^^o.j/ Srom f^e feifirarp of (Ret>. @.fFen J^enrg Q0roti?n, ®. ®. (jSequeaf^e^ 6g 0im fo i^ £i6rar)? of (Jjrinceton C^eofogicaf ^eminarg BX 8975 .L587 1852 Lowry, L. A. d.l855. An earnest search for truth ^ L.-<- :^^^": uc/ AN r .DEC 20 1911 EARNEST SE AK"^'^^ EOR TRUTH, SERIES OF LETTERS FBOH A SON TO HIS FATHER. BY THE REV. L. A. LOWRY. PHILADELPHIA: PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION, No. 265 CHESTNUT STREET. Entered according to the Act of Congress in the year 1852, by Alexander W. Mitchell, M. D. In the office of the Clerk of the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Stereotyped by Slote & M coney, Philadelphia. cntents. PAGE Introductory Note, 7 LETTER I. Introductory to the Series — Keasons for instituting an earnest search, stated, ----------- 11 LETTER n. Theology a System of Truth — Starting Point — Ori- ginal Sin — Condition of Man — Lost in the Fullest Sense of the Word — Position of the Cumberland Church, 20 LETTER in. The Cause of our Fall — Sin of our First Parents^ Imputation — View of Clarke and "Watson — Con- sequences— A Mountain Pass, 32 (3) CONTENTS. LETTER IV. The Remedy Provided — Ambiguity of Terms — Three Views of the Atonement — Early Impressions — Position of the Cumberland Church — The goal to which she is tending, 44 LETTER V. Application of the Remedy — A Painful Conflict — A Wrong Course — Universal Redemption — Uni- versal Grace — A Gloomy Prospect, 55 LETTER VI. Opposition to Calvinism — The Big Meeting — Armin- ian Logic and Zeal, --------------- 65 LETTER VIL Source and Evils of undue Excitement — Human Ability — Sufficient Grace — Same as Romish Doc- trine — Difficulties and Absurdities Involved, - 76 LETTER VIII. Same Subject Continued—Christians Deprived of all CONTENTS. 5 Encouragement to Prayer — and God of his Glory, Authority and Power — God Humbled and Abased, and the Sinner Exalted, 86 LETTER IX. Same Subject Continued — Argument from Scripture — Covenant of Grace, 96 LETTER X. Same Subject Continued — Testimony of Familiar Passages of Scripture — A Difficulty Removed, 109 LETTER XL Arminian Doctrine of Ability Abandoned — Still in the Wilderness — Steps Retraced — Calvinism Adopted in Full, 120 LETTER XIL Doctrines Involved in those already Stated — Election — Definite Atonement — Confirmed by Scripture — Objections Ans-wered, 129 LETTER Xin. Another Important Doctrine — Decrees of God-^ 1* 6 CONTENTS. Feeling of Cumberland Presbyterians— Statement of the Doctrine — Objections Answered, - - - 142 LETTER XIV. Summary Propositions—Conclusion, 155 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. A MISUNDERSTANDING of the doctrines of the Presbyterian Church has driven many good and pious people from her communion. A blinded and deeply rooted prejudice, engendered by the ignorance and bigotry of her enemies, has driven many more into violent opposition to her interests. Some have taken shelter behind an Arminian creed. Others, driven by the absurdities it con- tains, have sought a resting place in the depths of Pelagian and Semi-Pelagian darkness. Others again have sought a middle way between Calvin- ism and Arminianism, thereby hoping to avoid the difficulties of the one, and the endless contra- dictions and absurdities of the other. The latest of these theological pioneers, who have organized themselves into a distinct body, are the Cumber- land Presbyterians, who date their existence from the commencement of the present century. They claim to have made new and important discoveries (vii; 8 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. in theology. They profess to have solved the problem that has baffled the combined learning and genius of the past — and have advertised to the world that the middle way as opened out by themselves, between the conflicting systems of Calvin and Arminius, is both a practicable and easy route, free from difficulties and dangers. Fasci- nated by the peculiar charm of the name, in the commencement of my ministry I entered their ranks. T soon found, however, every possible variety of opinion among them, which it was im- possible to harmonize. They had a Confession of Faith, it is true — a mutilated copy of the West- minster — but in their interpretation of this there was the same difference of opinion. I paused. I asked myself the same question that had been asked repeatedly by others — where is the middle way ? — a question which had never been satisfac- torily answered. I resolved to make it the fixed purpose of my life to endeavour to clear the subject of all its difficulties — to examine thoroughly the groundwork of the system I had adopted — to survey carefully the whole field of speculative theology, to satisfy my own mind, and point out clearly and definitely the different points in the middle route. The nature and results of my in- vestigations are briefly detailed in the following INTRODUCTORY NOTE. » letters — the publication of which has been forced upon me by a combination of circumstances over which I have had no control. It may be proper here to state, that the respected and beloved parent to whom these letters are ad- dressed, is a minister of the gospel in the Cumber- land Presbyterian Church, who for many years acted as a government agent and missionary among the Winnebago Indians. He is at present pastor of the church at Lebanon, Tennessee, and one of the associate editors of the " Banner of Peace and Cumberland Presbyterian Advocate,'' published at that place. A more painful task could not have been assigned me than to address a parent as I have done, under the circumstances to which allu- sion has already been made. Those circumstances I need not here detail. It is sufficient for me to say that, in all that I have done, I have acted under a sense of duty, and in the fear of God. I am aware that, in consenting to publish these letters in their present form, I am widening the breach that has already been made between my- self and many of those who were once my warmest friends. They, I trust, will not forget the bitter- ness of the assaults that have been made upon me, and to which they have given countenance, im- pugning my motives for following truth to its 10 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. legitimate and final results ; and for giving testi- mony to those doctrines which I found, after ma- ture investigation, to be revealed in the word of God, and confirmed by my own religious experience. Jan, 1852. L. A. L. AN EARNEST SEARCH FOR TRUTH, IN A SERIES OF LETTERS. LETTER I. Dear Father : — I had hoped, on entering the ministry, to find a permanent and congenial home in the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. It has been my ardent wish that our interests, our feelings, and views, in our ecclesiastical relations, might be the same, and our labours in life directed to the same ends. It has been the ardent and absorbing desire of my mind, and the devout prayer of my heart, that I might be permitted to labour as an ambassador of Christ, side by side with an aged parent ; and if, in the order of nature, called upon to witness his departure from earthly scenes, to receive a father's mantle and a father's blessing. Nothing I can assure you could have given me greater pleasure ; no earthly consideration could compensate me for such a loss j the imagination (11) 12 "5 ' AN EARNEST SEARCH FOR TRUTH. itself could not have drawn a more pleasing and inviting prospect; the brightest of all earthly hopes beside, would have made but a feeble im- pression on my mind, when brought in conflict with this. But it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps. God in his providence has dis- concerted my plans, and led me in a way that I knew not. I find myself in another branch of the Church, whose doctrines by the great mass of Cumberland Presbyterians are not only rejected but despised ; and such have been the distorted views which they, in common with others, have taken of those doctrines, their opposition has often ripened into the most malignant hostility. Calvinism, says Alexander Campbell, is worse than atheism. Cal- vinism, says the Methodist, is a libel upon Deity — a system of blasphemy and impiety. Calvinism has, I fear, said a loved uncle, who has gone to his rest, and was once a co-labourer with yourself, done more injury to the cause of Christ, than the dogmas of the Romish Church. I myself, occu- pying the same stand-point, once indulged similar feelings. But that opposition and growing hos- tility that had begun to take root in my mind, re- ceived a timely check. My prejudices have all been removed, and looking out upon the broad AN EARNEST SEARCH FOR TRUTH. 13 ocean of trutli from a new and more elevated point of observation, I now love what once I loved to hate. I therefore feel it to he my duty to give a full statement of the circumstances that have led to such a change ; and I owe it to myself and my friends to do it in a public manner. I shall, in a few communications, endeavour to disclose to you only what shall be essential to the proper understanding of my own position, and the position of the Cumberland Church as I have viewed it ; and I think that I have had every op- portunity and every motive to judge correctly and impartially. Situated as you have been for the last eighteen or twenty years upon the extreme borders of the north-west, I am confident that you are not aware of the position the Church at present occupies, and the goal to which she is tending. Anything, therefore, that I may say, I trust will not be construed into a violation of any filial duty, or want of a proper regard for the feelings of a parent. Permit me, in the outset, to call your attention to an important fact which you have doubtless often seen verified in your intercourse with the world. It is this : Where a sect or party have nothing peculiar and distinctive, of a positive nature, of their own to present to the mind as a 2 14 AX EARNEST SEARCH TOR TRUTH. basis and bond of union, their constant aim is to tear down the systems of others, appropriate to themselves that which is popular, and poison the minds of the weak, the disaffected, and ignorant. The Church furnishes to our hands, if necessary, many illustrations of this truth. In every age, some sect or society has been started without any fixed or well-defined principles of its own, and has enlarged its boundaries in no other way than by poisoning the minds of the disaffected, the ignorant, and the credulous, with distorted views of the truth. Since the time of the Reformation, Calvinism has been the watchword of alarm. Opposition has raged and waxed hot and fierce, till the enemies of truth, blinded by their own zeal, have been driven to the farthest extreme, and wrested every important doctrine of the Scriptures to their own destruction. We have a painful illustration of the truth here referred to, in the history of the Cumberland Pres- byterian Church in many parts of the country. When they first made a start toward an inde- pendent organization, claiming a little latitude only on one or two points of doctrine, they repeat- edly sought a re-union with the church from whieh they had been cut off; but having failed, they ar- rayed themselves in direct opposition and open AN EAENEST SEAUCH FOR TRUTH. 15 hostility to tliose at whose door they had so long knocked for entrance, which had been repeatedly and emphatically denied. From that day to this, their opposition has increased, and continues to grow with their growth, and strengthen with their strength. There is an obvious reason for it; yea, a pressing necessity that arises from the want of something distinctive to present to the minds of those upon whom they would operate. They boast, it is true, of a ^' middle way ;" but nearly half a century has passed since the discovery was made, and it has not yet been defined. The ma- jority of those who are esteemed fathers in the Church are in the grave. The few that are left, with bending and tottering steps, are at its entrance waiting for the summons ; and yet all that has been effected in the way of presenting a system of doctrines to the world, has been a mutilation of the Westminster Confession of Faith. This upon the floor of the General Assembly of the Church has been pronounced with emphasis, " a ragged affair," because it savoured too much of Calvinism. Such a system, call it by what name you please, will not answer. A man may patch his garments with new or old cloth as suits his taste, but the truth in which the soul is clad must be seamless — woven from top to bottom. Princi- 16 AN EARNEST SEARCH FOR TRUTH. pies will and must work out their appropriate and legitimate results. It has been lamentably true in the case before us ; every development shows a tendency to the extremes of Arminianism. I will venture the assertion, if the whole can be judged by those with whom I have been conversant, that nineteen-twentieths of those who aspire to be teachers, so far as they have any system at all, hold to all the essential doctrines of the Methodist Church, save the doctrine of falling from grace and sinless perfection ; — the latter of which is now practically discarded by Methodists, and the former, to an alarming extent, is beginning to be confirmed by the practice of Cumberland Presbyterians what- ever may be their theory upon the subject. There is nothing distinctive that furnishes a bond of union, a positive influence, or an attractive force. Repulsion, in most instances, is the only power that can effect anything. If you wish to operate upon those inclined to Methodism, you must get up a noise upon the doctrine of falling from grace, and expatiate largely upon the beauty of perse- vering to the end by the semi-omnipotent self-mov- ing energies of the will. If you would turn the course of those inclined to the Presbyterian Church, you must poison their minds by distorted views and caricatures of the truth; raise the cry of AN EARNEST SEARCH FOR TRUTH. 17 ''atheism/' "impiety/' "blasphemy/' "popery/' and every other raw-head and bloody-bones the imagination can picture. I speak what I know, and testify what I have seen and felt. The united voice of the Presbyterian Church in Western Penn- sylvania will bear me witness, that this was the mode of operation practised by those who com- menced their labours there as "missionaries/' who made their boasts that in a few years not a " grease spot" of Calvinism would be left to tell posterity of its signal overthrow. Innumerable changes were rung upon the doctrines of " election/' " predestination/' " reprobation/' " infant damna- tion/' and every thing else out of which any capital could be made ; insomuch that if it were possible the very elect would have been deceived. Their success for a time was unparalleled ; but like every thing else of the kind, there was no depth of root, and the churches thus planted soon began to show visible marks of decay. As the eyes of the community were opened, the repulsive force they had succeeded in producing in the minds of many ceased to operate, and they were shorn of their strength. Repeated efforts have since been made to stir up the minds of the people in opposition to Calvinism and the Presbyterian Church, but to no purpose. Every means and 2* 18 AN EARNEST SEARCH FOR TRUTH. every energy has been applied, but nothing of any consequence has been efFected. They have piped long and loud, but nobody has danced; from morn till night, as the children in the market-place, they have mourned, but nobody has lamented. At such a crisis, a new occasion is offered, and a new theme presented, by which to stir up the minds of the people, and drive the alarmed and scattered flocks together. A young man, whom they had honoured with one of their most import- ant stations, is led, in the fear of God, and by careful steps, to embrace the despised and rejected doctrines of grace. Something must be done to counteract the moral effect of such a change upon the minds of the community and the church abroad. They must make an effort to ruin his character ; they must try to make it appear that the Presbyterians have taken to their bosom ^' a hypocrite," "^ renegade,'' "a wolf,'' "a viper;" they must summon rumour with her thousand tongues, and accuse him of all manner of evil ; they must heap upon him all kinds of epithets ; brand him with all manner of infamy ; and throw as much odium and suspicion on his path as pos- sible. I myself was the person thus assailed. I have borne it all in silence that they might have a prac- AN EARNEST SEARCH FOR TRUTH. 19 tical demonstration of their littleness and folly. My object has been accomplished; their shafts Lave returned to their own bosoms. I shall dis- miss all that has been said and done of a personal nature, by referring them to an important prin- ciple laid down by one who knew perfectly the hearts of men: '^Eveiy one that doeth evil/' says Christ, ^^ hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest that they are wrought in God." Johniii. 20, 21. In their deeds of dark- ness let this be their condemnation. Your affectionate Son. LETTER II. THEOLOGY A SYSTEM OF TRUTH — STARTING POINT ORIGINAL SIN — CONDITION OF MAN — LOST IN THE FULLEST SENSE OF THE WORD — POSI- TION OF THE CUMBERLAND CHURCH. Dear Father: — One of the earliest impres- sions made upon my mind, in entering upon the study of theology, was that it was a system of truth, as all other branches of knowledge — of re- vealed truth, having the Spirit of God for its au- thor, whose different parts are connected together by a logical sequence, as inseparably as cause and effect, that link together the phenomena of the natural world. It will not be my object, by any means, to develop the varied phases and elements of that system, in their different relations and consequences. Such a task would ill become a son, in addressing a father whose life has been spent in the active duties of the ministry. I shall only aim to disclose to you the workings of my own mind upon some of the leading doctrines of the gospel ; and, with all due filial regard, to call (20) THEOLOGY A SYSTEM OF TRUTH, &C. 21 your attention to the untenable and undefinable ground occupied by the Cumberland Church. It is a painful task, I can assure you, but it is one that a high sense of duty impels me to perform. In order to a correct understanding of the gos- pel plan of salvation, the system of truth revealed in the Scriptures, we must examine well the dis- ease for which it is provided ; we must probe to the bottom the subject of human depravity, its nature, its origin, and results. It is one of those doctrines about which the student of theology, the well instructed scribe, and even private member of the church, must have clear, well-defined, and cor- rect views. A single mistake here will vitiate the whole scheme of salvation, both in theory and practice. You have already examined it, and know its importance; I shall therefore simply glance at some of its more prominent features, which, in the outset of my theological studies, I marked as the necessary ground-work of a system of grace. *'The sinfulness of the estate whereinto man fell," says the Shorter Catechism, ^' consists in the guilt of Adam's first sin, the want of original righteousness, and the corruption of his whole nature — which is commonly called original sin — together with all actual transgressions which pro- 22 ORIGINAL SIN. ceed from it." Here tlien is the disease for which the gospel remedy was provided. It in- cludes three alarming symptoms, under the head of original sin. 1. The guilt of Adam's first sin, which has come upon us in view of a covenant arrangement. 2. The want of original righteous- ness, such as the creatures possessed in a state of innocency. 3. The corruption of our whole na- ture. Our personal transgressions may also be included in the disease-, but they are more pro- perly the result or acting out of our corrupt nature. They come from it as the fruit from the tree, or as the stream from the fountain. Matt. XV. 19. The immediate and remote consequences of this estate of sin into which we have fallen, so far as they relate to our happiness, are thus briefly and forcibly stated : '^All mankind, by their fall, lost communion with God, are under his wrath and curse, and so made liable to all the miseries of this life, to death itself, and to the pains of hell for ever." Such is the language of the Shorter Catechism, both of the "Westminster Confession of Faith, and also of the Cumberland Presbyterian Confession as extracted from it. I have made the quotation, not with a view of discussing at any length the different points introduced, but ORIGINAL SIN. 23 Bimply that the reader may see the position the Cumberland Church once occupied, and contrast it with the goal to which she is now tending, as regards the first elementary principles, the very ground-work of the whole gospel scheme. I shall only glance at some of the more prominent fea- tures of the subject, which, if properly appre- hended, will necessarily lead to correct views of all the others. There is a single word that embodies in its meaning the whole subject ; a word which, if pro- perly understood and felt, would break down many of the barriers that now divide the Church. It is found in the reply of our Saviour to those who complained of his being a guest with "a sinner.^' " The Son of man," said he, "is come to seek and to save that which was lost." Luke xix. 10. This, you recollect, was the passage assigned me to write upon, when I placed myself under the care of Presbytery. It led my mind into an easy and natural train of thought; and the opinions I then formed have remained with me to the present time. They constituted the foundation upon which I endeavoured to build an Arminian structure that fell before it was com- pleted, and upon which I now stand, under "a covert'^ and a " hiding-place/' formed of more 24 CONDITION OF MAN, durable materials. Man I regarded as lost, in every possible sense in which the word can be used. This view is one I found not only revealed in the Scriptures, but confirmed by reason, by facts, and personal observation. In whatever situation of life we find him, at whatever period of his existence since the fell, in all countries and ages, he has been found to be lost in the highest and fullest meaning of the word. At all times, and under all circumstances, the same alarming symptoms have prevailed. Lost as an intellectual being. — The light of nature, of science, and philosophy, with all the boasted wisdom of man, have been inadequate to penetrate the mists and the darkness that shroud the past, the present, and the future. The strange enigma of life, of death, of the provi- dences of God, of human miseries, and the com- plete wreck of high moral capabilities, have, under all circumstances, transcended the limited and paralyzed faculties of the human mind. "Where am I? — what am I? — whence came I? — and why the deep yearnings of the soul for some object of religious worship, where there is none but the wood and the stone, the workmanship of the creature^s hands? When such questions as these arise from the great deep of our hearts where CONDITION OF MAN. 25 shall we go for a response? Nature is silent, science is dumb, and reason and philosophy only serve to bewilder, and render more gloomy and dark the mystery. Lost too as a moral being. — He is declared in the Scriptures of divine truth to be dead in tres- passes and in sins j lost to a knowledge of God^ and consequently to all holiness of character. '^ The Lord looked down from heaven," says the Psalmist, "upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand and seek G-od. They are all gone aside ; they are altogether be- come filthy : there is none that doeth good, no, not one." Ps. xiv. 2, 3. There is no possible qualification of the sad truth. We are bom in sin, conceived in iniquity, the whole head is sick, the whole heart is faint, and all the affections of our carnal nature are alienated from God, and at enmity against him. The verdict the apostle Paul brought in, after the most careful and masterly review of the condition of the world in his day, was expressed in the strongest possible terms ; from which he draws the conclusion, that when the hearts and the lives of all who are under the law shall be tried, by the proper tri- bunal, " every mouth shall be stopped, and all the world become guilty before God.'' Rom. iii. 19. 3 26 CONDITION OP MAN. Bat I need not enlarge upon this point. You have been sufficiently thrown into scenes, both of savage and civilized life, to have had a practical exhibition of the moral character and condition of the human heart in every conceivable light ; and I presume that the great mass of Cumberland Presbyterians will subscribe to the doctrine of human depravity, to its fullest extent, if you will allow them the privilege, in common with all others who hold to Arminian sentiments, of stop- ping short of the legitimate consequences to which it leads. A man must be under a strange aberration of mind, who knows anything of him- self or his kind, who, for a moment, can doubt the teachings of the Bible upon this subject, taking its language in the most unqualified sense, and in its strongest meaning. This, however, is but a part of the subject, and gives us but a par- tial and imperfect view of the condition of man aa affected by the fall. He is lost also as a subject of the divine gov- ernment.— This follows as a necessary consequence, from the moral state of his heart developing itself in his life, and from the nature of the divine gov- ernment and the character of God. ^' The Lord hath spoken," says the prophet Isaiah, '^ I have nourished and brought up children, and they have CONDITION OP MAN. 27 rebelled against me." Isa. i. 2. It is in this cor- rupt and rebellious state that man is met by the eye of infinite purity and justice; his acts, his feelings, and the moral state of his heart, are all condemned, and the solemn curse of a broken and inflexible law pronounced against him. Upon this point also I imagine we agree. Your views of the holiness of God, of the nature of sin, of the operations of the divine government, and the con- sequent condemnation of the sinner, are thus far the same as my own, and such as a careful examin- ation will lead every mind to adopt. But there is yet another important aspect in which the sub- ject is to be viewed, and concerning which our ideas must be clear and well-defined. The ruin of man is not complete until we have carried our investigations still further. He can- not in any proper sense of the word be said to be lost until we can give an affirmative answer to the following question : Would it have been Just, on the part of God, to have left man in his estate of condemnation loithout a Redeemer ? A more im- portant question could not be asked in the outset of one's inquiries after truth; it involves much that is vital, and furnishes an infallible test of one's theological creed. The Arminian, for ex- ample, denies, and builds upon his denial a system 28 CONDITION OF MAN. that is destructive of every principle of grace and love revealed in the gospel, and degrades the gift of eternal life to a debt that God owed the crea- ture for injuries he had received. The Calvinist, on the other hand, affirms, and builds upon his affirmation a system alike honouring to God and humbling to man; that magnifies the grace of God, and traces every offer of life, and every bless- ing bestowed, to the boundless and unfathomable love of the divine bosom, whose height, and depth, and length, and breadth an inspired apostle could not measure. To this latter view I early and readily gave assent. It was the in- stinctive feeling of my heart ; and if there is a truth within the lids of the sacred volume, it is the feeling of every believer in his devotional moments, whatever may be his speculations when ti'ying to bolster up a tottering and falling creed. You will pardon the unqualified expression, for I know that your heart and faith cannot be other- wise than with me here also. Struggling as you have been, for the last eighteen or twenty years, to elevate the darkened mind of the savage to a knowledge of gospel truth, you will not hesitate, I trust, to adopt the strongest language of the Scriptures on this subject, as applicable to man in all his relations. CONDITION OF MAN. 29 Here, then; briefly is the condition of man since the fall ; his ruin is complete ; he is lost in the fullest sense of the word — intellectually, morally and legally ; is justly condemned, and by nature a child of wrath; the consequences of Adam's first sin are upon him ; he is destitute of original righteousness; his whole nature is cor- rupt, and his whole life is but the acting out of that nature; he has lost all "communion with God,'^ the only source of life and happiness; is under " his wrath and curse," and " made liable to all the miseries of this life, to death itself, and the pains of hell for ever ;'' and were the darkness of the pit for ever to close upon him, without even the offer of salvation, the character of God would be untarnished ; he would still be holy, just and true ; and the hosts of heaven would still mingle their responsive notes of praise around the eternal throne unto him that lives and reigns for ever. No other view of the lost and ruined condition of man can furnish the shadow of a foundation upon which to build a system of grace, of mercy, and love. There is no room for either, if God is a debtor to us instead of our being bankrupt and debtors to him. It was this view, I say, of our estate of sin and misery that I adopted in the outset of my investigations. Any other I found 30 POSITION OP CUMBERLAND CHURCH. would destroy every principle of vitality the gospel possessed. It is a view, too, pregnant with consequences of the first importance in a consistent theological system; consequences im- mediate and remote, which must sooner or later force themselves upon the con\^ction of every in- vestigating mind. In fact in it, as the foundation, is necessarily involved the character of the whole superstructure; and were there no other revela- tion on the subject, but that ^^ the Son of man is come to seek and save that which was loBty' it would be enough ; for from this may be evolved, by a clear and logical sequence, every important doctrine of the gospel. Some of these doctrines I will endeavour to exhibit in their proper place. I will close this communication with a single request. I would most earnestly and afi"ection- ately ask of you to consider well the importance of the view presented, and mark the position oc- cupied by the Cumberland Church. Principles, I have said, will and must work out their appro- priate results; and none, perhaps, involve more than the question as to the justice of God in leaving man in his estate of sin and misery, into which he is introduced by the fall. Where, I ask, is the Cumberland Church upon this point ? They are not upon Calvinistic ground ; they have POSITION OP CUMBERLAND CHURCH. 31 not struck out any new path, or made any new discoveries ; but have taken, as in all their travels, the beaten road of Arminianism, their Confession of Faith and Shorter Catechism to the contrary notwithstanding. It is painful to see them in the dim distance, with new names upon their banners, and boasting of a middle theology, thread- ing their way upon the very heels of the followers of Wesley. It is painful to see them, in different parts of the country, indulging in the most bitter abuse of Presbyterians and Methodists, and yet not having a foot of ground between the two that they can caU their own. It will not do. A Church that takes as its starting point the prin- ciple that the offer of salvation is a debt instead of a free gift, must in the end find themselves in Arminian ranks upon the mountains of Edom, or their carcasses, to the latest generation, will be left in the wilderness as a memorial of their folly. This conviction early forced itself upon my mind; but I hoped to find the middle way leading off from some other point. Your affectionate Son. LETTER III. THE CAUSE OF OTTR FALL — SIN OF OUR FIRST PA- RENTS — IMPUTATION — VIEW OP CLARKE AND WATSON — CONSEQUENCES — A MOUNTAIN PASS. Dear Father : — The view I have presented of the moral condition of man, is one that I found upon the very surface of the sacred page ; one, too, that entered into all my religious feelings; and it is a view that must find its way to every heart that is properly exercised under the in- fluence of gospel truth. It is not until the sin- ner is brought to feel his condition as one that is lost, in all its force, that he is prepared to feel his need of a Redeemer ; it is not until then he is prepared to pray the prayer of the publican, and receive pardon and life as the gift of God. I am confident that you will concur with me in the sentiment here expressed. But there is an important doctrine involved as its direct and im- mediate consequence, which is essential to a cor- rect theoretical knowledge of the plan of salva- tion; a doctrine about which there has been (32) IMPUTATION. 33 mucli counsel darkened by words without know- ledge, and which in my early investigations of truth gave me many a painful struggle, and against which I contended for a time with a more determined and bitter opposition, than against any other in the Calvinistic system. If all are born in sin, and thus brought into the world in a state of condemnation, a question naturally arises as to the cause of such a state of things in the government of a wise, a holy, and beneficent Being, who is infinite in all his attri- butes. Revelation alone can solve the difficulty. " By one man,^' says Paul, " sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." Rom. V. 12. Back of this, however, is another ques- tion, which must be clearly and definitely an- swered before we have advanced a single step. Upon what principle are we made sinners by the "one man," and our destiny thus linked with his ? In other words, what is the relation we sus- tain to him that furnishes a reasonable ground for involving us in the consequences of his first trans- gression ? Both the Calvinist and Arminian agree in considering it, in some sense, a federal relation — a relation in which the acts of one individual are considered in Jaw as the acts of those whom 34 VIEW OP CLARKE AND WATSON.^ be represents. According to the Calvinist, the sin of Adam is imputed to his posterity, or considered theirs in a legal sense in view of a covenant ar- rangement made with him as their federal head. The Arminian sometimes makes use of similar phraseology, but at the same time tells us that such a system would be unjust, had not God provided a plan by which we might work our way out of the evils and ruins of the fall. Hence they tell us that, as- an offset or compensation for what we are made to suffer in our fallen state, all are restored by Christ, the second Adam, to a new state of proba- tion. But hear their own language : ^^Had not Grod provided a Redeemer," says Adam Clarke in his commentary on the fifth chapter of Romans, " he would no doubt have terminated the whole moral story by cutting off the original trans- gressors; for it would have been unjust to permit them to propagate their like, under such circum- stances that their offspring must be unavoidably and eternally wretched.'' " Before any issue proceeded from the first pair,'' says Mr. Watson, '^ they were restored to the divine favour. Had no methgd of forgiveness and restoration been established with respect to human offenders, the penalty of death must have forthwith been executed upon them." Inst. V. ii. p. 87. A mortal thrust is here blindly CONSEQUENCES. 35 made at the very vitals of the gospel. They may talk largely of the depravity of the human heart, of the federal relation between Adam and his pos- terity, of the justice of God in their condemnation, and of the mercy and love of God in the gift of his Son ; but it is all an unmeaning jargon of words. They may discourse much upon the efficacy of means and the moral power of divine truth ; but if this, their fundamental principle, is carried out, the whole gospel scheme is reduced to a mere carcass, and the carcass maimed of its most important limbs J a carcass, such as the mummies of Egypt, which, after having been robbed of their vitals to preserve them from corruption and decay, must be wi'apped in the spicy and slimy garments prepared by the priest that ministers to the ignorance and pride of the human heart. A hideous object in- deed is presented to the sight when it is exposed to the light, its bandages untied and its covering re- moved. But we can form no just conception of what we have embraced, until the unpleasant task is accomplished. Indulge me, therefore, for a mo- ment, while I call your attention to some of the more immediate consequences, in addition to what has already been said, to which this fundamental principle of Arminianism leads. 1. It robs the gospel of every principle of 36 CONSEQUENCES. vitality it possesses. To this I have already alluded ; and again I would ask, if the redemp- tion of man from his estate of sin and misery was a deht that God owed the creature, where is the love, and where the mercy, of the gospel ? and what is the ground of our obligations to Christ for his obedience and sufferings unto death ? There is none, and there can be none in such a system. t 2. It degrades the character of Christ to that of a minister of sin. He is made the cause of all the sin and misery that have afflicted our race, both upon earth and in hell, from the foundation of the world. Look again at the quotations made above from Clarke and Wat- son. " It would have been unjust," says one, " to have permitted our first parents to propagate their like without a Kedeemer." '^ Had no method of forgiveness been provided,'* says the other, " the penalty of death must have been forthwith exe- cuted upon them." If this be true, then our coming into the world with a depraved nature is conditioned, not upon the sin of Adam, but the death of Christ ; and all the consequences flowing from that nature thus inherited are conditioned upon the same event. For example, if I dig a pit and draw a man into it, that I may have an opportunity of lifting him out again, to show how CONSEQUENCES. 37 benevolent I am, that which I choose to call a benevolent act is in an important sense the con- dition or cause of his misfortune. Again, if a servant administers poison to a family, at the instance of a physician who desires to show his skill in restoring them to health, the physician as well as the servant is chargeable with all the con- sequences that ensue. Precisely in the same sense is the death of Christ the necessary con- dition and cause of the fall of man and his con- sequent misery, if the position before us of those who hold to Arminian sentiments is correct. 3. It leads also to the denial of the very ex- istence of sin — confounds virtue and vice, and excuses men in the greatest crimes. According both to the Calvinist and Arminian, the sins of our race flow from the corrupt nature we inherit. If, then, this nature is not ours upon just and legal grounds, surely we cannot be held account- able, upon any principle of justice, for the acts and feelings that flow from it, whatever they may be. It is a clear deduction ; and there is no necessity of drawing out a lengthy argument, or of multi- plying illustrations, to render it more apparent. Look at it as it stands. The corrupt nature we inherit, says the Arminian, is not justly ours. The Bible teaches, and his own system teaches^ 4 38 CONSEQUENCES. that all sin proceeds from that nature as the stream from the fountain. What other conclusion can we draw, then, but that we are not accountable for anything we do in this our fallen state ? And where is the goal at which we can stop ? 4. It makes injustice and cruelty the most con- spicuous attributes of the divine character. God is represented not only as holding us accountable for that which is not justly ours, but as heaping immeasurable reproach, ignominy, and suffering upon an innocent personage when there was no necessity for it ; upon one whom he repeatedly declared to be his only and well-beloved Son. Where is the need of a Redeemer in such a sys- tem ? Where, I ask, is the necessity of such a sacrifice to satisfy the claims of the law and jus- tice of God, when the law can make no demands, and the sinner himself has claims upon justice for injuries received at her hands ? Go, then, to the garden and to the cross. What a spectacle is there presented ! The Son of God bathed in tears and blood, and suspended upon the torturing spikes by a centurion's band, at the instance of a Jewish mob ! For what ? Not to atone for his own sins; for he was led as a lamb to the slaughter, without spot and without blemish. Not to atone for the sins of others ; for there is no CONSEQUENCES. 89 sin for which to atone that might not have been pardoned without violating a single attribute of the divine character, or endangering a single in- terest of the divine government. What then? Can any satisfactory account be given of such scenes in such a system ? None whatever. Con- sistency will necessarily lead either to a denial of the divinity of Christ and of his death as a sacri- ficial act, or to the absurd and blasphemous as- sumption that God is the most unjust and cruel of all tyrants. It also involves a gross contradiction in itself. If it is necessary in the divine government, that the sentence of the law should be executed in all its force as soon as the offence is committed, the result would have been far different from what it was in the case of our first parents. Eve being first in the transgression, would have fallen a victim to death the moment she was be- guiled by the serpent, and tasted the forbidden fruit. In that case Adam might have been saved from the ruins of the fall, and blessed with ano- ther helpmeet, or left alone to enjoy the blessings and bounties of earth till his probation should end. But it may be said that it pleased Cod, in his in- scrutable wisdom, to link together the destiny of our fii'st parents ; that there was a fitness and pro- 40 CONSEQUENCES. priety in it that we cannot comprehend. This is the very principle for which I am contending. If it be just thus to bind two individuals together, making the fall of the one conditioned upon the fall of the other, where then, I ask, is the injustice of conditioning the fall of a third or fourth upon the same event, if the natural and social ties that bind them together are equally strong ? And what stronger ties can there be than those that exist between parent and offspring ? If, however, those who subscribe to the view of Clarke and Watson are not willing to go such a length, they must modify their view of what would have been the course of the law towards our first parents with- out the promise of a Redeemer. They must con- sign Eve to perdition the moment she yields to the tempter, and let Adam go free, at least until his superior wisdom and strength have been fully tested. I might go on almost to any length multiplying the errors and absurdities growing out of this fundamental principle of Arminianism ; but it is perhaps unnecessary. Enough has been said to show that both its immediate and remote conse- quences are ruinous in the extreme. I might also add, that every difficulty and absurdity, real or imaginary, that is urged against the Calvinistic A MOUNTAIN PASS. 41 view of the subject, may be retorted with a force and propriety, that can be resisted only by those whose eyes are closed to the light. It was such difficulties and absurdities that pressed upon me, and drove me to a more consist- ent and safe position. I tried every means, how- ever, to explain them away, but to no purpose. My way was always blocked up by a single passage of Scripture, that declares us to be ^' by nature children of wrath even as others." To this sad truth my heart gave a ready response ; and finding no safe foothold on Arminian ground, I tried to find some other, by which I might avoid the difficulties I felt would press upon me if I adopted the Calvinistic view of the subject. I read McKnight, Stuart, Barnes, and others, but found no satisfaction. I had frequent discus- sions with my classmates and others, with whom I was intimate at the seminary, which served only to deepen my prejudices. But as I advanced in my course, I obtained more enlarged views of the different points of theology; and in the whole range of my vision, I could see but one pass through the mountains of difficulties that roi^e on every side. The whole question resolved itself into this : If the gospel is a system of grace, and the ofier of life is a free gift, then is the sinner condemned. 4* 42 A MOUNTAIN PASS. If he is justly condemned there must be a legal or federal relation existing between Adam and his posterity, in which relation his sin is imputed to them, and their destiny linked with his. This view I found, on a more careful investigation, to be confirmed in the strongest and most unequivo- cal manner throughout the Scriptures. The fifth chapter of Paul's epistle to the Romans is sufficient to settle the question beyond all cavil or doubt. "The wages of sin,'' the penalty of the law, he tells us, " is death;" death temporal, spiritual, and eter- nal, as all are agreed. In the same connection we are told that death has passed upon all men, in view of their relation to Adam, as their federal head ; even upon those who die in infancy, who have never sinned "after the similitude of Adam's transgression." Upon this also there is no con- troversy between the Calvinist and Arminian. It is contended, however, that the word death in the latter case does not comprehend as much as in the former. Be it so. It does not free the sub- ject of a single difficulty ; for if it be just to sub- ject us to a part of the penalty of the law, in view, of our relation to Adam, the same principle is involved; and there can be no injustice in sub- jecting us to the whole of that penalty. And that such is the case, is stated by the apostle A MOUNTAIN PASS. 43 Paul in tlie same connection : '^ By one man's disobedience," says he, "many were made sin- ners" — " by one man's offence death reigned by one" — "by the offence of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation." Here, I say, was the only mountain pass through the difficul- ties and dangers that surrounded me. I entered it with the exclamation of the same apostle upon my lips : " How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out !" The beetling cliffs towered high above me; with a trembling heart and careful steps I found my way through j I read again the oracles of God, and found a clearness, a beauty, and a force, in many parts which I had never before seen. But my mind was by no means yet prepared to receive the whole Calvinistic system. I paused to search for the middle route. I used every possible precau- tion. I spared neither labour nor pains to accom- plish my object. I noted well every landmark. To use a figure drawn from scenes with which you are familiar, I kindled camp-fires in every valley, and upon every hill-top that I might obtain a correct knowledge of the country, and strike out some course in which all difficulties and dangers could be avoided. With what success the sequel will show. Your affectionate son. LETTER IV. THE RExMEDY PROVIDED — AMBIGUITY OF TERMS — THREE VIEWS OF THE ATONEMENT EARLY IMPRESSIONS POSITION OF THE CUMBERLAND CHURCH — THE GOAL TO WHICH SHE IS TEN- DING. Dear Father : — Having presented the view of tlie moral condition of man that forced itself upon my attention and conviction, I would, in the next place, notice a few facts with regard to the nature of the remedy that is revealed in the gospel. The object and limits of these commu- nications forbid my entering upon a discussion of the subject in its details. I shall therefore simply present, in general terms, the different views that are current among the denominations of professing Christians, and the early impres- sions I imbibed, together with other facts of importance that may be suggested. The subject is one that forms another important link in the chain of theological truth, and should be well understood, and clearly defined. Such, however, are the different- shades of meaning attached to (44) VIEWS OF THE ATONEMENT. 45 words in their metaphysical and theological use, that it is impossible for us to tell what a man believes till he has defined his terms, and we have succeeded in getting at the ground-work of his system. More especially is it true of the atone- ment, concerning which every possible variety of opinion has been invented by the ingenuity of man, and zealously advocated. When the question is narrowed down to the nature of that work, the discordant theories that divide the church may be reduced to three, at least for our present purpose, each differing from the others in its fundamental principles. For a full statement of these I am happy in being able to refer you both to Calvinistic and Arminian authority — such as Hill's Divinity, and Watson's Institutes. 1. The first goes upon the supposition that pure goodness, or benevolence, is the absorbing attribute of the divine character; that his only object is to communicate happiness to his crea- tures, and the only ground of his hatred to sin is because it leads to misery. Hence the work of Christ was in no sense propitiatory or vicarious, but simply that of a mere teacher, sent to reveal the clemency of God, and to offer pardon upon condition of repentance, without any satisfaction 46 VIEWS OF THE ATONEMENT. being made for sin. Such is the Socinian view. *' The great object of the mission and death of Christ/' says Dr. Priestley, "was to give the fullest proof of a state of retribution, in order to supply the strongest motives to virtue. * * * Although there are some texts in which the par- don of sin seems to be represented as dispensed in consideration of the suflferings, the merits, the resurrection, the life, or the obedience of Christ, we cannot but conclude, upon a careful exami- nation, that all these views of it are partial representations ; and that, according to the plain general tenor of Scripture, the pardon of sin is in reality always dispensed by the free mercy of God upon account of man's personal virtue, a penitent, upright heart, and a reformed, exemplary life, without regard to the sufferings or merit of any being whatever.'' Hill's Div. p. 419. According to such a system, the sufferings and death of Christ have nothing more to do with the sinner's salvation than the death of Stephen, of Paul, or any martyr to the truth, only as it was necessary for him to die to furnish an example to his fol- lowers, and confirm his doctrines by his resurrec- tion from the dead. 2. The second system, alluded to above con- cedes to the first, that the object of Grod, in his VIEWS OF THE ATONEMENT. 47 work of creation and providence, is the bestow- ment of happiness upon his creatures, and that there is no difficulty, founded in his nature, that lies in the way of his pardoning the sinner with- out an atonement. But it is contended, that in the government of a righteous Being some dis- tinction should be made between an innocent person and a penitent criminal, and that, before any offer of forgiveness is made upon conditions of repentance, there should be some memorial of the evil nature of sin; which is all that renders an atonement necessary. This, of course, involves a denial of the priestly office of Christ, and renders the whole gospel scheme a mere expedient in the divine government to cover up the guilt of those condemned, without any proper satisfaction to law and justice. I shall not enter upon an examination of either of the views here presented. It is sufficient to say, that they involve or lead to a denial of the divinity of Christ, and make the atonement as much applicable to the devils in hell, as it is to the fallen race of Adam. If he died for a mere abstraction, simply to make a grand display of the character of God, and the evil of sin, or that it might be meet and proper for* God to honour and reward his philanthropy, by forgiving the con- 48 EARLY IMPRESSIONS. demned subjects of bis moral government, then have Satan, or tbe lost souls in bell, as much right to the benefits of his death as Peter, Paul, John, or any other of those who have received forgiveness in his name. 8. The third view has for its fundamental prin- ciple, that there is a difficulty in the way of tbe sinner's pardon in the rectitude of the divine cha- racter, in his hatred of sin, as well as the nature of the divine government and the interests it up- holds. Hence the sufferings and death of Christ are regarded as strictly and necessarily vicarious. He came not only to reveal and offer pardon, but to procure it ; not merely to make an exhibition of the mercy of God, but of his justice also. He stands, therefore, in the sinner's place, and re- ceives what he should have borne. His sufferings and death have reference, not merely to the in- terests of the divine government, but to the infinite purity and rectitude of the divine character, and are, in the fullest sense, substitutional, vicarious, and propitiatory. Such is the doctrine of the Westminster and Cumberland Presbyterian Con- fessions of Faith. There has been no alteration made in the latter, so far as the nature of the atonement is concerned. See chap. viii. sec. 5. It was this last view of the atonement that I EARLY IMPRESSIONS. 49 early adopted. I could find no other that recom- mended itself either to my judgment or my feel- ings. When first I felt that I had found peace with Grod ; ^hen fii'st I was led to the cross, and enabled to contemplate the sufierings and death of Christ in their true light, I felt that I had found something more than a grand display of the divine character ; something more than a mere expedient to save the sinner, without any satisfaction to the claims of law and justice. It was ^' a hiding-place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest;" from the tempest that had spent all its force on him as the substitute of the sinner, upon whom was laid the iniquity of us all, and by whose stripes we are healed. A mere exhibition of philanthropy, or governmental display of the divine character, will not do. When the fountains of religious feeling and emotion are broken up by the omnipotent energies of the Spirit of God; when deep calls to deep, and guilt, with its ter- rific voice, pronounces the sinner's condemnation, the trembling soul finds no relief here. God is Iwli/ and just as well as true, and from his own nature is evolved the truth that he is a consuming fii-e ; and in his own bosom there lie the sleeping storms that shall for ever beat upon the unsheltered regions of the lost. Take from the gospel the 5 50 CUMBERLAND CHURCH. single idea of substitution ; take from it the doc- trine of a vicarious atonement, and there is nothing left worth contending for. It is this doctrine, too, that not only provides a hiding-place from the wind and the tempest, but presents itself as ^' the shadow of a great rock in a weary land," and fur- nishes ^^ rivers of wat^r" to the fainting traveller that measures over the parched deserts of life with a pilgrim's step. This doctrine I imbibed in the outset of my religious life, as well as in my inves- tigations of truth ; and upon it I anchored all my hopes. I tried, however, to reconcile it with the doctrine that the atonement is general in its pro- visions — a leading doctrine of the Arminian sys- tem, which led me into such a region of darkness. I was called upon again, however, to note the departure of the Cumberland Church from her own standards, and the danger of her position. Upon what ground, let me ask, do they stand as regards the nature and design of the atonement ? Not upon medium ground; not, as upon other points, in the rear or centre of the Arminian ranks, but upon the extreme left flank, crowding off into the regions of Pelagian darkness. Hear the language of one who has written a book upon the subject, and who stands high in the confi- dence and affection of the church : " The atone- CUMBERLAND CHURCH. 51 ment/' says he, '' is a sovereign and merciful provision introduced into the administration of the divine government, instead of the execution of the punishment on the offender. It is an expedient which justifies the executive of the government iu suspending the literal infliction of the penalty threatened/' Such is the language of one who is now editing a religious paper, and who has been placed, by the voice of the Cumberland Church, at the head of her " Board of Publication.'' His defi- nition is taken almost verbatim from a work on the extent of the atonement, by a Dr. Jenkyn of England, whose views accord with the ultra por- tion of New School Presbyterians of this country. '^An atonement," says he, ^' is 2iTij provision in- troduced into the administration of a government instead of the infliction of the punishment on the offender; any eocpedient that will justify a govern- ment in suspending the literal execution of the penalty threatened." I have neither time nor space here to develop the author's system ; but by examining the work referred to, you will find that it not only destroys the vicarious nature of the atonement, but degrades the obedience, the suffer- ings, and death of Christ to a mere apology for restoring the guilty to favour,' without any satis- faction, in the proper sense of the word, being 62 CUaiBERLAND CHURCH. made to law and justice. And his views of the nature of regeneration and the influence of the Spirit, as presented in a work upon the subject, coincide, in every important feature, with the views of Alexander Campbell, of Bethany, Va. ; are part and parcel of his theory of the atonement, and may be evolved from the loose definition he has given, as adopted by the Cumberland Church, in the only work she has yet produced on the subject. Another, who would be called great in the Cum- berland Church, and who is hailed as one of the brightest stars in the constellation of her talent, occupies, if possible, more dangerous ground. For condemning his opinions I have been charged with '•'■ slandering the brethren ;" the author of the charge darkly insinuating that it was some- thing too black to come to the light. Some time ago we were gravely told by him, in an article in the '' Cumberland Presbyterian,'^ that there is a great amount of ^^ stuff sung at the present day by " the orthodox,'^ and he cites as an example the familiar couplet : '* God in the person of his Son, Hath all his mightiest works outdone." This is the same man who, a short time since, found a fossil shell upon the top of the Alleghe- CUMBERLAND CHURCH. 53 nies, and in his sophomoric rhapsodies on the wonders of geology tells us, that the greatest work of the Almighty is that of creation. He calls it ^' a poem/' whose closing strains shall never be sung. The atonement, together with the redemption of man, is but an " episode' ' of that poem; and when this shall have been fin- ished — when the purposes of God upon earth shall have been accomplished, the great and the all-absorbing theme of heaven shall be the new and the mighty works of creation he shall bring to light. What then, I ask, shall become of the monuments of Calvary, that have been erected upon every plain and every field of the celestial world ? What of " the song of Moses, the servant of God and the Lamb ?" Shall its sweet and sublime strains, which now, "as the sound of many waters,'^ burst upon the ravished ear of heaven be forgotten ? Shall a new choir be ush- ered in to sing of a greater and more glorious work than that of redemption? No. Not a thought, not a note in the rounds of eternal ages but shall speak of Calvary and of Christ crucified. This shall be the song, this the theme, this the poem, of the redeemed of God. . Away, then, with such "expedients,'' "apologies," "provisions,'' and "episodes;" and let not those who would 5* 54 GOAL TO WHICH TENDING. minister at the altar, touch the ark of God with such unhallowed hands. And permit me here to add, that if the Cumberland Church are to follow such leaders, they will sooner or later find them- selves in a region of darkness and of night, where there is neither road nor course ; and where the deluded traveller, for entering upon such for- bidden territory, must give himself a prey to the monsters of the deep, or be prepared to navigate, as did a famous personage of Milton, who, in passing the limits of chaos and night, "O'er bog, or steep, through strait, rough, dense, or rare, With head, hands, -wings, or feet, pursues his way ; And swims, or sinks, or wades, or creeps, or flies." This is the end to which many of the theolo- gical finger-boards of the present day point the anxious inquirer after truth; this is the land, to which such principles, and definitions, and ideas, as are now being stereotyped in the Cum- berland Church, will ultimately lead. Pardon me in such allusions. I do not sound an alarm to bring odium upon a church that contains many with whom my heart still lingers. Far be it. I simply wish to call your attention to the develop- ment that is being made in the history of its doc- trines ; a development from which I have learned an important and useful lesson. Your affectionate son. LETTER Y. APPLICATION OF THE REMEDY — ^A PAINFUL CON- FLICT — A WRONG COURSE — UNIVERSAL RE- DEMPTION — UNIVERSi^L GRACE — A GLOOMY PROSPECT. Dear Father : — The points examined, and con- cerning which my mind had become permanently settled, were these : The doctrine of human de- pravity — the complete ruin of man — the justice of his condemnation — the legal or covenant relation of Adam and his posterity — the necessity of an atonement — and its vicarious nature. These doc- trines are dependent upon each other, and in their proper and scriptural sense belong exclusively to the Calvinistic system. The Arminian, it is true, often makes use of the same phraseology as the Calvinist, but his meaning, if he has any clear understanding at all of his subject, is widely dif- ferent. Because two places have the same name, it is no evidence that they lie in the same direc- tion, or have the same locality. Two men, for example, may hail from Boston, and yet when at home be a thousand miles asunder — the one in (55) 56 APPLICATIOX OF THE REMEDY. Boston, Massachusetts, and the other in some obscure village of Eastern emigrants upon the extreme frontier. The Arminian attempts to connect with his system the doctrine of a vica- rious atonement, because the phrase is a popular one, and he cannot well do without it ; but when we come to examine its meaning we find that he has no claim to it whatever. He may hold on to the name, but nothing more. The substance is as different from the view which forms a part of his creed, as a city on the Atlantic coast differs from a small village in the backwoods. It is a doctrine intimately associated with that of impu- tation ; indeed cannot be maintained without it. It is a point hard by that which I have represented as the only pass through the mountains of diffi- culties, that gather around the student of theology in the outset of his investigations, and that in- crease upon his pathway, winding among their frozen summits, unless guided by the light of heaven he is enabled to find his way through. But I must hasten on. Having determined the disease, and the nature of the remedy, the next question of importance relates to the application of the remedy. There are two questions that cover the whole ground. Xst. Upon what conditions are we made partakers APPLICATION OF THE REMEDY. 57 of the purchased blessings of the gospel ? 2d. How are we enabled to comply with those condi- tions ? With regard to the first of these there is but little controversy between Calvinists and Ar- minians, though there is here also a wide differ- ence in the meaning attached to terms and phrases employed by each. It would lead me entirely beyond my limits to enter upon a discussion of these differences at present. With regard to the second of these questions there has been much heated controversy. Over this one subject the dismembered body of Christ has wrangled and warred more than over any other that has divided the church ; and it is yet far from being settled. Each generation gives birth to the same exploded errors and arguments of the past, and the combat is renewed with the same degree of ardour as before. The question is one of vital interest, and demands of all a most careful and impartial inves- tigation. There is no subject in the whole range of theology that has left such an impress upon my mind as this. It has been, until of late, a source of continued anxiety and constant meditation, and has led to many painful sacrifices of friendly feeling. About the time I left home for the Theological Seminary, a friend placed in my hands a little 58 A PAINFUL CONFLICT. work on ^' The Divine Purpose." I read it witli interest and profit. It made a strong impression upon my mind, removed many of the difl&culties from a doctrine I had so often heard condemned, and led to further reading and reflection. I felt anxious to investigate thoroughly the system of which it formed a part, and compare it with others, and cast my lot where truth was to be found. I went to Princeton from the Assembly, in which their own Confession of Faith had been pronounced " a ragged affair,'' with the conviction on my mind that I would have to abandon the idea of labouring in the same field with those whom I loved. I asked, you remember, for a letter of dismission from the church to which I belonged, with the view of shaping my course according to my convictions of truth and duty. The effect produced on my mind by your reply to this I will not attempt to describe. The very memory of it gives pain. Never shall I forget your appeal to my heart, warm with parental affection, when, pointing to ^' the ringlets of age,'' you asked me, with a father's tenderness, to pause before taking such a step. I read your letter with painful feel- ings. I was grieved for having thus given pain to one whom I loved. I found relief, however, in the consciousness of being actuated by the purest A PAINFUL CONFLICT. 59 motives. Such an appeal at that time, doubtless, had a secret and powerful influence in deter- mining my future course. I tried, however, in all my investigations, to remember that I was responsible, in such matters, only to the Searcher of hearts. The words of the Saviour were before me : ^' If any man come to me, and hate not father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple." I continued my studies, with the determination to follow as my convictions of truth and duty might dictate. I paused as you had requested. There stood before me the doc- trines of original sin, a vicarious atonement, a general atonement, and the doctrine of election. One or the other must be discarded. Of the first two I felt fully convinced ; nothing, if I knew my own heart, could have shaken my faith in them. If they are taken away, the gospel is stripped of all its power ; of its power to convince of sin and guilt, on the one hand, and to bring peace and joy to the troubled conscience, on the other. The idea of a general atonement, with its blessings alike provided for all, had taken a strong hold upon my mind, and was one that I had been taught to cherish as the only warrant for preach- ing the gospel " to every creature." Such a view 60 A WRONG COURSE. of the extent of the atonement, however, could not be reconciled with the doctrine of election, without destroying its vicarious nature. I was again in trouble. It was an important crisis, a painful conflict, in which the tenderest feelings of my heart were called into exercise. One thought de- cided the case. I felt that I could discard, with more safety and comfort to myself, the doctrine of election, than that of a general atonement ; that I could . explain away the difficulties connected with the denial of the former more easily, than those that might follow upon the denial of the latter. I therefore discarded the doctrine of elec- tion, and with it there went by the board also " the decrees of God,'^ ^^ effectual calling,'^ and other distinctive doctrines of the Calvinistic sys- tem. I was glad thus to have before me still the hope of finding tJie middle way^ and of gratifying a parent's wishes without doing violence to my own conscience. Having, as before related, satisfied my mind with regard to the doctrine of imputation, I had hailed with delight the doctrine of a vicarious atonement as its necessary consequence — a doctrine which had previously found its way to my heart. At this point, however, I drove my last stake in the beaten road of Calvinism. I did not stop A GLOOMY PROSPECT. 61 long enougli to examine tlie doctrine of imputa- tion and the nature of the atonement, in all their relations and consequences. A little more reflec- tion here would have saved me from many diffi- culties and trials; but the fabled mountains, deserts, giants, goblins, and ghosts of the ulterior regions of Calvinism drove me away. I re- solved, therefore, at this point, in completing my system of theological truth, to leave the Calvin- istic path, and strike out for a popular point in the Arminian system, for which I had already formed a strong partiality. To continue the figure — my object was to open out a safe and continuous route from the less objectionable points of Calvin- ism, leading on through the great city of universal redemption. I knew it, however, to be a place of much resort, and one through which almost every road of error in Christendom, from Puseyism and Popery to Mormonism, is made to pass. But I was encouraged by the hope that from such a depot of systems and philosophy, one path, at least, could be found that would be safe and attractive. I bore off with the most sanguine ex- pectations. Little did I dream of what was to be encountered. A wilderness was before me — deserts and swamps of every description, unexplored and untrodden by the foot of man ; for who yet had 6 62 A GLOOMY PROSPECT. attempted and succeeded in connecting together the doctrine of imputation, a vicarious atonement, and that of universal redemption ? It was the only possible chance, however, for the middle way. After many days and nights of peril and anx- iety, I completed a hasty examination of the proposed route. I found, it is true, many difficul- ties to be encountered, but hoped to be able to remove them all. I conceived the wild project of clearing out the forests — levelling the moun- tains — filling up the valleys — -draining the swamps, and of becoming a second Saint Patrick, to go forth and destroy the many tribes of croaking rep- tiles by which they were infested. I was urged on, too, by the pleasing thought that he, whom providence might raise up to accomplish such a work, would not only be hailed as the greatest benefactor of his race, but at the same time would acquire a fame as imperishable as that of the man who is yet to invent a perpetual motion, find the quadrature of the circle, or discover the north- west passage to the Pacific. Inspired by such hopes, I began to feel that I was out of danger ; but, alas, was destined to meet with difficulties and disappointments at every step, until I got back into the beaten path I had left. There A GLOOMY PROSPECT. 63 was mucli yet to be learned — much in Arminian and Cumberland pbilosopliy, of wbicb I bad never dreamed. Holding to tbe doctrine of a vicarious atone- ment, general in its provisions, and denying tbe doctrine of election, I was led into tbe very heart of tbe Arminian system ; and was there compelled to adopt the doctrines of human ability, and of sufficient or universal grace, in answer to the question proposed as to tbe manner in which we are enabled to comply with tbe conditions of sal- vation required in the gospel. These doctrines, however, I found, after matui*e investigation, to be unscriptural in their character, absurd in their philosophy, dangerous in their tendency, and oftentimes destructive of the strength and vitality of religion. At first view, to a mind of limited research, they may appear exceedingly plausible, but when stripped of their appendages, and nar- rowed down to the germinating principle from which the whole system may be developed, they bear upon their face their own refutation. A simple statement of these principles is all that is necessary to a proper understanding of the subject. Two will suffice : one of which is, that a soul spiritually dead, under the ordinary operations of the Spirit of God, may exercise the 64 A GLOOMY PROSPECT. most important functions of life ; the otBer, that a certain amount of grace is given to every man at his birth, or when he arrives at the age of dis- cretion, upon the proper improvement of which his salvation is made to depend. These two prin- ciples constitute the ground-work and main pillars of the whole Arminian scheme, and are such as demand the serious attention and careful investi- gation of every lover of truth and order. View- ing them in this light, permit me here to solicit your attention to an examination of their merits as the importance of the subject may seem to demand. The practical workings of these principles, together with some of the exhibitions of party zeal, so often made by their ignorant and blinded votaries, demand at least a passing notice. This I shall reserve for my next communication. Your affectionate son. LETTEH VI. OPPOSITION TO CALVINISM — THE BIG MEETING ARMINIAN LOGIC AND ZEAL. Dear Father : — When I see a man trying to distort tlie proper meaning of words, and present- ing a garbled statement of the views of an oppo- nent, I take it as conclusive evidence that he has a bad cause ; more especially when he is con- stantly at it, and manifests in all that he does a feeling of uneasiness and hostility towards those who oppose him. During my brief sojourn in the Cumberland church I was called upon to witness many such exhibitions that, in the outset of my ministerial labours, made anything but a favorable impression on my mind. I found there, in com- mon with all others who hold to Arminian senti- ments, the most uncompromising and malignant opposition to the doctrines of the Presbyterian Church, while there was not a man that I met in all my intercourse, that could state fairly and fully what those doctrines are. Their views were entirely one-sided — the tiTith was garbled to suit their own convenience, and the creations of their 6 * (66) 66 OPPOSITION TO CALVINISM. own fruitful fancy were constantly being presented before the minds of the people, thereby deepening their prejudices, and drawing still closer the dark folds of their mantle of ignorance and bigotry. I found many things neither to edification nor profit; but, on the contrary, in their immediate and final consequences, highly injurious to the cause of religion and morality. I allude to the disgraceful scenes so often witnessed in Arminian churches, which some are pleased to call revivals of religion — where the sympathies and passions are worked upon by every possible means, and a com- bined and concerted effort put forth to make peo- ple religious by the instrumentality of mourners' benches, anxious seats, shouting committees, rant- ing exhortations, and such like — where noise and devotion are considered as synonymous, and the effect of the whole scene dependent upon the con- fusion that results from the extraordinary means employed. Am I wrong in tracing the origin of such exhibitions of enthusiasm to the Arminian doctrine of grace and ability ? If God has already done all that he will do or can do for the salva- tion of the sinner, then the use of such means, under certain circumstances, follows as a necessary consequence. Do not consider me as condemning revivals of religion when properly conducted. By THE BIG MEETING. 67 no means. They are the very life and soul of the church — essential to her growth and prosperity, if not to her very existence. I do condemn, however, in the most unqualified terms, every counterfeit of a revival, where passion and not reason is addressed, where sectarian bigotry pre- sides, and persons of every age and class are led to make '^ a profession of religion,'^ who can give no rational account of the gospel plan of salvation, or of the hope that is in them. In order that I may not be misunderstood, and that I may accomplish my object with as much brevity as possible, permit me here to present a characteristic scene, illustrative of Arminian logic and zeal, in which the advocates of such a system so often congratulate themselves. Scenes similar to this are of no unfrequent occurrence among those whose main standpoint is this doctrine of universal and sufficient grace — and, I am sorry to say, have sometimes been witnessed in the opera- tions of the Cumberland church. Its counterpart will be found in the early history of the church in western PennsyTvania, as well as other parts of the country ; the unpleasant and bitter fruits of which are now every day realized. I will locate the scene to which I allude in the town of , at what is called a " big meeting.'' QV THE BIG MEETING. It was at a time when religion was at a low ebb. The church was asleep. Many seasons of communion had passed without any tokens of the divine presence. Her broken ranks were becoming identified with the world, and their last end be- coming worse than the first. Something must be done. A meeting must be appointed, not to ob- tain the di\dne presence and power, but simply to stir the inborn energies of the soul to the im- provement of grace already possessed. The day was fixed — the meeting commenced — but its progress seemed to indicate a complete fail- ure. Nothing was efiected. Sermons had been preached, the people had been exhorted, yet they were still cold and lifeless. Something more must be done; every means must be employed to get up some kind of an excitement ; it will never do to let a Big Meeting close without a fuss of some kind ; there must be a little fox-fire kindled rather than have no fire ', the dry bones must be rattled a little, even if there should be no prospect of giving them flesh and sinews. The machinery was accordingly put in motion. 'Divers kinds of meetings were appointed, as time and circum- stances would permit — prayer-meetings for old men, young men, and women ; love-feasts, confer- ence-meetings, general class-meetings, particular THE BIG MEETIxa. G9 class-meetings, and every thing else that could be thought of. Preachers far and near were solicited to attend, and every arrangement was made by which to operate upon the prejudices and passions of the multitude. Those selected to officiate on the occasion were well adapted to their work, among the most promi- nent of whom were two very noted and distin- guished characters — a certain Professor Aristotle and Timothy Boisterous, whose sayings and doings demand our notice. A timely announcement of their ai-rival was made, and the community fully advertised as to what might be expected from such an array of talent. The town hall was brilliantly lighted for the occasion — the bells were rung — the hour ar- rived — the people assembled — and all eyes were turned towards the noted and distinguished char- acters on the stand. After the usual preliminaries, the Rev. Pro- fessor, with his colleague in the rear, arose and with solemn emphasis announced his text — " Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots ? then may ye also do good that are accus- tomed to do evil.'' Jer. xiii. 23. I can only give Bome of the leading thoughts of the discourse. The passsge of divine truth before us, said he, is 70 ARMINIAN LOGIC AND ZEAL. generally regarded as one of the strongholds of Calvinism ; the doctrines of which, I am bold and free to assert, and able to maintain, have done the world more injury than any other heresy or sys- tem of error. Atheism, Infidelity, and Popery itself may hang their heads when it appears. Grim, dark, and forbidding, it is more to be de- tested than the wildest dream of Beelzebub, or any other of the tenants of the pit. It has ground the poor — exalted the rich — licked the blood of martyrs — and steeped the souls of men in bigotry, ignorance and vice. I therefore, said he, invite and solicit your serious attention ; and when I have finished my argument, if there is any one here who will have the assurance to quote the passage before us, to bolster up the decayed, rotten, crumbling system of Geneva, I will venture to say that he will quote Scripture to prove the devil an angel of light. So much for the exordium. Then followed a summary account of the creation, the fall of man, the antediluvian, the patriarchal, the Mosaic, and prophetic periods of the world's history; and, lastly, the gospel dispensation, in which a suffix ciency of grace is poured upon all flesh — so that the Jew and the Greek, the bond and the free, the Christian and the Pagan, all have the neces- ARMINIAN LOGIC AND ZEAL. 71 sary light and ability to enable them to become as perfect as the angels in heaven, if they would only improve the means placed within their reach. This is the doctrine to which we hold, said he : free grace and fair chance to alL But to the proof, the points of which were as follows : 1. The Ethiopian is far more sagacious and tractable than the leopard; for the Scriptures expressly say that "Ethiopia shall stretch forth her hands;" whereas, no promise is made to the latter, except that he shall lie down with the kid, " and a young child shall lead them/' There is a self-determin- ation and ability exercised, under the influence of motives and means implied, in the one case that are not found in the other. 2. The language of the text plainly implies, that it is as easy for the Ethiopian to change his skin as it is for the leop- ard to change his spots ; and of course a far easier task to induce him to do it, if he could only be convinced of the fact, and the proper motives pre- sented to the mind. 3. It is as easy for the leop- ard, unless caged or confined, to change his spots as it is to perform any other act. There can be no greater mistake, said he, than is often found in the interpretation of a single word in the passage before us. The prophet is not here speaking of the inability of the leopard to shake off the beau- 72 ARMINIAN LOGIC AND ZEAL. tiful and spotted covering that nature intended it should wear — this is a dogma of Calvinism — but simply of its power to go from one place to another, as prompted by its instincts, its desires, its hopes, and fears. Precisely in the same way, said he, may the Ethiopian change his skin, by changing his relation to the outward circumstances and causes by which his dark, and swarthy appearance has been produced. Let him change his spots — let him migrate from the hot, burning, sandy deserts of Africa, to the frozen and snowy regions of the north. Let him gaze upon the perpetual snows of the frigid zone, as he has upon the scorched plains of the torrid, and in the course of time he will become as white and as bleached as the polar bear. The argument, then, is briefly this : as surely as the leopard has the power of locomotion, and can change his spots, so may the Ethiopian change his skin, and ye also do good, who are accustomed to do evil. Where, then, I ask, said he, in conclusion, are the absurdities and dogmas of Calvinism ? of election and divine effi- ciency ? — dead — thrice dead. And in view of such exhibitions of the truth of God, who will stand up for their defence ? — who will avow his belief in such absurdities ? — who, I ask, in this enlightened and progressive age will attempt to ARMINIAN LOGIC AND ZEAL. 73 uphold such a soul-destroying and Grod-dishonour- ing system ? Echo answers — who ? Thus closed the discourse of the ^^earned" professor, when his colleague addressed the audi- ence, byway of exhortation, in his usual vociferous and vehement style. He surpassed himself, and succeeded in raising the feelings of the numerous assembly to the highest point of excitement. The scene that followed beggars all description. The strongest hyperbole falls below the reality. While the preacher exhorted, the women shouted, and every thing that could make a noise sounded its highest and loudest note. Fiddles and fifes, ket- tles and drums, conch-shells and triangles, horse- fiddles and bag-pipes, and every other imaginable combination of sounds could not have produced a wilder discord. This, however, was a necessary part of the machinery, without which nothing could be effected. Accordingly, every appeal was now made to the passions and sympathies of the excited assembly. Nothing was too boisterous, and nothing too extravagant. The world was coming to an end — the judgment was just at hand — the stars were already loose in their sock- ets — and the moon was going crazy. The heav- ens are already black with the tempest, said Timothy. The old ship of Zion will soon be off 7 74 ARMINIAN LOGIC AND ZEAL. — the last chance is offered — steam high — and already loosed from her anchorage I €ome one, come all — change your spots and thereby change your skins and your hearts — old men and matrons, young men and maidens, with bonnets and boots, trimmings and trappings, luggage and baggage — higgelty piggelty — roll in and let us roll off, ere the elements are melted, and the bending heavens empty themselves of impending wrath. Amid such scenes of confusion the wearied and exhausted assembly tarried till the night was far spent. Had the priests of Baal been there, they might have found an atmosphere somewhat con- genial to their own feelings. Had the old prophet been there, who mocked their devotions, he might have said to them as he did to the idolatrous wor- shippers : "Cry aloud, for he is a god ; either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is on a jour- ney, or peradventure he sleepeth and must be awakened." But I forbear continuing this train of thought further. My object is not ridicule — far from it. Lest you should think me chargeable with such an attempt I will drop the figure, and in my next communication will endeavour to present this doc- trine of human ahility and universal grace in a more tangible form. You have here simply a ABMINIAN LOGIC AND ZEAL. 75 picture of the impressions made upon my mind with regard to the logic and untempered zeal of those who make it their main rallying point — im- pressions which I would gladly suppress, but they form an important link in the chain of causes that have led me to my present position. Your affectionate son. LETTER YII. SOURCE AND EVILS OF UNDUE EXCITEMENT — HUMAN ABILITY — SUFFICIENT GRACE — SAME AS ROMISH DOCTRINE — DIFFICULTIES AND AB- SURDITIES INVOLVED. Dear Father : — The extravagances to which I have referred, I am confident you will condemn, as much as I do, as being often both injurious and disgraceful to religion. But in condemning them we indirectly condemn the doctrine under consider- ation. Let a man be convinced that all men, under all circumstances and conditions of life, have the necessary light and ability in order to salvation, and what else has he to do, if he is a minister of the gospel, but to get up some kind of religious excitement, that by some spasmodic effort the will may be brought into exercise, something like getting in motion a wagon that has been stalled in the mud ? The way is clear, the horses have strength enough to pull it out, if they would only exert it. To accomplish this, all the driver has to do is to lay on the whip. Thousands under the influence of such heated excitements as are here alluded to, may be led to (76) EVILS OF UNDUE EXCITEMENT. 77 siiout their unmeaning hallelujahs, and run well for a time, but, destitute of any clear views of the plan of salvation, and having no principle of vi- tality, their last end, in most instances, will be found worse than the first. In the Methodist Church such cases are more easily disposed of. They may be placed upon the list of those who have fallen from grace. But in the Cumberland Church, whose book of discipline has been taken from one intended for a different order of things, they will oftentimes be found, as the extra pots of manna in the Jewish camp, to breed worms and disease. I am not drawing upon my imagin- ation. I speak what I have seen and felt during my ministry in the Cumberland Church. • I might cite numerous instances that have come under my own observation, illustrative of the evil here al- luded to, but I forbear pressing the point further. I promised to present this doctrine of human ability and sufficient grace in a more tangible form. For the sake of convenience, I will con- sider both together, as they are necessarily con- nected in the Arminian scheme. I wish, in the first place, to call your attention to an important fact, that is not sufficiently no- ticed, with regard to this cardinal feature of the Arminian system. It is a fa\ oui'ite doctrine of the 7* 78 ROMISH DOCTRINE. Romish Church, and constitutes an essential element in " the mystery of iniquities/' The decrees of the Council of Trent, on this subject, express the same views and feelings as are mani- fested by the great body of Arminians, of every grade throughout the country. ^^ Whoever shall affirm/' say they, '' that when man's free will is moved and wrought upon by God, it does in no respect co-operate and consent to divine influence and calling, so as to dispose and prepare him to obtain the grace of justification; or that he cannot refuse if he would, but is like a lifeless thing, altogether inert, and merely passive — let him be accursed." There is the same harmless shaft here blindly thrown at the shield of truth, from the hand of the '^mother of harlots," as now oftentimes comes in darkening showers from the Arminian ranks. This is no bugbear of the imagination. ^' The Jesuits maintain," says Pas- cal in his Provincial Letters, who himself was a devoted Romanist, " that there is a grace given generally to all men, subject in such a way to free will, that the will renders it efficacious or ineffica- cious at its pleasure, without any additional aid from God, and without needing anything on his part in order to act effectively — and hence they term this grace sufficient, because it suffices of ABSURDITIES INVOLVED. 79 itself for action." This, I am sorry to say, is precisely the position occupied by the Cumberland Church, in common with the great body of the Arminians. It would be an instructive lesson here to trace the many iniquities into which it has led its blinded votaries, as guided by popes, car- dinals and priests ; but such a discussion would be foreign to my purpose. It is not my object to aim at presenting any new phase of the subject, but simply such views as he that runs may read and understand, and have operated upon my own mind in leading me from such a dark and dangerous position. I found, it is true, many passages of Scripture, when isolated from their proper connection and meaning, that seemed to favour this doctrine ; but, if followed out by the light of other portions of the word of God, no end can be found to the diffi- culties and absurdities into which it will lead us. Some of these I will now briefly notice. It deprives the church, in the first place, of every motive to energy and action, in the great work before her — a work commensurate with the world's immortal interests. I will not draw out a lengthy argument to prove this fact; it is a plain case, and may be stated in a few words. The united voice of the Methodist and Cumberland 80 ABSTIRDITIES INVOLVED. Churches will tell us that Christ suffered and died in the same sense for every man ; and in view of the purchase of his death God is in justice bound to deal out to every man a sufi&ciency of grace, to enable him to comply with the t^rms of life as offered in the gospel ; and if these terms are not offered to some by a living ministry, it must be done by inspiration, or some other way provided for their salvation, than that of " repent- ance towards God, and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ." I am not speaking at random. '^ Since there is a future life," says Knapp, a popular author in the Lutheran Church, " we may trust that God will there lead the heathen to that higher degree of happiness and clearness of know- ledge which they did not attain in this life ; be- cause, without fault of their own, they were incapable of receiving it. To such a dispensation in the future world, there is at least an allusion in Rev. xxii. 2, — in the tree of life by the river of life, whose leaves are for the healing of the nations." Knapp's Theo. sec. 121. "God," says Adam Clarke in his commentary on the second chapter of Romans, "has never confined himself to any 07ie particular icai/ of communi- cating his salvation, any more than he has confined his saving grace to one people ;" — " as he is no ABSURDITIES INVOLVED. 81 respecter of persons, all nations are equally dear to him ; and he has granted, and will grant to them such discoveries of himself as have been, and will be, sufficient for their salvation/' "Where then, I ask, is the necessity of an organized Church, or the means of grace ? What advantage had the Jew, and what have we, from the fact that to us are committed the oracles of God ? The millions of Asia, and of Africa, although in the region of darkness and the shadow of death ; although in a land full of the habitations of cruelty, superstition and idolatry, are, accord- ing to this system, upon the same platform of mercy with ourselves, have the same amount of grace, the same chance, and may have the same hope of heaven that we enjoy. And to what pur- pose, I ask, have you been laboui'ing so long with the poor savages upon our frontier, if prior to your labours they had a sufficiency of grace, of light, and ability in order to salvation ? Such a doctrine is infinitely more calculated to destroy the energies of the Church than any in the Calvinistic system can be. I might here appeal to facts in the his- tory of the Church, as well as to standard authority, in proof of such a position ; but I pass to another difficulty that stood in my way. This doctrine of Arminian grace involves many 82 ABSURDITIES INVOLVED. principles, not only unphilosophical, but ruinous to the cause of morals and religion, if carried to their legitimate consequences. I shall not here enter upon the vexed question concerning the nature and condition of human volitions and the freedom of the will; it is wholly unnecessary; one or two thoughts of a more practical nature will suffice. The advocates of this doctrine, for instance, take for granted a commonly received maxim, which, if carried fully into practical life,- would undermine the most important institutions of society — a maxim upon which the Pelagian, the Socinian, the Arminian, the Papist, the Jesuit, and the libertine, alike build their creed and their hopes. " Responsibility," say they, " can only be commensurate with ability." Take this away, and all that is left of the system of each is in ruins. In order to test the danger and absurdity of such a position, apply the principle, for a moment, to the ordinary regulations of society. Let a pro- clamation be issued by the authorities of govern- ment, declaring that all persons disabled with regard to the performance of any duty required of them, shall no longer be amenable to law. Look at the consequences. The drunkard and the sot, whatever may be the crimes they commit while in a state of intoxication, must go free ; not a hair ABSURDITIES INVOLVED. 83 of their heads can he touched, though for every bottle of rum they take the life of a fellow-being. Every man, too, in a state of heated passion, may plead the same excuse, whatever may be the crime he commits. The debauchee, whose debasing and brutal habits have destroyed every refined feeling and sensibility of the soul, may wallow in sensu- ality and vice, till his body becomes as loathsome as the putrid carcass, that would even nauseate the fowl and the worm that feed upon it, and yet we are to look upon him with the same degree of complacency that marks our intercourse with the virtuous. And, if the maxim be true, the blas- phemies of hell are as innocent as the songs of paradise; for there is no ability there to love Gk)d. If responsibility and guilt are to be mea- sured by the ability of the creature at the time the offence is committed, then will Satan and his legions be for ever justified in their eternal and fiendish hatred of infinite purity and benevolence. The principle I am contending for is simply this : The morality of an act is determined hy the state of mind under which it is committed. Responsibility, therefore, in this case, must be referred to some other standard. The sinner cannot free himself from the charge of guilt upon the plea of his inability. God will not deprive 84 ABSURDITIES INVOLVED. any of his intelligent creatures of their ability to spiritual good, to virtue and holiness, without good, wise, and just reasons. When that ability is lost, I care not by what means or instrumen- talities it departs, they are held responsible for all that flows from their corrupt nature. It is an important principle, and should never be lost sight of, founded in reason and Scripture, and furnishes the only safeguard to the institutions of society. An opponent here steps up, and tells me that he is willing to grant all this, but he contends that it is a mffLciency of grace that makes men re- sponsible after all. I ask, is it grace that makes devils responsible, and fills all hell with blasphe- mies ? Is it grace that has brought sin and mis- ery into our world ? Is it grace that has peopled the regions of despair with millions of immortal beings from earth ? There is no escape from an affirmative answer to such questions, if it is grace only that makes men responsible ; for without it, if this be correct, no charge could be brought against them. I am here told that a distinction must be made; that devils once enjoyed a proba- tionary state in the immediate presence of God himself; but having rebelled, they were con- demned and con>signed to the burning lake; CUMBERLAND CHURCH. 85 whereas, we come into the workl with depraved natures, in producing which we have had no agency. In reply, I answer in the language of the Westminster and Cumberland Confession of Faith, that we stood probation in Adam, as our federal head, and ^^ sinned in him., and fell with him in his first transgression ;" or rather, in the more expressive language of the apostle Paul, " by one man's disobedience many were made sinners/' I would here call your attention again, in pass- ing, to the necessity that is pressing upon the Cumberland Church, and driving her from every Calvinistic position in her creed into the broad and beaten road of Arminianism. Already the whole body of the Church, as I have before stated, have departed from this important and funda- m-ental truth of the gospel, the doctrine of impu- tation, so plainly laid down in her Confession of Faith, and by the apostle Paul in his epistle to the Romans. And now, there is scarcely a land- mark that they can call their own, except a few outposts, that are being erected by individual effort, far off in the regions of Pelagian night. I will resume this subject again in my next. Your affectionate son. 8 LETTER VIII. SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED— CHRISTIAN DEPRIVED OF ALL ENCOURAGEMENT TO PRAYER — ^AND GOD OF HIS GLORY, AUTHORITY AND POWER — GOD HUMBLED AND ABASED, AND THE SINNER EX- ALTED. Dear Father: — The principles that lie at the foundation of the Arminian doctrine of ability and grace, are not only calculated to destroy the ener- gies of the Church, and unhinge the institutions of society, as I have endeavoured to show, but they go still farther ; they enter the Christian's closet, and destroy the life and soul of his private devotions. They are calculated to dry up every fountain, and destroy every spring of religious feeling and action. This you cannot fail to see by looking at the subject for a moment in a prac- tical way — directing your thoughts to one in whose present and everlasting well-being you can but feel the deepest interest. You have a son, my only and dear brother, who makes no pretensions to piety, and whose mind (86) DEPRIVED OF ENCOURAGEMENT, &C. 87 is absorbed in worldly pursuits and pleasures. Every morning and every evening a parent's heart is burdened with petitions at a throne of grace for converting power that he may be made wise unto salvation. What encouragement thus to pray, can be drawn from a scheme of which this doctrine of universal and sufficient grace forms an important part ? None. Not a ray of hope lightens up and cheers the Christian's closet when wrestling with God for the unconverted. If Arminians are right, if the Cumberland Church is right, heaven has already guarantied to every man a certain amount of grace, and all the prayers of men, of saints, and angels, although clad in sackcloth, and prostrated before the eternal throne in the most humble sup- plication, could not prevail upon God to add any- thing to that grace already bestowed, until it is properly improved. And when the sinner im- proves that grace, as required of him, the attri- butes of God, yea, the throne of God is pledged for the bestowal of more ; and if the new supply is improved, still more is granted ; and so on till he is brought into the kingdom. If this be true, then, we say, all our petitions, although they may rise from burdened, aching and bursting hearts, can avail nothing for the salvation of the uncon- verted. How chilling the thought to the pious 88 DEPRIVES GOD OF HIS GLORY. soul ! What encouragement have we as ambassa- dors of Christ, to give ourselves to prayer as well as to the ministry of the word ? What encour- agement can the devoted missionary of the cross draw from the fact that he is followed by the prayers of the church, and his cause statedly re- membered before a throne of grace ? If salvation is conditioned upon the will of the creature, in- stead of the will of God, there can be none. I have before shown that this doctrine deprives the Church of all motive to intelligent labour; what then is left for her to do, if her prayers can avail nothing at a throne of grace for the uncon- verted ? She can only fold her arms in sleep, and wait for the day of the creature's power and will. Now and then, it is true, she may shake off her slumbers, and put forth a spasmodic effort in her fitful operations, not to enlighten nor to convince — for such influences are already guarantied — ^but simply to get up some kind of religious excitement to save the craft, and bring the will to its " self- determining" point. This is all that can be aimed at upon such a system ; and when accomplished, what security have you that your work will stand for a single hour ? But we will go further still. Not only do the principles contained in the doctrine of Arminiaa OF HIS AUTHORITY AND POWER. 89 grace affect the Christian in his relations to the Church, to society, and to his God, as shown above, but they lead us into the very presence of Grod, and mar the most essential attributes of the divine character; yea, more, if carried out to their legitimate and utmost limit, they would even destroy every vestige of the glory, the authority, and power, of the divine Being, i It is common for Cumberland Presbyterians and others to illustrate this doctrine by what is called '^ an equilibrium of forces.^^ The world, the flesh, and the devil, are represented as pulling the sin- ner in one direction, and the Spirit of God in an- other, till the two opposing forces are equally balanced. It is then left " to the self-determining power of the will" to give efficiency to the one or the other, as it may see proper to decide. The same idea is sometimes presented under the figure of a balance — the pivot upon which it is sus- pended, representing the will. The devil is represented as hanging all his weights upon one arm of the scales, and the Spirit of God as suspending a counteracting influence upon the other, till an equilihrium is produced. It is then left ^0 the self-moving power of the pivot to give the predominating influence. To say nothing of the philosophy contained in such illustrations, 90 GOD ROBBED OF HIS AUTHORITY, &C. may I not with far more propriety bring the charge that is so often urged by Cumberland Presbyterians and others against the Calvinistic system — the charge of mockery and insincerity upon the part of God in his dealings with the sinner — mockery, not only of the sinner himself, but of him who died for his redemption ? I say it with emphasis, yet with reverence and respect. Can it be that the Son of God was bathed in the sweat of his own blood, and hung and died upon the rugged spikes of the cross beneath the hidings of his Father's face, and yet all that is done for those for whom he thus died, is to deal out to them simply an influence equal in amount to that which is dragging them to the pit ? Can it be that the thousands that daily crowd the gates of hell might have been saved, if only one more ray of light had broke in upon their darkness — if the feeblest breath of heaven, the smallest particle of down from an angel's wing had only been thrown into the scales — if the least possible influence had only been added to that already exerted upon them, and yet that influence withheld ? Is this the operation of infinite power as guided by infinite love ? And can it be that the heart that beat in the bosom of God, and bled upon the cross for human woes, is " satisfied" with such a display? god's power lighted. 91 Is it reasonable to suppose that infinite love, and wisdom, and power could withhold so small a pittance of grace necessary to complete the work of the soul's redemption, that has already cost such an outlay of blood and treasure ? If such questions can be answered in the affirmative — as they must if this doctrine of Arminian grace be true — then, I ask, where are the feelings in the divine bosom, corresponding to those revealed in his word ? When pressed upon this point, both Methodists and Cumberland Presbyterians tell us that God does all he can to save the sinner — that his power is limited by the free agency of the creature — that all the means that heaven could devise are ex- hausted. They go even farther than this. They tell us with a most unblushing confidence, that it is impossible for God to prevent sin in a moral government — that after the creation of man, om- nipotence itself could not prevent him from falling. I will not attempt here to follow this view of the power and moral government of God to its legiti- mate consequences — its difficulties, absurdities and blasphemies. Their name is legion, which no man can number and no man can bind. It involves the insecurity of heaven and earth, the wretch- edness of God, and the everlasting misery of 92 PRIDE CHERISHED. millions of his creatures whose salvation is beyond his reach. Once more : another tendency and necessary result of the doctrine under consideration, is to cultivate in the human heart a feeling, the de- struction of which is the great aim of the gospel, and essential to the happiness of man. It is that of pride — the strongest elementary principle of our carnal nature at work in the human heart. In its incipient stages, it has destroyed the image of God as stamped upon the soul in a state of innocency ; it has brought ruin, misery and death upon our race ; it has done more to destroy the temporal peace and happiness of man, than any other feel- ing of his nature ; it has presented more obstacles to the plans and purposes of God upon earth, than any other; and remains unmoved amid all his judgments and threatenings as revealed in his providence and word. A salvation from sin, then,, must put down this feeling in all its workings. God must be exalted and the sinner abased. God must be just while the sinner is condemned ; and, if saved at all, the glory is due to sovereign and invincible grace alone. There is no foothold upon which the sinner can stand and claim any- thing to himself Christ is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and re- GOD DISHONOURED. 93 demption, tliat, according as it is written, he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. 1 Cor. i. 30, 81. It is not so, if Arminianism be correct — it is impossible. Everything is here reversed; God is abased and the sinner exalted , God is unjust while the sinner is innocent and unfor- tunate in his condemnation ; God has humbled himself from the very necessity of the case ; the creature is exalted, not by the grace and power of God, but by the " self-determination" of his own will. God has done nothing toward his sal- vation but what he was in justice bound to do ; and the creature has all the glory to himself. I am not now speaking of the extremes of Arminian error, as found in the systems of the Pelagians and others. I refer simply to that one funda- mental principle of Arminianism upon which the Cumberland Church have learned to gaze as their jpolar star of theology. Look at the whole scheme as it stands out before us, and see if I am not right. We are told, with confidence and emphasis, that without some method of forgiveness and restora- tion, the providences of God to our race would be unjust — that without the offer of life, the misery, the wretchedness, and the death to which all are doomed would convulse the universe. So say the 94 THE SINNER EXALTED. oracles of the Methodist Church, and the same sentiment is loudly echoed from the pulpit of the Cumberland Church. As an off-set or compensa- tion for these evils, say they, God has brought life and immortality to light through a Redeemer. It was a debt, then, that God owed to the unfor- tunate race of man. Here we find introduced the doctrine under consideration. It stands thus : God is bound, not by the laws of his nature merely, but by the necessity of the case, to furnish a Redeemer, and bring life and immortality to light ; he is, by the same rule, bound to furnish to every man a '' sufficiency of grace" to enable him to understand and accept the terms of life. If, then, it is left to any imaginary spontaneity or " self-determining power'' in man to render effica- cious that grace, I ask, where is the mercy, the love, and the grace of the gospel. Grace is no longer grace — love is no longer love — and instead of justice and mercy reciprocating the kiss of re- conciliation at the cross, it was justice and cruelty that met and embraced each other in mockery ; justice with a sword bathed in innocent blood, and cruelty robed in the garb of mercy. And to what a degraded position is the great God brought upon such a scheme ! He humbles himself to indemnify a race of creatures he has injured ! He THE SINNER EXALTED. 95 sends his Son into the world to reveal his will, and the plan proposed — to make an apology to the universe for what he has done and what he intends doing ; his Spirit also is sent, a church is organ- ized, and a living ministry appointed to carry out that plan. And now to what a pinnacle of pride is the creature exalted, who, with his Maker under his feet as debtor , and with the keys of heaven and hell at his command, can do as he listeth ! It is enough. The mind recoils from the con- templation of such absurdities ; and my pen re- fuses to record the feelings of my heart. A single remark, and I will close this com- munication. If those who hold to Arminian sen- timents, would make a practical and personal application of the old adage, which teaches that those who live in glass houses should not throw stones — ^if they would only look well to their own views, they would find cause to spare much of the abusive language and epithets they are accustomed to heap upon the doctrines of the Presbyterian Church, or rather their perversion and caricatures of those doctrines. Your afi'ectionate son. LETTER IX. SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED ARGUMENT FROM SCRIPTURE — COVENANT OF GRACE. Dear Father: — Sucli difficulties as I have mentioned, growing out of the Arminian doctrine of ^^ sufficient grace/' multiplying upon my path, led me to a more careful perusal of the Scriptures upon the subject. It was not until my mind was satisfied here, that I was induced to abandon the position, and receive the teachings of inspiration upon other points with meekness and submission. I shall not, by any means, attempt to collate and comment upon the many passages of Scripture bearing upon this doctrine. I have neither time nor occasion to undertake such a task. Your at- tention is kindly solicited only to one or two, out of the many that might be adduced. There is one passage on which my mind ha-a often dwelt with delight and profit, both from its peculiar adaptation to the subject under considera- tion, and the circumstances under which it was delivered. It was first announced by the prophet (96) scriptuhe argument. 97 Jeremiah to the disconsolate Jews, and reiterated with peculiar and marked emphasis by the apostle Paul in the eighth chapter of his letter to the Hebrews. It reads thus : ^^ Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah : not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt ; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord. I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts ; and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people. And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord ; for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. For I wiU be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." Three distinct covenants have been entered into by God with man, in which have been offered to him the blessings of eternal life. Two of these having failed to accomplish their end, have passed away and are no longer in force ; though the ulti- 9 98 THE COVENANTS. mate and secret purposes of God have been fulfilled in them, as in all that he does. The first was a representative plan, adapted only to a state of innocency, in which our first parents were placed upon trial, not only for them- selves, but those also " descending from them by ordinary generation." The consequences in this case were disastrous — the covenant was broken, and the hopes of man seem buried forever in the ruins of the fall. The sentence, "dying thou shalt die," shattered his physical frame, by which he was left exposed to the rude attacks of disease, and finally to become a victim of death, and to rot in the grave. It left the immortal spirit deserted by the divine influence, and exposed to the with- ering and wasting moral disease that was to terminate in the deathless agonies of the second death. It left our world exposed to the curse of a broken and immutable law, and to the eye of sense, in a helpless and hopeless condition. Vain now are the efforts of man to revive the broken contract or the covenant of works, as it is called, as a means of salvation. Vain are the efforts of the moralist by which he goes about to establish a righteousness of his own, to secure the favour of God and the reward of eternal life. The " filthy rags" of such a righteousness will only THE COVENANTS. 99 serve to render still more exposed and deformed his nakedness and shame. Two insurmountable difficulties lie in the way. 1. The law requires an obedience which the sinner is not able to render : " Thou shalt love the Lord thy Grod with all thy heart, and thy neighbour as thyself;" and " cursed is every one that continueth not in all things written in the book of the law to do them.^' 2. The sinner's life is already forfeited for past offences — the penalty of the law must be met and the claims of justice satisfied; for, ^' without the shedding of blood there is no re- mission of sins.'^ Since the fall of man and his banishment from the garden, two important covenants have marked his history, embodying the terms of life and par- don — the one under the old, and the other under the new dispensation. The former of these proving to be defective, was annulled after the purposes of God were accomplished by it ; the latter, being " established upon better promises," comes to us laden with all the purchased blessings of the gospel, and makes full and ample provision for all the wants of man in his lost and ruined condition. The points of superiority of this cove- nant over the former, as presented to us in the passage already quoted, have an important bearing 100 THE COVENANTS. upon the subject under consideration, and are •worthy of more than the passing notice I shall be able to give them here. 1. It contemplates a universal diffusion of a knowledge of God — " All shall know me from the least to the greatest.'^ Under the old dispen- sation, all that was known of God was revealed in the law of Moses, the shadowy rites of the temple- service, and the extraordinary communications made to those raised up for a particular purpose. Such sources of knowledge were limited and ob- scure, and were insufficient to save the Jewish people from idolatry and rebellion against God. But under the new covenant or dispensation, it is not so. Every truth essential to the happiness and salvation of man is presented in the full revelation that God has made of himself, in the gospel of his Son, and every facility is offered for acquiring a knowledge of that truth. The prom- ise is even now literally fulfilled. The cove- nant being made with Israel — with the church of God — none says to his neighbour, Know the Lord ; for all know him, from the least to the greatest. The Sabbath-school scholar may learn more of God and the plan of salvation, by means and facilities placed in his hands, than the most learned of the priests or Scribes THE COVENANTS. 101 that ministered daily in the temple and syna- gogue service. It was in allusion to this fact, doubtless, that our Saviour said to the multitudes that had attended upon the ministry of John : "Among those that are born of women there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist ; but he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.'' What then, I ask, becomes of the levelling system of Arminians ? — of " the dis- coveries of himself," that Grod makes to those who are not of Israel, according to Adam Clarke and those who sympathize with him in this doc- trine of universal and sufficient grace ? If the least in the kingdom of God has more of these " discoveries" than he who was sent to prepare the way for the Messiah, what an impassable gulf, what a world of night must there be "between such and those upon whom the wrath of God abides, who have " changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things;" "having the un- derstanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart ; who, being past feeling, have given themselves 9* 102 THE COVENANTS. over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness." Rom. i. 23. Eph. iv. 18, 19. 2. This new covenant made with the church of God makes full and adequate provision for the forgiveness of sin. "I will be merciful to their unrighteousncsSj and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." In this respect, the covenant made at Sinai was defective also. It promised, it is true, forgive- ness to those who would repent and turn unto God; but the institutions of that covenant, in themselves considered, contained nothing upon which could be based the full acquittal of the sinner from the charge of guilt. "It is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins." Nevertheless, the sac- rifices and institutions of the ceremonial law, though having no efficacy in themselves, pointed the devout and believing Jew to the great sac- rifice that God himself was to ofier up in the fulness of the time. The time has come — the Lamb of God has been offered — ample provision is now made for the forgiveness of sin, and the everlasting salvation of those who accept of it as presented in the gospel; and what is more, to such the promise is, " I will be to them a God, aud they shall be to me a people." I will be THE COVENANTS. 103 their God, their benefactor, their preserver, their defender, and everlasting source of life. But this is not all. The provisions of the covenant of grace stop not here, else man would still have been without hope. 8. It provides for the fulfilment of those con- ditions upon which all is suspended. ^^ I will put my laws into their mind and wi"ite them in their hearts.'' Here was the prominent defect of the old covenant. When God descended upon the burning mount to deliver the tables of the law, together with the ceremonial institutions of the Jewish economy, every promise made was condi- tioned upon some external act of obedience or of worship. If the Jew desired temporal prosperity or length of days, a strict obedience to all the re- quirements of the law was to be rendered ] if he asked forgiveness of sin, the smiles of God, and the hope of heaven, sacrifices were to be oflfered at the appointed time, and in the appointed way ', and this with the eye of faith resting not upon the bleeding victim of the altar, but upon the victim that was to bleed upon the cross, " the Lamb of God slain from the foundation of the world.'' But while every promise was thus conditioned upon the performance of some stipulated duty, the grace necessary to enable the sinner to comply with the 104 THE COVENANTS. required conditions was not pledged. Its lan- guage in this respect was similar to that of the law — ^' do this and live." The vital prin- ciple thus being withheld, and prompted by their own hearts, the Jews not only failed to comply with the proposed conditions, but rebelled against God, '' turned quickly out of the way, their fathers walked in," ^' went a-whoring after other gods," and brought upon themselves the severest judgments of heaven. ^' They continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.^' The same general idea is incidentally, yet for- cibly, presented in the fourth chapter of Paul's epistle to the Galatians. ^^It is written," says he, " that Abraham had two sons ; the one by a bond maid, the other by a free woman. But he who was of the bond woman was born after the flesh ; but he of the free woman was by promise. Which things are an allegory ; for these are the two covenants : the one from Mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar. For this Agar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem, which is above, is free, which is the mother of us all." According to this instructive allegory, we are born not as THE COVENANTS. 105 Ishmael, who came tlirough the "combined agency" of the free and the bond — of Abraham and Agar — begotten by the power that was given to the one in his old and decrepid age, in connec- tion with the youthful and native strength of the other. Such is not our birth. " We brethren/' says Paul, " as Isaac was, are children of the promise." All the agencies concerned in our spiritual birth, as in the natural birth of Isaac, are fruitless even to old age, until made efficient by the power and grace of God. Here we say, was one of the prominent and marked defects of the covenant made at Sinai, answering to the Jerusalem that once was ; it left all those who were parties to it, and not to the new, in bondage, simply from the fact that no efficient grace was stipulated to enable them to comply with its terms. But notwithstanding this failure of the Sinaitic covenant, this its most prominent and defective feature is incorporated as a cardinal doctrine upon the system of those who hold to Arminian senti- ments — it is found in the very doctrine now under consideration. Christ is set forth crucified as the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world ; the promises of the gospel are held out to comfort and encourage; obedience is enjoined; pardoa 106 THE COVENANTS. and the blessings of eternal life are offered ; but all is conditioned upon the will of the creature, and no grace presented to secure the fulfilment of the conditions required; the free, sovereign, and efficient power, and grace of God, have no- thing to do with the work. Those born under such a system, Paul would say, are children of the bond women, and not of the free, and corres- pond to the Jerusalem that once was, and re- mained in bondage with her children till cast out. The Jerusalem that is from above, and is the mother of us all, is under a different covenant. ^' This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel, after those days, saith the Lord. I will put my laws into their mind and write them in their hearts." I will not only make a full revelation of myself in the character and work of one who shall be constituted the light of the world 3 but I will open the eyes of their understandings ; I will so illume the darkness of their minds that they may see and understand the wonderful things contained in my law, that they may know him whom to know aright is life eternal. Yet more : I will write my law in their hearts ', they shall not only see and understand, but my grace shall make effectual the truth ; my precepts, and my commandments shall be engraven upon THE COVENANTS. 107 their hearts in as legible and durable a manner as the law upon the tables of stone, upon the summit of the burning mount. They shall love me and walk in my ways, and I will be to them a God and they shall be to me a people. Here is the plan upon which God bestows the purchased blessings of the gospel. Here is that everlasting covenant that was laid in the counsels of eternity, and executed under the sovereign will and purpose of God in his own time and in his own way. Here rest the hopes of the Church. The omnipotence of God is pledged for her de- fence; his sovereign power and grace are promised for the ingathering of those who shall be heirs of salvation. Nothing more could be desired, yet nothing less would suffice. Look, for a moment, at the Israel of God under a cov-enant in which such an influence was not stipulated. See their fears amid the dividing waters of the sea, after they had witnessed such miracles as had been wrought for their deliverance. See them bowing to the golden calf at the foot of the trembling mount, whose summit is wrapped in clouds and smoke, where God is holding converse with 3Ioses, their leader. Follow them on through the wilder- ness, and mark their murmurings and their rebel- lion. Follow them on through all the judgments 108 THE COVENANTS. and mercies of God that are visited upon them, and what a lesson is furnished to us of the neces- sity of divine efficiency in the salvation of man ! Strike this one article from the covenant of grace, as Cumberland Presbyterians, together with the whole body of Arminians, have done, and with it are entombed all our hopes for the Church and the world. And how sad the reflection that it is so often abused and caricatured, by those who would be heirs of the promises made to the spir- itual seed of Abraham. But it is not to be won- dered at — it was so under the old dispensation. "As then," says Paul, " he that was born after the flesh, persecuted him that was born after the spirit, even so it is now.'' And so it will always be, until "the bond woman and her son" are "cast out" — until there shall be found none in the family of Abraham, but those who are willing to ascribe their spiritual birth to the sovereign power and efficient grace of God. Your afiectionate son. LETTER X. THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED — TESTIMONY OP FAMILIAR PASSAGES OF SCRIPTURE — A DIFFI- CULTY REMOVED. Dear Father: — The view I have presented of the covenant of grace, illustrative of the doc- trine of divine efficiency in the sinner's conversion, is one that beautifully harmonizes with every part of the plan of salvation; is sustained by every passage of Scripture, bearing upon the subject, when considered in its proper connection and meaning ; and enters into the devotions of every pious heart. A fruitful field of illustration and proof is here opened out before me. But I can refer you only to a few out of the many passages that might be presented. " God, who is rich in mercy,^' says Paul, ^^ for his great love, wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ.'^ Eph. ii. 4, 5. The figure here in- troduced is one in common use, and from which its meaning may be easily determined. Thus 10 (109) 110 TESTIMONY FROM SCRIPTURE. when we say that a man is dead, without any qualifying expression, we mean that he is incapa- ble of feeling or action ; but when the word is used figuratively, its meaning must be determined by the connection. If I say of a man that he is dead to every feeling of humanity, you understand by the expression that he is incapable of exercising a be- nevolent feeling, till that particular feature in his character is changed. If I say of another who has become hardened in crime, and has trampled un- der foot every law and statute of the land, that he is dead to the interest and welfare of society, you understand me to say that he is incapable of another class of feelings, till his character is radi- cally changed. If I say of another that he has become so steeped in drunkenness and debauchery that he is dead to virtue, to shame, and every re- fined feeling of our nature, you understand me to say that he is insensible to any other desire but that of gratifying a slavish appetite and his brutal passions ; and so if I apply the word to any par- ticular feeling, or class of feelings, you understand me to mean that the person to whom I allude, is incapable of exercising those feelings, till he has undergone a radical change in his moral constitu- tion. Precisely in the same sense must we under- stand the expression " dead in sins/^ as used by TESTIMONY FROM SCRIPTURE. Ill the apostle Paul in the passage before us, and elsewhere. If it means anything, it must mean that the sinner is incapable of originating a single holy thought, feeling, or desire, until the work of regeneration is complete — until quickened by the almighty power and grace of God, ^^for his great love wherewith he loved us.'' However much enlightened, however much wrought upon, by whatever agency you please, in his natural state, before the regenerating and quickening influence of the Spirit of God is applied, he is ^^ dead in sins ;" as incapable of originating those states of mind that are acceptable to God, as the stiffened corpse of giving life and motion to itself. Again : ^^ the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are fool- ishness unto him ; neither can he know them, for they are spiritually discerned.'' 1 Cor. ii. 14. It requires no lengthy argument to show that the expression, ^^ natural man," is applicable to the sinner up to the time of his being made ^^ a new creature" in Christ. The most superficial reader of the Scriptures, the Sabbath-school scholar even, need scarcely be told this. There is but one step, then, to the conclusion, that a man must be regenerated before he can acquiesce in the plan of salvation as presented in the gospel. Until 112 TESTIMONY FIPDM SCRIPTURE. this important change takes place, everything therein revealed relating to the salvation of the soul, is foolishness, and cannot be understood in a saving sense, ; for there is nothing here but what is *' spiritually discerned/' The same idea is presented by the apostle in the first chapter of the same epistle. ^' The preaching of the cross,*' says he, " is to those that perish foolishness, but unto us who are saved it is the power of Grod." What avail, then, all our labours in the ministry of reconciliation, unless this healing and saving power is exerted to make efi'ectual the truth? Any imaginary or supposed operation of the Spirit of God short of this will avail nothing, if this single passage of the word of God be true. The sinner will still remain blind, and stupid, and dead, however loud may be the external call, however great his privileges and the means of grace he is permitted to enjoy. But this is not all. ^^The carnal mind," says Paul, ^^is enmity against God, for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." Rom. viii. 7. The expression, " carnal mind," as used here, has evidently the same application as " natural man," in the passage already quoted. The word carnal throughout the New Testament is contrasted TESTIMONY FROM SCRIPTURE. 113 with spiritiialj and is applied to man in his unre- generated state, whatever may be the influences brought to bear upon the mind. ^^ I would not speak unto you as unto spiritual/^ says Paul to the Corinthians, ^^ but as unto carnal ;" evidently meaning that he was compelled to address them as those who had never been converted. If you will turn to Adam Clarke's commentary on the eighth chapter of Romans, and third of first Corin- thians, you will find the same idea advanced. I might cite to you any number of passages in proof of the position, but it is unnecessary. It would be like attempting to prove that black is not white, or red is not blue ] which, if a man should choose to controvert, there would be no arguing with him. Substitute, then, in the passage before us, an equivalent expression, and how does it read? " The unregenerate or unconverted mind is en- mity against God; is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.'' "Where then, I ask, is the possibility of a mind in such a state originating any thought, feeling, or desire, that will render it acceptable to God, and upon which can be conditioned the bestowment of life and pardon ? — a mind, in all the operations of which the ruling and regulating influence is enmity to God, and a determined and malignant opposition 10* 114 TESTIMONY FROM SCRIPTURE. to his law ? And what power, what influence shall be brought to bear upon that mind to over- come its enmity, and to bring all its faculties into subjection to the will of God ? Is there any amount of grace or power that would be sufficient, short of that which is efficient and invincible ? None. The carnal mind is enmity to God, and cannot be brought into subjection to his law till its carnality is removed. Bring all the ingenuity and the learned criticism of the living and dead to explain away the proper meaning of the Scrip- tures, we surely cannot rise from the contem- plation of this single truth without being con- vinced that if we are saved at all it must be by '' the effectual worhing^^ of the power of God — a power, which, in its operation upon the sinner's heart in his resurrection from the death of sin, ia commensurate with that "which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come." Eph. i. 20, 21. " I have planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth anything, neither he that watereth, but TESTIMONY FROM SCRIPTURE. 115 God that giveth the increase." 1 Cor. iii. 6, 7. Paul was wrong here, if Arminianism is right. In order for the passage to harmonize with such a creed it should read thus : '^ I have planted, ApoUos watered, God cissiMedj but the sinner gave the increase. So, then, neither is he that planteth anything, nor he that watereth, nor he that assisteth, but the sinner that giveth the in- crease." This is no sophism ; it is no caricature, but stands out in bold relief as a full and fair expression of this fundamental principle of the Arminian system — a principle which Cumberland Presbyterians have embraced as their dearest idol. Once more : '' "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is Grod which worketh in you, both to will and to do of his good pleasure." Phil. ii. 12, 13. There are three important propositions contained in this passage which must be taken together. The fii'st is, we are commanded to icorh out our own salva- tion with fear and tremhllng — the second, that it is God that worJcs in us — the third, that he icorJtS in us to loill and to do of his good pleasure. If either of these propositions is left out of view, or in any way concealed or obscured, we do vio- lence c3 the whole scheme of salvation. The Socinian, for example, gives prominence to the 116 A DIFFICULTY REMOVED. fil-st and discards tlie others. The Antinomian, on the contrary, takes only what the Socinian rejects. Both make shipwreck of the faith. The Ai'minian takes the first and second, and discards the third, in fact, if not in form. He, too, foun- ders, and is lost in endless absurdities. But the Calvinist, allow me to say, the man who endeav- ours to take the word of God as he finds it, receives with meekness each of these propositions. He endeavours to work out his salvation with fear and trembling, recognizing the fact that it is God that works in him, not merely to enlighten and persuade, but to will and to do of his good pleas- ure. Here, and here only, is safety. I might multiply, to any extent almost, quota- tions from the Scriptui-es, each sufficient in itself to enable us to determine upon which side truth is to be found ; but I have already prolonged this discussion further than I had intended. There are other important aspects in which the subject might be viewed, if the limits of these communi- cations would permit. Enough, however, has been said, I trust, to satisfy your mind of the importance of the principles involved, and that the conclusions to which I have arrived are safe, sound, and scriptural. I am aware that many hard things have been A DIFFICULTY REMOVED. 117 said with regard to the Presbyterian doctrine of divine efficiency and human inability as taught in the standards of the chureh, I have heard them all. I have sifted them, weighed them, and examined them in every aspect, and in every instance have found them weaJi and harmless. My heart has been pained, too, in seeing the Cumberland Church gleaning up the blunted ar- rows that have so often been hurled at the shield of truth by those, who have gone before them, and left their carcasses in the wilderness or upon the field of strife. I might multiply examples illus- trative of the ignorance and malignity manifested by them, in common with Arminians of every class, with regard to this important and vital doctrine of the gospel ; one, however, will suffice. They are not satisfied with the charge of incon- sistency, but go on to say that the Calvinist who commands and exhorts the sinner to repentance and faith, acts the part of '^ a liar''^ and ^^ juggler" — a liar because he commands him to do that which he knows he is not able to do — a juggler because the means employed are inadequate to th6 end. I ask, in reply, was Peter a liar, when he said to the woman of Joppa, " Tabitha, arise," who having been sick had died, and was washed and laid out for burial ? Was the blessed Saviour 118 A DIFFICULTY REMOVED. a liar and a juggler when he stood at the grave of one who had been dead four daysj and cried *^ with a loud voice" to the putrefying corpse, " Lazarus, come forth V* AVhat blasphemy is here involved in the charge so often brought by the Cumberland Church and the whole body of Arminians I — I speak with reverence and aflfection. My feelings would urge me to say more, but I must forbear. A single thought and I will close this communi- cation. The ambassador of Christ, as you yourself ac- knowledge, must be a man given to prayer as well as to the ministration of the word. With this admission is answered every objection that is urged against the much despised and caricatured doctrine of inability. As Peter knelt and prayed for life-giving power, before he commanded the dead to arise ; and as Christ lifted up his eyes to heaven in devout supplication, at the grave of Lazarus, before the omnipotent word went forth from his lips ; so must we, as we exhort those who are " dead in sins'' to " arise'' and " come forth" to a new life of repentance, obedience, and faith. As the prophet Ezekiel not only exhorted the bleaching bones of the valley to " hear the word of the Lord," but prophesied also to the winds, and prayed that the breath of heaven might DOCTRINE OF ABILITY ABANDONED. 119 breatlie upon the slain ; so must those who carry the message of life to the dead, whose " bones are dried/' whose " hope is lost/' till the Spirit of the Lord breathe upon them that they may live. The exhortation to the sinner to " turn from his evil ways/' must not only be presented to the mind, and pressed home to the heart and conscience, but at the same time accompanied by the humble and devout prayer, ^' turn thou us unto thee, Lord, and we shall be turned." If we could but breathe this one sentiment, if we could but feel it in all its force, it would prepare our hearts for receiving with meekness and submission many of the despised and rejected doctrines of the gospel. Your affectionate son. LETTER XI.. ARMINIAN DOCTRINE OF ABILITY ABANDONED — STILL IN THE WILDERNESS — STEPS RETRACED — CALVINISM ADOPTED IN FULL. Dear Father : — I have said enough, I trust, to satisfy your mind that the position occupied by the Cumberland Church in common with the whole body of Arminians, with regard to the ability and agency of the sinner in conversion, is involved in inextricable difficuLies — diflGiculties far greater than can possibly be urged against the opposite view, even by its bitterest enemies. I have said that it is calculated to lead the church into the wildest extravagance, as shown in the operations of those who have made it their main stand-point ; that it tends to the most dangerous and ruinous error ; that it is opposed to the mer- ciful and gracious terms of the covenant of grace ; and that it is contradicted by every passage of Scripture, when considered in its proper meaning, that has any reference at all to the subject. If you will follow out the train of thought intro- (120) DOCTRINE OF ABILITY ABANDONED. 121 duced under each of these heads, you will find that I am right. It was such difficulties and absurdities that, either directly or indirectly, pressed upon me while I occupied this fundamental doctrine of the Ar- minian system as my main stand-point in theology. I was again in trouble ; my mind became unset- tled, and I found no other way of ridding myself of the dangers that environed me, but by aban- doning the doctrine entirely. I did so, but not without a lingering hope of finding the middle way somewhere. To call up a figure already in- troduced, the woodman's implements were again my companions. Camp-fires were again kindled in the unexplored and untrodden regions of thought. I had already acquired some experience in such explorations, and spared neither pains nor labour in the work. Every possible means was employed to find some eligible point beyond the great city of Universal Redemption, as a substitute for the one I had been compelled to abandon, but all to no purpose. Many a beautiful ridge was discovered that promised for a time a pleasant and continuous route, but they all either led the deluded traveller, delighted with the grandeur of the scenery, to the precipitous clifi^, or sloped ofi" into interminable swamps, where 11 122 STILL IN THE WILDERNESS. those who are so unfortunate as to enter them, are left to flounder in mud and mire without ever finding a solid basis upon which to stand and breathe safely and freely. While my mind was operated upon as be- fore narrated, I was compelled, on philosophical and scriptural grounds, to yield assent to the doctrine that saving faith is a holy act or exercise of the mind, and can in no sense proceed from a corrupt and unregenerate heart. I was therefore compelled to abandon the Arminian position, and receive faith as one of the consequences, instead of a condition, of regeneration, as one of the essential and necessary fruits of the Spirit in his saving work upon the heart. I still, however, sought for a place in some exercise of mind prior to regene- ration where the so-called, '^self-determining power of the wilF' could operate, independent of the sovereign and efficient agency of the Spirit of Grod. While prosecuting my investigations on this point, I had occasion to examine Dwight's Theology. I read with interest and profit his seventy-fifth sermon on the " antecedents of regeneration." After presenting in a forcible manner the exercises of the sinner's mind in con- viction, he closes his sermon with the following paragraph : " In the struggle thus continued, and STILL IN THE WILDERNESS. 123 thus earnestly conducted, he learns how obstinate his sinful dispositions are, and with what hopeless difficulty they are to be overcome. Convinced at length that all his efforts must, without the imme- diate assistance of God, prove entirely vain, he casts off all his dependence on himself, and turns his eye to Grod, with the feelings of Peter when beginning to sink, and cries out in his language, '^Lord, save me, or I perish." Here, said I, is the proper place for the self-determining power to operate — here is the place where the will of man puts forth its efficient and self-determined act in deciding for God and for heaven. It flashed upon my mind at first with a dazzling and winning brightness. I hailed it as a new and important discovery in theology, as one pregnant with sound, wholesome, and popular doctrine ) but alas, it was soon found to be embarrassed with all the dangers, difficulties, and absurdities that I have already rehearsed. I found, indeed, the exercises of the sinner's mind under conviction as Dwight and other Calvinistic writers, and often even Ar- minians have recorded them, but was at last forced to admit that back of those exercises there must be a divine, a sovereign, an efficient, and omnipotent agency at work. Having been led to the adoption of this all- 124 STILL IN THE WILDERNESS. important and vital doctrine of the sovereignty and efl&cicnt agency of the Spirit of God in the salvation of the soulj there was but one alternative left. I had either to abandon the idea of ever finding a continuous route, a complete si/stcm of truth, or to retrace my steps for the point I had left in the beaten road of Calvinism, and follow it as God might give me faith and strength. I had either to die in the wilderness, or encounter " the giants,*' " the Emims,'' and " the Anakims," of which I had so often heard, from those who loved ^' the onions'' and " the garlic" of an earthly creed more than the clustering fruits of a sound theological system. Which shall it be ? You may better imagine the mental suffering and conflict of feeling through which I passed, in answering this question, than I can describe. There was the warmest filial regard and affection for others that held me bound as by some strange spell; there was pride that would lash me into some still wilder visions than any that had yet entered my mind ; there were fears and unbelief that would deter me from encountering the imagined diffi- culties and dangers of the ulterior regions of Calvinism. Love, pride, fear, and hope, were all united in urging me in one direction, while the strongest convictions of duty were driving in the STEPS RETRACED. 125 opposite — convictions that came as tlie whirlwind to the patriarch of Uz — a whirlwind from the Lord. There came also the same voice that re- minded the patriarch of the ignorance, the weak- ness, and the folly of man. " Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge ? Shall he that contendeth with the Almighty instruct him? He that reproveth God let him answer this." What other reply could I make but the patriarch's answer : " Behold, I am vile ; what shall I answer thee ? I will lay my hand upon my mouth. Once have I spoken ; but I will not answer : yea, twice, but I will proceed no further.'' '^ There came a voice from the storm, such as the patriarch heard, that seemed to say, Grird up thy loins now like a man.'' It was the same voice that had addressed the prophet who had fled to the wilderness through fear, and hid himself in the cave of the mountains : " What doest thou here, Elijah ? — go, return on thy way to the wilderness of Diimascus." It was enough. I obeyed the call. I retraced my steps. I re- turned on my way, through the wilderness of Universal Kedemption and Sufficient G-race — the wilderness of Arminianism — to the point I had left in the Calvinistic route. I read again the oracles of God, and found that the whole Calviu- 11* 126 CALVINISM ADOPTED IN FULL. istic system, as set forth in the Scriptures of divine truth and the standards of the Presbyterian Church, was involved in the principles I had already imbibed, as before related. There was but one path in which I could travel with any safety or comfort to myself I entered it with the determination to follow wherever truth might lead the way. The doctrines of original sin and a vicarious atonement, led me on, as the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night of the camp of Israel. I followed on as those who were not permitted to settle in the mountains of Edom, and who had seen the carcasses of the generation that had preceded them, fall in the wilderness because of their fears, their murmurings, and their unbe- lief. Every difficulty was met and every fear re- moved ; for there was nothing to fear. The fabled giants and hydra-headed monsters of which I had so often heard were nowhere to be found : the walled cities and ramparts of the enemy fell as the walls of Jericho before the blast of the ram's horn, in the mouth of the Levite ; every difficulty and danger disappeared before the light of truth. The vine-clad hills and vales, the fields of olives, the inviting gardens of pomegranates and figs were before me. I entered them, and, for the first time, experienced the pleasure of tasting the CALVINISM ADOPTED IN FTLL. 127 rich and soul-satisfying fruits of a sound, safe, healthy, and consistent system of theological truth. What an hour of triumph was that to the trem- bling faint-hearted Jew, when the Jordan rolled back its sacred tide for him to enter and possess the land he had so long sought I What a J03rful hour was that, when for the first time he was permitted to celebrate the feast of the Passover, and to eat of the old corn, the unleavened cakes, and the fruits of the land ! But these did not experience greater joy upon that day than did I, when for the first time it was my privilege to eat of the old corn, the unleavened cakes, and the fruits of scriptural Calvinistic truth as gathered by my own hands from the ripening fields. My only sorrow was, that many with whom my heart still lingered with the fondest and tenderest af- fection were yet in the wilderness, and doomed perhaps the remainder of their days to wander over its trackless waste, vainly in search of that which no where existed. But I forbear pressino- the analogy further. You will pardon me in its use. Convinced as I was, that the sentiments I had adopted were the eternal truths of God, upon which are anchored all our hopes, my feelings toward those whom I had left behind could not be 128 CALVINISM ADOPTED IN FULL. otherwise. I know from experience something of the strength of religious prejudice — of preju- dice fronted by distorted views of the truth, and backed by the secret workings of the pride of the human heart — and have, therefore, learned to regard with sympathy and charity those who are made its unfortunate victims. Your affectionate son. LETTER XII. DOCTRINES INVOLVED IN THOSE ALREADY STATED — ELECTION — DEFINITE ATONEMENT CONFIRMED BY SCRIPTURE — OBJECTIONS AN- SWERED. Dear Father : — If my time and limits would permit, I would like much to enter into a more full and satisfactory discussion of the several points I have so hastily presented, and many more that I shall be compelled to leave untouched. My object has been, however, simply to give prominence to a few of the leading doctrines of the Calvinistic system which have been most as- sailed by its enemies. Growing out of these plain doctrines of the gospel, there are several import- ant truths which it becomes necessary for me to notice. From the doctrine of imputation, as I have before stated, flows the doctrine of a vicarious atonement. They both stand or fall together. Let the doctrine of the imputation of Adam's sin to us be once rejected, and the doctrine of the imputation of our sins to Christ must go too, and (129) 130 DOCTRINES INVOLVED. also of his righteousness to us, and with these must go by the board also the only foundation of the Christian's hopes, the doctrine of justification by faith without the deeds of the law, and when this is gone there is nothing left worth contending for. These three aspects of the doctrine of im- putation God himself has joined together, and no man can put them asunder, without destroying the whole gospel scheme, and making shipwreck of his faith. They are the mighty links in the chain that terminates in the doctrine of justifi- cation by faith — the anchor that holds the soul steadfast and safe in all its peaceful moorings. "As by one man's disobedience,'' says Paul, ^^the many were made sinners, so by the obe- dience of one shall the many be made righteous." From this plain statement of the doctrine of im- putation as connected with the nature of the atonement, it follows that it is definite in its pro- visions. Nothing else can save from Universalism the Arminian as well as the Calvinist who looks at the substance as well as the names of things. And from the single word vicaricnis that enters into each of their creeds — from the single idea advanced by the prophet Isaiah, " surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows f' and by the apostle Peter, in speaking of the suflferings of . JELECTION. 131 Christ, "who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree'^ — from this grand cardinal feature of the gospel, upon which every Chris- tian's faith must fasten, may be evolved the whole Calvinistic system — the whole scheme of salvation by grace according to the full, the free, and definite provisions of the pui'chase made upon the cross. Again, from this view of the nature and extent of the atonement, and also from the doctrine of divine efficiency which I have discussed at some length, flows the doctrine of election — a doctrine against which the pride of the human heart has hurled many a harmless and blunted shaft. It is a doctrine, too, that not only flows from what has gone before by a logical sequence, but is also con- firmed by the plain and direct testimony of the word of Grod, and is there made a subject of the most intense joy and the highest praise. " Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,'' says Paul to the Ephesians, "who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ ; according as he hath chosen us in him, before tlie foundation of (lie world^\k\3X we should be holy and without blame before him in love ; having 'predestinated us unto the adoption of children, by Jesus Christ, to himself, according to the good 132 ELECTION. ' pleasure of his wiM, to the praise of the glory of his grace wherein he hath made us accepted in the Beloved, in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, accordvng to the riches of his graced Eph. i. 3-7. Could lan- guage be less ambiguous? could anything be plainer than the doctrine here presented ? But to make it, if possible, still more clear and em- phatic, he adds, " in whom also we have obtained an inheritance, heing predestinated according to the purpose of him who loorheth all things after the counsel of his own will, that we should be to the praise of his glory." vs. 11, 12. The whole chapter, and the one following, are full of instruc- tion upon this important doctrine ; and as I read by the light that now shines upon the sacred page, I cannot see how it can possibly be rejected by the candid and prayerful inquirer for truth. Admitting, for a moment, the doctrine to be true, I ask, could it have been expressed, even by an inspired writer, in language more clear, more emphatic, more forcible, or more elevated ? Ad- mitting, I say, the doctrine of election to be true, need a single word of the passage be altered ? Could its most rigid advocates have made it stronger or more emphatic ? Could John Calvin himself, with his burning-glass of thought, have DEFINITE ATONEMENT. 133 thrown words to a brighter focus to express Ms own peculiar views of the subject ? If standing by the apostle in writing to his Ephesian brethren, could he have desired him to have altered a single expression, a single word, or a single thought? This, however, is only one out of the scores of passages that might be adduced — passages, too, the obvious meaning of which all the learning of the living and the dead can never explain away. And the only possible way for the Ar- minian to escape from the plain yet hard and unpalatable doctrines to the carnal mind which they contain, is for him to close his eyes upon the light, and amuse himself with the goblins and the ghosts that dance before his darkened and disordered vision. It is only by amusing himself with the phantoms of his own creation — by dwel- ling upon the imaginary difficulties connected with the Calvinistic system, and by continually and fiercely urging the most absurd objections, that he is enabled to fortify himself in his own belief, and his unauthorized and unsafe positions. Pardon me in the expression of such a sentiment. It is the sentiment of my heart as confirmed by observation and my own experience. The same general remark applies to the doc- trine of a definite atonement, which is intimately 12 134 DEFINITE ATONEMENT. and essentially connected with the doctrine of election. We have here, also, principally to meet objections and imaginary difficulties that are con- tinually being urged. It is true we are often told in the language of our Saviour, that " God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have everlasting life." But it requires no small amount of ingenuity to torture even this passage to give countenance to the Arminian view of the nature and extent of the atonement. If God so loved the world as to give his only be- gotten Son, in the sense in which the Methodists and Cumberland Presbyterians understand the phrase, why, I ask, is not the whole world saved by the purchase of his death? The answer I know is that the influence of Satan and the enmity of the human heart have defeated the purpose of God. What strange language this ! Are not these the very things that Christ undertook to destroy — the very enemies of heaven and hap- piness he engaged to vanquish, so far as they conflicted with the plans and purposes of the Al- mighty ? Can it be that the counsels of heaven have been defeated ? Can it be that the blood and the treasure that have been spent for the recovery of man have been squandered for nought, DEFINITE ATONEMENT. 135 and made the trophies of hell ? Strange counsel that, which has infinite wisdom for its source, and eventuates in such a result ! And still stranger love is that, which will purchase the release of millions from captivity, and yet leave them in the galling chains of their bondage, without any effectual means to apply the benefits of the pur- chase ! There is no other way of escaping from the endless absurdities into which we are led by such a view, than by returning and taking the language of the Saviour as he himself has given it ; " God SO loved the world THAT he gave his only begotten Son, THAT whosoever believeth," &c. The divine love is here plainly measured by the nature of the gift, and the extent of the gift is measured by its application. This is the clear and obvious meaning of the passage, and he that runs may read and understand it thus, and all the ingenuity of man cannot extort from it any- thing more. In answer to all that can be said, however, we have again and again reiterated in our ears the language of Paul to the Hebrews, where it is said that Christ was ^^ crowned with glory and honour, that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man." But, by referring to the original text, it appears that the word man is not there, 136 DEFINITE ATONEMENT. and that the word rendered every^ instead of being a distributive pronoun, is most commonly translated ally and has an ambiguity of meaning that can only be determined by the context, or the nature of the subject; as when it is said that all Jerusalem and Judea went out to the preaching of John, no one would infer that every man, wo- man and child were there ; and when the woman of Samaria published in the city that she had found a man who had told her all that she ever bad done, no one understood her to mean that he had rehearsed to her every act of her life. And so it is in every case where the word all occurs, either in the Scriptures or in ordinary conver- sation; the context and subject-matter must de- termine the extent of its application. I shall not attempt here to notice the many strange and wilful misrepresentations that are continually made of election and its associated doctrines, as taught in the standards of the Pres- byterian Church ; nor shall I attempt at present to notice the many objections that are continually urged against those doctrines. There is one, however, that demands of me more than a pas- sing remark, in view of the fact that it was urged upon my attention, when a student of theology, with considerable effect by yourself. You then OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 137 presented, in a most feeling manner, the supposed difficulty under which the Calvinist labours in reconciling the doctrine of election and a definite atonement with the general call of the gospel. I might easily evade such an objection, by calling upon the Arminian to reconcile his idea of a general atonement with the particular or limited call of the gospel ; for the call is far from being general, in the sense in which he uses the term. Two-thirds, and more, of the human race have never yet so much as heard of the name of Christ, and are shrouded in the grossest ignor- ance, idolatry and superstition. "Why is it so? Let the Methodist or Cumberland Presbyterian attempt to give a rational explanation of such facts, in the providence of God to our race, that stare him in the face, and he will find himself involved in far greater difficulties than those which are so often and so blindly urged against the Calvinistic system. He will find it a far more difficult task to reconcile the choosing of many with the calling of a few, than the calling of many with the choosing of a few, and a far easier task to reconcile the latter with the providences of God and the plain teachings of I is word, for the Saviour himself has told us that " many a?e called but few are chosen.^' 12* 138 OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. But I do not wish to answer such an objection simply by urging another as an offset to it. Turn, if you please, to that remarkable scene in the temple recorded by the evangelist Luke, when the aged and devout Simeon, who had long waited for the consolation of Israel, took the infant Redeemer in his arms, and with up-lifted eyes blessed God for having spared his life and permitted him to witness the salvation he had prepared. After having pre- dicted the future greatness and glory of the child, he turned to Joseph and Mary, and having blessed them, said to Mary his mother, '' Be- hold, this child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel, and for a sign which shall be spoken against, that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.'^ Luke ii. 34, 35. By refer- ring to the original, or to almost any critical commentary on the passage, you will find that the word again is not a part of the text, and does not add anything to the sense, but rather obscures it. Comment is unnecessary. Language could not express in plainer terms the doctrine of election and a definite atonement, as associated together, than are here used; nor could the objection you have so feelingly urged upon my attention against those doctrines be more plainly and satisfactorily answered. The standards of the Presbyterian OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 139 Church nowhere give countenance to the idea that the blood that was shed for the redemption of man is limited in its value. And in view of the infinite sufficiency of the atonement, and the very nature of the law promulgated, God has laid all his intelligent creatures under obligations to love and serve his Son. Even the devils in hell are eternally increasing their condemnation for re- fusing that allegiance. It is in view then, I say, of the infinite sufficiency of the atonement and the very nature of the law promulgated under the gospel that our Saviour said to his disciples, " go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.'' And thus as I go in obedience to the command as God in his providence may call, I shall ever remember that, in the wise, the holy, and mysterious counsels of heaven, Christ is set for the rise of some and the fall of others ; and that as I endeavour to urge the claims of his gospel upon the hearts of men, there are revealed thoughts and feelings that shall fui'nish the evi- dence for their acquittal or their everlasting con- demnation in the judgment of the great day. Under such presentations of the truth the Arminian, driven to his last resort, is in the habit of ui-ging his hypothetical charges of the most wanton cruelty and injustice on the part of God 140 OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. to the creature. Let an inspired apostle answer such an objector in his summary way : ^' Nay, but man, who art thou that repliest against God V When will men cease their cavils, and learn to receive the teachings of the Bible as the words of inspiration ? How long, in the very face of the plainest declarations of the Scriptures, will they continue to cavil and speculate as if they were wiser than God ? " Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one ves- sel unto honour and another to dishonour ? What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make hia power known, endured with much long suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction ; and that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore pre- pared unto glory ?" Rom. ix. 20-23. But if Paul's summary answers to such objections are not satisfactory, let us go back to first principles. Let us go back to the dark hour of the fall, and see the whole race lying under the curse of a •*• broken law. Here lie all the difficulties involved in the whole subject ; and if the Arminian can comprehend why it is that God has permitted sin to enter his moral government with all its fearful train of evils — if he can rid this question of its insuperable difficulties, then, and not until then, OBJECTIONS ANSWEBED. 141 can lie with any show of consistency or propriety urge his objections to any part of the Calvinistic view of the plans and purposes of God as revealed in his word. Youi- affectionate son. LETTEE XIII. ANOTHER IMPORTANT DOCTRINE — DECREES OP GOD — FEELING OP CUMBERLAND PRESBYTE- RIANS — STATEMENT OF THE DOCTRINE — OB- JECTIONS ANSWERED. Dear Father : — Before closing these letters, it becomes necessary for me to notice another im- portant doctrine in the Calvinistic system, which is also involved in the views I have already pre- sented, and which has given me many an hour of anxious thought. I allude to the doctrine of the divine decrees, as presented in the standards of the Presbyterian Church, and confirmed by the plain teachings of the Scriptures, in accordance with the principles of both reason and common sense. There is no doctrine, perhaps, in the whole Calvinistic system that is more caricatured and misrepresented by Arminians of every class than this J and none against which Cumberland Pres- byterians have manifested more violent and bitter hostility. A single incident will serve as an illustration of the state of feeling that prevails throughout the church. (142) DECREES OF GOD. 143 Before I felt it my duty to sever the many ties that bound me to the church of my friends, my home, and my birth, I was strongly solicited, as you are aware, to take charge of one of her weekly journals. I felt anxious, then, to serve the church in some capacity, and to go as far as a sense of duty would permit in accommodating myself to your feelings and plans of usefulness in declining life. But before giving a definite an- swer either way, I felt it my duty to unbosom to those who had manifested so much friendship and kindness my whole heart. I did not wish to keep back anything, notwithstanding it might disappoint the expectation of friends and the fondest hope of a parent's heart, whom I had learned to regard with the warmest and tenderest affection. The very first intimation, however, of my feelings and views upon the subject of doc- trine, called forth in reply a strange epistle from one who occupies the highest position in the church, from which the following is an extract : " Can it be," says he, '^ that you too are a convert to the system that teaches the blasphemous doc- trine that God prefers the damnation of millions of the human race, and has brought them into being for that special purpose? That he has ordained and brings to pass the very crimes for 144 DECREES OF GOD. which he damns the sinner ? If, indeed, you have any sympathy with that very simple and very ab- surd system of fatality, an editor's chair in the Cumberland Church is not the place for you." Concerning the writer^s views of the qualifications of a Cumberland Presbyterian editor, I have nothing to say, but against such abuse and cari- catures of those doctrines which, after mature in- vestigation, I have found in the word of God, I must be permitted to enter a most solemn and indignant protest. When men become imbued with the knowledge, or rather ignorance, that puffeth up, they imagine in their vain conceits, that they are able to scan the ways of the Almighty, and to understand the secrets of his counsels. They will go so far as to presume to dictate to G-od, as to what is the proper course for him to pursue in the admin- istration of his moral government; and in their blinded zeal for creeds and confessions, both written and unwritten, will even at times exalt man to the place of God, and give him a power over himself which Deity cannot control. The ignorance and presumption of such can only be equalled by their bigotry and their pride. And when the eternal truths upon which rest the throne of God and the happiness of man are held DECREES OF GOD. 145 up to illumine the darkness of their disordered vision, they have no other means of defence but to close their eyes upon the light, and raise the cry of " blasphemy'' and '^ impiety/' forgetting that they themselves are guilty of the charge, while thus railing at the purposes and counsels of God. Turn, if you please, to the third chapter of the Westminster Confession of Faith, and read there the statement of the doctrine as held by the Pres- byterian Church and drawn from the Scriptures of divine truth : " God, from all eternity, did by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass ; yet so as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures, nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather estab- lished.'' Is there anything here condemned by what is revealed ? Is not the language of the Scriptures even stronger upon the subject than this ? As we turn the pages of the sacred vol- ume, the doctrine seems every where to stare us in the face in the most unqualified form. Take, for example, such passages as the fol- lowing, which might be multiplied to an indefinite extent : " The Lord hath prepared his throne o 146 DECREES OF GOD. in the heavens, and his kingdom ruleth over all/' "All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing ; and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth ; and none can stay his hand or say unto him, What doest thou." "The counsel of the Lord standeth for ever, the thoughts of his heart to all generations/^ "What his soul de- sireth even that he doeth.'' " My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure.'' "' My word shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it." " The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord as the rivers of water ; he turneth it whithersoever he will." " The Lord hath made all things for himself; yea even the wicked for the day of evil." " A man's heart deviseth his way, but the Lord directeth his steps." "Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all num- bered." Ps. cxiii. 19. Dan. iv. 35. Ps. xxxiii. 11. Job xxiii. 13. Isa. xlvi. 10, Iv. 11. Prov. xxi. 1, xvi. 4, 9. Matt. x. 29, 30. Time would fail me even to cite the numerous passages bearing upon the subject — passages which the learning and ingenuity of man cannot wrest OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 147 from their proper meaning and application. The subject, in every aspect in which it can be viewed, is exhaustless. There is scarcely a doctrine re- vealed in the word of God that is supported by clearer and more weighty evidence, when once it is properly understood ; and yet there is scarcely a doctrine that has been more bitterly assailed, and against which more fruitless objections have been brought — objections which are continually being urged, both from the pulpit and the press, in a most unchristian manner. Bear with me for a moment, then, while I call your attention to several of the more prominent of these objections, and the painful task which I have undertaken will be done. It is said, in the first place, that the Calvinistic view of the divine decrees and the administration of the divine government, makes Grod the author of sin. I repel the charge and call for the proof. No Westminster Calvinist, no sound Presbyterian, has ever yet advocated any view that would lead to such a result. The Confession of Faith ex- pressly states that the decrees of God are such as that he is not and cannot be the author of sin. The affirmation is not contained in an isolated pro- position, but is a part of the doctrinal formulai-y itself. Read again the language of the Confession 148 OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. of Faith as quoted above. "What more does it say, or what more can it Le made to say, than that God has wisely, freely and unchangeably ordained whatsoever comes to pass, yet so as he is not the author of sin ? Let language be taken in its most obvious meaning, and the whole difl&- culty is at once made to disappear. Let a proper stress be laid upon the three little words which are here made emphatic, and the far famed ghost has for ever vanished, which has so often haunted the pathway of the student of theology, and of which the Arminian delights to relate such marvels and wonders. I never yet have seen or heard of a Presbyterian who held that God exerted any physical agency or direct influence upon any of his creatures to lead them to sin. If any Methodist or Cumberland Presbyterian will be so kind as to inform me of one, I will lay down my pen, and seal my lips upon the subject, till he is removed from the pale of the church. And until this can be done, the charge, that Presbyterians make God the author of sin, applies with equal force to their own system. They can- not deny that God is the author of all his intelli- gent creatures, and also of the circumstances that gave rise to the introduction of sin into his moral government. But in admitting this self-evident OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 149 proposition, they have admitted that in which the whole difficulty is involved. Another objection that is urged against the Calvinistic view of the decrees of God is that it destroys the free agency of the creature. I might answer this objection by asking what is meant by free agency ? This, however, would lead me into a discussion foreign to my present purpose. By refeiTing again to the doctrinal formulary as quoted above from the Confession of Faith, you will find that upon its very face this objection is also clearly obviated. We are there plainly told, in language that cannot be misunderstood, that the decrees of God concerning every event are made in accordance with his wisdom and holiness of character, so as therehi/ neither is he the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creature. If anything more is needed, turn to the Scriptures. Listen to Peter on the day of Pentecost, as he charges home upon the Jews the murder of the Son of God : '' Ye men of Israel hear these words; Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you by miracles, and wonders, and signs, which God did by him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know; him being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken and by 13* 150 OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. wicked hands have crucified aud slain. '^ Acts ii. 22, 23. Here is a clear case where the act and the manner of the act had been fixed by " the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God," and yet it was done freely, and with wicked and cruel hands. But this is not the only case. I might turn over the leaves of the Bible at random, and upon every page almost find an illustration of the. same principle. Nothing can be made plainer than that God ordains the time, the place, and the circumstances of events, and yet leaves men free in acting while they are bringing to pass what he has wisely ordained. The Arminian tells us there is a difficulty here that he cannot com- prehend. Is this any reason why the plain teach- ings of the Bible should be rejected, and ex- changed for the vain and foolish imaginations of men ? Upon the same principle we might reject every important doctrine that God has revealed to man. But if the Arminian wishes to make the limited faculties of a fallen and corrupted worm a standard by which to measure the purposes and ways of the Almighty, he must look well to his own system. There is a beam in his own eye which must be removed, before he can see clearly to take the mote from his brother's eye. The same diffi- OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 151 culty he is urging against the Calvinistic view of the divine sovereignty and decrees cleaves to his own; and in condemning his brother he is con- demning himself. The foreknowledge of God presents the same difficulty. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, saw it and was frank enough to acknowledge it. Adam Clarke, the Sampson and the Hercules of leaVning among his followers, saw it, and was led to the denial of one of the essential attributes of God, which, if we were disposed to retaliate upon the enemies of Calvinism with their own weapons, we might in truth pronounce to be " a libel upon Deity ;" for what can be more essential in an architect in rearing a massive building, than to know whether it will stand or fall, especially if its tenants are liable to be buried in its ruins ? I am aware, however, that an attempt is made by many to show an imagined difference between the consequences of foreknowledge and foreordi- nation ; but it is far from being satisfactory. A distinction can easily be drawn between the two when viewed with reference to the mind of man, whose knowledge is drawn from experience and observation, and who reasons from cause to effect over which he has no control ', but in the mind of God, the great First Cause or Creator of all 152 OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. things, the one necessarily involves the other. For example, I am as certain that the sun will rise to-morrow as I can be of any event — though of this I am not absolutely certain ; for the fiat of God may unhinge the universe before the morning light — but God forsees it with perfect vision and with absolute certainty, because he has foreordained it. . Again, the prophet Isaiah fore- saw through a long vista of years the sufi"erings of Christ, yet he cannot in any sense be said to have foreordained them; but God who sent his Son into the world for the redemption of man, and raised up Pilate and Herod, the Gentiles and people of Israel, was able to throw the burning picture upon the vision of the prophet, because he hsid foreordained that they should be gathered together to do whatsoever his hand and counsel determined before to be done. Acts ii. 23; iv. 27, 28. I am ready to concede that there is a wide dif- ference between foreknowledge and foreordination when viewed with reference to finite beings ; but in the mind of God, I say, the one necessarily in- volves the other. If I am certain to be saved, or certain to be lost, and God is the author of my being, a denial of the doctrine of foreordination or even of foreknowledge itself, does not free the OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 153 subject of a single difficulty. In fact each denial serves only to multiply and increase the difficul- ties ten-fold. The whole subject of the divine decrees is in- volved in two simple questions, which every one is doubtless prepared to answer. First, did God when about to exert his creative power in bringing into existence a universe of creatures, comprehend in his infinite mind a perfect plan of his work ? And second, is the existing state of things in ac- cordance with that plan ? If a man can answer both of these questions in the affirmative, he stands upon Calvinistic ground; if in the negative, he has no foot-hold either for an Arminian or any other intelligible creed. If an omniscient God has no plan of his work, or if the existing state of things is not in accordance with that plan, where, I ask, is the goal, short of the denial of the most essential attributes of the divine char- acter ? And that goal many in the Cumberland Church, following in the footsteps of those who have gone before, have already reached. They tell us, as do Arminians of almost every class, that both the wisdom and the power of God have been exhausted in endeavouring to prevent the introduction of sin into his moral government, and to defeat the machinations of devils and those 154 OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. in rebellion against him, and yet he himself is defeated ! Heathen fatality is often charged upon the Calvinistic system -, but here it is in its worst possible form. Jupiter while he was under the dominion of the Fates still held an empire over mortals; but an all-wise and omnipotent God is here brought under the dominion both of the Fates and of mortals too. It was such strange absurdities in the Arminian system that pressed upon me and drove me to the stronghold of the sovereignty of God, " who doeth according to his will, in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, whose hand none can stay, or say unto him, What doest thou V Dan. iv. 35. Your afifectionate son. LETTER XIV. SUMMARY PROPOSITIONS — CONCLUSION. Dear Father : — I have endeavoured to present in as clear and brief a manner as possible, some of the operations of my mind, upon a few points of doctrine that divide the church, in reaching the position that I now occupy. Much remains to be said. Subjects of the deepest interest and im- portance are opened out before me, which I would gladly present in addition to what has already been said ; but I must forbear. I have already continued these letters longer than I intended when I commenced. Enough has been said, I trust, to satisfy you that I have acted wisely, at least cautiously, in the change I have made in my ecclesiastical relations. I wish, in conclusion, to sum up what I have written in a few propositions ', and would seriously and affectionately urge them upon your attention, as you may find leisure and inclination to examine them. 1. Arminians are without any consis- tent AND harmonious SYSTEM OE DOCTRINE. It is true that in speaking of the doctrines of (155) 156 SUMMARY PROPOSITIONS. those who hold to Amiinian sentiments, we are in the habit of using the word system, but it is only as a matter of convenience and courtesy. Some of those doctrines may sustain a logical connection with others — such as the doctrine of falling from grace and the denial of divine efficiency in con- version and sanctification — but Arminianism, as a whole, is a coat of many colours, that has been patched and pieced since the days of Pelagiiis, according to the taste and caprice of the man that wears it. 2. Their principles directly and neces- sarily LEAD TO THE MOST DANGEROUS AND RUiNors ERROR. It requires not the logic of an Aristotle or a Bacon to follow them out to their legitimate consequences. He that runs may read them, though a wayfaring man and a fool in worldly knowledge, if he has only a few cor- rect principles to guide him, and will open his eyes to the light. It is painful to witness the ignorance and stupidity of men — the^ malignity and opposition to the truth — who have learned to misrepresent, caricature, and abuse Calvinism, with such bitterness of feeling, till, like a rattle- snake in dog-days, they have become blinded by the poison of their own minds. It requires but half an eye to see, that the view of the fall of SUMMARY PROPOSITIONS. 157 man and tlie relation we sustain to Adam, as found in the standards of the JMethodist Church, vitiate the whole gospel scheme ; that the princi- ples growing out of the view there presented, lead to fundamental error with regard to the nature of virtue and vice, and destroy all human accoun- tability ; that the nature of the remedy found in the same standards necessarily destroys all motive to intelligent action and labour upon the part of the Church in the great work before her ; holds out no encouragement to prayer ; degrades the character of God to that of a debtor and apolo- gist for injuries he has done to the creature 3 and exalts the creature to heaven by a kind of semi- omnipotence of his own. Such consequences as these, I say, are dangerous and ruinous. They have already been noticed in connection with others, but the half has not been told. o. There is no way in which those who REJECT THE DOCTRINES OF THE CaLVINISTIG SYSTEM CAN ESCAPE THE DIFFICULTIES AND AB- SURDITIES OF Arminianism. Starting with the Calvinistic doctrine of human depravity, as Meth- odist and Cumberland Presbyterians are compelled to do, in form, if not in fact, there is no point from which we can diverge from the Calvinistic route, if we continue it a single step, until we get 14 158 SUMMARY PROPOSITIONS. beyoud the doctrine of imputation — until we Lave found our way through the mountain pass of theology. Having got thus far, we are compelled to adopt views of the nature of the atonement and the moral condition of man^ wholly incompatible with every principle of Arminianism. Moreover, the man who can subscribe to the Calviuistic doc- trine of imputation cannot, with the least show of consistency, urge a single objection to any of the other parts of that system. After swallowing and digesting a camel, it is then too late to begin to strain at gnats. Having got thus far, there is no other alternative but to continue on, if we wish to escape the perils of the wilderness ; for every difficulty in Calvinism may be resolved into this one doctrine. But if a man's unbelief and preju- dices are such that he cannot subscribe to the doctrine of imputation, he must be content with following upon the heels of Arminianism, and adopting all its errors and absurdities ; or crowd off into the numberless by-paths that lead the deluded traveller into the ulterior and darker regions of Pelagianism : or he must wander like the Arab of the desert, who pitches his tent as suits his convenience, lives upon his cameFs back, and clothes himself with the spoils of the plun- dered merchant. summary propositions. 159 4. The position of the Cumbert^nd Church, in a doctrinal point of view, is one that cannot long be maintained. " The middle way" is everywhere the watch cry of her leaders ; but where is it ? Xo intelligent answer has yet been given to this question. The world is tired of waiting. It is true the Westminster Confession of Faith has been mutilated and patched by unskilful hands, and published to the world as containing new and important discoveries in theology — as containing some of the prominent points in the newly discovered middle route. But something more must be done to save the hopes and credit of the Church. She has departed from the most important principles contained in her Confession of Faith. Upon the floor of the xissembly, as I have. before said, it has been pro- nounced " a ragged afiair," — a sentiment which I would not repeat, were it not for the fact that the man who uttered it was furnished by the same Assembly with means and countenance to estab- lish a Church paper. Every development made in the history of her doctrines shows, as I have before said, a tendency to the extremes of Armiuianism, In proof of this you have not merely the result of my own, observation, but the publications of the Church 160 SUMMARY TROrOSITIONS. SO far as any have yet been made. I have before me a book entitled, ''A Plea for the Cumberland Presbyterian Church." Its author is the lamented relative to whom I referred in my first letter. It is a work of some five hundred pages, and has for one of its leading objects, as stated in the preface, '' to answer the inquiries so often made as to what the Cumberland Presbyterians believe, and where- in they differ from others.'^ Now turn to that part containing an " apology" to the Methodist Church, and you will see that the only point of difi'erence in theology considered worthy of notice, is with regard " to the perseverance of the saints." What, then, has become of the Calvinistic doc- trines of the fall of man, the imputation of the sin of Adam to his posterity, the imputation of Christ's righteousness to the believer in justifica- tion, and others I need not mention, found in the Cumberland Confession of Faith, as taken verbatim from the Westminster ? They have been gradu- ally discarded and given place to the rankest Ar- minianism, or something worse. The doctrine of the final perseverance of the saints must go too. It is impossible for the man who holds to one or two principles of Arminianphilosoph?/, to advocate such a doctrine with any show of consistency, not- withstanding it may be found upon every page of CONCLUSION. 161 the sacred volume. The doctrine of " falling from grace'^ is nowhere found in the Scriptures, as you yourself are ready to acknowledge. It has been forced upon the Methodist Church by a singular philosophical and practical necessity, and the Cumberland Church must take it also, or abandon her philosophy and practice. 5. The Calyinistic system, as laid down IN THE STANDARDS OF THE PrESBYTERIAN Church, is the only one that I could find, CONSISTENT WITH THE WORD OF GOD AND WITH ITSELF. That it is a system, is admitted upon all hands — even by its most bitter opponents — and that it contains much important, fundamental and saving truth. In this admission everything is conceded. Truth is one, and indivisible ; it can no more be made to unite with error, to form a system harmonious and complete, than oil and water can be made to mingle together, their liquid drops. Light has no fellowship with darkness — nor Christ with Belial — nor truth with error. Here, then, is the conclusion of the whole matter. In all my investigations I have found many creeds, but one sf/sfem — and that is Calvin- ism — a system, solid and compact as the temple of old, where God displayed his presence and glory, the stones and timbers of which had all 162 CONCLUSION, been hewed and numbered at the quarry and among the cedars of Lebanon, so that the most inexperienced workmen could j5t them together, if the foundation was properly laid — a system which I found, after the most careful examination, to be seamless, woven from top to bottom — a chain, whose golden links unite heaven and earth together, and bind the humble and contrite to the throne of God. For the present, I will lay down my pen, which I can assure you was taken up with a trembling hand, and an aching heart. If I have said any- thing calculated to give offence to those whom I love, I trust you will extend to me a father's charity, and attribute all to a praiseworthy zeal for those truths which have cost me so many painful struggles and such a sacrifice of friendly feeling. I am, as ever, Your affectionate son. THE END. Princeton Theologpcai Semmary-Speer Library 1 1012 01144 6806