DOUBTS OF A CONTEMPORARY ON THE DESTINY OF MAN.
The New York Sun gave us (March 25, 1877) a short but thoughtful and substantial review of a little work lately published by Rev. Dr. Nisbet, of Rock Island, Ill., on The Resurrection of the Body. The reviewer very justly affirms that the author’s conclusions are anti-Scriptural, and that his method of interpretation lays the way open to a general disregard of dogmatic truth; for if the Bible, as the doctor contends, does not really teach what the whole world has hitherto believed it to teach concerning the resurrection of the flesh, it is plain that we can never be sure that we understand the doctrine of the Bible, even when it seems perfectly clear; and, if this be so, we can have no definite knowledge of revealed truth. The critic makes some very pertinent remarks on the baneful effects that such works as the one he criticises are apt to produce; and, although he does not point out explicitly the root of the evil, yet he gives us a clue to it by averring that any interpretation of Scripture which conflicts with the universal and traditional interpretation received in the church is calculated to shake the very foundations of faith, and exposes every dogma to the attacks and sneers of unbelievers. This is to say that the Protestant principle of freely interpreting the Bible without regard to ecclesiastical tradition leads to infidelity—a truth which is painfully confirmed by daily experience, and which accounts for the sympathy of all the anti-Christian sects with Protestantism; but which the writer in the Sun—an excellent Protestant, we presume—could not very consistently insist upon. Yet the whole tone of his article shows his sincerity. He is evidently an intelligent scholar; and though he finds himself somewhat entangled in the solution of some important questions, yet he does not imitate the folly of such flippant scribblers as blaspheme what they do not understand, but he shows forbearance and circumspection, a wholesome reverence for religion, and an ardent love of truth, and expresses an earnest desire to be taught how the resurrection of the flesh and the immortality of the soul can be successfully established and vindicated against the allegations of modern sceptics.
As we anticipate that Protestant divines will probably not take the trouble to investigate the objections of the infidel school with which they too often sympathize and of which they are the unconscious props and promoters, we will consider the honest appeal of the writer as addressed to Catholic thinkers; and we intend to do briefly what we can, from our doctrinal point of view, to solve his difficulties and to set at rest his doubts. The more so because, as he remarks, whoever can furnish a way out of such difficulties will confer, by so doing, an immense benefit upon a whole world of anxious but sincere doubters on the subject of immortality.
“It cannot be denied,” says he, “that while the Christians generally believe in some kind of continuance of human existence after death, there is a great diversity of opinions among them in regard to its nature and characteristics. The men of the primitive church were not perplexed about the matter, as they were not about many others which are actively debated among us.”
This introductory remark is exceedingly important. The primitive church “was not perplexed” about the matter. Why? Apparently because the faithful were in the habit of accepting the Gospel with humility and simplicity as it was given to them by the apostles and by their successors; because the Protestant method of interpreting Scripture according to every one’s individual bias was not thought to be consistent with the profession of Christianity; because the teachers of the faith did not contradict one another, as our modern Protestant preachers and writers are wont to do to the scandal and ruin of their bewildered flocks. When we see that our Lord’s words, “This is my body,” can be construed by Protestant divines as meaning “This is not my body,” we may form an idea of what must be the result of the Protestant system of Scriptural interpretation. No one can be surprised that such a system creates perplexity, fosters debate, and ends in discord and ultimately in unbelief. But if there is “a great diversity of opinions” among Protestants, such is not the case with us Catholics. We members of the universal church are not perplexed about such matters. We still believe with perfect unanimity as the primitive Christians believed; our teachers teach all the same Gospel—the Gospel of Jesus Christ as transmitted to us by legitimate channels, not the contradictory gospels and the doctrinal crotchets of free-thinking divines. That is what makes the difference.
The critic whose words suggested to us these passing remarks will not fail to see that it is mainly to the rebellious spirit and presumption of the Protestant reformers that the present age owes its theological perplexities and the loss of religious unity. Would it not be better, therefore, to give up at last the gospels of men, and return to the Gospel of the primitive Christians?
“They believed,” as our critic points out, “that at the last day the bodies of the dead would be raised to life, and that the faithful would once more, in flesh and blood, inhabit their former abodes. The most ancient versions of the Apostles’ Creed teach explicitly the resurrection of the flesh, and the earliest Christian apologist, Justin Martyr, writing only a hundred years after the death of Christ, defends the doctrine by asking whether it be any more difficult for God to create a body anew from its dust than for him to create it the first time in its mother’s womb. And Mr. Nisbet concedes that all the succeeding Fathers of the church maintain the same view. Tertullian declares: 'The flesh shall rise again wholly in every man, in its own identity, in its absolute integrity.’ Irenæus agrees with him, and so do Jerome and Augustine.”
It would appear that these authorities, to which many more of the same kind might be added, should leave no doubt in the mind of a Christian about the legitimate interpretation of the dogma of resurrection. For, when an article of faith is clearly expressed in the Gospel and has been uniformly understood in all ages by the doctors of the universal church, it is difficult to see how a man who makes profession of Christianity can think himself authorized to twist it according to his individual bias. Yet this is what Dr. Nisbet has had the courage to do.
“It is remarkable,” says the reviewer, “with what confidence Dr. Nisbet overrides this primitive interpretation of Scripture and declares it to be incorrect. He allows no weight whatever to the obvious fact that men living so much nearer than he does to the days when the New Testament was written, and with whom its very language was still in colloquial use, would be more likely than he to perceive its true meaning. He lays great stress upon the famous passage in Paul’s Epistle to the Corinthians (1 Cor. xv. 35-53), which, he thinks, asserts the resurrection-body not to be of flesh and blood. But he fails to perceive that all that Paul is contending for is a finer and more glorious form of flesh and blood. Paul’s language is: 'The trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed’ (v. 52). This he further explains in writing to the Thessalonians: 'We which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord’ (1 Thess. iv. 15-17). It was the expectation of the apostolic church that the Lord would come again in their time, agreeably to his prediction in Matthew xxiv.: 'This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled’; and in John v.: 'The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live.’ They know that the Lord had raised Lazarus and many others in their own flesh and blood, and had himself, after his resurrection, offered his body to the touch of Thomas; and they would have had to do violence to their own reasoning faculties had they conceived of any different fulfilment of his promises. When, therefore, Dr. Nisbet denounces, as he does, Mr. Talmage’s picture of the final resurrection, with its general scramble of souls for their old bodies, the flying of scattered limbs through the air, and their reconstruction in their pristine integrity, he discredits what has been for eighteen centuries the accepted faith of the Christian Church.”
One would scarcely expect that the writer, after so judicious a criticism, should hesitate to condemn Dr. Nisbet’s view; and yet he seems afraid of passing too severe a judgment on it, as he immediately adds: “Not that this proves him to be in the wrong, but only that, if he is in the right, no dogma, however venerable, is safe from attack.”
The conception that a man who professes Christianity may not be in the wrong while he throws discredit on the most venerable dogmas of Christianity is a monstrosity not only in a religious but also in a logical point of view. Unless the expressions of our critic can be construed as a figure of speech conveying under a mild and civil form the merited censure, every Christian reader will say that the critic himself is in the wrong. A pagan, or a man absolutely ignorant of the divine origin and glorious history of Christianity, might hesitate about the right or wrong of tampering with our revealed dogmas, for he would have to learn first how the fact of divine revelation has been ascertained; but a man who has read the New Testament, who lives in a Christian atmosphere, who knows the life, the miracles, the death, and the resurrection of Christ, and who consequently cannot conceal from himself the great fact of revelation—such a man, we say, astonishes us when he assumes that a Christian doctor may not be in the wrong, though he deal with revealed truth in such a loose manner as to expose every dogma, however venerable, to the attacks of our modern pagans. But let us proceed. To show how suicidal is Dr. Nisbet’s method of interpretation the reviewer says:
“In fact, men more daring and less respectful than Dr. Nisbet have employed his method of reasoning against the resurrection of what he calls the grave-flesh to controvert the idea of any resurrection at all. He assumes as unquestioned the proposition that human beings must in some way survive the death of the body, and is only solicitous to determine what that way is. But just as he shows the irrationality of expecting that the cast-off flesh and blood which served the soul for a tabernacle during life shall be taken up again, so do sceptics undertake to show the irrationality of expecting any kind of future existence whatever.”
The reviewer is perfectly right. If the teachers of Christianity are to be free to twist the word of God as they please, why shall their followers and other men be denied the same privilege? And what can be the ultimate result of such a reckless meddling with truth but universal unbelief? Faith must rest on unquestionable authority; when this latter is shaken, faith is replaced by doubt, opinion, perplexity, despondency, and all the vagaries of a weak, distracted reason. The present growth of unbelief is therefore nothing but the logical development of the Protestant method of free interpretation, which has engendered a thousand conflicting opinions and thwarted all honest efforts of its followers in the search after truth. The Catholic Church alone has a remedy for this plague of religious scepticism, for she alone has the power to teach with authority, as she alone has faithfully preserved in its primitive entirety the sacred deposit of revealed truths.
And now the reviewer comes to the most important part of his article, which consists of the objections urged by the modern unbelievers against both resurrection and immortality. He says:
“Let us briefly state some of the various reasons which they adduce, in the hope that Dr. Nisbet, or some other writer of ability, may be led to meet and overthrow these reasons, and to furnish the world at last with a solid and impregnable philosophical demonstration of the doctrine of immortality.”
It was after reading this passage that we resolved to write the present article. Not that we consider ourselves “a man of ability”; but we are in possession of truth, and are confident that we can vindicate it successfully, though we may lack the ability of our opponents. Let us proceed, therefore, without further observations, to the reviewer’s arguments.
“In the first place,” he says, “those who deny that there is any immortality of the individual human soul say it is contrary to all the analogies of nature to suppose that the death of the body does not end its individual being. Throughout creation, whenever any organization is destroyed, it is destroyed for ever. A new organization may arise similar to the old one, but it is not that one. A crystal crushed into powder ceases to be a crystal. Its particles may be dissolved and be crystallized anew; but they will form another and not the same crystal. Every vegetable runs its career from the seed to the mature plant, and, when resolved into its elements, perishes as a plant. If those elements be made to constitute a new plant, that plant begins its round as a new plant, and not as the old one. In like manner, when animals die and their bodies decay, they never reappear as the same animals. They may furnish materials for new forms of mineral, vegetable, and animal organisms, but these organisms are essentially new, and not the old ones under the new forms. And, in the same way, these sceptics contend, so far as our observation goes, human beings die once and finally, other men are born and succeed them, but they are other men and not the men who have died. Whether their dissolution took place yesterday or thousands of years ago, it is alike, so far as our ordinary experience goes, complete and irreparable.”
To answer this argument it suffices to point out that the resurrection of the flesh and the immortality of the soul are two distinct truths, of which the first is known to us by divine revelation only, the second by revelation and by reason. To say that “throughout creation whenever any organization is destroyed it is destroyed for ever,” is to say that we find nothing in the order of nature that authorizes us to infer the resurrection of our bodies. This, of course, is true; but what of it? No one pretends that the future resurrection will be brought about by natural causes acting in their natural manner and obeying natural laws. Resurrection will be the work of the Omnipotent. We believe it, not because it agrees with the analogies of nature, but because God himself, infallible truth, has informed us that he will raise us from death against all the analogies of nature. We concede, then, that whenever an organization is destroyed, it is, in the natural course of things, destroyed for ever; and consequently we concede that the course of nature affords no proof of our resurrection. But the course of nature is not the standard by which we have to judge of things supernatural. The analogies of nature did not prevent the resurrection of Lazarus, of the son of the widow, and of others of which we read in the Gospel and in other Scriptural books; nor did Christ respect the analogies of nature when he rose glorious from the tomb, as he had promised. Hence the argument from the analogies of nature has no strength whatever against the dogma of the resurrection.
Has it at least any weight against the immortality of the soul? On the contrary, it proves that the soul is naturally immortal. For, though nature can destroy the organic form, it has no power to destroy the substances of which the organism consists. The organic compound is destroyed, but all the components remain. If, then, no substance is ever destroyed by nature, how can we fail to see that the human soul, which is a substance, cannot naturally perish when the organism of the body is destroyed? We may be told that the sceptic does not concede that our soul is a substance; he rather believes that what we call the soul is a mere result of organic movements which must cease altogether when the organs are destroyed. But we answer that, if the sceptic honestly desires to be enlightened on this subject, he must not rely on the assertions of ignorant or perverse scientists who profess to know nothing but matter and force; he must read and meditate what has been written on the subject by competent men. If he has sufficient ability to understand their philosophical reasonings, he will come to the conclusion that the substantiality of the human soul is a demonstrated truth; if, on the contrary, he has too little stock of philosophy to be able to follow such reasonings, then he has no right to be a sceptic, and it becomes his duty humbly to recognize his incompetency, and to accept without demonstration what more cultivated minds consider a demonstrated truth. This last remark is very important. Scepticism and unbelief are the offspring of pride. Men pretend to see the why and the how of everything; but they often forget that they are born in ignorance, and that, as their knowledge of material things is the fruit of long and varied experience so, the knowledge of supersensible things is the fruit of long and methodic study. He who has not studied astronomy, may say very honestly that he does not know how to determine the mass of the sun or the distance of the moon; but he cannot honestly deny what astronomy teaches on the subject. To do this, to declare himself sceptic, would be accounted folly. How, then, can those be justified who, without having applied to philosophical studies, refuse to accept the soundest conclusions of philosophy about the nature of the soul? If they are at all anxious to know how to prove the substantiality of the soul, let them apply to philosophy; and they will learn that matter, owing to its inertia, cannot think, and that the organic movements cannot be the thinking principle.
The writer in the Sun answers the preceding objection in the following manner:
“In answer to this it is usually alleged that, though the body of a man dies and decays, his soul survives, and either, as Dr. Nisbet maintains, continues its existence in a purer or more ethereal world, or, as the Christian Church believes, retaining its potentiality of life, will clothe itself again, at some future time, with a bodily form and enter upon a new career.”
Let the writer take notice that, according to the doctrine of the Christian Church, the soul, when separated from the body, retains not a mere “potentiality of life,” but actual life and the exercise thereof. The life of the soul does not depend on the organism of the body; its spiritual operation has no need of organs; for reason and will are not organic faculties, though in the present life they are associated with the sensitive faculties which work through the organs. The potentiality of life, in the language of philosophy, means the capability of receiving life; and it is the organism, not the soul, that has such a potentiality.
The writer continues:
“This idea of the distinction between soul and body is as old as the history of the world. The ancient Greeks illustrated it by the example of the butterfly emerging from the hard chrysalis and winging its flight through the air. Like the butterfly, the soul of man, they said, when it casts off its material envelope, soars aloft in the enjoyment of a purer atmosphere. The symbol, and the argument drawn from it, have been adopted by moderns, and they represent the common opinion on the subject. The assertion is that the soul exists within the body as a separate entity, and that when the body dies the soul is merely set free.”
We wonder if any “argument” has ever been drawn from the example of the butterfly to prove that the soul survives the collapse of the body. Similitudes are simple illustrations of things, and they serve to help the imagination, not to convince the intellect. Yet the author seems to believe that the common opinion which holds the soul to be a substance distinct from the body owes its demonstration partially to an “argument” drawn from the butterfly; and he undertakes to show that such an “argument” has no weight. He says:
“But those who maintain this view fail to note that the butterfly, like the worm, is visible to the eye and subject to the laws of matter; and, moreover, that the butterfly, when it has fulfilled its function in the economy of creation, perishes and is never seen or heard of more. If the soul is enveloped in the body as the butterfly is in the worm, it should appear to sight when its covering is removed. This notoriously does not happen, and therefore the argument is unsatisfactory.”
Of course the “argument” would be unsatisfactory; and therefore it is that philosophers do not use it. But the critic should not condemn the similitude as wrong on the ground that “the butterfly is visible to the eye and subject to the laws of matter,” whilst such is not the case with the soul. Similitudes are used for illustrating something different from them; hence they cannot agree in all points with the things illustrated. When the visible is used as a symbol of the invisible, it is by no means pretended that we can see the one as we see the other, or that there is in the one every property of the other. A genius may be compared to an eagle; but the eagle has feathers, a beak, and a tail, which the genius has not. So the butterfly is visible to the eye, subject to the laws of matter, and perishable; and in all this it differs vastly from the human soul. But it is not on these points that the comparison is based. Hence it is idle to argue from these points against the use of the comparison.
The writer concludes the preceding in these words:
“The argument from analogy, therefore, does but little towards supporting a belief in the future existence of the soul either separately or in connection with a restored body.”
We admit that the analogies of nature, as alleged by the writer, do very little indeed towards proving a future resurrection; but we have seen that the same analogies afford an irresistible proof of the natural immortality of the human soul: No power in nature can deprive a substance of its being; the human soul is a substance; therefore no natural power can deprive it of its being. We have, then, in this argument, a first demonstration of the natural immortality of the soul. But let us follow the reviewer. He mentions four proofs adduced by philosophers and divines in favor of the immortality of the soul—namely, the reasonableness of immortality, the promises of Scripture, the legendary stories of apparitions, and, in our time, the phenomena of what is called spiritualism.
“Without in any way admitting the sceptic’s proposition,” he says, “we must yet recognize the striking fact that in the construction of the argument from reasonableness, or the à priori demonstration of the survival of the soul, our philosophers have not, so far, got one step beyond the point arrived at by the old Greeks two thousand years ago. No one has written more convincingly on the subject than Plato in his Phædo, nor is there any more thorough and exhaustive presentment of it extant than the one given by that diligent student of Greek literature, Cicero, in his Tusculan Disputations. Plato begins by appealing to the general belief of men in their immortality, which is like appealing to the general belief in fairies and witches as a proof of their existence. He then argues, from the soul’s readiness in acquiring knowledge, that it must have learned the same things in a previous state of existence; and hence, as it existed before the body, it will exist after the body ceases to be, which nowadays is not worth refuting. Next he says that the soul, being uncompounded and invisible, is indissoluble, and therefore immortal; but this is begging the question. Finally, he argues that the soul is in itself life and the opposite of death, and therefore cannot die; which is another petitio principii. In a similar manner Cicero enumerates in favor of the soul’s immortality the wide-spread conviction that it is immortal; the thirst for fame which inspires heroic deeds, and which would be absurd if death were the end of all existence; the volatile nature of the soul, which preserves it from destruction; and its superior powers over those of the body.”
We beg to remark that this passage is full of gratuitous assertions. What the writer calls “a striking fact” is not a fact. Our philosophers, as he himself proceeds to show, have added much to the reasonings of the old Greek philosophers. How can it be true, then, that they have gone “not one step beyond the point arrived at two thousand years ago”? And if this were true, how could the writer disclaim any intention of admitting “the sceptic’s proposition,” considering that the old proofs of immortality are, in his opinion, quite unsatisfactory?
A second gratuitous and unwise assertion is that to appeal to the general belief in immortality is “like appealing to the general belief in fairies and witches as a proof of their existence.” To say nothing of witches (for we need not enter into this controversy), it is not true that belief in fairies is, or has been, general, except perhaps among nursery children. But let this pass. There is a difference between belief and belief. The belief of men in the immortality of the soul does not originate in nursery tales, but in natural reason; nor is it a belief extorted by imposition, but a conclusion of which thinking men find sufficient evidence in their own nature. It is because the nature is common that the belief in immortality is common. To question it is to ignore the sensus naturæ communis, and to forfeit all claim to a fair philosophical reputation.
A third assertion, equally gratuitous and manifestly false, is that we cannot, without begging the question, infer the soul’s immortality from its simplicity. It is not easy to understand how the writer could fall into such a tangible error. The simplicity of the soul and its spirituality are demonstrated independently of the question of immortality. This being the case, it is plain that no begging of the question is possible in arguing from the known spiritual simplicity of the soul to its immortality. The writer might probably object that to assume the simplicity and spirituality of the soul is to assume its immortality. This is to say that to assume the premises is to assume the conclusion. But, if the premises are only assumed after demonstration, the conclusion which they involve will be based on demonstration and will be demonstrated. And this is the case with the soul’s immortality. If the simplicity and spirituality of the soul were assumed without proof, the argument would be worthless; but, since both are established by independent considerations, the conclusion is unquestionably valid.
The fourth gratuitous assertion consists in denouncing as a petitio principii the argument which says that the soul cannot die, “because it is life in itself.” The words “the soul is life in itself” mean that the life of the soul is not, like that of the body, borrowed from a distinct vital principle, but constitutes the very being of the soul and is involved in its essence. Hence, if the substance of the soul cannot be blotted out of existence by natural agencies, the soul is naturally immortal; for its very existence is life. And, since it is known and admitted that natural agencies are wholly incompetent to cause any created substance to vanish out of existence, the consequence is that the soul, as Plato very justly remarks, cannot naturally lose its life.
To complete the demonstration, however, something more is needed. For, although the preceding arguments show that the soul cannot be destroyed by natural agencies, they do not prove that the Author of nature, who has created it, will keep it in existence after its separation from the body. In other terms, it is necessary to show that the soul is no less extrinsically than intrinsically immortal. This the Greek philosophers, owing to their pagan notion of Divinity, have been unable to do; but it has been done by Christian philosophers, as our writer himself recognizes. He says:
“One argument, indeed, is employed by Christians which the heathens do not seem to have thought of—namely, the necessity of a future existence to compensate men for their sufferings, and to punish them for their misdeeds, in this world, and thus vindicate God’s mercy and justice. Virtuous human beings, it is said, are more or less unhappy in this life, while the wicked are happy; and therefore we must suppose that so just and benevolent a being as God will reward the one class and punish the other in a life to come.”
To this argument nothing can be objected. God cannot be more partial to the wicked than to the good. Such a course would evidently conflict with his sanctity, which necessarily loves all that is right, and necessarily hates all that is wrong. Hence the prosperity of the wicked and the trials of the good, though permitted by God for our present probation, are not final, but must be reversed when the time of probation is over—that is, at the end of the present life. A final triumph of virtue and a final punishment of vice are therefore as certain to come after this life as it is certain that God cannot forfeit his sanctity. Nevertheless, the writer in the Sun thinks that he can get rid of the argument by remarking that, if it proved anything, it would prove top much.
“As if God’s goodness,” he says, “does not much more require him to reward the virtuous here, if it requires him to reward them at all, and as if an uncertain future punishment, in a problematical state of existence, would offset a present sin.”
But this reply is extremely futile; for how can it be proved that God’s goodness requires him to reward the virtuous here? The assertion is quite arbitrary, not to say absurd; for if God’s goodness does not actually reward the virtuous here, it is evident that God’s goodness does not require that they should have their reward here. Then the writer seems to question the very necessity of reward and punishment; but he gives no reason for his doubt, as in fact no reason could be found for assuming that the moral law can be either observed without profit or violated with impunity. If there be no retribution, right and wrong are empty names, virtue becomes vice, and vice virtue. If no happiness is to be expected after death, he is most reasonable and virtuous who strives to satisfy all his passions, and he is most vicious and unreasonable who renounces his present gratification for the sake of morality. The sceptic, therefore, who denies a future life is constrained logically to admit that all virtue is foolishness, and all wisdom consists in self-indulgence and pleasure. The evident absurdity of this conclusion shows the falsity of the opinion from which it proceeds.
The writer imagines also that the future punishment is “uncertain,” and that after death there is only a “problematical” state of existence. To this we need not make a new answer, as we have seen that a future retribution is absolutely certain and not at all problematic.
“It may still further be said,” adds our writer, “that when we turn to the Scriptures, we do not find them by any means so clear and positive in regard to the survival of the soul as people generally suppose. The five books of Moses are absolutely destitute of all allusion to the subject. The Jews were told by the great lawgiver nothing whatever concerning a life beyond the grave. They were promised rewards in this world if they behaved well, and threatened with punishments in this world if they behaved ill. Their whole subsequent history illustrates this fundamental principle. When they rebelled against Jehovah and worshipped other gods, they were smitten with war, pestilence, famine, and captivity. When they were obedient to him, they were blessed with peace and plenty, and victory was granted them over their foes. In the prophetical writings, full as they are of rebukes and warnings, there is no more explicit teaching of a future life than in the Pentateuch; and, down to the advent of Christ, the sect of Sadducees, who prided themselves of their adherence to the faith of their fathers, stoutly denied it.”
Let us make a few remarks on this argument. First, were we to concede that Moses is absolutely silent about a future life, it would make no difference as to the question of the soul’s immortality. For if we argue with Christians, Moses’ silence is abundantly compensated for by other inspired writers; and if we argue with unbelievers, we know that Moses with them is no authority whether he speaks or remains silent.
Secondly, it is not true that “the five books of Moses are absolutely destitute of all allusion to the subject.” We are not going to write a dissertation on this Biblical question; it will suffice to point out a few passages which would have no meaning apart from a belief in a future life. We read in Genesis (xv. 1) that the Lord said to Abraham: “I am thy protector, and thy reward exceedingly great.” Can these words have any other meaning than “protector in the troubles of thy present life, and reward exceedingly great after the end of the struggle”? Again we read that Jacob at the approach of his death, while blessing his children, exclaimed: “I will look for thy salvation, O Lord” (ib. xlix. 18)—that is, “though I shall soon die, yet my soul will not cease to rejoice in the earnest expectation of the Redeemer who is to come”—Salutare tuum expectabo, Domine. And the same patriarch, when mourning for his son (Joseph), “would not receive comfort, but said: I will go down to my son into hell, mourning” (ib. xxxvii. 35). He therefore believed that his soul would survive its separation from the body. It is not true, then, that the books of Moses are absolutely destitute of all allusion to a future life. Nor is it lawful to argue that, because the great lawgiver promised rewards and threatened punishments of a temporal order, the eternal rewards and the eternal punishments must have been unknown to the children of Israel; for we must reflect that Moses’ menaces and promises were made to the nation or the political body, not to individual persons, and that the political body was not destined to last for ever; whence it follows that all the promises and all the menaces addressed to the nation ought to refer exclusively to the temporal order.
Thirdly, it is not true that the prophetical writings do not teach a future life. We read in Daniel (xii. 2) that “many of those that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some unto life everlasting, and others unto reproach.” These words are decisive. Death is but a sleep; we shall awake to a new life, and this future life will last for ever. “On the last day,” says Job, “I shall rise out of the earth, and I shall be clothed again with my skin, and in my flesh I shall see my God” (c. xix.) David says: “The wicked shall be turned into hell, all the nations that forget God. For the poor man shall not be forgotten to the end: the patience of the poor shall not perish for ever” (Psalm ix.) “Thy dead men,” says Isaias, “shall live, my slain shall rise again: awake, and give praise, ye that dwell in the dust” (c. xxvi.) Ezechiel (c. xviii.) intimates to the wicked that they shall die, while the just shall live; where living and dying cannot refer to the course of natural events, but must be interpreted as meaning salvation and damnation. David says again: “But God will redeem my soul from the hand of hell, when he shall receive me” (Psalm xlviii.) These passages, to which many others might be added, suffice to show that our writer is not more accurate in speaking of the prophetical writings than he is in speaking of the Pentateuch.
Fourthly, he does not seem to know that the Sadducees, notwithstanding their “priding themselves of their adherence to the faith of their fathers,” were nothing but a heretical sect; they denied the resurrection of the flesh, just as modern Protestants deny transubstantiation; and it is as absurd to appeal to the Sadducees for the right understanding of the Jewish faith as it would be to appeal to our modern heretics for the interpretation of the Catholic doctrine.
The writer adds:
“The historical books, indeed, show that in later days the doctrine gained admission into some Jewish minds, having most probably been communicated to them from their Assyrian, Persian, and Babylonian captors; but the form it took on was that of the resurrection of the flesh, which, Dr. Nisbet says, was erroneously adopted by the Christian Church. If, therefore, the Old Testament be silent on the topic, and the New Testament, as interpreted by contemporary critics, teaches a doctrine which reason cannot accept, what is there in the Bible to require a belief in any resurrection whatever?”
We have shown that the immortality of the soul was known to the Jews from the time of the patriarchs. The Assyrians, the Persians, the Babylonians, and the Egyptians were also acquainted with the same truth, but they seem to have been altogether ignorant of a future resurrection, and many of them thought that their souls were destined to transmigrate from one body to another. These errors may have been communicated to some Jews by their captors; as we know that the Sadducees denied the resurrection, and most of the Pharisees believed in metempsychosis, according to Josephus (Antiquit. l. xviii. c. 2). But if the captivity of the Jews may have been the source of these errors, it has certainly not been the origin of the belief in immortality and resurrection, which pre-existed among the Jews long before their captivity.
As to the argument which the author draws from Dr. Nisbet’s view of resurrection, we need hardly say that, if it may have some weight against Dr. Nisbet, it can have none against the Christian doctrine. The New Testament, “as interpreted by contemporary critics”—that is, by Dr. Nisbet—“teaches a doctrine which reason cannot accept.” What then? Then, concludes the writer, “there is nothing in the Bible to require a belief in any resurrection whatever.” We are at a loss to understand the logical connection of the consequence with the antecedent. Can we not suppose that there is something in the Bible which requires a belief in the resurrection of the flesh, and that Dr. Nisbet, whose infallibility is far from being demonstrated, has failed to understand it? When a man is bold enough to say that the Christian Church has “erroneously adopted” a doctrine which has been preached by the apostles and believed in without interruption for eighteen centuries by the Christian world, there is little doubt that such a man is himself in error, and that his assertions cannot be made the ground of any argumentation. On the other hand, if Dr. Nisbet “contends for a resurrection in a form composed of finer substances than flesh and blood,” he may indeed err theologically, but we fail to see how he thereby “teaches a doctrine which reason cannot accept.” In fact, reason is incompetent to decide what mode of resurrection should be accepted and what rejected; it being evident that in a question of this sort the province of reason is to submit to revelation, and to accept the doctrine universally received by the members of the church. If therefore the Old or the New Testament, or both, as interpreted by the Fathers of the church, teach a doctrine against which reason has nothing whatever to object, it is the duty of every wise and reasonable man to accept the doctrine without the least regard to the vagaries of “contemporary Protestant critics.” Now, this is the case with the doctrine of immortality and resurrection.
But our writer has more to say:
“Moreover, it is urged, if the survival of the soul is a fact at all, it is a fact to-day as much as it ever was, and, like other facts, susceptible of proof. There are departed souls enough now, if there ever were any, to make it easy to demonstrate their existence. If it be true, as so many multitudes believe, that when the body dies the soul of the man, the woman, or the child who inhabited it survives as a real man, woman, or child, with all that is requisite to personal identity, why, ask the doubters, does it not in some way manifest itself? From every home on this planet there go up daily and hourly passionate demands for the return of loved ones whom death has snatched away. Were they still in the flesh, no obstacle would prevent their hurrying to join the objects of their affection; and the sceptic finds it inconceivable that if, as is said, they hover about us in spirit form, they should not make their presence felt in some undeniable way.”
It is perfectly true that the survival of the soul is, like other facts, susceptible of proof. Yet not all facts are proved by the same kind of proofs. There are, even in the natural sciences, facts which must be proved by reasoning, owing to the impossibility of ascertaining them directly by the experimental method. We must not expect, therefore, that souls, which are spiritual and invisible, should, after departing from their bodies, give sensible signs of their survival in a different state. Nor do we need any such sensible proof of their survival; for we have proofs of a higher order, by which we show that the human soul cannot die. We therefore establish not only the fact of its survival, but also the necessity of the fact. On the other hand, if a soul were to appear before us, we might suspect the objective reality of the apparition; at best we might simply conclude that such a soul has been kept in existence; but we would have no ground for concluding that all other human souls are likewise kept in existence, and that they must remain in existence for ever. In fact, could not that soul be annihilated some time after its apparition? Or could we logically maintain that the survival of one soul suffices to prove the survival of all other souls? It is therefore impossible to prove the immortality of all human souls by means of individual apparitions; to establish it a general principle is indispensable, and this principle is drawn from the very essence of the soul and from the sanctity and justice of its Creator.
But “why does not the soul in some way manifest itself”? This question is very easily answered. The departed souls are either in heaven, or in hell, or in purgatory. If in hell or in purgatory, they are there like prisoners, and cannot freely roam about. If, on the contrary, they are in heaven, they have none other than spiritual relations with this world, except by special dispensation of divine Providence. And again, why should departed souls manifest themselves in a sensible manner? To convince us that the Scriptural doctrine of immortality is true? As if our faith in the word of God were based on the testimony of our senses, not on the authority and truthfulness of God himself. “Because thou hast seen me, Thomas, thou hast believed,” said our Lord to his sceptical disciple: “blessed are they that have not seen and have believed.” Miracles, in the present order of Providence, are not the rule, but the exception: hence the sensible manifestation of departed souls, as being above the requirements of nature, is not to be made the test of their survival.
“Were they still in the flesh,” we are told, “no obstacle would prevent their hurrying to join the objects of their affection.” Certainly; for if they were still in the flesh they would belong to this world; but, since they are no more in the flesh, they now belong to the world of spirits, which is invisible to our eyes of flesh, and from which they cannot communicate with us in sensible forms without a special command or permission of God. It is not true that they “hover about us in spirit form”; this is a pagan conception. Nor is it true that the soul survives “as a real man, woman, or child.” Souls have no sex, and man cannot be without a body; hence no departed soul is either man, woman, or child: it is a soul simply, and its “personal identity” consists in its being the same soul which was in the body.
To the question, “Why do not souls manifest themselves in a sensible way?” a second answer can be given by replying that many souls have thus manifested themselves. This answer, good and legitimate as it is, is ridiculed by sceptical critics, who, while constantly appealing to facts, are invariably determined to spurn all facts contrary to their theories. Our writer says:
“Equally inconclusive is the little we have of positive testimony on the subject. It is true that in all ages there have been some who have asserted the power of actually seeing and speaking with departed souls, and the whole tribe of spirit-mediums pretend to it now. As to what has happened in bygone times it is, of course, impossible now to base any conclusion upon it. The circumstances cannot be inquired into, and, moreover, one single witness coming before us and submitting his testimony to our scrutiny is worth more than a thousand who are out of our reach. The question is: Does anybody at this day really have intercourse with the spirits of the dead? The spirit-rappers and their followers say Yes, but the great incredulous world, after hearing all they have to present in confirmation of their assertions, still says No. There is so much fraud and nonsense connected with the business that the scientific mind rejects it contemptuously. The very phenomena themselves are clouded with a suspicion of jugglery and deceit, while there is a wide divergence of opinion as to their interpretation, even granting them to be honestly produced.”
We agree with the author that spiritists have no intercourse with the spirits of the dead, and we add that no mortal has the power to call back to this world a departed soul. This, we think, is certain both by authority and philosophy. Hence, if any spirits are really made to appear and to answer questions—which we know to be a fact, though not so frequent as simpletons are apt to believe—those spirits are not the souls of the departed, but the lying spirits of hell, who volunteer to play nonsensical tricks for the amusement and the perversion of their foolish consultors. But that departed souls have now and then appeared to men in visible form is a fact established on indisputable historical evidence. Do we not read in the Bible that the ghost of Samuel appeared to Saul, rebuked his recklessness, and intimated to him the impending defeat of his army and his own death? Nor can it be objected that the ghost was a devil, for devils do not know the future actions of men; nor can it be said that the apparition was a delusion, for the ghost was seen by the witch before it was seen by Saul; and the whole narrative of the sacred writer is so worded as to exclude the possibility of explaining away the fact by such a loose interpretation. It will be said, however, that “the scientific mind” rejects all such facts with absolute contempt. To which we may reply that “the scientific mind” has no right whatever to reject historical facts. Science is based on facts; its duty is to account for them by a sufficient reason, not to deny them when they transcend our comprehension. We know that there is a class of modern scientists who contend that everything must be explained by the properties of matter, and that no exception can be admitted in favor of supernatural facts. But we do not see how this mental disposition can be called “scientific.” If physicists refuse to acknowledge all the facts which transcend the limits of their sphere, why could not the musician reject all the phenomena which transcend his musical knowledge, or the chemist ridicule all the astronomical calculations? It is evident that every science must dwell within its proper limits, and therefore no weight can be attached to the opinions of mere physicists when they presume to decide questions entirely extraneous to their profession. Thus the facts remain, and all attempts at discrediting them must be accounted idle and unscientific talk. Lazarus, dead and buried, at the voice of Christ revived. The fact was public and recognized by Christ’s enemies. “The scientific mind” will not deny it. But then, we ask, how could the soul of Lazarus retake possession of his body, if it had ceased to exist? and what else was the rising of the body from its tomb than a sensible manifestation of the soul returned to its primitive office? We read in the Gospels, in the Acts of the Apostles, and in ecclesiastical history of many dead recalled to life either by Christ or by his disciples and followers. In all such facts souls have manifested themselves. We might mention a great number of genuine apparitions well known to all readers of the lives of saints; but as we have neither time nor intention to enter into a critical discussion of the evidence by which they are supported, we shall content ourselves with citing the glorious apparitions of Lourdes, of La Salette, and of Marpingen, which, as all the world knows, are unquestionable facts, accompanied and followed by a continuous series of public miracles, to which “the scientific mind” of modern thinkers has found nothing to object, though it has been formally and repeatedly challenged to disprove them by its pretended superior knowledge. Our Catholic readers know most of the facts to which we allude; but it is probable that the writer to whom we reply is not acquainted with them, and we would suggest to him to read M. Lasserre’s book on the apparition of Lourdes, where he will find, we trust, sufficient evidence concerning the reality and nature of the facts just mentioned. But we repeat that a Christian and a philosopher has no need of sensible manifestations to believe in the immortality of the human soul. Reason and the Gospel afford such a strong evidence of this truth that all further evidence may seem superfluous. When unbelievers ask for apparitions or sensible manifestations, we may answer them as Abraham answered the rich man: “If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they believe if one rise again from the dead” (Luke xvi. 31).
Our writer sums up his arguments as follows:
“The fact, then, seems to be—and we would earnestly press it upon the attention of religious thinkers of every kind, and especially upon theologians and clergymen, whose peculiar duty it is to deal with such subjects—the fact seems to be that analogy, reason, revelation, and human testimony alike fail to establish the doctrine that man can exist as a man without a material body. Books such as that of Dr. Nisbet rather add to than remove the philosophical difficulties of the subject so long as they leave the main question untouched. Moreover, in explaining away the popular interpretation of the Scriptures in regard to it, they tend to produce very much the same results as have been produced by the efforts to reconcile Genesis with geology. The conclusion that the Bible does not teach science correctly has been followed by the conclusion that it does not teach science at all; and so, if we agree with Dr. Nisbet that what it says about the resurrection is not to be taken literally, we shall be in great danger of rejecting its testimony altogether.”
This is to say that the Scriptures, in the Protestant system of free interpretation, lose all authority, inasmuch as the word of man is thereby substituted for the word of God. Thus far we agree with the writer. But that religious thinkers, theologians, and clergymen should undertake a new demonstration of the soul’s immortality and of the resurrection of the flesh, we consider unnecessary. Theologians and clergymen have done their duty on this point with such completeness as to make all sceptics inexcusable. All that is wanted is that the sceptics themselves undertake to study the works of such theologians and philosophers as have answered the objections of the materialists of the last century. Scepticism is ignorance. There is no remedy for it but study—the study of that special branch of knowledge on which the solution of any given question depends.
Our writer imagines that some “efforts” have been made “to reconcile Genesis with geology.” This, however, is not the case. The truth is that a class of scientists have made some “efforts” to turn geology against Genesis, and that those efforts have been unsuccessful. A science which denies to-day what it considered yesterday as demonstrated, and which is apt to deny to-morrow what it teaches to-day, needs none of our “efforts” to be reconciled with Genesis. When the facts of geology shall be well known, and when the theories built on those facts shall be logically correct, then we shall have no need of “reconciling” geology with Genesis; for geology will teach us nothing in opposition to the revealed origin of things.
As to the conclusion “that the Bible does not teach science correctly,” or “that it teaches no science at all,” we will only remark that the Biblical record of creation is a history of facts, not a treatise of science. Hence the proposition that the Bible does not teach science correctly has no meaning, whilst the proposition that the Bible teaches no science at all is perfectly true, although the facts themselves which it relates must be looked upon as the groundwork of geological science.
But our writer seems to take a different view of the subject. He says:
“Many believers in Christianity deny that the world was made in six days, although the Bible says it was made in six days; deny that a flood ever covered the tops of the mountains, that there ever were witches and magicians, and that Joshua made the sun and the moon stand still, although the Bible asserts all these things; why may they not likewise safely deny as unscientific the dogma of a future existence of all individual human beings? This is the dilemma into which speculations like those of Dr. Nisbet bring us; and if he and his school can furnish a way out of it, they will confer an immense benefit upon the whole world of anxious but sincere doubters upon this great subject.”
Such is the end of the article we have been examining. We would tell the writer that if there are believers in Christianity who deny anything revealed by God in the Bible, such believers are not consistent with themselves; for why should they believe in Christianity if they disbelieve the Bible? If the word of God in the Old Testament does not command their assent, why should the same word of God in the New Testament cause them to believe? It is clear that, if they believed on God’s authority, they could not reject anything based on that authority. A belief of this sort is not divine faith, but human opinion; it is not submission to God’s authority, but a denial of God’s authority in all things which man chooses to disbelieve; and consequently such a belief is not that faith “without which it is impossible to please God.” It is, however, the faith of many advanced Protestants; and thus we are not surprised that the writer considers such an irrational form of belief as consistent with the mutilated form of “Christianity” with which he is familiar. But we Catholics—we heirs of the apostolic doctrine transmitted to us in an uninterrupted manner by the universal church—we believe everything that has been revealed either in the Old or in the New Testament. We do not question the fact that there have been witches and magicians, nor do we see any reason for questioning it; we believe in like manner what the Bible says about the Flood, the six days of creation, Joshua’s great miracle, and everything else; by which we mean that those facts which we read in the Bible, whether we have a true appreciation of them or not, are all true, and that the difficulties we may find in their explanation arise from our ignorance, which the modern progress of science has done very little to dispel. Thus, while we are free to choose among the various explanations of Biblical facts, we all agree in believing the facts themselves. But, if this is true of those passages of Scripture whose meaning is obscure, and whose interpretation has not been settled by the authority of the church or by the consensus of the doctors, it is not true of those other passages whose meaning is obvious and unmistakable, or whose interpretation has been sanctioned by the unanimous decision of the universal church. Hence, while we may freely discuss the six days of creation and the astronomical result of Joshua’s dealings with the sun, we have no reasonable ground for discussing or doubting “the dogma of a future existence of all individual human souls.” To say that this dogma is “unscientific” is to assume what neither has been nor can be proved; unless, indeed, we call “unscientific” every truth which ranges above the compass of experimental science; in which case even logic itself would be utterly unscientific.
Whether Dr. Nisbet or his school can furnish a way out of the difficulties complained of by our writer we do not know. It is probable, however, that neither Dr. Nisbet nor any other doctor of the same school can successfully combat the invading spirit of infidelity so long as they do not give up their Protestant method of reasoning and their Protestant profession. Protestantism is itself one kind of infidelity; it cannot contribute in any way towards the restoration of sound philosophical or theological ideas; it can only sow doubt, discord, and inconsistency, thus paving the way for religious scepticism and its concomitant evils. The history of Protestantism is sufficient evidence of the fact. It is vain, therefore, to hope that Dr. Nisbet or his school will “confer any benefit upon the whole world of anxious but sincere doubters” by establishing either the immortality of the soul or the resurrection of the flesh on impregnable proofs. Let, then, all anxious but sincere doubters turn to Catholic doctors and Catholic books; let them hear the church—the old, calumniated church, the column of truth, the heir of the apostles, of the prophets, of the patriarchs, and the spouse of Christ. She will teach them how to reconcile reason with faith and religion with science, so as to believe rationally and consistently whatever God has revealed, while preserving the fullest liberty of judgment in regard to all other things. Yet we must warn these “anxious but sincere doubters” that no benefit will accrue to them, if they approach our divines or read our books with that spirit of contention which is so common among all the Protestant sects. If they are “anxious” to know the truth, they must not rely exclusively on the strength of their reasoning powers, but must be ready to yield to authority in all things connected with Christian faith. If they are “sincere,” humility must be a part of their sincerity.
To conclude: We have met and answered the reasons alleged by the writer in the Sun against the immortality of the soul and the resurrection of the flesh; and although we have scarcely developed the reflections suggested by those reasons, yet we confidently believe that our brief remarks will be found sufficient to set at rest the arguments of the sceptic. As to the doctrine of immortality in particular, of which the same writer desired “a solid and impregnable philosophical demonstration,” we have shown that the human soul neither can be destroyed by any created cause nor will be destroyed by God; accordingly, the human soul is intrinsically and extrinsically immortal. Our proofs have been few, but simple and intelligible; and we trust that the writer who gave us occasion to speak of this subject, if he chances to read these pages, will soon acquire the conviction that the doctrine of immortality was really in no need of a new philosophical demonstration.