THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA THE COLLECTION OF NORTH CAROLINIANA C378 UK3 UNIVERSITY OF N.C. AT CHAPEL HILL 00036721217 This book must not be taken from the Library building. Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive in 2010 witii funding from University of Nortii Carolina at Chapel Hil I http://www.archive.org/details/christianityonlyOOpalm CHRISTIANITY, THE ONLY RELIGION FOR MAN. A DISCOURSE DELITERED BEFORE THE GRADUATING CLASS UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA, JUNE 4, 1855. BY B. M. PALMER, D. D., COLUMBIA, S. C. RALEIGH : PRINTED AT THE OFFICE OF TEIE " CAROLINA CULTIVATOR." 1855. tJ.MVERi^ITY CnATEL, ChAPEL HiLL, N. C, • Jufw. bfh, 1855. Dear Sir: — You will please accept the sincere thanks of the Graduating Class, for the interesting Sermon, addressed to us, last evening, in thi? house. It is but littlo, that wc acknowledge our more than satisfaction, and high appreciation of the eflbr' ; allow us to gay, that we are not contented to have hoard once, so learned and masterlj' a discourse, which convinced us so thoroughly of the D-ut/i of Christianity ; but, we desire to turn over its pages (rurselves, and offef to others the same privilege. We would, therefore, res- pectfully solicit a copy for publication. Adding our own earnest solicitation to that of the class, and hoping vou may see fit to comply with our request, we beg leave to sign ourselves, Your bumble serv'ts, J AS. H. COLTON, JAS. PARK, D. E. MoNAIR, Committee of the Grad. Clasy. jRev. B. M. J'alnur, D. D. Chapel Hill, N. C, Jv.ne 5, 1855. To Meters. J. H. Colton and oilers, Cmnjnittee, Gentlemen— I herewith place in your hands, the Discourse deliveie'l on last evening, hoping and praying that its serious perusal may, by the Divine Spirit, be blessed to those fur whom it was prepared. With sincere reciprocation of the kindly sentiments yon have so gratefully expressed in yonr note, I am, Gentlemen, Very truly yours, B. M. PALMKR. SERMON. JOHN VI. 68, 69. " THEN SIMON PETER ANSWERED HIM, LORD, TO WHOM SHALL WE GO." " THOU HAST THE WORDS OF ETERNAL LIFE : AND WE BELIEVE AND ARE SURE THAT THOU ART THAT CHRIST, THE SON OF THE LIVING GOD." The miracle of feeding five thousand men with five barley loaves, was one so practical and use- ful, that the despairing patriotism of the Jews was suddenly revived. The spirit of sturdy independ- ence nourished through fifteen hundred years of a supernatural and sacred history, but which had chafed under nearly six centuries of tributary sub- jection, was now panting for a deliverer, as when the cry of their Fathers went up to Hea- ven under the oppressions of Egypt. Might not this wonder-working prophet again judge Israel with such deeds as when the rams' horns of Joshua blew down the walls of Jericho : or when the com- panies of Gideon broke their pitchers against the camp of the Midianites ? And with such a cham- pion might not the rainbow of the ancient glory fonce more encircle the throne of David ? With siich thoughts, tracking the Saviour's mysterious path across the sea of Galilee, the excited patriots 6 were soon to learn that His kingdom " was not ' meat and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." " Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of Man shall give unto you ; for Him hath God the Father seal- ed." This plain language, the only answer which is returned to their ambitious proposal, the Jews with all their bias, could not well mistake. They evidently understood Christ as professing to found a new and spiritual dispensation ; and requiring all other systems to be renounced, not excepting Ju- daism itself. As they filed away in disappointment and anger, He who came to His own saw with sorrow His own receiving him not ; and turning with deepest pathos in His tone, He said unto the twelve, '* Will ye also go away ?" With that characteristic ardour which made him always the speaker of the Apostolic College, Peter replies, — " Lord, to whom shall we go ? Thou hast the word of eternal life." He means to say in behalf of his colleagues and himself, that they adhere to Christ upon the very grounds on which others deserted him, because He was " the true God and Eterni*i Life.' Religious wants were developed in their breasts, which made them require such a teacher as "that Christ, the son of the living God." The choice with them lay not between religion and atheism ; for a religion they must have, and the al- ternative was either of the true or the false. Upon a deliberate survey of all systems, both of philoso- phy and religion, Christianity alone was found to solve their doubts and to satisfy their wants. Young gentlemen, you have seen in the Camera a broad landscape of lake and forest lie, in beauti- ful though diminished proportions, upon a sheet of paper. It is so with the text. Here in the pregnant reply of Peter is found an argument, which covers the whole breadth of our nature. — His rapid interrogation, " to whom shall we go," confesses man's need of a divinely extracted reli- gion. His affirmation reveals the essential condi- tions it must fulfil, in teaching " the words of eter- nal life." I propose now to fill up this bold outline with well-considered proofs of these two points : I. — Tliat mariDs religious nature constrains him to jmd repose i/n some form of faith cmd wor- ship. H. — That the xoants of this natwre^ well under- stood^ are met onl/y in Christianity^ as taught in the Gospel. I shall dwell chiefly upon the second proposi- tion ; though the first merits attention as antece- dently the ground-form of the other. It would evidently be supererogatory to discuss the pre-emi- nent fitness of any one religious scheme, if men 8 caa dispense with all schemes alike. The question then recurs : I. — Has man a religiou-s Tiature which compels him to the faith and warship of God? To answer this question, let us consider — 1. The elements which enter into our own moi'dl constitution. Take conscience^ for example. With- out entering into abstract discussion of the nature of conscience — whether it be an independent and single faculty, or only a name given to the complex operation of all our powers, when directed to mo- ral subjects — upon any view, it is that department of our nature which makes us cognizant of law. As the understanding distinguishes between the true and the false, and as the taste discriminates be- tween the beautiful and the vile, so conscience au- thoritatively decides between the right and the wrong. Now the question arises, what is the origi- nal ground of these moral distinctions, the source from which they spring ? Evidently, the theory of Hobbes does not exhaust the inquiry, that they are entirely the creatures of human prudence, and have their foundation in human legislation. It is suffi- cient to reply that human law is itself a creation, and can suggest nothing beyond the contents of the lawgiver's own mind. In tracing a stream to its source, the navigator will not pause thus at what is at best only the mouth of a single tributary. We 9 are yet to be told how these moral distinctions first occurred to the legislator, to be impressed upon his code ; and how, when suggested by him, they should obtain so uniformly among men, as never yet hap- pened with any institutes that were purely arbitra- ry. If, then, we discover these operations of con- science to be universal, and can trace them in an ascending series above all human legislation, noth- ing remains but to insist upon all morality as eter- nal and immutable, existing ab extra, anterior to all earthly enactments ; and though requiring human relations as the sphere of its operation, yet having its ground in something far higher and more endur- ing. We have exhausted all analysis, when we refer it directly to the infinitely holy nature of God ; and make the divine will, however revealed — whe- ther in written statutes, or engraved upon our moral constitution — its ultimate standard. Since man was created originally in Jehovah's image, the divine law was stamped upon his nature, the essen- tial condition of his moral activity, just as the atmos- phere is the condition of life. To this law the con- science has respect in all its judgments, as the expo- nant of that morality of which the divine nature is the ground. Thus, if Conscience be a witness, seal- ing up its testimony to the Great Assize, its deposi- tions state the contrariety or agreement of human conduct with the precepts of this law. If it be a 10 judge, sitting upon God's lower tribunal in the soul, its decisions are but tlie interpretations of the same law. If it be a rule, it only proximately reveals the contents of that primary law. Nor does it af- fect the integrity of this argument, that Conscience, as a witness, is often corrupted by interest ; as a judge, is biassed by passion ; and as a rule, is per- verted by prejudice. Blinded by ignorance, de- filed by sin, and paralyzed by resistance, it is still an indestructible element of our nature. Mistaken often in her judgments, decisions she does render ; incorrect in her interpretations of the law, exposi- tions she will give ; and though drugged by opiates into occasional repose, the torments of the lost show she has power to awake, and take ample re- prisals for the wrong. If Conscience, then, be this organ of an original law impressed upon the soul, every response is a witness for God; and every Tiioral judgment is an oracle bidding man find his satisfaction only in a divine fellowship. Precisely the same line of argument might be pursued with any other element of our moral con- stitution, say the affections. It is as natural for man to love, as to breathe or to think ; and he does the one or the other by the uncontrollable necessity of his being. If he lock up his affections within his own breast, he pays the forfeit of disobedience to the social law of the universe in a blighted nature, mil- 11 dewing beneath the lichen and moss which cover its ruins. It is the peculiar property of love how- ever, that it carries itself unbroken and entire, to each object lying within a given circle. It is not something parcelled out in measure to each, until the whole is exhausted ; but flowing forth in a per- ennial stream, the volume is never diminished by the extent of its distribution. Thus the parent bes- tows upon every child, the entire wealth of his love; each having the whole, though it is shared by sever- al.* Nor do the human affections, like the watei*s of the Nile, overflow only a single Delta, but are distributed over all the relationships of life, lying as these do in concentric cu'cles;^so that the whole undivided heart is carried over from one cii'cle to another, until all are embraced in one comprehen- sive fellowship. What do the expansiveness and unity of our affections prove, but that when we have loved through the entire breadth of earthly relations, the undiminished heart remains to pour its treasures into the bosom of a Being higher and nobler than ourselves ? As it sweeps inward with increasing intensity of love within each narrower cir- cle, should it pause in its path until it rests upon the great I Am, who is the common centre of them all? Each radius of every circle in human society j * This thought is presented in Taylor's Spiritual Christianity. 12 conducts the heart to that central Being from whom all others spring, and around whose throne all human orbits are described. I must be content with merely sketching thf. outline of an argument, which cannot be filled up without expanding this discourse into a treatise. But you will readily see how the argument might be conducted from the intellectual 'powers^ feeling onward through all nature to God, who is the sum and source of all knowledge. And how again the ac- tive powers should find their rest and exercise alike, in obeying that Sovereign will which moves the whole machinery of the universe. But these side glances are sufficient to j'eveal that, place ourselves at what point we may, in that moral constitution we possess, not a single element but has a separate voice for God ; and whose passionate yearnings find no adequate expression, but in the language of ador- ing worship. 2. The existence of a religious nature may he infer- red from the tenacity with which religicms ideas^ mice commmiicated^ are retained hy the mind. The ne- cessary existence of God, His moral government, the holiness and immutability of His law, lie at the ba- sis of all religion. It is remarkable, that whatever be the source of our knowledge upon these points, they are accepted upon the first statement, and can never afterwards be dislodged. Received, like the 13 light, upon tlieir own evidence, however capable of proof by reason, they do not depend upon argu- ment for their propagation in the world. They seem to enter at once into the very texture of the mind ; so that though overlaid, obscured, perverted, they are never forgotten nor erased. Thus, for example, while " the glory of the incorruptible God has been changed into an image, made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and to four-footed beasts, and to creeping things," yet the great idea itself of God's existence has never been eradicated. The very superstition which has multiplied the one living Je- hovah into " Lords many and Gods many," and the idolatry which has attempted to symbolize and bring the Deity within the range of human thought, only show how originally cognate to the souls of men is the notion of a God. It would be easy to descend into a particular enumeration of religious opinions, which have resolutely maintained their dominion over the human conscience. The admis- sion of man's sinfulness and consequent ex]^)osure to the divine curse, is expressed in the deprecatory rites of every false religion. The myths and le- gends, which form the oracles of Pagan antiquity, universally recognise God's conversableness with man, notwithstanding his apostasy. The incarna- tion of the Deity looms out in the numerous Ayli- tars of the Hindoos, as well as in the anthropomor- 14 phic manifestations of the gods of classical mythol- ogy. The altar-fires which have burned upon every hill, lift up a universal testimony to the doc- trine of redemption by sacrifice. Indeed, these truths, broken off from an original revelation, have intermingled themselves, fragmentary and distorted, with all the superstitions of men. They have be- come interwoven with all their religious associations and emotions; and though rendered grotesque by the additions of a credulous superstition, they are nevertheless the archetypes of all those fables which describe God's commerce with mankind and contain thus the essence even of Heathen religion. Now, could these truths command so universally the im- mediate assent of men, if there was not a suscepti- bility for their reception ? And to what but the congeniality of a religious nature can we ascribe the fact, that amidst a thousand distortions and ob- scurations, they have never yet been eliminated from the human soul ? 3. But once for all : a conclusive argument for man's religious nature is found in the uni/versal prev- alence of religion and worship in so many diwerse forms over the globe. Man is no where without a religion. Even in that savage state, where the attributes of humanity are scarcely discovered, the traces of wor- ship can be detected among the Bushmen and Hot- tentots of Africa. We perceive it equally in the 15 ^symbol-worship of ancient Egypt, in the fire-wor- ship of ancient Persia, in the star-worship and divi- nation of ancient Chaldea. We trace it in the dreamy contemplations of the Hindoo, seeking ab- sorption into the pure being of Brahm ; and in the mystical theism of the Buddhist, who seeks in the Grand Lama a glorified man who shall be the High Priest of the Universe, the central manifestation and representative of the Divine intelligence. We dis- cover it in the old patriarchal faith of China, which makes social order the first principle of religion, and the Emperor the abiding representative of fatherly iauthority. It sparkles before us in the poetical my- thology of classic Greece, whose beautiful concep- tions, eschewing an abstract Divinity, transfigure men into Gods, presiding over all the departments of nature and forming a grand senate upon the top of Olympus. It clothes itself in the steel armour )of ancient Rome, and sits upon the Capitol as a re- ligion of Government and law. It utters itself in the wild battle cry of the Mahometan, claiming as Jiis mission the practical assertion of a sovereign will ruling over the earth, which had nearly become ob- solete amidst the theosophic speculations and idola- trous Image-worship of Christendom. Amidst the Idark forests of Germany, the Goth worshipped the earth as his mother, and bowed before the God of :the mist and the storm. 16 But I must not omit to mention what will strength- en my argument as much as it will awaken your ad- miration, the wonderful vitality of these ancient faiths, inadequate as they seem to resist a violent "* | pressure from without. Buddhism, for example, passed over from Thibet and Burmah into China, and drove before it the cold state worship of Con- fucius. But it could not entirely expel it : and now the two religions with all their antitheses are seen side by side, dividing the homage of the Celestial Em- pire. During five centuries the old Persian faith lay crushed and smothered under the Parthian dynasty. Yet it experienced at last a resurrection to power ; and the religion of Zoroaster, restored by the Ma- gians, connected the new kingdom with the old em- pire of Cyrus. Again it was overborne by the stern proscription of Mahometan fanaticism ; yet is it seen cropping out from the surface in an element of Pan- theism it has breathed into the doctrine of the Ko- ran. In like manner, the dreamy Hindoo religion, now hoary with the lapse of thirty centuries, survived the invasion of its kindred Buddhism ; and though again overlaid by the conquering creed of the Mus- sulman, its secret life was still preserved, surviving merely by its own passive endurance. How shall these facts of history* be explained, unless these various * All of which have been taken from Maurice's " Religions of the World." 17 systems are admitted to contain some element of trutli whicli finds an echo in the human soul ? We stand nowhere upon this broad earth where a ca- pacity for religion does not appear a characteristic of the race. Wherever we find the power of rea- son and the exercise of thought, we discover traces of the religious sentiment— often dark and gloomy, grotesque and wild, sensual and licentious, fanatical and bloody ; yet sufficient to prove that man is, in the broad etymology of the term, a religious be- ing. The only exceptions, I confess at all perplexing, are those persons in Christian lands, who seem to live without any restraints of piety or forms of de- votion; who enter no sanctuaries, and bow before no altars, and who speak only the language of profane- ness and blasphemy. It is a portentous fact that the only men, who even in ap^^earance are apostates from all religion, should be found in the heart of Christianity itself. Yet the strange paradox admits an easy solution. Where the forms of religion are Fuch as suit the carnal taste, man is under no temp- tj^tion to be a dissenter from the national worship. But where idolatry, in its Protean shapes, is exclud- ed by the light of the Gospel, there is no resource for that carnal mind which is enmity against God but in this practical Atheism. Yet is it moi'e apparent than real. The current religious opinions taken up 18 Deity. I might tell you of the long process by which this conception was transferred to the human mind, and wrought into human belief. How that for three thousand years, the inspired prophet has stood side by side with the historian, pointing to the judgments with which an avenging providence has overtaken the transgressions of men, converting all history into a discipline of this great truth, God's abhorrence of all impurity and sin. I might describe minutely that splendid Mosaic ritual given amidst lightning and tempest from the top of Sinai ; its sacri- fices, lustrations, and ablutions, creating a language of symbols to convey and express accurately to man the abstract idea of God's infinite holiness.* But the waning moments warn me not to attempt an ex- haustive argument. I must be content with asking where but in the Jehovah of the Scriptures do we find such a cluster of perfections as is set forth in this answer of our Sab- bath Scholar ? If we pass through the Pantheon of Pagan Greece, the God within each separate niche is but the personification of a single attribute. — Apollo, with his quiver and bow, embodies the con- ception of Wisdom ; Venus, that of love ; Mars, of power ; Bacchus, of inspiration ; Chronos, devouring his own offspring, of time stretching back into an * See this well presented in an anonymous work entitled " Philosophy of the Plan of Salvation?' 19 untold and unreckoned duration; while Jupiter himself represents only the abstract notion of supre- macy, or dominion. And when the acute Philoso- phy of Greece applied itself to the interpretation of these poetical Theogonies, and sought the deep and hidden ground out of which they sprung, even the Heirophants of the mysteries failed to combine these vsepairate qualities into one complex conception ; but lost themselves in the abyss of God's unfathomed being, or traced His manifestations only in a degrad- ing pantheism. But Christianity differs not less from all heathen religions in asserting the distinct personality of the supreme being. The term God in the Scriptures is not a mere envelope, binding into one complex con- ception these separate and abstract qualities, con. verting the Deity only into a bundle of attributes. The Bible presents Jehovah to our faith and wor- ship as a personal being, of whose living nature these perfections may -be predicated, and from which they are unfolded. When on the contrary we turn back to the religions of antiquity, we discover eith- er the mythical popular faith, through the creations of the poets, deifying the powers of nature, and multiplying Gods until they shall equal all her di- versified phenomena ; or else the speculative spirit resolving all into a philosophical pantheism, in which the universe was viewed as a concrete (deity, and 20 God was regarded only as the auimating soul of na- ture. In both cases, the personality of God was lost, and He was hoj^elessly entangled witli His uni- verse. Nor is it better when we pass to the more profound and speculative theosophy of the East. — The Indian mystic is lost in the dream of compass- ing the absolute intelligence of Brahm or Buddh ; and the Persian Magus is swallowed in the abyss of that illimitable Being, out of whom light and dark- ness alike spring. How shall the Infinite pass out from the ButJios of His own essence into manifesta- tion, and how shall he pass back again into pure be- ing ? How shall the chasm be bridged between the Infinite and the finite ? In vain does the oriental hypostatize the powers of Deity, and substitute liv- ing personalities for abstract mental conceptions. He has either peopled the universe with whole genera- tions of fantastic aeons, or, his dualism resolves itself into pantheistic manicheism. God is not a personal subsistence, but only a name givenv to the general notion of spirit ; which :becoming mysteriously co- agulated with matter, passes back through various stages of development and purification, until it is swallowed and lost in the abyss of the primal essence a2:ain. Here, then, does apologetic Christianity take her first ground of defence. She presents to man the living Jehovah as the object of worship : not the 21 personification of tliis or tliat single trait ; not the deification of this or that power of nature ; not a Pantheus wearing the universe as His outside gar- ment ; not the symbol merely of such abstract con- ceptions as absolute intelligence, or illimitable be- ing, but a living, personal God, a spirit infinite and eternal, separate from matter, creating all things by the word of His power, and by w^hom all things consist. It is not simple being, and then it is Brahm ; it is not pure intelligence, and then it is Buddh ; it is not a destroyer, and then it is Siva ; it is not a restorer, and then it is Vishna' ; it is not a malignant hater, and then it is Kali ; it is not an arbitrary and mighty ruler, and then it is Allah ; but it is the one living and true God, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises and doing wonders : one God, Father, Son and Holy Ghost, infinitely bles- sed in the communion of the Trinity, the living Je- hovah, maker of Heaven and Earth, the creator, preserver, Kedeemer; the lawgiver, ruler and judge, the everlasting father and unfailing portion of all who trust, and love, and worship him. 2. Christianity is the only religion for man^ Hnc^ it alone reveals his true clmracter and his future des- tiny. What satisfactory accounts do Pagan theo- logians give of the human soul ; who now consider it a spark emitted from the divine essence, and now regard it as matter in its most sublimated and ethe- 22 rial form ? Plato sought to establish, by probable reasoning, the soul's immortality ; yet with argu- ments so airy and unsubstantial that Cicero mourn- fully confesses they eluded his grasp, so soon as the book containing them was laid aside. In what way the soul survives the shock of death, and whether in the world of spirits it will have an individual subsistence as on earth, were left wholly unresolv- ed. The more positive and adventurous theosophy of the East, gave a reply indeed, but a reply which reduced all religion to emptiness and air. In their scheme, after countless transmigrations, the soul was stripped of all limitation and individuality, and merged into the substance of the Deity, as a drop of water loses itself in the abyss of ocean. While the Pagan conscience too, like Laocoon in the embrace of the serpent, was writhing under a sense of the divine displeasure, what rational ex- planation was given of sin ? Blindly conscious only of disruption from God, and of the power of evil, their utterances were only the inarticulate groans of a sick man under the oppression of fright- ful dreams. Knowing nothing of a perfect moral law, impressed upon us as the guide of our nature, which man, in the exercise of his freedom as a res- ponsible being had violated, sin was nothing but physical evil, arising from the soul's alliance with matter. Instead of being the corruption and defile- 23 ment of the moral nature, it was only the thraldom of spiiit in the fetters of material bondage. Re- demption was only deliverance from this hateful alliance — the only purgation was metempsy chosis ; and salvation but a name for final re-absorption into Deity. Their moral discipline ol necessity, either diverged into a gloomy asceticism on the one hand, or else apostatized into lawless licentiousness on the other. What light again did Pagan theology shed upon the awful mystery of death ? What hand lifted the dark curtain which tails upon the stage of human life, showing whither the actors have fled ? A little chattering nonsense of Charon and the river Styx, and the shades seen flitting through the gloom of Tartarus, is all that we find written upon the leaves of the ancient sibyl. When the sepulchral lamp revealed the body " clothed with all the dishonors of corruption," what heathen gospel " brought life and immortality to light ?" The total ignorance which prevailed as to the resurrection of the body, vitiated the whole Heathen doctrine of a future state. Even Cicero, illuminated as he was with all the science and philosophy of antiquity, declared him- self unable to conceive of embodied spirit And take away the retributions of -a future world, what sanctions has religion with which to bind the con- sciences of men, putting her police into every liu- 24 man breast ? " There is li02:>e of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and through the ficent of water will bud and bring forth boughs like ;• plant:" l>ut which of the ancient augurs interpre- ted tliese analogies to the soul exclaiming in the tor- ture ot despair, " If a man die shall he live again V\ Socrates could say, when asked by Crito, how he should be buried, " as you please, provided I do not escape out of your hands," and enjoined upon his friends not to mourn over his lifeless corpse, as if it were Socrates. And this was the highest reach of Heathen Divinity, to disown a part of one beiu^-, and to the extent of one-half our nature, to consent to certain annihilatioii. How much more thrilling the language which the scripture put in the mouth of one who lived five centuries before Socrates,' " My flesh also shall rest in hope, for thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither shall thy holy one see cor- ruption ; thou wilt show me the path of life, in thy presence is fulness of joy, at thy right hand are pleasures for evermore." Christianity reveals one to us, of whom these words were prophetically utter- ed a full millenium before his advent, one who is the Lord of the Kesurrection, who has redeemed both bod}' and soul, and made them partakers of the same adoption ; one who ])oth died, and rose and revived, that he might be the Lord, both of the dead and of the living; and who henceforward proclaims 25 himself, in this royal style, " I am he that liveth and was dead, and behold I am alive forevermore, and have the keys of hell and deatli." A religion then, whose inspired voice anthenticates such truths, discloses the real nature of that disease it designs to heal, and brings the distinct doctrine of a future state to sanction its claims, is beyond competition. And upon this ground does christiaiiity challenge your verdict as the only true religion of man on earth. 3. In the third place, I present you the argu- ment of Isaac Taylor, though in a different form, tliat diristianiiy rests upon a Idstovkal hasis ; it is a religion of facts. The religions of antiquity, from first to last, were w]-ouo;ht in the foro-e of meta- physical speculation. Destitute of a written revela- tion, and with only a confused traditive remem- brance of God's primitive manifestations to the race, they substituted fancies for facts, and reasoned rather than believed. Thus from age to age their cosmogonies were weaved with endless toil, myste- riously unravelled as fast as they were spun. Not content to know God, simply as the creator of the universe, they would determine lioiu He is the au- thor of all existence. Postulating a process of de- velopment in the very nature of Deity, they con- strued all existence to be an eflSlux from the Su- preme being. The necessary lesult of grounding 26 all religion upon reason rather than faith is the in- troduction of an aristocratic element. The wor- shippers are divided into two classes ; the initiated or sacerdotal caste, whose theosophic speculations arc locked up in hieroglyphic and esoteric symbols, and the unelect masses who must be content with a mythical faith expressed in concrete and sensible images. Thus was it ever impossible for these an- cient systems to embrace the race of man in a close religious brotherhood : and during six thousand years the world has rocked uneasily between the desperation of unbelief, giving it over a prey to su- perstition, and the irrationality of superstition driving it back to infidelity. Now, in glowing contrast with all this, consider the influence of Christianity as a religion of simple facts. It opens with the grand announcement that God is ; and to all presumptuous inquiries into his essence, the rebuke comes with a voice of thunder from His pavilion, " Canst thou, by searching, find out God ? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection ? It is high as Heaven, what canst thou do ? Deeper than hell, what canst thou know: the measure thereof is longer than the earth, and broader than the sea. If men would inquire into the generation of the universe, it turns the eye of faith, beyond the whole series of outward pheno- mena, to God's infinite power, and contemplates .27 ( creation as a great incompreliensible fact : " tlirougli i faith we understand that the worlds were framed by ' the word of God, so that things which are seen, were ! not made of things which do appear." It does not suffer a metaphysical trinity like the Hindoo, Budd- hist, or Platonic to be spun from human specula- tions, but baptizes us into the name of the one God. Father, Son and Holy Ghost. It deals in no alio gories of incarnate deitirs, but declares as fact, "the Lord was made flesh and dwelt amongst us, and we beheld His glory." It reveals God, not as a blind fate, working concealed behind necessary laws of nature, but God moving up and down in Human History, " doing His pleasure among the armies of heaven, and among the inhabitants of earth." It proclaims an Historical Christ, who lived and wept and died among men, and who now reigns " a Prince and a Saviour at the right hand of the Majesty in the Heavens." It has a philosophy, indeed, which reason's golden reed shall take an eternity to measure, for the length and the breadth and the height of it are equal ; a philosophy, whose depth shall not be j^lumbed this side the gates of heaven. Yet, as a religion, its ba- sis is the testimony of God, accrediting the facts which are level to the peasant and the sage alike. — Both accept it upon the same grounds, and by the same faith in a divine testimony. Thus Christiani- 28 ty is competent to be, Avliat Paganism is not, a ca- tholic religion for man as man, embracing within its campreheusio^, sympathy, and holy fellowship, all ranks of social condition. 4. I draw your attention next to a point most material in this defence: tliat ChriMianity is pre eminently a religion of hu\ and alone solves the iwo- Uems wlikli arise from tlic Holiness and Justice of Jelwvali. We cannot conceive of a finite moral being who is not, ex vi termini, a subject of law. If he is en- dowed with understanding, conscience and will, he must l)e cognizant of duty ; and if he is a created being, his limited faculties require the guidance of a perfect standard of virtue. Angels in Heaven, and devils in Hell are neither of them exempt from the jurisdiction of law, simply because they have passed the bounds of probation. The blessedness of the one consists in the reward bestowed upon a perfect and confirmed obedience, as the penalty inflicted upon continual and hopeless transgression occasions the misery of the other. ISTo heresy can be more glaring or fatal than that of the anti-nomian ; who not only strikes at the authority of God, but repu- diates also the nature which is given to man, and utterly destroys the morality of eveiy human ac- tion. Here was the capital defect of Pagan theolo- gy. It regarded simply the abstract existence, or 20 else the natural perfections of the Deity. Its effort was by transcendental speculations to compass the mystery of his being, and then to explain how he can be the author of the material world so alien from his essence. Such inquiries were however rath- er physical than moral. The infinite purity of His nature formed no part of their conception of God ; nor did they recognize a holy and immutable law which should express his claims upon the love and obedience of his subjects. Hence the grand pro- blem of all religion, how God shall he "just and yet justify the ungodly," was never even proposed for solution. If hecatombs smoked on heathen altiirs, it was to placate the capricious anger of beings who were mighty, rather than to appease the holy wrath of a wise and righteous ruler. Precisely the same fatal defect vitiates all the fond schemes devised by the Deists of the 17th and 18th centuries, who labored to trick ofi:* natural relio-ion and to set her up as the rival of m€>ral Christianity. Whether it be contended — as in one school seduced l)y a false analogy with human governments — that God may, in the exercise of mere supremacy, remit the penalty of the law and grant a general amnesty to transgressors ; or, as in another, that simj^le re- pentance is a sufficient ground of Divine forgiveness; or, as in a third, that God may j^unish sin in part, either in the sufferings of this life or in the purgato- 30 rial torments of the next ; in all alike, tlie holiness of God is sunk out of view — the law, which from its absolute perfection must be immutable, is cancelled — or else sentence is craftily commuted, by the sub» stitution of another penalty than that which origin- ally enforced its claims. Yet this difficulty, which baffles alike the wisdom of the rationalist and the mystic, Christianity bold- ly and honestly meets in its doctrine of atonement. It openly proclaims the unchangeable holiness of the Divine law ; but announces salvation to the sinner, through a perfect satisfaction rendered to its dread- ful curse. It provides a surety for the sinner in the person of God's Eternal Son ; who, being above the law, owes no obedience for himself; who, having infinite resources, is able to endure the Father's wrath ; who being God, has power to lay down his life and power to take it again. His Divine substi- tute becomes a true man by supernatural birth of a virgin, and for man passes under the law to en- dure its curse. By legal union with Him, this obe- dience glorious above all other obedience in being rendered to both precept and penalty alike, is reck- oned to the beliver as though accomplished by him- self. And in this righteousness which meets every challenge of the law, the sinner is henceforward ac- quitted and accepted before the Judge. Nor is this all. The transgressor's own conscience is purged 31 from a sense of guilt, and by this reconciliation with the law the very ground is removed upon which all accusations rested. Thus does Chris- tianity build itself upon eternal principles of righte- ousness and of law; and justice no less than mercy becomes the guarantee of our salvation. Not more surely . Gerizim and Ebal of old echo to each other across the vale of Shechem the blessings and the curses of the Mosaic covenant, than from Calvary ! to Sinai the fulfilled curse rebounds across a ran- somed world. And in the poi'ch of that august tem- ple which Christianity has reared, wherein all na- tions shall gather to worship, the Justice and the Grace of God shall forever stand, the Jachin and the Boaz, the pillars of stability and strength as well as the glory and the ornament. 5. I ascend another step in reaching to "the height of this great argument," when I say that Christiani- ty is the only reUgimi which provides for the renova- tion of onr nature, in its doctrine of the new hirth. — Sin has not only deranged our relations to God, but has cut us off from Him who is the only source of the Creature's holiness, corrupting all his nature. — Even supposing reconcihation with law to be effect- ed, how is this new difficulty to be met ? Should the sinner by a judicial decree or by the exercise of arbitrary power be elevated to Heaven, the necessa- ry repulsion between his defilement and the Divine 32 jturity would precipitate him even from tlie steps of the eternal throne, or change the joys of Heaven in- to instruments of torture : -Fiom the bottom stirs The Hell wilhin him ; for within him hell He brings, and round about him, nor irom hell One steji, no more than from himself, can fly By change of place." What remedy does the intellectual idolatry of the Deist, or the grosser idolatry of the Pagan, provide for this exigency ? Neither the cold ethics of the one, nor the bloody rites of the other, undertake to I'ectify the inward nature of man and to fit it for obedience or worship. Hence communion of soul with God forms no part of either scheme. It is as though a pardon should be brought after the poor criminal lies cold under the executed sentence of the law. The form of a man is there, Avith all the or- gans perfect and entire, but mo more instinct with life. Just here Christianity interposes with its di- vine remedy. An almighty energy quickens once more that prostrate form ; and the supple organs play again, obedient to the mysterious princij^le of life, w^hich actuates and moves the whole. Were I called upon to select a single verse from the Bible upon which the last issue of Christianity should be staked, the oracle of Christ to Nicodemus should be tbat pass of Thermopylae where its truth should stand or fall : " Verily, verily, I say unto thee, ex- 33 cept a man be born again, be shall not see tlie king- dom of God." And with the air of one who is as- sured of his triumph, I would proclaim the chal- lenge of Isaiah of old : " Assemble yourselves and come ; draw near together, ye that are escaped of the nations ; tell ye and bring them near ; yea, let them take counsel together ; who hath declared this from ancient time ? "Who hath told it from that time ? Have not I the Lord ? and there is no God else beside me." Ah ! this is the glory of the Gospel, that it reveals the religion of a sinner. It not only tells of a great propitiatory sacrifice, smoking ever upon the altar in the outer court, and proclaiming " without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin ;" it not only tells of a great High Priest within the veil, interceding be- fore the mercy-seat, with hands which never, like those of Moses, hans^ down : But it tells of this almighty Spirit, who comes with a silent, yet re- sistless power, into the sanctuary of the human soul; who quickens the siyner dead in tresspasses and sins, breathing into him a new life of holiness and love ; who pours into his undei'standing the beams of light from his own glorious person ; who turns the affections back in their flowing current, till they empty into the bosom of God ; who sways the will not by an external necessity, but magnetizing, it through the operation of grace, " makes it willing 34 iu tlie day of his power," so that in its own polarity it points freely to the law of God, and " every thought is brought into capti\qty and obedience of Christ." It tells of the same Spirit, who dwells for- ever within the renewed soul, and brings the new- born natui'e to maturity of growth ; and finally sa- tisfies its craving for an immortality of virtue, by translating it to the presence of God, where in the immediate vision of the Good it is confirmed, like the angels, indefectibly m holiness. Produce now form the records of deism or of priestcraft, one form of religion, which professes to beget the sinner anew in the holy image of God, and I will be stag- gared by a rising doubt ; but until you shall do this, " I'll bind the Gospel to my heart, And call them, vanity and lies." 6. — Christianity will set up but one more plea in her defence, that of leing the only system of religion^ to ahsohite certainty of whose timth it is 'possible to he lyrought. By the inward work of God's Spirit upon the soul, in regeneration and sanctification, all the doctrines of revelation are brought within the range of experience, so as to be confirmed by the testimony of consciousness. Truth is collected in the Scripture, as light is gathered into the sun. — Yet the sinner's mind, like the eye of the blind, is closed against its rays. If now the Holy Ghost re- 35 moves tlie v^eil which has shrouded it in darkness, quickens it enfeebled by sin, renders it coDgeuial with the truth it is to receive, and then without the aid of artificial symbols, so to speak, impresses that truth nakedly upon the mind, there must be a cor- respondence between the objective revelation on the one hand, and the subjective illumination on the other. Not more certainly does the seal leave its impression upon the softened wax, than do the doc- trines of gi'ace upon the believer's heart. There is not one so abstract and unpractical, but it is the type or mould of christian feeling : nor an emotion of the renewed heart, but is awakened by its kindred truth. Is it not obvious that such a system admits a certainty of conviction which is attainable in no other ? It is seen not only in the direct light which beams from itself, but in the reflected light of hu- man consciousness. The truths are known, because felt as well as seen. And there was a deep though unsuspected philosophy in the reply of the unletter- ed peasant to the subtle sceptic : " Sir, I cannot an- swer your arguments," but, laying her hand on her breast, " I feel here that the Bible is true." We hnow the doctrine of regeneration to be true be- cause we are quickened, who before were dead in sins. We hnow the doctrine of spiritual illumina- tion to be true ; for " whereas we were blind, now we see." We Icnoio union with Christ to be true, be- 36 cause conscious tliat we walk by faith in Him. We hioiv adoption to be true ; for the spirit of sons is spread abroad in our hearts, crying Abba, Father, We hnoiu justification by faith to be true ; bacau^e we who believe have peace with God, which pas- seth all understanding. Thus we may pass around the entire circle of christian doctrine, and like the notes marked upon the k^ys of a well tuned instru- ment, the sanct^ied heart will give to each its own responsive sound. He, who by the teaching of the Holy Ghost has felt the j)o^Yer of all truth in his own soul, comes through experience to " the riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the ac- knowledgement of the mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ, in whom are hid all the trea- sures of wisdom and knowledge." While, too, the written word reproduces itself in the heart of the Christian, it is the perfect standard by which all the secret exercises of that heart are to be judgeid ; precisely as in the Photographic art, the light beam- ing from an objecit draws the image on the plate, while the original remains to test the accuracy of the resemblance. In this way an important check is imposed upon the way^Vard and licentious tend- encies of the imagination. The mystic cannot easi- ly mistake his dreams and reveries for the inspira* tions of the Spirit ; for, as He works outwardly from the scripture upon the mind, we have a law 37 and a testimony to which these inspirations can be referred; and if "they be not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." It is time, yonng gentlemen, to pause and see whi- ther the swelling' tide of this discussion has drifted US. I have not spoken in vain if you are brought to a practical conviction, that you cannot dispense with all religion. You may select any one of the sys- tems which you shall find ticketed and labelled in the vast museum of history. You may dream among the mystics of India, or divine among the star-gazers of Chaldea. You may sacrifice to the sun upon the hill-tops of ancient Persia, or veil yourselves before the consecrated fire of the Magi. You may wreathe garlands around the sacred Bull of Egypt, or dance with amulets and fetishes among the de^dliworshippers of Caflraria ; or turning with contempt from these gross and obsolete idolatries ; you may echo the profane wit of the French Ency- clopedists, or boast in the starched proprieties of in- tellectual Deism. You may look forth upon this beautiful world and exclaim, in the Pantheistic lan- guage of Pope, " All are but part of one stupendous whole, Whose bcfdy nature is, and God the soul:" or, you may write your own inscriptions upon the altar reared by natural religion to " the unknown God." You may cast ^side all the forms of worship 38 and walk the steep path, of earthly ambition, to wear the thorns with which heroes are crowned ; or you may go tripping through the world, a devotee of pleasure, to the sound of timbrel and harp ; or, standing under Heaven's high arch, with your eye upon the stars, you may proclaim in this vast, yet vacant temple of Jehovah, " there is no God !"■ — yet still you shall not esca^^e from the imperishable instincts of your religious nature. Crush out as you may, this element which most allies you to angels and to God, in secret hours yon must hear awful whispers from an oracle within, warning you that you can only become an apostate from God, by being first an apostate from yourself. I have come from afar to ask you solemnly, which of these religions do you accept as yours ? If you reply with Peter in the text, to whom slall we go but to Chiist, who has these words of Eternal life, I thank you for the answer ; but have you consi- dered what is involved in the acceptance of Christi- anity ? Besting as an historical religion, upon the testimony of God himself, given in an authentic re- velation, it is not to be received by an easy traditi- onal faith, as an ancestral heir-loom. To appropri- ate an argument of Dr. Chalmers upon the being of God, if Christianity only presents you with a pre- sumption of its truth, this binds you to a close and earnest investigation of its evidences, that you may 39 come to an absolute conviction of that trntli. Je- iliovali is a jealous God, who will not give his glory to another : and He claims this homage of our in- tellect, that the system of faith of which His vera- city is the pledge, should be received only upon that personal conviction which flows from a know- ledsre of its contents, and an examination of its claims ; such a conviction as shall forever exclude even the possible rivalry of other systems. Especi- ally is this demand just upon you, who have here been taught those secrets of nature, which science breathes but to few, and which are the foot-prints of the christian argument for the being of a God. — You who have conversed with Plato m the Acade- my, and with Zeno in the Porch — you who, with your hands upon the records of learning and philo- sophy treasured in these archives, are so competent to institute the comparison which I have drawn to- night between the religion of God and of men : — upon you, it is specially incumbent to give in your adhesion to Christianity, not upon a traditional and hereditary trust, but upon the faith of the intensest personal conviction. Remember, too, that Christianity is not to be ac- cepted simply as a philosophy, explaining the other- wise insoluble problems of human life. If it were nothing more than this, the Bible would still de- serve to be studied above all the tomes of human 40 wisdom, under whicli our bookshelves gi'oan ; for it contains the utterances of Divine wisdom. But the G-ospel reveals not a philosophy which explains riian's wants, but a religion which meets them. It proposes reconciliation with God through an atone- ment which satisfies all the requisitions of law ; and it renews and sanctifies the soul, fitting it for an eternal and blissful communion with its Maker, in this world and in that which is lo come. If in this aspect you accept it, you can only do so by an in- ward experience of its power. Let me impress up- on you this distinction. The Scriptures may be to you only the grove of Academus, and Jesus Christ but a diviner Socrates. Initiated in all the mysteries of its philosophy, you may wither and die whilst standing at the very fountain of life. Kemember, I pray you, that if Christ be a teacher, his are " the words of Eternal life." You must touch the hem of his garment and be healed. You must be sprinkled with His blood, so as " to have no more conscience of sins," You must have fellowship with him in his death and resurrection. You must experience the renew- ing and sanctifying . influences of the- Holy Ghost: or, nominally Christian as you may be, you will sink from the very shadow of the Saviour's cross into eternal perdition. Young gentlemen, I speak these words in deep solemnity of soul. Through 41 your pai tial kiiKliiess 1 am liei'e to-night : but 1 am li<'i'e as a minister of (rod, to si)eak His words u})on which tlie destiny of souls is suspended. This night has the kinu'dom '>f (xod come nigh unto you : and if you receive it not, 1 say unto you, it shall l»e more toleral)le in that da}' for Sodom than for you. "If ye wei'e blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye sa}', we see, tlierefore youi- sin remain- eth." •' But I hope better things of you, and things that accompany salvation, tliough I thus speak." ''To God and to the Spirit of his grace I commend you.*" May his guardian providence shield you in this life, froBii sorrow and from sin ! and may it 1 )e yours and mine to hear together the benediction of the last day, " come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world !" I