tibvary of Che Cheolojical ^eroinarp PRINCETON • NEW JERSEY 'iff \vv* FROM THE LIBRARY OF THE REVEREND JOHN ALEXANDER MACKAY LITT.D., D.D., LL.D., L.H.D. *? Oi £{A- CcT7. * 'xj (kf 1 - \ ^ faX £#. /ff/. Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2011 with funding from Princeton Theological Seminary Library http://www.archive.org/details/popularlecturesoOOhodg POPULAR LECTURES ON THEOLOGICAL THEMES BY THE to. ARCHIBALD ALEXANDER HODGE, D.D.,LL.D., Professor op Didactic and Polemic Theology in Princeton Theological Seminary. PHILADELPHIA : PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION, 1334 CHESTNUT STREET. COPYRIGHT, 1887, BY THE TRUSTEES OF THE PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION. All Rights Reserved. Westcott A Thomson, Stereotype™ and Elcctrotypers, Philada. PKEFACE. The Lectures which compose this volume originated in the request of a number of ladies in Princeton to be formed into a class for instruction in theological subjects. This class was continued for two winters, the method adopted being entirely oral. In the fall of 1885 a few ladies in Philadelphia pro- posed that the Lectures should be repeated to a similar class in that city. Large audiences of both men and women were attracted to hear them, and the reports pub- lished in the Presbyterian and the Presbyterian Journal awakened a desire for their repetition elsewhere. The reports published in The Presbyterian were for the most part from manuscript furnished by the author, which in some instances was prepared after the deliv- ery of the Lectures ; and the courtesy of The Presby- terian in permitting the author to use these, with revis- ion and amendments, is gratefully acknowledged. In 1886 it was proposed that a shorter course be pre- pared to complete the presentation of subjects, and that the whole should be issued in a volume. 4 PREFACE. Seven additional Lectures were prepared for this pur- pose, and, with the exception of the close of Lecture XVII., were fully written during the summer, but were never passed in review by the writer. In this way it appears that Lectures I., II., III., IV., V., VI., X., XV., XVIII., XIX. were revised or rewritten after delivery ; Lectures VIII., IX. are printed from the newspaper reports, which were not so revised ; while Lectures VIL, XL, XII., XIIL, XIV., XVI., XVII. are printed from the author's MSS. without revision. If all had passed under his eye while going through the press, he would doubtless have care- fully corrected them, and balanced the treatment so as to secure uniformity in the relation of parts. No changes have been attempted which were not obviously necessary. Many thanks are due to the author's friend, the Rev. S. T. Lowrie, D. D., for much labor kindly bestowed in preparing the copy for the press, as well as iu the prepa- ration of the Index. In the hope that their posthumous publication may serve to promote the truth to which the author's life was devoted, and so further the end of their original delivery, the Lectures are offered to the public. Princeton, March, 1887. CONTENTS. LECTURE I. PAGE God — His Nature and Relations to the Universe . 9 LECTURE II. The Scripture Doctrine of Divine Providence . . 33 LECTURE III. Miracles 52 LECTURE IV. The Holy Scriptures. — The Canon and Inspiration. 68 LECTURE V. Prayer and the Prayer-Cure 94 LECTURE VI. The Trinity of Persons in the Godhead 117 LECTURE VII. Predestination 140 5 s 6 CONTENTS. LECTUEE VIII.- PAGE The Original State of Man 164 LECTURE IX. God's Covenants with Man. — The Church .... 191 LECTURE X. The Person of Christ 215 LECTURE XI. The Offices of Christ 234 LECTURE XII The Kingly Office of Christ 259 LECTURE XIII. The Kingdom of Christ 288 LECTURE XIV. The Law of the Kingdom 313 LECTURE XV. Sanctifi cation and Good Works. — Higher Life . . 335 LECTURE XVI. The Sacraments — Baptism 361 LECTURE XVII. The Lord's Supper 390 CONTEXTS. 7 LECTURE XVIII. PAGE The State of Man after Death, and the Resurrec- tion 418 LECTURE XIX. y Final Rewards and Punishments 439 POPULAR LECTURES ON THEOLOGICAL THEMES LECTURE I. GOD— HIS NATURE AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. Ladies and Gentlemen : We have met together this afternoon to engage in the first of a proposed series of discussions of the chief questions in theology. It is not my purpose to attempt to present you with new truth, or even with unaccustomed views of truth long known, but simply to set before you in logical perspect- ive the whole assemblage of the things that from the beginning have been most surely believed among us, so that their symmetrical proportions and harmonious rela- tions may be more clearly discerned and appreciated. In this view of the matter the most important ques- tion is that of order. The perspective of every land- scape differs endlessly with the various points of view from which we look upon it. As you sweep rapidly on a railroad among the Alps, the vast mountain-peaks ap- parently revolve through involved curves and group themselves in innumerable combinations as in a dance, the law of which we are unable to unravel. But when 10 GOD— HIS NATURE we once gain the central summit in which the whole geological system culminates, we look down upon all the members of the landscape, each in its appropriate place and relations, and the picture is complete. As long as men were confined in their imaginations as well as in their bodies to this small and ceaselessly revolving sphere the movements of our fellow-planets, moving with us, were absolutely incomprehensible. But the instant Copernicus taught us to occupy in idea the solar- centric point of view all was seen to be the simplest and most orderly movement possible. All theology must therefore be theo-centrie, must have God for its beginning and end. There is a great deal of confusion of thought arising from substituting words for thoughts in the pious claim in vogue now-a-days that all theology must be grouped Christo-centrically. There is an immense sense in which every loyal Christian will recognize this as true. In the first place, the revelation of God in Christ is so infinitely more clear and full than in all the universe besides that we may well say not only that Christ is God, but also that there is no God other than the One whose consummate self-revelation is in Christ. In the second place, Christ is undoubtedly the Author and Finisher of our faith and the beginning and ending of human salvation. The entire scheme of sal- vation begins and ends in his person and work. And, in the third place, all power in all worlds is put in Christ's hands, so that all events are controlled by his will, all history revolves around his person and all science finds its key in his doctrine. Notwithstanding all this, however, Christ is central because Christ is God. The unincarnate God and his natural relations AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 11 to the universe must be logically prior to and more fundamental than the incarnate God and his gracious relations to his creatures. The apostle Paul has a deep meaning when he says (1 Cor. 11:3): " The head of every man is Christ, . . . and the head of Christ is God ;" which is equivalent to saying, " The centre of every man is Christ, and the centre of Christ is God." Three questions therefore obviously lie at the founda- tion not only of all man's religious knowledge, but equally at the foundation of every possible form of knowledge : (1) Is there a God? (2) What is God? (3) What is God's relation to the universe? And if he does sustain a relation to the x universe which is in any degree intelligible to us, a fourth ques- tion emerges : (4) What is the sphere, nature and extent of his provi- dential action upon or in reference to his creatures ? The answer to the first question, as to the fact of God's existence, we propose in these lectures to assume as granted. The most certain of all truths is the existence of God. I. The second question, therefore, presents itself: What do we know as to the essential nature of God? God reveals himself to us through the simultaneously concurrent action of two sources of knowledge, neither of which could give us the information separately. We are, each one, immediately conscious that we are intelli- gent, moral, voluntary agents and true causes. This, and all that this involves, comes to us by consciousness It is the most immediate and certain of all knowledge, and that upon which all other knowledge rests ; and we 12 GOD— HIS NATURE give definite expression to this self-knowledge when we call ourselves spirits and persons. It is precisely this, and nothing else, that we mean by the words "spirit" and " person." When we come to look upon the course of external nature, to reflect upon our own origin and history internal and external, and upon the history of the human race and the life of the general community of which we form a part, we immediately and indubi- tably discern everywhere the presence and control of a Being like ourselves in kind. In that intelligible order which pervades the infinite multiplicity and heterogeneity of events, and, which makes science possible, we see and certainly know the presence of intelligence, of personal will, of moral character — i. e. of all that is connoted by our common term " personal spirit." God is seen to be of common generic character with ourselves. The great difference we see is that while we are essentially limited in respect to time or space or knowledge or power, God, the personal agent we see at work in nature and history, is essentially unlimited in all these respects. The only reason that so many students of natural science have found themselves unable to see God in nature is that their absorption in nature has made them lose sight of their own essential personality. Hence they have at- tempted to interpret the phenomena of self-consciousness in the terms of mechanical nature, instead of interpreting nature under the light of self-conscious spirit. But the scientist, after all, comes before his science, the reader before the book he deciphers. And the intelligibility of nature proves its intelligent source, and the essential like- ness of the Author of nature, who reveals himself in his work, and of the interpreter of nature, who retraces his AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 13 processes and appreciates alike the intellectual and the artistic character of his design. Since God is infinite, of course a definition of him is impossible. Obviously, no bounds can be drawn around the boundless. God can be known only so far forth as he has chosen to reveal himself. And being essentially infinite, every side and element of his nature is infinite, and every glimpse we have of his being involves the out- lying immensity or the transcendent perfection which cannot be known. But since we have been created in his likeness, and since we discern him in all his works as, like ourselves, an intelligent and moral personal spirit, we can define our idea of him by stating (1) the genus or kind to which he is known to belong, and (2) the differentia, or differences, which distinguish him from all other beings of that kind. The best definition of the idea of God ever given is constructed on this principle. First, as to his kind : God is a personal Spirit ; second, as to his difference from all other spirits : God is infinite, eternal, unchangeable, and in all his moral attributes absolutely perfect, and he is infinite, eternal and un- changeable alike in his being, in his wisdom, in his power, etc. etc. First, as to his kind. God is a personal Spirit. We mean by this precisely what we mean when we affirm that we ourselves are personal spirits. This conception comes wholly from consciousness, and it is absolutely certain. We see and know God, as manifested in his activities alike in the whole world within us and around us as far as the remotest star, to be another of the same kind with ourselves. We know ourselves to be intelli- gent causes. We see him likewise to be an intelligent 14 GOD— HIS NATURE Cause, and the original, the absolute, aud the perfect One. In applying this law in constructing our idea of God we proceed according to three principles of judgment: (1) That of causality. We judge the nature of every cause from what we see of its effects; we judge the character of every author from what we read of his works. So the manifold works of God, past and present, physical and spiritual, reveal his nature as First Cause. (2) That of negation. We deuy of him all those attri- butes and conditions the possession of which involves imperfection — e. g. materiality, bodily parts or passions, the limitations of time or space. (3) That of eminence. We attribute to him all that is found to be excellent in ourselves, in absolute perfection and in unlimited degree. Second. This leads, necessarily, to the discrimination, in the second place, of those properties which distinguish God from all other personal spirits. 1. We know ourselves as causes; we can really orig- inate new things. But we are dependent and limited causes. We did not originate, and we cannot sustain, ourselves. We can put forth our causal energy only under certain conditions, and we can bring to pass only a very limited class of effects. But God as a cause is absolutely independent and unlimited. He is the un- caused First Cause of all things. He is an eternal and necessary Being who has his own cause in himself. He is not only the first link in the chain of causation, but he is the everywhere present sustaining and actuat- ing basis of all dependent existence and the originating con-cause in all causation, because we and all other de- AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 15 pendent causes act only as we live and move and have all our being in him. 2. We know ourselves always and necessarily as existing;, thinking and acting under the limitations of time and space; we can think or act only under these limitations. But God necessarily transcends all these limitations, and condescends to them only on occasion, at his own pleasure, in the way of self-limitation. We began to be at a definite period in the past. We continue to exist and to think and to act through a ceaseless succession of moments, the present moment ever emerging out of the past and immerging into the future. But God is without beginning or succession or end. All duration, past, present and future, is always equally comprehended in his infinite consciousness as the ETERNAL, NOW. We are m space definitely, and are surrounded by it, and pass from one position to another through all the intermediate portions of space in succession. But God fills all space : not by extension, like the water of the sea or as the atmosphere ; not by multiplication, nor by rapid movement, like an ubiquitous general along the line of his army ; not as represented by his agents, as the head of an army or state may be said to be and to act wherever his agents carry out his orders ; not by his knowledge or his power merely, as when an astrono- mer may be said to be in thought wherever his telescope points, or a great sovereign to reign wherever his laws are obeyed. But by reason of his own infinite perfec- tion, Father, Son and Holy Ghost are in their whole undivided being present at every point of space at every moment of time. The whole God is always everywhere : 16 GOD— HIS NATURE within all things, acting from within outward from the centre of every atom, and from the innermost springs of the life and thought and feeling and will of every spirit ; without all things, embracing them as an infinite abyss, and acting upon them in a thousand ways from without. 3. We know ourselves as possessing the spoiled and defaced lineaments of a moral character, the main ele- ments of which are truth, purity, justice, benevolence. We know that God, who has revealed his character in the external physical world, in human history and in the person of his Son Jesus Christ, is the absolutely perfect norm of our moral idea. Our morality is re- flected, his is original and radiant. Ours is defective, his is absolute. It has become the weak and conceited mode of those who pose as the advanced thinkers of this luxurious age, to emphasize the benevolence of God at the expense of his immaculate holiness and jus- tice. They teach us that the cultured mind finds the old doctrines of blood-expiation and of eternal perdi- tion utterly inconsistent with its better idea of God. They think the great God " altogether such an one as themselves." The ground of this widely-advertised opinion is purely subjective — the Christian conscious- ness of the cultured 6lite in contradistinction to the his- toric Christian consciousness of the ages. The facts are all on the other side. The terrible record of him in his- tory, blazed all along its line with the fires of judgment kindled by a sin-hating God, the death-throes of indi- viduals and of nations, the answering cry of the human conscience uttered in the ceaseless rites of blood on altars and penitential stools, the entire voice of revelation, from the cherubim with the fiery sword driving out the home- AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 17 less, helpless. first pair from Eden, the frowning thunders and blasting lightnings of Sinai, the history of Canaan exterminated and of Israel chastised, the awful horrors of Gethsemane and Calvary, the destruction of Jerusalem and the dispersion and bondage of the Jews, to the final issue of the lake of fire set as the background of the pict- ure of the Paradise regained, the eternal wailing and the smoke of torment ascending for ever and ever, — all these facts stand as the unquestionable evidence of the exist- ence of other perfections in God besides benevolence. II. The third question remains : What relation does God sustain to the universe he has called into being ? It is very evident that since we are able to compre- hend neither God's essential being, nor his mode of ex- istence superior to the limits of either time or space, nor the nature of his agency in creating, upholding in being or in governing his creatures, we cannot by any central principle or a-priori mode of reasoning think out a per- fect theory of his relation to the universe. We can only state severally the separate facts as we know them, leav- ing their complete elucidation and reconciliation to the future. And we are both assisted and confirmed in our efforts to present all the facts comprehended, by the cir- cumstance that different heretical schools of thought emphasize one or another of these facts, while they deny or suppress the rest. Here we have a new and striking illustration of the universal principle that all heretical dogmas are partial truths — true in what they assert, false in what they deny or ignore. Orthodoxy is always catholic truth, embracing and integrating all the possibly separate and apparently incongruous parts and aspects 2 18 GOD— BIS NATURE of the truth. Thus in the present instance we have the Agnostics, who maintain that the Infinite is the Un- knowable; the Deists, who set God apart from the world, separate upon his throne in heaven ; and those who maintain exclusively the fact that God is immanent, or uniformly and universally present in all things, while they deny or ignore his equal transcendence above and over all things. True Christian Theism maintains all these partial truths as equally parts of the one truth. God is at once the unfathomable Abyss, the transcend- ent Father, King and Judge, the immanent and vital Spirit. First. God is unknowable, the infinite Abyss of dark- ness in which the universe floats as an atom. Herbert Spencer's philosophy emphasizes the truth that the more science advances, the more must the questions as to origin, first cause, ultimate force and end, be pushed back into darkness. If you light a spark in a starless night, it will fill a small sphere of illuminated space extend- ing equidistant in all directions. If the spark be- comes a candle, if the candle becomes a flame of gas, if the gas-flame becomes an electric arc, if the electric arc becomes a sun, — in every case the sphere of light will grow as the cube of its radius; and as the sphere of light becomes larger and larger, in exact pro- portion will it be enfolded within an ever-growing sphere of darkness. In this sense the more we meditate upon him, God is ever beyond. In this sense, while the sphere of human knowledge is ever increasing, and will through eternity never cease to increase, God is always unknow- able. And the sphere of a creature's knowledge, be it that of an infant or of a man or of a philosopher or of AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 19 a prophet or of saint or archangel in heaven, will float as a point of light athwart the bosom of that God who is the infinite Abyss for ever. This tremendous fact conditions all human knowledge in every stage of it. We can know anything only im- perfectly, whether in science or in theology, because we know things only in parts, and can never comprehend the absolute whole. The botanist cannot comprehend a single flower except as he takes in the whole plant, nor the whole plant except as he takes in the whole species, nor the whole species except as he takes in the whole genus, nor the whole genus except as he takes in the whole system of organized life, the entire fauna and flora and all their history on the earth. The teacher may easily explain the laws and movements of the solar system to his class, but he knows them himself very partially, since he knows so little of the realities or of the history of the stellar universe of which the solar system is so small a dependency. All things go out into mystery. All our knowledge is conditioned upon the essential unknowable- ness of God. In all our knowing and in all our worship, the infinite God is always beyond. This side of the truth is taught as clearly in the oldest word of revelation as it is in the latest word of science. " Canst thou by searching find out God ? canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is as high as heaven ; what canst thou do ? deeper than hell ; what canst thou know? The measure thereof is larger than the earth, and broader than the sea" (Job 11 : 7-9). Second. God is transcendent ; that is, he is a distinct Person, separate from the world and from all other per- sons—who speaks to us face to face, who commands our 20 GOD— HIS NATURE wills and regulates our lives from on high ; who upon occasion, when he wills, acts upon the universe or any part of it from without. He is objective to each one of us as a distinct Person, alike when he speaks to us and when we speak to him. He created all things out of nothino- The universe is not a modification ot his essence" nor is it confused with his substance; he is essentially something other than any one of his crea- tures, the extramundane God. The relation he sustains to the universe, therefore, is analogous to that ot a maker to his work, of a preserver and governor ot a mechanism, of a father to his children, of a moral ruler to his intelligent and responsible subjects. _ ' This view of the nature of God and of his relation to the world, and especially his relation to created spirits, is common to Deists and Christian Theists It is de- nied utterly by Pantheists, and it is ignored m whole or in part by the modern special advocates of the im- manence of God as containing all the essential truth related to our interests in the matter. Yet this view iust presented of God's separate personality and agency and objectivity to man and transcendence above the world is true and infinitely important, although we con- cede that it is not the whole truth known to us on the subiect. The view of God as extramundane is essen- tially the moral view of his relation to the world ; that which recognizes his immanence is pre-eminently the religious view. If he be not extramundane, if he be not a separate transcendent person revealing himself objectively, commanding from above and working upon his creatures from without, it follows that he cannot sus- tain either social or governmental relations to us. He AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 21 eannot be truly our Father, or our Lawgiver, or our moral Governor, or our Judge distributing rewards aud punishments ; he cannot come down at his will from without and work miracles of grace or power as signs and seals to his intelligent creatures. This is the prominent view embraced by the mass of the worshipers in all theistic religions, Jews, Chris- tians and Mohammedans alike, among all historic bodies of Christians, Greeks, Romanists and all classes of Prot- estants. It is realized in the consciousness of every re- pentant sinner and of every believing Christian. It is implied in all faith and obedience, in all prayer and praise, and hence in all the psalms, hymns and prayers of the Church. It is taught equally in all Scriptures, the New Testament as well as the Old, which show forth Jehovah as sitting upon his throne in heaven, and as sending his messengers and as transmitting his ener- gies and his judgments from heaven to earth, and as marshaling the hosts of heaven and the nations of the earth from afar. Above all, is this truth made patent as the sky, a matter of daily personal experience, in the personal incarnation of God in Christ. Christ is God. Christ is the same to-day and for ever as he was when he lived on earth. God is therefore a Person who is outside of and distinct from the world and all other per- sons ; who speaks to us and we speak to him ; who hears us and we hear him ; who commands, leads and guides us from without as another ; and in whose personal soci- ety and under whose blessed reign we shall be transcend- ently happy for ever. Third. God is immanent. He is everywhere present in every point of space and within the inmost constitu- 22 GOD— HIS NATURE tion of all created things at the same time. God's activ- ity springs up from the central seat of energy in all sec- ond causes, and acts from within through them as well as from without upon them. He reveals himself in us and to us through our own subjectivity, as well as ob- jectively through the things presented to our senses. He is the universal present and active basis of all being and action, the First Cause ever living and acting in all second causes. This is evident, 1st, from the essential nature of God as omnipresent and as First Cause, the foundation of all dependent existence and the ultimate source of all ener- gy. 2d. This is evident from what we see very plainly in the entire sphere and history of the physical universe. The impression made by the most transient observation is abundantly confirmed by science, that the continuity of physical causation through all worlds, through every sphere of mechanical, chemical and vital action, and through all the succeeding ages, is absolutely unbroken. There are no broken links, no sudden emergencies of dis- connected events, but a continuous sequence of cause and effect everywhere. The deistical conception of God's relation to the uni- verse is analogous to that of a human mechanist to the machinery he has made and operates. He sits outside his engine, feeds its forces, adjusts its parts, controls its action, and thus directs its energies upon the accomplish- ment of its appointed ends. The conception of God and of his action as immanent in the universe, acting from within through the sponta- neities of the things he has made, rather than upon them from without, is analogous rather to the action of the vital AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 23 principle of a plant, which as a plastic architectonic en- ergy is ever present within the germ from its first for- mation, and continues to control all the natural physical forces engaged in the upbuilding of the organism through all its organs during its entire life. The works of man are built-up by the adding of part to part by external forces. The works of God grow continuously through the evolution of germs from within, by internal forces. Thus, in spite of the infinite number and diversity of the forces interacting in all the physical universe, and of all the wills interacting in human society, the history alike of the physical universe and of human society presents the absolutely continuous unfolding of a single plan. The same great truth is illustrated in our religious experience. A divine power not ourselves, working for righteousness, enters us on the side of our own subjec- tivity, and is confluent always with our most spontane- ous and least deliberative exercises. Thus, regeneration is an effect of God's immediate working within the soul below our consciousness, giving a new character to all our conscious states and acts. God works within us con- stantly to will, and by willing to do, of his good pleasure. And thus also, while each book of Holy Scripture was written by a human author in the language and style peculiar to his age, his nation and his personal character, and in the perfectly free exercise of all his faculties, yet all the books are the word of God. His suggestive, elevative and directive influence has so worked in them from within, mingling freely with their own spontane- ities, that the writing is at once both God's and theirs, both supernatural and natural, because they, being men, wrote as they were moved by the immanent Spirit of 24 GOD— HIS NATURE God. Angels and men influence one another from with- out by objective presentations ; God influences all from within by subjective impulses. Hence we realize the complementary truth that we live and move in him and have all our being in him. In some distant sense, as the birds draw their life and have their being in the air, God is the one essential, fundamental environment and life-condition of all creatures. The consequences of this great fact of the divine im- manence are : (1.) The whole universe exists in God. As the stars in the ether, as the clouds in the air, the whole universe floats on the pulsing bosom of God. (2.) All the intelligence manifested in the physical universe, all that larger and timeless intelligence which embraces and directs the limited and transient intelli- gence of the human actors in the drama of history, is of God. In the physical world we see an infinitude of blind, unconscious forces, apparently independent in their nature and source, working together harmoniously to build upon a continuous and universal plan the most intricate and harmonious results, as the great cathedral dedicated to St, Peter in Rome rose out of the marble quarries of Italy through the agency of multitudes of thoughtless men and beasts of labor working without concert for many years, yet conspiring to balance har- moniously in the air a miracle of mechanical construc- tion and of artistic beauty. It was because all the agents in that work, of all kinds and during the entire period of its development, were subject to the suggestive, ele- vative and directive inspiration of the great Michael Angelo. AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 25 (3.) Hence, also, in the third place, it follows that all the effect- producing energy seen in the physical universe is ultimately the efficiency of God. The First Cause must be the efficient cause of all second causes and the source of all the dependent energy they ever exercise. As the sun's rays, shining on the tropic seas, raise by evaporation the vast oceans of aerial vapors which, con- densed by our northern cold, precipitate in rain and generate the immense forces of our rivers and water- falls : as ultimately all the energies of nature distributed from our central suns hold the worlds together in the form of gravity, and are differentiated into the thousand forms of vegetable and animal life, and into the mechan- ical movement of the currents of winds and tides and of electric currents and of radiant light, — so all these issue ceaselessly from their ultimate seat in God. What the sun is to the solar system, what the furnace is to the steamship, what the great centre of nerve-force is to our bodies, that God is to his universe, and infinitely more. (4.) Hence, lastly, it follows that everywhere the universe reveals God. The power of the indwelling spirit to express its changing modes through the changes of the body is a great mystery, and nevertheless is one of the most obvious and constant of all facts. Pallid fear, raging passion, calm contenrplation, assured con- fidence, radiant joy, determined purpose, have each their universally recognized signs of expression current among all nations of men and animal tribes. So the construct- ive dream of the architect, the ideal of the sculptor and painter, the high theme of the musician, are all expressed in the several forms of their respective arts. The great artists are immortal, since they ever live, speaking and 26 GOD— HIS NATURE singino- in their works. As our souls animate and manifest their presence and their changiug modes in ever}' part of our bodies, and as God is immanent and active in all his works, so all nature and the course of universal history reflect his thoughts. All men always recognize events of extraordinary character as expres- sions of the will of God. Whatever is recognized by us as providential expresses to us the divine thought. Even Shakespeare says that Providence " shapes our ends, rough-hew them as we may." The Christian recognizes every event as providential. Every hair of our head is numbered, and not one sparrow falls to the ground ex- cept as our Father wills it. He works in us all to will and to do his good pleasure in all things. Hence every flower is a thought of God. The firmament reflects his immensity, and the order of the stars his limitless intel- ligence, and the myriad-fold beauty of the world unveils the secret chambers of his imagery. The tempest is the letting loose of his strength, and the thunder utters his voice. To the Christian the universe is not merely a temple in which God is worshiped, but it is also the ever-venerated countenance on which the affections of our Lord toward his children are visibly expressed. Everywhere we see God, and everywhere his ever-active and fecund benevolence toward us is articulated in smile and word and deed. This view of God, which we signalize by the word "immanence," is not a new one, nor is it confined to philosophers or to theologians. The plainest and most practical Christians of all churches live in the exercise of this faith every day. To the babes in Christ every event is providential and marks the constant thought AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 27 and care of God. Especially have evangelical Chris- tians of the school of Augustine and Calvin always recognized the constant dependence of the creature and the constant inwprking of the divine energy as the con- trolling source of all our spontaneous affections and actions. It is a first principle in their theology that the creature can act only as it is first acted upon by the First Cause. The doctrine ofprevenient grace, which is the grand evan- gelical distinction, implies this. God must first move the sinner to good before the sinner can begin to co-oj)- erate with that grace which ever continues to prompt and assist him. Thus they argue for a previous, simul- taneous and determining concursus — i. e. continuous co-working — of the ceaseless activities of God with the activities of his creatures. They hold that even the sin- ful actions of men originate in God as to their matter, while as to their form or moral quality they originate in the creature aloue ; as when a great artist handles an in- strument out of tune the sound that issues is due to the artist, but the discord which deforms it issues only from the unbalanced organism of the instrument, the unstrung cords or the unadjusted pipes. The claim made by the advocates of the " New Depart- ure " in theology, that this view of God as immanent and constantly active in all his works is new in the thoughts of Christians, is absolutely without shadow of evidence. It has never been denied or seriously ignored, nor is it in the least inconsistent with the complementary view of his personal transcendence and objective presentation and working from without. The Church has always held both sides together of this double truth, as both equally essential and precious. 28 GOD— HIS NATURE Neither is this view of the divine immanence to be confounded with Pantheism. They both alike empha- size the common truth that God is within us ; that he is to be sought in the sphere of the subjective as well as of the objective ; that he is the immediate basis of all cre- ated existence and the ultimate source of all the intelli gence and energy manifested in the external world. But Pantheism holds that the whole universe of exten- sion and thought is one substance, and that substance God — that God exists only in the successive forms or events which constitute the universe. These forms are various, but God is one. They are successive, but God endures the same. He is not a person, but all persons are tran- sient forms of his being. He has no existence other than that of the sum of all finite existence, and no consciousness nor intelligence other than the aggregate of the consciousness and intelligence of the transient creatures. Hence Pantheism denies the freedom of man and the personality of God. It makes all events proceed by a law of absolute necessity. All evil, precisely as all good, comes immediately from God, and evil men are related to him precisely as are saints and angels. It confounds the doctrine of immanence with ontological identity, and it turns it into a heresy by denying the complementary truth of the divine transcendence. It allows no place for a heavenly Father beholding us complacently and providing for us benevolently. It makes no place for a moral Governor and Judge ruling over us, distributing rewards and punishments, teaching, disciplining and act- ing upon us from without. It makes no place for a supernatural world, for revelations or supernatural AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 29 truths, for miracles or supernatural works, for a " king- dom of God," a supernatural state, or for a future or supernatural life. Therefore Pantheism in its very essence renders all morality and religion alike impos- sible. The Christian doctrine of the divine immanence, on the contrary, is the very essence of all religion. It ad- mits and adjusts itself to the complementary doctrine of the divine transcendence. We begin, as we have shown above, with the conception of God as a distinct Person of absolute intellectual and moral perfection, self-con- scious, self-determinate, absolutely free and sovereign, righteous and loving. This is our heavenly Father, the God and Father of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. He created us in his likeness, rules us as our righteous moral Governor and Judge, and executes through all the universe and through all ages his all- perfect and immutable plan conceived in the infinitely wise and righteous counsel of his sovereign will. This Being, moreover, transcends all the limitations of sjDace and time. He is everywhere present in his eternal essence. The whole essence, with all its inhe- rent properties, is present at every moment of time to every point of space. As First Cause he is the constant, abiding, supporting and actuating basis of every second cause. All creatures exist, and act only as they exist, in him. At the same time, he acts through every atom from within and upon every atom from without. " In him all things live and move and have their being ;" He turneth the hearts of men even as rivers of water are turned ; He worketh in us to will and to do of his own good pleasure. 30 GOD— HIS NATURE This is a function of the divine personality. The fact that the whole indivisible God is eternally in each point of space trauscends our understanding, but it does not rationally necessitate the belief in many gods nor in a divided God ; nor does it in any way invalidate the proof we have establishing his personality. The Script- ures clearly treat both truths together. The practical faith and experience of all Christians embrace both of these truths together in the same acts of trust and love. Both truths are together implied in all religious experi- ence, recognizing God as our Father, speaking to him and listening to his voice, obeying his word, trusting to his love, and at the same time recognizing him as pres- ent everywhere and in all things and events, recognizing his hand in every object and occurrence, trusting him ii 1 everything because all nature executes his will, and hence reveals his presence and expresses his thought. The extension of our knowledge of the physical uni- verse effected by modern science, rendering visible to us the absolute unity of the cosmos, the uninterrupted con- tinuity of the chain of cause and effect, as w r ell as of de- sign, through all space and time, has not altered, but it has greatly emphasized, this religious conception of "the divine immanence." An eminent Christian scientist said to me recently, " God is either in all or in none." It is not possible to believe, when looking upon the course of natural creation and providence, that God comes down upon them at disconnected intervals from without. In the miracle he does that very thing, for "a miracle" is a sign the essence of which is its articulate significance to the answering intelligence of man. But in the natural course of providence the immanent God works contin- AND RELATION TO THE UNIVERSE. 31 uously, without interval, from within through the spon- taneities of the things themselves in which he dwells. He is not in one object or event any more than in all others. The whole course of the universe is divine in every part, except so far as sin has marred it, and all the normal activities of men and angels are religious — i. e. have their source and their end in God. This view, therefore, evidently differs from Pantheism in that (1) it asserts the distinct personality of God as the Head of a moral government administered over free and responsible agents by a system of ideas and motives. (2) It asserts the distinct personality and moral freedom and responsibility of men. (3) It maintains the distinc- tion of the human and the divine agency, although mak- ing the former depend upon the latter. (4) It embraces and adjusts itself to the complementary doctrine of the divine transcendence, which Pantheism renders impossi- ble. (5) While Pantheism makes freedom, morality and religion impossible, this view of the divine immanence in all things is the necessary basis of the highest freedom and of the most exalted morality and of the most vivid religion conceivable. (6) This view, as held by Chris- tians, not only admits, but affords the most rational basis attainable for the supernatural ; that is, for the activity in the sphere of nature of that God who in himself infin- itely transcends all nature. III. In this catholic Christian doctrine of the relation of God to the universe we comprehend all the half-truths or heresies which have divided the schools. We recog- nize all the facts, and we reconcile the practical faith of Christians with the highest science, and we provide a rational basis alike for the natural and the supernatural, 32 GOD— HIS NATURE, ETC. for the reign of law and for special miracle, for science and for practical religion. Here we stand under the blended light of nature and of grace, of science and of revelation. God the infinite, and therefore the timeless and spaceless, the absolutely unknowable, remains ever the unfathomable Abyss. In all our knowing God is always beyond us, hid in the light which is impenetrable. At the same time, he is always above us, enthroned in heaven, commanding, revealing, ruling, showering myriad blessings from above. At the same time, the same infinite God is before us, looking upon us and speaking with us face to face. He is our heavenly Father. He has formed us in his own image. Our highest life and blessedness are found in his per- sonal communion; that is, personal interchange of ideas and of affections, for our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. At the same time, God is ever within us, the ulti- mate ground of our being and the unfailing source of our life, the wellspring of eternal life, the inspiration of all spiritual knowledge and beatitudes, springing up within us to the ages of the ages. All these glimpses of this immeasurable mystery, of God's nature and of his relation to the universe, afforded by the light of nature, are reinforced and gloriously sup- plemented and illumined by the revealed truths of the Trinity of persons and of the incarnation of the eternal Word. LECTURE II. THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE. We are this afternoon to consider the general doctrine taught in the inspired Scriptures of the providence which God exercises over the world and its inhabitants. It is evident that this doctrine presupposes, and can be under- stood only in the light of what was ascertained in the previous lecture to be the facts of the case as to God's nature and his relation to the universe. We then saw that there have prevailed among phil- osophers three partial views as to God's relation to the world, each presenting one side of the truth, but each: radically erroneous, in so far as it was partial and denied the complementary truths presented by the others : (1) The agnostic, maintaining that God is unknowable ; (2.) the pantheistic or naturalistic, maintaining that God is ever present and active in every element of every cre- ated existence, whether spiritual or material ; and (3) the deistical, which maintains the separate, extramun- dane existence of God and his action at will upon all his creatures from without. The element of truth in all of these alike is embraced and assimilated with the rest in Christian Theism. God is essentially unknowable. We can know only those parts of his nature, of his relations or of his ways which he has chosen to reveal to us. And at the best the crea- 3 33 34 THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE ture can know even that which he is permitted to know only in part. At the same time, God is essentially om- nipresent and active at the same time and in unbroken continuity in all his creatures. Our dependent being exists in him, and our dependent energies are ceaselessly re-created from the inexhaustible fountain of his life. All nature and all human history evolve in unbroken continuity through his guiding, co-operating will present in aud working through the created dependent things themselves. None the less is God separate from the world, existing alike extensively and intensively infin- itely above and beyond it. All these views are essentially involved in all our practical, every-day religious experience. We all sub- mit our intellects absolutely to Him, as we reverently bow before the inscrutable mystery of His being who, although his essence is light, in his relations to us has " made darkness his secret place, and his pavilion round about him the dark waters and the thick clouds of the skies" (Ps. 18 : 11). We all instinctively recognize his presence and activity in all his creatures, and in all their changes, and in the innermost and most spontaneous ex- ercises of our own souls. We all look up to him as our Father, speak to him and hear him speak to us in his word and providence. He deals with us as a person exterior to ourselves. He presides over the physical universe and over communities of men as a person exte- rior and superior to all. He controls all events by his interior confluent energies according to a plan, one and universal, formed before the beginning of the world. He has formed a great moral government over his intel- ligent creatures as men and angels, and governs them by OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE. 35 commands and motives objectively presented, and by his providences and by his word. He at times, and for pur- poses evidently subsidiary to his general plan and to his ordinary methods, acts upon the system of second causes from without, working miracles, or signals to his intel- ligent children, thus arousing their attention, instructing their faith and determining their action. He has re- vealed the great end of his whole system of works, to which all things, in all eras and in all spheres, work together, to be the giving of objective expression to the perfections of his own nature, or, as Ave usually phrase it, the manifestation of his own glory. In all our religious experience, when we work and when we study and when we pray, God is always at once beyond us and above us and before us and within us — at once the source of all life and movement, the authority binding all consciences, and the sublime object of all personal love and worship. I. The word providence means, first, to see before- hand, and then to exercise all that care and control which God's infinite prevision of his own ends and his knowledge of his appointed instrumentalities may suggest. The order of thought in theology is marked by the following commonplaces: Deus existms, God existing; his being, attributes and threefold personality ; Deus volcns, God willing or forming his eternal plan ; Deus agens, God in the successions of time executing the plan he had formed in eternity. Our term " providence," then, includes generally the entire sum of all God's activities exterior to himself and subsequent to creation through all time. " God executes 36 THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE his decrees " or plan " in his works of creation and prov- idence." Here "providence" evidently includes the entire sum of God's activities of all kinds with reference to his creatures previously brought into existence. It is the general term which includes all varieties or special kinds of the same. It includes the exercise in every mode of his potestas ordinata, or energy exercised along the lines of pre-established and uniform law, and his potes- tas libera, or energy put forth independently of all estab- lished sequences upon special occasion and as determined by his personal will. This includes his general or nat- ural providence, embracing the universe as one system and operating through the uniformities of natural law, and his special or supernatural providence, acting upon and modifying the action of second causes from without in the form of miracle and of grace. We should clearly apprehend and firmly hold the obvious truth that what we distinguish as the natural and the supernatural providence of God — e. g. his ordi- nary providence, his gracious operations and his mirac- ulous interventions — are nevertheless inseparable parts of one harmonious system in execution of one plan and the various manifestations of the energy of one God. They run on together at the same time as the work of one agent and the execution of one plan. Ordinary providence is the constant fact which is never intermit- ted. Grace always presupposes the ordinary providence, which it simply supplements and perfects ; and the mir- acle always presupposes grace, which it subserves and confirms. In the case of an apostolical miracle, as in that of the man lame from his mother's womb healed at the gate of the temple called " Beautiful " by Peter and OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE. 37 John, all three of these diverse modes of the divine ac- tivity were in operation at the same time and as neces- sary parts of one interdependent system : (1) There was the ordinary providence of God sustaining and directing the normal action of the bodies and souls of all the par- ties engaged and of their physical and moral environ- ment. (2) There was at the same time the gracious operation of the divine Spirit upon the souls of the apostle and of the subject of the miraculous cure, pro- ducing their appropriate effects in their sanctified affec- tions. (3) There was at the same time, and in perfect harmony with these, the miraculous power of God ex- ercised at the word of the apostles in the person of the man born lame. As to the ultimate method of God's action upon or in concurrence with natural causes, either in the forms of ordinary providence, of grace or of miracle, we absolutely know nothing. But it is important to observe that we do know very certainly (1) just as little of the one as of the other. The fact that we cannot understand the modus operandi of God in his works of grace or of mir- acle can be no objection to the admission of their reality to the man who believes in the reality of God's ordinary providence without being able to explain its method. (2) We know that God's methods of operation, whether natural or supernatural, whether in the forms of ordi- nary providence, of grace or of miracle, are all carried on simultaneously, are all mutually harmonious, are all the activities of one and the same infinite Agent and in the execution of one all-comprehensive plan. II. Whatever, however, may be the, to us, utterly un- known ultimate method of the divine operation, either in 38 THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE and through natural causes from within or upon them from without, it is intuitively certain, a priori, that they must in every case be consistent with what God has otherwise revealed to us of his own essential nature. It is simply impossible that God can deny himself or ever in any form act in a manner incougruous with his own perfections. Hence it follows — 1st. That the providence of God in all its modes, whether natural or supernatural, whether ordinary, gracious or miraculous, must be, all and several, the execution of one single indivisible plan. There can be no real incongruities or antagonisms between the nat- ural and the supernatural or between ordinary providence and grace. God, being eternal and infinite in knowledge and wisdom, sees the end from the beginning. There can be with him no surprise nor repentance nor change of plan nor divided counsel. All that he purposes must be one purpose ; all that he does, of every various mode of activity, must be the execution of the one purpose, and must therefore constitute one harmonious system. 2d. Hence it follows with equal certainty that the providence of God must be universal. It must compre- hend in its grasp equally every agent and every event without the least discontinuity or exception. One event is never in any degree more providential than any other event. There prevails a very unintelligent and really irreligious habit among many true Christians of passing unnoticed the evidence of God's presence in the ordinary course of nature, and of recognizing it on the occasion of some event specially involving their supposed interests, as if it were special and unusual. They will say of some sudden, scarcely-hoped-for deliverance from OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE. 39 danger, " Why, I think I may venture to say it was really providential." But would it have been any the less providential if they had been destroyed and nut de- livered? Would it have been any the less providential if they had not been in jeopardy at all and had needed no deliverance ? The great Dr. Witherspoon lived at a country-seat called Tusculuru, on Rocky Hill, two miles north of Princeton. One day a man rushed into his presence crying, " Dr. Witherspoon, help me to thank God for his wonderful providence. My horse ran away, my buggy was dashed to pieces on the rocks, and behold ! I am unharmed." The good doctor laughed benevo- lently at the inconsistent, halfway character of the man's religion. " Why," he answered, " I know a providence a thousand times better than that of yours. I have driven down that rocky road to Princeton hundreds of times and my horse never ran away and my buggy was never dashed to pieces." Undoubtedly, the deliverance was providential, but just as much so also were the un- eventful rides of the college president. God is in the atom just as really and effectually as in the planet. He is in the unobserved sighing of the wind in the wilder- ness as in the earthquake which overthrows a city full of living men, and his infinite wisdom and power are as much concerned in the one event as in the other. There is a distinction to be observed between God's natural providence, which is universal and ordinary, and his supernatural providence, which is occasional and special. His natural providence is equally in every thing and event, but his grace and his supernatural in- tervention are in one event and not in another, at one time and not at another. It is proper, therefore, to dis- 40 THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE tinguish his natural providence as general, and his grace or his supernatural providence as special. But it is essential to understand that in the ordinary sense of providence relating to the course of events in our nat- ural lives the common distinction between general and special providence is unintelligent and irreligious. All God's providence is at the same time both general and special, and general because it is special, and special be- cause it is general. It is general because it reaches by continuous action equally every element of the world and every event. It is special for the same reason, because, reaching equally to every particular, it reaches universally to all particulars and to their entire sum. That which controls every link controls the whole chain. That which controls the movement of every atom con- trols the whole world. That which controls the thought and volition of every man controls the entire course of human history. God does not come down from above upon the course of our lives in spots. His whole infinite being dwells everlastingly in each atom and each spirit. He is universally in all things, because he is ever equally in each thing. In every grain of sand, in every drop of water, in every pulse of air, in every flower that blows, in every infant soul, in every human thought and will and act, in the equable flow of natural law, in the great catastrophe of exploding worlds or of nations brought to judgment, in the fall of Adam, in the giving of the law on Sinai, in the redemption of man on Cal- vary, in the mission of the Holy Ghost, in the resur- rection of the dead and in the eternal judgment,— how- ever heterogeneous these agents and events in themselves, however incommensurate their significance to us, and OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE. 41 however various is the method of the divine operation in them severally, yet in them all the one Jehovah is equally present with his absolute perfections and in his supreme potency. Events may be infinitely different in their significance as well as in their importance to us, yet the truly religious mind finds equally in all things, even the least significant and the least important, the presence and supreme control and the benevolent ad- ministration of our heavenly Father. 3d. It is equally self-evident and certain that the whole of God's providence in every part of it must be an ex- pression of his essential perfections, of infinite wisdom and power and of absolute righteousness and benevo- lence. Nothing can be a surprise to his intelligence, or too complicated for his wisdom, or too difficult for his power, or inconsistent with his perfect righteousness or love. These essential attributes of the great Euler are abundantly manifested in all his works. The whole universe, and the entire course of its history as far as known to us, exhibit unquestioned evidence of limitless intelligence and power and of unmistakable righteous- ness and benevolence. This is witnessed to by the entire volume of human literature, that of philosophers, sci- entists and poets, as well as that of the special devotees of religion. Nevertheless, the course of providence from the point of view of man unilluminated by a supernatural reve- lation is full of anomalies to him utterly insoluble. The question is not whether the face of nature and the course of providence give evidence of the intelligence, power, righteousness and goodness of God— this is admitted by 42 THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE all sober men — but the true question is, as put by John Stuart Mill in his posthumously published Essay on Theism, Are the facts of nature and the history of events, as we know them, possibly reconcilable with the belief that the Creator and Controller of the world is at the same time infinite in his wisdom and in his power and in his righteousness and in his goodness? Mr. Mill is assured that this reconciliation is impossible in view of the awful prevalence of moral and physical evil. He is sure that God must be limited either in his wisdom or his power or his benevolence, and is inclined to think that he is limited in all, and upon the whole, with an imperfect standard and a limited ability, strives to do as well as he can. The apparent incongruousness of the facts, and hence the difficulty of the problem, we admit. But we have seen God because we have seen Christ, and we have learned to read all the course of providence in the light of the Cross. Since the baptism of Pentecost we have been convicted of sin and of a guilt we are utterly un- able to gainsay or remove. We have been convinced that the finite can never measure the Infinite, and that self-convicted sinners can never judge the integrity of the All-holy. In the light of Calvary we have an im- pregnable assurance that the Father of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is unlimited in wisdom and in power, and that he can do no wrong. Bowing our heads in unquestioning submission to his sovereign rights and with confidence iu his absolute perfection, we exclaim in the face of all apparent anomalies, " Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God ! how unsearchable are his judgmeuts, and his ways pa^t find- OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE. 43 ins; out ! For who hath known the mind of the Lord, and who hath been his counselor ? Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things : to whom be glory for ever. Amen " (Rom. 11 : 33-36). III. It is no less certain that, whatever be the ulti- mate method of God's exercise of his energy in provi- dence, it must necessarily be in a manner perfectly congruous to the nature of his creatures upon which and through which he works, and with the laws of their action. It is impossible to believe that the all-perfect Creator of all things will in his subsequent control of their action violate the properties with which he has endowed them or the laws he has imposed upon them. The Scriptures everywhere and constantly take for granted the principles of " natural realism " which cor- respond to the instinctive judgments and the spoken and written languages of all men. Material and spiritual beings are real entities. They have real, substantial, objective existence. Although they are ever dependent upon their First Cause, they are nevertheless real active agents and causes. God has endowed them each and severally, according to their respective kinds, with their essential properties and powers of action, which, as far as we know, never change or fail. We trace an abso- lutely unbroken continuity in the action of these second causes through the entire history of the world and of mankind. These elements, thus originally endowed with unchangeable properties, act and react with invari- able uniformity under the same conditions ; and as the conditions change they act differently, but always in a 44 THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE way uniformly related to the conditions under which they act. As, therefore, the general adjustments or groupings of second causes under which they act are for the most part uniform from age to age, and change only locally and slowly, the uniformity of action which re- sults gives origin to what are called " laws of nature," which continue absolutely uniform as long as the adjust- ments or groupings of these causes remain unchanged. It is obvious that we apply this only to the world of matter and to certain spheres of the natural actions of spirits. The spirit of men in certain spheres of action is confessedly endowed with the divine power of origin- ating and directing its own action independently of its external environment. But in the sphere of purely natural causes men never seek to attain their ends by violating the " laws of nature." On the contrary, they seek by science to attain a definite knowledge of those laws under all varieties of condition, and then they so apply this knowledge, by varying the conditions under which the natural causes act, that the very laws of nature themselves, thus directed, work out their purposes for them. Thus steam and electricity in the hands of men obey the " laws of nature " as implicitly as they do when nature is left to itself, only the same causes naturally produce different effects under changed conditions. Now, men of pure science, habitually confining their attention to the uniformities of nature's action under the uniform conditions existing, regard the habit of religious men in ascribing results to the action of a personal agent having personal aims in view, and special reference to human characters and necessities, as irrational and super- stitious. And hence, on the other hand, many unintel- OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE. 45 ligent religious men regard the point of view of men of science as essentially irreligious. But it is obvious that these contrasted views of the course of events in the nat- ural world are not mutually contradictory, but supple- mentary. They are the two equally true and real sides of the one system of objects. If even men comparatively ignorant and impotent can so wonderfully make the powers and laws of nature subservient to their own pur- poses without violating them, why cannot God at least do the same ? Nay, why, since God's knowledge and power are alike absolutely limitless, should not the whole of nature be as plastic to his will as the air in the organs of a great musician who articulates it into a fit expression of every thought and passion of his soaring soul. The reason that this analogy is not immediately conclusive to every mind is, that when man arranges the conditions so as to render the action of nature subservi- ent to his purpose you can always trace his trail, see the visible marks of his interfering agency, while the course of nature flows on with mathematical precision of phys- ical action, without the least trace of a providential inter- ference ab extra. But it is forgotten that while man is always locally outside his work, and acts upon all ele- ments from without, and in succession, a part at a time, God is simultaneously present and active within every ultimate element. His impulse is therefore through, not outside of, their own spontaneities. His control is neither partial nor successive, but simultaneously in the entire universe, thus co-ordinating all adjustments and all re- actions in the execution of one plan and in the current of one issue. There are two extreme tendencies to which different 46 THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE persons are inclined when regarding the course of events in the world, each of which is evidently false when ex- clusively indulged, but both of which together, when combined, lead to the true attitude which every Chris- tian should cultivate : the view of the mere naturalist, in which the supernatural is altogether merged in the nat- ural, and, conversely, the view of the pantheist, in which the natural is altogether merged in the supernatural. And these apparently opposite extremes virtually come to the same thing, because they both equally exclude a per- sonal God and human freedom, and maintain a naturalistic fatalism. But both present a side of the one truth. The natural is the fixed and regulated method which the per- sonal heavenly Father has laid down for his own guid- ance ; the supernatural does neither exclude nor super- sede the natural, but it is the self-revelation of the heavenly Father, who works through natural law, as the personal Agent who, haviug ordained law, uses it to accomplish his spiritual purposes. The universe has a personal basis. The laws of nature are the methods self-ordained of a personal Agent. The true scientists are the sons of God, who were not created for the laws of nature, but the laws of nature for them. After the Charleston earthquake the Christian preach- ers endeavored to enforce upon their hearers the scriptural lessons of the event viewed as a divine dispensation. The visiting scientists are represented as having scoffed contemptuously, maintaining that the preachers should have confined themselves to an exposition of the laws of nature and drawn comfort from the proven exceptional character of such experiences. These men of mere sci- ence may have been able and useful in their narrow spe- OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE. 47 eialty, but they were certainly very absurd philosophers. They were perfectly right in confining their own inves- tigations to the scientific aspects of the phenomena, and the preachers had an equal authority in calling the atten- tion of the Christian people to the aspect which the light of the inspired Scriptures, when thrown upon the provi- dential facts, presented. We say, advisedly, that the preachers' authority in the premises is limited to the application of the light of the inspired Scriptures to the current facts. They have no right to assume the role of prophets, as too many are at times inclined to do ; and no man not the subject of plenary inspiration should dare to explain the ultimate divine purpose in any par- ticular event or its relation to human guilt. The Master himself said, " Suppose ye that those eighteen upon whom the tower in Siloam fell were sinners above all men that dwell in Jerusalem ? I tell you, Nay ; but except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish" (Luke 13:4, 5). IV. Providence, as made known to us in Scripture, history and our religious experience, includes two dis- tinct exercises of the divine energy : (1st) preservation, and (2d) government. 1st. Preservation is the continuous exercise of the divine omnipotence through successive duration uphold- ing all creatures in being and in power. This does not in the least confound the Creator and Preserver with his works, nor does it invalidate the separate objective exist- ence and the real efficiency of these created elements as second causes. But it simply affirms that they are es- sentially and continuously dependent existences and causes. All atoms of matter and all created spirits live 48 THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE and move and have all their being and the unfail- ing spring of all their energies in him only. If he should withdraw his supporting power, the whole dependent universe would lapse into non-being imme- diately. 2d. Government includes God's control of all the activities of all his creatures of every kind, and his direction of them toward the fulfilling of his one eter- nal plan. [1.] That God has one universal plan which he exe- cutes with uudeviating purpose in all his works of cre- ation and of providence is made very certain, first, from the fact that he is an infinite Intelligence acting from eternity before all Avorlds, and absolutely unconditioned by any facts or powers external to himself. Secondly, from all that the Scriptures teach us as to his sovereignty, eternal foreknowledge, and as to making his own glory the single end of all things. And thirdly, the same fact is obviously exhibited in the unexceptional experience of all generations of men, and the revelations of modern science, exhibiting the absolutely unbroken continuity of thought and purpose and of divine superintendence and control in the whole universe, in all its parts and during all its successive ages. Of course this general plan, although one and indivisible, has many subordinate sys- tems successive and contemporaneous, and many varieties of method. To us, of course, these appear very various, and sometimes we make the mistake of regarding them as mutually inconsistent. But while various they are only to be understood when conceived as the many articulated members of one consummate system, reach- ing through all space and all time and all spheres. OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE. 49 Here we see that whatever is really true and significant in the famous but recent scientific doctrine of evolution had for many ages been anticipated by the Augustinian theology. Whatever may eventually turn out to be the facts with regard to geuetic evolutions through successive natural births, all must unite in recognizing the fact that the universe in all its spheres and through all its history is the continuous logical evolution of one purpose, to one end, through the energies of one infallible and inex- haustible Will. [2.] God effectually governs all his creatures and all their actions by a method to us inscrutable, but certainly consistent with his own perfections and with their prop- erties and laws. This government is revealed in the Scriptures and in our experience to be universal, cer- tainly efficient, holy, benevolent and wise. a. In matter God governs all things, apparently bv the distribution and adjustment of material particles under the great categories of time, place, quantity and quality. This procedure leaves the properties and laws of matter entirely unmodified, and it makes the omni- present, omniscient and omnipotent God Lord of all. b. The providence of God over his rational creatures involves three elements : First, his working in the entire sphere of their environment, presenting external motives and influences, moulding character and stimulating to action. Secondly, his working in their bodies and souls through the natural laws of their organizations, through the entire process of their growth. And thirdly, his immanent working within their will, whereby his direct- ive energy becomes confluent with their own sponta- neity, and " he turns the hearts of men as the rivers of 4 50 THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE water are turned," aud " works in us to will, and be willing to do, of his own good pleasure." The redeemed Christian is a child already at home in his Father's house. All these beauties and all this abundant wealth belong to our Father, and are set apart for our use. All things whatsoever that come to pass, however dark and enigmatical, are expressions of our Father's will, and are wisely designed to promote our welfare in the present and to secure it with infallible certainty in the great Hereafter. The word " chance " expresses simply a relation. An event happens by " chance " when the causes which produce it are so com- plex or so unusual as to be incapable of rational expecta- tion by us. Hence, as far as God is concerned, there is absolutely no such thing as chance. As for as we are concerned, all events which lie beyond the reach of sci- entific prediction fall into the category of chance. But by faith we embrace the infinitely wise will of God and accept all events as the excellent will of our heavenly Father. Creation and providence are seen to be the preparatory work which culminates in redemption. "VVe read all the means in the light of the glorious end. God is in every experience, making " known unto us the mys- tery of his will, according to his good pleasure, which he hath purposed in himself, that in the dispensation of the fullness of times he might gather together all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth, even in him. In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will : that we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of his glory." OF DIVINE PROVIDENCE. 51 " Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God ! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out ! For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things ; to whom be glory for ever. Amen." LECTURE III. MIRACLES. These are supernatural events implying a special and exceptional mode of God's providential action. I. The first thing we have to do in discussing the na- ture and attributes of a particular class of phenomena is to settle between ourselves very distinctly a common un- derstanding as to what particular class of phenomena we are talking about, The word "miracle" has been so vaguely and promiscuously used that, unless we come to an understanding as to the kind of events to which we aoree to restrict its application in this discussion, we should only talk at cross-purposes. It should be remembered that there are two kinds of definitions : (1) nominal or verbal, and (2) real. The former defines the thing by the etymology or the general usage of its name. The latter defines it by its own na- ture or relations. In the present case it is essential to recognize the fact that a verbal definition of miracles, or a definition formed upon a study of the etymology or usage of the word " miracle," would be of not the least value. The word itself simply means a wonder; that is, it defines the events called " miracles " not by any essential character- istic of the events themselves, but simply by the effect they happen to produce upon the minds of some classes 52 MIRACLES. 53 of beholders. That this is absurd is easily shown by an illustration. A missionary in the use of a chemical ap- paratus turned water into solid ice in the presence of the king of Siam. To the missionary it was a common effect of a combination of natural causes ; to the king of Siam and his courtiers it was an unparalleled wonder. The like had never been a matter of previous experience in all the land or in all its history. Yet it was not a miracle to them. If they had regarded it as one, they would have been miserably deceived, and would soon have been brought to discredit all that had been associ- ated with it in its assumed character. These events are designated in Scripture by various descriptive titles which severally connote their various aspects and relations. Their true nature is represented adequately by no one of these names separately, but all collectively should be understood as describing rather than as denning the class. These names are in Hebrew nta, signum, portentum; nS$ ; something separated, sin- gular; n*3«3, power, some extraordinary manifestation of divine power. Also, the Greek xkpara, wonders; duvdpeez, powerful works, manifesting divine power;