The Psychology of the Christian Life The Psychology of the Christian Life A Contribution to the Scientific Study of Christian Experience and Character By HORACE EMORY WARNER, M. A, D. D. WITH INTRODUCTION BY JOHN R. MOTT, LL.D. i New York Chicago Toronto Fleming H. Revell Company London and Edinburgh Copyright, 1910, by FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY \0 *m» 1 New York: 158 Fifth Avenue Chicago: 80 Wabash Avenue Toronto: 25 Richmond Street, W. London: 21 Paternoster Square Edinburgh: 100 Princes Street A t..a.».SW|-tw.rfm iOi-/tKMXV'o t Ty\m^ c &y |li\WrM'5av J FACTS IN THE FOKEGKOTJND I. — A Needless Dkead " I have heard by many of this man how much evil he hath done to thy saints." — Ananias of Damascus. 1 The genuine experimental Christian is confi- dent and jubilant. He has found " The Pearl of Great Price." It is precious Bryrd a An a cost! on and sacred ab °ve all values. It is the life of personal salvation from the guilt and slavery of sin. It is the life of spiritual peace and victory over evil within and without. It is a perpetual fountain of joy and hope. He counts nothing as sacrifice in its de- fense. He springs gladly into martyrdom for its retention. From Stephen's stony couch of death to the crimson sword of the Chinese Boxer and the dripping cimeter of the Moslem Kourd, the genuine Christian everywhere gives his blood for the life he has found in Christ. To touch, with critical hand, this priceless treasure is to touch the apple of his eye. He recoils ; he throws out every shield of the inner life with keenest concern. He is inspired, in 1 Acts ix. 13. 29 30 FACTS IN THE FOREGROUND the first impulse, with a shrinking dread. It is conceived that this life of peace, this joy of purity, this sense of power, Replned HandlinE: this communion with God, this exhilaration of holy Presence must not come under common touch. It is too sacred, too exalted, too divine to be put under ordinary scrutiny. It is in a class by itself and must be left in its solitude and hallowed glory undisturbed by profane in- trusion. Mortal has no units by which it may be measured ; no reactions by which it may be tested ; no balances in which it may be weighed ; no concepts in which its mystic nature may be embraced. To attempt to critically examine, analyze, define and correlate its parts, as if it were a thing of common mould, is felt to be an act of presumptuous sacrilege. " It is true that we instinctively recoil from seeing an object to which our emotions and affections are committed handled by the intellect as any other object is handled." x No less astute and scientific a per- son than the devout chemist, Michael Faraday, sympathetic with this exclusive spirit, declared : " I claim an absolute distinction between a re- ligious and an ordinary belief. If I am re- proached for weakness in refusing to apply those mental operations, which I think good in 1 James, " Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 9, A NEEDLESS DREAD 31 high things, to the very highest, I am content to bear the reproach." * It is thus conceived, by some, that such processes as have sifted and systematized the rest of the known world bring here an indefinable peril. It certainly must be admitted that these processes sometimes, when evidently inspired by an inimical purpose, have Beget r D M reld! ds brought threatening and slaughter to the vital essence of this sacred life. They have seized it with reckless violence and have relentlessly sought to eliminate its every apparently supernatural element. A class of these methods has been tersely char- acterized by one eminently qualified so to do : "Medical materialism finishes up Saint Paul by calling his vision on the road to Damascus a discharging lesion of the occipital cortex, he being an epileptic. It snuffs out Saint Teresa as an hysteric, Saint Francis of Assisi as an hereditary degenerate. . . . Medical ma- terialism then thinks that the spiritual authority of all such personages is successfully undermined." 2 All such destructive efforts have richly earned the name of unsparing foes of all spiritual life. They have begotten a prejudice, deep-seated and persistent, against 1 Holmes, "Pages from an Old Volume of Life," p. 312. 8 James, "Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 13. 32 FACTS IN THE FOREGKOUJSTD themselves. The rumour of their deadly work has permeated everywhere. The suggestion of anything, in the remotest way resembling them, awakens a dread, it matters not how just and even friendly the effort itself may be to the spiritual life. A single fact, however, strips such dread of all its force. That truth, once clearly appre- hended, the dread is seen to be Nee S d?es h s Dread utterly needless. This illuminat- ing truth is many-sided and may be variously stated. Every timorous soul should turn it over and over until he shall bring himself under its emancipating inspira- tion : Scrutiny can change no fact. Analysis has no power over essence. Truths are the same in the shadow or in the sunlight. Realities are invulnerable and unchangable to whatever processes subjected. The constituent elements of the life we call Christian are sub- stantial, real, unalterable. They are the eternal verities of the life begotten of God in the soul. No possible handling can render them less real, or change their essential nature. The dread of their scrutiny is a confession either of our in- ability to demonstrate their substantial nature or of our imperfect faith in their indestructible reality. All such dread is without adequate reason and actually groundless. Ll A CHOSEN INSTRUMENT 33 II. — A Chosen Instrument "He is a chosen vessel unto Me." — Jesus. 1 Christian psychology is the study of the soul in its exhibition of the phenomena of the Christian life. It is the PsTc V h1i°o f gy hriStian systematic, scientific knowledge of psychical activities involved in Christian experience and their coordinations in conduct and character. It is the exploration of the entire field of interrelated phenomena appearing in the life of the Christian. It is the classification of all of the facts thus discoverable in their correlated order. It is the formulation of the evident laws of the spiritual, experimental action developed under the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This Christian psychology is here to- day ready for the most devout and far-reaching service. To intimate that such psychological research, in its attempt to investigate the facts of Christian experience, will undo some of the sacred things of the Christian life, will under- mine faith, extinguish joy, emasculate spiritual virility or dissipate power, is Ananias-like to at- tempt to block the plan of God. A greater familiarity with the properly applied processes and the actual results of such psychological inquiry speedily recalls that intimation and 1 Aots ix. 15. 34 FACTS IN THE FOREGROUND accords a cordial welcome. A distinct Christian psychology has been given its place in the thinking of our day and its arrival is heralded in unmistakable events. Christian psychology is the inevitable specific application of an irresistible, world-wide move- ment. We are in the psycholog- b e e Givenlt n Must ical era par excellence in the world's thought. As the period of the ap- plication of scientific method to the investiga- tion of mental life its origin is of recent date. " It dawned ten, perhaps fifteen years ago, and we are living in the middle of it. . . . It began with an analysis of simple ideas and feel- ings, and it has developed to an insight into the mechanism of the highest acts and emotions, thoughts and creations. It started by studying the mental life of the individual, and it has rushed forward to the psychical organization of society, to social psychology, to the psychology of art and science, religion and language, his- tory and law." 1 This pushing of investigation into the region of the psychical to ascertain the demonstrable facts of that realm is not a fad, as a superficial survey sometimes concludes. It has come to stay as a permanent and important part of the world's research. The negative con- cept of the region of consciousness as impene- 1 Munsterberg, "Psychology and Life," p. 2. A CHOSEN INSTRUMENT 35 trable and unconquerable is an effete vestige of a past stage of thinking. The larger, newer vision perceives a region of fact, charged with a potentiality of untold measure, lying in the in- tangible sphere of the psychical. It is the self- imposed task of this age to attempt the posses- sion of the coveted facts of this region hitherto so vaguely perceived and understood. It is a movement both irrevocable and irresistible. The signal of general progress has sounded this advance and the wide-awake thinking of the Christian world cannot refuse to hear. With the arrival of a definite and opportune psy- chology of the Christian life is now borne abroad the call to its cordial recognition and prayerful reception. Where this psychological movement ap- proaches the confines of the Christian life there is the Damascus of our day and ZZSEZ the waiting figure of a new and half-awakened champion of ex- tended lines of gospel permeation. A remark- able metamorphosis is this hour in progress. A dreaded foe is being transformed into a power- ful ally. God is quietly preparing a mighty exponent of a clarified and demonstrated Chris- tian consciousness. The providences of God, taking cognizance of the factors of power in this psychological movement and winning them to 36 FACTS IN THE FOREGROUND His own gracious uses, are saying to listening ears, attuned to coming realities : Here is a chosen vessel unto Me ; this Saul is to cease his murderous mission and is to be My elect servant ; fear and shun him no longer ; take him by the hand and lead him into the inner circle of the saved soul's more sacred knowl- edge ; be the Ananias to this groping but soon- to-be invincible Ambassador of My Gospel to a larger world. The ear of Christian intelligence will not be deaf to such authoritative summons as God's providences are issuing to devout and studious minds. New apologetics are in birth for Christian conquest. A new world of psy- chological thought is appearing on the horizon. Its shores are drawing near us ; its areas are stretching afar ; its growing multitudes await the coming of an evangel equipped for his mis- sion. Already the cry is sounding out for the ear that is ready to hear : " Come over into Macedonia and help us." * No other appeal so imperative is in our air to-day. True to His historic methods God has been getting ready for the emergency, He has been schooling the new Apostle, even though to some he appears as " one born out of due time/' 2 for his far-reach- ing task. The men and the psychology are coming that are together to fill an apostolic 1 Aots xvi. 9. 2 1 Cor. xv. 8. A FEARLESS METHOD 37 mission to the great Gentile world, the ever- growing world of psychological prejudice and doubt, yet to be won to the claims and appeals of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. III. — A Feakless Method 11 Prove all things ; hold fast that which is good." — Paul 1 The attitude of Christian psychology must be a perfectly fearless one. There must be no handicap upon its work. It must Necessary to Dis- ■% -i • • , j ,i , solve illusion. have unlimited range ; there must be no restriction upon its action. Any other situation would be fatal to its efficiency and totally subversive of its self-respect. It must be given a free hand and every possible chance to make good in its delicate but momentous task. This psychology of the Christian life has every reason to be bold. Timidity illy becomes such an enterprise. On the very terms of the Christian cosmic postulate, Christian psychology is simply the search of the Father's child for the truth that the Father has put into its place in the psychic world in the prosecution of His re- demptive economy. Timidity as to the final consequences is entirely out of place in such an effort. All this arises from the fact that what God really says needs no special pleading in its *1 Thess. v. 21. 38 FACTS IN THE FOREGROUND defense. It, as the truth of divine utterance, is abundantly able to hold its own in all the or- deals of human investigation. Furthermore, what God does in the soul has all the enduring substance of a divine deed and must survive the most painstaking scrutiny that man can bring to bear upon it. " Nor ought this absolutely untrammelled scientific investigation to give anxiety to any real believer in God. For scien- tific investigation simply seeks the facts, and can, therefore, so far as it is successful, only make more clear to us exactly how God did proceed." 1 The genuine processes that take place in the soul, in the passing stages of Christian expe- rience and character, are real states, positively being what they purport to be, and hence by no possible handling resolvable into anything other than they really are. Anything that may have crept into Christian life that does not possess this real, substantial, divine nature and is palm- ing itself off on human interpretation as an es- sential and vital part of the saved life should be detected and dissolved away under such rigor- ous method as knows no mercy on illusion. Every real friend of the Christian life will de- mand such a method. The work of search into the entire range of psychical activity involved in Christian expe- 1 King, " Reconstruction in Theology," p. 49. A FEARLESS METHOD 39 rience should be, without fear of harm to any- thing true, unsparing of every spiritual state in the light turned on and in the S o m Truth° yaIty minute and penetrating inspection pushed to its last possible discov- ery and revelation. It is no treachery to the truth to put it through the processes that demon- strate its verity. It is, indeed, the highest loyalty to the truth to give it an unequivocal chance to prove itself, to sweep aside all occultations and to shine with undimmed radiance, to eliminate dilutions and adulterations and make its essence exhibit its own splendid self. " Truth has noth- ing to fear and everything to hope from such a struggle." * Every interest of truth calls for such a method since any other would inevitably betray the truth in countless instances. Prescribed in- quiry is the resort of tricksters and charlatans. Who has something to conceal seeks the shadow. Substantial truth ever triumphs best in the open. The challenge of Scripture summons to the widest range of untrammelled investigation. " Prove all things." 2 This is a call to rigid test- ing. Its goal is underlying essence. It curries no favour for cherished notions. It savours of the balances and the blinded eyes of Justice. It sweeps all fields and levels all barriers. 1 King, "Reconstruction in Theology n p. 14. UThess. v. 21. 40 FACTS IN THE FOREGROUND " Hold fast that which is good." x This is a call to discriminating loyalty ; it is obstruction to reckless iconoclasm. It assures the surviving real, substantial good, and enjoins unswerving and intense adhesion thereto. Such is the dar- ing, open-minded attitude of Scripture towards the possible appearings of truth wherever they occur. Christian psychology can afford to adopt no other method. It must lay bare the entire area and content of the Christian soul. Alone Worthy of christian Psy. I here cannot be the least reserva- tion in the range of its work. It must invite investigation of the profoundest, most deep-lying phenomena of the inner life. The origin and reaction of spiritual states, the continuity of processes, the Scriptural delinea- tions of indefinable and undiscernible stages, the gaps or abysses in experimental consciousness, all these must be passed under the search-light of an unfaltering inquiry as to the demonstrable truth that can survive such research. " If the fruits for life of the state of conversion are good, we ought to idealize and venerate it, even though it be a piece of natural psychology ; if not, we ought to make short work with it, no matter what supernatural being may have infused it." 2 1 1 Thess. v. 21. 2 James, "Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 237. A MEASURELESS BENEFIT 41 Such are the words of one of the most candid general psychologists of our day, setting forth, from his point of view, the proper attitude of sincere psychological research towards the facts of Christian experience. Christian psychology can take an attitude of no less candour and loy- alty to the truth. Such method needs no apology and calls forth the unqualified approval of every open-minded student of the Christian life. IV.— A Measureless Benefit "Ye shall know the truth ; and the truth shall make you free."— Jesus. 1 What are the definable states of Christian ex- perience ? What is the succession or interrela- tion of its states ? Do all of these ReH h e e ve P d. rplexities states lie within the range of con- sciousness? If any of them lie without that range, can we know where they lie and what they are ? Does inspired revela- tion shed any light on Christian experience be- yond the range of direct consciousness ? What may be positively known in Christian expe- rience ? How do the inner states of experience relate themselves to the outer states of charac- ter? What are the uniform, practical products in every-day life that normally spring from the 1 John viii. 32. 42 FACTS IN THE FOREGROUND genuine, typical Christian experience? How do these psychical states project themselves into the outer forms of Christian character ? What is the underlying, all-sufficient power operative in these experimental processes? Christian psychology sets itself to answer these queries, and, in the measure it succeeds, will go far to give to Christian experience and life a definite place and content in the thought of the world. It has been declared that Drummond's greatest contribution to our generation is this : " That there are definite conditions to be fulfilled for any spiritual attainment, that these conditions may be known, and that when fulfilled you may count on the results ; " this declaration being followed in the same utterance with the con- clusion : " Theology has much to gain in clear- ness and precision of statement, and in power of appeal in the development of this line of thought." 1 " The psychological standpoint is not only important but indispensable for the re- ligious worker, whether preacher or teacher. No amount of goodness or devotion can take its place." 2 The psychology of Christian life thus holds in its purpose the clarification of what assumes to be a systematic process of the grace of God in 1 King, " Reconstruction in Theology," p. 59. 2 Cutten, "The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity," p. 6. A MEASURELESS BENEFIT 43 the soul. It aims to sweep away the hazy, nebulous conceptions of spiritual states that have all too long been the misfortune Eiim'natcT ° f Christian terminology. It sets aside the alluring but bewilder- ing twilight of unwarranted mysticism. It eliminates misunderstandings and unreliable expectations which so often form misleading standards of saving experience. It forever puts a period to those heart-sickening gropings after fanciful phases of experience which the very nature of spiritual things and the promises of Scripture, when properly understood, never en- courage. It makes clear and luminous the pathway of spiritual states along which the normal heart moves in genuine Christian life. It traces the vital connection between the potent states of the inner, psychical being, constituting the essence of Christian experience, and the con- sistent states of character and life that spring therefrom as light and heat spring from fire. It does not explain processes ; it defines them and makes them clearly recognizable. It does not do away with mystery ; it locates, outlines, il- luminates, makes more positive and unques- tionable the unfathomed and evidently un- fathomable depths that underlie the conscious states of the Christian life. All these are vital and priceless things that 4A FACTS IN THE FOREGROUND we need to know ; indeed we cannot know too much about them. Every expansion of such knowledge confers measureless c n on E f™rred! pation benefits. With such knowledge we can more intelligently adjust ourselves to spiritual things. We are liberated from traditional, and often mythical, views. We are enabled to enter the stable, reliable uni- form region of experimental truth. We are no longer so subject to error by reason of indefinite- ness and confusion in our apprehension of the facts of Christian experience. We can more confidently and accurately lead into the sub- stantial spiritual states that are the sources of the purest and most exalted life others whose bewildered spiritual effort is aptly portrayed : " They are simply feeling around in the dark. What may result they can have no idea ; much disappointment is certain ; they can only hope that here and there something of what they seek may be stumbled upon." 1 We are thus able to protect ourselves and others from disap- pointments and disastrous reactions entailed by erroneous views of experimental things. We find out where God touches us. We learn how His divine hand changes and moulds our spir- itual being. We discover indubitable evidences of His presence and work. Christian experience ^ing, " The Seeming Unreality of the Spiritual Life," p. 103. A MEASURELESS BENEFIT 45 is made clear, definite, orderly, wonderful, in- vincible in its conquest of hearts whose volition is responsive to the impression of such truths. We are, in truth, made free in the liberty of a larger, clearer vision of the processes and forces constituting the experience and life of the Chris- tian. Thus the psychology of the Christian life, its experience and character, is big with measure- less blessing for the world of candid SLScSr* thought and spiritual aspiration. In this direction lie the richest un- foldings of Christian truth in coming genera- tions. This science of the spiritual life is only in its infancy. As it grows in grasp, penetra- tion and facility its beneficent results will multiply in an ever-ascending proportion. All hail to every sincere effort, however imperfect, towards the formulation of an approximate psy- chology of the inner and outer life of the Chris- tian. PART I The States of Christian Experience THE FIELD OF EXPEKIMENTAL STATES The soul's activities occur under all shades of vividness. They sometimes take place under the concentrated glare of mental Psychrclafvity. illumination that makes the most trifling stir of psychical powers stand out with a distinctness that is almost painful. Memory recalls it all with a clearness that never dims. It seems as if we were acting under the focalized rays of some brilliant spiritual search-light that floods Fun consciousness, the inner life until all is as clear as noonday. Thoughts, emotions, volitions act and interact in a white light of intense vividness. At other times, psychic movement is dim and vague. We scarcely realize that there is any action. It is with great difficulty consctusness. that we grope our way back over the path of consecutive brain- action along which we have been moving. We seem to have been borne along by a subtle, un- volitional undercurrent of psychic energy, in 49 50 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE such an obscure half-light that we have passed state after state of mental action practically un- awares. We have been brought abruptly up against our conclusions nearly oblivious of the stages by which the approach has been made. We are thoroughly convinced that the move- ment has taken place even though it has been through a hazy twilight of mental perceptions. Revery is full of such passageways where the course of psychical action dips well down to the lowest plane of consciousness, almost beyond voluntary recall, subsequently to emerge into the light of full consciousness bearing positive and accurate results whose sources in our mental action are quite obscure to us. There are yet other times when psychical action proceeds without the knowledge on the part of the individual that it is subconsciousness, transpiring. The outcroppings of a multitude of conditions appear- ing in consciousness are overwhelming indica- tions of this underlying region of psychic activity that no vision of introspection has been able to fathom. This is not the place for an attempt at an exhaustive statement of the psychological facts that have been accumulated in demonstration of this underlying region of psychic activity. For a survey of the mass of such material the reader is referred especially FIELD OF EXPERIMENTAL STATES 51 to the treatises of leading philosophical and psychological authors of the last decade. It should perhaps be said that while the psycho- logical world may not be absolutely unanimous in the matter of this subconscious field — what scientific postulate is ever positively unanimous among students of phenomena ? — it may still be safely affirmed that psychological thought is fast verging towards a practical unanimity on the existence of this subconscious area in the psychical field as the only possible key to the solution of numerous problems of the psychical life. " I cannot but think that the most im- portant step forward that has oc- v^rfficadon. curred in psychology since I have been a student of that science is the discovery, first made in 1886, that, in certain subjects at least, there is not only the conscious- ness of the ordinary field, with its usual centre and margin, but an addition thereto in the shape of a set of memories, thoughts and feel- ings which are extra-marginal and outside of the primary consciousness altogether, but yet must be classed as conscious facts of some sort, able to reveal their presence by unmistakable signs. I call this the most important step for- ward because, unlike the other advances which psychology has made, this discovery has revealed to us an entirely unsuspected peculiarity in the 52 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE constitution of human nature." 1 What will, therefore, be clearly understood as conceded in this entire discussion is that psychic activity has larger range than earlier psychological opinion has been accustomed to grant it, and that this range includes not only the region of consciousness but also a region of subconscious- ness, or ultra-consciousness, in which as genuine and potent spiritual activities occur as in the region of consciousness. This entire range con- stitutes the field of the states of Christian experience. Consciousness is the souTs knowledge of its own states and conditions. Conscious states are such states of the soul as come consciousness. within the embrace of such knowl- edge. The region of consciousness is comprised of all such states as are susceptible of being brought under the perception of con- sciousness. We are really only conscious of what actually occurs within the area of conscious- ness. That area, as a general region, is a vari- able surface of the psychical field. It varies in- versely as the intensity of attention. Concentra- tion of attention means the withdrawing of consciousness from its general area and its limi- tation to a specific spot. If the specialization is intense enough we become unconscious of every- 1 James, " Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 233. FIELD OF EXPERIMENTAL STATES 53 thing else. But while the area of consciousness is thus temporarily a variable surface, subject to volitional limitations, it soon reverts to its original, normal region which includes all psychical states apprehensible by the perceptions of consciousness. Consciousness has nothing to do with the con- ditions external to the psychical area. It has to do, however, with the sensations content of begotten of those external condi- Consciousness. ° tions. It has to do directly with the perceptions of the sensations thus occasioned. The region of consciousness is, therefore, com- posed of perceptions of sensations produced by external things, and of thoughts, emotions and volitions lying within the cognizable, psychical area. Just where the utmost limits of these states lie no one can tell. But what states come within the region of ordinary consciousness is a matter of testimony arising from the concensus of experience. Judgments, conclusions, convic- tions, imaginations, ideas in countless formula- tions are objects that consciousness apprehends and comprise a part of the region of conscious- ness. Other thoughts there evidently are, but they are not in the region of consciousness and we are not just here concerned with them. There is consciousness also of emotions. Joy, love, hate, sorrow, emotions in endless minglings 54 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE and varieties are immediately perceived by consciousness and comprise much territory in the region of consciousness. Other affections of the psychical structure, essentially emotional in nature, there may be, but they are not within the region of consciousness and are not just here pertinent to our thought. We are still further conscious of volitions. The movements of the will in choice, determination, resolution are preeminently matters of consciousness. What volitional exertion may be actual beyond the limits of definite consciousness does not here call for discussion. We do know that an im- portant part of the region of consciousness con- sists of clearly cognizable volitional activities. The region of consciousness becomes thus quite clearly definable. Its content is simple and easily discernible under discriminating examina- tion. Our task is not, however, the making of an exhaustive invoice of the entire content of the region of consciousness. Our purpose is merely to reaffirm what consciousness ever asserts for itself, the existence of a definite region of its own. This region of consciousness is the positive, tangible area of Christian experience. It is the final court of appeal. It is the norm by which all else is adjusted. It is the field of demonstration where Christian truth for the future is to prove itself. FIELD OF EXPERIMENTAL STATES 55 Our subsequent effort shall be to differentiate from all else, in this region of consciousness, such states therein occurring as ^ h Dia R gram n form an integral part of Christian experience ; to trace wherever dis- cernible the causal relations between these states as they succeed each other ; to analyze them into their component parts that a clear conception of their content may be had, and thus to contribute to a complete survey of the field of that expe- rience. That the area of the region of conscious- ness may be graphically put before the mind resort is had to a diagram which is made to enter as a component part of completer diagrams employed in the subsequent stages of our thought. (See Diagram I.) In this diagram the two parallel lines, AB, mark the division be- tween the region of consciousness and the region of subconsciousness. The region above these lines comprises the area of consciousness which is bounded by the lines : ABC. In subsequent treatment, all of Christian experience, of which we have any direct knowledge, must appear within this area. On this surface, here blank, will be sketched in later diagrams, an attempted map of this region of consciousness so far as it pertains to the states of Christian experience. The conscious field of that experience is thus spread before the eye. It is hoped that a care- 56 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE ful study of these diagrams will go far to make clear the distinctions and differentiations to which we are driven by a critical and psycholog- ical analysis of the inner life of the Christian. It is to be noted that, in point of fact, there is no under, no above, no beyond in the psychic sphere. The choice of a term to Region of Subcon- . i . -i . . 1 • 1 sciousness. express that psychic region which lies without consciousness is a matter of comparative indifference. Perhaps the one most generally used is subconsciousness. Possibly it is most wisely chosen as being ex- pressive of that region of the psychic area seem- ingly underlying, as a substratum, the region of consciousness. Its basal, fundamental function appears to find expression in this term more clearly than in any other that has been suggested. Subconsciousness, then, is the term that is de- scriptive of the state of absence of Meaning of Term, knowledge, on the part of the soul, of certain of its own conceded ac- tivities. " Mental changes, of whose results we subsequently become conscious, may go on be- low the plane of consciousness, either during profound sleep or while the attention is wholly engrossed by some entirely different train of thought." 1 Wundt positively declares: "It is proved that there is not merely a conscious, but 1 Carpenter, " Mental Physiology," p. 510. FIELD OF EXPERIMENTAL STATES 57 also an unconscious, thinking." The region where such psychic activities, attended by this ab- sence of consciousness, take place is the region of subconsciousness. Where it lies in the cerebral world matters little to us. It is not a difficult task to conceive of a por- tion of the sum-total of psychical activities of which there is no consciousness. It is the purest assumption that consciousness does or can take note of every stir of psychical energy. There may be large tracts of the psychical area of which there never can be any consciousness. Indeed it is possible, so far as any human being can certify, that the region of consciousness is a very meagre portion of the entire psychical field. " He who thinks to illuminate the whole range of mental action by the light of his own consciousness is not unlike the one who should go about to illu- minate the universe with a rushlight." 1 In any consideration of Christian experience, at all T ,. „ . __ , commensurate with the field in This Region Vital in christian Ex- which that experience is elabor- perience. ■ L ated, distinct account must be taken of this wide range of psychic activity. To attempt to delineate that experience in any intelligent way while restricting the in- quiry to the narrow limits of psychic activ- ity discernible in consciousness would be to 1 Maudeley, " Physiology of the Soul, " p. 44. 58 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE ignore unmeasured tracts of spiritual life in which occur some of the most vital and radical phases of the great process under investigation. An attempt so void of all comprehension of its task is to-day little short of puerile. All trust- worthy treatment of the profound states involved in the experimental aspects of the life of the Christian must take into account the occurrences that alone can be located in these outskirts of the psychic area. It must not be expected that this increased range can be exactly surveyed, its lines run, its distances computed and its areas chartered. Far from all such hard and fast method lie the possible delineations. Neverthe- less a treatment of Christian experience which ignores the subconscious suffers a tragic defect, leading many a soul into endless confusion, agonizing disappointment and, not infrequently, bitterest skepticism. To seek sub- Demands increased consc i ous phenomena in the region Recognition. -T o of consciousness is a hopeless quest. To heedlessly blend conscious and subconscious elements of psychic activity in indiscriminate discussion of Christian experience is, in this day, a species of censurable blundering which borders hard upon moral crime. The region of subcon- sciousness imperatively demands immediate and increasing recognition in the experimental thought of the Christian world. FIELD OF EXPERIMENTAL STATES 59 The subconscious region is given a large and important place in the development of this dis- cussion. The factors of Christian Experimental Con- tents of Subcon- experience, not appearing within sciousness. the range of consciousness, are as- signed their location in the region of sub- consciousness. Enough may be anticipated at this stage of our inquiry, in order here to in- timate in some slight measure the importance of the subconscious, to say that the so-called supernatural in Christian experience has its place in the region of the subconscious. " Just as our primary wide-awake consciousness throws open our senses to the touch of things material, so it is logically conceivable that if there be higher spiritual agencies that can directly touch us, the psychological condition of their doing so might be our possession of a subconscious region which alone should yield access to them." * God does not appear in consciousness. We are never conscious of the Holy Spirit directly. The actual work of regeneration does not occur in consciousness. These factors, and many of like nature, transpiring somewhere in the psychical tract, alone find place in the area of the subcon- scious. This region of subconsciousness also has its place in diagram. (See Diagram I.) The area 1 James, " Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 242. 60 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE lying below the parallel lines, AB, and em- braced by the lines, ABD, represents the sub- conscious tract. In this area, in This Region also subsequent diagrams, it has been in Diagram. *■ ° ; attempted to map, by the aid of inferential and inspirational sources of informa- tion, the experimental transactions occurring in the subconscious region. These two great regions of the psychical field, just considered, are not closed away from each other by impassible barriers. In- Consciousness and -i-iii i • n t i ' subconsciousness, deed, the lines 01 demarcation, where the one ends and the other begins, are very indistinct. The shading down of consciousness is by such imperceptible degrees that the point of exact separation is impossible to fix. The regions of consciousness and sub- consciousness are positive and distinct in their differentiation, but just where the cleavage oc- curs it is impossible for the Exact Line of , . . . . cleavage not most discriminating thought to determine. This blending at the borders spans all chasm that might otherwise occur. It bridges from one to the other in such a way that the interrelations between the two are exceedingly intimate and intricate. The inter- change of impulses is continuous, imperceptible and momentous. " That the soul may act with- out being conscious of what it does and that FIELD OF EXPERIMENTAL STATES 61 these unconscious acts affect those acts of which it is conscious has been already established." 1 Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes confidently asserted : 11 The more we examine the mechanism of thought, the more we shall see that the automatic, unconscious action of the mind enters largely into its processes." 2 " The two fields of mental activity are divided by what has been designated as ' the threshold of consciousness/ All above is consciousness ; all below is subconsciousness, but they interact on each other." 3 The ordi- nary life is utterly oblivious of the existence of two regions in the psychic field. Only the most painstaking and scientific introspection and observation have discovered these distinct hemi- spheres of the soul's life. Their interwoven, dovetailed points of contact have left the com- mon impression that there is but one region, that of consciousness. The passage back and forth is so easy and imperceptible as to utterly escape the attention of the casual observer. Consciousness contributes vast treasures to the subconscious region. It stirs its energies, directs its currents, cuts its channels, proposes its tasks. All this is done with no deliberateness of pur- pose. So intimate are the relations that all 1 Porter, " Human Intellect," p. 103. 5 Holmes, " Pages from an Old Volume of Life," p. 284. • Cntten, M The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity," p. 16, 62 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE tides of the conscious life beat on the farthest shores of the subconscious area. Habit begins in the region of consciousness. t E o^ e C Jt n hen Utes The repeated action is sometimes irksome and difficult and is only done by conscious and persistent volition. By degrees it passes over into the subconscious until it becomes an apparently automatic process and ceases to appear in consciousness at all. A problem staggers the conscious powers with its vexing difficulties. It is given up in conscious effort. At some later hour the subconscious powers push up into the region of consciousness the solution as clear as crystal without an instant of conscious effort. On the other hand the sub- conscious is perpetually on the initiative. It gives direction to thought ; it flashes new light on dark subjects ; it resurrects buried memories ; it is an exhaustless fountainhead, forever pour- ing out fresh conceptions as from some unseen laboratory. This interchange is distinctly im- plied in the statement : " When a psychical process passes into an unconscious state we speak of it as sinking below the threshold of conscious- ness and when a psychical process arises we say it appears above the threshold of consciousness." * So smooth and frictionless are these passages that the mind is superficially deceived into the 1 Wundt, " Outlines of Psychology," p. 229. FIELD OF EXPERIMENTAL STATES 63 feeling that all these are the direct product of its immediate conscious effort. " The most im- portant consequence of having a strongly developed ultra-marginal life of this sort is that one's ordinary fields of consciousness are liable to incursions from it of which the subject does not guess the source." * All of these facts have immensely to do with the elaboration of the experimental phases of the life of the Christian. Back First Task of christian and forth these processes pass be- Psychology. , . „ tween the regions of consciousness and subconsciousness. Occurrences in the sub- conscious region project themselves into con- sciousness and set in motion states that succeed each other in continuous movement ; these in turn seize upon conditions in the subconscious region and bring to bear upon the life processes that break out again into consciousness with startling revolutionary effects. The task of tracing these processes in the life of the Chris- tian as they move back and forth through the psychic area between consciousness and sub- consciousness is a work of exceeding delicacy and difficulty. It is, however, of incalculable importance. The intelligent Christian of the future must be able to recognize the genuine states of reliable, Scriptural experience that 1 James, " Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 234. 64 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE have any place in consciousness; he must as well be able to locate such other vital states as occur in subconsciousness ; and he must be able to identify the reciprocal relations between the two classes of phenomena. "The psychology of conversion cannot be understood without a recognition of the reciprocal action of these two factors. The conscious and the subconscious factors rarely act separately in conversion, if they ever do." 1 The psychology of Christian experience has thus placed upon it this its first great task of ever-growing importance, that of localization of the states of Christian experience in the psychical area and of interpretation of their mutual relations. These interchanges between the conscious and the subconscious regions, in the elaboration of Christian experience, have also iL h m e agram. changes been set forth in diagram. (See Diagram I.) The parallel lines, AB, marking the division between the conscious and the subconscious regions, have breaks in them. The arrows, piercing these openings, show points and directions of interchange be- tween the two regions. Down into the sub- conscious and up into the conscious the wondrous impulsions of the spiritual life move back and forth, shuttle-like, weaving the match- 1 Cutten, "The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity," p. 253. FIELD OF EXPERIMENTAL STATES 65 less fabric of the Christian life. In text and diagram the entire field of experimental states is now spread before us. Its wide range, its two great regions in the psychic area, its channels of interchange between them, these are all now clearly in thought, preparing us to enter at once upon the critical examination of the specific states constituting Christian ex- perience. II THE ANTECEDENT STATES (See Diagram II) The dawn of consciousness is exceedingly dim. Not even the vaguest shreds of memory reach back to its initial processes. ?o7sciousne SS . Reliable study of the first contents of consciousness can only proceed by careful external observation. The earliest possible use of such observation finds in child- consciousness a cluster of impulses and receptive capacities. Restraint and control of these are a later lesson. These first discernible phenomena are the revelation of the unmodified trend of the primal being. Limiting our inquiry to the problems in hand, we confine our attention to those conditions with which we are specifically concerned. The study of the earlier stages of conscious- ness reveals two which are profoundly suggestive Two Earlier Sta es- ^° US *** 0UT P reSen ^ ^est. There (i) Readiness of jg an instinctive responsiveness to the exhibition of love and sacri- fice. The story of the Gospel, telling of the love and sacrifice of Jesus Christ, finds a quick 66 3V« dOfavtv £ I. // ' c 8 a. • c * \ \0 ^e, Rucox\£CAOv^tv&$S. x / t* \agjT; &YW H. tW SWCUe&et/ && \&nc#. uteA,'\3^c>S\fto he sha11 in no wise enter therein." 2 Could the pre- pared state of the child soul be more explicitly affirmed? Through the profound depths un- derlying consciousness the ever-pervasive im- manence of the Spirit of God has penetrated, suffusing incipient consciousness with heavenly radiance and generating a holy relish so that the instant the truth of the kingdom drops into the soul it finds everything ready for its coming. Inspiration provides such meagre but significant glimpses as these into the initial stages which would otherwise baffle all human penetration. From the conditions thus revealed arises the preliminary movement towards the subsequent and more definite states of Christian experience. The subconscious, however, holds more than the simple initiative. It underlies all conscious- ness. The movement of Christian of a state^ elati ° ns experience seems now to be domi- nated largely by conscious states, and then again it appears to be almost com- pletely submerged among the subconscious states. While following this current of experimental activity in either of these regions of the psychical 1 Mark x. 14. 2 Mark x. 15. THE ANTECEDENT STATES 75 area we must not overlook the fact of the per- petual, though perhaps imperceptible, contribu- tions of the other. It should be distinctly borne in mind that we are only following the predominant drift. In the consecutive order of Christian experience some states never appear in consciousness at all. Other states seem to have no elements but such as are clearly in conscious- ness. Several states in succession seem to spring from each other in causal sequence. One state arises from its predecessor in consciousness as a logical and necessary consequent. The key to the psychological study of Christian experience is the accurate discernment of the causal capacity of a psychical state in relation to the state immediately subsequent. This fact obtains among the antecedents of Christian experience as well as among the states of the experience it- self. The distinct predisposition, which we have seen to arise in consciousness, takes on in its turn a causal function. It has thecal ent t0 every appearance of actually pro- ducing a direct consequent condi- tion in consciousness. Under proper influences and instruction a resultant state at once appears. Predisposition for naturally ripens into assent to the Gospel. This is the simple reception of the Gospel of Christ as a fact. There is no question- 76 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE ing of its truth. The psychic attitude is one of unresisting acknowledgment of its verities. It is a quiescent state of consent. It has points of distinct formulation in consciousness. By an examination of these we get a definite view of the content of this state. This assent to the Gospel is the acceptance of its divine source. It is from God. Its plan is points of Formula- God's plan ; its forces are God's source (I) Divine f° rces ; its commandments are Acknowledged. God's laws. God is behind it all. He conceived the great measure. He executed its wonderful scenes. He revealed its truth. In the child-thought God moves in the whole magic panorama of the gospel narrative. Its scenes are clothed with the halo of divine Pres- ence. In the thought of maturer years the glamour of childhood imagery fades out but the essence of the assent remains unmodified. That assent is the positive acceptance of the divine origin of the gospel movement. Jesus is the divinely sent Saviour of men. The Cross holds the rescue of the soul from its sin by the power of God. The Gospel is what it purports to be, the method of God for the salvation and spiritual development of man. The assent to the Gospel is also the acknowl- edgment of its right to claim unqualified obedience. The consciousness that holds the THE ANTECEDENT STATES 77 consent to the Gospel's divine source cannot stop short of the acceptance of its unquestionable au- thority. In such a mind the Gos- (») Right to obedi- pe i nas an a d m itted right to rule ; ence Admitted. ■*■ ° ' its sovereignty is instantly con- ceded as an inevitable logical sequence. Con- science is clear and positive. Age modifies this fact in no degree. The postulation in thought of the Gospel's divine origin essentially carries with it an all-embracing affirmation of the right of that Gospel to direct the life in its most trivial deed. In this situation the soul is, perhaps, for the first time brought face to face with clearly defined duty. God has spoken ; issues in Balance, the soul acknowledges His voice. Will it obey His commands? An instant of supreme significance has come to the spiritual life. Either one of two issues, directly opposite in their nature, may arise out of this stage. The conceded right to obedience does not carry with it the actual act of obedi- ence. If the life of the child, under proper guidance, moves right on into simple obedience there proceeds a series of states in Christian ex- perience which will be surveyed in detail in another part of our discussion and will only thus be alluded to here. 1 1 Part I, Chapter VI. 78 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE If, on the other hand, the child, under ill guidance or no guidance at all, disobeys the Gospel to which it assents, then foobe y Refusal there arises at once in conscious- ness another state characterized by its one dominant attitude of refusal to obey. It is the human will set against the divine will. It is the action of the inherent power of the human soul to reject the known command and the felt impulse of God. In the child this is meagrely comprehended. But whether or not the enormity of the deed be understood its disastrous nature is in no measure modified. It is a distinct, positive act in consciousness. The soul knows the will of God and deliberately re- fuses to do that will, or does other than that will. The act may be never so trivial but if it be sufficient to align the soul in its relation to the known will of God as refusing to act in accordance therewith, it becomes a momentous determinative factor in the spiritual life. It may be merely the passing whim of the child, capricious with undisciplined tendencies, but if it takes shape in consciousness as a positive refusal to obey it is fatal to the primal relation of acceptance with God. The necessary steps of its rise make clear its real content and nature. These steps are three and occur in the order in which we shall consider them. THE ANTECEDENT STATES 79 It is very difficult, if not altogether impossi- ble, to place in time the instant when the first contact with inducement to wrong; Steps in Formula- ° tion: (i) Rise of occurs. This, however, may be truthfully said, that it doubtless comes when desire finds itself face to face with adverse gospel precept or ideal, when sudden arousal of as yet undisciplined passion plunges the soul unexpectedly upon the utmost limit of right, or when seductive fascination appeals to otherwise good impulse to overstep proper in- dulgence. " Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed." l The child soul is a cluster of untrained ap- petencies and impulses. It finds itself in a strange new world. All is to be learned by severe experience. The very nature of tempta- tion is unsuspected. Notwithstanding this the temptation loses none of its peril. It ceases not to be the moment when the immediate future of the individual, immature as that individual may be, swings in the balance. All the interests of its immediate relations to God are at stake. The course of the movement we are following just now involves this rise of temptation. It is the instant that foreruns the refusal to obey and is a part of the process included in that state. It is one of the steps in the act 1 James i. 14. 80 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE by which the moral disaster of sin enters the life. It scarcely needs to be said here that there is nothing wrong in the mere presence of tempta- tion. The wrong begins the mo- Distbldfence. ment there is yielding to the temptation. The least voluntary conformity to the temptation is an act of dis- obedience, and this is the next step composing this state of refusal to obey. It is a positive going over to evil. It is the instant of the breakage •of inborn alliance with God. It is the act of the separation of the soul from its native, filial relationship to God. However crude and im- mature may be the apprehension of the nature of the act it matters not ; so long as it is recognized in the consciousness of the child as being the rejection of the will of God it has every essential of an act of disobedience. Here lies the core of this entire state. It is the distinct rejection of the divine will as the law of conduct in a single item of action. It is the resistance of all the inducements and impulsions to obedience brought to bear upon the soul and the actual choice and deed of violation of holy precept. This distinct act constitutes another step in the formulation of the state under con- sideration. The instant the act of disobedience occurs all THE ANTECEDENT STATES 81 the influences to good surge in upon the soul and besiege it to retrace its course. God lets no soul drift away from Him without ^ Q ^ d esistance thoroughgoing, persistent effort to win it back to paths of right and peace. If the attitude of refusal to obey be maintained, it is so because of continued, un- yielding resistance to God. The child-life be- comes confirmed in sin by repeated acts of dis- obedience and persistence in refusal to obey. The established spiritual attitude of the life now becomes that of resistance to God. It braces it- self against Him ; it hardens itself to His in- fluences. It deafens itself to His appeals. It is perpetually on the alert to circumvent all ap- proaches that would bring it back to Him. It bolsters itself in its attitude of disobedience by every possible reinforcement. Thus by all available means, step by step, the life is fortified in its position of refusal to obey and passes over into a more or less confirmed condition of sin. Refusal of obedience to accepted divine authority, by the very structure of the moral nature, generates an immediate slnsVofsin. anc * distinct sense of sin. There arises in consciousness a definite recognition that sin has become an accepted part of the life. It is present as an admitted and entertained reality. Assent to the Gospel, ac- 82 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE companied by resistance to its commands, thus issues by inevitable sequence in a conscious state of sin. There is a positive lapse from the peaceful condition prior to the act into a discordant mal- adjustment by reason of the presence of sin. That presence pollutes and perverts the whole conscious area. At the instant that the soul, for the first time in its life, asserts its power of re- jection of acknowledged duty, at such instant the sense of sin is born in consciousness. This sense at once defines itself by developing certain distinct conditions in consciousness. The moral judgment clearly affirms the wrong. There is the vivid perception of being arrayed Defining against the sense of duty and, conditions : back of duty, the will of God. A (i) Condemnation. " sentence of self-censure for the act takes shape in the soul. There is a pronounced gloom of self-condemnation. A depressing weight of disapproval pervades the conscious- ness. An ever-recurring oppressiveness of guilt shadows the heart. An undertone of sadness runs parallel with life's course, which ever and anon breaks out into clear and sombre tones, swelling like the cadences of a dirge through the solitudes of the soul. This condemnation, thus lived with, becomes a chronic spiritual, pathological condition. It is a slow fever, con- suming the life and making the spirit to toss THE ANTECEDENT STATES 83 and thirst as in a long dark night. It is the soul's ceaseless condemnation of itself for its re- jection of duty. This sense defines itself further by an evident effort to mitigate its discomfort by a seductive compromise. It takes to itself a (a) intent palliative. An undefined limita- of Return. * tion of disobedience is proposed. The sense of wrongness extorts the deliberate formulation of an intent to some time cease the sin, accept the Gospel in outward confession and obey its commands. This intent is itself a point of definition of the sense of sin it seeks to pacify. The call for the opiate is a defining symptom of the disease and a reliable index of the pain. Countless numbers, in every generation of Chris- tian civilization, have gone the full length of these antecedent states but have never entered into the real experiences of the Christian life. They assent to the claims of Jesus Christ ; refuse to conform to His precepts ; carry with them a perpetual sense of condemnation ; mitigate the inner revolt by an indefinite intent of future ac- ceptance. Such are the antecedents of that widely pre- vailing type of Christian experience occurring when sin has become a positive factor in the life. These antecedents take on varying modi- fications according to the environments of social 84: STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE and home life. The aim has been to present them in their general typical form* We have thus come to the very threshold of Arrival at cata- those more or less convulsive or clysmic States. cataclysmic states of experience which characterize the inner life of the Chris- tian whenever he enters that life after a period of pronounced disobedience to the Gospel and resistance to God. Ill THE CATACLYSMIC STATES {See Diagram III) The sense of sin, when once it has become clearly defined in consciousness, if ever removed entails psychic cataclysm. The c a a^ady°sm Through more intense and profound its presence, the more pronounced will be the cataclysm. " Divine grace and help are always needed and by all alike, but conversion as an event in conscious experience is needed only for those who from evil training or from will- ful transgression have turned away from God." * " We have seen that in a favourable environ- ment, gracious influences steal in upon the soul and insensibly mould it towards a divine har- mony, but that where these influences are lack- ing the soul becomes encased in a network, through which it can only break by a supreme effort, some deep stirring of the springs of life. And this same effort of the will brings the soul to God as well as the slow and insensible mov- ings of a quieter experience." 2 We now enter 1 Bowne, " The Christian Life," p. 116. 3 Granger, " The Soul of a Christian," p. 64. 86 86 STATES OF CHKISTIAN EXPERIENCE upon that phase of Christian experience covering the drastic and convulsive removal of sin which has thus become more or less deeply entrenched in the life. This experience varies through a wide range. The temperament of the person, the quality of the sin, the religious schooling of Variations in , i -i • • -i i .i • -i • , states. the individual, the immediate en- vironment of the experience, all of these factors, in infinite variety of combination, contribute to the production of experiences of this class in which no two are identical in every respect. However, in all this variance, the suc- cession of component states that go to make up any single experience is rigorously uniform. The intensity and prominence of the individual states furnish the elements of variability. Tables, prepared by painstaking students of the complicated phenomena, 1 harmonize with gen- eral observation and conclusively demonstrate such variability on the testimony of sufficiently large numbers of respondents to differing series of pertinent questions. In some experiences certain states are so feeble and colourless that without the most careful scrutiny of conscious- ness they would seem not to have been present at all. They occur in such close proximity to other states which are so violent in action and so 1 Starbuok, Coe, et al. THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 87 dazzling in vividness that these feebler states are dwarfed into comparative insignificance. In other experiences the states in which marked in- tensity appears are exactly reversed : the vivid in the former experience are colourless here. Between these two extremes numberless and in- describable variations lie. We are not attempting, however, the descrip- tive delineation of all possible experiences in the life of the Christian ; such would Treatise in this ^e a hopeless and needless under- taking. What we are essaying to do is to detect and define, as far as the facts now in hand will permit, the scientific succession of demonstrable psychic states in the typical Chris- tian experience and to give them their proper location in the area of psychic activity. This is a possible though difficult task and its complete accomplishment, whenever that shall have been fully achieved, will be of profound import and inestimable value to the Christian world. We are not proposing a museum of the curiosities of the spiritual life, but the concise portrayal of what takes place in consciousness, with greater or less vividness, and in subconsciousness, with more or less conscious evidence, in this most convulsive phase of Christian experience, wherein positive sin, its guilt and its power, are uprooted and eradicated from the life. 88 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE Our study of the Antecedent States, in the preceding chapter, left us in the state designated as the Sense of Sin, its condemna- Awa d ited Cataclysm tion having been placated by a more or less clearly defined intent of acceptance of the Gospel at some time in the future. In this antecedent attitude the major multitudes of the adult Christian world are to- day awaiting the advent of a movement suffi- ciently catalysmic to carry the personality on into the strenuous states of an effective Christian experience. How does the soul pass from this dormant antecedent condition into the actual states that characterize the experience itself? Our effort is now to trace this passage. The antecedent sense of sin, blunted and ren- dered inert by persistent procrastination of de- cisive action, has simply no out- fcious S ^at n e S Con " come in itself, possesses no energy of initiative. It is, therefore, on the plane of consciousness productive of no sub- sequent state whatever, except as it furnishes the inert material upon which extraneous agency may operate. The initiative of further move- ment clearly comes from somewhat beyond the limits of consciousness. We have evidently come to a well-defined break in the superficial continuity of this movement. A distinct chasm here separates conscious states ; but close discern- THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 89 ment makes it clear that the path of the move- ment is not lost. The process itself continues unbroken though in order to follow it we find that we must penetrate into the region underly- ing consciousness. This course is made neces- sary by the nature of the phenomena that next appear in consciousness. In order to make their presence intelligible we must trace their rise to the region whence they emanate. It is the testimony of those who have entered upon Christian experience from a period of sin that there comes into the life a t^nfo f rs!r ic " strange, profound, more or less cataclysmic action. It seems like some potent, disconnected, sub-surface move- ment. The conscious area, hitherto compara- tively calm and smooth, becomes disturbed and ebulitional from beneath. The unusually dis- quieting cause appears nowhere in the region of consciousness. Up from the underlying depths springs, sometimes suddenly and sometimes gradually, an agitation that often rocks and surges through the whole conscious being as by the upheaval of deep-running, seismic tides. This profound spiritual disturbance takes shape in consciousness as an acute and pungent revela- tion of personal sin. The dormant antecedent sense of sin, in this convulsive process, seems to have been seized, 90 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE drawn down into the subconscious region and there enlarged and intensified a thousandfold. When thrust back into conscious- fon«i t ou e s. Sub " ness ^ nas become a new, distinct and clamorous state. The mere sense of sin has been transformed into an im- perious conviction for sin. How this change has been produced does not appear in conscious- ness. The most astute person experiencing it can shed no light upon the process be he ever so observant. All he can affirm is that a new and unaccountable awakening has By the Hoiy spirit, come to him concerning sin. The Scriptures, however, attribute this subconscious agitation in conviction to the Holy Spirit. A very early instance of this kind of ac- tion by the Holy Spirit is seen in the incident at Shushan. 1 While the exiled Scriptural Indica- tions: case of people in the provinces were pros- Ahctsucrus trate in agonizing prayer before God, the king, Ahasuerus, having issued his edict of murderous slaughter, was tossing out a disturbed night on his royal couch. "On that night could not the king sleep." 2 He knew not the cause of his sleepless agitation ; but the recorded coincidence of the desperate appeal of an imperiled people and the strange 1 Esther iv. 16. * Esther vi. 1. THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 91 disturbance in the spirit of the king, culminat- ing in the reversal of the iniquitous edict, is un- questionable in its evidence of the subconscious activity in the work of conviction by the an- swering divine Presence. On the day of Pentecost, when multitudes cried out in violent contrition, " What must we do?" the Apostle declared that At Pentecost. that tumultuous awakening was the fulfillment of the prophet's utterance, averring that the Holy Spirit was the source of such overwhelming conviction as that which brought three thousand people to begin the Christian life in a single day. 1 Christ positively affirms of the Holy Spirit that " He shall convict the world of sin." 2 The great Teacher of the facts of the chnst^sAffir. spiritual world thus explicitly de- fines one function of the Holy Spirit as being the generation within the con- sciousness of man of this conviction for sin. While the soul may stand in wonder and per- plexity at its own strange agitation and anguish over sin, Christ would have it clearly under- stood that underneath all such spiritual dis- turbance the Holy Spirit is the active energy fulfilling the work He is among men to ac- complish. 1 Aoti ii, 41. 9 John xvi, 8 (K. V.). 92 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE In all aggressive Christian work these evident processes are constantly present, in confirmation of this position, when, in sequence crrrobo'rltL. to persistent agonizing prayer by believing hearts, powerful con- viction for sin has come unbidden and dis- connected with all discernible causes. Whole communities have been strangely wrought upon by pervasive conviction for sin when no ob- servable cause was active and when it became afterwards known that distinct united prayer had been persistently urged by a few believing hearts issuing in such answering action of the Holy Spirit as we are here contemplating. Frequently in great public awakenings it has been observed that vigour of conviction has varied exactly with the intensity of the quiet appeal of Christian people for the convicting Spirit. Marked individual instances are on credible record wherein profound conviction, without discernible cause, has come upon minds, mature and gifted, when it has been later ascertained that concerted prayer, within a solicitous and believing group, was being urgently offered for the specific object thus realized. It is sufficient for our present purposes to accept these declarations of Scripture and these ever-recurring corroborative instances as clearly THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 93 identifying this profound subconscious agitation in conviction for sin as the work of the Holy Spirit. Thus across the break in the surface continuity of this movement, occasioned by the occurrence of this subconscious stage, we step state: Conviction f th Antecedent States into the tor bin. first of the Cataclysmic States of Christian experience, which is the state of more or less intense conviction for sin. The action of the Holy Spirit in producing this state of conviction for sin, as we have seen, lies entirely without consciousness, as there is consciousness neither of the person of the Holy Spirit nor of His operation in the distinct acts of His work. The resultant state of conviction, on the other hand, is one lying entirely within consciousness. It may, therefore, be concisely defined and its distinguishing phenomena, as they take shape in consciousness, may be quite fully delineated. Such delineation must, however, be given a wide latitude for variation. Every instance of conviction for sin has its own focal point of greatest intensity. As these differing focal points shade off towards each other in intensity they give an endless variety of colour and de- gree to this state. Conviction for sin is thus seen in no two individuals to be exactly alike. The focal points in consciousness, where convic- 94 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE tion for sin centres its greatest intensity, may be more or less loosely given as three. We will examine them in some detail. Conviction for sin, in certain instances, takes shape in consciousness as an all-absorbing vision ru ^ , o • , °f tne heinousness of sin. All of Three Focal Points : (i) Heinousness the blackness of sin stands out with oppressive distinctness. lis ingratitude, its defiance of a loving God, its poisonous venom amid the sweetness and purity of unsullied life, its compulsion of the appalling sacrifice of Calvary, its illusive falsity luring with seductive fascination to inevitable anguish and loss, all of these phases of sin come out, in such instances, in peculiar and repulsive vivid- ness. Under a startling and sometimes shock- ing glare sin is seen to be a thing of horrid mien. One sees oneself in a sickening light of shame as having cherished and committed such an heinous act as sin. The soul loathes itself for such a course. Conviction for sin, at other times, centres itself with greatest violence about a sense of burden of guilt. The law of God W Burden of j g ^^ ^ ^ gQ()d ^ j^ j^ requirements are just. Sin openly tramples upon it. The wrongness of this course which has been pursued in sin crushes down upon consciousness like an unbearable weight. THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 95 The heart feels itself culpable in that measure that it has driven anew the nails into the quivering hands and feet of its crucified Lord. The burden of the guilt is smothering as it presses down over the life. There is no self- defense, but a stifling heartache that sin was ever done. Guilt grows relentlessly heavier and drags upon consciousness like an intolerable incubus. There is wrung from the agonized heart the cry to God : " Against Thee, Thee only, have I sinned and done this evil in Thy sight." x Conviction for sin, in frequent cases, develops its highest intensity in a fear of sin's effects. The ruinous work of sin is thrown ( 3 ) Fear of Effects, under an amazing illumination. It is seen to poison the soul. It corrodes the powers. It enervates the energies. It destroys the peace. It diminishes efficiency, limits development and circumscribes success. It stores up remorse and anguish. It paves the way to ultimate spiritual ruin. It bars the gates of heaven and is the harbinger of eternal doom to the spirit of man. It spreads its baleful con- tagion to others and sweeps like a pestilence upon innocent multitudes. Such an illumina- tion awakens alarm. Fear of sin's deplorable effects grows intense. In the more pronounced ^sa. li. 4. 96 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE instances the soul cowers in terror before the re- vealed results of its sin. This anticipation of the consequences of sin is fanned into a burning anguish of heart. Conviction for sin develops itself in con- sciousness at some one of these focal points of in- tensity, or with a measure of PivoTai state! equality at all of them, or at some one of the infinite number of blendings of them of which their endless pos- sible combinations are susceptible. Thus de- veloped, conviction for sin becomes both a crucial and a pivotal state. It is crucial because it, in a vital way, gives tone to the entire subsequent experience. If conviction for sin is clear-cut, positive, intense, then every subsequent state is placed on a high level of vigour and definite- ness ; if it is dim, uncertain, tame or sluggish, then, if any subsequent states at all arise from it, they are sure to be weak and vague, the entire experience being colourless and powerless. This state is pivotal because it holds two possible alternative issues, to either one of which the life may swing. If the individual Alternative resists this conviction for sin, with Issues. ' deliberate and persistent volition, it may be practically expunged as a state of con- sciousness. The disturbance on account of sin diminishes and finally ceases. However much THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 97 the Holy Spirit may act in the subconscious He no longer produces agitation and conviction in the area of consciousness. The life swings away to an irreligious career. If the individual offers no resistance to conviction for sin, but encourages the impulses aroused, the movement passes from state to state in the order of an invariable, progressive sequence. The life swings upward to a religious career. Conviction for sin, having overcome all voli- tional resistance, takes on a causal function in the sequence of spiritual states ; it Repentance. cannot abide alone. In such con- viction, by analytical study of its content, are discoverable all of the essential ele- ments to project into the life the subsequent and inevitable state of repentance for sin. Its dis- covery would be a scientific certainty were it at- tainable by no other processes than the simple psychical reactions from the antecedent spiritual conditions. Permit genuine virile conviction for sin unresisted place in consciousness and prompt repentance for sin follows as its im- mediate product as naturally as daylight follows dawn. Such repentance for sin takes shape in consciousness under three distinct constituent elements. In the definition and combination of these we construct this state of Christian expe- rience as it appears in consciousness. 98 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE The sensibilities are not brought into action at will. No degree of volitional exertion, how- ever strenuous or drastic, can give Three Elements : Y ^ Qe ^ genuine emotion. Feeling (i) Sorrow for Sin. ° © acts by rigid psychic law. There must be present in the mental field perceptions or conceptions of a suitable nature in order to arouse emotional activity. Such mental condi- tions, however, being actually present, correlated emotions spring spontaneously into action, their intensity varying with the nature and vividness of the mental states and the temperament of the individual. In other words, emotion is a psy- chical reaction occurring on the occasion of the presence in the mind of definite, correlated, per- ceptive states. Conviction for sin is a group of such perceptions. The exposures of sin made in conviction, its heinousness, its guilt, its ruin, all form an array of perceptions essentially eruptive in their effect upon the emotional susceptibili- ties. Under their action the dominant emotion aroused is a profound sorrow for sin. This emotion varies from calm regretful heartache to such violence of agony as shakes the whole being like a tempest. This grief that the sinful act has been done fills consciousness with a pungent anguish and seizes hold of the soul with an over- whelming power. Remorse, pitiless and stormy, many times lashes the soul into a frenzy border- THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 99 ing upon despair. It is the heart's emotional revulsion from the committal of the accursed thing that sin is now seen to be. Tears flow in copious flood ; the soul groans in the bitterness of its sorrow ; the spirit gropes in helpless agony for relief. This is not a spasm of overwrought nerves. It is not a freak of distorted hallucina- tions. It is the profound, orderly, though often violent, arousal of the emotional sensibilities under the vivid and alarming revelations made in conviction for sin. Such genuine sorrow becomes a powerful pro- pulsive energy. The act of sin, of the wrong- ness of which the soul is now (a) Abandonment • /» n • tit ofSiQ< so painfully conscious, suddenly comes to be a thing never to be re- peated. Repentance is not merely an emotion of sorrow. It is also a volition, a deliberate de- termination to forsake the thing, the fearful nature of which has been perceived in convic- tion and on account of which such anguish of sorrow has come. The emotion generates the motive force. It energizes the will to forsake the sin. Sorrow for sin thus begets a resolution to abandon it. The soul is set in repentance to get away from sin. Its entire impulse is to shake itself free. Repentance of this sort, such as springs from conviction by the Holy Spirit, is a sorrow so sincere, so intense that it stops noth- 100 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE ing short of the entire abandonment of the last vestige of sin. This is not the repentance of reformation ; it is the repentance of salvation. It is not a re- pentance towards oneself; it is a 0) Return to God. repentance towards God. It is a sorrow for sin because it rejects God's will, defeats God's grace, because, in a word, it has come as a ruinous presence between the soul and God. Repentance is, therefore, the abandonment of sin in order to get back to God. At the core of this repentance is the soul's hum- ble, sorrowing return to God. In it the con- scious personality turns its back on sin, with tear-dimmed eyes faces towards God and makes penitent approach to Him. It lands the soul at the foot of the Cross which is the supreme ex- ponent of the pardoning mercy of God. In the bitterness of conviction the soul knows its sin ; but such knowledge of sin communicates no power to sever itself therefrom. In repentance the soul sorrows over sin's alarming presence ; but such sorrow develops no power to dismiss the sin. The only help is in God. Christian repentance is only complete when it has brought the sorrowing soul back to God. The state of repentance in Christian expe- rience is but part of a vitally connected trans- action. The movement stops not here ; it pro- THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 101 ceeds to complete the transaction. Mere aban- donment of sin leaves the life without explicit committal as to its course for the foTsVrv C ice. enant future. In consistency with itself it instantly constructs the next state in the experience. Repentance for sin con- tains within itself initiative energies in action that, to make their action complete, must formu- late a covenant for service. The potent impulses, arising in the turbulent perceptions of conviction for sin, having crowded the soul in repentance to the positive abandonment of sin, now urge on to committal in unqualified pledge of obedience. The heart that avers abstinence from sin is car- ried on by its very momentum in such action to a pledge of loyalty in service. Springing up from the subconscious the accelerating impul- sions of the Holy Spirit imperceptibly assist, without doubt, in this process ; but in the state of repentance there are energies evidently pres- ent and amply adequate to the projection of this new state of Christian experience now under consideration. The covenant for service is the oath of allegiance to the kingdom of God. It is the volitional and explicit conveyance of the en- tire being and life over to the will of God. It is the giving back to God of what sin has wrested from Him. It is the only part the soul really has in undoing the wretched work that it 102 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE through sin has done. There can be no ap- proach to God for salvation without such definite all-embracing surrender to His will. If this is withheld the experience stops and never pro- ceeds until this point is yielded. Such cove- nant for service formulates itself in two compo- nent acts. In the examination of these we gain a comprehensive view of what this state holds. There is in this covenant the explicit dedica- tion of the inmost and utmost self to the Two Component Sei>Vice ° f G ° d « The e g°> the Acts : (i) Dedica- personality in its profoundest in- tionofSelf. £. J . *\ dividuality, gives itself over to God. It shall henceforth will what He wills, think what He thinks, love what He loves, do what He does, so far as it knows and is able. There is not permitted to remain a vestige of reservation of the being to itself. Not the faint- est shadow of rebellion is allowed to rest any- where in all the area of consciousness. The whole domain of being is transferred to the ownership and dominion of God. The veriest discoverable flaw in this solemn compact bars the whole proceedings. The most penetrating study of Christian experience corroborates these sweeping assertions. Neither can God nor His exact processes be evaded in this vital transac- tion. Every last palpitating brain-cell passes under His unerring inspection. If it deliber- THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 103 ately harbours the minutest nucleus of resistance, all is off. No process known to man is more sen- sitive than this ; none more appallingly exact. There is in this covenant, furthermore, the explicit dedication of all of self's belongings to the service of God. In a way this 2£3^ DBC| is involved in what has been al- ready stated ; for, strictly speak- ing, when self goes over to God there goes with it all that self holds. But in our looser common thinking possessions are too often apart from personality, and title to the former does not necessarily go with the transfer of the latter. No graver error has crept into the struggle for a satisfactory Christian experience. The cove- nant for service that satisfies the requirements of this state is one that includes the dedication of belongings to God's service. Family, time, property, position, influence, all that in any sense pertains to the being though not an inte- gral part thereof, all is included in the terms of this covenant. Any deliberate, purposeful with- holding of the smallest fragment of these is a fatal barrier beyond which experience cannot go until it is removed. Much unpurposed self- ishness and many unintended defects have oc- curred without checking, for an instant, the movement of this experience. Nevertheless the intent must hold unqualified dedication of be- 104 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE longings to the service of God. Thus all we are and all we control are gathered into this exact- ing covenant with God. The soul has now reached its limit. It has abandoned its sin ; it has returned to God ; it has surrendered itself to God's service ; by a Faith. cceptance it has dedicated its entire belong- ings to divine use. It can do no more ; yet guilt is still upon it. The power of sin is still over it. The sorrow of sin still fills consciousness with pain and darkness. It is ut- terly helpless; but just here the inspired word of God meets it. That word assures that the soul that will forsake its sin and turn unto God He will abundantly pardon ; that whosoever will accept Christ by faith shall be saved ; that the penitent, surrendered heart must be saved by grace through faith ; that its mere deeds are of no avail. The vital instant of saving faith is now on. The soul, having done all that it can do in effort for relief, in view of the assurances of the word of God, finds that its last and only resort is simply to open itself to the promised work of grace. There appears in consciousness the next state in Christian experience which is the receptive state of acceptance by faith. It is the voluntary, expectant opening up of the en- tire being to the saving work of God. It may aid us in getting a clear view of this state to THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 105 study in detail the distinct stages that mark its development. The seeking heart that has surrendered every- thing it is and has to the service of God has come face to face with the promises Three Stages : x (i) Application of God. If they are to mean any- of Promise. . , . . . . , . . , thing it is driven to a personal ap- plication of them. The soul to be saved is it- self ; the sin to be forgiven is its own sin ; the powers to be changed are its own polluted and shackled faculties. The promises cover its case ; they are, therefore, its own. It affirms these promises as given to itself. It wrests them from the impersonal and general and makes them personal and specific. It makes distinct and audible the present reiteration of the promise to its own individuality. It ceases all evasion, and urges no longer exceptional conditions in its case such as littleness, unworthiness or ex- ceeding sinfulness. Whoever it is and whatever its condition, it accepts God's promises as given to itself personally. These promises are the assurances of divine work. They pledge this work as now actually done. The soul has no part in it, (a) Cessation . • Ti ' /. . • of Effort. except to receive. Its function is now to be acted upon. It is to relax every muscle, to be perfectly pliable. Absolute passivity in the divine hand is the es- 106 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE sential thing. Repentant, surrendered, accept- ing the word, it stretches itself upon the under- lying promises, as upon an operating table, and awaits the action of the divine Surgeon and Healer. Without question, without exertion, with every door of the soul wide open to the in- coming, wonder-working Saviour, this is the seeking soul's attitude of acceptance. It is the psychic life putting itself unreservedly at the disposal of the immanent divine Presence and Power. It is the prodigal falling upon the Father's bosom and into the Father's arms. The final stage is the intense focus of all that has gone before. In it faith drops all future tense. The seeking soul no longer Fuififiment ion ° f sa y s > " The promise is for me and God will keep it." It no longer declares, " I cease my effort and wait for God to do His work in me." The language of the soul now is, " I have met the conditions of the promise ; God is true to His word ; He does the work this instant." It is the positive assertion of fulfillment. This is the completion of the state of faith ; it is the audacity of faith's assurance. It is absolutely vital to the whole process. Without it experience goes no further. The absence of this bars the depths of the soul from God. With this all of the profundities of the psychical life are thrown open to the uninter- THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 107 rupted operation of God's waiting purpose. It is the simple triumph of trust. It is the heart's unfaltering assertion of divine faithfulness. It is faith's exultant claim of the accomplished work of God. Here one division of the Cataclysmic States naturally ends. The effort of the seeker ceases and the states through which he g|e™" g of passes in the process of seeking reach their culmination in the exercise of this faith of acceptance. IV THE CATACLYSMIC STATES {Continued) (See Diagram III) Faith is without direct sequence in conscious- ness. It possesses no energy of projection. In psychical exertion it has all the consdo^s states, elements that mark finality in stage. The promised action of Another is now awaited. The psychical process, on the plane of consciousness, has now exhausted itself. Extraneous help must now come or the whole movement ceases. All effort to do for self has ended ; the final act was to accept the fulfillment of the work promised. Here, there- fore, is no initiative ; continuity in conscious- ness absolutely stops. A definite gap occurs in the chain of conscious states in Christian ex- perience. Scientific investigation cannot flip- pantly leap this chasm that separates acceptance by faith from the next state that appears in con- sciousness. It must find out, if it can, what lies in the depths of this chasm. 1 The continuity of the experimental movement is not really broken ; it only appears to be. The 1 Starbuck, " Psychology of Religion," p. 90. 108 >\VC<^ &xu / 'I ,2 B '5 kttSllV «AuSi\rf A V' giveness for sin. patience, to produce this vital juncture. Having now arrived it is seized with eager immediateness. " Before they call I will answer." l The repentant, surrendered heart, the instant it opens itself by an assertive faith, is forgiven for its sin. This is the repeated assurance of Biblical promise. " He will abundantly pardon." 2 " He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins." 3 We are not con- scious of this act of forgiveness ; yet it must have place somewhere in the psychical field. It is not merely an abstract enactment of a gov- ernment at some remote heavenly seat of ex- ecutive action, as some seem to have fancied. Experimentally it is an act of the immanent divine Presence in the soul. It is a change of the divine attitude towards the human person- ality involved. Grieved, offended, condemning while loving, the very presence of God in such an attitude in the psychical area must give a perpetual sense of oppressiveness and burden. In forgiveness this whole attitude is instantly reversed. God puts the sin behind Him as far as the east is from the west ; it utterly disap- 1 Isa. lxv. 24. 3 Isa. lv. 7. 8 1 John i. 7. 112 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE pears from His view. The cause of the divine grief being gone, the attitude of the Holy Spirit in the soul is no longer a grieved one ; the sinful resistance having been abandoned, His attitude is no longer that of parental offense. The censurable evil choice and action having been renounced, the imperative attitude of dis- approval and blame is instantly dropped. The attitude of the divine Presence in the psychical life is now not one of grief but of joy, not one of offense but of sweet harmony, not one of censure but of approval. Such a change is a profound transaction in the psychical area. Forgiveness for sin must involve just this radical transposition of the divine attitude in the region of subconsciousness. The relief of psychical strain, in whatever degree unconscious as to its direct source, must be an exceedingly important factor in the psychical conditions. Forgiveness, as to its part in the psychical situation, has to do specifically, as we have seen, with the divine attitude towards (2) Cleansing from .-t • n i i T> j. • l_ J sin-s impurity. the sinful soul. But sin has done something more than to grieve and estrange God. The entire psychical tract has been sullied by it. It has carried with it a positive moral smut. Every power that has participated in it has been smeared by it. In- deed, the grime of its dirt has been worn into THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 113 the very fibre of the spiritual structure. The very atmosphere of the psychic life is filled with the pervasive effluvia of this moral pollution that has come from sin's presence. The soul is deeply conscious of this spiritual impurity. The entire being is restless and unhappy under this persistent, indefinable sense of the con- tamination arising from voluntary contact with sin. Forgiveness does not touch this foul stain of sin ; but Scripture clearly affirms that, in an- swer to saving faith, this stain is Distinct from -i -i /» . • Forgiveness. cleansed away from every spot in all the psychical area. The blend- ing of this act with the change of the divine attitude in forgiveness is so close that they often in Scripture statement seem to be identical. Scripture does, however, make clear the occur- rence of both forgiveness and cleansing, and psychological study makes equally clear the es- sential distinction. God withdraws the embargo of His disapproval in forgiveness and He purges sin's pollution in cleansing. The assurance and description of both of these stages of the work of the Holy Spirit in the soul are so interwoven in Scripture that it is a difficult task to attempt to entirely unweave them. Fortunately we do not need to separate them. Let it be clearly under- stood that these acts are simultaneous but not 114 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE identical. The acts imply each other ; forgive- ness carries cleansing with it. Whom God for- gives He cleanses as He forgives. " Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow." ! "He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteous- ness." 2 " The blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanseth us from all sin." 3 There is evidently set forth in these and similar utterances more than the cessation of the condemning attitude of God in forgiveness ; there is also an act of the purging away of the pollution of sin. How this cleansing is done no one knows. It is the wondrous divine washing of the spiritual being. It is, however, a work Its Method Un- i , ii v • i known. wrought upon the psychical pow- ers and conditions by the Holy Spirit. It occurs, therefore, somewhere within the psychical area, yet does not come within consciousness. The soul has no direct percep- tion of this divine act. It unquestionably fol- lows that here, within the region of subcon- sciousness, the gracious power of God so acts upon the psychical structure that all of the stain and smut of sin are purged away. The entire psychical field is made clean and pure. Some- how every unholy atom that sin's soiling touch has left on the soul is dissolved off and flushed 1 Isa. i. 18. s 1 John i. 9. 3 1 John i. 7. THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 115 away. Not only is the grieved attitude of God, as a factor in the psychical life, completely elim- inated by forgiveness, but the pollution of sin, adhering to the psychical being, is perfectly re- moved by this purifying action of the Holy Spirit. This evident subconscious process of purifying, in whatever degree unperceived by us, is a profound change wrought in the psychical area, and must give unmeasured relief from the defiling deposit of sin's polluting contacts. Under repeated sinful action the psychical structure becomes deeply perverted from normal conditions. Powers that should be itiNeed? eratlon: strong are weak ; others that should be subordinate are domi- nant. Impulses, proper in their place, are trans- posed and thrown into ruinous disorder. Voli- tional capacity is diverted and distorted so that a wonderful spiritual function, designed to co-act with God, defies Him. AfTectional activities are depraved, adhering to the material, the sinful, often the vicious. The whole spiritual fabric is awry. It has become hopelessly fixed in this fatal perversion from type. " The whole head is sick, the whole heart faint." 1 "The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked." 2 The being is declared " dead in tres- passes and sins." 3 1 Isa. i. 5. a Jer. xvii. 9. 8 Eph. ii. 1. 116 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE Forgiveness, in its psychical aspects, is a change in the divine attitude from condemna- tion to favour. Cleansing is the Not Elsewhere • « . i , , „ Accomplished. purging away of the pollution of sin's contact. But these saving processes do not, in any degree, touch the funda- mental disorder and structural distortion that have been fastened upon the psychical being by continuous sinful action. In the profound depths of the subconscious life the Holy Spirit, in response to saving faith, lays hold upon the crippled, deformed, perverted powers, impulses and capacities, and reconstructs them. He straightens out the bent and tangled parts ; He lifts prostrated faculties from the prone into the upright ; He restores the normal force to im- pulse ; He reverses, purifies and exalts the affec- tions ; He reforms the appetencies and tastes ; He regenerates the entire spiritual being. Not the remotest fragment of the psychical structure escapes this transforming work ; the Holy Spirit permits no superficial, defective process. He leaves no unchanged vestiges of the old perverted conditions to brand His work with inadequacy and to harass the seeking soul He has promised to liberate. No portion, however seemingly trivial, of that regenerating work is either indif- ferently or imperfectly done. In all this wonderful achievement the Holy THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 117 Spirit does not appear in consciousness. There is no direct perception of Him as a person ; nor is a single stroke of His actual wrought in the WO rk perceived in consciousness. Subconscious. r His profound activities do not, therefore, lie within the region of consciousness. Yet He handles psychical powers ; He works upon psychical energies and states ; and this work of regeneration lies somewhere within the psychical field. It, however, not being within the region of consciousness, must take place in the region of subconsciousness. Here, there- fore, is the underlying laboratory where are wrought radical remedial processes and struc- tural changes in the psychical being as por- trayed in explicit Scriptural utterances. " Create in me a clean heart, O God." * " Ye must be born again." 2 In respect to the inscrutable na- ture of these processes Christ says, after refer- ring to evidently inscrutable processes occurring in the natural world, " So is every one that is born of the Spirit." 3 " If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature ; old things are passed away ; behold, all things are become new." 4 To look in the region of consciousness for this Per- son, or for this His work, is fruitless and an effort fraught with endless confusion. Christian psychology thus traces to its deep-lying retreat 1 Psa. li. 10. s John iii. 7. 3 John iii. 8. « 2 Cor. v. 17. 118 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE the divine elaboration of the regenerated life. Here God works, in the depths of the soul, as silently and securely as if on the remotest world of the stellar universe. The forgiven, cleansed and regenerated being is brought into apparently new, though actually restored, relationship to the divine <4) Adoption. Being. Sin had alienated him from God. He had wandered far, a voluntary orphan, disowning and forfeiting all affiliation with the family of God. The crowning work of the Holy Spirit, in conver- sion, is the restoration of these broken family ties. The regenerated child is reinstated in the family of the Father's accepted children. This is essentially a divine act ; but it is the psychical person that is acted upon, that is the subject of this divine adoption. It is the psychical being about which are thrown the encircling arms of the Father's restoring embrace. It is this psy- chical being through which permeates the very atmosphere of the paternal tenderness. But while all this is true, the distinct act of adop- tion finds no place in consciousness. The soul hears no mystic voice announcing its adoption into the family of heaven. All of this active impress of paternal recognition is wrought be- low the threshold of consciousness. This re- sumed paternal attitude of the Holy Spirit THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 119 must, however, create in the subconscious life a pervasive condition of filial harmony. The sin- tossed child rests at home once more on the Father's sheltering bosom. This potent work, which we have been observ- ing in the subconscious, instantly thrusts its effects up into the conscious area. State: Newness The J agt ^ J n ^ C OnSCiOUS COn- of Life. tinuity of states was the assertion of the fulfillment of promise. Now a clearly defined and wonderful conscious state takes shape. There springs from impenetrable depths a sense of newness of life. New vigour, new emotions, new conditions of great variety appear in consciousness. A life distinct, entirely apart from that immediately preceding, begins in the conscious soul. It rises full-fledged, with no discernible cause. Its genesis is a glad, over- whelming mystery. The reality of this new- ness of life is among the most substantial of psychological facts. As a state of consciousness it has distinct points of definition where it takes most perceptible shape. These points are found to correspond with the passing stages of the al- most simultaneous process which has been seen to take place in the subconscious region. We have seen that we are not, and cannot be, conscious of the act of forgiveness. It takes place in the divine Mind but results, in its re- 120 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE lation to the soul forgiven, in the change of the divine attitude from disapproval to favour. D . 4 en _ . From this changed divine attitude Points of Denni- O tion: (i) loss of i n subconsciousness there is caused Condemnation. to occur in consciousness the loss of condemnation. The burden of heart, because of sin, strangely and completely disappears. It is as thoroughly eliminated from consciousness as if it had never existed. The unrest, the shame, the chagrin, the anguish all vanish from the soul as by magic. When the divine dis- favour is withdrawn in pardon and the Holy Spirit drops the attitude of disapproval in the region of the subconscious, then condemnation instantly disappears from consciousness. We only know of forgiveness by this conscious loss of condemnation. We have also seen that the act of cleansing takes place in the subconscious region. But when the pollution of sin's con- (a) Peace-joy. tact is thus cleansed away from the soul we discover that a glad emotion floods the region of consciousness, vary- ing from a calm peace to an ecstatic joy. It is the holy exhilaration of cleansed powers. It is the heavenly sense of spiritual cleanness. It is the psychical rebound after release from spiritual defilement. Its appearance in con- sciousness is the evidence of the gracious THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 121 cleansing work which has taken place below consciousness. We only know of the cleansing by the peace and joy its purity begets. Of such emotions as these the following words are eminently true : " Consciousness only delivers up a part of their secrets ; it can never reveal them completely ; we must descend beneath it." * We have still further seen how the work of regeneration takes place utterly below the thresh- old of consciousness. But regen- condiTions 01 " 16 * 1 crated psychical structure gives rise in consciousness to completely transformed conditions. Conscious affection is radically modified. What was once loved is now hated. The appetencies are all remoulded. What was before bitterly spurned is now pas- sionately craved. Volitional impulses are given a new and exalted trend. God's will is now an unmingled delight, whereas before it was bur- densome and irksome. Passions, hitherto dis- torted and masterful, are subdued and under control. Ambitions and plans are now set in perfect accord with duty and God. These inner transformed conditions shed a transfiguring light upon all the world without. A new vision has come that sees the world's hitherto un- detected beauties and glories. The whole sphere of the conscious life has, by some unaccountable 1 Rebofc, " The Psychology of the Emotions," Preface. 122 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE process, passed under such an all-embracing transformation. It is evidently the conscious product of the regenerating presence of the Holy Spirit acting in the region of the subcon- scious. " What is attained is often an altogether new level of spiritual vitality, a relatively heroic level, on which impossible things have become possible and new energies and endurances are shown. The personality is changed, the man is born anew, whether or not his psychological idiosyncrasies are what give the peculiar shape to his metamorphosis." * The regeneration thus effected only becomes known by these trans- formed conditions thrust up into consciousness. We have, moreover, seen how, in the region of the subconscious, the regenerated heart is taken into the tender relations of ( 4 ) Filial sense. adoption into the family of the heavenly Father. " I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be My sons and daughters." 2 Consequent upon this fatherly recognition and adoption there springs up in consciousness, unbidden and unexpected, a filial sense more or less pro- nounced and vivid. " Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father." 3 " God has sent Barnes, "Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 241. 3 2 Cor. vi. 17-18. 8 Gal. iv. 6. THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 123 forth into our hearts the Spirit of adoption whereby the filial spirit is wrought in us and we are enabled to look up to God as our Father." 1 The love, the trust, the communion, the companionship, that make up a positive filial spirit pervade and possess the entire con- sciousness. Fear, recoil from the purity and greatness of the divine Presence, now strangely disappear. The glad, fearless spirit of loving childhood comes into the soul. There is be- gotten a clearly defined sense of being back again in the Father's family. Adoption into the divine family is thus known by the filial sense wrought in consciousness. In discriminating thought it is clear that the Holy Spirit appears in Christian experience only by what He does. He ever abides thVs^ilit ess ° f an( ^ ac ^ s * n tne re gi° n °f the sub- conscious. He speaks by His work ; He communicates by impression wrought in consciousness. He witnesses to the saved person of His salvation by the definite spiritual conditions He produces in consciousness. To that person those conditions are " the results of that which has transpired in him : the divine fact itself is, and remains for him, in an unat- tainable depth placed below his consciousness ; and as the natural birth, which has natural 1 Bowne, "The Christian Life," p. 76. 124 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE conscious life as its foundation, so the spiritual birth, the basis of his spiritual conscious life, remains hidden from him in darkness. He is conscious to himself of that which is effected, but only as the result of a spiritual work that has transpired in the region of his unconscious- ness." l " No outward being appears within the disciple's consciousness and literally testifies to a celestial fact concerning his standing in the court of heaven." 2 The removal of condemna- tion is the Spirit's witness to forgiveness. The coming of peace and joy into the troubled soul is His witness to the cleansing from sin. The transformation of affections, desires and tenden- cies in the entire conscious being is His witness to regeneration. The creation in the heart of a loving and confiding sense of harmonious child- hood to God is His witness to admission into the family of God's saved children. This wonderful cluster of definite spiritual changes, wrought in consciousness by the Holy Spirit, constitutes the Witness of the Spirit. " The Spirit Himself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God." 3 The Holy Spirit utters no audible voice in the soul. There is no formulated language by which He communicates direct with the spirit of man. His vehicle of expres- 1 Delitzsch, "System of Biblical Psychology," p. 402. 8 Bowne, " The Christian Life," p. 75. 8 Rom. viii. 16. THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 125 sion is the Word He has inspired and the psychical states He produces in harmony there- with. John, with great emphasis, declares that the knowledge of salvation rests upon the psychical states wrought in us. " We know that we have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren." * The witness of the Spirit is the love He generates in the soul. The cul- mination of this state of conscious salvation is the blending of all of these elements of newness of life into the indubitable Witness of the Spirit. Here we reach the end of another distinct division in the Cataclysmic States. The im- mediate object of the seeking heart consummation in ig per f ec ti y realized in this gra- Conversion. r j o cious work of conversion so posi- tively and completely accomplished in the con- scious soul. 1 1 John iii. 14. THE CATACLYSMIC STATES (Continued) (See Diagram III) Under the rude contacts of every-day life the new state of spiritual regeneration, studied in the preceding chapter, is subjected New.bo» soui to severe ordeals. In the storm Under Ordeal. and stress of these turbulent con- ditions, in the great majority of cases, a sub- sequent state more or less quickly develops in consciousness. The immediateness of its ap- pearance varies with the temperament of the individual. With the sanguine and impulsive its arrival is early ; with the phlegmatic and stolid its approach is slow. In nearly all cases, however, its coming is only a matter of time. The new-born soul is a babe in point of maturity. It is athrob with the freshness and enthusiasm of new life. It steps forth overconfidently, often recklessly, but to fall. For this reason it passes by a more or less speedy process into the state of vacillation. The state now reached is a fluctuating, check- ered and uncertain one. It is a state now aglow 126 THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 127 with the glory of a present salvation, and now overcast with all the gloom of positive condem- nation. It is a turbulent, self-con- va'cuiktion tradictory, conglomerate state. It can best be understood through studying the steps by which it develops. Such steps are the stages by which it emerges from the brilliant preceding state of newness of life. The new-born soul is feeling its way along a course absolutely new to itself. Neither it nor steps in Develop- any one else has ever gone just this m ,T : ( J ) .J enorance way before. It faces a trackless of New Life. ■» area, and everything is strange. It is ignorant of the new conditions : ignorant alike of the nature of the evil that entices it and of the seducibility of its own weaknesses. It has come into a new world ; it has everything to learn. Like a babe, it must come to know its own limitations and needs ; it must find out how to relate itself to the world of evil inducements about it. It does not know how to keep what experience it has acquired, or to recognize and resist the foes of its purity and peace. Moreover, the emotional tides of the new life fluctuate with physical conditions and changing mental states. The new life finds itself, in the ebbing of the emotional tide, resting upon the cold, hard, un- feeling supports of naked truth and principle. In this unlooked-for subsidence of feeling the 128 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE soul is liable to be an easy victim of invidious attack. In addition to all this, it must con- stantly be borne in mind how readily the deli- cate psychical balance of the regenerated life may be destroyed. The most trivial volitional action, it being sinful in essence, is ample to dis- turb the poise and transform the whole aspect of the spiritual life. Under these conditions of inexperience, evil meets the new life in countless guises. It often comes suddenly with no time for Yielding" 55 deliberation. It springs out at an unthought moment and takes the soul unawares. It comes, many times, at an in- opportune moment, when the new life is not at its strongest. That life is surprised and taken off its guard. It does not take in the gravity of the situation. The babe is tripped in its use of untrained muscles. There is not a distinct real- ization that it is stumbling. The action is im- pulsive and unstudied. The seriousness of the consequences is not comprehended, and the yielding is often almost imperceptible. Yet, notwithstanding all palliating conditions, the yielding is sin. Darkness again suffuses the soul ; condemnation spreads its gloom over conscious- ness. The offending child, quickly becoming aware of its fault and throwing itself at once upon the pardoning grace of the Father, dark- THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 129 ness and condemnation vanish once more. Thus surprise and yielding appear as the source of vacillation in the new life. In rare instances, it would seem, this yielding does not occur and the possession of power ap- pears to have been coincident RaTiVs'talccs. with the newness of life. This is probably the possible case with every regenerated soul ; but in actual experience it is not the fact. Indeed, such instances are so exceedingly infrequent that their existence re- quires merely to be alluded to here. We are following in this study the almost universal movement of experience and in that movement surprise and yielding take important place be- ing almost universally present. Sin once getting a foothold in the regenerated heart, however slight and brief at first, causes to return the old tendencies that, (3) Rise of Old • , • 1 j Tendencies prior to regeneration, have domi- nated the psychical being. With an electric touch, like a shock, it revitalizes and reinstates the old and extinct habits, impulses, tastes and appetites, and we have a case of re- version to former conditions in increasing meas- ure as sin is repeated. Biological thought rec- ognizes this resuscitation of the old life *. " We shall have ample evidence in the sequel that it does still live in the background, and will make 130 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE itself felt, if the new life weakens before it be- comes thoroughly established — before the nerv- ous reflexes which correspond to the new self- hood have become deeply ingrained and habitual. But as long as the new self-hood is maintained, as long as there is sufficient tension in the nerv- ous system to keep it intact, until it becomes weak and staggers, the old life does not exist as a sen- sible factor in consciousness." x One of the most marvellously regenerated men that ever lived declared : " I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection : lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway." 2 Every repeated sin committed by the regenerated life restores into larger place the tendencies of the old life associated with that sin, and develops in the soul more and more pro- nounced state of vacillation. As thus the old life regains its ascendency sin becomes more masterful and of more frequent recurrence. The old tendencies become a formidable factor in the life increasingly to be reckoned with. The outcome of all this is that there now takes place in consciousness a persistent oscilla- tion between victory and defeat. Now, the new life is victorious ; and now, the old tend- encies conquer. At one point of time, the ^tarbuck, "The Psychology of Religion," p. 134. *lCor. ix. 27. THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 131 sunlight of the mountain top bathes all con- sciousness ; in the next hour, the gloom and damps of the valley darken and tween victory and chill. Up and down, back and forth through consciousness, this vacillation swings, like some fateful pendulum. But such psychical fluctuations, from the very nature of the psychical structure, cannot be per- petual. Resilience gradually and imperceptibly grows less. Vacillation is a passing state with widely divergent and alternative issues. We are at another pivotal stage in Chris- tian experience. The movement now swings positively in one of two ways. Another Pivotal f T T /» «n ,• j • i j j stage. Weary of vacillation, disheartened by repeated failure, vanquished by continuous defeats, the heart may swing com- pletely back into the old grooves of action. The rebound from sin then ceases ; the recoil from condemnation ends. The life then re- mains under the domination of sin ; in common terminology, it is " back-slidden." Christian experience, as such, is brought to a positive ter- mination, for the experience of the back-slidden heart is no longer Christian. This pivotal stage has another possible issue ; the movement may swing another way. Weary of the fluctuations between victory and defeat, convinced that there is attainable power to 132 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE make victory continuous and not intermittent, there takes shape in the soul, moved by the im- pulsion of the Holy Spirit, a reso- foTuniformit ^ ute en ° or t f° r uniformity in saved experience. This is a state of en- deavour after an experience in which there is no backward step, no lost ground. The new effort emerges full and intense from the sickening vicissitudes in vacillation. On the part of the Christian life it is a desperate struggle for sur- vival ; unless it succeeds that life becomes a hollow form, a pitiful mockery. This struggle for uniformity consists of successive psychical acts. The content of this state becomes clearly discernible as we follow these several acts. The soul is heartily tired of the humiliating spectacle of weak vacillation between sin and re- A _ , pentance. Its grief is over the Acts Involved : * ° (i) confession of whole fluctuation and not over Unsteadiness. . . _ _ any one sin committed. Its revul- sion is from the crooked pathway of stumbling weakness. This effort for uniformity first takes shape in bitter confession of this shameful un- steadiness. It is the acknowledgment of radical fault that such culpable oscillation should be permitted to continue. It is the recognition of a fundamental dearth of power, leaving the life exposed to the successful attack of temptation. This sorrowful humiliation for repeated failure THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 133 and defeat wrings from the soul penitent ac- knowledgment to God of sinful vacillation. " To Jesus as to Paul the sense of a divided will is the essence of the sense of sin." 1 In humble contrition forgiveness is sought for such unworthy service. It is a repentance as distinct and positive as that prior to regener- ation. A vision of higher service has dawned upon the soul. A conception of a steady walk in righteousness has possessed the life. Hihe e r d servi°ce. for There has been begotten a yearn- ing for such an experience. The price of such an acquisition is willingly paid. There takes shape in consciousness a deliberate dedication of the life to this higher service. A calm covenant for the faithful use of such grace is explicitly formulated. With specific fore- thought, knowing the points of failure that have developed since regeneration, identifying the points of weakness that have come to the surface in the period of vacillation, with new and mature intelligence the soul now pledges itself to perpetual alertness against sin in every form. It vows, in an all-embracing consecration, the unreserved submission of itself to the leading of God in its minutest detail and its most self- sacrificing requirements. It affirms an un- 1 Peabody, u Jesus Christ and Christian Character," p. 108. 134 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE swerving intentional loyalty to this higher uni- form service. The foregoing acts, confession of unsteadiness and dedication for higher service, but lead the way to the final culminating act by Faith. ° ° ' er in this effort for uniformity. That which can alone make such uni- formity possible is the enduement of adequate power. Having met the conditions upon which that power is assured in gospel promise, faith now claims it as a present and actual possession. The bold assertion of saving faith again appears. God's word is true ; the heart meets the condi- tions to the last known iota ; faith avers God's instant fulfilling action. This claim of faith is assertive, compelling, imperious. It is the holy assurance of unfaltering trust. It is the glad volitional actualization of the as yet unper- ceived gift of God. It is sheer naked faith asserting the baptism of power for uniform service. Close analysis of the states of consciousness makes plain that this definite act of faith is fol- lowed bv a total blank in the proc- Process again in J x subconscious ess of conscious continuity. This claim of power by faith is an ap- peal to a Source of power outside of self. As we have seen elsewhere such faith has no possibility of sequence by inherent energy. Its sole func- THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 135 tion is to believe that the power is being given. How or where this gift occurs nothing in con- sciousness appears to show. There is silence, a vacuum, an unbridged chasm in the consecutive states in consciousness. The chain of conscious continuity again apparently snaps in two. The psychical continuity itself does not really break ; it merely sinks once more completely below the threshold of consciousness. The effort for uniformity evokes in the region of subconscious- ness a profound responsive activity of the Holy Spirit. By the glimmering light of revelation we dimly but positively trace once more this continuous movement transpiring in the abysses of the psychical structure. Penitence for and confession of unsteadiness in service find a yearning Father in glad wait- ^ „ ing. The sorrowing cry of the Response to Faith : o o J (i) Forgiveness for storm-tossed child strikes an eager Vacillation. Ear ever open to such a call. In response to this effort, culminating in the act of assertive faith, God forgives for vacilla- tion. The record of repeated lapses, evincing a culpable unsteadiness even though interspersed with as repeated returns to repentant harmony with God, is all cancelled. The sin of oscilla- tion, which lies at the core of the vacillating life, is blotted out in the divine act of pardon. The shadow, arising from the Holy Spirit's attitude 136 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE of reproach in the midst of the fluctuating life, is swept completely away. There is now again perfect harmony in the psychical depths. The release from constraint, arising from the restora- tion of approval of the Holy Spirit, must bring marked change and relief in psychical stress. This new harmony between child and Father is more mature, more complete, more intelligent than any hitherto known. The faith that claims the power for uniform service having put the psychical structure into attitude to receive that power, the (2) Gift of Power, waiting energies sought now flood the soul. All the depths of the psychical being are submerged by this in-filling of heavenly potency. It is the breaking out 'of unseen fountains ; it is the tapping of submerged rivers. It is the gift of power for service. This is the sanctification that sets apart to holy liv- ing. It is the bulwarking against sin in every form. It is putting at the very core and sources of the psychical life the power to stay clean. The outbreaking of this flood of divine energy never comes within consciousness. Of the real act of the Holy Spirit, in the bestowment of this gift of power, the receiving soul has no di- rect knowledge. It is the deep subconscious opening of a divine, artesian flow of spiritual energy. THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 137 Whom God cleanses from vacillation and em- powers for holy living He possesses entire. Into such a prepared being He crowds ( 3 ) Fullness of God. Himself to the profoundest spirit- ual depths. There is no direct con- sciousness of this gracious flooding of the divine Presence. He hides His infinite fullness in the unmeasured subconscious area of the psychical being. Though the soul be full of God it has no consciousness of Him as a personal Being. He thus eludes our direct knowledge because con- sciousness has no power to immediately perceive Him. The very climax of the act of salvation is this filling " with all the fullness of God." * He permeates like an incense ; He penetrates like an atmosphere ; He saturates and engulfs like a submerging sea. Such is the indwelling fullness of God, the subconscious aspect of the Spirit-filled life. All this work in response to faith is wrought in the area of subconsciousness and alone seen under the dim illumination of in- of ta powrr° sse8Sion s pi re d revelation. By figures and similes and with much meagreness of detail it is delineated. The last state in con- sciousness was the claim of power by faith. We have crossed the chasm that separates us from that state by passing down into the region be- 1 Eph. iii. 19. 138 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE low consciousness and through the underlying conditions just outlined. Now, as we follow the path of this movement, we find ourselves rising again into consciousness and in the possession of the power which faith then claimed. Conscious- ness knows nothing of how that power came ; it only knows that the power is here. A clear in- dubitable state of conscious potency is strangely present ; it has sprung into the soul as from the unseen. A sense of waiting energy, a realiza- tion of measureless reserve, a feeling of contact with limitless force, these make up a state of consciousness of the actual possession of power. This state defines itself most distinctly about cer- tain luminous points in consciousness. It will help us to get a clear view of it if we dwell specifically upon these points of definition. The shame of vacillation is gone. The chagrin of fluctuating weakness has vanished. An exultant joy has supplanted it. ^Exutt^y. 00 : Tnis distinct displacement has no conscious origin ; yet the depres- sion has disappeared as thoroughly as if it had never existed. The soul is filled with an ex- hilarating buoyancy. A weight has been thrown off; a gloom has been dissipated ; a pervading joy fills all consciousness. This rises often into a triumphant ecstasy. It is the profound emotional rebound from the stifling depression THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 139 of vacillation. It is the joyous psychical re- action upon divine forgiveness and approval after the condemnation and humiliation of un- steadiness. This powerful genesis of joyous emotion has acted in the subconscious. The pardoning embrace of the Holy Spirit has awakened an ecstasy of spiritual emanci- pation. It is the blissful thrill of divine liber- ation. The surprise of temptation has now lost its strategy. It no longer takes by the suddenness of its attack. It may startle but it (a) Uniformity of doeg t catch off guar( ^ The life Resistance. ° is now alert and firmly set. It is entrenched with a new energy. Where before it yielded it now resists. It maintains a steady front against sin, and there is a consequent uni- formity of resistance. A strange, strengthening power has in some way come into the life. It does not overwhelm the mental processes ; nor does it overmaster the will. It only makes steady and strong for the right. This new ability to resist gives consciousness of the new gift of power. This increased uniformity of resistance makes conscious of a greater establish- ment in righteousness. This steady rejection of sin makes clear the work of sanctification, the setting apart by divine power to a uniform course of holy living. 140 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE The inevitable psychical correlate to such uniform resistance of wrong is an abiding spiritual peace. Emotional tides An Abiding Peace, may come and go with all their changeful variance ; but abiding peace survives unmodified. This is the conscious calm of spiritual harmony with God. The power that enables to uniformly resist the wrong as- sures, so long as it continues, the presence in the conscious life of a steady quiet, a deep calm of being, a heavenly peace that the stormy disturb- ances of the external world can never ruffle. Of such peace Christ said, " My peace I give unto you." * This is the peace that is affirmed by in- spiration to flow in its steadiness and fullness " as a river." 2 The energy of God, co-extensive and commen- surate with the divine fullness, which we have seen saturating the soul, now for work°° clamours for use. Under the pres- sure of this divine possession Christ propulsively exclaimed, " My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." 3 Divine energy is never idle ; if it is retained it is applied. Possession of divine power charges a soul to the full with holy impetus. Consciousness quivers with new impulsive energy which seizes upon every faculty of the soul and electrifies it with a 1 John xiv. 27. 8 Isa. xlviii. 18. s John v. 17. THE CATACLYSMIC STATES 141 restless vigour. The entire being is charged with an hitherto unknown force. Love is made intense and tender. Thought is made clear and bold. Volition is made prompt and tireless. Perception is keen ; imagination is vivid ; memory is quick. The whole psychical being is thus consciously possessed from without itself and put at its best. The indwelling fullness of God gives a possession of power that projects into consciousness a holy unction for service. It is God crowding the psychical powers into action. A new zeal is awakened ; a new enthusiasm is kindled. The indwelling fullness of God is manifested in consciousness by this consuming unction for service. Such are the cataclysmic states of Christian experience. They are the more or less con- vulsive processes by which sin, cataclysmic states once having become fixed in con- not Normal. O sciousness, can alone be eradicated. The soul, conscious of sin's presence and effects, finds relief in no other way. These states, it must be borne in mind, are not the normal states of the rightly developed spiritual life ; they are, in fact, the states that are necessitated by the abnormal introduction of sin into con- sciousness. As a consequence of its confirmed presence there these strenuous, drastic psychic conditions must follow if sin is ever eliminated 142 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE and its devastation and dominion brought to an end. These states have been given precedence in treatment, not because they merit priority of attention in the normal order of the religious life, but because, arising from prevailing erro- neous views and education, sin is given almost universal place in consciousness, and therefore the cataclysmic states constitute the as universal type of positive Christian experience. This is true by reason of a very deplorable fact : " It is the very character and mark of all unchristian education that it brings up the child for future con version.' ' x When the spiritual life is given its proper in- structional environment by Christian nurture, Normal state Christian experience appears in its under christian normal development, in which cataclysmic states find small place because therein sin never becomes a confirmed factor. So the genuinely normal type of Chris- tian experience is not cataclysmic; the usual type of that experience, however, is cataclysmic. Precedence of consideration has been given to the cataclysmic states because of their overshadow- ing prevalence and the opportunity this order of treatment gives for showing by contrast how the normal Christian experience, developed under Christian nurture, escapes almost entirely the convulsive processes of the cataclysmic states. 1 Bushnell, " Christian Nurture," p. 17. VI THE STATES UNDER CHRISTIAN NURTURE (See Diagram IV) Christian nurture has much to do in deter- mining the psychic pathway described in Chris- tian experience. Its effects upon Earner Aspects of p SVC hic states for the entire subse- Chnstian Nurture, a «/ quent life is prodigious beyond all computation. The content of that nurture, in- cluding both its nature and results, merits the most painstaking and exact study. It deals with the psychic life when it is most plastic. Illumination from the depths is then easily in- tensified. Impulse from the subconscious is readily directed and encouraged. The almost intuitive perception of Scripture truth is aided and rendered clearer. The relish for spiritual things is deepened. The ready assent to the divine source of the Gospel is strengthened. The right of gospel authority to obedience is profoundly impressed. The atmosphere of faith and love and obedience is breathed in by the young life long before distinct religious activity is apparent. It prays with its first lisps. Its own first memories are blended with those of 143 144 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE that other Babe once lying in the manger at Bethlehem. In after years it cannot tell which it learned to love first, mother or Jesus. It would as soon grieve mother as the Saviour, so real does the latter Personality come to be. Heaven is all about it. Divine care shuts it in like mother's arms. These subconscious im- pressions of the genuinely Christian home-life upon the psychic life of the child are profound and intricate beyond comprehension. The ap- parently oblivious psychic being absorbs them like a sponge. They come to the surface in after days in dominant impulse. They determine taste and volition and destiny in a very large degree. Such are the earlier aspects of Christian nurture. The soul of man is born the child of God. It belongs to the kingdom of God : " Of such is the kingdom of God." 1 It is a mem- ££?£L* ber of the divine family. God is in closest, holiest touch with its psychic depths. As we have seen in our study of the antecedent states, the Holy Spirit illumi- nates it and stirs in it the initiative impulses towards the spiritual life. One has well said of such a child : " He is to open on the world as one that is spiritually renewed, not remember- ing the time when he went through a technical 1 Matt. xix. 14. STATES UNDER CHRISTIAN NURTURE 145 experience, but seeming rather to have loved what is good from his earliest years." * " Of the Moravian Brethren not one in ten recollects any time when he began to be religious. " 2 If ever the new soul becomes anything else than the accepted child of God it must be by its own choosing. Such blessed childhood is its first, and it may be its everlasting, estate. There comes, however, an instant when the first responsible choice is made. Shall there be in the psychic life obedience to under christian God and the following of His Gos- pel, or shall there be resistance to Him and rejection of His authority ? Shall the soul remain the accepted child of God, or shall it be alienated from Him and enter upon the life of sin ? This instant of choice may be very vague and difficult of exact identification, but it comes soon or late at some definite point in the progress of psychical life. When that instant does arrive Christian nurture, wherever it has been present, enters as an overtopping factor in the situation. In multitudes of cases it holds the young soul true to the impulses of the Spirit and to the precepts of the Gospel. In all such in- stances the deliberate choice is to continue in the service of God, to remain His obedient child, to abide in His heavenly family. 1 Bushnell, " Christian Nurture," p. 10. 'Ibid., p. 26. 146 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE On this volition of the child-heart the path of the psychic movement enters at once upon far-advanced states of Christian Sin-induced States • m l i . i Absent. experience. Two states, as they appear in the antecedent states heretofore studied, are here utterly wanting ; there are no such states as refusal to obey and sense of sin. The two opening states of the cataclysmic series are here also absent ; there are in this experience no such states as conviction for sin and repentance. (Compare Diagrams III and IV.) These four states find no place in the non-sinful child-heart. The occasion for them has never arisen, and hence the movement of Christian experience under Christian nurture has no knowledge of them. Condemnation, as a settled condition, can never appear in con- sciousness where sin, as an habitual act, has never ^occurred. The agonies of pungent con- viction are rendered impossible by the absence of sin committed and cherished. Repentance is entirely foreign to an experience in which no need of it is present. All states of Christian ex- perience, occasioned by the presence of sin and appearing in action only that sin may be re- moved, are utterly without trace of presence in the experience of the obedient heart under Chris- tian nurture. The two states, predisposition and assent to the Gospel, treated in Chapter II, the STATES UNDER CHRISTIAN NURTURE 147 only ones among the antecedent series having any place in the type of experience here under consideration, need no further am- IS^SHSSl pUfication. The treatment there given exactly applies to their present setting in the series of states now before us. We shall also silently drop out from this series those states already noted as not appearing here at all. The movement of the Christian experience of the child under Christian nurture passes at once from the antecedent state of assent State : covenant for to the Gospel to the advanced state of covenant for service. In this state the child-soul simply, with deliberate voli- tion, elects to continue in the same harmonious relationship with God into which it was born. It now distinctly and of its own free act cove- nants with God to serve Him. In so far as the child-mind comprehends the meaning of the act it is as intelligent as that of the adult. In its incipient sense of self-possession it dedicates that self to the service of God. All that enters into its being, vague and crude as t D o e c: c „dm n on A s dap,ed may be its conception of these things, it positively puts at God's service. All that belongs to it, limited and comparatively trifling as that may be, it in- cludes in this committal to the service of God. 148 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE This covenant is as clear as crystal. The com- mittal of the child-life to such service is whole- hearted and sincere to the last degree. It has no attachments to sinful things to break ; it has no longing for old indulgences to battle with. All its Spirit-stirred impulses and all the in- fluences of the nurturing Christian environment conspire to make this covenant complete. No instant in all the career of the soul is so favour- able for a perfect covenant as this. The trust of the surrendered child is without flaw. The innocent and implicit confidence of the child-heart is touching in the Acceptance by extreme. The certainty of divine fulfillment of promise, instruction in which constitutes so vital an element in true Christian nurture, has been incorporated into the very psychical structure of the child. It does not know how to doubt ; it has yet to have its first lesson in skepticism. It takes the promise to itself with unfaltering assurance. It springs at once to the certainty that God keeps His word and, therefore, its covenant is accepted. The struggle of adult years is un- known. With utmost positiveness and prompt- itude the child-soul takes by a perfect faith the certain fulfillment of the divine word. Not a semblance to distrust shadows the child-con- sciousness. STATES UNDER CHRISTIAN NURTURE 149 Even this perfect faith of childhood has no power in itself to project other states into the experience that follows. Indeed, L e bcon n s S c e ilus he these states that now occur are not new ; in incipient form they are constituent parts of the childhood to God in which every new-born human spirit finds itself. They are now only made clearer and more definite in content. By some process of which the soul is not conscious, in the depths of a chasm unbridged in conscious continuity, this work of greater clearness and definiteness is wrought. The action of the Holy Spirit in re- sponse to distinct covenant and faith is to make more positive what has been before as clear as it could be in the rudimentary psychic conditions. Marked differentiations from the corresponding cataclysmic state are to be carefully noted. No sin having been committed, there is no forgive- ness, no cleansing. There having been no dis- tortion of the spiritual nature by reason of in- dulgence in sin, there is no regeneration. The soul having never separated itself from the heavenly Father and His family by disobedi- ence, there is no adoption. All that is wrought now in the subconscious by the Holy Spirit is consistent with what remains after the complete elimination from the situation of all those con- ditions which only occur as consequent upon 150 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE habitual sin. What does take place is not con- version. The child, fully responsive under Christian nurture, needs no conversion and never has any. It would be turning the whole psychological situation into confusion and con- tradictory chaos to force such a change into these states. While, as we have seen, there is no act of forgiveness in answer to this volitional accept- phases of that Re- ance of childhood to God, there A P ttit S u e d : e ( ofAp. ser must be a glad intensification of prova1, the divine approval. The attitude of the Holy Spirit in the subconscious can but be one of such deepened approval. For, while God holds Himself in loving approving relation to the un volitional innocence of the child-heart, yet when that heart distinctly chooses to remain in that relation of an accepted child, the Holy Spirit must come into closer and more demon- strative attitude of approval than was before possible. Now the life is, of its own free elec- tion, the covenanted servant of God and as a consequence the divine sanction is more pro- nounced than ever. Moreover, while in this acceptance by faith of the life with God there is no regeneration proper, the fellowship between the child-soul and the Holy Spirit becomes more intensely in- timate. The fresh untried powers, the crude STATES UNDER CHRISTIAN NURTURE 151 unfledged faculties, the hasty untamed impulses, by close contacts of the Holy Spirit in com- munion, are steadied and adjusted (2) Completer Ad- . . ° justment in Feiiow- by that Spirit into a holy accord with Himself. His presence in such intimate relationship can but be a mighty conforming power. The entire subconscious structure and states are fitted to His divine Per- son. This is not regeneration ; it is psychical adjustment to the informing Presence. " The ideal form of the Christian life is that which never experienced conversion and which cannot date its beginning." 1 It being true that a soul, born a child of God and never having forfeited that childhood by sin, cannot in any proper sense be rental Acknowi- adopted into the family of God edgment. since it is already in that family, yet the hearty volitional avowal of, and the ac- ceptance by faith of the divine assurance of, that childhood must bring a more distinct and posi- tive touch of parental tenderness to the psy- chical contact with the Holy Spirit in the sub- conscious. The soul is now the child of God, not merely because He made it such but also be- cause it deliberately chooses to be such. The accepting embrace of the Holy Spirit has in it an enlarged acknowledgment and intensity of ^owne, "The Christian Life," p. 114. 152 STATES OF CHEISTIAN EXPERIENCE parental relationship. The Father, with a new pressure of spiritual union, now clasps to Him- self His voluntary and avowed child. From all this there springs out of the depths of the subconscious into consciousness a more clearly formulated sense of right- State: Rightness nesg of heart rp^ fc t th oi rieart. newness of life arising in the cataclysmic states ; it is the more fully developed stage of the sense of rightness of heart which is the soul's inherent birthright. It is more fully defined than before ; it is completer in detail. Before it was a vague and largely unintelligible condition ; now it has been given positive out- line and form in consciousness, is more intelli- gent, more perfectly understood. It stands out in consciousness as a separate state. Prior to this the heart was right without 2a\y distinct consciousness of being so; now that sense has risen into a definite realization. Where this new clearness of sense has come from does not appear. It has come in answer to the avowal of covenant and the exercise of faith. It has arisen, like the dawn, with no shock or con- vulsion or seeming suddenness. Just when it came may not be known, in most instances probably is not known. It is so like what had always been that its new coming was scarcely realized until it was fully here. This sense of STATES UNDER CHRISTIAN NURTURE 153 Tightness of heart defines itself by certain con- scious facts that appear in it. Brief examina- tion of these facts in detail gives a view of this state both exact and comprehensive. The mother's smile irradiates the entire home. It subtly tosses the cheer of its sunshine into every nook and corner. So the u) fi place Point8: approving attitude of the Holy Spirit, in response to the volitional committal of the young heart to the divine service, sends a sweet sense of peace throughout the entire psychical structure. It steals over consciousness like the penetration of heavenly perfume from hidden bloom. It is a profound calm, a pervading quiet, like the holy hush that attends a tender lullaby. It rises from the impenetrable depths of the subconscious, the soothing conscious reaction from the tender smile of approval with which the Holy Spirit beams through the depths of the psychical being. It is the peace of God because the soul is His. It comes to the child-heart at the period of the first volitional choice of obedience as clearly as to the adult heart of any years. The ability of the Spirit of God to communicate peace to the spirit of man is not limited by any immaturity of development. Such peace is one of the points at which rightness of heart comes to distinctness of outline in consciousness. 154: STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE Young life, however innocent, is ever full of tangential impulses, volcanic spurts and con- genital idiosyncrasies, until by the (2) Hoiy conditions, discipline of associations and ex- perience it gets its normal pace and settles into harmonious adjustments. As we have seen, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, in the region of the subconscious, works for the child-heart this needed adjustment. Without knowing how the young life finds itself loving the good and the pure, delighting in holy as- sociations, loathing the impure and shrinking from disobedience. These harmonious condi- tions in consciousness have every appearance of being its natal state so naturally and gently have they come. So perfectly has the Holy Spirit, by His intimate presence and fellowship in subconsciousness, subdued, moulded and ad- justed that the young heart receives these holy conditions of consciousness as its simple birth- right. This positive sense of holy conditions is another distinct point where Tightness of heart takes shape in child-consciousness. There is an instant somewhere when the child-soul first catches the sweet sense of phys- ical childhood. The tenderness of parental care, the softness and continuousness of parental ca- ress, somehow crowd into consciousness such a sense of childhood. So the Holy Spirit, in the STATES UNDER CHRISTIAN NURTURE 155 depths of the subconscious, caresses, embraces, evinces by the thousandfold ministries, of which only an infinite Fatherhood is ( 3 ) Final sense. capable, such demonstrative ac- knowledgment of the young soul's heavenly childhood that there rises into con- sciousness the unquestioning sense of being the accepted child of God. It trusts in Him, con- fides in Him, shelters itself in Him, feels the certainty of His perpetual protection and care, sings from very joy of His fatherly Presence. Here again rightness of heart takes distinctness of outline in this filial sense with which con- sciousness is thus pervaded. These facts existing in consciousness, how- ever imperceptible their rise may have been, are the evidence of the subconscious Witness of the ^^ q{ ^ jfojy g^ r^ date or the speed of their appear- ance have nothing to do with their reality or evidential value. They are here in conscious- ness in all their distinct and unquestionable reality, and being here they are the indubitable testimony of the Holy Spirit to the fact that the soul in which they exist is the accepted child of God. This is the voice of certified phenomena. This is the divine seal imprinted upon the very structure of the psychical being. This is the witness of the Spirit. Thus the states of Chris- 156 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE tian experience under Christian nurture come to the same witness of the Spirit to acceptance with God as found in the cataclysmic states, only it is reached by a very different pathway. The definiteness and reliability of the witness are, however, as satisfactory in the one case as in the other. The child under Christian nurture, brought to conscious Tightness of heart and the witness of the Spirit, occupies in its atti- state : vacillation, tude towards the external world a position identical with that in which we found the adult soul, brought by the cataclysmic states to newness of life and the witness of the Spirit to its salvation from sin. The inexperienced child-soul faces a new and untried region of activity. Under these condi- tions the prevailing experience, with more or less immediateness, next enters upon a state of vacillation. Ignorance of the new pathway, as we discovered in the cataclysmic states, throws the untried child of God open to surprise and yielding. Temptation springs up unawares and in unguarded moments sin is committed. Sin de- velops a repetitive energy. There TendenJe^ 111 * s no r i se °f °^ tendencies, for sin has never had any place in the life. There are no old habitual indulgences for the sinful lapse to reinstate ; but there are STATES UNDER CHRISTIAN NURTURE 157 new indulgences for it to fasten upon the life. Every repetition of the sinful act increases its energy. Repentance and forgiveness alternate with the yielding and the life vacillates between victory and defeat. We have studied these phenomena that now open before us as they ap- peared in the cataclysmic states and a repetition of that discussion is uncalled for here. From this point on, the cataclysmic Subsequent States _ _^_ . as in cataclysmic states and the states under Chris- Senes * tian nurture move along an identi- cal pathway which has already been described in full and for the consideration of which the reader is referred to the discussion of the cata- clysmic states from the state of vacillation to the end of the series. It should, however, be borne in mind that the psychic life under Christian nurture is far less liable to the violent fluctuations Advantage m chns- j n vac iH a ti n than the psychic tian Nurture. ± ■/ life that has passed through the convulsive processes of the cataclysmic states. This is true for two reasons : first, the constant safeguards of that nurture continue to buttress it against extensive yielding to sin until forti- fied by divine power in response to intelligent faith ; and second, if it yields, in so doing it does not in any measure restore an old weak- ness with which it must grapple anew in the 158 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE struggle, it has no former foes to fight. The life under Christian nurture, therefore, enters this vacillating stage of experience under no handicap and at an immense advantage in com- parison with his cataclysmic fellow Christian. VII THE STATES IN ASCENT (See Diagram V) The discriminating study of Christian experi- ence clearly reveals two directions of movement in the succession of its states. One Two Psychical Movements: of these movements may be tech- (i) Horizontal. • n l , • i nically characterized as progress, and the other as ascent. The former covers that advancing horizontal movement occurring in the process by which the soul is brought into saved relationship to God, empowered to remain in that state and thus prepared to enter actively upon the efficient service of God. There is a distinct advance of states in this progress. Each state succeeds its predecessor as one made possi- ble by what has gone before and necessary to the completed process of saving experience. It is an integral part of the fundamental condition constituting the saved life, in which the proc- esses of immediate salvation have been com- pleted. Figuratively speaking, this movement is on a level ; it is characterized by succession, but not by ascent, in states. Hence the hori- zontal direction given it in diagram. 159 160 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE But when the movement of saving progress is completed, then another direction of movement begins. The fundamental states (a) Ascending. of present salvation having been finished the states of growth com- mence. In this movement of states, to succes- sion is added ascent ; this being true because these are states whose movement is constantly into intensification, expansion, elevation. " The path of the just is as the shining light that shin- eth more and more unto the perfect day." * " First the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear." 2 Hence the ascending direction given this movement in diagram. It is now our task to take up this saved life and follow it through these states in ascent. In this division of our inquiry, definition, uniformity and consecutiveness of states become less exact. The movement is more Intricacy of this n •, ,-t Movement. oi a composite one than any we have been heretofore considering. States, distinct in themselves so far as their con- stituent elements are concerned, blend and mingle, overlapping and interlacing in such intricacy of action that the task of separation and individual examination is an exceedingly difficult one. Different states of growth are perpetually operative, simultaneously in action ^rov. iv. 18. 3 Mark iv. 28. iffr«k-s£S? iy« l$£ «.rrv ^W- u S iven the im P uls es of a life, the deduction of its dimen- sions is a mere matter of psychical computation. The innate outgushing of life's energies seems to take to itself the channel of these impulses. Consciousness now exhibits a notable elevation of impulse. The scope and aim of the impulses have received a new uplift. Their course is towards the highest levels. Their objects are the true, the pure, the good, the eternal, and these in their superlative degree. They seem to be buoyant psychical forces, springing from un- fathomable depths, impelling the soul towards loftiest acquirement. They are the affinities of heavenly life seeking its own. Their uplift and 188 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE invigoration are the indices of the presence of a larger life. " The sense of enlargement of life may be so uplifting that personal motives and inhibitions, commonly omnipotent, become too insignificant for notice, and new reaches of patience and fortitude open out." 1 Such im- pulses spring not from psychical voids. Their source must be a new increment of divine life, as such life alone can project them into con- sciousness. Their very altitude makes evident the positive enlargement that has come to the spiritual life and is another way by which that enlargement manifests itself in conscious- ness. In the growth of spiritual life all of these states in ascent combine and mingle, preceding and succeeding each other as each ofstlt C es! mination * n turn P re P ares tne wa y f° r a more mature and perfect action of the other. The whole is a composite process and what we have attempted to do in this examination is simply an untwisting of the thread of parts that compose this complex up- ward movement. The process is a cumulative one. The riper richer states are the later, the product and fruitage of all that has gone before, a constantly rising tide of attainment. On its crest the most remarkable state of all takes in- 1 James, "Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 273. THE STATES IN ASCENT 189 creasingly definite outline in consciousness, the culmination and ever-ascending goal of genuine Christian growth. We come now to this culminating state in the series in ascent. It is the one to which all others are tributary, for which State : Approxima- ° tion to the Christ- they are given their place and function. It is a progressive state, always acquiring its constituent elements but never complete in the measure of their pos- session. As the ripe product of all that we have been studying in Christian salvation and growth there takes shape in consciousness defi- nite approximation to the Christ-spirit. We are not here speaking of the external conduct of Christ except as it is a medium by which we get a vision of the peerless spirit behind it. It is the state of consciousness in the soul of Christ that is the resplendent type of the crowning acquirement of Christian experience. It is the Christ-spirit taking shape in the consciousness of His genuine disciple. Adequate definition of that spirit must ever transcend us. Its depth of love, its perfection of purity, its full- ness of life, its might of faith, its omnipotence of impulse, its unison with the heavenly, its communion with God, all overwhelm us even in the meagre glimpses we are able to get of their splendid content. There are even here, 190 STATES OF CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE however, certain distinct points in consciousness where this approximation to the Christ-spirit takes definable form and with these we must be content in our present discussion. The processes active in these states in ascent are such that the spiritual faculties are being Forms of this ap- constantly put into better condi- proximation: (i) in tion to understand more and more of the nature of the Christ-spirit. The elements that comprise that spirit are ever dawning upon the growing soul of the Chris- tian. What was once a puzzle in the Christ- spirit by development of experience in service is made to take shape in intelligible terms. In- terpretation of the Christ-consciousness is an ever-growing acquirement of the correctly-poised and aggressive Christian. It is an infinitely progressive art, this penetration to the inner soul of the Man of Galilee. New visions of that wondrous spirit are ever breaking over the per- ceptions. Larger comprehensions of its fathom- less nature are among the rich rewards of the soul expanding in Christian growth. New angles of vision, fresh gleams of light, newly acquired powers of penetration and perception, clearer revelation by the Holy Spirit, all con- spire to such an ever-enlarging understanding of the Christ-spirit. Each new comprehension of the spirit of THE STATES IN ASCENT 191 Christ carries with it an associate advance in the acquirement of that spirit. The enlarging processes of growth also put the (a) in Acquirement. S oul into readiness to take possi sion of the new vision in con- stantly increasing measure. Its expanding power of appreciation makes it an eager devotee to immediate attainment. The divine Spirit waits only for a chance to do the work, and so the newly-discovered phase of the Christ-spirit is as quickly as possible made a part of the soul- life. In such a manner that Christ-spirit steadily acquires increasing proportions in the area of consciousness ; its qualities multiply, enlarge and intensify. The ascent in acquirement, though by accretions imperceptible by reason of their minuteness and gradualness, is clearly cognizable by comparison of stages more or less apart from each other. The aggregate of minute acquisitions, thus perceived, makes such achieve- ment a very certain fact of consciousness. More and more the similitudes to the Christ-spirit ap- pear in the psychical life. All this, at its best, is only a very remote ap- proximation. The excellences and perfections of the spirit of Jesus Christ were such that it ever rises in still more lofty and unapproachable glory as the ascending Christian climbs to higher points of view and to greater capacities of ac- PART II A Study in Origins THE GREATER TASK OF CHRISTIAN PSY- CHOLOGY We now enter upon a most serious and im- portant stage of our inquiry. We are driven, by the compulsion of events in cur- Facing the Facts. r ent thought, to uncover the core of this entire discussion in explicit and unequivocal terms. The Christian world must face the facts and give them deferential and exhaustive consideration. To evade them is to demonstrate ourselves devoid of true Chris- tian candour and valour. To coddle ourselves in conceited and reiterated invincibility is to con- vict ourselves of a superficial foolhardiness un- worthy of our sacred cause. To be indolent in this vital affair or oblivious of the situation is to give to the assailants of Christian experience and life the immense advantage of the earlier exploitation, in their interests, of the territory involved and to fasten upon ourselves a disas- trous handicap of ignorance of the field and lack of familiarity with required methods of re- search. We, therefore, proceed to grapple with the supreme problem of present-day Christian 197 198 A STUDY IN ORIGINS thought. With a sober sense of the depth and range of the problem, of the magnitude of such an undertaking, and of the inadequacy of this attempt as an exposition, in any measure ex- haustive, of the vital and tremendous truths to be demonstrated, the writer seeks to do his part towards the clearer and more satisfactory eluci- dation of the psychical processes underlying the conscious states of Christian experience. The careful student of Christian thought has not failed to note the fact that the basis of ef- fective apologetics has been stead- A New Basis of • i t • n. • -i . Apologetics. ily smiting during recent years. By this is not meant that the old arguments are abandoned as invalid, but that their statement has been essentially recast, and their relative value and comparative position, in point of importance, have undergone radical change. This has been increasingly true until, for our day, the supreme and vital evidences of the truth of Christianity do not consist in the proof of positions hitherto thought to be posi- tively essential. The emphasis of finality in proof has been placed upon entirely different positions in demonstration. What was before thought to be of primary importance has become secondary and tributary. What has been con- sidered fully demonstrative has been made only corroborative ; and what was once brought out TASK OF CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY 1 with minor emphasis is now given the chief place and made to carry the burden of demon- stration. In these ways the basis of accepted apologetics has been radically changing. The inerrancy of Bible history is not felt to be so vital to the proof of Christianity as it once was. Accredited authors may be It is not Reliability j • i /> . i • 1 • • i • 1 .. j of History. deprived oi their historical right to certain writings with which their names have been always associated, and the truth contained in those writings be thereby in no measure invalidated. Indeed writings ac- credited to given authors may be undeniably shown to be composed of distinct parts which could not have been recorded by the same writer and in the same period. Still this may not in the least affect the credibility of any of these parts. Thus the emphasis on Bible history has been modified. It has come to be seen that such history may indeed be shown to contain actual error and yet the truth of Christianity be in no way affected thereby. The actuality of ancient miracles was once considered very vital to the demonstration of the truth of Christianity. But it It rlV DOt , Credibility has been a growing conviction that of Miracles. o o the miraculous nature of many alleged miracles may be very materially modi- fied and the truth of the Gospel in not the 200 A STUDY IN ORIGINS slightest degree impaired. The verity of Chris- tianity, as a divine saving agency, does not stay or go on the proof or disproof of any alleged miraculous event of a remote century of Bible history. The supreme defense of the Gospel does not rest on any such basis of apologetics. The essential meaning of the term, miracle, may undergo fundamental modifications of the earlier concept, and the proof of reputed miraculous oc- currences may utterly fall down, and yet the verity of the Gospel, as a divine saving measure, be as absolutely demonstrable as ever. The fulfillment of prophecy was long viewed as one of the invulnerable demonstrations of the divine Presence in the gospel it is not Fulfillment m0V ement. With the increasing of Prophecy. ° uncertainty of the interpretation of portions of Scripture formerly considered un- questionably prophetic in their nature, with the confusion of the fulfillment of prophecy with the general altruistic development of human history, the argument from prophecy has not retained all of its former emphasis. The range of admitted prophecy has grown less. Assertion of fulfill- ment has grown more cautious. While the abundant fulfillment of undoubted prophecy is one of the wonders of the gospel movement it is still clearly seen that this cannot be wisely postulated as one of the prime proofs of the TASK OF CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY 201 truth of the Gospel. The vagueness of the terms of much of prophecy makes interpretation a very difficult and by no means certain thing. The reputed fulfilling events are so difficult of positive identification that way is made for much hesitancy in affirming fulfillment. The new factors in the situation generate an atmosphere of uncertainty relative to prophecy that very naturally diminishes the emphasis placed upon it and makes it less to be depended upon as a prime factor in Christian apologetics. The forces of improvement with which Chris- tianity has blessed all nations in which it has been given any place have long Minki°nd Benefits to been re g arQ, ed as among the strongest evidences of its divine essence. When taken as a whole, these uni- versal beneficent results of its presence are very strong presumptive proof of its heavenly origin. But beneficial effects are not always the result of truth. Error, under given conditions and for special periods, may have exceedingly good ef- fects. Superstitions may have very salutary re- straints for specific social conditions. Myths may serve their time with excellent fruits in popular motive and deed. But times are ahead when such conditions will change and such re- sults will cease. The argument from beneficial results has future possible exigencies to let into 202 A STUDY IN OEIGINS the account. What proves good now may not a century hence, the other side of revolutions or evolutions where social conditions are trans- formed. Present day apologetics has felt the necessity of modifying its emphatic attitude on the demonstration of the Gospel from either na- tional or racial benefits. The argument in its strongest putting carries much of presumption but falls short of demonstration at all positive. One of the most impressive proofs of the valid- ity of the claims of the Gospel has been its evi- dent superiority among the relig- It is not Superiority iong of ^ WQY \& But it haS among Religions. come to be felt, in the thinking of men, that the fact that it is the best we have is no proof of its divine source and essence. The best, in comparison with several imperfect, is not overwhelming proof of any great intrinsic worth in the thing itself. The sense has evi- dently been growing among men that actual and even marked superiority falls far short of any adequate demonstration of divine origin and presence. A fortunate combination of talent, in the crossing and recrossing of historical currents, might have united in the construction of a sys- tem of religious thought, like the Gospel, and a religion surpassing all others be the outcome. Such mere superiority could not be urged as a demonstration of first rank in establishing its TASK OF CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY 203 divine origin. We discover here again the evi- dent traces of a shifting of emphasis. Accepted apologetics has materially changed its attitude in regard to the demonstrability of the truth of Christianity from its conceded superiority to all other religions known to man. None of these arguments have, however, been in any real sense superseded. They are as valid to-day, in every essential feature, These Tributary ag tfa fa ever been The but not Basal. •/ modification is in the degree of their positiveness. The only question with reference to them now is as to their true place in the line of defense. They have lost some de- gree of their formidableness. Their measure of vulnerability has been seen to be greater than hitherto supposed. They have evidently lost in elements that are necessary in the firing line. They should not be crowded into the front rank. They form substantial support, superb background for the prime argument on whose effectiveness the whole issue swings. The basis of apologetics, at least within the area of practi- cal thinking, has distinctly shifted in the items indicated. These older arguments have become secondary and tributary. They reinforce and corroborate, but there their function ceases. They have been relegated to the immediate rear but by no means dismissed from the field. We 204 A STUDY IN ORIGINS hail them still as splendid and indispensable energies in the championship of gospel truth. In the apologetics of our day, the one argu- ment upon which surpassing and ever-increas- ing emphasis is being placed is that The New Basis: w hich demonstrates the super- God in Experience. -t natural work of God in Christian experience and character. " The only valuable confession of the divinity of Christ must follow His own work upon us, not precede it as a con- dition." * This is the vital point of triumphant Christian defense. " At last men are beginning to discover the ludicrous blunder they have been making. On their astonished eyes the truth is beginning to dawn that while church, Bible, history, and philosophy have all their religious uses, it is not upon any of them that religion ultimately rests. Her stronghold is not in anything man has done. It is what is in himself. Her final evidence is a psychological one." 2 " Even if all historic factors were to prove fallacious and be abandoned there remains a Christ born within. To cling to this is the new psychological orthodoxy." 3 The assailants of the Gospel, even the doubts of the very elect, are largely withdrawing from historical ground 1 King, " Reconstruction in Theology," p. 246. 3 Brierly, " Ourselves and the Universe," p. 263. 3 Hall, "Adolescence," Vol. II, p. 338. TASK OF CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY 205 and from secondary positions in the field and concentrating on this one tremendous issue. No movement in apologetics was ever so momen- tous. It is the one gigantic struggle at the one strategic point in the whole field of Christian truth. It is gigantic in the issues it involves. All interests in the entire future of Christianity are being staked here. If the fact of the active supernatural in Christian experience is proven, then all other corroborative arguments easily follow. Once the supernatural activity of God in the soul is fully established then His provi- dential and supernatural supervision of Bible history, the action of miraculous agency at seasonable times and places, the vision of prophecy and the corresponding fulfillment, the superhuman uplift of the nations and the con- quest of all religions, all follow as a logical and imperative corollary. If, on the other hand, it could be proven that there is no divine action in Christian experience then all other arguments are swept away as with a triumphant flood of adverse demonstration. If God fails to appear at the culmination of all His work of grace, then it may well be conceded that He has had no hand in the whole procedure, and all apologetics lapses into a hopeless and ruinous chaos. Chris- tian thought is thus being driven to its final crucial stand. Apologetics will more and more 206 A STUDY IN ORIGINS base itself on the supernatural activity of God in the soul of the Christian in the evolution of his experience and character as the one climactic fact by which the whole system of saving truth stands or falls. We begin, therefore, to get some glimpse of the importance and magnitude of the scope of Christian psychology. As a whole two Propositions, the world of Christian thought has, in but very slight measure, ap- prehended the facts involved. This movement goes to the very bottom of things psychical and experimental. In the accomplishment of this work two distinct and profound propositions must be maintained. To get a comprehensive view of the endeavour we must take a careful and candid survey of the field of these two prop- ositions. The first of these propositions may be stated as follows : At the core of the Christian life, the active Agent in its experimental (i) God Beneath saving work is the personal om- Experience. o J. nipotent Spirit of God. This is a definite postulate, claiming to uncover the very origin of the deepest things in Christian experi- ence. In real essence, the issue is solely as to what takes place beneath the threshold of con- sciousness. We are standing at the chasm in the continuity of conscious states. We see TASK OF CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY 207 clearly the last of these states ; we look ahead and see as clearly the state that next appears in consciousness, bearing indubitable evidence that something has occurred between the two, mak- ing the latter possible. What was it that oc- curred in the intervening depths of the psychical area ? We are seeking to penetrate the obscure region of the subconscious. We are taking the position that in that region the Holy Spirit is personally present, is acting on the psychical conditions there existing and producing such changes that the next subsequent state in con- sciousness arises therefrom. God is at the origin ; His action is the origin. The issue is momentous and vital. If there is failure here all is lost and Christian apologetics is forever driven from the field so far as the intelligent thinking of the future is concerned. The undertaking is strenuous enough to take the breath of the bravest and strongest. Facts must be sought far and near. ITSZISZS? They must be scrutinized with un- wearying diligence. They must be forced to give up the utmost attainable infor- mation. Every intimation from the profundi- ties of the subconscious must be seized and pre- served. Accumulation of corroborative material must be vigilant and exhaustive. The massing of evidence must be convincing, if possible 208 A STUDY IN ORIGINS overwhelming. Deliberate preparation must be made for increasing efficiency in this critical work. Men must be schooled for this specific task. No tyro can engage in this struggle ; he would be powerless to handle and utilize the subtle and evasive material involved. The Christian world must more and more equip it- self for this supreme effort of the centuries. It is no passing flurry of a day ; it is on for succes- sive generations. The presence and activities of God in the soul of the Christian must be made more and more certain by the indisputable in- terpretation of phenomena clearly present in the spiritual life. These phenomena must be given their just and adequate exposition. They are as rugged and universal facts as any known to man. They have been very indifferently ex- ploited and very meagrely formulated as demon- strable realities. Place must now be made for them in reputable scientific thought. In this way the proposition they prove will ultimately take its place among the established demonstra- tions of psychological science. The Holy Spirit will be clearly seen to be beneath the experience and life of the Christian. His divine and mar- vellous work will be made to stand out in strik- ing and conquering distinctness. The great and final conquest in religious thought will have been achieved. TASK OF CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY 209 The second proposition is preeminently a de- fensive one. It is shaped to meet an attacking movement. It may be stated as £.'£££? Allows : Psychic, or neural, react- ive processes are totally inade- quate to account for the phenomena that arise out of the subconscious in the personal expe- rience of the Christian life. The insidious pos- tulate, which makes necessary the maintenance of this proposition, avers that at the core of the Christian life are merely certain, not unfamiliar, reactive psychic processes perfectly accounting for every apparently superhuman phenomenon in the experience and life of the Christian. It is maintained by the supporters of this hypoth- esis that by known laws of purely brain-action every psychic phenomenon of Christian con- sciousness and subconsciousness can be fully ex- plained without resort to the inferential pres- ence and operation of any supernatural spiritual Power. It is alleged that the processes of sug- gestion and auto-suggestion, with their associate subconscious reactions, purely reactions of nerve energy in the nerve-centres of the brain, duplic- able in numerous situations where no religious features are involved and no possible responsive action of the Holy Spirit could be introduced in explanation, are all-sufficient to account for everything that occurs in Christian experience 210 A STUDY IN ORIGINS with a seeming obscure origin, lying below the threshold of consciousness. This position is taken in all the baldness of specific declaration in but few instances. Its promotion goes on in a very subtle proposmon 1 ! 11118 Dut effective way. Statements are made whose inevitable implica- tions support such a position. The ignoring of any need of a supernatural factor, by com- plete obliviousness of it, eliminates it from the situation through contemptuous silence as if too trivial to merit any mention at all. One would have ample occasion to suppose a divine part was never even conjectured in these processes. Much of the literature of this subject is per- meated with the presence of such an attitude. An insidious leaning of sympathy in this direc- tion is covertly betrayed in the treatment of the matter. The spirit of much of what is said and written by many of the medical profession tends to induce this view. Students of the physiological phases of the subject drop intima- tions of the physical basis of all such phenom- ena. The movement has not as yet been defi- nitely formulated. It is so radical, sweeping and iconoclastic that it hesitates to come out into the open. But the issue is moving, by in- evitable stages, towards an explicit challenge for proof and an alignment of forces. When that TASK OF CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY 211 day fully comes the battle for survival will have opened its final and desperate struggle. Just now it is taking the form of a subtle atmosphere of compromising suggestion, pervading, like a paralyzing miasma, much of the related thinking of our day. Its permeating presence and gath- ering volume do unmeasured harm to vital god- liness. The task of classifying the states of Christian experience and locating them in the psychical _ ._ D . . area is only a part of the work of Christian Psychol- •/ -t ogy to Prove Christian psychology. When that Propositions. i has been done a still more difficult and important task remains. It must enter upon a most minute and painstaking study of the entire field of psychical activity in any way involved in the movement of Christian experi- ence, the design being to accumulate every par- ticle of evidence that will throw any light on what takes place in the subconscious area giving rise to the states of consciousness in that experi- ence. Its work now becomes such a study in experimental origins. The states of conscious- ness must be rigorously scrutinized both to de- tect every phase of those states that has any causal connections with, and to discover exactly those effects that are resultant from, what evi- dently has occurred in the region of subcon- sciousness. 212 A STUDY IN ORIGINS This is the work of gathering the evidence in proof of the propositions just stated. These ma- terials are recondite and difficult Task Its Greater of access. Christian psychology is the only systematic effort capable of performing this task. It alone has the sym- pathetic temper to descry and bring out the facts that make evident the active presence of the Holy Spirit underlying the subconscious states of the Christian life. It alone has the disposi- tion to find God in these depths. It alone is prepared to handle all the facts in evidence. To turn all the critical work of gathering these facts over to irreligious psychological research is to abandon the cause we cherish to unsympa- thetic, if not inimical, hands. " Our only anx- iety can be — and there is room for anxiety here — that the investigators be really competent ; and, particularly in the investigation of moral and religious problems, competence requires per- sonal experience in the sphere investigated. . . . With the best intentions, in the name of science, some exceeding crude attempts at in- vestigation of religion have been made for sim- ple lack of interpreting experience." * No work in all the range of research needs so fully the spirit of the genuine Christian student, having had a positive personal experience, as this search 1 King, " Reconstruction in Theology," p. 50. TASK OF CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY 213 for the evidences of the divine presence in the deep places of the soul's life. If Christian psy- chology does not gather and present this evi- dence in scientific form it will not be forthcom- ing. It is, moreover, equally true that nothing will meet and overcome the naturalistic and godless interpretation of religious psychical phenomena, if Christian psychology leaves it alone. The only sufficient movement that can amass the facts to prove the utter inadequacy of psychic reactions to account for the phenomena of Christian experience is intelligent Christian psychological research. It must be exhaustively familiar with all the known laws of nerve reac- tions. It must know thoroughly all the estab- lished processes of suggestion. It must have all such facts so in hand, their limitations as well as their possibilities, that there shall be permit- ted no attributing of impossible functions to the interaction of nerve energies. Conjecture and unfounded assumption must be effectually curbed in whatever direction they may attempt to act. " The religious teacher must not allow ignorant and excitable persons to mistake neurological disturbances, without any ethical content, for manifestations of the Spirit." 1 On the other hand, the actual work of God in the depths of the Christian life, assured by unprejudiced in- 1 Bowne, "The Christian Life," p. 61. 214 A STUDY IN ORIGINS terpretation of psychical facts, must be kept in- violate by an open and unanswerable defense. Here lies the culminating task of Christian psy- chology. It stands the inveterate guardian of the supernatural life of God in the soul of the Christian. It repudiates spurious constructions of spiritual phenomena by which the personal divine element is eliminated from the processes of Christian experience. It is set to keep the way clear into the depths of the saved soul, where ever moves the regnant Spirit of God in His wonderful work of generating specific states in the life of the Christian. II THE PHENOMENA IN QUESTION We are now in position to be specific in the designation of the phases of Christian experi- ence involved in this portion of Located in the our discussion. The localization Subconscious. of states in the psychical area, which we have considered in detail in Part I, and mapped in the accompanying diagrams, makes it possible to identify, with great pre- cision, those states that occur in the obscure depths of the mental life and, for that reason, giving occasion to investigate the cause or causes producing them. These states, located in the subconscious region, are primarily the phenomena in question ; but inasmuch as the states occurring in consciousness spring so directly and unquestionably from them, the entire phenomena of the life of the Christian are most vitally concerned in this inquiry. The whole course of Christian experience is con- stantly vitalized and moulded by impulsions from the subconscious. It would, however, prove an endless and infinitely complicated task, practically impossible, to undertake to go into 215 216 A STUDY IN ORIGINS all the minuteness and intricacy of the phenom- ena of these interrelations. For the purposes of our present discussion fortunately this is needless ; for what may be shown to be true of some of these phenomena will readily be con- ceded to be as true of all of obviously like nature. The end sought in this effort is the demon- stration of a principle of the life of the Chris- tian and not an encyclopedic and Three Phenomena- exna ustive delineation of all of clusters. the minute and specific phenomena of that life. Hence we shall take up for de- tailed investigation only three of the most prominent and vital phenomena and phenom- ena-clusters of the subconscious states. These are (1) the subconscious counterpart of Convic- tion for Sin ; (2) the cluster of subconscious states underlying Newness of Life in conver- sion ; (3) the other cluster of subconscious states issuing in Possession of Power for the estab- lished, or sanctified, life. A reference to Dia- gram III clearly places these states before the eye as they lie in the region of the subconscious. These all appear in the Cataclysmic States ; the second and third of them are, either in full- fledged or modified form, in both the Cataclys- mic States and the States under Christian Nurture. The solution of the problem of these THE PHENOMENA IN QUESTION 217 potent, deep-lying phenomena-centres of the Christian life settles the question of all other similar states occurring in the subconscious. These are preeminently the storm-centres for coming years. They are the battle-fields of future apologetics. For the sake of clearness of thought we should have their specific details well in mind in this discussion. We shall, therefore, dwell at some length upon each of them even at the risk of the repetition of somewhat already brought out in the earlier discussion of them. Conviction for Sin is one of the most striking phenomena in the whole range of normal Chris- tian experience. The dormant JteSf" ° f C ° n " Sense of Sin is merel y its sluggish antecedent, growing more inactive with the years of repression. Conviction comes as a distinct phenomenon. In it perceptions of moral distinctions become strangely awake. Peculiar spiritual light pervades consciousness. The Tightness of divine law is made startlingly clear. The blackness of sin is set forth in alarm- ing relief. The foreshadowings of lamentable consequences to the life are brought out with vivid outline. Not only are the mental per- ceptions so strangely awakened, but the emotional sensibilities are profoundly stirred. The feeling of guilt is often aroused to painful intensity and chagrin for sin is awakened to agonizing acute- 218 A STUDY IN ORIGINS ness. Fear of consequences is frequently quick- ened to a foreboding apprehensiveness of im- pending disaster. The entire range of the sensi- bilities, from some subtle cause, is thus made unusually active and sensitive to sin in the life. This peculiar and painful awakening appears unheralded in the mental area. The causal im- pulsions seem to come from regions beyond, or beneath, consciousness. What is the real origin of such conviction ? What is its producing cause ? Whence this light that breaks over sin and brings out so vividly its heinous features? Whence this distressing arousal of the emotions, culminating at times in unutterable anguish, at the presence of sin in the life ? This problem must have its solution. These facts cannot be ignored. This inquiry will not subside, in the minds of the thoughtful, until it has reached some reasonable settlement. These are some of the phenomena in question. The processes of experimental conversion form a cluster of phenomena unparallelled for their brilliancy and subtility in all the g ° ri * in of psychical field. The predominant Conversion. * J r occurrence, pervading and charac- terizing the whole cluster, is transformation. It is a scene of, as it were, psychical magic. As we look on the surface in consciousness we see the superficial reconstructive changes. The THE PHENOMENA IN QUESTION 219 profound underlying agency and forces are un- seen and forever imperceptible. Sensations en- tirely new spring up into the conscious area. A new era opens in the mental field. Condemna- tion, present through the years even though in quiescent form, perhaps of late awakened into painful intensity, drops completely out of con- sciousness. The stress of mental anguish posi- tively ceases. Peace and joy take the place of distress and gloom. Day rises upon the soul's night either in one glad burst of light or by gradual stages of dawn. A new, indescribable spiritual ecstasy often makes this stage incom- parably brilliant and epochal through its be- wildering contrasts. Out from the glory of this psychical convulsion, in its more violent types, there appear in the field of consciousness new conditions in the spiritual structure. Uplifts and subsidences have changed the whole topog- raphy of the conscious area. The individual looks upon a new world within himself. Forms of desire and passion, before predominant, have sunk out of sight. Tastes, affections and atti- tudes, hitherto totally absent, have come into commanding prominence in this area. Im- pulses, before masterful, have been seemingly banished and displaced by others diametrically different. The spiritual structure, as it appears in consciousness, is a new creation. Who, or 220 A STUDY IN ORIGINS what, is the author of this creation? What energies have effected these changes ? What spiritual states underlie them, projecting them into consciousness ? These searching queries open the depths where lie concealed the pro- found phenomena in question. A similar group of phenomena appears in the inauguration of the established, or sanctified, life, the life maturely and de- sessioTof Power 3 " liberately set apart to an unvary- ing career of holiness, and the pos- session of power adequate to such a life. The psychical field containing this group presents to the penetrating student a series of phenomena only second in profundity and brilliancy to those just considered in conversion. The pre- dominant occurrence pervading and character- izing this group is undergirding of energy. It is another scene of bewildering mystery. The profound forces that are thrusting their products up into consciousness are totally indiscernible. Chagrin and condemnation for the wretched im- perfections of past service sink completely out of consciousness. A new and strange steadiness of psychical equipoise pervades the soul. Resist- ance to evil becomes uniform instead of fluctuat- ing. Peace rests in unchanging calm upon the entire psychical area. External storm has lost its power to penetrate these inner regions of the THE PHENOMENA IN QUESTION 221 spiritual life. A diffusing sense of the posses- sion of power for activity in service permeates the psychical structure. A hunger for participa- tion in the saving work of God seizes upon every faculty of the soul. A tireless propulsion crowds the entire being on into holy service. The behest of an unwearying unction for action urges the personality like the call of another world. Again we ask whence come these un- questionable realities in consciousness ? What contacts have been made through which issue these new energies in the life ? How are we to account for these evident changes and forces? All of these questions point to the underlying phenomena that we must now consider. These phenomena in question, deep-lying and difficult of access as they are, must be identified and de- fined with the utmost precision possible, for here lies the crucial field of Christian evidences. There are certain pertinent facts concerning these phenomena that must here be carefully noted. They lie below the thresh- Beyond aii Direct old of consciousness. They occur Observation. •J in that region of the psychical field where there is no mental perception of their existence. All is blank where they tran- spire. No amount of investigation will ever open these regions direct to the observer. They are more impenetrable than the remotest stellar 222 A STUDY IN ORIGINS spaces. The depths of the psychical microcosm are more inscrutable than those of the material cosmos. Let the indomitable scientific spirit make here no rash promises of discovery. It seems beyond question that no possible untrod avenues of approach to these phenomena await the explorer of the future. It is with no hope of ever penetrating to their immediate midst that the study of these phenomena is under- taken. While all this is true, these phenomena are still proper, even imperative, objects of the most Their study Pos- painstaking and persistent study. sible by Two Meth- rr\ ill xl ods : (i) By infer- J- wo methods are open in these m- ence - vestigations, both of which have specific advantages making the unbiased student, seeking the utmost information, ready to em- ploy each to the limit of its reliable availability. One of these is the method by inference. This method is the gathering of relevant psycholog- ical facts and their correlation with such pos- sible occurrences in the subconscious as may constitute the phenomena in question and be considered in any measure adequate to account for the resultant states in Christian conscious- ness. From ascertained facts it presents as prob- able certain processes beyond psychical vision to account for phenomena in experience not other- wise explained. However unsatisfactory and THE PHENOMENA IN QUESTION 223 inadequate this method may be, in the present state of psychological knowledge it must be worked to its utmost. Christian psychology must approach these vital phenomena on this side and by this method and so keep itself abreast of the very latest information in the re- motest way bearing upon such occurrences in the subconscious as issue in the conscious states of Christian experience. All the light that such psychological investigations can shed upon the phenomena in question should be gladly wel- comed and given its merited place in such an inquiry as this. All unwarranted inferences, alleged to be deducible from facts now known, must be exposed and eliminated from reputable thought on the problem. The method by infer- ence must be thus recognized and given oppor- tunity for all reliable deliverances. The other of these methods is the method by inspiration. By this method the assertions of Scripture relative to the phenom- (a) By inspiration, ena in question are given a hear- ing and their right to credence examined with thoroughness and candour. In so far as Scriptural revelation undertakes to de- lineate the occurrences underlying the conscious states of Christian experience its study becomes one of the methods by which the phenomena we are now seeking to exploit may be approached. 224 A STUDY IN OEIGINS Scripture in its depiction of the experiences of the soul in the processes of salvation makes no distinction between those occurring in conscious- ness and those beneath consciousness. It fol- lows as it would seem the continuity of the states comprising Christian experience as they appear under the light of inspired perception. Its delineation is totally oblivious of the fact that some of these states stand out clearly in conscious experience, while others, of which it speaks with equal positiveness, are entirely wanting in consciousness save only as their presence is indicated by inference. To inspira- tion the whole process of experimental states thus appears in its completeness unmodified by the limitations of human consciousness. It is this very handling, in the Scriptures, of the states of Christian experience from the stand- point of inspired vision that gives rise to con- fusion in the thought of the undiscriminating. The superficial thinker looks for all states to be equally in consciousness because equally defined in Scripture. This Scriptural uncovering of the underlying, subconscious phenomena of Chris- tian experience brings within reach a very fruitful method of the study of the phenomena in question. If the survey of the situation so far as we have gone has been correct, what has been accom- THE PHENOMENA IN QUESTION 225 plished should be briefly recapitulated as a prep- aration for the critical stage of the inquiry upon which we shall enter in the chap- Review of course te immediately following. We Thus Far. •/ O have traced the consecutive states of Christian experience in unbroken succession through the conscious and subconscious areas of the psychical field ; we have thus been able to locate in its respective region every one of these states ; we have found that the origins of this entire movement, whatever they are, are resident in the subconscious area ; we have seen that while we can never hope to penetrate to the depths of the subconscious with actual observa- tion there are two methods of approach, in the study of these obscure phenomena, by which very positive presumptive conclusions may be reached. What we now purpose is to take up separately these two methods of approach to this inner sanctuary of the Christian soul, f,Tp" Fur " this holy of holies of gospel sal- vation, and rigorously examine their processes, their limitations and their credi- bility. Upon the mature and final conclusions reached in this portion of Christian psychology, not merely in this present effort but in the final completed efforts of future students of these facts, will rest the survival of the Christianity 226 A STUDY IN ORIGINS we know as the religion of coming ages. The accuracy of this statement will appear as we proceed. The solemnity and magnitude of the undertaking, together with its difficulty, will grow upon every conscientious student of the phenomena in hand. The aim is to move cau- tiously, modestly but fearlessly to the consum- mation of our quest. So far as we can aid in its accomplishment, we purpose to have known the last fact that can be known concerning the pro- found phenomena under scrutiny. We desire to join in sounding out an appeal to the un- flinching intelligence of Christendom for untir- ing investigation of these deep-lying processes until, with ever-growing certainty, the divine Presence and action shall be disclosed in the underlying states of Christian experience. We gladly become one among the pioneers of rever- ent but relentless inquiry into the farthest pos- sible analysis of the obscure and basal phe- nomena of the Christian life. With uncovered head and prayerful spirit we turn to our un- sought but imperative task. Ill THE AVAILABILITY OF PSYCHOLOGICAL IN- FERENCE We are now to inquire how far psychological inference is available as a means of the discovery of the origin of the subconscious ^u^^"" phenomena involved in this dis- cussion. The process employed in such inference is certainly legitimate. So long as inference remains within the confines of facts warranting its conclusions, it has much to contribute to this study. But when such infer- ence begins to mingle with itself positive con- jecture and prejudiced assumption a halt should be called in so misleading a procedure. We are, therefore, under the necessity of ascertaining ex- actly in what items and to what measure psy- chological inference is available for our purposes. In the study of the phenomena before us, there are certain psychological inferences the accuracy of which no well-in- ^feren A ces missible formed student, whatever his re- ligious attitude, can reasonably question. To the consideration of these we will first give ourselves taking them up in detail. 227 228 A STUDY IN ORIGINS Every student of the phenomena of Christian experience is forced, by the conditions appearing in consciousness, to the inference (i) Forces at Work . , in subconscious that there are definite and power- ful forces at work in the subcon- scious area. The postulation of the presence of these forces, from the point of view of the psy- chologist, is purely inferential. He sees effects in consciousness the causes of which are not ap- parent. In scientific consistency he must, at least inferentially, locate such causes. The only region open to such location is that of the subconscious, lying as it does outside the region of consciousness yet within the psychical field. For instance, no candid student of the phe- nomena of conviction for sin can escape the conclusion that beneath the surface of the con- scious occurrences in that state there are positive awakening energies in unwonted action. This is an inference generally so nebulously in thought that it has been only vaguely formu- lated. Nevertheless when fairly stated its ad- mission will not be seriously questioned. The plain uncoloured facts warrant the inference. This instance is but one of frequent situations in Christian consciousness forcing upon us the inference that beneath such conditions there are potent forces at work in the subconscious area. PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 229 Another of these generally admitted inferences is that these forces, acting in the subconscious, operate under fixed laws. The ( 2 ) They operate uniformity of the resultant condi- Under Fixed Laws. *> tions in consciousness, of which we infer that these forces are the direct causes, are such that their causes can only act in un- varying processes. For instance, the psychic conditions issuing in conversion are rigorous and exact. A failure to conform to them, even to the minutest requirement, it matters not how strenuous the non-conforming effort, leaves con- sciousness totally void of all of the conditions characteristic of conversion. Nothing brings re- sults but conformity to the unmodified require- ments imposed. But the instant conscious states meet every minutia of the psychical de- mand, the resultant state in consciousness springs immediately into its place. No more exact evidences of law appear anywhere than in relation to these evident activities in the sub- conscious area. No one can study these phe- nomena of Christian experience, from the stand- point of psychology, and not be increasingly impressed with the inexorable exactitude of the subconscious processes underlying its consequent conscious states. A third of these inferences, which will be readily conceded, is that these subconscious 230 A STUDY IN ORIGINS forces manifest every attribute of intelligence in their action. The interchange between the con- scious and the subconscious in ^nfouanties 11 * 61 "" Christian experience has every ap- pearance of an exchange of com- munications between coordinate intelligences. On whatever hypothesis this interchange is ac- counted for the fact of intelligence apparent in the psychical transaction is indisputable. The inter- change is petition and answer ; it is condition and fulfillment ; it is the price paid and the purchase received; it is offer and acceptance. No more intelligent transaction could occur between con- tracting personalities than is consummated in this action of the subconscious forces. The ap- pearance of mechanism in the process is com- pletely absent. The movement is so spontane- ous and full of the appearance of volitional in- telligence that consciousness is totally oblivious of anything in the remotest degree mechanical in its action. So pronounced is this element of intelligence in the process that the unanalytic consciousness of the ordinary Christian can with difficulty be persuaded that he has no perception of intelligent personality, other than his own, in the entire transaction. Indeed the person ex- periencing it can only after long violence to most persistent conviction drive himself to the conclusion that he is not in direct conscious con- PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 231 tact with intelligent individuality, so indispu- tably present is every attribute of intelligence in the responsive action of these subconscious forces. Their possession of intelligent qualities is, there- fore, a warranted inference in the study of their nature and origin, though as to in what essence those qualities inhere there may still be an open question. The exercise of psychological inference here finds itself facing the problem that lies at the core of this study of origins and ce e r s a e WeInferences blocks tn e way of further valid in- • ference. That problem takes this form : What is the source of this intelligent action in the subconscious area : (1) Is it merely the unconscious cerebration of the in- telligent personality himself, under fixed re- active psychic laws? or (2) Is it external in- telligence acting on the subconscious conditions of the psychical field and maintaining an in- variable uniformity of procedure in that action ? If psychological thought commits itself to an af- firmative answer to the first part of this ques- tion, then its further inferences, by which it arrives at such an answer, cease to be available for purposes of this investigation for such inferences are at once presumptive and misleading as we shall see. In the attempt to get at the origins of Christian experience, on the 232 A STUDY IN ORIGINS hypothesis just stated, inferences unwarranted, undemonstrable and deceptive, yet vital to the position taken, have been formulated, which must here be examined and our characteriza- tion of them vindicated. Only thus can their availability as inferences, for the purposes of this study, be set aside. " Psychology and relig- ion are thus in perfect harmony up to this point, since both admit that there are forces seemingly outside of the conscious individual that bring redemption to the life. Nevertheless psychology, defining these forces as ' subcon- scious,' and speaking of their effects as due to ' incubation/ or ' cerebration/ implies that they do not transcend the individual's personality ; and herein she diverges from Christian theology which insists that they are direct supernatural operations of the Deity." x The grouping of the unavailable inferences, characterized above and responsible for much divergence between Chris- tian and psychological thinking in not infre- quent instances, will under four heads be suffi- ciently representative and exhaustive. It is inferred and alleged that these subcon- scious phenomena are produced by the mere cerebral enlargements of the adolescent period. The growth of brain-matter and the ascent of cell-function are in very active process during 1 James, " Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 211. PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 233 adolescence. With the development of these en- larging nerve areas psychical acquirements Four Erroneous make rapid strides. Brain-cells Inferences: (i) Out- i i , ■ • come of Adolescent break out into new perceptions, change. expanding visions, ascending as- pirations, high resolutions and hitherto un- known emotions. The potencies of the unfold- ing being are enlarging. The impulses, appe- tencies and capacities of puberty are dawning, like a revelation, upon the maturing personality. That the moral nature, the religious capacities, should share in this awakening is but normal. That the marked time of spiritual uplift and transformation should fall within the adolescent period is an inevitable sequence. The world has not waited for modern psychological science to find out that the period of peculiar susceptibility to the experimental phenomena of the spiritual life is that of the adolescent years. It was an- nounced in comprehensive terms thirty cen- turies ago : " Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not." * But to class these subconscious phe- nomena as essentially adolescent because they largely occur in the period of adolescence is an induction evidently unfair to the facts. To allege that these phenomena are necessarily pro- duced by the structural changes inevitable in 1 Eccl. xii. 1. 234 A STUDY IN ORIGINS the stage of growth occurring in adolescence is a most presumptuous conclusion. To infer that because, in the great majority of instances, these phenomena actually occur amid the changes of adolescence therefore they are produced by, or are an inherent part of, those changes is exceed- ingly erroneous and misleading. The fact is that many of the most positive ap- pearances of these phenomena occur remote from . adolescence, in psychical structures This Inference -i ciearly un- full-grown and mature, where warranted. -i /» -i i t t i every phase ol adolescent develop- ment has been left far behind. Indeed, these phenomena are found to have occurred at any psychical stage, adolescent or mature, whenever the psychical states provided the conditions es- sential to their existence. To say that they, oc- curring when normal adolescence has long since passed, are merely belated adolescent phenomena is to indulge in purest assumption. These phe- nomena are not inherent in the adolescent pe- riod. Many an adolescence pushes through its entire range without the manifestation of the slightest similitude to these experiences. Among multitudes, brought up in Christian homes and under the faithful care of Christian nurture, no such experiences as conviction and conversion are ever met. Among still other multitudes, brought up entirely apart from all Christian in- PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 235 fluences, no such phenomena ever appear. Only in lives where positive sin has had a place do or can these phenomena arise either in adolescence or at any other period. All of these facts, de- monstrable by innumerable testimonies, go to show that the inference that these phenomena are in nature part and parcel of mere adolescent change is clearly erroneous. All that the facts, offered in proof of this inference, can possibly warrant is the conclusion that these experiences occur most frequently in the period of adoles- cence and that that period is most susceptible to their occurrence. The effort to stigmatize these experiences as mere adolescent phenomena, the ebullition of adolescent ferment, is a signal fail- ure. They are without question phenomena as much in place at any and every stage and in any and every quality of psychical life. They are among the most positive, substantial and reputable phenomena of the psychic being. It is inferred and alleged that exactly parallel phenomena, entirely non-religious, demonstrate , , % _ ., . _. the merely reactive nature of the (a) Parallel Phe- •/ nomena Prove psychical processes involved in These Reactive. x ^ A these subconscious phenomena of Christian experience. " Conversion is not unlike the experiences of every-day life." * " In every- day life we find mental experiences analogous to 1 Cutten, "The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity," p. 248. 236 A STUDY IN OKIGINS each factor of the conversion experience, and sometimes to the whole process." x " In psychic troubles depression precedes all exaltation, and this newness (in conversion) evidently arises as a reaction from the previous depressed state which we have called sense of sin." 2 Hall in defining a law of mental life gives expression to this inference when he asserts that law to be " The deep tendency of our nature to react from pain to joy, which is the moment of conversion, and all the more intense by contrast and resili- ence." 3 Starbuck, illustrating his position by instances of reaction from depression to joy, of sudden mental awakenings, and of the breaking of habits, declares : " These facts do make intel- ligible, however, the processes involved in con- version in the same way that any natural phe- nomena come to be understood. They help us to see a little way into the mental operations concerned in conversion. They also make it clear that, however inexplicable, the facts of con- version are manifestations of natural processes. We accept them as natural laws, because we see them working here and there and everywhere in the psychic life." 4 It is without question 1 Cutten. " The Psychological Phenomena of Christianity,' ' p. 247. a Ibid., p. 248. 3 Hall, "Adolescence," Vol. II, p. 313. 4 Starbuok, "The Psychology of Religion," p. 143. PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 237 that changes, transitions, reformations, involv- ing conscious and subconscious states, in which are drawn even radical and sudden dividing lines, do occur. Evidently reactive processes in the subconscious region do present remarkable psychical modifications. Awakenings, revul- sions, uplifts of mere intellectual nature present exceedingly interesting processes to the candid student of psychical changes. There is a large range of these occurrences in the mental life that form an important part of the field of psy- chological research. Here lie the arousal, the awakening and the formulation of aspiration and ambition, a recondite and fruitful field of inquiry. These, however, have no share of our concern in this study ; they are in no true sense parallel phenomena. It should be borne in mind that exact simili- tudes in such profound occurrences are difficult of detection. Similarities are ready Facts Discredit creatures of fancy. It is just here this Inference. ■» *> very easy to stumble into far- reaching errors of conclusion. Absolute identi- fication of these subtle processes is necessary to protect from calamitous fault in opinion and teaching. The fact is that the alleged parallel- ism between the phenomena we are considering and any other psychical occurrences known to man is a pure assumption. " It seems to me 238 A STUDY IN ORIGINS that few conceptions are less instructive than this reinterpretation of religion as perverted sexual- ity." * " The difference should be emphasized — religious conversion in contradistinction from other experiences comprehends the whole mental life." 2 If by the statement that " The conclu- sion is that the mechanism of striking religious transformations is the same as the mechanism of our automatic mental processes " 3 it is meant, which is evidently not the case, that the brain structure is the material medium of all psychical activities then the declaration may be readily accepted as true ; if, on the contrary, it is meant, which is evidently the case, that " striking re- ligious transformations," in the psychical opera- tions they require to explain them, are identical with all ordinary " automatic mental processes," then the statement is to be emphatically rejected as inadequate to satisfy the facts. It is demonstrable that the phenomena we are considering form a class by themselves. Their antecedents in psychical These Phenomena * u a class by Them- states are utterly inadequate to explain their occurrence. The peculiarities of their nature and the power ac- companying their presence permit no comparison 1 James, "Varieties of Religions Experience," p. 11. *lMd.," p. 247. 3 Coe, "The Spiritual Life," p. 128. PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 239 with any other having the least fancied simi- larity to them. The grapple of will in the sub- jugation of habit in moral reform bears not tho remotest likeness to the immediate and complete elimination of the very presence of the habit by a somewhat beyond the will. Fluctuations in emotional conditions because of fortuitous com- binations or conjunctions of subconscious cur- rents of psychical action have no resemblance to the reliable spiritual peace arising from the profound subconscious harmonization evidently occurring in these phenomena. The sporadic and spasmodic gush of strength arising from some brief arousal of impulse is not for a moment to be compared with the sustained power at- tendant upon the presence of these phenomena in the subconscious Christian life, a power alone making possible high Christian character and abiding Christian civilization. The cumulative series of these phenomena, persisting to homo- geneous and climactic states without any known limitations, place them far without any other class of phenomena yet discovered in the entire sweep of the psychical world. Any conclusions formed concerning the origin and nature of any other phenomena do not apply to these. An attempt to force such conclusions into service here is misleading and presumptive. If these phenomena have any explanation it must be 240 A STUDY IN ORIGINS one accounting for their incomparable and dis- tinctive features. No theory transplanted from other and irrelevant situations can fit the case. These phenomena have no real parallels ; there- fore they have no explanation, ready-made from apparently like phenomena, adequate to account for their unique nature. This inference, in the presence of the facts, is thus seen to be the sheerest assumption and sinks into utter inadequacy. It is inferred and alleged that, as tempera- mental incapacities prove that a deficient struc- ture defeats the process, these phe- (3) Incapacity x ' x proves these phe- nomena are purely structural in nomena Structural. , . . ^ T , . , , their origin. JNo unbiased student of the psychical life will for an instant dispute that psychical phenomena are varied in wide degree by brain structure. Mental faculties differ, no doubt, in just the ratio of the vari- ance in brain matter and its structural combi- nations. A psychical process which is very easy for one is very difficult, even impossible, for another. Defective structures, without ques- tion, measurably limit their capacities. But within certain, definite degrees the seeming fixedness of such limitations cannot be admitted to be insurmountable. One of the most eminent of brain and nerve specialists has announced a most suggestive and startling possibility as the PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 241 ripest conclusion of biological science in the matter of volitional modification of brain struc- ture. " We can make our brains, so far as special functions or aptitudes are concerned, if only we have wills strong enough to take the trouble." 1 Even structure, therefore, within limits is not a fixed and unalterable quantity. Tabulated percentages of ineffective seeking alleged as instances of incapacity are very in- conclusive to discriminating thought. Before any admissible deductions can be formed the instances must be shown to be cases of positive and hopeless incapacity and not of spiritual ignorance or volitional indolence. Many of the alleged incapacities are found, upon careful in- vestigation, to be resolvable into deficiency of information or insufficiency of endeavour. The unsuccessful seeker after definite Christian ex- perience may easily be classified as incapacitated when either of the last mentioned conditions is the real cause of the failure. Ignorance of the right psychical pathway in Christian experience many times misleads and renders such seeking ineffective. ?eryRare nCaPaCity 0ftei1 aftei> Y^™ Of grOpillg ill spiritual darkness, a few moments of wise instruction by one expert in the psychical processes involved, lead out into the brightness Thompson : " Brain and Personality," p. 217. 242 A STUDY IN ORIGINS of the long-sought experience. In less skillful hands the obstacle would have been pronounced a prohibitive incapacity. As often, perhaps, when the conditions of experience are clearly understood, defect in conformity to them, slight it may be yet vital, makes absolutely and per- manently abortive the whole process. The only thing that is needed to make the effort effective is scrupulous and persistent resolution to leave no part of the action incomplete, or indifferently done. Indiscriminate observation glibly pro- nounces the difficulty to be structural incapacity. It is safe to affirm that under well-informed and skillful handling, with resolute and tenacious purpose, the element of incapacity in the situ- ation is reduced to an inappreciable feature. Except in cases of positive imbecility, it may be seriously questioned whether structural inca- pacity need ever be allowed as an Incapacity War- . , ™, . . rants no such impediment to such a Christian experience as is adequate to the spiritual needs of the individual, clear and satis- factory in its quality though perhaps not spec- tacular in its states. Yet, waiving such an ex- clusive position as that and admitting that in- telligent instances seem to indicate a structural incapacity to participate in the distinctive states constituting Christian experience, the inference from such a fact that the processes involved in PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 243 such experiences are, therefore, merely struc- tural in their origin is wholly unwarranted. Even superhuman causes, if there are such, must work through the structural conditions as they exist in the psychical nature. Christian experience involves no recasting of the native structure of the brain as the organ of the per- sonality. If there be sufficient defect in that structure the effective action of any cause, hu- man or divine, except it be creative, may be completely inhibited thereby. Genuine struc- tural incapacity simply puts its possessor with- out the class of accountable beings for whom the Gospel, with its attendant experiences, is pro- vided. Incapacity, therefore, has no evidential quality whatever in regard to the origin of the subconscious states of Christian experience. Such incapacity, when it does exist, merely in- dicates that the individual suffering it is in- capable, for reason of deficiencies in brain struc- ture, of being acted upon by the causes produc- tive of the subconscious states in such expe- rience. Any inference as to the nature of those causes from the fact of such incapacity is, in the baldest sense, presumptive, unwarranted and misleading. It is inferred and alleged that the action of hypnotic suggestion meets every requirement for the explanation of these phenomena. The 244 A STUDY IN ORIGINS profound nature of mental suggestion is an in- disputable fact of recent psychological research. It has been lifted out of the cate- ( 4 ) origin in Hyp. ~ or y f men t a l jugglery, and notic Suggestion. ° J « °° J ' placed upon the exalted plane of reputable psychical phenomena. Hypnotic sug- gestion is a specific type of this suggestive action. There seems to be a peculiar susceptibility of the subconscious self, under hypnotic conditions, to take a suggestion made to it, to pass under the more or less complete domination of that sug- gestion and, for the time being, to supersede and suspend ordinary consciousness with its usual states. This susceptibility varies greatly with different individuals, some being much more open to such suggestion than others. This hypnotic suggestion is, however, a species apart and having certain definite qualities in its ac- tion which should here be carefully noted. It is preceded by hypnosis, an induced psychical condition, indispensable in order that appro- priate suggestion may take effect in the psy- chical process. Hypnotic action is temporary in its immediate results and duration. By con- tinuous repetition it may finally no^condftion 15 " become a habit just as any other mental habit may be acquired. The effect of its process is to suspend ordinary consciousness and make the individual, for the PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 245 time of its continuance, oblivious to his normal proper environment. Professor Jastrow says, 11 It is obvious that the hypnotic subject enters a peculiarly altered mental state upon the occa- sion of an outward suggestion," which in the same sentence he pronounces to be an " ab- normal psychological disposition " ; and a few lines later he declares that the distinctive trait of that disposition " is a disintegration or partitioning of consciousness, and with it a con- traction of the mental field." 1 " There is a limitation of awareness and of will ; there is a restricted scope of consciousness, a hampered ex- pression of initiative and resistance — the limita- tions of the two reducing the subject to the sem- blance of a remarkably intricate automaton." 2 11 Though we cannot speak of a loss of conscious- ness (in hypnosis), we must, however, suppose an abnormal state of consciousness ; for if some one believes he sees things that are not present, or fails to see things that are present, he is cer- tainly in an abnormal state of consciousness." 3 The whole effect of the unguarded repetition of hypnotic conditions is to weaken the voli- tional and mental energies. Its unquestionable tendency, in effect upon the subject, is towards psychical emasculation. " The consequences to 1 Jastrow, " The Subconscious, " pp. 272-273. * Ibid., p. 274. 3 Moll, "Hypnotism," p. 170. 246 A STUDY IN ORIGINS the intelligence in which such states habitually occur and multiply inevitably affect the entire integrity of consciousness. By Deplorable Results suc ] 1 development do dissociated of Hypnotic Action. - 1 - states pave the way to disinte- grated personality." : " Frequent submission to such foolish procedure (hypnosis for amusement or profit) may ultimate in imbecility. The hypnotic habit is easily contracted and is pa- thetically exhibited by professional subjects, in whom is engendered, through repeated experi- ments, the wont to moon and dream, and who yield in an instant to the dominant personality of an overbearing operator." An instance of such effect is cited : " The result of this was to induce in the subject an almost idiotic condi- tion ; she did not know whether she was in or out of the hypnotic state." 2 By a recognized authority the dangers of hypnotic suggestion are thus given : " The increased tendency to hypnosis, and heightened susceptibility to sug- gestion in the waking state, i. e., the possibility of a new hypnosis against the subject's will, perhaps without her suspecting it, and the dan- ger of her accepting external suggestion even without hypnosis." 3 Scientific study of the 1 Jastrow, "The Subconsoious, " p. 322. 2 Quackenbos, " Hypnotic Therapeutics," p. 110. 8 Moll, " Hypnotism," p. 306. : PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 247 hypnotic suggestive state has thus revealed its harmful and perilous effects. It is a phe- nomenon that, like poison, should only be evoked by persons specially qualified and then used with the utmost reserve and caution. " It is already evident that suggestion is an instru- ment of great and subtle power, and not one to be handled unwarily." l In all these remarkable qualities of hypnotic suggestion we find the evidences that the phe- nomena we are studying are not Inference Shown to foe pr0C l UC ts of SUCh SUggeStlOn. be Erroneous. * ^^ These subconscious states of Chris- tian experience are permanent in their duration. They are wrought for a lifetime. Their con- ditions once met, unless subsequently retracted, they appear never to disappear from the psychic field. In this respect they bear no resemblance whatever to the evanescent phenomena of hyp- notic suggestion. In these experiences there is no suspension of ordinary consciousness or its usual states. The personality remains in the regular walks and atmosphere of life. He is completely himself in relation to his entire en- vironment. He is oblivious of nothing in the usual course of life. Subconsciousness is not lifted into ascendancy. Sane consciousness is on the throne of the psychic realm. That con- 1 Coe, " The Spiritual Life," p. 162. 248 A STUDY IN ORIGINS sciousness feels the transformations in its states, wrought by strange subconscious forces, but is never unseated. None of the weird, grotesque qualities of ascendant hypnotic suggestion ever appear in the genuine phases of properly-poised Christian experience. In this vital respect these phenomena have not the slightest resemblance to the uncanny qualities of such suggestion. In these substantial experiences of the Christian life every faculty and energy of the normal psy- chical being is energized and exalted. There is no perversion of the spiritual structure. There is no enervation of the volitional powers. There is no emasculation of the spiritual being. There is no danger of degeneracy under the most en- ergetic and continuous action of these phenom- ena. On the contrary, the entire effect is to give balance, vigour, moral purity and exaltation to all activities of the psychical being. Its product is the best and strongest manhood the world has ever seen. In this incomparable item these sub- conscious phenomena of Christian experience are entirely apart from, and diametrically oppo- site to, the phenomena of hypnotic suggestion. The inference that the phenomena of such sug- gestion offer any adequate explanation of the subconscious phenomena of Christian expe- rience is clearly refuted by the facts. Such in- ference is not only unwarranted, it is mislead- PSYCHOLOGICAL INFERENCE 249 ing ; it partakes of the nature of calumny in its insinuations and reflections. It is little short of a libel on the sublime phenomena of Christian experience to impute to them such causal affil- iations. Such derivation for these phenomena can but be indignantly resented and disowned by every alert Christian psychologist. From such considerations as the foregoing it is evident that the availability of psychological inference in this discussion of the um"ted le Inference real origins of the subconscious phenomena in Christian expe- rience is very limited ; indeed, that it only serves to bring us face to face with the profound problem that constitutes the core of this entire subject. If we are to get any reliable light on the actual origin of these wonderful phenomena we must turn elsewhere than to any mere infer- ence that the most astute psychology may pre- sume to formulate. Is there any further light for the depths we seek to penetrate? For the Christian psychologist such light shines; we now proceed to avail ourselves of it. IV THE EELIABILITY OF SCEIPTUEE INSIGHT The voice that assumes to speak of ultra-con- scious occurrences must attest its credibility. No appeal to credulity will meet Demand for Evi- ^g neG ± No bold assertion, on dence Proper. » alleged authority, can command intelligent confidence. The bearer of light for these obscure depths must establish an assuring trustworthiness. If evidence of this nature can- not be forthcoming then the voice may as well not speak. Bald assumption of unquestionable reliability merits and receives the contempt of intelligent thought. The candid inquirer, baffled in his attempt to rely upon psychological inference, as we have seen him to be in the last chapter, stet^ r ° blem hears but one voice that proposes to throw any light into the depths of the subconscious and reveal the origin of the phenomena of Christian experience there aris- ing. That voice is the Word of God in Scrip- tural utterance. The reverent student of these phenomena must not shrink from the most un- sparing inquiry into the accuracy of Scriptural 250 RELIABILITY OF SCRIPTURE INSIGHT expositions of psychical states. The crucial question that must be answered in no evasive terms is this: Is Scriptural insight into psy- chical states such as inspires the candid mind with confidence and assurance of accuracy and reliability ? In aid of such inquiry the psychical insight of Scripture asks no concession of its reliability. It seeks no blind credence in its support. It steps out into the open and fear- lessly invites the challenge of its ability to penetrate to the depths of the psychical struc- ture, to interpret the processes of Christian ex- perience that are operative in the underlying depths. To put its attitude in an- open^TMt 18111 otner > an d perhaps more accept- able, way, it may be said that Scriptural insight is totally innocent of any at- tempt to demonstrate its reliability ; it simply sets forth the facts of psychical occurrences so absolutely positive of its own accuracy that it is entirely oblivious of any possibility of its utter- ances ever being called into question. It thus leaves itself open to the most critical investiga- tion of its trustworthiness as a revealer of the profound causal conditions that underlie the states of Christian experience. We are, there- fore, to examine in this chapter the credentials, so to speak, of Scripture insight as a reliable in- terpreter of the experimental occurrences of the 252 STUDY IN ORIGINS Christian life taking place in the psychical area beyond consciousness. The purpose is to give reasonable evidence that Scripture may be relied upon to accurately set forth the conditions and events of the subconscious area in the processes of Christian experience. This evidence consists of positive verifications of such ability in actual operation so far as consciousness can follow it. These are the only credentials that can meet the demands of this inquiry. They are of such decided importance that they must severally be given our consideration in detail. The real nature and result of sin in the psy- chical life is exclusively revealed by the insight Four credentials of Scripture. What sin actually is stated : (i) The and w k at j t ac tually does in the Diagnosis of Psy- «f chicai Disorder. psychical states is nowhere else described. References to any conception of sin in all non-Christian literature are in the most general and undefined terms. The vagueness of the terminology simply reflects the hazy indis- tinctness of the concept itself. Only under the insight of Scripture, piercing like the rays of a superhuman search-light into the depths of the soul, have the naked essence and distinct con- sequences of sin, as they appear in psychical conditions, found definite and exhaustive ex- position. It is a bold thing, a thing of ever- increasing wonder, to have stepped into the RELIABILITY OF SCRIPTURE INSIGHT 253 very centre of the soul's most abstruse conscious activities, when such a thing as psychological science was undreamed of, and given such an exhibit of the distinct psychical processes in- volved in the act of sin as stands undisputed, in all essential elements, under the vastly extended knowledge of subsequent psychological dis- covery. Such is the unapproached achievement of Scripture insight. Nearly two thousand years ago it gave the most exact and luminous delineations of sin, in its psychical aspects, pos- sible to be made. In one keen sentence that in- sight opened a view into the very essence of sin when it declared : " Sin is the transgression of the law." * We see, as in a flash, that sin is the volitional variance of the psychical attitude from exact conformity to the known require- ments of God's law. This definition is amplified and the evolution of sin in psy- ThePsychicai c hi ca l states is still more fully Evolution of Sin, J shown : " Every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed." 2 Thus is sketched the rise of im- proper desire, its clash with known law, its potent pull upon the volitional being and the resultant discernible inclination of that being away from absolute rectitude. The psychical scene is not left in fragmentary incompleteness ; 1 1 John iii. 4, ' James i. 14. 254 A STUDY IN ORIGINS the insight of Scripture proceeds to delineate the subsequent stages in the genesis of sin : " Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin." x The fructifying of unholy desire is thus portrayed. Such desire, once having been given place, takes on more and more distinct form and increases in strength, like the growth of em- bryonic fcetal life, until it culminates in kindred volitional action and sin is born. The law is broken ; God is disobeyed and the psychical being is a deliberate outlaw in the spiritual universe. But the portrayal of the psychical processes of sin does not stop here. It now sets forth, with unequivocal positiveness, the effect Disastrous Effects f sucn s [ n upon the psychical structure and life : " And sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death." 2 The scene thus opened, amplified in great detail in like disclosures of Scripture insight, uncovers the destructive and ultimately fatal processes that the presence of sin sets up in the psychical being. It renders the soul unfit for fellowship with God and separates it from Him : " Your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from you that He will not hear." 3 This insight affirms the sinning soul to be " without God in the world," 4 and " alienated from the life of 1 James i. 15. 2 James i. 15. 8 Isa. lix. 2. 4 Epb. ii. 12. RELIABILITY OF SCRIPTURE INSIGHT 255 God." 1 This alienation from the life of God is, in its functional and structural effects, seen to be the cause of the spiritual condition depicted by the words : " Dead in trespasses and sins." 2 The revolt of the psychical structure sp^uTDiforder. against this death-dealing process is vividly portrayed by this Scrip- tural insight : " The wicked are like the troubled sea when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt. There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked." 3 The endless tossing outreach of the soul after the life of God, from which it is alienated by sin, is thus laid bare to our gaze and to it the agonies of the centuries give overwhelming witness. Scripture insight has given such indisputable diagnosis of the psychical disorder that has blighted our race ever since sin began its fatal processes in the hearts of men. What inerrant vision is this that provided us with such a luminous analysis of these profound occurrences transpiring in the depths of consciousness ! If the diagnosis of the spiritual conditions produced by sin in the consciousness of the soul, thus given by Scriptural insight, forl h e !iff rescripti ° n is faultless in its accuracy, under the increasing psychological intel- ligence of men, no less so is the prescription for < Eph. iv. 18. 2 Eph. ii. 1. 3 Isa. lvii. 20. 256 A STUDY IN ORIGINS the relief of that condition delineated by that same insight. The detailed statement of the psychical steps to be taken by the conscious per- sonality is perspicuous and positive. There has been no variation in the essence of these steps in all the long stretch of ages during which this in- sight has been placing this prescription before the human soul for its relief. The medium of its expression has had scores of variations ; its repetitions have been separated by centuries and the stretch of deserts and seas ; its elaborations have been amid the crudities of pastoral sim- plicity and the refinements of cosmopolitan cul- ture. But the prescription itself has never varied. Scripture insight has never been di- verted from absolute uniformity by the lapse of time or the changes in place. This prescription provides for three distinct vo- litional acts. They embody all that the soul can do towards its rescue from sin. They Three steps ^\ lie within the range of ready Prescribed. ° ■» possibility to every normal person. Their expression in Scripture is multitudinous, scattered from end to end of the Word of God. It would be needless repetition to give here, and in the remaining parts of this chapter, numerous citations of Scripture passages. In the treat- ment of the states of Christian experience, as given in Part I, Chapter III, sufficiently copious RELIABILITY OF SCRIPTURE INSIGHT 257 citations of Scripture may be found to confirm the accuracy of the statements here made rela- tive to the states there more elaborately defined. Only in very limited measure, therefore, will additional and supplemental citations here be made. The Scripture passages presented in this chapter, together with those just referred to, will adequately cover the need of Scripture corrobo- ration of the positions taken, which find their better substantiation in the unquestionable gen- eral concensus of Scripture as a whole rather than in isolated passages. The first of these acts is the volitional separa- tion of the life from sin in all of its forms hitherto indulged in and the de- Abandonment terminate covenant to leave them of Sin. alone forever. It is the choice of complete cessation of all former variations of the psychical attitude from conformity to the known will of God. This act is concisely stated as one of the conditions of relief in the words : " Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts." l The specific psychic action here defined is evidently that of positive volitional separation from every form of known evil in the inner and outer life. Perhaps Scripture no- where more forcefully enjoins this act than in the words : " Be ye separate, saith the Lord, and 1 Isa. lv. 7. 258 A STUDY IN ORIGINS touch not the unclean thing ; and I will receive you." 1 The absolute volitional severance of the psychical being from all sinful contacts is thus clearly seen to be one of the essentials in this prescription. The second of these steps in the prescription is the seeming complement of the first. On first thought, it would appear that if committal to gin ig to be abandoned then the Obedience. divine will is to be scrupulously obeyed. But the separation from all former sin, which is all that this act of abandonment in- volves, does not necessarily carry with it the positive commitment to conformity to every known requirement of the divine will. The prescription adds as a second act necessary to relief a solemn covenant of obedience. In every possible circumstance the soul must be com- mitted to a volitional attitude of resistance to sin and compliance with every known injunc- tion of God. The unqualified intent of the soul must be to act, in the minutest exertion of vo- litional conduct, in the utmost possible con- formity to the law of God. The negative atti- tude of rejection of sin and the positive attitude of committal to obedience are unalterably linked together in this prescription. In that spectacular setting of this prescription *2 Cor. vi. 17. RELIABILITY OF SCRIPTURE INSIGHT 250 for relief, the Parable of the Prodigal Son, Chri.-t embodies this committal to obedience in the graphic words of the returning prodigal : " Make me as one of thy hired servants." x It is the soul's surrender to the most humble, even ab- ject, conformity to the divine will in every act. In that remarkable instance of the living appli- cation of this prescription, the conversion of Paul, he meets this requirement in the excla- mation : " What wilt Thou have me to do? " 2 The exactitude of this required condition is formulated with great detail in those compre- hensive words : u Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into cap- tivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." 3 The deliberate committal of the volitional being to the known will of God is thus made an essen- tial part of the prescription for relief from sin as made known by Scriptural insight. The third and final step in this prescription is the volitional act of acceptance. In essence this act of receptiveness is the act of Act of Acceptance, faith. It is the reliance of the soul upon the fulfillment of the promise of that in relief which it cannot do for itself. It is the voluntary opening of the gate- ways. It is the absolute cessation of self- 1 Luke xv. 9. a Acte ix. 6. 8 2 Cor. x. 6. 260 A STUDY IN ORIGINS reliance and complete spiritual dependence for relief. It is the putting of the psychical being where relief can be administered unhindered and is the culmination of this prescription. In a vivid disclosure of the states of a seeking soul which realized that it was at the limit of its own effort for relief from sin and could not cleanse itself, this throwing of itself open by faith for the saving work of God finds striking expression in the cry : " Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow." 1 This final step in the effort for relief is concisely stated : " By grace are ye saved through faith." 2 Relief from the presence and power of sin through the exercise of faith is a psychical process such as the unenlightened mind of man has never conceived. In the pro- foundest introspection of his own conscious depths man has never dreamed of this simple act. Besides the prescription of distinct psychical acts for relief from sin, Scriptural insight pro- , ^ ru ^ « •*• ceeds farther to define the exact (3) The Definition of Processes in working in consciousness of this prescription when applied. The psychical scene thus spread before the ever- growing intelligence of men is a daring one. It is the most hazardous feat ever attempted in the history of religious thought. If it prove false 1 Psa. li. 7. 2 Eph. ii. 8. RELIABILITY OF SCRIPTURE INSIGHT 2G1 to experience the whole plan of gospel salvation falls in utter collapse. But this insight is per- fectly oblivious of any such peril. What it per- ceives and reveals is known to be so unquestion- able, so unerring is the vision, that no element of uncertainty ever appears in the action of this insight. It proceeds in its illuminating work confidently at home among these profound and evasive phenomena. It defines the occurrences in consciousness under the application of this prescription, indicating the general stages in the processes which comprehend all the essential conscious facts. The first of these stages is the distinct passing out of sin from the area of consciousness. Its guilt disappears. Condemnation, The Passing of sin. before oppressive, is completely removed ; its darkness and depres- sion pass away. The burden of sin is lifted or falls away, and exhilarant buoyancy takes its place. The complete extinguishment of the sense of present sin and the pervasion of the entire consciousness by a sense of rest and peace is a most distinct and radical revolution in psy- chical states. Sins are " blotted out," l as by total cancelation ; they are " removed" " as far as the east is from the west," 2 as by omnipotent expulsion ; they are " cleansed " 3 away, as by an 1 Isa. xliv. 22. 2 Psa. ciii. 2. 3 1 John i. 9. 262 A STUDY IN ORIGINS efficacious spiritual flushing of the conscious field. After this passing of sin another stage is dis- closed by Scriptural insight ; it is the readjust- ment of spiritual structure. There o T f h Pow e a rf sting is a new alignment of the psychical impulses and powers owing to a reconstruction of the spiritual organism. There are strange subsidences and uplifts in the con- scious area of the psychical field. Tastes and affections and impulses are reversed, purified, refined, uplifted. So radical is this reconstruc- tion that the conscious being seems to itself " a new creature ; " 1 it seems to have passed through the mysterious transformations of a being " born again." 2 Scripture insight laid bare this wonderful reconstructive process in the con- scious being as another of the consequences of the applied prescription in relief of sin. As the final stage in this relief Scriptural in- sight portrays the influx of a new and ascendant life. Sin removed and structure The Ascendancy of recrea t e d, consciousness now be- New Life. ' comes sensible of the possession of a strange increment of vital energy. Powers, weak and vacillating before, are now vigorous and steady. Forces, dominant and dictatorial before, are subdued and docile. There is a glad- 1 2 Cor. v. 17. 2 John iii. 3. RELIABILITY OK SCRIPTURE ENSIGHT some thrilling and Barging as of new and tran- eoendant life through the entire Btructun Christ declared that He came to provide suob life ever " more abundantly." ! This life of power ever makes receiving souls M more than con- querors." 2 Former impulses for good that have struggled under desperate handicap now spring into the forefront of conscious exertion and rise into transcendant mastery as by some all-con- quering infusion of surcharged life. Kagern* zeal, ardour, unction in sinless living, all are conscious indices that somehow there has come into the being a marvellous fullness of holy ascendant life. With the depiction of this all- filling life the definition of the processes of re- lief from sin, as portrayed by Scriptural insight, reaches its culmination. Intermingling among these remarkable feats of Scriptural perception there is one other that must be urged as a valid credential (4) A Familiarity ... /» i • with conditions of the reliability of that insight. Involved. T . . ■» . •% It is an evident and impressive familiarity with the intricate conditions in- volved in these processes. Not a phase of pos- sible occurrence in the progress of Christian ex- perience but is anticipated and provided for in repeated forms by this unerring Scriptural in- sight. The workings of the psychic faculties in 1 John x. 10. * Rom. viii. 37. 264: A STUDY IN ORIGINS these saving processes seem to be clear as in a blazing sunlight to this inspired insight. The weaknesses, 1 the subterfuges, 2 the callousness 3 of the sin-vitiated human heart 4 are distinctly perceived and recognized. The provision of promise for the psychological moment is multi- tudinous, exact, adequate. The soul gazes into the depths of this Scriptural insight as into a " mirror " 5 and recognizes the exposure of all the secrets of its hidden conscious seclusions. This amazing familiarity with all the occurring situations arising in the psychical pathway along which Christian experience moves presents con- vincing evidence that this insight is qualified to speak with assuring trustworthiness of every phase of the conscious states occurring in Chris- tian experience. All this, it is true, pertains to only one class of psychic activities. If Scriptural insight is such a revealer of psychical states Reliability Within . conscious states as the facts we have just consid- Demonstrated. , , , . • i • ,i ered would seem to indicate, then why does it not open up with equal clearness all classes of conscious states, intellectual as well as spiritual ? In reply to this inquiry it need only be said that Scriptural insight is not en- gaged in the elucidation of general psychological 1 Rom. vii. 23. 2 Heb. iii. 13. 3 Matt. xix. 8. 4 Jer. xvii. 9. 6 James i. 23. RELIABILITY OF SCRIPTURE INSIGHT 265 science. Its sole concern is to deal with those psychical states that are connected with the proc- esses of saving grace. This being its supreme ii nd exclusive task, it must not be considered faulty if we find it limiting itself everywhere thereto. In this, its specific field, it has demon- strated itself accurate above mistake, reliable beyond all doubt, and therefore trustworthy to the utmost degree, in all matters however pro- found or recondite pertaining to the conscious states of Christian experience. V THE ULTIMATE POWEE, THE HOLY SPIEIT We have seen how trustworthy Scripture in- sight is in the perception and statement of the order and nature of the conscious proven Accuracy of occurrences in Christian expe- Scripture Insight. t rience. The exact correspondence between such statement and the universal ex- perience of those who have given such occur- rence opportunity to arise by meeting the psy- chical conditions, in consequence of which they alone take place, forms a mass of evidence be- yond all reasonable dispute. The demonstra- tion of the unerring accuracy of that insight in the region of consciousness is overwhelming. No less astute observer of human life than the historian, Hallam, states as his deliberate con- clusion : " I see that the Bible fits into every fold and crevice of the human heart. I am a man and I believe this is God's book because it is man's book." We have seen how perfectly at home, even from its earliest utterances, Scripture insight has been in all the intricate and abstruse processes of the conscious states involved in Christian experience. We must have been im- 266 THE ULTIMATE POWER 207 pressed that in the case of this insight we are dealing with an intelligence that possesses un- equalled power of penetration into the depths of the psychical life and undoubtable reliability in the uncovering of the processes active in the profoundest psychical depths. We are now ready to conclude that this Scrip- tural insight, presenting such indisputable cre- dentials of trustworthiness so far Valid Conclusion _ ,, . From such Ac- as we are able to follow it in con- curacy. . 1 J ••« 1 sciousness, has most positive claim upon our credence whenever we shall find it to speak concerning such occurrences as take place in the depths of the subconscious. The differ- ence between these two classes of psychical oc- currences, those transpiring in consciousness and those in subconsciousness, is one evidently aris- ing in the limitations of the ordinary powers of human insight. Both are occurrences in the psychical field of kindred, if not identical, na- ture ; their differentiation is one of location, one class transpiring under the light of conscious- ness, the other in the obscurity of subconscious- ness. Indeed the difficulties arising in the anal- ysis of conscious occurrences are often as in- surmountable for ordinary insight as are those pertaining to subconscious processes. A pene- tration equal to the task of clearing away all such difficulties with reference to conscious psy- 268 A STUDY IN ORIGINS chical activities, as we have seen Scriptural in- sight to have, may as well be able to do the same for subconscious spiritual occurrences. It should, therefore, be no strain upon the most scrupulous investigation to concede to Scripture insight the right to speak with authority con- cerning the subconscious conditions involved in Christian experience should it so choose. In point of fact we do find Scripture insight dealing with these subconscious phenomena. Indeed, this insight appears to Scripture Insight . ° * L penetrates into the know no difference between the Subconscious. • -i . 1 1 • conscious and the subconscious in point of ease of perception or clearness of their communication. In the readiness of its knowl- edge and the positiveness of its declaration this insight is just as much at home in the obscure depths of the subconscious as within the psy- chical area illumined by consciousness. There is no equivocation, no shadow of uncertainty. It speaks with all distinctness of those psychical conditions that never appear in consciousness and yet that, in the causal order of the succes- sive states of Christian experience, must occur before others that do appear in the area of con- sciousness. Without these states, of which Scripture insight alone speaks, there is an un- accounted-for gap in the continuity of states. Without these underlying states, thus supplied, THE ULTIMATE POWER 209 the attempt to trace the progress of Christian experience would come to certain bridgeless chasms beyond which we would be powerless to pass. For instance, the awakening and alarm- ing, taking place in the depths of the subcon- scious, alone account for the intense conviction for sin appearing in consciousness. So also for- giveness, cleansing, regeneration and adoption, all occurring in the subconscious, alone account for the conscious states appearing in conversion. (See Diagram III.) But Scripture insight is the only source of information shedding any light upon these deep-lying processes. It meets the situation exactly ; it bridges the chasm per- fectly ; it fills out the succession of states with- out a break. In all candour we are bound either to concede its trustworthi- such msight negs and accept its statement of trustworthy. IT the occurrences in the region of the subconscious as perfectly valid and reliable or show adequate reason why we decline so to do by disproving its trustworthiness in the mat- ter of subconscious activities. It is to be ad- mitted that the passage from the area of con- sciousness, the psychical region in which the reliability of Scripture insight is fully demon- strable, to the region of subconsciousness, where the proofs of that reliability are so largely infer- ential, is an act that will depend much upon the 270 A STUDY IN ORIGINS attitude of the individual as to openness of mind towards the probabilities of the case. Absolute demonstration is forever out of the question. Nevertheless, inferential probabilities are so many and so strong that the open mind confi- dently follows Scripture insight in its luminous exploitation of the subconscious in Christian ex- perience. All of the subconscious occurrences, just al- luded to, repeatedly delineated by Scripture in- sight, we have examined in detail in The crucial fae somewhat extended analysis of Question. */ them found in the earlier chapters on the cataclysmic states. We are not, therefore, here specifically concerned with them except as they are incidentally connected with the object of our search. From these conditions, occurring in the subconscious, we must take one step deeper down where our inquiry leads. We are be- neath the subconscious states now ; we are at the very beginnings. Amid the solitudes of these depths of the soul, with an inexpressible sense of awe upon us, we ask : What power is operative here producing the psychical states we have been finding? This is the crucial question of all Christian psychology ; this moment is the culmination of our whole inquiry. In the silences of these underlying recesses of the human spirit, where so little is attuned to the dull ear of THE ULTIMATE POWER 271 ordinary thought, once again the voice of Scrip- tural insight is alone heard in positive reply : "It is God that worketh in you hoth to will and to do of His good pleasure." l The deep, omnipotent background of all Christian experience is thus declared to be the unresting power The Answer of f the Ho ] y Spirit. Scriptural Scriptural Insight. 1/ x r insight is tirelessly insistent in the declaration of this fact. It stakes its whole va- lidity on this one ultimate verity. The causal power underlying Christian life is not hypnotic suggestion ; it is not neural reaction of any sort ; it is not latent psychic energy let loose by subtle play upon its occult connections like the push- ing of an electric switch. Scripture insight ignores all such inferential and erroneous ori- gins, alleged by some, and sets them aside by reiterated and positive assertion. No possible interpretation of passages as figurative, as per- sonifications of psychic forces remotely sourcing in the divine Personality, can so emasculate these utterances as to make them conform to a mechanical theory of this ultimate power and exclude the spontaneous action of the Holy Spirit in the depths of the subconscious. The presence of God, as a conscious parental Person- ality, in this unconscious area of the psychical field, projecting into the conscious area influ- 1 Phil. ii. 13. 272 A STUDY IN ORIGINS ences, impulses, states, whenever volitional con- ditions open the channels for such transfusion, is the unequivocal signification of the declara- tions of Scripture insight. This contact of the conscious, personal Spirit of God with the conscious spirit of man is vital to the maintenance of the experi- Elimination of Di- , x vine Personality ence we call Christian. The re- solving of such direct contact, in biological or psychological thought, into the processes or reactions of psychical energies, with remote and ultimate reference to a possible di- vine origin practically impersonal and uncon- scious, is fatal to an intelligent and intense Christian experience. The attributes of person- ality and consciousness, inhering in that divine Presence operating in the depths of the Chris- tian soul, are absolutely essential. What God does remotely, by second-hand agencies through intermediary processes of nerve cells and forces, cannot meet the terms of Scripture declaration. To pray to, to commune with, to have the abid- ing indwelling of only and merely psychical forces with their complex interactions, with no immediate living and loving Personality, is to eliminate all warmth and vitality from Chris- tian experience. When the divine Ear that hears is ascertained to be only the excitations of nervous ganglia, and the divine Love that re- THE ULTIMATE POWER 273 sponds is found to be only their automatic reac- tions, then the Spirit of God is quickly felt to evacuate the spirit of man and the heart to drop out of Christian experience. An interpretation that conceives of the process of Christian experi- ence as purely automatic, mechanical, unvoli- tional, save as harmony with the most arbitrary law may be seemingly volitional in a delusive way, takes all sense of direct personal contact with the Spirit of God out of Christian experi- ence, strips it of all warmth of spirituality, leav- ing it cold and formal, though perhaps admir- able as an exact chemical process would be. The forms and habits may survive; the moral- ity may maintain itself by momentum and the artificial supports of social influ- Survival of Formal- z^i • , . . i . t ism and Theism. ences. Christian theism may read- ily survive, as it has in the later adjustments of physical science; indeed, there is nothing in such an interpretation that does other than emphasize the wonder of the mechan- ism itself; and such mechanism does but make more incontrovertible the theism that alone ac- counts for its existence and operation. But theism and Christian experience are radically distinct. Theism may thrive upon that which totally destroys every vestige of vitality in the living experience of the Christian. That psy- chology which, by its biological theories, resolves 274 A STUDY IN OEIGINS all processes of Christian experience into nerve and brain action, relegating all recognition of immediate divine Presence and action in that experience to the limbo of mystic theological fancy, unscientific and unnecessary to account for the phenomena involved, is a destructive attack, however much disguised in conciliatory terms, upon all that is vital and potent in Christian experience. Scripture insight, in its answer to the crucial problem we have stated and in the most positive rejection of the above interpreta- tion, portrays divine Consciousness coming into immediate causal communion with human con- sciousness, through the orderly processes of the subconscious region. Thus in the depths of the subconscious, well beyond all ordinary human penetration, is definitely located by inspired per- ception the conscious divine Person, loving, con- victing, forgiving, transforming, empowering, unfolding and glorifying the redeemed spirit of man. We shall consider separately, and at some length, several of the most pertinent passages classified Grouping declarative of this perception of of Passages Em- n • j • • i j ■ ± ±~\ bodying scripture Scripture insight in answer to the Answer. question we are here facing. We cannot attempt to be exhaustive in the presenta- tion of Scripture expression of the fact we claim. Happily this is unnecessary, as a few of the most THE ULTIMATE POWER 275 emphatic passages will suffice to set forth the in- disputable trend of Scripture in its display of this fundamental, ultimate Power in Christian experi- ence. We shall undertake to see what Scripture insight sees as it peers into these depths. " In St. Paul's writing the biblical doctrine of the oper- ation of the Holy Spirit reaches its completion. . . . He teaches . . . that the Spirit has come to regenerate and restore the personal life, . . dwelling in the body as His temple, identifying Himself with the human spirit in its struggle with the flesh and its striving after God, until He has perfected the nature which the Son of God redeemed and has raised it to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. " x For the purposes of condensation I have attempted a brief but comprehensive clas- sification of a number of the most pertinent state- ments of Scripture. These deliverances of Scrip- ture insight set forth the following five facts as ultimate and final for the entire psychical area. First : The Spirit of God is an abiding Pres- ence somewhere in the psychical field of the willing soul. The fact that such Presence (i) The Holy Spirit . , . , . - Abiding in p S y. is not a direct object ot conscious- chicai Field. negs carries no we i g ht. The dwell- ing place of the Spirit of God in the psychical field is the region of subconsciousness. Scripture in- 1 Hastings, "Dictionary of the Bible," Vol. II, p. 411. 276 A STUDY IN ORIGINS sight makes clear that Presence by specific af- firmations of the fact. One of the sublimest spectacles ever opened to the thought of man is the vision sketched as from the very lips of God : "Thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy, I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit." * The bars of sinful volition withdrawn and the gate- ways of psychical depths thrown wide open in contrition and humility, the infinite Spirit of God enters there to dwell. He, therefore, be- comes an abiding Presence ever after to be taken into account in all of the subsequent life of the soul. Christ Himself joins in the declaration of this fundamental fact. When speaking of the Spirit of God, He says, " He dwelleth with you and shall be in you." 2 It would seem as if the first clause of this statement were not sufficiently exact to satisfy the purpose of Christ and He, therefore, adds the final clause asserting, with- out possible ambiguity, the presence of the Spirit abiding within the psychical limits of the personalities to whom He spoke. Apostolic ut- terance unites with the prophet and the Christ in the assertion of this Presence. The statement is thrown into the interrogatory form that its emphasis may be made the strongest possible : 1 Isa. lvii. 15. 2 John xiv. 17. THE ULTIMATE POWER 277 " Know ye not that ye are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" 1 Again the double clause is employed to bring out the fact of the positive presence of the Holy Spirit in the psychical depths. Thus Scripture insight discloses the Spirit of God as the abiding, underlying Presence in Christian experience. Second : Tlie Spirit of God is either the initiator, or sustainer, of all impulse towards better life. Scripture insight reveals not only (a) The Holy * & . . J spirit beneath the presence oi the bpirit in the Good Impulse. i • -• i ,-t i x i tt* • psychical depths, but also His posi- tive action on the psychical states as well. It must not seem to be the contention of the author that no better impulse ever arises in man apart from the action of the Holy Spirit. Even if that could be proven to be the fact, such con- tention is not necessary to our purpose. All that the fact before us covers is that to every better impulse arising in the soul of man the Spirit of God is related either as initiator or sustainer. The earliest utterance of Scripture expressive of this subtle and momentous fact is the passage holding such wealth of suggestion : " My Spirit shall not strive with man forever." 2 The statement has a background prolific with strenuous, Spirit-generated impulse. It presents a scene of subconscious Spirit-action, under a 1 1 Cor. iii. 16. * Gen. vi. 3. 278 A STUDY IN ORIGINS ceaseless effort of inducement to holy life. The same process is portrayed in the concise state- ment : " The Spirit also helpeth our infirmi- ties." l In the making of way for spiritual longing, in the formulation of prayerful desire, in the taking on of psychical attitude for the reception of divine response, human weakness and defect are seen to be supplemented by in- tense and superhuman cooperation of the Spirit of God. He pours into the soul a restless uplift of yearning appeal. The most remarkable vision of this inspirational action of the Spirit of God opens when He is declared to be working in the psychical area " Both to will and to do of His good pleasure." 2 That subtle unconscious proc- ess by which volitional stubbornness is softened and moulded, by which volitional weakness is empowered, by which volitional determination is crowded to its consummation in action, all this is here graphically connected with its causal Source, the operation of the Spirit of God in the impenetrable depths of the soul. In such unequivocal utterances Scripture insight reveals the origin of the holier impulses ever character- istic of the life of the Christian. Third : The Spirit of God is the active power in all genuine work of spiritual regeneration. The action of the Holy Spirit, in the subconscious 1 Rom. viii. 26. * Phil. ii. 13. THE ULTIMATE POWER 279 depths, goes farther than to affect the simple states of consciousness. Scripture insight sees this action to be also reconstruct- ed The Hoiy spirit j ye j n its e ff ec t upon the spiritual Alone Regenerates. A L being itself. It is thus made clear that beneath the process of regeneration in Christian experience is the readjusting power of the Spirit of God. Scripture insight, in the cry of a needy soul, brings this work of regeneration to divine power as alone adequate to its accom- plishment : " Create in me a clean heart, O God." 1 The power that takes a heart, polluted and perverted in its sin, and makes it clean and right is the power of God. The resultant is a "new creature." 2 The explicit reservation of this recreating work to the power of God is made in the words defining the process operat- ing in those who have accepted the way of sal- vation through Christ : " Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." 3 The distinct source of the regenerating power is thus traced to its ultimate identification in the volitional action of the Spirit of God. Possibly nowhere does Scripture insight set forth the fact under con- sideration more definitely than in that remark- able characterization of the Gospel of Christ : " It is the power of God unto salvation." 4 The 1 Psa. li. 10. 8 2 Cor. v. 17. 8 John i. 13. 4 Eom. i. 16. 280 A STUDY IN ORIGINS origin of the energy operative in gospel proc- esses, effecting the changed life, is here also lo- cated in God. Christ puts this with unmistak- able clearness in His interview with Nicodemus, where He repeatedly uses the language descrip- tive of this process : " Born of the Spirit." l The reconstruction of the moral being, justly characterized as a regeneration, is here dis- tinctly affirmed to be the specific work of the Spirit of God. While operating in the subcon- scious area, He is perceived by Scripture insight to be actually doing this reconstructive work. Four : The Spirit of God is the source of every specific increase of life and power experienced in Christian consciousness. Scripture (4) The Holy Spirit . x confers Life and insight makes clear that promi- nent among the functions of the divine Presence in the human soul is the per- petual infusion of life : " To revive the spirit of the humble and to revive the heart of the con- trite ones." 2 Such revivification is, in essence, the addition to the psychical states of a measure of life from outside their inherent resources, from the superhuman life-giving energies of the divine indwelling Presence. More explicit vision of the source of spiritual life in the soul of the Christian could not be stated than this : "This life is in His Son. He that hath the 1 John iii. 8. 2 Isa. lvii. 15. THE ULTIMATE POWER 281 Son hath life ; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." l The divine Presence, abid- ing in the subconscious, communicates life to the believing heart and is the source of the con- tinued maintenance of that life in the soul. The origin of the inpouring of power, necessary to the sustaining of the soul on the high levels of Christian life, is vividly portrayed in the ap- peal : " Uphold me with Thy free Spirit." 2 This action of standing under by the Spirit of God is nowhere more positively sketched than by the use of that spectacular term, " uphold." The supports of Christian service are, so to speak, the currents of power streaming up from the unfathomed depths like up-bearing pillars based upon the indwelling and underlying divine Presence. This whole scene is unveiled in the words of that intercessory prayer : " That ye may be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man." 3 This subtle transmission of power from the Spirit of God, through points of contact with deep-lying psychical areas, is here luminously displayed. Scripture insight thus reiterates its perception of the underlying Source of life and energy so strangely projected into consciousness in Christian experience. Five : The Spirit of God is the invigorating transformer in all the ascending acquirements in 1 1 John v. 11-12. 8 Psa. li. 12. 8 Eph. iii. 16. 282 A STUDY IN ORIGINS Christian growth. In the perception of Scripture insight never does this divine Originator of specific psychical conditions drop (5) The Holy Spirit « i . Transforms in out of the processes of Christian Christian Growth. . ^ -, .-, , experience. On and up through all the ascents of the Christian life is this transforming Presence traced and His momen- tous part in the intricate processes delineated. This final fact, now before us, covers the eternal ascent of spiritual life in its endless approxima- tions to the infinite excellences of the very life of God. The generation of divine love through- out the conscious area is definitely portrayed in the declaration : " The love of God is shed abroad in your hearts by the Holy Ghost." * The transfusion of that afFectional temper, partaking of the very qualities of the love of God, among the spiritual faculties, is by the specific action of the Spirit of God. He originates the afFectional attitude. Operating at the beginnings, in the submerged depths of the psychical life, He per- meates and animates the whole being with the holy impulses of divine love. This moulding power, active in the ascending transformations of the Christian life, is strikingly exhibited in the language : " Transformed into the same image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit." 2 The " same image " in this statement is the ^om. v. 5. *2Cor. iii. 18. THE ULTIMATE POWER 283 likeness to the " glory of the Lord," as will be seen by examination of the whole passage. The transformations, rising from" glory to glory " of the divine likeness, are then wrought in the psychical structure by the direct action of the Spirit of God. The causal action of the divine Spirit, in these successive spiritual transforma- tions, could not be more definitely stated by Scripture insight. The detailed enumeration of Christian attainments, attributed to the origi- nating operation of the Spirit by the meaning of the term under which they are classified, " The fruit of the Spirit," is a conclusive affirmation of the fact we are considering : " The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentle- ness, kindness, goodness, faith, meekness, tem- perance." 1 Scripture insight sees the source of these exalted spiritual attainments to be the im- planting and ripening action of the Spirit of God. Such is the vital deliverance of Scripture in- sight in its own language. It might be ampli- fied a thousand times more co- Deliverance of . . scripture insight piously. This, however, is here Accepted and Final. . .. ■u . i unnecessary since it will not be seriously questioned that the passages cited ade- quately represent the testimony of Scripture in- sight. To such as receive this insight as reliable 1 Gal. v. 22, 23, 284 A STUDY IN ORIGINS the problem of origins in Christian experience is settled. The ultimate power, operative in the subconscious area, producing the otherwise un- explained effects in consciousness, is the in- dwelling Spirit of God. If Scripture insight is in error in this supreme exercise of its powers of perception then it is open to the charge either of reprehensible ignorance assuming to speak in a matter of which it has no knowledge, or of de- liberate deception, before either one of which its entire range of deliverances must fall into the merited contempt of all candid minds. Neither of these alternatives is thinkable in view of de- monstrable facts, a sufficient number of which we have already considered. We, therefore, con- fidently close this study with the conclusion that the final word has been spoken by Scripture in- sight, and that the ultimate power, operative in Christian experience, is the Holy Spirit. VI THE WONDER AND GLORY UNDIMINISHED It now only remains to give brief emphasis to the supernatural factors of Christian experience, still unimpaired after any and all Supernatural . Factors Unim- reputable scientific scrutiny of that paire ' experience as a psychological proc- ess. As at the beginning of our inquiry con- cerning this inner life, so now at its close we are assured that any dread of such inquiry is with- out foundation and unworthy of a sturdy confi- dence in the substantial nature of the experience we are considering. This fact may be given even stronger expression by the statement, whose demonstration is outlined in the foregoing chap- ters, that all unprejudiced application of scien- tific method to the psychical processes of Chris- tian experience does but make clearer the invariable order and unfathomable mystery of that experience, leaving its origins in the im- penetrable regions of spiritual life where operate the supernatural and divine. One of the fore- most thinkers in the field of religious psychology makes remarkable declaration of this fact : " It would seem as though transmundane energies, 285 286 A STUDY IN ORIGINS God, if you will, produced immediate effects within the natural world to which the rest of our experience belongs." 1 The wonder of ordinary Christian experience remains unmodified. Elaborate explanations, with overbearing assumption and ™ n a n b d a " e< f bides bewildering terminology, have no substantial effect to weaken it. No exhaustive course of investigation avails to eliminate it. The wonderful phenomena of the conscious area retain, under the severest scien- tific examination, all of their inherent mysteri- ous qualities. To define and classify them has had no result to dissipate these unexplainable features of their nature. The dispersion of the haze of indistinctness has but made this wonder the more pronounced. The certainty of the superhuman origin of these phenomena is un- shaken. Indeed, the identification of God as that origin is made the more rational and pos- itive. The wonder deepens with all such cor- roboration of direct divine action. To feel the immediate and unquestioned touch of the per- sonal conscious Spirit of God on consciousness is to stir in the experiencing soul an indescribable sense of awe. That the divine Presence does condescend to actually take immediate part in the psychical processes, and that consciousness does 1 James, " Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 524. WONDER AND GLORY UNDIMINISHED 287 veritably feel the manipulation of the divine Hand in the changes of the conscious states, in the infusion of conscious power, all this, abiding as a demonstrated surety under the most pene- trating investigation of psychological research, thrills the soul with an unutterable feeling of wonder, of which it does not seem to lie within the power of the most adverse criticism to de- prive the devout heart. In accord with this fact is the statement : " If the grace of God miracu- lously operates, it probably operates through the subliminal door, then. But just how anything operates in this region is still unexplained, and we shall do well now to say good-bye to the process of transformation altogether, leaving it, if you like, a good deal of a psychological, or theological, mystery." * It would appear that the maturest conclusion of critical psycholog- ical inquiry is a willing confirmation of this wonder, even a stimulation of it, by reason of the evident nature of the phenomena of con- sciousness inducing it. A survival still more remarkable ensues upon the conclusions we have reached. All the glory that inheres in the primitive con- The Glory Shines . * . undimmed : (i) in ception oi Christian experience by God's Presence. « ,1 , -i • ,• n ,t reason oi the actualization oi the divine Presence and fellowship remains without Barnes, "Varieties of Religious Experience," p. 270. 288 A STUDY IN ORIGINS one ray gone or one splendour tarnished. To have the psychical field as the veritable dwell- ing-place of the Spirit of God gives to Christian experience a glory of indescribable intensity. To hold as its indwelling guest the infinite Per- sonality confers upon the finite spirit enjoying it a resplendent dignity and glory but feebly conceivable. All the exaltations of such Pres- ence are preserved to the previously sullied soul of man. The divine Presence is offered to the shrivelled psychical field of the sinful heart. The Lord of Heaven, the Sovereign of the Universe, with all His effulgent personality comes into the area of the psychical being as an abiding Presence to uplift, enlarge, glorify by the simple fact of His inbeing. Back of the veil that shrouds the subconscious, in those reaches of the psychical structure where the illumina- tions of consciousness never penetrate, here enters and abides the infinite person of the eternal God, forever putting upon the life of the Christian the stamp of resplendent dignity and glory. The highest deliverance of the most astute psychological science of our day, as it stands at the gateways of the subconscious, with bared head and bated breath, is to say, " Lo, He is here." Out from the depths of the Christian soul, in which the gracious work of Christ is being wrought, the glory of the WONDER AND GLORY UNDIMINISHED 289 indwelling divine Presence still shines un- dimmed. When the presence of the Spirit of God in the subconscious self of the Christian is conceded, only the beginning of the real (a) in God-s glory of such indwelling has been Fellowship. O J O stated. The resultant interchanges of companionship and loving fellowship bring with them to the favoured life an added glory far transcending that of the abiding Presence only. The sublime tribute to the worth of the individual man, rendered by the condescension of the Spirit of God in entering into such famil- iar relationships with Him, surrounds the en- tire situation with a flood of glory. The amaz- ing uplift, by which even the sin-polluted soul is exalted to such relationships with the divine Presence, in the glory it confers surpasses the most prodigal myths that ever opened their fic- titious splendours upon human thought. In that inspiring scene that Christ Himself, in the Apocalyptic vision, pictures when He says, " I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me," 1 what confi- dences, what revelations, what reliances, what adorations, what responsive abandonments of holy affection, what heavenly joys of in- describable comradeship spring into view 1 Rev. iii. 20. 290 A STUDY IN ORIGINS between the soul and its divine indwelling Guest ! This glory of divine association rises to a still higher level when the Spirit of God takes the faulty spirit of man into partner- workinl° d s C °" stli P witn Himself in the great work of making a perfected race. This astounding transaction occurs when the Holy Spirit inspires with love, impels to serv- ice, pleads with the lips, shines in the life, suf- fers in the sacrifice, wins through the surren- dered and anointed heart. Apostolic perception caught a glimpse of this glory when that sug- gestive calculation was made : " If so be that we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us." 1 This working affiliation with God, in which He stands behind the curtains of the subconscious, acting upon the hidden sources of psychical life, inspiring, guiding, intoning, manipulating, mak- ing of human powers peerless agencies aflame with His presence and athrob with His ener- gies, — such partnership with God is the un- speakable glorification of man. With what in- describable exaltation it endues the life of the Christian ! 1 Rom. viii. 17, 18. WONDER AND GLORY UNDIMINISHED 291 The climax of this glory is the psychical im- press, or metamorphosis, arising from this divine Presence, fellowship and coopera- u) in God-s con. tion g ucn pS ychical contact and ferred Likeness. r J spiritual mingling subjects the finite and plastic personality in this relationship to an inevitable process of moulding and trans- fusing. Nothing in all this association with the Spirit of God is of such tremendous import as the resultant structural impartation of the like- ness of God. To be filled, in all the subcon- scious area, with the divine Presence, to be steadily held in the gracious harmonies of His fellowship, to be surcharged with His power and guided from the innermost counsels of His love and wisdom, is to take on, soon or late, finite similarities to infinite excellences and glories. Human thought can apprehend no higher glory for the spirit of man than to be fashioned more and more into the possible simil- itudes to the divine attributes. It is the glory of endless approximations to an infinite Type, the very perfection of structure and action. Such transformations can alone arise from the infinite skill and power of the divine Personal- ity, ever issuing His products from His won- drous laboratory in the subconscious, projecting them into the conscious and tangible through the profound processes of the Christian life. The 292 A STUDY IN ORIGINS essential and climactic glory in Christian expe- rience thus centres about and radiates from the distinct presence and operation of the Holy Spirit in the impenetrable depths of the psy- chical life, conferring an ever-increasing Christ- likeness. All this follows from the unequivocal conclu- sion of Christian psychology that the ultimate power in Christian experience is D^ U ne a Odgfn° m the H()1 y S P irlt ' In a11 HJS 0m " nipotent majesty the Spirit of God sits enthroned in the subconscious background of the life of the Christian. All of the phenom- ena of the spiritual life, arising so strangely from underlying depths into Christian con- sciousness, originate with Him. All inquiry into the details of experimental facts but makes clearer the vision of Him and His activities. Every other alleged origin falls utterly down through inadequacy and unsupported assump- tion. The Spirit of God being thus left in abso- lute possession of the entire field of origins in the vital phenomena of the Christian life, all of the wonder and glory of such intimate and causal relationship remain like an upspringing halo glowing over all these profound experimental processes. All of their hallowed sacredness, all of their holy superiority over ordinary phenom- ena, all of their unique and eternal meaning WONDER AND GLORY UNDIMINISHED 293 emerges from the ordeal of the most rigorous inquiry of psychological science the same as when it went into that ordeal save it be with the acquirement of an added advantage, the out- standing of clearer outline of rational confirma- tion. So far as reliable psychological investiga- tion of Christian experience has gone to-day it hands back to the simple trusting Christian every vital fact of this experimental life unim- paired in all its former wonder and glory. We thus bring to a close this part of our in- quiry with every essential factor of the inner life of the Christian, as experienced Vital Factors of i i • i i i i • l j? inner Life in Tact, and cherished by devout souJs of the present and past, in full view and presenting, in the blaze of recent research, even more positive and intelligible verity than in the dim and credulous mysticism of former times when such a thing as exact psychological study of the facts of Christian experience had not occurred as a possibility to human thought. We await farther light, arising from more ex- tended research, with the confident assurance that this situation will not be materially changed. The inner life of the Christian is to be the growing fact of all coming time. BOOK II The Outer Life The States of Christian Character / « \^ r CtSftavaX 'IflXngtaw oS -MCttftV Rt\'\&ftftaCT&oi, fifgWftJfagjA&W Att&WVo&M.WC forgngcSWto* WwitiWoSCw^ tMX'UnuvmKei. I" avnav> SOS A^Sa- Con&uc^T ~T — CWnK^tWs YU*Aft»YY&A' |Co<\&\ieftVeftWS 3 'WUWis j(So«!(«\<)j&,\S jUsV^^ WnWolfc^A M\«M<4<™fcJCon9is.KM«u &ciA'Rt)fcr«z& |llW«ryi»^fflAKuXaY*s is \ "vtvk Su»c.ons.o\ouo Ps.ut.WA &Wi^ THE EISE INTO THE EXTEENAL The psychical states that constitute the total- ity of Christian experience comprise a group of spiritual conditions and energies inner Life cnar cr ec l with tremendous potenti- Irreprcssible. ° * ality. In full normal proportions they form an irrepressible aggregation of motive power. They seize upon every avenue of com- munication with the external world. They come into possession of every voluntary nerve and muscle of the human frame. " The natural terminus of all experiences, bodily and mental, is action. For the very sake, therefore, of thought and feeling, one must act." 1 In just the proportion that these psychical states are given the ascendancy in the conscious soul they be- come dominant in the control of every exit of volitional energy into action. With these states in undivided and perfectly adjusted supremacy inconsistent or incongruous volition is an abso- lute impossibility. Only when the psychic states of Christian experience lose their perfect tone, fall below normal, can a volition, or its 1 King, " Reconstruction in Theology," p. 44. 297 298 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER subsequent action, drop out of exact alignment with what it is ascertained should be its sane and uniform external manifestation. What it is that constitutes the perfect external counterpart of the psychical life of the Christian is, in considerable degree, a matter Must Have Exact ' g . External counter- of education. The ideals, the standards of action, are in large part of conventional formation. The purity of intent, the sincerity of purpose, the rightness of impulse, the loyalty of volition, the dominant energy of execution, all are possibly coincident with a most deplorable ignorance of what con- stitutes genuine rectitude and beneficence in outer action. Standards of conduct, concepts of righteousness, ideals of practical goodness, are contributions to the life of the Christian made by the Word of God and the consensus of conviction arising from experimental appli- cation of the precepts enjoined. Christ " in- sisted upon right actions and refused the easy substitutes of sentiment and profession. A man's religion must be doing, not hearing only, if it is to be founded on a rock." x " Not every one that saith unto Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven ; but he that doeth the will of My Father which is in heaven." 2 1 Carpenter, " Permanent Elements of Keligion," p. 193. 2 Matt. vii. 21. THE RISE INTO THE EXTERNAL 299 There must be ascertainable a scientific counter- part in external conduct, conforming with all the exactitude of nature to the such counterpart i mpu i ses an d needs of the trans- to be Formulated. r formed and divinely energized inner life of the Christian. The psychical states, composing genuine Christian experience, mature definite kinds of external action as inexorably as a fruit tree produces its fruit. The states of the normal inner life of the Christian are fruit- bearing states. Jesus clearly enunciates this principle in each of its two aspects. He said of the life of false prophets, " Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?" 1 He said of the life of His disciples, " He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit." 2 " Herein is My Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit ; so shall ye be My dis- ciples." 3 He elsewhere defines how that glori- fying is effected : " Let your light so shine be- fore men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven." 4 Under the guidance of a devout and critical intelligence the development of appropriate and invariable fruitage is universal and inevi- table. 1 Matt. vii. 16. s John xv. 5. 3 John xv. 8. 4 Matt. v. 16. 300 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER As the wisdom of the informed and expe- rienced horticulturist is needed by the inex- perienced fruit-grower in order to Formulation by x ° scripture and guard and guide the forces of the tree to bring out its most perfect genuine fruitage, so the wisdom of Scripture knowledge, interpreted by long processes of practical application in experience, is needed to guide the psychical energies to the produc- tion of that external fruitage which is the con- summate perfection of Christian conduct and character. When we undertake to follow the rise of the psychical states and energies of the inner Christian life into the tangible states of the outer life of the Christian we find ourselves almost wholly dependent upon the wisdom of the Word of God in its delineation of this genuine fruitage, and upon the experience of centuries for the illumination and interpretation of that delineation. By this means the external counterpart of the psychical states of Christian experience may, as an ever-perfecting achieve- ment, be accurately ascertained and reliably portrayed. Character, in all that we ordinarily mean by that comprehensive term, is composed of two hemispheres. One of these is bedded deep in the subconscious region of the inner life ; the other rises far into the tangible region of the outer THE RISE INTO THE EXTERNAL 301 life and through conduct is bedded deep in the conscious perceptions of an observing world. Character, in essence, is neither Two Hemispheres .1 i , l'i.' •• in character thought nor volition nor emotion nor conduct. Character, in its inner hemisphere, is subconscious process and momentum induced and confirmed by con- scious volitional action repeated over and over again until it is wrought into the very subcon- scious temper or current of the being. It is the subconscious resultant of habitual action. Char- acter in this hemisphere gives the assurance of certain uniform psychical reactions when given motive-incitements are present. The character known, the reactions may, with a great degree of probability, be anticipated. Character, in its outer hemisphere, is the assurance, in the minds of observers, of certain uniform actions when given inducements or provocations are present. The character known, the resultant action may, with a good degree of positiveness, be anticipated. Any other action than such as is consistent with the known character issues in shock to the world of acquaintance. Under normal conditions in the life of the Christian both of these hemispheres are per- fectly consonant throughout, and together form the perfect sphere of full-orbed Christian character. The processes that produce these 302 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER complementary hemispheres of Christian char- acter are simultaneous, many of them indeed being identical. They are the c^stTancVa°racter. processes of action in Christian service. That action which is only psychical, such as resisting improper impulse or entertaining a pure thought, enters only into the formation of the inner hemisphere of Christian character, being only a psychical act. That action that openly refuses participation in an unjust deed, or springs into eager performance of the self- sacrificing deed, enters into the formation of both the inner and outer hemispheres of character, being both a psychical and physical act. In the inquiry we are now entering upon we are to be specifically occupied with the for- mation of outer character inasmuch as that is more vitally involved in the rise of the psy- chical life of the Christian into the external ; the use of the term, character, hereafter in this treatise, will, therefore, be restricted in its meaning to character in its outer aspect. The psychology of the Christian life does not end with the consideration of the purely psy- chical conditions of the inner experience but finds itself under imperative necessity of deal- ing with the processes that have to do with the rise of the psychical forces into the formation of THE RISE INTO THE EXTERNAL 303 conduct and character. The activities of Chris- tian experience are not the mere sportive ex- ercise of psychic processes. They Christian Psy- • j • i /> choiogy and the are not carried on simply tor the mental exhilaration or ecstasy that may be derived from them. If they be genuine, their solemnity, their anguish, their sacrifice, their strenuosity make such a con- struction of their nature an impossibility. As they rise above empty formality they become the most substantial, intense and exhausting psychical activities of which the soul of man is capable. In this aspect we see them to be the most powerful causal states. To make our study of them complete we must follow them in the exercise of their causal function, we must explore the channels of their power as it mounts and penetrates to the farthest reaches of con- duct. " We can conceive no salvation that does not include character. We believe that the ethical is always involved in every genuine re- ligious experience." Christian psychology is thus compelled, if it would cover the entire field involved, to enter the outer region of con- duct and character in the prosecution of its work. The religions of mythology easily evaded all contact with the realm of morals or conduct. There were no psychical states in them touching upon the springs of moral ac- 304 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER tion. A like attempt in the Christian life de- grades Christian experience to a mere jugglery in emotions, a tragic performance in spiritual hypocrisy. The life of the Christian must be relieved of every last semblance to such a farci- cal travesty if it is to have its merited place in the modern world and fulfill its saving mission to a sin-blighted race. There are in the world of the Christian life phenomena like unto the transformations of enemy in the world of physical That Psychology . rni p pi Must Formulate science. The forces of the forgiv- that Outer Life. • . • . . xx , mg, regenerating, sustaining Holy Spirit, the forces of purity, love and volition in the psychical being are transformed into the forces of physical action, the forces present, in speech and look, in hand-clasp and errand of mercy, in deed of heroism or submission to martyrdom. The states of the psychical life are translated and transmuted into the states of the external life. " Unless the aspiration of the soul towards God is translated into its different forms and effects, it tends to die away into a mechanical and barren turn of mind." 1 The outer life of the Christian is transfigured by the transcendant forces and glories of the inner life. The Christian's outer life thus becomes a new channel for the material manifestation of the 1 GraDger, " The Soul of the Christian," p. 253. THE RISE INTO THE EXTERNAL 305 glorious power of God. Christian psychology, or some like procedure under whatever name characterized, must trace, define and direct this important process. It must depict, locate and correlate the essential elements of resultant Christian character as it is evolved in the outer life. The consummation of such work lies in the future when the formulation of every essen- tial factor in Christian character will be uni- formly conceded in the thought of the Christian world. The Christian world presents at this time a motley spectacle in the matter of character. No consensus of recognition appears ; Disparities in So- called christian no uniformity of standard exists. Character, professedly Christian, varies through the widest latitude. Indeed, with many Christian character so called has such uncertain significance as to have upon its face no valuation whatever. Only as it is proven, as all other character is by testing, is it permitted to have any standing, and then not as Christian character but as the character of common manhood. This is a humiliating concession, but the candid student of facts is compelled to make it. This disparity between the characters of professed Christians reaches over a wide range extending from the character inconsistent, unreliable, careless of moral dis- 306 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER tinctions, unscrupulous, to the character pure, faithful, zealous for good, the highest type known to man. Yet back of all this hetero- geneous mass of incongruous character is the same alleged Christian life. To the cursory ob- server this is a hopeless tangle ; there seems no possible way out. This bewildering confusion of checkered character presented to the world as presumptively Christian is occasioned by two fatal mistakes. These mistakes are so pertinent to our work in hand that they must here be dwelt upon at some length. The first of these lamentable mistakes con- sists in this : Character that has not now, and never has had, the psychical states Arise from Two Mis- . . . . . takes : (i) No Re- or energies of a genuine Christian quired Experience. • i ji •* i' i experience underneath it has been foisted upon the world as Christian. Christian experience as a distinct and definite causal proc- ess, susceptible of scientific formulation into a group of correlated psychical states which must underlie all genuine Christian character, has counted for little or nothing in the world's thought. Any one professing to be a Christian has, without discrimination, been reckoned as such and his character accepted as a sample Christian character. Character, having beneath it nothing more than the forces of mere moral reformation, the lone and fluctuating volitional THE RISE INTO THE EXTERNAL 307 energies of good impulse, has been loosely clas- sified with Christian character and the latter has been obliged to bear all the defects and failures incident to the weak and incompetent processes of the former. No blunder more un- just to true classification was ever made. Such course is to demand the excellences of Hamlet with Hamlet left out and to detract from the superiorities of the inimitable Hamlet by all the inferiorities of the pseudo-Hamlet. It is to load upon the matchless perfections of the exquisite and unique living rose all the defects in colour and form and vitality of the artificial wax prod- uct, to classify them together as members of the same floral family, when beneath the one are the incomparable processes of genuine life and beneath the other are only the lifeless processes of mechanical art. It is to throw the artificial and the vital together and call them all one. The day is coming when this injustice will be per- mitted no longer. Christian experience, consist- ing of definite, consecutive, divinely energized states, scientifically formulated and universally recognized by intelligent thinking, will be the sole basis of a character permitted to pass under the reputable name of Christian. When that day arrives Christian character, now so be- smirched by its motley and nondescript asso- ciations, will have come to its own superb estate, 308 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER no more to struggle against the opprobrium of fatal defects and inconsistencies never its own but forever to shine in its own undimmed splendours. The second of these mistakes is this : No com- mon ground has been sought in Christian think- ing by which the universal quali- ty no Accredited ties f an accre di te d Christian Standard. character might be established as a guide to endeavour and a standard of judgment. Christian character, to a large degree, has been a nebulous entity. There has been far too little uniformity and fixity in its elements. The thought of it as an invariable outgrowth of transcendant inner states has had meagre ex- pression. The concept of it as a distinctly for- mulated product of psychical energies, exactly de- fined state by state, towards which the entire psychical forces should be urged and directed, and by which all character aspiring to classi- fication with it might be measured, has scarcely found any place in the thought of the Christian world. The whole idea of Christian character has been conceived so loosely that almost any character maintaining a fair degree of respect- ability could train under its banners and be counted in its ranks. Need we wonder that a motley array should gather under such group- ing? How grievous the mistake that has per- THE RISE INTO THE EXTERNAL 309 mitted such laxity of concept so long to domi- nate the thought of the Christian world ! It would seem that the time has come for con- certed action towards a pronounced formulation of the definite qualities that are to be recog- nized as constituting accredited Christian char- acter. The psychology of the Christian life must lead in the work of establishing such a standard. It is not sufficient that that psy- Mrho d d yinExacter chology shall formulate, in an analytic way, the whole psychical process involved in the inner life of the Chris- tian, constituting the ever-ascending states of Christian experience ; it must also proceed to formulate, in a similar analytic way, the re- sultant processes rising into the outer life of the Christian, culminating in the ever-ripening states of Christian character. This is a delicate and intricate undertaking and cannot be speedily accomplished to the unanimous satisfaction of the Christian world. The ascent of the psy- chical states of Christian experience into the perceptible sphere of the outer life must and will be scientifically exploited. The appearing fruitage in action must be as minutely known as any growth now within the grasp of exact knowledge. The best methods by which to at- tain the most superior product must be ascer- 310 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER tained. All this region of the Christian life awaits investigation and development by the exactness of psychological method in Christian thought. II THE FOEMATION OF CHARACTER STATES When, in the mind of the observing world, by actions repeated indefinitely, impressions of confirmed uniformity of conduct a P c r rFor^ a on. have been deeply made, then a state of character has been formed. When the whole cycle of the life's action has become, in a like manner, thoroughly known by ample observation and information, then the entire character has been completed, having been gradually constructed state by state. This external process in character-building is only a surface view of the whole profound movement. We are now prepared to take a comprehensive survey of all of the stages that unite in the pro- duction of that consummate flower in the world's civilization, — genuine Christian character. In such a survey we get a bird's-eye Stages Culminat- . /» i i i -i ing in christian view of the whole process and are the better able to discern the re- lation between the component parts. These successive stages are five in number. In our study of the inner life we have seen 311 312 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER that, in the very lowest depths of the spiritual being fathomable by psychical and Scriptural perception, the Spirit of God is discovered in action as the fundamental impulse theHo^ri^ and P ower ini tiating and propelling the movement by divine energy. We have seen that energy of the Holy Spirit, well below the reach of mental insight but dis- closed by the insight of Scripture, begetting definite states in subconsciousness. All this underlying stage has been seen to be charged to the full with the omnipotent potencies of the divine Presence. As we have proceeded with our study we have witnessed the powerful subconscious stage break through into consciousness in the £S££ production of the distinct states of conscious experience. State after state, in wonderful succession, has taken shape in the conscious area until the ascending chain of states has been lost amid the inexpress- ible glories of approximation to Christlikeness. We have found that throbbing through all these conscious states of Christian experience the up- streaming of divine energy from the subcon- scious has been an ever-dominant factor. We are now finding how this movement pushes on into the outer life, its experimental transfor- mations and unctions impelling it to distinct FORMATION OF CHARACTER STATES 313 outer action, its dominant potencies empower- ing volition, under intelligent guidance, to issue in specific and appropriate kinds of conduct. The movement of the Christian 0) issuance in life cannot be confined to the Conduct. psychic sphere ; it rises by irre- pressible impulsion into the visible world. It dictates the deed ; it tones the tongue ; it wields the will ; it manipulates the muscle ; it steadies the step ; it lives the life. We are seeing this movement, as it clothes it- self in conduct, pass under the unsparing obser- vation of men. They see the ac- obsei'vati'on! 11 *° tion ; they note the deed ; not a phase of conduct escapes them. They record repetitions and detect breaks in uniformity if such occur. Every quality of con- duct makes its inevitable impression. Every degree of volitional pressure in intensity and persistence is unavoidably registered on the ob- serving mind. Inconsistency, fluctuation, hesi- tancy, wherever present, enter into the record ; consistency, steadiness, firmness form an impor- tant part of the fund of information gathered. The whole trend and nature of conduct is put under continuous and merciless inspection. From the facts apprehended in such observa- tion definite conclusions inevitably follow. We see, therefore, this movement reaching its cul- 314: STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER mination in the generalizations that appear in these conclusions. The constituent states of character are spontaneously formed by induc- tion in the mind of the world. g££££L The life is g iven its P lace amon s the forces for good or ill. The character is formed with a large degree of per- manence, though not unalterably. By this general survey of the stages of charac- ter formation we are enabled to clearly locate the view of conduct m P lace of conduct in the process. two Relations : (i) w e can the more readily study it To Its Causes. . . , . . with both of its two sides in view. There is the side of its causes. Conduct is the product of the psychical states ; it is the effect of the inner life. That inner life, in the case of the Christian, holds within itself such all-con- quering forces that conduct has no adequate ex- cuse for serious moral defect or sinful taint. It may have errors from ignorance and deficiencies in structural capacity, but it need have no de- fects from moral delinquencies. If such defects appear in conduct the reason must be found in corresponding defects in the states of the under- lying experience. Perfect saving experience is- sues in conduct perfect in moral quality so far as capacity and information will permit. Con- duct, therefore, as seen from the side of its causes, is the exact measure of the psychical states pro- FORMATION OF CHARACTER STATES 315 during it in so far as the true norm of consistent conduct is known. There is the other side of conduct, that of its results, and it is this point of view that most concerns us now. Here conduct, (a) to its Results, in its turn, takes on the function of cause. By exact laws of psy- chical action conduct proceeds to bring about definite results in the thought of others. These definite results group themselves together to form successive states of character. To use the ter- minology of the chemist, these states of charac- ter are the precipitates in the mind of the ob- serving world deposited by the combination of kindred and continuous phases of conduct. Ac- tions of similar quality are naturally thrown to- gether, in the mind observing them, into a defi- nite group by themselves. The general quality of character which they exhibit at once appears in the perceiving consciousness, as a precipitate forms from the commingling of given chemicals in the test-lube of the chemist. That precipitate is not composed of any single one of the ingre- dients in the mixture, but is the result of the combination of them all in a comprehensive state that includes them all. In such way, certain aspects of conduct deposit certain states of character. For instance, a mer- chant is observed never to misrepresent his 316 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER goods, always to be scrupulously exact in his weights and noted as correct, to a painstaking de- gree, in the return of every proper characte^statea penny in change, even to a child. The result of such conduct, re- peated through a continuous period, is that there is deposited, in the mind of his community, honesty as a distinct state in the recognized character of that individual. In like manner state after state of character is formed. Conduct, uniform and continuous, on affiliated lines of action, deposits in the minds of men successive and constituent qualities or states of character, one after another, until the whole character stands out in the mind of the observing world clear and complete. This is the universal proc- ess in character formation. By the view of the process just described, we are enabled to see how vital a part conduct fills in the life of the Christian. It is Definition of _ _ .. , christian conduct the only adequate and normal vent to the psychical energies operative in Christian experience. Without culmination and consummation in such conduct thoseliberated energies are diffused, dissipated and finally ex- tinguished. An astute observer of the general psychological law, under which this fact occurs, says, " Only through expression does any psy- chical state get its full significance. And on the FORMATION OF CHARACTER STATES 317 other hand, that which is not expressed dies." 1 The energies that are let loose in the psychical processes of Christian experience must have exit and application in specific forms of conduct. In just the measure that conduct varies from such exact and normal forms as are positively de- manded by these inner states and energies, the whole experience deteriorates and sinks into more or less rapid decay. Normal Christian ex- perience cannot survive the absence of normal Christian conduct. The development of Chris- tian experience, in its proper proportions and equipoise, is absolutely dependent upon the un- impeded issuance of that experience in exactly appropriate conduct. The delicate relations be- tween experience and conduct have, to this day, received all too little attention and emphasis. To adequately treat Christian experience, in its psychological aspects, we cannot stop short of definite portrayal of that conduct which is its proven reciprocal counterpart, and which is im- peratively required in order to its fullest acquire- ment and highest unfoldment. There is, there- fore, put upon us the imperative necessity of de- fining, in some degree of detail, the elements of conduct forming the exact external correlate of genuine Christian experience. Attendant upon such an analysis of conduct 1 King, " Reconstruction in Theology," p. 224. 318 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER as this definition involves, kindred conduct readily clusters itself together so as to enable us to arrive at the resultant states Conduct Defined, states of character of character. Indeed, with these clustered elements of kindred con- duct given, the states of character follow by the ordinary processes of inductive reasoning. Conduct thus spontaneously projects character. Mere verbal assertion cannot make character ; persistent profession will not issue in character ; conduct alone produces character. We have concluded that Christian experience has definite specific conduct which is its only legitimate is- sue in external action, and that just as definite as is that conduct is the character that is de- posited therefrom. If we define the conduct, we may simultaneously adduce the character ; the one follows from the other by a ready process of conclusion. As we are able to ascertain what are the elements of unvarying Christian conduct we proceed, by the inherent movement in the facts we handle, to the indubitable resultant states of Christian character. The psychology of Chris- tian experience, therefore, demands for its com- pletion the psychological treatment of Christian conduct and character thus covering the entire extent of the Christian life. Our method in such treatment will be to first ascertain what are the kindred elements of con- FORMATION OF CHARACTER STATES 319 duct normally issuing from the psychical states of Christian experience, and then to proceed to the states of character necessarily Method of deposited by such conduct, un- Treatment. * */ » til the whole range of that char- acter shall have been traced and defined in its successive states. For purposes of the great- est conciseness of method possible, the clustered elements of conduct and their resultant state of character will be considered together. In our attempt to ascertain the exact elements of Chris- tian conduct, the outer action that perfectly conforms to the inner life of the Christian, we shall recognize the following sources of informa- tion and judgment in the order named : the Word of God, the experience of Christians, and the indication of the evident fitness of things. With such aid it is purposed to construct an ap- proximate outer life in elements of conduct and states of character. It is not anticipated that such construction will escape material dissent in the opinions of many. The hope is to present, at least, a working basis for the perfection of which we must wait for the accumulating wisdom of coming years and thinkers. A fully developed Christian experience, intel- ligently guided in its issue in outer life, projects a perfectly balanced and well-rounded Chris- tian character. The most frequent defect of Vision of Balanced Character Needed. 320 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER Christian character, as we find it, is that it is off balance, some parts intensely in evidence, other parts exceedingly weak or entirely wanting. This dispro- portion does not always arise from defective experience. It often indicates unwise massing of the regenerated psychical energies upon one line of outer activity to the utter neglect of all others. It frequently occurs because of actual ignorance of what comprises the well- balanced proportions of perfect Christian con- duct. One great need of Christian service to- day is a true vision of the perfectly proportioned Christian character, every constituent element of conduct in its place and each such part given its proper share of prominence. Such a vision is needed as an exposure of too frequent deformity, a rebuke to distortion, an inspiration and guide to completeness of outer life, and a demonstration that Christian character may come to its true place in the life of the world. Selective and exclusive preferences have no proper place in the direction of the energies of the inner Christian life. Distinct specialized char- an( j specialized lines of activity acter an Error. * «/ are certainly permissible, even nec- essary. Division of labour is an imperative fact in the multitudinous life of modern times as well in Christian service as elsewhere. Special- FORMATION OF CHARACTER STATES 321 ized and predominant labour in Christian service is entirely apart from specialized Christian char- acter. Such specialization in service by no means entails consequent dwarfing or omission of any phase of the perfectly poised Christian character. Specialization in Christian labour means only greater range of activity given to some specific and peculiarly endowed powers, but no corresponding elimination by neglect of any function of the well-rounded Christian charac- ter. Every aspect of the outer life of the Chris- tian is needed at its best in the world, and to deliberately withdraw from the midst of men any such force of character, merely because preferences and impulses incline against it, is an error that needs only intelligent perception of the obligatory proportions of the true Chris- tian character to make it a positive sin. Christ gave the principle of the true balance of Chris- tian character in His memorable words : " These ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone." ! The purpose, therefore, of this study is to con- tribute to the putting of this vision of the per- fectly developed Christian charac- of states"" ter before the eyes of the Christian world as vividly as possible. The resort is had to diagram to aid in the attain- ^Iatt. xxiii. 23. 322 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER ment of this purpose through graphic appeal to the sense of sight. The states of the fully for- mulated Christian character will be seen to ar- range themselves into three distinct series. It is not to be understood that these series have any separate fixed chronological order. The energies of the inner life spring along all of these three lines of action simultaneously. In actual character these states are blended and in- termingled, mutually contributing to each other and each furnishing field for the exercise of the others. They are separated and studied apart for purposes of analysis. If one of them is wanting in the life its absence is at once evident in the narrowed range of effect the life produces upon the world in which it moves and the at- tendant dearth of that richness of the individ- ual's spiritual attainments which always follow the complete cycle of Christian conduct. These series of states, which are to be elaborately con- sidered in subsequent chapters, will here be given mere preliminary statement. There seems to be an order of precedence, in thought at least, that should be observed in their consideration. The series of states in Christian character, in the order in which we shall hereafter study them, are designated as the personal, the evangelistic, and the sociological states. FORMATION OF CHARACTER STATES 323 The personal states of Christian character are the states deposited by such conduct as seems to have no other uniform object than state" Personal to be the spontaneous, personal satisfaction of the impulses of the inner life, arising from the states and energies of Christian experience. They are the states of character that would be just as distinctly in action were the life completely by itself, apart from all other beings capable of corresponding response. They are the states, in other words, so personal in their nature that they would ex- ist independent of all relationships to mankind as such. They would be positively in action in a life marooned on some otherwise uninhabited island of the mid-sea or hopelessly fallen into some cliff-locked mountain valley, removed from all human contacts whatsoever, having only the brutes and fowls with which to mingle ; even the very beasts and birds would come to recognize, in their inarticulate way, some of the elementary aspects of conduct forming these states of character. They are, however, given added significance and effectiveness in the close relationships of human life, while not being de- pendent upon those relationships for a reason for being. They are the inevitable bloom and fruitage of the complete Christian soul any- where in the universe ; neither place nor con- 324 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER dition has power to modify them. Wherever a Christian soul exists, charged with the energies of a genuine experience, there these states in- variably develop under the right direction of such energies. They are thus essentially per- sonal in that they occur imperatively and incessantly because of the necessities of the inner life of the person possessing them without any regard whatever to environment. The evangelistic states of Christian character are the states deposited by such conduct as has the uniform object of securing the (a) The Evangel- salvation of others from sin. If istic States. there were none to persuade to the Christian life and none to induce to higher levels of experience and service, not one of these states could exist. In a Christian soul apart from all other human beings these states could never arise, having no field whatsoever for action. They are the states that find their supreme end in the direct saving spiritual good of other souls. They are distinguished by this one universal attitude of outreaching towards unsaved individuals. They are the soul-win- ning states. They are the product of the earliest and constant impulses of a vigorous Christian experience, those states and energies of the inner life that alone find their satisfaction in the un- saved soul brought into the highest possible ex- FORMATION OF CHARACTER STATES 325 perience of the saving presence and power of the Holy Spirit. By this distinct differentiation they stand out in a series by themselves and form a striking and potent part of the true Christian character. The sociological states of Christian character are the states deposited by such conduct as has the uniform object of securing and (3) The sociological maintaining those social conditions States. o in the world that shall most com- pletely conform to the spirit of Christ and pro- vide the amplest opportunity for the highest discharge of Christian service. If social en- vironment were complete, if there were no wrongs, cruelties, injustices wrought by organ- ized institutions, if there were no impediments in the way of righteousness arising from im- proper social customs, then none of these states would or could occur. But under conditions as they are in the world these states inevitably arise in genuine Christian character awake to its entire cycle of obligations. " When a citizen of the kingdom of God is at peace with any sin of society, becomes reconciled to any evil habits of the community or indifferent to anything incon- sistent with the full coming of God's kingdom on the earth, he is disloyal to the kingdom." 1 The ultimate consummation, contemplated in •Strong, "The New Era," p. 242. 326 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER these states, is a purified and transformed social order. They deal not with individuals directly, but with social institutions and customs. By this feature these states, as a series, are dis- tinguished from all others and form a very vital part of true Christian character. From this general view of the states of Chris- tian character we will now enter upon a specific examination of the three series series to be studied of thege states j t enumerated. in Detail. *> It is hoped that by some such method Christian psychology may arrive at a measurably satisfactory view in detail of what may be ultimately developed into an accredited formulation of the outer life of the Christian. Explanation of Diagrams of the Outer Life Diagrams VI to VIII The black line, extending the entire length of the dia- gram, marks the division between the area of the psy- Line Dividing the chical and the area of the external, the inner from Outer inner and the outer life, the former be- ing distinguished, by the red colour and the latter by the black. Below that dividing line lies the psychical area, comprising all that enters into the experience as set forth in the earlier diagrams of the in- ner life. In the region of subconsciousness, at the very origin of all, is the action of the Holy Spirit ; just above, arising from that action, are the subcon- Inner Life Be- . , . *. . , j i i_-r low Line. scious psychical states ; and above these, in the region of consciousness, are the conscious psychical states. These all constitute together the area of efficient causes underlying the outer life of the Christian. The projection of the action of these causes into the area of the external is shown by the red line extending from below across and above the divid- L^e ing black line and leading to their effects in tangible conduct. That conduct, an- alyzed, then appears grouped into separate clusters of kindred action, beneath each of which is shown the state of Christian character deposited by it in the mind of the observing world. 327 Ill THE PEKSONAL STATES (See Diagram VI) The entire life of the typical Christian is homogeneous. It is made up of exact corre- lates. The outer states of charac- All Christian States ^ are ag muc h a p ar t f that life Homogeneous. A as the inner states of experience ; these two groups of states, the outer and the in- ner, are perfect correlates to each other. Any break in that correlation is an imperfection in the life. That life is continuous whichever way you move : whether you begin with the states of character and move inward, or with the states of experience and move outward. The corre- spondence between states in these two areas is ever uniform and unbroken when the life is normal. The natural movement, however, is from within outward. The cause produces the effect here as elsewhere. The way to Movement from CQme upon ^q J effect | g t f J_ Cause to Effect. * low along the causal pathway un- til the effect appears. Our task in hand is to find the outer states of character. Our course 328 / c V 5 o 4 id (0 :>x\& V a**Xo4 \ \ — 5 T JCcXWwu T €/ " v&tw^etfatxC*/ WCogfm)) }K\\vV\X\o*v / CWr-acXW 5*= O o 4 0£^ V x X)\A>ofrv\£c/\ov\/4 veUcVwc^-aV y*yVCo\u U^wVv / J ma^v&wv ^X. ^\& ^rSoxsaV 6xaXe>4 c % va ►Con&ut'C' JT~ \ fta»&, Sou^W CtawSCeXiorvs X\06^.OJ.TV^ 'fcrfetfioT^ Oftwr5S\W«*»^ 1 1 ^1 \ \ TWoviKm^ I 'VauX^ I Yux^m&65 |Qfey?fle<\c& fi \ \ ( See Ti\a5Ucr\\taV ^f^letf THE PERSONAL STATES 329 is to follow up the movement of the psychical life as it brings its energies to bear in the pro- duction of conduct, the volitional acts of the outer life. Those volitional acts must bear an inexorable conformity to the states from which they spring, else there is a fatal break in the continuity. " We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." f What is this outer " walk " of " good works ' " ordained " of God as the conduct that shall correlate with the life " created in Christ Jesus"? We shall aim to formulate a state- ment of that conduct that in the delineation of Scripture 2 and in the consistency of things necessarily flows from the inner life and forms the personal states of Christian character. The act of prayer, if not the very first, is at least one of the very first of the products of Christian experience. The heart conduct : Prayer, breaks out in praise and com- munion upon its very entrance into the glad new life. Christ, as the supreme exemplar of that life, fixes the place of prayer in it : " He went out into a mountain to pray and continued all night in prayer to God." 3 Prayer, as an act of conduct, is not as open to observation as many another. The act is pe- 1 Eph. ii. 10. » 2 Tim. iii. 16, 17. 8 Luke vi. 12. 330 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER culiarly sacred and more often done in retire- ment. Yet when prayer becomes a positive part of the conduct it makes itself known in numerous ways to all who observe the life. 1 " In Christian prayer we find the unseen sources of Christian character. The power shown in holy living is power gained in the closet. ' ' 2 The spirit- ual child of God instinctively and necessarily maintains undisguised and constant communion with the divine Father. 3 Prayer becomes as spontaneous as prattle to a babe in mother's arms. A thoroughgoing Christian experience sends a soul unerringly and eagerly to the Bible. The Word of God becomes an un- Bibie study. dreamed-of delight to the heart. 4 New visions of meaning, new flavour of sweetness spring out of it. The more pronounced the experience the more persistent and penetrating the study of the Bible. The heavenly Father makes plain His will and love therein ; the Holy Spirit pours into the life floods of light through that channel. 5 Chris- tian experience can only be maintained in vital vigour by constant and consuming contact with Scripture. 6 The psychical impulses and crav- ings of the saved life normally give rise in con- 1 Matt. vi. 6. 2 Batten, " The New Citizenship," p. 95. 3 1 Thess. v. 17 ; Eom. xii. 12. 4 Jer. xv. 16 ; John vi. 63. 5 2 Peter i. 19. 6 James i. 21 ; Col. iii. 16. THE PERSONAL STATES 331 duct to an eager study of the Bible. Where this is wanting something is spurious. Where God's children gather for praise and communion in devotional things there the real child of God finds a congenial and worship. exhilarating atmosphere. 1 The liv- ing Christian resorts thither on every possible occasion. The life in the soul demands a presence in the place. The act of worship, whenever possible in companionship with the people of God, is a phase of conduct to which every normal tendency of the genuine inner life impells. 2 The observing world regu- larly finds the healthy experimental Christian in the place of worship. This attendance is not a matter of caprice ; it is not an item of con- venience. It is a matter of positive inviolable principle. 3 It arises irrepressibly from the im- perious psychic impulsions of the inner life of the real follower of Christ. 4 It enters inevi- tably into his conduct. Such conduct, by its continuous repetition without material variation, gives rise, in the minds Of all Who See it, tO a COn- State of Character: -i. i • i i«i ir» Devoutness. elusion which constitutes a defi- nite state of character. From such conduct, the impression that the life producing 1 Matt, xviii. 20. 3 Psa. lxxxiv. 2, 10. 8 Heb. x. 24, 25. 4 Luke iv. 16. 332 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER it is clearly devout is unavoidable. The ex- pectancy is at once established that wherever seen that life will always prove itself of devout spirit. That state of character, thus deposited in the thought of men, is properly termed de- voutness. It is a primary and fundamental state of Christian character. That character, to be complete, requires this state ; indeed, without it such character is fatally defective. To con- ceive of a genuinely Christian character without devoutness is unthinkable. It may, therefore, be set down that in the formulation of the exact character, arising from positive Christian ex- perience, this state of devoutness must be given place. A clean soul can alone exert itself in clean ac- tions. It is utterly beyond us to conceive of a heart in close fellowship with the Conduct : tt t m • • 1 •• • j ± ciean Actions. Holy Spirit as giving existence to unclean deeds. The thought, the impulse, the volition must all, to be true to their very essence, be set dead against all uncleanness of action. Can an orange bloom emit the foul stench of carrion ? No more can the cleansed spirit, regenerated by divine power and filled with the very atmosphere of heaven, emit the foul fumes of the debauchee or libertine. 1 There is seen, therefore, in the outer life of the Chris- l 2 Cor. vi. 17. THE PERSONAL STATES 333 tian, only actions that are clean to their remot- est intimation, free from the very appearance of evil. 1 So repulsive is uncleanness to the Chris- tian soul that it will go far out of its way to protect itself from seeming to have had unclean motive in action. 2 Words are as surely expressions of the inner life as are deeds. 3 It is, however, observable that persons who would spurn un- Pure words. cleanness in action are impure of word. Impure terms and images fall from their lips. The psychical conditions of Christian experience that insist on absolute cleanness of action equally insist on pureness of words. 4 It cannot be that pure thoughts, holy affections and divinely generated impulses will issue in foul language or salacious imagery how- ever chaste the language in which it is couched. Ages ago there was caught this vision of clean lips as alone consistent with a life in close touch with God : " Keep thy tongue from evil, and thy lips from speaking guile." 5 The foul story gives just ground for the charge of either a de- fective heart or a vitiated standard. The words of the experimental and instructed Christian are everywhere and always pure. No smut falls from his lips. His breath is full of heaven's ! Eph. v. 3. *1 Thess. v. 22. 8 1 Cor. viii. 9, 13. 4 Eph. iv. 29. 6 Paa. xxxiv. 13. 334 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER ozone. His exhalations are from the presence of the Spirit. 1 This conduct having come to be known as the confirmed course of the life, a fixed general im- pression takes possession of all State of Character : i 1 ,i -!•/» ti • it Purity. who know the lite. It is a deduc- tion from continuous, repeated ob- servation. It is the result of uniformity and consistency in conduct. The conclusion is reached that the life is pure without and within. There is deposited another state in the character of the Christian. That state of character is con- cisely expressed by the word, Purity. From the study of all the facts it would seem to be beyond question that purity is a state positively essential and vital to Christian character. An impure Christian character is a misnomer. The informed mind revolts from such a conception. The state of purity is imperatively demanded in the exact formulation of the standard character of the Christian. One of the transcendant impulses generated in the depths of Christian experience is an out- reaching benevolence. 2 It is the conduct: Need lo f th divine Father trans- Sought. muted into the love of His child. It is an attitude ever on the search for need. It gives keenness to the sight and quickness to the 1 Rev. xiv. 5. 2 1 John iii. 17. THE PERSONAL STATES 335 perception. The faltering step is instantly noted ; the line of pain is at once understood ; the hidden yearning is clearly sensed. 1 It is the act of vigilance ; the soul is seen to be on the perpetual hunt. It is constantly seeking for conditions of need, not waiting for such need to clamorously force itself upon attention. 2 The genuine Christian heart carries its nerves of sense to others' needs close to the surface where it instantly detects the slightest measure of such presence. This search is not an obtrusive curiosity. It is a quest for opportunity. 3 The impulses of a soul full of love are seeking vent. Need served. When the need is detected it is a glad discovery. Waiting energies spring into eager service. 4 Need is served to the limit of ability. The word of comfort is spoken ; unsolicited help is given ; soothing sympathy is shown. Even when no distinct need is present the upspringing impulses of loving service make opportunity to express themselves in action. They break out of the life by spontane- ous energy. 5 The soul of the Christian must exert itself in such service. The professed Christian, from whom such deeds are violently extracted by the irksome sense of duty, has lost 1 Phil. ii. 4. *1 Cor. x. 24. »Matt. xxv. 35, 36. 4 Luke x. 33, 34. B Gal. vi. 2. 336 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER his claim to the name. Such deeds are to the genuine Christian life what the song is to the bird, or the bloom to the plant, the imperative outcome of the psychical states and energies active in the soul. 1 Springing out of such impulses of loving serv- ice, there gathers about the life a diffusive atmosphere of cheer. That spirit cheer Diffused. of cheer seems to have seized upon every avenue of expression of the inner life. 2 It beams in smiles from the features. It thrills in tones from the voice. It rings in genial greetings from the lips. The ripple of happy-hearted laughter carries the witchery of cheer where the smile cannot reach. It is the soul-warming overflow of the abounding love of the real Christian heart. 3 It carries sunshine wherever it moves. The word of cordial greet- ing, the glow of beaming features, the playful touch of hand, the genial sally of 'pleasantry, even the careful thrust of innocent raillery unite to diffuse a glow of inspiriting cheer into a world all too full of depression and gloom. The pas- sage of such a soul leaves a lingering radiance brightening its path long after. 4 Such conduct can have but one product in the minds constituting the observing world. Re- 1 Gal. vi. 10. 2 Acts xvi. 25. 8 1 Cor. xiii. 7. 4 Rom. xii. 8. THE PERSONAL STATES 337 peated over and over, and continued through sufficient period of time to convince of its uni- formity, there is deposited another State of Character: gtate Q f c h arac ter. This new State Kindness. is that of kindness. The judg- ment is formed that the Christian spirit is never unkind when true to its inner self. Its whole outgoing is of the kindliest nature. Gruffness, harshness, cruelty are utterly foreign to genuine Christian character. Kindness is the invariable attitude of the true Christian life to all about it. Men count on this state and justly so. The ex- pectancy of such a spirit is fully warranted. Kindness is one of the personal states that must have place in the typical character of the Chris- tian. Regard for the feeling of another is one of the ripest and richest products of grace in the heart. 1 The soul with such a regard can- conduct: not willingly hurt another. Such Consideratenesa. o J regard inspires to solicitous effort for the discovery of sensitiveness. There rises from the depths of real Christian experience a cautious course of inspection. 2 No pain must be caused unless it is necessary ; no neglect, even in appearance, must be permitted to occur. There is studious search for the harmless way, out of consideration for possible feeling that may exist. 3 1 Matt. vii. 12. 3 1 Cor. viii. 9. 3 Phil. ii. 15. 338 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER Great care is taken to know just what are the conditions. Deepest concern is manifested about the possible infliction of injury by an incon- siderate act. 1 A purpose of the utmost consider- ateness for the feelings of others is evinced by this course of extreme caution. When once conditions are known conduct is, with minute delicacy, adjusted to them. There is no sacrifice of principle, no Tenderness. vestige of cowardice. Action is, however, marked by peculiar ten- derness of what is known to be another's feel- ing. 2 The words are carefully chosen so as not to wound ; the look is thoughtfully controlled so as not to give pain ; the deed is tenderly done so as to avoid harsh contact or jarring move- ment. 3 Everything about action, the whole demeanour, is full of the most considerate tender- ness. 4 This course of conduct produces in the thought of all about it the impression of gentle- ness. By the uniform continuous- state of Character : pi ±. 1 1 ■ i j Gentleness. n ^ss of such course an established state of character is formed. The whole life is rated as one full of considerateness and tenderness towards others. No other spirit is consistent with the Word of God. 5 No other 1 Eom. xv. 2. 2 Eph. iv. 32. 3 Col. iii. 12, 13. 4 Matt. xii. 20. 5 2 Tim. ii. 24. THE PERSONAL STATES 339 conduct could source in the loving, tender im- pulses generated in the genuine processes of Christian experience. We, therefore, place as another among the personal states of Christian character the state of gentleness. One of the most striking effects of Christian experience on conduct is the action it inspires in the presence of personal wrong. Conduct : Wrong n i i» ignored. ouch wrong, so tar as any varia- tion in the course of action is con- cerned, is completely ignored. 1 Not the slightest resentment appears in conduct ; neither anger nor any bitterness is perceptible in word or act. No shadow of a memory of any wrong having been done appears in conduct. Such complete elimination of resentment in feeling and action is the triumph of grace in the Christian soul. 2 The floods of sweetness from the psychical depths instantly neutralize every colour of resisting passion. Conduct passes the action over as if it never had been. 3 This conduct, in the face of wrong done, is not merely negative in that no retaliation is indulged in, but it is also positive Good Returned. i n that good is done in return for the evil. 4 So dominant are the loving energies of the inner life that they 1 Matt. v. 39, 45. ■ 1 Thess. v. 15. 8 1 Peter iii. 9. * Rom. xii. 20, 21. 340 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER inspire the doing of everything feasible in the interest of the author of the wrong done. 1 There is nothing patronizing or pharisaical in it. The act is spontaneous, the outgoing of a transcendant love that banishes ill-will and seeks to bless and benefit the life that would do it harm. 2 Never waiting for penitence to be manifested, it eagerly pours out its good in benevolent actions towards its enemy. 3 All who witness such a course of action, maintained in continuous uniformity, ulti- mately place to the credit of State of Character : 1-1 i • x i i i i Forgiveness. the character another remarkable state, that of forgiveness. It is a state indicated both by the absence of all ill-will harbouring grievance and by the pres- ence of an abundant benevolence hinged upon no equivalent reciprocity. It absolutely rejects all bitterness of spirit or action and maintains an utmost beneficence such as divine love can alone inspire. It is a state begotten of the Holy Spirit and vitally essential in the character of the Christian. It must, therefore, be given un- questioned place in this series of personal states we are undertaking to formulate. We now come upon another cluster of conduct kindred to, yet clearly distinct from, that seen in the state just considered. We are not here ^latt. v. 44. 2 1 Cor. iv. 12. 3 1 Cor. xiii. 4. THE PERSONAL STATES 341 brought to face personal injury, but the rather countless provocations, rasping irritations and vexing disappointments that tend Conduct: Irritation j • i j • i r Resisted< to radical disturbance of equanim- ity of spirit. In such environ- ment the inner life is seen to give positive resist- ance to irritation. 1 Its disturbances can find no entrance. 2 There develops a deliberate im- perviousness to all such attack. 3 By an under- girding of psychical calm, 4 the life seems firmly set in an irresponsive obliviousness to these irritating annoyances, often so sudden and subtle in their occurrence. 5 This resistance is so complete that not only is there no show of passion but there is no dis- turbed after-roll as from an en- Manner unruffled, counter with psychical storm. 6 The entire manner moves on un- ruffled in its uniform flow. No fretfulness rises to the surface ; no peevishness crops out in tone or deed ; no flush of subdued anger tinges the cheek. The entire exterior of the life main- tains its usual demeanour as if no irritation had occurred. 7 If any perceptible result appears it is an intensified sweetness of bearing, as the rudely shaken flower will often throw out a 1 1 Thesa. v. 14. 2 Rom. xii. 12. "James i. 4. 4 Isa. xxvi. 3. 6 Luke xxi. 19. ■ 1 Peter ii. 23. 7 1 Cor. iv. 12, 13. 342 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER richer perfume, or the crushed affection reveal a deeper tenderness. 1 These distinct phases of conduct bring out a definite conclusion in the minds of all who observe them. That conclusion State of Character : n ,-\ . . /» i • Patience. iorms another state of character, the state of patience. It is given its place by such steady unvarying action that it can but be recognized as an established quality of the life. The life has made such a record of patience, amid all exasperations, that any departure from that course gives rise at once to surprise and to question if the individual be fully himself. It must be recognized that phys- ical debility often destroys nervous self-posses- sion, and temporary perturbations from the usual path of patience may justly be attributed to that cause. Patience, however, is universally counted on in Christian character as one of the states indispensable to its completeness. The experience of the Christian is an emanci- pation. Impulses that have dominated for evil, habits that have held in slavery Conduct : Control 1 ■> , , ■> , o rni_ ofSelf< have lost their mastery/ I he soul now shows itself to be in con- trol of the inner and outer life ; the personality, by the supports from psychical depths, now ap- pears as its own absolute master in conduct. 3 1 James i. 2-4. a l Cor. ix. 27. 3 1 Thess. iv. 4. THE PERSONAL STATES 343 New vision reveals the real nature of this self- mastery. 1 Looks and words and deeds are held in just and proper balance. Self, in its passions, impulses and caprices, is seen to be under a steady hand of restraint and guidance. 2 Spurts and outbreaks and disproportionate side issues, constantly occurring in uncontrolled life, are held in by wise and powerful leash. 3 The purities within make outward wrong, however mitigated in form, to be distinctly loathsome. 4 Let once an action wroL nencc fr ° m ^e known to be wrong in any de- gree, the conduct of the Christian heart eliminates it. Living and intelligent Christian experience can never consort with known wrong in conduct. Participation in ac- knowledged evil, even in its most attenuated form, is positively incongruous for a soul pro- fessing to possess a genuine experimental life. Every known wrong, of every possible degree, is unequivocably banished from voluntary action. 5 Total abstinence from every act of recognized wrong is the invariable course to be followed with scrupulous care in the outer life of the Christian. 6 There is no permissible mod- eration in evil for such a life. All such modera- tion is participation, a thing never knowingly JRom. vii. 25. *1 Cor. vi. 12. •Phil, ii. 13. 4 Rom. xii. 9. 6 2 Cor. vi. 17. • 1 Thess. v. 22. 344 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER tolerated in conduct emanating from Christian experience. On the other hand, immoderation in right may be as sinful as moderation in wrong. 1 The extremist is always intoxicated i^ Right!° n under the disproportionate su- premacy of some one impulse ; intoxication is always wisdom dethroned. Nor- mal Christian experience, instructed in the true balance of righteousness, never develops the crank. 2 The equipoise of such an experience, when given a chance, develops itself in such reasonable moderation in action as commands the respect of the moral judgment of men. 3 The awakened and surcharged impulses of the Chris- tian soul, aglow with a living experience of the saving power of God, evinces the balanced re- straint and direction of the Holy Spirit acting in the psychical depths. 4 Whatever the im- pulses, preferences or predilections, this sense of just balance in the soul of the Christian ever maintains the attitude of a just and proportion- ate deference in conduct alike to all real obliga- tions in life. The conduct of the true Chris- tian is marked by a wise and equitable modera- tion in all that is right. 5 From such phases of conduct, perceived to be 1 2 Sam. vi. 6, 7. 8 Matt. xxii. 21. 3 1 Cor. xiv. 40. 4 James iii. 17. 6 Phil. iv. 5. THE PERSONAL STATES 345 premeditated and successively repeated until it is felt to be no temporary spasm of righteous action but the established course State of Character : r> n J i l Temperance. * coiihrmed conduct, a clear con- clusion formulates itself in the thought of the observing world, constituting another in these personal states of Christian character, the state of temperance. It is that state that protects the life from distortions and excrescences. It is no repression of zeal ; it is no extinguishment of visions. It is only the even balance of wisdom from above. It never permits the soul to be intemperate in any ac- tion. It prevents impulse from running into excesses ; it is the balance-wheel of the charac- ter. 1 Its right to a place in the formulation of the personal states of Christian character can never be questioned. A distinct phase of Christian conduct is an unwavering loyalty to righteousness. 2 Action is uncompromisingly held to what conduct : Loyalty jg understood to be the justand to Righteousness. vKC/V\\g&Y ^8*6* y?Cc)uovy <&/*&«/ A\o\xj i>WW \ / 1^Wra.m "5TT . me VvaucLeXWfic XiKk^i A i ^ a \^ rvo*\au.C/)l Wiwtoiwiftc/cieQv —J I -j — -j 5- otA\g,Vu»Ae/ l\mXgfC>g^6'\ow 1 MWonoe/ I JvppeaY 1 oa.cn ^'\d '"Uvg. Wa«\&c\'\5y\& i a/faVV/4 cfr CWiSXiarV C/WaracXW / "5 °5 ^ |-| 'II Y i •o luee -D\a. \ I % /U^/Kc^OTi/ &.,£* JftcVj t\fl<\>t \ THE EVANGELISTIC BTAT1 sin-blighted life. The whole manner ifl one of intense and constant burden of heart for bouIb without God's transforming presenoe. 1 There is urging to endeavour for the rescue of souls l'roin the wretchedness and ruin ofsin.' This anxiety is not an indefinite concern ex- hausting itself in platitudes and exhortations, taking into its embrace, by whole- specific concern. sa ] e ^ the entire mass of hlllllilll beings without God and His gracious work. It begets conduct of yet more specific sort. There is concern for the separate individual soul. 3 Indeed this specialization is the most positive type of such conduct. 4 There is repeated mention of distinct persons and con- ference with sympathetic spirits in their in- terest. 5 This concentration of concern upon particular souls is manifest in such convergence of saving effort upon those persons as puts about them the conditions designed to win them to Christ if possible. 6 None can witness such conduct, sustained in uniform course, w r ithout receiving an impres- sion that that life is possessed of State of Character : v* j • n l* *i. J r solicitude. an abiding state of solicitude lor souls. It is one of the indis- pensable states of rightly developed Christian 1 Rom. ix. 2. ■ Matt. ix. 37, 38. 3 John i. 41, 48, 4 Matt. iv. 19. 5 Philemon 10. •! Cor. ix. 20-2'J. 354 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER character. It springs inevitably from the depths of a thoroughgoing experience of the work of the Holy Spirit in personal salvation. That experience without the presence of such solicitude would be fatally defective, a share in gospel salvation being only assured on the evinc- ing of this practical solicitude in conduct. 1 " In the popular conception personal Christian work is not a necessary part of Christian living. The time ought to come, and I believe is coming, when it will be deemed as essential to a Chris- tian life as common honesty." 2 The processes of saving grace, operative in the psychical depths, produce such active anxiety and concern for the salvation of others as irresistibly deposit this state of solicitude in the mind of an observing world. In the formulation of the essential states of Christian character solicitude must undeniably be given place as the initial state in the evangelistic series. All saving effort of the true Christian is marked by an all-pervasive air of humility. The magnitude of the soul-saving Conduct : Inability , 1 • . n i . j , n conceded. task is too well understood to allow of a self-reliant manner. The con- sciousness of personal experience is too full of the evidences of the sole adequacy of divine power in the saving process to permit of any- 1 1 Cor. ix. 23. 2 Strong, " The New Era," p. 259. THE EVANGELI8TIC STATES 355 thing else than the total elimination of all con- it from mere human effort. Inadequacy of human power is spontaneously acknowledged in every move. 1 The most gifted human endeav- our is ever tempered by a manifest realization of utter powerlessness in itself. 2 The inevitable conduct, alone consistent with the inner life of the experimental Christian, is a humble con- cession of the utter inadequacy of mere human ability however earnest, energetic or brilliant. 3 This manifestation of inadequacy is consist- ently accompanied by an open resort to God. 4 He is the only sufficient Helper Resort to God. i n such a momentous undertaking as that to effect the cleansing and transformation of a sinful human soul. The besieging call is upon God in both private and public prayer. The strenuous endeavour is to get into perfect conjunction with God so as to make the infinite powers of the divine Being available in accomplishing the desired end. 5 Such adjustment to the divine will becomes a basis of direct and effective petition to the heart of God. Such resort to God in audible and eager cry for His help springs invariably from a soul aglow with the Christlike love, begotten alone of genuine Christian experience. 6 1 2 Cor. ii. 16. 2 John xv. 5. s 2 Cor. iii. 5. 4 Luke x. 2. 6 2 Theas. iii. 1 ; Eph. vi. 19. • Roin. x. 1. 356 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER Soul-saving is distinctly God's work ; man's part is merely contributive. 1 The believing heart is, therefore, impelled to a Reliance upon God. bold reliance upon the divine co- operation in its doing. 2 Conduct takes on an assurance, a fearless dependence upon the effectiveness of this divine joint-action. The spirit becomes trustful, expectant, jubilant, even in the face of difficulties and apparent failures. 3 The outer expressions of the inner reliance are numerous. By word and act un- faltering dependence on the effectiveness of the divine work, for which there is such urgent asking and believing, is given abundant demon- stration. 4 There is eager venture, there is glad- some courage, there is confident challenge, all evincing a conquering reliance on God. Such a course of conduct, seen to be continu- ous in the life, produces in the mind of all who witness it the impression of a defi- state of character: nit d es t a blished state of char- Intercession. acter. It may well be designated as the state of intercession. It is the Christian soul linking itself with the divine Personality to effect the salvation of another. It is the in- tercessory seizure and employment of the divine energies in the determined effort to rescue a soul 1 1 Cor. iii. 6, 7. s 1 Tim. iv. 10. 3 Acts xxviii. 30, 31. 4 Acts iv. 31. THE EVANGELISTIC STATES 357 lost in sin. It is the pleading intercession of a saved heart that, by any means possible and feasible with God, salvation may reach one or many. It is the " burden for souls " that the experience of the Christian world has shown is a vital part in all saving service. Christian character without it is a phlegmatic, indifferent thing. It has been said, no doubt with a great measure of lamentable truth, that " Probably not one out of ten professing Christians accepts a personal responsibility for certain ones and makes them the object of special prayer and ef- fort." ! Notwithstanding this, any exact formu- lation of Christian character must place fore- most among its evangelistic states this vital state of intercession. The great personal goal of Christian en- deavour is the individual unsaved life. 2 The entire being, stirred by the vitality sear^for Hold °^ a divine experience, is on the hunt for a hold upon the life in sin. It is not seeking congenial companionship. Its primary search is for a foothold by the side of the life that needs it most, that is farthest from God. 3 It is positively incongruous for the Christian soul, professing a living experience of personal salvation and fellowship with the Holy Strong, "The New Era," p. 259. 2 John xvii. 18; Luke xix. 10. * 1 Cor. ix. 19. 358 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER Spirit, to be content with the easy, delightful comradeship of souls in condition like unto its own. 1 If the heart be right the lure of the im- perilled is resistless. 2 Its entire conduct is per- meated with a tireless alertness to get into touch with unsaved ones. 3 It is forever after a chance to get into the lives of the sinful, the lives that are without God and without hope in the world. 4 It seizes and clings to such fellowships with an eager joy. And this is not so because there is selfish gratification in such relations, but solely because a chance is found therein to get hold upon a life that needs God. 5 Foothold, by such vigilance, having once been gained at the side of an unsaved life, then con- duct takes on another phase. Un- Forging of Links, obtrusive but deliberate effort is now made to form and strengthen the links that bind the two lives together. 6 Con- genialities are cultivated; friendship is cemented; confidences are exchanged; attractions are in- tensified ; kindnesses are multiplied ; not a single factor that can enter into these links, binding the two lives together, is neglected. The stronger the bands that tie the unsaved life to the Christian heart the more powerful the hold that heart has upon such life. 7 The evan- 1 Matt, xviii. 12. 2 John iv. 34. 3 John iv. 7. 4 Luke v. 29-32. 6 Rom. xv. 1,2. 6 1 Cor. x. 33. 7 1 Cor. ix. 20, 21. THE EVANGELISTIC STATES 359 gelistic passion develops an all-mastering adhe- sion of comradeship. The Christian lieart makes itself necessary to the life it would save. 1 There is no insincerity in such action ; it is instinct with the sublimest motive. 2 A so-called Chris- tian life void of this adhesive, evangelistic pas- sion is an empty delusion. 3 Such conspiracy of attachment is the inevitable outgrowth of a gen- uine work of experimental salvation in the depths of the psychical being. Conduct also proceeds to manipulate these links thus carefully forged. The sinful life, laid open by the intimacies of this chr£t ng Towards good-fellowship, is cautiously made to feel its need. Its mistakes and deficiencies are subtilely brought into view. Discontent with sinful conditions is delicately engendered. 4 The superiorities of the Christian life are adroitly pushed into prominence. The charm of Christ is imperceptibly diffused through the mutual atmosphere of the intimacy. 5 The links of attachment are gently but steadily strained to draw the wayward life to the Sa- viour. 6 Every relationship is made tributary to this heavenly task. 7 Every other use of the ties between these lives seems selfish, trivial and ignoble beside this one supreme consecration of 1 2 Cor. xii. 16. 2 1 Cor. ix. 22. 3 John xv. 2. 4 1 Peter iii. 1. 6 Col. i. 27. 6 1 Peter ii. 12. 1 Matt. iv. 19. 360 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER friendship to the achievement of the salvation of the soul away from God. 1 This all-pervasive pull towards Christ is an inevitable quality of the conduct of the heart truly Christian. The professed Christian that can live without it may well question the present reality of his ex- perience. 2 By such sustained action there is irresistibly precipitated in the perceiving mind of men an estimate of the life so conducting State of Character : ftg^f rj^ estimate formg ftn _ Influence. other state of character which, among these evangelistic states, may appropri- ately be termed the state of influence. It is the state in which all the unspoken outgoings of the life are seen to have one permanent trend and that to bring all under its touch to the life saved through Christ. Any act subversive of this trend would be a surprise. Any reversal of this course would be a shock and a revolution in character. Such a current in conduct, seeking to bear all about it to Christ, is an indisputable quality of all normal, full-vigoured Christian life. In the scientific formulation of the evan- gelistic states of Christian character such in- fluence must be given an important place. The effort to lead a soul into the experience of the Christian takes shape in verbal and oral ex- 1 Matt. v. 16. 2 John xv. 2. THE EVANGELISTIC STATES 361 pression. 1 Indirect conduct is an excellent vehicle of the impulse so far as it goes ; but it is very inadequate. The evangel- conduct-, invita- jgtio passion clamours for more tion to Accept. * definite expression. 2 All barriers of diffidence and worldly-wise discretion are thrust aside and heart speaks to heart by the living voice. 3 Forced from Christ's lips by the volcanic forces of a burning love for suffering souls the invitation to accept the Water of Life He brings fixes the type for His every Spirit- filled follower. 4 Through a soul, ceaselessly undergoing the transformations and inspirations of applied divine energy, the invitations to ac- cept the overtures of heavenly grace force their way into communication and repetition over and over again. It is the spontaneous message of saved life to lost souls. 5 Seas are no hindrance, mountains no barriers. Distance nor race make any difference. Degradation and prejudices form no obstacles. Wherever the lost soul may be and whatever its state the message of invitation to ac- cept Christ never pauses in its search until the last unsaved one has heard its glorious news. 6 As spontaneously as birds sing or suns shine the Chris- tian heart passes on the gospel invitation from eager lips to all sin-blighted lives everywhere. 1 John i. 46. 8 Rev. xxii. 17. s Luke xiv. 17. * John vii. 37. 6 Mark xvi. 15. 6 Luke xv. 4 ; Matt, xxviii. 19. 362 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER However exalted the privilege of being the bearer of such a message the evangelistic passion of the experimental life is far from pleading to satisfied with the mere function of Receive. a carrier. Such a soul must also become an advocate. Christian conduct irre- pressibly springs into the act of pleading with others to receive Christ. It takes on the energetic function of persuasion. 1 All the force of beseeching personality is put behind the in- vitation. All that has been hitherto confined within an unphrased influence or an uttered in- vitation is now brought out in definite expres- sion of urgent exhortation. 2 Every possible motive is called into action ; every inciting fact is pressed into service ; every contributive emo- tion is rallied to the effort ; every impelling thought is summoned to the struggle. 3 The torpidity of a sin-paralyzed soul must be over- come. 4 The pleading of heart, aglow with evan- gelistic ardour, sets itself to prevail in persuad- ing to receive the salvation of Christ. Such spirit of pleading is the very essence of the evangelistic passion. 5 This kind of conduct can have but one result upon the minds of all among whom it occurs. It deposits in them another state of Christian 1 2 Cor. v. 20. * Titus ii. 15. 3 Luke xiv. 23. * 2 Tim. iv. 2-4. 6 Acts xx. 31. THE EVANGELISTIC STATES 3G3 character. It is the state of appeal. It becomes a settled conclusion that there is in that soul a confirmed attitude of appeal. At State of Character : . • 1 i 1 • a • Appeal> timely moments, when conditions are ripe, the soul leaps out in an on- slaught of entreaty. Invitation is pressed and , persuasion is applied. All the power of the in- dividuality is concentrated to prevail upon the life to accept the invitation and receive the Saviour. This state of appeal is vital to the complete character of the true Christian. The character that lacks it is vitally deficient ; it ex- poses a ruinous lack in the psychical life, the underlying experimental processes. Any full and exact formulation of Christian character must make place among its evangelistic states for this indispensable state of appeal. To one who has by experience come to know the real worth of a genuine work of saving grace in the soul, such salvation sa^tion Exalted, becomes invaluable. All other possessions for oneself, or acquire- ment for another, are shown to be regarded as trifling in comparison with it. 1 All conduct at once aligns itself with this imperious estimate. 2 The words of the lips constantly declare it. Tireless effort to effect it forever proclaims its incomparable superiority. 3 When the salvation 1 Matt. vi. 23. • Matt. xiii. 46, 47. 3 Acts xj. 24. 364: STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER of a soul is involved, all other temporal and material concerns are, wherever at all practi- cable, set promptly aside until the higher task is done. 1 Any treatment of this saving process as if it were of inferior importance is positively incompatible with the radical and profound ex- periences of the typical inner life of the Chris- tian. That salvation, including all it stands for in the spiritual life, is given precedence in all action as the one thing worth living for in all the range of possible acquirement ; it is exalted to the supreme place of value and importance. 2 It is practically endorsed as bearing heaven's stamp of highest worth. 3 In the endeavour to effect the salvation of others the thought of cost has no place. So measureless is the valuation of a f T ost soul's salvation that its secure- uncounted. ment is eagerly sought with scarcely any respect to necessitated expenditure. The enthralling vision of a soul saved seems to make oblivious to any price paid. 4 The ardent soul saver, in the parlance of the financial world, is a reckless plunger with respect to the ex- haustion of resources. The controlling sense of inferior values seems to have been paralyzed. 5 All other worths are completely submerged in 1 1 Cor. x. 33. 2 Phil. iii. 13, 14. 8 Luke xv. 7. 4 Dan. xii. 3. 6 Acts xxi. 13. THE EVANGELISTIC STATES 3G5 the endless and infinite worth of a human soul. Thus in a life aglow with the evangelistic pas- sion, begotten of a genuine Christian experience, cost is seen to be completely ignored when suc- cess in reaching a soul is at stake. 1 At its normal intensity the evangelistic im- pulse, arising from the psychical conditions pres- ent in the complete experience of ah to save. the Christian life, not only feels no recoil from the surrender of physical conveniences or possessions but also tosses itself, its very being and hopes, into the surrender. 2 When the eternal salvation of human beings is in the balance there is nothing the real Christian soul withholds in order to save. The very essence of the saving passion of Christ Himself is evinced in the conduct of the truly experimental disciple. 3 All he is, all he has, all he hopes to be, all this is unreservedly and joyously poured out in his endeavour to save men and bring them into the possession of the life and power of God. 4 Time, energy, property, comfort, even life itself, all are given that the unsaved may be brought to Christ. The world is girdled in missionary devotion ; the foulest haunts of abandoned men are entered in Christly service ; nothing stops the soul 1 2 Cor. xii. 15. « Rom. ix. 3. 3 Eph. v. 2. 4 1 Theas. ii. 8. 366 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER under the call of the lost. Such all-inclusive abandon in positive action is one of the culmina- tions in conduct of the potent psychical proc- esses operative in Christian experience. Men see this conduct steadily persisted in, totally devoid of all selfish gain, throbbing with a yearning, overmastering love, State of Character : i ii i • , t sacrifice. and they are driven to a dis- tinct conclusion in their thought. There is deposited another and final state of Christian character, that of unhesitating and unbounded sacrifice. It is the state of deliber- ate forfeiture of values, otherwise prized, for the securement of spiritual salvation to those without it. It is a confirmed attitude of life so demonstrably established that it is counted on with unfaltering expectancy. It has built itself up as an essential part of all full-orbed Christian life. Without it such life is defective and de- formed, being deficient in one of its crowning states. Such a deficiency in Christian character is in fact impossible where there is the present existence of a living experience of saving grace in the inner life properly instructed as to its legitimate fruitage in conduct. The exact scientific formulation of Christian character can- not fail, if faithful to the facts, to crown the evangelistic states with this most effective of them all, the state of sacrifice to save. V THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES (See Diagram VIII) The impulses of Christian experience form still another channel of exit in conduct. The soul of the Christian, truly begot- c^nducf 081 ^ en a § a ^ n °f God, properly led in the evolution of conduct, finds it impossible to be oblivious of and inactive towards the unjust and harmful conditions prevalent about it. " Flight from the world and flight from human relations were no legiti- mate growth from the spirit of Christ." 1 While living in an imperfect and sinful environment, as an inherent resistance to existing dominant wrong, as a means of a better life for himself, as an aid to more effectively inducing others to lead the life of the Christian, the normal Chris- tian is irresistibly crowded into such conduct as issues in a series of sociological states of Chris- tian character. They are the states that take shape from such conduct as has for its supreme 1 King, "Reconstruction in Theology," p. 178. 367 368 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER object the relief and final remedy of such social conditions as are stimulative of the sinful life, repressive of the saved life, obstructive of effort for Christian manhood. They arise as normally and inevitably as any of the states origin in ex- f Christian character from the penence. profound processes of the psy- chical life wrought in genuine Christian expe- rience, underlying all true Christian person- ality. " The chief contribution of Christ to the social problem is the production of spiritual per- sonality. In the Christian character He pro- vides that element of social progress of which the world stands most in need." * Any so- called Christian experience that can leave un- touched the baleful sociological conditions of the world is either fatally defective in its own constituent elements or as fatally misled in its apprehension of the essential elements of its conduct. " He who carries the sorrows of the race in his heart has entered into the great phase of Christ's experience." 2 Any adequate psychological formulation of Christian character will discover and must make place for such conduct as constitutes the sociological states of that character. We shall now apply ourselves to the study of this conduct and the consequent 1 Bruce, " The Formation of Christian Character," p. 14. 2 Mabie, " Life of the Spirit," p. 260. / N5 Or- ^ 1 \\f\bK\VvvVvorv c }\\evt\c-o\C'V T \iX\zzrif) flit ^ Y^&mfc\\\v«,fc' T bfvw ?A\oW tvxecoA&Krawowi f\e>afrK\yUtt \fcYV -V\aw vA\-av*&d'A©<* ^ voasx,\ow£ v£uc\\\caV \)w(iA N S X \ 'OASX^now^ \$\v "B\ a.gr&YYv m. / iKe. OotAoVo^xc^V oKikX^i ■i aCw &M.iX N? ui — r — T T Vufnrv VVi m \ v\ aXi & &, T r \\e SB Id t t O \ \ THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES 369 character-states deposited by it, using the same method as in the two series of such states already considered, this series being their issues in states of culmination and the completion Character. A of the states comprising the full- orbed Christian character. Social wrongs, of every nature and degree, and the spirit of the thoroughly saved soul are in the uttermost antithesis. 1 In- conduct : condem- ve terate antagonism is in the very nation of Wrong. ° y air of their contact. Silence, on the part of the Christian heart, in the midst of such wrong is inconceivable to one who knows the psychical conditions of the saved being. Disapproval of the evil is spontaneous and out- spoken. 2 Condemnation of the wrong is un- equivocal and its denunciation is unsparing and fearless. 3 " Against an easy-going good-natured mood, which accepts ' rings ' and ' bosses ' in politics as necessary evils and will not fight them to the death as deadly enemies of society ; which sits content in a social order of injustice because it is more comfortable to let things alone ; which tolerates low standards, easy morals, cheap education and vulgar manners ; it is the bounden duty of all right-minded men to protest in season and out of season." 4 The 1 Matt, xxiii. 4. 2 2 Tim. iv. 2. 3 Rom. i. 18. 4 Mabie, " Life of the Spirit," p. 189. 370 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER wrong is in itself so reprehensible, its effects on the mass of public life are so deplorable that all the impulses of the pure and loving soul cry out in irrepressible protest against its continuance. 1 This protest is often a painful cry, sometimes stopping nothing short of an outburst of agony, arising from deep psychical anguish in the keen perception of such wrong as is fully sensed only by the heart of the experimental Christian. 2 The conduct of the Christian towards social wrong is not that of mere vocal condemnation, however pronounced that may be. opposition. The attitude of the personality, astir with the psychical energies of a living experience, is in all its bearings one of ceaseless opposition to every form of prevail- ing evil. 3 The polarities of the Christian heart and every phase of social wrong are constitu- tionally and eternally set against each other. 4 To the soul, filled with the pure and loving presence of the Spirit of God, all social wrong is forever repellent. 5 This opposition evinces it- self in conduct ; and that conduct is found, if under proper guidance, in inveterate antagonism to all evil in the social organism. A confirmed impression is produced upon the mind of men. Such conduct deposits a definite 1 Isa. i. 16, 17. 2 Luke xix. 41, 42. 3 Matt. xxi. 12, 13. 4 Aots xiii. 10. 5 Rom. xii. 9. THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES 371 state of character, the state of established re- volt against social wrong. " Once let the con- viction take hold that there is no State of Character : i , v • j Revolt . such thing as necessary and per- manent evil, and courage will rise to the attack of every evil, however well en- trenched." 1 All that is needed is the demon- stration that a social condition is definitely wrong to make the soul of the real Christian anywhere and at all times alive with aggressive and unqualified revolt. Quiescence in such a presence is impossible ; acquiescence with it positively abhorrent. The whole being is tur- bulent with a radical movement of revulsion. All of the saved energies are aroused to a sturdy revolt. All reliable analysis of Christian char- acter must place this state of revolt against all social wrong in the lead of the sociological states of that character. The psychical condition most responsive to immediate human need is that induced by the typical Christian experience. Conduct : Help for tt • j_ ii • . suffering. However intense the aversion to the social wrong, causative of the suffering, the revolt against the wrong in no way diverts the heart from action in immediate help. 2 Conduct, at once and to the limit of its abilit}% proceeds to extend help to the suffer- 1 Strong, " The New Era, " p. 242, 2 Luke x. 37. 372 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER ing. 1 Hunger is satisfied ; cold is relieved ; sickness is ministered unto. 2 Every phase of present suffering is given the needed relief. Out of the depths of psychical tenderness abundant munificence of gift and service is poured upon the suffering victims of social wrong. 3 The spirit of the Good Samaritan is waiting for every wayside sufferer whatever may have been the source of the marauding brigandage. 4 Even beyond such help for immediate suffer- ing the genuine Christian heart finds field for loving service in temporary allevia- Work of , • « i • . • • 1 1 Alleviation. tion of wrong conditions in the social life until more thorough- going and far-reaching processes can be made effective. 5 There is conduct that can mitigate the effects of social wrong, that can lessen the pains of suffering, that can modify the activity of the movement for evil, that can circumscribe and emasculate the harmful energies until the time comes for their eradication. 6 The Chris- tian heart eagerly seizes these opportunities for alleviation of the situation. Conduct sets itself to achieve any degree of favourable modification now attainable in order to secure thereby the greatest possible immediate help for the de- 1 Luke xviii. 22. 2 Matt. xxv. 35, 36. s 1 John iii. 17. 4 Luke x. 34. 5 Acts ii. 40. ° Rom. xii. 21. THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES 373 plorable situation. 1 Such conduct comprises a sincere endeavour to provide help for suffering and alleviation of wrong conditions to the utmost possible limit. 2 Here again we witness the formation of another state of character ; it is deposited in the mind of an observing public stat^of character : ^y foe steady continuance of the conduct just indicated. It may be designated as the state of relief. It may be, in- deed doubtless is, but temporary relief; it may seem to be the merest palliative ; it may truly be but a sedative that cannot touch the real fever ; but it lessens the pain while the real remedies are being brought to bear upon the deep-lying disease. The true Christian soul, everywhere and always, yearns with such a spirit of relief. The world of human need comes to count upon its quick and liberal response. To find, under genuine conditions of need, the absence of such response is to receive a shock, a painful sense of disappointment and defect. This responsive relief is inwrought in the Chris- tian life as a vital part of all true Christian character. Practical Christian sociology has an essential though passing function in Christian philanthropy. No accurate formulation of Christian character, in the present condition 1 1 Peter ii. 15. 2 Rom. xii. 2. 374 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER of the social world, can omit to include in its sociological states this state of relief. Conduct that springs from the underlying depths, where proceeds the work of the Holy Spirit in the soul of the Christian, conduct-. Location j g never satisfied to be a mere salve of Injustice. for social wrong. It dresses the open sore and soothes the pain only that it may apply itself strenuously to the poison that pro- duces the sore and the pain. It enters upon a relentless hunt, undertaking nothing short of the definite location of the injustice that consti- tutes the wrong. 1 It traces and probes and examines, without fear or favour, to get at all unjust persons and procedures. 2 It is not a professional or commercial transaction for which so much compensation is expected. It is the irrepressible benevolent impulse of the Christian life on the trail of the foe of social good that that foe may be unquestionably located and identified. 3 This is not a search of mere discovery. De- tection here means unhesitating exposure. Christian conduct, once having Firmness in discovered injustice in its actual Exposure. O work of social wrong, finds its next inevitable line of action to be to uncover that injustice to the gaze of the world. 4 This 1 Joshua vii. 18. 2 Heb. xii. 15, 16. s 1 Peter v, 8. 4 John viii. 44, THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES 375 exposure of injustice involves definite phases of conduct. There is the pointing out of its pres- ence ; x there is the delineation of its nature ; there is the pouring in of all possible light upon the lairs where the injustice lurks and operates. 2 This is unpleasant and disagreeable work, but the sincere and spirit-quickened Christian counts not his own comfort. The behest of the true follower of Christ, who has that living Christ in the depths of his subcon- scious life, is to stand in the courts of misappro- priated temples and cry : " Ye have made it a den of thieves;" 3 is to stand in the presence of unjust perpetrators of social wrongs and turn on the lights of unmerciful identification : " Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites ! " 4 Such conduct is the outspoken exposure of all dis- covered injustice and no soul, astir with all of the elements of true Christian manhood, can re- frain from it. The consistent conduct of the Christian only half appears in the detection and exposure of social injustice. Its attitude Fidelity in towards such injustice is only com- Eradication. o J pleted by fidelity in its eradica- tion. 5 This means faithfulness in the use of every opportunity to do away with the injustice, 1 Acts xiii. 10. 9 Acts viii. 22. 3 Mark xi. 17. 4 Matt, xxiii. 14. 6 Luke iii. 13. 376 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER to rally all kindred forces to extinguish it, to free the social conditions of the last vestige of its presence. 1 There is no evasion of the mis- sion ; there is no depreciation of the issue. The task is accepted and a determined struggle for the elimination of every phase of social injustice is maintained. 2 The conduct of the Christian rests nothing short of the utmost possible en- deavour to eradicate injustice wherever found in the social life of men. This is a remarkable grouping of conduct. This persistent activity in the location, exposure and eradication of injustice pro- state of character: d uces i n t ne m i n ds of men who Removal. observe it the impression of a dis- tinct state of character in relation to all social injustice, which may be properly termed the state of removal. The object upon which all the conduct of this entire grouping converges is the complete removal of every vestige of social injustice. The antagonism between such a soul as we are considering, one profoundly astir along all lines of Christly activity, and such injustice is a condition to be clearly foreseen. The two cannot be thrown together in the same social sphere without the immediate inauguration of this battle for removal. Christ defines this ef- fect upon human conduct : " I came not to send 1 James ii. 9. 2 James v.i THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES 377 peace but a sword." ! The exact formulation of Christian character cannot be made without this state of removal standing prominently among the sociological states of that character. The life of society is largely made up of cus- toms. They have sprung up in the past, more or less remote, and have been cuifomV'Revited. added to and multiplied by suc- cessive generations. In many of these customs evil is deeply entrenched. Into the midst of this mass of customs of varying moral quality the soul of the Christian is pro- jected. The heart, filled with the positive im- pulses of Christian experience, at once passes these customs, that have presumed hitherto to dictate its action, under unsparing revision. 2 Their qualities are analyzed, their elements scrutinized, their entire composition tested as to moral and spiritual effects. When reshaping is necessary in order to make them conform to the new life it is firmly and tactfully put into ex- ecution. The Christian appears as a determinate moulder of the customs of society ; he is the creator of social forces and not their toy. 3 Conduct that attempts the revision of social customs finds its first task in the elimination of the harmful features of such customs. 4 Im- ^att. x. 34. * Rom. xii. 2. 8 Phil. iv. 8, 9. 4 1 Peter i, 14, 15. 378 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER pelled by the compulsions of the inner life, it en- gages itself in the exposure of the harmfulness of these features. Their injurious na- Harm Eliminated. f. ure i s convincingly demonstrated until individuals and communities are persuaded to eliminate these erroneous ele- ments. 1 By word, by agitation, by example this work is done. The heart that is genuinely Christian cannot but set itself resolutely to stop the ruinous work of harmful customs. 2 It would be untrue to its inner experience, to the in- dwelling Holy Spirit, were it silent and idle in such surroundings. Christian conduct, in its relations to social customs, is not merely negative. When harm is eliminated only half its work is uplift substituted, done. Its supreme task, in this immediate field, is to substitute, in the customs from which harm has been eradi- cated, such elements as shall uplift. " The way to empty is to fill. Empty of evil by filling with good. Drive out darkness by admitting light." 3 Christian conduct is to make custom a power to purify and elevate the world. By ex- hibiting the excellences of pure customs, by showing in actual operation the superiorities of customs stripped of every harmful element, such 1 Matt, xxiii. 3-7. 2 1 Peter ii. 11. 3 Strong, " The New Era," p. 244. THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES 379 customs as hold only uplift for the social world are substituted for all other. 1 Conduct, springing out of the psychical depths of Christian experi- ence, has upon itself the task of the introduction and establishment of the uplift of purified cus- toms in the social life of the world. 2 Such conduct registers itself in the thought of men. It is not only remembered as a familiar incident, but it settles down in the state of character: b serv i n nr mind as a fixed state of Reformation. ° Christian character. It may be designated as the state of reformation. It is the state in which the active energies of the life are occupied in the reformation of social customs. It is the attitude of the Christian soul in which it insists that, in all moral phases, the customs of society shall be conformed, soon or late, to it- self as the organic expression of God's will in human action. It is a state of confirmed an- tagonism to all that is conceived to be wrong in the customs of society. The definite and accu- rate formulation of Christian character must give large place among the sociological states to this state of reformation. The action of Christian life on social structure goes deeper than the manipulation of accepted customs. Christian conduct penetrates to the basal elements of social organism. The very 1 Matt. v. 16. * Titus ii. 7. 380 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER organic institutions that form the framework of society become the immediate subjects of Chris- tian formulation. 1 Institutions, conduct: i^stiju- however time-honoured and deeply tions Remedied. -l J entrenched, that hold in themselves elements that are wrong to the acute sense of perception wrought by the processes of experi- mental salvation are at once and persistently the object of remedial action on the part of every genuine Christian. 2 The life wrought of God in the soul can never rest inactive under the abuses and disasters of erroneous institu- tions. It sets itself to rectify them. It applies itself to statutes and constitutions, stopping not short of the very foundations of governmental structure, that the institutions of society may be remedied wherever they are detrimental to the development of the largest and purest life. 3 The life of the Christian is a life in its nature and social requirements distinct from all other ever known in the world. It has institutions found itself under the necessity of Created. *> creating new institutions, such in- stitutions as give protection to its peculiar powers and sphere for their exalted activities in the social relations. 4 Christian conduct, born of the work of God's Spirit in the depths of the soul, creates in the governmental world an in- 1 Acts vi. 14. fl Acts xvii. 6. 8 1 Cor. v. 7. 4 Aots xvi. 21. THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES 381 stitutional environment in which men may have chance for the fullest exercise of the energies peculiar to and inherent in the life of the Christian. It creates a need for, and gives definite formulation to, institutions that differ- entiate Christian civilization from every other that has appeared upon the earth. 1 The whole face of society is being transformed by this ac- tion of Christian conduct upon its institutions. 2 Christian conduct cannot exist, in its genuine- ness and potency, without continuously mould- ing to itself the institutions of its social world. Such conduct, steadily in action under the gaze of men, deposits in the observing mind another distinct state of Christian state of character: cnarac ter. It is the state compre- Reconstruction. -T hensively designated by the term, reconstruction, since it is formed by the conduct of the Christian in his slow but resistless mould- ing of the institutions of society to make neces- sary field for the functions and activities of the Christian life. This reconstructive function be- longs to all true vitality. Christian vitality is in harmony with this general fact in that it lays a moulding hand upon its social surroundings and ultimately readjusts all, forming a social body adapted to its nature and range. No com- prehensive formulation of Christian character ^cte xxi. 21. *Eph. iv. 22-24. 382 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER can fail to recognize this state of reconstruction as essential to the completion of the sociological states of that character. Christian conduct comes now to its final tasks. One of these is the exemplification of Christian citizenship by the embodiment in conduct : citizen- act i on f t h e elements of that citi- ship Exemplified. zenship which is commissioned and destined to bring the world to a complete social life. 1 It is the purified and adjusted inner life taking to itself perfectly correlated outer ex- pression in all of its social relations. 2 " The Christian citizen has a divine calling to spiritual- ize the secular and to Christianize the com- mon." 3 The citizenship that is to save the world here gets its type ; and such typical citizenship multiplied by the entire population gives perfect society in all its details. 4 Purity, courage, vision, aggressiveness, fidelity to vital details, sacrifice of personal interests for general welfare, these and other kindred qualities, which the limits of this treatment exclude from men- tion here, stand out in the conduct truly be- gotten of the Spirit of God, as set forth in the states of Christian character already considered, and unite in exemplifying the type of citizen- ship that is to save the world. Any so-called I FhiL i. 27. 2 Phil. iii. 20. 3 Batten, "The New Citizenship," p. 186. 4 James i. 18. THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES 383 Christian citizenship falling short of that thus indicated demonstrates either a defective inner life or a perverted and misrepresenting outer expression by reason of ignorance of the true correlations in action or of insurmountable ob- structive limitations. Genuine Christian con- duct, informed and unobstructed, can have no other possible outcome than such an exempli- fication of Christian citizenship. In the experimental depths of the Christian soul is found the human birthplace of the world-redeeming ideals. God's ideals Diffused. plans are here transposed into human consciousness. In these psychical depths sublime visions are flashed be- fore human thought. 1 Christian conduct finds another of its final tasks to be the giving of ex- pression and diffusion to these ideals. 2 Great undertakings spring into daring endeavour. 3 Momentous conceptions of coming realizations for man leap into the inspired utterance of human lips. 4 Souls, in whose being the won- derful processes of experimental salvation have been wrought, diffuse through the social life of the world those transforming and exalting ideals, now coming slowly into actual realiza- tion, that are destined to dominate the entire 1 Acts ii. 17. 9 Matt. xiii. 33. 3 Matt, xxviii. 19. 4 Rev. xi. 15. 384 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER social relations of men. 1 True Christian con- duct can do nothing else than pour these ideals into the whole range of social life. It is the op- timistic vision of the life begotten of God break- ing out through every avenue of Christian con- duct. It pervades the social life of Christian civilization more and more, like the breaking of a heavenly dawn. 2 Christian conduct is, in its very essence, the linking of ideal and power. 3 Where the ideal is God-given the power to apply it is power Applied. provided. " The religion of the future must not only supply an ideal, but also a power ; a power, that is to say, which shall enable men to rise towards the ideal presented to their gaze." 4 The conduct of the genuine Christian exhibits such an application of power by the effectiveness of the execution of the ideal. 5 Such conduct is a perpetual object- lesson in demonstration of the applicability of an accessible power, making its contacts some- where in the depths of the psychical being, 6 per- fectly adequate to the realization in the outer life of all the required correlates of the inner ex- perimental life, constituting such a complete citizenship as must, when at all generally at- 1 Mark iv. 31, 32. 2 Rom. viii. 19. 3 Phil. iv. 13. 4 Carpenter, " Permanent Elements of Religion," p. 282. 5 Gal. ii. 20. 6 Eph. iii. 16. THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES 385 tained, redeem the entire social life of man. 1 Furthermore, the conduct of the Christian is not only a demonstration but it is also a per- suasion. It never rests, as we have seen in the evangelistic states, until all others are induced to form the same psychical contacts in saving experience and to apply this power to the same far-reaching results. 2 " Thus there is opened to humanity the possibility of realizing for the race that golden dream of a social and political paradise, which has been attempted by unprac- tical dreamers, striven for by large-hearted phi- lanthropists, cried out for by the weary and toil- ing, but whose realization can never come through the efforts of man but through the power of God." 3 So Christian conduct has set to it the final sub- lime task of effecting the application of divine power to the formation of such prevailing citizen- ship as shall, in its ultimate consummation, dom- inate the length and breadth of human society. 4 Whoever witnesses such conduct, vigorously maintained in the face of all difficulties and dis- couragements arising from present state of character: con ditions in the social world, is Redemption. ' driven to a definite deduction, an enforced conclusion that here is another socio- 1 Hfib.viiLU. 8 Col. i. 11. 8 Carpenter, " Permanent Elements of Religion," p. 284. 4 1 Cor. xv. 24. 386 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER logical state of Christian character. It is well defined by the term, redemption, inasmuch as the final purpose of all conduct depositing it is the redemption of the social world from its wrongs and injustices in customs and institu- tions. This is the evident, settled assurance of the ever bettering transformations of existing social conditions. It is the demonstrated dis- position of the individual Christian soul to contribute every possible aid to lift society towards higher levels, having ever in sight the final glorious stage of social redemption. 1 It banishes forever every vestige of pessimism from the Christian life. No correct formulation of Christian character can omit this state. Among the sociological states it forms the crowning culmination of all. No more significant words could close this discussion of the sociological states than these concerning the cross of Christ : " We cannot doubt that it is capable of far greater results in the future than that which we can trace in the past ; for we are only now beginning to recognize it as a social and political force which is able to do for commonwealths and great societies of men that which it has done for individuals, to uplift fallen nations, to breathe hope into the weaker classes and races of mankind, to give a human heart to systems 1 2 Peter iii. 13. THE SOCIOLOGICAL STATES 387 of commerce and science and art which have seemed non-moral before, to abolish war, to blend the whole world into one." 1 1 Freemantle, M The World as the Subjeot of Redemption," p. 26. VI THE EEACTION FEOM THE EXTEENAL The psychological functions of conduct in the Christian life are, generally speaking, three in number. These functions may be JgoUSS^ somewhat loosely defined as fol- lows : (1) To constitute the normal external vent and product of the psychical en- ergies and conditions active in Christian expe- rience. Without such outer counterpart, as the culmination and completion of the spiritual processes of the Christian life, that life would remain a mere fragment, imperfect, abortive, fruitless. (2) To deposit in the mind of the ob- serving world the states constituting the outer and effective character of the Christian. With- out the material that such conduct provides the mind of the observing world would be void of all that is essential to the formulation of the states of Christian character ; but with that ma- terial rational processes act at once and the ele- ments of Christian character take distinct form in the perceiving mind. (3) To react upon 388 I) agram- a • 51' VcrAvc»\ ; fVianftifrrfrfc 5 c<^Torv ofr , a »v THE REACTION FROM THE EXTERNAL 389 the psychical states of the Christian in a way to strengthen them through the activity and exer- cise necessarily involved in such conduct, and so to evolve higher stages of attainment through developments, demonstrations and inspirations otherwise inaccessible. The first and second of these functions we have considered in all essen- tial detail in former chapters. It The Third only, now on i v remains to examine, at Here Considered. *J ' some length, the third function, the reaction from the external. The psychological study of the Christian life that fails to include, as a factor in the psychical states involved, the reflexes from Reflexes from ,-t , • /» i , conduct vital. the outer region of conduct misses a wide range of facts vital to the right elucidation and comprehensive portrayal of the phenomena it assumes to treat. With the careless observer these reactive effects are easily overlooked. They are subtle and elusive, like the ultra rays in spectrum analysis. Their existence and importance are the discovery of long and careful observation. When fully ap- prehended they form the very capstone in the far-sweeping arch of psychical facts constituting the psychology of the Christian life and char- acter. It is the purpose here to give these reflexes their proper recognition and appropriate rank of importance. 390 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER We shall examine this reaction from two view-points. The first of these will be that of two view-Points: its structural effects on the psy- (i) The Structural i • i. <• i,« ... Effects on Psychical cnical iaculties or powers active in Faculties. the com plete life of the Christian. We are here introduced to most profound re- active results of Christian conduct. We trace that conduct as it returns, in its effects to the psychical area, whence it has arisen, and enters into the psychical processes fixing lines of action and shaping powers of being. The kind and degree of activity in conduct thus determines the nature of all subsequent psychical develop- ment. Rightly proportioned, well-poised ac- tivity can alone issue in balanced development of structure. One-sided, disproportioned ac- tivity, ill-balanced conduct reacts in warped, distorted development of the psychical faculties. The shoulders take on the stoop of their toil, the hand is shaped in muscle and Those Faculties -i , •• , i shaped. bone to its ever-recurring task ; but no more is this true than that the psychical structure is shaped to habitual conduct. Purity in word and deed gives ex- ercise to psychical powers in pure activities and the powers become shaped and set to pureness only. The faculties, in their very structure, grow into conformity to thoughts, choices and aspirations that are essentially clean. They THE REACTION FKOM THE EXTERNAL 391 lose, if they have ever had it, all adaptedness of essence to action that is impure; they become fixed in very fibre to action that is strictly and spiritually wholesome in every quality. Effort for the salvation of the unsaved bringing, as it does, the psychical faculties into solicitous ac- tivities they take on the form of structure educed by such endeavour. Sensitiveness to moral peril, perceptiveness of spiritual worth, intenseness of saving desire become ingrained in the very substance of the powers themselves. Indifference to the danger and neglect of the moral welfare of others become practical im- possibilities to the very psychical structure. Solicitude for the spiritual well-being of others becomes an inherent quality of the psychical processes. Revolt from social wrong in out- spoken condemnation of it and active opposition to it gives bent to the psychical powers towards the purification of the social world. The powers become fitted in their very essence, by such action, to uniform antagonism to all of the evils of human society. The faculties take on sensi- tiveness to all social injury, aversion to social indifference, restiveness under social suffering. Thus in all phases of Christian conduct w r e find it to produce marked structural effects on the psychical faculties. In the light of this fact it is seen to be indispensable to the fullest 392 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER life of the Christian that conduct be exact in its conformity to that kind of action as shall produce the right psychical effects Balance Given to J iL nL'^L • a. • i inner ufe. an d that this be maintained in un- varying uniformity. The symmet- rical evolution of psychical being can only oc- cur under the symmetrical reaction of conduct rightly adjusted and steadily sustained. All failure in conduct issues in corresponding defect in development. The outer life holds a hand of unmeasured structural possibility over the inner life. The second of the view-points from which we examine this reaction from the external is that of its functional effects upon the (2) The Functional . * Effects on Psychical psychical perceptions. JLntirely perceptions. apart from all structural results of conduct upon the psychical powers there may be clearly traced and defined distinct functional effects, effects manifest in the quickened intensity and perspicacity of the powers of spiritual ap- prehension. Conduct is possessed of a function to put the psychical faculties at their best. It keys the powers to an ever higher pitch ; it endows them with ever keener discernment. These effects naturally fall into two classes, and under such classification we will more fully amplify upon each. One form of these effects is found in intensi- THE REACTION FROM THE EXTERNAL 393 fied convictions. Conduct holds an abounding energy of demonstration. It confirms conviction with ever-increasing corroboration. tio t M* ifled Convlc " Christ formulates this inevitable effect in the words : " If any man will do His will he shall know of the doctrine." x Activity in conformity to the truth so affirms the truth to consciousness, so intensi- fies the conviction by a resistless demonstration, that the perception of specific truth is made in- creasingly positive. The faithful doer of the Word always becomes a more intense believer in the Word. Conduct is thus found to be a profound intensifier of conviction, it having be- come such by crowding the truth to actual verification in action. " The sense of reality of the spiritual life depends, to a degree true of no other sphere of life, upon the ethical atti- tude." 2 Conviction of the truth becomes ever deeper and stronger under the verifying reactions from conduct. The other form of these effects is a clarified vision. Conduct is also found to possess a re- markable function of setting things clarified vision. i n their true relations to each other. It is a great producer of right psychical perspective. Misplacements and distortions are eliminated under the applied 1 John vii. 17. "King, " The SeemiDg Unreality of the Spiritual Life," p. 133. 394 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER activities of actual conduct. Misfits are dis- covered and true correlations are ascertained. Misleading and deceptive perceptions are cor- rected under the stern contacts of conduct. Under such progressive readjustments vision finds a clearer air and more unobstructed per- spective. The perception of spiritual things be- comes ever more mature, more penetrating, more distinct. Conduct is a merciless corrective of errors in psychical optics. It is fatal to vagaries, spectres, fanaticisms. It verifies directions, di- mensions, colourings. The psychical life derives from conduct a vision clear, accurate, far reach- ing. " Vistas into reality may open along the way of duty-doing which are hid from the high- way of theological learning." 1 The psychical life of the Christian is in imminent peril of dis- astrous hallucinations when devoid of the cor- rections, balancings and inspirations of its exact correlated conduct. But under the effects of such conduct that life is possessed of an ever clearer vision and the light of eternal verities breaks over all of its perceptions. We have thus seen that from the region of con- duct comes some of the most important and po- tent moulding forces shaping the psychical life of the Christian. Indeed, so positive are these effects that it may be ventured that an open way to a subsequent Christian experience lies along 1 Peabody, " Jesus Christ and Christian Character," p. 38.] THE REACTION FROM THE EXTERNAL 305 the path of this reaction on psychical states from external conduct. Even mechanical conduct, in conformity to Christian truth and Possibility in • • , l j i • i such Reaction. spirit, may lead up to psychical states issuing in the development of a definite inner experience. Observation of this process has led to a striking remark by a recent author : " Other times have first been taught the nature of God and then have turned to the service of man. It may be the distinction of the present age to reverse this order of religious experience and to rediscover the knowledge of God through the doing of duty. It may be that beyond the ethical renaissance of the present time there is waiting a revival of religion." l Such words may contain an overestimate of the reactive function of conduct, but they are at least suggestive of the important discovery that such a function exists and fills a large place in the psychical processes of the Christian life. In view of these facts it becomes evident that action and reaction are the alternative and re- sponsive processes by which the Action and Reac- /ni • .• !•/» i i tion in co-operation. Christian life becomes more and more substantial in its reality and expansive in its attainments. The energies of the inner, experimental life project themselves in conduct ; conduct, in return, strengthens these energies, verifies their accuracies, enlarges 1 Peabody, "Jesus Christ and Christian Character," p. 29. 390 STATES OF CHRISTIAN CHARACTER their proficiencies and expands their capacities. These increased psychical faculties again project themselves in still more effective action, receiv- ing back in return a reaction of still larger sequence to the inner life. Thus the life of the Christian rises in ever ascending attainment in experience, conduct and character. Action and reaction are the counterparts in the eternal prog- ress of this life. Eternity can but give wider scope and greater speed to this glorious ascent. In this study of the psychology of the Chris- tian life, its experience and character, we have now reached a final view-point, Future of christian w h ence we may ta ke an indubi- Life Estimated. J table estimate of the future of the life of the Christian in its experimental and practical aspects. Its psychical energies and processes are to become ever more definite and positive ; its regions ever more clearly mapped and its states unquestionably located ; its under- lying areas, throbbing with the exhaustless di- vine Presence and energy, ever more distinctly conceded ; its output in conduct ever more exact and uniform in its formulation ; its issue in character ever more reliable and resplendent in moral quality ; its reaction from conduct ever more stimulative of the highest possible attain- ment, until the one finite thing of superlative worth in the known universe is the life of the Christian. Index Abundance of response, 164 Acceptance, state of, 148 Acquirement of Christ-spirit, 191 Actions, clean, in conduct, 332 Activity, in conduct, 348 Adequacy of reaction, 210 Adolescent period, 233 Adolescence, cause in, 233 Adoption, 1 18, 151 Advanced states entered, 147 Advantage in nurture, 157 Affectional functioning, 186 Ahasuerus convicted, 90 All to save, in conduct, 365 Alleviation, in conduct, 372 Ambition, state of, 350 Answer by Scripture insight, 271 Anxiety for souls, in conduct, 352 Apologetics, basis of, 198 Appeal, state of, 363 Approximation to the Christ-spirit, 189 Area of correspondence, 185 Ascending movement, 160 Ascent, states in, 159 Assent to the Gospel, 75 Assimilation of material, II Augmentation of energy, 175 Balance, by conduct, 392 Balanced character, 320 Basis of Apologetics, 198 Benefits of Gospel, 201 Bible history in apologetics, 199 Bible study, in conduct, 330 Birth by the Spirit, 115 Cataclysm awaited, 88 Cataclysmic states not normal, 149 Character formation, 311 Character, its forerunners, 311 Character, personal states of, 323, 328 Chasm, a seeming, 88 Cheer, diffusal of, 336 Child at parting of ways, 77 Child, apart from nurture, 77 Child, under nurture, 77 Child's vision of God, 76 Christ-spirit, the goal, 189 Christian life, forecast of, 396 Christian life only under consider- ation, 7 Christian states homogeneous, 328 Citizenship, exemplification of, 382 Clarification by conduct, 393 Cleansing not forgiveness, 113 Cleansing from sin, 112 Concern for individuals, 353 Conclusion from insight, 266 Condemnation, its loss, 120 Condemnation, its origin and ef- fects, 82 Condemnation, only where sin is present, 146 Conduct begets character, 318 Conduct, its relations, 314 Conduct, normal vent, 316 Conferment of divine likeness, 291 Consciousness, dawn of, 66 Consciousness, interrelations with subconsciousness, 59, 64 Consciousness, region of, 53 Consciousness, degrees of, 48 Considerateness, in conduct, 337 Consistency, in conduct, 346 Control of self, in conduct, 342 Conversion most frequent in ado- lescence, 233 Conversion remote from adoles- cence, 234 Conversion, not inherent in ado- lescence, 234 Conviction, at Pentecost, 91 Conviction, its rise, 89 Conviction, pivotal, 96 Conviction, recent, 92 Conviction, state of, 93 Cooperation of action and reaction, 395 397 398 INDEX Correction of erroneous institu- tions, 380 Cost uncounted, 364 Counterpart, external, 298 Covenant for service, state of, 101, 147 Co-working of God, 290 Craving for infilling, 181 Craving, without sequence, 183 Creation of salutary institutions, 380 Credentials of Scripture insight, 252 Critical study, dread of, 29 Dedication of self and belong- ings, 102 Dedication for higher service, 133 Dedication modified, 147 Definition of conduct, 316 Deliverance of insight final, 282 Delusions dissolved, 37 Depravity, total, without extant evidence, 69 Depths of God's word, 164 Destructive methods, 30 Devoutness, state of, 331 Diagnosis of disorder, 252 Diagrams of inner life explained, 48 Diagrams of outer life explained, 327 Diffusal of ideals, 383 Disobedience, its origin, 80 Disparities in character, 305 Distinctions in beliefs, 29 Divine personality, 272 Division of human being, tripartite, 10 Doubt foreign to child, 148 Drawing to Christ, 359 Dread of psychological inquiry, 31 Ease of possession, 179 Effort, cessation of, 105 Elimination of harmful customs, 378 Enlargement of life, 184 Entrance of power, 174 Environment, modifying, 86 Eradication of injustice, 375 Evangelistic states, derivative, 35 1 Evidence of insight, 250 Evidences, vary in value, 203 Exacter method, remedy in, 309 Exactness of promise, 163 Exaltation of salvation, 363 Exhibition of power applied, 384 Expansion of capacity, state of, 178 Expansion awaiting response, 182 Experience, clarified, 9 Experiences, never identical, 86 Experience, no required, 306 Exposure of injustice, 374 External, reaction from the, 388 External, rise into, 298 Facility indicates capacity, 180 Faith, acceptance by, 104 Faith, claim by, 134 Faith, its assertion, 106 Faith, response to, 109, 174 Faith, without direct sequence, 108, 135, 147, 174 Faraday's attitude, 30 Field of experience, 51 Filial sense, 122, 155 Fixed laws of subconscious forces, 229 Forces, subconscious, at work, 228 Forging of links, 358 Forgiveness for sin, ill Forgiveness for vacillation, 135 Forgiveness, state of, 340 Formalism, survival of, 273 Formation of character states, the, 3 11 Formulation of external counter- part, 299 Function of conduct, 388 Functional effects of conduct, 392 Future of Christian life, 396 Gentleness, state of, 338 Glory undimmed, 287 God beneath experience, 206 God, fullness of, 137 God's presence unmodified, 287 God, the Gospel's source, 76 Gospel, the, use of term, 5 Growth and progress, 160 Growth in grace, 159 Guidance in experience, 44 INDEX 399 Handicap, self-imposed, 197 Harmonization of general phe- nomena, 8 Help for suffering, 371 Hemispheres in character, 301 Holy Spirit in the psychical field, 275 Holy Spirit, initiator of better im- pulse, 277 Holy Spirit, alone regenerates, 278 Holy Spirit, source of life and power, 2S0 Holy Spirit, the transformer, 281 Home, impressions of, 143 Horizontal movement, 159 Hypnotic action, results of, 246 Hypnotic condition, 244 Hypnotic suggestion, 244 Identical states, 157 Illumination, 72 Impression of perception of God, 230 Impulses, an index, 187 Impulse, primal, 70 Impulses of child, 69 Inability, concession of, 354 Incapacity, alleged, 240 Incapacity, very rare, 241 Inclination to larger tasks, 176 Increase of faith, 167 Induction of character states, 314 Inerrancy of history, 199 Inferences, erroneous, 233 Inference, availability of, 227, 249 Inference ceases, 231 Inference, study by, 222 Inferences, admissible, 227 Influence, state of, 360 Infusion of uplift, 378 Initial refusal to obey, 78 Initiation by the Holy Spirit, 312 Inner and outer life, correlates, 328 Insight, Scriptural admitted as valid, 9 Insight, open to test, 251 Insight, reliability of, 264 Inspiration, authority of, 7 1 Inspiration, light of, no Inspiration, study by, 223 Integrity, state of, 347 Intelligence of faith, 168 Intelligence of forces, 230 Intensity of faith, 170 Intensification by nurture, 15 1 Intensification by conduct, 393 Intent of return, 83 Intercessation, state of, 356 Interpretation of the Christ-con- sciousness, 190 Intricacy of states, 160 Invitation to accept, 361 Irrepressibility of inner life, 297 Irritation, resistance of, 341 Issuance in conduct, 313 Joy of cleansing, 120 Joy of pardon for vacillation, 138 Key to this study, 75 Kindness, state of, 337 Location of injustice, 374 Loss of condemnation, 120 Love's power, 187 Loyalty to truth, 39 Man, born child of God, 144 Manner unruffled, 341 Mechanism absent, 230 Method fearless, 36 Minuteness of single acquirements, 191 Miracles, credibility of, 199 Mistakes, effect of on character, 306 Movement in apologetics, 205 Mystery not less, 43 Need, search for, 334 Need, supply of, 335 New depth of love, 187 Newness of life, state of, 119 Nurture, earlier aspects of, 143 Nurture, normal, 142 Nurture, states under, 143 Obedience, right to, 77 Observation has limits, 70 Old tendencies, rise of, 129 Ordeal of new-born soul, 126 Origin supernatural, 8 Origin of conversion, 218 4:00 INDEX Origin of conviction, 217 Origin of possession of power, 220 Origin of disorder, 255 Oscillation between victory and de- feat, 131 Outer life, the, 303 Overwhelming excellencies of Christ, 189 Palliating condemnation, 83 Parallel phenomena, 235 Pathway to character, 328 Patience, state of, 342 Peace of rightness, 153 Penetration progressive, 190 Perception, ready, 66 Persistence of faith, 171 Personal states, elementary, 351 Phenomena most involved, 215 Phenomena of conversion, 238 Pivotal stage, 131 Place of convulsion, 85 Pleading to receive, 362 Possibility in reaction, 395 Power, gift of, 136 Power, possession of, 137 Prayer in conduct, 329 Predisposition to Gospel, 69 Preparation needed, 207 Problem of insight, 250 Processes under conscious states, 198 Progress and growth, 160 Progressiveness in conduct, 349 Promise, application of, 105 Prophecy, fulfillment of, 200 Prospect in ascent, 192 Psychological era, this, 34 Psychological research, field of, 34 Psychological standpoint, indis- pensable, 42 Psychology, Christian, arrival of, 35 Psychology, Christian, benefit of, Psychology, Christian, defined, 33 Psychology, Christian, its mission, ^ 35 Psychology, Christian, its first task, 64 Psychology, Christian, its greater task, 198, 205, 211, 212, 225 Psychology, Christian, its recep- tion, 35 Psychology, Christian, material admitted by, 49 Purity, state of, 334 Purpose of this treatise, 87 Questions answered by psychol- ogy* 43 Range of affections, 186 Reaction from the external, 388 Reaction inadequate, 209 Reception of Gospel, 67 Recoil from scientific handling, 30 Reconstruction of institutions, 381 Redemption of society, 385 Reduction in struggle, 176 Reflexes from conduct, 389 Reformation of customs, 379 Regeneration, its place and process, "5 Regeneration, its results, 121 Reliability in conduct, 347 Reliability of insight, 250 Reliance upon God, 356 Relief from sin, 255 Relief of suffering, 371 Relish for truth, 68 Remedy in exacter method, 309 Removal of injustice, 376 Repentance, state of, 97 Research, this book outgrowth of, 11 Resort to God, 355 Resultants of divine origin, 292 Return of good for evil, 339 Revelations in service, 162 Revisal of wrong customs, 377 Revolt against social wrong, 37 1 Right, moderation in, 344 Rightness of heart, 152 Righteousness, loyalty to, 345 Sacrifice, state of, 366 Salvation, personal, beyond value, 29 Science, technical psychological, 9 Schooling in Psychology, 207 Schooling, religious, 86 Scientific method applied, 9 INDEX 401 Scripture insight, reliability of, 250 Search lor hold on others, 357 Service, covenant for, 10 1 Service, its revelations, 163 Shaping of faculties, 175 Sin, abandonment of, 99 Sin, evolution of, 253 Sin, fear of effects, 95 Sin, how removed, 85 Sin, how enters, 80 Sin, its burden of guilt, 94 Sin, its heinousness, 94 Sin, its sense defined, 81 Sin, return from, to God, 100 Sin, sorrow for, 98 Sin-induced states absent, 146 Solicitude, state of, 353 Soul entire, laid bare, 40 Specialization, faith increased in, 169 Specialized character an error, 320 Spiritual life, science of, in in- fancy, 45 Standard, no accredited, 308 States of character, deposit of, 315 States of character, three series, 321 States, in ascent, 159 States, the antecedent, 66 States, the cataclysmic, 85 States, the evangelistic, 323, 351 States, the personal, 322, 328 States, the sociological, 324, 367 States, their origin, 206 States, under nurture, 143 Structural effects of conduct, 390 Study by inference, 222 Subconsciousness, evidence of, 50 Subconsciousness, region of, 56 Subconsciousness, vital, 57 Subconscious phenomena-clusters, 216 Succession of states, 86 Suggestion, hypnotic, 244 Superiority among religions, 202 Supernatural defined, 8 Supernatural factors unimpaired, 285 Surprise and yielding, 127, 156 Survival of formalism and theism, 273 Tabulated testimonies, 86 Temperament, its effects, 86 Temperance, state of, 345 Temptation, its advent, 79 Tendencies, rise of old, 127 Tendencies, rise of sinful, 156 Tenderness in conduct, 338 Theism and Christian experience distinct, 273 Transformed by regeneration, 121 Trend of being, 66 Two methods of study, 222 Unction, divine, 161 Unction for service, 140 Uniformity, effort for, state of, 132 Uniformity of resistance, 139 Unlimited energy, 177 Unsteadiness, confession of, 132 Vacillation, state of, 127, 156 Vacillation, state of, rarely absent, 129 Vacuum, the call of, 181 Variations in experience, 86 Vision of character, 320 Vital factors in tact, 293 Vitality, increase of, 184 Witness of Spirit in conversion, I2 3 Witness of Spirit in unforfeited childhood, 155 Wonder unabated, 286 Words, pure, in conduct, 333 Worship in conduct, 331 Wrong, abstinence from, 343 Wrong by others, ignoring of, 393 Wrong, condemnation of, 369 Wrong, opposition to, 370 Yielding, upon surprise, 127 IAN 4 19ff Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide Treatment Date: April 2005 PreservationTechnologies A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive Cranberry Township, PA 16066 (724)779-2111 One copy del. to Cat. Div.