IvIBRARV OF THK University of California. GIRT OF^ Received ^^, ^ . 1^9"^ ■ Accession No.^^ ^ S I Class No Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive in 2007 witii funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation littp://www.arcliive.org/details/agreementofscienOOwytliricli THE AGREEMENT OF Science and Revelation BY Rev. JOS. H. WYTHE, M. D. The -word of the Lord is tried."— Ps. xviii. 30. SECOND EDITION. REVISED. PHILADELPHIA J. B. LI PPI NCOTT & CO, 1879. " The Bible, as the Book of books, is as the sun in the center of all other religious records ; the Kings of the Chinese, the Vedas of India, the Zendavesta of the Persians, the Eddas of the Germans, the Jewish Talmud, and the Mohammedan Koran ; judging all that is hostile in them, reconciling and bringing into liberty whatever elements of truth they may contain. . . . "As the ideal Cosmos of the revelation of salvation, it forms with the Cosmos of the general revelation of God an organic unity. (Ps. viii., xix., civ.) It is the Key of the World-Cosmos, while this again is the living illustration of the Cosmos of the Scripture." Lange : General Introduction to the Old Testament. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1872, by REV. JOS. H. WYTHE, M. D., In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. PREFACE. The present work is designed to supply a want long felt, not only by the readers of scientific books, but also by Christian ministers and people. It is an attempt to exhibit in brief compass the true relations . and harmony of Nature and Revelation, by present- ing some of the analogies between the truths of the supernatural world and the researches of history, astronomy, geology, and physiology. It claims that Science and Faith mutually support each other, — that the many-colored coat of infidelity is a patch- work taken from an effete and unscientific heathenism, — that the Bible is a record of the original faith of mankind and of its development in history, — that the principles of biblical interpretation must be based on the modes of Divine revelation, — and that the biblical doctrines concerning God, the creation, the human soul, the need of a Mediator, the faith- faculty, and the resurrection of the dead, are in perfect accordance with true science. A terse, simple style has been attempted, in hope (3) 4 Preface. of rendering the work useful both as a text-book for the student and as a collection of essays on topics of more than ordinary interest at the present day. A few technicalities were unavoidable : hence a Glossary of Scientific and Theological Terms has been ap- pended. The analyses of the chapters, and a copious Index, also, will be found useful. As to the doctrinal statements or scientific facts and principles referred to, information has been sought from reliable sources and is presented with the freshness of thorough conviction. Where practi- cable, indebtedness to others has been acknowledged, either in the text or the margin. By an exhibition of the harmony and essential unity of plan in all God's works, natural and super- natural, we seek to add to the living stream of Christian evidences, whose volume increases from age to age. PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. The sale of more than two thousand copies of the first edition, the introduction of the work into the course of study for junior ministers of the M. E. Church, and the many favorable notices from the press of different de- nominations of Christians, are sufficient evidences of the utility of this book. The author desires to record here his sense of gratitude to the Giver of all good, who has enabled him in some degree to serve the cause of religious truth. Some additional matter has been added to the present edition, chiefly relating to the antiquity of man, the theory of evolution, and the doctrine of a Mediator. 5 1* CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAGB Relation of Science and Faith ii CHAPTER II. The Variations of Skepticism 33 CHAPTER III. The Record of Faith 53 CHAPTER IV. The Interpretation of the Record 89 CHAPTER V. The Revelation of God 119 CHAPTER VI. The Creation 149 CHAPl^ER VII. The Spiritual Nature of the Soul 179 (7) 8 Contents. CHAPTER VIII. PAGB The Doctrine of a Mediator 217 CHAPTER IX. The Faith-Faculty in Man 241 CHAPTER X. The Resurrection 261 Glossary of Scientific and Theological Terms 283 Index 301 CHAPTER I. THE RELATION OF SCIENCE AND FAITH. " Faith is . . . the evidence of things not seen." — ST. PAUL. (9) CONTENTS. Definitions — General Relation of Faith and Science — Different Re- ception of Religious Faith and Hypothetical Speculations of Science — Pantheistic Objections to the Supernatural examined — Arguments against Pantheism from Physical, Mental, and Moral Science — De- istic Objection to the Possibility of Miracles examined — Evidence of Christian Truth various — Character of Modern Infidelity — The Materials for settling the Question of the Harmony of Nature and Revelation are complete. (lO) CHAPTER I. RELATION OF SCIENCE AND FAITH. A DEFINITION IS not Only a stepping-stone to truth, but also a revealer of fallacies. Like the spear of Ithuriel^ithas caused many a concealed temptation or doubt to assume its true shape and proportions. In the investigation of religious truth it is especially necessary to define the leading terms employed, in order to insure clearness of mental vision. What, then, is the meaning of Science, and what of Faith ? — terms often used, and essential to our present inquiry. Lexicographers define Science as certain knowl- edge, or, in a more particular sense, as a collection of the general principles or leading truths relating to any subject, arranged in systematic order. This term, though often loosely applied, is seldom misunder- stood. It is different, however, with the term Faith. Sometimes it is used as a synonym for the word Belief, meaning a persuasion of the truth of a decla- ration, proposition, or alleged fact, on the ground of evidence. At other times, and chiefly by theo- logians, it is used to express confidence, or such trust as influences the affections and conduct. Both senses seem to be derived from the primary meaning of the original word, which, according to Webster, is to strain, to draw, and thus to bind or make fast. (II) 12 Faith necessary to Science. The Apostle Paul says, "Faith is the substance {onoaxaaiq — a being set under, a reahzing) of things hoped for, the evidence (sAey/^c — persuasion, convic- tion) of things not seen." From the definition it is evident that the spheres of Faith and Science differ. Science relates to the known. Faith may refer either to the known or the unknown. If we use the term Faith in the sense of either belief or trust, it will apply to known or scientific truths as well as to those based on testi- mony or revelation. Indeed, there can be no science without faith. Deduction, induction, and testimony, the very pillars of science, appeal to faith, and are impossible without it. Mathematical axioms are called self-evident propositions, but they are so be- cause with the present structure of our minds they compel our faith. The objects of faith may be also the objects of science, or they may be things unknown to science. These latter, again, may be- come objects of science without ceasing thereby to be objects of faith. " Science has in many things altered the standpoint or extended the do- main of faith, but has never rendered faith un- necessary. It has enlarged the faith of childhood into the faith of manhood, but every hint of light which it has discovered has pointed out a great gloom beyond."* Into that gloom of the unknown the eye of faith pierces, from thence it hears voices of truth which are as yet inaudible to science. The * Ecce Deus. Faith a Necessity for Man. 1 3 spirit of science may incline a man to doubt, but not necessarily to unbelief. It weighs, disputes, ex- amines, deduces, experiments; but its generalizations are all inferences of faith. The majority of scientific truths are accepted by faith in the testimony of others ; few, comparatively, are verified by personal experiment. It is usually a sufficient authentication of a scientific fact if it be published by recognized authority and is consistent with other known facts. In this manner science* is propagated by faith. It is the nature of faith to be constructive; it educates or draws on the mind to the knowledge of truth. First faith, then science, then understanding; such is the progress of the mind towards a knowledge of the truths of nature or religion. To lose faith in sight is the constant hope of the instructed Christian. *' For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known." Unbelief is essentially de- structive. Its object is to pull down, not to build up, and it is really as much opposed to science as to religion. Few, if any, minds have been possessed with the full spirit of unbelief It is too unsatisfactory, as well as too malignant. Man must have belief of some kind, or existence would be insupportable. It would be useless to attempt to argue with unbelief; we address ourselves, therefore, to the spirit of inquiry and examination, — to the scientific spirit; we desire an investigation of the consistency of the leading doc- trines of Christianity with what we know of the world around us. We would bring Faith, as taught by the 14 Opposition to Faith unscientific, Bible, and Science, as instructed by deduction and experiment, face to face. We would interrogate the witnesses, and see if, while preserving their indi- viduality, they do not agree to the same facts. Faith in axiomatic truths is readily admitted, be- cause of their necessity to explain the phenomena of the natural world. The demonstrations of mathe- matics and the experiments of physical science are im- possible without it. In like manner, faith in spiritual things is necessary to explain the phenomena of mind. The faith which relates to the external world, even if hypothetical, finds no special opposition from the votaries of modern science; on the contrary, their works abound with deductions and theories which have nothing but a problematical basis. Thus the speculations grounded on the supposition of a uni- versal ether, the unity of force, the atomic theory of chemistry, the inhabitability of the planets, etc., are very far from being demonstrations, yet the faith of philoso- phers remains unshaken, and, generally, unopposed. It is very different with respect to religious faith, or faith in the reality of the supernatural. For this the naturalistic school ©f philosophers can find no- thing but contempt. With a blind and unscientific adherence to preconceived opinion, they exhibit, under the false pretense of science, the same vulgar prejudice which so long hindered the progress and acceptance of physical discovery. With them the supernatural and the imaginative are synonymous, and are set aside with an ill-disguised sneer. Their philosophic structure rests upon the theory that the whole nature of things Pafitheism. 1 5 is fixed and unalterable; the opposite of the Platonic theory that nature is in constant flow; hence their negation of the supernatural. "Men," says the Duke of Argyll, "who denounce any particular field of thought are always to be sus- pected. The presumption is that valuable things which these men do not like are to be found there. There are many forms of priestcraft. The same arts, and the same delusions, have been practiced in many causes. Sometimes, though perhaps not so often as is popularly supposed, men have been warned off particular branches of physical inquiry, in the sup- posed interests of religion. But constantly and habit- ually men are now warned from many branches of inquiry, both physical and psychological, in the in- terests — real enough — of the Positive Philosophy ! * Whatever,' says Mr. Lewes, 'is inaccessible to reason should be strictly interdicted to research.' Here we have the true ring of the old sacerdotal interdicts."* At the present day, faith in the supernatural is re- jected by the pantheists, who regard the universe as the evolution of absolute being, and by the deists, who consider the order of nature so perfect as to imply immutability and inviolability. Let us exam- ine these theories by the test of reason and an ap- peal to facts. By what process of reasoning do any persuade themselves that nature is self-evolved, and not the product of a Supreme Intelligence ? How comes it * Primeval Man. 1 6 Faith welcomes Science. to pass that any human intellect can conceive that contrivance, and thought, and feeling are the product of unintelligent, insensible matter ? The principal, if not the only, argument on which such theorists rely, is drawn from the advance of science. Day by day science contracts the sphere of the unknown in the world around us, and enlarges that which is known. Imaginary theories are ex- ploded, as the forces which act upon matter and their modes of action are brought to light. Our philosopher deems it therefore reasonable to suppose that when our knowledge of nature is perfected we shall see sufficient reason for the existence and de- velopment of all things in the universe itself, without resorting to the idea of a cause separate and apart from the universe. But is this true, or even rational ? If our knowl- edge of nature were perfect, would it disprove an order beyond and above nature? The very idea of the supernatural presupposes natural order and laws. Nature and the supernatural might coexist, and our knowledge of one be perfect while we know nothing of the other. That we may know the supernatural, it must reveal itself in the sphere of the natural. The reality of such revelation is a subject to be examined in a true spirit of scientific inquiry. Faith in the supernatural has nothing to fear from the enlarge- ment of the domain of science. It can afford to wel- come every improvement of the faculties of the human mind, as tending to that perfection of reason which will fully qualify us for examining the foundation of Natural Science against Pantheism, 17 eternal truth on which it rests. As to the revelation of the supernatural, we shall inquire hereafter; it is sufficient here to show that the ground of pantheism is untenable and unscientific. It is the intoxication of scientific pursuit which so strongly attracts its votaries to the exclusive study of nature as to limit human faculties to a narrow sphere, — one which excludes as unworthy all investigation outside its own limits. The dignity of reason should lead to broader views. Yet, forsooth, these are the men who give the name of narrow-mindedness to the generalization which includes heaven as well as earth, and regard themselves as perfect just in proportion to the specialty of their pursuit. Such infatuation is as unscientific as it is foolish. It is not science which teaches pantheism, but ignorance and pride. Arguments against pantheism, and in favor of the supernatural, may be drawn from every branch of science, — physical, mental, and moral; although the reality of the supernatural must be learned by its revelations. Physical science exhibits the universe to us as a series of existences, arranged in such a manner, rank above rank, that one species is never witnessed trans- forming itself into another. No such development as pantheism pretends is ever seen in nature. The theories of spontaneous generation and of natural selection have not a shadow of experimental proof, while the general arrangement of nature presents a plan full of unity and intelligence, exhibiting the hand of a contriver in each of its parts. Life and organi- 2* 1 8 Morality against Pantheism. zation can never be explained by the development of material atoms, much less can intellis^ence. " How should spirit be born of matter ? The appearance of life in the organic world was a new fact, or, to speak more correctly, an act of creation, for it could not leap from the insensate stone like the spark from fretted pebbles. The appearance of animal life was equally a new act, for plant never gave other than vegetable life. Surely from the life of the animal to that of the spirit the leap is more wide and sudden still, and creative energy must have manifested itself with greater glory to produce this higher form of life." We shall examine the theory of development more closely hereafter ; at present we only refer to the verdict of not prcroed, which science has rendered against it, bringing us to the only alternative of a Great First Cause. Metaphysics repudiates pantheism ; for " reason refuses to admit that the perfect and infinite of which it has the conception, can be inseparably bound to the imperfect and the finite ; that the imperfect and finite form part of God himself" Again, the only element of pantheistic philosophy is inflexible, abso- lute fate. This is seen in all its forms, — in atheism and positivism, in the romancing of Renan, the sta- tistics of Buckle, and the speculations of the material- istic physiologists. The consciousness of freedom in the mind of man is an ever-living testimony against all such folly. The Freedom of the Will is the central point of attack by modern skeptics, yet " the passionate ob- Morality against Pantheism. 19 stinacy with which the declarations of the common sense of mankind are contested and every fragment of free self-determining power denied, serves to bring out more emphatically than before the marvelous and isolated character of that power of choice which all unprejudiced men know that they possess. When it comes to be fully appreciated, amongst the many, how rigid law rules not only all living as well as inanimate irrational creatures, but how even the immense majority of our own actions are simply automatic; the wonderful character of our power of (in certain cases) voluntarily choosing the less attract- ive of two competing objects will be less inadequately estimated. Moreover, the recognition in our own being of this power, beyond anything else in nature, renders supernatural action external to us not only credible, but to be anticipated <2/;V^n. . . . The bitter hostility which exists to the doctrine of man's free- will is not difficult to understand. It is impossible to assert it without implicitly asserting religion ; and it is, in one aspect at least, a trial to pride. It is, indeed, no small trial to the pride of a highly-cul- tured man of powerful intellect to feel that the poorest peasant is fully as capable as himself of performing the highest actions — those which are the special pre- rogative of man — namely, the exercise of rational meritorious volition and choice. If there is such a thing as morality, it is beyond comparison as to value with mere intellectual culture or capacity, and it necessarily follows that a poor paralyzed old woman sitting in a chimney-corner may, by her good aspira- 20 Morality against Pantheism, tions and volitions, be repeatedly performing mental acts compared with which the discovery by Newton of the law of gravitation is as nothing. Again, in free-will and morality, we have that which cannot be the result of mere brute inheritance. Conceptions of time and space may be plausibly represented as structural results of a practically infinite brute an- cestry which has been submitted to conditions of time and space, but at any rate such ancestry was never submitted to conditions of moral responsibility. Thus the recognition of the human will renders ab- surd the conception that man can have developed from a brute." * President Edwards's treatise on the Will has long been regarded as a most masterly presentation of the predestinarian argument. Dr. Whedon, however, in his work entitled " The Freedom of the Will," has thoroughly answered the sophism that the will is swayed by the strongest motives, as well as other arguments of Edwards. In the chapter entitled "Freedom involves not Atheism," he remarks, "that it will be very difficult to find exceptions to the rule that all atheists, pantheists, materialists, and pro- fessed fatalists are necessitarians." Again : " The doctrine that there is no soul and no will exempt from that same invariable sequency which rules the domains of physics, that there is no God who does not come under the same inflexible inalternative law with matter, levels the whole into one system of fatal- istic materialism. The subjection of human volitions to the same law eliminates responsibility, dispenses * Mivart's Lessons from Nature, p. 380. Morality against Pantheism. 21 with retribution, divine government, and human im- mortality." Dr. Whedon shows that freedom must be held to exist until an unanswerable argument has proved its non-existence; that the common consciousness of mankind affirms it ; and that moral responsibility re- quires it. Thus the consciousness of free-will, uncontradicted by facts of physical science or by metaphysical rea- soning, protests against Pantheism, and proclaims that the personality of a Supreme God, and not fate, is the true fountain of force. "The moral consciousness," says Pressense,* to whom we are indebted for our train of thought, "pro- tests yet more loudly ; it could not survive the sup- pression of Divine order. It affirms it with author- ity every time that it enjoins the right on us and upbraids us for the wrong ; for what it commands is often that which we have no will to do, and what it condemns is that which our inclination has prompted. It is not, then, the simple echo of our hearts ; it speaks in the name of a law, which is neither that of our senses nor of our mobile and impassioned soul ; it brings us into the presence of another than our- selves, of one greater than ourselves, who has an ab- solute right over us, and its ' T/iou shalf sounds yet above the wrecks of all our other convictions, estab- lishing in us an immovable certitude. . . . Yes, the human soul believes in liberty, in responsibility, in * " The life and Times of Jesus Christ," by E. de Pressens6, D.D. 22 Morality against Pant J it ism. law and its sanction ; man believes that there is something which is the good, the true, the right, and some one who enjoins this upon him, renders it possible to him, and watches over its accomplish- ment. Pantheism, applied truly and upon a large scale, even by its best representatives, would cover with a plenary indulgence all infamies, would un- chain wholly the powers of evil, and render life im- possible." The author just quoted exhibits the unreasoning inconsistency of pantheism in recognizing no cause free and transcendent to the world by referring to its fundamental principles. " For it," he says, " there is no other absolute than the universe arriving at the consciousness of itself in our own reason. But evi- dently universal life does not begin with this highest form; it does not open with thought, which is rather like the flower of this vast development, for it is not the cause of it, but the product. That which is at the starting-pomt, at the origin of things, is not the idea, not mind, but abstract being, — an existence so vague as to be akin to non-existence. Thus the greater re- sults from the less, life from death or from inertia ; the immense column of universal existence springs from sheer nonentity. For what, in definite terms, is the abstractBeingof Hegelianism,or that fathomless abyss whence the universe is made to arise, if it is not non- entity? Thus the famous axiom, ex nihilo nihil, cannot be applied to Christians, or to the spiritualistic phi- losophers who place absolute being before the world, but it falls with its whole weight on the systems of Deism. 23 pantheism. It is idle to suppose myriads of centuries bringing forms of existence out of this nonentity; time, as has been well said, has nothing to do with the question. Millions of years cannot make fruitful that which has itself no existence. Behold, then, a grand and gorgeous effect, — the world with its har- monies, humanity with its highest life, born not even of Thales's drop of water, but of a void! Reason protests against such a doctrine, and to accept it she must deny the principle of causality, which is one of her essential elements." The system of deism, in contrast with that of pantheism, admits a Great First Cause, intelligent and wise and powerful, the Author of the universe and its laws. It objects to religious faith, however, so far as it relates to a supernatural intervention into the established order of nature. In other words, the deist admits the existence of a Creator, but denies the possibility of miracles. Two arguments have been adduced to sustain this position: ist. That the perfection and order of the universe imply the im- mutability of the laws of nature. 2d. That the very perfection of Divine wisdom forbids the idea that if is necessary for God to interfere with his own laws or retouch his own work. In both these arguments there is an implied supremacy given to the laws of nature, as if something more was meant by the term law than a mode of being or order of sequence, — as if, indeed, the laws of nature were superior to the Lawgiver who ordained them. As to the first, it is evident, upon the principle of deism, that before the 24 Divine Freedom against Immutable Law. creation of the world there was law or condition in the Divine existence itself. God was sovereign, free, and independent. The free personality of the Divine mind was governed by essential Holiness and Wisdom. If in creating the world God has alienated his own liberty or enchained his own independence, the Divine order has been changed, and law is not immutable. If the laws of the creation are immutable laws of necessity, and not the ordinary exercise of creative freedom, then the independence of the Divine exist- ence has been destroyed by the act of creation, and that which was the law of nature is not now the law. The truth is, that the phrase "immutable laws of nature" is wholly incongruous when applied to the subject of supernatural interventions of Divine power. Such a phrase may suit an atheist, but not one who believes in a personal and fatherly God. The very be- ginning of nature, or creation itself, was a miracle. Each successive step of the world's progress, as re- vealed to us in the rocks, or in the Bible, was miracu- lous. Life itself is continued in absolute dependence on Divine sovereignty. Besides, all the so-called laws of nature are not only reciprocal and interdependent, but have a certain rank or subordination, one to the other, and all are under the rule of Divine free agency. Thus the law of gravity acts upon a stone in my hand, but the law of freedom iii my will resists gravi- tation, and may cause the stone to mount high in the air, in opposition to the law of gravity It would be childish folly to argue against the reality of such a phenomenon that the order of the universe implies Creation not originally Complete, 25 immutable law! Then my own volition is exerted under Divine supervision, and I am accountable for its exercise. " The supernatural is the freedom of God, and it can only be abandoned, or at least its possibility contested, by abandoning the idea of a personal God." Respecting the argument that God's wisdom for- bids the necessity of interference, as if to retouch his own work, Pressense remarks, **The objection would hold good if we belonged to the world of necessity instead of to that of freedom." But creation was not complete from the beginning. Successive interposi- tions of creative power manifestly point to the de- velopment of some plan not fully completed, and the appearance of man in the last geologic age elevates that plan to the sphere of moral and spiritual life. The deistic argument is as much opposed by the teaching of science as by the Scripture history. The latter shows us that the free creature had to de- termine his own destiny, — a fact which implies the possibility of evil. It is not God's own work which He corrects when He miraculously interferes in re- demption, but a helping hand which He holds out to the creature made miserable by his own fault. *' If the fall is but a delusion, if evil is only the imperfection necessary to the harmony of the whole, I can under- stand the objections of the deist to miracles. But if it is true that God's free creature is unhappy through his own fault, and has placed himself under the yoke of a calamity as tremendous as it is terri- ble, in the name of what principle can those who 26 The Freedom of God a Reality, recognize a sovereign Deity set aside the super- natural? After all, miracle, which must not be re- garded exclusively in its secondary manifestations, is nothing else than the intervention of the Divine free- dom to save man, conformably with the laws of moral order. What? You admit that God is free, is master of the creation which He called out of nothing, and yet to this free God you deny the right to arise from his rest to restore his fallen creature, because, to this end, He must needs break the chain of cause and effect, and introduce a novel fact in history? But if He cannot save, how could He, then, create? Crea- tion is apparently an act of love, which reveals the depth of his being. If you question his sovereign right to save his creature when fallen from happi- ness, you refuse Him that which is the very essence of his being; you impugn his moral immutability, which must be in no wise confounded with immo- bility or inertia. The supernatural is, then, not only the freedom of God, it is also his love. I know no other definition of it more rigorously exact. Of what avail would his freedom be to God, in the sense in which it is accorded by theism, if he were unable to use that freedom for good?" In the estimation of true science, one fact is worth a thousand theories, and the revelation of the super- natural is, and must be, a question of fact, to be judged of in the same manner as other facts, by historical testimony or experimental verification. If intercourse with heaven may be realized consciously by the devout and prayerful spirit, as the Bible Christian Evidence various. 27 teaches, then experience is the quickest as well as the surest test. If it can be proved that God has made a communication of spiritual ideas and prin- ciples, all our theorizing respecting the possibility of such a communication is at an end. The evidences of Christian truth upon which faith is based, are regarded by many as among the trials of our state of probation. With such a view of them they can never be considered as. complete or final. Each age must review them from its own stand- point, every individual must examine them for him- self. What will produce conviction with one mind will not with another. To one, the external authen- tication of miracles and prophecy is all-sufficient to lead to his submission to the authority of Holy Writ. To another, the supernatural grandeur and moral excellence of the doctrines themselves, or of the life of Jesus, are all -convincing. Another regards the actual results as demonstrative of Divine power. With many, perhaps the most, the authority and influence of others — parents, teachers, legislators — lead to a ready acceptance of the truth. The Bible itself, whatever theologians may have done, rests its claims on no single evidence, or class of evidences, besides the saving influence of the truth it reveals upon the hearts and lives of those who receive it. Jesus said, " By their fruits ye sha.ll know them." St. Paul declared the gospel to be the power of God unto salvation. And St. Peter addressed his fellow- Christians as those who had received the end of their faith, even the salvation of their souls. Throughout 28 opposition various. the Scriptures, both of the Old and New Testaments, this experience of the power of truth upon the affec- tions and conduct is continually referred to. To many, however, the allusion to this kind of evidence is as a strange and unknown tongue; it becomes necessary, therefore, to meet the doubts and objec- tions which may be urged against the Christian re- cords, that men may be encouraged to accept and rely upon the truth revealed. The intensity and form of the opposition against the Scriptures vary at different times according to the amount of intellectual and critical activity em- ployed, or the moral character of the objectors. No man can live in Christian civilization without absorb- ing, it may be insensibly to himself, some of the light which is around him. Thus it happens that the un- belief of the present day differs in many respects from that of the last century. It is more mild and con- ciliatory. It is not disgraced by such low vulgarity. It is not made a matter of political agitation. It does not ridicule Christianity, nor does it altogether deny the facts of the Christian religion. It assumes a tone of candor and morality and fair dealing, and seems to wish to be recognized as an angel of light. It often becomes ultra-spiritualistic. There are, of course, localities where the old virulence and vulgarity break out under the guidance of men who are unfamiliar with the progress of modern ideas; but the skeptical literature of the present day is very different from that of the past. The spirit and tendency are the same, but the manner is different. Every age has New Forms of Objection improbable. 29 had its own form of doubt or unbelief, which has been met and overcome by the advocates of truth, yet every succeeding age has renewed the contest on the same or other grounds, with the same result. The gospel of peace and good will is still the rallying- point of strife and division, and will be, doubtless, till the probation of the world is ended. The principal ground of conflict now is the consistency of Faith and Science. The deductions of Natural Science being regarded as fixed facts, men are inclined to make them a standard of all truth. It is therefore neces- sary to show the harmony and consistency existing between the Book of Nature and that volume which claims to be the Book of God's revelation in human language. Such has been the progress of science and criticism during the present century that the materials for settling this question are doubtless complete. Enough of nature is known to enable us to judge of the har- mony of its principles and tendencies with the teach- ings of Scripture, and no new ideas on subjects traversed by the Christian religion, judging from the present state of scientific knowledge, are likely to appear. Mr. Farrar justly remarks, " If the present examination of some of the subtler forms of matter or of force, and of their existence in other globes of the solar system than our own, should lead here- after to a generalization which shall extend natural philosophy as widely beyond its present limits as the discovery made by Newton beyond those of his pre- decessors, yet these discoveries can have no bearing, 3* 30 The Plan proposed, favorable or unfavorable to religion, distinct in kind from that of present ones. If even a still mightier stride should be taken, and physiology be able to lay bare the subtle processes through which mind acts on body, yet the difficulty would only be an en- hanced form of that which is already used to dis- credit the spirituality and immortality of the soul."* We address ourselves, therefore, to the consideration of the scientific consistency of the leading doctrines of the Bible. As merchants sometimes try their goods by holding them up before the sun, we shall endeavor to examine these doctrines by the light of modern science. We pursue this plan, not be- cause we consider science to be the test of spiritual truth, but because it affords abundant confirmations of that truth. Such confirmations will remove many difficulties which have existed in sincere minds, and lead to a better appreciation of more positive evi- dence. Christianity asserts authority over religious belief in virtue of its being a supernatural com- munication from God. It professes to teach positive truth in reference to religion. Has science proved its revealings to be untrue, or can it do so? Are the doctrines taught by the professed revelation con- sistent with the truths arrived at by demonstration and experiment? Such are the questions we propose to discuss. * Critical History of Free Thought. CHAPTER II. THE VARIATIONS OF* INFIDELITY. ' Sacred and inspired Theology is the sabbath of all our labors." — BACon, (31) CONTENTS. Christian Truth ancient — Reason without Revelation tends to Panthe* ism, Dualism, Materialism, or Pyrrhonism, as seen in Ancient Phi- losophies — Opposition to Truth the native Temper of Heathenism and Infidelity — Four Crises or Epochs in the Contest against Truth, and their Characteristics — Present Infidelity an Attempt to revive Ancient Cosmogonies — Has forsaken the Scientific Principles of Bacon — Various Forms of Skepticism prevalent. (32) CHAPTER II. THE VARIATIONS OF SKEPTICISM. A BRIEF review of the efforts of scientific inquirers to obtain positive religious knowledge, and of the op- position which their speculations maintained against the Christian system, will throw light upon the tend- encies and spirit of the present age, and show the necessity of the work before us. Whatever we may think of the scientific consistency of the teachings of Scripture, the candid verdict of the historian will be that infidelity has turned very far aside from the fundamental principles of true science. The sacred books of the Christian religion contain the earliest ideas of the human race, and the history of the development of the first germs of religious thought. It is evident, therefore, that the patriarchal faith, as exhibited in the Scriptures, must have tinc- tured all subsequent histories and philosophies, and given origin to many thoughts which would other- wise have been unknown. In this way many ancient traditions originated, retaining more or less of truth. It would be a tedious, yet not impossible, task to cull out of the various systems and traditions of man- kind the ideas which show a common origin. Much that is good and true has clung to teaching other- wise fanciful or impure, and if we could eliminate the {33) 34 Origin of Philosophic Theories. product of imagination from the religious ideas of nations, the remainder would correspond to the teaching of the earlier books of the Bible. The history of philosophy proves that whenever human reason has attempted to solve the question of the origin of things, which is fundamental to re- ligion, without taking for the basis of its efforts the truth contained in the Scriptures, it has become in- volved in the speculations of one or other of the following theories: Pantheism, which beholds in finite beings only forms, or modifications, of the infinite substance; Dualism, which divides being, or sub- stance, between two uncreated principles ; Material- ism, or Atheism, which in place of the Infinite One substitutes a sort of indefinite multiplicity by the concurrence of atoms ; or Pyrrhonism, which is syn- onymous with universal skepticism, and doubts all things. These theories are not new. In Grecian literature the power of thought developed itself in all direc- tions, and it is remarkable that all subsequent sys- tems, even in the most modern times, so far as they rest on specific fundamental differences, may be recog- nized as anticipated by the Greek philosophers. Even these latter were dependent upon germs of thought, which suggests to us the profound culture of a very early period of the world's history. The Oriental philosophy, coming down to us from most ancient times, and embracing the speculations of the human mind in India, China, Persia, Chaldea, Phoenicia, and Egypt, presents a perfect parallel with the systems Temper of Heathenism and htfidelity. 35 of Greece, which, in connection with the early history of that country, justifies the conclusion that the East- ern philosophy was the source of all subsequent speculation. Pantheism, in its most complete form, is found in the Vedas, or sacred books of India. It is found, also, in the philosophies of China and Egypt. In Greece it seems to have been first taught by Pythagoras. The Zendavesta of Persia is the oldest exponent of dualism, and represents the universe under the notion of a grand conflict. The dualism of Chal- dean philosophy exhibited it as an immutable har- mony. This theory shows itself in the Grecian phi- losophy of Thales and Anaxagoras. Atheism, or materialism, distinguishes some of the Buddhist schools in India, and appears in Greece in Anaxi mander and Epicurus. Perfect skepticism cannot be met in argument by human logic, for every attempt to do so implies a certain principle on which it rests, and skepticism admits of no certain principle. It is invincibly repu- diated by human nature, however, as life repels death, for absolute skepticism would be the very extinction of reason. Yet this doctrine was taught by the Sophists, by Pyrrho, Sextus, and others. While the religious ideas and histories of the Bible were confined to the Jewish nation, or transmitted to other lands by patriarchal tradition, little or no op- position was excited against them. The founders of philosophic systems borrowed and moulded and altered these teachings at pleasure, to suit their own 36 Causes of Opposition. notions and designs ; but when, in the fullness of time, the patriarchal seed brought forth its fruit for the healing of the nations, and Christianity set up its claims as a universal and positive religion, and asserted its right to impose limits to the speculations of the human mind, a conflict might be naturally an- ticipated. The dispersion of the Jews during the two centuries preceding the Christian era, also provoked opposition, and the barbarous persecutions of Anti- ochus, in his attempt to exterminate the religion of the Jews and substitute that of the Greeks,* is a pic- ture of the native temper of heathenism and infidelity which history has often seen repeated. The gospel breathes the spirit of peace and brotherhood. It teaches good will towards men. Yet its Divine Founder, foreseeing the antagonisms which would be excited against it, said, " Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth ? I tell you nay ; but rather division." The natural dislike of a sinful heart to the moral standard of the gospel, the influ- ence of prejudice or self-interest, the disgust excited by the corrupt lives of hypocritical and formal pro^ fessors, the intolerance and heathenish spirit of a corrupt church, the intellectual doubts infused by some criticism or apparent scientific inconsistency, or some other cause, real or fanciful, excites opposition ; and it is amazing to see with what virulence and zeal Christianity is denounced, and often persecuted. Yet nothing has been substituted in place of the teaching * T. Maccabees, i. 44; TI. Mac. vi. Conflict with Heathenism. 37 of Scripture, by any skeptical system, down to the present day, save some modification of the theories already referred to, none of which have any scientific basis whatever, but are purely speculative. Four crises of Christian faith, in its struggles with infidelity, have been enumerated, as follows : ist The conflict with heathenism and heathen philosophy from the second to the fourth century. 2d. The skeptical tendencies of scholasticism in the twelfth and thir- teenth centuries. 3d. The infidelity attending the revival of literature in the fifteenth and sixteenth cen- turies. 4th. Modern infidelity in three forms, — Eng- lish deism, French infidelity, and German rational- ism. The result of these forms the skepticism of the present day.* The first of these struggles grew out of the tend- encies of the heathen world to absolute unbelief, to bigoted attachment to a national creed, to philosophic theorizing, and to a mystical inclination for magic rites. The Epicurean school of philosophers inclined to a total disbelief of the supernatural. Lucretius was among the best of them ; but, notwithstanding the effort sometimes made to put a favorable interpreta- tion upon his language, the world was to him a scene unguided by Providence, and death uncheered by the hope of a future life. Mr. Pope's " Essay on Man" is a reproduction of the skepticism of this school. Another example, of an opposite type, was Lucian, * Farrar's Critical History of Free Thought. 38 Christian Apologists. in the second century, the prototype of Voltaire. He seems to have had a universal ridicule for religion, and delighted in farcical caricature. It has been well remarked that human society has no worse foe than a universal scoffer, since such a one destroys not superstition only, but the very faculty of belief To such minds Christianity is a mark for the same jests as other creeds. The attachment to heathen worship and magic rites, and a tendency to philosophic theorizing, gave rise to what is known as the eclectic school of Alex- andria, or Neoplatonism, — the counterpart of our modern spiritualism. Lucian, Celsus, Porphyry, Hierocles, Julian were the writers who attacked Christianity during the period referred to ; and their arguments have been repeated in every subsequent age. The flippant wit of Lucian, which attributes religion to imposture, is repeated in Voltaire and Paine. The doubts of Cel- sus reappear in the English deists. The criticism of Porphyry is reproduced by modern exegesis. The disposition to regard Christianity as a product of the human mind, unsuited for men of superior knowledge and progress, is the parallel to Julian. Each of these champions of infidelity was met and his argu- ments fully overturned by the Christian apologists of that day. Tertullian, Justin, Origen, Eusebius, Athanasius, and Augustine, with many others, proved competent defenders of the faith. Yet the victory of the early c"u rch was not so much due to intel- lectual defenses as to moral influences. The common Scholastic Skcpticisin. 39 belief in magic and in oracles prevented the full force of the external evidence of miracles and pro- phecy ; but the internal evidences were most potent, — the doctrine of an atoning Messiah filling the heart's deepest longings, and the lives of Christians embodying heavenly virtues. Thus will it ever be. The effect of this wonderful scheme of reconciliation which the Bible reveals upon the hearts and lives of those who truly accept it, is the strongest proof of its Divine origin. " If a question of comparison be- tween this book and any other were started, Christ's own standard of judgment would best meet the case ; looking forward to the false prophets who should seek to undo his work. He said, ' By their fruits ye shall know them.' Modern civilization should be the field of research on both sides. Which book has done most for liberty, justice, progress ? Which book has most persistently branded, defied, and threatened every form of tyranny ? Which book has done most for the poor man ? These inquiries may be put in no declarriatory spirit, but simply with a view to the discovery of facts. The test is fair. It is marked by a high" sense of honesty on the part of Jesus Christ. He adopts no method of overriding human judgment, but, on the contrary, elevates the discriminative faculty of man, and in a manner throws the responsibility of the conclusion upon men's own common sense. This is not the plan of necromancers, soothsayers, and self-elected prophets. Christ appeals to his own works and the works of others, asking the verdict of the world upon their respective claims to 40 EnglisJi Deism. truth and veneration. There is no cunning leger- demain, no rebuke of human severity in the exam- ination, no indulgence bespoken on behalf of the worker : the words and works are before you ; judge, then, said Christ, and 'believe me for the very works' sake.' " * During the Dark Ages, men were oppressed with the double incubus of feudalism and the popedom; but about the twelfth century there was both a social and an intellectual struggle for freedom, which finally culminated in the revival of literature and in the Re- formation. At this time skepticism revived, and the idea of progress in religion, in the sense that Chris- tianity is to be replaced by a better religion, was ad- vanced. Christianity was also compared with other religions, so as to attempt to obliterate its peculiari- ties, and the leading principles of pantheism were re- asserted. The great medical school of Padua, and the medical philosophy of the Arabian Averroes, were the chief sources of pantheism at this time, — after- wards more fully taught by Des'cartes and Spinosa. English deism flourished at the close of the sev- enteenth and the first half of the eighteenth century. It allowed the existence of a Deity, and of the re- ligion of the moral conscience, but denied a revela- tion. This system called forth a number of writers into the arena. Toland, Collins, Shaftesbury, Wool- ston, Bolingbroke, and Hume were its champions. These men assailed religion with coarseness and * Ecce Deus. French Infidelity. 41 bitter hostility, but lacked a real insight into the nature of the system which they opposed. They argued against atheism and pantheism as well as Christianity, and tried to reduce revealed religion to natural. Among the many answers to this school of infidels, Bishop Butler's "Analogy" is perhaps the most complete. Probably no book since the times of the apostles has been so useful to the church in silencing unbelievers and solving the doubts of sin- cere minds. But the spread of infidelity was checked most of all by the extensive revival of spiritual re- ligion associated with the ministry of John Wesley and the Methodists. There are two causes for infi- delity, — the one intellectual, the other emotional. There are also two similar weapons against it. In- tellectual arguments may indeed serve the cause of truth ; but the story of Christ crucified, told in all simplicity, will awake an echo in the heart which neutralizes the doubts infused by the deist. Thus when the enemy came in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord lifted up- a standard against him. Bishop But- ler's arguments for the head, and the spirit of revival for the heart, saved England and America to religion and civilization. French infidelity was an excessive reaction against the evils of despotism in church and state. Voltaire, Diderot, D'Alembert, D'Holbach, Rousseau, and others studied in the school of English deism, but carried their skepticism to greater lengths. Their criticism was shallow and gross and vulgar, and the effect of their writings upon public morals was la- 4$ 42 German Rationalism. mentable in the extreme. Not only did they destroy the feudalism which had outlived its age, but they also encouraged blank atheism and gross immorality. The results of infidelity in France will ever remain a warning to mankind. Not only was the monarchy overthrown, but religion was declared to be obsolete. The churches were stripped, the images of the Sa- viour were trampled under foot, and 2. fete was held in November, 1793, in which an opera-dancer was made to impersonate the goddess of Reason, introduced to the National Convention, led as a deity to the ca- thedral, and received adoration from the audience. The churches were closed, the Sabbath was abolished, and on all the public cemeteries was placed the in- scription, " Death is an eternal sleep." Then followed a scene of most atrocious murders, robberies, and licentiousness, which made France appear as if given over to a carnival of fiends. Thomas Paine's "Age of Reason" was the direct outgrowth of French infi- delity, which also gave rise to the skepticism of Gib- bon, Shelley, Owen, and Byron. German rationalism seems to have been a mixture of English deism and French atheism. Its origin is doubtless to be traced to the decay of vital piety in Germany and the dissoluteness of the universities. The upholders of this scheme assume certain general principles as true and consistent with reason, and re- ject or explain away everything which seems to them at variance with their assumed standard. This stand- ard is said to be the deductions of reason from a contemplation of the natural and moral order .0/ Modem Infidelity. 43 things. As, however, these deductions vary accord- inpf to the intellectual and moral standpoint of each observer, rationalism has no settled creed. It is a vague, undefined system, whose adherents have no agreement among themselves, save in the rejection of a supernatural revelation. Some of its writers, by their criticisms, have made valuable additions to Christian literature, while others are wholly skepti- cal, attributing the origin of the Bible history to im- posture or to mythical tradition. Most of the churches of Germany seem to have been occupied for a num- ber of years by ministers who had no genuine faith in Christianity, and maintained the scheme of rational- ism in order to secure the pecuniary profits of their profession. The circumstances surrounding the ad- herents of skepticism were never so favorable as during the prevalence of rationalism in Germany. In addition to a general declension of piety, they had on their side literary prestige, wealth, numbers, and state patronage, and they improved every means in their power to propagate their views. Philosophical sys- tems, commentaries, and works on biblical criticism, grammars, lexicons, lectures, sermons, tracts, and al- most every other possible means of communication, became vehicles of unbelief. The purpose of the German rationalists has, however, signally failed, and a powerful reaction in favor of evangelical religion has taken place. Rationalism, as maintained at present, does not coldly deny Christianity, like the English deists, nor flippantly denounce it as imposture, like the French 44 Infidelity no Novelty, infidels, but seeks, after its own fashion, to appreciate its beauties and its genius, and by means of specu- lative criticism to separate what it deems to be truth from its errors. It claims for the human intellect the power and the authority to judge what is proper and right to be revealed from heaven, or to spurn the claim of such a revelation. Its real design is often hidden beneath a mask of Christian profession. It would substitute a metaphysical pantheism for re- vealed religion, while it retains the language of Scrip- ture, accommodated by means of hidden senses and special explanations to suit its own creed. Thus, with the most thorough rationalists, God means the soul of the universe; Christ is the ideal of humanity; the incarnation is the union of the higher and lower principles of human nature ; and the atonement is the reconciliation of those principles through struggle and suffering. Of course, to carry out this design, all that is miraculous in the Bible must be explained away. This they attempt to do by resolving such passages into accounts of unusual events mistaken for supernatural, or into a set of symbolical legends. From such elements has the infidelity of the present day been derived. Some of these elements, in the old or in a new dress, are to be found in every opposer of Bible truth. Some appear in scientific treatises ; others insinuate themselves into newspaper and mag- azine literature, as well as into history and poetry. Some found creeds, as that of spiritualism, so called. Some relate to Christian doctrines, and others to the criticism of the Scripture documents. It is mani- Heathenism the Root of Infidelity. 45 festly impossible to follow them through all the wind- ings, nor is it necessary, since every point has been fully answered. " The oracular utterances of Emer- son are but a revival of Spinoza's pantheism ; the ab- solute religion of Theodore Parker is but a rehash of the skepticism of the age of scholasticism ; and the difficulties of Colenso are the old objections of Bruno Bauer, long ago answered by Hengstenberg and other great German scholars." * The infidel objections against Christianity and the Christian record, notwithstanding the assumptions of rationalism, have not been caused by the discovery of any scientific facts, the natural inference from which required a change or readjustment of doctrine, but are the manifestation of the antagonism of the old philosophic cosmogonies. The root of modern skepticism is not new philosophy, but old heathen- ism. Occasional criticisms of interpretation have in- deed been made on scientific grounds; but these cannot militate against the truth of the history or doctrine. There are necessary and natural imperfec- tions attaching themselves to the language of one age when interpreted by others, which may tax our in- dustry to ascertain the real meaning of the record, but cannot overthrow our faith. Divine truth is com- municated in human language, but the value of the treasure is not depreciated by the earthen vessel which contains it. The effort and research necessary to understand the Scriptures are also in perfect accord * Tullidge's Triumphs of the Bible. 4^ Philosophy of Bacon. ance with the general order of nature, which ordains that useful results shall follow patient labor. The theories and speculations of ancient times served but to mystify and confound the human intel- lect, and rendered it necessary to reorganize the methods of scientific research. This was fully pointed out by Bacon, who inaugurated that mode of induc- tion and experiment which has done so much to enlarge the boundaries of true science. As false science is a sort of intellectual idolatry, which pays to error the reverence due to truth. Bacon gives the name of idols to the causes which have retarded and vitiated science, as follows: I. Idols of the tribe, or prejudices common to all men. 2. Idols of the cave, or individual prejudices. 3. Idols of the forum, or the prejudices men reciprocally communicate to each other. 4. Idols of the theatre, or the prejudices springing from the ascendency of teachers and phi- losophers. From these causes he shows that there had arisen both a false contemplation of nature and a false method of demonstration, to the injury of real science. He then lays down the methods of obser- vation, classification, and induction which are neces- sary to be followed in order to promote true knowl- edge, and enumerates the various branches of science to which they are applicable. It may be that this philosophy makes too little • account of deduction, and that its psychological principle of sensation has been pushed to excess by the materialistic school of the eighteenth century, represented by Helvetius and D'Holbach ; yet it has been, notwithstanding, the turn- Philosophy of Bacon. 47 ing-point of the human intellect from the confusion of ancient learning to the progress of the present. With respect to science, properly so called, as dis- tinguished from history and poesy, Bacon teaches that as there are waters which spring from the earth and others which descend from the skies, so there are sciences which man derives from the terrestrial world, and another science which comes from heaven by revelation. He declares that sacred and inspired the- ology is the sabbath of all our labors, — the divine day of repose and consummation to the intelligence. He is wise enough to teach that the stars of philoso- phy will not guide the vessel of human reason here, but that we must depend upon the divine needle for justly shaping the course. He shows that the use of human reason in matters of religion is confined to the explanation of mysteries and to deductions from them, and relates chiefly to the interpretation of Scrip- ture. He proves that our reason is no criterion of what God ought to require of us. He says, " We are obliged to believe the word of God, though our reason be shocked at it. For if we should believe only such things as are agreeable to our reason, we assent to the matter and not to the author, which is no more than we do to a suspected witness."* While Bacon sought the renovation of science by sensational experience, Descartes sought it in intel- lectual, — the instinctive utterances of consciousness. A true philosophy may yet find a union of the two * Advancement of Learning, Book IX. 48 Modern Skeptical Tendencies. extremes of metaphysical thought. It is the chiel merit of Bacon, however, that he was not so much a creator of theories as a founder of methods. Had his followers been content to follow the path he so clearly pointed out, the parallelism between the teach- ings of religion and science would have been more generally acknowledged. Instead, however, of con- fining themselves to observation, classification, and induction, men of scientific and literary tendencies are frequently found inventing cosmogonies and univer- sal systems, in imitation of the ancient schools, and endeavoring to compel the facts of modern science into their service. They desire to become world- builders, without the scientific knowledge which ren- ders it possible to attain such an end. One chief reason of this is that the Baconian system brings us no nearer to a knowledge of the elementary princi- ples of things than we were before. It unfolds to us a multitude of facts and phenomena, and their rela- tions, but of the real nature of matter, and force, and life, and intelligence, we are as ignorant as ever. Hence the temptation to return to ancient speculations. The skeptical tendencies manifested among scien- tific men of the present day vary from positive dis- belief of the supernatural, generated by fixed belief in the stability of nature and impossibility of miraculous interference, to merely isolated objections suggested by some presumed or apparent conflict between the discoveries of natural science and the statements of Scripture. In some form or other, however, nearly every ancient theory has its modern representatives. Tendencies of Free Thought. 49 The tendency to atheism or materialism may be seen in the apph'cation of statistics for the discovery of the laws of civilization, as taught by Buckle and Mill, in opposition to human freedom or divine agency. Dualism is represented by some of those naturalists who write on the correlation of forces. Pantheism is taught by the theory of development by law, and, in a similar form to the classical heathenism of the Eclectic or Neoplatonic school, by the spiritualists. Even the Pyrrhonists may find a parallel in some of the German schools of metaphysics. Mr. Farrar considers the tendencies of free thought at present to be three in number: "One, arising from Positivism, a tendency to deny the possibility of rev- elation; a second, from an opposite philosophy, to deny its necessity; and a third, to accept it only in part. These are the three tendencies by which the world and the church of the coming generation are likely to be influenced. Our path in life will be in a world where they are operating; and we shall need to be armed with the whole armor of God. If we have in our personal history so investigated the evi- dences of our faith as to feel that we have a well- grounded hope, unassailable by these doubts, we may be thankful; if we have gone safely through the perilous test of a careful examination of them, some- times staggering, perhaps, in our faith, yet struggling after truth, in prayerful trust that the Lord would himself be our teacher, until we are now able to feel that we have our faith grounded on -a rock, — a faith which is the result of inquiry, n t of ignorance, — let 50 Tendencies of Free Thought. us be still more thankful, and exemplify our thank- fulness by trying to assist the doubter with our tender sympathy, and to aid him in finding the truth and peace which Christ has given to us."* * Critical History of Free Thought, CHAPTER III. THE RECORD OF FAITH. God . . . spake in time past unto the fathers." — St. Paui» (50 CONTENTS. Mankind not originally barbarous — Civilization of the Earliest Ages as taught in the Scriptures — Religious Views of the Patriarchs — How Men become degraded in Civilization and Religion — The Scriptural Account confirmed by the History of Astronomy and the Ruins of Nations — Geological Argument for the Antiquity of Man — Duke of Argyll's "Primeval Man" reviewed — History and Literature of Greece and India confirmatory of Scripture — The Primitive Religious Faith not natural — If natural, would not in- validate Scripture — Religious Ideas neither innate, nor from Sen- sational Experience, nor from Psychological Investigations — Iso other conceivable Mode except Revelation — Answer Objections from the Interpretation of certain Passages of Scripture. (52) CHAPTER III. THE RECORD OF FAITH. In our last chapter we stated that the religious opinions of patriarchal times gave a coloring to the views of all nations, and showed that the variations of infidelity were but modifications or republications of ancient heathen philosophies and cosmogonies. We now examine whether the scriptural account of the early faith of mankind is confirmed by history, and whence that faith originated. Infidel writers have so persistently labored to show that man began his career in a state of barbarism, if, indeed, he be anything more than "a walking vegetable, an improved zoophyte, or, at best, a civil- ized orang-outang," and the sentiment that we are the greatest of all generations is so soothing to vanity, that it seems almost hazardous to obtrude an opposite opinion; yet Scripture and authentic history unite in testifying that the original character of mankind was one of intellectual dignity, that let- ters and arts were known in the earliest ages, and that the barbarism of nations was owing to nomadic habits or vicious pursuits. Christianity makes no claim to be a discovery of (S3) 54 Mankind not originally barbarous, any new fundamental truth. It is rather a history of facts than a new creed or hypothesis. It pro- fesses to exhibit the full development of the early faith of mankind, by means of a divinely-appointed system of agencies, extending from the first revela- tions made to patriarchs, through the Jewish church and nation, until in the fullness of time the entire scheme was completed by the mission of Jesus Christ and the establishment of ,the Christian church. The Bible transmits to us the Divine promise made to our first parents, and its renewal, from time to time, by special revelations, which Christianity asserts to have been fulfilled by the advent and death of Christ. We find also in the Scriptures, as collateral to its great design, an account of the religious opinions of the ancient world given by revelation, and of remark- able interpositions of Providence in the world's history. Mankind is represented in those early days not in a wild and barbarous condition, with merely ele- mentary notions of language and arts and civiliza- tion, but as having obtained in some manner a high degree of knowledge and refinement. The knowledge of useful metals and dominion over the animal creation have always been con- sidered marks of civilization ; yet Abel kept sheep, and Jabal was the head of a .noted tribe of cattle- breeders. Cain built a city called Enoch; and music and mechanical arts were known before the flood. Astronomy was cultivated, and names were given to the stars. Thus we find Job referring to Arcturus, Early Civilization. eq Orion, and the Pleiades.* He also declares that God "stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing-."t The fine arts, as music and poetry, were cultivated, as is evident from the passage, "They take the timbrel and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the organ."f Weaving and building and workmg in metals were well-known employments; hence the references, "My days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle."§ "Surely there is a vein for the silver, and a place for the gold where they fine it. Iron is taken out of the earth, and brass is molten out of the stone."|| War had its imple- ments, commerce its ships and caravans, and luxury its ornaments of gold and silver and precious stones. Job refers to the iron weapon, the bow of steel, and the sword,T[ as well as to pieces of money and ear- rings of gold.** Abraham also "weighed to Ephron the silver which he had named in the audience of the sons of Heth, four hundred shekels of silver, current money with the merchant."tt There was also a permanent literature, since language had books, and inscriptions, and laws of versification. It is thought by some good critics that the first part of the book of Genesis embodies more than one ancient docu- ment earlier than Moses. Certain it is that the song of Lamech, in antediluvian times, presents the prin- ciple of parallelism which is the form of Hebrew * Job, ix. 9; xxxviii. 31, 32. f Job, xxvi. 7. X Job, xxi. 12. \ Job, vii. 6. II Job, xxviii. I, 2. \ Job, xx. 24. ** Jol, xlii. II. ff Gen. xxiii. 16. 56 Religious Views of the Patriarchs. verse.* God commanded Moses to write in a book for a memorial ;t and the names on Aaron's breast- plate and mitre were engraved " like the engravings of a signet."J Job exclaimed, " Oh that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book! that they were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock forever !"§ These representa- tions are not pictures of a barbarous age. Compared with Oriental nations of the present day, it would not seem that progress is an inherent quality of human nature. The religious views of the most ancient times are represented in the Scriptures as embracing the per- sonality and greatness of God, the creation and prov- idential government of the world, the existence of good and evil angels, the fall and depravity of man- kind, the promise of forgiveness and restoration by the mediation of a Redeemer, the possibility of Di- vine communications to the human consciousness, the reality and perpetuity of a future state, and the Divine sanction of moral laws and precepts. The moral laws which were regarded as of Divine au- thority in the patriarchal age, and which are called by ancient Jewish commentators "the statutes of Adam," or "the precepts of the sons of Noah," have been thus enumerated: 1. To abstain from idolatry. • 2. To worship the true God. * Gen. iv. 23. ■}■ Ex. xvii. 14. X Ex xxviii. 21. \ Job, xix. 23. Development of Early Faith. 57 3. To commit no murder. 4. To refrain from all impure lusts. 5. To avoid all rapine, theft, and robbery. 6. To administer true justice. 7. To observe the Sabbath as a day of rest and worship. These things are clearly taught in the oldest books of Scripture, as the Pentateuch and the book of Job, and are there referred to as of most ancient date.* These great fundamental truths of religious history and doctrine the Bible records also as divinely re- vealed : " God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began. "f In the Hebrew nation they were preserved and developed by a national polity, a religious priesthood and ritual, and a succession of inspired men and inspired writ- ings, which served as " a light that shineth in a dark place until the day dawn." The Christian dispensa- tion is the fulfillment of the ancient promises, the full development of ancient doctrines, and the exhibition of the full application of ancient precepts. If these representations of Scripture are true, they ought to be capable of historic confirmation by trac- ing backwards the religious thought of various na- tions, as so many radii proceeding from a common centre. The want of perfect records, however, renders such an investigation incomplete and fragmentary; yet it will not be unsuccessful. Ancient literature, and the progress of antiquarian research, especially in * See Smith's Patriarchal Age. f Acts, iii. 21. 58 How Faith may be perverted or lost. Oriental lands, confirm the opinion that the lines drawn by history, though broken and effaced at many points, are perfectly parallel with the scriptural record. The manner in which religious ideas may become degraded, perverted, or lost is easy to trace. When a system of doctrines, or opinions, or historical events has been committed to writing, as in the Scriptures, it will, of course, be long preserved in its pure and simple form; but its traditional form will vary ac- cording to the habits and mental improvement of the people among whom it may be found. Among com- paratively civilized people, who congregate in cities and cultivate the arts and amenities of social life, its fundamental principles will remain longest, and its corruptions will be the product of philosophic specu- lation or poetic fancy. Among pastoral and agri- cultural nations we may expect to find, mingled with the elementary ideas, vagaries of greater simplicity, tinged with childish superstitions. Nomadic and barbarous tribes, who in the pursuit of the mere necessaries of life have but little time for instruction, are those among whom in the lapse of ages such a system will lose its distinctive characters, and in some instances may be totally lost. The history of religious opinion in all ages shows this to have been the case with respect to the primitive religion of the patri- archs. While we meet with fragments of it and testimonies to it in nearly all nations, the literature of Greece and the religious systems of Asia afford the most numerous points of coincidence. A few Ancient Civilization confirmed by Astronouty. 59 barbarous tribes have been found which seem to have retained no trace of the idea of a Supreme Being, or of religious worship. Mr. Locke refers to the Hot- tentots of Soldani'a, etc. as instances of this kind; and Mr. Moffat, after over twenty years' residence among the Bechuanas of South Africa, tells the same thing of them. The Papuans of Australia and the Digger Indians of California may in all probability be placed in the same class. The representations of the Scriptures respecting the arts and literature and civilization of the early world are fully confirmed by the history of astron- omy and by the remains of the most ancient nations known to historical science. Bailly, the friend and correspondent of Voltaire, in his treatise on Oriental Astronomy, bears un- witting testimony to the biblical account. He ob- serves that he had " found everywhere in the ancient world not only astronomical improvements, which imply a corresponding progress in science, but also civil institutions for chronology and the regulation of time, derived from one source, and identically the same ; an entire and consistent system of music, whose two halves, separated by revolutions incident to human affairs, had been transported to the two extremities of the globe; a primitive measure, which still exists everywhere in Asia, by itself or in its component parts, and which was connected with a very ancient and accurate determination of the mag- nitude of the globe; one and the same legislation for the sciences, arts, and religion ; the same system of 6o Human Remains confirmatory. physics and theology; in fine, everywhere remaining traces of ignorance succeeding to light and science." The accurate astronomical records which have come down to us from earliest times confirm the same view of the primitive age. It is not possible for ignorant barbarians to have been capable of the complex observations and calculations which these records imply. The ruins of Egypt, Phoenicia, Assyria, and Baby- lon, and the light thrown upon their history by the researches of ChampoUion, Botta, Layard, and Raw- linson, give a similar testimony and afford numerous illustrations of the manners and customs referred to in the Bible.* Finding no room for the theory of development in the remains of authentic history, skepticism has in- terrogated the earth's crust, and the discovery of human remains near Abbeville, France, and in other places, and the ruins of lake-habitations about several * " ' It is, indeed, one of the most remarkable facts in history,' writes Dr. Layard, ' that the records of an empire so renowned for its power and civilization should have been entirely lost; and that the site of a city, as eminent for its extent as its splendor, should for ages have been a matter of doubt; it is not, perhaps, less curious that an accidental discovery should suddenly lead us to .hope that these records may be recovered, and this site satisfactorily identified.' It is more than curious : it is the wise Providence of Him who uncov- ereth secret things that, in our busy, speculative, superficial age, when men are questioning the truth of his revelation, and, wise in their own conceit, denying his moral government of the worlds He has framed, the earth should, as it were, give forth a voice, reveal the buried pal- aces of ancient days, and proclaim thereby a fresh attestation to the truths of sacred writ." — Treasury of Bible Knowledge, Human Remains in the Rocks. 6 1 of the Swiss lakes, have afforded grounds for much scientific speculation and conjecture. No conclusion, however, can be drawn from these remains incon- sistent with the view of a degradation of some races from a more highly civilized condition. Dana, in his " Manual of Geology," after Prestwich, remarks that " the evidence, as it at present stands, does not neces- sitate the carrying of man back in past time, so much as the bringing forward of the extinct animals towards our own time." At the time of the Abbeville dis- covery, a scientific commission was appointed to in- vestigate it; but the evidence of relative antiquity was very conflicting, and in some respects incompati- ble. A distinguished French geologist, M. de Beau- mont, gave it as his opinion that the gravel deposit of the locality did not belong to the diluvian age at all, but to the actual or modern period. This latter period includes a large variety of rocks, of mechani- cal, organic, chemical, and igneous origin, having great variety of structure, from the alluvium of river- beds to travertine and lava of immense thickness. Prof Heer, of Zurich, also, from examinations of the plants found in the Swiss lake-dwellings, deduces their age at from looo to 2000 years B.C. The Duke of Argyll, in his ** Primeval Man," re- views the discussion between Archbishop Whately and Sir J. Lubbock respecting the origin of civiliza- tion. He argues for a vast antiquity for the human race, although fully accepting the scriptural account of man's primeval condition and degradation. He rejects every theory of chronology drawn from ex- 62 Chronology of the Early World. isting versions of the Old Testament, — the Hebrew, the Samaritan, and the Septuagint, — since they vary from each other, not by years, but by centuries. He suggests that the early history of the Old Testament was intended to be merely the history of typical men and typical generations, and its intimations of secular interests were obscure and incidental. Its account of the dividing of the tribes is so condensed as to give the impression of long intervals. The first of the de- scendants of Noah whose personality is clear to us is associated with the fact of national growth. Abra- ham figures in the advanced civilization of the Pha- raohs in Egypt, and Chedorlaomer appears the sov- ereign of a long-established race. The migrations of Abraham stand at the very beginning of historical chronology. They give us the earliest date on which chronologists, without great discrepancy, are agreed. This is 2000 years B.C. Yet the Egyptian monarchy was founded long before, — some say 700 years before. This places the beginning of the Pharaohs at 2800 B.C., which, according to Usher's interpretation of the Hebrew Pentateuch, would be 400 years before the flood. The Septuagint varies from this 800 years, — a variation so enormous as to throw doubt on the whole system of interpretation by which such com- putations are made. The authentic records of the Chinese begin in the twenty-fourth century B.C., or 300 years before Abraham, although some consider them less ancient. The Duke of Argyll thinks that such facts indicate either that the flood happened vastly earlier than has been usually supposed, or that Antiqiiity of the Human Race. 63 it destroyed only a portion of the human family. The chronologies professedly founded on the Pentateuch he considers to involve doubtful and inconsistent in- terpretations. Thus, when we read of Canaan, the grandson of Noah, that he " begat Sidon his first- born, and Heth," we seem to have the names of in- dividual men ; but when it is immediately added that he also begat *' the Jebusite, and the Amorite, and the Arkite, and the Sinite," etc., it is clear that we are dealing not with single generations, but with a con- densed abstract of the origin and growth of tribes. The varieties of the human race, also, which the science of language, as well as the Scriptures, shows to have descended from a common stock, require a vast antiquity to account for them, especially as there is proof from the Egyptian monuments of the existence of the negro race 1400 years B.C. He sums up the geological evidence as follows: 1st. That man ap- peared in Northern Europe at a time when it was covered with quadrupeds now wholly extinct. 2d. That the surface of the earth has since that period been subject to modifications which imply great changes in physical geography. 3d. That the period when these animals flourished and when man coex- isted with them was one when a colder climate pre- vailed. Argyll accepts the geological evidence for the great antiquity of the rude implements found in caves, etc., but considers it about as safe to argue from these im- plements as to the condition of man in his primeval home, as to argue from the habits and acts of the Es- 64 The Cave-Bear and the Glaciers. quimaux the state of civilization in London or Paris. He refers to the language of archaeologists respecting a stone age, a bronze age, and an iron age, and de- clares that there is no proof that such ages ever ex- isted in the world, since flint implements are a very uncertain index of civilization even among the tribes who used them, and are no index at all of the civiliza- tion of cotemporaneous tribes. He fully indorses the theory of moral degradation, and says that " human corruption in this sense is as much a fact in the natural history of man as that he is a biped without feathers." Dr. Winchell replies to the skeptical argument that Geology requires a higher antiquity for the human race than the Scriptures teach, as follows: " We have no rule for the measurement of post- Tertiary time which necessitates the admission of so higR antiquity to our race. If we have been accus- tomed to think of the extinction of the cave-bear as dating back to high antiquity, we now discover that he lived with man and the reind-eer, and other animals which still survive. The existence of even the cave- bear may not have been so very remote. What are the reasons assigned for the prevalent opinion that it was many ages age that the glaciers began to dis- appear from Europe ? Simply the existence at that time of quadrupeds now extinct, together with the presumption, unsupported, as it seems, by the facts, that no animals have coexisted with man except those of the recent fauna. The fact is that we come ourselves upon the earth in time to witness the retreat of the glaciers. They still linger in the valleys of the Beginnings of our Race. 65 Alps and along the northern shores of Europe and Asia, while the disappearance of animals once con- temporaries of man is still continuing. Not only did contemporaries of man become extinct during the age of stone; some survived to the twelfth, fourteenth, and sixteenth centuries, as already stated; the moa of New Zealand and the aepiornis of Madagascar have become extinct within the epoch of tradition, as indeed has the mammoth of North America; the dodo of Mauritius disappeared in the seventeenth century; the great auk of the arctic regions has not been seen for half a century ; and every one must be convinced that the beaver, elk, panther, buffalo, and other quadrupeds of North America, are approaching extinction by perceptible steps. The fact is, we are not so far out of the dust and chaos and barbarism of antiquity as we had supposed. The very begin- nings of our race are still almost in sight. Geological events which, from the force of habit in considering geological events, we had imagined to be located far back in the history of things, are found to have trans- pired at our very doors. Our own race has witnessed the dissolution of those continen-tal glaciers which we have so long talked of as incidents of pre-Adamite history. Our own race has witnessed the submer- gence of Southern Europe ; the detachment of the British Islands an*d Scandinavia from the continent ; tlie wanderings of the great rivers of Eastern Asia ; the submergence of thousands of square miles of the coast of China, so that the seats of ancient capitals are now rocky islets far at sea; the emergence of the 6» 66 The Bible and Geology Hartnonious. ancient country of Leetonia; the drainage of the vast lake which once overspread the prairies of Illinois ; the alternations of forests; and many other events which we once associated with high antiquity. It is the opinion of Hooker and Gray that the Falkland Islands, and others in the vicinity, have formed a part of the continent of South America during recent times, and that during this connection they acquired the continental fauna and flora. The Straits of Behring may even have been cut through since the early migrations of man and his contemporaries, the mam- moth and reindeer, as in some distant future age the Isthmus of Darien, which now connects North and South America, may become a strait separating them. There is no more reason in this day than fifty years ago to claim a hundred thousand years for the past duration of our race." * Dr. Dawson institutes comparisons between our present knowledge of palaeocosmic men as gained from Geology and the scriptural record. He shows that both the Bible and Geology exhibit man to be united without any break to the close of the (Ter- tiary) period of the great mammals ; that the oldest human remains are nearly allied to the most widely- distributed modern race, while their size and strength remind us of the nephilim or giants of Scripture ; that the cranial capacity of these earliest men shows no sign of affinity with brutes ; that the condition, habits, and structure of palaeocosmic men correspond * Sketches of Creation, p. 368. Argument of Prof. Lewis, dj with the idea that they may be rude and barbarous offshoots of more cultivated tribes ; and that their funeral rites and the traces of their religious beliefs point to a similarity with those of the most ancient races of men, which are all fairly traceable to corrup- tions of those primitive articles of faith revealed in the Scriptures.* Prof. Tayler Lewis [Excursus in Lange's Genesis, ch. X.] argues that the admission of a creation does not demand the idea of an instantaneous coming from nothing of everything belonging to the new existence, but only the new and distinct beginning of that which especially makes // ivhat it is — a new, peculiar entity separate from everything else. Ap- plying this to man, his origin may have been as remote as any theory may allow. Even the common idea of an outward plastic formation of the body implies the use of a previous nature in previous materials, and is essentially the same idea as that of the employment of previous growths and processes. How many steps there were we cannot know, but there may have been outwardly approximations to the human long before there was reached that humanity proper in which nature and spirit unite. We need not be startled at the thought of such anthropoidal forms, some, perhaps, larger than any now found on earth, and which may have perished, like some of the mammoth mammalia. If the ex- plorations of science have brought to light any such * Nature and the Bible, p. 176. 68 The Tnie Humanity. remains, our faith need not be disturbed by the ques- tion of their pre-historicalness. The interpreter of Scripture is httle concerned either in affirming or denying such discoveries. Whatever be their date, we have not yet come to the humanity proper, the Adamic humanity, that humanity which Christ as- sumed and raises to a still higher sphere. The true creation of man was not merely a formation or an animation^ but an inspiration — a direct, divine inspira- tion (Gen. ii. 7) ; and now there is what before was not, a new thing upon earth, not simply something higher physically (though even that would require a divine intervention), but an entity distinct as con- nected with a higher or supernatural world. From this prinncs homo, thus inspired, comes all of humankind. This inspiration is a new divine force in the earth. The fall does not at once destroy it, though giving a tendency to spiritual death, carry- ing with it a physical decline. Even with this, how- ever, the primitive divine impulse in the first men makes them very different from what is now called the savage state, which is everywhere found to be the dregs of a once higher condition, the setting in- stead of the rising sun. All past and present history may be confidently challenged to present the con- trary. Among human tribes, wholly left to them- selves, the higher man never comes out of the lower. In the antediluvian period the creative impulse manifested itself by its resistance to the death-prin- ciple, which the fall through the spiritual had intro- duced into the physical organization of man. After Confirmation by Secular History. 69 the flood this impulse tended to a sensual gregari- ousness, making humanity sublime even in its wick- edness. It was the time of the tower-builders, the pyramid-builders, the great city-builders, the empire- founders. It was different from anything now known in savage tribes, and produced results utterly un- known as ever following from such a state. Such were the primitive men as the Bible presents them to us, although their mere worldly greatness was to the Scripture writers a wholly subordinate subject. Secular history confirms the account: ist, by its silence as to all before. At most, only a few bones, here and there discovered, and about whose real antiquity men of science are still contending, are all the traces of man's existence in pre-historic times. We ask in vain for marks of progress, or of any transition state. A speaking silence, like that which seems to come from the blank chamber of the Great Pyramid, proclaims that man, the Adamic or Noachic man, is not much older than the pyramids. History confirms this, 2dly, by its positive testimony. It begins with men doing great things, raising pyra- mids, building cities, founding states. It opens with the Egyptian and Babylonian empires, and that, too, as new powers in fullest vigor and presenting every appearance of youthful greatness. In brief, the first historical appearances of men upon the earth are at war with the theory of savagism. The savage condi- tion is one ever sinking lower until aid is brought to it from without, and at the early time referred to there was no such aid except from a supernatural source. yo History of Greece Confirmatory. The early history of Greece is shrouded in ob- scurity ; but we deduce from the most rehable sources that about the time of the removal of the family of Jacob into Egypt a barbarous horde from Asia Minor migrated to the islands and coasts opposite. Other colonies from Egypt and Phoenicia followed, carrying with them their various arts and policies. Maritime and piratical expeditions brought them into contact with other parts of the world and served to elevate them into a state of semi-civilization. As time wore on, their manners became more refined, their language more perfect, and a succession of great and wise men exalted Greece to the position of the most learned and polished nation of ancient times. Its institutions and literature became the wonder and the model of the world. The first colonizers of Greece brought with them such principles as they retained of the sim- ple faith and worship of the patriarchs ; but as in all other countries except the land of Israel, so here this faith became corrupted by vain imaginations, and a degrading polytheism was substituted for the primi- tive worship ; yet in no other nation than Greece do we witness such struggles of the human mind to re- turn to elementary truth by means of reason and philosophy. Plato declares that " after a certain flood, which but few escaped, on the increase of mankind they had neither letters, writing, nor laws, but obeyed the man- ners and institutions of their fathers as laws; but when colonies separated from them they took an elder for their leader, and in their new settlements Patriarchal Ideas in Greece. 71 retained the customs of their ancestors, — those es- pecially which related to their gods, — and thus trans- mitted them to their posterity. They imprinted them on the minds of their sons, and they did the same to their children. This was the origin of right laws and of the different forms of government"* Herodotus states that at Dodona he was told that they had formerly sacrificed and prayed to the Deity in general, without giving any name or names to the object of their worship, but that, after a long time, the names of the gods were brought there from Egypt. The resemblance of the religious ideas of the Greeks to those of the early history of the Bible may be seen, notwithstanding many imaginations and speculations, in the theories of philosophers and in the poetic and historic literature of Greece yet extant. A volume of quotations might be made in confirmation of this view. The existence and worship of God, the sep- arate state of the soul after death, and its reward or punishment in Elysium or Tartarus, the doctrine of sacrificial mediation, the difference between virtue and vice, the primitive chaos, the golden age, the fall of mankind, the tendency of the world to moral corrup- tion, the deluge, and the doctrine of special interpo- sitions of Heaven, — all these primitive ideas were retained with more or less distinctness in all their idolatries and speculations and poetic fancies. The religious thought of India, and of the greater part of the Oriental nations, has been greatly modi- * Plato, De Leg., iii. p. 680. 72 Origin of Religiotis Ideas. fied by the theories of a philosophic pantheism, the peculiar character of which seems to have been the origin of Grecian, if not of all philosophic, specula- tion. The more luxuriant imagination of the East, also, has produced a greater variety of fabulous legends and idolatries than elsewhere. Yet amid all this it is not difficult to find the substratum of religious truth, corresponding to that of the primitive age as given in the Scriptures. The ideas of Divine exist- ence, of the nature of virtue and vice, of a future state of rewards and punishments, and of sacrificial mediation for the forgiveness of sin, may be clearly traced through all the fables and vagaries with which they are accompanied. Similar things may be said of every nation of which we have any authentic Slccounts. *' Everywhere," says Humboldt, " the traces of a common origin, the opinions concerning cosmogony, and the primitive traditions of nations, present a striking analogy even in minute circumstances. Does not the humming- bird of Tezpi call to mind the dove of Noah, that of Deucalion, and the birds, according to Berosus, which Xisutrus sent forth from the ark, to try if the waters had subsided, and if as yet he could erect altars to the gods of Chaldea?"* Whatever religious ideas may be culled out of the opinions or practice of any nation which find a par- allel in the ideas of others, have their primitive root and groundwork in the Bible, divested of speculative * Humboldt'- Cosmos. Religious Faith not natural, 73 and superstitious imaginations. The Bible records these ideas in their purest and simplest form. This of itself is a strong presumptive argument for its truth as a faithful history of the primitive and catholic faith of mankind. "Which of your poets," observes Ter- tullian, "which of your sophists, have not drunk from the fountain of the prophets ? It is from these sacred sources, likewise, that your philosophers have re- freshed their thirsty spirits, and if they found any- thing in the Holy Scriptures to please their fancy or to serve their hypotheses, they turned it to their own purpose, and made it serve their curiosity, not con- sidering these writings to be sacred and unalterable, nor understanding their sense, — every one taking or leaving, adopting or remodeling, as his imagination led him." Having traced the streams of religious opinion backwards to their common fountain in the patriarchal age as exhibited to us in the Bible, the question nat- urally arises. Whence these ideas ? Are they natural to mankind ? Are they the product of nature or reason, or have they been communicated by Divine revelation ? If religious faith is natural, or is the product of either nature or reason, it would be fair to presume that it would be equally clear and distinct in every age and nation of the world, since the gifts of nature and of reason are so largely distributed. We have seen, however, that this is not the case. The tendency of mankind, as shown by history, is to corrupt re- ligious truth ; and if the authorities referred to can be 74 The Bible tnie^ if Faith natural. relied upon, some tribes have lost all knowledge of it whatever. It is only as we ascend towards the fountain that the stream becomes pure and whole- some. Again, one item of primitive faith, — the prom- ise of forgiveness of sin through a Redeemer, — tes- tified to by all the sacrifices of the heathen world, is essentially germinal in its nature ; it points to a com- ing Saviour, — **the desire of all nations." If this faith be natural, how does it happen that it has never been developed, save in Israel and in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ ? The Avatars of India and other mythologies may have parodied this doctrine, but it has never been historically developed except as re- corded in the Christian Scriptures. It is literally true that " other foundation can no man lay than that is laid," and " there is none other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved." If the Scriptures are rejected, this hope of the ancient world must be regarded as vain or unaccomplished. In such a case the questions would still recur. Whence this faith ? If of natural origin, why not its develop- ment also ? If we were to admit that the patriarchal faith was natural to mankind, it would not necessarily militate against the truth and inspiration of the Scriptures. They might still be regarded as a republication of natural religion, made by Divine authority, with ad- ditional sanctions, more clearly established and de- veloped by providential interposition into a complete system for human redemption and the conduct of life. Some such view seems to have been taken by Innate Ideas no Source of Faith. 75 many theologians and writers who have referred to moral notions among the heathen as " the light of nature," and have considered such natural ideas suf- ficient to teach the difference between good and evil and to lead to the performance of religious duties. Some of these writers have been very inconsistent with their own views respecting the necessity of a revelation. Religious ideas can only be natural to man in one of two ways, — they must either be innate, or acquired by sensational or psychological experience. If we find on examination that they could have been ob- tained in neither of these modes, we shall be obliged to acknowledge that they have originated in Divine revelation. Metaphysicians have written largely upon these subjects, but none oi them, either of the sen- sational or idealistic schools of philosophy, have ever succeeded in proving that the religious faith of man- kind is either innate or acquired from nature. We therefore conclude with Bacon " that sacred theology must be drawn from the word and oracles of God, not from the light of nature or the dictates of rea- J) -k. son. ^ There can be no reasonable doubt that we have certain inborn (innate) natural faculties by which 'we are enabled to " discern the agreement or disagree- ment of some notions so soon as we have the notions themselves ; as that we can or do think, that therefore we ourselves are, that one and two make three, etc. * Advancement of Learning, Book TX. ^6 Religion 7iot innate. This we may call intuitive knowledge, or natural cer- tainty wrought into our very make and constitution."* Such knowledge, however, as insisted on by Kant and others, is always marked by necessity and universality. Mr. Locket argues against the theory of innate ideas, declaring that there are none to which men give a universal consent. Which side soever we assume in respect to the general principles of knowledge, the arguments of Mr. Locke will fully apply to every item of the patriarchal faith. He first shows that if there were certain truths wherein all mankind agreed, it would not prove them innate, if any other way can be shown how they obtained them. He then argues that there are no ideas so universal, for if children and idiots have no apprehension of them it destroys that universal consent which is the necessary concomitant of all innate truths. Further, such general maxims ought to appear clearest and brightest in those per- sons in whom we find them not, as in children and illiterate persons, who are least corrupted by custom or borrowed opinions. We have already seen that there are whole tribes of men who are so degraded as to have lost most, if not all, of the knowledge of God and of religious truth. The observations, also, of those who have had the care of deaf mutes — as in the interesting case of Laura Bridgman, who was born deaf, dumb, and blind, but was instructed through the sense of touch until she * Oldfield, Essay on Reason, p. 5. f Essay on the Human Understanding. Religious Ideas not from the Senses. yj could hold conversation, and who testified that she had no knowledge or idea of God or the soul until she was taught — tend to confirm the view that there are no innate religious ideas. Archbishop Whately pertinently remarks that "a deaf-mute, before he has been taught a language, — either the finger-language or reading, — cannot carry on a train of reasoning, any more than a brute. He, indeed, differs from a brute in possessing the mental capability of employing lan- guage ; but he can no more make use of that capa- bility till he is in possession of some system of arbitrary general signs, than a person born blind from cataract can make use of his capacity for seeing till the cataract is removed. Hence it will be found by any one who will question a deaf-mute who has been taught language after having grown up, that no such thing as a train of reasoning had ever passed through his mind before he was taught."* If reli- gious ideas were inborn or arose spontaneously in the mind, such persons would manifest their pos- session w^hen they were brought into contact with other minds, and had been taught to exercise their Acuity of expression. As we can find no reason to believe the primitive faith to be innate to mankind, there is likewise no evidence that it could have originated from sensa- tional experience. The ideas of God, of spirit, of moral duty, of sin, and of atonement, which lie at the basis, of the patriarchal religion, are spiritual '"■ Elements of Logic, p. 2] 7* 78 Knowledge depe7ident upon Sensation. ideas, i.e. they relate to the existence and nature and condition of spiritual beings; while external nature is only competent to communicate ideas of material things. The mind has no connection with the ex- ternal world except by means of the nervous system of the body, and every simple idea communicable by means of the nerves, as ideas of seeing, hearing, feel- ing, smelling, and tast-ng, must in the nature of things relate to the properties of matter. It is impossiWe to conceive that one could see, hear, feel, smell, or taste anything immaterial. "As it is written. Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit."* The manner in which super- natural communications of spiritual ideas may be re- vealed in the sphere of the natural world is a subject for subsequent consideration. In denying a material origin for faith, we do not underrate sensation as a means of acquiring knowledge. We are doubtless dependent upon it for our perceptions of the external world. So important and fundamental is it that many have conceived it to be the only means of gaining knowledge, and teach that every idea in our minds may be traced to our senses ; but, as the stream can- not rise higher than its source, it is evident that sen- sation can communicate no knowledge of anything beyond its own origin in the material world. The only remaining mode by which ideas may be •5^ I Cor. ii. 9, lo. Faith not from Mental Faculties. 79 naturally obtained is by psychological experience, or the observation and application of the mental faculties. Whatever importance we may assign to the senses with relation to our knowledge of external things, it is easily seen that no man "-knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him." Con- sciousness is a faculty or power of the mind by which a man knows himself to be himself, and to be the subject of the various sensations he experiences. The Creator, also, has obviously established a close rela- tion between the mind and outward things, and the power of tracing relations among the various objects of thought is a faculty of which the mind is conscious. The ideas derived from this source, called by Mr. Locke ideas of reflection, have much to do with the extent and accuracy of our knowledge of the ex- ternal world ; but the knowledge of " the things of a man," or those faculties which distinguish us from other creatures, depends entirely upon them. From the time of the first publication of the Pla- tonic philosophy, the various schools of metaphysi- cians, in all ages, have examined this subject in order to discover what may be known by observing or con- centrating the mind's inherent powers; but thus far no one has been able to point out how the primitive and universal religious faith of mankind could have originated in this manner. St. Paul declared that "the world by wisdom knew not God," and the most thorough investigation fully confirms the sentiment. Kant, who may be called the apostle of transcenden- 8o Reason ignorant of God. talism, or supersensuous philosophy, treats largely upon this subject, and denies the possibility of prov- ing the existence of a Deity on the grounds of spec- ulative reason. He discusses the three kinds of argu- ment which he declares to be the only modes possible, and which he terms the ontological argument, deduced from a priori conceptions alone ; the cosmological ar- gument, " from a purely indeterminate experience, that is, some empirical existence ;" and the physico- t/ieo/ogica/ argument, beginning " from determinate ex- perience and the peculiar constitution of the world of sense, and rising, according to the laws of causality, from it to the highest cause existing apart from the world." He declares " that all attempts of reason to establish a theology by the aid of speculation alone are fruitless, that the principles of reason as applied to nature do not conduct us to any theological truths, cind, consequently, that a rational theology can have no existence unless it is founded upon the laws of morality." Again, ** A supreme being is, therefore, for the speculative reason, a mere ideal, though a faultless one, — a conception which perfects and crowns the system of human cognition, but the objective reality of which can neither be proved nor disproved by pure reason."* From such considerations we are obliged to ques- tion the human origin or natural foundation of reli- gion, and are compelled to differ from those theolo- gians who regard the Scriptures as a republication of * Critique of Pure Reason. Light of Early Revelation. 8 1 the truths of nature. We are forced to the conclusion that the existence and prevalence of ideas pertaining to the spiritual world, as ideas of God, spirit, duty, sin, atonement, etc., prove that there has been a rev- elation made to man from the world of spirits, since no other mode of acquiring such ideas is conceivable. The spiritual or religious faculties of man have not been left without appropriate objects, any more than the intellect or the bodily nature. We have seen, also, that the root and substratum of all the primitive reli- gious ideas in the world are contained in the Bible, unconnected with speculative follies or degrading superstitions. We therefore regard the Bible as the genuine and original record of Divine revelation. This view of the origin of religious truth agrees with all the annals of antiquity. " Moses has recorded the settlements of the first parents of mankind, where God, in a more frequent and immediate manner, gave revelations of his will, and commanded them to teach it to their children and their children's children. Hence those first colonies of the East, Phoenicia, Persia, and Egypt, continued the oracles of learning to the world through all succeeding ages. The further men dispersed from them, the more they became sunk in barbarity and divested of humanity Reason was like the echo: where nearest to the voice it was strong, but as it removed, gradually sunk and died away. And what not a little contributed to this preservation of knowledge in the East was God's con- tinuing to reveal himself to the Jews, so that in pro- cess of time the little spot of Jewry was the only 82 Law wniten in the Hearts of the Heathen. place where the true God was known and taught. And some beams of this Divine wisdom could not but shine forth from time to time upon the neighbor- ing people who conversed with them. Accordingly, whenever we find a people begin to revive in litera- ture, it was owing to one of these causes : either to some transmigrators from those parts coming and settling among them, or else to their going thither for instruction. From these fountains they always had it, and at this fire the nations of the world lighted their own. There is no instance to the contrary. Hither Athens, and afterwards Rome, came in quest of knowledge and instruction. These were the schools and masters to the world. And, though our accounts of Asia are but short and defective, yet what remains there are, as also their traditions, even in China, trace their origin and oracles westward ; which is the fullest confirmation of the Mosaic history, and of the propa- gation of knowledge by instruction only."* It is sometimes objected that certain texts of Scrip- ture encourage the idea of the natural origin of religious truth. Thus, in Rom. ii. 15, St. Paul men- tions the law written in the hearts of men, even heathens, and implies that the principles of moral law are innate in man. To this the author last quoted replies, " That a principal distinction between the Jews and Gentiles was that one had a written law, the other not ; that, before the age of Moses, the whole world was subject to the same general law, as it had * Ellis's Knowledge of Divine Things from Revelation. The Law of God binding on all. 83 been given to Adam, Noah, etc. from God, and by them deHvered to their posterity, who were subject to the sanctions of it in rewards and punishments ; which in justice they could not have been, except it had the force of a law, and received sufficient promulgation. Thus the patriarchs were justified in obeying, the Sodomites and others condemned for disobeying the law delivered to them; and after-ages had these gen- eral notions of duty and sin providentially continued down to them, to keep conscience and the inward senses of the soul awake, and thereby render them excusable or inexcusable. And all the ancient com- mentators und-erstood these words, Z'^o-^^ yf'p ^^0>ri^ ' for when the Gentiles,' etc., Rom. ii. 14, of those who lived before the law, as Melchisedec, Job, etc., or who repented, as the Ninevites, or who had learned the worship of the true God, as Cornelius. This was theii: >oixoq uYpa(poq^ Unwritten law, for the heathen Avorld had no other. Draco's were the first (and those chiefly political ones) committed to writing in Greece, about 624 years before Christ ; and a moral system was not attempted till Socrates taught it, and Xeno- phon and Plato recorded his sentiments. "Again, the wisest writers on the law of nature (as Puffendorf) interpret these texts as a figurative ex- pression, and implying no more than a clear and cer- tain knowledge treasured up in the memory, of which the persons spoken of are convicted in their own con- sciences, by what means soever these notions entered into their thoughts. And to write in the mind cv ttj t^'u/rj Ypd(paiv^ et scnberc in animo, was a phrase in com- 84 God seen from the Creation, mon use with the Greeks and Latins as well as the holy penmen both of the Old and New Testaments." Another text is sometimes quoted to show that the being and attributes of God may be discovered in the works of nature : " For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse." Rom. i. 20. But the context shows that the apostle is so far from asserting the sufficiency of nature to discover the existence of a Deity, that his argument is founded on the heathens being already convinced of this truth. The following comments are judicious and conclusive: Dr. Ellis remarks, v. 19, " Because that which may be known of God" — as much as was necessary for their present circumstances, concerning his essence, attributes, and will — **is manifest in them," or (as the margin and others read it) to them, or among them, not indeed from nature and reason, "for God hath showed it unto them," iipa\>iinoat\ the word expressly denotes a positive act of God, who brought to light, made manifest and evident, that which was dark, ob- scure, and unknown before, by the sundry ways He thought proper to reveal and make himself known to us. V. 20, " For {j"-py nam, siqnidem, forasmuch as) the invisible things of Him" — ** his eternal power and God- head," as afterwards explained — "from (not ly-, but «"<), ever since) the creation of the world," when they were fully communicr.ted, " are clearly seen," because, after Religion as Old as the World. 85 a declaration of his nature and existence, the Divine attributes are plainly evinced, " being understood" (^voouftsva^ explained to the understanding) " by the things that are made" {r.oi7iiJ.aecial impulse must be afforded to his mental faculties. Each of these modes of revelation is referred to in the Scriptures as occurring in different dispensations and at different times. God has at sundry times and in divers manners spoken unto the fathers by the prophets, and in these last days has spoken unto us by his Son. The manner in which the Bible exhibits a Divine revelation to have been made will suggest to us the true principles of interpretation. It is the true key to the meaning of Holy Writ. Pictorial representation to the eye or imagination was frequent among the prophets of the Old Testa- ment, and characterizes the Apocalypse in the New. Jacob's vision at Bethel, Joseph's prophetic dreams, the visions of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, etc., and a number of references in the New Testament are Verbal Revelation. 99 examples. Hugh Miller, in his ** Testimony of the Rocks," refers to this manner of revelation respecting past events of which the seer was necessarily ignorant. He quotes a number of ancient commentators in con- firmation of his views, and applies it to the account of the creation given in the book of Genesis, He supposes the prophet to have received a series of visions illustrating or typifying those periods in which the earth was being prepared for man's abode. Each of those pictorial visions, he supposes, took up a nat- ural day, and that the phrases, "The evening and the morning were the first day," — "second," — " third day," etc., refer to the representations, and not to the cre- ative processes themselves. While this ingenious theory is not at all needed to reconcile the teachings of geology with the book of Genesis, there is no doubt of its application to many parts of Scripture, both historical and prophetical. The question may be asked, whether a warm and fertile imagination might not account for the origin of such visions, as in reveries, or waking dreams, or in the dramatic conceptions of the poets. Such a thought would scarcely occur to one who regards the Bible as entire, and remembers how all parts fit together, form- ing a complete system. It is altogether different from anything we know of imagination, to see a series of visions by different persons and in different times and places, during an interval of more than a thousand years, all referring to the development of the same facts, and permeated by similar sentiments. Again, from the nature of imagination it may be readily seen lOO special Impulses. that it has no power to invent any new ideas what- ever. Its sole office is that of combining ideas which were otherwise received. It has no power except to form images out of preconceived notions. Now, the visions of the prophets contained new and original ideas, and special predictions which could have had no elementary existence in their previous experience, but were evidently real revelations. The same thing is true of revelation by means of intelligible words, — so often referred to in the Scrip- tures and often introduced by the formula of *' Thus saith the Lord." We may consider it either as a real sound, or a strong impression on the mind, of Divine origin. Were it other than a real revelation, how does it happen that imagination and mesmeric excitement have never discovered a new spiritual truth, or referred to one whose root and essence are not in the Bible ? Verbal revelation has an advantage over pictorial, as being better adapted to the communication of abstract truth and argumentative reasoning. The last mode mentioned, viz., special impulses communicated by the Divine Spirit to the faculties, differs not in kind, but only in degree and application, from the Divine aid which is promised to every sin- cere and earnest Christian. Supernatural grace and direction are afforded to every one who will do God's will, that he may "know of the doctrine." "For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him ? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Adaptation of the Bible. loi spirit which is of God ; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God." " Hereby we know that He abideth in us. by the spirit which He hath given us." In the apostles and writers of Sacred Scripture, however, the Holy Spirit not only impelled their faculties so that they understood their personal relation to God, and by correspondence to that im- pulse were enabled to live sanctified lives, but it also impelled them to communicate the truth with such clearness and propriety as to express the mind of the Spirit. And as the needle points towards the pole when touched with the same magnetic influence as the earth itself, so the mind which has received the Divine Spirit recognizes the Divine teaching. This is the reason why many unlearned Christians are so little disturbed by the objections of infidelity. From this cause also arises the wonderful adaptation of the teachings of Scripture to the ever-varying conditions of mankind, notwithstanding the diversities existing as to their literal meaning. The correspondence of Scripture teaching with our highest religious impulses is a subjective argu- ment for inspiration. " In the skeptical writings of the day the argument is rarely stated, except to be dealt with as a form of a natural but not very harmless illusion. Yet it is an argument of the greatest force and importance, and an argument which, if rightly handled, it is much easier to set aside than to answer. Is it nothing that the Bible has spoken to millions upon millions of hearts, as it were, with the voice of God himself? Have not its words burned within 9» I02 Study of the Bible its own Reward. till men have seen palpably the Divine in that which spake to them? Is it not a fact that convictions on the nature of the Scriptures deepen with deepening study of them? Ask the simple man, to whom the Bible has long been the daily friend and counselor, who reads and applies what he reads as far as his natural powers enable him, — ask him whether longer and more continued study has altered, to any extent, his estimate of the Book as a Divine revelation. What is the invariable answer? The Book 'has found him;' it has consoled him in sorrows for which there seemed no consolation on this side the ^rave. it has wiped away tears that it seemed could only be wiped away in that far land where sadness shall be no more; it has pleaded gently during long seasons of spiritual coldness; it has infused strength in hours of weakness ; it has calmed in moments of excite- ment; it has given to better emotions a permanence, and to stirred-up feelings a reality; it has made itself felt to be what it is; out of the abundance of his heart his mouth speaks, and he tells us with all the accumulated convictions of an honest mind that, if he once deemed the Bible to be fully inspired on the testimony of others, now he knows it on evidence that has been brought home to his own soul. He has now long had the witness in himself, and that witness he feels and knows is unchangeably and enduringly true. "Ask, again, the professed student of Scripture, the scholar, the divine, the interpreter, one who, to what we may term the testimony of the soul in the Inexhaustible Blessing in Study of the Bible, 103 case of the less cultivated reader can add the testi- mony of the mind and the spirit, — ask such a one whether increased familiarity with Scripture has quickened or obscured his perception of the Divine within it, whether it has led him to higher or lower views of inspiration. Have not, we may perhaps anxiously ask, the difficulties of Scripture wearied him, its seeming discordancies perplexed, its obscu- rities depressed him? Have not the tenor of its arguments, and the seeming want of coherence and connection in adjacent sentences, sometimes awakened uneasy and disquieting thoughts? What is almost invariably the answer? * No ; far otherwise.' Deep- ened study has brought its blessing and its balm. It has shown how what might seem the greatest diffi- culties often turn merely upon our ignorance of one or two unrecorded facts or relations; it has conducted to standing-points where in a moment all that has hitherto seemed confused and distorted has arranged itself in truest symmetry and in the fairest perspec- tive. In many an obscure passage our student will tell us how the light has ofttimes suddenly broken, how he has been cheered by being permitted to recognize and identify the commingling of human weakness and Divine power, the mighty revelation almost too great for mortal utterance, the 'earthen vessel' almost parting asunder from the greatness and abundance of the heavenly treasure committed to it. He will tell us, again, how in many a portion where the logical connection has seemed suspended or doubtful, — in one of those discourses, for instance. I04 TJie Seers sometimes rapt beyond themselves. of his Lord as recorded by St. John, — the true con- nection has at length slowly and mysteriously dis- closed itself, how he has perceived and realized all. For awhile he has felt himself thinking as his Saviour vouchsafed to think, in part beholding truth as those Divine eyes beheld it; for a brief space his mind has seemed to be consciously one with the mind of Christ. All this he has perceived and felt. And he will tell us, perchance, what has often been the sequel, — how he has risen from his desk and fallen on his knees, and, with uplifted voice, blessed and adored Almighty God for his gift of the Book of Life."* In connection with this subject of spiritual impulses as a mode of revelation there is one principle which must not be overlooked. The ancients believed that one fully possessed with Divine impulse was merely a passive agent, and did not himself understand, and could not explain to others, what he spake while he was inspired. The heathen regarded their sooth- sayers and oracles, when they pretended to prophesy, as carried away with a divine madness, a sacred intoxication, which deprived them of their own powers of consciousness and reflection. The early Jews, also, according to the Talmud, taught that, in many instances, the prophets themselves did not understand the import of what they predicted. Now, while it was generally true that the spirits of the prophets were subject to the prophets, yet there are parts of Scripture where this principle of passivity in * Rev C. J. Ellicott, in " Aids to Faith." PAble anticipates Science. 105 those inspired is clearly recognized. Thus, it is said of Balaam that the Lord put words in his mouth. Numb, xxiii. 5. So Caiaphas the high-priest un- wittingly prophesied that it was expedient that one should die for the people. John, xi. 49-52. St. Peter also affirms that the prophets searched diligently lespecting the prophecies of Christ which were made through them. I. Pet. i. 1 1 ; II. Pet. i. 20. Analogous to this form of inspiration are those passages of Scripture in which language is so used as to develop thought and anticipate discoveries in science. Thus, in Genesis, where it is said that God made two great lights, the Hebrew word has the sense of light-bearers, thus anticipating the modern discovery that light is separate from the body of the sun. Another passage of a similar kind is found in the sublime description given of Wisdom in the book of Proverbs: "Before the mountains were settled, be- fore the hills was I brought forth : while as yet He had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world." But recently geology came to the conclusion that the highest parts of the earth were the oldest, yet the Bible revealed it ages ago. We can but allude to the subject of such incidental evidences of supernatural knowledge; to point them out is the province of a commentator. The majority of modern theologians hold to three degrees of inspiration as applied to the Scriptures. The first and highest degree is the revelation of things before unknown to the writers. The second degree is the security against error which God af- io6 Revelation chiefly illustrative. forded to the writers in the exhibition of facts and doctrines with which they were already acquainted The third degree is the authority given by the ap- probation of inspired men to writings originally com- posed without inspiration, as the genealogies and historical compilations found in some parts of the Old Testament, etc. Let us now apply these principles to interpretation. From what we have seen respecting the mode of spiritual communications, it follows that every reve- lation to the intellect must necessarily be chiefly illustrative. Spiritual and Divine truths come to us through earthly mediums. The vision of the ster symbolized or exhibited the truth in natural imageiy, since no other was possible. The words which fell upon the ear of the prophet were used in their con- ventional meaning, since no other meaning would have conveyed the idea. Hence it also follows that revelation conformed necessarily to the educational status of those to whom it came. It is true that in some instances the seer was rapt, or carried away, beyond his own sphere of thought; but this was rather exceptional than usual. Had it been com- mon, the revelation would have been unintelligible to the generation which received it. These instances of direct verbal inspiration are marks of miraculous knowledge, and are external Divine evidences of authority pertaining to the class of prophecy. We gather, therefore, from the manner of the rev- elation that the Bible should be explained in its grammatical sense, as we would interpret any other Seemuig Contradictions. 107 book, but with special reference to the language, customs, and ideas of the age of the world in which it was written ; remembering always that it is a rev- elation of spiritual truth communicated chiefly in illustrations and figurative language, and making use of the history, chronology, and other sciences of the age as vehicles or accessories. This principle will explain those seeming contra- dictions which result from the use of popular lan- guage, as when Joshua commanded the sun and moon to stand still, — the sun going forth from one end of heaven to the other, etc. It will even justify many actual errors in science, chronology, and his- tory, should such be found to exist. The Scriptures were not intended to teach men these things, but to reveal what relates to man's connection with moral law, and the spiritual world, and his salvation from sin. In order to teach these truths, the biblical writers availed themselves of the popular language and the current science and literature of the age in which they lived, so as to be intelligible to their contemporaries. As in the present day a man may be well instructed in the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, and " have an unction from the Holy One," while ignorant of or a disbeliever in the teach- ings of modern science, so likewise it was possible to those who first received religious truth and were commissioned to declare it. The presence of the Holy Spirit preserved from errors in science no more in the one case than in the other. A revelation of spiritual truth, of universal interest to mankind 1 08 Science not to be sought in the Scriptures, might have been made to the Bedouin Arabs or Chinese. Yet in reality the majority of inspired men were far from ignorant. Many of the writers of Scrip- ture were learned in the scholarship of their day, and through them the most lucid accounts of ancient times, and fragments of ancient literature, and copies or abstracts from ancient genealogies, have come down to us which would otherwise have been utterly lost. Yet whoever undertakes to construct a science out of their incidental allusions will find it labor in vain. It was no part of their mission to teach science. One may as well seek to study surveying in a bi- ography of Washington as the details of cosmogony or chronology in Genesis. This is the mistake of those who write "Harmonies of the Gospels," as well as others. It may, indeed, gratify a laudable curiosity to examine the chronological succession of recorded events, and may furnish additional confirmation of historic fidelity, but it is not necessary to prove the truth of the Evangelists. Dr. Smith has well said that "the inspiration of an historical writing will consist in its truth, and in its selection of events. Everything narrated must be substantially and ex- actly true; and the comparison of the gospels one with another offers us nothing that does not answer to this test. There are differences of arrangement of events ; here some details of a narrative or a dis- course are supplied which are wanted there; and if the writer had professed to follow a strict chrono- logical order, or had pretended that his record was not only true but complete, then one inversion of Human Element in the Bible. 109 order, or one omission of a syllable, would convict him of inaccuracy. But if it is plain — if it is all but avowed — that minute chronological data are not part of the writer's purpose, — if it is also plain that no- thing: but a selection of the facts is intended, or, in- deed, possible (John, xxi. 25), then the proper test to apply is, whether each gives us a picture of the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth that is self-con- sistent and consistent with the others, such as would be suitable to the use of those who were to believe on his Name ; for this is their evident intention."* Many of the apparent contradictions in the Bible may be explained by the mistakes of transcribers, or in some other way equally natural; but, "as the Bishop of London has well remarked, ' When laborious in- genuity has exerted itself to collect a whole store of such difficulties, supposing them to be real, what on earth does it signify ? They may quietly float away without our being able to solve them, if we bear in mind the acknowledged fact that there is a human element in the Bible.* " What if many of the numbers given in Exodus should, as Bishop Colenso asserts, be inaccurate? What is to be gained by assertions or denials relative to matters which have forever passed out of the reach of our verification ? What if, here and there, a law should seem to us strange and unaccountable ; an event difficult to comprehend ; a statement to involve an apparent contradiction? What has all this to do * Smith's New Testament History. 10 1 1 o Every Part of Scnpture useful. with the essential value of the book ? Absolutely nothing, unless thereby its truthfulness can be set aside. " If error were in the Bible cunningly interspersed with truth, the case would be different. But it is not so. The book, as a whole and as it stands, is whole- some and useful ; each portion of it has its proper place and is adequate to fulfill its appointed end. Everything has its purpose to fulfill and its object to accomplish, whether, properly speaking, inspired or not. Nothing may be despised, nothing pronounced superfluous. But everything in the book does not take hold alike on the heart and conscience. It may be very interesting, as indeed it is, to trace on the map the various journeyings of St. Paul, or the wan- derings of the children of Israel in the wilderness; to note a hundred undesigned coincidences ; to study and try to reconcile two apparently conflicting gene- alogies ; to examine into and to discuss the chronol- ogy, the geography, or the natural history of Pales- tine. All this and much riiore may be done ; and it is fitting that in its time and place it should be done; yet it may be accomplished without the slightest moral or spiritual benefit arising to the man who is thus occupied." * From the principle of interpretation referred to above, we may deduce the rules laid down by theo- logians as applicable to the Scriptures. Ellicott has briefly summed them up as follows : " Interpret gram- * " Liber Librorum'.' Rules of Interpretation. \ \ i matically, historically, contextually, and minutely,'' and " interpret according to the analogy of faith." The first rule is to interpret grammatically. This would seem almost superfluous ; yet " there is a strong desire evinced in many quarters to evade the rule, and, under cover of escape from pedantry, to endeavor to make Scripture mean what we think, or what we wish, not what it really says to us." In place of the nat- ural and obvious meaning, we are exhorted to inter- pret by means of mystical " correspondences," or by our own " verifying faculty" to rectify the imperfect utterances of words "of which it is assumed we have caught the real and intended meaning." Such a pro- cedure applied to other literature would produce end- less confusion. On such a principle " Mother Goose's Melodies" might be regarded as a treatise on moral philosophy, and romance be extracted from the most didactic compositions. St. George Mivart quotes from Mr. Tylor's " Primi- tive Culture " an amusing parody of certain recent at- tempts to explain almost all early history and legend by myths of dawn and sunrise. It will equally apply to some violations of our first rule. Mr. Tylor says, with respect to the " Song of Sixpence :" " Obviously, the four-and-twenty blackbirds are the four-and-twenty hours, and the pie that holds them is the underlying earth covered with the overarching sky. How true a touch of nature it is that when the pie is opened — that is, when day breaks — the birds begin to sing ! The king is the sun, and his counting out his money is pouring out the sunshine, the golden shower of Danae. 1 1 2 Rules of Interpretation. The queen is the moon, and her transparent honey the moonlight. The maid is the rosy-fingered dawn, who rises before the sun her master, and hangs out the clouds, his clothes, across the sky. The particular blackbird who so tragically ends the tale by snipping off her nose is the hour of sunrise." Mr. Tylor similarly explains the life and death of Julius Caesar.* The second rule is to interpret historically. This requires us to illustrate by reference to history, topog- raphy, and antiquities. We should transport our- selves in thought to the age and country in which the writer lived, and the scenes surrounding him, so as to realize, as far as possible, his original conception. Our only object is to find the idea intended by the inspir- ing Spirit. This necessitates, of course, industrious study and research, in order that the full force of the language may be understood. We need not expect to develop the meaning of Scripture with less labor than scholars bestow upon other ancient writings. The third rule is to interpret under the limitation-^ assigned by the context. This is to inquire for the design of the writer, and to give the words not only the meaning but the application he intended in that place where we find them. The want of attending to this rule has been the origin of many a fanciful and illogical interpretation. The fourth rule is to elicit the full significance of all details. The importance of this rule will be evi- dent when we remember " that in every case words * Lessons from Nature, p. 146. Rules of Interpretation, 113 are the appointed media of ideas and sentiments, and believe, in the case of Scripture, that both the ideas are heaven-sent and the sentiment inspired." This rule, however, admits of but limited application in the case of metaphors and parables, where the general teaching of the whole is evidently intended, rather than a minute application of details. The fifth rule is to interpret according to the anal- ogy of faith. This is a scriptural term, used by St. Paul in Rom. xii. 6. We consider it synonymous with several other passages, as " the Scriptures," ** all the law," " the mouth of all the prophets," etc. It might be rendered " the general tenor of the Scrip- tures." Mr. Ellicott refers it to the creeds, as the authorized exposition of the faith of the church ; but this elevates a merely human production to a superi- ority over Divine revelation. As the Bible is a com- munication of spiritual truth in human language, it is not to be classed with any merely human composition whatever, and mi!lst be interpreted in accordance with its own design and general meaning. Creeds are useful as showing what learned and pious men have gathered from Scripture teaching, and as compen- diums of Bible truth ; but, after all, we must refer them '* to the law and to the testimony ; for if they speak not according to this word, there is no life in them." ** It is thus that philosophy interprets natural ap- pearances. When once a general law is established, particular facts are placed under it, and any appear- ance that seems contradictory is specially examined ; and of the two explanations of the apparent anomaly 10* 1 14 Rules of Interpretation. that one is selected which harmonizes best with the general law." * Respecting diversities of interpretation, the author of the book entitled " Liber Librorum" (from many of whose teachings we dissent) has well said that "only as Scripture is allowed to adapt itself to the peculiar mental and moral condition of each individ- ual, do its words become * spirit and life' to him, ruling his conduct and reigning in his affections. Instead, therefore, of finding an occasion of stumbling in the fact that diversities of view on many points always have, and probably always will, characterize Chris- tians, we might rather discover in the wonderful adap- tation of Divine teaching to each, evidence of the source from which it comes. For it is at once one and yet diverse; unchanging and yet endowed with a capacity of all but infinite fitness to every variety of character. Just as material light, although the same to all, is yet different to persons of imperfect vision, suffering under diverse forms of disease, so is spiritual illumination a different thing to men in dif- ferent stages of the Divine life, with vaiying intel- lectual powers, and, above all, with conflicting wills, passions, and interests; and just as it would be im- possible to temper the light of the sun so that it should leave precisely the same impression on every optic nerve, whether sound or otherwise, so is it neither possible nor desirable that Divine truth should come home to the man who is jaundiced by his pre- * Angus's Handbook. spirit of an Interpreter, 1 1 5 judices, or drugged by his sins, precisely as it does to the simple and righteous soul who desires to know only that he may obey." If we admit the Divine inspiration of the Scriptures, we should approach their interpretation in a teachable spirit, with earnest prayers for the promised illumi- nation of the self-same Spirit by whom they were first communicated. Nor should we imagine that all the truth contained in Holy Writ can be bounded by our own conceptions. A good model for a Christian student may be found in the following passage from St. Augustine's "Confessions:" **I would hear and understand how * In the beginning Thou madest the heaven and earth.' Moses wrote this, wrote and de- parted, — passed hence from Thee to Thee. Nor is he now before me ; for if he were, I would hold him, and ask him, and beseech him by Thee to open these things unto me, and would lay the ears of my body to the sounds bursting out of his mouth. And should he speak Hebrew, in vain would it strike on my senses, nor would aught of it touch my mind ; but if Latin, I should know what he said. But whence should I know whether he spake the truth ? Yea, and if I knew this also, should I know it from him ? Truly within me, within, in the chamber of my thoughts. Truth, who is neither Hebrew, nor Greek, nor Latin, nor barbarian, without organs of voice, or tongue, or sound of syllables, would say, *It is truth;' and I forthwith should say confidently to that man of thine, * Thou sayest truly.' Whereas, then, I cannot inquire of Moses, Thee I beseech, O Truth, being filled with Ii6 Various Interpretations may be true. whom, he spake truth ; Thee, my God, I beseech, for- give my sins ; and Thou, who gavest him to speak these things, give to me also to understand them." Augustine understood the " heaven" to mean that spiritual and incorporeal creation which cleaves to God unintermittingly, always beholding his counte- nance; and " earth," the formless matter whereof the corporeal creation was afterwards formed ; but he was very far from so insisting on his own views as to re- ject other interpretations, since he believed that Scrip- ture was so deep and full that manifold senses might be drawn from it, all consistent with truth. He re- marks, " So when one says, ' Moses meant as I do,* and another, * Nay, but as I do,' I suppose that I speak more reverently, * Why not rather as both, if both be true ?' And if there be a third or a fourth, yea, if any other seeth any other truth in those words, why may not he be believed to have seen all these, through whom the One God hath tempered the Holy Scriptures to the senses of many, who should see therein things true but diverse ?" If such a spirit generally prevailed among interpreters, there would be greater unity in the church, and less infidelity to oppose. Truth is a unit, but it is a polygon also; and the many-sided appropriateness of Scripture is evidence that it is es- sential truth. This should never be lost sight of by the student who would penetrate deeper than the mere surface of things, and know the " mind of the Spirit," and " the things which are freely given to us of God." CHAPTER V. THE REVELATION OF GOD. " Blind metaphysical necessity, which is certainly the same always atd everywhere, could produce no vanety of tnmgs. All that diversity of natural things which we find suited to different times and places could arise from nothing but the ideas and will of a Being necessarily existing." Sir Isaac Newton. ("7) CONTENTS. The Idea of God fundamental to Morality — Origin of the Idea — Tend- ency of Mankind to Idolatry and Pantheism— Yet Reason finds the Idea of a Personal God necessary — Scripture Representation of Deity — Names of God — I Am that I Am — Origin of the Inscrip- tion at Delphi — Representation of Moses and the Prophets — Fullest Revelation of God in the Incarnation — The Scripture Representa- tion of God illustrated by the Discoveries of Astronomy andr the Microscope. (ii8) OF THK CHAPTER V. THE REVELATION OF GOD. The fundamental principle of religion — the basis of all religious ideas — is the existence of a personal yet infinite God, the Great First Cause of all things. What can reason tell us of this? How does the Bible represent it ? Are the views of the Bible in accord- ance with the legitimate deductions of science ? Such are the questions we propose. The idea we form of God underlies all our morality, and modifies every scheme of religious opinion what- soever, whether pagan or . Christian or skeptical. Modern infidelity teaches that God is not a personal, intelligent Being, but a sort of universal force, or soul of the world, the various manifestations of which make up the phenomena of the universe. We have seen that arguments against pantheism may be drawn from every branch of science, — physical, mental, and moral ; still, this idea of deified force, or eternal fatal- ism, distinguishes its adherents, tinges all their litera- ture, and is the foundation of all their philosophy and morality. Development and Necessity are the two poles of this system, around which all the thoughts of its votaries revolve. On the other hand, Christi- anity is based upon the fact of a personal and infi- nitely perfect God, who holds to our race the relation ("9) 1 20 Origin of the Idea of God. of Father, and has constituted mankind a common brotherhood. From these relations flow all our obli- gations and duties of worship and reciprocity and benevolence. Take away from our creed the father- hood of God and the brotherhood of man, and you leave behind nothing but the worship of brute force. Call it development, or evolution, or necessity, or anything else, there is nothing left for reverence, if we discard a personal God, but unreasoning, unfeel- ing force. All the relations and duties of life are by such a scheme interfered with, and the law of the strongest becomes our only rule of right. It is not, therefore, a merely harmless speculation, and a matter indifferent, whether we believe in God or Fate ; the very foundations of society are based upon such beliefs. The question of the origin of the idea of God, like that of the origin of matter, or life, or language, or society, is one respecting which there is a diversity of opinion. Some suppose that the mind of man at his birth is like a piece of blank paper, upon which nothing is written, and consider that we learn the idea of God, as well as other ideas, by experience and observation. Others believe that the mind is not a blank, but is furnished with a small stock of rational principles, which are the germs of future knowledge, and that among these germs is the idea of God, Others, again, — on the grounds of philosophy and Scripture, as we think, — believe that the ideas of God and duty were given originally by revelation from heaven, and that the religious opinions of mankind were all derived from that revelation, either by means Grecian Theism impersonal, \2\ of the Scriptures, or by traditions of the same truths flowing through channels more or less pure from the earliest ages of the world. Whatever belief we may entertain as to the origin of the idea of God, it is important to inquire how much we can learn or have learned of God without the aid of the Scriptures, except the indirect knowledge flow- ing from the influence which they may have exerted upon the opinions of the age. This will manifest the tendency of humanity when left to itself This ques- tion history supplies us with the means of answering. The resemblance of the primitive religious ideas of the Greeks to those of the Bible is very distinctly traceable in their mythological fables and poetry, and these resemblances all their subsequent speculations could not wholly obliterate ; yet with especial refer- ence to the Grecian philosophy the apostle wrote, " The world by wisdom knew not God. ' The people, indeed, worshiped many gods, but to none of them did they attribute the character of an intelligent First Cause. They worshiped the air as Jupiter, the ocean as Neptune, and other personifications of natural phenomena or of abstract qualities; but the true idea of a Creator was unknown. The religion of the philosophers was the same pantlieism which is sought to be restored by modern infidelity. None of them, not even Socrates, nor Plato, nor Aristotle, conceived the idea of a personal God. Mr. Farrar says,* " All philosophic theology in * Science in Theology. 11 122 Ionic School. Greece was pantheistic, i.e. if pantheism be made to mean any theory which admits an impersonal First Cause, and to include — ist, the theory which teaches an anhna inundi ; 2d, that which regards God as the sum total of all that exists (pantheism proper); and 3d, that which regards the Deity as an abstraction, synonymous with the idea of perfection. Thales might possibly represent the first of these views ; the Eleatics, the second; Anaxagoras, Plato, and Aris- totle, the third." Cudworth asserts that " Plato, in his tenth book of Laws, professedly opposing the atheists, and under- taking to prove the existence of a Deity, does, not- withstanding, ascend no higher than to the Psyche, or Universal Mundane Soul, as the self-moving prin- ciple, and the immediate or proper cause of all the motion which is in the world." This opinion is ably opposed by Professor Tayler Lewis, who regards Plato's use of the term ayaOuq as including all moral attributes. Other scholars, however, consider him to mean by it only order or harmony. Thales regarded water as the «m, or originating element, of the universe, doubtless from some per- verted tradition of the Mosaic account of the creation, where it is said that *' the Spirit of God was brooding over the waters." The succeeding hypotheses of Anaximander and Anaximenes, one of whom held that air, and the other that infinite space, was the first principle, were refinements upon the theory of Thales. The Ionic or atheistic school contended that there is nothing in the universe but phenomena, — all things Modern Pantheists. 123 being in perpetual flow ; nothing really being, but all things ever becoming; as Homer represents when he says that Oceanus is the origin of the gods, etc. The manner in which Plato represents Socrates as oppos- ing this view, and contending that the laws of our being compel us to affirm the real and not merely the relative existence of the Beautiful, the Good, etc., would seem to favor the views of Professor Lewis with respect to that author ; yet the general fact of the pantheistic or atheistic tendency of Greek phi- losophy is undeniable. Thus, ^schylus sings, -^ew? sVrti/ aiOi^p^ Zsh'Z ^i yr,^ Zthq di of)/>avi)c, Zsh^ rd Tzdvra. "Jupiter is the air; Jupiter is the earth; Jupiter is the heaven; all is Jupiter." This materialistic philosophy was imported into Greece from the Orient, where it still constitutes the foundation of Brahminism and Buddhism. From Greece it passed into Rome, and, through the Arabian restorers of Grecian literature, into modern thought. In its various forms of skeptical philosophy or heathen idolatry, it has ever been the chief antagonist of re- vealed truth, and probably will be until the end of the world. At the present day it is encouraged by the rhapsodies of the spiritualists, by crude and ill- digested theories respecting electricity, by avowed skeptics, and by a spirit of theorizing indulged in by certain writers who, but for their speculative tenden- cies, might establish a reputation as men of science. The development of the human mind in the pro- gress of history by means of religion and science, if it has not been a source of direct information respect- 124 'S'/r Isaac Newtori on Necessity. tng the Divine existence, has sufficed to satisfy the rational inquirer that pantheism, as well as atheism, is wholly unreasonable. Men of the deepest scientific research — the master-mijids of the world — unite in testifying to their belief in a personal Great First Cause. Even Kant, who declares that the objective reality of a personal God can neither be proved nor disproved by pure reason, acknowledges that the idea is necessary to reason, — that it " perfects and crowns the entire system of human cognitions." Sir Isaac Newton concludes his immortal Principia by declar- ing that " this most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being. . . . This Being," he says, " governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all ;'* and the argument proving that he is not the soul of the world he sums up in these words : " Blind meta- physical necessity, which is certainly the same always and everywhere, could produce no variety of things. All that diversity of natural things which -we find suited to different times and places could arise from nothing but the ideas and will of a Being necessarily existing.'* This argument of Newton's is a powerful one against the skepticism of the present day. We may also see the unreasonableness of atheistic pan- theism by the following considerations. The universe is either self-caused or create.d by another. If self- caused, it was eternal ; and if created, the first cause must have been eternal. Now, an eternal being must be a self-existent, independent, and necessary being. Rational Ai'gument for a Deity. 125 Either the universe or its Creator must therefore have these characteristics. It is also plain that the intelligent existences in the universe must have sprung from intelligence, since no being can communicate power with which it is not possessed. Hence the fountain of existence must be intelligent, as well as necessary and eternal. Is the universe, then, intelli- gent, or has it originated from the intelligence of another? ** Matter cannot be intelligent as a whole without being intelligent in every atom, for a con- course of unintelligent atoms can never produce in- telligence ; but if it be intelligent in every atom, then we are perpetually meeting with unintelligent com- pounds resulting from intelligent elements. If, again, matter be essentially eternal, but at the same time essentially unintelligent, then, an intelligent prin- ciple being traced in the world, and even in man himself, we are put in possession of two coeternal independent principles, destitute of all relative con- nection and common medium of action."* The doctrine of Evolution has been most indus- triously urged and elaborated by skeptical philoso- phers in modern times, and the facts of natural science have been arranged and classified in its support, so as to weaken or invalidate the idea of a special creation. Self-evolution, or the evolving or unfolding of the phenomena of the universe without extraneous power, is essentially a denial of the existence of God. It is only another phase of Pantheism. Many distinguished naturalists, however, contend that there is no antag- * Good's Book of Nature. 11* 1 26 Theory of Evohition. onisro between the ideas of creation and evolution, claiming that creative power was exerted only at the beginning, and all subsequent changes resulted from natural laws acting without intelligent design. We have already shown, page 25, that according to this view the liberty of the Divine Mind has been alienated or enchained by the act of creation, and a new law, or order of things, introduced, which is logically fatal to this hypothesis. Others, who admit the general phenomena of evolution, maintain the immanence of Divine Power throughout nature, as seen in forms and processes specially exhibiting design. To this class of naturalists, teleology, or the study of those facts which display adaptation and design, affords a large field of investigation, which notwithstanding the studied efforts of the other classes of evolutionists to ignore or repudiate, is as clearly manifest as any other class of facts or principles. Mr. Darwin is popularly considered to be the originator of the theory of evolution, or development by law, which is often referred to as " Darwinism," but it is not strictly correct. The ancient myth of Egypt and India of the chaotic or mundane ^^^ from which all things successively emerged, and the pan- theistic theories referred to on page 34, show the prevalence of such a theory in early times. Theistic evolutionists see a reference to creative development in Ps. cxxxix. : " My substance was not hid from thee when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect, and in thy book all Hypotheses of various Evolutionists. 127 my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them." In modern times, Leibnitz, Kant, and Laplace enunciated the principles of the nebular hypothesis, or the evolution of the world from a gas'eous or fluid condition, and Buffon, Wolff, Goethe, and Von Baer taught the transmutation of structure and form in plants and animals from almost structureless embryos. Lord Monboddo and Lamarck both suggested the possible origin of man from the ape. The doctrines of the correlation of forces in nature and of the con- servation or persistence of force, which have been so fully illustrated in the physical sciences by Rumford, Grove, Mayer, and Joule, have been applied to vital phenomena by Carpenter and others, and even to mind-force by Maudsley, Biichner, and most of modern materialists. (See page 175.) Prof Harts- horne (Art. Evolution, " Johnson's Cyclopaedia ") shows that evolutionists have adopted the following hypotheses to account for the origin of diverse spe- cies : I. Self-elevation by "appetency," or use and effort: Monboddo, Lamarck, and Cope. 2. Modifica- tion by the surrounding conditions of the "medium:" St. Hilaire, Quatrefages, Draper, and Spencer. 3. Natural selection under the struggle for existence, with spontaneous variability, causing the " survival of the fittest :" Darwin, Wallace, and Hackel. 4. Derivation by preordained succession of organic forms under an "innate tendency" or "internal force:' Owen and Mivart. 5. Evolution by "un- conscious intelligence:" Morel, Laycock, Murphy. 128 Insufficiency of Proofs of Design. 6. Less definite, but clearly implied in the writings of Prof. A, Gray, Dr. McCosh, Baden Powell, the duke of Argyll, and others, is the view of orderly creation "by law " through the immanent action and direction of Divine Power, or, in other words, creative evolution. We abridge the following reasons given by Prof Hartshorne for uniting with Carpenter, Dana, Agassiz, Henry, Sir J. Herschel, Sir W. Thomson, Asa Gray, and other distinguished scien- tists, in denying absolutely the insufficiency of the proofs of design m nature, and also in refusing to admit the elimination of special creative action or direct modification of nature from all periods since the first origination of the universe. I. The "nebular hypothesis" is null without a creative act to produce the required "inequality of distribution " of cosmic matter in space. Hackel admits that it is weak on two points, the heat of the nebular mass and its rotary motion. Herbert Spencer has also committed himself to a self-destructive pro- cess of reasoning in his " First Principles," as shown by a review in the "New Englander." The "insta- bility of the homogeneous," on which Spencer builds large consequences, might account for chaos, but never for the universe. Carried forward without de- signing will-force to modify them, natural cosmic forces tend always to equilibration, and consequent dissolu- tion. The universe must thus become its own ceme- tery. Mivart's special hypothesis of an " internal force " determinative of evolutionary changes in organisms is vague and unsatisfactory while detached from the " will-force" (Wallace) of an immanent creative power. Variation. 129 2. Variation is necessary to the Darwinian or any- other "non-teleolo<^ical " theory, and no such theory accounts for variation. Darwin requires also almost infinite variability of plants and animals; but, so far from infinite, observation shows it to be confined within very narrow, limits. The non-fertility of hy- brids of two nearly-allied species is a very important indication of the present fixedness of those limita- tions. Also, species do not pass in any case into each other. Palaeontology and recent zoology and botany are declared by Agassiz, Barrande, Dawson, Gould, Balfour, and Thomson to establish this. 3. Were variation possible without the regulation of selective or directive design, a simple calculation of probabilities (see *'N. Brit. Rev.," June, 1867) shows that a merely chaotic complication of forms must re- sult, the " struggle for existence " notwithstanding. 4. Infinite time has been proposed as affording a so- lution of the difficulties of natural selection. But infin- ite time would not alter the nature of the necessary re- sult of infinitevariations,norwould it regulate finite ones. 5. Without design (as Mivart has shown) incipient structures, which become useful only when com- pletely developed, have no explanation at all. Further items of fact unexplained, apart from teleology, are, the opposition of the sexes in plants and animals; the metamorphoses of insects ; the cessation of the in- dividual life; and the renewal of life-progress by parental reproduction. "Accepting, then, with Her- bert Spencer, the evidence found everywhere of the' unity of the 'inscrutable Universal power' which is 130 Pantheism repudiated by Reason. the cause of nature, there is proof also, in the mul- tipHcity and adjustment of the manifestations of that power, that it has the attributes of intelhgence and will. Every specialization, each true elevation of type (which is a different thing from modification on the same plane of being), involves new force-expendi- ture. Certain factors have been added in the evolu- tion of nature whose origin is a ** mystery" as yet quite unsolved by science. It is rational and philo- sophical, therefore, in the absence of any solution by secondary causation, to refer them, provisionally at least, to the direct creative action (whether sudden or gradual we cannot know) of the first cause. Such " factors," superadded from time to time in the past history of our globe, have been — i, life; 2.animality, as distinct from vegetable life; 3, mind-force, instinct, intelligence, Y'^/'? ; 4» Tcvzujia or spirit (see I Cor. 15 : 46), possessed by man alone of all creatures on the earth. While Theism must rest essentially upon evidence other and higher than that of physical sci- ence, it would appear that the facts of evolution tend to confirm and strengthen that evidence." We thus see that notwithstanding the evident tendency of philosophic speculation towards pan- theism, reason repudiates it, and acknowledges the necessity of an eternal intelligent personal Creator. If the Bible had not rev^ealed such a Being to us, the idea would have been a necessity of rational thought, without which the universe of matter and mind would have been an unsolved enigma. The Scriptures represent the Deity to us as a per- The Bible Representation of God. 131 sonal Being, of infinite perfection and intelligence, supremely great, and wonderful in condescension. Their representations of his moral government are perfectly consistent with what we know of the econ- omy of nature, as clearly shown by Bishop Butler in his "Analogy;" and the ideas connected with the names or terms by which He is designated are the sublimest conceptions of the human mind. The first word used by the sacred writings to represent the Creator* is in the Hebrew Elohim, — the plural form of a word signifying the Almighty. It was natural that the idea of force or power should be associated with the act of creation; but the plural form suggests something different from a Brahminical or pantheistic monad developing the creation from itself after ages of inactivity or torpor. We catch a glimpse of essential plurality in the Divine nature, the eternal object as well as subject of Divine thought and affection and activity. This essential plurality in the mode of God's existence is more fully explained in other parts of the Scriptures as a Trinity in Unity, — Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, mutually inexisting, yet holding personal relations with each other in a way surpassing human conception. The mystery of the Trinity, however, is not greater than that of the Divine essence, which is all in all, and all in every place, — embracing and filling all things without being identified with them; nor is it greater than any other truth which is too sublime for our limited faculties. * Gen. i. i. 132 Traces of the Trinity in Heathenism. The doctrine of a Trinity was known in the earliest ages. Moses represents the Holy Spirit as brooding over the waters of chaos (Gen. i. 2), and nearly all commentators agree that the visible appearances of God, recorded in the Old Testament, were manifesta- tions of the second person of the Trinity. In one remarkable passage of Genesis, the Father and the Son are both referred to by the name Jehovah : " The Lord [Jehovah] rained upon Sodom and upon Go- morrah brimstone and fire from the Lord [Jehovah] out of heaven." Here a visible and an invisible Jehovah are mentioned in the same passage. The scriptural proofs of a Trinity in the Divine nature are very numerous, but it serves our present purpose simply to allude to this doctrine as forming part of the patriarchal faith of mankind. Whether polytheism resulted from a corruption of this idea of God, or otherwise, the notion of a Trinity of some kind is found in many systems of mythology. The philosophy of Plato among the Greeks, and the worship of the Hindoos, Chinese, and Persians, con- tain plain allusions to it. The heathen triads, how- ever, are different from the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, since they only denote- elements (or phases) of a developing process; while the biblical view is that of a necessary and eternal relation in the mode of the Divine existence, best expressed by the term Person,* although that term must not be understood ^ The term " person" is used in mental science, strictly, to denote a spiritual being, — one having affections and will, — in contradistinc- tion to a thinjT or a brute. A Triunity reasonable. 133 in the sense of separation, as in polytheism. The word Triunity would perhaps better describe or characterize the true doctrine than the term Trinity. If God is eternal, He is also eternally active ; and all action requires an object adapted to the active power which is present; hence the infinite power of God requires an infinite object. Such an object must exist in Him, for if it were the world it would be necessarily eternal, and the existence of God would depend on the existence of the world, and a finite world is an unworthy object and could not absorb the infinite power of the Divine life. Hence God's life and action — that is, his thoughts, will, love, and desires — require both a subject and an object, — Father and Son. But a duality is merely a distinc- tion without unity, an antithesis without intermediate link; after a trinity appears, the antithesis ceases, and the difference established by a duality is brought back to a unity (as illustrated by the triangle and the cube). This necessary TJiird (person) in God is the Holy Ghost, proceeding from the Father and the Son, and of the same essence with both.* No illustration can give a full apprehension of the real manner of the Divine existence, which must needs surpass all finite things and finite conceptions; yet, for the sake of those who imagine that distinction always implies separation, and that therefore a Trinity in Unity is a self-contradiction, we may show that science is not without analogies of this truth. It is well known to science that a beam or ray of ordinary * Kurtz's Sacred History. 12 134 yehovah. light is composed not only of the seven prismatic colors, but also of two rays or beams intimately united, and nowise differing from each other save in the relation of their axes, — the axis of one ray being at right angles to that of the other. If a ray of light falls upon a doubly-refracting crystal, its components are separated from each other, so that they may be analyzed. The distinction between them is thus seen to be one not of quality but of relationship. When the axes coincide, or lie in the same direction, total darkness is produced, — the peculiar relation of the component rays seeming to be essential to the sense of ordinary vision. Hence a scientific mind always contemplates ordinary light as compounded of really distinct rays (or vibrations), without separation, just as a Christian contemplates either of the Divine persons as comprehending the others, without separation, and yet without confounding them. The relation of the Son, as the revealer of essential Godhead, is also illustrated by the peculiarity of polarized light, just referred to. The second word used in the Hebrew Scriptures as the name of the Deity is Jehovah,* generally translated Lord in our English Bibles. This word has been said by eminent scholars to be made up of the past, present, and future of the verb to be, and seems to signify He who was, and is, and is to come. Others, however, consider it to be the future form, — Yahveh, He who will be. In Exodus, xxxiv. we have * Gen. ii. 4. yehovah. 135 an extended explanation of the name Jehovah: "And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord [Jehovah], The Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty." These words are the revealed interpretation of the term Jehovah. They "have been considered as so many attributes of the Divine nature. Commen- tators divide them into eleven, thus : i . Jehovah, rwxv ; 2. SkX, El, the strong or mighty God; 3. Dim, Rachum, the merciful Being, who is full of tenderness and compassion ; 4. |un, Chanun, the gracious One, — He whose nature is goodness itself, — the loving God; 5. D'£ix -jnx, Erec Apayim, long-siiffenng, the Being who, because of his goodness and tenderness, is not easily irritated, but suffers long and is kind ; 6. 3-1, Rab, the great or migJity One ; 7. riDK, Emeth, the Truth, or true One, — He alone who can neither deceive nor be deceived, — who is the Foimtain of truth, and from whom all wisdom and knowledge must be derived; 8. non n];j, Notser Chesed, the Preserver of bountiful- ness, — He whose beneficence never ends, keeping mercy for thousands of generations, — showing com- passion and mercy while the world endures ; 9. nxDm ;;iy3i p>' J^t^J, Nose avon vapesha vechataah, He who bears away iniqidty and transgression and sin, — properly, the Redeemer, the Pardoner, the For- giver, — the Being whose prerogative alone it is to forgive sin and save the soul; 10. npj' iS npJ, Nakek 136 God revealed to Moses. LO YiNNAKEH, tJie rigkteoiis jfiidge, who distributes justice with an impartial hand, — with whom no imio- cent person can ever be condemned; and 11. p;; npa, Paked AVON, etc., He who visits iniquity. He who punishes transgressors, and from whose justice no sinner can escape, — the God of retributive and vindic- tive justice!'"^ In the wilderness of Sinai, surrounded by naked hills, the types of unchanging nature and strength, Moses saw the vision of the burning bush, and to his mind was then communicated the knowledge of the eternal and infinite presence of God. The patriarch Jacob had appreciated the same truth at Bethel, and doubtless others were similarly impressed. The book of Job contains frequent allusions to the same thought. But to Moses the renewal of this revelation was very emphatic, " I am that I am" were the words which fell upon his ear, and caused him to feel that God was personally present, that there was no such thing as solitude, and that every spot through the expanse of space was inhabited by the Almighty. The words he then heard are characteristic of a divinely inde- pendent and eternal Being, self-existent, and far re- moved above all creatures whatever. As an example of the manner in which the ancients were indebted to the Scriptures, Dr. A. Clarke, in his comment on Ex. iii., declares that to this passage the Greeks owed the celebrated inscription over the door of the temple of Apollo at Delphi. The inscrip- ■^ Dr. A. Clarke's Com. on Ex. xxxiv. 6, Revelation of God to Moses. 137 tion consisted simply of the monosyllable ^/, Thou art, the second person of the substantive verb ^huj am. He quotes Plutarch, who wrote a treatise upon the sub- jec'rofthis inscription, having received the true mean- ing in Egypt, doubtless from the Septuagint version of the Bible. This philosopher observes that " this title is not only proper, but peculiar to God, because He alone is being ; for mortals have no participation of true being, because that which begins and ends, and is continually changing, is never one nor the same, nor in the same state. The deity on whose temple this word was inscribed was called Apollo, A-6lXu)v, from «, negative, and r^uloz, many, because God is one, his nature simple, his essence uncom- pounded." Hence, he informs us, the ancient mode of addressing God was "^V, 'EN, etc., Thou art one, for many cannot be attributed to the Divine nature, in which there is neither first nor last, past nor future, old nor young; but as being one, fills up in one now an eternal duration." And he concludes with ob- serving that " this word corresponds to certain others on the same temple, viz., VN9.QI lEAYTON, Knozv thy- self; as if, under the name E[, Thou art, the Deity de- signed to excite men to venerate Him as eternally existing, and to put them in mind of the frailty and mortality of their own nature." In the opening verses of Genesis, Moses " makes us spectators of the birth of created nature. He calls up to our imaginations a season in the distant depths of a past eternity, when the assemblage of stars and of systems which strew the fields of space did not i2-« 138 The Pe7itateiich. exist ; when no glorious or undying spirit, angelic of human, lived to comprehend the God that had given them being. Nothing ever broke that wondrous silence, save the voice of the Eternal One, who ex- isted from the unfathomable depths of eternity. God was there then, as now, in three Persons, — the ever- blessed Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. But the uni- verse held only God, and in that Divine Being was the attribute of benevolence, and that benevolence craved the being girt round by dependent creatures. It seemed not good to God to continue alone ; the sublime loneliness was infringed ; the word was spoken, and the depths of space became strewed with worlds ; and immortal spirits, sparklings of his infinity, thronged his presence. *The morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy.' Such is the conception of the Divine Being which Moses has presented to us."* The Pentateuch also exhibits to us the personal agency of God in the natural and moral government of the world ; the care of the Creator for the work of his hands ; the constant supervision of his provi- dence, not only in conserving the general order of the universe, but also in the ordinary and daily affairs of life ; his intervention for the overthrow of wickedness, and the preservation of his people. The books of Job and Genesis show that such ideas prevailed during the patriarchal age. Such views of God and his government were a rich heritage forpri- * Farrar's Science in Theology. God as revealed in the Psalms. 139 meval man. It is a sad commentary on human de- pravity that so many nations did not like to retain God in their knowledge, " neither were thankful ; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corrup- tible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things." This was the natural consequence of that infidelity which ignores the supernatural. The subsequent revelations of God in the Old Tes- tament were of similar character to those made to the patriarchs and to Moses. The Psalmist speaks of his immeasurable greatness and of his real pres- ence to the heart of the praying worshiper: "When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained ; what is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him ?" Again, "Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there ; if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the dark- ness and the light are both alike to thee." St. Au- gustine's description of God's omnipresence, although very forcible, adds nothing to the teaching of this 140 A^ecting the primitive cell, from which all other parts of an organized being are developed, point, as we have seen, to something distinct from and superior to matter ; controlling, selecting, moulding, assimilating, and discarding matter, for its own pur- poses, and after its own peculiar mode (or law) of being. That must be a real existence which mani- fests such palpable effects of its presence. Its power of control over matter and physical laws proves its superiority over, and its distinction from, matter. Life is matter's master, not its slave. Life is a work- man ; a builder; a chemist; and each organized being has its own appropriate life, the result of the anion of the spiritual and the material in itself Physiologists usually repudiate the term "vital principle," or " organic agent," as tending to check 190 A Vital Age?it true, ' the spirit of philosophic inquiry; but this is by nc means a necessary result. It is plainly impossible to study the functions of living beings without regard- ing them as dependent on something which pro- duced and maintains life. This *' vital principle," or "principle of organization," or "plastic power," is as necessary to physiology as "light" is to optics, or "gravitation" to natural philosophy. Whether this plastic power be an agent, a condition of things, the effect of antecedent physical influences, or the result of the union of matter and spirit, is a question about which students of nature may differ widely, according to their metaphysical or religious proclivities. It is a question rather theological or philosophical than physiological, and the most elaborate treatises on the functions of organized beings might ignore it alto- gether, as works on natural philosophy decline to investigate the cause of gravity, etc., without being subject to the charge of incompleteness. Yet the interest, so strongly felt, which attaches itself to the question of our own origin, is the charm which com- pels us to speculate, whether we confine our specula- tions within the boundaries of revealed truth, or in the pride of scientific pretension ignore the guidance of faith. The existence of a living cell seems positive proot of a " force," " power," " principle," or " agent," differ- ing from the forces or agencies which we call phys- ical, and to which physical conditions and materials are subservient. Yet we do not consider life to be synonymous with the spiritual agent which produces Somatic and Molecular Life and Death. 191 it. Life is a condition, a result, of the action of im- material agents upon unorganized matter. Life is propagated by means of a previously exist- ing organism. As flame communicates the power of combustion from one torch to another, so life is transmitted from cell to cell, or from atom to atom. In every complex organized body, however, there is a somatic vitality, or life of the organism, which is independent of cell-life, which gives origin to cell's, and to which the life and death of myriads of cells are necessary. The functions of living beings depend upon molecular changes, or the constant destruction and renewal of the ultimate cells of which their tissues are composed. Yet physiology teaches that somatic death is distinct from molecular death. In some instances, as in death from pure " old age," from a powerful electric shock, or from certain poisons, etc., somatic and molecular death may be simultaneous ; yet in other and perhaps the majority of instances, molecular life may be maintained for a brief period apart from the organism, or continue for some time after the elemental vital spark has fled. Thus, the blood-disks retain their individual vitality for some time after removal from the body; severed fingers, etc. have occasionally adhered to and reunited with the body ; the poison of a rattlesnake continues to be secreted after death ;* hair continues to grow upon a corpse, etc. Somatic death is usually con- sidered to be the result of some physical changes, — * Carpenter's General and Comparative Physiology. 192 Existence depends on God. some molecular death which interrupts the organic functions. These changes, likewise, are regarded as wholly physical in their origin. Yet the fact that molecular or somatic death, or both, may result from a violent mental emotion, shows plainly the depend- ence of life upon the immaterial or spiritual part 01 the organism as well as upon its material part. It is a(imitted, also, by the best physiologists that cases of sudden death have occurred without any percepti- ble structural cause or disorganization.* A natural objection against the consideration that life results from the union of matter and spirit, arises from the fact that vegetables, as well as the lower tribes of animals, live and perform organic functions equally with ourselves. But such an objection is of little weight against well-ascertained facts. We know very little of the spiritual world, but analogy suggests that there is as much variety in it as in the material universe. Existence, either spiritual or material, de- pends wholly upon the will of the Creator, and it is by no means inconceivable that the animating spirits of the lower animals, or of vegetables, after having served the Divine purpose in the plan of creation, may pass into annihilation. The soul of man has endowments evidently surpassing all other inhabitants of this world, He has not only consciousness, volition, and a knowl- edge of relations, the same in kind but greater in degree than other animals, but he is also capable of analyzing his own mind, and of knowing his relation *■ Carpenter's General and Con^.parative Physiology. Future Development not pantheistic. 193 to the Creator of all. Revelation informs us that man is endowed also with immortality of being, alto- gether independent of the organization which is the result of his vitality. If it be urged that the very idea of the spiritual implies indivisibility and indestructibility, in opposi- tion to the ceaseless flow and change of visible and material things, we reply that the view of life which we have taken by no means necessitates the idea of the annihilation of the animating spirit ; the question of annihilation must be determined on other than physiological grounds. Yet indestructibility pre- cludes not the idea of change. Our mental habits and powers improve or change from day to day. Applying this thought to the condition of the ani- mated existences which are lower in the scale of endowments than man, it will be plain that the un folding ages of eternit)^ will afford room enough for the development of all. The same organic vitality produces the ^%%, the worm, the chrysalis, the butter- fly. And who but the Creator shall say to the vital- izing spirit, " Thus far shalt thou come, and no farther" ? This thought is very different from the theory of de- velopment put forth by infidelity, since it admits a specific creation for each individual, a personal Crea- tor, and a perso'nal identity to each animated being. The more refined pantheists regard "plants and animals as antagonistic and mutually-deviating mani- festations of a general natural vitality," or force, corre- lated with and transformable into physical conditions. It has been thus poetically expressed by an eminent 17 194 Pantheistic View of Vegetable Life. Geriran botanist: "The key to the mystery of vege- table life lies in the primitively-similar foundation of the animal and vegetable kingdom, from which indeed both have sprung, but have branched off in different directions. The animal nature is in the plant as it were caged, and this imprisonment is expressed throughout its entire existence, in its formation, and relation to the animal kingdom. They are the tears of Cypria, the blood of Hyacinth, which in the form and color of the flower whisper to us a melancholy strain. The complaining Dryad expresses the whole soul of the plant. Thus in melancholy seclusion 'does the plant achieve its life-destiny. But the fet- tered and slumbering world-spirit, which here scarce dares breathe, is the same which in animals bursts its bonds forever, and, lastly, sings its hallelujah in man. ^ This poetic pantheism is less reasonable and no more conceivable than the view which allows a real identity to each spiritual existence, with the capacity of indefinite improvement throughout the ages to come. This latter view receives some confirmation from Romans, viii. 19-23 ;t a passage which many divines * Unger's Botanical Letters. * I " For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the mani- festation of the sons of God. For the creature was made sul ject to vanity, not willingly, but by i:eason of him who hath subjected the same in hope, because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the chil- dren of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves Volition and Sensation imply a Soul. 193 have understood as referring to the future state of the brute creation; as well as from those numerous pas- sages which speak of the resurrection of the human body in a different, more glorious, and spiritual con- dition. Thus far we have considered the single topic of the origin of life, as confirmatory of man's spiritual na- ture; there are, however, other themes of physiology which point as clearly to the same truth. The func- tions of the nervous system — or sensation and vol- untary motion — cannot be explained by any theory of materialism whatever. The nerve-structure only implies a capability of reception or transmission. A second factor is necessary to the product of sensation; and that factor is the immaterial soul. The actions of the nervous system, also, upon the other organs and tissues of the body, as in voluntary motion, require for their explanation an agent as different from the body as are the sources of light and sound; and that agent is the soul. It is true that the active exertion of the powers o( the soul requires a corre- sponding health in the bodily organs, since the most accomplished artisan cannot exhibit his full powers with imperfect tools and materials; yet as the injury or destruction of the implement is no proof of the annihilation of the artisan, so the injury or destruc- tion of the body may not affect the soul. The union of body and mind is a subject of such also, which have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even tve ourselves gronn within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the body." 196 General Sensation, importance and interest that a brief sketch of the various affections of the mind and their influence upon the body, with the reciprocal action of the body upon the mind, will not be inappropriate here. It will serve both as proof and illustration of the statement that mental phenomena can only be explained by faith in spiritual existence. The real basis of mental science is an enlightened physiology. A true psychology is impossible elsewhere. We have already considered vitality as arising from the union of spirit and matter and giving rise to a peculiar structure, — the organic cell, — with peculiar laws and special affinities. We now examine the affections and special powers of living beings as seen in our own species, beginning with the most general and elementary affections of animal life, and rising in the scale of special endowments to the highest func- tions of our nature. The earliest sign of individuality is general, corpo- real sensation. This is previous to the senses, and independent of the nervous system. It manifests itself in animals without nerves, as the polypi, etc., and seems to be a necessary attribute of animal life. Yet this most primitive and most clearly innate faculty implies mind, for by it we know that our body is our body. Our corporeal structure is an object of which the mind takes cognizance. The presence of this sensitivity is a proof of the existence of something distinct from the body. In addition to general sensitivity, the mind takes cognizance of certain physical conditions within the Mind not dependent on Brain. 197 body, as tonicity, buoyancy, languor, hunger, thirst, warmth, cold, etc. To this knowledge physiologists have given the name of common sensation, or ccenaes- thesis. It is conveyed from the v.anous parts of the body, and especially from the orgaric of vegeta- tive or organic life, by the sympathetic or ganglionic system of nerves. We shall see hereafter how, by means of this special apparatus, the various affections of the mind act upon the organic functions, and how the.se in turn act upon the mind. Another affection of the mind is called sensation, or special sense, which is caused by an impression on certain parts of the nervous system, which are hence called sensitive. For sensation tv/o things are neces- sary, — an impressible state of the sensitive organs, and a perception by the mind. The nervous organs per- taining to sensation are contained in what is called the cerebro- spinal system, consisting of the cerebral hemi- spheres, or front brain, which is the bodily source of voluntary movement; the cerebellum, or back brain, for adjusting and combining voluntary motions ; the sensory ganglia, or mesocephalon, in immediate con- nection with the organs of special sense, as the eye, ear, etc. ; the medulla oblongata, a ganglionic centre for respiration and deglutition ; and the spinal cord, with its accompanying nerves. Notwithstanding the importance of continuously healthy nerve-structure for the manifestation of men- tal phenomena, the mind is not so entirely dependent on the brain as is generally supposed. According to Morgagni and Haller, every part of the brain ha5 17* 198 Voluntary Motions. been, in one instance or another, destroyed or disor^ ganized, without affecting what have been thought to be the corresponding intellectual powers. Abercrom- bie tells us of a lady in whom one-half of the brain was disorganized, who retained, notwithstanding, all her faculties to the last, except that there was an im- perfection of vision. A man, mentioned by Dr. Far- rier, lost no portion of his faculties till his death, which was sudden ; but, on examination, the whole right hemisphere was found to be destroyed by suppuration. A patient of Dr. Kingdon, of Stratton, Cornwall, was kicked by a horse. The whole of the brain on one side was taken out, and a silver false skull put on. Yet he recovered, and his intellect was in no respect disor- dered by the accident. Dr. Cowan relates two cases of cancer of the brain, of a very extensive character, which produced no intellectual disturbance. In the attack on the Redan, at Sebastopol, a young soldier was shot through the left parietal bone by a Minie bullet. The brain protruded through the orifice in the skull, and the surgeon thrust his finger to its full length within the brain to find the bullet and the portion of skull which it had carried inward. Neither could be discovered. Yet the wound healed, and the man continued lively and intelligent* Many other instances may be found among the curiosities of medical literature. Many of the motions connected with the nervous cords and ganglia are altogether reflex and automatic. * Creation's Testimony to its God, by Rev. T. Rajjg. Consciousness. 199 with which the mind has nothing to do; yet many other motions have their origin in the mind, and are called voluntary. The sensitive nerves also are in- fluential, not upon the brain-structure merely, which is inert, but upon the mind. Yet there is no constant relation between the integrity of mind and body: " The mind is sometimes an agonizing sufferer while the body is in perfect health, and only by degrees, by its continued action on the nervous system, brings the bodily organs into a sympathetic state. And though the body cannot long resist the influence of mental disease, the mind can effectually resist the depressing influence of bodily disease or bodily pain, even to the period of their separation. Paralysis has unnerved and unstrung the whole system and yet the mind has remained uninjured. Such was the case with Talleyrand, who, with a body like a living tomb, retained his mental faculties unimpaired. Nor need I more than allude to the rejoicing moments of the dying Christian, or the triumphs of the martyr at the stake, to show how the mind can continue in calm serenity while the body is enduring the most ex- cruciating torments or losing at once its vitality and power."* Consciousness is the knowledge which the mind has of its own operations. In some diseased con- ditions, as in a swoon or apoplexy, there is uncon- sciousness, as well as the suspension of relations to the external world; but it would be just as reasonable * Creation's Testimony to its God, by Rev. T. Ragg. 200 Ideas. — Feeling. . to suppose that the body was dead, because uncon- scious, as that the soul had ceased to exist. **That we cannot conceive how an immaterial substance, with whose real essence we are totally unacquainted, can exist, while all those powers and properties are apparently suspended in their operation, through the activity of which we can alone be certified of its existence, I am ready to admit; but it never ought to be forgotten that our inability to comprehend is no argument either against theory or fact."* Upon our consciousness the nerves which connect us with the external world are influential, and all the mental faculties are exercised in connection with it when the mind takes cognizance of its own operations. In the sphere of consciousness are produced what are called ideas, by which we mean, in a general sense, anything present to the mind as an object of thought, whether present really or representatively. Some ideas are related to experience, as the principles of mathematics, notions of figure, extension, number, time, and space. Others are independent of sensible representation, as the ideas of good and evil, just and unjust, true and false, etc. In addition to ideas, connected with consciousness, we find feeling, under which term we may include sensations (already referred to), sentiments, and emo- tions. When we say we feel heat or cold, etc., we refer to sensation ; when we speak of feelings of the sublime and beautiful, of esteem and gratitude, etc., * Drew on the Immateriality and Immortality of the Soul Obscure Impressions. 201 we refer to sentiments; and when we refer to feelings of pleasure or pain, we refer to emotions. The term feeling is also used sometimes as analogous to con- sciousness or to belief; but it always has reference to the mind or spiritual nature. Thus, we say of a thing, " I know it to be true, because I feel, and cannot but feel, it to be so," or "because I believe, and cannot but believe it." If asked how I know that I thus feel or believe, I can make no better answer than "I believe that I feel," or "because I feel that I believe." In other words, I am conscious of it. In the sphere of personal consciousness, in addition to feeling and ideas, we may name certain obscure impressions, of which we may be said to be half con- scious. They are either such as proceed from the sympathetic or vegetative system of nerves, the con- nection of which with the brain is more or less inter- rupted, or such as the mind does not bestow that attention upon which is necessary for clear perception. By means of these obscure impressions or percep- tions the soul influences and governs the functions of vegetative life, as digestion, circulation, respiration, secretion, etc. In the opposite direction they are also active in all the mental operations, giving us results without a consciousness of the successive steps employed. In habitual voluntary motions, such as playing on the piano, etc., they set the proper muscles in action without directing the mind to each. In sleep, dreaming, and insanity they play a very con- spicuous part, and altogether they make up that which we call the disposition or temper of a man. Thus 202 Influence of Mind on Body, the repletion and activity of the blood-vessels stimu- late to activity the nervous filaments which accom- pany them, and heighten those mental reactions which manifest themselves in cheerfulness and courage, and in a higher degree in arrogance; while a relaxed con- dition of the vessels produces a depressing effect. The exciting and depressing influence of diseases. and of alimentary and medicinal substances, may be thus accounted for. The phrenic and solar foci of the sympathetic nerve are the media through which the functions of digestion, assimilation, and secretion affect the mind. We all know how these act on the temper. Many a man may attribute his misfortunes to the intestines of another. How peevish, also, and ill-humored, and hypochondriac are dyspeptics! Enteric fever also operates severely upon the brain. Yet many disorganizations of this system scarcely affect the mind, while the smallest changes will sometimes deeply disorder it; showing how delicate and unde- fined is the union. Having thus considered the effects of various physical conditions of the body upon the mind, let us also glance at the influence of the emotions and passions of the mind upon the body. The influence of these latter upon the mind itself is a worthy study, but would lead us too far from the subject in hand. We know how intellectual feelings may rise to en- thusiasm and (as in Archimedes) absorb the whole nervous action. On the other side, it may sink to that despair which at length seizes the skeptic when Influence of Mental Passions. 203 not a ray of truth sheds a gleam into his benighted soul. The moral direction of intellectual feeling may become an emotion of joyful zeal or of painful repent- ance, as seen in the history of many a human heart. But, to return, Hope leads the vital current gently and equably through all the organs, and has a most active and beneficial influence. So we may say of Joy, when gentle and durable ; hence Virtue, the most durable of all joy, is most conducive to health. If Joy rises to a lively emotion, the brilliancy of the eyes, the inclination to sing, jump, and laugh, the quickened respiration, accelerated pulse, increased warmth, etc., indicate a more rapid circulation, and may lead to cerebral and pulmonary congestions. There are several cases on record of death from sudden joy. Melancholy, and especially its highest degree, Hopelesness, produces a directly opposite effect from Joy. The constant excitement, fluctuating between pleas- ure and pain, in which Love keeps the body and mind, is known to all. Anger is a passion compounded of several emo- tions. The clonic spasms of the muscles, producing tremors, indicate the excitement which urges the circulation to the utmost vehemence; the respira- tion keeps pace with it, and in some cases leads to pneumo-thorax and bursting of the heart. It acts also, through the sympathetic or ganglionic nerves, upon the secretions, — the saliva, milk, and bile, — which often become actually poisoned. A child died as if 204 Physiological Metaphysics, struck by lightning after taking the milk of its en- raged nurse.* Thus, while the mind receives impressions from the outer world through the anatomical organs of the body, it is itself also influential upon the body through the same organs, and produces as palpable effects as any external agent; proving its separate nature from the body. To complete this outline of the effects of the union of body and mind, we add the following table of the subjects pertaining to physiological metaphysics: Volition, Conscience, Judgment, imagination. Memory, Perception, Consciousness, - Pure Mental Attributes. Ideas. Emotions. Impulses. Reflex Motion. Afferent impressions deranged by disease. Special sense, Common (organic) sen Corporeal sensation. sation, Vohintai y motion, ^ Expression, Involuntary motion, Instincts, or con- sensual actions. Efferent mo- tions inter- rupted by ' sleep, Intoxi- cation, Insan- ity, etc. In the lower part of this plan are placed the ani- mal functions, or the various actions of the nervous system, and in the upper part the purely mental operations or attributes. On the left of the lower division we note those impressions which are con- veyed to the mind or act upon the body by means of nerves called afferent, because proceeding from the surface towards the great nerve-centres ; and on the * Tliis whole subject is more fully treated in Feuchtersleben'a Medical Psychology. Perception. 205 right hand are placed the motions produced by nerves (efferent) proceeding from the nerve-centres. Instincts and involuntary motion are produced by the reflex action of the nerves themselves, but expres- sion and voluntary motion require the cognizance of the mind. The sphere of consciousness pertains to both body and mind: hence it is placed in the centre of the plan, in connection with ideas, emotions, and impulses. The tendency of physiology is to locate conscious- ness in the mesocephalon, or middle brain. This is, doubtless, the seat of emotion; and in diseases of disturbed or excited emotion, as chorea or hysteria, the nerves most affected are those connected with this structure. The influence of the mesocephalon extends upwards to the cerebral convolutions, back- wards to the cerebellum, and downwards to all the nerves of sensation and motion. Hence the im- portant share which emotion has in the formation of character. Having already defined consciousness, it remains to give brief descriptions of the remaining mental operations, or powers, included in the above list. Perception is the evidence we have of external objects by our senses. On the bodily side it is necessary that the organs and nerves be sound, or false percep- tions will result. The ringing and other noises in the ears (tinnitus), floating dark specks before the eyes (muscae volitantes), and many spectral illusions (as in the celebrated case of Nicolai, — recorded by Sir D. Brewster, — in whom plethora was associated with a 18 2o6 Memory, great variety of phantasms), have their origin in a diseased condition of the organs. Yet that percep- tion is an attribute of the mind is evident from the fact that attention is required. The senses may be impressed by their appropriate objects, but without attention they are not perceived. Thus, in touch, the voluntary motion tests hardness, weight, and form ; and in hearing a concert we may concentrate atten- tion upon some sounds and be obUvious to the rest. The mental influence of this faculty is quite evident in some blind and deaf persons who make great progress on account of attention. Memory implies a former conscious experience, its retention, revival, and recognition. The preternatural excitements of the brain, as in fever or drowning, develop it strongly, rendering it highly probable that no conscious thought has ever perished. Some cir- cumstances seem to imply that every nerve and organ of sense has its own memory, or is capable of re- viving in the mind its former consciousness. Hence the laws of memory, which are coexistence and suc- cession, analogy and contrast: some enumerate them as resemblance, contiguity, cause, effect, contrast. Many curious illustrations of the laws and conditions of memory are on record. Thus, Van Swieten relates that he was seized with vomiting on passing a certain spot where some years before he had experienced a horrible stench. Instances have occurred in which the stimulus of disease has awakened the recollection of things which had been long forgotten, and the language of infancy has been renewed in persons Imagination. 207 who had for many years known only some other tongue. Long passages of Homer, etc., forgotten during health, have come before the mind during fever, even without any delirium. Some particular injuries, also, have affected the memory of some particular things rather than others, as in the case of a medical man who lost all recollection of his wife and children after having been thrown from his horse, although his intellect in other respects re- mained sound.* Loss of memory on particular topics is often connected with attacks of an apoplectic nature. A variety of this kind, called aphasia, has lately claimed special attention, from its increasing frequency. In this the patient retains a correct idea of the person or thing, but cannot recall the word or name. Sometimes one word is used for another, or words are invented which to a stranger would be quite unintelligible. Imagination is a term used to represent the power which the mind has of combining ideas previously received. Imaginations, or images produced by this faculty, are sometimes so vivid as to affect the organs of sense, and occasion morbid sensual delusions, as well as to influence the organs of motion, secretion, etc. No proof could be more positive of the inde- pendent agency of the mind. Thus, without any external stimulus other than the agency of the mind itself, a variety of sensations may be experienced in the body, the secretions, as tears, saliva, milk, etc., * Abercrombie's Intellectual Philosophy. 2o8 jfiidgment. — Conscience. are increased, and unconscious gesticulations and soliloquies, as in excited and sleeping persons, are produced. The excessive use of imagination causes first excitement, and then torpor, of all the functions. The hot-house education and premature development of this faculty of imagination, in modern society, have led to marasmus, spinal curvature, heart-affections, tubercles, etc. The frequent over-excitement and relaxation of the brain from this cause react on its nutrition, and may in some cases end in idiocy. In its highest degree. Imagination rises to the sphere of creative fancy, or poetic power. In some of its flights it encroaches upon the prerogative of conscience, or moral susceptibility, and leads to self- deception unless held in check by the precepts of Divine revelation. Judgment is the decision of the mind, the result of comparing two or more ideas. It is altogether mental in its application. It is an act of the mind upon and within itself Conscience is sometimes called moral sense, moral faculty, moral judgment, and susceptibility of moral emotions. It might also be termed the faith faculty, or the inspirational capacity of the soul. It is that faculty, or combination of faculties, by which we have ideas of right and wrong respecting actions, and cor- respondent feelings of approbation or disapprobation. It brings us into relation with the spiritual world, the claims of God and duty, etc. Awakened, quick- ened, and guided by the Spirit of God, it results in the highest type of humanity, — a real Christiaa Personality. 209 Some have called it the light of nature; but it is doubtful if this faculty is ever really active unless affected by special spiritual influences and enlight- ened by a knowle.dge of the Divine will. Without the latter it is certainly no safe guide for human con- duct; for as St. Paul was conscientious when consent- ing to the death of Stephen and the persecution of the early Christians, so many a man has committed great crimes in all good conscience. Volition is the dominion exercised by the mind over itself, employing or withholding its faculties ifl any particular action. It is synonymous with free agency, and is an essential attribute of spirit, sinc^ the very idea of spirit supposes self-action. Feuch- tersleben draws a very judicious distinction, however, between the essential freedom of the spirit and the freedom of the spirit linked to the body. He shows that freedom may — ist, limit itself, so far as the spirit makes itself the slave of sin or error; 2d, it may be limited by physical laws from without; 3d, it may be limited by organization. In the first, the free man is good and wise; in the second, powerful; and in the third, healthy. The spirit is connected with consciousness corpo- really in receiving impressions through the organs of sensation, and by reaction with the will by the organs of motion. This connection of body and mind is complicated by temperament, age, capacity, sex, habit, idiosyncrasy, race, nationality, profession, and education. The result of all these relations we call person, or abstract personality. 18* 2IO Accountability. When the mind of a man has such a mastery over his organs as, consistently with his individual person- ality, it is capable of obtaining, when he so thinks, feels, and wills, as, for example, in the character of a person of sanguine temperament, of a youth, of a person of eminent talents, of a soldier, etc., he can and ought to think, feel, and will, he is psychologically free, — that is, he is in health ; when he cannot, he is out of health. As a further illustration, if a man traveling on a railroad is prevented by the rapid motion from discerning the landscape, he is mechanically unfree. If he does not attend because he is stupidly insensi- ble to the beauties of nature, he is ethically unfree. If he does not attend because he has not learned what is to be seen in these objects, he is logically unfree. If he does not attend because he is engrossed by interesting conversation, he is hindered by his per- sonality, which he may, however, command. If he cannot attend because he is suffering from headache, or because a mental image flits before him, so that he does not perceive outward objects, he is out of health, and consequently irresponsible. It is difficult to determine the boundary of a healthy personality, and, as a consequence, account- ability, since we cannot always determine conscious- ness in another, — and every one can govern himself if he is conscious. There is, moreover, a state of transition, caused by certain half-free conditions, as sleep, dreaming, intoxication, and vertigo produced by mental causes. Our present outline of mental powers would be incomplete without some reference Dreaming. 2 1 1 to these states: we therefore condense from the author last referred to, and add a few remarks of our own respecting them. The necessity of sleep arises from the compensa- tion required by the nervous system for what has been expended. Its causes are fatigue, or suspended physical powers; intense and prolonged effect of heat or cold ; stupefaction, as by odors or strong liquors, — which act by lowering nervous vitality; mechanical pressure upon the brain, impeding the connection with the sensorium ; voluntary reveries ; intense mental action, and monotonous noise, pre- venting the conscious formation of ideal images. That personality is not suspended, but merely hindered or impeded in manifestation, is proved by voluntary waking at a predetermined hour. Having no external images through sensitive nerves, the personality has intercourse with subjective or in- ternal images, which constitutes dreaming. The mind is then occupied with the pictorial world of fancy, the materials of which are drawn from the store of memory. The obscure ideas conveyed from the vegetative organs by the sympathetic nerve, play a conspicuous part in dreams, although their cause is not recognized by the mind, which ascribes them to external sources. Yet the organs of perception are not wholly inert, since the noise of a falling book may cause a dream of a pistol-shot, etc. The organization and mental furniture of an in- dividual are reflected in dreaming ; hence every one has his own world when asleep, and when awake 212 Animal Magnetism, that of others and his true relation to it. Hence there can be usually no instruction in dreams. Yet in this condition the mind is most withdrawn from the ordinary influences of the world around; hence the adaptability of the dream-state to spiritual com- munication and inspiration, as referred to so often in the Scriptures. Intoxication may be either from spirituous liquor, narcotics, or exalted imagination. It excites the cir- culation and leads to cerebral congestion and stupe- faction. It is a state, as is well known, of varying proportions. Vertigo from rapid succession of ideal images is a state resembling intoxication from mental causes. Of these states, dreaming has the most interest in a scientific point of view. When carried to a patho- logical extent it becomes somnambulism. This is a condition of intense sleep, and the obscure images and instincts are most powerful. This is not a more exalted state, free from the trammels of the body, but a lower and diseased state, in which volition yields the sceptre to physically directed fancy. This condition may be brought about both by mental and bodily causes. On the one side, grief, suffering, mental exertion, passion, and a too effeminate edu- cation, and on the other, sexual indulgence, abuse of liquor, indigestible food, and other diseases, may result in somnambulism. Larrey brought it on in a wounded soldier whenever he probed a wound which led to the solar plexus. Animal magnetism is a sort of somnambulism Religious Sentiment. 213 produced by strong mental impressions. In it the obscure ideas become prominent, and are expressed positively, as a divination; sympathy obtains the mastery, the feeling alone is exalted, and the percep- tion and will are suppressed. The languages and flights of fancy exhibited by the clairvoyant are no doubt reproductions of dormant recollections. After all that its votaries have claimed for it, and the multi- tudes who have experimented with it, no new idea has been added by its means to the stock of human knowledge, but much has been witnessed that was vague, foolish, and wicked. There is a clairvoyance superior to that of the so-called magnetic: it is that of a wise, virtuous, and pious man. In examining thus a kw particulars in which the bodily organization is acted upon by its spiritual inhabitant, and how it reacts also upon the mind, we have found abundant proof of the independent nature of the soul as taught in Holy Writ. The religious sentiment arising from such inquiries is well expressed in the Psalmist's ascription of praise to his Maker: "I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being imperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them. How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them J 214 Religions Sentiment. If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand; when I awake, I am still with thee. . . Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my thoughts; and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." NoTE.-:-The progiess of Histology has shown that the elementary cell is still more simple than the above description. It is simply a mass of living jelly. The membrane and granules referred to are formed materials, and not essential to the existence or integrity of the cell, whose vital actions are associated with the continual assimilation and rejection of material particles, as described above. CHAPTER VIII. THE DOCTRINE OF A MEDIATOR. *• Once in the end of the world hath Christ appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." St. Paul. (215) CONTENTS. Ideas of Mediation and Sacrifice historical — Their Limitation to the Person of Christ the Characteristic of Christianity — Yet this opposed by Professed Adherents — Scripture Statement — Manner of Atone- ment not explained — History of the Doctrine from Apostolic Times — Summary of Anselm's Views — No Real Objection to Mediation in general — Christ's Mediation presupposes God's Moral Govern- ment, including Future Punishment — Analogies in Men's Circum- stances in Life — Mystery no Objection — Vicarious Suffering accords with the Moral Sense of Mankind. (216) CHAPTER VIII. THE DOCTRINE OF A MEDIATOR. The assertion of the mediatorial office of Christ is the distinguishing doctrine of the Christian religion. Ideas of mediation, and of atonement by sacrifice, are historical in many nations, even the most ancient, and may be traced directly to that primitive religion of the earliest ages which was originally revealed from heaven. The promise of a Saviour, given to Adam, has been distorted in various ways by the imaginations of mankind, yet it has never been wholly lost. To the majority of the world it has been a light shining in a dark place until the day-dawn and the day-spring arise in their hearts. In the Jewish nation that light was increased by successive commu- nications from heaven, and the Old Testament con- tains the history of those communications until the birth of Jesus, in whom all the promises and prophe- cies culminated. The limitation of the ideas of media- tion and atonement to the person and work of Christ constitutes the individuality of Christianity, since but for this limitation there is nothing in it to distinguish it from the systems of ancient philosophy. Its moral teaching, its doctrines of a personal Creator, of the spiritual nature of man, of a future state, and even of the resurrection of the dead, may be found ?1<=e- 19 (217) 2 1 8 opposition. where; but that Jesus came into the world to save sinners ; that his death was an offering, and that re- pentance and remission of sins must be preached in iiis name ; in other words, that Christ is the true me- diator between God and man, is plainly characteristic. The greatest opposition to Christianity has been directed against the personal mediation of Christ, as the doctrine most obnoxious to infidelity. Even persons who adhere strongly to a belief in the Divine existence and in man's spiritual nature are found objecting against the idea of atonement through the vicarious sufferings of Jesus. Many of these persons profess a strong attachment towards Christianity, but their love is for a modified form of it, very different from that which the apostles taught. They believe that God cares for man, and that He has spoken to man through his Son, but they regard Jesus as a Teacher rather than a Saviour, and the gospel as a system of morals and aesthetics rather than a revelation of spiritual force. They believe that Christ had a super- human, if not, in some sense, a Divine, character, but they consider his life to be merely an example of unrivaled teaching and of marvelous self-sacrifice, and his death a mere martyrdom. They accept Christ as a teacher or prophet, perhaps as a king, but not as a priest. They exclude the atonement from their scheme of Christianity, and i^egard religion simply as a system of morals. They expect Christianity tc prevail in the world by the destruction of its forms and dogmas, and by its being received as the highest type of ethics. If, however, there is any scriptural Scripture Representation. 219 teaching which is in full accordance with the analogy of nature and the constitution of things, it is that of tlie mediation of Christ for the salvation oi men. The arguments of Bishop Butler are so conclusive respect- ing this that we content ourselves with pursuing the path which he has so ably pointed out, Christ is represented in the Scriptures not only as "the light of the world," but also as a propitiatory sacrifice and atonement for sin. " Sacrifices of expia- tion were commanded the Jews, and obtained amongst most other nations, from tradition, whose original probably was revelation. And they were continually repeated, both occasionally, and at the returns of stated times, and made up great part of the external religion of mankind. *But now once in the end of the world hath Christ appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself'"* As He is our propitiatory sacrifice. He is called ^'the Lamb of God," and as He voluntarily offered himself up. He is styled our "High-Priest." In accordance with the usage of its language, the Old Testament refers to Him as if He had already come. "He was wounded for our trans- gressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace was laid upon Him: and with his stripes are we healed." In the New Testa- ment we read that "He suffered for sins, the just for the unjust;" that "He gave himself a ransom for all;" that He "hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us;" that He "died for * Butler's Analogy. 220 Manner not explained. us ;" that ** we have not been redeemed with corrupt! ble things, such as silver and gold, but with the precious blood of Christ;" that "we have redemption in his blood, even the forgiveness of sins;" that He "was once offered to bear the sins of many;" and that "we are sanctified, through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ, once for all." These, and other passages, show that the Scriptures teach the connection of Christ's sufferings and death with the salvation of sinners, or, in other words, the satisfac- tion of Divine justice for the sin of man by the sub^ stituted sufferings of the Son of God. Such passages cannot be explained on the supposition that the sufferings and death of Christ were only a great example, preaching the evil of sin and the dignity of sorrow. In what particular way the death of Christ has efficacy to redeem and pardon and sanctify the peni- tent believer is not explained in the Scriptures, nor is it necessary, , except as a matter of speculation or theory. The simple fact is set forth that Christ's death has removed the obstacles which were in the way of mercy and forgiveness to sinful men, and this is a sufificient ground for Christian faith and practice: The doctrinal summaries (or creeds) of Christian churches or communities usually adhere to the sim- ple biblical representation; but particular teachers sometimes enlarge and reason upon it, so as to shoW its acceptability to the enlightened reason. This is eminently proper, since we are nowhere forbidden in God's word to employ our reasoning faculties upon History of the Doctrine. 221 the elucidation of revealed truth. Some, however, with more zeal than knowledge, make use of very exaggerated and injudicious expressions, and repre- sent God as actually injured by the sins of men, and so angered and enraged (in the sense of perturbation) that it was necessary He should be propitiated. Even \{ such language is used only in a figurative sense, meaning that the law oi God must be preserved inviolate, and that the punishment following trans- gression can only be ameliorated or removed by a remedial mediation, still it would be better for the cause of truth to avoid such exaggerated language, it is so different from the sublime announcement, "God so loved the world that He gave his only- begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." To the minds of the apostles, the subject of the atonement was beset with no difificulties. Trained from childhood in the idea that God was approach- able by sacrifice, they beheld in the death of Jesus the realization of their religious aspirations, the ful- fillment of the Jewish sacrificial types, and the true offering for human guilt. The early Fathers of the church also refrained from speculation upon this subject, and confined themselves to the simplicity of scriptural language; but, as time passed on, crowds of Gnostic and Platonizing theorizers, the prototypes of modern schools, began to philosophize, and call in question the cardinal doctrines of Christianity and the cause of the atoning death of Christ. They rested not by simple faith in the mysterious facts revealed, 19* 222 Aftselm's View. but sought to find reasons for the facts, and endeav-. ored to measure the Infinite by their own finite stand- ards. In those dark ages of the church, when the natural consequences of such theorizing produced its evil fruit, many regarded the atonement as a price paid to Satan for the ransom of mankind. Others taught the need of penance and suffering to complete the work of Jesus. Others, again, taught that Christ paid the exact debt which we should have paid. Still, in every generation there were luminaries in the church which dispensed the light of truth and protested against error, and, as the word of God be- came unfettered, the apostolic doctrine of the atone- ment, as well as other truths, revived in the under- standings and hearts of men. Anselm of Canterbury and Thomas Aquinas are distinguished among those who have contributed to this end, and the Reformers of Germany and England have entered into their labors. In his treatise upon this subject, Anselm defines sin as the withholding from God what is due to Him from man. Sin is debt. But man owes to God the absolute and entire subjection of his will, at all times, to the Divine law and will. This is not given, and hence the guilt, or debt, of man to Deity. The extinction of this guilt does not consist in simply beginning again to subject the will entirely to its rightful sovereign, but in giving satisfaction for the previous cessation in so doing.- God has been robbed of his honor in the past, and it must be restored to Him in some way, while at the same time the present and future honor due to Him is being given. It is hifinite Merit fieeded for Atonement . 223 impossible for man, who is still a sinner, to render this satisfaction ; yet this impossibihty does not re^ lease him from his indebtedness or guilt, because it is the effect of a free act, which must be held re- sponsible for all its consequences. But the question arises, Cannot the love and compassion of God ab- stracted from his justice come in at this point, and remit the sin of man without any satisfaction? This is impossible, because it would be irregularity and injustice. If sin is punished neither in the person of the transgressor nor in that of a proper substitute, then unrighteousness is not subject to any law or regulation of any sort; it enjoys more liberty than righteousness itself, which would be a contradiction and a wrong. Furthermore, it would contradict the Divine justice itself, if the creature could defraud the Creator of that which is his due, without giving any satisfaction for the robbery. Since there is nothing better and greater than God, there is no attribute more just and necessary than that primitive right- eousness innate to Deity which maintains the honor of God. This justice, indeed, is God himself, so that to satisfy it is to satisfy God himself There are two ways, argues Anselm, in which the claims of justice can be satisfied. First, the punishment may be actu- ally inflicted upon the transgressor. But this, of course, would be incompatible with his salvation from sin and his eternal happiness, because the punishment required is eternal, in order to offset the infinite de- merit of robbing God of his honor. It is plain, therefore, that man cannot be his own atoner, and 224 ^ove satisfies justice. render satisfaction for his own sin. A sinner cannot justify a sinner, any more than a criminal can pardon his own crime. The second and only other way in which the attribute of justice is satisfied is by substi- tuted or vicarious suffering. This requires the agency of another. Yet ev^erything depends upon the nature and character of the Being who renders the substituted satisfaction. For it would be an illegitimate pro- cedure to defraud justice by substituting a less for a more valuable satisfaction. It belongs, therefore, to the conception of a true vicarious satisfaction that something be offered to justice for the sin of man that is greater than the finite and created. In other words, an infinite value must pertain to that satisfac- tion which is substituted for the sufferings of man- kind. Only God, therefore, can make this satisfaction. Only Deity can satisfy the claims of Deity. But, on the other hand, man must render it, otherwise it would not be a satisfaction for man's sin. Conse- quently, the required and adequate satisfaction must be theanthropic,—i.e. rendered by a God-man. As God, the God-man can give to Deity more than the whole finite creation could render.* This summary of Anselm's reasoning will enable the thoughtful inquirer to see that there is no alter- native for the Divine benevolence but either to leave the sinner to the natural and ordinary course of jus- tice, or else to deliver him from it by satisfying its claims for him and in his stead. The love of God is * See Shedd's History of Doctrines. Varied Vte'u/S^ 225 magnified in thus satisfying his own justice for the sinner by the gift and sacrifice of his Son. No lati- tudinarian views can lay aside the claims of Divine justice, nor show how these claims can be met with- out the sacrifice of Christ. Justice cannot be ignored by prerogative, nor satisfied without atonement, but the infinite merit of Christ's sacrifice fully suffices for the infinite demerit of sin. Here only do righteous- ness and peace meet together. Here holiness and love are reconciled. It is hard to see how the logic of Anselm can be set aside, if we admit the world to be under the government of moral law at all. Such reasoning, however, must not be regarded as the basis of our faith, since we can only know of God's will concerning us by what He has revealed ; yet rational argument, as well as analogy, tends to confirm our faith ^by showing the consistency of Bible teaching with the order of our own minds, — the Eternal Reason in the word corresponding with his manifestation in our own spiritual and rational nature, as well as with the world around us. Anselm's theory of satisfaction has had general acceptance both among Roman Catholics and Prot- estants, the latter, however, preferring the modifica- tion of it taught by Thomas Aquinas, that the value of Christ's blood was infinite, on account of the in- finite dignity of his person, and therefore outweighed the sins of all men. Duns Scotus, on the other hand, maintained that God was satisfied with the ransom paid, although it had not in itself any infinite value. 226 Socinian Objections. The tendency to hypothetical speculation and ex- aggerated expressions concerning the Divine wrath, such as before referred to, led many sincere Christians to repudiate this mode of representation, as contrary to reason and Scripture. Even the harmless term satisfaction, and the figurative expressions relative to debt, which had been introduced by Anselm, were disapproved, because they were so often perverted. Reinhard and other German writers regard the death of Christ as a solemn declaration that God will be merciful to sinners. " God thus appears as a loving father, who is willing to grant pardon to sinners, but also as a just and wise father, who, far from exhibiting any unseasonable and improper tenderness, will im- plant in the minds of the children whom He pardons a most vivid aversion to their former sins, and teach them by an example the dreadful consequences that attend the violation of his laws, and the misery which they themselves have deserved." Socinianism has made the strongest opposition to the theory of satisfaction, by arguing that the terms satisfaction and remission of sins contradict each other, — that if another make payment for debt it has the same value as if it had been paid by the debtor himself, and a gift is out of the question, — that the sufferings of the innocent could not satisfy the de- mand for the punishment of the guilty, — and that what Christ has done and suffered for us is no true equivalent for a guilty race, since He suffered only one temporal death. These and similar arguments lead them to regard the death of Jesus as that of a. Summary. 227 martyr, or as the necessary transition to his subse- quent exaltation, and not in any proper sense a substituted sacrifice. The Mystics sought to find the true principle of redemption in the repetition in themselves of the sacrifice once made by Christ, — i.e. in literally crucify- ing their own fiesh. Thus they expected to realize a second and internal redemption. The many-sidedness of truth finds a striking illus- tration in the various speculations concerning the atonement. If we regard it from the standpoint of moral governm.ent, it is a satisfaction to essential justice provided by Divine love. Yet it was also an example of the righteousness of God, and a solemn confirmation of his willingness to pardon sin. It was also the necessary transition to Christ's glorification, and the means of our personal sanctification and crucifixion of the flesh. In addition to these views, we may also regard it as the necessary and divinely- appointed means, ordained before the foundation of the world, to exalt the human race, through its glorified Head, to closest Divine communion and pre-eminence. Whatever difificulties were in the way of our pardon and access to God have been removed by Christ's death. "For He hath made Him to be sin [or a sin- offering] for us, who knew no sin ; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him." We may not be able to understand exactly how this effect has been produced, but we are satisfied that God selected this extraordinary means from the impulse of his 228 Moral Government implied, own sincere love and benevolence to man. " Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." There can be no reasonable objection to the idea of mediation, or of a Mediator, in general, since the whole visible government of God is a system of means and agencies and second causes, and the highest result of the researches of physical science is to discover and arrange these agencies in the order (or law) of their operation. All creatures are brought into the world by the mediation of others. Our lives in infancy are preserved by the instrumentality of others. Food is the medium of nutrition. Air mediates to the purification of the blood, and every satisfaction of life is obtained in like manner. Why should the mediation of Jesus be stricken out of the concurrent chain of agencies which make up the order of the Divine government of the universe? Do we wish to be independent, as God is? An honest answer to this question might reveal the real secret of much of the infidelity which is in the world. The mediation of Jesus necessarily presupposes the moral government of God, implying the spiritual nature of the soul, its relation to God as a creature under law, and the future punishment of voluntary wrong-doing. This is evident; for if there is no danger there can be no salvation. But the representa- tion of the principles of his spiritual government, as exhibited in the Scriptures, does not contradict the order of nature in the circumstances and conditions of human life, since the Author of Nature is also the Punishment of Sin. 229 God of the Bible. If there be punishment for vio- lating natural law, the same principle will apply to morals. If the breach of a natural law entails suffer- ing, may not the natural and necessary consequence of sin be suffering also? If we expect to be injured by falling from a precipice, can we hope to go free when we violate a principle of moral rectitude? That were to make the Creator of the world and the Re- vealer of moral law very different beings. As moral law relates chiefly to the moral and spiritual nature or soul of man, so it may be reasonably supposed that the suffering consequent on sin may principally affect the soul; yet, as we have seen that soul and body act reciprocally upon each other, so the dark- ness or suffering of the soul will degrade the body. The full nature of the punishment of sin, however, can never be known until the age of mediation and probation has passed away, and the age of retribution comes. In the mean time, the warnings of Holy Writ, given in various figures of speech, are both salutary and wise. ** The prudent man foreseeth the evil, but the simple pass on and are punished." That the full punishment of sin is yet future, is an objection often urged. The Bible says, "Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil. Though a sinner do evil an hundred times, and his days be prolonged, yet surely I know that it shall be well with them that fear God, which fear before Him ; but it shall not be well with the wicked, neither shall he prolong his days, which are 20 230 Remedial Provision, as a shadow; because he feareth not before God.'* Now, the circumstances of natural punishments — i.e. the injury or suffering produced by a violation of the order of nature — are perfectly analogous to what the Bible teaches respecting the future punishment of sin. Such punishments often follow actions which are accompanied with present pleasure and advantage, and are often much greater than the pleasure or advantage: as when sickness and untimely death result from pleasurable vice and intemperance. These punishments, also, are often delayed a great while, sometimes until after the acts which occasioned them are forgotten. They often come suddenly and with violence after such delay. There is also a certain bound to imprudence and negligence, which once passed, the opportunity of mediation is gone and the state of retribution begins, when there remains no place for repentance and recovery. If the husband- man lets his seed-time pass without sowing, the whole year is lost to him ; and a certain degree of extrava- gance and folly will surely entail poverty and sick- ness and disgrace, which no sorrow can avert. In perfect accordance with these natural principles do the Scriptures warn us against the evil consequences of sin, and point us to the hopeless condition of the finally impenitent: ''Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me." The mediation of Jesus proposes to deliver us from the punishment and guilt of our sins by forgiveness, and to recover us from our lapsed condition by the Remedial Objection. 231 sanctificatlon of our natures. Is there anything in nature analogous to this? It is useless to speculate as to whether the world might have been constituted without the existence of misery or evil. Our specu- lations will not change the nature of things. The fact is evident that the Creator of the world has per- mitted evil. But then He has provided reliefs, and, in many cases, perfect remedies; reliefs and remedies even for much of that evil which is the result of our own misconduct, and which in the regular course of nature would have ended in our destruction, but for such remedies. Neither sorrow nor reformation will repair the injury done by a violation of nature's laws. The principle of remedial mediation must be taken advantage of if we would escape the consequences of imprudence. If a man fall from a precipice and break a limb, sorrow for the fall will not repair it, yet it may be remedied by another. People ruin their fortunes by extravagance, they bring diseases on themselves by excess, they incur the penalties of civil laws, nor will sorrow for these past follies and good behavior for the future prevent the natural conse- quences of these things Men are often forced to rely upon the assistance of others in order to recover from the effects of their own misconduct. Another illustration may be drawn from pathology. A bone was not made to be broken, but for use, yet it is liable to be broken, and provision has been made for its reparation, not by immediate union through the ordinary processes of nutrition and growth, but by the mediation of a provisional callus, which re-estab- 232 Unreasonable Objections. lishes the relation of parts and holds them in coher- ence until restoration is effected, when it is removed. It is, therefore, perfectly consistent with the nature of things and the circumstances of mankind that God should provide deliverance from spiritual maladies and consequences of transgression for all who avail themselves of it. So that we may appropriately ask, " Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why, then, is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered?" The Divine character of Christ, and the spiritual nature of the change proposed to be wrought in the human soul, are sometimes objected to on the ground of their mystery. This is a childish and unphilo- sophic procedure ; for what is there known to science which is not mysterious? We take cognizance of facts and their relations, but the ultimate nature of things, and the reasons even of the simplest facts, are beyond the reach of human intellect. It is certainly reasonable to attribute Divinity to the Saviour, when we reflect on the nature of the work proposed. Who can forgive sins but God? Who can renew in the soul the principles of original rectitude but the Au- thor of its existence? Nor is it more mysterious to conceive of God becoming incarnate, and communi- cating the power of that divinely-human life to the souls of myriads of men, than to conceive of mag- netism communicated to a bar of iron, which, without loss of virtue itself, may magnetize a thousand needles Foolish Objections. 233 and endow them with properties which they had not before. Some object to the idea of vicarious or substituted atonement as representing God as being indifferent whether He punishes the innocent or the guilty. Such objectors must either deny the personal government of God in the affairs of the world, or they forget that vicarious punishment or suffering is a providential appointment of every day's experience. Innocent people, in various ways, suffer for the faults of the guilty. Men, by their follies, get into difficulties and dangers which would be fatal to them but for the help of others, whose assistance requires very great pains and labor and suffering on the part of those who render it. The objection, therefore, is as much against the facts of daily life as against Christianity, — which shows its fallacy. Bishop Butler well says of all such objectors, "It is indeed a matter of great patience to reasonable men to find people arguing in this manner, objecting against the credibility of such particular things revealed in Scripture, that they do not see the necessity or expediency of them. For though it is highly right, and the most pious exercise of our understanding, to inquire with due reverence into the ends and reasons of God's dispensations, yet when these reasons are concealed, to argue from our ignorance that such dispensations cannot be from God, is infinitely absurd. The presumption of this kind of objections seems almost lost in the folly of them. And the folly of them is yet greater when they are urged, as usually they are, against things in 20* 234 Vicarious Sttffering honorable. Christianity analogous, or like to, those natural dis- pensations of Providence which are matter of expe- rience." Those who object to the justice of the vicarious suffering of Christ do not consider that the sacrifice was not a forced but a voluntary one. Christ gave himself a ransom for us. His offering was self- imposed. By his assumption of our humanity and his suffering unto death He has removed the obsta- cles out of the way of our salvation. We had no claim upon Him, and by no law was He justly con- demned. His voluntary acceptance of the work of atonement has removed the act altogether out of the sphere of law, save that of the law of infinite good- ness. It is not manifested justice, but transcendent love, on his part, which even Divine justice must accept as vicarious and sufficient. Again, so far from the idea of vicarious suffering being revolting, it commends itself to the moral sense of mankind. The chief glory of history is to be seen in deeds of self-devotion and heroic self- offering. The forlorn hope is always the central point of honor. Leonidas at Thermopylae, Tell in Switzerland, Winkelried in the Tyrol, and Washing- ton in our own land, owe their fame to the nobility of self-sacrifice. To follow such examples, and live for others, — suffering vicariously for them if need be, — is the law and condition of all real greatness and goodness in the world. In this also Christ has set us an example that we should follow Him. It is the vicarious suffering and toil of a mother's love which Vtcarious Suffering our Natural Condition. 235 endear it to our hearts. It is this which makes a father's memory honorable. It is the recollection of a brother's or sister's love, taking on themselves the consequences of our faults, averting the penalties of our indiscretions, and denying themselves for our good, which makes the memory of home so precious. Vicarious suffering! It is the natural condition of our being! Shall we, then, question the right of God to display in highest perfection that which He has ordained to be the chief virtue and nobility of his? creatures? As He is Love itself, can we honor Him by denying Him the right or the opportunity to dis- play his love to man? In a ver>' favorable criticism of the first edition of this work by Dr. Whedon ("Methodist Quarterly Review," Oct., 1872) we find the following : "The suc- ceeding chapter, on the doctrine of the Mediator, is fresh from his (the author's) standpoint, but evades the central question how far a satisfaction of one man's sin by another man's suffering is reconcilable with our intuitive sense of absolute justice. Does not the same intuitive sense that requires penalty at all require that the doer of the sin solely should be the sufferer of the penalty ?" To this objection the three preceding paragraphs may be sufficient answer, yet the following remarks of Dr. Hodge,* in a similar stram, may not be inappropriate: "The substitution of the innocent for the guilty, of victims for trans- gressors in sacrifice, of one for many, the idea of ex- * Systematic Theology, vol. ii. p. 532. 236 Vicarious Punishment Rational. piation by vicarious punishment, has been familiar to the human mind in all ages. It has been admitted not only as possible, but as rational, and recognized as the only method by which sinful men can be reconciled to a just and holy God. It is not, there- fore, to be admitted that it conflicts with any intuition of the reason or of the conscience ; on the contrary, it is congenial with both. It is no doubt frequently the case that opposition to this doctrine arises from a misapprehension of the terms in which it is expressed. By guilt many insist on meaning personal criminality and ill-desert, and by punishment evil inflicted on the ground of such personal demerit. In these senses of the words the doctrine of satisfaction and vicarious punishment would indeed involve an impossibility. The Remonstrants were right in saying that one man cannot be good with another's goodness, any more than he can be white with another's whiteness. And if punishment means evil inflicted on the ground of personal demerit, then it is a contradiction to say that the innocent can be punished. But if guilt ex- presses only the relation of sin to justice, and is the obligation under which a sinner is placed to satisfy its demands, then there is nothing in the nature of things, nothing in the nature of God as revealed either in his providence or in his word, which forbids the idea that this obligation may on adequate grounds be transferred from one to another, or assumed by one in the place of others." We quote also from Rev. R. Watson's " Theolog- ical Institutes," vol. ii. p. 144 : " Generally speaking, it Vicarious Punishment Allowable. 237 cannot be a matter of difficulty to conceive how the authority of a law may be upheld and the justice of its administration made manifest, even when its penalty is exacted in some other way than the punish- ment of the party offending. When the Locrian legislator voluntarily suffered the loss of one of his eyes to save that of his son condemned by his own statutes to lose both, and did this that the law might neither be repealed nor exist without efficacy, who does not see that the authority of his laws was as much — nay, more — impressively sanctioned than if his son had endured the whole penalty ? The case, it is true, has in it nothing parallel to the work of Christ, except in that particular which it is here adduced to illustrate ; but it shows that it is not, in all cases, necessary for the upholding of a firm government that the offender himself should be punished. This is the natural mode of maintaining authority, but not, in all cases, the only one ; and in that of the re- demption of man we see the wisdom of God in its brightest manifestation securing this end, and yet opening to man the door of hope." It has often been said that true religion is nothing but common sense applied to the affairs of the soul; and the more carefully the doctrines of Christianity are investigated and compared, the more clearly will they be seen to be consistent with the nature of man and the order of the world about us. If Christ be indeed the Mediator between God and man, — i.e. if Christianity be true; if He be indeed our Lord, our Saviour, and our God, — the careless 238 Warning. disregard of tnese high relations, as well as the obsti- nate rejection of them, may lead to fatal consequences. If neglect of industry and prudence leads to poverty; if neglect of remedies and means may issue in death ; the neglect of Christ's mediation may end in eternal ruin. Let us, then, be wise while we may. "If thou art wise, thou shalt be wise for thyself; but and if thou scornest, thou alone shalt bear it." CHAPTER IX. THE FAITH-FACULTY IN MAN. " For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God." St. Paul. (239) CONTENTS. Spiritual Functions in Man — Provision made for these Functions-w- Bible Doctrine of the Holy Spirit and its Influence — The Test of Real Christianity — Proof of Spiritual Faculties from the Yearnings of the Human Mind — Heathen Oracles, Divination, and Magic — These revived in Spiritualism — Effects analogous to Catalepsy, etc. — Spiritual Influences taught in Scripture, yet Divine Knowledge only from the Divine Spirit — Scripture Condemnation of Divina- tion and Necromancy — Reasons for such Condemnation — Divine Communications and Mental Exaltation distinguished — Tests of Divine Experiences. (240) CHAPTER IX. THE FAITH-FACULTY IN MAN. In the foregoing chapters we considered the spiritual world as distinct from the physical, yet manifesting itself to man's intellectual nature by means of laws and forces which are peculiar, but whose consistency with the arrangement of the visible universe exhibits the stamp of the same designing intellect whose traces we mark in the ordering of material things. The laws of life and mental phenomena evidently pertain only tor a special order of beings, and require for their origin as well as for their elucidation something ex- traneous from, and additional to, the matter with which it is only temporarily united. Metals and stones do not live. The hand, the eye, the ear, and other organs, are not conscious of sensation or voli- tion, but are merely recipients, conductors, or in- struments of sensation and volition. The sensitive, willing being is the immaterial soul. We traced the functions or faculties of this immaterial nature from the most elementary consciousness of its connection with corporeal structure, and of physical conditions, to its agency upon immaterial ideas; recognizing them by Perception, retaining them by Memory, combining them by Imagination, comparing and deciding respecting them by Judgment. Conscience 21 ( 241 ) 242 Provision for Spinfual Functions. and Volition we considered as the highest functions of our spirits, bringing us into relations with the spiritual world, and giving us dominion over our own powers. We have seen, also, that mankind from the earliest ages of the world has been in possession of ideas and knowledge which could not have been innate, since they are not universal, and which neither sensational nor psychological experience is capable of communicating, but which claim origin in Divine revelation. The same originating power by which matter was created and impressed with forces appro- priate to its nature — cohesion, gravity, motion, elec- tricity, etc., whether these are modifications of a single force or otherwise — has also impressed mind with ideas and impulses peculiar to itself, and from the beginning of the world has ordained means and appliances for mental improvement, and remedial measures for spiritual restoration. We find abundant evidence that man has other faculties besides those which relate to the world of sense and to the ideas of his own mind. Conscience, or the faith-faculty, rises to higher themes than mere intellectuality or expediency. It implies a receptivity of special spiritual influences. It takes cognizance of God, — the invisible Supreme, — and of man's rela- tions to God. Whether we consider it a single faculty, or a combination of faculties, its existence among men proves the inspirational capacity of the soul. There are spiritual functions in human nature which render possible the subjective evidence of spiritual experience. These spiritual functions find Man's Fall and Restoration. 243 appropriate provision in supernatural impressions or impulses, as well as in intellectual conceptions revealed by the Spirit of God. So far as the order of nature has been observed, no instance of natural want has been met with which is not provided for in the econ- omy of the universe. Man's spiritual necessities and yearnings are no exception to this law. The religious nature may remain dormant for lack of its appro- priate stimulus, or for want of proper conditions of development, or it may be entirely blighted or de- stroyed, — as the life of a seed may remain dormant for years or become totally extinct; or, being in- structed by the Divine word, the soul may be lifted heavenwards by penitential desire and faith, and re- ceive the quickening, inspiring, and developing energy of the Divine Spirit. To this religious nature Kant refers when he says that "a rational theology can have no existence unless it is founded upon the laws of morality." The Bible teaches that man received his spiritual faculties from the Divine inbreathing, and, although by transgression he lost his original image of right- eousness, and the consciousness of God's favor, he is still capable of receiving Divine communications. The fallen creature can still hear the voice of Jehovah, and the capability of spiritual restoration is implied by all the warnings and promises of Holy Writ. To make that restoration possible was the great object of the work of redemption by our Lord Jesus Christ, which procured for us not only the offer of forgive- ness for past guilt, but the gracious aid of the Holy 244 Test of Real Christianity. Spirit, who is the true quickener and restorer of the spiritually dead. Thus it was possible for Enoch to have such conscious communings with heaven, and so to live up to the behests of his highest nature, that it is said of him "he walked with God." Thus God's Spirit strove with the sinful antediluvians in the days of Noah. Thus in every age we read of Divine help for human weakness, — the Holy Spirit given to write God's laws upon men's hearts and bring them into communion with himself When the work of redemption was complete, by the offering up of the body of Christ once for all, the ministration of the Spirit became the principal object of revelation; it was therefore fitting that the fullness of time should be marked by such a display of spiritual phenomena as was witnessed on the day of Pentecost, when the rushing wind and cloven tongues symbolized the power communicated from above. (Acts, ii.) This manifestation of Divine power was not confined to the apostles, but was experienced by all the repre- sentatives of the Christian church who were present, male and female, young and old. (Acts, ii. 17, 18.) Similar occurrences in the early history of the church, — as in the case of Cornelius, of the disciples of John, etc., — and many passages of Scripture, prove that the gift of the Holy Spirit is the privilege of all real Christians. The direct communication of the Divine Spirit to the individual heart, or religious nature, is the experi- mentum crucis of real Christianity. So palpable is this influence in those who comply with the condi- Effects of Divine Influence. 245 tions laid down that the illustrative imagery of the Scriptures is of the strongest possible kind. It is called a new birth, a new creation, a resurrection from the death t>f sin, a transformation, an indwelling, etc., and the strongest sensations are figuratively transferred to the spiritual sphere, as in the Psalmist's exclamation, "O taste and see that the Lord is good : blessed is the man that trusteth in Him." The necessary conditions of this Divine influence are a voluntary repudiation of impurity and sin, and acceptance of righteousness; prayer, or an earnest impulse of the spiritual nature towards God; and a confident trust in the Divine plan of mediation. The essential elements of these conditions may exist in minds which in other respects are unenlightened and superstitious. They were present in the woman who ignorantly thought that to touch the hem of Christ's garment would be the proper conduit of supernatural power. They existed in many before the coming of Christ, and among the heathen also, as in the case of Cornelius, the Syrophenician woman, and others. Jesus declared that men from all parts of the world should be accepted and saved, while those to whom He was plainly preached would in many instances be cast out. The principal effects of the influence of the Holy Spirit upon the soul are a consciousness of the Divine presence and favor, a conformity of the affections and will to the requirements of revelation, and a sort of exaltation and energetic action of all the mental faculties. This last effect is a consequence of the 21a 246 Heathenism a Parody on Truth. simplicity and frankness and directness of aim which are inseparable from true piety. " If thine eye be single," said Christ, *' thy whole body shall be full of light." As a matter of course, the reality of such influence, in any given case, is a question of experience or of testimony. As a sensation cannot be explained in words, or as the mental nature has no conception of an idea until it enters the sphere of consciousness, so an impression upon the spiritual nature must be ex- perienced in order to be known. Each must know it for himself Whether others have such experience must be judged of by their testimony and their fruits; for "by their fruits ye shall know them." Apart from the teachings of the Scriptures and the testimony of individual experience, proof of the ex- istence of such faculties as we have described, and which are presupposed by the biblical doctrine of the agency of the Holy Spirit, is found in the his- tory of the human mind and its yearnings, through all the ages. It is certain that men of every degree of intellectual culture, in every period of history, have sought for spiritual impulses from a source outside of the sphere of the intellect. The dceinon of Socrates was not a baseless notion, but had origin in the conscious want of an inquiring mind. As the memory of the early Divine revelations to the Patri- archs could not immediately fade away from the minds of men, we find the heathen nations who had corrupted the truth not only endeavoring to trans- mit the traditions of those communications in poetry Revival of Heathenism in Spiritualism. 247 aiid fable, but also seeking themselves to hold com- munion with the invisible world, establishing oracles, and inventing divination and magic, to support their various systems of superstition and idolatry. The oracles were the chapels, or residences, of their spir- itual mediums, — generally females, — who were sup- posed to be possessed with the spirits of the gods, and who went into nervous paroxysms, and recited fervid sentences, often without coherence, but some- times in regular poetic verse. Magic was called either white magic or black magic, according as they claimed intercourse with good or bad spirits. Divi- nation was the pretended art of foretelling future events by demoniacal possession, by mesmeric trance, by sacrifices, by lots, or by omens. These phenom- ena were regarded by the heathen as effected either by the special influence of their gods, or by the spirits of dead men, or by a class of spiritual beings inter- mediate between the gods and men. A very small class of philosophers argued that they were phenom- ena natural to the human mind. The nineteenth century has witnessed a remarkable revival of these practices among civilized nations. The rationalistic infidelity of Europe, and the pan- theism which it rendered popular, prepared the public mind for the reception of the grossest heathenism, and caused the delusion to be wide-spread and injuri- ous. Nothing, however, which spiritualism (so called) has developed has advanced beyond the daily prac- tices of the heathen world, both ancient and modern. The treatises of lamblichus and others contain direc- 248 Neo-platonic Philosophy. tions for producing effects which are a perfect parallel to the doings of the magnetizers and spiritualists of the present day. The following extracts will exhibit this parallelism, and suggest the origin of some of the theological speculations of modern times: "An innate knowledge of the gods is coexistent with our very essence; and this knowledge is superior to all judgment and deliberate choice, and subsists prior to reason and demonstration. . . . '•'The wise, therefore, speak as follows: The soul having a twofold life, one being in conjunction with body, but the other being separate from all body; when we are awake we employ, for the most part, the life which is common with the body, except when we separate ourselves entirely from it by pure intellectual and dianoetic energies. But when we are asleep, we are perfectly liberated as it were from certain surround- ing bonds, and use a life separated from generation. Hence this form of life, whether it be intellectual or divine, and whether these two are the same thing, or whether each is peculiarly of itself one thing, is then excited in us, and energizes in a way conformable to its nature. Since, therefore, intellect surveys real beings, but the soul contains in itself the reasons of all generated natures, it very properly follows that, according to a cause which comprehends future events, it should have a foreknowledge of them, as arranged in their precedaneous reasons. And it possesses a divination still more perfect than this, when it conjoins the portions of life and intellectual Neo-platonic Philosophy. 249 energy to the wholes from which it was separated. For then it is filled from wholes with all scientific knowledge; so as for the most part to attain by its conceptions to the apprehension of everything which is effected in the world. Indeed, when it is united to the gods, by a liberated energy of this kind, it then receiv^es the most true plenitudes of intellections, from which it emits the true divination of divine dreams, and derives the most genuine principles of knowledge. But if the soul connects its intellectual and divine part with more excellent natures, then its phantasms will be more pure, whether they are phan- tasms of the gods, or of beings essentially incorporeal, or, in short, of things contributing to the truth of intelligibles. If, also, it elevates the reasons of gen- erated natures contained in it to the gods, the causes of them, it receives power from them, and a knowl- edge which apprehends what has been and what will be; it likewise surveys the whole of time, and is allotted the order of providentially attending to and correcting them in an appropriate manner. And bodies, indeed, that are diseased it heals; but properly disposes such things as subsist among men errone- ously and disorderly. It likewise frequently delivers the discoveries of arts, the distributions of justice, and the establishment of legal institutions. . . . "Those who energize enthusiastically are not con- scious of the state they are in, and they neither live a human nor an animal life, according to sense and im- pulse, but they exchange this for a certain more divine life,by which they are inspired and perfectly possessed.** 250 Defense of Heathenism, lamblichus thus answers the objections of Porphyry that " a passion of the soul is the cause of divination:" "That ' tJie senses are occupied' therefore tends to the contrary of what you say, for it is an indication that no human phantasm is then excited. But 'the fumigations which are introduced' have an alliance to divinity, but not to the soul of the spectator. And *the invocations' do not excite the inspiration of the reasoning power, or corporeal passions in the recipi- ent, for they are perfectly unknown and arcane, and are alone known to the god whom they invoke. But that * not all men, but those that are more simple and young ai'e more adapted to diviiiation', manifests that such as these are more prepared for the reception of the externally acceding and inspiring spirit." Proclus on Theurgy (quoted in the notes in the work referred to) illustrates sympathy by a piece of heated paper inflamed by being placed near a lamp, without contact, comparing the heated paper to a certain relation of inferiors to superiors, and its ap- proximation to the lamp to the opportune use of things ; the procession of fire to the paper represents the presence of divine light to the nature capable of its reception, and "Lastly, the inflammation of the paper may be compared to the deification of mortals and to the illumination of material natures, which are afterwards carried upwards, like the enkindled paper, from a certain participation of divine seed."* The phenomena referred to are analogous to certain * lamblichus on the Mysteries. Angelic Inflrtences. 251 morbid conditions known to medical science as som- nambulism, catalepsy, trance, and other varieties of intense sleep, in which, the connection of the mind with the external world by means of the bodily organs being suspended, the organization of the individual is reflected in dreams. As we have seen in Chapter VII., the world of selfhood is then pres- ent to the mind by the resuscitation of the dormant ideas of memory, the obscure suggestions of the ccensesthesis, and the vagaries of physically directed imagination. Yet, because of its isolation, this dream- state is well adapted to real spiritual inspiration, and is frequently referred to in the Scriptures as affording the opportunity for Divine communications. Whether spiritual communications such as are pretended — human, or demoniac, or angelic — have occurred in modern times is a question which admits of grave doubt, since no contribution to the spiritual ideas of mankind has yet been promulgated by even the most enthusiastic among the votaries of revived heathenism. No revelation has yet surpassed " Moses and the prophets." The Scriptures teach plainly the receptive capacity of man for spiritual impulses. Angels are represented as interested in our welfare and as exerting an influ- ence in our behalf. They were frequent ministers of revelation as well as of special mercies and judg- ments, and are said to be still ministering spirits unto the heirs of salvation. Evil spirits, likewise, are rep- resented as having an influence on men's minds, inciting to evil and rebellion against God. But 252 Spiritualism condemned by the Scriptures, neither good nor evil angels, nor even the Spirit of God himself, are referred to as having an irresistible influence. They may incline or draw, but cannot force, the soul. As to the impartation of spiritual truth, the Bible teaches that none can reveal the things of God but the Spirit of God. "For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God." Thus, also, Jesus said, " No man knoweth the Father but the Son, and he to whom the Son shall reveal Him." To seek a knowledge of the Divine will and of spir- itual truth from intercourse with inferior spirits, is to reject and turn aside from the revelation which God has given. Hence the heathenish practices to which we have referred were distinctly forbidden. Moses says, "There shall not be found among you any one that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord: and because of these abominations the Lord thy God shall drive them out from before thee. Thou shalt be perfect with the Lord thy God. For these nations, which thou shalt possess, hearkened unto observers of times, and unto diviners: but as for thee, the Lord thy God hath not suffered thee so to do." (Deut. xviii. 10-13.) In this passage he men- tions eight different practices as opposed to the teach- ing of Divine revelation, viz., those of- 1st, the user of divination, a mode of seeking knowledge of futurity The Hunger of the Soul. 253 often employed among the heathen, three kinds of which — by arrows or rods, by images, and by the entrails of animals — are mentioned by Ezekiel, and denounced as rebellion against God; 2d, the observer of times, or dreams; 3d, the enchanter, or serpent- charmer; 4th, the witch, or sorceress, who divined by means of exhilarating and poisonous drugs, like the mephitic gas of Delphi, or the modern magician's incense; 5th, the charmer by the power of song, which was often resorted to as a means of exalting nervous influence; 6th, the consulter with familiar spirits; 7th, the wizard, or magician, who was sup- posed to possess magic arts which gave supernat- ural knowledge; 8th, the necromancer, or con- sulter of the spirits of the dead. Throughout the Scriptures, a resort to such abnormal excitements, or to communications with spirits, either real or sup- posed, for the purpose of gaining knowledge of the future or of the spiritual world, is plainly and strongly condemned. The reasons of this condemnation are both intellectual and moral. The responses of spirit- ism are fragmentary, fanciful, contradictory, and deceptive, like the imagination and mutterings of a man intoxicated, and the result is darkness and in- capacity of mind and instability of reason. "When they shall say unto you. Seek unto them that have familiar spirits, and unto wizards that peep, and that mutter: should not a people seek unto their God? for the living to the dead? To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them. And they 22 254 Elevation is not Inspiration. shall pass through it, hardly bestead and hungry; and it shall come to pass, that when they shall be hungry, they shall fret themselves, and curse their king and their God, and look upward. And they shall look unto the earth; and behold trouble and darkness, dimness of anguish; and they shall be driven to darkness." (Isa. viii. 19-22.) This passage exhibits the mental effects of all such pursuits. The superstitious arts and practices alluded to, however unsatisfactory or wrong, are nevertheless proofs and illustrations of the fact that man has con- sciousness of the possession of a spiritual nature, capable of being acted upon by impulses of a spirit- ual sort. Hideous distortions of the truth though they are, yet they have a foundation in our human nature. Properly interpreted, they are agonizing and pitiable expressions of the necessity of the soul wan- dering in darkness and feeling after God. They are manifestations of want which can be truly satisfied nowhere save in the provision which God has made for the soul. The tendencies of modern thought require us to give prominence to the scriptural doctrine of a real communion between the soul of a true Christian and the Spirit of God; but we must be careful to discrimi- nate between the communications of the Divine Spirit and the exercise of our own faculties. The superior faculties of man's nature will naturally in- fluence the inferior, but we may distinguish between these effects and the cause which produces them. In the extraordinary revelations to the prophets, pre-. The Scriptural Test of Spiritual Truth. 255 paratory to Christ's coming, there were frequent accompaniments of ecstasies and trances, and pecuHar elevations of mind, and special eloquence, not the same in all, nor at all times. These effects and accompaniments of central truth impressed the senses of observers often more than the truth itself, so that persons of lively or overheated imaginations were sometimes regarded as persons inspired. Thus the heathen priests and oracles found a ready soil for the growth of their systems, and their frenzies, trances, and clairvoyance, imitating and exaggerating the natural effects of Divine inspiration, led away men's minds from truth to childish superstition and heathenism. Even when a warm and enthusiastic fancy is employed on religious subjects, and rises to a high pitch of excitement, we must not conclude that it is necessarily impressed by the Spirit of God. Many instances have been known of persons who have been most eloquent and thrilling in preaching and exhortation, and ardent in prayers, who were yet destitute of all true piety towards God or humanity towards men. The witness of God's Spirit with our spirits is addressed to our consciousness in a manner peculiarly its own. It is not dependent upon the varying moods or feelings of our minds, although it may so impress the recipient as to beget even intense excitement. Christians may have ecstatic raptures and dreams, because they are men. But a real Christian may be assured, like the Psalmist, that even if both heart (or soul) and flesh fail, — if both bodily and mental faculties should be diseased or deranged, 256 Tests of Spiritual Experience, — God is the strength of his heart, and his portion forever. The difference between imagination and the con- sciousness of Divine favor is a subject of great im- portance, as a check to enthusiasm on the one hand, and confirmatory of a humble Christian faith on the other. Imagination is, as we have seen (page 207), a faculty of the spiritual nature by which we combine ideas previously received. Influential as it is, and most useful when well directed, it cannot create. Its office is wholly intellectual, or pertains to the sphere of ideas. Its combinations may always be represented in words or pictures. No state of consciousness can be thus represented. Every conscious sensation or feeling is a matter of experience known only to its possessor, and cannot be explained to another. Here lies the fallacy of those skeptical minds who seek for verbal explanations and logical formulae in every sphere of religious investigation. As the conscious- ness of physical sensation, like the taste of salt or sugar, or of mental states, like memory or volition, or of spiritual qualities, as love, gratitude, etc., is its own evidence, so likewise is the experience of the work of the Divine Spirit. As certainly as the an- swering telegram of a friend with whom we correspond at a distance by means of electric wires is the reply to the prayer of faith from a humble, penitent heart. It is a question altogether of experiment, and not of intellectual imagination or deductive reasoning. Again, imagination may be elevating to the intel- lectual nature; it may produce a glow of feeling, Tests of Spiritual Experience. 257 such as is produced by music or orator}) or by a con- templation of the starry heavens ; but it cannot trans- form the moral nature — it cannot change the soul from a sinful to a holy state. The consciousness of Divine favor communicated by the Divine Spirit is hallowing as well as elevating, and the soul is con- scious of it, so as to realize with the Psalmist: "As far as the east is from the west, so far hath God re- moved my transgressions from me." We may readily distinguish between a true child of the Spirit and a presumptuous self-deceiver by applying the scriptural test, " By their fruits ye shall know them." For all who are truly of God do the works of God, and the fruits of the Spirit are mani- fest in them: "love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentle- ness, meekness, faith, temperance, charity." If we are so happy as to have such a blessed consciousness of spiritual experience as to call God our Father, — or, to use the expressive Syriac word of the apostle, "Abba," a word easy even to stammering childhood, — and find the above-mentioned fruits and graces in our souls, the Spirit thus manifested to us will "seal us unto the day of redemption," "quicken our mortal bodies," and "reward our faithful use of his few gifts here with plentiful effusions of glory hereafter." 22* CHAPTER X. THE RESURRECTION. " This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal put on immortality." St. Paul. (259) CONTENTS. Idea of Resuscitation not innate, nor taught by Nature — Scriptures teach a Bodily Resurrection — Ecclesiastical History of the Doctrine — Variety of Opinions from Alleged Difficulties — Theory of Evolu- tion — Views of Whately and Drew — A True Theory must embrace all Past Cases and the Predicted Change of the Living — The Small Amount of Matter really belonging to our Bodies — Power of Vital Affinities gives Probability to the Idea of Resurrection — No Real Analogy in Nature — Analogies confirmatory of the Predicted Change in our Future Bodies. (260) OF THE TJNIVERSIT CHAPTER X. THE RESURRECTION. The idea of the resuscitation of the dead will. not, we think, be claimed as an intuition by even the most zealous advocates for that mode of accounting for the origin of our thoughts. And it is equally certain that there is nothing in nature capable of communi- cating such an idea to our minds. The transforma- tion of the insect tribes, the growth of a plant from its seed, etc., although useful illustrations of the difference between one state of existence and another, are quite different from a resurrection from a state of death. It is true that in every age persons seemingly dead have revived; but they were only apparently, and not really, dead. We claim, therefore, that the idea must have originated by revelation, and is, therefore, true. The number of passages in the Old Testament Scriptures which embody this idea shows that it was a familiar topic of thought in the days of primitive truth. Job declares, "I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth : and though after my skin worms destroy this (261) 262 A Patriarchal Truth. body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed within me."* The antiquity of the book of Job renders this pas- sage very remarkable as a record of the patriarchal and primitive revelation. Our translation of these words has passed through a fiery ordeal of criticism; yet, so far as spirit and meaning are concerned, it has, we think, received no improvement. Some regard this passage as a strong expression of confidence in a return to worldly prosperity ; but from the context it is evident that Job was in expectation of a speedy death, and desired these words engraved on the rock as an epitaph. Prof T. Lewis, although evidently inclined to give the text a spiritualistic interpretation, remarks, "Job says, 'my redeemer,' my next of kin; but the whole spirit of the solemn passage shows that it must have a wider significance. It is the universal Goel, the next of kin to humanity. The redeemer is regarded as standing in some mysterious relation to us all, as *the last man' of the family, who stands over the dust of dying generations, and who will avenge our cause against the cruel murderer of our race." Job's reference to a redeemer or avenger on the eve of his expected death, seems to us an unanswer- able proof that it is an expression of personal faith in the resurrection of his flesh. "The word is very emphatical [Goel], for it signifieth a kinsman, near * Job, xix. 25-27. Old Testament Teaching. 263 allied unto him, of his own flesh, that will restore him to life."* In II. Kings, iv. 32-37, we have an account of the prophet Elisha restoring the Shunammite's son to life; and in II. Kings, xiii. 21, we read of a dead man living again on touching the bones of a buried prophet. These are plain instances of the idea of a resurrection in Old Testament times. Refer also to Ps. xvi. 9, 10: "My flesh also shall rest in hope. For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption." Ps. xxx. 3 : " O Lord, thou hast brought up my soul from the grave." Ps. xlix. 15 : " God will redeem my soul from the power of the grave." Isa. xxv. 8 : " He will swallow up death in victory." Isa. xxvi. 19: "Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead." Ezek. xxxvii. I-12, — the vision of the valley of dry bones: "I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves," etc. Dan. xii. 2: "Many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake," etc. Hos. xiii. 14: "I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruc- tion," etc. We are aware that some of these passages refer chiefly to a restoration from temporal calamity; but * Legh's Critica Sac«:a- 264 ^^'^ Testament Teaching. the foundation for such reference is the idea of a resurrection. "An image which is assumed in order to express anything in the way of allegory, whether poetical or prophetical, must be an image commonly known and understood, otherwise it will not answer the purpose for which it is assumed."* The doctrine of the resurrection of the dead is plainly and frequently taught and alluded to in the New Testament. Christ himself, and the apostles, often referred to it as a fundamental truth of the Christian religion; and the raising of Jairus's daugh- ter, of the son of the widow of Nain, of Lazarus, and of the saints whose bodies arose at the time of the crucifixion of Jesus, were demonstrations of its possi- bility. The resurrection of Christ himself is asserted to be the model of the future resurrection of his people. He is "the first-fruits of them that slept," as the Jewish first-fruits were a pledge and specimen of the coming harvest. He is to " change our vile bodies, and make them like unto his own glorious body, according to the working whereby He is able to subdue all things unto himself" Vast and myste- rious as it will be, it is not deemed incredible by Christians "that God should raise the dead;" and so important is this doctrine to the integrity of the Christian scheme that it is said the apostles "preached Jesus and the resurrection." In the original Greek of the New Testament, four words are used to express this rising up again of the * Wemyss's Symbol Dictionary. History of Opinion in the Church. 265 dead body, — avdaxaaiq, and its corresponding verb, dviffrr^iu ; syepffiq and kysiput. The first of these is used thirty-eight times, the second thirty-one times, the third once, and the fourth seventy-five times, where the context requires us to associate it with the resus- citation of the dead body. They are also used to express the new Hfe of the regenerated, or a spiritual resurrection from sin to holiness, the first three times, the second once, and the fourth six times. The idea of a spiritual resurrection, however, is based upon and implies a literal one ; and the apostle expressly combats the views of those who restrict the resurrec- tion to the soul and affirm that the resurrection was past already, thereby overthrowing the faith of some. (II. Tim. ii. 18.) At a very early period in the history of the Chris- tian church a speculating tendency was observable, growing out of the teachings of Grecian — especially the Platonic — philosophy. The Apostle Paul speaks of it in his epistles, and particularly warns Timothy to avoid it. I. Tim. vi. 20. The Docetae, as they were called, were the forerunners of the Gnosti€s, and were especially opposed by the Apostle John. I. John, i. 1-3, ii. 22, iv. 2; II. John, 7. Ignatius also wrote against them subsequently in his epistles to the Ephesians and to the Smyrnians. They main- tained the divinity of Christ, but volatilized his human nature into a mere phantom, teaching that He acted and suffered not in reality but in appear- ance. What Docetism did in the doctrine concerning Christ alone, the more completely developed system 23 266 History of Opinion in the Church. of Gnosticism carried out in its whole spiritualizing tendency. It opposed the spiritualistic to the literal, the ideal to the real, in its interpretation of Scripture truth. To resolve history into myths, to dissipate positive doctrines by speculation, and thus make an aristocratic distinction between those who only be- lieve and those who know; to overrate ktiozvledge, especially that which is ideal and speculative in reli- gion, — these were the principal features of Gnos- ticism. It is necessary to refer to this tendency to speculation in order to appreciate the force and applicability of the expressions of the early Christian authors. The Apostles' Creed was perhaps the earliest ex- pression (symbol) of the Christian faith in a condensed form. Ambrose, in the fourth century, attributes it to the twelve apostles. The phrase in the creed, ** The resurrection of the body," before a.d. 600 read, "The resurrection of the flesh;" and "it is said of the ancient recitation that when they came to the clause, * Credo carnis reswrectionem^ it was recited with a gesture, the hand pointing to the body, as though each one declared for himself, ' I believe in the resurrection of this body.'"* This testimony is important, as showing that at that early day the resurrection of the flesh was re- garded as synonymous with the resurrection of the dead. Most of the Fathers believed in the resuscitation * Noldius, Concord. Heb. Part., quoted by Prof. Lewis. History of Opinion in the Church. 267 of the body, and of the very same body which man possessed while on earth. Clement of Rome, sup- posed to have been a fellow-laborer with Paul (Phil. iv. 3), and one of Rome's first bishops, in his First Epistle to the Corinthians argues largely in its favor from the analogies of nature, — the change of day and night, seed and fruit, the phoenix, etc. Ignatius and Polycarp, in their epistles, also refer to the same doc- trine. Justin Martyr (a.d. 89) also adopts the literal interpretation, and shows that Christianity differs from the systems of either Pythagoras or Plato, in that it teaches not only the immortality of the soul, but also the resurrection of the body. Athenagoras (last half of the second century) argues for it from a variety of considerations, and answers the objection drawn from the elements of one organism entering into the com- position of another, by advancing the idea that at the resurrection all things will be restored. Theophilus (Bishop of Antioch, a.d. 170) uses similar language. Irenaeus (the disciple of Polycarp, a.d. 177) also asserts the identity of the future with the present body, and appeals to the analogous revivification (not new creation) of separate organs of the body in some of the miraculous cures performed by Christ, — e.g, of the blind man, and the man with the withered hand. Tertullian (a.d. 160) wrote a work entitled De Resurrectione Camis, in which he made use of preceding arguments, and acutely pointed out the intimate connection between body and soul in the present life; using this to strengthen his position. The Alexandrian school of writers was distinguished 268 History of Opinion in the Church. by a strong leaning to speculation and allegorical interpretation of Scripture. Clement of Alexandria (a.d. 212) merely touches upon this doctrine, without discussing it; but, as in one place he represents the future deliverance of the soul from the fetters of the body as most desirable, his orthodoxy has been ques- tioned. His disciple, Origen (died a.d. 254), main- tained that we may put our trust in Christ without believing the resurrection of the body, provided we hold fast the immortality of the soul. Nevertheless he defended the resurrection against Celsus and the Arabians, but rejected the identity of the bodies, and argued that every body must be adapted to its cir- cumstances, — the heavenly state demanding heavenly bodies, like Moses and Elias. The Gnostics believed in the immortality of the soul, but their notions concerning matter made them shrink from the idea of a reunion of the body with the soul, and led them to reject the doctrine of a resurrection. Thus Apelles maintained that the work of Christ had reference only to the soul, and rejected a resurrection of the body. The false teachers of Arabia, whom Origen combated, asserted that both soul and body fall into a sleep at death, from which they will not awake till the last day. Methodius (Bishop of Lycia, died a.d. 311) com- bated Origen's idealistic doctrine of the resurrection ; yet several of the Eastern theologians adopted it, as Gregory of Nazianzum (Bishop of Constantinople, died A.D. 390) and Gregory of Nyssa (a.d. 394), who considered the soul as the breath of the Almighty, History of Opinion in the Church. 269 ai-i deliverance from the body as the most essential pou^t of future happiness. Chrysostom (a.d. 344), thoL^gh asserting the identity of the body, kept close to the doctrine of St. Paul, and maintained a differ- ence between the present and the future body. Epi- phanius (a.d. 404), Theophilus of Alexandria, and Jerome (died a.d. 420) were representatives of the anti-Origenist party. The latter went so far as to say that in the resurrection even our hair and teeth will not be wanting. Augustine (Bishop of Hippo, died A.D. 430), in the earlier part of his life, believed in a literal resurrection, but endeavOVed to make it accord with Platonic and Alexandrian views.* In after-life he adopted more sensuous notions, and entered upon the question of the stature, age, etc. of the resurrec- tion bodies. The opinion of Origen was condemned by the decisions of synods, after which a controversy ensued between Eutychius, Patriarch of Constantinople, and Gregory the Great, Bishop of Rome (died a.d. 604) as to whether the resurrection body was "impalpa- bilis;" and also a discussion between the Mono- physitic Philoponites and the Cononites whether the resurrection was to be considered as a new creation of matter or as a mere transformation. This latter grew out of the Aristotelian principle that matter and form are inseparable, and are both destroyed with the death of the body. One view condemned * " In coelestibus nullo caro, sed corpora simplicia et lucida." — De Fide et Symb. 23* 270 Modem Views of Resurrection. as Origenistic was that the resurrection body will be spherical, as being most perfect; another, that the bodies will at some future time be annihilated. From the time of Jerome and Augustine, the resurrection of the body with all its component parts was regarded as the orthodox doctrine of the Cath:.lic church. The Bogomiles, Cathari, and others, how- ever, revived the notion of the Gnostics, who, looking on matter as the seat of sin, rejected the idea of a resurrection. The ecclesiastical doctrine was defended by Moneta (of Cremona, a.d. 1220), a Dominican monk, and was further developed into particulars by the scholastics, especially by Thomas Aquinas (a.d. 1224), with many strange conjectures respecting the nature of the resurrection body. In more recent times this doctrine has given rise to various opinions. Dr. Priestley endeavored to re- concile the scriptural doctrine of a resurrection with the philosophical idea of immortality, by supposing that there is a particular organ of the soul which develops itself in the hour of death. Samuel Drew revived the notion of the Jewish rabbins that there is a particular part of the body which is indestructible, and from which the future body will be developed, like a plant from a seed. Swedenborg rejected the doctrine of the resurrection, as founded upon too literal an interpretation of Scripture, teaching that in fact the resurrection and the general judgment have already taken place, and that after death men con- tinue to live as men the righteous as angels). Prof. Bush teaches the development or evolution of a Cause of Variety of Opinions. 271 spiritual body from the natural one at deaths which he terms the resurrection. Archbishop Whately and Dr. Hitchcock have maintained that the future body will not consist of the same particles, but of the same chemical elements, arranged in the same form, and argue its identity from the change of particles which is continually going on in our bodies during life without changing their identity. The creeds or summaries of doctrine of modern churches or 'organized religious bodies uniformly contain a distinct avowal of their belief in a bodily resurrection. Perhaps the only exceptions are the Swedenborgians, the Shakers, and the Spiritualists. The variety of opinions respecting the resurrection, among those who admit the Divine authority of the Scriptures, arises from a consideration of the physical difficulties alleged against it, such as the entire disso- lution of the body into its original elements, the dissemination of these elements throughout the world, and the entering of these elements into the bodies of other animals or men. Those who hold the most literal idea of a bodily resurrection believe that each particle is under Divine supervision, and is preserved from forming any essen- tial part of other organized bodies until its reunion with the spirit. To a believer in a personal Creator, such as the Scriptures reveal, there is no incredibility in this view. The Divine omnipotence and the Divine superintendence answer all objections. A laudable desire, however, to remove the difficulties out of the 272 Traces of the Idea in Ancient Times. way o( faith encourages the adoption of any theory which seems to meet the requirements of Scripture lano-uasre and at the same time avoids the objections to which allusion has been made. The Swedenborgian idea, and that of Prof. Bush, respecting the evolution of a spiritual or rarefied body at death, contradict totally the idea of a resur- rection, which is the living again of the dead body. This idea, as we have seen, existed from primitive times, and entered into the traditions of all nations. The raising of the body of Osiris in the Egyptian mythology, the metempsychosis of the Eastern na- tions, the Grecian story of Proserpine and Ceres, with the rites and mysteries founded upon it, and the fable of the Phoenix, are but variously colored pictures of this truth as received from the fathers of the human race. Plato declared that "it is an original tradition that souls go from hence, and again return hither and arise from the dead."* The biblical record refers to this idea so often and so emphatically as to admit of no question as to its meaning. The Apostle Paul could not condemn the idea of evolution more plainly than he has done in II. Timothy, ii. i8. No method of interpretation which would not be fatal to all the distinctive ideas of revelation can apply the term resurrection to anything else than the body which dies and is buiied in the grave. The view of Archbishop Whately, Prof Hitchcock, and others, that the resurrection will consist in re- * T. Lewis's Platonic Theology, p 331. Theories of Identity. 2J7, building a new body from the same chemical elements, arranged after the same laws, and in the same form, but with great change of properties, commends itself to scientific men by its conformity with chemical and physiological laws; yet it is a serious objection that the idea of a real resurrection is lost sight of in this theory. It is rather a theory of a new creation than of a resurrection. The adherents of this view, how- ever, reply that the Bible was not given to gratify scientific curiosity, or to explain the manner of phe- nomena, and that the doctrine of the resurrection of the body simply means the reunion of the soul with a material body. The opinion of Mr. Samuel Drew, adopted by Dr. A. Clarke and others, has had quite an extensive acceptance. This claims that there is a certain part of the body which is essential to the identity of the body, and which is indestructible, and from which the resurrection body will be developed. Mr. Drew says, "Some radical particles must be fixed within us, which constitute our sameness through all the mutations of life; and which, remaining in a state of incorruptibility, shall put forth a germinating power beyond the grave, and be the germ of our future bodies." He sums up the various theories of per- sonal identity as follows: i. Those particles which compose the body of an infant. 2. The numerical particles which compose our bodies at any given period. 3. The modification of parts. 4. The par- ticles composing our bodies at death. 5. The majority of the particles deposited in the earth. 6. The prin- 274 ^^- ^- Clarke's Theory. ciple refcFred to above. He argues against the first from the changes it undergoes, and the injustice of its participating in the consequences of actions it could not have performed. As to the second, he argues that identity cannot be transferred from one system of atoms to another without contradiction, and therefore that identity is not in numerical particles. On the third he shows that sameness of material can never consist in the arrangement of parts. He argues against the fourth as presuming that no identity of the body existed before. On the fifth he says, " If identity cannot consist either in the union of original and acquired particles, or in particles which are wholly acquired, then the identity of the body cannot con- sist in the majority of those particles which are deposited." Dr. A. Clarke coincided with the opinion of Mr. Drew, and found some illustration of it in the Rab- binical use of the Chaldee word xh (Luz), by which they "signify a certain bone in the human skeleton which is incorruptible, and out of which they suppose the resurrection body will be formed." Much of the matter connected with our bodies during life is doubtless foreign and not essential to their identity. Nine-tenths of the human body con- sists of water,— as has been shown by the weight of a corpse which had been desiccated in an oven, — and of the remaining tenth part, much is material in a state of decay, having been used by the vital pro- cesses, and now effete, or being cast off. So that but a very small proportion of the matter of our bodies can Nascent Matter only essential. 275 really be said to be our own. These facts add much to the plausibility of Mr. Drew's theory. The prin- cipal objection to it is that it is a theory of vegeta- tion or development, and not of resurrection, and thereby fails to meet the requirements of the biblical idea. No idea of the resurrection can be true or scriptural which will fail in any essential respect to apply to the resurrection body of Christ, or to those instances of resurrection related in the Bible, or to the changed bodies of the living who shall remain on earth at the -general resurrection. The apostle says, "We which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent [that is, according to the old Eng- lish sense of the word, go before, or have preference over] them which are asleep." So that whatever view we may adopt should include all these instances. The evolution theory and the opinions of Whately and Drew all fail to apply to them. We have seen that of the total amount of material associated with our bodies, physiology shows a very small part only to be essential to their integrity.* * Dr. Beale, a most eminent English authority in histology, or the science of organic tissues, has succeeded in demonstrating, as he believes, the difference between living and formed structure. He says, " Some years ago I obtained evidence which convinced me that the substance of the bodies of all things living was composed of matter in two states ; and I showed that the truly vital phenomena, 7ititrition, growth^ and multiplication, were manifested by one of the two kinds of matter, while the other was the seat of physical and chemical changes only. From observation, I was led to conclude that, of any living thing, but a part of the matter of which it was 276 Probability from Vital Affinities. That matter only which is in a nascent condition, or which is being applied to vital use, can be said to belong to our bodies. Supposing this small part to be indestructible, many of the objections to a resur- rection drawn from the nourishment of other organ- ized bodies will be removed, for both animals and vegetables are built up from the decomposition of other beings. But even on the supposition of the complete reso- lution of bodily matter into its chemical elements, there is no scientific improbability against a resurrec- tion, in the literal sense of that word. For each substance in nature has its own special affinities, and the attraction between the plastic power (or forming spirit) of an organized being and the atomic material elements pertaining to it at any particular period, is sufficient to change and overcome the ordinary laws of matter and destroy chemical combinations. With the knowledge which science gives us of the supe- riority of the laws of life to all other affinities, and of the power of vitality to remove its appropriate matter from all sorts of combination whatever, there is no scientific impossibility in the revelation which announces that the spirit shall come again to claim its own appropriate bodily material. There is no more improbability in a resurrection than in the constituted was really living at any moment. In the case of adult forms of the higher animals and man, indeed, only a very small por- tion of the total quantity of their body-matter is alive at any period of existence." — Life- Theories : their Influence upon Religious Thought, By Lionel S. Beale, M.D., F.R.S., etc. No Analogy of a Resurrection. ' 277 union of matter and spirit at first. If vegetation was known only in theory, it would be more difficult to believe in the production of sixty or one hundred grains from one grain than to credit a resurrection. The suspension of vitality for two or three thousand years, as in a seed taken from the hand of an Egyp- tian mummy, which, on being planted in the ground, produced fruit, is just as difficult to understand as the resurrection of the body. We have indications of similar suspension of vitality in the sleep of plants and animals and in hibernation. Infusoria have been dried and resuscitated a number of times without losing their vitality, and the hydra and other polyps may be cut into an indefinite number of pieces and yet live. Such instances show the strength of the forming principle, and its power to renew its physical manifestations; but, although they tend to confirm our faith in the probability of a resurrection, they are not analogous. There are no analogies to it in nature. The change from a chrysalis to a butterfly, and other metamorphoses, are merely instances of developmental epochs, not of resurrection. The decomposing seed which gives rise to the plant is never severed from the vital principle or germ. The idea of restoration from a state of real death is so foreign to all our knowledge that we are warranted in assuming that the idea would never have occurred to our minds but for Divine revelation. The only real analogies of a resurrection kn'bwn to man are the historical illustra- tions given in the Bible. Yet although there are no real analogies in nature, 24 278 Some Illustrations of a Resurrection. — no instances of actual revivification other than those revealed, — there are hints and illustrations which may serve to confirm our faith. "Ask the furrows of the field, and they shall tell thee. For 'except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.' The parts of the seed cannot spring afresh till they have been dissolved. It is true, the husband- man soweth only bare grain, but it arises 'clothed upon' with a beautiful verdure. And 'if God so clothe the grass of the field,' how much more shall He clothe your mortal bodies with a glorious immor- tality, O ye of little faith? But why need we take the compass of a year? Every twenty-four hours there is a rehearsal, in nature, of man's death and resurrection. Every evening, the day, with its works, dies into darkness and the shadow of death. All colors fade, all beauty vanishes, all labor and motion cease, and every creature, veiled in darkness, mourns, in solemn silence, the interment of the world. Who would not say, ' It is dead, — it shall not rise' ! Yet, wait only a few hours, in faith and patience, and this dead and entombed earth, by the agency of heaven upon it, shall burst asunder the bars of that sepulchral darkness in which it was imprisoned, and 'arise, and be enlightened, and its light shall come; the day- spring from on high shall visit it, and destroy the covering cast over all people,' and array universal nature with a robe of glory and beauty, raiding those that sleep, to behold themselves and the world changed from darkness to light, and calling Resiirrectio7t the Triumph of the Supernatural. 279 them up to give glory to God and think of the resurrection."* The future resurrection of the dead will manifest the complete triumph of revealed truth. It will be the gathering together in one of the things in heaven and the things in earth, — the complete union and fusion of the natural and the supernatural. It is there- fore the crowning miracle of the Scriptures, and to it all other miracles testify. The resurrection power of Jesus was seen in all his miraculous cures. The revivification (not new creation) of separate organs of the body is analogous to the resurrection of the whole body, as in the cure of the blind, and of the man with the withered hand. But most of all was supernatural power displayed in Christ's own resur- rection. By this was He declared to be "the Son of God with power." In his Divine nature dwelt the essential power of life. No man took his life without his consent. He had power to lay it down, and He had power to take it again. His resurrection proves his ability "to subdue all things unto himself" The prophets of the Old Testament, as the messengers and heralds of the Saviour, had delegated power to work occasional miracles, but in Jesus, supreme supernatural power was his normal state, for "in Him dwelt all the fullness of the Godhead bodily." The final resurrection of the dead will be the completion of his work of redemption, and the " manifestation of the sons of God." * Bishop Home's Sermon on the. Resurrection. 28o The Same Body with Different Qualities. The Scriptures represent the future resurrection body as greatly changed from the condition of the present body. St. Paul affirms that Christ shall ** change our vile bodies, that they may be made like unto his own glorious body," and in another place he contrasts the buried body with its resurrection state, saying, "It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incor- ruption; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. . . . For this corruptible must put on incor- ruption, and this mortal must put on immortality." To these representations science affords many analogies. The various instances of developmental change are such analogies : as the difference between a seed and the plant and flower which spring from it; the differ- ence between an embryo and a child or an adult; the changes of the insect tribes, etc. It is well known in modern chemistry that many substances may exist in two or more physical states or conditions, called allotropic states. In these conditions the same sub- stance may possess very different physical and chem- ical properties. In one state they may be torpid and passive, and in the other active. Thus, there is as great an amount of physical difference between car- bon as it exists in the diamond and as it exists in pure lampblack as between copper and silver, or silver and gold. The diamond is the passive form of carbon, and can hardly be made to burn in oxygen gas, while lampblack, one of the active forms of the same element, is so highly combustible as often *o Conclusion. 281 take fire spontaneously in the open air. Phosphorus also, may be white, poisonous, odorous, luminous, soluble, crystalline, soft, and flexible; or in another state, without chemical change, but by another mode of aggregation of particles, as it is supposed, may be red, innocuous, odorless, illuminous, insoluble, amorphous, hard, and brittle. It has been suggested that these conditions of the elements are retained when they enter into combination. The term isomeric compcu7ids is used in chemistry to represent such as contain the same elements, in the same proportions, and yet have different properties. Thus, spirits of turpentine and the oils of lemon, of juniper, of black pepper, and of bergamot, contain equal amounts of carbon and hydrogen, yet their properties are very different. Oil of roses and illuminating gas are also identical in composition. The difference in isomeric bodies is theoretically accounted for by supposing that the atoms are differently arranged.* Thus science enlarges the number of illustrations which confirm the doctrines of Holy Writ, and re- moves the clouds of ignorance which obscure our vision of the Creator's resources. Thus the volume of Nature and the volume of Inspiration mutually confirm each other, and the changes indicated by the prophecies of the future are shown by science to be in accordance with the economy already established by Divine Providence. Faith in the record of super- natural truth is seen to be similar in essential principle * See Youmans's Class-Book of Chemistry. 24* 282 Conclusion, with the confidence we repose in the order and stability of nature. The natural and the supernatural are the complements of each other, and are permeated by the same Divine energies, under the guidance of the Supreme Wisdom of the same Infinite Will. GLOSSARY OF SCIENTIFIC AND THEOLOGICAL TERMS. Abnormal (Lat. ab^ "from," and norma, a "rule"). — Anything without or contrary to system or rule. Afferent (Lat. ad, " to," and/^rc, to "bear"). — Bearing or pour- ing into; as the absorbent vessels which pass into a lymphatic gland. Applied to nerves which convey sensation or influence towards the nerve-centres. Affinity (Lat. affinis, "related"). — In chemistry, the attractive force by which dissimilar substances unite to form chemical com- pounds. (See Element.) In natural history, a relation of animals to each other because of similarity of organization. Allotropism (Gr. oAAof {alios), "other," and r^xwrof {tropos)y "direction" or ^* way"). — In chemistry, the property of existing in different conditions. Thus, carbon occurs hard and ciystallized in octahedrons in the diamond, soft and in hexagonal forms in black- lead, and in a third form in lampblack and charcoal. Alluvium (Lat. luei-e, to "wash," and ad, "together"). — Soil or land brought together by the ordinary operation of water, as river- plains, low ground once the site of lakes, estuaries, etc. Analogy (Gr. dvd {ana), " with," and TJtyoq {logos), " reasoning"). — In geometry it signifies proportion; in zoology, the relation which animals bear to one another, but not in the essential points of organi- zation, as in affinity. Analogy is often used to express mere similarity; but its specific meaning is similarity of relations. Thus, analogical reasoning is reasoning from some similitude which things known bear to things unknown. (283) 284 Glossary, Anemone (Gr. Icvtuaq {aitemos), "wind"). — The wind-i3ower; a genus of plants of the order Ranunculacese. Applied also to the sea-anemone, or actinia, a species of polyp often seen in rock-holes on the sea-coast, which, from its resemblance to a flower, was called animal-flower. Animalcule (Lat. animahulum, a "little animal"). — An animal which can be seen only with a microscope. Annihilation (Lat. ad, "to," and nihilum, "nothing"). — The act of reducing to nothing, or non-existence. Antediluvian (Lat. ante, " before," and diluvium, " flood"), — Before the time of the Deluge. Aphasia (Gr. a^aaia {aphasia), "dumbness from perplexity or terror"). — A diseased condition of the brain, manifested by a suspen- sion of the faculty of communicating ideas. A Priori and A Posteriori. — Two general methods of reasoning according to what is called the synthetic and analytic method. The first lays down some previous or self-evident principles, and descends to their consequences; the other begins with phenomena, and en- deavors to ascend to the knowledge of the cause. Archaeology (Gr. Q!p;^:cM0f (arf>^«zt?j), "ancient"). — The science of antiquities. Arminians. — Those who hold with respect to predestination the tenets of Arminius, a Protestant divine born in Holland a.d. 1560. He taught, in opposition to the Calvinists, or followers of Calvin, that no part of the human race were decreed to be lost, or passed by without chance of salvation, but that God has determined to save all whom He foresaw would persevere in the faith. They are sometimes called Remonstrants, from their petition, in 16 10, to the States of Holland for protection against the persecutions of their opponents. At the Synod of Dort, A.D. 1618, nine years after the death of Ar- minius, their opinions were defended by Episcopius, professor of divinity at Leyden, but they were condemned, and their adherents treated with great severity. Among modern churches, the Methodists represent the views of Arminians, and Presbyterians those'of Calvinists, so far as the doctrine of predestination is concerned. Atheism (Gr. d {a), "without," and Geof {theos), " God").— The denial of the existence of a God or a Providence. The name Atheist was first applied to Diagoras, one of the followers of Democritus, who explained all things by the movement of material atoms. The Glossary, 285 other form of ancient atheism was that of Thales, who accounted for all things by the different transformations of water. Plato well says in his Laws that atheism is a disease of the soul before it becomes an error of the understanding. AssiMiLATlor? (Lat. assitnilo, " I liken to"). — The act by which organized bodies incorporate foreign matter and convert it into their own proper substance. It is a very complicate function, and has given rise to some of the most difficult problems of physiological chemistry. Atomic Theory. — In chemistry, the theoiy of atomic equivalents, or proportionate weights of the elements, according to which all substances combine. This theory of combining proportions, with the expression of the elements by symbols, has rendered the science of chemistry quite exact. Atonement. — Not merely the act or condition of being at one^ — i.e. agreement or reconciliation, — but also applied to the act of expia- tion, satisfaction, or reparation made by giving an equivalent for an injury. In theology it is applied to the expiation of sin made by the death of Christ, of which the sacrifices of Jewish and patriarchal antiquity were types. Automatic (Gr. amoQ [autos), "self," and/^dw (wa^)," motion"). — Self-moving. Not voluntary. Avatar. — In Hindoo mythology, an incarnation of the deity. The Hindoos teach that innumerable incarnations have taken place ; but nine of them are particularly noted, and the Kalki, or tenth avatar, is yet to come at the end of the iron age. AvERROES. — A renowned Arabian philosopher, born in Spain in the latter part of the twelfth century. He regarded Aristotle as the greatest of all philosophers, and devoted himself to the revival of his views. Axiom (Gr. u^uocf) {axioo), "I demand"). — A universal proposition which compels our faith, — the understanding perceiving it to be true as soon as it perceives the meaning of the words, although it cannot be proved, because it is impossible to make it plainer. All mathe- matics depend on such elemental truths. Indeed, all science depends on faith in such axioms, expressed or implied. Brahminical. — Pertaining to the Brahmins, the first or highest of the four castes of Hindoos, in whose hands the whole learning of 286 Glossary, India remained for ages, and from whom the Grecian sages obtained the elements of their philosophy. Buddhism. — The religious system of the greater part of Asia. Its chief tenets are that sensible objects are transient and delusive mani- festations of God, that the human soul is an emanation' from Deity, which, after death, will again be bound to matter and subjected to misery unless, by wisdom acquired through prayer and meditation, it becomes absorbed into the essence from which it sprang. Calvinists. — The followers of Calvin, one of the Reformers of the sixteenth century. He rejected the episcopal form of church government in favor of the presbyterial system; but his distinguish- ing tenets were the doctrines of unconditional predestination, particu- lar redemption, irresistible grace, and the certain perseverance of the saints. These doctrines are rarely preached in modem times, or, if preached, are rendered more acceptable by an announcement of the opposite doctrine of the freedom of the will, but they still find a place in the catechisms and confessions of some of the churches. Carboniferous (Lat. carbo, "coal," and y^ro, **I bear"). — A geological term applied to those strata which contain coal, and to the period when the coal measures were formed. Cell (Lat. cella, a " cell"). — The elementary form of living matter. The simplest form of both animals and vegetables is found to be a cell, — a bladder-like form, containing fluid, etc. Even the hardest tissues, as wood, and bone, and teeth, are shown by physiology to have originated from cells, and to consist of a congeries of altered cells. Cerebellum (Lat. cerebellum, " little brain"). — The hinder and lower part of the brain. Cerebro. Spinal Axis. — An anatomical term applied to the brain, spinal cord, and nerves which proceed therefrom. Cerebrum (Lat. cerebrzim, the "hv^in"). — The front and larger mass of the brain. Chronology (Gr. xpovog (cAronos),*' time,'* and ?ayos [logos), " discourse" or " doctrine"). — The science which treats of the various divisions of time, and of the order and succession of events. The diversities of epochs among different nations, and the various stand- ards for the measurement of intervals, render this one of the most uncertain of sciences. Desvignoles mendons that he had collected Glossary, 2^"/ upwards of two hundred different calculations, the shortest of which reckons only 3483 years between the creation and commencement of the common era, and the longest 6984; the difference being no less than thirty-five centuries. Objections to the Scriptures from so unre- liable a "source necessarily fail to apply. Chrysalis {Gr. xpvaog {chrysos), "gold"). — The second condition or state through which some insects pass before arriving at their winged or perfect state. Clairvoyance (Fr., " clear-sightedness"), — A power attributed to persons in a mesmeric state of discerning objects which are not present to the senses. Clonic Spasm. — An alternate contraction and relaxation of the muscles. CCEN.«STHESIS (Gr, KOLVOQ {koittos), "common," and alodeoig (ah- thesis), "feeling"). — Common sensation. By the coensesthesis, states of our bodies are revealed to us which have their seat in the sphere of vegetative life. Consensual (Lat. con, "with," and sentio, to "think," "feel," or "perceive"). — Excited or caused by sensation, and not volitional. Co-ordinated. — Brought into common action. Correlation of Force. — Corresponding similarity or parallelism. A term given to the modern theory that all the forces of nature are but modifications of a single force. Cosmogony (Gr, Koofiog {^kosmos), " world," and yoveia {goneia), "generation"). — The science, or rather theory, of the origin of the universe, sometimes called Cosmology. Creed (Lat. credo, " I believe"), — A summary of faith or of prin- ciples. In the Greek Church such a summary was termed a symbol, and this name is retained among Lutherans. Among numerous creeds, those most celebrated are the Apostles' Creed (so called), the Nicene, and the Athanasian, The necessity of such summaries arose out of the discussion of items of faith in the early Christian centuries. They were intended as testimonies against erroneous doctrines. Darwinian Theory. — A modification of the theory of the develop- ment of all living things from a single form or from a few forms. It is sometimes called the "theory of natural Helection." Agassiz, Bal- four, Brewster, and other eminent scientists have shown that this theory is contradicted by modern science; yet certain sciolists cling 288 Glossary, to it as if it possessed a charm for the human understanding. (See Chapter VI.) Deduction. — Inference drawn from premises laid down. It is the opposite of induction, which consists in rising from particular truths to the determination of a general principle. The principle of deduc- tion is, that things which agree with the same thing agree with one another. The principle of induction is, that in the same circumstances, and in the same substances, from the same causes the same effects will follow. The mathematical and metaphysical sciences are founded on deduction; the physical sciences rest on induction. Deism. — The creed of a deist. It acknowledges the existence of one God, but denies revelation. Demon (Lat. damon). — In the pagan mythology, a spirit holding a middle place between men and the celestial deities. In modern use the word is applied generally to an evil spirit. Development Theory. See Darwinian Theory. DiLUViAN (Lat. dis, "asunder," and luere, to "wash"). — The result of the extraordinary action of water. Deposits of loam, gravel, etc., which are supposed to have been caused by the Deluge, or ancient currents of water of extraordinary violence. Divination. — The art of foretelling future events by the aid oi superior beings, or by other than human means. The ancient heathens divided divination into two kinds, natural and artificial. The first was a sort of afflatus or supposed inspiration, the other by means of certain rites and ceremonies and omens. DoCETiE (Gr. doKELv {dokein), to *'seem"). — One of the earliest heretical sects, which taught that Christ lived and acted in appear- ance only, and not in reality. Some divines have considered that the express declarations of the nature of Christ in St. John's writings were especially directed against these errors. Dualism — The Manichean system, which taught the existence of two gods, — a good and an evil one. Also, the- system of Anaxagoras and Plato, who taught two principles in nature, an active and a passive one. Ecstasy (Gr. eKoraoig {ekstasis)). — A state of trance. In medicine, a species of catalepsy in which the patient remembers, after the fit, the ideas he had during its continuance. Efferent (Lat. eff'ero, to "bear out"}.— Conveying outwards. Glossary . 289 Element. — A simple or uncompounded substance; the last result of analysis. Thus, iron is consideied an element, while iron rust is an oxide of iron, because it is a compound of iron and oxygen. Chemistry has isolated about sixty elements, from whose combinations all material things are composed. Empirical. — Pertaining to experiment or experience. From the common custom of quacks to boast of their experience, it has come to signify what pertains to quackeiy. Enteric (Gr. cvrqxjv (^«/(?rt?«), "intestine"). — Intestinal; as, en- teric fever. EozooN. — The name given to a remarkable fossil, the remains of an animal of the order Foraminifera, but of much greater size than existing species. It was discovered in the Laurentian strata of Canada, below the Silurian formation. Its discovery in strata regarded as azoic, or primitive, has attracted considerable attention among geolo- gists, and may revolutionize present systems. Epicurean. — Pertaining to the tenets of Epicurus (b.c. 300). From a probably mistaken view of his teachings, the word has come tc represent tlios,e who make pleasure the chief end of life and standard of virtue. Evidences. — A term applied to the proofs of the Divine authority of the Scriptures, External evidences are miracles and prophecy; internal evidences are drawn from the nature of the revelation; and collateral evidences relate to other circumstances. EXPERIMENTUM Crucis. — A crucial or decisive experiment. Familiar Spirits. — Good or evil spirits [dcemons), which were supposed to be continually within call, and at the service of their masters. In the history of witchcraft in modern Europe the idea of familiar was restricted to evil spirits. (See Demon.) Firmament. — An expanse; a wide extent (referring to the sky). Such is the significance of the Hebrew word which is thus translated. In the language of the old astronomers, it is the orb of the fixed stars, the outermost of the celestial spheres. Fossil {'LzX. fosszis, "dug up"). — A term applied to organic re- mains, generally petrified, which are dug out of the earth's strata. Free- Agency. — The state of acting freely or without necessity. Synonymous with free will. Coleridge well says, "The will is ultimately self-determined, or it is no longer a will under tlie law of 25 290 Glossary. perfect freedom, but a nature under the mechanism of cause and effect." In the question of the spontaneity of mental power — the freedom of the will — is involved the whole discussion of religion and infidelity. If Nature be all (in the sense of infidelity), man's will is compelled, not free. Function {\jsA:. funciio, from fiingor, to "perform"). — In natural history, the proper action, office, or act of any part or organ, or system of organs. Thus, we speak of the vegetative functions of nutrition (including selection and assimilation), secretion, and repro- iluclion; and of the animal functions of sensation and volition. Ganglion — Ganglionic System (Gr. yayyhbv {ganglion), a '*knot"). — An enlargement in the course of a nerve. The ganglionic system, or great sympathetic nerve, is a term applied to the ganglia and nerves of common sensation. Geology (Gr. yj) {ge), the "earth," and "Xoyoq [logos), "doctrine") — The science which treats of the structure of the globe and the causes of its physical features. Gnostics (Gr. yvucts (gnosis), "knowledge"). — A sect of philoso- phers in the first ages of Christianity, who pretended that they only had a true knowledge of the Christian religion. The grand principle of the system seems to have been an attempt to reconcile the difficulties arising from the existence of evil in the world. They formed a the- ology after the philosophy of J*ythagoras and Platp, to which they accommodated all their interpretations of Scripture. They held that all things were derived from successive emanations from the fountain of Deity. These emanations they called aons. Gravity (Lat, gravis, "heavy"). — The mutual tendency of all bodies to approach each other with forces which are directly as their masses and inversely proportional to the squares of their distances. Harmony of the Gospels. — A title given to works proposing to reduce the events of gospel history to order of time. Hegelianism. — A form of German philosophy, named ^fter Hegel, It is one of the forms of pantheism. B?ahviinism viewed God as Being, Leibnitz as Monad, Pythagoras as Number, Spinoza as Sub- stance, and Hegel as the Notion of which everything existing is a form. With Hegel, mankind's knowledge of God is God's knowledge of himself; in the mind of mankind God evolves himself. Glossary, 29 1 Hibernation (Lat. hybemus^ "wintry"). — A condition of torpor in which some animals remain during the winter season. Hieroglyphics (Gr. Itgilu; {Jiieros), "sacred," and yXv^ui {glypho)^ "I engrave").— Picture-writing. Applied chiefly to the inscriptions on the Egyptian monuments. Champollion discovered that there were three kinds of characters used: I, Pictures of the objects, ir. whole or in part; 2. Symbols; 3. Phonetic, characters, referring to tlie initial letter of the name of the animal or thing represented. Hypochondriac (Gr. irm [Jiypo)^ " under," and xpv^poq {chotidros)^ "cartilage"). — A combination of dyspepsia and melancholy. Hypothesis (Gr. imidmo^ [Iiypothcsis),si^' supposition"). — A theory or supposition for the purpose of explaining what is not understood. It is to be regretted that so much jiasses for science which is merely hypothesis. Ideialism. — The theorj' which makes everything to consist in ideas, and denies the existence of material bodies. Identity (Lat. «i/^w, the "same"). — Sanreness, as distinguished from resemblance and diversity. Personal identity is synonymous with personality. Consciousness merely ascertains personal identity, but does not constitute it. Induction. See Deduction. Infusoria. — Microscopic animals inhabiting stagnant water and various infusions. Innate (Lat. in, "in," and nasco, to "be lx)rn"j. — Inborn. Inspiration. — In a theological sense, the suj^ruatural influence of the Spirit of God by which the sacred writers were qualified to com- municate Divine truth without error; or such suggestions or impres- sions on the mind as leave no room to doubt the reality of their Divine origin. Isomerism (Gr. laoq {I'sos), "equal," and fiepog {tneros)^ " part"). — Identity of elements and proportions, with diversity of properties. Latitudinarian.— Loose in principles or views. Free-thinking. An undue latitude of interpretation. Laurentian. — A term given to the primitive rocks in Canada, which form the bocklxine, as it were, of that part of the continent. Law (from the Anglo-Saxon lecgan, to "lay down"). — A mode or rule. A law supposes an agent and a power; for it is the mode 292 Glossary, according to which the agent proceeds, the order according to which the power acts. Physical laws are truly called in Scripture ordinance of heaven. Legend. —A fabulous or unauthenticated story purporting to come down from antiquity. Magic (Lat. ars magica, the "art of the Magi," these Persian philosophers being regarded by the Remans as the chief possessors of supernatural powers). — Magic was called white or celestial magic, when it claimed to originate from good spirits ; black or diabolical magic, or witchcraft, when based on a compact with the devil, or on superstitious rites borrowed from heathenism ; and natural magic, from the propensity of the scientific in a past age to take advantage of the credulity of the ignorant. Mammals (Lat. niafumoy a "teat"). — The highest and most com- pletely organized class of animals. Man is placed in this class, as well as the horse, dog, bear, whale, etc. It embraces those which suckle their young. Marasmus {Gr. fiapaivu {marazno\'' I waste away"). — Emaciation, wasting. Materialism. — The metaphysical theory which teaches that all existence may be resolved into some modification of matter. This theory assumes many shapes. At one time we meet it in one of the forms of pantheism, which teaches the self-evolution of the physical universe. At another time it assumes the form of the mechanico- coi-puscular theory. Again it teaches that the brain secretes thought, as the liver does bile. Democritus and Epicurus among the ancients, Gassendi, Hobbes, and Priestley among the moderns, were noted materialists. Mediator. — A term applied to Jesus Christ, as interceding between. God and man and obtaining for the latter the remission of the pun ishment due to sin. Those who deny the essential Divinity of Christ reject also the idea of his mediatorial character. Mediums. — A term applied to those who, according to the teach- ing of modern spiritualism, are possessed by the influence of disem- bodied spirits, and speak or write under such influence. Medulla Oblongata. — A part of the brain formed by the jimction of the crura of the brain and cerebellum. It terminates in the spinal Glossary. 293 Mesmeric Trance. — A sort of cataleptic condition into whict persons of impressible imagination may lie thrown by animal magnet- ism, or mesmerism, as it is called. Like natural catalepsy, or, rather, the disease so named, it is often associated with a soil of clairvoyance, the nature of which has led to much speculation, but is not yet understood. Metamorphosis (Gr. ^ra {nieta)^ " change," and /^op^ [luorphe), *iadikps), "pastoral*'). — Applied to tribes of men without fixed habitation, generally pastoral tribes. Ontological.— Pertaining to the science of ontology, or the science of being in general, and its attributes. Oracle (Lat. oractthini, from oro, to "utter"). — The name given primarily to the response given by the pagan divinities to those who consulted them, but afterwards applied to the place as well as to the divinities from whom the responses were supposed to proceed. It is used in the Bible to represent the sanctuary, or most holy place, in the temple; and in the plural — oi-acles of God — to express the reve- lations of God in the Scriptures. Organic — Organization (Gr. hfyyavov [organon), a "member" or •'instrument") — Pertaining to, or the act of forming, bodies with organs: usually appropriated to vitalized matter, as the tissues of animals and vegetables. Osiris. — The name of one of the chief Egyptian divinities, the brother and husband of Isis. After having effected a reformation in Egypt, it is said he visited and enlightened the greater part of Europe and Asia, and on his return he was assassinated by his brother Typhon (the evil principle). He, however, "rose again to a new life," and became the "judge of mankind in a future state," Pantheism (Gr. tzolv {pan), "all," and dtoq {i/ieos), "God").— The theory which identifies nature — the universe in its totality — with God. The modern German pantheism regards the universe as the Glossary. 295 self-development of God. Another view is expressed by Pope in hii E^say on Man, in the lines, — " All are but parts of one stupendous whole. Whose body Nature is, and God the soul." Many have considered this as similar to the Christian view of God AS expressed by St. Paul, — " In whom we live, and move, and have our being." The difference is that in the Scriptures God's independ- ent subsistence is regarded as the condition and ground of all phe- nomenal exii^tence, and of reason itself. God may exist without the world, but the world is inconceivable without God. Paralysis (Gr. napakveiv {paraluein), to "weaken").— Palsy. Pentateuch (Gr. i^ivrz [penfe) " five," and tevxo^ {Jeuchos), an " in- strument"). — The five books of Moses, viz.. Genesis, Exodus, Leviti- cus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Phcenix. — In mythology, a celebrated bird, which was said to live five or six hundred years in the wilderness, where she built a funeral pile of aromatic wood and gums, which she lighted by fanning with her wings. She was only apparently consumed, however, this beir^ the process by which she renewed her vitality. Ilenccthe Phoenix became an emblem of immortality, and was frequently brought for- ward by the Fathers of the church as an illustration of the resurrec- tion. Phrenic — Relating to the diaphragm. Physical Science, or Physics. — The science of the material sys- tem, including natuial history, natural philosophy, and chemistry. Physics and metaphysics include the knowledge of whatever exists. Physico-Theology. — Theology illustrated from nature. Physiology (Gr. ^ai^ {pkysis), "nature," and ')i^yo£ {logos), a "discourse"). — The science of vital phenomena, or of the functions of living beings. PLATONlSM.^-The })hiIosophy of Plato. It is difficult to give an idea of this philosophy in a few words, as it went deeper down to the foundations of science than that of any of his predecessors, and tinged the opinions of many who succeeded him. In this system knowledge is not to be confounded with the impressions on the senses, or with the judgments founded upon them. Radically, knowledge consists in archetypal ideas, which are themselves included in the highest unity, or God, from whom they derive their reality. Theology 296 Glossary. is, therefore, the ultimate science in which all the other sciences con- verge: dialectics, as the science of the true; ethics, as the science of the morally beautiful; and physics, as that which discenis the order and fitness of outward things. In this account we have followed those who give the most favorable view of Platonism. (See Chapter V.) Plutonic. — A geological term applied to unstratified crystalline rocks, supposed to be formed at great depths by igneous fusion. Pneumothorax (Gr. Trvtvfza (//;«^wrt'),*'air," and 06f)a^ (tfiorax)^ the "chest''). — An accumulation of air in the sac of the pleura. Polyps (Gr. izoTiix, {polus)^ "many," and novc {poi/s)ia. "foot"). — A group of radiated animals, having a fleshy body, of a conical or cylindrical form, commonly fixed by one extremity, and with the mouth at the opposite end generally surrounded with tentacles. There are rrany families of polyps, including the sea-anemones, madrepores, coral -polyps, etc. Polytheism (Gr. ttoIvc {pohts), " many," and 0toc {theos), " God"). — The doctrine of a plurality of Gods. Sal)ianism (or planet-worship), Zendism (or fire-worship), demon-worship, hero-worbhip, and animal- worship, together with the fetichism of some negro tribes, may all be considered as varieties of polytheism. Positivism. — The philosophy of M. Auguste Comte. " The lead- ing conception of M. Comte is, — There are but three phases of intel- lectual evolution, — the theological (supernatural), the vietapliysical^ and \h& positive. In the supernatural \yh:iS,Q, the mind seeks causes ; unusual phenomena are interpreted as the signs of the pleasure or displeasure of some god. In the metaphysical phase, the supernatural agents are set aside for abstract forces inherent in substances. In the positive phase, the mind restricts itself to the discovery of the laws of phenomena." Primitive Religion. — The religion of Adam and the patriarchs. For an account of the early religious faith, see Chapter III, Proi'ITIATION. — The act of making propitious. The atonement or atoning sacrifice which removes the obstacle to man's salvation. Christ is the propitiation for the sins of men. (I. John, ii.) Proserpine. — The Latin form of Persephone, the name of a Grecian goddess, sprung from Jupiter and Ceres. She was stolen by Pluto, au»l carried to the infernal regions, where she became his queen. The wanderings of Ceres in search of her daughter were Glossary. 297 finally rewarded by Proserpine being allowed to spend two-thirds of the year with her parents, the rest being spent with Pluto. Psychology (Gr. ■pvxri {psyche), the "soul," and Aoyof {logos) *' discourse"). — In its largest meaning it is synonymous with mental philosophy. Pyrrhonism. — The tenets of Pyrrho (b.c. 300). These are said to have been so absurdly skeptical that the Pyrrhonists would not put even as much confidence in the senses as was necessary to preserva- tion. Rationalism. — A system of interpretation common during the last century among German divines, and from them extending through Europe and America, which attributes a merely human character to Christianity, and reduces the Bible accounts to a mixture of truth and error natural to fallible men. Its adherents have no settled or con- sistent opinions among themselves, but unite only in opposing the supernatural character of religion. Reflex Motion. — A term applied in physiology to certain in- voluntary movements of the body, excited by influence conveyed to the nerve-centres by afferent, and thence to the muscles by efferent, nerves. Reformation. — An important era in political and ecclesiastical history, when the authority of the papacy and the peculiar doctrines of the Romish church were successfully called in question. It is commonly dated from the year 1517, when Luther began to oppose the pope and condemned the sale of indulgences. Remonstrants. See Arminians. Sanctification.^ — In theology, the purification of the moral nature by the special operation of the Holy Spirit, which ensues upon Justifi- cation, which latter word represents the being accounted just, or pardoned of sin, by reason of faith in the atonement of Qirist. Saurians (Gr. oaviJOf {smtros), a "lizard"). — Reptiles covered with scales and having four legs, as the crocodile and lizard. The. most gigantic species are found in a fossil state. Scholasticism. — The scholastic philosophy, — an endeavor to base the doctrines of the church upon the Aristotelian philosophy. It was common to the schools and universities during what are called the iarkages: hence its naice. 298 Glossaiy. ' Secretion. — The process by which substances are separated from the blood iu animals, or from the sap in vegetables, as milk, bile, etc. in the former, and gum, resin, etc. in the latter. Sedimentary. — In geology, applied to earth, sand, etc , which originated in the sediment of ancient waters. Skn'SATIONAL. — In mental philosophy, the theory which , resolves all intellectual operations into modifications of sensations. It js sometimes called Sensualism. Shakers. — A sect of seceders from the body of Quakers. They live in communities, as at New Lebanon, N.Y. Their name arises from their manner of worship. ■ Silurian. — In geology, fossiliferous strata below the beds of the old red sandstone. Called after the Silures, or ancient inhabitants of Wales. Skepticism. — A word first applied to the followers of Pyrrho, who reasoned themselves into universal doubt. In modern times Mr. Hume represents this school of metaphysicians. Th^ word is now applied to the expression of doubt or unbelief respecting the Divine inspiration of the Scriptures. SociNiANS. — The followers of Socinus. They assert the mere humanity of Christ, and thus differ from Arians, who attribute to Him a superhuman nature. Somatic (Gr. aw/za {soma), a "body"). — -Pertaining to the body. Sophists (Gr. ocxpog (sop/ios), "wise"). — From Greek customs it has become applied to all who cultivate science or philosophy for personal advantage, without regard to the truth of what they advance. It was chiefly applied to a class of teachers in the fifth century B.C., who were opposed by Socrates, Plato, etc. Sorcerer (Lat. soi-titor, from sors, a "lot"). — Properly, divination by lot, but ordinarily u.sed to signify one pretending to magical powers. Spectrum Analysis.— The discrimination of the chemical con- stitution of luminous or burning bodies by means of certain lines in the spectrum. The application of this mode of analysis, to the heavenly bodies, proving thereljy their chemical structure, is among the most wonderful of scieniifit attainments. Spiritualism.— In metaphysics, as distinguished from materialism, is the system which teaches that all that is real is spirit, soul, or self; the external world being considered only as. impressions on the mind Glossary: 299 The term is also applied to those who believe in intercourse with disembodied spirits by means of writing, speaking, or rapping me- diums. The conventions of such have been chiefly noted for antag- onism to the Scriptures. SwEDENBORGiANS. — The followers of Emanuel Swedenborg, the niost celebrated mystic of the eighteenth century. The principal doctrines of this system are, that there is one God, the Lord Jesus Christ, in whom is a Trinity, not of persons, but analogous to that which exists in man, — soul, fotm, and operation; that the resurrection is not of the natural body, but of the spiritual body from the natural; that natural things correspond to spiritual and represent them, so that tlie Bible contains a spiritual sense in every word and letter of the literal sense, and must be interpreted by what is called the doctrine of correspondences; and that the New Jerusalem foretold in the Apocalypse is the new church of those who hold these doctrines. SYM150L (Gr. ovv [sun), "t(gether," and ^uKKeiv [ballein), to "throw"). — A term applied to the creeds by the old ecclesiastical writers: \\qx\cq symbolical books are such as contain the creeds and confessions of different churches. The word is also applied to the representation of any moral thing by the images or properties of na- tural things. Thus, the lion is the symbol of courage, the lamb of meekness, etc. Symi' ATRETIC Nerve. — Sometimes called the ganglionic, the vegetative, or the organic nervous system. That p(jrtioii of the nervous system which is diffused through the abdomen, forming many nets and plexuses, and which harmonizes all the vegetative functions. Talmud. — The traditionary laws of the Jews. It consists of two parts, — the Gemara and the Miskna. The Gemara consists of com- ments on the Mishna, or Rabbinical traditions. Theology (Gr. Qtb^ {theos), " God," and Aoyoj- {logos), " doctrine"). — The science which treats of the nature and attributes of God, of his relations to man, and of the manner in which they may be dis- covered. Transcendental. — A word used in the Kantian philosophy to express that which transcends or goes beyond the limits of actual experience. Travertine. — A species of limestone, deposited from water hold- ing carbonate of lime in solution. 300 Glossal J, Unity of Force. See Correlation. Universal Ether. —Attenuated matter which is supposed bj natural philosophers to fill all space. Vedas. — The sacred books of the Hindoos. Versions.— Translations of the Scriptures. The earliest were the Samaritan Pentateuch and the Greek Septuagint. In the earliest periods of the Christian era, we meet with the Oriental versions, viz., the Syriac Old and New Testaments, in the first century; the Coptic, and the Ethiopic; the Latin or Western versions, the Italic, the Vul- gate, and the Gothic; and the Greek versions of Aquila, Theodotion, and Symmachus. Vicarious. — Substituted. Applied to the sufferings of Christ as substituted for the punishment of man's guilt. Witchcraft. — Pretended divination by supernatural agency. Zendavesta. — The sacred books of the Parsees in India, and Guebers or fire-worshipers in Persia. Zoophyte (Gr. fwov {zoon),zx). "animal," and ^6v {pkyton)yZ "plant") — An animal-flower. (See Polyp and Anemone.) INDEX Abstract being of Hegelianism, 22. Accordance of the Bible and geol- ogy, 165, 167. Action of sympathetic nerve, 197. Adaptation of the Scriptures, 114. Affections of living beings, 196. Agassiz on development, 158. AUotropism, 280. Analogies of future bodies, 280. Analogy of faith, 113. Anaxagoras, 35. Anaximander, 35, 122. Ancient ideas of the world, 149. Angelic ministries, 96. mode of, 96. Angel-Jehovah, the, 95. Angels, influence of, 251. Animal magnetism, 212. Anima mundi, 122. Annihilation, no necessity for, 193. Anselm's argument on atonement, 222. Antiochus, persecutions of, 36. Antiquity of the Bible, 33. Aphasia, 207. Apostles' Creed, 266. Appearance of the earth's crust, 164. Astronomy consistent with the | Bible, 143. Atheism, 34, 49, 124, 125. 26 Atonement, parodies of the, 74. Averroes, 40. Bacon's philosophy, 46. Balfour, Prof., on the identity of species, 156. Bible the original record of revela- tion, 61. Biblical ideas, source of, 73. history of the creation, 149. Brewster, Sir David, against the Darwinian hypothesis, 146, 158, 159- Brotherhood of man, 120. Buckland, Dr., on geology and the Bible, 156. Buddhists, 35. Burning bush, 136. Bush, Prof., on the resurrection, 272. Butler's Analogy, 41. Catalepsy, 251, Cell-life, 182. Celsus, 38. Cerebro-spinal nerves, 197. Chaos from ruined worlds, 165. Christ an expiatory sacrifice, 219. his sacrifice voluntary, 234. Christian conception of God, 94. Christianity adapted to man, 39. (301) 302 Index, Christianity a development, 54. peculiarity of, 217. true test of, 39. Circle of organic life, 181. Common sensation, 197. Conditions of regeneration, 245. Conflict of Christianity with hea- thenism, 37. Conscience, or moral sensibility, 208, 242. Consciousness, seat of, 205. Contextual interpretation, 112. Contradictions, apparent, explain- ed, 109. apparent, no real objection, 109. Convulsions of nature, 164. Corporeal sensation, 196. Correlation of forces applied to life and history, 187. Creation, account of, in Job, 150. implies freedom, 24. Creeds to be judged of by the Bible, 113. Crises of faith, 37. Curiosities of Scripture of no spirit- ual benefit, no, Cuvier on transformation, 157, Daemon of Socrates, 246. Days and generations synonymous, 166. of Genesis indeterminate, 166. Death not extinction, 179. Definitions of life, 186. Degrees of inspiration, 105, 106. Deism, 14, 18. Deity, a personal, unknown in Greece, 113. Delphic inscription, origin of, 124. Descartes, 40, 48. Destruction of the world, 121. Development theory, 17, i8. Discoveries anticipated by Scrip- ture, 105. Diversities of interpretation, 114, 116. Divination, 247. Divine condescension in the New Testament, 141. love more glorious than power, 142. truth only from God, 252. Docetism, 265. Doctrine of the Logos, 95. Dreaming, 211, 251. Drew, Samuel, on the resurrection, 273- Early Christian apologists, 38. Eclectic school of philosophy, 38. Effects of Holy Spirit on the soul 245. of passions on the body, 202, 203. Elevation not inspiration, 254. Elohim, 131. Emerson, 45. Emotions, 200. seat of, 205. English deism, 37, 38. Epicurus, 35, 37. Errors in science will not invalidate Scripture, 107, 108. Evidences of Christianity, classifi- cation of, 90. experimental, 28. external and internal , 90. various, 27. Examination of Romans ii. 17-24, 82, 83. Exceptions to general laws, 162. Existence dependent on God, 192, of God, 119. Expression, 205. . Index. 303 Faith defined, 11. necessary to science, 12. to explain mind, 14. Faith-faculty, the, 242. Fall of man, 243. Fatherhood of God, 120. Feeling, 200. Folly of mystical correspondences, 111. Forgiveness and santification thro" Christ, 230. Free-agency various, 209, 210. French infidelity, 37, 41, 42. Future of brutes, 195. Geology a science of beginnings, 167. confirmatory of Scripture, 152, 153. 164. discoveries of, 151. revolution impending in, 154. German rationalism, 37, 40. Gnostics, 265, 268. God not the universe, 125. God's moral government, what it involves, 228. Grammatical interpretation of Scripture, iii. Grecian philosophy, 34. Greece, early history of, 70. religion of, 71. Guyot, Prof., on geology and Scripture, 154. Harmonies of gospels, 108. Harmony, — a theory of life, 183. Hierocles, 38. Historic interpretation, 112. History confirmatory of Scripture, 57, 58, 80. of astronomy confirmatory of Scripture, 169. History of a vitalized atom, 182, of the doctrine of mediation, 221, 222. of the doctrine of resurrection, 266-270. Human element in the Bible, 91. remains at Abbeville, 60. Humboldt on origin of man, 72. on the Scriptures, 160. Hypocrisy of rationahsm, 44. Hypotheses of geology, 153. Ideas, 200. Identity, theories of, 274. Imagination, 207. Immutable law a fallacy, 163. India, early religious thought of, 71. Infidelity unscientific, 33, 45. Influence of mind on body, 202. Innate ideas not the source of re- ligion, 75. Insane philosopher, 185. Inspiration, extreme views of, 91. Inspired men sometimes passive, 104. Instincts, 205. Internal evidence, 90. Interpretation depends on inspira- tion, 90, 97, 98. Intoxication, 212. Irregularities in nature, 162. Isomeric compounds, 281. Jehovah, meaning of, 134. Jewish reverence for the Scriptures, 91. Judgment, 208. Julian, 38. Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, 79. 80. 304 Index. Knowledge of Moses divine, 173, 174- Language necessary to thought, 'jj. Law not necessity, 161. variations from, 161. Laws of nature, 23-26. Life a condition or result, 191. before light, 169, is matter's master, 189. necessary to physiology as light to optics. T90. not from organization, 184. not material, 18. propagation of, 191. Lucian, 38. Lucretius, 36. Lyell on species, 157. Magic, belief in, 39, 247. views of ancients respecting, 248. Man, creation of, 171, 172. not originally barbarous, 53, Materialism, 34, 49. Materials for study complete, 29. Mathematical axioms, 12. Mediation not unreasonable, 228. Memory, 206. Mental science based on physi- ology, 196. Mesmeric theory of life. 187. Metaphysics against pantheism, 18. Methodism, 41. Microscope, discoveries of the, 144. Mind not dependent on brain, 198. Minutiae of creation, 144. Miracles, Hume's argument against, 172. Mode of Christ's mediation not re- vealed, 220. of life modifies tradition, 58. Mode of revelation, 94. Modern rationalism, 44. unbelief, 28, 29, 37. Molecular death, 191. Morality against pantheism, 21, 22. Moses the prophet of the past, 155. Mungo Park, 146. Mutual action of mind and body, 196. Mystery no objection, 232. Names of Deity, 131, 134, 135. Necessity, argument against, 23. Necromancy, 253. Neo-platonism, 38. Nerves, afferent and efferent, 204, 205. Obligations flow from relations, 120. Obscure impressions, 201, Omnipotence of God, 139. Opposition to Christ as Mediator, 218. to Christianity, causes of, 34. to Christianity, various, 28, 29, 46. to faith unscientific, 14. Oracles, 247. Organic germ necessary to life, 181. Organization, 18. Oriental philosophy, 34. Origin of idea of God, 120. Paine's Age of Reason, 42. Pantheism, 15, 16, 34, 119, 188, 193. Parker, Theodore, 45. Parts' of Scripture originally unin- spired, 91, 92, 106. Patriarchal ideas of God, 138, 139. knowledge, 54, 55. religion, 56. Iitdex. 305 Pentecost, 244. Perception, 205. Philosophic theories, 34, origin of, 34. Physical origin of life in text-books, 188, 189. Physiological metaphysics, 204. Physiology no refuge for infidelity, i8o. Pictorial revelation, 98, 99. Picture of creation, 169. Plants anterior to sunlight, 170. Plato's Theism, 122, 123. Plurality essential in the Divine nature, 131. Pope's Essay on Man, 57, Porphyry, 38. Positivism, 49. priestcraft of, 16. Precepts of Noah, 56. Primeval man, — by the duke of Argyll, 61-64. Principle of interpretation, 106, 107, 110, III. Provision for spiritual functions, 242. Psychological experience not the origin of religion, 79. Punishment of sin, 228, 229. Pyrrhonism, 34, 49. Pythagoras, 35. Reason repudiates pantheism, 130. Reciprocity of body and mind, 196. Redemption the freedom and love of God, 26. Reflex motions, 198. Regeneration, 245. Relation of science and faith, 12. Religious faith not natural, 73. Resurrection a doctrine of revela- tion, 261-263. a spiritual, implies a literal, 265. 26* Resurrection in mythology, 272. no analogies to, 277. not a development, 272. not a new creation, 272. not a vegetation, 273. not improbable to science, 276. recent views of, 270, 271. testimony of ancients to a, 266- 269. Retrograde development, 167. Revelation a matter of fact, 26. by visions, words, or impulses, 98. conformable to knowledge of the age, 106. Revival of literature, 33, 37. Rocks of diluvian age, 61. Rosetta stone, 153. Rums of nations confirmatory of Scripture, 60. Rules of interpretation, no, in. Scale of existence, 17. Scholasticism, 37. Science and faith mutual witnesses, 14. defined, 11. not skeptical, 13. not to be constructed from Scripture, 108. speculations of, 14. Scripture chronology, 61-64. doctrine of resurrection, 261- 264. history the source of tradition. 73- representation of God, 125. Scriptures a complete system, 93, 99. no. the utterances of Divine ideas, 93. 3o6 Index. Seeming contradictions of Scrip- ture, 107, Sensation, 197. Sensational experience no source of religion, 78. Sextus, 35. Silliman, Prof., on geology and Scripture, 155. Sir Isaac Newton on necessity, 124. Skepticism of Shelley, Byron, etc., 42. Sleep, 211. Socrates on the soul, 184. Somatic death, 191. vitality, 191. Somnambulism, 212. Sophists, 35. Soul distinct from body, 179. Scripture account of the, 179. sensation and volition require a. 195. Sources of physiology, i8i. Spectrum analysis, 143. Spencer's philosophy, 188. Sphere of conscience, 242. Spinosa, 40. Spirit of an interpreter of Scrip- ture, 115. Spiritual communications not im- probable, 94. functions in man, 242. impulses, 100. Spirituahsm, 123, 247, 251. Statutes of Adam, 56. St. Augustine on Divine omnipo- tence, 140. Subjective argument for inspira- tion, lOI. Supernatural, the, 14. Superstition a distortion of truth, 254. 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"- Philadelphia Everting Bulletin. Poems. By Lucy Hamilton Hooper. With a Portrait from steel. i2mo. Toned paper. Extra cloth. Gilt lop. %\.']^. " Mrs. Hooper has rapidly taken a I tends to very loftv and noble regiom high rank among the poets of America, of thought and feeling."— //(//rt/i^A In »his volume there is much that as- I phia Evening Bulletin. PUBLICATIONS OF J. B. LIPPINCOTT ^ CO. Life and Writings of Alexander y antes Dallas. By his son, George Mifflin Dallas. 8vo. Extra cloth. Uncut edges. ^5. " This biography will form a valu- able addition to the materials for the political history of the United States." —New York Tribune. " An instructive and valuable me- moir, to whose merits we cannot do justice in one brief article." — Phila- ielphia Evening Bulletin, "This volume is an important con« tribution to history, a most interest- ing addition to modern biography. It is the life of a statesman by a states- man." — Philadelphia Age. '■ It is a valuable contribution to American political history." — Ciftcin' nati Gazette. Life of jfohn J. Crittenden. With Selections from his (correspondence and Speeches, Edited by his daughter, Mrs. Chapman Coleman. With Two Portraits from Steel. Royal 8vo. Toned paper. Fine cloth. $7.50. "The history of liis life is almost a | are stated without comment or illustra history of the country, and his memoirs contains rich material for the student of political economy." — Philadelphia Evening Brtllctin. "It is full of instruction to young America." — IVashitigton Morning Chronicle. " Since the Revolutionary period, our country has produced no man whose civil and political career better deserves to be commemorated. "This biography of him is by his daughter, Mrs. Coleman. It connects the events of his life and the letters illustrating them by a simple narrative, which is always natural and interest- ng. His political course and opinions tion. In the portraiture of the man we believe affection does not exag- gerate his merits. Few public men of any country have lived so free of just reproach. Few have been found so uniformly magnanimous and patriotic in the whole course of their public lives. This edition contains two vol- umes in one excellently printed octavo. It ought to be in every library, for the work covers a long and important period of political history, and exhibits a character that men of all parties agree to honor as a noble example of an American patriot and statesman." — Philad-elphia Age. Memoir of Ulric Dahlgren. By his Father^ Rear^ Admiral Dahlgren. With Portrait from Steel. i2mo. Extra cloth. * $1.75. "As an eloquent tribute to one of the real heroes of the war it will, we are certain, receive a cordial welcome." | —Philadelphia Evening Telegraph. \ " We heartily recommend it to tha notice of the reading public." — IVash- ington SutidnLy Gazette. Life of George Read, a Signer of the Declaration of Independence, with a Selection from his Correspondence, and Notices of some of his Contemporaries. By his grand- son, William T. Read. 8vo. Extra cloth. $4. commendation to the author. Tha " The work is enriched by very many iiiecdotes, descriptions and sketches. There are many excerpts from recon- lite sources, particularly in the chap- ers on Congress ; and the whole work s one of not less value to the public hail honor to its subject, and is a great letters form a large part of the whole, and express the opinions of contem- poraries on men. and questions, and events. ' ' — Philadelphia North A tneri- can. PUBLICATIONS OF J. B. LIFPJNCOTT & CO. The History of Charles the Bold, Duke of Bur- gundy. By John Foster Kirk. Complete in Three Vols., 8vo. With Portraits and Maps. Price per set: Fine cloth, $9; Library sheep, |Ji 1,25. Fine Paper Edition : Half vellum, $11.25; Extra cloth, gilt top, $10.50; Half calf, neat, $13.50; Half calf, gilt extra, $15. " We welcome with genuine pleasure I narrative of an important portion of history by a countryman of Mr. Pres- cott and Mr. Motley, a writer fully en- titled to take his place alongside of them, and in some respects, perhaps, to be preferred to either. . . . His re- search seems to be unwearied. . . , His narratives of events and his general pictures of the time are of a very high order ; it would not be going too far to say that they are first rate." —Edward A . Freeman {the historian if the Norman Conquest), in tJie National Review. " We have no hesitation in assigning to Mr. Kirk's most fascinating narra- tive a place with the great achieve- ments of genius in the department he has chosen to fill. This event among historians will be welcomed the world over." — Atlantic Monthly. " The author will take his stand at once among the great writers of his land and time." — Dr. R. SJielton Mackenzie. "Mr. Kirk has produced a work which is quite entitled to rank with the writings of his two predecessors (Prescott and Motley). . . . His ex- tensive and minute knowledge is the learning of a man of vigorous thought, accustomed to bring his mind to con- sider men and things, not merely as they have been written about, but as they actually were, in the variety and complexity of their real existence. . . . His imagination is active and impres- sible. . . . The last scenes of this im- pressive history, ^he glee and the mix- ture of cunning with shameless candor, the subtle play of amusement, anxiety and grim hatred in Louis, the sinking deeper and deeper into confusion and hopelessness of his doomed antagonist, the horrors of the Swiss victories, — are powerfully told. Perhaps Mr. Kirk allows himself sometimes to be carried awajr beyond the gravity of the histor- ian into the sentiment and passion which properly belong to tragedy. But he may plead an excuse in the awful character of what lie relates, and in his thorough comprehension of its significance, and his sympathy with its solemn and affecting vicissitudes. To the last he is equal to the great de- mands of his task, and he keeps his hold on thfe attention of his readers with imfailing mastery over tlie story, and sustained ability in telling it." — Sattirday Review. " Will unquestionably establish the title of Mr. Kirk to an eminent posi- tion in the already justly-honored school of American historians." — Nezt York Tribune. Memoirs of the Life and Services of the Right Reverend Alonzo Potter, D.D., LL.D., Bi.shop of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the Diocese of Pennsyl- vania. By M. A. DE Wolfe Howe, D.D., Rector of St. Luke's Church, Philadelphia. Crown 8vo. Toned paper. Extra cloth. $3. " His Memoirs have been compiled ffom copious material, collected with loving hands, and arranged with good taste and wisdom. We commend the entire volume to our readers as a aoble monument to one of the noblest men who has ever had his life cast ir this community, and whose mernory is still held in grateful esteem by thou- sands outside the pale of his own church." — Philadelphia Fvening Bui letin. THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW AN INITIAL FINE OF 25 CENTS WILL BE ASSESSED FOR FAILURE TO RETURN THIS BOOK ON THE DATE DUE. THE PENALTY WILL INCREASE TO SO CENTS ON THE FOURTH DAY AND TO $1.00 ON THE SEVENTH DAY OVERDUE. ^"C ^ t ~V/| I '^'^ i4 n. '«'