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 Def CHRISTIAN EXAMINER, 
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REVIEW. 
 
 An Impartial Exposition of the Evidences and Doctrines of 
 the Christtan Religion, addressed to the better educated 
 Classes of Society, by J. H. McCutuon, Jr., M. D., Au- 
 thor of “Researches, Philosophical and Antiquarian, con- 
 cerning the Aboriginal History of America.” Baltimore : 
 Armstrong & Berry. 1836. Svo. pp. 346. 
 
 Ir is not often that we are presented with a theological 
 treatise by a layman; not sa often as we could wish. There 
 are reasons why we should regard such productions with pecu- 
 Jiar interest. Though usually less furnished with theological 
 learning, laymen possess some decided advantages for religious 
 investigation. ‘They can speak out without fear of a congrega- 
 tion, presbytery, bishop, or synod; and though they cannot be 
 supposed to be so far exempt from the common weaknesses of 
 our nature as to be’ free from all party biases, they are cer- 
 tainly less liable to partiality than the professed divine, who 
 must be supposed to be enlisted by connexion, by interest, or 
 by sympathy on one side or the other of the great questions 
 which divide the Christian church. 
 
 These considerations apply with peculiar force to a work on 
 the Evidences. What has a layman to gain by vindicating 
 the truth of Christianity ? His temporal interests are not at 
 all at stake. His pride cannot be enlisted to establish the 
 respectability of that which makes him respectable. We are 
 disposed, then, to receive what he says as his simple and honest 
 
2 McCulloh on the Christian Evidences. — 
 
 convictions, which he promulgates to the world, only because — 
 he deems them true and important. 
 
 Another consideration, which makes lay theology peculiarly 
 worthy of regard, is the fact, that the clergy, as a body, are apt 
 to lag behind the people in the march of opinion. Such has 
 been hitherto the organization of church establishments, that it 
 has been unsafe for the clergy, either to examine for them- 
 selves, or to avow their opinions. It is certainly folly, — when 
 a.man’s opinions have been manufactured to his hand by some 
 provident council ages ago, and he has pledged himself to 
 maintain them at all events, — to go over again the grounds 
 on which they are understood to rest. If he comes to the 
 same result, he only believes with evidence what he before 
 believed without. If he comes to a different conclusion, he 
 has condemned himself to be either a heretic or a hypocrite 
 for the rest of his life. The clergy, therefore, need occasion- 
 ally to hear some awakening note from the people to urge 
 them forward, or at least to save them from being left entirely 
 in the rear. 
 
 We repeat it, therefore, we are glad to see such books as 
 this. We are glad to see a full, free, independent expression 
 of individual opinion. It is in this way alone, that any thing 
 valuable can be added to theological knowledge. ‘The repeu- 
 tion of other men’s ideas, the emptying of one book into 
 another, does us no good. Let every man state precisely 
 what is in his own mind. No matter if it be eccentric or 
 paradoxical, provided that it is sincerely held, and has been 
 well considered. Let him give us the impressions which any 
 subject makes on his own intellect, and then we have another 
 independent suffrage, or at least one more distinct intellectual 
 phenomenon, to further our investigation of truth. 
 
 The treatise under review had its origin, as the author states 
 in his Preface, in parental solicitude. 
 
 “When I first undertook to write the following Essay, I had no 
 intention whatever of making it public. I was solely influenced 
 by the suggestions of parental solicitude to prepare something 
 that should assist my own children to the better comprehension of 
 a subject, which I deemed of all others most important. But, 
 when the work was nearly finished, it seemed to me that its publi- 
 cation could not but have a beneficial influence at the present 
 time, when the institutions of the civilized world seem to be on 
 
McCulloh on the Christian Evidences. 8 
 
 the eve of a great change, in which new opinions must subvert 
 ancient prejudices, and society be regulated by a theory of princi- 
 ples very different from those, which have hitherto influenced the 
 interests of mankind.” — p. v. 
 
 We are glad that he has published his thoughts. As yet, 
 it is true, they have not made much noise except in his own 
 immediate vicinity, and probably never will make much. 
 They present, nevertheless, a sufficiently clear and able expo- 
 sition of a state of mind on religious subjects by no means 
 peculiar to the Author, but common to a large number of reli- 
 gious and inquiring laymen throughout the country, who, like 
 him, still continue attached to Orthodox churches, though they 
 have renounced Orthodoxy itself, and are feeling about, with 
 such helps as they can command, to find some other and bet- 
 ter foundation of trust. The volume is interesting and valua- 
 ble, therefore, as indicating a change which is everywhere 
 passing over intelligent and active minds among the Ortho- 
 dox, not professionally fettered, and the direction which this 
 change is beginning to take; and it is chiefly on this account, 
 that we are led to notice it so much at length in this journal. 
 
 The plan here pursued in the discussion of the Christian 
 Evidences, though not new, differs from the common one. 
 Most writers on this subject have availed themselves of what- 
 ever assistance they supposed might be derived to our faith, 
 from Natural Religion and man’s moral constitution. Butler, 
 Locke, Hartley, Clarke, Priestley (who professes to have 
 derived most of his principles on the subject from Hartley), 
 Jenyns, Paley, and very lately Lord Brougham, have all 
 considered the cause of revealed religion to be strongly cor- 
 roborated by what we know of God and duty by the light of 
 nature. Our author finds this ground preoccupied by the 
 Deists. Here they have entrenched themselves, and here 
 they have erected their batteries against Christianity. They 
 say, that revelation cannot be true, because it contains things 
 which are inconsistent with the moral attributes of God, and 
 the immutable distinctions of moral propriety established in 
 the mind of man. Before any progress can be made in 
 demonstrating the truth of Christianity, these assailants must 
 be dislodged and discomfited. And this he attempts to do, 
 not by reconciling with what are called the principles of 
 Natural Theology and the moral sense, those parts of the 
 
4 McCulloh on the Christian Evidences. 
 
 Scriptures to which the Deists object as being inconsistent 
 with them, but by annihilating the ground on which they 
 stand, and utterly denying that Natural Religion teaches us 
 any thing with regard to God’s moral attributes, and that our 
 own moral constitution is any criterion by which to judge of 
 the propriety or impropriety of the acts of the Deity. To 
 this purpose more than a hundred pages are devoted before he 
 proceeds to the direct proof. This he rests entirely on the 
 credibility of the sacred writers as witnesses of a supernatural 
 interposition to enlighten mankind. From -the Scriptures, and 
 from the Scriptures alone, he thinks, do we derive any evi- 
 dence of the moral attributes of the Deity, and from them 
 alone do we derive any moral distinctions, which are of suffi- 
 cient authority to be applied as a test to the propriety of his 
 _moral actions. Whether he has done wisely in thus thinking 
 to annihilate Natural Religion, the reader must judge. 
 Our Author begins by observing : 
 
 ** Now before we can undertake to estimate the truth or false- 
 hood of Christianity, it is of essential importance, that we first 
 ascertain the actual value of the principles by which we are to 
 make our decision. In other words we must accurately determine 
 the following particulars : 
 
 ** What is the actual amount of knowledge, that we derive from 
 the study of Natural Theology ? 
 
 ‘“‘ What is the actual value of those principles, that constitute the 
 Theory of Natural Religion ? 
 
 “* What is the true theory of Moral Distinctions, 7. e. what is it 
 that makes one action to be right and another wrong ? 
 
 “What is it that constitutes a man a credible. witness, and 
 what is it that makes us mistrust and reject the testimony of 
 another 2”? —p. 24. 
 
 He then proceeds to estimate the value of the dogmas, as he 
 calls them, which constitute Natural Religion. 
 
 “Our actual knowledge concerning the origin of religious 
 dogmas, may be stated in a few words. The past history of man- 
 kind, exclusive of the Bible, does not communicate to us any 
 information, how the theory of religious obligation has originated. 
 The most ancient records of human transactions, in every instance, 
 exhibit mankind as then living under the influence of religious 
 
 institutions, and the latest discoveries of modern enterprise, in’ 
 
 hitherto unexplored regions of the earth, inform us of a similar 
 
McCulloh on the Christian Evidences. 5 
 
 religious condition of things, with every newly discovered nation. 
 Hence it seems to be incontestable, that no nation, or people, have 
 ever yet been discovered, who were destitute of the theory of 
 religious obligation, and of which the following are the essential 
 dogmas. 
 
 ** Ist. That there are gods, creators, and governors of the world, 
 who rule all things, with both general and particular providence. 
 
 «2d. ‘That all men are responsible beings before the gods, and 
 accountable for their actions. 
 
 “3d. That the soul of man is immortal, and that, after the death 
 of the body, it shall exist in either happiness or misery, according 
 to the manner they may have lived in the present life.” 
 
 ..... “Instead of speculating how these dogmas originated 
 among men, we shall alone inquire into the value of the proofs or 
 arguments by which they are sustained.” — p. 29. 
 
 These dogmas, to our great surprise, our Author, with the 
 exception of the first, finds altogether unsupported by the 
 appearances of the universe. After a labored discussion he 
 comes to these conclusions concerning them, to our mind, we 
 must confess, most extraordinary. 
 
 “Ist. ‘That our universe, and all it contains, is the production 
 of intelligent power, but whether of one or more gods we cannot 
 determine. 
 
 «2d. Of this god, or gods, we have not the smallest idea, except 
 that he, or they, possess great power and intelligence; and it may 
 be important to add, we are altogether unable to discern their pos- 
 session of excellent attributes, such as benevolence, mercy, jus- 
 tice, &c. 
 
 ‘3d. Weare unable to perceive, that the moral affairs of human 
 life are superintended by any particular providence, and that uni- 
 versal experience opposes such a notion. 
 
 “Ath. That there is not only no proof, but on the contrary it is 
 against all fact, and the evidence of our senses, to believe that the 
 intelligent principle of man is immortal, and consequently we have 
 not the smallest reason to justify the theory of future reward or 
 punishment. — p. 73. 
 
 Of these striking conclusions we have space to examine but 
 one, and that is the proof of the Divine benevolence. ‘This, 
 every one must perceive, depends on the apparent predomi- 
 nance of happiness or misery, in those beings that are made 
 capable of both. 
 
 ** Now,” says our author, ‘‘ with respect to mankind, there can 
 
% 
 
 6 McCulloh on the Christian Evidences. 
 
 be no dispute, that human life is so much embittered by sorrow, 
 affliction, and pain, so much by tyranny and oppression, so much 
 by poverty and disease, that, in all ages, every moral writer what- 
 ever has exhibited human nature as being essentially unhappy ; 
 and death, however much we dread his approach, has ever been 
 regarded as our great deliverer from the troubles of human life. 
 The Scriptures decidedly take the same view, and, in short, none 
 but certain advocates of natural theology, hold any other language 
 on the question of fact.” ..... ** As he (God) is, by his visible 
 works, possessed of infinite power and intelligence, so, as he has 
 not appointed a happy state and condition to human existence, it 
 follows that we have no reason whatever to consider him good, 
 from any view derivable from our experience of his providence.” 
 — pp. 46, 47. 
 
 He also contends, that, “‘ with respect to the brute animals, a 
 stronger position against the theory of the divine goodness may 
 be sustained.” And, in another place, he thus concludes ; 
 ‘Ifa man will have a positive dogma on the subject of the 
 nature and attributes of the Creator, he can come to no other 
 conclusion, reasoning only from nature and experience, than 
 that the Deity was totally indifferent to human and animal 
 happiness.” 
 
 The facts here assumed, it will be perceived, rest entirely on 
 individual opinion, an opinion which we confess we had never 
 before either seen or heard expressed, except it may be in 
 some moment of great suffering or passionate grief. The 
 conclusions, then, which are drawn from them, will be satis- 
 factory only to those, and we cannot help hoping they will 
 be but a small number, who coincide with him in this opinion. 
 But, supposing it proved that the Creator is ‘totally indif- 
 ferent’ to the happiness of his creatures, and man especially, 
 —nay, more than this, that suffering actually preponderates, 
 and, therefore, as our author has cut off all consideration of 
 any compensation in a future state, that the -balance inclines 
 rather to the side of his malevolence ; — this being proved, we 
 seriously would inquire, if the foundations of revelation as well 
 as natural religion be not equally shaken. It immediately 
 establishes a presumption against a revelation. If God be 
 * totally indifferent”? to human welfare, it becomes improbable 
 that he would make a revelation at all, if its purpose be to do 
 man good;—much more, if he be in any degree malevolent. 
 Besides, unless you consider the goodness of the Deity, and 
 
McCulloh on the Christian Evidences. a 
 
 his care for human happiness, to be proved by the light of 
 nature, how can you possibly prove the truth of revela- 
 tion ;—- we do not here mean that it is a revelation, but that 
 what is revealed is true? You can place no dependence on the 
 divine veracity. Veracity is certainly a moral attribute; and 
 our author denies, that we can know any thing of the moral 
 attributes of God by the,light of nature. Veracity, moreover, 
 in this case is blended with the divine goodness, and that, he 
 says, bas no evidence in nature. A God whose moral attri- 
 butes are by supposition unknown, and who is “indifferent ”’ 
 to the happiness of mankind, would be quite as likely to de- 
 ceive them in a revelation, as to create them in a condition 
 “essentially unhappy.” Are we told that the Scriptures 
 assert that God is true, and therefore his veracity may be 
 proved from them? We answer, that this assertion makes a 
 part of that very revelation, the truth of which cannot be 
 proved, except by assuming as proved or made probable from 
 some other source, that God himself is true. It isto be feared 
 then, we think, that our author has made too great a sacrifice 
 in order to silence the infidel objections derived from natural 
 religion. Jn giving wp the moral attributes of the Detty as 
 being antecedently unknown, and indiscoverable by the leht 
 of nature, he has abandoned the only ground on which revela- 
 tion itself can be defended. 
 
 Our author next proceeds to dispose of the objections 
 brought by the Deists against the Scriptures, from what they 
 call the immutability of moral distinctions. ‘hey say that the 
 God of the Scriptures is represented in the Scriptures to have 
 done this and that, which contradict our ideas of moral pro- 
 priety, and therefore they are to be rejected as coming from 
 him. ‘This objection, which is similar to the last, he disposes 
 of in much the same manner. He meets it by saying, that our 
 ideas of moral propriety are relative only to ourselves, and 
 totally inapplicable to the Deity ; and therefore we have no 
 right to say that any thing whatever which has been done, or 
 is said to have been done by him, is either right or wrong. 
 He sums up the argument in the following manner. 
 
 «Then all that we claim for Christianity is, that it shall not be 
 supposed condemnable for any statement it has made concerning 
 Jehovah, or his proceeding with mankind, on the very intelligible 
 ground, that we know nothing whatever concerning his nature and 
 
 2 
 
8 McCuiloh on the Christian Evidences. 
 
 attributes,” ..... “Tivery attempt to estimate the morality of 
 God’s act, by what is called the immutability of moral distinctions, 
 has never failed in a single instance to end in error, folly, and 
 110) (10) 8) (=) Or “‘ All that moralists have ever written on the sub- 
 ject of moral obligations, extends to no system more universal than 
 is embraced by the word Philanthropy. Virtue and morality, jus- 
 tice, right, &c., are mere synonymes with philanthropy, and it 
 is impossible for us to give them any other universality.’ — pp. 
 105) ve, OL 
 
 We shall attempt briefly to examine the correctness of 
 these positions. In the first place we observe, that they take 
 for granted the truth of a hypothesis, which, to say the most, 
 has as yet gained but few suffrages, and which seems to us to 
 be positively false ; namely, that utility is not only the foun- 
 dation of morality, and the safe and proper one for men to 
 adopt when they come to years of discretion ; but that it is 
 constituted the standard in the human mind from the first, — 
 the first and only criterion by which the mind judges any act 
 to be right or wrong. ‘This, we repeat, we do not believe to 
 be a fact. Of this every human being is a sufficient judge. 
 
 _He has only to ask himself, if to perceive any action to be 
 calculated to promote the enjoyment of another, be the same 
 as to perceive it to be right? Is not the simple perception of 
 right and wrong in the mind long antecedent to the complex 
 perception of an action’s being calculated to produce good on 
 the whole? Does not the child’s consciousness of the crim- 
 inality of lying, long precede his knowledge of the social 
 evils, which at length grow out of it? 
 
 Benevolence or philanthropy, so far from being the su- 
 preme authority of the mind, and the standard of action, is no 
 authority at all. It is a motive, an affection, and belongs 
 rather to the heart than the mind. It has a power above it, 
 to which it is subjected, instead of reigning supreme, — this 
 very sense of right and wrong. And we have no other evi- 
 dence that it is good to be benevolent, except this very sense 
 of right and wrong, which assures us that benevolence is right 
 and malevolence is wrong. It is not a fact then, that all 
 moral principle can be resolved into philanthropy. ‘That God 
 has so constituted the moral sense, that its instinctive judg- 
 ments shall coincide with the greatest good of the human 
 race, we do not deny. Such an ordination corresponds to 
 that wisdom which forms the embryo bird or fish for the 
 
McCulloh on the Christian Evidences. 9 
 
 element in which it is afterward to live. But that the per- 
 ception of that good is the ground and constituent element of 
 the moral sense, we utterly deny. 
 
 Whether right and wrong can be made universals or not, or 
 whether they must be confined to the transactions and rela- 
 tions between man and tnan, will appear, if we analyze the 
 ideas contained in this distinction, and consider what they 
 imply. ‘Phey imply an agent, with perception, choice, power, 
 intention, and some sentient being to suffer or enjoy. Now, 
 for one being to destroy the happiness of another being when 
 innocent, strikes our minds as unjust, morally wrong. We 
 know of no exception to this. ‘The idea that it is wrong and 
 unjust to make an innocent being miserable, on the whole, is 
 as self-evident as that two and two make four. And it makes 
 no difference whether the agent be God or man. It is impos- 
 sible for us to view it in any other light. ‘The circumstances 
 of absolute property, and resistless power, make no differ- 
 ence. Might cannot make right, in the divine, any more 
 than it can in human governments. Let the case but fairly 
 be made out, and the mind decides as promptly in the one 
 case as in the other. 
 
 It would not be a satisfactory answer then to the Deist, 
 nor a fair one, when he objects that there are things im the 
 Bible represented to have been done by the Deity which 
 cannot be reconciled with our moral sense, to say that we 
 know nothing as to what would be right or wrong in the 
 Divine conduct. Our author’s argument covers every possi- 
 ble supposition, and must be equally good in every supposable 
 case. No matter what tissue of moral obliquity a revelation 
 may charge upon God, it is all the same. He gives, then, 
 the Deist, ail he asks; a case utterly irreconcilable. All we 
 can say then is, that the matter is brought to this dilemma, 
 supposing such an indisputable case can be found in the 
 Scriptures ;— either that the God of the Scriptures is not 
 good, or that the revelation does not come from him. Take 
 the latter alternative, and its authority is gone of course. 
 Take the former, and it is equally destroyed ; “for a revelation 
 from a Being not good, can have no claim to our trust. Is it 
 said that these Scriptures assert that he is good, and their 
 assertion must be emphatically received as true? We an- 
 swer, if they contain records of transactions on his part utterly 
 irreconcilable with goodness, as the Deists affirm, and our 
 
10 McCulloh on the Christian Evidences. 
 
 author supposes possible, then they likewise assert or imply 
 that he is not good, and so contradict themselves, and thus 
 neutralize their own authority. 
 
 Unless there be some fallacy in the preceding arguments, 
 we fear we shall be compelled to conclude that the Deist’s 
 hands would be strengthened, instead of being palsied, by the 
 proposed annihilation and abandonment of natural religion, 
 and the denial of the applicability of moral distinctions to the 
 Deity. And, if this be the case, we see not how we can 
 avoid the conclusion, that the first hundred pages of the book 
 have carried the author to a greater distance from his object, 
 than he was when he commenced. 
 
 The next two chapters relate to the nature of the evidence 
 by which the Scriptures are sustained as a Divine revelation. 
 This he considers to rest on one point, the credibility of the 
 writers. ‘‘In conformity with opinions already announced 
 on a preceding page, I reiterate the belief, that the only sure 
 argument upon which we can receive the Christian religion 
 as a Divine institution, depends upon the absolute credibility 
 of the biblical writers. If we can prove them absolutely free 
 from every imputation of knavery and fraud, I cannot see 
 how their testimony can be rejected.” 
 
 There is much valuable matter in these chapters, particu- 
 larly on the subject of miracles. We have never seen this 
 subject yet set in its true and proper light. “‘ Since a past 
 miracle can have no argument or demonstration of its truth 
 embodied in itself, but is absolutely dependent on historic 
 relation, | apprehend they cannot in themselves be brought 
 forward as matters of evidence to us at the present day. 
 Their whole force, as divine evidence, appears to have been 
 exhausted on the eye-witnesses.” And yet we suppose the 
 writer would agree with the Apostle, that, if Christ be not 
 risen, our faith is vain, and Christianity a delusion. What 
 ground then do they occupy? We confess we have never 
 seen this subject thoroughly investigated. We are disposed, 
 however, to give ‘credibility’ of the witnesses a much wider 
 signification than our author. He makes it to rest exclu- 
 sively on their honesty and disinterestedness.. We apprehend 
 that he has confounded two things here, which it is necessary 
 to keep distinct ; because the mind always does so in weigh- 
 ing testimony. This distinction is between the credibility 
 of the witnesses, and the credibility of the facts to which they 
 
McCulloh on the Christian Evidences. 11 
 
 testify, as supported by their testimony. ‘This latter depends, 
 ina great measure, on the nature of the facts themselves, 
 their antecedent probability, their consistency with the known 
 laws of nature, and with each other. ‘Thus, when we read 
 the testimonies of the Apostles concerning Christ, we do not 
 look solely at the apparent sincerity and honesty which they 
 exhibit, but likewise at the intrinsic probability and con- 
 sistency of their narrative. We cannot keep out of our 
 mind the probability or improbability of God’s making a reve- 
 Jation at all, at such a time and such a place, the character 
 of Christ and his religion, and other particulars of the same 
 general description. These are consider ‘ations, which we can- 
 not possibly separate from our estimate of the credibility of 
 the facts, even if we would. When, therefore, our author 
 asserts, that he rests the truth of Christianity on the honesty 
 and disinterestedness of the witnesses, he must be understood 
 as expressing only an individual opinion, stating merely what 
 seems the strong point to him. 
 
 And this leads us to express a conviction long entertained, 
 and which this publication has contributed to strengthen, of 
 the almost entire inutility of one man’s writing books of Evi- 
 dences for another, and almost, indeed, of writing books of 
 Evidences at all. ‘The evidences are plainly cumulative in 
 their nature, and are most convincing, when viewed by the 
 mind at once, and are rather weakened when separately dis- 
 cussed. Bacon’s censure of the Schoolmen applies here with 
 the greatest force. ‘* Questionum minutiis scientiarum frangunt 
 soliditatem.” ‘“¢ Considered as a whole,” he proceeds to say, 
 “like the fabled Scylla, it seems beautiful and specious ; but 
 when you descend into distinctions, it ends in monstrous 
 altercations and barking questions.” 
 
 One argument strikes one, and another another. More 
 than a hundred years ago, Locke wrote a book to show that 
 Christianity was to be “believed because it is reasonable. A 
 half-century later Soame Jenyns wrote another, to show that 
 it is to be believed because it is unreasonable, so utterly 
 contradictory to the principles of the human understanding, 
 that the mind of man could never have invented it. Lord 
 Brougham, on the other side of the Atlantic, publishes a book 
 in which he asserts, that miracles even cannot substantiate a 
 revelation which contradicts the principles of Natural Reli- 
 gion. Almost simultaneously a book comes out in America, 
 
12 McCulloh on the Christian Evidences. 
 
 which annihilates Natural Religion altogether, and denies that 
 it has a single dogma of sufficient certainty to form a criterion 
 by which to judge of the claims of a revelation. It is plain, 
 that no progress can be made in this way in the conviction of 
 skeptics. ‘They have only to set the different defenders of 
 the cause to quarrelling with each other, and thus neutralize 
 their authority. Let each state his own grounds, but let him 
 not attempt to invalidate the arguments of the other. Let 
 them do so, and this very fact, that there are so many inde- 
 pendent minds, convinced by independent arguments, will 
 show the richness and variety of the evidence, and thus de- 
 monstrate, that, when aggregated instead of divided, it must be 
 absolutely overwhelming. 
 
 The Bible, if it be from God, we may be sure, addresses 
 men in the best possible manner; and if it does not convince 
 them, just as it is, it must arise from some mental or moral 
 obliquity, which argumentation will be the last thing to cure. 
 And, paradoxical as it may seem, we believe that discourses 
 on the Evidences are generally among the most useless which 
 fall from our pulpits, even in congregations where doubt is 
 most prevalent. They suggest two objections where they 
 answer one, and are almost always found, in the end, to 
 unsettle many more minds than they confirm. 
 
 We do not, of course, mean to say, that there is any defi- 
 ciency in the evidence by which revelation is supported ; 
 we speak merely of the mode and need of its formal exhibi- 
 tion and examination. “ The whole need not a physician, but 
 those that are sick.’’? As for those whose faith has been dis- 
 turbed by deistical books or arguments, they may be occasion- 
 ally benefited by books of Evidences. Still we believe the 
 great battle is fought over the sacred pages, with very little 
 foreign aid. ‘The process through which the commonest mind 
 passes, 1s strictly philosophical ; quite as much so, as if guided 
 by the greatest masters of formal logic. It is, we believe, 
 something like this. ‘ Here is a book wnzque in every par- 
 ticular. Its doctrines concerning the Divine Nature are im- 
 measurably more pure and exalted, than those of any other 
 book or system of religion that the world has else exhibited. 
 Its doctrines concerning our moral and spiritual nature find a 
 witness in the inner man, of their truth. Humanity, under its 
 auspices, rises to a purity, strength, perfection, and happiness, 
 unimagined even by the human mind without it. ‘The God 
 
McCulloh on the Christian Doctrines. 13 
 
 which it reveals is the same God we see in nature, and is 
 represented to have interrupted the laws of nature in order to 
 give man evidence of his interposition, in a manner not un- 
 suited to the dignity and benevolence of his character. We 
 see, moreover, in the character of Christ, a moral miracle, 
 quite as striking as any change in the physical universe could 
 be. ‘These are actual facts, phenomena, presented to the 
 mind for its explanation. It must have some theory of their 
 origin. Which is the most probable, revelation or fiction ? ”’ 
 Now we aver, that no book ever has exhibited, or ever can 
 exhibit these considerations with the force, and comprehen- 
 siveness, and concentration, with which they are presented by 
 the Bible itself. The famous treatise of Dr. Paley, concern- 
 ing ‘the labors, dangers, and sufferings of the Apostles,” as 
 utterly fails of bringing before the mind the broad and general 
 grounds of belief in Christianity, as a narrow arm of the sea 
 fails of exhibiting the vastness and depth of the ocean. We 
 doubt whether one reader in ten of that book ever thought of 
 resting his faith on that individual point, on which he lays the 
 whole stress. 
 
 The most substantial and valuable part of this book is the 
 chapters on the constitution of the Jewish church and state. 
 Much of this is certainly new and very ably handled. The 
 author shows conclusively, from the independence of the 
 orders of the Priests, the Prophets, and the Kings on each 
 other, that there is absolutely no room for suspicion of collu- 
 sion and fraud. We commend these chapters to all thinking 
 men, and especially to the clergy, as containing much that 
 will strike them as fresh and valuable. 
 
 Our readers will be curious, we suppose, to know what our 
 author, having proved the truth of revelation, considers it to 
 teach. This division, on Doctrines, though not the most im- 
 portant, is certainly the most curious part of the work. If 
 the opinions there expressed may be considered, and we are 
 inclined to think they may be, as the index of progress of 
 mind on these subjects in this country among men of informa- 
 tion, they lead us to some gratifying conclusions. The . 
 position occupied by our author may be pretty well calcu- 
 lated, when we say, that he discards the doctrines of Original 
 Sin and the Trinity. Indeed, we have never seen the doc- 
 trine of Original Sin more lucidly and ably refuted. 
 
14 McCulloh on the Christian Doctrines. 
 
 ‘That all men,” he says, “ without exception, are more or 
 less sinful in their lives before Jehovah, arises not from any in- 
 herent taint or corruption, such as is imagined by the theory of 
 Original Sin, but from the fact that we are intellectual and moral 
 beings of an imperfect constitution, undergoing a probationary 
 discipline before him as free agents. As such, exercised on the 
 perfect law of Jehovah, we sometimes do right, and sometimes we 
 do wrong. How could it be otherwise? ‘The very theory of our 
 probation anticipates our disobedience as well as our obedience. 
 What else could be expected of free agents under trial? If 
 any man could keep the law of Jehovah perfectly, he is a perfect 
 being, and no longer in an imperfect condition.” —p. 271. 
 
 “Tf Adam and Eve fell without any taint of Original Sin, why 
 should our transgressions be considered a proof of the existence of 
 Original Sin inus? Adam and Eve’s transgression was not 
 less in its moral obliquity than any of our offences. If they 
 therefore sinned without Original Sin, it never can be inferred 
 that our transgressions proceed from that source.” —p. 267. 
 
 “With this plain exhibition of the fallacy of the doctrine of 
 Original Sin, I apprehend that we are not required to discourse 
 at large upon predestination, election, effectual calling, persever- 
 ance of the saints, and sundry other doctrines growing out of the 
 theory of Original Sin. These all fall together by the exposition 
 we have made above; for they are not taught in the Scriptures, 
 and are but doctrines of men made through unjustifiable infer- 
 ences.” — pp. 274, 275. 
 
 On the doctrine of the Trinity he is equally explicit. 
 Though he refuses to speculate, he rejects this doctrine as 
 not contained in Scripture. 
 
 “ Nothing can be clearer, nor more distinctly expressed in the 
 Scripture, than that God, meaning thereby Jehovah, is one. — 
 Tere ts put one Gop. — This is also the doctrine of the Trini- 
 tarians; there is but one God, though there are three persons in 
 the Godhead. | 
 
 “Bat, do the Scriptures anywhere use the word Trinity? . Do 
 the Scriptures anywhere say, there are three persons in the 
 Godhead? No, not ina single text, for the oft-quoted passage 
 of 1 John v. 7, has been, long since, shown to be a corruption, 
 _ and is admitted to be so by all the more eminent critics of the 
 present day. 
 
 ‘The doctrine of the Trinity, then, is one which men have 
 
 inferred from the Scripture writings, and is not a doctrine of 
 formal revelation.” — p, 278, 
 
McCulloh on the Christian Doctrines. 15 
 
 A. person, who had been accustomed to divide the Chris- 
 tian world into two classes, Unitarians and ‘Trinitarians, would 
 have no hesitation, we imagine, in placing the writer of the 
 above in the former class, but in the following paragraphs he 
 would find himself corrected. 
 
 “But if the doctrine of the Trinitarians be presumptuous and 
 contrary to the exhibition of the Scripture writings, what must we 
 say of that of the Socinians or modern Unitarians? I am at a 
 loss how to express myself upon this subject ; on the one hand they 
 profess to found their belief on the Scriptures, and largely quote 
 it to prove their doctrine. On the other hand, as I understand 
 the Scriptures, I have no hesitation in stating my opinion, that 
 their expositions and doctrine, in its important features, are 
 directly contrary to the whole scope and tenor of the Scripture 
 writings. I have no right to impugn the honesty or sincerity of 
 the Socinians, but I am perfectly at a loss how to reconcile their 
 Opinions with the Scriptures. Judging by the light of my own > 
 understanding and conscience, I do consider the doctrines of 
 modern Unitarians to be entirely subversive of the Christian 
 religion, so far as I can comprehend the subject; and, this being 
 the case, I will not hesitate to bear my testimony against such 
 opinions. If the Scriptures do teach us, and I am clear on this 
 point, that salvation from our sins is only to be attained through 
 the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ, and in virtue of that inter- 
 cession that he makes continually with the Father for us, so I 
 cannot consider the Unitarian doctrine other than an absolute 
 departure from the theory of the Scriptures, and a formal rejection 
 of that salvation which God has freely offered to us. Too reject 
 the mode that God has appointed, leaves no alternative and no 
 hope. What then shall the end of this be? 
 
 ““In the course of a very general reading upon the moral and 
 religious speculations of men, I have been often disturbed by the 
 extreme difference that sometimes existed between their views and 
 my own, but with none have I been so much disposed to lose 
 patience as with the Socinian writings. The excellent Arch- 
 bishop Tillotson, on one occasion, speaks of Socinus as ‘a great 
 master of reason,’ and which I shall concede to be the fact from 
 such commendation, for I have never seen his works; but I defy 
 any other sect of Christians, except the Unitarians, to read the 
 works of Priestly [Priestley], of Belsham, Evanson, and other 
 of their champions, without being amazed at their reasons, and 
 shocked with their apparent presumption. 
 
 “‘ But though I consider the Trinitarian doctrine to want Scrip- 
 tural authority, and that of the Socinians to be altogether con 
 
 3 
 
16 McCulloh on the Christian Doctrines. 
 
 tradictory to the Scriptures, I cannot advocate the hypothesis of 
 the Arians. I cannot but consider it presumptuous to determine 
 so incomprehensible a subject according to any hypothesis.’”’ — pp. 
 
 280, 281. 
 
 We had hitherto supposed that all possible opinions con- 
 cerning the nature and dignity of Christ were comprehended 
 under the three denominations of Unitarian, Arian (which is 
 in reality Unitarian), and Trinitarian. But here is attempted, 
 not a terteum, but a quartum quid, irreducible to any known 
 category, because undefined. How far it may be possible for 
 a human mind to think of Christ at all without assigning him 
 any specific rank in the universe, we shall not assume the 
 province of determining. If we examine the thing a little 
 closer, we shall find that our author has a greater dread of 
 heretical names than heretical sentiments. For, while he 
 denies the ‘Trinity, he denounces the Unitarians ; and, while 
 he disclaims the name of Arian, he hesitates not to advance 
 Arian opinions, for in one place he expresses himself thus ; — 
 * Jesus Christ, whom he of his infinite mercy sent into the 
 world from a state of preexisting glory, that we might be saved 
 from our sins.”’ Now how a man, who entertains such an 
 opinion, can be other than an Arian of some species, as_ that 
 term is commonly received, we confess ourselves unable to 
 see. And, what is still more surprising, in advancing this sen- 
 timent we find him treading the very ground which he has 
 forbidden to others, founding doctrines on inferences. It is 
 nowhere expressly asserted that Christ existed in a previous 
 state of glory. Robert Hall, one of the most able, earnest, 
 and, we may add, bitter advocates of the doctrme of the 
 Trinity, admits that it is merely a doctrine of inference, ex- 
 cept in one passage, — ‘‘ Before Abraham was, I am,’ —and 
 this passage, when examined, will be found to have quite as 
 great ambiguity as the rest. It does not positively assert that 
 Christ existed before Abraham, because the verb is in the 
 present tense. It may not be a verb of existence at all, but 
 only of affirmation, and used, just as it is in other cases, with 
 the ellipsis of he, or the Messtah; as when he says, “If ye 
 believe not that [ am, ye shall die in your sins;” that is, 
 “that lam he,” or the Messiah. It may mean, therefore, 
 according to the current use of language in the Scriptures, that 
 Jesus was personally promised, or designated in the counsels 
 of Jehovah, as the Messiah, before the days of Abraham. 
 
McCulloh on the Christian Doctrines. 17 
 
 Biblical criticism is not a subject with which we have a 
 right to expect a layman to be intimately acquainted. From 
 the specimens we have of it in this book, we should hardly 
 suppose the author to have examined this subject with suffi- 
 cient accuracy to justify a positive, not to say, dogmatic opin- 
 ion upon it. For in the very paragraph, in which he speaks 
 of the preéxistent glory of Christ, he quotes the Scripture as 
 saying, ‘There is one God, and one Mediator between God 
 and man, the Lord Jesus Christ.”” ‘The words of Scripture 
 are, ‘the man Christ Jesus.” Another passage he quotes as 
 bearing decisively on this subject. “ Say not in thy heart, Who 
 shall ascend unto heaven? that is, to bring Christ down from 
 above; or, Who shall descend into the deep? that ts, to bring 
 up Christ again from the dead.” Deeper investigation would 
 have convinced him, according to the opinion of the best com- 
 mentators, that Christ is here, by a common metonymy, put 
 for his doctrine or religion. 
 
 Of the facility with which he likewise can draw unauthor- 
 ized inferences from the Scriptures, we have still further proof 
 in this very passage. He goes on to quote. ‘‘ But what 
 saith 22 The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in 
 thy heart ; that 1s, the word of faith, which we preach ; that 
 af thou confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt 
 believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, 
 thou shalt be saved.’ In other words Paul observes, ‘Do not 
 concern yourselves how Christ descended from heaven, nor 
 how he again ascended to his glory ; believe the fact, that he 
 did descend, and that he again ascended with power sufficient 
 to save as many as shall call upon him.’” Now we affirm, 
 that, in this very passage, St. Paul makes saving faith to com- 
 prehend no such article as the descent of Christ from heaven, 
 or from a state of preéxistent glory. ‘The only essential 
 article is his resurrection from the dead, —“‘ and shalt believe 
 an thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou 
 shalt be saved.” Will not this, we ask, comprehend the 
 simplest form of Unitarianism ? 
 
 This brings us to our last topic, his denunciation of the 
 Unitarians and his reasons for it. It cannot be certainly for 
 the main article of their creed, that from which they derive 
 their name, —their maintenance of the simple unity of God 
 in opposition to a Trinity ; for in that opinion he coincides. 
 And, by so doing, he must subject himself to the bitter revil- 
 
18 McCulloh on the Christian Doctrines. 
 
 ings, which that sect suffers on all sides. ‘Those who main- 
 tain the Trinity, he must be aware, consider that between 
 them and all others, there is a great gulf fixed. But our 
 author, though a Unitarian in some sense, is sure that he is on 
 the safe side of the gulf, and that that gulf is not the Trinity, 
 but the Atonement. “If the Scriptures do teach us, and | 
 am clear on this point, that salvation from our sins is only to 
 be attained through the sacrificial death of Christ, and in 
 virtue of that intercession that he makes continually with 
 the Father for us, so I cannot consider the Unitarian doctrine 
 other than an absolute departure from the theory of the Scrip- 
 tures, and a formal rejection of that salvation, which God has 
 freely offered to us. ‘To reject the mode that God has ap- 
 pointed, leaves no alternative and no hope.” 
 
 We cannot but be astonished at the rashness with which 
 charges so grave are made, and a doom so dreadful is de- 
 nounced, upon specifications so exceedingly vague and indefi- 
 nite. Such is the extreme ambiguity of the language used in 
 this passage, such the number of distinct propositions which it 
 may contain, the denial of either of which may be fraught 
 with unutterable peril, that we must examine them in detail. 
 ** Salvation from our sins is only to be attained through the 
 sacrificial death and intercession of Christ’? may mean, in the 
 first place, that our past sins could not have been pardoned on 
 repentance, had they not been expiated by Christ ; or it may 
 mean, that our deliverance from the dominion and practice of 
 sin can be accomplished only by those divine aids which 
 were purchased by his death; or it may mean simply, that 
 Christ sacrificed his life to persuade men to renounce sin. It 
 may mean that sincere repentance, and all other acts and 
 exercises of a religious man, are inefficacious and unaccepta- 
 ble unless accompanied by this specific element of belief, that 
 the death of Christ was sacrificial and expiatory. Now, in the 
 denial of which of all these possible meanings of this allega- 
 tion, lies the deadly delinquency of the Unitarians? Suppose 
 it to lie in the last, which on the whole, is more probable, we 
 ask if it be either reasonable or scriptural to suppose, that a 
 sincere penitent Christian man must inevitably be lost, because 
 he does not look on the death of Christ as sacrificial and propi- 
 tiatory? Ifthe death of Christ be propitiatory and expiatory, 
 it must be so independently of human belief or unbelief. It is 
 a transaction finished and completed ages ago. If it was in- 
 
McCulloh on the Christian Doctrines. 19 
 
 tended to produce an effect on God to remove any obstacle in 
 him or in his law, that obstacle has been removed. ‘The only 
 fact, in which practical faith can be at all interested, is the fact, 
 that God is now ready to pardon sin on sincere repentance. 
 The practical point is the readiness, not the manner in which 
 it has been brought about. ‘There is no greater inducement 
 to repentance and obedience, on the supposition that Christ 
 died to produce that readiness, than on the supposition that he 
 died to give mankind assurance of it. And, even admitting 
 the sacrificial and expiatory nature of Christ’s death to be 
 true, it cannot be proved that even those who fail to recog- 
 nise it as such, are to be shut out from the benefits of it, 
 unless it can be shown from the Scriptures that God has 
 specified this element of faith im Christ, that his death was 
 sacrificial and propitiatory, as indispensable, superadded to 
 all other requirements. ‘The matter then is reduced to a 
 question of fact, Has he made such a requirement? We 
 affirm that he has not. And instead of running over all the 
 texts of Scripture on this subject, we shall recur to the 
 author’s own view of atonement and saving faith, which he 
 has formally summed up, a mode of proceeding which ought 
 certainly to be satisfactory to ham. “If thow shalt confess 
 with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine 
 heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thow shalt 
 be saved.” Here is the fundamental and all-comprehending 
 article of Christian faith according to our author, but not one 
 word in it of the sacrificial and expiatory nature of the death 
 of Christ. We do not say too much, then, when we affirm, 
 that he is not only narrowly bigoted, but grossly inconsistent, 
 in condemning Unitarians as lost. 
 
 But the ambiguities of this unsparing condemnation are not 
 yet exhausted. A sentence of so grave a nature as inevitable 
 perdition, one would suppose, ought to rest on charges most 
 specific in their statement, and most explicitly made out, 
 “'To reject the mode that God has appointed leaves no alter- 
 native and no hope.” ‘The most natural meaning of reject, is to 
 refuse to accept, to refuse to act upon or avail one’s self of 
 any thing. Now it does not appear, according to our author’s 
 own showing, that the death of Christ, as far as it was sacrifi- 
 cial, has ever been offered to man either for his acceptance or 
 rejection. God, to whom it was addressed, has already 
 accepted it. Man can accept or reject only what is offered 
 
20 McCulloh on the Christian Doctrines. 
 
 to him. Not the alternative of believing or not believing, 
 that the death of Christ was sacrificial, is offered to man, but 
 of accepting or not accepting the mercy of God thus procured, 
 on condition of true repentance and sincere obedience. And 
 do Unitarians reject the mode which God has appointed in 
 this: sense? As far as human judgment is concerned, their 
 lives and characters must answer. If their lives and char- 
 acters will not suffer by a comparison with the mass of their 
 fellow Christians of other denominations, if their faith in 
 Christ, evinced by their reception of his revelation as the 
 word of God, and worshipping the Father in his name, and, 
 in the midst af persecution and reproach, building temples fay 
 the inculcation of his religion, has the power to purify the 
 heart and overcome the world, we know of no sense, except 
 one of the most narrow and irrational bigotry, in which they 
 ean be said to reject the mode of salvation which God has 
 offered. Of all men, we should suppose, that our Author 
 ought to beware of wholesale denunciations for mere shades 
 of Aaith, after such tremendous departures from Orthodoxy as 
 he avows in this book. He must be aware that he 
 
 “but teaches 
 Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return 
 To plague the inventor.” 
 
 He must be aware, that, if he establishes the principle that 
 a precisely accurate faith as to the nature of the Atonement 
 be necessary to salvation, the great mass of Christians may 
 mourn over him as quite as Yiable to damnation, quite as 
 guilty of “rejecting the only mode that God has offered,” 
 in failing to recognise the infinite nature of the Victim, as the 
 Unitarians are in “failing to perceive that the death of Christ 
 was literally an expiatory sacrifice. [Further and more en- 
 larged investigations, we are sure, would convince him that the 
 nature of the Atonement. is such, that, among those who 
 believe the fundamental proposition, "which he himself has laid 
 down as the corner-stone, the resurrection of Christ, the only 
 fatal heresy is a wicked, irréligious life ; that Atonement is a 
 practical, not a speculative subject, ranoneliation to God by 
 repentance and reformation, “when by wicked works we were 
 enemies to him;”’ and that every man receives the benefits 
 of it just so far a he, by a religious life, enjoys peace with 
 God, and the testimony of a good conscience. 
 
McCulloh on the Christian Doctrines. 21 
 
 His violent prejudices against the Unitarians seem princi- 
 pally to have been excited, not by the general doctrines of 
 the sect, but by some particular passages or statements of 
 some of their champions, such as Priestley, Evanson, and 
 Belsham. He ought to be sure, that the whole denomination 
 participate in those obnoxious sentiments, before he condemns 
 them in a body. Priestley, though one of the greatest men, 
 and one of the sincerest and humblest Christians, who have 
 ever lived, mingled with his religious opinions some philo- 
 sophical dogmas, which have no more connexion with those 
 opinions than with any other creed,— materialism and phi- 
 losophical necessity, — dogmas, which, whether true or false, 
 cannot but be chilling and revolting to the great mass of man- 
 kind, and would be sufficient, we fear, to sink any religious 
 system, however true, to which they might be attached. He 
 has, besides, on religious topics, advanced some sentiments, 
 and adopted some modes of expression, for which it would be 
 altogether unjust to make all who are denominated Unitarians 
 responsible. ‘The head and front of EXxvanson’s offending con- 
 sists in having collected and arranged the facts, that altogether 
 annihilate the doctrine of verbal inspiration, which was so long 
 and so obstinately maintained, but which all, who have any 
 tolerable acquaintance with the subject, now perceive it to be 
 necessary to abandon, in order to sustain the divine authority 
 of the Scriptures. And we are sorry to see men, high in place, 
 disingenuous enough, in order to excite horror against the 
 sect among the common people, to criminate the Unitarians, 
 and join in the outcry against them for advocating a theory 
 which they know to be true, and without which they know 
 that inspiration of any kind cannot be sustained for a moment. 
 Mr. Belsham may have been unfortunate in his modes of ex- 
 pression, and extravagant in some of his positions, and may 
 have shocked some even of his own denomination, as well as 
 many out of it; but we believe, that those, who follow in his 
 steps of patient, careful, learned investigation, will always find 
 it more easy to be shocked with his presumption, than to 
 answer his arguments. 
 
 One word more on the use of names. It is a standing 
 maxim of the low morality of the world, that “ all is fair in 
 politics.” Would that we could say that the same principle 
 is not acted upon, though not avowed, in polemical discussion, 
 and in the tactics of sectarian struggle. Here we have a gen- 
 
29 McCulloh on the Christian Doctrines. 
 
 tleman, who maintains the character of high moral worth, and 
 who would scorn to utter a slander or a base insinuation e any 
 kind; and yet we find him applying the name “ Socinian” toa 
 large ‘Hody of professed disciples of Christ, without even, accord- 
 ing. to his own confession, having read ie works of Seahiks. or 
 knowing of course, what his peculiar opinions were, or whether 
 there was any coincidence between them and the opinions of 
 modern Unitarians. But he dzd know, that the Unitarians of 
 the present day disclaim that name, and that the word So- 
 cinian has been for centuries a nucleus of all evil and hateful 
 associations, which, in the minds of many, may be said 
 instantly to defile and pollute any thing to which it is applied. 
 
 To use our author’s language, there is nothing with which 
 we are so apt to lose patience, as with the moral obliquity and 
 fraud, which are exhibited in the pulpits of this land every Sab- 
 bath day. We see men stand up there as the advocates of 
 justice and righteousness, truth and honesty, and, in the same 
 breath, couple together, in one sweeping anathema, Atheists, 
 Infidels, and Unitarians. Do they not know, that the impres- 
 sion they make upon their uninformed hearers is slanderous 
 and false? Do they not know, that they are doing what in civil 
 affairs would be an indictable offence, and be followed by pro- 
 secution, and the loss of moral shameeer and all honorable 
 reputation? Do they not feel the gross injustice, the cruel 
 wrong, which they do their brethren, when, to excite odium 
 against them, they class them with the deniers of a God, and 
 the rejecters of all revelation; men, who worship God and 
 revere the Saviour, and who labor, according to their own views 
 of truth and duty, to build up his cause ?: However the Unitarians 
 may fall behind their opponents in professions of piety, we 
 hope that they may never be left to fall so low in point of 
 morality, as to endeavour to throw odium on their adversaries 
 by invidious names and slanderous classifications.