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AN 
 
 INQUIRY CONCERNING RELIGION. 
 
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AN 
 
 INQUIRY CONCERNING RELIGION. 
 
 *« 
 
 BY 
 ve 
 GEORGE LONG, 
 
 AUTHOR OF ‘AN ESSAY ON THE MORAL NATURE OF MAN,’ 
 ‘THE CONDUCT OF LIFE,’ &c. 
 
 “Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.’’—1 Thessalonians, v. 21, 
 
 LONDON: . 
 _ LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN AND LONGMANS. 
 
 1855. 
 
PRINTED BY TAYLOR AND FRANCIS, 
 RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET. 
 
PREFACK, 
 
 ‘Tue following pages contain the result of reading and 
 reflection on subjects of unrivalled importance, com- 
 menced at an early age, and continued through a 
 
 long life. 
 
 The work is divided into four parts. The first 
 relates to the Being and Attributes of God; the sub- 
 ject of the second is Natural Religion. Both are 
 short, and they may be properly considered intro- 
 ductory to the third and fourth parts, which form by 
 far the larger portion of the work. 
 
 The third part is an inquiry into the Evidences of 
 the Truth of the Christian Religion, both internal and 
 historical. 'The question whether it be incredible 
 that the Deity should have revealed his will to man 
 is discussed; and an investigation follows of the 
 proofs which may reasonably be expected of the truth 
 of a revelation. These are drawn from its nature and 
 
 character, which is usually called Internal Evidence, 
 
Vi PREFACE. 
 
 and from the facts which occurred on its first pro- 
 mulgation, and during its early progress. Under 
 this last head the question arises, whether human 
 testimony can afford satisfactory proof of a miracle. 
 The history of Jesus Christ is traced through the four 
 Gospels ; and an inquiry is pursued into what he re- 
 quired of his disciples in faith and practice to entitle 
 them to enjoy the blessings of his religion. Then 
 follows an examination of the history of the preaching 
 of the gospel by the apostles, contained in the book 
 of Acts, in which the evidence of the resurrection of 
 Jesus Christ from the dead is fully investigated, and 
 facts are produced from the Roman history in proof 
 of the truth of Christianity. The last portion of the 
 third part relates to the Epistles and. the Revelation, 
 and the evidence they afford of the early state and 
 condition of the Christian church is examined. 
 
 The subjects of the fourth part are, the Progress, 
 Present State, and Future Prospects of Christianity. 
 A sketch is given of the early history of the Christians, 
 of their persecutions by the Jews and the Romans, 
 till their religion was established by Constantine ; the 
 divisions among Christians, and the persecutions of 
 the dominant party; the rapid advance of Popery, 
 the assumption of unlimited power by the Roman 
 Pontiff, the Reformation, and its effects in the 
 Christian world. In considering the present state 
 and future prospects of Christianity, the subject of 
 
PREFACE. vu 
 
 Church Establishments is discussed. ‘The work con- 
 cludes with an examination of what appear to have 
 been the principal causes which have prevented the 
 Christian Religion from having the full effect which 
 its character and doctrines might have been. ex- 
 pected to produce on human conduct and human 
 happiness. 
 
 The right and the duty of Free Inquiry are asserted 
 throughout. A very full Table of Contents is prefixed 
 to the first part. 
 
 The object of the work bemg to discover the truth 
 in its infinitely important subjects, the strictest im- 
 partiality has been aimed at in the statement of every 
 argument. In what degree it has been attained the 
 serious and candid reader must judge for himself. 
 
 oo Queen Anne Street, 
 October 25, 1855. 
 
code 
 
 2 Cay 
 “e a 42 
 
 Ju 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. 
 THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 3 
 age 
 Ancient and modern conceptions of Deity............. 1-8 
 Something must have existed from eternity .......... 4 
 Intelligence must have been eternal ................ 4,95 
 Intelligence not the result of matter and motion ...... 5—9 
 Intelligence and power in the Creator ..............  9—12 
 Moarat wot. Goda ites oe he an Cade ON Ie 8 12—14 
 muessoouness of God! jes... . oui... Haein tae ee 14—20 
 Objection from the existence of physical and moral evil, 
 MUReA DOWER CO Ite cases theta ea. Phys ce bce ae OSStOO 
 PART II. 
 
 NATURAL RELIGION. 
 
 Natural Religion in ancient and modern times ........ 24, 25 
 
 The rational and the moral nature of man. orate ste DUG oO 
 Natural religion defective in not ee a » fall proof of 
 a future state: core ee. see eersee 20-29 
 
 And in not teaching the arene of epecitateel bas ted at Hat 
 
 PART III. 
 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 SMee Orc hetmguiry econ Pasa ee Roles Ales. ss: 31, 32 
 Account’ of the:four gospels)... ......5...4.-0.. 32—34 
 
 UNC Herbantikbere ee seat, FW ORR Ie se oe. oe 13436 
 ; h 
 
X CONTENTS. 
 
 Authenticity of the gospels ......... 060, ceecters 
 Account of the life and teaching of Jesus Christ .... 
 The sermon on the mount ........ 
 Jesus opposes the Pharisees, and peice ite aoe 
 OL TEDEN LACE eileen een octet tn ate Ree 
 He sends his disciples'to teach’ ..:.).0453). .2-s). + o« 5 
 The parable of the good Samaritan .............. 
 Too literal an interpretation of the New Testament to 
 be avorled 3s jor been ciosaire aera ence eas 
 
 Jesus commands humility to his apostles .......... 3 
 die last judoment 1 s.% 2 ue. ar ne ey, che ee een ote 
 Conduct and discourses of Jesus at the approach of 
 death . ee a 
 His trial, etdariacon aid criciicon JO We eee 
 Review of the life of Jesus. : 
 The question discussed whether a fevelation should Be 
 considered incredible .......... 
 What evidence is to be required of the truth ofa a re- 
 VOLAION ya5.401e) si molten eMart ie eters tetera 
 Early: history of Christianity ..7 . 3. Js. 
 The testimony of the apostles to the resurrection of 
 OSU ocr o cn ope eee Mons Sate te Paterna cig Rev ags se 
 The gospels must have been written soon after the 
 time of the transactions which they relate........ 
 The authors of the gospels. . an a 
 Account by Tacitus of the aha n of Gurncenity oe 
 Recapitulation of the facts of the gospel history . 
 The question of miracles discussed on the Erahial: 
 stated by Hume in his essay on the subject 
 Evidence of the resurrection of Jesus............. 
 What evidence is to be required of a miracle 
 Visits of the women to the sepulchre 
 Testimony of the apostles ........ 
 Objection stated and answered .................. 
 The apostles not actuated by interest or ambition. . 
 Martyrdom of Stephen .. 
 ibe-copversion of St. Paul. .;.. nine 2 eee 
 The first preaching of the gospel to the Gentiles .. .. 
 
 eere eee eee eetee 
 
 Page 
 
 36, 37 
 37—65 
 41—45 
 45—47 
 47, 48 
 48, 49 
 49, 50 
 56 
 
 b7 
 57—59 - 
 59—62 
 62—65 
 65—76 
 76—82 
 82—87 
 87—89 
 89—93 
 93—97 
 97, 98 
 98, 99 
 99, 100 
 101, 102 
 102—157 
 1lI—113 
 126—139 
 139—157 
 157, 158 
 158—161 
 167, 168 
 169—171 
 
 171—175 
 
CONTENTS. XI 
 
 Pa 
 Mission.on, Paul ant, Barnabass .<....0.. Sine ia eds 1175; 176 
 Further account of St. Paul . , NW. AF O=179 
 Constitution of the early eirecan Charcii 179-183, 185—188 
 Persecutions of the apostles .................... 183—185 
 Observations on the book of Acts ................ 185, 186 
 Dgctrine,of the epistles 5.0. oak AO 188 
 epevenisties: of St. Pauls .\.¢ 02.) vee seer 188—195 
 The epistle to the Romans. mite ae Cota. 190-198 
 The first epistle to the Gennihines PLA Oi Oy rd DRS te 1 98—200 
 ~ The second epistle to the Corinthians ...... eer one 200, 201 
 The epistles to the Galatians and Ephesians . . .. 202—204 
 The epistles to the Philippians, Timothy, and Tice 204—209 
 The epistle to the Hebrews ...... .. 210—215 
 The epistles of St. James, St. Peter, a St. fan -2 215d—219 
 The Revelation ...... AEA Sa es ee a A EU AE |] 
 General view of the New Testa tiene Ka lca os wa0=——220 
 The Old Testament. . m, 2230224 
 The essential tienen ae Dadian: “it sith ett 
 understood . Seviekt .... 224-229 
 Importance of “iy andl: of ie Nev ecient pt ee cou 
 Original and translations ..................+... 230—234 
 PART IV. 
 
 THE PROGRESS, PRESENT STATE, AND FUTURE 
 PROSPECTS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 . Persecutions of the Christians .................. 235, 236 
 State of the early Christian Church .............. 236—240 
 Bae e PISGLeS OPE NAUUS ote ets hae cisely avi) ae oes 241—244 
 Genuineness of the text of the New Testament.,.... 244, 245 
 No plan of perpetual church government laid down by 
 
 RE GATIOSEICR? ent reben re heectoate supreme el Ske ee 245, 246 
 
 Beneficial effects of Christianity Son ep 246—257 
 Christianity made the occasion of great evils........ 258, 259 
 RFCUCTALCOUMNCHS 7 fhe noe Wile ese Pike a, eevee on oe 259—264 
 Christian persecutions. . : Meee Sieis .' « a'seae) @20A——266 
 
 Usurpations of the abriega of Hove Savaecegle . oe vt. 200-273 
 State of religion in the middle ages .............. 273—276 
 Religious principles—fear, hope, and love.......... 274—276 
 
Xi CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 siplietbus Ketablishments. v2... seivkett be ave D7eMeee 
 Importance of Free Inquiry ..........+.++.-+++- 809—315 
 Religious Establishments .........--..-.+++++-. 318—329 
 Christian Faith: . oi no 20g 2s aso eee ee Pe ee ee 
 Heresysand Schism: 2... .... 0. 244-2207 0 Eas 
 Present state of opinions on religion .............. 329—338 
 Future prospects of Christianity ..............-- 328—346 
 
 ERRATA. 
 
 Page 61 line 11, after foretells strike out them. 
 » 128 ,, 14, for set read sat. 
 » 225 ,, 10 from the bottom, for same read sacred. 
 ,» 229 ,, 7 from the bottom, for council read counsel. 
 » 290 5, 19 for a read an. 
 » 244 ,, 9 from the bottom, after then read would. 
 », 278 ,, 19, for used read done. 
 » 921 note * line 3, for 1803 read vol. iii. 
 
AN 
 
 INQUIRY CONCERNING RELIGION. 
 
 PAWEL 
 
 THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 THE most important mquiries in which the human 
 mind can be engaged are those which relate to the 
 Author of our being, to the relation in which we stand 
 to him, and to the hope which we may entertain of 
 his favour here and hereafter. Is there indeed a God? 
 Is he my Creator? Am I dependent on him for all I 
 enjoy? Is my future existence for weal or for woe in 
 his hands? These are questions, which nothing but 
 absolute stupidity, or the most reckless unconcern 
 on the most important of all subjects, can prevent a 
 thinking being from asking himself. 
 
 “ Do you believe in the existence of a God?” 
 There are, I hope and believe, very few who will 
 hesitate to answer this question in the affirmative ; 
 
 } B 
 / 
 L4 
 
 / 
 
2 THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 but it is certain that these words may be used in very 
 different senses by different individuals. Among the 
 ancient heathens, even the most cultivated and refined 
 of them, the Greeks and Romans, the notion of a 
 Deity was only that of a bemg possessed of power 
 superior to that of man. Jupiter himself, though 
 called the Father of gods and man, was said to be the 
 son of Saturn, whom he dethroned, as the former had 
 previously dethroned his own father. Fate or Chaos 
 is referred to as the origin of the gods, and existence 
 from eternity was not ascribed to any of them. Fine 
 theistical sentiments may be met with here and there 
 in the writings of the ancient philosophers, but I do 
 not find that the exalted ideas now entertaimed of 
 the Deity are to be found distinctly indicated and 
 enforced in any of them. I shall endeavour to show 
 shortly that the eternity and the unity of the Creator 
 may be satisfactorily proved by the works of his 
 hands ; but it is only since the promulgation of the 
 Christian religion that men have been led to the 
 proper mode of considering this subject, and it may 
 well be doubted whether, without revelation, the 
 human mind would ever have attained the sound and 
 rational theistical views which now prevail among the 
 most intelligent mdividuals in all Christian countries. 
 It will perhaps be the best course, in treating of 
 the most important subject of the existence of God, to 
 state what appear to be the conceptions of the Deity 
 usually entertained by intelligent persons. All, I 
 think, now agree in believing God to be a self- 
 existent uncaused being who has enjoyed independent 
 existence from all eternity. To the modern theist 
 such beings as Jupiter, Apollo and Minerva would not 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 3 
 
 be considered gods; but would rather be classed 
 with angels or demons, beings to whom powers are 
 ascribed beyond those of man, but who are not held 
 to possess the independent and uncontrolled power 
 which we attribute to God. 
 
 Another of our conceptions of Deity in which all 
 are agreed, is that he is possessed of original un- 
 derived power. - In all ages and countries indeed, and 
 in all states of mind, from the lowest and most uncul- 
 tivated to the highest and most improved, power has 
 always been attributed to the gods; but it was held 
 by the heathen to be limited and controlled by fate. 
 
 Self-existence and power, however, are not the only 
 elements which form our conception of the Deity ; 
 and he is always held to be intelligent as well as self- 
 existent and powerful. There is nothing to distin- 
 guish a being without intelligence, although  self- 
 existent and possessed of uncontrollable power, from 
 what is usually called fate or destiny. Could we 
 suppose such a being to exist, we could feel no love 
 or reverence for dim or zt, whichever it ought to be 
 called, nor fear of any other kind than that which we 
 have of thunder, floods, or earthquakes. We might 
 indeed have extreme dread of such a power, but that 
 feeling could not be enhanced in the smallest degree 
 by any reference to our own character and conduct. 
 Such a being could give no laws for the regulation of 
 our lives, and therefore we could have no hope of 
 reward for obedience, or fear of punishment for dis- 
 obedience. Intelligence then must be held to belong 
 to God, and the notion of fate as controlling the Deity 
 is no longer a doctrine of any theist. 
 
 In entering on an inquiry into the foundation of 
 
 B 2 
 
4, THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 our belief in the existence of God, it will be proper 
 to begin with the assertion that something must 
 have existed from all eternity. The existence of any 
 thing clearly proves this. It has been well said, that 
 ‘when we place ourselves in an imaginary point of 
 time, and then try to conceive how a world, finite or 
 infinite, should begin to exist, absolutely without 
 cause, we find an instantaneous and irresistible check 
 put to the conception, and we are compelled at once 
 to reject the supposition, so that the manner in which 
 we reject it is a proper authority for doing so. It is 
 superfluous, in this case, to mquire into the nature of 
 the check and rejection, and dissent grounded thereon, 
 since after all our mquiries we must still find an in- 
 superable reluctance to assent. The supposition will 
 not remain in the mind, but is thrown out imme- 
 diately ; and I do not speak of this as what ought to 
 follow from a proper theory of evidence and assent, 
 but as a fact, which every man feels, whatever his 
 notions of logic be, or whether he has any or no; and 
 I appeal to every man for the truth of this fact. Now, 
 no truth can have a greater reality to us, nor any 
 falsehood a greater evidence against it, than this 
 instantaneous necessary assent or dissent*.’”’ I need 
 add nothing to this ; and perhaps it requires an apo- 
 logy to have mentioned so absurd a supposition as 
 that the universe should have come into existence 
 when absolutely nothing had existed before, a notion 
 not, so far as I am aware, to be met with in the 
 wildest freaks of insanity. 
 
 Our next inquiry will be whether we have sufficient 
 evidence to induce or rather to compel us to believe 
 
 * Hartley on Man, the beginning of the 2nd volume. 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 5 
 
 that some intelligent being must have existed from 
 eternity ; in other words, to believe in the existence 
 of an underived self-existent first cause, that is, in 
 God. Now, the existence of any degree of intelli- 
 gence in the universe clearly establishes this dogma. 
 Let us look into our own minds and ask ourselves if 
 we can possibly believe or conceive that there was a 
 period when no intelligent bemg whatever existed ; 
 and that at some point of time intelligence began for 
 the first time to exist. There seem to be only two 
 possible ways of putting this supposition: either in- 
 telligence began when there had been absolutely no 
 existence at all before, or masses of matter which had 
 been previously unintelligent at some period acquired 
 intelligence by means of some particular form into 
 which they had been brought by the motions of their 
 particles. The first case has been already negatived. 
 We will now proceed to the second. 
 
 The supposition that intelligence is the result of 
 matter and motion embraces the theory of the ancient 
 religionists, that the gods were produced from Chaos ; 
 and also the philosophy of Epicurus, which derives 
 the whole universe, animate and inanimate, intelligent 
 and unintelligent, from a fortuitous concourse of atoms. 
 But this supposition is as unintelligible and incon- 
 ceivable as the other. We are entirely at a loss to 
 conceive that any modification whatever of matter and 
 motion can produce thought. Our experience affords 
 no ground for such a supposition. We know indeed 
 that the phenomena of thought are connected with 
 the state of the brain, and that thought may be in- 
 jured and even destroyed by derangements of the 
 brain, but these facts throw no light on the question 
 
6 THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 how it is that we first became thinking beings. Our 
 existence, both bodily and mental, we must ascribe to 
 some pre-existing cause, unless we suppose ourselves 
 to have existed from all eternity. If we could be 
 satisfied that the particles of matter of which our 
 bodies are composed have had an eternal existence, 
 and taken varied forms from time to time, we have 
 no evidence of the pre-existence of our minds. It is 
 nothing to the purpose to say that they may have 
 existed previously to our coming into this world, 
 although we have no recollection of any such state of 
 bemg. This is but an arbitrary assumption ; and not 
 the slightest evidence, or anything deserving the name 
 of an argument can be produced in its favour. The 
 mind of an infant evidently appears to be in a primary, 
 rudimental state, endued with sensation, and with no 
 other indication of intelligence than a mere perception 
 of external objects. There is absolutely nothing from 
 which to infer that an infant is in any other than the 
 first stage of his existence. We have then a new 
 being in the world possessed of sensation and _perci- 
 piency. ‘To what are these qualities to be ascribed ? 
 If we say that they are the result of matter and 
 motion, let us consider to what this assumption will 
 lead. If matter and motion can produce sensation 
 and intelligence in any case, there is no possibility of 
 setting bounds to the degree of sensation and intelli- 
 gence which may be their result. If any, then, so far 
 as we know, all, even the highest intelligence, may 
 have been produced by matter and motion. But if 
 this be so, there may have been a period when nothing 
 but matter existed, and all the intelligence in the 
 universe may have been produced by the motion and 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 7 
 
 form of matter. Now, does or can any rational mind 
 believe this? In all the most elaborate contrivances 
 of the inventive genius of man, with whatever power- 
 ful working of the imtellect conceived, and however 
 skilfully executed, not the slightest degree of intelli- 
 gence has been given to the instrument formed. We 
 perceive no other connexion in ourselves between the 
 powers of the mind and the body than that they are 
 indissolubly united (at least as far as our existence in 
 this world is concerned), and that the body furnishes 
 the means by which the mind becomes acquainted 
 with external things. When an infant comes into 
 the world, we perceive the rudiments of his bodily 
 and of his mental powers, but the one is essentially 
 different from the other. It has been said by some 
 that we know nothing of mind; but it may be truly 
 asserted that we know more of mind than of matter. 
 That which I call myself is mind; and of matter | 
 know and can know nothing but what is derived from 
 impressions made on the mind by external objects. 
 The loss of a leg or an eye, or any other part of the 
 body, does not interfere with a man’s personal iden- 
 tity. Parts of the brain, and I believe each particular 
 portion of it, may be destroyed without extinguishing 
 the mental faculties. If indeed the whole brain be 
 destroyed, intelligence ceases. At the hour of death 
 sensation and intelligence vanish together, and the 
 body remains an inert and insensible mass. Beyond 
 this we know not what death really is. ‘There are 
 three possible suppositions: the mind may be de- 
 prived by death of all its powers, and may remain 
 inactive and unconscious as in sleep till it is again 
 united with a material organization at the resurrec- 
 
see THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 tion; or it may continue to exist in a state of con- 
 sciousness when severed from the body, or it may 
 cease to exist altogether. I do not perceive, from any- 
 thing we know of the powers of the human mind, that 
 we can positively deny that any one of these supposi- 
 tions may be true, but the believer in the truth of re- 
 vealed religion will adopt either the first or the second. 
 Kven supposing the third supposition should be ad- 
 mitted, it could only prove that the mind cannot 
 exercise its faculties except when combined with a 
 material organization ; but not that it results from it. 
 It gives no proof of the identity of matter and motion 
 with thought, which, according to our conception, 
 is of a totally different character ; and. which is never, 
 in the slightest degree, produced by the most skilful 
 exertion of mechanical genius. When a man ceases 
 to breathe he dies. The motions of the lungs, of the 
 heart, and of the blood along the veins and the arte- 
 ries have ceased; but not a particle of matter has 
 . been taken away from the body. The organized 
 frame remains as before; but sensation and mental 
 percipiency are withdrawn. Is there any sound ar- 
 gument to show us, is there any analogy to lead us 
 to believe, that all or any of the powers of the human 
 mind have their origin in the movement of the par- 
 ticles of matter of which the body is composed ? Can 
 we believe that the profound mathematical investiga- 
 tions and the wonderful discoveries of Newton, and 
 that the almost miraculous creations of Shakspeare’s 
 mighty genius were merely the result of the mecha- 
 nical action of a material substance? What is there 
 in motion which has any tendency to produce such 
 marvellous effects? To a vast majority of those whose 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 9) 
 
 minds have been engaged in the inquiry, it has 
 appeared clear that the mind is of a nature quite 
 distinct from material substance, though united ina 
 ‘way incomprehensible to us with a material organiza- 
 tion, which is the medium of its communication with 
 the outer world. If then we find no sufficient reason 
 to assent to the notion that our own mental faculties 
 are derived from mere matter and motion, we have 
 certainly no ground to admit that any other intelli- 
 gence can have had such an orig; and we are ne- 
 cessarily led to the conclusion, that as intelligence does 
 now exist, it must have existed from all éternity. 
 But as we have no rational ground to believe that our - 
 own minds had any existence till a short time before 
 we were born, and as we have. seen that we cannot 
 admit that they have derived their existence from 
 matter and motion, nothing remains to explain the 
 phenomena but that they have been called into ex- 
 istence by some superior intelligence. If we could 
 prove that the intelligence thus possessed of creative 
 power had itself originated in time, it would be neces- 
 sary to admit a cause of that intelligence; and, by 
 however many removes, we must at last arrive at an 
 intelligent Being who has existed from eternity. 
 
 . But it may here be asked what we know of creation, 
 and what conception can we form of one intelligent 
 being having been called into existence by the volition 
 of a superior intelligence? In answer to the first 
 question, it is enough to say that our present inquiry 
 is not concerning what we know, but about what we 
 have rational ground for believing. In answering the 
 second question, we must call our attention to what it 
 is most important that we should constantly bear in 
 
10 THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 mind—the limited nature of our own faculties. We 
 feel, and we must feel, that the creation of either 
 material or intellectual things or beings is far beyond 
 our comprehension. We know nothing but facts. We 
 perceive intelligent beings and material things around 
 us, and are able to carry our researches into their 
 natures and qualities to an amazing extent; and we 
 have built up, by investigations and considerations of 
 these facts, a vast body of science; but when we ask 
 ourselves how these things began to exist, we are 
 inevitably led to a power or powers far superior to 
 ourselves; and we perceive indications of power, 
 knowledge, and wisdom far beyond what the wisest 
 of the human race could ever pretend to possess. 
 These matters will be shortly considered in detail. 
 For the present it may suffice to say that the ex- 
 istence of creative power in some being superior to 
 man will account satisfactorily for the phenomena 
 in question; and that there is nothing in our ex- 
 perience to lead us to deny its existence. When 
 we direct our attention to the universe around us, 
 and find that the moon pursues its monthly course 
 around the earth; that the planets, with the globe 
 which we inhabit, revolve around the great centre 
 of light and heat; that all their motions are car- 
 ried on with unvarying regularity; and that the 
 principles which regulate their movements are com- 
 mon to all these vast bodies, and to the fixed stars 
 at immeasurable distance from the solar system to 
 which we belong; when we find that these motions 
 are such that the course of one planet does not 
 interfere with those of the others, and that though 
 alterations do take place continually from the action 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. ll 
 
 of one planet on another, yet that none of these per- 
 turbations tend to the destruction of the system or of 
 any one of its parts, but that, for any thing we know 
 to the contrary, the whole system of material things is 
 fitted to endure for eternity; when, leaving these large 
 views of the material world, we carry our attention to 
 the structure of the organized bodies, animal and 
 vegetable, with which we are acquainted, and find 
 throughout, wherever our attention is directed, that 
 the organization of all is fitted for the preservation 
 and well-being of the plant_or animal, and adapted to 
 the place which it is to occupy, and to the uses and 
 objects to which it is to be applied,—these observations 
 necessarily lead us to perceive that the material uni- 
 verse displays a wisdom in design and a power in 
 execution to which we can assign no bounds and which 
 appear to act wholly uninfluenced by any hostile and 
 antagonistic power. 
 
 From the material world let us now turn our atten- 
 tion to the world of mind; and here it may suffice to 
 consider ourselves. Well did our mighty dramatic 
 poet say, in the language of his most philosophical 
 character, “What a piece of work is a man! how 
 noble in reason! how infinite in faculties! in form 
 and moving how express and admirable! in action 
 how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god Le 
 Yet let us look to the most exalted in intellect of the 
 human species,—to the profound philosopher who has 
 sounded the depths of science, and extended its do- 
 main by his discoveries ; to the inventive genius who 
 has applied the forces of nature in new forms for the 
 use and benefit of mankind; to the great poet who 
 from the stores of his imagination has brought forth 
 
12 THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 characters, ideas and sentiments fitted alike for the 
 delight and the improvement of his species; or to the 
 wise and patriotic statesman whose sage measures have 
 advanced the prosperity of his country, improved her 
 resources, and raised her to a higher place among the 
 nations ; and let us then call to mind, taking the case 
 of any one of these individuals, that he was once a 
 poor weak and apparently insignificant infant, quite 
 helpless, dependent for his nourishment and for the 
 continuance of his existence on those around him, and 
 exhibiting nothing of an intellectual character beyond 
 the bare perception of external objects. Now, how is 
 it that the infant has grown to be a philosopher, a 
 man of inventive mechanical genius, a poet, or a 
 statesman, but by the development of those intellec- 
 tual powers of which we discover such slight indica- 
 tions in the infant ; and does not the wonderful deve- 
 lopment of those powers indicate beyond the possi- 
 buity of doubt the existence of a pre-existing cause ? 
 That cause must have been intelligent or unintelligent, 
 and we have already shown it to be inadmissible that 
 intelligence results from matter and motion. The 
 cause then for which we are seeking is an original 
 self-existent cause ; in other words, it is God. 
 Having proceeded thus far we will now inquire 
 whether we are to conclude that there is only one 
 self-existent intelligent being, or whether we find rea- 
 son to believe in the existence of a plurality of gods. 
 Now all that we know of what is commonly called the 
 works of nature combines to establish one point, that 
 the whole is contrived and designed by one or more 
 intelligent beings, and that if more than one exist, 
 they concur in the same uniform design. The notion 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 13 
 
 of the affairs of the universe being carried on by con- 
 flicting powers, the one intending good and the other 
 evil, has disappeared in the process of scientific inves- 
 tigation. All which we call contrivance in the works 
 of nature indicates benevolence in the contriver, and 
 whatever of evil exists appears to arise incidentally, 
 and must be traced either to want of wisdom or of 
 power in the contriver, or to causes which lie beyond 
 the reach of our apprehension. I will not here enter 
 on the inquiry, which of these solutions of the diffi- 
 culty we ought to adopt: that question I shall at- 
 tempt to answer hereafter; but we are now. in- 
 quiring whether there be any reason to believe that 
 the universe was produced not by one only, but by a 
 plurality of intelligent bemgs. On this subject I be- 
 lieve all thinking men are now agreed. Any one who 
 has to explain any phenomena whatever which may 
 be accounted for by the operation of a single cause, 
 would be considered to take a very unphilosophical 
 course if he were to assert that the facts in question 
 were produced by a plurality of causes. This would 
 be a relinquishing of a well-known law of philosophi- 
 zing laid down by Newton, and universally admitted 
 by philosophers, and it would be a supposition per- 
 fectly gratuitous and uncalled for by the phenomena 
 to be explained. Now there is absolutely no ground 
 at all for denying that every thing in the universe of 
 which we have any knowledge may have been created 
 by one Being of stupendous and immeasurable power 
 and wisdom, and the mind having advanced to this 
 conception, finds it perfectly satisfactory and ac- 
 quiesces in its truth. It is nothing to the purpose to 
 say that we can attain no distinct notion how intellec- 
 
14 THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 tual and material existences could have been called 
 into being by the volition of the Great First Cause. — 
 We have seén already that the phenomena of the ma- 
 terial and of the intellectual world necessarily lead to 
 the conclusion that eternal intelligence has produced 
 the whole ; and when we consider that there is not an 
 object around us which does not present difficulties 
 beyond the power of man to solve, and that our no- 
 tions of causation are exceedingly obscure; we ought 
 not to be at all surprised to find ourselves quite in- 
 competent to arrive at a clear conception of the crea- 
 tive power which formed the universe. We have 
 abundant reason to believe that the universe was 
 created by God. With that we ought to be satisfied, 
 and indeed it is by no means easy to say what it is 
 that we wish to know beyond this. 
 
 Seeing then sufficient reason for unhesitating belief 
 in the existence of one Great First Cause of the uni- 
 verse and every being and thing which it contains, the 
 mind is naturally led to the inquiry whether we have 
 any, and if any, what means of judging of the ends 
 and purposes for which the Almighty created the uni- 
 verse, and particularly of his designs as to ourselves. 
 Here we must be struck at the first step of our pro- 
 gress with the inadequacy of our faculties to the full 
 comprehension of this vast subject. It would be su- 
 preme folly, or rather it would be insanity to suppose 
 that we, the creatures of a day, are able to compre- 
 hend the whole design of the Deity in the creation of 
 the spiritual and of the material world. Thousands 
 of purposes may have been intended and fully carried 
 into effect which we are no more capable of under- 
 standing than an infant is of comprehending the 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 15 
 
 Newtonian philosophy. It would however be a great 
 error, and would be fatal to all religion, were we to 
 admit, that because we cannot comprehend the whole 
 design of the Deity in creation, we are incapable of 
 understanding any part of it. The very foundation of 
 religion is a sense of the relation in which we stand to 
 our Creator, of the duties which he requires of us, and 
 of the expectation of his favour which we may enter- 
 tain on our performance of those duties. If reason 
 and our moral faculty can teach us nothing respecting 
 the character of the Deity and his intentions towards 
 us, there can be no such thing as natural religion, and, 
 to say the least, the foundation of revealed religion 
 will be much shaken. “He that cometh to God,” 
 says the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, “ must 
 believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them 
 that diligently seek him ;” and unless we are satisfied 
 not only of the existence of God, but also that we may 
 rely on his promises, it is difficult to see how we can 
 place any confidence in what professes to be a revela- 
 tion of his will. It seems therefore essential to reli- 
 gion, or at any rate it is an important preparation for 
 our receiving the truths of revelation, that we should 
 be able to form some just conception of the attributes 
 of God, and of his purposes respecting ourselves. 
 
 We do, and we must of necessity, derive our 
 notions of the Deity in a great measure from what 
 we know of man, the highest intellectual, and 
 the only moral, being with whom our experience in 
 this world makes us acquainted. Imperfect as the 
 ~ analogy must necessarily be between the Creator 
 and the creature whom he has formed, difficult as it is 
 
 * Chap. xi. 6. 
 
16 THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 to compare a finite being with the Infinite, it is the 
 only mode which we have, independent of revealed 
 
 religion, of forming any conception whatever of God. 
 
 Natural and revealed religion are the two great branches 
 which we shall have to consider in the prosecution of 
 this work; and preparatory to the consideration of 
 those all-important subjects, we are now directing our 
 attention to the conceptions which our faculties enable 
 us to form of the Deity. 
 
 We have already seen that the phenomena of the 
 intellectual and of the material world lead us to ascribe. 
 to God power and wisdom to which we can assign no 
 limits ; and that there is no appearance of the exist- 
 ence of any antagonistic power capable in any degree of 
 opposing or limiting the operations of the Deity. The 
 power and wisdom of God, then, we believe to be in- 
 finite. Now as it is impossible to conceive that every 
 sentient and intelligent being should not will his own 
 happiness, we cannot but consider that the Deity 1s 
 perfectly happy; and that there is not, nor ever can 
 be, any being or thing im existence capable in the 
 slightest degree of interfering with, or diminishing his 
 happiness. We find in ourselves that benevolence 1s 
 a great source of happiness ; that every act by which 
 we endeavour to advance the well-bemg of others is 
 attended by an agreeable feeling, and is always re- 
 garded by us with satisfaction and approbation. On 
 the other hand, malevolence not only inflicts misery 
 on others, but is in general a fruitful source of un- 
 happiness to the agent. It is indeed true that a plea- 
 sure attends the gratification of revenge, but it is 
 evanescent in its nature, leads to no pleasing feeling 
 in the retrospect, and is never approved of by the 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 17 
 
 moral faculty. Of all the malignant passions, revenge 
 alone has anything even transiently pleasurable. Envy, 
 jealousy, hatred, each throws an ingredient of bitter- 
 ness into the cup of life. Previously therefore to in- 
 vestigating the works of nature, for the purpose of 
 discovering, so far as our faculties will enable us to 
 do so, the intentions of the Deity as to ourselves, we 
 should naturally be led from the analogy of our own 
 minds to conclude that God was entirely free from 
 anything bearing the slightest resemblance to the 
 malignant passions to which our nature is unhappily 
 subject. We should with some confidence exclude 
 every kind and degree of malignity from our concep- 
 tion of the Divine character. Our benevolent feelings 
 and sentiments are always objects of approbation, and 
 they seem worthy of eternal duration. We cannot 
 imagine any being in whom we should not consider 
 benevolence an excellence, nor could any character, 
 however excellent in other particulars, command our 
 esteem without it. It is then perfectly consistent with 
 our best sentiments to presume @ priori that the Deity 
 was prompted to the mighty work of creation by bene- 
 volence ; that he made his creatures for the purpose 
 of conferring happiness upon them. We cannot pre- 
 tend to understand the nature of the happiness of the 
 Divine Being; but as conferring good on others is one 
 of the best and purest sources of our own felicity, it 
 is not at any rate inconsistent with the most exalted 
 notions which we are capable of forming of the Creator, 
 that the happiness he confers on his creatures may be 
 a source of his own felicity. On this subject, how- 
 ever, we know and can know nothing. 
 
 Let us, then, turn our attention to what we perceive 
 
 c 
 
18 THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 around us, and consider what evidence the pheenomena 
 of the sentient and intellectual world afford of the 
 benevolent designs of the Creator. We shall indeed 
 find the work ready done to our hand in many excel- 
 lent treatises on natural theology which form no small 
 part of the treasures of English literature. To what- 
 ever branch of this most extensive and most iterest- 
 ing subject the active genius of man has directed its 
 attention, a similar result has always followed. In 
 every organized being there has invariably been found 
 an arrangement of parts admirably fitted for the pre- 
 servation of the life of the animal, and for its enjoy- 
 ment ; for guarding it from accidents and annoyances 
 in the state of life to which it is destined ; for a con- 
 stant supply of nourishment for its daily wastes; and 
 for a power of restoration or renewing parts which 
 have been accidentally injured or destroyed. In the 
 human body we discern a most complicated system of 
 mechanism carried to extreme minuteness, of the most 
 delicate character, very liable indeed to injury, but 
 nevertheless so admirably adapted to its situation as 
 often to endure 80, 90, or 100 years, during all which 
 periods the lungs continue to breathe, the heart to 
 expand and contract, and the blood to pursue its 
 course through the veins and arteries without a 
 moment’s cessation. How wonderful must be the 
 skill which formed the human body, and enabled it 
 thus and for so long a time to exercise its functions 
 for the preservation and the well-bemg of man! Well 
 may the Psalmist say that we are “ fearfully and won- 
 derfully made!’’ Well may the religious poet exclaim, 
 “Strange, that a harp of thousand strings should last 
 in tune so long!” But the mechanical organization is 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. | 19 
 
 by no means all that is wonderful and admirable in 
 the structure of the human body; which is also 
 a laboratory wherein chemical operations are conti- 
 nually going on, essential to the preservation and the 
 healthy condition of man. These matters are so well 
 known, and have so often been clearly and ably 
 laid before the public in full detail, as to render it 
 unnecessary to do more in this place than to refer to 
 them as admitted facts. 
 
 The human mind as well as the body affords 
 strong testimony to the benevolent intention of the 
 Maker of all in the formation of man. We have a 
 rational and a moral faculty, and both, when directed 
 to the purposes for which they are evidently intended, 
 are sources of great enjoyment. How much of the 
 happiness of life is derived from the occupation of 
 the mind in the investigation of truth, in the acquisi- 
 tion of useful knowledge, in reflection, in intellectual 
 conversation, and in applying our knowledge in various 
 ways for the benefit of ourselves and of our fellow- 
 creatures! With respect to our moral pleasures, they 
 rank among the highest and most important. With- 
 out them, indeed, we should find little in human life 
 worthy of our regard. ‘Take away the domestic cha- 
 rities, the delights of friendship, and the enjoyments 
 which are the result of kindness bestowed and accepted, 
 and little indeed would remain to cheer us in our 
 passage through the world. The most exalted in- 
 tellect, the highest genius feel the want of some to 
 whom their discoveries and their reflections may be 
 imparted. We all wish to be loved, and if any one 
 could be found with no yearnings for the kindness 
 and affection of his fellow-creatures, he would be sunk 
 
 Gra 
 
20 THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 into a state of sullen selfishness totally mconsistent 
 with a happy existence. If then both the body and 
 the mind of man are made for enjoyment, if all the 
 contrivance which we can trace in creation appears to 
 have a benevolent object, how can we hesitate to be- 
 lieve that the object of God in creation was the hap- 
 piness of the creatures whom he formed ? 
 
 The only objection which can, I think, be made to 
 the benevolent intention of the Creator in the forma- 
 tion of the universe, arises from the existence of phy- 
 sical and of moral evil, which, it must be admitted, 
 prevail to a very great extent indeed in the world. 
 How is this to be accounted for under the dominion 
 of a Being of almighty power, and of perfect wisdom 
 and goodness? Hither, says the objector, God had the 
 power to create the universe without the evil which 
 now exists and he would not, or he had the will to do 
 so and he could not: on the first supposition, you 
 deny his perfect goodness, on the second, his wisdom 
 or his power. Now this objection appears to me to 
 assume that we have a more distinct conception of 
 the attributes of the Deity and of the universe, than 
 our limited faculties can possibly attain. We have 
 already seen that all which Gn the most appropriate 
 language we can use) we call design and con- 
 trivance in the universe, indicates a benevolent in- 
 tention in the Designer, and that there is no appear- 
 ance anywhere of the end not being benevolent, or 
 of the means not bemg suited to attaim the end. 
 The wisdom and goodness of the Deity we, there- 
 fore, properly conclude to be perfect. With respect 
 to the power of God, we say that he is almighty, - 
 because we can discern nowhere any trace of a power 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 21 
 
 independent of him, and acting in hostility to him, 
 consequently we can discover nothing capable of con- 
 trolling his will. So far our apprehensions can go, 
 but no further. With respect to the evils which 
 afflict humanity, we know that human virtue is mainly 
 formed by encountering and overcoming evil in one 
 shape or other. ‘Sweet are the uses of adversity,” 
 and by the “sadness of the countenance the heart 
 is made better.” Human life is a continual struggle 
 witlf temptation to do wrong, and excellence of 
 character is attained by success in the contest. 
 Surely it would be an over-bold and presumptuous 
 assertion, that the existence of such a being as man is 
 inconsistent with the perfection of the Divine attri- 
 butes ; yet we see that a contact with evil, and a con- 
 tention with it are essential to the formation of his 
 character to virtue, in other words, to its highest and 
 best state. We perceive then plainly the subservience 
 of evil to good in this case, and we are not in a con- 
 dition to say that all the evil that exists m the uni- 
 verse is not of the like character. But, says the ob- 
 jector, why might not the good have been attained 
 without the evil? I can only answer that I do not 
 know, and that I am not concerned to know. ‘There 
 is, in inquiries of this sort, much which lies beyond 
 the boundaries of human apprehension. When we 
 consider the action of material substances on one 
 another, we easily perceive that it is calculated to 
 produce, and that it does produce, beneficial results ; 
 but if we are asked why matter was created with the 
 particular qualities which belong to it, we have no 
 answer to give. The subject is beyond our reach. In 
 like manner we can give no reason why man is made 
 
22 THE BEING AND, ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 
 
 as he is. Our only way of understanding such sub- 
 jects as we are now considering, is by observing the 
 relation which one being or thing bears to another, 
 their connexion with each other, and their mutual 
 action ; and if these tend to good, as we have already 
 seen that they do, they afford abundant reason for our 
 being satisfied of the benevolent design of the Creator. 
 ‘More especially should we be diffident in forming 
 conclusions on this abstruse subject, when we are ac- 
 quainted with a very small part of the universe,~and 
 for a very limited duration. We see but a speck 
 of that universe which fills immensity, and which 
 is destmed to endure through eternity. No one 
 will presume to assign any bounds to the universe; © 
 and it would exceed the wildest ravings of insanity to 
 suppose that a period can ever arrive when all exist- 
 ence shall be brought to an end, and absolutely 
 nothing shall remain. When we direct our thoughts 
 to the contemplation of the Deity, and of his work, 
 we must feel at every step which we take the in- 
 adequacy of our conceptions, and how very little way 
 we can see into this incomprehensible and _ infinite 
 subject. A humble sense of the limited nature of our 
 faculties should make us very careful not to indulge 
 in dogmatical assertions about things beyond the 
 reach of our apprehensions. It is surely proper for 
 wedk, short-sighted man to confess that the full 
 understandmg of this subject lies beyond his com- 
 prehension ; and that though he cannot account for 
 the existence of evil in the world, it would savour 
 more of presumption than of wisdom if we were to 
 pronounce it to be inconsistent with any of the attri- 
 butes of the Deity. There may be reasons for it, which 
 
THE BEING AND ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. 23 
 
 the human mind in its best and most improved state 
 is incapable of understanding. Let us then confess 
 our incapacity, and leave the existence of evil among 
 the deep things of God, which are to us, in our pre- 
 sent state, inscrutable. Possibly He may in a more 
 advanced stage of our existence enable us to attain a 
 solution of what, in our condition in this world, must 
 always be a painful and unintelligible subject. 
 
 Power, wisdom and goodness, then, we have seen 
 reason to ascribe to God, and these comprise all the 
 attributes which, according to our apprehension, make 
 up the perfection of the Divine character. Other 
 words are indeed often used in mentioning the attri- 
 butes of God. We shall have occasion hereafter to 
 consider the attribute of justice, which is often repre- 
 sented as distinct from benevolence. In this sense, 
 however, it can be only applied to the Almighty as a 
 moral Governor and not as a Creator. Certainly we 
 could not, before we were created, be objects of the 
 justice of God. If the term justice can be properly 
 used of the Creator, as such, it must be only in this 
 sense—that it would be unjust i the Deity to create 
 any being and to place him in such circumstances, 
 that his existence would prove a curse and not a 
 blessing. But this horrible supposition would rather 
 be described under the term malevolence than that of 
 injustice, which always is referred to something in 
 the object deserving of praise or censure, reward or 
 punishment. 
 
PART II. 
 NATURAL RELIGION. 
 
 Hoss who admit the correctness of the views of the 
 Divine character stated above, cannot fail to perceive 
 ‘that they afford a solid foundation of Natural Religion. 
 If indeed the Deity be all-wise, and powerful, and good, 
 we have abundant reason to be confident that he will 
 in all cases do that which is right, and that his pro- 
 vidence watches over the works of his hands, and 
 directs all things for the best. As I do not find that 
 the wisest of the ancient philosophers ever fully 
 attained this cheering view of the Divine character, I 
 feel it impossible to doubt that what is now called 
 Natural Religion is a light reflected in a great mea- 
 
 sure from Revelation. The views of the character and | 
 
 attributes of the Great Author of all set forth in the 
 Old Testament, and far more fully enunciated in the 
 New, have afforded the means by which the modern 
 theist has been enabled to attain far clearer and more 
 exalted notions of natural religion than ever flowed 
 from the reflections and investigations of the ancients. 
 But though revealed religion has led us into the right 
 path of inquiry, the arguments in favour of natural 
 religion are so satisfactory as to afford of themselves 
 a reason for regulating our characters and conduct 
 with reference to the will of God, though we should 
 not be able to yield our assent to the truth of re- 
 vealed religion. That we have abundant reason to 
 
NATURAL RELIGION. 25 
 
 do so, will be attempted to be shown hereafter. At 
 present we will consider natural as entirely independ- 
 ent of revealed religion. ! 
 
 We are sent into the world with a rational and a 
 moral faculty, both m a rudimental state, and both 
 developing themselves by slow degrees. From small 
 beginnings we learn to employ our reason in deducing 
 conclusions from what we perceive external to our- 
 selves, and from what passes in our own mind; and 
 our ability to reason grows with our growth and 
 strengthens with our strength, and at length enables 
 some favoured individuals to comprehend the pro- 
 foundest dogmas of science and philosophy. Others 
 are carried on by the wondrous powers of the imagina- 
 tion to extend the bounds of human thought, and to 
 produce the marvellous creations of painting, of sculp- 
 ture, of architecture and of poetry, by which the world 
 has been. delighted, refined, and improved. All the 
 workings of the intellect, when properly directed, tend 
 not only to the embellishment of human life, but to 
 the improvement of the human character in wisdom 
 and virtue. This is a legitimate though indirect result 
 of the working of our rational faculty, but it is the 
 direct and immediate object of the moral nature which 
 God has given us. We are naturally disposed to love 
 and honour all that is good, to feel gratitude for 
 benefits received, esteem and reverence for the bene- . 
 factors of their race, compassion for the afflicted, and a 
 desire to relieve their distresses. ‘These good disposi- 
 tions are indeed liable to be counteracted by many 
 opposing influences arising from self-interest and from 
 the unrestrained working of the passions; but very 
 rarely indeed is the moral faculty so far deteriorated, 
 
26 NATURAL RELIGION. 
 
 even in persons whose conduct is but little influenced 
 by it, as to destroy their respect for what is really good 
 in all cases where their own interest and passions are 
 not concerned. 
 
 Religion addresses itself both to our rational and to 
 our moral nature. Reason enables us to trace all 
 existence to one great first cause ; and by contemplating 
 the moral perfections of the Deity, we are naturally led 
 to fix our highest regards on him. Surely it is a 
 marvellous inconsistency to love and reverence the 
 good we find in men, and to be unmoved at the con- 
 templation of the moral attributes of him from whom 
 is derived every good and every perfect gift. How 
 exalted, how soul-absorbing is the contemplation of one 
 unspeakably Great Spirit; who formed, and who pre- 
 serves all things; by whom are directed all the compli- 
 cated movements of the universe ; and who makes all 
 things to work together for good to his creatures! It 
 seems impossible that these views should be entertained 
 of the Divine character, without impressing the mind 
 with love and veneration in the highest degree. These 
 effects then might be expected to flow from a sincere 
 belief in natural religion. ‘To the best and noblest 
 of the human race it may be so ; but these are a very 
 small fraction of mankind ; and we shall, I think, find 
 on investigation that natural religion is wholly in- 
 sufficient, in affording those motives which are requisite 
 to discipline the great mass of mankind to virtuous 
 conduct ; to excite in their minds a just and deep 
 sense of the relation in which they stand to their 
 Maker ; and to make them feel, that it is alike their 
 duty and their interest to yield obedience in all things 
 to his holy will. Self-interest and inordinate passions 
 
NATURAL RELIGION. yi 
 
 are extremely powerful agents in human characters ; 
 and more mighty counteracting principles are required 
 to control them than natural religion can produce. 
 When self-interest is the predominant principle, it is 
 necessary to restrain it by pointing out a higher interest 
 than any which is confined to this world alone; and 
 when the character is vitiated by the predominance of 
 passion, a more powerful passion must be excited to 
 counteract its force. From what source then are these 
 antagonistic forces to be derived? The answer is plain: 
 the belief of a future stateof rewards and punishment (as 
 it is usually called) can alone supply sufficient motives to 
 overrule the evil mfluences of passion and self-interest. 
 The tendency of virtuous conduct is undoubtedly in 
 general to the happiness of the individual in this world, 
 and, supposing external circumstances to be the same, 
 the most virtuous will always be the happiest men. 
 But this is far from being the case. It often happens 
 - that vicious men are gifted with fine constitutions, and 
 pass through life im uninterrupted prosperity. On the 
 other hand, the virtuous man is frequently beset by 
 disease and sickness, and is as liable as others to ill 
 success in his worldly pursuits, and to be reduced to 
 privation, to poverty, and to actual want. ven his 
 consolations are little understood by the world at large. 
 The worldly man knows nothing of the peace and 
 tranquillity which result from virtuous conduct, nor 
 can he be made to comprehend it. He sees that persons 
 of virtuous character are subject to the ordinary ills 
 of life, and that their principles of integrity often 
 prevent them from obtaining worldly advantages which 
 are procured by those who entertain no such scruples. 
 To their apprehension, all advantages are ranged on 
 
28 NATURAL RELIGION. 
 
 the side of those who make self-interest their leading 
 principle of action. ‘To this class of persons—and it 
 is to be feared that a majority of the human race fall 
 within it—no motive can be found adequate to produce 
 a change of character and conduct except the expecta- 
 tion of greater gain hereafter, which no one can deny 
 may be found in a future state. Now then comes the 
 question, can a future state be proved by the mere 
 light of nature? Volumes have been-writtén to prove 
 the natural immortality of the soul; and arguments of 
 much ingenuity, and of some force, have been advanced 
 in support of that opinion, but none I think which 
 will give full and entire satisfaction to an inquiring 
 mind. ‘To him who examines the subject fairly and 
 dispassionately, the result will, as it seems to me, not 
 go beyond doubt and suspense of judgment. It is to 
 the sure word of revelation that we must look for full 
 satisfaction. If the gospel be true, then indeed has 
 Jesus Christ brought life and immortality to light ; all 
 our doubts on the unspeakably important subject of a 
 future existence beyond the grave are fully dispelled, 
 and unhesitating faith takes their place. The uncer- 
 tainty as to a future life which belongs to natural 
 religion, must always prevent its having sufficient force 
 to counteract the evil passions of men. Passion is 
 often too strong for self-interest. It frequently re- 
 quires a considerable strength of resolution to prefer 
 future good to present gratification, and in proportion 
 as the passions are stronger than that calm desire for 
 our future welfare, which we call a regard to self- 
 interest, must the opposing force be powerful to make 
 an effectual resistance. The firm belief in a future 
 state of retribution, as we know by lamentable ex- 
 
NATURAL RELIGION. 29 
 
 perience, is often found insufficient to check the torrent 
 of passion; how then can we expect that, to say the 
 most, a hesitating and doubting assent to the doctrine 
 of man’s immortality can have that effect P 
 
 But if we were to admit that natural religion affords 
 sufficient proof of a future state, what information 
 can it give us of its nature, and of our future condition 
 in the world to come? Brought up and educated in a 
 Christian country, our minds are necessarily furnished 
 with Christian ideas on this subject, and the future 
 world is constantly represented as a state of rewards 
 and punishments. ‘This language is indeed, as to one 
 branch of the subject, erroneous and reprehensible. 
 As all we have is from God, as all our powers mental 
 and corporeal are his gifts, as we owe to him our 
 existence, which if we are not wanting to ourselves 
 will be an unspeakable blessing, we can, under no 
 circumstances, be entitled to claim a reward from him : 
 all the enjoyment we can ever have in this world or in 
 that which is to come, can properly be considered in 
 no other light than as derived from his bounty; and 
 if he should confer upon us the happiness of the next 
 world, as a consequence of our obedience to his holy 
 will here, it will be a gift, and not, in strict propriety 
 of language, a reward. It is probable, however, that 
 no one has ever believed in a future state, without also 
 connecting with that belief an expectation that our 
 condition in the next world will depend on what we 
 have done in this. But here arises an important 
 question. very religion which has prevailed in any 
 part of the world, has had its rules of faith and practice 
 which have been held obligatory on those who admit 
 its authority. Now it is certain that few, if any, in 
 whatever age or country, and under whatever dispen- 
 
30 NATURAL RELIGION. 
 
 sation of religion, have yielded a complete obedience 
 to its laws, and in the whole course of their lives 
 abstained from every act of disobedience. The great 
 mass of mankind, and probably the whole human race, 
 must stand in the condition of offenders against the 
 law of God. Admitting then that they would have 
 become entitled to the happiness of the future state if 
 their obedience had been entire and complete, what 
 can we determine as to those who have lost their claim 
 by disobedience to the divine law? The Christian 
 Scriptures teach the efficacy of repentance, but on this 
 subject natural religion appears to be quite silent. 
 
 The just result of our investigation then seems to 
 be, that a sense of the perfections of the Deity will 
 afford a ground for religious feelings and principles 
 which will affect, to a considerable extent, the minds 
 and influence the character and conduct of those who 
 are virtuously disposed; but that on the minds and 
 hearts of the great mass of mankind, it is not ‘calculated 
 to produce much effect: that the grounds it affords for 
 the expectation of a future life, are not so satisfactory as 
 greatly to operate in inducing men to lead virtuous 
 and religious lives; and that it holds out no certain 
 hope to the sinner that his sins will be forgiven on 
 repentance. If these views be just, it follows that 
 something more is wanting to give consolation to the 
 human race amid the, sorrows and conflicts of this 
 life, and to afford them a hope of obtaining eternal 
 felicity in the world to come. These deficiencies the 
 Christian Religion undertakes to supply. We will 
 proceed to examine whether it presents itself under 
 such circumstances, as will compel us to admit the 
 validity of its claims, and to yield obedience to its 
 commands. 
 
3] 
 
 PART IIT. 
 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Havine concluded what I had to say respecting natural 
 religion, let us now proceed to the inquiry, whether 
 we have sufficient reason to believe that God has 
 revealed himself to his creatures through the instru- 
 mentality of individuals to whom he has given super- 
 natural knowledge and power, and whom he has en- 
 trusted with authority to declare his will to the human 
 race. Respecting the vast importance of this inquiry 
 there can be no difference of opmion, unless any should 
 be found who have made up their minds that a revela- 
 tion of the Divine willis in itself wholly credible, and 
 incapable of proof by any evidence whatever. I shall 
 endeavour hereafter to show that such an opinion is 
 without any rational foundation, and we will at once 
 proceed with our inquiry concerning the truth of 
 revelation. 
 
 Many religions, in different ages and m different 
 parts of the world, have claimed to be revelations of 
 the Divine will; but the inquiry will here be confined 
 to the claims of the Christian religion to Divine anu- 
 thority. The course to be pursued will be, in the 
 first place, to examine the facts of its origin and early 
 history, and then to consider its progress in the 
 world ; the changes it has produced in the condition 
 of the human race ; its present state, and its future 
 prospects. All these subjects will be considered very 
 
Se THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 generally, and all unnecessary detail will be carefully 
 avoided. 
 
 With respect to the origin of the Christian religion, 
 no difference of opinion will probably be found among 
 persons competently informed, and of any degree of 
 candour.. That it was first promulgated by Jesus 
 Christ, a Jew, and a native of Palestine, there is 
 abundant reason to admit, as well from the assertion 
 of heathen, as of Christian writers who lived near 
 the time; accounts of his life, his teachings, his 
 death, and his resurrection from the dead, have come 
 down to us in the four gospels, two of which are 
 ascribed to two apostles, and the other two to in- 
 dividuals who are represented by tradition to have 
 been friends and followers of the apostles. I shall 
 make no further use of the gospel narratives in 
 this place than to treat them as credible accounts 
 of the ordinary facts mentioned in them ; claiming 
 neither for them, nor for him whose history they tell, 
 any Divine authority, nor asserting the truth of any 
 thing miraculous in their history. These are matters 
 which will be considered hereafter. For the present, 
 I content myself with the assertion that they are cre- 
 dible narrations of the common facts of their history. 
 
 The origin of the Christian religion, which now, in 
 some form or other, is the professed religion of all the 
 most civilized nations in the globe, is the fact for 
 which we have to account. Its commencement is 
 asserted by all Christian and by many heathen writers 
 to have been in Palestine between eighteen and nine- 
 teen centuries ago. All the writers on the subject 
 agree in ascribing its origin to Jesus Christ, a native 
 of Palestine. We have come down to us from very 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. — 33 
 
 early times four narratives of his life, three of which 
 bear a close resemblance to each other, and, for the 
 most part, give accounts of the same transactions. 
 The fourth narrative, which professes to be written 
 by a person very intimately connected with Jesus, 
 contains much which is not found in the writings of 
 the other evangelists ; but, in the concluding scenes, 
 relates the same facts. All these narratives are 
 written with great simplicity; without any ap- 
 pearance of studied composition, and without eulo- 
 gium or comments on the character of the subject 
 of the narratives. ‘They have in themselves all the 
 marks of a true and authentic biography; and we 
 have no other writings in existence which contradict 
 them, or are in any way inconsistent with them. On 
 what ground, then, can we be called upon to reject 
 these narratives? Observe, I am in this place only 
 treating them as credible narrations of common facts. 
 Their claim to anything supernatural will be con- 
 sidered hereafter. For the present I lay it down that 
 they are to be held authentic histories of the origin of 
 the Christian religion. What, then, is the account 
 they give? I will say nothing here of the narratives 
 of the birth and parentage of Jesus contained in the 
 gospels of Matthew and Luke, but will take up the 
 history at the time when he began to promulgate his 
 religion by publicly teachng in Judea and Galilee. 
 We find him then described as a Jew of humble 
 origin ; appearing to the world as the son of a car- 
 penter who resided at Nazareth ; and apparently him- 
 self employed in the same trade as his supposed 
 father. ‘There is no reason to think that he enjoyed 
 any advantage of education beyond others in his 
 D 
 
34 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 station in life; and we have no other account beyond 
 his being, in one instance, called a carpenter, in what 
 manner or in what employment he spent the early 
 years of his life. About the age of thirty he appeared 
 as a public teacher of religion. 
 
 Previously, however, to making any observations 
 on the conduct and teachings of-Jesus Christ, it will 
 be proper to direct our attention to a very remarkable 
 person, John the Baptist. 
 
 The account of his first appearance as a religious 
 teacher is given in the gospel of St. Matthew in the 
 following words: “In those days came John the 
 Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judea, and 
 saying, Repent ye; for the kingdom of heaven is at 
 hand. For this is he that was spoken of by the pro- 
 phet Esaias, saying, the voice of one crying in the 
 wilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his 
 paths straight. And the same John had his raiment 
 of camel’s hair, and a leathern girdle about his loms ; 
 and his meat was locusts and wild honey. Then went 
 out: to him all Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the 
 region round about Jordan, and were baptized of him 
 in Jordan confessing their sins.*”’ 
 
 From the authoritative style of the Baptist we 
 might reasonably expect that it was his intention to 
 become the head of a new religion. ‘This, however, 
 he entirely disclaims ;, and he points the attention of 
 his hearers to one who is to follow him; and who is 
 greater and mightier than himself. “J indeed,” he 
 says, “ baptize you with water unto repentance: but 
 he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose 
 shoes | am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you 
 
 * Matt. ii. 1-6. See also Mark i. 1-6; Luke i. 1-6. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 30 
 
 with the Holy Ghost, and with fire*.’ After this 
 declaration Jesus himself comes to be baptized of 
 John, whereupon John thus addresses him: “I have 
 need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to 
 me? +” I can see then no reason to doubt that John 
 the Baptist appeared in Judea in the character of a 
 religious teacher; that he professed to come as the 
 forerunner of one of greater authority than himself ; 
 and that he distinctly pointed out J esus as that indi- 
 vidual. This last circumstance is fully proved in the 
 texts from St. John’s gospel referred to in the note 
 below. 
 
 Here then we have an account of a man who ap- 
 peared in Judea, exhorted his hearers to repent of 
 their sins, and performed the rite of baptism on a 
 great number of individuals; but who was so far 
 from setting himself up as the head of a new religion 
 as to assume the character of a precursor of one 
 greater than himself, and who pointed out Jesus as 
 the individual for whose appearance he was preparing 
 the way. Now there is certainly nothing incredible 
 in any part of this narrative. John professed, and, 
 no doubt, believed himself to be acting under a Divine 
 commission as the precursor of the Messiah. This 
 claim may or may not have been well founded; but, 
 for the present, we have nothing to do with that 
 question ; our business now being only to consider 
 the common facts of the gospel, leaving everything 
 supernatural for future examination. The narration 
 then is simply this: That a man, who believes him- 
 self to be divinely authorized and appointed for the 
 
 =<Matty tiie: 1.14 
 + Matt. ii. 14. See also John i. 19-36. 
 
 D2 
 
36 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 purpose, preaches repentance from sin to his hearers ; 
 exhorts them to the performance of good works ; in- 
 stitutes them into a new religion by baptism; and 
 refers them to another teacher pointed out by him, 
 whose forerunner he professes to be, and to whom he 
 represents himself as subordinate. I draw no other 
 conclusions from these facts, than that the Baptist 
 was sincere, that he actually believed himself to be 
 what he professed, and that the object of his teaching 
 was to lead his hearers to repentance, and to the per- 
 formance of the duties of religion. There is not the 
 slightest appearance in the narrative that he was 
 actuated by ambitious motives. He was followed by 
 a multitude of people over whom he exercised great 
 influence. Can it be doubted that, if ambition had been 
 the principle of his conduct, he would have reserved 
 to himself the chief authority as the head of the new 
 religion? But he does no such thing; on the con- 
 trary, he represents his own preaching as preparatory 
 to the appearance of another. ‘“ He,” John says, 
 “must increase, but I must decrease*.” 
 
 Having seen, then, that John the Baptist was a 
 preacher of repentance, and of righteousness ; that he 
 professed himself to be the forerunner of a teacher 
 superior to himself, and that he pointed out Jesus as 
 that person, let us now proceed to the account of the 
 latter contained in the four gospels. I shall here 
 consider these narratives as credible accounts of or- 
 dinary facts ; leaving everything miraculous for future 
 consideration. That they have a just title to be so 
 esteemed will appear from the following considera- 
 tions. Without pretending to fix the dates of any 
 
 * John ii. 30. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 37 
 
 of the gospels, it will be sufficient to say, that they 
 were received at a very early period in the Chris- 
 tian church; that they have been always ascribed 
 to the authors whose names they bear, two of whom 
 were apostles, and the other two have always been 
 held to have been friends and followers of apostles ; 
 and that they have been handed down from age to 
 age, as the writings of Matthew, Mark, Luke and 
 John. Now this is precisely the sort of evidence on 
 which we receive all ancient writings; and we can 
 have no other. “I can perceive no more reason for 
 doubting that the apostle Matthew was the author of 
 the gospel which is called by his name, than that 
 Xenophon and Tacitus were the authors of their 
 respective histories. Those who wish for minute 
 and detailed accounts of the evidence of the authen- 
 ticity of the gospels may find full satisfaction in 
 Larduer’s great work on the ‘ Credibility of the Gospel 
 History.’ 
 
 The first three gospels contain, for the most part, 
 narratives of the same facts and the same discourses, 
 differing im some particulars, but agreeing in the 
 main ; having in that respect precisely the character 
 which is usually found in the accounts given by dif- 
 ferent individuals of the same transactions. None of 
 the authors of the gospels appear. to have written in 
 strictly chronological order. 
 
 As the question which we shall in the end have to 
 consider is, whether the Christian religion is really of 
 divine authority ; and as we can only form a-judg- 
 ment by the exercise of our rational and our moral 
 faculties of the claim of any religion to be a divine 
 revelation ; I shall now proceed to a review of the life 
 
38 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 and teaching of Jesus Christ, with the object of show- 
 ing what he taught his disciples to be, and to do; 
 and whether those instructions approve themselves to 
 our reason and to our moral sentiments. I shall 
 pursue the narrative of the life of Jesus in the 
 order in which the events seem to have happened ; 
 making use of all the gospels, and availing myself of 
 the light which one of these narratives may throw 
 upon another. 
 
 The public teaching of Jesus commenced after his 
 baptism by John, and his temptation in the wilder- 
 ness. ‘The first account which we have of his life, 
 after these transactions, relates his interviews and 
 conversation with Andrew, Peter, Philip, and Natha- 
 nael, and is in the Gospel of St. John; who also 
 gives an account of the presence of Jesus at a mar- 
 riage feast in Cana of Galilee; but, as neither of these 
 parts of that gospel contains any general precepts or 
 commandments, I shall pass them over without further 
 notice. In the third chapter of the same gospel occurs 
 one of the most important passages in the New Testa- 
 ment. The evangelist had just narrated a remarkable 
 dialogue between Jesus and Nicodemus, a ruler of 
 the Jews. There is great obscurity m this conversa- 
 tion, and the interpretation of it has led to much con- 
 troversy. It does not fall with my present purpose 
 to make any comments on it. It appears to me to 
 end with the 15th verse; and what follows I believe 
 to be the remarks of the author of the gospel. The 
 texts'to which-I now refer (v. 16, 17), are as follows: 
 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only 
 begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should 
 not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. | 39 
 
 not his Son into the world to condemn the world ; 
 but that the world through him might be saved.’ 
 Here we have distinctly stated the object of Christ 
 appearing in the world. fle was, according to the 
 evangelist, sent by his Father on a mission of mercy 
 for the salvation of sinners. This is the first declara- 
 tion of the purpose of the ministry of Jesus ; and it is 
 in perfect consistency with all future representations 
 of it. In a remarkable conversation with a woman of 
 Samaria in the same gospel (iv. 21-24), in answer to 
 a question of the woman respecting the proper place 
 for offering worship to God, Jesus indicates the uni- 
 versality of the religion which he was going to set 
 up ; and clearly declares its spiritual character. “ Jesus 
 saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, 
 when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at 
 Jerusalem, worship the Father. Ye worship ye know 
 not what: we know what we worship: for salvation 
 is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, 
 when the true worshippers shall worship the Father 
 in spirit and im truth: for the Father seeketh such to 
 worship him. God is a spirit; and they that worship 
 him must worship him in spirit and in truth.” In 
 the 5th chapter, m a conversation with the Jews, 
 Jesus expresses himself in the following words, 
 v. 19-80: “ Verily, verily, I say unto you, the Son 
 can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the 
 Father ,do: for what things soever he doeth, these 
 also doeth the Son likewise. For the Father loveth 
 the Son, and showeth him all things that himself 
 doeth: and he will show him greater works than 
 these, that ye may marvel. For as the Father raiseth 
 up the dead, and quickeneth them; even so the Son 
 
AO THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 quickeneth whom he will. For the Father judgeth 
 no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the 
 Son: that all men should honour the Son, even as 
 they honour the Father. . He that honoureth not the 
 Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent him. 
 Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth my 
 word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath ever- 
 lasting life, and shall not come into condemnation ; 
 but is passed from death unto life. Verily, verily, 1 
 say unto you, the hour is coming and now is, when 
 the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and 
 they that hear shall live. For as the Father hath life 
 in himself, so hath he given to the Son to have life 
 in himself; and hath given him authority to execute 
 judgment also, because he is the Son of man. Marvel 
 not at this; for the hour is coming, in the which all 
 that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall 
 come forth; they that have done good, unto the re- 
 surrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto 
 the resurrection of damnation. I can of mine own 
 self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judg- 
 ment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but 
 the will of the Father which hath sent me.” Now in 
 this memorable passage we find Jesus Christ declaring 
 that all his authority is derived from the Father ; that 
 there will be a resurrection from the dead to a future 
 life, in which men will be treated accordingly as they 
 have done good or evil in this life. It must also be 
 observed, that the promise of eternal life is to those 
 who believe in his divine mission. 
 
 In perfect consistency with what Jesus taught above, 
 we find him afterwards at the feast of tabernacles 
 using the following words, John vii. 16, 17: “My 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 4 
 
 doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me. If any 
 man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, 
 whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself.” 
 Here is an express promise that the doctrine shall be 
 made known to those who do the will of God. There 
 is here no arbitrary preference of one man to another ; 
 but the preparation for the reception of divine revela- 
 tion is obedience to the will of God. By what means 
 the obedient servants of God will be able to judge of 
 the truth of the doctrine of Christ I shall consider 
 hereafter when I have to treat of his claims to divine 
 authority. 
 
 After this Jesus went into Galilee, and commenced 
 his preaching there with an exhortation to repentance. 
 “Repent : for the kingdom of heaven is at hand (Matt. 
 iv.17).” Afterwards he ascends a mountain, and delivers 
 what is usually called the Sermon on the Mount, the 
 whole of which is contained in the 5th, 6th and 7th chap- 
 ters of St. Matthew’s gospel; and many parts of it are 
 found scattered in different portions of the gospel of 
 St. Luke. It is the longest discourse in the gospels 
 which is addressed to the general body of his hearers, 
 and its contents are of the highest importance, as 
 fully stating the purpose and object of his mission. 
 He begins by pronouncing blessings on the poor in 
 spirit, on those who mourn, on the meek, on those 
 who hunger and thirst after righteousness, on the 
 merciful, on the pure in heart, and on the peace- 
 makers. He then adds, what probably astonished a 
 oreat part of his hearers, “ Blessed are they which are 
 persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the 
 kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye, when men shall 
 revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all man- 
 
4,2 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 ner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, 
 and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in 
 heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which 
 were before you.” The proud character of the Jew- 
 ish people is well known. Considering themselves 
 as the chosen people of God, they entertained the 
 profoundest contempt for the gentile world. Their 
 subjection to the Romans was most galling to them; 
 and the whole nation looked forward to their promised 
 Messiah, fully confiding in his delivering them from 
 the Romans, and setting up a kingdom of his own 
 far superior to any earthly dominion. In these sen- 
 timents even the chosen followers of Jesus, the apo- 
 stles, concurred, as we shall see hereafter. If, therefore, 
 the object of Jesus had been to conciliate popular 
 favour to his claims as the Messiah, he would have 
 availed himself of the general feeling, and endeavoured 
 to mcite them to such exertions as would be necessary 
 to enable him to head an enterprise for throwing off 
 the Roman yoke. On the contrary, his exhortations 
 in the sermon on the mount are all of a peaceable and 
 gentle character ; and he anticipates for his followers, 
 instead of a participation in the trrumph of their 
 leader in establishing the liberties of their country, a 
 State of persecution and suffering, in which he in- 
 structs them that they ought to rejoice. All his ex- 
 hortations are in favour of moral excellence. The 
 disciples are to let their light so shine before men, 
 that they may see their good works, and glorify their 
 Father which is in heaven. He tells his hearers that 
 whosoever shall break one of the least’ command- 
 ments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the 
 least in the kingdom of heaven; but whosoever shall 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 43 
 
 do and teach them, the same shall be called great in 
 the kingdom of heaven: and he adds, “ For I say 
 unto you, that except your righteousness shall exceed 
 the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye 
 shall m no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.” 
 Now as the persons alluded to were leading characters 
 among the Jews, and as the Pharisees had always 
 been distinguished by a strong profession of zeal for 
 religion, Jesus by making this declaration was raising 
 enemies against himself in the most powerful and in- 
 fluential class of the Jewish nation. Neither here nor 
 anywhere else in the gospel history is there the slight- 
 est indication of his being actuated by worldly mo- 
 tives ; or of his having any other end in view than to 
 induce his hearers to repent of their sins, to receive 
 him as acting under divine authority; to lead reli- 
 gious and virtuous lives in this world; and to hope 
 for everlasting felicity in the world to come. 
 
 The exhortations throughout the sermon on the 
 mount are so pure and holy; approve themselves so 
 entirely to our moral nature; so accord with the best 
 lessons of the wisest philosophers ; and are in them- 
 selves so complete, as to enable every reflecting mind 
 to perceive that if these precepts were indeed to be- | 
 come the ruling principles of the world, a very great 
 part of the evils of life would vanish away; and a 
 state of virtue and happiness would prevail beyond 
 the visions of the most sanguine philanthropist. 
 Having thus noticed the general character of the ser- 
 mon on the mount, I shall not load my pages with 
 numerous quotations, but shall merely advert to some 
 few texts which seem to require particular notice. 
 
 There is no doubt that exhortations closely re- 
 
4A, THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 sembling many of those in the sermon on the mount 
 may be found in the works of the ancient philoso- 
 phers (though never, I think, given in the authorita- 
 tive style assumed by Jesus); but 1am not aware that 
 there are in the writings of any of the philosophers, 
 such sentiments of sublime virtue as what follows : 
 “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do 
 good to them that hate you, and pray for them which 
 despitefully use you and persecute you.” 
 
 I shall quote the concluding paragraph of this in- 
 comparable discourse, in order to show that the reli- 
 gion of Jesus is practical; and that all professions are 
 utterly worthless when the character has not been 
 governed by Christian principles. “ Not every one 
 that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the 
 kingdom of heaven ; but he that doeth the will of my 
 Father which is in heaven. Many will say unto me 
 in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in 
 thy name? and in thy name cast out devils? and in 
 thy name done many wonderful works? and then will 
 I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from 
 me, ye that work iniquity. Therefore whosoever 
 heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will 
 liken him unto a wise man, which built his house 
 upon a rock: and the ram descended, and the floods 
 came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house ; 
 and it fell not; for it was founded upon a rock. And 
 every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and 
 doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, 
 which built his house upon the sand: and the rain 
 descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, 
 and beat upon that house ; and it fell: and great was 
 the fall of it.” The evangelist goes on to say: “ And 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. Ad 
 
 it came to pass, when Jesus had ended these sayings, 
 the people were astonished at his doctrine: for he 
 taught them as one having authority, and not as the 
 scribes.” 
 
 Nothing indeed is more remarkable in the teaching 
 of Jesus than the air of authority which he con- 
 stantly assumes. It seems impossible for any candid 
 person to read the gospel narrative, and not to per- 
 ceive that Jesus acted throughout the whole of his 
 ministry with the firm conviction that he was au- 
 thorised and instructed by God to teach a new religion 
 to the world. Whether or not this claim was well 
 founded will be matter for future consideration. At 
 present we have only to do with the fact of his 
 having believed it, on which subject I cannot enter- 
 tain a doubt. It may be observed that he had not at 
 this time put forth to the Jews his claim to be their 
 promised Messiah, though he had assumed that cha- 
 racter in his conversation with the woman of Samaria. 
 He left the Jews to draw their own conclusions from 
 his teaching and his conduct. 
 
 I shall make no other observation on the two next 
 occurrences in the life of Jesus, the curing of the 
 leper and of the centurion’s son, recorded in Matt. vii.., 
 Mark i. and Luke v., but that he assumed on these, 
 and many other occasions, the power of working mi- 
 racles. Whether he really possessed that power will 
 be the subject of inquiry in a subsequent part of this 
 work. 
 
 After this we find Jesus acting m direct opposition 
 to the feelings and practices of that straitest sect of 
 the Jews, who affected peculiar holiness and the 
 strictest regard to the law. Matt. ix. 10-15: “ And 
 
4.6 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 it came to pass, as Jesus sat at meat in the house, 
 behold, many publicans and sinners came and _ sat 
 down with him and his disciples. And when the 
 Pharisees saw it, they said unto his disciples, Why 
 eateth your master with publicans and sinners? But 
 when Jesus heard that, he said unto them, They that 
 be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick. 
 But go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have 
 mercy, and not sacrifice: for I came not to call the 
 righteous, but sinners to repentance. ‘Then came to 
 him the disciples of John, saying, Why do we and the 
 Pharisees fast oft, but thy disciples fast not? And 
 Jesus said unto them, Can the children of the bride- 
 chamber mourn, as long as the bridegroom is with 
 them? but the days will come, when the bridegroom 
 shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast.” 
 In the parallel passage, Mark ii. 18, the inquiry re- 
 specting fasting is made by the disciples of John and 
 the Pharisees; and in Luke v. 33, the scribes and 
 Pharisees alone are represented as making the inquiry. 
 Both Mark and Luke report the question of Jesus to 
 have been, Can the children of the bridechamber fast ? 
 This agrees best with the context. It therefore seems 
 probable that the word mowrn has been inserted by 
 mistake in Matthew’s gospel instead of /ast. It 
 appears from Griesbach’s edition of the New Testa- 
 ment that fast is the reading of the very ancient 
 Cambridge MS., and that there are other authorities 
 for that reading. Observe, that in the passage above 
 referred to, Jesus distinctly states the purpose of his 
 mission to be, to call sinners to repentance. The effi- 
 cacy of repentance to procure the pardon of sin is 
 uniformly taught by him. We find Jesus on this 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 47 
 
 occasion putting himself in opposition to the most 
 powerful and influential of his countrymen ; _asso- 
 ciating with those who were the objects of their con- 
 tempt ; and not complying with what they considered 
 a religious duty, and on which they laid great stress. 
 He acts quite independently ; and appears here, and 
 everywhere, as a teacher of practical righteousness, 
 and of the efficacy of repentance to procure the 
 pardon of sin. From whatever source he derived the 
 religion which he promulgated, it is plain that he did 
 not acquire it by the instruction of the scribes and 
 Pharisees, or of any other class of his countrymen. 
 He says he was sent from God. The validity of his 
 claim will be considered hereafter. 
 
 In the next recorded transaction, sending forth his 
 twelve disciples, we find Jesus assuming not only 
 authority to set up a new religion, and to work mi- 
 racles, but that of conferring the like power on his 
 apostles. “Go not,” he says (Matt. x. 5-8), “ into 
 the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Sa- 
 maritans enter ye not: but go rather to the lost 
 sheep of the house of Israel. And as ye go, preach, 
 saying, ‘he kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal the 
 sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils : 
 freely ye have received, freely give.’ There is nothing 
 of fanaticism in the instructions he gives to his fol- 
 lowers. He tells them to expect persecution, but 
 directs them to avoid it. Matt. x. 23: “ But when 
 they persecute you in this city, flee ye into another.” 
 This commission to the apostles, it will be observed, 
 is confined to the Jews. When they are called on to 
 endure persecution they are to meet it with fortitude. 
 Matt. x. 28-32: “ Fear not them which kill the body, 
 
48 - THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him 
 which is able to destroy both soul and body im hell. 
 Whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also 
 deny before my Father which is im heaven.” And he 
 declares, Matt. x. 37-89, “ He that loveth father or 
 mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he 
 that loveth son or daughter more than me is not - 
 worthy of me. And he that taketh not his cross, and 
 followeth after me, is not worthy of me. He that 
 findeth his life shall lose it; and he that loseth his 
 life for my sake shall find it.” After this the follow- 
 ing interesting occurrence takes place, Luke x. 25-29: 
 « And, behold, a certain lawyer stood up, and tempted 
 him, saying, Master, what shall I do to inherit: eternal 
 life 2 He said unto him, What is written in the law? 
 “how readest thou? And he answering said, ‘Thou 
 shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and 
 with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with 
 all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself. And 
 he said unto him, Thou hast answered right: this 
 do and thou shalt live. But he, willing to justify 
 himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my neigh- 
 bour?” Then follows the affecting story of a man 
 who was wounded and left by thieves, whom a priest 
 and a Levite passed by without regarding him, but 
 who was relieved and provided for by a Samaritan. 
 Jesus then asks the lawyer, Luke x. 36, “ Which now 
 of these three, thinkest thou, was neighbour unto 
 him that fell among the thieves?’ The lawyer 
 answers, Luke x. 37, “ He that shewed mercy on him. 
 Then said Jesus unto him, Go, and do thou likewise.” 
 It is well known that there was great hatred and 
 aversion between the Jews and the Samaritans. We 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 49 
 
 find Jesus nevertheless making no concession to 
 Jewish feelings and prejudices; but, on the contrary, 
 introducing one of a despised nation as fulfilling a duty 
 which had been grossly neglected by those of the 
 Jews to whom the people were accustomed to look up 
 as their guides and* instructors. Such a representa- 
 tion could not fail to be very offensive to the Jews ; 
 and it appears perfectly clear that it was not the 
 object of Jesus to procure their favour by any com- 
 promise with their prejudices and errors. Whatever 
 else may be thought, it is certain his was at least an 
 independent course of conduct. 
 
 As the principal object which I have now in view 
 is to ascertain what it was that Jesus required his dis- 
 ciples to be and to do, I shall make no particular 
 comment on the assertions of his divine authority 
 which may be found in many parts of the gospel. 
 The very essence of the Christian religion is the be- 
 lief that it is from Heaven. He that does not believe 
 that it really is a revelation from God, cannot be called, 
 in any propriety of language, a Christian. If, as seems 
 to be the case with some in the present day, a man 
 by stylmg himself a Christian only means that he as- 
 sents to the precepts of Jesus, as good in themselves, 
 and calculated to improve the human race, he may be 
 called a Christian, in the same sense that a follower 
 of Aristotle is called an Aristotelian ; but that is quite 
 a different meaning from that which from the earliest 
 times has been given to the word Christian, and it is 
 reasonable to expect, that he who gives a new sense to 
 old and recognized terms should begin with an ex- 
 planation of the meaning he annexes to them. 
 
 It may be proper to give a caution to those who 
 
 E 
 
50 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 have not thoughtfully read the New Testament, to be ~ 
 careful not to adopt too literal an interpretation of its 
 
 contents. This practice has often led to great and 
 mischievous errors. By an over-literal understanding 
 of particular texts they will appear at variance with 
 the general tenor of the book. Such passages will be 
 easily understood by those who have duly considered 
 the peculiarities of Jewish phraseology. Luke xiv. 
 12-14: “When thou makest a dinner or a supper, 
 call not thy friends, nor thy brethren, neither thy 
 kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbours, lest they also bid 
 thee again, and a recompence be made thee. But 
 when thou makest a feast, call the poor, the maimed, 
 the lame, the blind, and thou shalt be blessed; for 
 they cannot recompense thee: for thou shalt be re- 
 compensed at the resurrection of the just.” Now 
 this was addressed to one of the chief. Pharisees at 
 whose table Jesus was actually dining at the time. 
 One thing is clear from the narratives of all the evan- 
 gelists, that the life and doctrine of Jesus were per- 
 fectly consistent. If then he had intended wholly to 
 condemn such social meetings as that which he had 
 jomed on this occasion, there can be no reasonable 
 doubt that he would have declined the mvitation of 
 the Pharisee. The object of the text in question is 
 to point out the superior importance of relieving dis- 
 tress to the social engagements of society. In lke 
 manner, when Jesus tells his disciples that if one 
 strike them on the left cheek, they should turn to 
 him the right, he does not mean that this should 
 be taken literally, but he intends to inculcate a gentle, 
 peaceable and forgiving temper. So when he says 
 that unless a man hate father and mother he cannot 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. ae | 
 
 be his disciple, he means that the principle of duty 
 must be paramount in the Christian life, and that 
 even the tenderest domestic feelings must be sacri- 
 ficed when duty requires it. When Jesus was smitten 
 before his crucifixion, he did not solicit further ill- 
 treatment ; and he showed a tender affection for his 
 mother while he hung on the cross. 
 
 The parable of the prodigal son, contained in the 
 15th chapter of the gospel by Luke, is highly interest- 
 ing, and is intended to set forth the readiness of the 
 Almighty to receive repenting sinners to his favour. 
 
 Luke xii. 18, 14: “ And one of the company said 
 unto him, Master, speak to my brother, that he divide 
 the inheritance with me. And he said unto him, 
 Man, who made me a judge or a divider among you?” 
 Here we find Jesus disclaiming all civil authority, 
 and, by so doing, setting himself in direct opposition 
 to the expectations of the Jews, who looked to their 
 promised Messiah as a deliverer from the dominion of 
 the Romans, and as one who was to set up a kingdom 
 of his own over them. 
 
 Matt. xvi. 21, 22: “From that time forth began 
 Jesus to show unto his disciples, how that he must 
 go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the 
 elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and 
 be raised again on the third day.”’ Peter, who had 
 just before acknowledged Jesus to be the Messiah, 
 than began to rebuke him, saying, “Be it far from 
 thee, Lord: this shall not be unto thee.” This calls 
 forth a severe observation from his Master. Thus we 
 find Jesus acting in opposition not only to the feel- 
 ings and expectations of the Jews in general, but also 
 to those of his own immediate followers. How deeply 
 
 B2 
 
52 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 the expectation that their master was destined to set 
 up a temporal kingdom had fixed itself in their minds, 
 may be seen from a question asked of him by them 
 after his resurrection, Acts i. 6: ‘“ Lord, wilt thou at 
 this time restore again the kingdom to Israel ?” 
 
 Matt. xvii. 22: “And while they abode in Galilee, 
 Jesus said unto them, The son of man shall be be- 
 trayed into the hands of men; and they shall kill 
 him, and the third day he shall be raised agam. And 
 they were exceeding sorry.” From their great sorrow 
 it may be inferred that they now believed in the pre- 
 diction of Jesus, although they had refused their 
 assent on the former occasion. This will prove of 
 some importance in connexion with what took place 
 after his death. 
 
 Matt. xvi. 1-3: ‘ At the same time came the dis- 
 ciples unto Jesus, saying, Who is the greatest in the 
 kingdom of heaven? And Jesus called a little child 
 unto him, and set him in the midst of them, and said, 
 Verily I say unto you, except ye be converted, and 
 become as little children, ye shall not enter into the 
 kingdom of heaven.” ‘The virtue of humility is con- 
 stantly enforced by Jesus. Of its value we shall have 
 occasion to form an estimate hereafter. In the 14th 
 verse of the same chapter he asserts, in the strongest 
 terms, the mercy of God: “It is not the will of your 
 Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones 
 should perish.” 
 
 Forgiveness of injuries he inculcates in the strong- 
 est language. Luke xvi. 3, 4: “If thy brother tres- 
 pass against thee, rebuke him; and if he repent, for- 
 give him. And if he trespass against thee seven times 
 in a day, and seven times in a day turn again to thee, 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 53 
 
 saying, I repent; thou shalt forgive him.” His sen- 
 timents on this subject are even more strongly ex- 
 pressed, Matt. xvi. 21, 22: “Then came Peter to 
 him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin 
 against me, and I forgive him? ‘Till seven times? 
 Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, until seven 
 times, but until seventy times seven.” 
 
 The following passage contains a rebuke of the 
 spiritual pride of the Pharisees, and an encourage- 
 ment to the penitent sinner. Luke xvii. 10-14: 
 “Two men went into the temple to pray; the one a 
 Pharisee, and the other a publican. The Pharisee 
 stood and prayed thus with himself,—God, I thank 
 thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, 
 unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast 
 twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess. 
 And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up 
 so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his 
 breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner. I 
 tell you, this man went down to his house justified 
 rather than the other: for every man that exalteth 
 himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth him- 
 self shall be exalted.” Here we have Jesus again 
 setting himself.in direct opposition to the feelings of 
 his nation, among whom the Pharisees were followed 
 and venerated, while the publicans or tax-gatherers 
 were regarded with the utmost contempt and aversion. 
 
 Matt. xx. 25-28. Jesus having reproved the am- 
 bition of two of his disciples, James and John, whom 
 he had distinguished by particular favours, inculcates 
 humility in the following words :—‘ Ye know that the 
 princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, 
 and that they that are great exercise authority upon 
 
54. THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 them. But it shall not be so among you: but who- 
 soever will be great among you, let him be your mi- 
 nister ; and whosoever will be chief among you, let 
 him be your servant: even as the Son of man came 
 not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to 
 give his life a ransom for many.” 
 
 We have now arrived at the last and the most im- 
 portant period of the life of Jesus: when he went up 
 to Jerusalem; was seized by the Jewish authorities ; 
 delivered by them to the Roman governor ; and ended 
 his life by a most cruel and ignominious death on the 
 cross. Let us examine and consider the facts and 
 discourses narrated by the four evangelists as having 
 taken place on this occasion ; assuming, as heretofore, 
 the truth of nothing but ordinary facts; and leaving 
 the most important question, whether Christianity be 
 really what it purports to be, a revelation from God, 
 for future consideration. 
 
 A design to apprehend Jesus, with a view to his 
 being punished, had been formed before his arrival at 
 Jerusalem. John xi. 57: “Now both the chief priests 
 and the Pharisees had given a commandment, that, if 
 any man knew where he were, he should shew it, that 
 they might take him.” At this time Jesus was held 
 in high estimation by the people. His triumphant — 
 entry into Jerusalem is thus described, John xii. 12,13: 
 ‘On the next day much people that were come to the 
 feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Je- 
 rusalem, took branches of palm trees, and went forth 
 to meet him, and cried, Hosanna: blessed is the King 
 of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord.” His 
 enemies on account of his popularity feared to lay 
 hands on him openly in the sight of the multitude. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 55 
 
 Matt.xxi.46: ‘“ When they sought to lay hands on him, 
 they feared the multitude, because they took him for a 
 prophet.” ‘They attempted, therefore, in the first in- 
 stance, to entrap him in an act of disobedience to the 
 Roman government, which would be a legal ground for 
 his apprehension. Matt. xxii. 15-22: “ Then went the 
 Pharisees, and took counsel how they might entangle 
 him in his talk. And they sent out unto him their 
 disciples with the Herodians, saying, Master, we know 
 that thou art true, and teachest the way of God in 
 truth, neither carest thou for any man: for thou re- 
 gardest not the person of men. Tell us therefore, What 
 thinkest thou? Is it lawful to give tribute unto Cesar, 
 or not? But Jesus perceived their wickedness, and 
 said, Why tempt ye me, ye hypocrites? Shew me the 
 tribute money. And they brought unto him a penny. 
 And he saith unto them, Whose is this image and super- 
 scription? They say unto him, Cesar’s. Then saith he 
 unto them, Render therefore unto Cesar the things 
 which are Ceesar’s, and unto God the things that are 
 God’s. When they had heard these words, they mar- 
 velled, and left him, and went their way.” The Pha- 
 risees having thus completely failed in their attempt, 
 their antagonists, the Sadducees, now endeavoured to 
 puzzle Jesus, by an inquiry concerning the resurrec- 
 tion; but they also are foiled. After this occurs a 
 conversation in which Jesus discloses the leading 
 principles of the religion which he was seeking to 
 establish. Mark xu. 28-32: “ And one of the scribes 
 came, and having heard them reasoning together, and 
 perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, 
 Which is the first commandment of all? And Jesus 
 answered him, The first of all the commandments 1s, 
 
56 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: And 
 thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, 
 and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with 
 all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And 
 the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy 
 neighbour as thyself. There is none other command- 
 ment greater than these.” These were undoubtedly 
 the doctrines of the Jewish law; and they are ad- 
 mitted by the scribe to be so. Jesus does not pre- 
 tend to add to, or to alter them; what he does lay 
 claim to is to proclaim, by divine authority, the for- 
 giveness of sins on repentance, and a future life in the 
 world to come, in which all the human race will re- 
 ceive happiness or misery according as their conduct 
 has been good or bad in this world. The enemies of 
 Jesus had now been baffled in their attempts to entrap 
 him by his answers to their questions; and from 
 thenceforth ceased to pursue their purpose. Mark 
 x. 834: “And no man after that durst ask him any 
 question.” 
 
 After the treatment which Jesus had received from 
 the scribes and Pharisees, he might have been ex- 
 pected to set their authority aside. Like wise and 
 good men in all ages, however, he makes a most im- 
 portant distinction between yielding obedience to those 
 who are invested with lawful authority, and following 
 their example when they do evil. Matt. xxiii. 2, 3: 
 “The scribes and the Pharisees” (he says) “sit in 
 Moses’ seat: All therefore whatsoever they bid you 
 observe, that observe and do; but do not after their 
 works: for they say, and do not.’ In the midst of 
 some very severe strictures by Jesus on the hypo- 
 crisy and other evil deeds of the scribes and Pharisees, 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION, 57 
 
 in which he censures their desire to be distinguished 
 by titles of honour, he gives commandments to his 
 apostles not to assume authority over their brethren. 
 Matt. xxii. 8-12: * But be not ye called Rabbi: for 
 one is your Master, even Christ; and all ye are 
 brethren, And call no man your father upon the 
 earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven. 
 Neither be ye called masters, for one is your Master, 
 even Christ. But he that is greatest among you shall 
 be your servant. And whosoever shall exalt himself 
 shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall 
 be exalted.” Thus we see that Jesus holds out no 
 hope of worldly power to his chosen followers; but, 
 on the contrary, strongly inculcates lowliness and hu- 
 mility as distinguishing marks of his true disciples. 
 
 I intentionally pass over here the predictions of 
 Jesus respecting the destruction of Jerusalem, which 
 was shortly to take place. If these predictions were 
 really prophecies, they were of a miraculous character ; 
 but we are now considermg the narratives of the 
 evangelists in no other view than as credible relations 
 of ordinary facts. 
 
 In the latter part of the 25th chapter of Matthew’s 
 gospel, and there only, occurs a description of what 
 shall take place at that awful day when the destinies 
 of the human race in the world to come shall be fixed 
 and declared. I shall cite the passage at length on 
 account of its extreme importance. ‘ When the Son 
 of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels 
 with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his 
 glory: And before him shall be gathered all nations : 
 and he shall separate them one from another, as a 
 shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats: And he 
 
58 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats 
 on the left. Then shall the King say unto them on 
 his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit 
 the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of 
 the world: For I was an hungred, and ye gave me 
 meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a 
 stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and ye clothed 
 me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, 
 and ye came unto me. ‘Then shall the righteous 
 answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an 
 hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee 
 drink? When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee 
 in? or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we 
 thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? And 
 the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I 
 say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one 
 of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it 
 unto me. ‘Then shall he say also unto them on the 
 left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting 
 fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: For I was 
 an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, 
 and ye gave me no drink: I was a stranger, and ye 
 took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not : sick, 
 and in prison, and ye visited me not. Then shall they 
 also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an 
 hungred, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, 
 or in prison, and did not minister unto thee? Then 
 shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, 
 Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, 
 ye did it not to me. And these shall go away into 
 everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life 
 eternal.” It must be plain to every one who is 
 acquainted with the discourses of Jesus, that the 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 59 
 
 virtues here enumerated as the subjects of reward at 
 the last day, do not comprise the whole sum of Chris- 
 tian duty. No mention is made of the love of God, 
 which Jesus had lately declared to be the first 
 commandment. What is to be collected from this 
 passage is, that the condition of the human race in 
 the world to come will depend on their character here 
 below. In the language usually applied to this sub- 
 ject, virtue will be rewarded, and vice punished. In 
 more correct terms, God will of his goodness confer 
 happiness in the world to come on those who have 
 been obedient to his holy will, and will punish the 
 transgressors of his law. 
 
 We have now arrived at the last day of the life of 
 Jesus, beginning, according to the Jewish mode of 
 computation, at sunset on the evening of Thursday ; 
 and, in order to form a just estimate of his character 
 and views, we must fully consider his conversations 
 with his disciples, his instructions to them, and his 
 conduct throughout the trying scene, when, deserted 
 by his followers, he had to contend alone with the 
 unjust proceedings of iniquitous judges; to endure 
 the insults of his adversaries, and their cruel scour- 
 ging of his person; to be nailed alive upon the 
 cross; to bear the agonies of a most cruel death, 
 ageravated by the contumelious reproaches and con- 
 temptuous remarks of the bystanders. Under these 
 circumstances there is no room for dissimulation ; the 
 world, with all its joys and sorrows, its hopes and 
 fears, is vanishing away ; nothing is to be gained by 
 insincere professions, nothing to be lost by sincerity. 
 Here then we may assuredly look for a genuine dis- 
 play of character ; and we will now, with some minute- 
 
60 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 ness, proceed with the narratives by the evangelists of 
 the closing scene of the life of their Master. 
 
 _ The Jewish authorities had now resolved to seize 
 Jesus in order to destroy him, but his popularity was 
 at this time so great that they were afraid to apprehend 
 him in the sight of the multitude; and they therefore 
 determined to find the means of getting access to the 
 place of his retirement ; and there to seize him. For 
 that purpose they engaged to give a sum of money to 
 Judas Iscariot, one of his apostles, who undertook to 
 deliver Jesus into their hands. 
 
 Jesus, having previously sent Peter and John to 
 secure a room for him in which to eat the Passover, 
 took his seat at table, with his apostles, in the evening 
 for that purpose. 
 
 He now proceeds to eat the Passover with his 
 disciples, and here occurs a memorable incident which 
 shows that even his chosen disciples were actuated by 
 worldly motives, and had formed entirely erroneous 
 notions of the religion which their master was esta- 
 blishing. Notwithstanding his repeated exhortations 
 to humility, we find them now striving for superiority, 
 Luke xxii. 24-26: “And there was a strife among 
 them, which of them should be accounted the greatest. 
 And he said unto them, The kings of the Gentiles 
 exercise lordship over them; and they that exercise 
 authority upon them are called benefactors. But ye 
 shall not be so: but he that is greatest among you, 
 let him be as the younger; and he that is chief as he 
 that doth serve.” This was followed by a remarkable 
 act of humility on the part of Jesus in washing the 
 feet of his disciples (John xiii. 5-11). He next points 
 out that Judas Iscariot is the disciple who will deliver 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 61 
 
 him up to his enemies. He then institutes the Lord’s 
 Supper, and delivers the most interesting discourse 
 contained in the 14th, 15th, 16th, and 17th chapters 
 of the gospel of John. He assumes throughout this 
 discourse to act by the authority of God, whom he 
 uniformly styles the Father ; he tells them that he is 
 going to leave them; exhorts them not to be sorrow- 
 ful; promises to send the Holy Spirit to comfort and 
 guide them ; and directs them to address their prayers 
 to God in his name. He also foretells them that they 
 will all desert him, and leave him alone; and also 
 that they will be persecuted for his sake. On this 
 occasion the disciples express their belief that their 
 Master came from God. 
 
 Jesus now retires to a garden at Gethsemane, close 
 to Jerusalem, taking with him the three disciples 
 Peter, James, and John, whom he had already distin- 
 guished on former occasions. Having desired them 
 to watch, he departed a little distance from them and 
 earnestly prayed to God, under a deep and agonising 
 anticipation of the suffermgs which he expected to be 
 called on to endure. While he is thus engaged in 
 prayer, the apostles fall asleep. Jesus reproaches 
 them for not watching with him as he had requested 
 them to do, but he directly finds an excuse for them, 
 Matt. xxvi. 41: “the spirit, indeed, is willing, but 
 the flesh is weak.” Immediately after this, Judas, with 
 a band of men, sent by the Jewish authorities, comes to 
 the garden for the purpose of taking Jesus into custody. 
 It does not appear that any other than the three 
 selected apostles were present in the garden at the 
 time of the apprehension of Jesus by the officers ; 
 which perhaps accounts for some important circum- 
 
62 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 stances which took place having been narrated by 
 John only. The other disciples, however, were pro- 
 bably near enough to know what was done, and we 
 are informed by Matthew and Mark that all the dis- 
 ciples forsook him and fled. At first, however, those 
 who were with him, or at least Peter, were determined 
 to attempt to prevent his being taken; and that 
 apostle went so far as to cut off the ear of one of the 
 servants of the High Priest; but he was immediately 
 reproved by his Master, who commanded him to 
 put up his sword. Jesus then surrendered himself 
 quietly. 
 
 It will not be necessary for our present purpose to 
 go at any length mto an account of what took place 
 on the examination of Jesus before the chief priests, 
 the Sanhedrim, Herod and Pontius Pilate. A few 
 things only must be noted. When interrogated by 
 the High Priest, he distinctly owns himself to be the 
 Messiah. Mark xiv. 61, 62: “ Again the High Priest 
 asked him, and said unto him, Art thou the Christ, 
 the Son of the Blessed? And Jesus said, I am; and 
 ye shall see the Son of man sitting on the right hand 
 of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven.” He 
 in effect says the same things, though not so distinctly, 
 on his examination before the Sanhedrim. (See Luke 
 xxil. 66-70.) What he says to Pilate afterwards is to 
 the same effect ; but he adds, that his kingdom is not 
 of this world. (See John xviii. 33-37.) Pilate, though 
 convinced of the innocence of Jesus, and desirous to 
 release him, yields most iniquitously to the chief 
 priests and the people; and, partly to gratify them, 
 and partly, it should seem, from a fear of offending 
 the Emperor, if he should fail to punish one who had 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 63 
 
 acknowledged himself to be the king of the Jews, 
 although he had at the same time declared that his 
 kingdom was not of this world, gave Jesus up, first to 
 endure a cruel scourging, and afterwards to suffer the 
 punishment of death by crucifixion. 
 
 That the hellish ingenuity of man should have in- 
 vented so horrible a punishment as nailing a living 
 being to a cross and suspending him till his frightful 
 agonies were terminated by death, is a most lament- 
 able proof of the wickedness of which human nature, 
 when corrupted and depraved, is capable. In addi- 
 tion to the suffering of this unspeakably dreadful 
 punishment, it was in the highest degree ignomi- 
 nious, as it was reserved for slaves and the greatest 
 criminals. No Roman citizen was liable to be cruci- 
 fied. In writing of the crucifixion of Jesus I shall only 
 advert to such circumstances as display his character. 
 
 It was customary for persons condemned to be 
 crucified, to carry the cross, or, as some think, a part 
 of it, to the place of execution; and the evangelist 
 John informs us, that Jesus bare his cross. As, how- 
 ever, the other three evangelists agree in saying that 
 the cross was laid upon a person of the name of 
 Simon, it is probable that Jesus had been so far 
 weakened by what had taken place as to be unable 
 to sustain the weight of the cross; and that although 
 it was laid on him, in the first instance, he was after- 
 wards relieved of the burthen by Simon. This seems 
 to be generally understood to have been the case. 
 An affecting incident is told as follows, Luke xxiii. 
 27-31: “And there followed a great company of 
 people, and of women, which also bewailed and 
 lamented him. But Jesus turning unto them said, 
 
64, THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep 
 for yourselves, and for your children. For, behold, 
 the days are coming, in the which they shall say, 
 Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never 
 bare, and the paps which never gave suck. Then 
 shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us ; 
 and to the hills, Cover us. For if they do these things 
 in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry ?’”’ The 
 evangelist adds (ver. 34), that when they crucified him, 
 he prayed to God, “Father, forgive them; for they 
 know not what they do.’”’ It does not appear that any 
 of the apostles, except John, had so far repented of the 
 base desertion of their Master as to attend on him at 
 his crucifixion. The disciple whom Jesus loved (to 
 use his own language) was there, as were also the 
 mother of Jesus, and other women. John proceeds 
 thus, xix. 25-27: ‘“ Now there stood by the cross of 
 Jesus his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the 
 wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus 
 saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom 
 he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold 
 thy son! ‘Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy 
 mother! And from that hour that disciple took her 
 unto his own home.” Matt. xxvi. 46: “And about 
 the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, 
 Eh, Eh, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, 
 my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” This exclama- 
 tion was probably made to call the attention of the 
 bystanders to the 221d Psalm, of which it is the first 
 verse, and which Jesus must have understood to be 
 prophetic of his suffermgs. The closing event of his 
 life is thus described by Luke, xxii. 46: “ And when 
 Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 65 
 
 into thy hands I commend my spirit : and having said 
 thus, he gave up the ghost.” 
 
 Here let us pause to review the narrative of the life 
 of Jesus. We have been introduced to a person 
 totally dissimilar in character to any who had _pre- 
 ceded, or to any who has followed him. The indi- 
 viduals who approach nearest to him are Socrates, the 
 great moral teacher of Greece, and the Hebrew pro- 
 phets; but these are distinguished by broad and 
 palpable differences. Much discussion has arisen 
 respecting what is commonly called the demon of 
 Socrates ; but it has led to no satisfactory conclusion 
 as to the question, whether he considered himself in 
 any, and, if so, in what degree, endowed with super- 
 natural wisdom. In his conversations, which are 
 fully reported by Plato and Xenophon, and though 
 generally thought to be mixed by the first-named 
 writer with speculations of his own, are apparently 
 given with accuracy by Xenophon, we find him some- 
 times referring to his demon, and professing to be 
 guided by him in the course of conduct which he 
 pursues, yet assuming nothing of a didactic manner, 
 but professing his own ignorance, he leads on those 
 with whom he converses by a series of artful questions 
 which ends in the exposure of their ignorance, and 
 the inconsistencies of their opinions. The excellent 
 moral precepts which follow appear to result from the 
 foregoing conversations, and are not laid down by 
 Socrates on the ground of any authority belonging to 
 him. ‘The Hebrew prophets, on the other hand, cer- 
 tainly claim to be inspired by God ; but they fall very 
 short from arrogating the authority which we shall 
 find uniformly assumed by Jesus. 
 
66 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 I will now proceed to make some observations on 
 the character and conduct of Jesus Christ. These 
 will be considered under four heads: 1. The circum- 
 stances under which he came into the world, and 
 lived in it; 2. The doctrines which he taught; 
 3. The authority which he assumed; 4. His personal 
 character. 
 
 1. Jesus appeared to the world as the son of a car- 
 penter at Nazareth in Galilee ; and probably he him- 
 self followed that trade till he was about thirty years 
 old. He is once in the gospel history called a car- 
 penter, and as we have no account of the manner in 
 which his life was passed, from the age of twelve till 
 thirty, there seems no ground to doubt that the de- 
 signation given to him was correct. I see no reason 
 to believe that he possessed any advantage of educa- 
 tion beyond other Jews of his station. One anecdote 
 we have of his early life, which shows a remarkable 
 intellectual superiority. At the age of twelve years 
 we find him in the Temple at Jerusalem sitting with 
 the doctors, and hearing and asking them questions. 
 “ And all (the evangelist adds) that heard him were 
 astonished at his understanding and answers.”’—Luke 
 ii. 47. This mcident, however, only shows that he 
 displayed a. superior intellect, which is a gift of nature, 
 and is sometimes found in those who have enjoyed 
 but little advantage, of education; but it does not 
 prove, or tend to prove, that he had an education 
 superior to such of his countrymen as were brought 
 up to mechanical employments. It does not then 
 appear that at the period when he appeared as a 
 public teacher, the previous circumstances of his life 
 had given him any advantage beyond what belonged 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 67 
 
 to the station of an ordinary Jewish mechanic. The 
 astonishment of the Jews was naturally excited by 
 a person so circumstanced appearing among them as 
 a teacher; and they naturally asked, How knoweth 
 this man letters, having never learned? Jesus here, 
 as everywhere else, claims to have been instructed by 
 Almighty God: “ My doctrine is not mine, but his 
 that sent me.’”’—John vii. 15, 16. After all, it must 
 be admitted, that as the evangelists are silent re- 
 specting the early life of Jesus, he may possibly, 
 though it seems highly improbable, have obtained 
 instruction to a much greater extent than the gene- 
 rality of his countrymen. In pursuing another branch 
 of our inquiry, I will therefore assume that such may 
 have been the case. 
 
 2. Let us now turn our attention to the doctrines 
 which Jesus taught. Following John the Baptist, 
 who had professed to be nothing more than his fore- 
 runner, we find Jesus beginning his ministry by 
 preaching the forgiveness of sins to the penitent. He 
 proceeds, without adhering to any systematic plan of 
 instruction, to lay down the most exalted moral and 
 religious precepts; often applying them to the par- 
 ticular state of things around him; and in many 
 instances, in the enlivening and interesting form of 
 parables. ‘The leading principles of his teaching are, 
 love of God, which he declares to be the first and 
 great commandment; love of our neighbour as our- 
 selves, to which he assigns the second place ; personal 
 purity, fortitude, and humility. All these precepts 
 are inculcated in plain and simple language, generally 
 speaking, and are enforced with deep and impressive 
 seriousness, and often in a most affectionate manner. 
 
 F 2 
 
68 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Never before nor since has such a teacher of practical 
 religion appeared in the world. It may be true that 
 not a single precept is to be found in the evangelists 
 to which a parallel may not be discovered in the Old 
 Testament, or in the writings of the philosophers of 
 Greece and Rome; though I much doubt if any of 
 either the Jewish or the heathen writers have carried 
 the doctrine of forgiveness of injuries so far as Jesus 
 did. But supposing any of them to have done so, no 
 where else shall we find all these exalted principles 
 united in one complete system, and enforced by the 
 highest sanctions. Jesus differs from other teachers 
 in the authority which he assumes, which will be con- 
 sidered in the next division of our subject; and im 
 teaching clearly the doctrine of a future state of retri- 
 bution both to good and evil doers. 
 
 3. Jesus on all occasions professes to act by 
 authority derived immediately from Almighty God. 
 Again and again does he disclaim all power of his 
 own, and declare that it is given by the Father. 
 John vy. 19: “The Son can do nothing of himself, 
 but what he seeth the Father do: for what things 
 soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son like- 
 wise.” John v. 30: “I can of mine own self do 
 nothing.” John vi. 38: “For I came down from 
 heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of 
 him that sent me.” John vii. 16: “ My doctrine is 
 not mine, but his that sent me.” John vii. 28, 29: 
 “ T do nothing of myself; but as my Father hath 
 taught me, I speak these thmgs. And he that sent 
 me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; 
 for I do always those things that please him.” Many 
 more texts to the same purpose will be found in the 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 69 
 
 gospel of St. John. But while thus acknowledging 
 the supreme power of God, and claiming to act only 
 as his delegate, he expresses himself, with respect to 
 the power which had been communicated to him, in 
 such language as the most highly gifted of the Hebrew 
 prophets had never used. John x. 30: “I and my 
 Father are one.” John x. 38: “Though ye believe 
 not me, believe the works; that ye may know, and 
 believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him.” In 
 a subsequent chapter he prays to his Father that his 
 disciples also may be exalted to unity with the 
 Father. John xvii. 11: “ Holy Father, keep through 
 thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that 
 they may be one, even as we are.” John xvii. 18 : 
 “ As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have 
 I also sent them into the world.” John xvii. 21-23: 
 « That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in 
 me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: 
 that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. 
 And the glory which thou gavest me I have given 
 them; that they may be one, even as we are one: I 
 in them, and thou in me, that they may be made 
 perfect in one; and that the world may know that 
 thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast — 
 loved me.” 
 
 4. We now come to the important subject of the 
 character of Jesus. Assuming, as we have all along 
 done, that the ordinary facts of the gospel history 
 must be admitted to be true, it will follow that they 
 truly set before us a character who stands alone in 
 the history of the human race. We have already seen 
 that the instructions of Jesus to his disciples consist 
 of precepts of the most exalted piety and virtue. 
 
70 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Nothing is to be found in any of them which does 
 not approve itself to the highest and purest moral 
 sentiments and principles which we are capable of 
 receiving or forming. If the Christian world were in 
 practice what it is in profession; if the human race 
 were to regulate their conduct by the precepts of 
 Jesus, the larger part of the ills which we have to 
 endure in the world would vanish at once. Imperfect 
 as the characters of even the best Christians are, if 
 the world at large were to reach their standard, it 
 would advance the well-bemg of the human race far 
 beyond what has been the condition of man in the 
 - most prosperous and happy times with which history 
 has made us acquainted ; and would bring to pass a 
 state of order, virtue, and happiness of which we can 
 scarcely form a conception. ‘The spirit which flows 
 from the precepts of the gospel is alike applicable to 
 all times and to all circumstances. The human mind 
 may be well employed in showing in what manner 
 they can be best applied to the continually changing 
 condition of different ages and nations; but the 
 gospel principles remain, and ever must remain the 
 same. The love of God, and the love of man, per- 
 sonal purity, humility, and fortitude must always be 
 the great leading principles of duty. 
 
 Such bemg the mstructions of Jesus, we find his 
 character m all respects worthy of his teaching. The 
 narratives of the evangelists are given with great sim- 
 plicity ; and there is not in any of them the least 
 
 appearance of literary display. ‘There is no apparent 
 
 intention to draw a character; nor is there any eulo- 
 gium on the extraordinary person whose life they 
 narrate. Never did any writings exhibit more 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 71 
 
 striking marks of authenticity than the four gospels. 
 I confess it seems to me impossible that any candid 
 person can entertain a doubt of their being authentic 
 histories. How then do they describe the character 
 of JesusP From the moment that he commences his 
 public ministry, his whole life is devoted to its duties. 
 He “ goes about doing good.” He instructs his hear- 
 ers in all the duties of religion, and sets them an 
 example of every virtue. He lives in a state of 
 poverty ; and has not where to lay his head. He 
 accumulates no property ; he has no home. Assuming 
 Divine authority for his commission, he is content to 
 live in the humblest station. While labouring in- 
 cessantly for others, he does not solace himself with 
 the domestic charities of life. He pursues no object 
 of temporal ambition ; but declares that his kingdom . 
 is not of this world. He lives on terms of familiarity 
 with his apostles; and shows no resentment when 
 they disbelieve his prediction of his sufferings. They 
 are very slow in understanding the nature and pur- 
 pose of his mission ; and to the time of his death, and 
 even after his death, as we shall see presently, they 
 indulge in ambitious anticipations. These, however, 
 are always reproved by Jesus; who clearly and re- 
 peatedly forewarns them, that persecution and suffer- 
 ing will be their lot in this world. These warnings, 
 however, produce no conviction on their minds ; 
 and, to the last, they are disputing who is to be 
 greatest among them in the kingdom which they 
 expect their Master to set up. ‘The other apostles do 
 not appear to have been less worldly in their views 
 and expectations than the traitor Judas, though 
 they were perfectly guiltless of any participation in 
 
123 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 his treacherous and wicked conduct in delivering up 
 his Master to his enemies. Much has been written, 
 and great diversity of opinion has existed respecting 
 the object of Judas in betraying his Master. His 
 subsequent conduct seems to show clearly that he 
 did not anticipate the death of Jesus as the result of 
 - his treachery. ‘The most common opinion seems to 
 be that avarice was the passion which stimulated him 
 to betray his Master; but I can scarcely think that 
 thirty pieces of silver could have held out a sufficient 
 inducement to this act of treachery. It appears to me 
 that Judas had, in common with all the other apostles, 
 entertained an expectation of Jesus setting up a tem- 
 poral kingdom in which he and they would be chosen 
 to fill eminent stations; and that his object in de- 
 livermg up his Master to his enemies was that he 
 might exert his miraculous powers for his deliverance, 
 and immediately establish his kingdom. Be this, 
 however, as it may, it is quite clear from the gospel 
 history that none of the apostles had elevated their 
 minds above worldly considerations ; and it is really 
 astonishing to find how little they had profited by 
 the unworldly and spiritual character of their Master’s 
 teaching. In him was no worldliness, no ambition ; 
 but all his precepts are exalted, spiritual, divine. 
 While asserting confidently, and with unparalleled 
 dignity, the divinity of his mission, he sets before us an 
 example of perfect humility. When he is called Good 
 Master, he rejects the appellation, and declares that 
 none is good but God. He affects no power or state, 
 but lives on familiar terms with his disciples. Pure 
 and holy as is his life, he avoids all unnecessary sin- 
 gularity ; adopts the ordinary modes of living of his 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. To 
 
 countrymen ; and partakes of their hospitality. When 
 near the termination of his life, he performs that 
 remarkable act of humility, washing his disciples’ 
 feet. He bears all the reproaches which he meets 
 with from his countrymen, and the tortures which 
 precede and accompany his death, with the greatest 
 fortitude. He prays for those who are inflicting these 
 cruelties upon him; and when life is ebbing fast 
 away, consigns his mother to the care of a beloved 
 disciple. He sets himself in direct opposition to the 
 scribes and Pharisees, who, at that period, assumed 
 the character of teachers of religion, affected peculiar 
 sanctity, were esteemed the strictest sect among the 
 Jews, and were held in reverence by the people. 
 Karly in his ministry Jesus declares to his hearers, 
 Matt. v. 20, “I say unto you, that except your right- 
 eousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes 
 and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the king- 
 dom of heaven.” In a subsequent discourse in the 
 same gospel, Matt. xxii. 3-33, he reprehends them 
 in the severest terms, accusing them of hypocrisy and 
 extortion, and threatening them with the vengeance of 
 Heaven. Deep indeed must have been the sense of 
 their hypocrisy and wickedness which would lead so 
 gentle a spirit as that of Jesus to put forth such stern 
 invectives, and such awful denunciations; nor do I 
 see how we can account for his so doing in any other 
 way than by admitting that he really believed, what 
 he always professed, that he acted by authority de- 
 rived immediately from God. I can conceive no other 
 cause adequate to produce such an effect. Let it 
 never be forgotten, that Jesus stood quite alone in 
 the world. We have already seen that his most 
 
74 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 intimate associates, the apostles, misunderstood his 
 instructions, and disbelieved his predictions. He en- 
 joyed, it is true, for a time, great popularity with the 
 people; but although it was no doubt to be imputed 
 in part to the exalted character of his teaching, there 
 is no reason to suppose that the multitude did not 
 fully participate in the expectation of the apostles, 
 that Jesus was destined to restore the kingdom to 
 Israel. When, on his last visit to Jerusalem, he dis- 
 appointed their expectations, the cry, ‘‘ Hosanna to 
 the son of David,’ was changed to, ‘“ Crucify him, 
 crucify him ;’’ and the populace of Jerusalem, from 
 being his admirers and followers, became his bitterest 
 enemies. At the last trying season of his life even 
 his chosen apostles deserted him; and he stood alone 
 and unsupported when he declared, before his ini- 
 quitous judges, that his kingdom was not of this 
 world. 
 
 T will here review what has been said respecting 
 the life and character of Jesus. We have seen that 
 he belonged to a humble class among the Jews ; that 
 he lived in a poor condition all his days; that. his life 
 was devoted to religion and virtue, and affords no 
 tittle of evidence that he was actuated by motives of 
 ambition, or of any worldly advantage ; that he taught 
 the most pure and exalted morality, and that religion, 
 in its most spiritual form, was the vivifying principle 
 of his teaching ; that he uniformly professed to act 
 by the immediate authority of God; but that in his 
 private demeanour he affected no other dignity than 
 that which essentially belonged to his office, but lived 
 on familiar terms with his apostles; bore kindly their 
 infirmities ; and condescended to the humble office, 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 75 
 
 on one occasion, of washing their feet; that he sub- 
 mitted to the persecutions of his enemies with re- 
 signation, and bore with unshaken fortitude the 
 cruelties which they inflicted upon him; and which 
 were terminated by a most painful and ignominious 
 death. 
 
 It is now time to inquire who and what this most 
 extraordinary person really was. I can perceive but 
 three possible suppositions: he was either an im- 
 postor who attempted to deceive others, or an en- 
 thusiast who was himself deceived, or he was, what 
 he always professed himself to be, the son of God. 
 Surely the first supposition must be immediately 
 rejected by every candid mind. The character of 
 Jesus was in all respects holy and undefiled. In 
 the histories of the four evangelists there is not a 
 single instance of his transgressing any moral or 
 religious law. His piety was most fervent and 
 exalted ; his benevolence extended to all around him ; 
 he displayed the utmost courage in reproving the 
 vices of the scribes and Pharisees, the most power- 
 ful persons of his nation; the fortitude with which 
 he bore his sufferings was truly admirable ; and his 
 humility, in the station which he filled, was unex- 
 ampled. 
 
 ‘The supposition that he was an enthusiast, and 
 deceived himself, seems to me equally inadmissible. 
 Nothing is more remarkable in the character of Jesus 
 than the calmness of his mind under all circumstances. 
 Once, and once only, and that for a short time, in 
 the garden of Gethsemane, he was overcome by the 
 apprehension of his approaching sufferings, but he 
 soon recovered his habitual calm and collected state. 
 
76 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Though fully prepared to endure such sufferings as 
 necessarily attended his mission, he encountered none 
 unnecessarily ; and when he sent forth his disciples 
 to instruct their hearers, and to perform acts of bene- 
 volence, though he warned them to expect persecu- 
 tion, he charged them not to expose themselves to it 
 when it could be avoided. Matt. x. 23: ‘“ But when 
 they persecute you in this city, flee ye into another.” 
 There is nothing in the history of himself or of his 
 immediate followers at all resembling what sometimes 
 took place in subsequent ages, a desire in professing 
 Christians to expose themselves to persecution and 
 martyrdom ; thus glorifying themselves in their own 
 eyes, and in those of the witnesses of their sufferings. 
 Are we then, in spite of these indications of a calm, 
 rational, and well-balanced mind in Jesus, to assume 
 that he was merely an enthusiast ; or shall we find, on 
 investigating the subject, that there is satisfactory 
 proof that he was, what he professed to be, invested 
 with authority by God himself, to preach repentance 
 of sins; to promise eternal life to the faithful servants 
 of God; and to institute a pure and holy religion 
 which should endure to the end of the world? 
 
 Here arises an important question: Is there any- 
 thing incredible in the belief that God has revealed 
 his will to man? ‘Those who support the affirmative 
 answer to this question, have often put forth as an ob- 
 jection to any revelation of the Divine will, the ex- 
 treme difficulty of decidmg among the various reli- 
 gions in the world which have laid claim to a Divine 
 origin, whether any, and which of them, has sub- 
 stantiated its clams. ‘This, however, is no argument 
 against the credibility of a revelation; but relates 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 77 
 
 alone to the proof of it. The first matter to be 
 settled in our inquiry is, whether revelation be abso- 
 lutely incredible ; the second, whether the Christian 
 religion was established in the world under such cir- 
 cumstances as afford satisfactory proof of its Divine 
 origin. The only argument for the incredibility of 
 a revelation of the Divine will which appears to 
 me to have any force at all, is that which is drawn 
 from the limited extent to which it has prevailed. 
 Of the antediluvian period of the world’s history 
 we know but little; and that little is derived from 
 the Old Testament, the validity of which, of course, 
 will not be admitted by the objector to revelation 
 in any shape. He will take his stand therefore on 
 its subsequent history. You must, he will say, 
 admit that the globe had been inhabited by human 
 bemgs for many centuries before Jesus appeared. 
 You too, the believer in the truth of the Christian 
 religion, tell us that there had been no revelation 
 of the will of God previously to that period, except 
 to the Israelites, a small nation, who had been se- 
 lected from the mass of mankind as God’s peculiar 
 people ; and that the religion revealed to them was 
 neither intended nor fitted for the world at large. 
 If, however, a revelation of the will of God be such an 
 inestimable blessing as you represent it, it must be 
 equally necessary for the whole human race as for Jews 
 and Christians ; yet the Jewish system was confined to 
 one nation, and Christianity is to this day unknown 
 to a great majority of the human race. How can 
 that be from God which is thus partially promulgated 
 and received? You say that there will be a future 
 state ; and that the Christian religion is given to pre- 
 
78 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 pare men to enjoy its happiness; but as all men are 
 to live again in the future world, all must stand 
 equally in need of this preparatory discipline ; how, 
 then, can I believe that the knowledge of it, if it were 
 from God, would be confined to a part, and that the 
 smaller part, of his rational and moral creatures ? If 
 the moral and rational faculties of those who are not 
 acquainted with revealed truth be not sufficient to 
 direct them in the path of duty, how are they to be 
 judged? Is there not gross injustice in judging them 
 by a law with which they have never been made 
 acquainted ; and if they are to be amenable only to 
 the law of nature and reason, how is their condition 
 to be considered inferior to that of those who have 
 been enlightened by the revealed truth of God? 
 
 It seems to me that these objections to the truth 
 of the Christian revelation cannot be got rid of by 
 those who hold that all who do not believe in Christ 
 will be condemned and doomed to punishment in 
 the world to come. Now it is obvious that those 
 cannot believe in him who have never even heard 
 of his existence; which is the case with a large 
 portion of the human race. These persons then, 
 on this theory, will be condemned to future and, 
 as a great majority of Christians profess to be- 
 lieve, to eternal punishment; and have never been 
 in a condition to ‘escape from this unspeakably 
 dreadful state. How those who hold this opinion can 
 answer the arguments of the unbeliever which have 
 been stated above, I feel no inclination to inquire ; 
 because I am perfectly satisfied that the New 'Testa- 
 ment lends no support to the opinion in question. 
 The only text directly to the point is in the last 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 79 
 
 chapter of the gospel by Mark. I shall lay no stress 
 here on the well-known fact that many learned men 
 have entertained serious doubts about the authenticity 
 of the concluding verses of Mark’s gospel. ‘The text, 
 with -its context, is as follows. Mark, xvi. 15, 16: 
 “And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, 
 and preach the gospel to every creature. He that 
 believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that 
 believeth not shall be damned.” The question as to 
 the proper interpretation of the 16th verse is, whether 
 it is to be held applicable to the whole human race, 
 in all ages and nations of the world, or whether it is 
 to be restricted to the hearers of those who are in- 
 structed to preach the gospel. The division of the Old 
 and New Testaments into the small portions which 
 we call verses, however convenient for reference, has 
 led to the very serious and extensively prevailing error 
 of interpreting each verse as an independent sentence, 
 without regard to what precedes and what follows ; 
 and the mischief of this most erroneous mode of inter- 
 pretation has been greatly enhanced by the circum- 
 stance that the divisions into verses—and the same may 
 be truly said of the chapters—have been made with 
 but little skill, and without such a reference to the 
 context as would suggest a sound interpretation. 
 Every one who has really studied the Scriptures must 
 be aware that both chapters and verses are often 
 divided in the wrong place, and that words are in- 
 cluded in them which properly belong to a preceding 
 or succeeding portion of the book of which they form 
 part. If the New Testament, instead of its present 
 arrangement, had been divided into paragraphs in 
 such a manner as to bring the subject-matter clearly 
 
80 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 before the reader by placing in each paragraph all 
 that belonged to one particular branch of a subject, 
 I cannot think that any one could have entertained a 
 doubt about the meaning of the 16th verse. The 
 15th verse contains a command from Jesus to his 
 disciples, to go and preach the gospel in the world ; 
 and but for the separation of what follows, by its 
 being placed in another verse, there seems to be not 
 the slightest reason to understand the 16th verse as 
 applying to any other persons than those to whom 
 the gospel was to be preached. ‘To extend it to all 
 mankind, including those who have never even heard 
 the name of Jesus, is, to my mind, a most irrational 
 interpretation. 
 
 I rest therefore fully satisfied, that the doctrine in 
 question is not taught in the text which has been just 
 examined. It may be said, however, that although 
 this text should be given up, other passages may be 
 produced from the epistles which prove that all will 
 be condemned in the next world who have not be- 
 lieved in Jesus Christ. This, I think, is not the case ; 
 but I must reserve the observations I have to make 
 on this subject till I come, in regular course, to con- 
 sider the teachings of the apostles in the epistles. 
 
 Having then got rid of the objection founded on 
 the supposed condemnation hereafter for their want 
 of belief in Christ of those who had never heard his. 
 name, I proceed to the consideration whether there 
 be really anything incredible in a Divine revelation of 
 the will of God having been made to man. 
 
 I have endeavoured to show, in an early part of 
 this work, that we have abundant reason to believe 
 that the universe was created, and that it is governed 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 8] 
 
 by one unspeakably wise and powerful Being; and 
 that he is perfectly benevolent. But although no- 
 thing appears in the world which we could pronounce, 
 without the wildest presumption, to be inconsistent 
 with the goodness of God, it is certainly true that we 
 perceive much which cannot fail to puzzle us; and 
 which is very different from what, judging with the 
 only faculties which we can apply to the subject, we 
 should have expected to find in the works of a Being 
 of infinite wisdom, uncontrollable power, and _ perfect 
 goodness. No really benevolent mind can contemplate 
 the vice and misery in the world without occasionally 
 yielding to deep depression of spirit. We do not, 
 and we cannot understand why so much physical and 
 moral evil is allowed to exist under the superintending 
 providence of the Supreme Being. The only cure for 
 our dissatisfaction and despondency in viewing the 
 scenes of vice and misery around us, is to be found in 
 a just sense of the inadequacy of all our conceptions 
 of the Deity. They are sufficient, if we be true to the 
 best part of our nature, to form within ‘us the pro- 
 foundest piety, and a perfect ‘reliance on him who 
 made us; and this is all that is really important. We 
 cannot however know him to perfection : his deep 
 things we cannot understand. ‘To our feeble appre- 
 hensions it would seem that God would afford to every 
 man the means of attaining the highest state of which 
 his nature is capable. We might expect that God 
 would treat all his human offspring alike; that no 
 advantage would be given to one above another: but 
 we know that these things are not so. Perhaps it 
 - would be impossible to find any two human beings 
 who have been placed in the world in circumstances 
 G 
 
82 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 completely equal. ‘To one is given sound health, 
 ereat bodily strength, and superior intellectual capa- 
 city ; while another is infirm in mind and body. One 
 is born in the lap of prosperity ; and another has to 
 contend with the ills of adversity. One is kindly 
 nurtured by intelligent, virtuous and religious parents ; 
 while another is the offspring of those who live with- 
 out God in the world.. All these, however, must 
 be admitted by those who believe im the existence 
 of God to be the work of his hands; and the cir- 
 cumstances in which they are placed are under his 
 direction ; and cannot therefore be inconsistent with 
 his perfections. I have the most confident belief 
 that God is good unto every man; that his tender 
 mercies are over all his works: but it 1s quite certain 
 that he confers different degrees of good on different 
 individuals. This is a fact which none can deny ; 
 and reflection on it leads to the question, whether the 
 human mind can determine to what extent one class 
 of men may be blessed with advantages above the 
 rest of the human race consistently with the Divine 
 attributes. The question, however, answers itself. It 
 is plain that we can assign no limits to the Divine 
 operations ; or pretend. to say to what extent the infi- 
 nitely wise, good and powerful God may prefer one 
 creature or one class of creatures to another. If it 
 should be objected, that although there may be no 
 injustice to an individual in his being placed in an 
 inferior situation to another, as to physical advantages, 
 the case is different with respect to morals and reli- 
 gion, because our condition in the next world will 
 depend on our conduct here; the answer is, that all 
 will be then judged according to the circumstances in 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 83 
 
 which they have been placed: to whom much has 
 been given, from those much will be required, while 
 less will be expected from those who have enjoyed 
 fewer advantages. This is the doctrine of the New 
 Testament, clearly expressed in several of the dis- 
 courses of Jesus. Be the force of the objection what 
 it may, it applies as much to natural as to revealed 
 religion; and those who admit the former, notwith- 
 standing the inequalities ‘in the condition of different 
 persons and classes, cannot consistently object to re- 
 vealed religion, because it professes to give advantages 
 to those who receive it, which are not granted to the 
 rest of the world. This objection then being disposed 
 of, I am not aware of any other argument to prove 
 that a divine revelation is in itself incredible, and in- 
 capable of being proved by any evidence whatever. 
 
 The question then, whether a religion which pro- 
 fesses to be a revelation from God, can make good its 
 claim, must depend on the testimony which is_pro- 
 duced in its favour. I will therefore now inquire what 
 is the character of the evidence which we are justified 
 in requiring in this case. 
 
 The appeal can only be made to our rational and 
 our moral faculties. Reason affords us abundant 
 ground to believe in the existence and the attributes of 
 God; and our moral faculty teaches us to love, honour 
 and adore his perfections; and to expect nothing 
 from him but what is good, and tends to good. As 
 the Deity is the source of all power, wisdom and good- 
 ness, we may properly consider the possession of these 
 qualities in a superior degree to that which the natural 
 faculties of man can reach, as indications and proofs, 
 that he who possesses and displays them thereby esta- 
 
 G2 
 
84, THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 blishes his claim to be the delegate of Heaven. I 
 do not perceive that we possess faculties which will 
 enable us to admit any other internal evidence of the 
 truth of revealed religion. 
 
 Let us apply this principle to the proof of the 
 truth of the Christian religion derived from the cha- 
 racter and conduct of Jesus Christ. As to the be- 
 nevolent object of his instructions, and his own pure 
 and unblemished character, there is no room for doubt 
 or hesitation. From the commencement to the close 
 of his ministry, his whole life was a labour of love. 
 It was spent in giving the most exalted lessons of 
 piety and virtue; and in administering to the wants 
 of those around him. We come then to the question,. 
 Did he, in these benevolent exertions, exercise a super- 
 natural power? If we believe the authors of the four 
 gospels, he did this on many occasions, by miracu- 
 lously healing the sick, restoring the power of walk- 
 ing to the lame, hearing to the deaf, and sight to 
 the blind, and, in three instances, life to the dead. 
 Whether or not we have sufficient ground to com- 
 mand our assent to the relations of these miraculous 
 facts will depend on the credit due to the writers 
 as witnesses of the facts they narrate, or as having 
 received accounts of them from others under such 
 circumstances as entitle them to full credit for the 
 truth of what they said. I see no reason to deny 
 that which is established by the concurrent testimony 
 of the early age of Christianity, that two of the 
 evangelists were apostles of Jesus; and that the 
 other two were companions and friends of apostles. 
 Matthew and John then must have been personal 
 witnesses of a great part of the facts which they 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 85 
 
 relate ; and John, according to his own account, was 
 present at the crucifixion of Jesus; and witnessed 
 the concluding scene of his life. The credit due to 
 the apostles in the narration of the miracles which 
 they affirm to have been worked by their Master, 
 will depend on their characters and conduct, of which 
 we have not, in the narrative of the life of Jesus, 
 sufficient information. Much further light will be 
 derived from the book of the Acts of the Apostles, to 
 which our attention will be next directed ; and also 
 from the epistles, which will be considered in due 
 course after the Acts. ) 
 
 Before I proceed, however, to consider whether the 
 early teachers of the Christian religion have a just 
 claim to be believed in their account of the miracles 
 which they tell us were wrought by Jesus, it will be 
 proper to say a few words on the professed objects of 
 Christianity, and of the sanctions by which it is sup- 
 ported and enforced. The object of the preaching of 
 Jesus Christ was to set up a pure and holy religion, 
 which he directed to be taught to all the world; the 
 principles of which are applicable to all nations and 
 all times; and are admirably fitted to carry human 
 nature to its best and highest state. Not a precept 
 is to be found in the discourses of Jesus which does 
 not evidently tend to the advancement of religion and 
 virtue. ‘There is nothing superfluous in the Christian 
 morals, and nothing redundant. . New states of things, 
 new combinations of circumstances are continually 
 arising among the various nations of the earth; but 
 Christianity is fitted for all circumstances, and for all 
 states of society. Is not this a religion worthy of 
 
86 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 God to give; and should it not be received by man 
 with the profoundest gratitude ? 
 
 I have said, in my remarks on Natural Religion, 
 that it gives us no satisfactory information on two 
 most important points, the efficacy of repentance, and 
 a future state. Jesus authoritatively declares that sin 
 shall be forgiven on repentance, that there will be a 
 resurrection of the whole human race, and that their 
 happiness or misery in the world to come will entirely 
 depend on their characters and conduct here. ‘Thus 
 we have enlisted on the side of religion two of the 
 most powerful passions of the human breast, hope 
 and fear. These, however, are by no means put for- 
 ward as the only, or the most prominent motives and 
 principles of the religion of Jesus. By many Chris- 
 tian teachers they have been adopted as the only mo- 
 tives for good conduct; and a large class of moralists 
 acknowledge no other principle of virtue but a regard 
 to our own happimess. Such is not the teaching of 
 Jesus Christ. It strongly urges, indeed, occasionally, 
 the hope-of reward and the fear of punishment as 
 motives for the performance of Christian duty; but 
 they never stand in the foremost rank. He does not 
 tell his disciples that the hope of heaven and the fear 
 of hell are the first and second commandments ; nor 
 does he make them commandments at all. He refers 
 to higher and nobler ‘principles than those which ter- 
 minate in self. The love of God is his first command- 
 ment, and the love of our neighbour as ourselves the 
 second. Of what value, then, it may be said, is the 
 doctrine of a future state of rewards and punishments? 
 Of the greatest, I answer, because it is applicable to 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 87 
 
 all; and is especially calculated to be the first step in 
 reclaiming sinful men from vice and wickedness. 
 MTuman nature is prone to selfishness; and is apt to 
 be led to sm by violent and uncontrolled passions. 
 Hope and fear are the most powerful antagonists of 
 these evil tendencies. There can, I think, be no doubt 
 that the fear of punishment in the world to come often 
 operates powerfully to prevent the commission of the 
 more heinous sins. Hope, and more particularly fear, 
 are excellent teachers in the early period of a religious 
 life; but the true Christian will by degrees rise above 
 their influence ; and disinterested love of God and love 
 of man will in the end gain an ascendency in his cha- 
 racter ; and exert a power far beyond any regard to 
 his own individual interest. Forgetfulness of self is 
 an essential element of a truly great moral and reli- 
 gious character. 
 
 In order to form a judgment of the claim of Chris- 
 tianity to be from God, we must now direct our at- 
 tention to its history immediately subsequent to the 
 death of Jesus. That the Christian religion survived 
 its founder ; that it spread rapidly in the world ; that 
 its professors were obliged to endure persecution in 
 its most dreadful forms, which they bore with un- 
 shaken fortitude ; that it was adopted by the emperor 
 Constantine as the religion of the mighty Roman 
 empire; that it became that of the kmmgdoms and 
 states which arose out of the ruins of the empire ; and 
 that it is at the present day the professed religion 
 of the most intelligent and civilized nations of the 
 earth—these are facts beyond the reach of cavil and 
 dispute. ‘To account for these facts, then, putting 
 
88 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 aside the question of Divine authority, cannot be a 
 matter of indifference to any who take an interest in 
 the history of the human race; and the inquiry is 
 made unspeakably more interesting when it includes 
 the question, whether this religion can really substan- 
 tiate the claim which it has always made to Divine 
 authority. The book of Acts and the Epistles contain 
 accounts of the promulgation of Christianity by the 
 followers and disciples of Jesus Christ ; and of the 
 early state of the Christian church. These writings 
 have been received, and their authority has been ac- 
 knowledged from a very early age; and there is no 
 other account of the early history of Christianity which 
 holds any sort of competition with these writings. So 
 far, then, as the common facts contained in them are 
 concerned, I see not the slightest reason to reject 
 their authority. Now, what are these common facts ? 
 It appears from the gospels and the book of Acts, 
 that the apostles and other followers of Jesus pro- 
 fessed themselves to be witnesses of his resurrection 
 from the dead; to have had repeated interviews with 
 him; and to have received instructions from him to 
 preach his religion to the world. That the resurrec- 
 tion of Jesus has been an article of faith in the 
 Christian church from early ages; and that amidst 
 all the controversies which have divided and dis- 
 tracted the Church, it has been steadfastly held by 
 all sects and parties, is perfectly well known. This 
 doctrine, then, must either have been held from the 
 first, or it originated at some particular period in the 
 history of the Christian church. Let us for a moment 
 consider the latter supposition, and assume that the 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 89 
 
 doctrine of the resurrection was taught, for the first 
 time, at an early period, say in the second century. 
 This assumption supposes that the Christian religion 
 had been previously in existence, but that the belief 
 in the resurrection of Christ had formed no part of 
 it. It is easy to imagine the astonishment with 
 which the announcement of this fact would be re- 
 ceived by those who had never heard of it before ; 
 and I know of nothing in the history of human 
 credulity which can induce me to believe that it could 
 possibly have been received by any under such cir- 
 cumstances. How can it be supposed that men in 
 their senses could have believed in a pretended fact 
 which was said to have taken place at least a hundred 
 years ago, and which had not been believed by their 
 fathers, and others who lived near the time? The 
 supposition is perfectly incredible. It may be added, 
 that there is not the slightest trace in history of this 
 change having taken place in the creed of professing 
 Christians. I conclude, then, that the doctrine of the 
 resurrection of Christ from the dead has been pro- 
 fessed by Christians from the beginning ; and there 
 appears no probable, or indeed possible, way of ac- 
 counting for it but by the testimony of those who ~ 
 had known him when living; and who bore their 
 attestation to having seen and conversed with him 
 after his resurrection. J can, then, see no reason to_ 
 reject the accounts given in the gospels and the book 
 of Acts of the assertions of the apostles and others of 
 the followers of Jesus that they had seen him alive 
 after his resurrection. Whether they ought to be 
 believed will be considered hereafter. 
 
 Accounts of the resurrection of Jesus from the dead 
 
90) THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 are contained in all the four gospels; but the details 
 of the respective narratives vary materially. Whether 
 the apparent discrepancies in these accounts can be 
 reconciled seems to me of little importance. All 
 agree in the great important facts that Christ actually 
 rose from the dead, and had repeated interviews with 
 those who were well acquainted with his person, 
 among whom were the eleven apostles who had been 
 his chosen companions. Supposing the four evan- 
 gelists to differ irreconcileably in some of the minor 
 circumstances of these transactions, it is only what is 
 constantly occurring in courts of justice ; and is easily 
 accounted for by the circumstance that the more im- 
 portant facts of any given event are always more 
 accurately observed than things of smaller moment. 
 This alone would satisfy every fair inquirer ; but this 
 is by no means all which may be said of the case in 
 question. None of the earlier scenes which are stated 
 to have followed the resurrection took place in the 
 presence of the apostles. The first transaction in 
 which any of them were concerned was that of Peter 
 and John going to the sepulchre after they had heard 
 the account of the women who had previously been 
 there. The visit of the two apostles to the sepulchre 
 is fully narrated in the gospel of John, who was one 
 of them ; and there is nothing inconsistent with it in 
 the other gospels. Matthew and Mark do not men- 
 tion this incident. Luke only says that Peter ran to 
 the sepulchre, and looked in; but he does not say 
 that Peter went into the sepulchre, as John says he 
 did, nor does he mention John at all. There is, 
 however, no contradiction between the two evan- 
 gelists. Luke narrates only part of the transaction, 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. Q] 
 
 while John (a party concerned) tells the whole. Now, 
 it must be borne in mind that Luke was not an 
 apostle, and that we have no evidence of his having 
 been at any time in the life of Jesus one of his 
 disciples. It is therefore not improbable that Luke, 
 when he wrote his gospel, may not have been fully 
 informed of what is not a material, or at least not an 
 essential circumstance, in the evidence of the truth of 
 the resurrection,—this visit of Peter and John to the 
 sepulchre. 
 
 We come now to the material part of our inquiry, 
 the fact that the apostles and others who had been 
 companions of Jesus during his life, asserted that he 
 had risen again ; had appeared to them and conversed 
 with them ; and had given them instructions to pro- 
 claim his religion to the world. Here the question 
 arises, Are they deserving of credit, or ought we to 
 reject their testimony altogether? There are only 
 three possible suppositions : either they were deceived 
 themselves ; or they attempted to deceive others ; or 
 what they asserted is true. 
 
 It is certainly remarkable that neither Matthew nor 
 John mentions the ascension of Jesus into heaven, 
 although that has always been a received doctrine in 
 the Christian world. With respect to the gospel of 
 Matthew, I find much in the last chapter which leads 
 me to believe that it is.an unfinished work. Whether 
 the apostle was prevented by death from putting a 
 finishing hand to it, or whatever else may have been 
 the cause, the impression on reading the last chapter 
 is to me quite irresistible that he could not have in- 
 tended so to conclude his work. This indeed is only 
 conjectural ; and I cannot presume to say how the 
 
92 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 minds of others may be affected by reading this 
 chapter ; but the effect on my own is precisely as I 
 have stated; and I can come to no other conclu- 
 sion. The only solution of the silence of John on 
 this important subject is, that he had probably 
 read the accounts of the ascension given by Luke 
 in his gospel and in the Acts of the Apostles, and 
 that he thought it sufficient without any additional 
 testimony. Mark mentions the ascension in a single 
 verse ; but many learned and able men have thought 
 that the concluding paragraph of his gospel is not 
 the work of the evangelist, but was added by some 
 subsequent writer. The first two evangelists give 
 very short accounts of the appearance of Jesus to his 
 disciples. Luke’s is fuller. In his gospel he men- 
 tions shortly the ascension of Jesus, and in the Acts 
 he narrates more at large the circumstances which 
 preceded and accompanied it. He also says that 
 forty days elapsed between the resurrection and the 
 ascension. St. John states several particulars which 
 it will be important to consider. 
 
 Notwithstanding that Jesus had on several occa- 
 sions predicted his resurrection from the dead, none 
 of his disciples appear to have believed it. St. Mark 
 tells us that when Mary Magdalene told the apostles 
 that Jesus was alive, and had been seen of her, they 
 believed her not. Luke says, when she and other 
 women informed the apostles that they had seen Jesus 
 risen from the dead, that their words seemed to them 
 idle tales, and they believed them not. All the hopes 
 of the disciples appeared to have been fixed on a tem- 
 poral kingdom, and to have vanished away at the 
 death of their Master. “ We trusted,’ said the dis- 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 93 
 
 ciples at Emmaus, Luke xxiv. 21, “that it had been 
 he which should have redeemed Israel.” Even after 
 they are quite satisfied of the truth of the resurrec- 
 tion, and that the person with whom they are con- 
 versing is really no other than their Master, Jesus, 
 they ask: “ Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again 
 the kingdom to Israel?” Acts i. 6. The apostle John 
 is the first of them who is thought to have believed 
 in the resurrection. John xx. 8: “Then went in also 
 that other disciple, which came first to the sepulchre, 
 and he saw and believed.” The meaning of the text, 
 however, is very doubtful ; and the next verse seems 
 rather to indicate that what he believed was only that 
 the body of Jesus had been taken away, as Mary 
 Magdalene had informed him and Peter. 
 
 I will here make a few observations respecting the 
 historical part of the New Testament. The gospels 
 and the book of Acts must be considered to be either 
 narratives of real facts, or to be fictitious stories fabri- 
 cated to answer some particular purpose. Now the 
 only purpose which, to my knowledge, has ever been 
 suggested is, that the Christian religion, having by 
 some means or other—of which none of those who 
 embrace the strange hypothesis which I am going to 
 examime give any satisfactory account,—been esta- 
 blished in the world, the New Testament scriptures 
 were written afterwards, for the purpose of furnishing 
 a record of a supernatural origin of Christianity. 1 
 have already endeavoured to show that the resurrec- 
 tion of Jesus Christ from the dead must have been 
 believed by Christians from the very commencement 
 of their religion. Supposing then this article of faith 
 to have been supported merely by tradition till the 
 
QA, THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Christian religion had made a considerable advance 
 in the world, it seems highly improbable that a fic- 
 titious narrative should be invented and introduced 
 in proof of the reality of this most important fact. 
 For what purpose could such a transaction have taken 
 place? In all ages the inquirers into the foundation 
 of their faith are but few; the great mass of the 
 people in all countries, and at all times, are willing to 
 follow their fathers; and even in the present en- 
 lightened age it is very generally made a matter of 
 reproach to a man that he has departed from the 
 church or sect in which he was brought up. The 
 teachers of the Christian religion could at no time 
 have been tempted to commit a baréefaced and im- 
 pudent forgery for the purpose of attaching their 
 followers to the doctrines which they taught. If 
 such an attempt were made, it must have been with 
 reference to the inquiring few; but how could this 
 be done with any hope of success? Could men of 
 inquiring minds be possibly induced to receive as 
 authentic, narratives of facts represented to have 
 taken place a century or two centuries ago, and of 
 a most extraordinary and even miraculous character ? 
 Surely the success of such an imposture would be 
 impossible. But if the attempt had been made, it 
 must have been in a very different manner. The 
 gospels are four independent histories, of which the 
 first, second, and third run parallel to a great 
 extent, while a large part of the fourth consists of 
 narrations and discourses which are not contained 
 in the other gospels; besides which, the language 
 of the fourth gospel widely differs from that of the 
 others, and contains discourses of Jesus expressed in 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 7) 
 
 strong figurative language, very hard to be under- 
 stood. Even in the three synoptical gospels (as they 
 are often called) there are considerable differences 
 and apparent inconsistencies. Matthew and Luke 
 give accounts of the birth and infancy of Jesus, 
 but they vary greatly in their circumstances. These 
 variations do not amount to contradictions; but still 
 they are very remarkable. Many of the narratives 
 by the different evangelists cannot im all particulars 
 be reconciled. The language, too, in which the 
 discourses of Jesus are delivered greatly differs in the 
 synoptical gospels ; and (as has been already said) in 
 those contained in the fourth gospel we find a style 
 distinguished widely from anything in the other go- 
 spels. It is very difficult, if not actually impossible, to 
 reconcile all the accounts of the crucifixion and of the 
 resurrection. It is remarkable that no two of the 
 evangelists agree in the precise language of the in- 
 scription which was placed on the cross of Christ. 
 Now, it is easy to understand how these apparent 
 discrepancies arose, if we consider the four gospels as 
 independent histories, written by four individuals. 
 All agree in the leading and important acts and. clis- 
 courses of Jesus ; but they frequently differ on matters 
 of inferior importance, which were from their nature 
 less likely to leave an accurate impression on their 
 memories. This is perfectly consistent with our 
 ordinary experience of human testimony, and does 
 not detract in the least degree from the general cre- 
 dibility of the narratives. These discrepancies, how- 
 ever, have always afforded an occasion for cavil and 
 dispute to the enemies of Christianity. Supposing 
 then the gospels to have been formed in a sub- 
 
96 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 sequent age, for the purpose of supporting an existing 
 form of religion, it appears perfectly incredible that 
 the apparent discrepancies which have been mentioned 
 above should have found a place in them. TI can con- 
 ceive no plausible reason why there should, under the 
 circumstances supposed, have been more than one nar- 
 rative. To multiply the forgery to four gospels would 
 have been quite unnecessary; and would have in- 
 creased the chances of its detection. But admitting 
 that, for some reason unknown to us, the introducers 
 of these fictitious narratives had thought proper to 
 resort to a plurality of numbers, it is highly impro- 
 bable that they would have permitted anything to 
 appear in one gospel apparently inconsistent with the 
 others. They must indeed have been wretched 
 bunglers at their work to have done this. 
 
 Supposing that the gospels were written at a time 
 considerably subsequent to the period of which they 
 profess to give an account, and for the express pur- 
 pose of sustaining and strengthening the Christian 
 religion, it is in the highest degree probable that they 
 would have given the most favourable account of the 
 characters and conduct of the followers of J esus, who 
 first proclaimed his religion to the world; and that 
 they would have carefully avoided relating anything 
 which could dishonour them. How very different is 
 the gospel history from this! The characters of the 
 apostles appear in a much less favourable light in 
 the gospels than any one could have expected. They 
 are all very slow to learn; and are so far from un- 
 derstanding and feeling the spiritual and unworldly 
 character of their Master’s teaching, that to the last 
 they are expecting him to set up a worldly kingdom. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 97 
 
 In the day of his persecution they all forsake him. 
 Even the three apostles who are most distinguished 
 by his favour appear, on some occasions, in an un- 
 favourable light. They cannot watch with him in the 
 _ hour of his agony, though he had requested them to do 
 so. The sons of Zebedee on one occasion request per- 
 mission to call down fire from heaven to consume 
 those who had offended them ; and, near the end of the 
 life of Jesus, they are desirous of places above the other 
 apostles in the kingdom which they expect him to 
 set up. Peter, who had always taken the leading 
 part among the apostles, denies all knowledge of his 
 Master when he is delivered up to his enemies, and 
 accompanies his denial with curses and oaths. Could 
 any person of common sense have introduced state- 
 ments so derogatory to the first preachers of Chris- 
 tianity into a work expressly intended to advance its 
 interests in the world ? Surely this is impossible. 
 Enough I trust has been said against an hypothesis 
 most improbable in itself; gratuitously assumed ; 
 and unsupported by any well-authenticated historical 
 fact. 
 
 And now a difficulty may be thought to arise as to 
 the authors of the gospels. How, it may be asked, 
 do we know that the four gospels were written by 
 Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John; and that the first 
 and last of the evangelists were apostles of Jesus ? 
 We certainly cannot pretend that we have absolute 
 certainty in this matter; but we have all the evidence 
 which can be reasonably expected in the case, that the 
 gospels were written by those whose names they bear, 
 and that they sustained the characters ascribed to 
 them, two being apostles, and the other two friends 
 
 H 
 
98 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 and followers of apostles. The concurrent testimony 
 of the early ages of Christianity establishes this. 
 The heathens, who regarded the Christian religion as 
 a superstition, and its claims to Divine authority to 
 be unfounded, of course, would not trouble them- 
 ~ selves about the authors of the gospels; and it is 
 therefore from Christian writers only that we can 
 expect to get information on this subject. Many 
 learned men have shown that the gospels and the 
 other books of the New Testament were referred to 
 in very early times; and that with the exception of a 
 few of the epistles and the Revelation they were 
 always ascribed to the authors whose names they bear. 
 Those who require full and complete information on 
 this subject may find the arguments learnedly and 
 candidly stated in Lardner’s excellent work on the 
 Credibility of the Gospel History. The evidence pro- 
 duced by him, I think, satisfactorily proves that the 
 gospels were written by the evangelists whose names 
 they bear. But even supposing any doubt should 
 remain as to those individuals being the real authors, 
 it appears, from the reasons stated above, that they 
 were written in very early times when the ordinary 
 facts stated in them were well known. 
 
 I will here refer to a heathen writer to prove that 
 Jesus Christ was the author of the Christian religion. 
 “They’’ (the Christians), says Tacitus, “had their 
 name from Christus, who, in the reign of Tiberius, 
 was put to death as a criminal by the procurator 
 Pontius Pilatus*.” It is true that Tacitus says that 
 the Christians were hated for their crimes, and that 
 
 * Auctor nominis ejus, Christus, Tiberio imperitante, per procu- 
 ratorem Pontium Pilatum supplicio adfectus erat.—Annal. xv. 44. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 99 
 
 he calls their religion a pernicious superstition ; but 
 his ill opinion of them cannot in the slightest degree 
 derogate from the weight of his testimony as to the 
 origin of their religion. Seeing then that Jesus Christ 
 is referred to by Tacitus who lived in the first cen- 
 tury, and that all the Christian writers whose works 
 are now in existence refer their religion to the same 
 origin, I do not see how any fair and reasonable 
 person can deny this to be the fact, unless he come 
 prepared with proofs to the contrary; and is in a 
 condition to point out and prove some other com- 
 mencement of it. No plausible attempt of this kind 
 has, to my knowledge, been made. 
 
 Believing therefore that no rational doubt can be 
 entertained that Jesus Christ was the founder of the 
 religion which for more than eighteen centuries has 
 borne his name ;. having also shown that the gospels 
 must have beer written at no great distance of time 
 after the events which they profess to record occurred 
 that they have been uniformly attributed to the authors 
 whose names they bear; and that the internal evidence, 
 derived from their contents, of the authenticity ofthe 
 common facts which they relate is most strong and 
 convincing, I feel myself fully warranted in holding 
 them to be authentic narratives. , 
 
 Before we proceed to the consideration of the claims 
 of Christianity to be a Divine revelation, let us look 
 back on the ground which we have passed over, and 
 recapitulate the ordinary facts of the gospel history. 
 We have seen that Jesus, following the steps of his 
 precursor John the Baptist, preached repentance from 
 sin as a qualification for forgiveness; that he announced 
 a future state in which all mankind would be rewarded 
 
 H 2 
 
100 we CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 or punished according to their conduct in this world ; 
 that he acknowledged on all occasions, that he had 
 no power of himself, but that he always acted under 
 the authority of God, whose Son he professed him- 
 self to be; that he taught the love of God to be 
 the first, and the love of our neighbour as ourselves 
 the second commandment; that he uniformly incul- 
 cated purity of life and humility, and forewarned his 
 disciples that they would be exposed to persecution 
 in the promulgation of his religion; that he pro- 
 fessed to work miracles by healing the sick, giving 
 sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, and, on three 
 occasions, by restoring life to the dead; that he pro- 
 phesied that he should come to a violent death, and 
 should be raised from the grave and restored to life 
 on the third day; that he also prophesied that the 
 city of Jerusalem would be destroyed within the life- 
 time of some of those who heard him; that the king- 
 dom which he professed himself authorised by the 
 Almighty to set up was entirely of a spiritual cha- 
 racter, and was declared by himself not to be of this 
 world ; but that nevertheless his disciples could never 
 be brought to comprehend the spiritual purport of 
 the teaching of their Master, but to the last were 
 looking for temporal distinction in a worldly king- 
 dom; and to these we must add, that his own cha- 
 racter was pious and virtuous in the highest degree, 
 undegraded by a single evil action, and affording the 
 brightest example of moral excellence. 
 
 Embracing then the gospels as setting forth the 
 common facts in the life of Jesus, it remains to con- 
 sider whether his claim to supernatural authority is sup- 
 ported by such evidence as should command our assent. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 101 
 
 It will be proper, before I examine the claims of 
 Christianity to a miraculous origin, to make a few 
 remarks respecting miracles in general. Hume, in 
 his celebrated essay, endeavours to show that miracles 
 are absolutely incapable of being proved; and that 
 they never have been, and never can be supported by 
 arguments strong enough to induce rational persons 
 to believe that the order of nature has ever in any in- 
 stance been suspended by a miracle. Hume’s argu- 
 ments have, I think, been satisfactorily confuted more 
 than once; but it will be unnecessary to attempt a 
 confutation here, because the question I am going to 
 enter upon may be discussed on the grounds stated 
 by Hume himself as decisive on the subject. It will 
 be only requisite to correct an Inaccuracy of language 
 in what he calls a general maxim: and to add a few 
 words of comment on the latter part of it. 
 
 The maxim is, “that no testimony is sufficient to 
 establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a 
 kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous than 
 the fact which it endeavours to establish: and even 
 in that case there is a mutual destruction of argu- 
 ments, and the superior only gives us an assurance 
 suitable to that degree of force, which remains after 
 deducting the inferior.’ There is an Inaccuracy in 
 the language of the first branch of this maxim, for 
 as by a miracle we mean a deviation from the laws of 
 nature, it is evident than one event cannot be more 
 miraculous than another. Substituting the words 
 “more incredible” for “more miraculous,” I see no 
 objection to reasoning the case on the ground of the 
 maxim. ‘The latter part is quite unnecessary ; and 
 seems to have been inserted for the purpose of dis- 
 
102 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 crediting miracles, however strong the evidence by 
 which they are supported. No doubt, in all cases of 
 conflicting arguments, the strength of those which 
 produce conviction can be no other but their excess 
 of force above those which are opposed to them. 
 This may be so small as to leave only a slight pro- 
 bability on the side of the preponderating arguments, 
 or so large as to exclude any degree of doubt of 
 their truth. The inquiry on which I am now about 
 to enter is, whether or not we have satisfactory 
 evidence of the resurrection of Jesus from the dead? 
 This, in the language of Hume’s maxim, may be 
 thus expressed: Is it more incredible that those who 
 attested the fact, that Jesus had risen from the dead, 
 should have, in the circumstances i which they were 
 placed, asserted a falsehood, than that Jesus should 
 really have been raised from the dead? Those who 
 find themselves bound to answer this question in 
 the affirmative must, on Hume’s principle, admit 
 the reality.of the resurrection of Jesus; and the 
 firmness of their faith in it will depend on the 
 degree of force which they thmk belongs to the 
 arguments in its favour beyond that of its presumed 
 incredibility. 
 
 I have selected the resurrection of Jesus Christ 
 as the subject of inquiry, because whoever receives it 
 as a fact acknowledges the truth of the Christian 
 religion; which is, on the other hand, rejected by 
 all who disbelieve it. [ am not acquainted with a 
 single exception to this statement; nor is it easy to 
 imagine a mind so strangely constituted as to admit 
 a miraculous resurrection of Christ from the tomb ; 
 and nevertheless to deny the Divine authority of his 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 103 
 
 religion. ‘The question then to be decided is this : 
 Have we sufficient evidence to believe that Jesus 
 Christ died on the cross, and was restored to life on 
 the third day? The resurrection is the great leading 
 fact of Christianity. “If,” says St. Paul, “ Christ be. 
 not raised, your faith is vain.” 
 
 Before I enter on the inquiry as to the truth of the 
 resurrection it will be proper to state what kind of 
 evidence can reasonably be expected; and therefore 
 ought to be required, of the fact in question. We 
 have already seen that there is abundant reason to 
 believe that the universe was formed and is sustained 
 by a Being of uncontrolled power and of perfect 
 wisdom and goodness. Everything therefore which 
 comes from him we must expect to bear marks of 
 these perfections ; and if anything should be found in 
 a professed revelation clearly and undeniably incon- 
 sistent with the power, wisdom, or goodness of God, 
 a strong argument would arise that the claim to 
 Divine authority could not be supported. If, on the 
 other hand, the supposed revelation should be appa- 
 rently consistent with the Divine attributes; if it 
 should be a message of benignity and mercy, pro- 
 mising forgiveness to repentant sinners, containing 
 the purest and sublimest precepts of religion and 
 virtue ; calculated, if received and acted upon, to ad- 
 vance the virtue and happiness of the human race in 
 this world, and holding out an assured hope to those 
 who receive it and regulate their lives by its pre- 
 cepts, of eternal felicity in the world to come, it 
 would have the strongest claim to serious considera- 
 tion, and to a candid examination of its assertion of 
 Divine authority. 
 
104 ~~ CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 And here some observations may be introduced 
 respecting the supposed incredibility of miracles. The 
 human race, it may well be said, have the firmest 
 confidence in the regularity and permanency of the 
 laws of nature. All believe that the sun will con- 
 tmue from day to day to gladden the face of the 
 earth, that a piece of lead thrown into water will 
 sink, and that dry wood placed on fire will be burned. 
 The regularity of the laws of nature is attested by the 
 experience of all living, and by the historical and tra- 
 ditional accounts of all former ages. With respect to 
 human testimony the case is widely different. We 
 know that falsehood has always prevailed, and does still 
 prevail in the world to a very great extent ; how then 
 can we believe in miracles, in other words that the 
 laws of nature have been suspended, when our only 
 reason for dog so must be derived from human 
 testimony, which our experience and that of mankind 
 in all ages have proved to be often unworthy of credit ? 
 Now, this objection in truth only brings us back to 
 Hume’s maxim, and I have already agreed with him, 
 that testimony to miraculous facts is not to be ad- 
 mitted, unless it can be shown to have been given 
 under such circumstances as make it more incredible 
 that it should be false than that the miracle which it 
 is produced to prove should be true. But there is, I 
 suspect, a latent objection in the minds of those who 
 consider miracles incapable of proof by any means 
 whatever, though I do not know that it has been 
 distinctly put forward, that a belief in miracles 
 strongly tends to diminish our confidence in the 
 regularity and permanence of the laws of nature. 
 ‘This appears to me to be implied in much of what 
 
 OO 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 105 
 
 has been written on the subject of miracles. I can- 
 not, however, perceive that it has any rational found- 
 ation. With what pretence can it be said that those 
 who believe in miracles have less confidence in the 
 general regularity of the operations of the laws of 
 nature than others? Those who admit the truth of 
 all the miracles recorded in the legends of the saints, 
 although they probably have been more disposed than 
 others to believe in any miraculous tales which have 
 fallen in their way, have not, to my knowledge, ex- 
 pected with less confidence than others that the sun 
 will pursue its course from day to day, that seedtime 
 and harvest will succeed each other at the usual 
 periods, that fire will continue to burn, and water to 
 drown. The belief in miracles therefore has appa- 
 rently no tendency to lessen in the slightest degree 
 our confidence in the permanency and general regu- 
 larity of the laws of nature. These things then being 
 premised, we come to the question, on what ground 
 do we hold miracles to be antecedently incredible ? 
 The answer does not lie much. beneath the surface. 
 The laws of nature are fitted to the wants of man and 
 of other sentient beings, and produce a regular succes- 
 sion of events by which the lives of men and animals 
 are in a great degree regulated. Any deviation from 
 those laws which did not tend to produce some good 
 which would not have resulted from their operation 
 would be useless, and therefore we should reasonably 
 deem it incredible. But supposing a miracle should 
 tend to produce some beneficial effect which would 
 not have taken place by the operation of the ordinary 
 laws of nature, I know of no reason derived from the 
 notions which we are able to form of the ways of the 
 
106 a CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 great Creator, which can authorise us to pronounce 
 such a miracle incredible. 
 
 There is a passage in Hume’s ‘ Essay on Miracles,’ 
 which, though put im a plausible form, appears on 
 examination to have no weight whatever in support 
 of the object for which it was written. ‘“ Upon the 
 whole, then,” he says, ‘it appears that no testimony 
 for any kind of miracle has ever amounted to a pro- 
 bability, much less to a proof; and that, even sup- 
 posing that it amounted to a proof, it would be 
 opposed by another proof; derived, from the very 
 nature of the fact which it would endeavour to esta- 
 blish. It is experience only which gives authority to 
 human testimony; and it is the same experience 
 which assures us of the laws of nature. When, 
 therefore, these two kinds of experience are contrary, 
 we have nothing to do but subtract the one from 
 the other, and embrace an opinion, either on one side 
 or the other, with that assurance which arises from 
 the remainder. But according to the principle here 
 explained, this subtraction with regard to all popular 
 religions, amounts to an entire annihilation; and 
 therefore we may establish it as a maxim, that no 
 human testimony can have such force as to prove a 
 miracle, and make it a just foundation for any such 
 system of religion.” | 
 
 As experience and testimony are put in opposition 
 in this passage, and as the force of its reasoning en- 
 tirely rests on the superior weight of the former to the 
 latter, we will now consider what this experience really 
 is. At the time when the ‘ Essay on Miracles’ was 
 published, Hume was about 36 years old. Does he 
 mean to say that his confidence in the permanence and 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 107 
 
 regularity of the laws of nature was derived from his 
 individual experience in the few years in which he had 
 lived? This would indeed have been drawing a very 
 large conclusion from extremely limited premises. The 
 author, however, was far too acute and able a reasoner 
 to fall into such an error. In a former part of the 
 essay he thus expresses himself :—“<A miracle is a 
 violation of the laws of nature; and as a firm and un- 
 alterable experience has established those laws, the 
 proof against’ a miracle, from the very nature of the 
 fact, is as entire as any argument from experience can 
 possibly be imagined.” It is obvious that the force 
 of this argument turns entirely on the meaning which 
 is assigned to the word experience. If we are to un- 
 derstand by it the experience of the thirty-six years of 
 Hume's life, the argument has no force whatever. 
 This is easily shown. It is a supposable case undoubt- 
 edly that changes may have taken place in the general 
 laws of nature. Supposing, then, we had been in- 
 formed. by historians of former times, that the course 
 of the sun and the tides of the sea had, in distant 
 ages, been different from those which existed in the 
 eighteenth century, a man would scarcely have been 
 thought in his sober senses who should assert that the 
 experience of the six-and-thirty years of Hume’s life 
 was sufficient to establish the permanence of the laws 
 of nature against this conflicting testimony of the old 
 historians of former ages. Surely no rational doubt 
 can be entertained that the word experience, in the 
 passage in question, means the experience of all times 
 concerning which we have any authentic information ; 
 and what does this amount to but human testimony ? 
 We believe in the regularity and permanency of the 
 
108 E CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 aN 
 
 laws of nature, because they have been permanent and 
 regular within our own very limited experience; and 
 because the credible chronicles of former periods of 
 the world’s history have in general agreed in giving 
 accounts of physical facts perfectly consistent with our 
 own experience. ‘The experience then on which this 
 acute philosopher founds his argument is, for the 
 most part, drawn from human testimony; and the 
 question whether credit should be given to assertions 
 of a deviation from the laws of nature, will depend in 
 every case on the degree of weight to which the testi- 
 mony which supports it is, under the circumstances 
 in which it is given, entitled. In truth, the experi- 
 ence on which Hume lays. so much stress, does not 
 exist to anything like the extent which he assumes. 
 So far from all history bearing testimony to an unde- 
 viating regularity in the succession of natural pheeno- 
 mena, the histories of Greece and Rome, and of all 
 other ancient nations, abound in prodigies and devia- 
 tions, in various forms, from the ordinary course of 
 nature; and miraculous events are continually re- 
 corded in the histories of the middle ages, and not 
 unfrequently in the pages of modern historians. Are 
 we then to assent to these miraculous narrations on 
 the ground of their frequency and of the testimony by 
 which they are supported? By no means; but the 
 reason of our rejection of the greater part of them is 
 not their inconsistency with an undeviating regularity 
 in the laws of nature, which has never been proved, 
 and apparently never can be proved; but because the 
 testimony in favour of the general regularity of those 
 laws is liable to no suspicion of falsehood, while strong 
 suspicion may be reasonably entertained as to the 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 109 
 
 truth of miraculous facts for the reasons to be now 
 given. In the former case there is no advantage to 
 be gained by falsehood, in the latter there may be 
 much. I cannot conceive any motive which could 
 induce historians and other authors, in different ages 
 and countries, to agree in giving false accounts of the 
 periods of the rising and setting of the sun and moon, 
 the succession of the seasons, the course of human life, 
 the property of fire to burn, and of water to quench. 
 It is quite inconceivable that numbers of people, at 
 different times and places, should concur, without any 
 intelligible motive, in disseminating falsehoods. With 
 respect to supposed miraculous events, the case is 
 widely different. The love of power affords a strong 
 stimulus to human action, and the desire to be thought 
 superior to others acts perhaps with equal force. The 
 man who can work a miracle excels others in power, 
 and will attain a reputation among those who believe 
 in the miracle beyond other men. These are distinc- 
 tions attaching to all pretences to the possession of 
 miraculous powers; but these are by no means the 
 only, or even the strongest motives which may lead to 
 the assumption of these powers. Those who have 
 pretended to possess them have generally been either 
 founders of some new religion, or introducers of some 
 important changes in that which was established, or 
 persons who held, or aspired to hold, important offices 
 in their respective churches. Such persons have an 
 obvious interest in giving strength to the authority 
 which they enjoy, and in advancing and increasing 
 their influence over the minds of their followers ; which 
 ends would evidently be answered by the belief of their 
 possessing miraculous powers. But this is by no 
 
110 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 means all. The priesthood has been usually closely 
 connected with the civil authority of their respective 
 countries. Often the same persons have wielded both 
 civil and ecclesiastical power ; and where that has not 
 been the case, the ecclesiastical and the civil authority 
 have given mutual aid and support to each other. 
 Thus the natural desire of power and distinction may 
 be reasonably presumed to have stimulated mdividuals 
 to pretend to possess miraculous power, and to de- 
 lude the world by pretended working of miracles, 
 whenever the circumstances of the age in which they 
 lived, and the position in which they were placed, 
 afforded a probable chance of success in them attempts. 
 Credulity largely prevails among men, particularly in 
 the ignorant and ill-informed ; and pretences to super- 
 natural power, when skilfully conducted, and claimed 
 with unhesitating confidence, will often, in a rude and 
 credulous age, be attended with success. The conclu- 
 sion to be drawn from history is, that a disposition to 
 believe in supernatural events bears an inverse pro- 
 portion to the intelligence of the age in which they 
 are alleged to have taken place, and a direct propor- 
 tion to the tendency of the age to superstition. I see 
 not the slightest objection to a passage from Bacon, 
 which Hume considers confirmatory of his argument. 
 “ Above all,” says Bacon, ‘every relation must be 
 considered as suspicious which depends in any degree 
 upon religion, as the prodigies of Livy.” 
 
 Returning then to the question of the assumed in- 
 credibility of miracles, I see nothing to warrant the 
 conclusion, that it is incredible that the Deity has 
 at any time, under any circumstances, and for any 
 purpose, caused a deviation from the ordinary laws 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. ' yeE) 
 
 of nature. If any one should say that the laws of 
 nature are absolutely in themselves unalterable, so 
 that even the Almighty cannot change them, I must 
 demand of him to prove this; as no proof of it, or, 
 to my knowledge, plausible argument for it, has been 
 yet produced. Those who believe that those laws 
 are the appointment of God, which I have endea- 
 voured to show in the early part of this work is 
 the only rational belief, can have no difficulty im 
 admitting that he has power to suspend or alter 
 them. Are we then in a condition to assert, that 
 having the power, he never has had, and never can 
 have the will to do so? Surely it would be folly 
 and presumption in the highest degree for weak, 
 shortsighted man to say this of his Creator. I do 
 not see then that we can positively assume that there 
 is any incredibility in a deviation from the laws of 
 nature, such deviation having been calculated to pro- 
 duce beneficial effects which would not have occurred 
 if they had constantly been in force without such 
 deviation. 
 
 But although we should admit that there is nothing 
 incredible in such a miracle as this, the evidence of 
 its having taken place ought to be sifted with great 
 care, and a reasonable suspicion may well be enter- 
 tamed that some deception has been practised. The 
 grounds of this suspicion have been enumerated 
 already. We will now consider what sort of evidence 
 we may reasonably require to prove a miracle :—1, 
 we must be satisfied that the witnesses could not be 
 deceived; 2, that they were persons of honest cha- 
 racter who did not intend to deceive others ; which 
 can only be proved by their being placed in such cir- 
 
La THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 cumstances as leave no reason for believing that they 
 were induced to give false testimony by a regard to 
 their own interest, or by the influence of prejudice or 
 passion; 3, that if there are several witnesses, they 
 should all agree in the main fact of the miracle. We 
 have already seen that differences respecting immate- 
 rial circumstances connected with the miracle, but not 
 essentially belonging to it, would not tend to inva- 
 lidate their testimony. This will be easily understood 
 by all who have been in the habit of attending courts 
 of criminal justice, where, in the proof of the most 
 serious crimes, witnesses frequently differ as to imma- 
 terial facts, such as the dress of the person present, 
 the exact time in which the event took place, &c. No 
 sensible jury attaches any importance to discrepancies 
 of this sort, for the plain reason, that these are facts, 
 immaterial and, on that account, not likely to have 
 been observed with close attention. 
 
 I will add here that great strength will be given to 
 the evidence if the witnesses were previously strongly 
 indisposed to believe the fact in question ; and if they 
 were very slowly brought to the conviction that a 
 miraculous event had actually occurred. 
 
 In estimating the weight of the evidence produced 
 to prove a miracle, due regard must be paid to the 
 circumstances under which it is said to have taken 
 place. We are always justified in demanding the 
 best evidence which can be produced of the event in 
 question. If we have an opportunity of personally 
 witnessing the supposed miraculous fact, we ought to 
 do so, because the evidence of our own senses must 
 have greater weight than the testimony of others. 
 If the miracle is said to have taken place in a distant 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 113 
 
 age and country, we can of course have nothing be- 
 yond historical testimony. With respect then to the 
 miraculous resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 
 the question is, have we or have we not sufficient 
 evidence of its truth ? 
 
 The Christian religion must have had a beginning. 
 All the information from the writings of Christians 
 and heathens which we possess concurs in showing 
 that it had its origin in Palestine in the reign of the 
 emperor ‘Tiberius ; that its original promulgator was 
 Jesus Christ; and that after his death it was taught 
 . by his followers. That Jesus was crucified, and that 
 he was miraculously raised from the dead, has been 
 the belief of Christians in all ages of which we have 
 any written account ; and there is not a tittle of evi- 
 dence tending to show that this was not an article of 
 the Christian creed from the very beginning of the 
 religion. We must, then, unless we choose to assume 
 a fact without any evidence, believe that the first 
 teachers of Christianity embraced and inculeated this 
 belief. We have five narratives which profess to give 
 accounts of the resurrection of Jesus, and of the sub- 
 sequent conduct and teachings of his disciples. There 
 are no writings in existence inconsistent with these 
 histories ; and if we reject them we are left without 
 any information respecting the origin of Christianity. 
 Considered as histories of ordinary facts, they are 
 quite as much entitled to be received as authentic as 
 any other ancient historical writings. I shall there- 
 fore continue to treat the gospels and the book of 
 Acts as authentic narratives, as I have already done 
 as to the accounts of the life of Jesus contained in 
 the four gospels. The question for our serious con- 
 
 I 
 
114 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 sideration will be, whether the common facts contained 
 in these books afford satisfactory evidence of the re- 
 surrection of Jesus from the dead. 
 
 I will now proceed to state these common facts, 
 claiming for the gospels and the Acts of the Apostles 
 the same degree of credit as is usually given to his- 
 torical narrations written at or near the time when. 
 the events occurred. I shall not greatly trouble myself 
 with the question whether there may not be found in 
 these histories inaccuracies and inconsistencies which 
 prove that they cannot be, in every minute particular, 
 correct accounts, because in the view which T take of 
 the subject, such an inquiry 1s not at all necessary. 
 It must indeed be thought essential by those who hold 
 what is usually called the plenary inspiration of the 
 whole of the Old and New Testament, that 1s, that 
 every word was inspired by God ; but I can discover 
 no rational foundation for that doctrine. I shall treat 
 them as credible histories of common facts ; ‘and exa- 
 mine their contents in no other way than that which 
 I should pursue with respect to any other historians. 
 
 All the evangelists relate the death and burial of 
 Jesus ; but the following passage, Matt. xxvii. 62-66, 
 will require some remark :—‘‘ Now the next day, that 
 followed the day of the preparation, the chief priests 
 and Pharisees came together unto Pilate, saying, Sir, 
 we remember that that deceiver said, while he was 
 yet alive, After three days I will rise again. Com- 
 mand therefore that the sepulchre be made sure until 
 the third day, lest his disciples come by night, and, 
 steal him away, and say unto the people, He 1s 
 risen from the dead: so the last error shall be worse 
 than the first. Pilate said unto them, Ye have a 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 115 
 
 watch: go your way, make it as sure as ye can. So 
 they went, and made the sepulchre sure, sealing the 
 stone, and setting a watch.’’ In connexion with this 
 passage, I will now cite what immediately follows the 
 account given by Matthew of the resurrection, xxviii. 
 11-15: “ Now when they were going, behold, some 
 of the watch came into the city, and shewed unto the 
 chief priests all the things that were done. And 
 when they were assembled with the elders, and had 
 taken counsel, they gave large money unto the 
 soldiers, saying, Say ye, his disciples came by night, 
 and stole him away while we slept. And if this come 
 to the governor’s ears, we will persuade him, and 
 secure you. So they took the money, and did as 
 they were taught: and this saying is commonly re- 
 ported among the Jews until this day.”’ From the first 
 of these passages it appears that all due precaution 
 was taken to prevent the body of Jesus being taken 
 from the sepulchre by his disciples, a watch being 
 set, and the sepulchre being sealed. In the beginning 
 of the next chapter Matthew says that an angel de- 
 scended from heaven and rolled away the stone from 
 the door of the sepulchre; and that for fear of him 
 the keepers did shake, and became as dead men. 
 When, therefore, in the second passage cited above, 
 the evangelist says that the watch showed to the 
 priests the things that were done, I do not see what 
 other meaning can be given to his words, but. that 
 they told the priests of the descent of the angel, and 
 the rolling away of the stone from the sepulchre. The 
 reader will, however, bear in mind that I am at 
 present only assuming that the common facts of the 
 
 , ire 
 
 ~ 
 
116 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 narratives are true, leaving the question of their 
 miraculous character to be considered hereafter. The 
 story told by the watch then consists of the assertion 
 of the body being missing, and the supposition that 
 the disciples had taken it away. They stole him 
 away while we slept, say the soldiers ; and as they 
 could not have known what was done while they 
 were asleep, their account of its having been taken 
 away must have been merely conjectural. If the fact 
 of Jesus having been miraculously raised from the dead 
 can be established by satisfactory evidence, there 1s 
 nothing in the story of the soldiers to contradict it. 
 In investigating the evidence for the resurrection 
 of Jesus Christ from the dead, I shall confine myself 
 to the testimony of the eleven apostles, who always 
 _ professed themselves, as we shall presently see, to be 
 the chosen witnesses of that event. All the evan- 
 gelists, however, agree in the statement that the first 
 appearance of Jesus after his resurrection was not to 
 his apostles, but to Mary Magdalene. This is posi- 
 tively asserted by Mark, and Matthew mentions his 
 appearing to her and the other Mary, apparently at a 
 subsequent period, but before he was seen by any of 
 the apostles. Mark says that when Mary Magdalene 
 told the apostles that Jesus was alive, they believed 
 her not; and Luke says that, when she and other 
 women told them that they had seen Jesus alive, 
 their words appeared to them idle tales, and they 
 believed them not. It does not appear that any of 
 the apostles professed to believe the resurrection of | 
 Jesus till they had actually seen, or pretended to have 
 seen, him. A passage in the gospel of John may 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. LL 
 
 seem to contradict this, but will not, I think, on 
 examination be found to do so. The account given 
 by that evangelist of the events following the resur- 
 rection is much fuller than any in the other gospels, 
 and contains an important incident in which he was 
 a party concerned. It is remarkable that he mentions 
 Mary Magdalene only, and says nothing of the women 
 who are said by the other evangelists to have accom- 
 panied her. According to the narrative of John, 
 Mary Magdalene, having gone to the sepulchre and 
 found that the body was not there, ran to Peter and 
 John and told them of the fact; they then ran to- 
 gether to the sepulchre, but John arriving first looked 
 into it, but did not enter it; Peter then arrived at 
 the sepulchre, and went into it, and was followed by 
 John. The 8th and 9th verses of the 20th chapter 
 run thus: “Then went in also that other disciple, 
 which came first to the sepulchre, and he saw and 
 believed. Yor as yet they knew not the scripture, 
 that he must rise again.”” Now the question is, what 
 John believed. Some suppose the text to mean that 
 he believed that Jesus had risen from the dead, but 
 this seems to me a wrong interpretation. When Mary 
 Magdalene went to Peter and John, she said, “ They 
 have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and 
 we know not where they have laid him.” It is plain, 
 therefore, that she had no thought of Jesus having 
 been raised from the dead, but that her concern arose 
 from her not being able to find the body, which, as 
 appears from Mark and Luke, she and the other 
 women had brought spices to anoint. The apparent 
 object of Peter and John, in their visit to the sepul- 
 chre, was to ascertain the truth of Mary’s statement. 
 
118 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 John became satisfied of this by going into the sepul- 
 chre, and finding the linen grave-clothes lying there, but 
 the body gone. Leaving the 8th verse to itself, I see 
 no reason to doubt that what John believed was, that 
 the body of Jesus had been taken away as Mary had 
 asserted ; and this interpretation seems to be irre- 
 sistibly confirmed by the 9th verse, and the accounts 
 of Mark and Luke. ‘The 9th verse says, “ For as yet 
 they knew not the scripture, that he must rise again 
 from the dead.” If John had at this time believed in 
 the resurrection of Jesus, he could not have failed to 
 call to mind his distinct and repeated prediction of 
 that great event, nor of applying to it any part of the 
 Scripture which can be justly considered to predict it. 
 It is also clear from Mark and Luke that the disci- 
 ples disbelieved the accounts of the women when they 
 professed actually to have seen Jesus ; and that John 
 was one of them, appears from Luke, who says, that 
 the women told their story to the eleven, meaning of 
 course the eleven apostles, If then we admit the true 
 interpretation of the 8th verse to be that John be- 
 lieved in the resurrection, we must conclude that he 
 inferred it from the absence of the body from the 
 sepulchre, though no one at that time pretended to - 
 have seen Jesus; and yet that shortly afterwards, 
 when the women professed to have seen Jesus, John, 
 in common with the other apostles, disbelieved them. 
 It seems scarcely necessary to say that this is in- 
 credible. 
 
 I will now examine the proofs of the resurrection 
 of Jesus Christ from the dead which are afforded by 
 the testimony of his apostles. We have already seen — 
 that during his lifetime they gave no credence to his 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 119 
 
 repeated predictions of his death and resurrection, 
 and also that they disbelieved the assertions of the 
 women who said that they had seen him alive after 
 his crucifixion. Our principal sources of information 
 in this inquiry will be the gospels of Luke and John, 
 and the Acts of the Apostles. But little is to be 
 gathered from Matthew and Mark. After much con- 
 sideration of the subject, I have come to the con- 
 clusion that, from some accidental circumstance of 
 which we can give no account, a considerable portion 
 of the last chapter of the first gospel has been lost. 
 The narratives in the gospel of Matthew are, in ge- 
 neral, given with remarkable conciseness, but it seems _ 
 to me highly improbable that he or any other author 
 could have left an account of facts in so unfinished a 
 state as the 28th chapter of his gospel. The 2nd and 
 drd verses give an account of an earthquake, and of an 
 angel descending and rolling away the stone which 
 had been placed on the sepulchre. The evangelist 
 says that the watch shook, and became as dead, and 
 then without a word more about the watch, whether 
 they remained or went away, and without disclosing 
 whether or not the women, whose coming to the 
 sepulchre is mentioned in the first verse, witnessed 
 the rolling away of the stone, he proceeds to mention 
 that the angel told the women that Jesus had risen 
 from the dead, and ordered them to tell the disciples. 
 The women are then described as meeting Jesus in 
 the way, and receiving from him a command to see 
 him in Galilee. The evangelist then introduces the 
 passage about what passed between the watch and 
 the priests, which I have already mentioned, and 
 without saying anything more of the occurrences on 
 
120 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 the day of the resurrection, proceeds to mention very 
 shortly the disciples going into Galilee and meeting 
 Jesus there. Now, as we learn from the other evan- 
 gelists that the apostles saw their Master on the very 
 day of his resurrection, or at any rate professed to 
 have seen him, it seems impossible to believe that 
 Matthew, one of their own body, could have passed 
 over that interview in silence, and contented himself 
 with giving an account of a subsequent meeting 
 between Jesus and the apostles in Galilee. 
 
 With respect to the testimony of Mark, there is no 
 small difficulty. The last twelve verses of his gospel 
 are of very doubtful authority ; and the weight of 
 testimony seems to be strongly against them. The 
 probability is, I think, that they are spurious. If they 
 should be deemed so, we can hardly avoid the con- 
 clusion that death or accident prevented the evan- 
 gelist from finishing his work, for he can scarcely be 
 supposed to have intended to end his gospel with the 
 Sth verse*. It would be foreign from the object of 
 this work to state the arguments which have in- 
 duced me to believe that this portion of Scripture is 
 spurious; but, holding that opinion, I am precluded 
 from producing Mark’s recital of what passed among 
 the disciples after. the resurrection. I will therefore 
 proceed to Luke and John, whose testimony I can see 
 no reason to reject. 
 
 The first account given by Luke of the appearance 
 of Jesus to any of his disciples, contained in the last 
 chapter of his gospel, relates that two of them 
 were going on the day of the resurrection to a village 
 
 * See Norton on the Genuineness of the Gospels, vol. i. note 4, 
 page 216. | 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. Lies 
 
 called Emmaus, about threescore furlongs from Jeru- 
 salem, and that Jesus drew near and went with them. 
 The 16th verse is remarkable: “ But their eyes were 
 holden that they should not (or as perhaps it would 
 be better translated, they did not) know him.” Now, 
 as the account of this transaction must have been a 
 communication of the two disciples, none other appear- 
 ing to have been present but the person whom they 
 represent to have been Jesus, and as they must have 
 intended to assert the reality of his appearance, it 
 scems impossible to conceive that if they had in- 
 vented a false story for that purpose, they would 
 have thus introduced a circumstance calculated to 
 throw discredit on it. A conversation of some length 
 takes place, and Jesus’ disclosing himself is thus 
 described: “And it came to pass, that as he sat at 
 meat with them, he took bread, and blessed it, and 
 _ brake, and gave to them. And their eyes were 
 opened, and they knew him; and he vanished out of 
 their sight.”’ It is plain that these disciples believed 
 that they had seen Jesus. I am, however, far from 
 thinking that this narrative of itself affords an argu- 
 ment of much strength to prove the resurrection. 
 The two disciples were not apostles, and the name of 
 one of them is unknown. ‘The other is called Cleo- 
 phas, which was the name of the husband of the sister 
 of the mother of Jesus, who was the father of the 
 apostle James the Less, so called probably to distin- 
 guish him from James the son of Zebedee: but - 
 whether this Cleophas was the same as the person 
 mentioned here, we are not informed. All we know 
 therefore is, that the individuals present had been 
 disciples of Jesus; but how often they had been 
 
139 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 with him; and what means they had possessed of 
 becoming familiarly acquainted with his person, are 
 matters respecting which we are quite in the dark. 
 Keeping in mind that for a considerable time they 
 did not think that they were talking with Jesus; and 
 that they discovered him only a short time before he 
 left them, I cannot think that this highly interesting 
 story in itself affords any important testimony to the 
 truth of the resurrection, though it is not without 
 some weight as a corroboration of other evidence. 
 Luke goes on to relate that the two disciples went 
 immediately to Jerusalem to the apostles, and that 
 before they told this story they were mformed that 
 Jesus had risen, and had appeared to Simon. There 
 can be no doubt, that the Simon here mentioned is 
 Simon Peter; but we have no other account of this 
 interview with Jesus. ‘The two disciples then tell the 
 apostles that they had seen Jesus; and the narrative 
 is continued as follows :—‘ And as they thus spake, 
 Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, and saith 
 unto them, Peace be unto you. But they were terri- 
 fied and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen 
 a spirit. And he said unto them, Why are ye 
 troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts ? 
 Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: 
 handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and 
 bones, as ye see me have. And when he had thus 
 spoken, he shewed them his hands and his feet. And 
 ~ while they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, he 
 said unto them, Have ye here any meat? And they 
 gave him a piece of a broiled fish, and of a honey- 
 comb. And he took it, and did eat before them. 
 And he said unto them, hese are the words which T 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 123 
 
 spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all 
 things must be fulfilled, which were written in the 
 law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, 
 concerning me. ‘Then opened he their understanding, 
 that they might understand the scriptures, and said 
 unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behoved 
 Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third 
 day; and that repentance and remission of sins 
 should be preached in his name among all nations, 
 begimning at Jerusalem. And ye are witnesses of 
 these things. And, behold, I send the promise of my 
 Father upon you: but tarry ye in the city of Jeru- 
 salem, until ye be endued with power from on high.’’ 
 The gospel of Luke ends as follows: “And he led 
 them out as far as to Bethany, and he lifted up his 
 hands, and blessed them. And it came to pass, 
 while he blessed them, he was parted from them, and 
 carried up into heaven. And they worshipped him, 
 and returned to Jerusalem with great joy; and were 
 continually in the temple, praising and blessing God. 
 Amen.” In order to place together all the evidence 
 afforded by the writings of Luke to prove the resur- 
 rection, I shall here give his account of the appear- 
 ances of Jesus after his resurrection in the book of 
 Acts, which runs thus: “The former treatise have I 
 made, O ‘Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to 
 do and teach, until the day in which he was taken up, 
 after that he through the Holy Ghost had given com- 
 mandments to the apostles whom he had chosen: to 
 whom also he shewed himself alive after his passion by 
 many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, 
 and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom 
 of God: and, bemg assembled together with them, 
 
124 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 commanded them that they should not. depart from 
 Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, 
 which, saith he, ye have heard of me. For John 
 truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized 
 with the Holy Ghost not many days hence. When 
 they therefore were come together, they asked of him, 
 saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the 
 kingdom to Israel? And he said unto them, It is 
 not for you to know the times or the seasons, which 
 the Father hath put in his own power. But ye shall 
 receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon 
 you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jeru- 
 salem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto 
 the uttermost part of the earth. And when he had 
 spoken these things, while they beheld him, he was 
 taken up; and acloud received him out of their sight. 
 And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he 
 went up, behold, two men stood by them in white 
 apparel; which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why 
 stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, 
 which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so 
 come in lke manner as ye have seen him go into 
 heaven.” 
 
 The apostle John gives a much fuller account of the 
 appearances of Jesus to his apostles after the resurrec- 
 tion than the other evangelists. The 20th chapter of 
 his gospel, verses 19-29, relates the first two of those 
 interviews: ‘Then the same day at evening, being the 
 first day of the week, when the doors were shut where 
 the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came 
 Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, 
 Peace be unto you. Aud when he had so said, he 
 shewed unto them his hands and his side. Then were 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 125 
 
 the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord. Then 
 said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my 
 Father hath sent me, even so send J you. And when 
 he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto 
 them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whose soever 
 sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; .and 
 whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained. But 
 Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not 
 with them when Jesus came. ‘The other disciples 
 therefore said unto him, We have seen the Lord. 
 But he said unto them, Except I shall see in his hands 
 the print of the nails, and put my finger into the 
 print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, 
 1 will not believe. And after eight days again his 
 disciples were within, and Thomas with them: then 
 came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the 
 midst, and said, Peace be unto you. Then saith he 
 to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my 
 hands ; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into 
 my side; and be not faithless, but believing. And 
 Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and 
 my God. Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because 
 thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are 
 they that have not seen, and yet have believed.”” The 
 last interview mentioned by John to have taken place 
 between Jesus and his disciples was in Galilee at the 
 sea of ‘Tiberias; but the particular time is not men- 
 tioned. ‘The persons present were Peter, Thomas, 
 Nathanael, the two sons of Zebedee, James and John, 
 and two other disciples. Nathanael is thought, I 
 think on good grounds, to be the apostle Bartho- 
 lomew. Whether the other two were apostles does 
 not appear. ‘These. persons were all fishing on the 
 
126 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 lake, and it was on this occasion that the transaction 
 is said to have taken place which is usually called the 
 Miraculous Draught of Fishes. It will not be neces- 
 sary to state all that passed, but I will merely mention 
 that a conversation ensued between Jesus and Peter 
 of a, highly interesting character as particularly con- 
 cerning what was to befall him and the apostle John. 
 
 Let us now look back upon the evidence which has 
 been produced, and inquire whether it affords a suffi- 
 cient ground to believe that the apostles asserted that 
 their Master had risen from the dead; and that they 
 had on several occasions seen and conversed with 
 him. The truth of the fact is another question which 
 will be dealt with hereafter. 
 
 I will, however, first examine the different accounts 
 of the visits of the women to the sepulchre, beginning 
 with the objections to the credibility of the narratives 
 founded on their apparent inconsistencies. First, as 
 to the time of the visit. Matthew tells us that they 
 came to the sepulchre at the end of the sabbath day, 
 as it began to dawn towards the first day of the 
 week ; Mark says, it was very early in the morning, 
 the first day of the week, at the rising of the sun; 
 Luke, that is was very early in the morning; and 
 John, that Mary Magdalene (whom alone he mentions) 
 came to the sepulchre early, while it was yet dark. 
 ‘The inconsistency here is in the account of Mark, that 
 it was at the rising of the sun. Though it had begun 
 to dawn, it might without impropriety of language be 
 said to have been still dark, therefore there is no real 
 discrepancy between the accounts of Matthew and 
 John, and Luke fixes no particular time, saying only 
 that it was very early. Mark’s account cannot be 
 
 i, 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. — 127 
 
 reconciled with that of the other evangelists. It 
 has been conjectured by Bishop Pearce that a 
 mistake has occurred in copying this text, and that 
 what the evangelist really wrote was, the sun not 
 having yet risen. This is a mere conjecture, but, if 
 admitted, it would reconcile Mark’s narrative with 
 that of the other evangelists. 
 
 Secondly, as to the persons who visited the sepul- 
 chre. Matthew mentions Mary Magdalene and the 
 other Mary, that is Mary the mother of James ; Mark 
 adds Salome; John only names Mary Magdalene ; 
 and Luke mentions in the first instance no name, but 
 afterwards says, it was Mary Magdalene, and Joanna, 
 and other women which were with them, which told 
 these things to the apostles. It must be a very forced 
 construction of this text to apply it to any other per- 
 sons than those whose visit to the sepulchre had just 
 been described; yet from the circumstance that the 
 name Joanna is here introduced, a strange hypothesis 
 was first propounded by West in his ‘ Observations 
 on the Resurrection,’ which was received with oreat 
 favour, and is now extensively adopted, that the 
 women went in different parties to the sepulchre, and 
 that the account of Luke relates to a second party of 
 whom they have chosen to make Joanna the leader. 
 This hypothesis is ingeniously defended by West, but 
 as I cannot find the slightest scriptural foundation 
 for it, I forbear making any remarks upon it. It cer- 
 tainly seems strange that the evangelists should have 
 differed so much in their mention of the women at 
 the sepulchre; but there is no contradiction, and 
 therefore nothing to invalidate their testimony. 
 
 Thirdly, as to the appearance of the angel, and the 
 
128 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 rolling away of the stone from the sepulchre, the con- 
 ciseness of Matthew’s narrative leaves us to get at the 
 succession of events by inference, from comparing one 
 part of the narrative with the others. The apostle 
 then, I think, clearly indicates that the rolling away 
 of the stone took place before the women arrived at 
 the sepulchre. If they had been present, it would 
 have been quite unnecessary for the angel to tell them 
 that Jesus had risen. If then the soldiers alone were 
 present, the information of the evangelist must have 
 been received from them. 
 
 Fourthly, what happened when the women visited 
 the sepulchre. Matthew says that the angel set upon 
 the stone which he had rolled from the sepulchre ; 
 and he adds: “The angel answered and said unto the 
 women, Fear not ye; for I know that ye seek Jesus, 
 which was crucified. He is not here, for he is risen 
 as he said. Come and see the place where the Lord 
 lay.” It appears, therefore, that the evangelists un- 
 derstood the conversation to have taken place on the 
 outside of the sepulchre ; for if the women had entered 
 into it they must have seen where the Lord lay; and 
 an invitation to see it would have been wholly unne- 
 cessary. No one could collect from the narrative of 
 Matthew that the women entered the sepulchre. 
 Mark says that the women entered it, and saw a 
 young man sitting on the right side clothed in a long 
 white garment. ‘This appears inconsistent with the 
 account of Matthew, who describes the angel, evidently 
 the same person as the young man mentioned by Mark, 
 as sitting on a stone at the outside of the sepulchre. 
 Grotius endeavours to reconcile these accounts by 
 supposing that there was an enclosure round the 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 129 
 
 sepulchre ; and that Mark is to be understood to say 
 that the women entered, not into the real sepulchre, 
 but into this enclosure. Now both Matthew and Mark, 
 in describing the burial of Jesus, say that a stone was 
 rolled to the door of the sepulchre ; which was obvi- 
 ously done to secure the body, as it would effectually 
 do, both the evangelists having told us that the se- 
 pulchre was hewn out of a rock. Matthew adds, that 
 the stone was sealed, and a watch set. Surely this 
 must have been the real sepulchre, and not an enclosure 
 around it. How could laying a stone at the door of 
 the supposed enclosure have secured the body, unless 
 it was inaccessible all round, of which we have no 
 proof, nor indeed of the existence of any such enclo- 
 sure? I cannot regard it in any other light than as a 
 mere fiction of Grotius, invented for the purpose of 
 remedying the apparently conflicting narratives of the 
 two evangelists. We now come to the account of Luke, 
 according to whom, the women entered into the se- 
 pulchre, found the body gone, and saw two men 
 standing by them in shining garments. Thus Luke 
 agrees with Mark as to the women having entered the 
 sepulchre, but mentions two men, Mark having only 
 named one. This, however, does not amount to a 
 contradiction. There may have been two angels or 
 men present, although Matthew and Mark, we know 
 not why, mention only one. Greater difficulties than 
 we have hitherto encountered will arise in comparing 
 the account of John with those of the other evange- 
 lists. He mentions Mary Magdalene only, and tells 
 us that she went to the sepulchre and found the stone 
 gone, and then ran to Peter and John, and told them 
 K 
 
130 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 that the body had been taken away, and that she 
 knew not where they had laid it. Nothing is said by 
 her at that time of having seen an angel; but after 
 Peter and John have visited the sepulchre, and left it, 
 Mary is described as having remained there, and seen 
 two angels, and afterwards, Jesus himself. 1 will 
 here compare the account of her seeing the angels 
 with that given by the other evangelists. John agrees 
 with Luke in saying that there were two angels, but 
 he says that Mary stood without at the sepulchre, that 
 she stooped down and saw two angels in white, one 
 sitting at the head and the other at the feet where the 
 body of Jesus had lain. ‘Thus Matthew describes the 
 women seeing an angel sitting on a stone outside of the 
 sepulchre; Mark says that the women entered the sepul- 
 chre, and saw a young man sitting on the right side ; 
 Luke, that the women entered the sepulchre, and that 
 while they were much perplexed two men stood by 
 them in shining garments; and John, who mentions 
 Mary Magdalene only, says that she saw two angels 
 within the sepulchre. John therefore agrees with 
 Mark as to the angels, or at least one of them, having 
 been seen sitting within the sepulchre, but he does 
 not say that Mary Magdalene entered the sepulchre. 
 Luke differs with Matthew, and, it seems, with John, 
 in saying that the women entered the sepulchre, and 
 with Mark in mentioning only one angel, and with 
 him and John in saying that the angels were stand- 
 ing. He does not say, in express terms, that the 
 angels were within the sepulchre, but his account 
 implies that they were. It leads one to conclude that 
 the angels were not present, or at least were not 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 1d} 
 
 seen by the women at the time when they entered 
 into the sepulchre, but that they appeared after- 
 wards. 
 
 Fifthly, as to the conversation of the women with 
 the angels. The narratives of Matthew and Mark 
 agree In substance, but not in words. Both state 
 that the angels told the women not to be afraid ; 
 that they knew that they sought Jesus; and that 
 he had risen. They also agree that the angels in- 
 vited the women to see the place where the body 
 had been laid; directed them to tell his disciples 
 (Mark mentioning Peter by name) that their Master 
 had risen; and that he would go before them into 
 Galilee, where they would see him. Luke’s account 
 is more concise. He mentions nothing of the angels 
 tellmg the women not to be afraid; and he says that 
 the angels put the question to them, « Why seek ye 
 the living among the dead?” instead of asserting that 
 they did so seek him. They tell them that he had 
 risen, but do not command them to tell his disciples. 
 In narrating the concluding part of the address of the 
 angels, he differs remarkably from Matthew and Mark : 
 “He is not here, but is risen ; remember how he 
 spake unto you, while he was yet in Galilee, saying, 
 The son of man must be delivered into the hands of 
 sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise 
 again.”” ‘Thus Galilee is here mentioned for quite a 
 different purpose from that specified in the other 20- 
 spels. It will be convenient to defer John’s account of 
 these transactions till the next head. 
 
 Sixthly, as to what occurred after the women had 
 seen the angels at the sepulchre. Matthew’s account 
 
 K 2 
 
132 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 is, that they went away to tell the disciples; that 
 Jesus met them, saying, “ All hail;” that they held 
 him by the feet, and worshipped him ; and that he told 
 them to go and tell his brethren that they should go 
 into Galilee, where they should see him. Mark says 
 that the women went away quickly from the sepulchre; 
 “neither said they anything to any man, for they were 
 afraid.’’ This assertion may perhaps admit of the in- 
 terpretation that they said nothing to any one whom 
 they met on their way to the disciples ; it is however 
 remarkable, that Mark gives no account whatever of 
 the women having collectively given any information 
 to the apostles of the resurrection of Jesus, nor of his 
 haying appeared to them; but he adds, that Jesus 
 first appeared to Mary Magdalene; that she told it to 
 the disciples; and that they did not believe her. I 
 must however observe, that this last account is from 
 that part of the gospel of Mark, the authenticity of 
 which is very doubtful. Luke says that the women 
 returned from the sepulchre and told all these things 
 to the disciples ; and that their words seemed to them 
 idle tales, and they believed them not. The account 
 given by John of what followed the vision of angels at 
 the sepulchre requires close attention, as it differs, in 
 some important particulars, from the narratives of the 
 other evangelists. He names Mary Magdalene alone 
 as having gone to the sepulchre; and proceeds to say 
 that she went to Peter and John, and told them that 
 the body of Jesus had been taken away, and that she 
 knew not where they had laid him. The two apostles 
 then went to the sepulchre, and found it as Mary had 
 told them. After they had returned Mary remained, 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. foe 
 
 saw two angels in the sepulchre, and afterwards Jesus 
 himself, with whom she conversed. In the first instance 
 she did not know that it was Jesus, but took him for 
 the gardener (the place of burial being a garden); but 
 she afterwards fully satisfied herself that it was Jesus : 
 she then went and told the disciples that she had seen 
 the Lord, and what he had said to her. Now all this 
 forms a clear, distinct narrative, and appears to leave 
 no room for reasonable doubt that the facts are told 
 in the order in which they happened; nor can I think 
 that any one could have understood it differently, 
 unless some extraneous circumstance had suggested 
 another interpretation. A predetermination to re- 
 concile the accounts of all the evangelists in every 
 particular could alone, it seems, have induced Gro- 
 tius to venture on a strange attempt to prove that 
 Mary Magdalene did not go to Peter and John 
 until after she had seen Jesus, and that the account 
 given by John of this event, is to be read as a paren- 
 thesis. It is evident that this interpretation does 
 violence to the apparent order of the narrative. I will 
 endeavour to show the invalidity of his reasoning ; 
 and that he totally fails in the attempt, by means of it, 
 to reconcile the account of John with that of the other 
 evangelists. John, says Grotius, did not make this 
 inversion of the natural order of his narrative without 
 reason. He knew how weak the testimony of women 
 would be held by many ; for imbecility of judgment 
 is commonly attributed to that sex. He says that 
 Celsus, writing against the Christians, calls Mary Mag- 
 dalene a fanatical female ; and that John, bemg about 
 to treat of matters, which, though most true, are hard 
 to be believed, first sets forth what had been seen by 
 
134 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 himself and Peter, the latter of whom had already sealed 
 his testimony by his death, and the former, himself, 
 being prepared to suffer on the same account. It is not 
 easy to believe that John (although the most inartifi- 
 cial of writers) would have told his story in this extra- 
 ordinary manner. ‘The reason given by Grotius might 
 have operated in preventing an historian of the resur- 
 rection recording Mary Magdalene’s testimony at all ; 
 but how it could have led John or any other writer to 
 cut it in half, and to insert the very important circum- 
 stance to which it gave occasion between the two parts 
 of the narrative, exceeds my comprehension. Let us 
 now examine the narrative closely on the hypothesis 
 of Grotius. Mary he supposes to have gone to the 
 sepulchre, and to have found it empty. While she 
 was standing outside of the sepulchre weeping, she 
 saw two angels sitting in the sepulchre who asked her 
 why she wept. She told them because they had taken 
 away the Lord, and she knew not where they had laid — 
 him. No answer is said to have been given by the 
 angels ; but Mary turning round saw Jesus himself, 
 and, after some conversation, he says, “Go to my 
 brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Fa- 
 ther, and your Father; and to my God, and your 
 God.” Mary went to the disciples, and told them 
 that she had seen Jesus. Grotius places the visit of 
 Peter and John to the sepulchre after all these events. 
 Now there is not the slightest suggestion in the nar- 
 rative that Mary entertained a doubt that she had 
 really seen Jesus. If then she had seen him, she 
 must have known that he had risen; how then could 
 she have said at that time (v. 2), “ they have taken 
 away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and we know not 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 135 
 
 where they have laid him’? Grotius endeavours to 
 get rid of the difficulty by supposing, that because 
 Jesus had forbidden Mary to touch him, she supposed 
 that what she had seen was not Jesus, but a vision, 
 in contradiction to her own express assertion, that she 
 had seen the Lord. Having thus reviewed the whole 
 narrative, I conclude that the interpretation of Grotius 
 rests on no rational foundation*. | 
 
 I will now proceed to consider the order in which 
 the events which have been the objects of our attention 
 may have happened. We have seen that, excepting 
 the visit of Peter and John to the sepulchre, all the 
 facts of this part of the gospel history could only have 
 been made known to the apostles by the women. 
 Four of these are mentioned by name, Mary Magda- 
 lene, Mary the mother of James, Salome, and Joanna. 
 Some of the discrepancies in the accounts of the evan- 
 gelists may be reasonably accounted for by supposing 
 that they derived their narratives from different 
 sources. As John mentions Mary Magdalene only, 
 we can scarcely doubt that his account was received 
 from her; Matthew’s may well be referred to the other 
 Mary who is the only person besides Mary Magdalene 
 mentioned by him; Mark adds Salome, from whom 
 he probably derived his account ; and as Luke alone 
 mentions Joanna, we may presume that she was the 
 source of his information. It must, however, be ad- 
 mitted to be a strange circumstance, that the evan- 
 gelist John, who was the son of Salome, does not 
 
 * As I have endeavoured to overthrow two interpretations of 
 Grotius, I cannot help adding, that I have in general found his 
 comments on the New Testament more satisfactory than those of 
 any other writer who has fallen in my way. 
 
136 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 mention her having paid a visit to the sepulchre, or 
 seem to have derived from her any information on 
 the subject of what passed there. I will now state 
 the order in which the events probably took place, 
 and endeavour to ascertain what are really incon-— 
 sistencies in the narratives. First, as to the time of 
 
 the women arriving at the sepulchre. I have already 
 said that it is clear. to my mind that the vision of 
 angels (assuming it to be true) must have taken 
 place when all the women mentioned by the evan- 
 gelists were present; and the hypothesis of West, 
 that Luke’s account refers to a different transaction 
 from those narrated by the other evangelists, rests on 
 no scriptural foundation whatever, but directly con- 
 tradicts Luke himself. It seems to me impossible 
 to reconcile the different narratives of the evan- 
 gelists as to the time when the women came to the 
 sepulchre ; as Mark says it was at the rising of the 
 sun, and John that it was still dark. This dis- 
 crepancy I do not, however, consider at all to inva- 
 lidate their testimony. ‘The exact time of their 
 arrival at the sepulchre was an immaterial circum- 
 stance, and considermg the great events which fol- 
 lowed, might have made no lastmg impression on 
 their minds. Neither do I see anything improbable 
 in some of the evangelists having mistaken what was 
 said by the women as to a circumstance of no im- 
 portance in itself, while their minds were fully oc- 
 cupied with the unspeakably great and interesting 
 subject of the resurrection of their Master from the 
 grave. ‘lhe mistake may easily have taken place if 
 the arriving at the sepulchre was while it was yet 
 dark, but that as some interval passed (which T shall 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 137 
 
 show presently must have been the case) before the 
 appearance of the angels, that event did not happen 
 till the rising of the sun. Secondly, as to Mary Mag- 
 dalene going to Peter and John. It appears from 
 John’s account, that Mary, on finding the sepulchre 
 empty, suspected that the body had been taken away, 
 and ran and communicated her suspicions to the two 
 apostles. Whether any of the other women went 
 with her is not said; but it seems most probable 
 that they did not. Thirdly, as to the visit of Peter 
 and John to the sepulchre. This transaction is not 
 mentioned by Matthew or Mark. Luke merely says 
 that Peter ran to the sepulchre, and this was after 
 the women had told the disciples that they had 
 seen a vision of angels. I see no possibility of re- 
 conciling this with the account of John; and as 
 he, beng a party concerned in the transaction, must 
 have known the truth, I cannot entertain a doubt 
 that this part of Luke’s narrative is erroneous. It 
 was probably the impossibility of reconciling it with 
 the interpretation ordinarily given to John’s nar- 
 rative of the visit of the apostles to the sepulchre, 
 which led Grotius to adopt the strange interpre- 
 tation which we have just examined. Fourthly, as 
 to the appearance of the angels at the sepulchre. 
 Any one reading the account of Matthew would 
 certamly understand the angel to have appeared 
 to the women immediately on their arrival at the 
 sepulchre; and the narratives of Mark and Luke 
 would lead to the same conclusion. I have, how- 
 ever, already endeavoured to show that the visit 
 of Peter and John to the sepulchre must have 
 been before the appearance of the angels. The 
 
138 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 reason of the omission by Matthew and Mark of this 
 event I cannot pretend to give, nor can I account for 
 John’s mentioning Mary Magdalene only, and saying 
 nothing of the presence of the other women at the 
 sepulchre. Fifthly, as to the appearance of Jesus_ 
 to Mary Magdalene. This event seems. to have 
 happened before Jesus showed himself to all the 
 women together. From John’s narration we should 
 conclude that it was immediately after her answer 
 to the question of the angels, ‘‘ Woman, why weep- 
 est thou?” As it is not said that the angel gave 
 her any information, as he is said to have done to 
 the women in the accounts of the other evangelists, 
 I understand by the words, “she turned herself 
 back,” that she went away from the sepulchre, 
 leaving the other women there ; shortly after which, 
 Jesus appeared to her. Why he forbad Mary at 
 this time to touch him, and shortly afterwards per- 
 mitted the women to hold him by the feet, does 
 not appear. Sixthly, as to the interview of Jesus 
 with the women, and the account they afterwards 
 gave to the disciples. That the apostle John, who, 
 throughout the preceding part of his narrative, had 
 mentioned Mary Magdalene only, should say nothing 
 of the appearance of Jesus to the other women, is not 
 perhaps to be wondered at; but that Luke should 
 have omitted it, seems extraordinary and unaccount- 
 able. I have already given my reasons for thinking 
 that the gospel of Mark was left by the author in an 
 unfinished state, and that the last twelve verses have 
 been added by some subsequent writer. The fact is 
 distinctly mentioned by Matthew, and as he was an 
 apostle, he must have had the best means of knowing 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 139 
 
 what the account which the women gave to the dis- 
 ciples really was. Strange as it must appear, I cannot 
 help concluding that this part of the transaction was 
 unknown to Luke. The 22nd verse of the 24th 
 chapter is strongly confirmatory of this. ‘“ Yea,” says 
 one of the disciples at Emmaus, “ and certain women 
 also of our company made us astonished, which were 
 early at the sepulchre; and when they found not his 
 body, they came, saying, that they had seen a vision 
 of angels, which said that he was alive.” 
 
 The conclusions to be drawn from what has been 
 said, are, I think, that it is impossible to reconcile all 
 the accounts of the evangelists as to the details of 
 what happened on and after the visit of the women 
 to the sepulchre; but that their discrepancies are 
 such as might well have arisen in the independent 
 testimony of different witnesses to the same transac- 
 tion, and consequently do not lessen the weight of 
 their evidence to the main fact—the resurrection of 
 Jesus from the dead. 
 
 It is not, however, to the testimony of the women 
 that we are to look for the proper evidence of the 
 truth of the resurrection. They soon disappear from 
 the history ; and we know nothing of their subsequent 
 conduct. From the apostles, his chosen companions 
 in life, and the promulgators of his religion in the 
 world, we must seek for the proofs of the resurrection 
 of their Master from the dead. 
 
 The first question is, have we sufficient reason to 
 admit that the apostles really professed to believe 
 the resurrection of Jesus by constantly asserting 
 it; and by treating it as the proof and founda- 
 tion of their authority in preaching the Christian 
 
140. THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 religion? That this may have been so, no one 
 can deny. Supposing then such to have been the 
 fact, we have now to consider what evidence we could 
 reasonably expect to substantiate it. Christianity 
 must have had a beginning. That it was derived 
 from Christ, and that he died as a malefactor in the 
 reign of Tiberius, we have the express testimony of 
 Tacitus. “ Of the primitive condition of Christianity,” 
 Paley well observes, “a distant only and general view 
 can be acquired from heathen writers. It is in our 
 own books that the detail and interior of the transac- 
 tion must be sought for. All this is nothing different 
 from what might have been expected. Who would 
 write a history of Christianity but a Christian? Who 
 was likely to record the travels, sufferings, labours 
 or successes of the apostles, but one of their own 
 number, or of their followers?’ If this be held a 
 correct view of the subject, we must either admit the 
 New Testament to contain a credible account of the 
 conduct and history of the early teachers of the Chris- 
 tian religion, or we mist conclude that it is impossible 
 for us to obtain such an account; and the origin of a 
 religion which has extended over a great part of the 
 world, and which is, in some form or other, the pro- 
 fessed religion of the most intelligent and civilized 
 nations, lies hid in impenetrable darkness. I can per- 
 ceive no difficulty in preferring the former alternative. 
 I cannot see why the testimony of the professors of 
 Christianity, Mahometanism or any other religion, as 
 to common historical facts, is to be rejected, unless 
 some fraudulent or interested purpose could have been 
 answered by it. That the books of the New Testa- 
 ment are very ancient, admits of no dispute. That 
 
-THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 141 
 
 their authority, or at least that of the gospels, the 
 Acts, and the far larger number of the epistles, has 
 been admitted from very early times, must be granted. 
 I shall endeavour to show presentiy that the account 
 they give of the early history of Christianity is in 
 itself credible ; and agrees with what we know from 
 other sources of the state and condition of the Chris- 
 tians, and of the feelings of the Jews and heathens 
 towards them. hese narratives then, as to the 
 common facts, Iam bound to admit to be true; and 
 the important question for our decision is, whether 
 the common facts of the New Testament history afford 
 satisfactory proof of the resurrection of Jesus Christ 
 from the dead. This the Christian apologist is bound 
 to prove ; and he is fairly entitled to claim our serious 
 and candid attention to his arguments. I have se- 
 lected the resurrection of Christ, because, if the 
 question should be decided in the affirmative, it is 
 conclusive ; as I do not find that any who has ad- 
 mitted this fact has denied the Divine authority of 
 the Christian religion; and because, if we fail in 
 proving the resurrection of Christ, I cannot discover 
 any arguments by which the truth of the other mi- 
 racles of the gospel history can be proved. 
 
 I have already said that, to prove a miracle, it is 
 essential that the witnesses should be placed in such 
 circumstances that they could not be deceived; that 
 there must be satisfactory proof that they did not 
 intend to deceive others ; and that if there are several 
 witnesses, they should agree in the main fact to be 
 proved. As to the third condition, no difficulty can 
 arise. Not only the apostles and their followers, but 
 all Christians in every age down to the present, have 
 
142 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 agreed in believing that Jesus Christ really rose from 
 the dead. With respect to the first requisite, that 
 they could not be deceived, we will again review 
 those parts of the narratives of what passed between 
 the alleged resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ. 
 I will premise that the twelve apostles had been for 
 a considerable period the chosen companions and 
 friends of Jesus. One of them had proved a traitor, 
 and disclosed to his enemies his private retreat for 
 the purpose of enabling them to apprehend him with- 
 out any risk of exciting a tumult among the people. 
 After the death of Jesus, the eleven apostles kept 
 together; but there is nothing in the history to 
 show that, they entertained any expectation that their 
 Master had risen from the dead. On the contrary, 
 Luke distinctly says, that they did not believe the 
 women who had been at the sepulchre ; and Mark, if 
 the controverted verses at the end of his gospel should 
 be held authentic, agrees with Luke. Mary Mag- 
 dalene says to the apostles Peter and John, “ They 
 have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and 
 we know not where they have laid him.’’ And sub- 
 sequently she makes a complaint to the angels in 
 nearly the same terms. I have already endeavoured 
 to show that what John believed when he saw the 
 linen clothes lying m the sepulchre was not, as has 
 been supposed by some, the resurrection of Jesus, 
 but that his body had been removed. The disciples 
 at Emmaus say, “ We trusted that it had been he 
 which should have redeemed Israel.” This seems to 
 show that the death of Jesus had put an end to their 
 hopes; and that they did not entertain any expecta- 
 tion that he would be raised from the dead, and 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 143 
 
 restored to life. The first indication of the apostles 
 having believed in the resurrection, is found in the 
 account of what passed on the return of the disciples 
 from Emmaus to Jerusalem, when they were told that 
 the Lord had risen, and had appeared to Simon. 
 Immediately after this, however, when Jesus is repre- 
 sented to have appeared to them, they are said to have 
 been terrified, and to have supposed that they had 
 seen a spirit, and not to have been satisfied till he 
 had shown them his hands and his feet. Even then 
 the evangelist says that they believed not for joy. 
 According to John, the incredulity of the apostle 
 Thomas was carried so far as to determine him to 
 reject all evidence of the resurrection unless he could 
 examine the person of Jesus with his hand ; which he 
 was afterwards allowed to do. At an interview of 
 Jesus with his disciples in Galilee, Matthew says that 
 some of them doubted. As the eleven disciples only 
 are mentioned by the evangelist, the interpretation of 
 this passage which first presents itself is, that some of 
 them doubted ; but, as we shall see, by their sub- 
 sequent conduct, that they professed an unhesitating 
 conviction of the resurrection of Christ ; and as there 
 appears to be no other way of accounting for their 
 conduct than that they really believed it ; and as Mat- 
 thew does not say that other persons were not present, 
 it seems reasonable to suppose that those who doubted 
 were either some who had not been well acquainted 
 with his person previously ; or who were at too great 
 a distance to see him distinctly. This may well have 
 been the case, if, as St. Paul tells us (1 Cor. xv. 6), 
 he was once seen by five hundred brethren at once, 
 which maybe the very time here mentioned by the — 
 
144 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 evangelist. It seems quite incredible that St. Paul 
 should have written this text unless a large number 
 of the disciples had either seen, or professed to have 
 seen, Jesus at the same time. 
 
 The historians of the New Testament having shown 
 that the apostles had no expectation of the resurrec- 
 tion of Jesus, and that they were very slow to believe 
 it, let us consider whether their assertion of it as a_ 
 fact is credible or incredible, whether it should be 
 received or rejected. In the first place, the writers 
 of these narratives were evidently believers in the 
 Divine authority of the Christian religion, and of 
 the resurrection of Christ, which is a most important 
 proof of it. If then we suspect any bias to have 
 operated in their minds to give a particular colouring 
 to the facts which they relate, it must have been on 
 the favourable side. It might not be unreasonable 
 to suppose that they might suppress unfavourable 
 circumstances ; but that they should insert anything 
 which had not happened, and which was of such a 
 nature as to afford an argument against the truth of 
 the resurrection, is wholly incredible. Such is their 
 account of the incredulity of the apostles and of their 
 reluctance to believe, even after ocular demonstration, 
 of Jesus’ having risen. It is true that this argu- 
 ment may be satisfactorily answered by the fact, that, 
 however reluctant they were to give their assent to 
 the resurrection in the first instance, their subsequent 
 conduct clearly shows that they ultimately received it 
 with unhesitating conviction. This fact, however, 
 affords no ground at all for the supposition of the 
 evangelists having introduced a fiction into their 
 narratives for no conceivable purpose, and. calculated 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 145 
 
 to afford a plausible argument to their opponents 
 against the fact they intended to establish. 1 con- 
 clude then that the testimony of the evangelists on 
 this head is fully entitled to our credence. 
 
 The conduct of the apostles, as we shall presently 
 see, shows beyond the possibility of doubt that they 
 really believed that they had seen Jesus after his 
 resurrection ; or, at the least, that they professed to 
 have seen him; and behaved in such a manner as 
 must have disposed all who witnessed their conduct 
 to admit that they really believed what they professed. 
 There are only three ways of accounting for this: 
 either they were deceived themselves, or they endea- 
 voured to deceive others, or their testimony is true. 
 With respect to the first of these suppositions, I must 
 leave it to every candid reader to decide whether 
 under the circumstances of the case any reasonable 
 doubt can be entertained that they really believed 
 that Jesus had risen from the dead, and had, on 
 several occasions, appeared to them. In this part 
 of our subject, we must assume that the apostles acted 
 with good faith in their representations of the inter- 
 views which they alleged to have taken place between 
 them and their Master. The question of their inten- 
 tion to deceive will form the next head of our inquiry. 
 The narratives of the evangelists inform us that Jesus } 
 repeatedly appeared to the apostles; that they not 
 only saw him, but that they laid their hands upon his 
 person and felt the marks of the nails with which he 
 had been fixed to the cross, and examined the wound 
 which had been made in his side while he hung upon 
 the cross; that they conversed with him, saw him 
 eat and drink, received his command to publish his 
 
 L 
 
i 
 
 146 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 religion in the world, and saw him ascend into the 
 air, and disappear. Could then, I ask, those who had 
 lived familiarly with him for a considerable period 
 have been deceived as to his person? Supposing the 
 resurrection of a dead man from the grave to be a 
 matter capable of proof, which Hume alone, to the 
 best of my knowledge, denies, I cannot see how it 
 could be proved in a more satisfactory, or, indeed, in 
 any other manner, than by the testimony recorded in 
 the gospels and the book of Acts. But it may be said, 
 that although the evidence of their senses would 
 be conclusive of the truth of the fact to those who 
 were eye-witnesses, it cannot possibly have the same 
 force with us who live more than eighteen centuries 
 after it is said to have taken place. This opens the 
 question, whether any historical evidence can be of 
 sufficient force to command a rational assent to a 
 miracle having been worked. If the negative answer 
 be given to this question, it will follow that the 
 Deity can by no other means give evidence of a 
 miracle in proof of a revelation of his will, than by 
 its occurring before the eyes of each individual. 
 Surely, the human mind ought not to presume to lay 
 down such a proposition. In all cases our business 
 is not to prescribe beforehand what means must be 
 resorted to by the Deity to effect his purposes. We 
 must take the evidence produced in each case, and 
 decide upon its validity by the best exercise in our 
 power of our rational and moral faculties. I readily 
 concede that working a miracle is im itself no cer- 
 tain proof that the person who works it is to be 
 considered a teacher sent from God, because I can- 
 not pronounce it to be certainly impossible for any 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 147 
 
 one to do this unless he is immediately inspired and 
 authorized by God. I say, it does not seem to me 
 that we are in a condition to assert that it is ab- 
 solutely impossible for any one to work a miracle 
 without authority immediately derived from God. I 
 fully believe that this is the case; and I see no 
 evidence in any quarter in contradiction to it*. Still 
 I cannot assert that the human mind can pronounce 
 absolutely its impossibility. It may be conceived, 
 although I feel fully satisfied that such a thing never 
 has happened, and never will happen, that a miracle 
 might be worked, and that the person who worked it 
 might promulgate some doctrine which would be at 
 once rejected by our moral faculty, as that children 
 might lawfully murder their aged parents to get rid 
 of the trouble of taking care of them, and to enjoy 
 the advantage of succeeding to their property. Such 
 an atrocious doctrine would at once be rejected by 
 the general sentiment and feelings of mankind; and 
 any superhuman power exercised by him who pro- 
 mulgated it would certainly not be ascribed to the 
 Great Author of our being. But this supposition, 
 though, as it does not involve a contradiction, I do 
 not see that we can pronounce to be absolutely im- 
 possible, is not founded on any known fact; and we 
 have no reason to believe that it has ever been 
 realized. We must then conclude that a miracle can 
 only be performed by the direct agency of the Deity 
 so long as no proof can be adduced of such an event 
 having taken place under such circumstances as for- 
 bid our ascribing it to his will. It will add much 
 * See Hugh Farmer’s excellent work on ‘ Miracles’. 
 
 : ie 
 
148 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 strength to this view of the subject, if the miracle 
 shall appear to have a strong tendency to advance the 
 well-being of the human race, especially their moral 
 and spiritual improvement. We will proceed then to 
 consider whether we have sufficient reason to believe 
 that the apostles, in bearing their testimony to the 
 resurrection of Jesus Christ, had no intention to de- 
 ceive; and whether the religion which they promul- 
 gated was calculated to improve the character and 
 the condition of the human race. 
 
 A fire occurred in Rome in the year 64, by which 
 a large portion of the city was destroyed. ‘This was 
 little more than thirty, and certainly not more than 
 thirty-five years, after the crucifixion of Jesus. Tacitus 
 says that the religion of the Christians, which he calls 
 a pernicious superstition, had, at that time, not only 
 spread over Judea, but had reached Rome. ‘The 
 emperor Nero, having been accused of setting fire to 
 the city himself, in order to suppress the rumour, 
 accused the Christians of having perpetrated the fact, 
 and a dreadful persecution of them was the conse- 
 quence*. ‘Tacitus, whose mind was profound and 
 philosophical, no doubt regarded the religion pro- 
 fessed by the Roman people in no other light than as 
 a useful political institution ; and while he would have 
 laughed at any one who could suppose that he be- 
 lieved in the wild stories of the gods in the heathen 
 mythology, he probably thought it necessary that 
 some sort of religion should be supported by the 
 state, and that it was the duty of a good citizen or 
 subject to support the established religion of his 
 
 * Tacitns, Annal. xv. 44. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 149 
 
 country. Christianity is necessarily opposed to all 
 other religions; and its professors must have con- 
 demned the idolatry which surrounded them. It is 
 in the highest degree improbable that Tacitus had 
 taken any pains to examine in detail the evidences on 
 which the Christians rested the Divine authority of 
 their religion. It was enough for him that they set 
 themselves against the religion which, for political 
 reasons, he felt himself bound to support. The use 
 which I now make of his testimony is to show that the 
 Christian religion, within at most five and thirty years 
 of the death of its founder, had so far spread in the 
 world as to reach the Imperial city, and to become 
 considerable enough to engage the attention of the 
 monster who then sat on the throne, and to make its 
 professors the objects of his false accusation, and of 
 his hideous cruelty. Now this could only have been 
 effected by the most strenuous exertions of those who 
 promulgated the new religion. What those exertions 
 were, and in what manner the followers of Christ pro- 
 ceeded in establishing his religion, the New Testa- 
 ment informs us, and we have no other account of 
 those transactions. I can see no reason whatever 
 why we should dispute the common facts of the 
 New Testament history ; and the question recurs, do 
 they prove the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the 
 dead ? 
 
 I will now proceed with the history of the apostles 
 given by the evangelist Luke in the book of Acts. 
 After the alleged ascension of Jesus, the first account 
 we have is contained in the 12th, 13th and 14th 
 verses of the first chapter: ‘Then returned they unto 
 Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is from 
 
150 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Jerusalem a sabbath-day’s journey. And when they 
 were come in, they went up into an upper room, where 
 abode both Peter, and James, and John, and Andrew, 
 Philip, and Thomas, Bartholomew, and Matthew, 
 James the son of Alpheus, and Simon Zelotes, and 
 Judas the brother of James. These all continued 
 with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the 
 women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his 
 brethren.” The apostles appear to have clearly un- 
 derstood that they were to bear witness of the resur- 
 rection of Jesus, and to promulgate his religion in the 
 world. ‘Their next proceeding is of a very extraordi- 
 nary character. As their original number twelve had 
 been diminished by the treachery of Judas in deliver- 
 ing his Master into the hands of his enemies, their 
 first step was to supply his place by electing another 
 person to the apostleship, who, from his previous 
 acquaintance with Jesus, would be qualified to bear 
 testimony to his resurrection. The number of the 
 disciples who were assembled on this occasion is said 
 to have been about one hundred and twenty. Peter, 
 who had always taken the leading part among the 
 apostles m the lifetime of Jesus, and who still con- 
 tinued to do so, after referring to the treason of 
 Judas, and giving an account of his death, proceeded 
 to say that some one who had been with them from 
 the baptism of John till the ascension of Jesus, must 
 be ordained to be a witness with the apostles of 
 the resurrection. No command is found in any of 
 the gospels, or in the Acts, by Christ to the apostles, 
 to fill up the vacancy in their number occasioned by 
 the treachery of Judas, and at this time they do 
 not claim to have been illuminated by Divine in- 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 151 
 
 spiration; the election therefore of a successor to 
 Judas seems to have been suggested by nothing 
 but their own sense of what was fit and proper. The 
 mode of election adopted was by casting lots, the 
 apostles having previously selected two individuals, 
 and prayed to God to show which of the two he had 
 chosen. Now this is certainly a strange proceeding, 
 and such as could hardly have been adopted by any 
 but very simple-minded persons. Assuming the ne- 
 cessity of appointing a successor to Judas, the mode 
 of choice which would have occurred to reflecting per- 
 sons would, one should think, be either by making it 
 in accordance with their own judgment, or referring it 
 to the Almighty to give some manifestation of his will 
 as to the person to be appointed. The plan of select- 
 ing by their own choice two individuals, and then 
 referring it to God to say which he preferred, could, I 
 think, only have occurred to persons of great simpli- 
 city of character, and of minds but little tramed to 
 reflection. Some thinking persons have been led by 
 the strangeness of the proceeding to doubt the real 
 apostleship of Matthias, who was elected; and to con- 
 sider the apostle Paul to be the real successor of Judas ; 
 and it has been thought a confirmation of this opinion 
 that Matthias is nowhere mentioned again in the New 
 Testament. There is, however, little weight in these 
 objections to the apostleship of Matthias, which has 
 been acknowledged in all ages of the Church. With 
 respect to the apostle Paul, we have no reason to be- 
 lieve that he had any personal acquaintance with Jesus ; 
 and as he speaks of the appearance of Jesus to him at 
 his conversion as to one born out of time, it seems 
 clear that he did not personally know him ; and there- 
 
152 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 fore he could not have been a witness of his resurrec- 
 tion, which was one of the primary duties of the 
 apostleship. It does not appear at what time. Paul 
 became an apostle ; and it seems probable that it was 
 not till after the death of James, so that the number 
 of the apostles never exceeded twelve at one time. 
 At that period the fact of the resurrection of Christ 
 had been established to the satisfaction of a great 
 number of Christians, and the apostolical powers were 
 probably conferred on Paul for the more effectual pro- 
 mulgation of the gospel among the Gentiles, for whom 
 his energies were mainly exerted. As to Matthias 
 not bemg mentioned afterwards, the same thing may 
 be said of all the apostles except Peter, James and 
 John, the sons of Zebedee, and James the son of Al- 
 pheus. Judas, the brother of James, is understood 
 to have been the author of the short epistle bearing 
 his name. The names of none of the other apostles 
 occur after the enumeration of them in the first chapter 
 of the book of Acts. Philip, who is mentioned in that 
 book, was not the apostle, but the deacon. The story 
 of the election of Matthias seems to me to have the 
 strongest mark of authenticity. I cannot think it 
 possible that any one contriving a fictitious narrative 
 for the purpose of supporting the Christian religion, 
 could have introduced so extraordinary a circumstance. 
 
 I shall not, on the present occasion, go into the 
 transaction of the day of Pentecost ; but shall proceed 
 at once to consider the testimony afforded by the con- 
 duct of the apostles of their belief in the resurrection 
 of Jesus. The public teaching of the apostles com. 
 menced with the address of Peter to the multitude 
 who had gathered together. Let us attend to what 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 158 
 
 he says on the subject before us, Acts ii. 22-24: 
 “Ye men of Israel, hear these words; Jesus of Na- 
 zareth, a man approved of God among you by miracles 
 and wonders and signs, which God did by him in the 
 midst of you, as ye yourselves also know: him, being 
 delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknow- 
 ledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands 
 have crucified and slain: whom God hath raised up, 
 having loosed the pains of death; because it was not 
 possible that he should be holden of it.”” Here we 
 have an open profession by one who could not have 
 been deceived of his belief in the resurrection of Jesus 
 Christ, and we shall find throughout the history of 
 the apostles, contained in the book of Acts, that such 
 was their unanimous testimony, The question then 
 will be, have we sufficient reason to believe that they 
 were led by ambition, interest, or some other personal 
 object, to assert what they knew to be false? If it 
 shall turn out that their conduct entirely negatives 
 such a supposition, nothing remains but to acknow- 
 ledge the truth of their testimony, and consequently 
 to admit the Divine authority of the Christian religion. 
 In this inquiry particular attention will be paid to the 
 conduct of the apostle Peter, who took the leading 
 part in the first promulgation of the Christian faith. 
 ‘The next transaction recorded in the 3rd chapter 
 of the book of Acts is the healing of a lame man by 
 Peter and John. On this occasion Peter addresses 
 the people around him in the following words: “ Ye 
 men of Israel, why marvel ye at this? or why look ye 
 so earnestly on us, as if by our own power or holiness 
 we had made this man to walk? The God of Abra- 
 ham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, 
 
154 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 hath glorified his son Jesus; whom ye delivered up, 
 and denied him in the presence of Pilate, when he 
 was determined to let him go. But ye denied the 
 Holy One and the Just, and desired a murderer to 
 be granted unto you; and killed the Prince of life, 
 whom God hath raised from the dead; whereof 
 we are witnesses.” The 4th chapter begins thus: 
 ‘And as they spake unto the people, the priests, and 
 the captain of the temple, and the Sadducees, came 
 upon them, being grieved that they taught the people, 
 and preached through Jesus the resurrection from the 
 dead. And they laid hands on them, and put them 
 in hold unto the next day ; for it was now eventide.” 
 The next day they are brought before the High Priest 
 and other authorities, and, being interrogated as to 
 the healing of the lame man, Peter, in part of his’ 
 answer, says: “ Be it known unto you all, and to all 
 the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ 
 of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised 
 from the dead, even by him doth this man stand here 
 before you whole,”’ Here and in all other places the 
 apostles represent themselves as acting by the au- 
 thority of Jesus Christ. After this the apostles were 
 sent aside, and the rulers, having conferred among 
 themselves, commanded them not to speak at all nor 
 teach in the name of Jesus. “ But Peter and John 
 answered and said unto them, Whether it be right in 
 the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto 
 God, judge ye: for we cannot but speak the things 
 which we have seen and heard. So when they had 
 further threatened them” (the narrative continues), 
 “they let them go, finding nothing how they might 
 punish them, because of the people: for all men 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 155 
 
 glorified God for that which was done.” In the 5th 
 chapter we find the apostles seized and put in prison. 
 ‘They are described as having been delivered by an 
 angel, and going and teaching the people in the 
 temple; when they are again brought before the 
 council, vv. 27-32: “And when they had brought 
 them, they set them before the council: and the High 
 Priest asked them, saying, Did not we straitly com- 
 mand you that ye should not teach in this name? 
 And behold ye have filled Jerusalem with your doc- 
 trine, and intend to bring this man’s blood upon us. 
 ‘Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, 
 We ought to obey God rather than men. The God of 
 our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged 
 on a tree. Him hath God exalted with his right 
 hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give 
 repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins. And 
 we are his witnesses. of these things; and so is also 
 the Holy Ghost, whom God hath given to them that 
 obey him.” By the wise advice of Gamaliel, the 
 council are induced to adopt a milder course than 
 they would have otherwise pursued. “And when 
 they had called the apostles, and beaten them, they 
 commanded that they should not speak in the name 
 of Jesus, and let them go. And they departed from 
 the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were 
 counted worthy to suffer shame for his name. And 
 daily in the temple, and in every house, they ceased 
 not to teach and preach Jesus Christ.” 
 
 Having traced thus far the proceedings of the apo- 
 _ stles, and seeing that by preaching the gospel they 
 exposed themselves to stripes and imprisonment ; and 
 had great reason to expect still more severe treatment, 
 
156 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 from which they were only kept by the sober advice 
 of a discreet and moderate man; I now ask, why did 
 the apostles pursue this course? If we believe them, 
 it was because their Lord and Master Jesus Christ 
 had risen from the dead; had instructed them to pro- 
 mulgate his religion ; and had promised them super- 
 natural aid; and that they had been the recipients of 
 powers from on high, in the gift of tongues and other 
 spiritual endowments. If we reject their testimony, 
 we must believe that twelve men agreed together to 
 impose on the world by a tale of falsehood, and on that 
 tale to found a new religion of a pure and holy cha- 
 racter, such as the world had never known before, and 
 the immeasurable superiority of which to all others is 
 at the present day recognized in all the most civilized 
 parts of the world. They must at the same time have 
 been endeavouring to impose on the world a gross 
 falsehood, and to inculcate lessons of the most exalted 
 piety, the most expansive benevolence, of truth, justice, 
 temperance, fortitude, and every virtue which adorns 
 human nature. They must have persisted in the as- 
 sertion of this falsehood, and in their plan of establish- 
 ing a new religion, not only with no aid from without, 
 but in direct opposition to the religious feelings of their 
 own country, and to the professed religion of that 
 mighty empire which had extended its dominion over 
 all those nations of the earth which had reached the 
 highest state of civilization. To the Jews they 
 preached, that he who had been rejected by them, 
 condemned by their rulers, and on their accusation, 
 consigned by the Roman governor to a shameful and 
 most painful death, was in truth no other than the 
 Messiah, whose advent had been foretold by their 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 167 
 
 prophets. Unawed by the power of imperial Rome, 
 they boldly denounced the idolatrous and polytheistic 
 religion of the empire; taught that an idol is nothing 
 in the world; and that the universe was formed and 
 is sustained by one God, in whom we live, and move, 
 and have our being. ‘To believe that fraud and false- 
 hood could have been thus combined with an attempt 
 to set up a new religion so exalted, so pure, so 
 admirable, that nothing that is truly excellent has 
 been added to it in the long succession of ages which 
 has passed away since its first. establishment in the 
 world, is to me impossible ; and I cannot see that any 
 one can adopt this opinion who has not previously 
 made up his mind to reject all evidence which can 
 possibly be produced to prove a Divine revelation. 
 I have therefore no hesitation i declarmg my firm 
 conviction that the Christian religion is what it pro- 
 fesses to be—a revelation from God; and I shall be 
 relieved from the restraint which the nature of the in- 
 quiry we have been engaged in has hitherto imposed 
 upon me of treating as doubtful, facts of the truth of 
 which I entertain no doubt; and shall from henceforth, 
 whenever I have occasion to mention Jesus Christ, 
 unhesitatingly recognize him as what he always pro- 
 fessed himself to be, the Son of God, the Mediator 
 between God and man, the Saviour of the world. 
 
 It will be proper here to notice a plausible ob- 
 jection to the view which I have just taken of the 
 subject in hand. It may be said, that all which I 
 have stated goes only to prove the sincerity of the 
 first preachers of Christianity, and that sincerity in 
 religious profession is so far from being a proof of 
 the truth of the professed creed, that it may be found 
 
158 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 in the followers of every religion in the world, among 
 Jews and Mahometans, Brahmins and Buddhists, 
 and the followers of every known form of idolatrous 
 worship; and that all these hold to their opinions 
 with as much tenacity as any Christian professor ; 
 and that numbers are to be found among them who 
 are ready to sacrifice their worldly interests, and to 
 endure persecution for conscience sake. This is un- 
 doubtedly true; and it must be conceded, that sin- 
 cerity in the belief of any particular religion affords 
 no proof of its truth. It is not, however, sincerity 
 in the profession of a mere belief or opinion that we 
 are concerned with at present. Our business is to 
 ascertain the evidence of a fact. The apostles, like 
 other men, were no doubt liable to fall into error 
 in matters of opinion, and in matters of faith, unless 
 they were enlightened by Divine wisdom; but in the 
 fact of having scen the Saviour after his resurrection 
 they could not possibly be deceived; and I have 
 endeavoured to show that there is no rational ground 
 to think that they intended to deceive others. Un- 
 less, therefore, we are prepared to give up all reliance 
 on human testimony, I do not perceive how we can 
 refuse our assent to that of the apostles in proof of 
 the resurrection of Jesus Christ. 
 
 I shall now proceed to produce other parts of the 
 New Testament, to show that the apostles were not 
 actuated by interest or ambition. That they could 
 not have looked for riches or worldly honours or 
 rank, is apparent from the whole of their history. If 
 they were urged on by ambition, it must have been 
 as leaders of the new religion ; and the proof of this 
 would be their arrogating to themselves powers and 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 159 
 
 privileges beyond what was required for the purposes 
 of their mission. If the early history of Christianity 
 contained in the New Testament be true, it follows 
 that great authority must have been yielded by the 
 early Christians to the apostles who had been the 
 constant companions of our Saviour; had therefore 
 enjoyed the best means of becoming fully acquainted 
 with his doctrines; and were the chosen witnesses of 
 his resurrection from the dead. ‘To a considerable 
 extent, therefore, they must have exercised power in 
 the infant Church. We will now inquire whether 
 they endeavoured to strain it beyond its just limits. 
 My observations on this head will be confined to 
 those who were apostles at the commencement of 
 their public teaching. The very remarkable history 
 and character of St. Paul will be the subject of future 
 consideration. 
 
 In the 6th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles we 
 are informed that complaints had arisen among the 
 Grecian converts against the Hebrews, that the 
 widows of the former had been neglected in the daily 
 administration of charity which took place among the 
 Christians. ‘The apostles desired to find a remedy for 
 this evil; and, that their time might be given to 
 prayer and to the ministry of the Word, they deemed 
 it expedient to appoimt seven men to attend to this 
 business. The appoimtment or election of these 
 deacons, as they are usually called, was an act of 
 power to be exercised by some one. Did the apostles 
 then arrogate this appointment to themselves? In- 
 stead of doing so, they left the selection of the indivi- 
 duals to the general body of believers ; afterwards 
 confirming the choice of the brethren by prayer, and 
 
160 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 laying hands on those who had been selected for the 
 office of deacon. 
 
 In the 15th chapter of the same book we have an 
 account of a dispute which had arisen at Antioch. 
 Before this time Paul and Barnabas had preached the 
 gospel in many different places ; and had been very 
 successful in converting Gentiles to Christianity. 
 Some Jews had come down to Antioch; and had 
 taught that it was necessary that the Gentile converts 
 should be circumcised after the manner of Moses. 
 This doctrine having been resisted by Paul and Bar- 
 nabas, they, with some others, were sent to Jerusalem 
 to consult the apostles and elders about this question. 
 Now, what is the conduct of the-apostles ?. Consider- 
 ing their station in the Church, it might be reasonably 
 expected that they would at once, and of their own 
 authority, decide the question. This, however, was 
 not the case. After some discussion, in which the 
 apostles Peter and James take the leading part, they 
 came to a conclusion as follows, vv. 22—29: “Then 
 pleased it the apostles and elders, with the whole 
 church, to send chosen men of their own company to 
 Antioch with Paul and Barnabas ; namely, Judas sur- 
 named Barsabas ; and Silas, chief men among the 
 brethren; and they wrote letters by them after this 
 manner: ‘The apostles,and elders and brethren send 
 greeting unto the brethren which are of the Gentiles 
 in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia: forasmuch as we 
 have heard, that certain which went out from us have 
 troubled you with words, subverting your souls, 
 saying, Ye must be circumcised, and keep the law, 
 to whom we gave no such commandment; it seemed 
 good unto us, being assembled with one accord, to 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 161 
 
 send chosen men unto you with our beloved Barnabas 
 and Paul, men that have hazarded their lives for the 
 name of our Lord Jesus Christ. We have sent there- 
 fore Judas and Silas, who shall also tell you the same 
 things by mouth. For it seemed good to the Holy 
 Ghost, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden 
 than these necessary things; That ye abstain from 
 meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from 
 things strangled, and from fornication: from which if 
 ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well. Fare ye well.”’ 
 This is a remarkable document ; and it well deserves 
 our serious attention. It clearly appears from it that 
 the apostles did not arrogate to themselves exclusive 
 authority im the Christian church. The sending of 
 Judas and Silas to Antioch is the act, not of them 
 only, but of the apostles, elders, and the whole Church : 
 and the letter sent is from the apostles, elders, and 
 brethren. We have among us in this country some 
 who profess to be successors of the apostles. Would 
 they be content with the degree of authority which 
 was exercised by these founders of the Christian 
 Church ? | 
 
 I shall here introduce some observations tending to 
 show that the apostles, and especially Peter, were not 
 influenced by motives of ambition. Peter, who was 
 evidently a man of a sanguine and ardent character, 
 uniformly takes the leading part among the apostles 
 in the whole course of our Lord’s personal ministry, 
 and in the earlier transactions which followed his 
 ascension. We shall find that a change takes place 
 afterwards, and that James the son of Alpheus appa- 
 rently occupies the highest post at Jerusalem. He is 
 often indeed called the bishop of Jerusalem ; but the 
 
 M 
 
162 THE: CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 ideas affixed in modern times to that designation have 
 but little application, as I shall show hereafter, to the 
 original condition ofthe primitive Church. TI shall 
 first endeavour to prove that the presidency among 
 the apostles was actually exercised by James ; and we 
 will then try to find a reason for his appointment. 
 Lardner writes thus respecting the transaction which 
 we have just been considering: ‘When the con- 
 troversy about the manner of receiving the Gentiles 
 was brought before ‘ the apostles and elders,’ assem- 
 bled in council at Jerusalem ; ‘ after there had been 
 much disputing,’ Peter spake, and then Barnabas and 
 Paul. After all which James speaks last, sums up 
 the argument, and proposeth the terms on which the 
 Gentiles should be received. To which the whole 
 assembly agreed. And they sent letters to the Gen- 
 tiles in several places accordingly. It is manifest, I 
 think, that James presided in this council.” In the 
 21st chapter of Acts we have an account of a visit of 
 St. Paul and his companions to Jerusalem ; vv. 17-19 
 run thus: “ And when we were come to Jerusalem, 
 the brethren received us gladly. And the day follow- 
 ing Paul went in with us unto James; and all the 
 elders were present. And when he had saluted them, 
 he declared particularly what things God had wrought 
 among the Gentiles by his ministry.” It is very 
 difficult to assign any reason for James being par- 
 ticularly mentioned here, except that he exercised 
 some sort of authority and pre-eminence in the 
 Church. James, however, appears to have acted as 
 the president of the assembly only, and the advice of 
 the persons assembled to Paul is represented to have 
 been given by the whole assembly. It was long after 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 163 
 
 this that Christian teachers assumed to themselves 
 authority to decide on matters affecting religion, to 
 the exclusion of the laity. In the 9th verse of the 
 2nd chapter of the epistle to the Galatians, St. Paul 
 mentions James, Cephas, and John as pillars, and 
 says that they gave the right hands of fellowship to 
 him and Barnabas. Eusebius strangely supposes that 
 the Cephas here mentioned is not Peter, but some 
 other person having the same name. Nothing can 
 apparently be more improbable than this supposition. 
 In the ministry of our Saviour on earth, Peter, and 
 James and John, the sons of Zebedee, had been, on 
 many important occasions, distinguished by him ; 
 and we have seen that Peter was the leading cha- 
 racter among the apostles in the transactions which 
 shortly followed the resurrection. It does not appear 
 at what time this visit of Paul and Barnabas to Jeru- 
 salem took place. Paley thinks it probable that they 
 had gone to that city on an occasion which is not 
 mentioned in the Acts. Whether this were so, or 
 this is the identical visit mentioned in the 15th chapter 
 of Acts, is of no material consequence. If it be re- 
 ferred to this time, the apostle James, the son of 
 Zebedee, had been previously killed by Herod ; and 
 whenever the visit happened, there is nothing impro- 
 bable in supposing it to have been after his death. 
 That apostle then, having been removed, whom should 
 we expect to find the most distinguished among that 
 body, and as such aptly described as pillars of the 
 Church, but the two who remained alive of the three 
 who had been particularly honoured by the favour of 
 their Master, and James, who is on two occasions 
 shown.in the book of Acts to have taken a prominent 
 M 2 
 
164 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 part in the proceedings of the Christian assembly ? 
 That in mentioning the leading characters among the 
 disciples, St. Paul should have omitted the name of 
 Peter, and inserted that of another Cephas, who is 
 mentioned in no other part of the New Testament, is 
 so improbable as to amount almost to a moral im- 
 possibility. I can therefore entertain no doubt that 
 the Cephas mentioned by St. Paul is no other than 
 the apostle Peter; and as James is placed first, 
 that circumstance strongly corroborates the evidence 
 drawn from the Acts, that he exercised the presiding 
 authority at Jerusalem. 
 
 I will now endeavour to discover why Peter was 
 thus, as it were, deposed from his pre-eminence 
 among the apostles, and James advanced to preside 
 in their council in his stead; and I think a very 
 satisfactory reason may easily be found. Lardner 
 quotes the following passage from Eusebius :—* Cle- 
 ment, in his sixth book of his Institutions, writes after 
 this manner: that after the Lord’s ascension, Peter, 
 and James, and John, though they had been favoured 
 by the Lord above the rest, did not contend for 
 honour, but chose James the Just to be bishop of 
 Jerusalem.’’ Considering the peculiar favour shown 
 by our Saviour to Peter, James, and John, it is im- 
 possible that they should not, after his ascension, 
 have been held in higher estimation than the other 
 apostles. ‘I'o Peter the first place would be assigned, 
 as he had been accustomed uniformly to take the 
 lead, and he had been particularly charged by Christ, 
 after his resurrection, to feed his sheep and his lambs ; 
 in other words, to instruct his disciples in religion. 
 Peter was a man of great activity and energy of cha- 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 165 
 
 racter. Such persons are the natural leaders of the 
 rest of the world ; and it can hardly be called am- 
 bition that they desire to be so. All men, even the 
 best, are pleased by being distinguished above others ; 
 and it is scarcely possible to suppose that Peter did 
 not wish. to retain the influence, and exercise the 
 authority to which he had been accustomed. With 
 respect to James and John, they had shown that they 
 desired power and distinction by the request made 
 by them to Jesus that they might sit on his right 
 hand and his left in his kingdom. How then are 
 we to account for these three distinguished apostles 
 yielding precedence to one who does not appear to 
 have ever been particularly distinguished by their 
 Master? I see but one solution; which, however, is 
 quite satisfactory. If the great object of the apostles 
 was to establish Christianity, and if their desire to do 
 SO was so strong as to overcome all personal regards 
 to their own interest or ambition, a satisfactory solu- 
 tion of the difficulty is afforded. 'The world is always 
 ready to suggest some selfish motives for the actions 
 ‘of all who endeavour to promote reformation of what- 
 ever kind. Peter, James, and John had been greatly 
 distinguished by Jesus Christ; and if the Christian 
 community had ranged itself under the banner of 
 either of them, it might have led to a plausible charge 
 of these apostles imposing upon the world a system of 
 religious faith and practice for the purpose of esta- 
 blishing their own authority. That the election of 
 James to the presidency was made for this reason 
 seems to me highly probable ; and there is no diffi- 
 culty in supposing that it was a recommendation of 
 him that was the cousin of our Lord, 
 
166 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Peter, in common with the other apostles, had been 
 charged by Jesus not to assume arrogant titles or 
 undue authority: “ Be ye not called Rabbi; for one 
 is your Master, even Christ ; and all ye are brethren. 
 And call no man your father upon the earth ; for one 
 is your Father, which is in heaven. Neither be ye 
 called masters; for one is your Master, even Christ. 
 But he that is greatest among you shall be your 
 servant. And whoseover exalteth himself shall be 
 abased ; and he that shall humble himself shall be 
 exalted.*’’ That the apostle Peter obeyed the com- 
 mand of his Master appears from the following texts : 
 “Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking 
 the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly ; 
 not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind; neither as 
 being lords over God’s heritage, but being ensamples 
 to the flock.+”’ Those who are conversant with eccle- 
 siastical history will be apt to imagine that these 
 passages of the New Testament have accidentally 
 dropped out of the copies of all hierarchies, episcopal, 
 presbyterian, &c. A large portion of the Christian 
 laity seem now to be awakening from a long slumber ; 
 and to be disposed to assert their charter of religious 
 liberty in opposition to those who claim to be the 
 sole depositaries of Divine truth. May success attend 
 them ; and may all who profess earnestly and truly 
 to be disciples of Jesus Christ rejoice in the liberty 
 he has given them. May the New Testament be con- 
 sidered the supreme authority in matters of religion ; 
 and may every one, according to his opportunities, 
 “read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest” it. But to 
 do so effectually, the spirit of humility must combine 
 
 * Matt. xxur.'9- + 1 Peter, v. 2, 3. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 167 
 
 with the spirit of hberty, and both must be sanctified 
 by the spirit of prayer. We must study the Sacred 
 Volume with a full sense of the infirmity of our 
 minds, and our consequent liability to error; and 
 must be ready to avail ourselves of every practicable 
 assistance from the labours of those who have travelled 
 in the same path, and for the same purpose. Let 
 us look with respect to those who have come with 
 honest minds to the study of the Scriptures ; and 
 receive them not as the lords, but as the helpers of 
 our faith. I hope, and am persuaded, that the 
 number of those who study the New Testament for 
 themselves is steadily increasing ; and that the time 
 is arriving when the far greater part of the contro- 
 versies which have disturbed the Christian Church 
 will be consigned to oblivion. That which is neces- 
 sary to guide us in the way of salvation may assuredly 
 be found in the instructions of our Saviour and his 
 disciples contained in the New Testament ; and though 
 we may meet with much in the Sacred Volume which 
 we are unable to explain, we shall everywhere find 
 the love of God and of man, and every virtue which 
 can adorn human nature, earnestly and authorita- 
 tively inculcated. Let us then adhere closely to the 
 Sacred Record, studying for ourselves ; undeterred by 
 the cries of heresy, schism, and the like, which will 
 be sure to be raised against us if we should arrive at 
 conclusions at variance with the opinions of those who 
 enjoy the world’s favour, and to whom the profession 
 of godliness has proved great gain. 
 
 [I will now proceed with the history of the apostles 
 and other early teachers of Christianity which is con- 
 tained in the book of Acts. We have seen already 
 
168 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 that certain individuals had been appointed to re- 
 gulate the charitable distributions of the Christian 
 assembly. We are told that Stephen, one of these 
 persons, full of faith and power, did great wonders 
 and miracles among the people.* A fierce opposition 
 arose against him; a false accusation was laid to his 
 charge ; and after a defence of considerable length, 
 but which he was not permitted to finish, he was 
 stoned to death. A young man named Saul, who was 
 destined to assume afterwards a most distinguished 
 character in the early history of the Christian Church, 
 is said to have been present, and to have been con- 
 
 senting to Stephen’s death. “ As for Saul,” the nar- 
 
 rative proceeds, “ he made havock of the church, 
 entermg into every house, and haling men and women 
 committed them to prison.t” Now as this man Saul 
 was no other than the apostle Paul, who afterwards 
 
 became a most distinguished preacher of the gospel ; 
 
 and whose labours in converting the Gentiles to 
 Christianity so greatly exceeded those of the other 
 apostles as to occasion him to be designated as the 
 apostle of the Gentiles; and as Luke, to whom the 
 authorship of the book of Acts is attributed by the 
 concurrent testimony of all Christian antiquity, was 
 the friend and companion of Paul, there can be no 
 reasonable suspicion that this account of the per- 
 secution of the Christians is untrue; for certainly 
 no friend of the apostle would feign a story so little 
 to his honour; and we have therefore evidence as 
 satisfactory of the reality of this transaction as 
 we can have of any fact which took place centuries 
 ago, 
 
 * Acts vi. 8. + Acts viii. 3. 
 
 —— 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 169 
 
 The remainder of the 8th chapter does not contain 
 anything which has a direct bearing on the subject 
 which I am now going to investigate, that is, what 
 were the instructions given by the apostles and early 
 teachers in the Christian Church ; and in what manner 
 its affairs were ordered and directed. I shall tran- 
 scribe the early part of the 9th chapter, which con- 
 tains a short account of a very memorable transaction 
 to which I shall have frequent occasions to refer here- 
 after. ‘And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings 
 and slaughters against the disciples of the Lord, went 
 unto the High Priest, and desired of him letters to 
 Damascus to the synagogues, that if he found any of 
 this way, whether they were men or women, he 
 might bring them bound unto Jerusalem... And as he 
 journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly 
 there shined round about him a light from heaven: 
 and he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying 
 unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? And 
 he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I 
 am Jesus whom thou persecutest : it is hard for thee 
 to kick against the pricks. And he, trembling and 
 astonished, said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to 
 do? And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go 
 into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must 
 do. And the men which journeyed with him stood 
 speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man. And 
 Saul arose from the earth; and when his eyes were 
 opened, he saw no man: but they led him by the 
 hand, and brought him into Damascus. And he was 
 three days without sight, and neither did eat nor 
 drink.” The account goes on to show how his sight 
 was restored, and that he was baptized; and adds: 
 
170 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 “And straightway he preached Christ in the syna- 
 gogues, that he is the Son of God. But all that heard 
 were amazed, and said: Is not this he that destroyed 
 them which called on this name in J erusalem, and 
 came hither for that intent, that he might bring them 
 bound unto the chief priests?” Such is the account 
 given by Luke of the conversion of St. Paul; and we 
 shall find in the progress of our inquiries that his 
 own account of it on several occasions is consistent 
 with it. I can conceive of no one, who has not re- 
 solutely predetermined to resist all rational evidence, 
 doubting that St. Paul fully believed that he had 
 actually seen Jesus Christ, and had been instructed 
 by him to preach the gospel; and that in consequence 
 of that conviction he devoted himself to the propa- 
 gation of the Christian religion; and, in pursuance of 
 that object exposed himself (as we shall presently see) 
 to a life of severe privation, great danger, and actual 
 persecution. He was a man of great natural abilities, 
 which had been improved by a learned education. 
 It does not appear that he had had any previous 
 knowledge of Jesus; but he was several times in 
 communication with the other apostles ; and was well 
 able to judge of the weight due to their testimony 
 when they asserted that they had seen and conversed 
 with Jesus Christ after his resurrection. If Chris. 
 tianity had been indeed a cunningly devised fable, no 
 man could have been placed in a more favourable 
 situation to discover its falsehood than St. Paul, and 
 his early opinions and his strong feelings against 
 the religion of Christ could not have failed to dispose 
 him to exert his best faculties for that purpose. Sin- 
 cerity marked his character alike as Saul the per- 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. Lai 
 
 secutor, and as Paul the apostle, and the most able 
 and ardent defender and promulgator of the Christian 
 religion. At all times he obeyed the dictates of his 
 conscience ; though in the end he was led deeply to 
 repent the errors of opinion, and the persecuting spirit 
 to which an ill-informed and mistaking conscience 
 had led him. 
 
 The Jews were greatly offended by the conversion 
 of Saul, and by his becoming a preacher of the Chris- 
 tian religion; and “they took counsel to kill him.” 
 He escaped however and went to the apostles at Jeru- 
 salem, and taught there; but his life having been 
 in peril in that city, he went to Caesarea, and after- 
 wards to his native place, ‘Tarsus. 
 
 I find nothing requiring further notice till the 10th 
 chapter, which contains an account of the first preach- 
 ing of the gospel to the Gentiles by Peter, who had 
 been directed by a vision to go to the house of Cor- 
 nelius, a Roman centurion, for that purpose. Peter 
 makes the following remarks, vv. 28, 29: ‘“ Ye know 
 how that it is an unlawful thing for a man that is a 
 Jew to keep company, or come unto one of another 
 nation; but God hath shewed me that I should not 
 call any man common or unclean. Therefore came I 
 unto you without gainsaying, as soon as | was sent 
 for: I ask therefore for what intent ye have sent for 
 me?” Cornelius having informed Peter why he had 
 sent for him, Peter goes on to say, vv. 834-43: “Of a 
 truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons : 
 but in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh 
 righteousness, is accepted with him. The word which 
 God sent unto the children of Israel, preaching peace 
 by Jesus Christ: (he is Lord of all:) That word, I 
 
172 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 say, ye know, which was published throughout all 
 Judea, and began from Galilee, after the baptism 
 which John preached; how God anointed Jesus of 
 Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who 
 went about doing good, and healing all that were 
 oppressed of the devil; for God was with him. And 
 we are witnesses of all things which he did both in 
 the land of the Jews, and in Jerusalem; whom they 
 slew and hanged on a tree: him God raised up the third 
 day, and shewed him openly; not to all the people, 
 but unto witnesses chosen before of God, even to us, 
 who did eat and drink with him after he rose from 
 the dead. And he commanded us to preach unto the 
 people, and to testify that it is he which was ordained 
 of God to be the Judge of quick and-dead. To him 
 give all the prophets witness, that through his name 
 whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of 
 sins.” | 
 
 I have to offer the following remarks on this ad- 
 dress of the apostle Peter. In the first place we have 
 distinctly his authority that in every nation he that 
 feareth God, and worketh righteousness is accepted 
 of him, in direct opposition to an opinion very exten- 
 sively held among Christians, that the favour of the 
 Almighty in the world to come will be confined to 
 those only who are believers in the Christian religion. 
 Cornelius was a Roman, and certainly was not a 
 Christian at the commencement of the transactions to 
 which we have been. directing our attention. He is, 
 however, described as a devout man, one that feared 
 God with all his house, and gave much alms to the 
 poor, and prayed to God alway. He was a truly 
 pious and good man, and, although unacquainted 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 173 
 
 with Divine revelation, was fully prepared by his 
 honest character to receive it when presented with 
 such assurance of its truth as the case required. An 
 angel is said to have appeared to him, and to have 
 declared that his prayers and his alms had come up 
 for a memorial before God. Peter is then divinely 
 instructed to go to Cornelius, and the discourse 
 quoted above ensues. In no part of the New. Testa- 
 ment do I find anything inconsistent with the decla- 
 ration of Peter which has been just mentioned*. We 
 also find Peter saying in this discourse, what indeed 
 is the uniform doctrine of the New Testament, that 
 the power exercised by Christ on earth was derived 
 from God, “for God was with him;” that it was 
 God who raised him from the dead; that the apostles 
 were appointed to be the witnesses of his resurrection ; 
 that they were commanded to preach to the people 
 that Jesus was ordained of God to be the Judge of 
 quick and dead; and that the prophets had testified 
 that through his name whoever believed in him should 
 receive remission of sins. Such was the doctrine first 
 preached. to the Gentiles by the most eminent of the 
 apostles ; and although the peculiar office of apostle 
 to the Gentiles was afterwards delivered to the hands 
 of another, we shall find the same doctrine uniformly 
 taught by that highly gifted and most distinguished 
 person. 
 
 And now as to Peter himself: he was a Jew, and 
 there is no reason to think that he was less influenced 
 by the peculiar feelings and prejudices of the Jews 
 than his fellow countrymen in general. He informs 
 us that, previously to his vision, he had held it unlaw- 
 
 * See some observations on Mark xvi. 16, ante pp. 79, 80. 
 
174 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 ful for a Jew to keep company with one of another 
 nation, Indeed, so strongly was he imbued with the 
 exclusive spirit of his nation, as to be influenced by it 
 to a certain extent on a subsequent occasion. St. Paul 
 tells us, “when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood 
 him to the face, because he was to be blamed. For, 
 before that certain came from James, he did eat 
 with the Gentiles; but when they were come, he 
 withdrew, and separated himself, fearmg them which 
 were of the circumcision. And the other Jews dis- 
 sembled likewise with him; insomuch that Barnabas 
 also was carried away with their dissimulation. But 
 “when I saw that they walked not uprightly according 
 to the truth of the Gospel, I said unto Peter before 
 them all, If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner 
 of the Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why com- 
 pellest thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews?”’* 
 With so much of the exclusive feeling of the Jews, 
 and of their aversion to mix with other nations, what 
 could have induced Peter to visit and convert Corne- 
 lius but a firm belief that he was directed to do so 
 by a Divine vision? There seems no possible reason 
 to doubt the sincerity of this belief, when it thus con- 
 strained him to act against his former feelings and 
 convictions. His subsequent relapse at Antioch 1s 
 quite in keeping with what we know of his character. 
 He was evidently of a sanguine temperament; he 
 was always ready to take a forward part, but was by 
 no means remarkable for tenacity of purpose. ‘The 
 first to engage in an enterprise, his heart often failed 
 him in pursuing it: witness his attempt to walk on 
 the sea, and his denial and desertion of his Master. 
 * Gal. ii. 11-14. 
 
‘THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 175 
 
 One thing is abundantly clear; that no friend of 
 Christianity could possibly have forged the account 
 of Peter’s conduct at Antioch. Nothing could be 
 more unseemly than an open dispute between the 
 leading apostle of the Jews, and him who was taking 
 the like part among the Gentiles. I shall endeavour 
 to show hereafter that we have satisfactory proof that 
 the epistles usually ascribed to St. Paul were actually 
 written by him. Assuming for the present that he 
 was the author of that to the Galatians, it is im- 
 possible to imagine that his dispute with Peter is a 
 mere fiction, unless we were to suppose him actually 
 insane ; but when we come to examine his epistles, 
 we shall find, notwithstanding the difficulty and 
 obscurity of some of them, the clearest indications of 
 a sound and vigorous understanding. 
 
 Nothing which tends particularly to throw light on 
 the teaching of the apostles and other instructors of 
 the infant Christian Church occurs till we come to the 
 mission of Paul and Barnabas. The following texts 
 are taken from an address of St. Paul delivered at 
 Antioch in Pisidia. Speaking of Jesus, he says: “Be 
 it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that 
 through this man is preached unto you the forgive- 
 ness of sins: and by him all that believe are justified 
 from all things from which ye could not be justified 
 by the law of Moses.” * What this justification is we 
 shall have to consider when the epistles of St. Paul 
 are brought before us. In the next chapter we find 
 a text which throws some light on the constitution of 
 the early Christian church: “And when they had 
 ordained them elders in every church, and had prayed 
 
 * Acts xiii. 38, 39. 
 
176 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 with fasting, they commended them to God on whom 
 they believed.”* Passing over the proceedings at 
 Jerusalem respecting the Gentile Christians, which 
 I have already fully gone into, I have to notice 
 a remarkable incident, which is derogatory to the 
 parties concerned ; and on that very account, must 
 be held by all candid inquirers to have a strong in- 
 ternal mark of authenticity. This is no other than a 
 violent dispute between Paul and Barnabas, who had 
 been hitherto associated together in the preaching of 
 the gospel; and which terminated in their separation : 
 “The contention was so sharp between them that they 
 _ departed asunder one from the other.” + That Luke, 
 the companion and friend of Paul, should have made 
 this statement if the fact had not actually occurred, 
 is so incredible that no one can possibly believe it. 
 Here then is another mark of the authenticity of the 
 book of Acts. 
 
 We have after this an account of Paul and Silas 
 having been beaten and imprisoned; and of the 
 keeper of the prison having been alarmed by an 
 earthquake, by which the prison doors had been 
 opened, and his attempting to kill himself, supposing 
 that the prisoners had fled. ‘“ But Paul cried with a 
 loud voice, saying, Do thyself no harm ; for we are all 
 here. Then he called for a light, and sprang in, and 
 came trembling, and fell down before Paul and Silas, 
 and brought them out, and said, Sirs, what must | 
 do to be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord 
 Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. 
 And they spoke unto him the word of the Lord, and 
 to all that were in his house. And he took them the 
 
 * Acts xiv. 23. + Acts xv. 39. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. LT 
 
 same hour of the night, and washed their stripes ; 
 and was baptized, he and all his house, straightway *.”’ 
 Salvation is here promised, if they believe in Jesus 
 Christ ; but the attentive reader will observe that the 
 historian adds, that they (Paul and Silas) spoke unto 
 them the word of the Lord. What could this word 
 be but the commandments of our Lord to his disciples 
 to the practice of piety and virtue as essential for pro- 
 curing the favour of God? Neither here nor elsewhere 
 does the great apostle of the Gentiles (as I hope to 
 show hereafter) teach that a mere belief in Christ, 
 unaccompanied by obedience to his commands, will 
 find acceptance with God. If he had taught such a 
 doctrine, it would have been in direct opposition to 
 that of his Master ; and would yield a conclusive proof 
 that he was no real apostle. I have, however, the firmest 
 conviction that there is no inconsistency between the 
 teaching of Jesus Christ and that of his apostle Paul. 
 
 After this we have honourable mention of the 
 Bereans: “These were more noble than those in 
 Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all 
 readiness of mind, and searched the Scriptures daily, 
 whether those things were sot.” The Scriptures here 
 mentioned must have been the Old ‘Testament, as the 
 New was not then in existence. If the number of 
 those who now search the Scriptures daily for the 
 purpose of discovering what it is’ they really teach, 
 could be ascertained, I fear we should suffer greatly 
 in comparison with these noble Bereans. The time, 
 however, I trust, is advancing, though slowly, when 
 the New Testament will be more studied and better 
 understood than it is at present. The cause of free 
 
 * Acts xvi; 32~33, + Acts xvii. 11. 
 N 
 
178 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 inquiry in religion is making progress, and will 
 assuredly in the end put aside all the vain dogmas 
 and fancies of men which shall be found inconsistent 
 with the teaching of Jesus Christ and his apostles. 
 
 Paul next visits Athens. The inhabitants of that 
 celebrated city seem to have borne a strong resem- 
 blance to not a few in England in our own day, “ For 
 they spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell, 
 or to hear some new thing*.” Paul made a remarkable 
 speech at Athens, which, after he had reproved the 
 Athenians in the gentlest way for their idolatry, ends 
 thus: “And the times of this ignorance God winked 
 at; but now commandeth all men everywhere to 
 repent: because he hath appointed a day, in which 
 he will judge the world in righteousness by that man 
 whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given 
 assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him 
 from the deadt.’”” When the apostle told the Athe- 
 nians that God would judge the world in righteous- 
 ness by Jesus Christ, I cannot understand m what 
 other sense he could have used these words but to 
 express that the condition of men in the next world 
 would be the consequence of their conduct and 
 character in this; and this is uniformly the doctrine 
 of the New Testament, whatever pretended orthodoxy 
 may have said to the contrary. 
 
 After this Paul taught at Ephesus, where his 
 preaching gave occasion to a remarkable tumult. 
 The apostle remaimed at Ephesus two years. After 
 visiting other places, he went on his way to Jerusalem, 
 intending to be present at the day of Pentecost; and 
 on that account determining to sail by Ephesus, with- 
 
 * Acts xvii. 21. + Acts xvii. 30, 31. 
 
‘THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 179 
 
 out going there. He then sent from Miletus to 
 Ephesus for the elders of the church. When they 
 arrived, he addressed them in a pious and _affec- 
 tionate discourse ; which concludes with the follow- 
 ing remarkable passage: “Take heed therefore unto 
 yourselves, and to all the flock, over which the Holy 
 Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of 
 God, which he hath purchased with his own blood *.” 
 This is a very important text, and, taken in conjyunc- 
 tion with what precedes, it casts great light, and, 
 indeed, appears to me perfectly conclusive, on a 
 question which has been much contested in the 
 Christian church ; whether in the first age elders or 
 presbyters were the same or a different order from 
 bishops. The great body of episcopalians hold that 
 bishops were from the first a superior class, having 
 authority over the presbyters. Those who have adopted 
 either a presbyterian or a congregational form in their 
 churches have uniformly maintained that bishops and 
 presbyters are only different names for the same office. 
 The word bishop is expressed in the Greek Testament 
 by a word which means inspector, or overseer. Elder 
 is a literal translation of a Greek word, and it is much 
 to be regretted that any other term has ever been 
 employed to designate the office. Unfortunately the 
 word presbyter was afterwards introduced in its place, 
 and yielded in its turn to the designation priest, a 
 term entirely unknown to the New Testament as the 
 denomination of a Christian teacher; and the epi- 
 
 * Acts xx. 28. It seems that the word Lord should be read 
 in this text instead of God. This reading is adopted in Gries- 
 bach’s edition of the New Testament, and appears to be so on 
 satisfactory grounds. 
 
 N 2 
 
180 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 scopalians—by far the larger portion of the Christian 
 world—are to this day taught that three distinct 
 orders of Christian ministers, bishops, priests, and. 
 deacons, were appointed at the first promulgation of 
 the Christian religion; or at least in the lifetime of 
 the apostles. Many too consider that the bishops 
 are the legitimate successors of the apostles; and 
 that an apostolical succession has been continued 
 from the first age to the present time. The text re- 
 ferred to clearly relates to the elders who had come 
 from Ephesus to Miletus, and to whom the apostle 
 addresses his discourse. They are therefore the 
 same persons who are called overseers in the 28th 
 verse. Elders and overseers then mean the same 
 individuals, and are two terms signifying the same 
 office in the Christian church. But the word here 
 translated overseers is in every other text of the New 
 Testament translated bishops. Why then did not our 
 translators render it by the same word here? ‘The 
 answer is plain enough. That translation would have 
 afforded an argument, to my mind irresistible, that 
 elders and bishops were originally the same. We 
 shall find important confirmatory evidence of this in 
 some of St. Paul’s epistles. The early constitution of 
 the Christian church, so far as the New Testament 
 affords us information,—and we have none from any 
 other quarter,—appears to have been this. Elders, 
 who are sometimes called bishops, were appointed by 
 the apostles, either with or without the concurrence 
 of the members of each particular church or congre- 
 gation, to whom was committed the general manage- 
 ment of the affairs of the church. From the texts 
 which have been already quoted to show that the 
 
’ THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 181 
 
 apostles were very .anxious not to exercise undue 
 authority over the disciples, I am inclined to think 
 that the congregations were consulted, and that the 
 appointment of elders was made with their concur- 
 rence ; but I do not find the New Testament explicit 
 on this head. From what passed on the nomination 
 of the deacons, and at the meeting respecting the 
 Gentile Christians, narrated in the 15th chapter of 
 Acts, and which has already been the subject of 
 attention and remark, it seems probable that the 
 whole congregation was called on to act on occasions 
 of importance. 
 
 Besides the elders, and probably in subordination 
 to them, persons who are called deacons and deacon- 
 esses, both men and women, had committed to them 
 the charge of the poor. 
 
 It seems highly probable that at a very early period 
 some one of the elders was selected to preside at their 
 meetings, and that the term bishop naturally enough, 
 considering its etymology, then began to be applied 
 exclusively to him. The necessity of a president or 
 chairman is soon felt in all societies; and I see no 
 reason to think that the bishop, as distinguished from 
 the general body of the elders, was at first anything 
 more than this. This distinction would of course be 
 given to some person among the elders superior in 
 station, or ability, to the rest, and it is quite in the 
 ordinary course of human affairs that the authority 
 thus confined should go on extending itself. The in- 
 crease of numbers in the church too would infallibly 
 lead to increased power in the bishop. It is foreign 
 to the purpose of this portion of my work to carry my 
 
182 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 remarks on this subject any further. I shall have much 
 more to say hereafter respecting the teachers of the 
 early church. I will only add here, that we should be 
 mistaken if we were to suppose, that because the indi- 
 viduals who, under the apostles, exercised the highest 
 authority in the Christian church are often called 
 elders, they were always persons of advanced age. 
 That they were generally so is probable; but it can 
 scarcely be thought that in their selection no regard 
 would be had to station, property and education. 
 Probably all these things were considered; and we 
 know that Timothy, who was a young man, was en- 
 trusted with high authority by the apostle Paul. 
 With respect to what is called apostolical succes- 
 sion, that term may be very properly used if it be 
 only meant to express that there has been a regular 
 succession of teachers in the church from the time of 
 the apostles to the present day. If, however, it be 
 contended that the bishops of the present time are in 
 legitimate possession of all the powers conferred by 
 Christ on the apostles, I find nothing in the New 
 Testament which supports that opinion. It seems 
 that the apostles never increased their original 
 number of twelve. Matthias was appointed to suc- 
 ceed Judas Iscariot, and Paul’s apostleship probably 
 did not commence til after the death of James. 
 Lardner has, I think, satisfactorily shown that Bar- 
 nabas was not an apostle in the strict and peculiar 
 sense of that term, although the appellation is once 
 applied to him. ‘The original meaning of the word 
 apostle is, one sent on a particular mission; and in 
 that sense it is sometimes applied to those who were 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 183 
 
 not in the number of the twelve. I can see no ground 
 from the New Testament to think that any person 
 was appointed to the apostolical office after St. Paul. 
 
 I shall now shortly advert to the accounts con- 
 tamed in the Acts of the persecution of the apostles, 
 in addition to those which have been already men- 
 tioned. We are informed that Herod slew the apo- 
 stle James, the brother of John, with the sword; and 
 that he imprisoned Peter, who was delivered by an 
 angel. We find that at Lystra Paul was stoned and 
 left for dead; that he and Silas were sent away by 
 night from Thessalonica on account of the violence of 
 the people against them; that the Bereans, whose 
 previous good dispositions have been already noticed, 
 were stirred up against them, which occasioned Paul 
 to be sent away; that in Corinth the Jews brought 
 him before the judgment-seat of Gallio, who wisely 
 refused to interfere in a matter concerning religion, 
 and restored him to freedom; and that he was ex- 
 posed to great danger in a disturbance at Ephesus. 
 In his address to the Ephesians, which has been 
 already mentioned for another purpose, Paul says: 
 “And now, behold, I go bound in the spirit unto 
 Jerusalem, not knowing the things that shall befall 
 me there; save that the Holy Ghost witnesseth in 
 every city, saying that bonds and afflictions abide 
 me. But none of these things move me, neither 
 count [ my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish 
 my course with joy, and the ministry, which I have 
 received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of 
 the grace of God*.” 
 
 After this we find the apostle at Caesarea, where a 
 
 * Acts xx. 22-24. 
 
184 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 person named Agabus foretells that Paul will be 
 bound at Jerusalem, and delivered to the Gentiles ; 
 which induces his followers to endeavour to dissuade 
 him from going to Jerusalem. “Then Paul answered, 
 What mean ye to weep and to break mine heart? 
 For I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die 
 at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus*.” He 
 then goes to Jerusalem, and in a tumult there is bound 
 with two chains and imprisoned, and only escapes being 
 examined by scourging, on telling them that he is a 
 Roman citizen, and therefore not liable to be put to 
 torture. He is then examined by the Jewish council 
 and again committed to prison. It is afterwards 
 communicated to the Roman officer that there is a 
 conspiracy to take Paul’s life; and he is sent to Ce- 
 sarea, where Felix the Roman proconsul resided. An 
 accusation is then brought against him before Felix, 
 who detains him two years in prison without deciding 
 on his case; andon giving up his government, he leaves 
 Paul still in prison. After this he is examined before 
 Festus the new Roman governor, and also before 
 Agrippa, at that time king of Judea. Paul then ap- 
 peals to the Roman emperor, and is sent to Italy ; 
 where he arrives after a tempestuous voyage, and 
 after having suffered shipwreck. On his arrival at 
 Rome, he is not treated, probably as bemg a Roman 
 citizen, with any unnecessary severity, being suffered 
 to dwell by himself with a soldier that kept him. 
 The book of Acts concludes thus: “And Paul dwelt 
 two whole years in his own hired house, and received 
 all that came in unto him; preaching the kingdom 
 of God, and teaching those things which concern the 
 
 * Acts xxi, 13. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 185 
 
 Lord Jesus Christ, with all confidence, no man for- 
 bidding him.” 
 
 We have now gone through the book commonly 
 called the Acts of the Apostles. The title may be 
 thought not to have been happily chosen; for it is 
 far from being a history of the proceedings of all the 
 apostles, and indeed is chiefly confined to two, Peter 
 and Paul, who, however, appear to have been the 
 most distinguished among the apostles. I can- 
 not think that any candid person can rise from an 
 attentive perusal of this invaluable record without a 
 conviction that the apostles acted a sincere and honest 
 part ; that they firmly believed in the resurrection of 
 Jesus Christ from the dead, in his divine commission, 
 and in their own as derived from him. There is in 
 this book no indication of the apostles having been 
 actuated by motives of ambition. They assume no- 
 where any more authority than was necessary for the 
 promulgation of the religion which they believed 
 themselves sent to teach. Peter, the first of the apo- 
 stles, yields precedence to James, and, in his epistle, 
 expressly warns the teachers of the Christian religion 
 not to assume any undue authority over their brethren. 
 The apostles are imprisoned and beaten, and charged 
 by the Jewish authorities to forbear preaching in the 
 name of Jesus; but threatenings and persecutions 
 fail entirely to make them renounce the course of life 
 which, in obedience to the instructions of their Master, 
 they had chosen. When a question arises respect- 
 ing the Gentile converts, and is brought before the 
 apostles at Jerusalem, the whole body of Christians is 
 called together to consult upon it, and the answer 
 given to the inquiry is by the apostles, the elders, and 
 
186 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 the brethren. Very soon after the resurrection, the 
 apostles proceed to appoint a successor to the traitor 
 Judas ; and we shall see hereafter that St. Paul claimed 
 to be an apostle by the immediate appointment of 
 Jesus Christ. This was probably after the death of 
 James; and if so, the apostles never exceeded their 
 original number twelve. No part of the New Testa- 
 ment, as far as I can discover, shows, or tends to 
 show, that the apostolical authority was transferred 
 to any other persons whatever. With the death of 
 the original eleven, and the two afterwards added to 
 their number, the office expired. It had served its 
 double purpose ; first, that of affording witnesses, 
 among those who had been well acquainted with his 
 person, of the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the 
 dead; and, secondly, of providing a certain number 
 of individuals, endowed with superior knowledge and 
 wisdom by divine revelation and appointment for the 
 promulgation of the Christian religion in the world. 
 With respect to the discipline and government of 
 the early Christian churches, I see no reason to doubt 
 that it was strictly congregational. Finding as we do 
 in the account of the question respecting the Gen- 
 tiles, that the brethren, which can scarcely admit 
 of any other meaning than all the members of the 
 church, were called on to act and decide, although 
 the apostles themselves were present, I cannot con- 
 ceive that a less degree of authority was exercised 
 by the other Christian churches. That a deference 
 was paid to the apostles, such as no subsequent teach- 
 ers have any right to require, cannot be doubted ; but 
 even their authority is not clearly defined; and we 
 have already seen that they disclaimed all power be- 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 187 
 
 yond what was required for the purpose of their mis- 
 sion. ‘The distinction between clergy (as we now 
 understand the term as denoting a class of persons 
 withdrawn from secular pursuits, and wholly devoted 
 to the ministerial office) and laity was quite unknown. 
 We find St. Paul, the most laborious of the apostles, 
 supporting himself by the labour of his hands*. The 
 introduction of clergy at a subsequent period into the 
 Christian church may have been proper, and was 
 perhaps even essential to the support of Christianity 
 in the world; but the establishment of their order 
 rests on no direct divine appointment, and must be 
 justified and defended on the satisfactory ground of 
 thew usefulness in the church. Even at the present 
 day the Quakers and the Sandemanians have no 
 clergy; and no candid person will deny their sin- 
 cerity as professing Christians. It may, however, 
 well be doubted, whether Christianity, with all the 
 bad passions of man arrayed against it, could have 
 subsisted in the world without the aid of men, sepa- 
 rated from secular pursuits, and devoted exclusively 
 to instruction, to exhortation, to the supply of the 
 wants, physical, moral and religious, of those who 
 are in need, to the consolation of the afflicted, to the 
 reproof of the wicked, and to the support and en- 
 couragement of the simmer who desires to turn from 
 his evil ways and to do that which is lawful and right. 
 To a clergy so employed, the regard and respect of all 
 whose good opinion is worth having, can never be 
 wanting. It is only when they suffer themselves to 
 be seduced from their proper line of duty by the pomp 
 and pleasures of the world, by avarice, or by ambi- 
 
 * Acts xvii. 2, 3. 
 
188 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 tion, that they lose the high estimation to which the 
 conscientious discharge of their sacred functions would 
 have entitled them. | 
 
 The doctrines taught by the apostles in the Acts 
 are perfectly consistent with those of our Saviour in 
 the gospels. All good is ascribed in the first instance 
 to God; and Jesus Christ, whom God raised from 
 the dead, is always regarded as the instrument in the 
 hands of God of spiritual blessings to man. The 
 doctrine of a future state is inculcated with apostolic 
 authority ; and piety and virtue are insisted on as 
 necessary preparations for the happiness of the world 
 to come. Faith in Christ is the condition of being 
 received into the new covenant made through him by 
 God with man ; and obedience to the laws of God is 
 essential to the participation of the blessings of the 
 heavenly state which is to follow this life. Both in 
 the Gospel and in the Acts we find the most cheering 
 and encouraging views of the goodness and mercy of 
 God, who knoweth our infirmities, and remembereth 
 whereof we are made. If we draw our religious 
 opinions from these sacred. books, we shall be satisfied 
 that if we really and seriously desire and strive to 
 serve God to the best of our power, we shall find 
 Him not extreme to mark what is done amiss; full 
 of mercy towards his ‘sinful creatures, and desirous 
 that the sinner should turn from his evil ways and 
 live. | 
 We are now about to commence an examination of 
 a very important part of the New Testament—the 
 Epistles. Thirteen of these epistles are universally 
 ascribed to the apostle Paul, as is the epistle to the 
 Hebrews, in the common version of the Scriptures 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 189 
 
 used in this country, although many well-informed 
 persons think they have reason to deny, or at least to 
 doubt, the apostle being the author of this epistle. 
 All the other epistles are usually thought to have 
 been written by apostles; and with respect to the 
 far larger part of them, the judgment of the Christian 
 church appears to have been almost unanimous. 
 
 We have seen that the lessons of practical religion 
 given by the apostles at the first preaching of Chris- 
 tianity differ in no respect from those of our Lord 
 and Saviour Jesus Christ; but if we are to believe a 
 host of divines, among whom I fear we must reckon 
 most of the early reformers, St. Paul taught his disci- 
 ples a far different doctrine. According to these 
 writers, the benefits of Christianity are to be obtained 
 solely by faith in Jesus Christ, and by reliance on his 
 merits. The more sober of these divines indeed 
 inculcate piety and virtue, and represent them as the 
 natural and necessary results of a true and lively 
 faith; but still they consider these good works, as 
 they are generally termed, of no efficacy whatever in 
 procuring our salvation. The zeal with which the 
 fathers of the Reformation supported this doctrine 
 apparently arose from their detestation of the Popish 
 dogma respecting the merits of the saints, and the 
 pernicious effects which resulted from it. That: St. 
 Paul never taught it, I hope to be able to show in 
 the following pages. If he had preached such a 
 doctrine, so directly opposite to what is taught by 
 Christ in the gospels, and by his disciples in the 
 Acts, I do not think all the external arguments in 
 favour of the apostleship of Paul could have pre- 
 vailed with a rational inquirer to admit its validity. 
 
190 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 The error of this system seems to have arisen from 
 confounding the cause with the conditions of our 
 salvation. Salvation, that is, forgiveness of sins and 
 participation in the felicity of the world to come, 1s 
 the free gift of God; and to assert that by anything 
 we do or can do, by a life even of perfect obedience 
 to the will of God, we should be entitled to claim the 
 inestimable blessing of eternal felicity as a matter of 
 right, would be in the highest degree absurd. The 
 conditions of salvation, however, is quite a different 
 matter ; and the whole tenor of the New Testament 
 shows that unless we lead lives m the main con- 
 formable to the laws of God, we can entertain no 
 rational hope of salvation. Man by the very law of 
 his being can attain happiness only by the practice of 
 piety and virtue. The wicked, the selfish, the sensual 
 in this world have by their lives disqualified them- 
 selves from the enjoyment of those beatitudes in the 
 world to come, which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, 
 and which it hath not entered into the heart of man 
 to conceive. 
 
 Misconceptions of St. Paul’s epistles arose early in 
 the Christian church. In writing of him St. Peter 
 says, “ In which (his epistles) are some things hard 
 to be understood, which they that are unlearned and 
 unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, 
 unto their own destruction*.” If then St. Peter 
 found things hard to be understood in these writings, 
 how can we expect fully to understand them P 
 
 The epistles of Paul were written in a remote age, 
 and in a state of society greatly differmg from the 
 condition of the world in our own times. ‘They are 
 
 * 2 Peter, i. 16. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 191 
 
 addressed either to particular churches or to indi- 
 viduals, and refer to a variety of circumstances with 
 which we are unacquainted. The peculiarities of the 
 Jewish people, and the personal character of the 
 apostle, combine greatly to enhance the difficulty of 
 understanding these compositions. The Jews had for 
 many ages considered themselves the people of God, 
 and had looked with contempt on other nations. 
 They had anticipated a conquering and triumphant 
 Messiah who would restore the kingdom of David, 
 and re-establish it with power and splendour far sur- 
 passing what it had attained at its most prosperous 
 period. He was to free them from the yoke of the 
 Romans, at that time the masters of the civilized 
 world. The idea of the Gentiles ever being placed in 
 a state of favour with God equal to themselves, had 
 never entered the Jewish mind. By the nation at 
 large Jesus was rejected when they found that he did 
 not intend to set up a temporal kingdom. That he 
 would do so was the hope of his disciples even after 
 his resurrection. Engrossed by their ideas of a king 
 and a conqueror, the Jews were totally incapable of 
 appreciating the character of Jesus, and of perceiving 
 that the gentlest and humblest of men was, at the 
 same time, the most dignified and exalted. We have 
 seen how far his own chosen disciples were from fully 
 understanding and imitating his virtues, and the 
 generality of his followers no doubt fell far short of 
 the apostles. When, after the death and resurrection 
 of Jesus, converts were made among the Jews, it does 
 not appear that they entertained the least expectation 
 that the Gentiles were to be admitted to the same 
 privileges with themselves; and when the latter 
 
192 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 became Christians, the Jews expected that the Gen- 
 tiles would conform to the laws of Moses. Against 
 these inveterate prejudices the apostle Paul had to 
 contend; and the object of a large portion of his 
 epistles is to assert and defend the privileges of the 
 Gentiles, of whom he was peculiarly the apostle ; 
 their independence of the Jewish law; and their 
 equal participation with the Jews in all the blessings 
 of the Christian dispensation. 
 
 St. Paul was in every respect a great man. All 
 the intellectual and moral elements of his character 
 were on a large scale. Accurate judgment and 
 vigorous power of reasoning were united in him with 
 a most fertile imagination and the intensest feeling. 
 Fervent piety to his Maker was combined with 
 benevolence in the highest degree to his fellow- 
 creatures. Not the slightest mdication of an approach 
 to selfishness is to be found in any part of his history 
 or his writings. Conscience reigned supreme through- 
 out his whole life; as much im the persecutor Saul as 
 in the zealous and indefatigable apostle Paul. He 
 was led to persecute the Christians, not by those 
 malignant feelmgs which we are perhaps too apt to 
 impute to persecutors, but by a mistaken sense of 
 duty. His moral and religious elevation gives a tinge 
 to all his writings, and carries him on in a strain of 
 imaginative and impassioned eloquence, which makes 
 it often difficult even for an attentive reader to follow 
 the course of his reasoning, and to perceive the con- 
 nexion of the different parts of his discourse. I 
 must introduce here the admirable remarks of Locke 
 on the epistles of St. Paul. ‘I continued,” he says, 
 “to read the same epistle over and over, and over 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 193 
 
 again, till I came to discover, as appeared to me what 
 was the drift and aim of it, and by what steps and 
 arguments St. Paul prosecuted his purpose. I re- 
 membered that St. Paul was miraculously called to 
 the ministry of the gospel, and declared to be a 
 chosen-vessel ; that he had the whole doctrine of the 
 gospel from God by immediate revelation, and was 
 appointed to be the apostle of the Gentiles for the 
 propagating of it in the heathen world. This was 
 enough to persuade me, that he was not a man of 
 loose and shattered parts, uncapable to argue, and 
 unfit to convince those he had to deal with, God 
 knows how to choose fit instruments for the business 
 he employs them in. A large stock of Jewish learning 
 he had taken in at the feet of Gamaliel, and for his 
 information in Christian knowledge, and the mysteries 
 and depths of the dispensation of grace by Jesus 
 Christ, God himself had condescended to be_ his 
 instructor and teacher. The light of the gospel he 
 had received from the Fountain and Father of hight 
 himself, who, I concluded, had not furnished him in 
 this extraordinary manner, if all this plentiful stock 
 of learning and illumination had been in danger to 
 have been lost, or proved useless, in’ a jumbled and 
 confused head; nor have laid up such a store of 
 admirable and useful knowledge in a man, who for 
 _ want of method and order, clearness of perception, or 
 pertinency in discourse, could not draw it out into 
 use with the greatest advantages of force and cohe- 
 rence. ‘That he knew how to prosecute his purpose 
 with strength of argument and close reasoning, with- 
 out incoherent sallies, or the intermixing of things 
 foreign to his business, was evident to me from several 
 0 
 
194, THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 speeches of his recorded in the Acts; and it was hard 
 to think, that a man, that could talk with so much 
 consistency and clearness of conviction, should not be 
 able to write without confusion, inextricable obscurity, 
 - and perpetual rambling. The force, order and per- 
 spicuity of these discourses could not be denied to be 
 very visible. How then came it that the like was 
 thought much wanting in his epistles? And of this 
 there appeared to me this plain reason: the par- 
 ticularities of the history in which these speeches are 
 inserted, show St. Paul’s end in speaking, which being 
 seen, casts a light on the whole, and shows the per- 
 tinency of all that he says. But his epistles not bemg 
 so circumstantiated, there beg no concurring history 
 that plainly declares the disposition St. Paul was in, 
 what, the actions, expectations, or demands of those 
 to whom he writ, required him to speak to, we are 
 nowhere told. All this, and a great deal more, ne- 
 cessary to guide us into the true meaning of the 
 epistles, is to be had only from the epistles them- 
 selves, and to be gathered from thence with stubborn 
 attention, and more than common application*.” 
 
 I shall now proceed to a review of such parts of St. 
 Paul’s epistles as seem to me clearly to show that the 
 doctrine of that apostle was precisely the same as that 
 which we find inculcated in the Gospels and Acts ; 
 and that he uniformly taught that obedience to the 
 laws of God in this world is the condition of his 
 favour in the next; and, consequently, that there is 
 no foundation for the notion that salvation can be 
 obtained merely by faith in Jesus Christ, and reliance 
 
 * Locke’s Preface to a Paraphrase on the Epistles of St. 
 Paul. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 195 
 
 on his merits. By far the most difficult to be under- 
 stood of these epistles is that to the Romans. After 
 long study of it, with the assistance of many commen- 
 tators, I feel by no means fully satisfied that I clearly 
 perceive its general object ; and many particular texts 
 I cannot at all understand. This, however, is nothing 
 extraordinary. here are, no doubt, many allusions 
 to facts and circumstances well known to those to 
 whom the epistle was addressed, and which enabled 
 them to understand it. As these matters are un- 
 known to us, we can have no concern with them ; 
 and need not disquiet ourselves about them. Our 
 business is to avail ourselves of all the aid the apostle 
 affords us to strengthen our faith, and to promote our 
 advance in the path of holiness and goodness.“ 'The 
 wrath of God,” says the apostle, “is revealed from 
 heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of 
 men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness*.” In 
 this passage the apostle declares that some hold the 
 truth in unrighteousness. The faith therefore of these 
 persons was right, but their conduct was evil; and 
 we are informed that the wrath of God -is revealed 
 against them. Much of the second chapter is directed 
 against the presumption of the Jews, and their as- 
 sumption of superiority over the Gentiles. St. Paul 
 declares, that God will render to every man according 
 to his deeds ; and, that “ when the Gentiles, who have 
 not the law, do by nature the things contained in the 
 law, these, having not the law, are a law unto them- 
 selves tT.” | 
 
 The Old Testament (more properly Covenant) re- 
 
 * Rom. i. 18. + Rom, u. 14. 
 : 0 2 
 
196 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 presents the Jewish nation in a peculiar relation to 
 the Deity by having received an express promise of 
 his favour; but this promise was on condition that 
 they obeyed his laws. The New Covenant, in the like 
 manner, makes Christians partakers of the promise of 
 God both as to their welfare in this world, and as to 
 their becoming partakers of everlasting felicity in the 
 world to come; and the apostle mforms us that we 
 are justified freely by the grace of God through the 
 redemption that is in Christ Jesus; and therefore we 
 conclude that a man is justified by faith without the 
 deeds of the law: by all which I understand that the 
 Christian is admitted into a covenant relation with 
 God by faith without submitting himself to the law 
 of Moses. But the whole course of the teaching of 
 our Saviour, of the apostles as recorded in the book 
 of Acts, of St. Paul himself, as I have already shown 
 in part, and shall show more at length hereafter, and 
 also of the authors of the other epistles contamed in 
 the New Testament, combine to show that the eternal 
 law of righteousness is binding on Christians, and 
 that they cannot justly entertain the hope of salvation 
 unless they conform their lives to it. ‘“ Do we,’ says 
 the apostle, “ then make void the law through faith ? 
 yea, we establish the law*.”’ The sense of the last 
 text is, I think, clearly expressed in the following 
 paraphrase: ‘ But let not any imagine, I set law 
 aside, or render obedience unnecessary, by affirming, 
 mankind have a title to the blessings of God’s cove- 
 nant only by faith, or a dependence upon grace. On 
 the contrary, the gospel, which I preach, establishes 
 
 * Rom. iii. 24, 28, 31. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 197 
 
 the eternal obligations of law, or the rule of right 
 action, and brings us under the strongest engage- 
 ments to the obedience of it*.” 
 
 The main drift of the fourth chapter is, I think, 
 that as Abraham was admitted by faith to the favour 
 of God before the establishment of the Mosaic law, 
 and even before the rite of circumcision, to which he 
 afterwards submitted, so the Gentiles are by faith 
 made partakers of the blessings and promise of the 
 gospel without subjecting themselves to the law of 
 Moses. “It seems very clear to me,” says ‘Taylor, 
 “that the justification the apostle is contending for, 
 in the five first chapters of this epistle, is the calling 
 of the Gentiles, and their being admitted, upon faith, 
 into the peculiar family and kingdom of God Tas 
 
 In the beginning of the sixth chapter the apostle 
 rejects with indignation the suggestion that we should 
 continue in sin that grace might abound. “How 
 shall we,” he says, “that are dead to sin, live any 
 longer therein?’? The eighth chapter begins thus : 
 “There is therefore now no condemnation to them 
 which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the 
 flesh, but after the Spirit.” What can walking after 
 the Spirit mean but leading holy and virtuous lives ? 
 The 13th verse of the same chapter runs thus: “ For 
 if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die; but if ye 
 through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, 
 ye shall live.” The epistle to the end of the 11th 
 chapter abounds in difficulties ; and many parts of it 
 I feel myself quite unable to understand. The re- 
 maining chapters are chiefly filled with exhortations 
 
 * Taylor on the Romans. 
 + Key to the Apostolic Writings, chap. xvii. 
 
198 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 to a pure and holy life, which the apostle could not 
 have pressed so earnestly if he had laid so little stress 
 on what is commonly called good works, as many of 
 those have done who profess to take their doctrines 
 from him. On looking back on the whole of this 
 most difficult, but, on many accounts, highly im- 
 portant epistle, I rise with the firmest conviction that 
 nothing contained in it proves, or tends to prove, that, 
 in the opinion of the apostle, obedience to the com- 
 mandments of God. by a religious and holy life is not 
 an essential condition of our attaining that state of 
 felicity in the world to come which is promised in 
 the gospel to the faithful disciples of Christ. 
 
 The first epistle to the Corinthians is much less 
 hard to be understood than that to the Romans; but 
 it has, nevertheless, considerable difficulties. A large 
 portion of it relates to the reprehensible conduct of 
 the Corinthians in several particulars, and to that of 
 some teacher who had set himself up in opposition to 
 the apostle ; facts with which we are imperfectly ac- 
 quainted, having no other knowledge of them than 
 what is afforded by the epistle itself. St. Paul gives 
 the following affecting account of the labours and 
 sufferings of the apostles: “ Even unto this present 
 hour we both hunger, and thirst, and are naked, and 
 are buffeted, and have no certain dwelling-place ; and 
 labour, working with our own hands: being reviled, 
 we bless; being persecuted, we suffer it; being de- 
 famed, we entreat: we are made as the filth of the 
 earth, and are the offscouring of all things to this 
 day*.’’ As this epistle was written to the Corin- 
 thians, with whom he had spent a considerable time, 
 
 * 1 Corinthians, iv. 11-13. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 199 
 
 and to whom his course of life must have been well 
 known, I can see no possible reason to doubt the 
 truth of the representation here made by the apostle. 
 These labours and sufferings then had really been 
 undergone by himself and other early teachers of the 
 gospel; and for what purpose had they encountered 
 them? We can easily account for their conduct by 
 admitting the truth of what they uniformly asserted— 
 that they believed themselves to be acting by Divine 
 authority. [can conceive nothing short of this which 
 could have induced them to practise such a mode 
 of life, or could have afforded them the slightest 
 hope of success in their attempt to set up a new 
 religion in the world in direct opposition to that of 
 the heathen, and to the most cherished feelings and 
 prejudices of the nation to which they belonged. In 
 a subsequent passage in the epistle we find these 
 words: “ Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor 
 idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers 
 of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, 
 nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall 
 inherit the kingdom of God*.” Can any language 
 be plainer than this to show that abstaining from the 
 vices enumerated is essential to a participation in the 
 blessmgs of the future world? It may indeed be 
 doubted whether the kingdom of heaven means a 
 future state of felicity, or denotes here, as it certainly 
 does in many passages of the gospels, the kingdom of 
 Christ on earth, that is his religion. But supposing 
 this latter to be the meaning of the text, it comes to 
 the same thing, for the kingdom of Christ in this 
 world is preparatory to the happiness of that which 
 
 * 1 Corinthians, vi. 9, 10. 
 
200 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 is to come; and the joys of heaven are promised to 
 those only who receive the religion of Jesus here. 
 The thirteenth chapter of this epistle is filled with the 
 praises of what is in our common translation called 
 charity. I know of no English word which will pre- 
 cisely express the meaning of the original. “ Love,” 
 as has been justly said by a late translator of the New 
 Testament, “is the more correct, and now the usual 
 translation ; but on the whole it does not seem worth 
 while to disturb the old word, to which usage has 
 now given an understood application. Love almost 
 equally requires to be understood somewhat in a 
 special sense.”’ I will add to these observations, that 
 the word benevolence, the proper signification of 
 which is willing the good of others, is by no means 
 strong enough to express the meaning of the apostle ; 
 which indicates a strong feeling of the heart, by which 
 we regard the happiness of others as our own. ‘The 
 charity of St. Paul I understand to be the loving of 
 our neighbours as ourselves, which our Saviour him- 
 self calls the second great commandment; making 
 it inferior only to the love of God. The more deeply 
 we investigate our moral nature, the more fully satis- 
 fied we shall become that the love of God and of our 
 fellow-creatures are the highest principles of human 
 character. The chapter concludes as follows: ‘“ And 
 now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but 
 the greatest of these is charity.” Surely this is a 
 distinct declaration by the apostle of that branch of 
 religion which consists in the love of our neighbour 
 being superior even to faith in the Christian religion. 
 
 In the second epistle to the Corinthians we find the _ 
 following passage: “ We must all appear before the 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 201 
 
 judgment-seat of Christ; that every one may receive 
 the things done in his body, according to that he hath 
 done, whether it be good or bad*.’”’ The following 
 passage, though not relating to our immediate object, 
 is of great importance: “ All things are of God, who 
 hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and 
 hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation ; to 
 wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world 
 unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them ; 
 and hath committed to us the word of reconciliation f.”’ 
 Divines of a certain class are fond of talking of God 
 being reconciled to us; but this is language nowhere 
 contained in the New Testament; which shows, in 
 many passages, that the object of Christ’s coming into 
 the world was, not to reconcile God to us, but to re- 
 concile us to him ; that is, to reclaim us from estrange- 
 ment from God by disobedience to his commandments, 
 and to render us, by lives of purity, piety and virtue, fit 
 recipients of his bounty. When we reflect that we all 
 are the creatures of God, it seems perfectly inconsist- 
 ent with our conceptions of his perfections that he can 
 ever be estranged from the work of his hands. But 
 although the Deity is never estranged from men, they 
 are always alienated from him when they transgress 
 his laws. The perfection of our moral nature con- 
 sists in piety and virtue; and by those alone can we 
 attain true happiness. ‘The nature of things must be 
 altered before a vicious and wicked man can be fitted 
 for the joys of heaven. ‘To attain the happiness of a 
 future state, we must- practise piety and virtue here ; 
 and this is precisely what is meant. by our being re- 
 conciled to God. 
 *; 2.Gor. vest 0} + 2.Cor.v..18,.F9. 
 
pA ily. THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 In the epistle to the Galatians we find the following 
 passages : “ Now the works of the flesh are manifest, 
 which are these; adultery, fornication, uncleanness, 
 lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, 
 emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, 
 murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like; of 
 the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in 
 time past, that they which do such things shall not 
 inherit the kingdom of God*.” “Be not deceived ; 
 God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, 
 that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his 
 flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that 
 soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap everlast- 
 ing lifef.” In none of the writings of Paul is stronger 
 language used respecting faith than in this to the Ga- 
 latians ; but the texts just quoted clearly show that 
 the apostle never could have intended to teach that 
 faith, without a good life, would entitle any one to 
 salvation. 
 
 In the epistle to the Ephesians St. Paul speaks of 
 the mystery hidden in former times; “that the Gen- 
 tiles should be fellow-heirs, and of the same body, and 
 partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospelt.” 
 This doctrine, which was highly unpalatable to the 
 Jews, the apostle always enforces with great zeal ; 
 and it is explanatory of rnuch in his epistles respect- 
 ing faith. He afterwards exhorts the Ephesians, “ to 
 walk worthy of the vocation wherewith they are called, 
 with all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, 
 forbearing one another in love, endeavouring to keep 
 the unity of spirit in the bond of peace§.” After- 
 
 * Ayal. 10-21, T (val; vie7, 6: 
 t Ephes. iii. 4-6. § Ephes. iv. 1-3. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 203 
 
 wards he instructs them as follows: “That ye put off 
 concerning the former conversation the old man, 
 which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts ; and 
 be renewed in the spirit of your mind; and that ye 
 put on the new man, which after God is created in 
 righteousness and true holiness. Wherefore putting 
 away lying, speak every man truth with his neigh- 
 bour: for we are members one of another. Be ye 
 angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon 
 _ your wrath; neither give place to the devil. Let him 
 that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, 
 working with his hands the thing which is good, that 
 he may have to give to him that needeth. Let no 
 corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but 
 that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may 
 minister grace unto the hearers. And grieve not the 
 holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of 
 redemption. Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, 
 and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from 
 you, with all malice: and be ye kind one to another, 
 tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God for 
 Christ’s sake” (or as it should have been translated, 
 in or by Christ) “hath forgiven you*.” In the next 
 chapter we meet with the following verses: ‘ For this 
 ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, 
 nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inhe- 
 ritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let 
 no man deceive you with vain words; for because of 
 these things cometh the wrath of God upon the chil- 
 dren of disobedience ; be ye not therefore partakers 
 with themt.” Surely the words which I have quoted 
 from this and the preceding epistles are of awful im- 
 * Ephes. iv. 22-32. + Ephes. v. 5-7. 
 
204 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 port, and calculated to alarm to the utmost a care- 
 less and sinful world. I do not feel it necessary to 
 bring any farther proof that the teaching of St. Paul 
 is perfectly consistent with that of his and our Lord 
 and Master Jesus Christ. The doctrine of the New 
 Testament throughout is, that salvation is the free gift of 
 God by Jesus Christ ; but that leading a religious and 
 virtuous life is the essential condition of our partici- 
 pation in that inestimable blessing. Similar passages 
 to those which I have quoted may be found in the 
 other epistles of the apostle, which I feel it quite un- 
 necessary to quote. 
 
 In referring to them, I shall chiefly confine myself 
 to those texts which throw light on the consti- 
 tution of the early Christian church. ‘The epistle to 
 the Philippians begins as follows: ‘“ Paul and Timo- 
 theus, the servants of Jesus Christ, to all the saints in 
 Christ Jesus which are at Philippi, with the bishops 
 and deacons.” Whitby, himself an Episcopalian, has 
 clearly shown, in a learned note, that the word bishops 
 in this text must be understood to be applied to the 
 individuals who are called elders. We have already 
 had reason to believe that the. same class of persons 
 were designated by the two words, bishops and elders; 
 and I can discover nothing in the New Testament to 
 indicate that this was not always the case. I have 
 already admitted that a distinction was made at a very 
 early period, and that precedence was given to the 
 bishop above the other elders; but I find nothing to 
 lead me to think that he was considered in any other 
 light than as the presiding elder. When the change 
 took place, one bishop only was appointed to each 
 church. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 905 
 
 The plural word “ bishops” being used in this text 
 clearly shows that no such change had taken place at 
 the time when this epistle was written; and it can 
 properly be understood to mean nothing more than 
 elders. 
 
 The epistles to Timothy and Titus have generally 
 been considered the strongholds of those who contend 
 for the establishment of episcopacy in apostolic times. 
 I will proceed to consider whether they afford any 
 authority for that opinion. It appears from the com- 
 mencement of the first epistle to Timothy that St. Paul 
 left him at Ephesus, “that,” says the epistle, “thou 
 mightest charge some that they teach no other doc- 
 trine, neither give heed to fables and endless genealo- 
 gies, which minister questions, rather than godly 
 edifying, which is in faith.” From this text nothing 
 can be gathered, but that Timothy was left for the 
 purpose of preventing the dissemination of unsound 
 doctrine; there is nothing to show whether this mis- 
 sion of ‘Timothy was intended to be temporary or 
 permanent. It is a common opinion that Timothy 
 was the first bishop of Ephesus; and this may be 
 true; but the text in question affords no proof of it. 
 The third chapter begins thus: “This is a true say- 
 ing, if a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth 
 a good thing.” The apostle goes on to describe what 
 a bishop ought to be; and he then shows what ought 
 to be the character of deacons, and their wives, as our 
 translation has it; but, in the opinion of many able 
 and learned commentators, both ancient and modern, 
 deaconesses, who appear to have held offices in the 
 Church similar to those of the deacons. The only 
 reason that I can perceive for interpreting the word 
 
206 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 bishop to mean any more than elders, to whom I have 
 shown that term is applicable, is, that the singular 
 number is used. But this does not seem to deter- 
 mine the meaning of the text. If there had been 
 three degrees of teachers in the Church at that time in 
 Ephesus—a bishop, elders or presbyters, and deacons,— 
 it seems in the highest degree improbable that St. 
 Paul should have given directions as to the characters 
 of the bishops and deacons ; and have entirely omitted 
 the elders. Their office was certainly more important 
 than that of the deacons; and at least equal qualifi- 
 cation of character must have been required of them. 
 And so it was if we suppose bishop and elder to be 
 only designations of the same individuals. But it 
 may perhaps be supposed that the two following texts 
 lend a support to the notion, that a bishop was supe- 
 rior to an elder: “ Let the elders that rule well be 
 counted worthy of double honour, especially they who 
 labour in the word and doctrine. Against an elder 
 receive not an accusation, but before two or three 
 witnesses*.” The last verse certainly shows that the 
 apostle deemed Timothy to have some authority over 
 the elders; for otherwise it would be useless and ab- 
 surd for him to receive an accusation against them. 
 Whatever power he possessed, however, was com- 
 mitted to him personally by the apostle; and there is 
 not a word in the epistle to show that a like authority 
 was to be transmitted to his successor, or that it was 
 intended that he should have a successor. ‘The no- 
 tions that a bishopric was founded on this occasion 
 in Ephesus, that Timothy was the first bishop, and 
 that a regular succession of individuals were in time 
 
 * | Timothy, v. 17, 19. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 207 
 
 to hold the same office, are totally void of any founda- 
 tion in the epistle. It would be a strange interpreta- 
 tion of the third chapter, which mentions the qualifi- 
 cations of a bishop, to apply it to Timothy himself, 
 who had been appointed to that office, and therefore 
 must, in the apostle’s estimation, have been possessed 
 of the requisites for the office. I can see no room for 
 a rational doubt that the mstructions contained in 
 the third chapter are to be referred to persons to be 
 appointed at a time subsequent to the period when 
 the epistle was written. I have said already that I 
 see no improbability in Timothy having really been 
 the first bishop of Ephesus ; but then a bishop in those 
 days, I suspect, was very different in his functions from 
 those who subsequently ruled the Church in that name. 
 The elders in any large congregation of Christians 
 would probably be considerable in point of numbers ; 
 and it would be found necessary for the ordinary con- 
 duct of business, that some individual should act as 
 president or chairman in their meetings. For this 
 purpose some one distinguished by abilities, character 
 or station, would naturally be elected; and if he dis- 
 charged the duties of his office to the satisfaction of 
 his brethren, it is highly probable that the office would 
 become permanent in his person; and that on his 
 death or removal another elder would be appointed to 
 succeed him. If this were so, a name would evidently 
 be required for the new office ; and as of the two words 
 previously in use, bishop and elder, the former in its 
 meaning imported authority, it would naturally be 
 preferred as the title of him to whom the presidency 
 was committed. I beg it may not be understood that 
 
208 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 I assert this to have been the origin of episcopacy ; I 
 only say that it seems probable that it was so. All 
 which I am concerned with is, whether by the author- 
 ity of the apostles, expressed in the New Testament, 
 two separate orders of ministers in the Church were 
 established under the names of bishops and elders. 
 The first epistle to Timothy seems to me to afford no 
 ground for that opinion. 
 
 In the second epistle to Timothy we find the fol- 
 lowing verse: “ The things which thou hast heard of 
 me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to 
 faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also*.”’ 
 It would be difficult to produce a stronger instance of 
 the creative faculty by which divines contrive to make 
 something out of nothing, than in the interpretations 
 which Whitby tells us have been given to this very 
 plain text. “That deposition (chap. i. 14) which I 
 committed to thee, in the public assembly, at thine 
 ordination, do thou also, in like manner, deposit with 
 other faithful men, that the truth may be continued 
 in an uninterrupted succession of such persons.” So 
 Obadiah Walker. ‘The things agreed on, and con- 
 sented to by all the other apostles, do thou commit 
 to able men, and appoint them as bishops of the 
 several churches under thee.” So Dr. Hammond. 
 Well does Whitby add, “I think there is no founda- 
 tion for all this in the text.” In spite of the reproof 
 of honest Dr. Whitby to these makers of new scrip- 
 tures, divines have gone on, and are going on vigor- 
 ously in the same course, making additions to the 
 Scriptures according to their own inclinations and 
 
 * 2 Timothy, ii, 2. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 209 
 
 fancies. Happily the Scriptures afford satisfactory 
 and abundant evidence to overturn all the wild imagi- 
 nations of men. | 
 
 The following passage is from the epistle to Titus: 
 “ For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou should- 
 est set in order the things that are wanting, and 
 ordain elders in every city as I had appointed thee : 
 if any be blameless, the husband of one wife, having 
 faithful children, not accused of riot, or unruly. For 
 a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God ; 
 not selfwilled, not soon angry, not given to wine, no 
 striker, not given to filthy lucre ; but a lover of hos- 
 ' pitality, a lover of good men, sober, just, holy, tem- 
 perate; holding fast the faithful word as he hath 
 been taught, that he may be able by sound doctrine 
 both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers*.” 
 cannot conceive how anything short of a predeter- 
 mination that bishops and elders were different can 
 prevent any one from seeing that the word bishop in 
 the 7th verse of the passage quoted above means one 
 of the same order to which the term elders was ap- 
 plied in the 5th verse. I can discover nowhere in 
 the New Testament the slightest ground for supposing 
 that bishops were distinguished from elders in the 
 time of the apostles, except in the way above men- 
 tioned. 
 
 I have no further remark to make on the undis- 
 puted epistles of St. Paul. From the extracts which 
 have been made, and from their general tenor, it is to 
 my mind perfectly clear that the apostle taught, as his 
 Master had always done, that a religious and virtuous 
 life is the essential condition of our being admitted 
 
 * ‘Titus 1275—-9; 
 
210 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 to a state of happiness in the world to come. On the 
 second point to which I have directed the attention 
 of the reader, there appears no reason whatever to 
 believe that the apostle either established or recognized 
 an order of teachers called bishops of higher authority 
 in the Church than the elders. Bishops and elders 
 appear in his writings, as well as in his speech to the 
 elders of Ephesus*, to have been merely different 
 terms appled to the same individuals. 
 
 We are now led, in the course of our investigation, 
 to a very remarkable production, the epistle to the 
 Hebrews. In the version in common use in this 
 country it is called the Epistle of Paul the apostle to — 
 the Hebrews. It is, however, well known that great 
 doubts exist as to the apostle being really the 
 author of the epistle; and that there has been much 
 controversy on the subject. Arguments of great 
 weight have been produced on both sides of the 
 question, and those who, on studying the matter in 
 dispute, come to the conclusion that St. Paul was 
 probably the author of the epistle, can hardly attain 
 such an unhesitating conviction as we yield to those 
 epistles which bear the apostle’s name, and which 
 have in all ages of the Church without doubt or con- 
 troversy been ascribed to him. Under this uncer- 
 tamty I shall treat the epistle as an independent 
 document, with whose author we are unacquainted ; 
 and examine its contents in order to discover whether 
 or not it agrees on the points which we have been 
 considering with what we find in the gospels and in 
 the undisputed epistles of St. Paul. The epistle may 
 be divided into two parts: the object of the first 
 
 * Acts, xx. 18. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. PAL 
 
 appearing to be to assert the superiority of the Chris- 
 tian to the Jewish dispensation; and the second, 
 setting forth the excellence of faith, enforcing with 
 great earnestness and eloquence the duties of life ; 
 and holding out encouragement to Christians by ex- 
 amples drawn from the Old Testament history. The 
 earlier part of the epistle ranks among the most 
 obscure of the writings in the New ‘Testament. 
 When we consider that this epistle was written 
 before the destruction of Jerusalem ; when the temple 
 service with all the burdensome ceremonies of the 
 Jewish ritual was still in existence, we can scarcely 
 wonder that a work full of references to the forms 
 and ceremonies of the Jewish religion, to which the 
 destruction of the temple at Jerusalem, which took 
 place within a few years of the writing of the epistle*, 
 put an end, and with which our acquaintance is 
 necessarily imperfect, should contain much which, at 
 the present day, we are unable to understand. With 
 these difficulties we have nothing to do here. I shall 
 endeavour to show hereafter that Christians have often 
 been unnecessarily alarmed on finding themselves un- 
 able to understand the obscurer parts of Scripture ; 
 and that their ill-founded fears have been encouraged 
 and exaggerated by those who have assumed an au- 
 thority in the Christian Church to which they have no 
 legitimate title; and who have made religion sub- 
 servient to their own ambition and interest. At 
 present our business is to examine the epistle to the 
 Hebrews for the purposes stated above. The passages 
 to which I refer are as follows: “For if we wilfully 
 
 * Lardner thinks it probable that the epistle was written a.p. 63, 
 The destruction of Jerusalem was a.p. 70. 
 
 p 2 
 
Ue by THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 sin after that we have received the knowledge of the 
 truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, 
 but a certain fearful looking-for of judgment and fiery 
 indignation, which shall devour the adversaries ;” * 
 “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without 
 which no man shall see the Lord.’+ ‘These texts 
 clearly show that the author of the epistle held no 
 other doctrine as to the necessity of a good life than 
 what had been taught by Jesus and his apostles. 
 
 I shall mention two other texts which bear relation 
 to the second part of our inquiry: “‘ Remember them 
 which have the rule over you, who have spoken unto 
 you the word of God: whose faith follow, considering 
 the end of their conversation :” ‘“ Obey them that have 
 the rule over you, and submit yourselves: for they 
 watch for your souls, as they that must give account, 
 that they may do it with joy, and not with grief: for 
 that is unprofitable for you.” { These texts are im- 
 portant as directing respect and obedience to be paid 
 by Christians to their teachers. The situation of the 
 instructors in the infant Christian Church differed in 
 some important particulars from that of those who 
 devote themselves to the duties of the ministry in our 
 own days. The early teachers in general had pro- 
 bably received personal instructions from the apostles ; 
 and were appointed by them, in concurrence with the 
 respective congregations, to the ministerial office. A 
 considerable time too must have elapsed before the 
 writings which we call the New Testament became 
 generally accessible. This could have been effected 
 only by the tedious and laborious copying of manu- 
 scripts. The Christians therefore of those days must 
 
 * Heb. x. 26, 27. .” + ‘Heb? xiii 14.) ~t Hebrxni’7-17 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. PAs 
 
 have looked almost exclusively to the oral instructions 
 of their teachers; and, of course, obedience to these 
 instructions would be required of them. To set them- 
 selves against their teachers would be throwing off the 
 only legitimate authority to which they were in a 
 condition to refer. Notwithstanding, however, these 
 differences, there is much in the position and circum- 
 stances of those who now exercise the Christian 
 ministry to entitle them to the respect, and, to a con- 
 siderable extent, to the obedience of their hearers. 
 They are in general persons of much superior educa- 
 tion to the far greater part of their congregations, 
 and they are by profession devoted to the cause of 
 religion. It is their proper business to lead the devo- 
 tional services of the church; to give the word of 
 exhortation; to alarm the guilty; to console the 
 afflicted ; to encourage the penitent. To them the 
 indigent look for assistance, the sick and the dying 
 for support and consolation. A. life spent in these 
 outward acts of religion can hardly fail to improve 
 and elevate the inner man; and to raise his character 
 above that of those who are deeply engaged in the 
 affairs of the world. I cannot doubt that the clergy 
 of all denominations are in general superior in all that 
 pertains to religion and morals to the laity. Nor can 
 we reasonably hesitate to admit that the clergy are 
 commonly far more acquainted with the Scriptures 
 than the laity. Ignorance should in all cases yield to 
 knowledge ; and it seems reasonable that on all points 
 which the layman has not examined for himself, he 
 should adopt the sentiments of his clerical instructors. 
 But the authority of the clergy must not be strained 
 too far. ‘The Scriptures are open to all; and every 
 
214 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 man, according to his ability and opportunities, has a 
 right to search and examine their contents for himself. 
 There is nothing in the New Testament to deprive 
 the laity of this right. When laymen seriously study _ 
 the Scriptures they have an important advantage over 
 the clergy, which may be justly considered equivalent 
 to the regular training of the latter. The clergy of 
 all established churches are bound to the profession 
 of creeds and articles; and if their researches should 
 lead to any conclusions inconsistent with the doctrines 
 professed by the church to which they belong, they 
 must, as honest, conscientious men, resign their situa- 
 tions in the church; which, in numberless mstances, 
 afford the sole means of subsistence to themselves and 
 their families. With how strong a bias will the 
 generality of men so circumstanced study the Scrip- 
 tures! Here and there an individual is found to give 
 up all worldly advantages for conscience sake; but 
 these instances are, and probably always will be, 
 extremely rare. But it may be said that the dissent- 
 ing clergy are in more favourable circumstances in 
 their study of the Scriptures. This is m some degree 
 true as to those religious sects which recognize the 
 authority of the Scriptures only, and profess to owe 
 no obedience to creeds and articles formed by fallible 
 men. These are, however, but a very small part of 
 the great body of dissenters; and even with respect 
 to them, the advantage is more apparent than real. 
 The mere circumstance of a congregation assembling 
 for religious worship implies the existence of some 
 bond of union which holds them together. Whatever 
 this may be, it must extend as well to the minister as 
 to his flock; and consequently if he is led by his 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 215 
 
 study of the Scriptures to abandon it, he must either 
 play the hypocrite, or resign his situation. The lay- 
 man who sits down to the study of the Bible may, 
 if his conviction should require it, abandon the 
 church or sect to which he belongs without the 
 distressing sacrifice which the minister of religion has 
 to make. He will, it is true, probably be branded 
 with the name of apostate, and condemned for for- 
 saking the religion of his fathers. He may be looked 
 on coldly by his relations and friends, and may be 
 somewhat lowered in his social position; but these 
 are light evils to endure for conscience sake ; and the 
 real lover of truth will but little regard them. Very 
 encouraging are the examples of those laymen who 
 have seriously devoted their attention to the study 
 of the Scriptures. The serious, pious, and humble 
 student of Holy Writ may derive most important 
 assistance in his researches from laymen who have 
 travelled in the same path, and laboured in the same 
 field. Few but the ignorant and bigoted of those 
 who are competently acquainted with their works 
 will fail deeply to feel, and gratefully to acknowledge 
 their obligations to Grotius, Locke, and several other 
 laymen. “Grotius,’’ says Doddridge, “has done 
 more to illustrate the Inspired Writings, by what is 
 called profane learning, than all the commentators 
 put together. No man possessed a more extensive 
 and accurate knowledge of the Greek and Latin 
 writers, and no man has more successtully applied 
 them to sacred criticism.”’ 
 
 The epistle of St. James is held in no favour by 
 those who consider that faith alone is necessary to 
 our salvation. It has been thought by many that the 
 
216 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 doctrine contained in this epistle is inconsistent with 
 what was taught by St. Paul. I am fully satisfied 
 that there is no such inconsistency. It has been 
 shown already that the apostle Paul lays it down that 
 the remission of sins and the beatitudes of heaven are 
 . the free gift of God; but that a righteous life is an 
 essential condition of our obtaining these mestimable 
 blessings. The doctrine of St. James will be found 
 perfectly consistent with that of St. Paul. That the 
 former esteemed a good life essential to our salvation 
 is apparent, as well from the general drift of the 
 epistle as from particular texts. “Lay apart,” he 
 says, “all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, 
 and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which 
 is able to save your souls. But be ye doers of the 
 word, aud not hearers only, deceiving your own 
 selves. Pure religion and undefiled before God and 
 the Father is this, to visit the .fatherless and widows 
 in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from 
 the world *.” The following large portion of the 
 second chapter gives us fully the doctrine of St. 
 James as to the necessity of good works: ‘“ What 
 doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he 
 hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him? 
 If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily 
 food, and one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, 
 be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give 
 them not those things which are needful to the body ; 
 what doth it profit? Even so faith, if it hath not 
 works, is dead, bemg alone. Yea, a man may say, 
 Thou hast faith, and [ have works: shew me thy faith 
 without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by 
 * < Jamés, 1; 215:22)'27: 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 7 Oe 
 
 my works. Thou believest that there is one God ; 
 thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble. 
 But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without 
 works is dead? Was not Abraham-our father justi- 
 fied by works, when he had offered Isaac his son 
 upon the altar? Seest thou how faith wrought with 
 his works, and by works his faith was made perfect ? 
 And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham 
 believed God, and it was imputed unto him for right- 
 eousness: and he was called the Friend of God. Ye 
 see then how that by works a man is justified, and 
 not by faith only. Likewise also was not Rahab the 
 harlot justified by works, when she had received the 
 messengers, and had sent them out another way? 
 For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith 
 without works is dead also *.” 
 
 We come now to the epistles of the first of the 
 apostles ; and we shall find him perfectly consistent 
 in his instructions with what we have shown to be 
 the doctrme of the Gospels, the Acts, and those 
 Hpistles which have been already examined. ‘The 
 time past,” says St. Peter, “‘ of our life may suffice us 
 to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we 
 walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revel- 
 lings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries : wherein 
 they think it strange that ye run not with them to 
 the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you: who 
 shall give account to him that is ready to judge the 
 quick and the dead y.’’ The apostle gives the fol- 
 lowing instructions to the elders and others: ‘“ The 
 elders which are among you I exhort, who am also 
 an elder, and a witness of the suffermgs of Christ, 
 
 * James, ii. 14-26. + 1 Peter, iv. 3-5. 
 
218 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed : 
 feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the 
 oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly ; 
 not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind; neither as 
 being lords over God’s heritage, but being ensamples 
 to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd shall 
 appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth 
 not away. Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves 
 unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to. 
 another, and be clothed with humility: for God re- 
 sisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble *.” 
 Neither here, nor in any other part of the New ‘Testa- 
 ment, do we find anything to sanction the claims of 
 the clergy to such authority over the laity as is as- 
 sumed by the church of Rome; and by such of the 
 Protestants as profess what are called High Church 
 principles. The following texts clearly imply the 
 necessity of obedience to the commandments of God ; 
 and consequently that faith alone is not sufficient for 
 salvation: “For if after they have escaped the pollu- 
 tions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord 
 and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again entangled 
 therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with 
 them than the beginning. For it had been better 
 for them not to have known the way of righteousness, 
 than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy 
 commandment delivered unto them +.” 
 
 I quote the following texts from the first epistle of 
 St. John to show that he considered a righteous life 
 essential to the Christian character. ‘‘ Love not the 
 world, neither the things that are in the world. If 
 any man love the world, the love of the Father is not 
 
 * | Peter, v. 1-5. + 2 Peter, 1. 20, 21. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION- 219 
 
 in him. For all that is i the world, the lust of the 
 flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is 
 not of the Father, but is of the world*.”’ “In this 
 the children of God are manifest, and the children of 
 the devil; whosoever doeth not righteousness is not 
 of God, neither he that loveth not his brother +.” 
 “We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth 
 not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, 
 and that wicked one toucheth him not t.” In his 
 second epistle the apostle says, “ And this is love, 
 that we walk after his commandments. This is the 
 commandment, that, as ye have heard from the be- 
 ginning, ye should walk in it$.” So in his third 
 epistle: ‘‘ Beloved, follow not that which is evil, but 
 that which is good. He that doeth good is of God: 
 but he that doeth evil hath not seen God||.”’ In the 
 short and very obscure epistle of St. Jude I find 
 nothing particularly applicable to the subjects of which 
 1 have been treating. 
 
 We have now arrived at the last book of the 
 New Testament, the Revelation, of which the apostle 
 John is generally believed to be the writer, although 
 some have ascribed it to another author. The fol- 
 lowing texts will clearly show that the doctrine of 
 this book as to the necessity of good works to our 
 salvation is precisely the same as we have seen laid 
 down in the other books of the New Testament. 
 “‘ And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before 
 God; and the books were opened: and another book 
 was opened, which: is the book of life: and the dead 
 were judged out of those things which were written 
 
 © ie Jonnpar t5,0165 4+ ki John, i910. +t) John, vi118% 
 § 2 John, 6. || 3 John, 11. 
 
220 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 in the books, according to their works, And the sea 
 gave up the dead which were in it; and death and 
 hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and 
 they were judged every man according to their 
 works*.” “And, behold, I come quickly; and my 
 reward is with me, to give every man according as 
 his work shall bet.” | 
 
 The angels of the seven churches mentioned in the 
 early part of the Revelation are generally, and | think 
 rightly, understood to be their bishops. We shall 
 have to inquire presently whether there be a just 
 foundation for the conclusion which has been some- 
 times drawn from these texts. 
 
 Our Saviour is several times called a priest in the 
 epistle to the Hebrews, and in the following text the 
 word priests is applied to pious and virtuous Chris- 
 tians: “ Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a 
 spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spi- 
 ritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. 
 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, 
 an holy nation, a peculiar people}.’ “ And hath 
 made us kings and priests unto God and his Father §.”’ 
 « And hast made us unto our God kings and priests|.”’ 
 “Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first 
 resurrection: on such the second death hath no 
 power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, 
 and shall reign with him a thousand years4.” 
 
 I have now gone through the whole of the New 
 Testament with a view to ascertain what are the 
 leading and most important doctrines of the Christian 
 religion; and I have arrived at the following con- 
 
 * Rev. xx. 12,13. + Rev. xxii. 12. {1 Peter, 1. 5, 9. 
 § Rev. 1. 6. | Rev. v. 10. q Rev. xx. 6. 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 221 
 
 clusions: That Christianity is a dispensation of mercy 
 and goodness with which it has pleased Almighty 
 God to bless the human race through the instrument- 
 ality of his Son our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, 
 whom he sent into the world to seek and to save that 
 which was lost; that as all men had become sinners 
 by failing to yield obedience to the Divine law, all 
 were liable to punishment, and therefore in need of 
 forgiveness ; that Jesus Christ was authorized by God 
 to declare not only forgiveness of sins, but the un- 
 speakable gift of a happy eternity to those who believe 
 in him, and live in obedience to the laws of God; 
 that the first and greatest of the commandments is, 
 to love the Lord our God with all our hearts and 
 souls, minds and strength, and the second, to love our 
 neighbours as ourselves; that our Saviour inculcates 
 humility, purity, fortitude, and all that the best and 
 wisest moralists have called virtue; and that, as an 
 essential part of the Divine dispensation, Jesus Christ 
 devoted himself to the instruction of his hearers, gave 
 them im his own person a perfect example of a re- 
 ligious and virtuous life, wrought miracles im at- 
 testation of his Divine mission, endured privation and 
 persecution, submitted to a most painful and igno- 
 minious death upon the cross, rose from the dead on 
 the third day, and, after many interviews with his 
 disciples, and giving them instructions to promulgate 
 his religion in the world, ascended into heaven. ‘The 
 New Testament further informs us that the apostles 
 professed to be the chosen witnesses of their Master’s 
 resurrection ; claimed to be endued with supernatural 
 power; and that they engaged in a life of peril, and 
 suffered persecution in their efforts to convert the 
 
yAa THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 world to the religion of Jesus Christ. I have found 
 that throughout the Acts, the Epistles, and the Re- 
 velation the same doctrines are uniformly taught. 
 The object of Christianity is frequently said in the 
 Epistles to be, to reconcile man to God, that is, to 
 induce him to repent of his sins, to believe in the 
 Divine mission of Jesus Christ, and to live in obe- 
 dience to the commandments of God. The notion 
 that the end of the mission of Christ was to reconcile 
 God to man, arose at a subsequent period ; and, ex- 
 tensively as it has prevailed in the world, it has no 
 scriptural foundation. ‘The language of the New Tes- 
 tament is, that God sent his Son into the world to 
 save sinners. Goodness and mercy have always cha- 
 racterized the dispensations of the Almighty to his 
 human creatures; and the end of all is to brmg them 
 to a just sense of his unspeakable perfections, and to 
 an imitation of his moral attributes. Piety and virtue 
 are the only road to happiness; or, to speak more 
 correctly, they are the main constituents of happiness. 
 A man of exalted piety, and of benevolence extended 
 to all whom he can in any way benefit, has in himself 
 a continually flowing spring of felicity which the 
 world can neither give nor take away. All the dis- 
 pensations of God are intended to lead his human 
 creatures to this state. The Greek philosophers, 
 especially the Stoics, went to extravagant lengths in 
 representing man as capable of rising above the 
 influence of external circumstances, and, being happy 
 in himself, to whatever evils from without he might 
 be exposed. This is not, nor ever can be, the con- 
 dition of man in this world, constituted as it is 
 at present. Bodily pain, imprisonment, indigence, 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. PAN | 
 
 accidents, diseases, disappointment, calumny, loss of 
 friends, and numberless others of the “ills that flesh 
 is heir to,’ will always be afflictive to the best; and 
 those who have reached the highest elevation of piety 
 and virtue will still, under such afflictions, be very 
 far from the enjoyment of perfect happiness. In the 
 main principle, however, that we must look chiefly 
 to ourselves for our felicity, the philosophers were 
 perfectly right ; and when we add to this the sancti- 
 fying belief that we owe -all we have and all we. are 
 to the great Creator, and that to Him through Jesus 
 Christ we are indebted for the inestimable blessings 
 seeured to us by the Christian religion, we have laid 
 a just foundation for that elevation of soul, which, 
 although it cannot destroy entirely the evils which 
 surround us, tends more and more to lessen their 
 force, and is the commencement of that state of pure 
 and spiritual happiness which we hope will be per- 
 fected in the world to come. 
 
 It may be thought strange by some that I have 
 confined my inquiries in this work to the New Tes- 
 tament, without adverting to the Old, which the 
 generality of Christians seem to think of equal au- 
 thority and importance. ‘Tull, however, I shall be 
 better informed, I must hold the New Testament to 
 be the institute of the Christian religion. Every 
 sincere disciple of Jesus Christ will willingly accord 
 all the authority to the Old Testament which he 
 ascribed to it. Some may think that this extends to 
 the whole, from the first verse of Genesis to the last 
 of Malachi: others may be of opinion, that while 
 the Divine authority of the Mosaic law is admitted, 
 and the prophets are spoken of as illuminated by 
 
224 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 wisdom from on high, there is no sufficient reason to 
 think that our Saviour ever taught that Moses was 
 inspired to instruct the Israelites in science ; or that 
 the history of the Jews is free from errors such as are 
 found in the histories, particularly of the earlier periods, 
 of all nations. Whatever view may be taken of this 
 subject, let all, however fully persuaded in their own 
 minds, refrain from censuring others. 
 
 It will be perceived by every reader that the ac- 
 count which I have given of the leading doctrines of 
 the Christian religion is plain, simple, and easily un- 
 derstood. A revelation of the will of God, intended 
 for all, must surely be intelligible to all. Too many 
 indeed have treated Christianity as a revelation in 
 which nothing is revealed; and have taught men to 
 look for instruction in religion, not directly to Christ 
 and his apostles, but to the creeds and articles of fal- 
 lible men; all indeed professing to be derived from 
 the Scriptures, but differing most widely in the various 
 churches and sects into which the Christian world 
 is divided; each party, in general, condemning all the 
 others; and not a few exhibiting to the world the 
 lamentable spectacle of weak and erring man presu- 
 ming, not only to enforce on others his own religious 
 convictions, but to consign to everlasting punishment 
 those who refuse to receive his dogmas. The church 
 of Rome, which assumes to be infallible, may con- 
 sistently condemn those who deny its claims, and 
 dispute its creed; but nothing can be more glaringly 
 inconsistent, than that Protestants, who justify their 
 separation from the church of Rome by the right of 
 private judgment, should deny the same right to others 
 which they themselves have exercised. If there be an 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 225 
 
 infallible church, let us all submit to it; if not, every 
 one must be left to the exercise of his own judgment. 
 There is no sense in any middle scheme. 
 
 I will here anticipate an objection which may per- 
 haps be made to what I have said, that the leading 
 doctrines of the Christian religion are so plain that all 
 may understand them; and that the instructions of 
 our Saviour and of the early teachers, whose discourses 
 and writings are contained in the New Testament, are 
 a sufficient, and should be our only authority, in the 
 formation of our religious opinions. It is true, it may 
 be urged, that much which is taught by our Saviour 
 and the early teachers is plain and easily understood ; 
 but it is equally true that a large portion of their in- 
 structions, as indeed you have acknowledged, is of very 
 difficult interpretation, and has, from its obscurity, 
 occasioned great diversity of opinion in the Christian 
 world. Now, as these obscure parts of Scripture must 
 be allowed to be of equal authority with the plainer 
 ones, is it not a matter of necessity that some guides 
 should be found to explain to the general mass of 
 Christians, who cannot be conceived equal to the task, 
 what is the true meaning of these difficult portions of 
 the same volume? My first answer to this objection 
 is, that although every thing that is said or written 
 by Jesus Christ and his apostles, and other authorised 
 teachers, is true, it is by no means to be conceded 
 that every part of their instructions is of equal import- 
 ance to us. Some of their teachings were, no doubt, 
 intended for the instruction of Christians: in all ages 
 and nations ; while many others had reference to the 
 particular circumstances of the age, and especially to 
 the opinions, passions and prejudices of the Jews. 
 
 Q 
 
226 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Much of the writings of the apostle Paul was intended 
 to explain and defend what was to the Jews a mystery 
 —that is, a thimg hidden,—that the Gentiles were to 
 be admitted to equal religious advantages with them- 
 selves. This doctrine was directly opposed to the 
 most cherished opinions and feelings of the Jewish 
 nation; and on that account was strenuously urged 
 and insisted on by the apostle. It is plain that with 
 this part of his writings we can have little concern. 
 No one now thinks it extraordmary that the Great 
 Being, who created all men, should extend his care 
 to all; and the only wonder with us is, that the 
 Jews should have clung so fondly to the notion that 
 their nation was exclusively the favourite of the Deity, 
 although the Psalmist had ages before declared that 
 God’s tender mercy is over all his works. My second 
 answer to the supposed objection is, that I can see no 
 reason to believe that mistakes in the interpretation 
 of the obscurer parts of the Scriptures can endanger 
 any man’s salvation. If this were so, how could the 
 most learned, the wisest, and the best be safeP Can 
 a man be found so besotted by self-conceit, as to 
 imagine that the sense he puts upon every text of 
 Scripture is precisely that which the writer intended 
 to convey? Human folly and presumption can scarcely 
 go so far as this. Let not my readers suppose that I 
 have any hope or wish to insulate each individual of 
 the human species from all around him, and to de- 
 stroy or loosen those ties which connect man with 
 man. Lvery one is bound to look with respect and 
 deference to those who are his superiors in ability 
 and learning. Children must and ought to defer to 
 the opinions of their parents and masters; and the 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 227 
 
 laity, who have not examined for themselves, will be 
 in a great measure guided by their clergy. All this 
 is right and proper in the present condition of the 
 world, nor does it seem likely it will ever be mate- 
 rially altered. The progression of human opinion will 
 probably go on as it has hitherto done. The few will 
 think and inquire; the many will be content to yield 
 assent to the opinions of those around them. When 
 erroneous opinions have long been extensively professed 
 by a large majority, and particularly by those who, 
 from filling exalted stations in the world, exercise 
 great influence over the minds of others, they will be 
 adhered to with a tenacity which the greatest force of 
 reason and argument will, with great difficulty, if at 
 all, overcome. Those who are opposed to established 
 opinions are not likely, in our age and country, to 
 expose themselves to persecution as in former times : 
 but they will be fortunate if they escape misrepre- 
 sentation and calumny. “No religion,” it is truly 
 observed by Lardner, “can be so absurd and unrea- 
 sonable, especially when it has been established, and 
 is of a long time, that will not find men of good abi- 
 lities, not only to palliate and excuse, but also to 
 approve and justify and recommend its greatest ab- 
 “surdities.” There is so much of feeling, and so much 
 of fear in the general sentiments respecting religion, 
 as greatly to disturb the reasoning powers, and, con- 
 sequently, to lead to great errors. On no subject is 
 it so difficult for the human mind to arrive at that 
 calm and unimpassioned state which is essential to 
 the investigation of truth, as on religion. Few indeed 
 are able to emancipate themselves from the seductions 
 of the imagination, and the powerful impulses of the 
 Q 2 
 
928 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 passions. And let us not fondly imagine that we 
 could have formed human nature on a better plan 
 than He who made it what it is. The strength of our 
 passions, and of the affections which spring from them, 
 may be justly ranked among the most important and 
 beneficial elements of the human character; tending, 
 on the whole, to give stability to religion and virtue. 
 Reluctance to change religious opinions must exist i 
 the minds of all on whom they have had a powerful 
 practical influence. There will always be a severe 
 conflict in a well-disposed and amiable mind in adopt- 
 ing sentiments differing with those of parents, bro- 
 thers and sisters, instructors and friends; and the 
 struggle will be hardest with those who have at- 
 tained the highest degree of religious and virtuous 
 character. Still the love of truth ought to be para- 
 mount. ‘To this we owe the transition from paganism 
 to Christianity ; to this the Protestant believes that 
 he owes an inestimable blessing in the Reformation ; 
 and to this the most enlightened in our own days are 
 indebted for their emancipation from many of. the 
 errors of the early reformers. And why are we to 
 presume that we have reached the confines of sound 
 scriptural interpretation, and have embraced religious 
 opinions in all particulars just and correct, and with- 
 out a particle of mistake or error? When we are in- 
 formed in the 19th article of the church of England, 
 “that as the church of Hierusalem, Alexandria, and 
 Antioch have erred, so also the church of Rome 
 hath erred, not only in their living and manner of 
 ceremonies, but also in matters of faith ;”” how can 
 we fail from asking ourselves, May not the church of 
 
 England also have erred? Are we to regard the 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 999 
 
 creeds and articles of that church, or those of the 
 church of Scotland, or the dogmas of any church or 
 sect in existence, as infallible? Surely if infallibility 
 is to be asserted of the doctrines of any church, that 
 of Rome, which first put up the claim to it, and 
 whose authority was allowed universally, for many 
 centuries, has the best title. Protestantism rests alto- 
 gether on the right of private judgment ; and a claim 
 of infallibility in any Protestant church or sect is, in 
 truth, surrendering its very essence,—an assumption 
 quite suicidal. To think, and to let think, is the only 
 consistent principle of Protestantism. 
 
 Let it not be supposed, that because the essential 
 doctrines of the Christian religion are plainly laid 
 down, and easily to be understood, that it is an easy 
 matter to be a Christian. It requires the full, earnest 
 purpose of the mind to become so in the highest 
 sense of the term. ‘The difficulty, however, lies not 
 in what we are to believe, but in what we are to be, 
 and what we are to do. Many—lI hope a majority—in 
 the Christian world are to some extent influenced in 
 their conduct and character by Christian motives, 
 which keep them from the commission of the more 
 heinous sins, and lead them to the performance of 
 some of the most important duties of life: but to im- 
 bibe the full spirit of Christianity; to make it the 
 “man of our council and the rule of our life,” this is 
 what few indeed attain; but towards the attainment 
 of which all professing Christianity are bound to 
 strive to the utmost to make the nearest advances in 
 their power. ‘This is the true Christian warfare which 
 is more or less the business of every day of our lives. 
 To arm us for this perpetual conflict with our unruly 
 
230 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 passions and the seductions and temptations of the 
 world, an intimate and frequently renewed acquaint- 
 ance with the practical parts of the Bible, and parti- 
 cularly of the New Testament, is of inestimable m- 
 portance. The serious perusal of a chapter of the 
 New Testament every day can hardly fail to improve 
 a man’s character. I have again and again stated 
 that Jesus Christ stood alone in the world; and that 
 his most intimate associates were very far indeed from 
 fully entering into his views, and realizing the spirit of 
 his instructions. As it was then, so itis at present. The 
 character of Jesus still stands alone in its solitary 
 grandeur, unequalled, unparalleled. Nevertheless he 
 is our great example, and the duty of every Christian 
 is to make as near an approach to his excellences as 
 possible. Nothing can more tend to advance us in 
 this course than the constant study of his history and 
 instructions. By attending to what he did and what 
 he taught, we may hope to imbibe his spirit, and to 
 become really and truly his disciples by regulating 
 the whole of our lives by his. precepts and _ his 
 example. 
 
 As a great object in this work is to show that 
 Christianity may be easily understood; and that, in 
 the quaint language, 1 cannot now recollect of whom, 
 “it is no cunning thing to be a Christian,’ I may fairly 
 be asked whether the means afforded to the common 
 unlearned Christian are sufficient for that purpose ; 
 in other words, whether the English translations of 
 the original Greek Testament are sufficiently accurate 
 to enable an English reader, unacquainted with Greek, 
 to collect from them the leading doctrines of the 
 Christian religion. It will be convenient to narrow 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. PA 
 
 the question, and make the inquiry whether the com- 
 mon authorised version is sufficient for that purpose. 
 This question I am happy to be able to answer 
 decidedly in the affirmative. After having studied 
 the subject for a great many years, and carefully 
 examined the original with this and several other 
 translations, I have no hesitation in giving my 
 opinion, that the common version of the New Testa- 
 ment is, in general, an excellent and accurate trans- 
 lation ; although no candid inquirer can deny that it 
 contains many, and some considerable errors. Neither, 
 however, in that nor in any other English translation 
 with which I am acquainted, will a Sober, rational, and 
 thoughtful reader fail to find distinctly laid down the 
 essential doctrines of the Christian religion. 
 
 But although all that is necessary to make a man 
 a Christian may be found in a translation, there can 
 ‘be no doubt that a fuller and more accurate know- 
 ledge of any book—and the New Testament is not an 
 exception—may be acquired by studying the original 
 than by the best translation. Every language has its 
 peculiar character and idiom, and contains words and 
 phrases which cannot be transferred with perfect clear- 
 ness and precision into any other language. Many 
 ancient manuscripts and versions of the Greek Testa- 
 ment have been examined by learned men, who have 
 been enabled thereby to correct errors, suppress 
 some passages, and add others to the text which were 
 not contained in the edition used by our translators. 
 We have therefore the Greek Testament in a far more 
 correct shape than they had. It is true that trans- 
 lations have appeared from later editions of the Greek, 
 but none of them have supplanted, or seem likely to 
 
Jae THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 supplant, the common version; which is, indeed, in 
 most respects so excellent, and is become so sancti- 
 fied in our minds by its constant use in the public 
 services of the church, and in private study and 
 devotion, as to make it desirable that it should be 
 the basis of any new translation ; and that the altera- 
 tions should be confined to such parts as are erro- 
 neously translated, to what has been added or sub- 
 tracted on sound critical principles by the editors of 
 the Greek text; and to such alterations of the lan- 
 guage as the changes which time has wrought in the 
 English tongue have made expedient. It is strange, 
 and deeply to be lamented, that while classical litera- 
 ture is cultivated with great and increasing assiduity, 
 very few, indeed, of the best-educated laity devote 
 their time to the study of the Greek Testament. Such, 
 however, I fear, is the fact. No doubt this arises 
 principally from a want of that deep interest in 
 religion which its unspeakable importance demands ; 
 but two other causes, I suspect, tend to produce this 
 strange neglect ; first, a prevailing sentiment that the 
 study of the Scriptures is exclusively the business of 
 the clergy ; and secondly, the peculiar character of the 
 language of the New Testament. The first arises from 
 the unwarrantable assumption of authority by the 
 clergy which reached its acme in the church of Rome, 
 and is still successfully claimed and practised in most 
 Protestant churches. The second cause I conceive 
 to operate in this way. The Greek of the New 
 Testament differs materially from that of the classical 
 writers of Greece, whose elegance of style is not 
 attained by any of the writers of the Sacred Volume, 
 although some of them make nearer approaches to it 
 
 ae iis a 
 
THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 233 
 
 than others. It also contains many Hebrew forms of 
 expression quite foreign to classical Greek. I fear 
 that those who are well acquainted with the best 
 writers of ancient Greece, when they sit down to the 
 study of the Greek ‘Testament, are repelled by the 
 homeliness of the style, and the absence of that 
 elegance of expression to which they have been 
 accustomed ; and thus are prevented from pursuing 
 the study of the Scriptures in the original tongue. 
 After all, I freely confess that the second cause 
 assigned’ for the neglect of the study of the Greek 
 Testament is merely conjectural, and that I may be 
 altogether mistaken. With respect to the first cause 
 mentioned above, I can hardly be so. It will be more 
 fully considered in a subsequent part of this work. 
 Before I quit this subject, I must endeavour to 
 impress earnestly on the minds of my readers the 
 necessity of studying the Holy Scriptures with a 
 -humble spirit. Humility, which is little considered 
 by some moralists, and despised by others, finds a 
 prominent place in Christianity. The nature of it, 
 however, is often misunderstood. Humility does 
 not require us to think worse of ourselves than we 
 deserve. We should on all matters endeavour to 
 form a just and accurate judgment of ourselves as 
 well as of others. Every man is bound to do his 
 best for those around him; and the fittest prepara- 
 tion for fulfilling the duties of life is a just sense 
 of what we are able to do. An ill-founded diffi- 
 dence might deprive the world of the advantages 
 derived from the statesman, the divine, or the philo- 
 sopher. Let each individual duly consider what he 
 can do for the good of society in general, and for his 
 
234 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 own family, friends, and connexions, and regulate his 
 conduct accordingly. But to do this effectually he 
 must form a just estimate of his own knowledge and 
 abilities. I have no doubt that in some instances in- 
 dividuals have been prevented from acting their parts 
 in the world efficiently by @ want of that degree of 
 self-reliance to which their talents and acquirements 
 fairly entitled them. Undoubtedly, however, the over- 
 rating of ourselves is a far more common error; and 
 in order to prevent our falling into it, the greatest 
 vigilance, and a deep sense of our weakness and prone- 
 ness to error, are requisite. This is real humility ; and 
 it is an important element of wisdom. A true Chris- 
 tian believes that Jesus Christ and his apostles were 
 sent ito the world on a Divine mission, and there- 
 fore he is bound to receive with submission all that 
 they taught, so far as he apprehends it; and to exert 
 his best powers by a constant and diligent study of 
 the New Testament rightly to understand their in- 
 structions. Let the Sacred Volume be constantly, 
 seriously, humbly, and piously studied; and let its 
 study be accompanied by fervent prayer to Almighty 
 God to assist the student’s researches, and he need 
 yield to no fear of offending his Maker, although he 
 may perhaps expose himself to the censures and ana- 
 themas of those who set themselves up as the Privy 
 Councillors of Heaven, if he should happen to arrive 
 at any conclusions inconsistent with their dogmas. 
 Let him at all times regard with respect and de- 
 ference those who possess greater ability or learning 
 than himself; but refuse to relinquish a particle of the 
 liberty with which Christ has made him free. 
 
235 
 
 PART IV. 
 
 THE PROGRESS, PRESENT STATE, AND FUTURE 
 PROSPECTS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 I sHaLL now proceed to solicit the attention of my 
 readers to some reflections on the progress of Chris- 
 tianity ; the changes which it has made in the con- 
 dition of the world; its present state; and the anti- 
 cipations which we may reasonably indulge respecting 
 its advancement, and its probable future effects on 
 the well-being of the human race. I shall confine 
 myself as much as possible to large and general views 
 of these most important subjects: to treat them in 
 detail would require far more time and labour than I 
 am able to devote to the subject; would swell this 
 book to an inconvenient size; and would be incon- 
 sistent with its main object, which is to bring to- 
 gether in a small compass the evidences and the 
 leading doctrines of natural and revealed religion, 
 and the reflections which are to follow. 
 
 We have seen that the Christian religion made a 
 rapid progress in the world; and that in less than 
 thirty years after the crucifixion, the Christians were 
 cruelly persecuted at Rome by Nero on a false charge 
 of having set fire to the city. This was the first per- 
 secution by the Romans, and’ it was followed by nine 
 others, in which the followers of Christ endured the 
 severest sufferings of every kind; imprisonment, and 
 
236 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 every variety of exquisite torture which the infernal 
 ingenuity of their persecutors could invent, from 
 which death alone relieved them. All this they bore 
 with unshaken fortitude, supported by unhesitating 
 faith in their religion, and a firm reliance on Him 
 who will reward the sufferers for his cause in this 
 world with a “far more exceeding and eternal weight 
 of glory’’ in that which is to come. Worthy of the 
 highest honour is the noble army of martyrs; and 
 when the spirit of discontent begins to stir within us 
 at the ordinary troubles and sufferings of life, let us call 
 to mind what they had to endure, their unconquered 
 fortitude, and their faith and trust in Him who 
 ordereth all things for the best to those who love and 
 serve Him. Let us make it the subject of sincere 
 and heartfelt thanksgiving that we are not called to 
 abide the fiery trial; resign ourselves with entire 
 acquiescence to whatever afflictions our all-bountiful 
 Creator may inflict upon us; and learn to “rejoice in 
 all things with joy unspeakable and full of glory.” The 
 tenth and last persecution of the Christians under the 
 emperor Diocletian appears to have been the most 
 extensive and severe of all; but the time of refresh- 
 ment was at hand. The emperor Constantine, who 
 ascended the imperial throne in the year 306, stopped 
 the persecution, and professed himself a Christian. 
 Christianity became the established religion of the 
 mighty Roman empire. 
 
 Whatever may be thought of the aggressive spirit 
 and the unbounded ambition of the Romans, which 
 led that wonderful people to extend their dominion 
 from the Atlantic ocean in the west to the frontiers 
 of Persia in the east, and from Caledonia in the north 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 230 
 
 to a large portion of Africa, including Egypt, on the 
 south; however a well-regulated, and especially a 
 Christian mind, may think and feel that. much which 
 we are often called on to admire in their history, is 
 in truth deserving of the severest reprobation—it can- 
 not be doubted that the fact of the most civilized 
 parts of the world having been united under one 
 government was eminently favourable to the advance- 
 ment of Christianity when it had become the religion 
 of the state. I cannot, indeed, conceive any other 
 merely human means by which its advance could have 
 been so rapid and so extended. Evil and good, how- 
 ever, are so mingled in this world as to render it in 
 general impossible to attain a large portion of the 
 latter without a considerable infusion of the former. 
 When Christianity was combined with the state, it 
 soon became infected with ambition and worldliness. 
 The early teachers of this heavenly religion had felt 
 that their Master’s kingdom was not of this world. 
 They had assumed no undue authority ; had coveted 
 no worldly honour or power. But when the Chris- 
 tian religion became that of the state, by degrees a 
 hierarchy was established claiming distinctions and 
 authority which the early teachers had never assumed, 
 encroaching more and more on the right of private 
 judgment on one hand, and on the lawful civil power 
 of the state on the other, till in the middle ages the — 
 pope became more than a match for emperors and 
 kings ; and a grinding ecclesiastical tyranny was esta- 
 blished, from which happily a great portion of Kurope 
 was freed by the Reformation ; but which keeps its 
 hold, though with greatly diminished power, over a 
 still larger part of the European nations. 
 
288 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 It will be necessary here to recall our attention to 
 the information which we have derived from the New 
 Testament as to the state and form of Christian 
 churches in the apostolic period. We have seen 
 that the apostles held the highest place, and exercised 
 the greatest power among the primitive Christians, 
 but that they were careful not to push their authority 
 beyond what was necessary for the establishment of 
 their religion; and that they seem on all practicable 
 occasions to have admitted not only the elders, but 
 the whole body of worshippers, to a joint exercise of 
 power with themselves. The apostles selected, pro- 
 bably with the approbation and consent of their 
 respective congregations, persons who are generally 
 denominated elders, but sometimes bishops, to give 
 instruction and to superintend the affairs of the 
 congregations. Some were appointed to administer 
 charities, and probably to manage other affairs of 
 a temporal character, who are called deacons. ‘To 
 these, it appears from some of the epistles of St. Paul, 
 were added women, who are called deaconesses, pro- 
 bably for the like services. I trust I have made it 
 perfectly clear by what has been said already, that 
 the words bishop and elder, or as it is often translated 
 presbyter, were names of the same office. Very early, 
 however, and before the writing of the Revelation, 
 the title bishop appears to have been appropriated in 
 each church or congregation to one elder or presbyter, 
 who enjoyed precedence over the rest. The word 
 made use of in the Revelation to designate this 
 person is not indeed bishop, but angel, one of whom 
 is addressed for each of the seven churches to whom 
 the Revelation is made. These angels, however, have 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 239 
 
 been universally understood to mean the bishops of 
 the respective churches. It is clear then that St. 
 John mentions these angels or bishops as the heads 
 of their churches, but he gives us no information as 
 to the authority which they possessed. Considering 
 that no distinction is made in any other book of the 
 New Testament between bishops and presbyters, and 
 that no apostolical authority can be produced for 
 placing a Christian church under the dominion of a 
 single individual, I cannot think that the bishop 
 ought to be regarded in any other light than the 
 president or chairman of the presbyters. This indeed 
 supposes such a number of teachers in each church 
 as may seem improbable to those who take their 
 ideas of church matters from what they see before 
 their eyes in our own days, But we ought to bear 
 in mind, that at that time there were no clergy, but 
 religious instruction to the congregations was given 
 by those who had their own secular affairs to attend 
 to, and therefore could not give so much of their time 
 to teaching religion as our clergy, who are often ex- 
 clusively devoted to that duty. I see no reason to 
 think that the office of a bishop extended in the time 
 of the apostles, or for a considerable period after- 
 wards, beyond one church or congregation, or at most 
 beyond the churches of one town. Diocesan bishops 
 must have been introduced long afterwards. ‘ Sozo- 
 menus,’ Milton tells us, “who wrote above twelve 
 hundred years ago, in his seventh book, relates from 
 his own knowledge, that in the churches of Cyprus 
 and Arabia (places near to Jerusalem, and with the 
 first frequented by apostles), they had bishops in 
 every village; and what could those be,” he asks, 
 
* 
 
 <3 
 
 240 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 a 
 
 ‘‘more than presbyters*?” A living dignitary of the 
 Church of England who, by many excellent works, 
 has deservedly attained a very high rank in the lite- 
 rary world, after discussing, with great candour, the 
 question of the origin of episcopacy, brings forward 
 an argument which he thinks conclusive against the 
 opinion which has been mentioned above, that the 
 bishop was originally nothing more than the president 
 of the elders or presbyters. ‘“ At a very early period,” 
 he says, “one religious functionary, superior to the 
 rest, appears to have been almost universally recog- 
 nized; at least, it is difficult to understand how, in 
 so short. a time, among communities, though not 
 entirely disconnected, yet scattered over the whole 
 Roman world, a scheme of government popular, or 
 rather aristocratical, should become in form monar- 
 chical +.” It would indeed be difficult to under- 
 stand, and we may add impossible to believe, that 
 bishops possessing such authority as has been claimed 
 and exercised for many centuries, could have arisen 
 at an early period by usurpation over the elders or 
 presbyters who had previously been their equals; but 
 assuming this to be the case, is taking for granted the 
 matter in dispute. We learn from St. John in the 
 Revelation, which Lardner thinks was written about 
 95 or 96 a.p., that bishops existed in the seven 
 churches of Asia Minor mentioned in that book ; but 
 as to the degree of power which they possessed we 
 have no information whatever. As they are addressed 
 as the heads of their respective churches, they must 
 
 * FEikonoclastes, xvii. . 
 t Milman’s (Dean of St. Paul’s) History of Christianity, 
 vol. ii. chap. 4, p. 64. 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 24] 
 
 of course have enjoyed the highest rank; but that 
 their position drew with it such a degree of authority 
 as can justify the application of the term monarchical, 
 remains to be proved. 
 
 I wish to confine myself in this work as much as 
 possible to the New Testament ; but it will be perhaps 
 desirable to introduce a few observations respecting 
 the works of Ignatius, which are thought by many 
 to afford a strong confirmation of the opinion that 
 bishops were originally a separate and superior order 
 in the church to presbyters *. Ignatius, according 
 to Lardner, was bishop of Antioch in Syria, the latter 
 part of the first, and the beginning of the second 
 century. If then we can get an account of the actual 
 state of the church at that very early period, it may 
 render us material assistance in forming at least a 
 probable conjecture as to what was its original form. 
 We shall, however, find great difficulties in our way. 
 The following is Lardner’s account of the works said 
 to have been written by Ignatius. «Besides seven 
 epistles mentioned by Eusebius and Jerome, there are 
 several other epistles which have been ascribed to Ig- 
 natius. But they are now almost universally sup- 
 posed by learned men to be spurious, and I think are 
 plainly so. Of these seven mentioned by Eusebius 
 and Jerome, there are two editions: one called the 
 larger, and oftentimes the interpolated ; and another, 
 called the smaller. And, except Mr. Whiston, and 
 perhaps a few others who may follow him, it is the 
 
 * I use the word presbyters instead of elders, because it has 
 been far more generally adopted ; but the word is unnecessary, as 
 elder is the accurate translation of the original Greek word in the 
 New Testament. 
 
 R 
 
* 
 242 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 general opinion of learned men, that the larger are 
 interpolated, and that the smaller have by far the 
 best title to the name of Ignatius. I have carefully 
 compared the two editions, and am very well satisfied, 
 upon that comparison, that the larger are an inter- 
 polation of the smaller, and not the smaller an 
 epitome or abridgment of the larger. I desire no 
 better evidence in a thing of this nature.” Since 
 Lardner’s time, indeed very lately, considerable light 
 has been thrown on the controversy respecting the 
 epistles of Ignatius; which has induced a learned 
 writer, who has deeply studied the subject, and who 
 supports his opinion by apparently very strong argu- 
 ments, to conclude that three only of these epistles 
 were written by Ignatius; and that even those three 
 have many interpolations in the common edition *.” 
 He has shown that an ancient Syriac MS. contains 
 only these three epistles, and that much that is found 
 in what is called the smaller edition of Ignatius has 
 no place in the Syriac version. ‘The epistles of Ig- 
 natius in the hands of Mr. Cureton shrink into a very 
 small compass indeed. 1am far from intending to 
 enter into the Ignatian controversy, which fills many 
 volumes ; but seems so completely to have lost all 
 interest, that Mr. Cureton tells us that he has never 
 met with one person who professes to have read the 
 celebrated book of Bishop Pearson on the subject. I 
 shall content myself with a few observations on what 
 has been already stated, adding only that many 
 learned men have come to the conclusion that the 
 whole of these epistles are spurious. Let us look at 
 
 * Cureton’s Vindicie Ignatiane, published in 1846 : Cureton’s 
 Corpus Ignatianum, published in 1849. 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 243 
 
 the state of facts already brought forward. I will 
 confine my observations to the seven epistles which 
 have been generally received, leaving the others to 
 their fate. These epistles have come down to us in 
 three different forms; and assuming one or other of 
 them to be genuine, there is room for three different 
 opinions. Either the larger is the genuine edition, 
 and the smaller and the Syriac version are abridg- 
 ments of it; or the smaller is the genuine, to which 
 the larger has considerably added, and from which 
 the Syriac has taken away; or the Syriac version is 
 the original, and has been enlarged by unwarranted 
 additions in the smaller, and still more in the larger 
 edition. ach of these opinions has found supporters 
 among learned men, but the larger much fewer than 
 the smaller edition The Syriac version has been dis- 
 covered since the far greater part of the controversy 
 was written, but the editor expresses his strong con- 
 viction that it is the only genuine edition of the 
 epistles ; that all the other epistles ascribed to Tg- 
 natius are spurious; and that the additions, of which 
 there are many even in the smaller edition, are un-— 
 authorised interpolations. Add to this, that a con- 
 siderable number of learned men have rejected these 
 epistles as altogether spurious; and the difficulty of 
 coming to a satisfactory conclusion about them is 
 greatly enhanced. Now, the question I would ask of 
 any candid and thoughtful man is, whether he can 
 think that, amid all this uncertainty respecting these 
 epistles, any stress can be fairly laid upon them as 
 teaching things not contained in the New Testament ; 
 or rather as giving evidence of the then state of 
 the Christian church, from which we may be led to 
 R 2 
 
944. PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 form different opinions respecting it from those which 
 may be derived from the New Testament? I do not 
 pretend to much reading of the textual controversies 
 about the writings of Ignatius and the other Aposto- 
 lical Fathers, as they are called; but a very slight 
 acquaintance with them will show the student that 
 complaints of interpolations are so frequently made 
 as to lead to very serious doubts as to the integrity 
 of any existing copy of them. In the early ages of 
 the Christian church there is, I fear, too much reason 
 to think that the different parties into which it was 
 divided had little scruple in supporting their opinions 
 by the production of spurious works, and by unau- 
 thorised additions to the works of former writers. 
 This was no difficult task when books could be mul- 
 tiplied only by the laborious copying of MSS., and 
 few readers could have had recourse to the original 
 manuscripts. 
 
 But it may be asked, May not the same thing have 
 happened to the manuscripts of the New Testament ; 
 and what security can we have of the integrity of the 
 Sacred Volume? ‘To this I think it may be fairly 
 answered, that, from the great reverence in which 
 the writings of the New Testament must always 
 have been held, the desire to possess them have led 
 to far more copies being made of them than of any 
 other books; and consequently interpolations would 
 with much greater difficulty find reception in the 
 world. It is indeed remarkable of how very little 
 importance in general are the variations which are 
 found in the ancient manuscripts and versions of the 
 New Testament. Some few of more importance have 
 apparently been introduced for the purpose of sup- 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 245 
 
 porting particular doctrines, but their absence from 
 the older manuscripts and versions affords the means 
 of detecting their spuriousness. The most remark- 
 able of these, the text of the three witnesses, is, I 
 believe, almost universally rejected, and on grounds 
 as satisfactory as any one could possibly expect on 
 such a subject. 
 
 I return with pleasure from the very dim twilight 
 in which we have been groping about after the Tona- 
 tian epistles to the clear daylight of the New Testa- 
 ment. After an attentive perusal of all that is to be 
 found there on this subject, I rise with an unhesi- 
 tating conviction that no plan of perpetual church 
 government was settled by the apostles. That elders 
 were appointed by them in the churches there can be 
 no doubt; and that they sometimes delegated the 
 authority to do so to others, as Titus is directed to 
 ordain or appoint elders in every city. I have already 
 given some reasons why I think it probable that the 
 members of the respective churches took part in these 
 appointments ; but the New Testament is not clear 
 on that head, and I therefore lay no stress upon it. 
 It is, however, certain that at a later period the whole 
 church elected the bishops; and that the tumults 
 attending these popular elections occasioned the 
 choice of the bishops to be afterwards confined to 
 the clergy. Now, if the apostles had appointed an 
 order of men who were to exercise certain powers in 
 the church,-to be themselves the successors of the 
 apostles, and to appoint others to succeed them, it 
 seems perfectly inconsistent with such an arrangement 
 that a popular election of bishops could ever have 
 been introduced. On reviewing the whole matter, 
 
946 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 the just conclusion appears to be, that if the apostles 
 had purposed to lay down any plan of church govern- 
 ment which was to continue in force in all future 
 times, they would have expressly declared their in- 
 tention; and that the silence of the New Testament 
 on the subject affords a conclusive argument that 
 nothing of the kind was intended. The whole matter 
 of church government appears to have been left for 
 all classes and bodies of Christians to arrange for 
 themselves in the best way they could. Freedom of 
 opinion and action is the inestimable possession of 
 every Christian. All may exercise their own judg- 
 ments both as to the doctrines taught in the Scrip- 
 tures, and as to the discipline which is best cal- 
 culated to secure and extend the Christian church in 
 the world. 
 
 It cannot be denied that great and highly beneficial 
 changes have taken place since the introduction of 
 Christianity, which have rendered the state of society 
 far better than that of the ancient republics of Greece 
 and Rome. The Greeks were the civilizers of the 
 world. They laid the foundations of philosophy and 
 science, and pursued them with eminent success. 
 They have left us some of the noblest specimens in 
 most of the higher branches of literature, and remains 
 of architecture so admirable, that the moderns have 
 been able to add nothing to it, although they have 
 invented an architecture of their own of a totally 
 different character, and deserving all admiration. 
 The sculpture of Greece is universally admitted to 
 be to this day unrivalled; and there is good 
 reason to believe that painting had arrived at a very 
 high degree of excellence in Greece, but from its 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 247 
 
 perishable nature, the best specimens have long been 
 lost. The general character of the Roman mind was 
 not inventive, but many of their writers attained the 
 highest eminence in literary composition. Their ex- 
 traordinary talents for war and state affairs; their 
 dauntless courage, their unconquerable tenacity of 
 purpose, their magnanimity under reverses of fortune, 
 the wisdom with which their measures were planned, 
 and the energy with which they were carried into 
 execution, advanced them by degrees to the dominion 
 of the civilized world. . They spread through the vast 
 extent of their dominions all that the world then pos- 
 sessed of art, science, and literature. But although 
 under their rule civilization made great advances, 
 there is a reverse side of the picture which no bene- 
 volent mind can look at without horror and detesta- 
 tion. Dreadful is the scourge of war at all times and 
 under any circumstances, but there is much in modern 
 warfare to distinguish it favourably from the wars of 
 the ancients. It is impossible to read the histories of 
 Greece and Rome without a deep feeling of horror at 
 the recital of the indiscriminate slaughter of men, 
 women, and children, which constantly took place, 
 and of the miseries of the prisoners who were reduced 
 to a state of degraded and wretched slavery. The 
 heart sickens at the recital of these enormities. I will 
 hasten over them as quickly as possible, adverting 
 particularly only to the accounts given by Josephus 
 of what took place at and after the siege of Jeru- 
 salem. ‘That historian tells us, that when the Jews, 
 pressed by famine, left the city in the hope of finding 
 food, and when they were attacked by the Romans, 
 defended themselves, and were taken, they were first 
 
248 | PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 whipped, and then tormented with all sorts of tortures, 
 before they died, and were then crucified before the 
 wall of the city. He says the Romans caught every 
 day five hundred, and sometimes more; and _ that 
 the multitude crucified was so great, that room was 
 wanting for the crosses, and crosses wanting for the 
 bodies. Josephus, after a recital of dreadful cala- 
 mities attending the siege and the taking of the city, 
 informs us that ninety-seven thousand were carried 
 away captive. What treatment these miserable per- 
 sons received we shall now see. ‘“ While Titus,” says 
 the historian, ‘‘ was at Ceesarea, he solemnized the birth- 
 day of his brother (Domitian) after a splendid manner, 
 and inflicted a great deal of the punishment intended 
 for the Jews in honour of him; for the number of 
 those that were now slain in fighting with the beasts, 
 and were burnt, and fought with one another, exceeded 
 two thousand five hundred.” He also mentions, that 
 a still more pompous solemnity took place at Berytus 
 on the birth-day of the emperor Vespasian, “so that,”’ 
 he says, “a great multitude of the captives were here 
 destroyed in the same manner as before.”’ * 
 
 Wretched as was the condition of the captives who 
 were thus cruelly slaughtered, it may be doubted 
 whether that of the survivors was not still more cala- 
 mitous. It would take much more space than I can 
 spare, and would be quite unnecessary, to go into any 
 detail of the wretchedness of those who, having been 
 taken captive in war, were reduced to a state of slavery 
 by the Greeks and Romans. The deplorable condi- 
 tion of these unhappy people is well known; and 
 their numbers were enormously great. The boasted 
 
 * Wars of the Jews, chap. iii. 1. 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 249 
 
 liberty of the ancients was the privilege of the domi- 
 nant few, who held thousands and thousands of men 
 and women of like feeling with themselves in a state 
 of degrading and wretched slavery. ~The patriotic 
 devotion to their country, of which the ancients made 
 their boast, was combined with an utter disregard to 
 justice, mercy, and compassion in their conduct to 
 other nations; and, indeed, to the inhabitants of the 
 Grecian states in their wars with each other. The 
 mild spirit of Christianity, even in the imperfect state 
 in which it has hitherto been received in the world, 
 has done much to mitigate the evils of war and of 
 slavery. Wars are now carried on in a far less fero- 
 cious spirit, and captives in general do not find much 
 to complain of in the treatment which they receive 
 from their conquerors. Slavery has in general ceased 
 to exist among the European nations, and among 
 some of their descendants in America, though it un- 
 happily continues in the slave states of the American 
 Union, among those who consider themselves the 
 freest people on earth. There are, however, indica- 
 tions that its doom is approaching, although no one 
 seems yet to have shown distinctly the best means by 
 which the ultimate emancipation of the negro race 
 may be accomplished. 
 
 The belief of the Jews in one God, the Creator and 
 Governor of the world, is their great distinction from 
 other nations; and the Old Testament abounds in 
 expressions of the most exalted sentiments respecting 
 the Great First Cause. Still the Jews always con- 
 sidered themselves as the peculiar people of God, and 
 had but little sympathy with the Gentile world. It 
 was reserved for Christianity to break down the par- 
 
250 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 tition wall between Jew and Gentile. It offered its 
 blessings to all nations, and represented God as the 
 common Father of all. The ancient nations had each 
 gods of their own, and these fancied deities were 
 believed to aid their respective votaries, and. conse- 
 quently to be often in hostility to one another. The 
 circumstance of all the nations of Christendom having 
 agreed in acknowledging one God and one Saviour 
 has undoubtedly tended to soften animosities, to in- 
 troduce a milder spirit in their mutual intercourse, 
 and to mitigate the horrors of war. Unhappily this 
 softening influence has generally not extended beyond 
 the pale of Christianity. The crusades and other wars 
 with the Mahometans generally were carried on in a 
 spirit of bigoted ferocity; and the treatment of the 
 Jews by Christians in the middle ages was marked 
 with the greatest injustice and cruelty. 
 
 Among the beneficial results of the establishment 
 of Christianity we may with unhesitating confidence 
 place the improved condition of the female sex. What- 
 ever exalted notions have been entertained of the 
 matrons of Greece and Rome, and however interest- 
 ing are the anecdotes of some of them which have 
 come down to us, there cannot be a doubt that the 
 condition of women in most Christian countries is 
 far superior to what it was in any of the ancient 
 nations. ‘The noble and generous, although in some 
 particulars wild and fantastic chivalry of the middle 
 ages, greatly elevated and improved the condition “of 
 the fair sex, and has had lasting and beneficial effects 
 on their state in the world. 
 
 It cannot be denied that civilization and know- 
 ledge, and what in some degree always attends them, 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 25] 
 
 liberty, have made much further advances among the 
 nations of Christendom than in the most enlightened 
 countries of ancient times. ‘True it is that there is 
 still much tyranny and oppression in the Christian 
 world; that in too many countries the many are 
 treated as if they were made for the few; but it can 
 hardly be doubted that even in the worst-governed 
 Christian countries the mass of the people are in a 
 happier condition than that of any nation in the 
 ancient world. No class in Europe is placed in so 
 miserable a state as the slaves in the dominions of 
 Greece and Rome; and those unhappy beings were a 
 very great part of the population. Tyranny and 
 anarchy are the Scylla and Charybdis of politics. If 
 political power is confined to one or a few, tyranny is 
 sure to prevail; if large bodies of people exercise it, 
 it almost necessarily happens that a state of anarchy 
 is the consequence, worse in its effects than the worst 
 of tyrannies. It is in modern and in Christian times 
 that the inestimably beneficial plan of representative 
 government has been introduced. By this admirable 
 invention the political power of the people at large 
 consists chiefly in the election of their representatives, 
 to whom is always committed the whole or a share in 
 legislation, and sometimes the appointment of ad- 
 ministrative and judicial officers. In our own country 
 the representative is by no means considered as a 
 mere delegate. He is sent to parliament, not as the 
 mouthpiece of his constituents, but as a representative 
 of the people in general; and is bound on all oc- 
 casions to give his vote in such a manner as he thinks 
 will best promote the public good. 
 
 But it may be said, that admitting that the great 
 
252 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 improvements in the condition of society which have 
 been enumerated, have arisen since the promulgation 
 of Christianity, it does not follow that the Christian 
 religion is really the cause of the beneficial changes. 
 The business of philosophy is to trace effects to their 
 causes ; but the more the mind has been engaged in 
 philosophical investigation, the more deeply does it 
 feel the difficulties of the task; more particularly in 
 respect of morals and politics, which indeed is nothing 
 more than a branch of morals. As, however, it can- 
 not be denied that civilization and an improved con- 
 dition have existed more extensively, and have been 
 carried further among the nations of Christendom 
 than in any Pagan or Mahometan country; and, as it 
 must be admitted by every candid mind, that the 
 practical principles of the Christian religion are emi- 
 nently favourable to the virtue and happiness of the 
 human race; it is, 1 think, a rational inference, that, 
 although civilization might perhaps have made further 
 advances than it had previously done if Christianity 
 had never been introduced into the world, there is no 
 sound reason for thinking that it could have reached its 
 present state without the aid and influence of Chris- 
 tianity. So far then as this branch of our inquiry 
 goes, we come to the reasonable conclusion, that 
 Christianity has proved a great benefit to the world. 
 One good we undoubtedly owe to it,—the devoting 
 of one day m the week to a cessation from worldly 
 business, a rest from our labours, an attendance on 
 public religious worship, and the reading of the 
 Scriptures and other religious books for our edifi- 
 cation and advancement in religion and virtue. The 
 blessings of this day are inestimable to all, but espe- 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 258 
 
 cially to the lower classes. ‘To the poor man, bowed 
 down by the labours of six days, sometimes called on 
 to make exertions beyond what his constitution can 
 bear, and often employed in occupations of an un- 
 healthy character, which lead to disease, and shorten 
 the duration of life; who comes to his humble home 
 wearied every night, and incapable from fatigue to 
 relish the few enjoyments which it affords; living 
 almost a stranger to his wife and children, and enjoy- 
 ing little of the domestic charities of life which are the 
 best solace of its toils and troubles; to him Sunday is 
 indeed a pearl of great price. On that blessed day 
 he enjoys with his wife and children the sweet de- 
 lights of domestic love, engages in friendly intercourse 
 with his neighbours, and wanders with delight, ac- 
 companied by his wife and children, in the most 
 pleasant places which his neighbourhood affords: in 
 the house of God he feels himself in a state of equal- 
 ity with his rich neighbours, many of whom perhaps 
 usually treat him with indifference, and some with 
 contempt ; he is at home in that place where the rich 
 and poor meet together to worship God, who is the 
 Maker of them all; while in his own habitation some 
 part of the day is employed in the perusal of that in- 
 estimable book which abounds in consolation to the 
 afflicted, in promises of forgiveness to the penitent, in 
 all that precept and example can afford to lead us on 
 to the practice of religion and virtue, and with the ele- 
 vating hope of eternal felicity in the world to come. 
 Sadly indeed are these innocent delights interfered 
 with by those who give to the Lord’s day the austere 
 character of the Jewish sabbath; making it a period 
 of gloom and dejection; and severely condemning 
 
254 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 all innocent recreations. Giving this harsh character 
 to the day of rest arises from a notion that it is a 
 continuation of the Jewish sabbath, the day only 
 being changed from Saturday to Sunday. LExten- 
 sively as this opinion prevails in the Christian world, 
 it rests on no scriptural authority. The Lord’s day 
 is nowhere in the New Testament called a sabbath, 
 or said to take the place of the Jewish sabbath in the 
 Christian dispensation. The apostles were all Jews ; 
 and I see no reason to suppose that they and other 
 Jewish Christians held themselves absolved from obe- 
 dience to the Mosaic law as long as the temple 
 remained standing at Jerusalem, and the temple ser- 
 vices continued. An incident mentioned in the 21st 
 chapter of Acts sets this matter in a clear light. 
 St. Paul, having gone to Jerusalem, gave an account 
 to James and the elders of his success in preaching 
 the gospel to the Gentiles. Then follows this remark- 
 able passage: ‘And when they heard it, they glori- 
 fied the Lord, and said unto him, Thou seest, 
 brother, how many thousands of Jews there are 
 which believe ; and they are all zealous of the law: 
 and they are informed of thee, that thou teachest 
 all the Jews which are among the Gentiles to for- 
 sake Moses, saying that they ought not to circum- 
 cise their children, neither to walk after the customs. 
 What is it therefore? the multitude must needs come 
 together ; for they will hear that thou art come. Do 
 therefore this that we say to thee: We have four men 
 which have a vow on them; them take, and purify 
 thyself with them, and be at charges with them, that 
 they may shave their heads; and all may know that 
 those things, whereof they were informed concerning 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 255 
 
 thee, are nothing ; but that thou thyself also walkest 
 orderly, and keepest the law*.” The apostle assented 
 to this proposal, and then gave a public proof of his 
 obedience to the Mosaic law. But although the apo- 
 stle, as a Jew, conformed to the law, he was, as we 
 have seen already, a strenuous assertor of the entire 
 freedom of the Gentile converts from the law of Moses. 
 “Let no man,” he says, “judge you in meat, or in 
 drink, or in respect of an holiday or of the new moon, 
 or of the sabbath days, which are a shadow of things 
 to come; but the body is of Christ.” It is to my 
 mind perfectly clear, that St. Paul, in these texts, in- 
 cludes the sabbath among the Jewish ordinances 
 which are not binding on Gentile Christians. The 
 Jewish sabbath, then, not being obligatory on Gen- 
 tile Christians, I must ask those who contend for the 
 sabbatical character of the Lord’s day, to show me 
 any passage from the New Testament to prove that it 
 was substituted by our Saviour or his apostles in the 
 place of the Jewish sabbath ; and that we are bound 
 to observe it with the same strictness as was required 
 of the Jews. I have searched the New Testament in 
 vain for such an authority; and I am fully satisfied 
 that none such exists. 
 
 With respect to the Lord’s day, the observance of 
 it as a Christian festival in commemoration of the re- 
 surrection of Christ, was practised by the apostles and 
 early disciples ; and although there is no express com- 
 mand given that it should be observed in all future 
 ages in the Christian church, yet the example of the 
 early Christians, the obvious necessity of setting apart 
 some particular seasons for the celebration of public 
 
 * Acts, xxi20224; 7 Col. ti 16, 17. 
 
 ~ 
 
256 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 religious worship, and the undoubted advantage of a 
 period regularly recurring at no great distance of time, 
 of a day devoted to religious instruction, and to rest 
 from ordinary labour, have induced the Christian world 
 to continue the observance of the Lord’s day, and to 
 attach great importance to it. There is nothing, 
 however, in this which should interfere with mnocent 
 enjoyment. The most pious and the most learned 
 man cannot employ with advantage or improvement 
 all the waking hours of Sunday in public and private 
 prayer, singing praises to God, hearing sermons, read- 
 ing the Scriptures and religious books, and meditations 
 on religious subjects; and to expect this to be done 
 by the working man is a gross absurdity. Supposing 
 then a due portion of the day to be devoted to at- 
 tendance on public worship, and to religious occu- 
 pations at home, how should the remainder of it be 
 spent? I unhesitatingly answer, in any innocent en- 
 joyments which may present themselves to the indi- 
 vidual, and which are not calculated to weaken the 
 impression made on his mind by the duties of the 
 day. The Lord’s day is the proper designation of 
 Sunday, and the name which, I believe, has been in- 
 ~ variably used in legislation respecting it. ‘The word 
 Sabbath was, I think, in this country, first applied 
 to it by the Puritans, and with the use of that word 
 the rigorous observances of the Jewish sabbath were 
 most unjustifiably united to the periodical weekly 
 festival of Christianity. We owe so much of our civil 
 and religious liberty to the Puritans, that I can never 
 think or speak of them but with respect; but in 
 regard to Sunday, and not a few other matters, they 
 fell into what I believe a very large majority of 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 257 
 
 the best-informed, and most thinking Christians agree 
 in esteeming great errors. It is sad to consider how 
 much the religion of love has been disfigured by the 
 unwarranted additions of well-intentioned and truly 
 pious, but strangely mistaken men. One would really 
 think that the opinion of a certain class of divines 
 was, that nothing is so displeasing to the Deity as the 
 happiness of his creatures, in spite of the indications 
 of benevolent design in the works of creation, and of 
 the reiterated assertions of the goodness and mercy 
 of God, both in the Old and in the New ‘Testament. 
 
 Two great steps in advance of humanity were made 
 by the first Christian emperor Constantine ; he abo- 
 lished the cruel punishment of crucifixion, and he laid 
 restraints on the shows of gladiators, although they 
 were not entirely abolished till the reign of Honorius, 
 A.D. 403*. The gladiators were originally captives, 
 slaves, and condemned malefactors, to whom, strange 
 to relate, freeborn citizens sometimes added them- 
 selves. The slaughter in their savage encounters 
 was immense. We are told by Dion Cassius, that 
 after the triumph of Trajan over the Dacians, 10,000 
 gladiators were brought forward to fight with and 
 destroy one anothert. The mind shudders at the 
 thought of the miseries inflicted by these barbarous 
 spectacles. If, on one single occasion, so many human 
 beings were slaughtered, how extensive must have 
 been the destruction of human life during the long 
 period when these spectacles were among the favourite 
 amusements of the Romans ! 
 
 I have represented the Christian religion as a great 
 
 * Justin’s Remarks on Ecclesiastical History, vol. iii. p. 220. 
 
 + Ixviii. 15. 
 
 S 
 
258 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 blessing to the world; and I have no doubt that it 
 has been so, even amid the various corruptions of it 
 which have existed, more or less, in every period of 
 its history, and by which its beneficial influence has 
 been and is greatly impeded. It cannot, however, be 
 in fairness denied that Christianity, though not the 
 cause, has been the occasion of very great calamities. 
 Much of these evils may be traced to the proneness 
 of the human mind to superstition on the one hand, 
 and to enthusiasm on the other; but the far greater 
 part has originated in an unauthorized assumption of 
 spiritual power by the priesthood, and a most unjus- 
 tifiable union of temporal and ecclesiastical authority, 
 which has called in the former to support and enforce 
 by pains and penalties the usurpations of the latter. 
 If the Christian community had been always mindful 
 of the words of Jesus, that his kingdom is not of this 
 world; if, in pursuance of his command, they had 
 refused to call any man lord or father, and if Christian 
 teachers had been mindful of St. Peter’s mjunction, 
 “not to be the lords over God’s heritage,” the greater 
 part of the evils which I am now goimg to enumerate 
 - could never have existed. 
 
 Whether Christianity could have continued by any 
 merely human means to subsist in the world without 
 the protection of the state, is a question which no one 
 can satisfactorily answer. We cannot possibly know 
 what its condition would have been if the powers of 
 the world had been always either adverse or indiffer- 
 ent to it. It is deed easy to assert that God would 
 take care of his own church, and the assertion is true; 
 but how do we know that the protection of religion 
 by the state is not the appoimted means of Divine 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 209 
 
 Providence for its preservation ?. I know not to what 
 conclusion the reflections of others may lead them, 
 but for myself I feel no hesitation in stating my own 
 belief, that a very large majority indeed of the Chris- 
 tian world are Christians, for no other reason than 
 that Christianity is the established religion of their 
 country. I can see nothing in what passes around 
 me to induce me.to believe that one in a thousand, or 
 a much larger number, is a Christian on inquiry and 
 conviction. I shall, however, have to consider state 
 establishments of religion hereafter, and shall, for the 
 present, refrain from any further observations on this 
 subject. 
 
 When the emperor Constantine became a Christian, 
 and the Christian religion was established in the 
 Roman empire, the professors of the faith might have 
 reasonably congratulated themselves that the per- 
 secutions were ended, and that from thenceforth they 
 would be left to peace and security in the profession 
 of their religion. They probably entertained no ap- 
 prehension that the demon of persecution was to 
 assume a new form, and that new sufferings would 
 be inflicted by the dominant party of Christians on 
 those who should presume to dispute their authority 
 on points of religious belief, and hold what they 
 should be pleased to call heretical doctrines. There 
 was, however, introduced shortly after Christianity 
 became the religion of the empire, the notable plan 
 of settling disputes and controversies, not by reason 
 and arguments, but by counting heads. Bishops 
 from all parts of Christendom, with all their errors 
 and prejudices about them, assembled in general 
 councils ; and however great the errors of individuals 
 
260 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 might be, it was assumed that the result of their con- 
 sultations was infallible truth, to which was to be 
 affixed the stamp of orthodoxy; and to dissent from 
 which was deservedly to incur the penalties of im- 
 prisonment, tortures and death in this world, and 
 eternal punishment in the world to come. Perse- 
 cution raged throughout the Christian world ; and the 
 persecutors deemed themselves to do glory to God by 
 tormenting and destroying his creatures. In the 
 lamentable disputes about the Trinity, Athanasians 
 and Arians enjoyed power in turns, and both abused 
 it by the persecution of their opponents, till at length 
 a complete victory was gained by the Athanasians. 
 The following are the sensible remarks of Dr. Jortin 
 respecting general councils :—*“ Let us,” he says, 
 “imagine then a council called by a Christian em- 
 peror, by a Constantine, a Constantius, a Theodosius, 
 a Justinian, and therein four or five hundred prelates 
 assembled together from all quarters, to decide a 
 theological debate. Let us consider a little by what 
 various motives these various men may be influenced, 
 as by reverence to the emperor, or to his counsellors 
 and favourites, his slaves and eunuchs; by the fear 
 of offending some great prelate, as a bishop of Rome 
 or of Alexandria, who had it in his power to insult, 
 vex, and plague all the bishops within and without 
 his jurisdiction ; by the dread of passing for heretics, 
 and of being calumniated, reviled, hated, anathema- 
 tized, excommunicated, imprisoned, banished, fined, 
 - beggared, starved if they refused to submit ; by com- 
 pliance with some active leading and imperious spirits, 
 by a deference to the majority, by a love of dictating 
 and domineering, of applause and respect, by vanity 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 261 
 
 and ambition, by a total ignorance of the question in 
 debate, or a total indifference about it, by private 
 friendships, by enmity and resentment, by old pre- 
 judices, by hopes of gain, by an indolent disposition, 
 by good nature, by the fatigue of attending and a 
 desire to be at home, by a love of peace and quiet, 
 and a hatred of contention, etc. Whosoever takes 
 these things into due consideration, will not be dis- 
 posed to pay a blind deference to the authority of 
 general councils, and will rather be inclined to judge 
 that the council held by the apostles at Jerusalem 
 was the first and the last in which the Holy Spirit 
 may be affirmed to have presided. Thus far we may 
 safely go, and submit to an apostolical synod; but if 
 once we proceed one step beyond this, we go we 
 know not whither. If we admit the infallibility of 
 one general council, why not of another? and where 
 shall we stop? at the first Nicene council a.p. 325, 
 or at the second Nicene council a.p. 736 ? They who 
 disdain private judgment, and believe the infallibility 
 of the church, act consistently in holding the infalli- 
 bility of councils ; but they who take their faith from 
 the Scriptures, and not from the church, should be 
 careful not to require or yield too much regard to 
 such assemblies, how numerous soever*.” The same 
 learned author cites a respectable contemporaneous 
 authority as to the character of one of the general 
 councils. ‘A council of gladiators,’ he observes, 
 “held in an amphitheatre would be as venerable as 
 that of the Constantinopolitan Fathers, if Gregory 
 Nazianzen may be believed +.” 
 
 * Remarks on Ecclesiastical History, vol. iii. pp. 55-57. 
 
 + Ibid. p. 58. 
 
262 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 It is a gross absurdity to pretend to settle any 
 point of faith or opmion by the determination of a 
 majority. In practical matters, where men are to 
 act together for the purpose of attaming a common 
 object, the minority must give way to the majority ; 
 but truth, or even probability of a correct opiion, 
 can never be obtained by an arithmetical process. 
 Assuming our rational faculties alone to be concerned 
 in the matter, any one at all acquainted with the 
 state and progress of human opinion, must be aware 
 that on all subjects which require much thought and 
 reasoning, it is so far from being true that the major- 
 ity have always, or generally been, right, that it is 
 much nearer the truth to say that they have always 
 been wrong. It is to the thmking few in all ages 
 and countries that we must look for the most correct 
 opinions and the furthest advances towards the dis- 
 coveries of truth. ‘The opinions of the thmkmeg and 
 the wise make a slow, but happily a sure progression 
 in the world. Deep thinkers command the assent of 
 a few candid minds im their own age, and often 
 obtain adherents among the young, whose minds are 
 uot enslaved by long-established and inveterate pre- 
 judices. In another generation their opinions spread 
 more extensively, and in the end their truth comes to 
 be generally acknowledged. Neither the Baconian 
 uor the Newtonian philosophy made a rapid progress 
 in the world; but time, the great ally of truth, has 
 long established them. Even the strongest and the 
 most profound minds cannot entirely free themselves 
 from the prejudices of the age in which they live. 
 Literary history gives many curious instances. Har- 
 vey, the great discoverer of the circulation of the 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 263 
 
 blood, is reported to have said of Bacon, that he 
 was no great philosopher, and that he wrote on phi- 
 losophy like a lord chancellor; meaning, I presume, 
 like one whose mind had been chiefly employed on 
 other subjects. Bacon himself rejected with disdain 
 the Copernican system ; and Newton entertained very 
 unjust suspicions as to the tendency of some of 
 Locke’s writings, as he owns in a penitential letter to 
 that great philosopher and excellent man. Shak- 
 speare, universal Shakspeare, seems, in the ‘ Merchant 
 of Venice,’ to have imbibed in its full virulence the 
 persecuting spirit of his age and nation against the 
 Jews, and he makes those whom he wishes us to 
 esteem, restore to Shylock half of his forfeited pro- 
 perty on condition of his performing an act of hypo- 
 crisy in professing himself a Christian. 
 
 But it will be said by the believers in the infalli- 
 bility of general councils, that they were guided in 
 their decisions by the Holy Spirit. Admitting this 
 to be true, it follows that all the previous debates and 
 discussions on the subject must have been totally 
 useless; and that all the malignant feelings which 
 they have never failed to generate have been pure 
 evil unmixed with any good whatever. If indeed the 
 Deity will interfere to show us what is right, nothing 
 can be more impertinent, or more wanting in reve- 
 rence to Him, than disputing about matters which He 
 only can decide. Our Saviour, in giving his Divine 
 instructions, spake with authority as one entitled to 
 be obeyed ; so also did the Hebrew prophets and the 
 apostles. They never resorted to the absurd project 
 of setting people to reason on matters beyond the 
 powers of their understanding, and in the end making 
 
264 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 the majority, by supernatural means, to give their 
 votes on the side of truth, leavmg the unfortunate 
 minority to flounder on in error. According to this 
 strange scheme, bishops were to be assembled from 
 all parts of Christendom, and were to be set to work 
 to argue the matter im hand, each, according to 
 appearance, exercising his rational faculties, while in 
 reality that was the case with the minority only, the 
 majority bemg influenced and guided by the Holy 
 Spirit. Surely this is not the way in which God 
 deals with his creatures. Can it for a moment be 
 doubted, that, whenever He has revealed his will, he 
 has accompanied his revelation with such proofs as 
 are satisfactory and conclusive to our rational and 
 moral faculties? But it may be said that all the 
 bishops were really left im the first instance to the 
 exercise of their natural faculties; but that, after a 
 time spent in debate, the Almighty interfered, and, 
 by his Holy Spirit, led the majority into the path of 
 infallible truth. But this is only substitutmg one 
 absurdity for another. The infallibility of the Pope 
 is perfectly intelligible, and volves none of the diffi- 
 culties and absurdities which belong to the notion of 
 the infallibility of a general council. There would be 
 no other difficulty than that of ascertaming whether 
 an individual lawfully filled the chair of St. Peter, and 
 obedience to his behests would be the duty of all 
 Christians. 
 
 ‘To the doctrine of infallibility, whether existing in 
 a general council, in a Pope and council, or in the 
 Pope alone, is to be traced all the frightful persecutions 
 for infidelity, heresy and schism which have given to 
 ecclesiastical history the appearance of having been 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 965 
 
 written in characters of blood. First and foremost in 
 the list of Christian persecutors stands the Church of 
 Rome, to which belongs the guilt of all the horrid 
 tortures inflicted on her victims within the walls of 
 the inquisition ; and consummated by Jews, infidels, 
 and heretics being roasted alive, in the presence of 
 assembled multitudes, who were so far deluded as to 
 believe that those were doing God service by their 
 inhuman and unchristian persecutions. That church 
 is answerable in a great degree for the barbarities of 
 the Spaniards inflicted on the unoffending Indians in 
 America, and altogether for the fires of Smithfield in 
 our own country. But although Popery holds the 
 first place in the history of Christian persecution, it 
 must be admitted that Protestantism was not slow to 
 follow her example. Though the early reformers did 
 not in so many words set up a claim of infallibility, 
 they undoubtedly assumed it in fact by the perse- 
 cution of those who differed with them in doctrine ; 
 for what can be conceived more absurd than punish- 
 ing any one for professing a doctrine which we do 
 not certainly know to be false? Supposing you were 
 to ask any one who persecuted another for what he 
 called heresy, whether he was certain that the ob- 
 noxious doctrine was false, it is evident that nothing 
 short of an affirmative answer could justify him, even 
 in his own judgment. It is well known that Luther 
 and Calvin, and many others of the reformers, made 
 no scruple of persecuting heretics; and the burning 
 of Servetus by Calvin was attended by circumstances 
 of peculiar atrocity. Even Socinus, who found refuge 
 in Poland, and who would not have been tolerated in 
 any Protestant nation, was himself a persecutor of 
 
266 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 David, who deviated more widely than himself from 
 the general opinions of the Christian world. In our 
 country we hear enough, and perhaps more than 
 enough, of the persecutions of bloody Mary; but I 
 _ suspect that comparatively few are aware that two 
 persons were burned alive for heresy in the reign of 
 Elizabeth, and two in that of James the First. A 
 most touching appeal was made to Elizabeth on 
 behalf of these heretics, as they were called, by Fox, 
 the author of the Martyrology, to whom the queen 
 was so much attached as to be in the habit of calling 
 him Father Fox, but it was made in vain. That able 
 and politic, but heartless and tyrannical sovereign, was 
 deaf to the voice of reason and compassion; and the 
 unhappy sufferers endured the dreadful punishment 
 of being burned alive. 
 
 But imprisonment, tortures, and death, for errors 
 real or supposed in religion, are far from being the 
 ' whole of the evils inflicted on the human race by the 
 Church of Rome. If the views of Christianity taken 
 in this work be correct, religious liberty and the right 
 of private judgment are the inalienable rights of every 
 Christian. The spiritual authority of the Church of 
 Rome is in direct opposition to these rights, and 
 therefore can only be lawfully exercised over those 
 who voluntarily consent to obey it. When a man 
 chooses to part with his liberty, and to submit to the 
 will of another, he has no right to complain of the 
 exercise of authority over him to which he has volun- 
 tarily submitted himself. ‘To that extent the authority 
 of the Church of Rome, or of any other church, may 
 be held lawful. But the pretended successors of St. 
 Peter have been far from confining themselves to 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 267 
 
 merely spiritual matters; and by degrees they as- 
 sumed a power above that of all the princes and 
 states in the world. One of the principal steps by 
 which the church advanced its temporal power was by 
 getting into its hands very large landed possessions. 
 These were no doubt sometimes voluntarily bestowed, 
 with a sincere desire to forward the cause of religion ; 
 but probably much more frequently extorted by the 
 fears excited by the clergy as to the future world, 
 and by the hope of atoning for a life of violence, 
 oppression and cruelty, by giving their property to 
 the service of religion. The extent to which, in this 
 country, these donations were made to the church, 
 after a time, was felt to be a great grievance. “The 
 feudal services,’ says Blackstone, “ ordained for the 
 defence of the kingdom, were every day visibly with- 
 drawn ; the circulation of landed property from man 
 to man began to stagnate; and the lords were cur- 
 tailed of the fruits of their seignories, their escheats, 
 wardships, reliefs, and the like*.’’ These evils were 
 felt to be intolerable; and they gave occasion to the 
 various Acts of Parliament in our statute book to 
 restram what is technically called “alienation in 
 mortmain.”” ‘Those who feel disposed to become 
 acquainted with the cunning, and often successful 
 devices by which the ecclesiastics sought to evade 
 these salutary laws, may satisfy their curiosity by a 
 perusal of the elegant pages of the great commentator 
 on the laws of England. | 
 
 The see of Rome, however, was far from confining 
 itself to the accumulation of landed property in the 
 hands of the clergy as a means of advancing its power. 
 
 * Blackstone’s Commentaries, Book ii. chap. 18. 
 
268 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 The pope, as the vicar of Christ, claimed an authority 
 beyond the control of the civil power; and a succes- 
 sion of ambitious and able pontiffs, a Gregory, an 
 Innocent, and a Boniface, set up successfully a power 
 above the sovereigns of the world. The humilia- 
 tion of the emperor Henry IV. before the haughty 
 Gregory VII., and the surrender of his crown by our 
 dastard monarch John to the legate of Innocent III., 
 are well-known historical facts. The papal usur- 
 pations of temporal power were carried to their 
 highest point by Boniface VIII., who boldly claimed 
 the whole authority of what was. called the holy 
 Roman empire*. Such audacious and unfounded 
 presumption, however, could not long be endured 
 even in that calamitous period of human history, that 
 time of violence and brute force which is called the 
 middle ages. “ Boniface,” says Hume, “was among 
 the last of the sovereign pontiffs that exercised an 
 authority over the temporal jurisdiction of princes ; 
 and these exorbitant pretensions which he had been 
 tempted to assume from the successful example of 
 his predecessors, but of which the season was now 
 past, involved him in so many calamities, and were 
 attended with so unfortunate a catastrophe, that 
 they have been secretly abandoned, though never 
 
 * « Lorsqu’en 1298, Albert d’ Autriche se révolta contre Adolphe 
 de Nassau, se fit couronner roi des Romains a sa place, et le vain- 
 quit peu aprés dans un combat ot: Adolphe fut tué, Boniface‘non 
 seulement refusa de le reconnoitre, mais il le traita comme un 
 traitre et un rebelle; et mettant la couronne sur sa propre tte, 
 il saisit une épdée, et s’écria, “C’est moi qui suis César, c’est 
 moi qui suis l’empereur, c’est moi qui défendrai les droits de 
 empire.’’—Sismondi’s Républiques Italiennes, chap. xxiv. tome iv. 
 p. 130. ; 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 269 
 
 openly relinquished, by his successors in the apostolic 
 chair *.”” 
 
 Those who have the happiness to believe that all 
 the events in the world are under the control of 
 Divine Providence, will be slow to think that any 
 great and extensive evil has been permitted to exist 
 without some portion of good inseparably connected 
 with it. That this has been the case with respect to 
 the great ecclesiastical usurpation of the church of 
 Rome, I cannot entertain a doubt. This subject has 
 been very ably treated by a learned writer, who has 
 attained high distinction as well in the political as in 
 the literary world; and the elegance and beauty of 
 whose style is so captivating, that it is impossible to 
 peruse his works without great pleasure, even when 
 we may happen not to be able to coincide with his 
 opinions F. 
 
 M. Guizot, after making a just distinction between 
 (what have been too often confounded) Christianity and 
 the church, the essence of the former being a common 
 belief, and common feelings and sentiments, and the 
 latter consisting of an organized system of ecclesias- 
 tical authority, proceeds to state that he considers the 
 church as the human means of the preservation of 
 Christianity in the world. His views are clearly ex- 
 pressed in the following words: “S’il n’etit pas été 
 une église, je ne sais ce qui en serait avenu au milieu 
 de la chute de empire romain. Je me renferme 
 dans les considérations purement humaines; je mets 
 du coté tout élément ¢tranger aux conséquences natu- 
 relles des faits naturels: si le christianisme n’etit été, 
 
 * History of England, chap. xiii. vol. ii. p. 296, 8vo ed. 
 + Guizot’s Civilisation en Europe, deuxitme lecon. 
 
270 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 comme dans les premiers temps, qu'une croyance, un 
 sentiment, une conviction individuelle, on peut croire 
 qu il aurait succombé au milieu de la dissolution de 
 empire et de l’invasion des barbares. Il a succombé 
 plus tard, en Asie et dans tout le nord de |’Afrique, 
 sous une invasion de la méme nature, sous |’invasion 
 des barbares mussulmans ; il a succombé alors, quoi- 
 qu il fat a Pétat Vinstitution, d’église constituée. A 
 bien plus forte raison le méme fait aurait pu arriver au 
 moment de la chute de empire romain. II n’y avoit 
 alors aucun des moyens par lesquels aujourd’hui les 
 influences morales s’établissent, ou résistent indépen- 
 damment des institutions, aucun des moyens par les- 
 quels une pure vérité, une pure idée acquiert une 
 empire sur les esprits, gouverne les actions, détermine 
 les évenemens. Rien de semblable n’éxistait au IV° 
 siecle, pour donner aux idées, aux sentiments per- 
 sonnels une pareille autorité. Il est clair qu'il falloit 
 une socicté fortement organisée, fortement gouvernée, 
 pour lutter contre un pareil désastre, pour sortir victo- 
 rieuse d'un tel ouragan. Je ne crois pas trop dire en 
 affirmant qu’a la fin du IV° et au commencement du 
 Ve siécle, c'est léglise chrétienne qui a sauvé le 
 christianisme ; c’est l’église avec ces institutions, ses 
 magistrats, son pouvoir, qui s est défendue vigoureuse- 
 ment contre la dissolution intérieure de lempire, 
 contre la barbarie, qui a conquis les barbares, qui est 
 devenu le lien, le moyen, le principe de civilisation 
 entre le monde romain et le monde barbare.”” ‘These 
 remarks appear just and satisfactory. The Christian 
 religion was at first established by supernatural agen- 
 cies. Since the first age, I see no satisfactory reason 
 for doubting that its preservation and advancement in 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 27 1 
 
 the world have been left to natural means; and the 
 church appears to have been the means appointed for 
 those purposes. Let it not be for a moment supposed 
 that I am here denying, or attempting in the slightest 
 degree to weaken a belief in the Divine influence on 
 the mind of man. All who admit that prayer to 
 Almighty God is a duty must in consistency assent 
 to this doctrine. When a man prays for Divine 
 assistance to enable him to resist temptation, he must 
 hope that such assistance will be granted. When he 
 prays for Divine aid on his inquiries after religious 
 truth, he must hope that it will be given to him. I 
 see, however, no reason to believe that Divine direction 
 to man is afforded in any other way than through the 
 medium of his rational and moral faculties; and it is 
 to the working of these, however aided and directed, 
 that I apply the terms human means. 
 
 ‘A religious establishment,’ Paley justly observes, 
 ‘is no part of Christianity ; it is only the means of 
 inculcating it.’” The question then of the expediency 
 and of the value of it must depend on its answering 
 the purpose for which it is established. We have 
 found reason to conclude that the right of private 
 judgment is the privilege and inalienable possession 
 of every Christian. To infringe on that right can 
 be no other than a usurpation. In like manner 
 civil and political liberty are rights of the human 
 race; and no other infringements of them are lawful 
 than such as are required for the public good. In 
 the middle ages the civil and political rights of men 
 were disregarded ; and the mass of the people all over 
 Kurope were subjected to the tyrannical rule in some 
 degree of the sovereign, but far more extensively to 
 
272 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 that of the feudal lords. The assertion which has just 
 been made, indeed, requires some limitation ; and in 
 our own country in particular the spirit of liberty led 
 to many struggles against the arbitrary and tyrannical 
 proceedings of the ruling powers, which in several 
 important instances were crowned with signal success. 
 It cannot, however, be denied that the general cha- 
 racter of the middle ages was violent, oppressive, and 
 tyrannical. The mass of the people were totally un- 
 provided with the means of combining and organizing 
 their strength so as to offer effectual resistance to the 
 oppression of their rulers. The church was in those 
 times the only refuge from the tyranny of the civil 
 powers. ‘The liberties to which man has an inalien- 
 able right were trampled on both by the civil and 
 the ecclesiastical powers, but the one was to a con- 
 siderable extent antagonistic to the other, and the 
 consequence was some mitigation of the wretchedness 
 of the people in that dismal period. But when in 
 process of time the invention of printing had given a 
 far wider extension to knowledge than had ever been 
 known before; when the noble sentiments of the 
 great writers of Greece and Rome became widely 
 disseminated in the European world; and, above all, 
 when the Holy Scriptures were made accessible to the 
 people, the world was awakened from its long slum- 
 ber; a love of civil and religious liberty prevailed 
 extensively ; a greater share of political and civil 
 freedom was extorted from kings and nobles; and 
 the Reformation asserted the principles of religious 
 liberty, although its leading advocates swerved lament- 
 ably in practice from these principles. The religious 
 tyranny of the Church of Rome, and the political 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 273 
 
 tyranny of kings and barons in the middle ages were 
 alike opposed to the rights and well-being of the 
 human race; but by Divine Providence the former 
 proved no small mitigation of the oppressions exer- 
 cised by the latter. 
 
 No one will be found bold enough to deny the vast 
 advance of literature and science since the era just 
 adverted to; but doubts may still be entertained on 
 the subject of religion. _The Jaudator temporis acti 
 may well exclaim,—“ Look at the noble churches 
 which were erected during the middle ages ; and call 
 to mind what has been done since in the way of pro- 
 viding places for religious worship. Consider the 
 state of our own metropolis. In its ancient part, the 
 city of London, you meet with churches in all direc- 
 tions, and which were quite large enough for the 
 accommodation of all its inhabitants at its most 
 populous period, while in the north-western part of 
 the metropolis you might, till within a few years, have 
 passed through street after street, and square after 
 Square, comprising a part of the district compared to 
 which the remainder is quite insignificant, without 
 finding a church or any building whatever erected for 
 the purpose of religious worship. Of late, indeed, 
 many churches have been erected in this part of the 
 metropolis; but even at the present moment, the 
 places of worship, including as well the chapels of 
 Roman Catholics and Dissenters as those of the esta- 
 blished religion; are very far, indeed, from affording 
 sufficient room for all the inhabitants of the populous 
 and wealthy parishes of St. Pancras, St. Marylebone, 
 and Paddington.” The observation is a fair one, and 
 of no small weight in a discussion as to the state of 
 
 T 
 
974 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. | 
 
 religion in the middle ages and in our own times. It 
 might well lead to a very long examination of parti- 
 culars which would be required in order to come to a 
 sound conclusion on the subject. It will not, however, 
 be necessary here to enter on any such comparison, as 
 it must be admitted that the Christian religion has 
 neither in our own nor in any former age produced 
 effects equal to what might have been expected from 
 its genius and character. It is to future times that 
 we must look for the bright light and animating heat 
 of Christianity, purified from every human pollution, 
 to clear the intellects, and warm the hearts of pro- 
 fessing Christians. A single observation I will venture 
 to make. The great principles of religion are fear, 
 hope, and love. The first stimulates us by the dread 
 of future punishment, the second by the expectation 
 of future reward,. and the last by a sense of the 
 intrinsic beauty and excellence of religion. ‘The first 
 and second may be properly considered as steps in 
 advance towards the third, which is the perfection of 
 true religion. If I mistake not the character of the 
 religion of the middle ages, it had far more of the 
 principle of fear, than either of hope or of love, and 
 much more of the former of these two than of the 
 latter. Few, however, even down to our own times, 
 have advanced much beyond hope and fear; and the 
 religion of love, in other words, Christianity in its 
 purest, brightest, and loveliest form, has yet to be 
 established in the world called Christian. 
 
 In the latter part of the 17th century appeared the 
 writings of John Locke, a name never to be pro- 
 nounced without respect and veneration. No writer, 
 I think, has done so much in laying down and 
 
PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 275 
 
 enforcing rational views in metaphysics, religion and 
 politics. Much of what he has written on education 
 deserves serious attention; and he may perhaps be 
 considered as the father of political economy. Iam 
 far from thinking that the works of this great and 
 excellent man are free from many considerable errors ; 
 but the spirit of his writings is excellent; and their 
 effects in advancing sound thought and reasoning, 
 and, above all, in setting forth and exposing the 
 sources of intellectual errors, haye been incalculably 
 great. It is, however, the rational faculty only that 
 the works of Locke are greatly calculated to im- 
 prove. Little of them is properly ethical, and he un- 
 happily embraced what is usually called the selfish 
 theory of morals*, a system irreconcileably opposed 
 to the noblest and best feelings and sentiments of the 
 human mind. The philosophy of Locke found adhe- 
 rents among many of the ablest writers and closest 
 thinkers of the 18th century. Much that is excellent 
 may be met with in their writings concerning both 
 philosophy and religion ; but on the last-named sub- 
 ject they are in general too exclusively rational. 
 Reason has undoubtedly an important part to maintain 
 in religion, but not the only part, nor even the highest. 
 A man may have very rational and just. theoretical 
 views of religion, and nevertheless feel little or no- 
 thing of its power. It is when the heart is given to 
 God, and then only, that the full power of religion 
 operates in the soul. Moral sensibility is the source 
 from which flows all that is most excellent in religion. 
 It is the mind which is most alive to moral beauty, 
 which feels most deeply all that is amiable in senti- 
 
 * See Essay on the Human Understanding. Book ii. ch. 28, par. 5. 
 inp 
 
276 PROGRESS OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 ment and conduct, which is best prepared for the 
 reception of Christianity im its most exalted form. 
 ‘To him who possesses a high degree of moral sensi- 
 bility, goodness in any shape is irresistibly attractive. 
 The most exquisite productions of genius in his esti- 
 mation have far less interest than exalted goodness. 
 This in all its manifestations is the object of his su- 
 preme delight and love, and he cannot rest till he has 
 traced it up to the great Author of all good, in the 
 contemplation of whose perfections he finds rest for 
 his soul, and a perennial object of faith, and trust, 
 and love. Now little, I apprehend, of this character 
 could be found in the middle ages. A few well-con- 
 stituted and happily disciplined minds perhaps really 
 attamed to the love of God and of goodness; but in 
 general the hope of reward and the fear of punish- 
 ment seem to have been called into vivid action; and 
 the latter far more than the former. Churches were, 
 I fear, generally erected in the hope that the founder 
 would, by that good work, be saved from the eternal 
 torments of the world tocome. In the earlier part of 
 the period, after a life spent in the pursuits of ambi- 
 tion, and distinguished by treachery, oppression and 
 cruelty, the monarch would sometimes choose to finish 
 his days in the garb of a monk ; hoping, by assuming 
 that character, and by building a church or an abbey, 
 to escape from the punishment which he felt to be 
 due to his crimes. 
 
 I have endeavoured in this work to show that the 
 right of private judgment should be enjoyed by every 
 Christian ; and that neither pope, patriarch, arch- 
 bishop, bishop, synod, nor ecclesiastical assembly, 
 has had, or can have, authority to set aside this 
 
THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 277 
 
 right, or in any degree to diminish it. But it is 
 nevertheless admitted that the usurped ecclesiastical 
 power had a beneficial effect in controlling and miti- 
 gating the oppression of civil tyranny in times when 
 no other antagonistic power could have been brought 
 to act effectually against it. In the present age the state 
 of things is essentially different. The invention of print- 
 ing has completely changed the state of society in all 
 the civilized parts of the world; and a return to the 
 ignorance of the mass of the people in the middle ages 
 we may safely pronounce to be impossible. We are na- 
 turally led to the mquiry, what, under the altered circum- 
 stances of the world, are the best means to be adopted 
 for the support and extension of the Christian religion ? 
 
 It is plain, that every church, whether in words 
 calling itself infallible or not, which lays down doc- 
 trines, not in terms expressed in the Scriptures, con- 
 demns any deviation from those doctrines as heresy, 
 and denounces separation from its communion as 
 schism, does in effect claim to be infallible. But this 
 assumption is in direct contradiction to the right of 
 private judgment, which is the malienable privilege of 
 every Christian, and the real principle of the reforma- 
 tion. ‘This assumption of authority in religion must 
 therefore be rejected by every consistent friend of the 
 right of private judgment. ‘The important question 
 remains, whether the establishment and support of a 
 particular form by the state is calculated to advance 
 religion, or whether it should be left entirely to the 
 exertions of individuals without. any intervention 
 of the civil power? Religion, say the supporters of 
 what is called the voluntary system, will support itself 
 by its own intrinsic excellence, and by divine grace, 
 
278 THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 
 
 independent of any authority of the civil power; and 
 if such authority be called to its aid, its mevitable 
 tendency will be to establish and to perpetuate error 
 in doctrine, and to oppress and probably persecute 
 those who reject the dogmas, and separate themselves 
 from the communion of the established church. Re- 
 ligion, it is true, answer the friends of establishments, 
 is the gift of God to man, and he will undoubtedly 
 provide means for its continuance and extension ; but 
 we have no reason to expect a series of miracles to be 
 performed for that purpose, unless it should appear 
 that ordinary human exertions for its maintenance 
 and support are inadequate, which is a question for 
 inquiry. We conceive that a religious establishment 
 does afford these means, and on that account we sup- 
 port it. This is, I believe, a fair statement of the 
 question at issue. All agree that something must 
 be used for the support of religion, and the question 
 is, what are the means best fitted to secure that most 
 important object? The question of the utility of a 
 church ‘establishment is, in its application to this 
 country, greatly encumbered by difficulties which do 
 not necessarily belong to it; but which are defived 
 from the particular character of the church of England. 
 When Henry the Eighth threw off his allegiance to the 
 church of Rome, his leading objects were the divorce 
 of queen Catharine, and a marriage with Anna Boleyn, 
 which the pope would not allow. Henry, in rejecting 
 the pope’s authority, had no other intention but to 
 substitute his own. Nothing could be further from 
 his thought than the recognition of the right of private 
 judgment. Even the reformers on the continent, who 
 deviated much more widely from the church of Rome 
 
THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 279 
 
 than the church of England has ever done, were far 
 from being consistent in their adherence to the prin- 
 ciple of private judgment, on which the Reformation 
 was founded, and by which alone it can be defended. 
 Each church had its own dogmas and its own form of 
 worship; and each held a deviation from its doctrines 
 to be heresy, and a withdrawing from its communion 
 to be schism. Thus were the reformers reduced to 
 the inconsistency of defending the right of private 
 judgment in their contests with Rome, and virtually 
 denying it when they had to do with those whom 
 they called heretics and schismatics. It was not to 
 be expected that the founders of the church of 
 England would be wiser than the continental Protest- 
 ants. No where does the inconsistency above men- 
 tioned appear in a more striking form than in the 
 20th and 2Ist articles of the English church. The 
 20th article is as follows: “The church hath power 
 to decree rites or ceremonies, and authority in con- 
 troversies of faith; and yet it is not lawful for the 
 church to ordain anything that is contrary to God's 
 word written, neither may it expound one place of 
 scripture, that it be repugnant to another. Where- 
 fore, although the church be a witness and a keeper 
 of holy writ, yet, as it ought not to decree anything ~ 
 against the same, so, besides the same, ought it not to 
 enforce anything to be believed for necessity of salva- 
 tion.”? Surely this is setting up the right of private 
 judgment wit one hand, and knocking it down with 
 the other. If the church possess authority in contro- 
 versies, there must be persons subject to that autho- 
 rity, whose duty it is to obey it. It is then of essen- 
 tial consequence to ascertain who are those who possess 
 
280 THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 
 
 lawful authority to command, who are those who are 
 bound to obey, and what are the limits of the required 
 obedience. On all these subjects I fear we shall find 
 ourselves quite in the dark. First, as to the church 
 which is to command obedience to its decisions. We 
 had been already told, in the 19th article, that ‘the 
 visible Christian church of Christ is a congregation of 
 faithful men, in the which the pure word of God is 
 preached, and the sacraments be duly ministered ac- 
 cording to Christ’s ordinance, in all those things that 
 of necessity are requisite to the same.” This defi- 
 nition of a Christian church seems to involve diffi- 
 culties which few, if any, can be found to solve, and 
 which are far beyond the reach of ordinary apprehen- 
 sion. First, the church is to consist of a congregation 
 of faithful men. But supposing two congregations, 
 each of which appears to be composed of faithful men, 
 to come to different conclusions on some question of 
 faith—no uncommon case certainly—who is to decide, 
 and by what means, which is really the congregation 
 of faithful men which has authority in controversies of 
 faith, and which, therefore, we are bound to obey? 
 Again, the sacraments must be duly ministered ac- 
 cording to Christ’s ordinance. Now we know that 
 these ministrations differ in different churches ; which 
 then of these is to be held to have authority to decree 
 rites and ceremonies? Again, the church is a congre- 
 gation of faithful men, and I see nothing in the article 
 that gives authority to one member of it over another : 
 are then all the members of the congregation to be 
 called together to decide on matters of faith, and is 
 the question in dispute to be settled by the majority, 
 or in what other way? Again, by a congregation we 
 
THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 281 
 
 always understand a number of people assembling in 
 the same place of worship: now there are many thou- 
 sands of such congregations in this kingdom: are 
 they all to be called together to settle matters of faith, 
 and is the sentence of the majority of the whole to 
 prevail? Certainly no sane men could for a mo- 
 ment have thought of resorting to such absurdities 
 as these. There can be no doubt that the word 
 church, in the 20th article, was intended to express 
 something very different from the definition of the 
 same term in the preceding article. By the church 
 is intended the clergy, and that is the meaning 
 attached to it at the present day by the high-church 
 party. If, indeed, you ask any one of them whether 
 the church consists of the clergy only, he will give a 
 negative answer, and admit that the laity are an 
 essential part of the church ; but only take the trouble 
 of carrying your inquiry a little further, and every 
 sincere and honest high-churchman will give you to 
 understand that the clergy are to command and the 
 laity to obey. ‘The whole high-church system would 
 crumble to pieces if it were once allowed that the 
 laity had any share whatever in deciding controver- 
 sies, and in settling points of faith. ‘The clergy then _ 
 are those whose authority is to be recognized; but 
 here arise difficulties, which, I fear, neither the articles 
 nor their most acute supporters and expounders can 
 remove. ‘To say nothing of foreign churches, how is 
 the power of the English clergy to be exercised? We 
 have in England two archbishops, each presiding in 
 his own province over a number of: suffragan bishops, 
 and besides the bishops, there are two other orders of 
 clergy, priests and deacons. Which of these, or are 
 
282 THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 
 
 they all collectively to exercise authority in controver- 
 sies of faith? Are the clergy of the two provinces to 
 act separately or collectively? If the whole body of 
 clergy are to act together, is no more weight to be 
 given to the vote of an archbishop than to that of a 
 mere priest, or even of a deacon, if they should be 
 included? Supposing the authority to belong to 
 archbishops and bishops only, what are their relative 
 rights? Assuming these different questions to be 
 satisfactorily answered, what is to be done in case of 
 a difference of opmion among the bishops? There 
 seem to be no means of coming to a conclusion but 
 by the majority deciding; but such majority may be 
 very small, only exceeding the minority by a single 
 vote. Is such a majority to be allowed, without ap- 
 peal, to settle a disputed doctrme? The framers of 
 the articles seem to have felt that such an arrange- 
 ment could not be satisfactory; and the 21st article 
 is apparently intended to carry matters further, with a 
 view to an ultimate decision of the point in dispute. 
 It runs thus: “General councils may not be gathered 
 together without commandment and will of princes. 
 And when they be gathered together (forasmuch as 
 they be an assembly of men, whereof all be not go- 
 verned with the spirit and word of God) they may 
 err, and sometimes have erred, even in things per- 
 taining unto God. Wherefore things ordered ne them 
 as necessary to salvation, have neither strength nor 
 authority, unless it may be declared that they be taken 
 out of holy scripture.” ‘Truly this is confusion worse 
 confounded. Here are as many difficulties as sen- 
 tences. In the first place general councils are not to 
 be gathered together “without commandment and 
 
THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 283 
 
 will of princes.” What princes? is the first inquiry. 
 There appears to be no reason why any Christian 
 prince should be excluded, to say nothing of those 
 Christian countries which, having adopted a republican 
 form of government, have no princes. All the princes of 
 _ the Christian world, consisting of those who belong to 
 the church of Rome, those of the Greek church, and 
 all the various forms of Protestantism, must agree to 
 assemble the clergy of their respective countries in a 
 general council. That such a body can never be as- 
 sembled is quite evident. The church of Rome, 
 which considers all others to be heretical and schis- 
 matical, will never agree to assemble in council with 
 the bishops of those churches whose members it 
 holds not to be within the pale of salvation; nor 
 wil the Greek or the Protestant bishops be prepared 
 to meet those of the Roman church, whose first step, 
 they well know, would be to assert an authority in 
 their church which the Protestant and the Greek must at 
 once reject. Supposing this formidable difficulty sur- 
 mounted, and waving all consideration of the civil 
 power interfering at all in the settling of religious 
 disputes, as it is here made to do by the consent of 
 princes being held necessary to the assembling of a 
 general council, let us consider what good end could 
 be answered by the meeting and the discussions of all 
 the bishops im Christendom, or of so many of them as 
 should attend the council. In the first place, the de- 
 cisions of such’ a body could only be received by those 
 Christians who acknowledge the divine authority of 
 episcopacy. Now, it is notorious that a large section of 
 the Christian world rejects this doctrine ; and of course 
 could not be bound by the decisions of a council com- 
 
284, THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 
 
 posed of bishops only. But leaving those persons to 
 themselves, let us consider what the results of such a 
 council as we have supposed to be called together 
 would be, as affecting episcopalians only. There are 
 two possible suppositions as to the result of the deli- 
 berations of the council: either they might come to ~ 
 a conclusion agreeing with the doctrine of some one 
 of the existing churches, or they might differ with all 
 of them. In either case what hope would there be of 
 their decrees being generally adopted? If they were 
 to decide on any doctrine differing from the dogmas 
 of the church of Rome, that church, which professes 
 to hold the same doctrines from the beginning, with- 
 out a particle of error, would undoubtedly not give 
 way to the decision of those whom it accounted 
 heretical and schismatical bishops. If the decision 
 were in favour of the Romish, it would inevitably be 
 rejected by the Greek and the Protestant churches, 
 who know full well that the claims of the church of 
 Rome are destructive of their very existence. Be the 
 decision of the council what it might, the defeated 
 party would inevitably reject it, as bemg the work of 
 those who (in the language of the article) “ be not go- 
 verned by the spirit and word of God.” The last clause 
 of the 21st article shows clearly the utter worthlessness 
 of a general council, by telling us that things ordained 
 by them as necessary to salvation have neither strength 
 nor authority, unless it may be declared that they be 
 taken out of Scripture; and leaving us entirely in the 
 dark as to who is to declare whether those doctrines 
 be taken out of Scripture or not. General councils 
 have had their day; and in the present state of the 
 Christian world it is impossible that such a body can 
 
THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 285 
 
 be assembled; nor can we anticipate or expect any 
 combination of circumstances which could lead to their 
 revival. Their absurdity has been already pointed 
 out. They have ascended to the limbo of vanity. 
 Requiescant in pace. 
 
 I am very far from thinking that the divines who 
 framed the thirty-nine articles had the slightest hope 
 or wish that Protestants would ever have recourse to 
 a general council for the settlement of their doctrinal 
 differences. They had all been brought up in the 
 communion of the church of Rome, and had been 
 taught to look with reverence to general councils. 
 When they became sensible of what they believed to 
 be great and grievous errors of the church of Rome, 
 and made up their minds to engage in the pe- 
 rilous work of bringing about a reformation, they 
 speedily found that the decisions of many of the 
 later councils were undeniably favourable to the claims 
 of that church; and therefore they were constrained 
 to deny their authority; but their minds were not 
 sufficiently opened to perceive that submission to 
 the decision of a general council was essentially at 
 variance with the principle on which alone they could 
 justify their separation from the church of Rome. 
 The conflicting sentiments therefore of a reverence 
 for the decisions of the earlier general councils, and a 
 necessary denial of the authority of some of the later 
 of them, led to the unintelligible compromise which 
 is expressed in the 21st article. 
 
 I am anxious that it should not be supposed that I 
 intend to cast any reproach on those who framed the 
 thirty-nine articles. I believe them to have been 
 honest and pious men, and that in settling the articles 
 
286 THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 
 
 they had no other object but to express what they 
 believed to be sound Christian doctrine, and thereby 
 to advance the cause of piety and virtue in the world. 
 If they were unable to emancipate themselves from 
 the errors and prejudices of their age, the same thing 
 may be said of the wisest and best of men of all ages. 
 We live im far more enlightened times, and can 
 plainly see their errors. In like manner those who 
 inhabit the earth in some future age, when intelli- 
 gence shall be more advanced than it is at present, 
 will probably discern errors existing in our days as 
 palpably as we now perceive those of former ages. 
 Let us then all be mindful of our proneness to error, 
 and follow the pursuit after truth in the spirit of 
 Christian humility. 
 
 At the era of the Reformation the great practical 
 error of the reformers was, attempting to attain a 
 uniformity of belief in all points of religion, which 
 subsequent experience has proved to be impracticable. 
 I have already endeavoured to show that the essential 
 doctrines of the Christian religion are to be derived 
 from the discourses of our Saviour, and the discourses 
 and writings of his apostles and early followers ; and 
 that these doctrmes are easily understood. But 
 besides. these, the Scriptures contain much of greater 
 or less importance, which every one who is able to do 
 so should use his best exertions to understand, but 
 concerning which great diversity of opinion has ex- 
 isted in all ages of the Christian church. It was in 
 the attempt to bring all minds to agree on these 
 doubtful points that the early reformers wasted their 
 strength m vain; and the consequences have been 
 deplorable. Instead of all who profess themselves 
 
THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 287 
 
 followers of Christ uniting to advance the cause of 
 piety and virtue in the world, Christians have been 
 divided into different churches and sects, each in 
 general attaching an undue importance to its own 
 peculiar doctrmes, and often outraging Christian 
 charity by misrepresenting, abusing, and anathe- 
 matising all whose religious opinions differed with 
 their own. Not only has this attempt to achieve an 
 impossibility in bringing all to agree on disputed 
 points of religion led to the division of the Christian 
 world into different sects, but it has entirely failed to 
 secure unanimity among those who professedly belong 
 to the same church, and are called by the same name. 
 Even in the pretended infallible church of Rome 
 much difference of opmion has existed; and, to say 
 nothing of older controversies, those between the 
 Jesuists and the Jansenists, and between the sup- 
 porters of the ultra-montane and the cis-montane 
 doctrines, reach to our own times. ‘The thirty-nine 
 articles, which were intended to ensure unanimity of 
 opinion, have entirely failed of their object. A Cal- 
 vinistic and an Arminian party were formed among 
 the clergy of the Church of England at an early period 
 of her history ; and so notorious are the differences of 
 opinion among its members at the present time, as — 
 to have occasioned the publication of an article in the 
 ‘ Edinburgh Review ’ giving an account of the different 
 parties under the denominations of High Church, 
 Low Church,- and Broad Church*, which has been 
 
 * This is, as far as I know, a new term, but I presume it has 
 been adopted in reference to the divines called Latitudinarians in 
 the days of Charles the Second. See an interesting account of 
 them in Burnet’s History of his own Times, book ii. 
 
288 THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 
 
 very generally read; and which, it is to be hoped, 
 will tend to open men’s minds to the vanity of the 
 attempt to procure unanimity on subjects which afford 
 not the slightest hope of its bemg attained. Very 
 lately has raged, and indeed does so at this moment, 
 a controversy respecting baptism. Both parties agree 
 in admitting it to be a Christian rite, and in ascribing 
 great importance to it; but they differ as to its opera- 
 tion and effect ; and on this account Christian charity 
 has been violated; and the controversy has been pursued 
 with a virulence which has deeply grieved every reli- 
 gious mind. ‘Truly this is a notable instance of the suc- 
 cess of the attempt to attam unanimity in the church! 
 
 If it be admitted that the mght of free inquiry 
 belongs to every Christian, it follows that all attempts 
 to set up an authority inconsistent with that right, 
 whether by the professed infallibility of the Church 
 of Rome, or the implied infallibility of Protestant 
 churches, must be resisted by all who are determined 
 to exercise their freedom as to the doctrines of re- 
 ligion. If then a particular form of religion cannot 
 be adopted and endowed by the state without an 
 infringement of the inalienable right of private judg- 
 ment, it follows that such an establishment ought 
 not to be allowed to exist. If, on the other hand, it 
 be possible to set up an established religion which 
 shall not interfere with this sacred right, the im- 
 portant question arises, whether the cause of religion 
 is likely to be advanced by such an establishment, or 
 whether it be the wiser course to leave religion entirely 
 unconnected with the state; in other words, to adopt 
 what is commonly called the voluntary principle. 
 
 It would, I conceive, be a great mistake to suppose 
 
THE MEANS OF ADVANCING RELIGION. 289 
 
 that all the members of the established church in 
 this country are supporters of the high-church prin- 
 ciples which are undoubtedly laid down in the articles. 
 Few probably doubt that a considerable body of the 
 clergy, and a very large majority of the laity, would 
 willingly and even gladly assent to such an alteration 
 as would get rid of all interference with the rights of 
 conscience, if the change could be brought about 
 quietly, without producing fierce and violent contro- 
 versies which would outrage Christian charity, and of 
 which no man could foresee the end. Religious 
 disputes have been in general conducted in so dog- 
 matical a spirit, and with so much heat and violence, 
 as to deter the wisest and best men in a great mea- 
 sure from engaging in them. Few indeed have been 
 the instances in which controversies on questions of 
 religion have been carried on with good temper, good 
 manners, and a kindly feeling of the opponents to 
 each other. Strange indeed it is, that, while all feel 
 how subject they are to fall into error in temporal 
 affairs,-very few mdeed can be found who entertain a 
 doubt that thei religious opinions, even in their 
 minutest details, are infallibly correct! Advancing 
 intelligence will, it is to be hoped, in time bring 
 about a happier state of things, when religious in- 
 quiries and discussions will be conducted with the 
 calmness and impartiality which their importance 
 requires, and without which there is but little hope 
 of beneficial results. 
 
 I have already given the reasons which have led 
 my mind to the conclusion that religious establish- 
 ments have been hitherto efficacious and powerful 
 means of supporting and advancing religion in the 
 
 U 
 
290 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 world, and the important question remains, whether 
 they are still necessary for that purpose, or whether 
 religion should be left for support to the voluntary 
 exertions of individuals altogether unconnected with 
 the state. 
 
 In order to come to a satisfactory solution of this 
 most important question, it will be necessary to con- 
 sider what are the religious wants of the community, 
 and which are the best means of supplying those wants. 
 Unspeakably great is the importance of free inquiry 
 in religion. To it we owe the triumph of Christianity 
 over Paganism, and the establishment of the Christian 
 religion in all the most civilized countries in the 
 world. To the same cause we are indebted for the 
 Reformation, and for the correction of many of the 
 errors of the early reformers ; nor can it be reason- 
 ably doubted, that if we and those who follow us 
 devote our time and attention to the study of the 
 Scriptures, and avail ourselves of all the means m our 
 power for our advancement in religious knowledge, 
 clearer and juster views of Christianity may still be 
 attained than those which are professed at the present 
 day. ‘the human mind will not stand still. It is 
 destined to a progressive or to a retrograde motion. 
 Christianity has shown itself fitted for various con- 
 ditions of society. Under the despotic Roman em- 
 perors its votaries lived in obedience to the laws, 
 gave edifying examples of virtuous lives, and ex- 
 hibited fortitude in suffermg imprisonment, tortures, 
 and death in its most frightful forms, which deserves 
 our highest veneration. In the free governments of 
 modern times, Christianity is still the most powerful 
 instrument of good, affording the strongest incite- 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 29] 
 
 ments and motives to piety and virtue, and the best 
 consolation in the days of affliction. We must, how- 
 ever, bear in mind that free inquiry in religion has in 
 all ages been confined to a very few individuals, and I 
 see no reason to expect that in any future age it will 
 be very widely extended. The great mass of the 
 population in every age and country will probably to 
 the end of time believe what their instructors teach 
 them ; and consequently the state and condition of 
 religion in the Christian world will greatly depend on 
 the knowledge, talents, and characters of those who 
 take upon themselves the function of teachers in the 
 church. The religious wants of the common Christian 
 can only be supplied by a Christian ministry ; and 
 this has been admitted by Christians in general by 
 setting apart a class of men to conduct their religious 
 services, and to administer their religious rites. The 
 fact that the Quakers and some few small sects have 
 no settled ministry does not afford an exception to 
 the general rule of much importance. The number 
 of the members of those sects is very small compared 
 with that of those who avail themselves of the services 
 of regular ministers of religion ; and they, in common 
 with others, partake mdirectly of the benefits derived 
 from the public oral instructions of the ministers of 
 other Christian denominations, and directly from 
 their published writings. I see nothing in the his- 
 tory of Christianity to lead us to conclude that it 
 could have been maintained in the world without the 
 support of a separate class peculiarly devoted to the 
 business of religious instruction and religious con- 
 solation. Assuming then the necessity of a body of 
 clergy for the support of religion, two important 
 u 2 
 
 ~~ 
 
992 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 questions arise—how are they to be trained for their 
 office, and how are they to be supported in. their 
 exercise of it? It will scarcely be denied that it is 
 desirable that the clergy should enjoy the advantage 
 of the best education which the country affords. Re- 
 ligion being the most important concern of all 
 classes, those to whom its support and extension are 
 mainly committed should be able to mix with all on 
 terms of at least intellectual equality. The ill-edu- 
 cated and poorly informed teacher will seldom give 
 instruction with much effect to those who have had 
 greatly the advantage of him in intellectual training. 
 There are doubtless many instances of individuals of 
 very limited acquaintance with science and literature 
 who are nevertheless mighty in the Scriptures, and 
 - well qualified to be the instructors of those who have 
 not enjoyed the advantage of a superior education. 
 Neither can it be denied that many persons may be 
 found among the highly educated classes whose 
 minds are so happily disciplined as to render them 
 willing to receive religious instruction from those who 
 are, intellectually considered, greatly their mferiors ; 
 but these are rare exceptions, and in general to give 
 effectual instruction to the learned, the teacher must 
 himself be learned. Now, when we consider how 
 great is the influence exerted by those who have 
 received a superior education on the rest of the com- 
 munity, we can scarcely overrate the importance of 
 enlisting them on the side of religion. To this class 
 belong a very large majority of persons of rank, and 
 a large proportion of the wealthier classes of society. 
 The desire to advance in wealth and rank is almost 
 universal ; and the disposition to follow the example 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 293 
 
 of those who occupy exalted stations or enjoy great 
 riches is nearly as general. The placing of the clergy 
 in a state of intellectual equality with the higher and 
 wealthier classes of the country is, however, by no 
 means the only reason why it is desirable that they 
 should have the advantage of a superior education. 
 The very nature of their occupation requires it. We 
 have in our hands all the books of the New Testament 
 (with perhaps one exception) in the language in which 
 they were originally written, that is, in Greek. It 
 seems indeed probable that St. Matthew’s gospel was 
 originally Hebrew, and that our Greek gospel is an 
 early translation of it; but this is not certain, and if 
 a Hebrew gospel of St. Matthew really existed, it has 
 been long lost, and our Greek version is the nearest 
 approach to it which we possess. No one will deny 
 that an acquaintance with the original of any book 
 whatever will enable a reader to understand it better 
 than merely reading a translation. Now, it is cer- 
 tainly desirable that a Christian teacher should be 
 thoroughly conversant with the New Testament, the 
 great institute of our religion. Although we Gentile 
 Christians are under no obligation to yield obe- 
 dience to the Jewish law, and therefore with large 
 portions of the Old Testament we have little to do, — 
 yet every Christian will admit that the older por- 
 tions of the Scriptures have strong claims to our at- 
 tention, and to study them to the greatest advantage, 
 a knowledge of Hebrew, in which they were written, 
 is necessary. A knowledge of Latin is required, as 
 some of the best commentaries on the Scriptures are 
 written in that language, and also much respecting 
 ecclesiastical history, with which a clergyman should 
 
294, RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 be acquainted. Little, however, need be said on this 
 subject, as instruction in Latin is invariably part of a ° 
 liberal education. On the whole, we may safely _ 
 assert, that every clergyman should be competently 
 acquainted with Latin, and with the Greek of the 
 New Testament ; and that a considerable acquaintance 
 with classical Greek and with Hebrew, although not 
 absolutely essential, is very desirable. With respect 
 to other branches of knowledge, a clergyman will cer- 
 tainly not possess the full weight which should attach 
 to his character if he be notoriously deficient in the 
 current information of the age in which he lives. 
 Another important consideration respecting the 
 clergy is, that the means of living should be secured 
 to them. A clergyman occupies the station of a gen- 
 tleman, and therefore should possess an income ade- 
 quate to support him in that station, to provide a 
 fund for charities to which he is expected to con- 
 tribute a larger portion than laymen of the same 
 amount of income, and to make a reasonable pro- 
 vision for his family. It is, no doubt, true that indi- 
 viduals have existed in different ages since the first 
 promulgation of Christianity who have devoted them- 
 selves exclusively to the promoting of the cause of 
 religion, and lived in a state of voluntary privation 
 and poverty. ‘These were indeed the “salt of the 
 earth ;” but they are rare exceptions in human cha- 
 racter, and it would be absurd to found a general 
 rule on those exceptional cases. It may be reasonably 
 expected that the characters of the clergy would be 
 superior in general to those of the laity, and I have 
 no doubt that such is the fact; but it would indicate 
 a limited acquaimtance with human nature to expect 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 295 
 
 to find a very high degree of piety and virtue common . 
 in any large class of men whatever. In order then to 
 give a just influence to the clergy, it is necessary to 
 invest them with those adventitious incidents which 
 naturally tend to secure attention and respect from 
 the other classes of society. While, however, a decent 
 competence should be secured to the clergy, it is by 
 no means to be wished in general that they should be 
 endowed with a large share of worldly possessions. 
 Great riches usually lead to a luxurious mode of 
 living, and an inordinate love of ease and pleasure, 
 which are calculated to undermine and destroy all 
 that is most elevated and excellent in human cha- 
 racter. 
 
 As a clergyman is to instruct others in religion, it 
 is obviously essential to’ the adequate fulfilling of his 
 office that he should himself be well instructed. - He 
 should therefore be placed in such a situation as will 
 be likely to induce him to study the Scriptures freely, 
 impartially, and seriously, for the purpose of discover- 
 ing truth, and not for that of supporting and forti- 
 fying preconceived notions. It is also to be desired 
 that, at least, the leading characters among the clergy 
 should be largely acquainted with theological litera- _ 
 ture, and should also be well mformed in general 
 literature and science, almost every branch of which 
 may be made subsidiary to religion. 
 
 We have now, [ think, got thus far: 1, that there 
 should be a body of men set apart and properly edu- 
 cated for the office of religious teachers; 2, that they 
 should be provided with a competency ; 3, that they 
 should be placed in circumstances favourable to the 
 impartial study of the Scriptures, and to the acqui- 
 
296 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMEN'S. 
 
 - sition of such knowledge as may enable them to dis- 
 charge efficiently the duties of Christian instruction. 
 
 There are three modes in which religion may, as to 
 its external condition, exist in any country. There 
 may be a religion established by law, to which all 
 the inhabitants shall be obliged to conform, or be 
 subject to punishment for non-conformity ; or there 
 may be an established religion with liberty to those 
 who cannot conscientiously join it to dissent, either 
 with or without the loss or infrmgement of their 
 civil rights ; or religion may be left to sustain itself 
 by its own intrinsic excellence, without any aid or 
 support from the state, which is commonly called 
 the voluntary system. It is plain that the first-men- 
 tioned state of things is altogether inconsistent with 
 the right of private judgment im religion, which has 
 been asserted throughout the whole of this work. 
 The question lies between the second and the third 
 plans. 
 
 It is proper m this place to advert to an objection 
 of the supporters of the voluntary principle, that 
 governments are appointed for secular purposes only, 
 and consequently that they have no right whatever 
 to interfere in matters appertaiming to religion. It 
 seems to me essential to the validity of this argument 
 that spiritual and secular things are not only distinct 
 in their respective natures, but that the former can 
 have no relation to, or bearing on the latter. Such, 
 however, is not the fact. It cannot be denied that 
 the temporal good of a nation greatly depends on 
 the people regulating their conduct by the rules of 
 morality; and it is quite clear that moral duties are 
 enforced, and that the motives to practise them are 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 297 
 
 strengthened by the hopes and fears which are the 
 natural results of faith in religion. Honesty un- 
 doubtedly tends to the benefit of society, and taking 
 away and appropriating the property of another is an 
 offence against the law m every country in the world. 
 Now, when religion teaches that stealing the property 
 of another is a sin, for which the offender is liable to 
 punishment by the Great Ruler of all in a future state, 
 how can it be denied that the belief in this lability 
 affords a strong inducement to the believer to deter 
 him from the commission of the act? The same 
 view may be justly taken with respect to many other 
 offences against the law. Religion then is of the 
 greatest importance to the temporal well-being of the 
 community ; and therefore, even on the narrow prin- 
 ciple stated above, the civil power is not only war- 
 ranted, but called wpon to support the cause of reli- 
 gion. But we must go further than this, and discuss 
 the validity of the maxim, that the civil power has 
 only to do with the temporal good of a nation, and is 
 not warranted in interfering in matters of religion. 
 Let us, in the first place, inquire what is the nature 
 and character of the state, in other words, of the 
 supreme power of a nation. The lawful origin of 
 government springs from the necessities and wants of” 
 human nature. It is necessary for the well-being of 
 man that the weak should be protected against the 
 ageressions of the strong; that the right of property 
 should be established, and that its enjoyment should 
 be secured. No one individual in any country has 
 abstractedly a right to govern others ; but as it is im- 
 practicable, except in very small communities, that 
 the powers of government can be exercised by all, each 
 
298 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 country has established what is called a constitution, 
 by which the powers of the state are vested in parti- 
 cular individuals, and which is either monarchical, 
 oligarchical,* or democratic, or a combination of some 
 or all of them. The state, then, is the aggregate of 
 the powers of the community placed in the hands of 
 particular individuals for the good of the whole people. 
 It will not be denied by any Christian that every man 
 is bound to do his best for the benefit of his fellow- 
 creatures, and the same obligation obviously attaches 
 to the state which is the representative and the de- 
 pository of the power of the people. A virtuous 
 individual feels that he ought to promote the moral 
 as well as the physical good of his fellow-man, and 
 that the former is the more important of the two, 
 inasmuch as being exposed to mdigence, and even 
 dying of want, dreadful as those calamities are, is to 
 be preferred to the most prosperous life spent in 
 the indulgence of gross and hemous immoralities. 
 Human benevolence therefore should be directed to 
 the production of moral even in preference to physical 
 good. But must we not, on the same principle, pro- 
 ceed a step further? If by religion the moral can be 
 advanced to the Divine, if it be really in the power of 
 the human race, by embracing the Christian religion 
 and by regulating their conduct by its precepts, to 
 prepare themselves for a state of eternal felicity in the 
 world to come, can a benevolent man refrain from 
 rendermg such assistance as lies in his power in 
 
 * Aristocratical is the word commonly used, but I prefer 
 * oligarchical,’’ which properly means the government of a few. 
 Aristocracy is the government of the best men, which, if it can 
 be attained by any form, is the perfection of government. 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 299 
 
 advancing the unspeakably important interests of 
 religion? The question answers itself. That then 
 which is the duty of an individual according to his 
 ability, must surely be alike incumbent on the state, 
 which is the collective power of the whole nation. 
 The only remaining question then is, What are the 
 best means of promoting religion in a country ? When 
 the French minister Colbert asked some merchants 
 what he could do to promote commerce, the answer 
 was, “ Laissez nous faire.” So say the supporters of 
 the voluntary system: “ Leave religion to itself; you 
 will only do mischief by meddling with it.”’ We will 
 now proceed to the examination of this question. 
 
 We must here call to mind that we have to secure 
 three objects: a learned education of the ministers of 
 religion ; an adequate provision for them; and such a 
 state of circumstances as will lead them to an assi- 
 duous and impartial study of the Scriptures, other 
 theological works, and such parts of literature and 
 science as may be made subsidiary to the cause of 
 religion. I shall im the first instance treat these 
 important subjects abstractedly, without reference to 
 the particular state of the country in which we live; 
 and then consider how far the conclusions to which I 
 am led should be modified in their application to the ~ 
 existing condition of the United Kingdom. 
 
 With regard to the first head, it must always be in 
 the power of the state in all countries to secure for 
 those intended:for the Christian ministry the advan- 
 tage of a learned education, and to exclude from the 
 ministry such as shall not prove themselves qualified 
 for the exercise of its functions. And as the state 
 has the power, so there appears no reason to suppose 
 
300 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 that it will not have the will to do this. A states- 
 man must be blind, indeed, not to perceive that 
 religion affords the most stable support to govern- 
 ment; that the religious man will im general best 
 fulfil the public and private duties of life; and will 
 contribute most to advance the happiness of the com- 
 munity, and thereby increase its attachment to the 
 constitution. But if these matters be left to the 
 private exertions of individuals, what security have we 
 that such beneficial results will ensue? I find nothing 
 in history to lead me to indulge in such an anticipa- 
 tion. The state of religious opmion, and still more 
 of religious feeling, is ever varymg. Sometimes a 
 strong fanatical feeling becomes very prevalent; at 
 others a great regard to rites, ceremonies, and ex- 
 ternal observances, with very little to imterest the 
 heart and regulate the conduct. In the deplorable 
 reign of Charles the Second a general spirit of irre- 
 ligion prevailed throughout the land, led on by an 
 abandoned and profligate court. ‘Throughout the 
 eighteenth century the spirit of religion i the upper 
 and middle ranks was cold and lifeless; although the 
 lower classes were awakened to its importance by the 
 powerful exertions of the Wesleys, Whitfield, and 
 other Methodists. However strong reasons persons 
 of serious and reflecting minds may think they have 
 for rejecting some of the dogmas of these teachers, I 
 can scarcely think that any impartial person can deny 
 that we owe them great obligations for their success- 
 ful efforts in implanting the fear of God and a sense 
 of duty in thousands of minds which had previously 
 led a life of profligacy without God in the world. If 
 there had been in the reign of Charles the Second no 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 301 
 
 established church, I cannot see what could have pre- 
 vented uncontrolled profligacy throughout the country. 
 I may, indeed, be reminded of the excellent men who 
 conscientiously resigned their preferments on the pass- 
 ing of the Act of Uniformity, and of the exertions of 
 those and other dissenting teachers amid the persecu- 
 tions to which they were exposed. I wish to give all 
 honour to the memory of those illustrious English 
 confessors, but their history cannot be said to have a 
 legitimate bearing on our present subject, for they 
 were bred in the church, and enjoyed the advantage 
 of the learned education which she has provided for 
 her sons. Those who are acquainted with the great 
 difficulties’ which the most flourishing bodies of 
 dissenters in this country have had to contend 
 with in providing the means of education for their 
 ministers, cannot, I apprehend, hesitate to admit that 
 on this branch of our inquiry the advantage is entirely 
 on the side of a religious establishment. . 
 
 The next question is, whether by a national esta- 
 blishment or on the voluntary principle a decent sub- 
 sistence for the clergy will be best secured. I hardly 
 can think that any reflecting person can entertain a 
 serious doubt on this subject. In this country a 
 tenth part of the produce of the soil is set apart for 
 the support of the clergy*. In arguing the general 
 question, indeed, we are not at liberty to avail our- 
 selves of this fact. In every country, however, it is 
 and always must be in the power of. those who exer- 
 cise the supreme authority to make such provision for 
 the clergy as they may deem necessary, and as the 
 
 * A considerable portion, however, of the tithes has been diverted 
 from its legitimate purpose, and is now in the hands of laymen. 
 
302 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 particular circumstances of the nation at the time 
 may admit of and require. I can find no reason to 
 expect that this would be done on the voluntary prin- 
 ciple. Let us look to the condition of the dissenters 
 in this country. Those members of the dissenting 
 denominations who contribute to the support of their 
 ministers give proofs of a conscientious adherence to 
 their religious profession by voluntarily payimg money 
 in support of it, which burden they might avoid by 
 conforming to the established church. In all countries | 
 where a particular form of religion is established, the 
 dissidents from it must be more conscientious than 
 the bulk of those who adhere to it, for the plain 
 reason, that those who care little for religion, and 
 profess it chiefly because attendance on religious 
 worship is the general practice of the country, and 
 because refraining from attendmg would incur a loss 
 of respectability, will naturally attach themselves to 
 the established church in preference to any dissenting 
 sect. The temptations to relinquish dissent and to 
 jom the establishment have been found so power- 
 ful, by those who have attained wealth and station 
 in society, as to have led one whose character and 
 writings did honour to the religious denomination to 
 which she belonged*, to observe that she had never 
 known a family keep a carriage for three generations 
 and remain dissenters. The dissenters then at large 
 may be fairly considered as a conscientious body. Do 
 they then or do they not support their mimisters on 
 so liberal a scale as to place them on an equality in 
 point of income with the clergy of the establishment ? 
 Without having the means to ascertain this distinctly 
 * Mrs. Barbauld. 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 303 
 
 as a matter of fact, it is my firm conviction, drawn 
 from general observation, that this question must be 
 answered in the negative. I believe that a large 
 majority of the dissenting clergy are very poorly pro- 
 vided for; and that their situation in point of income 
 is much inferior to that of the clergy of the established 
 church. We often hear much of the scanty stipends 
 of curates ; and these complaints may perhaps be well- 
 founded. But be that as it may, we must bear in 
 mind that in general a curacy is only the first stage in 
 a clergyman’s life, and that but few remain curates 
 throughout their whole lives. I suspect, however, that 
 a larger proportion of dissenting ministers, compared 
 with the whole body, than the number of curates in 
 proportion to the vicars, rectors, and dignified clergy, 
 receive smaller stipends than the curates, and have a 
 worse chance of bettering their condition. I regret 
 being under the necessity of resorting to conjecture 
 on this subject; but still it is founded on such ob- 
 servations as can hardly fail to lead to a conclusion 
 which is in the main right. Dissenting ministers, 
 even among the most wealthy sects, are, I believe, in 
 general very poorly paid; and it seems a strong fact 
 to show that this is the case, that members of the 
 wealthy families among the dissenters are very rarely 
 brought up to the ministry. A considerable pro- 
 portion of the clergy of the church of England are 
 sons of noblemen and of persons of rank, station, and 
 fortune. If the incomes of dissenting teachers made 
 any near approach to that of the clergy of the church, 
 the sons of wealthy dissenters would assuredly be 
 brought up to the ministry much more frequently 
 than they now are. 
 
304. RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 Another important circumstance is required to 
 be taken into consideration, the mode in which the 
 provision for the clergy is made. Under this head 
 two incalculable advantages will be found on the side 
 of the established church, the independence and. the 
 permanence of the provision. The clergyman, when 
 he is admitted to his living, has a provision for life ; 
 the dissenting minister will retain his income only so 
 long as his services are acceptable to the subscribers 
 by whom he is paid. The former has no anxiety 
 about the future; the latter is in continual danger of 
 losing the means of his subsistence. I shall have to 
 consider presently what effect this difference in their 
 circumstances will probably lead to in the perform- 
 ance of their duties: suffice it to say here, that the 
 situation of the clergyman, in the poimt of view in 
 which we are at present considering it, appears to be 
 far preferable to that of the dissenting minister. 
 
 We have now arrived at the last subject of our in- 
 quiry respecting what should be the situation of a 
 Christian teacher. He should, if possible, be so cir- 
 cumstanced as to be left at liberty to study the Scrip- 
 tures with impartiality. The importance of this object 
 no Protestant can deny. Whether it can be practi- — 
 cally attained requires serious consideration. Many 
 of the supporters of the voluntary principle consider 
 themselves on high ground here; and that their 
 strength lies chiefly in this part of the question. In- 
 deed the larger part of them would probably admit 
 that the first and second questions, which we have 
 discussed respecting the education and the support of 
 the clergy, must be decided against them; and that 
 their case rests on this third branch of our inquiry. 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 305 
 
 Their argument may, I think, be fairly stated as fol- 
 lows. If you have a church established by law, its 
 doctrines and its discipline must be enforced on all 
 its members; and_as the church system will of neces- 
 sity be the work of fallible men, we must expect that 
 it will contain some things which are erroneous. 
 These errors may be exposed and confuted by learned 
 and able men ; but as the church system is, as it were, 
 stereotyped in a form from which it is held an offence 
 to deviate, the errors are perpetuated; and there 
 appears to be no hope of their ever being corrected. 
 If, on the other hand, we reject all creeds and _arti- 
 cles, every man will be left to study the Scriptures for 
 himself, and the-cause of religious truth cannot fail to 
 be benefited by the free action of independent minds. 
 All this sounds well, and the former part is unde- 
 niably true; but the state of things contemplated in 
 the latter part does not exist; and I shall proceed to 
 show the reasons which have induced me to think 
 that it never can exist. The supposition is, that a 
 man can commence his studies for the Christian mi- 
 nistry with strict impartiality, and without a bias on his 
 mind in favour of any one of the churches or sects into 
 which the Christian world is divided. This seems 
 to be an impossibility. At however early an age 
 our supposed student may commence the studies 
 which are to prepare him for the ministry, a con- 
 siderable period of his life must have previously 
 elapsed. How has this been spent? . No one, I pre- 
 sume, expects that the future minister is to be abso- 
 lutely without religion till the moment when he sits 
 down to study for the ministry. He must then have 
 been in the habit of attending some place of religious 
 x 
 
306 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 worship, and of receiving religious instruction at home 
 from his parents or others. He must also have had 
 intimate connexions with some class of persons or 
 other; and the probability is, that his associates will 
 have been chiefly those who agree in the main with 
 the sentiments of his parents. All these things will 
 necessarily tend to give him a strong bias in favour 
 of a particular modification of the Christian religion. 
 This is not only unavoidable, but its existence is 
 most desirable, and even essential to a young man 
 who aspires to the sacred office of a Christian mi- 
 nister. A man cannot enter on the study of re- 
 ligion as he may on that of geometry or chemistry. 
 Religion addresses itself to the whole man. It is not 
 a mere matter of reasoning. ‘The whole heart and 
 soul must be engaged and deeply interested in it. 
 Every religious parent will desire to implant pious 
 feelings and sentiments in the minds and hearts of 
 his children at the very earliest period when they are 
 capable of receiving them. Few, I presume, will be 
 found who will not admit the age of eighteen to be 
 quite as early as a young man should be called upon 
 to direct his principal attention to those studies which 
 are to prepare him for the Christian ministry. If he has 
 been religiously educated, how much of religious senti- 
 ment and habit must he then have acquired, and how 
 strong an attachment to the particular church or sect 
 in which he has been brought up? And is it really 
 to be expected that all this will be laid aside from the 
 moment when he commences his study of the Scrip- 
 tures; and that the Episcopalian, the Presbyterian 
 and the Independent, the Calvinist and the Armi- 
 nian, the Trinitarian and the Unitarian, will sit down 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 307 
 
 to read the Bible free from a bias in favour of any 
 of the doctrines and opinions indicated by the words 
 used above? No one can be so entirely unacquainted 
 with human nature, and so little observant of what 
 passes around him, as to believe this possible. No 
 man can possibly enter on the study of the Scriptures 
 without a predilection in favour of some particular 
 view of Christianity. All that the wisest and best 
 parents and instructors can do is to inculcate and 
 promote in their children and pupils, to the utmost 
 of their power, the love of truth, in the hope that it 
 will, in the end, prove too powerful for all bias and 
 prepossession. 
 
 It must also be observed, that the free inquiry 
 which is only to extend to the short period devoted 
 to those studies which are immediately preparatory 
 to the exercise of the Christian ministry, cannot be 
 reasonably expected to produce any very important 
 results; we must therefore follow our student in 
 his career after he has taken upon himself the office 
 of a Christian teacher. By this time he must have 
 adopted some particular views of Christianity; and 
 his object must be to connect himself with persons 
 professing sentiments similar to his own. It is 
 nothing to the purpose to say, that congregations 
 may be found among the dissenters who acknowledge 
 no allegiance to any creed or formula of faith com- 
 posed by fallible men, and who profess to derive their 
 doctrines from the Scriptures alone, which every one 
 is allowed to interpret for himself. But although 
 these congregations have no creed expressed in words, 
 it is absolutely essential to their existence, as Chris- 
 tian societies, that there should be an implied agree- 
 
 x 2 
 
308 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 ment among their members. Without this, religion 
 would be a mere name, or at most, a matter of out- 
 ward observance. It is certainly possible to conceive 
 that a number of individuals may think it respectable 
 to attend some place of religious worship, and that 
 the keeping up of such places is beneficial to the 
 public; and, at the same time, may be indifferent as 
 to the doctrines inculcated. But with such persons 
 religion is merely political; and the most enlarged 
 charity cannot class them among religious men. That 
 which is addressed to the head exclusively, and does 
 not affect the heart, can never deserve the honoured 
 and hallowed name of religion. True religion ad- 
 dresses itself to the moral sentiments and feelings, 
 and supplies the spiritual wants of man. It elevates, 
 purifies, spiritualises. A Christian congregation, which 
 has no specific views of Christianity, 1s an absurdity. 
 If it could exist at all (which seems incredible), there 
 is absolutely nothing to secure for it more than a very 
 short duration. It would speedily, in the nature of 
 things, vanish away, and be seen no more. Every 
 Christian congregation has, in truth, its own peculiar 
 scheme of doctrine, which its minister must incul- 
 cate ; or he will be obliged to relinquish his situation. 
 Nothing more absurd can be imagined, than that a 
 religious society should have a permanent, or indeed 
 more than a very short existence, in which the mi- 
 nister should feel himself perfectly at liberty to espouse 
 either side of the controversies which divide and agitate 
 the Christian world. 
 
 Supposing, then, our student now to have become 
 a minister of a congregation professing the utmost 
 liberality, and asserting most strongly the right of 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 309 
 
 free inquiry in religion, he can, if he act with honour 
 and integrity, hold his situation no longer than he 
 agrees in the leading doctrines of his congregation ; 
 and if he should remain in it and promulgate opinions 
 inconsistent with those doctrines, a withdrawal of the 
 subscriptions of his hearers would speedily deprive 
 him of his means of subsistence. The result of the 
 investigation is, that every minister of religion, whether 
 of an established church or of a dissenting sect, must 
 necessarily be placed in circumstances which are cal- 
 culated to pre-engage his mind in favour of some 
 particular views of Christian doctrine; and that his 
 interpretation of the Scriptures will, in general, be 
 greatly biased by such predisposition. 
 
 Is then the cause of religious truth absolutely hope- 
 less ; and must the Christian world go on in a course 
 of perpetual controversy without making any real 
 advance? I hope and I think not; but those who 
 labour for the advancement of religious truth, will 
 probably always be few. Some, however, may be 
 found in every age, in whose minds the love of truth 
 is paramount. These will go on calmly and fearlessly 
 examining the foundations of their faith ; relinquish- 
 ing by degrees what may appear to them to be erro- 
 neous ; and availing themselves of all the means in 
 their power, from whatever quarter, to assist them in 
 the search after religious truth. It is deeply to be 
 regretted that very few laymen appear to engage their 
 minds and employ their time in religious inquiry ; as 
 they are much more likely to give an wabiased atten- 
 tion to the subject than a minister of religion, or one 
 who aspires to that station, can be in general ex- 
 pected to do. 
 
310 FREE INQUIRY IN RELIGION. 
 
 Free inquiry in religion is one of the noblest pur- 
 suits of the human mind, and it has been most bene- 
 ficial in its results; but it has unhappily fallen into 
 disrepute with many serious and truly religious per- 
 sons. This seems mainly attributable to the manner 
 in which it has been too often conducted. Its sup- 
 porters have frequently been represented as leaning 
 too much to their own understanding, led on by inor- 
 dinate self-conceit, and despising those who were wiser 
 and better than themselves. That these charges are, for 
 the most part, greatly exaggerated, and when applied 
 to many individuals, wholly unfounded, cannot be 
 truly denied; but the manner in which religious 
 investigations have been conducted, has often given 
 plausibility to the accusations. The vzght is derived 
 from the duty of free inquiry. ‘Those who believe 
 that the Almighty bas blessed his human creatures 
 with a revelation of his will, must admit that it 
 is the duty of those who have access to the Sacred 
 Volume in which the revelation is contained, to 
 employ their faculties in its study, and to use their 
 best exertions to understand its contents. We can 
 have no rational expectation of understanding any 
 book, unless we study it; and it is obvious, that 
 freedom and impartiality are the conditions of the 
 mind the most likely to enable us to attam our 
 object. But if it is our duty freely to inquire, the 
 right of free inquiry naturally flows from it, as no one 
 can deny that we have a right to do what our duty 
 requires of us. 
 
 It may not be amiss to make a few remarks here 
 on the subject of free inquiry ; what it is concerning 
 which we wish to inquire, and in what manner and 
 
FREE INQUIRY IN RELIGION. Sia 
 
 with what limitations our inquiries should be con- 
 ducted. All Christians admit the Divine authority of 
 Christ and of the early teachers who were appointed 
 and authorised by him to promulgate his religion in 
 the world. It is also admitted that the mstructions 
 of Jesus Christ and his disciples are contained in the 
 New Testament. To that book, then, and to such 
 parts of the Old Testament as are properly applied to 
 the condition of Gentile Christians, that is to all 
 except converts to Christianity from Judaism, we are 
 to look for instruction in revealed truth. The Scrip- 
 tures, however, are known to the great majority of 
 the Christian world only in translations from the lan- 
 guages in which they were written. These transla- 
 tions are very numerous, and differ considerably in 
 many passages. It becomes therefore the duty of 
 those who are competent to the task to have recourse 
 to the original Scriptures in order to ascertain their 
 meaning. But here arises a difficulty. The existing 
 printed versions are translations from ancient manu- 
 scripts ; but besides these, many others of great an- 
 tiquity, as well as other ancient writings, which it is 
 not necessary to enumerate here, but of which full 
 accounts may be found in the works of learned 
 divines, are in existence, and a considerable variety is 
 found in the language of these ancient authorities. 
 It has been the labour of a large portion of the lives 
 of many eminent scholars to examine the manuscripts 
 in question, to estimate their respective importance, 
 and to bring before the public the result of their 
 labours in the shape of new editions of the Scriptures. 
 The learned student cannot fail to derive great assist- 
 -ance from the labours of these men; and those who 
 
312 FREE INQUIRY IN RELIGION. 
 
 can only read the Scriptures in their own languages 
 will easily meet with summaries of the arguments m 
 support of any particular reading. Amid all the 
 different readings and discrepancies of the MSS., I do 
 not believe that-anything is to be found at all affect- 
 ing those great leading doctrines which I have en- 
 deavoured to show it was the principal object of our 
 Saviour to inculcate; and which were intended to | 
 promote the cause of piety and virtue in this world ; 
 and to prepare the human race for the beatitudes of 
 that which is to come. Every one should do his best 
 to understand the volume of Divine truth ; the learned 
 by studying the origimal, the unlearned by reading 
 translations, and by availing themselves, as they have 
 opportunities, of the labours of the learned. 
 Unspeakably important is the disposition in which 
 we engage in the task of free inquiry. Unless this 
 be done with a pious and humble mind, we can have 
 no reason to hope for the blessing of God on our 
 inquiries. If we pursue them in the hope of finding 
 the means of evading any Christian duty, or with a 
 vain-glorious desire of acquiring a character of su- 
 perior learning or ability, we shall probably heap 
 error upon error, and find ourselves at last in a con- 
 dition far inferior to that of the humble unlearned 
 Christian, who believes as he has been taught, and 
 regulates his conduct by the love of God and the 
 love of man, and practises all the personal virtues. 
 Let me, however, not be understood to represent a 
 free inquiry into the meaning of the Scriptures as a 
 small matter. To it we owe the great reformation in 
 religion ; and by means of it the more intelligent and 
 informed Christians have had their minds freed from 
 
FREE INQUIRY IN RELIGION. 313 
 
 much which perplexed and troubled the ablest and 
 most learned men of former times. The world has 
 never, even in the best times, fully imbibed the true 
 spirit of Christianity. Even the apostles, the chosen 
 companions of Jesus, we have seen were far from 
 having attaimed that exalted spirituality which cha- 
 racterises the Divine teaching of their Master. In pro- 
 portion as intelligence has advanced in this world, more 
 pure and exalted views of Christianity have prevailed. 
 Jesus Christ is the instructor of all ages. He pours a 
 sweet drop into the bitter cup which the uninstructed 
 and degraded negro is doomed to drink ; and checks by 
 his heavenly wisdom the vain speculations of the self- 
 glorifying philosopher. His words may, for the most 
 part, be easily understood ; but who has fully imbibed 
 his spirit? The study of his teachings, and of those 
 of his chosen disciples, accompanied by earnest prayer, 
 are the best means of attaming it. Were Christianity 
 really established in the world, war, tyranny, oppres- 
 sion, profaneness, intemperance, impurity, would cease 
 to exist; and thus the most fruitful sources of cor- 
 ruption and wretchedness would at once be stopped. 
 From this (I hope it will not be thought unneces- 
 sary) digression respecting free inquiry, we will return 
 to the important subject of the best means of sup- — 
 porting and advancing religion. For the reasons 
 stated in the foregoing pages, I conclude that a re- 
 ligious establishment is to be preferred to what is 
 generally called the voluntary system, that is, to 
 leaving religion to be supported by the voluntary 
 exertions of individuals without any interference by 
 the state. Two most important questions arise here : 
 1, what should be the doctrines and form of the esta- 
 
314 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 blishment ; and, 2, what is the duty of the supreme 
 power of the state towards those who dissent trom it, 
 and set up churches of their own ? 
 
 Those who agree in the principle laid down in 
 this work, that every man has a right to follow the 
 dictates of conscience in matters of religion, and that 
 there is no infallible judge of religious truth on earth, 
 must admit, that as no church establishment can 
 possess infallibility, it follows that none can have a 
 right to condemn and punish those who deny its 
 dogmas, and refuse to submit to its authority. All 
 such interference must be condemned as unjust and 
 tyrannical. 
 
 Church establishment we have considered to be a 
 powerful means of supporting and advancing Chris- 
 tianity. I have endeavoured to point out in former 
 parts of this work what was the leading object of 
 Christ’s coming into the world. The 16th verse of 
 the 3rd chapter of St. John’s gospel is a complete 
 summary of the Christian religion: “For God so 
 loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, 
 that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, 
 but have everlasting life.” Christianity has its origin 
 in the love of God; it is carried on and perfected by 
 the mission of his Son Jesus Christ; and its end is 
 the conferring of everlasting life on the faithful fol- 
 lowers of the Saviour. Let us examine closely this 
 remarkable text. “God so loved the world ;”’ this is 
 the first branch, and it clearly shows that the origin 
 of the Christian religion was the love of God to his 
 human creatures. If anything shall be found in any 
 formula of faith, or in the profession of any church or 
 sect, inconsistent with this doctrine, it is a departure 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 815 
 
 from what was taught by the disciple whom Jesus 
 loved. That God gave his only-begotten Son to 
 redeem the world, is the common creed of Christen- 
 dom, and requires no particular comment. The third 
 branch of the text, ‘whosoever believeth in him 
 should not perish, but have everlasting life,”’ leads to 
 the consideration of what is to be understood by be- 
 lieving in Christ. Whoever seriously studies the New 
 Testament cannot fail to perceive that by faith is to 
 be understood much more than a mere assent to the 
 truth of the gospel dispensation. Faith is the vivi- 
 fying principle of the Christian religion, comprising a 
 full conviction of its truth,-an entire trust in its pro- 
 mises, and an unshaken fidelity to its precepts. The 
 necessary result of such a faith is obedience to the 
 commands of God. He who lives in habitual dis- 
 obedience to God’s laws, although he may assent to 
 the truth of the Christian religion, cannot be said, in 
 a scriptural sense, to have faith. I shall not quote 
 particular texts in proof of the accuracy of this ex- 
 planation of the word faith, but I refer the candid 
 reader to the general tenor of the New Testament, 
 and particularly to the writings of St. Paul. There 
 is in reality no inconsistency between the doctrine of 
 faith, and that of the necessity of good works, or, in 
 other words, obedience to God’s laws, to secure our 
 salvation. .This obedience naturally and necessarily 
 flows from a true faith. The mind of him who has 
 the true faitli of a Christian must be deeply pene- 
 trated with a sense of the goodness of God; must 
 receive the message of salvation with heartfelt gra- 
 titude, and with love and veneration for him who 
 came to seek and to save that which was lost; and 
 
316 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 must love all that is good and pure and holy, and 
 reject and detest that which is evil. Weak and in- 
 consistent he may be, and from: the frailty of his 
 nature and the strength of temptation he may commit 
 many offences against God’s laws ; but that he should 
 live in contempt of them, and in the general course 
 of his life disobey them, is impossible. The man who 
 so lives, whatever his speculative opinions may be, 
 has certainly not the faith of a Christian. In this 
 view of the subject, we may see that religious faith 
 will exist in different degrees m the minds of dif- 
 ferent individuals. The lowest is the mere assent 
 of the understanding to the truth of the Christian 
 religion. But this falls far short of the faith by which 
 the Christian becomes entitled to the promise of sal- 
 vation. Between the bare assent of the understand- 
 ing and that faith which acts on the mind with all 
 the force of certainty, are many degrees; and every 
 really religious man will strive with all his force, and 
 avail himself of every means in his power, and above 
 all, of earnest prayer, to rise from a lower to a 
 higher faith, till he has attained that state which 
 excludes all doubt and hesitation. Would a man 
 examine the state of his mind as to his faith, let him 
 consider whether he holds the great truths of religion 
 with the same unhesitating confidence as he gives to 
 historical and geographical facts not within his know- 
 ledge; as that Hannibal and Cesar existed many 
 ages ago; and that Pekin, which he has never seen, 
 is really a city in China. Another and a more prac- 
 tical test of the strength of our faith is a searching 
 inquiry into our motives of action, whether the hopes 
 and fears respecting the world to come have the same 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 817 
 
 degree of assurance in our minds as those which 
 belong to the present life. Do we feel equally con- 
 fident that our condition for weal or woe in the future 
 state will depend on our character and conduct here, 
 as that extravagance and neglect of business will 
 probably lead to poverty and indigence, that intem- 
 perance will destroy our health, and that gross vio- 
 lations of the law will lead to severe punishment ? 
 Even if we can answer these questions affirmatively, 
 we may still: not have attained the perfection of the 
 Christian faith, which consists in an entire acqui- 
 escence in the will of God at all times and under all 
 circumstances, and a firm conviction that he will 
 always do that which is wisest and best for ourselves 
 and for all his creatures. This is the state towards 
 which all who bear the Christian name should be 
 constantly and earnestly striving. Very few, it is to 
 be feared, make any near approach to it ; and, looking 
 to the actual state of mankind, we may be tempted 
 to ask by what degree of Christian faith man may be 
 entitled to the benefits of the gospel promises. Such 
 an inquiry is dangerous, and no one should indulge 
 in it. ‘The business of every Christian is to press 
 forward to higher degrees of faith, in the hope of 
 attaining the highest; and in the course of his pro-— 
 gress to rely on the mercy of him “ who desireth not 
 the death of a sinner, but rather that he would turn 
 from his wickedness and live.” 
 
 What has been said respecting faith cannot be 
 properly considered as a departure from the subject 
 in hand, a national establishment, since the object of 
 such an establishment is the support of the Christian 
 faith. We will now proceed to consider how that 
 
318 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 great object can be best obtained. Previously to in- 
 quiring what a church establishment ought to be, it 
 will be desirable to bear in mind what it should not be. 
 If it be true that all Christians have a right to read 
 the Scriptures for themselves, and to form their own 
 conclusions as to the meaning of the Sacred Writings, 
 and that no power on earth can lawfully dictate to any 
 individual what he is to believe, which I have already 
 endeavoured fully to prove from the New Testament, 
 it follows that all condemnation of others on account 
 of their holding different interpretations of the Scrip- 
 tures from those professed by any particular church, 
 and charging them with a religious offence under the 
 name of heresy, is totally unwarranted. So again it 
 must, on the principle set forth above, be left to the 
 choice of every individual, whether he will attach bim- 
 self to any particular church or not, and no church 
 has a right to bring a charge of schism against him 
 who refuses to join its communion; or who, having 
 formerly been a member of it, withdraws from it. 
 Are the words heresy and schism then without mean- 
 ingP Certamly not. They denote great offences, of 
 which numbers have been guilty ; but they cannot be 
 properly applied to merely erroneous opinion where 
 there has been no evil intention. Whoever is led into 
 error in religion by worldly interest, or by any evil 
 ~ inclination, is guilty of heresy. He that separates 
 himself from the communion of a church of which he 
 is a member, from personal dislike of any of those 
 who exercise authority in it, for the purpose of for- 
 warding any ambitious or interested purpose, or 
 from any evil desire whatever, is guilty of schism. 
 “ Schism,” says the ever-memorable John Hales, “ is 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 319 
 
 nothing else but an unnecessary separation of Chris- 
 tians from that part of the visible church of which 
 they were once members.” The guilt of heresy 
 and schism then are real; but I do not see how any 
 human being can pronounce that they have been 
 incurred in -any particular instance. They must be 
 left to the Searcher of hearts. Let every man se- 
 riously, and with a deep sense of religious obligation, 
 examine himself, and take every precaution in his 
 power to prevent his being actuated by any worldly 
 and unhallowed motive in rejecting or adopting any 
 particular doctrine, or in withdrawing himself from 
 the communion of the particular church to which he 
 belongs ; but having fully satisfied his conscience on 
 this head, let him openly profess what he believes to 
 be Christian truth; and exercise his own free judg- 
 ment as to the church or sect with which he thinks it 
 best to connect himself. An established church then 
 should not directly or impliedly assume to itself the 
 attribute of infallibility ; and should not charge those 
 who deny its doctrines with heresy, or those who 
 withdraw from its communion with schism. By such 
 assumptions it takes to itself powers which belong to 
 none on earth; and which are so far from being 
 authorised by the Saviour of the world, as to be at ~ 
 variance with his command. 
 
 Having settled in our own minds what an esta- 
 blished church should not be, let us next consider 
 what it ought to be. The purpose for which it is 
 instituted is the support of the Christian religion. 
 The three principal things to be considered are the 
 doctrines, the means and mode of instruction, and 
 the discipline of the church. On the first head I 
 
320 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 have devoted a large part of this work to an mquiry 
 what was the great purpose of Christ’s mission ; and 
 what were the leading doctrines taught by him and his 
 disciples. Those who agree in my conclusions will 
 think that, as Christianity was intended for all, it may 
 be understood by all; and that those who make it 
 “a cunning thing to be a Christian,’ depart lament- 
 ably from the plain intelligible doctrines taught by 
 its first promulgators. If those doctrines were deemed 
 sufficient for them, it is difficult to understand why 
 they are not enough for all times. Unhappily the 
 mind of man has too frequently been urged by its 
 restlessness to employ its leisure i speculating and 
 refining on matters of religion, forming systems of 
 faith, and insisting on dogmas hard to be understood, 
 and, when received, not at all calculated to promote 
 the great cause of piety and virtue. ‘Thus the skill 
 and learning of divines have been often employed 
 to support abstruse and difficult doctrines, generally 
 drawn from the more obscure parts of Scripture, and 
 requiring a great expenditure of time and thought 
 to understand them; and, while the head has been 
 taxed to the utmost of its powers, the heart and the 
 affections have been in a great measure neglected. 
 Nor is even this the worst part of the case: the 
 blindest bigotry, and an absolute abandonment of 
 Christian charity have been too often characteristics 
 of those who have engaged in theological controversy. 
 I am happy to find my views of-this subject strongly 
 corroborated by the excellent writer whom I have 
 lately quoted. “It hath been,” says Hales, “the 
 common disease of Christians from the begmning, not 
 to content themselves with that measure of faith which 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 321 
 
 God and the Scriptures have expressly afforded us ; 
 but out of a vain desire to know more than is revealed, 
 they have attempted to discuss things of which we 
 can have no light, neither from reason nor revelation : 
 neither have they rested here,* but upon pretence of 
 church authority, which is none, or tradition, which for 
 the most part is but pigment, they have peremptorily 
 concluded, and confidently imposed upon others, a 
 necessity of entertaining conclusions of that nature ; 
 and to strengthen themselves, have broken out into 
 divisions and factions, opposing man to man, synod 
 to synod, till the peace of the church vanished, with- 
 out all possibility of recal.”’ Such are the sentiments 
 of an able writer and excellent man of the seventeenth 
 century. Let us now attend to an author of great 
 ability of the eighteenth. “If,” says Paley,+ “it be 
 deemed expedient to establish a national religion, that 
 is to say, one sect in preference to all others, some test, 
 by which the teachers of that sect may be distinguished 
 from the teachers of different sects, appears to be an 
 indispensable consequence. The existence of such an 
 establishment supposes it, and the very notion of a 
 national religion includes that of a test. But this 
 necessity, which is real, hath, according to the fashion 
 of human affairs, furnished to almost every church a 
 pretence for extending, multiplying, and continuing 
 such tests beyond what the occasion justified. For 
 though some purposes of order and tranquillity may 
 
 * These words, we are told by an excellent and highly respected 
 living author, ‘‘ he afterwards slightly qualified.”” Hallam’s Litera- 
 ture of Europe, 1803, chap. ii. p. 80. I do not know where this 
 qualification is to be found. 
 
 + Moral Philosophy, book vi. chap. x.: Of Religious Establish- 
 
 ments and Toleration. 
 = 
 
329 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 be answered by the establishment of creeds and 
 confessions, yet they are all at times attended with 
 serious inconveniences: they check inquiry; they 
 violate liberty; they ensnare the consciences of the 
 clergy, by holding out temptations to prevarication ; 
 however they may express the persuasion, or be 
 accommodated to the controversies or to the fears of 
 the age in which they are composed, in process of 
 time, and by reason of the changes which are wont 
 to take place in the judgment of mankind upon reli- 
 _ gious subjects, they come at length to contradict 
 the actual opinions of the church whose doctrines 
 they profess to contam; and they often perpetuate 
 the proscription of sects and tenets, from which any 
 danger has long ceased to be apprehended.” 
 
 Fortified by the sentiments of these eminent writers, 
 and by those of many others who might be easily 
 adduced, and after full consideration of the subject, I 
 cannot hesitate in expressing my own conviction that 
 the doctrine professed by an established church should 
 be that which was first taught by our Saviour and his 
 disciples; that it should be expressed in plain and 
 unequivocal terms; and that all beyond this should — 
 be left for each individual to decide for himself. ‘The 
 argument for a more elaborate creed is that it pro- 
 duces unanimity. There can be no doubt that it was 
 intended to have this effect, but it is equally certain 
 that the attempt has signally failed. Even within the 
 pale of the pretended infallible church of Rome there 
 has always been much diversity of opinion. Within - 
 a very short time a great division has taken place in 
 the church of Scotland, and a very large portion of 
 its members have left it and set up a free church. 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 393 
 
 As to the church of England, we have seen that a 
 late writer has divided its members into three classes, 
 which he has denominated High Church, Low 
 Church, and Broad Church; he has also made sub- 
 divisions of each, and although all may not agree in 
 his classifications, none can doubt the reality of a 
 great diversity of religious opinion among the clergy 
 of the established church. It was this vain attempt to 
 procure unanimity which led to a recent memorable 
 event which no religious mind can think of without 
 deep concern and regret: I mean what is called 
 the Gorham controversy. Both parties agreed that 
 baptism was obligatory on the whole Christian world, 
 and that Divine grace was the gift of God to man. 
 Surely we might have expected that an agreement in 
 such important doctrines would be a sufficient bond 
 of union. But no; it was not thought enough to 
 acknowledge that to baptize was a Christian duty, 
 and to practise it; and that Divine grace was an 
 inestimable blessing, and humbly to hope and _ pray 
 for it; but they must also know precisely 4ow baptism 
 operated, and Aow grace produced its effect ; and for 
 this cause Christian charity was outraged, courts of 
 justice were resorted to, and a charge of heresy was 
 made by one party against the other. Should these 
 things be so in a Christian land? Can any good be 
 expected to arise directly or indirectly from this con- 
 troversy, commensurate with the evil of angry pas- 
 sions, and the ‘outrage of Christian charity which 
 accompanied it ? 
 
 ‘The doctrine then to be professed by an established 
 church should be plain and simple; and it seems 
 desirable that. it should be expressed in Scripture 
 
 yey 
 
324 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 language. But it may be said that this leaves room 
 for unseemly controversies among the clergy, which 
 would excite those feelings of bigotry and unchari- 
 tableness which have been already denounced. That 
 this can be entirely prevented I will not undertake to 
 say. The bad passions of man will sometimes burst 
 out, do what we will to restrain them; but that much 
 occasion for controversy would be taken away by the 
 plan of an established church here proposed, seems to 
 admit of no reasonable doubt. We must, however, 
 fully to grasp the subject, enter on our second head of 
 the means and mode of instruction to be adopted in 
 the church. It will not be necessary to say more than 
 that it is the indispensable duty of a clergyman to 
 give religious instruction, and to administer religious 
 consolation in private to his parishioners as they 
 may stand in need of his assistance. I shall confine 
 myself to the subject of the public services of the 
 church. It would be useless to discuss the question of 
 a settled form of prayer and what is commonly 
 called free prayer, that is, such as the minister shall 
 compose himself, or select from the compositions of 
 others, because I consider a liturgy absolutely neces- 
 sary in a church constituted in the manner which has 
 been suggested. If every clergyman were to be 
 allowed to use what prayers he thought proper, each 
 religious sect in the country might find its representa- 
 tive in the established church ; and the most opposite 
 doctrines might be indirectly inculcated from the 
 reading-desk, as it should happen to be filled by the 
 supporters of one or other of the religious parties in 
 the country. This would lead to great confusion and 
 uncertainty in the minds of the hearers, and thereby 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 825 
 
 weaken the impression which the services of the church 
 should make on the mind and heart. To prevent such 
 an evil consequence, there should be a fixed form of 
 prayer. But how is such a liturgy to be made? The 
 answer is plain. Let the Scriptures, particularly the 
 New Testament, be laid open before the compilers of 
 the liturgy; let them make free use of its language ; 
 and let its spirit breathe through whatever they add 
 to it. Much may be found in existing forms and 
 in the works of many pious writers, which would be 
 of excellent use in forming a liturgy. It should be 
 the especial care of the compilers to admit nothing 
 which cannot be clearly supported by Scripture au- 
 thority; and they ought, as far as they can con- 
 scientiously, to avoid inserting anything which shall 
 give pain or offence to any serious Christian. Such a 
 liturgy would be indeed a blessing; and would tend 
 more to promote union among Christians than any- 
 thing besides. One caution should be added, that the 
 prayers should not be long. Nothing tends more to 
 deaden the spirit of devotion than mere lip-service, 
 when the mind is either listless or engaged on other 
 subjects. We cannot for any length of time keep up 
 in our minds the fervency required in prayer. 
 
 But it may be said, your plan of preventing con- — 
 flicting opinions among the clergy by the use of a 
 liturgy must fail, unless you abolish preaching alto- 
 gether, or lay such restrictions on the preacher as 
 would be quite’ inconsistent with your notion of reli- 
 gious liberty. In answer to this objection I must say 
 that I do not think it practicable, or even desirable, 
 in the present state of the Christian world, that all 
 the clergy should be of one mind. ‘The professors of 
 
326 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 Christianity have still much to learn and much to un- 
 learn; and free discussion is the means to clear our 
 minds from error, and to advance us in the know- 
 ledge of Christian truth. These desirable discussions, 
 however, may be carried on more satisfactorily, and 
 to a much better purpose, by the press than in the 
 pulpit. In few things do the thinking part of the 
 Christian world more generally agree than in the in- 
 expediency in general of controversial preaching. It 
 is objectionable on two grounds: first, on account of 
 its tendency to generate evil passions and uncha- 
 ritableness; and secondly, because it deprives the 
 hearers of those helps towards forming religious affec- 
 tions and religious habits which preaching should 
 afford. Much of the ordinary maxims and the general 
 practice of the world are at variance with the prin- 
 ciples of the gospel which the preacher is bound to 
 enforce. ‘The great question with him is, How can I 
 give the best assistance in my power to advance my 
 hearers in the way of true religion? His business is to 
 warn them against all sins, and particularly those which 
 most prevail m the age in which he lives; to excite 
 their devotional feelings; and to address himself to 
 the purest and best principles of our nature. Contro- 
 versial preaching is apt to engender spiritual pride in 
 the hearers from the opinion of their own orthodoxy, 
 and a contempt of those whose opinions they are 
 taught to consider erroneous and heretical. Although 
 then, I do not consider it expedient, or even practi- 
 cable, to exclude controversial preaching altogether, 
 and I am even willing to admit that occasions may 
 sometimes arise which render it necessary to resort to 
 it, yet, 1 think, few reflecting persons will deny that 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 327 
 
 it should in general be discouraged. Wheu, however, 
 a great number of controverted pomts are admitted 
 into the doctrimes of the church, it must be expected 
 that the clergy in their sermons will discuss those 
 subjects. By confining the doctrine of the church 
 to the plain and simple creed which we have seen is 
 all that was required by Christ and his apostles to 
 make a man a Christian, the imcitement to preach 
 polemical sermons is taken away. Controversial 
 preaching then should in general be discouraged both 
 by the precept and the example of those who have 
 authority in the church; but the only restriction I 
 would lay on the clergy is, that they should preach 
 nothing inconsistent with their profession of belief in 
 the doctrine mentioned above as plainly taught by 
 our Saviour and his apostles, or with the liturgy of 
 which, if it contained nothing but what was clearly 
 justified by the teaching of Christ and his disciples, 
 could not justly be complained of as any restriction on 
 Christian liberty. It must be kept steadily in mind, 
 that in the constitution of such a church as we have 
 been contemplating, there is no assumption of a right 
 in any one to make his own interpretation of Scripture 
 binding on the consciences of others. I have endea- 
 voured to prove that a national establishment of reli- ~ 
 gion is a great good. Admitting this, it follows that 
 the supreme power of the state ought to set up and 
 support such an establishment. They will effect their 
 purpose in the-best manner by adopting such a plan 
 as they believe will be most fitted to advance the 
 cause of Christianity in the country. It is perfectly 
 consistent with this to allow the fullest liberty of reli- 
 gious profession to all. Let every man be left to 
 
328 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 follow the dictates of his own conscience in joining 
 the establishment or dissenting from it; and if he 
 choose the latter course, let it not expose him to any 
 diminution of his civil rights; and there will then be 
 no ground of complaint against the establishment. 
 
 With respect to the discipline of the church, nothing 
 need be said here, but that it must be settled by the 
 supreme powers of the state, who would call to their 
 aid, both as to this and the other branches of an eccle- 
 siastical establishment, those who, from large and 
 profound acquaintance with the Scriptures, superior 
 abilities, great experience, and religious and moral 
 character, are best fitted for the work. In settling 
 the discipline of the church nothing should be in- 
 sisted on but what is really important ; and the clergy 
 should be allowed as much liberty as is consistent 
 with the end for which they are appointed. ) 
 
 What has been hitherto advanced relates to a 
 country where there exists no established religion ; 
 and this has been thought the best way of educing 
 the just principle which should form and regulate an 
 establishment. The principle once settled, we must 
 find out how it should be modified in its application 
 to the state of things in this country, where a religious 
 establishment has long existed. 
 
 As many well-meaning but timid persons are 
 alarmed at the suggestion of any alterations in the 
 church, and as they seem to think that any change 
 whatever would lead to its subversion, I will here 
 insert a passage from the works of a high-churchman 
 of the greatest ability: “The church,” says Burke*, 
 “like every body corporate, may alter her laws without 
 
 * Works, vol. x. p. 5. 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 329 
 
 changing her identity. As an independent church, 
 professing fallibility, she has claimed a right of acting 
 without the consent of | any other; as a church, she 
 claims, and has always exercised, a right of reforming 
 whatever appeared amiss in her doctrine, her disci- 
 pline, or her rites. She did so, when she shook off the 
 papal supremacy in the reign of Henry the Eighth, 
 which was an act of the body of the English church, 
 as well as of the state (I don’t inquire how obtained). 
 She did so, when she cut off three articles from her 
 original 42, and reduced them to the present 39; 
 and she certainly would not lose her corporate identity, 
 nor subvert her fundamental principles, though she 
 were to leave ten of the 39 which remain, out of any 
 future confession of her faith. She would limit her 
 corporate powers, on the contrary, and she would 
 oppose her fundamental principles, if she were to 
 deny herself the prudential exercise of such a capacity 
 of reformation.” 
 
 I shall not presume to enter here into the im- 
 portant questions, whether any alterations should be’ 
 made in the established church at the present day ; 
 and, if so, what those alterations should be; but I 
 proceed to poimt out circumstances in the existing 
 state of the country, which to my mind clearly in-~ 
 dicate that some great change in ecclesiastical affairs 
 must take place at no great distance of time. At the 
 census of the population in 1851 arrangements were 
 made to ascertain the number of persons who attended 
 divine service at all the churches and chapels of the 
 established church, of the Roman Catholics, and of the 
 dissenters, as also the number of sittings in all places 
 of religious worship, and some other matters. The 
 
330 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 returns made under this regulation afford a valuable 
 body of religious statistics. They are certainly far 
 from furnishing evidence making a near approach to 
 certainty as to the comparative number of those who 
 belong to the established church, and those who are 
 included in other denominations. ‘They show, how- 
 ever, undeniably that a very large proportion of the 
 population are not members of the establishment ; 
 and they lead to a reasonable conjecture that the 
 members of the church of England do not greatly 
 exceed half the population of the country. Here then 
 arise questions of the greatest importance for the con- 
 sideration of those who exercise the legislative and 
 the executive powers of the country, of those who 
 occupy influential stations in the church, and of every 
 really sincere and pious Christian. Does the church 
 give the best aid which circumstances will admit of 
 to. the great interests of Christianity? Is she secure 
 from great danger, and is her present state such as 
 can reasonably be expected to be permanent ? 
 
 In order to give the proper answer to the first 
 question, we must keep steadily m mind that the 
 great object of an establishment of religion by law is 
 the promotion of Christianity ; and that the best 
 mode of attaining this end is the thing to be con- 
 sidered. If it be desirable to advance Christianity at 
 all, it must be so to do it to the greatest extent pos- 
 sible. If, then, any are excluded from the pale of the 
 established church, who are acknowledged to profess 
 all that is essential to Christianity, the benefit con- 
 ferred by the church on the community is diminished 
 in proportion to the numbers of those who are thus 
 excluded. Even if we were to admit that one reli- 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. aE 
 
 gious body was just as good as another, and that, 
 provided Christianity be taught, its particular form is 
 of no material importance (which, by the way, no one 
 will admit), religious divisions occasion great incon- 
 venience, and are no small impediment to the ad- 
 vancement of the cause of religion. In large towns, 
 where the numbers of each religious sect are sufficient 
 to enable them to support schools, and to afford all 
 the requisite means for the support of religion to 
 their own parties, the evil will be less felt; but even 
 then it is by no means inconsiderable. The affections 
 are developed, and the foundations of valuable friend- 
 ships are laid among those who are associated -with 
 each other in early life, and who enjoy together the 
 advantages of education. If the children of dissenters 
 have a separate education from those of churchmen, 
 and those of one class of dissenters from those of an- 
 other, they will be likely to fall into narrow and con- 
 tracted views, and to fail to acquire that liberality of 
 spirit which a really good education is calculated to 
 give; and there is great fear that a regard to the 
 sect will, in after life, prevail over a love of the great 
 principles of Christianity which are held in common 
 by all Christians. On the other hand, the children of 
 churchmen will be apt to look on dissenters as an in- 
 ferior race, with whom it is hardly creditable to form 
 habits of intimacy. Thus religion, which should be a 
 bond of union, is made a source of disunion and 
 estrangement.” 
 
 Where dissenters reside in small towns or in the 
 country, the evil takes a somewhat different shape ; 
 but is not the less real. Where the number of dis- 
 senters 1s small in any parish and its surrounding 
 
ar RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 vicinity, they are of necessity brought into union with 
 the members of the established church. They send 
 their children to the same schools; and give their 
 support to the same institutions. Between them and 
 the clergymen of their parishes, mutual kind and 
 friendly feelings may exist; but the dissenter must 
 always be, in some degree, an object of suspicion to 
 the churchman. In the course of their cooperation 
 for the benefit of their neighbours, it can scarcely 
 happen but that something shall arise which is con- 
 nected with those particular points which are the 
 grounds of their religious separation ; and which will 
 interfere with their cooperation in the religious and 
 benevolent objects of the clergy and laity of the esta- 
 blished church. Is it not worthy of serious reflection, 
 whether these great evils might not be got rid of by 
 enlarging the boundaries of the established church, so 
 as to admit all who agree in the essential doctrines 
 taught by our Saviour and his immediate followers ? 
 The next subject of inquiry is, whether the church 
 is not in its present circumstances exposed to great 
 ‘danger; and whether it can be reasonably expected 
 that, as now constituted, it can be permanent? Ifa 
 dissenter should complain that an equivalent for a 
 tenth part of the produce of his estate is paid for the 
 support of a church of which he is not a member, the 
 proper answer is, Hither you or your ancestor bought 
 the estate subject to this encumbrance; the tithes 
 have never been yours, and even if the church were 
 destroyed, you would have no right to them, but the 
 state would clearly be entitled to appropriate them to 
 public uses. This appears perfectly satisfactory. The 
 condition of the body of dissenters at the present day, 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 333 
 
 however, raises another question of a very different 
 character. It has been stated, that at the census in 
 1851, an attempt was made to collect an important 
 body of ecclesiastical statistics. Accounts were taken, 
 as far as the necessary returns could be procured, of 
 the members who attended all the churches and 
 chapels in the kingdom on what was called the Census 
 Sunday, also of the number of sittings in each place 
 of worship, and some other matters. The results 
 have been given in a very able report by Mr. Mann; 
 and although they are not altogether so satisfactory 
 as might have been wished, on account of no returns 
 having been made by a considerable number of con- 
 gregations, they afford tolerably satisfactory evidence 
 that the members of the established church do not 
 greatly exceed half of the inhabitants of the country. 
 Now, it may well be urged by those who dissent from 
 the established church, that if the state interfere in 
 religion at all, it should extend its benefits as far as 
 possible; and that a church system, which excludes 
 nearly half the population of the country, must have 
 something radically wrong in it. If it were not that a 
 large proportion of the dissenters have embraced the 
 voluntary principle, and consequently are opposed to 
 the state interfering in religion at all, this objection to ~ 
 the existing state of the established church would be 
 constantly and urgently enforced. ‘There can be no 
 doubt that the proportion of dissenters (including the 
 Roman Catholics) to the members of the established 
 church, has rapidly increased ; and it is no improbable 
 conjecture, that, at no great distance of time, they may 
 become the majority, nor indeed is it certain that they 
 are not sonow. Under such a state of things, it seems 
 
334 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 hardly possible that-the church could remain, for any 
 considerable time, in its present state. The body of 
 dissenters must be considered to be either supporters 
 of the voluntary principle, i which case they must 
 desire the abolition of the church; or they must 
 admit the usefulness of an establishment, and then 
 they will naturally think themselves entitled to par- 
 take of its benefits. Let us attend to what is said by 
 Burke as to alterations in a church establishment”. 
 “ But it is not human frailty and imperfection, and 
 even a considerable degree of them, that becomes a 
 sround for your alteration; for by no alteration will 
 you get rid of those errors, however you may delight 
 yourselves in varying to infinity the fashion of them. 
 But the ground for a legislative alteration of a legal 
 establishment is this, and this only: that you find the 
 inclinations of the majority of the people concurring 
 with your own sense of the intolerable nature of the 
 abuse, and in favour of a change.” In the case sup- 
 posed (and I can see no reason for thinking it impro- 
 bable that it may shortly take place), the majority of 
 the people would assuredly think it an intolerable 
 abuse that they were excluded from partaking of the 
 spiritual benefits of the established church; and the 
 majority of the House of Commons, which must be 
 expected to adopt the feelmgs and wishes of the na- 
 tion, would probably have the same conviction. In 
 such a state of things an alteration must take place : 
 it is morally impossible to prevent it. 
 
 With such a prospect before us, is it not the dictate 
 of wisdom to examine calmly, considerately and reli- 
 siously, the church system, established in the coun- 
 
 * Works, vol. x. pp. 7, 8. 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 335 
 
 try, with a view to ascertain whether it contains any- 
 thing unnecessary to Christian edification ; anything 
 which lays on the Christian professor a burthen which 
 was not imposed by the Saviour of the world and his 
 immediate disciples ; anything which obliges a serious 
 and conscientious Christian to withdraw from its pale ; 
 and, if such should be found to be the case, to endea- 
 vour to discover a remedy. Let those who enjoy au- 
 thority in church and state, duly consider these things. 
 Let them enter on the task with a humble and a 
 pious disposition, and with a profound sense of their 
 solemn obligation to diffuse to the largest practicable 
 extent religious instruction, admonition, and consola- 
 tion. Let them take care that their teaching shall 
 be such as the people can understand. There must 
 be milk for babes as well as strong meat for men. 
 The higher attamments of a Christian can be only 
 reached by much study of the Scriptures, by deep 
 reflection, and by earnest and frequent prayer. Some 
 assistance may be given, by the public services of the 
 church, to those who are striving to reach the summit 
 of the holy hill; but they are far more needed for 
 others who are labouring to mount its lower accli- 
 vities. For their benefit, then, let the largest efforts 
 be made. And here arises an important inquiry as to 
 the persons who should be employed in the ministra- 
 tions of the church. All classes require assistance ; 
 therefore instructors should be provided for all. He 
 who is the fittest teacher of the studious and the 
 learned, will seldom, if ever, be found able to give the 
 most useful instruction to the uneducated classes. 
 A well-constituted church should provide ministers 
 suited to all the divisions of whom its congregations 
 
336 RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 
 
 are composed; and should, so far as it is practicable, 
 place them in situations where their talents may be 
 exercised to the greatest advantage. He that is to 
 instruct the poor and ignorant, should be well ac- 
 quainted with their habits of life and thought. It 1s 
 the want of this knowledge which often renders the 
 services of the highly educated clergyman unavailing ; 
 while the slightly instructed methodist preacher, who 
 understands the characters of his hearers, is attended 
 by crowds, and succeeds in deeply impressing on their 
 minds his own religious convictions. 
 
 Let no one, however satisfied of the correctness of 
 his opinions on abstruse doctrinal matters, expect 
 that he will be able to give the like satisfaction 
 to those whose minds have not received a culture 
 similar to that which he has enjoyed. It is reported 
 to have been said by Solon, that his laws were not 
 the best that could be made, but that they were the 
 best the Athenians could bear. ‘This saying may 
 give a valuable hint to Christian preachers. It is not 
 enough that their doctrines should be true and scrip- 
 tural; for unless we can add to this that they are 
 capable of being so explained as to be received and 
 understood by the congregation, they should be 
 banished from the pulpit. 
 
 If, then, some alteration in~the church establish- 
 ment is, or shortly will be required, the question 
 arises, what means should be adopted to obtain this 
 most important object? Here a great difficulty pre- 
 sents itself at the threshold, arismg from the state of 
 religious feeling in the country. It is to be deeply 
 lamented, that although liberality of sentiment has 
 undoubtedly made great advances in England, on 
 
RELIGIOUS ESTABLISHMENTS. 337 
 
 other subjects its progress in matters concerning reli- 
 gion has been very slow. So long as Catholic is 
 estranged from Protestant, and Protestant from Ca- 
 tholic, Churchman. from Dissenter, and Dissenter 
 from Churchman, and the members of different classes 
 of Dissenters from each other respectively, there will 
 be little hope of advance in the sacred cause of reli- 
 gious truth. When Christians shall be more disposed 
 to inquire than to dogmatize, and all shall engage 
 in inquiry in the true spirit of humility; then, in- 
 deed, may we hope for unity, and a sounder judg- 
 ment in sacred things, than now exists in any church 
 or sect, or perhaps in the mind of the most enlight- 
 ened individual. It is a great point of wisdom to 
 examine ourselves seriously and severely as to all 
 our opinions, and with reference to the circumstances 
 in our situation, which expose us to prejudices 
 likely to mislead our judgments; in order that we 
 judge impartially of any subject to which our atten- 
 tion is directed. In the present state of religious 
 feeling, it would, no doubt, be very difficult to find 
 men of different opinions who would cordially act 
 together for the general benefit of the country in re- 
 ligious affairs. Those who have rule and authority 
 must do their best; and I cannot despair of the 
 blessmg of divine Providence on so good a work. 
 Let the wisest and best persons in the country, 
 men of calm minds and extensive knowledge, men 
 who have deeply and piously studied the Scrip- 
 tures, both lay and clerical, be selected for the holy 
 work; and success will attend it. I am far from 
 expecting that a reformation in the church can be 
 effected within a very small space of time; but some 
 Z 
 
3388 FUTURE PROSPECTS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 advance might be made towards it without delay. It 
 would far exceed the limits which I desire to assign 
 to this work to enter into particulars ; I must, there- 
 fore, here close my | remarks. 
 
 As we have now reached the last sition of our 
 inquiry—what anticipations we may reasonably enter- 
 tain respecting the advancement of Christianity in the 
 world, and its probable effects hereafter on the well- 
 being of the human race,—it will be well to recapi- 
 tulate the principles which I have endeavoured to 
 establish. JI have asserted, on the authority of our 
 Saviour and his disciples, that it is the duty, and con- 
 sequently the right of every Christian, to study the 
 Scriptures, and to form his own judgment of their 
 meaning. From this it follows, that every church 
 which arrogates authority over the consciences of men 
 is, to the extent to which it does so, a usurpation ; 
 and that such assumption should be resisted by all 
 who claim the right of private judgment. It has, 
 however, been readily conceded that the mass of man- 
 kind always has been, and probably always will be, 
 the followers of those who are constituted by re- 
 cognized authority, or who take upon themselves to 
 be their guides; and that comparatively few are dis- 
 posed or qualified to exercise the right of free in- 
 quiry. In religion, as in other matters, the thmking 
 few will always be in advance of the age in which 
 they live; in general their views will, in their own 
 times, be only received to a very limited extent ; but 
 if well-founded, they will make @ sure though slow 
 progression. Religion bemg the most important 
 business of human life, that which leads to the great- 
 est enjoyment here, and will conduct us to the far 
 
FUTURE PROSPECTS OF CHRISTIANITY. 339 
 
 more exalted and happy state of the blessed in the 
 world to come, every one who has a sincere regard to 
 the well-being of his fellow-men will endeavour to 
 promote it according to his opportunities. The state, 
 which is the concentration of the power of a nation, 
 and is bound in all things to the best of its ability 
 to advance the good of the people, should therefore 
 consider religion as its most important object, and 
 should find the means of supporting and extending it 
 to the utmost. As it is of equal importance to all 
 classes and to all individuals, government should use 
 its best endeavours té extend religious instruction to 
 all. But a difficulty arises here from the circumstance 
 of the great diversity of opinion as to doctrine among 
 Christians. It becomes necessary then to ascertain 
 what are the essential doctrines of Christianity. This 
 can be done only by a-diligent study of the history 
 and teachings of our Saviour, and of the discourses 
 and writings of his apostles and early followers. I 
 have gone through the whole of the New Testament 
 in order to discover what is really required to make a 
 man a Christian. The result of this examination is, 
 that the Christian creed is so plain and simple as 
 to be easily understood by any one possessed of 
 ordinary intelligence. I have adduced, as a complete 
 epitome of Christian doctrine, the text of the apostle 
 John: “God so loved the world, that he gave his 
 only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him 
 should not perish, but have everlasting life.” In 
 order that the benefits of a religious establishment 
 should be extended as far as possible, its creed should 
 be confined to what is essential to the Christian re- 
 ligion. I have given reasons why a fixed form 
 Z2 
 
340 FUTURE PROSPECTS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 of .prayer should be adopted in the established 
 church. Every prayer introduced into the liturgy 
 should be justified by example from the Scriptures, 
 or by the unequivocal precepts of Jesus Christ or 
 his disciples. The clergy should engage to preach 
 nothing inconsistent with the liturgy; and contro- 
 versial preaching should be discouraged. It is a 
 grievous error to explain the faith which is so 
 strongly insisted on in the New Testament to mean 
 merely the assent of the understanding to the truth 
 and Divine authority of the Christian religion. Its 
 real meaning goes very far beyond this. ‘True Chris- 
 tian faith comprises a firm belief in the Divine au- 
 thority of Jesus Christ and of those who were selected 
 and authorized by him to promulgate his religion in 
 the world; unhesitating trust in God, a deep feeling 
 of the unspeakable importance of religion, and a firm 
 determination to regulate our lives by its precepts. 
 It is the very life of our life; the essential spirit, the 
 pure essence of all that is noble, exalted, and holy. 
 In its highest state it is the source of every virtue, 
 and is destructive of sin and of every tendency 
 to sm. Few, alas! reach this perfection of faith. 
 “ Lord, I believe ; help thou my unbelief,” is a prayer 
 well-fitted to express the want of the most faithful 
 Christian. ‘The increase of faith is his greatest con- 
 cern. ‘This once attained, everything else follows. 
 There are among us men sincerely and earnestly re- 
 ligious, who think little of the historical evidence of 
 the truth of the Christian religion. This seems to me 
 a great error. They judge properly that religion is 
 mainly concerned with the higher moral principles 
 and sentiments of our nature; and that when it 
 
FUTURE PROSPECTS OF CHRISTIANITY. 341 
 
 deeply interests the heart, and regulates the conduct, 
 its great object is attamed; but they seem to forget 
 that we are in need of full assurance on two most 
 important points; the disposition of Almighty God 
 to pardon sinners on repentance, and a future state. 
 I have endeavoured to show, in a former part of this 
 work, that natural religion can give us no satisfaction 
 on these subjects. Jesus Christ assures us that we 
 shall obtain forgiveness on repentance; and he has 
 brought life and immortality to light. Historical 
 testimony appears to be absolutely essential to 
 the establishment of the Divine authority of his 
 mission. Greatly important, however, as we ought 
 to esteem the historical evidence of the truth of the 
 Christian religion, it is still only introductory to that 
 state of the affections and sentiments which alone can 
 justly be called faith. Merely to believe the facts 
 which prove the Divine authority of Christianity can 
 scarcely be called so. We must go beyond this, 
 and not only believe, but realize its truth, if we aspire 
 to become Christians worthy of the name. Could we 
 once attain the full assurance of a future state in 
 which our happiness or misery will depend on our 
 characters and conduct here ; could we be as entirely 
 assured of this as we are that seed-time and harvest, 
 day and night, will go on in constant succession, the 
 whole moral and religious condition of the world 
 would be changed. ‘The highest degree of religious 
 faith might not*be often attained, for that consists in 
 “the perfect love which casteth out fear,” but sin, in 
 its worst forms, would cease to exist ; and the religion 
 of fear would lead by degrees to the religion of love. 
 To this pomt then should Christian teachers direct 
 
342 FUTURE PROSPECTS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 their strenuous exertions. They should strive, with all 
 earnestness, to assist their hearers to realize the great 
 truths of religion, to the end that they might influence 
 their minds, and regulate their conduct. Unhappily, 
 mere belief, which is but a beginning of Christian 
 faith, has been chiefly insisted on; and a great variety 
 of doctrines, mostly of an obscure nature, and seldom 
 calculated to improve the character, have been put 
 forth and enforced by Christians of all churches 
 and sects; and controversies have been carried on 
 with virulence and bigotry disgraceful to the Chris- 
 tiannname. Nowhere do we discover a temper more 
 at variance with the gentle, kind, and humble spirit 
 of the gospel than in the writings of theological con- 
 troversialists. These works have too often tended to 
 perplex the head; but the great business of the Chris- 
 tian teacher is to improve the heart. Never can 
 Christianity produce its full effect in the world till 
 this is understood and felt to be so. To the attain- 
 ment of this end @ second reformation is essential. 
 Its leading principles must be a full and consistent 
 acknowledgment of the right of private judgment, 
 and, consequently, a denial of the authority of any 
 man, or of any body of men, to dictate to others in 
 matters of faith; and an earnest desire deeply to 
 impress the great truths of religion upon the minds 
 and hearts of men, that they may regulate the whole 
 of their conduct. Can we entertain a rational hope 
 of such a change in the Christian world ? 
 
 That great difficulties lie in the way of a consum- 
 mation so devoutly to be wished no one can deny 
 who has thought seriously on the subject. They 
 seem to spring chiefly from a desire to domineer over 
 
FUTURE PROSPECTS OF CHRISTIANITY. 343 
 
 others, a sectarian feeling which lays a greater stress 
 on the peculiarities of the church or sect to which an 
 individual belongs than on those which are common 
 to the whole Christian church, and the tenacity with | 
 which the mass of the people cling to existing forms, 
 rites, and ceremonies. If, however, it be admitted 
 that Christianity is calculated to produce a far greater 
 and more beneficial effect in the world than it has 
 ever done in the best times, and that causes of dis- 
 union among Christians exist which it is most de- 
 sirable to remove, the friend of reformation will not 
 be deterred from encountering those difficulties, nor 
 will he entertaim any apprehension that they may not, 
 and will not, in the end, be overcome. ‘The first 
 cause has its origin in pride and ambition, and is 
 entirely at variance with Christian humility ; and the 
 second has much of the same ingredients, and may, 
 in a great degree, be corrected by a due consideration 
 of the vast importance of those Christian doctrines in 
 which all agree. The third cause deserves the fullest 
 consideration ; and the error should be corrected with 
 the utmost kindness and discretion, as it arises from 
 a conscientious conviction of the importance of the 
 religious rites and services to which the worshipper 
 has been accustomed. It is a most important rule in 
 reformation of every kind, either civil or ecclesiastical, 
 to avoid all unnecessary innovations. By slow degrees 
 only can men be weaned from their errors; and we 
 must be careful in changing the form not to injure 
 the substance of religion. This consideration, how- 
 ever, only amounts to a lesson of caution; and ought 
 not to deter us from endeavouring, as far as we can, 
 to further the great cause of Christian union, and of 
 
O44 FUTURE PROSPECTS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 the advance of Christianity in its original purity. 
 I entertain no hope of success without the steady 
 and energetic exertions of the laity. The clergy 
 of all churches and sects can hardly escape an 
 undue attachment to their peculiar tenets and prac- 
 tices. ‘The laity are far more likely to judge fairly 
 and impartially. Unhappily, but few laymen, I fear, 
 have deeply studied the Scriptures; and those who 
 have done so, for the most part, have resorted to 
 them rather for the support of preconceived opinions, 
 than for the purpose of ascertaining what they really 
 teach. I should be greatly rejoiced to find that I am 
 in error on this subject; and I have no means of 
 judging but from observation. While, however, I 
 perceive not only that every new fact in chemistry 
 and geology excites a lively interest in the public 
 mind, as indeed it well deserves; but that even the 
 investigations of the antiquary of the date of a build- 
 ing or the inscription on a monument meet with 
 acceptance,—a critical investigation of the Scriptures 
 scarcely commands any degree of attention. The 
 laity seem in general to receive implicitly the dogmas 
 of their church or sect without inquiry and often 
 without interest. The greater part give a nominal 
 assent to these doctrines, but having never seriously 
 considered them, they can scarcely, in propriety of 
 language, be said to have any opinion respecting 
 them. This observation, however, only applies to 
 matters of a speculative nature. Those who are the 
 least given to inquiry in general hold all which I 
 have endeavoured to show is essential to Christianity. 
 They believe that Almighty God sent Jesus Christ 
 into the world with authority to offer salvation to all 
 
FUTURE PROSPECTS OF CHRISTIANITY. 345 
 
 who receive his religion, and obey his precepts. It 
 is this general agreement which gives the hope 
 that a union of all Christians may take place at 
 some future happy period. Still the most sanguine 
 can only look for it at a great distance. Not only 
 is it incompatible with the spiritual claims of the 
 church of Rome, but every Protestant church which 
 assumes to decide authoritatively in matters of faith 
 is opposed to that perfect liberty of thought which 
 is essential to a universal Christian union. All that 
 can be hoped for then at present by those who 
 desire a second reformation, or more properly a 
 restoration of Christianity to what it was on its first 
 promulgation, is, to prepare the way for it by support- 
 ing to the utmost of their power the cause of religious 
 freedom ; and to strive to attain themselves, and, as 
 far as they may be able, to assist others in attaining, 
 that deep heart-felt conviction of the great truths of 
 the Christian religion which will elevate the soul 
 above all sinful passions, and all worldly desires, and 
 commence on earth that heavenly life which they trust 
 they are to enjoy in the world to come. 
 
 I can perceive nothing in a difference of opinion on 
 the subject of religion more than on any other matter 
 which should lead one man to condemn another, or 
 to form an unfavourable opimion of his character. 
 Ecclesiastical history, however, informs us that theo- 
 logical controversies have rarely failed to excite the 
 harshest passions, and the odiwm theologicum has be- 
 come proverbial. How has this arisen? I can give 
 no other explanation than that it flows from the 
 assumption of authority by Christian churches to 
 settle points of faith. Renounce that authority, and 
 
346 FUTURE PROSPECTS OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 disputes about religion will be conducted in the same. 
 peaceable manner as those on any other subjects. A 
 unity of faith on all the theological questions which 
 have divided the Christian world cannot be expected ; 
 but if all could obtain that Christian charity which 
 “thinketh no evil,” diversity of opinion would pro- 
 duce no great mischief. Those who look with a 
 candid eye on the different churches and sects in the 
 Christian world will find something to commend 
 and something to blame in all; and we should never 
 relinquish the hope that the time may arrive when all 
 that is good, in every division of the church, may 
 be united in one harmonious whole. Such an event 
 would indeed be an inestimable blessing. We might 
 then expect that angry controversies would give place 
 to calm and amicable discussion ; that the true spirit 
 of Christianity would be universally cultivated; and 
 that the moral and religious condition of the world 
 would be improved and carried forward to an ex- 
 tent, of which we can hardly form an adequate 
 conception. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 Printed by Taylor and Francis, Red Lion Court, Fleet Street. 
 
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