 whose character it shrinks with instinctive dis- 
 like and dread. 
 
 Could we see infidelity cultivating the spirit 
 of prayer, laying aside its extreme and disgusting 
 levity, and evincing an anxiety to arrive at the 
 true knowledge of God, we should begin to 
 hope on: behalf of its unhappy victims; but 
 reckless as its advocates are of all devotion, and 
 leaning as they do to their own understanding, 
 and evincing an utter contempt for every thing 
 sacred, we are compelled to look on them as in 
 a condition peculiarly hopeless, and must say 
 respecting them “There is no fear of God before 
 
 their eyes.”’ 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. oA 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 A BRIEF SURVEY OF THE CHARACTER OF THAT 
 MORALITY WHICH INFIDELITY INCULCATES AND 
 DISPLAYS. 
 
 Att who read the Bible attentively, whatever 
 they may think of its divine origin, must be 
 struck with the perfection of its moral precepts, 
 and especially with the sublime and cogent 
 reasons which it assigns for the performance of 
 every duty which we owe both to God and man.* 
 
 That monster of wickedness, Thomas Paine, 
 whom no man that ever knew could trust, has 
 said respecting the Bible—«TI feel for the honour 
 of my Creator in having such a book called after 
 his name.” He must surely have meant, that he 
 felt for himself, when he discovered in the Bible, 
 if he ever read it, such an array of holy and 
 
 benevolent precepts upon which it had been his 
 
 * See the second part of this Treatise, chap. i. sect, 3. 
 
24 “A PORTRAITURE OF 
 habitual practice, during a long life, to trample 
 with proud disdain ! 
 
 The morality of the Bible is not the morality 
 of mere decorum, the garnishing of the outward 
 man, the “ making clean the outside of the cup 
 and platter ;’’ itis the morality of principle,—it is 
 the morality of right dispositions,—it is the mo- 
 rality of love to God and love to man. Infidelity 
 says, “there is no merit or crime in intention ;”’ 
 but Christianity says, that hatred is murder,* 
 that secret lust is adultery,t and that we must 
 “love the Lord our God with all our heart, and 
 strength, and mind, and our neighbour as our- 
 selves.’+ It prohibits the resentment of in- 
 juries, and urges the forgiveness of enemies.§ 
 It tells us “to weep with them that weep, 
 and rejoice with them that rejoice.”|| It en- 
 forces every relative duty by an appeal to 
 motives equally tender and sublime, and it de- 
 mands a personal sanctity of manners, which 
 
 admits of no reserve, and leaves room for the 
 
 * J John, ii. 14, 15. + Matt. xxvii. 28. 
 { Matt. xxii. 37—39. § Rom. xii. 19—21. 
 ‘|| Rom. xii. 15. q Eph. v. 25. vi. 1, 5—9. 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. 25 
 
 indulgence of no single habit of transgres- 
 sion.* 
 
 If infidelity were from above, it would bear 
 the marks of its celestial origin. God must be 
 holy; and a religion suited to his intelligent 
 creatures ought to carry with it some resem- 
 blance to his moral nature. Infidelity has no such 
 resemblance in either theory or practice. In 
 theory it is an apology for almost every crime 
 that disgraces human nature; and in the dif. 
 ferent codes of its advocates, every species of 
 transgression is either defended or palliated. 
 And what it is in theory, it is yet more abun- 
 dantly in practice. Its leading characters have 
 been worthless beyond expression. What were 
 Herbert, and Hobbes, and Shaftesbury, and 
 Woolston, and Tindal, and Bolingbroke, but so 
 many notorious hypocrites, who, for a piece of 
 paltry self-interest, professed to love and reve- 
 rence Christianity, while they were all the while 
 insidiously endeavouring to lower its credit in the 
 
 world? In the long and gloomy catalogue of 
 
 * Heb. xii, 14, 
 dD 
 
26 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 human delinquents, where shall we find two 
 miscreants such as Rochester and Wharton ? 
 They were indeed a reproach to our common 
 nature. Morgan’s dishonest quotation of Scrip- 
 ture to serve a purpose, and his miserable cant 
 in professing himself to be a Christian, notwith- 
 standing his amazing zeal to subvert all the pe- 
 culiarities of revealed religion, speak volumes as 
 to his notions of morality. Hume, the most 
 dishonest and prejudiced of all historians,* died 
 as a fool dieth, cracking vulgar jokes with some 
 of his unhappy companions. Voltaire so little 
 
 regarded truth, that, in speaking in his “ Ignorant 
 
 * How can the guardians of the rising generation still 
 leave them to the guidance of such a syeophant in politics, 
 and such a sceptic in religion ? 
 
 + “ Nothing but the most frivolous dissipation of thought 
 can make even the inconsiderate forget the supreme impor- 
 tance of every thing which relates to the expectation of a 
 future existence. Whilst the infidel mocks at the supersti- 
 tions of the vulgar, insults over their credulous fears, their 
 childish errors, or fantastic rites, it does not occur to him 
 to observe that the most preposterous device by which the 
 weakest devotee ever believed he was securing the happi- 
 ness of a future life, is more rational than unconcern about 
 it. Upon this subject, nothing is so absurd as indifference ; 
 no folly so contemptible as thoughtlessness and levity.” — 
 Sce a work entitled “ The Nature of the Proof of the 
 Christian Religion,” &c., by D. B. Baker, A.M., p. 42. 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. oF. 
 
 Philosopher’ of the tolerative spirit of the ancient 
 Romans, he observes, “ they never persecuted a 
 single philosopher for his opinions from the time 
 of Romulus till the popes got possession of their 
 power.’ In this passage a vail is drawn over 
 the massacre of thousands and tens of thousands 
 of unoffending Christians. In like manner, this 
 boasted friend of liberty and reason, when he 
 describes the expatriation, or cruel death of one 
 million of French Protestants, speaks of them as 
 “weak and obstinate men.’ As these Protest- 
 ants, not being infidels, were stripped of all claim 
 to philosophy, we suppose it was a small matter 
 to murder such vulgar persons in cold blood! 
 We find this same champion of infidelity request- 
 ing his friend D’Alembert to tell for him a direct 
 lie, by denying that he was the author of the 
 “ Philosophical Dictionary.” His friend told 
 the lie for him; and he has himself well de- 
 scribed his own’ character in the following 
 words :—‘ Monsieur Abbé, I must be read, no 
 matter whether I am believed or not,’ Vol- 
 taire, after all his infidelity, being threatened by 
 
 the authorities, died a Catholic. 
 
2S A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 Rousseau was profligate and immoral from his 
 youth up. “I have been a rogue,” says he, 
 ‘and am so still sometimes, for trifles which I 
 had rather take than ask for.’ He abjured 
 Protestantism, and became Catholic; “ for 
 which,” says he, “ in return, I was to receive 
 subsistence ; but,” he adds, “from this interested 
 conversion, nothing remained but the remem- 
 brance of my having been both a dupe and an 
 apostate.” After this, settling at Geneva, and 
 finding that there he was denied the rights of 
 Christian citizens, he renounced popery and con- 
 formed to the religion of the state. The life of 
 this wretched man was one continued and unin- 
 terrupted scene of hypocrisy, fornication, seduc- 
 tion, base intrigue, and, withal, constant violation 
 of the rules of honesty. What he said of one of 
 the events of horror which marked his career 
 may be applied, with too much truth, to his 
 whole history—“ Guilty without remorse, I 
 
 soon became so without measure.”’ 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM, 29 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE PRACTICAL EFFECTS OF INFIDELITY, 
 
 Ir is no wonder surely that such a race of men 
 should have prepared the minds of their disciples 
 for deeds of unusual atrocity. In a neighbour- 
 ing country, a fit theatre presented itself for the 
 exhibition of infidelity in its own native colours. 
 There gross superstition on the one hand, and 
 arbitrary government on the other, led thousands 
 vertuously to sigh for national deliverance. With 
 loud professions of love of liberty and self. 
 devoted patriotism, infidelity rushed into the 
 field of conflict; but though she professed to be 
 an angel of mercy, she soon proved herself to be 
 but a fiend of perdition. There was no deed of 
 horror which she did not perpetrate. Within 
 her destructive sphere life and property ceased 
 to have any value attached to them. The most 
 
 Deo 
 
 aod 
 
30 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 virtuous citizens fell victims to her insatiable 
 cruelty. Personal agrandisement became the 
 sole object of her ambition ; and, under the fair 
 pretence of philosophy, of enlightened policy, 
 and of regard to the public weal, a whole nation 
 was laid in ruins, every public institution was 
 plundered, the state was sunk in anarchy and 
 confusion, deeds: of blood too shocking to de- 
 scribe were perpetrated, and the church herself, 
 already sufficiently degraded, was made the 
 organ of propagating blasphemies the most hide- 
 ous against the God of heaven. “ Infidelity,” 
 observes a spirited and able chronicler of these 
 events,* “having got possession of the power of 
 the state, every nerve was exerted to efface from 
 the mind all ideas of religion and morality. The 
 doctrine of the immortality of the soul, or a 
 future state of rewards and punishments, so 
 essential to the preservation of order in society, 
 and to the prevention of crimes, was publicly 
 ridiculed, and the people were taught to believe 
 
 that death was an everlasting sleep. 
 
 * Judge Rush, of the United States. 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. 31 
 
 “They ordered the words ‘ Temple of Rea- 
 son’ to be inscribed on the churches, in con- 
 tempt of the doctrine of revelation. Atheistical 
 and licentious homilies were published in the 
 churches, instead of the old service; and a ludi- 
 crous imitation of the Greek mythology exhibited 
 under the title of ‘The Religion of Reason.’ 
 Nay, they went so far as to dress up, with the 
 most fantastic decorations, a common strumpet, 
 whom they blasphemously styled * The Goddess 
 of Reason,’ and who was carried to church on 
 the shoulders of some jacobins selected for the 
 purpose, escorted by the national guards and 
 the constituted authorities. When they got to 
 the church, the strumpet was placed on the altar 
 erected for the purpose, and harangued the 
 people, who, in return, professed the deepest 
 adoration of her, and sung the Carmagnole and 
 other songs by way of worshipping her. This 
 horrid scene—almost too horrible to relate—was 
 concluded by burning the prayer-book, confes- 
 sional, and every thing appropriated to the use 
 of public worship; numbers, in the mean time, 
 
 danced round the flames with every appearance 
 
54 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 of frantic and infernal mirth.’ I might also 
 notice the fiend-like malignity which was 
 directed against the institution of the Sabbath, 
 during the reign of terror in France, as if the 
 sole design of that desperate faction was not 
 only to efface all reverence for the Deity from 
 the public mind, but also to destroy every 
 memorial of an intelligent creature’s obligation 
 to him, and every symbol of the existence of a 
 moral government. 
 
 Let revolutionary and infidel France teach 
 mankind, by one great and affecting lesson, 
 what the enemies of Revelation can do to heighten 
 the standard of national morals, and to render 
 inviolable the persons and properties of men. 
 With the page of their own infamous history 
 before them, let sceptics of every school blush 
 to talk of the benefits which their system is fitted 
 to confer on the human race. And let them 
 remember, that the grand reason why the pre- 
 valence of their principles has ever issued in the 
 disruption of every social and moral tie, has been 
 because there was “no fear of God before their 
 
 ? 
 
 eyes. 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. ae 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 A CONTRASTED VIEW OF INFIDELITY AND 
 CHRISTIANITY.* 
 
 FRom such scenes as these, how delightful to 
 turn to the pure, and mild, and benignant genius 
 
 of Christianity! Were her golden rule—“as ye 
 
 * The Bishop of Calcutta, in his twenty-second lecture 
 on the “ Evidences of Christianity,” has finely contrasted 
 the character of Voltaire with that of the Hon. Robert 
 Boyle. ‘ Now contrast,” says he, “ with this character, 
 any of the eminent Christians that adorned their own 
 country and Europe about the same period. Take the 
 Hon. Rozert Boytz, of whom it is difficult to say 
 whether his piety, as a Christian, or his fame, as a philo- 
 sopher, was most remarkable. Consider the compass of 
 his mind, the solidity of his judgment, the fertility of his 
 pen, the purity ofhis morals, the amiableness of his temper, 
 his beneficence to the poor and distressed, his uniform 
 friendships, his conscientious aim at truth in all his pursuits 
 and determinations. At an early age he examined the 
 question of the Christian religion to the bottom, on occa- 
 sion of some distracting doubts which assaulted his mind. 
 Confirmed in the truth of Christianity, his whole life was 
 a comment on his sincerity. He was admitted to certain 
 secret meetings before he had reached mature years—but 
 they were graced and enlightened associations—for can- 
 
3t A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 would that men should do unto you, do ye ever 
 so unto them’’—the universal law of all the fami- 
 lies and nations under heaven, how would it 
 change the face of society !—how would it stem 
 
 the torrent of pride, ambition, and vain glory !— 
 
 vassing subjects of natural philosophy, at a time when the 
 civil wars suspended all academical studies, and they led to 
 the formation of one of the noblest establishments of his 
 country.* His disinterestedness and humility were such 
 that he refused the provostship of Eton, and the honours 
 of a peerage, that he might devote his talents and time and 
 noble fortune to works of public utility and benevolence. 
 His uniform regard to truth made him the example and 
 admiration of his age. His tenderness of conscience led 
 him to decline the most honourable officet in the scientific 
 world, because he doubted about the oaths prescribed, and 
 his reverence for the glorious Creator induced him to 
 pause whenever he pronounced his name. From such a 
 studeut we. may expect truth. From such a philosopher 
 we receive, with unmixed pleasure, ‘ A Treatise of the 
 high veneration which men’s intellect owes to God;’{ or a 
 discourse ‘ On greatness of mind promoted by Christianity.’ §” 
 
 The same excellent author furnishes the following ad- 
 mirable contrasts :— 
 
 ‘¢ Contrast, in point of mere benevolence, the lives and 
 deportment of such an infidel as Rousseau, and such a 
 Christian as Doddridge ; the one all pride, selfishness, fury, 
 caprice, rage, gross sensuality—casting about firebrands and 
 death—professing no rule of morals but his feelings, abus- 
 ing the finest powers to the dissemination, not merely of 
 
 * The Royal Society. + President of the Royal Society. 
 + Published in 1685. § Published in 1690. 
 
MODERN SChPTICISM. 30 
 
 how would it cause wars, and rumours of wars, 
 to cease to the very ends of the earth !—how 
 would it unite the whole family of man in one 
 common bond of brotherhood !—how would it 
 
 banish injustice, cruelty, oppression, and licen- 
 
 objections against Christianity, but of the most licentious 
 and profligate principles ;— Doddridge all purity, mildness, 
 meekness, and love, ardent in his good will to man, the 
 friend and counsellor of the sorrowful ; regular, calm, con- 
 sistent ; dispensing peace and truth by his labours and by 
 his writings; living, not for himself, but for the common 
 good, to which he sacrificed his health and even life. 
 
 ** Or contrast such a man as Volney with Swartze. 
 They both visit distant lands,—they are active and indefa- 
 tigable in their pursuits,—they acquire celebrity, and com- 
 municate respectively a certain impulse to their widened 
 circles ; but the one, jaundiced by infidelity, the sport of 
 passion and caprice, lost to all argument and right feeling, 
 comes home to diffuse the poison of unbelief, to be a misery 
 to himself, the plague and disturber of his country, the 
 dark calumniator of the Christian faith. ‘The other remains 
 far from his native land to preach the peaceful doctrine of 
 the gospel on the shores of India; he becomes the friend 
 and brother of those whom he had never seen, and only 
 heard of as fellow-creatures,—he diffuses blessings for half 
 a century,—he ensures the admiration of the heathen 
 prince near whom he resides,—he becomes the mediator 
 between contending tribes and nations,—he establishes a ° 
 reputation for purity, integrity, disinterestedness, meek- 
 ness, which compel all around to respect and love him,— 
 he forms churches,—he instructs children,—he disperses 
 the seeds of charity and truth,—he is the medel of all the 
 virtues he enjoins.” 
 
36 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 tiousness from the earth! In proportion as 
 Christian principles have triumphed, in that 
 same proportion: immorality has disappeared, 
 and all social virtues have been practised; and 
 when it is universal, which we are assured it 
 will be, it will bring moral health along with it 
 to all the dwellers upon earth. 
 
 “ Of all the dispositions and habits which 
 lead to political prosperity,’ said the immortal 
 Washington, “religion and morality are indis- 
 pensable supports. In vain would that man 
 claim the tribute of patriotism who should labour 
 to subvert the great pillars of human happiness, 
 those firmest props of men and citizens. ‘The 
 mere politician, equally with the pious man, 
 ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume 
 could not trace all their connexions with private 
 and public felicity. et it be simply asked, 
 Where is the security for property, for reputa- 
 tion, for life, if the sense of religious obligation 
 desert the oaths which are the instruments of 
 investigation in the courts of justice? And let 
 us with caution indulge the supposition that 
 
 morality can be maintained without religion. 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. 37 
 
 Whatever may be conceded to the influence of 
 refined education on minds of a peculiar strue- 
 ture, reason and experience both forbid us to 
 expect that national morality can prevail in ex- 
 clusion of religious principle.’’* 
 
 In a happier age, fast approaching, Christi- 
 anity will dictate rules of right government; it 
 will establish equitable principles of national 
 commerce; it will teach kings and senates how 
 to rule in wisdom and love; it will remove the 
 great barriers to national tranquillity and national 
 prosperity out of the way, by constituting the 
 “ people all righteous,” and setting up the au- 
 thority of God as the best possible support of 
 laws which accord with his word. 
 
 Infidelity can dream of no such renovation. 
 Its past steps may be traced in_ blood and 
 anarchy ; and the prospect which stretches be- 
 fore it is scarcely less appalling. It has no link 
 whereby to bind man to man, because it severs 
 man from his Maker. It is essentially heartless 
 and cruel. It rules without God, and would 
 
 * Washington’s farewell Address to the people of the 
 United States, 
 
38 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 exclude him from his own world, and nothing 
 awaits it but the exposure and infamy which 
 must sooner or later overtake all systems of 
 evil. 
 
 O, what a world were this if all men were 
 infidels! Then, indeed, would they soon destroy 
 themselves. Their vices would be such as to 
 annihilate all the social sympathies, and to cause 
 the various elements of society to rush together 
 in wild confusion and ruin. 
 
 What cause of congratulation is it, that infi- 
 delity, in its more direct forms, has so little power 
 in this country to mould our national institutions ! 
 No one who marks the zeal and malignity of our 
 infidel press, can doubt, for a moment, what 
 would be the fate of every honest and virtuous 
 family, if infidels could, by any means, acquire 
 ascendancy. ‘There is a great deal of secret 
 and avowed infidelity in the land; but, blessed 
 be God, our property, our domestic peace, our 
 national security are not as yet menaced by the 
 impugners of revelation. 
 
 It is at the same time a mournful considera- 
 
 tion, that so many of the labouring classes of the 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. 39 
 
 community are vitiated by the wretched dogmas 
 of this school. It is a distinct characteristic of 
 moderm infidelity, that it aims to subvert the 
 hopes of the poor. The writings of Mr. Paine, 
 combined with other circumstances, have led to 
 this feature in its malignant history. The liber- 
 tinism of sceptics, till of late years, was regarded 
 as the exclusive privilege of the educated, the 
 intellectual, and the distinguished portion of 
 mankind. Now it is far otherwise; the pestilence 
 has spread itself, and operatives, in every depart- 
 ment of trade, are plied by the apostles of infi- 
 delity, who, not content with destroying the 
 poor man’s hopes of immortality, set themselves 
 to lower all his notions of moral obligation, to 
 vitiate all his social habits, to foster in him the 
 spirit of rebellion against all constituted authority, 
 and thus, as it were, to deck their victim for the 
 day of sacrifice. I firmly believe that in London 
 alone, to say nothing of other large populations, 
 there are thousands and tens of thousands lost 
 to industry, to health, to reputation, and to 
 peace, outcasts from society, and terrors to the 
 
 community, who might trace the utter wreck of 
 
40 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 their characters to their association with com- 
 panions of infidel sentiments, and to their fami- 
 liarity with the infidel press. It has been my 
 lot as a Christian minister, more than once, to 
 confirm these affecting statements by the unequi- 
 vocal avowals of infidels themselves, in the last 
 periods of human existence, and also by witness- 
 ing in some, once promising characters, the bane- 
 ful effects arising from the adoption of infidel 
 
 opinions. 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. 4] 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 AN AFFECTIONATE APPEAL TO THOSE WHO HAVE 
 BEEN ENTANGLED IN THE SNARES OF INFIDELITY. 
 
 WuEN I reflect how many there are whose faith 
 in Christianity has been shaken, and whose 
 minds have fallen a prey to the wiles of scep- 
 ticism; and, moreover, when I call to remem- 
 brance that so many of the young and promis- 
 ing rank among the victims of this moral conta- 
 gion, I cannot but feel an earnest desire to become 
 an instrument of good to a portion of my fellow- 
 creatures, at once so interesting and so much 
 exposed. O that God would strengthen me to 
 speak a word to unhappy and deluded sceptics ! 
 With all the zeal for their salvation that I can 
 possibly give utterance to, would I make my 
 appeal to their judgments and consciences, Let 
 me bespeak their candour. I am conscious of 
 no motive but a desire to honour God, and to 
 
 ne 
 
4? A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 save their souls. Regarding them as the victims 
 of fatal error, | am devoutly anxious to see them 
 extricated from it. Their creed I hold to be 
 alike gloomy and pernicious, and I would shew 
 them a more excellent way, and would introduce 
 them, with a bounding heart, into the light and 
 liberty of Christianity. 
 
 What, then, let me ask, has led you to 
 reject Christianity? Have you carefully ex- 
 amined it, and found its evidence defective ? 
 If so, where does the difficulty press? If 
 you are really perplexed, ask counsel of some 
 enlightened Christian, and he will readily aid 
 you in disposing of the doubts and misgivings of 
 a mind really sincere. I believe a doubting man 
 may be sincere. There are many volumes 
 suited to your state, and which you might read 
 with the greatest possible advantage. Let me 
 particularly recommend to your attentive perusal 
 «The Gospel its own Witness,’’ by the late Rev. 
 Andrew Fuller; “The Evidences of Chris- 
 tianity,”’ by Dr. Paley; “ A Short Method with 
 Deists,”’ by Leslie; Dr. Chalmers’ work on “The 
 
 ? 
 
 Christian Revelation,’ and a work entitled “A 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM, 43 
 
 Treatise on the Nature and Causes of Doubt in 
 Religious Questions,”’ 
 
 But let me deal honestly with you, as your 
 friend. Have you all this supposed difficulty about 
 the evidence and the truth of Christianity ? Or 
 is your hesitancy of a very different order ? Do 
 you feel a repugnance to the holy requirements 
 of Christianity, and a consequent dread of the 
 judginents which it threatens? And does this 
 prompt in you the baneful wish, “O that it might 
 not be true?”” Remember what Rochester said— 
 “A bad life is the only grand objection to this 
 book ;” laying his hand emphatically on the 
 Bible. Has not this been very much the case 
 with you? You have fallen into sinful courses 
 —you have yielded to the ways of the world— 
 you have gone with a multitude to do evil—you 
 have forsaken your better fellowships—you have 
 learnt to spend your Sabbaths in pleasure, and 
 you have gradually become more and more 
 careless. In this state you have been very un- 
 happy at times ; you have thought, well, “what if, 
 after all, the Bible be true! What if, after all, 
 
 the wicked shall be turned into hell!” At this 
 
44 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 juncture, some one further advanced in scepti- 
 cism than yourself has aided you in shaking off 
 the galling yoke of conscience. He has put 
 some infidel publication into your hand; you 
 have read it; it has fallen in with your previous 
 wishes and habits; you have said, “ This is the 
 very thing I wanted ;’’ and you have, at last, 
 learned to revile the Bible, to set light by its 
 hopes, and to talk slanderously of its professors. 
 
 Come now, my friend, and let us reason toge- 
 ther. Look back on the process. Why did you so 
 readily drink in the poison contained in the infidel 
 volume? Why? because you were in a state 
 of mind very much the opposite of that which 
 the Bible demands. But what have you found, 
 my friend, in the regions of scepticism? You 
 have relinquished the hopes of Christianity, by 
 Christ Jesus. What have you obtained in their 
 place? Amidst all your acquirements, have you 
 found peace ofmind? Will your present charac- 
 ter and your present religion sustain you in a 
 dying hour? Multitudes of infidels have found 
 their creed, at death, insufficient to meet the 
 
 awful catastrophe. Not a single instance can 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. 45 
 
 be produced, in which a believer in Revelation 
 was terrified or dismayed because he had been a 
 Christian. Many have been distressed on ac- 
 count of the defective evidence of their Chris- 
 tianity, but none on account of. their being 
 Christians. Does it never occur to you, that if 
 Christianity be true, you are undone ?—that 
 if it be false, he who believes it can suffer no 
 injury ?* Who, let me ask you, are your com- 
 panions ? What are your pursuits? and what 
 your hopes? I deeply feel for you, while I 
 greatly blame you. You may have been inade- 
 quately instructed,—you may have seen bad 
 examples,—you may have witnessed great in- 
 consistencies in some of the professors of religion. 
 Granting, however, that all this may have been 
 
 the case, still the interests of the soul are a per- 
 
 * “TIndisputably,” said Lord Byron, in a letter sent by 
 him to the late Mrs. Sheppard, “the firm believers in the 
 Gospel have a great advantage over all others, for this 
 simple reason—that if true, they will have their reward 
 hereafter ; and if there be no hereafter, they can be but 
 with the infidel in his eternal sleep, having had the assistance 
 of an exalted hope through life, without subsequent disap- 
 pointment, since (at the worst, for them) ‘ out of nothing, 
 nothing can arise,’—not even sorrow.” 
 
46 A PORTRAITURE OF 
 
 sonal concern. No man can stand in your place 
 when you die. I beseech you, then, to arouse 
 yourself from that lethargy into which se and 
 unbelief, acting and reacting, have conjointly 
 sunk you. 
 
 Ask yourself this question, “ What makes me 
 asceptic? Is it because I have examined for 
 myself, and know the Gospel to be a fable? or 
 is it because I desire that it may be one?’”’ And 
 why should you desire this? If Christianity 
 does not meet your case, no other system can. 
 Infidelity has not met your case; it has not 
 awakened hope; it has not allayed despair ; it has 
 not ministered peace. No: it has only stupified 
 a conscience which must yet awake ; it has only 
 taught you to put the evil day far away ; it has 
 only blinded you for a time to the dread pros- 
 pects of a future and impending eternity. 
 
 Why, I ask again, should you wish that 
 Christianity may not be true? Is it because 
 you feel yourself guilty, and shrink from the 
 condemnation which it threatens? Well might 
 you thus shrink if it did not reveal a remedy, 
 
 as well as disclose a disease and point out its 
 
MODERN SCEPTICISM. 47 
 
 consequences. You are guilty—yea, ten thou- 
 sand times more guilty than you ever imagined 
 yourself to be; but what I maintain is, that if 
 you turn away the eye of faith from that great 
 sacrifice which Christianity reveals, you must 
 sink for ever beneath the pressure of your guilt, 
 and with this superadded horror, that you pe- 
 rished at the threshold of mercy. 
 
 Is it because you do not love the pure and 
 holy demands of Christianity, that you turn 
 away from it? Well; but is not this, its pure 
 character, the proof of its celestial origin ? and if 
 so, will it avail you to reject it? Will the holy 
 life it requires be less obligatory because you 
 determine not to pursue it? Will the great 
 Judge excuse you at last because you loved 
 your sins more than his revealed will ? 
 
 Besides, what is to root out unholy inclina- 
 tions, to correct depraved habits, to superinduce 
 devotion, and to raise the soul to God? Js tt 
 not divine meditation on the blessed word? Here 
 is that consecrated fountain which, by the grace 
 of God, shall quench your thirst of sin. Here 
 
 you may read of “the new heart’ till you 
 
48 A PORTRAITURE, ETC. 
 
 know, by experience, what it is. Here is a 
 divine Deliverer, whose “ name is called Jesus, 
 because he saves his people from their sins.’’”* 
 Here is a divine Sanctifier, who can “create 
 within you a clean heart, and renew within you 
 a right spirit.” +—One word more, and I have 
 done. Ask God to teach you. Ask him, if the 
 Bible be from him, to enable you to come to the 
 belief of it. Ask him to remove your blindness, 
 to allay your prejudices, and, above all, to prevent 
 any sinful habit from giving a bias to your 
 dicision. Make no delay in this work. If you 
 die a stranger to the hopes of Christianity, it had 
 been better for you that you had never been 
 
 born ! 
 
 * Matt. i. 25. + Psalm li. 10, 
 
PART SECOND. 
 
 es 
 
 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE OF 
 CHRISTIANITY, 
 
 CHAPTER I, 
 THE COMPARATIVE CREDIT DUE TO THE CONCLUSIONS 
 OF SCEPTICS AND CHRISTIANS. 
 
 “« For we have not believed cunningly devised fables,”* 
 SUCH, at least, is the Christian’s estimate of the 
 stability of his own hopes; and such is the 
 settled conviction of every sincere friend of 
 revealed truth. When the moral character and 
 habits of those who profess their belief in Chris- 
 tianity is taken into account, there can be no 
 hesitation in admitting that they are strictly 
 honest in the avowal of their faith, and that 
 
 they do not affect to repose on the truth of a 
 
 Wem bets ar LOS 
 
 K 
 
50 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 system which, after all, they secretly disbelieve. 
 That there are many false pretenders to the 
 faith of Christ is readily conceded; but after 
 the names of all such have been struck off from 
 the list of its genuine friends, there will yet 
 remain a multitude of honest men, far above all 
 suspicion, who, in life, and at death, have pro- 
 fessed their sincere and heart-felt belief in the 
 religion of Jesus of Nazareth. To impugn 
 their integrity, as men of veracity, would be 
 alike absurd and unjust. hey are, beyond 
 doubt, entitled to all credit for sincerity, when, 
 with the Bible in their hands, they exclaim, 
 “We have not followed cunningly devised 
 fables.”’ 
 
 The great question then is, are they mistaken 
 in the estimate which they have formed of the 
 Bible? Are they under the influence of a delusion, 
 though they fondly believe that they have em- 
 braced the truth of God?. In deciding such in- 
 quiries as these, several considerations naturally 
 occur to the mind, irrespective even of the direct 
 evidences of the Christian Revelation. 
 
 What, then, has been the amount of intellectual 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 51 
 
 qualification possessed by Christians for inves- 
 tigating the truth or falsehood of their hopes ? 
 It may be true, indeed, that the mass of those 
 who have embraced the gospel have been little 
 elevated, in point of mind, above any other 
 equal portion of the human race; although it 
 cannot be denied, that in Christian countries 
 the common people are much superior to their 
 fellows in heathen lands. But be this as it may, 
 can any one affirm that among the list of Chris- 
 tian advocates there are not to be found multi- 
 tudes of men in the highest degree qualified to 
 decide upon any question of evidence submitted 
 to their notice? Will it be pretended that imbe- 
 cility of intellect produced the faith of such men 
 as Sir Isaac Newton, John Locke, Sir Matthew 
 Hale, the Hon. Robert Boyle, Bishop Butler, 
 Dr. Watts, Mr. Wilberforce, Dr. Paley, Dr. 
 Beattie, Dr. Chalmers, and Robert Hall? Such 
 a pretence, on the part of any infidel, would be 
 equally fatal to his sense and candour. In grasp 
 of mind, in depth of erudition, in diversity and 
 extent of science, the pledged advocates of the 
 
 gospel have had no rivals in the republic of 
 
52 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 letters, or inthe ranks of scepticism.* All who 
 know any thing of the state of facts, must concede 
 this point, that the sublimest exercise of reason 
 
 is not incompatible with the most profound defer- 
 
 * The following eloquent passage, from a speech of the 
 late Lord Erskine, delivered by him in the Court of King’s 
 Bench, on occasion of a prosecution for the publication of 
 Paine’s “ Age of Reason,” may not be unacceptable, as 
 tending to illustrate the position, that superiority of intel- 
 lect has been enlisted on the side of Christianity :— 
 
 “It seems, gentlemen,” said his Lordship, “ this is an 
 age of reason; and the time and the person are at last 
 arrived, that are to dissipate the errors which have over- 
 spread the past generation of ignorance. The believers 
 in Christianity are many, but it belongs to the few that are 
 wise to correct their credulity. Belief is an act of reason, 
 and superior reason may, therefore, dictate to the weak. 
 
 “In running the mind along the list of sincere and 
 devout Christians, I cannot help lamenting that Newton 
 had not lived to this day, to have had his shallowness filled 
 up with the new flood of light. 
 
 “But the subject is too awful for irony ; I will speak 
 plainly and directly. Newton wasa Christian !—Newton, 
 whose mind burst forth from the fetters cast by Nature 
 upon our finite conceptions. Newton! whose science was 
 truth, and the foundation of whose knowledge of it was 
 philosophy ; not those visionary and arrogant presumptions 
 which too often usurp its name, but philosophy, resting 
 upon the basisof methamaties, which, like figures, cannot lie. 
 Newton, who carried the line and rule to the utmost bar- 
 riers of the creation, and explored the principles by which, 
 no doubt, all created matter is held together and exists. 
 
 ‘¢ But this extraordinary man, in the mighty reach of 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 53 
 
 ence to the truth and excellence of Revelation. 
 It is easy for some infidel demagogue to vaunt 
 himself of his great wisdom and learning be- 
 
 fore an ignorant and vicious assembly; but let the 
 
 his mind, overlooked, perhaps, the errors which a minuter 
 investigation of the created things on this earth might have 
 taught him of the essence of his Creator. 
 
 ‘* What, then, shall be said of the great Mr. Boyle, who 
 looked into the organic structure of all matter, even to the 
 brute inanimate substances which the foot treads on? 
 Such a man may be supposed to have been equally qualified 
 with Mr. Paine to ‘ look through Nature, up to Nature’s 
 God.’ Yet, the result of all his contemplation was, the 
 most confirmed and devout belief of all which the other 
 held in contempt, as despicable and drivelling superstition. 
 
 “ But this error might, perhaps, arise from a want of 
 due attention to the foundations of human judgment, and 
 the structure of that understanding which God has given 
 us for the investigation of truth.. 
 
 “Let that question be answered by Mr. Locke, who 
 was, to the highest pitch of devotion and adoration, a Chris- 
 tian. Mr. Locke, whose office was to detect the errors of 
 thinking, by going up to the fountains of thought, and 
 to direct into the proper track of reasoning the devious 
 mind of man, by shewing him its whole process, from the 
 first perceptions of sense to the last conclusions of ratioci- 
 nation ; putting a rein, besides, upon false opinion, by 
 practical rules for the conduct of human judgment. 
 
 “‘ But, these men were only deep thinkers, and lived in 
 their closets, unaccustomed to the traffic of the world, and 
 to the laws which practically regulate mankind ! 
 
 “Gentlemen ! in the place where we now sit to admi- 
 nister the justice of this great country, above a century 
 
 KF 2 
 
54 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 entire history of the Christian era be appealed 
 to as the proof, that the choicest spirits in each 
 age, since the days of the apostles, have been 
 
 the professed adherents of the gospel. Chris- 
 
 ago, the never-to-be-forgotten Sir Matthew Hale presided,— 
 whose faith in Christianity is an exalted commentary upon 
 its truth and reason, and whose life was a glorious example 
 of its fruits in man,—administering human justice, with a 
 wisdom and purity drawn from the pure fountain of the 
 Christian dispensation, which has been, and will be in all 
 ages, a subject of the highest reverence and admiration. 
 
 “‘ But it is said by the author, that the Christian fable 
 is but the tale of the more ancient superstitions of the 
 world, and may easily be detected by a proper understand- 
 ing of the mythologies of the heathen. 
 
 “‘ Did Milton understand those mythologies ? was he less 
 versed than Mr. Paine in the superstitions of the world ? 
 No: they were the subject of his immortal song ; and though 
 shut out from all recurrence to them, he poured them forth 
 from the stores of memory, rich with all that man ever 
 knew, and laid them in their order, as the illustration of 
 that exalted faith, the unquestionable source of that fervid 
 genius, which cast a sort of shade upon all the other works 
 of man. ‘The mysterious incarnation of our blessed Sa- 
 viour (which this work blasphemes in words so wholly 
 unfit for the mouth of a Christian, or for the ear of a 
 court of justice, that I dare not, and will not, give them 
 utterance), Milton made the grand conclusion of the 
 ‘¢ Paradise Lost,”—the rest from his finished labours,—and 
 the ultimate hope, expectation, and glory of the world. 
 
 ‘A virgin is His mother, but His sire 
 The Power of the Most High; he shall ascend 
 
 The throne hereditary, and bound His reign 
 With earth’s wide bounds, His glory with the heavens,’’’ 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. VO 
 
 tianity, then, has not been subjected to the humi- 
 liation of being only embraced by the weak and 
 ignorant of mankind; it has called forth the 
 plaudits of the greatest men that ever lived, and 
 has done more by its own simple energy to 
 augment the genius and to multiply the acquire- 
 ments of the race, than all other systems of reli- 
 gion and all other causes combined.* 
 
 But I ask again, what have been the moral qua- 
 lifications possessed by Christians to enable them 
 to decide upon the validity of their own hopes ? 
 Have they been men, in general, whose percep- 
 tions have been blunted and vitiated by an irre- 
 gular and profligate life? or has not the very 
 reverse of this been the case? If two persons 
 of equal intellect, but of extremely different 
 moral habits,—the one devout, consistent, bene- 
 volent; and the other proud, self-important, de- 
 voted to pleasure,—should set themselves to 
 _ * “Tf a map,” observes the present Bishop of Chester, 
 “could trace the real influence of the Gospel, it would also 
 delineate the proportion of intelligence and active virtue. 
 i The measure of spiritual knowledge is also the measure 
 
 of barbarism and of civilization, of mental stupidity, or 
 
 mental illumination.”—2Hvidences, Fourth Edition, 12mo, 
 pp- 427, 428. 
 
56 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 ascertain the truth or falsehood of any system 
 assuming to be a revelation from God—which 
 of the two parties might be expected to be the 
 more successful in the investigation, provided 
 that the assumed revelation were genuine? It 
 cannot surely be denied that the advantages in 
 favour of the man of correct moral feeling and 
 habit would be immense. Nor can it be main- 
 tained by any one in possession of sound reason, 
 that a wrong state of mind and character will 
 not materially influence the decisions of the un- 
 derstanding, in reference to moral truth. Upon 
 this principle it is that we enter our earnest 
 protest against the flimsy dogma of modern infi- 
 delity, that belief is, in all cases, a thing strictly 
 involuntary. On the contrary, we submit, that 
 in no case where belief is claimed on behalf of 
 moral truth, can it be yielded in a state of mind 
 fairly entitled to the appellation involuntary. 
 That can never be involuntary which may either 
 be prompted or retarded by the state of disposi- 
 tion. Nothing is more obvious than that men 
 may blind themselves to the light of truth, and 
 
 stumble, as in the dark, at noon day. But who 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 5 
 
 would say that that blindness is involuntary 
 which is the result of a man’s loving darkness 
 rather than light because his deeds are evil? 
 Upon a full and impartial review of the moral 
 character and habits of those who have truly 
 embraced Christianity, we are disposed to abide 
 by the conclusion, that their advantages for 
 reaching truth have been astonishingly great. 
 Compared with the leading advocates of Deism, 
 they stand on a lofty eminence, from which, 
 with a vision unclouded by the mists of prejudice 
 and crime, they can discern the moral beauty 
 and loveliness of that fair land which opens to 
 their view in the territory of revealed truth.* 
 If, then, the intellectual advantages of the 
 - Christian are fully equal to those of the infidel, and 
 if his moral advantages are far superior, to what 
 conclusion must such a fact conduct us? Why, 
 to this, that the Christian is much more likely to 
 
 be right in embracing the gospel, than the sceptic 
 
 * “Religion cannot exist,” said Sir Walter Scott, 
 “‘where mmorality prevails, any more than a light can 
 burn where the air is corrupted.” —Life of Napoleon, vol. i. 
 p. d4. 
 
58 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 is in rejecting it. His judgment is not less to be 
 respected, and his dispositions and habits are 
 more in accordance with the dictates of what 
 even natural conscience and pure deism would 
 pronounce to be right. And do we on this 
 account urge men to receive Christianity? By 
 no means. All we demand is, that they will 
 give it a fair hearing, and that they will look on 
 it with that respect which will dispose them to 
 weigh well its divine evidence, and not rashly to 
 dash from their parched lips the cup of salvation. 
 We ask not that men should believe because 
 others have believed; but that they would 
 honestly inquire whether believers or sceptics 
 are most worthy of imitation? The careful 
 investigation of this question will generate a state 
 of mind favourable to the claims of revelation, 
 and will prompt the reasonable desire that the 
 gospel may be true, 
 
 I may here premise, that no man was ever in 
 earnest to find out the truth of Christianity who — 
 did not make conscience of imploring God’s 
 direction and assistance in an inquiry upon which 
 
 so much depends. If Christianity be not a re- 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 59 
 
 velation from God, then has none ever been 
 vouchsafed to the children of men; and if none 
 has ever been vouchsafed, then are the whole 
 race sunk in gross darkness as to the character of 
 God, and the destinies of futurity. If chris- 
 tianity be a revelation from God, then is it trea- 
 son against Heaven to reject its evidence, or to 
 set light by the remedy which it prescribes for 
 our fallen and guilty nature. Under these cir- 
 cumstances, how necessary is it to ask of God 
 that he would lead us, his erring children, into 
 all truth, and that he would so far banish every 
 unholy prejudice that our minds may be open to 
 receive whatever bears upon it the stamp of a 
 celestial origin. It is a mournful fact that this 
 spirit of devotion seems an utter stranger to 
 almost all writers of the sceptical class. They 
 boast of their deism, and neglect one of its first 
 and simplest lessons,—viz., the duty of an intel- 
 ligent, but feeble and dependent creature seek- 
 ing counsel of the great and merciful Being 
 
 who formed him. 
 
60 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 SHEWING THAT THE EVIDENCE OF CHRISTIANITY IS 
 OF SUCH A NATURE THAT IT ADMITS OF BEING 
 BROUGHT HOME INDIVIDUALLY, WITH CONVINCING 
 
 POWER, TO EVERY MAN’S BOSOM. 
 
 Ir is never to be forgotten that. those who are 
 called to examine the divine pretensions of Chris- 
 tianity are the very persons interested in its 
 communications. ‘To man it distinctly makes 
 its appeal, and in him it proposes to effect that 
 mighty renovation of which it speaks. Should 
 it be true, then, to its own assumed character, it 
 will undoubtedly verify its several claims in the 
 personal consciousness of all its recipients. I 
 choose to begin here, because I am satisfied that 
 no man can sit down to investigate the truth of 
 his Bible, who does not stand in need of light on 
 the subjects of which it treats. Kvery man’s 
 
 conscience may suggest to him that he has 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 6] 
 
 offended against God, that he has violated, in 
 innumerable instances, his own sense of right 
 and wrong, and that there may be some fearful 
 retribution awaiting transgressors in another and 
 unknown state of existence. But whatever Rea- 
 son may surmise on these subjects, she has no 
 balm with which to soothe an anguished con- 
 science, no system of propitiation by which to 
 relieve a guilty and foreboding mind, no media- 
 tor between the offended Majesty of Heaven and 
 his erring creatures. It is Christianity alone 
 which opens up a door of hope to an apostate 
 race; every thing besides is utter conjecture. 
 Infidels may boast of the composure and satis- 
 faction they feel in contemplating the issues of 
 the present life ; but their exemption from anxious 
 dread is but one instance out of many in which 
 the voice of conscience is silenced by that spirit 
 of utter and reckless scepticism, which on the 
 one hand rejects a mass of well-authenticated 
 evidence, and on the other professes firm belief 
 and unshaken confidence in jts own dogmas, 
 without so much as a tittle of proof to support 
 them. . 
 
 G 
 
62 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 The man, then, who examines Christianity in 
 a right spirit, may expect to perceive, in its inti- 
 mate bearing on his own case, that it is of God. 
 If he is in that state of mind which is suitable to 
 a rational creature anxious to know the will of 
 God, he will find in Christianity what he can 
 discover no where else. Is he conscious of sin ? 
 it reveals to him its true character, traces it to 
 its source, and points to its consequences, Is he 
 the subject of legitimate dread and apprehension 
 in prospect of standing before an offended God? 
 +t tells him how his guilt may be effectually re- 
 moved, and how the peace of an accusing con- 
 science may be restored. Is he oppressed when- 
 ever he thinks of the divine purity, and contrasts 
 it with a nature ever prone to evil? it proposes 
 to subject him to a healing and remedial process, 
 by which moral health is to be restored to his 
 diseased soul, and by which he is to be taught to 
 delight in God, and to aspire after his likeness. 
 Is he mournfully sensible of the fact, that “ all is 
 vanity and vexation of spirit,’ and that nothing 
 under the sun can satisfy the desires of a mind 
 
 panting after immortality ? it opens up to his 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 63 
 
 view sources of never-ending delight, it brings 
 him to the very fountain of all happiness, it 
 shews him how his fondest expectations may be 
 realized, it tells him how to delight in God, and 
 how to draw near in acceptable worship to Him 
 whom angels adore, and before whom the spirits 
 of darkness flee in terror and dismay. 
 
 It becomes every man who sets himself to the 
 task of examining Christianity, to fix his attention 
 on the following momentous inquiry :—“Is this 
 professed revelation adapted to my actual neces- 
 sities? to my fears and hopes? to the circum- 
 stances by which I am surrounded? and to the 
 prospects which stretch before me?” If, upon 
 minute inquiry, it is found to be thus adapted to 
 our fallen state, it will surely carry along with it 
 a striking demonstration of its divine origin; and 
 if, upon actual experiment, we find that the recep- 
 tion of Christianity allays our guilty fears, gives 
 peace to our troubled consciences, quenches the 
 thirst of sin, inspires the hope of immortality, 
 supplies motives for patient endurance, and sheds 
 the lustre of moral loveliness and purity over 
 
 the character in whom it dwells, then may we 
 
64 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 assure ourselves of the source whence it sprung, 
 and then may we enter, with a full heart, into 
 the meaning of the beloved disciple when he 
 says, “ He that believeth on the Son of God hath 
 the witness in himself.”’* 
 
 «J think,” said the good and great Richard 
 Baxter, “ that in the hearing and reading of the 
 Bible, God’s spirit often so concurreth, as that 
 the will itself should be touched with an internal 
 gust and savour of the goodness contained in the 
 doctrine, and at the same time the understanding 
 with an internal irradiation, which breeds such 
 a certain apprehension of the verity of it, as 
 nature gives men of natural principles. And | 
 am persuaded that this, increased by more ex- 
 perience and love, doth hold most Christians 
 faster to Christ than naked reasonings could do. 
 And were it not for this, unlearned, ignorant 
 persons were still in danger of apostacy by every 
 
 subtle caviller that assaults them. And I be- 
 
 * John v. 10. See also a discourse, by the Author, on 
 ‘the Experimental Evidence of Christianity,” included in 
 2 volume lately published by ministers connected with the 
 Monthly Meeting, “ On the Evidences of Christianity.” 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 65 
 
 lieve that all true Christians have this kind of 
 internal knowledge from a suitableness of the 
 truth and goodness of the gospel to their now 
 quickened, illuminated, and sanctified souls.’’* 
 Let no one venture to reject Christianity, 
 then, who has never made it the subject of his 
 intense regard, in connexion with the exigencies 
 which press upon his own condition and _pros- 
 pects. It can be but ill understood by the man 
 who has never looked at it in its adaptation to 
 his own case. It is an individual, as well as a 
 general remedy ; and the true study of Christi- 
 anity is the examination of its coincidence with 
 the wants and wishes, the hopes and fears, which 
 press upon every son and daughter of Adam. 
 For the want of this close inspection of the indi- 
 vidual aim of Christianity, it is to be feared that 
 thousands either reject it, or are utterly in- 
 different to it. But how contrary is all this to 
 the spirit of true science, which rejects nothing, 
 
 and admits nothing but upon actual experiment. 
 
 * See Baxter’s reply to Lord Herbert, entitled “ More 
 Reasons for the Christian Religion,” 12mo. 1672, pp. 135, 
 136, 
 
 G2? 
 
66 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 Let Christianity be fairly put to the test—let 
 it be taken home with unhesitating confidence 
 to the heart—let its divine remedies be applied 
 to the distempered mind—let its proffered influ- 
 ence be implored—let its true character as a 
 restorative system be fully and impartially tried, 
 and then, should it after all fail to impart peace, 
 to heal the malady of the soul, to answer its 
 own professed designs, let it be held up to that 
 obloquy which it deserves. 
 
 But where is the man who ever betook him- 
 self to Christianity without finding it to be the 
 refuge of his weary mind? Who could ever, 
 upon actual trial, charge it with a lack of faith- 
 fulness to its own pretensions ? Who ever 
 embraced its animating hopes without finding 
 them productive of peace, and purity, and joy? 
 Who ever became a true Christian without feel- 
 ing the self-evidencing power of the gospel ? 
 Who ever believed on the Son of God without 
 having proof, in his own mind, that the Bible is 
 true? Who ever made actual trial of Christi- 
 anity without finding it to be the “ wisdom of 
 
 God, and the power of God,” to the salvation 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 67 
 
 of his soul? Who ever knew the truth as it is 
 in Jesus without being made free by it from the 
 thraldom of sin and the bondage of corruption ? 
 The man who is a genuine believer is as fully 
 conscious as he is of existence, that Christianity 
 is no cunningly devised fable. It has established 
 its throne in the deep-seated convictions of his 
 heart. He has felt the transformation it has 
 wrought: “old things are passed away; be- 
 hold, all things are become new.’’* His entire 
 character has been favourably affected by it. 
 Upon his once gloomy path it has shed the light 
 of immortality,—it has taught him to “ rejoice 
 even in tribulation,’+—it has changed all the 
 aspects of life, by throwing over them the hues 
 of eternity,—jt has conferred on him a reality of 
 happiness which the whole creation had no 
 power of imparting. In his own person he be- 
 holds a monument of the truth and excellence 
 of Christianity, which forbids him for ever to 
 doubt. By other evidences, indeed, his faith is 
 
 confirmed; but in his peace of mind, in that 
 
 * 2 Cor. v. 17. t Rom. v. 3—S, xii. 12. 
 
68 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 “ hope which is full of immortality,” and in the 
 heavenward bearing of his once earthly cha- 
 racter, he is enabled to feel that Christianity is 
 no “ cunningly devised fable.” 
 
 Having briefly looked at what may be re- 
 garded as the experimental evidence which Chris- 
 tianity is capable of planting in every man’s 
 bosom, we may now advance is other parts of 
 
 this momentous subject. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 69 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 CONTAINING A BRIEF SURVEY OF THOSE BRANCHES 
 OF EVIDENCE WHICH IT IS PROPER TO URGE UPON 
 THE ATTENTION OF THOSE WHO HAVE NOT AS YET 
 YIELDED UP THEIR MINDS TO THE DIVINE AU- 
 THORITY AND TRANSFORMING POWER OF THE 
 GOSPEL. 
 
 Some of those evidences may be traced in the 
 internal character of Christianity itself, and 
 others in those outward attestations by which 
 Divine Providence has demonstrated the fact of 
 its celestial origin. As I am fully convinced of 
 the self-verifying power of the religion of Jesus 
 Christ, I think it well to begin with the first of 
 these branches of evidence, that no one may, 
 with truth, imagine that we shrink from a 
 thorough investigation of the internal structure 
 
 and actual tendencies of our Holy Faith.* 
 
 * IT do not think, judging from the manner in which 
 infidels themselves have written, that the most successful 
 
70 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 SECTION I. 
 
 THE INTERNAL EVIDENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 Wuen the subject of internal evidence has at 
 any time deeply engaged my thoughts, I have 
 proposed to myself the following question :— 
 « What is the most wonderful, and at the same 
 time the most unaccountable, object which pre- 
 sents itself to our notice in a careful perusal of 
 the New Testament Scriptures?” This ques- 
 tion has always drawn forth one simple answer— 
 the character of Jesus of Nazareth. (n examin- 
 
 ing the internal evidence of Christianity, look— 
 
 method of assailing them is to begin with a discussion of 
 the external evidences of the gospel. From their general 
 ignorance of the character of Revelation itself, and from its 
 marked adaptation, when examined, to produce conviction 
 of its divine origin, I rather hesitate as to the propriety of 
 demanding the belief of a sceptic upon the mere presenta- 
 tion of its external credentials. Besides, there is scarcely 
 any object to be achieved by this mode of procedure, which 
 is not equally well answered by the method of arguing the 
 truth of scripture from an examination of its own contents. 
 Assuredly the divine authority of the heavenly messengers 
 may be verified as much by what they say, as by any other 
 circumstance whatsoever ; and if the real power of convic- 
 tion lies in their message, it seems but right to try its 
 
 efficacy. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 71 
 
 1. At the moral character of its Great Founder. 
 Let that character be fairly investigated, and I 
 am greatly mistaken if it will not breed a con- 
 viction that Christianity must be from heaven. 
 That such a person lived, and suffered, and died 
 in the land of Judea, is admitted equally by 
 heathen and Jewish writers, and requires no 
 formal proof, therefore, to establish the fact. 
 Josephus, Suetonius, ‘Tacitus, and Pliny the 
 Younger, place beyond all reasonable doubt the 
 fact of his existence, and the period of his life, 
 ministry, and death, 
 
 But what an object of astonishment and 
 wonder do we behold in “the man Christ 
 Jesus!” Trace the son of Mary and Joseph 
 from the manger at Bethlehem to the cross on 
 Calvary, and what a combination do you witness 
 of all that is innocent and pure and benevolent! 
 Here is wisdom the most profound in the ab- 
 sence of all the ordinary means of acquiring it. 
 Here is a Being in whom all the social and 
 relative affections are not only seen to advan- 
 tage, but in absolute perfection. Here are 
 
 humility and dignity perfectly combined ;—the 
 
Hire THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 loftiness of moral excellence, without a single 
 approximation to the feeling of contempt for 
 others. Here is a sanctity of character which 
 never yielded to a single temptation, and never 
 deviated from the path of rectitude in a single 
 instance, combined at the same time with a con- 
 descension and mercy which never spurned the 
 miserable, and never frowned on the trembling 
 penitent conscious of his guilt and pleading for 
 forgiveness. Here is one who never resented 
 an injury, and never forgot a kindness,—who 
 never thought of an enemy, but to bless him, or 
 of a faithless friend, but to pity and forgive him. 
 Here is one whose days were devoted to the 
 exercises of active benevolence, and whose 
 nights were spent in communion with his God,— 
 who sought no reward of all his generosity,—who 
 wept tears of anguish over the approaching fate 
 of those who persecuted him at every step of his 
 existence with unabating cruelty, — and who 
 spent his last breath in praying for his guilty and 
 relentless murderers. Whence such a character 
 as this? Was it from earth or heaven? If 
 
 from earth, then where can we look for its great 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 73 
 
 archetype? Not, surely, in the Gentile world ; 
 for it infinitely surpassed even the ideal models 
 which were laid down by the purest and most 
 enlightened of its philosophers. Not in the 
 Jewish world, for even its most cherished patri-° 
 archs were chargeable with innumerable imper- 
 fections; and in the days of Jesus of Nazareth, 
 the great body of the nation were peculiarly 
 degraded, both as it respected the acquirements 
 of the understanding, and the habits of the life 
 and conduct. Whence, then, this ‘mysterious 
 and wonderful personage—this Being so unlike 
 all the generations of men who had preceded 
 him or who have followed after him, yet clothed 
 in a human form, possessed of human sym- 
 pathies, and subject to human woes? No 
 wonder that Rousseau, in his exquisite and well- 
 known contrast between Socrates and Christ, 
 should feel himself constrained to remark, that 
 “the inventor of such a personage would bea 
 more astonishing character than the hero.?’*: « Is 
 
 it possible,” said he, speaking of the Bible and 
 
 * Works, vol. y. pp. 215218. 
 
 H 
 
74 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 of the character of Christ, “is it possible that a 
 book, at once so simple and sublime, should be 
 merely the work of man? Is it possible that 
 the sacred personage, whose history it contains, 
 should himself be a mere man? Do we find 
 that he assumed the tone of an enthusiast or 
 ambitious sectary? What sweetness, what 
 purity in his manner! What an affecting 
 gracefulness in his delivery ! What sublimity 
 in his maxims! What profound wisdom in his 
 discourses! What presence of mind, what sub- 
 limity, what truth in his replies! How great 
 the command over his passions! Where is the 
 man, where is the philosopher, who could so 
 live and so die without weakness and with- 
 out ostentation? When. Plato described his 
 imaginary good man, loaded with all the shame 
 of guilt, yet meriting the highest rewards of 
 virtue, he described exactly the character of 
 Jesus Christ: the resemblance was so striking 
 that all the fathers perceived it.”” Yet this was 
 the strange and unhappy man who, through the 
 wickedness and pride of his heart, declared, “I 
 
 cannot believe the gospel.” 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 75 
 
 Upon no correct or reasonable supposition 
 whatever but that the Lord Jesus was the very 
 person he assumed to be, the person whom the 
 Christian Scriptures describe him to be, viz., 
 the Messiah of the Church, and “ God manifest 
 in the flesh,” can we account for the solitary 
 
 and awful grandeur* of a character “holy, 
 
 * Bishop Sherlock, in contrasting the character of Jesus 
 Christ with that of Mahomet, has, in one of the most beauti- 
 ful personifications in our language, finely touched the argu- 
 ment for the truth of Christianity here contended for. “Go,” 
 says he, “to your Natural Religion; lay before her Mahomet 
 and his disciples arrayed in armour and in blood, riding in 
 triumph over the spoils of thousands and tens of thousands 
 whofell by his victorious sword; shew her the cities which he 
 set in flames, the countries which he ravaged and destroyed, 
 and the miserable distress of all the inhabitants of the earth. 
 When she has viewed him in this scene, carry him into his 
 retirements. Shew her the prophet’s chamber, his concu- 
 bines and wives; let her see his adultery, and hear him 
 allege revelation and his divine commission to justify his 
 lust and his oppression. 
 
 “When she is tired with this prospect, then shew her 
 the blessed Jesus, humble and meek, doing good to all the 
 sons of men, patiently instructing both the ignorant and 
 perverse ; let her see him in his most retired privacy ; let 
 her follow him to the mountain, and hear his devotions and 
 supplications to God. Carry her to his table to see his poor 
 fare, and hear his heavenly discourse. Let her see him 
 injured, but not provoked ; let her attend him to the tri- 
 bunals, and consider the patience with which he endured 
 the scoffs and reproaches of his enemies. Lead her to his 
 
76 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and 
 made higher than the heavens,’’* “who did no 
 sin,’’+ and “who knew no sin.’’+ 
 
 The Rev. Cuartes Bripess, in his excellent 
 Memoir of Miss M. I. Graham, (and which 
 I take the liberty of strongly recommending 
 to the notice of the young,) who had been con- 
 siderably tinctured with infidelity, states that 
 the character of Christ, as a proof of the cre- 
 dibility of the Christian revelation, arrested her 
 peculiar attention. A minute scrutiny of his 
 spotless life was most satisfactory in its result. 
 “The more,” said she, “I studied this divine 
 character,—the more I grew up, as it were, into 
 its simplicity and holiness, the more my under- 
 
 standing was enabled to shake off those slavish 
 
 cross, and let her view him in the agony of death, and hear 
 his last prayer for his persecutors—‘ Father, forgive them, 
 for they know not what they do.’ 
 
 _“ When Natural Religion has viewed both, ask—which is 
 the prophet of God? But her answer we have already had 
 when she saw part of this scene through the eyes of the cen- 
 turion who attended at the cross; by him she spake and 
 said, ‘ Truly this man was the Son of God.’”—See Sher- 
 lock’s Sermons. 
 
 * Heb. vii. 26. + 1 Pet. ri. 22. $82 (Cores 2k. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. aE 
 
 and sinful prejudices which had hindered me 
 from appreciating its excellence. Truly, his 
 words were dearer to me than my necessary 
 food. He was my ‘Allin All.’ I did not want 
 to have any knowledge, goodness, or strength, 
 independently of him. I had rather be <ac- 
 cepted in the Beloved,’ than received (had that 
 been possible) upon the score of my own merits. 
 I had rather walk leaning upon his arm than 
 have a stock of strength given me to perform 
 the journey alone. To learn, as a fool, of 
 Christ,—this was better to me than to have the 
 knowledge of an angel to find out things myself. 
 
 “ From that moment,” she adds, “I ceased to 
 stumble at the doctrines of the cross, The 
 doctrines of Scripture, which had before ap- 
 peared to me an inexplicable mass of confusion 
 and contradictions, were now written on my 
 understanding with the clearness of a sun-beam. 
 Above all, that once abhorred doctrine of the 
 Divinity of Christ was become exceeding pre- 
 cious to me. The external evidences of Chris- 
 tianity, though I now perceived all their force, 
 were no longer necessary to my conviction. 
 
 H 2 
 
73 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 From that time,” she concludes, “I have con- 
 tinued to ‘sit at the feet of Jesus, and to hear his 
 word,’ taking him for my teacher and guide 
 in things temporal as well as spiritual. He has 
 found in me a disciple so slow of comprehen- 
 ‘sion, so prone to forget his lessons, and to act in 
 opposition to his commands, that were he not 
 infinitely ‘meek and lowly of heart,’ he would 
 long ago have cast me off in anger, but he still 
 continues to bear with me, and to give me ‘line 
 upon line, and precept upon precept ; and I am 
 certain that he «will never leave me, nor forsake 
 me,’ for though I am variable and inconsistent, 
 ‘with Him there is no variableness, neither sha- 
 dow of turning.’.’’* 
 
 Such was the effect produced upon this intel- 
 ligent lady’s mind by an examination of the 
 moral character of the Lord Jesus, and I am 
 satisfied that a similar result will follow in every 
 instance. the adoption of the same course. At 
 least we do claim from infidels, if they will still 
 
 continue to reject the truth, that they furnish us, 
 
 * Page 17—19. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 79 
 
 upon their own principles, with some reasonable 
 account of the source whence sprung the ineffa- 
 ble purity and benevolence of the Son of God. 
 Till they have accounted for his unequalled cha- 
 racter they are chargeable with the utmost levity 
 and irrationality in persisting in their unbelief.* 
 
 2. Contemplate, as another internal evidence 
 of the divine origin of Christianity, the unrivalled 
 sublimity of its diction. 
 
 Compared with the rich treasures of the Old 
 and New Testament Scriptures, all other compo- 
 sitions must retire into the shade. Rousseau must 
 have felt this conviction most powerfully. when 
 he made the following reluctant but important 
 concession :—“ I will confess,” said he, “ that 
 the majesty of the Scriptures strikes me with 
 admiration, as the purity of the gospel hath its 
 influence upon my heart. Peruse the works of 
 
 our philosophers with all their pomp of diction ; 
 
 * See a very able Discourse on the Character of Christ, 
 as an evidence of the Christian Religion, by the Rev. W. 
 Walford, in a volume lately published by the Independent 
 ministers of London on the Evidences of Christianity. See 
 also the present Bishop of Calcutta’s Seventeenth Lecture 
 on the Evidences, &e. 
 
80 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 how mean, how contemptible are they, compared 
 with the Scriptures !”’ 
 
 The opinion of Rousseau is confirmed by that 
 of men vastly his superiors in learning and virtue. 
 Sir William Jones, than whom few of the human 
 race have been distinguished by a more laudable 
 thirst after knowledge, has penned the following 
 striking, but just eulogium, on the style and man- 
 ner of the sacred writers :—“ The collection of 
 tracts which we call, from their excellence, The 
 Scriptures, contain, independently of a divine 
 origin, more true sublimity, more exquisite 
 beauty, purer morality, more important history, 
 and finer strains of poetry and eloquence, than 
 could be collected within the same compass from 
 all other books that were ever composed in any 
 age or in any idiom. The two parts of which 
 the Scriptures consist are connected by a chain 
 of compositions which bear no resemblance in 
 form or style to any that can be produced from 
 the stores of Grecian, Indian, Persian, or even 
 Arabian learning. The antiquity of those com- 
 positions no man doubts, and the unstrained ap- 
 
 plication of them to events long subsequent to 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY, Sl 
 
 their publication, is a solid ground of belief that 
 they are genuine predictions, and consequently 
 inspired,” 
 
 The celebrated Mr. Addison, in discoursing on 
 the same subject, says, “ After perusing the book 
 of Psalms, let a judge of the beauties of poetry 
 read a literal translation of Horace or Pindar, 
 and he will find. in these two last such an 
 absurdity and confusion of style, with such a 
 comparative poverty of imagination, as will make 
 him sensible of the vast superiority of Scripture 
 style.” 
 
 If we examine carefully the pathetic story of 
 Joseph and his brethren ;. the songs of Moses at 
 the Red Sea, and on the borders of the promised 
 land; the sublime narrative of the giving of the 
 Law from Mount Sinai; the celebrated prophecy 
 of Balaam; the prayer of Solomon at the dedi- 
 cation of the Temple; the visions of the Jewish 
 prophets, particularly those of Isaiah; the odes 
 of Jesse’s son; the matchless sermon on the 
 Mount; the public appeals of the apostles before 
 heathen tribunals; and the mystic symbols of 
 
 the Apocalypse, we cannot but be struck and 
 
82 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 awed with the unrivalled diction, the surpassing 
 imagery, and the lofty conceptions of the inspired 
 writers. Let all the other books of antiquity be 
 produced; let the classic page disclose its richest 
 stores; let the entire mass of apocryphal writings 
 undergo the strictest scrutiny; let Egypt, and 
 Greece, and Arabia bring forth the proudest 
 monuments of their genius; let the most dazzling 
 passages of the Koran be separated from the 
 mass of its absurdities; let all ages and all 
 nations vie with the writers of the Jewish and 
 Christian Scriptures, and it will be seen, by a 
 judge of the most inferior grade, that no argu- 
 ment can be held for a single moment as to the 
 comparative grandeur of the book commonly 
 called the bible, that it throws the whole round 
 of other productions into the shade, and that it 
 is written altogether in a style and manner which 
 admits of no successful rival or counterfeit. 
 Now, what is the force of this particular 
 argument? Why, the bible was written by the 
 posterity of Abraham—a people proverbial for 
 their destitution of all mental refinement, and 
 
 who, in their secular history, have displayed a 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 83 
 
 marked inferiority to all the other nations of 
 antiquity. The conclusion then is, if the wonder- 
 ful volume known by the name of the bible was 
 verily the production of several Jews, who lived 
 in different ages of the world, they must have 
 written under a direction and an impulse more 
 than human—they must have written under the 
 guidance of that Spirit, to whom they themselves 
 trace their loftiest and humblest inspirations. I 
 feel that this conclusion is sound and rational. 
 Try the bible by any other Jewish production of 
 any age whatsoever, try it by any work that has 
 ever emanated from the pen or the genius of 
 man, and the feeling must resistlessly take 
 possession of the mind, that the words which 
 God speaks, “ They are spirit, and they are life.’** 
 Unlike every other document that has been 
 handed down from a remote antiquity, the 
 volume of inspiration carries along with it, in 
 the unutterable dignity and sublimity which 
 pervade all its parts, an evidence of the source 
 
 whence it sprung,—an evidence which could not 
 
 * John vi. 63. 
 
84 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 fail to strike the mind even of an untutored 
 savage, who might meet with it accidentally in 
 some vast desert, and who had no living teacher 
 to unfold to him the character or merciful designs 
 of the God whom it reveals. How can men of 
 taste, and genius, and literature, remain blind to 
 this argument! The very poetry, the lofty and 
 well sustained imagery, the unparalleled diction 
 of the sacred volume, will rise up in judgment 
 against them, inasmuch as their dislike to the 
 truths of revelation has led many of them to 
 overlook qualities which would have commanded 
 their profoundest veneration had they been able 
 to discern them in a single uninspired produc- 
 tion. It may be added here, that the few 
 infidels who have written in commendation of 
 the style of the inspired writers have totally 
 neglected to account for the commanding and 
 indubitable superiority .of the Scriptures to all 
 other compositions. Upon any hypothesis but 
 that: of their divine origin the attempt must 
 utterly fail. My only wish is, that intelligent 
 men would make the honest effort to satisfy 
 
 their own convictions that the bible might have 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY, 85 
 
 been written by such persons as the Jewish 
 patriarchs and the Fishermen of Galilee, without 
 any divine afflatus; when such an attempt has 
 been made by them, I am satisfied that, whether 
 they are led to embrace the Holy Scriptures as 
 the word of God or not, they will be compelled 
 to admit the fact that, wpon all the canons of 
 literary criticism ever admitted, there is nothing 
 whatever to warrant the idea that the bible has 
 been furnished to mankind in the same way, and 
 on the same principles as other documents of a 
 remote antiquity. When men are brought thus 
 far there is great reason to hope that they will 
 look with some measure of devoutness and 
 integrity at the whole question of Christian 
 evidence. 
 
 3. Let the high standard of the morality of 
 Christianity be examined with impartiality, and 
 it cannot fail to arouse attention to its extraordi- 
 nary claims. For though the uncompromising 
 sanctity of revealed truth is among the chief 
 reasons which induce men to cavil at its 
 evidence, and secretly to reject its authority, 
 it is, nevertheless, one of the most powertul 
 
 I 
 
86 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 and indubitable proofs of its proceeding from 
 the fountain of infinite purity and benevo- 
 lence,% 
 
 On this subject the celebrated John Locke 
 has said, “The morality of the gospel doth so far 
 excel that of all other books, that to give a man 
 full knowledge of true morality, I would send 
 him to no other book than the New Testament.” 
 And, verily, if we examine all the writings of the 
 most enlightened and virtuous of the heathen 
 world, and compare or rather contrast them with 
 the writings of inspiration, we shall be fully 
 satisfied of the accuracy of this great man’s 
 opinion. ‘That there are fine passages on certain 
 branches of morals, in some of the writings of 
 pagan philosophers and poets, we do not attempt 
 to deny; but the great question is, what were 
 their writings as a whole, and what were the 
 _ views of morality generally entertained and acted 
 
 upon among their disciples? Is it not notorious 
 
 * Lord Bolingbroke himself has said, that “ The gospel 
 is in all cases one continued lesson of the strictest mo- 
 rality, of justice, of benevolence, and of universal charity.” 
 Works, vol. v. p. 138. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 87 
 
 that self-murder,* that crimes which admit of 
 no description,t that theft, that sacrilege, that 
 fornication, that adultery,t that revenge, that 
 pride, that dissimulation in the worship of the 
 gods,§ that habitual disregard of the duty of 
 prayer,|| and that awful irreverence for the name 
 of the Great Supreme, are taught, with an un- 
 blushing effrontery, by some of the chief patrons 
 and guardians of pagan morality? Who does 
 
 not know that some of the most brilliant passages, 
 
 * Seneca thus pleads for self-murder: “If thy mind be 
 melancholy and in misery, thou mayst put a period to this 
 wretched condition ; wherever thou lookest, there is an end 
 to it. See that precipice! there thou mayest have liberty. 
 Seest thou that sea, that river, that well ? liberty is at the 
 bottom of it; that little tree? freedom hangs upon it. 
 Thy own neck, thy own throat, may be a refuge to thee 
 from such servitude; yea, every vein of thy body.” Deira, 
 lib. iii. cap. 15. p. m. 319. Plutarch, and Cato, and Brutus, 
 and Cassius, and Cicero, all agree to justify the crime of 
 self-destruction. See Plutarch’s Life of Cato. 
 
 + Juvenal, Satyr ii. ver. 10. -Diog. Laértus, vol. i. pp- 
 m. 165, 166. 
 
 { Millar’s History of the Propagation of Christianity, 
 vol. i. pp. 63—65. 
 
 § Epictetus bids his disciples « temporise and worship 
 the gods after the fashion of their country.” Enchiridion, 
 cap. 38. p. m. 56. See A. Fuller’s Works, vol. i. p. 37. 
 
 || Pythagoras forbids prayer to God, “because,” says he, 
 “ you know not what is convenient,” 
 
88 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCK. 
 
 both of the Greek and Latin classics, cannot be 
 read by ingenuous youth without involving the 
 risk of a total downfal of their morals?* We 
 shall find no counterpart, indeed, to the writings 
 of heathen antiquity, unless we turn to the 
 licentious and utterly reckless productions of 
 modern infidelity, in which every thing like dis- 
 guise is laid aside, and men are taught to do, 
 without restraint, whatever their own vile incli- 
 nations may dictate. 
 
 How unlike the imperfect and often polluted 
 writings of men is the system of morality laid 
 down and detailed in the several books of the 
 Old and New Testament! Let any man devote 
 a reasonable period to the examination of the 
 spirit and moral precepts of Christianity, and he 
 will be compelled to admit its unsullied purity, 
 its coincidence with all our natural notions of 
 right and wrong, and its indubitable tendency to 
 improve human intercourse, and to constitute 
 
 mankind a community of brothers. Did all men 
 
 * Ts it not a heavy disgrace that in Christian countries 
 so much of the time of youth should be spent poring over 
 the vitiated pages of the ancient classics. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 89 
 
 believe and obey the dictates of Revelation, what 
 a mighty and favourable revolution would be 
 wrought in the entire frame-work of society ! 
 What habit of known eyil does it not proscribe ? 
 What irregular passion does it not forbid ? 
 What acknowledged virtue does it not enforce ? 
 What kindly or generous affection does it not 
 inculcate ? How lofty is its standard of action! 
 Though self-interest is not and cannot be ex- 
 cluded from a system so adapted to the nature of 
 man, yet it is only permitted to occupy a subor- 
 dinate place in the morality of the gospel. There 
 men are urged to endure and act “as seeing Him 
 who is invisible ;’’* there we are commanded to 
 do no act of beneficence to be seen of men Ss 
 there the honour of God and the good of others 
 are the objects at which they are called habitually 
 to aim;} there the surface morality of the world is 
 treated with scorn, and a right state of the thoughts 
 and affections is imperatively demanded;§ there 
 
 meekness, and humility, and condescension, 
 
 * Heb. xi. 27. + Matt. vi, 1—<4, 
 { Matt. xxii. 35—40. Luke x. 27, 
 § Matt. xv. 19. xxiii, 2527. 
 
 ew 
 
90 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 are represented as the true path to greatness ;* 
 there haughtiness and pride are associated with all 
 that is mean and worthless ;+ there an assuming 
 and lofty air is forbidden even in the ordinary 
 intercourses of social life ;¢ there covetousness is 
 ‘branded as idolatry,§ hatred as murder,|| and 
 hidden lust as adultery ;4] there every species of 
 resentment is absolutely prohibited ;** there the 
 refusal to forgive an injury is described as an 
 effectual barrier in the way of the exercise of 
 divine mercy ;t+ there all detraction, all back- 
 biting, all evil speaking, all envy, all malice, all 
 circumvention, are shewn to be inconsistent with 
 the hope of eternal life, and the state of accept- 
 ance through a Redeemer.++ 
 
 There is indeed one grand peculiarity belong- 
 ing to the morality of Christianity, which dis- 
 tinguishes it from that of every other system, 
 
 viz.—the sublime and all-subduing character of its 
 
 * Matt. xxiii. 6. 
 
 + Mark xii. 388—40. Luke xx. 46. 
 
 ¢ Luke xiv. 7—11. § Col. iii. 5. 
 
 || Matt. v. 21—26. 1 John iii. 15. 
 
 q Matt. xxiii. 28. 
 ** Matt. v. 388—42. Rom. xii. 17—2]. 
 +t Matt. vi; 14, 15. ttl Pet i. 13. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 9] 
 
 motives. Many useful virtues were enjoined by 
 the Gentile philosophers, but they had no para- 
 mount considerations by which to ensure obe- 
 dience to their own precepts; they had no moral 
 engine of sufficient power to urge a sinful race 
 onward in the path of obedience. Hence their 
 code of morals was almost a dead letter, little 
 regarded by themselves, and totally overlooked 
 by the mass. But who can glance for a moment 
 at the morality of the Bible without coming into 
 contact with those mighty and heart-stirring 
 considerations which are fitted to rouse all the 
 sensibilities of human nature, and to subdue into 
 willing and grateful obedience the most stubborn 
 and rebellious of the race? Let the following 
 examples of the class of motives referred to 
 suffice :— “Herein is love, not that we loved 
 God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to 
 be the propitiation for our sins.”* « Let all 
 bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, 
 and evil-speaking, be put away from you, with 
 
 all malice: and be ye kind one to another, ten- 
 
 * 1 John iv. 10. 
 
92 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 der-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God 
 for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.’’* “Come 
 out from among them, and be ye separate, saith 
 the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and 
 I will receive you, and will be a father unto 
 you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, 
 saith the Lord Almighty.’’+ ‘God so loved the 
 world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that 
 whosoever believeth in him should not perish, 
 but have everlasting life.’+ ‘Beloved, if God 
 so loved us, we ought to love one another.’’§ 
 “ Let nothing be done through strife or vain- 
 glory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem 
 other better than themselves.’’|| Ye are 
 bought with a price, therefore glorify God in 
 your body and in your spirit, which are his.’ 
 ‘“ The love of Christ constraineth us; because 
 we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were 
 all dead: and that he died for all, that they 
 
 which live should not henceforth live unto them- 
 
 * Eph. iv. 31. 
 
 pi icor. vie 17. ¢ John iii. 16. 
 $ 1 John iy. 11. 
 
 || Philip. ii. 3. q 1 Cor. vi. 20. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 93 
 
 selves, but unto him that died for them and that 
 rose again.* 
 
 How mean and poverty-stricken are the mo- 
 tives of all other systems when compared with the 
 religion of Christ Jesus! A book which founds 
 its code of morals upon such considerations can 
 never surely be the production of man. In 
 the wide range of his efforts there is nothing 
 analagous. ‘The fair inference, therefore, is, that 
 a greater than man speaks to us in the living 
 oracles, | 
 
 It may be safely affirmed, that if Christianity 
 were cordially embraced as the religion of man- 
 kind, it would renovate the entire fabric of society. 
 It is impossible for any one to say advisedly, 
 or with truth, that one immoral habit, or one 
 irregular thought or desire, receives a sanction 
 from the writings of Christ and his apostles. 
 The Christian may often have reason, through 
 the infirmity and corruption of his fallen 
 nature, to blush on account of the very imperfect 
 
 manner in which he acts out his great principles ; 
 
 ¥ 2 Cortv. 14. 
 
94 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 he may often have occasion to mourn that in 
 him the religion of Jesus has such an unworthy 
 representative ; but he can at all times refer with 
 exultation and triumph to the glorious charter of 
 his hopes ; and while he sees that « the wicked- 
 ness of man upon earth is great,” he may un- 
 hesitatingly assure himself that the total neglect 
 or but partial reception of Christianity is the sole 
 cause of the crime and wretchedness which 
 abound. ‘The enemies of revelation themselves 
 being judges, what can they predicate of its pro- 
 bable tendency on the race but unmixed good ? 
 Must they not own that all the moral evil which 
 abounds in the earth is in direct violation of the 
 doctrines and precepts of revealed truth? Must 
 they not, however reluctantly, concede, that the 
 principles of deism are feeble and powerless as a 
 system of moral renovation, compared with the 
 high and holy dictates of the Gospel? Who 
 does not perceive that if a time should ever 
 arrive when all men shall give heed to the 
 words of Christ, that that will be the precise 
 period of the world’s deliverance from the cruel 
 
 vassalage of sin? “Men would then,” to use 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 95 
 
 the words of an eminent divine, « universally do 
 justice, speak truth, shew mercy, exercise mutual 
 forgiveness, follow after peace, bridle their appe- 
 tites and passions, and lead sober, righteous, and 
 godly lives. Murders, wars, bitter contentions, 
 cruel oppressions, and unrestrained licentiousness, 
 would no more desolate the world, and fill it 
 with misery ; but righteousness, goodness, and 
 truth would bless the earth with a felicity ex- 
 ceeding all our present conceptions. This is, no 
 doubt, the direct tendency of the scriptural doc- 
 trines, precepts, motives, and promises : nothing 
 is wanting to remedy the state of the world, and 
 to fit men for the worship and felicity of heaven, 
 but that they should believe and obey the Bible. 
 And if many enormous crimes have been com- 
 mitted under the colour of zeal for Christianity, 
 this only proves the depravity of man’s heart; 
 for the Scripture, soberly understood, most ex- 
 pressly forbids such practices; and men do not 
 act thus because they duly regard the Bible, but 
 because they will not believe and obey it.’’* 
 
 * See Scott’s Kissays, vol. ii, of his works, p, 21. 
 
96 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 Now the argument for the divine origin of 
 Christianity arising from its transcendent mo- 
 rality, may be viewed in various lights. In the 
 first place, how comes it to pass, that of all the 
 religions which have sought to obtain the suffrages 
 of mankind, that of Jesus of Nazareth is incom- 
 parably the most pure and benevolent in its 
 tendency ? How comes it to pass, moreover, 
 that among a rude people, such as were the 
 Jews, there should have arisen a system of faith 
 and worship, which, for grandeur of conception 
 and sanctity of character, outstrips all the other 
 records of time? Is there not in this very cir- 
 cumstance a presumption of the highest order in 
 favour of the divine origin of Christianity ? 
 
 But supposing, in the second place, that the 
 apostles of our Lord were chargeable with the 
 crime of dexterously imposing a false religion 
 upon mankind, how happens it that they set 
 themselves with such zeal and ardour to oppose 
 the prejudices and preconceived notions of their 
 | countrymen ? How happens it that they took the 
 very method the least likely to conciliate their 
 
 good opinion, and to secure their hearty ap- 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 97 
 
 proval? How happens it that in their system 
 of morality they not only struck a death blow at 
 the pride and hypocrisy of their own nation, but 
 insisted on a purity of heart and life which they 
 knew must expose them to the hatred and de- 
 rision of all mankind? Upon a mere human 
 calculation they adopted a method which could 
 only issue in a perfect failure. Had they flat- 
 tered the depravity of man; had they introduced 
 a scheme which winked at any of his corruptions ; 
 had they imitated the subsequent conduct of the 
 False Prophet; had they promised to their dis- 
 ciples a life of ease and sensual indulgence; had 
 they exhibited in their own history an exemption 
 from poverty, reproach, persecution, and death ; 
 in a word, had there been any one thing in the 
 scheme of doctrine they taught to secure the 
 esteem and to call forth the approbation of a 
 corrupt and vitiated state of society, we might 
 then have been left to suspect that they had 
 artfully constructed a system to suit the depraved 
 taste of mankind, and to raise themselves to 
 notoriety by pandering to the vices of human 
 nature. But when the very reverse of this is the 
 
 KK 
 
98 THE TRUTH AN EXCELLENCE 
 
 case; when the morality of the Gospel is so 
 lofty and unbending as to surrender none of its 
 claims to meet the prejudices either of Jews or 
 Gentiles ; when it is so pre-eminent as to stand 
 forth, in solitary grandeur, amidst the religions 
 of all ages and all nations; when it is found to 
 embody every quality which is fitted to diffuse 
 peace, and justice, and benevolence among man- 
 mankind; when it is impossible to detect in it 
 a single precept which would not elevate the 
 character of man and augment all his personal 
 and relative enjoyments, what ought any thought- 
 
 2 
 
 but that it is the offspring of the Fountain of all 
 
 ful or considerate mind to conclude respecting it 
 
 Purity, and that it has been vouchsafed by Him 
 in mercy to heal the distempers and redress the 
 miseries of our fallen race ? 
 
 I conclude this chapter in the words of one 
 who cannot be suspected of any undue partiality 
 to the Christian faith, of one who, unhappily for 
 himself, did not allow the convictions of his 
 judgment to rule his decisions or to form his 
 character :— 
 
 “The Gospel, that divine book, the only one 
 
 a 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 99 
 
 necessary to a Christian, and the most useful of 
 all to the man who may not be one, only re- 
 quires reflection upon it, to impress the mind 
 with love for its author, and resolution to fulfil 
 his precepts. Virtue never spoke in gentler 
 terms; the profoundest wisdom was never ut- 
 tered with greater energy, or more simplicity. 
 It is impossible to rise from the reading of it 
 without a feeling of moral improvement. Look 
 at the books of the philosophers, with all their 
 pomp ; how little they are compared with this ! 
 Shall we say that the history of the Gospel is a 
 pure fiction? This is not the style of fiction; 
 and the history of Socrates, which nobody 
 doubts, rests upon less evidence than that of 
 Jesus Christ. After all, this is but shifting the 
 difficulty; not answering it. The supposi- 
 tion, that several persons had united to fabri- 
 cate this book, is more inconceivable than that 
 one person should have supplied the subject of it. 
 The spirit which it breathes, the morality which 
 it inculcates, could never have been the inven- 
 tion of Jewish authors; and the gospel pos- 
 
 sesses characters of truth so striking, so perfectly 
 
100 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 inimitable, that the inventor would be a more 
 astonishing object than the hero.’’* 
 
 Let attention be devoted— 
 
 4. To the coincidence of Christianity with the 
 
 character of God, and the actual condition of man.’’+ 
 
 * J. J. Rousseau, vol. xxxvi. of his works, p. 36, Ed. 
 Paris, 1788—1793. 
 
 “ L’évangile, ce divin livre, le seul nécessaire a un chré- 
 tien, et le plus utile de tous a quiconque ne le serait pas, 
 n’a besoin que d’étre médité pour porter dans ame 
 Yamour de son auteur, et la volonté d’accomplir ses pré- 
 ceptes. Jamais la vertu n’a parlé un si doux langage ; 
 jamais la plus profonde sagesse ne s’est exprimée avec tant 
 d’energie et de simplicité. On n’en quitte point la lecture 
 sans se sentir meilleur qu’auparavant. Voyez les livres des 
 philosophes avec toute leur pompe: qu’ils sont petits auprés 
 de celui-la! Dirons nous que Vhistoire de l’évangile est in- 
 ventée a plaisir ? Ce n’est pas ainsi qu’on invente ; et les faits 
 de Socrate, dont personne ne doute, sont moins attestés que 
 ceux de Jesus Christ. Au fond, c’est reculer la difficulté 
 sans la détruire. TI seroit plus inconcevable que plusieurs 
 hommes d’accord eussent fabriqué ce livre, qu'il ne Vest 
 quwun seul en ait fourni le sujet. Jamais les auteurs Juiss 
 n’eussent trouvé ni ce ton ni cette morale ; et l’évangile a 
 des caractéres de vérité si frappans, si parfaitement inimi- 
 tables, que l’inventeur en seroit plus étonnant que le 
 héros.”—See Dr. J. P. Smith’s admirable answer to a 
 printed paper entitled “‘ Manifesto of the Christian Hvi- 
 dence Society.” 
 
 + The Author is greatly indebted, in this part of his 
 essay, to a work entitled “ Remarks on the Internal Evi- 
 dence for the Truth of Revealed Religion.” By Thomas 
 Erskine, Esq., Advocate. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 101 
 
 There is a marked tendency in the human 
 mind to trace results to some adequate cause. 
 Hence our dissatisfaction in the mere perception 
 of facts which, in our present state of knowledge, 
 we cannot account for; and hence also the rest- 
 less effort made by us to discover some principle of 
 causation sufficient to produce the phenomena 
 beheld. The revolutions of the heavenly bodies 
 must impress every one endowed with reason 
 that there is some mighty impulse to which 
 they are all obedient ; and the feeling we have 
 of the existence of such an impulse has roused 
 that inquiry into the laws of the material uni- 
 verse which has led to all the discoveries of 
 modern science, and which has enabled us to 
 trace, in the one pervading law of gravitation, 
 the reason of certain revolutions and appear- 
 ances, which without such an application of the 
 human faculties must have been hid in perpetual 
 obscurity. 
 
 Nor is the tendency in man to reason from 
 effects to causes the only one discoverable in the 
 examination of what may be called his mental 
 instincts. It is obvious that he is equally prone 
 
 KZ 
 
102 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 to reason from causes to effects; so that when 
 he has satisfied himself as to the existence of a 
 particular cause, and has acquired some know- 
 ledge of the mode in which it operates, he is 
 prepared to concede that other effects may be 
 attributed to it besides those which he has 
 already discovered, provided they are in no 
 way inconsistent with the facts and relations 
 now perceived. 
 
 Now, the tendencies thus described will be 
 found equally to manifest themselves in refer- 
 ence to mental and moral science, as in reference 
 to the phenomena of the material universe. It 
 is to these laws of our nature that we are in- 
 debted for many of those inductions by which 
 we are enabled to judge of the characters and 
 actions of men, and to predicate what may or 
 may not be reasonable to anticipate in certain 
 given circumstances. 
 
 Apply these general principles to the investi- 
 gation of the subject in hand. The Bible is a 
 book professing to come from heaven. Is it, 
 then, a communication possessing anything in 
 
 common with our ordinary’ associations? or is it 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 103 
 
 a book so entirely new as to furnish us with no 
 means of judging of it by the exercise of that 
 ordinary tendency of our nature which leads us 
 to judge of causes by their effects, and of effects 
 by their causes? The slightest examination of 
 the Christian scheme will convince any impar- 
 tial mind that the view of the divine character 
 and government which it presents is in strictest 
 harmony with what may be dednced from the 
 survey of nature, the phenomena of divine pro- 
 vidence, and the dictates of natural conscience. 
 The particular modifications of divine perfection 
 which are seen displayed in the pages of revela- 
 tion may be to a great extent new, but the great 
 question is,—Are not these modifications such as 
 to fall in and harmonize with all that the reason 
 of man would suggest to him, as suited to the cha- 
 racter of God and the condition of human nature ? 
 I am satisfied that the discoveries of the Bible, 
 though so transcendently glorious, are, in their 
 great outline, answerable to all our natural con- 
 ceptions of the Most High, as the supreme moral 
 governor. 
 
 Two things seem necessary to authenticate 
 
104 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 a religion as coming from God,—first, that the 
 facts and representations which it contains should 
 be such as to exhibit all that is lofty in wisdom, 
 mighty in power, awful in purity, and subduing 
 in kindness ; and, second, that the representation 
 thus afforded of the divine character should, 
 when contemplated and believed by man, be 
 fitted, by the laws of his being, to transform him 
 into the divine image, and to make him a par- 
 taker of the divine happiness. The very first 
 shewing of Christianity is to this effect. It pro- 
 poses, by an overwhelming manifestation of the 
 character of God in the great scheme of re- 
 demption, to raise man from his present state of 
 sin and rebellion, and to confer on him that 
 elevated species of blessedness which arises from 
 conformity to the will of an infinitely perfect 
 Being. 
 
 « When,” says an eloquent writer, “ we read 
 a history which authoritatively claims to be an 
 exhibition of the character of God in his deal- 
 ings with men,—if we find in it that which fills 
 and overflows our most dilated conceptions of 
 
 moral worth and loveliness in the Supreme 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 105 
 
 Being, and at the same time feel that it is 
 triumphant in every appeal that it makes to our 
 consciences in its statements of the obliquity, 
 
 and if our 
 
 and corruption of our own hearts, 
 reason farther discovers a system of powerful 
 moral stimulants, embodied in the facts of this 
 history, which necessarily tend to. produce in 
 the mind a resemblance to that high character 
 which is there portrayed,—if we discern that 
 the spirit of this history gives peace to the con- 
 science by the very exhibition which quickens its 
 sensibility—that it dispels the terrors of guilt by 
 the very fact which associates sin with the full 
 loathing of the heart—that it combines in one 
 wondrous and consistent whole our most fearful 
 forebodings, and our most splendid anticipations 
 for futurity—that it inspires a pure and elevated 
 and joyful hope for eternity by those very de- 
 clarations which attach a deeper and more inter- 
 
 esting obligation to the discharge of the minutest 
 
 part of human duty,—if we see that the object 
 of all its tendencies is the perfection of moral 
 
 happiness, and that these tendencies are naturally 
 
106 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 connected with the belief of its narration,—if we 
 see all this in the gospel, we may then say that 
 our own eyes have seen its truth, and that we 
 need no other testimony. We may then well 
 believe that God has been pleased, in pity to 
 our wretchedness, and in condescension to our 
 feebleness, to clothe the eternal laws which 
 regulate his spiritual government in such form 
 as may be palpable to our conceptions, and 
 adapted to the urgency of our necessities.’’* 
 Such an interposition has the Eternal Majesty 
 of heaven vouchsafed in the revelation of mercy 
 by Christ Jesus,—a revelation which abounds 
 in all that is awful and all that is tender; which 
 describes God as the avenger of sin, and the 
 Saviour of the guilty; which exhibits the loftiest 
 claims of the lawgiver, and the tenderest attri- 
 butes of compassion; which makes moral im- 
 purity infinitely odious and detestable, by the 
 very means whereby it is forgiven; which points 
 
 to a guilty race reclaimed and saved, while the 
 
 * Erskine on Internal Evidence, third edit., pp. 18, 19. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 107 
 
 Glorious Projector of the scheme stands forth 
 before the intelligent universe in the ineffable 
 majesty of spotless and unchangeable purity. 
 Does reason tell us, that as God has seen fit 
 to create various orders of intelligent creatures, 
 to him they must all be accountable, and over 
 them all he must exercise the right and the con- 
 trol of a moral governor? Revelation comes in 
 with its direct and absolute assurance upon this 
 point, resolving all the doubts which sin had 
 fostered in the human mind, and proclaiming 
 God’s right to rule, his title to obedience, and 
 his determination to punish every infringement 
 of his righteous government. Had the Bible 
 said less on this head, or spoken a language quite 
 different, it would have been at variance with 
 the simplest dictates of sound reason. If there 
 be one God, the creator and upholder of the 
 universe, the fountain of all being, and of all 
 happiness, it follows by resistless consequence, 
 that he is the governor of the world he has made, 
 and that the laws by which he governs must be 
 in accordance with the dictates of his own pure 
 
 and benevolent nature. The Scriptures teach us 
 
108 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 distinctly what those principles are; but in 
 doing so, they do not violate one of all our 
 natural conclusions. 
 
 Does the reason of man whisper to him, that 
 the Being who made him is the constant in- 
 spector of his actions, and that a period may 
 arrive when an account will be required of the 
 manner in which he has passed the few short 
 years of his transitory existence? Revelation 
 does not proffer its aid to repress this natural 
 and almost universal feeling; but to place it 
 upon the sure basis of a divine communication, 
 to impart to it the character of an incontroverti- 
 ple truth, and to raise it to the potency of an 
 all-pervading and all-subduing motive. 
 
 Does a secret monitor disturb man’s inward 
 repose, and tell him that he has sinned against 
 his own acknowledged standard of duty, and fill 
 him with awful forebodings of judgment to come, 
 and urge him to many a vain expedient for the 
 settlement of that score of guilt which he knows 
 he has been contracting from. the earliest dawn- 
 ings of reason? Revelation does not lift up its 
 
 yoice to repress the natural testimony of con- 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 109 
 
 science, but to cause it to be heard in yet louder 
 strains of condemnation,—to strip man of all vain 
 conceit of excellence which, in his fallen state, 
 he does not possess,—to shew, by the pure 
 standard of the written law, how far he has 
 departed from his original integrity,—to present 
 such an image of his moral defection as shall 
 cause him to loathe and abhor himself in dust 
 and in ashes before God,—and to teach him the 
 utter insufficiency of all human aid to extricate 
 him from that state of condemnation and sin into 
 which, by rebellion against the righteous Law- 
 giver of the universe, he has sunk. 
 
 Does the mind of man, conscious of its own 
 evil desert, and no less conscious of the blight 
 which sin has spread over all the sources of 
 ‘human enjoyment, sigh after some hidden well- 
 spring of life,—some new manifestation of the 
 character of God, which shall dart a ray of mercy 
 and hope across the gloom of his apostacy,— 
 some divine balm that shall heal those wounds 
 which have been inflicted in his lacerated spirit ? 
 Yes, my beloved reader, such have been, and 
 such are the wishes and aspirations of the guilty 
 
 i 
 
110 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 spirit of man. He has departed from “the foun- 
 tain of living waters,’’and the entire range of crea- 
 ture enjoyment has proved but a broken cistern 
 to him. He is not, indeed, rightly affected with 
 the true nature of his malady, nor does he pro- 
 perly appreciate the means by which his peace 
 and happiness may be restored; but he is in 
 that precise state in which, if he will open the 
 revelation of God, and prayerfully examine its 
 contents, he will find the very blessings after 
 which he sighs, and in the application of them 
 will perceive that the Author of his being is also 
 the God of his salvation. 
 
 In the promise of a Saviour, divinely accom- 
 plished in the fulness of time, and in the pro- 
 pitiatory sacrifice of the cross, we behold a 
 scheme which bears along with it indubitable 
 proofs of its conformity to the character of God, 
 and of its adaptation to the guilt and necessity 
 of man. It is so far, indeed, above all his 
 natural conceptions of a divine interposition, 
 that it may well be styled “ the wisdom of God 
 
 in a mystery ;’’* but it is at the same time so 
 
 * 1 Cor. ile Ce 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. ETI 
 
 exquisitely adjusted to his moral relations, and 
 to the moral catastrophe in which he is involved, 
 that he has only to open his eyes that he may 
 see, and his heart that he may feel. The 
 problem of his salvation is here solved, while 
 the claims of the moral governor remain unim- 
 paired. His conscience tells him that he is a 
 transgressor ; but it suggests no effectual method 
 of escape from merited condemnation. But 
 Christianity points him to “the blood of the 
 Lamb,” to the “one offering’ of Jesus Christ, 
 “for the sins of the people.’ He feels that he 
 is at a fearful moral distance from God ; but he 
 sees in the method of his reconciliation the 
 means whereby his nature may be reclaimed, 
 and learns that a heart all rebellion may be 
 drawn by the mighty attractions of divine love 
 into the habit of cheerful, unreserved, and filial 
 obedience. 
 
 To doubt that such a scheme,—so perfect in 
 its conformity to all that we connect with the 
 infinitely pure Spirit, and so admirably adapted 
 to the nature, condition, and prospects of man, 
 
 —to doubt that such a scheme is from heaven, 
 
112 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 is to do violence to the surest inductions of 
 enlightened reason, to turn a deaf ear to the 
 voice of conscience, and obstinately to lose sight 
 of a coincidence which distinctly shews that the 
 nature of man and the means of his redemption 
 lay claim to a common origin. 
 
 Without the provisions of the Bible, man is a 
 wanderer and an outcast. He beholds, in some 
 measure, his responsibility and his guilt; but 
 he has no well defined prospect of how it may 
 fare with him when his body goes down to the 
 dust. He feels that this world is a wilderness, 
 and all its inhabitants mourners; but he is unable 
 to solace himself in the prospect of a blessed 
 immortality. He finds himself the subject of 
 indefinite forebodings, and discovers nothing in 
 the wide range of created nature that can fill up 
 the desires of a mind distanced from its native 
 element; but how to impart a fixed character to 
 his hopes, and how to satisfy his enlarged desires, 
 he knows not. Let him turn, then, to the well- 
 springs of salvation, let him view the character 
 of God as set forth in the doctrine of the gospel, 
 
 let him examine for himself the great mystery of 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 113 
 
 godliness, let him yield up his whole soul to the 
 impression of redeeming love, let him implore 
 the spirit of Christ to unfold the infinite grace 
 and loveliness of his character, let him bow 
 down his reason to the verities of the cross,— 
 then will his guilt subside, his fears vanish, his 
 prospects brighten; then will his soul glow with 
 ardent love to God; then will the darkness which 
 broods over the scenes of earth be scattered ; 
 then will the truth of revelation be felt ; then 
 will the self-evidencing power of the gospel be 
 verified; and then will the proud objector be 
 converted into a “little child,’ and the vain 
 disputer into a meek and humble disciple of the 
 Son of God. 
 
 SECTION II. 
 
 THE EXTERNAL EVIDENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 By the external evidences of Christianity we are 
 to understand those attestations to its divine 
 origin which haye been either directly youch- 
 safed from heaven, or which may be infallibly 
 traced in its early success and in its great moral 
 
 Eee 
 
114 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 results. And if, by an impartial survey of 
 the various topics connected with internal evi- 
 dence, we are compelled to admit the pre- 
 sumptuous boldness of those who can disburden 
 their minds of all apprehension in rejecting a 
 scheme distinguished alike by its grandeur and 
 adaptation,—by a careful examination of exter- 
 nal evidence, we are driven to the conclusion, 
 that the rejector of Revelation is at war with 
 omnipotence, and that he is standing out against 
 a species of proof which demands of every intel- 
 ligent and accountable creature the most prompt 
 and unhesitating submission. Such is the nature 
 and such the variety of external evidence, that 
 it leaves every man inexcusable who remains in 
 secret or avowed opposition to the claims of the 
 gospel. In treating of the subject of external 
 evidence I begin— 
 
 1. With Miracles. 
 
 If the Bible be from God, it must be true in 
 itself, irrespective of all miraculous attestation ; 
 and if it be not from God, it is equally clear that 
 no miracle can have been vouchsafed on its be- 
 half. A MIRACLE IS AN ACT OF OMNIPOTENCE, 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY, 115 
 
 WHICH DEVIATES FROM, OR SUSPENDS THE OR- 
 DINARY COURSE OF NATURE,* and which is 
 fitted to produce an impression upon rational 
 beings by the very circumstance of its singularity 
 and its unaccountableness. Such an interposi- 
 tion we may assure ourselyes would not be 
 "granted in support of any messenger not from 
 God, or of any doctrine containing in it the 
 slightest shade of imposture. 
 
 The most inveterate enemies of Revelation 
 have been compelled to admit that a miracle 
 wrought by any being professing to act under 
 
 * Dr. Samuel Clarke has said that “A miracle isa 
 work effected in a manner unusual, or different from the 
 common and regular method of providence, by the inter- 
 position of God himself, or of some intelligent agent su- 
 perior to man, for the proof or evidence of some particular 
 doctrine, or in attestation of the authority of some particu- 
 lar person.” The Rey. Richard Watson, in his Theologi- 
 cal Dictionary, observes, that “ A miracle, in the popular 
 sense, is a prodigy or an extraordinary event which surprises 
 us by its novelty. In a more accurate and philosophic sense, 
 a miracle is an effect which does not follow from any of 
 the regular laws of nature, or which is inconsistent with 
 some known law of it, or contrary to the settled constitu- 
 tion and course of things. Accordingly, all miracles pre- 
 suppose an established system of nature, within the limits 
 of which they operate, and with the order of which they 
 disagree.” 
 
116 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 the authority of God, would be a sufficient evi- 
 dence of the divinity of his mission. “We 
 know,” said a Jewish ruler to Christ, “that 
 thou art a teacher come from God; for no man 
 can do these miracles that thou doest, except 
 God be with him.’’* A principle is here ad- 
 mitted which it is impossible, consistently with 
 sound reason, to deny ; it is this—that a teacher 
 working miracles furnishes indubitable evidence 
 that his mission is from God. To test, with ut- 
 most severity, the evidence of miraculous inter- 
 position in any given instance, must be an im- ; 
 perative duty, but to withold our assent to any 
 doctrine after the finger of Omnipotence has in- 
 scribed over it its celestial origin, is to trample 
 reason in the dust, and to set up in its place the 
 most inveterate and stupid prejudice. 
 
 The question, then, is, did Christ and his 
 apostles perform the miracles attributed to them 
 in the books of the New Testament? and did 
 they appeal to those miracles in confirmation of 
 
 the message they delivered? In reading the 
 
 * John iii. 2. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 117 
 
 inimitable discourses of Christ, no one can hesi- 
 tate for a moment as to the nature of the appeal 
 made by Him to miracles. The works,’’ said 
 He, “which the Father hath given me to finish, 
 the same works that I do, bear witness of me, 
 that the Father hath sent me.’’* The works 
 that I do in my Father's name, they bear wit- 
 ness of me,”+ “If I do not the works of my 
 Father, believe me not. But if I do, though 
 ye believe not me, believe the works; that ye 
 may know and believe that the Father is in me, 
 and I in him.’ Believe me that I am in the 
 Father and the Father in me; or else believe me 
 for the very work’s sake.”§ Here miracles are 
 assumed, upon the ordinary principles of reason, 
 to be a sufficient evidence of Christ’s mission 
 from the Father to every impartial and unbiassed 
 mind. So unhesitatingly did Jesus of Nazareth 
 use this argument, that when the disciples of 
 John came to him to inquire whether he was 
 indeed the Christ, his only reply was, “Go and 
 shew John again those things which ye do 
 
 * John v. 36. + John x. 25. 
 ¢ John x. 37, 38. § John xiv. 11. 
 
118 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 hear and see: the blind receive their sight, ana 
 the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the 
 deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor 
 have the gospel preached to them.’* And 
 when the apostles of our Lord allude, at any 
 time, to the power by which they perform their 
 several miracles, they invariably refer to the all- 
 potent charm of “that name which is above 
 
 every name;” 
 
 as when the helpless paralytic 
 was healed at the beautiful gate of the Temple— 
 “If we, this day,” said Peter, “‘be examined of 
 the good deed done to the impotent man, by 
 what means he is made whole; be it known 
 unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that 
 by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom 
 ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, 
 even by him doth this man stand here before 
 you whole.’’+ 
 
 * The last clause of this appeal is founded on the argu- 
 ment for Christianity which is derived from prophecy, 
 and which will be glanced at in a subsequent part of this 
 treatise. It was a distinct part of Messiah’s prophetic 
 character that when he appeared he should “ preach glad 
 tidings to the meek”—that is, to the poor.—Isaiah, Ixi. 1. 
 
 4. Acts, iv. 9,10. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY 119 
 
 The whole question of miracles, then, must 
 resolve itself into a matter of fact. And the 
 attempt of Hume and others to blink the fact, 
 by assuming the insufficiency of any testimony 
 to transmit the knowledge of a miraculous occur- 
 rence, is neither more nor less than to affirm, that 
 if God should at any time see fit to perform a 
 miracle, in attestation of some message of mercy 
 to.a ruined race, he could not adopt any method 
 by which the certain evidence of its occurrence 
 could be preserved from age to age.* It is not, 
 surely, the spirit of sound philosophy in which 
 any man asserts that a miracle is contrary to 
 experience. It may not, indeed, come under 
 the head of the ordinary experience of man- 
 kind; but that it is contrary to it cannot be 
 shewn. According to our ordinary experience, 
 bodily disease, when successfully removed, is 
 subdued by the influence of certain human 
 remedies which God is pleased to bless. Ac- 
 cording to the wonderful history of the gospel, 
 disease-is often rebuked by a word, a look, an 
 
 exercise of the secret will of the miraculous 
 
 * See “ A Dissertation on Miracles,” &c., by George 
 Campbell, D,D,. 
 
120 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 agent. But what is there, we ask, in these two 
 distinct classes of facts opposed to each other ? 
 They may each, indeed, belong to a distinct 
 chain of causation,—they may be totally inde- 
 pendent events,—they may admit and require 
 various kinds of proof; but he who says that they 
 are contrary the one to the other, utters a sen- 
 timent opposed to true philosophy, and commits 
 his good sense in his zeal to overturn the evi- 
 dence of the gospel. “ To pronounce a miracle 
 to be false,’ says a distinguished writer, “be- 
 cause it is different from experience, is only to 
 conclude against its general existence from the 
 very circumstance which constitutes its particular » 
 nature; for if it were not different from expe- 
 rience, where would be its singularity? Or 
 what particular proof could be drawn from it if 
 it happened according to the ordinary train of 
 human events, or was included in the operation 
 of the general laws of nature? We grant that 
 it does differ from experience; but we do not 
 presume to make our experience the standard of 
 
 the divine conduct.’’* 
 
 * See the Rey. Richard Watson’s Theological Diction- 
 ary, under the article “ Miracles.” 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY, 12] 
 
 We hear much among infidel writers of the 
 immutability of the laws of nature; but whence 
 do they learn that these laws are never to be 
 infringed on by the omnipotent will of the Infi- 
 nite Mind? It is surely no proof that the Al- 
 mighty is a changeable being because he either 
 creates a world, or acts according to his own 
 infinite perfections in governing it. There is 
 often a great deal of assumption in the use of 
 the terms “ laws of nature,” “‘ course of nature,”’ 
 &c., as employed by writers of a sceptical turn. 
 If in the use of such terms it were only intended 
 to assert, that the Most High has subjected the 
 material universe to the government of certain 
 great laws, which act uniformly, except when 
 he is pleased to suspend or to counteract them, 
 there could be no objection whatever to the 
 phraseology employed; but when they are 
 spoken of as a kind of intelligent and inde- 
 pendent power,—when they are described as 
 something almost distinct from the continued 
 exercise of the divine behest,—when they are 
 regarded as an imperative control, binding even 
 the will of Deity itself, they are placed in an 
 
 M 
 
122 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 imposing light, to which they have no conceiy- 
 able title. “ Our knowledge of the ordinary 
 course of things, though limited, is yet real; and 
 therefore it is essential to a miracle, both that it 
 differs from that course, and be accompanied 
 with peculiar and unequivocal signs of such 
 difference. We have been told, that the course 
 of nature is fixed and unalterable; and therefore 
 it is not consistent with the immutability of God 
 to perform miracles. But, surely, they who 
 reason in this manner beg the point in question. 
 We have no right to assume that the deity has 
 ordained such general laws as will exclude his 
 interposition ; and we cannot suppose that he 
 would forbear to interfere where any important 
 end could be answered. This interposition, 
 though it controls, in particular cases, the 
 energy, does not diminish the utility of those 
 laws. It leaves them to fulfil their own proper 
 purposes, and effects only a distinct purpose, for 
 which they were not calculated. If the course 
 of nature implies the laws of matter and motion, 
 into which the most opposite phenomena may be 
 
 resolved, it is certain that we do not yet know 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 123 
 
 them in their full extent; and, therefore, that 
 events which are related by judicious and dis- 
 interested persons, and at the same time imply 
 no gross contradiction, are possible in them- 
 selves, and capable of a certain degree of proof. 
 If the course of nature implies the whole order 
 of events which God has ordained for the 
 government of the world, it includes both his 
 ordinary and extraordinary dispensations, and 
 among them miracles may have their place as a 
 part of the universal plan. It is, indeed, con- 
 sistent with sound philosophy, and not incon- 
 sistent with pure religion, to acknowledge that 
 they might be disposed by the Supreme Being 
 at the same time with the more ordinary effects 
 of his power; that their causes and occasions 
 might be arranged with the same regularity ; 
 and that in reference chiefly to their concomi- 
 tant circumstances of persons and time, to the 
 specific ends for which they were employed, 
 and to our idea of the immediate necessity there 
 is for a divine agent, miracles would differ from 
 common events, in which the hand of God acts 
 
 as efficaciously, though less visibly. On this 
 
124 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 consideration of the subject, miracles, instead of 
 contradicting nature, might form a part of it. 
 But what our limited reason and scanty expe- 
 rience may comprehend, should never be repre- 
 sented as a full and exact view of the possible 
 or actual varieties which exist in the works of 
 » Goa 
 
 It is daring and presumptuous in the extreme 
 to attempt, by reasonings @ priori, to set aside 
 the physical possibility of a miracle, or to assume 
 that human testimony is inadequate to the task 
 of rendering it available to the conviction of 
 mankind. If the argument @ priori is at all to 
 be admitted in a question of mere fact, where 
 the senses were originally appealed to, it were 
 easy to shew that the miraculous attestations of 
 the gospel are entitled to all the benefits which 
 it can possibly yield. No one can prove 
 that it is contrary to the determined arrange- 
 ments of Divine Providence that miracles 
 should be wrought; no one can assert, in the 
 spirit of true science, that it may not have 
 
 * See the Rev. Richard Watson’s Theological Diction- 
 ary, under the article “‘ Miracles.” 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 125 
 
 been a part of the great scheme of God’s 
 moral government thus to step aside from 
 the rule of his ordinary procedure; no one can 
 advisedly say that if an occasion worthy of 
 miraculous interposition should present itself 
 to the divine omniscience, God would fail to 
 grant such interposition; no one can seriously 
 contemplate the professed objects of Christianity, 
 or examine in detail its wondrous provisions, 
 without being constrained to admit, that it fur- 
 nishes an occasion worthy of some unusual 
 effort of omnipotence; and no one can calmly 
 survey the miraculous facts recorded in the 
 gospel history without feeling that they are 
 admirably adapted to attest as divine the several 
 communications to which they belong. 4 priori, 
 I should say, that nothing is more reasonable 
 than to suppose, first, that God would furnish 
 his erring and sorrowful children with a revela- 
 tion of his merciful designs; and, second, that he 
 would so attest that revelation with the finger of 
 omnipotence as to leave all without excuse who 
 did not embrace its inestimable provisions. If 
 any one is bold enough to affirm that testimony 
 M 2 
 
126 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 is an insufficient medium for the conveyance of 
 a miraculous history, he should be prepared to 
 go the whole length of his extravagant assump- 
 tion, and to maintain, that no revelation could 
 at any time be imparted by God to his creatures, 
 because human testimony, the only method of 
 transmitting historic facts, was insufficient to the 
 task of conveying to the next and to succeed- 
 ing generations the evidence of such revelation 
 having been imparted. There is no end to 
 vague conjecture if it is allowed to usurp the 
 province of sound reason, and to dictate, before 
 hand, what may and what may not be proper 
 in the Almighty todo. There is no sure way 
 of knowing what God may do, but by ascertain-— 
 ing what he has done; and this can only be 
 known through the medium of that testimony, 
 the accuracy of which admits of being tested by 
 rules which cannot deceive. 
 
 I would state the argument, then, on behalf of 
 the miracles of the New Testament in some 
 such way as the following :—The gospel history 
 informs us that both Christ and his apostles 
 
 wrought miracles; it shews us that those miracles 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 27 
 
 were appealed to as evidences of their divine 
 mission; and it presents every direct and col- 
 lateral mark of authenticity and truth which can 
 possibly belong to any document of antiquity. 
 It is admitted, on all hands, that Jesus of 
 Nazareth actually lived and died in Judea,— 
 that his followers became zealous and successful 
 in the propagation of his cause after his death,— 
 and that they were surrounded by many invete- 
 rate enemies, both among their own countrymen 
 and the gentiles. In the midst of danger, and in 
 opposition to all their own worldly interests, they 
 persevered even unto death. The cause they 
 espoused was at all times open to the gaze of 
 subtle and fierce enemies, who would have been 
 more than happy to detect any imposture, and 
 who would have been eagle-eyed to discover any 
 pretension to the exercise of the mighty power 
 of God which was not actually possessed. The 
 persecutors of Jesus of Nazareth had their 
 attention drawn to his miracles, which could no 
 longer be hid in a corner; and, unable to account 
 for them, and anxious to prevent their mighty 
 
 effect, they attributed them to satanic power. 
 
128 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 The cause, however, spread with amazing rapi- 
 dity, and the death of the Master but added 
 fresh energy to the cause of his disciples. For 
 a time, indeed, through the weakness of their 
 faith, they were filled with gloomy forebodings ; 
 but, according to his own prediction, their 
 divine Leader rose from the dead; with powers 
 of tongues and gifts of healing they went forth 
 in his name; his resurrection they openly pro- 
 claimed in the city of Jerusalem; thousands of — 
 impenitent Jews laid down the weapons of their 
 hostility ; the miracles of Christ and his apostles 
 were acknowledged by multitudes as indubitable 
 matters of fact; and their fame spread through- 
 out the whole world. Had they been mere 
 impostures, they would have been speedily 
 detected; on the contrary, however, they drew 
 down the peculiar notice of heathen writers, and 
 Celsus himself finds no better method of dispos- 
 ing of them than by absurdly attributing them to 
 a skilful use of the arts of magic on the part of 
 Christ’s disciples.* 
 
 * Justin Martyr, Apol. I., chap. xxxvil., assures us 
 that the early apologists for Christianity insisted more on ~ 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 129 
 
 The following things are clear respecting 
 Christ’s miracles :— They were of such a nature 
 as to surpass all efforts of human power or skill. 
 By them, and without the intervention of second 
 causes, the blind received their sight,* the 
 paralytic instantly walked,+ the lepers were 
 cleansed.t By them five loaves and two small 
 fishes were multiplied so as to become food for 
 thousands ;§ by them simple water was converted 
 into wine ;|| by them the stormy tempest was 
 hushed into an immediate calm ;4] by them the 
 spirits of darkness were compelled to depart from 
 those unhappy victims whom they had been 
 suffered to possess ;** and by them, once and 
 again, the dead were restored to life, and became 
 the resistless witnesses of a supernatural inter- 
 
 position.t+ Now, in all these cases, every 
 
 the argument from prophecy than from miracles, because, 
 when they appealed to miracles, the enemies of the truth 
 retorted upon them, by attributing the entire miraculous 
 phenomena of the gospel to the power of magic. The 
 apologists were wrong, but the fact speaks volumes as to 
 the reality of the miracles recorded by the Evangelists. 
 
 * Mark x. 46—52. 
 
 t Mark ii. 10, 11. t Luke xvii. 12—19. 
 § Matt. xiv. 17—21. || John ii. 1—11. 
 q Matt. viii. 23—27. ** Luke iv. 41. 
 
 tt John xi. _—43. Luke vii. 11—18. 
 
130 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 human being was an equally sufficient judge ; 
 from the very nature of the facts it was im- 
 possible that any one could be deceived; the 
 finger of God was so distinctly palpable, that 
 both sense and reason combined to verify the 
 true nature of the events. 
 
 Again, the miracles of Christ were done in 
 public, at the doors of the Jewish temple, in 
 the places of public resort, when he had been 
 preaching to thousands, and when thousands 
 were the actual subjects of them. 
 
 They were, moreover, of such a nature that 
 no collusion, no magical art, no legerdemain, 
 no kind of deception, could have been practised. 
 
 They were wrought in the presence of persons 
 full of enmity and cruel hatred, who would not 
 have failed to lay open the entire imposture, had 
 any existed ; but so confounded were the Scribes 
 and Pharisees at the sight of them, that they 
 sought relief from their unhappy impressions, by 
 representing Jesus of Nazareth as in league with 
 the great spirit of darkness. 
 
 The accounts of these miracles were, soon 
 after their occurrence, published to the world, 
 
 in the very places where they happened; yet 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 138i 
 
 no evidence can be adduced to shew that a 
 single contemporary of the Saviour was found 
 bold enough to deny the fact of their occurrence ; 
 nor indeed can it be shewn that any attempt 
 of this kind was made* till long after Christ had 
 ascended to heaven. “Here, it may be de- 
 manded, When could the belief of such transac- 
 tions have been obtruded on mankind, if they 
 had never happened? Surely not in the age 
 when they were said to have been witnessed by 
 tens of thousands, who were publicly challenged 
 to deny them if they could! Not in any sub- 
 sequent age; for the origin of Christianity was 
 ascribed to them, and millions must have been 
 persuaded that they had always believed those 
 things of which they had never till that time so 
 much as heard.’ + 3 
 
 Having offered the preceding remarks on the. 
 
 * The fable that the disciples stole the body of Jesus 
 will be dealt with in its own proper place. It is evident, 
 however, that no use was made of it by the Jews where 
 it could have been most available: in fact, it was too 
 absurd to be gravely referred to, 
 
 + See the Rev. Thomas Scott's Works, yol. ii. p. 16. 
 
132 THE TRUTH AND BEXCELLENCE 
 
 miracles of Christ, I would just observe, that the 
 miracles recorded in the Old Testament Scrip- 
 tures belong to the same great system of truth, 
 and are supported by similar evidence. Infidels 
 have spoken of the Patriarchal and Mosaic 
 dispensations as if altogether distinct from the 
 religion of Christ; but this is a gross mistake, as 
 Christianity is the consummation of all those 
 institutions which are embodied in the Jewish 
 Scriptures. The miraculous fact of a universal 
 deluge is abundantly confirmed by all the re- 
 searches of geologists, and the organic remains 
 of a former world must leave those inex- 
 cusable who reject the data of revelation. And 
 with regard to the miraculous history of the 
 Israelites in Egypt, at the Red Sea, in the 
 Wilderness, and in Canaan, the facts of that 
 history and the national monuments which, from 
 the earliest ages, were fixed on to perpetuate it, 
 combine to relieve the mind from the slightest 
 suspicion as to its genuineness. “ Can any man 
 of common sense think that Moses and Aaron 
 could possibly have persuaded the whole nation 
 
 of Israel that they had witnessed all the plagues 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 133 
 
 of Egypt, passed through the Red Sea with the 
 waters piled on each side of them, gathered the 
 manna every morning, and seen all the won- 
 ders recorded in their history, had no such 
 events taken place? If, then, that generation 
 could not be imposed on, when could the belief of 
 these extraordinary transactions be palmed upon 
 the nation? Surely it would have been im- 
 possible in the next age to persuade them that 
 their fathers had seen and experienced such 
 wonderful things when they had never before 
 heard a single word about them in all their 
 lives, and when an appeal must have been 
 made to them, that these were things well 
 known among them! What credit could have 
 been obtained to such a forgery at any subse- 
 quent period? It would have been absolutely 
 necessary, in making the attempt, to persuade 
 the people that such traditions had always been 
 current among them ; that the memory of them 
 had for ages been perpetuated by days and 
 ordinances, observed by all the nation; and 
 that their whole civil and religious establishment 
 had thence originated: and could this possibly 
 
 N 
 
134 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 have been effected if they all knew that no such 
 memorials and traditions had ever been heard of 
 among them ?’’* 
 
 I cannot deny myself the pleasure of furnish- 
 ing my readers with a remarkably clear and 
 beautiful account of the miracles of the Mosaic 
 dispensation furnished by the ingenious author 
 of “ Theological Institutes,” who has already 
 been referred to.* 
 
 “ Out,” says he, “ of the numerous miracles 
 wrought by the agency of Moses, we select, in 
 addition to those mentioned in chap. ix., the 
 plague of DARKNESS. 'T'wo circumstances are to 
 be noted in the relation given of the event. 
 (Exod. x.) It continued three days, and it 
 afflicted the Kigyptians only, for “ all the children 
 of Israel had light in their dwellings.’ The 
 fact here mentioned was of the most public 
 kind; and had it not taken place, every Egyp- 
 tian and every Israelite could have contradicted 
 
 the account. The phenomenon was not pro- 
 
 * See the Rev. Thomas Scott’s Works, vol ii. pp. 12, 13. 
 * Theological Institutes, vol. i. pp. 157—161. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 135 
 
 duced by any eclipse of the sun, for no eclipse 
 of that luminary can endure so long. Some of 
 the Roman writers mention a darkness by day 
 so great that persons were unable to know each 
 other ; but we have no historical account of any 
 other darkness so long continued as this, and so 
 intense that the Egyptians “rose not up from 
 their places for three days.’ But if any such 
 circumstance had occurred, and a natural cause 
 could have been assigned for it, yet even 
 then the miraculous character of this event 
 would remain unshaken; for to what but to a 
 supernatural cause could the distinction made 
 between the Israelites and the Egyptians be 
 attributed, when they inhabited a portion of the 
 same country, and when their neighbourhoods 
 were immediately adjoining? Here then are 
 the characters of a miracle. The established 
 course of natural causes and effects is interrupted 
 by an operation upon that mighty element, the 
 atmosphere. That it was not a chance irregu- 
 larity in nature, is made apparent from the 
 effect following the volition of a man acting in 
 the name of the Lord of Nature, and from its 
 
136 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 being restrained by that to a certain part of the 
 same country,—‘ Moses stretched out his hand,’ and 
 the darkness prevailed, every where but in the 
 dwellings of his own people. The fact has been 
 established by former arguments; and the fact 
 being allowed, the miracle follows of necessity. 
 
 “ The destruction of the Frrst-BoRN of the 
 Kxgyptians may be next considered. Here, too, 
 are several circumstances to be carefully noted. 
 This judgment was threatened in the presence 
 of Pharaoh, before any of the other plagues 
 were brought upon him and his people. The 
 Israelites also were forewarned of it. They 
 were directed to slay a lamb, sprinkle the blood 
 upon their door-posts, and prepare for their 
 departure that same night. The stroke was 
 inflicted upon the first-born of the Egyptians 
 only, and not upon any other part of the family,— 
 it occurred in the same house,—the first-born of 
 the Israelites escaped without exception,—and 
 the festival of ‘the passover’ was from that 
 night instituted in remembrance of the event. 
 Such a festival could not in the nature of the 
 
 thing be established in any subsequent age, in 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY, 137 
 
 commemoration of an event which never oc- 
 curred; and if instituted at the time, the event 
 must have taken place, for by no means could 
 this large body of men have been persuaded that 
 their first-born had been saved, and those of the 
 Egyptians destroyed, if the facts had not been 
 before their eyes. The history, therefore, being 
 established, the miracle follows; for the order 
 of nature is sufficiently known to warrant the 
 conclusion, that, if a pestilence were to be 
 assumed as the agent of this calamity, an epi- 
 demic disease, however rapid and destructive, 
 comes not upon the threat of a mortal, and 
 makes no such selection as the first-born of 
 every family. 
 
 “The miracle of dividing the waters of the 
 Rep Sra has already been mentioned, but 
 merits more particular consideration. In this 
 event we observe, as in others, circumstances 
 which exclude all possibility of mistake or collu- 
 sion. The subject of the miracle; the witness 
 of it the host of Israel, who passed through on 
 foot, and the Egyptian nation, who lost their 
 king and his whole army. The miraculous 
 
 Nee 
 
 hed 
 
138 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 characters of the event are :—the waters are 
 divided and stand up on each side; the ‘instru- 
 ment is a strong east wind, which begins its opera- 
 tion upon the water, at the stretching-out of the 
 hand of Moses, and ceases at the same signal, 
 and that at the precise moment when the return 
 of the waters would be most fatal to the Egyptian 
 pursuing army. 
 
 “It has, indeed, been asked whether there 
 were not some ledgés of rocks where the water 
 was shallow, so that an army, at particular 
 times, might pass over; and whether the Lte- 
 stan winds, which blow strongly all summer 
 from the north-west, might not blow so violently 
 against the sea as to keep it back ‘on a heap.’ 
 But if there were any force in these questions, it 
 is plain that such suppositions would leave the 
 destruction of the Egyptians unaccounted for. 
 To shew that there is no weight in them at all, 
 let the place where the passage of the Red Sea 
 was effected be first noted. Some fix it near 
 Suez, at the head of the gulf; but if there was 
 satisfactory evidence of this, it ought also to be 
 
 taken into the account that formerly the gulf 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 139 
 
 extended at least twenty-five miles north of 
 Suez, the place where it terminates at present.* 
 But the names of places, as well as tradition, 
 fix the passage about ten hours’ journey lower 
 down, at Clysma, or the valley of Bedea. The 
 name given by Moses to the place where the 
 Israelites encamped before the sea was divided 
 was Ptha-hiroth, which signifies ‘the mouth of the 
 ridge,’ or of that chain of mountains which line 
 the western coast of the Red Sea; and as there 
 is but one mouth of that chain through which 
 an immense multitude of men, women, and 
 children, could possibly pass when flying from 
 their enemies, there can be no doubt whatever 
 respecting the situation of Pzha-hiroth ; and the 
 modern names of conspicuous places in its 
 neighbourhood prove that those by whom such 
 names were given believed that this was the — 
 place at which the Israelites passed the sea in 
 safety, and where Pharaoh was drowned. Thus 
 we have close by Piha-hiroth, on the western 
 side of the gulf, a mountain called Attaka, which 
 
 signifies deliverance. On the eastern coast op- 
 
 * Lord Valentin’s Travels, vol. iii. p. 344, 
 
140 THE TRUTH AND RXCELLENCE 
 
 posite is a head-land called Ras Musa, or ‘the 
 Cape of Moses;’ somewhat lower, Harnam 
 Faraun, ‘Pharaoh’s Springs ;’ whilst at these 
 places, the general name of the gulf itself is 
 Bahr-al-Kolsum, ‘the Bay of Submersion,’ in 
 which there is a whirlpool called Birket Faraun, 
 ‘the Pool of Pharaoh.’ This, then, was the 
 passage of the Israelites ; and the depth of the sea 
 here is stated by Bruce, who may be consulted 
 as to these localities, at about fourteen fathoms, 
 and the breadth at between three and four 
 leagues. But there is no ‘ledge of rocks;’ and, 
 as to the ‘Ktestan wind,’ the same traveller 
 observes, ‘If the Htestan, blowing from the 
 north-west in summer, could keep the sea as 
 a wall, on the right, of fifty feet high, still the 
 difficulty would remain of building the wall to 
 the left, or to the north. If the Htesian winds 
 had done this once, they must have repeated it 
 many a time before or since, from the same 
 causes.. The wind which actually did blow, 
 according to history, either as an instrument of 
 dividing the waters, or, which is more probable, 
 
 as the instrument of drying the ground, after the 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 14] 
 
 waters were divided by the immediate energy of 
 the Divine power, was not a north wind, but an 
 ‘east wind; and, as Dr. Hales observes, ‘ seems 
 to be introduced by way of anticipation, to 
 exclude the natural agency which might be 
 afterwards resorted to for solving the miracle ; 
 for it is remarkable that the monsoon in the 
 Red Sea blows the summer-half of the year from 
 the north, and the winter-half from the south, 
 neither of which could produce the miracle in 
 question.’ 
 
 “The miraculous character of this event is, 
 therefore, most strongly marked. An expanse 
 of water, and that water a sea, of from nine to 
 twelve miles broad, known to be exceedingly 
 subject to agitations, is divided, and a wall of 
 water is formed on each hand, affording a pas- 
 sage on dry land for the Israelites. The phe- 
 nomenon occurs, too, just as the Egyptian host 
 are on the point of overtaking the fugitives, and 
 ceases at the moment when the latter reach the 
 opposite shore in safety, and when their enemies 
 are in the midst of the passage, in the only 
 
 position in which the closing of the wall of 
 
142 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 waters on each side could insure the entire 
 destruction of so large a force ! 
 
 “ The fallmg of the MANNA in the wilderness 
 for forty years, is another unquestionable miracle, 
 and one in which there could be neither mistake 
 on the part of those who were sustained by it, 
 nor fraud on the part of Moses. That this event 
 was not produced by the ordinary course of 
 nature, is rendered certain by the fact, that the 
 same wilderness has been travelled by indi- 
 viduals, and by large bodies of men, from the 
 earliest ages to the present, but no such supply 
 of food was ever met with, except on this occa- 
 sion; and its miraculous character is further 
 marked by the following circumstances :—1. 
 That it fell but six days in the week. 2. That 
 it fell in such prodigious quantities as sustained 
 three millions of souls. 3. That there fell a 
 double quantity every Friday, to serve the 
 Israelites for the next day, which was their 
 Sabbath. 4. That what was gathered on the 
 first five days of the week stank and bred worms 
 if kept above one day; but that which was 
 gathered on Friday kept sweet for two days; 
 
 a a 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 143 
 
 and 5. That it continued falling while the 
 Israelites remained in the wilderness, but ceased 
 as soon as they came out of it, and got corn to 
 eat in the land of Canaan. 6. Let these very 
 extraordinary particulars be considered, and 
 they at once confirm the fact, whilst they un- 
 equivocally establish the miracle. No people 
 could be deceived in these circumstances; no per- 
 son could persuade them of their truth if they had 
 not occurred ; and the whole was so clearly out 
 of the regular course of nature, as to mark un- 
 equivocally the interposition of God. To the 
 majority of the numerous miracles recorded in 
 the Old Testament, the same remarks apply, 
 and upon them the same miraculous characters 
 are as indubitably impressed.” 
 
 To these remarks I may just add, that the 
 fact of the antiquity, genuineness, and uncor- 
 rupted transmission of the books both of the Old 
 and New Testament Scriptures, is sustained by 
 an uninterrupted chain of evidence, which could 
 be adduced in favour of no other document of 
 a remote antiquity, and which ought to have 
 
 shamed and for ever silenced the opponents 
 
144 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 of revelation. Even enemies themselves have 
 unwittingly served the cause of truth by add- 
 ing to this testimony. The Jews are to this 
 day, and have been through every past age, the 
 effective and unanswerable defenders of their 
 own canon; and the enemies of Christianity 
 who arose in the second century and down- 
 wards, were valuable coadjutors of the Christian. 
 apologists, in alluding to the alleged facts of 
 Christianity, though with a view to refute them. 
 It would be easy to shew, not only that the 
 Christian fathers, notwithstanding their many 
 errors and absurdities, served the cause of reve- 
 lation, by proving the antiquity, genuineness, 
 and uncorrupted character of the sacred text; 
 but that Clesus, and Porphyry, and Julian, to 
 say nothing of the Roman historians, Tacitus 
 and Suetonius, did an immense service, though 
 they intended it not, in endeavouring to refute 
 facts which, if they had never existed, could not 
 have obtained currency in the world. 
 
 It is unreasonable, then, in the extreme to re- 
 fuse credit to the facts of Christianity, standing 
 
 as they do upon such an irrefragable basis. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 145 
 
 God has spread over them the shield of omni- 
 potence, and he who will not be convinced by a 
 well authenticated testimony of miracles, would 
 not be persuaded though one actually rose from 
 the dead. | 
 
 As the resurrection of Christ is a fact of such 
 vital moment in the argument connected with 
 miracles, I shall devote to it the notice of a dis- 
 tinct discussion, hoping thereby to condense into 
 very narrow limits the amount of proof arising to 
 Christianity from the survey of its miraculous 
 character. 
 
 2. The argument derived from the Resurrection 
 of Christ. 
 
 It must have been remarked by every care- 
 ful observer, that there are two distinct classes 
 of miracles recorded in the gospel history,— 
 those which the facts of Christianity themselves 
 involve, and those which were wrought by our 
 Lord and his apostles in confirmation of the 
 message they delivered. The necessity, per- 
 haps, of the latter class of miracles chiefly ori- 
 ginates in the first. A revelation of facts and 
 doctrines altogether supernatural seemed to de- 
 
 O 
 
6 
 
 4 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 mand an attestation corresponding to its own 
 nature. It is difficult, indeed, to conceive of the 
 idea of an express and direct revelation from the 
 Infinite Mind without instantly associating it 
 with what is miraculous, and without feeling a 
 sort of intuitive conviction that it will be sup- 
 ported with a species of evidence answering to 
 the wondrous facts which it professes to disclose. 
 Most of the doctrines of revelation far transcend 
 the puny conceptions of finite minds, and some 
 of them are of such a sublime nature that 
 they are to be regarded rather as subjects of 
 humble belief than as topics of querulous dispute. 
 ‘The resurrection of Christ, in common with 
 his incarnation, his temptation, his transfigura- 
 tion, and his ascension to the right hand of 
 power, is a fact of a distinctly miraculous cha- 
 racter. It is, moreover, a fact which was di- 
 vinely attested on the day of Pentecost, and, 
 subsequently, by indubitable marks of a super- 
 natural interposition. 
 Yor a person to rise from the dead is an indis- 
 
 putable manifestation of the mighty power of 
 
 @ 
 
 (sod; and if it can be shewn that Christ actually 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY 147 
 
 rose from the dead, according to his own predic- 
 tions, it must of necessity follow that both the 
 prescience and the omnipotence of Deity were 
 associated with the wondrous event. Many 
 sceptics have been ready to admit, that if the 
 resurrection of Christ could be fully established 
 their opposition to Christianity must cease. 1? 
 was impossible for them to concede less than this ; 
 and the zealous efforts they have made to repu- 
 diate the evidence of our Lord’s resurrection 
 sufficiently proves their anxiety to get rid of a 
 fact which, if properly established, must, as by 
 some mighty convulsion, shiver infidelity to 
 atoms. 
 
 As the doctrine contended for is of such vast 
 importance to the full development of the truth 
 of Christianity, it is a peculiarly happy circum 
 stance that the evidence upon which it stands is 
 of such a diversified and powerful kind; bearing, 
 as it were, an exact proportion to the comman«- 
 ing position which it occupies in the Christian 
 scheme. With the fact of Christ’s resurrection 
 
 from the dead, the whole system of Christianity 
 
148 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 must stand or fall;* to bear witness to this fact 
 the office of apostles was mainly established ;+ 
 upon its reception our salvation vitally de- 
 pends ;{ and by its all-powerful influence be- 
 lievers are inspired by the animating hope of 
 eternal life.§ 
 
 By this event, also, Christ was “declared to be 
 the Son of God with power;’’|| by it the perfec- 
 tion of his atonement was fully announced ;4 
 and by it the evidence, pattern, and earnest of the 
 resurrection of all his followers were strikingly 
 displayed.** How momentous, then, upon the 
 shewing of Christianity itself, is the doctrine of 
 Christ’s resurrection! How firm ought our faith 
 to be in the evidence by which it is supported! 
 And how cautious and thoughtful ought he to 
 be who ventures to treat it as an imposture of 
 human device ! 
 
 In briefly surveying the evidence upon which 
 the doctrine of Christ’s resurrection rests, we 
 * 1 Cor. xv. 14—19. ~ =f Actsi. 22. iv. 33. x. 40, 41. 
 ¢ Rom, x. 9. § 1 Pet. i. 3, 4. | Rom. i. 4. 
 
 «1 Cor.’ xv. 17., Rom. iv.’ 25. 
 ** 1 Cor. xv. 21, 22, 20, 28." Rom. vii. FE. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 149 
 
 are naturally led to inquire whether his deat 
 actually took place? Here no conceivable dif: 
 ficulty can arise. The fact is admitted both by 
 friends and enemies; and as the Jews procured 
 his crucifixion and thirsted for his blood, there 
 can be no reason to doubt that they would carry 
 the infamous sentence of the law into complete 
 execution. Fully aware of his own predictions that 
 he wouldrise again, they did not suffer his body to 
 be removed from the cross till every symptom of 
 life was extinct; and so decisive were the marks 
 of dissolution, that the soldiers, perceiving that 
 he was already dead, did not break his legs, ac- 
 cording to ordinary custom, when they wished 
 to hasten the death of a particular culprit; but 
 one of their number “ pierced his side with e 
 spear, and forthwith came thereout blood and 
 water.’’* Nor did Pilate deliver up his body to 
 be buried till he received direct assurance from 
 the officers in command that the victim of Cal- 
 vary had actually expired, 
 
 Nor was the place of Christ’s burial less ma- 
 
 * Jobn xix, $3, 34. 
 
 OZ 
 
150 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 nifest than the fact of his death. No secrecy | 
 was attempted to be practised in this matter by 
 Joseph of Arimathea, or any of the rest of 
 Christ’s disciples. The request, indeed, that 
 they might be put in possession of the body of 
 Jesus was complied with; but all their move- 
 ments were watched with nicest scrutiny, and « 
 a Roman watch of sixty soldiers was instantly 
 set over the place of sepulture. 
 
 That Christ died, then, and was buried, no 
 one can doubt. Jews and heathens confirm 
 the facts. Yet in a period short of three full 
 days, notwithstanding the strict watch of a 
 Roman guard, the body of Christ, by the ad- 
 mission of the disciples and Pharisees, is removed 
 from the tomb. Arumour of the fact instantly 
 spreads, and enemies and friends have each their 
 particular mode of accounting for it. Which ac- 
 count, then, bears upon it the signature of truth— 
 the disciples’ or the Jews’? They cannot be both 
 true, for they are contradictory. The disciples say 
 that two women, Mary Magdalene and Mary 
 
 the mother of James and Salome,* had repaired 
 
 * Mark xvi. 1—8. Luke xxiv. 1—12. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 151] 
 
 to the sepulchre for the purpose of perfuming 
 the body of Christ with Eastern spices, and that 
 an angel appeared to them, rolling away the 
 stone from the door of the sepulchre, and inviting 
 them, in the language of condescension, to look 
 into the now empty tomb, where their Lord had 
 been placed on the evening of the crucifixion, but 
 ~ from whence he had now risen in the exercise 
 of an omnipotent power; it is moreover stated 
 by the disciples, that the women received com- 
 mission from the angel to announce the fact of 
 Christ’s resurrection to the rest of his followers. 
 From the same source we learn, that others sub- 
 sequently repaired to the tomb and found the 
 body of Christ removed, and only the linen in 
 which it was wrapped left behind; that the fact 
 of an actual resurrection was demonstrated by 
 the appearance of Christ to several of his disci- 
 ples, both alone and in full assembly; that the 
 eye saw him, that the hand touched him, that 
 the mind entered into fellowship with him, that 
 some enjoyed the benefit of his conversation, 
 partook of food with him, listened to his instruc- 
 
 tions, received his commands, and for the space 
 
152 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 of more than five weeks, had more or less inter- 
 course with him; when, at the end of this period, 
 and after he had given commission to his apostles, 
 he finally conducted his disciples to a mountain 
 in Galilee, and rose to his native heavens in their 
 admiring presence. 
 
 Such is the account of Christ’s resurrection as 
 furnished by his friends. And what is there in 
 the opposite scale? Nothing whatever. It is 
 said, indeed, by the Sanhedrim, that the disciples 
 stole the body of Jesus while the watch slept! 
 This is verily all, in the shape of fact, that the 
 Jews ever attempted to oppose to the combined 
 testimony of the disciples; and it is so utterly 
 absurd, that nothing but the consternation occa- 
 sioned by the astounding fact of the resurrection 
 could have tempted them to induce the watch, by 
 an act of bribery, to make such a statement. 
 Either the watch were asleep or awake : ifawake, 
 how could an armed body of sixty men have al- 
 lowed the disciples to rob the tomb of its sacred 
 inhabitant? and if asleep, how could they bear 
 testimony to the fact of the disciples’ theft? This 
 
 wild and extravagant fabrication, however, was 
 
OF OHRISTIANITY. 153 
 
 speedily abandoned. Not once is it adverted to 
 on those trials of the apostles which soon took 
 place at Jerusalem, on account of their bold and 
 open proclamation of their Master’s resurrection. 
 Though the apostles were cited before that very 
 body who had given currency to the report of the 
 disciples’ theft, they are not even once taxed 
 with the crime; not a whisper escapes the lips of 
 the Sanhedrim on the subject ; not one of all the 
 watch is brought forward to confront the apostles, 
 and to shame them out of their adherence to the 
 imposture of the resurrection ; on the contary, an 
 influential member of the Jewish council advises 
 forbearance to the witnesses of the resurrection, 
 and intimates even the possibility of the event 
 itself.* If the Sanhedrim had had the slightest 
 belief of the wicked story invented, would they 
 have adopted such a course? Undoubtedly not. 
 Now was the time to muster all their strong evi- 
 dence against the facts of the resurrection, and 
 to prevent its further currency among the people; 
 but nothing whatever of this kind is resorted to; 
 
 * Acts v. 33—40.- 
 
154 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 persecution and threats are the only weapons 
 employed to check the rising doctrine; and a 
 whole assembly of men, deeply involved in the 
 consequences of the resurrection, not only suc- 
 cumb to the counsel of an individual, but ap- 
 parently acquiesce in the hypothetical admission 
 that the entire doctrine of the apostles may yet 
 prove itself to be of God. 
 
 There is not, then, an atom of contradictory 
 testimony to the fact of the resurrection as stated 
 by the apostles. If we reject their account, we 
 are left in a state of the wildest conjecture as to 
 what became of the body of Jesus. Look, then, 
 at their testimony, and see if it bears along with 
 it the credentials of truth. Upon a review of 
 the gospel history itself, was there any thing im- 
 probable in the occurrence of Christ's resurrec- 
 tion? Did he not again and again, in the pre- 
 sence of friends and enemies, predict the event, 
 and point to it as the great seal of his mission ? 
 and did he not furnish examples of the same 
 mighty power in the resurrection of Lazarus, and 
 of the widow’s son, as well as in many other 
 
 demonstrations of his eternal power and godhead ? 
 
 Se 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 155 
 
 Before any one can shew that the event of 
 Christ’s resurrection was one by no means to be 
 anticipated, he must disprove the entire facts of 
 our Lord’s history, and thereby subvert the tes- 
 timony of Heathens, Jews, and Christians. The 
 question is, were the apostles deceived, or did 
 they attempt to deceive others? The former of 
 these could not have been the case ; for they had 
 every opportunity of identifying their Lord’s per- 
 son which could possibly be furnished, or which 
 could ever be regarded, by the most scrupulous, 
 as necessary. The very doubts of their own 
 minds contributed to add strength to the convic- 
 tion which they acquired of their Lord’s identity ; 
 and for the space of full forty days, they were 
 enabled, in a succession of interviews, to correct 
 any sudden or erroneous impression, and to 
 settle themselves in the triumphant belief that 
 Christ was risen indeed. 
 
 Nor was there one sign of an impostor or 
 deceiver attaching to these simple-hearted wit- 
 nesses of the resurrection. There is no attempt 
 to furnish one uniform record of the transaction. 
 
 On the contrary, we haye four different accounts 
 
156 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 of the resurrection, so distinct as to shew that 
 each writer aimed at truth, and was under no 
 apprehension of discrepancy in his statements ; 
 and yet so entirely harmonious that the apparent 
 contradictions only tend to establish the validity 
 and perfect consistency of the history.* 
 
 It may be asked, moreover, when and where 
 did the apostles of our Lord begin to proclaim 
 the fact of the resurrection? Why, at the very 
 period of its alleged occurrence, and in the very 
 city of the crucifixion. When they were once 
 convinced of the glorious event themselves, they 
 were bold as lions in its defence, and were not 
 afraid to give utterance to their convictions in 
 the presence of those who must have possessed 
 the best means of detecting the imposture, if any 
 such had been practised. The most subtle and 
 disputatious of the Jewish nation heard their tes- 
 timony; malice, and wit, and power, were all 
 
 enlisted against them; but the new doctrine 
 
 * See a Discourse by Dr. J. P. Smith ‘on the Evidence 
 of the Divine Origin of Christianity from the Resurrection 
 of Jesus,” in a yolume of Lectures delivered at the monthly 
 mectings. 
 
 by 
 ' 
 
 2OCm oe 
 
 a 
 
 oS 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 157 
 
 prevailed, and fresh instances of miraculous 
 power, in the gift of tongues, and in the ability 
 to heal all manner of diseases, accredited the 
 apostles as the commissioned servants of the 
 Most High. 
 
 “Jn all other things,’ observes the late ‘Mr. 
 Scott, “they appeared simple, upright, holy men; 
 but if in this they deceived, the world never yet 
 produced a company of such artful and wicked 
 impostors, whose schemes were so deeply laid, 
 so admirably conducted, and so extensively and 
 permanently successful. For they spent all the 
 rest of their lives in promoting the religion of 
 Jesus, renouncing every earthly interest, facing 
 all kinds of opposition and persecution, bearing 
 contempt and ignominy, prepared habitually to 
 seal their testimony with their blood, and most 
 of them actually dying martyrs in the cause, re- 
 commending it with their latest breath as worthy 
 of universal acceptation. It is likewise obser- 
 vable, that, when they went forth to preach 
 Christ as risen from the dead, they were mani- 
 festly changed, in almost every respect, from 
 what they before had been,—their timidity gave 
 
 P 
 
158 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 place to the most undaunted courage; their car- 
 nal prejudices vanished ; their ambitious contests 
 ceased; their narrow views were immensely ex- 
 panded; and zeal for the honour of the Lord, 
 with love to the souls of men, seem to have 
 engrossed and elevated all the powers of their 
 minds. A more complete human testimony to 
 any event cannot be imagined; for if our Lord 
 had shewn himself ‘openly to all the people’ of 
 the Jews, and their rulers had still persisted in 
 rejecting him, it would have rather weakened 
 than confirmed the evidence; and, if they had 
 unanimously received him as Messiah, it might 
 have excited in others a suspicion that it was a 
 plan concerted for aggrandizing the nation.’’* 
 
 3. The argument derived from Prophecy. 
 
 This is a branch of Christian evidence pos- 
 sessing extraordinary power, and capable of very 
 extensive application. The proper idea of pro- 
 phecy is the foretelling of such future events as no 
 human skill or sagacity could anticipate, and as 
 
 nothing but the prescience of the Eternal could 
 
 * See the Rev. Thomas Scott’s Works, vol. ii. pp. 15, 16. 
 
 ol ati 
 
 ——ooooe 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 159 
 
 either know or reveal. This is the test applied of 
 old to the false gods of the heathen—*Shew us,”’ 
 said Jehovah to their votaries, “ what shall hap- 
 pen; declare us things for to come; shew the 
 things that are to come hereafter, that we may 
 know that ye are gods.’* If it can be shewn 
 that the leading facts recorded in Scripture were 
 foretold by omniscience long ere they occurred, 
 it will follow of necessity that a revelation thus 
 accredited is from God. Prophecy is, indeed, a 
 species of miraculous attestation challenging the 
 investigation of men in every age, and accumu- 
 lating new materials of proof as the revolutions 
 of Divine Providence disclose and illustrate the 
 events embodied in the prophetic testimony. 
 
 The great object and end of the prophetic dis- 
 pensation was evidently to testify “before hand 
 the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should 
 follow,’’+ and to this object and end all the pre- 
 dictions of Scripture might be shewn more or 
 less to contribute. 
 
 I shall begin, therefore, with those prophecies 
 
 * isa: ol or: pea bete i, stOs Li. 
 
160 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 which relate more immediately to the Messiah ; 
 and if it should appear, from a survey of facts, 
 that there were many prophecies uttered concern- 
 ing Him which no human skill or fore-thought 
 could have ventured to announce, and which 
 have realized a minute and circumstantial ac- 
 complishment,—it will then follow, that they 
 furnish a convincing testimony to his character 
 as the Son of God, and to his mission as the 
 Saviour of the world. We shall first make the 
 induction of the prophetic testimony, and then 
 inquire how far it is probable that the prophecies 
 of the Jewish Scriptures could have induced the 
 followers of Jesus of Nazareth to endeavour, by 
 their own means, to bring about the events pre- 
 dicted—in other words, to produce a coincidence 
 in the life of Jesus to the anticipations of the 
 prophets. 
 
 The minuteness both of the predictions and 
 the fulfilments will, perhaps, surprise those who 
 have not closely examined this most interesting 
 topic. In the texts referred to in the notes, the 
 prophecy and its accomplishment will be placed 
 
 in immediate contact, so that those who wish to 
 
 ees ees 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 16] 
 
 examine this subject for themselves may see how 
 utterly impossible it was for any thing like chance 
 or human imposture to have furnished such an 
 exquisite harmony.* 
 
 When we look at the very first page of man’s 
 apostacy, we find the Great Deliverer promised, 
 as that seed of the woman who was to bruise the 
 head of the serpent.+ ‘This mysterious personage 
 was to be of the seed of Abraham.t He was to 
 belong to the tribe of Judah. He was to be a 
 member of the royal house of David.|| He was 
 to be born at Bethleham Judah, the city of 
 David. He was to be miraculously coneeived 
 
 and born of a virgin.** He was to be carried 
 
 * See a very able Discourse on “ the Object and End of 
 the Prophetic Dispensation,” by the late Archibald M‘Lean. 
 Works, vol. iv. 12mo. p. 283. 
 
 + Compare Gen. iii. 15. with Luke i. 29—36. and Gal. 
 iv. 4. 
 
 t Com. Gen. xxii. 18. with Gal. iii. 16, 17. and Heb. 
 ii. 16. 
 
 § Com. Gen. xlix. 10. with Heb. vii. 14. 
 
 || Com. 1 Sam. vii. 12—-17. Isa. xi. 1—6. Jer. xxiii. 
 5, 6. with Luke i. 32, 69. Rom. ]. 3. 
 
 q Com. Micah v. 2. with Matt. ii. 1,5, 6. and Luke ii. 
 4, ll. 
 
 ** Com. Isa. vii. 14. with Matt. i. 20—24, 
 
 p 2 
 
162 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 into Egypt, and called out of it.* He was to have 
 Klias, or John the Baptist as his forerunner.t 
 He was to confirm his mission and doctrine by 
 miracles.t He was to make a public though 
 lowly entrance into Jerusalem, riding upon a 
 colt, the foal of an ass.§ He was to be rejected 
 of his own countrymen the Jews.|| He was to 
 be betrayed by one of his disciples.4/ He was 
 to be sold for thirty pieces of silver.** He was 
 to be scourged, mocked, and spit upon.t+ He 
 was to be nailed to the cross, by his hands and 
 
 his feet.tt He was to be numbered with the 
 
 * Compare Hos. xi. 1. with Matt. ii. 13—16. 
 
 + Com. Isa. xl. 3, 4. Mal. iii, 1. and iv. 5. with Matt. 
 iii. 1—4. xvii. 1O—14. Luke i. 17. vii. 27. 
 
 + Com. Isa. xxxv. 5, 6. with Matt. xi. 3—7. John v. 
 36. and Acts ii. 22. 
 
 § Com. Zech. ix. 9. and Psalms exviii. 25, 26. with 
 Matt. xxi. 2—12. and John xii. 12—19. 
 
 | Com. Isa. viii. 14, 15. xviii. 16. liii. 3. and Psa. exviil. 
 22. with Matt. xxi. 42—45. John i. 10, 11. xii. 37—40. 
 and xv. 22—26. 
 
 q Com. Psa. xli. 9. with John xiii. 18. 
 
 ** Com. Zech. xi. 12. with Matt. xxvi. 14, 15. and 
 xxvii. 3—11. 
 
 +t Com. Isa. 1. 6. with Matt. xxvi. 67, 68. and xxvii. 
 26a. 
 
 tt Com. Psa. xxii. 16. with Luke xxiii, 33, and John 
 xix. 17, 18. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 163 
 
 transgressors.* He was to be mocked and 
 reviled while on the cross.t He was to have 
 gall and vinegar to drink.t His garments 
 were to be parted, and upon his vesture lots were 
 to be cast. He was to be cut off from the land 
 of the living by a violent death.|| He was to be 
 pierced, but not a bone of him to be broken.4 
 He was to make his grave with the rich.** He 
 was not to see corruption.t+ He was to rise 
 from the dead.tt He was to ascend into 
 heaven, sit at the right hand of God, and 
 pour out the Holy Spirit in his various gifts 
 
 upon men.§§ 
 
 * Com. Isa. liii. 12. with Luke xxii. 37. and xxiii. 33. 
 
 + Com. Psa. xxii. 7, 8. with Matt. xxvii. 34, 35. 
 
 + Com. Psa. lxix. 21. with Matt. xxvii. 34, 48. 
 
 § Com. Psa. xxii. 18. with Matt. xxvii. 35. and John 
 xix. 20,194, 
 
 | Com. Isa, lili, Dan ix. 26. with John xix. 30. Acts 
 ii. 23. 
 
 q Com. Zech. xii. 10. Exod. xii. 46. Psa. xxxiv. 20. 
 with John xix. 33—38, i 
 
 **® Com. Isa. liii. 9. with Matt. xxvii. 57—61. 
 
 tt Com. Psa. xvi. 10. with Acts ii. 25—32. xiii. 34—38. 
 
 tt Com. Psa. ii. 7. xvi. 11. and Isa. liii. 8. with Acts ii. 
 30, 31. xiii. 33, 34. 
 
 §§ Com. Psa. Ixviii. 18. and ex. i. Joel ii. 28. with 
 Eph. iv, 813, Mark xvi. 19, Acts ii, 33. 
 
164 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 His divine dignity was also distinctly marked 
 in the prophetic testimony. According to the 
 flesh, he was to be of the seed of David; but 
 beyond this there was a view of his character 
 which exhibited him in all the glory of essential 
 and uncreated Godhead. He was to be called 
 Immanuel.* He was described as the mighty 
 God.t He was spoken of as Jehovah our 
 righteousness.t He was portrayed as the Son 
 of God.g He was declared to be David's 
 Lord. || 
 
 Nor were the offices which Messiah was to 
 sustain overlooked by the omniscient spirit of 
 the prophetic dispensation. He was to be a 
 prophet like unto Moses.4{ He was to be a 
 priest for ever, after the order of Melchisedec.** 
 
 He was to be an anointed King, on Zion’s holy 
 
 * Com. Isa, vii. 14. with Mark i. 23. 
 
 + Com. Isa, ix. 6. with Tit. ii. 13. 
 
 ¢ Com. Jer. xxxiii. 5, 6. with 1 Cor. i. 30, 31. 
 
 § Com. 2 Sam. vii. 14, Psa. ii, 7, 12. with Roms i. 3, 4, 
 Heb. i. 5. 
 
 || Com. Psa. ex. 1. with Matt. xxii. 42-46. 
 
 q Com. Deut. xviii. 18. with Acts iii, 22—24. 
 
 ** Com, Psa cx. 4. with Heb. v. 5, 6, vile Vill. ix. x. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 165 
 
 hill,—that is, the Messiah and Sovereign of his 
 church.* 
 
 In like manner the spiritual empire of the Son 
 of God is portrayed in the prophetic page. 
 Its nature, its extent, its duration, its blessedness, 
 its happy subjects, are all described.+ And 
 though many of the predictions which relate to 
 that empire are not yet fulfilled, and though 
 some of them will not realize their accomplish- 
 ment till the consummation of all things; yet 
 enough has been fulfilled to shew that Christ and 
 his kingdom are the distinct objects of reference, 
 and that what is yet unaccomplished shall ere 
 long have the light of Divine Providence shed 
 upon it. 
 
 When I look at the number, minuteness, and 
 singular character of the prophetic testimonies of 
 the Jewish Scriptures to Messiah, and compare 
 
 them with their exact and circumstantial accom- 
 
 * Com. Psa. ii. 6. Psa. ii. 2. Dan. ix. 26. with John 
 xx. 30, 31. Acts ii. 36. 
 
 + Com. Psa xly. .@,7-1sa. ix. 6—8, xi. 111. xlix. 
 6. with Gal. iii. 8. Heb.i. 8,9. Luke i. 30—34. Rom. 
 xiv. 12. Acts xiii. 47. 
 
166 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 plishment in the person, office, and empire of 
 Jesus of Nazareth, I am equally astounded at 
 the unbelief of Jews and Infidels. How can 
 they resist such a flood of light ? Upon any con- 
 ceivable scheme of adjustment, how can they, 
 in their present state of mind, account for the 
 predictions and their fulfilment! Let it be re- 
 membered that Christians did not construct the 
 prophecies ; they formed part of a document in 
 the hands of their bitterest enemies; and let it 
 be equally remembered, that the principal facts 
 in the history of the Son of God which verify 
 the prophecies, were realities which the most 
 inveterate infidels have been compelled to admit. 
 Let the wondrous coincidence, then, be accounted 
 for on any other principle but the admission of a 
 great scheme of prophecy originating in the 
 divine prescience, and intended to vindicate the 
 claims of a revelation which has been vouchsafed 
 by God to his bewildered and erring children. 
 
 I know of no method of evading the force of 
 the argument derived from prophecy, but by the 
 supposition, that the apostles of our Lord, finding 
 
 in the Jewish Scriptures a vast number of pre- 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 167 
 
 dictive statements, concerning an_ illustrious 
 personage who was to rise up in the nation of 
 Israel, accommodated themselves, with their 
 leader, to the scheme thus perceived by them. 
 But the entire character and conduct of the men, 
 their benevolence, their contempt for every thing 
 like human ambition and applause, the purity 
 and integrity of their manners, their fearless 
 exposure of themselves to persecution and death, 
 the total absence of any thing like inferior motive 
 to sustain them, forbids us, upon all the ordinary 
 calculations of human nature, to conceive of 
 them as heartless deceivers and villains. If 
 they were so, it may be safely affirmed that they 
 acted a part the very opposite of all the other 
 impostors that ever lived. 
 
 But supposing they were deceivers, and that 
 they made themselves agents to the fulfilment of 
 the Jewish prophecies; let us see how this can 
 be borne out by the facts of the case. This 
 inquiry is so well met by the present Bishop of 
 Chester, that I cannot do a greater service to my 
 readers than to quote his own words on the 
 subject. 
 
168 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 “Jt may be thought,’’ says he, “ that a design 
 like that attributed to the followers of Jesus 
 would be greatly assisted by the prophecies 
 recorded in their national Scriptures, and point- 
 ing to some remarkable personage who was 
 expected to appear. 
 
 «‘], For example: the time of this appearance 
 was fixed by the prophet Daniel at about four 
 hundred and ninety years from his own days; 
 which so closely corresponded with the birth of 
 Jesus, that such an event was looked for, by 
 ‘devout persons, at the very period when it 
 occurred.* This would be, as was before ob- 
 served, a circumstance greatly in their favour. 
 
 «2. The next thing to be considered by the 
 framer of this deceit, would be the place of their 
 leader’s birth. Jesus was born at Bethlehem. 
 Upon consulting their Scriptures, they would 
 find this passage respecting Bethlehem : ‘Thou 
 Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little 
 among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee 
 
 shall he come forth unto me that is to be the 
 
 * Dan, ix. 24. Luke ii. 20. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 169 
 
 ruler in Israel, whose goings forth have been 
 from of old, for everlasting. * This would prove, 
 beyond what could be anticipated, an assistance 
 of their design, 
 
 “3. It seemed to be intimated in the prophe- 
 cies, that the deliverer who was to come should 
 be preceded by a forerunner, who might awaken 
 the attention of the people to him. For it was 
 written, ‘The voice of him that crieth in the 
 wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord; 
 make straight in the desert a highway for our 
 God.’+ And again, ‘Behold, I will send my 
 messenger, and he shall prepare the way before 
 me; and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall sud- 
 denly come into his temple.’ Now it was 
 notorious that a singular character, John, called 
 ‘the Baptist,’ had appeared a short time before 
 Jesus began his ministry, pretending to be this 
 messenger, and nothing more, and directing his 
 followers to one who was to ‘come after him.’ 
 This was another coincidence equally wonderful 
 
 and favourable, 
 
 * Micah v. 3. t Isa, xl, 3... + Malachi iii, 1. 
 Q 
 
170 THE TRUTH AND BXCELLENCE 
 
 “4, Further, as to the most important parts: 
 the way in which Jesus had lived, and had 
 been received, and died. His character, as repre- 
 sented in the Gospels, had been peculiar in 
 every respect ; but especially remarkable for the 
 union of meekness and constancy which it dis- 
 played. 
 
 “ Of unknown origin and humble parentage, 
 he had attracted considerable notice, and many 
 followers; yet he had not been generally ac- 
 knowledged among his countrymen, and those 
 who adhered to him were not the great and 
 powerful. His life, upon the whole, was one of 
 trial and hardship, not one of triumph and exal- 
 tation. In the end, he was sentenced to death 
 with the notoriously wicked; and suffered a 
 punishment, which even his judge confessed that 
 his conduct had not deserved. Yet, though 
 dying with malefactors, he was laid in a rich 
 and honourable tomb.* 
 
 «“ A character answering this description was 
 
 portrayed by that prophet who had always 
 
 * Matt. xxvii. 57—60. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY 171 
 
 been considered as most particular in what 
 respected the future Messiah.* 
 
 “Tt cannot be denied that the existence of 
 these ancient prophecies would be very advan- 
 tageous to men setting out with the purpose in 
 question. But it is time to ask in our turn, how 
 they came to find these prophecies ready to 
 their hand ?—prophecies of such a nature, that 
 no man could have contrived a scheme depen- 
 dent upon them, because they could not command 
 the fact by which they were to be fulfilled. 
 With respect to the birth-place, for example : 
 in order that it might happen to be Bethlehem, 
 it was requisite that a general census should be 
 held, convening all the inhabitants of the country 
 to their chief town; by which means alone the 
 mother of Jesus was called away from her usnal 
 residence, and her infant born at Bethlehem, 
 instead of Nazareth. The preparatory ministry 
 of the Baptist was equally beyond the control 
 of the disciples. So were the minute details of 
 incidents, which agree in a wonderful manner 
 with the circumstantial narrative. The entrance 
 
 * Isaiah liii, 1—9, 
 
172 THE TRUTH AND EXC&LLENCE 
 
 of Jesus into Jerusalem, at once humble and 
 triumphant.* The manner of his death, and his 
 own countrymen the cause.t The peculiar 
 indignities which he underwent: the very words 
 of mockery used against him.t The price 
 which “Judas received for his treachery. The 
 purpose to which that money was applied.§ 
 
 «‘Passages of this nature could not have been 
 introduced by the apostles into the existing 
 scriptures, because, as their countrymen were 
 generally hostile to the design, such an attempt 
 must have proved fatal to their pretensions. 
 And further, because the books among which 
 these scattered sentences are found, had now 
 been extensively diffused during a period of 
 three hundred years in a foreign language, 
 defying the imposture of the whole nation, if the 
 whole nation had concurred in the design. 
 
 “‘We are reduced, then, to the necessity of 
 
 supposing that the followers of Jesus, desiring 
 
 * Com. Matt. xxi. 1, &c. with Zech. ix. 9. 
 t Zech. xiii. 6. 
 { Com. Isa. 1. 6. Ps. xxii., Ixix. 20. with Matt. xxvii. 
 § Com. Zech. xi. 12. with Matt. xxvi. 15, xxvii. 3. &e. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY, 173 
 
 to deify their teacher, selected from their na- 
 tional Scriptures these pointed allusions to 
 circumstances like his, which happened to be 
 written there, and brought them forward to 
 confirm his pretensions. 
 
 “But surely to ascribe coincidences like these 
 to chance, to allege that all these passages were 
 thrown out at random in the Jewish Scriptures, 
 and that the circumstances of the birth, and life, 
 and character, and death of Jesus, turned out so 
 as to agree with them, is to attribute to chance 
 what never did or could take place by chance; 
 and in itself far more improbable than the event 
 which such a, solution is intended to disprove. 
 For, allow to Jesus the authority which he 
 claims, and every difficulty vanishes. We 
 should then expect to find prophetic intimations 
 of his great purpose, and of the way in which 
 it was to be effected. We should expect to 
 find them, too, just what they are; not united 
 and brought together in a way of formal descrip- 
 tion, which could only be a provision for impos- 
 ture ; but such scattered hints and allusions as, 
 after the event has occurred, serve to shew that 
 
 Q 2 
 
174 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 it was predicted, by a comparison of the event 
 and the prophecy. 
 
 “It ought to be observed, in addition, that if 
 the disciples of Jesus had framed their story and 
 their representation of facts, with a view of 
 obtaining this collateral support, they would have 
 been more diligent and ostentatious in pointing 
 out the circumstances of resemblance. They 
 would have anticipated the labours of those 
 writers who have made it their business to shew 
 the completion of prophecy in the events related 
 in the gospels. But, on the contrary, they bring 
 these things forward in an historical rather than 
 an argumentative way, and commonly leave 
 the deductions which may be drawn from them 
 to the discernment of after times.””* 
 
 I must be allowed to remark, before dismiss- 
 ing this branch of evidence, that though the 
 prophecies of the Old and New Testaments 
 
 chiefly relate to the Messiah, and are all so con- 
 
 * ©The Evidence of Christianity derived from its 
 Nature and Reception.” By John Bird Sumner, AD Oe 
 Lord Bishop of Chester. Fourth Edition. 12mo. 
 pp. 124—133. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 175 
 
 structed as, in their accomplishment, to add 
 strength to the evidence which confirms the 
 Christian revelation, they are by no means con- 
 fined to the delineation of his character and 
 claims. They occupy a range most extensive, 
 and carry the mind over the eventful history of 
 the Jewish nation, and of almost all the nations 
 of heathen antiquity. Let it never be forgotten, 
 that Nineveh’s predicted ruin has come upon 
 it ;*— that Babylon, in all its boasted splen- 
 dour, has been “swept with the besom of 
 threatened destruction ;’’}—that Tyre, the great 
 port of the ancient world, has become, accord- 
 ing to the warnings of Ezekiel, a place only for 
 the drying me fishermen’s nets ;+—that Kigypt, 
 the mother of arts, has become “the basest of 
 kingdoms,’ and has never since been able 
 “to exalt herself among the nations,’ as if to 
 shew that all the events of futurity are naked 
 and open to that omniscient Spirit who foretold 
 her doom, and predicted her permanent humilia- 
 tion.§ 
 
 * Nahum i. il. iii. + Isa. xiti. xiv. 
 
 } Ezek. xxvi. 4, 3. § Ezek, xxix. 14; 15. 
 
176 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 Nor, in contemplating the great scheme of 
 prophecy, and the support which it yields to the 
 truth of Revelation, must we lose sight of the 
 destinies. of the Jewish nation.* In the fearful 
 destruction of Jerusalem by the Roman army,— 
 in the dispersion and long-continued peculiarity 
 of the seed of Abraham,—in the contempt, per- 
 
 * “The great lawgiver of the Jews,” observes Mr. 
 Horne, (in his Introduction, vol. i. p. 327,) “ foretold that 
 they should be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth, 
 ~—scattered among all people, from one end of the earth, even 
 unto the other,—find no ease or rest,—be oppressed and crushed 
 always,—be left few in number among the heathen,—pine 
 away in their iniquity in their enemies’ land,—and become an 
 astonishment, a proverb, and a bye-word unto all nations. 
 These predictions were literally fulfilled during their sub- 
 jection to the Chaldeans and Romans; and, in later times, 
 in all the nations where they have been dispersed. Moses 
 foretold that their enemies would besiege and take their 
 cities; and this prophecy was fulfilled by Shishak, King 
 of Egypt; Shalmaneser, King of Assyria; Nebuchad- 
 nezzer, Antiochus, Epiphanes, Sosius, and Herod; and 
 finally by Titus. Moses foretold that such grievous 
 famines should prevail during those sieges, that they should 
 eat the flesh of their sons and daughters. This predic- 
 tion was fulfilled about six hundred years after the time of 
 Moses, when Samaria was besieged by the King of Syria; 
 also, about nine hundred years after that time, among the 
 Jews, during the siege of Jerusalem, before the Babylonish 
 captivity ; and finally, fifteen hundred years after, at the 
 siege of Jerusalem by the Romans. Though the Hebrews 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY, 177 
 
 secution, and infamy which they have so long 
 endured,— in the promulgation of the gospel 
 among Gentile tribes,—in the many and hate- 
 ful corruptions of the religion of Jesus which 
 have been introduced through the medium of 
 Anti-Christian powers,— and in the preservation 
 
 and growing triumphs of the Christian faith, we 
 
 were to be as the stars of heaven for multitude, Moses 
 predicted that they should be few in number, and his 
 prophecy was fulfilled: for, in the last siege of Jerusalem, 
 Josephus tells us that an infinite multitude perished by 
 famine; and he computes the total number who perished 
 by it, and by the war in Jerusalem, and other parts of 
 Judea, at one million two hundred and forty thousand Sour 
 hundred and ninety, besides ninety-nine thousand two hun- 
 dred who were made prisoners, and sold unto their enemies 
 for bondmen and bondwomen ; and after their last overthrow 
 by Hadrian, many thousands of them were sold; and 
 those for whom purchasers could not be found (Moses 
 foretold that no man would buy them) were transported into 
 Egypt, where they perished by shipwreck or famine, or 
 were massacred by the inhabitants. Since the destruction 
 of Jerusalem, they have been scattered among all nations; 
 among whom they have found no ease, nor have the soles of 
 their feet had rest ; they have been oppressed and spoiled ever 
 more, especially in the east, where the tyranny exercised 
 over them is so severe, as to afford a literal fulfilment of 
 the prediction of Moses,— Thy life shall hang in doubt 
 before thee, and thou shalt fear day and night, and shalt 
 have no assurance of ‘thy life. Yet, notwithstanding all 
 their oppressions, they have still continued a separate 
 
178 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 have such indubitable fulfilments of the pro- 
 phetic record, that he who refuses to embrace, 
 as divine, the wondrous volume of which it 
 forms such a distinguished part, sins against all 
 the laws of moral evidence, and, at the same 
 time, risks his eternal salvation by rejecting the 
 counsel of God against himself. 
 
 4. The Evidence of Christianity derived from 
 a correct estimate of its early success. 
 
 It would be most inconclusive to infer the super- 
 
 people, without incorporating with the nations; and they 
 have become an astonishment and a bye-word among ail the 
 nations whither they have been carried since their punish- 
 ment has been inflicted. The very name of a Jew has 
 been used as a term of peculiar reproach and infamy. 
 Finally, it was foretold, that their plagues should be wonder- 
 ful, even great plagues, and of long continuance. And have 
 not their plagues continued more than seventeen hundred 
 years? In comparison of them, their former captivities 
 were very short ; during their eaptivity in Chaldea, Ezekiel 
 and Daniel prophesied ; but now they have no true pro- 
 phet to foretel the end of their calamities. What nation 
 has suffered so much, and yet endured so long? What 
 nation has subsisted as a distinct people in their own 
 country so long as the Jews have done in their dispersion 
 into all countries? And what a sraNDING MIRACLE is 
 thus exhibited to the world in the fulfilment, at this very 
 time, of prophecies delivered considerably more than three 
 thousand years ago! What a permanent attestation is it 
 to the divine legation of Moses !” 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 179 
 
 natural origin of Christianity from the mere fact 
 of its success ; inasmuch as some of the greatest 
 impostures the world ever knew have obtained, 
 for many ages, a most powerful and extensive 
 dominion over the human mind. The early preva- 
 lence of the gospel is, in itself, no decisive proof of 
 its divine origin. Ere it can be regarded as such, 
 a number of circumstances must combine with 
 the fact of its success, which admit of no just or 
 rational solution but the admission of the finger 
 of God. The question then is, did such circum- 
 stances evince themselves in the early triumphs 
 of Christianity? And, if they did, wherein dia 
 they consist ? and how do they admit of being 
 exhibited in the shape of a conclusive argument 
 for the truth and divinity of the gospel? 
 
 It is then a fact that Jesus of Nazareth was 
 put to death in the reign of Tiberius, by the 
 order of Pontius Pilate, his Procurator.* It is 
 a fact that as early as the time of Claudius, who 
 died within twenty years of the crucifixion, the 
 
 religious assemblies of the Christians were pro- 
 
 * See Tacitus, Annal. xv. 44. 
 
180 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 scribed under open pretext that they were with- 
 drawing men from the worship of the gods.* It 
 is a fact, that in the reign of Nero, the followers 
 of Christ endured persecutions of the most fear- , 
 ful kind, and that this wicked despot endeavoured 
 to fix upon them the stigma of burning Rome, 
 though it was justly and loudly charged on 
 himself.+ It is a fact that Pliny the younger, 
 
 * See Suetonius in Claud. 25. 
 
 + See Tacitus, as above. I give Paley’s translation. 
 « But neither these exertions, nor his largesses to the people, 
 nor his offerings to the gods, did away the infamous impu- 
 tation under which Nero lay, of having ordered the city to 
 be set on fire. To put an end therefore to this report, he laid 
 the guilt and inflicted the most cruel punishments upon a set 
 of people who were held in abhorrence for their crimes, 
 and called by the vulgar, Christians. The founder of that 
 name was Christ, who suffered death in the reign of Tibe- 
 rius, under his Procurator, Pontius Pilate. The perni- 
 cious superstition, thus checked for awhile, broke out again, 
 and spread not only over Judea, where the evil originated, 
 but through Rome also, whither every thing bad upon earth 
 finds its way, and is practised. Some who confessed their 
 sect were first seized; and afterwards, by their informa~ 
 tion, a vast multitude were apprehended, who were con- 
 victed, not so much of the crime of burning Rome, as of 
 ‘hatred to mankind. Their sufferings and their execution 
 were aggravated by insult and mockery, for some were dis- 
 guised in the skins of wild beasts and worried to death by 
 dogs, some were crucified, and others were wrapt in pitched 
 shirts and set on fire when the days closed, that they might 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 18] 
 
 a Proconsul under the Emperor Trajan, who 
 was contemporary with Ignatius, and who flou- 
 rished about seventy-five years after the death 
 of Christ, describes the Christian assemblies in 
 Bithynia and Pontus as consisting of “a vast 
 
 multitude’’* of all ages and sexes, and speaks of 
 
 ‘ 
 
 serve as lights to illuminate the night. Nero lent his own 
 gardens for these executions; and exhibited at the same 
 time a mock Circensian entertainment, being a spectator of 
 the whole in the dress of a charioteer, sometimes mingling 
 with the crowd on foot, and sometimes viewing the spec- 
 tacle from his car. This conduct made the sufferers pitied ; 
 and though they were criminals, and deserving the severest 
 punishments, yet they were considered as sacrificed, not so 
 
 much out of regard to the public good, as to gratify the 
 cruelty of one man.” 
 
 * “Tngens multitudo,” a vast multitude, is the histo- 
 rian’s expression. I insert the whole letter according to 
 Milner’s translation, though he has not preserved the full 
 force of the original in his rendering of this expression. 
 
 “C, Pliny to Trajan, Emperor. 
 
 “ Health.—It is my usual custom, Sir, to refer all things 
 of which I harbour any doubts, to you. For who can 
 better direct my judgment in its hesitation, or instruct my 
 understanding in its ignorance? I never had the fortune 
 to be present at any examination of Christians before I 
 came into this province. I am, therefore, at a loss to 
 determine what is the usual object either of inquiry or 
 of punishment, and to what length either of them is to be 
 earried. It has also been with me a question very pro~ 
 blematical, whether any distinction should be made 
 between the young and the old, the tender and the robust 5 
 
 R 
 
182 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 Christianity as an inveterate superstition which 
 
 —whether any room should be given for repentance, or 
 the guilt of Christianity once incurred is not to be expiated 
 by the most unequivocal retraction ;—whether the name 
 itself, abstracted from any flagitiousness of conduct, or the 
 crimes connected with the name, be the object of punish- 
 ment. In the mean time, this has been my method, with 
 respect to those who were brought before me as Christians. 
 I asked them whether they were Christians : if they plead- 
 ed guilty, I interrogated them twice afresh, with a menace 
 of capital punishment. In case of obstinate perseverance, 
 I ordered them to be executed. For of this I had no doubt, 
 whatever was the nature of their religion, that a sullen and 
 obstinate inflexibility called for the vengeance of the 
 magistrate. Some were infected with the same madness 
 whom, on account of their privilege of citizenship, I 
 reserved to be sent to Rome to be referred to your tribunal. 
 In the course of this business, informations pouring in, as 
 is usual when they are encouraged, more cases occurred. 
 An anonymous libel was exhibited, with a catalogue of 
 names of persons, who yet declared that they were not 
 Christians then, or ever had been; and they repeated after 
 mean invocation of the gods and of your image, which, for 
 this purpose, I had ordered to be brought with the images 
 of the deities ;—they performed sacred rites with wine and 
 frankincense, and execrated Christ ; none of which things, I 
 am told, a real Christian can ever be compelled to do. On 
 this account I dismissed them. Others, named by an in- 
 former, first affirmed, and then denied the charge of Chris- 
 tianity ; declaring that they had been Christians, but had 
 ceased to be so; some three years ago, others still longer, 
 some even twenty years ago. All of them worshipped 
 your image and the statues of the gods, and also execrated 
 ‘Christ. And this was the account which they gave of the 
 nature of the religion they once had professed, whether it 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 183 
 
 had spread itself, not only through cities, but 
 
 deserves the name of crime or error ;~-namely, that they 
 were accustomed, on a stated day, to meet before day-light, 
 and to repeat among themselves an hymn to Christ as to a 
 god, and to bind themselves by an oath, with an obligation 
 of not committing any wickedness, but, on the contrary, 
 of abstaining from thefts, robberies, and adulteries ;—also, 
 of not violating their promise, or denying a pledge ;—after 
 which, it was their custom to separate, and meet again 
 at a promiscuous harmless meal, from which last prac- 
 tice they however desisted after the publication of my 
 edict, in which, agreeably to your orders, I forbade any 
 societies of that sort; on which account, I judged it the 
 more necessary to inquire, By ToRTURE, from two females, 
 who were said to be deaconesses, what is the real truth. 
 But nothing could I collect, except a depraved and exces- 
 sive superstition. Deferring, therefore, any further inves- 
 tigation, I determined to consult you; for the number 
 of culprits is so great, as to call for serious consultation. 
 Many persons are informed against, of every age, and both 
 sexes; and more still will be in the same situation. The 
 contagion of the superstition hath spread, not only through 
 cities, but even villages and the country. Not that I think 
 it impossible to check and to correct it. The success of 
 my endeavours hitherto forbids such desponding thoughts ; 
 for the temples, once almost desolate, begin to be frequented, 
 and the sacred solemnities, which had long been intermitted, 
 are now attended afresh; and the sacrificial victims are 
 now sold everywhere, which once could scarce find a pur- 
 chaser, Whence I conclude, that many might be reclaimed 
 were the hope of impunity, on repentance, absolutely 
 confirmed.” 
 The Emperor Trajan’s reply to Pliny. 
 
 ** You have done perfectly right, my dear Pliny, in the 
 
 inquiry which you have made concerning Christians. For 
 
184 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 over villages and the whole country.* It isa 
 fact, that Christian churches were established 
 in every province of the Roman empire within 
 a very brief period of the death of Christ,+ and 
 that thousands and tens of thousands of new 
 converts maintained, with unshaken confidence, . 
 their adherence to the facts and promises of the 
 gospel amidst the heaviest persecutions and 
 calamities that ever befel mortals in this vale of 
 tears. It is a fact that the first propagators of 
 Christianity were only fishermen of Galilee, and 
 
 that they sought and obtained no aid from human 
 
 truly no one general rule can be laid down which will 
 apply itself to all cases. These people must not be sought 
 after; if they are brought before you and convicted, let 
 them be capitally punished, yet with this restriction, that 
 if any renounce Christianity, and evidence his sincerity by 
 supplicating our gods, however suspected he may be for the 
 past, he shall obtain pardon for the future, on his repent- 
 ance.. But anonymous libels in no case ought to be attended 
 to; for the precedent would be of the worst sort, and per- 
 - fectly incongruous to the maxims of my government.” 
 
 * See Plin. Epist. Lib. x. Ep. 91. 
 
 + “ The rapidity and extent of the propagation of the 
 gospel were such as to prove its divine origin. On the 
 very first day of its promulgation, three thousand were 
 converted ; these soon increased to five thousand. Multi- 
 tudes, both of men and women, were afterwards daily 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 185. 
 
 power in the prosecution of their extraordinary 
 undertaking. It is a fact, that the experiment 
 of Christianity was made in one of the most 
 enlightened and refined periods in the history of 
 the world, and on a theatre which laid it open 
 to the scrutiny and detection of all Greece and 
 Rome. It is a fact, that the first messengers of 
 the cross entered into no compromise with the 
 vices and corruptions of mankind, but that they 
 denounced every system of evil, and sought only 
 to win men’s applause by bringing them to per- 
 
 ceive and acknowledge the exquisite loveliness 
 
 added to the new religion. Before the end of thirty 
 years, the gospel had spread through Judza, Galilee, 
 Samaria, almost all the numerous districts of Lesser Asia; 
 through Greece, and the Islands of the Augean Sea, and 
 the sea- coast of Africa, and had passed on to the capital of 
 Italy. Great multitudes believed at: Antioch in Syria, at 
 Joppa, Ephesus, Corinth, Thessalonica, Berea, Iconium, 
 Derbe, Antioch in Pisidia, at Lydda and Saron. Con- 
 verts, also, are mentioned at Tyre, Caesarea, Troas, Athens, 
 Philippi, Lystra, Damascus. Thus far the sacred narra- 
 tive conducts us. The religion being thus widely diffused, 
 the New Testament carries us no further. But all eccle- 
 siastical and profane history concurs in describing the rapid 
 progress of the new doctrine. Tacitus, Suetonius, Juve- 
 nal, Pliny, Martial, Mareus Aurelius, sufficiently testify 
 the propagation of Christianity.”—See Bishop Wilson’s 
 Evidences, vol. i. p. 260, 12mo. 
 
 a 2 
 
 o 
 
186 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 of truth, and by teaching them to submit to a 
 course of religious and moral discipline, which 
 made them kind and forgiving, peaceful and 
 holy. It is a fact, that the doctrine taught by 
 the Apostles of Jesus of Nazareth was, in many 
 respects, new; that it proclaimed facts of a 
 strictly miraculous nature; that it sternly opposed 
 every existing system of religion; that it rebuked 
 and condemned those vices and depraved habits 
 which universally prevailed ; that, nevertheless, 
 it rapidly spread, and that in less than three 
 centuries it subverted the religion of pagan 
 Rome, and established itself on the throne of the 
 Ceesars. 
 
 Had Christianity been adapted to the de- 
 praved inclinations of the human heart; had it 
 flattered men’s pride, ambition, and vain-glory ; 
 had it promised or secured worldly honour and 
 prosperity ; had it been hailed by the great 
 and noble of mankind; had it been supported 
 by human power, and defended by the swords 
 and shields of the earth ; had conquering armies 
 been its heralds, and the spoils of enemies its 
 
 rewards,—its success would then have been no 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 187 
 
 mystery, and its triumphs would then have 
 afforded no proof of supernatural interference. 
 But if the reverse of all this was the case,—if 
 Christianity had nothing in it to pamper human 
 corruption,—nothing to minister to the pride of 
 the human heart, —nothing to present to its 
 disciples in the shape of worldly allurement,— 
 nothing to draw around it men of high renown,— 
 nothing of power to terrify or subdue,—nothing 
 to support the courage of its professors but the 
 testimony of a good conscience and the hopes of 
 a better life,—what shall be said if after all it 
 triumphed? Yes, if while it opposes itself to 
 all the world it prevail, what shall be said ?— 
 if in the absence of all the ordinary causes 
 and weapons of success it prevail, what shall 
 be said? let us look at the facts of this case, 
 and impartially determine if there was any thing 
 merely human in the original agencies of Chris- 
 tianity to account for the results which followed 
 their employment. The results are these :—the 
 whole Roman empire, in a few short years, was 
 pervaded by the gospel,—multitudes of Jews and 
 
 Pagans were won over to the sincere belief of the 
 
188 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 facts of Christianity,—the very aspects and insti- 
 tutions of society were completely changed and 
 re-modelled by the new doctrine,—the flames 
 of persecution were borne with exemplary for- 
 titude, patience, and forgiveness, — the cause 
 triumphed by means of its very disasters,—and 
 the power which attempted to crush it at last 
 yielded to its mysterious influence. 
 
 Such are the results; and what are the 
 apparent agencies by which they were effected ?— 
 The doctrine of ong who was crucified at Jeru- 
 salem between two thieves,—the preaching of 
 a few illiterate fishermen of Galilee,—and the 
 exemplary zeal and consistency of those who 
 ranked themselves as the disciples of the cross. 
 
 If, then, the agencies of Christianity were 
 merely human, or if they were nothing more 
 than a system of deliberately adjusted imposture, 
 how comes it to pass that there was so little in 
 the apparent process to account for the effect 
 produced? If all was of man, how did it happen 
 that he constructed a scheme in the very teeth 
 of human prejudice? and, more than this, how 
 
 did it happen that a scheme so constructed 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 189 
 
 obtained a footing among mankind? Was it so 
 easy a thing to subvert Jewish prejudice, in the 
 very city of Jerusalem, and to silence the oracles 
 of heathenism where they had ruled with des- 
 potic sway, that twelve fishermen, just quitting 
 their nets, and determining to become the foun- 
 ders of a new religion, should be deemed equal 
 to the task? Let such a case be imagined to 
 take place in our own age and nation. For if 
 Christianity be not from heaven, nothing forbids 
 the success of such another experiment on the 
 credulity of mankind now any more than for- 
 merly. But does any one in his sober senses 
 believe that it would succeed, or that it would 
 produce even any considerable impression ? We 
 have had, it is true, occasional excitement pro- 
 duced by certain extravagant persons, but their 
 partial success has mainly depended upon their 
 appeal to the general data of Christianity, and 
 upon their professed adherence to its cardinal 
 doctrines. We might challenge all the philoso- 
 phers who ever lived to invent or to propagate 
 any imposture answering to the character of 
 
 Christianity. The thing is impossible. Its facts 
 
190 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 and its success are solitary examples in the 
 history of our world. Paganism and the religion 
 of the False Prophet have nothing in common 
 with them.* The former accumulated its ma- 
 terials by a progressive departure from all right 
 notions of the moral character of God, and by 
 its marked coincidence with every thing base 
 and polluted in human nature ;—and the latter 
 
 was propagated at the edge of the sword, and 
 
 * “No religion, purely as a religion,” observes Dr. 
 Wilson, the present Bishop of Calcutta, “was ever pro- 
 pagated but the Christian. Heathenism was never a 
 matter of dissemination or conversion. It had no creed, 
 no origin distinct from the corrupt traces of a remote 
 fabulous antiquity. It was a creature of human mould, 
 contrived for the sake of human legislation. The Greeks 
 and Romans imposed it not on their subject nations, 
 Mahomedanism was the triumph of the sword. Conquest, 
 not religious faith, was its manifest object; rapine, violence, 
 and bloodshed were its credentials. 
 
 “No religion was ever attempted to be spread through 
 the world by the means of instruction and persuasion, 
 with an authority of its own, but Christianity. The idea 
 never came into the mind of man to propagate a religion 
 haying for its set design and exclusive object the en- 
 lightening of mankind with a doctrine professedly divine, 
 till Christianity said to her disciples, “Go ye into all the 
 world, and preach the Gospel to every creature.”——See 
 “The Evidences of Christianity stated, &c. &c.,” in two 
 vols. 12mo, Second edition, pp. 259, 260. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 191 
 
 amidst all those promises of sensual indulgence 
 which are so grateful to a nature prone to the 
 love of sin. But Christianity stood forth in the 
 spotless purity of its divine Author, and refused 
 to own any as its true disciples who remained 
 under the dominion of their crimes. It assailed 
 men with none of the weapons of human power, 
 but made its triumphant appeal to the under- 
 standing and the heart. It boasted of no earthly 
 patronage ; but went forth in a secret and hid- 
 den power, which was “ mighty to the pulling 
 down of strong holds.’ All weakness in its 
 exterior agencies, it became “the wisdom of 
 God, and the power of God to the salvation ”’ 
 of thousands and tens of thousands who em- 
 braced its merciful provisions. It changed the 
 very face of society, and effected revolutions in 
 the manners, customs, and laws of mankind, 
 which all other systems had failed to achieve. 
 It is unphilosophical in ‘the highest degree to 
 trace its early prevalence to the mere influence 
 of ordinary and secondary causes. There is 
 no problem of the world’s history bearing the 
 
 least resemblance to it. The experience of 
 
192 THE TRUTH AND EXCRLLENCE 
 
 mankind supplies no illustration of any thing 
 like the successes of Christianity springing from 
 mere human instrumentality, whether well or 
 ill directed. Must men then acknowledge a 
 miracle in their zeal to get rid of a miraculous 
 history? This is indeed very preposterous; 
 but it is nevertheless the condition to which 
 those reduce themselves who would attempt to 
 account for the mighty revolution produced by 
 Christianity upon mere natural principles. They 
 discard the doctrine of miracles, they repudiate 
 the testimony by which the miraculous facts 
 of the Gospel are handed down to mankind; 
 but they call upon their disciples to believe, 
 without a tittle of evidence, that the fishermen 
 of Galilee could have done all that they did, 
 and that Christianity could have gained all its 
 conquests, without the slightest aid from hea- 
 ven,—-nay, though imposture and deception 
 were written on the entire undertaking. We 
 demand of them an illustrative example, and we 
 are sure that they cannot produce it. In the 
 absence, then, of all experience to guide our 
 
 course, and in opposition to all enlightened 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 193 
 
 calculations of what human agency can effect, 
 in certain given instances, we are called upon 
 by infidels to believe that the early successes of 
 Christianity might be traced to the operation of 
 secondary causes.* To the mind of any un- 
 prejudiced person, this will present all the start- 
 ling difficulty of a miracle, without any of that 
 credible testimony by which alone a miracle can 
 be shewn to have taken place. 
 
 It is nothing short of an insult offered to my 
 understanding, first to point me to the great 
 moral and intellectual revolution which was pro- 
 
 duced by Christianity, within a very short period 
 
 * The reader will perceive that the author has not taken 
 any distinct notice of Gibbon’s attempt to trace the success 
 of Christianity to the influence of second causes. The 
 reason is simply this, that he deemed it better to pursue 
 the argument without encumbering it by any specific re- 
 ference to the special pleadings and inconclusive reasonings 
 of that great but unhappy man. The objections, how- 
 ever, have been met, though they have not been alluded 
 to ; and, indeed, it is matter of just surprise that arguments 
 so weak and futile should have ever been raised to the 
 notoriety of a grave refutation. Those who wish to see 
 this sceptical philosopher exhibited in his proper light, are 
 recommended to read the Rev. A. Reed’s discourse on 
 “The Evidence of Revelation derived from the success 
 of the Gospel.” See Note, p. 197, 
 
 S 
 
194 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 of the death of its founder, and then to assign 
 as its sole cause, the zeal, energy, and talent of 
 the fishermen of Galilee ; and the credulity, love 
 of novelty, and versatility which obtain among 
 mankind. 
 
 Upon every sceptical theory, the early. 
 triumphs of the gospel are not only unac- 
 counted for, but totally unaccountable. Such a 
 change was never wrought by mere human 
 means. ‘The entire experience of the race, and 
 all the great facts of history, combine to shew the 
 utter irrationality of supposing that a few obscure 
 fishermen and mechanics could have baffled all 
 the wisdom of the wise, brought to nothing the 
 counsel of the prudent, and levelled in the dust 
 the mightiest fabrics of superstition and vice. 
 
 But when we admit the doctrine of a super- 
 natural influence, according to the distinct an- 
 nouncements of Christianity itself, we are 
 reminded of a cause adequate to produce the 
 effects witnessed. Then we wonder not that 
 the weakest instruments should prevail, that 
 disaster should lead to triumph, and that the 
 blood of the martyrs should be the seed of the 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 195 
 
 church. Ifthe mighty power of God was with 
 the apostles, no wonder that thousands and tens 
 of thousands should become obedient to their 
 message. Ifthe quickening energy of the living 
 Spirit was seen, on the one hand, in external 
 signs and wonders, rendering all gainsayers in- 
 excusable; and, on the other, in inward, power- 
 ful, and all-subduing movements of the heart and 
 conscience, what wonder was it if the congregated 
 multitudes of Pentecoste trembled, repented, 
 and turned to God; and if the Pagan world re- 
 sponded to the mighty and gracious impulse ? 
 By the nature of the facts to be accounted for, 
 then, no less than by the actual data of Christi- 
 anity, are we driven to the conclusion, that there 
 was an interior and hidden but all controlling 
 power, which accompanied and rendered effec- 
 tual the first propagation of Christianity, which 
 has watched over it from age to age, and which 
 occasions all its success and all its blessed influ- 
 ence in the day in which we live. I conclude 
 this branch of evidence in the language of an 
 
 eloquent living author :—“ Here is a religious 
 
196 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 system, denominated Christian, which enters the 
 world at a most inauspicious period, supposing it 
 to be an imposture. It has not one principle in 
 common with the religions which then prevailed. 
 It is attempted to be propagated by a few per- 
 sons who are signally disqualified for the under- 
 taking, and are hated of all nations. It is 
 opposed, from the very first, by Jew and Gen- 
 tile, and chiefly by those who had most power 
 and influence in their hands. Moreover, this 
 religion is hostile to human opinion, human pre- 
 judice, human interest, human nature; and 
 this is apparent from the admitted nature of 
 man and the avowed principles of the gospel, as 
 well as from the facts, that when men have been 
 induced to adopt the Christian name, they have 
 remained at enmity to the Christian faith, and 
 that there has been, in every age, a predominant 
 disposition to misunderstand and misrepresent, 
 to pervert and degrade it. Yet has this religion 
 been propagated over the earth with a facility 
 altogether unparalleled by any art or science. 
 
 Yet has it found a place for itself in many a 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 197 
 
 mind and country, to which the simplest mathe- 
 matical demonstrations are at this moment un- 
 solved problems. 
 
 «What is the conclusion? It is—it must be 
 this—that the religion of Christ could not have 
 been propagated by any earthly power—that it 
 could not have been propagated by any mere ex- 
 ternal agency of Providence—that it could have 
 been propagated only by a spiritual and super- 
 natural influence addressed to the perceptions 
 and: affections of men,—and therefore that the 
 religion of Christ is DIVINE, and its propagation 
 through all ages is a DISTINCT, INDEPENDENT, 
 and SPEAKING EVIDENCE of its DIVINITY.’’* 
 
 5. The Evidence derived from a survey of the 
 moral and social benefits conferred on mankind by 
 Christianity. 
 
 This branch of evidence may be treated, like 
 
 the preceding one, as a question simply of fact. 
 
 * Seea Discourse by the Rev. A Reed, on “ The Evi- 
 dence of Revelation derived from the success of the Gospel,” 
 in a Volume entitled “ Lectures on some of the Principal 
 Evidences of Revelation, delivered at.the Monthly Meet- 
 ings, &c.,” pp. 225, 226. 
 
 S32 
 
198 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 For if it can be shewn that Christianity has 
 done more than all other causes combined to 
 augment the resources of man’s present enjoy- 
 ment; if it can be shewn that it has heightened, 
 to an almost inconceivable degree, all the social 
 virtues; if it can be shewn that human nature 
 has risen to an unheard-of elevation under. its 
 benign auspices, it will follow, as by. resistless 
 consequence, after all the fruitless experiments 
 of Greece and Rome, that it owes its origin to 
 the Fountain of all wisdom and benevolence. 
 
 It is a fact, then, that “ the world by wisdom’’ 
 never reformed itself... For the space of four 
 thousand years effort after effort was made, but 
 without avail, to reduce mankind to some stand- 
 ard of obedience, and to rescue them from the 
 dominion of selfishness and crime. This process 
 of renovation was attempted in the fairest por- 
 tions of the globe, and amidst all the advantages 
 of the highest intellectual cultivation. It was 
 tried in the heart of Europe and Asia, when 
 philosophy and arts had reached their greatest 
 eminence, and when the human mind had been 
 
 nurtured in the schools to prodigious greatness. 
 
.) 
 
 OF CHRISTIANITY. 199 
 
 In a thousand forms the task of bettering man’s 
 moral condition had been tried, but without even 
 the shadow of success. Many of the precepts, 
 indeed, of the heathen philosophers were good ; 
 but the motives urged by them were sometimes 
 absurd, often vicious, and always powerless upon 
 the great mass of the people. Their own 
 standard of morals, in not a few instances, was 
 glaringly defective ; and as it respected the com- 
 munity at large, the theories of the schools did 
 not so much as reach even the outward ear. 
 
 In ail their pomp and magnificence, when 
 poetry, and painting, and. statuary, and arms, 
 and empire had reached the very zenith of their 
 glory, Greece and Rome were as little purged 
 from crime and moral degradation as were the 
 savage hoards of the north, who, in wild fury, 
 broke in upon the empress of the world’s destiny. 
 The extreme of refinement, and the extreme of 
 moral turpitude, met on the same theatre, and in 
 the same actors. A base and monstrous idolatry 
 everywhere prevailed, and everywhere associ- 
 ated itself with crimes which are reserved in 
 
 Christian countries for the worst of men, and for 
 
200 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 the most hidden recesses of the basest and most 
 degraded of mankind. “It is a shame even to 
 speak of those things which were done of them 
 in secret.” The very temples of the gods were 
 the dwelling-places of sin. There virgin inno- 
 cence was sacrificed at the shrine of the most 
 scandalous lusts; there human victims were 
 immolated upon the blood-stained altars of a 
 vile and unmeaning idolatry; and there every 
 species of impurity and heartless cruelty received 
 the sanction of a priesthood whose hands reeked 
 with blood, and whose hearts were steeped in 
 impenitence and covetous desire. 
 
 It is a fact, too, that all other nations have 
 shewn the same propensities, and have been 
 distinguished by the same moral habits as Greece 
 and Rome. It might have been supposed, 
 indeed, that they would have been much more 
 vicious; and that in proportion as they receded 
 from the schools of philosophy, and from the 
 sphere of the arts, they would put on a hue of 
 polution far deeper and more hideous. This, 
 however, is by no means the case. The crimes 
 
 of classic antiquity have never been exceeded 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 201 
 
 in the African hoard, or in the Polynesian wild. 
 Idolatry, human sacrifice, polygamy, female 
 degradation, have everywhere abounded in 
 heathen lands; while there stands not upon the 
 record of this world’s history one solitary instance 
 of a nation rising, by its own energy, from the 
 worship of false gods, or from the moral debase- 
 ment and crimes which it uniformly involves. 
 
 It is a fact, too, that Christianity did operate, 
 and still continues to operate, a wondrous 
 change upon the state of society. This change 
 it produced, at first, by means the most unlikely. 
 By preaching salvation through the cross of Christ, 
 the first heralds of Messiah’s kingdom, though 
 individuals comparatively obscure, brought about 
 a revolution of public opinion and of outward 
 manners such as had never been the result of any 
 preceding attempt to enlighten and to purify 
 mankind. In all the heathen provinces of the 
 Roman empire, and in the very capital itself, 
 idolatry was everywhere laid aside or proscribed. 
 The oracles of paganism were silenced by the 
 living oracles of God; and the horrid practices 
 
 of the temples and the groves were exchanged for 
 
202 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 the decent solemnities of Christian worship, and 
 for the sober and virtuous habits of Christian 
 citizens. At Athens, and Corinth, and Ephesus, 
 and, indeed, all the chief cities of heathen anti- 
 quity, the doctrine of Christ was the instrument 
 of changing and remodelling the whole frame- 
 work of society. Wherever it reached, it melio- 
 rated human life; and wherever it was actually 
 embraced, it ennobled and purified individual 
 character. The limits of Christianity have been, 
 from its first propagation to the present moment, 
 the boundary wall beyond which idolatry has not 
 dared, in its direct forms, to pass. It has raised 
 the standard of public morals above the most 
 favoured models of pagan antiquity, not except- 
 ing those even of the far-famed kingdoms of 
 Sparta and Syracuse. Where Christianity has 
 waved her triumphant banner, she has given 
 birth to a state of things altogether new. The 
 
 worship of dumb idols* in every palpable shape, 
 
 * The idolatry of the Church of Rome, though prac- 
 tised under the Christian name, is of common origin with 
 that of the Pantheon, and can be no less hateful in the 
 sight of God. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 203 
 
 she has utterly abolished ; the cruel and bloody 
 rites which were practised for ages and genera- 
 tions under the auspices of the gods of heathen- 
 ism, have been laid aside at her enlightened and 
 benevolent call; the shameless, and even mur- 
 derous, sports of the Colisseum she has frowned 
 into total annihilation; the destruction of slaves 
 and of female children finds no sanction where 
 her voice of mercy is distinctly heard; the de- 
 preciation of the rights which belong to woman 
 is no where countenanced beneath the mild 
 sway of the gospel; the abominations of poly- 
 gamy and capricious divorce are but little felt in 
 any Christian state; the vassalage of domestic 
 slavery has ceased to foster tyranny on the one 
 
 hand, and ignoble baseness on the other ;* the 
 
 * Tn ancient Attica there were 450,000 inhabitants, out 
 of which population, only 40,000 are said to have been free. 
 It is a dreadful blot upon the character of this country, 
 that still she permits eight hundred thousand British subjects 
 to be bought and sold, in the Colonies, at the will of their 
 masters. Christians should combine, as such, and seek the 
 immediate removal from the land of this crying sin. Alas! 
 that any of the American states should be found, to this day, 
 engaged in the slave traffic! Surely the word liberty must 
 freeze upon the tongues of such Americans, and surely Chris- 
 tianity itself can be known among them only as a name! 
 
204 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 direful practice of private assassination,* by the 
 dagger or by the poisoned bowl, finds no adyo- 
 cates in countries upon which the religion of 
 Christ has exerted its beneficial tendency ; the 
 horrors of war, great as they must ever be, are 
 mitigated in a tenfold degree under the generous 
 dictation of the gospel; the poor, the aged, and 
 the afflicted are treated with a degree of consi- 
 deration in Christian countries altogether un- 
 known in pagan lands; and all the rights of 
 property and of personal safety are guaranteed, 
 with a degree of precision, in nations blessed 
 with the light of revealed truth, to which Rome, 
 in all the glory of empire, never attained. 
 
 All this is matter of fact, which no one who 
 wishes his understanding to be respected will 
 venture for a moment to deny. So palpably, 
 indeed, is it such, that the traveller, blind-folded, 
 
 * It was no uncommon thing for a Roman Pretor to 
 convict, in one short season, in Italy, three or four thousand 
 individuals for the crime of private assassination; and 
 among these, husbands were often condemned for the secret 
 murder of their wives in order to obtain their dowry; and 
 wives for the murder of their husbands in order to secure 
 a union to the miscreants who bad seduced them from the 
 paths of virtue. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 205 
 
 may be able to tell when he passes from Christian 
 territories into pagan lands. The heathen world 
 was one vast theatre of crime, relieved, indeed, 
 by here and there some heroic example of 
 virtuous conduct, but sunk as a'whole into the 
 abyss of moral putridity and vice. But when 
 Christianity arose in the east, like some bright 
 and glorious luminary, it dispelled the darkness 
 of the pagan world, and, in little more than two 
 centuries from the time of its first publication, it 
 shivered to atoms the whole system of idol 
 worship, reconstructed the entire fabric of 
 society, introduced new maxims of government 
 and of personal conduct, changed the manners 
 and habits of mankind, drove vice from its 
 ancient lurking places, shut the temples of the 
 gods, abolished the sacrifices of an idolatrous 
 priesthood, and made the hopes and fears of 
 immortality the governing principles of thou- 
 sands and tens of thousands of the human 
 race. 
 
 Whence, then, sprung the power of a triumph 
 so great, so speedy, and so benignant ?—a 
 triumph which proclaimed peace on earth, and 
 
 7 
 
206 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 good will to men,—a triumph bloodless and 
 serene,—a triumph which delivered such a large 
 portion of the human race from the vassalage 
 of the most cruel and abominable idolatries,— 
 a triumph which issued in a melioration in all 
 the social relations of man which the wisdom of 
 this world could never produce? Whence, I 
 ask, sprung the power of such a triumph ? Not 
 from man assuredly ; for it was unlike all the | 
 other manifestations of his mental character ; 
 and it was followed by such benign and holy 
 results that it stood solitary and alone upon the 
 page of this world’s history. Nor was there any 
 thing whatever in its origin to indicate the 
 wisdom of man. Had man constructed a scheme 
 of moral renovation it would have been intro- 
 duced to the notice of his fellow-creatures in a 
 way very different from that in which Christianity 
 began its auspicious career. Let two considera- 
 tions then fully possess the mind, and it will be 
 impossible to resist the conclusion, that Chris- 
 tianity is from heaven. In the first place, re- 
 collect that of all agencies that could be con- 
 
 templated, the first heralds of the cross were the 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 207 
 
 least likely to succeed in the proposed undertak- 
 ing of converting the world; and, in the second 
 place, bear in mind, as a matter of fact, that in 
 spite of prejudice, in spite of a huge system of 
 idolatry, in spite of all interest and power and. 
 terror, they did succeed in such manner as never 
 before had been known; and in doing so, changed 
 the whole face of society, purified all the springs 
 of human action, established the reign of peace 
 and happiness, drove idolatry from the high 
 places of the earth, and, to the full extent of their 
 triumph, paved the way for the realization of 
 another paradise. 
 
 The power which scattered so much darkness, 
 and which spread so much light; which wrought 
 a change on mankind so pure and beneficial ; 
 which diffused such a mass of happiness, and 
 checked such a mighty current of misery; which, 
 like an electric shock, blasted and withered all 
 the ancient fabrics of idolatry, and on their ruins 
 erected a system of doctrine and a form of 
 worship which promised and yielded peace and. 
 joy and happiness to all the dwellers upon 
 
 earth,—such a power as this could only have 
 
208 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 emanated from that throne from which issued 
 originally the high behests of creation. 
 
 And, O! if a triumph which can yet only be 
 regarded as partial affords such intimation of the 
 benevolent interposition of the Infinite Mind, 
 what an evidence of the divine origin of Chris- 
 tianity will be supplied to mankind when its 
 moral transformations are complete, when all 
 nations are subjected to its righteous sway, when 
 its disciples shall drink more deeply into its pure 
 and benignant spirit, when that blessed influence 
 which is now partial shall be universal, and 
 when the church of the living God, vocal with 
 his praise, shall reflect with sweetest lustre the 
 radiance of his moral image. 
 
 Great as were the first triumphs of the gospel, 
 there can be no doubt but that greater triumphs 
 yet await its peaceful heralds. In the morning 
 of its strength it subdued the Roman empire, and 
 stood confessed the prevailing religion of the 
 civilized world; but the time is fast approaching 
 when it shall be proclaimed the religion of the 
 whole earth, and when the mighty changes it 
 
 shall work in the opinions, manners, and hopes 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 209 
 
 of mankind, shall compel the most thoughtless 
 of a rebellious race to exclaim—* this is the 
 finger of God!’ Then when “the people shall 
 be all righteous,’ and when the Spirit of God 
 shall be “ poured out upon all flesh,” shall it be 
 seen that Christianity is the. balm of bleeding 
 hearts, the parent of peace and good will, and 
 the angel of God’s mercy to heal all the miseries 
 
 and vices of an apostate race. 
 
210 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ON THE TRANSMISSION OF THE SACRED BOOKS. 
 
 TuouGu Christianity be a divine religion, it may 
 be possible, in the lapse of ages, that the record 
 which discloses its leading doctrines and facts 
 has undergone some serious mutilation. Is this 
 or is it not the case? This is an important 
 inquiry, and it admits of an easy and satisfactory 
 reply—a reply which must carry conviction to 
 every candid mind as to the genuineness, authen- 
 ticity, and incorruptness of the Sacred Books. 
 That they were written by the men whose 
 names they bear is a thing quite as well esta- 
 blished as that the AMneid was composed by 
 Virgil, the Iiad by Homer, and the Cyropeedia 
 by Xenophon. The very “terary character of 
 the Old and New Testament Scriptures would 
 go far to prove that they are genuine productions. 
 They exhibit a diversity of style, which shews 
 that they were written by various authors, and 
 
 they display an idiomatic peculiarity correspond- 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 211 
 
 ing to the ages and circumstances in which they 
 were written. Thus, in the Pentateuch we meet 
 with a slight mixture of Egyptian words, as 
 might be expected if Moses was the writer; 
 while in the books of Ezra, Nehemiah, and 
 Esther, there is a considerable infusion of 
 Chaldee and Persian, connecting them beyond 
 all reasonable doubt with a period in Jewish 
 history subsequent to the Babylonish captivity. 
 If, moreover, we turn to the New Testament, 
 we find its several parts written in a species of 
 Greek partaking largely of Hebrew, Chaldee, 
 Syriac, and Latin words and phrases,—a circum- 
 stance exactly answering to all that might have 
 been anticipated upon the supposition that men 
 in the precise condition of the Evangelists and 
 Apostles had furnished their contents. 
 
 Nor is it within the range of probability to 
 imagine for a moment that the sacred books are 
 forgeries. If they are, then they must have 
 been palmed upon the world by persons whose 
 imposture could not be detected... But how could 
 this occur in the matter of giving currency to the 
 
 records of a public faith? Take, for instance, 
 
212 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 the Books of the Old Testament Scriptures. If 
 they are not genuine productions, I ask who 
 were the parties concerned in the iniquitous 
 forgery? It could not be the men of heathen 
 antiquity,'for they were imperfectly acquainted 
 with the national peculiarities and rites of the 
 Hebrews; and were not likely, moreover, to 
 stamp the seal of their approbation upon records 
 which accredited the posterity of Abraham as 
 God’s peculiar people, and condemned the whole 
 Gentile world as sunk in a state of idolatry and 
 crime. It could not be the followers of Christ, 
 for it is matter of undoubted historical certainty 
 that the Scriptures of the Jews existed many 
 centuries before the Christian name was ever 
 heard of. It could not be the Jews themselves, 
 for never was there a more uncompromising 
 exposure of the crimes, idolatries, and righteous 
 chastisements of a rebellious and guilty nation 
 than that which they contain. 
 
 If we look at the New Testament, it is equally 
 unreasonable to suppose that it is not a genuine 
 production, and that it was not actually written 
 
 by the men to whom it is attributed. Unbe- 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY, 213 
 
 lieving Jews and Gentiles were happily, in this 
 instance, the guardians of revelation; for as they 
 were equally opposed to the doctrine of Him 
 whom they had combined to crucify, and as 
 they were both zealous in persecuting all who 
 ranked themselves as his humble and devoted 
 followers, it stands to reason, that if the records 
 of the Christian faith had not been genuine nar- 
 ratives of facts, furnished by the very men who 
 assume to be the writers, the dishonest effort 
 would have been detected and exposed, and the 
 whole world, and all succeeding generations, 
 would have been warned against the iniquitous 
 attempt to originate a history not founded in 
 fact. 
 
 The genuineness of the Books of Scripture 
 was never called in question by friends or ene- 
 mies. From the earliest periods of the Jewish 
 history downwards, the Hebrews regarded their 
 sacred Books as their peculiar treasure, and as- 
 sociated them all with their several authors and 
 ages; and, in like manner, the Christians, from 
 the apostolic age to the present moment, have 
 
 had a regular succession of writers, who have 
 
214 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 quoted and authenticated, in various ways, the 
 Books which compose the New Testament 
 canon. It is an interesting fact that Celsus, 
 and Porphyry, and Julian, and an endless race 
 of heretics, combine with the apostolic and Chris- 
 tian fathers, Barnabas, Clement, Ignatius, Poly- 
 carp, Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Origen, and 
 Eusebius, in accrediting the Books of Scripture 
 as genuine productions. The most inveterate 
 opponents of revelation have been compelled to 
 admit the fact that the Bible is no forgery. 
 
 Nor is there the slightest reason to suspect 
 that the Scriptures have undergone any material 
 alteration, or that they are not now in the same 
 condition in which they were when they came 
 from Moses and the prophets, the evangelists 
 and apostles. To say that the original Hebrew 
 and Greek manuscripts of the Bible, or that the 
 ancient versions and translations, had not been 
 deviated from in a single particular, would be to 
 assume a position too lofty. In the process of 
 transcribing some thousands of copies, before the 
 art of printing was discovered, letters and syl- 
 
 lables, and even words, without the intervention 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 215 
 
 of a miracle, must have been left out. But that 
 there has been any serious or fraudulent omis- 
 sion or interpolation, or that any one doctrine 
 has been added or subtracted, cannot be shewn 
 by any enemy of revelation, and need not be 
 apprehended by any humble-minded or unlet- 
 tered Christian. 
 
 As it respects the Old Testament Scriptures, 
 it is a well-established fact that the Jews were 
 their faithful guardians. They were often em- 
 ployed, indeed, in the act of transcribing them, 
 but so strict were they in comparing the copies 
 with the originals, that they numbered both the 
 words and letters. 'That the Jews never altered 
 their Sacred Books is triumphantly proved by 
 the fact that neither their own prophets nor Jesus 
 Christ, though they laid many a heavy charge at 
 their door, ever once intimated that they were 
 guilty of such mutilation. The Great Teacher, 
 indeed, told them, with the utmost fidelity, that 
 they had made void “The commandment of 
 
 God by their traditions,’’* but he never insinuates 
 
 * Matt. xy. 6. 
 
216 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 that they had corrupted the Sacred Books. “It 
 is one of the wonders of providence, that God, 
 for the preservation of these books, should make 
 use of that scrupulous, and I might say, almost 
 superstitious, care that was among those Jews 
 whose office it was to keep the Books of the 
 
 Old Testament.’’* Among the one thousand one 
 
 * See John How’s Lectures on the oracles of God. 
 Works, one Vol. Imperial Octavo, just published, p. 1075. 
 The whole passage referred to is as follows: ‘It was 
 known they used to count all the letters of the Old Testa- 
 ment, that they might be sure never to miss a letter. 
 Again, in transcribing copies, (which was frequent, ) every 
 copy was always examined by an appointed number of 
 their wise men, as they termed them. Further, if any 
 copy should have been found, upon examination, to_have 
 four or five faults in it, in one copy of the whole Old Testa- 
 ment, that book was presently adjudged to be buried in the 
 grave of one or other of their wise men. And, lastly, for 
 those books that, upon examination, were found to be 
 punctually true, it was very plain from the history of those 
 times, that there was the greatest reverence paid to them 
 imaginable. They never used to touch those perfect 
 copies (taking them into their hands) without kissing them 
 solemnly, nor to lay them down again without solemn 
 kissing of them. They were never used to sit upon the 
 place where one of those books was wont to be laid. If 
 one of them by casualty fell to the ground, they appointed 
 a solemn fast to be kept for it, as an ill-boding thing, that 
 such a thing should happen. So that it is most plain that 
 these keepers of the Books of the Old Testament could 
 neyer haye it in design to corrupt any of them; but it was 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 217 
 
 hundred and fifty manuscripts and. versions of 
 the Old Testament which are still extant, there 
 is an essential agreement, an agreement most 
 
 wonderful and striking, shewing, beyond all 
 
 that which they did abhor above all things. And it was a 
 principle (as Philo tells us, and Josephus much to the same 
 purpose) instilled into the youth of that nation, and even 
 those of the best quality, that they should run the utmost 
 hazard, and incur a thousand deaths, rather than they should 
 suffer any alteration or diminution of those books, or that 
 any of them should be lost in any other way. And then, 
 besides all this scrupulous care of the keepers of the books 
 of the Old Testament (with which a design of corrupting 
 would no way consist), we may add, that the thing itself 
 was afterward impossible. If they would before, when it 
 was in their own hands, they could; but afterwards, if they 
 would, they could not; because that in Christ and his 
 apostles’ days, a great number of them were converted to 
 the Christian faith, who knew all the Books of the Old 
 Testament as well as themselves. Therefore, it was impos- 
 sible now for the infidel Jews, those that were not con- 
 verted, to make any alteration but it must be presently 
 spied and exclaimed against; therefore it was a vain thing 
 for any to attempt it, after so many were converted to the 
 Christian religion. And thereupon we may further add, 
 that the testimonies that were contained in these books 
 against themselves, and with which contained in them they 
 are transmitted to us, do shew that they never went about 
 to corrupt them. ‘The many testimonies against idolatry 
 contained in these books, whereby their forefathers from age 
 to age, for many ages, were witnessed against, would have 
 induced them to expunge all things that were therein con- 
 tained against idolatry (so tender were they of their repu- 
 
 U 
 
218 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 conjecture or doubt, the uncorrupted preserva- 
 tion of these precious records. 
 Nor is the protection less manifest which has 
 
 been spread over the books ofthe New Testament. 
 
 tation), if there had not been a great awe upon their minds 
 never to attempt the corrupting or the alteration of any 
 thing in those books. The wickedness of their forefathers 
 was, in these books, so highly remonstrated against, in re- 
 spect of the testimonies they so often gave against their 
 idolatry, and yet these books we find in their own hands, 
 with these testimonies in them, against the Jews and their 
 forefathers, for many foregoing ages, through sundry times 
 and divers intervals, though we do not find after the second 
 temple that people relapsed into that crime. And then 
 there is the fullest testimony against their infidelity in these 
 books that can be. Who would not wonder that these 
 books should come out of the hands of the Jews, with these 
 testimonies, in the great controversy between the Chris- 
 tians and them? that is, of Christ being the Messiah, in 
 which you have so punctual assertions against them that 
 nothing can be more. Those many testimonies that do 
 concern the Messiah, particularly that famous prophecy, 
 that the sceptre should not depart from Judah till Shilo 
 should come, and those numerous presages in many of the 
 latter prophets, (Isaiah especially, and sundry others, ) 
 make it one of the greatest wonders of Providence that 
 such a book should come, with these things in it, out of 
 men’s hands, against whom they are a continual remon- 
 strance. But, however, this proves that they did never 
 design any alteration; either they saw it impossible for one 
 while, and before that, they had no inclination or induce- 
 ment that would be prevailing with them to go about it, 
 that is, that there should be an alteration with design.” 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 219 
 
 The early multiplication of copies, together with 
 the several translations into foreign tongues, ren- 
 dered any serious deviation from the orginal manu- 
 scripts utterly impossible. Besides, in the course of 
 one century from the period of Christ’s resurrec- 
 tion, the gospel was spread over the greater part 
 of the Lesser Asia, and over many portions of 
 Africa and Europe; so that if any of the early 
 Christians, in any particular district of the world, 
 had attempted to alter or mutilate the sacred 
 books, it would have been impossible that they 
 should have escaped detection among the many 
 disciples of Christ spread over other sections of 
 the globe. 
 
 The early heresies, too, which sprung up 
 among the professed followers of Jesus, rendered 
 the corruption of the sacred books next to an 
 impossibility. “That passage of the apostle,” 
 observes the immortal Howe, “is not greatly 
 enough pondered according to the weightiness 
 of the expression, that there must be heresies. 
 This great use that hath been of the divisions in 
 Christian churches is not, it may be, considered 
 
 as it should be by many. But nothing can carry 
 
2230 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 a clearer evidence and demonstration with it 
 than that, because of those divisions, any depra- 
 vation of the said records (that is, any material, 
 
 general, successful, continued depravation) is 
 
 altogether impossible; because the one party 
 
 would be continually declaiming and erying out 
 against the other; and then how would it be 
 espied ?’’* 
 
 Indeed it may be safely affirmed, that the 
 Christians were never charged by their bitterest 
 enemies with the crime of mutilating their Scrip- 
 tures, and that these sacred records have suffered 
 less from transcribers, copyists, and translators, 
 than any other documents of a remote antiquity. 
 
 “Tt is true, that in translations, persons have 
 laboured to serve their own purposes, by trans- 
 lating this way and that, as they thought fit. 
 But for alteration of copies, that is what never 
 entered into the mind of any body to attempt; 
 
 ‘which is a thing so easily spied out, that nothing 
 is more so; and so must needs blast and dissever 
 
 the cause and interest of that party it was de- 
 
 * Howe’s Work, in one vol., p. 1076. 
 
 : 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 22a 
 
 signed to serve, and therefore could never be. 
 And the impossibility of any such alteration it 
 is easy for any man that useth his understanding 
 to apprehend from a similar instance. And 
 thus, do but take any one people that are under 
 the same government, and that have their laws, 
 by which they are governed, digested into some 
 system or other; as, for instance, our statute 
 book; why, suppose very ill-minded men in the 
 nation should have a design to corrupt and alter 
 the statute book, every one would see it to 
 be impossible. Which way would they go to 
 work to impose a false statute book upon a nation, 
 wherein every man’s right and property is con- 
 cerned? And if any such should have such a 
 design, they would soon give it up, as finding it 
 impossible, and a thing not to be done, and 
 therefore a vain thing to attempt. But the 
 difficulty is a thousand times greater of making 
 designed alteration of those sacred books and 
 records that are spread so unspeakably further 
 than a nation, and wherein the concernments 
 of all that have them in their hands are recorded, 
 not temporal only, but eternal. Here is their all 
 
 u 2 
 
pipers THR TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 for eternity, another world! So that it must be 
 altogether impossible that there could have been 
 such a thing effected; and therefore it is the 
 most unlikely thing that such a matter should 
 ‘ever be attempted. And then, I say, if there 
 be that plain evidence, that for that reason these 
 books must be the same, that they cannot have 
 been altered with design, and consequently not 
 materially, then it were the most unreasonable 
 thing in all the world to expect that God could 
 confirm it to us otherwise than he hath done, or 
 that the nature of the thing doth admit of it ; 
 because, otherwise, there must have been miracles 
 wrought for every one to see and take notice of, 
 nay, that would altogether loose the usefulness 
 and significancy of miracles themselves, because 
 it would make miracles so common in such a 
 case. If every man must have a miracle to 
 prove to him this is God’s word, it would take 
 off that particular thing for which they are 
 only significant with men, that is, because they 
 are rare and extraordinary things, and then 
 they would cease to be so. It might as well be 
 
 expected that every man should have a Bible 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 222 
 
 reached him down by an invisible hand from 
 heaven, as that there should be a miracle wrought 
 to prove to him that this was the same book 
 that was so and so confirmed and sealed in our 
 Saviour’s and his apostles’ time. And therefore 
 I reckon that, upon the grounds that have been 
 laid, it is very plain both that these books that 
 were extant under the name of Scriptures in our 
 Saviour’s and his apostles’ time, were of divine 
 authority, and that the books that we now have 
 in our hands are the same with those books, 
 and therefore are of divine authority.”* 
 
 It is, then, a most animating consideration, that, 
 by avariety of striking providences, it hath pleased 
 Almighty God to preserve to us unmutilated and 
 uncorrupted the very records which the first 
 Christians held to be divine, and upon the doc- 
 trines and principles of which they were ready, 
 in the midst of the greatest dengers, to repose 
 their eternal all. It is highly consolatory to those 
 who have but little time and few advantages for 
 
 research to be informed, upon the most indubi- 
 
 * Howe’s Work, p. 1076. 
 
224 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 table evidence, that in their English Bibles they 
 have the same precious document which was 
 read in the first assemblies of the Christian 
 church; and that, in the multiplication of manu- 
 scripts and translations, no serious or important 
 alteration has been obtruded into the sacred 
 text. For this fact let the humble and devout 
 Christian bless God; and, in the contemplation of 
 it, let the rejecter of Revelation pause and tremble, 
 lest peradventure he should be found fighting 
 against God. 
 
 Let this chapter be fairly weighed in connexion 
 with what has been previously advanced on the 
 subject of the evidences of our holy faith, and let 
 him whostill doubts say within himself—“ W here- 
 fore doI doubt?” To such a solemn interrogatory, 
 conscience may perhaps supply the ready and 
 faithful response,—“ How can you but doubt, 
 while sin is blinding your perceptions, and 
 
 hardening your heart ?”’ 
 
bo 
 ho 
 Or 
 
 OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 ON THE INSPIRATION OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 
 
 Havine glanced at the evidence which supports 
 the conclusion that the Bible is a Revelation 
 from God, and having, moreover, ascertained 
 that the books of Scripture have been trans- 
 mitted to us in a pure and unadulterated form, 
 it may now be proper to inquire into the true 
 nature of inspiration, and to endeavour to deter- 
 mine to what extent the sacred volume is 
 entitled to the high and distinctive appellation 
 of—“ THE WORD OF Gop.” 
 
 The importance of this question is very great, 
 for upon its answer must depend the degree of 
 deference which is due to the Scriptures as an 
 authoritative communication from Heaven. It 
 is a question which cannot be decided, I pre- 
 sume, by any arguments @ priori, but by a direct 
 appeal to the testimony of the infallible word. 
 The real nature of inspiration, as belonging to 
 
 the writers of Scripture, is a doctrine purely of 
 
226 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 Revelation; and the only duty of a sincere in- 
 quirer in reference to it must be simply this, to 
 ascertain for himself what is predicated or an- 
 nounced concerning it in the word of God. 
 
 With this conviction on my mind, I shall not 
 trouble my readers with any lengthened details 
 of what others have advanced on the subject of 
 inspiration, but shall come almost immediately 
 to the point in hand, viz., the doctrine of Scrip- 
 ture, as to the manner in which it was imparted. 
 
 I must just be allowed, however, to premise, 
 that writers of the Socinian creed have so 
 relaxed their notions of inspiration as to talk 
 even of the inconclusive reasonings of apostles ; 
 and that others, not of this pernicious creed, 
 have spoken and written about degrees and kinds 
 of inspiration until they have inadvertently 
 weakened, on their own minds, and on the minds 
 of others, the authority of God in the Scriptures. 
 I would have all such writers remember, that 
 these modified views of inspiration are of modern 
 date, and that for full sixteen hundred years 
 they were unknown in the church of Christ. 
 
 ‘‘ Many considerable writers on the evidences 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. add 
 
 of Christianity, of late, have satisfied themselves 
 with proving its divine authority generally, but 
 have tacitly, and most inconsistently, given up 
 or denied the infallibility of the books in which 
 it is recorded. They speak of authenticity, 
 veracity, credibility; but not inspiration. Some 
 have limited the assistance of the Spirit to the 
 prophetical parts. Others have extended it to 
 the doctrinal, but excluded the historical. Whilst 
 many have lowered the whole notion of inspi- 
 ration to a mere aid occasionally afforded to the 
 sacred penmen. Thus the impression left on 
 the minds of their readers has been, that the 
 Bible is authentic indeed, and credible, and con- 
 tains a revelation from God; but that it was 
 indited by good and pious men only, with 
 little more of accuracy than would belong to 
 them as faithful historians. An intermixture of 
 human infirmity and error is thus by no means 
 excluded ; and the Scriptures are considered as 
 the work of fallible writers, doing their best, and 
 entitled in all their main statements to full belief, 
 but not under that immediate and plenary in- 
 
 fluence of the Holy Spirit, which renders all 
 
228 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 they say concerning religion, the unerring word 
 of God.i/* 
 
 Most ruinous to the souls of men must be such 
 views of the blessed word of God, and most 
 derogatory are they to that Spirit, who has not 
 given so much as a shadow of countenance, in 
 the sacred books, to such vague and sceptical 
 notions. We ought to be jealous, not only of 
 such latitudinarian views of inspiration, but also 
 of every approach to them. For my own part, 
 after much deliberation, and I trust careful and 
 unprejudiced examination of the arguments of 
 opponents, I have come to the conclusion, not 
 only that the ideas contained in scripture were 
 conveyed by the Spirit to the minds of inspired 
 men, but that they were supernaturally guided 
 in their diction and in their writings. I shall 
 not, however, bring this theory to the word of 
 God, to seek countenance for it there ; but shall 
 rather call the attention of my readers to the 
 word of God itself, that they may thence gather 
 
 the true notion of inspiration. 
 
 * See Bishop Wilson’s Lectures on “ The Evidences,” 
 &c., 12mo, vol. i. p. 314. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 229 
 
 I begin, then, with that part of scripture 
 which was included in the Jewish canon, and 
 which is known by the name of the Old Testa- 
 ment. And if it can be shewn that the infalli- 
 ble Teacher, whose ‘divine mission has already 
 been clearly established, fully accredits the 
 divine authority, and the infallible character of 
 that document, considered as a whole, and 
 without a single recognised exception, an im- 
 portant step will have been gained towards 
 ascertaining the perfection of the Jewish canon, 
 and also the real nature and extent of inspiration. 
 
 At an early stage in his public ministry the 
 Messiah announced, to an immense assembly of 
 his countrymen, his views and determinations 
 respecting their ancient Scriptures—“ Think 
 not,’ said he, “ that Iam come to destroy the 
 Law and the Prophets: I am not come to destroy, 
 but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, till 
 heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall 
 in no wise pass from the law, till all be ful- 
 
 filled.’’* Kvery attentive reader of the New 
 
 * Matt; vi 17,38. 
 BS 
 
230 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 Testament must have discovered that the phrase 
 “‘ the law and the prophets’ denotes the sacred 
 books of the Jews; and every unprejudiced 
 reader must perceive that the Saviour in this 
 declaration recognises them as an _ infallible 
 standard, by which he was willing that his own 
 pretensions should be rigidly tried. 
 
 On another occasion he charges those who 
 reject him with not having the word of God 
 abiding in them, because they believed not in 
 him whom God the Father had sent to them ; 
 and then he immediately adds—“ Search the 
 Scriptures; for in them ye have eternal life: 
 and they are they which testify of me.” “ Do 
 not think that I will accuse you to the Father: 
 there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in 
 whom ye trust. For had ye believed Moses, ye 
 would have believed me: for he wrote of me.’’* 
 Here are several things to be noticed. In the 
 first place, the Scriptures of the Jews, which did 
 not abide in them through their unbelief, are dis- 
 
 tinctly recognised as the word of God. In the 
 
 * John v. 38, 39, 45, 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 238t 
 
 second place, they are appealed to as a testi- 
 mony from God concerning Christ, rendering all 
 those Jews inexcusable who rejected him. And, 
 in the third place, they are spoken of empha- 
 tically as the writings, evidently including them 
 all, and leaving no room to dispute the divine 
 origin of their diction any more than the doc- 
 trines they contained. 
 
 On many occasions, Jesus spake of the sacred 
 books of the Jews as divinely authoritative 
 writings. ‘He that believeth on me, as the 
 Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow 
 rivers of living water.”’* “If he called them 
 gods, unto whom the word of God came, and 
 the Scripture cannot be broken; say ye of him 
 whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into 
 the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, 
 I am the Son of God.’+ “Jesus saith unto 
 them, did ye never read in the Scriptures, the 
 -stone which the builders rejected, the same is 
 
 become the head of the corner: this is the 
 
 * John vii. 38. + John x. 35, 36. 
 
232 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 Lord’s doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes ?’’* 
 «‘ Jesus answered and said unto them, ye do err, 
 not knowing the Scriptures.’’+ 'Thinkest thou 
 that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he 
 shall presently give me more than twelve legions 
 of angels? But how then shall the Scrip- 
 tures be fulfilled, that thus it must be?’ $ “T_ 
 was daily with you in the temple teaching, and 
 ye took me not: but the Scripture must be ful- 
 filled.’’§ Now what are we to gather from this 
 species of reference? Why, two things—first, 
 that there is not the shadow of a doubt upon the 
 inspiration of any part of a document to which 
 the infallible Teacher made such implicit and au- 
 thoritative allusion; and, second, that simply con- 
 sidered as writings, the books thus referred to 
 are the product of God’s immediate inspiration. 
 Where is there any thing like a surmise that 
 there is not as much authority in the writings as 
 
 in the thoughts and ideas which they convey? 
 
 * Matt. xxi. 42. + Matt. xxii. 29. 
 t Matt. xxvi. 53, 54. § Mark xiv. 49. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 233 
 
 To the testimony of our Lord may be added 
 that of his Apostles, who bore his commission, 
 and who wrought stupendous miracles in his 
 name. “ All Scripture,’ said Paul to Timothy, 
 “jis given by inspiration of God, and is profitable 
 for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for 
 instruction in righteousness, &c.”** Now, grant- 
 ing that the rendering of Grotius, “all divinely 
 inspired Scripture ts even profitable, &c.’’ is the 
 correct one, it is perfectly clear that the context 
 mainly, if not exclusively, restricts the Apostle’s 
 declaration to the Old Testament Scriptures,— 
 those sacred writings which Timothy had known 
 from his infancy. The whole Scripture, in the 
 knowledge of which this young evangelist had 
 been trained, is here said to be given by inspira- 
 tion of God; that is, breathed by him into the 
 minds of those holy men who were divinely and 
 infallibly gifted to hand it forth to the church. 
 
 The Apostle Peter, when speaking of the office 
 and end of prophecy, as “a light that shineth in 
 a dark place,” asserts, that “no prophecy of the 
 
 * 2 Tim, ig. 16. 
 
 iD 
 
e 
 
 234 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 Scripture is of any private interpretation. For 
 the prophecy came not in old time by the will 
 of man; but holy men of God spake as they 
 were moved by the Holy Ghost.’’* I cannot help 
 thinking that an unprejudiced expositor would 
 regard this as a distinct affirmation of the inspi- 
 ration of the prophecies, both as it respects their 
 matter and manner. As to their matter, they 
 were not the result of any private impulse;+ and 
 as to their manner, “ holy men spake as they 
 were moved by the Holy Ghost.’’ The pro- 
 phets are also represented, by the same Apostle, 
 as “searching what, or what manner of time 
 the Spirit of Christ, which was in them, did sig- 
 nify, when it testified before-hand the sufferings 
 
 * 2 Pet. 4.20, 21. 
 
 + Dr. Doddridge’s paraphrase is as follows : — Knowing 
 this first, as a matter of chief importance, that no prophecy 
 of Scripture is of private impulse,” or original ; “For prophecy 
 was not brought of old to the minds of those that uttered it by 
 the will of man ; they could not work themselves up to the 
 attainment of this extraordinary gift, nor divinely foretel 
 what they themselves desired, and whenever they pleased ; 
 but holy men of God, whom he honoured with that impor- 
 tant work, spake [as they were] borne on by the Holy Spirit ; 
 and they were only his organs in declaring to the people 
 what he was disposed to suggest to them.” 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 235 
 
 of Christ, and the glory that should follow.’’* 
 From this passage it is plain that the prophets 
 did not always, nor even frequently, understand 
 the import of their own predictions; from which 
 it may be inferred, with indubitable certainty, 
 that the words in which they were couched, no 
 less than the thoughts which they contained, 
 were imparted by the Spirit of God; for surely 
 they could not have been trusted with the diction 
 and verbiage of a communication which con- 
 fessedly they did not understand. | 
 It is upon this same principle, that we find the 
 Old Testament Scriptures styled “the Oracles of 
 God,”’+ and “ the lively oracles ;’’t to indicate, 
 doubtless, that they were given forth by God 
 himself. Hence the following expressions — 
 - Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled 
 which was spoken of the Lord, by the prophet.’’§ 
 “How then doth Dayid, zx spirit, call him 
 Lord?”’|| “For David himself saith by the Holy 
 Ghost.” “As he spake by the mouth of his 
 
 = let pully f¢ Rom. iii. 2. 
 t Acts vii. 38. § Matt. i. 22. ii. 15. 
 || Matt. xxii. 43. q Mark xii. 36. 
 
236 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 holy prophets, which have been since the world 
 began.”* “Which the Holy Ghost spake by 
 the mouth of David.”’+ “ He saith (that is God) 
 also in another Psalm, thou shalt not suffer thine 
 Holy One to see corruption.”+ Well spake 
 the Foly Ghost, by Esaias the prophet, unto our 
 fathers.Ӥ Wherefore, as the Holy Ghost saith, 
 to-day if you will hear his voice.’’|| 
 
 Now all this corresponds with what we find 
 in the Old Testament Scriptures themselves. 
 Take the case of Moses, the great prophet and 
 lawgiver of Israel, and the inspired author of 
 the Pentateuch. When he was commanded to 
 go to Pharoah, and to lead forth the people of 
 Israel, he entreated that he might be excused 
 from the performance of a task for which he 
 deemed himself so utterly unqualified. His 
 sense of weakness was, in a high degree, proper ; 
 but his refusal to go, when God had assured him 
 that he would be “with him,” evinced great 
 
 want of faith. God reproved him for his sinful 
 
 * Luke i. 70. + Acts i. 16. 
 t Acts xiii, 39. § Acts xxviii. 25, 
 || Heb. x. 15. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 234 
 
 timidity, and said to him, “Who hath made 
 man’s mouth? or who maketh the dumb, or 
 deaf, or the seeing, or the blind ? have not I the 
 Lord? Now, therefore, go, and I will be with 
 thy mouth, and teach thee what thou shalt Saye 
 The leader of Israel again repeats his difficulty, 
 and again receives a similar reply. At last his 
 scruples are overcome by the feeling of super- 
 natural aid, and ever after his addresses to the 
 chosen tribes are couched in terms indicative of 
 their immediate divine origin—« Thus saith the 
 Lord,”’—*“ These are the words which the Lord 
 hath commanded, that ye should do them.” 
 Had he not been conscious that the inspiration 
 under which he wrote extended to his words as 
 well as thoughts, would he haye adopted the 
 phraseology attributed to him in the following 
 passages ?—“ Ye shall not add unta the word 
 which I command you, neither shall ye diminish 
 aught from it, that ye may keep these command- 
 ments of the Lord your God which I command 
 
 you.’+ “And these words which I command 
 
 * Exod. iv. 11, 12. + Deut. iv. 2. 
 
238 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 thee this day shall be in thine heart, and thou. 
 shalt teach them diligently unto thy children.”* 
 “Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in 
 your heart and in your soul, and bind them for 
 a sign upon your head that they may be as 
 frontlets between your eyes. And yeshall teach 
 them to your children, speaking of them. when 
 thou sittest in thine house, and when thou 
 walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and 
 when thou risest up. And thou shalt write them 
 upon the door posts of thine house,.and upon 
 thy gates.’’+ 
 
 In like manner all the prophets represent their 
 entire communications as from God; they all ad- 
 dress themselves to the people, “Thus saith 
 the Lord,” and some of them, as in the case of 
 Ehjah to Ahab, personate the Deity, and utter 
 his threatenings as if they were their own; 
 “ Behold I will bring evil upon thee, and will take 
 away thy posterity; this was the voice, in- 
 
 deed, of Elijah, but the speaker was God. Hence 
 
 * Deut. vi. 6. 
 t Deut. xi. 18. t 1 Kings, xxi. 21. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 239 
 
 the word of the Lord is said again and again to 
 come to the prophets, and the sweet Psalmist of 
 Israel says, “The spirit of the Lord spake by 
 me, and his word was in my tongue.’’* 
 
 It may, indeed, be said that, though in the 
 prophetical and doctrinal parts of the Old Testa- 
 ment Scriptures the sacred writers were under 
 the influence of a full and verbal inspiration, this 
 could not be necessary in furnishing the histori- 
 cal parts of the word of God. Now, this is a 
 distinction which is never once made, to the best 
 of my recollection, in the inspired volume itself; 
 and when the vast importance of the chronologi- 
 cal and historical. details of Scripture is taken 
 into account, in the relations which they bear 
 to the transcendent scheme of human redemp- 
 tion, I think it will be regarded as futile and 
 dangerous. Upon the whole I am satisfied that 
 there is no solid foundation for any theory of 
 the inspiration of the Old Testament Scriptures 
 which does not consider all their several parts 
 as written under the immediate teaching of the 
 
 Holy Ghost, both as to sentiment and diction. 
 
 * 2 Sam. xxiii, 2. 
 
240 THE TRUTH AND REXCELLENCE 
 
 Nor is the complete inspiration of the apostles 
 and writers of the New Testament less satisfac- 
 torily demonstrated than is that of Moses and 
 the prophets. Such full inspiration they emi- 
 nently needed, in order to the faithful execution 
 of their responsible task. They were to be em- 
 ployed in raising up disciples to their risen Lord, 
 and as the historians of his life and death; and 
 as the authoritative counsellors of his church in 
 all ages, they needed “ an unction from the Holy 
 One.”’ We find accordingly that such unction and 
 such infallible guidance as were necessary were 
 distinctly promised to them. Twelve men were 
 selected as the heralds of his kingdom, who en- 
 joyed his familiar intercourse, and were in every 
 way qualified for bearing witness to his doc- 
 trine, miracles, sufferings, death, and resurrection. 
 “Go ye,” said Christ to his chosen band, “ and 
 teach all nations, baptizing them in the name 
 of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy 
 Ghost; teaching them to observe all things what- 
 soever I have commanded you; and, lo, I am 
 
 with you alway, even unto the end of the world.’’* 
 
 * Matt, xviii. 19, 20. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY, 241 
 
 When, during his own personal ministry, he sent 
 them forth to visit the cities of Israel, he gave 
 them this miraculous assurance, — “But when 
 they deliver you up, take no thought how or 
 what ye shall speak ; for it shall be given you in 
 that same hour what ye shall speak. For it is 
 not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father 
 which speaketh in you.’”’* And when our 
 blessed Lord was about to ascend up on high and 
 to leave his apostles and disciples, he delivered to 
 them the following animating promises :—« And 
 I will pray the Father, and he will give you 
 another Comforter, that he may abide with you 
 for ever; even the Spirit of Truth, whom the 
 world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, 
 neither knoweth him. But ye know him, for he 
 dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. The 
 Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the 
 Father will send in my name, he shall teach you 
 all things, and bring all things to your remem- 
 brance, whatsoever I have said unto you. I 
 
 have yet many things to say unto you, but ye 
 
 * Matt. x. 19, 20, 
 iY 
 
242 THE TRUTH AND REXCELLENCE 
 
 cannot hear them now. Howbeit, when He, the 
 Spirit of Truth, is come, he will guide you into all 
 truth; for he shall not speak of himself, but 
 whatsoever he shall hear that shall he speak ; 
 and he will shew you things to come.”’ “ Here,” 
 observes an eminent writer, “are all the degrees 
 of inspiration which we have seen to be necessary 
 for the apostles; the Spirit was to bring to their 
 remembrance what they had heard; to guide 
 them into the truth, which they were not then 
 able to bear ; and to shew them things to come; 
 and all this they were to derive, not from occa- 
 sional illapses, but from the perpetual inhabita- 
 tion of the Spirit.”’* 
 
 Hence we find that the apostles laid claim to 
 that inspiration which their divine Master had 
 so distinctly promised, ‘“ We shall not find,” as 
 the above writer well observes, “that claim 
 formally advanced in the gospels. This omission 
 has sometimes been regarded by those superficial 
 
 critics, whose prejudices seem to account for their 
 
 * See the Rev. Richard Watson’s Theological Dictionary, 
 under the article ‘ Inspiration.” 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 243 
 
 haste, as an objection against the existence of in- 
 spiration. But if you attend to the reason of 
 the omission, you will perceive that it is only an 
 instance of that delicate propriety which pervades 
 all the New Testament. The gospels are the 
 record of the great facts which vouch the truth of 
 Christianity. These facts are to be received upon 
 the testimony of men who had been eye-witnesses 
 of them. The foundation of the Christian faith 
 being Jaid in an assent to these facts, it would 
 have been preposterous to have introduced in 
 support of them that influence of the Spirit which 
 preserved the minds of the apostles from error, 
 For there can be no proof of the inspiration of the 
 apostles unless the truth of the facts be previously 
 admitted. The apostles, therefore, bring forward 
 the evidence of Christianity in its natural order 
 when they speak in the gospels as the companions 
 and eye-witnesses of Jesus, claiming that credit 
 which is due to honest men who had the best 
 opportunities of knowing what they declared. 
 This is the language of St. John—“ Many other 
 signs did Jesus in the presence of his disciples. 
 
 But these are written that ye may believe; 
 
244 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 and this is the disciple which testifieth these 
 things.’’* 
 
 When the following circumstances, then, are 
 taken into account, the absence of any formal 
 announcement of inspiration in the gospels is no 
 barrier in the way of admitting their full claim to 
 this high distinction. In the first place, there was 
 an assistance promised by our Lord, ere he left 
 his disciples, which, from its very form, must 
 have been partly at least intended to qualify his 
 disciples for the task of recording the history of 
 his earthly sojourn. By that assistance they 
 were to have “all things whatsoever the Lord 
 said to them brought to their remembrance ;”’ 
 they were to be conducted “into all truth;” 
 they were to be shewn the “things to come;” 
 and Christ was to be with them always. 
 
 In the second place, we find that no distinc- 
 tion whatever is made, by Christ, between the 
 authority of those whom he accredited and his 
 
 own. “ He that heareth you, heareth me; and 
 
 * John xx. 30, 3]. xxi. 24. See Watson’s Theological 
 Dictionary, on the article ‘ Inspiration.” 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 245 
 
 he that despiseth you, despiseth me; and he that 
 despiseth me, despiseth him that sent me.’’* 
 This is language which equally accredits the 
 gospels+ and the epistles, and which renders it a 
 high affront to the Son of God to cavil at any 
 thing contained in the one or the other. 
 
 In the third place, we find the apostles placing 
 their own communications on a level with those 
 of prophets and inspired men of old. “That ye 
 may be mindful,” said the apostle Peter, “of the 
 words which were spoken before by the holy 
 
 prophets, and of the commandments of us the 
 
 * Luke x. 16. 
 
 + It may be said, indeed, that Mark and Luke were not 
 apostles, and that, therefore, the infallible assistance promised 
 to such distinguished servants of the church did not belong 
 tothem. Inreply to this, it may be stated, that early general 
 tradition places Mark among those seventy disciples whom 
 Christ sent out through the land of Israel with miraculous 
 endowments and a promise of supernatural aid ; and awards 
 to his gospel a place among the canonical books of the New 
 Testament ;—and that Luke, who appears to have written his 
 gospel first, (though several uninspired accounts of the 
 history of Christ obtained before, Luke i. 1,) was the con- 
 temporary and intimate companion of Paul, (Col. iv. 14,) 
 who, it is universally conceded, examined and approved his 
 gospel, stamping it with apostolic authority, and thereby 
 ushering it into the church of Christ with the full credentials 
 of canonical and inspired scripture. 
 
 y 2 
 
246 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 apostles of the Lord and Saviour.”* Hence the 
 language of the great apostle of the Gentiles :— 
 “Paul an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will’ or 
 “commandment of God:’+ Paul, an apostle, 
 not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, 
 and God the Father, who raised him from the 
 dead. I neither received the gospel of man, 
 neither was I taught it but by the revelation of 
 Jesus Christ. When it pleased God, who 
 separated me from my mother’s womb, and 
 called me by his grace to reveal his Son in me, 
 that I might preach him among the heathen, 
 immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood, 
 neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which 
 were apostles before, but I went into Arabia.’’+ 
 
 In the most unequivocal forms that can be 
 adopted, the apostles assert their inspiration in 
 their epistolary correspondence. ‘ Now,” said 
 Paul, “we have received not the spirit of the 
 world, but the spirit which is of God; that we 
 might know the things which are freely given us 
 of God, which things also we speak, not in the 
 
 *' 9 ‘Pet in, 2. + Eph. a. h4v im, aed 
 ¢ Gal.i.1, 12, 15—17. compared with Acts xxvi. 12—I18. , 
 
‘OF CHRISTIANITY. 247 
 
 words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which 
 the Holy Ghost teacheth.”* “If any man think 
 himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him ac- 
 knowledge that the things that I write unto you 
 are the commandments of the Lord.”’+ “For 
 this cause, also, thank we God without ceasing, 
 because when ye received the word of God which 
 ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of 
 men, but, as it is in truth, the word of God.’’+ 
 “ We are of God,” said the apostle John; “he 
 that knoweth God, heareth us: he that is not of 
 God, heareth not us.’”’§ And, speaking of the 
 New Testament Church, Paul declares that it is 
 “ built upon the foundation of the apostles and 
 prophets, Jesus Christ being the chief corner 
 stone.’’|| Such a form of expression must have 
 been blasphemous in the extreme, if the writings 
 and the authority of the apostles did not stand 
 upon an equal footing with the writings and the 
 authority of the prophets. In all the passages 
 
 which demonstrate the inspiration of the word of 
 
 Wel Caray bom boe + 1 Cor. xiv. 37. 
 $ 1 Dhess: 13. 113. § | John iv. 4. 
 | Eph. ii. 20. 
 
248 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 God, there is not one, as far as I remember, that 
 limits the divine afflatus to the sentiments con- 
 veyed; and, on the other hand, there are several 
 texts which extend it, beyond all reasonable doubt, 
 to the words which the speakers employ :* the 
 conclusion I draw from this is, that the distinction 
 between mental and verbal inspiration is altogether 
 of man’s devising, and that the only safe way of 
 receiving the entire Scriptures is to regard both 
 their sentiment and their language as “THE 
 WORD OF Gop,” 
 
 There may be difficulties to some minds in 
 this view. But what view of truth is without 
 difficulty? If we believe nothing till we get 
 rid of all difficulty, we shall verily soon be in 
 the condition of believing nothing. 
 
 Some have said, if inspiration be plenary and 
 
 verbal, how can the difference of style among the 
 
 * Take all those parts of the Prophets and of the Penta- 
 teuch which begin with—“ Thus saith the Lord ;” and also 
 such parts of the prophetic announcements as were unin- 
 telligible to the prophets themselves. Dan. xii. 7—9. In 
 the New Testament, see also John xiv. 16, 17, 26. xvi. 12, 
 13. Luke xxi. 15. Matt. x. 19, 20. 1 Cor. ii. 13. 2 Pet. 
 12. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY.’ 249 
 
 several writers of Scripture be accounted for ?_ 
 My reply is, that the Spirit of God was as 
 capable of influencing the mind of a prophet or 
 an apostle in coincidence with his own tastes, 
 predilections, and education, as in opposition to 
 them. If the inspiration is admitted at all, there 
 need, therefore, be no doubt or perplexity here. 
 I may just add, however, that though there is a 
 striking variety in the diction of the inspired 
 writers, there is, at the same time, an inex- 
 pressible peculiarity attaching to the books of 
 Scripture at large, which distinguishes them from 
 all apocryphal and uninspired productions in the 
 several ages to which they belong. The indivi- 
 duality of the writers is indeed preserved; but 
 the individuality of the divine agency is not less 
 conspicuous. “Is it not evident,’ observes an 
 eminent divine, “that God may exercise a per- 
 fect superintendency over inspired writers as 
 to the language they shall use, and yet that each 
 one of them shall write in his own style, and in 
 all respects according to his own taste? May 
 not God give such aid to his servants, that, while 
 
 using their own style, they will certainly be 
 
250 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 secured against all mistakes, and exhibit the 
 truth with perfect propriety? It is unquestion- 
 able that Isaiah, and St. Paul, and St. John 
 might be under the entire direction of the Holy 
 Spirit, even as to language; and, at the same 
 time, that each one of them might write in his 
 own manner; and that the peculiar manner of 
 each might be adapted to answer an important 
 end; and that the variety of style thus intro- 
 duced into the sacred volume might be suited to 
 excite a livelier interest in the minds of men, and 
 to secure to them a far greater amount of good 
 than could ever have been derived from any one 
 mode of writing. 
 
 “Tf we should admit that the divine super- 
 intendence and guidance afforded to the inspired 
 writers had had no relation at all to the manner 
 in which they exhibited either doctrines or facts, 
 how easily might we be disturbed with doubts in 
 regard to the propriety of some of their repre- 
 sentations ? We should most certainly consider 
 them as liable to all the inadvertencies and mis- 
 takes to which uninspired men are commonly 
 
 liable ; and we should think ourselves perfectly 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 26% 
 
 justified in undertaking to charge them with real 
 errors and faults as to style, and to shew how 
 their language might have been improved; and, 
 in short, to treat their writings just as we treat 
 the writings of Shakspeare and Addison. ‘ Here,’ 
 we might say, ‘Paul was unfortunate in the 
 choice of words; and here his language does not 
 express the ideas which he must have intended 
 to convey. ‘Here the style of St. John was 
 inadvertent; and here it was faulty; and here it 
 would have been more agreeable to the nature of 
 the subject, and would have more accurately 
 expressed the truth, had it been altered thus.’ 
 If the language of the sacred writers did not in 
 any way come under the inspiration of the Holy 
 Spirit, and if they were left, just as other writers 
 are, to their own unaided faculties in regard to 
 every thing which pertained to the manner of 
 writing, then, evidently, we might use the same 
 freedom in animadverting upon their style as 
 upon the style of other writers. But who could 
 treat the volume of inspiration in this manner 
 without impiety and profaneness? And rather 
 
 than make any approach to this, who would not 
 
bo 
 
 52 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 choose to go to an excess, if there could be an 
 excess, in reverence for the word of God.’’* 
 
 To these excéllent remarks I would add, that 
 he who objects to the doctrine of verbal inspira- 
 tion on account of the variety of style which 
 obtains among the sacred writers, might, on the 
 same principle, object to mental inspiration on 
 account of the variety of thought by which they 
 are equally distinguished. | 
 
 It is in receiving “ all Scripture as given by in- 
 spiration of God’ that the mind finds repose from 
 those endless suspicions which must assail those 
 who regard the Bible as the word of God as to 
 doctrine, but the word of man as to the channel 
 
 of conveyance. 
 
 * Dr. Woods, on Inspiration. 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 253 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 SOME POPULAR OBJECTIONS TO THE FULL INSPIRA- 
 TION OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES.* 
 
 1. It has been objected, that if the inspiration 
 of the Scriptures be plenary and verbal, it will 
 then follow, that the improper and wicked say- 
 ings of bad men, and even devils, which are 
 introduced in Scripture, must lay claim to an 
 immediate inspiration.—The answer to this very 
 flimsy difficulty is simply this,—that though, 
 in such cases, the Holy Spirit dictated to in- 
 spired men the very words which were uttered 
 by the sinful agents referred to, he dictated them 
 not as his, but theirs. 
 
 2. It has been objected, that as the inspired 
 
 * I cannot but strongly recommend to my readers a 
 work which I have found of great use to myself on this 
 subject, by Robert Haldane, Esq., entitled, “‘ The Books 
 of the Old and New Testaments proved to be canonical, 
 and their verbal inspiration maintained and established, 
 &c.” 12mo, 
 
 Th 
 
254 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 writers were thoroughly acquainted with many 
 things of which they wrote, they could not in 
 such matters require any immediate afflatus 
 from the Holy Spirit, and that therefore such a 
 redundant influence would not have been vouch- 
 safed by that infinitely wise Being who never 
 Javishes his supernatural bestowments.—To this 
 I reply, that the authority of a messenger must 
 cease when he acts merely in his own name, 
 and gives forth that only which comes within 
 the range of his own personal knowledge, with- 
 out reference to the express dictation of the 
 power by which he is delegated. On this prin- 
 ciple, a writer of Scripture recording that which 
 was simply the result of his own knowledge, is a 
 contradiction in terms; inasmuch as he must 
 cease to be the medium of an infallible record 
 the moment that he is thrown, in a single in- 
 stance, on his own unaided resources :—that is 
 not Holy Scripture which is not given by in- 
 spiration of God. 
 
 3. To the full view of inspiration here con- 
 tended for, it has been objected, that some things 
 
 are introduced by the inspired writers of too 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 255 
 
 trifling a nature to be the subject of a direct 
 communication from God. As, for instance, 
 when Paul says to his son Timothy—« Drink 
 no longer water, but use a little wine for thy 
 stomach’s sake, and thine often infirmities ;” or 
 as elsewhere, when the same apostle says— 
 “The cloak that I left at Troas with Carpus, 
 when thou comest, bring with thee, and the 
 books, but especially the parchments.”* It is 
 assumed, by objectors to the full inspiration of 
 such texts, that they are below the standard 
 of a divine communication, and that therefore 
 they were the simple unaided dictates of the 
 apostle’s own mind. Could we see no design 
 couched in them worthy of God, this would be 
 a most irreverent way of dealing with any part 
 of a book which gives no countenance to the 
 idea of one part being more inspired than ano- 
 ther. “The question is not at all whether the 
 apostle Paul needed inspiration to enable him 
 to give such directions, but whether it was 
 
 without inspiration that these doctrines form a 
 
 ROT Dini. veo uss vs 13) 
 
256 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 part of a book, all of which comes to us as the 
 word of God, and inspired by him. There are 
 many parts of Scripture that might have been 
 written without inspiration ; but the question is, 
 were the sacred writers left without inspiration 
 to seleet what they would put into this book, 
 and what they would keep out of it? If so, 
 then the book is theirs, not God’s. Besides, if 
 it be thought absurd to suppose that there is 
 any inspiration in the direction which the apostle 
 gave about his cloak and his books, it may very 
 naturally be thought that as little inspiration 
 was necessary to tell us how often he had re- 
 ceived forty stripes save one; that he had fought 
 with wild beasts at Ephesus; that he had un- 
 dergone an endless variety of perils; that he 
 had been let down over the wall of Damascus 
 in a basket, and put into the stocks at Philippi. 
 Of all these, and many other similar instances, 
 it may be said, that these are cases in which, 
 as it would be absurd to suppose any inspiration, 
 so it was unnecessary to disavow it. We shall 
 thus get quit of the whole account of the suffer- 
 
 ings of the apostles. The apostle says, that 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 257 
 
 ‘all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, 
 and is profitable,” &c. If there be many pas- 
 sages, or any passages, in which it would be 
 absurd to suppose any inspiration, or which is 
 not profitable, then he is guilty of stating what 
 is not true.’’* 
 
 Besides this general defence of the full in- 
 spiration of the passages in question, they admit 
 of a more specific support. Take the first of 
 them—viz., Paul’s counsel to Timothy respecting 
 the use of wine. Does not the exhortation in 
 question stand in the midst of a group of precepts, 
 the most solemn and weighty that can be con- 
 ceived of ? Who, then, can prove to me, that 
 the apostle was under inspiration in delivering 
 them, if not in delivering 7? And was it alto- 
 gether unworthy of the Holy Spirit to dictate 
 to Paul such an injunction for the use of Timothy, 
 when the preservation of his health, and his 
 continued labours and usefulness in the church, 
 might depend upon it? Besides, does not the 
 
 very permission to Timothy of a “little wine ”’ 
 
 * Mr. Carew, as quoted by Mr. Haldane. 
 Ti 
 
 i 
 
258 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 inculcate the doctrine of temperance, especially 
 upon all the ministers of Jesus Christ ? 
 
 As to the second passage, we may fairly 
 assume, with Grotius and Erasmus, the poverty 
 of Paul, but not surely the absence of in- 
 spiration. “See,” said Grotius, “the poverty 
 of so great an apostle, who considered so small a 
 matter, left at such a distance, to. be a loss to 
 him!’ “Behold,” said Erasmus, “ the apostle’s 
 household furniture, a cloak to defend him from 
 the rain, and a few books!” With regard to the 
 ‘books or parchments,’’ unless we knew what 
 they were, it would be the height of presumption 
 to affirm that the request which relates to them 
 was uninspired. 
 
 4. I shall only notice one supposition more, 
 viz., that the writers of Scripture sometimes 
 intimate themselves that they are not speaking 
 by inspiration of God. Now, before referring 
 to the instances in question, I would here take 
 leave to observe, that should it even appear, 
 in certain given cases, that inspired men do 
 disavow the immediate dictation of the Holy 
 
 Spirit, all that can be fairly gathered from this 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 259 
 
 fact will be, that on all other occasions, not 
 thus limited, they spake under his immediate 
 guidance. In reference to certain delicacies 
 belonging to the marriage compact, the apostle 
 thus expresses himself in his first Kpistle to the 
 Corinthians* — “TI speak this by permission, 
 and not of command.” Now who permitted 
 Paul to lay down the rules referred to ? Why, 
 unquestionably, the Spirit of God. What is 
 meant, then? That Paul spake by inspiration, 
 but that there was no express command from 
 the Lord on the subject. As at the 10th verse 
 of the same chapter.—< Unto the married,’’+ 
 said Paul, “I command, yet not I, but the 
 Lord, Let not the wife depart from her hus- 
 band.” The meaning is, that upon this particular 
 Christ had issued his own mandate ;+ neverthe- 
 less Paul gave command by the Spirit of Christ. 
 “To the rest,” said he, « speak I, not the 
 Lord.’’§ That is, the remaining counsels of the 
 
 apostle were such as the great Master had left 
 
 * 1] Cor. vii. 6. + 2 Cor. viii. 
 
 + Matt. v. 32. § 1 Cor. vii. 12. 
 
260 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE 
 
 no express injunction about, but which were 
 nevertheless entrusted to him by the Spirit. 
 At the 25th verse of the same chapter the apostle 
 has the following expression : ‘‘ Now, concerning 
 virgins, I have no commandment of the Lord; 
 yet I give my judgment as one that hath 
 obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful.” 
 The thought is the same here as in the former 
 instances. Though no express command had 
 been given by Christ, on the subject treated of, 
 yet the apostle, as one of his inspired servants, 
 had received that grace which qualified him for 
 a full development of the divine will, in all 
 those things to which the personal ministry of 
 Christ had not been directed. 
 
 In the last verse of the chapter the apostle 
 adds—“ And I think, also, that I have the mind 
 of Christ ;’ an expression which some of the 
 most eminent critics have shewn not to indicate 
 an uncertain opinion, but full conviction and 
 unhesitating knowledge, as in John vy. 39. 
 
 But supposing all the above passages, and 
 some others which might be quoted, to be in- 
 
 stances in which the apostle spake without the 
 
OF CHRISTIANITY. 261 
 
 immediate guidance of inspiration,—a thing 
 which I cannot admit for a moment,—it is clear 
 that he must have acted under inspiration in 
 apprising the church that the Spirit did not 
 influence him in such communications ; so that 
 nothing can be derived from the objection 
 against the immediate and full inspiration of 
 other parts of the word of God; but on the con- 
 trary, it would rather go to the conclusion, that 
 nothing short of an apostolic denial of such 
 inspiration can justify any man in hesitating 
 about the immediate divine authority of a single 
 
 portion of the word of God. 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 From the whole of the preceding remarks, we 
 may infer the paramount duty of entire and 
 unreserved submission to the authority of God 
 in the written word. Our reason, our conscience, 
 our affections, are all called to surrender them- 
 selves to the heavenly vision. In this ines- 
 timable volume God speaks to us upon sub- 
 
 jects of the highest interest; and, refusing to 
 
 a 
 
262 THE TRUTH AND EXCELLENCE, ETC. 
 
 listen to his voice, we seal our own unhappy 
 doom. “Hear ye the word of the Lord,” is the 
 message addressed to all who possess the sacred 
 boon; and he who by prejudice or sin excludes 
 himself from the benefits of this message, which 
 reveals the only method of salvation, is charge- 
 
 able with a degree of rashness and folly which 
 
 eternity itself will but fully disclose. Let the | 
 
 prayer of each one who reads this little treatise 
 be—* Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold 
 
 wonderful things contained in thy law!” 
 
 THE END. 
 
 . Harjette and Savill, Printers, 107, St. Martin’s Lane.