PRINCETON", N. J. 
 
 5>4<f^ 
 
 BT 75 .M38 
 
 Mason, Arthur James, 1851 
 1928. 
 
 The faith of the Gospel 
 
THE FAITH OF THE GOSPEL 
 
The Faith of the Gospel 
 
 ^ JWnnual of C!ri)n'stian Boctrine 
 
 BY / 
 
 ARTHUR JAMES MASON RD. 
 
 FORMERLY FELLOW OF TKINITV COLLEGE CAMBKIUGE 
 
 ' JVM cne sou! striving tog-ether with the Faith of the Gospel " 
 
 RIVINGTONS 
 WATERLOO PLACE, LONDON 
 
 MDCCCLXXXVai 
 
DEDICATED TO 
 
 JOSEPH, 
 
 JSisljop of IBurljam, 
 
 AND 
 
 BROOKE FOSS WESTCOTT, 
 
 i^cgtus professor of ©ibinttg at Camtritjgc, 
 
 TO WHOM I OWE IT IF 1 MAY STILL HOPE 
 TO BEGIN TO BE A DISCIPLE. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 The writer of this book was drawn to his task in 
 the first instance by his experience in conducting 
 Missions. It has always formed part of his plan on 
 such occasions to give consecutive Instructions on the 
 leading doctrines of the Gospel. Twice, especially, in 
 the year 1885, — at S. George's, Hanover Square, and 
 at Stoke Damerel, — it was his privilege to deliver a 
 course of the kind to large audiences of cultivated 
 persons, many of whom desired to be directed to some 
 book which would contain such an exposition of the 
 faith as they had listened to. It was difficult to satisfy 
 the demand by suggesting already published works. 
 The modern English books which have dealt with the 
 field of dogma as a whole have, perhaj)S, been either 
 too condensed for the ordinary reader, or too slight 
 for the thoughtful. Many of them have had the 
 disadvantage of appearing in the unattractive guise 
 of Commentaries on the Thirty-Nine Articles, or in 
 some other shape not suited to freedom and breadth 
 of treatment. 
 
 h 
 
viii Preface. 
 
 This history of the origin of the present book will 
 explain its form. While attempting to go with fair 
 thoroughness into the various questions raised, it does 
 not profess to deal with them exhaustively, as a book 
 written for the learned would. It assumes little in 
 the reader besides an average English education and 
 a devout mind. Eecondite theological language is 
 avoided. Terms are explained as they occur. It is 
 hoped, therefore, that the book may prove useful, 
 not only to Teachers of the Divine Mysteries at the 
 beginning of their studies, but to many private Chris- 
 tians also, who wish to have an intelligent grasp of 
 their faith. 
 
 Dogmatic Theology lies very near, in its purpose, 
 to Apologetics. Its object is not merely to state in 
 orthodox language the sum of what is to be believed, 
 but to commend what it states by shewing its inherent 
 reasonableness. At the same time, it differs from 
 Apologetics inasmuch as it assumes that the student 
 is already a believer, and only needs to have his mind 
 cleared and his faith made explicit. It does not prove 
 every point as it goes along ; it suggests, and explains, 
 and connects. If such a word may be used in connexion 
 with a popular handbook, our object in Dogmatics is 
 to exhibit a Christian Philosophy. Mere correctness 
 in the use of terms might be taught in the form of a 
 dictionary ; but the dogmatic teacher wishes to shew the 
 bearings of things, to display the unity of truth, to give 
 
Preface. ix 
 
 an idea of the structure and system in which the lives 
 of men are placed. But in order that it may be truly 
 a Christian Philosophy, and not, like the systems of 
 the Gnostics, a human fabric borrowing elements from 
 the Gospel, it must needs start with faith in Christ, 
 endeavouring purely to arrive at the inward meaning 
 of His words, and to piece together the fragments of 
 truth which it is able to apprehend, in no arbitrary 
 fashion, but in the way in which the Church has 
 always grouped them. 
 
 A work of this nature is only by accident con- 
 troversial. It does not aim at exposing errors, 
 although it does so when contrast with the error 
 serves to elucidate the truth. Controversy is a form 
 of Apologetics in which the opponent, instead of 
 standing outside the faith altogether, claims to be the 
 true representative of it. With such persons the 
 dogmatic teacher is not directly concerned ; he is only 
 concerned with them so far as it may be useful to 
 caution the learner against them. This book is not 
 an appeal to those who differ from the Church, but 
 an attempt to help those who profess allegiance to 
 her. Nevertheless, it would be vain to deny that the 
 writer has had throughout a wider outlook. He is 
 not much disposed to believe in controversy as a 
 means of producing agreement, and inclines to think 
 that the positive statement of belief acts much more 
 convincingly upon honest divergence than any amount 
 
X Preface. 
 
 of negative criticism. It is bis most earnest hope 
 that this book may contribute something to the cause 
 of Christian unity. If any word is contained within 
 its pages which sounds impatient, or bitter, or in- 
 flammatory, or superciHous, or in any way uncharitable 
 towards those who differ from us, whether Protestants 
 or in the Roman or Oriental Communions, that word 
 is withdrawn beforehand, as belying the deepest feel- 
 ings of the writer's heart. There are difficulties 
 enough in the way of agreement upon doctrines so 
 mysterious, and covering so wide a field, without 
 creating fresh obstacles by want of tenderness and 
 sympathy. But yet, if real agreement is ever to be 
 reached, it can only be reached by frank and trustful 
 avowal of the points of difference, not by hushing them 
 up. Unity must be based on a real understanding of 
 one another, and no man can sever those two things 
 which the Prophet joined so closely together when he 
 said, *' Execute the judgment of truth and peace in 
 your gates, saith the Lord " (Zech. viii. 16). 
 
 If there is an object still more to be sought in a 
 work of this kind than the unionof Christians amongst 
 themselves, it is to lead souls to a worthier adora- 
 tion of God and a life of trustful obedience. At every 
 moment. Dogmatic Theology touches Ethics. A manual 
 of Christian doctrine is not a volume of sermons ; yet 
 in some ways it ought to answer the same purposes. 
 There is a restfulness in sometimes escaping from the 
 
Preface. xi 
 
 thouglit of ourselves, and observing what things are, 
 irrespective of our relations to them. The Christian 
 heart will easily and instinctively deduce comfort 
 and warning, moral direction and devotional attitude, 
 from an intelligent survey of Christian truth. While 
 this book is not written for the purpose of stirring the 
 emotions or guiding the will, it is hoped at least that 
 nothing will be found in it which chills the spirit of 
 worship, or diverts the ethical intention. 
 
 It would be impossible for the writer to ac- 
 knowledge what he owes to other minds, without 
 composing an autobiography. All the influences of 
 a lifetime combine to form a man's belief. To dis- 
 entangle what has been learned from holy parents, 
 from schoolmasters, in sermons, in intercourse with 
 friends, and in a hundred chance ways, would be an 
 interminable occupation. Nevertheless, the writer 
 would acknowledge once more his paramount obliga- 
 tion to the two great Divines whose names he has in- 
 scribed upon the dedicatory page. Their printed works, 
 their public lectures and instructions, the privilege of 
 private conversation with them, have conveyed to him 
 — or it is his own fault — immeasurably more than he 
 can re^Droduce in words. He ought to apologize for 
 taking, without leave, such a liberty with their names ; 
 but he hopes that if in anything his conclusions are 
 not what they would wish, at any rate the book is not 
 wholly destitute of their spirit. Students who are 
 
xii Preface. 
 
 acquainted with Martensen's Christian Dogmatics will 
 discern in the following pages many reminiscences of 
 that noble book. These last years have been very 
 fruitful of strong and reverent exegesis of Holy Scrip- 
 tiu:e, which is the material for Dogmatics. It would 
 be ungrateful not to name the Commentaries of Pro- 
 fessor Godet as having laid the present writer under 
 specially deep obligations. For a general view of 
 modern Eoman theology he has chiefly used the 
 Theolofjle Dogmatique of Cardinal Gousset, and for 
 that of the Oriental Church, the work of the Eussian 
 Bishop Macarius, bearing a similar title. 
 
 Three dear friends of the author have kindly gone 
 through the labour of reading his proofs. But for 
 their strictures and suggestions, the work would be 
 far more imperfect even than it is. They know how 
 sincerely grateful to them the author is ; but he does 
 not mention who they are, lest he should seem to 
 shelter himself under well-known names from criticism 
 which ought to be borne by himself alone. 
 
 He hopes that it is not necessary to add, that if 
 unwittingly and unwillingly he has misrepresented in 
 anything the doctrine of the Church, he submits him- 
 self um-eservedly to correction. 
 
 Alliiallows Baukino 
 October , 1887. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Chapter I. 
 'TLije 93cing auD Nature of ©oU, 
 
 I. The Existence of God page 
 
 (i.) a matter of faith, not of proof (§ i) . ...... i 
 
 (ii.) but of reasonable certainty (§ 2) 2 
 
 Evinced by 
 
 (a) the general consent of men (§3) 4 
 
 (6) the phenomena of Nature (§4) 5 
 
 of life 8 
 
 of consciousness 9 
 
 (c) our mental constitution and moral conscience (§5) 10 
 
 (iii.) confirmed by revelation (§6) 13 
 
 (iv.) verified by Christian experience (§7) 15 
 
 II. The Nature of God 
 
 (i.) as spirit (§8) 16 
 
 (ii.) self-existent (§9) 17 
 
 (iii.) one (§ 10) 18 
 
 III. The Attributes of God 
 
 (i. ) omniscient (§ il) 20 
 
 (ii.) omnipresent in regard to space and to time .... 2I 
 
 (iii.) omnipotent (§12) . . 23 
 
 IV. The Character of God 
 
 (i.) holiness (§13) 25 
 
 (ii.) love (§ 14) . . . 28 
 
xiv Contents. 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 I'AGE 
 
 The Athanasian Creed tlic Cliurch's expression of responsibility 
 
 for the truth {§ i) 30 
 
 Passages of the Scriptures clearly revealing 
 
 (i.) a Unity in Trinity (§2) 32 
 
 (ii.) a Trinity in Unity 33 
 
 I. The True Doctrine opposed to 
 
 (i.) Tritheism, the notion of three Gods (§ 3) 34 
 
 (ii.) Sabellianism, an unreal distinction of Persons (§ 4) . 37 
 (iii.) Arianism, a denial of the Eternal Godhead of the Son 
 
 and Spirit (§5) 39 
 
 (a) apparent simplicity of Arianism 40 
 
 (U) its real difficulty ' 40 
 
 II. The Idea of God requires 
 
 (i.) an eternal reproduction of Himself (§ 6) 43 
 
 (ii.) in a Person equal to Himself 44 
 
 (iii.) bound to Himself in conscious freedom 45 
 
 III. Such is the Scriptural Doctrine of 
 
 (i.) the Father (§7) 47 
 
 (ii.) the Word 48 
 
 (iii.) the Spirit 49 
 
 IV. Subordination of the Son and Spirit to the Father, 
 
 AS the Sole Fountain of Deity (§ 8) . . . . 51 
 
 Chapter III. 
 '©icatiott iDvougl) ll)c S23;oit). 
 
 I. The Doctrine of the Holy Trinity leads to a Right 
 View of the Relation of the World to God 
 (i.) as oi)posed to Pantheism, by shewing the independence 
 
 ofGod(§ 1) 56 
 
 His purpose in creation (§2) 57 
 
 (ii.) as opposed to Deism, by giving a starting-point for 
 
 creation (§3) 60 
 
Contents. xv 
 
 II. The Place of the Word in the Divine Being page 
 
 (i.) the world ideally pre-existent in Him (§ 4) . . . . (>Z 
 
 (ii.) and made and sustained through Him (§ 5) .... 66 
 
 III. The Angels (§ 6) 
 
 (i.) their relation to nature . 67 
 
 (ii.) their relation to man 69 
 
 (iii.) their relation to each other . . 7° 
 
 (iv.) their power 7' 
 
 (v.) their personality • 73 
 
 IV. Revelation and Science (§7) 74 
 
 The Mosaic account of creation as a progressive work (§8) 76 
 
 culminating in the production of INIan (§9) 7^ 
 
 Chapter IV. 
 iWan anU Ijig iFall. 
 
 I. Man the created Image of God (§ i) 80 
 
 (i.) his body (§2) 81 
 
 (ii.) his spirit (§3) . , . . 83 
 
 (iii.) his soul (§4) 84 
 
 II. His Original Righteousness 
 
 to be secured through temptation (§ 5) .«..•• • 85 
 
 Mystic account of the temptation (§ 6) ...... . 87 
 
 III. The Origin of Evil 
 
 Seduction of Man (§7) 89 
 
 The Devil and his history 9 1 
 
 IV. The Unity of the Human Race (§8) 96 
 
 (i.) Traducianism and Creatianism (§9 98 
 
 (ii.) hereditary sin (§ 10) lOO 
 
 (iii.) the slavery of the will (§ II) 103 
 
 (iv.) humanity still capable of recovery (§ 12) IC5 
 
xvl Contents. 
 
 Chapter V. 
 '^^t Incarnation of t^c Mort) of ^ob. 
 
 PACE 
 
 The hope of recovery for the fallen race in Christ (§ I ) .... io6 
 
 I. Preparation for the Incarnation (§2) 107 
 
 (i.) of the Word Himself 108 
 
 (ii.) of mankind 108 
 
 (a) heathen 109 
 
 {}!) Jewish 1 10 
 
 (iii.) Teleology of History (§ 3) 112 
 
 II. The Miraculous Conception of Christ (§4) . . . 113 
 
 Obscured by doctrine of miraculous conception of Mary . 1 14 
 
 III. The Hypostatic Union 
 
 (i.) as opposed to Nestorianism (§ 5) 117 
 
 necessitates impersonality of the manhood (§ 6) . 120 
 
 (ii.) asopposed to the theory of God converted into flesh (§7) 124 
 
 (iii.) as opposed to Monophysitism (§ 8) 125 
 
 (iv.) as opposed to Eutychianism (§9) 126 
 
 IV. Both Natures perfect in Christ (§10) 131 
 
 V. Accommodation of the Natures to each other 
 
 (i.) of the human to the Divine (§ 11) . 134 
 
 (ii.) of the Divine to the human (§ 12) 137 
 
 Chapter VI. 
 Vc^t Atoning SJaorfe of ©Jrigt. 
 
 Christ the natural Mediator between God and Man (§ i) 
 
 (i.) as Son of God 144 
 
 (ii.) as Son of Man 145 
 
 I. Relation of the Incarnation to the Atonement 
 
 (i.) fittingness of the Incarnation apart from Redemption (§ 2) 146 
 
 (ii.) Redemption possible by other means (§ 3) . . . . 149 
 (iii.) the benefits of the Incarnation not commensurate with 
 
 Redemption (§4) 151 
 
 (iv.) the Incarnation revealed as the eternal purpose of God 
 
 (§5) 152 
 
 Simplicity of the Catholic Doctrine of the Atonement (§ 6) . . 155 
 
Contents. xvii 
 
 II. God's Character revealed page 
 
 (i.) in Christ's life (§ 7) 157 
 
 (ii.) in His words (§8) 159 
 
 (a) as reconciling men to Himself {§ 9) . . • • 160 
 
 (3) as suffering in His Son's Person (§ 10) . . . 162 
 {c) as vindicating His own righteousness thereby 
 
 (§11) 166 
 
 III. Christ as the Representative Man satisfies the 
 
 Divine Righteousness 
 
 (i.) by His life (§ 12) 167 
 
 (ii.) sinless under temptation (§ 13) 170 
 
 (iii.) and ideally perfect (§14) 173 
 
 (iv.) obedient under suffering (§ 15) 175 
 
 (v.) even unto death (§ 16, 177 
 
 (vi.) and that the death of the Cross (§ 17) 179 
 
 IV. Christ as the Representative Man satisfies the 
 
 Divine Righteousness 
 (i.) by His death considered as a confession of men's sin 
 
 (§18) 182 
 
 (ii.) by actually enduring the penalty of sin {§ 19) , . . 186 
 
 (iii.) not as a substitute for us, but as our surety (§ 20) . . 188 
 Our salvation not dependent on holding a right theoiy of the 
 
 Atonement, but on the fact itself (§21) 192 
 
 Chapter VII. 
 Vi}z Migcn 3lovli, ant> i^)z ffiift of \\)t Spirit. 
 
 I. (i.) Christ's Death a True Death (§ I ) 194 
 
 (a) The Descent into Hell 195 
 
 {b) The incorruption of His body 196 
 
 (ii.) His Resurrection (§2) 197 
 
 (a) real 198 
 
 (3) to a new life 198 
 
 {c) not merely for our sakcs 198 
 
 (iii.) His Ascension 199 
 
 (iv.) His Return hereafter 199 
 
x\iii Contents. 
 
 I' AGE 
 
 II. His New Work for Men (§ 3) 200 
 
 (i.) intercession 201 
 
 (ii. ) obtaining for us the gift of the Spirit 202 
 
 III. The Holy Ghost (§ 4) . . . . 203 
 
 (i.) His eternal procession 203 
 
 (ii.) His personality 205 
 
 (iii.) His relation to our Lord as Man (§5) 205 
 
 (iv.) His characteristic work in the world {§ 6) 208 
 
 (v.) difference between His work before the Incarnation 
 
 and after (§7) 210 
 
 IV. Formation and Illumination of the Church (§ 8) . 212 
 
 (i.) The Body of Christ (§ 9) 213 
 
 (ii.) The Communion of Saints (§ 10) 216 
 
 Chapter VIII. 
 IZTJc ©l^arattcdstic^ of tjjc €J)ucc]^. 
 
 The Notes of the Church not visible tokens but inward 
 
 characteristics (§1) 220 
 
 I. The Church One by reason of Oneness of Historical 
 
 Life (§2) 221 
 
 Her unity not destroyed by 
 
 (i.) schisms from her 222 
 
 (ii.) interrupted Communion within her 224 
 
 II. The Church Holy by reason of the Holiness of that 
 
 WHICH is entrusted TO HER (§3) 227 
 
 III. The Church Catholic (§4) 230 
 
 (1.) by universal adaptation 230 
 
 (ii.) more especially by universality of truth 231 
 
 Her Catholicity secured 
 
 (i.) by Tradition (§5) 233 
 
 (ii.) by Scripture 234 
 
 The Bible (§ 6) 
 
 (a) its Inspiration 236 
 
 {J)) its completeness 239 
 
 (c) development of doctrine from it 240 
 
 Freedom of individual investigation and Authority of the 
 
 Church (§7) 240 
 
Contents. xix 
 
 PAGE 
 
 IV. The Church Apostolic by reason of her unfailing 
 
 Mission (§8) 245 
 
 The Christian Ministry (§9) 247 
 
 Identity of the Church Militant and Triumphant (§ 10) ... 251 
 
 Chapter IX. 
 Z\^t JJtcang of ©race. 
 
 The Object of the Means of Grace both social and individual {§ i) 253 
 
 I. The Word of God (§2) 254 
 
 The underlying principle of the Sacraments (§3) 257 
 
 Their number (§4) , 264 
 
 II. Baptism 
 
 (i.) incorporation into Christ (§ 5) 266 
 
 (ii.) the washing away of sin (§ 6) 269 
 
 (iii.) regeneration (§7) 272 
 
 Baptism of infants (§ 8) 275 
 
 Administration of the Sacrament (§ 9) 277 
 
 III. Confirmation 
 
 (i.) its connexion with Baptism (§10) 278 
 
 (ii.) its distinctive gift 279 
 
 Administi-ation of it (§ 11) 283 
 
 IV. The Eucharist 
 
 (i.) The fundamental conception of it (§ 12) 284 
 
 (ii.) The Real Presence (§13) 2S7 
 
 {a) insufficiency of the Calvinistic view of a purely 
 
 spiritual presence 289 
 
 (I)) unsatisfactoriness of the Roman doctrine of tran- 
 
 substantiation 290 
 
 (<r) doctrine of the English Church 292 
 
 (iii.) The communion of Christ's Body (§ 14) 296 
 
 (a) present conditions of Christ's Body .... 297 
 
 {b) its connexion with the mystical Body .... 29S 
 
 (c) participation in it impossible except by faith . . 300 
 
 (iv.) The Blood of Christ (§ 15) 301 
 
 Its special connexion with our need as sinners . . 303 
 
 (v.) The Eucharist as a Sacrifice (§ 16) 306 
 
 (vi.) Christian Prayer as connected with it (§ 17) , . . . 312 
 
XX Contents. 
 
 V. Penance (§ i8) page 
 
 (i. ) ils connexion with Baptism 315 
 
 (ii.) the sacramental character of it contained in the 
 
 Absolution 317 
 
 (iii.) public and private Absolutions 318 
 
 (iv.) confession 319 
 
 VI. Unction of the Sick (§19) 319 
 
 VII. Ordination (§20) 320 
 
 VIII. Marriage (§ 21) , .321 
 
 Chapter X 
 Vcit ^coff0^ of 5ali)a((on, 
 
 Grace personal in its mode of operation {§ I ) 324 
 
 I. Foreknowledge and Election (§2) 326 
 
 Predestination and human freedom (§3) 330 
 
 II. Grace and Free-will (§4) 333 
 
 (i.) Man's will free and not free 334 
 
 (ii.) Pelagian and Semi- Pelagian theories 335 
 
 (iii.) Grace necessary both to will and to do 337 
 
 (iv.) Grace not irresistible 338 
 
 III. The Christian Course 
 
 (i.) Vocation (§5) 338 
 
 (ii.) Repentance and Faith (§6) 340 
 
 (iii.) Conversion (§7) 342 
 
 (iv.) Justification (§ 8) 
 
 (rt) its nature 344 
 
 (/') its grounds 345 
 
 {c) when given 348 
 
 (d) its effect of peace (§9) 349 
 
 (v.) Snnctification (§ 10) 
 
 [a) its nature and working 350 
 
 (</) -special development in the Saints 352 
 
 (vi.) Final Perseverance (§ 11) 355 
 
Contents. xxi 
 Chapter XI. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Probation ends with death, but not education (§ I ) 356 
 
 Importance of the hour of death 358 
 
 I. Condition of the Faithful departed (§ 2) 
 
 (i.) Scriptural names for it 360 
 
 (ii,) its repose 361 
 
 (iii.) its spiritual activity 362 
 
 (iv.) its penitential aspect 363 
 
 (v.) its timelessness 366 
 
 (vi. ) Prayers for the dead 367 
 
 (vii.) their fellowship with each other , . 368- 
 
 (viii.) and with Christ 366 
 
 II. Resurrection of the Dead (§3) 369 
 
 (i.) nature of the resurrection body 370 
 
 (ii.) difference between the resurrection of the righteous 
 
 and of the wicked 373 
 
 III. The Second Advent of Christ (§4) 375 
 
 (i.) impossibility of calculating the date 376 
 
 (ii.) new birth of the creation . 377 
 
 (iii.) Antichrist 378 
 
 IV. The Final Judgment (§5) 378 
 
 (i.) manifestation of all truth 379 
 
 (ii. ) separation of good and evil 380 
 
 (iii.) Person of the Judge 381 
 
 V. Heaven (§6) 381 
 
 (i.) Salvation 382 
 
 (ii. ) Perfection of the Blessed 
 
 [a) in themselves 383 
 
 (J}\ in relation to God 384 
 
 (c) in relation to the universe 385 
 
 {d) in relation to each other 386 
 
 (iii.) Degrees cf blessedness 387 
 
 (iv.) and of authority 388 
 
 (v.) Relation of the Elect to the rest of mankind (§7) . . 3S9 
 
xxii Colli enis. 
 
 PACE 
 
 VI. Hell (§8) 391 
 
 (i.) the opposite of Heaven 392 
 
 (ii.) none punished beyond their deserts 393 
 
 (iii.) the punishment, not for past acts, but of permanent 
 
 character 394 
 
 (iv.) the punishment, not by arbitrary arrangement, but of 
 
 natural sequence 395 
 
 (v.) necessary to God's justice 396 
 
 (vi.) and to His love 398 
 
 (vii.) eternity of the pimishment 399 
 
 The absolute triumph of Divine goodness (§ 9) .'..... 401 
 
Chapter I. 
 ^i)e ^m% ant i^ature of ffiol), 
 
 T/ie Existence of God a matter of Faith, not of Proof— Its rcasonahh 
 Certainty — Argument from Consent of Mankind — Argument from 
 the Phenomena of Nature, from Life, and from Consciousness — 
 Argument from Hitman Ideals and Conscience — Revelation — 
 Verification of the Doctrine by Experience — Nature of God as 
 Spirit — His Absolute Existence — His Unity — His Infinity — His 
 Omniscience — His Omnipresence in Space and in Time — His Omni- 
 potence — His Moral Character — His Love, 
 
 §1. 
 
 It is no i^art of the duty of one who expounds the 
 Christian doctrine to prove the existence of God. 
 The attempt to exhibit such a proof belongs to a 
 different department of study. The Christian Church 
 does not, in the first instance, seek to convince men 
 by argument that God is. Her voice is that of a 
 v?itness, not of an uncertain inquirer. She bears 
 testimony to what she knows ; and, instead of 
 speculating how to establish God's existence, she 
 teaches men, on God's authority, what God is. 
 Indeed, if we follow the guidance of Holy Scripture, 
 we shall not be led to expect that God's existence can 
 be demonstrated like a problem in mathematics. 
 Although the Bible is full of appeals to nature and 
 
 B 
 
2 God's Existence a Matter of FaitJi. 
 
 history and conscience, as evidence both of the being 
 and of the character of God, it teaches also that this 
 evidence needs something besides intellect in us, if its 
 force is to be felt. " By faith," it says, " ^Ye appre- 
 hend " — not by logical necessity — " that the worlds 
 have been framed by a word of God " (Heb. xi. 3). 
 And again, lest ^Ye should suppose that, under an 
 earlier dispensation, men apprehended the existence 
 and presence of God in some more direct and easy 
 •way than ourselves, the writer of the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews tells us that the same faculties were requu'ed 
 and the same difficulties encountered then as now, 
 and that this must always be the case. " By faith 
 Enoch was translated; for before his translation 
 witness is borne to him that he had pleased God " — 
 so the Septuagint renders the word "walked with 
 God" — "but without faith," he adds, "it was im- 
 possible to walk with Him ; for he that cometh unto 
 God must begin by an act of believing {i^iarivaai) that 
 He is, and that He is found a Rewarder to them that 
 seek Him out " (Heb. xi. 5, 6). Thus, according to 
 Holy Scripture, we must not look to be led by a 
 process of dry reasoning, with an unmistakeable, 
 inevitable certainty, to the conclusion that God is. 
 There is a leap, an assumption to be made, in which 
 the logical faculty is helped out by other faculties in 
 our nature. 
 
 §2. 
 
 We do not assert, then, that the existence of God 
 is to us on the same footing as the earth's motion 
 
Reasonableness of the Belief. 
 
 round the sun, or the equality of the angles at the 
 base of an isosceles triangle — an established and un- 
 questionable fact of science. But, at the same time, 
 we claim to have evidence for it so strong as to put 
 the matter beyond all reasonable doubt. The proof 
 may not be formally complete, but it is practically 
 certain. If our belief in God's existence rests upon 
 an assumption, the assumption is more than justified. 
 Eeasoning alone does not, perhaps, force us over the 
 last step ; but it carries us all the way up to it, and 
 meets us again when we have taken it. No other 
 theory satisfies all the demands of reason like the 
 Christian theory. If we call it impossible to prove 
 that there is a God, we know it to be much more 
 truly impossible to prove that there is not. It is a 
 task which no serious thinker has ever attempted. 
 The utmost that could be maintained is that, from the 
 nature of the case, the question is incapable of being 
 solved in either direction. Agnosticism — ^the doctrine 
 that it is impossible for us to be sure whether God is 
 or not — is the furthest position that logic will admit 
 of; and to be an agnostic — to give up all hope of 
 settling so weighty a question, to say that the 
 evidence is so scanty or so complicated that no 
 decision can be safely formed, to allow the faculty of 
 judgment to be thus completely paralysed — ^appears 
 unworthy of human nature, an intellectual cowardice, 
 a despair almost amounting to treason, and liable to 
 take the heart out of all noble inquiry. Christians 
 do not deny that there are difficulties in the way of 
 belief, but they hold that the difficulties of unbelief 
 
Argument from the Common 
 
 are far greater, and that in Christianity they have 
 the key by which at last every door of thought may 
 be unlocked which unbelief only bars more firmly, 
 
 §3. 
 
 Most of us, to begin with, believe in the exist- 
 ence of God upon the authority of other men. We 
 are taught it in childhood, as we are taught other 
 facts and theories, by our elders. As we grow up, we 
 have to test the truth of it for ourselves. Unless we 
 are of a specially sceptical turn of mind, we start 
 with a not ungenerous prejudice in favour of the 
 opinion. It is commended to us, in the first instance, 
 by persons whom we are inclined by nature to suppose 
 the wisest and best on earth. "We find later on that 
 their belief is shared by almost all the world. This 
 is the famous argument from the common consent of 
 mankind. It has, indeed, very little logical weight ; 
 but there is a moral impressiveness about it, which 
 raises a presumption in favour of belief. We feel it 
 to be unlikely that practically the whole race should 
 be wrong, when, with such an extraordinary variety 
 of form and circumstance, it testifies its conviction 
 of the existence of unseen powers. If this universal 
 conviction is a delusion, how did the delusion arise 
 and spread so far? We are bound to give some 
 account of the origin of religious belief; and it 
 cannot but be felt how hollow and unsatisfactory are 
 all theories which trace it to a dread of ghosts, or 
 such like. Whether we imagine some primeval revela- 
 tion, or whether we suiDpose the belief to be the natural 
 
Consent of Mankind. 5 
 
 impression left upon the unsophisticated mind of man 
 by what he perceives round him and within him, 
 when guided by the Life which was always the Light 
 of men, we cannot refuse to acknowledge that the 
 fact of the belief being so widespread carries weight. 
 This somewhat vague and uncritical concession to 
 the generally received tradition acquires a more solid 
 value when we find the very greatest names in science 
 and philosophy on the same side as the mass of men. 
 It passes into a real conviction when we believe on 
 a deliberate survey of the reasons which have con- 
 vinced other thoughtful minds. We can then say to 
 parents and teachers, to mankind and to the Church, 
 what the men of Samaria said to the woman in the 
 Gospel, that authority had done its work, and was no 
 longer needed : " Now we believe, not because of thy 
 saying ; for we have heard for ourselves, and know " 
 (S. John iv. 42). 
 
 The consideration which most obviously leads us 
 to believe in the existence of God is that which 
 regards the history and character of the world we 
 live in. Usually, indeed, the very existence of a 
 world at all has been held to show the existence of 
 a Creator. How, it has been asked, could the world 
 have come into being, if there had been no God to 
 make it ? Must there not be some First Cause to 
 account for its existence ? Perhaps in its popular 
 form this argument has not the strength that is often 
 assigned to it. It begs the question. If it can be 
 
6 Need of a First Cause of the Universe. 
 
 proved that the -world ever came into being, there 
 must, of course, have been a cause ; but apart from 
 revelation, it is not positively proved that the world, 
 or at least its original elements, ever did come into 
 being. We can only say as yet that there are certain 
 facts which point in the direction of that belief. The 
 investigations of Sir William Thomson, Professor 
 Clerk Maxwell, and others, with regard to what is 
 called the Degradation of Energy, tend to show that 
 the universe, even in the most elementary condition 
 which science leads us to conceive of, had a beginning, 
 and that it must have an end. Yet, were we only 
 face to face with a world of matter and force, we 
 might perhaps have distrusted these conclusions, 
 and imagined an eternity of matter. 
 
 Even then, indeed, the opponents of a belief in 
 God would not have been freed from difficulties. 
 Had there been no natural indications m the world to 
 make us think of a First Cause of the universe in the 
 physical sense, to start the whole series of physical 
 causation, there would still have been facts to deal 
 with of a more recondite, but perhaps as cogent, a 
 kind. Ontological considerations — that is to say, 
 those which are concerned with the mncr problems 
 of existence — suggest the need of a First Cause in a 
 totally different sense. We have to ask, not only how 
 the world began, but how it is, and what it is. Are 
 these atoms and forces an ultimate fact, or do they 
 represent something behind ? Is not their existence 
 founded on something underlying, which is their cause 
 in the same sort of way as the thinking mind is the 
 
Argument from Order in Nahtre. 7 
 
 cause of thonglit ? It is acknowledged that material 
 science tells us nothing about things in themselves, 
 but only about our impressions of the things. Is 
 there any reason to suppose that the things themselves 
 liave any real existence, except by virtue of relation to 
 intelligence ? If the world were but a mass of con- 
 fused forces and atoms, there would still be meta- 
 physical reason to feel sure of a Mind beneath it. 
 
 But our world is not a confused mass like that. 
 The force with which we are acquainted has acted 
 upon matter in a manner which makes it practi- 
 cally certain that an intelligent Will has guided 
 it. Blind force acting at random upon dead matter 
 could not possibly — or at least the odds against it 
 are infinitely great — have reduced cliaos to cosmos, 
 and j)roduced regularity, order, unity, beauty. If 
 some imaginable world might have existed without a 
 Creator, the world which we know could not. This is 
 not only the sentiment of unscientific piety. Every 
 year new facts are discovered which impress the mind 
 more and more with the sense of law in the world ; 
 and though, if we knew that there was no God, we 
 might resign ourselves to thinking that it was a 
 property self-existing in the very nature of things, it 
 seems far easier to believe that the law indicates the 
 presence of guiding thought. To many minds the 
 idea of Evolution, which in our time has made such 
 way, so far from militating against the belief in a 
 Creator, is entirely in favour of that belief. It lends 
 itself perfectly to Christian teleology, or the thought of 
 a purpose to which things tend. An evolution which 
 
S Arguuicnt front Phoionicna of Life. 
 
 aims at nothing in particular, or which goes from 
 better to worse, would be against the Christian belief ; 
 but when we hear of an evolution which is an advance 
 from a ruder economy to a more delicate, which 
 adapts things more and more to their surroundings, 
 and the surroundings to the things, then it seems to 
 us that matter and force must be instruments in the 
 hands of One who has an object in view. 
 
 This feeling is much strengthened when we turn 
 to the phenomena of Life. Supposing that the whole 
 fabric of inorganic matter, with its wonders of light 
 and heat and electricity, with its planetary systems, 
 with the beauties of water, air, and earth, were the 
 result of an accidental play of atoms, j^et life, so far as 
 we can see, cannot be accounted for in the same way. 
 It is as nearly certain as anything can be that the 
 conditions of matter were at one time such — the solar 
 system consisting of gases at a white heat — that no 
 kind of organic life such as we are acquainted with 
 was possible in it. Organic life, then, has had a 
 beginning in the world, even if matter and force have 
 not. How did it begin ? Experimental evidence 
 cannot establish a negative ; but the researches of men 
 unprejudiced and competent confirm us in supposing 
 that there is no such thing as spontaneous generation. 
 Science knows of no life which had not a living 
 parent; and science teaches that once there were 
 no living parents on earth to produce a life. Yet 
 here life is. The chasm between the noblest form of 
 inorganic being and the lowest form of organic — a 
 crystal, for instance, and a cell of protoplasm — is 
 
Argument from Self-Consciousness. 
 
 so great that no connecting link can be found. So 
 far as we see, no evolution works gradually up to life. 
 It is a sudden, startling phenomenon, which uses 
 matter and force for its own purposes, but which is 
 not derived from them. Whence was the first life 
 introduced into a world which had once been incapable 
 of harbouring it, and which seems for ever incapable 
 of producing it ? 
 
 Furthermore, since the introduction of sentient life 
 into the world, yet another factor has made its appear- 
 ance, in human Self-consciousness. The bodily consti- 
 tution of man may without difficulty be supposed to 
 have been evolved out of lower forms of organic life ; 
 but no evolution, no culture, so far as can be as- 
 certained, is able to put even into the highest animals 
 the human power of reflexion. The acuteness, the 
 intelligence, the memory, of an animal never rise any 
 nearer to it. However highly developed, they form 
 but the ground material, so to speak, out of which 
 our human self-consciousness constructs itself a 
 home, just as life constructs for itself a home out 
 of particles of matter. To many thinkers, even the 
 distance between inorganic and organic existence 
 appears not so wide and impassable as that between 
 merely sentient and truly conscious life. Where, 
 then, are we to look for that power which laid hold 
 upon the highest of animal forms, and, by adding the 
 gift of self-consciousness, first made of it a man? 
 Matter and Force seem unable to evolve Life ; Matter, 
 Force, and Life seem unable to evolve Self-conscious- 
 ness; but here, in the world of experience, we find 
 
lo Conclusion froDi tJie Evidence of Nahwc. 
 
 these four things at present coexisting. They have 
 not always coexisted, hut some principle has been at 
 work which has gradually prepared Matter for the 
 reception of Life, and Life for the reception of free 
 Consciousness, and has so arranged the whole system 
 and hierarchy of existences as (with some apparent 
 exceptions) to subserve the well-being and happiness 
 of all and each. 
 
 It seems impossible candidly to reflect upon these 
 successive steps in the history of nature, and to 
 examine in detail the mutual adaptation of the parts 
 of this great whole, especially the animal and 
 vegetable kingdoms, without coming to the conclusion 
 that there is a wise and mighty Will behind it all. 
 John Stuart Mill was not a man who held a brief for 
 Christianity, and few men have felt so bitterly as he 
 did the defects and cruelties of nature ; yet in his last 
 posthumous essay, " On Theism," he sums up his cold 
 investigation of the argument from the appearances 
 of design by saying, " I think it must be allowed that, 
 in the present state of our knowledge, the adaptations 
 in nature afford a large balance of probability in 
 favour of creation by intelligence." 
 
 § 5. 
 
 The balance of probability becomes greater when 
 we add the evidence supplied by our mental and 
 moral constitution. It is difficult, indeed, to throw 
 this argument into a form as popular as the argument 
 from the adaptations in nature ; for the ordinary 
 mind is not accustomed to follow trains of abstract 
 
Evidence of Htiinan Ideals. 1 1 
 
 thought. But those who maintaiu that there is no 
 God have a hard task to account for some facts 
 connected with men's internal nature. It may suffice 
 for our present purpose to ask how the idea of God, 
 as held by an enlightened Christian, was ever formed. 
 If He is a real being, and men, by virtue of some 
 kinship with Him, caught glimpses of " Him, the 
 answer is easy; but not otherwise. Man's power 
 of mental creation is very limited. He can only 
 construct out of materials which come to hand. 
 He can combine elements with which he is acquainted 
 into imaginary forms, but he cannot, for instance, in 
 any practical way, conceive of a fourth dimension, an 
 additional sense, or a new colour. But man has ideals, 
 which transcend all experience, although suggested 
 by it. The finite leads him up to the infinite. His 
 circumscribed powers make him uneasy without the 
 thought of a power not circumscribed. His frag- 
 mentary knowledge makes him demand the existence 
 of a mind to which the sum of truth is present. The 
 artist is unsatisfied by his highest eftorts ; the per- 
 fection of beauty lies immeasurably beyond him. 
 And this ideal, this infinite perfection, is not man's 
 creation. He has not made it — each man does not 
 make it — for himself. He feels that it is there. He 
 is but striving to apprehend a reality. He cannot 
 think of himself as inventing the very material of his 
 thought ; he is moving on solid ground, through 
 regions prepared for him before he came thither, 
 and dimly descries still fairer regions beyond, to 
 which he aspires to penetrate. 
 
12 Testimony of JMoral Conscience. 
 
 And this law holds true, above all, in the domain 
 of morals. A man's sense of right and -wrong may 
 become depraved, like his sense of beauty ; but when 
 men are in a fairly healthy condition of conscience, 
 there is a moral ideal, practically the same for all, 
 which they acknowledge when it is shown to them. 
 This moral ideal lays hold upon them. Conscience 
 evidently speaks, not of itself, but of something else 
 whose authority it recognises. To that moral ideal 
 men find themselves under an unique obligation. 
 They feel an awed sense of responsibility towards it. 
 They are uncomfortable when they have neglected 
 it. Men will think little of a slip in grammar, a 
 lack of artistic perfection; but they will not hghtly 
 trifle with their conscience. And when they make 
 any approaches to the moral ideal, they are conscious 
 that they are not creating the ideal which they ap^ 
 proach, but that their action corresponds to something 
 which actually is ; to use the language of Scripture, 
 they are " doing the truth." Intuitively they demand 
 that the moral law, which asserts its mastery over 
 themselves, should assert an universal mastery, and 
 form part of the very constitution of things. While 
 obedience to it conduces both to the happiness of the 
 world in general and to an enlightened self-interest, 
 conscience is not satisfied to consider the moral law 
 as a set of rules which human prudence has collected 
 with a view to such ends. All attempts to make it 
 universally binding break down when any other ethical 
 basis is taken instead of that which makes right to be 
 necessarily right, and the whole world to be framed 
 
Antecedent Probability of a Revelation. 1 3 
 
 with a view to it. And as men labour more earnestly 
 to reach moral perfection, ever seeming fm'ther from 
 them as they near it, they see with increasing clear- 
 ness that it is impossible to separate the ideal of 
 sanctity from the ideal of beauty, the ideal of know- 
 ledge, the ideal of power ; and they feel that it is no 
 idolatry, no worship of the work of their own hands 
 or of the fiction of their own brains, when they fall 
 down before this Ideal of all perfections, and say, 
 ''Holy, holy, holy. Lord God Almighty, which xi^as, 
 and is, and is to come.'' 
 
 §6. 
 
 Eevelation corroborates and completes the evidence 
 borne by nature and the mind of man. If we had no 
 grounds apart from revelation for thinking that God 
 is, there would have been much reason for suspect- 
 ing the revelation. But "the sender of the alleged 
 message," says John Stuart Mill in the essay to 
 which we have before referred, "is not a sheer 
 invention; there are grounds independent of the 
 message itself for belief in his reality — grounds 
 which, though insufficient for proof, are sufficient to 
 take away all antecedent improbability from the 
 supposition that a message may really have been 
 received from him." Nay, we may say, there is a 
 strong antecedent probability in behalf of revelation. 
 It would surprise us if such a Creator as we infer from 
 the phenomena of the world and man had not wished 
 to be known by His intelligent creation. And the 
 Church maintains a standing witness that, as a 
 
14 Tesliviony oj History. 
 
 matter of fact, the Creator has made Himself known 
 to her. She afHrms that she was gradually prepared 
 for that revelation, " in many parts and in many 
 manners " receiving from time to time, as the progress 
 of her education enabled her to bear it, more and 
 more of the Divine communication. Few arguments 
 for the belief in God are more convincing than those 
 derived from a study of human history, with its plain 
 traces of moral training and providential discipline, 
 whether we consider the experience of individual 
 lives, or the fashioning of the race for that which 
 it was to receive. At last, the life of Godhead 
 actually presented itself to the sight, and hearing, 
 and touch of men, under the conditions of the life 
 of man. That Jesus Christ really lived and died 
 is doubted by none. The historical consequences 
 which have flowed from that life and death are 
 open for all to examine. And the more rigorous the 
 examination is, the more it appears that the account 
 of Jesus Christ given by the Church is rational and 
 straightforward, and alone consistent with all the 
 facts. This carries us, however, somewhat beyond 
 our ijrescnt subject ; for the account of Jesus Christ 
 given by the Church is that He was Himself God 
 Incarnate. But even if, for the moment, we leave the 
 question of our Lord's own proper Divinity, we may 
 truly say that the life and work of Christ are inexplic- 
 able, are impossible, if the God from whom He professed 
 to come had no existence. Taken in conjunction 
 with the strong cumulative evidence derived from 
 elsewhere, the phenomena presented by the history 
 
Faith move Profitable than Demonstration, 15 
 
 of Jesus Christ and of the Church may be said — not 
 indeed in the logical, but in the judicial, sense — to 
 prove that God is. 
 
 § 7. 
 
 If any one finds it to be a stumbling-block that 
 proof in the stricter sense is still wanting, it is easy 
 to reply that there are many other things of which 
 we are certain, though they lie beyond strict proof. 
 Can we prove to demonstration that such a man as 
 Csesar ever lived ? Can we prove that the world 
 round us is not a dream of our own ? or that motion 
 is a reality? or even that we ourselves are in existence ? 
 The famous solvitur amhulando of Diogenes, and the 
 famous cogito, ergo sum of Descartes, are appeals from 
 the tyranny of a sophistical logic to the good sense 
 of mankind. In like manner, God has not made 
 Himself the subject of prying experiments or of 
 pedantic syllogisms. Perhaps, if His existence had 
 been one of those things of which formal proof could 
 be given to the world, the acknowledged fact would 
 have lost its interest. It would have killed individual 
 inquiry. Few men would have cared to verify what 
 no one would dispute. The tendency would have 
 been to rest upon an intellectual assent to the pro- 
 position. When it came to the proof, the poor and 
 simple would have been at too great a disadvantage 
 compared with the philosopher. We should have lost 
 all those touching and noble associations which gather 
 round the name of faith, and should have had instead 
 a cold science — common property, and so appropriated 
 
1 6 TJie Belief verified by Experience. 
 
 by none. As it is, each man has to prove the fact 
 for himself. It is the great adventure, the great 
 romance of every soul — this finding of God. Though 
 BO many travellers have crossed the ocean before us, 
 and bear witness of the glorious continent beyond, 
 each soul for itself has to repeat the "work of a 
 Columbus, and discover God afresh. And this can 
 indeed be done ; but intellectual argument is not the 
 sole nor the main means of apprehension. At best 
 it prepares the way. Moral purification is equally 
 necessary. Then spiritual effort, determined, con- 
 centrated, renewed in spite of failure — calm and 
 strong prayers in the Name of Christ — enable the 
 believer to say, like Jacob after he had wrestled with 
 the Angel, "I have seen God face to face, and my 
 life is preserved." 
 
 §8. 
 
 Emerging from the dim region of human guess- 
 work into the light of an accepted revelation, we 
 desire to understand, by the teaching which God has 
 given us, what He is and what He is like. The 
 nature of God is briefly stated by our Lord, when He 
 says to the woman of Samaria, "God is spirit" (S. 
 John iv. 24). His meaning is somewhat obscured in 
 the English Bible. To say that "God is a spirit" 
 would mean that He belongs to a class, that He is a 
 specimen of an order comprising other beings besides 
 Himself. Our Lord's words— -11 1'tr^m 6 Gto'c — make 
 no such suggestion. They do not assign God to a 
 class, but simply describe what His nature is — as, in 
 
Spirititality of God's Nature. 1 7 
 
 the previous chapter, our Lord had said to Nicodemus, 
 " That which is born of the Spirit is spirit ; " or as, 
 in a later one, He says to His disciples, " The sayings 
 "which I have spoken unto you are siDirit." Energetic 
 life forms part of the notion which the word conveys ; 
 but, beyond that, we can best understand it by 
 negatives. God is not flesh. There is nothing 
 material about Him. The finest and most subtle of 
 ethereal substances, such as some have supposed to 
 invest even angels and disembodied spirits, is as 
 alien from His nature as the coarsest. Not only has 
 He no " shape " or bodily outline, which men might 
 conceivably see (S. John v. 37), but He has no 
 extension in space at all, and bears no local relation 
 to anything. Hence it is that neither at Jerusalem 
 nor on the Samaritan mountain could men find Him 
 by being (so to speak) on the same si^ot with Him. 
 If they were to find Him there or elsewhere it must 
 be by a purely inward movement. " God is spirit ; and 
 they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit 
 and truth." 
 
 §9. 
 
 There are, indeed, other spirits besides God, whicli 
 may, therefore, be said in a sense to belong to the 
 same class of beings with Him, inasmuch as, like 
 Him, they are immaterial. But there is this funda- 
 mental difference between God and all other beings, 
 even those whose nature is most like to His — they 
 have an origin; and that origin is not from them- 
 selves; mediately or immediately it proceeds from 
 
 c 
 
1 8 His Absolute Existence. 
 
 Him, and they depend always upon Him. "It is He 
 that hath made us," they say, " and not "we our- 
 selves " (Ps. c. 2). But God, on the other hand, 
 has no 'origin. He eternally is. His existence is 
 the final fact upon which all other facts repose. The 
 mystery of being is beyond our thought ; we do not 
 deny the reality of other existences when we say 
 that God alone is. Other things have a true, but 
 only a contingent, being. God alone is because He 
 chooses to be. Our springs of life are in Him ; 
 but His are nowhere but in the depths of His own 
 being. He is independent of all but Himself. This 
 is the meaning of the revelation made to Moses at 
 the Bush. We have not exhausted the significance 
 of the name "I Am" when we say that it teaches 
 the eternal, the unbegun, the unchanging nature of 
 God. All these are natural consequences from the 
 name " I Am," but the name itself contains a positive, 
 not a negative, thought. It expresses God's absolute 
 existence. While cutting at the root of every pan- 
 theistic conception, by declaring the independent, 
 personal self-consciousness of God, it teaches the 
 infinite fulness of life which God has within His own 
 being. 
 
 §10. 
 
 The God thus revealed to us is One. " Hear, 
 Israel ; the Lord our God is one Lord " (Deut. vi. 4). 
 When God is declared in Scripture to be One, the 
 object is not usually to warn us from polytheism and 
 teach us monotheism instead. Moses does not saj', 
 
His Unchanging Unity. 19 
 
 '' The Lord thy God is the One— the only— Lord." 
 That truth is indeed often expressed in the Bible. 
 *'Is there a God besides Me? yea, there is no God; 
 I know not any " (Isa. xliv. 8). But (usually, at least) 
 the unity of God set before us is not numerical, deny- 
 ing the existence of a second ; it is integral, deny- 
 ing the possibility of division. God has no parts. 
 ** If it were so," said one of the prophet-like philo- 
 sophers of early Greece, "then the component ele- 
 ments would sometimes get the better of each other 
 and sometimes the worse ; and that, in one who is 
 God, is impossible." God is indivisible. There can 
 be no conflict within Him, such as there is in us 
 between flesh and spirit. He cannot be at cross 
 purposes with Himself. He is not moved, as we are, 
 by incompatible impulses. In His singleness of 
 nature there is not one set of feelings prompting 
 Him to work and another to rest, one to iDunish and 
 another to spare, one to remember and another to 
 forget. However infinite the variety of His action, 
 it is but the manifestation, in varying circumstances, 
 of one and the self-same character and will. The 
 causes which produce change and dislocation in us 
 by the course of time have nothing analogous to them 
 in the life of God. We are one thing to-day and 
 another to-morrow; but God is unchangeably the 
 same, without progress or falling back, without altera- 
 tion slow or sudden ; for He is One. And in every 
 thing which He does, or thinks, or wills, God is 
 wholly engaged. His consciousness is undivided, 
 and is entirely present at every point of His working. 
 
20 His Ouiniscicnce. 
 
 §11. 
 
 For the unity of God is not the unity of a limited 
 Being. God is infinite. The bounds which confine 
 'us do not confine Him, whether in respect of know- 
 ledge or of power, of space or time. 
 
 The infinity of God's knowledge we express by the 
 word '* omniscient." By that word we do not mean 
 only that God can, if He chooses, find everything 
 out, that nothing can ultimately be hidden from Him, 
 that He has all departments of knowledge open to 
 Him whenever He is pleased to turn to them. We 
 mean that all objects of knowledge and thought are 
 at all times actually present to His consciousness. 
 Nothing is too minute for Him to be observant of. 
 The humblest forms of life are under His eye, even 
 after they have passed away from their earthly 
 exhibition. "Are not five sparrows sold for two 
 farthings ? and not one of the five {twiXeXiicrnivov 
 iariv) has vanished from the mind of God. Behold," 
 adds our Lord, ** the very hairs of your head arc all 
 numbered" (S. Luke xii. G, 7). The laws which 
 regulate so minutely all energy and matter, are but 
 ways of stating this truth as observed by our experi- 
 ence : every particle, molecule, atom, represents a 
 thought of God, and continues to exist because He 
 is still thinking it. His knowledge is exact and 
 searching to the uttermost. 
 
 This is, indeed, what is conveyed by the word 
 "omnipresent" as applied to God. He is not ubi- 
 (luitous, or in an immense number of places at once. 
 
His Ommpresencc. 2 1 
 
 We must not think of Him as diffused universally 
 everywhere throughout space, a portion of His Being 
 attaching itself to every object in existence. To put 
 Him in any place, or any number of places at once, 
 would reduce Him to being of the same nature as the 
 things among which He would be placed. Eather, 
 all existing objects, material or immaterial, are 
 present to His one consciousness, are in His mind, 
 in immediate contact with Himself. It is to this 
 spiritual, as distinct from physical or local, omni- 
 presence that the Psalmist points when he says, 
 " "Whither shall I go from Thy Sinr'xt ? or whither 
 shall I flee from Thy presence ? If I ascend up into 
 heaven. Thou art there : if I make my bed in hell, 
 behold, Thou art there. . . . Yea, the darkness hideth 
 not from Thee ; the darkness and the light to Thee 
 are both alike " (Ps. cxxxix. 7, foil.). The presence 
 and the knowledge of God are treated as identical. 
 
 But the omniscience of God does not consist in 
 an exhaustive perception of ever so many separate 
 things. Were this so, creation would never be any- 
 thing but a confusion ; there would be no unity nor 
 order in it. God's knowledge is not analytical only ; 
 it is at the same time in the highest degree synthetic. 
 God does not become lost and bewildered in a multi- 
 plicity of details. His unity enables Him to see all 
 things that are or can be, in all their relations to 
 each other, actual or possible. Being Himself One 
 and at the same time infinite, He has before Him 
 for ever all things and thoughts in every conceivable 
 combination of beauty and wisdom. It is not neces- 
 
2 2 His Eternity compatible 
 
 eary for Him, as for us, to turn His attention from 
 one subject in order to fix it upon another, nor to 
 run His eye backwards and forwards to see the 
 mutual bearings of the various parts of that which is. 
 We cannot say for certain what answers to suc- 
 cession of thoughts in the mind of God. He is as 
 much above time as He is above space. This is the 
 true notion of eternity. As God is not a being who 
 pervades all places by local expansion, so neither 
 is He a being who pervades all ages by temporal 
 duration. Space and time alike are names for 
 certain relations in which finite things stand to each 
 other; God Himself transcends them. He enters 
 into them, indeed, and sympathizes with those crea- 
 tures of His which are subject to them, for they are 
 part of the orderliness and system that is in the 
 mind of God ; and in a sense He subjects Himself to 
 them by creating a world in which they find place ; 
 but He is not subject to them by His own nature. 
 God's life compared with ours is not like ours com- 
 pared with that of some ephemeral insect. To the 
 insect the interval between sunrise and sundown 
 might appear as long as threescore years and ten 
 to man. Thus Moses says, " A thousand years in 
 Thy sight are but as yesterday," as if the vast total 
 of God's life diminished the significance of any 
 measurable portion of it. But the fuller thought 
 of the New Testament brings out the converse side. 
 ** One day is with the Lord as a thousand j^ears" 
 (Ps. xc. 4 ; 2 S. Pet. iii. 8). He values the infinitesimal 
 in time, even as He does in space ; and thus we can 
 
with a Feeling for Time. 23 
 
 see that the Bible does not use an unmeaning meta- 
 phor when it speaks of the patience, the long-suffering, 
 the expectation of God. But the words "future" 
 and ** past " only become realities for Him in Hie 
 dealing with creation. Perhaps, for that matter, 
 so does the word " present " also ; for, as God is 
 not to be conceived of as located in one point of 
 space, commanding all other space, which to Him 
 is " here," so neither is He to be conceived of as 
 dating at one point of time, commanding all other 
 time, which to Him is *' now." He transcends all 
 these links which bind finite things together, holding 
 them all clearly and feelingly in His one infinite 
 intelligence. 
 
 §12. 
 
 The all-knowing God is revealed as being also an 
 almighty God. By this title He is most frequently 
 described to us, not only in the Church Creeds, but 
 in the Bible, because it sums up all the rest of the 
 Divine attributes. No being could be almighty whose 
 knowledge was limited, who should have to look on to 
 an uncertain future, or move from place to place at 
 His work, who was irresolute and divided in mind, 
 or who depended for His completeness or for very 
 existence upon something outside Himself. God has 
 revealed Himself to us as almighty. In other words. 
 He has entu-e freedom of action, coupled with un- 
 limited resources. 
 
 Men commonly interpret the word " almighty " 
 to mean " able to do "everything." This, however, is 
 
34 His Omnipotence. 
 
 j not accurate. It gives a false idea about God ; for 
 I there are some things which God cannot do. "He 
 ( cannot deny Himself." " It is impossible for God to 
 lie " (2 Tim. ii. 13 ; Heb. vi. 18). God is unable 
 to do anything bad, or capricious, or Irrational, or 
 self-contradictory. But the inability is not due to 
 any deficiency of power, or any restriction placed 
 upon God from without. Itj^ses from the fact that 
 He knows all things, and therefore cannot be deceived 
 into preferring that which is less good. *' God is not 
 tempted of evil things " (S. James i. 13); they can have 
 no attraction for Him. He can do whatever He wills ; 
 but thes&4hings He cannot, by His very nature, will 
 to do. 
 
 r Indeed, the Latin word omnlpotcns (as well as 
 
 Ahe Greek TravTOKpuTMp, which it represents) con- 
 
 , veys a different notion from that of power .to do 
 
 / anything. The word is of the same class as cacUpotens, 
 
 ; "master of the sky," armipotens, "master of arms," 
 
 ! and the like. Omnipotens means " master of all." It 
 
 i expresses God's universal sovereignty, His dominion 
 
 ' over all things that are or that can be. For, on the 
 
 one hand, God is complete master of Himself. He is 
 
 not, like the god of the pantheist, blindly struggling 
 
 forward into self-possession. " God is light, and in 
 
 Him is no darkness at all " (1 S. John i. 5). He is 
 
 profoundly conscious of all His own fulness. No part 
 
 of it remains for Him yet to discover. Thus He 
 
 wields all His infinite powers with an unerring 
 
 precision, and cannot be blinded with regard to the 
 
 issues of His action. This being so, it follows that 
 
His Moral Character. 25 
 
 God is com]3lete master of all other things as well. 
 / For all things that are not God are creatures of 
 God; and God cannot have created anything and 
 then lost the control of it. Thus even those things 
 which seem most defiantly and outrageously in 
 rebellion against Him are still under His hand, and 
 His omnipotence will be proved at length the more 
 strikingly by means of their rebellion. 
 
 § 13. 
 
 It was, perhaps, imaginable — though barely so — 
 that these attributes might have been found in a 
 being without any moral character, or even with 
 a character that was immoral. Though a Socrates 
 was able to teach that " virtue is knowledge," yet, in 
 our present fallen condition, we should hardly have 
 known for certain, without revelation, the true re- 
 lations between virtue and vice, and therefore the 
 necessary alliance between perfect knowledge and 
 perfect holiness. Left to themselves, men have 
 worshipped gods of the vilest wickedness. Heathen 
 religions teach that the deity may do what is evil 
 without suffering contamination, even as light is 
 uncontaminated by shining on a dung-hill. But our 
 God is known to us as a being of perfect and infinite 
 righteousness. Moral light and intellectual light are 
 found to be the same thing in Him, constituting the 
 glory in which God lives. 
 
 This glory cannot be approached by man (1 Tim. 
 vi. 16) ; but it is everywhere assumed that men are 
 cfipable of apprehending it aright. From the per- 
 
26 God and the Moral Law. 
 
 cej^tions of our conscience ^ve can argue confidently 
 to the moral action of God. The moral law is not, 
 like time and space, a limitation imposed by the 
 Creator upon His creatm-es while He is Himself 
 independent of it. He gives us clearly to understand 
 that right and wrong are the same for Himself as for 
 us. The rule of justice and purity is not an arbitrary 
 and conventional rule which could have been other 
 than it is. Right is not right simply because it is the 
 will of God ; wrong is not wrong merely because God 
 has forbidden it. These names are not an expression 
 for some personal preferences of our Maker. It would 
 have been impossible for Him to have made wrong to 
 be right, or right to be wrong, by an exercise of 
 authority. God Himself does right because it is 
 right. 
 
 Yet, at the same time, it must not be supposed 
 that the moral law exists independently of God, or 
 that He finds it imposed upon Him by some external 
 necessity, and obeys it as a subject, or even ad- 
 ministers it as a governor responsible to the law 
 which He administers. There is no such thing as 
 a moral law apart from God. He is the moral law. 
 That law for us cannot fully be expressed in precepts, 
 not even in the nicest subtleties of directors of the 
 conscience. It is essentially a living ideal. That 
 " perfect law of liberty " (S. James i. 25) by which we 
 are ruled consists in nothing else but the imitation 
 of the Divine character. To this it owes its freedom, 
 its infinite depth, and its unity. " Be ye therefore 
 perfect," so our Lord sums up the new code of His 
 
GocTs Holiness. 27 
 
 kingdom, " even as your Father which is in heaven is 
 perfect " (S. Matt. v. 48). 
 
 But such terms as "the moral law" are too cold 
 to be used in connexion with the character of God. 
 He is perfectly calm, it is true, and fulfils His own 
 infinite ideal of moral perfection without a struggle, 
 without an effort, without need of vigilance. It 
 is natural to Him. And yet the whole energy of 
 the Divine Being is in it. For He is not merely 
 "pure," as one whom no evil thing has ever 
 sullied (Hab. i. 13). He is not merely "faithful" 
 (1 Cor. X. 13 J 1 S. Pet. iv. 19), as one who recognises 
 that He owes a duty and who is ready to perform 
 it. He is not merely "righteous" (Ps. vii. 9; 
 2 Thess. i. 6), as one who will see equity all round 
 Him, and will scrupulously bring home to all the 
 true nature of their deeds. Purity and faithfulness 
 and righteousness might possibly be found in one who 
 was without emotions. But God is holy. All good 
 moral qualities which we regard separately, like 
 light when broken by a prism, are shown to be one, 
 and that one quality is shown in its beauty and its 
 intensity. God is holy. He burns with love of all 
 that is noble, and with hatred of all that is base. 
 " The righteous Lord loveth righteousness " (Ps. xi. 
 7). It is the idea of His holiness which enables us to 
 understand those strange words in which the prophets 
 speak of His vehement transports of wrath against 
 sin. " God is jealous, and the Lord revengeth ; the 
 Lord revengeth, and is furious. . . . Who can stand 
 before His indignation ? and who can abide in the 
 
28 Holiness more than Absence of Sin. 
 
 fierceness of His anger ? His fury is poured out 
 like fire, and the rocks are tbro^Yn down by Him " 
 (Nah. i. 2 — 6). At first sight it might seem as if 
 holiness meant nothing but the absence of evil; 
 but that is because Tve have so little acquaintance 
 T\'ith positive moral beauty. Even God's hatred of 
 sin is not a full measure of His love of righteousness ; 
 for sin is not an infinite thing, but righteousness 
 is infinite (Ps. Ixxi. 15). It is not the sight of 
 God's majestic unity, nor of His exhaustive knowledge, 
 nor of His all-mastering might, nor even of His 
 severe justice, which most moves the hearts of His 
 intelligent creatures to adoration. It is the ever- 
 deepening perception which they have of the steady, 
 devouring passion for right which lives within Him. 
 Before this, the Seraphim, who for countless ages 
 have had the uninterrupted task of contemplation, 
 hide their eyes and cry continually, as if " stung with 
 the splendour of a sudden thought," their admiration 
 of fresh glories of His holiness coming into view. 
 And we, who are not like them, unfallen, serve God 
 with reverence and godly fear, acknowledging that 
 "our God is a consuming fire " (Heb. xii. 20). 
 
 But the crowning revelation vouchsafed to us con- 
 cerning the nature and character of God is contained 
 in the words, "God is Love" (1 S. John iv. 8, 16). We 
 know what love is because we arc capable of loving. 
 It is no vague general benevolence. Still less is it a 
 hunger for something which will supply a felt want. 
 
God's Love. 29 
 
 It is a strong and calm outgoing of the being towards 
 personal objects. Its main exhibition lies in self-sacri- 
 fice for the sake of the beloved. It cannot, indeed, be 
 contented until it receives ■ love in answer to love ; yet 
 it does not love for the sake of the reward which it 
 expects. It says, with the voice of its great exponent 
 (whatever the true text may be), ''I will gladly 
 spend and be spent for you, though the more abun- 
 dantly I love you the less I be loved " (2 Cor. xii. 15). 
 *'Love suffereth long, and is kind; love envieth not; 
 love vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not 
 behave itself unseemly, seeketh not the things which 
 are its own, is never provoked, taketh no account of 
 the evil; rejoiceth not at unrighteousness, but re- 
 joiceth along with the truth ; putteth up with all 
 things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, en- 
 dm-eth all things " (1 Cor. xiii. 4 — 7). This is the 
 description of God. Love is His very being ; it is not 
 an attribute which mixes in among the rest and 
 tempers their exhibition. AH the other attributes are 
 attributes of love. It is love that is spirit; love is 
 self-originating ; love is one and indivisible. The omni- 
 science is the omniscience of love ; love is everywhere 
 present; love is eternal. Omnipotence belongs to 
 love ; righteousness and holiness mark the character 
 of love. Whatever God does, love does, and He does 
 it because He loves. "Whatever perfect love would 
 design, God designs and will perform; for love and 
 God are but two names to express the same meaning. 
 
Chapter II. 
 'Eijt 33lc0Scl) ^rinttg. 
 
 The At/ianastan Creed the C/iureli's expression of Responsibility for the 
 Truth — Docti-ine of the Trinity no figment — Error of Tritheism 
 and of Sabellianism — Difficulty of Arian teaching from point of 
 view of riiilosophy — A Trinity of Persons required by the conception 
 of God as self-conscious Love — Distinction of the Th)-ee as revealed 
 in Scripture — Subordination of the Son and S/>irit to the Father, 
 
 §1. 
 
 T£> many persons, not otherwise prejudiced against 
 Christianity, tUe doctrine that there are Three Persons 
 in the Godhead is a serious stumbling-block. They 
 imagine that they would find it simpler to believe in 
 a God who should be one person as well as one sub- 
 stance, like the God presented by the Muhammadan 
 or by the modern Jewish religion. It seems to them 
 a needless complication, an arbitrary dogmatic impo- 
 sition, to teach that there is a Father, a Son, and a 
 Spirit, who arc all One. If they do not think it an 
 actual contradiction, a sheer impossibility, they think 
 it a metaphysical puzzle, which the brains of ordinary 
 Christians ought not to be troubled with. The diffi- 
 culty felt by such persons is increased by the solemnity 
 with which the Church has insisted upon the impor- 
 
Purpose of the Athanasian Cixed. 3 1 
 
 tance of this doctrine. The Qidcumque viilt, by its 
 warnings, even more than by the difficult language of 
 its statements, repels them from assenting to the 
 truths asserted. Whether that psalm is suited in 
 the present state of things for public recitation, may 
 without disloyalty be debated. But it is to be observed 
 that the warnings of the Quicumque are not addressed 
 to the world outside, or to those who have never 
 received the faith. It is the Church's warning to 
 herself and to her own children who anxiously desire 
 to be saved. It is an exhortation to prize the great 
 treasure which is committed to the Church, and to 
 her alone. The Church is the repository of revealed 
 truth. She holds it in trust for mankind, and is 
 responsible to God for "keeping it whole and unde- 
 filed," that is, without mutilation and without ad- 
 mixture. False notions having been circulated from 
 time to timie by persons who claimed to represent her, 
 she was bound to point out to the faithful where those 
 false notions differed from the truth as she had received 
 it, and to warn those who cared for her judgment of 
 the grave moral fault they would incur if they should 
 treat the revelation of God irreverently, whether 
 through negligence they allowed the truth to be 
 forgotten, or through presumption defined it amiss. 
 
 The Quicumque, in its intention at least, is not an 
 attempt to impose metaphysical subtleties, but to 
 oppose them. It forbids them; it keeps the ground 
 clear, and will not permit " the Name of the Father, 
 and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost " to be reduced 
 by those who have been baptized into it to the barren 
 
32 Importance of Doctrine of the Trinity. 
 
 unrealities invented by a Sabelliiis or an Arius. But 
 in thus resisting the aggressions of a profane human 
 speculation, the Church encourages us to study de- 
 voutly the real nature of the threefold Name. We arc 
 not to pass it over as if it meant nothing. It is not 
 ** a vain thing for us " (Deut. xxxii. 47), which we 
 may safely ignore. We ought to try our best to 
 understand it, and so to grow in the knowledge of 
 God. All that the Church insists upon is that we 
 should not approach the subject in the spirit of dis- 
 putants, but with veneration and awe, and the desire 
 simply to be taught of God. " The Catholic faith is 
 this" — not that we define, or understand, or assent, or 
 subscribe to anything, but — " that we worship one God 
 in Trinity, and the Trinity in Unity." 
 
 §2. 
 
 In order to be assured that the doctrine is not a 
 mere figment — that it cannot be dismissed unheard — 
 two of the passages of Holy Scripture which bear upon 
 the point may be examined. We find our Lord bidding 
 His disciples to baptize all nations " into the Name of 
 the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost " 
 (S. Matt, xxviii. 19) . It is obvious that He is not simply 
 dictating a form of words to be used in the adminis- 
 tration of Baptism. "Into the Name," He says, not 
 "in" it. He sums up, in this brief description, the 
 whole revelation which He came on earth to bring. 
 That Name is the Gospel. Every spiritual privilege 
 we enjoy is to be found in it. Our Baptism ushers us 
 into it ; for it puts ub into a living connexion with the 
 
Testimony of the Baptismal Formula. 33 
 
 God who is thus set forth, and who obviously wishes 
 us to understand what the Name means. But we 
 mark that our Lord does not speak of baptizing men 
 into the " Names," as if they were plural. They can- 
 not be dissociated from each other. The Name is one. 
 Now, we could hardly imagine that Christ would use 
 such a phrase, with its pregnant assertion of the unity 
 of the Name, if " Father, Son, and Holy Ghost " 
 represented notions so separate as those of God, and 
 a human i^rophet, and a sanctifying influence. He 
 must needs, in that case, have at least used the plural, 
 or, as He often did when He would imply a distinction 
 (S. Matt. xvii. 27 ; S. John xx. 17), repeated the word : 
 "baptizing them into the Name of the Father, and 
 into the name of the Son, and into the name of the 
 Holy Ghost." By choosing without repetition to say 
 "■ the Name," He teaches that the Father, the Son, 
 and the Holy Ghost are one. The revelation of each 
 of the Three is the revelation of the other Two. They 
 cannot be known apart. There are not three names 
 of three separate beings ; but the Name of the one 
 God is, when written out full, a threefold Name. 
 
 And yet throughout the New Testament the dis- 
 tinction between the Three is as clearly kept and 
 brought out as Their unity. Thus our Lord at the 
 Last Supper says to His disciples, " I will pray the 
 Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that 
 He may be with you for ever, even the Spirit of truth " 
 (S. John xiv. 16). Here the personal distinctions are 
 clear and sharp. The Son prays ; the Father hears 
 and gives ; the Holy Ghost comes. The Son is not 
 
 D 
 
34 Testimony of the Promise of the Comfo7'tey. 
 
 the same as the Father ; for how could He intercede 
 with Himself? The Father is not the same as the 
 Spu'it ; for how could the Father " give " Himself in 
 the sense which is here required, and which is 
 afterwards explained by the word " send " (ver. 
 26) ? The Spirit is not the same as the Son ; for 
 how could He in that case be " another Comforter," 
 a permanent substitute for the Comforter whose brief 
 sojourn was ending ? If the Name into which we are 
 baptized leads us to think of the Father, the Son, 
 and the Holy Ghost as an indivisible unity, this great 
 promise of Christ as clearly sets before us the actions 
 of a distinct Trinity. From the one we learn not to 
 " divide the substance ;" from the other, not to "con- 
 found the Persons." There are many other such 
 passages in Holy Scripture, and these are only 
 selected as samples in which all the Divine Three 
 are, in a marked way, mentioned together. It will 
 be felt that no other interpretation answers so simply 
 and so deeply to the natural meaning of them as the 
 Catholic interpretation does. 
 
 §3. 
 
 The Catholic interpretation of these and other 
 passages guards the reader of Scripture from two 
 opposite mistakes, either of which might easily be 
 made without impugning the Godhead of the Son 
 and Spirit, and either of which would cloud tlie 
 clearness of our Christian hope. The first of these 
 mistakes is known by the name of Tritheism, or 
 supposing that there are three Gods. This belief 
 
Christianity a Pure Monotheism. 35 
 
 has never been formally maintained; but it is un- 
 consciously the creed of a great many persons who 
 have no wish to dispute the teaching of the Church. 
 They think of the Father, the Son, and the Holy 
 Ghost as three separate Beings, possessed of the 
 same glorious attributes, and bound together by 
 mutual love and concord ; accommodating and 
 serviceable in many ways to each others' schemes, 
 but independent of each other, and not necessary to 
 one another's existence or completeness. For those 
 whose thoughts take a tritheistic shape, the Son 
 might (imaginably) cease to exist, and the Father 
 still remain the same, intact; or a period could be 
 conceived of at which no Holy Sphit was, and yet the 
 Father and the Son existed in all their perfection 
 without feeling much difference. This is the form of 
 thought and feeling which the Quicumque says is 
 "forbidden by the Catholic religion." It would be 
 "to say. There be three Gods, or three Lords." The 
 Catholic religion asserts, with all sincerity and earnest- 
 ness, the purest and loftiest monotheism. We have 
 no need to explain anything away — we are in no 
 degree juggling with words — when we repeat that 
 God is One. We believe it without qualification or 
 reserve. We rest upon this fact as the one great 
 fundamental truth. We pray to be taught it as the 
 highest work of the Spirit — 
 
 "Teach us to know the Father, Son, 
 And Thee, of both, to be but one." 
 
 For the threefold personality of God does not 
 contradict His unity in any way ; it shows the manner 
 
Error of Tritheism. 
 
 or condition of it. There are not three independent 
 units side by side, on a level with each other, each 
 almighty, each eternal, each finding in Himself 
 the som-co of His own life. The unity between the 
 three blessed Persons is not a similarity of character 
 and qualities and xjowers, not a harmony of wills and 
 purposes between three individuals belonging to the 
 same species — three beings each of whom is a God. 
 It is a true, though inexpressible, unity of Three 
 Persons mutually depending upon each other and 
 completing each other, indivisible, and incapable of 
 existence apart from one another. The life of all 
 Three is one and the same life, and it has but one 
 source, not three. God is one Being, who is Father, 
 because He eternally finds Himself in a Son and 
 Spirit, begotten of Him and proceeding from Him, 
 not by a mere act of His will, but by the very 
 necessity of His nature ; and yet not by the mere 
 necessity of His nature, but by the act of His loving 
 will. It is He that is in Them, and They are in Him. 
 For this reason it is that we are cautioned not to 
 speak of three almighty ones, or three eternal ones, 
 or (according to the teaching of S. Ambrose) even 
 of three holy ones, although each of the three is 
 holy and eternal and almighty ; because to speak in 
 such a manner would imply only a likeness between 
 three separate specimens of a class which might 
 without absurdity be thought more numerous. 
 
Sahellian Conception of God. 
 
 §4. 
 
 The opposite mistake to Tritheism is that which 
 is known to students of history by the name of 
 SabelHanism. That name is derived from an early 
 teacher who hoped to make the doctrine of the Holy 
 Trinity easier by some such explanation as the follow- 
 ing. We find Divine actions ascribed to a Father, a 
 Son, and a Holy Spirit ; yet, if God is one, all these 
 names must be names for the one God. That one 
 God, accordingly, must be pleased to act sometimes as 
 Father, sometimes as Son, and sometimes as Spirit, 
 sometimes as all three. For example. He acts as 
 Father when He initiates or creates ; He acts as Son 
 when He puts into execution what He has, as Father, 
 willed; He acts as Spirit when He imparts life and 
 consciousness and moral freedom by infusing Himself 
 into that which, as Father and Son, He has formed. 
 But in Himself He is none of these. He passes from 
 one to the other. The so-called '' Persons " may 
 come and go ; they have no permanent being. They 
 only express a threefold relation of the one God 
 towards us, as displayed in three manners of dealing. 
 It is but Sabellianism exaggerated to maintain that 
 the persons are only notions of ours ; and that, except 
 in our perception, they would not exist at all — that 
 they are but three phases or aspects of God, names 
 for God as observed from different points of view; 
 God not being conscious of hdng Father, Son, and 
 Spirit, but only of being thought so. According to 
 this form of the theory, the difference between the 
 
3^ Unsatisfactorincss of Sabellianism. 
 
 persons only began when there was an intelligent 
 creation to see the difference. But whether the 
 difference depends on our perception, or whether the 
 difference is now a real one to God Himself, in either 
 case, if the creation were to pass away, the difference 
 would pass away also, and only an abstract God be 
 left, neither Father, nor Son, nor Holy Spirit. " The 
 Unity (or rather, the Unit)," said Sabellius, "has come 
 to be a Trinity by expansion." It is not, therefore, 
 the original and eternal condition of God, but only 
 began with the beginning of the world, and the Trinity 
 would relapse into a Unity when no world was left for 
 it to be exhibited in. 
 
 Such is roughly the Sabellian conception of the 
 Trinity. But if it were the real meaning of the 
 language of Scripture, then these names of Father, 
 Son, and Spirit would be mere illusions. They would 
 deceive us. The Scriptm-cs would then be no true 
 revelation of the nature of God ; on the contrary, they 
 would suggest what is actually false. We should be 
 mocked by an appearance of mutual recognition and 
 love between these imaginary— or, at best, transitory 
 — " Persons." Instead of having to do with a real 
 heavenly Father, made known to us in a real in- 
 carnate Son, by the illumination of a real indwelling 
 Spirit, we should find ourselves face to face, after all, 
 with an unintelligible, impersonal God, who had played 
 upon us and confused our understandings for a time 
 by showing Himself to us under three disguises. If, 
 according to the Catholic tradition, the distinction 
 of the Three Persons is an eternal distinction, we can 
 
It impairs the Hope of Eternal Life. 39 
 
 understand how God is indeed eternally love, within 
 Himself, and not merely love towards us ; but if the 
 Persons are confounded, as Sabellius confounded 
 them, then love can only have begun when there 
 was a creation to be loved, and we have no guarantee 
 that it will continue. And indeed, if God's eternal 
 state is higher than any manifestations of Himself 
 can be, we should imagine that the so-called Unity 
 would have to reassert itself some time or another, and 
 reabsorb the temporary Trinity under which it had 
 been pleased to figure; and, as creation owes its 
 origin to the act by which the Unity broke out into 
 a Trinity, the return of the Godhead to its original 
 Unity must needs carry with it the annihilation of all 
 creaturely existence. A Sabellian conception of the 
 Trinity weakens the hope of eternal life as much 
 as the Catholic faith assures it. " This is the life 
 eternal, that they may know Thee the only true God, 
 and Him whom Thou didst send, even Jesus Christ " 
 (S. John xvii. 3). 
 
 §5. 
 
 The two forms of thought which we have now 
 considered agree in this, that they justly acknow- 
 ledge, in Scripture, the Godhead of Father, Son, and 
 Spirit, though Tritheism does so at the expense of the 
 eternal Unity, and SabelHanism at the expense of the 
 eternal Trinity. Arianism, on the other hand, in 
 its ancient and modern forms, including an immense 
 range of opinions from Socinianism upwards, would 
 cut the knot by denying the Godhead of the Second 
 
40 Ariajiis/n : its Appa^'cnt Simplicity, 
 
 and Third Persons, and teaching that the Father alone 
 is, in the full sense, God. 
 
 Such a sj'stem does not profess — at any rate in 
 the first instance — to be derived from a large and 
 careful study of Scripture. It is a philosophy. It 
 comes to the Scripture already determined that there 
 is but one God, and that the unity of God is incom- 
 patible with a Trinity of Persons. It rejects the 
 Christian doctrine of the Godhead not on the plea that 
 it is unscriptural, but on the plea that it is irrational. 
 The pri7nil facie view of many isolated texts would 
 appear to favour this j)hilosophy, and ingenuity 
 can devise ways of dealing with other texts ; but 
 meanwhile the stronghold of the Arian position lies 
 in its supposed logical simplicity. While the Catholic 
 doctrine seems far-fetched and intricate, the Arian 
 doctrine seems obvious and easy. Why cannot we 
 believe, it is asked, in an Almighty Father, a personal, 
 living, loving God, without adding a belief in a co-equal 
 Son and Spirit ? 
 
 Plausible as that theory seems, it involves graver 
 difficulties than the revealed doctrine. Not only is 
 the language of Scripture about the Son and the 
 Holy Ghost unsatisfied by Arian explanations ; but, 
 on serious reflexion, the very notion of a personal 
 God who is but one person becomes, as a philosophy, 
 impossible to rest in intellectually. A man may 
 fancy that he can think of such a thing, but he cannot 
 really. It is, in fact, unthinkable. Sabellianism here 
 lays itself open to the same charge as Arianism. 
 For we are bound to think of God as containing in His 
 
Inconsistent luith God's Self-consciotLsness. 41 
 
 own Being all that is needed for His own perfection. 
 He must be self-sufficing. We cannot imagine Him 
 depending upon anything outside of Himself. Creation 
 does not supply a void in the life of God, who must 
 have been all that He now is before the world was, and 
 can undergo no change or modification, for worse or 
 for better, by reason of contact with the world. Now, 
 so far as we can understand, a solitary unit could 
 have no perceptions at all. Suj^pose a man to be 
 born entirely without communion with the world 
 around him, possessing, indeed, the faculties of sight, 
 hearing, touch, taste, smell, but in some way seques- 
 tered from all objects on which to exercise those 
 faculties, even the other parts of his own body being 
 withdrawn from his sight and feeling; suppose, 
 further, that no intellectual or spiritual touch from 
 outside were allowed to come near him, although the 
 man was naturally capable of converse with intellectual 
 and spiritual beings ; in short, suppose such a one 
 to be absolutely isolated from all other things in 
 existence ; — is it conceivable that he should attain 
 to consciousness of his own being, or, indeed, have 
 any thoughts at all? We cannot imagine such a 
 one to have even the perceptions of an animal. This, 
 on the Arian supposition, was the condition of God 
 before the worlds were made, or at least before the 
 Son was begotten. 
 
 Still more difficult it is to reconcile the Arian 
 supposition with the doctrine of the love of God. 
 God is Love. That is His essence. And love is 
 not love without exercise. Until it finds an object, 
 
42 Arianism obscures God's Love. 
 
 there is but a capacity for love, not love itself. If 
 God, therefore, had no object for His love until He had 
 formed a creation, then God has not always been love 
 — is not love by Himself in His own nature, but only 
 (so to speak) accidentally, through the circumstances 
 in which He finds Himself. And even now, if creation 
 be the sole object of God's love. He cannot find in it 
 adequate exercise for the whole of His love. For we 
 have no reason to suppose that creation is, or can be, 
 infinite. It may well be doubted whether the total 
 fulness of God's being can ever be expressed in that 
 which God makes. Therefore, although infinite love 
 is at work in every part^of creation, yet the exercise 
 of it upon creation is not infinite. There remains 
 behind an infinite reserve of love, which never can be 
 expended to the blessed satisfaction of God upon any 
 existing thing which falls short of Himself. And if 
 we say that before creation was, the infinite love of 
 God was infinitely expended upon Himself, we cannot 
 but feel that such an expression would be shocking to 
 all our best instincts, if God is a single person. A 
 monstrous selfishness is the only picture which such 
 language could suggest. It can only be morally true 
 to say that God loves Himself, if there be eternally 
 within the Divine nature a real distinction of Persons, 
 whereby one Divine Person may lavish the infinite 
 wealth of His love upon another Divine Person, who 
 is infinitely worthy of receiving it. 
 
 It may, of course, be said that we are judging from 
 what we know of limited, human, existence ; and that 
 what applies to a limited being need not perforce 
 
It makes God unlike Man. 43 
 
 apply to an infinite, a Divine being. This is quite 
 true ; but at the same time, if man is made in the 
 image of God, we have some right to form conceptions 
 about His nature from our own, within due and 
 reverent limits. And if, as a matter of fact, we are 
 wrong in this particular conception, and it should at 
 length burst upon us as true that God is a monad, 
 a unit, but aware, before all creation, of His own 
 existence, cognisant of the fulness of His powers, and 
 eternally exercising a paternal love, we can only say 
 that such a state of things would not only transcend 
 our experience and thought, but that it would contra- 
 dict it. Assuming the Arian belief to be true, nothing 
 within our reach leads us in the direction of the true 
 belief, or gives us any hint that may afterwards be 
 developed into knowledge. Quite the contrary. Hard 
 though it may be to understand the Church doctrine 
 of the Trinity, it is much harder to conceive how 
 God could be eternally Love, if He were a solitary 
 unit. 
 
 §6. 
 
 Unless, therefore, we are to take refuge in suppos- 
 ing that God is not self-sufficient, but is only, as Pan- 
 theism fancies, gradually coming to know Himself by 
 means of the world, we are drawn to believe, with the 
 Church, that God contains in His own being both 
 subject and object. We human beings find ourselves 
 set off by the world of which we form part ; but God 
 must be set off to Himself by something within His 
 own nature. He must be presented to His own 
 
44 God eternally reproduced to Himself. 
 
 contemplation. There must be some movement by 
 which eternally He is reflected to Himself. God must 
 be ever inwardly projected, reproduced ; or rather pro- 
 jecting, reproducing, Himself ; not by a succession of 
 fresh reproductions, for we have no right to say that 
 with God there is any succession, but by one act of 
 reproduction, complete and abiding, yet ever new, as 
 if the one act were always in the living process of 
 being performed. Thus there must ever confront 
 Him somewhat which is at once Himself and not 
 Himself, which He can regard as embodying His own 
 whole being, while still (in a sense) separate from, 
 and contrasted with, that which in the first instance 
 is the "I," the ''Ego," of God. 
 
 But if there is to be such a reflexion of God to 
 Himself, the reflexion must needs be personal, in the 
 same sense in which God Himself is personal. God 
 would in no true way be represented to Himself by a 
 mere picture or image in a mirror, so to speak, lifeless, 
 and without power to respond to Him. It is incon- 
 ceivable that there should be within the nature of 
 God anything which is not life ; and even if it were 
 conceivable, a lifeless image of God would return to 
 Him, not only an inadequate, but a totally false vision 
 of Himself. That which truly reproduces God must 
 be to Him, not "It," but " Thou; " and God in turn 
 must be *' Thou " to that which reproduces Him. 
 And if God is truly to know Himself, the hving Image 
 which is before Him must be in every respect worthy 
 of Him, that is, equal to Him. Any partial repre- 
 sentation of God falls infinitely short of Him ; and no 
 
Need of Bond between Subject and Object. 45 
 
 number of finite and partial representations could 
 mount up so as to supply the deficiency. No part of 
 God's perfections and possibilities can at any time be 
 absent from His consciousness ; and they cannot be 
 present to it in infinite detail without being present 
 in their complete unity. Therefore of necessity that 
 absolute reproduction by which God is set before His 
 own eyes must be God, because, otherwise, God's self- 
 knowledge would fall infinitely short of the truth. 
 Nothing but God can represent God. 
 
 Thus we seem led even by reason, apart from 
 revelation, to see the need of a duality in the Divine 
 nature. But we are unable to rest here. Although 
 the next step in thought is less easy to express in 
 words, the mind naturally demands a bond between 
 the " I " and the " Thou," by which they may know 
 themselves as "I" and "Thou." There is in the 
 Godhead the subject and the object ; but how are 
 they related to each other ? Duality gives us only 
 the notion of separation. If there were no other 
 movement in the Divine nature but that whereby 
 the first Person projects Himself into a second, the 
 two might, for all we can see, be left for ever gazing 
 upon each other, without knowing the difference 
 between themselves, without mutual sympathy, and 
 therefore without freedom of intercourse. A God whose 
 nature was but dual could hardly, to our thinking, rise 
 to as high a level of intelligence as man's. There 
 might be mutual observation and attraction ; but not 
 the consciousness either of antithesis or of union. In 
 order that God may be complete and self-sufficing, 
 
46 The Bond itself Pcrsondl and Divine. 
 
 there must be within the unity of His nature a pro- 
 cess which estabHshes mutual knowledge, and along 
 with mutual knowledge mutual love. We shall expect 
 to find the movement whereby God places Himself 
 before Himself, followed up by a movement whereby 
 He makes Himself fully known, in all His loveable- 
 ness and wisdom, to the object thus set before Him, 
 and receives back the response of that object. And 
 we may perhaps dimly apprehend how this mediation 
 between the Divine " I " and " Thou " should itself 
 be fitly the work of a Person. Were it not so, there 
 would be one view (so to speak) of God, which He 
 would not Himself be able to gain. He would not 
 have the blessedness of sceiwj Himself effect that 
 union that is within Himself. And as we saw that 
 the object in which God is reproduced to Himself 
 must be in all points equal with God, so the Person 
 who mediates between the two must be in all points 
 the equal of either, or He could not adequately 
 interpret the one to the other. It seems to put the 
 completing touch to the glory of the Divine life when 
 we see Person and Person eternally made known to 
 each other, in their difference and in their unity, by 
 a Person to whom both are absolutely known, and 
 who is absolutely one with both. 
 
 §7. 
 
 Such guesses of the natural reason prepare us to 
 receive with adoring reverence the glimpses of the 
 inner life of God accorded to us in Holy Scripture. 
 As might be expected, the Bible speaks most often 
 
Revelation of Eternal Fatherhood. 47 
 
 of the active relations of God towards creation, 
 and shows us what is called by theologians the 
 *' economic " or '' practical Trinity," that is, the three- 
 fold way in which God deals with us. But here 
 and there we are shown (as it were) an opened 
 heaven, and the Godhead is revealed in its " essential 
 Trinity." 
 
 God is seen to have been eternally and absolutely 
 *'the Father," before time began. It is not a title 
 given to Him because, as matter of history, the life 
 of us all can be traced back to Him. That name 
 belongs to Him, not because He always prospectively 
 had the capacity, the desire, the will, to become 
 Father. In the eternal days before creation He was 
 actually Father, by the true communication of all 
 His own glorious nature to One who was perfectly 
 "the Son." That Son's existence constitutes Him 
 Father ; and it was not when the Son became incar- 
 nate, nor even when the Son began to fashion the 
 world, that God acquired fatherhood by Him. ** I 
 glorified Thee upon the earth, having perfected the 
 work which Thou hast given Me that I should do." 
 So says the Incarnate Son, looking back upon His 
 earthly life ; and then He continues with a lengthen- 
 ing retrospect : " And now glorify Thou Me, 
 Father, at Thine own side, with the glory which I 
 had, before that the world was, beside Thee " (S. 
 John xvii. 4, 5). Long before the Son stooped from 
 heaven to the task of redemption, — long before the 
 immeasurable cycles began through which the Son 
 was framing the worlds, — God is shown to us as 
 
48 Revelation of the Word as Eternal. 
 
 dwelling in no solitary grandeur. One who calls 
 Him "Father" is in His company, and who proves 
 the truth of the title by sharing with Him the full 
 possession of that glory, which created things may 
 " see," but none but God can *' have." 
 
 No less clear is the witness of the solemn sen- 
 tences at the beginning of S. John's Gospel. The 
 language is different, though the Persons spoken of 
 are the same. The Son and Father, in the glory 
 of Their common nature, are now described as " the 
 Word " and '' God." " In the beginning was the 
 Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word 
 was God" (S. John i. 1). A word is a thought 
 launched forth from the thinker's mind, making clear 
 to himself and to others what he thinks. As the 
 name of " Son " brings out more prominently the 
 notion of personality and love, so that of "Word" 
 brings out the notion of ordered ideas, distinctly and 
 rationally perceived. God has not many words, but 
 one Word, who is the utterance and expression of the 
 whole mind and will of God. And that whole mind 
 and will of God was already articulate and complete 
 before any single act of creation had taken place. 
 When creation began to be, it found the Word already 
 in existence, and it owed its origin to His agency. 
 "In the beginning the Word was." But it is not 
 enough for us to know that He " was." Had the 
 Evangelist stopped here, we should have been free 
 to fancy that the Word was but some faculty or 
 element in the person of God the Father. But he 
 proceeds to teach us the mystery of a second personal 
 
Eternal Fellowship of the Word with God. 49 
 
 subsistence in active relation to the first : " And the 
 Word was with God." The preposition is not the 
 same as that employed in the last passage under 
 consideration. There the Son was shown to us in 
 simple juxtaposition with the Father. They were 
 together, in the presence of each other. Here we 
 have a further thought. Two may be together with- 
 out taking notice of each other ; but this preposition 
 shows us, if we may say so, the attitude of the second 
 Person to the first. Quite literally it is, *' And the 
 Word was towards God." His face is not outwards, 
 so to speak, as if He were merely revealing, or wait- 
 ing to reveal, God to the creation. His face is 
 inwards. His whole person is directed towards God, 
 motion corresponding to motion, thought to thought. 
 He appears to find His very being in the intensity 
 of bliss with which He receives all that passes in the 
 mind and heart of God. In Him God stands revealed 
 to Himself in all the inexhaustible possibilities of 
 His wisdom. And lest it should for a moment appear 
 as if this perfect revelation could be found in some 
 being shot forth outside the Divine life itself, of lower 
 nature than that of Him who is revealed, the Apostle 
 adds, "And the Word was God." The self-revela- 
 tion is completed within the unity of the Godhead by 
 the mutual knowledge and love of more than one 
 Person. 
 
 So again, to take one more instance, another 
 Apostle opens to us a view of the eternal place of the 
 Holy Ghost within the life of God, apart from the 
 created universe. "The Spirit searcheth all things^ 
 
50 Place of the Spirit in Eternal Godhead. 
 
 even the depths of God. For who of men knoweth 
 the things of the man save the spirit of the man 
 which is in him ? So also the things of God none 
 hath known save the Spirit of God " (1 Cor. ii. 10, 
 11). The spirit of the man is his own ultimate con- 
 sciousness, whereby he knows about himself what 
 no one else can know unless he chooses to tell it. So 
 also the Spirit of God is the ultimate consciousness 
 of God, whereby He knows Himself. That Spirit is 
 not merely an emanation from the Divine nature, 
 working upon the world, but a movement within the 
 Divine nature, returning upon itself. The separate- 
 ness of the Spirit's person is not, indeed, so clearly 
 brought out here as elsewhere ; for if this passage 
 stood alone, we might even, perhaps, have pressed 
 too far the analogy of the place of the Spirit in the 
 Divine subject and in the human. But all the more 
 unmistakeably this passage teaches that the Spirit is 
 of the very essence of the God whose Spirit He is, 
 so one with Him that God cannot be imagined with- 
 out Him. His perfect Deity is testified to by the 
 infinite reach and range of His activity. The spirit 
 of man has but a limited knowledge of the things of 
 the man, and there are mysteries in his nature and 
 character and career which he cannot now explore, 
 and perhaps never will be able. But the Spirit of 
 God finds nothing in God which bafiies His scrutiny. 
 His ''search" is not a seeking for knowledge yet 
 beyond Him; it is a penetrating, comprehensive 
 cognisance of all that is in God, even to the depths. 
 If the act of search points to a personal conscious- 
 
Manner of the Unity in Trinity. 51 
 
 iiess in the Spirit, the extent of the search involves 
 His true Godhead. Nothing but God could search 
 the depths of God. 
 
 The manner of the unity of the Three blessed 
 Persons must always be beyond the reach of our 
 intelligence, although not contradictory to our reason. 
 The only approach which we can make to a right 
 understanding of what is revealed lies in the doctrine 
 of the subordination of the Son and Spirit to the 
 Father. Even careful divines are not always free 
 from ambiguity on this point. Sometimes, from 
 their language, the learner might imagine that there 
 was something still in the background, in which 
 Father, Son, and Spirit alike have the foundation 
 of Their being. One might fancy that they spoke 
 (somewhat like the Sabellians) of one called '' God," 
 behind the Three Persons in which He is known 
 or of which He is composed; or of an abstract 
 thing called *'tlie Godhead," wholly entering into 
 all Three Persons, but in thought separable from all 
 Three. 
 
 Such a conception would be contrary to the 
 language of Scripture. In the New Testament the 
 name "God"— "God" as a Name, "God" with 
 the definite article (6 Geo^-) — is absolutely identified 
 with the Person of the Father. It is never used of 
 the Son or Spirit. It is never used of the blessed 
 Trinity in general, without person specified. While 
 "the Lord" most frequently denotes the Son, but 
 
52 The Name "God" applied to the Father only. 
 
 sometimos tlie Father (S. James iii. 9, E.V.), some- 
 times the Spirit (2 Cor. iii. 17, 18), "God" is always 
 the Father. "To us there is but one God, tho 
 Father " (1 Cor. viii. 6). Whenever the ^Yord is 
 used of the Son or of the Spirit, it is used as a pre- 
 dicate, or with some descriptive and quaUfyiug 
 addition. "My Lord and my God" (S. John xx. 
 28). "The blessed hope and appearing of the glory 
 of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ " (Titus 
 ii. 13). " The Word was with God (tt/joc tov Gfo'i^), 
 and the Word (Gcoc t» was God" (S. John i. 2). 
 The Son is God, but God is not the Son. The Spirit 
 is God, but God is not the Spirit. The Father is 
 God, and God is the Father. We can speak of God 
 and His Son ; we could never speak of God and His 
 Father. 
 
 Thus the unity of God is not so much to be looked 
 for in the community of "substance" between the 
 Three Divine Persons : unity of substance would 
 not necessarily exclude Tritheism. God's unity is 
 to be found in the relation of the Son and Spirit with 
 the Father, from whom They derive. The Father 
 — God — is the sole Fountain of all being, uncreated 
 as well as created. The well-spring of His life is 
 not in some abstract " Godhead " beyond Him ; it 
 is in Himself. The well-spring of the life of the 
 Son and Spirit is not in Themselves, but in Him. 
 There is a sense, indeed, in which They "have life 
 in Themselves ; " but They have it in Themselves 
 by " gift " from Him (S. John v. 26). Not that, like 
 creatures, they live by a gift that might have been 
 
Subordination of Son and Spirit. 53 
 
 withheld — by a fiat of His will. They are necessary 
 to the very notion of God. The Father would not be 
 Himself without Them; God would not be the God 
 He is. And yet the existence of the Father — of God, 
 that is— does not depend upon the Son and Spirit in 
 the same way as Theirs depends upon Him. " The 
 Father is made of none, neither created, nor begotten," 
 and, it might be added, "nor proceeding," On the 
 other hand, '' I live," said our Lord, not speaking of 
 His human life only — " I live because of the Father " 
 (S. John vi. 57). 
 
 So the equality of the Son and Spirit with the 
 Father is not a dead parity. "In this Trinity none 
 is afore or after other," indeed, in point of time, for 
 "the whole Three Persons are co-eternal together; " 
 there never was a moment when God was incomplete, 
 as He would have been without Son or Spirit. "None 
 is greater or less than another," in point of nature, 
 attributes, or character, for "the whole Three Persons 
 are co-equal ; " God would be still incomplete if Son 
 or Spirit were not in everything " such as the Father 
 is." And yet the ancient Greek teachers made no 
 mistake of doctrine when they interpreted the saying 
 of om- Lord, " The Father is greater than I " (S. John 
 xiv. 28), to refer to the Father and the Son in Their 
 eternal relations, not to the humiliation of the Son 
 in the days of His flesh. The very fact of the com- 
 parison being made points, as they observe, to the 
 identity of nature in the Two ; but it reveals clearly 
 the subordination of the second Person to the first. 
 He is " equal to the Father as touching His God- 
 
54 Subordination Consistent with Equality. 
 
 head," but He is "inferior to the Father," not only 
 **as touching His manhood," hut also as touching 
 His Sonshii). There is nothing in the Father which 
 He does not bestow upon the Son ; but there is 
 nothing in the Son which He does not owe to the 
 Father. He has no initiative of His own, either in 
 thought or in action ; nor has the Holy Ghost. The 
 Son's life is a life of eternal obedience, which makes 
 up its joy. The Father alone has the initiative. 
 *' The Son can do nothing of Himself, except He 
 seeth the Father doing it" (S. John v. 19). "As I 
 hear, I judge " (ver. 30). " The Spirit of truth shall 
 guide you unto all truth ; for He shall not speak from 
 Himself, but whatsoever He shall hear, that shall 
 He speak " (S. John xvi. 13). 
 
 Nor may we think that in this way the power or 
 wisdom of the Son and Spirit is limited. Not at all ; 
 these words only explain the mode and condition of 
 their limitless thought and action ; and they are fol- 
 lowed up by sayings like these : " What things soever 
 He" — the Father — " doeth, these the Son also doeth 
 in like manner ; for the Father loveth the Son, and 
 showeth Him all things that Himself doeth " (S. John 
 v. 19). And again, "All things that the Father hath 
 are Mine ; therefore said I that He " — the Spirit of 
 truth — " taketh of Mine, and shall show it unto you " 
 (S. John xvi. 15). This it is which makes, we may 
 say, the true oneness of the Eternal Trinity. God is 
 Love ; and the union of the Three is not one of barren i 
 necessity. It is a free and living union, in which all 
 are bound together by an absolute outpouring of each 
 
Moral Aspect of the Divine Unity. 55 
 
 to other in love. We may think of the joy which 
 the Father has in giving, — in communicating without 
 reserve, to the Son, " all the fulness " (Col. i. 19) of 
 His being, draining Himself, to the very last ray 
 of glory, to bestow it all on Him, and finding it all 
 the more His own because lavished freely on the Only 
 Begotten. And it is the joy of the Son to receive, — to 
 feel the infinite flow of the Father's love concentrated 
 in Himself; and, in the gratitude which must always 
 be a part of filial love, we may understand, to some 
 extent, the gladness with which He welcomes most 
 those wishes of the Father which will cost most to 
 Himself, the pure pride with which He reflects that 
 He mixes nothing of His own with what the Father 
 gives Him. The Spirit likewise has His joy in making 
 known, — in keeping the eternal love alive by that 
 incessant sounding of the deeps which makes the heart 
 of the Father known to the Son, and the heart of 
 the Son to the Father. None of the Three adorable 
 Persons has, or ever had, or ever could have, or ever 
 could wish to have, anything of His own, peculiar 
 to Himself, not common to the whole Trinity. It is 
 the glory of Them all to be One, not by a mere meta- 
 physical identity of nature, but also (if we may dare 
 to say so) by a moral living for and in each other, 
 in a mutual devotion such as serves as an example 
 for men. '' The glory which Thou hast given Me I 
 have given them ; that they may be one, even as We 
 are one." " That they all may be one, even as Thou, 
 Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may 
 be in Us " (S. John xvii. 22, 21). 
 
Chapter III, 
 CTrcatiou t^tougl) tj^c 2!£tort), 
 
 flie Christian doctrine of Creation contrasted with Pantheism — God's 
 Purpose i7i Creation — The Christian doctrine contrasted luith Deism 
 — Source of Creation in the Eternal Word — Immanence of the Word 
 as a principle of Order — Doctrine of the Angels — Science and Pcjc- 
 lation — The Mosaic account of Creation as a progi-essive Work — 
 Man the crown of Creation, 
 
 The doctrine of the Holy Trinity leads in two direc- 
 tions to a true view of Creation. In the first place, by 
 helping us to see that God is independent of all 
 external to Himself, and that He already has within 
 Himself all that He needs, for life, for consciousness, 
 for love, for bliss, it makes us perceive that Creation 
 is indeed Creation. The world had once a definite 
 beginning ; at the first beat of time it sprang into a 
 course of historical existence. And the act of Creation 
 is one of pure free-will. There was no outward com- 
 pulsion upon God to create ; no blind instinct from 
 within impelled Him to do it, without His knowing 
 why. It produced no change in His internal life. 
 Ho had ever been exactly what Ho is now and ever 
 will be, world without end. No new powers came 
 to Him through the action, nor was He feeling His 
 
No Pantheistic Confusion zvith the World. 57 
 
 way to a more vivid sense of life. The unique 
 language used by S. James, apparently, of the second 
 creation, applies also to the first, when he says, 
 " Because it liked Him ((iovXnOdg) " — or rather, "by 
 an act of liking" — "He brought us forth by a word 
 of truth " (S. James i. 18). He knew what He was 
 about, and He need never have created had He 
 not chosen to do so ; it was an exhibition of His 
 sovereign and irresponsible pleasure. And that which 
 He created forms no part of Himself. However closely 
 the Creator may connect Himself with His creature, 
 there is no passing of the one into the other. Though 
 God, the Father of all, is "through all" and "in all," 
 nevertheless He is "above all" (Eph. iv. 6). He 
 stands well off from the world, and the world from 
 Him ; and although it is His continual presence in all 
 things which sustains them in being, and without Him 
 they could not be, yet they are not mere phantom 
 existences, wonderful puppets playing in His fancy 
 and made conscious of their own and others' playing ; 
 but He has given to them a real substantive being of 
 their own, a true creaturely dignity which the Creator 
 Himself respects. Thus the doctrine of the Trinity 
 frees us from the confusions of Pantheism. 
 
 §2. 
 
 The motive of God in creation was undoubtedly 
 benevolent. As S. Athanasius says, "He grudged 
 existence to nothing." If we are the handiwork of 
 God, we are the handiwork of love. God made us 
 because He wished to do us good, and had a magnifi- 
 
58 GocTs Purpose in creating. 
 
 cent "purpose" for us in view. Knowing the wealth 
 of wisdom and beauty and love that was in Himself 
 and His Son and Holy Ghost, He could not refrain 
 from sharing the pure enjoyment of it with beings 
 other than Himself. In this sense we may even say 
 that God's nature compelled Him to create, for had He 
 not done so, a love could have been imagined more 
 perfect than was displayed. At least it was becoming 
 for a perfect love to create, and what becomes Him, 
 God does. Acute thinkers, indeed, like John Stuart 
 Mill, have doubted whether benevolence towards His 
 creatures was the sole or the main purpose in the 
 Creator's mind. Mill's reason for the doubt was the 
 incidental misery and pain in nature ; but he should 
 have seen that benevolence is very different from love. 
 Love is prepared to take deeper and sterner measures 
 than benevolence, which is, by itself, a shallow thing. 
 It may, however, be conceded that the creation of the 
 world is not due to a love which has no other object 
 besides the world. We are plainly told in one passage 
 that all things exist, not only by means of the Father, 
 but *'for His sake" (Heb. ii. 10, St' tii-). As plainly, 
 though in a somewhat different form, we are told that 
 aU things have been created by means of the Son 
 of God's love, " and with a view to Him " (Col. i. 16, 
 iiq oi/ro'i'). And again, in an ascription where it is 
 difficult to tell whether the Father or the Son is 
 meant, we read, "For out of Him, and by means 
 of Him, and with a view to Him, are all things " 
 (Eom. xi. 36, uq oiiro'v). Assuredly God created us 
 for His own glory. We are instruments for the mani- 
 
His own Glory and Love of the Creatnre. 59 
 
 festation of His character. But the two ends are one 
 and the same. If the Father created the world to 
 give it as a kingdom to the Son of His love, over 
 which the Son might reign as its Firstborn, and if the 
 Son did His part in the creation in order to reveal by 
 it the glory of His Father, the interests of the world 
 itself were in no wise neglected, nor could they be. 
 The true glory of God could never have been revealed 
 through a world for which He did not care. There 
 might have been an exhibition of skill and might, but 
 not of love, and love is the true glory of God. The 
 more God loves the world, the more deeply must 
 He reveal Himself to it ; and this, so far as we can 
 see, He could never have done in a government of 
 mere benevolence, from which all pain and suffer- 
 ing were excluded. Nor can we shut off the second 
 creation from the jQrst ; and the second creation leaves 
 no room to doubt our Maker's motive. The Father 
 and the Son glorify each other, and the Holy Spirit 
 glorifies both, by vying as it were with each other to 
 exhibit the love which each bears to the world. It was 
 an act of self-sacrifice when God vouchsafed to give 
 birth to a free universe ; and in proportion to the 
 depth of the self-sacrifice was the joy which attended 
 it. " The glory of the Lord "—that display of His 
 love for which we were created — " shall endure for 
 ever : the Lord shall rejoice in His works " (Ps. civ. 
 31). 
 
6o No Deis tic Separation 
 
 §3. 
 
 At the same time as the doctrine of the Trinity 
 frees us from Pantheism, it frees us also from the 
 difficulties of the opposite error of Deism. Deism 
 (along with modern Judaism and Islam) not only puts 
 a great chasm between the world, as at present ex- 
 isting, and its Maker, but it offers no help towards 
 understanding how the world ever came to be made 
 at all. The j)roblem, when seriously considered, is 
 by no means an easy one. All the early Gnostic 
 systems sprang out of a desire to solve it. However 
 a Supreme Being — presumed to be a unit — could 
 suddenly find himself with a material world under 
 his hand, the Gnostic thinkers could not divine ; nor 
 can any one else. The contrast, they saw, was too 
 violent. Flights of emanations and aeons were 
 imagined, each in succession coming lower, until one 
 had been produced — at a great distance from the 
 abstract and absolute God — debased enough to be 
 what was called the Demiurge, or the common World- 
 maker. Gnosticism, however, was wrong on two 
 cardinal points. It was wrong in considering the 
 world unworthy to be the work of the Most High; 
 and it did not see (any more than Arianism) that the 
 very noblest of emanations must, in fact, stand as 
 far beneath the absolute God as any weed or stone. 
 In trying to express the distance between God and 
 the world, it did, in fact, bring God hopelessly down ; 
 for the notion of any sort of demigod can only be 
 entertained by those whose thoughts of God are low. 
 
behueen God and the World. 6i 
 
 The real difference comes in between God and what 
 is not God. The things which are not God may 
 rightly be compared among themselves, and may be 
 arranged in a true hierarchy; but when compared 
 with God Himself, one thing bears the comparison no 
 better than another. Nothing created can, in reality, 
 fill the gap, and the Gnostic fabrications leave but 
 a form of Deism after all. The only doctrine which 
 affords any true help towards connecting God and the 
 world is that same Christian doctrine of the Trinity 
 which makes so sharp a difference between them. 
 
 §4. 
 
 The teaching of Holy Scripture concerning the 
 Logos, or "Word of God, has already been touched 
 upon. Whatever were the sources, Alexandrine or 
 Palestinian, to which S. John's language is histori- 
 cally to be traced, we see in the prologue to his 
 Gospel the truth which gives the starting-point for 
 creation. God is no sterile and motionless unit. He 
 has from all eternity within Himself a rich fulness of 
 life and thought, in which His whole heart finds 
 a satisfying exercise. This fulness of His life and 
 thought is in the Word, and inseparable from the 
 Word, so that, on the one hand, no thought or move- 
 ment of will can take place in God without taking 
 place through the Word, nor, on the other hand, can 
 the Word ever have been an empty, meaningless word, 
 destitute of that fulness of life and thought. God 
 cannot be conceived of as having at any time been 
 silent and mute towards Himself, holding no converse 
 
62 Ideal Pre-exist eiicc of Things in the Word, 
 
 with Himself; but this converse He does and must 
 hold by His Word, ^vhich is at once spoken and 
 speaking. The Word is spoken, inasmuch as the 
 thought is not primarily the Word's own thought, but 
 springs out of God. The Word is speaking, inasmuch 
 as the thought is appropriated by a true personal 
 energy in the Word that is spoken, and is returned in 
 its fulness to Him -who spoke it, by means of that 
 Spirit in whom God and His Word are joined. It 
 seems probable that "Word," spoken and speaking, 
 more truly represents the biblical conception of the 
 " Logos " than the more technical term " Reason." 
 " Word " is a larger conception than that of "Eeason." 
 It gives a more objective reality to the Logos, as 
 truly uttered, and standing in a certain sense outside 
 of Him who utters it. And at the same time the 
 thought of '' the Word " includes all that the narrower 
 term contains. Speech is not possible without reason. 
 The Word, therefore, is the summing up and, if the 
 metaphor may be allowed, the precipitation of all 
 the infinite multiplicity of the thoughts of God, in 
 a harmonious and logical perfection. That inex- 
 haustible wealth of ideas which God possesses does 
 not float vaguely and disconnectedly — in solution, so 
 to speak — through His mind ; but, in His Word, it is 
 formed into a true cosmos, an ordered kingdom, an 
 ever-replenished and perfectly arranged living treasure- 
 house, which the Holy Ghost eternally uses in every 
 part for the refection of the Father and the Son. 
 The act by which the Father begets the Son is the 
 act by which He gains the true grasp of His thought ; 
 
The Word the ''Beginning of the Creation^ 6x, 
 
 and, conversely, the process by which He realises the 
 total fertility of His resources, gives birth to Him who 
 is *' God Only-born " (S. John i. 18, the true reading 
 and translation). 
 
 Thus it is that the Eternal Son is *'the Beginning 
 of the creation of God " (Kev. iii. 14), not as being 
 the first thing created, but as being the deep principle 
 by which any creation becomes possible. "By Him 
 all things were made." His everlasting birth is the 
 first step towards creation. Among the glorious 
 thoughts which were included before all time in the 
 revelation of God to Himself in the Word, was the 
 thought of an universe of things. He perceived Him- 
 self able to give existence to something which should 
 be not Himself. The image of a world of various 
 beings, linked together in a wonderful order, and all 
 looking to Him as their Author, was ever present to 
 His mind. That "manifold wisdom" (Eph. iii. 10), 
 which has been historically displayed in the world 
 and the Church, was already present as an " eternal 
 purpose in Christ Jesus our Lord." In a tranquil 
 and natural manner the author of the Book of 
 Proverbs runs on describing the activities of Wisdom 
 — which is one aspect of the Word — before and in 
 creation, as if he scarcely observed the difference. 
 " The Lord possessed Me in the beginning of His way, 
 before His works of old. I was set up from everlast- 
 ing, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. 
 When there were no depths, I was brought forth; 
 when there were no fountains abounding with water. 
 Before the mountains were settled, before the hills. 
 
64 Relatio7t of ^^ Wisdom'' to Creation. 
 
 was I brought forth : while as yet He had not made 
 the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the 
 dust of the world." Thus far Wisdom is speaking of 
 Her part iu the uncreated world. Without Her the 
 " works " cannot be planned ; but in Her they clearly 
 are present as possibilities, and as intended to be 
 produced. They are already contemplated as true 
 ideas, before they become outward realities. Though 
 not j^et made, they are ready and waiting to be made. 
 But the point of transition is scarcely marked, as the 
 speaker continues, "When He prepared the heavens, 
 I was there : when He set a compass upon the face of 
 the depth : when He established the clouds above : 
 when He strengthened the fountains of the deep : 
 when He gave to the sea his decree, that the waters 
 should not pass His commandment : when He 
 appointed the foundations of the earth : then I was by 
 Him, as one brought up with Him : and I was daily 
 His delight, rejoicing always before Him, rejoicing 
 in the habitable part of His earth ; and My delights 
 were with the sons of men " (Prov. viii. 22 — 31.) 
 
 The thoughts of God, as they confront Him in the 
 Eternal Word, are not mere imaginations ; they have 
 a true, though not yet a separate, existence. And so 
 the view which is implicitly contained in Solomon's 
 praise of Wisdom is twice set before us in so many 
 words in the New Testament, though hidden from 
 the ordinary English reader behind inferior readings 
 ftnd punctuations. There can be little doubt that we 
 ought, in S. John's prologue, to read, " That which 
 hath been made was life iu Him" (S. John i. 3, 4). 
 
Creation not making ont of Nothing. 65 
 
 There was no sudden and violent apparition of 
 a world unthought of before and unprepared for. 
 Before it came into a separate existence of its own, 
 that world, which we now observe as having begun 
 to be, was already to be found, completely thought 
 out, in the fulness of the life of the Word. To God 
 it already was. It was not strictly made of nothing. 
 It did not come out of a dead nonentity, for already it 
 " was life in the Word." 
 
 In the Apocalypse the same thought is once more 
 expressed. When the elders shall at last witness 
 the completed adoration of the four living things 
 which symbolize the animated creation, they will, it 
 says, fall down before God, saying, ''Worthy art 
 Thou, our Lord and our God, to receive the glory 
 and the honour and the power : for Thou didst create 
 all things, and because of Thy will they were, and 
 were created" (Eev. iv. 11). Origen was, indeed, 
 wrong when he spoke of creation as an eternal fact, 
 like the generation of the Son, but only because he 
 confounded the two modes of existence together, and 
 so lost the true beginning of the world. *' All things 
 were " because they were present to the mind of God 
 in His Word. It was not by any necessity that they 
 were there, but "because of His will." The thought 
 of God is free. But God was not content to have 
 them exist solely to His own consciousness. In His 
 love and condescension He gave them being, and, 
 when it pleased Him, "they were created." At a 
 word they sprang from the womb of His thought into 
 an actual life of their own. 
 
66 Inwiancncc of tJic Word in all Things. 
 
 As before time the ideas of tilings contained in 
 the Word were ranged in due order, so it Avas also 
 in the actual production of the things. They did not 
 issue forth, all ready-made at once, and at haphazard; 
 nor were the materials thrown out to fashion them- 
 selves for themselves as best they might. The Word, 
 in whom they had been life before, was still present 
 as their guiding principle. Not only were " all things 
 made through Him," but "apart from Him was nothing 
 made, no not one " (S. John i. 3). His immanence, 
 that is, was felt, pervading all, sustaining all, or 
 *' bearing the universe along by the utterance of His 
 power" (Heb. i. 3), and giving unity and system to 
 all; for "in Him the universe consists," or "holds 
 together" (Col. i. 17). The invariable sequences of 
 nature, the regularity and method of all her pro- 
 cesses, the uniformity with which she works, the 
 adaptation of things to their environment, the laws 
 of gravitation, the laws of number and geometry, 
 and all the mysteries which science developes and 
 explores, above all, the progress and rise which have 
 been observed both in the world and in man — inex- 
 plicable if there were no Divine power behind them — are 
 expressions of the presence of that Word, or Wisdom, 
 which "reacheth from one end to another," both in 
 time and space, " mightily and sweetly ordering all 
 things " (Wisd. viii. 1), and making all nature to 
 be a visible word of God — a true, though partial, 
 revelation of His mind. 
 
Angels the First Created Beings. 67 
 
 §6. 
 
 Holy Scripture ■s\'OiilcT lead us to suppose that 
 the material heavens and earth ^Yere not the first 
 product of the creative energy of the Word. A 
 chorus of angelic beings witnesses and salutes the 
 first appearance of the newly founded world. 
 "Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of 
 the earth? Who hath laid the measures thereof, 
 or who hath stretched the line upon it ? Who 
 laid the corner-stone thereof, when the morning 
 stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted 
 for joy?" (Job xxxviii. 4 — 7). It is precarious, of 
 course, to press the language of such a poetical 
 apostrophe for purposes of doctrine ; but what we 
 learn elsewhere of the relation of angels to the world 
 makes it seem natural that the purely spiritual 
 creatures should be the first to come into being. 
 For they are not the outcome of the different parts 
 of the universe which they represent and influence 
 — generated by the growth and development of the 
 things. Eather, we may consider them as a kind 
 of spiritual substratum, in which the material things 
 are planted. They form a preparatory creation, to 
 receive what is to follow. It is, perhaps, for this 
 reason that, in the vision of Jacob, and our Lord's 
 interpretation of it, the angels are seen ascending 
 first, and descending after : their natural place is 
 in the world below (S. John i. 51). 
 
 What their numbers may be we can only guess ; 
 but there seems nothing unreasonable in the 
 
68 Relation of Angels to Nature. 
 
 suggestion that everything has its spiritual counter- 
 part, so to speak, and that, as Origen felt, not a 
 plant of grass or a fly is without its " angel." We 
 find operations of nature of greater and of less 
 magnitude committed to these spiritual agents. We 
 read of an angel "that hath power over fire" (Eev. 
 xiv. 18), and of angels "holding the four winds of 
 the earth" (Eev. vii. 1). The figui-ative language of 
 the Apocalypse reproduces that of earlier hooks 
 of the Bible. "He maketh winds His angels, a flash 
 of lire His ministers" (Ps. civ. 4). "He rode upon 
 a cherub, and did fly : He came flying upon the 
 wings of the wind" (Ps. xviii. 10). It is but a gloss, 
 but we may believe it to be a true gloss, when the 
 action of an intermittent and healing spring is 
 attributed to an angel (S. John v. 4). An angel's 
 descent caused the earthquake on the morning of 
 our Lord's resurrection. The control of diseases, 
 especially of an epidemic sort, is distinctly assigned 
 to angels. An angel smites Herod with his horrible 
 malady; angels annihilate the hosts of Sennacherib, 
 and are seen with outstretched hand over the plague- 
 threatened city of Jerusalem. They seem, with their 
 native regularity, well fitted to preside over the un- 
 deviating course of nature, and are inseparably linked 
 to it. Hence, in the mystic throne upon which the 
 Almighty moves in Ezekiel's vision, symbolical of 
 the universe, the winged living creatures are vitally 
 connected with a complicated set of wheels, them- 
 selves full of eyes, and penetrated by "the si)irit of 
 the living creature" (Ezek. i. 20). Later speculations 
 
Appointed Guardians to Man. 69 
 
 have not hesitated to find_ an angel of the sun, and 
 angels of the planets ; nor is there anything im- 
 probable in the thought that such living agencies 
 regulate the movements of the heavenly bodies, and 
 that they may even have taken an active part in 
 developing both them and the things of earth out of 
 the primordial chaos. Definite knowledge upon this 
 point has not, however, been given to us. 
 
 But it is in connexion with man that their true 
 significance comes out. All nature exists for man ; 
 and the spirits, greater and less, which are so bound 
 up with nature, find their true vocation in ministering 
 to man. It seems probable that each man has his 
 special attendant spirit, representing him before God, 
 and in some ways acting on his behalf among men, so 
 that it is difficult sometimes to distinguish between 
 the man's own self-conscious "spirit" or "ghost," and 
 his " angel." " Take heed that ye despise not one 
 of these little ones; for I tell you that their angels 
 in heaven unceasingly look upon the face of My 
 Father which is in heaven " (S. Matt, xviii. 10). 
 " She ran in and announced that Peter stood before 
 the door ; . . . but they said. It is his angel " (Acts xii. 
 15)- However this may be — whether one particular 
 guardian is for life attached to every man, or many 
 guardians at once, or different guardians in succession 
 and in bands, any of which would fit the language of 
 the Bible — it is indubitable that men who are en- 
 deavouring to rise to the God-given dignity of human 
 nature are special objects of the uninterrupted care 
 of angels. "Are they not all ministerial spirits. 
 
70 llicir Miiiisiralions to Man. 
 
 perpetually sent forth on service for the sake of those 
 who are to inherit salvation ? " (Heb. i. 14). If 
 the word rendered ** ministerial " (X£tT0U|07tica) makes 
 us think of their disciplined and regular movements, 
 as of some great temple-ritual in which they bear 
 their several parts, the word for *' service" {uq ^uiko- 
 vlav) brings out their busy and lowly attendance upon 
 the needs of men. They supply, whether unseen or 
 on occasion seen, their bodily wants. They shield 
 them from accident (Ps. xci. 11, 12). They protect 
 them from jSre and from wild beasts (Dan. iii. 28 ; 
 vi. 22). They can bring them food (1 Kings xix. 6), 
 or turn the darkness into light, or open the iron gates 
 of a prison for them (Acts xii. 7, 10). By what 
 means the spiritual can work such effects upon the 
 material we cannot tell, not even knowing by what 
 means our own spirits work upon our fleshly frames ; 
 but if it be true, as already suggested, that the 
 ordinary operations of nature are under their super- 
 vision, w^e need not be astonished at these special 
 acts of power over physical objects. Still, it is, 
 perhaps, easier to understand how they can be the 
 bearers of spiritual messages from God to men — of 
 promise (Gen. xxii. 15; S. Luke ii. 10), of rebuke 
 (Judg. ii. 1), of warning (S. Matt. ii. 13), of enhghten- 
 mcnt (Dan. viii. IG), of comfort (Dan. x. 18); and how 
 they can join in our public worship with satisfaction 
 or the contrary (1 Cor. xi. 10), and can carry the 
 aspirations and prayers of men up to God (Rev. viii. 3). 
 The angels are pure spirits, without form, though 
 various symbolical shapes express them when they are 
 
Their Spiritual Nahire. 7 1 
 
 manifested to the senses : they appear sometimes as 
 young men ; sometimes as horses of fire and chariots 
 of fire (Zech. i. 8 ; 2 Kings yi. 17) ; sometimes, it 
 may be, as birds (1 Kings xvii. 6). So far as we are 
 aware, they have no manner of propagation. For this 
 reason it is, i3robably, that they are called *' sons of 
 •God," as owing their existence to Him alone, without 
 the instrumentality of parentage (S. Luke xx. 36). 
 They are not bound together by a unity of substance 
 such as binds together men, or any other race of 
 animals, but stand or fall purely as individuals. 
 They cannot, strictly speaking, be divided into species 
 or kinds. Perhaps, therefore, no distinction other 
 than one of function is contained in the names of 
 Cherubim and Seraphim — the "Forms," which appear 
 to be the most closely allied to the physical creation 
 — and the "Burning ones," whose life appears to 
 be entirely occupied with adoring contemplation, 
 forming, as it were, a body-guard round the imme- 
 diate Presence, to burn up any evil thing which might 
 approach (Isa. vi. 2). 
 
 The pure spirituality of the angels, by virtue of 
 which they are able to hear and contemplate God, 
 through the Eternal Word, immediately, gives them 
 great power and great dignity (Ps. ciii. 20 ; 2 S. Pet. ii. 
 11). Their terrible and imperious strength is the first 
 thing observable in their apparitions. The prophet 
 by the river Hiddekel (Dan. x. 8), and the Roman 
 soldiers at the sepulchre of our Lord, alike swooned 
 at the sight of an angel ; S. John, in the Apocalypse, 
 fell worshipping at the angel's feet. The spiritual 
 
72 Their Power. 
 
 might and burning indignation in the face of S. 
 Stephen reminded the guilty Sanhedrin of an angelic 
 vision. Even in their tenderest ministrations, their 
 strength comes prominently into view. Daniel con- 
 fesses that the angel's touch has strengthened him 
 (Dan. X. 19) ; and when our Blessed Lord was seen 
 to ''reel amid that solitary fight" in the garden, the 
 angel which appeared to Him did not merely soothe 
 or encourage Him, but — the word is a remarkable 
 word (a't(Tx<JWj^) — communicated to Him some inward 
 supporting force. In comparison with the angels, 
 man, in his present state, seems but a feeble creature. 
 He is subject for the time being to their control, and 
 they rule over him. Even the Incarnate Word Him- 
 self, during His earthly sojourn, was "made lower 
 a short space than the angels " (Heb. ii. 7), who 
 governed, in some sense, while they waited upon Him, 
 as they do with other men. In all their communica- 
 tions with men they show that they mean to be 
 believed and obeyed. " I am Gabriel, that standeth by 
 in the presence of God ; . . . and lo, thou shalt be mute, 
 and not able to speak, imtil the day that these things 
 shall come to pass, because thou believest not my 
 words " (S. Luke i. 19, 20). They are not to be trifled 
 with, any more than physical nature itself, and 
 cannot leave the authoritative station in whiclv the 
 Eternal Word has ranged them. 
 
 The angels are not a mere multitude of isolated 
 spirits. They are camps, hosts, armies — Mahanaim, 
 Sabaoth (Gen. xxxii. 2; Ps. xxiv. 10). There are 
 Archangels as well as angels. S. Paul and S. Peter 
 
Their Order. ^'^^ 
 
 half adopt a still larger nomenclature of angelic ranks, 
 though it is plain that they only borrow the nomencla- 
 ture from teachers whose teaching they are in part 
 combating. "Principalities and Authorities" is a 
 frequent phrase with them; and at other times S. 
 Paul adds the titles of Thrones and Dominions and 
 Powers (Eph. i. 21 ; Col. i. 16). The extent of their 
 sway it is impossible to guess ; but they appear in 
 some way to have not only individual persons, but 
 large bodies of men and whole nations, subject to 
 them. There are ** Princes " of Persia and Grecia, as 
 well as of the Chosen People (Dan. x. 20, 21) ; and in 
 something of the same way, it may be, the seven 
 Churches of Asia are represented as under the 
 management of seven ''angels," whose character is 
 mysteriously one with that of the Churches under 
 them. Their power over men is not such as to 
 destroy human free will and responsibility ; j'et it 
 forms one of the many conditions under which our 
 freedom acts. Those great moulding influences of 
 which we speak under such terms as the " spirit of 
 the age " or " national character " may well be due 
 to the unseen " Principalities " under whom we live. : 
 Some Christian thinkers go so far as actually to 
 identify these influences with the angelic agencies, at 
 the cost, as it would seem, of the personal conscious- 
 ness and will of the angels. Our acquaintance with 
 the nature of pure spirits is so slight that we may 
 hardly deny the theory ; but the personal names given 
 to some of the blessed angels appear to teach that 
 some, at any rate, are more than vague and semi- 
 
74 Their Personality. 
 
 conscious influences. Besides the apocryphal Raphael, 
 who guides Tobias, and Uriel, who communes with 
 Esdras, there is Gabriel, who visits Daniel and 
 Zacharias, and heralds the Incarnation to the 
 blessed Virgin. At the head of the whole spiritual 
 hierarchy stands a great being to whom, in a special 
 way, the championship of the Chosen People and its 
 leaders was committed. His name — Michael, '* Who 
 is like God ? " — proclaims the unimaginable distance 
 between the mightiest of created essences and the 
 Creator. Though these mighty spirits are true " kings 
 (f3dcrtXfi;oi/r£c) " and "lords {KvpitvovTiq) " (1 Tim. vi. 
 15), yet high above them is that Fu-stborn of all 
 creation in whom they were created (Col. i. 16) — 
 whom S. John saw riding forth to battle with His 
 name on thigh and garment, *' King of kings, and 
 Lord of lords," while a higher title declares Him to 
 be the "Word of God," in whom is made the com- 
 plete revelation of God to His creatures, and a thii-d 
 name, still more august, is there, exj^ressing, not His 
 office or His work, but His true personal glory — "a 
 name which no man knoweth, but He Himself" 
 (Rev. xix. 16, 13, 1-2). 
 
 §7. 
 
 To gain a knowledge of the history of the material 
 "heavens and earth," theology must sit at the feet of 
 science. We have to look to man's investigation 
 rather than to God's revelation. Or rather, we look 
 for God's revelation to come to us in a different form. 
 For if the reasoning faculty in man is (as the Fathers 
 
Dogma and Science. 75 
 
 teach) a particle of the Divine Word, and if the order 
 in nature is also due to the immanent energy of the 
 Divine Word, then whatever human reason truly 
 recognises in the order of the world about us is a 
 true revelation from God. We must not, indeed, too 
 severely blame the timidity of those believers who 
 resist as long as they can a new light of science 
 because it seems at variance with revealed dogma. 
 It is not only natural, but right, that men should 
 refuse to accept new and momentous theories until 
 they have been well tested, and that the apparent 
 sense of Scripture should not be discarded as if it 
 were of no importance. But all that a true believer 
 will require is that the theories of science should be 
 scientifically made good ; and when once this is done, 
 he will accept them with gratitude. He knows that 
 Truth cannot be divided against Itself, that is, Christ 
 against Christ (S. John xiv. 6). The new light may 
 alter his interpretation of a text of Scripture, or of 
 a book of it; it may require a readjustment of his 
 conception of Inspiration as a whole ; it may modify 
 his view of some important doctrine. But he will be 
 certain that nothing can be lost by progress in true 
 knowledge, and that the view so modified of Christ, of 
 the world, of the Bible, of Providence, of man, will 
 result in a richer and more living doctrine, and lead 
 to a more profound adoration of a God whose won- 
 drous works declare His Name to be nearer than we 
 thoujTfht. 
 
76 TJic Mosaic Account of Creation. 
 
 §8. 
 
 This is not the place in which to attempt an ex- 
 haustive reconciliation between the first chapter of 
 Genesis and the discoveries of modern science. The 
 design of the first chapter of Genesis (it has often 
 been pointed out) is not to teach us scientific facts, 
 but the way in w^hich scientific facts, are religiously to 
 be regarded. A series of visions passes before the 
 recipient of the revelation, like the visions of Isaiah 
 and Ezekiel, for him to interpret as he may. Selected 
 facts in the history of nature are depicted to him, so 
 grouped and in such an order as to convey to a 
 spiritual intelligence all that is necessary to be known 
 of the history of the relation of the world to its 
 Creator. That any part of the account in Genesis is 
 scientifically untrue does not appear to be proven; 
 but even if it were, the object of an artist is not 
 always to copy line for line what he sees before him. 
 It produces the required effect more livingly, nature is 
 more truthfully portrayed, by following a different 
 method. So it may be with the first chapter of 
 Genesis. The main thing is to produce a true effect 
 by bringing out certain great truths. 
 
 It is there seen, in the first instance, that matter 
 is not eternal, but that it had an historical beginning, 
 and that the sole cause of its beginning was the will 
 of God. Next, we are made to observe that things 
 were not in the beginning such as we see them now\ 
 They have only attained to their present condition 
 through a series of acts of Divine power. At first 
 
Religious rather than Scientific. 77 
 
 there is but a seething chaos of forces and atoms, 
 ** without form and void." This chaos comes step 
 by step to be an organic and harmonious world ; but 
 the transformation is not due to accidental causes, 
 nor to some natural property inherent in the material 
 particles themselves apart from God. It is traced to 
 the action of the Creator Spirit. Even if we were 
 to translate, "And a wind of God," — instead of ''the 
 Spirit of God," — '' was hovering upon the face of 
 the waters," yet that phrase would not be explained 
 by saying that it was an Orientalism for '' a mighty 
 wind." It would testify that our God was not the 
 God of the Deist, making the world and leaving 
 it to itself ; and the Christian would still see, under 
 the figurative description of the rushing mighty wind, 
 the action of the Divine Spirit imparting life and 
 order and beauty. And each new movement of 
 the creation upwards to a more perfect system and 
 a richer differentiation is (in the same way) ascribed 
 to a voice of God, a free utterance of the Divine 
 Word. The " days " which mark the stages of 
 development are probably to be taken in their literal 
 sense, not, indeed, as indicating the length of time 
 which the development historically took, but as the 
 symbolical framing of the successive visions to the 
 Seer's eye. Three times over, and only three times, 
 a truly creative act is discerned : first, in the pro- 
 duction of the primeval atoms out of which the uni- 
 verse is constructed; second, in the introduction of 
 sentient animal life, all else, apparently, even to the 
 growth of organic vegetable life, being treated as only 
 
yS Nahtrc C7ihninates in Man. 
 
 an arrangement of what already exists; and lastly, 
 in the movement by which man is created in the 
 image of God (Gen. i. 1, 21, 27). Thus, while Moses 
 docs not enter upon a detailed and scientific account, 
 he at least prepares the believer to hear of an evolu- 
 tion in some form; and to hear that that evolution 
 all tends, with a Divine unity of purpose, to the 
 genesis of man. All the efforts of nature are bent 
 upon producing a man. When man at last stands 
 upon the earth, the natural development is finished. 
 Then comes the "■ seventh day," expressive of rest in 
 an accomplished work, ushering in a new and higher 
 kind of progress. 
 
 §0. 
 
 The infinite development of which man is capable 
 makes him the lord and heir of all things, under God. 
 His intelligence enables him even now to rule himself, 
 and to control the animal and the material world. 
 ** The earth hath God given to the children of men " 
 (Ps. cxv. 16). Man is to subdue it (Gen. i. 28) ; and, 
 sometimes by slow steps and sometimes (as of late 
 years) by great strides, science advances towards the 
 fulfilment of the task, although an immensity yet 
 remains to be fulfilled. It is man's kingdom, to be 
 brought under a reign of holy law. But his powers 
 are as yet only in their nonage, nor can he 3'et work 
 the wonders upon creation which he is destined to 
 work when the great regeneration takes place. The 
 very angels who now govern the universe are only 
 temporary regents on his behalf — "tutors and 
 
His Destined Stiperio7'ity to Angels. 79 
 
 stewards " (Gal. iv. 2), under whom lie and his pos- 
 sessions are, by the Father's will, until the appointed 
 day. They have not man's interminable spring of 
 progress in themselves ; and therefore, mighty as 
 they are, it is not to them that God has " subjected 
 the world to come," but to that being whom, even now 
 in his weakness, God deigns to visit so graciously and 
 so richly (Heb. ii, 5, 6). To the great Head of 
 humanity all principalities and powers are already 
 subject, and hereafter they will be so to all the true 
 members. We shall judge angels (1 Cor. vi. 2, 3), as 
 well as the world, not in the sense of acquitting or 
 condemning merely, but in the larger sense of govern- 
 ing and presiding over them. 
 
Chapter IV. 
 iWan anD f)i0 Ml 
 
 Jlftitt, the created Image of God — His Body and its earthly Origin — His 
 Spirit — His Soul — Liability to Temptation — The Knoidedge of 
 Good and Evil— The Devil, and the Fall of Man — Unity of the 
 Human Race — Traducianism and Creatianism — Hereditary Sin— 
 Enslavement of the IVill — Mankind still capable of Restoration, 
 
 §1. 
 
 Looking upon man as we now see him, we are con- 
 scious of looking upon a wreck, but a wreck which 
 still retains enough of the original constitution to 
 enable us to conjecture what he is intended for. Man 
 is intended to be, in the world, what the Eternal Son 
 is above the world. He is the created image of God, 
 as the "Word is the uncreated. Other creatures reflect 
 fragments of the mind of God, but in man God is 
 reflected whole. A rock, a tree, an animal, have no 
 meaning by themselves; they only gain a meaning 
 through their connexion with other things, and 
 especially with man. But man, though essentially 
 bound up with the world, has a meaning by himself. 
 He is a complete world in himself. We cannot say 
 what special faculties or special grouping of faculties 
 in man constitutes the image of God in him ; for man, 
 
Mosaic Account of his Oi^ighi. 8 1 
 
 with all bis complexity, is a single and undivided 
 whole. There is something in him corresponding 
 to everything that is in God. The uncreated Image 
 of God contains explicitly, in one comprehensive con- 
 sciousness, every motion of the Divine life; the 
 created image contains the same implicitly, in a con- 
 sciousness destined to expand for ever, drawing for 
 ever nearer to the Divine fulness, while for ever 
 finding an unexhausted ocean heyond him (Eph. iii. 
 19, reading TrXnpojOijn). 
 
 §2. 
 
 Man is at once a summing-up of that which was 
 before him, and a point of new departure. The say- 
 ing, "Let Us make man in Our image" (Gen. i. 26), 
 is in no way opposed to the modern theory of our 
 development (so far as the animal nature is concerned) 
 out of lower forms of life. Indeed, it would be per- 
 fectly grammatical to translate, "Let Us make man 
 into Our image " — at once suggesting that a higher 
 potency was conferred on an already existing thing. 
 This, however, is unnecessary. Man became man, 
 whatever he may have been before, by being made 
 in the image of God. That gift constituted his 
 humanity. Out of what material he was thus made 
 is not mentioned in the verse which we have quoted. 
 In another verse, which by some is supposed to con- 
 tain a different tradition, and has hastily been judged 
 incompatible with the first, we read, " The Lord God 
 formed man, of the dust of the ground, and breathed 
 into his nostrils the breath of life " (Gen. ii. 7). 
 
 G 
 
Si Ulans Body formed of the Dust. 
 
 Without disloyalty to these words, we may, in the 
 light of modern discoveries, helieve that the dust was 
 already animated dust before the breathing spoken of, 
 and ages may have elapsed between the "forming" 
 and the "breathing." For the object of the sacred 
 writer is to teach the lowly origin of man's physical 
 constitution — that on one side he is composed of 
 mere material particles, "of the earth, earthy;" 
 and this is equally shown, whether we believe the 
 first man's body to have been fresh formed out of 
 its chemical elements, or produced out of earlier 
 living organisms. But We may see a special fitness 
 in the latter thought if man is indeed to be the 
 meeting-point of heaven and earth. Each human 
 being now, they tell us, in the rudimentary stages 
 of his growth, passes through phases similar to 
 those of the lower animals. In a sense, each of us 
 gathers up and recapitulates in his own body the 
 forms of life below him. And that which thus takes 
 place in the specimen may well be true of the genus. 
 We welcome the continuity of physical life which binds 
 us to all that went before us and to all that on earth 
 surrounds us. The body which is the result of that 
 long evolution is one of which we have no need to be 
 ashamed. It is itself a noble thing. It is not yet 
 all that it will be, but even now it has something 
 of the glory of the Image of God, being the true 
 expression in flesh of that which man at present 
 really is. 
 
The Hitman Spirit. 83 
 
 §3. 
 
 Upon the bodily side man stands among the 
 animals as the noblest of them ; but he has another 
 side by which he holds communion with God and 
 invisible things. He has a spirit as well as a body — 
 a spirit not like that " spu'it of the beast which goeth 
 downward to the earth," having but an attraction to 
 the things of sense, and that an unreflecting attrac- 
 tion ; *' the spirit of the sons of man " is one ** which 
 is ascending" (Eccles. iii. 21). The spirit is in us 
 the element of self-consciousness and freedom. By it 
 we see our true relation to the things of sense, and are 
 able to claim affinities above them. It is a gift from 
 God (Eccles. xii. 7), and unless it be unfairly tampered 
 with, it must by its very constitution *' ascend," and 
 aspire after God and what is Godlike. In it is the 
 seat of the higher, the only true, free, will, as opposed 
 to the random animal impulses of the flesh. There 
 lies the power of conscience, by which we are able to 
 judge our own actions, comparing them with what we 
 see to be the right standard, and condemning our- 
 selves when we have allowed the true will to be 
 mastered by the inferior appetite. Such a spirit is 
 not and cannot be (so far as we can understand) a 
 product of natural evolution, but comes direct from 
 the hand of God. 
 
 §4. 
 
 Man is thus a dual being, living at once in two 
 worlds, not two separate lives, but one life in the two. 
 
84 Diffcycnce of Soul and Spirit. 
 
 The spirit lives in the body, and acts through it 
 and makes it its vehicle. The meeting-point of spirit 
 and body appears to lie in the soul. " The Lord 
 God formed man out of the dust of the ground" — 
 there is his body — " and breathed into his nostrils the 
 breath of life " — there is his spirit — "and man became 
 a living soul." Particular expressions like "living 
 soul" and "breath of life" might be used of other 
 beings than man ; but the unique act of the Divine 
 insufiflation gives in this instance a different value to 
 the words. The same tripartite division of man's 
 being is distinctly brought out by S. Paul. " May the 
 very God of peace sanctify you entire, and may your 
 spirit and soul and body be preserved unimpaired, 
 unblameably, in the coming of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ " (1 Thess. v. 23). Once more, the difference 
 between soul and spirit is sharply marked in the 
 Epistle to the Hebrews. " The word of God is alive 
 and energetic, piercing even to the dividing of soul 
 and spirit, of joints and marrow^" (Heb. iv. 12). 
 And a whole array of thoughts gather about the 
 adjectives derived from the two words respective!}'. 
 "Spiritual" things (TrvEu/xfmico) stand in the sharpest 
 contrast with " soul " things {^\)\i.Ka), which latter are 
 represented in our versions by the word " natural " 
 (1 Cor. ii. 14 ; xv. 44), and even " sensual " (S. James 
 iii. 15 ; S. Jude 19), whUe the'margin of the Eevised 
 Version suggests the ambiguous rendering " animal." 
 Holy Scripture, therefore, although frequently using 
 the word " soul " in a popular sense, either for the 
 whole immaterial part of man. or for the man himself 
 
Saving and Losing of the SottL 85 
 
 in the fulness of his individuality, seems, when it speaks 
 with psychological precision, to join the soul more 
 closely with the body than with the spirit. Though 
 capable of exaltation, the soul more naturally gravitates 
 downwards. In this animal, or sensual, or natural, 
 region lies the great struggle of life. The soul is torn 
 by the conflict between flesh and spirit, with both of 
 which it is so vitally one. It is their debateable ground, 
 and the winning of it is the winning of the man him- 
 self. His very life is at stake. The one great business 
 is the "acquisition of the soul" (Heb. x. 39). The ''loss 
 of the soul " (S. Mark viii. 36) is the great irreparable 
 loss. That loss is (so far as this life is concerned) 
 consistent with very great and valuable acquisi- 
 tions. The man may not merely have enjoyed 
 sensual pleasures, and the possession of wealth and 
 influence and power, but he may have attained to 
 great intellectual culture, a high degree of learning 
 and scientific knowledge and artistic skill. Yet 
 these things belong, after all, to the lower faculties 
 — the faculties of the ''natural," or "sensual," or 
 "animal," man; and unless they have been put at 
 the disposal of the spiritual faculties, to be brought 
 to the service of God, the soul is lost. 
 
 §5. 
 
 It is this duality which lays man open to tempta- 
 tion. Though the Creator, looking down upon His 
 newly formed image in Eden, pronounces him — or 
 rather, the world and man in it — "very good," the 
 goodness was not a final and completed goodness. 
 
86 Mans Original Righteousness 
 
 The " original righteousness " in which we were made 
 was the goodness of a perfectly fair and noble begin- 
 ning. It was the goodness of holy infancy as com- 
 pared with that of the fully developed saint. It 
 consisted in a perfectly well-ordered constitution, 
 which only needed to be normally exercised that it 
 might reach a true moral as well as natm*al per- 
 fection. But in order that the promise of that first fair 
 start might be realised, it was necessary, so far as we 
 can see, that it should be brought to the test. Good 
 dispositions do not ripen into virtues except by seeing 
 and rejecting their opposites. Though made " in the 
 image of God," it is significantly said that man was 
 made ''after His likeness." He was not as yet 
 actually Hke in character to God, but had the power 
 and tendency to rise into that likeness and to make 
 it voluntarily his own by the proper and harmonious 
 use of his varied faculties. Man had himself to 
 train ; and he had, besides, a duty towards the world, 
 over which he was to rule, as God's representative. 
 To rule over the world in any full sense, he needed a 
 sympathetic appreciation of all that it contained ; 
 and to have a sympathetic appreciation of all that 
 the world contained at once involved a possible 
 seduction. One of the great paradoxes of life is this 
 —that the true value of the flesh and fleshly things 
 is only known to those who, by cultivation of their 
 spiritual nature, are able to maintain their indepen- 
 dence of the flesh and their attitude of sovereignty 
 towards it ; while, on the other hand, that is no true 
 spiritual sovereignty or independence which looks 
 
to be made his own by Temptation. %"] 
 
 upon the flesh and fleshly things with indifference, 
 or with abhorrence, or with contempt, or with dread. 
 If, therefore, man was to bear the character for 
 which he was destined, and if he was to perform tho 
 office for which he was placed in the world, he could 
 not but be tempted to fling himself with too much 
 ardour into the good things of the realm that was put 
 under him, and to make it his own instead of making 
 it God's. But the very attempt to make it his own, 
 irrespective of God, tears it away from himself and 
 God alike. The true link between God and the world 
 is severed, and, instead of " subduing " the world, man 
 is himself "subdued" by it. No longer standing 
 above it, in the stability of the " free spirit," he 
 becomes engrossed in it, a mere part of it, without 
 true freedom of will, which can only be obtained from 
 communion with God. By selfish grasping at the 
 mastery of things, he makes himself the sport of his 
 surroundings; and these surroundings have them- 
 selves become disordered by man's desertion of his 
 post, and tend to become more and more disordered, 
 and to exhibit an ever-sharper antagonism towards 
 the Creator's will. Man himself falls into bondage, 
 and "the creature itself also," according to S. Paul, 
 though " not willingly," shares his bondage, and 
 groans for deliverance through and with him (Rom, 
 viii. 19, foil.). 
 
 §6. 
 
 The whole account of the Fall of man, in Genesis, 
 is full of difficulties. It contains, doubtless, a record 
 
88 The Knoiulcdo-e of Good and Evil, 
 
 of true historic facts, tlioiigli the facts are presented 
 to us partly unclor an allegorical shape. Under any 
 other shape we could not have received or under- 
 stood them. 
 
 Our first parents, in a state of innocence, are set 
 before us as dwelling in a " Garden of Delight," 
 having all that vras necessary for their happy develop- 
 ment. Two mystic Trees stand in the garden, of 
 which the first, the Tree of Life, no doubt represents 
 the life of union with God. Of this they were per- 
 mitted to eat, as of the other trees of the garden. 
 The second, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, 
 was submitted to their contemplation, and the Creator 
 Himself forces their attention to it, in the form of a 
 commandment not to eat of it, combined with a warn- 
 ing of the consequences of so doing. By this tree, 
 and the prohibition attached to it, we are to under- 
 stand that God wished man to know evil indeed, but to 
 know it as He Himself knows it — as a thing possible, 
 but hateful. The thought of evil must, it is admitted, 
 eternally be present to the mind of God, but present 
 as the opposite of all that God is or can be ; and if 
 man was to rise into the likeness of his Creator, he 
 too must know evil, but as a thing external to himself 
 and for ever to be detested. To eat of that Tree of 
 Knowledge of Good and Evil — that is, probably, of 
 the difference between good and evil, or, possiblj', 
 of the mixture of evil with good — is to become 
 acquainted with the difference, not by contemplation, 
 but by experience, to know what evil is by choosing 
 to do, and suffer, and be, evil. 
 
Form assumed by Human Temptation. 89 
 
 It may at first surprise us that the fatal tree did 
 not appear outwardly repulsive, and thereby of itself 
 guard man against a fall. But such a thought ignores 
 the very nature of temptation. Temptation does not 
 and cannot come to man in a bare notional form. 
 Evil, as evil, can gain no access to him unless it be 
 after a long course of desperate -wickedness. It is 
 only as the abuse of that which is positively good 
 and desirable that it possesses any attractions for 
 him ; and so long as man is conscious of having a 
 personality of his own, and of being surrounded by 
 a world of good things, so long the Tree of Knowledge 
 of Good and Evil cannot help looking to him '* good 
 for food, and pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be 
 desired to make one wise." 
 
 §7. 
 
 But although man, from his constitution, could 
 not have failed to feel the temptation — and indeed his 
 rise and progress without it cannot be imagined — yet 
 we are allowed to understand that the enticements of 
 the world were not sufficient by themselves to with- 
 draw him from his allegiance to the Creator, without 
 the interposition of a '' seducing spirit," which made 
 use of those enticements. The aecoimt of the Fall in 
 Genesis sets before us another symbolic figure in the 
 scene, namely, the Serpent. Much speculation has 
 gathered round this figure, and various explanations 
 of it have been x^roposed. But the common solution 
 seems to be the simplest. Whatever we are to under- 
 stand by the Devil, the same we may understand of 
 
go The Genesis of Evil. 
 
 this cunning and insinuating figure, which, perhaps 
 itself in the allegoric picture feeding on the forbidden 
 fruit, suggests the doubt of God's motive in forbidding 
 it. Certainly the Apocalypse appears to identify the 
 two : " The great dragon was cast out, the ancient 
 serpent, he that is called the Devil, and Satan, he that 
 leadeth astray the entire inhabited earth " (Rev. 
 xii. 9). It will be necessary, before iDroceeding, to 
 dwell for a while upon this unhappy being and his 
 history. In so doing we are brought face to face 
 with the problem of the origin of evil. It is simple 
 enough to narrate, so to speak, the story of its 
 beginning ; but it is more difficult — perhaps im- 
 possible at present — fully to explain how, in the 
 eternal nature of things, cu'cumstances could arise 
 which admit of such a beginning of moral evil. 
 
 That evil, as the opposite of good, must always 
 have occupied a place in the thoughts of God, we 
 have already seen. But God can neither think, nor 
 do, nor create, nor be in any way drawn towards 
 evil, so as to call it into any positive existence, or 
 give it any historical development. It remains for 
 Him always a hateful conception, but nothing more. 
 Although the utmost excesses of what might be done 
 in the way of evil lie bare to His consciousness, God 
 does not dwell upon it, for He is ** of purer eyes than 
 to behold evil, and cannot look on iniquity " (Hab. i. 
 13). The very idea of it is revoltmg to Him. All 
 His works, as He first made them, were free from the 
 least admixture of it, and from the least tendency 
 towards it. It is not (as the Manichreans taught) 
 
Fall of Satan. 91 
 
 inherent in matter. It is not involved in the creation 
 of limited wills. Its existence, as an actual fact, is 
 not necessary to the development of human or angelic 
 excellence. It never ought to have been, and God 
 never designed that it should be. And, in a certain 
 sense, moral evil does not exist now. It is not a thing. 
 It only exists so far as it is adopted and embodied in 
 evil wills ; and if those evil wills were all purged of it, 
 evil would again have no existence. But in order that 
 wills may be truly good and not evil, they must have 
 seen evil, and seen it without sympathy, with no 
 desire to know it by experience, and must have 
 freely chosen to know only God. "We can form no 
 idea of a holy will, without evil being presented to 
 it as a possible alternative. Therefore the very 
 creation of beings intended to be holy appears to 
 involve the risk of their choosing wrong. 
 
 It would seem that this necessary test had been 
 applied to older spirits than man's. Amongst those 
 angelic beings whom God appointed to be His 
 mediators and agents with the lower creation, some 
 made the right choice, and some the wrong. It would 
 be rash and vain to profess to understand in what 
 form the temptation could present itself to pure im- 
 material spirits; but some light is, perhaps, thrown 
 upon the question by S. Paul's warning to S. Timothy 
 not to appoint a new convert to high spiritual office, 
 "lest, being puffed up with pride, he fall into the 
 condemnation of the Devil " (1 Tim. iii. 6). Though 
 the meaning of these last words is doubtful, it has 
 reasonably been supposed, from S. Paul's language, 
 
92 All Sin I raced to Satan. 
 
 that the being whom wo now know as the Devil fell in 
 eome way through pride— an undue elation at the 
 position he occupied, and at the wealth of powers 
 which he found within himself. Our Lord's more 
 general, yet more explicit, statement is that "he stood 
 not firm in the truth (S. John viii. 44, ouk fori/Ktr)." 
 All forms of sin, according to the teaching of S. John, 
 are departures from *'the truth;" and it is clear, from 
 our Lord's words, that the Evil One was once " in 
 the truth," but did not maintain his position. The 
 same is taught concerning other condemned spirits : — 
 " Angels which kept not their own beginning " — or, as 
 some would translate, ''their own principality " — "but 
 deserted the dwelling-place which belonged to them " 
 (S. Jude 6). 
 
 At what point of time this fall of angels took place, 
 or whether all fallen angels fell together, is lincertain. 
 There is much ground for thinking that S. Jude 
 identified the fall of the angels, of which he speaks, 
 with the fall of the " sons of God " which preceded 
 the Flood (Gen. vi. 2, 4). Not being linked together 
 by that solidarity of species which unites mankind, 
 the fall of one did not necessarily involve the fall of 
 others, and each fell for himself alone. But the first, 
 as well as the greatest, to fall was Satan, if we rightly 
 understand our Lord to say that Satan is not only 
 himself a liar, but "the father of it" (S. John viii. 
 44). That is to say, all evil, as an active and existing 
 fact, is to be traced to him. It was he who first gave 
 historical birth to evil, by himself choosing to try it. 
 When and how this was, we are not told ; we on!}' 
 
Uniijneness of his Case. ^^ 
 
 know that ''from the beginning he was a murderer," 
 not, that is, from the outset of his own existence, but 
 from the beginning of history as known to us — from 
 our first experience of his deahngs with us, from the 
 day when he induced man to revolt from God, and so 
 " murdered " him. 
 
 It is quite possible to think that Satan did not 
 attain his utmost depth of wickedness at the first 
 bound. The ancient theologians are agreed that he 
 is without foreknowledge, although his vast experience 
 has doubtless given him extraordinary power of fore- 
 casting. If he bad known, or believed — as he might 
 have known, and ought to have believed — what it 
 would come to, he would never have taken the first 
 step in his mad and wicked adventure. Having once 
 invented evil as an active principle, and gaining 
 perpetually wider knowledge of its power, he was 
 determined to play it out to the end, and relied upon 
 its force to rival goodness and love. " Lo, this is he 
 that took not God for his strength, but trusted in the 
 abundance of his own resources, and strengthened 
 himself upon his wickedness " (Ps. lii. 7). This it is 
 which makes the case of Satan a case of unique hope- 
 lessness. Had his attempt been purely a speculative 
 one, or had it been a mere prank like that of a 
 mischievous child, had he taken care to try the power 
 of evil upon himself alone, had he been frightened 
 when he saw how fearful a force he had set at work, 
 or believed the proofs which were given him that 
 love and goodness were still more powerful, and ac- 
 knowledged, and desisted, then we can imagine that 
 
94 ^/''<^' Seduction of Jllajt. 
 
 his punishment might have been lessened or re- 
 mitted. But, knoAving the evil of evil, he chose it 
 just because it was evil, and espoused its cause, and 
 explored it to its depths, and drew it all into his life, 
 until evil as a whole became as entirely identified 
 with Satan, as good is with God. He is " the Evil 
 One." 
 
 The seduction of man was one stage in his down- 
 ward career. Himself having tasted evil, he per- 
 suaded mankind to do the same, not in the open and 
 direct manner in which himself had done so, but 
 craftily and subtilly, as the serpent-form expresses. 
 He displays and calls attention to the charms of the 
 lower world, as they appeal to the senses, the imagi- 
 nation, and the intellect. What would have tempted 
 silently and almost unheeded without him, becomes 
 through him articulate, aggressive, insistent. The 
 special point of assault is as craftily selected as the 
 special engine. It is not the man himself who is 
 first assailed — the authoritative rational head ; but 
 the woman, representing the more impulsive and 
 passive element in our nature. Not seeing, though 
 she ought to have seen, what she was about, she 
 yielded to the desire which ought to have been felt 
 and checked; and then, in her turn, became temp- 
 tress. The man, who would have resisted the attrac- 
 tions of sense, and detected the falsehood of the 
 spiritual whisper, was unwilling to withstand the 
 temptation when ho had to choose which he w'ould 
 part company with, his God or his fallen wife, and 
 went open-eyed into the snare. "Adam was not 
 
Punishment of the Fallen. 95 
 
 beguiled, but the woman being beguiled hath fallen 
 into transgression " (1 Tim. ii. 14). 
 
 The words, ''Because thou hast done this thing," 
 in the sentence on the serpent, show that Satan's last 
 day of grace was thus ended. Each actor in the 
 scene receives the natural and condign reward of his 
 action. Each must accept the situation in which he 
 has placed himself. The man is to continue his task 
 of subduing the earth, under the new difficulties with 
 which he has surrounded himself; the woman still 
 to crave, and to suffer through her craving ; the evil 
 spirit to remain what for the nonce he had chosen to 
 be — expressed by the serpent-figure, with no power to 
 erect himself any more, unable to rise even into such 
 freedom and happiness as are enjoyed by the brute 
 creation, to find no support for his existence except in 
 ** dust." And so to this day it is with the Evil One, 
 and will be so long as he continues to exist. Unable 
 any longer to receive the '"food of angels," and 
 having no more power of self-sustenance than any 
 other creature, he is driven, with all the other spirits 
 which have taken his side, to find a life for himself in 
 picking uj) what he can in the world of living beings — 
 in that lower element out of which man is made — by 
 actual possessions of man or beast when circum- 
 stances allow of it : or by triumphs of sin, petty as 
 well as great ; or at least by making himself felt 
 through cruel and harassing temptations. These are 
 his only outlet into real existenc;. 
 
96 Unity of the HiiDian Race. 
 
 The position wliicli Adam occupies "with regard to 
 the human race makes his fall a matter of more than 
 personal consequence to himself. Mankind is so 
 bound up together that, even now, what befalls any 
 member of the species affects the fortunes of the 
 whole. " No one of us liveth unto himself, and no 
 one dieth unto himself " (Eom. xiv. 7). But Adam 
 was not a mere individual member of the species, 
 like one of ourselves. He was the whole of 3'oung 
 humanity. It was all gathered in his one person. 
 
 It is not needful here to go into the inquiry 
 whether, as a matter of history, the human race 
 emanated from a single pair of progenitors or not. 
 It may suffice to say that, although the fact has been 
 discussed with freedom, no scientific proof has been 
 given to the contrary. The unity of the race would 
 not, indeed, be overthrown by the discovery that 
 several strands of diverse origin had been blent to- 
 gether. If ever such proof is forthcoming, the Chm-ch 
 will be guided by the Holy Spirit to see the true 
 bearings of the newly acquired fact. Mankind would 
 still have many points of union. But till then we 
 may, with equal fidelity to science and to Scripture, 
 believe that the acknowledged unity now existing is 
 based upon a unity of origination. Logically, it 
 seems easier to account for the divergence of what 
 was at first one, than for the union of what was at 
 first heterogeneous. And the New Testament, as well 
 as the Old, seems to lay emphatic stress on the one- 
 
Origin of Woman. 97 
 
 uess of our source. '^ God," said S. Paul to the elite 
 of a nation who prided themselves on the tradition 
 that their ancestors had sprung out of the soil of 
 Attica, and who looked upon the Jew as something 
 not to be classified in the same category of being with 
 themselves — '' God made out of one " — -not merely 
 *'of one blood," but '*by derivation from a single 
 ancestor " — *' every nation of men for to dwell upon 
 all the face of the earth " (Acts xvii. 26). 
 
 So earnestly, indeed, do the sacred writers insist 
 upon this, that they will not allow us to trace our 
 descent to Adam and Eve, and there to stop. Eve 
 herself must be traced to Adam. Woman, according 
 to Holy Scripture, owes her origin to a definitely 
 creative act on the part of God, like man himself; 
 but her creation is not independent of his. It is 
 the man who is created "the image and glory of 
 God ; but the woman is the glory of the man " 
 (1 Cor. xi, 7). The man contains within himself 
 all that is, in the moral sense, characteristic of the 
 woman also; but for his enriching and perfecting, 
 for the emphatic bringing out and development of 
 what was best in him — ''his glory" — woman is 
 taken out from him and given existence in a separate 
 form. While revealed religion strenuously asserts 
 the spiritual equality of women with men, — as it 
 teaches the equality of barbarian with Greek, or 
 of bond with free, the accidental circumstances of 
 the soul's position making no difference to the soul's 
 intrinsic dignity; — yet it asserts with equal clear- 
 ness that womanhood occupies a subordinate posi- 
 
 H 
 
98 Position of Woman, 
 
 tion to manhood in the economy of the race. While 
 manhood represents the creative element, the i^oint 
 of new departure, •womanhood has been held to 
 represent rather the traditional element, the abiding 
 groundwork of human nature. If this be true, it 
 shows far-reaching significance in S. Paul's saying, 
 "Adam was first formed, then Eve " (1 Tim. ii. 13). 
 Though himself formed from the dust, man did not 
 mingle with the dust again. His bride owed her origin 
 to nothing less than himself — himself in his newly 
 given dignity. " The mother of all living" (Gen. iii. 
 20), took shape from him, her fountain-head. Close 
 and recent as was Adam's cousinship to the lower 
 forms that surrounded him, they gave him no solace 
 or sympathy ; but in Eve he recognises at once all 
 that was most loveable in himself set forth before him 
 in a form that he could love with self-sacrifice and 
 without selfishness. " This, at last, 'is bone of my 
 bones, and flesh of my flesh : she shall be called 
 Woman, because she was taken out of Man. There- 
 fore shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall 
 cleave unto his wife : and they shall be one flesh " 
 (Gen. ii. 23, 24). Thus what seemed to threaten a 
 division in human nature, conduces to a richer unity. 
 
 §0. 
 
 The children born of this union inherit the one 
 common nature, but that nature infinitely diversified. 
 In past years it was a much-debated question whether 
 the soul of the child is derived from its parents, or 
 whether it is a direct creation of God. The former 
 
Creation of Individuals. 99 
 
 opinion is known as Traducianism, the latter as 
 Creatianism. The truth lies in the union of the two 
 beliefs. Each human being is the direct creation of 
 the Almighty, who has been pleased to call such a 
 being into existence, and to give it its special and 
 individual characteristics. But these characteristics, 
 as well as the common nature that is modified by 
 them, come in no sudden or violent manner. They 
 are the result — we may say, the inevitable result 
 — of the forces at work in the generations before. 
 Human nature is a rich material to work upon; 
 and the diversities that may be brought out in it 
 through various combinations are endless. God's 
 creative power is as much seen in effecting these 
 combinations, so as to produce the diversities, as 
 in the original act by which He breathed into the 
 nostrils of the thing which He had formed of the 
 dust. Our religion is entirely opposed to the Deistic 
 notion that God at the beginning started the species 
 on its course, and then stood aside and allowed it to 
 develope by mechanical laws or by its own caprice. 
 His providence is incessantly at work even in the 
 smallest details of history, not by a number of 
 arbitrary fiats, but by continuous and orderly pro- 
 cesses of gentle manipulation. As we have shown 
 the immanence of the Divine Word in nature to be 
 the principle which carries nature along without con- 
 fusions or interruptions, so it is with the life of man- 
 kind. Each human being is the vehicle of a special 
 manifestation of the Word, and each has been the 
 object of the special forethought of God. It is not 
 
100 Crcafianism ignores Original Sin. 
 
 only of great prophets, but of every person on earth, 
 though with a different shade of meaning, that the 
 saying to Jeremiah holds true : "Before I formed thee 
 in the "womb, I knew thee " (Jer. i. 5), 
 
 §10. 
 
 This tempering of the Creatianist with the Tradu- 
 cian belief helps us to understand the Church's 
 doctrine of original sin. Upon the Creatianist theory 
 alone, the universality of sin would be inexplicable. 
 If the soul comes entirely fresh from the hands of the 
 Creator, without dependence upon its earthly parent- 
 age, how comes it to exhibit evil tendencies from 
 earliest infancy ? Is it possible for God to create — 
 in the sense of an entirely fresh origination — a thing 
 which is morally faulty? Or, on the Pelagian as- 
 sumption that the new-born infant is not morally 
 faulty, how comes it that no single human being, 
 except Christ, has been able to withstand temptation ? 
 On the Creatianist theory pure and simple, every 
 child must come into life with as fair a field as the 
 first man had — except for the prevalence of bad 
 examples all around — and every child must submit 
 to the test for himself, as if it were the first time that 
 any one had been tested. Surely if this had been 
 the case, and human beings had such independence 
 of each other, the "following of Adam" would not 
 have prevailed so universall3^ Here and there at 
 least we should have expected to see an unfallen 
 specimen of humanity. Out of a million million 
 A-dams we could not think that all would go wrong. 
 
Truth of Tradticianisui. lol 
 
 But in point of fact that theory ignores the unity 
 of the human race. It makes our relation to each 
 other a merely external and fantastic one. If human 
 parentage does nothing more than provide physical 
 organisms into which heings from some other region 
 are introduced, mankind is only a nominal thing ; it is 
 but a temporary classification of spirits accidentally 
 thrown together and united only by transitory 
 interests. The love of parents to children, and of 
 children to then- parents, rises up against so unnatural 
 a doctrine. We are bound to think that the inward 
 as well as the outward life of men is one, and is 
 transmitted from generation to generation. And this 
 being so, the father can transmit to his son only the 
 life which is his own. He transmits humanity, not 
 in its ideal, but in its actual condition, in the form 
 in which he himself has it. This is significantly 
 brought out in the book of Genesis, where, after 
 saying that Adam was made in the image and after 
 the likeness of God (i. 26), it tells us that Adam, now 
 fallen, "begat hi his own likeness, after his image" 
 (v. 3). The similarity of character was already there ; 
 it tvas now the original constitution which was harder 
 to be recovered. 
 
 So in practice we find it. The offspring favours 
 the parent (with the natural differences), not only in 
 feature, and form, and voice, and gait, and little 
 tricks of manner — partly imitated, it may be, yet 
 partly inherited — but also in intellectual parts, in 
 tastes and inclinations, in moral bent. As the son's 
 body inherits, not, perhaps, his father's consumption 
 
I02 N'aiurc of Original Sin. 
 
 or gout, but the peculiar liability to it, so his soul 
 lies specially open to the sins which were his father's 
 and his grandfather's curse. When drunkenness, or 
 violent temper, or covetousness, have had unre- 
 strained sway in a family for two or three generations, 
 the descendant stands in a much worse position for 
 resisting those forms of temptation than another man 
 might. The natural defences of his soul are broken 
 dossil. In the language of old theologians, the//r»!0A 
 cujmUtatiiin, the bridle of the desires, is no longer 
 born in him. And that which we see visibly, in 
 special instances, and_ with regard to particular forms 
 of sin, we are taught to be equally true of sin in 
 general throughout the race. Each soul has its own 
 particular weakness, but all alike are weak. And not 
 weak only, but depraved and distorted and wrong. 
 
 We must not, indeed, mistake. The Church never 
 teaches that the guilt of Adam's sin is imputed 
 to his progeny, as if in some way they were held 
 responsible for it, and deserved punishment for it 
 although themselves innocent of it. Such teaching 
 would be a shocking travesty of the Catliolic belief. 
 If we are " by nature children of wrath " (Eph. ii. 3), 
 it is to be referred to no such artificial and unrighteous 
 arrangement, but to the fact of the solidarity of the 
 human race. It is vain to speculate whether, if Eve 
 had stood firm, or if Adam had repudiated his wife's 
 action, the race would thereby have been established 
 and secured fi'om danger of subsequent falling, or 
 whether the conflict would have been renewed over 
 each individual with a hope of detaching one here 
 
Reality of Huiiian Freedom. 103 
 
 and one there from the noble species. But the con- 
 verse is certainly true, that the fall of our " first 
 father " (Isa. sliii. 27) was the fall of us all, and that 
 "by the one man's disobedience the many were con- 
 stituted sinners " (Eom. v. 19). From that time 
 forth every human being but One has been conceived 
 in sin, and has come into the world with a more or 
 less vitiated and depraved nature, upon which, accord- 
 ingly, God's holiness cannot but iiook with displeasure, 
 however blent with pity. And that which was by 
 birth our misfortune has become by choice our fault. 
 The tendency which a discerning eye would have seen 
 in us at our very conception has been verified ; and, 
 by embracing and approving the defect of our nature, 
 we have become verily guilty. 
 
 §11. 
 
 The true harmony between Creatianism and Tradu- 
 citinism suggests the lines which must lead eventually 
 to the harmony between necessity and free-will. Our 
 personal freedom is a fact within our cognisance. 
 We are conscious of making acts of choice all day 
 long. We deliberate freely, and take the advice of 
 friends, and feel that we are actually responsible for 
 what we have done or left undone. No sophistica- 
 tion really persuades the conscience to acquiesce in 
 wrong-doing as inevitable ; or, at least, if a man can 
 persuade himself that it is so in his own case, he 
 does not when the wrong-doer is his neighbour and 
 himself the sufferer. We hiow that we are free. 
 
 Yet the stoutest champion of free-will cannot 
 
104 Conditions of Hnman Freedom. 
 
 assert that the free-will is unconditioned. It is 
 exerted within limitations, and accurate thought 
 tends to make the limitations more and more close. 
 My freedom is not an absolute freedom, but the 
 freedom proper to me. It is the freedom of a man ; 
 not the freedom of God on the one hand, nor the 
 freedom of an animal on the other. I cannot choose 
 to create a world, nor can I choose to fly. I am only 
 able to choose what lies within the powers of humanity. 
 Nor, indeed, is my freedom as wide as the limits of 
 humanity. It is modified by my being an English- 
 man, of the nineteenth century, a middle-aged man, 
 born in a certain station of life, the son of certain 
 parents, educated after a particular fashion, sur- 
 rounded by my own surroundings, influenced by my 
 own past acts of choice. Both within and without 
 there are forces which give a special direction to my 
 will. 
 
 Some of the very conditions which in a certain 
 sense restrict a man, in another sense heighten and 
 elate his sense of freedom. Praise him for acting 
 like a man and an Englishman ; tell him that he is a 
 man of the day, his father's true son ; and he will 
 feel pleased and flattered, and endeavour to act in the 
 same way again. He reckons himself free from all 
 thwarting influences when he acts according to the 
 law of his true self. But there is one thing which has 
 come in to qualify his freedom, which ought never 
 to have been there. He does not choose with the 
 liberty, however restricted, of a perfect man. It is 
 but the liberty of a maimed and paral^'sed nature. 
 
Mans Fall not Irrecoverable. 105 
 
 He naturally wills ■with a bias towards evil — at least 
 in some directions. To act according to the perfection 
 of nature would be the true freedom. And this man 
 has lost. He recognises that he is not his true self. 
 It is only with difficulty that he works towards it 
 again. By the fall of Adam, the will, which before 
 was conditioned but free, is now not only conditioned 
 but enslaved. Nothing but the action of grace can 
 free it. To this subject we must recur when we treat 
 of the doctrine of grace. 
 
 §12. 
 
 All the flood of beings, then, to whom Adam has 
 transmitted his nature are evil and sinful. The evil 
 penetrates their moral fibre, their flesh and blood, 
 thek imagination and intelligence, their very con- 
 science and spirit. And yet amidst all this woeful 
 ruin there are signs of hope. Men are not in the 
 condition of devils. Here and there, indeed, some 
 men have attained, as has been terribly said, to " a 
 disinterested love of evil." But they are few, and 
 they were not born so. Human nature, though fallen, 
 has not lost its true prerogative and characteristic. 
 Although it no longer naturally developes into the 
 Divine likeness, but the opposite, yet it still retains 
 the Divine image, broken and obscured, but remaining. 
 Even in doing evil, we are sorry for it, and feel it 
 to be unworthy of us. While this remains there is 
 something that can be laid hold of. Man, though 
 lost, is still capable of being saved. 
 
Chapter V. 
 Z\jt Uiuarnation of tl)c Sltovti of ffioD. 
 
 //e/e of Recovery for the Fallen Race — Prepared ion for the Incarnation 
 — Teleology of History — I\Iiraciiloiis Conception of Christ — 77/^? 
 Incarnate Word the satne Person as before — Impersonality of His 
 Human Nature — Union of the Two Natures not effected by Conver- 
 sion of the Godhead into Flesh — nor by Confusion of the Two — nor 
 by Absorption of the Human in the Divine — Perfectness of both 
 Natures — the Human capable of receiving the Divine — the Divine 
 accommodated to the Human by Voluntary Limitation. 
 
 §1. 
 
 The fragmentary good ^Ybicb the Fall has left in man 
 is not sufficient to enable man to save himself. His 
 spiritual faculties are not destroyed ; but they are so 
 sprained and -weakened that they would be unable to 
 assert their rightful mastery unless aided from with- 
 out. And man's will is not only too much enfeebled 
 to set itself persistently to recover those faculties, but 
 (in varying degrees in different persons and races) it 
 is positively bent in an opposite direction. It natur- 
 ally seeks to make self its centre ; and, though it ^Yould 
 have no objection to God, if God would accommodate 
 Himself to its convenience and keep the place we 
 choose to assign to Him — yet, when it finds the 
 
Mans Need of Divine Help. 107 
 
 nature and extent of His claims, man's self-wili 
 resents them, and carries the resentment of them so 
 far as actually to dislike Him who makes them. The 
 statement of S. Paul proves accurately true, that 
 " the carnal mind is enmity towards God, for it does 
 not submit to God's law, and in fact it cannot" 
 (Eom. viii. 7). 
 
 To enable it therefore once more to submit to 
 God's law, and so attain the true creaturely freedom, 
 which is salvation, man needs a Saviour. And, if so, 
 there is but one direction to which he can hopefully 
 turn. The inexorable foes who wrought his ruin will 
 take no pity on him, or undo what they have done. 
 No remedy for his plight can be found in a closer 
 observance or better application of the laws of nature. 
 No specimen member of the tainted race rises high 
 enough above his fellows to restore them to their 
 normal condition ; nor can any association of men, 
 on the natural basis, do more than partially restrain 
 the outward activity of evil ; it cannot cure the souls 
 of its members. God alone is able to repair the 
 mischief which man has inflicted on creation and 
 himself. The great message of the Gospel is that 
 God is not only able so to do, but willing also ; and 
 that He has, in fact, done it, in the Person of His Son 
 Incarnate. 
 
 §2. 
 
 S. Paul's favourite expression about " the fulness 
 of the times " teaches us that the providence of God 
 had long been preparing for the Incarnation. There 
 
loS Preparation for tJie Incarnation. 
 
 was nothing abrupt and violent in the circumstances 
 of its accomplishment. The whole course of things, 
 however little understood by men, led directly up to it. 
 
 On the one side, a mysterious phrase in the 
 Gospel of S. John teaches us that there was some 
 Divine process by which the adorable Person who was 
 to come was made ready for His mission. ** Say ye 
 of Him w^hom the Father sanctified and sent into the 
 world, Thou blasphemest, because I said, I am the Son 
 of God ? " (S. John x. 36). What constituted that con- 
 secration and equipment of the Eternal Son remains 
 a secret into which we cannot look. 
 
 But the Word was also fashioning things on earth 
 for His manifestation — first in those long processes, of 
 which we have spoken, which led up to the formation 
 of man, and then in human history. It might have 
 been thought that the Fall of man rendered him 
 incapable of receiving the Incarnation; but it was 
 not so. He was still possessed of reason and of 
 conscience and of will, though not in full perfection ; 
 and the mercy which could educate those powers was 
 not withdrawn from him. "The Life," which was 
 observable in the constitution of things, and which 
 came from the immanence of the Word, "was the 
 Light of men ; and the Light shiueth in the darkness, 
 and the darkness did not overtake it " (S. John i. 4, 5). 
 There was a moment, or there were moments, when 
 it seemed as if the light would be wholly quenched. 
 But it never came to pass. " The true Light " still 
 "was, which enlighteneth every man, as it cometh 
 into the world," No single human being has been 
 
Training of the Heathen. 109 
 
 left altogether destitute of the illumination. In 
 various degrees, and in a multitude of ways, the 
 truth has pressed itself upon all men ; and in whatever 
 shape it has eome to them, it was a manifestation of 
 that one and the same Eternal Word, and a prophecy 
 of His drawing nearer still. 
 
 The heathen — that is, the mass of mankind — had 
 their appropriate discipline. They were left to them- 
 selves. '*In the generations gone by," said S. Paul 
 to the Lycaonian pagans, ** God suffered all the 
 nations to walk in their own ways," although He 
 bore such testimony to Himself as they might gather 
 from the bounties of nature (Acts xiv. 16). They 
 knew enough of God to distinguish Him from His 
 works, and to worship Him with thankfulness, if they 
 would (Eom. i. 21, 25). Eight and wrong were 
 familiar notions to them, and the inward verdict of 
 conscience made them feel at ease or not at ease 
 according to their moral conduct, as if by a living 
 code of law (Eom. ii. 14, 15). Their self- invented 
 ritual, and even to a certain extent their mythology, 
 formed a kind of elementary training, preparing them 
 for something better (Gal. iv. 8, 9). Lawgivers and 
 philosophers took them in hand. Here and there 
 a choice and gifted soul among them received some- 
 thing which S. Paul recognises as a form of inspira- 
 tion, and became '* a prophet of their own " (Titus i. 
 12). Thus left to their own devices, they found and 
 showed what men could do and what men could not do. 
 Their successes and their hopeless failures alike wit- 
 nessed to the possibility and the need of a redemption. 
 
1 1 o Trainijig of Israel. 
 
 Meanwhile the way for that redemption was more 
 markedly preparing in the history of the Israelite 
 race. That race was naturally well qualified for its 
 high purpose. It had what has been called a genius 
 for religion. Upon them, therefore, the Divine choice 
 fell ; and from Abraham onwards they were, by unmis- 
 takeable signs and wonders, singled out and set apart 
 from all other nations to be the medium of God's 
 self-revelation to the world. While mankind in 
 general was left to find its own wa}', Israel felt 
 himself to be the people of the Lord, and bound to 
 Him in the strictest bonds of duty. But this special 
 nearness to God did not put the Chosen People in any 
 j)osition of moral superiority over others. It did not 
 exclude from them the liability to sin, or even give 
 them much help to overcoming it. Indeed, the 
 object of the Law which was given them was nothing 
 else but this — to bring vividly home to them a sense 
 of their sinfulness and infirmity. They were to learn 
 by it that, beneath their legal observance, their 
 covenanted privilege, their correct belief, the Jew was 
 no better than the Gentile. This was the price 
 which they had to pay for their prerogative. " You 
 only have I known of all the families of the earth ; 
 therefore I will visit upon you all your iniquities" 
 (Amos iii. 2). They were made to know, on behalf 
 of all mankind, the guilt and shame of sin. An 
 elaborate system of sacrifice inculcated the feeling. 
 Whether that system was complete from the outset, 
 or, according to the risky theories of a modern school 
 of critics, received its full development at a later 
 
The Law and the Prophets. in 
 
 date, makes no difference to the deep and prophetic 
 Buggestiveness of its symbolism. And the spiritually 
 minded Hebrew felt, as he used it, that it disappointed 
 him. It spoke of a release and a restoration which 
 it never accomplished. The worshij)pers felt it to be 
 an unsubstantial shadow in itself, and yearned for 
 something which should in reality "fulfil " what this 
 Divinely instituted ceremonial taught them to think 
 of, but could not suppl3^ 
 
 And what the Levitical worship taught through 
 visible signs, the prophets taught in mysterious words. 
 Prophecy was the special glory of the Israelite people. 
 Unlike the heathen nations, who looked back wist- 
 fully to a dim golden age in the past, the whole mind 
 and soul of Abraham's descendants were anchored to 
 the future. Faith — "the assurance of things hoped 
 for, the proof of things not seen " (Heb. xi. 1) — was 
 their very life. The nation was forward-bound. 
 Their day was coming. It had been promised to 
 Abraham, and, though it might tarry, it would come. 
 Every partial deliverance, every partial deliverer, 
 became to them — like their religious system itself— 
 a type of the perfect that was to come. Vague and 
 indefinite at first, their conception became richer and 
 clearer with succeeding centuries. Each promising 
 young king, or venerable priest, or woe-stricken 
 prophet, added some detail to the ideal that was 
 gradually forming, and for which at last a name was 
 found. A Messiah — anointed with the Spirit of God 
 beyond all others — would bring all that was looked 
 for. Not that we have reason to suppose that any 
 
1 1 2 Teleology of History. 
 
 consistent and comprehensive set of beliefs had 
 gathered about the name of the Christ. The prophets 
 themselves had not been able fully to grasp their own 
 thoughts. Here and there a touch, a glimpse, a flash, 
 came to them ; but they could not piece it all together. 
 They only felt, with such longing as made Daniel 
 swoon away, that what they uttered was true, and 
 that in due time others who came after them would 
 see and profit by it (1 S. Pet. i. 10-12). 
 
 §3. 
 
 The more outward preparation of mankind, 
 through the fortunes of empu-es, belongs, perhaps, 
 rather to history than to theology. We need not 
 now stay to point out the influences of the Egyptian 
 bondage, or the Babylonian captivity, upon the 
 Hebrews; or the effect of Greek conquests and the 
 si^read of the Greek language, and of the universal 
 dominion of Eome ; or of the dispersion of the Jews. 
 This side of the Pracimmtio Evangelica has often been 
 worked out; and undoubtedly it affords a most im- 
 l^ressive testimony to the Christian faith. On the 
 assumption that our Lord was what we believe Him 
 to be, nothing can be more reasonable than to 
 suppose that all these movements on the large scale 
 had a distinct teleological aim, and that they had 
 reference to Him. There was nothing accidental 
 in the fitness of the world's condition when our Lord 
 was born. Though the historical development was 
 perfectly free and spontaneous, there was a Provi- 
 dence which knew how to guide it. And yet, with 
 
Miraculous Conception of Christ. 1 1 3 
 
 all this perfect adaptation of circumstances, our Lord 
 was no necessary or merely natural outcome of His 
 time and place. As, in tlie beginning, the \Yorld was 
 made ready for the reception of human life before 
 human life appeared, and yet human life was an 
 entirely new factor introduced from without, so, 
 " when the fulness of the time came," and not before, 
 *' God sent forth His Son, born of a woman," and 
 yet by no action of simply natural laws. 
 
 §4. 
 
 The new point of departure in history is marked 
 by the miraculous mode of Christ's birth. He was 
 "conceived by the Holy Ghost" (S. Matt. i. 20).* 
 Though the whole office of motherhood was performed 
 by Mary, from the initial consent onwards, there was 
 nothing at all resembling human fatherhood. The 
 act which brought the Godhead into flesh was a 
 purely creative act, like those at the beginning of 
 the world. It was due to the operation of that 
 Divine Spirit, who is the Finger of God, moulding 
 all things as He wills, and imparting life in all its 
 forms. 
 
 This miraculous intervention is not entirely due 
 to the presence of sin in humanity. If there had been 
 no Fall, and the Word had still been pleased to become 
 incarnate by a birth, that birth would fittingly have 
 been of a virgin, because so only would it be clear 
 that a new thing was taking place on earth, and One 
 coming into the world who was not simply man* 
 And the absence of earthly fatherhood appears also 
 
1 1 4 His Sanctity not Dependent on Marys. 
 
 to accord well with that impersonal universality of 
 our Lord's human nature of which we shall have 
 to speak. Supposing that the Ncstorian notion of 
 Christ's Person were the right one, and Christ had 
 been, in the ordinary sense, "a man," associated 
 with the Word, there would have been little need 
 for the virgin birth, — to secure a sinless father aa 
 well as mother might have been enough; but for 
 the true Incarnation no other entrance into the world 
 is imaginable but that which was chosen. 
 
 No manner of sin entered into the movement of 
 will which issued in Christ's holy nativity. That 
 maiden life which gave our Lord birth was entirely 
 holy. It was the flower which sprang out of all 
 the preparatory discipline which mankind — which 
 Israel — had undergone. It was the most beautiful 
 thing which had been seen since the expulsion from 
 Paradise. Yet our Lord's original stainlessness was 
 not absolutely dependent upon the holiness of His 
 sacred Mother, in such a way as to be a purely natural 
 heirloom from licr as sin is from other parents. It 
 was fitting, indeed, that the Mother of the. Lord 
 should be the highest specimen of humanity; she 
 would not have been chosen for the honour had she 
 been otherwise ; but in no case could any taint from 
 her have attached itself to the Divine Person of her 
 Offspring. It seems, in fact, to be the delight of 
 S. Matthew, in tracing the genealogy of Christ, to call 
 attention to the unholy and profane channels through 
 which, after the flesh. He came. The incestuous 
 Tamar and the harlot Eahab, Euth the heatheness 
 
.S", Bernard on the Conception of Mary. 1 1 5 
 
 and " the wife of Urias," are the only ancestresses 
 ■whom he mentions. The purity of the last stage in 
 the transmission was not actually more necessary to 
 our Lord's incorruption than that of earlier stages. 
 The Holy Ghost could only take from the maternal 
 suhstance suoh elements as were befitting to the 
 Incarnate Son, and would purify them in taking. 
 We have no need, therefore, to assume the immacu- 
 late conception of Mary herself. 
 
 The first objection to pressing that doctrine upon 
 the Church is that it is nowhere taught in Holy 
 Scripture, nor by any ancient Father, — although, as 
 S. Bernard points out, the doctrine is not one 
 which the Fathers could have passed by with un- 
 animous silence, if the doctrine had been true. 
 It arose at Lyons, in France, in the twelfth century ; 
 and the local festival which was begun in honour 
 of it was greeted by S. Bernard as " a presumptuous 
 novelty — mother of rashness, sister of superstition, 
 daughter of frivolity." He complained that so re- 
 spected a Church as that of Lyons should have 
 " allowed itself to be disfigured by such juvenile 
 levity," introducing what "is unknown to Church 
 practice, unapproved by reason, uncommended by 
 ancient tradition." The royal Virgin, he said, had 
 so many genuine honours that she stood in no 
 need of spurious ones. That she was sanctified in 
 the womb, he held in common with most Catholic 
 believers, and that she was preserved sinless 
 throughout her life; but this did not of necessity 
 prove her exempt from original sin. If the acknow- 
 
1 1 6 Objections to ImmaciUateConception of Mary. 
 
 ledged sauctity of her birth depended on the sanctity 
 of the antecedent conception, it would be easy to go 
 still further back, and argue for the immaculate con- 
 ception of her parents, and of her grandparents, and 
 of her great-grandparents. Her conception was con- 
 fessedly in the natural order of things, through the 
 marriage union of her parents, and, as such, could 
 not be free from the sin which now penetrates the 
 whole working of the natural order. Indeed, S. Ber- 
 nard thought it a strange mode of honouring the 
 Blessed Virgin to teach that she was herself immacu- 
 lately conceived, inasmuch as the credit of it would 
 belong to another, not to her. It robbed her of the 
 unique distinction which she possessed, by extend- 
 ing to her mother also the dignity of motherhood 
 achieved without any compensating loss. Mary was 
 no longer the only woman who had conceived without 
 sin. And what was still more contrary to the Chris- 
 tian conscience, this novel doctrine took away a pre- 
 rogative which belonged to Christ alone. " The Lord 
 Jesus alone," says the saint, "was conceived of the 
 Holy Ghost, because He alone was holy before His 
 conception. He alone excepted, it holds true of all 
 the rest of the children of Adam, what one of them 
 confessed with as much truth as humility concerning 
 himself, ' Behold, I was shapeu in iniquity, and in sin 
 hath my mother conceived me.' " 
 
 So S. Bernard reasoned. However much the 
 Catholic might be inclined, as S. Bernard says was at 
 first the case with him, to allow as a pious opinion 
 what seemed to be suggested by love of our Lord's 
 
That Doctrine insulates Clu'ist front us. 117 
 
 Mother, after-reflexion shows that the opinion is not 
 pious, but detracts from the fulness of Christ's re- 
 demption. Not only does it make the Blessed Virgin 
 herself exempt from original sin, and therefore exempt 
 from the common need of salvation ; but by so doing 
 it insulates our Lord Himself from direct touch with 
 the sinful world. If it were true, the regeneration of 
 humanity would begin, not with Him, but with her ; 
 and, instead of springing sinless out of the sinful 
 race which He came to save, He would derive His 
 humanity from something not like the rest of us. 
 The doctrine would make His human sanctity, in a 
 way, dependent upon hers, and a consequence of it. 
 Thus the dogma of the immaculate conception of 
 Mary, by its over-refinement, would put Christ at a 
 distance from us, and mutilate the blessed fulness of 
 the truth that He is " the Son of Man," and that all 
 we are His ''brethren." 
 
 §5. 
 
 By the action of the Creator Spirit upon the sacred 
 Virgin, He who existed from all eternity as God with 
 the Father became also Man with men. The Incarna- 
 tion is the union of the Godhead with human nature 
 in the single Person of Christ. It is a totally different 
 thing from [what we know as the mystical union of 
 men with God. The mystical union consists in a 
 loving apprehension of God by man, in response to 
 God's apprehension of him, which results in an iden- 
 tity of will between the two — or, to speak more 
 strictly, in an identity of the things willed — idem 
 
1 1 8 Hypostatic Union milikc Mystical. 
 
 velle ac nolle. This mj'stical union is, indeed, grounded 
 upon the same fact as the Incarnation, namely, that 
 man is made in the Divine image, and therefore can 
 enter into close relationship with God. But for all 
 that, the hypostatic (that is, the personal) union is 
 not merely a higher degree of the mystical. However 
 fully developed the mystical union may be, it does 
 not, and cannot, break down the distinction of per- 
 sonality. It would be mere Pantheism to suppose it. 
 The heart may have perfect sympathy with God, the 
 understanding may come to know Him even as He 
 knows us, the will may cease to have a movement 
 but that which He inspires; and j-et the human 
 person remains separate from the Divine. God, in 
 the mystical union, does not become the man, nor the 
 man God. It does not set up a single consciousness ; 
 the two remain unaltered, with free interchange be- 
 tween them. The i)erfect type of the mystical union, 
 therefore, is rather to be found in the relation between 
 the Father and the Son, than in the relation between 
 the two natures of Christ. 
 
 To think otherwise is the error which is known to 
 the Church by the title of Nestorianism. Although 
 Nestorius did not formally maintain that the historical 
 Christ was a combination of two associated persons, 
 one human and the other Divine, the expressions 
 which he used can bear no other meaning. Revolting 
 from the title of Thcotokos (roughly rendered "Mother 
 of God ") applied to the Blessed Virgin, he maintained 
 that she gave birth to something which was human 
 first, and afterwards was taken into " conjunction " 
 
The Nestorian Idea of Christ. 1 1 9 
 
 with the Eternal Word. The Eternal Word appro- 
 priated that human being which sprang from Mary, 
 and made him His organ and instrument of self- 
 manifestation ; the humanity became His "recep- 
 tacle ; " but it was never personally united with 
 Himself. The man who suffered and was buried was 
 BO open to the .Divine communication as to become 
 like an embodiment of God to the world; he was 
 filled with the Divine energy to an infinitely greater 
 extent than any other man; his conjunction with 
 God was BO intense as to render him a fit object 
 for worship, and even to make him ''rank as God;" 
 but still it was not the Word Himself who suffered 
 and was buried. If such teaching were true, it is 
 clear that there was never any real Incarnation, 
 There was but an alliance, after all, between a man 
 and God ; there was no actual entrance of God Him^ 
 self into human conditions. Thus God, under the 
 system of Nestorius, remains still at as great a dis» 
 tance from man as ever. 
 
 As against this disheartening fiction, the Church 
 clung and clings firmly to the plain and literal meaU' 
 ing of S. John's words, supported by the whole tenor 
 of Scripture : " The Word was made flesh, and dwelt 
 among us" (S. John i. 14). It is evident that S. 
 John intends to set before us, not the birth of a 
 remarkable man, but a stupendous event in the life of 
 the Eternal Word. S. John is, so to speak, following 
 the history of that Word; and, after speaking of 
 creation as an incident in it, and giving a suinmary 
 of His previous dealings with the world, he proceeds 
 
120 Contiimiiy of Person in the Incarnation, 
 
 to say that that same adorable Person who " was in 
 the beginning with God," Himself '' became flesh, and 
 dwelt among us." He did not exhibit Himself through 
 another: He became human Himself. There was 
 no break in the continuity of His personal life. It 
 was one and the same throughout. He who pre- 
 existed "in the form of God" (Phil. ii. 6) took upon 
 Himself another form, and passed through a fresh 
 series of experiences, without any loss of His true 
 identity. In the womb which He did " not abhor," 
 in the cradle and the carpenter's shop, in the bap- 
 tismal stream and the wilderness of temptation, in 
 the miracles of power, in the still greater miracles of 
 weakness, entreating with " strong crying and tears " 
 in Gethsemane, pouring out His soul unto death upon 
 the Cross, as He lay dead in the sepulchre, and 
 preached to the spirits in prison, rising, and returning 
 to heaven, — His own Person never sank into abeyance, 
 nor became confused with some other, created, person 
 who acted as His earthly embodiment. It was He — 
 the Word — who did and suffered all these things. 
 *'He that descended is the same also that ascended 
 up" (Eph. iv. 10) — ''Jesus Christ, the same yester- 
 day, and to-day, and for ever" (Heb. xiii. 8). 
 
 §6. 
 
 In order to guard this inestimable truth, the 
 Church has learned to speak of our Blessed Lord's 
 human nature as impersonal. The expression is 
 a difficult one, and seems at first to imply that His 
 humanity was defective, and not the same as ours. 
 
Impersonality of the Manhood. 121 
 
 It is, however, but a way of saying what is expressed 
 in the Quicumque vult: "He is not two, but one Christ." 
 To assert that our Lord's human nature had a per- 
 sonality of its own, independent of Him, as if it could 
 conceivably have been dissociated from Him and stood 
 alone, and lived out its own life like any other man, 
 occupying some other relation to the Godhead from 
 that which it did occupy, would be to nullify the 
 Incarnation. The purpose of the Incarnation is not 
 solely to exhibit or display the character or power 
 of God to men. Perhaps such an object might have 
 been effected through something like the " posses- 
 sion" of a man by the Word. But if a solid union 
 between God and man is to be brought about, if the 
 Son of God is Himself going to take human nature 
 as His own, if in His own Person He is to be 
 " the Second Man " from'heaven (1 Cor. xv. 47), and 
 begin a new departure for the human race, then it 
 is imperatively necessary that we should conceive of 
 the humanity which He assumed as " impersonal" — 
 that is, as having no centre of consciousness or being 
 apart from Him. It was He who became man, who 
 was born and who died, not another person, however 
 closely connected with Him. 
 
 This is all that we mean by the " impersonality " 
 of Christ's human nature. We do not mean by it 
 that His human nature was an unreality, a phantom, 
 an automaton, made to go through the semblance of 
 a human life, and worked by a Divine Person outside 
 of it. The Church does not substitute a Docetic 
 figment for a living agent. Better the honest Nesto- 
 
122 Analogy of Body and Soul. 
 
 rian man than such a neuter thing. A personal 
 human being ^YOuld make a worthier medium of 
 communication ^Yith the world. The phrase simply 
 betokens the unity of our Lord's Person, not a defect 
 in the nature which He assumed. 
 
 The human nature stands no further off from our 
 Lord's Person than the Divine, though He is Divine 
 first and human after. We count it no defect in our 
 bodies that they have no personal subsistence apart 
 from ourselves, and that, if separated from ourselves, 
 they are nothing. They shara in a true personal life 
 because we, whose bodies they are, are persons. 
 What happens to them happens to us. The analogy 
 has from ancient times been a^Dplied to the mystery 
 of the hypostatic union in Christ. " As the reason- 
 able soul and flesh is one man, so God and man is 
 one Christ." It would be easy to press the analogy 
 too far ; but it serves its purpose in reminding us 
 that personality is a thing which lies very deep in the 
 background, and reaches forth through various organs, 
 and enters into more than one range of experiences. 
 The relation of soul to body in us is not the same as the 
 relation of the Godhead to the manhood in Christ; 
 but it helps us to see how the human nature of 
 Christ possesses personality only by being His, and 
 how He, in it, can live a full human life. 
 
 Indeed, although theologians avoid the word be- 
 cause it is liable to be mistaken, there is nothing 
 untrue in describing our Lord as having, in the Incar- 
 nation, become ** a man." So He is called, in Holy 
 Scripture, both in passages where the word may be 
 
In IV hat Sense Christ '* a Man.'' 123 
 
 taken in an adjectival or predicative sense, as in 
 1 Tim. ii. 5, where we could render it " the human 
 Christ Jesus," or '' Christ Jesus who is Himself 
 Man ; " and also in several places which do not admit 
 of such a treatment. Not only is He so called by 
 enemies, or as yet uninstructed disciples, but He 
 calls Himself so : '* Ye seek to kill Me, a Man (avOpo)- 
 TTov) that hath told you the truth " (S. John viii. 40). 
 S. Paul calls Him so, singling Him out from other 
 men; "the grace of the one Man {avOpioTrov), Jesus 
 Christ" (Kom. v. 15). Using a still more significant 
 word, S. Peter speaks of Him as " a Man (avSpa) 
 approved of God " (Acts ii. 22), and S. Paul as " a 
 Man (ctvdpi) whom God ordained " to judge the world 
 by (Acts xvii. 31). 
 
 Such language sets vividly before us the personal 
 fulness of that human life which was lived on earth 
 and is still being lived in heaven ; and all that we 
 need is to remember that that " Man " is none other 
 than the Everlasting Son Himself. Men saw a per- 
 sonal human being, and not merely an impersonal 
 nature, when they saw Jesus; but it was because 
 they saw the Word Himself in flesh. Within what 
 met their gaze there were not two persons residing, 
 who could hold dialogue with each other. They be- 
 held an absolute and indivisible unity ; and it was 
 the same Person who spoke, whether He said, ''Be- 
 fore Abraham was, I am," or whether He Raid, " I 
 thirst." 
 
1 24 N'o Conversion of Godhead into FlcsJi. 
 
 §7. 
 
 The manner of this personal union lies bej'ond 
 our comprehension, and we are not at liberty to make 
 it suit our intelligence by anything which alters the 
 character of either nature. Of such false methods, 
 perhaps the most elementary would be that con- 
 demned in the Qiiicumque vult, by the words, " One, 
 not by conversion of the Godhead into flesh, but by 
 taking of the manhood into God." The "Word, when 
 He became man, did not turn Himself into a man. He 
 did not exchange one nature for another, or cease to 
 be what He was before. We may not thus secure the 
 unity and continuity of His Person at the expense of 
 His Divine nature. Were such a thing possible, 
 although it might prove the kindness and self-sacri- 
 ficing pity of the Son of God, it would destroy all the 
 hopes which the Catholic faith brings us. The " con- 
 version of the Godhead into flesh " would but have 
 added one more man to the number of men — a sin- 
 less one indeed among sinners, but it would have 
 effected no union of God and men. The human 
 nature would not have been appropriated by God, nor 
 the Divine nature communicated to men. If the Son 
 abdicated His Deity to assume humanity. He did but 
 lower Himself, without raising what He came to help. 
 But the very idea is inconceivable. The fantastic 
 language of a myth or a fairy tale can speak of turn- 
 ing one thing into another, but thought refuses to 
 follow the process. No continuity could be preserved 
 through such a change as that which would turn 
 
Error of Monophysitisrii. 125 
 
 Daphne into a bay tree. It would simply mean the 
 cessation of the one existence, and the substitution of 
 another altogether. And if we tried to imagine the 
 cessation of the Son of God, and the substitution for 
 Him of a human being bearing His name, we should 
 find ourselves reduced to a direct absurdity. Such a 
 theory has never found a champion. 
 
 §8. 
 
 A more specious appearance is presented by 
 another false theory which the Athanasian symbol 
 proceeds to reject. *' One, not by confusion of sub- 
 stance," it says, " but by unity of person." There 
 have been, and still are, large numbers of Christians 
 who, more or less consciously, and with considerable 
 differences among themselves, occupy this heretical 
 position. It is known as Monophysitism. For many 
 hundred years it has been the recognised creed of 
 several ancient Churches. In its coarsest form it 
 would teach that the two natures of which the Christ 
 is composed, though originally distinct, have so run 
 into each other as to be indistinguishable. They 
 not only permeate and interpenetrate each other at 
 every point : they are fused and blent into one. It 
 does not suffice to say that Christ is one person ; you 
 must say that He has but one nature. You must 
 attribute both His glories and His limitations indis- 
 criminately to the new whole developed by the 
 Incarnation. 
 
 The Monophysite theory is an improvement upon 
 that of the conversion into flesh, inasmuch as it 
 
1 26 Error of EtUychianism. 
 
 recognises the action of both elements in Christ ; but 
 it, too, destroys the true conception of an Incarnation. 
 The fusion of the two natures, had it been possible, 
 ■would have produced a tertium quid which would be 
 neither God nor man. Thus, no less than the theory 
 last considered, it would involve a " tm-ning " of one 
 thing into another ; only it would repeat the absurdity 
 twice over. It would necessitate turning, not the 
 Godhead only, but the manhood also into something 
 foreign — into some nameless nature, betwixt and be- 
 tween, the fabulous nature of a semi-human demigod. 
 
 §0. 
 
 The most frequent form of Monophysitlsm, how- 
 ever, is that which is known by the name of its 
 exponent Eutyches. In our remarks upon it we do 
 not confine ourselves to the language employed by 
 Eutyches himself, but deal with the tendency which 
 he represents. It differs from that which has just 
 been described by virtually making nothing of our 
 Lord's humanity. It may be called the opposite of 
 the doctrine which turns the Godhead into flesh, for 
 it practically turns the flesh into Godhead. Accord- 
 ing to this view, when the two natures become 
 united in the Person of the Incarnate Lord, the 
 limited creaturely nature must, to all intents and 
 purposes, disappear amidst the glories of the infinite 
 nature to which it is joined. It becomes absorbed 
 and lost. As a di-op of vinegar is swallowed up in the 
 sea, so the humanity of Christ is swallowed up in His 
 Divinity. The illustration is an ancient one. 
 
It makes the Manhood Unreal. I27 
 
 Such a doctrine practically reduces the historical 
 life of Christ to an unreality. It offers little more 
 than the earlier Docetism, which holdly maintained 
 that the body of our Lord was a hallucination. 
 Eutychianism would give it as much reality as would 
 fulfil the false though splendid image of Shelley — 
 
 " A mortal sliape to Him 
 Was as the vapour dim, 
 Which the orient planet animates with light." 
 
 It would agree with that poet in making Him tread 
 the thorns of death and shame ''like a triumphal 
 path," of which He never felt the sharpness. The 
 development of His human nature, according to Euty- 
 chian views, could only take place in appearance and 
 externally ; there could be no expansion and progress 
 which He could observe within Himself. If it could 
 be said that His human soul was at any time igno^ 
 rant of any fact, such ignorance was altogether 
 imperceptible amidst the omniscience of His Godhead. 
 To speak of Him as having been unable to do this or 
 that would shock the Eutychian tendency of mind, as 
 seeming to derogate from the truth of His Deity. 
 
 Thus it comes to pass that the sense of His being 
 (in the language of Chalcedon) " consubstantial with 
 us according to His manhood," and really like to us 
 in all things but sin, becomes obliterated. Divine 
 attributes are bestowed, not upon Kim, but upon 
 His sacred humanity. It is made to be ubiquitous. 
 It receives Divine honours, not He residing in it. 
 Unguarded modes of worshipping the Blessed Sacra- 
 ment of the Altar ; the cultus — not harmless because 
 
l28 EiUycJuanis))i ends by degrading Dcily. 
 
 symbolical — of a special portion or aspect of the 
 creaturely nature, like the Sacred Heart ; are an out- 
 come of this deification of our Lord's humanity. 
 
 And then, by a curious though natural counter- 
 move, that habit of mind which begins by losing sight 
 of the true manhood in the Godhead, follows on to 
 lose the true Godhead in the manhood. An example 
 may bo found in the extravagant use of the title 
 " Mother of God," which is heard in some quarters. 
 The same tendency is observable in the use of lan- 
 guage which implies that the Deity in Christ was 
 passible. In hymns and other devotions there is 
 a fondness for such phrases as " the dying God." 
 People speak of the piercing of the , Divine hands, 
 the marring of the Divine face, and the like. An 
 isolated expression in Holy Scripture is, indeed, 
 quoted in support of such language, where S. Paul — 
 if the text be correct — speaks of " the Church of 
 God, which He purchased with His own Blood " (Acts 
 XX. 28) ; but as the words stand they aj)pear to be 
 nearer to Patripassianism than to Eutychianism, for 
 the Father alone in Holy Scripture is called in this 
 absolute manner *' God." Many of those who speak 
 in such terms are well-instructed persons, who do not 
 themselves suppose the Divine nature in Christ to 
 have been merged in the human, or vice versa, and are 
 only led on by a love of paradox. But the love of 
 paradox needs to be narrowly watched. The ignorant, 
 and still more the half-taught, are apt to be misled 
 by what they hear ; and tlio result of feeding much 
 upon these paradoxes is that men lose on the one side 
 
The Natures truly united in one Person. 129 
 
 the solace and strength which comes from a right 
 conception of Christ's humanity, and are driven into 
 seeking from His Blessed Mother or elsewhere a 
 sympathy which they dare not claim from Him ; and, 
 on the other side, with the inconsistency which has 
 been observed before, they fall into sentimental, 
 sensuous, fondling, modes of addressing our adorable 
 Lord, which both dishonour Him and enfeeble the 
 soul of the worshipper. 
 
 In order to approach Him aright, and to gain from 
 the approach what He desires to bestow, it is as 
 necessary to be clear from all confusion of the two 
 natures, as to reject all separation into two persons. 
 The Godhead is real, and the manhood is real, as 
 neither could be if they were in any way mixed and 
 compounded.- The Godhead is as pure and un- 
 adulterated as the Godhead of the Father ; the man- 
 hood is as simple and as creaturely as in her from 
 whom He took it, or as in us. The union between 
 the two natures is indeed a union, and not a mere 
 juxtaposition of two disconnected things ; but the 
 union is found in the oneness of Christ's Person, and 
 not in any physical combination, nor yet in any 
 metaphysical transubstantiation of either essence into 
 the other. Our own constitution again supplies us 
 with an illustration. Spirit and body in us are not 
 merely put side by side, and insulated from each 
 other. In a great variety of ways they affect and are 
 affected by each other. But each retains its own 
 proper nature. An attack of rheumatism in a man's 
 shoulder has an influence upon his spiritual condition, 
 
130 TJie " Comvitmicaiio Idiomatuni!' 
 
 but it would be absurd to speak of his spirit as 
 having the rheumatism. And the communing of a 
 man's spirit with God makes demands upon his body, 
 forcing it to be wakeful, to assume a reverent attitude, 
 to weep, and the like ; but it is not his body which 
 thus communes with God. The reason why they 
 affect each other is because they are both equally Ais, 
 not because of any confusion between themselves. 
 
 In something of the same way we may say it is 
 with Christ. Mary may be called Tlicotokos, because 
 her Child was, "from the birth, and from the womb, 
 and from the conception," very God ; but she was not 
 the mother of His Godhead. We may legitimately 
 speak of the Blood of God the Son, but it is not as 
 God that He has blood — it is the Blood of One who is 
 God, but the blood belongs to His human nature and 
 not to the Di's-ine. And again, it is true that Jesus 
 Christ came down from heaven, but He was not Jesus 
 Christ before He came down, — that is to say. He had 
 no human nature before His Incarnation. To say 
 that those hands which were tied with swaddling- 
 clothes were the same which made the stars on high 
 may be passed over in poetry among those who 
 understand; but it is not true, except in the sense 
 that He whose hands they are was the Agent in 
 creation. His human nature had no part in that 
 work ; it was as God alone that He did it. The 
 Person is absolutely the same ; but the natures retain 
 their own properties. There is a real and vital union 
 between them ; but it is because both are Ills, the 
 one as much as the other, " Of both natures," says 
 
Christ'' s Godhead Perfect. 131 
 
 Hooker, " there is a co-operation often, an association 
 always, but never any mutual participation whereby 
 the properties of the one are infused into the other." 
 
 §10. 
 
 We believe, then, that in the Incarnation the two 
 natures were perfectly and inseparably joined in the 
 one Person of the Word, not by conversion of the God- 
 head into flesh, nor by the conversion of the flesh into 
 Godhead, nor yet by the conversion of both into an 
 intermediate compound. It remains to be pointed 
 out that the two natures thus united are not only 
 true, but complete. It is difficult to say what con- 
 stitutes our idea of the completeness of Deity. God 
 cannot be broken up and divided. Such a thing as 
 a mutilated or diminished Godhead is an impossible 
 conception. If there was Godhead at all, it was full 
 and perfect Godhead. And the human nature which 
 om' Lord assumed was likewise a complete human 
 nature. This is a matter more easily tested. If the 
 component elements of man are spirit, soul, and body, 
 these are all found in Christ ; and the mutual rela- 
 tions of the three are the same in Him as in us, 
 except where sin, in our case, has deranged the 
 normal connexion. 
 
 He had — He has — a body. It gathered shape, 
 like ours, from the maternal substance. It grew ; it 
 walked; it ate and drank, and needed to be sus- 
 tained by eating and drinking. It hungered and 
 thirsted ; it was weary and slept ; it sweated ; it bled ; 
 it died. Before it rose transformed from the dead, 
 
132 Chrisfs Ulan hood Perfect. 
 
 men saw it, gazcil upon it, handled it, struck it, 
 embalmed and buried it. They found it to be a solid 
 material thing, subject to the same laws as ours. 
 Though, on occasion, things which most of us cannot 
 do with our bodies were done by it, yet His Body 
 itself was not on that account different from ours ; and 
 if our Lord walked on the water of the lake, so did 
 S. Peter when our Lord bade him. 
 
 And to our Lord's body was joined a spirit. It 
 was the organ by which He prayed to His God and 
 Father. In it He took deep note of spiritual facts : 
 " Jesus knew in His spirit " (S. Mark ii. 8). In it 
 He rejoiced and sorrowed: "In that hour Jesus 
 rejoiced in spirit " (S. Luke x. 21) ; " He was troubled 
 in spirit, and testified" (S. John xiii. 21). In it He 
 felt the emotion of a moral indignation : — " He sighed 
 deeply in His spirit " (S. Mark viii. 12) : " He groaned 
 in the spirit" (S. John xi. 33). It was the seat of 
 His inmost human self-knowledge : He " was justified 
 in the spirit " (1 Tim. iii. 16). It was the last retreat 
 of His human life : " Father, into Thy hands I com- 
 mend My spirit " (S. Luke xxiii. 46) ; " In which 
 also He went and preached unto the spu'its in prison " 
 (1 Pet. iii. 19). 
 
 And He had a soul. " My soul," says Christ, " is 
 exceeding sorrowful, even unto death " (S. Matt. xxvi. 
 38). The heresy of Apollinaris consisted in a well- 
 meant attempt to explain the unity of Christ's Person 
 by teaching that His humanity had no rational soul, 
 but only the animal soul, and that the Eternal Word 
 supplied its place. The Gospels are against that 
 
His Rational Soul and Htunan Will. 133 
 
 mode of getting rid of the mystery. Loosely as 
 the word "soul" is sometimes used in the New 
 Testament, it cannot be doubted that Christ had 
 and has a soul entirely like ours — except that His 
 is perfect, and ours are not — when we regard the 
 faculties of which He stood possessed. He mar- 
 velled; He learned. "What once He had perceived, 
 He thenceforth knew. He had no opinions, no 
 conjectures ; we are never told that He forgot, nor 
 even that He remembered, which would imply a 
 degree of forgetting ; we are not expressly told of 
 His arriving at truths by the process of reason- 
 ing them out; but He reasons them out for others. 
 It is not recorded that He took counsel, or formed 
 plans ; but He desired, and He purposed, and He did 
 one thing with a view to another. 
 
 This intelligent aim necessitates also a genuine 
 human will. The Monotheletes, who suppose that 
 there is but one will in Christ — the will which belongs 
 to Him as Son of God — ought logically to go further, 
 and adopt the whole Apollinarian view, and deny the 
 rational soul. For where there is intelligent percep- 
 tion and free reflexion there cannot fail to be moral 
 choice. Moral choice is the direct outcome of intelli- 
 gent reflexion ; and will is the faculty for making 
 a series of acts of moral choice, self-determined 
 by rational reflexion. If, therefore, there was but 
 one will in Christ, and that the Divine will, it could 
 be guided only by His Divine knowledge, and the 
 human perceptions had no share in its direction. 
 If that were the case, for all moral purposes Christ's 
 
134 Two Wills in Christ. 
 
 humanity was as good as worthless, and His rational 
 soul lacked that which is its true end and object. We 
 are, therefore, forced to believe, in spite of difficulties 
 upon which we must touch afterwards, that Christ's 
 human natm-e was possessed of active free-will like 
 our own — except in being truly free, while ours is 
 partially enslaved. In conforming this human will 
 always to the Divine lay the glory of His human self- 
 sacrifice. When He says, " I came not to do Mine 
 own will, but the will of Him that sent Me " (S. John 
 vi. 38), or, "Not My will, but Thine be done" 
 (S. Luke xxii. 42), we may not, indeed, exclude the 
 thought that the Son in His Divine nature is in perfect 
 accord with the Father, but the phrases would have 
 little meaning if He who uttered them were not 
 supremely conscious of making a free creaturely 
 choice. 
 
 §11. 
 But while both natures in Christ are perfect, and 
 unimpaired by contact with each other, they are not 
 unaffected by their union. It does not quite satisfy 
 the mind to be told that the unity of Christ's 
 Person is the key to the mystery of the Incarnation. 
 For, in the first place, it would create a false impres- 
 sion if we made men think that the Person of the 
 Word was incarnate, but not His Nature ; whereas, 
 indeed, the whole point of the great transaction is 
 that it was the Incarnation of the Godhead — the 
 taking of the manhood into God, and the impartition 
 of the Godhead to man. And, in the second place, we 
 
HiLinan Nature aJzin to the Divine. 135 
 
 may riglitly ask — Was it really possible for the same 
 Person to be at once both God and man ? How could 
 the t^Yo forms of consciousness exist side by side in 
 the same subject ? 
 
 This is the point where faith has least to aid it. 
 We can do little more than revere, and wait in 
 silence for the fuller light that is to come. To be 
 sure that Christ is perfect God and perfect Man is the 
 great thing ; and this assurance we have. If we try to 
 investigate further the mutual relations between the 
 two natures, it must be in no curious idleness, but 
 to deepen our adoring gratitude. 
 
 But while much is dark to us, the main things 
 which we know about man and God in some measure 
 mitigate the difficulty. As has been stated before, 
 the natures of God and man are not contradictory 
 of each other, as life and death are, or holiness and 
 sin. To conceive of a union between such mutually 
 exclusive terms as those is impossible, but not 
 between God and man. The question was at one 
 time frequently debated whether, if it had pleased 
 Him, God could have become an angel, or a stone, 
 or a vegetable, instead of man. The answer cannot 
 be doubtful. Whatever may be in the abstract the 
 power of God, He could not will to do such a thing, 
 and it would not be possible for the nature of the 
 vegetable or the stone, or even for that of an angel, 
 to receive Him. There is no such affinity between 
 Him and them as to prepare the way for any direct 
 union with Him other than that which they already 
 have. Only through man, the high priest and 
 
13^ Hiimanity capable of the Incarnation.- 
 
 mediator of creation, can the rest of creation become 
 partaker of God. It Avould be false to say, as some 
 ancient thinkers did, that Deity and humanity are, at 
 bottom, the same thing ; for in that case there would 
 be no true Incarnation after all, — the Godhead would 
 merely have assumed, in the birth of Christ, one 
 fashion of its own being. But it is true to say that 
 humanity has not attained its jjerfection, and is like 
 an eye without the light, until it is crowned and ful- 
 filled by the Incarnation. It is not Deity itself ; but 
 it is a germ which, by correspondence with God's grace, 
 can grow up into being a true complement or counter- 
 part to Deity. 
 
 Thus there is nothing which outrages our reason 
 in the thought of a human nature being personally 
 united with the Divine and assimilated to it. It does 
 not destroy its humanity. Our bodies, even in this 
 life, are brought by discipline under the dominion 
 of the spirit to such an extent that we are not sur- 
 prised to learn what is their destiny hereafter. They 
 are to become spiritual bodies — bodies, that is, with 
 characteristics of the spirit imparted to them ; but 
 they do not for that reason become spirits, and cease 
 to be bodies. So we may believe the human nature 
 to be capable of such subservience to the Divine as 
 to receive many powers which were quite beyond 
 itself to develope, and yet to remain true human 
 nature from the first stage to the last, never parting 
 with any one of the distinctive features of manhood, 
 yet receiving a progressive conformation to the Divine. 
 This was what took place in Christ. His human 
 
Gradual expansion of Chrisis Manhood. 137 
 
 nature began at the beginning, and from the very 
 beginning it was the organ of the Divine. As growth 
 is human, it grew. " Jesus increased in wisdom 
 and stature, and in favour with God and man" (S. 
 Luke ii. 52). One faculty after another, in due order, 
 awoke, and exerted itself, and throve, and gained 
 strength. First came what seems the purely animal 
 life of infancy ; and then the dawning and expanding 
 reason ; and then the conscious spiritual life which 
 says, "Wist ye not that I must be in My Father's 
 house ? " (S. Luke ii. 49). And so the progress went 
 on, physical, intellectual, moral, spiritual, up to the 
 Transfiguration, and so to death and through death 
 to resurrection, and from resurrection to ascension, — 
 the whole harmonious human constitution appro- 
 priating more and more fully the Nature which dwelt 
 in it, and becoming a more and more adequate vehicle 
 for the Divine, yet never, even on the throne of 
 heaven, ceasing to be purely human, entirely '' con- 
 substantial with us." 
 
 §12. 
 
 It is, however, comparatively easy to imagine 
 how the human nature could lend itself to receive 
 the Divine. "The very cause," says Hooker, "of 
 His taking upon Him our nature was to change 
 it, to better the quality, and to advance the con- 
 dition thereof, although in no sort to abolish the 
 substance which He took, nor to infuse into it the 
 natural forces and properties of His Deity." Far 
 
138 Sclf-c))ipiyi)ig of tJic Soil of God. 
 
 harder it is to reach any intellectual notion of the 
 efifect of the union upon His Divine nature. How 
 was it accommodated to the conditions in which it 
 appeared on earth ? How was it made — to use a 
 favourite word of S. Cyril's — "hearable" to the in- 
 ferior nature which it assumed? Perhaps, if the 
 nature which it assumed had been from the first in 
 the full glory of its present maturity, the wonder 
 would not have seemed so great ; but how could the 
 Son of God become an embryo, a babe, a dying 
 and a dead man ? 
 
 One great saying of S. Paul's flashes upon the 
 subject all the light which in this life we are likely to 
 obtain. Exhorting the Philippians not to stand upon 
 their rights, but voluntarily, for love's sake, to give 
 them up to one another as not worth a contest, he 
 adduces the example of "Christ Jesus; w^ho, being 
 originally in the form of God, deemed it not a prize to 
 be clutched at to be " as He then was "on an equality 
 with God, but" by His own act "emptied Himself, 
 taking the form of a bondman, coming to be in the 
 likeness of men " (Phil. ii. G, 7). Piound this central 
 statement gather others of a less explicit nature. 
 What infinite suggestiveness lies in the reserve of 
 those similar words to the Corinthians : "Ye know 
 the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that for your 
 sakes He became poor, rich though He was, that ye 
 by His poverty might be rich " (2 Cor. viii. 9) ! The 
 Hebrews are told that He was "made a little" — or, 
 " for a little while " — " lower than the angels " (Heb. 
 ii. 9). IMorc faintly still, the same thought is con- 
 
Necessity of this Doctrine. 139 
 
 stantly implied wherever, instead of saying that our 
 Lord "came," or "came into the world," we are told 
 that He "came down " {e.g. S. John vi. 38; Eph. iv. 
 9). The mystery comes in sight again when our Lord, 
 in His last prayer, prays for the restitution of His 
 original glory as of a thing of which He had for 
 a time been dispossessed : " Now glorify Thou Me, 
 Father, with Thyself, with the glory which I had, 
 before the world was, with Thee " (S. John xvii. 5). 
 
 Perhaps the significance of these profound words 
 has as yet hardly been thoroughly explored in the 
 Church, and the doctrine which they contain may be 
 among the things which have yet to be worked out. 
 Certainly any refusal to believe in the self-emptying 
 of the Eternal Son, any attempt to minimise it and 
 explain it away, seems to impair the completeness of 
 the Incarnation. Unless we frankly accept the doc- 
 trine, difficult as it is, our Lord's earthly life assumes 
 to us an aspect of unreality. Without it, we must 
 either believe that the Child of Mary, even at His 
 bii'th and before, was fully aware of all things, and 
 felt Himself still in enjoyment of that equality with 
 the Father which S. Paul tells us He abandoned — 
 which would make of that sacred Infant a sort of 
 prodigy, of an unimaginable and hardly attractive kind, 
 destitute of real humanity — or, on the other hand, we 
 have to suppose that the Babe was not as yet really 
 and truly the Word Himself, but only mysteriously 
 annexed to the Word, while the Word Himself still 
 lived on, somewhere else, outside, so to speak, of the 
 human being, in uninterrupted exercise of all the 
 
140 Mystery of the Condcseension. 
 
 attributes of Gocllicad.-^ But to conceive of Christ's 
 Deity as somehow external to His Manhood would 
 seem to reduce the earthly career of Jesus to an 
 illusion, — the setting in motion of a human-looking 
 thing, not the real living of a human life. 
 
 The language of the Bible sets before us a mystery 
 quite as deep and as far beyond human intelligence, 
 but not so harassing and self-contradictory. Instead 
 of making us think of a Divine consciousness aloof 
 from the human, it tells of the one completel}^ lodged 
 in the other, and, for a time, conditioned by it. '•' In 
 Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead," says 
 S. Paul, "in bodily wise" (Col. ii. 9). This belief 
 involves many mysteries which we cannot solve. 
 We cannot understand how, in those days of His 
 humiliation, the Almighty Word was still carrying 
 on that work which He performs in nature and 
 history, and how from the new-born Babe still 
 radiated forth (as assuredly they did) those influences 
 which maintain the unity and order of the world. 
 We cannot understand how the essential life of God 
 
 * There is, perlmpsi, but one passage of the New Testament which 
 Eccnis to lend any direct countenance to this way of looking at things. 
 In the Autiioriscd Version, our Lord says to Nicodemus, " No man hath 
 ascended up to heaven, but He that came down from heaven, even the 
 Son of Man which is in heaven" (S. John iii. 13). The paradox hero 
 seems complete. He " came down ; " yet there Ho " is." But those 
 who have best right to speak tell us that the last clause does not stand 
 in the most ancient text at all. If it is an integral part of the Gospel, 
 it might, perliaps, be interpreted to mean that iieaven, altliough He lias 
 left it, is essentially the home of Him wlio is now Son of IMan ; or even 
 that, by constant fellowship with God, He lives upon earth an unearthly 
 life, conversant with heavenly realities, as S. Paul teaches tliat it 
 is our privilege also to do. 
 
Its Reality. 141 
 
 in heaven was affected by the coming down of the Son 
 into the created order. It may be a partial answer to 
 the former of these difficulties to say that God governs 
 the world, not, as we govern, by consecutive exertions 
 of attention and force, but by being to it what He is. 
 And for the second we must remember that the 
 coming down of the Son at His Incarnation is always 
 spoken of in Scripture as corresponding to a self- 
 sacrifice on the part of the Father, who " gave " Him. 
 In order to realise what privation in the fulness of 
 the Divine life is represented by the three and thirty 
 years' sojourn of Christ upon earth, or how the Word 
 could suspend (so to speak) His consciousness of 
 Divine knowledge and power to enter into earthly 
 conditions, we should need to understand, much more 
 fully than we do, the relations between time and 
 eternity. But our not understanding another side 
 of things must not be allowed to throw doubt upon 
 that side which we can understand. This, at least, 
 we must believe — that the little Babe which lay in the 
 manger of Bethlehem, with Its undeveloped mind and 
 spirit, was the Eternal Son, and nothing less. It was 
 the personal Word in all His fulness which was made 
 flesh ; and the Word was all made flesh at once. He 
 Himself ''dwelt among us." What men saw and 
 handled was the Word Himself. The Word Himself 
 became subject to time and space, to growth and 
 change. So true was the self-emptying on the part 
 of the Word as to give room for all the experiences 
 of a sinless humanity, from the blind life before 
 birth and onwards. Deity was not laid aside ; it 
 
142 The Self-emptying- a Proof of Poiver. 
 
 could not be ; but the exercise of some of its attributes 
 was, while the Word moved through the daj^s of His 
 humiliation. The glory of our Lord's redeeming love 
 is obscured if we lose sight of this. "In those very 
 homely facts and phrases," says an ancient Greek 
 writing formerly assigned to S. Athanasius, "lies 
 exactly the point of Christianity." 
 
 To part in appearance only with Divine preroga- 
 tives would be to impose upon us with a pretence of 
 self-sacrifice ; but to part with them in reality was to 
 manifest most perfectly the true nature of God. The 
 very act by which He laid aside the enjoyment of His 
 omnipotence was a proof that He was omnipotent. 
 " He emptied Himself." It was His own doing. If 
 He entered into the limitations of human knowledge 
 and of human power, it was because He chose to do 
 so; and all the time that those Divine powers were 
 (in the ancient phrase) " quiescent " within Him, they 
 still were His. Had He chosen to revoke His self- 
 emptying, there was nothing but Himself to hinder 
 Him. " The weakness of God," says the Apostle, " is 
 stronger than men " (1 Cor. i. 25) ; and, however it 
 might have appeared at the moment, on looking back, 
 at least, the self-suppression of Christ — that perfect 
 mastery of His glorious attributes, symbolized in the 
 prophetic vision by the "horns coming out of His 
 hand " (Hab. iii. 4), and displayed m " the hiding of 
 His power " — this is the greatest of His miracles. It 
 was, we may reverently say, the only way to show us 
 the Father. Men are too ready to look upon God as 
 crushing force and cold omniscience. Had Christ 
 
It makes Room to reveal Love. 143 
 
 aj)peared on earth with all His splendours about Him, 
 He would have perpetuated our mistake. But He 
 took another way. It is the very essence of the Word 
 to be the Divine expression of the inmost nature of 
 God. The inmost nature of God is love. And when 
 Christ emptied Himself of the exercise of omnipotence 
 and infinite knowledge, He did not empty Himself of 
 love. He divested Himself only of that which would 
 have dazzled and distracted us, in order that we might 
 see His love more perfectly. The self-sacrifice of 
 Bethlehem, leading on to that of Calvary, leaves no 
 room for doubt. The Babe, lying in the manger, is 
 the ''sign " (S. Luke ii. 12) which convinces us of a 
 richer theology than we could have guessed at, and 
 makes us cry, with the angels, " Glory to God in the 
 highest." 
 
Chapter VI. 
 ^l)c Atoning Moife of ®J)riSt, 
 
 Christ the A^atural Mediator bct^vcen God and Man by reason of His 
 Eternal Relations with Both — The Incarnation to have been expected 
 apart from Redemption — Redemption possible to God by other means 
 — Redetnption not the only benefit of the Incarnation — Incarnation 
 the Eternal Purpose of God— Simplicity of Catholic Doctrine of 
 Atonement — Chrisfs Life reveals to men the Character of God — Its 
 Meaning made explicit by His Words — The Reconciliation to be 
 effected not a mutual Reconciliation — // originates zvith the Father 
 Himself— Sympathy of the Father with the Sufferings of the Son — • 
 The Atomment reveals the Divine Hatred of Sin — Atoning Value 
 of Christ's Life as that of the Representative Man — Its Sinlessness 
 tested by Temptation — A Life of perfect Obedience — under Suffering 
 — and Death — Unique Character of Christ's Death — His Death 
 regarded as a Confession — Renal Natui-e of the Dereliction on the 
 Cross — No Substitution of Christ for Sinners — Salvation by the 
 Cross itself not by Theories concerning it. 
 
 Christ is the Mediator between God and the world bj- 
 no arbitrary act of selection. He is the Mediator 
 by nature, and the only complete Mediator who can 
 be imagined. This arises from the position which 
 Ho eternally occupies in relation to God on the one 
 hand, and to man on the other. 
 
 The Son of God is, as we have seen, the absolute 
 expression of the whole being and character of God. 
 
Christ the Archetype and Son of Ulan. 145 
 
 He is — even before and a^oart from creation — God as 
 revealed, the Liglit as streaming forth from the Source 
 of Light. Whatever communication can be made 
 from God to creation — angelic, human, or inferior — 
 must needs be made through the Son of God ; and 
 "whatever approach is made by creation towards God 
 must needs be likewise made through Him, and 
 cannot be made otherwise. This mediation of the 
 Son is as necessary for sinless as for sinful creatures. 
 When Christ says, ''I am the Way; no one cometh 
 unto the Father but by Me" (S. John xiv. 6), He 
 expresses, not a rule of privilege and of conventional 
 arrangement, but an inherent necessity of the case. 
 
 And as He is naturally the expression of God, so 
 is He naturally the Archetj^pe of man, who is made 
 after Him as his pattern. And by the Incarnation 
 the Word became really, what He always was ideally, 
 the j)erfect Man. We see Him as " the Son of Man." 
 This title, which He invented and chose for Himself, 
 signifies that He has, by actual derivation from human 
 parentage, everything that is characteristic of hu- 
 manity, even as, by actual derivation from His Father, 
 He has everything that is characteristic of Godhead. 
 He is not merely a man, as one out of many similars ; 
 nor merely man, as if in the abstract, and disconnected 
 from the rest of us ; nor the son of a man, as if He 
 obtained His humanity through some limited channel ; 
 nor a son of man, as if others might conceivably hold 
 the same sort of position in the race. He is " the 
 Son of Man," the supreme production of the human 
 kind, into whom all that is of the essence of manhood 
 
 L 
 
146 Christ the Son of A/an. 
 
 is fully poured. Though living under true historical 
 conditions, " of the seed of David " (2 Tim. ii. 8), and 
 educated as a Jew, He yet transcends all national 
 peculiarities and all the peculiarities of His age ; and 
 what S. Paul says of the mystical body of Christ 
 is true of Christ's own life, that it has not the 
 exclusive features of Jew or Greek, barbarian or 
 Scythian, bond or free, nor even of male or female 
 (Col. iii. 11 ; Gal. iii. 28). He is the perfect type of 
 them all. Not even any predominant excellences 
 are seen in Him : He is not the poet, or the statesman, 
 or the man of science, or the artist ; He cannot be 
 distinguished by the possession of the active or the 
 passive virtues. He is simply man, as man. It was 
 His, through the virgin birth, to gather up and 
 harmonize whatever true constituent of human nature 
 is found in fragments in us all, and so to be the fit 
 interpreter of the best side of every one of us. Hold- 
 ing, therefore, as He does, this twofold relation, as 
 the Son of Man and the Son of God, He is the natural 
 Mediator between the two, perfectly representing God 
 to man, and perfectly representing man to God. 
 
 §2. 
 
 There is no need to think that it was sin which 
 caused the Eternal Son to become man. The 
 mediatorial function is essentially His, and it seems 
 as if it could never have been thoroughly fulfilled by 
 anything short of an Incarnation. The Church has 
 not pronounced judgment on the question whether 
 Christ would have been incarnate had there been no 
 
Affinity of the Word for Creation. 147 
 
 Fall; but the advance of thought in two opposite 
 directions appears to converge upon the belief that it 
 would have been so. The naturalness and fitness of 
 the Incarnation in itself, apart from sin, is brought 
 out by considering alike the source, and the course, of 
 the work of creation. 
 
 In the first place, the source of creation is more 
 clearly seen than perhaps at any previous epoch 
 in the inner relations of the Persons of the Blessed 
 Trinity. We begin to have a richer understanding of 
 the affinity of the Word for creation, and to feel 
 increasingly how even His existence before the founda- 
 tion of the world was, in a sense, the basis and 
 beginning of it. His immanence in the world as its 
 guiding principle seems to have pointed forward to a 
 more explicit manifestation of Himself. The very 
 nature of the Son of God contains, we may say, a pre- 
 disposition to enter into the closest connexion with the 
 world and with man. S. Athanasius, after mention- 
 ing with approval the Greek speculation that the 
 universe is a great organic body, goes on significantly 
 to say, " If, therefore, the Word of God is in the world 
 as in a body, what is there strange in affirming that 
 He has also entered into men ? What is there in- 
 credible, if, being in men. He reveals Himself among 
 them? It is no strange thing if the Word, who 
 orders all things and gives life to all things, and who 
 willed a revelation to come through men, has used 
 a human body for the manifestation of the truth and 
 making known of the Father." 
 
 And, on the other hand, what we know of the 
 
148 Evoljition leads up to the Incarnation. 
 
 course of the history of nature leads up to the same 
 expectation. It is true that the doctrine of evohition 
 has not yet attained the consistency of proven fact ; 
 but enough is ah-eady certain to convince us that 
 there has been an onward and upward movement 
 in created things. The inorganic, the organic, the 
 sentient, have prepared for the rationah Man re- 
 capitulates them in himself, and takes authority over 
 them. But must the evolution stop there ? Here is 
 a being capable of knowing and loving God — a being 
 like to God, and with a "heart restless until it rests 
 in Him," a being capable (as we know now by blessed 
 experience) of appreciating an Incarnation. Can we 
 imagine that he was not intended to receive it, and 
 was not made for the purpose ? If it were so, it 
 would seem to stultify that upward striving implanted 
 in nature before sin came. It would be like the 
 sudden and unaccountable stopping short of some 
 series in a calculating-machine. The mind which 
 has followed the process of the evolution thus far 
 stands demanding that the final step should be taken. 
 The aptitude of the Word for becoming man, and the 
 aptitude of man for receiving the Word, together 
 claim the Incarnation as their natural result. Instead 
 of being surprised to find the AYord made flesh, we 
 might rather have been surprised had it not been so ; 
 and instead of turning to the Fall for an explanation 
 and a cause of the great mystery, we may wonder at 
 the imperturbable mercy which held on upon its 
 course in spite of man's rebellion. 
 
Some other Form of Redemption conceivable. 1 49 
 
 §3. 
 
 Neither have we a right so to limit the inventive 
 powers of the Creator as to say that sin could not 
 have been arrested and atoned for without the Incar- 
 nation. It attributes too great a skill to the author 
 of sin, if we try to make out that no resource was left 
 to God, if He wished to be rid of it, but to give His 
 Son to die for it. To have succeeded in reducing God 
 to such straits might well appear like a triumph for 
 Satan, even though the ultimate victory remains with 
 God. Sin can be made too much of. It is, indeed, a 
 vast and terrible factor in the life of the world. Of 
 necessity it occupies a great share of our attention. 
 All our thoughts are affected by its presence, and to 
 fight against it is, in a sense, the main business of 
 our lives. It may easily appear to us, then, as if 
 nothing short of the Divine Sacrifice could have 
 delivered us from it. Men sometimes have even 
 maintained that an infinite ransom for sin was 
 required, on the ground that the offence itself was 
 infinite. But this is not true. Sin is a finite thing, 
 and not an infinite. Those creaturely minds and wills 
 which embody it are themselves limited ; and it has 
 no existence outside of them. It cannot, therefore, be 
 measured and weighed in the balance against God. 
 If God's only object was to make an end of sin, we 
 may conceive of His being able to attain the object 
 without so stupendous an act as the Incarnation. 
 It has been argued that if anything less than the 
 Incarnation could have put an end to sin, God woxild 
 
150 Becomingncss of Redemption by Christ. 
 
 not have committed Himself to such a waste of power. 
 But this argument is based on the assumption that 
 to provide a remedy for sin was the sole purpose 
 of the Incarnation. If God had other, greater, 
 objects in view, the argument falls to the ground. 
 Some new start for the human race might, perhaps, 
 have been found ou a less exalted footing. The 
 writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews appeals, not to 
 our sense of logical necessity, but to our sense of 
 moral fitness, when he twice says that God's method 
 of redemption was that which in the circumstances 
 "became" Him (Heb. ii. 10 ; vii. 26). Not to have 
 redeemed at all, but to have left the world, however 
 guilty, to its usurping conqueror, would have been, as 
 S. Athanasius points out, in a high degree ** unbe- 
 coming and unnatural." But if it became God to 
 redeem, there was no way so becoming as that which 
 He took. And its becomingncss is brought out in a 
 peculiarly striking way, if we suppose that the Incar- 
 nation is no afterthought consequent upon the Fall, 
 but the very thing for which man was created. 
 Nothing could be so dignified and so touching as to 
 proceed simply with the Divine plan — not restoring 
 the world first, and then effecting the Incarnation in 
 humanity so restored; but fully accepting the Fall 
 and its consequences, and triumphing over it, and 
 even turning it to account, by the love which did in 
 spite of it what it had purposed to do independently 
 of it. 
 
Other Benefits of the Incarnation. 151 
 
 §4. 
 
 We are permitted, conversely, to perceive that the 
 Incarnation and Death of Christ have actually brought 
 us blessings far wider than the removal of sin. It 
 has often been pointed out that the Nicene Creed 
 itself suggests that the Son's condescension had other 
 purposes in view. " For us men," it says, "and for 
 our salvation He came down from heaven." The 
 two clauses do not mean precisely the same thing, 
 Christ had other benefits to bring to *' us men " 
 besides our salvation. 
 
 He has united the Godhead and creation in a way 
 in which nothing short of the Incarnation could (so 
 far as we know) have united them. The revelation 
 of God to man which we now possess through witness- 
 ing the historical life of Christ is infinitely clearer and 
 closer at hand than anything which we can imagine 
 vouchsafed in any other way. Through that great 
 transaction man is not merely restored to the first 
 estate which Adam occupied, but to one immeasur- 
 ably higher. Though still suffering from the cor- 
 ruption which the first Adam entailed to his 
 descendants, we are at the same time enriched by 
 the communication of the Divine nature in a way 
 which Adam never knew. And the gathering up of 
 the human race in Christ imparts a unity and solidity 
 to mankind, and to the universe through mankind, 
 which, so far as we can judge, was otherwise unat- 
 tainable, much exceeding the unity and solidity which 
 existed before the Fall, 
 
152 '' O fclix Culpa !'' 
 
 And are \\-e to suppose that these hcnefits would 
 never have been given to men hut for then* trans- 
 gression ? Are they indeed a premium upon human 
 disobedience ? Did God intend something less glorious 
 for humanity as He originally designed it, and 
 then, when He saw us in rebellion, devise for 
 us these overwhelming gifts ? In that case the 
 famous apostrophe, *' fd\x cidjxi ! " — "0 happy 
 fault ! " expresses a literal truth, and we have not only 
 to thank God for giving us a Redeemer, but to thank 
 Adam for drawing down to us, by his sin. One who was 
 so much more than a redeemer. The facts seem to 
 be against such a theory. We can hardly think that 
 God would have punished the race for loyalty to its 
 Maker by withholding what now He has bestowed, 
 and what He always knew Himself able to bestow. 
 Long ages after sin has disappeared from existence, 
 and almost from the memory of the saints, creation 
 will be rejoicing more and more in the abiding fruits 
 of the Incarnation ; and it seems inconceivable that 
 it should owe them all to its own aberration from the 
 Creator's original design. 
 
 §5. 
 
 That the Incarnation was not dependent upon the 
 Fall seems to be distinctly involved in more than one 
 passage of Holy Scripture, especially in S. Paul's 
 Epistles of the Captivity. He tells the Ephesians 
 that " before the foundation of the world " — there- 
 fore certainly before the Fall of man— God "elected 
 
The Incarnation eternally ptirposcd. 153 
 
 us, having predestined us unto adoption throngli 
 Jesus Christ unto Himself" (Eph. i. 4, 5); and that, 
 at length, He has ** made known to us the mystery of 
 His will, according to His good pleasure, which good 
 pleasure He purposed before in Christ unto a dispen- 
 sation of the fulness of the times," — that is. He was 
 reserving the announcement of His purpose until the 
 ripe moment should be brought about, — and this good 
 pleasure was " to sum up all things in Christ, the 
 things in the heavens, and the things on the earth, in 
 Him " (Eph. i. 9, 10). And again, S. Paul declares 
 himself commissioned '' to divulge what is the dis- 
 pensation of the mystery that has been hidden away 
 since the ages in God who created all things, that 
 now should be made known to the principalities and 
 the authorities in the heavenly places, through the 
 Church, the manifold wisdom of God, according to a 
 purpose of the ages, which purpose He formed in the 
 Christ, Jesus our Lord " (Eph. iii. 9-11). It may be 
 readily acknowledged that these passages, and similar 
 ones in the Epistle to the Colossians and elsewhere, 
 are more or less tinged by thoughts of redemption 
 and suffering, because S. Paul's purpose is rather 
 practical than speculative, and he deals with things 
 as they are ; but it is at least clear from them that 
 the Incarnation, and our union with and in the 
 Incarnate Son, was the eternal purpose of God, 
 formed before — that is, independently of — the actual 
 history of creation, and not devised after the event. 
 When the ** foundation of the world " was laid, it was 
 laid with a view to the Incarnation. The only 
 
154 ^'/'<" /t?// not purposed at all. 
 
 question is wliethcr the Fall itself and its reparation 
 was part of the fundamental design. 
 
 Those who hold that without it the Incarnation 
 would not have taken place are bound to consider that 
 the Fall, as an indispensable preliminary to it, was 
 eternally in the Creator's counsels ; and this is hardlj' 
 possible to maintain. That God foreknew, indeed, 
 the disobedience of His creature cannot be doubted ; 
 but that He intended and lolanned it, with the design 
 of thus repairing it, cannot be asserted without im- 
 piety. It would destroy all the sinfulness of sin, or 
 rather it would make God Himself the author of it, 
 and so sinful, if we could believe that His eternal 
 purj)ose involved sin as a necessary element. And in 
 that case the love also, which is shown in redemption, 
 is emptied of its glory; for its task is wholly self- 
 chosen and self-imposed. This we cannot think. 
 God's foreknowledge, we may say, is not an absolute, 
 but a contingent, foreknowledge. He exposes Him- 
 self to a risk in giving birth to limited free-wills, and 
 ventures on an experiment. ** It may be " is the 
 word which our Lord puts in His Father's mouth 
 (S. Luke XX. 13). The thing is not a dead certainty 
 beforehand. God is prepared for all emergencies, 
 and nothing takes Him by surprise ; yet the creature 
 does not merely execute a design laid down for it in 
 detail. There is room for movement and free play 
 between the Divine will and the creaturcly will. Thus 
 we may believe that, while the Atonement was from 
 eternity the conditional purpose of God, the Incarna- 
 tion was His unconditional purpose — that He willed 
 
Redemption conditionally purposed. 155 
 
 His Son to suffer and die for men if man should fall, 
 but to become man in any case.^ The drawing of the 
 creation into union with the Creator, " in the Christ, 
 Jesus our Lord," was contained in the very idea of 
 creation ; the circumstances and conditions depended 
 upon the way in which men might choose to act. And, 
 as it proved, men chose to act in that way which 
 served more than any other to manifest the strength 
 and tenderness of God's love. 
 
 §6. 
 
 In considering the redemptive work of our Lord 
 Jesus Christ, the human conscience demands that the 
 theory of it should be simple. No one can rest with 
 confidence upon what is, on the face of it, an artifice, 
 a scheme. What are called forensic doctrines have 
 seemed to satisfy many hearts, but only so far as they 
 were right metaphors, parables hinting at a fuller 
 truth which was consciously or unconsciously felt to 
 lie behind them. If our Lord's work be regarded as a 
 cleverly devised legal contrivance, it repels instead of 
 attracting ; or if it does not actually repel, it invites 
 criticism and admiration rather than worship and 
 
 ' The popular phrase, "the Lamb slain from the foundation of the 
 ■world" (Rev. xiii. 8), is not rightly quoted. A comparison with Eev. 
 xvii. 8 on the one hand, and Eev. v. 12 on the other, will show 
 clearly that the words, " from the foundation of the world," belong, not 
 to the participial clause, " the Lamb that is slain," but to the main 
 verb, " whose names have not been written." It refers, therefore, to 
 tlie predestination of those wlio are saved, not to the eternal nature of 
 Christ's sacrifice. This latter thought is expressed more clearly else- 
 where, as in 1 Pet. i. 20, where the words are, " before," — not merely 
 "from" — " the foundation of the world." 
 
156 Doctrine of Atonement must be Simple. 
 
 devotion. It is only when we strongly apprehend the 
 naturalness of it all that we are able to embrace it 
 with a hearty faith. Our Lord's redeeming work may 
 be infinitely complicated. It may have many more 
 aspects and a greater number of effects than we can 
 imagine. It would not be natural were it otherwise ; 
 for all that is natural is complex. But its complica- 
 tions must be those which belong to life, capable of 
 being resolved into a simple and majestic unity, and 
 not the complications of a studied mechanism. 
 
 This we firmly believe to be the character of the 
 Catholic doctrine of Eedemption. However deep it 
 goes, however subtle its adaptation to its purposes, 
 however varied its results, the whole of Eedemption 
 rises, as it were without an effort, out of the fact that 
 the Redeemer was what He was, and acted always 
 according to His nature. We have already drawn 
 attention to the truth that there was nothing far- 
 fetched in the choice of a redeemer, but that He who 
 undertook it, undertook it because it was His natural 
 place to do so. And in like manner, His method of 
 doing what He came on earth to do was natural and 
 simple. There was no going out of His way, no 
 straining after bye-ends and cross-purposes. From 
 moment to moment He lived the life which (being 
 what He was) He could not help living ; and it had 
 the infinite effects which (that life being His) it could 
 not help having. When He, to whom everything 
 pointed as the obvious Mediator between God and 
 men, began and carried through to the end His his- 
 toric work, His mode of operation was only this — to 
 
Need of Revelation of God^s Character. 157 
 
 be Himself, very God and very Man, and to act 
 becomingly in the circumstances. In the unity of 
 His Person all contradiction was reconciled, and the 
 same things which became Him as Son of God be- 
 came Him as Son of Man, and the very same line of 
 events showed Him throughout as the ideal repre- 
 sentative both of the one nature and of the other. 
 This double aspect of each and all of our Lord's works 
 must never be forgotten. He was not by one series 
 of acts showing Himself as Son of God, and by another 
 as Son of Man. There was in Him no alternation 
 between two parts which were to be played. He was 
 continuously and harmoniously both. Thus we may, 
 for clearness of study, contemplate His whole life and 
 death, first as the manifestation of God to man, and 
 secondly as the representation of man to God. 
 
 §7. 
 
 The true manifestation of God to man is the first 
 great need in the Atonement. For the main object 
 of the Atonement is a moral not a legal one. It is 
 not only satisfaction for past offences, but the removal 
 of sin for the future. And sin for the future can only 
 be precluded by fully persuading the wills of men to 
 give it up. And the only chance of their being able 
 to give it up lies in their being brought into frank and 
 normal relations with God Himself. This was an 
 impossibility for man as he was. His alienation from 
 God was too deep to be easily got over. He had 
 learned to travestie and caricature to himself the 
 nature and mind of God in a thousand ways. The 
 
158 Mots Misconceptions of God 
 
 more unlike to God he became, so much the more he 
 " thought wickedly that God was even such an one as 
 himself" (Ps. 1. 21). To the minds of the heathen in 
 general, God was no better than men, and would con- 
 demn Himself if He condemned them ; or He was 
 indifferent to their actions, and, as an early con- 
 troversialist against Christianity affirmed, was "no 
 more angry with men than with apes or flies ; " or 
 God was capricious and revengeful and implacable, 
 and the utmost that could be done w^as to endeavour 
 to keep Him in good temper with fair words and 
 frequent offerings ; or perhaps He appeared, as in 
 some of the higher Gentile sj^stems, and to some 
 amongst the Jews, as a sternly pure being, extreme 
 to mark what was done amiss, who might give a 
 happier lot in another world in exchange for ascetic 
 self-torture in this, or for rigid observance of a rule more 
 exact than that which He had Himself imposed. But 
 in whichever way the error travelled, mankind at large 
 had lost the true conception of God as a righteous 
 Father; that is, as One who must needs be at war 
 with sin wherever sin was to be found, but who at 
 the same time loved men with an intense and personal 
 affection, and was therefore impelled equally by love 
 and by righteousness to seek to deliver them fi'om sin. 
 This w^as the character displaj-ed in Christ to draw 
 men back to God. Prophets among the Israelites 
 had striven to portray such a character ; and more 
 dimly moral philosophers among the Gentiles had 
 set forth fragments of it. But the fullest of inspired 
 descriptions could not have the same eflect as the 
 
removed by Chris fs Life and Words. 159 
 
 sight of an actual life lived among men, simply and 
 necessarily exhibiting at every turn the mind of God. 
 In all the infinitely varied circumstances of that life, 
 in dealing with saints and in dealing with sinners, 
 there was one continuous manifestation of the Father's 
 heart ; so that without a touch of exaggeration Christ 
 could say, *'He that hath seen Me, hath seen the 
 Father" (S. John xiv. 9). For although they did not 
 see the Father in person, they saw One who not only 
 resembled Him exactly, so that there was nothing in 
 the Son unlike that which was in the Father, but He 
 whom they saw was so entirely one with the Father 
 that He could have no imaginable being apart from 
 the Father, nor the Father apart from Him. 
 
 §8. 
 
 Our Lord's words "gave articulate and explicit 
 expression to the message of His life. What He did 
 and was amongst men no doubt proved the most 
 eloquent way of setting forth the truth about God. 
 Yet as words without deeds are disbelieved, so deeds 
 without words are misunderstood. If our Lord had 
 been content to work His miracles and say nothing 
 about the God who had sent Him, or, in His own 
 phrase, if He had "come in His own name " (S. John v. 
 43), He would have had it all His own way. Men might 
 even have contrasted Him invidiously with the God 
 whom they so misinterpreted. But with the utmost 
 persistence and vigilance He made it His rule to 
 trace every deed of His, and every word, to its source 
 in the Father's heartj as something " given " Him to 
 
i6o Christ reveals God's Fatherli'ness. 
 
 do or to sa}'. He claimed to be the absolute and 
 only exponent of the Father's mind. Amidst all the 
 di£fercnces between the Fourth Gospel and the others, 
 this great feature stands out perfectly clear in all 
 alike : " No man knoweth the Father save the Son, 
 and he to whomsoever the Son is pleased to reveal 
 Him " (S. Matt. xi. 27). And the main characteristic 
 of the new revelation is precisely that fatherliness of 
 God towards men. The language was indeed not 
 entirely new to men. Isaiah had said, " Now, 
 Lord, Thou art our Father" (Isa. Ixiv. 8); and S. 
 Paul could quote a heathen testimony of like nature, 
 "We are also His offspring" (Acts xvii. 28). But 
 not only were such expressions rare before ; — they 
 were mainly intended to appeal to a fatherhood of 
 origination rather than to a fatherliness of disposition. 
 And while Christ revealed more clearly than ever that 
 God was the ultimate source of our being, He revealed 
 in a still more striking and persuasive way that the 
 heart which is the source of our being is truly, and 
 in spite of all our sin, a Father's heart. It is by the 
 perfect way in which He did this, by word and deed, 
 that Christ is to us the ideal Prophet. 
 
 §9. 
 
 The gift of His Incarnate Son, even prior to the 
 thought of what the Son did for us, was a proof of 
 the Father's good will. It is difficult to understand 
 how, in the teeth of Holy Scripture, some misrepre- 
 sentations of the doctrine of the Atonement, formerly 
 popular, but now fast vanishing away, can ever have 
 
The Reconciliation not mutual. i6i 
 
 come to exist. The expression found in the AngHcan 
 Articles, that Christ suffered " to reconcile His Father 
 to us," is one for which a true meaning can indeed 
 be found, but which is not itself scriptural. Often as 
 S. Paul uses the words " reconciliation " and " to 
 reconcile" (KoraXXayrj, KaraXXao-o-HV, ctTTOKaraAXaa-ffEii') 
 of the work of Christ, he never uses them (nor does 
 any other New Testament writer) of the reconciliation 
 of God to His creature, but always of the reconciliation 
 of the creature to God. A different compound of the 
 verb i^iaSXaaativ), a slight modification of the con- 
 struction, would have suggested that a mutual recon- 
 ciliation of the two parties was effected through the 
 good of&ces of Christ, who had the interests of both 
 parties equally at heart. But S. Paul will give no 
 colour to any theory of the kind. Christ's mediator- 
 ship is not of such a sort. He does not occupy a 
 ground of friendly neutrality between contending 
 parties; He is entirely on the side of both. He 
 arranges no compromise or accommodation between 
 them ; He exacts to the utmost the full claims of God, 
 while He obtains for man terms infinitely better than 
 man would ever have dreamt of. 
 
 For indeed, as S. Paul's language appears 
 studiously to convey, the alienation is not a mutual 
 alienation. The estrangement is wholly on one side. 
 It is only the offending party which demurs to a 
 relation of sweet concord. The One who alone has 
 had cause of complaint has never been unwilling to 
 heal the breach. It is true that God has been deeply 
 displeased and grieved and angered, , and even, we 
 
 M 
 
i62 God not estranged fro7n Man. 
 
 might say (though the expression is not in the Bible), 
 " offended." So long as men cleave to their sin, He 
 cannot, of course, deal with them as if they had never 
 done wrong or as if they were penitent for it. But 
 He has never turned away from them, except for 
 purposes of gracious discii^line, and has never ceased 
 for an instant to make the most generous advances to 
 them, and to devise ways by which the race, and each 
 individual member of it, may be brought into such 
 conditions that the forgiveness which He longs to 
 bestow may be actually bestowed and accepted. 
 
 If, indeed, the Father had been in any other 
 sense "offended" with men, Christ could not have 
 undertaken to mediate. To imagine it would be to 
 separate the Son from the Father in a way altogether 
 impossible. There can be no division of will or 
 thought between the Two ; for the Two are not only 
 in moral agreement, but are one in actual essence. 
 What the Son loves, the Father loves, and to the 
 same degree. What the Father hates, the Son hates, 
 and to the same degree. The one can be no kinder 
 and no sterner than the other. It is the will of the 
 Father, as much as it is the wiU of the Son, to redeem 
 mankind. 
 
 But more than this. The relation of the Son to the 
 Father is such that the Son cannot be regarded as 
 the originator of the scheme of redemption. Human 
 imagination has depicted Him as coming forward in 
 the councils of Heaven, and offering to solve the 
 problem by an incarnation and death. It is, however, 
 clear that the Eternal Word initiates and can initiate 
 
Salvation specially ascribed to the Father. 163 
 
 nothing in the Divine schemes. So to suppose would 
 be to make two Gods. Our Lord perpetually speaks 
 of Himself as " sent." He speaks of a commandment 
 given to Him, which He obeys. The Father has not 
 accepted a spontaneous offer of self-sacrifice on the 
 part of the Son, but has Himself imposed the self- 
 sacrifice upon Him ; while the Son, in that absolute 
 union with the Father which is, by the Spirit, a free 
 and loving union, rejoices to devote Himself to the 
 task which glorifies the holiness and love of the 
 Father. Thus it comes about that the Atonement is 
 constantly spoken of in Scripture as in a special 
 sense the Father's work. In the Pastoral Epistles, 
 which exhibit S. Paul's final and most matured 
 thought, the most frequent title of the Father, not 
 used by him before, is that of " God our Saviour " 
 {e.g. 1 Tim. i, 1). He still, indeed, speaks of Christ 
 also, as is natural, under the title of Saviour (as 
 2 Tim. 1. 10) ; but he seems at the same time to 
 delight in tracing our salvation to its yet deeper 
 origin in the mind of the Father, who has saved us 
 through His Son. 
 
 §10. 
 
 Nor is the good will of the Father towards men 
 displayed in having merely desired their salvation, 
 and willed that His Son should undertake it. Even 
 the nature and extent of the sufferings of Christ are 
 adduced by the sacred writers as a proof and measure 
 of the Father's love towards us. It is not only the 
 love of Jesus Christ Himself which is shown by the 
 
164 Christ's Sufferings prove God's Love. 
 
 Cross. The love of the Father is, in a pecuhar 
 manner, credited with it all. If it be true to say of 
 Christ, " He loved me, and gave Himself for me " 
 (Gal. ii. 20), it is no less true to say, ** So God loved 
 the world, that He gave His only begotten Son " 
 (S. John iii. 16), and " Herein is love, not that we 
 loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to 
 be the propitiation for our sins " (1 S. John iv. 10) ; 
 and again, to take the witness of another Apostle, 
 " The love of God hath been shed abroad in our 
 hearts through the Holy Ghost which was given to 
 us. For Christ, while we were yet weak, in due time 
 died for ungodly ones. For scarcely for a righteous 
 man will one die (for the good man, indeed, perad- 
 venture some one may even dare to die) ; but God to 
 us commendeth His own love, because, while we were 
 yet sinners, Christ died for us " (Eom. v. 5, 6). 
 
 There is, indeed, this element of truth even in 
 Patripassianism. It was, of course, impossible, in 
 the nature of things, that the Father Himself should 
 be incarnate, and should suffer and die for us, while 
 the Son remained aloof. Any imagination of the kind 
 must spring out of a Tritheistic idea, and ignores the 
 necessary relations of the Blessed Persons. But the 
 Father cannot have been indifferent to the sufferings 
 of His beloved Son. The impassibility of the God- 
 head, which we rightly maintain — that is, God's 
 superiority to anything inflicted upon Him from with- 
 out — does not mean that He is incapable of feeling. 
 If words mean anything, God is capable of grief and 
 joy, of auger and of gratification; though there is 
 
The Father ivounded through the Son. 165 
 
 nothing which can force upon Him such states of 
 feeling without His being wilHng to endure them. It 
 would be a defect, not a perfection, if it were other- 
 wise. We can, therefore, guess from the feelings of 
 earthly parents that the suffering and grief of the 
 Father, in delivering up His Son for us all, was even 
 greater than what He would have endured if He 
 could have borne it all in His own Person. A 
 pious cottager, on hearing the text, " God so loved 
 the world," exclaimed, " Ah ! that was love ! I could 
 have given myself, but I could never have given my 
 son." If this be true, we may read in the Crucifixion 
 not only the indignation and pain of the Father at 
 men's sin, but the intensity of His love for the sin- 
 ners, which made Him willing to endure such anguish, 
 a thousandfold the more acute for being inflicted, not 
 on Him, but on One dearer than Himself. 
 
 The prophet foretold this wounding of the Father 
 through the heart of the Son, when he said, " They 
 shall look on Me whom they have pierced, and shall 
 mourn for Him" (Zech. xii. 10). Convinced of the 
 love which we have outraged by our sin, we are forced 
 into an attitude of penitence. Penitence is nothing 
 else but love, convicted of having injured the beloved. 
 Nothing purges the soul of sin like penitence. No 
 conviction of the abstract righteousness of the law, 
 still less any pressure from fear of the consequences 
 of sin to our own souls, would have bred that passion 
 for holiness which springs up naturally when the heart 
 perceives what has been the mind of God towards it 
 throughout. Thus the Cross of Christ reconciles men 
 
1 66 GoiVs Righteousness cleared by the Cross. 
 
 to God by making them abhor and abjure sin. There 
 is no standing out against it. " The love of Ch;.'ist con- 
 straineth us " (2 Cor. v. 14). 
 
 §11. 
 
 But the doctrine of the Atonement would lose all 
 its meaning for us, if we were to suppose that Christ 
 aimed at nothing else but turning men from sin for 
 the future ; or if we could believe that He aimed only 
 at shewing that God still cared for us. The Atone- 
 ment had also a retrospective side. It revealed the 
 judgment of God upon past sin also. It was most 
 necessary that the character of God should be clearer'. 
 The ** silence" which God had kept (Ps. 1. 21) in 
 view of men's sins was mercifully designed. He 
 '* winked at the sins of men, because they should 
 amend" (Wisd. xi. 23). A premature disclosure of 
 all His burning indignation would have terrified men 
 into despair, and would have frustrated the attempt 
 to rid them of sin. But this reticence on the part 
 of God was liable to be misunderstood. It might 
 have been thought that, after all, God did not care 
 much about men's sin ; that He was easy, good- 
 natured, indulgent ; that on occasion, indeed, He used 
 strong words against sin, but that His words were 
 sterner than His deeds. To remove such a miscon- 
 ception was, to say the least of it, as marked a feature 
 of the Atonement as the demonstration of His love. 
 "God," says S. Paul, "set forth Christ Jesus to be 
 a propitiation, through faith, by His blood, to shew 
 His righteousness, because of the passing over of the 
 
Christ represents the Human Conscience. 167 
 
 sins done aforetime in the forbearance of God, — for 
 the shewing, I say, of His righteousness at this 
 present season : that He might Himself be just, and 
 the justifier of him that hath faith in Jesus " (Rom. 
 iii, 25, 26). And, indeed, unless we bear this in 
 mind, the Cross is no very cogent proof of love. It 
 is only in proportion as we recognise the hatefulness 
 of sin in God's eyes — His perfect loathing and detes- 
 tation of having anything to do with it — that we see 
 the magnitude of the sacrifice which He made for us, 
 in not only bearing so long with it, but at last giving 
 His Son to hear it. It was this identifying of His 
 Son for our sakes with all that God most abominates, 
 which shews the depth of His fatherliness : "He made 
 Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we 
 might be made the righteousness of God in Him " 
 (2 Cor. V. 21). 
 
 § 12. 
 
 So far we have considered the atoning work 
 of Christ as a true exhibition of the mind of God 
 towards sinful men, both in its stern and in its tender 
 aspect, thus at the same moment wooing them and 
 warning them back from sin to God. But our 
 Redeemer is as truly man as He is God. He repre- 
 sents, therefore, with equal fidelity, the response of 
 the human conscience to the revelation thus made. 
 He redeemed mankind by the perfectness with which 
 He responded to it. 
 
 "We may, perhaps, consider first the response as 
 shewn in His life. It is a loss to the Church when 
 
1 68 Nis Life fnoi'c iJian an Exainple. 
 
 the redemptive character of the life of Jesus upon 
 earth is forgotten, and when His death alone is con- 
 sidered in that light. When this is the case, the three 
 and thirty years of His sojourn come to be regarded 
 as serving only to set an example to men, or as a 
 time of teaching and preaching. If attention turns 
 at all to His life in itself, apart from its didactic 
 effect, the life wears the look of being only a neces- 
 sary preliminary to dying, or at best of qualifying for 
 a work of atonement at the close. 
 
 We do not mean to deny that such views of our 
 Lord's life are true, but to assert that they are only 
 partial. It is most important, for instance, to con- 
 sider our Lord as the Example and Pattern whom we 
 are to imitate. He revealed to men in His life the 
 true ideal of manhood, as well as the true conception 
 of God. The one revelation was as necessary as the 
 other, for both had been equally obscured. Mankind, 
 as S. Athanasius says, was made to be a picture of 
 the Eternal Son ; but the picture was become so 
 blurred and begrimed, that it could not be restored 
 without the appearance of Him whose portrait it was 
 intended for. He shewed us by example what is the 
 true relation of the creature to the Creator. He 
 shewed us what sonship is, and in His conduct 
 towards men He shewed us also what brotherhood is. 
 
 But His life was far more than an example for us. 
 As such, it would have daunted us at least as much 
 as it would have stimulated, because Christ did not 
 start with our disadvantages. Christ's life had a 
 value on our behalf quite independent of its moral 
 
Christ's Life fulfils the Ideal for Man. 169 
 
 effect on us. It had a value on our behalf towards 
 God. He lived, as He died, the true Eepresentative 
 Man. He displayed before the eyes of the Creator 
 His own ideal for mankind perfectly realised. Once 
 more there was something in mankind upon which 
 the regard of God could rest with satisfaction. One 
 generation of men after another had come and gone 
 since the first Fall, and all had been sinful. Some 
 men had been better than others, and offered points 
 of hope ; but all had proved faulty. It was a series 
 of disappointments and failures. There was nothing 
 which came up to the requirements of God, nothing 
 which did not in some degree move the Holy One to 
 displeasure and abomination. It seemed as if Satan's 
 triumph over the race was complete and irreversible, 
 and that all men must necessarily sin. But such an 
 induction would have been hasty. It would have 
 ignored a fundamental fact in the conception of 
 humanity. The members must not be reckoned 
 without the Head. Humanity without Christ is not 
 humanity. It is, as an able writer has pointed out, 
 the mistake of the Positivist Eeligion to think so, and 
 to worship humanity to the exclusion of Christ. But 
 if it is a mistake to exclude Christ and worship what 
 remains of humanity, so is it a mistake, by the exclu- 
 sion of Christ, to reckon humanity as lost. Even if 
 we could consider Christ as a private individual 
 human being, yet, if He is really human, there is at 
 least one sound spot in human nature. But Christ 
 is not, and cannot be, a private, casual, human being. 
 He occupies the unique position of the Second Adam, 
 
170 Christ necessaj^ily impeccable, 
 
 the necessary "Head of every man" (1 Cor. xi. 3). 
 Therefore, until Christ be fallen, humanity is not 
 wholly lost. Christ's perfect life offers a firm rallying- 
 point for all that is human to gather round. In spite 
 of the defection of many, God sees in Him what He 
 desired to see ; and as at the first bright beginning 
 of human life in Eden, He could say that it was 
 " very good " (Gen. i. 31), so, looking down again upon 
 human life in Jesus, He could bear testimony, " This 
 is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased" 
 (S. Matt. ill. 17). 
 
 §13. 
 
 The Second Adam, no less than the first, had to 
 pass through His probation. That probation of the 
 Incarnate Son is by no means easy to understand. 
 Any firm grasp of the facts of the case makes it clear, 
 to begin with, that Christ could not sin. To suppose 
 Him peccable, however sinless, or fallible, however 
 free from actual error, betrays a Nestorian conception 
 of His Person ; it shews that He is thought of as pos- 
 sessed of a double personality — a Divine Being lodged 
 in a man. 
 
 Christ is a single Person, and that Person is a 
 Divine Person. In that accommodation of Himself 
 to human limitations which S. Paul speaks of as 
 "emptying Himself" (Phil. ii. 7), He by no means 
 emptied Himself of His essential holiness ; He only 
 caused that holiness, like His love, of which it is a 
 part, to manifest itself under new conditions. But 
 the conditions under which this indefeasible holiness 
 
yet fully liable to Temptation. 171 
 
 was manifested were those of a real and a progressive 
 human natm-e. The Divinity of His Person did not 
 hft Him up out of the reach of natural human wants 
 and impulses. Quite the contrary. Amongst our- 
 selves, an intellectual man is sometimes so absorbed 
 in his intellectual pursuits as to become oblivious of 
 lower necessities. But with Christ this was not — at 
 least not usually — the case. He was never " absent." 
 It was part of His perfection to be keenly alive to 
 everything. When we read that on a certain occasion 
 Jesus " troubled Himself " (S. John xi. 33), voluntarily 
 breaking up the serenity that was natural to Him, in 
 order to enter with conscious completeness into the woe 
 with which He was surrounded, we have an illustra- 
 tion of what was habitual to Him. His very Divinity 
 made it possible for Him more fully than for others to 
 taste the ingredients of human life. And although, 
 by His freedom from original sin, He had none of the 
 vicious and depraved desires which are congenital to 
 us, and could only think of such with an instinctive 
 abhorrence, yet, being human. He could ngt fail to be 
 tempted by the same things which had tempted our 
 first parents. Bodily pains and pleasures found in 
 Him the most exquisitely sensitive nerves to which 
 they had ever appealed. He had a human intellect 
 and imagination, of which Aristotle, Alexander, Dante, 
 Eaffaelle, Beethoven, afford feeble and stunted types ; 
 and it cannot have been easy to forego the prospects 
 opened out by the possession of such powers. His 
 human spirit met its peculiar trial, in the very close- 
 ness of its association with the Divine nature. 
 
172 Christ actually tempted more than others. 
 
 Although, therefore, He could not fall. He could 
 be tempted. There was no risk of His choosing 
 wrong, but He felt the hardship of choosing right. 
 His human nature could not be torn away from the 
 Divine — that is, from Himself ; but it could be racked 
 by the strain of keeping up with it. The very fact 
 that His human nature was healthy, and could only 
 be inclined to things good in their kind, made it all 
 the harder to sacrifice them to a higher purpose. We 
 may truly say that our Lord not only could be tempted, 
 but that He had a greater susceptibility to temptation 
 than any other human being. And at the same time, 
 the crafts and assaults of the Tempter were more art- 
 fully and more persistently concentrated upon Him 
 than upon any other. It is a mistake to suppose that 
 He was only tempted during the forty days in the 
 wilderness. Those forty days were a fierce and typical 
 outbreak of new temptations such as He had been 
 incapable of before His Baptism ; but we are signifi- 
 cantly told that, at the close of them, the devil 
 departed from Him " for a season " (S. Luke iv. 13). 
 It was a short lull, and the storm was but gathering 
 strength to burst upon Him again. 
 
 And as the temptation was true human temptation, 
 so was the victory true human victory. It was not, 
 indeed, the victory of a man overcoming by sheer 
 force of human will without the assistance of Divine 
 grace ; but neither was it the victory of a God, over- 
 coming by His Divine force, and silencing and ignor- 
 ing His human feelings. It was the victory of One 
 who had thrown His whole self into human conditions, 
 
Christ conquers Temptation as Man. 173 
 
 and fought with no weapons but those which are 
 common to men, such as prayer and fasting and 
 vigilance. Christ's life was a life of faith, like that of 
 His brethren (Heb. ii. 13). If His spotless character 
 was appealed to by those who wished to emulate it, 
 He taught them the secret of its spotlessness by point- 
 ing them to the source from which they, as well as 
 He, might derive holiness. *'Why callest thou Me 
 good? there is none good save One, that is, God" 
 (S. Mark x. 18). It was not, we may believe, by 
 drawing upon a reserve of superhuman powers of His 
 own that Christ resisted temptation while on earth, 
 but by a humble and creaturely dependence upon 
 God. That position of dependence He could not have 
 abandoned without ceasing to be Himself, which was 
 impossible ; but His human faculties freely chose the 
 position. 
 
 When the Church teaches that Christ was im- 
 peccable, she teaches no arbitrary dogma. The 
 inability to sin was not a mechanical inability, the 
 result of inherent apathy towards the objects of 
 temptation ; still less was it the result of any sys- 
 tem of special protections. The fulness of Christ's 
 humanity presented an almost infinite frontier to 
 assault ; and there was no spot at which the assault 
 was not attempted. " He was in all points tempted 
 like as we are, yet without sin" (Heb. iv. 15). 
 
 § 14. 
 
 But to say that Christ was sinless — " as a lamb 
 without blemish and without spot " (1 S. Pet. i. 19) — is 
 
1 74 Christ not only sinless, bnt perfect. 
 
 but one side, the negative side, of His redeeming life. 
 It represents a larger and more positive notion to 
 speak of Plis life as perfect. It was not only unsullied 
 by sins of commission, but its splendour was undi- 
 minished by an}^ sin of omission. Nothing was lacking 
 to it. Not that it was a perfection stereotyped from 
 the first, and unchangeable. It was a perfection that 
 increased and developed from year to year. Conceived 
 without sin as He was, the initial fashioning of His 
 human nature was a perfect fashioning. He became 
 a perfect Infant, a perfect Boy, a perfect young Man. 
 He would not have been so, had He possessed at three 
 years old, or at thirteen, the mature powers of the 
 man of thirty ; for a perfect childhood must mean a 
 perfect compliance with all the conditions of child- 
 hood. Gradually the holiness which was never absent 
 from Him was absorbed by His human natm'e, and 
 made more and more consciously its own. The will 
 of the Father, which in infancy had been instinctively, 
 though perfectly, obeyed, became, as He grew older, 
 the freely chosen rule of His life. He not only yielded 
 to it when made known to Him ; in His own pregnant 
 phrase, He " sought " it. " I seek not Mine own will, 
 but the will of Him that sent Me" (S. John v. 30). 
 He thus "learned obedience " (Heb. v. 8), not because 
 He was ever in any degree disobedient, but because 
 obedience is not fully obedience so long as it is a bHnd 
 compliance with a command, but only when it can 
 enter intelligently into the whole counsel of him who 
 commands. When, therefore, the Hfe of Christ is said 
 to be a perfect life, it involves an appalling range of 
 
Christ s hnmense Responsibilities. 175 
 
 intelligent obedience. The humbler the position is, 
 the more easy it is to be perfect. As men rise in the 
 scale, the relations of life become more complicated, 
 and responsibilities more difficult to meet. And 
 Christ's life was beyond all comparison the most 
 complicated in its relations and responsibilities of all 
 that have ever been lived. It was a simple thing to 
 be a good little child, a simple thing to be a good 
 young man at the carpenter's bench in Nazareth; 
 but no man, — no emperor with all his political and 
 social power for good or ill, no pontiff with "the 
 care of all the Churches " weighing upon him, — has 
 such a delicate and difficult task to acquit himself 
 of as that of Jesus. He had all mankind, all history, 
 to think of ; and the welfare of every individual human 
 being depended upon each act, word, and thought of 
 His. He was not called upon to live the life of a per- 
 fect man of one restricted type, but the life of a perfect 
 Head of the Eace. And He did it perfectly. The 
 exacting eye of God Himself could find nothing left to 
 desire. At no moment in all that life could a single 
 detail have been altered, except for the worse. 
 
 §15. 
 
 There is one point in our Lord's life of obedience 
 on which it is necessary to enlarge somewhat more. 
 His position was not that of a Head of the Eace in the 
 normal condition of the race. The difficulty of the 
 position was aggravated beyond our power of thought 
 by the disordered state of things into which Christ 
 came. The first Adam had been tempted, but he had 
 
1 76 Christ's Obedience tested by Suffering, 
 
 not been tempted through suffering. Obedience would 
 have cost hira nothing but self-restraint. Everything 
 was made easy for him. But for the Second Adam 
 everything was made hard. He "learned obedience 
 by the things which He suffered " (Heb. v. 8). He 
 was called upon, not only, like the first man, to hold 
 back fi-om an abuse of endowments, but to endure 
 every variety of pain and penalty for His adhesion to 
 the Father's will. The guiltless heu* to the throne of 
 David was born an outcast in a stable. In early 
 infancy, a plot against His life drove Him hastily 
 into exile. In youth. He laboured at a trade, amidst 
 the privations of a poor and bereaved home. Then, 
 when He came into public life, after the fasting and 
 afflictions of the wilderness. He became " acquainted 
 with grief " (Isa. liii. 3) in every shape which it assumes. 
 Besides the homeless state, which His own words 
 shew that He felt acutely — " The Son of Man hath 
 not where to lay His head " (S. Matt. viii. 20) — the 
 subsistence on the uncertain charity of others, the 
 bodily hunger and thirst and weariness, the heat and 
 cold, the loss of friends by death, He had the deeper 
 sorrows of failure and rejection, of involving others in 
 His own calamities, of misunderstanding and contempt 
 in His own family, of furious hatred and cruel and 
 wilful misinterpretation from the representatives of 
 religious authority, of fickle and insincere attachment 
 on the part of multitudes whom He had benefited 
 in soul and body, of desertion by every one of His 
 followers, of being sold by one and denied with oaths 
 and curses by another, and at last as it seemed, of 
 
Christ's Joy in Obedience. 177 
 
 being disowned and forsaken by God Himself. It 
 was not only through innocence, it was not only 
 through obedience that Christ redeemed us ; it was 
 through obedience tested and perfected by suffer- 
 ings so manifold in their character, so ingenious in 
 their combination, and so overwhelming in volume, 
 that no imagination short of His could comprehend 
 them. And the glory of the obedience lies in this — 
 that Jesus, so far from flinching from doing the will 
 of God at such a cost, found joy and happiness and 
 contentment in doing it. " Lo, I come (in the volume 
 of the book it is written of Me) to do Thy will, My 
 God : I am content to do it, yea, Thy law is within 
 My heart" (Ps. xl. 7, 8). "If ye keep My com- 
 mandments, ye shall abide in My love ; even as I 
 have kept My Father's commandments, and abide in 
 His love. These things have I spoken unto you, that 
 My joy might remain in you, and that your joy might 
 be full" (S. John. XV. 10, 11). 
 
 §16. 
 
 The obedience of our Lord's life was crowned by 
 the obedience of His death. " Being found in fashion 
 as a Man, He humbled Himself and became obedient, 
 even to the extent of death, yea, the death of the 
 Cross" (Phil. ii. 8). In one sense it was the most 
 fitting, in another sense the most unfitting end to 
 such a career. Man, we are given to believe, had not 
 always been intended to die, like the lower animals. 
 Though his terrestrial life was not designed to be 
 
 N 
 
1 78 Meaning of tJie Transfiguration. 
 
 infinitely prolonged, it was designed to lead up to a 
 splendid departure. 
 
 Such a splendid departure was actually, at one 
 moment, as it seems, within the reach of Jesus. The 
 Transfiguration was, we can hardly douht, the begin- 
 ning of that glorious passing away into other con- 
 ditions, which was the appropriate close of our 
 Lord's perfect human development. So far as His 
 own personal probation was concerned, all had by 
 that time been accomplished, and nothing remained 
 but to take the reward. Two saints of the Old Testa- 
 ment, who had themselves passed away by other than 
 the ordinary gates of death, were seen appearing, to 
 welcome Him as "that which was mortal" in Him 
 began to be "swallowed up of life," and He drew near 
 to be " clothed upon with His habitation from heaven " 
 (2 Cor. V. 2, 4). But those who heard the colloquy be- 
 tween our Lord and them, heard them, "in glory" 
 themselves, speak of a different kind of " exit (i' ^oSov) 
 which He should accomplish at Jerusalem " (S. Luke 
 ix. 31). He tore Himself back from the open door, to 
 mix a while longer with a "faithless and perverse 
 generation," bidding His disciples to say nothing 
 about it, till He should be "risen from the dead." 
 It was part of His duty, as the sinless Head of the 
 sinful Eace, to go on as He had begun. He had not 
 demanded exemption from the lesser sufferings which 
 His brethren had brought upon themselves ; nor would 
 He demand, nor accept, exemption from the greatest. 
 He had received such a commandment from His 
 Father — to lay His life down, and take it again 
 
Voluntary Character of Christ's Death. 1 79 
 
 (S. John X. 18) ; and He did not hesitate to do it. 
 He did not die because He must, but because He chose. 
 It was this free renunciation of His right to a 
 triumphal end, prompted by love to men and obedience 
 to the Father, which gave its atoning value to His 
 death. "It was not His death which was well 
 pleasing," says S. Bernard in famous words, "but the 
 will by which He chose to die." His death may not 
 be isolated from His previous life. It was a supreme 
 and concentrated exhibition of that which had all along 
 characterized Him — ^joyful and perfect creaturely 
 obedience under the test of the severest suffering. 
 The Apostle regards the whole life of Jesus, cul- 
 minating in His death, as a single and undivided 
 act of righteousness, all of one piece, and far out- 
 balancing by its absolute conformity to the Divine 
 will Adam's fatal error. " As through one trespass 
 the judgment came unto all men to condemnation, 
 even so through one act of righteousness i^iKaiwiia) 
 the free gift came unto all men to justification of 
 life : for as through the one man's disobedience the 
 many were made sinners, even so through the obedi- 
 ence of the One shall the many be made righteous " 
 (Rom. V. 18, 19). 
 
 §17. 
 
 Men often wonder why Jesus shrank from death 
 with such horror and repugnance. While a Socrates 
 and a Seneca can move towards death with calm 
 composure, Jesus is seen to be " sore amazed and 
 overwhelmed with anguish (lK6aiui(3dadai koX adri- 
 
i8o Christ considered as ^'tasting'' Death. 
 
 jiovtlx')." " My soul," He says, " is exceeding sorrow- 
 ful, even unto death " (S. Mark xiv, 33, 34). It is as 
 though He had never fully felt till that moment what 
 death would be, although He had long lived in 
 contemplation of it ; and now it almost kills Him even 
 to anticipate it. Why was it so ? 
 
 A striking phrase in the Epistle to the Hebrews 
 seems to touch the point. Jesus was made "by the 
 grace of God on behalf of every man to taste death " 
 (Heb, ii. 9). It has been nobly shewn by a modern 
 writer that Jesus alone of all men has truly tasted 
 death. Some men are naturally stolid and apathetic : 
 they lack the imagination requisite for tasting death. 
 Some purposely refuse to contemplate what would 
 unman them, and steadily string their nerves to 
 endure it, whatever it may be. To Christians, the 
 bitterness of death is gone, just because Christ died 
 and rose again ; and they can hardly be said to die at 
 all, but to pass from a less desirable scene of life to 
 a more desirable. But when Christ, in His human 
 spirit and soul and body, confronted death, no one 
 before Him had passed through death victoriously. 
 Its terrors were as yet undiminished ; and Jesus knew 
 that it lay with Him to put an end to them by ex- 
 hausting them. He was not secured against those 
 terrors by any indifference, either natural or assumed. 
 He refused the stupefying draught, which was offered 
 Him. He resolutely set all His human faculties to 
 sound to the depths the dreadfulness of dying. So 
 far from casting Himself upon His Divine impassi- 
 bility, He lent, we may say, His Divine nature to 
 
special Horror of Crucifixion. i8i 
 
 extend His human consciousness into an infinity of 
 suffering. Not a circumstance was allowed to be 
 wanting which could aggravate the inherent horrible- 
 ness of death. 
 
 Perhaps the world might have been redeemed, had 
 He died for it in Seneca's comfortable bath, or by 
 Socrates' narcotic poison ; but S. Paul adds it as a 
 grave factor in Christ's obedience, that He was not 
 only obedient even unto death, but that that death 
 was "the death of the Cross" (Phil. ii. 8). What 
 .the Eomans, who inflicted it, thought of crucifixion is 
 well known. Servitutis extremum summumque suppli- 
 cium is what Cicero calls it ; and he declares that the 
 Latin language contains no word strong enough to 
 describe the crime of inflicting such a punishment 
 upon a Eoman citizen, however bad he might be. 
 But to the Jew, who looked upon everything in 
 a religious light, it was far worse. A peculiar sense 
 of malediction had, in a half superstitious manner, 
 gathered about punishments of this kind, owing, or 
 partly owing, to the variously interpreted words of 
 the Law, "He that is hanged is the curse of God" 
 (Deut. xxi. 23). Any other form of execution, even 
 stoning itself, seemed kindly when compared with 
 this hoisting up of the naked and pierced body 
 between earth and heaven, as if rejected and abhorred 
 by both. And no element in all this complication of 
 horrors passed untasted by Jesus. The bodily tor- 
 tures, the indignities and shame, the sense of failure, 
 the fear, the hatred with which His love was requited, 
 — all this, and much more, was felt by Him with a 
 
i82 Sin tJie Sting of Death. 
 
 sensitiveness which has had no parallel, and which 
 was able both to analyse it into its constituent parts, 
 and to weigh it altogether in its solid completeness. 
 He drained the cup until He had sucked out the very 
 dregs. 
 
 §18. 
 
 The physical and imaginative terrors of death, 
 though acutely felt by our Lord, were a small part of 
 His sufferings in dying. Its connexion with sin is 
 the "sting" of death (1 Cor. xv. 56). Human death 
 is, as we have said, an unnatural thing. For Christ 
 to bear the earlier pains of His life was a great 
 condescension, because pain follows normally upon 
 transgression of the laws of the universe, not upon 
 perfect conformity to them. Being in a disordered 
 world, however, it was impossible that He should 
 escape some pains. But that, after He had cheer- 
 fully borne all else, He should yield up His life itself 
 as a forfeited thing, seems almost more than could 
 have been expected. Christ, by His perfections, had 
 fully established His right to live ; and God called 
 upon Him to die. It was tantamount to demanding 
 of Him a confession of sin. Perhaps this is the light 
 in which it is easiest for the devout mind to lay hold 
 upon the Atonement made by Christ. 
 
 If we try to imagine, apart from revelation, what 
 would be the necessary elements in an act of repara- 
 tion for past wrong-doing, we can hardly think of 
 anything else besides an adequately contrite acknow- 
 ledgment of it, coupled with a perfect and effectual 
 
An Atone^nent necessitates Confession. 183 
 
 resolve to do the very opposite from thenceforth. 
 Merely to cease from ■wrong-doing in the future, while 
 saying nothing about the past, would clearly be 
 insufficient. But it would as clearly be insufficient, 
 if, even along with the cessation of the offence, an 
 external punishment for the past were inflicted. A 
 truly righteous being like God could never be satisfied 
 with exacting penalties which left the mind of the 
 offender unaltered. He must needs require that the 
 offender should come to look upon his offence with 
 the same eyes as Himself. The sinner must be made 
 to regard the sin in its true light, and to measure it 
 with the true measurement. This once fully done, it 
 is difficult to see what more is wanting to a satisfactory 
 reparation. 
 
 This is just what the sinner is unable by himself 
 to do. He cannot fully confess or feel his sin. The 
 sin itself impedes him. His eyes are blinded by it, 
 and his conscience benumbed. He has lost the ideal 
 of holiness, and therefore cannot appreciate the con- 
 trast between the ideal and the actual. None but a 
 perfectly healthy and pure conscience can adequately 
 take in the heinousness of sin, or adequately give 
 expression to it. But Christ could do this. Having 
 no sin of His own to dull His perceptions. He could 
 feel to the full the demands of a holy law, and 
 acknowledge their unalterable justice ; and therefore 
 He could gauge the extent to which His brethren had 
 fallen short. He would be able to give an absolute 
 and unwavering consent to that wrath of God which 
 went out against sin — not deprecating it, not begging 
 
184 CJwisi s Sympathy with the Divine Wrath, 
 
 that it might be appeased with anything less than 
 justice, not minimising the sin against which it went 
 out, effecting no kind of composition with it, but 
 going the whole length with it, and sympathizing 
 with its entire reach and range of indignation and 
 fury. 
 
 This is involved in describing Jesus as a " faith- 
 ful " High Priest (Heb. ii. 17 ; iii. 2), a " righteous " 
 Advocate (1 S. John ii. 1). Such a complete and 
 exhaustive concurrence in the Father's judgment 
 upon sin is even spoken of as sustaining our Saviour 
 through* the anguish of His task. He was taking, 
 not only giving, revenge for the outrage done by sin. 
 " The day of vengeance is in My heart, and the year 
 of My redeemed is come. And I looked, and there 
 was none to help " — not one who was able to take the 
 same view of sin as He took — " and I wondered that 
 there was none to uphold ; therefore Mine own arm 
 brought salvation unto Me ; and My fm-y, it upheld 
 Me " (Isa. Ixiii. 4, 5). But it was not the fury of one 
 who assented to the chastisement of some guilty third 
 person. The wrath of which He so deeply felt the 
 justice blazed forth upon Himself. It was this which 
 gave it so terrible a power. On Him was laid "the 
 iniquity of us all" (Isa. liii. 6). He felt Himself to 
 be identified with His brethren for weal and for woe. 
 Though it was no fault of His that they had sinned, 
 He was in a manner held responsible for them. Their 
 shame was His shame, their guilt His guilt. Stand- 
 ing to them in the relation in which He stood, He 
 could not disown them ; and He would not if He 
 
and with the Shame of His Brethre7i. 185 
 
 could. He loved them too well for that. He had 
 espoused their cause because He loved them, and 
 therefore He must suffer with them and for them. 
 And if His work was to be well and lastingly done, so 
 as to need no repetition and no supplementing, He 
 must, once for all, taste the whole bitterness of sin, 
 even of the sin of all mankind, He must, as repre- 
 senting the conscience of the race, feel a loving, filial, 
 submissive sorrow for sin, which should not only be 
 sincere and good as far as it went, but which should 
 cover the whole field which had to be covered. It 
 was His lot to realise to the utmost item in His own 
 Person all that each individual conscience ought 
 to realise when it is piercingly awakened to the 
 righteous claims of God on the one side, and to 
 the base selfishness with which it has met them on 
 the other. And if such an awakening is bitter to the 
 guilty conscience, how much more to the sinless ! 
 Often a pure-hearted mother will feel the disgrace and 
 wickedness of her son more profoundly than the son 
 himself does even in his most contrite moments. So 
 Christ, we may believe, felt the torture more deeply 
 than the whole world of penitents could feel it, when 
 the iniquity of all men was borne in upon His pure 
 human conscience — not indeed as His own, but as 
 more than His own, because it was the iniquity of 
 those whom He so loved. There is a kind of selfish- 
 ness in penitence for sins of our own, but none in 
 such a penitence as this, where love for the offender 
 and love for the Offended, in all their combined force, 
 were converted into an agonized sense of the offence. 
 
1 86 Christ's Death, in what sense penal. 
 
 And this was not to be done by an act of contem- 
 plation only. All through life Christ had been made 
 to bear the loathsome pressure of other men's sins 
 encompassing Him. But during all that time He 
 stood in some measure aloof from them. It was His 
 death which made the union with men complete. It 
 broke down the last barrier between His Person and 
 ours, and let in upon His soul the whole flood of our 
 transgression, to be expiated and purged and done 
 away by the satisfactory thoroughness with which 
 Christ's broken heart admitted it, grieved over it, and 
 repudiated it. In such a death, voluntarily accepted, 
 Christ made the faithful response of the human con- 
 science in view of the broken law of God 
 
 §19. 
 
 That Christ's death was in a true sense penal, is 
 clearly conveyed to us in Holy Scripture, though it 
 has been denied by pious and tender souls of our own 
 time. ** The chastisement of our peace was upon 
 Him " (Isa. liii 5). But when it is asked what the 
 penalty was, the answer must be sought in some such 
 considerations as the foregoing, not in anything more 
 outward and adventitious. It was the death itself 
 which formed the penalty — only death realised and 
 tasted. Christ did not bear our sins in addition to 
 dying, or die in addition to bearing our sins. His 
 death — Christ being what He was, and feeling it as He 
 did — was itself the bearing of our sins. Thus the 
 natiuralness and simplicity of the Atonement are 
 preserved. 
 
Christ s Isolation in Death. 187 
 
 But there was one feature in Christ's Passion 
 which deserves a separate mention, because it wears 
 most clearly the penal aspect, although strictly it 
 was an integral part of His "tasting death." The 
 sins which He bore were so completely laid on Him, 
 as to produce upon His personal consciousness the 
 sense of being Himself cut off from God. *' My God, 
 my God," He cried, in the words of the Psalm, 
 " why didst Thou forsake Me ? " It was the hour in 
 which the Son's " self-emptying," spoken of by S. Paul 
 as begun in the Incarnation (Phil. ii. 7), was consum- 
 mated. '' Non solvit imionem," says S. Leo, " sed suh- 
 traxit visionem." The Divine fellowship between the 
 Father and the Son was not annulled, but, for the 
 time, it was not actively enjoyed. It was Christ's 
 own will and the Father's that it should be so. His 
 Godhead seemed to retreat and withdraw itself into 
 His manhood, so that there might be no alleviation 
 to the anguish which the manhood felt, and which 
 the Godhead alone enabled it fully to feel. It was 
 made to bear the weight in absolute isolation. No 
 human sympathy reached it from below the Cross, 
 and no Divine sympathy from above. That heart 
 which was distended even to bursting, with entire love 
 to both, had to endure the sense of estrangement from 
 both, as if all sin were concentrated in His own Per- 
 son, and were abhorred and disowned by God and 
 man alike. And the sense of estrangement from God 
 is the greatest pain that can be conceived of. Even 
 to feel the active exercise of His wrath, as when it 
 says, '* Upon the ungodly He shall rain snares, fire 
 
1 88 Mystery of the Derelict tan. 
 
 and brimstone, storm and tempest ; this shall be their 
 portion to drink " (Ps. xi. 6) — this would be a less 
 thing to bear, especially to a holy soul, than the 
 freezing sense of a calm, deliberate, inexorable 
 abandonment. Indignant punishment is a sign of 
 love that is pained; but forsaking shews only 
 aversion and dislike. The transport of anger might 
 spend itself and subside ; but there is a hopelessness 
 about God's judicial dereliction of the soul which 
 gives it the appearance of being eternal and irrever- 
 sible. If S. Paul's description of the state of the lost 
 is exact, '' eternal perishing from the face of the 
 Lord " (2 Thess. i. 9), then it may even be said that 
 our Lord knew by experience on the Cross the 'poena 
 damni. It was not, of course, the case that the 
 Father had rejected Him, or was personally wroth 
 with Jesus ; nor did He feign to do so ; but man was 
 under condemnation, and must be made to realise 
 what really the condemnation was; and Jesus was 
 man, and could alone realise for us the extent, and 
 the righteousness, of the condemnation. So it was 
 brought home to Him in dying that He was perfectly 
 identified with us. Our sins rolled like an ocean 
 between Him and God, and out of the deep of it He 
 cried, " My God, my God, why didst Thou for- 
 sake Me ? " 
 
 §20. 
 
 It will be seen that, on this view of the Atonement, 
 there is no need to resort to the language of substitu- 
 tion, which has so often alienated thoughtful minds. 
 
StibstihUion not the Scripture Doctrine. 189 
 
 That language is neither scriptural nor ancient, and 
 therefore has no special claim upon the adhesion of 
 the Christian conscience. Indeed, it seems to be 
 studiedly excluded from the New Testament. There 
 is but a single saying of our Lord's which appears to 
 teach it, where He says, " The Son of Man came not 
 to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give 
 His soul a ransom instead of many " (S. Matt. xx. 28 ; 
 S. Mark x. 45). But the preposition which is here 
 used, and only here {avri), belongs to the notion of 
 "ransom." It cannot now be doubted that the 
 notion of *' ransom " in this connexion is meta- 
 phorical, and must not be pressed into a dogma. To 
 accept it literally would involve us in the question 
 whether the ransom was paid to God or (according 
 to some early exponents) to the devil. If we adopted 
 the former alternative, it would involve us in the 
 further question — what ransom Christ paid instead of 
 us, so that we need not pay it. Not bodily death, for 
 we all die; not eternal damnation, for (if it is not 
 blasphemous even to deny such a thought) Christ was 
 not eternally damned. But as a fact, the very idea 
 of ransom is not strongly felt in the metaphor. In 
 the New Testament itself, Moses is spoken of as sent 
 to be " a ransomer " (Acts vii. 35) of the Israelites. 
 The word is the same ; but no one would maintain 
 that anything was paid by Moses for the deliverance 
 of the people. Therefore it would not be true to say 
 that the statement, " Christ gave His soul a ransom 
 instead of many," is the same as " Christ died in- 
 stead of many." The preposition is a part of the 
 
IQO Impossibility of Siibstitution. 
 
 metaphor. And as if to take away any occasion of 
 misunderstanding, S. Paul, when citing our Lord's 
 expression, alters the form of it : " Who gave Himself 
 a ransom on behalf of all {hvTWvrpov virlp iravTwv) " 
 (1 Tim. ii. 6). He exchanges the unusual preposi- 
 tion, which would denote a substitution, for the usual 
 one, which denotes simply an action in another's 
 cause. 
 
 So far, therefore, as the language of the New 
 Testament goes, there is no reason for supposing our 
 Lord to have been substituted for us in His Passion. 
 But the objection to a theory of atonement by substi- 
 tution lies deeper than the meaning of a preposition. 
 If the one object of the Divine justice had been to 
 inflict a condign punishment, perhaps the theory 
 might have been more tolerable. But we have seen 
 that such was not the case, and that an equivalent 
 penalty could not satisfy God, instead of the removal 
 of the sin. Even had it been otherwise, however, it 
 runs counter to all our best conceptions of justice 
 that penalties should be inflicted in that fashion. 
 We can understand a just penalty being remitted to 
 the "offender at the intercession of a powerful friend. 
 We can understand such a friend undertaking any 
 pains and dangers, any obloquy and humiliation, the 
 loss of his property, the loss of life itself, in promoting 
 the cause which he has espoused. The greater his 
 self-sacrifice, the more powerful will his interces- 
 sion be. The whole world, both of nature and of 
 men, teems with sufferings which are in that sense 
 vicarious, as borne by one for the sake of another. 
 
Atonement by Union with Men. 191 
 
 They constantly move our compassion and our ad- 
 miration. There is nothing contrary to our feel- 
 ings if such self-sacrifices, perhaps of a wife or of 
 a father, are taken into account, and the penalty of 
 the offender is mitigated in consequence ; especially 
 if there are signs that the offender himself is 
 moved to amendment by the love displayed on his 
 behalf. But that a legal tribunal, professing to 
 act on principles of strict justice, and to visit speci- 
 fied oifences with fixed penalties, should accept the 
 offer of an innocent party to undergo the penalty 
 in the stead of the guilty, would be totally im- 
 possible. 
 
 But, indeed, such vicarious sufferings as we have 
 spoken of point us, not to the thought of a legalised 
 substitution, but to that of something far deeper. 
 They serve as types of the Atonement made by Christ, 
 because they shew the union, the solidarity, existing 
 throughout the world, and (in all the more marked 
 examples) because they shew love as the great bond 
 of union. There is no bare substitution ; there is 
 vital connexion, free and sympathetic identification. 
 Such is the position of our Redeemer in the world. 
 He cannot be substituted for man ; He is Man. One 
 thing cannot be put in the stead of another unless it 
 distinctly is another. But our Lord is not another. 
 He has made Himself one with us. He has gathered 
 us up into Himself. His love binds each one of us 
 to Him so closely that He does not feel Himself to 
 be apart from us. The difference of person, indeed, 
 remains, or there would be no reciprocity of love ; 
 
192 Naturalness of the Doctrine. 
 
 but He is " consubstantial with us," even as He is 
 ■with the Father. In the completeness of the union 
 ■which His mercy has effected with us, all that is ours 
 has become His — our sin included ; and all that is 
 His has become ours — even that righteousness which 
 swallowed up and expiated our sin. On our behalf 
 He suffered, but not in our stead ; and He undertook 
 for us that we too should suffer, that we should share 
 His mind about sin, and should abhor ourselves for 
 it, and die to it, as He died. He made Himself " a 
 Surety" (Heb. vii. 22) for us, laying down His own 
 life as a pledge that we, by faith, should one day 
 become like Him. 
 
 §21. 
 
 This consideration of the Saviour's Person gives a 
 majestic unity and consistency to the whole doctrine 
 of the Atonement, and makes it appear, not a strained 
 and artificial transaction, but natural and simple, and 
 in harmony with what we know and with what we 
 feel. It is just in itself, and becoming to God. The 
 Divine purpose is not allowed to be thwarted ; the 
 very obstacles placed in its way are made the trophies 
 of its power. Evil is not overborne by violence; 
 there is so much of truth in the old notion of the 
 devil being fairly treated ; it is conquered by moral 
 means, by love entering unarmed upon the combat, 
 and inspiring the sinful race with a new determina- 
 tion to be holy. Though God is the author of the 
 Atonement, and without Him fallen humanity would 
 have been unable to offer it, yet it was made by Man, 
 
The Atoneinent a Fact, not a Theory. 193 
 
 acting in the true conditions of man's nature. Full 
 reparation is made for all that has been done wrong, 
 and security is given for the ultimate extirpation of 
 the sinful principles. 
 
 And yet, however we may labour to set forth in 
 human words the nature and character of the Atone- 
 ment, it is certain that no complete account of it 
 can be given. It is too far-reaching for our under- 
 standing. We are, no doubt, intended to inquire 
 about it, to dispel false notions about it, to bring 
 together facts which throw light upon it. But there 
 is a danger in doing so, lest men should rest in a 
 theory of redemption rather than on the fact itself. 
 We are not saved by what we think about the Cross 
 of Christ, but by the Cross itself. It is of great 
 importance that we should adoringly ask of our Lord 
 the meaning of His Passion ; but those who under- 
 stand least of it as a system of philosophy are often 
 those who best know its power by experience. Calvary 
 is not in the first instance a school for theologians, 
 but a refuge for penitents ; and S. Paul tells us that 
 he deliberately refused, at least on one scene of his 
 labours, to set forth the Atonement as a doctrine, lest 
 it should lose force as a historical action. " Christ 
 sent me to preach the Gospel," he says ; and he adds, 
 ''not in wisdom of words, that the Cross of Christ 
 should not be emptied " (1 Cor. i. 17). 
 
Chapter VII. 
 
 Effects of Death jipon Christ's Spirit ami Body — Ilis Resurrection and 
 Ascension — Neiv IVork of the Risen Lord, in Intercession, and in 
 the gift of the Spirit — Person and Procession of the Holy Ghost — 
 His relation to the Human Nature of our Lord — Characteristic 
 Function of the Spirit in the World — Difference betiveen His Work 
 before the Incarnation and since — Birth and Illumination of the 
 Church — The Church Christ's Visible Embodiment — The Com- 
 munion of Saints, 
 
 §1. 
 
 Our Lord's death was a real and complete death : He 
 "became dead" (Eev. i. 18), and remained so, according 
 to Jewish modes of counting, for three days. During 
 that time, He did not return to heaven and His Father 
 (S. John XX. 17). He condescended to endure all the 
 limitations which are essential to the state of death. 
 The Apostles' Creed, in its latest form, follows out that 
 thought in its twofold consequences for body and for 
 soul. He was " dead, and buried : He descended into 
 hell." It is commonly said that our Lord's Divinity 
 was not withdra^Yn from either part of His human 
 constitution. This may be imphed by the way in which 
 both the Creed and the Scriptures still identify each 
 of the separated parts with Himself. His body is 
 
Christ'' s Descent into Hell, 195 
 
 still in a sense He, and so is His spirit. *' There laid 
 they Jesus " (S. John xix. 42), is as true a statement 
 as that ''neither was He left in Hades " (Acts ii. 31). 
 If we do not believe that He was in this way really 
 and truly dead, we lose the significance of His 
 Besurrection. 
 
 But death did not benumb and paralyse His 
 spiritual faculties. On the contrary, by it He was 
 " quickened in spirit " (1 Pet. iii. 18), so as to be able 
 to perform a work of mercy and power. Stripped of 
 the bodily integument, but still invested with His 
 human spirit, " He went and preached to the spirits 
 in prison " (1 Pet. iii. 19). Not only did He vouch- 
 safe the blessing of His company to the faithful dead 
 in Paradise (S. Luke xxiii. 43), but according to S. 
 Peter He penetrated — assuredly not Himself to suffer 
 there any more — into the place or state where some 
 at least were confined who had died an apparently 
 impenitent death by the visitation of God. What 
 was the exact purport and effect of His activity among 
 them we are not told, but only that He preached 
 to them, a " gospel " (1 Pet. iv. 6). The power of His 
 Passion was already being felt in the unseen world, 
 ev-en before His Eesurrection. 
 
 And in like manner His dead body, in the world 
 of sense, gave signs of what was to come. The wound 
 which was inflicted by the soldier's spear, was only 
 given because the body was "dead already;" and 
 if it had not been dead, the wound would have caused 
 death. But, as Professor Westcott has pointed out, 
 the " blood and water " which issued from the wound 
 
196 Effect of Death on Christ's Body. 
 
 were not a sign of death. Blood does not readily flow 
 from an ordinary corpse. The separation of the blood 
 and the water, or serum, which takes place in such a 
 rupture of the heart as our Lord is thought by some 
 to have died of, would be the beginning of decomposi- 
 tion and corruption; and the sinless flesh of Jesus, 
 tliough subject to death, was not subject to corruption 
 (Acts ii. 31). We ought, therefore, rather to see, in 
 the outpouring of the blood and water, a sign that 
 the dead body of Christ was being prepared for the 
 coming Eesurrection. And more than this. What 
 the soldiers did, and what they did not do, were alike 
 full of symbolical import. Unconscious of the signifi- 
 cance of their own action, they were providentially 
 guided to a double fulfilment of prophecy, and set 
 forth mystically the method which redemption was 
 about to follow. The unviolated frame, which had 
 been typified by the Paschal Lamb, of which not a 
 bone was to be broken, taught the undivided unity of 
 the Church which was to be : and the pierced side, with 
 its twofold out-flow, expressed the communication of 
 her Bridegroom's life to that Church, — the blood a true 
 fountain for her sin, and the water for her unclean- 
 ness, — which gifts were to be conveyed to her until the 
 end of the age in the two Gospel Sacraments (S. John 
 xix. 32-37 ; with Ex. xii. 4G, Zech. xii. 10, xiii. 1). 
 
 §2. 
 
 It does not enter into our present scope to examine 
 the historical evidence for the fact of our Lord's 
 Besurrection, but to show its doctrinal significance. 
 
Reality of His Resurrection. 197 
 
 The importance of the fact is so great, that the whole 
 structure of the Church, and the whole hope and belief 
 of Christians, rests upon it. " If Christ hath not been 
 raised," says S. Paul, "then is our preaching vain, 
 your faith also is vain " (1 Cor. xv. 14). He goes on 
 to speak of the whole Apostolic message as a grave 
 misrepresentation of the character of God, if it should 
 be found that the Eesurrection never took place. It 
 is therefore of much consequence that the nature of 
 the Eesurrection of Christ should be rightly appre- 
 hended. 
 
 The Church cannot be satisfied with the theory 
 which,'under various forms, has of late years appeared 
 to some minds a sufficient account of the matter, — 
 namely, that the personality of Jesus had so wrought 
 upon His disciples, that after His death they could 
 not resist the impression that He was spiritually alive 
 and near them, and that they saw visions of Him, — 
 whether as the natural result of their exalted state of 
 feeling with regard to Him, or by the special inter- 
 position of God. It is enough to say that the evidence 
 which we have is not of such a character. "What the 
 disciples experienced was not a subjective impression, 
 however spiritually correct, — except in the same sense 
 as all our physical perceptions are subjective. They 
 saw, not a ghost, but a body, which they handled, and 
 felt it to be built up of flesh and bones, — which 
 uttered words, — which assimilated the food they 
 offered to it, — which at frequent intervals during six 
 weeks presented itself to them, when assembled, as 
 weU as to single persons, and remained with them in 
 
198 Christ rose to a Neiv Life. 
 
 conferences of long duration. The Eesurrection of 
 our Lord brought Him back into a living relation with 
 material and jmlpable things. 
 
 But on the other hand it would be as gross a 
 depravation — to say the least of it — of the Gospel 
 teaching, to suppose that our Lord's Eesurrection 
 was a return to the natural and earthly conditions to 
 which He was before subject. The nature of the 
 "spiritual body" is a matter which we shall have to 
 consider hereafter. Suffice it to say here, that the 
 Eesurrection of our Lord was not merely a proof of 
 His continued existence, nor merely a proof of His 
 being indeed the Son of God, nor merely a proof of 
 the success and acceptance of His atoning death, but 
 it was a revelation, and a most unexpected revelation, 
 of the nature of the new life. It was clearly seen that 
 the new life is not a simple continuation of this, — like 
 the life to which Lazarus or the child of Jairus 
 returned, — but something far higher. 
 
 Nor was the Eesurrection of om- Lord only an 
 exhibition for our benefit. By it Jesus Christ Him- 
 self went through a distinct change in the mode of 
 His human existence. It would not have been a true 
 revelation to us, if this were not the case ; it would 
 have been only a feint, like the Docetist notion of 
 the Incarnation. Our Lord's own Person reached a 
 further point by it; and He gained through death 
 that spiritual condition into which He had looked at 
 His Transfiguration. 
 
 But even in rising again from the dead, our Lord 
 had not attained the full reward of His life's work and 
 
Nature of the Ascension. 199 
 
 His death's merit. For our sakes He allowed Himself 
 to be for forty days detained on His heavenward way, 
 —in an exalted state indeed, — possibly in one of 
 gradually advancing glory — but not in that of His 
 final exaltation. The Ascension was needed to com- 
 plete what the Eesurrection began. By it He passed, 
 not only into a spiritual, but into a glorified condition. 
 It was the great resumption of everything which in 
 His " self-emptying " He had laid aside. He entered 
 once more upon the full enjoyment of all His Divine 
 glories and prerogatives. Every humiliating restric- 
 tion and limitation was for ever at an end. In the 
 figurative language of Scripture He once more " sat 
 down on the right hand of God " (Heb. x. 12). He 
 sat down Incarnate, not, as before the Incarnation, 
 in His Divine nature alone : but He sat down en- 
 riched by the nature which He had assumed, not 
 clogged and impoverished and weakened by it any 
 more. The humanity which He wore was in no way 
 annulled or dehumanised, though the conditions under 
 which it acts are to our present faculties inconceivable. 
 Every constituent of our nature is still there, and 
 still truly human, only carried into the highest per- 
 fection of which it is capable, and answering with 
 ease and readiness to every demand which is made 
 upon it by that adored Person whose it is. 
 
 That perfection it will not leave when our Lord 
 reappears upon the scene of this lower world in His 
 Second Advent. The Second Advent will not, like 
 the first, involve a change in the conditions of His 
 personal life, — at least not in the direction of con- 
 
200 Effects of Christ's Resurrcctioit. 
 
 desccnsion. Wc expect Him to become visible again, 
 not to the cya of faith only, but to that of unbelief 
 also (llev. i. 7) ; but He -will be seen in glory, not in 
 weakness any more. It will be by removing the veil 
 from men's eyes, so that they may see Him as He is, 
 not by His accommodating Himself to them again 
 and appearing outside the veil. 
 
 §3. 
 
 It is the doctrine of our Lord that not until aftei 
 His Death and Resurrection was He in a position to 
 begin the actual regeneration of the world. "Except 
 the corn of wheat fall into the ground and die," He 
 said, "it abideth itself alone" (S. John xii. 24). 
 Until that epoch, He was Himself only on the 
 natural level, so far as His human nature was con- 
 cerned. His death became the occasion of exercising 
 a new power upon mankind. It was not only that by 
 the Atonement made in His death He removed the 
 obstacles which hindered God's grace from flowing 
 freely out upon us. Nor was it only, on the other 
 hand, that the pathetic story of His death touched 
 the hearts of men, and made them susceptible to 
 better influences. In other words, it was not His 
 death, as death only, which made the difl'ereuce to the 
 world, but His death as the indispensable mode of 
 entrance upon a new vantage-ground, — the gate to the 
 Resurrection. If we are saved at the present time, — 
 if the centuries since Christ's life on earth are of 
 a loftier character than those before, it is due, not to 
 the simple action upon us of a past event — even the 
 
His 'Intercession in Heaven, 20 1 
 
 greatest — in the history of Christ ; it is due to Christ 
 Himself, in His continued and heightened activity, 
 still living to apply to us the results of that event. It 
 was this which made Him in an effectual sense the 
 Second Adam, and rendered Him capable of imparting 
 to other men a new life. By His death and resurrec- 
 tion He became, not what the first Adam was, "a 
 living soul," but much more, "a quickening spirit" 
 (1 Cor. XV. 43) ; — a Second Adam not only as once 
 more recapitulating and representing the race, but 
 as an actual father to it, reproducing His own life 
 in it, — and that, not a life " of the ground, earthy," 
 but " of heaven " (1 Cor. xv. 47). 
 
 There are two closely connected ways by which 
 Christ after His glorification began a new work for 
 mankind, the one inward, towards God; the other 
 outward, towards the world. The first is the exercise 
 of an immeasurably increased power of intercession. 
 In the Epistle to the Hebrews we appear to be given 
 to understand that so far from having accomplished 
 and laid aside His priestly function with His death, 
 our Lord was first truly consecrated to His priesthood 
 on the morning of the Eesurrection (Heb. v. 5, 6). 
 The sacrificial task was not at an end when His life 
 was laid down on Calvary, which answered to the 
 slaughter of the typical victims. The whole point of 
 the sacrifice lies in the presentation of that life, 
 enriched and consecrated to the utmost by having 
 undergone death, and still and for ever living, in the 
 inmost presence of God. This was expressed in the 
 Jewish ritual by the sprinkling of the blood upon 
 
202 His Gift of the Spirit. 
 
 the mercy seat (Heb. ix. 12, 24). Christ then has 
 passed within the veil, to complete His merciful work 
 for men, by pleading for them, not as in the weak life 
 of earth, but "in heaven itself," appearing for them 
 " in the presence of God," — and by pleading for them 
 in the irresistible power which His perfect discharge 
 of His mission has given Him. What may be the 
 nature and mode of His advocacy is beyond our 
 power to conjecture ; but we can feel it to be reason- 
 able that the needs of the creation should in some 
 such way find representation through Him who is its 
 Firstborn, not only ideally, but by being the first to 
 pass from the natural into the spiritual order, " the 
 First-begotten from the dead " (Col. i. 18). 
 
 The second activity of the glorified Christ is 
 a result of the first. The chief effect of His inter- 
 cession on behalf of His disciples was to obtain for 
 them the gift of the Holy Ghost. "I will ask the 
 Father, and He will give you another Advocate, that 
 He may be with you for ever " (S. John xiv. IG). 
 Although in one sense that request was fully granted, 
 once for all, ten days after our Lord's Ascension, in 
 another sense our Lord is constantly making the 
 same demand and receiving the same full reply. He 
 is always engaged in sending the Holy Ghost to us 
 from the Father. This was, it seems, a thing im- 
 possible before His exaltation. "If I depart not, the 
 Advocate will not come unto you; but if I go My 
 way, I will send Him unto you " (S. John xvi. 7). 
 Christ had not yet won the Gift by His Passion. He 
 was not yet in a position to demand it. But even 
 
Divinity of the Holy Ghost. 203 
 
 if the Gift could have been offered, men were not 
 capable of receiving it, so long as they had Christ 
 with them in the flesh. The natural presence and 
 the spiritual presence were incompatible and mutually 
 exclusive. It was necessary that the old state of 
 things should be broken up, before the new and 
 supernatural order could be begun. 
 
 §4. 
 
 That Holy Ghost, whom the Eedeemer won for 
 His brethren, is, as we have shown in an earlier 
 chapter, truly and essentially God, — so entirely so, 
 that God could not be conceived of as existing without 
 Him. Though only manifesting Himself at an ad- 
 vanced date in human history, the Holy Ghost is no 
 late development of Divine activity. His mission, 
 indeed, like the mission of the Son, is of " the last 
 days " (Heb. i. 2 ; Acts ii. 17) ; but He Himself, like 
 the Son, is co-eternal and consubstantial with the 
 Father. If creation had never existed, the Holy 
 Ghost would have always existed, and must neces- 
 sarily exist, in the fulness of the Divine Being. 
 
 He is the eternal product of the mutual love of 
 the Father and the Son, the full expression of either 
 to either, the bond which makes the two one. In 
 this sense we believe that doctrine to be true, which 
 is expressed in the Filioque clause of the Creed. A 
 Catholic believer is free to confess that he cannot 
 justify the way in which the clause was inserted by 
 the Western Church, without the consent of the 
 Eastern, into a Creed which was the joint heritage of 
 
204 m^ Procession from Father and Son. 
 
 all. Ho is bound also to acliiiowledge that as the 
 clause stands, it needs guarding and qualifying. Yet 
 it 'would seem like receding from the truth, if the 
 words which assert the Double Procession of the 
 Spirit were now to be struck out from the Creed. 
 Western theologians agree that the Spirit does not 
 proceed from the Son as from a second fountain 
 independent of the first. Eastern theologians agree 
 that the Spirit does not issue out of the Father with- 
 out coming through the Son. As the Son Himself 
 is perfectly one with the Father, and owes all that 
 He is and has to Him, the Spirit owes ultimately to 
 the Father whatever belongs to Him as being the 
 Spirit of the Son. It is therefore easy to hope that 
 an agreement may be reached on this point, as soon 
 as East and West are in a position to understand one 
 another's language, without adopting the theory that 
 the Holy Spirit owes only His temporal mission to 
 Both, His eternal procession to the Father alone. 
 Such a theory suffers a double disadvantage. The 
 one passage of Holy Scripture which speaks of the 
 " procession " at all (S. John xv. 26), appears certainly 
 to mean by it the temporal mission ; and it refers it 
 only to the Father. Moreover, we must needs suppose 
 that the respective actions of the Three Blessed 
 Persons in time arc founded upon their essential 
 relations to each other in eternity ; so that if the Son 
 can be said now to send the Holy Ghost to us from 
 the Father, it must be in view of some deep fact by 
 which the Holy Ghost is subordinated to the Son as 
 well as to the Father, though entirely equal to either. 
 
The Holy Ghost a Person. 205 
 
 All the language of the Bible concerning the Holy 
 Ghost shows that He is as truly a Person as either 
 the Father or the Son, — One who -wills (1 Cor. xii. 11), 
 who searches (1 Cor. ii. 10), who intercedes (Eom. viii. 
 26), who is grieved (Eph. iv. 30), who, if that be the 
 correct translation, longs yearningly for the souls in 
 which He is lodged (S. James iv. 5). And yet, 
 although His personality is so clearly marked. His 
 unity with the Father and the Son is equally plain. 
 His coming. His abiding presence, is the coming and 
 the presence of Christ, and not of Christ only but of 
 His Father also. " I will not leave you comfortless," 
 says Christ, speaking of the mission of the Spirit, 
 "I come to you;" and immediately after, He adds, 
 " If a man love Me, he will keep My word ; and My 
 Father will love him, and We will come unto him, 
 and make Our abode with him " (S. John xiv. 18, 23). 
 
 §5. 
 
 The Father alone, as we have said, is the ultimate 
 cause of the eternal being of the Holy Ghost ; and the 
 Father alone, ultimately, bestows Him upon men. 
 But none the less, He is the Gift of Christ, who has 
 "received" Him from the Father for that purpose 
 (Acts ii. 33). Indeed, as known to us. He is in a 
 peculiar sense the Spirit of Christ, and not only the 
 Spirit of God. There is a special connexion between 
 Christ and Him. It is His great function to reveal 
 Christ, who is in turn the revelation of the Father. 
 The glories of the Father are not displayed to us as 
 such ; they become intelligible to us as the glories of 
 
2o6 His Relation to CJirisCs Humanity. 
 
 the Son ; and therefore the Father is glorified when 
 the Holy Spirit brings the riches of Christ before our 
 hearts. "He shall glorify Me, for He shall take of 
 that which is Mine, and shall declare it to you. All 
 things that the Father hath are Mine ; therefore said 
 I that He taketh of that which is Mine and shall 
 declare it to you " (S. John xvi. 14, 15). And when 
 He makes known the glory of Christ, it is not only 
 His glory as the Eternal Son of God, but as the 
 Incarnate Son of Man. He interprets and applies 
 Christ's historical work to its proper ends. He is the 
 full Eepresentative of Christ, in His human as well as 
 in His Divine nature. 
 
 It would indeed be a rash innovation upon Catholic 
 teaching to say that by the Incarnation of the Son 
 some corresponding change took place in the mode of 
 the Holy Ghost's existence, or to imply that to His 
 Divine nature was added the nature of the human 
 spirit. It has never been taught that in His own 
 Person the Spirit of God has become humanised. 
 But none the less. His sympathy with the Incarnation 
 is so profound that He is able to express with perfect 
 fidelity all the movements of sanctified human nature, 
 as held by Jesus Christ. It was by His operation 
 that the Word was made flesh. The whole early 
 development of the Incarnate Life was under His 
 control. At the Baptism of Jesus, He descended in 
 a new manner upon Him, and possessed Him, and 
 imparted to His human soul that consciousness of all 
 Divine truth which was typified by the *' opened 
 heaven " (S. Matt. iii. 16). The dove-like form under 
 
The Spirit of Christ. 207 
 
 which He was pleased to betoken His coming was 
 a sign that He was giving Himself, not as to others 
 " by measure " (S. John iii. 34), dealing out particular 
 gifts or graces, but in all His personal plenitude. 
 The life of Christ became thus, we may say, an 
 adequate historical embodiment of all the influences 
 of the Holy Ghost ; and the Holy Ghost became, not 
 indeed confused with the human spirit of our Lord, 
 but so entirely infused into it and so exclusively its 
 animating principle, that thenceforth He bears for us 
 titles which set forth the new relation into which He 
 entered with humanity in Christ. Thus, for instance, 
 when S. Paul says, "Because ye are sons, God hath 
 sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, 
 crying Abba, Father" (Gal. iv. 6), we shall not be far 
 wrong if we suppose him to mean, not only that Spirit 
 by which eternally the Son feels filially towards the 
 Father, but that Spirit which marked Him in His 
 Incarnate life. And so, after His Resurrection, our 
 Blessed Lord at once began to impart to His disciples 
 gifts of the Holy Ghost as being His own to give. He 
 breathed upon them, from His human mouth, and 
 said, '' Eeceive ye holy Spirit " (S. John xx. 22). 
 Ascending into heaven and receiving the consumma- 
 tion of His human nature. He, in His human nature, 
 became able still more completely to absorb and 
 assimilate the fulness of the Holy Ghost. Instead of 
 being, as in the days of His flesh, under the direction 
 of the Holy Ghost, the Holy Ghost came, if we may 
 say so, to be under His. As man. He has made Him 
 His own, and inspires Him into men. His humanity 
 
2o8 The Spirit as Finger of God. 
 
 has become the medium for transmitting Deity to 
 creation. Whatever Christ does now in His Church, 
 He does in His glorified humanity ; and He does it 
 through His imj^arted Spirit. And that imparted 
 Spirit acts upon us as the agent of one who is still 
 truly human: He is "the Spirit of Jesus" (Acts 
 xvi. 7). 
 
 §6. 
 
 Since the beginning, it has been the work of the 
 Holy Ghost to educe in creation the order, and the 
 life, which belong eternally to the Word. We read 
 that when the materials, out of which the world was 
 to be formed, lay in undistinguished confusion, the 
 first movement towards arrangement came from the 
 hovering of the Spirit of God upon the face of the 
 waters (Gen. i. 2). He is named by our Lord " the 
 Finger of God" (S. Luke xi. 20). The name ex- 
 presses both the ease and the delicacy with which He 
 moulds and finishes ofi' in detail the designs of God 
 in the Word. We may attribute to His special care 
 that beauty which is the most impressive evidence of 
 the Divine hand in nature, and the faculty by which 
 we appreciate that beauty. And what He docs in the 
 domain of nature. He does also in the domain of 
 history. The working out of the Providence of God 
 is His. It was He who prepared the way for the 
 Incarnation. It is He who fashions the character 
 and the destiny both of nations and of individual men 
 in such a way as to conduce to the glory of Christ, 
 Avho is the object and purpose of all. And He is 
 
His Function in the Church. 209 
 
 also '' the Spirit of life " (Eom. viii. 2). By His own 
 incorruptible presence in all things (Wisd. i. 7, xii. 
 1), He makes the universe to be not a dead, me- 
 chanical contrivance, but instinct with the life of the 
 Word. Especially in the Christian Church, He is 
 seen as the Quickener, both imparting the original 
 spark of the Christian life, and afterwards renewing 
 and reinvigorating it, for the Church as a whole, and 
 for the Christians who compose it. The gifts of order 
 and of life which He bestows are, when viewed in 
 their higher aspects, akin to those of holiness and of 
 liberty, which are His most characteristic gifts in the 
 Church. It is His aim to reduce the seething chaos 
 of human life to moral order and beauty, by drawing 
 every man to share the holiness of Christ. He does 
 this, not by imposing restrictions and laws, but by 
 inspiring healthy affections. " Where the Spirit of 
 the Lord is, there is liberty " (2 Cor. iii. 17). In 
 view chiefly of this blessed work of renovation, of 
 applying the redemptive work of Christ, of the 
 inexhaustible energy with which He works His moral 
 miracles, we call Him Creator : — Veni Creator 
 Spiritus. This work of holy emancipation which He 
 carries on, is effected through His inward " teaching " 
 (e. g. S. John xiv. 26). As it is the power of conscious 
 reflexion which makes the difference between the 
 animals and man, so the heightening of consciousness, 
 or rather the infusion of a new and Divine form of 
 consciousness, by the Holy Ghost, produces sanctifica- 
 tion. Such teaching, enlightenment, realisation of 
 the truth, are everywhere spoken of as specially the 
 
 p 
 
2IO Difference in His Jllode of Working 
 
 work of the Holy Spirit. Being the principle of 
 consciousness and freedom in God, He becomes so, by 
 impartition, to men. 
 
 §7. 
 
 When wo come to express the difference between 
 the operations of the Holy Ghost upon men before 
 and after the glorification of Christ, — or, which is 
 much the same thing, between His work upon 
 Christians and upon those who are not Christians at 
 the present day, — we find both the poverty of language, 
 and also the difficulty of entering with any fulness of 
 imagination into experiences different from our own. 
 Could we ourselves consciously have passed, like the 
 Apostles, from the earlier stage of His influence to 
 the later, we might have been able better to point the 
 contrast. To them, the coming and presence of the 
 Holy Ghost was a new fact so marked, so perceptible, 
 so insistent, that they could appeal to it without 
 hesitation in testimony of their doctrine. *' He, then, 
 that supplieth to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles 
 among you, doeth He it by works of law " (Gal. iii. 5) ? 
 " Herein perceive we that He dwelleth in us, by the 
 Spirit which He gave us " (1 John iii. 21). 
 
 We arc bound to believe that all good desires and 
 virtuous practice and true teaching among heathen 
 people is the result of the "striving" of the Holy 
 Ghost with their wills (Gen. vi. 3). Amongst the 
 Chosen People under the Old Covenant, His agency 
 was much more observable. The prophets were in- 
 spired by Him : He was in them " the Spirit of 
 
before and after Pentecost. 2 1 1 
 
 Christ " (1 Pet. i. 11). However slowly the ethical 
 ideas of the people at large were purified, individual 
 saints were formed before Pentecost whose morality 
 could hardly have been improved, had they lived in 
 the later dispensation. Yet broadly speaking it is 
 true that in those days, " there was no Holy Ghost 
 (in the world), because that Jesus was not yet glori- 
 fied" (S. John vii. 39). Since that event, He not 
 only bestows His grace more abundantly on those 
 who receive it, and extends it to a greater number 
 of persons : — the very mode of His operation is 
 changed, both in its outward presentment, and in its 
 inward character. 
 
 The Holy Ghost is now manifested as forming and 
 maintaining a corporate Society of elect men ; and in 
 this society He personally and permanently dwells. 
 Whereas, before, He worked upon isolated beings, 
 raising up single heroic witnesses to His power amidst 
 the great mass of unsanctified humanity, He now 
 works upon the world through the medium of a com- 
 pact and united body of men, who not only respond 
 to His motions when He calls them to advancing self- 
 sanctification, but feel themselves responsible for the 
 redemption of the whole world around them. Where- 
 as, before, the persons who came under His influence, 
 felt it as something external to themselves, — a breath 
 which came upon them and went again, in sweeping 
 and stormy gusts, — it is now felt, both by the 
 Church and by the single Christian as an internal fact, 
 quiet and settled, — sometimes more felt, indeed, and 
 sometimes less, yet always there, and always to be 
 
2 1 2 Genesis of the Church. 
 
 relied upon. He gives, now, not a grace only, but 
 His own personal self, to make both the ^Yhole Church 
 and each full member of it a " Temple " for His own 
 inhabitation, where He is " at rest for ever " (1 Cor. 
 iii. 16, vi. 19 ; 1 Pet. iv. 14). This could not be, so 
 far as we know, without the Incarnation and Ascen- 
 sion of Christ. Through that glorijfied humanity 
 alone could the Holy Spirit find an inlet into the 
 very inward parts of men to dwell there ; and through 
 it alone could He unite all those persons in whom He 
 dwells into a living and solid whole. 
 
 §8. 
 
 It was one of the first acts of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ after He rose from the dead to inaugm-ate the 
 new departure. He cannot be said to have formed 
 a Church during His lifetime. The materials for it 
 Lad been gathered ; and, in separating twelve of His 
 disciples from the rest and giving them a title of 
 office. He had even begun to prepare the structure 
 of His society. But He still spoke of the creation of 
 His Church as a future thing : " Upon this rock I 
 will build My Church" (S. Matt. xvi. 18). In the 
 outset of His Passion, He gave them their bond of 
 union in the first impartition of His Body and Blood. 
 But as yet, it was only like what we may imagine to 
 have taken place at the creation of the first Adam, — 
 the dust of the earth being got ready to receive the 
 Breath which made him a Hving soul. Then came 
 the Breath. Into the structural unit already prepared, 
 the Eisen Lord, on the evening of His Eesurrection, 
 
The CJnirch Christ's Body. 213 
 
 breathed His own incorruptible life and made it a 
 Church. The gift was not yet that full gift which He 
 was afterwards to give — not '* the Holy Spirit," but 
 "Holy Spirit" — a gift similar to that which is still 
 bestowed in Baptism, — the gift of new life (S. John xx. 
 22). There is a gradation in the gifts of God : first 
 life, afterwards, that for which life is worth having. 
 This first gift, Jesus was already competent by His 
 victory over death to bestow. The second, as we 
 have already said. He gained by His Ascension. 
 Then, upon the new-born but still infant Church, He 
 poured forth all at once the indwelling Spmt with 
 His mature gifts of power, of holiness, of conscious 
 knowledge, and of world-convincing utterance. 
 
 §9. 
 
 When the Church is described in Scripture as a 
 Body, and the Body of Christ, the description is more 
 than a metaphor. It is not a case of mere analogy. 
 The Church stands to Jesus Christ in the same 
 relation as a man's body does to his personal self. 
 Of course there are differences in the mode of con- 
 nexion, which it would be easy to point out ; but the 
 connexion is as close and vital as in the case of the 
 natural body. It does not fully explain the phrase to 
 say, that the Church is as dependent upon Christ, as 
 a body upon connexion with its head. As in the 
 animal organism, the relation is not one-sided only ; 
 it is reciprocal. Connexion with the Church affects 
 Christ's life as well as hers. Though of course He is 
 not in any way dependent upon her for existence, not 
 
214 The Church as Chrises " Fulness .'' 
 
 even in His human nature, far less in His Divine, yet 
 the Church is necessary to the fulness of His incarnate 
 life. The union hetween Christ and her is so real that 
 the two together make up a single entity. He is not 
 His whole self without the many members who are 
 joined to Him. When we speak of '' Christ " (though 
 not, of course, in every context), we speak of both in 
 conjunction. " For as the body is one, and hath many 
 members, so also is Christ " (1 Cor. xii. 12). A very 
 remarkable and difficult passage of S. Paul brings 
 out this reciprocity of relation. It speaks not only 
 of Christ as a gift to the Church, but of the Church 
 as performing a corresponding function for Christ. 
 After dwelling on the marvellous greatness of the 
 hope held out to us in the Eesurrection and Ascension 
 of Christ, and His present and perpetual supremacy 
 over all creation, the writer adds : '* And Him," being 
 what we have now described Him, "He gave as Head 
 over all things to the Church, which in fact {wig) is 
 His Body, the fulness of Him that filleth all in all " 
 (Eph. i. 22, 23). So the last clause is usually trans- 
 lated; but there is no reason why the verb should 
 not be considered passive here, as in other similar 
 passages. It will then give an even stronger mean- 
 ing : ** His Body, the fulness of Him who is fulfilled 
 with all things in all." S. Paul is thus seen to say, 
 that the Church is the present and future organ of 
 Christ's complete self-manifestation. He is "fulfilled" 
 in her. In and through her He displays the richness 
 of His own exalted life. 
 
 This is the very meaning of a " body." That 
 
Christ's oivn Life lodged in the ChtLvch. 215 
 
 Christ has a heavenly body of His own, apart from 
 other men, we cannot doubt, — in which He is mani- 
 fested to celestial beings. It may, however, be possible 
 to separate too sharply between that Body (sometimes, 
 erroneously, called His natural Body), and the Church 
 which is His mystical Body. But whatever the re- 
 lation may be between His glorified Body and the 
 mystical, it is certain that He has not done with the 
 earth, and withdrawn from it. He still is incarnate 
 not only in heaven, but here also. He wears a bodily 
 presentment upon earth, which expresses Him and is 
 identified with Him. Clothed in it. He acts and 
 speaks among men still. It is a true body, with a 
 clear and visible and well-defined outline, as well as 
 with a strong differentiation of its parts, and an 
 organic bond between them. That body is His Church. 
 It is not enough to say that she represents Him, for 
 a representative has a iDcrsonal life apart from him 
 who is represented. But the Church has no personal 
 life apart from Christ. It is His own life which 
 animates her, and which forms the bond between her 
 various members. It is His Spirit which inhabits 
 her, and creates in her an identity of consciousness 
 with His own, so that the Apostle can say, " We have 
 the mind of Christ " (1 Cor. ii. 16), — that is, we not 
 only have feelings and views of life like those which 
 He entertained (^povrj/ia, Phil. ii. 5), but we think 
 His own thoughts and share His inmost intuitions 
 
 iyovq). 
 
 Thus the Church now, as Christ Himself when He 
 was on earth, is an object both of sight and of faith. 
 
2 1 6 The Church an Object of Sight and of Faith. 
 
 She is a visible society of men, which all the world 
 can see and observe ; " a city set on an hill " (S. Matt. 
 V. li). Her laws and organization are familiarly 
 known. The most worldly and unbelieving of states- 
 men are obliged to reckon with them as with practical 
 forces. It can be told in an instant whether a man 
 belongs to this body or not. There is nothing hazy 
 or uncertain about its contour. To draw a distinction 
 between a visible and an invisible Chui*ch was un- 
 heard of in the apostolic or in primitive days : it was 
 the confusing and sophistical work of an age of 
 schisms. The Church is not called a ''mystical" 
 hody because of difficulty in ascertaining its form ; 
 nor do we say, ** I believe (in the existence of) the 
 the Holy Catholic Church " because we suppose it to 
 consist of an aggregation of devout souls known only 
 to God. Faith comes in for a different reason. It is 
 because faith alone can discern the true nature of the 
 Society which is seen by all. Faith alone, amidst 
 sore trials and perplexities, is able to acknowledge 
 that the life of the Church is indeed the life of her 
 Ascended Head, — that the visible company of men is, 
 in spite of appearances, the home and the embodiment 
 of a Divine principle, which will never leave it, nor 
 suffer it permanently and universally to be prevailed 
 against. 
 
 §10. 
 
 In thus describing the Body of Christ as a visible 
 structure we are not forgetful of the generations of 
 faithful men who have passed away from this world. 
 
The Communion of Saints. 217 
 
 They are still members of the mystical Body. Christ, 
 who has *' ascended up far above all heavens that He 
 may fill all things " (Eph. iv. 10), presents Himself 
 in due form alike in heaven and in Paradise and on 
 earth ; but the Body in which He does so is the same 
 Body throughout. This is not the place at which to 
 enter on the doctrine of the Intermediate State ; but 
 it is impossible to speak of that Body of living souls 
 in which the life of Jesus is still lodged, without say- 
 ing that the unseen parts of it are in full and vital 
 connexion with the seen in ''the communion of the 
 Holy Ghost " (2 Cor. xiii. 13). The dead act upon 
 the living and are reacted upon by them in ways 
 which it is not easy to state, but which are none the 
 less real. Their recorded lives, their extant writings, 
 the undying consequences of what they did while on 
 earth, the tone which they set ; and besides that, their 
 continued intercessions, of which we cannot doubt, and, 
 it may be, still more direct and active interpositions ; 
 in all these ways the faithful dead powerfully affect 
 the living world, — so much so, that one of the latest 
 products of Old Testament inspiration, according to 
 the most probable interpretation of it, represents the 
 world, with all its political and social forces, as help- 
 lessly (though unconsciously) enthralled and swayed 
 by the saints at rest "in their beds" (Psalm cxlix. 
 5, comp. Is. Ivii. 1, 2). And in like manner, though 
 we cannot be sure how far their knowledge of current 
 events on earth extends, without question they are 
 in some way interested in these events, so far as 
 they affect the glory of Christ. The successes and 
 
2 1 8 Relations of the Living with the Dead. 
 
 failures of the Church on earth, the hastening or 
 retarding of the final Advent, the revivals of true 
 religion or the sinking into lethargy and false- 
 hood, — probably also the spiritual vicissitudes of 
 individual souls with whom the connexion while on 
 earth was close, — all touch the departed, though we 
 may shrink from affirming how. This lies at the 
 base of those latest additions by which the Apostles' 
 Creed was brought into its present form, — the articles 
 which brought out the Descent of our Lord into hell, 
 and which affirmed "the Communion of Saints." 
 By those articles the Christian consciousness made 
 explicit to itself the feeling that death does not break 
 up the community of interests which are eternal. 
 There is so necessary a fellowship between all who 
 are vitally united to Christ that they still, in a sense 
 which was typically shewn forth at Jerusalem in 
 the first days, "have all things common" (Acts 
 iv. 32). 
 
 It seems hardly necessary to add, what is within 
 our immediate perception, that the Communion of 
 Saints does not mean only the fellowship of the living 
 with the dead, but the fellowship between those classes 
 amongst themselves also. The welfare of one is the 
 welfare of all. The ancient Stoic philosophy caught 
 a glimpse of this truth when it taught that every 
 "wise man" in the world was benefited by every 
 other wise man's acts of perfection. If the con- 
 ception had been enlarged so as to include not only 
 a proud aristocracy of philosophers, but humble and 
 struggling seekers after righteousness, and if the com- 
 
The Coimnumon of Saints. 2 1 9 
 
 munity bad been not one between scattered individuals 
 undiscoverable to eacb other, but between all the 
 members of a well-known and divinely organized 
 Body, the Stoic doctrine would have failed but little 
 of the perfected idea of the Christian fellowship. 
 
Chapter VIII. 
 ©I^e ©Ijaractcrbttcg of ilje ©jburc]^, 
 
 T/ie Azotes of the Church not Visible Tokens hut Inward Characten'stics — 
 Unity of the Church depetident on Historical Continuity — Holiness 
 of the Church — The Church Catholic mainly in respect of her 
 Doctritu — Tradition fixed by Scripture — Inspiration and Fulness of 
 the Bible — Freedom of Investigation and Authority of the Church — 
 The Church Apostolic in virtue of her Mission — The Christian 
 Ministry — Identity of the Church Militant and Triumphant, 
 
 §1. 
 
 The four great notes, as they are called, of Christ's 
 Church, are not always borne as visibly upon her front 
 as they ought to be. This must with shame be con- 
 fessed ; and those who maintain that the true Church 
 is so unmistakeably distinguished by them as to be 
 known from false Churches at a glance, are driven to 
 strange interpretations of history. Nevertheless, 
 these notes, however they may be outwardly obscured, 
 are deeply engraven upon her heart. They are more 
 than a mark at which she aims. Her essential being 
 is bound up in them ; and so far as she is true to her 
 own self she exhibits them. Although from time to 
 time, and in particular places, the men who represent 
 hor may fail to be impressed with the character de- 
 scribed in these four words, the Church herself never 
 
The Church One. 221 
 
 loses it. Endowed, as the Bride of Christ, with an 
 imperishable life, the Church, as long as she lives, is 
 One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic. 
 
 §2. 
 
 A Church which is the embodiment of the risen life 
 of Christ, and the instrument of His indwelling Spirit, 
 is necessarily marked by unity. The Christian 
 Church is, and can be, but one. It is usual, in teach- 
 ing the unity of the Church, to dwell upon the unity 
 of the object of her worship, — upon the substantial 
 unity of the faith professed by all her branches, — 
 upon the unity of her Sacraments (at least the chief 
 of them) which are everywhere the same, — ** One 
 Lord, one Faith, one Baptism " (Eph. iv. 5). But 
 perhaps the thought which offers the greatest hope of 
 clearness amidst existing confusions is that on which 
 we have already enlarged, and on which S. Paul him- 
 self touches first. The Church is one because of the 
 unity of life which possesses her : ** One Body, one 
 Spirit " (Eph. iv. 4). Both her numerical and her 
 integral unity are thus secured, and we see that there 
 cannot be more than one Church, nor a Church com- 
 posed of finally severed fractions. A single life can- 
 not build for itself more than a single living domicile ; 
 and a single organism cannot represent more than 
 a single inward principle. The one Spirit ia a 
 guarantee for the unity of the Body ; the one Body is 
 a guarantee for the unity of the Spirit. The Church 
 is both outwardly and inwardly one, — one through the 
 whole length of time from the first century to the nine- 
 
222 Classification of Christian Aggregates. 
 
 teentb, one all over the world of space, — one (as we 
 have said) in all conditions of human existence ter- 
 restrial and ultra-terrestrial. The unity of her origin 
 is our clue. Firmly grasping this thought, of an 
 indestructible and Divine life, once for all imparted to 
 a single historical society, we are able to look at the 
 present divisions of Christendom and yet say that the 
 Church is one. Her actual unity is indeed most im- 
 perfect, — sinfully and calamitously so, — but it is not 
 at an end. 
 
 If we look at the different groups of Christians in 
 the world, we shall see, in the first place, that they 
 are of two classes. There are those which, in greater 
 or lesser degrees of perfectness, preserve a historical 
 continuity with the original foundation of the Church : 
 and there are those which have a later origin, and are 
 practically new societies. To the former class belong, 
 for example, the Eoman, the Coptic, the Scandi- 
 navian Churches ; to the latter class belonged in old 
 days the Montanists and Novatianists, in modern 
 times the Congregationalists and Irvingites, and many 
 of the sects of Russia. With regard to this latter 
 class, the position stands thus. The men who com- 
 pose them are, as individuals, members of the Church, 
 provided that they have received Christian Baptism, 
 though they have preferred to transfer themselves to 
 other bodies. In order to enjoy the full benefits of 
 the Church, they have but to renounce communica- 
 tion with the separate bodies to which they are 
 attached, and they are at once re-admitted (if there 
 be nothing else against them) to active membership 
 
Position of Christian Sects. 223 
 
 in the historical society. But the separate bodies 
 themselves are on a different footing. There can be 
 no question of intercommunion between the historical 
 Church and them. Considered as bodies, they form 
 no part of the Church of Christ, but occupy (even 
 when unintentionally) a position of rivalry and an- 
 tagonism towards it. They are Christian sects, in so 
 far as they are composed of Christian men ; but their 
 Christianity is (so to speak) accidental ; they contain 
 no perpetual and pledged inhabitation of the Spirit. 
 Often they abound in graces, which put the Church 
 to shame ; but the graces are imported into them 
 from the Church, through the gracious persons who 
 join them : they are not communicated to the indi- 
 viduals from the inherent wealth of the separate 
 society. And so it comes to pass that such sects live 
 out their lives ; and after performing the work for 
 which the Divine Providence allowed them to rise, 
 and receiving fitting rewards and blessings from God, 
 at length, like other human institutions, they decay 
 and disappear. The good elements in them pass 
 back into the historical Church ; the worse element 
 is hardened into active "evil will at Sion," and like 
 the grass upon the housetops '* withers afore it be 
 plucked up " (Psalm cxxix. 5, 6). While the 
 Church, therefore, is unfeignedly thankful for the 
 good which it pleases God to do through such socie- 
 ties, and can join with them in many good works, 
 and loves every devout member of them, she cannot 
 acquiesce in their separate existence. She must 
 always yearn to draw back into her own bosom every 
 
2 24 The Church and the Churches. 
 
 choice spirit which adorns them, recognising those 
 spirits as, but for a mistake, her own. Every useful 
 suggestion which the sects can make, she would 
 endeavour to adapt and adopt, — if for no other reason, 
 at least to take away any semblance of just cause for 
 remaining aloof from her. Meanwhile the unity of the 
 Church herself is clearly not broken up by parties of 
 men withdrawing from her and establishing themselves 
 outside. 
 
 We turn now to the first class of Christian aggre- 
 gates, — those whose historical existence dates back to 
 the first formation of the Church. These may be 
 called " Churches." The plural title does not con- 
 tradict the unity of the Church. When the Apostolic 
 writers speak of " Churches," they do not mean inde- 
 pendent organizations spreading themselves side by 
 side; they mean local branches of the same world- 
 wide organization, the Church. Thus in Scripture we 
 read of the Seven Churches of Asia ; and in modern 
 language we can legitimately speak of the Church of 
 England, the Church of France, the Chm-ch of Scot- 
 land. No one of the Churches professes to be " the 
 Church," — except, indeed, the Eoman. The popular 
 exponents of the Eoman belief treat "the Church" 
 as exactly co-extensive with that group of Christians 
 who admit the claims of the Roman Bishop, and 
 thereby they go near to reduce themselves to a sect, 
 taking that for its basis of separation. All other 
 Churches are ready to acknowledge that they are but 
 parts of a greater whole. They do not consider the 
 gatherings of their bishops to bo entitled to speak for 
 
Excommunication when justified. 225 
 
 universal Christendom ; and for the solution of final 
 difficulties they look on, like Cranmer, to *'the next 
 General Council." Now it is plain that all these 
 Churches ought to be in full communion with each 
 other. A 'schism within the Body is an even sadder 
 spectacle than a separation from it ; and those who 
 are responsible for the beginning, or for the perpetua- 
 tion, of such a schism are guilty of the gravest of sins. 
 Nevertheless, in the imperfect and probationary 
 stage of existence through which the Church is pass- 
 ing, errors and misunderstandings cannot fail to arise. 
 The different Churches ought to deal with one another 
 in the largest spirit of forbearance and tenderness, 
 to make generous allowance for national and local 
 idiosyncrasies, to welcome, and not only to tolerate, 
 wide divergencies in thought and practice, as all 
 tending to bring out, under the breath of the Spirit 
 of charity, the manifold fertility of the Christian life. 
 Even when a neighbour Church is to blame, and 
 becomes corrupt or mutilated, it ought not to be 
 excommunicated unless communion with it directly 
 involves partaking in its fault. There are occasions 
 when it is necessary and right to take this extreme 
 step. When sinful terms of communion are explicitly 
 imposed, then, but only then, separation is held 
 to be justified. Even then, however, the excom- 
 munication ought to be uttered, not in human pride 
 and anger, but in love and meekness, for the sake of 
 correction ; and it ought to be removed as soon as 
 possible ; and incessant efforts should be made to 
 regain the normal relations (2 Thess. iii. 14, 15). To 
 
 Q 
 
2 26 Unity not destroyed thereby, 
 
 the primitive Christians it would have been impossible 
 to imagine the situation which to us is familiar, of 
 one Church quietly ignoring the existence of another 
 ^Yhich has had differences with it, and going on as if 
 it were only concerned with its own internal affairs. 
 Selfish isolation of that kind must end at last in the 
 extinction or apostasy of such a branch of the Church ; 
 for the Spirit by which the Church lives is above all 
 things a Spirit of love. 
 
 But unity is only the full expression of love : and 
 where there is love, and a true striving after recon- 
 ciliation, the loss of intercommunion between these 
 branches of the one historical society is only a 
 temporary disaster, not a real disruption. The one 
 life, once given, is still flowing on through those 
 apparently divided members, and must one day 
 triumphantly bring them again into a unity made 
 the richer and more precious for having been lost 
 and found again. ^ It is a comfort, in our present 
 anomalous condition, to observe that our Lord does 
 not exactly pray for His disciples that they may be 
 kept in such unity as they already had, but that, 
 
 * It may be observed that in S. John x. IG the original is not 
 oorrcclly rendered in tlio English Bible. Our Lord says, " They shall 
 become one flock, one Sliephcrd," not " There shall be one fold." It 
 must not, however, be inferred that our Lord thought of having many 
 folds, or of doing without a fold at all. Tt was the custom for tho 
 flocks of several shepherds to bo enclosed in the same fold ; and our 
 liord, intending to include in His new Catholic Church botli the Jews 
 who were "of this fold," and the Gentiles who were of none, promised 
 that they should not only be comprised within the same external system, 
 but should be completely fused into a living unity. Within His one 
 fold there should bo not many flocks, but one, as being all the sheep 
 of one Shcplicrd. 
 
Unity an Aim, not only a Possession. 227 
 
 being kept true to the revelation of God's love which 
 they had received, they might he brought thereby to 
 a diviner unity, *'Holy Father, keep them in Thy 
 Name which Thou hast given Me, in order that they 
 maybe one, even as "We" (S. John xvii. 11). And 
 S. Paul, in the same chapter where he speaks of the 
 Christian unity as a possession to be '' kept " by 
 strenuous exertions {a-Kov^dZ^ovTiq r^puv), goes on to 
 speak of it as a goal of final attainment, not as a fact 
 already realised. All the gifts, which were won for 
 the Church by the Ascension, were, he says, destined 
 " for the full equipment of the saints unto the work 
 of ministry, for the building up of the Body of Christ, 
 until we, — all we, — arrive at the unity of the faith and 
 of the deeper knowledge of the Son of God, at a full- 
 grown man, at the measure of stature which expresses 
 the plenitude of Christ " (Eph. iv. 12, 13). 
 
 §3. 
 
 The same fact which makes the Church One, 
 makes it also Holy. It could not be otherwise with 
 a society which embodies the life of Christ and is 
 animated by the Holy Ghost. Here again the same 
 perplexity encounters us as in considering Church 
 unity. Appearances are often against us. The 
 Church has sometimes been a scandal to the world, 
 and to religious but impatient children of her own. 
 Again and again detachments of men, disappointed 
 with the Church, have quitted her communion in the 
 vain hope of establishing a pure society outside. But 
 our Lord told us to expect that in its earthly career 
 
2 28 Ivipcrfect Men in the CJinrch. 
 
 His Cluu'ch would contain a mixture of good and bad. 
 He likened it to a field with tares sown among the 
 wheat, awaiting the harvest before disentanglement 
 could be effected. To expect the realisation of perfect 
 holiness throughout the Church on earth is as vain 
 as to expect the realisation of perfect unity or perfect 
 knowledge. Indeed one great aspect of the Church 
 would be destroyed if none were admitted into her 
 fellowship till they were finished saints. She could 
 not in that case act as the organ of redemption in a 
 corrupt world. Like our Lord Himself when on 
 earth, if she would recover the lost, she must be truly 
 the " friend of i^ublicans and sinners." She is con- 
 strained by the very spirit of holiness which animates 
 her, no less than by the spirit of love, to open her 
 arms freely to the most imperfect, and to attract and 
 not repel. The Church is a school, for instruction in 
 righteousness, as well as for instruction in doctrine 
 (S. Matt, xxviii. 19 ; /to0»)r£ii(Tar£). All disciples who 
 promise fairly are welcome, and receive a patient 
 education. It is not expected that those who enter 
 the sacred shade will bo at once perfectly cured of 
 all sinful impulses and erroneous tendencies. Even 
 among those who in the end repay the care bestowed 
 on them, the struggle is often long, and doubtful to 
 the last. And there are many comi^lete failures. 
 Not all the disciples of the Church turn out well, nor 
 all her teachers. Sometimes, in the mysterious ebb 
 of the spirit of sanctity, ungodliness appears to take 
 possession of large tracts of the Church, — as in the 
 vileness of the fifteenth century in Ital}', — or the 
 
Her Holiness not lost throngh them. 229 
 
 deadness of the eigliteenth in England. But, not to 
 speak of the faithful work which even at those worst 
 times is being done in secret, the Church does not 
 lose her character of holiness by these melancholy 
 lapses. Though in a certain sense the Church as a 
 whole may be said to have incurred guilt, and to have 
 been defiled, yet the Spirit which is in her shews 
 itself after such times as a spirit of repentance and 
 return, and forgiveness is vouchsafed, and the sin put 
 away, and the Church is seen to be a Holy Church, — 
 not by reason of having never fallen, but by reason 
 of being " washed " (Eph. v. 26). 
 
 Nor, indeed, is her holiness only the holiness of 
 a thing forgiven. All along, the sins which have 
 stained her history have been contrary to her own 
 principles. Her better self has protested against 
 them and disowned them. No deliberate consent of 
 the Church has ever been given to any sinful thing. 
 However she may have been misrepresented at any 
 given time by the men who publicly stood for her, the 
 aim and intention of the Church was always to main- 
 tain and diffuse holiness, and to save men from their 
 sins. This is the object of all her permanent institu- 
 tions, — the sacraments, the ministry, the preaching, the 
 laws, the discipline. If ever anything was done which 
 was false to this fundamental purpose, the healthful 
 action of the infused life of Christ soon reasserted 
 itself; and in that ''fellowship one with another," 
 which is established by the Church's unity, " the Blood 
 of Jesus " cleanses the Church at large, as well as the 
 penitent souls within her, ''from all sin" (1 Johni. 7). 
 
2 30 Meaning of the Word '' CatJioIie:' 
 
 §4. 
 
 The reason why the Chiircli is called Catholic is 
 frequently misconceived. It is supposed that the 
 title refers mainly to her local extension. So, in the 
 Tc Deum, it is roughly rendered *' the Holy Church 
 throughout all the world." But any Greek scholar 
 feels at once that much more than this is involved in 
 the very form of the adjective. The Church is not 
 merely n kuOoXov, that is, the Church in general, as 
 opposed to the Church of a particular place or nation ; 
 but ■!] KctOoXiKi], the Church whose inward character is 
 one of universality. Thus in one of the very earliest 
 writings in which the title occurs — the Martyrdom of 
 S. Polycarp — a separate clause is felt to be necessary 
 in order to convey the idea of actual extension, *' the 
 Catholic Church throughout the world " (tT]q kotu riiv 
 olKovinivriv KaOoXiKijg iKKXijaiag) ; while on the other 
 hand the title itself is given to a single branch of the 
 Christian Society, and Polycarp is styled " Bishop of 
 the Catholic Church in Smyrna " (rPjc ti' '2fuipvij KaOo- 
 XikTjq £icicX))(Ttoc). The fixing of the word to its more 
 outward sense seems to be due to Latin writers, not 
 well acquainted with the Greek language, and naturally 
 prone to think more of practical organization than of 
 ideal characteristics. Oriental teachers, while not 
 excluding the local notion, rightly insisted on the 
 metaphysical notion as well. The Church, says S. 
 Cyril of Jerusalem, " is called Catholic because it 
 exists over all the world from one end of the earth to 
 the other ; and because it teaches universally (Kado- 
 
The CImrch tmiversal in Extension. 23 1 
 
 Xiicwc), and with no omissions, the entire body of 
 doctrines which men ought to know." 
 
 It is indeed of great practical importance to 
 remember that the Church is, as a matter of fact, far 
 greater than that fraction of it with which any one of 
 us happens to be acquainted. It enlarges the heart 
 and mind to meditate upon the unity of those widely 
 spreading branches. But the very reason why the 
 Church is thus spread abroad lies in her intrinsic 
 character. It is her nature to penetrate everywhere 
 and to embrace all. Eesolutely refusing to be cramped 
 and petrified and stereotyped, by reason of the free 
 Spirit which animates her, she is capable of adapting 
 herself to all circumstances. Our religion, — no longer, 
 like that of the Jews, given under a form suitable to 
 one race only, — is equally at home among all nations 
 and in all climates, in all times, under all forms of 
 government, amidst all varieties of social and intel- 
 lectual culture. In fact, Hke Christ Himself, the 
 Catholic Church is in sympathy with everything that 
 is truly human, and cannot acquiesce in being bounded 
 by anything less large than humanity, being indeed 
 co-extensive with the new humanity inaugurated by 
 Christ. Her mission is to lay hold upon every soul, 
 and — not to force it into some narrow and uniform 
 mould, but to train and develope it into shewing forth 
 those features of the life of Christ for which it was 
 predestined. 
 
 Nor is this all. If we enquire still further what it 
 is which qualifies the Church thus to deal with all 
 conditions of men, we find that it is the nature of the 
 
2 2,2 TJic Church universal in Doctrine. 
 
 message wliicli she bears. The Church is a Catholic 
 Church, because her Gospel is a Catholic Gospel. 
 There is no man to whom it is inapplicable. In some 
 respects all mankind are alike. All need to be taught 
 the character of God; all have sinned, and feel, at 
 bottom, the need of some reparation for their sins ; 
 all require Divine assistance for their restoration as 
 individuals and as members of society. These are 
 the needs which are met by the chief elements in the 
 Gospel; and the Catholic Church does not allow 
 herself to be turned aside from the declaration of 
 these chief elements, — to the right hand or to the left. 
 While the sects form themselves for the purpose of 
 emphasizing some" peculiar view, — it may be a true 
 one, or it may be false, — or for the purpose of pro- 
 moting some peculiar practice, w^hether right or 
 wrong, — the Catholic Church holds on her way, 
 " rightly dividing the word of truth " (2 Tim. ii. 15), — 
 or, as S. Paul's word more probably implies, laying 
 down the word of truth like a great road that goes 
 straight ahead, without losing itself vsj. side issues and 
 speculations which lead nowhither. Not that the 
 Church is careless or contemptuous concerning any 
 legitimate subject of inquiry. All truth is sacred to 
 her ; and her Catholicity is displayed both in her 
 vigorous maintenance of the supremacy of the great 
 master-facts, and in the patient orthodoxy with which 
 she works them out in their application to detail. 
 She is, then. Catholic mainly for this reason, because 
 of the doctrine round which she rallies men ; — because 
 she teaches the truth, the whole truth, and nothing 
 
Ottr Tradition secures Catholicism. 23. 
 
 but the truth. It is a mistake to suppose that the 
 Church has any *' distinctive doctrines ; " for every- 
 thing that is true is an integral part of her belief, and 
 everything false is under her ban. The real opposite 
 of " Catholic " is not '' local," nor even '' partial," but 
 " heretical." 
 
 It might be feared lest this Catholicity of which we 
 have spoken should pass into a vague, colourless, 
 enfeebled, comjDlacency towards all persons and 
 parties professing to seek truth, such as passes at 
 the present day for Catholicity in the semi-christian- 
 ized world. So assuredly it would, were it not for 
 the power of the primitive Tradition within the 
 Church. Eespect for her traditions has always been 
 a chief note of the Church, and the great safeguard 
 of her Catholicity. In this she is governed, not 
 merely by principles of human conservatism, but by 
 a sense of Divine responsibility. Knowing herself to 
 have no earthly origin, the result of mutual consent, 
 but to have been created and raised up by God for 
 this very purpose, to bear witness to Christ, she has 
 always felt herself bound, as the first of her duties, 
 to deliver from age to age the revelation made to 
 her at the outset, unimpaired, and unadulterated. 
 Voluntary societies, such as the sects, are under no 
 such obligations. To modify the doctrines of their 
 founders is, in them, no crime. But in the Church 
 it would be the gravest of all crimes. She believes 
 that her Founder was Himself ''the Truth " (S. John 
 
234 Binding Force of Catholic Tradition. 
 
 xiv. 6). She knows that He imparted to ber, once 
 and for all, **tbe Spirit of truth" (S. John xvi. 13). 
 It is her conviction that in the first burst of His 
 inspiration, He opened to the earliest generation of 
 believers, the Apostles and those next to them, the 
 entire -wealth of truth. Through those illuminated 
 teachers she received the truth, as a sacred trust, for 
 the benefit of humanity to the furthest shores and to 
 the latest posterity. "Keep the deposit " (1 Tim. vi. 
 20), is the solemn injunction of the departing Apostles. 
 " Contend earnestly for the faith once for all delivered 
 to the saints " (S. Jude 3), repeat their immediate 
 associates, %Yho shared their inspiration. "Let no 
 innovation be made upon the received tradition," is 
 the response of the Eoman chair in the third cen- 
 tury. " Let the ancient customs hold good," echoes 
 the Nicene Council in the fourth. To this test 
 everything is brought. Is it in accordance with 
 the historical belief and practice of the Church ? If 
 not, it stands self-condemned. By this test, the 
 Nicene Fathers rejected Ariauism. By this test the 
 controversies of modern times must be settled. No 
 new-fangled inventions are to be joined with that 
 sacred heirloom, — not even if, in some quarters, they 
 are now inveterate enough to have gained a look of 
 antiquity; and if any portion of the heirloom has 
 in any quarter been discarded or ignored, it must be 
 recovered and brought into use again before the claim 
 to the title of Catholic can be made out. 
 
 Holy Scripture, and especially the New Testament, 
 is the anchor of Catholic tradition. It would not, 
 
Its Relation to Holy Scripture. 235 
 
 indeed, be true to history to trace back all Christian 
 doctrine and practice to the existing writings of the 
 Apostles, for the Catholic tradition is older than those 
 writings, and there are many phrases in them which 
 we should be much perplexed to explain, but for the 
 Catholic tradition. The scattered notices of the 
 observance of "the Lord's day" (Rev. i. 10) may be 
 given as an instance. We know what these mean, 
 not by any explanations in the New Testament itself, 
 but by the practical commentary of Church life. 
 But one chief factor in the value of the New Testa- 
 ment is this, that it preserves for us a historical 
 record of the faith and practice of the first days, to 
 serve as a standard of reference. If it is essential to 
 Catholicity that the last things in the Church should 
 agree with the first, we have here a witness which 
 cannot be tampered with. It might have been 
 possible for the Holy Spirit dwelling in the Church 
 to have secured the permanence of the Church's 
 doctrine without this means ; but as the Church is 
 an aggregate of men who still retain their natural 
 propensities, and as it is the proverbial tendency of 
 oral traditions to gather new touches and to lose 
 some of the old, the Holy Spirit has provided the 
 Church with these written documents, — themselves 
 the gathering up of her own first and best thoughts — • 
 as a testimony against later departures. The Holy 
 Spirit within the Church is constantly bearing witness 
 to the Scriptures ; and if the appeal to the Scriptures 
 is ever distasteful to any part of the Church, it is a 
 clear sign that some other spirit is usurping the place 
 
236 T^Iie Holy Scriptures a living Voice. 
 
 of the Spirit of Christ. It has always been one of 
 the proudest boasts of the Church, that she is the 
 "Keeper of Holy Writ." Such a title implies her 
 unalterable fidelity to the tradition with which, under 
 the guidance of the Apostles, she started on her his- 
 torical career. 
 
 §6. 
 
 But while the Holy Scriptures are the great 
 security for the stability of Catholic doctrine, they 
 represent none the less its inexhaustible richness, 
 and therefore the progressive element in it. They 
 are far more than a mine of antiquarian information 
 about the beliefs and practices of the early Christians. 
 No word of God can ever become a dead, obsolete 
 thing. The Scriptures are a living and eternal Voice 
 of God, speaking to all ages as freshly as to those 
 who first received them. We believe that the Bible is 
 inspu'ed. There is no portion of it which does not 
 convey, when right'y studied, instruction from God for 
 the guidance of thought and life. " Every passage of 
 Scripture is full of Divine inspiration, and profitable 
 for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction 
 which is in righteousness " (2 Tim. iii. 16). What 
 S. Paul here says of the Old Testament is at least 
 as true of the New. 
 
 The Church is committed to no mechanical views 
 concerning tlje mode of the Inspiration. She is 
 satisfied with the conviction that the writers were 
 ** actuated by the Holy Ghost " (2 Pet. i. 21). It was 
 a heretical, and not a Catholic teacher, who first 
 
Nature of their Inspiration. 237 
 
 maintained that the human penman or mouthpiece of 
 the Spirit was a passive instrument, lying with his 
 faculties dormant under the celestial impulse, like the 
 lyre under the performer's hand. On the contrary, 
 it seems true to believe that the Holy Ghost, who 
 " distributes to every man severally as He wills " 
 (1 Cor. xii. 11), has selected His own agents for this 
 high task, and has so prepared them that their natural 
 temperament, their circumstances and education, their 
 very frailties and faults, have contributed to the effect 
 which He designed to convey. As He was to speak 
 to men, He made His thoughts first to be the thoughts 
 of men, in order that they might be the more per- 
 suasive and intelligible, and instinct with human life 
 and sympathy. 
 
 Only on the supposition of this freedom of the 
 inspired agent can we understand those little varia- 
 tions and discrepancies, — perhaps mistakes, — which 
 meet us occasionally, for instance, in the Synoptic 
 Gospels. It would expose the work of God to derision 
 to think that S. Matthew was directly inspired to 
 speak of two demoniacs on the coast of Gadara and 
 S. Mark to speak of one ; but to those who have the 
 faith of the Church such things are not difficulties. 
 On the contrary, they lead a reverent and thoughtful 
 mind to a more profound and satisfying conception 
 of inspiration, in which the Holy Ghost is felt to lay 
 hold upon the very roots of the inspired writer's 
 being, and not upon his fingers only. Thus the 
 precise form in which the writer's thought clothes 
 itself appears to come more under the head of the 
 
238 Infallibility of tJic Bible, 
 
 Holy Spirit's providence than under that of His 
 special inspiration. It was, we may say without 
 irreverence, the Divine aim rather to hreathe a spirit 
 of truth than to secure an infallibility of the letter. 
 Not that the Church abandons the belief that the 
 Scriptures are infallible in that which is of primary 
 importance. The numbers of persons slain in an 
 Old Testament engagement may be wrongly given, — 
 though perhaps by the error of copyists ; a quotation 
 may be assigned by an Evangelist to one prophet 
 •which really belongs to another, — although some lost 
 facts might give a different aspect to such phenomena ; 
 — but accuracy upon details of this nature cannot 
 logically be put on the same footing as accuracy in 
 matters of doctrine, and worship, and nioral practice. 
 We could understand how a soul like S. Paul's, pene- 
 trated with intense devotion to Christ, might turn 
 with indignant contempt from a learned wrangle 
 over such minutise of historical criticism, but by the 
 very same impulse throw himself ardently into con- 
 troversy over a word which might confuse or clear 
 men's minds with regard to the nature of our Lord 
 or His method of salvation. Absolute infallibility of 
 (loctrinal statement is found in Holy Scripture, 
 because doctrinal statement is the outcome of a 
 y/hole inner life of thought and adoration and 
 experience ; in the other kind of cases accuracy is 
 but a matter of memory or of research. 
 
 Infallibility, however, is but one side, — and that 
 the negative side, — of the Scriptural inspiration. It 
 has always been the conviction of the Church that 
 
Its Completeness and Sufficiency. 239 
 
 the Scriptures which she has received are not only 
 trustworthy as far as they go, hut that they are 
 complete and all-sufficient. Much is to be learned 
 from the history of the formation of the Canon, in 
 which again the general providence of the Holy 
 Ghost co-operates with the instinct imparted by Him 
 to the Church. There is no reason to think that other 
 writings of the Apostles, now lost, were less inspired 
 than those still extant, — any more than unrecorded 
 words and acts of our Lord were less Divine than the 
 recorded ones. But by the Divine will they passed 
 quickly out of sight ; and the Church acquiesced in 
 their disappearance. It was gradually felt by the 
 Christian consciousness that the collection of books 
 which we now possess under the name of the Bible 
 was not only truly, but fully, representative of the 
 teaching first received, and that the preservation of 
 other documents would have swelled the bulk of 
 what the Christian has to master, without adding any 
 new element to its richness. Thus " unscriptural' ' 
 becomes synonymous with ''novel," and therefore 
 with "false," or at least with ''unnecessary." Those 
 "fierce words," as Jeremy Taylor calls them, of 
 S. Basil well express the feeling of the Fathers on 
 this point, " It is a manifest fall from the faith and a 
 manifest incurrence of the charge of arrogancy, either 
 to make light of anything that is in Scripture, or to 
 introduce in addition anything that is not." 
 
 Yet, while the introduction of anything novel and 
 unscriptural as an article of faith forfeits the title of 
 Catholic, if not of Christian, the eduction and develop- 
 
240 Christian Doctrine progressive. 
 
 ment of that which \s Scriptural and primitive is a 
 mark of Catholic vitality. Fixity in dogmatic expres- 
 sion, the invariable repetition of orthodox formulas, 
 is not a sure sign of the Catholic heart. It may 
 indicate a stagnation of devout thought. The fields 
 of Holy Scripture, though ploughed over for so many 
 centuries, are still as fertile as if they were virgin soil, 
 and every century teaches the Church how she may 
 expect from them larger and larger harvests. No 
 less than Polycarp and Clement, we sit at the feet of 
 the Apostles themselves, — but with our power of 
 understanding them increased by all the labours of 
 the Saints of eighteen hundred years. There cannot 
 fail to be an advance in the Catholic doctrine, if the 
 Church is faithful. The only caution needed is that 
 the faith be not altered in the process. S. Vincent 
 of Lerins, so inexorable towards any novelties, has 
 well laid down the lines of doctrinal advance, when 
 he compares it to the growth of a living thing ; never 
 losing its identity, and always preserving its pro- 
 portions, — only gaining a fuller differentiation of its 
 parts, and an increase of solidity, and strength, and 
 suppleness. 
 
 §7. 
 
 Thus Catholicity, like unity and like sanctity, still 
 gives us an aim to be aimed at, not an achievement 
 to congratulate ourselves upon. As yet the Holy 
 Spirit has much to do to " lead us into all the truth " 
 (S. John xvi. IB). It can only be fully accomplished 
 when every particular Church, and each individual 
 
Authority and Private Judgment. 241 
 
 Christian, insists upon winning and wearing the 
 Catholic title. " Christian is my name," says S. 
 Pacian, "and Catholic is my surname;" and no 
 Christian man, and no Christian body, can without 
 shame make any other confession. But the only 
 pledge of Catholicity which the individual or the 
 particular Church can have, lies in dutiful deference 
 to the authority of the Church at large. 
 
 Such deference is not a blind deference, nor 
 opposed to true liberty of thought or to what is 
 called i^rivate judgment. There come times when 
 the spirit of error, like that of unholiness, spreads 
 abroad in the Church, and it becomes the duty of the 
 faithful few, or the faithful one, at the cost of what- 
 ever isolation, to withstand the prevalent false 
 doctrine of the day. Although the Church is in- 
 fallible, yet at any given moment the truth may be 
 driven into a corner within her, and an Athanasius, 
 expelled and persecuted and anathematized as a 
 heretic by his contemporaries, may be the narrow 
 channel through which the stream of true doctrine 
 passes from the fathers to the children. Each Chris- 
 tian is bound to think for himself. He could not 
 otherwise make a good scholar in the school of our 
 Lord. Neither is hesitancy and doubt in accepting 
 what is taught, always the sign of a wrong temper. 
 Doubt of the truth is often but the feeling after a 
 more delicate form of truth. Although the sceptical 
 spirit, which can only criticize and never firmly 
 believe, is an unchristian spirit, the spirit of enquiry, 
 which believes the truth to be attainable, and questions 
 
2^2 Duty of Enquiry, 
 
 in order that it may imclcrstand, is a spirit charac- 
 terized in Scripture as a "noble " one (Acts xvii. 11). 
 Indeed, the Apostle's words would justify our believing 
 that "love of the truth," even when entangled among 
 confused and wrong conclusions, may be more pleas- 
 ing to God than the most correct creed held without 
 being loved (2 Thess. ii. 10). The Apostle, also, and 
 our Lord Himself, recognise that there is in men a 
 faculty for discerning truth which may be trusted to 
 act properly if properly handled. Thus S. Paul 
 describes his method as that of one who ** by the 
 manifestation of the truth recommends himself to 
 every conscience of men before God" (2 Cor. iv. 2). 
 And Christ, speaking "to those Jews who had believed 
 Him " — that is, who had but taken the very first step 
 of faith, and were still far from satisfactory views of 
 things, — said, "If ye continue in My word, 3'C are 
 truly My disciples, and shall know the truth, and the 
 truth shall free you" (S. John viii. 31). 
 
 But the true disciple of Christ will recollect that 
 he has not joined a society of adventurous guessers 
 after the truth, in which he is as likely to guess right 
 as any one else, but a society which is already in 
 possession of the truth, and is divinely commissioned 
 to preach and teach it. And though every man may 
 with great profit verify what he is taught, he will not 
 approach the Scriptures as if nothing in them' bad 
 5'et been made out for certain. Much still remains 
 to be explored ; but on some points the Church has 
 given her testimony with abundant clearness. It is too 
 late, for instance, to expect the Church to reconsider 
 
The Voice of the ChzLVch. 243 
 
 the doctrine of Christ's Godhead. A man may treat 
 it as an open question, if to bim it seems so ; but if 
 be does, be sets himself up as a judge of the Church, 
 and therefore of Him who said, " He that despisetb 
 you, despisetb Me, and be that despisetb Me despisetb 
 Him that sent Me" (S. Luke x. 16). The same 
 holds true of many doctrines which have not received 
 as explicit a declaration from the Church, but on 
 which there has been at all times a practical con- 
 sensus. 
 
 If it be asked where a man may find the authori- 
 tative teaching of the Catholic Church, the answer is 
 less simple than human impatience would wish. 
 The Church is divided into ccclesia doccns and ccclesia 
 quae docetur, the teachers and the taught. The 
 superior officers of the Society are the accredited and 
 authorised exponents of her doctrine. Yet it is never 
 claimed that the individual priest or bishop is 
 rendered unconditionally infallible by the tenure of 
 bis office. In the teacher, no less than in the taught, 
 doctrinal accuracy depends on faithfulness to the 
 illuminating Spirit and loyalty to the Church at large. 
 There is no sufficient ground for making an exception 
 in the case of the Bishop of Rome. Nothing but an 
 a ijriori demand for an infallible see would have led 
 to such a notion, — and it has been falsified in advance 
 by history. A variety of reasons led the early Chris- 
 tians to pay much deference to the Church of the city 
 of Rome, and to its Bishop as representing that 
 Church ; but all the great controversies were settled 
 by other methods than a recourse to him as if be 
 
244 Truth established by Conference. 
 
 were warranted to be right. It is impossible to make 
 out that the CathoHc Church is so focussed, — so 
 necessarily focussed, — in the occupant of one see, that 
 he always correctly represents her tradition. God 
 has taken a way of speaking through His Church 
 which is more like His usual methods, more vital and 
 less mechanical, than that ; — a way which involves 
 more discipline to faith, as well as to intelligence, 
 than the consulting of an external oracle and the 
 submission to ready-made decrees. 
 
 The truth is not finally and in detail defined 
 except by collaboration and conference of the whole 
 Society. To all the bishops of the Church, according 
 to ancient teaching, the guardianship of the faith is 
 solemnly committed, individually and collectively. 
 They are jointly, and yet singly and equally, respon- 
 sible for it. What is decided by the universal 
 episcopate may be presumed to be a Catholic decision ; 
 but even so, the decision is referred back to the whole 
 body of the faithful, and Councils are not reputed 
 Ecumenical until their decrees have been ratified by 
 the acceptance of all. Neither is a consensus of the 
 entire Church of to-day sufficient, unless it be in 
 harmony with the teaching of other ages also. 
 "What," asks S.Vincent, ''will the Catholic Christian 
 do, if some recent corruption, not content with con- 
 taminating a single branch, proceeds to contaminate 
 the whole Church alike ? At such a time he will see 
 to it that he cleaves to antiquity, which is beyond the 
 reach of modern and seductive fraudulence." By 
 such reciprocal action between Church and Church, 
 
The ChurcJis Apostolic Mission. 245 
 
 and between the teachers and the taught, and between 
 ,age and age, unity and love and mutual confidence 
 are developed ; and that Spirit of Christ, by whom 
 the Church is made Catholic as well as One and Holy, 
 is felt to pervade the whole Body both in time and in 
 space. 
 
 The final note of the Church of God is that she is 
 Apostolic. This title belongs to her not in virtue of 
 her teaching the primitive doctrine, — or aiming at 
 a simplicity of life like that of the Apostles, but 
 in virtue of the unfailing Mission with which she is 
 charged. She is still as truly sent as the first agents 
 in her foundation were, — nay, as'^Christ Himself was. 
 In fact, her mission may not only be compared to 
 His : — it is historically the same. Every word in our 
 Lord's great sentence, uttered on the night of the 
 Eesurrection, brings this out. "According as the 
 Father hath commissioned Me {a-wiaToKKiv /ue), I also 
 send you" (TrijUTru) vjuag S. John xx. 21). Our Lord's 
 mission was not come to an end, to be succeeded by 
 a similar one. His mission was still in force, — we 
 may say rather, was just coming into full force ; and 
 the way in which He exercises it is through His 
 Apostolic Church. Nor is the impulse, by which He 
 first sent the Church out, spent, nor will it ever be 
 spent : it is a continuous sending, — as continuous as 
 that which makes it effectual, namely, the flowing 
 forth of the Holy Spirit into the Church (Eev. xxii. 1). 
 It was much more than a promise of doctrinal 
 
246 Po'Pchial Youth of the CImrch. 
 
 infallibility -which Christ made when He said, *' The 
 gates of Hades shall not prevail against her " (S. 
 Matt. xvi. 18). Dogmatic error is only one of the 
 forms in which the life of the Church is threatened ; 
 but she is proof against them all. Particular branches 
 of the Church may decay, and die out, and be ex- 
 terminated ; but the Church as a whole not only lives, 
 but remains as young as ever. She has the promise 
 of shewing no "wrinkle" of old age, as well as that 
 of shewing no **spot" of sin (Ej)h. v. 27). No 
 powers that she once had, have been lost to her 
 by the action of time. If she is tauntingly asked 
 why she does not work miracles now, as she pro- 
 fesses to have done in earlier days, she cannot with- 
 out unfaithfulness say that the power to do them 
 has been withdrawn from her; the answer is that 
 the circumstances have changed. Our Lord Him- 
 self, and the Apostles, did not work miracles 
 except when they perceived that circumstances de- 
 manded them; and if circumstances again demand 
 them, precisely the same " power of the Lord will be 
 present" with us that we should do them (S. Luke v. 
 17) ; for it is but one mode of operation of that Spirit 
 who is still and for ever the life and vigour of the 
 Church. 
 
 At times, indeed, she is apt to lose the sense of 
 her Divine mission to mankind, to abandon enter- 
 prise amongst the unconverted, and to rest content 
 with looking after herself. Portions of her may lapse 
 into worldly ways, — either by what is called Eras- 
 tianism, — that is, by putting herself at the disposal of 
 
The whole Church ApostoHc. 247 
 
 earthly forces, — or on the other hand by an imitation 
 of Imperialism, using her spiritual pretensions to 
 exalt herself into a kingdom like the kingdoms of this 
 world, and mistress of them. But in spite of such 
 unfaithfulnesses, the Lord still uses her as His pleni- 
 potentiary envoy in the world, content even to suffer 
 by her misrepresentation. From age to age she goes 
 on exercising the powers with which He entrusts her, 
 in His Name and with His authority preaching the 
 Gospel and teaching the truth, forgiving sins and 
 retaining them, binding and loosing — that is, laying 
 down regulations for the discipline of her children 
 (S. Matt. xvi. 19), — blessing and interceding and 
 offering the perpetual Sacrifice, administering the 
 means of sanctification, and appointing men to sacrecl 
 offices. 
 
 §9. 
 
 Here comes in the doctrine of the Christian 
 ministry. We must plainly recognise at the outset 
 that it is the whole body of the Church which is 
 apostolic, and not only a particular order within it. 
 No proof is forthcoming that the commission given 
 by Christ on the evening of His Resurrection was 
 addressed to ''the eleven," to the exclusion of "them 
 that were with them " (S. Luke xxiv. 33) ; or that 
 the Holy Ghost, on the day of Pentecost, fell only on 
 the Twelve, to be by them dispensed to the rest. The 
 entire Society received the mission ; the entire Society 
 received at once the inspiration by which it was 
 qualified to perform it. No inner distinctions break 
 
248 PriestJiood of the Laity. 
 
 up the Church's unity. Within the apostolic Church 
 all are priests. There is no sacerdotal caste, per- 
 forming religious offices for a secular laity. The 
 contrast between clergy and laity is that between a 
 higher and a lower degree in the priesthood. This is 
 implied in the ancient title of " Ordination," and of 
 *' Holy Orders," which bear witness to the fact that 
 the difference between clergy and laity is one of 
 function and arrangement and mutual relations, not 
 a difference of fundamental opposites. If wilfully 
 severed from the faithful laity, the clergy would have 
 no right to act in the name of Christ. Their priestly 
 ministries are those of the whole body, performed 
 through them as its natural organs. 
 
 But there are two things which must not be for- 
 gotten. Those who deny the sacerdotal character of 
 the Christian ministry are too apt to destroy along 
 with it the sacerdotal character of the Christian laity, 
 and to make the doctrine that we all are priests 
 equivalent to the doctrine that none are. The true 
 priesthood of Christians contains more than a right 
 of direct approach to God for ourselves. It conse- 
 crates us, in our several stations, to be mediators on 
 behalf of others, and lays upon us the responsibilities 
 as well as the privileges of spiritual authority. Pro- 
 motion in the hierarchy of which we arc all members 
 carries with it an intensified power of priesthood. 
 And secondly, the order of the Church is not a thing 
 of conventional polity ; it is an essential. Our Lord, 
 as wc have said before, had already given the rudi- 
 ments of a structure to His societv before His Passion. 
 
Ministry not delegated from below. 249 
 
 Such the Holy Ghost foimd it at His coming, and as 
 Biich He sealed it. It would have heen strangely in- 
 congruous for that Spirit, whose work is universally 
 a work of order, to choose an amorphous and un- 
 organized collection of men to be His apostolic 
 instrument for the redemption of mankind. In order 
 to the welfare of the body, the proper relation of the 
 part to the whole must be preserved, and of the whole to 
 the part ; and if the eye cannot see apart from its place 
 in the body, no more can the body reject the Divinely 
 appointed eye, and develops some other organ of sight. 
 It is sometimes thought that the ministry of the 
 Church derives its authority by delegation from below ; 
 that for convenience' sake some members of the society 
 are deputed to represent the rest, and that the 
 functions which they perform might, but for that 
 deputation, be as well performed by any other 
 Christian. Such a theory is not agreeable to the 
 mode . of ordination prescribed in Scripture and 
 practised from the beginning by the Church. The 
 setting apart of the first deacons may be taken as a 
 case in point. There, the faithful laity are invited 
 to select the men for the office ; for the clergy are not 
 a close corporation, to co-opt among themselves, and 
 to this day the voice of the faithful laity is asked at 
 every Catholic ordination. But their nominees do 
 not become ministers by the act of nomination. It 
 is absolutely reserved to the supreme order in the 
 Church to determine whether they shall be made so 
 or not. The Apostles '' appoint " the selected persons 
 (Acts vi. 3) — this is the investiture with mission and 
 
250 Orders and Mission given by Bishops. 
 
 jurisdiction; the Apostles, with prayer, "laid their 
 hands upon them," — this confers on them the sacred 
 character and spiritual gift, by which they are in- 
 delibly distinguished from the rest of the faithful, and 
 enriched with grace for their duties. These two 
 things are necessary to an apostolic Church, — that its 
 ministry should have ordination proper, — or the sacred 
 character and gift, — and mission, or the authority to 
 execute the office. To these is added, for the sake of 
 order in working, jurisdiction, or the assignment of a 
 sphere of labour. And these are not given by the 
 mass of the faithful, or by their lay representatives. 
 A king, for instance, may appoint to a bishopric, or 
 the ratepayers of a parish elect a clergyman for their 
 incumbent ; but the clergyman only becomes incumbent 
 when the bishop institutes him to the charge of those 
 souls ; and the king's nominee remains what he was 
 before, until the bishops of the Church have laid 
 hands on him. If the theory of delegation from below 
 were correct, the ordaining hands would be those of 
 the laity ; and on each avoidance of the see, the 
 representatives of the diocese would confer on the 
 man who was to be their bishop the power which 
 had passed back to them at his predecessor's death. 
 But this is unheard of in Scripture or antiquity. 
 The authority to ordain, along with other powers of 
 government, is lodged by S. Paul solely in the hands 
 of a Timothy and a Titus (1 Tim. v. 22 ; Titus i. 5), 
 who are responsible for it to God alone, with the 
 evident intention that they in their turn should 
 provide for a due succession (2 Tim. ii. 2). 
 
Necessity of the Episcopal Order. 251 
 
 Our scanty materials for the history of the end of 
 the first century, and of the beginning of the second, 
 have caused some doubts about the organization of 
 the Churches of that date ; but the doubt is scarcely 
 a serious one. If in any quarters some little con- 
 fusion for a while prevailed, it had all passed away 
 within the lifetime of those who had learned from 
 Apostles in person, and it had come to be recognised 
 that no Church could be complete without the three 
 orders of the ministr3\ Bishops alone could ordain. 
 By whatever steps this conviction may have been 
 established, — whether (as is probable) by direct com- 
 mand of the Apostles, acting on the instructions of 
 our Lord, or by the natural instinct of the Church, — 
 in any case it was the work of the Holy Ghost. The 
 apostolic succession is the guarantee of the continued 
 historical identity of the Church. No Church which 
 has lost it can complain, if the validity of its acts 
 is questioned by those Churches which retain the 
 primitive tradition. 
 
 §10. 
 
 This One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church 
 will preserve her identity not only to the end of this 
 dispensation, but for ever. The Bride of Christ, and 
 Mother of us all, has a career which resembles in 
 many ways that of any typical child of hers. She 
 is on her probation in this world ; and though we 
 are certain that she is indefectible, yet the promise 
 is not one which will allow of the relaxation of vigi- 
 lance. Holy Scripture warns us of great fallings 
 
252 Identity 0/ CImrch now and Jicreafter. 
 
 away, of false doctrines presented under specious 
 appearances, of immoral teaching and practice, sup- 
 ported by miracles and made to look like the severity 
 of holiness. It is possible that the true Church may at 
 last be but a remnant, as compared in numbers with 
 the apostate mass; possible also that the apostasy 
 may be fostered by some of the most influential sees 
 in Christendom. There is no positive assurance 
 regarding the future of any special Church. But 
 the remnant, if so it must be, will be not only in 
 spiritual sympathy with the Church of the first days, 
 but organically the same with it. The Church which 
 Christ founded will not die, to be succeeded by another. 
 She is now imperfect, in her unity, her holiness, her 
 belief, her sense of mission. Then she will be perfect. 
 But perfect and imperfect she is the same. " That 
 Church which now contains an admixture of bad 
 men," so the African Catholics maintained against 
 the Donatists, " is not different from the kingdom of 
 God where there will be no such mixture. It is one 
 and the same Holy Church, existing in one condition 
 now, and in another condition hereafter," 
 
Chapter IX. 
 ®i)c iUteang of (State. 
 
 Object of the Means of Grace at once Social and Individnal — The Word 
 of God — Fundamental Principle of the Sacraments — Their Number 
 — Baptismal Incorporation into Christ — Washing away of Sin— 
 — Regeneration — Baptism of Infants — Administration of this 
 Sacrament — Confirmation — Mode of administering it — Christ our 
 Support the zinderlying Idea of the Eucharist — Doctrine of the Real 
 Presence — Chrisfs Body — Christ's Blood — The Eucharistic Sacri- 
 fice — Christian Prayer — Absolution — Unction of the Sick — Holy 
 Orders — Marriage, 
 
 §1. 
 
 The connecting point between the Church and the 
 individual Christian is in the means of grace appointed 
 by Christ and employed by the Holy Ghost. A two- 
 fold work is effected by them. They are at once the 
 means by which the Church is extended and consoli- 
 dated, and also the means by which souls are made 
 partakers of the benefits procured for them by the 
 meritorious work of Christ. It is plain from such 
 an arrangement of Divine wisdom that these two 
 ends are not to be separated from each other, nor 
 is the one of greater importance than the other. In 
 Christianity the single soul is at once everything and 
 nothing. On the one hand it is only to be valued in so 
 
2 54 ^/'^' ^yo)-d of God, 
 
 far as it serves to augment the kingdom of God, and 
 contributes some special gift to the riches and fulness 
 of the Christian commonwealth. Yet on the other 
 hand, the Church herself -would be a mere name, an 
 abstract and barren idea, but for the single souls which 
 compose her. Though she is a living thing, and not a 
 piece of formal machinery fitted up for the salvation of 
 souls, yet her very life depends upon the performance 
 of the saving task, and she only gains true existence 
 as the Bride of Christ by actually bringing men forth, 
 and becoming ''the Mother of all living" to the New 
 Adam (Gen. iii. 20 ; Gal. iv. 26). 
 
 §2. 
 
 First amongst the appointed means of grace comes 
 the preaching of the. Word of God. The instinct 
 of the Church has led her not to class preaching 
 among the Sacraments, although there' would be 
 much reason for doing so. It was distinctly ordained 
 by Christ Himself. "Preach the Gospel," He said, 
 "to the whole creation" (S. Mark xvi. 15). The ex- 
 terior form in which it is clothed, though not addressed 
 to jsight or touch, is addressed to hearing, so that the 
 body also has share in it, as in other sacraments. 
 And it cannoi be doubted that there is a truly 
 sacramental grace and power in preaching. The 
 words are not mere words, but vehicles of something 
 beyond words. Christ says, "The sayings that I 
 have spoken unto you are spirit and are life " (S. 
 John vi. G3). Speech altogether is a great mystery ; 
 and no one can pretend to understand or measure the 
 
tV/iy it is not a Sacrament. 255 
 
 power exerted by mind upon mind by means of 
 vibrations of sound, imparting ideas which alter the 
 whole career and character of a man, for good or for 
 evil. Christianity has not overlooked so mighty a 
 force. If preaching is not reckoned among the 
 Sacraments, but parallel with them, it is because it 
 is more, not less, than a sacrament. The gift con- 
 veyed through it, indeed, may not be greater, but it 
 more immediately influences the springs of thought 
 and will. Indeed, there is a sense in which 
 all the Sacraments depend for their efficacy upon 
 preaching. Without faith, they are received in vain; 
 and "faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the 
 Word of God " (Eom. x. 17). And while there are 
 other ways by which the Word of God can find an 
 entrance into men's hearts, besides the public preach- 
 ing in the congregation, — as for instance through the 
 reading of books, or the conversation of religious 
 friends, — yet there is a special power in the solemn 
 and authoritative utterance of the living voice in the 
 Church. It stands related to the private modes of 
 instruction, as the united prayer of the Church stands 
 to private devotion. A blessing rests on either ; but 
 the former may claim the x^romise of a peculiar 
 presence of Christ (S. Matt, xviii. 20). 
 
 No doubt another reason why the preaching of the 
 Gospel is not considered a sacrament is because the 
 ** outward part " in it cannot possibly have a fixed 
 and unchangeable form. There is infinite variety in 
 the substance of the preaching, and it needs present- 
 ing in an infinite variety of ways, to suit the needs of 
 
256 Divine and human Elements mixed. 
 
 many classes of bearers. Much more depends, in the 
 ministry of the "Word, upon the human agent, than 
 in other ministries. Even such adventitious gifts as 
 eloquence and imagination modify the result pro- 
 duced. Still more is this the case with the more 
 valuable inward gifts. The more deeply the preacher 
 feels the reality of his message, the more effect will it 
 have upon his hearers ; and the power of grace is to 
 some extent paralysed, when the word is unbelievingly 
 or unsympatbetically delivered. But however much 
 the Spirit may be "quenched" (1 Thess. v. 19) by 
 the minister's own unfaithfulness, or by the reaction 
 upon him from the apathy of the congregation, all 
 Christian preaching is an operation of the Spirit. 
 Christ still speaks, by the Holy Ghost, wherever His 
 appointed ambassadors, in the exercise of their lawful 
 calling, speak in His Name. They may obscure the 
 Gospel which they preach, by affectations, and errors, 
 and confusions ; but the Divine element is not wholly 
 wanting, and hearers whose hearts God has touched 
 will be able to discover it, in spite of all that overlays 
 it. And in proportion to the minister's singleness of 
 aim, and right conception of his office, will the Divine 
 element come out, A self-conscious ministry, whether 
 it takes the form of apologetic timidity or of boastful 
 display, is a weak ;ininistry; but a minimum of 
 natural endowments may work wonders, if used in 
 accordance with S. Peter's saying, " If any man speak, 
 let him speak as an oracle of God" (1 Pet. iv. 11). 
 The Apostle docs not mean that the man is to speak 
 what is in keeping with the Liblc. He means that 
 
Dtity of Meditation. 257 
 
 each person, whose business it is to speak in the 
 Christian Church, has it in his power, if he will, to 
 be an inspired prophet of God, — as much as the 
 prophets before Christ, or the projphets mentioned in 
 the Acts. He has but to put his faculties at the 
 disposal of the Holy Ghost, and to exert them faith- 
 fully under His guidance, — and he will be an oracle 
 indeed. 
 
 Like every other ordinance in the Church, the 
 ministry of the Word, to be fruitful, needs to be 
 received in faith, and reflected upon in after-thought. 
 *' A forgetful hearer " (S. James i. 25) carries away 
 no benefit, however plentiful the outpouring of grace 
 may have been at the time of hearing. Hence the 
 Church, even at times when it has timorously kept 
 the written Bible out of the hands of people in general, 
 has always encouraged the practice of meditation, or 
 pondering upon the verities of the Gospel. A close 
 connexion exists between the public ministry of the 
 "Word, and private reading and meditating upon it. 
 The public preaching gives guidance and vitality to 
 the private exercise, and a faithful use of the private 
 exercise qualifies the Christian to receive the spoken 
 message with increasing intelligence and appreciation. 
 
 §3. 
 
 The principle on which all Sacraments are based 
 lies deep in the very heart of the Christian faith. It 
 is not a superficial detail, which may be safely 
 neglected. It has its root in nothing less fundamental 
 than the relation which subsists from the beginning 
 
 s 
 
2s8 The Incarnation a Sacrament. 
 
 between creation and the "Word, or oven in the nature 
 of the Word Himself. That title of the Divine Son 
 suggests at once that the fulness of God has the 
 tendency to express itself in an objective form. Wo 
 have already seen that the existence of the Son ^Yith 
 the Father was eternally a prophecy and pledge of 
 creation, and that when creation is launched forth to 
 what we may call its furthest point from God, there 
 is still within it an immanent presence of the Word, 
 which by successive stages draws it again towards the 
 Author of its being, until the moment arrives when 
 the Word Himself stands in the midst of the world 
 which was made through Him, visible and tangible, 
 wholly expressed, and fully revealing the nature of 
 God, in a body fashioned out of our own earthly 
 substance. The Incarnation was itself, in the language 
 of the Fathers, a Sacrament. It linked, by no fan- 
 tastic or unreal or conventional union, the Divine life 
 to a material form. The Word was made flesh. And 
 BO far from the union thus effected being severed by 
 the Ascension, it was extended and completed. Christ 
 "ascended far above all heavens," not in order to be 
 as far as possible removed from the world, but " that 
 He might fill all things" (Eph. iv. 10), uniting, by 
 His own living contact with both, the height beyond 
 all height to vvhich He rose, with " the earth's lower 
 regions " (Eph. iv. 9) to which He had come down. 
 In His Incarnate Person is now fociissed and con- 
 centrated the fulness not only of the Godhead, but of 
 creation. Jesus Christ is in living connexion with 
 every part of it. 
 
The Saci'ainents not Judaic Symbols. 259 
 
 An immense advance is thus gained for our religion 
 upon the rehgion of the Jews. Theirs, like ours, was 
 a religion of symbolism. But with them, the symbol 
 was a symbol and nothing more. A certain resem- 
 blance may be found between their circumcision 
 and our Baptism, between their sacrifices and our 
 Eucharist; but the difference is more profoundly 
 significant than the resemblance. To them, the 
 inner import of the prescribed action was a lesson 
 which might be learned, not a gift which might be 
 apprehended. Circumcision, for instance, taught the 
 Jews in a striking figure, that the only way to enter 
 into covenant with a holy God, was to put away, 
 even at the price of pain and blood, the corrupt desires 
 of our fallen hearts ; but it offered no help towards 
 putting those desires away. The sacrifices, in a 
 multitude of instructive details, pointed on to One 
 who would be able to take away sin, and restore com- 
 munion between man and God ; but they took no sins 
 away, and the man had no actual communion with 
 God by eating of the offering. Yet by such ordinances 
 the principle of symbolism was consecrated, and pre- 
 pared for a higher use. Now, since the glorification 
 of Christ, and the outpouring of His Spirit, we are 
 presented with signs which not only speak of spiritual 
 mysteries, but convey the things which they speak of. 
 Otherwise, the institution of external rites would be 
 unworthy of Christ. His religion is a spiritual re- 
 ligion, — a religion of grace, and not of law. It would 
 have been a retrogression, — the reintroduction of a 
 modified Judaism, — if Christ, amidst all His high 
 
26o Effectual Signs of Grace. 
 
 si)iritual doctrines, had imposed as an obligation on 
 His Church one or two symbolical acts by which their 
 souls would not be enriched, except so far as it en- 
 riches the soul to profess obedience to His precepts 
 and to keep alive its sense of obligation to Him. If 
 such be our view of the Sacraments, we might do 
 well to follow the Quakers, and to abjure the outward 
 S3'mbol as a piece of mistaken literalism. There is 
 nothing between the position of the Quakers and that 
 of Catholics which makes Christ consistent with Him- 
 self. If the Sacraments were what Zwingli made 
 them, they would not be Christian. Christ could not 
 have devised what the Article calls '' only badges or 
 tokens of Christian men's profession." If the Sacra- 
 ments are His, we may be sure that "they be certain 
 sure witnesses, and effectual signs of grace and God's 
 goodwill towards us, by the which He doth work in- 
 visibly in us, and doth not only quicken, but also 
 strengthen and confirm our faith in Him." 
 
 The last-quoted words in the Article bring out 
 one merciful aspect of the Sacraments, namely their 
 adaptation to the needs of weak faith. Even if heroic 
 souls could get on without them, the common run of 
 Christians may be grateful for not being permitted to 
 lose blessings by a too universal diffusion of them. 
 A gift to be had anywhere would by most of us be 
 found nowhere. It is a mercy that we are shown 
 where, and when, and how, the spiritual gifts we most 
 need, may be with absolute certainty appropriated by 
 every one for himself. For this very reason it is most 
 important that we should not so interpret the promises 
 
Objectivity of the Grace. 261 
 
 which Christ attached to the Sacraments as to make 
 the reality of the grace there offered depend upon the 
 faith of the worshippers. It is acknowledged on all 
 hands that the measure of grace actually imbibed and 
 taken into the spiritual system is proportioned to the 
 receiver's faith, — that the ill-disposed gains no good, 
 but only harm, from the use of the means of grace, — 
 that the man whose faith is strong and lively gets 
 more out of them than the man whose faith is inert 
 and half-hearted. But the benefits received are not 
 necessarily the same as the benefits offered. It is not 
 the worshipper's business to create or conjure up a 
 gift which is not there. He has but to take, and 
 use to the best advantage, a gift which is there. We 
 rely upon the honour of Christ to be ready in waiting 
 for us with all that He has engaged Himself to give, 
 and not to hang back until He sees how much faith we 
 bring to meet Him. Nothing could be more daunting 
 to those of weak faith than to imagine that it rests 
 with them, not only to receive the grace when there, 
 but in some sense to bring it there also. 
 
 But in fact, the Sacraments are not merely an 
 accommodation to the needs of the weak, unless the 
 Incarnation itself is to be so regarded. That is a 
 notion which we cannot entertain, Christ did not 
 come in the flesh simply because it made it easier for 
 ordinary men to believe in what He did for them. He 
 came to unite heaven and earth, and to raise the 
 nature which He assumed. In pursuance of the same 
 design He instituted His Sacraments. By them He 
 brings out the true dignity of the visible creation, and 
 
262 Vital Union of inner and enter. 
 
 still further glorifies it. He not only teaches that the 
 material and corporeal can be made a basis and 
 vehicle for the spiritual, but He actually makes it so. 
 It does not satisfy the conception of a Sacrament, 
 when seen by the light of the Incarnation, to say that 
 the sacramental action, typifies in the external order 
 a spiritual process taking place !?«?•* fassxi in the 
 unseen. To think so would be to apply to the Sacra- 
 ments the principle on which Nestorius went in 
 speaking of the Person of Jesus. Neither ought we to 
 fall into an opposite error, analogous to Eutychianism, 
 and confound the outward and the inward. The 
 Sacrament is never the same thing as that of which 
 it is the sacrament. But the inward and the outward 
 are wedded together in a vital union. We find the 
 spiritual grace actually embodied and presented to us 
 in the action or the element which symbolizes it. It 
 is lodged there. It pleases Christ, not merely to give 
 covenanted graces along with the faithful performance 
 of prescribed ceremonies, but to make the ceremonies 
 quite literally the means of grace, and to charge with 
 His own fulness the thing which His Church uses or 
 does. In such a sublime consciousness of the living 
 unity of the outward and the inward, S. Paul, for 
 instance, does not scruple to say to Timothj-, "1 put 
 thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God, 
 which is in thee through the imposition of my hands " 
 (2 Tim. i. G). 
 
 Thus the Sacraments are the beginning of the 
 fulfilment of that yearning which Pantheism expresses 
 and distorts. God and the world are not identical, 
 
The Hallowing of Nahire. 26 
 
 o 
 
 nor ever will be ; but God, through the Incarnation 
 of His Word, is drawing all things into Himself. 
 ** Heaven and earth are full of His glory " even now. 
 Every portion of His creation is a concrete manifes- 
 tation of some fragment of Divine thought, a.nd ought 
 to impress the Christian observer with the sense that 
 he is on holy ground. All nature, it has been said, 
 is sacramental. By the selection of representative 
 materials like water and bread, to be set apart for 
 purposes of stupendous import, Christ emphasizes 
 this thought and gives it point. He thereby hallows 
 all natural substances, as, by the appointment of 
 selected holy days. He consecrates all our time. That 
 greatest of early doctors upon sacramental subjects, 
 S. Irenasus, fresh from the traditions of S. John, 
 insists with peculiar emj)hasis upon this line of 
 thought, which was made the more significant to 
 him by the Gnostic disparagement of matter. To 
 him, the Eucharistic Offering is the offering to God of 
 " firstfruits from His creatures " — and that, not as a 
 separate purpose independent of its being the offering 
 of Christ's Body, but in consequence of its being so. 
 He dwells again and again upon the action of the "Word 
 in nature, as preparing nature to serve the purposes of 
 grace. " Since we are members of Him," he says, "and 
 are nourished by the creature, and He Himself provides 
 us with the creature, making His sun to rise, and rain- 
 ing according to His pleasure. He confessed the cup, 
 which the creature supplies, to be His own Blood, with 
 which He infuses our blood, and asseverated the bread 
 supplied by the creature to be His own Body, by which 
 
264 Number of iJic Sacrauunts. 
 
 He augments our bodies." It is the vindication of 
 the sanctity of matter, — the condemnation of that 
 false spirituah'ty which sees no value in anything 
 which is not simply spiritual. S. Irenseus is right 
 when he connects the doctrine of the Sacraments 
 with the resurrection of the body, as well as with the 
 Incarnation of the Word and with the creation and 
 development of the world through the Word. 
 
 §4. 
 
 It is a matter of small moment how many sacred 
 rites we include under the title of Sacraments. 
 Among the Fathers, the word is very loosely used. 
 When they enumerate at all, some speak of two 
 Sacraments, some of three, some of four. With the 
 advance of time the perfect number of seven came to 
 be generally recognised. It depends entirely upon 
 the definition ; and as the word is not one taken from 
 Scripture, where its precise significance could be 
 ascertained and must be preserved, the Church is at 
 liberty to define it as she pleases. Nevertheless it is 
 a misfortune that new significations should be put 
 upon terms of long ecclesiastical standing; and the 
 question whether, for instance, marriage is a sacra- 
 ment, ought never to divide the Church. Clearly the 
 Articles of the English Church intend to suggest an 
 inner distinction among the Sacraments, when they 
 speak carefully of two " Sacraments of the Gospel," 
 as marked ofl' from " five, commonly called Sacra- 
 ments," which "yet have not like nature of Sacraments 
 with Baptism and the Lord's Supper." And it is to 
 
Ci'oupiiig of them. 265 
 
 be observed that the Catechism only professes to deal 
 with those Sacraments which " Christ ordained in His 
 Church ; " it does not deny that there are others, 
 although no others are " generally " (that is, for all 
 men alike) ''necessary to salvation." Those two are 
 generally necessary, inasmuch as without them there 
 is no admission into the Church and no active member- 
 ship in it; and there is no pledged salvation outside 
 of the Church. The others are properly put on 
 a somewhat different level, because they are ancillary 
 to these. Penance for instance is the continued 
 application of a gift already conferred once for all in 
 Baptism. Confirmation is practically one Sacrament 
 with Baptism, completing what Baptism begins. 
 Orders is a special development of the grace given in 
 Confirmation ; and so, perhaps, is the Unction of the 
 Sick. Marriage is not an exclusively Christian in- 
 stitution, though it receives special honour and grace 
 in the bosom of the Church. Thus there is clearly 
 a difference of importance between Baptism (as com- 
 pleted by Confirmation) and the Eucharist on the one 
 hand, and the rest of the Sacraments on the other. 
 But if we are jealous for the dignity of the two great 
 Sacraments, it is not because we hold the others 
 cheap. There is a world of difference between them 
 and those edifying ceremonies in which the Church 
 abounds, but to which she does not attach the idea of 
 grace. For example, it has long been the custom to 
 marry people with a ring for "token and pledge;" 
 but the Church would condemn it as a profane 
 superstition to suppose that the grace of marriage is 
 
266 Necessity of Union zvith Christ. 
 
 conveyed by the ring. Sacred symbolism clusters 
 round all the Sacraments, which are themselves 
 Divinely appointed symbols ; but there is no con- 
 fusion between those acts which are means of grace, 
 and those which are only impressive parables. 
 
 §5. 
 
 Union with our Lord Jesus Christ is the first 
 thing absolutely necessary to salvation. There could 
 hardly be a greater departure from Scriptural Chris- 
 tianity than is shewn on this point in much of the 
 popular teaching of the day. According to this 
 modern Gospel, union with Christ would appear not 
 to be the soul's starting-point in its new career of 
 development, but a reward to be attained when the 
 soul has made good Christian progress. When we have 
 been justified by faith in Him, and have lived for some 
 time in accordance with our faith, we may then, it is 
 implied, expect to be drawn into vital union with Christ. 
 This is an inversion of the true order. None of the 
 characteristic blessings of the Gospel, — whether justi- 
 fication, or sanctification, or Divine knowledge, or 
 eternal life, or any other, — are promised to any except 
 " in Christ." A measure of repentance and of faith can 
 be given to us before we are united to Him. We may 
 have a true conversion of heart while still external to 
 Him. But these gifts are not the special gifts of the 
 Gospel. They were enjoyed under the Law as well. 
 They were the chief features in the work of John the 
 Baptist. To become partakers' of Christ's righteous- 
 ness, to receive His merits, we need something more 
 
Baptism admits to that Union. 267 
 
 than to stand at a distance and believe. The type of 
 the Brazen Serpent, with all its wonderful teaching, 
 is, after all, but a partial type. It must be supple- 
 mented by such rich statements as these, which 
 abound in the New Testament, *' Him that never 
 knew sin, on our behalf He made to be sin, that we 
 may become Divine righteousness in Him" (2 Cor. v. 
 21). "Being justified freely by His grace through 
 the redemption which is in Christ " (Eom. iii. 24). 
 "In whom we have our redemption through His 
 Blood, even the remission of our sins" (Eph. i. 7). 
 *' Seeking to be justified in Christ " (Gal. ii. 17). 
 We do not receive these things first, and then become 
 one with Him. It is in Him alone that we gain them. 
 We first taste these privileges when we begin to 
 realise that we have already been made to share in 
 the life of Christ Himself. 
 
 Without faith on our part, our union with Christ 
 remains inoperative, but our faith does not constitute 
 the union. Faith is needed to make the union re- 
 ciprocal, fruitful in all those good things for which 
 the union is established ; but faith, by itself, would 
 be incompetent to put us into that union. It is the 
 act of Christ Himself, not ours. 
 
 Admission into Christ is the great gift of Baptism. 
 All Christians are agreed that Baptism is the act by 
 which we are visibly incorporated into the historical 
 Church. But if the historical Church is what we have 
 already seen it to be, in no merely figurative sense the 
 Body of Christ, then incorporation into it must carry 
 the blessing of membership in Christ. And this is in 
 
268 Union ivith CJirist a Reality. 
 
 fact the constant doctrine of Scripture. S. Paul 
 speaks twice of being "baptized into Christ" (Rom. 
 vi. 3 ; Gal. iii. 27). His language must not be 
 explained away by paraphrases, as if it were equiva- 
 lent to being baptized into the Christian religion, or 
 into the Christian covenant. It is true that he once 
 also speaks of being "baptized into Moses" (1 Cor. 
 X. 2), which might seem to justify such paraphrases. 
 But the Apostle is there expressly comparing the two 
 dispensations, and for that purpose transfers to Moses 
 the language properly applicable only to Christ. He 
 never uses exj)ressions concerning Moses such as he 
 elsewhere heaps up about Christ, — " members of 
 Christ," "in Christ," "holding the Head, even 
 Christ," "Christ liveth in me." Evidently, to the 
 mind of S. Paul, inspired by the Holy Ghost, union 
 with Christ was infinitely more than a metaphor. It 
 did not mean to him an agreement with the principles 
 of Christ, or sympathetic intercourse with His Person. 
 It meant, literally, a participation in His very self. 
 The Christian was annexed to Him. Christ's own 
 life overflowed him, and took him in, and extended 
 itself by embracing him. And there was a definite 
 moment when this began to be the case. It was the 
 moment of Baptism. Till then, the believer was still 
 being acted upon from without. By that Sacrament, 
 he passed into a new relationship to his Saviour, like 
 a branch grafted into the vine. He was no longer 
 without, but within. 
 
Baptism a Washing from Sin. 269 
 
 § 6. 
 
 Two main blessings flow to the soul as a direct 
 consequence from this admission into union with 
 Christ. Of these, the most universally recognised is 
 the Kemission of Sins. The Nicene Creed explicitly, 
 in the words of Scripture, connects it with Baptism. 
 The Apostles' Creed does so by implication, when it 
 names the forgiveness of sins as the first consequence 
 of membership in the Holy Catholic Church. It is 
 implied in the very symbolism of the Sacrament. 
 Baptism is a washing. By the outward aiDplication 
 of the cleansing element is typified the inward ablution 
 of the man's moral self which accompanies it. Pro- 
 bably this was present to our Lord's mind when He 
 spoke to Nicodemus of being "born of water and 
 spirit" (S. John iii. 5). The mention of "water" 
 would doubtless recall to His hearer the penitential 
 rite by which John was preparing men for the king- 
 dom of God. At the same time, it would, especially 
 when contrasted with "spirit," raise the thought not 
 only of the outward element, but of all that the out- 
 ward element meant. By being " born of water " our 
 Lord seems to have pointed to the cleansing operation 
 of the Holy Ghosts as distinct from the life-giving 
 operation spoken of as being "born of spirit." The 
 symbolism of the use of water is the same in Christian 
 Baptism as in that of John. In both, it is the sinner's 
 confession of guilt, and demand for a purification of 
 conscience (the probable meaning of 1 Pet. iii. 21). But 
 one great difference between John's baptism and ours 
 
270 Christian Baptism no mere Symbol. 
 
 is this, — that while his penitents had to wait for 
 their inward washing until Ho should come to whom 
 S. John pointed them, we receive our inward washing 
 at once, hy means of the outward. John, in the very 
 act of baptizing, confessed the inadequacy of his rite ; 
 but no sooner was the Atonement of Christ completed 
 and the Holy Ghost come, than the effectual power 
 was added to the significant ceremony, and S. Peter 
 could point convicted consciences to it with unfalter- 
 ing assurance : "Eepent, and let each one of you be 
 bai)tized in the Name of Jesus Christ into the re- 
 mission of 3'our sins " (Acts. ii. 38). Conviction, con- 
 trition, conversion, did not of themselves remove the 
 burden and stain of guilt, but the Baptism to which 
 these led. Thus the man who was sent by our Lord 
 Himself to the converted Saul, to instruct him in *' all 
 the things which were appointed for him to do," deals 
 with him as still not cleansed, and shows him the 
 way to obtain the cleansing: "Now, why tarriest 
 thou ? arise and be baptized and wash away thy sins, 
 calling upon His Name " (Acts xxii. IG). 
 
 All sin alike is washed away in Baptism, both 
 original and actual. The soul which rightly receives 
 the washing is no longer an object of displeasure and 
 wrath to the holy eyes of God ; because all the guilt 
 which made it so is removed by the passing into union 
 with Christ. Nor is the washing to be considered as 
 only retrospective. Under that mistaken notion, — 
 combined with a right sense of the increased heinous- 
 ness of sin after Baptism, — it was common in early 
 centuries to defer the Sacrament to advancing life, or 
 
Eternal Character of the Washing. 2 7 1 
 
 to the death-bed. Such a practice not only ignored 
 the second and still greater gift of Baptism, by which 
 we are qualified for a holy life as well as for a peace- 
 ful death ; it ignored the eternal character of union 
 with Christ, — what is called in the Prayer-book *' the 
 everlasting benediction of God's heavenly washing." 
 Currents catch us which are above and beyond time. 
 Our inmost selves are dealt with, not simply the 
 succession of our acts. The baptized man is not 
 barely forgiven up to that point, but is transplanted 
 into a region of forgiveness in Christ. Thenceforth, 
 unless he wilfully banishes himself from it again, he 
 lives and moves in it. He is not indeed guaranteed 
 never to sin again ; and his sins for the future are 
 more and more inexcusable, in proportion as he 
 drinks more deeply of the experience of life in Christ. 
 But not every sin cuts him off from union with Christ. 
 Though his sins may weaken the union, yet by peni- 
 tence and faith he will be preserved from falling 
 altogether away. God has provided His Church with 
 means to keep always fresh the baptismal absolution, 
 without any repetition of the baptismal act. Indeed, 
 there are few things which the Church regards with 
 such horror as the thought of a repetition of Baptism. 
 There is " one Baptism for the remission of sins." We 
 cannot pass backwards and forwards in and out of 
 the sacred sphere into which we have been brought. 
 Either we are in Christ, or we are not. If we are not 
 (after being once baptized), then nothing can put us 
 back in Him. If we are, then, though we may de- 
 servedly have the lowest place, we are at least within 
 
272 Remission comes by Regeneration. 
 
 reach of forgiveness. It is still ours, if we will put 
 forth our hands and take it. 
 
 §7. 
 
 Forgiveness is the primary need of a guilty being, 
 and any further gift, if it could be bestowed upon one 
 under condemnation, would be to such a one a mockery. 
 Nevertheless the baptismal union with Christ brings 
 with it a blessing out of all proportion greater than 
 forgiveness of sins. We could imagine a guilty person 
 receiving a free pardon, and yet not raised above his 
 original position. This is not what is dont with us. 
 Baptism is to us not only a laver, but a **laver of 
 Regeneration" (Tit. iii. 5). The connexion between 
 the two things is very close. They are not companions 
 by accident. According to the pregnant phrase of 
 the Prayer-book we "receive remission of sins hxj 
 spiritual regeneration." It might otherwise have 
 seemed as if the order could be reversed, and the 
 man might be said to be born again because he is 
 forgiven, and so starts fair on a future unprejudiced by 
 his past, a new man. But that is not enough. The 
 union with Christ which he has received conveys for- 
 giveness as a kind of inseparable consequence, because 
 it conveys to him a new and higher form of life. "We 
 need forgiveness, because we are fallen ; but Eegenera- 
 tion places iis on a higher level than that of our 
 nnfallen innocence. Adam' in Paradise had no such 
 glory as is made ours in Baptism. The Incarnation 
 of the Son of God has done far more for us than the 
 taking away of our sins. It has made us "partakers 
 
We are made Children of God. 2^3 
 
 of the Divine nature " (2 Pet. i. 4). " He was made 
 man," says S. Atbanasius, "that we might be made 
 Gods." It is in Baptism that we are made so, through 
 incorporation into the sacred humanity of Christ. 
 
 This is to be understood whenever we are said to 
 be made in our Baptism children of God. Devout 
 thinkers like Frederick Denison Maurice felt the 
 difficulty of such language, because it seemed to deny 
 that we were the children of God before. It does not 
 really deny it, however. All men are children of God, 
 in one sense, by virtue of their humanity ; and though 
 they are justly banished from the filial privileges in 
 consequence of their sins, they still retain a natural 
 kinship with the Divine. But in Baptism we receive, 
 by membership in the Incarnate Son, a new kind of 
 filiation altogether, in comparison with which the 
 unbaptized might rightly be said not to be children 
 of God. It is for this reason that we are said to be 
 "adopted" (Ej)h. i. 5), — which indicates, not the 
 restoration of forfeited rights, but special admission 
 to rights of sonship beyond anything which nature 
 could have claimed. Our adoption does not give us 
 only the privilege of free and bold access to our 
 Heavenly Father ; it brings us into a position where 
 we ourselves are made partakers of Christ's own 
 sonship. What He is by nature, we are made by 
 grace, in Him. It is not by His taking our nature, 
 but by our receiving His in consequence, that He 
 becomes "the Firstborn among many brethren" 
 (Eom. viii. 29). 
 
 We are far from fully grasping the Scripture 
 
2^4 Regeneration not Conversion. 
 
 doctrine of regeneration if we consider it to mean 
 a change in a man's moral attitude or character. 
 When S. John says that ** every one that doeth 
 righteousness hath been begotten of God"" (1 John 
 ii. 29), it is evident from the context that he does not 
 mean simply to identify moral rectitude with the 
 regenerate life. He is applying a test within the 
 Church, not to Christians and others indiscriminately. 
 Eighteousness, love, and the like, when seen among 
 Christians, are, in his eyes, good proof that their 
 regeneration has been successful; but they do not 
 constitute regeneration. The idea that regeneration 
 was synonymous with conversion was, no doubt, in 
 the mind of Nicodemus, when he suggested that 
 without an actual return to infancy a man in years 
 could never take a really fresh start. But His 
 Divine Teacher meant something more profound. 
 However often a man might be *' born again " in 
 Nicodemus's sense, his nature would not be essentially 
 altered. It might be purified and elevated, but it 
 would still be " flesh." Our Lord had come to 
 introduce an entirely new element, unattainable by 
 any natural process. "That which is born of the 
 flesh is flesh, and that w^hich is born of the Spirit is 
 Spirit " (S. John iii. C). Flesh may attain a magni- 
 ficent nobility of character, a sanctity which can 
 hardly be surpassed even in Christianity. It did so 
 in the case of S. John the Baptist. Our Lord takes 
 him as the highest type of humanity as it then 
 existed. But He says that John, after all, was but of 
 the natural order, '' a woman-born thing" (S. Matt. 
 
Two Natures unite in us. 275 
 
 xi. 11). The least in the new order should be — not 
 better, — but greater than he, — higher in the scale of 
 being, because partaking, not only of human nature 
 at its highest, but of the Divine. 
 
 Each baptized person is, accordingly, like a kind 
 of fresh incarnation of Christ. The difference between 
 Him and us is this ; that He is a Divine Person who 
 has assumed from us a human nature, while we 
 are human persons who through His humanity have 
 received the Diyine. His Divine personality made 
 it impossible for Him to sin ; and our human per- 
 sonality renders us still liable to it. But in spite 
 of profound differences, the juncture of the two 
 natures under one person is seen both in Him and 
 in us. It requires the eye of faith, however, to dis- 
 cern it. When we are true to our regeneration, the 
 effect is perceptible even to unbelief; but unbelief 
 does not understand the cause. *' The wind bloweth 
 where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, 
 but thou knowest not whence it cometh and whither 
 it goeth ; so is every one that hath been born of the 
 Spirit " (S. John iii. 8). So it was in the earthly life 
 of Jesus, and so it is in ours. *' Behold, what manner 
 of love the Father hath given us, that we should be 
 called, and are, children of God ! For this cause the 
 world knoweth not us, because it knew not Him " 
 (1 John iii. 1). 
 
 §8. 
 
 All ages are suitable for Baptism ; none more so 
 than infancy. Eegarding Baptism as a cleansing, we 
 
2 '](i Infancy suitable for Baptism. 
 
 cannot think it superfluous for infants, inasmuch as 
 the human heart from the outset contains the germs 
 of sin, however undeveloped. Nor can we suppose 
 that infancy is incapahle of receiving grace, or our 
 Lord would not have blessed the infants which were 
 brought to Him. It might be difficult to think of 
 infants receiving some other forms of grace, but not 
 the grace of regeneration. Life, by its very nature, 
 comes as an absolute gift, not by the choice of the 
 recipient. The grown up man, indeed, may ask to 
 be baptized and the new life be granted him ; but on 
 the other hand it is difficult to see how he could refuse 
 it, if it were thrust upon him. If he chooses, he may 
 speedily destroy it out of his soul, but he has had it, 
 even though but for a moment. Certainly the in- 
 tellectual neutrality of an infant's mind towards the 
 gift can form no obstacle to its entrance. Even in 
 later life it holds good as a general law that the 
 sacramental gifts of God are in advance of our 
 understanding, and He can say of them all, what He 
 said of one, " What I am doing, thou knowest not 
 now, but shalt perceive hereafter " (S. John xiii. 7). 
 And in that case, the sooner it is received the better. 
 Christ considered the praise which came " out of the 
 mouths of babes and sucklings," to be the perfection 
 of praise (S. Matt. xxi. IG), and, with indignant re- 
 pudiation of the contrary opinion, claimed the little 
 children as peculiarly fitted to be the subjects, — or 
 possessors, — of His kingdom of grace (S. Mark x. 14). 
 It was significantly pointed out by S. Irenteus that 
 the sacred infancy of Jesus Himself proved His desire 
 
Christ sanctifies every Age. 277 
 
 to lay hold upon human life not only in its later, and 
 sadder, and more self-conscious stages, but from first 
 to last, " He sanctified every age by passing through 
 the like; for He came to save all men through 
 Himself; all, that is to say, who through Him are 
 born again unto God, infants, and young children, 
 and boys, and young men, and elders. Therefore He 
 went through every age, and was made for infants an 
 Infant, sanctifying the infants ; among young children, 
 a young Child, sanctifying those of that age likewise, 
 and being made also to them an example of affection 
 and good principle and obedience ; among young men, 
 a young Man, becoming an example to young men 
 and sanctifying them to the Lord ; and so also among 
 elders, an Elder." 
 
 Mindful of the warning of our Lord, not to '* give 
 that which is holy to the dogs " (S. Matt. vii. 6), the 
 Church as a rule refuses Baptism to those who have 
 no sponsors. It is the part of the sponsors to give 
 security to the Church that the candidates are pro- 
 perly qualified and likely to make good use of the 
 grace bestowed, and also to see to it that they do so, 
 as far as they reasonably can. 
 
 §9. 
 
 The proper minister of this Sacrament is the 
 priest; but in his absence, a deacon is permitted to 
 give it. Indeed, as so much more depends upon 
 admission into union with Christ than upon any 
 subsequent gift, it has always been held lawful, in 
 an emergency, for a layman^ or even a woman, to 
 
278 Validity of schismatic Baptism. 
 
 baptize. Furthermore, the Sacrament is held to be 
 valid even if the person who administers it be a 
 heretic or schismatic. So long as he uses water, and 
 the sacred formula, he baptizes, not into his own 
 sect, but into the Catholic Church. If it were desired 
 to make a person by Baptism a member of a sect, 
 it would be necessary to introduce the name of the 
 sect into the formula, — in which ease it would cease 
 to be Christian Baptism. Unless there is genuine 
 doubt whether the right words and the right element 
 were used, conditional Baptism ought not to be 
 resorted to in receiving into the Church those who 
 have been bai)tized elsewhere. Any irregularity in 
 the Baptism was thought in ancient times to be 
 covered by the Laying on of Hands. How much of 
 the body is touched by the sacramental element makes 
 no difference to the effect of Baptism ; but immersion 
 is the normal and most instructive mode of baptism. 
 The Church of England allows Baptism by affusion, 
 but does not sanction Baptism by aspersion, or 
 sprinkling. 
 
 §10. 
 
 Confirmation ought not to be regarded as a sepa- 
 rate Sacrament, but as forming one Sacrament with 
 Baptism. It is only a separate Sacrament in the 
 same kind of way as the Eucharistic Chalice might 
 be called a separate Sacrament from the Eucharistic 
 Bread. Christ Himself instituted it, when He said, 
 " Make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them 
 into the name of the Father and of the Son and of 
 
Confirmation a Part oj Baptism. 279 
 
 the Holy Ghost " (S. Matt, xxviii. 19). Only part of 
 the baptismal grace is bestowed, when the baptized 
 stops short of Confirmation. So S. Peter understood, 
 when he promised to those who, on repentance, were 
 baptized into the remission of sins, that they should 
 "receive the gift of the Holy Ghost" (Acts ii. 38). 
 So S. Paul understood, when, on discovering the igno- 
 rance of some at Ephesus with regard to that gift, he 
 asked in astonishment, ''Into what then were ye bap- 
 tized?" (Acts xix. 3). From this close connexion 
 between the two acts the distinctive gift of Confirma- 
 tion is frequently attributed, both in Scripture and in 
 early Fathers, to Baptism. . It was not that the 
 gift was considered to be conveyed by the baptismal 
 water itself, but that the name of Baptism covered 
 the Laying on of Hands as well, — even as the Break- 
 ing of the Bread covered also the participation of 
 the Cup. When circumstances forced the separation 
 of the two parts of the Sacrament, the distinction 
 between them was recognised clearly enough. 
 " They prayed for them, with a view to their receiv- 
 ing the Holy Ghost ; for as yet He was fallen upon 
 none of them, but they were only in the position of 
 having been baptized into the name of the Lord 
 Jesus. Then they laid their hands upon them, and 
 they received the Holy Ghost" (Acts viii. 15-17). 
 While this passage shews unmistakeably that the 
 gift of the Holy Ghost was associated with the Laying 
 on of Hands, not with the baptismal Water, the word 
 ''only" shews no less unmistakeably that Baptism 
 was considered incomplete without it. 
 
28o The Spirit not given in Baptism. 
 
 All operations of Christ in His Church are per- 
 formed through the Holy Ghost, and assuredly the 
 act by which we are made a "new creation" is no 
 exception. But to be born of the Spirit is not the 
 same thing as to receive the Spirit. Baptism is re- 
 lated to Confirmation as the breathing of our Lord 
 upon His disciples on the evening of His resurrection 
 was related to the outpouring of Pentecost. If ever 
 the Church speaks of the Holy Ghost being given in 
 Baptism, apart from Confirmation, she expressly de- 
 fines the extent of the gift : " Give Thy Holy Spirit to 
 this infant that he may be born again." It would 
 have been inaccurate to ask for the gift without that 
 limitation. Strict theology, following the language 
 of Scripture, connects such terms as giving, and 
 receiving, and having the Spirit, the Spirit falling on 
 a man, and dwelHng in him, and making him His 
 temple, and being shed abroad in his heart, sealing, 
 and anointing him, with Confirmation, not with 
 Baptism by itself. We are quickened into new and 
 eternal and Divine life by the first act which ushers 
 us into the Body of Christ ; the rudiments of new 
 faculties are imparted to us, which are called " the 
 powers of the world to come" (Heb. vi. 5); we 
 begin at once to be subject to heavenly motions 
 from the Holy Ghost, such as the unbaptized cannot 
 be said to experience ; but not immediately does 
 the Spirit of Christ take possession of us and flood 
 our inward selves with His penetrating presence. 
 Even Christ Himself, whose Nativity in some degree 
 corresponded to our regeneration, did not receive 
 
Nature of the Confirmation Gift. 281 
 
 the complete unction of the Spirit till many years 
 later. 
 
 Ill-instructed Christians often suppose that the 
 gift of the Holy Ghost, which was at first bestowed 
 by the laying on of hands, consisted in the power 
 to speak with tongues and prophesy, or to work 
 miracles, because we sometimes read that the first 
 effect of the gift was to make the recipients break 
 forth into such actions. Or if it is recognised that 
 a gift of which so much is made could not be of 
 so superficial and poor a nature, men suppose that 
 to receive the Holy Ghost must necessarily involve 
 becoming holy. But this is to confuse the gift with 
 its effects. Startling results at first accompanied 
 the reception of the gift, in order to convince the 
 recipients and others of the reality of what was 
 given. These results are no longer produced, because 
 we believe without them. The absence of miracles and 
 tongues does not make us doubt the presence of the 
 Holy Ghost. Even an evil life is no proof that the 
 Holy Ghost is not there. S. Paul expressly rebukes 
 the Corinthians for living profligate lives while they 
 knew, all the time, that the Holy Ghost was within 
 them (1 Cor. vi. 19). It only shews that the gift, though 
 received, has been thus far received in vain. No gift 
 of God takes away the man's responsibility for using 
 it rightly, and it is quite possible for the Holy Ghost 
 to lie in a man's heart without effect. The simplest 
 account of this matter is really the truest. What 
 we receive in Confirmation is not an operation or 
 influence of God, but the living and personal Spirit 
 
282 Gifts and Fruits of the Spirit. 
 
 Himself. He enters into a new relation with us 
 tberebj^ and lodges Himself close by tbe springs of 
 our thought and desire, to make of us what we will 
 allow Him to make. 
 
 Behind all special manifestations of His grace lie 
 the great universally needed gifts. Of these, seven 
 are usually enumerated, all of which are forms of 
 enlightened spiritual and moral consciousness. By 
 this inward teaching, which not only sets the truth 
 before us as an object, but quickens our own faculties 
 to perceive it, the Holy Ghost sanctifies us. The seven- 
 fold gifts should bear fruit in a company of virtues, the 
 various grouping of which in different souls makes 
 the difference of character, and exhibits the manifold 
 artistic skill of the indwelling Spirit. '' To every man 
 severally as He wills " (1 Cor. xii. 11), He divides 
 the particular grace appropriate to the man himself 
 and to his function in the society. Those individual- 
 ising features of grace are sometimes called charismata, 
 or bounties in a definite shape. No man who has 
 been confirmed is without some charisma, which 
 becomes his contribution to the general wealth of 
 the Church. 
 
 Confirmation is often called a Sealing. In all 
 probability this is on account of its relation to Holy 
 Baptism. Sealing is not a first but a second act ; and 
 in Confirmation God's seal is set to what has already 
 been done. It is the "Amen" to the already uttered 
 "Yea" (2 Cor. i. 20-22). But it is more than the 
 ratification of an act ; it is the sealing of persons 
 (Eph. iv. 30). We ourselves are thereby indelibly 
 
Modes of Confirming. 283 
 
 marked as being God's own by a special consecration. 
 That consecration is set forth also under the figure of 
 Unction, because in Confirmation we, in our degree, 
 are consecrated to the same kind of office as our Lord 
 Himself, to be prophets and priests and kings in the 
 world, under Him. 
 
 §11. 
 
 It is a pity that the prominence anciently given 
 to this last thought has been lost in the English 
 Church by discontinuing the use of oil in Confirma- 
 tion. Nevertheless the laying on of hands is certainly 
 an apostolic way of administering the Spirit, and it 
 is not clear that the actual use of oil accompanied the 
 imposition in the very first days, although it soon 
 came to be regarded as an integral part of the 
 Sacrament. We are therefore in at least as good a 
 position with regard to this ordinance as some other 
 ancient Churches, which have retained unction but 
 have lost the laying on of hands. 
 
 This ministration belongs exclusively to the first 
 order in the Church. Following the precedent of 
 apostolic days (Acts viii. 14), the Church permits none 
 but bishops to confirm, although local usage has 
 sometimes varied upon the point. In the Eastern 
 Church, where unction alone is used, the priest is 
 permitted to confirm, but only with oil specially 
 prepared by the bishop. • 
 
 While the East also administers the rite to infants 
 along with Baptism, the West, by an important stretch 
 of authority, separates it from Baptism in the case of 
 
2 84 Confirmation precedes Communion. 
 
 infants, and defers it till the recipient has "come to 
 years of discretion." Confirmation is then wisely 
 preceded by a previous examination of the candidate 
 touching his baptismal vows, to make sure of his 
 being duly qualified to receive so great a gift. None 
 are admitted, in ordinary circumstances, to Com- 
 munion until they have been confirmed, because, as 
 S. Basil says, " The man who comes to the Com- 
 munion without understanding the principle on which 
 the participation of the Lord's Body and Blood is 
 given, derives no benefit from it." The saint is not 
 indeed giving this as a reason for the priority of Con- 
 firmation ; but as that which is Christ's can only be 
 shown to us by the Spirit, who alone searches the 
 depths of God, it is natural that we should first seek 
 the Spirit's enlightenment before we approach so 
 deep a mystery as the Sacrament of the Altar. 
 
 §12. 
 
 The fundamental idea embodied in the Holy Com- 
 munion is that of our perpetual dependence upon the 
 Incarnate Lord for support. This idea is set forth in 
 the discourses of our Lord at Capernaum, just as the 
 fundamental idea of Baptism is set foi-th in the con- 
 versation with Nicodemus. It is not enough that we 
 have once for all been brought into life, eternal life, by 
 Him. Our eternal life is not so made over to us in 
 our regeneration that we become independent centres 
 of it, thenceforth drawing only upon ourselves. We 
 are still compelled to resort for our nutriment to the 
 same source from which our life was originally con- 
 
Christ our Meat and Drink. 285 
 
 veyed to us, namely Christ. The relationship in 
 which we stand to Him, Christ compares to the 
 relationship in which He stands to the Father. 
 Although the Son ''has life in Himself" (S. John v. 26), 
 not merely the contingent existence of a creature, yet 
 He tells us that even in Him that life is not inde- 
 pendent of its sole and everlasting source: "I live 
 because of the Father" (S. John vi. 57). And as He 
 lives by a perpetual absorbing into Himself of the 
 entire fulness of the Father, so we live by a perpetual 
 absorbing into ourselves of so much of the fulness of 
 the Son as we are capable of receiving. The life of 
 God Himself is beyond our reach, and we cannot draw 
 upon it directly ; but it is stored for us, as in a bound- 
 less reservoir, in the person of the Son, and the Son 
 has brought it down to us in His Incarnation, and — 
 because we are fallen — has made a way for us to 
 appropriate it still more surely and copiously in His 
 Passion. 
 
 These thoughts are set forth to us under the 
 language of eating and drinking. But it must be 
 remembered by those who would get at the heart 
 of the matter, that even the eating and drinking which 
 supports our natural life is a profound mystery, and 
 that it proceeds from the same Creator who now uses 
 it in the Church for a great spiritual purpose. It 
 is not too much to say that our very constitution has 
 been devised with a view to this great spiritual pur- 
 pose, and that Christ did not merely adapt, as an 
 afterthought, a thing which He happened to find 
 ready to hand. Our natural constitution is such 
 
286 Mystery of Eating and Drinking. 
 
 that we cannot subsist in isolation. In order to 
 maintain life, we are compelled to eat, — that is, to 
 take into ourselves and assimilate a substance which 
 is not our own. We are kept in a constant union 
 with surrounding nature. Seeds, and herbs, and 
 animals, yield up their lives, and minister to the 
 sustenance of ours. How it is done, science is unable 
 to explain to us, for, as yet at least, it has no certainty 
 what life is. How the dead material particles, which 
 made up something else, become part of ourselves 
 and instinct with our own life which they have gone 
 to support, is an unexplained wonder, although so 
 common and universal that we seldom pause to think 
 upon it. The eating by which our bodies are kept 
 alive is an enigma in the very framework of nature. 
 It receives its answer in those sayings of Christ in 
 which, in a wonderful progress. He sets forth His own 
 relation to men. " Work for the food which abideth 
 unto eternal life, which the Son of Man will give 
 you ; for Him the Father sealed (or solemnly con- 
 secrated to this purpose), even God." " The bread 
 of God is that which cometh down out of heaven and 
 giveth life to the world." '' I am the bread of life." 
 " And the bread, moreover, which I will give, is, for 
 the sake of the life of the world, My flesh." '' Verily, 
 verily, I say unto you, except ye eat the flesh of the 
 Son of Man, and drink His blood, yQ have not life 
 in yourselves." "As the living Father sent Me, and 
 I live because of the Father, so h that eateth Me, 
 he also shall live because of Me " (S. John vi. 27, 33, 
 3o, 51, 53, 57). 
 
Christ truly received in Eucharist. ^87 
 
 These words were thrown out by our Lord for 
 faith to ponder ; and then, a year later, " on the same 
 night in which He was betrayed," they were — not 
 indeed explained, for the mystery of them was deep- 
 ened — but gathered up, and put into visible form, and 
 commended to the Church, until Christ should come 
 again, in the institution of the most Holy Eucharist. 
 
 §13. 
 After what has been said on the nature of Sacra- 
 ments in general, it will not be necessary to state that 
 the Eucharist is no mere repetition of the ideas 
 above set forth, only expressed in symbol instead 
 of language. It is a symbol which actually con- 
 veys to the believer the thing symbolized. To use 
 our Lord's own expression, we "eat Him" in this 
 Divine mystery, — and that, not merely by devout 
 memory and meditation, not merely by a subjec- 
 tive act of faith and love such as might be made 
 at other times and places, but "verily and indeed," 
 because He chooses in this Sacrament " verily and 
 indeed" to bestow His own self upon us. This is the 
 main thing which faith requires to know ; and it was 
 the wisdom of Hooker to rest upon this his famous 
 Eirenikon between contending parties of believers. 
 Eomans, Anglicans, Orientals, Lutherans, even Cal- 
 vinists, all sincerely maintain that the true-hearted 
 communicant is thereby made really, by the operation 
 of the Holy Ghost, to partake of the living Christ. 
 All these alike are agreed, when they speak with 
 deliberation, that the blessing received by the faithful 
 
2^8 Utility of further Investigation. 
 
 is no creation of their faith, no image formed within 
 them of something which is after all not there, but 
 a thing truly conveyed into them from without, a 
 movement by which our Incarnate Saviour plants 
 Himself, — His personal self, — in our most inward parts. 
 Where this is adoringly believed, there ought to be 
 no insuperable hindrance to reunion. All else which 
 we have to say upon the subject is but the working 
 out into detail of this central truth ; and it will be far 
 better for the soul and for the Church that the detail 
 should be forgotten and the central truth firmly held, 
 than that there should be clear and exhaustive under- 
 standing of the minutiae of the doctrine, equally 
 removed from superstition and from scepticism, with- 
 out a living grasp of the personal Christ. 
 
 Yet solid unity is never reached by agreeing to 
 inquire no further, but rather by investigating as 
 deeply as possible in a spirit of reverence and charity, 
 and bearing patiently with all who work in a kindred 
 spirit, even where their present conclusions seem 
 erroneous. In such a spirit we would point out 
 candidly where others appear to have gone wrong, 
 not for the sake of controversy and criticism, but 
 because the examination of what looks like an error is 
 often the most effective way of coming to the truth. 
 
 The Church, then, is dissatisfied with the doctrine 
 of the purely Spiritual Presence, as taught by the 
 Calvinists and propagated in England (for example) 
 by Jeremy Taylor. In its reaction from what was 
 felt to be a carnal and materialistic view, this doctrine 
 falls into the error of undervaluing the true con- 
 
The Calvinistic Doctrine Insttfficient. 289 
 
 nexion between the outward and the inward. It 
 appears to forget that our Lord is not only alive from 
 the dead, but is risen again in a glorified body, and 
 that our own future glory is to be one not of naked 
 spirituality, but of spirit befittingly embodied. If 
 anything is clear in our Lord's teaching, and in the 
 doctrine of the Incarnation in general, it is that our 
 Lord's humanity is the medium through which men 
 receive His Divinity, and not His Divinity the medium 
 through which they receive His humanity. This is 
 ignored in the Calvinistic doctrine. In its eager- 
 ness to reach that which, assuredly, is the supreme 
 object, it dismisses with something like disdainful im- 
 patience, both the Sacrament under which our Lord 
 is pleased to clothe His coming, and the sacred 
 Flesh or Body, which in His own language is the 
 special thing signified by the Sacrament ; it looks only 
 to a spiritual action upon our spirits, not to one which 
 deals with our whole complex nature, with its bodily 
 as well as spiritual organization. No real difference 
 is made between the Eucharistic Presence of Christ 
 and the receiving of the Holy Ghost. If men of this 
 persuasion turn aside to acknowledge that we are 
 made partakers of Christ's sacred flesh at all, they 
 acknowledge it only as a consequence of our having 
 already been made partakers of the still greater gift. 
 In this way the true notion of a Sacrament is lost, 
 and what we have called the Nestorian notion comes 
 in. The doctrine lacks the simplicity of Gospel faith. 
 The connexion between the Sacrament and that of 
 which it is the Sacrament is made purely arbitrary 
 
 u 
 
290 The Doctrine of Transubstantiation. 
 
 and conventional. The consecration of the Eucliaristic 
 elements has no other effect than to set them apart to 
 serve as symbols in a transaction to which they are not 
 actually necessary. All that is of real value, besides 
 a profession of faith and a recognition of Church 
 fello^Yship, is an act of inward appropriation by the 
 communicant of an invisible grace which is, after all, 
 only nominally attached to the sacramental elements. 
 And if a devout enquirer should ask, what that is 
 which lies upon the altar between the consecration 
 and the act of communion, the answer would hardly 
 be an ex animo quotation of our Lord's words, ** This 
 is My Body." 
 
 Opposed to this conception of the Eucharistic 
 Presence, as Eutj^chianism is opposed to Nestorianism, 
 stands the scholastic dogma of Transubstantiation. 
 This, too, as the Article says, " overthroweth the 
 nature of a Sacrament." The bread and wine, ac- 
 cording to this theory, at the touch of that more 
 glorious Substance which takes possession of them, 
 pass out of existence and are lost, leaving behind 
 nothing but shadowy appearances of themselves, 
 w'hich serve to indicate the Presence of something 
 else instead. Such a doctrine is capable of being 
 stated in ravishing terms, and it was indeed first 
 formulated with the best intention. It appeared 
 to guard the true honour of the Sacrament of the 
 Altar, to afford a clear position on which the intellect 
 could repose, and to bring the Presence of Christ into 
 the midst of His people in an indisputable way. But 
 nevertheless it loses, like Eutychiauism, some rich 
 
It rests on a False Philosophy. 291 
 
 elements of truth, and so imperils the rest. Our first 
 objection to the dogma is that it is based upon 
 a discarded philosophy. It is questionable whether 
 any well-instructed thinker of the present day holds 
 the metaphysical theory of substance and accidents 
 which it perpetuates. That theory is not itself clefide, 
 even in the Eoman communion, apart from the 
 doctrine of the Eucharist. Possibly some assembly 
 of competent scholars from that communion might be 
 given liberty to revise the terms in which their 
 doctrine of the Eucharist is couched, and, while 
 preserving the essential thought which the Councils 
 of Lateran and Trent aimed at expressing, to clothe 
 it in formulas less crude, and therefore more in 
 harmony with the advance of scientific knowledge, as 
 w^ell as with spiritual insight. Meanwhile, even if the 
 philosophy of Transubstantiation were tenable, the 
 miracle which would be involved in it would be unique 
 among Divine actions. God does not usually deceive 
 our senses ; nor is it His method to annihilate what 
 He has made, in the way that — according to the 
 Eoman doctrine — the substance of the bread is 
 annihilated. He treasures every atom of His universe. 
 If indeed there were no other way of obtaining as rich 
 and full a meaning from our Lord's words about the 
 Sacrament, such an objection might soon be disposed 
 of ; but if the same meaning can be retained by some 
 other method of interpretation, we shall give the 
 greater glory to God by not discrediting our divinely 
 given senses, and by setting a more reverent value 
 even upon the material creation, with which God has 
 
292 Transiibstaniiation unnecessary. 
 
 so closely associated us. There is an alternative. 
 Nothing binds us to accept the medireval explanation, 
 or evasion, of the mystery. Our Lord's words, " This 
 is My Body," do not require us to choose between 
 scholastic Transubstantiation and some figure of 
 speech. The thing which we see can be something 
 more than we see it to be. When S. Thomas bowed 
 down before the Figure whose hands and side he was 
 invited to handle, and cried, " My Lord and my God," 
 he did not deny that what he touched was a true 
 substantial human body, nor even that it was a body 
 composed of particles of carbon and hydrogen ; but he 
 felt that it was vitally united with something greater 
 than itself; it was not an illusory set of " accidents " 
 caught up to serve as the mere symbol of a Presence, 
 but a thing which, with no fear of idolatry, he could 
 fall down and worship, because, though he did not 
 see the Divinity, yet what he saw was his Lord and 
 his God. So may we feel when Christ says to us, 
 " Take, eat ; this is My Body." 
 
 The Church of England is not committed to the 
 opinions of any single doctor, or group of doctors, 
 whether of the sixteenth or of any other century. 
 Nevertheless it is a happy thing that the Providence 
 of God has preserved for us clear evidence of the 
 thoughts which were in the hearts of those who 
 framed our present formularies on this subject. 
 When our Articles were drawn up, Cheney, Bishop 
 of Gloucester — a man who had risked his life under 
 Mary by staying, when others fled, and opposing in 
 his place in Convocation the doctrine of Transub- 
 
Teaching of the Anglican Article. 293 
 
 stantiation, — protested strongly against that which 
 is now the XXVIIIth Article. He disapproved of 
 saying that in the Eucharist the Body of Christ 
 " is given, taken, and eaten, onlxj after an heavenly 
 and spiritual manner." He j)roceeded to allege 
 Guest, Bishop of Eochester, who was then absent, 
 as feeling the same disapproval. Thereupon, Guest 
 wrote to Cecil, '' I suppose you have heard how the 
 Bishop of Gloucester found himself grieved with 
 the placing of this adverb, * only,' . . . because it did 
 take away the Presence of Christ's Body in the 
 Sacrament, and privately noted me to take his part 
 therein, and yesterday, in my absence, more plainly 
 vouched me for the same. Whereas, between him 
 and me, I told him plainly that this word * only ' in 
 the aforesaid Article did not exclude the Presence of 
 Christ's Body from the Sacrament, but only the 
 grossness and sensibleness in the receiving thereof; 
 for I said unto him, though he take Christ's Body 
 in his hand, received it with his mouth, and that 
 corporally, naturally, really, substantially, and 
 carnally, as the doctors do write, yet did he not, for 
 all that, see it, feel it, smell it, or taste it. And, 
 therefore, I told him I would speak against him herein, 
 and the rather because the Article was of my own 
 penning. And yet I would not, for all that, deny 
 anything that I had spoken for the Presence." If 
 Bishop Guest's interpretation of his own Article may 
 be considered to represent faithfully the teaching of 
 the Keformed Church of England, it will be evident 
 that Transubstantiation was not rejected because 
 
294 '^^^<^ Doctrine of the Eastern Church. 
 
 men shrank from a full belief in the Sacramental 
 Presence. It was because the manner of the 
 Presence had been defined in a way not only un- 
 necessary, but liable to be painfully misunderstood. 
 In order to protect, and preserve, and commend, the 
 Catholic belief about the Eucharistic Presence, it 
 was necessary to be rid of the modern definitions 
 which had obscured it. 
 
 It is possible that in this great matter the 
 Eastern Church may be able to mediate between the 
 divergent utterances of the West. The Eastern 
 Church, while accepting (at a late date) the word 
 Transubstantiation, has never imported into it the 
 scholastic metaphysics, with those notions of one 
 substance going and another coming in its place, 
 which often in Roman language suggest something 
 more like human dexterity than the mighty works 
 of God. Eastern theologians are careful to point 
 out, that the word, as they use it, ofi'ers no explana- 
 tion of the mode of change, — which in their judgment 
 would be foolish and irreligious, — and that it is only 
 used to exclude those opinions which would connect 
 the elements with the Body and Blood of Christ by 
 nothing more than a link of thought, or (as in the 
 Lutheran view) by local iuterpenetration. Perhaps no 
 better general line can be taken. It accords well 
 with the teaching of the Fathers, — among whom, 
 amidst the wickst range of expression, there may 
 be said to be at least a consent in the doctrine of 
 S. Justin Martyr, that the Eucharist is no longer 
 "common bread or common drink." When the 
 
Teaching of S. Gi^egory of Nyssa. 295 
 
 consecration is accomplished, the bread and wine 
 do not remain simply what they were before. An 
 unspeakable change has come upon them, by the 
 overshadowing of the Holy Ghost. The change 
 cannot be defined in the language of human schools. 
 No metaphysical terms can set it forth. But those 
 elements have been taken into a new relation to the 
 Person of our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, even as 
 the substance of our flesh, in the womb of the Blessed 
 Virgin, was taken. It does not satisfy the heart to 
 tell us that they serve a new purpose, or have a 
 new meaning for us, or that they have undergone a 
 virtual or even a spiritual change. This language 
 sounds distant and cold. The change is not only 
 spiritual; it is vital. S. Gregory of Nyssa, though 
 in confused sentences, seems to set forth this thought, 
 when he reminds us that our Lord, when on earth, 
 lived by bread, and that the bread, which it pleased 
 Him to partake of, was joined to His Body and 
 became His Body, and that such a vital union as 
 He then effected with the material elements in one 
 way. He now effects in a higher way, for our benefit, 
 in the Sacrament. " There, the grace of the Word 
 made for itself a holy Body, composed out of the bread 
 which it ate, and so in a kind of way being itself 
 bread ; here, likewise, the bread, as the Apostle says, 
 * is sanctified by the Word of God and prayer,' not 
 passing into the Body of the Word through eating 
 and drinking, but being directly made {tvBvg (.uTairoi- 
 ovfiivog) the Body of the Word, as it hath been said 
 by the Word Himself, * This is My Body.' " Thus 
 
296 Christ'' s Body no longer ^^ Natu^'al!' 
 
 the miracle wrouglit by the Holy Ghost at the 
 Christian altar is of a kind at once more lofty and 
 more natural than that which the medi£eval schools 
 imagined, and the Eeal Presence of the glorified 
 Lord is assured to us in all its fulness without need 
 to do violence to any of our faculties. 
 
 §14. 
 
 This doctrine does not involve the difficulty which 
 has often been alleged (with more or less ignorance) 
 against Eoman teaching, namely, that Christ's Body 
 cannot be in heaven and on earth at the same time. 
 The objection has even found its way, by a curious 
 history, to a place within the Prayer-book, in the so- 
 called " Black Eubric," which was not the work of 
 careful theologians, and which has hardly the same 
 authority as other rubrics. Two mischievous fal- 
 lacies underlie the objection as there verbally stated, 
 — although, doubtless, the intended meaning is correct 
 enough. Christ's Body is no longer a "natural" 
 body after the fashion of ours. It is a "spiritual" 
 body. And heaven is not a distant place, but a 
 Divinely exalted state. To say, therefore, that 
 "Christ's natural Body is in heaven" must be re- 
 garded as only a clumsy way of saying that it has 
 ceased to be a natural body, and has received con- 
 ditions of freedom and glory which are out of the 
 reach of our knowledge. A man who doubts whether 
 our Lord still has a body, doubts the Christian faith ; 
 but it would be rash in the extreme for any one to 
 transfer to that Body in its present state all that is 
 
It is received in a Heavenly Manner. 297 
 
 gathered up for us in the notion of place. It is im- 
 possible to tell whether a glorified spiritual body is 
 in local relations with anything at all, except at the 
 will of him whose body it is. Still less can we tell 
 with how many things at the same time it can enter 
 into local relations, — especially in the case of Him 
 who ''fills all things" (Eph. iv. 10). If, however, the 
 difficulty thus clumsily put be explained to mean that 
 Christ's Body cannot be at the same time in two 
 . states, a heavenly and an earthly, the Church would 
 gladly admit it. Christ's Body is in no way brought 
 down or back from its heavenly condition when set 
 before us in the Sacrament. It is certainly not there 
 in such a way as to exclude it from glory in its own 
 present condition. There it is, not as it was when 
 Christ was living upon earth, — still less as it was 
 when He hung dead on the Cross, but as it is at the 
 right hand of God. In this wonderful mystery, we, who 
 are still pilgrims here below, are permitted to feed, 
 though with blindfolded eyes, upon that which will 
 openly be our sustenance hereafter, the true Bread 
 of Angels. It is a foretaste of heaven, given upon 
 earth. He who eats it, becomes already possessed of 
 "eternal life;" and the holy and glorified thing which 
 is communicated to his body, carries with it the 
 assurance of the man's own resurrection (S. John 
 vi. 54). 
 
 It is much to be observed that this Sacrament 
 is not only our means of maintaining union with 
 Christ, but also of maintaining union with one 
 another. The two things necessarily go together. 
 
298 " Co7nmunionl' and " Breaking of Bread" 
 
 There is no such thing as an attachment of isolated 
 Bouls to Christ. Each soul is indeed — to say the 
 least of it — as directly and personally attached to 
 Christ as if there were no other, and Christ is as 
 ^Yholly and entirely communicated to each soul as 
 if none besides were to share the benefit. That is, no 
 doubt, what is meant by saying that the entire Body of 
 Christ, and all the fulness of His Person, is in each 
 fragment of the Sacrament. But none can receive 
 Christ as a kind of private property. We must 
 receive Him in unity and lo\dng fellowship, or not 
 at all. The name of Communion itself implies this 
 fact. When S. Paul asks, " The bread which we 
 break, is it not the communion of the Body of 
 Christ?" (1 Cor. x. 16) he does not mean that it is 
 an act of communion between the soul and Christ; 
 still less does he mean that the bread is a medium 
 for the communication of Christ's Body (an interpre- 
 tation which the Greek will not bear) : — he means 
 that it is our joint participation of the Body, our 
 fellowship in it. That is why he refers particularly 
 to the ''breaking" of the bread. That most signifi- 
 cant action has no reference to the breaking of 
 Christ's Body on the Cross, for S. John emi)hatically 
 records that it was never broken. The breaking of 
 the bread is done in order that all may receive a 
 share in one and the same whole ; so that S. Paul 
 pursues, "Because we, many as we are, are one 
 bread," — or rather " one loaf." — " one body, for we 
 all partake from that one loaf." If we may reverently 
 conjecture, this was the thought which prompted our 
 
// unites us in Christ's Body. 299 
 
 Lord to use at the institution of the Sacrament a 
 different word from that which He had used at Caper- 
 naum, and to say, " This is My Body," not " This 
 is My Flesh." His Flesh is His human nature, the 
 principle by which He is man. It might conceivably 
 have been imparted to a disconnected aggregate of 
 souls. But His Body is the structural whole, the 
 organism in which He is presented. It is of that 
 that we all partake, and partake together. We not 
 only receive the same substance, but we receive what 
 forms an indissoluble unity. Thus the Eucharist is 
 the great standing Sacrament of the Church. To 
 take the Communion is the only known way of 
 claiming membership in the Church. To be excom- 
 municated is the suspension of membership. It is 
 by no accidental concurrence of metaphors that the 
 Eucharist is Christ's Body and the Church is Christ's 
 Body; for the whole being of the Church is in the 
 Eucharist. By it the Church is sustained, and filled 
 out, and kept together. By it Christ embodies Him- 
 self in the Church for action. And when Christ 
 offers us Himself at the holy table, saying, " This 
 is My Body," He offers the Church also ; and if we 
 uncharitably disdain her, we cannot receive Him. 
 However little this thought is insisted upon at the 
 present day, it is enshrined in S. Paul's words to 
 the Corinthians above cited, and forms a large element 
 in the teaching of the Fathers. "If you," says S. 
 Austin, *'are the body of Christ, and members, then the 
 Mystery placed on the Lord's table is the Mystery of 
 yourselves. Be what you see, and receive what you are." 
 
300 Eatino- a Vohintary Act. 
 
 The main purpose and object of the Eucharist is 
 plainly to develope and strengthen our union "with 
 our glorified Head and with our fellow members. 
 Great as the baptismal blessing of union with and 
 in Christ is, we must not think of it as a finished 
 and stationary thing. Union with Christ is pro- 
 gressive ; and faithful communions do not only pre- 
 serve the once-formed bond from being broken, but 
 they make us more and more deeply to dwell in 
 Christ and Christ in us. The last communion of 
 a saint is a much greater thing than his first, — not 
 that what he receives is substantially different, but 
 because each good communion helps to give the next 
 a more penetrating effect. The initial union with 
 Christ in regeneration is irrespective of our wills; 
 not so the development of it. That is why this 
 Sacrament takes the form of eating; because eating 
 expresses more than nourishment, and more than 
 identification between the eater and his food ; — eating 
 is essentially a voluntary act. To bring out the 
 voluntary nature of our effectual union with Himself, 
 Christ, in the discourses at Capernaum, gradually 
 substitutes for the ordinary word of eating {icrOUiv) 
 a word which denotes the eating of dainties, the 
 eating of one who relishes what he eats (rpwysiv). It 
 is truly taught, therefore, that "the wicked eat not 
 the Body of Christ in the use of the Lord's Supper." 
 The thing offered to them is identical with that which 
 is offered to the faithful, but they lack both the 
 will and the power to assimilate it. Honest faith, 
 however rudimentary, and right intention, however 
 
Communion in Two Kinds. 301 
 
 weak in practice, may count on receiving the Body 
 of Christ ; but the touch of positive unbelief and 
 contempt and disobedience profanes the Sacrament. 
 The outraged Presence is withdrawn, and the impious 
 consumer of the desecrated elements receives nothing 
 but an earnest of wrath and woe. 
 
 §15. 
 
 Whenever the Holy Eucharist is treated of, it is 
 instinctively assumed that the Sacrament of the 
 Lord's Body is the chief thing, and the Sacrament 
 of the precious Blood takes, as in order of adminis- 
 tration, so in order of thought, a secondary place. 
 It is not so audacious a departure from Christ's in- 
 stitution to withhold the Cup from the body of the 
 faithful, as it would be to withhold the Bread. 
 Undoubtedly, in ancient days, the first part of the 
 Sacrament was sometimes administered — as to those 
 sick and in i^rison — without the second. S. Paul 
 himself disjoins the two when he speaks of ''eating 
 the Bread or drinking the Cup of the Lord " (1 Cor. 
 xi. 27), which implies that the one might possibly be 
 received without the other. It is needless, however, 
 to point out how different this is from the modern 
 Roman rule. The very fact of disjunction, attested by 
 S. Paul's language, and still more by the emphatic 
 interval which Christ at the Last Supper made 
 between the two parts of the rite, shews that they 
 cannot have one and the same meaning. Our Lord 
 would not have appointed two separate acts, if the 
 second were not to convey a distinct benefit of its 
 
302 We receive the Blood as shed. 
 
 o\Yn. It is reasonable to suppose that where persona 
 are debarred, without their fault, from receiving the 
 Sacrament of Christ's Blood, some at least of its 
 benefits are conferred through the faithful reception 
 of His Body ; but we cannot guess what may, in the 
 long run, be the result to a Church at large, where, 
 on insufficient grounds, the Cup is systematically 
 denied to the entire laity. 
 
 When, in defending a position which would be 
 better frankly abandoned, Roman theologians teach 
 that the Blood of Christ is already contained in 
 the gift of His Body, they not only make the ChaUce 
 superfluous, but they pass lightly over two important 
 truths. Their language too often suggests that our 
 Lord's Body is still a body of ''flesh and blood" 
 in the same sense as it was on earth, although, 
 according to S. Paul, such a body " cannot inherit 
 the kingdom of God" (1 Cor. xv. 50). And in the 
 second place they treat it as a matter of little moment 
 whether the precious Blood, conceived of in this some- 
 what physical and material way, is received as still 
 circulating, so to speak, in our Saviour's veins, or 
 whether it is received by itself, as shed forth for 
 a beverage to the faithful. This is the very i)oint. 
 The gift of the Cup is not simply the gift of Christ's 
 Blood, but of Christ's Blood " which is poured out on 
 behalf of many" (S. Mark xiv. 24). It is a difficult 
 thought to follow out, but one which ought to repay 
 devout study. 
 
 The blood, according to the ancient Law, — and it 
 may be added, according to our latest physical re- 
 
Ritual Significance of Blood. 303 
 
 search — "is the life" (Deufc. xii. 23); or still more 
 strictly, it is the seat and medium of the life: ''The 
 life of the flesh is in the blood " (Lev. xvii. 11). In 
 its course through the body, it both carries away im- 
 ndrities, and brings into every corner those elements 
 which repair the waste of nature. If this beneficent 
 work of the blood ceases, the body dies. In this way 
 the blood is truly identified with the life of the body. 
 When, therefore, it is drained out of the body, the life 
 goes with it. This was the significance of its sacri- 
 ficial use. The blood of the victim meant, not the 
 death of the victim, but its surrendered life. It was 
 not considered that the life was extinguished and 
 annihilated by slaughter, but only that it was de- 
 prived of its earthly activities and separated from the 
 natural organism in which it had been embodied. 
 The carcase was dead ; but the blood was still alive. 
 To have brought any portion of the dead carcase 
 into the inner sanctuary would have seemed to the 
 Israelites a horrible profanation ; but it was the 
 appropriate destination of the life-blood. No other 
 reason could be assigned for the slaughter of the 
 victim, for God has "no pleasure in the death of him 
 that dieth " (Ezek. xviii. 32) ; but He has pleasure in 
 the humble surrender of the guilty life, which acknow- 
 ledges that it has forfeited earthly existence, and 
 presents itself absolutely to Him. 
 
 This is what our Blessed Kedeemer has done for us. 
 Once for all, in acknowledgment of the sins of man, 
 He shed forth His Blood. The act was itself a great 
 Sacrament, for it was the true " pouring out of His 
 
304 TJie Blood His Life ivon through Death. 
 
 soul unto death " (Is. liii. 12), clothed in a natural 
 and vivid symbolism, which answered to all the sa- 
 crificial types going before it, and appealed to the 
 hearts of men for ever after. But that was not the 
 end. The typical high-priests, when they went into 
 the Holy of Holies, were forced to take with them 
 " blood of others " (Heb. ix. 25), because there was 
 no way of dislodging their own lives and presenting 
 them. It could only be typically done. But Christ, 
 made an High-priest for ever in His Eesm-rection, 
 has passed into heaven for us, "through His own 
 Blood" (Heb. ix. 12). He, the Victor Victim (as 
 S. Austin calls Him), is able for ever to shew before 
 the Father — not His death only, nor His life only — 
 but His own indestructible life as enhanced and en- 
 riched by having once passed through death, and that 
 a violent and voluntary death of sacrifice. "We need 
 not, we cannot, picture to ourselves the Blessed Lord, 
 like a Jewish high-priest, sprinkling upon a heavenly 
 mercy-seat some spiritualised substance in which 
 His life still resides, apart from Himself. His life is 
 lodged again and for ever in its proper organism, the 
 glorified body. But just as the glorified Body bears 
 in its presentment marks (however we are to conceive 
 of them) of slaughter (Eev. v. 6), so the very principle 
 of the human life which animates it is profoundly 
 modified by its glorious self-effusion upon Calvary. 
 Thus the "Blood of Sprinkling" — sprinkled both on 
 the mercy-seat and on us, — "which speaketh a more 
 excellent thing than Abel" can, in thought, be 
 singled out as a glory of the Church distinct from 
 
Its special Connexion zvith Sin. 305 
 
 " Jesus, mediator of a new testament " (Heb. xii. 24). 
 It is not, indeed, apart from His Person, but it gathers 
 up one vast benefit to be derived from His Person. 
 His Blood contains all the virtue of His Passion. 
 
 We see from this that the second part of the 
 Eucharist is that which meets our peculiar need as 
 sinners. If men had never fallen, and yet the Word 
 had been made flesh, we can believe that something 
 like the Sacrament of the Body might have been 
 given, but not the Sacrament of the Blood. And 
 so our Lord indicates in the words of institution. 
 Over the Bread, He says nothing about suffering or 
 sin. But He expressly connects the Cup with the 
 "remission of sins " (S. Matt. xxvi. 28). The gift of 
 His Body, again, stands absolutely, without parallel ; 
 it is more than the reversal of a calamity or the 
 restitution of a forfeited blessing. The gift of His 
 Blood is introduced by a manifest contrast with the 
 covenant which condemned us ; it is ** the new Cove- 
 nant in His Blood " (1 Cor. xi. 25 ; Ex. xxiv. 8). So 
 the two parts of the Sacrament stand related to each 
 other as the Incarnation and the Atonement. And in 
 this view the order in which they come is unspeakably 
 suggestive. We are not first purified from our sins 
 and then incorporated into Christ. When we have 
 been brought, just as we are, into the communion 
 of His Body, then we are in a position to receive the 
 cleansing action of His once outpoured Blood. "We 
 have fellowship one with another," — if, that is, we 
 fulfil that condition of the communicant, of "walking 
 in the light," — " and the Blood of Jesus cleanseth us 
 
 X 
 
3o6 The Eucharist a Sacrijice. 
 
 from all sin " (1 John i. 7). Having been first raised 
 to partake of His glorified humanity, we are then per- 
 mitted to drink in those special properties of His 
 life with which His death has charged it. And 
 although the first gift is the wider and further-reach- 
 ing, no one who has a deep sense of sin will feel that 
 the second is superfluous or unnecessarily emphasizes 
 the sinner's need. 
 
 §16. 
 
 I'rom the earliest times the Holy Eucharist has 
 been regarded by the Church as not only the great 
 means by which we are permitted to draw into our- 
 selves our glorified Lord and all His benefits, but 
 also as her one appointed Sacrifice. So universally 
 do the early Christians interpret Malachi's prophecy 
 of a pure and catholic Sacrifice as referring to the 
 Eucharist, that we cannot doubt that it was part of 
 the Apostles' doctrine (Mai. i. 11). The word does 
 not apply only to the praises and thanksgivings which 
 accompany the oblation — though they form an in- 
 tegral portion of it, and are, indeed, so characteristic 
 of it as to establish its name of Eucharist, or Thanks- 
 giving. Nor does it apply only to the alms which 
 Christians have always been accustomed to offer with 
 it, and which come up as a true " memorial before 
 God " (Acts X. 4). Nor does the sacrifice consist 
 only in the presentation of the bread and wine which 
 are to bo used in the Mysteries, though ancient 
 liturgies invest this presentation with great solemnity. 
 It comes closer to the point when we consider " our- 
 
The Chtirch herself offered up. 307 
 
 selves, our souls and bodies," as the sacrifice. A 
 hasty reading of S. Austin, for example, might almost 
 lead to the conclusion that the saint knew of no 
 other sacrifice in the Eucharist. He insists with 
 vehement reiteration that the Church is herself the 
 Body of Christ which is offered. *' This," he says, 
 " is the Christian Sacrifice : the many, one body in 
 Christ. This the Church celebrates in the Sacrament 
 of the Altar with which the faithful are familiar, 
 where the Church learns that in that thing which she 
 offers, she is herself offered." It does not explain 
 this Father's meaning to allege that he is using 
 allegorical or metaphorical language. What S. 
 Austin says is a real and substantial fact, and no 
 offering of the Body of Christ can be imagined now, 
 which does not include the offering of all His members 
 in their unity. But if the Body of Christ cannot be 
 offered in sacrifice without the Church, still less can 
 the Church be offered in sacrifice without that sacred 
 Thing, the partaking of which alone makes the Church 
 to be Christ's Body and renders her acceptable to God. 
 The sacrifice of ourselves — as well as of our gifts and 
 alms and praises — is the new and additional element 
 in every Eucharist ; but it requires some other more 
 potent and constant Sacrifice on which to rest. 
 
 That which gives substance and value to all our 
 other offerings is the continual offering up to God of 
 the Person of Jesus Christ, in His Body and His 
 Blood. Christ empowered and commanded His 
 Apostles to do this, when He made the Eucharist 
 His own memorial, as the yearly Passover which He 
 
J 
 
 08 The Sacrifice a IMenioyial. 
 
 was superseding by it was the '* memorial " of tlie 
 Exodus (Ex. xii. 14). It should be observed, how- 
 ever, that He did not say, "Do this for a remem- 
 brance of My Death." The Eucharist was to be 
 connected not merely with one, even the greatest and 
 most touching, of His acts, but with Himself. Now 
 Christ cannot be remembered in His Church as one 
 who is dead and gone. He can only be remembered 
 as living and present, though out of sight ; and His 
 living Presence is guaranteed in the bread and wine 
 which He had akeady affirmed to be His Body and 
 Blood. Over those sacred elements we remember 
 Him, truly present in them, and gathering up in 
 Himself all that He has done for us. And what 
 direction does our remembrance of Him take ? Not 
 merely an internal one, as in meditation. S. Paul 
 speaks of it as a proclamation, — a telling from age to 
 age and from shore to shore. The Eucharistic act 
 announces and re-announces '' the Lord's death " 
 (1 Cor, xi. 26), — the death endured by One who is 
 more than man, — and of whom the act itself bears 
 witness that He is alive, and that its witness is only 
 needed "until He come," when "remembrance" will 
 pass again into sight. But the Eucharist cannot be 
 regarded as simply an act between man and man ; 
 and if the remembrance is not only in the heart, no 
 more is it only amongst the members of the Church. 
 It is a remembrance towards God. And this is its 
 primary chaj.'actcr. AVith thanksgivings for all God's 
 mercies, — His ordinary gifts of food and drink, His 
 providential dealings with our race, — wc specially give 
 
Sacrifice involves no Destruction. 309 
 
 thanks to Him for the mercies bestowed upon us in 
 Christ, and display to Him, and not only to one 
 another, that precious Body and Blood in which all 
 our hopes are centred. Such an act is most truly a 
 sacrifice.^ 
 
 To prevent mistake, however, the first thing 
 which we must clearly apprehend in the Catholic 
 doctrine of the Eucharistic Sacrifice, is that it neither 
 detracts from the perfectness of the Sacrifice of the 
 Cross, nor in any way subjects the glorified Lord 
 again to pain or death. We cannot follow Bellar- 
 mine in thinking that "change and destruction " of 
 the thing offered is essential to a sacrifice. In the 
 typical sacrifices — or at least with some portions of 
 
 " Many have thought that the very words " Do this " are intended 
 to have a sacrificial meaning, and should rather be rendered " Offer 
 This." In that case, of course, the word "this" will denote the 
 Eucharistic Bread and Cup respectively, and not the Eucharistic 
 action ; — " Offer this Thing," not " Perform this action." The Greek 
 word for " do " {joulv) is constantly so used in the Old Testament : — 
 for instance, where we are obliged to say, " I will offer bullocks and 
 goats" (Ps. Ixvi. 13), the Septuagint has, "I will do bullocks and 
 goats." The word "do " in such a connexion does not point particularly 
 to the slaughter of the animal, but to the whole sacrificial operation. 
 There would therefore be no dogmatic objection to such an interpreta- 
 tion. If our Lord had wished to say, " Offer This," without using a 
 word of slaughter. He could scarcely have used other words than those 
 •which He used. The difficult sentence in 1 Cor. xi. 25, " This do as 
 often as ye drink," would be much simplified if we could supply the 
 same object to both verbs. But the rendering " Offer this " has 
 against it the fact that it is of recent origin. All the Greek Fathers, 
 with the exception of S. Justin Martyr, treat the words as meaning, 
 " Perform this action." Although they certainly see a sacrificial con- 
 notation in the words as a whole, they do not give so much as a hint 
 that another rendering of the word " this " had occurred to them. Such 
 could hardly have been the case if the Evangelists and Apostles had 
 understood the words so differently. 
 
3 1 o Christ endures no Fresh Pain. 
 
 them — this was the case, because, without their being 
 burned or the like, there was no way of expressing 
 that they had passed away from all human utility 
 and were irrevocably given over to God. But the 
 destruction was only necessary because of the in- 
 herent weakness of the type. The essential feature 
 of sacrifice is the presentation to God of that which 
 is precious to us and acceptable to Him. If, there- 
 fore, we believe that in the Eucharist Christ is offered 
 to God, there is no need to think of Him as still 
 suffering. Although some expressions in the Fathers 
 would literally imply that they thought so, they can 
 readily be paralleled by expressions in authors who 
 certainly did not think so. A S. Chrysostom or a 
 S. Ambrose would have been as much shocked as we 
 are to read in a modern schoolbook of dogmatic 
 theology by a Cardinal Archbishop, that in con- 
 sequence of the "immolation" in the Eucharist, "a 
 change takes place in the Victim : by the consecra- 
 tion, Jesus Christ is reduced to an unnatural con- 
 dition ; and those sacramental words, * This is My 
 Body,' * This is My Blood,' pronounced separately, 
 are like a sword which separates mystically and as far 
 as may be the Body and the Blood of Christ." The 
 whole spirit of the Epistle to the Hebrews, with its 
 clear and powerful contrast of the daily propitiations 
 of the Law and the majestic singleness of Christ's 
 self-sacrifice on the Cross, — and all right Catholic 
 feeling as well, — rises in judgment against such 
 a perversion, or rather such a contradiction, of the 
 Gospel. "We have already shewn that the manner of 
 
He is offered here as in Heaven. 3 1 1 
 
 Christ's Real Presence in the Sacrament of the Altar 
 is not such as to drag Him back from His state of 
 glory, nor is the nature of the Christian Sacrifice such 
 as to involve Him in any fresh and perpetual pain. 
 It could be no *' Eucharist " to us if it were so. 
 Instead of joyous anthems, our churches would be 
 filled with the wailings, and sobs, and smitings upon 
 the breast, of those whose sins compelled them, day 
 after day, to save themselves, by again summoning 
 the willing Eedeemer back, to undergo some new 
 mysterious anguish for them. Many of us would 
 refuse to save our souls at the price. It is one thing 
 to accept with tears of thankfulness what was once 
 effected for us, without our knowledge, by His 
 Sacrifice : it would be quite another, solemnly and 
 of set purpose to repair to the altar, to perpetuate, or 
 renew, any measure of His redeeming pain. 
 
 The way, then, in which the Sacrifice must be 
 conceived of is this. Christ is present with us at the 
 altar in the same manner as in heaven. He allows 
 us at the altar to do with Him what He Himself does 
 in heaven. Although He is for ever seated there, as 
 one whose toils are over, yet He is '* a Priest upon 
 His throne " (Zech. vi. 13), and is perpetually engaged 
 in presenting on our behalf the life which He once for 
 all laid down and has taken again, and never needs 
 to lay down from henceforth. By means of that 
 Sacrament which He puts in our hands, we do the 
 same. We do not merely speak of the Cross to the 
 Father; we shew Him the Body and Blood of the 
 living and present Saviour, who died upon the Cross, 
 
312 TJie Eucharisl a Propitiation. 
 
 and who not only once for all made a propitiation for 
 us there, but who ''is a propitiation for our sins, and 
 not for ours only but also for all the world " (1 John 
 ii. 2). In this sense we may even use language not 
 commonly used in England, and say that the 
 Eucharist is a propitiatory Sacrifice. It is so in the 
 same way as Christ's presentment of Himself in 
 heaven is. There is no iteration of the Sacrifice of 
 the Cross, and no continuation of it, properly so 
 called ; but neither is there the bare remembrance of 
 it. In the living Person of Christ, the eternal Sacri- 
 fice of Calvary remains an ever fresh fact, neither 
 needing nor admitting of a renewal. Christ presents 
 Himself in heaven for us in the inexhaustible virtue 
 of His past suffering ; and all the efficacy of the 
 Eucharistic Sacrifice is derived from the same. 
 
 §17. 
 
 All Christian prayer is founded upon the Eucha- 
 ristic Communion and Sacrifice. We acquire the 
 right to pray by union with Christ, and we exercise it 
 by pleading His merits. This is involved in saj'ing 
 " through Jesus Christ our Lord," when we pray. It 
 is called in Scripture, praying " in His name." The 
 solitary prayers of the individual Christian and the 
 united prayers of the Church are alike in this respect. 
 They are only heard by virtue of membership in 
 Christ, and only so far as they are in true agreement 
 with His own intercession. Not every praj-er is " in 
 the name of Christ " because of His name being 
 mentioned in it, any more than "two or three" 
 
Prayer in Chrises Name. 313 
 
 are necessarily "gathered together in His name" 
 (S. Matt, xviii. 20) because they call themselves 
 Christians. There must be no admixture of any 
 other principle, if the name of Christ is to be cogently 
 urged. When the basis on which the assembly meets, 
 is Christianity 'plus or minus some separate view of its 
 own — such as Unitarian or Irvingite Christianity, for 
 example — then it does not meet purely in the name 
 of Christ, and cannot with confidence count on the 
 special Presence which He promises. None but the 
 Catholic Church of His own foundation meets simply 
 in His name. That is why the validity, as it is 
 called, of other than Catholic communions is doubted. 
 No one denies that Christ can give Himself to indi- 
 vidual faith, even amidst a schismatic assembly ; but 
 the assembling in a schismatical name gives no security 
 that Christ will be there, but rather the contrary. 
 
 Prayer in Christ's name, whether public or pri- 
 vate, must be unreservedly in accordance with His 
 revealed character and purpose. " We do not ask in 
 the name of our Master," says S. Austin, " what we 
 ask otherwise than by our Master's rules." Such a 
 caution puts us on our guard in prayer. It makes 
 us ask conditionally for things about which we are 
 not clear. At the same time, when we cordially accept 
 the name in which we pray, it gives us perfect assur- 
 ance in two directions. It assures us that our prayer 
 will not be literally and mechanically answered, how- 
 ever fervently we pray, if what we beg would be 
 harmful to ourselves, or to the Church, or to the 
 honour of Christ. And it assures us that if what we 
 
314 Prayer not an Act of Resignation. 
 
 ask is good, we shall certainly gain it, in due time. 
 The limitation which is thus placed on Christian 
 prayer by no means unnerves it, or reduces it to a 
 languid fatalism. On the contrary, our Lord encour- 
 ages earnestness and insistence. He Himself used 
 " strong crying and tears " in the Garden, even over a 
 doubtful point ; and we are told that He was ** heard 
 in consequence of His careful reverence " (Heb. v. 7). 
 The thing which He conditionally asked was not given 
 Him, but the prayer was not fruitless. It procured 
 something better instead. Prayer is thus not merely 
 the human will submitting itself to the will of God. 
 It is a free and filial expression of our desires to the 
 heavenly Father, in the confidence that His wisdom is 
 greater than ours, and His love and power as great 
 as His wisdom. So far from its being an act of 
 passive resignation, it actually sets in motion the 
 Divine activities in directions in which, without it, 
 God would not have worked. As it is in temporal 
 things, so also in spiritual. God allows His operation 
 to be conditioned by ours. The riches with which 
 God has stored a fertile country arc left idle or 
 opened out according to the energy and skill of its 
 possessors. And so with the riches of the kingdom 
 of grace. If they are to be made the most of. Chris- 
 tians, both in private and in pubhc, must pray, and 
 pray " in the Holy Ghost " (S. Jude 20). Praying in 
 the Holy Ghost is the correlative to praying in the 
 name of our Lord. It indicates both the fervour and 
 energy with which we must pray (Rom. viii. 26), and 
 also the sanctified purport of our prayer. 
 
Sin not extirpated by Baptism. 315 
 
 §18. 
 
 Baptism, considered as a washing, sets us free 
 from the guilt and shame of our original sin ; and, 
 considered as a regeneration, it im^Dlants in us a new 
 principle by which to overcome its power. Neverthe- 
 less, the "infection of nature," as the Article says, 
 " doth remain." Baptized men, — even those in whom 
 their regeneration has taken good e£fect, — are not 
 exempt from sinful movements within ; and some- 
 times they fall into actual sins, and into long-con- 
 tinued states of sin. S. John's teaching does not 
 deny this. When he says, " He that hath been 
 begotten of God doeth not sin, because His seed 
 abideth in him, and he is unable to sin, because he 
 hath been begotten of God " (1 John iii. 9), he is con- 
 fronting Antinomian license. He denies that sin is 
 normally compatible with the Divine birth, or can be 
 a matter of indifference to the regenerate. He teaches 
 that so far as the regenerate man is true to his own 
 nature, sin is impossible for him ; and that in so far 
 as he sins, he is acting in opposition to his real self. 
 The sin of the baptized man is made the more ex- 
 ceeding sinful, because to him it is, in the highest 
 sense, unnatural. When, therefore, the baptized 
 have sinned, what provision is there for their recovery ? 
 
 It has already been said that Baptism neither can 
 be, nor needs to be, repeated. The baptismal union 
 with Christ, once given, cleanses the life which de- 
 sires to be cleansed, from end to end, within and 
 without, not in fragments, but as a complete whole. 
 
3i6 Oiw Need of Reneived Washing. 
 
 But it is difficult for the mind to grasp this idea as it 
 stands. As we pass througli life, ^Ye are obliged to deal 
 ■with it piecemeal, as a matter of day by day. There- 
 fore, since we find ourselves often involved in sin, and 
 our consciences tell us that we are again guilty, we 
 require to have our baptismal washing made a new 
 and present reality to us. Such a blessing our Lord 
 promised us when He said that, though a man would 
 not need to go down a second time into the great 
 bath and wash himself all over, but would know him- 
 self as a whole to be clean, yet he would need to 
 remove the stains upon his feet (S. John xiii. 10). 
 He bade us humbly apply to one another this merciful, 
 if somewhat tedious and unpleasant, ministry : " Ye," 
 He said, "ought also to wash one another's feet" 
 (ver. 14). In so saying. He instituted, not in form, 
 but in substance, what is sometimes called the Sacra- 
 ment of Penance. It is the application of no new 
 element, but the continued and partial application, 
 according to our need, of that by which we were first 
 cleansed. No new gift is conferred on us by it, but 
 the baptismal purity from guilt is maintained and 
 renewed. 
 
 It is questionable in what particular act the Sacra- 
 ment of Penance lies. Eoman theologians incline to 
 make it consist partly, if not altogether, in the dis- 
 positions and acts of the recipient. His repentance, 
 and the appropriate expression of it, enter, in their 
 judgment, into the very essence of the Sacrament. 
 Such a doctrine shews a true and evangelical sense of 
 the uselessness of a formal absolution pronounced 
 
AbsohUion truly Sacramental. 3 1 7 
 
 upon an impenitent soul. Nevertheless, it is simpler, 
 and more in accordance with analogy, to consider 
 these things as being rather the necessary qualifica- 
 tions for receiving the grace, and to make the Abso- 
 lution alone truly sacramental. To unburden the 
 heart in confession is a great relief ; but the act of 
 authoritative pardon is the point where the Divine 
 bounty comes into play. Confession is human ; but 
 Absolution is indeed a superhuman thing. The 
 priests to whom, as officers of the Church, Jesus 
 Christ has entrusted the absolving power (S. John xx. 
 23), exercise it as no possession of their own, but 
 ministerially, for Him. They are His ambassadors, 
 offering reconciliation on no terms but His ; but, on 
 His terms, confidently offering it. And what they offer 
 must not be coldly reduced to a remission of Church 
 censures ; it is the blessing of a free and bold access 
 again to the living God, who has been justly dis- 
 pleased. Nor is this Absolution a purely subjective 
 thing. There is in it, as in Baptism, a real, sub- 
 stantive movement of that cleansing grace which is 
 stored in the Church. Whether it takes effect or not, 
 depends upon the disposition of the recipient ; but in 
 any case the grace is there. 
 
 It is a mistake to suppose that Absolution is only 
 sacramental when pronounced in private to single 
 souls. In itself, so far as the movement of grace is 
 concerned, the Absolution is the same, whether public 
 or private. The difference lies in the method of pre- 
 paring to receive it. If souls are able to grasp it for 
 themselves as firmly, it is as valid and full when 
 
3i8 Auricular Confession left Free. 
 
 uttered in a general formula to a thousand together 
 as when uttered to them one by one. It is to be 
 feared that the public Absolutions are as a rule more 
 listlessly received than the private : but God is good, 
 and perhaps even a listless faith, — listless at the 
 moment, because ill-instructed, — may suffice to secure 
 as much of the grace as is positively necessary. 
 
 If the Sacrament of Penance be understood in the 
 narrower sense, as administered in one of its forms, 
 in private, we can lay down no all-embracing rule 
 about its necessity. All who would be saved, must 
 be absolved ; and all who would be absolved, must 
 confess to the best of their ability. But Holy Scrip- 
 ture, although it recommends confession to men as 
 well as to God (S. James v. 16), lays down no positive 
 and universal command to make definite confession to 
 a priest as a condition of Absolution. The experience 
 of ages has led the Church to provide that method 
 in case of need ; but without clearer instructions from 
 ancient times, she has no right to prescribe it for all. 
 The Holy English Church vindicates for her children 
 the liberty with which Christ has set us free, — in both 
 directions. If conscience tells them that a full and 
 explicit confession before God alone, joined with the 
 general confession in the public service, would be more 
 beneficial to their advance in holiness than private 
 confession to a priest, no man may compel them to 
 a private confession. If conscience tells them that 
 a private confession would be beneficial, no man 
 may dare to forbid it them. Upon the doctrinal 
 question, indeed, the English Church leaves no 
 
Unction of the Sick. 319 
 
 doubt whatever ; but the practical question is left to 
 be decided for each soul separately. There are many 
 cases where private confession to the priest would 
 seem to do more harm than good. But it can 
 hardly be doubted that things have gone too far the 
 other way amongst us, and that it would be of great 
 advantage to many, especially of the male sex, if con- 
 fession (in the technical sense) were considered less 
 exceptional than it is. A Christian man's sin is not 
 a thing between God and his own soul alone, for we 
 all " are members one of another " (Eph. iv. 25). 
 Even sturdy independence and masculine self-reliance 
 can be too dearly purchased ; — though the practice of 
 confession by no means necessarily destroys them. 
 
 The use of Confession need not involve Direction, 
 which is a wholly different thing. 
 
 §19. 
 
 The Sacrament of Unction of the Sick is formally 
 in abeyance amongst us, but its place is taken by the 
 solemn Office of Visitation. It would be inexact to 
 ascribe its origin to the directions given by S. James 
 (ch. v. 14). Clearly that Apostle is recommending 
 a practice already in existence. Most probably it 
 sprang from the promise of our Lord ; " They shall 
 lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover" (S. 
 Mark xvi. 18; comp. S. Mark vi. 13). Unction and 
 Imposition of Hands are closely connected, and both 
 are strengthened and solemn forms of blessing. There 
 is undoubtedly something of a sacramental nature in 
 all benedictions; they are gracious outgoings of the 
 
320 Benefits of Unctiojt of the Sick. 
 
 Holy Spirit in the Church towards the persons who 
 receive them. Of such benedictions, Confirmation is 
 the greatest ; and the Unction of the Sick, or Imposi- 
 tion of Hands upon them, though certainly no repeti- 
 tion of Confirmation, partakes of the same character. 
 There is no reason to think that it was miraculous in 
 its intention, except in the same way as all prayer 
 is ; but its intention was primarily the restoration of 
 bodily health. The promise attached to it was never 
 unconditional : recovery is given or withheld as is most 
 expedient in the eyes of God. But doubtless, if the 
 lesser blessing is withheld, a greater is given, and the 
 Holy Ghost, instead of quickening the sick body to 
 earthly life again, refreshes the soul to meet death, 
 and so works towards a better resurrection. It would 
 be an undue pressing of the letter of Scripture, 
 especially in view of the uncertain history of this rite 
 in early days, to make the visible act either of unction 
 or of laying on of hands essential to the obtaining of 
 the inward gi-ace ; but the latter symbol can be used 
 without any disloyalty in performing the existing 
 Office of Visitation. 
 
 §20 
 
 The means of grace already spoken of are the only 
 ones which claim to be for all Christians without 
 exception. Of the two which remain, Ordination 
 has already been dealt with in connexion with the 
 Apostohc nature of the Church; It will only be 
 necessary here to repeat that the act is truly sacra- 
 mental. It is not only an official recognition of the 
 
The Grace of Orders. 321 
 
 person promoted to ministerial authority. It conveys 
 a special charisma, or gift, for his work. In the case 
 of those who are consecrated to supreme rule in the 
 Church, S. Paul describes the charisma as " a spirit 
 of power and love and discipline " (2 Tim. i. 7). He 
 teaches in the same passage that this gift does not 
 work unless the recipient diligently cultivates it. But 
 inasmuch as the Word and Sacraments belong to 
 Christ and to the Church, and are not the private 
 property of those who administer them, no unfaith- 
 fulness or wrong intention on the part of the duly 
 appointed agent can vitiate them. He may by his 
 spirituality enhance their actual effect, or by his 
 apathy detract from it ; but he has no power to annul 
 the essential grace, any more than to create it. 
 
 §21. 
 
 Marriage differs from all the foregoing in two 
 ways. The other Sacraments belong solely to the 
 Christian dispensation, and they concern the Church 
 at large. Not so with this. It only concerns the 
 Church in so far as the Church is deeply interested in 
 her children's private welfare and the good of society. 
 And marriage is a primeval institution, a Sacrament 
 of Nature. The Church which blesses it does not 
 make it ; in technical language, the ministers of the 
 Sacrament are the husband and wife. When a 
 husband and wife are baptized into the Church from 
 without, no new ceremony needs to be performed ; 
 the Church recognises the tie between them as lawful 
 marriage. Of course, in cases where a man has lived 
 
 Y 
 
32 2 Christian Doctrine of Marriage. 
 
 under the sj'stem of polygamy, the passage into 
 Christ cannot carry with it conjugal relations with 
 more than one wife, for the words ** they twain " are 
 of the very essence of marriage as known to the 
 Church ; but the one wife who is retained is a true 
 wife already. Nevertheless, the consecration with 
 which Christianity em-iches all life profoundly modifies 
 marriage. There is nothing necessarily sinful in 
 heathen polygamy ; to recognise it among Christians 
 would be to sanction a regulated adultery. Heathen 
 marriages are not essentially indissoluble ; Christian 
 man and wife can never be anything else to each 
 other, and all the legal divorces in the world can only 
 make a profane pretence of putting asunder those 
 whom God has joined together. Christian marriage 
 is more than a binding contract between two parties 
 still in reality separate. " They are no more twain " 
 (S. Matt. xix. 6). There is, of course, no fusion of 
 personality ; but there is a vital union of personalities 
 for which S. Paul can find no parallel but that between 
 Christ and the Chui'ch. "Where marriage has its due 
 course this union goes far beyond what is earthly 
 and physical. The natural element in it is made to 
 serve as the basis and vehicle of Divine grace. By 
 coming within the sphere of the Holy Ghost's opera- 
 tions, marriage conveys the grace of unselfish devo- 
 tion, of perfected and purified outpouring of heart to 
 heart, of living in and for each other. The solitari- 
 ness of the single life is relieved, and its deficiencies 
 more than made good. 
 
 Such being the Scriptural and Catholic doctrine 
 
Marriage and Virginity. 
 
 0^0 
 
 of marriage, the Church cannot be accused of Mani- 
 chsean asceticism, when she recognises as even 
 higher than the grace of marriage the grace o± 
 Christian virginity. While nothing is more selfish 
 and unworthy of a Christian than to abstain from 
 marriage out of dislike of responsibilities or out of 
 cynical indifference, it is a noble thing to feel, and 
 voluntarily embrace, and suffer patiently, the priva- 
 tions of the single life, in order to be more freely at 
 the disposal of God and man. Our Lord spoke of it 
 as a " gift " given to a few, and challenged those who 
 could, to take up with it (S. Matt. xix. 11, 12). And 
 S. Paul, who at least in widowhood, if not in virginity, 
 had received the gift, commends it to the reverent 
 admiration of the Church as the " better " thing 
 (1 Cor. vii. 38). 
 
Chapter X. 
 'E\)t ^rocc00 of ^albation. 
 
 Grace personal in its Aim and Method — Election according to Fore- 
 knowledge — Predestination and Human Freedom — Grace and Free 
 Will — Vocation — Repentance and Faith — Conversion^Justification 
 by Faith — Christian Assurance — Satutification — Final Perseve- 
 rance. 
 
 §1. 
 
 The faith becomes truly a Gospel when it is seen 
 in its appHcation to individual souls. If we were 
 to stop at the point already reached, we should only 
 have sketched a system, a philosophy, or a polity. 
 But God aims through these things — through the 
 Church and the Sacraments — at reaching individual 
 souls. He does not deal with men only in the mass. 
 Although He desires to lay hold upon them in order 
 to weld them into a perfect unity in Christ, yet they 
 have, singly, a value of their own in His eyes which 
 cannot be exaggerated. The Apostle speaks of the 
 redeeming work of Christ as effected for the whole 
 and for the part in precisely the same terms. 
 " Christ loved the Church, and gave Himself for her," 
 he says ; but in another place, " He loved me, and 
 gave Himself for me " (Eph. v. 25 ; Gal. ii. 20). It 
 
 i 
 
Grace Personal in its Aim. 325 
 
 requires more imagination, as well as more unselfish- 
 ness, than the run of men possess, to feel from the 
 outset great joy in promises to the world, the race, 
 the Church. The thing which touches hearts is to 
 discover God's interest in their personal needs and 
 trials. This, then, is what makes the Church so 
 evangelical. She seeks men one by one, not for her 
 own good, but for theu's. The love of souls, the 
 longing to bring home to them what God feels with 
 regard to them and what He has done to prove it, is 
 as true a "note " of the Church as any of the four 
 which have been described. It is little comfort, — it is 
 positive pain, — to know what blessings are stored for 
 men in the Church, until they have been brought to 
 realise it for themselves and to rejoice in a conscious 
 experience of those blessings. 
 
 It is, then, one of the main wonders of the Gospel, 
 that God has not only made a bountiful provision for 
 men's needs in Christ, but that He also prepares and 
 leads men to seek, and to find, and to make good use 
 of the provision. God's grace is not simply embodied 
 in an objective form, and despatched into the world, 
 for any one to help himself to it who likes. It both 
 singles out the persons to whom it comes ; and it 
 occupies itself with their inward and most subjective 
 moods and inclinations, aiding them to receive what 
 it brings. In fact we are accustomed almost to 
 restrict the name of Grace to its internal operation 
 upon souls. That beautiful word denotes in the first 
 instance simply a favour ; and it may rightly describe 
 God's new line of conduct towards humanity at large 
 
J 
 
 26 Stunmary of the Life of Gi^ace. 
 
 in the Incarnation. Nevertheless, its characteristic 
 action is to be seen to greatest advantage in relation to 
 men one by one. However widely diffused, the favour 
 of God is never promiscuous and undiscriminating ; 
 and although it moves on principle, without caprice, — 
 or it could not be Divine, — yet it accommodates and 
 adapts itself most tenderly to the personal objects of 
 its choice. The whole history of Christian souls is 
 the history of the dealings of grace with them. There 
 is an endless diversity in the details of operation, and 
 a guide of souls has to beware of substituting a coarse 
 and rough uniformity of experience for the delicacy 
 and flexibility of grace. Souls are not turned out 
 like manufactured articles. Yet the main course of 
 the history is the same for all. S. Paul gathers it up 
 in a famous summary. "Whom He foreknew, He also 
 predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, 
 that He might be a firstborn among many brethren. 
 Moreover whom He did predestinate, them He also 
 called ; and whom He called, them He also justified ; 
 and whom He justified, them He also glorified " 
 (Rom. viii. 29, 30). 
 
 §2. 
 
 This summary shows us how far back the work of 
 grace begins. It does not begin when the man first 
 becomes conscious of it, nor even at his appearance 
 on the stage of life. No Christian emerges unforeseen 
 in the stream of time, to attract on emerging the 
 favourable attention of God. Before the stream began 
 to flow, — before ever God set in motion the forces 
 
Foreknowledge and Election. 327 
 
 which ultimately issued in producing the man, the 
 man was "foreknown." It is not said that all the 
 man's actions were foreknown, — that is a human way 
 out of the difficulty which only complicates matters 
 more, — but the man himself. In the eternal play of 
 possible creations before the mind of God in Christ, 
 this character appeared, — this combination of gifts, 
 capable of subserving just this sacred purpose, of 
 exemplifying this special form of truth, of answering 
 to this particular aspect of love. God hiew that 
 character, and was pleased with it, and determined to 
 give it a real existence, and to subject it to the actual 
 discipline of life ; and He so ordered things, that in 
 due time we should be born, and should be born 
 again; and should be set to those "good works which 
 God before prepared that we should walk in them " 
 (Eph. ii. 10). 
 
 Foreknowledge, by itself, might be predicated of 
 every human being; for all souls are the creation 
 of God, who cannot be thought of as acting on the 
 spur of the moment. But the foreknowledge which 
 issues in Predestination is not the lot of all. It only 
 holds true of a certain number. Such foreknowledge 
 is the foreknowledge of approval for a particular 
 purpose, and it causes God to make a distinction 
 between those souls and others. They are, in S. 
 Paul's language, " an election of grace " (Rom. xi. 5). 
 It is manifest, upon the face of things, that the grace 
 of God picks and chooses among men. Though aU 
 souls are dear to Him, and He " wills all men to be 
 saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth " 
 
o 
 
 28 Privileges of the Elect, 
 
 (1 Tim. ii. 4), yet He does not deal with all alike. 
 As it is with regard to natural gifts, — wealth, beauty, 
 intellect, and the like, — so it is in spiritual things. 
 There is great inequality. The elect are on a different 
 footing from the rest of men. To them has been 
 given, by the predestination of God, what is not the 
 common property of mankind. Whether the numbers 
 who share the privilege with them be large or small, 
 makes no difference to the reality of their election. 
 In some countries and ages, — our own for example, — 
 the elect may form an immense majority of the 
 population ; but nevertheless, each single soul is as 
 much the object of a deliberate choice of God, dating 
 from all eternity, as if it were one of a little handful 
 in the Ephesus or Rome of S. Paul's time. 
 
 Of course, the difference is not that which Antino- 
 mianism has imagined, — that the elect may do with 
 impunity what is regarded as sin in others, for God 
 "hath not given any man licence to sin" (Ecclus. 
 XV. 20). Nor is the way of holiness made easier for 
 them ; on the contrary, it is often far harder. The 
 difference is wholly one of spiritual privilege. And 
 that privilege is a present privilege, not a futui-e one. 
 According to the general usage of the New Testament, 
 all who are admitted into the Church on earth are the 
 elect. The term (except in a few passages of the 
 Gospels, where the context makes its meaning clear) 
 does not express those who are finally selected to par- 
 take of the joys of heaven. Before that blessing can 
 be theirs, they must, with faithful endeavour, " make 
 their calling and election sure" (2 Pet. i. 10). The 
 
The Few chosen on behalf of All. 329 
 
 thing to which they have been elected, " according to 
 the foreknowledge of God," is described by S. Peter as 
 "obedience and sprinkling of the Blood of Jesus 
 Christ " (1 Pet. i. 2) : that is to say, they are 
 Christians. This is already theirs ; and if it be 
 rightly used, it is a pledge and an earnest of eternal 
 salvation. 
 
 If it seems at all unfair that God should thus 
 make distinctions among His human creatures, which 
 are not based upon their proven personal merits, nor 
 even upon His prevision of their merits, but upon His 
 own absolute sovereign pleasure, we must remember 
 first that we do not yet see all the issues of this mode 
 of action, and that in the end it may be found to be 
 the best way of benefiting mankind at large, to 
 approach them through a concentrated and united 
 body of highly privileged souls, whose object it is not 
 to exclude others from their privilege, but to extend it 
 to as many as they can reach. The elect people of 
 God, in this dispensation as well as in that which 
 preceded it, are not elected only for their own advan- 
 tage, but for the advantage of all. " Ye are a chosen 
 race," says S. Peter, " in order that ye may carry 
 abroad the tidings of His excellencies who called you 
 out of darkness into His marvellous light " (1 Pet. 
 ii. 9). If the salvation of the world was to be effected 
 in a historical manner at all, perhaps no other 
 method was possible. But however this may be, at 
 least the harshness of the doctrine of election is 
 softened, when we see that the true antithesis to 
 election is not rejection or reprobation, but passing 
 
330 Predestination and Freedom. 
 
 by, and that, perhaps, only for a time. Mankind are 
 not divided into two classes, — the few eternally set 
 apart for salvation, — the mass for damnation. The 
 privilege of the few, though real and positive now, is 
 theirs on probation ; and others are to gain it 
 through them. 
 
 §3. 
 
 Attempts have been made, but without much suc- 
 cess, to draw a broad line of distinction between 
 Election and Predestination. Those attempts have 
 been prompted by the desire to reconcile God's 
 eternal purpose with human freedom. Perhaps it 
 is impossible for our present intellectual powers 
 clearly to state how the two things are compatible. 
 It is but one instance of the difficulty of co-ordinating 
 the finite and the infinite. At present we do not see, 
 in the first place, how time and eternity meet. 
 Eternity is commonly thought of as if it were a state 
 or series anterior to time, and to be resumed again 
 when time comes to an end. This, however, only 
 reduces eternity to time again, and puts the life of 
 God in the same line as our own, only coming from 
 further back. And our conceptions of the almighti- 
 ness of God are coarse. It seems as if an almighty 
 being could never be crossed or hindered. Having 
 everything in His own hands, and perfectly knowing 
 His own mind, God must, so men argue, always have 
 His own way in every detail. But they forget that 
 God is not an abstract almightiness, but almighty 
 Holiness and Love ; and that for the sake of holiness 
 
Our Freedom Certain. 331 
 
 and love He may be willing to submit to things 
 which He would rather have had otherwise, confident 
 that His holiness and love will eventually come forth 
 victorious even where He seems to have been most 
 crossed. 
 
 This at any rate is certain, that where two truths 
 seem to us incompatible, one of which is beyond our 
 experience, and the other within it, we have no right 
 to magnify the more distant truth at the expense of 
 the nearer. And as we are conscious of freedom, — 
 within limits which we shall proceed to discuss, — we 
 are bound not to interpret God's Predestination in 
 such a manner as to annihilate our freedom. God's 
 elect are not machines, which fulfil of necessity and 
 with exactness a fore-ordained programme. Their 
 liberty is not a semblance and fiction. They are not 
 like chessmen on a board who should attribute to 
 themselves the actions of the mind and hand that 
 moves them. When Holy Scripture appeals to 
 motives of conduct, it recognises in us a power to 
 give heed to such motives, or to ignore them. Com- 
 mandments and promises, warnings and threats, all 
 shew that God Himself regards us as voluntary and 
 responsible agents. If the lives of the predestinate 
 were only the execution of what was perfectly known 
 and mapxDed out eternally, God's anger at their falls, 
 and God's joy over their penitence, would become for 
 us unmeaning. 
 
 It seems plain, therefore, that we must regard 
 God's Predestination as contingent, not absolute, so 
 far as concerns our ultimate destiny. As we have 
 
332 Comfort of the Doctrine. 
 
 shewn, the Scripture teaching about election, being 
 for practical and not for theoretical purposes, is con- 
 cerned with our present position, rather than the 
 future. It rests with us whether the life of grace 
 shall pass into the life of glory. So far as we can see, 
 the Divine Predestination is capable of being defeated. 
 But such a thought, though full of solemnity and fear, 
 does not rob the doctrine of Predestination of all 
 strength and comfort. On the contrary. If we could 
 suppose the Divine Predestination to be absolute, then 
 we might live in a fever of uncertainty whether we 
 were among the predestinate or not. Few, especially 
 at the outset of their Christian career, would dare to 
 assume it of themselves ; and in many instances it 
 would do more harm than good to do so. But when 
 we follow the teaching of S. Peter and S. Paul, and 
 recognise that all the baptized are elect and pre- 
 destinate, then, although the final result is not yet 
 assured to us, we receive unspeakable comfort and 
 hope. The weakest Christian may believe that he is 
 no intruder within the sacred precinct, brought in by 
 his own presumption or the mistaken kindness of 
 friends. He is where God Himself has placed him, 
 and had eternally determined to place him. His very 
 weaknesses may be a reason why he was thus elected, 
 to shew strikingly the power of Divine grace. And if 
 the discerning choice of God has so favoured him a& 
 to translate him into the kingdom of His dear Son, 
 then God will not easily give him up or cast him out 
 again. The Christian sees, represented in the con- 
 crete fact of his Baptism, the eternal and unchangeable 
 
Oi'iginal Freedom of Mans Will. 333 
 
 attitude of God towards him. His own personality, 
 now passing tbrough the vicissitudes of an earthly dis- 
 cipline, is linked to the stability of the life of God. 
 That God should change His mind towards His 
 servant is inconceivable, unless the servant should 
 altogether throw off his allegiance to God. God has 
 set His heart upon him, and will not easily let him go. 
 By gentle means, or by stern, He will use every art to 
 retain him. And thus the man who would soon despair 
 if he thought only of his own weak will, is encouraged, 
 without being made presumptuous, by remembering 
 that there is another, stronger Will, no less deeply 
 interested in his salvation than he is himself. 
 
 §4. 
 
 The Grace which foreknows and elects us in eternity, 
 actively busies itself with us when, in due time, we 
 come into life. It would go ill with us otherwise. 
 It has been shewn in an earlier chapter that the 
 will of man is not wholly free. Even according to 
 the Creator's intention it was never free in the sense 
 of being unlimited and unconditioned. Adam had 
 freedom of will in Paradise, but his freedom had 
 only the range belonging to man, and to a man in 
 his circumstances. Within that range, however, it 
 was truly free, — by which we mean that there was 
 no unnatural check upon its action, either from 
 within or from without. For without, everything 
 had been designed for the very purpose of eliciting 
 all his powers healthily and happily; and within, 
 there was no disorder to hinder him from complete 
 
334 Mans Will no longer Free. 
 
 correspondence with his environment. But when 
 he ahused his powers, he vitiated his own constitu- 
 tion, and his relation to all that surrounded him. 
 He came to be unnaturally under the power of the 
 things that were intended to have ministered to his 
 advancement, and he found himself destitute of the 
 force by which to recover his former footing. The 
 heirs of his fallen nature are still indeed free, in 
 a sense. When they act, that is, they are conscious 
 of never being violently forced to act, against their 
 wills, they themselves repudiating the action con- 
 tinuously and to the last. Strong pressure may be 
 brought to bear upon them, which they feel unable 
 to resist; but in the end, even if they would have 
 preferred to act otherwise, they act voluntarily. They 
 yield, though it may be reluctantly, to the pressure. 
 In this sense they are free agents. But this does 
 not constitute true freedom. Fallen men have only 
 the freedom of a diseased, not of a healthy subject. 
 "What would be repulsive to the human soul in its 
 right state, has a morbid fascination for them which 
 they cannot resist. They act according to their 
 nature when they voluntarily choose it; for the 
 unnatural has become to them the natural. A 
 j3ressure of temptation, which Adam in Paradise 
 would have instantly repelled, by the wholesome 
 instinct of his uncorrupted constitution, in concert 
 with ever present grace, overwhelms at once his 
 descendant, as unwilling as he is unable to stem the 
 flood. 
 
 The Pelagian teaching, which it was the great 
 
Plaits idleness of Pelagianism. 335 
 
 work of S. Austin to confound, started with an 
 excellent intention. It claimed to enter, in the name 
 of masculine and common-sense morality, a protest 
 against a system which appeared to discourage 
 strenuous effort, and make men only passive in the 
 work of sanctification. It did not indeed assert that 
 men might be righteous if they chose without the 
 grace of God ; but it explained grace in such a way 
 as to confuse it with natural endowments. Grace, 
 to the Pelagian, consisted in such gifts as conscience 
 and free will within the man, and the revelation of 
 God's character and law without. Eefusing to 
 recognise the congenital depravity which results from 
 the Fall, this school of moralists called upon men to 
 be up and doing, instead of petitioning God for more 
 grace to do what He had already put well within their 
 power. In this first rough form Pelagianism was not 
 difficult to expose ; but it was more difficult to expose 
 the Semipelagianism, as it is called, which succeeded it, 
 and which in various forms continues in the Church 
 to this day. The Semipelagian turn of thought 
 recognises, though it minimises, the disorder of our 
 human nature. It also accepts a true definition of 
 grace. But it clings to the notion that there is at 
 any rate so much good left in man as to enable him 
 to meet God part way. He cannot, so it is said, 
 succeed in his efforts after righteousness without 
 Divine aid, but he can desire to succeed, and do his 
 best, and God will reward his endeavours by a gift of 
 grace. He can put himself in the way to obtain 
 grace, and so practise himself in the lower degrees 
 
336 Oiir Entire Dependence on Grace. 
 
 of goodness that be may (in the quaint phrase con- 
 demned by the Anglican Articles) deserve grace of 
 congruity. 
 
 Catholic teaching, on the other hand, in accord- 
 ance with Scripture and with deep observation, insists 
 upon ascribing to God's grace the very earliest germ 
 of a movement in the will towards what is good. The 
 Church does not, it is true, agree with Calvinism in 
 its extravagant estimate of the corruption of our 
 nature. It acknowledges that, in spite of internal 
 discord and of a distinct bent towards selfishness in 
 some form or other, there yet remain in man the 
 elements of a noble being, if only they can be rightly 
 set to work. But without a quickening touch the 
 noble elements have no chance of going rightly to 
 work. The will of man, at best, cannot choose in 
 entire independence of its surroundings, or fall in love 
 with visions which are not suggested by the things 
 it actually sees. If, therefore, it is to desire good- 
 ness, goodness must be presented to it ; and, in the 
 present state of man and his world, goodness must 
 be presented with sujSicient vigour and pertinacity 
 to neutralise, at least, the dead set which is being 
 made upon the soul from the other side, and give 
 it a fair field. Grace must bring a counter-pressure 
 to bear upon the will, to save it from being swept 
 away by temptation, and enable it even to wish for 
 what is good. The Semipelagian theory is so far 
 true, that each gift of grace properly utilised becomes 
 a foundation for fresh gifts. God gives "grace in 
 answer to grace" (S. John i. IG). But they are His 
 
Impossibility of meriting it. 337 
 
 own gifts which He thus rewards in us. Trace the 
 series back to the very earliest, and the very earliest 
 is as much His as the latest. Man has absolutely 
 nothing by which to purchase or attract even the first 
 rudiments of grace. It would be quite contrary to 
 the fundamental notion of grace to think so. There 
 is nothing so opposed to it as the thought of debt or 
 of merit. " If by grace," says S. Paul, " then no 
 longer as a result of works, otherwise grace is no 
 more grace " (Eom. xi. 6). It is of the very essence 
 of grace that it should be a movement of pure gene- 
 rosity on the part of God, unmixed with any sense of 
 obligation or necessity. Thus the grace of God is as 
 much needed to enable us to desire to do what is 
 right, as to do it when we desire it. It is a true, and 
 not a false humility, — the payment of a just tribute, 
 not a hypocritical adulation, — when the soul, on doing 
 well, refuses to take any credit to itself whatever, and 
 passes on the glory with sincere gratitude to God, 
 saying, " Thou, Lord, hast wrought all our works in 
 us " (Isa. xxvi. 12), and again, " It is God which 
 worketh in us, both to will, and to work, in fulfilment 
 of His gracious purpose " (Phil. ii. 13). It is His 
 "preventing {i.e. antecedent) grace" which inspires 
 the holy wish ; it is "accompanying, or co-operating 
 grace " which brings the holy wish to a good effect. 
 Thus from first to last the performance of every right 
 action, and the building up of every good character, 
 is God's work. 
 
 Yet grace never supersedes the man's self-deter- 
 mination. It would be totally at variance with its 
 
 z 
 
338 Grace not Irresistible. 
 
 purpose, were it to compel men to act in a certain 
 way, independent of their own choice. For it is not 
 God's object merely to get right things done, but 
 to get holy characters established ; and the only 
 notion we can form of a holy character is that of a 
 being who always freely chooses holiness. Forced 
 sanctity would be but a poor make-believe. Grace 
 may, it is true, sometimes go beyond the bare restora- 
 tion of a moral equilibrium. It may make it, as in 
 the case of Saul of Tarsus, "hard for a man to kick 
 against the pricks " (Acts xxvi. 14). Sovereign grace 
 can be very masterful ; in its benevolent determina- 
 tion it often appears almost overbearing. But there 
 are lengths to which it cannot go. In the very 
 nature of things it dare not be irresistible. The man 
 himself, in the last resort, and on each occasion, 
 must decide on which set of forces he will throw 
 himself, those that make for good, or those that 
 make for evil. 
 
 §5. 
 The first motions of preventing Grace are indis- 
 tinguishable from those of Providence. They take 
 place in that kingdom of nature which needs pre- 
 paring before it can receive the characteristic work 
 of grace. To this fact our Lord ai^pears to point 
 when He says, " No man can come to Me, except the 
 Father which sent Me draw him " (S. John vi. 44), — 
 where, however, we must be careful to understand 
 that our Lord is not repelling and discouraging effort, 
 but rather assuring His hearers that if they feel them- 
 selves desirous of coming to Him, it is a proof already 
 
The Calling of God. 339 
 
 of the Father's interest in their salvation. The 
 Father thus draws men naturally towards Christ hy 
 causing them to be born of Christian parents, by 
 temperament, by education and discipline, by sorrows 
 and losses, or joys and affections, which make their 
 hearts susceptible, even by permitting falls into sin 
 which create a sense of bondage and a desire for 
 liberty. Then, when the soul is ripe for it, God 
 utters His. Call to it. The eternal Election expresses 
 itself in time as an actual Vocation. At what moment 
 in the history of the soul the vocation shall be issued, 
 God alone can tell. The man's own behaviour may 
 hasten or delay it, though (as we have said) he can 
 do nothing to cause it. And after being called he 
 may long be unaware of it, or neglect it, or fight 
 against it. In the normal state of things, in a 
 Christian nation, the call of God comes to us in 
 infancy, before we have power to discern its meaning. 
 To many the sense of the call is mixed with the 
 earliest recollections, and has quietly increased with 
 advancing years. Many who received it in infancy, 
 only become conscious of it in later life, and suppose 
 that it never came to them before. There are some 
 to whom it remains through life an unknown thing. 
 Some, it may be, hear it for the first time in the 
 moment of dying. Men to whom it does not come in 
 vain may reply to its summons with very varying 
 degrees of alacrity ; but, although the firstfruits of 
 grace may be given before the call is clearly heard, 
 the soul cannot be said to be living the life of grace 
 until it begins to respond to its vocation. 
 
340 Repentance and Faith 
 
 §6. 
 
 To create in the soul a sense of need, and to 
 direct it to the source of supply, is the first marked 
 action of grace. These two things are the beginnings 
 of Repentance and Faith. 
 
 Eepentance is not merely a change of conduct, 
 but a change of conduct based upon a change of 
 feeling and mind. It is a repudiation of what is now 
 felt to be sinful. It is not enough to leave off from 
 doing wrong and begin to do right ; there must be 
 a sense of guilt, joined with sorrow for having done 
 wrong in the past, and for being still tainted by 
 inward evil. And in order that the repentance may 
 be good, the motive for sorrow must be found not 
 solely in the sinner's hopes or fears for himself, nor 
 even in the thought of the injury he has inflicted upon 
 his fellow men; but in the knowledge that he has 
 grieved and offended God. The determination to 
 make what amends may be possible (called in tech- 
 nical language, satisfaction), and the readiness to 
 acknowledge to God and (where advisable) to man 
 the whole extent of the wrong done (or confession), 
 must be the outcome of a loving and unselfish grief, 
 which bears the name of contrition. These — contri- 
 tion, confession, amendment, — are the three parts of 
 repentance. 
 
 Faith, in like manner, is not the acquiescence of 
 the intellect in a true proposition or propositions. 
 To assent, for instance, to the fact that Christ died 
 for us is insufl&cient. Saving faith is the reliance 
 
not to be thought of qtiantitatively. 341 
 
 of the soul upon a living Being. Convinced by such 
 facts as it has already apprehended, the soul is assured 
 that the unknown is in keeping with the known, 
 and. that it may safely trust its God. Nor is the 
 trust a passive one only. It cannot help influencing 
 action. As repentance springs from the heart and 
 expresses itself in language and in conduct, so does 
 faith. That is not faith which does not prompt men 
 to make " confession with the mouth unto salvation " 
 (Rom. X. 10), and " thoughtfully to take the lead in 
 excellent works" (Titus iii. 8). Faith may be de- 
 scribed as an active and outspoken reliance upon 
 God. 
 
 There is no necessary order of precedence between 
 Faith and Repentance. Sometimes the one makes its 
 conscious appearance first, and sometimes the other. 
 They continue to work side by side throughout life. 
 Repentance is perpetually deepened by the advance 
 of faith, — and faith strengthened in proportion to the 
 increasing purity of repentance. Neither term repre- 
 sents a fixed amount. There is an endless variety 
 of degrees of repentance and faith. No quantitative 
 limit is named in Scripture, as a minimum below 
 which the soul cannot be saved. The thing required 
 is that repentance and faith should be honest and 
 sincere so far as they go. If that be the case, 
 then, however small may be the present amount, it 
 contains the whole future development. When our 
 Lord says- to His disciples, "If ye have faith as a 
 grain of mustard seed, nothing shall be impossible 
 unto you " (S. Matt. xvii. 20), He does not mean that 
 
342 Conversions, some Sudden, some not. 
 
 the very smallest measure of faith will then and there 
 be able to work miracles, but that it will go on till 
 it becomes able to work them, because a true faith 
 necessarily expands. We are not in a position, there- 
 fore to say whether saving faith must, at any par- 
 ticular moment, be what is called ^fZes/orma to, — that 
 is, a faith fertilised by love, — or not. In any given 
 case, the answer to that question must depend on the 
 opportunities which the soul has had. 
 
 §7. 
 
 "When repentance and faith reach a point where 
 they become conscious, free, and energetic, the crisis 
 is known as Conversion. Conversion is not quite the 
 same as an awakening to spiritual facts ; for there 
 is sometimes, as in the case of Judas, a real awaken- 
 ing without conversion. And, on the other hand, a 
 true conversion often takes place without much 
 awakening. The essence of conversion is a true 
 movement of the will, turning solidly from self and 
 the world to God. It is a fatal mistake to suppose 
 that conversion must be exactly alike in all. It 
 wears different aspects in different men, according to 
 their temperament, and according to their circum- 
 stances. With some it comes almost unperceived, 
 like the moment when the sun begins to appear above 
 the horizon. With others it comes through agonizing 
 struggles and on a sudden. But in the most sudden 
 cases, there has been a long secret preparation ; and 
 in the most quiet, there is a definite point at which 
 the turning begins to be truly voluntary. God has 
 
Conversion and Regeneratioit. 343 
 
 need of all kinds of experience in His kingdom of 
 grace, and we cannot assign a higher value to the 
 one form of conversion or to the other. Only we see 
 that, as a rule, the temperaments which are the most 
 vividly and violently awakened to spiritual facts, — such 
 facts as guilt, and pardon, judgment to come, and the 
 meaning of the Cross, — are those which are the most 
 effective agents in the evangelization of the world ; 
 while the others are often the most useful in the work 
 of edifying. 
 
 It has been pointed out elsewhere that Conversion 
 is not to be confounded with Eegeneration. There is 
 no necessary connexion between the two. Sincere 
 and deep conversions took place under the Jewish 
 dispensation; we might almost say that they take 
 place under still less perfect systems ; but regenera- 
 tion is the peculiar privilege of Christianity. Con- 
 version may either begin before the act of regenera- 
 tion, as in the life of S. Paul ; or it may follow after, 
 as in that of S. Francis or any others who have been 
 baptized in infancy. Eegeneration is a metaphysical 
 change, altering a man's nature : conversion is a 
 moral change, altering a man's character. The one 
 gives him new faculties, and a new sphere in which 
 to exercise them : the other gives a new direction to 
 whatever faculties he has. Though unquestionably 
 regeneration, which makes us children of God, is a 
 higher benefit than conversion, which makes us begin 
 to be good men, yet, unless it be preceded, or accom- 
 panied, or followed, by conversion, it will avail a man 
 nothing, or rather increase his damnation. Conver- 
 
344 y ustijication : its Definition. 
 
 sion, on the other hand, though through lack of oppor- 
 tunity, or through ignorance and prejudice, it maj^ not 
 be crowned in this life by regeneration, is assured of a 
 true salvation hereafter. Of the two, therefore, the 
 one which is intrinsically the less, is the more essential 
 to the soul's welfare. Allowing to conversion its widest 
 diversity of form and circumstance and degree, we 
 must assert that it is, in the truest sense, " generally 
 necessary to salvation." Whether the wrong attitude 
 of the soul towards God be exactly that which our 
 Saviour reprimanded in His disciples or some other, 
 His words hold true of all, " Except ye be converted 
 and become as little chiklren, ye shall in no wise 
 enter into the kingdom of heaven " (S. Matt, xviii. 3). 
 
 §8. 
 
 Justification, according to the strict meaning of 
 the word as used in Scripture, is God's declaration of 
 the soul's freedom from guilt. It is both less and 
 more than forgiveness. The word does not contain 
 that touching element of personal love which is felt 
 in forgiveness ; but at the same time it brings out 
 more clearly the abolition and real undoing of sin. 
 It is a forensic word, expressing the view which God 
 takes of the soul in His character of Judge. It is the 
 opposite of condemning. When He justifies. He 
 declares not guilty. If Roman theologians differ from 
 us concerning the grounds of justification, it is mainly 
 because it has become traditional with them to give a 
 different definition of the word itself, which they 
 practically identify with Sanctificatiou. That being 
 
The Grounds of it variously stated. 345 
 
 so, it could not be expected that they should be in 
 agreement with us about the terms on which it is 
 given. Nevertheless, the most hopeful way of coming 
 to an understanding will be to adhere to the ascer- 
 tainable sense of the word in Scripture, where it has 
 nothing to do with the process by which the soul is 
 made righteous, but with the act, or mental attitude, 
 which recognises the soul as righteous. It must, 
 however, be frankly acknowledged that a righteous 
 Judge cannot possibly recognise a soul as righteous 
 when it is not so. If therefore God justifies any man 
 in the Scriptural sense of the word, it must be because 
 the man is previously in course of being justified in 
 the Eoman sense, — because, that is, an active prin- 
 ciple of righteousness is infused into him. 
 
 This brings us at once to the terms or grounds of 
 justification. In the New Testament we are said to 
 be justified by our faith, by our works, and by our 
 words. These three things correspond to the usual 
 division of human activity into thought, word, and 
 deed. It is obvious that the deepest of the three is 
 that which lies hidden in the secret places of the 
 heart, and that the outward manifestations of word 
 and deed are only of moral value in so far as they 
 truly represent what is passing within. This is best 
 seen in the case of the most superficial of all, namely 
 words. If our Lord says, " Every idle word which 
 men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in 
 the day of judgment ; for by thy words thou shalt be 
 justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned," 
 it is because of the reason alleged a few verses before, 
 
346 y ustification by Faith only. 
 
 " For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth 
 speaketh " (S. Matt. xii. 34, 37). But the same prin- 
 ciple applies to actions also. While action is the 
 best, indeed the only test of inward purpose, it is not 
 — at least so far as men are judges — an infallible one. 
 Men may deceive by deeds as well as by words ; and 
 what are in themselves good works, whether of mercy, 
 or of piety, or of self-discipline, may be the cloak in 
 which self-sufficiency, and spiritual pride, and schem- 
 ing hypocrisy, array themselves. Clearly if men are 
 justified by their works, as S. James teaches, — or are 
 condemned by them either, — it cannot be purely on 
 account of the intrinsic nature of the works, but on 
 account of the spirit in which they are done. The 
 spirit which must inspire such words and works as 
 will justify a man in God's eyes, is the spirit of faith. 
 By faith alone are we justified, not by faith plus 
 something else of a different and an opposite cha- 
 racter, such as " works of law " (Kom. iii. 28) would be. 
 Faith truly lodged in the heart by the grace of God 
 cannot fail to produce faithful works and words ; and 
 by such evidence of the vitality of our faith God 
 will try us : but " works of law," done on the Semi- 
 Pelagian principle of which we have spoken, — done 
 proprio motu with a view of ingratiating ourselves 
 with God, to merit His justifying regard, — these are 
 not only no sign of faith, but an indication of its 
 absence, and therefore invite condemnation, not 
 approval. 
 
 Faith, therefore, is that active principle of right- 
 eousness which, as we have said, must be infused into 
 
Its Relation to the Atonement. 347 
 
 us before we can be accounted righteous before God. 
 It is the abandonment of the false theory that we can 
 set things right for ourselves, or make our own wills 
 independent and self-supplying fountains of holiness. 
 It casts us upon Him " who of God was made to us 
 righteousness " (1 Cor. i. 30), as well as sanctifica- 
 tion and redemption. Living communion with God 
 and willing dependence upon Him would have been 
 necessary to our justification if we had never fallen. 
 It is at least equally necessary to us now that we are 
 weak through the Fall. But our justification is the 
 justification of men who are not only weak, but who 
 have actually been guilty. The faith therefore which 
 is required to justify us is not simply a general 
 reliance upon the character of God. It includes a 
 recognition of our sin, and a concurrence in God's 
 judgment upon it; and it attaches itself with all its 
 force to the Atonement made by Christ. However 
 little the sinner may be able to explain the nature of 
 what Christ did for us upon the Cross, he apprehends 
 by faith that Christ died for him, and that all his 
 hopes lie in that one fact. He knows that, do what 
 he would, he could not have delivered his soul from the 
 guilt which by his own fault he had brought upon it, 
 but that in a way known only to Christ and the 
 Father and to the Holy Spirit who applies the work of 
 Christ, Christ has indeed done it. He has nothing to 
 plead on his own behalf, — not his sorrow for sin, not 
 his confession of it, not what he has done to make up 
 for it, — but only that Christ has borne it, and shed 
 His Blood for it. And as the thought of Christ's 
 
34^ Its Relation to Baptism. 
 
 Atonement enters deeper and deeper into his heart, 
 he naturally, without any forcing, dies to sin with 
 Christ, so that sin actually loses its hold upon him, 
 and becomes extinguished. Nor is this all. S. Paul 
 includes as an element in saving faith the conviction 
 **that God raised the Lord Jesus from the dead" 
 (Eom. X. 9). It is not to a past fact that we cling, 
 not to a dead Christ. It is to One living and trium- 
 phant, who not only thought of us and our sins upon 
 the Cross, but who thinks of us now, and is not only 
 near us, but in us. Such faith has more than the 
 negative virtue of expelling sin ; it has the positive 
 virtue of appropriating the risen life of Christ. 
 Realised union with Him, acquired by no merits of 
 ours, but involving a willing conformity to Him, is 
 assuredly a ground on which a righteous God can 
 justify the greatest of sinners. Nor need He hold His 
 justification in reserve until faith has had its perfect 
 work. The earliest beginnings of such a faith are 
 met by a recognition that guilt has completely passed 
 away, because that new principle which is at work in 
 the soul is the pledge of future perfection. 
 
 It will be seen from the foregoing that there is a 
 close connexion between Justification and Baptism. 
 Sometimes, in Holy Scripture, justification is spoken 
 of as a thing still future ; then, it is, of course, in view 
 of the day of final judgment. Sometimes it is spoken of 
 as present, because the lives of true Christians pass 
 continually under review before God, and He con- 
 tinually gives the same sentence upon them. But 
 sometimes it is spoken of as a thing done once for 
 
Peace and Assurance. 349 
 
 all in the past. In that case it belongs to the moment 
 when the believer first received incorporation into 
 Christ, — the moment when "the old things passed 
 away" (2 Cor. v. 17). After the Apostle has de- 
 scribed the vileness of the natural life, he adds, 
 "And such were some of you; but ye were washed, 
 but ye were consecrated, but ye were justified in the 
 Name of our Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of 
 our God " (1 Cor. vi. 11). It is evident that he refers 
 to the period of Baptism. There is no reason to 
 doubt that justification is as freely given in the 
 Baptism of infants as in that of grown men; but 
 of course, on coming to years of discretion, the child 
 must secure it for himself by active faith and obedience, 
 lest it should slip from him. 
 
 §9. 
 
 " The work of righteousness," says the Evangelical 
 Prophet, " shall be peace; and the effect of righteous- 
 ness quietness and assurance for ever " (Isa. xxxii. 17). 
 This is so in the normal state of things ; but Protes- 
 tant teachers have often confused and troubled con- 
 sciences by identifying the objective and the subjective 
 sides of justification. They speak of it sometimes as 
 if "justification by faith" meant the soul's con- 
 sciousness of its own justification. This is a great 
 mistake, and has led to the opinion, often harshly 
 insisted on, that no man is justified without knowing 
 it. As we have already pointed out, justification is 
 an act or attitude of God towards the soul ; and it by 
 no means follows of necessity that the soul realises 
 
350 Nature of Sanctification. 
 
 what that attitude is. Thousands of souls are truly 
 justified before God though living ia great fear and 
 doubt about their acceptance with Him. Neverthe- 
 less such souls are living beneath their privilege. 
 "Having been justified by faith," says S. Paul, "let 
 us have peace with God through our Lord Jesus 
 Christ " (Eom. v. 1). It gives greater glory to God, 
 and affords greater facility for progress in holiness, 
 when the soul can boldly and humbly take God at His 
 word, and rest peacefully upon the work of Christ, 
 and, while grieving over its sins, grieve over them 
 as forgiven and put away, not as a still incumbent 
 burden. Such an assurance about its present state 
 the soul ought to have. Assurance about the future 
 is a very different thing. 
 
 §10. 
 
 That infusion of the new principle of righteousness 
 which qualifies us for justification, is the beginning of 
 the lifelong process which we understand by Sancti- 
 fication. Here (as in the case of Conversion) we need 
 not be tied by formal definitions, because the word 
 with which we are dealing has no fixed theological 
 value in the New Testament ; — where it sometimes 
 means an act of consecration, sometimes an act of 
 purification, sometimes a recognition of holiness, as 
 well as the process of which we have to speak. But 
 we take it to mean the actual formation of a holy 
 character, the progressive development of likeness to 
 Christ, As such, the very idea is opposed to those 
 spasmodic efforts by which some sectarians have 
 
Its Gradual Advance. 351 
 
 sought to obtain it, as if it were a second gift like 
 regeneration, a " baptism of the Holy Ghost " as they 
 say, capable of being obtained and fixed in a moment. 
 There are, no doubt, special seasons which serve as 
 crises in the life of grace, when the soul, — as in a 
 Eetreat, for instance, — stirs itself up to be completely 
 delivered to the Spirit of God. But character is 
 not formed by isolated and convulsive movements, — 
 though they may give an impetus to the formation, — 
 but by constant practice and habitual exercise. Sanc- 
 tification, therefore, is founded first in a regular and 
 diligent use of the means of grace, whereby the soul 
 absorbs into itself the richness and strength of the 
 life of Christ. Then, the virtues which have thus 
 been taken into the spiritual system, must be put to 
 the proof and called out in the daily trials and duties 
 which Providence appoints. Temptation is the natural 
 way by which the Christian heart is at once tested 
 and educated ; and painful as the struggle with it is, 
 the Apostle bids us count it " all joy" when we have 
 to go through such temptation as comes to us by no 
 fault of our own (S. James i. 2), because of the good 
 result which it brings when rightly used. The name 
 of temptation, however, must not be unduly restricted. 
 There is not only a temptation to do wrong, but also 
 to leave right alone ; and the development of the 
 Christian character consists equally in mortifying 
 corrupt impulses and in giving free play to all 
 wholesome ones. The talents committed to us must 
 be made good use of, and we must become actively 
 serviceable in the Church of God. 
 
352 Special Development m the Saints. 
 
 Sanctification is thus seen to be the deliberate 
 work of the Christian man himself. He cannot be 
 sanctified without his own diligent co-operation. And 
 yet, on any true theory of grace, it is the work of 
 the Holy Ghost upon him all the while. It is only 
 by faith, not by "works," that a man is sanctified, 
 inasmuch as any attempt to perfect om-selves inde- 
 pendently of grace can only result in Pharisaism or 
 Stoicism. The Imitation of Christ, therefore, must 
 always be balanced by a living dependence upon Him. 
 
 In some measure the work of Sanctification must 
 be going forward in all who are to be saved. The 
 title of saints belongs in the New Testament to all 
 the baptized, because they have all been set apart 
 and consecrated. But the instinct of the Church has 
 inclined to reserve the title for those who may be 
 called the elect of the elect, — for those in whom the 
 power of grace has been most conspicuously shewn, 
 and has been most perfectly responded to. Even 
 amongst the members of the Church, the Holy Ghost 
 appears to find " chosen vessels," in whom He 
 becomes more deeply interested than in the rest, as 
 He sees them capable of a greater external work, or 
 of a more exquisite internal finish. These are, in a 
 special sense, the Saints. Amongst them there have 
 been wide differences in experience and training, and 
 none but the Divine eye is able to discern at the out- 
 set who will become Saints. God takes some of them 
 from among the most apparently hardened sinners, 
 like S. Paul, and S. Mary Magdalene, and S. Austin ; 
 while some are trained from infancy in ways of sweet- 
 
Final Perseverance. 353 
 
 ness and purity, like the Blessed Virgin herself, and 
 S. Polycarp, and S. Bernard. Not all the Saints 
 have been free from doctrinal errors ; and there have 
 been not a few instances where the grace of God has 
 triumphed even over the obstacles of schism, and 
 made true Saints who were not in visible communion 
 with the Catholic Church. It is a rough and external 
 standard which only reckons as Saints those who are 
 attested to have worked miracles, and which canonizes 
 mainly with a view to invocation. The Church on 
 earth can make no final judgment amongst those 
 that have passed into Paradise, but it is her duty to 
 cherish the memory of those who have in other days 
 borne signal witness to Christ. 
 
 §11. 
 
 The theory that a soul once in grace remains 
 always in grace is only practically true and cannot 
 be counted on infallibly. It is true that when the 
 seed of eternal life has once germinated properly in 
 a soul, and has made good growth, the soul itself 
 becomes almost incapable of a final desertion of God. 
 Grace obtains a hold upon it, and brings it into a 
 new slavery, — that service of God which is perfect 
 freedom. The soul is bound to Him by the recollec- 
 tion of such marvellous mercies, not merely heard of, 
 believed in, hoped for, but actually enjoyed, that it 
 cannot escape from their strong grip. They become 
 a powerful factor in that complex setting which con- 
 ditions a man's freedom. The man may be wayward 
 
 2 A 
 
354 ^'^^^' Doch'ine practically True, 
 
 find foolisli, may plunge into sin and even abandon 
 religious practices for a time ; but somehow at last be 
 remembers himself and comes back. This is almost 
 invariably the case, — so much so, that wherever it 
 appears to be otherwise, there is some ground for 
 doubting whether the soul ever really knew the love 
 of God, or had only deceived itself when it thought so. 
 Something like a miracle of evil is needed, if a- soul 
 which has once truly embraced the Divine promises 
 is to be torn away from them at last. 
 
 So far, as a matter of practical observation, there 
 is truth in what is called the doctrine of final perse- 
 verance, and numbers of passages in Holy Scripture 
 bear it out. But it is just when it passes from a 
 fact of observation into a dogma of necessity that it 
 becomes false and pernicious. That same conscience 
 which is serenely assured of God's present forgiveness 
 and of God's unfaltering purpose with regard to it, 
 and which cannot seriously think that it is likely to 
 fall away from Him and lose its eternal life, yet bears 
 witness that it might conceivably do so, and must 
 take heed that it does not. The thing is no mechani- 
 cal impossibility. Nay, a fearful experience of Satan's 
 ways — his long sieges, and sudden assaults, and 
 insidious deceits — and of its own repeated falls before 
 them, shews the soul how readily it might be taken an 
 irrecoverable captive. It dare not take things easily. 
 If saved at all, it sees that it will be " scarcely saved " 
 (I Pet. iv. 18) ; and to the last it stands in fear. 
 When it turns to the Bible it finds its fears as faith- 
 fully echoed as its hopes. If on one page it reads, 
 
hit dogmatically Insecure. 355 
 
 " They shall never perish, neither shall any pluck 
 them out of My hand " (S. John x. 28), it reads on 
 another, " It is impossible to renew unto repentance 
 those who were once enlightened and tasted of the 
 heavenly gift, and then fell away " (Heb. vi. 4-6). 
 
Chapter XI. 
 
 rrohatlon closed by Death — The Intermediate State — The Restirrection 
 of the Body — Christ'' s Second Coining and the Signs of it — Nature of 
 the Last Judgment — The Bliss of Heaven — Relation of the Elect to 
 the Mass of Mankind hereafter — State of the Lost — Final Tritimph 
 of Goodness, 
 
 §1. 
 
 This period of the earthly life is our time of pro- 
 bation ; and so far as our present knowledge serves, 
 there is no other. The moral bent is sufficiently 
 exhibited here, and we have no warrant for teaching 
 that it can be radically altered elsewhere. S. Austin 
 lays it down, that no sacrifices which the Church can 
 offer are of any avail for those w'ho have departed with- 
 out at least the rudiments of faith and. repentance. 
 The thought that impenitent wickedness will have 
 another chance, or series of chances, hereafter, not 
 only weakens the force of fear as a dissuasive from 
 sin, but it appears to involve a loss in the opposite 
 direction as well. If in some future state, men may 
 change from fixed evil to good, it would seem arbitrary 
 to deny that they might change from fixed good to 
 evil. This would be intolerable to the Christian heart 
 
Death ends Probation. 357 
 
 and conscience, already sorely taxed. Faith demands, 
 and Scripture gives it a right to demand, that the 
 judgment founded upon conduct in this life should be 
 eternal and final, and that probation should be at an 
 end. 
 
 But this life is far more than a probation ; it is 
 an education, a discipline ; and this aspect of existence 
 by no means ceases at death. No unfair strain is put 
 upon S. Paul's language by supposing that he dis- 
 tinctly contemplated a progressive work of grace in 
 the soul between death and judgment. *' I am con- 
 fident," he says, " of this very thing, that He who 
 began in you a good work will accomplish it until the 
 day of Jesus Christ " (Phil. i. 6). While, therefore, 
 we must hesitate to affirm that souls are still open to 
 begin conversion in the Intermediate State, we may 
 hope that many, in whom conversion was very imper- 
 fect here, will then be ripened to such a degree of 
 perfection as they are found capable of. There is a 
 wide difference between an unawakened state, and one 
 of wilfully thwarting God's motions, or '' doing despite 
 unto the Spirit of Grace " (Heb. x. 29). For this 
 latter unhappy class we are told of no fresh kinds of 
 opportunity, and no ways of retrieving the past. But 
 we may feel confident that those wills which were, at 
 last, on the whole, upon the right side, though with 
 no strong determination, will be saved by being here- 
 after subjected to some purifying and bracing action 
 of God's love. He cannot cast away even the unde- 
 veloped germs, or the shrunken remains, of goodness. 
 
 In some cases — perhaps in many — where the sOul 
 
358 Dcatli-bcd Awakcning-s. 
 
 seems likely to forfeit the grace with which it has 
 trifled, His vigilant Providence sends — when chastise- 
 ment and diseases fail — a hastened and punitive 
 death, " that we should not be condemned with the 
 world " (1 Cor. xi. 32). To such a class of spirits, as 
 it appears, our Lord presented Himself in the interval 
 between His death and resurrection, and x^reached to 
 them His Gospel (1 Pet. iii. 19, 20). God's outraged 
 patience had at last found no resource, if the men were 
 to be saved in the end, but to sweep them indignantly 
 off the face of the earth. It may be that in the very 
 fears and agonies of death some vital movement of 
 will may have taken place, — some spiritual cry for 
 mercj^ — some one long breath of penitence, like that 
 breath which makes the difference between a stillborn 
 babe and one that has had a moment of separate 
 existence. And that single flash of response to grace 
 may have made the men capable of education and 
 discipline in that "prison" to which they were 
 removed. While death-bed repentances are in no way 
 to be counted upon, they are always possible; and 
 although they may not lead to anything more than 
 the minimum of salvation, they at any rate avert the 
 ultimate loss of the soul. 
 
 It is for this reason that the Church has always 
 laid such stress — sometimes it almost looks like super- 
 stition — upon the moral and spiritual value of the last 
 moments, seeking to stay the dying man's eyes and 
 heart upon the Cross, and, even if the man himself be 
 unconscious of outward things, surrounding him with 
 the offices of religion, invoking from God the ministry 
 
Value of the Last Moments. 359 
 
 of angels, keeping intense the intercessions of the 
 priesthood and of friends, and even appealing by the 
 passing bell to the sympathetic help of strangers. It 
 is not only that the moment of death has its special 
 temptations and dangers, — Satan using what he knows 
 to be his last chance, and the soul itself in many 
 cases becoming sensible of an awful loneliness; — it 
 is not only that the moment of death, especially for 
 those who have shewn little previous sign of grace, is, 
 as we have said, a moment of unique hopefulness. 
 Death is the last test of the soul's direction. God 
 does not judge us by the way we die, but by the way 
 we live : nevertheless, as any previous crisis in a 
 man's history reveals what the man has been making 
 of himself up to that point, so also, but in a higher 
 degree, does death. The way we have lived is 
 gathered up — not for man's judgment but for God's — 
 in the way we die. 
 
 §2. 
 
 But little is revealed to us concerning the condi- 
 tion of those who die in grace, in the interval between 
 death and resurrection. Much knowledge on the 
 subject would be both impossible and improfitable for 
 us now. But enough light is vouchsafed us to direct 
 our own conduct, and to give us comfort in thinking 
 of our- departed friends. Their state or abode some- 
 times bears the title of Paradise (S. Luke xxiii. 43), 
 carrying us back to the ^secluded and sinless happi- 
 ness of the first beginnings of our race ; sometimes 
 Abraham's bosom (S. Luke xvi. 22), which makes us 
 
o 
 
 60 Names of tJie Disembodied State. 
 
 think of the maintenance of the covenant relation 
 with God, and of the protecting patronage of our great 
 forefathers in the faith. Sometimes, — and mainly in 
 quotations from the Old Testament, — it is simply called 
 Hades, or Hell, answering to the Hebrew Sheol, — a 
 negative word which would include the state of all 
 departed spirits, both good and bad, but which is 
 never used without a sense of privation and incom- 
 pleteness, easily passing into the darker thoughts of 
 punishment and torment (Eev. xx. 13 ; S. Luke 
 xvi. 23). Once, a special class of "souls" are 
 described as lodged *' beneath the altar," which is 
 perhaps identical with the Throne (Eev. vi. 9). The 
 description appears to indicate the sacrificial nature 
 of their martyrdom, as well as their special nearness 
 to the Lamb ; w^hile it suggests also a kind of con- 
 finement from which the souls would be glad to be 
 freed. 
 
 The first characteristic of Christian death is its 
 restfulness. ''They rest from their labours" (Eev. 
 xiv. 13). In one aspect of it, this repose belongs to 
 good and bad alike, and is simpl}^ the result of their 
 disembodied condition.^ The body is the instrument 
 
 • It has been argued by some that, although tlic natural bod)- is in 
 ftbcyancc and the si^iritual body not yet given, the spiiit is clothed 
 mcainvhilo with some temporary organism which relieves its sense of 
 nakedness. But such is not the meaning of S. Paul in the passage to 
 whicli reference is made, but ratiier the opposite. Tiie Apostle is 
 weary of the " tabernacle " life of this world, and, if it must bo so, 
 would rather be "absent from tiie body" in order to be " present with 
 the T,ord." But there was a third alternative, which, if he might, ho 
 would choose before either. It was that there should be no need to bo 
 etrippcd at all, no interval between tiio tabernacle and the heavenly 
 
The Restfiihiess of Paradise. 361 
 
 of moral action ; and when once it is taken away, the 
 man, for weal or for woe, has reached that "night," 
 which our Lord speaks of, " when no man is able to 
 work " (S. John ix. 4). Every one has had his 
 " twelve hours " (S. John xi. 9) to work in upon 
 earth, and now he must rest perforce until the new 
 morning comes, and leave all practical occupation. 
 The whirl of this busy life is at an end. And the 
 body is also the medium of passive impressions. 
 These, too, are left behind. The dead are at rest 
 from the confusing and distracting succession of 
 interests and excitements, of sensuous pains and 
 pleasures. No fresh temptations can assail them. 
 If they cannot break out into new action, nothing 
 can break in, to disturb them with new troubles. It 
 is this absolute stillness of the dead which makes 
 us unable, except in symbols and poetry, to picture 
 to ourselves the life of Paradise. Purely spiritual 
 existence is to us an unimaginable thing. All we can 
 say about it is that every condition of life with which 
 we are acquainted is directly reversed. 
 
 But it would be totally at variance with Scripture 
 to suppose that the departed, because they are in- 
 capable of positive commerce with the outer world, 
 must therefore be in a state of swoon or abeyance. 
 No such notion is intended when they are said in 
 the Bible to have fallen asleep, or to have been laid 
 
 house. He wished that Christ might return before he died, and that 
 instead of putting off his eartlily dress, he might be " clothed upon," 
 that is, that the new vesture might come down upon the okl aud 
 transform it into itself, " in order that what is mortal may be swallowed 
 up by life " (2 Cor. v. 1-9). 
 
o 
 
 62 Its Repose not Unconsciousness. 
 
 to rest (ko I fii^Oyivai). The word is expressive of repose, 
 but not of vacancy. As Christ, on passing out of this 
 world into "Hell," was "quickened in spirit" (1 Pet. 
 iii. 18), so are others. The spirit is set at rest from 
 outward activities and impressions in order that it 
 may he free to develope a whole world of inward 
 consciousness. It is shut up within itself, that it 
 may have no alternative but to contemplate deeper 
 facts. Here, we have had hard work to recall our- 
 selves from what is phenomenal to what is real. 
 But to the dead the task is easy. It is their sole 
 occupation. Having no outlet of escape, such as we 
 have, into the amusements of temporal existence, 
 they sound the things which are eternal. The 
 "breadth" and the "length" which S. Paul speaks 
 of, through which they have roamed before and 
 through which they will roam again more freely here- 
 after, are now inaccessible to them ; and their range 
 lies in exploring that " depth " which S. Athanasiua 
 explained to be the realm of the dead (Eph. iii. 18). 
 
 Now it is impossible to suppose that spirits can 
 be all at once confi-onted with the essential verities 
 of existence without experiencing emotion. When 
 no veil, no medium, no sacrament is any longer 
 interposed, but things are borne in upon the naked 
 consciousness, just as they are ; when it is no longer 
 possible for the truth to be evaded, or disguised, or 
 misapprehended; then comes an awakening, which 
 even for the Saints must mingle terror with joy. In 
 proportion, no doubt, as men have lived in the light 
 of the Gospel on earth, there will be less surprise in 
 
Awfidness of Paradise. 363 
 
 the revelation which death makes, and the delight 
 of finding the truth of those things -which were 
 believed will overpower the pain of discovering what 
 was before imperceived. Yet the vision must have 
 in it something appalling even for the holiest. S. 
 Paul had had a foretaste of Paradise (2 Cor. xii. 4) ; 
 and he spoke of that awful ** depth," which must 
 then have opened before him, as a thing formidable 
 enough to make the soul reel, and lose its hold, if 
 it were not for the love of God in Christ which 
 embraces and supports it (Eom. viii. 39). Although 
 he was assured that passing out of the body would 
 bring him home to Christ, yet he shrank from the 
 necessity, and felt that it needed courage (Oappov/xtv) 
 to choose such an exposure in preference to the life 
 of earth (2 Cor. v. 8). 
 
 Among the facts which come most vividly before 
 the consciousness of the departed, are those con- 
 nected with the mystery of their own being. For 
 the first time, the man fully realises what he is, and 
 how he came to be what he is. The whole history 
 of God's merciful dealings with him, and of his own 
 narrow escapes from self-perdition, rises up before 
 him. He learns now what his sins have cost, in the 
 strong light of the Presence of Him who bore them. 
 " Thou hast set our misdeeds before Thee," says the 
 funeral Psalm, *'and our secret sins in the light of 
 Thy countenance" (Ps. xc. 8). The fact that that 
 Countenance beams upon the pardoned sinner with 
 love surpassing all previous conception, does not take 
 away from him all remorse for his wrongdoing. On 
 
364 Its Purgatorial Aspect. 
 
 the contrary, it adds poignancy to it. Death ushers 
 the Christian into a state of profound penitence. 
 "While he was on earth, his penitence was mixed with 
 alarms for his salvation, which relieved the sense of 
 the intrinsic horribleness of the sin. But when all 
 anxiety about the future is over, the spirit is able 
 disinterestedly to enter into the feelings of the holy 
 Eedeemer with regard to the sins which He bore. It 
 then understands the prophetic promise; ''that thou 
 mayest remember, and be confounded, and never 
 open thy mouth any more, because of thy shame, 
 when I am pacified toward thee for all that thou 
 hast done " (Ezek. xvi. 63). And whereas on earth 
 penitence was able in some measure to appease its 
 cravings by earnest action, it no longer has that 
 resource. S. Bernard well points out, — though he 
 has chiefly the lost in view, — how keen a difference 
 the absence of the body makes ; so that the man is 
 forced to taste "the hatefulness of his acts without 
 being able to repair them {j^acniUntxam hahcri, non 
 agi). No purgatorial flames that are imagined, could 
 cause such anguish as this sword of penitence which 
 both rends and mends the soul. 
 
 The doctrine of Purgatory as taught in the Bom an 
 communion expresses these truths in a parable ; but 
 it also introduces ideas which are quite foreign to the 
 Gospel. There are, no doubt, diversities of discipline 
 to be undergone between death and judgment, suited 
 to the diversities of those who are to be disciplined ; 
 but such a purgatory as Scripture teaches us to think 
 cf has nothing retributive in it. It is not different 
 
TJie Timelessness of Paradise. 365 
 
 from Paradise. The spirit passes into no more exile 
 from the face of Christ, or from His felt grasp. "The 
 souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and 
 there shall no torment touch them " (Wisd. iii. 1). 
 All that is sharp in it is of the spirit's voluntary and 
 natural self-infliction, by the help of grace. There are 
 few good Christians who think that they have had 
 penitence enough in this life. As a rule, they long 
 to have a deeper sense of their forgiven sins, and 
 would desire some space for reflexion and recollec- 
 tion, some leisure for purging and shriving, before 
 presenting themselves for the final judgment. Such 
 an opportunity is given, when our Lord says to the 
 departing faithful, ** Come, My people, enter thou 
 into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee ; 
 hide thyself for a little moment, until the indignation 
 be overpast" (Isa. xxvi. 20). 
 
 The life of Paradise being lived in memory on 
 the one hand, and in expectation on the other, can 
 hardly be said to have a present. ** Their works 
 follow them;" so the Apocalypse describes the one 
 aspect of it: — "And they cried with a loud voice, 
 saying. How long, Lord ? " so it describes the 
 other. Where successive actions are impossible, and 
 the seasons of the natural world are not felt, our 
 temporal divisions are unknown. To speak, as in 
 the language of Indulgences, of years or days in this 
 connexion, must be purely figurative, if it has any 
 sense at all. Whatever measurements the spirits of 
 the departed have, must be of a subjective and 
 internal kind. In all probability it is the same to 
 
366 The Mutual Fellowship of the Dead. 
 
 them whether a thousand years have elapsed on 
 earth since they left it, or only a few minutes. 
 When, therefore, we speak of their state as a state 
 of progress and education, we do not tie ourselves 
 to an earthly mode of progress, gauged by length 
 of time. There is no reason to suppose that the 
 Saints pass through their intermediate state more 
 quickly, in the temporal sense of the word, than 
 ordinary Christians, or take their places in heaven 
 before the end of the world. 
 
 The strange isolation of the dead from all external 
 intercourse with other persons and things does not 
 really make them solitary. It leads them to a far 
 more profound communion with each other and with 
 us. In this life we only guess at the meaning of 
 the Fellowship of the Holy Ghost. They know it 
 by a direct experience. Here, we conjecture one 
 another's meaning through signs and words and 
 looks, and often misinterpret them. There, they 
 read clearly, seeing the truth of things in Christ. 
 The outward events of this world's history do not 
 affect them; but the spiritual bearings of those events 
 no doubt affect them deeply. 
 
 This is involved in their relations with Christ, the 
 closeness of which is brought out in every passage of 
 Scripture which deals with the subject at all. "When 
 the believer dies, he " goes to rest through Jesus " 
 (1 Thess. iv. 14), because it is Jesus that prepares 
 his place of repose and conducts him to it. He "dies 
 in the Lord " (Rev. xiv. 13), because death does not 
 carry him outside of that sacred union in which he 
 
Their Relationship ivith Christ. 367 
 
 has lived. His parting cry is, ''Lord Jesii, receive 
 my spirit " (Acts vii. 59), because, however great the 
 submission to Christ has been before, the spirit now 
 springs absolutely into His keeping, to have no 
 independent Hfe of its own. Yet it is not lost in 
 Him. It departs to *' be with Christ " {gvv, Phil. i. 23), 
 as still a separate personality, capable of enjoying the 
 privilege of being in the same place where He is. 
 And He promises that it shall " be with " Him in 
 more than a local sense in Paradise {fi^T ejnov, S. Luke 
 xxiii. 43) : it shall have a sense of companionship 
 with Him, and of sharing His fortunes. Nor does 
 the spirit of the believer feel that its sojourn there 
 in His company is either precarious or unobserved. 
 He is " at home with the Lord " (evSrj^fjo-m irpog, 2 Cor. 
 V. 8), in reciprocal intercourse with Him, in mansions 
 which are his true and native abode, because they are 
 Christ's to begin with. When his stay in that par- 
 ticular ** mansion" of the Father's house is ended, 
 " God will bring" him, still ''with Jesus" (1 Thess. 
 iv. 14), to that more complete state in which body 
 and spirit together will have the fruition of eternal 
 fellowship with Christ. 
 
 No prayers which we can offer for the Christian 
 dead accord better with this view than that which the 
 English Church puts in our lips, that God's kingdom 
 may be hastened, so that they and we alike may have 
 our perfect consummation, both in body and soul. But 
 any other petitions which we please to offer for them, 
 we may freely offer, provided that we offer them sub- 
 ject to those general laws of prayer which have been 
 
368 Prayers for the Dead. 
 
 laid down elsewhere. It is a cruel wrong to Christian 
 moiu-ners when they are deterred from pouring out 
 their hearts in prayer for the dead. God is a Father, 
 and would have us tell Him everything we feel. If 
 there is any desire in our minds which we dare not 
 bring to Him, we ought not to retain it at all. Every- 
 thing that we may legitimately wish for, we may 
 reverently ask. We may not ask for things which 
 God makes it plain that He does not will, — such as 
 the return of the dead to this corruptible life, or 
 communication with them in superstitious and for- 
 bidden ways. Nor ought we to make definite peti- 
 tions based on uncertain Imowledge of the facts, or at 
 least we must make them with great reserve. But 
 it is safe, with S. Paul, to ask for the departed 
 "mercy in that day" (2 Tim. i. 18), or with the 
 Psalmist, that they and their past afflictions may be 
 "remembered" (Ps. cxxxii. 1). Eest, peace, refresh- 
 ment; light perpetual, the favour of the Divine 
 regard ; a portion with the Saints ; a joyful resurrec- 
 tion and a merciful judgment ; — these are the kind of 
 requests which ancient piety was accustomed to make 
 for them. Nor can it be unavailing and superfluous 
 to offer such prayers. No doubt a disproportionate 
 amount of time and energy has sometimes been 
 devoted to them, and in the fifteenth century the 
 deliverance of the dead from the pains of purgatory 
 seemed to have become the main object of the Mass. 
 The dead do not need the succour of the prayers of the 
 living in the same way as those do who are still liable 
 to temptation, and whose salvation is not yet assured. 
 
The Resurrection of the Body, 569 
 
 But our praj'ers are of use to them iu their progress. 
 To omit the mention of them in the devotions of the 
 Christian Church on earth would imply that all con- 
 nexion between them and us had ceased. Nothing 
 could be more untrue. 
 
 §3. 
 
 The Church knows no special doctrine of the 
 Immortality of the Soul, such as philosophers have 
 imagined. Her doctrine is that of the future Immor- 
 tality of the Man. Though she teaches the continuous 
 existence and consciousness of the spirit in Paradise, 
 the man, during that period, must be regarded as 
 dead. So our Blessed Lord says of Himself, '' I am 
 the living one, and I became dead; and behold, I 
 am living for evermore " (Eev. i. 18). But as death 
 is not annihilation, so the return to life is not the 
 recovery of anything so thin and shadowy as a being 
 without a body. Life, in Christian language, is a more 
 vigorous and substantial thing. Human life requires 
 an organism for its completion and manifestation ; 
 and therefore any doctrine of human immortality 
 must presuppose a Eesurrection of the Body. When 
 arguing with the Sadducees, who rejected the belief, 
 our Lord convicted them of a great and twofold error. 
 They erred concerning "the power of God," not 
 believing that He was able to raise the dead to life, 
 because they had no notion of any bodily life that 
 could transcend this; and they erred in ''not know- 
 ing the Scriptures." The reasoning of Jesus from 
 the Scriptures is not immediately clear, but the very 
 
 2b 
 
3/0 Christ's Arguinent zuith the Saddiicees. 
 
 nssiimptioiis which it makes are most instructive. 
 Many years after the death of the Patriarchs, He 
 says, God still speaks of Himself as their God. It 
 might have been supposed that He called Himself 
 so because He v^^as their God while they lived. But 
 deeper reflexion shews that such a bond as had been 
 formed between God and the Patriarchs could not be 
 a momentary and perishable thing. Creatures so 
 made in the image of God as to be capable of friend- 
 ship with Him, and actually admitted to it, could 
 not pass out of existence and be forgotten. Therefore 
 Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were still alive ; — indeed 
 it was the case with all the dead, " for all live unto 
 Him." But this involves a still further thought. If 
 those Patriarchs, though dead, are still alive, not 
 as memories in the retrospect of God, but as personal 
 existences, it must be by virtue of a coming resurrec- 
 tion. The spirit of Abraham by itself is not Abraham, 
 any more than the body of Abraham is. Therefore, if 
 God is Abraham's God, and not a God of the dead 
 but of the living. He must have in reserve for His 
 friend a return to life, certainly not less rich and full 
 than the life of earth, and therefore clothed in a 
 fitting body. 
 
 The nature of the resurrection body is to be 
 learned from the descriptions given us of our Lord's 
 own Body after the resurrection ; and by S. Paul's 
 deductions from the same. It was by rising from the 
 dead Himself that Christ "lighted up life and iucor- 
 ruption " (2 Tim. i. 10). There arc two cautions 
 which must reverently be borne in mind, however, 
 
Nature of Christ's Risen Body. 371 
 
 in applying to ourselves what was seen in Him. 
 First, His Body was the Body of the Incarnate 
 Word ; and as He was able to do with it, even before 
 death, what other men cannot do, so it may have 
 been afterwards. And on the other hand, His Body, 
 dm'ing the forty days, was not seen in the final state of 
 glorification, but only in the initial stage of its return 
 from death. Yet with this reserve we may find an 
 abundance of instruction to gather concerning our 
 own future. His Body was seen, and felt, to be a real 
 body, — He does not say of " flesh and blood," — but 
 of "flesh and bones" (S. Luke xxiv. 39). It was 
 still in such relations with this material universe, 
 that His disciples *' ate and drank with Him after 
 that He rose from the dead" (Acts x. 41). It was 
 undoubtedly the same Body with which He had been 
 born and had lived and died, not a different one. In 
 token of this. He shewed them His hands. His feet, 
 and His side, where there were still traces of the 
 death which He had suffered (S. Luke xxiv. 39 ; S. 
 John XX. 20). Upon this identity of His resurrection 
 Body with His natural Body, He even bases the proof 
 of His own personal identity, — " that it is I Myself," 
 — as if He could not have been Himself, had He 
 appeared in another body. And yet the changes 
 which have taken place in it are no less remarkable 
 than the signs of continuity. It is not always and 
 at once to be recognised, even by those who are 
 familiar with Him, either by look, or by tones of voice. 
 Some sort of spiritual preparation is required in order 
 to be on a perfect understanding with it. Once we 
 
2i']2 Teaching of S. Paid on 
 
 even read of His appearing ''in a different form " 
 (S. Mark xvi. 12). Even on an occasion when they 
 were expecting Him, and had been appointed to meet 
 Him, " some were in two minds " when He appeared, 
 not knowing what to make of it (S. Matt, xxviii. 17). 
 If still able to draw breath from the air, and to eat 
 the food which was given, and to walk upon the 
 ground, Christ's resurrection Body was not tied to 
 these things. In a chamber where no door is opened. 
 He suddenly starts into view (S. John xx. 26). He 
 no less suddenly " vanishes out of sight " (S. Luke 
 xxlv. 31) when it pleases Him. His Body is able 
 at will to move upwards through the air (Acts i. 9). 
 
 Such are some of the indications which Christ 
 vouchsafed to give us of the relations of the resurrec- 
 tion body to this in which we now are. S. Paul 
 carries our knowledge a little further, by a parable, 
 and by a generalisation. He likens the difference 
 between the present earthly body and that which 
 will develope from it to the difference between the 
 naked grain which is sown and the plant which 
 springs out of it. The seed appears to be hopelessly 
 disintegrated; but it pleases God to re-embody the 
 life which in germ existed in it, and that, after no 
 capricious fashion. An invariable law connects the 
 seed sown with the springing plant, and, although 
 science may be unable to inform us why, the grain 
 of wheat produces wheat and the grain of barley, 
 barle5\ So the body which a man will wear here- 
 after will bo ** his own body " (1 Cor. xv. 38), — by no 
 means on account of an identity of component par- 
 
the Resurrection-Body. 373 
 
 tides, or of similar configuration, but because it is 
 the only one ^Yllicll could issue out of that aggregate 
 of faculties and relations called now his body, so 
 employed as he has employed it. But the organism 
 which is to clothe the man at the resurrection differs 
 far more from the present body than the plant from 
 the seed. Not only is it more beautiful, and stronger, 
 "in glory" and ''in power;" — "it is sown in corrup- 
 tion, it is raised in incorruptibility." There is no fear 
 lest it should again droop and decay and die. The man 
 has at length reached true immortality. For, to sum 
 up the whole contrast in a word, the body which was 
 "sown a natural body, is raised a spiritual body" 
 (1 Cor. XV. 44). That is the great distinction. Where- 
 as on earth the man was "in the flesh," and in 
 Paradise "in the spirit," he now finds the perfect 
 union between the two, when the spirit which has 
 learned all that the world of pure spirit has to teach 
 it comes again into a body which never limits or 
 thwarts it, but which absolutely fulfils all its behests 
 without difiiculty. Those who are still alive at our 
 Lord's coming, will experience the same change with- 
 out passing through death. 
 
 Although "all men shall rise again with their 
 bodies," yet such a resurrection as this is only given 
 to the faithful. It is the special privilege of those 
 who have learned to make our Lord's flesh their 
 meat (S. John vi. 54). This is that "resurrection 
 from the dead " (ilai^daram? 17 ck vek^wv, Phil. iii. 11), 
 which saints long and labour to attain. In contra- 
 distinction to them, the wicked, though they return 
 
374 Resurrection not alike for all. 
 
 likewise from the merely spiritual state, still remain 
 among the clcad.^ Such bodies as tliey receive 
 correspond to their moral and spiritual condition, 
 and therefore contribute nothing to their freedom 
 or fulness of life, but on the contrary, bear witness 
 to their inward disorganization and decay. If we 
 could adopt what appears to be the most direct gram- 
 matical translation of one hard text, it would seem 
 to suggest that some men, too far gone in natural 
 corruption to be capable of the full " resurrection 
 of life," yet not so wilfully wicked as to deserve " the 
 resurrection of damnation" (S. John v. 29), w^ould 
 be permitted to continue a disembodied existence, 
 apart from other men, but not apart from God (1 Pet. 
 iv. 6). Possibly something of a like nature underlies 
 our Lord's sajdng about those who should " enter 
 into life maimed, or halt, or having one eye " (S. 
 
 ' The popular notion that there will be separate resurrections of 
 the faithful and the Tvickcd, at distinct times, is founded on a miscon- 
 ception of the figurative language of the Apocalypse. " The first 
 resurrection" (Ecv. xx. 5) appears to indicate that rising to new 
 power, by which the saints inflncnce the Church after their death. 
 It has been treated of in this work on p. 218. The study of tho 
 lives and teacliiug of tho saints by after generations gives them a 
 Bhare with Christ in His supreme rule over the world now. Another 
 and more usual interpretation is that tho " first resurrection " is tho 
 awakening to newness of life which is given to the faithful through 
 their Baptism (comp. 1 Pet. i. 3). But whatever else it may mean, 
 the character of tho Apocalypse forbids a literal acceptance of the 
 word.s. When S. Paul says (1 Thess. iv. IG), "The dead in Clirist 
 Bhall rise first," it is clear from the original at a glance that he does 
 not contrast them with other dead who shall rise after, but witii the 
 quick who are to be transformed: "Then we wliich are alive and 
 remain." St. Paul is just reversing the opinion which liad gained 
 ground at Thessalonica that " wo which are alive and remain . . , 
 should j)reve»j< them w hieh are asleep," 
 
Christ's Second Coming. 375 
 
 Mark ix. 43-47). Something of the man's history 
 must be visible iu his very apiDearauce. 
 
 §4. 
 
 The general resurrection takes place at the Last 
 Day. It accompanies the coming of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ. Lideed, it may almost be said to he His 
 coming; for as we have pointed out elsewhere, the 
 Second Advent of Christ does not mean that He 
 returns to our level, but that we are caught away 
 to His. Instead of subjecting Himself again to our 
 earthly senses. He gives, "in a moment, in the 
 twinkling of an eye," to quick and dead alike, those 
 new faculties of the resurrection body by which to 
 apprehend His Presence, — that Presence which ever 
 since His Ascension has been among us, but per- 
 ceived only by faith. 
 
 That such a Coming awaits the world is one of the 
 clearest revelations of the Gospel. Recently, men 
 have been drawn with much profit to consider, 
 more definitely than before, some less extraordinary 
 facts and events in the Church's life as Comings of 
 our Lord. He comes in the Sacraments, and in His 
 Word. He comes to the soul at death. He comes to 
 the Church in those great moments, like the Fall of 
 Jerusalem, the Conversion of Constantine, the Refor- 
 mation, which we rightly call crises or acts of decision 
 and judgment. But these all are but tentative and 
 preliminary Comings. They form points of transition 
 from one scene in the long tragedy to another. But 
 we still wait for a great denouement, which will give 
 
37^ Uncertainty of its Date. 
 
 au appropriate and artistic close to it all, gathering 
 up in one final catastrophe all that the minor Advents 
 have prefigured. 
 
 The date at which the great Advent will take place 
 is entirely unknown to us. It cannot he calculated 
 from the symbolical numbers of S. John ; nor can the 
 most spiritual discernment be sure of reading un- 
 erringly the signs of its approach. If, in reaction 
 from the profane curiosity which delights to make out 
 the day and hour, we hold that it is still far distant, 
 om* very thinking so is more of a sign that it is at 
 hand than otherwise ; for the one thing certain about 
 the date is that it will throw out all computations, 
 *' for in such an hour as ye think not, the Son of Man 
 cometh " (S. Matt. xxiv. 44). Assuredly Christ will 
 not come till the very moment of the "fulness of the 
 times," any more than at His first coming. But if 
 the world does not yet appear ripe for the end, no one 
 can calculate how long or short a time might be 
 needed for the ripening. '* One day is with the Lord 
 as a thousand years " (2 Pet. iii. 8) ; and events 
 might move with an appalling rush if it pleased Him 
 to give the impulse. The ingredients are all in the 
 cup ; it only needs the addition of some drop to 
 resolve and precipitate them. There is but one 
 lesson which our Lord inculcates on every mention of 
 His Coming, — to be always watching for it, and never 
 to acquiesce in the belief that it is far away. 
 
 It is dangerous to fix too closely the meaning of 
 those warnings which were given by Christ upon the 
 !MoCint of Olives, and afterwards developed by S. John 
 
Preparation for it in Nature. 377 
 
 in Patmos ; but the preparation for the Advent ap- 
 pears to lie in two main directions, natural and 
 historical. The resurrection of the dead, and the 
 transformation of the still living, will not take place 
 on an unchanged theatre. There is too close a con- 
 nexion between man and the world for that. Christ 
 speaks of " signs in the sun and in the moon and in 
 the stars " (S. Luke xxi. 25), and S. Peter of '' fire " 
 and "fervent heat," which will dissolve this present 
 fabric (2 Pet. iii. 7, 10, 12), and prepare the way for 
 a new. Whatever may be the form of those last con- 
 vulsions of the visible order, both revelation and 
 science lead us to believe that as this world had a 
 beginning, so it must have an end. The end, how- 
 ever, is a new and more glorious beginning again. 
 Creation, which has, by no fault of its own, shared 
 in the degradation and misery of man, shares also in 
 the benefits wrought out by Jesus Christ. When " the 
 redemption of our body" comes, then ''creation also 
 shall be emancipated from the slavery of decay into 
 the freedom of the glory of the children of God " 
 (Eom. viii. 20-23). The travail in which it now 
 groans shall not be an unfruitful travail. It issues 
 in that " regeneration " which was stated and left 
 without explanation by our Lord (S. Matt. xix. 28). 
 
 And as nature, through the sins of men on one 
 hand, and their diligence and science on the other, as 
 well as by processes of her own, is working up towards 
 the Advent of her Eedeemer and ours, so also is the 
 history of man. By the spread of the Gospel among 
 all nations (S. Matt. xxiv. 14), and by the subsequent 
 
37^ Preparation for it in History. 
 
 reassiimption of Israel (Rom. xi. 15), the way of 
 Christ's Coming is prepared. The Catholic Church 
 refuses to enter into any vain speculations about a 
 Millennium in which Christ is literally and visibly to 
 reign upon earth among Saints already risen from the 
 dead; but she has reason to expect that before the 
 world is hurried to the final Judgment, wider triumphs 
 will be allowed to her than she has yet seen. Great 
 Oriental nations, as well as the simpler races of the 
 islands and of Africa and America, have still to con- 
 tribute to the fulness of her Catholicity. Her broken 
 unity must be restored. And then she expects to 
 have one last terrible combat with all the concen- 
 trated force which Satan can levy in the world, when 
 good and evil will endeavour to disentangle them- 
 selves from each other and gain possession of the 
 earth. Then, when the mysterious Eebel, — the Anti- 
 christ who, it may be, pretends to be the Christ, — 
 shall have gathered head, and exhibited the utmost of 
 his impious power, unrestrained, the Lord Jesus will 
 be revealed, and ** bring him to nought by the mani- 
 festation of His Presence " (2 Thess. ii. 8). 
 
 §5. 
 
 Impressive pictures of the Final Judgment are 
 drawn for us in the Bible ; and we can only con- 
 ceive of it in a symbolical, apocalyptic form. Never- 
 theless it is as well to recognise that those pictures 
 are not to be interpreted literally, and to endeavour 
 to disengage some of the chief ideas which they 
 represent. 
 
The jfudgmcnt an ExposiLre of Truth. 379 
 
 The first element in a judgment is that of deciding 
 what has been in dispute. It is a clearing up of con- 
 fused and uncertain questions. The matter of debate 
 is examined, the "witnesses heard and tested, a lumi- 
 nous review of the cause is given, and an authori- 
 tative conclusion drawn. But, although the principle 
 is the same, there is no need to transfer to the Last 
 Day every detail of human courts. No evidence will 
 be called for, and there will be no pleading and 
 counterpleading. In the light of Christ's appearing, 
 all human history, in its most secret and intricate 
 windings, will be made visible at a glance. It will be 
 unnecessary to call attention to this or that fact, to 
 point out circumstances here and there, to discuss 
 and argue. Our Lord tells us that His Coming will 
 be like a flash of lightning. When the lightning 
 bursts out upon the night, it does not move slowly 
 along from feature to feature of the landscape, but 
 reveals the whole, from end to end, and from side to 
 side, at once. So it will be in the Judgment Day 
 (S. Luke xvii. 24). The motives which lay behind 
 words and actions will be as plain as the words and 
 actions themselves. What private and humble per- 
 sonages ^contributed to the development of the world 
 and the Church will be seen in its true relation to the 
 brilliant achievements of great statesmen, or generals, 
 or ecclesiastics. It is sometimes asked by trembling 
 souls whether repented and forgiven sins will be 
 brought into the judgment. No other answer can be 
 given but that saying of Christ, that " There is nothing 
 covered up that shall not be revealed ; and hid, that 
 
380 The Judgment severs Good from Evil. 
 
 shall not be known " (S. Luke xii. 2) ; and that of S. 
 Paul, "Make no judgment before the time, until the 
 Lord come, who will both throw light upon the hidden 
 things of darkness, and manifest the counsels of the 
 hearts " (1 Cor. iv. 5). Everything must come out, 
 good and bad. But penitent souls Avill then rejoice 
 that it is so. The revelation will do them no harm, 
 nor cause them any uncertainty or fear. It will put 
 the finishing touch to their own penitence, and along 
 with the revelation of their former shame will come 
 the revelation of the glory of Christ's love which it 
 has been made to subserve, and of the grace which 
 has been able to turn it to account. Confessed and 
 forsaken sin will be the most powerful evidence 
 against the Accuser, who will find nothing to ''lay to 
 the charge of God's elect " (Rom. viii. 33). 
 
 Such a judgment, however, is more than a con- 
 vincing exposure of the truth. It does not leave 
 things where it found them. It shapes itself into an 
 eficctive sentence. There is no more return, after 
 that, to the state of mixture in which we now live. 
 The " eternal judgment " (Heb. vi. 2) not only gives a 
 speculative satisfaction regarding the past, but it is 
 the dawn of a new day altogether, in which good 
 and evil enter no more into conflict, but are finally 
 separated from each other. 
 
 Against the decision then made there will be no 
 appeal, — not simply because there is no higher autho- 
 rity to appeal to, but because the truth will be so 
 sclf-evidently shewn that none can dispute it. Those 
 who are condemned will condemn themselves, and 
 
The Judge a Human Jtcdge. 381 
 
 those who are justified will see the grounds of their 
 justification. For the Judge is not only one who 
 knows all things in their bearings with a Divine 
 omniscience, and weighs them in the scales of a 
 Divine righteousness : — the same perfect, representa- 
 tive, once-tempted human nature which qualified 
 Him to be "a merciful High-priest and a faithful " 
 (Heb. ii. 17), qualifies Him also to be a faithful and 
 a merciful Judge. There could indeed be no differ- 
 ence, either in strictness or in tenderness, between 
 the Father's judgment and that of Jesus Christ. 
 Nevertheless, it is to Him, as the responsible Head 
 of the human race, that all decision affecting the 
 human race is assigned. " The Father judgeth none, 
 but hath given the entire judgment to the Son, . . . 
 because He is Son of Man " (S. John v. 22, 27). 
 
 §6. 
 
 When even S. John the Divine acknowledged that 
 he was unable to guess what the children of God 
 would develope into (1 John iii. 2), it would be worse 
 than idle to dogmatize upon the future state of the 
 blessed. The glory of it infinitely transcends all 
 power of imagination, even when quickened by 
 a life-long experience of the Divine goodness to- 
 wards the saints on earth. To those who have felt 
 what it is to be under the guilt and power of 
 sin, it is enough to fill the heart with "joy un- 
 speakable and full of glory " even to contemplate 
 that one aspect of it which is suggested by the word 
 salvation (1 Pet. i. 9). Salvation is a v/ord which 
 
3^2 Salvation. 
 
 draws its splendour from a contrast. It makes us 
 think of the danger we were in, — of the certain per- 
 dition which awaited us, if it had not been for our 
 Saviour. The whole life of grace, indeed, is a life 
 of gradually realised salvation, and throughout our 
 pilgrimage we keep (in S. Peter's language) ** receiv- 
 ing " it ; but it is only when the last trial has been 
 surmounted, and the eternal judgment pronounced, 
 that the soul can be thought of as fully saved. Then, 
 looking back upon the sins of life as purged, and 
 its labours all without damage accomplished, the 
 white-robed and palm-bearing company will acknow- 
 ledge the completeness of what they possess, and to 
 whom they owe it : " Salvation unto our God that 
 sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb " (Rev. 
 vii. 10). There is nothing ignoble in the seeking of 
 salvation ; and men who blame Christians for it, as 
 if they were pursuing a sordid and selfish object, 
 can have entered but little into the wholesome fears 
 which the teaching of Christ inspires. An instinct 
 of self-preservation lies in the very springs of life, 
 and must shew itself in spiritual and eternal concerns 
 as much as in earthly. Our Lord and His Apostles 
 constantly appeal to it. It only becomes unworthy, 
 when men seek the salvation of their souls by 
 methods which will never lead to it, namely by 
 neglect of duties and by uncharitable isolation. Yet, 
 in spite of its all-important greatness, salvation de- 
 scribes only the negative side of that which Christ 
 has procured for His people. The future glory is 
 a positive thing. Salvation is our rescue from the 
 
Perfection. 383 
 
 consequences of the Fall. Glory is the destmy for 
 which God created men in Christ without reference 
 to the Fall. 
 
 Without attempting anything like an account of 
 the heavenly glory of the children of God, it will 
 be safe to say that it must include a fourfold per- 
 fection. Those who attain it will be perfect in 
 themselves, and in perfect relation with God, with 
 the world in which they are, and with their 
 brethren. 
 
 To be perfect in themselves is to have true 
 freedom, so that they may follow out to the full 
 what is natural to them. Their constitution itself 
 will no longer impose an irksome restriction. They 
 could not be happy without some medium through 
 which to act and to be acted upon ; nor with a 
 medium inadequate to their wishes. But the spiritual 
 body will give them all that they require. No conflict 
 will arise, as now, between flesh and spirit. There 
 will be no inertness, or weariness, or weakness, or 
 pain, or disease, or anything connected with decay. 
 Nor will there be any need of vigilance against corrupt 
 desires ; for the body being absolutely under the 
 control of the will, and the will itself being perfectly 
 guided by the conscience, and the conscience irradi- 
 ated by the direct light of love, all power of tempta- 
 tion will be at an end. The whole man will move 
 together in all that he does, with an inward unity 
 like the unity of God. Faculties beyond anything 
 which can now be guessed at, will be wielded with- 
 out effort by a central authority, itself sure and 
 
384 The Beatific Vision. 
 
 sound, with the confident health of a hoHness which 
 nothing can seduce. 
 
 Such perfect soundness of the redeemed soul 
 within itself will be at once the condition and the 
 result of a perfect relation to God. *' Without sancti- 
 fication no man shall see the Lord " (Heb. xii. 14) ; 
 and yet he cannot attain the sanctification except 
 by seeing Him. " We know that if He appear, we 
 shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is " 
 (1 John iii. 2). The Beatific Vision of God in 
 Christ will have the power to transform those who 
 arc admitted to it, in proportion to their power of 
 taking it in. As it will be perpetually before their 
 eyes, and they will never for an instant lose sight 
 of it again, their power of taking it in will be per- 
 petually increased ; and they, in consequence, will 
 still, in heaven, be more and more " transformed into 
 the same image from glory to glory " (2 Cor. iii. 18). 
 All will not be accomplished at the first glance. It 
 is only true up to a certain point to say that the 
 day of faith and hope will be over, because they 
 are swallowed up in sight (2 Cor. v. 7 ; Eom. viii. 24). 
 Faith and hope, like charity, arc among the things 
 which will " abide," even when the saints know as 
 they were known (1 Cor. xiii. 12, 13), because there 
 will always remain an infinity of blessed experience 
 to be drawn from that inexhaustible fountain of good- 
 ness ; and as age passes after age, it will seem 
 to the redeemed as if they were only just beginning 
 to appreciate the glory of God, and only just begin- 
 ning to bo capable of appreciating it. The eternal 
 
The Neio Heavens and New Earth. 385 
 
 life of the saints consists in the knowledge of God, 
 in heaven as on earth, and there is no limit that 
 we are aware of, at which that eternal life will 
 cease to expand and increase in strength. 
 
 Perfect in themselves, and in perfect relation to 
 God, they will live in perfect smToundings. Those 
 "new heavens and new earth, wherein dwelleth right- 
 eousness" (2 Pet. iii. 13), will give them a never 
 ending field for enjoyment, and wonder, and thanks- 
 giving. Heaven is not a place, it is true; but it 
 expresses a whole world of things with which the 
 blessed will be connected. Everything which here 
 is charming to the senses will be found there in its 
 glorified and spiritual counterpart. Far as the Chris- 
 tian imagination of heaven is removed from anything 
 sensuous, we are not required to represent it to our 
 minds as so severely spiritual, so unmixedly a king- 
 dom of ideas, that the simple and unintellectual and 
 childlike would find no attraction in thinking of it. 
 There will be transformed objects to correspond with 
 the transformed body ; and the relation to them will 
 be a perfect relation, — of mastery, not subjection, — of 
 free and restful delight, not of bewildered snatching 
 here and there. And, imless we wrongly interpret some 
 passages of the New Testament, our relation to the 
 glorified world will not be one of ethical freedom 
 only, but of direct control and government. We 
 are destined to take that place with regard to nature 
 which is now occupied by the angels. Ourselves 
 made '* equal unto angels " (S. Luke xx. 36) in those 
 respects in ' which now we fall short of them, — in 
 
 • 2 c 
 
o 
 
 86 Perfect Union of the Blessed 
 
 spirituality, in concentration, in reach of understand- 
 ing, in orderliness, in holiness, in devotion, — we shall 
 be able perfectly to fulfil those functions which were 
 contained in the charge given to man at his beginning 
 (Gen. i. 28). It may even be that those faculties 
 which now are employed in artistic interpretation and 
 imaginative invention may become a power of actual 
 creation, and that new realms may be framed through 
 the children of God to the glory of their Father. 
 
 The mutual relations between those who are saved 
 will be no less perfect than their relations to renovated 
 nature. Perfected imion of all men in Christ is a 
 main part of the glory to which we look forward. 
 But little is told us of special joys for individual souls 
 in heaven ; the teaching of Scripture is mainly occu- 
 pied with what is common to all. It would, indeed, 
 be most false to suggest that the separate person- 
 alities of men will cease to exist, and that nothing 
 wiU remain but a general consciousness of the race, — 
 whatever that might be. S. Peter will for ever be 
 S. Peter, and S. Paul, S. Paul, each with his own 
 continuous experience, which none can share with him 
 at first hand. This is contained in the promise of 
 the " white stone, and upon the stone a new name 
 written which no man knoweth but he that receiveth 
 it " (Pev. ii. 17). But the joyful experience of each 
 soul will pass on into the joy of all. Even here. 
 Christians are sufticicntly knit into one body to be 
 affected by one another's sufferings and delights. But 
 the sympathy which is here a matter of deliberate 
 and dillicult attainment, and most imperfectly real- 
 
compatible with Wide Differences. 387 
 
 ised even among those who stand nearest to each 
 other, will then be instinctive and universal. Where- 
 as now the union of Christ's members is a matter of 
 faith and hope, it will then be a matter of realised 
 consciousness and of sight. Love will go out from 
 soul to soul in the same strong and satisfying manner 
 in which it moves in the Blessed Trinity itself. All 
 those peculiarities which in this life repel and hinder 
 confidence will be done away. Hearts will be all open 
 to each other. No false reserve will any longer 
 conceal the motive which prompts every thought and 
 action: ''His name shall be upon their foreheads" 
 (Eev. xxii. 4). 
 
 If personality is preserved in heaven, it is evident 
 at once that there will be no dead level of blessedness 
 among the redeemed, but that inequalities will still 
 remain. In the Gospel parable, each labourer receives 
 the same reward, because all receive the salvation of 
 their souls, and all are blessed up to their full capacity 
 of blessedness. But the souls thus saved are still 
 widely different from each other, — not in sinlessness, 
 for all will be sinless, — but in depth of character, in 
 powers, in versatility, in receptiveness. All are 
 glorified, and each one will rejoice in his own par- 
 ticular glory without envying another's, but the glory 
 of all cannot be alike (1 Cor. xv. 41). There is, for 
 example, the glory of the innocence which was never 
 lost, remaining eternally distinct from the glory of 
 the cleansed penitent (Eev. xiv. 3, 4). And as with 
 moral characteristics, so also with the intellectual. 
 There will be the glory of the childlike, and the glory 
 
388 Permanence of Relationships. 
 
 of the genius. Mere acquirements, indeed, will go 
 for very little, and many that have been first in this 
 life will be last there, and the last first, — if they were 
 last only for lack of opportunity; but natural bent, 
 and diligent self-culture, must assuredly receive their 
 appropriate consecration and perfection. In like 
 manner — although all that is physical and earthly 
 in such distinctions passes away — distinctions like 
 those of sex, and nationality, which enter into the very 
 essence of souls, cannot be utterly obliterated. And ties 
 which have bound souls closely together in this life, 
 like those of husband and wife, mother and son, friend 
 and friend, wdll retain, in the altered circumstances, 
 all that was inward and of eternal value, and will be 
 glorified with the glory of the souls which they con- 
 nect. Even on earth, such relationships are not 
 stationary, but change their 'outward features from 
 year to year, and Mary's attitude towards Jesus, and 
 His to her, was not the same on Calvary as it had 
 been at Nazareth ; still less is it the same now ; but 
 every instinct of the heart rebels against supposing 
 that Mary in heaven will be no more to Jesus than 
 any other holy woman, and that she will remember 
 her motherhood as only a strange dream of the past. 
 
 Perfect mutual relations among souls so widely 
 different necessitate the ideas of authority and sub- 
 ordination. Such ideas are commended to our minds 
 when the glorified Church is represented to us, not as 
 a Garden of Eden, with its lonely scenerj', but as a 
 City, a " new Jerusalem " (Eev. xxi. 2). Our Lord, 
 in figurative language, said that His Apostles should 
 
Degrees of Authority in Heaven. 389 
 
 judge, — that is, should rule, — the ''twelve tribes " of 
 His new Israel (S. Matt. xix. 28). He spoke of some 
 being set to govern ten cities, and others five (S. Luke 
 xix. 17, 19), in proportion to the faithfulness with 
 which they had acquitted themselves in a simple 
 office of trust on earth. Thus good work is rewarded 
 by further opportunities of good work. It is altogether 
 beyond us to guess in what kind of way such ruling 
 spirits will be able to benefit those who are put under 
 them, in a state where all are blessed beyond fear of 
 failure ; but in whatever way it may be, it is at least 
 certain that the rule will be like that of Christ Him- 
 self, — one of loving watchfulness, of meek and unself- 
 asserting serviceableness (S. Luke xxii. 25, 26), — one 
 in which priesthood is not forgotten in the organizing 
 work of kingship (Eev. i. 6). 
 
 §7. 
 
 And here, perhaps, may come in what was observed 
 concerning those who in this life were not among the 
 elect, and yet cannot be classed among the reprobate. 
 There is a special sense in which salvation belongs 
 only to the Church, but the Apostle's language 
 suggests that in a different sense it may belong to 
 others also (1 Tim. iv. 10). Christians are regarded 
 by S. James as *' a kind of firstfruits of God's 
 creatures " (S. James i. 18). It follows that there 
 must be a harvest of some kind to come afterwards. 
 How extensive that harvest may ultimately be we are 
 not told ; but there is no difficulty in supposing that 
 it includes all those who, in the midst of false beliefs 
 
3?o yndgnicnt of those outside. 
 
 and heathen superstitions and heartless philosophies, 
 have endeavoured to live worthy of the human name, 
 with some better and more kindly desires than those 
 which selfishness dictates. Thus our Saviour tells us 
 of the judgment by which He will judge the nations — 
 that is, the mass of mankind, outside the line of the 
 Chosen People, Jewish or Christian. While the test 
 for the elect is of a higher character, as shewn in the 
 Parables of the Virgins and of the Talents, the test 
 for the nations, gathered like unenlightened animals 
 before their Judge (S. Matt. xxv. 32), is that of simple 
 humanity. If they have been actively kindhcarted 
 towards those in need, they are saved. Not that such 
 persons, any more than we, have atoned for their 
 faults by their good works, or are " saved by the law 
 or sect which they have professed." Jesus Christ 
 is their Saviour; and their actions have shewn a 
 rudimentary faith in Him. Though they little knew 
 whom they were befriending, they were befriending 
 Him. They were not yet made partakers of His 
 Nature, but He was already partaker of theirs, — and 
 by thus claiming their place as true human beings, 
 they became without knowing it, eternally attached 
 to Him. They were " of the truth," and they learn to 
 their surprise that the Voice which they obeyed was 
 His (S. John, xviii. 37). Everything that is really 
 human belongs to Christ, and is saved by Him ; and 
 we may be sure that if any one who was once human 
 is finally lost, it must be because such an one has 
 finally destroyed in himself that which made him truly 
 a man, refusing the likeness of God and at last ceasing 
 
Relations of the Church zuith thcni. 391 
 
 to bear His image. But it is not probable that those 
 whom the inscrutable Providence of God has left in 
 darkness in this life will rise all at once into the 
 full stature of those who were chosen to be His 
 children. There will still be an inner and an outer 
 circle among the saved. The Church will even 
 then have a mission to those who are not yet wholly 
 incorporated into her, but are willing to become her 
 tributaries, her subject allies. '' And the nations shall 
 walk through her light, and the kings of the earth 
 bring their glory into her " (Eev. xxi. 24). And so, 
 perhaps, through one seon after another, those who 
 shared the Cross of Christ upon earth may keep 
 ahead of others who follow as they advance, and may 
 be the means of revealing the wonders of the ever- 
 lasting Gospel to world after world. 
 
 §8. 
 
 When we contemplate the blessedness of those 
 who are saved, we are forced to turn to the terrible 
 contrast of the misery of the lost. Naturally difficult 
 in itself, the subject has been made none the less so 
 by the controversies of recent years. A matter re- 
 quiring the most grave and patient treatment has 
 been made the topic of unguarded rhetoric on the one 
 side and on the other ; and it has almost come to pass 
 that men who are willing to be disciples of Christ in 
 other things, rebel against His teaching about Hell. 
 For, as a matter of fact, the clearest and the most 
 awe-inspiring words which form the Church's doctrine 
 
392 Contrast of the Lost and the Saved. 
 
 on this point, are -words of oui* Lord Himself, recorded 
 in the Gospels. 
 
 To conceive what the state of the lost will be, it 
 will suffice to mention the opposite of those things 
 which form the bliss of heaven. Instead of complete 
 soundness and inward unity, our Lord speaks of 
 " destroying both soul and body in hell " (S. Matt. 
 X. 28), and quotes the language of Isaiah about the 
 "worm" which preys unceasingly upon their corrup- 
 tion (S. Mark ix. 48; Isa. Ixvi. 24). While the 
 righteous enjoy eternal life by the direct sight and 
 knowledge of Christ, the lost undergo a " second 
 death " (Rev. xxi. 8), which S. Paul describes as an 
 "eternal perishing from the face of the Lord and 
 from the glory of His might " (2 Thess. i. 9). It is 
 what our Lord taught, when He said, " Then will 
 I profess unto them, I never knew you : depart from 
 Me" (S. Matt. vii. 23). In contrast with the perfect 
 new world in which the saints move and reign, the 
 only surroundings of the lost which our Lord mentions, 
 are those of "the hell of lire" (S. Matt. v. 22), and 
 "the furnace of fire" (S. Matt. xiii. 42), and "the 
 outer darkness " (S. Matt. xxv. 30), And while the 
 saints are united with each other in the fellowship of 
 unhindered love, the companionship of the lost is 
 of a sadder kind ; " Begone from Me, accursed, into 
 the fire, the eternal fire, which hath been prepared for 
 the devil and for his angels " (S. Matt. xxv. 41). 
 " In the time of harvest, I will say to the reapers, 
 Gather together first the tares, and bind them into 
 bundles to burn them" (S. Matt. xiii. 30). 
 
None suffer beyond their Deserts. 393 
 
 The objections ■which have been raised against the 
 Gospel teaching on this matter are for the most part 
 generous protests against doctrines which appeared 
 to obscure either the love or the justice of God. 
 They have, however, been mostly directed against 
 language and thoughts to which the Catholic Church 
 was never committed, though some of her ministers 
 . may have supposed that she was so. Before Christ's 
 teaching about the eternity of chastisement (S. Matt. 
 XXV. 46) can be cordially accepted, it is necessary to 
 have a clear notion about the personages to whom it 
 is to be applied. We may be absolutely certain, 
 to begin with, that none will suffer it who do not fully 
 deserve it. To decide whether any particular person 
 deserves it or not, does not fall within our province, 
 because we are unable to tell what measure of grace 
 has been given, and how far it has been resisted, and 
 the like. But we may certainly trust Him who died 
 for all men, not to pass condemnation upon any who 
 might have received a different sentence, and when 
 the time comes, every one will understand and concur 
 in the judgment which He gives. The lost may be 
 regarded as "many," or as "few;" for those are 
 relative terms (S. Luke xiii. 23, 24) ; but, whether 
 many or few, they will be lost, not because they were 
 predestined to be lost, nor because God would not 
 elect them to partake of grace, nor because His Spirit 
 was weary of striving with them and gave them up 
 before they were fully tested, nor because they failed 
 to comply with a standard which was beyond their 
 reach, nor because they mistook the meaning of the 
 
394 ^^^^^ Z^^^ perish by their Wickedness. 
 
 Gospel and under a mistake held back from it. All 
 who are lost will be lost by their own fault, in spite 
 of warnings and assistances. They will be lost, not 
 because they were weak, or unimaginative, or stupid ; 
 but because they were wicked, — because, when con- 
 science appealed to them, they silenced it, — because 
 they wilfully quenched what light they had, — because 
 they chose what was wrong, knowing that it was 
 wrong, and preferring it to the right — and that, 
 not once or twice, but persistently, and with increas- 
 ing persistence, and to the end, until they had 
 destroyed in themselves the faculties which might 
 have expanded into faith, hope, and charity, which 
 are the life of the soul. They will be lost because 
 they have fixed and determined their characters for 
 evil ; so that all good that could be offered them 
 further would only be made food for fresh evil. They 
 have become like devils and not like men. 
 
 Here lies the answer to that plea so often urged by 
 tender hearts, that a just and merciful God cannot go 
 on for ever and ever punishing men for what they did 
 on earth. Life on earth was short ; and it is an 
 exaggeration to say that the sin of a finite being is 
 itself infinite. How then can it be right to prolong 
 punishment out of all proportion to the deeds of sin ? 
 But that is not really what God does. He is dealing 
 not merely with the past actions of these unhappy 
 beings, but with their present character. The earthly 
 life both shewed what they were, and made them 
 what they became ; and God treats them accordingly. 
 God must deal with facts as facts. He cannot pre- 
 
Characters, not Acts, are pttnished. 395 
 
 tend that things are different from what they are. 
 It is true that, while we are still under probation, He 
 holds His hand, and does not deal with us after our 
 sin nor reward us after our iniquities ; because, if 
 He did, we should have no opportunity of amendment. 
 But, when probation has had its work, there is 
 nothing to be gained by continuing an attitude of 
 reserve. Mercy persistently spurned on earth would 
 be equally spurned somewhere else. It would be of 
 no use to give the lost a fresh beginning in a new life 
 of probation ; for before they could really start fair, 
 the whole memory of the earthly life, and all its 
 inwrought effects upon the soul, must be obliterated, 
 in which case the men would not really be the same 
 men, but only nominally the same ; neither can God 
 do anything so capricious as to annihilate the past. 
 Or if, on the other hand, the men were put to begin 
 life again, on earth, or in paradise, or in heaven, 
 with the character which they had formed before 
 death, they would only repeat the same kind of history 
 on the new scene. If, indeed, there were any case, 
 in which character had not had sufficient opportunity 
 of declaring itself in this life, God would undoubtedly 
 give it some other opportunity ; but to His eye, with 
 its unerring observation, this life is trial enough, and 
 in rewarding and punishing alike, God is not reward- 
 ing or punishing what has once for all been done, 
 but the being who still is what his acts prove and 
 make him. 
 
 It will now be evident that the punishment of the 
 lost is not of an arbitrary kind, like the penalties of 
 
39^ The Penalty is, to be zv/iat they are. 
 
 human law. Amongst men, in order to ensure 
 obedience, it is agreed that those who infringe a 
 regulation shall pay a fixed fine, or be imprisoned for 
 a certain length of time, or have so many lashes. 
 The arrangement is simply conventional, and a power 
 is lodged somewhere of remitting the penalty at dis- 
 cretion. But in the moral world it is all different. 
 The penalty of being a drunkard or a hypocrite is not 
 to pass so many days in hell, or to be tortured with 
 so many degrees of heat ; the penalty is, to be a 
 drunkard or a hypocrite. It works like a law of 
 physical nature. It adapts itself with the most 
 minute equity to each individual case, making the 
 more hardened offender suffer more, and the less 
 hardened less. These are the things which make 
 the pains of hell. Stripes, and hard labour, and 
 terms of penal servitude may be remitted or relaxed ; 
 but what can remit to a man his being what he is 
 and what he still chooses to be ? 
 
 Not that the law is so entirely self-acting as to 
 exclude all personal action on the part of God. There 
 is no reason to shrink from the belief, awful though it 
 is, that God Himself applies His own law to every 
 condemned soul, even as He applies His salvation to 
 every one that is saved. His breath it is, in the 
 Prophet's language, which kindles the fire for them 
 (Isa. XXX. 33). For, though the most part of their 
 penalty is that which comes to them by an inevitable 
 sequence, — to be what they are, — yet they might con- 
 ceivably be what they are without knowing it. But 
 this God does not allow. It is not His will that they 
 
Retributive Element in the Penalty. 397 
 
 should go on for ever deceiving themselves, and 
 thinking that sin brings no evil consequences. He is 
 determined to bring home to them the true character 
 of their deeds. ** I will reprove thee," He says, *' and 
 set before thee the things which thou hast done " 
 (Ps. 1. 21). If they would not learn it in penitence, 
 by seeing what it cost their Saviour, they must be 
 made to learn it in some other way. We could not 
 otherwise understand how God could be a righteous 
 God. If indeed men's sins were only a personal 
 offence to Himself, and a crossing of His private 
 wishes, so to speak, then He might mercifully pass 
 them over in silence for ever, and lavish benefits upon 
 the doers, even though they still continued to grieve 
 Him. But sin is an outrage upon the world, and 
 upon men in general, and upon the sinner's own soul, 
 and upon the eternal and unchangeable principles of 
 justice which God is bound to maintain ; and there- 
 fore He cannot but constrain every soul which has 
 transgressed to recognise, one way or another, the 
 majesty and 'sanctity of the law. This is the ven- 
 geance which He takes. Our conception of righteous- 
 ness, and of the righteousness of God, is not that 
 which is set forth in Holy Scripture, if we exclude 
 from it the idea of retribution. Eetribution, the 
 rendering to all men exactly what they deserve, is 
 not the whole of justice, but it is an important 
 element in it ; and where retribution is lost sight of, 
 government is enfeebled and becomes immoral. Our 
 Lord, therefore, does not hesitate to say that ven- 
 geance will be taken for the wrongs of the elect 
 
398 Love itself inflicts the Penalty. 
 
 (S. Luke xviii. 7) ; and S. Paul says the same 
 (2 Tbess. i. 6 foil.) ; and it is assumed that all 
 healthy souls will be glad that it should be so, and 
 ■will rejoice to see Babylon treated as she deserves to 
 be treated (Eev. xix. 1-3). 
 
 It conducts us to the same result, if we think of 
 God as love ; for the ends of love and justice can 
 never be opposed to each other. When God is said to 
 be love, it is not for a moment to be thought that He 
 loves everything and every one alike. He can only 
 love what is truly loveable. There is nothing love- 
 able in sin, but the very contrary ; and even because 
 He is love God cannot help hating it. And in so far 
 as any being, angelic or human, voluntarily identifies 
 itself with sin, God cannot help hating that being. 
 Satan, and those who take part with him, put them- 
 selves outside of God's love ; or rather, love, in deal- 
 ing with them, can only shew itself in the form of 
 hatred. Love does not make an exception in disfavour 
 of the lost ; on the contrary, it acts towards them in 
 its normal way, manifesting its detestation and 
 abhorrence and fury with them as much for their 
 own sakes as for the sake of others. Hell and its 
 torments are the last resource of love, which it 
 employs with the deepest grief to itself, yet with 
 unhesitating firmness and satisfaction, because it 
 knows that, when souls have reached such a point 
 of wickedness, it is the kindest, as well as the most 
 righteous thing to do. Anything else would do them 
 harm ; and God does not wish them harm, though 
 they may have made it imiDOSsible for Him to do 
 
The Punishment Eternal as the Life. 399 
 
 them good. Difficult as it seems to imagine it now, 
 the tenderest mother of a lost son will in heaven 
 not only acquiesce in the doom which Christ pro- 
 nounces upon him, but will be thankful for it, and 
 say, ** Thou, Lord, art merciful ; for Thou rewardest 
 every man according to his work " (Ps. Ixii. 12). 
 
 If this be true, and Hell is the best place for 
 the lost to be in, they are not likely to be set at 
 liberty from it, which would mean a transference 
 to a place less advantageous for them. When the 
 Church is asked if their punishment will endure for 
 ever, she can only reply that God has not told her 
 of any end or limit to it, and that where He 
 has not spoken, she cannot speak. Christ's word, 
 "eternal," is not, indeed, the same as " everlasting." 
 It does not express an interminable succession in 
 time, but something which transcends time. It 
 might even be supposed in some circumstances to 
 suggest a fixed period, and might be translated "age- 
 long." But the point to be observed is that our 
 Lord used the same epithet, in the same context, 
 to describe the portions of the saved and of the 
 lost alike. If the life is eternal, so is the punish- 
 ment ; if the word fixes a period to the punishment, 
 it fixes a period to the life (S. Matt. xxv. 46). 
 Perhaps some passages which have been thought to 
 indicate endless time may be otherwise interpreted. 
 For instance, when our Lord says, "Their worm 
 dieth not, and the fire is not quenched" (S. Mark 
 ix. 48), the thought is rather that of unintermittency 
 than that of interminableness. And again, there are 
 
400 No Indication of Punishment ending. 
 
 a few sayings which appear to encourage the thought 
 of a limit that may be reached. Such is the saying, 
 " Thou shalt by no means come out thence, till 
 thou hast paid the uttermost farthing " (S. Matt. v. 
 26). But this expression is of the nature of a parable 
 or metaphor, and is used for a very different purpose 
 from that of inspiring hope in the midst of sin. The 
 utmost, then, that can be said is this. We do not 
 know what will answer to temporal succession when 
 we pass out of our present state, and therefore cannot 
 press dogmatically the language which seems to teach 
 an endless duration of punishment. Our knowledge 
 of God's character convinces us that He will punish 
 no one more severely than is necessary, nor for 
 an instant longer than he deserves, and that if at 
 any point some soul in Hell could be found to turn 
 and repent and cease to oppose itself to love and holi- 
 ness, it would cease to be punished as it had been 
 punished. It may also be said that if anj-thing could 
 bring the lost round, it is the treatment which they 
 will receive in Hell, and that God, who has no 
 pleasure in the death of a sinner, is not likely to 
 spare any pains to accomplish such an end. But 
 after all is said, the fact remains, that in Holy 
 Scripture this life is constantly regarded as the time 
 for fixing character, that the judgment of the Last 
 Day is spoken of as absolute and conclusive, and 
 that the condition of those who are then condemned 
 is set over against the condition of those who are 
 justified without a hint that the one is more transient 
 than the other. 
 
Reconciliation of Things in Heaven, 401 
 
 §9. 
 
 Here the doctrine of the Church and of the Bible 
 leaves us. It shews us evil absolutely separated from 
 good, and rendered incapable of doing any further 
 mischief, and made to feel — not by force, but by 
 moral means — its inherent weakness and folly. It 
 shews us evil subjugated to good, and acknowledging 
 its subjugation. If any of those great Principalities 
 in heaven, who watch the drama of human life and 
 learn by it (Eph. iii. 10), were uncertain, at the outset 
 whether evil would prove stronger than good, they 
 are now convinced. If some were inclined to waver 
 in their allegiance, and to indulge in some degree 
 of sympathy with the revolt of Satan, the moment 
 is come when they make their confession and are 
 reconciled through Christ (Col. i. 20). The sight of 
 the completed salvation of the saints removes the 
 last vestige of a doubt, and they fall before the throne 
 with a heartfelt and adoring *' Amen" (Kev. vii. 12). 
 There is no more room for question. Evil has had 
 every chance, and has utterly failed, and has only 
 recoiled upon the heads of those who, in defiance of 
 love and holiness, sold themselves to it. 
 
 This is enough for us to know. If there be any- 
 thing further to come, we are not told of it. The 
 "times of restitution of all the things which God 
 spake by the mouth of His holy prophets " are the 
 times of the return of Jesus from heaven (Acts iii. 
 21). There is nothing to indicate an interval between 
 the '^ coming" of Christ and ''the end, when He 
 
 2 D 
 
402 The ytidgmcnt closes our Vista. 
 
 delivers up the kingdom to God, even the Father ; 
 when He shall bring to nought every principality and 
 every authority and power," subjecting even death, 
 the last enemy, to His feet, and then Himself becom- 
 ing subject to the Father in whose strength He has 
 triumphed, "that God may be all things in all" 
 (1 Cor. XV. 24-28). The Eeturn, the Resurrection, 
 the Judgment, close the Church's vista for the pre- 
 sent, with Heaven and Hell dimly seen stretching 
 beyond. It may be that in some unrevealed future, 
 evil w^ill no more be exhibited only as inheriting its 
 own reward, but will be put out of actual existence 
 altogether. If it be so, the method is unknown to 
 us. To annihilate beings still clinging resolutely to 
 evil would seem to be no triumph of goodness, but 
 a confession of failure. To cure Satan and those who 
 are his — for it is hardly logical to dissociate them 
 from him — and so reduce evil once more to the purely 
 notional existence out of which Satan called it, — this 
 would be the only way that would satisfy our concep- 
 tions of an abolition of evil. Such a conversion may 
 not be beyond the power of God. It need not neces- 
 sarily involve the admission of the unhappy beings to 
 a bliss for which they are too late. But to teach for 
 a doctrine of faith such a final purging of evil out 
 of all wills would be rash in the extreme. If not 
 opposed to the spirit of Scripture, it can hardly 
 be reconciled with the letter of it. Nor is it neces- 
 sary to count upon it. It is sufficient for our present 
 needs to be assured that justice will be done, — that 
 the event of the long day of time will not be doubtful 
 
Complete Victory of Good. 403 
 
 in the end, — that it will be no indecisive battle between 
 good and evil, or one in which good comes off barely 
 conqueror, and evil with a creditable defeat. The 
 defeat of evil, whatever form it takes, will be a perfect 
 defeat, leaving nothing to be desired, nothing still 
 in the enemy's hands. God will have triumphed in 
 a manner worthy of God, and His redeemed children 
 will see it and be satisfied. 
 
 THE END. 
 
A SELECTION 
 
 FROM THE 
 
 Recent Publications 
 
 OF 
 
 Messrs. RIVINGTON 
 
 WATERLOO PLACE, PALL MALL 
 LONDON 
 
RiyiNGTON'S SELECT LIST 
 
 Woodford's Sermons. 
 
 Two Vols. Crown Zvo. ss. each. Sold separately. 
 
 Sermons. 
 
 By James Russell Woodford, D.D., 
 
 Sometime Lord Bishop of Ely. 
 
 Vol L—OLD TESTAMENT SUBJECTS. 
 
 The Feast of Tabernacles— Man's Impatience of Things Supernatural — The 
 Death of Moses — The Power of Christ's Presence in Restraining Evil— 
 The Co-operation of Divine and Human Forces — The Sovereignty of God 
 — The Noiseless Buihling of the House of God — The Power of ^lusic — The 
 Gentleness of God — The Silence of God — Man's Yearning for Safety, 
 Satisfied in a Personal God — God's Use of Evil in Working out His Pur- 
 poses — The Probation of Man Limited to this Life — The Arm of the Lord 
 — Noah, Daniel, and Job and the Communion of Saints — The Church De- 
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 A City that is Set on a Hill — The Closed Door — The Peril of Playing with 
 Spiritual Convictions — Misinterpretation of the Voice of God — The Resur- 
 rection Change-The Birthday of the Church — St. Peter's Shadow — The 
 First Martyr — The Reign of the Son of Man — The Condition of the Dis- 
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 Keeping — Entrance through the Veil of Christ's Humanity — The Cloud 
 of Witnesses — The N.tmes of Individual Souls on the Breastplate of Christ 
 — Absolute Obedience to the Guidance of Christ — The Many Crowns — The 
 Rightful Entrance into the City of God. 
 
 Pao;et on Belief. • 
 
 Crown %vo. (>s. 6d. 
 
 Faculties Axn Difficulties for Belief and Disbelief, 
 
 By Francis Paget, D.D., 
 
 Canon of Christ Church, Oxford. 
 
 Introductory Essay. Part I. — The Virtue of Self-assertion, in the Life of the 
 Intellect— The Virtue of Self-assertion, in the Life of the Will— The Social 
 Instinct — The Reasonableness of Life — The Love of Beauty in Nature — 
 The Love of Beauty in Art — The Love of Beauty in Character— The Place 
 of the Intellect— The Dignity of Man— Readiness. Part II.— The Need 
 of Healing— The Miracle of Repair— The Reality of Grace— The Trans- 
 formation of Pity — The Transformation of Hope^The Records of the Past 
 — 'The Force of Faith — Discord and Harmony — The Inner Life. 
 
 tinatcrToo place. Honnon. 
 
OF RECENT PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 Armitage — Early Church History. 
 
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 Sketches of Church and State in the First Eight 
 Centuries. 
 
 By the Rev. William Armitage, B.A., 
 
 Vicar of Scotford^ Lancaster ; late Scholar of Enitnatiuel College, 
 Cambridge. 
 
 Extension of the Roman Empire into Britain — Early Struggles of the Church 
 with Jews and Gnostics — Heresies and Persecutions — Christian Apolo- 
 gists — Christianity estabUshed by the State — The Arian Heresy — Growing 
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 Rational Aspects of some Revealed Truths. 
 
 By Edward B. Ottley, M.A., 
 
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 Causes — The Authority of the Holy Scriptures— The Divinity of Christ 
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RIVINGTOirS SELECT LIST 
 
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 Easter in St. Paul's. Sermons bearing chiefly on the Resurrection 
 of our Lord. 
 
 By Henry Parry Liddon, D.D., D.C.L., 
 
 ChaticiUor and Canon of St. PaitVs. 
 
 Liddon — Bampton Lectures. 
 
 Eleventh Edition, revised. Cro7un Zvo. ^s. 
 
 The Divinity of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; being 
 the Bampton Lectures for 1866. 
 
 By Henry Parry Liddon, D.D., D.C.L., 
 
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 Liddon — Elements of Religion. 
 
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 Some Elements of Religion. Lent Lectures. 
 By Henry Parry Liddon, D.D., D.C.L., 
 
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 Sermons Preached before the University of Oxford. 
 By Henry Parry Liddon, D.D., D.C.L., 
 
 Chancellor and Cation of St. Paul's. 
 
 First Series.— 1859-1868. 
 Second Series.— i868-i88a. 
 
 JDtlBtertoo place, JLoitDott. 
 
OF RECENT PUBLICATIONS. 
 
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 they are drawn from the Writings of the four Evangelists. 
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 dontcnts. 
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 erontcuts. 
 Eve — Sarah — Lot's Wife — Rebekah — Leah and Rachel — Miriam — Rahab — 
 Deborah — Ruth — Hannah — The Witch of Endor — Bathsheba — Rizpah — The 
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 Body — The Life of Temptation. 
 
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 Street. 
 
 By the Bev. George Body, D.D., 
 
 Caiio/i 0/ Durham. 
 
 arontrnls. 
 The Leading into Temptation — The Rationale of Temptation — Why we are 
 Tempted— Safety in Temptation — With Jesus in Temptation — The End of 
 Temptation. 
 
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 Second Edition. Cr07UftSvo. ys. 6d. 
 
 Sermons Preached for the most part in Manchester. 
 By the Rev. W. J. Knox Little, M.A., 
 
 Canon Residentiary of It'oycester^ and Vicar of Hoar Cross, 
 
 Contents. 
 
 The Soul instructed by God — The Claim of God upon the Soul -The Super- 
 natural Powers of the Soul — The Soul in its Inner Life — The Soul in the World 
 and at the Judgment — The Law of Preparation — The Principle of Preparation 
 — The Temper of Preparation — The Energy of Preparation — The Soul's Need 
 and God's Nature — The Martyr of Jesus — The Secret of Prophetic Power — The 
 Law of Sacrifice — The Comfort of God^The Symbolism of the Cross — The 
 Beatitude of Mary, the Mother of the Lord. 
 
 Knox Little — The Christian Life. 
 
 Third Edition. Cro^vnZvo. ^s. 6d. 
 
 Characteristics and Motives of the Christi.-\n Life. Ten 
 Sermons preached in Manchester Cathedral in Lent and Advent 
 1877. 
 
 By the Rev. W. J. Knox Little, M.A., 
 
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 CTontrnfa. 
 Christian Work — Christian Advance — Christian Watching — Christian Battle — 
 Christian Suffering — Christian Joy — For the Love of Man — For the sake of 
 Jesus— For the Glory of God — The Claims of Christ. 
 
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 The Witness of the Passion of our Most Holy Redeemer. 
 By the Rev. W. J, Knox Little, M.A., 
 
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 A Devotional Commentary on the Gospel Narrative. 
 By the Rev. Isaac Williams, B.D., 
 
 Formerly Fellow ofTrinily College, Oxford. 
 
 THOUGHTS ON THE STUDY OF THE HOLY GOSPELS. 
 
 A HARMONY OF THE FOUR EVANGELISTS. 
 
 OUR LORD'S NATIVITY. 
 
 OUR LORD'S MINISTRY (Second Year). 
 
 OUR LORD'S MINISTRY (Third Year). 
 
 THE HOLY WEEK. 
 
 OUR LORD'S PASSION. 
 
 OUR LORD'S RESURRECTION. 
 
 Voices of Comfort. 
 
 New Edition. Crown %vo. ys. 6d. 
 
 Voices of Comfort. 
 Edited by the Rev. Thomas Vincent Fosbery, M.A., 
 
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 This Volume of prose and poetry, original and selected, aims at revealing 
 the fountains of hope and joy which underlie the griefs and sorrows of life. 
 It is so divided as to afford readings for a month. The keynote of each day is 
 given to the title prefixed to it, such as : ' The Power of the Cross of Christ, 
 Day 6. Conflicts of the Soul, Day 17. The Communion of Saints, Day 20. 
 The Comforter, Day 22. The Light of Hope, Day 25. The Coming of Christ, 
 Day 28.' Each day begins with passages of Holy Scripture. These are fol- 
 lowed by articles in prose, which are succeeded by one or more short prayers. 
 After these are poems or passages of poetry, and then very brief extracts in 
 prose or verse close the section. The book is meant to meet, not merely cases 
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 For Days and Years. A Book containing a Text, Short Reading 
 
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 Selected by H. L. Sidney Lear. 
 
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 Sermons on the Epistles and Gospels for the Sundays 
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 Aufhor q/'a ' Devotional Commentary on the Cosf el Narrative.' 
 
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 CTDntents. 
 
 The Night is far spent, the Day is at hand — Elijah, the Warner of the 
 Second Advent of the Lord — Christmas — Epiphany — The Rich Man and 
 Lazarus — The Seventh Day Rest — I will arise and go to my Father — Con- 
 firmation, a Revival — Korah — The Law of Liberty — Buried with Him in 
 Baptism — The Waiting Church of the Hundred and Twenty — Whitsun Day. 
 I will not leave you comfortless — Whitsun Day. Walking after the Spirit 
 — The Barren Fig Tree — Depart from me ; for I am a sinful man, O Lord — 
 Feeding the Four Thousand — We are debtors — He that thinketh he standeth 
 — The Strength of Working Prayer — Elijah's Sacrifice — If thou hadst known, 
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 By George Moberly, D.C.L., 
 
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 ffionttnls. 
 
 Except a man be born again— The Lord with the Doctors— The Draw-Net— I 
 will lay me down in peace — Ye have not so learned Christ — Trinity Sunday — 
 My Flesh is Meat indeed — The Corn of Wheat dying and multiplied — The Seed 
 Corn springing to new life— I am the Way, the I'rufh, and the Life— The Ruler 
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 Footprints of the Son of Man as traced by Saint Mark : 
 being Eighty Portions for Private Study, Family Reading, and 
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 By Herbert Mortimer Luckock, D.D., 
 
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 With an Introduction by the late Bishop of Ely. 
 
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 Thoughts on Personal Religion : being a Treatise on the 
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 By Edward Meyrick Goulburn, D.D., D.C.L., 
 
 Dean o/Konvich. 
 Also a Cheap Edition. 3*. 6d. 
 
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 Church of England ; to which is added an Appendix on Fasting 
 Communion, Non-communicating Attendance, Auricular Confes- 
 sion, the Doctrine of Sacrifice, and the Eucharistic Sacrifice. 
 
 By Edward Meyrick Goulburn, D.D., D.C.L., 
 
 Dean of Norwich. 
 
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 Swayne — The Blessed Dead. 
 
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 The BLE.SSED Dead in Paradise : Four All Saints' Day Sermons 
 
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 The Collects of the Day : an Exposition, Critical and Devotional, 
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 the First Prayer Book of 1549, and of the Collects of Morning 
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 By Edward Mejo-ick Goulburn, D.D., D.C.L., 
 
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 lEontcnts. 
 Volume I. Book I. Introductory. — On the Excellencies of the Collects — On 
 the Origin of the word Collect — On the Structure of a Collect, as illustrated by 
 the Collect in the Burial Sei-vice— Of the Sources of the Collects : Of the Sacra- 
 mentary of Leo, of the Sacramentaiy of Gelasius, of Gregory the Great and his 
 Sacramentary, of the Use of Sarum, and of S. Osmund its Compiler — On the 
 Collects of Archbishop Cranmer — Of the Restoration Collects, and of John 
 Cosin, Prince-Bishop of Durham — Of the Collects, as representing the Genius of 
 the English Church. Book IL V:^\-i\.— The Constant Collect. Part IL— Ct;/- 
 lects varyitig iviih the Ecclesiastical Season — Advent to Whitsunday. 
 Volume H. Book II. contd. — Trinity Sunday to All Saints' Day. Book III. 
 —On the Collects after the Offertory. Afi'endix A.— Collects in the First 
 Reformed Prayer Book of 1549 ivhich were suppressed in 1552 — The Collect 
 for the First Communion on Christmas Day — The Collect for S. Mary Mag- 
 dalene's Day (July 22). Appendix B. — Exposition of the Collects of Mor>nug 
 and Evening Prayer — The Second at Morning Prayer, for Peace — The Third 
 at Morning Prayer, for Grace — The Second at Evening Prayer, for Peace — 
 The Third at Evening Prayer, for Aid against all Perils. 
 
 Knox Little — Good Friday Addresses. 
 
 New Edition. Small 8vo. 2s. ; or in Paper Cozier, is. 
 
 The Three Houks' Agony of Our Blessed Redeemer : being 
 Addresses in the form of Meditations delivered in S. Alban's 
 Church, Manchester, on Good Friday 1877. 
 
 By the Rev. W. J. Knox Little, M.A., 
 
 Canon Reiidentiary of Worcester, and Vicar of Hoar Cross. 
 
 ©aaterloo Place, KtottBon. 
 
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 Luckock — After Death. 
 
 Sixth Edition. Crmvn Sj'c. 6^. 
 
 After Death. An Examination of the Testimony of Primitive 
 Times respecting the State of the Faithful Dead, and their rela- 
 tionship to the Living. 
 
 By Herbert Mortimer Luckock, D.D., 
 
 Canon of Ely, etc. 
 
 CTontcnfS. 
 
 Part I. — The Test of Catholicity — The Vahie of the Testimony of the Primi- 
 tive Fathers — The Intermediate State — Change in the Intermediate State — 
 Prayers for the Dead : Reasons for Our Lord's Silence on the Subject — The 
 Testimony of Holy Scripture — The Testimony of the Catacombs— The Testi- 
 mony of the Early Fathers — The Testimony of the Primitive Liturgies — 
 Prayers for the Pardon of Sins of Infirmity, and the Eflfacement of Sinful 
 Stains — The Inefficacy of Prayer for those who died in wilful unrepented Sin. 
 
 Part II. — Primitive Testimony to the Intercession of the Saints — Primitive 
 Testimony to the Invocation of the Saints — The Trustworthiness of the Patristic 
 Evidence for Invocation tested — The Primitive Liturgies and the Roman Cata- 
 combs — Patristic Opinions on the Extent of the Knowledge possessed by the 
 Saints — The Testimony of Holy Scripture upon the same Subject — The Beatific 
 Vision not yet attained by any of the Saints — Conclusions drawn from the fore- 
 going Testimony. 
 
 .Supplementary Chapters. — (a.) Is a fuller Recognition of the Practice of 
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 Invocation of Saints in any form or not? — Table of Fathers, Councils, etc.— 
 Passages of Scripture explained or quoted — General Index. 
 
 S. Bonaventure's Life of Christ. 
 
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 The Life of Christ. 
 
 By S. Bonaventure. 
 Translated and. Edited by the Rev. W. H. Hutchings, 
 
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 rich veins of thought, and whether as a com- scarcely imagine a more acceptable book.' 
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 Edited, by the Rev. W. J. Copeland, B.D., 
 
 Late Rector 0/ Farnhajji, Essex. 
 
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 ^(fr'i'w/;— Self-denial the Test of Religious Earnestness— Divine Calls— The 
 Ventures of Faith— Watching. Christinas Day :—'Re\\.^\o\i?,]oy. New Vear's 
 Sunday: — The Lapse of Time. Epiphany :—'Rtmemhr3.nce of Past Mercies — 
 Equanimity— The Immortality of the Soul— Christian Manhood— Sincerity and 
 Hypocrisy— Christian Sympathy. Sepluagesima .-—Present Blessings. Sexa- 
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 Christ's Privations a Meditation for Christmas— The Cross of Christ the Measure 
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 and Festival. Easter- Tide : — Witnesses of the Resurrection— A Particular 
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 INTRODUCTION TO THE DEVOUT LIFE. From the French of S. 
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 of Paradise. By Laukence Scupoli. 
 
 'We heartily wish success to this iin- venient for common use. The price at 
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 By Various Writers. 
 
 Edited by the Rev. John Henry Blunt, D.D., 
 
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 Rudiments of Theology. A First Book for Students. 
 
 By John Pilkington Norris, D.D., 
 
 .'irdtdeacon of Bristol, a>id Canon Residentiary of Bristol Cathedral. 
 
 ffionttnts. 
 
 Part I. — Fundajiental Doctrines : — The Doctrine of God's Existence — The 
 Doctrine of the Second Person of the Trinity — The Doctrine of the Atonement 
 — The Doctrine of the Third Person of the Trinity — The Doctrine of The Church 
 — The Doctrine of the Sacraments. 
 
 Part II. — The Soteriology of the Bible: — The Teaching of the Old 
 Testament — The Teaching of the Four Gospels — The Teaching of S. Paul — 
 The Teaching of the Epistle to the Hebrews, of S. Peter and S. John — Soterio- 
 logy of the Bible (concluded). 
 
 Appendix — Illustrations of Part I. froji the Early Fathers: — On the 
 Evidence of God's E.xistence — On the Divinity of Christ — On the Doctrine of 
 the Atonement — On the Procession of the Holy Spirit — On The Church — On the 
 Doctrine of the Eucharist — Greek and Latin Fathers quoted or referred to in 
 this volume, in their chronological order — Glossarial Inde.x. 
 
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 By Peter Goldsmith Medd, M.A., 
 
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 MADAME LOUISE DE FRANCE, Daughter of Louis xv., known also 
 
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 HENRI PERREYVE. By A. Gratry. Translated by special permission. 
 
 With Portrait. 
 S. FRANCIS DE SALES, Bishop and Prince of Geneva. 
 THE REVIVAL OF PRIESTLY LIFE IN THE SEVENTEENTH 
 
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 being the Life of Hippolyte Flandrin. 
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 By the Rev. E. B. Pusey, D.D. 
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 THE HIDDEN LIFE OF THE SOUL. 
 
 THE LIGHT OF THE CONSCIENCE. With an Introduction by the 
 
 Rev. T. T. Carter, M.A. 
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 Rev. T. T. Carter, M.A. 
 
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 Maxims and Gleanings from the Writings of Edward Bouverie 
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 Body — The Life of Justification. 
 
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 The Life of Justification. A Series of Lectures delivered in 
 substance at All Saints', Margaret Street. 
 
 By the Rev. George Body, D.D., 
 
 Canon 0/ Durhat?t. 
 
 (Contents. 
 
 Justification the Want of Humanity — Christ our Justification — Union with 
 Christ the Condition of Justification — Conversion and Justification — The Life of 
 Justification — The Progress and End of Justification. 
 
 Keys to Christian Knowledge. 
 
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 CHURCH HISTORY (Ancient). 
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 CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE AND PRACTICE (founded 
 on the Church Catechism). 
 
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 ■ THE FOUR GOSPELS. 
 
 THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 
 
 WL&tttioa place, JLoitUon. [xii. 87. 
 
Prmceion Theological Semmary-Speer Library 
 
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