12

TEMPTATIONS TO ADOPT

more widely blighting scepticism, which pervades all classes of society, and has infected more or less the public sense of every moral and religious obligation.

II. It is not difficult to ascertain the circumstances to which the ordinary mode of treating the evidences of Christianity is indebted for the preeminence in esteem which it enjoys. The age in which it was matured was at once intellectual and self-sufficient. The cultivated mind was in union with the unchastened heart; and the unvarying result ensued, a presumptuous reliance on the mere intellect, supported by an exaggerated formal view of its capacity and office. The pride of mind and education was flattered when the advocate of religion was heard to speak the language of the world, and pay such marked homage to the mere earthly gifts of talent and accomplishment. At the same time the general silence as to any moral preparation appeared to justify the forgetfulness, so widely prevalent, of the necessity of self-discipline and holy living.

It must be allowed that the temptation to such a compromise is both strong and subtle. The world assumes its right to judge on equal terms, and the Christian is unable to dispute the assumption without incurring the necessity of defending much more than is involved in the mere subject of debate. Good men are at all times unwilling to give offence,

A WRONG THEORY UPON THE SUBJECT. 13

and, in this case, a delusive charity might restrain them from language which implied a moral disqualification in their opponents. Nor do we lightly incur the charge of bigotry,-an imputation always prompt and serviceable against the maintainers of fixed principle, and, when they stand alone, most painfully invidious. Besides, the attempt to exclude others from an assumed common ground, involves a real responsibility with which the better men are always the less willing to be burdened, until the call of duty is distinctly heard. It required a high sense of Christian honour and a burning love of truth to inspire the defender of his faith with strength to overcome these obstacles, and assert his rightful position as the appointed guardian of a sacred trust.

Moreover, the world has always been active in its own cause. One result of the manner in which the political relations of the Church had been employed to her disadvantage was, that among those who shared her authority were many who were unfaithful expositors of her doctrine, and many more who very inadequately represented her faith and spirit. She was thus made to speak a language foreign to her mind; while the secularity of her tone detracted further from the credit of those truths of which she certainly appeared as the chief witness.

From the operation of these and the like causes,

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SPECIFIC EVILS WHICH HAVE

those writers were but few in number and of no great authority, who ventured to think that rebuke and entreaty are sometimes as appropriate as argument in dealing with the perverse and immoral sceptic, and dared to speak for Christianity as becomes a Christian, assured of the truth himself, and authorized, as well as anxious, to strengthen and extend its influence. It seemed left almost entirely to the written Word of God to proclaim still to the forgetful world, that the "pure in heart," and none other, shall "see Him," and that the only road to the knowledge of His doctrine lies through obedience to His will'.

III. Among the evils which have attended this facility of concession to human pride and wilfulness, should be mentioned its direct tendency to substitute for the "faith once delivered to the saints" a limited and arbitrary creed, which might adapt itself to the unyielding prejudices of the individual. Witness the deliberate care with which Soame Jenyns, a writer formerly much read and in esteem, endeavours to relieve his argument from the presumption of any necessary connexion between the veracity of Holy Scripture and the truth of the revelation for which he is contending'. Lardner,

1 Matt. v. 8; John vii. 17; 1 John ii. 3, &c.

2 66

Let us suppose that the accounts of Christ's temptation, the devil's taking refuge in the herd of swine, with several other narrations in the New Testament, frequently ridiculed by un

RESULTED FROM THIS ERROR.

15

to whom so many modern authors on the Evidences have been indebted for their materials, became a Socinian himself; in other words, he carried the supremacy of the intellect, with still greater boldness, into the very heart and substance of revealed truth'. One is loath to mention the name of the very able Paley with an expression of blame, especially when the increased earnestness of his later years is remembered; and yet, in equal justice, it must be confessed that his writings, and even actions, afford strong indications of that spirit of compromise which permits the rejection of one or more truths of the Gospel in order to secure an unsound adherence to the rest. To be able to see this it is only necessary to call to mind the advice that he gave to an Arian, who consulted him on the lawfulness of seeking holy orders. In strong

believers, were all but stories, accommodated to the ignorance of the times, pious frauds, &c., will this in the least impeach the excellence of Christ's religion, or the authority of its founder? or is Christianity to be answerable for all the fables of which it may have been the innocent occasion? The want of this obvious distinction has much injured the Christian cause," &c.-Works, vol. iv. p. 80.

3

Life, by Kippis, prefixed to his Works, p. lviii. He prided himself expressly on having found his way to that heresy without being indebted to any of its earlier partisans.

He only "entered, in his reply, into a further explanation of what he had advanced in the chapter on Subscription." (Mor. and Pol. Phil., B. iii. pt. i. c. 22.) Meadley's Life,

16

SPECIFIC EVILS WHICH HAVE

contrast with such faint-hearted surrender, or presumptuous denial of the truth, is the unwavering fidelity of its early champions. As an example to the purpose, we may take the doctrine of the resurrection of the body, which seems, as we may collect from Scripture itself, to have presented peculiar difficulties to the heathen mind. Notwithstanding the general aversion of unbelievers to this article of faith, the primitive Christians did not feel themselves at liberty to deny it, to evade the assertion of it, or to explain it away; on the contrary, they maintained it openly and broadly, and were content to leave the result in the hands of Him who had revealed it. Among the remains of the second century alone are three treatises upon this subject, intended for

p. 96. One case which he considers (and it was that of his correspondent) is of a person who finds "certain particular propositions in the Articles which he disbelieves, although he assents to

the main part of them," &c. "As to this case," he says, "I find no reason, upon much reconsideration, to question the principle I have laid down."—Works, vol. xi. p. 133. To allude to a single other point; the same turn of mind is shown in the following sentence, adopted from Burnet; the effect of which, on a young mind, has more than once come under the notice of the present writer: "When divine writers argue upon any point, we are always bound to believe the conclusions that their reasonings end in, as parts of divine revelation; but we are not bound to be able to make out, or even to assent to, all the premises made use of by them, in their whole extent, unless it appear plainly that they affirm the premises as expressly as they do the conclusions proved by them."-Evid. pt. iii. c. 2.