RELATION BETWEEN NATURAL AND REVEALED RELIGION.
The contempt with which it is the frequent practice of divines to treat the grounds of natural religion, betrays an ignorance both of the true office of revelation and of the true wants of the human heart. It cannot be justified, except on the supposition that there is some contradiction between the teachings of creation and those of Christ, with some decided preponderance of proof in favor of the latter. Even if the Gospel furnished a series of perfectly new truths, of which nature had been profoundly silent, it would be neither reasonable nor safe to fix exclusive attention on these recent and historical acquisitions, and prohibit all reference to those elder oracles of God, by which his Spirit, enshrined in the glories of his universe, taught the fathers of our race. And if it be the function of Christianity not to administer truth entirely new, but to corroborate by fresh evidence, and invest with new beauty, and publish to the millions with a voice of power, a faith latent already in the hearts of many, and scattered through the speculations of the wise and noble few,—to erect into realities the dreams which had visited a half-inspired philosophy, interpreting the life and lot of man;—then there is a relation between the religion of nature and that of Christ,—a relation of original and supplement,—which renders the one essential to the apprehension of the other. Revelation, you say, has given us the clew by which to thread the labyrinth of creation, and extricate ourselves from its passages of mystery and gloom. Be it so; still, there, in the scene thus cleared of its perplexity, must our worship be paid, and the manifestations of Deity be sought. If the use of revelation be to explain the perplexities of Providence and life, it would be a strange use to make of the explanation were we to turn away from the thing explained. We hold the key of heaven in our hands. What folly to be for ever extolling and venerating it, whilst we prohibit all approach to the temple whose gates it is destined to unlock.
One would search long to find a finer illustration than is here given of the real
NATURE OF DEVOTION.
In Devotion there is this great peculiarity,—that it is neither the work nor the play of our nature, but is something higher than either,—more ideal than the one, more real than the other. All human activities besides are one of these two things,—either the mere aim at an external end, or the mere outcome of an inner feeling. On the one hand, we plough and sow, we build and navigate, that we may win the adornments and securities of life; on the other hand, we sing and dance, we carve and paint, that we may put forth the pressure of harmony and joy and beauty breaking from within. Mechanical Toil terminates in a solid product; graceful Art is content with simple expression; but Religion is degraded when it is reduced to either character. It is not a labor of utility; and he who looks to it as a means of safety, to ingratiate himself with an awful God, and bespeak an interest in a hidden Future, is an utter stranger to its essence; his habits and words may be cast in its mould, but the spark of its life is not kindled in his heart. When fed by the fuel of prudence, the fire is all spent in fusing it into form; and the finished product is a cold and metal mimicry, that neither moves nor glows. Nor is Religion a simple gesture of passion; and to class it with mere natural language, to treat it as the rhythmical delirium of the soul working off an irrepressible enthusiasm, is to empty it of its real meaning and contents, and sink it from a divine attraction to a human excitement. The postures and movements and tones which simply manifest the impassioned mind are content to go off into space, and pass away; they direct themselves nowhither; they have no more object than a convulsion; they ask only leave to be the last shape of a feeling that must have way; and be the inspiration what it may, they close and consummate its history. But he who prays is at the beginning of aspiration, not at the evaporating end of impulse; he is drawn, not driven; he is not painting himself upon vacancy, but is surrendering himself to a Presence real and everlasting. If he flings out his arms, it is not in blind paroxysm, but that he may embrace and be embraced; if he cries aloud, it is that he may be heard; if he makes melody of the silent heart, it is no soliloquy flung into emptiness, but the low-breathing love of spirit to Spirit. Devotion is not the play even of the highest faculties, but their deep earnest. It is no doubt the culminating point of reverence; but reverence is impossible without an object, and could never culminate at all, or pass into the Infinite, unless its object did so too. In every case we find that the faculties and susceptibilities of a being tell true, and are the exact measure of the outer life it has to live; and just as many and as large proportions as it has, to just so many and so great objects does it stand related; so that from the axis of its nature you may always draw the curve of its existence. Human worship, therefore, turning to the living God as the infant's eye to light, is itself a witness to Him whom it feels after and adores; it is "the image and shadow of heavenly things," the parallel chamber in our nature with that Holy of Holies whither its incense ever ascends.
In a similar strain is this argument to show that
DEVOTION IS NOT A MISTAKE.
Be assured, all visible greatness of mind grows in looking at an invisible that is greater. And since it is inconceivable that what is most sublime in humanity should spring from vision of a thing that is not, that what is most real and commanding with us should come of stretching the soul into the unreal and empty, that historic durability should be the gift of spectral fancies, we must hold these devout natures to be at one with everlasting Fact,—to feel truly that the august forms of Justice and Holiness are at home in heaven, the object there of clearer insight and more perfect veneration. There are those who please themselves with the idea that the world will outgrow its habits of worship; that the newspaper will supersede the preacher and prophet; that the apprehension of scientific laws will replace the fervor of moral inspirations; that this sphere of being will then be perfectly administered when no reference to another distracts attention. But, for my own part, I am persuaded, that life would soon become intolerable on earth, were it copied from nothing in the heavens; that its deeper affections would pine away and its lights of purest thought grow pale, if it lay shrouded in no Holy Spirit, but only in the wilderness of space. The most sagacious secular voice leaves, after all, a chord untouched in the human heart: listening too long to its didactic monotone, we begin to sigh for the rich music of hope and faith. The dry glare of noonday knowledge hurts the eye by plying it for use and denying it beauty; and we long to be screened behind a cloud or two of moisture and of mystery, that shall mellow the glory and cool the air. Never can the world be less to us, than when we make it all in all.
Our author makes a striking reply to the common assertion that