The Theism of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries is in some respects different from the Deism of the eighteenth. It is not so cold, the God in whom it believes is not so distant from His creatures. But it is not less vehement in its depreciation of Christianity as a needless and even harmful addition to the Religion of Nature. Conspicuous among the advocates of this modern Theism have been Francis William Newman, Miss Frances Power Cobbe, and the Rev. Charles Voysey.
Francis Newman, in his youth, belonged, like his brother the famous Cardinal, to the strictest sect of Evangelicals, but, like the Cardinal also, drifted away from them, though in a totally different direction.[[4]] As he found the untenableness of certain views which he had cherished, the insufficiency of certain arguments which he had employed, he came with much anguish of mind to the conclusion that the whole fabric of historical Christianity was built upon the sand. He rapidly renounced belief after belief, and caused widespread distress and dismay by a crude attack upon the moral perfection of our Lord. His conviction that Christianity had nothing special to say for itself, and that one religion was as good as another, seems to have been mainly brought about by a discussion which he had with a Mohammedan carpenter at Aleppo. 'Among other matters, I was particularly desirous of disabusing him of the current notion of his people that our Gospels are spurious narratives of late date. I found great difficulty of expression, but the man listened to me with much attention, and I was encouraged to exert myself. He waited patiently till I had done and then spoke to the following effect: "I will tell you, sir, how the case stands. God has given to you English many good gifts. You make fine ships, and sharp penknives, and good cloth and cottons, and you have rich nobles and brave soldiers; and you write and print many learned books (dictionaries and grammars): all this is of God. But there is one thing that God has withheld from you and has revealed to us; and that is the knowledge of the true religion by which one may be saved."'[[5]]
But although Newman was led to give up Christianity, and practically to hold that one religion was as good as another, he clung tenaciously to what he supposed to be common to all religions, belief in God, a belief deep and ardent. The rationalism of the Deists did not approve itself to him. 'Our Deists of past centuries tried to make religion a matter of the pure intellect, and thereby halted at the very frontier of the inward life: they cut themselves off even from all acquaintance with the experience of spiritual men.'[[6]] He nourished his soul with psalms and hymns: he sought communion with God. He saw the weakness of Morality without the inspiring power of Religion. 'Morals can seldom gain living energy without the impulsive force derived from Spirituals.... However much Plato and Cicero may talk of the surpassing beauty of virtue, still virtue is an abstraction, a set of wise rules, not a Person, and cannot call out affection as an existence exterior to the soul does. On the contrary, God is a Person; and the love of Him is of all affections by far the most energetic in exciting us to make good our highest ideals of moral excellence and in clearing the moral sight, so that that ideal may keep rising. Other things being equal (a condition not to be forgotten) a spiritual man will hold a higher and purer morality than a mere moralist. Not only does Duty manifest itself to him as an ever-expanding principle, but since a larger and larger part of Duty becomes pleasant and easy when performed under the stimulus of Love, the Will is enabled to concentrate itself more on that which remains difficult and greater power of performance is attained.'[[7]] Where shall we find a more vivid or more spiritual description of the rise and progress of devotion in the soul than in the words of this man, who placed himself beyond the pale of every Christian communion? 'One who begins to realise God's majestic beauty and eternity and feels in contrast how little and transitory man is, how dependent and feeble, longs to lean upon him for support. But He is outside of the heart, like a beautiful sunset, and seems to have nothing to do with it: there is no getting into contact with Him, to press against Him. Yet where rather should the weak rest than on the strong, the creature of the day than on the Eternal, the imperfect than on the Centre of Perfection? And where else should God dwell than in the human heart? for if God is in the universe, among things inanimate and unmoral, how much more ought He to dwell with our souls! and they, too, seem to be infinite in their cravings: who but He can satisfy them? Thus a restless instinct agitates the soul, guiding it dimly to feel that it was made for some definite but unknown relation towards God. The sense of emptiness increases to positive uneasiness, until there is an inward yearning, if not shaped in words, yet in substance not alien from that ancient strain, "As the hart panteth after the water-brooks, so panteth my soul after Thee, O God; my soul is athirst for God, even for the Living God."'[[8]]
Mr. Newman, in his later days, we understand, had modified the bitterness of his opposition to historical Christianity and was ready to avow himself as a disciple of Christ.
Miss Frances Power Cobbe was another devout spirit who, with less violence but equal decisiveness, accepted Theism as apart from Christianity. In her case, even more visibly than in Mr. Newman's, it was not Christianity which she rejected, but sundry distortions of it with which it had in her mind become identified. She wrote not a few articles so permeated with the Christian spirit and imbued with the Christian hope that the most ardent believer in Christ could read them with entire approval and own himself their debtor. She took an active part in many philanthropic movements, and she was an earnest and eloquent advocate of faith in the Divine Ordering of the world and in human immortality.
'Theism,' she said, 'is not Christianity minus Christ, nor Judaism minus the miraculous legation of Moses, nor any other creed whatsoever merely stripped of its supernatural element. It is before all things the positive affirmation of the Absolute Goodness of God: and if it be in antagonism to other creeds, it is principally because of, and in proportion to, their failure to assert that Goodness in its infinite and all-embracing completeness.'[[9]] 'God is over us, and heaven is waiting for us all the same, even though all the men of science in Europe unite to tell us there is only matter in the universe and only corruption in the grave. Atheism may prevail for a night, but faith cometh in the morning. Theism is "bound to win" at last: not necessarily that special type of Theism which our poor thoughts in this generation have striven to define: but that great fundamental faith, the needful substruction of every other possible religious faith, the faith in a Righteous and Loving God, and in a Life of man beyond the tomb.'[[10]]
'All the monitions of conscience, all the guidance and rebukes and consolations of the Divine Spirit, all the holy words of the living, and all the sacred books of the dead, these are our primary Evidences of Religion. In a word, the first article of our creed is "I BELIEVE IN GOD THE HOLY GHOST." After this fundamental dogma, we accept with joy and comfort the faith in the Creator and Orderer of the physical universe, and believe in GOD THE FATHER ALMIGHTY, MAKER OF HEAVEN AND EARTH. And lastly we rejoice in the knowledge that (in no mystic Athanasian sense, but in simple fact) "these two are One." The God of Love and Justice Who speaks in conscience, and Whom our inmost hearts adore, is the same God Who rolls the suns and guides the issues of life and death.'[[11]]
In an able paper, A Faithless World, in which Miss Cobbe combated the assertion of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, that the disappearance of belief in God and Immortality would be unattended with any serious consequences to the material, intellectual, or moral well-being of mankind, she forcibly said, 'I confess at starting on this inquiry, that the problem, "Is religion of use, or can we do as well without it?" seems to me almost as grotesque as the old story of the woman who said that we owe vast obligations to the moon, which affords us light on dark nights, whereas we are under no such debt to the sun, who only shines by day, when there is always light. Religion has been to us so diffused a light that it is quite possible to forget how we came by the general illumination, save when now and then it has blazed out with special brightness.' The comment is eminently just, but does it not apply with equal force to Miss Cobbe herself? The Theism which she professed was the direct outcome of Christianity, could never have existed but for Christianity, was, in all its best features, simply Christianity under a different name.
That Theism, as a separate organisation, gives little evidence of conquering the world is shown by the fact that, after many years, it boasts of only one congregation, that of the Theistic Church, Swallow Street, Piccadilly, of which the Rev. Charles Voysey is minister. Mr. Voysey was at one time vicar of a parish in Yorkshire, where he issued, under the title of The Sling and the Stone, sermons attacking the commonly accepted doctrines of the Church of England, and was in consequence deprived of his living. He is distinctly anti-Christian in his teaching; strongly prejudiced against anything that bears the Christian name: criticising the sayings and doings of our Lord in a fashion which indicates either the most astonishing misconception or the most melancholy perversion. But his sincerity and fervour on behalf of Theism are unmistakable. He describes it as Religion for all mankind, based on facts which are never in Dispute. The book which is called by that title is written for the help and comfort of all his fellowmen, 'chiefly for those who have doubted and discarded the Christian Religion, and in consequence have become Agnostics or Pessimists.' It is prefaced by a dedication, which is also a touching confession of personal faith: 'In all humility I dedicate this book to my God Who made me and all mankind, Who loves us all alike with an everlasting love, Who of His very faithfulness causeth us to be troubled, Who punishes us justly for every sin, not in anger or vengeance, but only to cleanse, to heal, and to bless, in Whose Everlasting Arms we lie now and to all eternity.'[[12]]
Mr. Voysey has compiled a Prayer Book for the use of his congregation. The ordinary service is practically the morning or evening service of the Book of Common Prayer, with all references to our Lord carefully eliminated. The hymn Jesus, Lover of my Soul is changed to Father, Refuge of my Soul; and the hymn