BR 127 .B3 1880 
 Banks, John S. 1835-1917 
 Christianity and the 
 of religion 
 
 science 
 
CHRISTIANITYrLEcssioco 
 
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 SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
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CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE 
 OF RELIGION. 
 
 '•' Of Him are ye in Clirist Jesus, "who of God is made unto us wisdom, and 
 righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.'" — 1 CoE. i, 30. 
 
 The science of religion imdertakes to do for the religions of 
 the world what the science of language does for its languages. 
 To such an undertaking there can be no preliminary objec- 
 tion. The phenomena of the religious life are just as legiti- 
 mate objects of investigation as those of language, or, indeed, 
 of any other branch of knowledge. This science differs con- 
 siderably from the philosophies of religion, several of which 
 bear great names. Far be it from us to deny to these 
 systems great interest and value of their own. But they are 
 intensely speculative ; they proceed to a great extent inde- 
 pendently of history and experience ; they are based upon, 
 and therefore vary with, their authors' peculiar theories of 
 human nature, and in consequence rather excite than satisfy 
 inquiry. The modern science of religion is far less ambitious 
 and more practical. By classifying, comparing, and analysino- 
 the facts of religion it seeks to arrive at comprehensive views 
 of its nature and laws. Religious philosophies profess to be 
 complete, to give a complete rationale of their subject, whereas 
 this science, by its very nature, Is tentative and progressive. 
 And yet it Is much more than a history. It is just as littlo a 
 mere enumeration of facts as any of the physical sciences. Its 
 
 B 
 
2 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 aim is to discover the laws, and exhibit the mutual relations, 
 of religious ideas and systems ; to trace the order of their 
 histo)ical development ; and thus to prepare the way for a 
 judgment upon their meaning and value. No doubt this 
 presupposes a general notion of the nature of religion, but by 
 no means a complete theory. What a flood of light has been 
 cast in this way upon the world of language ! That world may 
 be said to have been discovered within the last few years. 
 Instead of being the chaos it seemed to be, the creature of 
 caprice and accident, it is found to be just as much a scene of 
 ordered harmony and law as the material world about us. 
 We anticipate similar results in the sphere of religion. 
 
 Even in itself, apart from all higher considerations, such an 
 inquiry must possess the greatest interest for every thoughtful 
 mind. The analogies and contrasts, the points of contact and 
 difference, brought to light, are of the most curious kind. 
 As is well known, three great families of speech have been 
 traced, exclusive of those tongues which as yet refuse to 
 acknowledge kinship to others — the Aryan, which includes 
 Sanscrit, Greek, Latin, Gothic, German, English, &c. ; the 
 Semitic, including the languages of Egypt, Arabia, Juda3a, 
 Babylon, Phoenicia, &c. ; and the Turanian, of which 
 Mongolian or Malay may stand as the representative. It is 
 now shown that religion follows the same order. The Aryan, 
 Semitic, and Turanian types of religion arc as distinctly 
 marked off from each other by peculiar characteristics as the 
 three types of language, one of many evidences of the in- 
 timate connection between the two spheres. Is it not strange 
 also to be told that by one of the closest of all ties, the tie of 
 language, we English are nearly related to that great Eastern 
 people which Providence has brought under our rule? 
 
ANALOGY OF LANGUAGE. 
 
 Sanscrit is the elder sister ; Greek and Latin, Saxon and Celtic, 
 are younger sisters in the same family. It would be wrong to 
 say that words like deity, creed, pa^e?', mater, have come 
 into the West from India, because the truth is that these 
 represent a large stock of words common to all the Ar^'an 
 tonorues. Thev formed the common inheritance which the 
 
 O t/ 
 
 several nations carried away from their early home. Even 
 words like father and mother come to us from the same 
 source, but by a different route, through northern instead 
 of southern Europe. Professor Max Miiller is never weary 
 of telling us that the Latin Jupiter, the Greek Zev^ irarrfp^ 
 and the Sanscrit Dyaushpita, are one and the same word. 
 Dyaus is Sanscrit for shj, pita for father. When the Yedic 
 Hindu looked up to his brilliant sky, he addressed the power 
 dwelling there as Dyaushpita, Heaven-father ; the Greek said 
 Zev^ Trarrjp ; the Roman Jupiter. 
 
 And still more curious than the points of resemblance are 
 the points of contrast. Just as we find the greatest differences 
 between brothers and sisters in one family, so is it in the 
 families of nations. Who could be wider apart in character 
 than the Hindu — speculative, mystic, his whole gaze tm-ned 
 inwards — and the Greek or Roman or Englishman, with his 
 genius for the material and practical ? Of the ancient Hindus 
 it has been said with perfect truth, '^ There never was a nation 
 believing so firmly in another world, and so little concerned 
 about this. Their condition on earth is to them a problem ; 
 the real and eternal life a simple fact." And again, ^^ They 
 shut their eyes to this world of outward seeming and activity, 
 to open them full on the world of thought and rest." We 
 may remark, by the way, that our German brethren possess 
 a larger share of Eastern speculativeness than ourselves. 
 
 b2 
 
4 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 Scliopenliaucr and Hartmann are veritable Buddhists. Is 
 it not also worth noting that we Englishmen, and indeed 
 all European Christendom, are to-day Aryan in speech and 
 Semitic in religion? When Christianity triumphed in the 
 West, our forefathers broke with the old faith of the Aryan 
 world. 
 
 But if such inquiries are full of interest for the general 
 student, how much more for the Christian believer? The 
 subject touches him most nearly. Nothing which throws 
 light on the religions of mankind can be indifferent to him. 
 Nor, if he wished to be neutral, is he allowed to be so. 
 The attitude taken by some teachers of the new science is such 
 as to compel a Christian to define his own position. We need 
 scarcely say that some schools, especially on the Continent, 
 believe that in this science they have a key to the origin and 
 history of all religion without exception. Christianity is 
 brought under the law of natural evolution, and said to be 
 reduced to the level of other faiths. These boasts on one side 
 give rise to suspicion and fear on the other ; but there is just 
 as little reason for the boasts as for the fears. The boasts that 
 we hear are altogether unfounded and premature. It is far 
 too soon for a science not many days old, which has scarcely 
 mastered its first jnnnciples, to claim that it lias solved a 
 problem so vast and intricate as that presented by universal 
 religious history. There is nothing in the survey, as far as 
 it has gone, to disturb, but much to confirm, a Christian's 
 faidi in revelation. It is indeed conceivable that, when the 
 survey is completed, something may turn up to modify 
 present conclusions. But when will that time come ? Think 
 of the magnitude of the field. Brahman Ism and Buddhism 
 in India, Confucianism and Taouism in China, Zoroastrianism 
 
MAGNITUDE OF FIELD. 
 
 in Persia, have each a vast history and Hterature of their own. 
 The same is true of Mohammedanism. How much has to be 
 learnt, and how slowly, of the religions of ancient Egypt and 
 Babylon and Phoenicia? The old paganism of Rome and 
 Greece is little understood. Africa teems with the ruins 
 of perishing superstitions, to say nothing of Polynesia 
 and ancient America. In exploring this vast territory there 
 is work for any number of workers any number of years. 
 But we are not afraid of the complete survey modifying the 
 results already arrived at. In religion as in language there 
 are certain main lines which never vary. Beneath superficial 
 differences there is a common nature. In any one section you 
 may read the history of the whole. 
 
 There is no ground then for an attitude of distrust and 
 reserve on the part of Christians towards this subject. We do 
 not need to be exhorted, as we often are, to be willing to 
 compare Christianity with other systems. This is what we 
 are always doing. It is what Christian missionaries do every 
 day. Such comparison by no means implies the concession of 
 equality. On the contrary, we hold that the result of such 
 comparison will always be to set in clearer relief the unique 
 position of Christianity. Our attitude towards religious is 
 the same as towards physical science. To facts, verified or 
 verifiable, we cannot object. Theories based upon these facts 
 we claim the right to challenge. Now the boasts, to w^hich 
 reference has been made, rest on mere theories — theories which 
 represent rather what their authors wish than what they 
 prove. We must regret that the subject should be put to such 
 use, but it is only what has been done in other fields. This 
 sceptical inclination is merely an infantine weakness which 
 the manhood of religious science will not fail to outgrow. 
 
6 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 The result so far lias been in favour of Christian faith, and 
 there is no reason to doubt that it will be increasingly so in 
 the future. 
 
 Before proceeding to illustrate these positions, let us 
 remark that this subject has been singularly fortunate in being 
 introduced into this country by so distinguished an advocate 
 as Professor Max Mliller, of Oxford, to whom Indian mis- 
 sionaries owe special gratitude for all that he has done in 
 bringing India home to the intelligence and sympathy of 
 Englishmen. As we shall have to controvert some of the 
 views put forth by this author in his various writings on 
 this subject, we wish to render this sincere tribute to his 
 learning and candour and gifts of exposition. Indeed, we 
 are not sure that the latter gifts are not a snare to their 
 possessor. Professor Mliller is nothing if not picturesque, 
 and even brilliant. But impassioned rhetoric sometimes con- 
 ceals, we do not say is meant to conceal, serious gaps in the 
 argument. 
 
 I. Let us, in the first place, gather up a few of the 
 incidental services already rendered by religious science to 
 Christian faith. 
 
 It has put the crown on the argument for the unity of tlie 
 human race. That unity was once disputed, in order to 
 make a point against Scripture. It is curious how scepticism 
 has completely faced about on this subject, and is now just as 
 anxious to build up as it was once to destroy, in order to turn 
 the fact of unity against religion. We accept the argument 
 apart from the purpose. To the physical evidence is now added 
 the more cogent evidence from language and religion. These 
 belong not to the surfiicc of human nature, but to that which 
 is deepest and imperishable. If in this region any real con- 
 
INCIDENTAL BENEFITS. 
 
 tradiction had come to light, we know to what use it would 
 have been put. But there is no such contradiction. Deeper 
 than the diversity is the unity. 
 
 This science has also established the fact of the universality 
 of religion. This fact was once questioned. It was asserted 
 that tribes had been found which showed no trace of relisiion. 
 
 o 
 
 No one asserts this now. Even so thorough-going a religious 
 evolutionist as Professor Tiele, of Ley den, says : " The state- 
 ment that there are nations or tribes which possess no 
 religion rests either on inaccurate observation or confusion of 
 ideas. No tribe or nation has yet been met with destitute of 
 belief in any higher beings ; and travellers who asserted their 
 existence have been afterwards refuted by facts. It is legiti- 
 mate, therefore, to call religion in its most general sense a 
 universal phenomenon of humanity. ' ' Professor Miiller writes : 
 " We may safely say that, in spite of all researches, no human 
 beings have been found anywhere who do not possess some- 
 thing which to them is religion, or, to put it in the most 
 general form, a belief in something beyond what they can see 
 with their eyes" (Hibbert Lecture, p. 79). All the alleged 
 exceptions have been shown to be no exceptions, at least 
 among the savage nations, where they have been diligently 
 souofht. We are sometimes reminded that in Buddhism, which 
 is the religion of nearly a third of the human race, we have 
 an example of a religion with a high code of morality, and 
 yet without a god. But it is only in theory that Buddhism 
 is atheistic. In practice Buddha himself has been in- 
 stalled on the empty throne of Deity.* Tliere are exceptions 
 to the universality of religion, but they are to be found in 
 the heart of Christian civilisation. In spite of all efforts to 
 * See Note 1. 
 
8 CHRISTIANITY AND TEE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 make Agnostics and Materialists religious against their will, 
 we must hold that when a writer asks, ^^Have we still a 
 Religion ?" and answers in the negative; when another re- 
 pudiates religion on the ground that it is rooted in selfishness ; 
 when we hear another declaring that jDoetry is the only- 
 religion left to the educated; when we see another, ^^ after 
 declaring both God and gods obsolete, falling down before 
 a beloved memory," we see no reason for refusing to accept 
 the disclaimer. But surely, in this case as in others, the 
 saying holds good, that the exceptions prove the rule. 
 Blindness is the exception, vision is the rule. There would 
 be no blindness if there were no vision. Disease and suffering: 
 are the exceptions, sound health is the rule. Faith is 
 natural, scepticism artificial. Whatever consequences the 
 universality of religion carries with it, their full benefit 
 belongs to the Christian believer. 
 
 Another valuable service rendered by this science is the 
 evidence it has brought against the notion that all religion 
 originated in Fetishism. This notion is a main pillar of 
 the Comtist explanation of religion. Just as, according to 
 some, the highest bodily forms are the outgrowth of the 
 animal, so the purest devotion and sanctity that ever beautified 
 human character have sprung from the worship of a fetish. 
 It is refreshing to hear the heavy blows dealt by Professor 
 Miiller at this most irrational of monstrosities. In the 
 lecture which he devotes to the subject, he shows that even 
 at the stage of Fetishism there arc many degrees of better 
 and worse, and that higher notions are to be found mixed 
 up with the most abject superstitions, like fading remini- 
 scences of better days. A story is told of a negro who, 
 when reproached for worshipping a tree, replied : " Oh, the 
 
CHIEF BENEFIT OF THIS SCIENCE. 9 
 
 tree is not the fetish ; the fetish is a spirit and invisible, but 
 he has descended into the tree. Certainly he cannot devour 
 our bodily food, but he enjoys its spiritual part, and leaves 
 behind the bodily part which we see " (Ihicl, p. 101). ISTow 
 here the notion of an invisible power existed alongside 
 the most degrading worship. Professor Mliller evidently 
 leans to the view, wdiich Christians generally hold, that 
 Fetishism represents not the first step in religious develop- 
 ment, but the last step in religious declension. Everything 
 points to this conclusion. Look at the tribes of Fetishists in 
 Africa. Is it credible that at this period in the history of 
 the world they have got no farther than the alphabet in 
 religion, that for untold centuries they have stood still while 
 the rest of the world has been moving forward ? Is not 
 their present condition more intelligible on the theory of its 
 being the lowest stage in a process of declension? We 
 simply quote Professor Miiller's conclusions, omitting the 
 arguments and evidence by which they are supported. He 
 says : '' I maintain that Fetishism was a corruption of religion 
 in Africa as elsewhere ; that the negro is capable of higher 
 religious ideas than the worship of stocks and stones, and 
 that many tribes who believe in fetishes, cherish at the same 
 time veiy pure, very true, very exalted sentiments of the 
 Deity" (p. 105). And again, "We are justified therefore, I 
 think, in surrendering the theory that Fetishism either has 
 been or must have been the beginning of all rehgion" (p. 127). 
 To have shown good cause against this ugly theory is surely 
 no unimportant service. 
 
 IL But these are only minor points. The chief service 
 which we believe this science is destined to render to Christian 
 faith is the negative proof it affords of the necessity of 
 
10 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 special revelation in order to clear and satisfactory know- 
 ledge of the great objects of faith. The history of religion 
 outside the sphere of Christian revelation is the history of 
 sincere and strenuous but vain effort on the part of man to 
 construct a religion satisfactory to reason and conscience ; in 
 other words, it is a history of mistake and error. Men 
 sought the Lord, ^^ if haply they might feel after him and 
 find him," with but one result — they never found Him. 
 
 AVe have already intimated that one school of writers on 
 this subject rejects the idea of special revelation altogether, 
 and seeks to bring Christianity itself under the law of natural 
 evolution. We are very far from charging such a design 
 upon our English teachers, although much which they have 
 written seems to look in this direction. But there can be no 
 doubt that as regards India Professor Mliller is a thorough 
 evolutionist. He thinks that the notion of a primeval 
 revelation is unnecessary to explain the phenomena which 
 meet us in this field, and by inference in every similar field. 
 The theory is that religion may grow out of the soil of 
 human nature apart from the aid of specific revelation, 
 external or internal, and India is taken as an illustration, 
 a test-case. We accept the test. We think [that an 
 examination will show that the explanation breaks down, 
 that there are phenomena which it does not cover, and that, 
 even accepting the theory as it stands, the course which 
 religion has taken in India proves the necessity of special 
 revelation. Perhaps it Avill be best to indicate at once the 
 two principal points on which we are compelled to differ from 
 the evolution theory in its application to India. 
 
 The first concerns the way in which the necessary postulate 
 of this theory is obtained. This postulate is the idea of the 
 
POSTULATE OF EVOLUTION THEORY. 11 
 
 infinitej or supernatural, or divine. Give us this, it is said, 
 and out of it we will bring all that India has thought and 
 believed on the subject of religion. Out of this germ come 
 Yedas and Puranas, Polytheism and Pantheism, the refine- 
 ments of Hindu philosophy and the extravagances of Hindu 
 mythology. Just as some scientists evolve the whole 
 physical universe out of a primitive monad, just as 
 Schleiermacher finds the fountain-head of religion in the 
 feeling of absolute dependence, so our author says : ' Give me 
 the consciousness, the presentiment in man of the existence of 
 an infinite something, and out of this I will construct every 
 non-Christian religion.' And how does he obtain this 
 presentiment? Let the answer be carefully marked. From 
 the senses. It is the senses which perceive the infinite. Of 
 course it is not meant that the infinite or divine is just as 
 obvious as the sun and stars. This would be very much like 
 the direct intuition which is strongly repudiated. The 
 meaning is that the least reflection will show that the infinite 
 is involved in the knowledge which the senses give us. A 
 great deal indeed of what is said on the point would bear the 
 construction tliat all that is meant is the existence of a capacity 
 in man for apprehending the infinite; but even this, we 
 should contend, lies not in the senses but in the reason. At 
 first sight we think we must have mistaken the meaning, and 
 that the reference must be to the senses in conjunction with 
 the reason — the senses supplying the material out of which 
 reason elaborates the higher idea. But we are assured again 
 and again that this is not the meaning. Indeed, it cannot be 
 the meaning for several reasons. The position that the reason 
 by working upon the materials supplied by the senses may 
 arrive at a conception of the infinite is a very old and common 
 
12 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 doctrine. There was no need to devote a whole lecture to 
 enforce what none but a Materialist w^ould be disposed to 
 deny. But observe that in this case it is not sense which 
 gives us the idea but reason, which merely uses sense as an 
 instrument. But this would blunt the very point of our 
 author's argument. He is here arguing against the 
 Positivists, without naming them. The Positivist will admit 
 no evidence but that of the senses. He will not allow that 
 reason can ever be an independent source of knowledge, or 
 give us anything not already involved in sense-knowledge. 
 Professor Mliller accepts this ground of argument, and says 
 in effect, ^ On your own premisses, accepting nothing but 
 your own data, I will show you that faith in the infinite is a 
 necessity.' * Put briefly, he not only accepts to the full 
 the old dictum, "There is nothing in the intelligence which 
 did not exist previously in the senses," ignoring even 
 Leibnitz's addition, " Except the intelligence itself," but 
 adds, " There is nothing in religion which did not exist 
 previously in the senses." 
 
 What are we to say of this theory ? We could almost wish it 
 were true. It would save us a world of trouble. It would be 
 a great convenience if we had nothing to do but to say to the 
 sceptic, ' Use yom^ senses. Look at, he ar, touch the infinite 
 for yourselves.' But what if the sceptic turns round and says, 
 as he will say, ' I have used my senses, and they give me no 
 such information as you promise' ? How will you establish 
 your assertion ? You cannot do it by the senses themselves. 
 You can only do it by falling back upon those means of proof 
 which you have given up. No, much as we approve both the 
 motive and the conclusion of the argument, we cannot admit 
 * See Note 2. 
 
SENSE AND EEASON. 13 
 
 the cogency of the mode of proof. We must not even believe 
 truth on false grounds. The theory is no doubt original, but 
 its very originality excites suspicion. Strange that men 
 should have sought far and wide, high and low, for that which 
 after all lay within the grasp of the five senses. But the 
 argument will not bear examination. It confounds the 
 indefinite with the infinite. The indefinite, which hems in 
 the sphere of sense-perception at every point, may be regarded 
 as an analogue of the infinite, but it is not the infinite. It 
 is nothing but the finite indefinitely prolonged. The finite, 
 apart from rational inquiry into its cause, can never give us 
 anything but a repetition of itself, ie.y the finite. It is a 
 contradiction that sense should ever transcend itself. We may 
 as well say that a man can climb on his own head. The 
 whole theory is a transference of the results of reason to the 
 province of the senses, which are made to do what they were 
 never intended to do and have no power to do. We might 
 just as well confound the functions of the senses, and make 
 sight do the work of hearing, and so on. Sense and reason 
 have each their own province. Neither can take the place 
 of the other.* 
 
 If, then, the way in which our author makes man arrive 
 at a knowledge of tlie infinite were essential to his argument, 
 w^e must hold that the argument breaks down at the first step. 
 But it is not essential. AVe quite admit the conclusion, 
 though w^e reject the reasons here assigned for it. That is, 
 we see no reason to doubt that man might, independently 
 of special revelation, arrive at some knowledge of God. 
 Whether, as matter of fact, he has ever done so, whether the 
 means for doing so are intuition or reasoning, or both, we 
 
 * Sec Note 3. 
 
14 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF BELIGION. 
 
 need not here consider. We simply state the fact. Place a 
 man in front of the universe, give him the unfettered use of 
 his senses and reason, and there will inevitably grow up 
 within him the thought of a higher power behind the veil of 
 the material. Scripture nowhere asserts, much less proves, 
 but simply assumes the existence of God. Special revelation 
 is necessary, not to give knowledge of God, but to give 
 distinct, certain, trustworthy knowledge ; to correct and 
 guard against error on this most vital subject. This is clearly 
 the teaching of St. Paul when, addressing a heathen audience, 
 he says that " God left not Himself without witness ;" and 
 again when he says that " the invisible things of Him from 
 the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood 
 by the things that are made, even His eternal power and 
 Godhead," and that the heathen " having not the law are a 
 law unto themselves." 
 
 Although somewhat of a digression, wc may be allowed to 
 indicate what seems to be the right attitude to the Positivist 
 position on this subject. The right course to pursue, as it 
 seems to us, is not to concede that position and try to argue 
 from it, but to show its thoroughly illegitimate and arbitrary 
 character. If you accept sceptical premisses you cannot 
 escape the sceptical conclusion. It is of no use trying to prove 
 a case when the very means of proof arc interdicted. You 
 might as well forbid the astronomer to use his formulas, the 
 chemist to resort to experiment, the historian to appeal to 
 written testimony, the barrister to call his witnesses, and 
 then bid them prove their case. Tiie Positivist knows very 
 well that if he lays an interdict on reason, an interdict as 
 thoroughly arbitrary as any issued in the past by Popes of 
 Home, if he makes it the slave instead of the lord of the 
 
POSITiriST POSITION. 15 
 
 senses, he forecloses the path to reh'glon, and for this very 
 reason he arbitrarily interdicts it. Arbitrarily, we say : for 
 all the reasons we ever yet heard for the course amount to 
 this, that if you admit an appeal to anything outside or above 
 the senses even in man, religion becomes inevitable. To close 
 the mouth of the witnesses on the other side is no doubt an 
 easy way of gaining your case, but at least you must show 
 cause for doing so. This is not done in the present case. It 
 has never yet been established that reason is not just as 
 integral a part of human nature as the senses, not just as 
 trustworthy in its action, not just as much or as little liable 
 to mistake. How do I know that there are such things as a 
 mind or soul, causal power, substance, force of gravitation, 
 or the like ? These are not objects of sense, but inferences 
 of reason from facts of sense. The Positivist denies all 
 these, as he is bound to do by the law of consistency, but the 
 very fact of his being obliged to do so, and to reduce the 
 whole universe to matter and force, is refutation enough 
 of his fundamental principles. According to him man is 
 essentially a seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, touching 
 animal, for the higher faculties are all derived from the lower. 
 Sense is supreme ; reason, instead of being queen, is a helpless 
 slave. The world's greatest thinkers have all been deceived 
 as to what constitutes the essence and crown and glory of 
 human nature. Let those believe this who can. But those 
 who do believe it have small reason to reproach others with 
 credulity. Can any one doubt that if the infinite had been 
 an object of sense, we should have heard the same arguments 
 against the authority of the senses that we now hear against 
 reason, and on as good grounds ? 
 
 III. But granting the possibility of arriving at some know- 
 
16 CHEISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 ledge of God by the light of reason, are all the contents of 
 the Hindu religion, as is asserted, such as might conceivably 
 be attained in this way ? We think not. We think that 
 there are elements ^yhich point to a higher source, and are 
 best explained by, if they do not absolutely require, the 
 primeval revelation which we are forbidden to assume. 
 
 We take the Vedic teaching as the earliest accessible form 
 of Indian faith. We have no space to dwell on the general 
 character of the Vedas, nor is there any need, as Professor 
 Mliller's ample and graphic descriptions are readily accessible. 
 Let it suffice to say that the earliest part of the Vedas may be 
 assigned to at least 1000 B.C., and the latest to 500 B.C. The 
 system of the earlier portion is one of polytheistic nature- 
 worship, nothing higher and nothing lower. There are no 
 divine incarnations or human deifications. Look round 
 the Vedic Pantheon. You do not see there one of 
 the deities of modern India. First and chief is the Sun 
 with a different name for each different aspect — Surya, 
 the Shining One ; Pushan, the IN'ourisher ; Savitri, the 
 Life-giver, and so on. Varuna, the Greek ovpavo^^ the 
 all-embracing sky, is a considerable deity. There is 
 Indra, the god of rain and thunder ; Prithivi, the Earth ; 
 Agni (Latin ignisj, Fire; Vayu, Wind; Ushas, the Dawn; 
 and many others. If we were to quote hymns and prayers 
 page after page, they would simply show that the Vedic 
 religion in its earliest form is worship of the powers of 
 nature. But while this is its ruling character, there are other 
 elements of an altogether different order. Professor Mliller 
 has insisted very strongly that in the Veda the ideas of sin, 
 guilt, sacrifice, forgiveness, personal immortality, are all found, 
 althougli it may be observed incarnation is not of the number. 
 
FOREIGN ELEMENTS IN HINDUISM. 17 
 
 It is true that tliey form far too small a portion of tlio whole 
 to exert any appreciable influence ; they are lost in tlio mul- 
 titude of details of an entirely different kind. But we confess 
 that to us these hifrher moral ideas are amonc^ the most in- 
 teresting features of those ancient writings, for they reveal 
 the workings of conscience, a sense of spiritual need, and 
 prove that within man, as w^ell as without, God did not leave 
 Himself without witness. Amid prayers for food and health 
 and victory, it is startling to come upon such prayers as the 
 following : " We pray to the rivers, the mothers, and to the 
 grassy mountains, to the sun and the dawn, to keep us from 
 guilt " (p. 201). Some of the prayers sound like echoes of 
 other words familiar to Christian ears : " 1. Let me not yet, 
 
 Varuna, enter into the house of clay ; have mercy. Al- 
 mighty, have mercy. 2. If I go along trembling, like a cloud 
 driven by the wind; have mercy. Almighty, have mercy. 
 
 3. Through w^ant of strength, thou bright and strong God, 
 have I gone wrong; have mercy. Almighty, have mercy. 
 
 4. Thirst came upon the w^orshipper, though he stood in the 
 midst of the w^aters; have mercy. Almighty, have mercy. 
 
 5. Whenever we men, Yaruna, commit an oifence before 
 the heavenly host ; whenever we break the law through 
 thoughtlessness; have mercy. Almighty, have mercy." With 
 the question of Micah, " Wherewith shall I come before the 
 Lord, and bow myself before the high God?" compare "How 
 can I get unto Yaruna ? Will he accept my offering with- 
 out displeasure? When shall I, with a quiet mind, see him 
 propitiated? I ask, Yaruna, wishing to know this my sin. 
 
 1 go to ask the w^ise. The sages all tell me the same, Yaruna 
 it is who is displeased with thee." A hymn to Prajapati, 
 Lord of all creatures, consisting of ten verses, closes each 
 
 c 
 
18 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 verse with the refrain, ^' Who is the God to whom we shall 
 offer our sacrifice?" Lest these quotations should give the 
 impression that they represent the general tone of the Yedic 
 hymns, w^e repeat that they are exceptional, and that the pre- 
 vailing character is what might be expected in a system of 
 nature-worship. The fact is, that confessions of sin, petitions 
 for mercy, ideas of sacrifice, are out of place in such a system. 
 They belong to another circle of thought. What have rivers, 
 grassy mountains, tlie sun and dawn to do with keeping 
 man from guilt? Our author may well say, '^ The first 
 prayer that sounds really strange to us is when they are 
 implored to keep us from guilt." Do not these elements look 
 like an importation from a system of an altogether different 
 nature and with different associations ? Observe, these ideas 
 are not put to any further use. They are not made to har- 
 monise with their surroundings. They do not become the 
 basis of any further development in the Yedic circle. There 
 they hang, unconnected with anything about them. As far 
 as we know, such ideas as those of sacrifice, propitiation, for- 
 giveness, have never been regarded as belonging to a system 
 of simple nature-worship. Even in modern days they have 
 always been repudiated by those who content themselves with 
 what is called natural religion. These ideas do indeed re- 
 appear at later stages, where they are made the centre of 
 elaborate rituals ; but there they are plainly borrowed from 
 early days. What we have to do with now is their presence 
 in these earliest records, where they are so thoroughly out 
 of keeping with the ruling spirit of the system. They 
 are evidently a difficulty to our author, who does not 
 attempt an explanation, but passes them by with the casual 
 remark, that " individual genius frequently anticipates by 
 
PRIMITIVE REVELATION NECESSARY, 19 
 
 centuries the slow and steadj advance of the main body of 
 the great army for the conquest of truth." To attribute any- 
 thing to genius is very much like attributing it to instinct, or 
 chance, or nothing, i.e., it is a giving up of the problem. 
 
 The theory of a primitive revelation explains the presence 
 of these foreign elements, and nothing else does. Here 
 these ideas are seen to be at home and find their adjustment. 
 The Vedas do not profess to be original works. They are 
 arranged in divisions called Samhitas, Collections. Thus, on 
 their very face, they are merely collections of opinions and 
 beliefs previously current. The period anterior to the Yedas 
 is a region of conjecture. That is the most probable explana- 
 tion which covers all the facts. The theory of natural evolu- 
 tion does not cover all the facts. The appearance of this circle 
 of ideas at such an early stage is a difficulty which it cannot 
 get over. The supposition of a primeval revelation, what- 
 ever hard words may be used about it, does cover all the 
 facts. These ideas are seen to be relics of a vanishing re- 
 velation, held mechanically, without any comprehension of 
 their meaning and use. Granting that this is nothing but 
 hypothesis, the opposite theory is no more. 
 
 IV. Our main argument still remains. The difference 
 between our position and that of Professor Miiller in a prac- 
 tical point of view is not as great as at first sight it might 
 appear. He maintains that the Hindus were from the 
 first left to the lio-ht of reason and nature. We allow that 
 they were so left from the time when they broke with the 
 original divine revelation, and that time goes back far beyond 
 the earliest dawn of history. While we believe that their 
 creed, as soon as It becomes known to us, includes some 
 traditional elements of revelation, we deeply feel that these 
 
 c 2 
 
20 CHRISTIANITY AND TEE SCIENCE OF BELIGION 
 
 elements are a very inconsiderable portion of the whole, and 
 exerted the least possible influence on Hindu faith. Without 
 interpreter or key, they fell more and more into the back- 
 ground before the inventions of man. Thus, practically, the 
 Hindus were left to find their own way to God, to make 
 a religion for themselves from the materials supplied by 
 nature. And Hinduism is substantially the result of this 
 process. We have in India a specimen of what unaided 
 human reason could effect in the discovery of religious truth. 
 What is the result? The science of religion gives tlie 
 answer. There may be difference of opinion respecting the 
 process and the value of the result ; but as to what the result 
 is, there is, there can be no difference of opinion. 
 
 The result may be stated in a single sentence. You have 
 in the Vedas polytheistic nature-worship at the beginning 
 and pantheism at the end. We leave out of sight later 
 forms of Hinduism, because these supply nothing additional, 
 but are simply reproductions of the essential parts of Vedic 
 teaching. As far as the Ycdas are concerned, with the 
 exception of germs of monotheism which always remained 
 germs, they contain nothing but polytheistic nature-worship 
 and philosophical pantheism. The combination of two such 
 opposite elements in the same professed revelation has 
 scarcely received the notice it deserves. 
 
 Hinduism began, as every other heathen religion began, as 
 the Greek, German, Persian religions began, with worship of 
 the forces of nature. Whether this was really the beginning 
 or not, whether a purer idea of God had existed before or 
 not, is here immaterial. Kor again docs it concern us much 
 how nature-worship grew up. Professor Mliller proposes an 
 ngenious sliding-scale of .scm:-!angllilc objects, such as trees, 
 
NATUBJE-WOESHIP OF VEDAS. 21 
 
 mountains, rivers, the earth ; and intangible ohjects, such as 
 the skj', stars, sun, &c., by wliieh as by a ladder the Hindus 
 may have risen to the worship of the Divine. This may be 
 &o or not. On the basis of purely natural evolution it would 
 be enough to suppose in general that men reasoned from 
 themselves to the world ; in short, personified natural objects. 
 How this was done in language has been often shown. A 
 river was called a runner, a plougher, mother, defender, 
 .shouter. A stone was called a cutter, the heel a kicker, the 
 moon a measurer, the plough a tearer, the ship a flier, and so 
 on. So men surmised powers or beings like themselves acting 
 behind the great movements of creation. But we have only 
 here to do with the result, not with the process. Nor again 
 do we need to discuss the new term by which Professor Miiller 
 Avould designate the early Yedic stage of worship — Katheno- 
 iheism, which he prefers to polytheism, as marking the stage 
 at which the worshipper regards the deity he is worshipping 
 at the moment as supreme. The distinction between the two 
 seems to us greater than the difference. Althoupjh the wor- 
 shipper, while he is worshipping Yaruna, speaks as if he 
 believed Varuna to be supreme, yet if he is ready the next 
 moment to say the same of Surya, is he not a polytheist? 
 He simply prays to different deities for different blessings. 
 Kathenotheism is in fact a form of polytheism. But these 
 are secondary points. The cardinal fact to be seized is that 
 the first form of Vedic worship is nature-worship of a very com- 
 ])lete and elaborate kind. As to this fact there is no disj^ute. 
 
 And there is just as little dispute as to the pantheism con- 
 tained in the latter part of the Vedas. Yedanta is composed 
 of two words, which mean End of the Veda, and pantheism 
 being the doctrine taught at the end of the Yeda, Yedantism 
 
22 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 has come to be synonymous with pantheism, and Vedantist 
 with pantheist. Vedantism is the favourite school of Indian 
 philosophy. The bias of the Hindu mind is all towards it. 
 Indian pantheism is the most systematic, the most elaborate 
 and pervasive, that the world has ever seen, shrinking from 
 no consequences, but pushing its logic to the utmost extreme. 
 The great cleavage of Hindu speculation is into Dwaitism, 
 dualism^ and Adwaitism, non-dualism. A Dwaiti is one who 
 believes in the distinction of creating and created. An 
 Adwaiti is one who holds the essential oneness of the two. 
 He holds that the distinction is only in appearance and for 
 a time, and that all separate existences are merely phenomena 
 of the one essentially changeless substance. We do not say 
 that Adwaitism or pantheism underlies all Hinduism. There 
 may be sects or castes which hold the eternity of the distinc- 
 tion between the two orders of being. But it underlies the 
 greater part of Hinduism. There are sects which are 
 dualist in profession and yet hold non-dualism in the ultimate 
 result, as a sort of esoteric doctrine. A Yishnuite Brahman 
 will tell you that, while he acknowledges Brahma, Vishnu, 
 and Shiva, and all the other deities, these are merely tem- 
 porary manifestations of the One supreme, only Being ; that 
 after they have measured their vast cycles of existence they 
 will all be resolved back into the depths of the one sole exist- 
 ence from which they sprang. 
 
 Now what we wisJi to point out is that this universal 
 pantheism of India, implicit or expressed, a2)peals to the 
 Veda as its authority, and justly so. There is no need to 
 prove or illustrate at length what every one admits. The 
 Upanlshads, or closing treatises of the Vcdas, are steeped in 
 pantheism. One of them says, " Whoever looks for this 
 
PANTHEISM OF VEDAS, 23 
 
 worldj for the gods, for all beings, for this universe, elsewhere 
 than in the divine Spirit, should be abandoned by them 
 all. This Brahmahood, this Kshatra power, this world, 
 these gods, these beings, this universe, — are all the divine 
 Spirit" (Mliller, Hist, of Anc. Sanscrit Literature^ p. 
 23). The universe is said to rise out of God as sounds 
 out of a drum or lute, smoke out of fire, vapour out of 
 the sea. As salt dissolves in water, so the finite merges in 
 the divine. The two Hindu names for the supreme, sole 
 existence are Brahman, the objective self, and Atman, the 
 spirit or subjective self, which eventually become one. 
 Atman means hreatJi, then spirit j then self, and is a favourite 
 name for the absolute self of the universe, just as in these 
 days we hear of the absolute Ego. Professor Miiller says : 
 " It was used to express not simply the Ego or the I, for that 
 Ego, the AJiam, the I, was too much made up of the fleeting 
 elements of this life. No, it expressed what was beyond the 
 Ego, what supported the Ego for a time, but after a time 
 freed itself from the fetters and conditions of the human Ego, 
 and became again the pure self." . And again, "The key-note 
 of the old Upanishads is ' know thyself,' but with a much 
 deeper meaning than that of the FvchOc aeavrov of the Delphic 
 oracle. The ' know thyself ' of the Upanishads means, know 
 thy true self, that which underlies thine Ego, and find it and 
 know it in the highest, the eternal Self, the One without 
 a Second, which underlies the whole world. This was the 
 final solution of the search after the Infinite, the Invisible, 
 the Unknown, the Divine, a search begun in the simplest 
 hymns of the Veda, and ended in the Upanishads, or as 
 they were afterwards called the Yedanta, the end or the 
 highest object of the Veda" (Hibb., pp. 314, 318). Again 
 
24 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 and ao-ain it is declared in the Yedanta that Brahma is both 
 maker and matter, he is to the universe what yarn is to cloth, 
 what milk to curds, what earth to a jar, what gold to a 
 bracelet. The Vedantist creed is summed up in two words, 
 Ekamcv adwitijam. One without a second. Another saying 
 of the Upanishads is, Brahma satyam, jagan mithya, jivo 
 Brahmaiva naparah, " Brahma is true, the universe false, 
 the soul is Brahma, there is no other " (Williams, Indian 
 Wisdom, p. 113). The goal of all knowledge is the ability 
 to say. Tat twam asi, " Thou art that," i.e, '' Thou art 
 identical with that, meaning Brahma" (Colebroke, Essays, 
 i. 30). Here is another extract from the Upanishads. 
 ^^ Where there is anything like duality there one sees another, 
 one smells another, one tastes another, one speaks to another, 
 one hears another, one minds another, one regards another, 
 one knows another. But where the whole is one spirit, 
 whom and by what can one see ? whom and by what can one 
 smell ? whom and by what can one taste ? to whom and by 
 what can one speak? whom and by what can one hear? 
 whom and by what one mind ? whom and by what can one 
 regard ? " (Williams, ut supra). Such is the pantheism of the 
 Vedas. 
 
 These are the only definite doctrines respecting God which 
 the Ycda knows. The polytheist can appeal to it, the 
 pantheist can appeal to it, but no one else. The deities of 
 modern India have no place in it. They come from the 
 Puranas, much more recent productions, which remind us of 
 nothing so much as of Gnostic cosmogonies on a vast scale, 
 and which cannot pretend to a tithe of the authority belong- 
 ing to the Veda. The modern thcist of Calcutta professes to 
 appeal to the Ycda, but he brings his theism to it. The 
 
SOLE TEACHING OF VEDAS. 
 
 place of theism, or monotheism, in India is anterior to the 
 Vedic age, not during its course or afterwards. The only 
 elements of theism in the Veda are vanishing relics, which 
 soon entirely disappear. My own conviction is that the 
 amount of religious truth to he found in the Ycdas has been 
 greatly exaggerated. In this case, as in many others, 
 readers find what they bring. Much of course must be 
 allowed to the enthusiasm excited by the discovery of the 
 new world opened in Vedic literature. But calm reflection 
 will show that the strongest statements in the Vedas respect- 
 ing the divine unity are vague. They cannot compare with 
 the clear enunciations, on the other side, of polytheism and 
 pantheism. As far as definite teaching goes, these two doc- 
 trines divide between them the whole area of Hinduism, — one 
 the creed of the masses, — the other the creed, though often 
 held esoterically, of the educated and philosophical. And 
 observe that even if monotheism could be shown to be an 
 integral element of Vedic teaching, it would but increase 
 the confusion and contradiction. Surely it is contradiction 
 enough that the same sacred books should teach doctrines so 
 mutually exclusive as polytheistic and pantheistic theories of 
 the divine nature. 
 
 To the truth of this representation we summon Professor 
 Muller as a witness, although we are sorry to find that at 
 this point his language, usually so transparent, becomes 
 strangely ambiguous. He sums up the stages of Hindu faith 
 as Kathenotheism, Polytheism, Monotheism, and Atheism. 
 Kathenotheism we may dismiss, as it is simply incipient 
 polytheism. Atheism also should be struck out ; for, 
 although it has no doubt existed as an opinion in the schools, 
 it has never taken root in Indian soil, and certainly does 
 
26 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION, 
 
 not deserve to rank as a sta£:e in the religious life of the 
 country. "We have now two phases left — Polytheism and 
 Monotheism. But what is meant by monotheism in India ? 
 I confess that I was startled beyond measure on first seeing 
 the word in the heading of the chapter. What, I asked my- 
 self, after living some years in India, and doing what I could 
 to understand the people, have I been all the while deceived ? 
 Is there monotheism, was there ever monotheism, in that 
 country? I turned eagerly to the chapter, but found no 
 reference to the monotheism mentioned in the heading. Then 
 another surprise started up. In the whole volume, text and 
 index, the word pantheism is not to be found. What, I said, 
 deceived again ? No pantheism in India ! You may as well 
 say there are no castes in India, no idols in the temples, 
 no genius and poetry and philosophy in the ancient books. 
 It is about you everywhere. You hear it, feel it, breathe it. 
 The Hindus would thoroughly sympathise with the pantheistic 
 sentiment breathing in so many of Wordsworth's lines, as 
 where he speaks of — 
 
 '* A sense sublime 
 Of something far more deeply interfused, 
 Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, 
 And the round ocean and the hving air, 
 And the blue sky, and in the mind of man ; 
 A motion and a spirit that impels 
 All thinking things, all objects of all thought, 
 And rolls through all things." 
 
 And yet pantheism is not so much as mentioned in our 
 author's account of Hinduism ; but you will have divined the 
 explanation. Professor Miiller's monotheism is Indian pan- 
 theism. Well, if pantheism is monotheism, as it no doubt is 
 in a sense, India is certainly monotheistic, and long has been. 
 But if Hindus arc monotheists, wo arc not. Of course there 
 
MONOTHEISM ABSENT, 27 
 
 is no sucli property in words as in land. If I choose to call 
 low what you call high, and to say ^^ Yes " when you say 
 " No," there is no law to prevent me. But it is not con- 
 venient to do so without giving notice of the change. We 
 cannot but look upon the term as unfortunate, and, although 
 not intentionally, misleading to general readers. Le Page 
 Renouf, in the second series of Hihhert Lectures, speaks far 
 more clearly, ascribing to the religion of ancient Egypt but 
 three stages — Henotheism, Pantheism, Materialism. How- 
 ever, although in an ambiguous way. Professor Miiller, or 
 rather the science of religion through him, testifies that the 
 Hindu religion has known but two stages — Polytheism and 
 Pantheism. 
 
 This position may need some further explanation and 
 defence. We are far from denying that monotheistic ten- 
 dencies are to be found in the Vedas, as they are to be found 
 in India now. But these tendencies never took definite shape, 
 or acquired practical influence. Just at the point where 
 monotheism should have emerged, pantheism emerged instead. 
 Pantheism, and not monotheism, was the Indian solution of 
 the problem of the universe. Even on the supposition that 
 India was, from the first, under a law of simple evolution, 
 this is what evolution led to. Can any one regard it as 
 satisfactory ? On any theory is not India a demonstration of 
 the insufficiency of human reason left to Itself, and of the 
 necessity of higher revelation ? How little monotheism there 
 is In the Vedas we have seen. That there has been any 
 since no one will contend. In India to-day you have a more 
 extreme polytheism and a more logical pantheism, both of 
 them developments of Yedlc teaching. Plato and Aristotle 
 held far more definite language respecting the unity of the 
 
28 CBBISTIAMTY AND TEE SCIENCE OF BE LI G TON. 
 
 First Cause than any Indian thinker. But do we on that 
 account speak of the monotheism of ancient Greece ? Would 
 it not be misleading to rank this among the stages of Greek 
 religious life? There are altars to the Unkno\Yn God. 
 A\ here are the altars to the One God ? Monotheism, as "we 
 understand it, is essentially intolerant of rivalry. It cannot 
 fraternise with polytheism. The jealousy of the Decalogue 
 burns in it. Are these views in Greece or India, which 
 were consistent with polytheistic practices, rightly called 
 monotheism ? Professor Miiller is far truer to fact when he 
 speaks of a " tendency towards monotheism " (p. 292). 
 Tendency? Yes, but tendency towards a thing is not the 
 thing itself. He presently goes on to show that the tendency 
 never issued in anything definite. Even the lonely supre- 
 macy of the Western Jupiter never had a parallel in India, at 
 least in Vedic days. The only unity Hinduism ever reached, 
 if unity it may be called, is that of pantheism. Our author 
 says very truly : " With the Greeks and Romans and Germans 
 we know that their ancient gods, when their course was run, 
 either disappeared altogether, or, if their existence could not 
 be entirely annihilated, they were degraded into evil and 
 mischievous spirits ; while there was, at the same time, a new 
 religion, namely, Christianity, ready at hand, and capable of 
 supplying those cravings of the heart which can never be 
 entirely suppressed. In India there was no such religion 
 coming, as it were, from the outside, in which the Brahmans, 
 after they had lost their old gods and protectors, could have 
 taken refuge." We are quite unable to reconcile such lan- 
 guage with the ascription of a monotheistic stage to Indian 
 life, except, of course, on tlie supposition tliat ])anthcism is 
 ailed by this name. In his last pages Professor Muller does 
 
RESULTS. 29 
 
 indeed s^oeak as if the distinction between Creator and created 
 is permanent in Indian faith. He says, " And yet they did 
 not believe in the annihilation of their own Self." But we 
 do not see how this can be made to agree with tlic teacli- 
 ing of the Yedic Upanishads. If pantheism of the most 
 definite type is taught anywhere, it is taught in those 
 treatises.* 
 
 Xow, here is a people, acute if any were ever acute, 
 religious if any were ever religious, age after age glvluo; to 
 the study of the mysteries of existence the enero-y which 
 other peoples gave to material conquests, and what Is tlie 
 outcome ? Polytheism and Pantheism. The seekers only 
 burst through the iron bars of sense to plunge sheer down 
 into the abyss of universal being. They never rose to the 
 simple and sublime conception of one living and true God, 
 Maker of heaven and earth, but, because its Maker, dis- 
 tinct from it. They never succeeded in disentangling the 
 spiritual from the material, the infinite from the finite, 
 the Creator from the creature. Religious history in India, 
 as elsewhere, is a history of declension ; for we hold that 
 pantheism, wdiile an advance on polytheism intellectually. Is 
 no advance morally and religiously, but the opposite. If any 
 people could have succeeded in finding God, apart from the 
 aid of revelation, we should have expected the Hindus to do 
 so. Where they failed who is likely to succeed? Did it 
 fare better with the Chinese, Persians, Egyptians, Greeks, 
 Romans? We know that it fared worse. Their religions 
 will not compare for consistency, depth, and thoroughness 
 with the Indian. Does not such a failure amount as nearly 
 as possible to a demonstration of the inability of man, In his 
 * See Xote 4. 
 
30 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 present state, and with his present powers, to arrive at clear 
 and certain conceptions of the nature of God ? * 
 
 By way of contrast let us turn to Old Testament teaching. 
 Here we are in quite a different world. Here from the 
 first the grand central truth of the unity of God stands out in 
 sharp definition. We say, from the first, for in this feature 
 lies the very pith of the contrast. Here is no wavering, no 
 feeling after God, no searching for the truth, no progress in 
 its discovery ; for, great as was the progress as respects the 
 contents of the doctrine of God, that is, as respects knowledge 
 of the divine character and will, on the single point of 
 the divine unity there was no progress from the first page of 
 revelation to the last. The very first verse of Scripture 
 enunciates a doctrine of the divine unity as clear and full as 
 that we liold ; in fact, the same. In the words, '^ In the 
 beginning God created the heavens and the earth," the unity 
 of God, His distinctness from nature, and His personality, are 
 all plainly implied. When we remember that the book of 
 Genesis was at least contemporaneous with the Vedas, and 
 probably earlier, we must feel that the contrast between the 
 two on this fundamental point is unique. And we know how 
 subsequently Israel stood forth before the world as the witness 
 and guardian of the doctrine of the divine unity; how the 
 history of the doctrine and the history of the people were 
 interwoven. This is the fact, guaranteed by the science of 
 religion ; for, as to the theories about the development of 
 Jewish faith in the divine unity out of a pre-existent poly- 
 theism, they are mere unproved speculations. No unbiassed 
 person can read the fantastic theories put forward respecting 
 the '^ Mythology of the Hebrews " without coming to the 
 
 * See Note 5. 
 
CONCEIVABLE THEORIES, 31 
 
 conclusion that the age of myth-making is not yet past, and 
 that the true mythologists are these modern theorisers. Here 
 is the fact. What is the explanation ? Only tlu'ee explana- 
 tions are conceivable. 
 
 We may suppose that the Jews discovered this truth for 
 themselves by their own force of genius. And this seems 
 to be the notion of some, who speak of the genius of the Jews 
 for the discovery of religious truth. But, as already in- 
 timated, genius is a vague term, and is rather a substitute 
 for an explanation than an explanation. How is it that the 
 Jews never displayed special genius in any other intellectual 
 field ? To suppose that a people of no philosophical aptitude 
 made a discovery which such nations as the Greeks and 
 Hindus failed to do would be to believe, not in an intellectual 
 miracle — for in the case of miracle an adequate cause is 
 assigned — but in an intellectual contradiction or impossibility. 
 No ^ one knows this better than M. Kenan. He says: 
 " Apart from superiority in religion, the Jewish people had 
 superiority of no other kind. Of all the nations of antiquity 
 they are the least gifted in science and philosophy. They 
 have no great political or military position. Their institutions 
 are purely conservative. The prophets, who well represent 
 their genius, are essentially men of the past (?), with theii* 
 faces always turned to a former ideal. How explain, in a 
 society so contracted and so little developed, a revolution of 
 ideas such as Athens and Alexandria failed to accomplish ? " 
 He therefore rightly rejects this explanation. 
 
 But M. Kenan's own ex|)lanation is just as little satisfactory. 
 He attributes the Jewish doctrine to a monotheistic tendency 
 in the Semitic nature. A mere tendency, unsuj^ported by 
 evidence, is just as poor an explanation as genius. And 
 
32 CHRISTIANITY AND TEE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 where is the evidence of such a teiicleiicj ? Is it to be found 
 among the old Egyptians, Arabs, Babylonians, Assyrians, 
 Phoenicians, all belonging to the Sotnitic line ? On the con- 
 trary, these were one and all idolaters of the grossest kind, 
 and on the most colossal scale. ISTot one of these nations 
 worked its way out of idolatry, except the Arabs, long after 
 the Clu'istian era, under the influence of Mohammedanism. 
 Professor Miiller well says that if we transfer the word 
 instinct from animal to rational life, we simply use a word to 
 avoid a definition. '' It may sound more scientific to speak 
 of a monotheistic instinct rather tlian of the inborn image, or 
 the revealed truth of the one living God ; but is instinct less 
 mysterious than revelation ? Can there be an instinct with- 
 out an instigation or an instigator? And whose hand was 
 it that instigated the Semitic mind to the worship of one 
 God? Could the same hand instigate the Aryan mind to 
 the worship of many gods?" {Chijys, i. 351). We have no 
 objection to admit this monotheistic instinct in the Semitic 
 character, if it can be proved by evidence, because even then 
 we should require a cause for the instinct. What we object to 
 is i)urc hypothesis. What we object to is an instinct, the only 
 evidence of which is that very Jewish monotheism which it is 
 called in to explain. Wh}^, there was no such instinct even 
 in the Jews. Their frequent rela])scs into idolatry prove 
 that they were made of the same material as their Semitic 
 brethren, and that, if they had been left to themselves, they 
 would have followed the same course. 
 
 The other explanation is that of divine revelation, and it 
 is tlic only satisfactory one. Even Professor MUllcr feels 
 himself slmt up to this conclusion. In an earlier essay on 
 '' Semitic Monotheism " ( C/^//.)5, Vol. 1.) he derives the first 
 
PEIMITI VE B VELA TION. 33 
 
 knowledge of God, not from the operation of the senses, as 
 in the hiter work, but from a primitive, innate intuition in 
 human nature. We need not dwell on his theory to the 
 effect that this intuition simply included the general notion of 
 Ood, without reference to the question of one god or many, 
 and that the polytheism of the Aryan peoples was a sort of 
 trick played upon them by the peculiar structure of their 
 language, while the Semitic tongues favoured a monotheistic 
 tendency. We are not quite sure that M. Renan would not, 
 after all, claim Professor Miiller as a follower. However, 
 consistently or not, nothing can be clearer than the lan- 
 guage of the latter. He says : " If we are asked how Abraham 
 possessed not only the primitive intuition of God as He had 
 revealed Himself to all mankind, but passed through the 
 denial of all other gods to the knowledge of the one God, we 
 are content to answer that it was by a special divine revela- 
 tion. We do not indulge in theological phraseology, but 
 we mean every word to its fullest extent. The Father of 
 truth chooses His own prophets, and He speaks to them in a 
 voice stronger than the voice of thunder. A divine instinct 
 may sound more scientific and less theological, ^but in truth 
 it would neither be an appropriate name for what is a gift or 
 grace accorded to but few, nor would it be a more scientific, 
 i.e.^ a more intelligible word than special revelation. The 
 important point, however, is not whether the faith of Abraham 
 should be called a divine instinct, or a revelation ; what we 
 wish here to insist on is, that that instinct, or revelation, was 
 special, granted to one man, and handed down from him to 
 Jews, Christians, and Mohammedans, to all who believe in 
 the God of Abraham" (p. 373). 
 
 We have only touched on a single point in the domain of 
 
 D 
 
34 CHRISTIANITY AND TEE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 religious knowledofe, albeit a fundamental one. We have 
 said notliincr of the doctrine of the divine nature, and 
 especially its moral attributes ; nothing of immortality, the 
 moral law, sin, sacrifice, incarnation, and all the other great 
 ideas belonging to the same domain. On these subjects far 
 more powerful arguments might be raised. The contrast 
 drawn between Christianity and Hinduism, on a single point, 
 might be carried round the whole circle. And what has been 
 said of India might be said, and no doubt will be said, of 
 other countries. We have simply tried to show how the 
 researches going on in this new field will eventually tell in 
 favour of Christian truth. Nor, although we have made fre- 
 quent reference to the first series of Hibhert Lectures, has it 
 been our object to criticise those Lectures as a whole. If it 
 had been, we should have had something to say of the strange 
 half-hope, half-prophecy, with which the Lecturer concludes, 
 of a " Church of the Future," in which Hindu, Buddhist, 
 Mohammedan, Jew, and Christian are to feel equally at 
 home; the Hindu having been persuaded, by some unexplained 
 agency, to leave behind everything but his firm faith in the 
 invisible, the Buddhist everything but his passive resignation, 
 the Mohammedan everything but his sobriety, the Jew every- 
 thing but his faith in one God, the Christian everything but 
 one word — love. And we should have had still more to say 
 of the radical fallacy running through the Lectures, that all 
 ideas, even the moral and spiritual, are derived from the 
 senses.* The Lecturer here confounds ideas with their 
 names. That the names we give to objects in the spiritual 
 world arc derived from the material, we admit. And there 
 arc no better illustrations of the process by which these words 
 
 • See Note 6. 
 
THE NATURAL AND SPIRITUAL. 35 
 
 gradually lose their old material associations than those given 
 by Professor Muller. Bat that those ideas themselves have a 
 material origin, we altogether deny. Take the words spirit 
 and inspiration. In most languages, both Semitic and Aryan, 
 the name for the spirit is taken from breath, a material object. 
 But did those who first used this name think of the spirit in 
 man as mere breath ? If they did, why create a new dis- 
 tmction ? Must not the new idea have existed before it was 
 named, just as the material object existed before it was 
 named? They evidently contemplated that within them 
 which thought and felt, which loved and feared, as like breath 
 in some respect, but, because like breath, not breath. Why 
 spiritual things borrowed their names from physical is obvious. 
 Physical things lay nearest, struck the attention first, and 
 w^ere first distinguished from each other. The spiritual world 
 was only discovered and mapped out by degrees. '' That 
 was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural, and 
 afterward that which is spiritual." Take as another illus- 
 tration the Hebrew word for glory or honour, Kahod, which 
 means originally iceiglit. Did the idea of honour or glory 
 arise from weight ? How could it ? "What relation is there 
 between the two ? How could weight suggest glory ? Is it 
 not evident that the Hebrews, having the idea of glory or 
 honour, and looking about in the material world for some- 
 thing by which to characterise its essence, were most struck 
 by the thought of the hurden or iceight of responsibility 
 attaching to honour, and named it accordingly ? Before one 
 thing can be named after another, they must be compared, 
 and before they can be compared they must exist. To 
 borrow names for spiritual objects from the material world is 
 one thing, to derive the spiritual world itself from the material 
 
 d2 
 
36 CEIUSTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 is another and -widely different thing. On the basis of 
 materialism no religion, and, indeed, no philosophy can be 
 built, and none know this better than materialists themselves. 
 Manipulate matter as you please, you have only matter at 
 the end. Out of matter you cannot get thought, soul, God. 
 No wonder that the philosophers, so called, who deny the 
 existence of mind, scout mental philosophy as much as 
 religion. 
 
 On this subject, as in most others, two extremes are to be 
 avoided. First, there is the danger of under-estimating the 
 amount of truth in heathen systems. And this danger is not 
 a harmless one in the case of Christian missionaries. Any- 
 thing like contempt or indiscriminate condemnation on their 
 part awakens a spirit of hostility, which is an effectual 
 barrier to all influence for good. Such condemnation is sure 
 to be put down to ignorance. A missionary of all men must 
 show that he knows and can appreciate all that is true 
 in other faiths, and he can do this with perfect loyalty 
 to the truth whose messenger he is. Oppose error and con- 
 demn sin he must, and he will find enough to oppose and 
 condemn ; but he will do this with greater effect the more he 
 has sought to bring himself into sympathy with those to 
 whom he speaks. A Christian can afford to be charitable 
 and generous in his estimate of other faiths. Those who 
 know the best and worst of heathenism know that rivalry is 
 not to be dreamt of. Moreover, is it not a mark of Christian 
 charity that it "rejoices in the truth"? No one can give 
 larger scope to such charity than a disciple of John Wesley. 
 He believes in universal redemption and goes forth to speak 
 to a redeemed world. He has no doubt that Christ made 
 atonement even for the millions who passed away in " the 
 
TWO EXTREMES. 37 
 
 times of this ignorance." Can we suppose that even with 
 respect to these the atonement was without result, that it 
 procured for them no grace from " the Father of the spirits 
 of all flesh"? Nay, ought we not to trace whatever gleams 
 of truth and goodness we find in the heathen world of Greece, 
 and Rome, and India, the wisdom and virtue of their greatest 
 lives, not to the unaided resources of human nature — that 
 would surely be the veriest Pelagianism — or to natural evolu- 
 tion, but to " the true light which lighteth every man that 
 Cometh into the world" ? The light that pours on us its full 
 noontide splendour shone there only in broken, glimmering 
 rays, but it was the same Light. Just as there was never 
 any light in the physical world that did not come from the 
 Sun, so there was never any light in human mind or con- 
 science that did not come from " the Light of the world," the 
 eternal Word, the Revealer of God to man. Besides, to deny 
 to the heathen all possession of truth would be to destroy 
 their responsibility. Their sin is in proportion to their light. 
 We cannot follow a better example than the great Apostle, 
 who, while taking his stand on what the heathen knew of 
 God and appealing to the remnants of truth in their litera- 
 ture, was none the less a faithful and fearless herald of the 
 Gospel of Christ. 
 
 The other extreme, which exaggerates the good in 
 heathenism, is more dangerous, and in certain quarters 
 more popular. Religious evolutionists would make the 
 difference between Christianity and other religions one 
 merely of degree, and explain Christianity itself by natural 
 development. We cannot of course complain of the attempt 
 to prove this by the ascertained facts of history. An evolu- 
 tionist has just as much right to try to prove his thesis by 
 
38 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 accepted facts as we have to try to prove ours. What we 
 complain of is that the theory which should only appear at 
 the end is often assumed at the beginning, and colours the 
 whole course of investigation. The verdict is brought in and 
 sentence passed before the evidence is heard. Indeed the 
 witnesses are only allowed to say what agrees with the 
 verdict. Against this we protest, not in the name of faith, 
 but in the name of science. It may be said that we commit 
 the same fault in coming to the subject with Christian pre- 
 possessions. But this is to misstate the case. We simply 
 argue from accepted facts, as we have conceded every one is 
 at liberty to do. The conclusions can always be tested by 
 the facts. The injustice is when professedly scientific in- 
 quiry is prosecuted in the interest of theory. A criticism by 
 Professor Miiller applies to only too many : ^^ We may 
 accept all the facts of M. Renan, for his facts are almost 
 always to be trusted ; but we cannot accept his conclusions, 
 because they would be in contradiction to other facts, which 
 M. Eenan places too much in the background or ignores 
 altogether" {Chips, i. 349). 
 
 If we are asked, What is likely to be the ultimate result 
 of inquiry in this field in relation to Christian faith? we 
 answer, The same as in the field of physical science. Does 
 any Christian doubt that in the end j^hysical science will 
 greatly strengthen the foundations of faith ? Its most fruitful 
 discovery is that of the universal reign of law. In ancient 
 times the great physical symbol of order or law was the 
 stately march of the heavenly bodies. The Eastern world is 
 in accord with the Western on this point, for it has been 
 shown that tlic Sanscrit word lita, which is the equivalent of 
 our law or order, is taken from the movements of the heavens. 
 
FIXAL BESULTS. 39 
 
 But the application of the same principle to the internal 
 structure of material bodies, to human society and history, 
 was little suspected in antiquity. It is now shown that the 
 same law extends to the most minute objects, and the struc- 
 ture of the smallest particles which analysis can reach. From 
 the least to the greatest everything is ordered in number, 
 weight and measure. Surely this universal harmony, this 
 Cosmos, as the Greeks with their fine sense for the beautiful 
 called the fair world they looked upon, strengthens to an in- 
 calculable degree the necessity for a Supreme Intelligence. 
 A world all caprice and chaos might be explained by the 
 blind working of atoms, but not so a universe pervaded from 
 centre to circumference by order and beauty. To make law 
 itself the explanation is not a very rational proceeding, for it 
 is the very fact of law which requires to be explained by 
 beincr assio-ned to a sufficient cause. In some hands law 
 becomes a sort of philosophical fetish, ^^e look upon the 
 present sceptical tendencies of science as a passing aberration. 
 Sceptical theories are no part of science itself, but additions 
 due to unscientific imagination. When a justly distinguished 
 teacher discerns in matter " the promise and potency of all 
 terrestrial life," he candidly tells us that in order to reach 
 this tremendous conclusion he has to " cross the boundary of 
 experimental evidence " in obedience to an ^' intellectual 
 necessity " — a necessity, by the way, as hypothetical as in- 
 stinct, or genius, or intuition, or, according to some, revela- 
 tion, — that is, he is merely expressing a personal opinion. 
 It is often said that works like the Bridgewater Treatises and 
 Paley's Natural Theology are out of date, and no doubt this 
 is true as to the range of their scientific knowledge. 
 But their principles of argumentation are the old, everlasting 
 
40 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION. 
 
 principles of universal reason. We trust that when the new 
 Christian apologies of the same class come to be written, as 
 they will, they may be marked by the same clearness and 
 strength and felicity of argument. 
 
 Similar results, we believe, w^ill follow in the religious- 
 sphere. The object of science in the religious and historical^ 
 as in the physical field, is to discover and exhibit the unity 
 that binds the Avhole together. From the greater complexity 
 of the phenomena and the nature of the factors which here 
 come into play, this task is far more difficult in the former 
 than in the latter case, but it is being done. 
 
 Let us here protest against the notion that, by establishing 
 the presence of law in the world of human action, we exclude 
 the possibility of freedom and bring the moral world under 
 the reign of the same necessity, or, as it is called in these 
 days, determinism, as the physical. It is a mere assumption 
 that all laws in the sense of orderly sequences must perforce 
 be of the same kind. Their nature must vary with the con- 
 ditions with which they deal. Law cannot mean the same 
 for man that it means for a stone or a planet. It must take 
 into account the whole difference between man and a stone. 
 Moral law must harmonise with the freedom and responsi- 
 bility to which every one's consciousness bears witness. It 
 is a curious inconsistency of modern scepticism that the very 
 persons who forbid us to argue from mind to matter, as 
 in the design argument, and assert that to do so is illegi- 
 timate, themselves argue from matter to mind. They say 
 that, because the physical laws which reign in nature are 
 necessary, the laws which govern human conduct are neces- 
 sary too ; that to prove the existence of law is equivalent to 
 proving necessity. We affirm, on the contrary, that our 
 
GOB IN HISTORY. 41 
 
 argument from mind to matter is legitimate, because we do 
 not assimilate matter to mind, we do not say that the design- 
 ing intelligence is in the matter but simply the product of 
 designing intelligence ; whereas they assimilate mind to 
 matter, asserting that law must mean the same for one which 
 it means for the other. We do not transmute matter into 
 mind, they do transmute mind into matter. On the con- 
 trary, law must leave human freedom untouched, and 
 work out its results through or in spite of that very 
 freedom. 
 
 Some dim perception of the unity of purpose running 
 through the religious history of mankind is beginning to 
 dawn upon us, and it brightens day by day. We have no 
 reason to think that the unity fails where our knowledge of 
 it fails. We do not suppose that our horizon is the limit of 
 existence, that beyond where our vision ends there is nothing 
 more to be seen. We would rather attribute the defect to 
 the limitation of our faculties. Higher intelligence may 
 read order and harmony where we see confusion. Our 
 knowledge on this subject is only in its infancy. There can 
 be little doubt that one day the evidences of design will be 
 seen to be as plentiful in history as in creation. In other 
 words, it will be seen that one can as little be explained 
 without a Divine Ruler as the other without a Divine Creator; 
 that man has just as little been left to be the sport of chance 
 or accident as inanimate nature. It is a far stronger proof of 
 intelligence, a far higher order of government, to control free 
 agents than to control dead matter and force. It would be poor 
 praise to God to say that He can only carry out His purposes 
 through passive instruments. The very perfection, the very 
 glory of His government consists in the fact that amid the 
 
42 CHRISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCU OF RELIGION. 
 
 endless play of powers free as His own, he carries on His 
 purposes to ultimate triumph. 
 
 Contemplated under this point of view, the whole religious 
 history of the world may be regarded as a preparation for 
 Christianity. Not that other religions stand on the same 
 level as the Jewish in this respect. There are different 
 kinds of preparations, some designed, others permitted ; some 
 positive, others negative. When we see that not one nation, 
 but every nation has put forth its whole strength in the effort 
 to solve the problem of religion, that the question has been 
 approached from every side and every kind of solution has 
 been tried, and with the same result, can we suppose that all 
 this has been permitted without purpose? All these blind 
 gropings and longings of man's spirit after God, these hesi- 
 tating answers and guesses at truth, liave they been mere 
 beatings of the air? 
 
 Such a view of the meaning of history is by no means 
 identical with the theory of the divine education of the world, 
 of which we have heard so much. That theory supposes 
 error to be a necessary stage on the way to truth. We might 
 as well say that wrong is a necessary stage to right, and 
 ignorance to knowledge, 2.<?., that opposites are identical. If 
 there is any meaning in words, error is a departure from 
 truth ; and how men can reach truth by departing from it is 
 a mystery. The first step in the return to truth is the 
 abandonment of error. True, the abandonment may be 
 gradual, but in so far as it is abandonment of error it is 
 truth. The theory referred to virtually implicates God in 
 the authorship of error and sin, implying that He uses them 
 of set purpose in the training of mankind. Such a notion is 
 altogether abhorrent to every right-thinking mind, nor is it 
 
PREPARATIONS FOR CHRISTIANITY. 43 
 
 necessary on the Christian standpoint. We hold that man 
 was originally in possession of truth as he was morally good, 
 and that he might have advanced to perfection in both 
 respects without error and sin. That he did not do so, is his 
 own fault. It may be said that the law of development, which 
 we admit, in Scripture is practically the same thing, but it is 
 not so. Incomplete truth is not error, just as incipient good- 
 ness is not sin. The morning twilight is not darkness. 
 Error and sin are no necessary conditions of development 
 and progress. There may be development in what is good. 
 But while rigidly limiting the authorship of evil to man, we 
 may yet consistently believe that God overrules evil for 
 greater good. Scripture and history are full of examples of 
 this. Otherwise, it would be in the power of man to with- 
 draw himself altogether from the divine control, and to 
 exclude God from wide tracts of His own kingdom, a thought 
 not to be entertained for a moment. The Pharaohs and 
 Nebuchadnezzars and Herods and Pilates of history are only 
 more striking illustrations of a universal law, by which evil is 
 made to contribute to its own defeat. The entrance of sin 
 modifies, but it does not annihilate, the divine purpose in 
 creation. It is impossible for us to trace the working out of 
 this purpose in all cases, or to explain all the difficulties which 
 may be started. It may never be possible for us to do this 
 fully. But we know enough to justify us in believing the 
 fact. Such a divine purpose gives meaning and unity to 
 history, which otherwise is a scene of discord and contradic- 
 tion. If St. Paul could speak of inanimate nature as longing 
 for the revelation of future glory, may we not regard man's 
 religious strivings as an unconscious prophecy of a prepara- 
 tion for that purer faith which was to be the satisfaction of 
 
44 CHBISTIANITY AND THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION 
 
 all his aspirations? This point of view, which is the one 
 taken in such works as Hardwick's Christ and Other Masters, 
 is, we are convinced, the right one, and the only one from 
 which the history of mankind becomes intelligible. 
 
 On one point we differ fundamentally from religious evolu- 
 tionists of all shades. They are looking for some system in 
 the future which will combine the good of all preceding 
 systems. We hold that Christianity does this. Whatever of 
 truth and goodness is found in other religions is found in 
 Christianity in finished form. Is it asked. Which Christianity, 
 of which school, or church, or age ? We answer. The common 
 Christianity of all churches and ages. We hear much about 
 " The Church of the Future," '' The Gospel for the Nineteenth 
 Century." Christianity is the Church of the Future. The 
 Gospel of the first century is the Gospel for the nineteenth. 
 It alone bears the stamp of universal purpose. We need not 
 fear to acknowledge that polytheism, and all the other isms, 
 owe whatever attraction or vitality they possess to certain 
 elements or aspects of truth which they embody ; but all 
 these, purged of the enormous errors with which they are 
 connected, are harmonised into a perfect whole in Christianity. 
 Each doctrine in the complete system of Scripture answers to 
 some need of human nature. Christ is " the Truth " abso- 
 lutely. Our hope for the future is not that false systems 
 and true will blend into something higher, but that Hindu, 
 Buddhist, Mohammedan, and Jew will recognise in the Gospel 
 of Christ that which responds to every true instinct of the 
 soul. Here is the centre of unity for mankind. That cannot 
 be found, as some dream, in sentiment alone. Men cannot 
 be one in affection while utterly at variance in intellio^ence 
 and will. Human nature is itself a unity of powers, not all 
 
CHRISTIAN HOPE. 45 
 
 intelligence, or feeling, or will, but all these together. That 
 which satisfies human nature must satisfy these. Christianity, 
 that is, Jesus Christ, does this. He reveals God, who is 
 truth and holiness and love — truth for the intellect to appre- 
 hend, love for the affections to delight in, holiness for the will 
 to strive after — and it can only be by believing the same 
 truth and holiness and love that man can be brought into 
 harmony with himself and his fellows. " No man knoweth 
 the Father but the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal 
 Him." "No man hath seen God at any time; the only- 
 begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath 
 declared Him." Thus is Christ the centre of the world. There 
 is not a soul but is connected by invisible lines with Him. To 
 men in their weary search for truth and righteousness and 
 eternal life. He says, " Come unto Me, and I will give you 
 rest." Thus, our faith stands secure that " in the dispensa- 
 tion of the fulness of times He will gather together in one all 
 things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on 
 earth." 
 
NOTES. 
 
 Note 1. 
 
 Buddhism, by Rhys Davids, published by the Society for 
 the Propagation of Christian Knowledge, is an excellent 
 popular manual on the subject. The founder of Buddhism is 
 known by different names. Guntama is his family name ; Shakya- 
 muni, Shakya-sage, his tribal name ; and Baddha, the Enlightened 
 One, a title of honour. The history of his renunciation of princely 
 rank for the life of a religious student and teacher, is one of the 
 most romantic on record. In the recoil from the extravagances of 
 Hindu polytheism he ignored, or altogether denied God, the soul, 
 and immortality. In short, he rejected religion, making virtue 
 everything. To speak in modern language, he taught pure 
 materialism or secularism. The distinctions of caste and faith in 
 ceremonialism were utterly repudiated. While the system which 
 bears his name has played as great a part in history as Moham- 
 medanism, his personal character is far purer and nobler than 
 Mohammed's. He relied on teaching alone for the propagation of 
 his views. Buddhism has proved itself a missionary religion. 
 Although it originated, and at one time it is said generally pre- 
 vailed, in India, to-day there is not a Buddhist to be found there. 
 The history of its expulsion is involved in obscurity. At present 
 China, Burmah and Tibet are its strongholds. Buddhists found 
 themselves unable to live on the abstractions of their founder, and 
 in their hands the system became completely transformed. Of 
 Tibetan Buddhism, Mr. Davids says : '' Lamaism, indeed, with its 
 shaven priests, its bells and rosaries, its images and holy water, 
 and gorgeous dresses ; its service with double choirs, and pro- 
 cessions, and creeds, and mystic rites, and incense, in which the 
 
48 NOTES. 
 
 laity are spectators only ; its abbots and 'monks, and nuns of 
 many grades ; its worship of the double Virgin, and of the saints 
 and angels ; its fasts, confessions, and purgatory ; its images, its 
 idols, and its pictures ; its huge monasteries, and its gorgeous 
 cathedrals ; its powerful hierarchy, its cardinals, its Pope, bears 
 outwardly, at least, a strong resemblance to Eomanism, in spite 
 of the essential difference of its teaching, and of its mode of 
 thought." 
 
 Eespecting Nirvana, the distinctive dogma of Buddhism, there 
 has been much controversy. That the word means extinction, is 
 universally admitted. But extinction of 2vhat? It is generally 
 interpreted as equivalent to the extinction of the soul, or personal 
 existence. Mr. Davids thinks that it means extinction of the evil 
 desire, which is the cause, according to Buddhist notions, of suc- 
 cessive births. He would thus make it equivalent to virtue, or 
 Jwliness. But it must be remembered that Mr. Davids has already 
 said that for Buddha there is no soul to be extinguished. Thus, 
 in the end, Mr. Davids agrees substantially with the common view, 
 which ascribes to Buddhism in the first instance the common belief 
 in the existence of the individual soul. 
 
 Note 2. 
 
 The following quotations will be enough to show that we have 
 rightly interpreted his position : " What I hold is that with every 
 finite perception there is a concomitant perception, or, if that 
 word should seem too strong, a concomitant sentiment or pre- 
 sentiment of the infinite ; that, from the very first act of touch, 
 or hearing, or sight, we are brought in contact not only with a 
 visible, but also, at the same time, with an invisible universe. 
 Those, therefore, who deny the possibility or the legitimacy of the 
 idea of the infinite in our human consciousness, must meet us here 
 on their own ground. All our knowledge, they say, must begin 
 with the senses. Yes, we say, and it is the senses which give us 
 the first intimation of the infinite. What grows afterwards out of 
 this intimation supplies materials both to the psychologist and to 
 the historian of religion, and to both of them this indisputable 
 sentiment of the infinite is the first pre-historic impulse to all 
 
NOTES. 49 
 
 religion. I do not say that in the first dark pressure of the infinite 
 upon us, we have all at once the full and lucid consciousness of 
 that highest of all concepts — I mean the very opposite. I simply 
 say we have in it a germ, and a living germ ; we have in it that 
 without which no religion would have been possible ; we have in 
 that perception of the infinite the root of the whole historical 
 development of human faith" (p. 45). Observe how, in the next 
 quotation, our author accepts the premiss that reason must assert 
 nothing which the senses do not give : "In trying to discover the 
 living and natural springs of religion, we must take nothing for 
 granted, except what is granted us by all philosophers, whether 
 positive or negative. I explained in my first lecture how I was 
 quite prepared to accept these terms to the very end of my course. 
 "We were told that all knowledge, in order to be knowledge, must 
 pass through two gates, and two gates only — the gate of the 
 senses, and the gate of reason. Religious knowledge also, 
 whether true or false, must have passed through these two gates. 
 At these two gates, therefore, we take our stand. Whatever 
 claims to have entered in by any other gate — whether that gate be 
 called primeval revelation or religious instinct — must be rejected 
 as contraband of thought ; and whatever claims to have entered by 
 the gate of reason, without having first passed through the gate of 
 the senses, must equally be rejected, as without sufficient reason, 
 or ordered at least to go back to the first gate, in order to pro- 
 duce there its full credentials. Having accepted these conditions, 
 I endeavoured to show, first of all, that the idea of the infinite, 
 which is at the root of all religious thought, is not simply evolved 
 by reason out of nothing, but supplied to us in its original form by 
 our senses. If the idea of the infinite had no sensuous percept to 
 rely on, we should, according to the terms of our agreement, have 
 to reject it." And so on. 
 
 Note 
 
 On page 22 of Hihlert Lectures Professor Miiller says : *' In a 
 course of introductory lectures on the * Science of Religion,' 
 delivered at the Royal Institution in 1873, I tried to define the 
 
 E 
 
50 NOTES. 
 
 subjective side of religion, or what is commonly called faith, in the 
 followin;^^ words : — ' Religion is a mental faculty, which, inde- 
 pendent of, nay, in spite of sense and reason, enables man to 
 apprehend the infinite under difterent names and under varying 
 disguises. Without that faculty, no religion, not even the lowest 
 worship of idols and fetishes, would be possible ; and if we will 
 but listen attentively, we can hear in all religions a groaning of 
 the spirit, a struggle to conceive the inconceivable, to utter the 
 unutterable, a longing after the Infinite, a love of God.' I do not 
 quote these words because I altogether approve of them now. I 
 very seldom approve altogether of what I have written myself 
 some years ago. I fully admit the force of many objections that 
 have been raised against that definition of rehgion, but I still think 
 that the kernel of it is sound. I should not now call it an ex- 
 haustive definition of rehgion, but I believe it supplies such 
 characteristics as to enable us to distinguish between religious con- 
 sciousness on one side, and sensuous and rational consciousness on 
 the other." On page 2G the lecturer proceeds to speak of the three 
 functions of sense, reason, and faith ; but the two latter are 
 made subordinate to, or dependent on, the first. Both are "de- 
 velopments of sensuous perception." How in this case faith 
 acts independently, nay, in spite of sense and reason, it is not 
 easy to see. 
 
 Note 4. 
 
 So high an authority as Dr. Legge in his recent work, The 
 llelifjions of China, takes the same view of the course of religion in 
 that country that has been taken above in respect to India. The 
 modern Chinese religion, or religions, he regards as a corruption of 
 a primitive monotheism. Owing to the peculiar structure of the 
 Chinese language, he believes that he is able to cstabhsh the 
 existence of such monotheism at least 5,000 years ago, long before 
 the date of the carHest literature. "Five thousand years ago," he 
 says, " the Chinese were monotheists — not hcnotheists but mono- 
 theists " (page 1(3). And again, " A belief in one supreme and only 
 God was coeval with the fathers and founders of the nation, and 
 was testified to by the primitive characters " (page 70), a species 
 
NOTES. 51 
 
 of proof not accessible in India. The cormption of religion in 
 China took a different form from what it did in India, the worship 
 of spirits and ancestors taking the place of nature-worship. Like 
 the writers of the Yedas, Confacius did not claim to be an original 
 founder, but simply a transmitter of what he received from earlier 
 days (pp. 4:, 123). 
 
 Note 5. 
 
 Another point should be remembered. \Ye must beware of 
 reading modern meanings into old words. The Yedic Hindu had 
 the word devata, which answers to our deiti/, and also the word 
 demyV/hich. is the Greek ^eos and the Latin Dens ; but it is more 
 than doubtful whether he had the idea of Deity or God. The 
 words are the same, hut the meanings attached to them are widely 
 different. Professor Miiller rightly enough thinks that deva in the 
 Vedas would be better rendered '' bright one " than " god." He 
 says : " Dcva, from the root div, to shine, meant originally bright ; 
 the dictionaries give its meaning as god or divine. But, if in 
 translating the hymns of the Veda, we always translate dfrca by 
 Deus, or by god, we should sometimes commit a mental ana- 
 chronism of a thousand years." And again : " Let us suppose that 
 we could place ourselves face to face with the poets of the Ycda, 
 even with those who called the rivers mothers, and the sky father, 
 and who implored them to listen, and to free them from guilt ; 
 what would they say if we asked them whether the rivers and the 
 mountains and the sky were their gods ? I believe they would not 
 even understand what we meant." This is good doctrine, but, 
 unfortunately, the teacher sometimes forgets his own teaching; 
 else he could not so often picture before us the Indian Aryan with 
 his Dijaushjntd, and the Greek Aryan with his Zsiq Trart'ip, and 
 the Italian Aryan with his Jupiter, and the Teuton Aryan with 
 his Tiu or Zio, and the EngHsh Aryan with his ''Our Father, 
 which art in heaven." We confess that the parallel grates sadly 
 on our ears, and the more so as by the writer's own canon it is 
 without reality. 
 
 E 2 
 
52 , NOTES. 
 
 Note G. 
 
 *' We also saw liow other ideas, which are truly religious, and 
 which seem the most abstract ideas that man can form, were 
 nevertheless — like all abstract ideas — abstracted, deduced, derived 
 from sensuous impressions ; even the ideas of law, virtue, infini- 
 tude, and immortality." — IUhherl Lectures, p. 375. 
 
THE DOGMATIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 EELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEP. 
 

 THE DOGMATIC PRINCIPI%^..,lse^ 
 
 IN 
 
 EELATIOX TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 
 
 I Disrnurst, 
 
 DELIVERED IX WESLEY CHAPEL, LIVERPOOL, 
 
 Augtist ist, 1 88 1, 
 
 IX COXNECTIOX WITH THE ASSEMBLING OF THE 
 
 WESLEYAN-METHODIST CONFERENCE 
 
 AND AS 
 
 THE ELEVENTH LECTURE ON THE FOUNDATION OF THE 
 LATE JOHN EERNLEY, ESQ. 
 
 BY THE EEV. F. W. MACDONALD. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 PUBLISHED FOR THE PROPEIETOE BY 
 
 THE WESLEYAN-METHODIST BOOK-ROOM, 
 
 2, CASTLE STREET, CITY ROAD, 
 
 And 66, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C. 
 
 1881. 
 [^All r'lglits reserved.'] 
 
PRINTED BY BEVERIDGE AND MILLER, 
 IIOLBORN PRI^^TIXG ^ORKS, FULLWOOD'S REXTS, HIGH HOLBORX. 
 
ANALYSIS. 
 
 Preliminary exaraination of prevailing- liostility to dogma 
 
 Prejudice against the term 
 
 Hostility to dogma which it is useless to discuss as such 
 
 Dogma depreciated — 
 
 (1) By those who represent the principle of intellectual and 
 
 spiritual freedom 
 
 The uses of this opposition 
 
 (2) In the interest of the " simple Gospel " 
 
 This opposition examined. Misapprehension from which 
 
 it proceeds. Evils to which it leads 
 
 Inquiry into the true meaning of the term dogma 
 
 Conceptions included in it — Befiniteness and Av.tliority ... 
 
 The Dogmatic Principle defined 
 
 Causes to which the origin of dogma is to be assigned — 
 
 (1) The Character of Revelation • ... 
 
 Which compels us to seek ultimate summaries, and final 
 
 expressions of revealed truth 
 
 Instance of the doctrine of the Trinity 
 
 {2) The Vocation of the Church 
 
 Necessities of her oflBce as Teacher 
 
 And Defender of the faith 
 
 Dogmatic theology greatly the result of conflict . . . 
 Analogy furnished by development of doctrine within the 
 
 Scripture 
 
 Development of doctrine — Romish and Eationalist 
 
 theory of 
 
 (Z) The Requirements of tlLe Iluvian Mind 
 
 The rights of theology as a science 
 
 PAGE 
 
 7 
 
 
 10 
 
 11, 
 
 12 
 
 
 12 
 
 13- 
 
 -18 
 
 
 18 
 
 19 
 
 20 
 
 
 21 
 
 22 2-4 
 
 24—26 
 
 26 
 
 27—29 
 
 30 
 
 30 
 
 31 — 35 
 
 33, U 
 
 3i 
 
 85—37 
 
ANALYSIS. 
 
 The Principle of Aiithor It y 
 
 Alternative of infallible authority or none— how 
 The Roman claim. Rests upon what ? ... 
 Private judgment. Its real character ... 
 Principle of Authority in common life ... 
 
 The analogy of religion ... 
 
 The testimony of the Church. Its true value 
 Its tests and safeguards 
 
 The final test 
 
 Authority and scientific belicr 
 The abuse of dogma 
 Mental freedom, what it is not 
 The uses of the creeds 
 
 presented 
 
 PAGE 
 
 39 
 
 40, 41 
 
 42—4.-) 
 
 46,47 
 
 48 
 
 4'.) 
 49, 50 
 
 51 
 51, 52 
 53, 54 
 
 55 
 5r,-58 
 
 5J 
 
THE DOGMATIC PRINCIPLE IN RELATION 
 TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 
 
 The subject assigned to me by the Trustees of the Fernley 
 Lecture is that of Christian Dogma, or, as I have ventured 
 to interju-et and define it, the Dogmatic Prmciple in relation 
 to Christian Behef. I approach my task under limitations too 
 obvious to be more than hinted at. They arise in part from 
 the nature of the subject, and the many outlying but closely 
 related questions to which it leads ; and in part they are 
 personal to the lecturer, and, as such, deserve no further 
 mention. In the brotherhood to which he has the honour to 
 belong apologies and excuses are not greatly encouraged ; 
 but he who amid the occupations of an active ministry 
 attempts a duty whose first condition of success would seem 
 to be studious leisure, will not reckon in vain upon the 
 sympathy of his brethren. 
 
 It would be a difficult, if not a hopeless, undertaking to 
 enumerate and classify the various movements of religious 
 thought in our time. Fortunately it is not necessary to 
 make a complete survey of the courses of contemporary 
 thought, and determine their mutual relation and signifi- 
 cance, before discussing a particular characteristic of the 
 present period as to whose existence men of all parties are 
 agreed. 
 
 What is the nature, and what are the probable conse- 
 
8 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 quenceSj of tlie hostility to dogma so widely prevalent around 
 us ? That hostility ranges from timid disparagement to open 
 assault. It embraces and combines persons who have little in 
 common with each other beyond a general notion that the 
 interests of truth, of freedom, and religion are imperilled by 
 the principle of dogma. The term itself is loaded with evil 
 associations. It is so used as to sucr^^est harshness and 
 arrogance. It is put in contrast with free inquiry, Avith the 
 claims of reason, with the spiritual instinct of man, or the 
 clearness and simplicity of Scripture, and under this weight 
 of aspersion is, in many quarters at least, prejudged beyond 
 possibility of appeal. The secondary and inferior meaning of 
 the word '' dogmatism " — itself very suggestive — has been 
 made to reflect discredit on the whole family of terms, from 
 which they continue to suffer in popular estimation ; for 
 when once a term has become effectually, however unreason- 
 ably, depreciated, the chances of restoration to its proper 
 sphere are small and remote. The effort required to discover 
 and maintain its real meaning is what most persons are un- 
 willing, and many unable to make. Hence the opponents of 
 dogma possess a practical advantage of no small value. Let 
 the assumptions contained in popular language be allowed to 
 pass ; let the impression be made that dogma means the sub- 
 stitution of authority for truth, and of confident assertion for 
 reasonable proof; that the dogmatic method is under the 
 curse of intellectual and spiritual barrenness ; that on the one 
 hand it impedes the free movement of the human mind, and 
 on the other invades the province and prerogative of 
 Scripture, — and who will care to defend it ? Grant this, 
 and who will not fall in with the cry of " Religion without 
 dogma ; a living faith, but no fixed creeds ? " 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 
 
 It follows that in any inquiry into the value of the 
 dogmatic principle it will be necessary to rescue the terms 
 dogma and dogmatic from associations with which they are 
 but accidentally connected, and for which they cannot be 
 held responsible. To this matter we shall refer again in due 
 course. 
 
 Amongst the opponents of dogma to whom we must refer, 
 we shall not, on this occasion, include the most unappeasable 
 of all. There is a hostility to dogma which it is useless to 
 discuss as such, since it is not really directed against the dog- 
 matic method, but against the foundations and first principles 
 of all religion. It is not a question with these of excess or 
 defect in the method of defining and formulating doctrine, 
 but of the possibility of a religion in any sense whatever. 
 Where the knowledge of God and the very possibility of 
 that knowledo-e are denied, or classed amono; thino;s that 
 cannot be afiirmed, there is nothing to be looked for from a 
 vindication of the dogmatic principle, or of any other prin- 
 ciple which proceeds on the assumption that God is, and that 
 He may be known. It is not in the more or less of our 
 formal definitions that we ofiend, nor is it by any revision of 
 our doctrinal methods that we can satisfy opponents of this 
 kind. The issue is altogether deeper and more direct. If 
 there be no God, or if God be unknowable, there can be no 
 theology, and it is worse than waste of time to discuss 
 theological method. For atheist and agnostic, for sceptic and 
 secularist, our inquiry can have no interest or even relevancy. 
 
 But amongst the depredators of dogma with whom we 
 have enough in common to make discussion reasonably 
 hopeful, two classes may be distinguished. The anti-dog- 
 matic spirit, as exhibited by the first of these, is in principle 
 
10 THE DOGMA TIC PEINCIFLE 
 
 legitimate, and even necessary, and only becomes hurtful 
 when excessive and disproportionate ; with the other, it 
 arises from misapprehension, or, it may be, from pure 
 ignorance. We will consider them in their order. 
 
 I. There is an attitude, if not of positive hostility to 
 dogma, at least of watchfulness bordering on suspicion, to 
 which some minds naturally incline. They have a strong 
 sense of the abuses to which the exercise of authority is 
 liable, more esjDCcially where religion and morals are con- 
 cerned. They are keenly alive to the evils arising from a 
 too-confident logic. To establish particular interpretations 
 of truth in creeds and other formularies they reckon a kind 
 of intellectual tyranny, by which the ways of personal 
 freedom are narrowed or foreclosed. They talk much of 
 progress in theology, and expect great things from an under- 
 standing and insight yet to be developed in the Church ; but 
 toward this, defined and formulated belief will contribute 
 little. They interpret the antagonism between ^' the letter" 
 and ^Hhe spirit" to mean that religion thrives best apart 
 from doctrinal standards. Hence they are found on the 
 anti-dogmatic side, not with the intention of injuring Chris- 
 tianity, but rather of doing it service. 
 
 In all this there is, perhaps, not much to complain of. It is 
 the manifestation in theology of an order of mind largely re- 
 presented in almost every department of human activity, and 
 to which here, as elsewhere, important functions are assigned. 
 The equilibrium of living bodies is the equation and result of 
 various forces, those that restrain and moderate being as 
 necessary to the result as those that originate and impeL 
 Familiar illustrations of this truth present themselves in 
 civil and social life. The principle of authority, essential to 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 11 
 
 the existence of society, must be co-ordinated with that of 
 personal freedom, — the rights of the State as a whole with 
 those of individuals. These involve opposing, though not 
 contradictory, claims, often very difficult to adjust, and men 
 are attracted to the one side or the other by considerations 
 with which the structure and habit of the mind have much 
 to do. It is not perverseness, nor yet infirmity of judgment, 
 that makes one of two men, or of two parties in a State, the 
 champion of freedom, and the other of authority. To 
 neither of them can it fairly be said, ^^ I have no need of 
 thee." The due combining proportions of great principles 
 can hardly be arrived at save through their mutual pressure 
 and conflict ; nor, as it appears to us, is it much otherwise 
 in the development of doctrine. Progress is rarely achieved 
 in the straight line of consecutive and unimpeded reasoning. 
 Its line is determined by those elements of resistance which 
 answer to gravitation, to friction, to atmospheric pressure in 
 the material world. As long as the majority of men are 
 quick at drawing inferences, and confident of their con- 
 clusions, it is well that there are minds naturally disposed to 
 urge considerations which should check and qualify our 
 inferences, such as the limits of our knowledge, and the 
 imperfection alike of the powers we possess and the methods 
 we employ. In this way the process of doctrinal definition 
 is kept under wholesome restraint. We can hardly imagine, 
 we can hardly wish it otherwise, while our powers are what 
 they are, and while it is apparently impossible to arrive at 
 the full and fair proportions of truth except through the co- 
 operation of many minds, and those of various orders. What 
 is this but to say that the Church as a whole is always greater 
 than its members ? Among the servants of Christ and His 
 
12 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 kingdom there is no mind so gifted, no heart so large, no 
 unction so abundant but its labours must be made perfect 
 through the gifts and anointing of others. 
 
 There is, then, an opposition to dogma which is not so much 
 hostile to the dogmatic principle as contributory to its proper 
 exercise. It is of the nature of a restraining and moderating 
 influence ; its office is to keep close watch over all attempts 
 to increase the number and minuteness of the Church's 
 doctrinal decisions. In the interests alike of theology and 
 of spiritual freedom it is to be desired that the anti-dogmatic 
 spirit, in this its reasonable exercise, should always be found 
 among us. To the lamentable consequences of its sup- 
 pression within the Roman community all Christendom is 
 witness. There it has been thought right and wise to silence 
 its faintest utterances, and the result is, on the one hand, a 
 monstrous growth of rank, unchastened dogma, and on the 
 other an anti-dogmatic spirit which, cast forth from the 
 Church, repays its expulsion by renouncing the last bond of 
 allegiance to Christianity and to Christ. 
 
 11. We have next to consider another and very different 
 class of objections to dogma. It is not uncommon to hear 
 dogmatic theology disparaged among sincere Christians as 
 metaphysical and abstruse. It is put in contrast with the 
 simple Gospel, where all is plain and clear. Dogmas are 
 human inventions, mainly due to pride of intellect and 
 naughtiness of heart. To theology is ascribed a principal 
 share in the corruption of religion ; creeds and other doc- 
 trinal formularies arc at the best man's wisdom ; and so high 
 does this spirit rise that it is considered a strong recommen- 
 dation fur a tcaclier of religion that he knows nothing of 
 theology. 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 1 3 
 
 It is with sincere regard for persons who mean well that 
 we have ventured beforehand to ascribe this kind of lano-nao^e 
 to misapprehension, or to plain ignorance. The term 
 " simple Gospel," with its winning and beautiful associa- 
 tions, may be improperly used. That is the case when it is 
 limited to such truths or aspects of truth as immediately and 
 obviously bear on edification, to the exclusion of others 
 equally, though not so obviously, essential. The truths which 
 go to a complete setting forth of the Grospel are neither few 
 nor altogether simple, as some men count simplicity. Paul 
 may surely be taken as having preached the simple Gospel. 
 His words to the Corinthians, '^ I determined not to know 
 anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified," 
 are often quoted as the very watchword of a Gospel ministry. 
 Yet it lay within an office thus rigorously limited to set forth 
 the doctrine of Christ's Person — incarnate and pre-incarnate, — 
 of sin in its relation to the race and to the individual, of 
 redemption under many profound aspects,- of justification, 
 regeneration, and sanctification, of salvation as administered 
 by God and as appropriated and experienced by man, of 
 Christian ethics, of resurrection, and judgment, and the life 
 to come. Are these truths simple ? If they are, let us not 
 omit to include them in our " simple " Gospel. If they are 
 not, what sort of a Gospel would it be that was simplified by 
 their omission ? 
 
 The fact is, that the very simplest presentation of the 
 Gospel leads by logical and moral necessity to one and all of 
 these great topics, or assumes them as already established. 
 The call to repentance implies a doctrine of sin; the ex- 
 hortation, " Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt 
 be saved," raises sooner or later every question in the circle 
 
1 4 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 of Christian doctrine. It is not every man's calling to be a 
 theologian, nor is it desirable that the preaching of the 
 Gospel should take the form of lectures in theology; but 
 the Gospel which is not doctrinal in root and branch is 
 '• another Gospel, which is not another." In vain will Christ 
 be preached if the questions concerning His Person be left 
 open and unresolved. Who is He ? Man — more than man ? 
 God — less than God ? What is His relation to our race ? 
 What consequences follow that relation ? To answer these 
 questions single passages of Scripture will not suffice. The 
 comparison and analysis of many Scriptures w^ill be required, 
 and even then it will be found that Scripture furnishes pre- 
 mises which compel us to advance to conclusions, and terms 
 must be devised in which such conclusions can be embodied 
 and expressed. Thus we may be far on the way towards a 
 dogmatic theology before we are well aware. We have 
 defined and formulated in spite of ourselves. And, as a 
 matter of fact, the depredators of dogma are not able to 
 get away from it or do without it. It underlies their 
 thoughts, it gives coherence and unity to their beliefs, it 
 supplies the foundations and premises of their teaching, and 
 moulds their very phraseology. 
 
 The humble village preacher or city missionary, little as he 
 may know of the history of doctrine, little as he may value 
 its tcrminolog}^, could not do what he docs, or be what he is, 
 but for the creeds and formularies by which he sets so little 
 store. For many of the terms he finds it convenient, or 
 even necessary, to use he is indebted to dogmatic theology ; 
 while others which he does not employ are held in solution 
 in his mind, and are with him though he knows it not. The 
 range of his obliirations to do^-ma extends from the Niceno 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 15 
 
 Creed to the Westminster Confession, or the Minutes of the 
 early Methodist Conferences, as the case may be. Literally, 
 it was for him that the Nicene Council discomfited Arianism, 
 and made the word Homoousian the chosen symbol of the 
 Church's faith in the true Godhead of Jesus Christ. For 
 him Anselm asked the question, ^^ Cur Deus Homo," and 
 answered it by bringing out the doctrine of satisfaction for 
 sin by the voluntary death of the God-man. It would be easy 
 to multiply illustrations. The popular sermon, the Sunday- 
 school address, the article in the relio-ious mafrazine reveal to 
 the student their dogmatic origin and line of descent. They 
 who repudiate dogma do so in word only ; in practice they 
 cannot. For the most part they tread the ordinary paths of 
 doctrinal tradition, or if by special effort they succeed in 
 forsaking them, it is but to construct, at the utmost possible 
 disadvantacre. a doo^matic theolofry of their own. 
 
 These considerations should be borne in mind when we 
 hear doctrinal teaching disparaged in the supposed interests 
 of spiritual religion. That disparagement, when examined, 
 will be seen to proceed in part from a dogmatic self- 
 sufficiency that defines and formulates with much confidence, 
 but is indifferent to the historic results attained by the labours 
 of others, and in part from non-appreciation of the propor- 
 tion and harmony of Divine truth. The practical result of 
 such depreciation of dogma is a narrow and one-sided 
 teaching, unduly subjective, overweighted in one direction 
 and lean and scanty in another, here unduly 2:)0sitive and 
 there unreasonably timid, and, for want of broad base and 
 general balance, continually exposed to overthrow. In the de- 
 preciation of dogma all heresies find their opportunity. In the 
 disuse of creeds and catechisms the restraints upon vagrant 
 
16 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 fancy, upon excessive individualism, upon speculation and 
 scepticism, arc diminished. When landmarks, boundaries, 
 and guide posts arc removed the chances of safe journeying 
 are not increased. 
 
 ^Vitli regard to the proportions of doctrine, a further word 
 may perhaps be allowed. 
 
 There are, doubtless, some truths of the Gospel more 
 immediately bearing upon the conversion of souls than 
 others, and where there is an earnest evangelistic spirit in 
 the Church they will be made specially prominent. We will 
 go further, and say that they ought to be prominent in the 
 preaching of the Gospel everywhere and at all times. But 
 we must not therefore disparage and slight other truths of 
 revelation because their use for edifying is not so readily and 
 so generally perceived. The parts of a building that are 
 under ground arc at least as essential to its stability as those 
 which meet the eye. Any indifference to the objective 
 nature and grounds of redemption will soon avenge itself 
 upon the subjective and popular doctrines of salvation. 
 Repentance, faith, conversion cannot long be preached suc- 
 cessfully apart from a doctrine of sin, and of the mediatorial 
 ministry of the incarnate Son of God. It is easy to repre- 
 sent the Homoousian controversy as a strife about words. 
 ' What matters the iota inserted or omitted — " of one sub- 
 stance with the Father," or '-' of like substance with the 
 Father " ? What learned trifling is this ! How much better 
 are we emi:)loyed who conduct mission services, and preach 
 the Gospel to the masses ! ' And yet on those fine details of 
 Christology, whose scholastic form is sometimes matter of 
 ill-considered reproach, everything depended. Is He or is 
 He not God — God Incarnate — not something only less than 
 
IN DELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 17 
 
 God, but Yerj God of very God ? All depends on this : 
 Gospel for the masses, Gospel for the heathen, simple Gospel 
 and the saving of souls — all preaching, prayer, praise depend 
 on, wait for, this : Is He, or is He not, eternal, only-begotten, 
 uncreated Son of God ? May we sing. 
 
 and 
 
 " Jesu, Lover of my soul, 
 Let me to Thy bosom fly," 
 
 "Eock of Ages, cleft for me, 
 Let me hide myself in Thee ? " 
 
 Brethren, we are safe and strong to-day in the faith 
 confessed by the Church throughout the world, " Thou art 
 the King of Glory, Christ, Thou art the everlasting Son of 
 the Father." But not without conflict was that faith defined. 
 Other men laboured, and we are entered into their labours. 
 Through great crises of fierce and subtle assault they held 
 fiist ; they examined and rejected the phrases of honour and 
 laudation that would have betrayed the Godhead of Jesus 
 with a kiss : they drew together the golden threads of 
 revelation and wove them into doctrine that ofuarded alike 
 the humanity and divinity of our blessed Lord ; they felt 
 their way to definitions which the keen acid of criticism 
 could not dissolve, and fixed their doctrinal decisions in 
 dogmatic forms against which the tides and currents of 
 fifteen centuries have chafed in vain. 
 
 Devotional theology is the flower of which dogma is the 
 root. For a while religious feeling may appear to be self- 
 sustaining, but its seed is not in itself, and unless it renew 
 itself continually from roots of doctrine it will die. Our 
 methods in religion may become too subjective. We may 
 allow ourselves to say what we like and what we don't like 
 
18 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 in doctrine till half the wealth of revealed truth Is practically 
 neglected. Consciousness may be consulted too early and too 
 often, In forgetfulness of the fact that the needs of human 
 nature cannot be wholly estimated from that nature itself, 
 even when regenerate. Let us not then be drawn from our 
 allegiance to dogmatic truth by pletlstic any more than by 
 sceptical invitations. To build up churches on the basis of a 
 non-dogmatic teaching may seem at first to be the short way 
 to great results, and a non-doctrinal piety may for a while 
 reward and encourage the attempt ; but when the rain 
 descends, and the floods come, and the winds blow, and beat 
 upon that house it will fall, for it is founded upon the sand. 
 
 The objections to dogma which we have thus briefly 
 discussed do not proceed upon any strict interpretation of 
 the term, but rather upon a general notion of its meaning 
 which hitlierto we have accepted without examination. We 
 must now consider it somewhat more closely. 
 
 The word Soy/jua occurs five times in the New Testament. 
 Twice It is used in a political sense of the decrees of Caesar ; 
 twice It is applied to the decrees or ordinances of the Mosaic 
 law ; and once to the decrees of the Apostolic Council at 
 Jerusalem. In the Revised, as in the Authorised Version, 
 the word Soyfjia is three times rendered "decree," and twice 
 " ordinance." Its sole meaning, therefore, In New Testa- 
 ment usage is decree, or authoritative injunction. This also 
 is its significance in the Septuaglnt. As a philosophical 
 term it was frequently employed by Greek and Latin writers 
 to denote theories or princi])]es held in the various schools. 
 The etvmology of the word would make its primary meaning 
 "that which seems true to any one," hence an opinion or 
 belief. But by a natural process of frequent occurrence 
 
IX RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 19 
 
 in the history of words, the objective meaning of the term 
 became more and more prominent, and the subjective retired. 
 As the word doctrine generally means — not teaching, but the 
 tliino* tauo;ht, so the word doo-ma calls attention not to the act 
 of discerning and accepting, but to that which is discerned 
 and accepted. It is a judgment or perception regarded in 
 itself — in relation, that is, to its subject-matter rather than 
 to the apprehending mind. Hence the Avord dogma came to 
 be used by way of contrast with mere individual opinion, 
 to denote objective and positive judgments in opposition to 
 what is subjective, or matter of speculation and conjecture. 
 A term so useful soon passed into the service of Christian 
 theology, to which it may be said almost exclusively to 
 belong. By early Christian writers it was employed to 
 denote that which was held as true among Christians, being 
 thus equivalent to the ' Christian faith.' 
 
 Amid all variations of usage two conceptions underlie the 
 term, and are found in various proportions — sometimes the 
 one and sometimes the other predominating — and these are 
 dejiniteness and authoriti/. 
 
 A judgment or principle that is not defined, but only hinted 
 at or suggested, is not a dogma. Similarly, the term must be 
 withheld from all reasonings that are incomplete, from specu- 
 lation in all its stages, and from all conjectures, discussions, 
 and inquiries. Whatever else a dogma is, it is at least some- 
 thing defined or formulated. Alike in classical. Biblical, and 
 ecclesiastical usage, dogma implies definite statement. 
 
 Again, a dogma has not only definiteness but autliority. 
 A definition or formulary which is, so to speak, impersonal, 
 having no assignable relation to any person or persons, can 
 hardly be called a dogma. In its very idea it is the expres- 
 
 B 
 
20 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 sion of a consent already arrived at, as well as an instrument 
 for securing and 2:)reserving consent. In its scientific aspect 
 it is a judgment or conclusion formally stated ; in its eccle- 
 siastical aspect it implies authority in those who propound it, 
 and is meant to command the belief of others. 
 
 When, however, we ascribe authority to dogma, we are 
 not committing ourselves to any theory of the Church's 
 authority in relation to doctrine, nor to any particular view 
 of the nature and constitution of the Church itself. These 
 are separate questions. The nature, the limits, the value 
 of authority in reference to belief may well be examined 
 hereafter. All that we now maintain is that the term dogma 
 implies, not only definite statement, but the existence and 
 action of the Church within which it originates, or by which 
 it is set forth. To this extent it has authority. Theological 
 dogmas in themselves may be true or false,- — this they 
 have in common with other definitions and formularies ; 
 the authority propounding them may be legitimate or il- 
 legitimate, trustworthy or untrustworthy, as is the case 
 with other authorities, — inrpiiry into these matters is not 
 foreclosed ; but the term we are discussing, whether used 
 with more or less of accuracy, must be held to connote 
 dpfiniteness and authoritij in the statement of essential 
 Christian truth. 
 
 In thus inserting the word essential it is not necessary that 
 we should accept the challenge to say what truths are essen- 
 tial to the Christian faith, and what are not. The question 
 of fundamentals is too complicated to be a matter of subordi- 
 nate inquiry in connection witli our present subject. ' Let it 
 suffice that we assume that the term essential as applied to 
 doctrines is not an unmeaninir one, and that the word doo-ma 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 21 
 
 is reserved for those statements of Christian truth which are 
 primary and fundamental in tlieir importance. 
 
 A final word may be snid as to tlie difference between 
 doctrine and dogma. It is not always easy to obser\'e the 
 distinction, seeinoj that there is no general aijreement amono; 
 writers on the subject. Some would employ the word doc- 
 trine to denote familiar and informal teaching, and dogma 
 that which is more guarded and precise. Others would 
 confine the word doctrine to the authoritative teaching of 
 inspiration, and dogma to that teaching when formulated by 
 the Church. To quote an honoured theologian of our own, 
 '' Let the word doctrine be sacred to the Bible, and dogma 
 be handed over to the Church." The distinction thus drawn 
 is clear and valuable, but it seems to require the additional 
 canon just named, that, while Christian truth in its endless 
 details may be grasped and moulded by the dogmatic prin- 
 ciple, no statement or definition deserves to be called a dogma 
 which is not of primary importance in the scheme of Christian' 
 doctrine. This economy in the use of the term will prevent 
 some misunderstanding and much prejudice. 
 
 The dogmatic principle, we are now justified in saying, is 
 that which aims at giving formal and authoritative statement 
 to essential Christian truth. We have next to examine the 
 two important conceptions included in our definition. What 
 is the necessity for defining and formulating, and within what 
 limits may they be carried on ? And, second, what is the 
 nature of the authority that may be claimed for doctrinal 
 formularies ? 
 
 I. The necessity for definitions and formulas of belief 
 arises from — 
 
 (1) The character of Revelation ; 
 
 b2 
 
22 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 (2) The vocation of the Church ; and 
 
 (3) The requirements of the Human Mind. 
 Let these be considered in their order. 
 
 (1) First, then, the Character of Revelation itself is re- 
 sponsible, if the word may be allowed, for the existence of a 
 dogmatic theology. Under any conceivable mode of reveal- 
 ing God's will, some responsibility will devolve upon the 
 minds of men and of communities by the mere existence of 
 such revelation. It must be apprehended. The meaning of 
 the terms employed, and the relation of its component parts, 
 must be ascertained and recorded. !N'or will it be possible to 
 refrain from inferential reasonings, since we may take it to 
 bo equally improbable that a revelation should supply no 
 grounds for farther inferences, and that all inferences from 
 revealed truth should be themselves matter of revelation. 
 The importance of revealed truths, their spiritual suggestive- 
 ness, and, it may be, the very form in which they are con- 
 veyed, will irresistibly impel to processes of comparison and 
 inference. AYe cannot conceive a Revelation which would 
 not lead to the formation of a theology. What, then, is the 
 character in this respect of the Revelation we possess ? God 
 has spoken to us " by divers portions and in divers manners." 
 For 1,500 years His revelation grew to completeness. By 
 lawgivers and leaders of the people, by priests and prophets, 
 by psalmists and chroniclers God spoke to our fiithers, till in 
 tlie last days He spoke to us in His Son, " the effulgence of 
 His glory and the very imago of His substance." To this 
 Revelation belongs a twofold perfection. Perfect in respect 
 of the temporary and economic purposes for which its various 
 portions were successively given, it is perfect in its enduring 
 completeness and adequacy as a whole, the one Revelation of 
 
7.Y RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEI . 23 
 
 God to man. But its perfection is in itself, and onlj passes 
 into the sphere of man's apprehension through the exercise of 
 his moral and intellectual faculties, quickened and illuminated 
 by the Spirit of God. Upon us devolves the noble duty of 
 searching the Scriptures, and of drawing together into the 
 miity of an enlightened perception the various elements of the 
 one Revelation. Its " divers portions." and " divers manners" 
 compel us to compare, to anah'se, to classify, to draw in- 
 ferences, to find terms in which to embody conclusions and 
 results. In no other way can v/e even ajoproach complete- 
 ness of knowledge and belief. Let a single example suffice. 
 The whole of Scripture is a revelation of God, His nature, 
 attributes, and will. In form it is as unlike as possible to 
 that in which our creeds and doctrinal treatises set forth these 
 great themes. It would indeed be a dull pedantic soul that 
 wished the method of revelation to resemble the methods of 
 theology; but he is almost as unwise who assumes that a 
 perfect revelation leaves no place or function for theology. 
 Concerning the nature of God Scripture records facts whoso 
 relation to each other it is absolutely necessary to determine. 
 Always and everywhere it testifies that there is one God ; yet 
 in the Old Testament there are intimations of some kind of 
 plurality in the Godhead, and in the New Testament we 
 learn that the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy 
 Ghost is God, and yet they are not three Gods, but one and 
 the same God. Further, though Father, Son, and Hol3> 
 Ghost are one God, they are distinguished one from anothe 
 as personal agents. Each of these statements is the sum and 
 result of many passages of Scripture. Ought we to refrain, 
 can we refrain from thus gathering them into summaries ? 
 And what shall we do with our summaries when arrived at? 
 
24 THE DOGMATIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 \Ye. can ncitlicr keep tlicm apart from one another, nor 
 simply lay them side by side and leave the matter so. A 
 final expression must be sought, an ultimate summary in 
 ^vllich, if possible, all previous and lesser ones shall be 
 gathered up, for in this way also it is ours to " seek the Lord 
 if haply we may feel after Him and find Him." If it be 
 said that this is a rash and unwarranted endeavour, we 
 answer that it is sanctioned, nay it is prompted, by the 
 ^^' lively oracles" themselves. The things which are revealed 
 belong unto us, and we have hardly made them our own 
 until we have combined their testimony, and discovered, if it 
 may be, the hidden unity that underlies and holds together 
 the manifold utterances of the Word of God. Thus did the 
 Christian Church in early times, not alone from the exigencies 
 of her calling, but under the attraction of glorious truths 
 newly visible above the horizon, labour to formulate her doc- 
 trine of the nature and attributes of God. In the course of 
 this endeavour, when the two p)aramount languages of earth 
 were waiting upon her need, and yielding their wealth to 
 furnish her vocabulary, the word Trinity rose to her lips, a 
 term henceforth redeemed from all uses but one, and finally, 
 not without perils on the right hand and on the left, the doc- 
 trine of the Holy Trinity received dogmatic form to wdiich 
 we may boldly say that fifteen centuries have added nothing, 
 even as they have taken nothing away. 
 
 We may linger for a moment over this noblest achievement 
 of the Dogmatic Principle, the doctrine of the Trinity in 
 Unity formulated in the oecumenical creeds, and faithfully 
 reflected in the leading confessions of Christendom. The 
 term itself, excelling in dignity and strength, stands at the 
 head of those in which dogmatic theology interprets Divine 
 
/xV RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. zo 
 
 revelation. It is at once scholastic and devotional ; it 
 belongs to the schools of learning, and to the congregation 
 ^vhere God is worshipped in the assembly of His saints. In 
 creeds and articles it ceases not to testify that " in unity of 
 the Godhead there be three Persons, of one substance, power, 
 and eternity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost : " 
 and in the prayer of humble and penitent souls the separate 
 invocations of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are crowned 
 and perfected by the prayer : " holy, blessed, and glorious 
 Trinity, three Persons, and one God, have mercy upon us 
 miserable sinners." 
 
 In the confession of the Holy Trinity we may say with but 
 little reservation that Christendom " is builded as a city that 
 is compact together." The schism between East and West in 
 the matter of the double procession of the Holy Spirit hardly 
 disturbs the unity of their consent in this great dogma. 
 Between Rome and the Churches of the Reformation, here at 
 least is no issue raised, the great convulsion of the sixteenth 
 century having left this foundation of faith unshaken. The 
 Lutheran and Reformed Confessions, the English Articles 
 and the Westminster Confession, are here at one with the 
 Decrees of Trent. The very sharpness of controversy and 
 width of separation in other matters, does but render the 
 agreement of the Churches in this fundamental belief the more 
 impressive. To the fact of this agreement Rome bears 
 witness as well as we. Speaking of the Three Creeds, and of 
 the doctrinal decrees which the first four general councils have 
 laid down respecting the Trinity and the Person of Christ, 
 Moehler, the learned Romish historian of doctrine, is pleased 
 to say : " These formularies constitute the common property 
 of the separate churches — the precious dowry which the over- 
 
26 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 wise daughters carried awav with them from the maternal! 
 liouse to their new settlements." We will not quarrel with 
 the metaphor, nor argue upon the disparaging epithet applied 
 to the daughters. Enough that they ' hearkened and inclined 
 their ear, and forgot their own people and their father's 
 house, that the King might have pleasure in their beauty, 
 and that they might worship Him.' Happy alike in that 
 which they carried away with them and that which they left 
 behind, they may well bear the reproach of overwisdom, and 
 we, their children, shall not be prevented by a sharp word 
 from acknowledging that beneath the wood, and hay, and 
 stubble of her later dogmas, Rome still preserves the ancient 
 and catholic doctrine of the Trinity and of the Person 
 of Christ. And ' we therein do rejoice, yea, and will 
 rejoice.' 
 
 (2) The second of the causes to which we have ascribed 
 the growth of dogma is The Vocation of the Churcli, or the 
 necessities of her office as witness and defender of the truth. 
 
 It has been well observed that '^ the nations which filled 
 the earth before the establishment of Christianity had cere- 
 monies of devotion, sacrifices, libations, and priesthood, but 
 they had no articles of faith, no dogmatic theology. They 
 were never taught whether the objects of their adoration 
 were true personal beings, or merely personifications of the 
 wondrous powers of nature ; even their mysteries consisted 
 only in the performance of certain rites and practices, and 
 were not accompanied by the delivery and acceptance of any 
 dogma."* With Christianity it is otherwise. It reveals the 
 
 * Leibnitz's EssaU do Thcodicce, quoted iu Swainson's llLstorij of the 
 Niccnc and Apostles' Creed. 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 27 
 
 Person and the redeeming acts, of the incarnate Son of God 
 and along with these, responsibilities, duties, consequences 
 ■which have man's whole being for their domain, and time and 
 eternity for their duration. The Apostles preached Jesus 
 and the resurrection ; preached Jesus by setting forth His 
 Divine-human person, His authority and office and mission ; 
 preached the resurrection by witnessing to the fact and de- 
 claring its meaning and results, and called men to a definite 
 belief and confession — " for with the heart men believe unto 
 righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto 
 salvation." As occasion required, the truths of the Gospel 
 were presented in brief summaries, or expanded into long and 
 detailed statements ; but, under all circumstances, to preach 
 the Gospel was to make known the truths concerning Christ, 
 and the commands and promises that centred in His person. 
 These constituted the ^^ faith once delivered to the saints," the 
 "deposit," or "thing committed to him" which Timothy 
 was exhorted to "guard through the Holy Ghost which 
 dwelleth in us." Then, as time went on, came short sum- 
 maries of doctrine for use within the churches, forms of 
 instruction for catechumens, confessions of belief to be made 
 by candidates for baptism, directions as to faith and practice 
 for the preservation and furtherance of believers in the way 
 of holiness. It can hardly be questioned that the earliest 
 formularies of the nature of creeds were expansions of the 
 baptismal formula, and that they were used in connection with 
 the administration of baptism. Thus simply and naturally 
 did the Dogmatic Principle come into operation within the 
 Church. Had there been no other influences working to- 
 wards the same end, the necessities of the teaching office 
 would have led to the formation of dogma. The dogmatic 
 
28 THE DOGMA TIC PBINCIPLE 
 
 method, whatever may be said against it, is the method of 
 the teacher, not only of religion, but of knowledge of every 
 kind, so far at least as its elements are concerned. In every 
 school, in every household, the foundations of knowledge are 
 laid in young minds in the form of dogma. Even where 
 there is the promise of largest intellectual freedom farther on, 
 when the region to be traversed is one where authority cannot 
 accompany the student, and no sound other than that of his 
 own footfall will reach his ear, even then the first steps must 
 be taken under authority, and the first grounds of belief be 
 those which dogmatic teaching supplies. And the dogmatic 
 method of teaching, which experience sustains and justifies, 
 has its analogies in the constitution of the human mind and 
 its relations to knowledge generally. If the teacher is found 
 saying to the scholar, ' You must for the present hypotheti- 
 cally believe, believe upon authority what you may not now 
 adequately understand, and this as a condition for under- 
 standing hereafter,' nature uses similar language to us all. 
 In the order of nature belief always precedes knowledge, and 
 is the condition of instruction. And when knowleclo-e is at 
 its completest, it rests upon primary and indemonstrable facts 
 of intelligence, the dogmatic foundations, so to speak, laid by 
 God Himself in the form of natural and necessary beliefs. 
 
 But to return to the domnatic teachinn; of relio'ioii. If it 
 be impossible to dispense with the dogmatic method in the 
 arts and sciences, still less can it be dispensed with here. 
 Nothing but the exigencies of a desperate argument could 
 liave given rise to the phrase '' the Bible without note or 
 comment." Let such a restriction be suo-fjestcd in the case 
 of any other book, and ->\ ho would not perceive its absurdity ? 
 Let the leanest and barest of human studies be selected, and 
 
7.V RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 29 
 
 if it be a condition that no questions may be asked or expla- 
 nations given, that all definitions, formulas, summaries, and 
 expressions of judgment and opinion on the teacher's part arc 
 forbidden, who will undertake his office ? And yet in these 
 studies none but intellectual qualities may be engaged, and 
 no facts or reasonings be concerned that in any way involve 
 the moral nature ; while in religion and morals it is not the 
 understanding merely, but eminently the conscience and the 
 will that are addressed, faculties that make light of all 
 didactic methods that do not use the direct imperative " Thou 
 shalt," and " Thou shalt not." Moreover, the foundations of 
 Christian faith and practice must be laid in childhood, in the 
 period of life, that is to say, which beyond all others claims 
 positive and authoritative teaching. And while all men are 
 children for a time, the majority never emerge from child- 
 hood, so far as concerns dependence on moral and intellectual 
 guidance. If, then, Christianity is to be successfully pro- 
 pagated, if its truths are to be widely effective over the lives 
 of men and nations, the common modes of instruction must 
 be, as they have ever been, dogmatic. Xow and again we 
 hear protests against the injustice of committing young minds 
 to fixed beliefs, and, along with these, suggestions towards a 
 kind of teaching, free from bias and prepossessions, that shall 
 wholly abstain from influencing its scholars in their conclu- 
 sions. But the protests are not sincere — the suggestions arc 
 not acted on by those who make them. It turns out to be 
 a revolt against particulai- dogmas, not against the dogmatic 
 method which, contradictory as it may appear, finds some of 
 its chief professors among its opponents. 
 
 Along with the office of teaching doctrine, that of defend- 
 ing it pertains to the Clu'istian Church. Having laid down 
 
so THE D0G2IA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 certain 2:>ositions concerning God and man, sin and salvation,, 
 it cannot be matter of indifference in what sense these state- 
 ments are received. Thej may be subjected to serious mis- 
 apprehension. On some ambiguity of statement conflicting 
 interpretations may arise, and one and another of these, 
 allying itself with existing tendencies of thought, or falling 
 in with some special characteristics of the time or the place, 
 may run on to perilous extremes. An aspect or element of 
 truth may be separated from all that qualifies and maintains- 
 its place and proportion in the general scheme, and may 
 actually be developed into a falsehood of vast dimensions. 
 Or a truth hitherto assumed rather than formulated may need 
 to be secured by a definition. These possibilities have, in the 
 course of history, been realised over and over again. The 
 development of doctrine in the Christian Church must bo 
 regarded in its actual, not its ideal, progress. It has not 
 advanced by regular stages of logical construction, nor as the 
 accompaniment and expression of an even and measurable 
 growth of spiritual life. The dogmatic fliith has been for- 
 mulated amid conflict, and by reason of conflict. We may 
 go farther, and say that the existing body of dogmatic and 
 confessional theology carries upon it the marks of the doc- 
 trinal controversies to which in such great part it owes its 
 existence. This may seem to be a serious admission, in- 
 volving us in dangerous concessions to the advocates of non- 
 dogmatic religion. Is it not made matter of reproach by 
 them that theology is overweighted by the past, and 
 needs to bo disengaged from it if it is to live in the 
 future ? But our admissions, properly weighed, will not be 
 found to serve their cause. Although their polemic origin is 
 urged in disparagement of creeds and confessions, it is difficult 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 31 
 
 to see the justice of the reproach, or indeed to see how it 
 could have been otherwise. There is a development of doc- 
 trine within the Scripture which throws some light upon this 
 matter. The teaching both of our Lord and His Apostles to 
 a great extent had its occasion and took its form from exist- 
 ing and definite errors in thought and practice. Not only 
 were these reproved, but truth was exhibited in such aspects 
 and proportions as most effectually to refute them. This is 
 notably the case in the writings of St. Paul. Some among 
 the Corinthians had said there is no resurrection of the dead ; 
 this gives rise to the Apostle's great discourse on the resur- 
 rection (1 Cor. XV.). The Galatians had gone wrong in 
 bringing in circumcision and other works of the law; the 
 Apostle not only administers reproof, but expounds the rela- 
 tion between the old and the new covenants, and clears the 
 doctrine of justification from the perversions of the legal and 
 ritualistic spirit. The Epistle to the Colossians could not 
 have been what it is but for the Gnostic speculations on the 
 relation of the Infinite and the Finite, and on the nature and 
 origin of evil against which it was directed. 
 
 It woidd bo easy to urge beforehand the improbability of 
 this method of inspired teaching. It might be said to be 
 below the dignity of such teaching to start from points 
 presented by human weakness and error; that catholic and 
 permanent doctrine could not afford to entangle itself with 
 local and temporary questions ; that in proportion as it re- 
 flected the characteristics of any period its fitness to mould 
 and govern following ages was diminished. But objections 
 of this kind, and all others drawn from antecedent proba- 
 bility, disappear before the facts of the case. The Epistles 
 of St. Paul are not prevented by their origin from speaking 
 
32 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 Avitli authority to successive generations. It is equally true 
 that they have characteristics determined by the time, the 
 place, the circumstances of their origin ; and that in respect 
 of authority and fitness to rule men's faith, they are not '' for 
 an ao-e, but for all time." Corinthian schisms and Colossian 
 heresies have passed away, but the Epistles that were written 
 to heal the schism and confute the heresy are with us to this 
 day, " profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for 
 instruction in righteousness." 
 
 In spite, then, of abstract objections, we cannot allow that 
 the development of doctrine through conflict with error is a 
 blemish, or source of weakness, in the New Testament 
 Scriptures. Here, as everywhere, the actual method of the 
 Divine o;overnment leaves far below it the narrow wisdom 
 which prescribes beforehand what is likeliest and best. 
 
 In applying this consideration to our subject, it is not 
 intended to compare the subsequent development of doctrine 
 with that contained in the Xew Testament, in respect of 
 authority. The distinction involved in the very term in- 
 spiration is not a wayward or artificial one. It lies deep 
 in the history of the kingdom of God, attested and illustrated 
 in a thousand ways, and must be here assumed. But the 
 point of comparison is this — that both within the compass of 
 tlie New Testament, and in the subsequent course of Christian 
 history, the development of doctrine was largely the result of 
 conflict with error. This in itself forms no presumption 
 against its worth ; for in the New Testament we have in- 
 spired teaching accepting the conditions, and following the 
 requirements, of controversy, without detriment to its abso- 
 lute and permanent value ; and if in post- Apostolic times the 
 same conditions prevail, no presumption lies against the 
 
IX PiELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 33 
 
 development of doctrine in this respect. Truth as truth owes 
 nothing to error, but in our apprehension of truth we may 
 owe much to conflict with error. Few of man's best pos- 
 sessions are arrived at except along this stormy path. The 
 truths in philosophy and science, in political and social life, 
 now most firmly held and highly prized among us, have a 
 record of strife, and suffering, and long endeavour, that will 
 compare with the history of our creeds and formularies. 
 Liberty is the last result of many a struggle with oppression ; 
 truth is the treasure that remains after the winnowing and 
 sifting of many errors. There is no science, or art, or 
 sphere of human effort from wdiich the reproach can be 
 levelled at theology that peace is the result and crown of 
 successful w^ar. 
 
 Before passing from this branch of the subject, a remark 
 or two may be made upon the expression '^ development of 
 doctrine," more than once employed. This very useful term 
 lies, not unnaturally, under some suspicion, from its connec- 
 tion on the one hand with rationalistic, and on the other with 
 Romish speculation. There is a modern Romish '^ Theory of 
 Development," of wdiich Dr. Xewman's celebrated essay is 
 the classical exposition, and there is a rationalistic theory 
 which is an application of the hypothesis of evolution to the 
 religious ideas of man. According to the former, the process 
 of development is the expansion, under an infallible directing 
 authority, of doctrinal germs and ideas into a variety of new 
 forms and aspects, " and the existing belief of the Roman 
 communion is its mature result." Accordino* to the other 
 theory, all religious conceptions have their origin in the 
 human mind, and Christian doctrine is but one branch of 
 its general progress, the Scriptures themselves, and all beliefs 
 
84 THE DOGMATIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 arising from thenij being the natural outgrowtli and product 
 of the mind acted upon bj surrounding conditions. These 
 opposing theories have much in common, and this among the 
 rest — that truth is not made the test of dogma. In the one 
 case authority is the sole criterion ; in the other there is, 
 properly speaking, no criterion at all, seeing that, from the 
 rationalistic point of view, dogma can possess no other kind 
 of truth than a temporary and relative adaptation to the 
 religious consciousness from which it springs. But between 
 these opposing theories there is room for a theory of doctrinal 
 development which is allied neither with the one nor the 
 other. It is distinguished from them by the following 
 ^^ notes." First. Development does not consist in additions 
 to the Revelation contained in Holy Scriptures ; in other 
 words, it does not call new doctrines into existence. Second. 
 It is development, not of doctrine in its subject matter, but 
 in the understanding and apprehension of the Church ; and, 
 Third. Keither for the process nor for the results of develop- 
 ment is infallibility claimed, or anything beyond tlie general 
 guidance and blessing of Him who is " Head over all things to 
 the Church," a guidance which we have abundant reason to 
 know docs not preclude the possibility of error in His people. 
 
 Having thus briefly examined two of the causes operating 
 within the Christian Church towards the formation of dogma, 
 viz., the character of Ecvelation, and the necessities of the 
 Church's vocation, we must now proceed to the third of the 
 causes assigned. 
 
 (3) Tlie Dogmatic Principle, as a defining and formulating 
 principle, has its essential and necessary cause in the Require- 
 ments of the Human Mind. We are not only created with the 
 faculty of knowledge, but with a tendency to classify our 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF, 35 
 
 knowledgGj to reduce it to system, and, if possible, to carry it 
 up into unity. The mind cannot be content while facts or 
 phenomena within its range are isolated : an intellectual 
 necessity is experienced for connecting causes with effects, 
 and parts with the whole to which they belong. The re- 
 semblances and differences which we perceive become grounds 
 of classification, and in no direction does the mind more 
 constantly press than towards a classification that shall be 
 final and exhaustive. The relation of this mental tendency to 
 philosophy and theology is thus characterised by fit repre- 
 sentatives of each. In his Lectures on Metaphysicsj Sir 
 William Hamilton says : '' Reason, concatenating thoughts 
 and objects into system, and tending always upwards from 
 particular facts to general laws, from general laws to 
 universal principles, is never satisfied in its ascent till it 
 comprehend (what, however, it can never do) all laws in 
 a single formula, and consummate all conditional knowledge 
 in the unity of unconditional existence." In the Introduction 
 to his Compendium of Theology j Dr. Pope writes: ^^The 
 aim of theology is to exhibit the grounds and principles, the 
 connection and harmonies, the results and applications, of the 
 facts of revelation. In common with every science, it obeys 
 the laws of the human mind, which demands that the 
 materials of its knowledge should be inductively generalised 
 and systematically arranged ; and, in common with every 
 science, it arranges its materials for use and practical 
 application." 
 
 In its endeavours then to arrive at dogmatic conclusions, 
 theology is well within its rights as a science. All science 
 works towards dogma, and, in every department, ^ counts not 
 itself to have apprehended ' until hypothesis and experiment 
 
36 THE DOGJFATIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 have brought it to the formula of which it was in quest. 
 Science glories in proportion as it becomes dogmatic, as it is 
 able, that is to say, to announce in definite terms some 
 constant ratio, or true cause, or exact measure of a force. 
 Newton's law of gravitation and Dalton's laws of combining 
 proportions are illustrious instances of scientific truth brought 
 to dogmatic form. The formulas in vvliich these laws are 
 expressed are among the best treasures of modern civilisa- 
 tion, — some would even say, the most impressive testimonies- 
 we have to the powers of the human mind. 
 
 Be that as it may, the growth of dogma marks the progress 
 of science. The transition from mere empirical to theoretical 
 and systematised knowledge has its record and measure in 
 precise definitions and formulated results. These are to the 
 schools of science Avhat domnatic decisions are to the schools 
 of theology. In the one region as in the other there may 
 be hasty generalisations and erroneous conclusions, but the 
 method, common alike to science and theology, is not thereby 
 discredited. 
 
 ' But,' it may be said, ' a scientific dogma is an assured con- 
 clusion, a statement of truth arrived at by appropriate 
 methods of inquiry ; whereas theological dogmas are of the 
 nature of assumptions, and are grounded, not upon proof, but 
 upon authority. The one is a goal or landing-place to which 
 we come, the other a starting-point arbitrarily assumed.' It 
 is to be hoped that the nature of this misapprehension is by 
 this time apparent. In so far as dogmas are confident ex- 
 pressions of a ijriori judgment, whether in science or theology^ 
 we abandon them to their critics ; but the true dogma is, as 
 Ave have seen, the result of the inductive method applied to 
 the materials of knowledge. A formulated decision, in 
 
IX UELATIOX TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 37 
 
 science or in theology, will be at once a goal in relation to 
 the process by which it was reached, and a starting-point in 
 relation to succeeding inquiries. The history of a dogma 
 may be divided into two portions— the one embracing its 
 origin and history up to the point of attaining full ex- 
 pression, and the other exhibiting its subsequent influence 
 on progress or discovery. In this respect no invidious 
 comparisons may be made between religious and scientific 
 dogma. In theology, as in science, formulas are results 
 arrived at ; but the converse is equally true, in science as 
 in theology formulas are foundations, and in either domain 
 the caution ai^plies, ^^ Let every man take heed how he 
 buildeth thereupon." 
 
 In thus comparing theology with physical or mental 
 science, we are content with the general analogy of their 
 methods and results. Doubtless, differences as well as 
 resemblances will present themselves to our minds. Scientific 
 method undergoes modification in the different spheres in 
 which it is applied. Its application is simplest in connection 
 with purely material phenomena, and becomes more com- 
 plicated as we pass into the region of moral and spiritual 
 truth. Here not only is the subject-matter more subtle and 
 refined, but serious disturbing causes come into action within 
 the observer which did not arise before. The infirmities and 
 errors of mind which accompany all man's eftbrts after know- 
 ledge have more than their analogue in the deep defects of 
 his moral and spiritual nature. Hence, as has been well said, 
 ''the physical sciences may be properly made the practice- 
 ground of the reasoning powers," and, we would add, 
 theology is the sphere in which those powers find themselves 
 at once summoned to their noblest, most arduous task, and 
 
 c '2, 
 
38 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 weighted with their heaviest disadvantage. But not thus, 
 thank God, is the statement of the case complete. Over no 
 other province of inquiry do such Divine promises of help and 
 guidance breathe encourao'cment. To what other seeker is it 
 said, " the Spirit of truth shall guide you into all the truth. . . . 
 Pie shall take of Mine and declare it unto you " ? The nature 
 of our subject bids us make prominent the method common to 
 theology and to science in general ; but theology has a 
 blessing all its own. Immeasurably raised above all other 
 sciences in the greatness of its subject-matter, distinguished 
 from them all in the way it discovers and rebukes the folly 
 and feebleness of man, it is equally distinguished by the 
 provision it discloses for enlightening the eyes and directing 
 the heart of the true inquirer. '^ The meek will He guide 
 in judgment, and the meek will He teach liis way." 
 
 But to return : — With the claim of theology to be a science 
 the legitimacy of the Dogmatic Principle is established — 
 estabhshed, let it be observed, by the right of every science 
 to classify its facts and formulate its conclusions. The 
 Dogmatic Principle is also justified, as we have seen, by the 
 character of Eevelation itself, sanctioning, and indeed de- 
 manding, the efforts which an intellectual necessity compels 
 us to make. And in the practical requirements of the 
 Church's vocation, outward and historic causes combine with 
 these inherent characteristics of revealed truth and of the 
 human mind to give rise to the theology of dogma. Other 
 causes mioht doubtless be named as contributinfr in their 
 measure to the same end, but the grounds assigned are, we 
 are persuaded, sufficient to vindicate the Dogmatic Principle. 
 Further than this our argument has not, thus far, sought to go. 
 Tlic vindication of the Dogmatic Principle is one thing, the 
 
IN RELA TION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 39 
 
 defence of particular dogmas is another. So far as these 
 are concerned, the proper tests have yet to be supplied. A 
 certain principle, capable of wide and varied application, and 
 fruitful of great results, is accredited, but that is all. It is to 
 the application of the principle that we must now dii'ect our 
 attention. 
 
 In our definition of the Dogmatic Principle, it will be 
 remembered that we included the idea of authority. Both in 
 popular acceptation and in its stricter meaning a dogma is an 
 authoritative utterance. It is a decision arrived at, and is put 
 fortli as such. This is at once its merit and demerit. The 
 principle of authority which has so much to do with the forma- 
 tion of opinion, and with the general conduct of human life, 
 cannot, as we have seen, be excluded from the teaching of 
 religion. What are the limits to its exercise ? If authority in 
 matters of fliith be underestimated, we surrender, it may be, 
 a chief evidence and principal support of religion ; if it be 
 overestimated, allegiance will be transferred from religion 
 itself to the guarantees by which it is accredited. 
 
 What shall we say to those who demand an adequate 
 guaranteeing authority for all belief, and again to those who 
 repudiate all authority in matters of faith? This is no 
 imaginary issue. It presses upon Christendom at this hour 
 with tremendous force. We of the Reformed Evangelical 
 Churches are called upon from the right hand and the left to 
 accept authority, and to repudiate authority. The Romanist 
 and the Rationalist unite (not for the first or only time) in 
 assuring us that the only alternative is authority in religion 
 absolute and infallible, or no authority at all. Both declare 
 our position logically untenable. Rome reproaches us with 
 wilfulness and arrogance in accepting the principle of 
 
40 THE DOGMA TIC FrJNCIPLE 
 
 authority where it suits our purpose, and breaking away 
 from it when it docs not. Her language is ' You accept 
 the Nicene Creed, but exclude that of Pius IV. ; you receive 
 the Church's doctrin6 of Original Sin, and reject that 
 of Purgatory, and the Primacy of Peter.' Ptationalist 
 criticism chimes in approvingly. ' Your Protestantism is an 
 illogical compromise. You believe so much on authority that 
 you might as well believe more. You have accepted a 
 principle, and then hesitate and bargain as to the application 
 of it. If authority is good for anything as a ground of 
 belief, it is good for m^ore than you are willing to admit. 
 Either come back or go forward. Choose between reason 
 and authority, but don't try to unite principles that are 
 mutually destructive.' To most of us it may appear the 
 easiest thino: in the world to decline the alternatives thus 
 ])resented. But it would be a mistake to suppose they do 
 not powerfidly appeal to very many minds. Perversions to 
 Pomanism have been a notable feature in the religious history 
 of this country during the last generation, and there is 
 abundant testimony, much of it of an autobiographical 
 character, as to the motives that have led men to Rome. 
 Beyond and above all other motives, the desire for authority 
 in religion has driven them step by step to the Church that 
 claims to be infallible. Pausing for a moment on her 
 threshold, with one final exercise of private judgment to 
 renounce private judgment for ever, they have passed within 
 her 2:)ortals, to find such repose as her infallibility may afford. 
 With personal responsibility exhausted in one great act of 
 aljiicgation, doubtless many have found that Church a place of 
 rest not unlike '^ the island-valley," 
 
 " Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow, 
 Xor ever wind blows loudly/' 
 
7.V RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 41 
 
 Others, again, having gone part of the way, and come 
 near enough to the would-be sponsor and guide of souls, to 
 see the joints and patches of a human invention instead of 
 the radiant beauty of a Divine creation, have turned back, 
 henceforth declaring truth unknowable, and authority a vain 
 pretence. A main part of the strength of the ultramontane 
 position on the one side, and of the rationalistic on the other, 
 is a kind of logical completeness exceedingly effective with 
 many minds. A principle that is unqualified and consistent 
 throughout, that has at least the merit of distinctness and 
 unity, possesses controversial advantages over another that 
 has limitations, and requires to be qualified in statement, and 
 balanced and compensated in application. The theorj^ of an 
 absolute authority vested in the Church to determine and 
 pronounce upon all matters of faith is at least intelligible ; it 
 may be without foundation, but its front is broad, and its 
 attitude imposing. As a theory it is confident, it reveals no 
 misgivings, it has no saving clauses, and shrinks from none 
 of the inferences to wdiich it leads. ^Authority, to be 
 authority at all, must,' it is said, ' be infallible. A guide that 
 can err is no guide.' To what poor advantage, by the side of 
 an infallible Church, must a Church appear that eagerly 
 asserts her liability to error, and anxiously disclaims just that 
 authority which is required of her. A big, bold claim to 
 authority, wdiich may be roughly condensed into '' Whatever 
 the Church teaches is to be believed," will make its voice 
 more readily heard than a modest and cautious theory which 
 says, "The Church of Christ has authority in relation to 
 doctrine, but it is not infallible, and as a matter of fact her 
 authority is subject to many limitations." 
 
 What shall we say then to the notion of authority 
 
42 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 fundamental alike in the scientific and in the popular 
 theology of Rome? The history of its development is far 
 too lengthy and complex for review, nor is this the time to 
 dwell upon the results of which it has been so fruitful. Our 
 one question shall be, " What is the authority for that 
 authority?" We are in the presence of a church and a 
 hierarchy, a theology and an ecclesiastical system. The 
 claim that underlies, upholds, and animates the whole vast 
 structure is the claim of authority, — of authority, that is, 
 infallibly to determine what men are to believe. Whether 
 vested in popes and council, or in popes alone, matters not. 
 It is claimed for the Church, and that not an abstract or ideal 
 Church, but the organised and historic community of which 
 the Bishop of Rome is the acknowledged head, that it 
 possesses infallible authority in matters pertaining to fiiitli 
 and morals ; that through it, as through an organ of its own 
 creation, the Divine Mind declares itself as to the meaning of 
 revelation. Surely we may be allowed to ask, " Who gave 
 thee this authority?" With this question we touch the root 
 and heart of the whole Papal system, and the answer we 
 obtain is more amazing than all beside in that great system. 
 Volumes more than can be numbered have been written in 
 defence of its authority. Learning, eloquence, zeal, have 
 asserted, vindicated, and glorified it for centuries past. 
 Within our own time tlic top-stone has been put upon the 
 structure by the dogma of the personal infollibility of the 
 Pope. On what does this authority, in the last place, rest ? 
 Let the answer be noted. 
 
 Not on tradition. Tradition, properly speaking, can 
 originate nothing. It is but tlic handing on of belief, or 
 sentiment, or thought. The etymology of the word should 
 
IX RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 43 
 
 guard us from ascribing to tradition functions beyond its 
 province. 
 
 JVot on Scripture. Such arguments from Scripture as are 
 used to sustain this authority are after-thoughts. They did 
 not precede, they do not account for it ; they were called in 
 to justify its existence. It is sought to make certain Scrip- 
 ture yield proof after the event ; that the claim itself arose 
 from those Scriptures never was, and never can be, shown. 
 
 The claim rests upon the antecedent prohahilit?/ that such 
 an authority must needs exist. Literally, this is all ! First, 
 the assumption, there must be somewhere an infallible 
 authority, and then, Eome says, '^ Take my word for it, I 
 am that authority." It comes to this : — all matters of belief 
 must be accredited and guaranteed by infallible authority, or 
 else we are in confusion and anarchy, nothing is sure, no one 
 knows what to believe ; but the infallible authority itself 
 must be taken on trust. This is not a caricature, but a 
 summary of the literature of the question. I must refer 
 again to the remarkable treatise written by the finest genius 
 that Eome now counts among her scholars and divines. I 
 mean the Essay on Development^ by Dr. Kewman. The 
 ultimate point on which the whole argument turns is the 
 existence of an infallible guide who pronounces with certainty 
 the fact of a development being right or wrong. Here then 
 is the place to prove the existence of such a guide, and if 
 learning, and eloquence, fineness of perception and delicacy 
 of touch, are required for the task, this is not only the hour 
 but the man. "Well, what is the nature of the proof given ? 
 Let the student unwind the fine-wrought passages, almost 
 irresistible in their dialectic subtlety, their grace of insinu- 
 ation, and power of hinting and suggesting conclusions 
 
44 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 beyond the evidence adduced, and what does he find ? 
 Nothing but the argument from antecedent probability, 
 appearing and reappearing in every variety of rhetorical 
 form. '^ Such an authority must needs exist. The need of it 
 is the strongest of arguments in favour of the fact of its 
 supply." '^ The common sense of mankind feels that the very 
 idea of revelation implies a present, infallible guide." " If 
 Christianity is both social and dogmatic, and intended for all 
 ages, it must, humanly sj)eaking, have an infallible ex- 
 pounder." This is Dr. Newman's language. Nothing more 
 or better has been said, or can be said, for infallible authority. 
 The ^\•hole strength of its case lies in antecedent probability. 
 Eloquence can adorn this argument; it cannot add to its 
 logical value. But, to all representations that there must be 
 visible guarantee and infollible authority, we have only to 
 answer ^^Why?" An assumption has logical value only 
 until it is challenged. What are these specious anticipations 
 of what God must do or will do worth in presence of the 
 facts of the case ? The worlds constructed on a ijiiori prin- 
 ciples in the minds of philosophers are very different from the 
 actual world that God has made ; and we need not be sur- 
 prised if the revelation we possess does not conform in all 
 respects to notions formed beforehand. The memorable 
 words of Butler will here recur to many: ^'As Ave are in 
 no sort judges beforehand, by what laws or rules, in what 
 degree, or by what means, it were to have been expected, 
 that God would naturalln instruct us ; so upon supposition of 
 His affording us light and instruction by revelation . . . we 
 are in no sort judges, Ijy what methods, and in what propor- 
 tion, it were to be expected that this supernatural light and 
 instruction would be afforded. . . . We know not beforehand 
 
7.V RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 45 
 
 whether the evidence of it would be certain, highly probable, or 
 doubtful. ... In like manner we are wholly ignorant . . . 
 how far, or in what way, God would interpose miraculously, to 
 qualify them to whom He should originally make the reve- 
 lation, for communicating the knowledge given by it ; and to 
 secure their doing it to the age in which they should live ; 
 and to secure its being transmitted to posterity." 
 
 Let us then avoid the perils of pronouncing beforehand 
 upon what '^ must needs he " in the way of authority, and of 
 authority, and of endeavouring to torture facts into agree- 
 ment with our theory. Let us rather, taking hold upon the 
 fact of revelation, and bearing in mind the analogy supplied 
 by the constitution and course of nature, ask, " What ground 
 is there for this hypothesis of an infallible authority to 
 interpret and develop revelation ?" There is no reply. The 
 spell is broken. The vast structure, rising to the very 
 heavens, and flinging its shadows over all the earth, trembles 
 to its base, and sinks into the sand on which it rose. ^^ I 
 went by, and lo, it was gone : I sought it, but its place could 
 nowhere be found " (Ps. Ixxiii. 37). 
 
 We shall perhaps be prepared to listen with equanimity to 
 llie evils prophesied as following the rejection of infallible 
 authority. These resolve themselves into utter uncertainty 
 as regards belief, w^ith all its consequent attendant sorrow 
 and loss. The perils of private judgment are made to figure 
 gloomily in the account. The term is loaded with every 
 possible reproach. It is made to imply wilfalness and arro- 
 gance, ignorance and presumption, shallowness and conceit. 
 As a mental condition it lacks humility, and reverence, and 
 teachableness. As a mental act It is unreasonable and un- 
 lawful. It is always considered as unaided by the Spirit of 
 
46 THE DOGMATIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 God, or its claim to such aid is treated with contem2:)t as tbo 
 dehision of fanatics. The exercise of the intellectual faculties, 
 which is censured under the name of Private Judgment, is 
 thus satirised by a master of sarcasm : " We exult in what 
 we think our indefeasible right and glorious privilege to 
 choose and settle our religion for ourselves ; and we stigma- 
 tise it as a bondage to be bid take for granted what the wise, 
 good, and many have gone over and determined long before, 
 or to submit to what God has revealed." 
 
 But when this storm has gone over our heads, and wo 
 have time to take our breath again, we make rejDly. Though 
 neither private judgment nor Church authority be infallible, 
 both the one and the other may be good for somethiuo-. 
 When disparagement is too wide and sweeping we may wait 
 composedly till it has spent its force. What is this miserable 
 creature private judgment, this parent of all heresies and 
 source of all mischief, this rebel against authority and law, 
 this other Satan presenting himself among the sons of God ? 
 It proves to be nothing less than the reason and the under- 
 standing, the whole sum of the intellectual ficultles, all that 
 whereby man is man, that is, a moral and responsible being, 
 all that whereby each man is himself and no other. This it 
 is which by a false antithesis is contrasted with authority. 
 It is the conscience and reason of man which, even when 
 seeking Divine guidance, are declared untrustworthy and 
 Incapable in relation to spiritual truth. But this is to prove 
 too much. On what is our whole belief in God and Christ 
 fuundcd ? If the faculties throuo;h which alone Revelation 
 can be a])prehended are, we do not say imperfect, but funda- 
 mentally incapable, there is an end of the matter. No reve- 
 lation, and for the matter of that, no infiilliblo Teacher of 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 47 
 
 doctrine can be of service to those whose faculties are thus 
 disqualified. Private judgment, if it must go by that name, 
 is that which revelation addresses, which it challenges, com- 
 mands, invites to belief and obedience. It is neither treated 
 as perfect in its intellectual and moral capacity, nor yet as 
 wholly incapable. Tlie economy of redemption recognises in 
 man a capacity along with incapacity wliich is one of the 
 deepest paradoxes of our nature, and yet a commonplace of 
 experience. The proposal that an infallible interpreter shall 
 mediate between God's revelation and the mind of man is 
 a double error. It impeaches the Divine method of revelation, 
 and misapprehends alike the office and mission of the 
 Holy Spirit, and the nature of moral responsibility in 
 man. 
 
 Must we then accept the alternative pressed on us by 
 Romanist and Rationalist— ^f not infldlible authority then no 
 authority at all'? Some persons, strong in a personal grasp 
 of Divine truth, have not hesitated to accept the alternative. 
 They recoil from exaggerated claims, they see no way of 
 admitting authority iu connection with Christian doctrine, 
 and at the same time excluding its abuses. They therefore 
 surrender the notion, and rest everything upon individual 
 discernment and conviction of truth. But this we cannot do. 
 We have now to protest from another point of view against 
 the headstrong logic whose motto is all or none. 
 
 It will be admitted that authority plays a great part in the 
 structure and organisation of human life. In the acquisition 
 of knowledge, in the formation of opinions, in our practical 
 decisions, we go largely upon authority, some of us knowing 
 that we do so, others unconscious of the fact, but none the less 
 conforming to the practice. It cannot be said that authority 
 
48 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 is in all cases trustworthy ; numerous instances to the contrary 
 have ccmc home to us. Sometimes we have been wilfullv, 
 sometimes unwittingly, deceived. The person from whom 
 we inquire the nearest way to town may misdirect us ; the 
 man called in to give legal or medical advice may make 
 a mistake ; but no one suggests that human testimony is 
 worthless, or that the notion of authorityj based on special 
 studies and experience, is a delusion. None of our informants, 
 from our own senses to the wisest of our fellow-men, is in- 
 fallible ; but w^e do not therefore cease to use their aid. Xo 
 one demands infallibility in his informants, or refuses their 
 testimony because it has no infallible guarantees. Students 
 of Butler know that ^' probability is the very guide of life ;" 
 but a whole world, ignorant of philosophy, acts upon this 
 understanding. We receive testimony, as w^e take all else in 
 (jur life, according to the conditions under w^hich it presents 
 itself. It may range through every degree of probabihty, from 
 faintest presumption to practical certainty. But theoretical or 
 demonstrated infallibility is, as all men know", out of the question. 
 It cannot be met with in any one province of our life. Are 
 we, therefore, involved in hopeless confusion and uncertainty? 
 Is there nothing for us, in the absence of infallible directors, 
 but a miserable individualism, in wdiich no man can have good 
 grounds of belief which he has not personally constructed or 
 evolved ? Is testimony good for nothing because there are 
 limits to its value? Is there no such thing as authority 
 because no authority is infi\llible? The common sense of 
 mankind may be trusted for the answer. All the business of 
 men and nations proceeds on the assumption that authority 
 is, widiin reasonable limits and under fair conditions, a 
 trustworthy guide ; and it is part of the practical conduct of 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 49 
 
 life to judge of the particular conditions under which authority 
 may be accepted and acted upon. 
 
 Seldom is the analogy of religion to the constitution and 
 course of nature more manifest than it is here. We ask for 
 authority in connection with doctrine ; it comes to us under 
 conditions with which we have been made familiar elsewhere, 
 not demonstrably infallible, but practically sufficient It docs 
 not relieve us of the responsibility of using our judgment, 
 and applying the tests which reason and experience provide. 
 But we are not left the chartless, rudderless mariners which 
 it is some men's pleasure to suggest. 
 
 The testimony of the Christian Church as a whole, and of 
 its separate portions in particular, has all the authority which 
 the nature of the case allows. The famous rule of Vincentius, 
 ^' Quod semper^ quod iihique, quod ah omnibus''^ — ^^ That is 
 to be believed which has been held true always, everywhere, 
 and by all " — is obviously rhetorical in form, and incapable 
 of literal application. There is absolutely no one belief that 
 complies with the demands of this canon. But the truth that 
 underlies it is more weighty and impressive to-day than when 
 it was written 1,500 years ago. None but a trifler can lightlv 
 dismiss the testimony of the Christian Church to the great 
 primary truths of the Christian religion. Let that testimonv 
 be viewed in its most general aspect. It is a testimom^ 
 contained in her continuous existence, in ordinances and 
 institutions, in express and solemn utterances, and in implied 
 and incidental references innumerable. It is a testimony 
 accompanied and accredited by character and actions new 
 and original in human history, but exquisitely accordant with 
 the truths and principles to which she bears witness. 
 
 The unity of this testimony to the incarnation of the Son 
 
,50 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 of God, His death and resurrection, the forgiveness of sins, 
 the sanctification of man by the Holy Ghost, and eternal life 
 throup'h faith in Jesus Christ, — the unity of the Church's 
 testimony to these great truths, is not broken by all its strifes 
 <and schisms, survives all the faults and failures which her 
 history reveals, and at the present time is the more 
 impressive from the number and variety of outward forms in 
 which the Church's life is cast. If we give the name of 
 authority to the consent or testimony by Avhicli, in other 
 provinces, matters are commended to our belief and 
 acceptance, we may well call that ample, varied, accumulated 
 -consent of many races and many centuries by which 
 Christianity is accredited to us, authorit}^ also, — authority 
 commensurate in weight and impressiveness with its subject. 
 Such authority is not, cannot be the final and sufficient 
 ground of fiiitli in Christ ; " Not that we have dominion over 
 your faith," is the language of an Apostle and of all 
 Apostolic Churches. But it is a call to faith, it is a proper 
 conducing cause, it is a reasonable, prehminary ground. 
 With Hooker we may say, '' By experience we all know that 
 the first outward motive leading men so to esteem of the 
 Scripture is the authority of the Church " (Ecc. PoL I. 310), 
 or with Field : ^^ The authority of God's Church prepareth 
 us unto the faith, and serveth as an introduction to bring us 
 to the discerning and perfect apprehension of Divine things, 
 but is not the ground of our faith, and reason of believing " 
 {On the Church, IV. 8). 
 
 But there is other authority for doctrine beyond that 
 supplied by the testimony of the Church. AVe receive the 
 witness of men — we cannot but do so — but the witness of God 
 is greater. All creeds, confessions, and formularies in which 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 
 
 Ill 
 
 so 
 
 the Cliurcli embodies her testimony and interpretation arc 
 open to appeal. From tlie most venerable to the last-born 
 of them all, appeal lies to the Scripture. Theoretically and 
 practically considered, Scripture supplies the tests of dogma 
 and the safeguards of dogmatic theology. :N^wliere is this 
 more clearly laid down than in the Articles of the Churcli 
 of England, a document of dogmatic theology rich 
 theological and historic interest. Art. VI. runs thus : '' Ho]\ 
 Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation 
 that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved 
 thereby, is not required of any man that it should be believed 
 as an article of the foith, or be thought requisite or necessary 
 to salvation." Art. VIIL declares " the three Creeds, Kicenc 
 Creed, Athanasius's Creed, and that Avhich is commonly 
 called the Apostles' Creed, ought thoroughly to be received 
 and believed : for they may be proved by most certain 
 warrant of Holy Scripture ; " and, finally, Art. XX. ^A\y^, 
 ^'Although the Church be a witness and a keeper of holy 
 writ, yet as it ought not to decree anything against the samc^ 
 so besides the same, ought it not to enforce anything to bo 
 believed for necessity of salvation." Here we have, thrice 
 repeated, the keynote of Reformation theology so far as the 
 authority of dogma is concerned. To the mocking scepticism 
 and to the arrogant infaililjiiity that unite in asking ^ Who is 
 to judge of the truth of creeds and formularies,' we reply 
 ' The Truth 2^5^//,'— and calmly await the issue. 
 
 We say ^'the Truth," for here we reach at last the end of 
 argument. Let the credentials of messengers or witnesses 
 be what they may, the final test of truth is in itself. All 
 questions concerning authority in relation to truth are subor- 
 dinate and preparatory to this. Sooner or later we are in the 
 
 D 
 
52 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 presence of that which claims our belief, not on the ground 
 of any concurring and sustaining human testimony, but for its 
 own sake, on grounds within itself, and an accompanying 
 Divine testimony. Hence the paradox by which many are 
 offended. ^^ . . The witness which he witnesseth of Me is 
 true. . . . But the witness which I receive is not from man. 
 
 . . The very works that I do bear witness of Me . . . and 
 the Father which sent Me^ He hath borne witness of Me " 
 (John V. 32, 34, 36, 37). The truth itself, its character and 
 potency, or the witness of the Spirit in, and through, and 
 with the truth, is the last, best, highest authority. *' It is 
 the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is the 
 truth " (1 John v. 7). " He that believeth on the Son of 
 God hath the witness in himself" (1 John v. 10). " I have 
 heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye 
 seeth Thee" (Job xlii. 5). ^' Now we believe, not because 
 of thy saying, but we have heard Him ourselves, and know 
 that this indeed is the Christ, the Saviour of the world " 
 (John iv. 42). 
 
 The nature and value of authority in relation to Christian 
 belief has now, we trust, been indicated with sufficient 
 accuracy, so far as its principle is concerned. The examina- 
 tion of this princij)lc in its historic manifestations cannot be 
 attempted within the limits of this discourse. The authority 
 of the Christian Church as a whole in its testimony to the 
 main articles of Christian belief is, as we have said, over- 
 whelmingly powerful. For these truths she answers, literally, 
 with her life, for the sum of her testimony is her whole 
 existence. But authority in this widest sense has no local 
 seat or official organ. It is an utterance from all the ages 
 and from many lands. It is at the service of every inquirer, 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 53 
 
 but cannot be officered or directed by any person or persons, 
 however august and venerable. The authority of particular 
 churches is variable, and cannot be expressed by an invariable 
 formula. But in its least or greatest exercise, like that of the 
 Church as a whole, it cannot constitute an ultimate and 
 adequate ground of belief for any man. Let the analogy of 
 scientific dogma be for a moment recalled. Laws of motion 
 and gravitation, of solid bodies and of fluids, have been dis- 
 covered, and are now set forth in well-known formulas. By 
 these the young student is instructed. They are set before 
 him in their dogmatic form. He is as yet unable to prove or 
 disprove them. Considerable time must elapse before he is 
 able to comprehend the steps by which these conclusions have 
 been reached, or test for himself the definitions and formulas 
 in which they are expressed. But they come to him with 
 authority. It is not unscientific, or in any way unworthy, 
 that the names of Kepler and Newton, of Dalton and Faraday, 
 should commend to him the formulas with wdiich they are 
 associated. Suppose him to be critical, to be sceptical at 
 this early period of his studies, it will not be unbecoming to 
 remind him that these laws come to him not only recom- 
 mended by the authority of great names, but by the consent 
 of the scientific schools of tliis and other countries, and of 
 the century or more, as the case may be, during which they 
 have been successfuhy employed in experiment and practical 
 research. In a w^ord, the principle of authority would be 
 invoked, not as the ultimate and sufficient ground for scientific 
 belief, but as a strong commendatory reason at least wliy 
 some persons, in certain stages of their knowledge, should 
 accept conclusions of wdilch they are credibly assured. It is 
 an aim of true scientific education to put every man in the 
 
 D 2 
 
THE DOGMATIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 way of understanding the proofs of things, and if it be said that 
 this is the only kind of knowledge worth calling knowledge, 
 it may be admitted. At the same time, it might be interest- 
 ing to learn how^ many persons in an ordinary assembly of 
 educated people are acquainted with the proofs of some of 
 the most familiar scientific truths, or, in other words, have 
 passed out of the state of dependence on scientific dogma, into 
 a well-grounded knowledge of the reason or proof of things. 
 Similarly, it is the aim of all rightly directed religious teaching 
 to lead persons to a knowledge of Divine truth of wdiich they 
 shall ultimately have the proof or witness in themselves ; but 
 on the way to that true end of teaching, it is authority, 
 speaking through parents, teachers, catechisms and creeds, 
 that, like the law^, " is a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ.'* 
 It best fulfils its oflRce in preparing us to dispense with its 
 service. From the first its note is, " He must increase, but 
 I must decrease;" and when they that w^ere under authority 
 have made their ow^n the living Truth to which it bore testi- 
 mony, the cry of the forerunner is heard again, '^ Ye your- 
 selves bear me witness that I said I am not the Christ, but 
 that I am sent before Him . . . this my joy therefore is 
 fulfilled." 
 
 We may, in closing, recur to an objection lightly touched 
 upon at an earlier part of this discourse. Dogma in theology 
 is conceived to be opposed to freedom of thought, and this is^ 
 perhaps, the most widespread of the misconceptions that 
 surround our subject. This charge, when examined, will, in 
 many instances, prove to be a true indictment laid in the 
 wrong court. Theology is not responsible for theologians, 
 nor dogma for the ecclesiastics and statesmen who have 
 oppressed the consciences of men. The dogmatic principle 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 55 
 
 has been abundantly abused. As a defining principle it has 
 been pressed beyond bounds and out of proportion ; and as 
 a principle of autliorifij it lias been employed in forgetfulness 
 alike of its true sphere, and of its limits within that sphere. 
 Burdens have been placed upon it which it was wholly 
 incompetent to sustain, and in its name burdens have been 
 laid on the spiritual life of men which it was not lawful to 
 impose. The history of Christianity, like the history of men 
 and nations generally, is, to a humiliating extent, a record of 
 sins, infirmities, and follies. Who has the heart to deny it? 
 Who will labour to prove it ? What deeds have been done 
 in the name of liberty, and of truth, and of our blessed Lord 
 Himself! The sad prediction, sadder for the oppressors than 
 Ihe oppressed, "They shall put you out of the synagogues; 
 yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that 
 he doeth God's service," has had its too abundant fulfilment. 
 Kings and bishops, councils and synods, have oppressed the 
 souls and bodies of men, slowly and reluctantly giving heed 
 to the command, '^ Put up thy sword into the sheath." 
 
 But what of all this can be laid to the charge of dogma ? 
 Is it inherent in the dogmatic principle that its conclusions 
 should be enforced by penalties ? Does the logic of doctrine 
 involve the ultima ratio of the sword ? Let us distinguish 
 between things that differ; between conclusions in science, 
 philosophy, or theology, and the means employed to give them 
 currency, or silence their opponents. 
 
 If, however, it be asked whether, apart from the ecclesiastical 
 and political uses to which creeds and confessions may be put, 
 dogma itself is a restraint upon thought, the answer must be 
 ^' Yes " or " No," accordino; to the notion that is entertained 
 of mental freedom. Human thought is as free in religion as 
 
56 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 in science, but let us see what that freedom amounts to. It 
 certainly does not sanction the claim to think as I please and 
 believe what I like, which is sometimes put forward as 
 amongst the rights of man. The laws and forces of natui'e 
 make light work of any such claim. They exist outside and 
 apart from the minds of men. They do not yield, and shift, 
 and vary with our thoughts, but hold on their way. It is for 
 man to put himself right with them. If he believe things to 
 be other than they are, if he takes them to be that which they 
 arc not, he will suffer. He is at liberty to believe that which 
 is true, and this is the only liberty that nature allows. If we 
 deny her she also will deny us. Suppose the permission given, 
 ' Believe what you please concerning nature and her ways, 
 the properties of bodies and the relations of forces,' will the 
 permission convey any real right or privilege, or be anything 
 more than a form of unsound words? If it could mean 
 anything at all, it would be a sentence of deprivation, under 
 wdiich all knowledge acquired and recorded by others would 
 be forfeited, and man sent out to learn through direct and 
 solitary conflict with nature that things are what they are, 
 and that freedom lies, not in denying or ignoring the fact, 
 but in apprehending it. If it be freedom of thought to think 
 as I please, there is least room for it where knowledge is most 
 fixed and certain. Intellectual independence diminishes with 
 each discovery, and the area of free thought shrinks as the 
 bounds of knowledp-e are enlaro-ed. Alike in science and in 
 religion, the mind's freedom lies, not in arbitrary or wayward 
 self-determination, but in joyful obedience to the truth, for 
 "the truth maketli free." Man froinix forth unto his work 
 and unto his labour till the evening finds everywhere, in the 
 order of light and darkness, of seed time and harvest, of heat 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 57 
 
 and cold, of moist and dry, the commands and prohibitions of 
 law, the Divine " Thou shalt " and " Thou shalt not " ^Yritten 
 in the frame and constitution of the world. Nature, which 
 exacts a right belief and a true obedience from man as the 
 condition of her bounty, is herself a witness and embodiment 
 of obedience to law. If we may enrich a modern page wdth 
 the noble thoughts and stately language of Hooker, we may 
 ask, " ISTow if nature should intermit her course, and leave 
 altogether, though it were but for a while, the observation of 
 her own laws ; if those principal and mother elements of the 
 world, w^hereof all things in this lower world are made, should 
 lose the qualities which now they have ; if the frame of that 
 heavenly arch erected over our heads should loosen and 
 dissolve itself; if celestial spheres should forget their -wonted 
 motions, and, by irregular volubility, turn themselves any 
 way as it might happen ; if the prince of the lights of heaven, 
 which now as a giant doth run his unwearied course, should, 
 as it were, through a languishing faintness, begin to stand 
 and to rest himself; if the moon should wander from her 
 beaten way, the times and seasons of the year blend them- 
 selves by disordered and confused mixture, the w^inds breathe 
 out their last gasp, the clouds yield no rain, the earth be 
 defeated of heavenly influence, the fruits of the earth pine 
 aw^ay as children at the withered breasts of their mother, no 
 longer able to yield them relief : what would become of man 
 himself, whom these things now do all serve ? See we not 
 plainly that obedience of creatures unto the law of nature is 
 the stay of the whole world ?" {Ecc. Pol. I. iii. 2.) 
 
 And if from the ordered and harmonious w^orld around 
 him man wdll look within, the structure of his mind bears 
 witness against his claim to independence. The axioms that 
 
58 THE DOGMA TIC PRINCIPLE 
 
 underlie liis knowledge, that are assumed in every exercise 
 of his understanding, are there he knows not how. He has 
 not devised nor adopted them ; they precede every act of 
 mind ; they are alike indemonstrable and indispensable. It 
 is a poor preparation for exercising his right to think as he 
 pleases that he proceeds continually upon beliefs which he 
 cannot analyse, of which he can give no account though they 
 cleave more closely to him than his shadow. He cannot 
 believe contraries, he cannot but believe in causes. Whether 
 these are Laws of thought or Laws of things, whether they 
 inhere in the mind, or are the reflection of truths exterior to 
 itself, they are conditions which cannot be escaped, and as 
 such are incompatible with absolute and unconditional 
 freedom. 
 
 But when we ascend to the highest sphere of thought and 
 action, that wdiich concerns God and his relations to us, the 
 claim to freedom of thought is most of all out of place. If 
 in respect of other knowledge every fact ascertained is a 
 restraint upon thought, and every fixed truth lessens the 
 range over wdiich we are free to speculate, this is emphati- 
 cally the case with regard to God's revelation of Himself and 
 His will. That whicli we believe to be true of Him we are 
 not at liberty to deny. The liberty to wander to and fro in 
 uncertainty, to call God unknown or unknowable, to treat all 
 things as open questions, to disclaim obligation and respon- 
 sibility,— this liberty he surely loses who has found the 
 Father of his Spirit, and the Redeemer and Lord of his 
 being. Happy loss of liberty ! Liberty to wander, exchanged 
 for freedom to abide in the truth ! 
 
 Let it not then be thought that the dogmatic principle is 
 unfriendly to freedom. If that which we call revealed truth 
 
IN RELATION TO CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 59 
 
 be neither true nor revealed, if we have followed cunningly- 
 devised fables, let us renounce and withstand it to the last ; 
 but if the Scripture doctrines of God and Christ, of sin and 
 salvation be true, our intellectual liberty is not curtailed, but 
 rather established and preserved by the creeds in which they 
 are defined. 
 
 These products of the dogmatic principle enshrine and 
 guard the truths by which we live ; they protect them from 
 changing fashions, and wayward fancies, and passing in- 
 fluences. They are landmarks when the floods are out, 
 breakwaters to stem the tides of restlessness and love of 
 change. They are standards by which to correct the reckon- 
 ings and measurements of various minds ; they are the voice 
 of the centuries as against the cry of the day ; they symbolise 
 at least the calm of eternity amid the hurry and heats of 
 time. Nevertheless, they are among the " tongues that shall 
 cease, and the knowledge that shall vanish away." 
 
 " When that which is perfect is come, then that which is 
 in part shall be done away. 
 
 '• For now we sec through a glass darkly, but then face to 
 f^ice ; now we know in part, but then shall we know even as 
 also we are known." 
 
WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT: 
 
 '^^ 
 
 ^%.. .....^ 
 
 51 iisrniirsE, 
 
 DELIVERED IN ST. PETER'S CHAPEL, LEEDS, 
 
 jftdy ^ist, 1882, 
 
 IN COXXECTION WITH THE ASSEMBLIXG OF THE 
 
 WESLEYAN-METHODIST CONFEEENCE 
 
 AND AS 
 
 THE TWELFTH LECTURE ON THE FOUNDATION^OF THE 
 LATE JOH:Nr FERNLEY, ESQ. 
 
 BY THE REV. ROBERT NEWTON YOUNG. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 PUBLISHED FOE THE PEOPKIETOE BY 
 
 THE WESLEYAN-METHODIST BOOK-ROOM, 
 
 2, CASTLE STREET, CITY ROAD, 
 
 And C6, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C. 
 
 1882. 
 [All rights reserved.] 
 
LONDON : 
 
 FEINTED BY BEVERIDGE AND MILLER, 
 
 HOLBORN PRINTING WORKS, lULLWOOD'S RENTS, HIGH HOLBORN. 
 
THE WITA^ESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 It is provided by the terms of the Fernley Foundation that a 
 Sermon or Lectmre shall be delivered annually in connection 
 with the meeting of the Wesleyan- Methodist Conference, for 
 the purpose of explaining and defending the Theological 
 Doctrines, or the Ecclesiastical Polity of Methodism, with 
 special reference and adaptation to the necessities of the 
 times. 
 
 These terms are sufficiently elastic to admit of a broad 
 interpretation; for the Theological Doctrines of Wesleyan 
 Methodism are the doctrines of the Universal Church ; and 
 every feature of her Ecclesiastical Polity is reflected in the 
 spirit and j^rinciples of Apostolic Christianity. Any subject, 
 therefore, of general religious interest, might be fairly 
 regarded as falling within the range of the Founder's in- 
 tentions. 
 
 In choosing from an almost unlimited field of topics a 
 doctrine so special and distinctive as that of the ^-Witness of 
 the Spirit," as the subject of this year's Lecture, I have been 
 influenced mainly by two considerations. The first of these 
 is, that the public preaching and profession of this doctrine 
 is an essential element of the mission of Methodism. It was 
 so regarded by Mr. Wesley himself ; for in his second sermon 
 on the " Witness of the Spirit" he says : " It more nearly 
 
 a2 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 concerns the Methodists, so called, clearly to understand^ 
 explain, and defend this doctrine, hecause it is one grand 
 part of the testimony which God has given them to bear to 
 all mankind. It is by His peculiar blessing upon them, in 
 searching the Scriptures, confirmed by the experience of His 
 children, that this great evangelical truth has been recovered, 
 ■which had been for many years well-nigh lost and for- 
 gotten." * 
 
 This extract disposes of the allegation that the doctrine of 
 the ^^ Witness of the Spirit" is peculiar to Methodism. It 
 is to be found, as every student of Church history knows, not 
 only in the Holy Scriptures, but in the Creeds and Confessions 
 of Christendom from the earliest times. It was no part of 
 Mr. Wesley's mission — as it has been of the mission of many 
 Reformers — to found a School of Thought : nor, if it had been 
 — if under the mighty impulses which stirred within him he 
 had found time or heart to elaborate new schemes of belief — 
 would even Ids name have proved weighty enough to authen- 
 ticate a doctrine which was not Divinely and distinctly 
 revealed. It was his work, rather, to give an impulse to the 
 slumbering life of the Churches ; and it was the necessity of 
 such a mission, that he should bring to the front all teachings 
 of Holy Scripture which bore upon experimental religion. 
 The great movement of the eighteenth century involved no 
 new doctrinal departure. It was a recovery and reassertion 
 of forgotten truths — It was a revival of expiring life. 
 
 The principle of this revival was the presentation of a 
 
 sound and conscious rehVious life, as ac-alnst a cold and 
 
 formal orthodoxy on the one side, and the j^hantasles of a 
 
 mystical empiricism on the other. This, under God, was 
 
 * "Wesley's Works : v. 124. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 the secret of its power. The organisation of Methodism, 
 however masterly in its conception and felicitous in its 
 ada])tation, cannot justly be credited with its persistent 
 vitality and its unparalleled success. That which appealed to 
 the eager thousands who gathered round Mr. Wesley and his 
 preachers was the exhibition of a religious life which rested, 
 not on undefined anticipations, or fallible and uncertain 
 inferences, but on a present and conscious sense of the 
 forgiving grace of the Father. The doctrine of the " Witness 
 of the Spirit " opened out to them a heaven, not in the 
 distant future only, but in the very heart of their daily life. 
 Care and poverty and pain were as nothing in presence of a 
 Divine and infallible assurance of the pardon of their sins, 
 and their acceptance in the Beloved. And thus '^ the Lord 
 added daily to the Church." 
 
 This is the testimony which the Methodism of to-day is 
 commissioned to bear. It is a trust, the faithful discharge of 
 which cannot but issue, sooner or later, in the fulfilment of 
 the grand ideal of her Founder — an ideal which he formed at 
 the feet of his Master and ours — the spreading of Scriptural 
 holiness throughout the land. Just in proportion as this 
 doctrine is attenuated, and shaded off in her teachings, will 
 the strength of Methodism be impaired, and her very ex- 
 istence imperilled. Methodism is nothing if not a Life. It is 
 hers, by the grace of God, "to revive the spirit of the humble, 
 and to revive the heart of the contrite ones " [Isaiah Ivii. 15]. 
 Her mission is manifold; but no function of it is of graver sig- 
 nificance than this. If on this doctrine " the trumpet give an 
 imcertain sound ; " if, in deference to the rationahsing pre- 
 judices of the times, the clear teachings of Scripture on this 
 question be compromised, then indeed is the glory departed. 
 
6 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 The second consideration which has led me to make choice 
 of this subject, rather than of some other which might seem 
 to have greater claims, arises out of the tendency of the 
 religious thought of the day. Reflecting the spirit of the 
 current philosophy, the drift even of Christian thought is 
 towards the elimination of the supernatural from religion, and 
 the depreciation, if not the denial, of the doctrine of the direct 
 interposition of God in the affairs of human life. As, in the 
 domain of the physical world, it is asserted that the true 
 interpretation of the phenomena of life and form is not 
 creation but evolution : so in the moral and spiritual world it 
 is maintained that the countless problems of our relation to 
 God are to be resolved, not by revelation, but by intuition or 
 induction. 
 
 In view of this almost characteristic tendency of religious 
 thought, no subject seems to me of graver mojiient than 
 that which I have chosen ; — nor could an occasion like the 
 present be devoted to a question of more practical and vital 
 utility. For this is the dispensation of the Spirit — a pro- 
 found fact, too often treated as though it were but a phrase. 
 The Church — that holy temple of the Lord, whose chief corner 
 stone is Christ Jesus, in Whom we also are builded together — 
 "is for an habitation of God through (or in) the Spirit" [Eph. 
 ii. 22]. To every revelation of God among men, to every 
 gracious exhibition of Divine mercy, to every fruitful presen- 
 tation of the Sacrifice offered once for all, to every pulse of 
 holy life and devotion, the Spirit is essential. Not a prayer 
 reaches the Holiest Place, not a song ascends to Heaven, not 
 an act of Christian grace and charity sheds its fragrance upon 
 earth, but in answer to the inspiration of the Holy Ghost. 
 Everything therefore which touches the honour, the sym- 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 metiy, the completeness of His operations and ministrations 
 is of profounclest moment. And if this subject did not bear 
 so close a relation to the personal experience of the Christian 
 — and religion is nothing if it be not experimental — the 
 choice of it would have been constrained by loyalty to the 
 Spirit of God, loyalty indeed to the " Holy, Blessed, and 
 Glorious Trinity ; " to the Father, Whose forgiving love is the 
 matter of attestation ; to the Son, Whose promised Represen- 
 tative tlie Spirit is : to the Spirit Himself, Whose supreme 
 function is to bear witness unto the truth. 
 
 There is no such counteractant to loose and mischievous 
 speculation as a sound religious life springing from direct and 
 conscious communion with God. " He that belleveth on the 
 Son of God hath the witness in himself" [1 John v. 10], for- 
 tifying him against all misgivings, and filling him with a 
 satisfaction as to the revelation of God, which no sceptical 
 cavillings or suggestions can sneer away. In proportion to 
 the simplicity of a man's faith will be the soundness of his 
 convictions. Just as he is filled with the Spirit will ho be 
 <' filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and 
 spiritual understanding " [Col. I. 9]. And it seems fitting, 
 at the annual gathering of the representatives of a Church 
 which is pre-eminently a Church of experience, which owes 
 her best— her all, indeed— to the Holy Ghost, that some lowly 
 and loving tribute should be offered to Him Who is " The 
 Lord and Giver of Life, Who proceedeth from the Father 
 . and the Son, Wlio with the Father and the Son together is 
 worshipped and glorified." 
 
 The doctrine of the '^ Witness of the Spirit " is one which 
 scarcely admits of novelty of treatment, while it offers little 
 encouragement to the indulgence of speculation. The lite- 
 
8 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 rature of the subject is scanty ; nor has its historical develop- 
 ment, been as striking and divergent as that of other doctrines 
 of inferior importance. No councils have been summoned 
 for its special discussion ; no schisms have arisen out of its 
 perversion ; no such controversies have gathered around it 
 as those which have encircled the doctrine of the Person of 
 Christ, or the Personality and Procession of the Holy Ghost. 
 It has been variously interpreted and misjudged. It has been 
 dissipated as into thin air by the dreamings of the Mystic, 
 overshadowed by the assumptions of the Sacramentarian, de- 
 preciated by Predestinarian prejudices, and not unfrequently, 
 at certain periods of Church history, almost ignored and 
 abandoned. But there has been no ao;e of theoloo-ical activity 
 and reality in which this doctrine has not been held with more 
 or less vigour, and its Scrij)tural basis maintained. 
 
 The argument, touching as it does the very core of religious 
 life and experience, and resting rather upon the testimony of 
 Scripture than upon any other data, lies within the circle of 
 Christian belief. It can have no relevancy whatever for 
 those who decline to accept the Scheme of Redemption, or 
 any of its essentials. To such minds, any evidence as to one 
 of the methods of applying a scheme which, as a whole, they 
 suspect or repudiate, would be altogether superfluous. In tills 
 study we are called to hear ^^what iho Spirit saith unto the 
 CI Lurches.^'' 
 
 The teaching of Scripture as to the '' Witness of the 
 Spirit " is not merely casual and inferential. Many doctrines 
 of much importance have to be reached by deduction, 
 gathered rather from the general tenour of inspired teaching, 
 than from direct and special testimony. For it was no purpose 
 of Inspiration to formulate a system of theology. The atoning 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 work of Christ impresses every page of tlie Sacred Eecord ; 
 but it took centuries to adjust and harmonise the teachings 
 of Scripture as to His Person, and the mystic relations of the 
 Triune God. Hence the crudeness — I might almost say 
 the puerility — of much of the Patristic literature. In all that 
 directly affects Christian life and experience it is inexpressibly 
 rich ; from its wonderful stores of spiritual thought and sug- 
 gestion we form our noblest manuals of devotion ; its senti- 
 ments are the proverbs of saintly lore ; yet its doctrinal concep- 
 tions are often illogical and false. But the teaching of Holy 
 Scripture on this doctrine is singularly simple and direct. 
 It needs no subtle analysis for its discovery ; it lies on the 
 surface ; and, far from being limited to one or two cardinal 
 texts, its illustration is most ample and various. This impor- 
 tant truth, says Mr. Wesley, is revealed " not once only, not 
 obscurely, not incidentally, but frequently, and that in 
 express terms ; but solemnly and of set purpose, as denoting 
 one of the peculiar privileges of the children of God."* 
 
 This should be sufficient. The Church of Christ has a 
 right to postulate, in the face of unbelief, whether from 
 within or from without, what God has said. This was the 
 method of the ancient Prophets. It was the method of the 
 Master. It was the method of His Apostles. It has been too 
 seldom the method of the Church. She has busied herself 
 rather in the tracing of subtle analogies, in the construction 
 of outworks of evidence, which in their very complexity and 
 vastness have seemed to discredit her faith in the Divine in- 
 violability of that citadel against which '^ the gates of hell shall 
 not prevail." The weapons of her warfare have too often been 
 carnal, borrowed from the appliances of the foe, rather than 
 * Wesley's Works : v. 123. 
 
10 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 from the armoiiiy of heaven. But an age of Apologetics has 
 seldom been an age of spiritual power. The defence of truth 
 is less effective than its simple and earnest proclamation. 
 The Church is never so mighty as when she bears upon her 
 banners that leo^end which is at once the ^varrant of her mission 
 and the watchword of her streno;th : " Thus satth the Lord." 
 I shall therefore endeavour to treat this subject from the 
 standpoint of the Christian believer ; and while not declining 
 the help of such side lights as inference and analogy may 
 offer, I shall found my argument mainly on the direct testi- 
 mony of the inspired Word of God : praying that ^^He Who 
 did teach the hearts of His faithful people, by sending to them 
 the light of the Holy Spirit, may grant us by the same Spirit 
 to have a right judgment in all things, and evermore to rejoice 
 in His holy comfort, through the merits of Christ Jesus our 
 Saviour, Who liveth and reigneth with the Father in the unity 
 of the same Spirit, world without end. Amen." 
 
 I. Provisioji is made in the Sclieme of Redemption for certi- 
 fying to the heliever in Christ the fact of his adojytion into the 
 Family of God. 
 
 ^' My belief in general is this," says Mr. Wesley, '' that 
 every Christian believer has a Divine conviction of his recon- 
 ciliation with God." * 
 
 Even if there had been no distinct Scriptural testimony on 
 this point, it might have been assumed that some such inti- 
 mation of the relation of the believer to God would have been 
 afforded to him. 
 
 1. The character of God, and the perfection of His works 
 would certainly encourage this assumption. The study of 
 * Wesley's Works : xii. 473. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 11 
 
 Nature, Avhetlier scientific or superficial, discovers everywhere 
 not only the evidence of a wise and beneficent purpose, but 
 an infinitude of resources for its fulfilment ; a matchless sym- 
 metry, and an adaptation of means which is competent and 
 complete. Even if we accept a theory of development which, 
 through an ascending series of processes, secures an ultimate 
 perfection of form and fitness, the argument is in no wise 
 invalidated. * Each stage in the series may be for its purposes 
 as perfect as the final result. The closer our investigation of 
 physical phenomena, the more thorough will be our endorse- 
 ment of the legend which appears on the very first page of the 
 inspired Word : '' And God saw everything that He had made, 
 and behold it was very good '' [Gen. i. 31]. 
 
 Our studies in the sphere of Divine Providence, though 
 necessarily limited in their range, and not admitting the exact 
 and scientific method which we apply to physical phenomena, 
 furnish ample evidence of the perfection of an administration 
 which has its centre in the heart of an All-wise and All-loving 
 Father. " As for God, His way is perfect " [2 Sam. xxii. 31]. 
 " The Lord is righteous in all His ways, and holy in all His 
 works" [Ps. cxlv. 17]. These are the principles on which 
 the Divine economy is founded; and if their play cannot 
 always be recognised, it can never be challenged. The words 
 in which the passing wonder of the multitude found expression 
 when some notable miracle had been wrought by Jesus of 
 Xazareth embody the sober and intelligent judgment of the 
 Church of all ages on the Divine rule : "He hath done all 
 things well" [Mark. vii. 37]. 
 
 But it is more particularly in the Scheme of Redemption that 
 the perfection of the Divine character and administration is 
 displayed. In the conception and carrying out of this Scheme 
 
12 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 notliing was spared. This was with the Apostle an argument 
 of overwhehiiing force. '^ He that spared not His own Son, but 
 delivered Him up for us all " — every word thrilling with sig- 
 nificance— " how shall He not" — how is it possible but that 
 He will — "with Him also freely give us all things" [Rom. 
 viii. 32] ? On this consideration alone one might fairly base the 
 doctrine of the " Witness of the Spirit." For what was the 
 object of the Scheme of Redemption ? Was it not at least to 
 restore fallen man to the dignity and fellowship and blessedness 
 which he had forfeited? And what was the nature of that 
 blessedness ? Is it to be supposed that in the sacred fellowship 
 of Eden, its happy tenants were left to infer the Divine favour 
 from their sentiments and surroundings ; that there was no 
 direct intimation and assurance from God that He was well 
 pleased with them ? Was it not because that assurance was 
 withdrawn that " Adam and his wife hid themselves from the 
 presence of the Lord amongst the trees of the garden " ? 
 And could any scheme of recovery be considered as complete 
 which failed to restore to fallen man the assurance which he 
 had lost, the simple confidence, springing out of that conscious 
 relation to God, which had been the charm of Paradise, and 
 without which life must have lacked its supremest and most 
 indispensable satisfaction ? 
 
 2. No judicial system among men could escape the charge 
 of inherent defect, which left a criminal in any uncertainty as 
 to his conviction or acquittal at its bar. Or to make the 
 analogy more exact, let us suppose the case of a rebel, con- 
 victed and condemned on a charo'C of In'o-h treason. His 
 sovereign, against whom ho has conspired, has a character for 
 magnanimity and clemency. It is notorious, it is in f.ict a 
 matter of proclamation, that it is his pleasure to pardon his 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 13 
 
 rebellious subjects, even though condemned, on their giving 
 evidence of contrition. The convict is encouraged to appeal 
 to the royal mercy. No answer is vouchsafed to that appeah 
 But as he waits in his gloomy cell, in a tumult of excited 
 feeling, the subject alternately of hope and despair, the 
 chains drop from his hands and his feet, the iron-barred door 
 of his dungeon flies open, there is no warder to challenge his 
 exit, and he goes forth into the sunshine and the fresh air, and 
 the unfettered freedom of the outside world. But he is not 
 happy. No sign or symbol of liberty is wanting. There can 
 be no mistake as to the exhllaratino^ breeze which crlves elas- 
 ticity to his limbs, and sends the warm blood coursing through 
 a frame which imprisonment has robbed of its buoyancy. 
 Yet he starts at every sound. Not a footstep falls upon his 
 ear, but he shudders lest some officer of justice is on his 
 track. The very sunshine grows almost hateful to him, and 
 the uncertainty becomes more oppressive than the fetters 
 which he has left behind. One thing he wants : without it the 
 very brightness of his surroundings is a mockery. It is the 
 sign-manual of his sovereign, certifying that he is forgiven, 
 and that he is legally free. An administration which failed to 
 provide its criminals with the attestation of their pardon, 
 would lie open to the charge of injustice, if not of cruelty. Is 
 it to be conceived then, do not our very instincts recoil from 
 the assumption, that in the perfect administration of heaven, 
 a penitent sinner, who has fulfilled the conditions on which 
 the forgiveness of God is guaranteed, will be left without the 
 direct authentication of his forgiveness ? AVell might it be 
 said that if such a provision as this were removed from 
 Christianity it would be a dead letter. Some such conside- 
 ration as this must have inspired one of the most touching 
 
14 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 and memorable passages in John Bunyan's vision. " As 
 Christian came up to the Cross, his burden loosed from off his 
 shoulders, and fell from off his back, and began to tumble, and 
 so continued to do till it came to the mouth of the sepulchre, 
 where it fell in; " and, as Bunyan adds, ^^I saw it no more. 
 Then was Christian glad and lightsome, and said with a merry 
 heart, ' He hath given me rest by His sorrow, and life by His 
 death.' Then he stood still awhile to look and wonder, for it 
 was very surprising to him that the sight of the Cross should 
 thus ease him of his burden. He looked, therefore, and looked 
 again, even till the springs that were in his head sent the 
 water down his cheeks. Now as he stood looking and weep- 
 ing, behold three shining ones came to him and saluted him 
 with ' Peace be to thee.' The first said to him: ' Thy sins 
 be forgiven thee.' The second stripped him of his rags, and 
 clothed him with a change of raiment. The third set a mark 
 on his forehead, and gave him a roll with a seal upon it.^^ 
 " Then," says Bunyan, '^ Christian gave three leaps for joy, 
 and went on singing." 
 
 3. The very essence of religious life and experience lies 
 in the conscious relation of the soul to God, — a relation 
 Avliich, as I hope to show, cannot be realised, without some 
 direct Divine communication. It is in the consciousness 
 of forgiveness that the general relation of God becomes per- 
 sonal. The craving for forgiveness is a human instinct which 
 nothing but a Divine response can satisfy. " Show us tlie 
 Father," cried the disciples to their Master, " and it suf- 
 ficeth us " [John xiv. 8]. They had read of Plim in the sacred 
 story. They had witnessed the manifestation of His power 
 and goodness in His works. They had received yet further 
 illumination from the teachings of their Lord concerning His 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 1 
 
 tenderness and love. The Fatherhood of God, in its pic- 
 turesqueness, in the beauty of its general demonstration, had 
 been most fully displayed in His teachings. But they Avere 
 not satisfied. There was a Divinely implanted craving within 
 them which no merely objective relation of the Father could 
 satisfy. ^^ Show us the Father," they cried, — as our Father, 
 as related personally to us^ — " and it sufficeth us." In that 
 cry they were the representatives of human nature. They 
 gave expression to the feeling which underlies all human 
 aspiration after God. The revelation of God in the beauty 
 and harmony of His works inspires my admiration, constrains 
 my worship, but does not satisfy my heart. There can bo no 
 solid satisfaction — there may be elevated sentiment, there 
 may be vague and visionary hope, there may be blind and 
 even passionate devotion — without a direct revelation of God 
 to the soul as the Father, lovino- and forij^ivino; for Christ's 
 sake. It is not sufficient that the seal of God should be 
 on the Church to w^hich a man is attached, or on the creed 
 which he professes, or even on the method by which he has 
 sought forgiveness. It is essential to assurance and peace 
 that God's seal should be upon his soul. 
 
 4. A purely subjective religion, seeking and securing no 
 verification of its genuineness, either by direct supernatural 
 witness, or by a comparison of the feelings and fruits of life 
 with some divinely constituted standard, would expose the 
 soul to the peril of a wild and unbridled fanaticism. There 
 is no extreme of infatuation, of mystical and antinomian 
 extravagance, to which it might not lead. And even if some 
 authentication were sought in the sphere of those sentiments 
 and dispositions which are represented by Scripture as 
 " fruits of the Spirit " — such authentication, resting on the 
 
16 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 fallible judgment of the individual, could not but be arbitrary 
 and precarious. It has often been objected that the doctrine 
 of the '^ Witness of the Spirit " is promotive of enthusiasm. 
 Similar objections have been laid against all doctrines which 
 have encouraged a direct relation between the soul and God. 
 I hope to show that the doctrine has an exactly contrary 
 tendency. There can be no such guarantee against mystical 
 delusion on the one hand, and fanatical presumption on the 
 other, as that which is supplied by some such infallible 
 attestation as the doctrine of the " Witness of the Spirit " 
 involves. For a belief in this doctrine inexorably demands 
 that a man shall accept no assurance of his personal relation 
 to God, but such as is furnished by Him who, as knowing 
 the mind of God, can alone certify the fact of their adoption 
 to His children. 
 
 5. The Christian service assumes throughout a filial re- 
 lation to God, distinctly and directly ascertained. 
 
 For whereon does the love of the soul towards God — that 
 love which is its very life — rest ? Is it upon the sentiment 
 of admiration for One Whose works bear witness to His 
 wisdom and benignity ? Is it upon some grateful recognition 
 of the Divine mercy in the redemption of the world ? Is it 
 even on some conviction of personal indebtedness to One Who 
 has made it possible for every man to be saved ? No true 
 religion was ever founded upon any such basis. The soul's 
 love of God rests upon the persuasion of a personal interest in 
 God, as pardoning, as adopting, as fulfilling His promised 
 mercy to the recipient. '' We," not generlcally, as included 
 in the Scheme of Reconciliation, but individually, as having had 
 the scheme brought home to us, *' love Him, because He first 
 loved us" [1 John iv. 19]. "God may adopt you," says 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 17 
 
 Ricliard Baxter, " may give you that Spirit which He gives 
 only to His children, and possess you with true filial affection 
 towards Him, before ever you know yourself to be adopted." * 
 Such a statement confutes itself. It involves a contradiction 
 of terms. True filial affection can exist only where the filial 
 relation is ascertained. 
 
 The love of God is the principle of all holiness, and the 
 inspiration of all filial service. It lies at the root of true and 
 implicit obedience, and is the strongest incentive to personal 
 purity. The aspiration of the soul after the Divine image is 
 not the prompting of ambition : it is not an impulse towards 
 an ideal of moral beauty ; it is the yearning of the soul's love 
 to be like that which it loves. '^ I shall be satisfied, wdien I 
 awake, with Thy likeness " [Ps. xvii. 15]. How thoroughly 
 true this principle is will appear from the consideration that 
 holiness of heart is not always that which ministers to personal 
 gratification, or commends its subject to the sympathy and 
 admiration of others. The process by which it is reached is 
 painful, its aspect is not always attractive, it is often misinter- 
 preted, not seldom is it mistrusted. Yet men pursue and press 
 towards this high prize of their calling ; they are content to 
 suffer, if they can apprehend it ; they accept the bitter cup, 
 they endure the thorn, they bear the cross, if they can be 
 thus helped towards its attainment: and why? Because thej; 
 feel that in seeking to be like their Lord, they are giving 
 the fullest expression to the consciousness of their love for 
 Him. 
 
 The perfunctory discharge of Christian duty does not fulfil 
 its responsibility. Much of the service of the Christian life 
 is directly filial. " He that loveth Me not, keepeth not My 
 
 * Baxter's Works : ix. 53. 
 B 
 
IS THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 sayings " [John xiv. 24] ; — the love of Christ is the principle 
 of holy obedience. But whence springs that fruitful love ? 
 '^ If God were your Father," if there were in your hearts 
 the consciousness of a filial relation to God, ^^ye would love 
 Me" [John viii. 42], Gallant and self-denying service 
 might be inspired by devotion to a person, to a creed, to an 
 ideal ; but filial service, such as the service of the Christian 
 life is, can be fully rendered only by a child, who is con- 
 scious of the relation. Profound indeed are the teachings 
 which lie in the inspired charge : ^^ Be ye followers of God, 
 as dear children" [Eph. v. 1]. 
 
 JSTot less closely is Christian hope identified with the filial 
 relation of the believer to God. In proportion to the certainty 
 of that relation will be the '^ assurance of hope." For the 
 hope of the Christian is the hope of an inheritance, the hope 
 which accrues through "the adoption of children;" which 
 pertains not to the " children of disobedience," but to the 
 ^' children of light ; " the hope of an inheritance of which the 
 Father makes us "meet to be partakers;" the hope to 
 which we are begotten by the Father, to " an inheritance 
 incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away " 
 [Eph. i. 5 ; V. G, 8 ; Col. i. 12 ; 1 Pet. i. 3, 4]. The drift 
 of these passages cannot be mistaken. The heaven beyond 
 — through the grace which invests us with the adoption of 
 sons — is our inheritance as such. If children, then are we 
 heirs; and until wo know that we are children, by an 
 evidence that is distinct and infalUblc, we cannot indulge with 
 confidence the prospects of heirship. That hope alone which 
 springs out of a divinely certified relation to God as His 
 children is a hope which " maketli not ashamed." 
 
 But in no exercise of the Christian life is the conscious 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 19 
 
 filial relation more indispensable than in prayer. The prelude 
 of all true prayer is '^Ahha, Father I " In the recorded prayers 
 of the Incarnate Son — prayers recorded because of the light 
 which they shed on our relation to the Father as well as His 
 — there is a holy boldness of which His conscious Sonship is 
 the natural interpretation. ^^ Father, I will that they also, 
 whom Thou hast given Me, be with Me where I am ; that they 
 may behold My glory, which Thou hast given Me : for Thou 
 lovedst Me before the foundation of the world " [John xvii. 
 24]. Nothing can surpass the conscious dignity, the holy 
 boldness, of the Divine Intercessor. " I ?yz7/," — not I desire, 
 I pray — but " I luill : " such was the confidence with which 
 the Beloved Son in His approach to the Father could invest 
 His prayers when He pleaded for others; and it was His 
 appeal to the Fatherhood of God that was His strong conso- 
 lation when He prayed for Himself. '^ Abba, Father," He 
 cried, in the exceeding sorrowfulness of Gethsemane, ^^all 
 things are possible unto Thee : take away this cup from 
 Me !" But that very word " Father ^^ inspired a confidence 
 which moved Him to recall the prayer as it trembled upon His 
 lips : " Nevertheless not what I will, but what Thou wilt ! " 
 [Mark xiv. 36]. When upon the Cross there was wrung from 
 Him the cry of an agonised despair : " My God, My God, 
 why hast Thou forsaken Me? " But scarcely had these words 
 escaped Him when He cried : ^^ Father, into Thy hands I 
 commend My spirit ! " and it is added with profound signi- 
 ficance, " having said thus,^'' having with that one word 
 " i^«^/«er " withered the forces of death, "He gave up the 
 ghost " [Luke xxiii. 46]. 
 
 So is our love made perfect, love springing from the con- 
 sciousness of God's love to us, that we may have boldness; 
 
 b2 
 
20 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 for '' there is no fear in love, but perfect love casteth out 
 fear " [1 Johniv. 18]. '' Because ye are sons, God hath sent 
 forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, 
 Father!" [Gal. iv. 6]. "Ye have not received the Spirit 
 of bondage again to fear : but ye have received the Spirit 
 of adoption, whereby we cry, " Abba, Father ! " [Rom. 
 viii. 15]. So it is the conscious filial relation, divinely 
 attested and certified, that renders possible, while at the same 
 time it inspires, that most touching and most comprehensive 
 of prayers, consecrated to our use by the sublimest example : 
 " Abba, Father ! " 
 
 6. The experience of the people of God in all times illus- 
 trates and confirms the position which I have taken. 
 
 In the earliest ages of which we have any record there is 
 abundant evidence of the assurance of God's favour not 
 only to nations and communities, but to individuals. Before 
 their fidl Adam and Eve lived in the unshadowed manifesta- 
 tion of their Creator's love. We learn on inspired authority 
 that Abel " offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than 
 Cain, by which he obtained witness (or rather, he had witness 
 borne to him) that he was righteous, God testifying of his 
 gifts" [Heb. xi. 4]. Of Enoch it is said: "Before his 
 translation he had this testimony (or he had witness borne to 
 him) that he pleased God" [Heb. xi. 5]. A similar witness 
 was borne to Noah, for God said to him : " Thee have 
 I seen righteous before Me in this generation" [Gen. vii. 1]. 
 Abraham had not only particular assurances of the Divine 
 rco-ard for him, but he was a partaker of that blessedness 
 of which David speaks : " Blessed are they whose iniquities 
 arc forfn'vcn, and whose sins are covered : Blessed is the 
 man to whom the Lord will not impute sin " [Bom. iv. 7, 8], 
 
THE WITNESS OF TEE SPIRIT. 21 
 
 Few will hesitate to believe that Jacob, whose new name was 
 itself an attestation of Divine favour ; that Moses with whom 
 Jehovah spake "as a man speaketh unto his friend" [Ex. 
 xxxiii. 11] ; that Job, even though we should accept the 
 criticism which divests the memorable passage, " I know 
 that my Kedeemer liveth " [Job xix. 25 — 27], of the' sense 
 that is generally assigned to it — that these men lived in the 
 distinct and divinely attested persuasion of their accept- 
 ance with God. The striking chapter in the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews which tells of the exploits of those ancient heroes of 
 the faith, of whom the world was not worthy, closes with 
 these remarkable words, which I quote from the Revised 
 Version : " And these all, having had witness borne to them 
 through their faith, received not the promise, God having 
 provided some better thing concerning us, that apart from 
 us they should not be made perfect" [Heb. xi. 39, 40]. By 
 them the promises were only sighted and saluted from afar, 
 as mariners sight the distant shore ; but the witness of God's 
 favour to them was their present compensation and their 
 reward. 
 
 Not less ample is the evidence furnished by the era of the 
 Prophets. In the august vision in the Temple, the fearful 
 heart of Isaiah was cheered by the assurance, " Thine iniquity 
 is taken away, and thy sin purged" [Is. vi. 7]. In his 
 inspired prediction of the gladness of the faithful, he says, 
 ''In that day thou shalt say: Lord, I will praise Thee; 
 though Thou wast angry with me. Thine anger is turned away 
 and Thou comfortedst me" [Is. xii. 1]. Hezekiah, in his 
 song of thanksgiving for recovery from the gates of the 
 grave, declares, " Thou hast cast all my sins behind Thy 
 back" [Is. xxxviii. 17]. In the vision of Zechariah the 
 
22 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 angel of the Lord spake unto Josliua, the high priest, who 
 had been clothed with filtliy garments, " Behold, I have 
 caused thine iniquity to pass from tliee, and I will clothe 
 thee with change of raiment" [Zech. iii. 4]. And the Book 
 of Psalms is exuberant in the expression of a confidence 
 which nothing short of a distinct Divine authentication could 
 warrant. 
 
 In the ministry of our Blessed Lord upon earth the forgive- 
 ness of sin was graciously attested by His own word to those 
 whom He healed, and to others whose privilege it was to come 
 into contact w^ith Him. After His departure, the Apostles 
 distinctly and frequently professed the assurance of their 
 personal acceptance with God. St. Paul says : "I know 
 Whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that He is 
 able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against 
 that day" [2 Tim. i. 12]. Again: ^^ We also joy in God 
 through our Lord Jesus Christ, by Whom we have now 
 received the atonement" (or reconciliation) [Pom. v. 11]. 
 " But now we are delivered (or rather have been discharged) 
 from the law," — the language surely of one who was con- 
 sciously justified, — " that being dead (or having died to tliat) 
 wlierein we were held" [Rom. vii. 6]. ^'Therefore being 
 justified by faith, we have peace," or " let us have peace," 
 — cither rendering serves the purpose of the argument, which 
 rests mainly on the former clause, " with God, through our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, by Whom also we have access by faith 
 into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the 
 glory of God" [Pom. v. 1, 2]. Not less conclusive is the 
 testimony of St. John : ''• We know that we are of God ; and 
 the whole world lieth in wickedness." " Beloved, now are 
 we the sons of God." '' Behold what manner of love the 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIBIT. 23 
 
 Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called 
 the sons of God; cuid such ice are ;^^ this invaluable addition 
 having been made to the text on the most unimpeachable 
 authority [1 John v. 19; iii. 2; iii. 1]. 
 
 This privilege, thus constantly and distinctly avowed by 
 the Apostles, was not regarded by them as in any sense their 
 peculiar prerogative. They clearly assumed that the grounds 
 of their assurance were common to all believers in Christ; 
 for in writing to the Churches they take it for granted that 
 their readers were as conscious as themselves of the fa.vour 
 and forgiveness of God. They appeal to their actual ex- 
 perience. " Being then made free from sin ye became the 
 servants of righteousness" [Rom. vi. 18]. ^^ For ye were 
 as sheep going astray; but are now returned unto the 
 Shepherd and Bishop of your souls " [1 Pet. ii. 25]. 
 " Whom having not seen ye love : in "Whom, though now 
 ye see Him not, yet believing, ye rejoice, with joy un- 
 speakable and full of glory : receiving the end of your faith, 
 even the salvation of your souls " [1 Pet. i. 9]. "I write 
 unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you 
 for His ^Niame's sake." '^ I write unto you, little children, 
 because ye have know^n the Father" [1 John ii. 12, 13]. 
 
 But I need not multiply quotations. Ic is clear that the 
 Epistles of the New Testament would have been as unintel- 
 ligible to those to wdiom they were originally written, as they 
 would now be to us, on any other assumption than that they 
 were written to those to whom the Christian life was a 
 conscious experience ; who were resting not on some theory 
 of probabilit}^, but on a relation to God, through faith in His 
 Son, clearly ascertained and certified. 
 
 To the evidence furnished by the early Chm'ch may be 
 
2i THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 added the evidence of eighteen centuries of Christian life. 
 Not to cite even one of the myriads of testimonies of wliich 
 our own history as a Church is full, I will content myself 
 with two or three illustrations which are furnished by a 
 Church which in recent timeSj at least, has taken up a posi- 
 tion adverse to this doctrine. Three days before his death, 
 "that he might receive a new assurance for the pardon of 
 his sins," the good Bishop Sanderson partook of the Lord's 
 Supper. " After the praise and thanksgiving for this blessing 
 v^'as ended," says Izaak Walton, '^ he spake to this purpose : 
 ' I have now, to the great joy of my soul, tasted of the 
 all-saving sacrifice of my Saviour's death and passion ; and 
 with it received a spiritual assurance that my sins past are 
 pardoned, and my God at peace with me.'"* "Good 
 doctor," said Hooker, the judicious, and even more, the 
 saintly, " God hath heard my daily petitions, for I am at 
 peace with all men, and He is at peace with me ; and from 
 tliat blessed assurance, I feel that inward joy which tlie world 
 can neither give nor take from me." 1* And in the Journal of 
 Henry Marty n I read : " After a long and blessed season in 
 prayer I feel the Spirit of Adoption drawing me very near to 
 God, and giving me the full assurance of His love."t Now 
 if it could be assumed that the unflinching courage and con- 
 fidence of the " noble army of martyrs " was but the product 
 of religious enthusiasm ; if the triumphant death of genera- 
 tions of saints could be regarded as an illustration of an 
 exceptional privilege, accorded in emergency — a supposition 
 whicli would in itself endorse the general principle for which 
 
 * Bishop Sanderson's Works : vi. .'M8. 
 t "Walton's Life of Mr. Richard Hooker. 
 X Memoirs, 99. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIBIT. 
 
 I am contending ; no such exceptional prerogative, no such 
 passing religious excitement, can be pleaded in the ease of 
 those myriads who in all ages of the Church, and in all cir- 
 cumstances of life, have maintained a serene and steady con- 
 fidence in God ; and who in the strength of that confidence 
 have pursued their daily task, and borne their daily burden ; 
 passing often through deep waters and unenlightened mys- 
 teries ; yet singing always ^^ the Lord's song," and joying in 
 the God of their salvation. To ascribe the relio-Ious convic- 
 tions of generations of devout people — convictions professed 
 by them, deliberately recorded in their journals, witnessed by 
 the constancy of their lives — to enthusiasm, is not only to 
 insult the common sense of men, but to cast grave discredit 
 on the economy of God. It cannot be that the wise and 
 loving Father should permit countless multitudes of His true- 
 hearted and faithful children to become, and continue to the 
 last, the victims of '* strong delusion," that they should 
 "believe a lie" [2 Thess. ii. 11]. 
 
 From these considerations, apart from any distinct testi- 
 mony of the Inspired Word, it may be reasonably assumed 
 that the position taken at the outset of this argument may be 
 maintained : that provision is made in the Scheme of Ee- 
 demption for certifying to the believer in Christ the fact of 
 his adoption into the family of God ; and that, in the words 
 of Mr. Wesley : "It is no absurdity to suppose that when 
 God pardons a mourning, broken-hearted sinner. His mercy 
 obliges Him to another act, to witness to his spirit that He 
 has pardoned him." * We may go further than this; and 
 assert with a livino; divine of our own Church that " it would 
 be wrong to doubt that every Christian should expect the 
 * Wesley's Works : xii. 468. 
 
26 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 Holj Ghost," or some accredited Representative of the 
 Blessed Trinity, '^ io confirm distinctly the release from con- 
 demnation in the Mediatorial Court of Justice, the assurance 
 of sonship in the Divine Family, and the conscious consecra- 
 tion of the soul in the Temple of God." * 
 
 11. — The Holy Spirit of God is the Agent hy Whom the fact 
 of Adoption into the Family of God is certified to the heliever 
 in Christ. 
 
 jSTo such testimony as has been assumed could be authentic 
 if it were not Divine. For all that we can know as to the 
 nature of God, as to His purposes and dispositions, or as to 
 His personal relations to ourselves, we are dependent on 
 Divine revelation. Man, whatever the range of his intellect, 
 or the compass of his spiritual instincts, cannot " by search- 
 ing find out God." " The things of God " — the genitive is 
 purely subjective — " knoweth no man, but the Spirit of 
 God " [1 Cor. ii. 11]. The adoption of the believer in Christ 
 is a Divine act ; it takes place in the Divine mind. It may 
 be accompanied by certain signs and followed by certain 
 results, but no general description of the effects of that act 
 on the heart and life of the believer can furnish an infallible 
 assurance to the individual who is the subject of it. In such 
 a case as the justification and adoption of a sinner, God must 
 be by logical necessity the ultimate guarantee and source of 
 all true certainty. 
 
 To the Third Person in the Holy Trinity the various re- 
 velations which God has been pleased to make of Himself, 
 through His Son, whether in Creation, or Providence, or 
 Redemption, are attributed throughout the Scriptures. In 
 * Dr. Pope's Sermons : 2G4, 2G5. 
 
THE WITNESS OF TEE SPIRIT. 27 
 
 every dispensation He appears as the Agent and Administrator 
 of the purposes and operations of the Triune God, and as the 
 Interpreter to the Church and the individual of the deep 
 things of God. 
 
 1. But while the Spirit is thus ^' the representative of all 
 the revelations of the Holj' Trinity," His function is more 
 particularly that of bearing witness to Christ. In the words 
 of a distinguished predecessor in tliis lectureship : ^' As the 
 work of Christ may be summed up in manifesting the Father, 
 so may the work of the Spirit be summed up in testifying of 
 Christ." * 
 
 This testimony was not borne in the first instance on the 
 Day of Pentecost. It pervades the Sacred History from the 
 beofinnino^. From amono; the numerous distinct notices of 
 the presence and power of the Eternal Spirit which are to be 
 found even in the Old Testament, it would be easy to select 
 many striking illustrations of the exercise of this special 
 function. To the Holy Spirit, for instance, is attributed 
 the work of Creation. '^Bj the Word of the Lord were 
 the heavens made, and all the host of them by the breath 
 of His mouth" [Ps. xxxiii. 6]. ^'The Spirit of God 
 moved upon the face of the waters " [Gen. i. 2]. In one 
 of the noblest passages of his prophecy, Isaiah, after de- 
 scribing the measuring of the waters and the meting out of 
 Heaven with the span, the comprehending of the dust of the 
 earth in a measure, and the weighing of the mountains in 
 scales, and the hills in the balance, ascribes these stupendous 
 operations to the Spirit, and cries : " Who hath directed the 
 Spirit of the Lord, or being His counsellor hath taught Him ? " 
 [Is. xl. 13]. To claim the work of the Spirit in Creation as 
 * Dr. Osborn's Fernley Lecture, 15. 
 
28 THE WITNESS OF TEE SPIRIT. 
 
 a direct witness to the work of Christ might be somewhat 
 hazardous; yet it would be no less venturesome to deny that 
 in the processes of creation, the reduction of chaos to order, 
 the bringing in of light, the development of life, the investi- 
 ture of the wdiole with beauty, there was a foreshadowing of 
 that new Creation, that passing " from death unto life," that 
 turnino; ^^from darkness to li^ht," that brinmno; forth of 
 '^ fruit unto holiness," which are the characteristics of His 
 w^ork wdio says : '' Behold ! I make all things new." It is not 
 without significance that while the first chapters of the In- 
 s])ired AYord describe the creation of the heaven and the earth, 
 the last chapters tell of '^ a new Heaven and a new Earth," in 
 which is " the throne of God and of the Lamb." 
 
 The Tabernacle in the Wilderness — " the Tabernncle of 
 Witness " — and the Temple which succeeded it, with their 
 furniture and decorations, were intended to symbolise, as 
 indeed w^as the entire ritual of Judaism, the work of the 
 Redeemer. The instructions given to Moses as to the building 
 and furnishing of the Tabernacle were most minute. "Ac- 
 cording to all that I show thee," said Jehovah, " after the 
 pattern of the Tabernacle, and the pattern of all the instru- 
 ments thereof, even so shall ye make it" [Ex. xxv. 0]. For 
 the carrying out of this work thus minutely specified, and thus 
 profoundly significant and symbolical, technical skill, even of 
 the highest order, was not sufficient. The resources of art 
 and genius must be enriched by Divine inspiration, and so it 
 is said of Bezaleel : "I have filled him with the Spirit of 
 God, in wisdom, and understanding, and in knowledge, and 
 in all manner of workmanship " [Ex. xxxi. 3], 
 
 In the records of the building of the Temj)lc we find several 
 notices of the intervention of the Spirit. " All this," said 
 
THE WITNES;^ OF THE SPIRIT. 20 
 
 David, after an elaborate description of the materials to be 
 used in the structure, ^' the Lord made me understand in 
 writlno-j by His hand upon me, even all the works of His 
 pattern" [1 Chron. xxviii. 19]. Further on we read: " Then 
 David gave to Solomon his son . . . the pattern of all that 
 he had by the Spirit" [1 Chron. xxviii. 11, 12]. The latter 
 phrase has been rendered ^' in spirit," that is '^in mind;" 
 but such a criticism, of dubious value under any circum- 
 stances, in the light of the passage previously quoted is 
 utterly indefensible. When the second Temple was erected, 
 the Spirit of God is represented as having been most closely 
 identified with the enterprise. The selection of men for the 
 undertaking, the influence exerted upon Cyrus and Alexander, 
 the readiness of the Jews to assist in the work, the successful 
 issue of the whole are attributed to the Spirit of God, of 
 Whom it is said, ^' Not by might, nor by power, but by My 
 Spirit, saith the Lord of Hosts " [Zech. iv. 6]. 
 
 Yet further : in the book of the prophet Ezekiel, eight 
 chapters are occupied with a description of the vision of a 
 Temple, distinguished by the same minuteness which marks 
 the accounts of the building of the Tabernacle, and the Temple 
 on Mount Sion. Whether this vision is intended to prefigure 
 the second Temple, or to depict the beauty and perfection of 
 the Church of Christ, is not determined. In either case, 
 however, one principle is established : the Spirit of God is 
 the guide and director ; He prescribes all the outlines and all 
 the details; and so bears witness to the glory of that Church 
 of the Future, of wdiich this vision is either directly or in- 
 directly the prediction, and of which Christ is the Head and 
 Lord. 
 
 But whatever the value of these illustrations, they by no 
 
30 TEE WITNESS OF THE SPIEIT. 
 
 means exhaust, possibly they may not even represent, the 
 Witness of the Spirit to Christ in the Old Testament. " We 
 have a more sure word of prophecy." ^^ Ye search the 
 Scriptures," said the I^Iaster, ^^ for in them ye think ye have 
 eternal life : and they are they which testify of Me " [John 
 V. 39]. "The testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of Pro- 
 phecy " [Rev. xix. 10]. " Of which salvation the prophets 
 have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the 
 (Trace that should come unto you : searchino; what, or what 
 manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did 
 signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, 
 and the glory that should follow " [1 Pet. i. 10, 11]. One 
 further passage will more than suffice for attesting the rela- 
 tion of the Spirit to the Messianic predictions : " The 
 prophecy came not in old time by the will of man, but holy 
 men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost " 
 [2 Pet. i. 21]. 
 
 In the oracular utterances of the ancient Seers, in the sweet 
 singing of the Psalmist, in the august visions of Isaiah, in 
 the plaintive strains of Jeremiah, in the mystic revelations of 
 Ezekiel, in the brilliant imagery of the Minor Prophets, the 
 key-note, the theme of song, the motive of inspiration, is the 
 work of the llcdeemcr. The whole story of the incarnate Son 
 of God, in every point of detail, as well as in its grand and 
 comprehensive issues, is anticipated by these holy men of 
 God who spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. 
 " To Him give all the prophets witness, that through His 
 name whosoever believcth in Him shall receive remission 
 of sins " [Acts X. 43]. 
 
 In the New Testament the function of the Holy Spirit as a 
 Witness to Christ finds yet more abundant illustration. It 
 
THE WIT^^ISSS OF THE SPIEIT. 31 
 
 was when filled with the Holy Ghost that Elizabeth saluted 
 Mary : " Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the 
 fruit of thy womb. And whence is this to me, that the 
 mother of my Lord should come to me ? " [Luke i. 41, 
 43]. Under the same afflatus, Zacharias prophesied, saying: 
 " Blessed is the Lord God of Israel, for He hath visited 
 and redeemed His people : and hath raised up an horn of 
 salvation for us in the house of His servant David" [Luke 
 i. 67, 68'], It was when the Holy Ghost was upon him 
 that the ao^ed Simeon, who had lono; looked for the con- 
 solation of Israel, and to whom it had been revealed by the 
 Spirit that he should not see death before he had seen the 
 Lord's Christ, san^ that sono; which has been echoed from the 
 death-bed of many a saint : " Lord, now lettest Thou Thy 
 servant depart in peace, according to Thy word ; for mine eyes 
 have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the 
 face of all people, a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory 
 of Thy people Israel " [Luke ii. 29]. 
 
 During the exercise of our Lord's public ministry, the 
 relation of the Holy Spirit to Him as His witness is con- 
 tinually illustrated. The divinely appointed sign by which 
 the Baptist was directed to discern the Messiah was this : 
 " Upon whomsoever thou shalt see the Spirit descending 
 and abiding upon Him, the same is He that baptizeth with 
 the Holy Spirit" [John i. 33]. This sign was hterally 
 fulfilled: for at the baptism of the Lord, John ^^saw 
 the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting 
 upon Him " [Matt. iii. 16]. He opened His commission 
 in the synagogue of Nazareth by laying claim to the fulfil- 
 ment in Himself of the prophecy of Isaiah : '^ The Spirit 
 of the Lord is upon Me, because He hath anointed Me to 
 
32 THE WITNESS OF THE SFIBIT. 
 
 preach the Gospel to the poor/' &c. [Luke iv. 18]. To this 
 anointing St. Peter referred in the liouse of Cornehus, when 
 he taught " how that God anointed Him with the Holy Ghost 
 and with power," and that as the result He " went about 
 doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil " 
 [Acts X. 38]. The function of bearing witness to Him was 
 distinctly assigned by the Lord Himself to the Holy Spirit, 
 not only in the future, but in the present. '' I have greater 
 witness," He said, ^' than that of John: for the works which 
 the Father hath given Me to finish, the same works that I do 
 bear witness of Me, that the Father hath sent Me " [John 
 v. 3(3]. Again: ^' The works that I do in My Father's 
 name they bear witness of Me" [John x. 25]. These works 
 He attributed to the Spirit: ^^ I cast out devils by the Spirit 
 of God" [Matt. xi. 28]. When His work on earth was 
 finished, and He had offered Himself without blemish unto 
 God ^'through the Eternal Spirit," He was "quickened by 
 the Spirit" [1 Pet. iii. 18], and "declared to be the Son of 
 God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the 
 resurrection of the dead" [Rom. i. 4]. 
 
 Not less rich in the testimony of the Spirit to Christ is the 
 apostolic history. The shedding forth of the Holy Ghost on 
 the Day of Pentecost was the seal of the Father on the 
 finished work of the Son, " the last and crowning credential 
 of the Faith." To tlie ministry of the Apostles God bare 
 witness " both with signs and wonders, and with divers 
 miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost" [Heb. ii. 4]. The 
 "mighty signs and wonders" which accompanied the 
 preaching of St. Paul he attributes to " the power of 
 the Spirit of God" [Ptom. xv. 11)]. To the same Spirit 
 St. Paul ascribes the revelation to the " holy apostles 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 3: 
 
 and prophets " of the mvsteiy which in other ages was 
 '^ not made known unto the sons of men . . . that the 
 Gentiles should be fellow heirs, and of the same body, and 
 partakers of His promise in Christ bj the Gospel " [E])h. 
 iii. 5, 6]. And in one conclusive passage, St. Peter, after 
 affirming the exaltation of Christ by the right hand of God 
 ^Ho be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance 
 to Israel and forgiveness of sins," adds, " And we are 
 His witnesses of these things, and so is also the Holy 
 Ghost, Whom God hath given to them that obey Him " 
 [Acts V. 32]. 
 
 The history, the very existence of the Christian Church, is 
 the permanent authentication to the world of the Divine 
 mission of the Son of God. The credentials of that mission 
 are furnished by the Holy Spirit. It is He Who summons 
 men by a voice which they cannot ignore, and separates them 
 to the ministry. He equips them for their holy vocation, and 
 gives authority to their word. His power is exhibited in the 
 conviction and conversion of sinners, in the holy life of the 
 Church, in the inception and success of her enterprises, 
 in the vigour of her services, and in the gracious issue of 
 her prayers. He is the inspiration of her literature ; it is He 
 Who gives force to the whole body of evidences whereby she 
 seeks to establish the authority of the Faith ; and He invests 
 all her organisations with vitality, blending His voice with 
 hers in her appeal to the world : for '^ the Spirit and the 
 Bride say ' Come ! ' " He, too, is '^ the Lord and Giver of 
 Life," the secret spring of that inner growth of the soul, that 
 going on unto perfection, that 'liberty" in the exercise of 
 which the saints, " with open face beholding as in a glass 
 the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image, 
 
 c 
 
o4? THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord " 
 [2 Cor. iii. 18]. 
 
 This witness of the Spirit to Christ has a yet wider range. 
 There is a light " which lighteth every man that cometh 
 into the world." It played among the ancient faiths, lending 
 to them, here and there, a more than human lustre. In no 
 age of the world's history, in no tribe of the human family, 
 has God left Himself " without witness." A yearning after 
 God, after some revelation from heaven, after the forfeited 
 fellowship of Eden, may be traced among all faiths and forms 
 of worship. There is perhaps no human heart which has not 
 its altar, though it be inscribed " To an unknown God." The 
 universal unrest of the world in all ages is for deeper than 
 political, or intellectual, or social. '• The whole creation 
 groaneth and travaileth in pain," waiting " for the 
 manifestation of the sons of God " [Rom. viii. 19, 22]. 
 By mysterious processes the world is being educated to 
 receive the truth, ^^ as the truth is in Jesus ; " and 
 though it may be impossible for us, as yet, to know how, 
 or how far, it is equally impossible to cast away the 
 hope that outside all Churches, beyond the range of holy 
 enterprise, save so far as the prayers of the Church per- 
 vade all human life, some testimony of the Spirit is borne 
 to the grace and sympathy and tender mercy of Him who 
 is '^ the Desire of all nations." It is not too much to sup- 
 pose that our Lord contemplated no narrower range of 
 spiritual attestation than the vast circle of human need, 
 when He said of the promised Paraclete : " He shall testify 
 of Me." 
 
 2. In presence of these considerations, — it being clearly 
 estabhshed that the function of bearing witness to Christ has 
 
TEE WITNESS OF THE SPIEIT. 
 
 been assigned throughout the entire course of the Divine 
 administration to the Holy Spirit, — it would not be unreason- 
 able to assume, even if there were no direct evidence on the 
 l^oint, that a part of His work would be to bear that testi- 
 mony to the soul of the believer, which of all the revelations 
 which God can make to man is the most momentous, — which 
 is indeed indispensable to the perfection of his happiness, — the 
 revelation of personal forgiveness. If it were not the office 
 of the Holy Spirit to bear any other testimony ; if Divine 
 revelation were conveyed through some other channel or by 
 other means ; this assumption might seem precarious ; though 
 it would be impossible to avoid the conclusion that by some 
 method God would minister this comfort to His children. But 
 the doctrine of the "Witness of the Spirit" assumes no 
 special assignment of a function not otherwise exercised by 
 Him ; it assumes and illustrates only one phase of a ministry 
 Avhich is pre-eminently characteristic of the Third Person in 
 the Trinity. He Whose mission it was to attest and authen- 
 ticate the victory of the Redeemer by signs and wonders 
 appealing to the eye, is discharging no new function Avhen 
 He certifies to the heart of the believer his personal interest 
 in that victorious work. 
 
 The indirect evidence — if indeed it may be called indirect 
 — which Holy Scripture furnishes in favour of this assump- 
 tion is uTesistible. On no other theory is it possible to 
 interpret that wonderful cluster of passages in the farewell 
 discourses of our Lord to His disciples, which refer to the 
 gift of the Spirit on His own departure. For what else 
 could our Lord intend His disciples to understand when He 
 said : " It is expedient for you that I go away : for if I go not 
 away the Comforter will not come unto you : but if I depart 
 
 c2 
 
36 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 I will scud Him unto you" [John xvi. 7] ? It may be that 
 we shall never fathom the meaning of that profound and 
 wonderful word " Comforter." The Greek Fathers, following 
 the Hellenistic usage of the verb from which it is derived, 
 interpreted it as the '' Consoler." The Latin Fathers, on 
 the other hand, maintaining the usage common to classic 
 authors, rendered it ^'Advocate." The same term is applied 
 by St. John to Christ; and is rendered '^ Advocate " hy the 
 translators of our Authorised Version [1 John ii. 1]. 13at 
 the word '' Advocate," as commonly understood, docs not 
 represent the office of the Holy Spirit ; nor does the word 
 " Comforter " exactly reproduce the original term. The 
 Revisers of the Kew Testament, appreciating the difficult}- of 
 rejecting a term so sacred in its associations, have retained 
 " Comforter " in the text, but in the mar2;in thev su£ro;est 
 as alternatives ^'Advocate" and ^'Helper." ISTot one of these 
 words, however, conveys the actual sense of the original : 
 and it may be doubted whether any single term in the 
 English language can be found to represent its full import. 
 "If," as says Archdeacon Hare, " we understand the 
 word ' Comforter,' not merely in its secondary and common 
 sense as ' Consoler,' but in its primary and etymological 
 sense as ^ Strengthener ' and ^ Supporter,' it would be diffi- 
 cult to find any word in our language so well fitted to 
 express a range of meaning corresponding to that embraced 
 by the Greek TIapdK\r]TO^^ although etymologically diffe- 
 rent." * Within that rano:e of meanino; — wide and varied 
 and exhaustless as it is — it surely is not unreasonable to 
 include some such function as that of conveying to the fouI 
 the unspeakable comfort, the gracious help, the blessed 
 * Mission of the Comforter, 311. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 37 
 
 inspiration of a personal assurance of adoption into the 
 family of God. 
 
 Light, much more precious than philology can furnish, is 
 shed on this word by our Lord Himself. " I will pray the 
 Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He 
 may abide with you for ever, even the Spirit of Truth " 
 [John xiv. 16, 17]. This teaches us at the least, that whatever 
 He had beefi to His disciples within the range of the meaning 
 of that word ^' Comforter," during His intercourse with them 
 on earth, the Holy Spirit, as in some sense His representative, 
 would be after He had gone away. In His personal ministry 
 they were to see but the jDrediction and the parallel of the 
 work of Him whom He would send from the Father. The 
 blessed assurance with which He had charmed away the fear 
 and doubt of the penitent heart was not to be withdrawn ; it 
 was to be perpetuated. Instead of the assurance of a passing 
 word it was to be that of an abiding witness. Through 
 another medium, but not with lower authority, through all 
 time, that blessed formula which it is '^ the universal prero- 
 gative of penitence to hear" was to be heard: "Thy sins 
 are forgiven." 
 
 But our Lord goes beyond this. In the memorable 
 passage already quoted — a passage prefaced by solemn words 
 which were the evidence at once of the peerless value of the 
 promised gift, and of the authority of the Giver — He 
 said : " Nevertheless I tell you the truth : it is expedient 
 for you that I go away " [John xvi. 7]. The charm of 
 His personal presence, of His voice, of His touch, was 
 to be transcended. Something was to be given to them 
 not only as precious, but more precious than His loving 
 assurance was to Peter, to Thomas ; — something more precious 
 
S8 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIBIT. 
 
 than the ^^ Neither do I condemn thee" was to the frail 
 penitent on the Temple floor ; more precious than the 
 '^ This day is salvation come to this house " was to 
 Zaccheus ; more precious than the " Thy faith hath saved 
 thee " was to the weeping outcast in Simon's house. What 
 could be more precious ; what could compensate for the loss 
 of His presence ; wliat could make it expedient for them that 
 He should go away? Could it be anything 4ess than the 
 living, indubitable, abiding attestation of the Spirit of God to 
 their adoption ? Only thus could the promised Comforter be 
 " another Comforter," not acting in His stead merely, but 
 by blessed assurances supplementing His eternal work. 
 Only thus could it be more blessed for them not to see 
 than to see. Only thus could they enter upon the legacy 
 which He bequeathed to them, when He said : '^ My peace — 
 deep, untroubled, assured — I give unto you" [John xiv. 27]. 
 Not yet, however, is the wealth of His promise exhausted. 
 The Comforter Whom He would send, and Whose presence 
 among them would secure to them blessings which even His 
 own ministry had not furnished, was to be to them " the 
 Spirit of Truth." He was to teach them all things ; to 
 brine: all things to their remembrance whatsoever He had 
 said unto them [John xiv. 26]. ^^ He was to take," as He 
 said ''of Mine and show it unto you" [John xvi. 15]. 
 In that day — in the enjoyment of that gift — He said " Ye 
 shall know that I am in the Father, and you in Me, and 
 I in you" [John xiv. 20]. Many tilings He had yet to 
 say unto them ; but they could not bear them then ; but, said 
 He, " Ye shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall make you 
 free" [John viii. 32]. The Spirit was to guide them ''into 
 all Truth" [John xvi. 13]. How can these promises, 
 
TEE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 89 
 
 bewildering in their suggestiveness, be explained? The 
 public ministry of the early Church, of the Church of to-day, 
 does not explain them. No revelations of new Truth appear 
 in the teachings of the Apostles, or in their epistolary 
 treatises. The Apostolic Theology is but the Theology of 
 the Gospels, formulated and systematised. The germs of all 
 Apostolic thought lie in the words and works of the Master. 
 The Truth into which they were to be supernaturally led was 
 clearly beyond the range of inference or intuition, — it was to 
 be a truth which would confirm them, and all who should 
 believe in Him through their ministry, in an allegiance which 
 would be tested beyond the limits of merely human endurance. 
 Is it unlikely, that in ^^ all the Truth " into which they were 
 to be led, that would be included which must have been more 
 precious to them, as it is to us, than any other revelation ? 
 
 For what if a man should '' understand all mystery and 
 all knowledge?" What if he should pass within the veil, 
 into " the Holiest of all," and look with undazzled eye into 
 the things which '^ the angels desire to look into ?" What if 
 with an intelligence wrought into supernatural intensity he 
 should by searching ^^ find out God," '' find out the Almighty 
 to perfection ?" What even if he should penetrate and fathom 
 the serene and mystic depths of that love which "passeth 
 knowledge," that love which devoted the eternal Son to 
 the death of the cross ? Would any one of these revela- 
 tions, would all of them put together, compare for one 
 moment with the revelation to his own inner soul of God's 
 love to Jiim ? " Tell me," cried Jacob to his antagonist, as 
 he strove with Him till the breaking of the day, " Tell me, I 
 pray thee. Thy name ! " [Gen. xxxii. 29]. In that impas- 
 sioned demand for a personal revelation of God to his soul. 
 
40 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 he represented the intensest yearning of the human hcarl", 
 and anticipated the promise Avhieh the Mediator of the better 
 covenant made to His followers, and which in the gift of the 
 Holy Spirit He so gloriously fulfilled. 
 
 3. The special relation of the Christian believer to the 
 Third Person in the Holy Trinity gives additional weight to 
 the argument involved in this doctrine. His is a spiritual 
 life from beginning to end; — a life in which the Holy Spirit 
 not only ministers, but is ministered. The Spirit strives 
 with him from the early dawn of his intelligence. The Spirit 
 convinces him of sin, of righteousness, of judgment. He is 
 born of the Spirit, is led by the Spirit, walks in the Spirit, 
 walks in the comfort of the Holy Ghost. The Spirit of God 
 dwelleth in him ; he is the temple of the Holy Ghost ; he is 
 filled with the Spirit ; the Spirit helpeth his infirmities, and 
 maketh intercession within him ; the manifestation of the 
 Spirit is given to him to profit withal ; and he is strengthened 
 with might by the Spirit in the inner man. His is the com- 
 munion of the Holy Ghost. He is w^arned not to grieve the 
 Holy Spirit of God; not to quench the Spirit; and the love 
 of God is shed abroad in his heart by the Holy Ghost given 
 unto him. Can it be possible that, touched as he is at every 
 point by spiritual influences, from the daAvn of life to the final 
 hour, the Spirit of God, fruitful in consolation, the Lord and 
 Giver of Life, taking of the things of God and showing 
 them to the soul, inspiring with noble purposes, investing 
 with supernatural strength, withholding in fact no good 
 thing from him, should leave him In ignorance on the most 
 vital question of his life? Surely the Holy Spirit who Is 
 the source of all Christian enlightenment, of every Christian 
 endowment, and the principle of the Christian's life in its 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 41 
 
 blessed fulness and in its minutest detail, is the medium and 
 agent of that Divine Revelation wliich bears witness to the 
 soul of its adoption into the family of God. 
 
 4. There are many passages of Holy Scripture wliich, if 
 not bearing direct and independent testimony to this doctrine 
 of the " Witness of the Spirit," cannot but be regarded as fur- 
 nishing substantial auxiliary evidence. One or two illustra- 
 tions will suffice to indicate the profound wealth of support 
 which this doctrine can command. 
 
 i. For instance : " Now we have received not the Spirit 
 which is of the world, but the Spirit which is of God, that we 
 might know the things that are freely given to us of God " 
 [1 Cor. ii. 12]. The argument of which this passage forms a 
 part is to this effect : God prepared for them that love Him 
 things which eye saw not, and ear heard not, and which 
 entered not into the heart of man, — that is to say, according 
 to Rabbinical phraseology, things which cannot be appre- 
 hended, by the senses or by the intellect. Such things lie 
 only within the ken of the Spirit : " for what man knoweth 
 the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him ? 
 even so, the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of 
 God" [1 Cor. ii. 11] ; that same Spirit which " searcheth 
 all things, yea the deep things of God " [1 Cor. ii. 10] ; 
 terms which point not only to what is abstract; not only 
 to His rich and exhaustless and incommunicable fulness ; but 
 to His attributes. His thoughts, purposes, decrees; to all 
 phases of His relation to man in general, and to men in 
 particular, — phases not otherwise discovercible. This Spirit, 
 says the Apostle, we received as a revealing Spirit, " that we 
 might know the things that are freely given to us of God." 
 
 In the same direction tend two well-known passages from 
 
42 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIP.IT. 
 
 the First Epistle of St. John : ^' Hereby we know that He 
 abideth in us, by the Spirit which He hath given us ; " and 
 ^^ Hereby know we that we dwell in Him, and He in us, 
 because He hath given us of His Spirit" [iii. 24; iv. 13], 
 With these passages compare another in the same Epistle : 
 " Hereby we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure 
 our hearts before Him ; " a passage which gains much by the 
 clause taken from the following verse in the Revised Version, 
 ^^ Whereinsoever our hearts condemn us " [iii. 19]. If these 
 passages mean anything, they surely mean that the child of 
 God is certified that he is of the truth, that he is not deceiving 
 himself; that the indwelling Spirit, the source of his spiritual 
 life, is also its sure token and witness ; and that such evidence 
 is not objective only, gathered from the observation of ex- 
 ternal phenomena, but that it is specially subjective, having 
 its seat and sphere in the heart, the centre of the emotions 
 and the source of the activities of life. 
 
 Other passages from the Vv^ritings of St. John — the Apostle 
 of the subjective — illustrate the same doctrine. Such, for 
 instance, are the passages which speak of the Christian 
 ^' clu'isma : " '' Ye have an unction from the Holy One, and 
 ye know all things : " and " the anointing which ye have 
 received of Him abideth in you, and ye need not that any 
 man teach you ; but as the same anointing teacheth you of 
 all things, and is truth and is no lie, and even as it hath 
 taught you, ye shall abide in Him " [1 John il. 20, 27] . The 
 Holy One from W^hom the anointing proceeds is Christ. 
 The " chrisma " — that with which the soul is anointed — is the 
 Holy Ghost. This chrisma is the token that we are in the 
 Father and in the Son, children and heirs. Primarily, 
 especially if the use of ')(^p[(j-/xa is set against the avTi^Laroo 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 43 
 
 named by the Apostle previously, this passage may be taken 
 to indicate that " the Church is in a position to discern and 
 detect anti- Christian error, down to its most subtle ramifi- 
 cations." * But that the passage has a wider scope appears 
 from what immediately follows ; the effect of this anointing is 
 not merely that of inducing a capacity for distinguishing 
 truth from error ; it inspires the subject of it with personal 
 confidence, so that he may await the manifestation of his 
 Lord with boldness, and not be ashamed. The most subtle 
 powers of discrimination between truth and error, the un- 
 hesitating persuasion of the general verity of Revelation, do 
 not presuppose, much less do they guarantee, the personal 
 confidence of the soul. Boldness in prospect of His appearing 
 is the fruit only of the duly certified assurance of personal 
 acceptance with God. And it is impossible to study these 
 passages from St. John's Epistle without discerning in them 
 a reflection, even in detail, of our Lord's discourse on the 
 Comforter. 
 
 ii. Yet more explicit, if possible, are those passages in the 
 writings of St. Paul, which relate to the " sealing" of believers 
 by the Spirit of God. "• In Whom {i.e., Christ) also after 
 that ye believed, ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of 
 promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance, until the 
 redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of 
 His glory" [Eph. i. 13,14]. Again: "Grieve not the 
 Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of 
 redemption " [Eph. iv. 30] . Yet further : " Who hath also 
 sealed us," the reference is to the Father, " and given us 
 the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts " [2 Cor. i. 22]. 
 
 The Anglican interpretation which refers this sealing to 
 * Haupt : First Epistle of St. Jolin 
 
4-4 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 the act of Baptism, and ^' its immediate complement," Con- 
 firmation, will not commend itself to the unbiassed jndgment. 
 For while it Is admitted that the original word is used by 
 ecclesiastical writers in connection with Baptism, any special 
 reference of this nature in the passage before us would be 
 unintelliirlble, as beino; alien to the sense of the context. Far 
 more worthy of acceptance is the interpretation that " the 
 seal of the Spirit is that blessed hope and assurance which the 
 Holy Spirit imparts to our spirit," that we are the children 
 of God. * 
 
 The use of the passive in two of these passages is sig- 
 nificant, as show^ing that the experience indicated does not 
 proceed from the subject. The seat of it is the personal 
 consciousness, but it is not developed from within ; it is the 
 act and gift of another. And the assurance of our right lo 
 the inheritance is conveyed after believing, so that the seal is 
 something distinct from the act of faith ; it is the immediate 
 witness and testimony of the Holy Ghost, the assurance of a 
 present adoption, and the earnest of a future inheritance. 
 
 ill. Yet higher rank in the department of suggestive evi- 
 dence must be assigned to the remarkable passage in the fifth 
 chapter of St. John's First Epistle. The controversy re- 
 specting the authenticity of the famous clause in the seventh 
 verse, as to the record borne in heaven by the Father, the 
 Word, and the Holy Ghost — a controversy now happily 
 settled so far as pure scholarship is concerned — has no re- 
 lation whatever to this aro;umcnt. Neither the retention of 
 the clause, nor its rejection, touches the point at issue. The 
 wdiole passage as given in the Revised Version, reads thus : 
 '^ This is He that came by water and blood, even Jesus 
 Ellicott : Ephesians, i. 13, 14. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 45 
 
 Christ ; not with the \Yater onlv, but with the water and the 
 blood. And it is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the 
 Spirit is the truth. For there are three who bear w^itness, 
 the Spirit and the water and the blood ; and the three agree 
 in one. If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God 
 is greater ; for the witness of God is this, that He hath borne 
 witness concerning His Son. He that believeth on the Son 
 of God hath the witness in him" [1 John v. (3-101. A 
 passing reference may be made to the substitution of the ob- 
 jective ^^him" for the subjective "himself" — though the per- 
 sonal pronoun used in the original has in some cases a reflexive 
 force. The reading of the text is a little doubtful ; Lachmann 
 and Westcott and Hort adopt avTO) — the latter noting avrcp 
 in the margin, — wdiile Tregelles and Tischendorf read aurw. 
 But whatever the reading adopted, the context seems to 
 render necessary a reflexive interpretation. For after the 
 distinct and emphatic exhibition of the Spirit as the Witness, 
 it would be strange indeed if that witness should be repre- 
 sented as in the Son of God. 
 
 The detailed exegesis of the passage is confessedly difficult. 
 Its general spirit, however, can scarcely be misunderstood. 
 The central idea is that of the /J^aprvpla which pervades the 
 writino-s of St. John. But how are we to explain the three 
 forms of testimony which combine to make up " the witness 
 of God"? It is hopeless to seek for any explanation in the 
 fact recorded by St. John in his Gospel : that one of the 
 soldiers who was present at the crucifixion of our Lord 
 pierced His side with a spear, and that straightway there 
 came out blood and water [John xix. 34j. Much has been 
 made of the fact that the writer of the Epistle is the only 
 Evangelist who records this remarkable phenomenon. But 
 
46 TEE WITNESS OF THE SPIEIT. 
 
 this is probably a coincidence, and nothing more. No rela- 
 tion need be traced between " the most perplexing incident in 
 the Gospel," and " the most perplexing passage in the 
 Epistle." Some profound and mystical meaning may lie 
 in the incident itself; but there is no reason to suppose that 
 St. John had the incident in his mind when he wrote his 
 Epistle. For if so, he would not have reversed the order of 
 the phenomenon as described in his Gospel. Besides, whether 
 we regard the Spirit here as representing the visitation at 
 Pentecost, or more generally as pervading the life and history 
 of the Church with His testimony to Christ, it is not to be 
 supposed that the blood and the water which came from the 
 body of the Lord are to be regarded as co-ordinate in the 
 function of the witness of God with the Holy Spirit. 
 
 Quite as hopeless is the interpretation which refers these 
 terms " water and blood " to the Sacrament of Baptism and 
 the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. For not only is such 
 an interpretation open to the objection just advanced, that 
 the Sacraments would thus be raised to a dignity co-ordinate 
 with that of the Holy Spirit ; but it is entirely irrelevant 
 to the obvious drift of the passage : " This is Ho that came 
 by water and blood ; not with the water only, but with the 
 water and the blood." Is it not clear that the water and the 
 blood are here referred to as " constitutive factors in the life 
 of the Eedeemer; " that, taken in connection with the Spirit 
 which beareth witness, they point to the three occasions on 
 which the Father bore testimony to His Son : the water re- 
 calling the Baptism, with the Divine attestation which 
 accompanied it, the blood suggesting the Sacrifice on the 
 Cross, which was also associated with supernatural attesta- 
 tions ; and the Spirit referring to the miraculous phenomena 
 
TEE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 47 
 
 of Pentecost, wliicli were the seal of tlie Father's satisfaction 
 in the work of His Son? These three, the water, the blood, 
 the Spirit in His gifts, are " the three great factors in the 
 Gospel;" they recall the most significant and characteristic 
 acts of the Gospel history ; and they form together ''■ the 
 witness of God." And when the soul of man, encom^aged and 
 persuaded by this testimony, ventures to cast itself on the Divine 
 mercy as revealed and assured in Christ Jesus, the testimony 
 '^ no longer remains an outward object of thought, to be con- 
 templated and grasped;"* the objective becomes subjective; 
 that which the mind has apprehended passes into the expe- 
 rience; and ^'he that believeth on the Son of God hath the 
 witness in himself." If there could be any doubt as to the 
 purport of the witness thus realised, it would surely be dis- 
 pelled by the consideration not only of the general design of 
 the Epistle, and of the frequency of St. John's appeals to the 
 inward witness of believers, as a fact obvious to themselves 
 and fruitful of most blessed results ; but more particularly by 
 the consideration of the words with which the Apostle's argu- 
 ment closes : " These things have I written unto you, that ye 
 may hioio that ye have eternal life, even unto you that believe 
 on the name of the Son of God " [1 John v. 13, Revised 
 Version] . 
 
 5. The doctrine which I have endeavoured to illustrate by 
 passages which more or less directly endorse the position 
 which I have taken, is not dependent for its authentication 
 on inferences drawn from analogy or from the comparative 
 teaching of Holy Scripture. It is distinctly affirmed that the 
 witness of the believer's adoption into the family of God is 
 borne to him by the Holy Spirit, and that this is one of the 
 * Speaker's Commentary, in loco. 
 
48 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 special functions wlilcli the Spirit sustains in tlie Divine 
 administration. 
 
 This is clearly the teaching of St. Paul in his Epistle to 
 the Galatians. In his memorable argument on the distinc- 
 tion between the two Covenants, he thus concludes the con- 
 trast : " When the fulness of the time was come, God sent 
 forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to 
 redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive 
 the adoption of sons. And because ye are sons, (or, that ye 
 are sons, it being a matter of doubt whether the particle is 
 demonstrative or causal), God hath sent forth the Spirit of His 
 Son into your (our) hearts, crying, ^' Abba, Father " [Gal. 
 iv. 4-6]. The adoption of either the causal or demonstrative 
 sense of the particle does not affect the argument. The 
 *^ Abba " cry is the attestation, as well as the inspiration of 
 adoption. 
 
 The same doctrine is developed with even greater fulness 
 in the eighth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. It is 
 significant that this chapter begins with the assertion : " There 
 is therefore now no condemnation (no KaTaKpifxa, or sen- 
 tsnce of condemnation) to them which are in Christ Jesus " 
 [ver. l]. It is also a matter of great moment that in the 
 ])assage cited from the Epistle to the Galatians, as well as in 
 that which I am about to quote, the Apostle does not content 
 liimself with laying down a theory, or elaborating an argu- 
 ment : he appeals to the personal experience of his readers. 
 
 The passage reads thus : ^' Ye have not received the Spirit 
 of bondage again to fear, but ye have received the Spirit of 
 Adoption, whereby we ciy, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself 
 (or Himself) beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the 
 children of God" [Rom. vill. 15, IG]. In this passage there 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 49 
 
 is a distinct development and expansion of the doctrine 
 involved in the passage cited from the Epistle to the Galatlans. 
 That which appears there by implication is here asserted : 
 that the Holy Spirit of God is a Witness, and that the son- 
 ship of believers is the fact to which He testifies. 
 
 The particular terms of these two passages, which are of 
 unspeakable value in this study, I reserve for consideration at 
 a later stage. The passages themselves, independently and 
 apart from any interpretation which may be given of their 
 details, clearly and decisively affirm the position that the 
 Holy Spirit of God is the Agent by Wlioni the fact of 
 adoption into the family of God is certified to the believer 
 in Christ. 
 
 III. It ivould appear J tlien^ from the direct testimony of 
 Holy Scripture, as well as from arguments founded upon other 
 considerations, that some ivitness of the lelievers adoption into 
 God^s family is home to his heart, and that the Agent of this 
 ivitness is the Holy Spirit of God. 
 
 These principles have been admitted in all ages, and more 
 or less by all sections of the Christian Church. But it must 
 not be assumed that the interpretation of the doctrine of the 
 "Witness of the Spirit" has always been uniform. On the 
 contrary, so various have been the opinions of the Church on 
 this question, that it is almost impossible to classify them 
 with any degree of distinctness. 
 
 i. With the representatives of the extreme Sacerdotal 
 school, who deny that any direct communication of the Spirit 
 is made to the heart of the believer, and admit no sort of, 
 assurance but that which is ministered througli priestly 
 absolution, I Iiold no argument at all. For no argument is 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIFdT. 
 
 possible. The assumptions of this school have no basis, 
 either in Scripture or in Reason ; they are grounded only on 
 perverted interpretations and Vv'orthless traditions. Every 
 instinct of loyalty to the One Divine Mediator revolts against 
 the man, or the system, that would plant a priest or a Church 
 between me and my God. 
 
 Many theologians, however, who have little sympathy 
 with an extreme Sacerdotalism, hesitate, on various grounds, 
 to admit the possibility of the attainment by the soul of any 
 certainty as to its acceptance with God. To some, every 
 theory of religious consciousness savours of '^ hysterical 
 pietism." They regard the profession of such conscious- 
 ness as a phase of fanaticism. Others hold that the doc- 
 trine of assurance involves a dangerous presumptuousness, 
 and encourages an unhallowed attempt to interpret the mind 
 of God by the standards of human feeling. Others, again, 
 teach that any such assurance is out of place in a system 
 of probation, as tending to relax the soul's proper vigilance, 
 and to invest it with a confidence at once rash and perilous. 
 And not a few, from morbid views as to the essential im- 
 purity of the human heart, affirm that it is impossible that, 
 in this stage of life, it can ever attain to any absolute 
 certainty as to its relation to God. 
 
 ii. A second school of thought, while admitting the doc- 
 trine of the Spirit's witness, denies that this witness is direct 
 and independent. A distinguished representative of this school, 
 the learned Bishop Bull, whose sermon on the " Witness of 
 the Spirit" Mr. Wesley characterises as ^^ full of gross per- 
 versions of Scripture, and manifest contradictions both to 
 Scripture and experience,"* thus defines the doctrine : '^ The 
 '^' Clarke's Wesley Family : ii. 210. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 51 
 
 Spirit of God produces those graces in us which are the evi- 
 dence of our adoption. It is He who, as occasion requires, 
 illuminates our understanding and assists our memories, iu 
 discerning and recollecting those arguments of hope and com- 
 fort within ourselves. But God's Spirit doth witness with, not 
 without, our spirits and understandings, in making use of 
 our reason in considering and reflecting upon those grounds 
 of comfort which the Spirit of God hath wrought in us, and 
 from these drawing this comfortable conclusion."* Thomas 
 Scott, the commentator, follows in the same strain: ^^The 
 Holy Spirit by producing in believers the tempers and affec- 
 tions of children, as described in the Scriptures, most mani- 
 festly attests their adoption into God's family. This is 
 not done by any voice, immediate revelation, or impulse ; or 
 merely by any text brought to the mind ; for all these are 
 equivocal and delusory ; but by coinciding with the testimony 
 of their own consciences. ... So that whilst men are examin- 
 ing themselves as to the reality of their conversion, and find 
 Scripture evidence of it, the Holy Spirit, from time to time, 
 shines upon His own work, excites their holy affections into 
 lively exercise, renders them very efficacious upon their con- 
 duct, and thus puts the matter beyond doubt ; for while they 
 feel the spirit of dutiful children towards God, they become 
 satisfied of His paternal love to them."t Similarly Richard 
 Baxter : ^^ The Spirit witnesses first and principally by giving 
 us those graces and workings which are our marks, and then, 
 secondly, by helping us to find and feel those workings or 
 marks in ourselves ; and then, lastly, by raising comforts in the 
 soul upon that discovery." Baxter further furnishes certain 
 grounds of probability, by the knowledge of which, without 
 * Bull's Works : ii. 41. f Thomas Scott's Commentary : Rom. viii. IG. 
 
 D 2 
 
52 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 any other assurance, we may live " in much peace and com- 
 fort." Such are the nature of God, the mediatorial office, 
 the universal sufficiency of Christ's sufferings, the general 
 tenour of the promise and offer of pardon and salvation, the 
 comparison of our case with that of others, and the present 
 frame and inclination of our soul.* 
 
 The fallacy of this, and kindred theories is, that they practi- 
 cally reduce the testimony of tlie Holy Spirit to the testimony 
 of our own spirit. They confound the operations of the Holy 
 Spirit with those of our own intellect, so that the witness, 
 in direct contradiction to the teaching of Scripture, is but 
 one. For, as Richard Watson says : ^' Though another may 
 assist a witness to prepare and arrange his evidence," as this 
 theory represents tlie Holy Spirit as doing, ^' there is still 
 but one deposition and one deposer." If the '' Witness of the 
 *SpIrit" be the '' fruits of the Spirit," with the judgment of 
 the soul thereupon, then there is no direct witness of the 
 Spirit at all. f 
 
 iii. A tliird view confounds assurance with faith, regarding 
 assurance as of the essence of faith ; so that to believe in the 
 Lord Jesus Christ is to be certified of acceptance with God 
 through His name. 
 
 Two things may be inseparable which are not identical. 
 Salvation is inseparable from Faith, but it is subsequent to 
 it. ^' Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou sJialt bo 
 saved." The death of Christ made it possible that all men 
 might be brought into union and fellowship with God, but it 
 did not actually bring them into that state. The Gospel of 
 the o-raco of God declares that all men ma>/ bo saved, but it 
 
 * Baxter's Works : ix. 53. 
 
 t Rev. R. Watson's Works : xi. 2G1. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 53 
 
 does not bear Avitness to any man that he is saved. The 
 assurance of personal salvation, that God for Christ's sake 
 actually receives and adopts me as His child, comes from 
 another source.* 
 
 The act of faith is no evidence of forgiveness ; for faith 
 has Its exercise only in Divinely authenticated verities, and 
 not In speculative contingencies. Faith is liuman, assurance 
 is Divine. Faith in an unauthentlcated conversion, in a 
 change of heart lacking the Divine certificate, Is not faith, 
 but fanaticism. I may believe that God will for Christ's 
 sake pardon my sins. I may even venture to believe 
 that, on the fulfilment of Divinely imposed conditions. He 
 has pardoned my sins ; but my faith can deepen Into con- 
 viction only when He tells me that I am forgiven. If it 
 had been stated in the Word of God that in every case 
 pardon is dispensed when repentance and faith have reached 
 some definite degree ; if that degree were so clearly Indicated 
 that it would be possible to ascertain without doubt whether or 
 not it had been reached ; and if, further, we were distinctly 
 authorised to be ourselves the judges of the case, so as confi- 
 dently to realise the fact of our justification ; theu the act of 
 faith mldit be taken as an evidence of for2;iveness. But ^' no 
 such particular description of faith " Is furnished in Scrip- 
 ture; we are not authorised to constitute ourselves the judges 
 of the fact of our adoption. The act of justification is 
 an act which passes In the mind of God ; It Is secret, 
 invisible, and without outward sign ; and It Is Impossible 
 for us to know '' whether the act of pardon, as to us, 
 has passed the mind of God." f The Holy Spirit, Who 
 
 * Rev. C. Prest : Witness of the Spirit, 37. 
 t Rev. R. Watson's Works : xi. 2C2, 2G3. 
 
54 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 only knows the mind of God, and to Whom the function 
 of revealing the things of God to us has been assigned, can 
 alone disclose to us the fact that God accepts us as His 
 children. 
 
 iv. A fourth theory admits the direct witness of the Holy 
 Spirit of God, but only as a special privilege, conferred on 
 favoured individuals, or at critical times. 
 
 1. The true and competent answer to all Avho deny, or 
 doubt, or attenuate the doctrine of the Witness of the Spirit, 
 lies in the passage already cited from the Epistle to the 
 Romans ; a passage so full and so unequivocal that I should 
 be content to rest the doctrine solely on its teaching. " The 
 Spirit itself," or as the Revised Version reads, '^ the Spirit 
 Himself," a rendering more intelligible to the general reader, 
 and in perfect accordance with the Greek idiom, " beareth 
 witness with our spirit that we are the children of God." 
 
 The use of the personal pronoun in conjunction with '^ the 
 Spirit," and its position in the original, is most significant. 
 It is not ^'the same Spirit;" neither is it "He, the 
 Spirit;" it is "the Spirit Himself," the Spirit on His own 
 part, expressive not only of the importance and preciousness 
 of the testimony, but of its directness and independence. 
 " The Spirit Himself," as directly and distinctly as though 
 there were no other evidence, " beareth witness . . that we 
 are the children of God." 
 
 That a direct witness of the Spirit of God to the human 
 soul is possible no one will doubt who is prepared to admit the 
 Divine Omnipotence, or the sensibility of the soul to impres- 
 sion from without. The principles of spiritual action are too 
 recondite for complete investigation ; but their phenomena 
 are universally patent. There is not an hour of our lives in 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 55 
 
 Avliicli we are not acted upon and impressed by subtle in- 
 fluences external to ourselves. And it is as unpliilosophical 
 as it is irreverent to assert that the Divine Spirit, in Whom 
 " we live and move and have our being," is incapable of 
 directly informing and controlling those whom He has made 
 and whom He ever sustains. ^' He that made our souls in His 
 own image and likeness, can easily find a way into them." 
 " It concerns us," says Jeremy Taylor, '' in the maintenance 
 of the dignity of our nature, to say that the Spirit of God can 
 inform our soul, as well as our soul can inform our body." 
 
 The whole theory of temptation involves the agency of 
 subtle and invisible powers, directly suggesting doubts, and 
 evil surmisings, and desires after the forbidden. No lesson 
 stands out more distinctly from the mysterious record of the 
 forty days and forty nights spent by our Lord in the wilder- 
 ness than that of the direct action of the great enemy of our 
 souls. However that solemn transaction may be interpreted, it 
 is impossible to evade the significance of the clear and reite- 
 rated appeals of the Tempter to the Lord. Nor is it within the 
 domain of evil influences alone that the soul is the subject of 
 direct impression. The sentiment of a profound thinker 
 and divine surely expresses more than a passing fancy: 
 " Unclothed and unbodied spirits may converse with us by 
 secret illapses wliile we are not aware of them. I doubt not 
 but there are many more Divine impressions made upon the 
 minds of men, both good and bad, than are ordinarily 
 observed. There are many soft and silent impulses, gentle 
 motions, like our Saviour putting in His hand by the hole 
 of the door, soliciting and exciting men to religion and 
 holiness."* 
 
 John Smith's Select Discourse, 648. 
 
56 THE WITNESS OF THE SFIRIT. 
 
 But ^Ye are not limited to theory or conjecture in discussing 
 the doctrine of the direct action of the Holy Spirit upon the 
 heart. It is admitted by all that it is the Spirit Who convinces 
 " of sin, of righteousness, of judgment." How is this convic- 
 tion wrought in the heart of the sinner ? We are not left to 
 infer from the testimony of our own evil works, or the convic- 
 tions of our own conscience, that we are sinners before God. If 
 we were, we should not be found penitent and broken-hearted 
 at His feet. " Conscience," says Hare, " has no power to con- 
 vince sinners of sin. When she is utterino; her most rif]^hteous 
 words she often is only casting pearls before swine."* Con- 
 viction is brought home to the heai't by the direct action of 
 the Holy Ghost. Is it then unreasonable to conclude that 
 He who is a Spirit of bondage is also with equal directness 
 a Spirit of adoption ? He is said to ^^ strive with man." 
 Can it be supposed that His work is only detective, that He 
 is only a Minister of Justice, only the Remembrancer of an 
 outraged law ? Is His mission only to break down, and 
 never to build up ; only to picture to us the terrors of evil- 
 doing, and never to minister the gentle consolations of 
 mercy ? Does He by direct and unmistakable action awaken 
 in me the conviction that I am a child of wrath ; and when 
 under His guidance I have returned to my Father, does He 
 withhold from me the blessed assurance that I am His 
 child ? Are we to be taught by the Spirit, led by the Spirit, 
 filled with the Spirit, in followshi}) with tlic Spirit, and is it 
 impossible that He should ever say to us what the Master so 
 often said to those who kneeled at His feet : " Thy sins are 
 forgiven " ? Surely He who begins the good work is able 
 to complete it, inspiring not only conviction and contrition, 
 * Mission of the Comforter. 10. 
 
THE IVITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 57 
 
 but the fulness of knowleclgej the fuhiess of faith, the fulness 
 of hope. 
 
 It is affirmed by those who hesitate to admit the doctrine 
 of the direct Witness of the Spirit of God, tliat the only and 
 sufficient witness provided in the economy of grace is one of 
 inference, drawn from considerations of the cliaracter of God, 
 or from statements found in His Word, or from the fruits of the 
 Spirit as exhibited in our lives ; and that the Witness of the 
 Spirit implies no more than a Divine guidance and illumina- 
 tion whereby the soul is led to draw such conclusions as may 
 assure it of the favour of God. 
 
 That there is a witness of our own spirit is readily 
 admitted ; for not only is this the clear teaching of the 
 passage in the Epistle to the Eomans, but it is more or 
 less directly involved in the numerous passages which refer 
 to the testimony of the conscience, which is practically iden- 
 tical, though not strictly so. "' Our rejoicing," says the 
 Apostio, '^ is this, the testimony of our conscience" 
 [2 Cor. i. 12]. '^1 say the truth in Christ; I lie not; 
 my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost " 
 [Rom. ix. 1] ; where it must be noted that the wdtness of his 
 conscience is subordinate to the Holy Ghost. But this 
 w^itness of our own spirit, though in\aluable, must not be 
 exalted at the expense of that higher and Diviner Witness, 
 without which its testimony would be fidlible and precarious 
 indeed. The witness of our own spirit may be concurrent 
 and conjunctive, but it is not co-ordinate. 
 
 This is clearly the sense of the passage under review, which 
 speaks of a direct communication of the Spirit of God to the 
 spirit of man. The Vulgate rendering is significant, " the 
 Spirit Himself beareth witness to our spirit." This rendering 
 
5S THE WITNESS OF TEE SPIBIT. 
 
 is adopted hj Luther and other critical authorities. Even 
 Mr. AVcsley ventures to say that ^' the Apostle is so far 
 from speaking of the testimony of our own spirit only, that it 
 may be questioned whether he speaks of it at all." But in 
 a sermon published some twenty years afterwards, he deli- 
 berately expresses the conviction, founded on more mature 
 judgment, that the passage in question speaks of two v\dtnesses 
 '^ who together testify the same thing — the Spirit of God 
 and our own spirit." * This is probably the correct interpre- 
 tation. There is no example, either in the Bible, or in classical 
 or patristic literature, from which it may be assumed that tlie 
 compound verb of the original is identical with the simple 
 form. But there are examples of the use of the verb which 
 imply a concurrency of testimony, in wdiich one witness is 
 direct, and the other indirect and confirmatory. That this 
 is the meaning of the Apostle is apparent from the fact that 
 he refers to a witness the effect of which is purely subjective. 
 It is not a united witness borne to the outside world to the 
 fact of our adoption into the family of God, but a witness to 
 and in as well as ivitJi our spirit, prompting us to cry, " Abba, 
 Father." [Note A], And it is to the direct testimony 
 of the Holy Spirit to our spirit that the witness of our 
 own spirit owes its authority. For as Archbishop Trench 
 says, '•^ God's justification of a sinner is not merely a word 
 spoken about a man, but a word spoken to him and in him ; 
 not an act of God's, immanent in Himself, but transitive 
 upon the sinner." t The adoption of the soul is an act of God 
 in vol vino; a chancre in our relation to Him. That act can 
 be certified only by God Himself. He must pronounce the 
 absolving decree; and then ^Hhc love of God," that is the 
 * Wesley's Works : v. 120. f Trencli's Miracles, 202. 184G. 
 
TSE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 59 
 
 love flowing from the conscious sense of adoption, '^ is shed 
 abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto 
 us " [Rom. V. 5]. 
 
 If there were no authority for affirming the direct witness 
 of the Spirit of God, such a witness would seem to be essen- 
 tial. For no inferential evidence, however clear and various, 
 could possibly prove satisfactory. It is true that there are 
 certain criteria, certain fruits of the Spirit, from which a 
 probable inference as to our adoption may be drawn. But 
 such a basis of confidence must ever be uncertain and pre- 
 carious. ISTo such inference could warrant assurance. For, 
 granting the evidence of certain graces which betoken the 
 Divine life ; granting the fulfilment of certain conditions on 
 our part, to which justification and adoption are inseparably 
 attached ; " the impossibility of knowing in what measure 
 these graces must exist in order to constitute a sufficient 
 evidence of a change of state," the need of some "direct 
 communication from the Holy Spirit of God to assure us that 
 we had adequately performed those conditions," would inevi- 
 tably involve the soul in doubt and uncertainty, its very 
 sincerity standing in the way of a favourable conclusion.* If 
 the knowledge and assurance of forgiveness be not directly 
 communicated by Him, with Whom that forgiveness origi- 
 nates, and Who alone can testify to its certainty, the soul can 
 have no objective security whatever. And that it has not, 
 the unassured and shadow^ed life of many thousands of 
 Christians who do not regard the Witness of the Spirit as the 
 privilege of their faith only too sadly affirms. 
 
 A religious life dependent for its confidence on mere 
 inference would always be exposed to those fluctuations 
 * Rev. Daniel Walton : Witness of tlie Spirit, 41, 43. 
 
60 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT 
 
 which constitution and temperament encourage. Some im- 
 pressions of the mind are healthy ; some are morbid ; some 
 are presumptuous. In some cases the premisses on ^vhich 
 the soul founded its judgments would be false ; or the process 
 of reasoning would be unsound ; or the reasoner himself 
 prejudiced and incompetent. For, as a rule, no man is an 
 infallible judge of his own feelings or actions. A tender 
 conscience, a diffident estimate of one's own character, a 
 morbid tendency, would rob the truest soul of peace ; while, 
 on the other hand, a native buoyancy of disposition, a sunny 
 temperament, an indulgent conscience, would interpret th(3 
 most equivocal evidence in its favour. The sensitive soul 
 would be the victim of every passing cloud, while the bright- 
 ness of the religious life would be the prerogative of the 
 sanguine. That on the most vital question the soul should 
 be left to a testimony so precarious and inconstant is not to 
 be believed. For '^ we are not sufficient of ourselves, to 
 think anything of ourselves:" to adopt any independent 
 conclusions, or to draw any infallible inferences : — " Our 
 sufficiency is of God" [2 Cor. iii. 5]. 
 
 There must be many cases in which any inference, drawn 
 either from a general description of the character of God, or 
 from tlio graces and operations of the Holy Spirit in the 
 heart and life, is simply impossible. If the assurance of for- 
 giveness, and the joy and peace in believing which accompany 
 it, are dependent on a process of inference, how may the case 
 of a new convert be explained, who in a moment passes from 
 death unto life, and is filled with joy unspeakable ? In such 
 a case — and happily the history of the Church abounds with 
 illustrations of sudden conversion — there is no time for 
 inference; there are no premisses from which it may be 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. Gl 
 
 drawn ; there is no room for reasoning. Upon the darkness 
 of a life of sin and separation from God there is a sudden 
 day-break; the mourning of the penitent is turned into 
 praise ; okl things pass away and all things become new. 
 The work is instantaneous ; its suddenness admits no logical 
 calculations : there has been no time for the brino-iufr forth of 
 such fruits of the Spirit as might suggest an infereace ; and 
 the phenomena are capable of no other explanation than that 
 which is furnished in the Word : ^' Because ye are sons, God 
 hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, 
 Abba, Father" [Gal. iv. 6]. 
 
 A further and fatal objection to the doctrine of mere 
 inference arises out of the fact that the very marks which are 
 supposed to attest a man's adoption into the family of God, 
 such as the love of God, joy in God, peace with God, hope 
 in God, are all subsequent to and dependent on the witness 
 of the Spirit ; they cannot exist but as fruits of that witness ; 
 for it is out of the manifestation of God's love to us that our 
 love to Him, that love which is the inspiration of the holy 
 life, springs. " We love Him, because He first loved us " 
 [1 John iv. 19]. It is the consciousness of the need of 
 reconciliation that drives us to the mercy-seat; and until 
 the fact of our justification is certified to us, it is impos- 
 sible that we can have such "joy and peace in believing" 
 as are provided for the fiiithful; impossible that we can 
 cherish in our hearts the love of God as reconciled to us, 
 while we have a trembling fear of Him as a Judge. There 
 can be no such experimental acquaintance with Christ as 
 the fruits of the Spirit involve without His direct illumina- 
 tion as to the fact that God for Christ's sake has pardoned 
 our sins. 
 
62 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 Whatever value, therefore, we may attach to the witness 
 of our own spirit, — and such witness, when confirmatory of 
 the immediate and antecedent witness of the Spirit of God, is 
 invaluable, — it is clear that there can be no infallible assur- 
 ance of adoption apart from the direct testimony of the Holy 
 Spirit to the heart. The fact of our belief, wdiatever its 
 issues, is not, and cannot be, the ultimate source of certainty. 
 'No secondary knowledge produced by inference from effect 
 to cause can usurp the place of that immediate and Divinely 
 inspired knowledge which is essential to our satisfaction and 
 peace. No testimony of the graces and operations of the 
 Spirit can be substituted for the testimony of the Spirit 
 Himself. The " Abba " cry is not the inspiration of logic, 
 but of the Holy Ghost. No syllogism can authorize the 
 decree wdiich God alone can pronounce : ^^ Thy sins are 
 forgiven thee ! " 
 
 . 2. As I have already intimated, the Witness of the Spirit 
 of God, as being distinct from and higher than all subjective 
 inference and conclusion, is necessarily antecedent to the 
 witness of our own spirit. For the true foundation of all 
 love to God is the persuasion which the believer has of the 
 love of God to him. 
 
 The various terms which are used to indicate the Divine 
 operation in conversion, — Justification, Adoption, Regenera- 
 tion, — are generally treated as identical, representing but 
 different phases of the same act of God. Some distinction 
 and precedence, however, must be admitted in the order of 
 thouo-ht. Before the new life of the sinner can be said to 
 berrin he must be released from condemnation ; he must be 
 justified. Justification therefore takes precedence in the 
 order of thought. Then follows adoption ; and the witness 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 6S 
 
 of tins, according to the canons of Methodist theology, 
 though it does not actually produce the regenerate life, is 
 the Divine instrument in Regeneration. '^ The self-same 
 testimony," says Dr. Hannah, " ascertains the relationship, 
 and instrumentally produces the real change in the believer." * 
 This statement is not, perhaps, entirely free from objection, 
 though the points involved are almost too subtle for definition. 
 The firstfruits of the Spirit are love ; but it is difficult to con- 
 ceive of these without assuming the priority of the new life. 
 In the wonderful parable which illustrates the conversion of 
 the soul, from the standpoint of the Father, there is an order 
 of events which is at least significant. When the prodio-al 
 was sighted from afar, the Father had compassion, and ran, 
 and fell on his neck, and kissed him. Then he ordered the 
 best robe, and the ring, and the shoes, and the festal prepara- 
 tion ; and then, v/hen these emblems of his new position had 
 been indicated, he publicly acknowledged the sonship of the 
 wanderer : '' For this my son was dead, and is alive again ; 
 he was lost, and is found " [Luke xv. 24]. Whatever light 
 this parable may shed on the relation which the witness 
 of the Spirit of adoption sustains to the act of Regenera- 
 tion, — and I am quite aware of the precariousness of a too 
 detailed interpretation of parabolic teaching, — there can be 
 little question as to the antecedency of the Divine Witness to 
 the witness of our own spirit. The former Witness is in no 
 sense reflex. It is not, as Meyer argues, that the subjective 
 self-consciousness, ^-I am the child of God," is met by the 
 accordant testimony of the objective Spirit : " Thou art the 
 child of Grod " — the latter being the yea, the confirmatory 
 attestation to the former. f It is the Spirit of God who utters 
 * Lectures on Theology. f JMeyer's Commentary : Komacs viii. IG. 
 
C4 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 and inspires the ^' Abba " cry. The reflex act of our own 
 spirit follows the Divine attestation. 
 
 All this Mr. Wesley puts with characteristic logical in- 
 cisiveness. '^ That this testimony of the Spirit of God must 
 needs, in the very nature of things, be antecedent to the 
 testimony of our owai spirit, may appear from this single 
 consideration : We must be holy of heart and holy in life, 
 before we can be conscious that we are so ; before we can 
 have the testimony of our spirit that we are inwardly and 
 outwardly holy. But we must love God before we can be 
 holy at all, this being the root of all holiness. Now we 
 cannot love God till we know He loves us. And we cannot 
 know His pardoning love to us, till His Spirit witnesses it to 
 our spirit. Since, therefore, this testimony of His Spirit 
 must precede the love of God and all holiness, of consequence 
 it must precede our inward consciousness thereof, or the 
 testimony of our spirit concerning them." * In estimating the 
 value of this argument it must be borne in mind that the love 
 of God which the Holy Spirit reveals to us is not general, 
 but special and particular. In the Divine Word, in the 
 administration of Providence, in the impressive story of the 
 Cross, we may discover the love of God to man — to the 
 human race in general. But there is no passage of Scripture 
 which tells mo that mi/ sins are forgiven : which brings 
 home, without a special attestation, the truth, God loves me. 
 There may be an intellectual perception of the truth, when 
 there is no experience of it. It is the persuasion of the 
 Father's love to us in our individual adoption that elevates 
 the heart, and bears fruit in the life. 
 
 o. But while independent of and antecedent to all objective 
 * Wesley's Works : v. 115. 
 
TEE WITNESS OF TEE SPIBIT. 65 
 
 testimony, the direct Witness of the Spirit of God is accom- 
 panied always, to a greater or lesser degree, by tlie indirect 
 evidence of the fruits of the Spirit. The Spirit's witness, in 
 other words, is not only distinct and immediate, it is con- 
 junctive and concurrent. 
 
 It has been a favourite allegation of those who deny the 
 doctrine of the direct Witness of the Spirit of God, that the 
 belief of such a doctrine encourages the worst forms of 
 enthusiasm, leading on inevitably to Antinomianism and 
 fanaticism. There might be some ground for this allegation, 
 if the holders of the doctrine had ever been guilty of ignoring, 
 or even depreciating, the confirmatory evidence which is 
 furnished by the sincere and holy life. But no such charge 
 can be honestly made. For the doctrine of the Witness of 
 the Spirit involves the fruits of the Spirit. We contend that 
 there can be no real testimony of the Holy Spirit which is not 
 followed by the '' fruits of the Spirit," inasmuch as the fruits 
 of the Spirit spring immediately from His testimony. '' Let 
 none ever presume," says Mr. Wesley, " to rest in any sup- 
 posed testimony of the Spirit which is separate from the fruit 
 of it."* 
 
 While, however, ft w^ould be venturesome indeed to rest in 
 any supposed testimony of the Spirit which is not confirmed 
 by corresponding fruit, no less would be the danger of ac- 
 cepting any supposed ^^ fruits of the Spirit" as independent 
 evidence of adoption. All evidence apart from a Divine 
 testimony falls short of satisfaction on the momentous question 
 of our adoption into the family of God. Clearly as the 
 criteria of the new life are distinguished in Scripture, so 
 numerous and varied are the devices of Satan, and so stronn- 
 
 * Wesley's Works : v. 133. 
 £ 
 
GG THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 is the tendency of the human heart to self-deception, that the 
 Holy Spirit must not be excluded even from the testimony of 
 our own spirit. We need the clear light of His teaching and 
 guidance to be shed on our life, in order that we may discern 
 what is truly of His operation. There can be no effectual 
 guarantee against natural presumption and Satanic delusion, 
 save in the concurrent witness of His Spirit with our spirit 
 that we are the children of God. 
 
 4. No strict definition is given in Holy Scripture of the 
 method by which this direct Divine witness is borne to the 
 heart of the believer in Christ ; but we may assume that, as 
 the operations of the Divine Agent in conversion are varied in 
 different individuals, so is it with the method of that Divine 
 attestation which accompanies conversion. 
 
 ISTot only from the records of conversion in the New Testa- 
 ment, but more particularly from our Lord's striking illustra- 
 tion of the work of the Spirit, it may be inferred, that though 
 the result in every case is uniform, the method of producing 
 it is inexplicable, and the attendant circumstances may bo 
 almost infinitely diversified. ^^ The wind bloweth where it 
 listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof," — this, as bearing 
 upon the Spirit's witness, is of great moment — it is real and 
 ascertainable, though not explicable, — " but canst not tell 
 whence it cometh and whither it goeth : so is every one that is 
 lorn of the Spirit ^^ [John iii. 8]. 
 
 Following in the track of this illustration, Mr. Wesley says: 
 " The manner how the Divine testimony is manifested to tho 
 heart I do not take upon me to explain. . . . But the fact we 
 know, that the Spirit of God does give a believer such a 
 testimony of his adoption, that, while it is present to the soid, 
 he can no more doubt the reality of his sonship than he can 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 67 
 
 doubt of the shining of the sun while he stands in the full blaze 
 of his beams." And again, in substance; '' The Spirit of God 
 does not testify bj any outward voice. Neither does He always 
 apply to the heart one or more texts of Scripture. But He 
 so works upon the soul by His immediate influences, and by 
 a strong though inexplicable operation, that the stormy wind 
 and troubled waves subside, and there is a sweet calm, the 
 heart resting as in the arms of Jesus, and the sinner being 
 clearly satisfied that God is reconciled, that all his iniquities 
 are forgiven, and his sins covered." * 
 
 While it would be vain to attempt any definition of the 
 Divine method of bearing witness to the soul, — a witness 
 which is silent, secret, and inexpressible, — a mystery which 
 is more easily apprehended by those in whose heart it works, 
 than it can be described or expressed by those who have it 
 not, — a sealing " not always accompanied by certain demon- 
 strations and kinds of assurance which many require^ and 
 will not take comfort without them ; " | and while, further, it 
 would be perilous to adopt any standard of an operation 
 which is necessarily as varied as it is mysterious ; it is 
 happily possible to define the nature of the witness itself, 
 both from the teachings of Scripture and the testimony of 
 personal experience. 
 
 Among those who hold the doctrine as it is held by the 
 Methodists, — and there is an innumerable company outside 
 the Methodist Church, and included in all churches, who do 
 so hold it. — there is not only a wonderful consensus as to the 
 doctrine itself, but as to the very phraseology of its definition. 
 It is represented as " a powerful energy of the blessed Spirit, 
 first witnessing God's love to us, and then shedding abroad 
 
 * Wesley's Works : v. 117, 125. * Dr. Pope's Sermons, 263. 
 
 E 2 
 
6S THE WITNESS OF THE SPIEIT. 
 
 and increasing the love of God in our hearts;"* as "a 
 gracious hint or intimation given to the soul by God, assuring 
 our hearts and consciences of His favour and love towards us, 
 and of our atonement, and reconciliation with Him through 
 the blood of His Son ; " f as ^' a direct, perceptible, un- 
 equivocal testimony, spiritual and satisfactory, relating to 
 the believer's adoption, distinguished from any disposition or 
 affection of mind which the adopted person may feel ; " J as 
 ^' a satisfactory and joyful persuasion, produced by the Holy 
 Ghost in the mind of a believer, that he is now a child of 
 God ; " as "a satisfying persuasion and feeling of God's par- 
 doning love," which He diffuses through the soul, ^' and thus 
 banishes our shy distrust of Him, silences our fears, subdues 
 our painful anxieties, and fills us with a grateful sense of our 
 unspeakable obligations to His redeeming goodness ; "§ as " a 
 comfortable persuasion or conviction of our justification or adop- 
 tion, arising out of the Spirit's inward and direct testimony." 
 Admirable as these definitions are, they are, if possible, 
 excelled in clearness and Scriptural correctness by the de- 
 finition furnished by Mr. Wesley, which ever has been and 
 must be the Methodist Confession of Faith with regard to this 
 doctrine. " But perhaps one might say, desiring any who 
 are taught of God to correct, soften, or strengthen the ex- 
 pression, the testimony of the Spirit is an inward impression 
 on the soul whereby the Spirit of God directly witnesses to 
 my spirit that I am a child of God ; that Jesus Christ hath 
 loved me and given Himself for me ; and that all my sins arc 
 blotted out, and I, even I, am reconciled to God." || 
 
 * lAicas : Inquiry after Happiness. f Ilorton : Romans viii. 
 
 i Dr. Adam Clarke. § Dr. Bunting's Sermons : ii. 75. 
 
 II Wesley's Works : v. 115. 
 
THE IVITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 69 
 
 These simple yet careful!}- chosen words, only less precious 
 than the Divinely inspired words of which they are the happy 
 paraphrase, were written in the maturity of manhood ; and 
 they represent convictions founded upon much thoughtful 
 study and blessed experience. Some of Mr. Wesley's earlier 
 opinions, conceived in the enthusiasm of youth, he lived to 
 modify, and even to reject. In regard to others, he was 
 honourable enough to confess a growing uncertainty. But it 
 was not so with this formula of his faith. Eehearsino- these 
 
 o 
 
 words, in the ripeness of his intellect and experience, he said : 
 ^^ After twenty years' further consideration I see no cause 1x) 
 retract any part of this. Neither do I conceive how any of 
 these expressions may be altered, so as to make them more 
 intelligible." * 
 
 5. It may be asked : How is it possible to distinguish 
 between the witness of the Spirit as thus defined, and mere im- 
 pressions of the senses, or presumptuous mental calculations ? 
 Mr. Wesley's answer to this question is somewhat curt. 
 " How may one who has the real witness in himself distin- 
 guish it from presumption ? How, I pray you, do you dis- 
 tinguish day from night ? How do you distinguish light 
 from darkness, or the light of a star, or a glimmering taper, 
 from the light of the noonday sun ? Is there not an inherent, 
 obvious, essential difference between the one and the other?" 
 And he goes on to say that '' to require a more minute and 
 philosophical account of the manner whereby we distinguish 
 these, and of the criteria, or intrinsic marks, whereby we 
 know the voice of God, is to make a demand which never 
 can be answered ; no, not by one who has the deepest know- 
 ledge of God."t 
 
 * Wesley's Works : v. 123. t Ibid. v. 121. 
 
70 TEE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 It is true that just as the beHever's adoption ^^ belongs to 
 a class of facts existing beyond the sphere of sense," the 
 inward evidence which accompanies belief in Christ is 
 '' phenomenally distinct from that which results from any 
 other persuasion whatever." * The man who has this witness 
 in himself cannot explain it to the man who has it not. It 
 is precisely one of those things which the natural man can- 
 not know; it must be "spiritually discerned." Yet unques- 
 tionably there are certain tests by means of which the Spirit's 
 witness may be freed from all suspicion either of presumption 
 or mistake, and distinguished from " impulses, fancies, and 
 wandering lights." " That you may know the voice of the 
 Spirit of God from the carnal confidence of our own 
 spirits," says Richard Sibbes, " inquire what went before, 
 what accompanieth it, what followeth after this ravishing 
 
 Joy."t 
 
 This witness of the Spirit, for instance, is always preceded 
 by true and hearty repentance, the distress of which it 
 soothes, the tears of w^hich it dries up. It is vouchsafed in 
 answer to that simple faith in Christ which is the condition 
 of the soul's adoption into the family of God. It is asso- 
 ciated only with that self-renunciation, and that abandonment 
 of sin which are 'essential to fellowship with God. It is 
 only bright and vigorous when the soul is healthy, rendering 
 to God a full-hearted service and devotion. It is never 
 found where the ordinances are neglected, where relish for 
 the Divine Word is not felt, where prayer is withheld, and 
 where the soul is not " dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto 
 God." The reality of it may be gauged by its effects. For 
 
 * Stanley Leathes : Boyle Lecture, 130. 
 t Sibbes' Works : v. 443. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 71 
 
 wherever this Spirit of the Lord is, "there is Uberty" 
 [2 Cor. iii. 17]. It silences all objections, it scatters all 
 temptations, it banishes all scruples and doubts as to its 
 certainty, and sets the heart fully at rest. It inspires grati- 
 tude, confidence, purity, praise. It kindles zeal, it pro- 
 motes high and holy aspiration, and qualifies for submission. 
 And in no respect is its authenticity more triumphantly 
 vindicated than in the purely filial reception of the Divine 
 discipline which it induces, and which finds expression in 
 such words as these ; " The cup wdiich My Father hath 
 given Me, shall I not drink it? " [John xviii. 11]. 
 
 It is among such considerations as these that a competent 
 answer may be found to the ancient but not yet exploded 
 charge, that the doctrine of the Witness of the Spirit en- 
 com-ages Antinomian indifference. It is " upon the foundation 
 of this immediate testimony of the Holy Spirit" that all con- 
 viction as to Christ and His work finally rests. It is the 
 inspiration of the full and final consecration of every faculty 
 to God. Ko more potent incentive to entire consecration 
 can be conceived than that which arises out of the Divine 
 attestation of adoption into the family of God. " If chil- 
 dren, then heirs I " Who can measure the force of such an 
 attestation upon a man's moral convictions, upon his prin- 
 ciples, upon his estimate of his responsibilities, upon the 
 growth of the newly-planted scorn and hate of sin within 
 his heart ? For this w^itness is not to be regarded as a mere 
 matter of feeling ; it is one the whole inward and outward 
 efficacy of which must be taken together. Profoundly sug- 
 gestive are the words of St. John : " Every one that hath 
 this hope in him (or set on him) purifieth himself, even as 
 He is pure " [1 John iii. 3]. Not less suggestive are the 
 
72 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIEIT. 
 
 words of St. Peter: ^' If ye call on Him as Father, . . . 
 pass the time of your sojourning in fear, knowing that ye 
 are redeemed not with corruptible things, with silver or 
 gold, . . . but with precious blood, as of a lamb without 
 blemish and without spot, even the blood of Christ " [1 Pet. 
 i. 18, 19, Revised Version"!. 
 
 6. To enumerate all the blessed results which flow from 
 the Witness of the Spirit would be to rehearse the whole 
 catalogue of the graces and privileges of the Christian 
 life. 
 
 But the testimony of the Spirit is specially indicated as 
 pertaining to " the adoption of sons." He is '^ the Spirit of 
 adoption," the Spirit bearing witness to adoption, "whereby 
 we cry: Abba, Father!" Into the quaint and curious 
 explanations of this singular combination of the Aramaic 
 with the Greek word which have been furnished, it is not 
 worth our while to enter. The cry itself, which in the 
 parallel passage in the Galatians is represented as His cry, 
 while in the passage in the Romans it is described as our 
 cry, — both statements being harmonised by the fact that it is 
 not at His instance, or through Him, but in Him, as " an 
 indwelling and pervading power," " as the containing and 
 enveloping presence," that the cry is uttered, — this cry, 
 betokening "joyous confidence, in contrast with trembling 
 despondency," involves the simplest, and, at the same time, 
 the intensest expression of our religious life. It represents 
 the profoundest reverence, the profoundest confidence, the 
 profoundest affection. It is the first utterance of the holy 
 life in its dawn ; it is the ripe fruit of its maturity. Never 
 does the true Christian experience fall below this ; never does 
 it pass beyond it. It is never less than this ; it is never more. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 It may be the expression of varying degrees of affection ; it 
 may represent a shallower or a deeper confidence ; but, as in 
 the earthly life of our Blessed Lord, the word *^ Father" was 
 the keynote of His first recorded utterance, and of His last 
 [Luke ii. 49 ; xxiii. 46], so does this cry express and interpret 
 the whole life of the redeemed soul, from its inception to its 
 final fruition. It is the cry of the frail child of earth and of 
 the glorified saint in heaven. 
 
 But it is more than a cry. For ^^ if children, then heirs," 
 heirs not only of a purchased inheritance of which we have 
 at once the earnest and pledge, but " heirs of God," not as 
 belonging to Him, but as inheriting Him. In Him we inherit 
 all things ; "all beams of comfort in the creation are derived 
 from this Sun ; all streams of delight in other things are 
 conveyed from this Spring."* "The testimony of our 
 conscience," says Smith, " is, if we damp it not, our continual 
 feast. But the testimony of the Spirit is a superadded taste 
 out of G,)c''s right hand, as it were a piece of Heaven in the 
 soul." " When true assurance comes, heaven itself will 
 appear upon the horizon . . . like a morning light, chasing 
 
 away all our dark and gloomy doubtings before it It is 
 
 the budding and blossoming of felicity, the inward sense and 
 feeling of the true life, sweetness, and beauty of grace. "f 
 Not without significance as to the new relation of the soul 
 thus certified of its adoption into the family of God is the 
 chano-e of terms in the orio-inal of Romans viii. 14-16. Those 
 who are led by the Spirit of God are said to be " sons of 
 God," viol Qeov. They receive "the Spirit of adoption," 
 TTveu/jia vloOeaia^. But when the Apostle proceeds to speak 
 
 * Horton : Rom. viii. 
 
 f John Smith's Select Discourses, 449, 450. 
 
74 TEE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 of the testimony of the Spirit to this adoption, the terms 
 viol and vlodecrta seem to recede into the backcrround, as 
 though they represented only a legal relation. So the 
 Spirit's testimony is that we are ^'the children of God," 
 not viol only, but reKva, a term of profounder tenderness, 
 as expressing a relation not only of position, but of 
 nature. 
 
 One of the profoundest of German theologians thus graphi- 
 cally sums up the manifold fruits of this Divine testimony. 
 " The ripened, vital, child -like receptivity, and the holy living 
 fulness of love now strike in the inmost centre of the per- 
 sonality a new-creating spark of life, and he who was appre- 
 hended by preventing grace now apprehends and possesses. 
 Appropriated Christianity may now work what it will, the 
 new consciousness, the Divine adoption, indeed the new 
 being, the new creature. The eternal atonement, reaching 
 down to the deepest foundation of the conscience, is now found. 
 Living in time, the believer knoAvs himself to be now living 
 in the eternal life, knows the heavens open above him, and in 
 the heavens his Father. Out of a doubting and divided being 
 he has now become in his innermost nature one. For he 
 participates in Him who is in His Person the principle of 
 the union of all oppositions in the universe. He knows 
 himself to be united with the centre of all truth in 
 heaven and on earth, and has now found the most 
 precious treasure, — religious certainty of the Christian 
 salvation." * 
 
 7. There is no countenance given by the doctrine of the 
 Witness of the Spirit to the Calvinistic view of the assurance 
 of final and unconditional salvation. 
 
 * Domer : Christiau Doctrine, 153. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SFIFdT, /5 
 
 The doctrine of assurance, as held by Mr. Wesley, involves 
 an assurance " on the ground of which no relaxation of 
 religious effort can bo pleaded, and no unwatchfulness of 
 spirit or irregularity of life allowed." * He knew nothing 
 whatever of an assurance of final perseverance and of an 
 indefeasible right to heaven — a theory which has driven 
 many to give up the doctrine of assurance altogether. He 
 was careful to distinguish between the assurance of present 
 and the assurance of future salvation, and ultimately he 
 abandoned the use of the term as being ambiguous and un- 
 scriptural. " Assurance," said he, " is a word I do not 
 use, because it is not Scriptural." f 
 
 In this assertion, one instance among many of that pro- 
 found critical insight which anticipated the philological deci- 
 sions of more recent times, Mr. Wesley was probably correct. 
 The Old Testament usage of the word contributes little to the 
 arofument. In the New Testament the word occurs six 
 times ; in*four of these [Col. ii. 2 ; 1 Thess. i. 5 ; Heb. vi. 11 ; 
 X. 22] the same word is used in the original. This word 
 does not necessarily include the idea of assurance ; it is 
 by no means certain that such a meaning can possibly be 
 assigned to it ; and even if it could, it would be difficult to 
 establish any identity between it and what is implied in the 
 Witness of the Spirit. The Revisers, with a natural hesita- 
 tion as to the rejection of a term which is so closely inter- 
 woven with ecclesiastical traditions, have in one instance, 
 rendered it " assurance," with " fulness " in the margin. In 
 another instance they translate the same word by '' full 
 assurance," again placing " fulness " in the margin. But 
 
 * Rev. R. Watson's Works : v. 175. 
 f Wesley's Works : xii. 473, 
 
76 TEE WITNUSS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 in the two passages in which the word occurs in the Epistle 
 to the Hebrews, they render it by " fahiess," relegating ^' full 
 assurance " to the margin. The translation " fulness " has 
 the authority of the Vulgate, Wiclif, Tyndale, in two in- 
 stances, and Cranmer, with a considerable number of dis- 
 tinguished scholars of more recent times. [Note B]. 
 
 It is obvious that a term which, to say the least, is 
 ambiguous in its meaning, cannot be pressed into any con- 
 troversy in favour of the doctrine of final perseverance. 
 Under any circumstances the use of it is unadvisable, not 
 only because it has no direct Scriptural sanction, and because 
 it encourages a perilous confidence, but because it " shuts out 
 all those lower degrees of persuasion which may exist in the 
 experience of Christians." * We rejoice in hope, which may 
 be fuller or feebler in proportion to our faith, but we do not 
 rejoice in security. Our witness is to a present adoption ; it 
 is not to the certainty of a final inheritance. The fulness of 
 understanding, the fulness of faith, the fulness of hope, of 
 which the Apostle speaks, are fruits of the Spirit arising out 
 of the Witness which He continually bears to the believer, 
 but they are not to be confounded with the Witness itself. 
 They represent advanced stages of Christian intelligence, 
 confidence, and expectation, but they do not involve the 
 faintest evidence of an infallible certainty of perseverance. 
 Such a certainty may spring from a perverted or pre- 
 sumptuous judgment ; it is not warranted by any attestation 
 of the Spirit of God. 
 
 8. Finally, the Witness of the Spirit as thus defined is 
 the common privilege of all believers at all times. 
 
 Nothing in the passage from the Epistle to the Romans, 
 ♦ Rev. Tv. Watson's Works : xi. 25-1. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SFIPdT. 
 
 which is the sheet-anchor of this doctrine ; nothing, indeed, 
 in any passage of Holy Writ, warrants the tlieory that the 
 privilege was confined to the Apostolic circle or the Apostolic 
 age — a miraculous accompaniment of the Church's transition 
 from the servile to the filial state, from the Mosaic to the 
 Christian economy. In no instance is the privilege cited as a 
 symbol and seal of Apostolic authority, or as one of those 
 supernatural gifts with which the Church w^as endowed in 
 the rudimentary age of her life. On the contrary, the 
 privilege is represented as the common prerogative of faith ; 
 it is classed with other " privileges of a private and personal 
 character arising out of its ordinary saving operation ; " and 
 it '^ cannot be proved to have belonged to any specific 
 period, without admitting that the enlightening, justifying, 
 corrective, and sanctifying process of the Gospel belonged 
 also exclusively to that time." * If it be granted that the 
 Apostles received the Witness of the Spirit of Adoption, it 
 maybe inferred that the same privilege is open to all believers. 
 For whatever special relation they sustained to the first publi- 
 cation of the Gospel, — whatever necessity there was that 
 their mission should be miraculously authenticated before the 
 eyes of the world, — their relation to God Himself was that 
 of every Christian believer, with whom in respect of purely 
 spiritual gifts they had all things in common. For " the 
 Spirit's highest function, that of revealing Christ in all His 
 offices to the believer, is discharged with perfect impartiality 
 towards every soul." f 
 
 The theory that the Witness of the Spirit is only an occa- 
 sional privilege reserved for hours of strong temptation, or 
 
 * Rev. C. Prest : Witness of the Spirit, 28. 
 f Dr. Pope's Sermons, 287. 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SFIMIT. 
 
 profound sorrow, or for the article of death, has no warrant, 
 either in Scripture or in reason. " He that believeth on the 
 Son of God hath the witness in himself," coincidently and 
 coextensively with his belief. No mental peculiarity can 
 hinder the Divine manifestation ; no moral disqualification 
 for its enjoyment can exist in the soul of one who is justified 
 and accepted of God. It is the witness of sonship, pertaining 
 not to distinguished sons, or aged sons, or to sons in afflic- 
 tion, but to sons as such, whatever their outward circum- 
 stances, or the complications of their inner life. ^' Because 
 ye are sons," and for no other reason, and to attest no other 
 fact, and to awaken no other consciousness, " God hath 
 sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, 
 Abba, Father." Equally conclusive is the teaching of 
 the passage so often quoted: " The Spirit Himself beareth 
 witness," a witness that is present and habitual, and not 
 ^^ bestowed upon the induction of the believer into the 
 Christian state, and occasionally revived to cheer in 
 sorrow, to strengthen in temptation, or to prepare for 
 death." * 
 
 The fallacy of any other theory lies in the fact not only 
 that it is impossible to regard any moment of the Christian 
 life as being free from emergency, but also, as I have endea- 
 voured to show, in the inability of the soul to discharge 
 the duties of life in the full and filial spirit without the 
 inspiration of this Witness. If this testimony be but fitful 
 and inconstant, so also will be the service which it 
 constrains. 
 
 It is not denied that the witness may be enjoyed with 
 varying degree, according to the circumstances and tempera- 
 ♦ Rev. C. Prest : Witness of tlie Spirit, 107. 
 
THE WITNJiJSS OF THE SPIRIT. 79 
 
 ment of the individual, there being " diversities of administra- 
 tion/' the " self-same Spirit dividing to every man severally 
 even as He will." It may also occur in the same individual 
 Avitli varying intensity, sometimes dimmed, or even wholly 
 excluded by acts of unfaithfulness, by weakness of faith, by 
 unw^atchfulness of spirit, by om-ission of duty, by restrainino; 
 prayer ; or again shining with unclouded light and clearness 
 in the hour of devout fellowship and holy consecration. It 
 may be, too, that this testimony is more vividly borne in the 
 hour of need; because sorrow, sickness, solitariness realise 
 truth ; because they render the soul more sensitive and sus- 
 ceptible ; or because the Father would provide some unwonted 
 manifestation of His love for the solace of His child in special 
 straits ; but wdiatever may be the exceptional provision of the 
 Divine mercy and sympathy, it is the express teaching of the 
 Word that the Witness of the Holy Spirit to the adoption of 
 the believer into the family of God is the privilege of all, and 
 at all tim-es, and in such a degree as may suffice for their 
 assurance and comfort. " He that followeth Me shall not 
 walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life " [John 
 viii. 12]. 
 
 Such is ^^ the Witness of the Spirit." Such too is the testi- 
 mony of the Church respecting it from the earliest times. The 
 Apostolic Fathers and their successors ; the greatest divines 
 of the mediaeval Church; the Reformers, the Puritans, the 
 Nonconformists of all shades of opinion, profess substantially 
 the same faith. [Note C]. In its defence, and more ha2:)pily 
 still in the personal experience of its joyous assurance, the 
 noblest names in the history of religion unite. Under its 
 holy inspiration the suiferer has accepted his Divinely ap- 
 pointed burden with cheerful acquiescence, the toiler for God 
 
80 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 has bravely attempted the most perilous enterprises, and the 
 martyr has given his body to be burned. 
 
 It is true that the doctrine as we hold it is not held by 
 some who " profess and call themselves Christians ; " by not a 
 few in whose creeds and catechisms and theological standards 
 it is nevertheless distinctly taught. And there are many 
 whose difference from us is rather a difference of phraseology 
 than of principle — the differentiating lines of our thought are 
 but faint. But we must not be misunderstood as affirming, 
 or even assuming, that those whose views are distinct from 
 ours ; who do not accept the doctrine of the ' ' Witness of the 
 Spirit" as an article of their creed; who do not claim it as 
 the privilege of their faith, or who, claiming it, have as yet 
 failed to realise it ; are destitute of spiritual life, or are 
 deliberately defrauding the Holy Spirit of "the glory due 
 unto His name." On the contrary, we are persuaded that 
 vast numbers of holy men, whose piety no one may challenge, 
 live and die without any such absolute certainty of accept- 
 ance with God as we have indicated. But we believe that they 
 are living beneath their privilege ; that there is a " glorious 
 liberty " which they have not asserted ; that their joy in 
 believing, often rich and fruitful, might be incomparably 
 richer and more fruitful, if they would claim for themselves 
 with unfaltering trust that prerogative of faith which we 
 have ventured to claim. But we have no controversy with 
 them. We rather rejoice in the prospect of being " glorified 
 together " when we no longer " see through a glass darkly, 
 but "face to face;" when we no longer "know in part," 
 but " even as also we are known." 
 
 To those who venture to affirm that we are mistaken ; that 
 there is no such certitude as to the favour of God as we pro- 
 
THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. SI 
 
 fess ; that our faith on this question is the relic of an enthu- 
 siasm pardonable indeed in an age of religious excitement 
 and transition, but altogether out of date in times of religious 
 intelligence; our answer is simple and straightforward : '^ We 
 speak that ice do know.'''' It is altogether beside the mark 
 for men to deny the fticts of our experience. They may 
 challenge the accuracy of our interpretation, tliey may 
 impugn our critical judgment, they may denounce our 
 conclusions; but they cannot with any show of reason affirm 
 that what we unhesitatingly declare to be a matter of personal 
 life and feeling is a delusion. They cannot by any authority 
 either of logic or conunon sense, annul and cancel the expe- 
 rience of eighteen hundred years of Christian life. " That 
 which we have seen and heard declare we." ^' Our fellow- 
 ship," ascertained and authenticated by the Holy Spirit of 
 God, ^^ is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ " 
 [1 John i. 3]. 
 
 It would seem as if in the wisdom of God the enunciation 
 and profession of this precious privilege of the common fliith 
 were specially committed in these times to " the people called 
 Methodists." The Holy Spirit, Who from among " diversities 
 of gifts " has ministered this one to us, has also signally 
 honoured our faithful maintenance of the trust. It can- 
 not be doubted that as we have let this light shine, so in 
 proportion have men, seeing our good works, glorified our 
 Father which is in heaven ; and so, too, in projiortion, 
 '^ walkino^ in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of 
 the Holy Ghost," have we been multiplied. To the Church, 
 as well as to the individual, is borne the witness of the 
 Divine fevour and acceptance. If we are true to our 
 mission, the infallible signs will attend our public work and 
 
 F 
 
82 THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. 
 
 services, as truly as they authenticate our personal faith ; 
 and in the revolving cycles of our history that inspiration 
 Avill be vouchsafed to the living Church which was the con- 
 solation of the dying Wesley, as the sunrise of the everlasting 
 niornine; broke anion 2: the sliadows of failinoj heart and 
 flesh : " The best of all is, God is with us ! " 
 
N T E S. 
 
[Note A.] 
 
 The passage from Mr. Wesley's first sermon on the AVitness of 
 the Spirit, only a portion of which is cited on page 58 of this lecture, 
 reads thus : "I cannot but desire all those who are for swallowing 
 up the testimony of the Spirit of God in the rational testimony of 
 our own s^^irit, to observe that in this text (Rom. viii. 16) the 
 Apostle is so far from speaking of the testimony of our own spirit 
 only, that it may be questioned whether he speaks of it at all, 
 whether he does not speak only of the testimony of God's Spirit. It 
 does not appear but the original text may be fairly understood 
 thus." After quoting the Greek text, he proceeds : " the preposi- 
 tion avv only denoting that He witnesses this at the same time that 
 He enables us to cry, Abba, Father." " But," he adds, "I contend 
 not ; seeing so many other texts, with the experience of all real 
 Christians, sufficiently evince that there is in every believer both 
 the testimony of God's Spirit, and the testimony of his own, that he 
 is a child of God." 
 
 This view of the text, which was subsequently modified by Mr. 
 Wesley in his second sermon on the Witness of the Spirit, is not 
 without supporters. It is sustained by many of the Fathers ; by 
 the Vulgate : I^^se enini Spiritus testimonium recUit spiritid nostra quod 
 sumiisjilii Dei ; by Luther : Derselhe Geist gibt Zeugniss iinserm Geist, 
 class ivir Gottes Kinder sind ; and by Grotius, Koppe, Riickert, Eeiche, 
 De Wette, and others. Lange, though he does not determine 
 definitely in favour of any view, seems to lean to that which the 
 Vulgate indicates. In his note on the X3assage he says: "The cur, 
 though it be not a mere simple prefix, does not always signify the 
 equality of two different parts in one function. Sometimes it denotes 
 the effect (cwoyo*, cvvaQgoi^uj), and sometimes the conjoint conclu- 
 sion of the act specified in the verb with a kindred fact {avi''n]i.u). 
 This is the case here.'' Alford boldly translates the passage : " The 
 Sim-it itself testifies to our spirit," and affirms that the <tvv in 
 composition does not refer to ti^j TrvivjiarL 77/xaJr, but to agreement in 
 the fact, as in contestari, confirmare. And Godet, while careful to 
 
86 NOTES. 
 
 maintain that the preposition in the compound verb should preserve 
 its natural meaning, " bears witness conjointly with our spirit," 
 claims that "the dative, r^p Trvevixan >/ju&jv, to our spirit, is not to be 
 regarded as the regimen of aiv, with : it is our spkit which here 
 receives the Divine testimon3\" 
 
 For the concurrence of the two witnesses the critical testimony is 
 overwhelming. Philippi contends that there is no example to prove 
 that the compound is identical with the simple verb: it is ^- una 
 testari, to bear witness along with." Bishop AVordsworth, who, with 
 Philippi, fails to recognise any direct assurance, maintains that " the 
 Holy Spirit witnesseth, together with our spirit, by the fruits of the 
 Spirit." Mej^er holds that the Spirit "unites His own testimony 
 that we are children of God with the same testimony borne by our 
 spirit, which is the seat of our self-consciousness." Dr. Gifford, in 
 the Sjmiliefs Commentary, contends for " a twofold but united 
 testimony." Dr. Sanday, in JBisliop EllieotVs Commentary for English 
 Readers, speaks of "this concurrent testimony." Dr. Vaughan also 
 favours the theory of "a concurrent testimony with that of our 
 own spirit ; " and Mr. Moule, in the admirable series of the Cambridge 
 Bible for Schools, saj^s : "The S^Dirit of Adox^tion witnesses with a 
 witness which concurs with a witness borne by our own spirit." 
 Bengel's note on the passage is characteristic: Splritus noster 
 iestatur : Sp'iritus Del ipse una festatur cum sp'irltu nostro. In 
 confirmation of this general consensus, Dr. Pope says : " The Holy 
 Ghost does not in His testimony supersede conscience ; He honours 
 that ancient representative of the Divine voice within man, and 
 never disjoins His evidence from that of the subjective moral con- 
 sciousness which condemns or ajjproves according to the standard 
 of law written on the heart, or the conscience objective." {Compen- 
 dium of Theology, iii. 121). These, and many other authorities which 
 might be cited, confirm abundantly the conclusion which Mr. Weslej' 
 adopts in his second sermon on the "Witness of the Spirit: "It is 
 manifest here are two witnesses mentioned, wlio, together, testif}' 
 the same thing: the Spirit of God and our own spirit." 
 
 St. Paul's use of the compound verb as implying concurrent 
 testimony is sustained by the other passages in the New Testament 
 in which the word occurs, Rom. ii. 15 ; Rom. ix. 1 ; and Heb. ii. 34, 
 where the double compound bears substantially the same sense. 
 The reading in Picv. xxii. 18 is too doubtful to be used in evidence. 
 The Lexicons generally unite in the same interpretation. Parkhurst, 
 whose authority is not of much weight, thus explains the verb : " to 
 
NOTES. 87 
 
 bear witness also, together, or at the same time ; either absolutely, as 
 Eom. ii. 15 ; or goverDing, like the simple verb fiaprvpeoj, a dative of 
 the person to whom the witness is borne. Thus it is plainly used 
 Eom. ix. 1, ' my conscience also bearing me {i.e., to me) witness.' 
 And in the same sense the verb followed by a dative case seems to 
 be used in the famous text, Rom. viii, 16 : ' the Sph'it itself bears 
 witness at the same time (viz., that we cry Abba, Father) to our 
 spirit.' " Glass {Phil. Sac.) admits that the x)i'eposition in composi- 
 tion maintains the signification of cum ; but adds, " quandoque tameii 
 aliiid, vel nihil etiam signijicat ; " and he cites Eom. vii. 22, Acts xii. 12, 
 and other x)assages as illustrations. Similarly Schleusner, and even 
 Stephens, who affirms that while cvy in composition adds strength 
 and grace to the verb, " nonnunquam racat, et ornatus causa additiis 
 est.'" But a careful examination of all the instances in which the 
 compound verb occurs in the New Testament convinces me that the 
 prex)osition is never entirely otiose. 
 
 Many passages might be cited from classical TiTiters in confirma- 
 tion of the view that the compound verb implies the existence of at 
 least two witnesses, who concur in their testimony, " both wit- 
 nessing tlie same thing, and the one, by his testimony, confirming 
 the authority of the other.'' See Euripides: Hipijolytus, 286: 
 Ipliigenia in Aidide, 1,158 ; Xenophon : Hellenica, iii. 3, 2, vii. 3, 35 ; 
 Sophocles : Philoctetes, 438. The verb is used absolutely in Sophocles, 
 Electra, 1,224, and Thucydides, Hist. viii. 51. But though there are 
 a few passages in which the verb is not followed by a dative of the 
 person in concurrence with whom the testimony is borne, I have 
 met with no instance in which the compound verb has merely the 
 sense of its simple form. 
 
 [Note B.] 
 
 In Blunt's Dictionary of Doctrinal and Historical Theology, under 
 the head of Assurance, I find the following : " Out of the word 
 7rX7]po(popia, or rather out of the word as rendered by the Authorised 
 Version, a doctrine has been developed which substantially assigns 
 to truly converted x^ersons a perfect assurance of x:)eace with God, 
 that is, of present pardon and future salvation. This tenet prevails 
 chiefly among the Methodists, and those sections of the religious 
 world wliich take their colour from the teaching of Wesley." 
 
88 NOTES. 
 
 While not charging the writer of the above with wilful misre- 
 presentation, it is impossible to hold him guiltless of an ignorance 
 which, under the circumstances, is culpable. The Wesleyan doc- 
 trine of the Witness of the Spirit is not developed out of the word 
 7r\i]po<po£ia, nor does the Wesleyan theology admit the doctrine of 
 the assurance of future salvation. In none of our theological 
 standards can any ground be found for such a statement. On the 
 contrary, Mr. Wesley not only makes an " im^Dortant distinction 
 between assurance of x^resent, and assurance of future salvation " 
 [Watson's Works, v. 7], but, as we have seen, he discards the use 
 of the word " assurance " altogether : " Assurance is a word I do 
 not use, because it is not Scriptural." Mr. Watson, than whom no 
 writer of the Methodist or any other church has discussed the 
 question of the " Witness of the Spirit " with greater force and 
 clearness, thus expresses his view of the word ' assurance : ' " Perhaps 
 the expression of St. Paul, ' the full assurance of faith,' and ' the 
 full assurance of hope,' may warrant the use of the word ; but as 
 there is a current and generally understood sense of this term 
 among persons of the Calvinistic persuasion, implying that the 
 assurance of our present acceptance and sonship is an assurance 
 of our final perseverance, and of our indefeasible title to heaven, 
 the phrase 'a comfortable persuasion or conviction of our justifica- 
 tion and adoption, arising out of the Sinrit's inward and direct 
 testimony, is to be preferred" [Works, xi. 254]. In commenting 
 r.pon those passages in the Epistles in which 7r\t]po<popia is used, 
 Mr. Prest, in his very admirable treatise on the " Witness of the 
 Spirit " [p. 196] , says : " These Scrix^tural expressions denote the 
 full persuasion and confidence of the understanding in the truth of 
 God ; the full and confident exercise of faith in the mercy and grace 
 of God through His Son ; and the co-existent, as full and undoubt- 
 ing, expectation of everlasting life ; but they do not countenance 
 the opinion of infallible assurance and certainty of perseverance 
 unto the end." And Dr. Poi^e, far from regarding the doctrine of 
 the Sx)irit's Witness as developed from tlie word TrXjjpo^opta, and as 
 involving an assurance of future salvation, thus intcrxirets the 
 words of the Apostle : "He speaks of three kinds of full assurance : 
 that of faith, that of hope, and that of the understanding. In one 
 sense these three are various forms of the same thing, the sure 
 conviction of the reality of the objects x^^rsonally trusted in, 
 hoped for, and ax>prchended in knowledge " [Prayers of St. Paul, 
 214]. 
 
NOTES. 89 
 
 These quotations disxoose of the statement in Blunt's Dictionary 
 as to the deyelopment of the Wesleyan doctrine of the " Witness of 
 the Spirit'' out of the word 7rXi]po(popia, and as to the belief of the 
 "Wesleyans in any assurance of future salvation. But as to the term 
 itself : was Mr. Wesley justified in discarding the use of the word 
 " assurance," on the ground of its not being Scriptural ? 
 
 The Lexical authorities, with the exception of Stephens, whose 
 account of the word is well worth studying, are in the main against 
 Mr. Wesley's conclusion. They generally render the word by 
 certitudo, plenissima jJersuasio, certissima jiclucia, or by some other 
 term which involves the notion of " assurance." Grimm, however, 
 admits the rendering plenitudo, ahundant'ia, copia ; and Stephens 
 regards the expressions TrXrjpotpopia Tr'KTTewg, iXTriSog, aweaeiog. as equi- 
 valent to TvXrjpijg or 7r£7r\j7pw/i6j/J7 iriaTig, IXTrig, abviaig. In estimating 
 the value of Lexical testimony as to the sense of this word it must 
 be remembered that the word is strictly Biblical and Patristic; 
 no light is shed upon its interpretation by classical usage ; and all 
 renderings of it are more or less coloured by the prejudices of 
 ecclesiastical writers. 
 
 The Versions, with remarkable unanimity, follow the lead of the 
 Vulgate, in rendering the word by some term expressive of 
 "fulness." In three out of the four places in which the word 
 occurs, the Vulgate renders it by "plenitudo; in the fourth instance 
 by " expletio." Wiclif uses either " plente" or " fillynge ; " Tyndale 
 uses "full," " certayntie," and " stablischynge ; '' Cranmer follows 
 Tyndale, but in one instance uses "sure;" the Geneva Version 
 reads " persuaded understanding,'' "certaintie of persuasion," "ful 
 persuasion," and " fulfayth ; " the Eheims Version, "fulness" and 
 " accomphshing." Beza, as might have been expected, diverges 
 from the Vulgate. His renderings are : Col. ii. 2, " plene certio- 
 ratse intelligentise ; " 1 Thess. i. 5, "plena certioratione multa ; " 
 Heb. vi. 11, " plenam spei certiorationem ; " but x. 22, he renders 
 " Xjlenitudine fidei." 
 
 The majority of the more critical commentators favour a render- 
 ing similar to that of the Authorised Version. Very few of them, 
 however, venture on any analysis of the w-ord TzXjjpocpopla in defence 
 of their rendering. Delitzsch is an exception. He says: "The 
 noun 7rX7]po(popia is generally = full conviction, joyous assurance, — 
 a meanlEig so entirely suitable here [Heb. vi. 11], that we must, 
 with most expositors, abide by it." " The verb irXr]po(pope~iv;' says he, 
 " signifies to fulfil, tlioroughlij accomplish, or discharge, to give full satis- 
 
00 NOTES. 
 
 faction or full i^oof ; then {pass.) to he fully persuaded., and also to he 
 irell attested., so as to produce full conviction. It is a peculiarly 
 Alexandrine word." He adds further : " The meaning of the noun 
 may always be traced back to that of ' full conviction, entire con- 
 fidence,' which is found in the passive verb." 
 
 In favour of an interx^retation wiiich excludes the idea of " assur- 
 ance," there are many authorities of great weight. Such are Bleek, 
 De Wette, Cornelius A. Laj)ide, Grotius, Schulz, Ewald, Olshausen, 
 and others. Bishop Lightfoot in his note on Col. ii. 2 renders 
 rijc 7rXi]po(popia(: by "the full assurance," and goes on to say "for 
 such seems to be the meaning of the substantive wherever it occurs 
 in the New Testament." How little importance, however, he attaches 
 to this rendering, may be gathered from what follows : " With the 
 exception of 1 Thess. i. 5, all the Biblical passages might bear the 
 other sense, ' fulness.' " He admits als.o that the verb TrXijpotpopiTv 
 has several senses, some of which do not include the idea of assur- 
 ance. Professor Jowett in his note on 1 Thess. i. 5 proposes three 
 exiDlanations of TrXiipo^opia: (i.) certainty, (ii.) fulness of spiritual 
 gifts, (iii.) effect, fulfilment. Webster and Wilkinson, on the same 
 X)assage, render the word " great abundance," that is, of declaration 
 and evidence. Dr. Kay, in the Sx^eaker's Commentary on Heb. vi. 
 11, explains the word by : " the full energy of development." " Of 
 itself," he adds, " the word denotes simply the completeness with 
 which the faculty produces its own fruit." The passage in Heb. x. 
 22 he explains : " So that our faith may have its full develox)ment." 
 In the same passages Dr. Moulton (Ellicott's Commentary for 
 English Readers) renders the term "fulness," "full productive- 
 ness ; " and Dr. Barry, in the same Commentary, on the passage 
 in Colossians, renders t^q 7r\i]ao<j)opLac tTiq amnaeioQ " fulness of 
 intelligence." 
 
 On the whole : in consideration of the fact that the etymology of 
 the word TrXijpocpopia does not necessarily involve the sense of assur- 
 ance, — and considering further that the passages in which the word 
 occurs in Holy Scripture may be clearly interpreted without any 
 reference to assurance, I venture to conclude that Mr, Wesley was 
 justified in his statement: "Assurance is a word I do not use, 
 because it is not Scriptural." 
 
NOTES. 01 
 
 [Note C] 
 
 In a letter to Mr. Richard Tompson [Works : xii. 468] Mr. Wesley 
 says : " With regard to the assurance of faith, I apprehend that the 
 whole Christian Church in the first centuries enjoyed it. For though 
 ^ve have few i^oints of doctrine explicitly taught in the small remains 
 of the ante-Nicene Fathers, yet I think none that carefully read 
 Clemens Romanus, Ignatius, Poh'carp, Origen, or any other of them, 
 can doubt whether either the writer himself possessed it, or all whom 
 he mentions as real Christians. And I really conceive, both from 
 the Harmon'ia Confessionum , and whatever else I have occasionally 
 read, that all the Reformed Churches in Eurox^e did once believe, — 
 Every true Christian has the Divine evidence of his being in the 
 favour of God." Further he says : " I know liliewise that Luther, 
 Melancthon, and many others (if not all) of the Reformers, frequently 
 and strongly assert that every believer is conscious of his own 
 acceptance with God, and that by a supernatural evidence." 
 
 In the able httle volume on the " Witness of the Spirit," by the 
 Rev. Charles Prest, to which reference has already been made, a very 
 remarkable list of Fathers, Bishops, and Divines, representing 
 almost every age and every school of thought, is given, with extracts 
 from their w^orks illustrative of their full belief in this doctrine. The 
 list, which might be largely supplemented, contains the names of 
 Clement, Novatian, Chrysostom ; Anselm, Bernard, Luther, Melanc- 
 thon, Peter Martyr ; BuUinger, Hooper, Ridley, Cranmer, Tyndale, 
 Bradford ; Whittaker ; Arminius, Grotius ; Archbishops Abbot, 
 Usher, Wake ; Bishops Abbot, Andrews, Babington, Cooper, Brown- 
 rig, Davenant, Hopkins, Jewel, Pearson, Reynolds, Wilkins, Barlow, 
 Hall, with Boys, Barrow, Donne, Dent, Field, Hooker, Mede, South, 
 Whitby, Wills, Robinson, Simeon, Loathes, Kingsley, and other dis- 
 tinguished divines of the Church of England. The list includes 
 also some of the noblest names in the ranks of Puritanism and Non- 
 conformity. In it are found Goodwin, Perkins, Burroughs, Simon 
 Ford, Byiield, Dyke, Wilson, Preston, Manton, Poole, Owen, Isaac 
 Ambrose, Samuel Clarke, Sibbes, Bolton, Doddridge, Gill, Howe, and 
 Watts. Mr. Prest also cites the Confessions of Augsburg [1538], 
 Bohemia [1573] , France [1559], and the Saxon Confession [1551] ; 
 the Lambeth Articles [1595] ; the Homilies of the Church of Eng- 
 land ; Certain Questions and Answers, j)rinted hj Robert Barker 
 
92 NOTES. 
 
 [1G07], and bound up at that time with our English Bibles; 
 "Certain godly Prayers to be used for sundry purposes," imme- 
 diately following the Psalms, in the Book of Common Prayer 
 [1G08]; and other valuable documents, in all of which the doctrine 
 of the Witness of the Spirit, as held substantially by the Wesleyan 
 Methodists, is clearly a£&rmed. Indeed, the doctrine of "special 
 and particular assurance was never condemned for heresy before 
 the Council of Trent condemned it." [Perkin's Works : i. 540]. 
 
 Sir William Hamilton, in his Discussions on Philosoi^hy, &c. 
 [508-9], remarks: "Assurance, personal assurance, special faith 
 (the feeling of certainty that God is propitious to me, that my sins 
 are forgiven, fid/ucia, plerophoria fide'i, fides specialis), was long univer- 
 sally held in the Protestant communities to be the criterion and 
 condition of a true or saving faith. . . . Assurance stands essentially 
 part and parcel of all the Confessions of all the Churches of the 
 Reformation down to the Westminster Assembly. ... In the 
 English, and more particularly in the Irish Establishment" (this of 
 course was written more than twenty years ago), "it still stands a 
 necessary tenet of ecclesiastical belief. Assurance was consequently 
 held by all the older Anglican Churchmen, of whom Hooker may 
 stand for the example ; but it is now openly disavowed, without 
 scruple, by Anglican Churchmen, High and Low." 
 
 A few representative extracts wiU suffice to show how generally 
 the doctrine of the Witness of the Sxjirit has been, and is yet held, 
 by the Protestant Churches. " With regard to the certainty (or 
 assurance) of salvation," says Arminius, " my opinion is, that it is 
 possible for him who believes in Jesus Christ to be certain and per- 
 suaded, and if his heart condemn him not, he is now in reality 
 assured, that he is a son of God, and stands in the grace of Jesus 
 Christ. Such a certainty is wrought in the mind, as well by the 
 action of the Holy Ghost inwardly actuating the believer, and by 
 the fruits of faith, as from his own conscience and the testimony 
 of God's Spirit witnessing together with his conscience " [Works : i. 
 G03]. " This," says Dr. Isaac Barrow in his sermon on the Gift of 
 the Holy Ghost, " is that ' Spirit of Adoption ' which constituteth us 
 the sons of God, qualifying us so to be, by dispositions resembling 
 God, and filial affections towards Him, certifying us that we are so, 
 and causing us, by a free instinct, to cry, Abba, Father." Bishop 
 Davenant in his Commentary on Colossians says: " The Holy Spirit 
 specially seals each particular believer, and makes him sure of his 
 adoption by a certain wonderful and secret testimony ; and He 
 
yOTES. 93 
 
 finally pronounces in the hearts of the godly that they are in favour 
 with God." " The Spirit which God hath given us to assure us that 
 we are the sons of God," says Richard Hooker, " to enable us to call 
 upon Him as our Father" [Sermon on Certainty of Faith]. " It is 
 the office of the Holy Ghost," says Bishop) Pearson, " to assure us 
 of the adoption of sons, to create in us a sense of the paternal love 
 of God towards us, to give us an earnest of our everlasting inherit- 
 ance. As, therefore, we are born again by the Spirit, so we are 
 also assured by the same Spirit of our adoption " [Exposition of the 
 Creed] . In one of his noblest sermons, Dr. South, after affirming 
 that under the Gospel there must needs be the same intimacies 
 which God maintained under the law, with those whom He loved, 
 says: "Assurance is a rarity covered from the inspection of the 
 world ; a secret that none can know but God and the x^erson 
 that is blessed with it ; it is writ in a private character, not 
 to be read nor understood but by the conscience, to which the 
 Spirit of God has vouchsafed to decipher it. Every believer 
 lives upon an inward provision of comfort that the world is 
 a stranger to." In his treatise on the Self-denial of Moses, 
 Burroughs writes : " The Sioirit does not write oi^inions 
 but assertions in our hearts, more certain than life itself, and all 
 experiences whatever. Strengthen your faith by the assurance 
 of your interest in the covenant of grace, and in the assurance 
 of God's fatherly love unto you." "Fear," says Simon Ford, 
 " is banished by a soft whisjier from the Spirit of God in the 
 heart ; and this, in such a way, that though the spirit of a man is 
 immediately calmed by it, yet it cannot tell how it comes to pass." 
 [On Adoption, 217.] " The Holy Spirit," says Poole in his 
 Annotations, " wituesseth to our spirit by a distinct and immediate 
 testimony, and witnesseth with our spirit by a conjunctive and con- 
 current testimony." In his work on Communion with God [Works : 
 X. 310] Dr. John Owen says: "The Comforter comes; and by a 
 word of promise, or otherwise, overpowers the heart with a com- 
 fortable persuasion, and bears down all objections, that he is a child 
 of God." " Not the most exquisite music," says Robert Bolton, " can 
 convey so delicious a touch to the outward ear of a man, as the 
 sound of a certificate brought from the throne of mercy by the 
 Blessed Spirit, sealed with Christ's blood, to the ear of the soul." 
 In a sermon on the Witness of the Spirit, Dr. Doddridge says : " He 
 acts under the character of a Comforter : it is the voice of God, 
 inwardly speaking to the soul, to confirm its hopes and to awaken 
 
94 NOTES. 
 
 its joys, saying, ' Sou ! Daughter ! be of good courage : thy sins are 
 forgiven thee.' " " The spirits of the saints," says Dr. Gill, " receive 
 the witness of the Spirit of God, — not to their ears, not an audible 
 testimony ; but to their hearts ; it is internal to their understandings, 
 that they may know and be assured of it. Now it is the Spirit 
 Himself that bears this witness, and not others, or by others, but 
 He Himself in Person, Who is a Divine Witness, Whose testimony 
 therefore must be greater than others, — and a faithful Witness, Who 
 will never deceive, for He witnesses what He knows, and what is 
 sure and certain." [On Ptomans viii.] 
 
 Many extracts of similar import might be given from more recent 
 writers ; though it cannot be denied that the theology of recent 
 times is less pervaded by the teaching of this doctrine than that of 
 the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. The reason 
 it is not difficult to divine. 
 
 I will close with one final passage which I have not seen quoted 
 in any work on this subject. It is from " the Eeverend Father and 
 Faithful Servant of God, Mr. William Cowper, Bishop of Galloway." 
 "Unless the Holy Sx^irit testify unto us that God is become our 
 Father, and hath made us His children, we dare not go near Him, 
 to crave good things of Him. The -beginning of our acquaintance 
 with God flows from Him. We must first receive from God some 
 secret information of His love and Fatherly affection, or ever we be 
 able to return unto Him the desires, the words, and the deeds of His 
 
 loving children Now this testimony of the Spirit is the secret 
 
 voice of God, whereby He speaks from heaven unto thine heart, 
 assuring thee that He is thine, and thou art His. No man can 
 conceive what it is, unless he have received it, for it giveth that 
 * new name ' which none can know but they who have it, and that 
 'hidden manna' which none do understand but they who taste it. 
 It is not gotten but after long and unfeigned humiliation, and it is 
 not kept without sanctification ; for every sin which the godly 
 commit diminishes in them this testimony of the Spirit." [Works: 
 ii4]. 
 
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