TIIE MYSTERIOUSNESS OF OUR PRESENT BEING.
N the very iml)rcssive Psahn fl'm which these words are take,, this is worth noticing among other thiIgs, —that the insl)ired writer finds in the mysteries without and within him, a source of admiration and praise. " I will praise Thee, for I ara fearfully and wonderfully ruade; qnarvcllovs are Thy works." When Nicodemus heard of God's wonderful working, he said, " How can these things be?" But holy David glories in what the natural man stumbles at. It awes his heart and imagination, to think that God sees him, wherever he is, yet without l)rovoking or irritating his reason. He ]las no proud thoughts rising agdnst what he cannot understand, aud calling for his vigilant control. He does hot submit his reason by an effort, but he bursts forth in exultation, to think that God is so mysterious. "Such knowledge," he says, "is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it." Again, "How precious are Thy thoughts unto me, 0 God!"
[ystc'iouslzcss of ou" gcilzg. 2 8 3 This refleetion is suitable on the Festival I which we are a preseng engaged in eelebraing, on which out houghs are espeeiMly m'ned o the grea doctrine of lle Triniy in Unit.y. I is my intention llOg o make s(»me remarks Ul)m it; hot hmrever exl,lanatory of the detrine itsclf, which we have to-day eolffessed in the Athanasian Crced as fitlly and explicitly as it ean be set fi)rth in hulnan words; but I will endeaw»ur fronl the text to show, t.hat thc diNculty whi,,h human words ha-e in expressing it, is ne greater tlutn we meet with whcn we would express in hmnan words even t.hose eart.hly things of whieh we aetually have experienee, and which we eanno deny to exist, beeause we witness t.hem: so that out part evidently lies in using the lnysteries of religi,)n, as ]la.vid did, simply as a lneans of ilnpressing on out minds the inserutableness of Ahnight, y (lod. Mysteries in religion are nleasured by the proud aeeording to their own eolnprehension, by the humble, aeeording t.o t.he power of (h»d; the humble glorify God tç)r thenl, the proud exalt themselves agaillSt thenl. The text speaks f earthly things," I ara fearfltlly and wonderfully ruade." Now, let us observe SOlne of the mysteries whieh are inv,lved in our own nature. 1. First, we are ruade up of soul and body. Now, if we did hot know this, so lm we ea.nnot deny it, what notion eould our lninds ever forln of such a lnixture of natures, and how should we ever sueeeed in making those who go only by ahstraet reason take in what we lneant The body is lnade of lnatter; this we see; it has a eerta extension, make, form, and sodity: by the Trinity Sunday.
284 The 3[.ystcriousncss of soul we men 6lm6 iuvisible prineipl whieh thinks. We are eonscious we are alive, and are rtional; eeh man has his own thoughs, fee]ings, and desires; eaeh man is one to himself, and he knows himself o be one and indivisille,on in sueh sense, tha6 while he exists, it were [lll absurdity to suppose he cn be any other than himself; one in a sense in which no nmteria] lody which c, msists,f larts cau be one. l[e is sure that he is distinct i'rm the body, thousq jnined to it, because he is one, au, l the ],ody is n,,t one, bHt collection of lliany things, lit fecls lnOl'C,ver that he is distinct fr,m it, bçcause he uses if; fi,r what a lnan cn use, tn tlmt he is superi,,r. No one can by any possibility lnistake his body for ]imselte It is his; it is hot he. This principle, then, which thinks and acts in the body, aud which each persol feels to be himself, we caH the soul. We do not know wlmt it is; it cannot be reached by any of the senses; we Calmot see it or touch it. It bas nothing in common with extension or tbrln; to ask what shape the soul is, wouhl be as absurd as to ask what is the shape of a thought, or a wish, or a regret, or a hope. And hence we call the snul spiritual and imlnateAal, and say that it bas no parts, and is of no size at aH. All this seems undeuiable. Yet observe, if aH this be true, wlmt is meant by saying that it is in the body, any lnore tlmn saying that a thought or a hope is in a stone or a tree? How is it joiued to the body? what keeps it one with the body? what keeps it in the body? what prevents it any moment froln separating from the body? when two things which we see are united, they are united by some connexion which we can understand. A chain or cable keeps a ship in its place; we lay the foundation of a buflding in the eart, h, and t, he lmilding endm'es. But, what is it whieh unites soul and body? how do they toueh? how do they keep together? how is it we do hot wander to the stttrs or the depths of the sea, or to and fi'o as chance lnay earry us, while out body remains where it -cas on eart.h? So far from its being wonderfnl that the body one day dies, how is it that it is ruade live and lnove at alI? how is it thxt it keeps ri'mn dying a single hour? Certainly it is as ineolnprehelsible as any thing ean be, how soul and body ean lnake up one man; and, unless we had the instmme belote out eyes, we should seem in saying so to 1)e ushg words without meaning. For instance, would it hot be extravagant and idle to speak of rime as deep or high, or of spaee as quiek or slow? Not less idle, surely, it perhaps seelns to some raees of spirit, s to say that thought and lnind have a body, whieh in the case of man they have, aeeording to (lod's marvellous will. It is certain, then, t.hat experienee outstrips reason in its eapaeity of klmwledge; why then should reason eh-eumseribe faith, when if, eanhot eolnpass sight? 2. Again: the soul is hot only one, and without parts, but moreover, as if by a great contradiction even iii terres, if, is in every part of the body. It is no where, yet every where. It may be said, indeed, that if is espeeially in the brain; but, granting this for argulnento 's sake, yet it is quite certain, sinee every part of his body belongs to him, that a man's self is in every part of his body. No part of a man's body is like a mere instrument, as a knife, or a eruteh might be, whieh he takes up and
286 T/e 3[ystcriousess of nlay lay down. Every part of il is parl of hinlself; il is eonneced into one ly his soul, whieh is one. Supposing we t.ake sones and raise a. house, the 1,nilding is hot 'cally Olle; it is composed of a nulnber of separate parts, wbich viewed as eollected together, we eall one, but which are n,L one except in out notio of t.hem. But he hands and feeL, Lhe head and Ll'unk, fin'm one body under the presenee of Lhe soul within thcm. Unless the soul were in every pal'L, they wouhl hot. fin'ni one body; so t.ha 0e soul is in every pal% uniting i with eve othcr, Lhough iL ensist.s f 1) parts aL ail I do noL of course mea.li thaL there is any real contradiction in these opposit.e truths; indeed, we know there is hot, and cannot le, leeause t.hey a'e truc, beeause human nature is a tiret before us. But the state of the case is a contradiction w]c. l»«t into wo'ds; we ca.tarot so express it as hot fo involve an apparent cont.radiction; and then, if we discrilninate out terres, and lnake distinctions, and balance phrases, and so on, we shall seem to be technica], a.tifieial and speculat.ive, and fo use words without meaning. Now, t.his is precisely our dieulty, as regards the doetrille of tle Ever-blessed Trinity. We have never been in heaven; God, as He is in Hilnse]t is hid from us. We are infi»rmed COlcerning tl lin by those who were inspired by lIim fl»r the purpose, nay by One who " knoweth the Father," His Co-eternal Son Himself, when He came on earth. And, in the message which they brought fo us ff'oto above, are declara.tions eoncenfing His nature, which seem to run eounter the one to the otber. He is revealed to us as One God, the Father, One indivisible Spirit; yet there is said to exist in Him from eveflting out Presezt t?cig. 8 7 His Oy-begotten 8on, the saine as He is, and yet distinct, and ri'oto and in Them boh, ri'oto everlasing indivisibly, exiss le Co-equal Spiri. 11 his, pu ino words, seems contradiction in erms; men bave urged it as such; then Christians, lest they should seem to be unduly and harshly insisting upon words which clash with each other, and so should dishonour the truth of God, and cause heartrs t,, stumlle, have guarded their words, and explained them; and then for doing this they have been aecused of specflating and theorizing. The saine result, d, mbfless, would take place in the parallel case already mentioned, t[ad we no bodies, and were reveltion lnade us that there was a race who had bodieg as we as souls, vhat a nUlnber of powerful objections should we seem fo possess against that revelationl We might plausibly say, that the words used in conveying if were arbitrm-y and Unlneaning. What (we should ask) was the meaning of saying that the soul had no parts, yet was in every part of the body? what was lneant by sang it was every where and no vhere how cofld if be one, and yet repeated, as it were, ten thousand rimes over in evew atom and porc of fle body, which if was said to exist in? how could it be confined fo the body af all how did itact upon the body? how happened if, was pretended, that, when the soul did but will, the moved or the feet walked? how cm a spirit which tanhot touch any thing, yet avail to more so large a mass of matter, and so efly as the human body? These are some of the questions which lnight be asked, partly on the ground that the alleged fact was impossible, paly that the idea was self-contradicto W. And these are just
88 e 3[yseriousncss of the ldnd of quest.ions with which an-ogant and profane minds do assail the revealed doctrine of the Holy Trinity. 3. Fm'her consider what a strange state we are h when we dremn, and how dicult it would be to eonvey to a person who had never dremned what was meant by dreamilg. H vocalmlary would contain no words to express a.ny middle idea 1,egween perfeet possession and engire suspensim of ghe mind's pmvers. He would undersand w]m. i was t.o be awake, wha i was o be insensible; lmt a state between the two he would neither lin.ve wrds fo deseribe, nor, if he were self-confident and ara)gant., ilelilmtion t.o believe, however weU if was attested by t,]mse who ought to know. I do hot say there is no coneeival,le aeemnulation of evidenee that would subdue sueh a man's reason, sinee we sec sometimes men's reason subdued by the evidenees of the (lospel, whose hearts are imperfeetly affeeted: but I mean, that this earthly mystery nigkt be brought before a man wih about that degree of evidenee in its favour which the (ospel aetually has, hot ordinarfly overpowering, but eonstiuting a tri«l of his llear, a trial, that is, whether t.he mysteries eontained in it do or do hot rouse lfis pride. Dreaming is hot a fiction, but a rem state of the mind, flmugh only one or two in the whole woHd ever deamed; and if these (,ne or two or a dozen men, spoke o the rest of the world, and unanimously witnessed to the existence of flat mysterious state, many doubfless wotfld resist their report, as t.hey do the myseries of tire Gospel, on the ground of its being unintegigible: yet in that case they would be resisting a truth, and woNd be wrong (hot indeed blameably so, compared with those who on a like account reject the Gospel, which cornes to us as a practical, lmt a mere abstract matter), yet they would undeniably be considering a thing fitlse which was true. If is no great harm t.o be wrong in a marrer of opinion; but in matters which influence conduct, which bear upon our eternal interests, such as Bevealed P, eligion, surely it is most hazard, us, mst unwise, though it is so eolnmon, to stuml,le at its mysteries, instead of bélieving and acting upon ifs threats an,t promises. Instead of bracing what they ean understa«d, together with what they ealmot, men critieise the wording in which truths are conveyed, which ealne from heaven. The inspired Apostles taught them to the first Christian converts, and they, according to the capa.cities of lmman language, whether their own or the Apostles', partly one and partly the other, preserved them; and we, instead of thanking them fir the benefit, instead of rejoicing that they should have handed on to us those secrets concerning God, instead of t.hanking Him for His condesceusion in allowing us to hear them, have hearts eold enough to eomplain of their mysteriousness. Profane minds ask, "Is God one, or t.hree?" They are answered, He is One and He is also Three. They reply " He cannot be One in the smne sense in which He is Three." It is in reply alh,wed fo them, " He is Three in one sense, One in another." Thev ask, "In what sense? what is that sense in which He is Three Persons,—what is that sense of the word Person, such that it. neither stauds for one separate Eêing, as if does with lnen, nor 3"et cornes short of such a real and sufficient sense as the word requires?" We reply IV] T that we do not know that intermediate sense; we cannot reconcile, ve confess, the distinct portions of the doctrine; we can but take what is given us, and be content.. They rejoin, that, if this be so, we are using vords vithout meaning. We answer,:No, hot without meaning in thelnselves, but without meaning which we fltlly apprehend. Goal understands His own words, though lmmau. God, when He gave the doctrine, put it into words, and the doctrine, as we word if, is the doctrine as the Apostles wordcd if; if is conveyed to us with the saine degree of meaning in if, intelligible to us, with which the Apostles received it; so that it is no reason for giving it up that in part it is hot intelligible. This we say; and they insist in reply, as if it were a sufficient answer, that the doctrine, as a whole,/s unintelligible to us (which we grant); that the words which we use have very little meaning (which is hot truc, though we ma.y hot sec the ritll meaning); and so they think fo excuse their rejection of them. But surely all this, I say, is much the saine as what might t,ke place in any discussion about dreaufing, in a comp,ny where one or two persons had experienced it, and the mtfltitude hot. If might be said to those told us of it, Do you mean that if is a state of waking or insensibility? is if one or the other? what is that sense iii which we are hot insensible iii dreaming, and yet are hot awake and om'seNes? Now if we bave mysteries even about ourselves, which we cannot even put into words accur,ntely, much more may we suppose, even were we hot told it, that there are mysteries in the natm-e of Alnfighty God; and so far from its being improbable that there should be mysteries, the declaration that there are, even adds some probabflity to the revelation which declares them. On the other haad,stl more unreasonable is disbelief, if it be grounded on the mysteriousaess of the revelation; because, if we cannot put into consistent human language human things, if the state of dreaming, which we experieuce commonly, must be described in words either vague or contradictory, much less is there to surprise us if hunmn words are insufficient to describe heavelfly things. These are a few, out of the many remarks which might be ruade concerning out own mysterious state,— that is, concerning things in us which we know to be really and truly, yet which we cannot accurately reflect upon and conterai)lute, cannot describe, cannot put hto words, and cannot convey to another's comprehension xvho does hot experience them. Ïut this is a very large subject. Let a man consider how hardly he is able and how circuitously he is forced to describe the commonest objects of nature, when he attempts to substitute reason for sight, how difficult it is to define things, how ira- 1)racticable it is to convey to aother any complicated, or any deet) or refined feeling, hov inconsistent and selfcontradictory his own feelings seem, when put into words, how he subjects himself in consequence to misunderstanding, or ridicule, or triumphant criticism; and he will hOt wonder at the impossibilit.y of duly delineating in earthly words the first Cause of ail thought, the Father of spirits, the One Eternal Mind, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who only bath immortality, dwelling in light unapproachable, whom no man bath seen nor caa sec, the icomprehensible iufinite God.
To eonclude. One objection Olfly, as ig seems go me, tan be nmde o hese refleeions, and ha. is soon answered. Ig may be said tha, tloug there be, as flere well may be, en housand mysgeries Mou he ivine Nature, ye why should hey be disclosed in the Gospel? beemtse the very circumstance that they canot be put into words is a reason why this should hot be attempted. But this surely is a very bold and presumptuous way of speaking, hot to say more about it; as if we had any means of knowing, as if we had any rigt to ask, why God des what Hç does in the ve W way He does it; as if shmcrs, receiving a great and nnmerited favour, were hot very unthankfifl and acting ahnost lnadly, in saying, Why was it given us in this way, hOt in that? Is God obliged to take us into counsel, aùd explain to us the reason for every thing He does; or is it out plain dut.y to take what is given us, and feed upon it in /hith And to those who do thus receive the blessed doctrine under consideration, it will be found to produce specia.1 and singular practical eficts on theln, on the very ground of its mysteriousness. There is nothing, according as we are given to sec and judge of things, which will make a greater difference in the retaper, character, and habits of an individual, than the circumstance of his holding or hot holding the Gospel to be mysterious. Even then, if we.,'o by its influence on out minds, we might safely prononnce that the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, and of other like mysteries, cannot be unimportant. If it be truc (as we hold it to be), it must be of cpnsequence; for it tends to draw the mind in one çatictflar direction, and to form it on a differeut mould from theirs who do hot believe in if. And thus what we actually are given to sec, does go a certain way in confirming fo us what Scripture and the Church declare fo us, that belief in this doctrine is actually necessu'y to salvation, by showing us that such bclief has a moral effcct on us. The retaper of truc t:aith is described iii the text,—" Marvellous are Thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well." A religious mind is ever marvelling, lld irreligi»us nlen laugh and scoff tt it because if marvels. A rcligious lnind is ever looking out of itscli; is ever pondering God's words, is ever "looking into" them with the Angels, is ever realizing to itself Hiln on whom if depends, and who is the centre of i1 truth and good. Carnal and proud nlinds are contented with self; they like to remain af home; when they hear of mysteries, they have no devout cnriosity to go and see the great sight, though if be ever so little out of their way; and when if actually falls in their path, they stumble af if. As ga-eat then as is the diflhrence between hanging upon the thought of God and resting in ourselves, lifting up the heart to Goal and bringiag ail things in heaven and earth down to ourselves, exalting God and exalting reason, measuring things by God's power and measuring them by our own ignorance, so great is the difference between him who believes in the Christian mysteries and him who does hot. And were there no other reason for tlte revelation of them, but this gracious one, of mising us, refining us, making us reverent, making us expectant and devout, surely this would be more than a suIficient oue. Let us then all, learned and mflearned, gain this great
294 _Myslcs, io¢tsness of out ?ciszg. benefiL ri'mn the mystery of the Ever-blessed TriniLy. IL is ealeulated to humble the wise in this world with the flaoughL of whaL is above them, and to eneourage and elevate the lowly with the thought of Ahnighty God, and the glories and marvels which shall one day be revealed fo them. In the Beatific Vision of God, should we through His grace be found worthy of if, we shall comprehend clem'ly what we now dutifully repeat and desire to know, how the Father Ahnighty is truly and by I[imself God, the Eternal Son truly and by Himself God, and the Holy Ghost truly and by Himself (lod, and yet not three Gods but one God.