I have adduced the testimony of Bishop Butler as to the soundness of our views on human nature: I shall here transcribe a few passages from a writer, in whose language a kindred philosophy becomes most eloquent and inspiring—I mean Doctor Channing.—“I repeat it,” he says, “showing the moral power of faith in the divine capacities of man, to resemble our Maker we need not quarrel with our nature or our lot. Our present state, made up as it is, of aids and trials, is worthy of God, and may be used throughout to assimilate us to him. For example: our domestic ties, the relations of neighbourhood and country, the daily interchanges of thoughts and feelings, the daily occasions of kindness, the daily claims of want and suffering, these and other circumstances of our social state, form the best sphere and school for that benevolence which is God’s brightest attribute; and we should make a sad exchange by substituting for these natural aids any self-invented artificial means of sanctity. Christianity, our great guide to God, never leads us away from the path of nature, and never wars with the unsophisticated dictates of conscience. We approach our Creator by every right exercise of the powers he gives us. Whenever we invigorate the understanding by honestly and resolutely seeking truth, and by withstanding whatever might warp the judgment; whenever we invigorate the conscience by following it in opposition to the passions; whenever we receive a blessing gratefully, bear a trial patiently, or encounter peril or scorn with moral courage; whenever we perform a disinterested deed; whenever we lift up the heart in true adoration to God; whenever we war against a habit or desire which is strengthening itself against our higher principles; whenever we think, speak or act with moral energy, and devotion to duty, be the occasion ever so humble or familiar; then the divinity is growing within us, and we are ascending towards our Author. The religion thus blends with common life. We thus draw nigh to God without forsaking men. We are thus without parting with our human nature, to clothe ourselves with the divine.” (Discourse at the ordination of the Rev. F. A. Farley.) Honour is due to all men on the ground of the worth and dignity of their nature, and of this the eloquent writer shows Christianity a proof and an illustration. “The whole of this religion is a testimony to the worth of man in the sight of God—to the importance of human nature—to the infinite purposes for which we were framed. God is there set forth as sending, to the succour of his human family, his beloved Son, the bright image and representative of his own perfections; and sending him, not simply to roll away a burden of pain and punishment, (for this, however magnified in systems of theology is not his highest work) but to create man after that divine image which he himself bears, to purify the soul from every stain, to communicate to it new power over evil, and to open before it immortality as its aim and destination—immortality by which we are to understand, not merely a perpetual, but an ever-improving and celestial being. Such are the views of Christianity. And these blessings it proffers, not to a few, not to the educated, not to the eminent, but to all human beings, to the poorest and the most fallen; and we know that through the power of its promises, it has, in not a few instances, raised the fallen to true greatness, and given them in their present virtue and peace, an earnest of the heaven which it unfolds. Such is Christianity. Men viewed in the light of this religion, are beings cared for by God, to whom he has given his Son, on whom he pours forth his spirit; and whom he has created for the highest good in the universe, the participation of his own perfections and happiness. Such is Christianity. Our scepticism in our own nature cannot quench the bright light which religion sheds on the soul and on the prospects of mankind; and just so far as we receive its truth we shall honour all men.” (Discourse on “Honour due to All Men.”)
“Theologians,” remarks a powerful writer, “say, that the very infant comes into the world under the wrath and curse of the Deity. They never learned that by observing the glory of God in the face of Christ. No such withering frown ever sat on his benignant countenance. Think of Christ’s wrath with a child! Think of Christ cursing a child! I must read in the Gospel that he did so, before I believe that God does so, and that the Calvinistic doctrine of original sin is true. In the strong horror of the human heart at the monstrous combination of such a person with such an action, I read the condemnation of that gloomiest article of a gloomy creed; and if it be a foul calumny on Christ, it must, exalted as he was, be a yet fouler calumny on God. I would sooner believe the one than the other. I would sooner imagine some Jesus of Nazareth encountering some fond father and fonder mother, in the first freshness of their parental feelings, as they pass beneath ‘the gate of the temple which was called the Beautiful;’ less beautiful in the sculptured forms of marble on which its gorgeous architecture rested than in the living human group which were there bearing the babe to the altar to dedicate it to the God of its fathers; and encountering them with that solemn malediction which would sink into their souls and corrode their lives; than I would imagine Omniscience, which witnesses each man’s birth, life, and death, to be in all earth’s scenes of parental anxiousness and fondness over helpless infancy, the all-pervading presence of an Almighty curse. Yet this is the doctrine into which thousands upon thousands of children are catechised. Why will not parents and teachers lead them, not to Calvin, but to Christ? So should they receive a blessing, even as did those children, notwithstanding that there were not wanting, even then, erring disciples to intercept their approach and forbid their coming. As his blessing was on them, so is that of his and our God. His doctrine, his conduct. ‘Their angels,’ he says, ‘do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven;’ they are the peculiar objects of the providential care which, by the number, and swiftness, and power of those supposed winged messengers, was pictorial typified; and again, ‘Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come to me, for of such is the kingdom of heaven!’”—Christ and Christianity, a series of Sermons, by the Rev. W. J. Fox: which for energy of thought, richness and beauty of imagery, truth of moral analysis and description, force and eloquence of language, may be placed in the very highest class of pulpit oratory, and even in that class be ranged with its rarest specimens. The taint of heresy has robbed them of their due fame, for in those days, without the proper admixture of orthodoxy, logic only beats the air, and eloquence speaks to the deaf adder that will not hear the voice of the charmer, charm he never so sweetly.
I quote with great pleasure one or two passages from Mr. Dewey, as illustrative of our common doctrine on human nature:
“The theologian says that human nature is bad and corrupt. Now taking this language in the practical and popular sense, I find no difficulty in agreeing with the theologian. And indeed, if he would confine himself—leaving vague and general declamation and technical phraseology—if he would confine himself to facts; if he would confine himself to a description of actual bad qualities and dispositions in men, I think he could not well go too far. Nay more, I am not certain that any theologian’s description, so far as it is of this nature, has gone deep enough into the frightful mass of human depravity. For it requires an acute perception that is rarely possessed, and a higher and holier conscience, perhaps than belongs to any, to discover and declare how bad, and degraded, and unworthy a being a bad man is. I confess that nothing would beget in me a higher respect for man, a real—not a theological and factitious—but a real and deep sense of human sinfulness and unworthiness—of the mighty wrong which man does to himself, to his religion, and his God, when he yields to the evil and accursed inclinations that find place in him. This moral indignation is not half strong enough in those who profess to talk the most about human depravity. And the objection to them is, not that they feel too much or speak too strongly, the actual wickedness, the actual and distinct sins of the wicked; but they speak too vaguely and generally of human wickedness; that they speak with too little discrimination to every man as if he were a murderer or a monster; that they speak, in fine, too argumentatively, and too much (if I may say so) with a sort of argumentative satisfaction, as if they were glad that they could make this point so strong.”
The next extract is in advocacy of human nature, eloquently pleading for it in a low and guilty condition.
“The very pirate that dyes the ocean wave with the blood of his fellow-beings; that meets his defenceless victims in some lonely sea where no cry for help can be heard, and plunges his dagger to the heart that is pleading for life, which is calling upon him by all means of kindred, of children, and of home, to spare—yes, the very pirate is such a man as you or I might have been. Orphanage and childhood; an unfriended youth; an evil companion; a resort to sinful pleasure; familiarity with vice; a scorned and blighted name; seared and crushed affections; desperate fortunes—these are the steps that might have led any one amongst us to unfurl on the high seas the bloody flag of universal defiance; to have waged war with our kind; to have put on the terrific attributes; to have done the dreadful deeds; and to have died the awful death of the ocean robber. How many affecting relationships of humanity plead with us to pity him! That head that is doomed to pay the price of blood once rested upon a mother’s bosom. The hand that did that accursed work, and shall soon be stretched cold and nerveless in the felon’s grave, was once taken and cherished by a father’s hand, and led in the ways of sportive childhood and innocent pleasure. The dreaded monster of crime has once been the object of sisterly love and all domestic endearment. Pity him, then. Pity his blighted hope and his crushed heart. It is a wholesome sensibility, it is meet for frail and sinning creatures like us to cherish. It forgoes no moral discrimination. It feels the crime, but feels it as a weak, tempted, and rescued creature should. It imitates the great Master; and looks with indignation upon the offender, and yet is grieved for him.”—Dewey.
Additional Remarks, &c.
“Our Lord Jesus Christ,” says Mr. Buddicom, “hath solemnly and emphatically said, ‘He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, but that believeth not shall be damned.’” (Yes, but is this to believe what our opponents tell us, and to be baptized into the faith of Athanasius?) “Unitarians,” he continues, “assert that they fulfil the requirement, and therefore are safe from the penalty. We, on the other hand, are assured, that as it would be treason against the sovereign of these realms, to acknowledge her claim only to a part of her dominions, while her royalty over the remainder was utterly denied; so the Unitarian scheme which would give unto the Saviour the honours of a prophet and a witness, while it would unsphere him from that full-orbed glory wherein He shines through the revelation of his grace, is treason against him and against the Majesty of God, who willeth ‘that all men should honour the son, even as they honour the father.’ Thus convinced, we deem the professors of that system to be under sentence of spiritual outlawry, which if it be not reversed, will end in the terrors of the second death.”—Lect. 8. pp. 438, 439.
The tone in which we have often been spoken of in this controversy appears to assume that we in some degree doubt the sincerity or charity of our opponents. We deny them neither. We know the history of religion well enough to be aware that as severe things have been done in sincerity as to pronounce that men dishonour Christ and God, that they are under sentence of spiritual outlawry, and if they repent not (i.e. do not turn to the opinion of their antagonists) shall surely endure the second death; we can easily believe that men say these things sincerely; for except from the necessity of conviction, we do not imagine they would reiterate perdition and denunciation as often as they do. We deny not the sincerity in which an opponent may hold an opinion or resist one: but though the motive may not be impeachable, the quality of the opinion itself may be in the last degree anti-social and pernicious. The men who built the Inquisition did it in perfect sincerity: the men who sat on its judgment-seats were for the most part sincere, so were those who dragged the heretic from his home to the dungeon, and from the dungeon to the stake. And so are those who tell us that our faith is damnable. Men may on account of belief consign antagonists to hell-fire for eternity; but unless the evidence be most clear, to pronounce the judgment requires a goodly quantity of courage. As little willing are we to refuse our opponents the charity they claim, if by that be meant a desire to promote good in their idea of it: but we may very fairly doubt the justness of that idea. Believing that heretics, such as we, are in the way to eternal destruction, it is neither inconsistent with candour or charity to tell us so, in the hope of reclaiming us; and if theologians imagined that inflicting bodily suffering might have a similar effect, we are compelled to admit them to the same merit. The worst effect of harsh and austere doctrines is that they produce harsh and austere feelings; and the professors of them, under their indurating process, can do deeds from principle which even bad men would rarely do from passion. One perverted motive is worse than a thousand evil actions. Charity in her own native sweetness is meek and gentle as the dove, and yet theology has often made her ravenous as the vulture; charity as she came from heaven marked her way in tears of mercy, but theology could so pervert her as to cause her wade to the lips in blood. The charity of the heart is very different from the charity of creeds; and when we hear English clergymen condemn the Romish Church as uncharitable, we naturally ask on what ground? Is it because she condemned heretics? So do you. Is it because she has a wrong test of heresy? Her test is substantially the same as your own. You assume that we do not believe in Christ, because we do not believe in your creed: she assumes that you do not believe in Christ because you do not believe in her councils: you denounce eternal torments on us for want of your faith; and she delivers you to the same destiny for want of her faith: the tabooed ground of heresy and orthodoxy may be circumscribed or extensive—the points may be few or many, the principle is the same, or if there be any difference, it is but breaking the big end or the little end of the egg. We are accused as traitors against God and Christ, and to make the indictment clear against us, it is illustrated by the instance of rebellion against a sovereign. This is a heavy charge, but one both unjust and false. It is evil intention that constitutes crime: a traitor opposes his sovereign and intends his dethronement; but though we should even mistake the nature of Christ, can any one who thinks for a moment venture to say our intention is for his dethronement? Let us suppose the case, no uncommon one, of an Eastern monarch who should disguise himself, and that some of his subjects failed, in their ignorance of his rank, to pay him the customary honours; what should we think of his justice, if he should call this treason, and impale the wretches who were unconscious of having offended him. It is too monstrous even for Eastern despotism. Or take the case in our own history; what should we think of Alfred’s rectitude and clemency, if when he ascended the throne from his poverty, he should have thrown the shepherd’s wife into a dungeon and chains, because, in his disguise, she uttered against him a surly rebuke. The instance is not entirely parallel, but the analogy goes far enough for my purpose. Now, though Christ were in reality the Deity which orthodoxy proclaims him, the circumstances of his earthly life, and the concealment of his infinite nature, were certainly sufficient to excuse some in ignorance for taking him to be that which he appeared; and to punish them for so natural an error, would not be a vindication of majesty, but a capricious exhibition of cruelty.
The legal and political mode of illustration is a favourite with the reverend lecturer. P. 450, we have a quotation from Blackstone, and the distinction very admirably elucidated of private wrongs and public wrongs, civil injuries, crimes and misdemeanours, &c. Sir William Blackstone never, I imagine, anticipated the honour that his Commentaries would be used to illustrate the principles of the divine government; and one of the last ideas, I apprehend, that entered his brain in delivering his lectures, was, that he was giving expositions on the ways of Providence. The Preacher in the order of illustration, gave a passing blow “at those wretched and guilty disturbers of the public peace in one of our own colonies who lately crossed the borders of a friendly state to slay and ruin and destroy, under the name of sympathizers.” An allusion, doubtless, extremely loyal; but in the present case not very logical. (Lect. p. 452.) In this part of the discourse we have other distinctions, showing that man is a public offender, that God is not a person but a sovereign, in relation to guilty man, and that a sovereign is different from a person; that God is not a creditor but a judge, and that a judge is different from a creditor. All this may be very acute, very legal, but, theologically, it has one imperfection, that of mistaking entirely the relation between God and man, of turning false analogies into false premises, and, of course, deducing from them false conclusions: of properly having nothing to do with the true matter in hand, and leaving the question precisely where it was before. “Our opponents,” says the Preacher, “assert that sins are to be regarded as debts, and as debts only.” We assert no such thing, have never asserted it, but all the contrary, and to such an idea the whole tone of our argument and of our system is in most perfect contradiction. We have no such low view of God as to think that man could owe him anything, nor any such presumptuous view of man as to imagine he could make payment to his God. Yet upon this poor assumption whole pages of declamation are wasted, for if it serves any purpose it is but to beat down the man of straw which the lecturer himself had fashioned. We hold no such view, and therefore we have never defended any such. We do our best to maintain what we assert; if others assert doctrines for us, we leave them the pleasure of the refutation; although it is only when men invent opinions for opponents that they have the double enjoyment of first building up and then pulling down. We do not regard sins as debts for which payment can be made to God; but we may fairly assert that on this principle rests the whole scheme of orthodoxy. What are the atonement and righteousness of Christ but a payment or equivalent to God for the salvation of the elect?—the very nature of the system implies this idea, and in truth it is the only idea that gives it even the appearance of consistency; for crime as such cannot be punished in the person of another, but a debt can be fairly paid by the money of another. If I commit high treason against the sovereign—to borrow an analogy from the Preacher—it would be sad work to lay the head of some one else on the block for it—but if I owe a severe creditor a thousand pounds, a rich and generous friend may pay it in my stead, and no social principle is violated by the substitute.