Rebedied Realipion:
_ pation which it creates, that a Revelation will be given. ‘That earnest desire of it, which religious minds cherish,
~ Jeads the way to the expectation of it. Those who know nothing of the wounds of the soul, are not led to deal with the question, or to consider its circumstances; but when our attention is roused, then the more steadily we _ dwell upon it, the more probable does it seem that a revelation has been or will be given tous. This presentiment is founded on our sense, on the one hand, of the infinite goodness of God, and, on the other, of our own extreme misery and need—two doctrines which are the primary constituents of Natural Religion. It is difficult to put a limit to the legitimate force of this - antecedent probability. Some minds will feel it to be ~ so powerful, as to recognize in italmost a proof, without _ direct evidence, of the divinity of a religion claiming to be the true, supposing its history and doctrine are free ~ from positive objection, and there be no rival religion _ with plausible claims of its own. Nor ought this trust ina presumption to seem preposterous to those who are so confident, on & priori grounds, that the moon is inha- _ bited by rational beings, and that the course of nature is never crossed by miraculous agency. Any how, very _ little positive evidence seems to be necessary, when the mind is penetrated by the strong anticipation which I am supposing. It was this instinctiye apprehension, as we may conjecture, which carried on Dionysius and _ Damaris at Athens to a belief in Christianity, though §$t. Paul did no miracle there, and only asserted the _ doctrines of the Divine Unity, the Resurrection, and the 2 universal judgment. while, on the other hand, it had had ae pi gti and phir. 5 Rel Joton. a ee outfit of existing thoughts, principles, ikings al no tendency to attach them to any of the mythological | rites in whieh the place abounded. ¥
Heremy method of argument differs from that adopted — by Paley in his Evidences of Christianity. This clear- — headed and almost mathematical reasoner postulates, — for his proof of its miracles, only thus much, that, under — the circumstances 6f the case, a revelation is not impro-—
bable. He says, “ We do not assume the attributes of — the Deity, or the existence of a future state.’ “ It is not necessary for our purpose that these propositions — (viz. that a future existence should be destined by God — for His human creation, and that, being so destined, He _ should have acquainted them with it,) be capable of |
proof, or even that, by arguments drawn from the light of nature, they can be made out as probable; it is enough that we are able to say of them, that they are not so violently improbable, so contradictory to what we already believe of the Divine power and character, that [they] ought to be rejected at first sight, and to be rejected by whatever strength or complication of evidence they be attested.” He has such confidence in
the strength of the testimony which he can produce in favour of the Christian miracles, that he only asks to be allowed to bring it into court.
I confess to much suspicion of legal proceedings and legal arguments, when used in questions whether of history or of philosophy. Rules of court are dictated by what is expedient on the whole and in the long run; bu they incur the risk of being unjust to the claims of par- _ ticular cases. Why am I to begin with taking up a position not my own, and unclothing my mind of that desires, and hopes, which make me what I am? If I am asked to use Paley’s argument for my own conversion, I say plainly I do not want to be converted by a _ smart syllogism;* if Iam asked to convert others by _ it, I say plainly I do not care to overcome their reason
_ without touching their hearts. I wish to deal, not — with controversialists, but with inquirers. I think Paley’s argument clear, clever, and power- _ ful; and there is something which looks like charity in going out into the highways and hedges, and compelling men to come in; but in this matter some exertion on the part of the persons whom I am to convert is a condition of a true conversion. “hey who have no religious earnestness are at the mercy, day by day, of some new argument or fact, which may overtake them, in favour of one conclusion or the other. And how after all, is a man better for Christianity, who has aever felt the need of it or the desire? On the other hand, if he has longed for a revelation to enlighten him and to cleanse his heart, why may he not use, in his inquiries after it, that just and reasonable anticipation of its probability, which such longing has opened the way to his entertaining? Men are too well inclined to sit at home, instead of _ stirring themselves to inquire whether a revelation has been given; they expect its evidences to come to them without their trouble; they act, not as suppliants, but as judges.’ Modes of argument such as Paley’s, en- _ courage this state of mind; they allow men to forget that revelation is a boon, not a debt on the part of the ue Ter eat and Ase wm Religion. a
Giver; they treat it as a mere historical phenomenon. | If I was told that some great man, a foreigner, whom I ~ did not know, had come into town, and was on his way — to call on me, and to go over my house, I should send — to ascertain the fact, and meanwhile should do my best to put my house into a condition to receive him. He would not be pleased if I left the matter to take its chance, and went on the maxim that seeing was believing. Like this is the conduct of those who resolve to treat the Almighty with dispassionateness, a judicial temper, clearheadedness, and candour. It is the way with some men, (surely not a good way,) to say, that without these lawyerlike qualifications conversion is immoral, Itis their way, a miserable way, to pronounce. that there is no religious love of truth where there is fear of error. On the contrary, I would maintain that the fear of error is simply necessary to the genuine love of truth. No inquiry comes to good which is not conducted under a deep sense of responsibility, and of the issues depending upon its determination. Even the ordinary matters of life are an exercise of conscientiousness; and where conscience is, fear must be. So much is this acknowledged just now, that thereis almost. an affectation, in popular literature, in the case of criticisms on the fine arts, on poetry, and music, of insisting upon conscientiousness in writing, painting, or singing; and that earnestness and simplicity of mind, which makes men fear to go wrong in these minor matters, has surely a place in the most serious of all undertakings.
It is on these grounds that,inconsidering Christianity,
‘I start with conditions different from Paley’s; not, however, as undervaluing the force and the serviceableness of his argument, but as preferring inquiry to disputation in a question about truth.
There is another point on which my basis of argument differs from Paley’s. He argues on the principle that the credentials, which ascertain for usa message from above, are necessarily in their nature miraculous; nor have [ any thought of venturing to say otherwise. In fact, all professed revelations have been attended, in one shape or another, with the profession of miracles; and we know how direct and unequivocal are the miracles of both the Jewish Covenant and of our own. However, my object here is to assume as little as possible as regards facts,and to dwell only on what is patent and notorious; and therefore I will only insist on those coincidences and their cumulations, which, though not in themselves miraculous, do irresistibly force upon us, almost by the law of our nature, the presence of the extraordinary agency of Him whose being we already acknowledge. Though coincidences rise out of a combination of general laws, there is no law of those coincidences;° they have a character of their own, and seem left by Providence in His ~ own hands, as the channel by which, inscrutable to us, He may make known to us His will.
__ For instance, if Iam a believer in a God of Truth and Avenger oi dishonesty, and know for certain that a
428 Inference and Assent in Religion. market-woman, after calling on Him to strike her dead if she had in her possession a piece of money not hers, did fall down dead on the spot, and that the money was found in her hand, how can I call this a blind coincidence, and not discern in it an act of Providence over and above its general laws? So, certainly, thought the inhabitants of an English town, when they erected a pillar as a record of such an event at the place where it occurred. And if a Pope excommunicates a great conqueror; and he, on hearing the threat, says to one of his friends, ‘ Does he think the world has gone back a thousand years? does he suppose the arms will fall from the hands of my soldiers? ” and within two years, on the retreat over the snows of Russia, as two contemporary historians relate, “famine and cold tore their arms from the grasp of the soldiers,” “ they fell from the hands of the bravest and most robust,”’ and “ destitute of the power of raising them from the ground, the soldiers left them in the snow;”’ a coincidence so special, as rightly to be called a Divine is not this too, though no miracle, judgment? So thinks Alison, who avows with religious honesty, that ‘‘ there is something in these marvellous coincidences beyond the operation of chance, and which even a Protestant historian feels himself bound to mark for the observation of future years.” ’ cumulation of coincidences, separately less striking; when Spelman sets about establishing the fact of the illfortune which in many instances has followed upon acts of sacrilege among us, then, even though in many instances it has not followed, and in many instances he aa — ‘Dan raled Relio. bond nhs: _ exaggerates, still there may be a large i ted ofcases which cannot be properly resolved into the mere accident of concurrent causes, but must in reason be considered the warning voice «f God. So, at least, ‘thought Gibson, Bishop of London, when he wrote, “Many of the instances, and those too well-attested, are so terrible in the event, and in the circumstances so surprising, that no considering person can well pass them over.” I think, then, that the circumstances under which a professed revelation comes to us, may be such as to impress both our reason and our imagination with a sense of its truth, even though no appeal be made to strictly miraculous intervention—in saying which I do not mean of course to imply that those circumstances, when traced back to their first origins, are not the outcome of such intervention, but that the miraculous intervention addresses us at this day in the guise of those circumstances; that is, of coincidences, which are indications, to the illative sense of those who believe in a Moral Governor, of His immediate Presence, especially to those who in addition hold with me the strong antecedent probability that, in His mercy, He will thus supernaturally present Himself to our apprehension.
Now as to the fact; has what is so probable in anticipation actually been granted to us, or have we still to look out for it? It is very plain, supposing it has been granted, which among all the religions of the _ world comes from God: and if it is not that, a revela- oy 430 ©6Lnference and Assent in Religion.
tion is not yet given, and we must look forward to the — future. There is only one Religion in the world which tends to fulfil the aspirations, needs, and foreshadowings _ of natural faith and devotion. It may be said, perhaps, that, educated in Christianity, I merely judge of it by its own principles; but this is not the fact. For, in the first place, I ha¥e taken my idea of whata revelation _ must be, in good measure, from the actual religions of the world; and as to its ethics, the ideas with which 1 come to it are derived not simply from the Gospel, but prior to it from heathen moralists, whom Fathers of the Church and Kcclesiastical writers have imitated or sanctioned; and as to the intellectual position from which I have contemplated the subject, Aristotle has been my master. Besides, I do not here single out Christianity with reference simply to its particular doctrines or precepts, but for a reason which is on the surface of its history. It alone has a definite message addressed to all mankind. As far as I know, the religion of Mahomet has brought into the world no new doctrine whatever, except, indeed, that of its own divine origin; and the character of its teaching is too exact a reflection of the race, time, place, and climate in which it arose, to admit of its becoming universal. The same dependence on external circumstances is characteristic, so far as I know, of the religions of the far East; nor am I sure of any definite message from God to man which they convey and protect, though they may have sacred books. Christianity, on the other hand, is in its idea an announcement, a preaching; it is the depository of truths beyond human discovery, momentous, practical, maintained one and the same in substance in every age from its first, and addressed to all mankind. _ And it has actually been embraced and is found in all parts of the world, in all climates, among all races, in all ranks of society, under every degree of civilization, from barbarism to the highest cultivation of mind. Coming to set right and to govern the world, it has ever been, as it ought to be, in conflict with large masses of men, with the civil power, with physical force, with adverse philosophies; it has had successes, it has had reverses; but it has had a grand history, and has effected great things, and is as vigorous in its age asin its youth. In all these respects it has a distinction in the world and a pre-eminence of its own; it has upon it primd facie signs of divinity; I do not
__ know what can be advanced by rival religions to match prerogatives so special; so that I feel myself justified in saying either Christianity is from God, or a revelation has not yet been given to us.
It will not surely be objected, as a point in favour of some of the Oriental religions, that they are older than Christianity by some centuries; yet, should it be so said, it must be recollected that Christianity is only the continuation and conclusion of what professes to be an earlier revelation, which may be traced back into prehistoric times, till it is lost in the darkness that hangs over them. As far as we know, there never was a time when that revelation was not,—a revelation continuous and systematic, with distinct representatives and an orderly succession. And this, I suppose, is _ far more than can be said for the religions of the East.
7. ° 6. Here, then, I am brought to the consideration of the - Hebrew nation and the Mosaic religion, as the first step | in the direct evidence for Christianity. The Jews are one of the few Oriental nations who are known in history. as a people of progress, and their line of progress is the development of religious trath. — In that their own line they stand by themselves among — all the populations, not only of the Hast, but of the West. ‘Their country may be called the classical home of the religious principle, as Greece is the home of intellectual power, and Rome that of political and prac-_ tical wisdom. Theism is their life; it is emphatically — their natural religion, for they never were without it, and were made a people by means of it. This is a phenomenon singular and solitary in history, and us? have a meaning. If there be a God and Providence, it must come from Him, whether immediately or indirectly; and the people themselves have ever maintained | that it has been His direct work, and has been recognized by Him as such. We are apt to treat pretences — to a divine mission or to supernatural powers as of frequent occurrence, and on that score to dismiss them from our thoughts; but we cannot so deal with Judaism. When mankind had universally denied the first lesson of their conscience by lapsing into polytheism, is it a thing of slight moment that there was just one exception to the rule, that there was just one people who, first — by their rulers and priests, and afterwards by theirown ~ unanimous zeal, professed, as their distinguishing doc- _ trine, the Divine Unity and Government of the world, and that, moreover, not only as a natural truth, but as revealed to them by that God Himself of whom they _ spoke,—who so embodied it in their national polity, that a Theocracy was the only name by which it could be called? It wasa people founded and set up in Theism, kept together by Theism, and maintaining Theism for a period from first to last of 2000 years, till the dissolution _ of their body politic; and they have maintained it since in their state of exile and wandering for 2000 years more. They begin with the beginning of history, and _ the preaching of this august dogma begins with them. _ They are its witnesses and confessors, even to torture - and death; on it and its revelation are moulded their laws and government; on this their politics, philosophy, and literature are founded; of this truth their poetry is _ the voice, pouring itself out in devotional compositions which Christianity, through all its many countries and _ ages, has been unable to rival; on this aboriginal truth, as time goes on, prophet after prophet bases his further revelations, with a sustained reference to a time when, _ according to the secret counsels of its Divine Object and 4; Author, it is to receive completion and perfection,—till at length that time comes. _ _‘The last age of their history is as strange as their first. When that time of destined blessing came, _ which they had so accurately marked out, and were so carefully waiting for—a time which found them, in fact, more zealous for their Law, and for the dogma it. enshrined, than they ever had been before—then,
, instead of any final favour coming on them from above,
434. Inference and yo ap in ryeleon ee they fell under the power of their enemies, and were) | overthrown, their holy city razed to the ground, their. a - polity destroyed, and the remnant of their people — cast off to wander far and away through every land — except their own, as we find them at this day; lasting. 4 on, century after century, not absorbed in other. populations, not annihilated, as likely to last on, as unlikely to be restored, as far as outward appearances. go, now asa thousand years ago. What nation has so grand, so romantic, so terrible a history? Does it ~ not fulfil the idea of, what the nation calls itself, a — chosen people, chosen for good and evil? Is itnotan — exhibition in a course of. history of that primary declaration of conscience, as I have been determining it, “With the upright Thou shalt be upright, and with the froward ‘Thou shalt be froward”? It must have — a meaning, if there is a God. We know what was — their witness of old time; what is their witness now?
Why, I say, was it that, after so memorable a career, — when their sins and sufferings were now to come to an’ end, when they were looking out for a deliverance and a Deliverer, suddenly all was reversed for once and for — all? They were the favoured servants of God,and — yet a peculiar reproach and note of infamy is affixed — to their name. It was their belief that His protection was unchangeable, and that their Law would last for ever;—it was their consolation to be taught by an un- — interrupted tradition, that it could not die, except by. changing into a new self, more wonderful than it was — before;—it was their faithful expectation. that. a _ promised King was coming, the Megsiabe: who- won iw asc eae 2: mm: oe ee ' He me Ron ver a wh - ts Hay 4 ae ke yh i ee: Revealed Religion. | 435 e, tel fA.!. % Z - extend the sway of "Taral over all people;—it was a: - condition of their covenant, that, as a reward to
Abraham, their first father, the day at length should dawn when the gates of their narrow land should open, and they should pour out for the conquest and occupa- - tion of the whole earth;—and, I repeat, when the day came, they did go forth, and they did spread into all. few but as hopeless exiles, as eternal wanderers. Are we to say that this failure is a proof that, after all, _ there was nothing providential in their history? For myself, I do not see how a second portent obliterates a first; and, in truth, their own testimony and their own 4 sacred books carry us on towards a better solution of the - difficulty. I have said they were in God’s favour under _ a covenant,—perhaps they did not fulfil the conditions of it. This indeed seems to be their own account of i the matter, though it is not clear what their breach of | engagement was. And that in some way they did sin, a whatever their sin was, is corroborated by the wellknown chapter in the Book of Deuteronomy, which so iikingly anticipates the nature of their punishment. That passage, translated into Greek as many as 350 years before the siege of Jerusalem by Titus, has on it “the marks of a wonderful prophecy; but Iam not now ‘referring to it as such, but merely as.an indication that the disappointment, which actually overtook them at the ‘Christian era, was not necessarily out of keeping with q he original divine purpose, or again with the old pro-
Z ise made to them, and their confident ex pectation of ts fulfilment, Their national ruin, which came instead 1x ef eggrniaenen, is described in that book, in ney Bes 9 oe might be, those promises were dependent on the terms — hearing upon the evidence for the divine origin of of all promises, with an emphasis and minuteness which prove that it was contemplated long before, at least as _ a possible issue of the fortunes of Israel. Amongother — inflictions which should befall the guilty people, it was — told them that they should fall down before their enemies, and should he scattered throughout all the kingdoms of the earth; that they never should have quiet in those nations, or have rest for the sole of their foot; — that they were to have a fearful heart and languishing eyes, and a soul consumed with heaviness; that they were to suffer wrong, and to be crushed at all times, and to be astonished at the terror of their lot; that their sons and daughters were to be given to another people, and they were to look and to sicken all the day, and their life was ever to hang in doubt before them, and ~ fear to haunt them day and night; that they should be a proverb and a by-word of all people among whom ~ they were brought; and that curses were to come on them, and to be signs and wonders on them and their | seed for ever. Such are some portions, and not the 3 most terrible, of this extended anathema; and its par- — tial accomplishment at an earlier date of their history — was a warning to them, when the destined time drew near, that, however great the promises made to them of the covenant which stood between them and their Maker, and that, as they had turned to curses at that former time, so they might turn to curses again.: This grand drama, so impressed with the characters | of supernatural agency, concerns us here only in its”
Christianity; and it is at this point that Christianity
- comes upon the historical scene. It is a notorious fact that it issued from the Jewish land znd people; and had 1t no other than this historical connexion with
Judaism, it would have some share in the prestige of its original home. But it claims to be far more than this; it professes to be the actual completion of the Mosaic Law, the promised means of deliverance and triumph to the nation, which that nation itself, as I have said, has since considered to be, on account of some sin or other, withheld or forfeited. It professes to be, not the casual, but the legitimate offspring, heir, and successor of the Mosaic covenant, or rather to be
Judaism itself, developed and transformed. Of course it has to prove its claim, as well as to prefer it; but if it succeeds in doing so, then all those tokens of the Divine Presence, which distinguish the Jewish history, — at once belong to it, and are a portion of its credentials.
And at least the primd facie view of its relations towards Judaism is in favour of these pretensions. It is an historical fact, that, at the very time that the Jews committed their unpardonable sin, whatever it was, and were driven out from their home to wander over the earth, their Christian brethren, born of the same stock, and equally citizens of Jerusalem; did also issue forth from the same home, but in order to subdve that same earth anc make it their own; that is, they undertook nation actually was ordained to execute; and, with a i method of their own indeed, and with a new end, and
_ the very work which, according to the promise, their —
Him as coming then and there, as announced; they the part of the Jews, only by their assertion that He see what led them into error; they thought a triumph igradual growth of many, centuries cade a dong warfare, —
Pie. a ee as ‘ye Pe PA eee a ene’ ge ae sent in Religion. om only cal and painfully, but still really and: the roughly, they did it. And since that time the two children ofthe promise haye ever been found together —of the promise forfeited and the promise fulfilled; and — whereas the Christian has been in high place, so the Jew has been degraded and despised—the one has been ‘“ the head,” 4nd the other “ the tail;” so that, to’ go no farther, the fact that Christianity actually has done what Judaism was to have done, decides the con- _ troversy, by the logic of facts, in favour of Christianity. The prophecies announced that the Messiah was to come at a definite time and place; Christians point to are not met by any counter claim or rival claimant on did not come at all, though up to the event they had said He was then and there coming, Further, Christianity clears up the mystery which hangs over Judaism, accounting fully for the punishment of the people, by specifying their sin, their heinous sin. If, instead of hailing their own Messiah, they crucified Him, then the strange scourge which has pursued them after the deed, and the energetic wording of the curse before it, are explained by the very strangeness of their guilt;— or rather, their sin is their punishment; for in rejecting their Divine King, they ipso facto lost the living principle and tie of their nationality. Moreover, we and an empire were to be given to them at once, which | were given indeed eventually, but. by the slow and 2
Judaism having been the channel of religious traditions which are lost in the depth of their antiquity, of course
_ it is a great point for Christianity to succeed in proving that it is the legitimate heir to that former religion. Nor is it, on the other, of less importance to the significance of those early traditions to be able to determine that they were not lost together with their original store-house, but were transferred, on the failure of Judaism, to. the custody of the Christian Church. And this apparent correspondence between the two is in itself a presumption for such correspondence being real. Next, I observe, that if the history of Judaism is so wonderful as to. suggest the presence of some special divine agency in its appointments and fortunes, still more wonderful and divine is the history of Christianity; and again it is more wonderful still, that two such wonderful creations should span almost the whole course of ages, during which nations and states have been in existence, and should constitute a professed system of continued. intercourse between earth and heaven from first to last amid all the vicissitudes of human affairs. This phenomenon again carries on its face, to those who believe in a God, the probability that it has that divine origin which it professes to have; and, (when viewed in the light of the strong presumption which I have insisted on, that in God’s mercy a revelation from Him will be granted to us, and of the contrast presented by other religions, no one of which professes to be a revelation direct, | definite, and integral as this is,)—this phenomenon, I say, of cumulative marvels raises that probability, wotley for Judaism and Christianity, in religious minds, mae: to a certainty,
If Christianity is connected with Judaism as closely as I have been supposing, then there have been, by means of the two, direct communications between man and his Maker from time immemorial down to this day—a great prerogative such, that it is nowhere else even claimed. No other religion but these two professes to be the organ of a formal revelation, certainly not of a revelation which is directed to the benefit of the whole human race. Here it is that Mahometanism fails, though it claims to carry on the line of revelation after Christianity; for it is the mere creed and rite of certain races, bringing with it, as such, no gifts to our nature, and is rather a reformation of local corruptions, and a return to the ceremonial worship of earlier times, than a new and larger revelation. And while Christianity was the heir to a dead religion, Mahometanism was little more than a rebellion against a living one. Moreover, though Mahomet professed to be the Paraclete, no one pretends that he occupies a place in the Christian Scriptures as prominent as that which the Messiah fills in the Jewish. To this especial prominence of the Messianic idea I shall now advert; that _ is, to the prophecies of the Old Scriptures, and to the argument which they furnish in fayour of Christianity; _ and though I know that argument might be clearer — and more exact than it is, and I do not protege here to — a still so far forth as we enter into it, will it strengthen - our conviction of the claim to divinity both of the Religion which is the organ of those prophecies, and of _ the Religion which is their object.
- long before the Christian era, and were in the sole custody of the Jews, is undeniable; whatever then their Scriptures distinctly say of Christianity, if not attributable to chance or to happy conjecture, is pro- _ phetic. It is undeniable too, that the Jews gathered _ from those books, that a great Personage was to be born of their stock, and to conquer the whole world and to _ become the instrument of extraordinary blessings to it; _ moreover, that he would make his appearance at a fixed date, and that, the very date when, as it turned out, our Lord did actually come. ‘This is the great outline of the prediction, and if nothing more could be said about them than this, to prove as much as this is far _ from unimportant. And it is undeniable, I say, both that the Jewish Scriptures contain thus much, and that _ the Jews actually understood them as containing it. _ First, then, as to what Scripture declares. From the book of Genesis we learn that the chosen people was set up in this one idea, viz. to be a blessing to the whole arth, and that, by means of one of their own race, a greater than their father Abraham. This was the meaning and drift of their being chosen. There 1s no room for mistake here; the divine purpose is stated from the first with the utmost precision. At the very time of ie aie / ys