Philosophy of the Plan of Salvation: A Book for the Times

by James B. Walker

THE THIRD FACT IS STATED.

There were no means within the reach of human power or wisdom, by which man could extricate himself from the evil of idolatry, either by an immediate or by a progressive series of efforts.

This fact is maintained from the history of idolatry, the testimony of the heathen philosophers, and the nature of man.

1. Instead of man acquiring the power or the disposition, as the race became older, to destroy idolatry—idolatry, from its first entrance into the world, gained power to destroy him. Amid all the mutations of society, from barbarous to civilised, and amid all the conflicts of nations, and the changes of dynasties and forms of government, from the first historic notices which we have of the human family down to the era of Christ, idolatry constantly became more evil in its character and more extended in its influence. It is well ascertained that the first objects of idolatrous homage were few and simple, and the worship of the earliest ages comparatively pure. Man fell into this moral debasement but one step at a time. The sun, moon, stars, and other conspicuous objects of creative power and wisdom received the first idolatrous homage. Afterwards a divinity was supposed to reside in other objects, especially in those men, and beasts, and things which were instrumental in conferring particular benefits on tribes or nations of men. And finally, images of those objects were formed and worshipped. Images, which subsequently became innumerable, were not so in the earliest historic ages. In some nations, they were not allowed until after the era of the foundation of Rome.[4] As the nations grew older, images, which were at the first but few and clothed with drapery, became more numerous, and were presented before the worshippers in a state of nudity, and in most obscene attitudes. And, as has been before stated, their character, from being comparatively innoxious, became, without exception, demoralising in the extreme.

[4] Plutarch says that Numa forbade the Romans to make statues of their gods. [Back]

2. During the Augustan age of Rome, and the age of Pericles and Alcibiades in Greece—those periods when the mind had attained the highest elevation ever known among heathen nations—the mass of the people were more idolatrous in their habits, and consequently more corrupt in their hearts, than ever before. The abominations of idol-worship, of the mysteries, and of lewdness, in forms too vile to name, were rife throughout the country and the villages, and had their foci in the capitals of Greece and Rome. Jahn says, in relation to this period, ‘Deities increased in number, and the apotheosis of vicious emperors was not unfrequent. Their philosophers, indeed, disputed with much subtlety respecting the architect of the universe, but they knew nothing about the Creator, the holy and almighty Judge of men.’

Some of the more intelligent of the philosophers, perceiving the evil of the prevailing idolatry, desired to refine the grossness of the popular faith. They taught that the facts believed concerning the gods were allegories. Some endeavoured to identify the character of some of their deities with the natural virtues; while many of them became sceptical concerning the existence of the gods and of a future state. Those were, however, but isolated exceptions to the mass of mankind; and had their views been adopted by others, they would only have modified, not remedied the evil. But a contemporary writer shows how entirely unavailing, even to modify the evil, was the teaching of the philosophers. Dionysius of Halicarnassus says, ‘There are only a few who have become masters of this philosophy. On the other hand, the great and unphilosophic mass are accustomed to receive these narratives rather in their worst sense, and to learn one of these two things, either to despise the gods as beings who wallow in the grossest licentiousness, or not to restrain themselves even from what is most abominable and abandoned, when they see that the gods do the same.’ Cicero, in one sentence, as given by Tholuck, notices both the evil and its cause; confirming, in direct language, the preceding views. ‘Instead,’ says he, ‘of the transfer to man of that which is divine, they transferred human sins to the gods, and then experienced again the necessary reaction.’ Such, then, is the testimony of the philosophers in relation to the idolatry of their times. A few gifted individuals obtained sufficient light to see the moral evil in which men were involved, but they had neither wisdom to devise a remedy, nor power to arrest the progress of the moral pestilence that was corrupting the noble faculties of the human soul.

3. It was impossible, from the nature of man, that he should extricate himself from the corrupting influence of idolatry. In this place we wish to state a principle which should be kept in view throughout the following discussion: If man were ever redeemed from idolatrous worship, his redemption would have to be accomplished by means and instrumentalities adapted to his nature and the circumstances in which he existed. If the faculties of his nature were changed, he would not be man. If his temporal condition were changed, different means would be necessary; if, therefore, man, as man, in his present condition, were to be recovered, the means of recovery, whether instituted by God or man, must be adapted to his nature and his circumstances.

The only way, then, in which relief was possible for man was, that an object of worship should be placed before the mind directly opposite in moral character to those he had before adored. If his heart was ever purified, it must be by tearing his affections from his gods, and fixing them upon a righteous and holy being as the proper object of his homage. But for man to form such an object was plainly impossible. He could not transfer a better character to his gods than he himself possessed. Man could not ‘bring a pure thing out of an impure.’ The effect could not rise higher in moral purity than the cause. Human nature, in the maturity of its faculties, all agree, is imperfect and selfish; and, for an imperfect and selfish being to originate a perfect and holy character, deify it, and worship it, is to suppose what is contrary to the nature of things. The thought of the eloquent and philosophic Cicero expresses all that man could do. He could transfer his own imperfect attributes to the gods, and, by worshipping a being characterized by these imperfections, he would receive in himself the reaction of his own depravity.

But if some men had had the power and the disposition to form for the world a perfectly holy object of worship, still the great difficulty, as we have seen in the case of the philosophers, would have remained, that is, a want of the necessary power to arrest the progress of idolatry and substitute the better worship. To doubt the truth of the prevailing idolatry was all that men, at the highest intellectual attainment ever acquired in heathen countries, could do. And if they had had power to convey their doubts to all minds in all the world, it would only have been to place mankind in the chaotic darkness of atheism, and leave them to be led again by their instincts into the abominations of imperfect and impure worship.

The testimony, then, is conclusive, from the history of idolatry, that the evil became greater every age—from the statement of the wisest of the heathen, that they had no power to arrest its progress—and from the nature of man, that it was not possible for him to relieve himself from the corrupting influence of idolatry, in which he had become involved.

From the foregoing facts and reasonings it is plain that the high-born faculties of the human soul must have been blighted for ever, by a corrupting worship, unless two things were accomplished, neither of which it was in the power of human nature to effect; and yet both of which were essentially necessary to accomplish the elevation of man from the pit into which he had fallen.

The first thing necessary to be accomplished was, that a pure object of worship should be placed before the eye of the soul. Purity of heart and conscience would be necessary in the object of worship, otherwise the heart and conscience of the worshipper would not be purified. But if an object were presented, whose nature was infinitely opposed to sin—to all defilement, both physical and spiritual—and who revealed, in his example, and by his precepts, a perfect standard to govern the life of man under the circumstances in which he was placed, then man’s mind would be enlightened, his conscience rectified, and the hard and corrupt feelings of his heart softened and purified, by assimilation to the object of his worship.—As, according to the nature of things, an unholy object of worship would necessarily degrade and corrupt the human soul; so, on the contrary, a holy object worshipped would necessarily elevate and purify the nature of man.

The second necessary thing in order to man’s redemption was, that when a holy object of worship was revealed, the revelation should be accompanied with sufficient power to influence men to forsake their former worship, and to worship the holy object made known to them. The presentation of a new and pure object would not cause men to turn from their former opinions and practices, and become directly opposed in heart to what they had formerly loved. A display of power would be necessary, sufficient to overcome their former faith and their present fears, and to detach their affections from idols, and fix them upon the proper object of human homage.

It follows, then, that man must remain a corrupt idolater for ever, unless God interpose in his behalf. The question whether he would thus interpose, in the only way possible, to save the race from moral death, depends entirely upon the benevolence of his nature. The question whether he has done so may be answered by inquiring whether any system of means has been instituted in this world, characterized by sufficient power to destroy idolatry—revealing at the same time a holy object of worship—and this revelation being accompanied by means and influences so adapted to man’s nature as to secure the result.

To this inquiry the future pages of this volume will be devoted. The inquiry is not primarily concerning the truth of the Bible; but concerning the only religion possible for mankind, and the only means by which such religion could be given consistently with man’s nature and circumstances.

CHAPTER II.
THE DESIGN AND NECESSITY OF THE BONDAGE IN EGYPT.

There are certain bonds of union, and sources of sympathy, by which the minds of a whole people may be united into one common mind: so much so, that all hearts in the nation will be affected by the same subjects, and all minds moved by the same motives. Any cause which creates a common interest and a common feeling, common biases and common hopes, in the individual minds which compose a nation, has a tendency to unite them in this manner.

Some of the causes which have more power than any others to bind men, as it were, into a common being, are the following:—The natural tie of consanguinity, or a common parentage, is a strong bond of affiliation among men. And there are others, which, in some cases, seem to be even stronger than this; among these may be named a common interest; a common religion; and a common fellowship in suffering and deliverance. Any circumstance which educes the susceptibilities of the mind and twines them together, or around a common object—any event in which the interest, the feelings, the safety, or the reputation of any people is involved, causes them to be more closely allied to each other in social and civil compact.

The more firmly a people are bound together by these ties of union, the more strength they will possess to resist opposing interests and opinions from without; while, at the same time, everything national, or peculiar to them as a people, will be cherished with warmer and more tenacious attachment.

From the operation of this principle originates the maxim ‘Union is strength;’ and whether the conflict be mental or physical, the people who are united together by the most numerous and powerful sympathies will oppose the strongest and the longest resistance to the innovations of external forces. On the contrary, if the bonds of moral union are few, and easily sundered, the strength of the nation is soon broken, and the fragments easily repelled from each other.

According to this principle, in all cases in which a whole nation is to be instructed, or prepared for offence and defence, or in any wise fitted to be acted upon, or to act as a nation, it would be necessary that the bonds of national union should be numerous and strong; and that, as far as possible, a perfect oneness of interest and feeling should pervade the nation.

So long as the human mind and human circumstances continue what they are, no power in heaven or on earth could unite a people together, except by the same or similar means as have been stated. If, therefore, God designed to form a nation, either to be acted upon or to act as a nation, he would put in operation those agencies which would bind them firmly and permanently into one mass.

Now, mark the application of these deductions to the case of the Israelites. About the period when the corruptions of idolatry were becoming generally prevalent, Abraham, the Bible record states, was extricated by Divine interposition. He was assured that his descendants should suffer a long bondage, and afterwards become a numerous nation. Abraham was their common ancestor, one whom they remembered with reverence and pride; and each individual felt himself honoured by the fact that the blood of the “father of the faithful” circled in his veins. The tie of consanguinity in their case was bound in the strongest manner, and encircled the whole nation. In Egypt their circumstances and employments were the same; and, in the endurance of a protracted and most galling bondage, they had a common lot. Their liberation was likewise a national deliverance, which affected alike the whole people, the anniversary of which was celebrated by distant posterity with strong and peculiar national enthusiasm.

Now, it has been said that the events of our colonial servitude, and the achievement of American independence, are points in our history which will ever operate upon our national character, impressing clear views of the great principles of republicanism, and uniting all hearts in support of those principles: how much more affecting and indelible, then, was the impress made upon the national heart of the Israelites by their bondage and deliverance! They were bound by blood, by interest, feeling, hopes, fears, by bondage, and by faith.

And how firmly did these providences weave into one web the sympathies and views of the Jewish people! It is a fact which is the miracle of history, and the wonder of the world, that the ties which unite this people seem to be indissoluble. While other nations have risen and reigned and fallen; while the ties which united them have been sundered, and their fragments lost amid earth’s teeming population, the stock of Abraham endures, like an incorruptible monument of gold, undestroyed by the attrition of the waves of time, which have dashed in pieces and washed away other nations, whose origin was but yesterday, compared with this ancient and wonderful people.

In this manner was this nation prepared for peculiar duties, and to discharge those duties under peculiar circumstances. Many of the nations by which they were surrounded were more powerful than themselves; all were warlike, and each had its peculiar system of idolatry, which corrupted all hearts that came within its influence. Hence the necessity that this people should be so united as to resist the power and contagious example of surrounding nations, while they were fitted to receive and preserve a peculiar national character, civil polity, and religious doctrines; of all which they were to be the conservators, amid surrounding and opposing heathenism, for many ages.

Other facts might be added to the induction, which would make the design, if possible, more apparent. If the Jews were to be the recipients of new instruction—to obey new laws, and to sustain new institutions, it would be desirable that their minds, so far as possible, should be in the condition of new material, occupied by little previous knowledge, and by no national prejudices against or in favour of governmental forms and systems. Now, in the case of the Jews, the habit of obedience had been acquired. They had no national predilections or prejudices arising from past experience. In relation to knowledge of any kind, their mind was almost a tabula rasa. They were as new material prepared to receive the moulding of a master hand, and the impress of a governing mind.

Now, as this discipline of the descendants of Abraham was the result of a long concatenation of events, and could not have been designed by themselves to accomplish the necessary end; and as the whole chain of events was connected together and perfectly adapted, in accordance with the nature of things, to produce the specific purpose which was accomplished by them, it follows, as the only rational conclusion, first that the overruling intelligence of God was employed in thus preparing material for a purer religious worship than the world then enjoyed; and, second, that a nation could have been so prepared by no other agent, and in no other way.

CHAPTER III.
CONCERNING MIRACLES—PARTICULARLY THE MIRACLES WHICH ACCOMPANIED THE DELIVERANCE OF THE ISRAELITES FROM BONDAGE IN EGYPT.

There has been so much false philosophy written concerning the subject of miracles, that it is difficult for those conversant with the speculations of writers upon this subject, to divest their minds sufficiently of preformed biases, to examine candidly the simple and natural principles upon which are based the evidence and necessity of miraculous interposition.

The following statement is true beyond controversy: Man cannot, in the present constitution of his mind, have sufficient reason for believing that religion has a Divine origin, unless it be accompanied with miracles. The natural inference of the mind is that, if an Infinite Being act, his acts will be superhuman in their character; because the effect, reason dictates, will be characterized by the nature of its cause. Man has the same reason to expect that God will perform acts above human power and knowledge, that he has to suppose the inferior orders of animals will, in their actions, sink below the power and wisdom which characterize human nature. For, as it is natural for man to perform acts superior to the power and knowledge of the animals beneath him, so reason affirms that it is natural for God to develop his power by means, and in ways, above the skill and ability of mortals. Hence, if God manifest himself at all—unless, in accommodation to the capacities of men, he should constrain his manifestations within the compass of human ability—every act of God’s immediate power would, to human capacity, be a miracle. But, if God were to constrain all his acts within the limits of human means and agencies, it would be impossible for man to discriminate between the acts of the Godhead and the acts of the manhood. And man, if he considered acts to be of a Divine origin, which were plainly within the compass of human ability, would violate his own reason.

Suppose, for illustration, that God desired to reveal a religion to men, and wished them to recognise his character and his benevolence in giving that revelation. Suppose, further, that God should give such a revelation, and that every appearance and every act connected with its introduction were characterized by nothing superior to human power; could any rational mind on earth believe that such a system of religion came from God? Impossible! A man could as easily be made to believe that his own child, who possessed his own lineaments, and his own nature, belonged to some other world, and some other order of the creation. It would not be possible for God to convince men that a religion was from heaven unless it was accompanied with the marks of Divine Power.

Suppose, again, that some individual were to appear either in the heathen or Christian world—he claimed to be a teacher sent from God, yet aspired to the performance of no miracles. He assumed to do nothing superior to the wisdom and ability of other men. Such an individual, although he might in gaining proselytes to some particular view of a religion already believed, yet could never make men believe that he had a special commission from God to establish a new religion, for the simple reason that he had no grounds more than his fellows to support his claims as an agent of the Almighty. But if he could convince a single individual that he had wrought a miracle, or that he had power to do so, that moment his claims would be established, in that mind, as a commissioned agent from heaven: so certainly, and so intuitively, do the minds of men revere and expect miracles as the credentials of the Divine presence.

This demand of the mind for miracles, as testimony of the Divine presence and power, is intuitive with all men; and those very individuals who have doubted the existence or necessity of miracles, should they examine their own convictions on this subject, would see that, by an absolute necessity, if they desired to give the world a system of religion, whether truth or imposture, in order to make men receive it as of Divine authority, they must work miracles to attest its truth, or make men believe that they did so. Men can produce doubt of a revelation in no way until they have destroyed the evidence of its miracles; nor can faith be produced in the Divine origin of a religion until the evidence of miracles is supplied.

The conviction that miracles are the true attestation of immediate Divine agency, is so constitutional (allow the expression) with the reason, that so soon as men persuade themselves they are the special agents of God, in propagating some particular truth in the world, they adopt likewise the belief that they have ability to work miracles. There have been many sincere enthusiasts, who believed that they were special agents of Heaven, and, in such cases, the conviction of their own miraculous powers arises as a necessary concomitant of the other opinion. Among such, in modern times, may be instanced Emanuel Swedenborg. Impostors also, perceiving that miracles were necessary in order that the human mind should receive a religion as Divine, have invariably claimed miraculous powers. Such instances recur constantly, from the days of Elymas down to the Mormon, Joseph Smith.

All the multitude of false religions that have been believed since the world began have been introduced by the power of this principle. Miracles believed, lie at the foundation of all religions which men have ever received as of Divine origin. No matter how degrading or repulsive to reason in other respects, the fact of its establishment and propagation grows out of the belief of men that supernatural agency lies at the bottom.[5] This belief will give currency to any system, however absurd: and without it, no system can be established in the minds of men, however high and holy may be its origin and its design.

[5] Mohammedanism is no exception: as the wonders reported by the false prophet, though unseen, were believed. ‘The Koran,’ he said, ‘is itself a miracle!’ [Back]

Such, then, is the constitution which the Maker has given to the mind. Whether the conviction be an intuition or an induction of the reason, God is the primary cause of its existence; and its existence puts it out of the power of man to accept a revelation from God himself, unless accompanied by miracle. If, therefore, God ever gave a revelation to man, it was necessarily accompanied with miracles, and with miracles of such a nature as would clearly distinguish the Divine character and the Divine authority of the dispensation.

The whole fulness and force of these deductions apply to the case of the Israelites. The laws of their mind not only demanded miracles as an attestation of Divine interposition; but at that time, the belief existed in their minds that miracles were constantly performed. Although they remembered the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, yet they likewise, as subsequent facts clearly attested, believed that the idols of Egypt possessed the attributes of Divinity. The belief in a plurality of gods was then common to all nations. And although this error was corrected, and perhaps entirely removed, by succeeding providences and instructions, from the minds of the Jews; yet, before the miracles in Egypt, while the God of Abraham was, perhaps, in most cases acknowledged as their God, the idols of Egypt were acknowledged as the gods of the Egyptians, and probably worshipped as the divinities who had power to dispense good and evil to all the inhabitants of that land. And in common with all Egypt, they, no doubt, believed that the acts of jugglery, in which the magicians, or priests of Egypt, had made astonishing proficiency, were actual miracles, exhibiting the power of their idols, and the authority of the priests to act in their name.

In view, therefore, of existing circumstances, two things were necessary, on the part of God,[6] in order to establish belief in any revelation to the Israelites:—First, that he should manifest himself by miracles; and, Secondly, that those miracles should be of such a character, as evidently to distinguish them from the jugglery of the magicians, and to convince all observers of the existence and omnipotence of the true God, in contradistinction from the objects of idolatrous worship. Unless these two things were done, it would have been impossible for the Israelites to have recognised Jehovah as the only living and true God.

[6] When we speak of a thing as necessary on the part of God, it is said, not in reference to God’s attributes, but to man’s nature and circumstances. [Back]

It follows, then, that by the miracles which God wrought by the hand of Moses, he pursued the only way that was possible to authenticate a revelation in which his presence and power would be recognised. The only point of inquiry remaining is, Were the miracles of such a character, and performed in such a manner, as to remove false views from the minds of the Israelites, and introduce right views concerning the true God, and the non-existence of factitious objects of worship?

With this point in view, the design in the management and character of the miracles in Egypt is interesting and obvious. Notice, first, the whole strength of the magicians’ skill was brought out and measured with that of the miraculous power exerted through Moses. If this had not been done, the idea would have remained in the minds of the people that, although Moses wielded a mighty miraculous power, it might be derived from the Egyptian gods, or if it were not thus derived, they might have supposed that if the priests of those idols were summoned, they would contravene or arrest the power vested in Moses by Jehovah. But now, the magicians appearing in the name of their gods, the power of Moses was seen to be not only superior to their sorceries, but hostile to them and their idolatrous worship.

Notice, secondly, the design and adaptedness of the miracles, not only to distinguish the power of the true God, but to destroy the confidence placed in the protection and power of the idols.

The first miracle, while it authenticated the mission of Moses, destroyed the serpents which, among the Egyptians, were objects of worship; thus evincing, in the outset, that their gods could neither help the people nor save themselves.

The second miracle was directed against the river Nile, another object which they regarded with religious reverence. This river they held sacred, as the Hindoos do the Ganges; and even the fish in its waters they revered as objects of worship. They drank the water with reverence and delight; and supposed that a Divine efficacy dwelt in its waves to heal diseases of the body. The water of this, their cherished object of idolatrous homage, was transmuted to blood; and its finny idols became a mass of putridity.

The third miracle was directed to the accomplishment of the same end—the destruction of faith in the river as an object of worship. The waters of the Nile were caused to send forth legions of frogs, which infested the whole land, and became a nuisance and a torment to the people. Thus their idol, by the power of the true God, was polluted, and turned into a source of pollution to its worshippers.

By the fourth miracle of a series constantly increasing in power and severity, lice came upon man and beast throughout the land. ‘Now, if it be remembered,’ says Gleig, ‘that no one could approach the altars of Egypt upon whom so impure an insect harboured, and that the priests, to guard against the slightest risk of contamination, wore only linen garments, and shaved their heads and bodies every day,[7] the severity of this miracle as a judgment upon Egyptian idolatry may be imagined. Whilst it lasted no act of worship could be performed; and so keenly was this felt, that the very magicians exclaimed—“This is the finger of God!”’

[7] Every third day, according to Herodotus. [Back]

The fifth miracle was designed to destroy the trust of the people in Beelzebub, or the Fly-god, who was reverenced as their protector from visitations of swarms of ravenous flies which infested the land, generally about the time of the dog-days, and removed only, as they supposed, at the will of this idol. The miracle now wrought by Moses evinced the impotence of Beelzebub, and caused the people to look elsewhere for relief from the fearful visitation under which they were suffering.

The sixth miracle, which destroyed the cattle, excepting those of the Israelites, was aimed at the destruction of the entire system of brute worship. This system, degrading and bestial as it was, had become a monster of many heads in Egypt. They had their sacred bull, and ram, and heifer, and goat, and many others, all of which were destroyed by the agency of the God of Moses. Thus by one act of power Jehovah manifested his own supremacy, and destroyed the very existence of their brute idols.

Of the peculiar fitness of the sixth plague (the seventh miracle), says the writer before quoted, the reader will receive a better impression, when he is reminded that in Egypt there were several altars upon which human sacrifices were occasionally offered when they desired to propitiate Typhon, or the Evil Principle. These victims being burned alive, their ashes were gathered together by the officiating priests, and thrown up into the air, in order that evil might be averted from every place to which an atom of the ashes was wafted. By the direction of Jehovah, Moses took a handful of ashes from the furnace (which, very probably, the Egyptians at this time had frequently used to turn aside the plagues with which they were smitten), and he cast it into the air, as they were accustomed to do; and instead of averting evil, boils and blains fell upon all the people of the land. Neither king, nor priest, nor people escaped. Thus the bloody rites of Typhon became a curse to the idolaters; the supremacy of Jehovah was affirmed, and the deliverance of the Israelites insisted upon.

The ninth miracle was directed against the worship of Serapis, whose peculiar office was supposed to be to protect the country from locusts. At periods these destructive insects came in clouds upon the land, and, like an overshadowing curse, they blighted the fruits of the field and the verdure of the forest. At the command of Moses these terrible insects came—and they retired only at his bidding. Thus was the impotence of Serapis made manifest, and the idolaters taught the folly of trusting in any other protection than that of Jehovah the God of Israel.

The eighth and tenth miracles were directed against the worship of Isis and Osiris, to whom and the river Nile they awarded the first place[8] in the long catalogue of their idolatry. These idols were originally the representatives of the sun and moon; they were believed to control the light and the elements, and their worship prevailed in some form among all the early nations. The miracles directed against the worship of Isis and Osiris must have made a deep impression on the minds both of the Israelites and the Egyptians. In a country where rain seldom falls—where the atmosphere is always calm, and the light of the heavenly bodies always continued, what was the horror pervading all minds during the elemental war described in the Hebrew record—during the long period of three days and three nights, while the gloom of thick darkness settled, like the out-spread pall of death, over the whole land! Jehovah of hosts summoned Nature to proclaim him the true God—the God of Israel asserted his supremacy, and exerted his power to degrade the idols, destroy idolatry, and liberate the descendants of Abraham from the land of their bondage.

[8] Against the worship of the Nile, two miracles were directed, and two likewise against Isis and Osiris, because they were supposed to be the supreme gods. Many placed the Nile first, as they said it had power to water Egypt independently of the action of the elements. [Back]

The Almighty having thus revealed himself as the true God, by miraculous agency, and pursued those measures, in the exercise of his power, which were directly adapted to destroy the various forms of idolatry which existed in Egypt, the eleventh and last miracle was a judgment, in order to manifest to all minds that Jehovah was the God who executed judgment in the earth.

The Egyptians had, for a long time, cruelly oppressed the Israelites, and to put the finishing horror to their atrocities, they had finally slain, at their birth, the offspring of their victims; and now God, in the exercise of infinite justice, visited them with righteous retribution. In the mid-watches of the night, the ‘angel of the pestilence’ was sent to the dwellings of Egypt, and he ‘breathed in the face’ of all the first-born in the land. In the morning, the hope of every family, from the palace to the cottage, was a corpse. What mind can imagine the awful consternation of that scene, when an agonizing wail rose from the stricken hearts of all the parents in the nation? The cruel task-masters were taught, by means which entered their souls, that the true God was a God not only of power but of judgment, and as such, to be feared by evil-doers, and reverenced by those that do well.

The demonstration, therefore, is conclusive, that in view of the idolatrous state of the world, and especially of the character and circumstances of the Israelites, the true God could have made a revelation of himself in no other way than by the means, and in the manner, of the miracles of Egypt; and none but the true God could have revealed himself in this way.[9]

[9] In accordance with the foregoing are the intimations given in the Bible of the design of the miracles of Egypt. By these exhibitions of Divine power God said—‘Ye,’ the Israelites, ‘and Pharaoh shall know that I am Jehovah.’

Miracles, moreover, were the evidence that Pharaoh required.—Ex. vii. 9, God said to Moses, that when he should present himself as the Divine legate, and Pharaoh should require a miracle, he should perform it accordingly.

In relation to the destruction of idolatry, the design of Jehovah is expressly announced (Ex. xii. 12), ‘Against all the Gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am Jehovah.’

See also Ex. xviii. 11. [Back]

CHAPTER IV.
WHAT WAS NECESSARY AS THE FIRST STEP IN THE PROCESS OF REVELATION.

By the miracles of Egypt, the false views and corrupt habits of the Israelites were, for the time being, in a great measure removed. Previously they had believed in a plurality of gods; and although they remembered the God of Abraham, yet they had, as is evident from notices in the Bible, associated with his attribute of almighty power (the only attribute well understood by the patriarchs) many of the corrupt attributes of the Egyptian idols. Thus the idea of God was debased by having grovelling and corrupt attributes superinduced upon it. By miraculous agency these dishonourable views of the Divine character were removed; their minds were emptied of false impressions in order that they might be furnished with the true idea and the true attributes of the Supreme Being.

But how, to minds in the infancy of knowledge respecting God and human duty—having all they had previously learned removed, and being now about to take the first step in their progress—how could the first principles of Divine knowledge be conveyed to such minds?

One thing, in the outset, would evidently be necessary. Knowledge, as the mind is constituted, can be communicated in no other way than progressively; it would be necessary, therefore, that they should begin with the elementary principles, and proceed through all the stages of their education. The mind cannot receive at once all the parts of a system in religion, science, or any other department of human knowledge. One fact or idea must be predicated upon another, just as one stone rests upon another, from the foundation to the top of the building. There are successive steps in the acquisition of knowledge, and every step in the mind’s progress must be taken from advances already made. God has inwrought the law of progression into the nature of things, and observes it in his own works. From the springing of a blade to the formation of the mind, or of a world, every thing goes forward by consecutive steps.

It was necessary, therefore, in view of the established laws of the mind, that the knowledge of God and human duty should be imparted to the Israelites by successive communications—necessary that there should be a first step, or primary principle, for a starting point, and then a progression onward and upward to perfection.

In accordance with these principles, God, in the introduction of the Mosaic dispensation, revealed only his essential existence to the Israelites. In Exodus iii. 13, 14, it is stated that Moses inquired of God, ‘Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them? And God said, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you.’ In the Hebrew text, the simple form of the verb is used, corresponding with the first person present, indicative, of the English verb to be. Simply, ‘I am,’ conveying no idea but that of personality and existence. What He was, besides his existence thus revealed, was afterwards to be learned. This was a revelation of Divine BEING—a nucleus of essential Deity, as a foundation fact of the then new dispensation, upon which God, by future manifestations, might engraft the attributes of his nature.

Thus, at the outset of the dispensation, there was thrown into their minds a first truth. God revealed his Divine existence; and the idea of God, thus revealed, was in their minds, without any other attribute being connected with it than that of infinite power—an attribute of the Godhead which all men derive from the works of nature—which was known to the patriarchs as belonging to the true God, and which was now, by the miracles manifesting supreme power, appropriated to I am—Jehovah—the God of the Israelites.

Thus were this peculiar people carried back to the first principles of natural religion—their mind disembarrassed from false notions previously entertained, and the true idea of the supreme God and Judge of men revealed. By these providences, they were prepared, in a manner consistent with the nature of things and the nature of mind, to receive a further revelation of the moral attributes of Jehovah, whom they now recognised as the Supreme God.

CHAPTER V.
THE NECESSITY OF AFFECTIONATE OBEDIENCE TO GOD; AND THE MANNER OF PRODUCING THAT OBEDIENCE IN THE HEARTS OF THE ISRAELITES.

The following principles in relation to the affections will be recognised by consciousness as true in the experience of every man. As they lie at the foundation of the moral exercises of the soul, and as they relate to the sources and central principles of all true religion, it will be necessary for the reader to notice them, in order that he may see their application in subsequent pages.

1. The affections of the soul move in view of certain objects, or in view of certain qualities believed to exist in those objects. The affections never move—in familiar words, the heart never loves, unless love be produced by seeing, or by believing that we see, some lovely and excellent qualities in the object. When the soul believes those good qualities to be possessed by another, and especially when they are exercised towards us, the affections, like a magnetised needle, tremble with life, and turn towards their object.

2. The affections are not subject to the will;[10] neither our own will nor any other will can directly control them. I cannot will to love a being who does not appear to me lovely, and who does not exhibit the qualities adapted to move the affections; nor can I, by command, or by any other effort of will, cause another being to love me. The affections are not subject to command. You cannot force another to love, or respect, or even, from the heart, to obey. Such an attitude assumed to produce love would invariably produce disaffection rather than affection. No one (as a matter of fact) thinks the affections subject to the will, and, therefore, men never endeavour to obtain the affections of others solely by command, but by exhibiting such a character and conferring such favours as they know are adapted to move the heart. An effect could as easily exist without a cause as affection in the bosom of any human being which was not produced by goodness or excellencies seen, or believed to exist, in some other being.

[10] We state the facts in the case, of which every man is conscious in his own experience, without regard to the theories of sects in religion or philosophy. [Back]

3. The affections, although not governed by the will, do themselves greatly influence the will. All acts of will produced entirely by pure affection for another are disinterested. Cases of the affections influencing the will are common in the experience of every one. There is probably no one living who has not, at some period of his life, had affection for another, so that it gave more pleasure to please the object of his love than to please himself. Love for another always influences the will to act in such a way as will please the object loved. The individual loving acts in view of the desires of the loved object, and such acts are disinterested, not being done with any selfish end in view, but for the sake of another. So soon as the affections move towards an object, the will is proportionably influenced to please and benefit that object; or, if a superior being, to obey his will and secure his favour.

4. All happy obedience must arise from affection. Affectionate obedience blesses the spirit which yields it, if the conscience approve the object loved and obeyed, while, on the contrary, no happiness can be experienced from obedience to any being that we do not love. To obey externally either God or a parent, from no other than interested motives, would be sin. The devil might be obeyed for the same reasons. Love must, therefore, constitute an essential element in all proper obedience to God.

5. When the affections of two are reciprocally fixed upon each other, they constitute a bond of union and sympathy peculiarly strong and tender:—those things that affect the one affecting the other, in proportion to the strength of affection existing between them. One conforms to the will of the other, not from a sense of obligation merely, but from choice; and the constitution of the soul is such that the sweetest enjoyment of which it is capable arises from the exercise of reciprocal affection.

6. When the circumstances of an individual are such that he is exposed to constant suffering and great danger, the more afflictive his situation the more grateful love will he feel for affection and benefits received under such circumstances. If his circumstances were such that he could not relieve himself, and such that he must suffer greatly or perish; and, while, in this condition, if another, moved by benevolent regard for him, should come to aid and save him, his affection for his deliverer would be increased by a sense of the danger from which he was rescued.

7. It is an admitted principle that protracted and close attention always fixes the fact attended to deeply in the memory; and the longer and more intensely the mind attends to any subject, other subjects proportionably lose their power to interest. The same is true in relation to the affections. The longer and more intensely we contemplate an object in that relation which is adapted to draw out the affections, the more deeply will the impression be made upon the heart, as well as upon the memory. The most favourable circumstances possible to fix an impression deeply upon the heart and memory are—First, that there should be protracted and earnest attention; and—Second, that at the same time that the impression is made, the emotions of the soul should be alive with excitement. Without these, an impression made upon the heart and the memory would be slight and easily effaced; while, on the contrary, an impression made during intense attention and excited feeling will be engraved, as with a pen of steel, upon the tablets of the soul.

Now, with these principles in mind, mark the means used to fix the attention and to excite the susceptibilities of the Israelites, and, while in that state of attention and excitement, to draw their affections to God.

The children of Israel were suffering the most grievous bondage, which had arrived at almost an intolerable degree of cruelty and injustice. Just at this crisis the God of their fathers appears as their Deliverer, and Moses is commissioned as his prophet. When the people are convened and their minds aroused by the hopes of deliverance, their attention is turned to two parties: one, Pharaoh, their oppressor and the slayer of their first-born; and the other the God of Abraham, who now appeared as their Deliverer, espousing their cause and condescending personally to oppose Himself to their oppressor. Then a scene ensues adapted in all its circumstances to make a deep and enduring impression upon their memory and their hearts.—The God of Abraham seems, by his judgments, to have forced the oppressor to relent, and to let the people go. At this point hope and encouragement predominate in their minds. Now their oppressor’s heart is hardened, and he renews his cruelty; but while their hopes are sinking, they are again revived and strengthened, by finding that God continues to use means to induce Pharaoh to release the captives. Thus, for a considerable length of time, all the powers of excitability in their nature are aroused to activity. Towards that being who had so graciously interposed in their behalf they felt emotions of hope, gratitude, love, and admiration. Towards their oppressor feelings of an opposite character must have been engendered; and this state of exciting suspense—the emotions vacillating between love and hatred, hope and fear—was continued until the impression became fixed deep in their souls.

Keeping in mind the fact, that the more we need a benefactor and feel that need, the stronger will be our feelings of gratitude and love for the being who interposes in our behalf—notice further: When, through the interposition of the Almighty, the Israelites were delivered, and had advanced as far as the Red Sea, another appeal was made to their affections which was most thrilling, and adapted to call by one grand interposition all their powers of gratitude and love into immediate and full exercise.

The army of the Israelites lay encamped on the margin of the Red Sea, when, suddenly, they were surprised by the approaching host of Pharaoh;—before them was the sea, and behind them an advancing hostile army. If they went forward, they would find death in the waves; if they returned backward, it would be to meet the swords of their pursuers. A rescue, by earthly means, from death or bondage more severe than they had ever borne, was impossible. Just at this crisis of extremity, Jehovah appears as their Deliverer. The bosom of the pathless sea is cleft by the power of God. The stricken waters recoil upon themselves on either side. The Israelites pass over in safety. The Egyptian host enter, and are overwhelmed in the waters.

Now, it may be affirmed, without qualification, that, in view of the nature and circumstances of the Israelites, no combination of means, not including the self-sacrifice of the benefactor himself, could be so well adapted to elicit and absorb all the affections of the soul, as this wonderful series of events. That this result was accomplished by these means, is authenticated by the history given in the Bible. When the people were thus delivered, they stood upon the other side of the sea, and their affections, in answer to the call which God had made upon them, gushed forth in thanksgiving and praise. Hear the response of their hearts, and their allusion to the cause which produced that response:

‘I will sing unto the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously: the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea. The Lord is my strength and song, and he is become my SALVATION. He is my God, and I will prepare him an habitation; my father’s God, and I will exalt him.’—Ex. xv. 1, 2, etc.

Thus was the attention of the whole nation turned to the true God. An impression of his goodness was fixed deeply in their memory, and their affections drawn out and fastened upon the true object of worship. Now this, as was shown in the commencement of the chapter, was necessary, before they could offer worship either honourable or acceptable to God. The end was accomplished by means adapted to the nature of the human soul and to the circumstances of the Israelites; and by means which no being in the universe but the Maker of the soul could use. The demonstration is therefore perfect, that the Scripture narrative is true, and that no other narrative, differing materially from this in its principles, could be true.

CHAPTER VI.
THE DESIGN AND NECESSITY OF THE MORAL LAW.

At this stage of our progress it will be useful to recapitulate the conclusions at which we have arrived, and thus make a point of rest from which to extend our observations further into the plan of God for redeeming the world. This review is the more appropriate as we have arrived at a period in the history of God’s providence with Israel, which presents them as a people prepared (so far as imperfect material could be prepared) to receive that model which God might desire to impress upon the nation.

1. They were bound to each other by all the ties of which human nature is susceptible, and thus rendered compact and united, so that everything national, whether in sentiment or practice, would be received and cherished with unanimous, and fervent, and lasting attachment: and, furthermore, by a long and rigorous bondage, they had been rendered, for the time being at least, humble and dependent. Thus, they were disciplined by a course of providences, adapted to fit them to receive instruction from their Benefactor with a teachable and grateful spirit.

2. Their minds were shaken off from idols; and Jehovah, by a revelation made to them, setting forth his name and nature, had revealed himself as a Divine Being, and by his works had manifested his almighty power: so that when their minds were disabused of wrong views of the Godhead, an idea of the first, true, and essential nature of God was revealed to them; and they were thus prepared to receive a knowledge of the attributes of that Divine essence.

3. They had been brought to contemplate God as their Protector and Saviour. Appeals the most affecting and thrilling had been addressed to their affections; and they were thus attached to God as their almighty temporal Saviour, by the ties of gratitude and love for the favour which he had manifested to them.

4. When they had arrived on the further shore of the Red Sea, thus prepared to obey God and worship him with the heart, they were without laws either civil or moral. As yet, they had never possessed any national or social organization. They were therefore prepared to receive, without predilection or prejudice, that system of moral instruction and civil polity which God might reveal, as best adapted to promote the moral interests of the nation.

From these conclusions we may extend our vision forward into the system of revelation. This series of preparations would certainly lead the mind to the expectation that what was still wanting, and what they had been thus miraculously prepared to receive, would be granted—which was a knowledge of the moral character of God, and a moral law prescribing their duty to God and to men. Without this, the plan that had been maturing for generations, and had been carried forward thus far by wonderful exhibitions of Divine wisdom and power, would be left unfinished, just at the point where the finishing process was necessary.

But besides the strong probability which the previous preparation would produce, that there would be a revelation of moral law, there are distinct and conclusive reasons, evincing its necessity.

The whole experience of the world has confirmed the fact, beyond the possibility of scepticism, that man cannot discover and establish a perfect rule of human duty. Whatever may be said of the many excellent maxims expressed by different individuals in different ages and nations, yet it is true that no system of duty to God and man, in anywise consistent with enlightened reason, has ever been established by human wisdom, and sustained by human sanctions; and for reasons already stated,[11] such a fact never can occur.

[11] See chap. [i]. p. [9], et seq. [Back]

But, it may be supposed that each man has, within himself, sufficient light from reason, and sufficient admonition from conscience, to guide himself, as an individual, in the path of truth and happiness. A single fact will correct such a supposition. Conscience, the great arbiter of the merit and demerit of human conduct, has little intuitive sense of right, and is not guided entirely by reason, but is governed in a great measure by what men believe. Indeed, faith is the legitimate regulator of the conscience. If a man has correct views of duty to God and men, he will have a correct conscience; but if he can, by a wrong view of morals and of the character of God, be induced to believe that theft, or murder, or any vice, is right, his conscience will be corrupted by his faith. When men are brought to believe—as they frequently do believe in heathen countries—that it is right to commit suicide, or infanticide, as a religious duty, their conscience condemns them if they do not perform the act. Thus, that power in the soul which pronounces upon the moral character of human conduct, is itself dependent upon and regulated by the faith of the individual. It is apparent, therefore, that the reception and belief of a true rule of duty, accompanied with proper sanctions, will alone form in man a proper conscience. God has so constituted the soul that it is necessary, in order to the regulation of its moral powers, that it should have a rule of duty, revealed under the sanction of its Maker’s authority; otherwise its high moral powers would lie in dark and perpetual disorder.

Further, unless the human soul be an exception, God governs all things by laws adapted to their proper nature. The laws which govern the material world are sketched in the books on natural science; such are gravitation, affinity, mathematical motion. Those laws by which the irrational animal creation is controlled are usually called instincts. Their operation and design are sketched, to some extent, in treatises upon the instincts of animals. Such is the law which leads the beaver to build its dam, and all other animals to pursue some particular habits instead of others. All beavers, from the first one created to the present time, have been instinctively led to build a dam in the same manner, and so their instinct will lead them to build till the end of time. The law which drives them to the act is as necessitating as the law which causes the smoke to rise upwards. Nothing in the universe of God, animate or inanimate, is left without the government of appropriate law, unless that thing be the noblest creature of God—the human spirit. To suppose, therefore, that the human soul is thus left unguided by a revealed rule of conduct, is to suppose that God cares for the less and not for the greater—to suppose that he would constitute the moral powers of the soul so that a law was necessary for their guidance, and then reveal none—to suppose, especially in the case of the Israelites, that he would prepare a people to receive, and obey with a proper spirit, this necessary rule of duty, and yet give no rule. But to suppose these things would be absurd; it follows, therefore, that God would reveal to the Israelites a law for the regulation of their conduct in morals and religion.

But physical law or necessitating instinct would not be adapted in its nature to the government of a rational and moral being. The application of either to the soul would destroy its free agency. God has made man intelligent, and thereby adapted his nature to a rule which he understands. Man has a will and a conscience: but he must understand the rule in order to will obedience, and he must believe the sanction by which the law is maintained before he can feel the obligation upon his conscience. A law, therefore, adapted to man’s nature, must be addressed to the understanding, sanctioned by suitable authority and enforced by adequate penalties.

In accordance with these legitimate deductions, God gave the Israelites a rule of life—the Moral Law—succinctly comprehended in the Ten Commandments. And as affectionate obedience is the only proper obedience, he coupled the facts which were fitted to produce affection with the command to obey; saying, ‘I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, and from the house of bondage’—therefore, love me and keep my commandments.[12]

[12] Deut. v. 6, passim. [Back]

CHAPTER VII.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE IDEA OF HOLINESS AND ITS TRANSFER TO JEHOVAH AS AN ATTRIBUTE.

As yet the Israelites were little acquainted with any attribute of the I am—Jehovah—except his infinite power and goodness; and his goodness was known to them only as manifested in kindness and mercy towards themselves, as a peculiar people, distinguished from other nations, as the special objects of the Divine favour. They had a disposition to worship Jehovah, and to regard the rights of each other according to his commandments; but they knew as yet little of his moral attributes. Of the attribute of holiness—purity from sin, and opposition of nature to all moral and physical defilement—they knew comparatively nothing. After the law had been given, they knew that God required worship and obedience for himself and just conduct towards others, but they did not know that his nature was hostile to all moral defilement of heart and life. And to this knowledge, as we have seen in the introduction, they could not of themselves attain.

At the period of the deliverance from Egypt, every nation by which they were surrounded worshipped unholy beings. Now, how were the Jews to be extricated from this difficulty, and made to understand and feel the influence of the holy character of God? The Egyptian idolatry in which they had mingled was beastly and lustful; and one of their first acts of disobedience after their deliverance showed that their minds were still dark, and their propensities corrupt. The golden calf which they desired should be erected for them, was not designed as an act of apostasy from Jehovah, who had delivered them from Egyptian servitude. When the image was made, it was proclaimed to be that God which brought them up out of the land of Egypt: and when the proclamation of a feast, or idolatrous debauch, was issued by Aaron, it was denominated a feast, not to Isis or Osiris, but a feast to Jehovah; and as such they held it.[13] But they offered to the holy Jehovah the unholy worship of the idols of Egypt. Thus they manifested their ignorance of the holiness of his nature, as well as the corruption of their own hearts.

[13] Ex. xxxii. 4, 5. [Back]

It was necessary, therefore, in order to promote right exercises of heart in religious worship, that the Israelites should be made acquainted with the holiness of God. The precise question, then, for solution is, How could the idea of God’s holiness be conveyed to the minds of the Israelites? If it should be found that there is but one way in which it could be originated, according to the nature of mind, then it would follow, necessarily, that God would pursue that way, or he would have to alter the human constitution, in order to communicate a knowledge of his attribute of holiness. But, as it is matter of fact that the constitution of the mind has not been altered, it follows that that method would be pursued which is in accordance with the nature of mind, to convey the necessary knowledge. Now all practical knowledge is conveyed to the understanding through the medium of the senses. Whatever may be said about innate ideas by speculative philosophers, still all agree that all acquired knowledge must reach the mind through the medium of one of the five senses, or upon the occasion of their exercise. Through the senses the knowledge of external objects is conveyed to the mind, and these simple ideas serve as a material for reflection, comparison, and abstraction.

The etymology of the Hebrew language, as written by Moses, and spoken by the Israelites, furnishes an interesting illustration of the origin of the few abstract terms with which their minds were familiar. The abstract ideas of the Hebrew tongue may even now, in most instances, be traced to the object or circumstance whence they originated. Thus the idea of power, among the Hebrews, was derived from the horn of an animal; and the same word, in Hebrew, which signifies horn, likewise signifies power, and may be translated in either way to suit the sense. The idea was originally conveyed through the eye, by noticing that the strength of the animal was exerted through its horn. The force thus exerted, especially when the animal was enraged, was the greatest which fell under their observation; and sometimes, in its effects, it was disastrous and overwhelming. Hence, the horn soon became a figure to denote power, and when the idea was once originated and defined in their minds, they could apply it to any object which produced a strong effect either upon the bodies or the minds of men. An idea of power likewise originated from the human hand, because through it man exerted his strength. The same word in Hebrew still expresses both the object and the idea derived from it—‘Life and death are in the power of the tongue,’ reads literally—‘Life and death are in the hand of the tongue.’ Sunshine, in Hebrew, is synonymous with happiness, the idea being originated by experiencing the pleasant feelings produced by the effects of a sunny day; and when thus originated, it was applied to the same and similar feelings produced by other causes. The abstract idea of judgment or justice is derived from a word which signifies to cut or divide; it being originated by the circumstance that when the primitive hunters had killed a stag, or other prey, one divided the flesh with a knife, among those who assisted in the pursuit, distributing a just portion to each. Thus, the act of cutting and dividing their prey, which was the first circumstance that called into exercise and placed before their senses the principle of justice, was the circumstance from which they derived this most important abstract idea.

Other instances might be mentioned. These are sufficient to show the manner in which the abstract ideas of the Hebrews were originated. And so, every new idea which found a place in their understanding had to be originated, primarily, by an impression made by external objects upon the senses.

Further, all ideas which admit of the signification of more or most perfect, can be originated only by a comparison of one object with another. More lovely, or more pure, can only be predicated of one thing by comparison with another which it excels in one of these respects. By a series of comparisons, each one exceeding the last in beauty or purity, an idea of the highest degree of perfection may be produced. Thus one flower may be called lovely, another more lovely, and the rose the most lovely; and the idea of the superior beauty of the rose would be originated by the comparison or contrast between it and other flowers of less beauty. It is not said that the rose would not appear lovely without comparison, but the idea of its superior loveliness is originated by comparison, and it could be derived in no other way.

With these principles in mind, we return to the inquiry, How could the idea of God’s holiness, or moral purity, be conveyed to the minds of the Jews?

First, mark the principles—(1.) There was not an object in the material world which would convey to the mind the idea of God’s holiness.—(2). The idea, therefore, would have to be originated, and thrown into their mind, through the senses, by a process instituted for that express purpose.—(3.) The plan to originate the idea, in order to meet the constitution of the mind, must consist of a series of comparisons.

Now mark the correspondency between these principles, founded upon the laws of the mind, and that system devised to instruct the Israelites in the knowledge of God.

In the outset, the animals common to Palestine were divided, by command of Jehovah, into clean and unclean; in this way a distinction was made, and the one class in comparison with the other was deemed to be of a purer and better kind. From the class thus distinguished, as more pure than the other, one was selected to offer as a sacrifice. It was not only to be chosen from the clean beasts, but, as an individual, it was to be without spot or blemish. Thus it was, in their eyes, purer than the other class, and purer than other individuals of its own class. This sacrifice the people were not deemed worthy, in their own persons, to offer unto Jehovah; but it was to be offered by a class of men who were distinguished from their brethren, purified, and set apart for the service of the priest’s office. Thus the idea of purity originated from two sources; the purified priest and the pure animal purified, were united in the offering of the sacrifice. But before the sacrifice could be offered it was washed with clean water—and the priest had, in some cases, to wash himself, and officiate without his sandals. Thus, when one process of comparison after another had attached the idea of superlative purity to the sacrifice—in offering it to Jehovah in order that the contrast between the purity of God and the highest degrees of earthly purity might be seen, neither priest, people, nor sacrifice was deemed sufficiently pure to come into his presence; but the offering was made in the court without the holy of holies. In this manner, by a process of comparison, the character of God, in point of purity, was placed indefinitely above themselves and their sacrifices.[14]

[14] It is not argued that no other end was designed and accomplished by the arbitrary separation of animals into classes of clean and unclean. By this means the Jews were undoubtedly excluded from partaking in the feasts of the heathen around, who ate those animals which were forbidden to them. An excellent writer observes that it is characteristic of the wisdom of God to accomplish many ends by a single act of providence. [Back]

And not only in the sacrifices, but throughout the whole Levitical economy, the idea of purity pervaded all its ceremonies and observances. The camp was purified—the people were purified—everything was purified and re-purified; and each process of the ordinances was designed to reflect purity upon the others; until finally that idea of purity formed in the mind and rendered intense by the convergence of so many rays, was, by comparison, referred to the idea of God; and the idea of God in their minds being that of an infinitely powerful and good Spirit, hence purity, as a characteristic or attribute of such a nature, would necessarily assume a moral aspect, because it appertained to a moral being—it would become moral purity, or holiness. Thus they learned, in the sentiment of Scripture, that God was of too pure eyes to look upon iniquity.

That the idea of moral purity in the minds of the Israelites was thus originated by the machinery of the Levitical dispensation, is supported, not only by the philosophy of the thing, but by many allusions in the Scriptures. Such allusions are frequent, both in the writers of the old and of the new dispensations; evidencing that, in their minds, the idea of moral purity was still symbolized by physical purity. The rite of baptism is founded upon this symbolical analogy: the external washing with water being significant of the purifying influence of the Holy Spirit. St. John saw in vision the undefiled in heart clothed with linen pure and white; evincing that, to the mind of the Jew, such vestments as the high priest wore when he entered the holy of holies, were still emblematical of moral purity. In the Epistle to the Hebrews, which is an apostolic exposition of the spiritual import of the Levitical institution, so far as that institution particularly concerns believers under the New Testament dispensation, we have the foregoing view of the design of ceremonial purification expressly confirmed. ‘It was, therefore, necessary,’ says Paul to the Hebrews, ‘that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these (that is, with these purifying processes addressed to the senses), but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.’ The plain instruction of which is, that the parts and processes of the Levitical economy were patterns addressed to the senses of unseen things in heaven, and that the purifying of those patterns indicated the spiritual purity of the spiritual things which they represented.

There is, finally, demonstrative evidence of the fact that the idea of perfect moral purity, as connected with the idea of God, is now, and always has been, the same which was originated and conveyed to the minds of the Jews by the machinery of the Levitical dispensation. The Hebrew word קדש ([Transliteration]) quadhosh, was used to express the idea of purity as originated by the tabernacle service. The literal definition is, pure, to be pure, to be purified for sacred uses. The word thus originated, and conveying this meaning, is employed in the Scriptures to express the moral purity or holiness of God.[15] In the New Testament this word is translated by the Greek term ἅγιος, ([Transliteration]) hagios, but the Hebrew idea is connected with the Greek word. In King James’s version this Greek word is rendered by the Saxon term holy—the Saxon word losing its original import (whole, wholly), and taking that of the Hebrew derived through the Greek. So that our idea of the holiness of God is the same which was originated by the Levitical ceremonies; and there is no other word, so far as I have been able to examine, in any language which conveys this idea. Nor is there any idea among any people that approximates closely to the Scripture idea of holiness, unless the word received some shades of its signification from the Bible.[16]

[15] שם קדשי ([Transliteration]) ‘my holy name.’—Lev. xx. 3. [Back]

[16] One of the principal difficulties which the missionary meets with, according to letters in the missionary reports, is, that of conveying to the mind of the heathen the idea of the holiness of God. They find no such idea in their minds, and they can use no words in their language by which to convey the full and true force of the thought. The true idea, therefore, if communicated at all, must be conveyed by a periphrasis, and by laboured illustration. This obstacle will be one of the most difficult to surmount in all languages; and it cannot be perfectly overcome, till the Christian teacher becomes perfectly familiar with the language of those whom he wishes to instruct. [Back]

Here, then, the idea of God’s moral purity was conveyed by the Mosaic economy in a manner in accordance with the constitution and the condition of the Jewish mind. This same idea has descended from the Hebrew, through the Greek, to our own language; and there is, so far as known, no other word in the world which conveys to the mind the true idea of God’s moral purity, but that originated by the institution which God prescribed to Moses upon the Mount.[17]

[17] Ex. xxv. 9. [Back]

The demonstration, then, is conclusive, both from philosophy and fact, that the true and necessary idea of God’s attribute of holiness was originated by the ‘patterns’ of the Levitical economy, and that it could have been communicated to mankind, at the first, in no other way.[18]

[18] The foundation principle of that school of scepticism, at the head of which are the atheistical materialists, is, that all knowledge is derived through the medium of the senses, and that as God is not an object of sense, men can have no knowledge of his being or attributes. Now these deductions show that the truth of revealed religion may be firmly established upon their own proposition. [Back]

CHAPTER VIII.
THE ORIGIN OF THE IDEAS OF JUSTICE AND MERCY, AND THEIR TRANSFER TO THE CHARACTER OF JEHOVAH.

Although holiness and justice convey to the mind ideas somewhat distinct from each other, yet the import of the one is shaded into that of the other. Holiness signifies the purity of the Divine nature from moral defilement; while justice signifies the relation which holiness causes God to sustain to men, as the subjects of the Divine government. In relation to God, one is subjective, declaring his freedom from sin; the other objective, declaring his opposition to sin, as the transgression of the Divine law. The Israelites might know that God was holy, and that he required of them clean hands and a clean heart in worship, and yet not understand the full demerit of transgressing the will of God, or the intensity of the Divine opposition to sin. God had given them the moral law, and they knew that he required them to obey it; but what, in the mind of God, was the proper desert of disobeying it, they did not know. They had been accustomed, like all idolaters, to consider the desert of moral transgression uncertain and unequal. Now they had to learn the immutable justice of the Supreme Being—that his holiness was not a passive quality, but an active attribute of his nature, and not only the opposite, but the antagonist principle to sin.

In what manner, then, could a knowledge of the Divine justice, or of the demerit of sin in the sight of God, be conveyed to the minds of the Jews?

There is but one way in which any being can manifest to other minds the opposition of his nature to sin. A lawgiver can manifest his views of the demerit of transgression in no other way than by the penalty which he inflicts upon the transgressor. In all beings who have authority to make law for the obedience of others, the conscience is the standard which regulates the amount of punishment that should be inflicted upon the disobedient; and the measure of punishment which conscience dictates, is just in proportion to the opposition which the lawgiver feels to the transgression of his law; that is, the amount of regard which he has for his own law, will graduate the amount of opposition which he will feel to its transgression. The amount of opposition which any being feels to sin is in proportion to the holiness of that being, and conscience will sanction penalty up to the amount of opposition which he feels to crime.

If the father of a family felt no regard for the law of the sabbath, his conscience would not allow him to punish his children for violating, by folly or labour, a law which he did not himself respect. But a father who felt a sacred regard for the Divine law, would be required by his conscience to cause his children to respect the sabbath, and to punish them if they disobeyed. The penalty which one felt to be wrong, the other would feel to be right, because the disposition of the one towards the law was different from that of the other.

The principle, then, is manifest, that the more holy and just any being is, the more opposed he is to sin, and the higher penalty will his conscience sanction as the desert of transgressing the Divine law. Now God being infinitely holy, he is, therefore, infinitely opposed to sin; and the Divine conscience will enforce penalty accordingly.

This is the foundation of penalty in the Divine mind. The particular point of inquiry is, How could the desert of sin, as it existed in the mind of God, be revealed to the Israelites?

If the penalty inflicted is sanctioned by the conscience of the lawgiver, it follows, as has been shown, that the opposition of his nature to the crime is in exact proportion to the penalty which he inflicts upon the criminal. Penalty, therefore, inflicted upon the transgressor, is the only way by which the standard of justice, as it exists in the mind of God, could be revealed to men.

The truth of this principle may be made apparent by illustration. Suppose a father were to express his will in relation to the government of his family, and the regulations were no sooner made than some of his children should resist his authority and disobey his commands. Now, suppose the father should not punish the offenders, but treat them as he did his obedient children. By so doing he would encourage the disobedient, discourage the obedient, destroy his own authority, and make the impression upon the minds of all his children that he had no regard for the regulations which he had himself made. And further, if these regulations were for the general good of the family, by not maintaining them he would convince the obedient that he did not regard their best interests, but was the friend of the rebellious. And if he were to punish for the transgression but lightly, they would suppose that he estimated but lightly a breach of his commands, and they could not, from the constitution of their minds, suppose otherwise. But if the father, when one of the children transgressed, should punish him and exclude him from favour till he submitted to his authority, and acknowledged with a penitent spirit his offence, then the household would be convinced that the father’s will was imperative, and that the only alternative presented to them was affectionate submission, or exclusion from the society of their father and his obedient children. Thus the amount of the father’s regard for the law, his interest in the well-being of his obedient children, and the opposition of his nature to disobedience, would be graduated in every child’s mind by the penalty which he inflicted for the transgression of his commands.

So in the case of an absolute lawgiver: his hostility to crime could be known only by the penalty which he inflicted upon the criminal. If, for the crime of theft, he were to punish the offender only by the imposition of a trifling fine, the impression would be made upon every mind that he did not, at heart, feel much hostility to the crime of larceny. If he had the power, and did not punish crime at all, he would thus reveal to the whole nation that he was in league with criminals, and himself a criminal at heart.

So in relation to murder, if he were to let the culprit go free, or inflict upon him but a slight penalty, he would thus show that his heart was tainted with guilt, and that there was no safety for good men under his government. But should he fix a penalty to transgression, declare it to all his subjects, and visit every criminal with punishment in proportion to his guilt, he would show to the world that he regarded the law, and was opposed directly and for ever to its transgression.

In like manner, and in no other way, could God manifest to men his infinite justice and his regard for the laws of his kingdom. Did he punish for sin with but a slight penalty, the whole universe of mind would have good reason to believe that the God of heaven was but little opposed to sin. Did he punish it with the highest degree of penalty, it would be evidence to the universe that his nature was in the highest degree opposed to sin and attached to holiness.

Now, whatever may be said in relation to the application of these principles to future rewards and punishments, one thing will be apparent to all, which is all that the present argument requires to be admitted, that is—the mind of man would receive an idea of the amount of God’s opposition to sin, only by the amount of penalty which he inflicted upon the sinner.

Having ascertained these premises, we return to the inquiry, How could the demerit of sin in the sight of God, or the idea of God’s attribute of justice, be conveyed to the minds of the Jews?

The people had now, in a good degree, a knowledge of what sin is. In addition to the light of natural conscience, which might guide them to some extent in relation to their duties to each other, they had the moral law, with the commentary of Moses, defining its precepts, and applying them to the conduct of life. Their minds were thus enlightened in relation to sin in the following particulars. First, those acts which were a transgression of the positive precepts of the law; Second, omissions of duties enjoined in the law; and, Third, many acts which the spirit of the law would condemn, but which might not be defined in any particular precept, would now be noticed by enlightened conscience, as sin against Jehovah, their holy benefactor, and the giver of the law.

Having thus been taught what was sin of commission and omission, one obvious design of the institution of sacrifices,[19] and one which has been perceived and understood, both by the Jews and Gentiles, was to convey to the mind the just demerit and proper penalty of sin.

[19] The question whether the sacrifices, and the particular regulations concerning them, were of Divine origin, does not affect the argument. Whether they were originally instituted by Divine command, or whether Moses, acting under Divine guidance, modified an existing institution and adapted it to the Divine purposes, both the design, and the end accomplished, would be the same. There are good reasons, however, for the opinion, that sacrifices for sin were of Divine appointment. [Back]

There were three classes of sacrifices in the old dispensation in which death was inflicted. The first, which Gentiles as well as Jews were permitted to offer, was the holocaust, or whole burnt-offering, which was entirely consumed by fire. Sacrifices of this description seem to have been offered from the earliest ages. They were offered, as the best informed think, as an acknowledgment of, and atonement for, general sinfulness of life. They seem to have had reference to the fact that men constantly violate known duty, and do many things which the light of nature and conscience teaches them not to do.

After the whole burnt-offering, was the sin-offering, sacrificed for an atonement, when the individual had transgressed any specific precept of the moral law.

The trespass-offering differed only from the sin-offering, as the learned suppose, in this, that it was a sacrifice for sins of omission, or for the non-performance of duty, while the sin-offering was made for a violation of the specific precepts of the moral law. Whether the design of the different classes of sacrifices was as above specified or not, is not material, further than it shows how nicely the forms of the Levitical economy were adjusted to meet that varied consciousness of sin which the precepts of the law and an enlightened conscience would produce in the human soul. The material point to which attention is necessary, with reference to the present discussion, is that by which the death and destruction of the animal offered in sacrifice were made to represent the desert of the sinner.

When an individual brought a sacrifice, he delivered it to the priest to be slain. He then laid his hands upon its head, thereby, in a form well understood among the Jews, transferring to it his sins; and then the life of the sacrifice was taken as a substitute for his own life. He was thus taught that the transgression of the law, or any act of sin against God, was worthy of death; and that the sacrifice suffered that penalty in his stead.

Further: the Jews had been taught that the blood of the sacrifice was its life; or rather the principle upon which the life of the body depended. Upon this subject they had the following express instruction—‘For the life of the flesh is the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul.’[20] Now, this blood, which the Jews were thus taught to believe was the life of the sacrifice, was repeatedly sprinkled by the priest upon the mercy-seat and towards the holy place; thus presenting the life of the sacrifice immediately in the presence of God (the ineffable light, or symbol of God’s presence, rested over the mercy-seat between the cherubim); signifying—as plainly as forms, and shadows, and external types could signify, that life had been rendered up to God to make atonement for their souls.

[20] Lev. xvii. 11. [Back]

Thus the idea was conveyed to their minds through the senses, that the desert of sin in the sight of God was the death of the soul. And while they stood praying in the outer court of the tabernacle, and beheld the dark volume of smoke ascending from the fire that consumed the sacrifice which was burning in their stead, how awful must have been the impression of the desert of sin, made by that dark volume of ascending smoke! The idea was distinct and deeply impressed, that God’s justice was a consuming fire to sinners, and that their souls escaped only through a vicarious atonement.

As a picture in a child’s primer will convey an idea to the infant mind, long before it can be taught by abstract signs, so the Jews, in the infancy of their knowledge of God, and before there were any abstract signs to convey that knowledge, had thrown into their minds, through the senses, the two essential ideas of God’s justice and mercy: His justice, in that the wages of sin is the death of the soul; and His mercy, in that God would pardon the sinner, if he confessed his sin, acknowledged the life of his soul forfeited, and offered the life of the sacrifice as his substitute.

In this manner an idea of the desert of sin was conveyed to the minds of the Jews; God’s law honoured, and the utter hostility of the Lawgiver to sin clearly manifested; and God’s mercy was likewise revealed as stated in the preceding paragraph. Thus, in a manner accordant with the circumstances of the Jews, and by means adapted in their operation to the constitution of nature, was the knowledge of God’s attribute of justice, and the relation which mercy sustains to that attribute, fully revealed in the world; and in view of the nature of things, it could have been revealed in no other way.[21]

[21] Inquiring readers of the Old Testament often find many things announced in the name of God, which must seem to them inconsistent with the majesty of the Divine nature, unless they view those requirements in the light of the inquiry, ‘What impressions were they adapted to make upon the Jewish mind?’ There are but few readers of the Old Testament who read on this subject intelligently. In this remark we do not refer to the historical or preceptive portions of these writings, but to the elements of the Mosaic institution. In order to see the design of many items of the system, we must consider those items as exhibitions to the senses, designed chiefly, perhaps only, to produce right ideas, or to correct erroneous ones then existing, in the minds of the Jews. The inquiry ought not to be, What impressions are they adapted to produce upon our minds concerning God? but, What impression would the particular revelation make upon their minds? An instance or two will illustrate these remarks.

The adaptation to accomplish a necessary end is apparent in the scene at Sinai. The Israelites had been accustomed to an idolatry [!-- continuing footnote --] where the most common familiarities were practised with the idol gods. The idea of reverence and majesty which belongs to the character of God had been lost, by attaching the idea of divinity to the objects of sense. It was necessary, therefore, that the idea of God should now be clothed, in their minds, with that reverence and majesty which properly belong to it. The scene at Sinai was adapted to produce, and did produce for the time being, the right impression. The mountain was made to tremble to its base. A cloud of darkness covered its summit, from which the lightnings leaped out and thunders uttered their voices. In the words of a New Testament writer, there was ‘blackness, and darkness, and tempest.’ It was ordered that neither man nor beast should touch the mountain, lest they should be visited with death. The exhibition in all its forms was adapted to produce that sense of majesty and awe in view of the Divine character which the Israelites needed to feel. To minds subjected to the influence of other circumstances than those which affected the character of the Israelites in Egypt, such manifestations might not be necessary; but in the case of the Jews, accustomed as they had been to witness a besotting familiarity with idols, these manifestations were directly adapted to counteract low views of the Divine character, and to inspire the soul with suitable reverence in view of the infinite majesty and eternal power of the Being with whom they had to do.

The testimony of the Bible in relation to the design of the exhibition at Sinai corroborates the views that have been given. ‘When the people saw it, they removed and stood afar off. And they said unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear: but let not God speak with us, lest we die. And Moses said unto the people, Fear not: for God is come to prove you, and that his fear may be before your faces, that ye sin not.’—Ex. xx. 18-20.

The scene which occurred afterwards, evinced the necessity of this exhibition, and developed the result of the proof [trial] that was made of their character. In the absence of Moses, they required an image of Jehovah to be made, and they feasted and ‘played’ (this last word having a licentious import) in its presence. Thus, after trial of the strongest exhibitions upon their mind, some of them proved themselves so incorrigibly attached to licentious idolatry, that they desired to worship Jehovah under the character of the Egyptian calf. They thus proved themselves unfit material, too corrupt for the end in view; and they were, in accordance with the reason of the case, destroyed.

Another conviction necessary to be lodged in the minds of the Israelites, and impressed deeply and frequently upon their hearts, was faith in the present and overruling God. This was the more necessary, as no visible image of Jehovah was allowed in the camp. There were but two methods possible by which their minds could be convinced of the immediate presence and power of God controlling all the events of their history. Either such exhibitions [!-- continuing footnote --] must be made that they would see certain ends accomplished without human instrumentality; or they must see human instrumentality clothed with a power which it is not possible in the nature of things it should in itself possess. The circumstances connected with the fall of Jericho will illustrate the case. The people were required to surround the city, by a silent procession during seven days, bearing the sacred ark, and blowing with rude instruments which they used for trumpets. On the seventh day, the people were to shout after they had compassed the city seven times; and when they shouted, according to a Divine promise, the walls of the city fell to the ground. Now, here was a process of means in which there was no adaptation to produce the external effect, in order that the INTERNAL effect, the great end of all revelation, might be produced—that they might be taught to recognise Jehovah as the present God of nature and providence, and rest their faith on him.

If the Israelites had, in this case, used the common instrumentalities to secure success—if they had destroyed the wall with instruments of war, or scaled its height with ladders, and thus overcome by the strength of their own arm, or the aid of their own devices, instead of being led to humble reliance upon God, and to recognise his agency in their behalf, they would have seen in the means which they had used a cause adequate to produce the effect, and they would have forgotten the First Cause, upon whose power they were dependent. Second causes were avoided in order that they might see the connection between the First Cause and the effect produced—human instrumentality stood in abeyance, in order that the Divine agency might be recognised. Thus they were taught to have faith in God, and to rely upon the presence and the power of the Invisible Jehovah. [Back]

CHAPTER IX.
THE TRANSITION FROM THE MATERIAL SYSTEM, BY WHICH RELIGIOUS IDEAS WERE CONVEYED THROUGH THE SENSES, TO THE SPIRITUAL SYSTEM, IN WHICH ABSTRACT IDEAS WERE CONVEYED BY WORDS AND PARABLES.

Human language has always advanced from its first stage, in which ideas are acquired directly through the medium of the senses, to the higher state, in which abstract ideas are conveyed by appropriate words and signs. When an idea is once formed by outward objects, and a word formed representing that idea, it is then no longer necessary or desirable that the object which first originated the idea should longer be associated in the mind with the idea itself. It is even true that the import of abstract ideas suffers from a co-existence, in the mind, of the abstract thought with the idea of the object which originated it. Thus the word spirit now conveys a distinct idea to the mind of pure spiritual existence; but the distinctness and power of the idea are impaired, by remembering that the word from which it was derived originally signified wind, and that the word itself was originated in the first place by the wind. So in other cases, although the ideas of abstract and spiritual things can be originated, primarily, only from outward objects, yet when they have been originated, and the spiritual idea has been connected with the sign or word conveying its proper sense, it is desirable, in order to their greater force and perspicuity, that their connection with materiality should be broken off in the mind.

In all written languages this advancement from one stage of perfection to another, by the addition of abstract ideas, can be traced; and experience teaches, incontrovertibly, that the advancement of human language, as above described, and the advancement of human society, are dependent upon each other.

The preceding principles being applied to the subject under consideration, it would follow that the Mosaic machinery, which formed the abstract ideas, conveying the knowledge of God’s true character, would no longer be useful after those ideas were originated, defined, and connected with the words which expressed their abstract or spiritual import. It would follow, therefore, that the machinery would be entirely dispensed with whenever it had answered the entire design for which it was put into operation. Whenever the Jews were cured of idolatry, and had obtained true ideas of the attributes of the true God, then the dispensation of shadows and ceremonies, which ‘could not make the comers thereunto perfect,’ would, according to the reason of things, pass away, and give place to a more perfect and more spiritual dispensation.

We find, accordingly, that the machinery of the tabernacle was gradually removed, it never having existed in perfection after the location of the tribes in Palestine. They sojourned in the wilderness until those who had come out of Egypt died. The generation who succeeded them had the advantage of having received their entire education through the medium of the Mosaic institution, and thus of being freed from vicious habits and remembrances contracted in idolatrous society.

Afterwards the Prophets held an intermediate place between the material dispensation of Moses and the pure spirituality of that of Christ. In the prophetic books, especially the later ones, there is an evident departure from a reliance upon the external forms, and an application of the ideas connected with those forms to internal states of mind. Their views of the old dispensation were more spiritual than the views of those who lived near the origin of the institution. And in the dispensation of the Messiah, the Prophets evidently expected clearer light and purer spirituality.

The state of the case, then, is this: The old dispensation was necessary and indispensable in itself, and in its place; but it was neither designed nor adapted to continue. The knowledge of Divine things which it generated was necessary for all men, but as yet it was circumscribed to a small portion of the human family. The point of inquiry now presents itself: How could this essential knowledge concerning the Divine Nature and attributes be extended throughout the world?

There would be but two methods possible—either the same processes, and the same cumbrous machinery (which were a ‘burden’ that an apostle affirmed neither he nor his fathers were able to bear) must be established in every nation, and kindred, and tribe of the human family, and thus each nation be disciplined and educated by itself, or one nation must be prepared and disciplined, their propensity to idolatry destroyed, the ideas coined in the die prepared by Jehovah thrown into their minds, and then, being thus prepared, they might be made the instruments of transferring those ideas into the languages of other nations.[22] If the Almighty were to adopt the first method, it would exclude men from benevolent labour for the spiritual good of each other; and besides, the history of the process with the Jews, as well as the reason of the thing, would indicate that the latter method would be the one which the Maker would adopt.

[22] There is a common, and to some minds, a weighty objection against the truth of revealed religion, stated as follows:—If God ever gave a religion to the world, why did he not reveal it to all men, and reveal it at once and perfectly, so that no one could doubt? If this had been possible, it might not have been expedient; but the nature of things, as we have seen, rendered it impossible to give man a revelation in such a manner. [Back]

But, in order to the diffusion of the knowledge of God by the latter method, some things would be necessary as pre-requisites, among which are the following:

1. That the Jews, who possessed these ideas, should be scattered throughout the world, and that they should be thus scattered long enough before the time of the general diffusion of Divine knowledge to have become familiar with the languages of the different nations where they sojourned. This would be necessary, in order that, by speaking in other tongues, they might transfer into them their own ideas of Divine things, by attaching those ideas to words in the respective languages which they spoke, or by introducing into those languages words and phrases of Hebrew origin conveying the revealed ideas. Whether the different languages were acquired by miraculous or by human instrumentality, there would be no other way possible of transferring ideas from one language to another, but by the methods above mentioned.

2. It would be necessary, before the Jews were thus scattered, that their propensity to idolatry should be entirely subdued, otherwise they would, as they had frequently done before, fall into the abominable habits of the nations among whom they were dispersed.[23]

[23] Idolatry is one of the most unconquerable of all the corrupt propensities of the human soul. Miracles under the new dispensation had scarcely ceased—the apostolic fathers were scarcely cold in their graves, before idolatrous forms were again superinduced upon the pure spirituality of the holy gospel; and in the papal church the curse continues till this hour. [Back]

3. The new and spiritual system should be first propagated among those who understood both the spiritual import of the Hebrew language, and likewise the language of the other nations to whom the gospel was to be preached. It was necessary that the new dispensation should be committed, first to the Jews, who were scattered in the surrounding nations, because, as we have seen, they were the only individuals immediately prepared to communicate it to others.

Now the following facts are matters of authentic history.

1. By instruction and discipline the Jews were entirely cured of the propensity to idolatry—so much so that their souls abhorred idols.

2. They were, and had been for many generations, dispersed among all nations of the Roman world; but still, in their dispersion they retained their peculiar ideas, and multitudes of this peculiar people assembled out of all countries, at least once a year, at the city of Jerusalem, to worship Jehovah; and it was while the multitudes were thus assembled that the gospel was first preached to them; and preached, as was proper it should be, by power and miracle, in order that those present might know assuredly that the dispensation was from heaven.

3. The new dispensation was likewise introduced, in the first place, among the Jews who continued to reside in Palestine, and when a sufficient number of them were fully initiated persecutions were caused to arise which scattered them abroad among the nations; and the Gentile languages not being known to them, they were miraculously endowed with the gift of tongues, that they might communicate to others the treasures of Divine knowledge committed to them.

Thus, when the old dispensation had fulfilled its design in disciplining the Jews, in imparting first ideas, and thus, as a ‘schoolmaster,’ preparing the people for the higher instruction of Christ; and when the fulness of the times had come that the means and the material were prepared to propagate the spiritual truth of the new dispensation, then the Mosaic cycle would appropriately close—it would not be consistent that it should remain longer, for the plain reason given by Jesus himself, that new wine should not be put into old bottles, nor the old and imperfect forms be incorporated with the new and spiritual system.

Therefore it was that so soon as the new dispensation had been introduced, and its foundations firmly laid, Jerusalem, the centre of the old economy, with the temple, and all things pertaining to the ritual service, was at once and completely destroyed, and the old system vanished away for ever. It would not have been expedient for God to destroy the old system sooner, because it was necessary to engraft the new system upon the old; and it ought not to have remained longer, for the reasons above stated.[24]

[24] It was necessary that the old system should be destroyed at this time in order to throw the Jews upon Christ as the sacrifice for their sins. Under the old dispensation the sacrifices for sin were allowed to continue to the end. From this sacrifice they were taught to hope for pardon. An idea had been, by the process which God himself instituted, originated in their mind, that death must ensue for sin; but by transferring their sins to the head of the sacrifice, it died as a vicarious expiation, and they lived. It had become a part almost of the Jewish mind, that they could not hope for pardon, unless the sacrifice was offered. They felt that their life was forfeited by sin, and they were unpardoned until the sacrifice was made, and it could be made nowhere else but at Jerusalem. Now God destroyed Jerusalem, and caused the offering for sin to cease, and entirely annihilated the possibility of their ever again expiating their sins by the bloody sacrifices; they were therefore shut up to the doctrine of Christ’s sacrifice for sin. By the destruction of Jerusalem the alternative was presented to the Jews—Accept of Christ’s sacrifice, or you have no propitiation for your sins. [Back]

CHAPTER X.
THE MEDIUM OF CONVEYING TO MEN PERFECT INSTRUCTION IN DOCTRINE AND DUTY.

The knowledge which the old dispensation was designed to generate had been transmitted into the minds of the Jews; and the Jews had been prepared to transmit the abstract import of those spiritual ideas into other languages. The Mosaic institution, having accomplished its design, was about to ‘vanish away,’ and give place to the new dispensation, which would end the series of God’s revealed instructions, by giving men a perfect system of religion, accompanied by those aids and influences which would be adapted to develop and perfect man’s moral powers, and render him, in his present condition, as perfect as his nature and his circumstances would allow.

At this point of our progress the inquiry presents itself—What can we learn, from the present constitution of things, concerning the medium or instrumentality that God would adopt in giving mankind a perfect system of religion?

When the ideas that conveyed the knowledge of God were understood by the people, human language would then become the proper medium of communication. The very fact that the ideas were generated and thrown into language, evinces that language was designed eventually to be the medium through which they should be transmitted to the world. When the ideas were prepared, as has been stated, then all that would be necessary, in order to the further and more perfect communication of knowledge, would be, that men should have a teacher to use this language—to expand, illustrate, and apply these ideas; and by these, give definitions, and illustrate and spiritualize other ideas when necessary.

Further: man’s senses are constituted with an adaptation to the external world; and his intellectual constitution is adapted to intercourse with his fellow man. The delicate bony structure of the ear, which conveys sounds from the tympanum to the sensorium, is nicely adjusted by the Maker to appreciate and convey the tones and modulations of the human voice. Human gesture, likewise, and the expression of the countenance and the eye, are auxiliary to human language in conveying instruction. The nature of man, therefore, is adapted, both physically and intellectually, to receive knowledge by communications from one of his own species. If God designed that an angel should instruct the human family, one of two things would have to be done—either the human constitution would have to be elevated and adapted to intercourse with a being of a higher order in the scale of creation, or that being would have to let down his nature to human capacity, and thus adapt himself to intercourse with human natures. And it would even be requisite that the teacher should not assume the highest condition of humanity in order that his instructions should accomplish the greatest general good; nor should his communications be made in the most cultivated and elevated style of language. If he would instruct the common mind in the best manner, he must use common language and common illustrations; and if God (blessed be his name) were himself to instruct human nature, as it is, the same means would be necessary.

Another step—Man is so constituted that he learns by example better than precept. Theory without practice, or precept without example, does not constitute a perfect system of instruction. The theory of surveying, however perfect it may be taught in college, never makes a practical surveyor. An artist may give a most perfect theory of his art to his apprentices or those whom he wishes to instruct in a knowledge of his business; but if he would have them become practical artists themselves, he must, with tools in hand, practise his own instructions before the eyes of the learner. In the language of the trades, he must ‘show how it’s done.’ Such, then, is the nature of man, that in order to a perfect system of instruction there must be both precept and example.

Now there can be but one perfect model of human nature. And man could not be removed to some other planet, nor out of his present circumstances, to be instructed. If the Almighty, therefore, designed ever to give a perfect and final system of instruction to mankind, it could be done only by placing in this world a perfect human nature—a being who would not only give perfect precepts, but who would practise those precepts before the eyes of men. If such a being were placed among men, who, amid all the perplexities, difficulties, and trials which affect men in their present condition, would exhibit perfect action of body, heart, and mind in all his relations of life, and in all his duties to God and man—that would be a model character, practising the precepts of the Divine law in man’s present circumstances. The example of an angel, or of any being of a different order from man, would be of no benefit to the human family. Man must see his duties, as man exemplified in his own nature. Human nature could be perfected only by following a perfect model of human nature. But, with the rule of duty in his hand, and a model character before him, man would have a system of instruction perfectly adapted to his nature, and adapted to perfect his nature. If God, therefore, designed to give man a final and perfect system of instruction, he would adopt the method thus adapted to the constitution which he has given his creatures.—Now, Jesus Christ is that model character. He assumed human nature—came to the earth, man’s residence—expounded and illustrated the law in human language; gave it its spiritual import, and applied it to the different circumstances and conditions of human life. He removed the false glosses which the ignorance and the prejudices of men had attached to it; he modified or rescinded those permissions or clauses which were accommodated to the darkness of former times, and the imperfections of the Jewish system: and then, by applications the most striking and definite, he showed the bearing of the rule of duty upon all varieties of human action.

And further: the law being thus defined and applied, in order that the world might have a model character, he conformed himself to all its requirements. And in order that that model might be a guide in all the varied circumstances in which some of the family of man might be placed, Jesus placed himself in all those circumstances, and acted in them. Is man surrounded by a sinful and suffering world? So was Jesus. Does he desire to know how to act in such circumstances? Jesus ministered occasionally to the temporal wants of men, and laboured continually to promote their spiritual good. Is man popular? So was Jesus; and he used his influence to purify his Father’s house. Is man forsaken by his last friend? So was Jesus; and he upbraided and murmured not, but sought consolation in communion with the Father. Does man visit and dine with the learned and the religious formalists of the age? So did Jesus; and in his conversation he maintained the claims of spiritual religion, and reproved man’s hypocrisy and formality. Does man sit down in the cottage of the poor? So did Jesus; and he encouraged and comforted the inmates with spiritual instruction. Is man present when a group of friends are assembled on an occasion which warrants innocent enjoyment? So was Jesus; and he approved their social pleasures. Is man called to sympathize with those in affliction? So was Jesus; and ‘Jesus wept.’ Thus by land and by sea, in all places and under all circumstances, wherever any of earth’s children are called to act, Jesus—the model Man—is seen living and moving before them: and his voice falls upon their ear with the mingled cadence of authority and encouragement, ‘Follow Me.’

The demonstration, then, is manifest, that, through the medium of Jesus Christ, man has received a perfect system of instruction; and a final and perfect revelation of duty to God and man could be given in no other way.

CHAPTER XI.
SOME OF THE PECULIAR PROOFS OF THE MESSIAHSHIP OF CHRIST.

We have now arrived at a point in our subject where the light of history will aid in our investigations. The facts which history furnishes, and which will elucidate the present point of inquiry, are the following: First, the Jewish prophets lived and wrote centuries before the period in which Jesus appeared in Judæa. This fact is as certain as any other item of human knowledge.

A second fact is—The Jews, about the time of Christ’s appearance, expected with more earnestness and desire than usual the appearance of their Messiah, who, they supposed, would deliver them from subjection to Gentile nations, and place the Jewish power in the ascendant among the nations of the earth. They generally supposed that as a king he would reign with great dignity and power, and, as a priest, preside over, not abrogate, the ceremonial law. Although some of the common people may have had some understanding of the true nature of the Messiah’s kingdom, yet the prominent men of the nation, and the great body of the people of all classes, were not expecting that the kingdom of Christ would be purely spiritual, but that it would be mainly temporal. And, indeed, it was necessary that they should not have a clear conception of the worth and spirituality of the Messiah’s dispensation previously to his coming; because if they had had such a conception, the imperfections and darkness of their own dispensation would not have been borne. It is contrary to the nature of mind when it is enlightened, to delight in, and employ itself longer about, the preparatory steps that lead it to the light.

The facts in the case, then, were, first, The prophets lived and wrote centuries before the era of Christ; and, second, On account of intimations, or supposed intimations, in their prophecies, the Jews were expecting the Messiah about the time that Jesus appeared in Judæa. With the question concerning the inspiration of the prophets, we have just now nothing to do. Whether they were inspired or not, their books contained the matter upon which the Jews founded their expectations of the appearance of the Messiah. With the question how the Jews could mistake the character of the Messiah, we have also now nothing to do; although the solution of the question would not be difficult. The simple facts which require attention are—The prophecies existed; and in those prophecies a Ruler was spoken of, of most exalted character, whose dominion would be triumphant, universal, and endless—whose doctrines would be pure and spiritual; and whose administration would be a blessing, not only to the Jews, but also to the Gentiles—and yet, his life would be humble and not suited to the feeling of the Jews—his sufferings extreme; and that he would terminate the old dispensation, and die for the sins of the people.[25]

[25] Isaiah liii. Dan. ix. 24-27. Micah v. 1, 2. Mal. iii. 1-3. Zech. ix. 9, 10. Isa. ix. 1-7. [Back]

Now, in view of these facts, In what character would the true Messiah appear, when he assumed his duties as the Instructor of mankind?

If he had appeared and conformed to the views which the Jews entertained of a temporal Messiah, it would have been direct evidence that he was an impostor; because the Jewish views of his character and reign, as all can now see, were selfish, ambitious, imperfect, and partial. Now, a teacher sent from God to give the world a perfect religion could not conform to such views; but an impostor, from the nature of the case, could have conformed to no other standard than the views of the people. If an impostor wished to pass himself upon the Jews as their Messiah, he must assume that character and conform to that conduct which he knew they expected in their Messiah. For an impostor to assume a different character from that which he knew the nation expected their Messiah would bear, would have been to use means to frustrate his own plans, which would be impossible; because man cannot have a governing desire for attainment of an end, and at the same time use means which he knows will frustrate the accomplishment of his own object. An impostor, therefore, in the state of expectancy which existed at that time in Judæa, could not do otherwise than conform himself to the character which the nation were expecting their Messiah would possess.

Mark the two points. The prophets gave a delineation of the character, life, and death of the Messiah. This delineation the Jews misinterpreted, or applied to several individuals; so that they were expecting in their Messiah a character entirely different from that described by the prophets.

Now mark the application of these points. If Christ had conformed to the views of the Jews there would have been three direct testimonies that he was not from God. (1.) Because their views were partial, prejudiced, wicked. (2.) He could not have conformed to their views, and sustained at the same time the character of a perfect instructor.[26] (3.) He would not have fulfilled the predictions of the prophets concerning him. But, on the other hand, if he conformed to the prophets, and assumed the character of a perfect teacher, his rejection by the Jews was absolutely certain.[27] It follows, therefore, legitimately and conclusively, that Jesus Christ was the Messiah of God, because he pursued that course which would, from the nature of the case, result in his rejection by the nation; which conduct, in an impostor, would be impossible—but in the true Messiah it was the necessary course.

[26] See chap. [x]. [Back]

[27] The fact that Jesus conformed to the prophets, established the truth of the prophecies; because, by conforming to them, he suffered death; while by his death, in accordance with the prophets, the world gained the evidence that he was the true Messiah. To give life as a testimony to falsehood, is impossible, either in a good or in an evil being. [Back]

But further: it was necessary that Jesus should establish his claim as the Messiah by miraculous agency.[28] But owing to the peculiar state of the Jewish nation at that time, there would be great difficulty in doing this, for the following reasons.—If he, as Moses did, had come publicly before the nation at Jerusalem, and by miracles of great power, frequently repeated, and extending their influence throughout all the land, had forced conviction upon the minds of all the Jews that he was the true Messiah, the immediate and inevitable result would have been, that they would have raised one universal revolt against the Roman power, and would have hurried the Saviour of sinners into the office of the King of the Jews; and then bowed down to him as the temporal sovereign of the Jewish nation. But, notwithstanding this error of the Jews, and the results to which it would directly tend, still it would be necessary in order to meet the constitution of things, that Christ should manifest, by exhibitions of miraculous power, the credentials attesting the Divinity of his mission. The inquiry then arises, How could Jesus perform miracles, and at the same time prevent revolt in the nation?

[28] See chap. [iii]. On Miracles. [Back]

The circumstances of the case would render it necessary that his miracles should not be attended by that publicity and power which would lead those who had the influence of the nation in their hands, and who were blind to the true design of his mission, into revolt and destruction. It was likewise necessary, on the other hand, that they should be sufficiently frequent, and of sufficient power, to convince the candid who witnessed them that they were the seal of heaven to the mission of Jesus. When Christ wrought miracles, therefore, he would have to aim at one end, and endeavour to prevent another—the end aimed at, that the impression might be made on honest minds, that he was the true Messiah; the end avoided, that the rulers of the nation might not, on account of his mighty miracles, rally round him as their temporal king, and thus hurry themselves and their nation to premature destruction.

Now, the character and conduct of Jesus accord entirely with the foregoing deductions, made out from undoubted historical facts. That he performed many miracles, and yet suppressed their extensive publicity, is frequently noticed in the New Testament. Jesus, therefore, had the peculiar marks of the true Messiah; and, in view of the peculiar condition of the Jewish nation at that time, the true Messiah could have assumed no other character, and pursued no other course of conduct, than that exhibited in the life of Christ.[29]

[29] Another item might be added to this demonstration, showing that in order to the ultimation of the plan of salvation, it was necessary that Jesus should so manifest himself and manage his ministry, that a part of the Jews should receive him as the Messiah, and a part reject him. [Back]

CHAPTER XII.
THE CONDITION IN LIFE WHICH IT WAS NECESSARY THE MESSIAH SHOULD ASSUME IN ORDER TO BENEFIT THE HUMAN FAMILY IN THE GREATEST DEGREE, BY HIS EXAMPLE AND INSTRUCTIONS.

Selfishness is a fundamental evil of human nature, the existence of which is acknowledged by all men. It is not an evil which belongs to any one class of human society. It is generic; and moves all ranks; each individual looks upon those who stand next or near him in society, and desires equality with, or superiority over them in wealth, or popularity, or power. The law of reason and of God requires that men should endeavour to elevate those below them up to their own condition; selfishness is the opposite principle, which urges men to elevate themselves over others. If the militia captain could follow the desires of his nature, and ascend from one condition to another until he stood upon the floor of the senate chamber, he would find that the desire which led him to take the first step, had only increased its power by gratification, and was still goading him on to rise higher; and he would stop nowhere while life lasted, until he perceived further efforts useless or dangerous. This selfish pride and desire for self-aggrandizement is detrimental both to the individual and to the social interests of men. Wherever selfish ambition exists in any degree of strength, it generates misery to the individual and to others about him. There are not, perhaps, more miserable men in the world than are some of those who have gained to some extent the object of their ambition, and are seated in the halls of legislation. Their minds are constantly anxious in making some effort, or devising some plan, by which they may promote the schemes in which they are engaged. And every time the hopes of one are realised, the stings of envy, and jealousy, and concealed hate, rankle in the bosoms of some others. In the humbler walks of life, the evil exists, perhaps in a less degree, but still it exists; and its existence is the bane of human happiness, and the cause of human guilt.

Now, this wicked desire of human nature to aspire after elevated worldly condition, rather than after usefulness of life and goodness of heart, would be either fostered or checked by the condition in life which the Messiah assumed among men. In proportion as his condition was elevated, pride and the desire of elevation would be fostered in the hearts of his followers. In proportion as his condition was humble and depressed, pride of heart would be checked in all those who received and honoured him as their Master and Teacher.[30]

[30] See chap. [v]. [Back]

Suppose that the Messiah had presented himself in the condition anticipated by the Jews; surrounded by the pomp and parade of a powerful temporal prince; sustaining the earthly dignity and splendour of the ancient monarchs of the dynasty of David. Now, had such a Messiah appeared in Judæa, it is perfectly certain, from the character of human nature, that his earthly circumstances would have a tendency to cherish in the people, as a nation, and as individuals, the bad principles of pride and ambition. Worldly pomp and circumstances would have had the sanction of the highest authority in the person of their Messiah; and it would have induced the desire in all hearts to elevate themselves as nearly as possible to his temporal condition. The pride of the human heart would have been fostered and not humbled. Instead of causing the middle walks of life to be grateful and contented in their condition, it would have produced in them an anxiety to stretch themselves upwards. And instead of causing those already elevated to benefit the worthy poor, it would have caused them to have no sympathy for any of the human family in low estate; because theirs was a condition the opposite of that assumed by the great model which they loved and admired. And instead of causing the poor to feel a greater degree of contentment, and to avoid repining at their lot, the circumstances of the Messiah would have deepened their dejection, and rendered them less happy in their depressed condition; because their condition would hinder them from approach to, or fellowship with, the Heaven-sent Instructor. A teacher, therefore, believed to be from heaven, who should assume an elevated condition in the world, instead of being a spiritual blessing to the whole family of man, by promoting in their bosoms humility and sympathy for each other, would have been a spiritual curse, by producing haughtiness and hardness of heart in the rich, ambition in the middle classes, and hopeless dejection in the poor.

Suppose the Messiah had come in the character which the Greeks admired; that, assuming the seat of the philosophers, he had startled the learned world by disclosing to them new and sublime truths. Suppose he had, by the power of far-reaching intellect, answered all the questions and solved all the difficulties which perplexed the minds of the disciples of the Porch and the Academy. In such a case his instructions would have been adapted to satisfy the minds of a few gifted individuals, but they would not have been adapted to benefit the minds of many, nor the heart of any of the great mass of mankind. Vain of their wisdom already, the character of the Messiah would have been adapted to make the philosophers more so; and instead of blessing them, by humbling their pride, and giving them a sympathy with their fellow men, it would have led them and their admirers to look upon those who were not endowed with superior mental qualities, as an inferior class of men.

But, if the Messiah could not have appeared in the condition desired by the Jews, nor in that admired by the Gentiles, the inquiry arises—What condition in life would it be necessary that the Messiah should assume, in order to benefit the human family in the highest degree by the influence of that condition? In view of the foregoing deductions, the solution is obvious: In that condition which would have the most direct influence to destroy selfishness and pride in the human heart, and to foster, in their stead, humility, contentment, and benevolence.

Now, in view of this result, deduced directly from the acknowledged character of human nature, turn your attention to the earthly circumstances of Jesus, and see how he brought the whole weight of his condition in life to bear against selfishness and pride of heart.—He was born in the lowest possible circumstances. His life was the constant rebuke to every ambitious and proud feeling of the human heart; and his death was one esteemed by men the most ignominious. No one who openly acknowledged and had fellowship with Jesus of Nazareth, as his Teacher and Master, could do so until the natural pride of his nature was subdued. It was impossible for a man to find fellowship with Jesus unless he humbled himself, because in no other state could his feelings meet those of Christ. ‘Take my yoke upon you,’ said Jesus, ‘and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.’

Thus did Jesus place himself in a condition which rendered humility absolutely necessary in order to sympathy with him—in the condition directly opposed to pride of heart, one of the most insidious enemies of man’s happiness and usefulness. And as it is an acknowledged and experimental fact that the soul finds rest only in meekness, and never in selfishness and pride of mind, therefore, the demonstration is perfect, that Christ assumed the only condition which it was possible for him to assume, and thereby destroy pride and misery, and produce humility and peace, in human bosoms.

Profane history and the New Testament Scriptures confirm the foregoing views. Tacitus, speaking of the primitive Christians, alludes to them with marked contempt, as the followers of one who had been crucified. His manner evinces clearly not only his own feelings, but it is a good index to the feelings of a majority of the people of that proud and idolatrous age; and it establishes, beyond all controversy, the fact, that no one could declare himself a follower of Christ until, for truth and for Christ’s sake, he was willing to be considered base in the estimation of the world. The elegant Pliny likewise bears direct testimony to the humility and integrity of life which characterized the early disciples of Christ.

A great number of passages in the New Testament confirm the preceding views. It is only necessary to say that the apostles understood not only the effect of their Lord’s circumstances, in life and death, upon the minds of men, but they understood likewise the philosophy and the necessity of the case. Says Paul—‘It became (or was expedient for) Him, from whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the Captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren.’—That is, the humble and self-denying life and death of Jesus was necessary, because it would have a sanctifying effect in counteracting the evils in the hearts of men. It was necessary for him to become their brother man, and assume a certain character and condition, in order that, by their becoming one with him, they might be sanctified and made happy and useful.

Thus, while the Jews required a sign, and the Greeks sought after wisdom, the apostles preached Christ crucified; understanding the philosophy, the efficiency, and the necessity of their doctrine. And so long as the world lasts, every man who reads the New Testament, whether saint or sinner, will be penetrated with the conviction that a vain, aspiring, selfish spirit is incompatible with the religion of Jesus.

CHAPTER XIII.
THE ESSENTIAL PRINCIPLES WHICH MUST, ACCORDING TO THE NATURE OF THINGS, LIE AT THE FOUNDATION OF THE INSTRUCTION OF CHRIST.

The Messiah having come in the proper character, displayed the proper credentials, and assumed the necessary condition, the question arises, What may we learn from the character of God and the nature of man concerning the fundamental principles which would govern the teaching of Jesus?

God is righteous and benevolent; it therefore follows that he would connect happiness with righteousness and goodness in his creatures. Were he to do otherwise, it would be causing the happiness of man to arise from a character different from its own, which, as God is good, would be impossible, because it would be wicked.

Further, man is so constituted that, as a matter of fact, his true happiness depends upon righteousness of life and benevolence of heart. When his will accords with his knowledge of duty, or when he acts as he knows is right towards God and his fellow men, there is peace and even complacency of conscience. Peace and complacency of conscience is the happiness which, according to man’s moral constitution, arises from righteousness, or right acting, in life. And when man exercises benevolent feeling—has love in his heart to God and men, this exercise of benevolent affection produces happiness. Now there can be no such thing as happiness of spirit except it arise from these sources. And when these sources are full and flowing, and thus unite together—when there is perfect love and a perfect life, the soul is rendered happy. A single unrighteous act of will or malevolent feeling of heart will destroy this happiness; a single emotion of hatred or ill-will, or a single evil act, known to be such, towards any of God’s creatures, will destroy the peace of the soul. Even hatred to an enemy, or the desire of revenge, or any emotion but good-will, injures the soul’s happiness.

Thus, in constituting the human soul, God, in accordance with his own character, has caused its happiness to depend upon righteousness and goodness.

Now, then, a teacher sent from God must recognise these fundamental principles, and give him instruction in view of them. The happiness of the human soul, which is its life—its first, and best, and only good, could be produced in no other way. The whole force, therefore, of Divine instruction would be designed and adapted to accomplish this necessary end. The legitimate development of God’s nature, exercised towards man, would produce such instructions and such an example; and the best good of the human soul rendered it necessary that they should be given.

It is not said that, as in the schools of philosophy, the constant inquiry and search should be for the ‘greatest good.’ The very effort to obtain happiness in this way would destroy its existence. Happiness is not objective but subjective; no direct effort could gain it; it is the result of the right action of the moral powers. It would not be necessary, therefore, that those instructed should even understand the principles which governed their instructor. It would be sufficient if the instruction were designed and adapted to promote righteousness and goodness: the happiness of the soul would follow as a result, whether or not the recipient of the instruction understood the principles which governed his teacher.

Now the whole power of Christ’s instruction was directed to this point. It was distinguished in this respect from all other instruction ever given to mankind. I say unto you, Love your enemies. Do good to them that despitefully use you. Be anxious about no worldly good. The weightier matters of the law are righteousness and the love of God. Love and obey God, and love and do good to your neighbour: this is the law and the prophets. Seek first the kingdom of heaven and its righteousness, and all other things will be added to you. That is, seek first righteousness and the love of God, and the necessary result will grow out of these exercises—happiness, or life, will be added as a consequence.

Thus was the whole force of the Saviour’s teaching and example designed and adapted to produce righteousness and benevolence; and as these are the only exercises from which man’s true happiness can arise, it follows that the principles involved in the instruction of Christ, connecting happiness with holiness, are the only principles which can, in accordance with the character of God and the constitution of man, produce the greatest good of the human soul. Jesus, therefore, was the Christ of God; because the Christ of God could found his instructions on no other principles,—the principles which are fundamental in his teaching being those which alone can produce the happiness of the soul in accordance with its own moral nature, and in accordance with the moral character of God.

CHAPTER XIV.
FAITH, THE EXERCISE THROUGH WHICH TRUTH REACHES AND AFFECTS THE SOUL.

When Christ, man’s perfect and spiritual Instructor, had come, and introduced the great doctrines of the spiritual dispensation, the next necessary step in the process was, that those truths should be brought to impress the soul, and influence the life, and so produce their proper effects upon human nature. The inquiry then presents itself: In what way could the truths of the gospel be brought into efficient contact with the soul of man?

There are but two ways in which truth can be brought into contact with the mind. The one is sometimes called knowledge; the other, faith, or belief of testimony. In the earlier and ruder ages, men were necessarily moved more by knowledge, derived from their own observation and experience, through the medium of their senses; but as mankind increased in number, important truth was conveyed by one man or one generation communicating their experience, and another man or another generation receiving it by belief in their testimony. Perception and faith are the only modes by which truth can be brought into contact with the soul; and their effects are nearly the same upon man’s conduct and feelings, with the following remarkable exception: Of facts which are the subjects of personal observation, every time they are experienced, the effect upon the soul grows less; while, on the contrary, those facts which are received by faith, produce, every time they are realised, a greater effect upon the soul. By constant sight, the effect of objects seen grows less; by constant faith, the effect of objects believed in grows greater. The probable reason of this is, that personal observation does not admit of the influence of the imagination in impressing the fact; while unseen objects, realised by faith, have the auxiliary aid of the imagination, not to exaggerate them, but to clothe them with living colours, and impress them upon the heart. Whether this be the reason or not, the fact is true, that the more frequently we see, the less we feel the power of an object; while the more frequently we dwell upon an object by faith, the more we feel its power. This being true, it follows that faith would be the method best adapted to bring the sublime truths of the new dispensation to bear upon the souls of men. And further, as the dispensation is spiritual, and has relation to unseen and eternal things, faith becomes the only medium through which they can be conveyed to the soul.

Furthermore, man is so constituted that his faith, or belief, has an influence not only over his conduct in life, but, likewise, over the character and action of the moral powers of the soul.

Faith governs the conscience.

We have said, in another place, that a true conscience depends upon a true faith. No proposition in morals is more plain. It is not our design to inquire what leads, or has led, men to a wrong faith. Whatever may be the cause of any particular belief, it is incontrovertible that, if a man believes a thing to be right, conscience cannot condemn an act performed in view of that belief. Conscience is so modified and guided by a man’s faith, that it will sanction and command an act in one man which it will forbid and condemn in another. A Roman Catholic believes that he ought to pray to the Virgin Mary to intercede for him with God; and if a good Roman Catholic were to neglect his worship to the saints, his conscience would smite him, until, in some instances, he confessed his sin with tears. Now, if a good Protestant were to pray to saints, or to any other being but God, his conscience would smite him for doing that which the conscience of the Roman Catholic smote him for not doing. So the heathen mother will conscientiously throw her infant into the Ganges, or under the wheels of Juggernaut, while the conscience of a Christian mother would convict her of murder were she to do the same act. Conscience seldom convicts those whom Christians call impenitent persons for neglecting to pray, while the moment a man becomes a true believer, he will be convicted of guilt if he neglects the duty. So certainly and so clearly is it true, that a man’s conscience is governed by his faith.

Faith governs the affections.

As man is constituted, no power in the universe can move his affections to an object until he believes that the object possesses some loveliness or excellency of character. The heart is affected just as much by the goodness of another, if we believe that goodness to exist, as it would be if we knew that it existed. No matter, in the case of the affections, whether the object in reality possesses the good qualities or not, if they are fully believed to exist, the affections will act just as certainly as though they really did exist. The affections are constituted to be governed by faith. And they act most powerfully, as was demonstrated in a previous chapter, in view of good qualities existing in another, who, under certain circumstances, exercises those qualities towards us. The fact, then, is apparent, that the conduct of man’s life is influenced by what he believes; and especially that the character and action of the moral powers of his nature are governed by the principle of faith.

Another most important fact in connection with this subject is, that a man’s interests, temporal and spiritual, depend upon what he believes. The nature of man and the nature of things are so constituted, that the belief of falsehood always destroys man’s interests, temporal or spiritual, and the belief of truth invariably guides man right, and secures his best and highest good.

Perhaps the most absurd and injurious adage that has ever gained currency among mankind, is ‘that it is no difference what a man believes, if only he be sincere.’ Now, the truth is, that the more sincerely a man believes falsehood, the more destructive it is to all his interests, for time and eternity. This statement can be confirmed in every mind beyond the reach of doubt.

First, The influence of believing falsehood on temporal and social interests.

We will state some cases of common and constant occurrence, in order that the principle may be made obvious.

A gentleman of property and the highest respectability, in the course of his business transactions, became acquainted with an individual, who, as the event showed, was a man destitute, in a great degree, of a conscientious regard for truth. The persuasions and false representations of this man led the gentleman referred to, to embark almost his entire fortune with him in speculations in which he was at that time engaged. While this matter was in progress, the friends of the gentleman called upon him, and stated their doubts of the individual’s integrity who solicited his confidence, and likewise of the success of the enterprises in which he was asked to engage. The advice of his friends was rejected—he placed confidence in the false statements of the individual referred to—he acted upon those statements, and was, consequently, involved in pecuniary distress. In this case, the gentleman not only sincerely believed the falsehood to be the truth, but he had good motives in relation to the object which he desired to accomplish. He was a benevolent man. He had expended considerable sums for charitable and religious uses, and his desire was, by the increase of his property, to be enabled to accomplish greater good. In this case he was injured likewise by believing what others did not believe. The individual who seduced him into the speculation, had endeavoured to lead others to take the same views and to act in the same way; they did not believe the falsehood, and were, consequently, saved; he believed, and was, consequently, ruined.

When the English army under Harold, and the Norman under William the Conqueror, were set in array for that fearful conflict which decided the fate of the two armies, and the political destinies of Great Britain, William, perceiving that he could not, by a fair attack, move the solid columns of the English ranks, had recourse to a false movement, in order to gain the victory. He gave orders that one flank of his army should feign to be flying from the field in disorder. The officers of the English army believed the falsehood, pursued them, and were cut off. A second time, a false movement was made in another part of the field. The English again believed, pursued, and were cut off. By these movements the fortunes of the day were determined. Although the English had the evidence of their senses, yet they were led to believe a falsehood—they acted in view of it; the consequence was, the destruction of a great part of their army, and the establishment of the Norman power in England.

How often does it occur that the young female, possessing warm affections and being inexperienced in the wiles of villains, is led to believe falsehood which destroys her prospects and her happiness while life lasts! Under other circumstances she might have been virtuous, useful, happy. By false indications of affection her heart is won—by false promises of faithfulness and future good her assent to marry is gained; and then, when too late, she discovers that her husband is a villain, and she is forsaken, with a broken heart, to the cold sympathies of a selfish world. No matter how many hearts, besides her own, are broken by her error; no matter how sincere, or how guileless, or how young; she sincerely believed the falsehood, and is thereby ruined. Nothing in heaven or on earth will avert the consequences. If she had doubted, she would have been saved. She believed, and is consigned to sorrow till she sinks into her grave.

Secondly, The belief of falsehood in relation to spiritual things destroys man’s spiritual interests.

It is an incontrovertible fact that the whole heathen world, ancient and modern, have believed in and worshipped unholy beings as gods. Now, from the necessities of the case, as demonstrated in the introductory chapter, the worshipper becomes assimilated to the character of the object worshipped. In consequence of believing falsehood concerning the character of God, all heathendom, at the present hour, is filled with ignorance, impurity, and crime. As a mass of corruption spreads contagion and death among all those who approach it, so certainly does the worship of unholy beings taint the soul, and spread moral corruption through the world. ‘Can a man take coals into his bosom, and not be burned?’—Neither can the soul hold communion with beings believed to be unholy, and not itself become corrupt. The fact is so plain that it is not necessary to detail again the impurities, the vices, the tortures, the self-murders, and the unnatural affections of the heathen world, in order to show the deadly evils, both to the body and soul, which arise from the belief of falsehood in relation to spiritual things. It must be obvious to everyone that, if the heathen believed in one holy and benevolent God, their abominable and cruel rites would cease. It follows, therefore, that it is the belief of falsehood that causes their ignorance and corruption.

Thus it is invariably and eternally true that the belief of truth will lead a man right, and secure his temporal, spiritual, and eternal interests; and on the contrary, the belief of falsehood will lead a man wrong, and destroy his interests in relation to whatever the falsehood pertains, whether it be temporal or eternal.

The preceding premises being established, the following conclusions result:

1. The entire man, in his body and soul, his actions and moral feelings, is governed by what he believes; and that, in relation to things that should have a constantly increasing influence over the spirit, faith is a more powerful actuating cause than sight, because the one gains while the other loses power by repetition.

2. That the belief of falsehood, concerning any human interest, is fatally injurious; while the belief of truth is eternally beneficial. And that the more sincerely any one believes error, the more certainly he destroys his interests, whether temporal or spiritual: while, on the contrary, the more sincerely a man believes truth, the more certainly and powerfully are his interests advanced. The living God has connected evil with the belief of falsehood, and good with the belief of truth; it is a part of the constitutional law of the moral universe; and there is no power in existence that will stop the consequence from following the antecedent.

Mark it—That doctrine which rectifies the conscience, purifies the heart, and produces love to God and men, is necessarily true; because, as it has been demonstrated that righteousness and benevolence are the greatest good of the soul, and likewise that the greatest good must depend on the belief of truth, therefore the conclusion is inevitable that that doctrine which, being believed, destroys sin in the heart and life of man, and produces righteousness and benevolence, is the truth of God. No matter whether men can comprehend all its depths and relations or not, if it destroys sin wherever it takes effect by faith, and makes happiness grow out of right living and right loving, from the constitution of things—from the character of God—from the nature of man—that doctrine is the truth of God. And that doctrine which hinders this result, or produces a contrary result, is the falsehood of the devil.[31]

[31] John viii. 44. [Back]

4. Therefore Christ laid at the foundation of the Christian system this vital and necessary principle, ‘He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall be damned,’—saved in accordance with the moral constitution of the universe, and damned from the absolute necessities existing in the nature of things.

CHAPTER XV.
THE MANIFESTATIONS OF GOD WHICH WOULD BE NECESSARY, UNDER THE NEW AND SPIRITUAL DISPENSATION, TO PRODUCE IN THE SOUL OF MAN AFFECTIONATE OBEDIENCE.

Man’s mental and moral constitution was the same under the New as under the Old Testament dispensation. The same methods, therefore, which were adapted to move man’s nature under the one, would be adapted to do so under the other. The difference between the two dispensations was, the first was a preparatory dispensation, its manifestations, for the most part, being seen and temporal; the second, a perfect system of truth, spiritual in its character, and in the method of its communication. But whether the truths were temporal or spiritual, and, whether they were brought to view by faith or sight, in order to produce a given effect upon the soul, or any of its powers, the same methods under all dispensations would be necessary, varied only to suit the advancement of the mind in knowledge, the differences existing in the habits and circumstances of men, and the character of the dispensation to be introduced. For instance: under one dispensation—it being in a great measure temporal, preparatory, and imperfect—love might be produced by making men feel temporal want, and by God granting temporal benefits: while under a spiritual and universal system, men must likewise feel the want, and receive the benefit, in order to love; but the want felt and the benefit conferred must be of a spiritual character.

Under all dispensations, an essential requisite, after the way for its introduction was prepared, would be such manifestations of God to men as would produce love in the human heart for the object of worship and obedience. ‘Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,’ is the first great law of the universe; and God cannot be honoured, nor man made happy, unless his obedience be actuated by love to the object of obedience.[32] Now the manifestations of mercy, under the old dispensation, were mainly temporal in their character, and limited in their application to the Jews. But God’s special goodness to them could not produce love in the hearts of the Gentiles. The manifestations in Egypt were, therefore, neither adapted in their character, nor in the extent of their design, to the spiritual and universal religion of Jesus Christ. But one part of the Mosaic economy was universal and immutable in its character. The moral law is the same for ever in its application to all intelligent beings in the universe. It is plain to reason that, whatever means may be adopted to bring men to rectitude of conduct or to pardon them for offences, the rule of right itself, founded upon the justice and holiness, and sustained by the conscience, of the Eternal, must be immutable and eternal as its Author; and the means, manifestations, and influences, under the different dispensations, are expedients of mercy, designed and adapted to bring men to act in conformity with its requirements.

[32] See chap. [iv]. on Affectionate Obedience. [Back]

How, then, under the new dispensation, and in conformity with its spiritual and universal character, could love for God be produced in the human heart?

We will here, again, as the subject in hand is most important, notice some of the conditions upon which affection for an object may be produced in the heart.

The will is influenced by motives and by affection; and all acts of will produced entirely by pure affection, are disinterested acts. There is, probably, no one living, who has attained to maturity of years, but has, at some period of life, felt affection for another, so that it was more gratifying to please the object of his affection than to please himself. Love for another always influences the will to do those things which please the object loved; and the acts which proceed from affection are disinterested, not being done with any selfish end in view, but to conform to the will and meet the desires of another. The moment the affections are fixed upon an object, the will is drawn into union with the will of the object loved; and if that object be regarded as superior, in proportion as he rises above us in the scale of being, to obey his will and secure his regard becomes a spontaneous volition of the soul; and the pleasure that arises from affectionate compliance with the will of a worthy and loved object, does not arise because it is sought for, but from the constitution the Maker has given to the human soul; it is the result of its activity, produced in accordance with the law of love.

All happy obedience must arise from affection, exercised towards the object obeyed. Obedience which arises from affection blesses the spirit which yields it, if the conscience approve of the object obeyed. While, on the contrary, no being can be happy in obeying one whom he does not love. To obey a parent, or to obey God, from interested motives, would be sin. The devil might be obeyed for the same reasons. All enlightened minds agree to what the Bible confirms, and what reason can clearly perceive, without argument, that love for God is essential to every act of religious duty. To tender obedience or homage to God, while we had no love for him in our hearts, would be dishonourable to the Maker, and doing violence to our own nature.

When an object presents itself to the attention, whose character engages the heart, then the affections flow out, and the soul acts sweetly in this new relation. There is a bond of sympathy between the hearts of the two beings, and those things which affect the one affect the other, in proportion to the strength of the cherished affection. One meets the desires and conforms to the will of the other, not from a sense of obligation merely, but from choice. And in thus giving and receiving affection, the soul experiences its highest enjoyment, its greatest good; and when the understanding perceives, in the object loved, perfections of the highest character, and affection of the purest kind for those that love him, the conscience sanctions the action of the heart and the obedience of the will, and all the moral powers of the soul unite in happy and harmonious action.

We return, now, to the problem—Under the spiritual dispensation of Christ, how could the affections of the soul be awakened by faith, and fixed upon God their proper object?

The principle has been stated, which everyone will recognise as true in his own experience, that the more we feel the want of a benefactor, temporal or spiritual, and the more we feel our inability to rescue ourselves from existing difficulties and impending dangers, the more grateful love will the heart feel for the being who, moved by kindness, and in despite of personal sacrifices, interposes to assist and save us.

Under the Old Testament dispensation the affections of the Israelites were educed and fixed upon God in accordance with this law of the soul. They were placed in circumstances of abject need; and from this condition of suffering and sorrow, God delivered them, and thus drew their hearts to himself. Now the Jews, as has been noticed, supposed that the Messiah would appear, and again confer upon them similar favours, by delivering them from their state of dependence and subjection as a nation. But a temporal deliverance of this kind, as has been shown, was not consistent with the design of Christ’s perfect and spiritual dispensation, which was designed to save men from sin and spiritual bondage, and restore them to spiritual happiness by restoring them to affectionate obedience to the only living and true God.

The inquiry, then, presents itself, as a feeling of want was necessary, in order that the soul might love the Being who supplied that want—and as Jesus came to bestow spiritual mercies upon mankind—How could men be brought to feel the want of a spiritual Benefactor and Saviour?

Allow the thought to be repeated again—According to the constitution which God has given the soul, it must feel the want of spiritual mercies before it can feel love for the Giver of those mercies; and just in proportion as the soul feels its lost, guilty, and dangerous condition, in the same proportion will it exercise love to the Being who grants spiritual favour and salvation. How, then, could the spiritual want be produced in the souls of men, in order that they might love the spiritual Benefactor?

Not by temporal bondage and temporal suffering, because these would lead men to desire a temporal deliverance. The only possible way by which man could be made to hope for and appreciate spiritual mercies, and to love a spiritual deliverer, would be to produce a conviction in the soul itself of its evil condition, its danger as a spiritual being, and its inability, unaided, to satisfy the requirements of a spiritual law, or to escape its just and spiritual penalty. If man could be made to perceive that he was guilty and needy, that his soul was under the condemnation of the holy law of a holy God, he would then necessarily feel the need of a deliverance from sin and its consequences; and in this way only could the soul of man be led to appreciate spiritual mercies or love a spiritual benefactor.

Mark another fact, in connection with the foregoing, which is to be especially noticed, and which will be developed fully in subsequent pages—The greater the kindness and self-denial of a benefactor manifested in our behalf, the warmer and the stronger will be the affection which his goodness will produce in the human heart.

Here, then, are two facts growing out of the constitution of human nature—First, the soul must feel its evil and lost state, as the pre-requisite condition upon which alone it can love a deliverer; Secondly, the degree of kindness and self-denial in a benefactor, temporal or spiritual, graduates the degree of affection and gratitude that will be awakened for him.

Now, in view of these necessary conditions, mark the means which God has used, and the manifestations which he has made of himself, in order to secure the supreme love of the human soul.

In the first place, The soul is brought to see and feel its evil and lost condition, and its need of deliverance.

At the advent of Jesus, the Roman world was in precisely the condition which was necessary to prepare it for his doctrines. The Jews had the moral law written in their Scriptures, and recognised it as the will of Jehovah; and the Gentiles had its requirements, concerning their duty to each other, and their duty to worship, written upon their hearts. Both the doctors among the Jews, and the schools of philosophy among the Gentiles, especially those of the Stoics, taught the obligatory nature of many of the important moral duties which man owes to man. No period in the history of the heathen mind ever existed before or since, when man’s relations to man were so clearly perceived.[33] The Jews, however, had these advantages, that while the few intelligent Gentiles received the instruction of the philosophers in relation to morals as truth, it was truth without any higher sanction than that of having been spoken by wise men, and therefore it contained in itself no authority or weight of obligation to bind the conscience; while they had the Moral Law as a rule of duty, sanctioned by the authority and infinite justice of Jehovah. Thus the moral virtues assumed the sanction of religious duties; and they had not only the moral precepts thus sanctioned, but, having been taught the true character of God, their religious duties were likewise united in the same sacred decalogue.

[33] For the views of the different schools of Grecian and Roman philosophy at this period, and the amount of their indebtedness to the Jewish Scriptures, see Enfield’s History of Philosophy. [Back]

There was, however, in the application of the law, one most important and vital mistake, in relation to what constituted human guilt. The moral law was generally applied as the civil law, not to the acts of the spirit, but to the acts of the body. It was applied to the external conduct of men, not to the internal life. If there was conformity to the letter of the law in external manners, there was a fulfilment, in the eyes of the Jew and the Gentile, of the highest claims that God or man held upon the spirit. No matter how dark or damning were the exercises of the soul, if it only kept its sin in its own habitation, and did not develop it in action, the penalty of the law was not laid to its charge. The character of the spirit itself might be criminal, and all its exercises of thought and feeling sensual and selfish, yet if it added hypocrisy to its guilt, and maintained an outward conformity to the law—a conformity itself produced by selfishness—man judged himself, and others adjudged him, guiltless. Man could not, therefore, understand his own guilt, as a spiritual being, nor feel his condemned and lost condition, until the requirements of the holy law were applied to the exercises of his soul.

Now, Jesus applied the Divine law directly to the soul, and laid its obligation upon the movements of the will and the desires. He taught that all wrong thoughts and feelings were acts of transgression against God, and as such would be visited with the penalty of the Divine law. Thus he made the law spiritual, and its penalty spiritual, and appealing to the authority of the supreme God, he laid its claims upon the naked soul. He entered the secret recesses of the spirit’s tabernacle; he flashed the light of the Divine law upon the awful secrets known only to the soul itself; and with the voice of a God, he spoke to the ‘I’ of the mind: ‘Thou shalt not will, nor desire, nor feel wickedly.’

When he had thus shown that all the wrong exercises of the soul were sin against God, and that the soul was in a guilty condition, under the condemnation of the Divine law, he then directs the attention to the spiritual consequences of this guilt. These he declared to be exclusion from the kingdom and presence of God, and penalty which involved either endless spiritual suffering, or destruction of the soul itself. The punishment which he declared to be impending over the unbelieving and impenitent spirit, he portrayed by using all those figures which would lead men to apprehend the most fearful and unmitigated spiritual misery.

Before the impenitent and unpardoned sinner there was the destruction of the soul and body in hell—consignment to a state of darkness, where the worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched—cursed and banished from God into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels—agonising in flame, and refused a drop of water to mitigate the agony. Now, these figures, to the minds both of Jews and Gentiles, must have conveyed a most appalling impression of the misery that was impending over the soul, unless it was relieved from sin, and the consequent curse of the law. Jesus knew that the Jews, especially, would understand these figures as implying fearful future punishment: he therefore designed to do, what was undoubtedly accomplished in the mind of everyone that believed his instruction, which was, to produce a conviction of sin in the soul, by applying to it the requirements of the spiritual law of God, and by showing that the penalty consequent upon sin was fearful and everlasting destruction. We say, then, what everyone who has followed these thoughts must perceive to be true, that the instruction of Jesus would necessarily produce, in the mind of everyone that believed, a conviction that he was a guilty and condemned creature, and that an awful doom awaited his soul, unless he received pardon and spiritual deliverance.

Thus, then, by the instruction of Jesus Christ, showing the spirituality and holiness of the Divine law, and applying it, with its infinite sanctions, to the exercise of the soul, that condition of mind was produced which alone could prepare man to love a spiritual deliverer; and there is no other way in which the soul could have been prepared, in accordance with truth and the constitution of its own nature, to appreciate the spiritual mercies of God, and love him as a spiritual Saviour.

The law and the truth being exhibited by Christ in the manner adapted to produce the condition of soul pre-requisite to the exercise of affection for spiritual deliverance—now, as God was the author of the law, and as he is the only proper object both of supreme love and obedience; and, as man could not be happy in obeying the law without loving its author, it follows, that the thing now necessary, in order that man’s affections might be fixed upon the proper object of love and obedience, was, that the supreme God should, by self-denying kindness, manifest spiritual mercy to those who felt their spiritual wants, and thus draw to himself the love and worship of mankind. If any other being should supply the need, that being would receive the love; it was therefore necessary that God himself should do it, in order that the affection of believers might centre upon the proper object.

But, notice, that in order to the accomplishment of this end, without violating the moral constitution of the universe, it would be essentially necessary that the holiness of God’s law should be maintained. This would be necessary, because the law is, in itself, the will of the Godhead, and God himself must be unholy before his will can be so. And whatever God may overlook in those who know not their duty, yet, when he reveals his perfect law, that law cannot, from the nature of its Author, allow the commission of a single sin. But, besides, if its holiness were not maintained, man is so constituted that he could never become holy. Every change to a better course in man’s life must be preceded by a conviction of error; man cannot repent and turn from sin till he is convicted of sin in himself. Now, if the holiness of the law, as a standard of duty, was maintained, man might thus be enlightened and convicted of sin, until he had seen and felt the last sin in his soul; and if the law allowed one sin, there would be no way of convicting man of that sin, or of converting him from it; he would, therefore, remain, in some degree, a sinner for ever. But, finally and conclusively, if the holiness of the law was not maintained, that sense of guilt and danger could not be produced which is necessary in order that man may love a spiritual Saviour. Jesus produced that condition by applying to the soul the authority, the claims, and the sanctions of the holy law. It is impossible, therefore, in the nature of things, for a sinful being to appreciate God’s mercy, unless he first feel his justice as manifested in the holy law. Love in the soul is produced by the joint influence of the justice and mercy of God. The integrity of the eternal law, therefore, must be for ever maintained.[34]

[34] The preceding views are confirmed, both by the character of the moral law, and by its design and exposition, as given by the apostles of Christ. The moral law, or the rule and obligation of moral rectitude in the sight of God, which is revealed in the Scriptures, and interpreted by Christ as obligatory upon the thoughts and feelings of the soul, is not only in its nature of perpetual and universal obligation, and adapted to produce conviction of sin in every soul that is sensible of transgressing its requirements; but the Scriptures expressly declare that it was designed to produce conviction of sin in the soul, in order to prepare it to receive the gospel.

The moral law is set forth in the Scriptures as holy, just, and good in its character; and whatever may be its effects upon the soul itself, that its character is such no intelligent being in the universe can doubt, because it requires of every one perfect holiness, justice, and goodness; it requires that the soul should be perfectly free from sin in the sight of God: and, as we have seen, God ought not to allow one sin; if he did, the law would not be holy, nor adapted to make men holy. But the more holy the law, the more conviction it would produce in the mind of sinners. If the law extended only to external conduct, men would not feel guilty for their wrong thoughts, desires, or designs; and if it extended only to certain classes of spiritual exercises, men would not feel guilty for those which it did not condemn; but if it required that the soul itself—the spiritual agent—the ‘I’ of the mind—should be holy, and all its thoughts and feelings in accordance with the law of love and righteousness, then the soul would be convicted of guilt for a single wrong exercise, because, while it felt that the law was holy, just, and good, it could not but feel condemned in breaking it. When Christ came, therefore, every soul that was taught its spirituality would be convicted of sin. One of two things men had to do, either shut out its light from their soul, and refuse to believe its spiritual and perfect requirements, or judge and condemn themselves by those requirements. And while the law thus showed sin to exist in the soul, and condemned the soul as guilty and liable to its penalty, it imparted no strength to the sinner to enable him to fulfil its requirements; it merely sets forth the true standard, which is holy in itself, and which God must maintain; and, by its light, it shows sinners their guilt, condemns them, and leaves them under its curse.

Now, the Scriptures declare that this is the end which, by its [!-- continuing footnote --] nature, it is adapted to accomplish, and that it was revealed to men with the design to accomplish this end, and thus lead men to see and feel the necessity of justification and pardon by Jesus Christ. The Scripture says, ‘It is easier for heaven and earth to pass than one tittle of the law to fail.’ ‘The law worketh wrath: for where there is no law, there is no transgression.’ ‘Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded grace did much more abound; that as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.’ Mark the following—‘Now we know that what things soever the law saith it saith to them who are under the law; that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.’

The argument of the apostle in vindicating the holiness of the law, while it, at the same time, produced conviction and condemnation, is conclusive. ‘What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet; (that is, I should not have felt covetousness to be sin, except the law had condemned it as such;) for I was alive (that is, not consciously condemned) without the law once; but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died; and the commandment, which was ordained to life, (that is, which required the soul to be holy and therefore alive to God,) I found to be unto death. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, (or acts shown to be sin by the commandment,) deceived me, and by it slew me. Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good. Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, (that is, sin which did exist in the soul, was made to appear in its true evil character,) working death in me by that which is good; (that is, the holiness of the law showed the evil of sin;) that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful. For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.’ And then, for deliverance from this bondage, he looks to Christ—‘For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death,’ etc. And mark again—‘Is the law then against the promises of God? God forbid: for if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law (that is, while the law showed the soul unholy and condemned to spiritual death, it provided no means for the relief of the sinner—no influence by which love and holiness could be produced in the heart). But the Scripture (that is, the revelation of law in the Scriptures) hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed; wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.’

Now, from the above Scriptures it is evident that the apostle understood the law not only to be adapted, but designed by its Author, to show the soul its guilty and lost condition, its inability to free itself from the condemnation to which it was liable, and to prepare it, at the proper time, to love and trust in Christ for salvation from sin, and spiritual death, the consequence of sin. [Back]

How, then, could God manifest that mercy to sinners by which love to himself and to his law would be produced, while his infinite holiness and justice would be maintained?

We answer, in no way possible, but by some expedient by which his justice and mercy would both be exalted. If, in the wisdom of the Godhead, such a way could be devised, by which God himself could save the soul from the consequences of its guilt—by which he himself could in some way suffer and make self-denials for its good; and, by his own interposition, open a way for the soul to recover from its lost and condemned condition, then the result would follow inevitably, that every one of the human family who had been led to see and feel his guilty condition before God, and who believed in God thus manifesting himself to rescue his soul from spiritual death—everyone, thus believing, would, from the necessities of his nature, be led to love God his Saviour; and mark, the greater the self-denial and the suffering on the part of the Saviour, in ransoming the soul, the stronger would be the affection felt for him.

This is the central and vital doctrine of the plan of salvation. We will now, by throwing light and accumulating strength upon this doctrine from different points, illustrate and establish it beyond the possibility of rational doubt.