LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 
 
 
 CNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 
 
NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 a Stutrg of Bible Ferificatton 
 
 / 
 
 ( 
 
 IN THE RANGE OF COMMON EXPERIENCE. 
 
 E. C. CUMMINGS. 
 
 "rt Ka9' Tjfiepay avaKpivoures ras ypa<pas, et ex<>'^ ravra ovrcas. 
 
 The Acts, xvii. 11. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 CUPPLES AND KURD, 
 
 94 ^oplfiitan mvttt 
 
 1887. 
 
^ 
 
 ^v^l 
 
 CL"* 
 
 \<i^ 
 
 Copyright^ 1884, 
 By B. C. Cummings. 
 
 »niber«tta Press: 
 John Wilson and Son, Cambridqe. 
 
PEEFACE 
 
 TO THE SECOND EDITION. 
 
 IN" offering another edition of " Nature in Scripture," 
 the author desires to acknowledge the generous 
 recognition accorded to the first, especially the appre- 
 ciative judgments of the eminent men appealed to for 
 careful criticism. He could not, however, regard the 
 book as having hopefully sustained its first trial, with- 
 out proofs of genial interest such as have reached him 
 from those reading it for truth's sake simply. 
 
 Important suggestions, thankfully considered, have 
 seemed to point toward a supplementary study, rather 
 than to essential changes within the limits of this one. 
 An index has been added. 
 
 A very discriminating reviewer has said that " this is 
 not a work that he who runs may read ; " adding, that 
 " it is worth the time which a thinking man may spend 
 upon it." One does not need to go far in intellectual 
 experience to find that a degree of temporary difii- 
 culty may be incident to the very quality on which 
 the value of a work depends, — at least in the case 
 of some readers. While, therefore, it is no small com- 
 fort to be assured that one's work is not unsuited to "a 
 
IV PRE FA CE. 
 
 thinking man," it would be a pity, certainly, if it should 
 not address itself effectually to any one really beginning 
 to go beyond conventionalities. 
 
 It is on this account that the author has a value, pos- 
 sibly peculiar to himself, for some prefatory definitions 
 and the introductory chapter. Whoever looks well to 
 this preliminary part, especially the ground-plan at its 
 close, will find himself easily in possession of the whole 
 order of inquiry, according to which each successive 
 chapter claims its place, and asserts its significance, as 
 a w^ork of detail. 
 
 FOKTLAND, Me., 
 
 July 28, 1887. 
 
PEEFACE. 
 
 SO long as the Bible is studied as a deposit of truth, 
 so long it will be studied as- a standard of appeal 
 with respect to what is the truth, which, in the whole or 
 in any part, was intended to be conveyed. In studying 
 the Bible, however, different minds may start from oppo- 
 site points and meet on a common ground. 
 
 For example, one class of minds starts from a postu- 
 late of inspiration, and moves on to a conviction of truth 
 in which the postulate is sustained. Another class of 
 minds starts from a point of view which denies the pos- 
 tulate of inspiration, and moves on to a conviction of 
 truth — the same truth, possibly, by which alone the 
 postulate of inspiration can be supported, whether as 
 premise or conclusion. 
 
 But vastly more numerous than either of these classes 
 is the great middle class, children in families and Sun- 
 day-schools, sober-minded hearers in church, who listen 
 for the meaning of what is said, preoccupied people, who 
 do not concern themselves with speculations, — to all of 
 whom the Bible is commended, and to many of whom it 
 commends itself, on account of its kindly intention, its 
 truth to nature and life. 
 
vi PREFACE. 
 
 Of course, the truth of the Scriptures is in what they 
 really mean. Any theory of inspiration would contem- 
 plate that meaning of the written word which is identical 
 with the Divine thought ; but no theory of inspiration 
 can assure us of what that meaning is. On the other 
 hand, let the Divine thought be made clear, and it is 
 independent of all theories of inspiration. We are satis- 
 fied with the truth, in whatever way it may have been 
 ministered to our spirits. 
 
 The study which is to follow has reference to the 
 meaning of the Scriptures, — not the meanings of detail, 
 the affair of critical exegesis, but the meaning which is 
 simple and coherent, the result of a reasoned estimate 
 and comparison of plain popular testimony. 
 
 In the Scriptures the order of nature is the creation of 
 God. This might suffice as the one premise on which 
 our study should proceed. But for the sake of distinc- 
 tion and definiteness, it seems better to define two prem- 
 ises — the answers to two questions; namely. What is 
 nature as contemplated in Scripture? and. What is 
 Scripture in relation to nature? 
 
 1. Nature^ as contemplated in Scripture, is the uni- 
 versal system of which man finds himself a part, and 
 which he rationally refers in- whole and in detail to 
 supernatural causation. 
 
 2. Scripture, in relation to nature, is a complement of 
 writings, whose distinguishing mark is not in unity of 
 time, action, or literary form, but in unity of testimony 
 to one self-existent Creator of all things, conceived as 
 dealing, through material elements and spiritual messen- 
 gers, with human society as a whole; especially, as ad- 
 vancing a chosen people to eminent service for mankind 
 under an economy of moral control and spiritual disci- 
 
PREFACE. vii 
 
 pline, wherein the people is called to voluntary co-opera- 
 tion with God in his revelation, while the revelation of 
 God is affirmed as the ruling factor in the history of 
 mankind, till at length revelation surpasses the earlier 
 economy, and comes to personal consummation in a Man 
 of divine character — the Word of God, the Light of the 
 world. 
 
 These premises are important, as indicating what the 
 verification of Scripture involves. 
 
 There is a process of verification applicable to the 
 Scriptures as to other writings, which is outward and 
 incidental. Assuming the canon and the text, attentive 
 reading is a process of verification in proportion to the 
 reader's intelligence, whether as respects the outward 
 representations or the inward significance of the sacred 
 writings. Any further verification is a broader or deeper 
 reading. It is a broader reading that is carried on in 
 the fields of comparative philology, archaeology, history, 
 and physical science, where are sought the proofs of 
 fidelity and exactness in the setting forth of outward 
 aspects or objects in any region or period contemplated. 
 The range of this reading is without assignable limits of 
 space or time. 
 
 But the province of verification which is the most 
 important as well as the most interesting, is inward and 
 integral. It contemplates the quality and power of di- 
 vine teaching as certified in its spiritual effects ; for ex- 
 ample, that it commands the concurrence of human 
 reason in its own right; that it takes sovereign posses- 
 sion of man's higher convictions, in order to dominate 
 his lower tendencies ; that it proclaims prophetically in 
 the human soul the overruling of man's free activity 
 according to divine intention; that it raises the con- 
 
viii PREFACE, 
 
 ception of God and of his government through lessons of 
 experience and the logic of events ; and so educates the 
 human mind to an apprehension of manhood as designed 
 to surpass the degree of physical creation, the visible 
 image of God, and to reach spiritual consummation in 
 the very character of t]ie Father. This is the verifica- 
 tion of deep reading, — on the basis of " internal evi- 
 dence," but without limits of time or space. 
 
 The revelation of God set forth in the Scriptures is, 
 therefore, co-extensive in its range with the work of God 
 as disclosed to us in nature. But as accommodated to 
 the spmtual apprehension and experience of mankind, 
 this revelation is progressive and cumulative, — holding 
 on its way according to a ruling idea and purpose. It 
 contemplates the instruction of mankind in the knowl- 
 edge of God and of eternal life, — not in the cosmical 
 mysteries of matter and motion. Accordingly, it deter- 
 mines the religious consecration of language, — not its 
 scientific development. It gives names and descriptions 
 of material nature according to conceptions of common 
 sense, which cover all that science can ever discover, — 
 addressing men in their own tongue wherein they were 
 born, not in the terminology of experts to which but few 
 are ever trained. Hence it is logically impossible that 
 any but constructive and transitory contradictions should 
 ever occur between Scripture representation and scien- 
 tific truth in the domain of material nature. 
 
 But in the realm of the human spirit the case is dif- 
 ferent. Here revelation makes for change, — change in 
 the forms of conscious experience, change in the quality 
 and quantity of being. Man is conceived as constituted 
 in order to his being changed. It is in the progress of a 
 personal struggle with outward nature, with his fellow- 
 
PREFACE. ix 
 
 men, with himself, in fine, with the Maker of all, that 
 man passes from what he is to what he is becoming. 
 Hence the meaning of Scripture which concerns the 
 divine law of personal development, the meaning of Scrip- 
 ture which declares itself as the oracle of life through 
 all ages of transformation, — this is the meaning which 
 abideth forever, the Word of the Eternal. 
 
 If, then, there is found in Scripture a convincing tes- 
 timony to universal nature as the medium of a perpetual 
 creative teaching in the human spirit for man's ultimate 
 perfection, no wonder if it be found necessary, in each 
 succeeding generation, to verify the vital significance of 
 particular words, and to deal anew with questions of 
 faith that can never be so answered as not to be asked 
 again, till it is recognized as a rule of life, — that any 
 one, having freely received, shall freely offer to other 
 learners the results of such inquiry as the progress of 
 his own mind has required him to undertake, and re- 
 warded him for carrying through. 
 
 Under this rule the essay that follows is offered, for 
 acceptance or correction, — not as if what is verifiable 
 were the measure of what is true, but because the 
 human mind is ever seeking what is verifiable in the 
 effort to learn what is true. 
 
 Portland, Me., Feb. 1, 1884. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 INTRODUCTIOK 
 
 Page 
 Concerning Speech and Words 3 
 
 PART FIRST. 
 
 THE WORLD TUTELAGE. 
 Chapteb 
 
 I. Tutelage a Law op Nature 23 
 
 II. CosMicAL Tutelage 27 
 
 III. JEoNiAN Tutelage 31 
 
 IV. Ages of Human Development 39 
 
 V. Ages of Divine Teaching 46 
 
 PART SECOND. 
 
 THE FALL. 
 
 I. Original Man and Primitive Trial 57 
 
 n. Genesis Cosmical and Ionian 73 
 
 III. Moral Development from Discoveries of Law 83 
 
XU CONTENTS. 
 
 PART THIRD. 
 
 THE PRINCIPLE OF JUSTIFICATION". 
 
 Chapter * Page 
 
 I. Of Faith as related to Man's Dependence and 
 
 Progress 101 
 
 II. Against Transcendental Notions of Primitive 
 
 Kesponsibility 114 
 
 IH. Original Man and Historic Man 127 
 
 IV. The Perfect Faith and the Approved Man . 135 
 
 PART FOURTH. 
 
 THE MANIFESTATION OF EVIL. 
 
 I. Or Speculations on Original Sin 145 
 
 11. Of Spiritual Law Overruling Physical Ten- 
 dency ... 151 
 
 III. Of Pains and Penalties as related to Conduct 160 
 
 IV. Op Physical Death as related to Spiritual 
 
 Development 175 
 
 V. Deterrent Consequences of Deliberate Un- 
 belief 188 
 
 VI. Evil as set forth in the Christ's Teaching . 193- 
 
 PART FIFTH. 
 
 THE LAW OF ATONEMENT. 
 
 I. Recapitulation and Transition 213 
 
 II. The Law of Atonement in its Physical Type . 220 
 
 III. The Law of Atonement in General History . 228 
 
 IV. The Law of Atonement in Scripture History. 
 
 Primitive and Patriarchal Sacrifice . . . 242 
 
CONTENTS. xiii 
 
 Chapter Page 
 
 V. Sacrifice under the Law 252 
 
 VI. Sacrifice according to the Prophets . . . 263 
 VII. The Law of Atonement Fulfilled in the 
 
 Christ 271 
 
 VIII. Immediate Sequel of the Christ's Incarnate 
 
 Ministry 290 
 
 PART SIXTH. 
 
 CRISES m THE PROCESS OF REDEMPTION. 
 
 I. Of Justice and Judgment 299 
 
 II. Crises under Laws of Physical Change . . 303 
 
 m. Crises under Laws of Spiritual Development 30&- 
 IV. Crises According to the Old Testament 
 
 Teaching 316 
 
 V. Crises Interpreted by the Christ .... 319 
 
 Conclusion 337 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 CONCERNING SPEECH AND "WORDS. 
 
" And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the 
 field, and every fowl of the air ; and brought them unto Adam to 
 see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every 
 living creature, that was the name thereof." 
 
 Genesis, ii. 19. 
 
 " A NATURAji action is it that man speaks ; 
 But whether thus or thus, doth Nature leave 
 To your own art, as seemeth good to you." 
 
 Longfellow's Dante, — " Paradise," xxvi. 130. 
 
NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 INTEODUCTIOK 
 
 CONCERNING SPEECH AND WORDS. 
 
 TT is proposed to study some parts of the Scripture 
 -*- teaching in the light of material objects and human 
 experiences to which that teaching bears testimony. 
 
 To adjust one's instrument is to begin work. I know 
 of no better introduction to the work proposed than 
 paying some attention to speech, — that curious instru- 
 ment by which all things, and all relations of things, 
 are brought into the working of men's minds. 
 
 The fundamental teachings of Scripture are not local 
 or temporary, — but universal. The field is the world. 
 Accordingly, the earliest Scripture brings to our notice 
 the universal law of human speech; and a brief con- 
 sideration of this law can hardly fail to quicken and 
 temper our judgments as to the use of some very impor- 
 tant words in the latest Scriptures, — words by which 
 the whole sphere of reality wherein our thought moves 
 has been summed up. 
 
 The picture of primitive speech in the second chap- 
 ter of Genesis is fresh and appreciable now, for the 
 reason that in whatever ways the forms of speech may 
 
4 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 have changed, the inner reality is ever the same. To- 
 day, as in the beginning, living creatures are formed 
 out of the dust of the ground, and are brought to man. 
 New species, or peculiar individuals, may at any time 
 come to man's notice in the course of propagation and dis- 
 covery, and still the rule holds good that whatsoever man 
 calls every living creature, that is the name thereof. The 
 method of naming belongs to the method of creation. 
 
 Any object brought to man's attention suggests its 
 own name, we may imagine, by means of some striking 
 quality or aspect. Then other objects possessed of the 
 same quality, or presenting the same aspect, range them- 
 selves under the same name. In this way the name be- 
 comes a general or family designation ; while individuals 
 demand a further naming, according to their several attri- 
 butes, to distinguish them from each other. In any case, 
 a name once given not only stands in the mind for the 
 object to which it belongs, but grows to be representa- 
 tively the equal of the object, — puts itself into the 
 same conditions and relations, demands connectives and 
 auxiliaries, seeks, in fine, to become as vital and important 
 as the existence or action it contemplates. 
 
 The name need not consist of one word only. It may 
 be supplemented, — in fact, drawn out indefinitely. Thus 
 there is secured to the latest comer in the world his 
 individual right of naming. He is permitted to call the 
 objects presented to him by names other than those 
 already given, — names that shall correspond with his 
 peculiar susceptibility, interest, and knowledge with re- 
 gard to the objects. For example, " mountain " is a very- 
 general name. Among many mountains there is one, it 
 may be, that attracts somebody's attention by its color 
 or shape, and he calls it *' green " or " round " mountain. 
 
SPEECH AND WORDS. 5 
 
 But the mountain presents itself to multitudes of ob- 
 servers in successive generations. Firm as it is, the 
 mountain does not hold out unchanged. Adverse ele- 
 ments are at work upon it, — now fire, now frost. At 
 one time it is denuded of trees or even of soil. Again 
 it is overrun with various orders of vegetation, haunted 
 by tribes of animals, explored and perused by lovers of 
 wild scenery, or analyzed and penetrated by the curious 
 in science, to make it disclose the secrets of its forma- 
 tion and contents. Why would not the accurate account 
 of all this make just so much descriptive name or repute 
 of the mountain, exactly like one's calling it green or 
 round ? Thus there is brought before us the persistent 
 correlation of three sorts of things, namely, outward ob- 
 jects, observing minds, representative names. We find 
 the most extended descriptions depending upon a mental 
 exertion identical with that which originated the first 
 word-element. It is the law of existence. The world's 
 history is the co-ordinate development of material na- 
 ture, mind, and language. Mind is the luminous centre, 
 and whatever objects are presented, the word-shadow is 
 sure to be cast. Be the shadow one syllable or thou- 
 sands of sentences, it may be called a name. There is 
 an assumed equality of a book's title and its contents. 
 The detail of a descriptive catalogue is only what is 
 meant by the name that sums up the collection. The 
 whole creation, throughout the ages of life of which 
 man is speaking, " according to his own art, as seemeth 
 best to him," is conceived in Scripture as the Word 
 of God, by which he awakens thought, teaching us to 
 give him names, — and at length a name of majesty 
 and goodness. 
 
 Our extended sense of name implies, of course, not 
 
6 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 simply the multiplication of words, but the organic 
 structure of language. AVords are vitally related to one 
 another. Otherwise they could not be made to repre- 
 sent the intimate relations and lucid order of thought, 
 — till they have actually grown by inflection and com- 
 position, by logical and rhetorical arrangement, to the 
 very form and pressure of intellectual experience. The 
 naming faculty rises to a new effort when the objects 
 and elements of nature are studied under conditions of 
 thought connected with accumulated results and re- 
 sources of investigation, — the effort indicated in scien- 
 tific nomenclature. 
 
 As speech tends to keep even pace with the intelligent 
 appreciation of things, so a word having the beginning 
 of its use from a cfertain original suggestion or starting- 
 point of thought tends to hold on its way in the same 
 direction. Those who use words are concerned to keep 
 them lively and active, — equal to the vigor and variety 
 of the objects they represent. Words in one respect are 
 like the giant who was strong only when he touched the 
 ground. They need to be kept in close contact with the 
 realities which are the ground of their significance. But, 
 if words are carried away from the real ground of their 
 meaning, so as to acquire a fanciful or merely conven- 
 tional force, then it happens, according to the saying 
 of Bacon, " that words, as a Tartar's bow, do shoot back 
 upon the understanding of the wisest, and mightily 
 entangle and pervert the judgment." ^ This applies es- 
 pecially to words of comprehensive significance, that 
 have their rights in part by inheritance from other 
 words in other languages, — whose duties they are set 
 to discharge. 
 
 1 "Works, vol. i. p. 211, — '* Advancement of Learning." 
 
SPEECH AND WORDS. 7 
 
 The word world, for example, has a really inexhaust- 
 ible import in the English New Testament ; such, indeed, 
 that it would be impossible to appreciate the general cast 
 of thought to which those writings seek to introduce us, 
 without particular attention to this word. Its fulness 
 of meaning is due to the fact that, in our authorized ver- 
 sion, the single word world has taken up into itself the 
 force of two Greek terms, each of immeasurable import ; 
 and now it will be hard for any revision to disengage 
 and distribute anew the values that have been treasured 
 so long in one syllable. 
 
 It is plain that our word ivorld, as a name for the 
 sum of things, has not reached its fulness till there is a 
 general consent as to what grand total is referred to. 
 But when creation has disclosed the rounded system, 
 and thought has embraced the same and confided it to 
 this word's keeping, then, in whatever subordinate sense 
 the word may be used, it is never wholly alienated from 
 its supreme significance. We may have any number of 
 worlds by reason of the world that includes them all, 
 and by whose law they exist. Call the earth the world. 
 It is not the world without its sun, moon, and stars. 
 Take them away, and earth falls into chaos. Speak of 
 the world of mind in distinction from the world of mat- 
 ter. But it is mind in relation with matter that we 
 mean. The two worlds are one. Refer to the world 
 of art or science, — the religious, the political, the social 
 world. But these are not worlds apart from the grand 
 total which is the world. Say there is a world of law 
 in a drop of water. Yes : because the same law " pre- 
 serves the stars from wrong." Any kind or order of 
 world implies the world-total. Each variety of the idea 
 requires the unity to constitute it. The ultimate reach 
 
8 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 of thought which a word registers is inseparable from 
 the minor phases of its meaning ; because throughout 
 its gradations the word is animated by a common soul. 
 
 Let us take now the Greek word cosmos, to whose 
 properties and functions our word world has fallen heir 
 in the New Testament, and see how the same law is 
 illustrated. 
 
 Cosmos seems to set out from a fundamental idea 
 of orderly relation and harmony of parts, and to rise 
 through humbler uses to its high significance. An orna- 
 ment making an impression of harmony and beauty on 
 the observer, the fine arrangement and keeping of dress, a 
 well-ordered army animated by a single mind and will, — 
 these are examples to indicate the kind of objects to 
 which, by reason of a certain common quality, the word 
 cosmos was applicable at first. But when all visible 
 order is apprehended as the reign of invisible law, when 
 the heavens and the earth with all their hosts are seen 
 to exhibit a harmony so pervading as to awaken the be- 
 lief that the order of nature is unbroken, — then there 
 is not only this or that thing which may be called a 
 cosmos; there is the cosmos, the totality of order and 
 beauty, the revelation of transcendent Intelligence and 
 Power. Let this ultimate idea be once in the mind, 
 and it takes possession of the word also. Throughout 
 the range of its minor uses the word carries henceforth 
 the grand cosmical conception, and refers the least ex- 
 ample of real order to universal law. Indeed, the word 
 has a tendency to give up its primitive applications, as 
 too little in keeping with its great calling as a name for 
 the material universe. 
 
 It is natural that the words " world " and " cosmos," 
 though starting from different original suggestions, in 
 
SPEECH AND WORDS. 9 
 
 different portions of the human family, at diiEferent times, 
 should come to be the equivalents of each other, since 
 both reach a unity of significance in the sum of things. 
 Of course this unity overrules all distinctions ; and, 
 moreover, in the intellectual process of comparison and 
 translation, either word would easily appropriate to itself 
 any power of suggestion that might once have been 
 peculiar to the other. 
 
 Having before shown that the word world is not de- 
 graded from its high service by lending itself to limited 
 conceptions, it is hardly necessary to remark how nat- 
 urally it comes down to well-known and well-inhabited 
 regions, — for example, in the New Testament, the realms 
 ruled by Caesar Augustus, — or to remind ourselves that 
 we have an " old world " according to the measure of former 
 knowledge, and a " new world," the glory of modem dis- 
 covery. It is perhaps more needful to mention that sev- 
 eral places in the Greek Testament give oikoumene, — 
 very properly rendered "world," and pointing particu- 
 larly to the earth's inhabitants, — the household world 
 of a period contemplated as vitally interested in events 
 described. 
 
 But our word world is more than a name for the ma- 
 terial universe ; it is a name for universal history also. 
 The world is not a consummation of harmony and beauty, 
 that admits of no change. It is an enduring world, and 
 still a world of life, growth, and vicissitude. The world 
 exists for a purpose, and that purpose implies the reason 
 for its continuance. While we have been here and there, 
 going through with various forms of personal experience, 
 all things have moved with us in so steady a round as 
 to afford us exact measures for different parts of com- 
 mon duration, — signs, seasons, days, and years. 
 
10 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 Now, in Greek, there is not only a word to represent 
 the world as existing in space (cosmos), — the nursery and 
 theatre of life, — there is also a word (alcov, — "aeon") 
 to sum up the invisible progress of life itself, and 
 stand for the inner world of conscious being and col- 
 lective history. Times measured mechanically and regis- 
 tered punctually, by means of regular movements of 
 bodies in space, give an outward and abstract notion of 
 continuance ; but life has a chronology of its own, that 
 cannot be tabulated, and the ceons are measured only in 
 themselves. Therefore, those who, in giving us the Eng- 
 lish New Testament, merged cosmos and ceon in one word 
 world, failed to mark adequately those ages on ages, 
 somewhat distinguishable yet really dateless, that ensue 
 by historic development upon the original creation. 
 
 The Greek word aion represents, commonly, a thing 
 of life, having the law of its duration in itself, not inde- 
 pendently, but subject to universal elements and laws 
 of being. It denotes not time in the abstract, but a life- 
 time — as of a man, a family, a nation, a race. Let the 
 term be applied to particular things, and there may be as 
 many aeons as there are objects, having each a vital con- 
 stitution, upon which, under general conditions of life, 
 the measure of its existence depends. Every aeon may 
 be signalized by outward phenomena of life whose times 
 and changes may be noted. But the interior process of 
 life, the very essence of the aeon, is too subtile for chro- 
 nometers ; and it suggests rather than defines its own 
 limits. It is in virtue of this vital quality that the word 
 rises above the applications of detail, and reaches a com- 
 prehensive and even supernatural significance. Thus, 
 using instead of ceon the familiar word age, we may 
 speak of the age of plants or animals, individuals or 
 
SPEECH AND WORDS. 11 
 
 species; we may contemplate the age of governments, 
 systems of thought, modes of worship ; but we reach the 
 unity of finite duration in the sum of things. Every 
 living creature has its own period, and all creatures com- 
 bine to constitute the living age in general, — that reality 
 of unmeasured existence which is the world of far-reach- 
 ing history. The scientist has to do chiefly with the 
 world as cosmos; the historian has to do chiefly with 
 the world as ceon. The cosmos is attributed to God as 
 Creator; the ceon is oftener referred to God as Provi- 
 dence, Euler, or Eedeemer. When the world is spoken 
 of as one whole, without reference to the varying phases 
 of its physical and moral order, it is cosmos. When the 
 world is distinguished from itself, so to speak, — when it 
 is contemplated as many worlds in as many successive 
 periods, as the world that now is or the world that is to 
 come, as the world beginning or the world ending, — 
 then it is ceon. 
 
 " Through faith we understand that the worlds were 
 framed;"^ but it is important to understand also that 
 the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews is referring to 
 ceonian worlds, — not to the cosmos merely. There is 
 the conception of a sin incompatible with forgiveness, 
 whether in this world or in that which is to come.^ 
 And both worlds are aeons, periods of moral government. 
 " The harvest is the end of the world ; " ^ " so shall it be 
 in the end of this world ; " * " what shall be the sign of 
 thy coming, and of the end of the world ? " ^ In these in- 
 stances, not to mention others,^ it is the consummation 
 
 1 Heb. xi. 3. 2 Matt, xii! 32. ^ Matt. xiii. 39. 
 
 * Matt. xiii. 40. ^ Matt. xxiv. 3. 
 
 ^ Mark x. 30 ; Luke xviii. 30 ; xx. 34, 35 ; 1 Cor. x. 11 ; Gal. i. 4 ; 
 Eph. i. 21; 1 Tim. vi. 17; 2 Tim. iv. 10; Titus ii. 12; Heb. i. 2; 
 vi. 5 ; ix. 26. 
 
12 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 of the aeon, or world-age, which is referred to, — a con- 
 summation by no means of necessity final in such a 
 sense that another world-age may not be expected to 
 emerge from the one that is ready to pass away. 
 
 Thus far we have reached no seon whose nature does 
 not admit the possibility of limits, albeit to forecast or 
 definitely to mark these limits is not given to finite 
 minds. Ages arrive and pass in a movement of incom- 
 prehensible reality. The ages of ages, surpassing all 
 reach of imagination, do not carry the mark of absolute 
 duration. The metaphysical eternity is that which the 
 ages of ages are not, and to which they can bear no 
 rational proportion. It is the antithesis, not the syn- 
 thesis, of limited periods. The wheeling of planets is as 
 irrelevant to the abstract idea of eternity as the ticking 
 of the clock. 
 
 Moreover, if it be true that mon signifies properly not 
 abstract duration, but an enduring life, then the law of 
 thought demands absolute Being, or else it admits of no 
 absolute ceon. Plato, in the Timaeus, affords an example 
 of what was the law of his thinking. There the Creator 
 is the Eternal, let us say the Eternity. The created 
 universe is after an eternal pattern. But "time," he 
 says, "was generated with the universe, in order that, 
 being produced together, they might together be dis- 
 solved, if their dissolution should ever happen." Time, 
 accordmg to Plato, is an image of eternity, — aionos 
 eikon. But both eternity and time are conceived as real- 
 ized in beings. The image of self-existence is in the ever- 
 present now of conscious life, of which we do not say 
 that it begins or ends ; and so all ages of life, past or to 
 come, afford a shadowy suggestion of measureless exist- 
 ence. In this way of thinking, all passing times and 
 
SPEECH AND WORDS. 13 
 
 numbered eras have their life and law from the Eternal. 
 True, the supreme Mon, transcending all finite thought, 
 has been thought of differently by different minds. Some, 
 given to speculation, taking their notions as the higher 
 sphere of their knowledge, have ventured far, and even 
 thought to find proceeding from the depth of unbegotten 
 Being a whole hierarchy of spiritual aeons on the way 
 down to worlds and ages here below. But the pretence 
 of knowledge in what is beyond experience is sure to 
 encounter the reaction of minds predominated by an op- 
 posite tendency, — minds slow in trusting themselves to 
 a speculative drift, for fear of being borne away from solid 
 reality. Each of the tendencies referred to, however, is 
 essential to human nature. The two are developed to- 
 gether in every mature person, though not always in 
 stable equilibrium. Only by the action of both, exciting 
 and restraining each other, is the full-orbed revelation 
 of history possible. Yet, while the too presuming and 
 the too sceptical, the gnostics and the agnostics, may be 
 alike losers for a time in something of sober truth which 
 a rational comprehension may possess, neither the one 
 class nor the other can avoid the logic of words. To 
 both mon stands for existence, having a law of enduring 
 life within, — implying a duration not to be mathemati- 
 cally demonstrated, no matter whether the existence be 
 wholly of ideal stuff, or of the palpable material by 
 which the senses are addressed. But the aeons of reve- 
 lation are not aeons of philosophic fancy. They are 
 genuine world-ages, whose secret is life, organic law, 
 holding on its way beneath and beyond the shows of 
 .things, binding different elements and existences in 
 unity, and so opening a broad avenue of thought to one 
 supreme Being, the Source of life, — in all, through all, 
 over all. 
 
14 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 The study of the New Testament ceon cannot come 
 to a satisfactory end, however, without bringing in the 
 adjective formed from the noun. As we find aeons 
 within seons, aeons before aeons, and aeons succeeding 
 aeons ; as every aeon may be looked upon as an age of 
 ages, and all aeons are conceived in the New Testament 
 as conditioned with respect to other aeons, according to 
 the eternal purpose and operation of God ; it is hard 
 to imagine that the adjective cconian could be alienated 
 from the objective variety and fluxional nature of what 
 it grows from What belongs to unseen life, universal 
 causation, organic law, we should naturally think, might 
 be called emphatically ceonian. So, at any rate, St. Paul 
 seems to think, when, speaking of the hidden and surviv- 
 ing man in distinction from transitory forms of organ- 
 ization, he declares that "the things which are seen 
 are temporal, but the things which are not seen are 
 ceonian!' ^ 
 
 As ceonian does not recognize beginning or ending in 
 terms of time, so it does not deny beginning or ending 
 in so far as either may be implied in the proper concep- 
 tion of elements described as aeonian. In classic Greek 
 the life of a man is referred to as an aeon. A man's life 
 is also an age of ages. St. Paul speaks of what was the 
 character of his life at different periods. All the ele- 
 ments of his beiug were childish during the child-age. 
 And, although he does not note the moment when child- 
 hood ended, it is plain that it did end ; for, when he 
 became a man, his life took on the characteristics of an- 
 other age. Now this presents a perfect likeness to the 
 manner of speaking in the New Testament about the 
 aeon of mankind, — that is, the world-ages. 
 1 2 Cor. iv. 18. 
 
SPEECH AND WORDS. 15 
 
 In the second chapter of the Epistle to the Ephe- 
 sians there is set forth an inner reality and progress of 
 human existence that was expressly "according to the 
 course (aeon) of this world (cosmos) " as governed by 
 invisible principles and agencies working in the souls 
 of men ; and this seonian experience was so alien and 
 insensible to the highest revelation of divine life as to 
 be described under the figure of death. The immortal 
 life, the perfect law of being, the Ephesians had not re- 
 ceived by tradition from their fathers, but were relatively 
 "dead in trespasses and sins." This seonian death, how- 
 ever, was to be limited and annulled by new life commu- 
 nicated through the revelation of Jesus Christ ; and, the 
 impartation of the divine life to that seon was to avail 
 for the ages (seons) to come, that God might show them 
 " the exceeding riches of his grace " through the same 
 revelation of Jesus Christ. Thus the seonian . life, that 
 is such by way of eminence as being imparted to men 
 by the eternal Spirit, struggles with and overcomes the 
 aeonian principles that are negative to itself, superseding 
 the seons of ignorance and error due to man's immaturity 
 and proneness to low appetites, with other aeons that de- 
 clare man's resurrection and joint heirship with the Son 
 of God. 
 
 As certainly as the Creator desires to correct the mis- 
 takes and perversities of his offspring, and thus to take 
 away their sins, so certainly he desires that punishment 
 may give place to those moral results which punishment 
 contemplates. Accordingly the twenty-fifth chapter of 
 Matthew sets before us the coming of the Son of Man 
 in the glory of his revelation as involving not only a 
 life-giving energy but a judicial process. The seonian 
 life evinced in love and service, to whomsoever done, 
 
16 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 meets approval and reward in the larger fellowship of 
 £eonian life to come; while those who recognized no 
 divine call in the sufferings of their fellow-men are sent 
 away into an seonian punishment. We know at once 
 that this is not a punishment to be summed up in a 
 sentence, which is to be mechanically executed within 
 punctual limits of time. What is aeonian is revealed 
 under relations of cause and effect known as organic 
 law ; and, herein is the common quality of aeonian pun- 
 ishment and seonian life. Neither is a thing of arbi- 
 trary prescription. Manifested in individual experience, 
 ■ — not, it may be, without distinction of times, — both 
 are conditioned and determined in the nature of things, 
 which is another name for the reign of God. Having 
 recognized, therefore, the common relation of both life 
 and punishment to the divine energy and authority, we 
 are bound also not to overlook the distinction between 
 the two. The life of love is divine and eternal as having 
 its source in God, — its perfection in harmony with the 
 divine character. The endurance of punishment (kolasis), 
 on the contrary, is the mark of an immature nature, or 
 of a perverse will, needing to be changed and super- 
 seded. It belongs to an economy of teaching and cor- 
 rection. The suffering experienced enforces a just 
 demand for reformation of conduct, and so declares 
 the discipline of creative Goodness with reference to a 
 moral end. The end achieved, the experience of punish- 
 ment has passed into the development of character. 
 
 If seonian life may annul the death of sin, so may 
 the law of love do away with the discipline of chastise- 
 ment that has gained its moral end. The adjective quite 
 overdoes its function when, instead of qualifying its sub- 
 stantive, it contradicts the very element of truth which 
 
SPEECH AND WORDS. 17 
 
 the substantive represents. But suppose punishment 
 should aggravate the moral distemper : what then ? May 
 not punishment, which is negative to the perfection 
 of existence, be negative also to the perpetuity of exist- 
 ence that cannot be reconciled with love ? Failing of 
 its moral end, may not positive punishment reach a nat- 
 ural limit in the cancelling of an abnormal being, just 
 as sickness ends in death? At least, there is nothing 
 in the conception of punishment as seonian to force 
 upon us the conclusion that the Creator is determined 
 to communicate his immortality of being to those who 
 will only outrage the law of well-being. The experience 
 of punishment may be conceived as reaching either a 
 moral or a physical limit according to divine law, with- 
 out the least sacrifice of its seonian character. The 
 only remaining hypothesis, that of incorrigible character 
 and endless being, needs no discussion. But, as we are 
 dealing now, not with doctrine, but with the use of a 
 word, I will call attention to a text having no direct 
 bearing upon any disputed tenet. It is the three last 
 verses of the Epistle to the Eomans, — the concluding 
 ascription to Him who is able to establish believers in 
 the gospel, " according to the revelation of the mystery 
 which hath been kept in silence through times eternal 
 (seonian), but now is manifested, and by the scriptures 
 of the prophets, according to the commandment of the 
 eternal (seonian) God." The seonian times expressly 
 limited by revelation, and exactly noted in the phrase 
 " since the world began," — what proportion have they to 
 the eternity of the seonian God ? 
 
 Having in our language a name for the sum of things, 
 and endeavoring to verify the use and range of the name 
 in the New Testament, we have found our world to be 
 
 2 
 
18 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 cosmical and oeonian. From the masses that make up 
 the world of space we have passed to the hving realities 
 that make up the world of history, and have recognized 
 the tendency of human minds to rise above dependent 
 existences to the thought of one absolute Being. The 
 conception of God transfigures our worlds. They pass 
 into the universe. The ages are inspired with boundless 
 meaning. The name that properly marks the periods 
 of world-life connotes the ever-existent Originator and 
 Governor of all things. The most ephemeral organism 
 has life from the Eternal, and is an aeon by itself. But 
 the word ceon receives a consecration which withdraws 
 it from common associations. Taking lower forms of 
 being into silent partnership with higher, and marking 
 all life-periods with the seonian stamp as "times and 
 seasons which the Father hath put in his own power," 
 ceon becomes a comprehensive name, and is set apart to 
 high service in connection with those cycles of being 
 that are God's revelation in the human race. 
 
 In fine, that man should conceive of outward nature 
 as the building and temple of God by reason of responses 
 in his soul from the inner sanctuary, which responses he 
 utters in hallowed names and sacred writings, is an aus- 
 picious token of man's place and calling in the universe. 
 It indicates his birthright, — to " dwell in the house of 
 the Lord all the days of his life, to behold the beauty 
 of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple." All truth is 
 man's province ; his vocation is discipleship. His earHer 
 conceptions may be crude and mistaken. But if he 
 knows but little of the cosmical world, he himself is 
 part and parcel of the seonian creation; and when the 
 fulness of times has developed the motive and tendency 
 of the divine working, then assurance begins to take the 
 
SPEECH AND WORDS. 19 
 
 place of doubt. The movement of humanity according 
 to a ruling Eeason becomes more prophetic than the 
 prophets. The dispensation which culminates in the 
 divine Man gives the Word of perfection for the future 
 of mankind. It introduces us to the sphere of the 
 Father's spiritual creation, — to the reign of God, which 
 is within us. 
 
 Without assuming man's destiny as bound in a neces- 
 sary immortality, — since it seems to be the implication 
 both of Nature and Scripture that an existence given by 
 the Creator can be cancelled by the same Power, — we 
 may say at least that every intelligent agent is naturally 
 bound, and morally free, to make trial of life, that life 
 may the more effectually make proof of him. Pupils 
 of nature, yet represented in Scripture as heirs of God, 
 each of us is called to study in his own way the natural 
 elements and the inspirations from above which go into 
 the growth of character and the maturing of destiny. 
 Taking Nature and Scripture to be witnesses for each 
 other, we can examine them as to the situation and 
 experience of the race to which we belong. AVe can 
 interrogate them ; namely, — 
 
 I. As to our common subjection under the constraints 
 of cosmical conditions and social governance, — The 
 World Tutelage. 
 
 II. As to the presumably peculiar inability of primi- 
 tive man to cope at once with the problems confronting 
 him, and the special danger of his yielding, from unwise 
 choice, to physical tendencies against the higher law of 
 his being, — The Fall. 
 
 III. As to that faith and loyalty in man through 
 which he is open to suggestions from above, and can 
 move in a manner to be held approved, reasonable, and 
 
20 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 acceptable in a provisional way, — in default of advanced 
 knowledge, faultless obedience, or ideal devotion, — The 
 Principle of Justification. 
 
 IV. As to the development of man's apprehension 
 and experience of the not-good as necessarily correla- 
 tive to his progressive knowledge of the good ; together 
 with his possibly wilful violation of faith with respect 
 even to obligations on which his physical welfare 
 depends, — The Manifestation of Evil. 
 
 V. As to the motive and method of man's recon- 
 ciliation with God in the revelation of his character 
 and will, and of his deliverajice from the errors and cor- 
 ruptions of a comparatively irresponsible and cliildish 
 career, — The Law of Atonement. 
 
 VI. As to the judgments in which faith is appealed 
 to, knowledge increased, and law enforced, till the con- 
 summation of the world-history, — Crises in the Pro- 
 cess OF Eedemption. 
 
 These are indissoluble parts of the Creator's teaching. 
 They indicate the orbit of divine revelation as conceived 
 in Scripture, and they mark the high road of human 
 experience. They combine all ruHng conceptions proper 
 to human nature, irrespective of any limits, whether in 
 time or space. 
 
PART FIEST. 
 
 THE WORLD TUTELAGE. 
 
" Now I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth noth- 
 ing from a servant, though he be lord of all, but is under tutors and 
 governors until the time appointed of the father. Even so we, 
 when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the 
 world." 
 
 Galatians iv. 1, 2. 
 
 "Quid enim sibi volnnt multimodse formidines, quse cohibendis 
 parvulorum vanitatibus adhibentur ? Quid psedagogi, quid magistri, 
 quid ferulae, quid lora, quid virgse, quid disciplina ilia qua Scriptura 
 sancta dicit dilecti filii latera tundenda, ne crescat indomitus, doma- 
 rique jam durus aut vix possit, aut fortasse nee possit ? " 
 
 St. Augustine ; De Civitate Dei, lib. xxii. c. 22. 
 
PAET FIRST. 
 
 THE WOULD TUTELAGE. 
 
 CHAPTEE L 
 
 TUTELAGE A LAW OF NATURE. 
 
 THE common schooling of life in the world is the 
 basis of man's study and teaching since the world 
 began. As the world grows in age the schooling of the 
 world gains in scope and effectiveness by the subordina- 
 tion of special achievements to the common instruction. 
 The beginner in life, content if not wearied at first with 
 the most rudimentary exercises, is by and by full of ex- 
 citement at finding that even these are his introduction 
 to a limitless learning. And, as if to meet his growing 
 need of guidance, the enlightened souls and choice writ- 
 ings of the race are peculiar by reason of their unlimited 
 range of thought. They salute the eternal Wisdom in 
 the progress of ages, and find, contiguous to our earthly 
 domain, an invisible realm of spiritual activity, whither 
 every generation of mankind migrates in its turn. Thus, 
 from teachings and efforts that have made life what it is 
 at any time or place, there results the discipline of life 
 into which at birth every human being is entered. 
 
 But the distinction between teachers and taught, 
 governors and governed, in human society is not abso- 
 lute. The power exemplified in parental influence and 
 control finds public expression in various forms of gov- 
 
24 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 ernmeat, civil or ecclesiastical, that stand for social 
 order and moral regulation. Yet this general exercise 
 of power is always checked. Nature is made to out- 
 grow institutions. All government struggles with the 
 reactions of advancing life, till the advancing life pre- 
 vails, only to give way in its turn. The sovereign can- 
 not govern his people without being governed by them ; 
 as the parent cannot justly guide and restrain the child, 
 without learning how much the child is commissioned 
 to guide and restrain the parent. All teaching involves 
 the effort and resistance by which the teacher also is 
 taught. Thus it is that under organic law, which is the 
 expression of creative wisdom, all the life of man defines 
 itself as tutelage. The conscious subjection and docility 
 of the moment is typical of a continuous experience of 
 life, wherein the destiny of mankind is never to escape 
 entirely from the earlier physical limitations, and never 
 to carry out to completeness the later spiritual inten- 
 tions. The ideals of perfection are for a higher order of 
 development than is accorded to mankind on earth. 
 
 The experience of life puts personal faculties and 
 character to such constant proof, that a man's whole 
 career in the world is often looked upon as a probation ; 
 and, as holding a necessary and just relation to his whole 
 career in a world to come. But probation is not an arbi- 
 trary enactment, but something in the course of nature. 
 Therefore it needs to be guarded at the outset from con- 
 ventional constructions; and, especially, with reference 
 to what Bishop Butler has set forth as " the general doc- 
 trine of religion, that our present life is a state of pro- 
 bation for a future one." ^ This general doctrine does not 
 justly involve anything artificial or arbitrary. But it 
 has been systematically construed as ascribing the limits 
 
 1 Analog}', part i. ch. iv. 
 
TUTELAGE A LAW OF NATURE. 25 
 
 of physical life to a spiritual trial, whose limits cannot 
 be experimentally ascertained, and are not definitely 
 revealed. 
 
 Our personal probation, as a verifiable reality deter- 
 mined by our spiritual constitution and the law of the 
 universe, is not measured by our physical life. On 
 the contrary, it is reasonably apprehended as fulfilling 
 itself according to a progress of the spirit into whatever 
 conditions the spirit may pass. That which begins and 
 ends with physical life is the physical trial, — the strug- 
 gle for life which man exhibits in common with the ani- 
 mal creation. In this trial success or survival is seen to 
 have no paramount relation to spiritual character. Life 
 often ends before spiritual probation can have begun, 
 as well as at all stages of moral trial, without refer- 
 ence to its fulfilment. Therefore, to call "our present 
 life," meaning our life in the body, "a state of proba- 
 tion for a future one," which by implied antithesis is a 
 state of retribution without probation, is a partial use 
 of the analogy contemplated. For, if we are to reason 
 of unending life from the analogy of our earthly exist- 
 ence, we can do no less than take the whole testimony. 
 Conduct in the present life is found to develop retribu- 
 tive consequences. Hence retributive consequences may 
 not unreasonably be expected to disclose themselves in 
 the future life. But in the present life retributive con- 
 sequences are an essential element of probation. Then, 
 by analogy, retributive consequences must be a mark of 
 probation, equally in the future life. 
 
 Or, to put the thought so as to recognize the general 
 relation of the present life to the future life, without 
 denying any spiritual facts which may possibly be com- 
 mon to both, let us ask : If the whole life, after death, is 
 
26 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 conceived as retributive in relation to the whole life in 
 the body, while the whole life in the body is conceived 
 as probationary in relation to the whole life after death, 
 is there anything in this general relation which should 
 or can contradict either the retributive experience of the 
 present life, or the probationary character of the future 
 life, considered by itself ? What valid objection to infer- 
 ring that the future life is probationary in being retribu- 
 tive, since the present hfe is confessedly retributive in 
 being probationary? But an administration conceived 
 as judicially cancelling all liberty or power of personal 
 reformation on the part of offenders, whose personal ref- 
 ormation is demanded by eternal law and prompted by 
 corrective experience, involves an absolute contradic- 
 tion, — the contradiction of the supreme Lawgiver by 
 the supreme Judge. 
 
 Therefore, whatever modifications in the elements 
 and conditions of moral experience may ensue upon the 
 crisis of death, we are naturally forbidden to assume a 
 priori that character will crystallize into immovable 
 destiny at the moment of our deliverance from the con- 
 straints of mortality. The nature of man indicates the 
 contrasts of character which his trial may determine ; 
 not any point in a personal career at which character is 
 no longer capable of change. Hence we rationally look 
 at the nature of our probation for a theory of its 
 limits, not at assumed limits of probation for our theory 
 of its nature. 
 
CHAPTEE II. 
 
 COSMICAL TUTELAGE. 
 
 T TAYING premised what would be misplaced argu- 
 -*- -^ ment, were it not for the importance of clearing 
 our range of thought from obstructions, we have no 
 more to do with the abstract idea of probation. That 
 idea at once pervades the whole reality of the world- 
 tutelage. It belongs to the constitution of moral gov- 
 ernment. Any statute of limitations is an incidental 
 matter, that must present its own credentials, and keep 
 its own place. Our preliminary considerations pass at 
 once into a general statement, which contains in sum 
 the truth we desire further to unfold. 
 
 Man's normal development as a moral being starts 
 from the least degree of self-control with the greatest 
 degree of outward constraint, and moves on toward the 
 least degree of outward constraint and the greatest degree 
 of self-control. 
 
 This direction of development, if it can be verified, 
 infers the ruling purpose of man's training ; namely, 
 that deliberate choice may more and more adjust itself 
 to the requirements of law, until personal aims shall 
 coalesce with universal truth in final maturity of char- 
 acter and general harmony of being. 
 
 Material nature is bound fast in its own law, that the 
 
28 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 free activity of man may learn by trial what support and 
 what resistance to expect. As material nature is sub- 
 jected to the imperfect treatment of man by the creative 
 will, so also by the same will is man in subjection under 
 the tutelage of material nature. 
 
 If we look at man with respect to his cosmical envi- 
 ronment simply, deferring for the present any considera- 
 tion of his growth, we find him even in the fulness of his 
 powers not a little dwarfed in comparison with the ele- 
 ments he is required to deal with. The magnificence of 
 the home with the profusion of its treasures is certainly 
 a testimony to the quality of the occupant ; but should 
 not the occupant be master of his possessions ? Yet man 
 is a pupil — never done with learning to call things 
 presented to him by their right names. Face to face 
 with all the world contains, his possessions are too grand 
 and vital for his faculties. " What is it ? " is the riddle 
 which nature is proposing in every object; and the 
 answer is at no little peril of life. To find out what a 
 thing is, and to name it well, much as it concerns 
 man's destiny, is far from being an instinctive action of 
 powers that unerringly fulfil their own law. It is an 
 effort demanding good-will and patient attention, while 
 after the best endeavors the secrets to be known are 
 infinitely beyond the most penetrating intelligence. The 
 more our answers seem to be allowed, the deeper the 
 mysteries into which nature's questioning withdraws. 
 We have no sooner proved the reality of our powers than 
 we have become aware of their deficiency. Fresh dis- 
 coveries are required to correct previous mistakes ; and 
 other mistakes are incident to fresh discoveries. In the 
 midst of over-curious researches we are under correction 
 as to the simplest problems of life. 
 
COSMIC AL TUTELAGE. 29 
 
 Moreover, that primacy of intellect, whose privilege it 
 is to look deep into the nature of things, is for very few. 
 The multitudes have their faculties chiefly occupied in 
 seeking the satisfaction of animal craving. " What shall 
 we eat?" "What shall we drmk?" "Wherewithal 
 shall we be clothed ? " These are the preoccupations 
 that absorb the energies of mankind, and hold them 
 back from higher aims. Nature holds out her gifts for 
 man to appreciate. With other orders of living things 
 man is invited to take what is suited to him. Only, his 
 choice is that of a superior being. The hungry rapacity 
 from hand to mouth must learn to wait upon diligent 
 and judicious selection. What the offered thing is, even 
 as to its commonest use, it is not for momentary sensa- 
 tion or the accompanying suggestion of thought fully to 
 tell ; and its final significance may be infinitely far to 
 seek. Let man try to know any bulk or any atom, and 
 the more he knows the more is he baffled by the universe 
 of which his inquiry takes hold. Thor thought to drain 
 the drinking-horn of Utgard-Loki at the first pull, not 
 being aware that it was connected with the sea : a sym- 
 bol this of what the stoutest personal energy amounts 
 to as against the magnitude and coherency of material 
 nature. 
 
 What is it ? The question is, first of all, practical. 
 What is to be done with it ? To what account can it be 
 turned ? The vision that came to the entranced Peter 
 for his spiritual direction was not unconnected with his 
 physical wants, — was indeed substantially the every- 
 day vision of mankind in general : " All manner of four- 
 footed beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping 
 things, and fowls of the air." To arise, to kQl and eat, 
 to taste the tree's fruit, to use things according to their 
 
30 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 nature, is on the way to higher knowledge. Though the 
 cuckoo name itself in its note, still naturalists and poets 
 listen long to know what the name may mean. And no 
 matter how many things may be said or sung about it, 
 the bird-note remains untranslated, — a voice that wan- 
 ders through all years to call forth a response from all 
 singers. 
 
 So, in general, while most men find their poetry of 
 life in the practical arts of life, a few take the hint of 
 nature in a higher sense. They give us masterpieces in 
 architecture, sculpture, painting, literature. But nature 
 is mistress of all the masters." Their works have a pecu- 
 liar finish, but a minor dignity. Nature's works are of 
 their own kind, — things of life, of original design. 
 Man's monuments decay, and fall into neglect. Then, 
 it may be, nature adopts them as her own. But in 
 majesty of building, in breathing forms, in glory of color, 
 in mystical voices, nature is ever fresh and productive. 
 The cosmical teaching grows more mysterious as it pro- 
 ceeds. It bears witness to its source. The most divinely 
 gifted of men are the most apt to recognize a supernatural 
 in the natural. Man in his minority, in the primitive trial 
 of his powers, while giving proof of his pupilage in every 
 experiment he makes, is still quickened, inspired, in- 
 structed by the infinite Wisdom speaking through the 
 things that are made, whether they be things in earth or 
 things in the infinitude of the sky. 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 
 J^O]S^IAX TUTELAGE. 
 
 "13 UT we must think of man as growing, — as exliibit- 
 -*-^ ing a personal and collective development, to which 
 no limits of time can be assigned. Here at once cosmical 
 conditions become subsidiary to social environment. The 
 house is made for the family, not the family for the 
 house. Man may make trial of some powers, as an 
 inhabitant of the planet; but even this trial, and es- 
 pecially the formation of character connected with it, 
 belongs to us as members of the human family. We 
 take conscious intellectual and moral training from 
 those with whom we come into intellectual and moral 
 relations. 
 
 Every child of our race is brought into the world at 
 the lowest degree of its capabilities. In this extreme of 
 minority man is under a reign of social law. Sponta- 
 neous self-assertion yields of necessity to pressures from 
 without. There is no force in infancy to sustain a prac- 
 tical conflict with adult powers. The child is set to 
 forming habits under the sway of ideals which it knows 
 nothing about, in order that those ideals, when they shall 
 have taken possession of the child's nature, may have the 
 advantage of trained and obedient service from subordi- 
 nate faculties. Not any formal correctness is sought at 
 
32 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 first ; but a discipline of powers that may result in ap- 
 proved modes of action by and by. Yet there are no 
 perfect masters even of this primary discipline. The 
 chiefs of households and leaders of society address them- 
 selves to various problems of conduct ; but the solution 
 is in no case a thing of outward demonstration. Last, as 
 well as first, the demand is for docility. One man's well- 
 doing may furnish suggestion and motive to another man, 
 but not a formula of righteousness. The child, whose 
 praise is that it does not rebel against natural control, 
 rebukes the adult, who resists the spiritual admonition 
 given him for warning or direction. The moral of life, 
 to those experienced in their own imperfections and the 
 errors of mankind, is that they should be born anew 
 and become little children through a spiritual inspira- 
 tion from the Father, to whom they owe their being. 
 Our spiritual development demands a discipline superior 
 to that of natural guardians. Man realizes at length a 
 certain personal function, in which he goes not only be- 
 yond the cosmos, but beyond the authorities and influ- 
 ences that make up the age in which he lives, and is 
 drawn into the presence of the eternal Power, — Source 
 and End of all beginning and ending things. 
 
 As the thought of God comes to man in his contem- 
 plation of outward nature, so there is a communica- 
 tion and growth of the same thought in connection with 
 social discipline. The thought seems to arrive by natural 
 and universal suggestion, to be subsequently shaped by 
 outward images or quickened by inward teaching. But 
 whatever may be said of the origin of man's religious 
 conceptions, we are sure that the idea of God asserts a 
 power both in the thinker and over thought. It becomes 
 a common element of spiritual trial, a law in the inter- 
 
IONIAN TUTELAGE. 33 
 
 pretation of things, an assurance, not to be slighted, of 
 supernatural Eeason ruling in all destinies. 
 
 We are obliged, therefore, to contemplate the growth 
 and experience of mankind, not only with respect to ma- 
 terial elements and the physical economy, not only with 
 respect to society in the different phases through which 
 it may pass, but above all with reference to that law of 
 the rational spirit according to which an invisible and 
 unhmited Power is recognized, under whatever names, as 
 affirmed in creation and history. Such are the grand as- 
 pects of our schooling in the world. It is not for man 
 to throw off the physical, social, or rehgious regimen. 
 To live by suitable nourishment and protection of the 
 body, to live as belonging to our kind, to live as the 
 creatures of our Creator, — this is simply to live. 
 
 But life has successive phases of development, whether 
 in the individual or in society. Though all principles of 
 Hfe may be present in germ from the beginning, still 
 their growth is such as to exhibit varied proportions of 
 knowledge and successive types of activity. The great 
 motives of action come to their practical predominance 
 in a regular order of time. If duties have a transcendent 
 range, and are liable to come into mutual convict, they 
 may well wait a little upon one another. The primary 
 and most pressing demands receive the earliest attention, 
 that the more important obligations may employ the 
 more developed power and mature judgment in their 
 discharge. 
 
 The different functions of society are not sharply dis- 
 criminated at first. The rehgious practice may be min- 
 gled with industrial and social habits under a patriarchal 
 authority, that commands the children and the household 
 after it in all the round of service. The tribe compelled 
 
34 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 to maintain its own existence in more or less hostile com- 
 petition with other tribes will not furnish its offspring 
 with the protection of stable institutions. The patri- 
 archal authority is a primitive tutelage. In the progress 
 of civilization this tutelage is not superseded, but supple- 
 mented. Families and tribes are reduced to harmony 
 under a common administration of authority. Yet the 
 kingdom, brmging order and comity out of confusion and 
 contention, affords no perfect law ; though it may justly 
 claim to be better than the anarchy which it supersedes. 
 The king may do what the patriarch cannot do. He 
 may not only organize a more comprehensive regulation 
 of common affairs, but he may encourage and secure the 
 special institution of religious functions. Civil order, 
 however, tends to become universal. States incorporate 
 other states, as tribes reduce to subjection other tribes. 
 The imperial ruler takes his turn; and, with a genius 
 for conquest and government, controls powers that had 
 been foreign and hostile, extending to customs and wor- 
 ships before estranged a common recognition. But, 
 though empires may accomplish what other forms of 
 government cannot undertake, has any empire exhibited 
 the consummate type of society ? Can more be expected 
 of the empire than that it shall surpass in justice and 
 magnanimity the powers which it holds in check? Is 
 it anything but a larger school, in which the pupils may 
 be brought on towards that inward and universal revela- 
 tion of law, which will have perfect individuals as the 
 constituents of perfect society, and regards personal duty 
 to God, the supreme Euler, as including all duties to 
 one's self or to one's kind ? 
 
 It is evident, therefore, not only that human nature 
 is constituted to develop religious institutions in con- 
 
jEonian tutelage. 35 
 
 nection with industrial or political organization but 
 also that religion, being first in rank as. regards the 
 realities and aims contemplated, is for that very reason 
 last to reach its full power and expression in the order 
 of successive developments. Eeligious institutions come 
 to maturity in history as an endeavor to fill out the 
 human ideal and destiny to its ultimate possibility, — 
 the possibility of communion with the divine Source of 
 being. 
 
 Is it true, then, that in religious institutions man has 
 found a perfect guidance and restraint ? Nay ; if we 
 identify religion with its institutions, we are compelled 
 to ask, from what evils has religion been able wholly to 
 deliver man, and to -what evils has it not been able at 
 times to persuade him ? In the sphere of religion the 
 world-tutelage has shown itself most disastrously une- 
 qual to its aim. It has ever, in seizing upon the high- 
 est authority, furnished the most flagrant examples of 
 what is not the law of perfection. It has compelled 
 the divinest personal illumination to confirm its testi- 
 mony with the most ignominious sufferings. Nor has it 
 been able to guard the sanctuary of conscience in unde- 
 veloped natures from formality and hypocrisy. An 
 institution or discipline accommodated to the habits and 
 capacities of imperfect creatures is of necessity below 
 the standard of ideal wisdom; nor can it do absolute 
 justice to the claims of even the humblest learners. 
 What is it that outward law has made perfect ? In the 
 administration of outward law, wisdom is shown in not 
 being wise overmuch, — in not transgressing the narrow 
 limits of provisional jurisdiction. 
 
 We have to confess, moreover, that far from reaching 
 anything like perfection in our earthly training, the very 
 
36 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 conditions and gradations of our progress, such as it is, 
 are the occasion of ever-fresh ebullitions of passionate 
 egotism and partisan desire. Taking his chance with 
 his kind, man appears in space and in time according to 
 a natural movement of creation. If he belongs to the 
 whole school of life, he belongs immediately to his own 
 class. But the whole school being not wise, the differ- 
 ent classes compare themselves among themselves, and 
 measure themselves by themselves, to some useful pur- 
 pose certainly, but with much injustice. The less ad- 
 vanced have little appreciation of their superiors ; the 
 more advanced are wanting in respect for those below 
 them. Peoples full of prejudices about gods of the hills 
 and of the valleys, gods of rivers or of the sea, divinities 
 of woods, caves, fields, and dwellings, have a training, it 
 may be of many generations, before them, if they are to 
 reach the grand and simple conception of one God, from 
 whom all things have their being and law. But in the 
 elevation and zeal of faith in one God, believers are apt 
 to feel that idolatrous nations are enemies to be de- 
 stroyed or subjugated. The faithful, as they think them- 
 selves, with God upon their side, are infinitely in the 
 majority of strength ; how should they not conceive 
 themselves as having an equal preponderance of rights ? 
 It is the fault of faith to interpret the government of the 
 world according to its own views ; till, in due time, the 
 schooling of life corrects this natural assumption, and 
 shows that all degrees of service are needed, — that no 
 unkind pretensions are tolerated. Those reckoned low 
 in the scale of being are taught to look upward. The 
 elevated are set to learn condescension. To aU are the 
 lessons of righteousness. 
 
 The child of nature, whose strength is from touching 
 
JEONIAN TUTELAGE. 87 
 
 the ground, is naturally driven to disgust and desperation 
 by the cunning arts of a selfishness more disciplined, if 
 not more aggressive, than his own, which he makes proof 
 of in his civilized fellow-man. The adventurous pioneer 
 of civilization, on the contrary, finds the simple savage 
 no fellow of his ; but practically assigns him a middle 
 rank between the wild beast and the foul fiend. Up to 
 a certain point the mutual acquaintance of the two is apt 
 to force the growth of mutual distrust and hostility, 
 dooming the sentiments of humanity and religion on 
 either side to a corresponding depression or distortion. 
 
 Let the religious power come in to compose the quarrel. 
 Let that spiritual conviction and organization which 
 represents divine law and human fellowship — the best 
 motives and rules for living together — mediate between 
 imperial enterprise and barbaric obstruction. Cannot 
 those in chartered communion with the infinite Father 
 mete out approximate justice to contending children ? 
 But here the rehgious power is an interested party, not 
 an impartial mediator ; and, though it should claim to 
 sit in judgment or to make reconciliation, it would inevi- 
 tably open the way to other divisions and conflicts. Not 
 peace but division is the outward mark of human pro- 
 gress. It takes only a little too much assertion of 
 spiritual authority to provoke either violent reaction on 
 the one hand, or prudent and ambitious co-operation on 
 the other. Eeligion itself is ever on its trial among 
 men with respect to its sincerity and sobriety. If 
 hypocrisy and scepticism invade the domain of faith, 
 shall not contemptuous neglect or active rebellion rule 
 in the ranks of unbelief ? Church and State are likely 
 to be most deeply at variance when most they affect to 
 be one; and the spiritual power is most distrusted and 
 
38 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 cheated by individuals, when most it appeals to the 
 secular arm for the enforcement of its dictates. Pro- 
 gress is through patience. It is for the wise to teach ; 
 not to gain an easy victory over the illusions and abuses 
 of unthinking people. The sufferings of the prophets 
 are less to be pitied than the crime and misery of those 
 who ignorantly reject or destroy their prophets. Men 
 cannot but value the things whereto they have already 
 attained. Has a thing no worth because we cannot take 
 it with us on the march ? It is a costly thing to move 
 onward. 
 
CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 AGES OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT. 
 
 TMPEEFECT as the world's discipline may appear at 
 •*- any time, when we consider long periods we find that 
 despite the downward and backward tendencies of nature 
 there is an upward and onward movement of mankind. 
 We mark the current of history from far away. Man 
 was once the child of nature. He worshipped her 
 powers and learned her ways. He found companionship 
 and wealth in flocks and herds, hunted wild beasts, and 
 fought strange tribes, — exhibiting only the simplest 
 household habits. Again he appears in highly organized 
 society, possessed of multifarious and refined arts, which 
 it required much time to develop ; • while his progress is 
 celebrated in national memorials, attested in ancient in- 
 stitutions, asserted in military and naval powers, com- 
 mercial activity, and far-reaching supremacy of law. 
 
 And still the movement is onward. History is not 
 left to grow sluggish and dead in common achievements ; 
 but takes a new impulse and inspiration, aspires to a 
 higher law, apprehends a reign of divine benevolence and 
 boundless hope, — an inheritance of glory and virtue to 
 be enjoyed, though all material elements should be dis- 
 solved. Nothing is more impres'sive than the lights and 
 shadows that come upon the world's face from the unseen 
 life of its inhabitants. 
 
40 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 Man's advancement is not seen alone by looking into 
 the dim background out of which he has emerged. It is 
 shown in the warning and awakening contrast of retribu- 
 tive effects, that marks opposing motives and differing 
 degrees of human endeavor. It seems both a physical 
 and moral necessity that humanity should be appealed 
 to, not only from the examples of conspicuous progress, 
 but also from its aboriginal and degraded types. Those 
 who do not march with the column must be known as 
 lingering in the rear ; and when in the natural distribu- 
 tion of life it is found that the lot of some human beings 
 is cast in languid air and spontaneous abundance, an in- 
 vading force is called for to break up an animal repose 
 not corrected by any recurring compulsions of earth and 
 sky. Is it thought that some men '' builded better than 
 they knew," and others worse? Then at least their 
 works are not looked upon with indifference by their 
 successors. Men will fall below the standards of the past, 
 if they do not learn to judge and surpass them. The 
 ripest civilization will sink into decadence if it cannot 
 bring up reserves of native vigor and simplicity to aid in 
 reorganizing the elements of old renown. As both em- 
 pire and church trace their lineage from the same 
 primeval manhood, so both must have men of a primitive 
 sort to save their glory from becoming a fading flower. 
 Esthetic and religious luxury, the repose of wealth 
 and civil order, combine to produce an enervating moral 
 climate; and the too happy possessors are liable to 
 forget what is due to a common brotherhood, unless 
 aroused by the challenge and threats of lawless claim- 
 ants. The schooling of hfe measures progress by ser- 
 vice. To do kindness to the fallen and disinherited, to 
 raise untutored peoples to civilization and baptism, — 
 
AGES OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT. 41 
 
 this is the way of salvation not for the degraded alone. It 
 is the highest proof of a divine calling which the most 
 disciplined and privileged of mankind can give. 
 
 Meanwhile, the progress of liberty keeps even pace 
 with the reign of law. It is the rule of law that a call 
 to high service is a mark of special confidence. The 
 civil ruler is, in idea, the servant of God, with ample 
 powers and large discretion for the purpose of guiding 
 the efforts, and controlling the excesses, of persons too 
 little trained in their duties, and naturally overbearing 
 in the assertion of their own claims. The office of the 
 ruler may be tentatively and tyrannically administered; 
 but it may not be dispensed with. Gradually the experi- 
 ment of government works its way toward a common 
 judgment and practical consent, which, written or un- 
 written, has the force of law. Legislation learns to take 
 hiuts of those for whom the laws are made. Executive 
 administration becomes the practical trial of what has 
 been deliberatively enacted. Law reigns over rulers 
 and subjects. Personal rights, liberties, prerogatives, 
 are practically defined, moderately asserted, and peace- 
 fully accepted. All this goes on independently of theory 
 or form, through a conflict of forces not in stable equi- 
 librium, but under a necessity of composing themselves 
 as they can in a career of general order. 
 
 Nor can it be denied that it is under the banner of 
 religion, in spite of all abuses of the name, that law and 
 liberty move on together. There must be a tribunal of 
 last appeal. We take guarantees and hostages of every 
 power but the Power who gave us to ourselves that we 
 might fulfil his intention in our being. Eeligion appeals 
 to man as free, as possessed of conscience, reason, faith, 
 the elements of a sacred and inviolable personality, which 
 
42 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 to profane were worse than death. Over and above the 
 religious principle and sentiment in men of authority and 
 power, there is the voluntary and permanent organiza- 
 tion of popular religious conviction, — public teaching 
 and practice, which contemplate the divine authority, 
 and man's final accountability to God alone. It is im- 
 possible to measure the moulding, restraining, and in- 
 spiring influence of religion as a factor in the common 
 experience of mankind. 
 
 This ever-mounting conception of duty, — this ever- 
 enlarging discipline of obligation, by which liberty is 
 defined as well as promoted, throws a backward light 
 upon the new-born, untrained creature of appetite and 
 impulse, which shows even infancy as not without 
 the image of God. That ignorant outreaching of the 
 child, which unconsciously opens a breach between itself 
 and its governors, which by and by, perhaps, seems at 
 odds with society, at odds with institutions, at odds with 
 the overruling Power, is equally at odds with the child's 
 own higher and better possibilities. Through that open- 
 ing breach comes the hint of a principle of freedom in 
 human nature, in which man's birthright is so involved, 
 and his destiny so wrapped up, that all outward authority 
 needs to stand in awe before the sovereign man that is to 
 be ; while through the same breach of harmony comes to 
 the insubordinate learner of life his calling to rule in a 
 sphere of his own, — to compose the factions of his na- 
 ture, to harmonize body, soul, and spirit, to reconcile the 
 claims of self, society, God. 
 
 Experience determines also the progress and play of 
 ideas. The pupil of nature thinks himself almost her 
 master by and by, so much has he learned by obedience 
 to her laws. Just so man comes to look upon himself 
 
AGES OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT. 43 
 
 as not by any means the creature of political institutions 
 and social customs, but rather as the source whence cus- 
 toms and institutions originate and the standard by which 
 they are to be judged. Eebellions and revolutions come 
 to be regarded as more lawful than the power they bring 
 into judgment. History has its turn of being written and 
 read from the point of view of undistinguished people. 
 The oracles of man's spiritual nature give responses from 
 the life that now is as to the life that may be hereafter. 
 Departed souls are conceived as treasuring up and car- 
 rying on the moral achievements of incarnate human- 
 ity. The dead are not of necessity held to inhabit an 
 under-world, but rise in thought to the brightness of a 
 spiritual heaven. Unable to limit that career of invisible 
 manhood, whose tendencies and issues are typified in our 
 earthly training, the prophets of the future avail them- 
 selves of the imagery and colorings of transitory exist- 
 ence to depict their anticipations of eternal life. In view 
 of such anticipations, the perfection of our whole provi- 
 sional discipline, like that of our individual infancy, 
 seems to be, not in any prescriptive and faultless out- 
 ward action, but in the development of inward principles 
 and motives, such as shall by and by dispose and enable 
 their possessor to originate just conduct independently of 
 outward constramts. Accordingly, the final proof of crea- 
 tive goodness depends upon the mature results of our dis- 
 ciplinary experience, and cannot reasonably be looked for 
 in the happiness immediately accruing from our present 
 conditions. And, as the faith demanded of us in the con- 
 ditions of our nonage goes on towards its justification in 
 the evidence of a consummation to come, so the anxiety 
 incident to partial views undergoes a necessary transfor- 
 mation into the confidence of maturer knowledge. 
 
44 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 We may now recur to tlie opening of our discussion, 
 and briefly go over the general movement of thought 
 thus far. Man's point of departure in life was set forth 
 as " from the least degree of self-control with the greatest 
 degree of outward constraint." The instinct of liberty 
 does not fail to appear in the earliest life. It appears, 
 however, in the law of spontaneous and unreflective 
 self-assertion. This early motive and manifestation of 
 liberty demands checks and regulations, and demands 
 them more peremptorily the more unguarded and dan- 
 gerous the natural self-assertion appears. But checks 
 and regulations from without, necessary and useful as 
 they may be, are not growth, and cannot secure a perfect 
 development. It is the inward law that determines the 
 fulfilment of being. 
 
 Again, it was said that the normal movement of life is 
 " toward the greatest degree of self-control with the least 
 degree of outward constraint." The instinct of liberty is 
 gradually transformed, and passes into the rational law of 
 liberty. The type of freedom changes from that of spon- 
 taneous self-assertion toward outward objects to that of 
 conscientious obedience to the inward revelation of truth. 
 The inward revelation is at last sovereign. When the 
 reign of God announces itself with assurance in man's 
 spirit, he is commissioned to judge what he owes to tu- 
 tors and governors. It is the mark of a spirit inspired 
 of God to master the world in refusing to be mastered 
 by it, though the world should summon all machineries 
 of coercion to its aid. There is a sphere of personal 
 liberty in which a man is alone with God, and in this 
 liberty is the consecration of all great service to man- 
 kind. To be saved from the evils of excessive self-asser- 
 tion, man must submit to provisional restraints ; and in 
 
AGES OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT. 45 
 
 winning his way to ultimate freedom he must not de- 
 cline the struggles and sacrifices that are the price of 
 redemption from usurping ordinances. 
 
 Under the laws of physical life, however, our emanci- 
 pation cannot be fully realized. Were the full develop- 
 ment of spiritual being possible under earthly conditions, 
 which is not conceivable, such a development is practi- 
 cally denied to mankind in the fact of death. What is 
 of the earth returns to the earth. What is spirit must 
 reach its higher destiny under the trial of new disclos- 
 ures and new responsibilities, or else the whole life of 
 man is " a vapor, that appeareth for a little time, and ihen 
 vanisheth away." The hard service of mortal existence, 
 the bondage through fear of death, the bondage of cor- 
 ruption, — all this is but the antithesis and prelude of 
 perfection, if we are sons of God. Tutelage is ministe- 
 rial and transitory. The reign of the Father is eternal. 
 
CHAPTEE Y. - 
 
 AGES OF DIVINE TEACHING. 
 
 TF human beings, as they enter the world, are actually 
 -■- entered into a discipline of life, if the reality of tute- 
 lage is universal, and essentially one under all varieties 
 of form, then this tutelage belongs to the constitution of 
 nature. In other words, it is in the intention and work- 
 ing of the Author of nature. Hence for men to recog- 
 nize a genuine leader is in effect to salute the creative 
 Leadership. It is the grand distinction of the Scriptures 
 that they give us an interpretation of the world's history 
 through a long succession of men who regarded them- 
 selves and regarded mankind as under the guidance and 
 discipline of one God. 
 
 No doubt, every note in the scale of human possibili- 
 ties finds some sort of utterance among all men ; but the 
 historic harmony Involves distinction of parts. Any 
 group of human beings may have leaders, individuals 
 brought to the front by force of nature, by force of cir- 
 cumstances, — chieftains in the struggle of life, heredi- 
 tary heroes, imperial masters; and even a polytheistic 
 faith will recognize a nameless numen in the chief of the 
 state. But the great demand is for one divine leading, 
 for a religious primacy, for the man who shall best 
 mediate to the world a guidance coming down from the 
 
AGES OF DIVINE TEACHING. 47 
 
 Father of lights. The Scriptures are alive with the be- 
 lief that not only the being, but also the well-being, of 
 mankind, depends finally upon God. Men are not suffi- 
 cient for themselves. Hence leaders are conceived as 
 servants of God for the welfare, not of a peculiar people 
 only, but of all mankind; while nations, like men, are 
 given precedence or rebuke according to the service they 
 are rendering in the direction of interests that are uni- 
 versal. The movement of thought in the sacred writers 
 is according to a method of revelation which contem- 
 plates the coming of the divine Man, the perfect Leader, 
 and so the Saviour of mankind. 
 
 The men chosen to prepare the way for this ultimate 
 leadership were selected spiritually by a law of faith in 
 one God, the knowledge of whom was to fill the earth. 
 The whole action, through every scene, belongs to a 
 theocratic drama shadowing forth the eternal reign. 
 Noah's family is not represented as having escaped the 
 deluge by a natural struggle; it was saved by divine 
 interposition on moral grounds. Abraham's calling of 
 faith had reference to no immediate worldly pre-emi- 
 nence ; it was in the assurance that he would not only 
 command his children and his household after him, but 
 that in him and his seed all the families of the earth 
 should be blessed. Moses was the lawgiver of Israel, 
 not by the natural claim of Egyptian learning, but as 
 a man taught of God. It required much more than an 
 able military leader to settle the twelve tribes in the 
 land of promise. It was no natural gift of divination 
 that made a prophet, but the word of Jehovah becoming 
 the burden of a human spirit. There was a priestly 
 family; but no law of physical descent could make a 
 priest, unless he were called of God, as was Aaron. 
 
48 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 And royalty, — was it natural inheritance, anointing 
 oil, state, power ? No. It was truth, justice, piety. 
 Nothing was real, nothing answered to its name, with- 
 out the divine mspiration, the seal of the supreme Sov- 
 ereign. No prophecy was of private interpretation. The 
 anointed man was consecrated to service on behalf of 
 his kind. Prophet, priest, or king was forbidden to 
 transgress the proper limits of his calling. "I am not 
 the Christ" was the tacit if not express confession of 
 all forerunners of the Christ. 
 
 But when the Christ is come, there is in him an inde- 
 pendence of traditions, a mysterious infinitude of spirit, 
 importing the fulfilment of Nature's original design. He 
 is conceived as the mystery of communion with the 
 Father, that he may be the revelation of love to the 
 children; the Son of God, that he may be the perfect 
 Son of Man. He came into the course of nature from 
 above, that he might show the true meaning of what 
 was from beneath. He was King by the truth and grace 
 of God, or he could not have taken the form and minis- 
 tries of a servant with absolute fidelity to man. He was 
 the impersonation of the Father's reign, or he could not 
 have been the example and inspiration of loyalty to his 
 brethren, who had failed to recognize their birthright 
 under the solicitations of appetite and worldly desire. 
 On the other hand, if Christ had not done full justice 
 to what was true in the schooling of the world, he could 
 not have carried out that rudimentary teaching to the 
 fulness of its eternal meaning. If he had not honored 
 with meek heart and due obedience those sitting in 
 Moses' seat, he could not have reproved their works in 
 the name of divine justice. If he had not rendered to 
 Caesar the tilings that were Caesar's, he could not have 
 
AGES OF DIVINE TEACHING. 49 
 
 rendered to God the things that are God's. It was for 
 him to divide the light from the darkness, to reveal the 
 reign of God and the law of perfection in the weakness 
 of the body and under all temptations of the world. He 
 was to rebuke the world's routine methods of self-aggran- 
 dizement and success in the wilderness. He was to van- 
 quish the world's tyranny, that had the power of death, 
 upon the cross. He was to rise to the life immortal, and 
 be recognized as the successful Initiator of the era of re- 
 demption. He was to reign in the glory of the Father, 
 till he should witness the consummation of the divine 
 purpose, — the deliverance not of man only, but of the 
 whole creation, from its primitive bondage into the glo- 
 rious liberty of the children of God. 
 
 Such is the Biblical conception. In the Christ incar- 
 nate the Scriptures represent to us absolute spiritual 
 superiority to outward constraints ; though the Son ap- 
 pears in the house of bondage, is called out of Egypt in 
 a deeper than the literal sense, through a Eed Sea more 
 terrible than that in which Israel of old was baptized 
 unto Moses. In the conception of Christ risen from the 
 dead the Scriptures give us the idea of man's sonship 
 and majority, in communion with the Father without 
 the obstructions incident to the natural life. 
 
 Who but the Christ should sum up for us the Scrip- 
 tural interpretation of the world ? What has he told us 
 in word or action of the world-tutelage ? Did he call it 
 a dead failure ? In demonstrating its errors did he deny 
 its usefulness ? In denouncing its sins did he refuse any 
 longer to employ it in working out righteousness ? In suf- 
 fering its oppressions was there no joy of it set before 
 him in his hopes ? Surely, he did not come to abolish 
 the imperfect government by which the natural man 
 
 4 
 
50 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 is kept in some kind of order and training for better 
 things. Harsh Eoman masters had done much in bring- 
 ing mankind to the fulness of the time when the Christ 
 should come ; and would do still more in extending the 
 protection of imperial law over the progress of his gos- 
 pel among the nations. Moses was faithful in all his 
 house as a servant. The mastership of Moses was not 
 to be repudiated, but fulfilled in its full intention. More 
 wonderful still, the will of the Father, that forbade an 
 unconditional subjection to hierarchical or imperial de- 
 mands, was not supernaturally to hinder the governing 
 powers from having their way in the infliction of suffer- 
 ing to be sacrificially endured. In this infliction the 
 proper function of earthly government was recognized, 
 its perversion by the powers of evil was judged, and the 
 Son of Man was glorified. Nor in the resurrection is 
 he represented as counting his sacrifice too great. His 
 word to two sad disciples is : — "0 foolish men, and 
 slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have' 
 spoken. Behooved it not the Christ to suffer these 
 things, and to enter into his glory ? " Then, from Moses, 
 and from all the prophets, and in all the Scriptures, he 
 interpreted the things concerning himself. 
 
 To whom, according to the New Testament, is the 
 revelation of the Christ to appeal ? Who are personally 
 interested in its effects ? Who are to share in its influ- 
 ence and success ? The men of all ages. Abraham, who 
 rejoiced to see the day of the Lord ; Moses and Elijah, 
 whose presence with him in the holy Mount shows them 
 as awaiting the universal transfiguration ; the men of faith, 
 from Abel down, mentioned in the eleventh chapter of 
 Hebrews, who were not to reach their perfection but in 
 fellowship with their brethren of the Christian era. In 
 
AGES OF DIVINE TEACHING. 51 
 
 the third chapter of the First Epistle of St. Peter the 
 Christ is represented, having first suffered for sins, as 
 hastening in spirit with his proclamation to the once 
 disobedient antediluvians. The remotest residents of 
 hades are conceived as not beyond his reach. For, if 
 the men of faith need to know their Leader in order to 
 reach perfection, certainly, according to the New Tes- 
 tament, the men of unbelief must come to the truth, 
 which is to put their conduct and destiny also in the 
 proper light. But in the fourth chapter of the same 
 Epistle, sixth verse, a broader statement is made. We 
 are told that the gospel was preached " also to the dead," 
 for this purpose, that they might not only " be judged 
 according to men in the flesh " (as they had been), " but 
 live according to God in the spirit." In fine, the scope 
 and unity of God's revelation, according to the wisdom 
 given to St. Paul, may be read in the third chapter of 
 Ephesians : " Unto me, who am less than the least 
 of all saints, was this grace given, to preach unto the 
 Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ ; and to make 
 all men see what is the dispensation of the mystery 
 which from all ages hath been hid in God, who created 
 all things ; to the intent that now unto the principalities 
 and the powers in the heavenly places might be made 
 known through the church the manifold wisdom of God, 
 according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in 
 Christ Jesus our Lord." 
 
 We may add, then, that, whether we inquire of Nature 
 or Scripture, we gain a reasonable assurance on three 
 points : First, bodily life is made to serve in the propa- 
 gation and training of spiritual men. Secondly, while dis- 
 union and servitude mark the world's history, the divine 
 revelation indicates the creative purpose as one of recon- 
 
52 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 ciliation and freedom; namely, "to gather together in 
 one all things in Christ." Thirdly, if tliis purpose, rul- 
 ing in spite of obstructions in our earthly history, is to 
 reach perfect fulfilment, it must be in liistory transcend- 
 ing our present experience ; that is, in history conceived 
 as the eternal reign of the Father in the life of the 
 resurrection. 
 
 The process of spiritual training permits something to 
 appear which is to disappear. In the world's experience 
 the moral trial is not a thing of spiritual instinct and 
 speculation alone, but a reality of practical moment, tlie 
 effort of overcoming the worse with the better. The 
 wheat and the tares grow together. The church of the 
 Eedeemer carries along with her, through all phases of 
 her earthly history, the antichrist from which she is to 
 be redeemed. The visible Christianity of the modern 
 age, like the old Jerusalem and the old Eome, exhibits 
 not only the vices to which its virtues are opposed, but 
 faults which spring from virtues that have not reached 
 their fulness. The reign of God moulds and moves to 
 its own purpose that governance which the nature and 
 needs of imperfect men will not dispense with. Divine 
 efficiency is working through human deficiency. With- 
 out the reactions of the world to come, the Christian 
 calling could not have its distinctive character in the 
 world that now is. Without the trials of the world that 
 now is, the earthly generations of men could not effec- 
 tively conceive or actually win the triumphs and joys of 
 the world to come. The consummation of man as par- 
 taker of the divine nature revealed in the Christ does 
 not disown connection with the physical laboratory of 
 life. The bruising of the serpent's head, and the deliv- 
 erance of the spiritual man, not without suffering, dates 
 
AGES OF DIVINE TEACHING. 53 
 
 from that far receding period of the garden and the 
 living creatures, — when above the beasts, yet like them 
 of the earth, the first human pair is conceived as erring 
 in a primitive choice between the seductions of animal 
 appetite, or intellectual ambition, and the divine voice 
 of benevolent restraint and authority. The principles 
 and tendencies that have asserted themselves in historic 
 human nature hitherto are set forth in Scripture as be- 
 longing to original man. 
 
PAET SECOND. 
 
 THE FALL. 
 
" The first man is of the earth, earthy." 
 
 1 Cob. XV. 47. 
 
 " Nemo ergo quserat efficientem causaia malae voluntatis ; quia 
 nee nia effectio est, sed defectio. Deficere namque ab eo quod 
 summe est ad id quod minus est, hoo est indpere habere volun- 
 tatem malam." 
 
 St. ArousTiNE : De Civitate Dei, lib. xii. c. 7. 
 
 " Now, son of mine, the tasting of the tree 
 Not in itself was cause of so great exile, 
 But solely the o'erstepping of the bounds." 
 
 Longfellow's Dante : Paradise, xxvi. 116-117. 
 
 " What fear I then ? rather, what know to fear 
 Under this ignorance of good or evil, 
 Of God or death, of law or penalty ? " 
 
 Milton : Paradise Lost, ix. 773-775. 
 
 " Some falls are means the happier to arise.** 
 
 Shakspeaee : Cymbeline, Act iv. Sceue 2. 
 
PART SECOND. 
 
 THE FALL. 
 
 CHAPTER L 
 
 ORIGINAL MAN AND PRIMITIVE TRIAL. 
 
 IT is seen that man, though started in life as the fee- 
 blest factor in his own destiny, exists in such organic 
 relation with universal nature as not only to be subject 
 to a necessary tutelage, but also to co-operate voluntarily 
 with the spiritual purpose revealing itself from age to 
 age in the progress of human society. 
 
 If, therefore, the progress of every human being opens 
 a growing contrast between the inappreciably small be- 
 ginning of life and the immeasurably great objects and 
 efforts to which life is addressed, what are we to think 
 of the ever-growing contrast between the opening trial 
 of original human nature and the teachings of ex- 
 perience in the vast career of mankind as a whole ? 
 Would the earliest human mistake or misdoing be nat- 
 urally looked upon as a peculiar mystery and scandal ? 
 Or, would it not rather be regarded as something quite 
 within the range of personal liabilities ; something to be 
 reasonably expected from the spontaneous development 
 of inward principles, that require the disciphne of expe- 
 rience for their proper ordering and lawful restraint ? 
 
 At any rate, we cannot study the Scripture conception 
 of man's primitive moral error without giving some 
 
58 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 heed to the obvious teaching of nature as to its source 
 and character. 
 
 The drama of Eden does not come down to us as the 
 thought of primeval man. It is part of the literature of 
 a people, peculiar by reason of their advanced theologi- 
 cal conceptions, whose calling was in a world no longer 
 young. The experience of ages had taught the mortality 
 of man's physical nature. To die was to be judged "ac- 
 cording to men in the flesh ; " while the administration 
 of this judgment was recognized as haviug a persistent 
 reference to a moral discipline, by which mankind might 
 learn to live " accordtug to God in the spirit." But since 
 no man of the by-gone generations had survived, as an 
 example of what it is to fulfil the divine law of life, of 
 course the common transgression of law, by which death 
 was found to invade the human body, was carried back 
 to the beginning of human experience. From the first, 
 the race of man was one to be instructed, to be held 
 responsible, and to be judged. Such was the organic 
 law of life. The discipline which all succeeding genera- 
 tions have inherited is presumably the discipline into 
 which the original family of mankind must have been 
 initiated. 
 
 This moral initiation is set forth in Scripture accord- 
 ing to the very elements and image of Nature. But it 
 has also been enveloped in a transcendental halo by 
 theological speculation and dogmatic systems, in such 
 a way as very much to obscure its verifiable features. 
 
 We are now concerned with what is in the order of 
 nature, — and so, verifiable. We take the words of St. 
 Paul, " howbeit that is not first which is spiritual, but 
 that which is natural ; then that which is spiritual," ^ 
 
 1 1 Cor. XV. 46. 
 
ORIGINAL MAN AND PRIMITIVE TRIAL. 59 
 
 for a verifiable statement as to the common order of 
 human development. Life in its beginning is preoccu- 
 pied with material objects and physical necessities, while 
 spiritual revelations are reserved for a later day. 
 
 That a creature of God is entered into such an order 
 of development is shown by what he begins to do, not 
 by how he began to be. Science may penetrate the 
 method of creation, if it can. It may try to deter- 
 mine whether the different species of living things were 
 brought into reproductive being at an instant word, 
 or the creative fiat be more reasonably conceived as the 
 working out of various organic forms and functions 
 through secret processes and inscrutable generations of 
 life. The postulate of Scripture with regard to man is, 
 that such and so much as he originally appeared in the 
 order of nature, such and so much he was created and 
 made by the Author of nature. Here, at this stage of 
 intelHgence, we are told in effect, is the beginning of the 
 human movement in the history of things. Here is rep- 
 resented a creature of physical organization, to be devel- 
 oped more and more as a rational and moral power ; a 
 creature instinct with natural motives that imply a career 
 of spontaneous activity, yet limited in faculty, checked 
 in thought, sensibihty, and effort ; a being conscious of 
 a free initiative, yet held to a constant reckoning with 
 outward objects, that react upon him according to no 
 choice of his. 
 
 In nature also' are the limits of any instruction to be 
 communicated. Teaching must be according to the 
 learner's powers and conceptions. Creative tuition may, 
 nay, must have reference to conditions and laws, of 
 which man is not only ignorant at first, but of which 
 he cannot be taught by mere intellectual suggestion. 
 
60 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 Hence the mark of divine teaching is its condescension 
 and accommodation to finite capacity. The material 
 envelopment is made to mitigate the uncreated light, 
 and adjust it to human vision. The same material nature 
 is man's defence against malignant spirits, if such be 
 supposed to act against him. In whatever guise they may 
 be fancied to appear, man cannot be an intentional ac- 
 complice in their spiritual aim. He is not taken into 
 the secret of it. The human trial is in the universe, to 
 be sure ; but it is meted out in the measure of human 
 nature, in order that the universe may be gradually and 
 safely apprehended in experience and thought. The 
 plain story of human conduct at any particular moment 
 is not verified, but is rather made unverifiable, by being 
 complicated with what is foreign to itself. It is postu- 
 late enough that man, as part of creation, Lives and 
 moves, and has his being in the Creator. 
 
 That the moral trial of humanity was social in the 
 beginning cannot be held as otherwise than favorable to 
 its success. What is essential to the development of 
 our race is represented in Scripture as conducive also 
 to personal welfare. So far as man and woman are 
 distinguished from each other, this is equivalent to the 
 larger range of their united powers, and to more ample 
 security against individual weakness. But since man 
 and woman are two in one, the unit of the race, their 
 conduct is set forth as pertaining to one nature, — a 
 nature conceived as originally without taint of moral 
 depravation, without bias of foregoing example. Man's 
 career is, in Genesis, the central reality of a physical crea- 
 tion which is of God, and very good. Nature was in the 
 beginning, is now, and ever shall be, perfect in principle, 
 wise in organic law, — yet having reference not only to 
 
ORIGINAL MAN AND PRIMITIVE TRIAL. 61 
 
 an immediate personal discipline, but to a vast spiritual 
 design requiring unknown ages for its fulfilment. 
 
 The danger of life is the danger of transgressing the 
 law of life. So far as we have evidence that man was, or 
 is naturally liable to transgress the law of his being, the 
 evidence connects this liability with two phases of our 
 individual and collective history : namely, first, the pecu- 
 liar proneness of unschooled nature to practical errors of 
 ignorance ; and, secondly, the discipline of physical and 
 moral law for the better regulation of conduct. Each of 
 these phases of our history can be discussed with the cer- 
 titude that goes with conscious experience. 
 
 From the nettle danger to pluck the flower safety is 
 the natural allotment of all living creatures upon earth. 
 Man's dangers are to be estimated by the vast range of 
 interests that are at stake upon his conduct. The expe- 
 rienced chemist does not handle the elements and appara- 
 tus of his own laboratory without a care^ which signifies 
 danger. How, then, shall the novice of a race make his 
 way in the laboratory of creation and the chemistry of 
 life without risk, wisely as all things are arranged for 
 his guidance and warning? However exalted in faculty 
 the original man may be conceived to have been, he was 
 constituted to be schooled, at least physically and intel- 
 lectually, by his own mistakes ; not to move on tenta- 
 tively in experiments of life, and come to no practical 
 error. Indeed, man comes upon occasions of stumbling 
 and falling so various and recurring that he cannot afford 
 to be preoccupied with shunning mishaps, for fear that 
 such a preoccupation might be the greatest mishap of 
 all. He will gaze at the stars in spite of the danger of 
 stumbling at the stone in his path. He is even diverted 
 and stimulated by the risks to which his spontaneous 
 
62 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 movements expose him, and wins familiarity with out- 
 ward things through a somewhat heroic disregard of 
 hurts and pains. 
 
 The original man has it before him to learn and prac- 
 tise the arts of life. He is to make trial of the difference 
 between thought and bodily organs, as well as of the 
 difference between bodily organs and the more inert ma- 
 terial through which the mind's intention must be car- 
 ried out. The muscular movement does not obey with 
 inevitable precision the inward mandate. The organ is 
 untrained, and the instrument is rude. The stroke slips 
 away from the mark, and the manufacture falls below 
 the idea. What was not too well conceived is but too 
 ill done. Only by degrees can mechanical execution 
 rise above its early failures towards those better pat- 
 terns which the mind is gradually working out. To hold 
 the thing done as at once equal to the idea, — this were 
 the most disastrous fall, the fall of the idea itself to the 
 level of the manufactured article, the fall from the birth- 
 right of progress, wherein all future achievements are 
 stored. Instead of this, the thing done becomes an ob- 
 ject to be judged, a proof of how the effort fell below the 
 design, a pungent suggestion of failure on the one hand 
 and of possible improvement on the other. Thus the 
 artistic judgment and sensibility, the artistic conscience, 
 becomes active through a sense of practical deficiency, 
 and moves on to better efforts and worthier results. If 
 it were needful to account for primitive failure in manual 
 exertions, how could the truth be better summed up, on 
 reflection, than by saying that the work, not having been 
 done according to the perfect conception of what was 
 required, could be recognized, not as free from forbidden 
 elements and unqualifiedly good, but only as containing 
 
 \ 
 
ORIGINAL MAN AND PRIMITIVE TRIAL. 63 
 
 elements of good and evil. The highest law, of course, 
 demands good only, and is against the knowledge of 
 good mixed with evil. Must we not suppose that in the 
 first man especially there was a practical deficiency, due 
 to inexperience and the consistency of his clay, the rec- 
 ognition of which would prick him on towards what 
 might he due to the nobility of his spirit ? 
 
 But if in the simplest beginnings of art there is a 
 natural law of practical failure ; if the law of the mind 
 is intellectual and aesthetic, while the law in the mem- 
 bers is physical and cosmic, so that at first it seems 
 good luck rather than good effort when the mark is hit, — 
 how is it in the sphere of science ? Did flesh and blood 
 ever so inherit the inscrutable laws of physical life as to 
 be under no liability of transgressing their bounds ? On 
 the contrary, is not this liability the portion peculiarly 
 of initial existence ? That there are things contrary to 
 the law of life may soon appear; but what, and how 
 many, are the forbidden things, or the forbidden rela- 
 tions of things, not even the largest experience can fully 
 tell. Only we know that the things forbidden by or- 
 ganic law or by artistic judgment are by and by for- 
 bidden by the moral sense as well. The physical 
 and industrial habits are gradually taken up into the 
 moral training, in order that the body itself, and all tem- 
 porary forms of activity, may be brought for their day 
 under spiritual control. Here, too, in the sphere of 
 rational faith and righteousness, the man of primitive 
 nature left us no perfect example. 
 
 But who is to cast the first stone at the first man ? 
 Certainly not we, who share his moral infirmity after 
 ages of instruction and experience. Is man a creature 
 to originate perfect moral conduct from partial and pro- 
 
64 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 liibitory hints of moral obligation ? No. He is consti- 
 tuted to originate conduct freely, that in the judgment 
 of that conduct, as the particulars of it complete them- 
 selves, he may learn to distinguish the good from the 
 not good. As in art, so in morals, judgment and sensi- 
 bility are combined in the consciousness of what is done 
 in a way to rebuke the mixture of good and evil in mo- 
 tive or action, that the spirit, inspired with faith and 
 hope, may be spurred on toward what is good only. 
 
 Primitive moral trial — what is it ? Is it not a seK- 
 government, constitutional but untutored, in which the 
 personal power is necessarily moved to action, but under 
 limits of knowledge and liabilities of inexperience such 
 that, if the danger of practical error be great, the danger 
 of contracting moral guilt is correspondingly mitigated ? 
 Witness the pointed teaching of the New Testament, that 
 the gravest spiritual perils are associated with the final 
 word, not with the first lessons, of revelation. 
 
 The primitive liability to failure is connected indeed 
 with animal appetites, together with a certain awkward- 
 ness of muscular effort and resistance of matter ; but it 
 reaches also to the complex and comprehensive moral 
 calling that gradually opens to the mind. Duty dis- 
 closes itself in the sphere of art, in the sphere of physical 
 law ; but it goes beyond these spheres, and contemplates 
 the effort of all powers toward their rational ends. All 
 personal relations, all service and loyalty, are leading on 
 to the apprehension of infinite righteousness; while at 
 the same time the uninformed and inexperienced soul is 
 open to only partial hints, shut up within the narrowest 
 bounds of knowledge, and occupied about details of im- 
 mediate and pressing requirement, that make up the 
 rudimentary lessons for a far-off perfection of being. Is 
 
ORIGINAL MAN AND PRIMITIVE TRIAL, 65 
 
 there a discrepancy between our ideal and our actual, 
 which all the discipline of life cannot cause to disap- 
 pear ? — which the discipliae of life may for a time 
 make more and more apparent ? And is there no neces- 
 sary difference between creative thought in universal 
 nature and the rude essays of unschooled faculties ? Is 
 man held to have been highly endowed at first, a spiritual 
 nature far above the common range, in the invisible like- 
 ness of ideal Divinity ? How, then, should not his gifts 
 be quite out of proportion to his earthly calling, and he, 
 the apprentice in practical methods, be perpetually hum- 
 bled and irked by lowly and tedious trials on the very 
 threshold of existence ? Or, suppose the spiritual gifts 
 and calling to be reserved for a later period of personal 
 development, and the habit of being to take shape for a 
 time in quiet harmony with earthward relations and 
 efforts, how should not these natural preoccupations ab- 
 sorb energy and limit development, so that by and by 
 the spiritual calling would appeal to the awakened con- 
 sciousness with incitements and reproofs in view of sen- 
 sual and sluggish days ? Grant the diviuest tempering 
 and harmony of powers, organs, and exercises ; there is at 
 least the liability to fatigue, the natural limit of every 
 exertion, and of every indulgence. There is in idea the 
 line of perfection, the boundary at every point between 
 not too little and not too much, in which all opposing 
 claims are reconciled. But can we suppose that the true 
 orbit of a combined physical and spiritual movement, 
 which has never been intellectually demonstrated, is, in 
 the very first trial, to be spontaneously described ? Only 
 the fulness of the creative Godhead in man is equal to 
 such a result, — not man, as a stranger in the earth, set 
 to labor, to listen, to learn, and to obey. A healthy de- 
 
 5 
 
66 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 sire to do tlie riglit thing degenerating into an anxious 
 scrupulosity has already missed the mark; and so has 
 the quiet assurance of having done as well as it was pos- 
 sible to do. No sooner does the inward purpose formu- 
 late itself in outward conduct, than there appears an 
 action to be reviewed and judged. Was it perfect ? If 
 so, the actor has hit the mark of his calling at one point 
 only. AVas it well meant, but worse done ? Then there 
 takes place at once a corresponding distinction and judg- 
 ment with regard to it. The act is not simply good, but 
 good and evil. Thus, a phase of completed moral action 
 becomes the practical prelude to the revelation of a 
 higher law of conduct, — a law which finds fault with 
 what went before, and beckons onward to nobler exer- 
 tion. The higher law enters by reason of what is seen 
 to have involved, however unintentionally, an element of 
 transgression ; and the expression for moral advancement 
 is that of the Psalmist: "I have seen an end of all 
 perfection, but thy commandment is exceeding broad." 
 
 Now, if it be urged that the unavoidable distinction 
 between inward suggestion and outward performance is 
 accounted for and justified by the organic law of our 
 existence, and that a man is to be blamed only so far as 
 he has acted from a faulty intention, there is no occasion 
 to object. What appears is that our organic law does 
 involve a necessary missing of the ideal mark, a neces- 
 sary falling below the ideal standard, especially in the 
 momentary efforts of initial experiment. In other words, 
 man was originally set to win his way and to win 
 his prize by voluntary discipline and self-sacrificing 
 obedience. 
 
 But there are tendencies in human nature that make 
 against discipline and obedience. It follows that a faulty 
 
ORIGINAL MAN AND PRIMITIVE TRIAL. 67 
 
 intention, or a disloyal passion, or a disobedient purpose, 
 is an evil into which an untried virtue might fall for a 
 time, through inappreciable processes of temptation. Here 
 we come to that freedom of moral agency in which man 
 learns to know himself as a prince, and possibly to think 
 of himself as like his Maker. He is under a necessity 
 of legislating for himself in detail, and he judges him- 
 self in detail; but he can only spell out in part, and 
 never fully know, the divine law ; which is over him 
 as well as in him, and by which he is, however myster- 
 iously, brought to judgment. If the new man, being 
 both prince and apprentice, has adjudged various doings 
 of his own to be what he would not have the same kind 
 of doings to be in future, would it be the way of a gen- 
 erous and upright spirit to say, " There is no fault of 
 mine here ; I disavow all responsibility for what is done 
 amiss ; it is all due to the law of my creation" ? On the 
 contrary, shall not the reverent and conscientious sus- 
 ceptibility be prompt to suspect some personal delin- 
 quency, and even to accept a responsibility not literally 
 forced upon it, — assured that the supreme Judge can do 
 no wrong? Conviction of error is one element in the 
 conviction of sin, and for a time the chief, possibly the 
 sole, element; but the other element, the feeling of 
 blame-worthiness, is not far off. It is ever ready to 
 come in with the after judgment of any regrettable 
 act, whose character was not distinctly known or duly 
 weighed beforehand. 
 
 This would hold true in a special sense of a first diso- 
 bedience. Disobedience, while man is little aware of 
 the significance of law, may be determined upon, not as 
 wrong, but as probably advantageous, or at any rate as 
 not likely to be very injurious. How can the disobe- 
 
68 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 dience be realized as wrong before it has fulfilled itself 
 so as to prove its own character, and thus enable the 
 conscience quickened by experience to pass judgment 
 upon it ; or, what is the same thing, to feel the force of 
 a higher judgment saying, " That was wrong " ? At 
 this later stage, the least foregoing suspicion or doubt is 
 transfigured into a clear warning, that condemns the error 
 and precipitation of the disobedient act. If the man re- 
 fuse to own his responsibility ; if he set himself to pre- 
 varicate, to escape the mortification ensuing upon his 
 conduct , — what is this but to aggravate the fault and 
 diJB&culty into which he has fallen, to prepare the way 
 for a more painful recoil from what is done, and for a 
 severer discipline in what is still to do ? As there is 
 a demonstration of error inseparable from a slow and 
 difficult progress in truth, so there is a development of 
 practical wrong in acts that grow imperceptibly to their 
 fulfilment, through infinitesimal increments of motive 
 and energy; and the wrong is appreciated only when 
 the act is fulfilled. It is when something is produced 
 out of harmony with the law of the mind, that one be- 
 comes aware that in the members there is a bondage of 
 sin, a rule not to live by, but to be deUvered from. So 
 it comes to pass that, on the side of provisional expe. 
 riments and unsatisfactory results, man finds himself 
 lapsing, failing, and his works perishing; but on the 
 other side, the side of a noble purpose and a beneficent 
 teaching, he finds himself going on and up, enlarging 
 his range, disciplining his powers, and producing works, 
 not immortal indeed, but not so soon or so willingly 
 allowed to perish. 
 
 It is not in the primitive action alone that the ques- 
 tion is put, What motive shall be honored, and what mas- 
 
ORIGINAL MAN AND PRIMITIVE TRIAL. 69 
 
 ter shall be served? That action is the opening of a trial, 
 that continues open. More and more pressingly with 
 every new experience does the great alternative recur: 
 law and life, or disobedience and death. It is a princely 
 probation. Law may seem severe for the moment ; yet 
 law is vital and progressive, an austere but beautiful 
 queen. Lawlessness may seem real and vital in a way, 
 and pleasantly indulgent to the senses ; but lawlessness is 
 a treacherous mistress with forbidden fruit, rejecting the 
 higher only to fall under the lower requirement — the 
 law of death. Life discloses no full justification in 
 what a man has done, no matter how well. Nothing 
 that man can finish, or formulate in act, is man's whole 
 duty or perfect obedience. He must go on and up. This 
 is his law, and his blessedness. He is not to talk of being 
 tantalized with an unapproachable perfection. He is to 
 move towards the excellence he apprehends ; or else fall 
 into the beggarly listlessness that seeks no higher good 
 — and lives no more. 
 
 Contemplate the accumulation and continuity of fail- 
 ure through which the best discipline of life has realized 
 its measures of good ; and so appreciate the life itself — 
 the spirit begotten and nourished from above for so ar- 
 duous a progress. If man is not constituted to originate 
 conduct of ideal perfection at first, how significant the 
 fact that he never fails to develop the polarities of 
 thought and sensibility known as conscience ; and that, 
 when conscience affirms something of evil even in what 
 was meant only for good, not even the good mixed with 
 evil can save the whole from that active resentment which 
 demands a new trial and a better result. Thus man's nat- 
 ural liability to fall into evil becomes the ground of a high 
 calling : " Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with 
 
70 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 good." And while we may well believe, with St. Paul, that 
 sin is not imputed as intentional transgression while as 
 yet no positive law has been announced, still we must rec- 
 ognize the fact that unintentional transgression needs to 
 be corrected ; and so, it may well be by reason of such 
 transgression that the ditine law enters, bringing with it 
 the knowledge of sin. 
 
 The distinction of what is done according to opposite 
 poles of thought, — good and evil, right and wrong, — 
 originating, as we have seen, from the centre of personal 
 judgment through the teachings of experience, does not 
 confine itself to its own sphere, but goes out into a dual- 
 ism that conceives the universe, whether of space or 
 time, as exhibiting a like polarization of energy. Man 
 reconstructs all things according to this original anti- 
 thesis. He makes new heavens and a new earth with 
 elements of good and evil. JEonian powers before the 
 world was are at odds, — Ormuzd and Ahriman, Odin 
 and Loki, powers of good and powers of evil. The 
 same antithesis rules in the conception of the limitless 
 future. The carnal mind and the spiritual mind are 
 represented respectively in actions and powers that sig- 
 nify a truceless warfare. The moral discord seizes upon 
 all natural contrasts and incompatibilities, as its symbols. 
 It becomes the interpreter of the world, transfiguring 
 things and names, that it may assign them to service in 
 the spiritual realm. Day and night, summer and winter, 
 earth and air, fire and water, health and sickness, growth 
 and decay, life and death, become expressions for inward 
 struggle and vicissitude. Of course, the inward struggle 
 comes to conscious vigor according to the development 
 of races and individuals ; but it takes all literature to 
 record it, and all life to utter its voice. The Brahmin 
 
ORIGINAL MAN AND PRIMITIVE TRIAL. 71 
 
 looking upon limited experience as ambiguous and illu- 
 sive, longing to be absorbed through knowledge in the 
 universe of being; the Buddhist trying by meditative 
 discipline to shorten a tedious metempsychosis and reach 
 that mysterious Nirvana, good at least as the negation of 
 evil ; the Christian finding no adequate repose here, but 
 sighing for a sabbath-rest that remaineth for the people 
 of God ; the whole creation groaning and travailing in 
 pain, waiting for redemption or reconciliation, that shall 
 rule out the irrational elements of finite destiny, — these 
 are some of the notes in a universal chorus of testimony 
 to man's deficiency and failure in realizing the good, to 
 the discord and mortal agony of his experience in the 
 knowledge of good and evil. 
 
 But if man is impelled to look beyond himself for 
 deliverance from evil, he is obliged to find the source of 
 his defection from good in his own nature. The mo- 
 menta of personal conduct are in the person. It may 
 seem little to know ; but when we inquire into the 
 natural history of man's defection, we justly conceive 
 it to be a falling from the harmony of an original con- 
 stitution attributable to the Creator alone, of whose work 
 no evil can be predicated, into an immaturity and uncer- 
 tainty of action, at necessary odds both with creative 
 wisdom and with the growing ideas of creaturely perfec- 
 tion. The fall appears as a childish proneness, for a time, 
 to trial of things not known to be good, or even presumed 
 to be evil; whose rashness or precipitancy may be ac- 
 counted for, if not excused, by the natural limits of ap- 
 prehension, the predominance of physical nature pending 
 the gradual development of spiritual powers, the conceiv- 
 able lack of dutiful attention to the better and worse 
 aspects of proposed conduct through ignorance or pre- 
 
72 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 occupation, and finally, by the tendency, in view of things 
 already done, to a sluggish or self-willed complicity with 
 what needs to be corrected. Thus, the smallest deviation 
 from the perfect law of being is just so far a partaking 
 of forbidden elements, a turning of experience from the 
 knowledge of good simply, to the knowledge of good and 
 evil, an opening of life to inroads of decay and death. 
 It is with reference to this gradual process of defection, 
 too unconscious and obscure to be seized upon and de- 
 fined, till it is summed up in some deed, that St. Augus- 
 tine conceives our first parents to have moved in secret 
 disloyalty to their act of outward disobedience.^ 
 
 1 In occulto autem mali esse ccEpenmt, ut in apertam inobedientiam 
 laberentur. — De Civitate Dei, lib. xiv. c. 13. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 GENESIS COSMICAL AND ^EONIAN. 
 
 TT is a mark of Scripture that not only its general repre- 
 -*- sentations, but even its particular figures or phrases, 
 come promptly to our aid, when we are trying to reach 
 the truth of nature. The living Word is that which sets 
 forth what the Creator declares in the very realities re- 
 ferred to. In the things that are made is the divine 
 thought, — whether the things are presented immediately 
 to the senses, or represented to the mind in words. 
 Scripture is of its own kind, but in the common order 
 of thought. It is not the possession of specialists ; but 
 has to do with universal religious faith, and with nature 
 as depending upon God, and known in the common con- 
 sciousness. It sets forth the words which the Creator 
 spoke in things that were made, words which man is to 
 hear, according to St. Augustine, not with his bodily 
 ears ; for God " speaks in the truth itself, if any one is 
 ready to hear with the mind, not with the body." ^ If, 
 therefore, we desire to hear God speak in the truth itself, 
 as the author of Genesis heard him speak, we shall avoid 
 the anachronism of trying to find the discoveries of mod- 
 ern science in that ancient form of knowledge and faith. 
 We shall bear in mind that the relation of the Creator 
 
 1 De Civitate Dei, lib. xi. c. 2. 
 
74 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 to his works is the truth itself, no matter how little or 
 how much those works may have disclosed their secrets 
 to human inquiry. God made the world, in whatever 
 way man may conceive or represent the world. The fresh 
 witness of the morning is not to be contradicted or cor- 
 rected by the dry brilliancy of midday. The world that 
 was made, in whole and in detail, is the world that con- 
 tinues to be made, that always presents itself in some 
 phase of its well-ordered harmony to common sense and 
 universal intelligence. 
 
 In studying the Scripture testimony to man's moral 
 beginning, however, we have to do with two accounts in 
 Genesis, often treated as in part at least varying narra- 
 tions of the same facts, with no very serious effort to 
 ascertain the essential difference between them. We 
 have nothing to do here with critical inquiries about 
 different documents. Our concern is only with the 
 sense of what is written. Any distinction in the sense 
 must be unavoidable, obvious to the most uncritical 
 reader, when once pointed out, or the distinction may 
 be held not to exist. But, on the other hand, if the dis- 
 tinction be easily marked, and its application brings out 
 clearly the unity and coherency of the parts, then the 
 distinction is presumably real and necessary. 
 
 What, then, is the distinction which assigns its own 
 sphere to each narration ? Simply this : that the first ac- 
 count, including the first chapter of Genesis and three 
 verses of the second, contemplates universal nature as 
 the completed Cosmos, and sets forth the creative work 
 in relations of space ; while the account that follows, 
 beginning with the fourth verse of the second chapter, 
 and going on in the story of Eden, regards nature as in- 
 volving development in relations of time, and sets forth 
 
GENESIS COSMICAL AND IONIAN. 75 
 
 creation with respect chiefly to the ceon, or world-history. 
 In the first account we have fiats of consummation, the 
 work of Mohim, who spake and it was done, whose 
 thought and will are realized and reflected upon in dis- 
 tinctions and groups of things conceived as complete 
 and very good. The second account brings before us the 
 work of Jehovah Elohiiii, of God ever existent and ever 
 active, whose thought and will are revealed, not only 
 in natural processes, but in spiritual and historic crea- 
 tions as well, wherein things naturally good may fall 
 into temporary evil. 
 
 Go through the two accounts with this distinction in 
 mind, and see if it be not essential. What is the sphere 
 of the first narration ? Light, as distinguished from dark- 
 ness upon the boundless abyss; earth, as distinguished 
 from atmosphere and sky ; earth with its vegetation, as 
 distinguished from seas ; sun, moon, and stars, as dis- 
 pensing light and marking time ; distribution of animal 
 life in water and air ; distribution of animal life upon 
 the earth, ending in man: these are determinations of 
 nature in space. Spoken from the depths of eternity, 
 they are represented in the light of common days. The 
 cosmical artist does not give us the perspective of time. 
 His compositions are peremptorily foreshortened to the 
 measure of, " He spake, and it was done." As pre- 
 sented in nature, and as represented in Scripture, the 
 groups of created things strike the sense and govern the 
 common intelligence, though having no more to tell di- 
 rectly of interior development and natural duration than 
 have Michael Angelo's pictures in the Sistine Chapel. 
 The original aurora flashes upon the background of 
 chaos at the word. The celestial clock-work is set in 
 order with omnipotent abruptness. All the prolific parts 
 
76 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 of creation are produced in full career. The creation is 
 punctual, simultaneous, complete, — universal harmony 
 and happy correlation. The different sections contemplate 
 no verifiable order of time. Hence, they may be divided 
 conventionally by common days before the sun is said 
 to have been set in heaven. " For what man possessed 
 of reason," asks Origen, "would deem that a first and 
 second and third day, evening and morning, came to pass 
 without sun, moon, and stars ? " ^ The infinite concep- 
 tions of divine achievement and divine repose are com- 
 mended to the feeble memory of mankind by association 
 with the week of ordinary work, rounded by a day of rest, 
 
 — according to the plain understanding of St. Augustine, 
 that though we cannot have evening but from the setting 
 of the sun, nor morning but from his rising, the period 
 of six days was still made use of in the narrative, not as 
 if God required time or could not create all things at 
 once, but because by this number the perfection of his 
 works was signified.^ 
 
 Try the second account. We have come to genera- 
 tions, — a genesis of things in a difi'erent order of thought. 
 It is the order of thought contemplated by our Lord when 
 he said, " My Father worketh hitherto." Withdrawn from 
 the luminous outlines and objective coloring of space, we 
 have passed into the indistinguishable depths of time. 
 We have to do with physical change and organic develop- 
 ment moving mysteriously on to world-history. There is 
 a chaotic period of crude material and creative energy be- 
 fore any plant or herb of the field had grown in the earth, 
 
 — a chaos of negations, no rain, no man to till the ground. 
 Creation is not the completed work, but the continuing 
 
 1 Quoted in Hagenbach's History of Doctrines, vol. i. p. 135. 
 
 2 De Civitate Dei, lib. xi. c. 7, and 30. 
 
GENESIS COSMICAL AND IONIAN. 77 
 
 process. The day when the Lord God made the earth 
 and the heavens is an seonian day. There is a striking 
 absence of chronological exactness, whether as respects 
 the origin of things or the progress of man towards his 
 recognized place and character in history. The human 
 race is represented, not as developed and mature in func- 
 tion, chief of the works of God, but as inchoate and pro- 
 gressive, coming forth from earthly elements into vital 
 being. The organic perfectness of humanity, created 
 male and female, honored and blessed with an endow- 
 ment of fruitfulness and a commission to rule over the 
 works of God, gives place to individual experience and 
 effort in a certain subjection and serviceableness to sur- 
 rounding nature. A garden becomes the narrow scene 
 of a drama without assignable limits of duration, just as 
 the conventional week afforded a convenient method for 
 marking off the different parts of a visible universe with- 
 out assignable limits of extension. Man is set to fill up 
 actual days in the garden, to dress and keep it. He ac- 
 quires instruction about his manner of living, — what 
 to eat and what not to eat. He touches the border-land 
 of science, — observation, nomenclature. He comes to 
 the consciousness of social needs. Animal or intellec- 
 tual isolation is not good. " Male and female " become 
 " man and woman " in a social and spiritual correspond- 
 ence, "husband and wife," in a conjugal destiny and 
 marriage institution. Man's genesis as a creature of 
 God's moral government ensues in process of time upon 
 his genesis in the order of the physical creation. There 
 is indicated an awakening out of the deep sleep of ani- 
 mal existence — through observation, comparison, reflec- 
 tion — to love and worship, to law and discipline, to the 
 hope of a spiritual career. 
 
78 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 Here is a progress, as I have said, in time, — not time 
 measured, not time told off in days, weeks or years, but 
 time as belonging to conscious being — life-time. In 
 awakening life there is ever new trial. The senses are 
 quickened. Curiosity refuses to sleep. There is an in- 
 stinct of freedom and self-possession, a growing confi- 
 dence of being able to take care of one's self, a tendency 
 to experimental knowledge at all risks, possibly even a 
 pride in refusing to be governed by reasonable restric- 
 tions and warnings. In fine, there is a fall at length from 
 an earlier simplicity of faith and obedience. Generic 
 humanity is pictured under conditions of temptation 
 which every child can apprehend, and as acting with an 
 immaturity of judgment and character which every child 
 in some way illustrates. But with transgression there is 
 announced a change. Life becomes moral discipline, in 
 distinction from native innocency. There is no going 
 back to the simple constitutional goodness to which 
 transgression cannot be imputed. The whole history of 
 good and evil in the world comes in this way to its orig- 
 inal epitome and rehearsal. 
 
 If the distinction set forth be one grounded in the 
 nature of things, if it be self-evident that the days which 
 it requires the completed orbs of space to make are not 
 days which can denote the duration of the process by 
 which those orbs were made, then the days in question 
 are at once resolved into elements of literary representa- 
 tion. The quasi day's-works are a mode of summing up 
 and distinguishing the vast effects exhibited to common 
 observation in the ordering of nature, which effects are 
 summarily referred to the word of the Creator. They 
 also furnish an ideal type of legitimate human effort 
 and rest. But, especially as marking a modest range of 
 
GENESIS COSMICAL AND JEONIAN. 79 
 
 verification really open to us, the distinction is impor- 
 tant. A writing is properly verified in the order of 
 thought in which it is conceived, and to which it is ad- 
 dressed. The scripture of common observation is not 
 verified in terms of transcendental physics, nor the scrip- 
 ture of common inward experience in terms of tran- 
 scendental metaphysics. There may be conceptions in 
 science, or even in mythology, which we accept as ideally 
 true, without the power to test their objective reahty ; 
 and these may help to explain other conceptions which 
 we accept as true simply because we can and do appre- 
 ciate their fidelity to nature. But in comparing the 
 plain language of Genesis with the common sense of 
 things, we have apparently as little concern with geo- 
 logical periods for construing the six day's-works as we 
 have with St. Augustine's mythological theory that " let 
 there be light " refers to the creation of angels, in con- 
 struing the fall. For, supposing that " let there be light " 
 does refer in some secondary way to the creation of 
 angels, and that, as St. Augustine further sets forth,^ 
 part of the angels fell into the darkness from which the 
 light was divided, thus determining two hostile states, 
 which were to make the new creation of God the theatre 
 of their strife ; still, as this setting-forth is beyond the 
 whole range of reality with which we are acquainted, 
 we pass it by, as belonging to an order of unverifiable 
 conceptions. 
 
 Let us therefore take the cosmical genesis as simply 
 scenery and prelude, with reference to an seonian revela- 
 tion of God in human history. 
 
 A garden which man is set to keep and dress is no 
 strange thing. A tree allegorically named is likely to 
 
 1 De Civitate Dei, lib. xi. c. 9. 
 
80 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 be not of an extinct species. All life has its proper 
 nourishment, its authorized enjoyment, the law of its 
 best and longest career. This law transgressed by any 
 forbidden indulgence, evil begins to be known in con- 
 trast with good; and death, no longer marking the 
 necessary goal of existence, shadows the progress and 
 obstructs the achieving energy of life. Fruit which is 
 a desire to the eyes, animal appetite, precipitate curi- 
 osity, and rash ambition of new knowledge, whether of 
 good or evil, — this tempting solicitation from below 
 creeping darkly up to the height of an intellectual ar- 
 gument, as it was the original, so is it the universal, 
 temptation of man. Here is no violent assault, nothing 
 but quiet and plausible suggestion, wholly within the 
 range of natural motives, yet without the due apprehen- 
 sion of natural consequences, — the easy and una wed 
 movement of a moral nature in need of prohibitory in- 
 junctions, but prone to unreflecting determinations, and 
 liable, with no excited consciousness of wrong intent, 
 yet with a certain deliberate purpose of self-gratification, 
 to disregard the rational persuasions of duty ministered 
 from above. It is the ancient and universal error. It 
 imports natural infirmity. It discredits spiritual dignity. 
 It is of a piece with the latest yielding to temptation ; 
 only, being conceived as at the beginning of moral agency, 
 when the human mind was open to the voice of God in 
 nature, but not to the same voice articulated in the 
 parental and social guardianship that watches over the 
 actions of ordinary childhood, the fall of the first pair is 
 referred directly to the judgment of God, and so the 
 highest sanction is given to the subsequent verdicts of 
 the human conscience. 
 
 But if in the fall man was stung with the knowledge 
 
GEXESIS COSMICAL AND J20XIAX. 81 
 
 of evil, the knowledge of good was not to be denied him. 
 He did not fall from the guardianship of God. He did 
 not fall from the calling of faith and obedience. The 
 good still beckoned to him. The voice of duty still pur- 
 sued him. Hope still went before him. But life and 
 history assume at once a dualistic character. A bad 
 suggestion fulfilled in a disloyal act opens the door to 
 discord, prevarication, contradiction. The man and the 
 beast are contradistinguished in the same body and soul. 
 Divine service is alloyed with self-seeking. The loss of 
 inward peace brings on a conflict with outward nature. 
 The processes of life are mysteriously flavored with the 
 sentence of death; and death itself is armed with a 
 moral sting, a new and punitive terror. The serpent of 
 temptation has entered upon his typical function as 
 both beast and false prophet. Wherever peace on earth 
 is' violated, or there is war in heaven, there is the 
 "dragon of the prime," to be bound, cast out, killed, 
 but again to live and act whenever that first falsehood 
 is repeated — that man by himself, man in virtue of 
 appetite, intellect, or ambition, shall be as God. Against 
 such a suggestion there is the girding of man for his 
 moral struggle. Man did not stumble that he might 
 fall ; but rather through his fall there came the prompt- 
 ing to more wary and virtuous endeavor, to a conscious 
 and principled reaction against wrong, the promise and 
 potency of the Creator's redeeming work. 
 
 In the Scripture genesis, nature sums up the things 
 that are made ; and there is one supernatural Maker — 
 God. Whether the works be conceived as complete in 
 space, or the divine operation be represented as going on 
 in time, the Creator and Mover is one and the same. 
 This exhaustive distinction implies that man, as a crea- 
 
82 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 ture, had his original motives and laws of conduct from 
 his Creator, under outward conditions which the Creator 
 had arranged. If, then, human nature was constituted 
 not to realize spontaneously an ultimate and perfect form 
 of action, but to be taught by its own failures and defi- 
 ciencies to depend upon continual help from above ; if 
 human nature was peculiarly liable to transgress the law 
 of life, when there was everything to learn as to what the 
 law of life is ; it becomes a fact of the utmost significance 
 that man was constituted to hear the voice of his Creator 
 from within and from without. By the nature of man's 
 powers, as well as by the nature of things with which 
 man had to deal, the Creator shaped experience, fash- 
 ioned thought, inspired conviction, and so led on to the 
 very language in which the divine teaching should be 
 afterwards rendered. Man was encompassed by natural 
 law, which was the effective vehicle of instruction, of 
 warning, of judgment, perfectly adapted to convert the 
 rational soul from delusive aims and lead it on toward 
 its proper perfection. 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 
 MORAL DEVELOPMENT FROM DISCOVERIES OF LAW. 
 
 'T^HE Scripture conception of primitive man as pass- 
 -*- ing from original innocence to positive moral disci- 
 pline by disobedience to a divine command, was inter- 
 preted by St. Augustine as involving the certainty, not 
 only that all mankind would fall in the same way, but 
 also that this voluntary defection would become a per- 
 manent habit of existence and a final bond of social 
 organization for a very large proportion of the human 
 race.^ 
 
 This interpretation assumed that the divine adminis- 
 tration of law, seen to be universally corrective in its 
 moral intention, was to be not universally remedial in 
 its personal effects. Hence the kingdom of darkness, 
 the profane state, would naturally be developed and 
 strengthened in constant struggle with divine law as 
 exemphfied in the holy state or kingdom of God. The 
 gloomy support which this theory of human destiny has 
 in the conflicting moral tendencies of mankind is only 
 too apparent. But, as Augustine himself intimates, the 
 
 1 In hoc primo homine, qui primitus factus est, nondum quideni se- 
 cundum evidentiam, jam tamen secundum Dei prsescientiam, exortos 
 fuisse existimemus in gen ere humano societates tanquara civitates duas. 
 — De Civitate Dei, lib. xii. c. 27. 
 
84 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 ultimate issues of the divine government of the world are 
 not in evidence with us. They are subjects for relig- 
 ious faith and rational anticipation. What we are now 
 concerned to verify is the practical efficiency and spir- 
 itual aim of law with reference to transgression, as taught 
 in the Scripture of the fall. Are the penal consequences 
 of wrong-doing as much in favor of man's final rectitude 
 as they are against his primitive errors ? 
 
 It speaks well for the nature of things, that man in his 
 immaturity should not go on in error and misdoing with- 
 out being arrested and instructed by the consequences 
 that wait upon his actions. Outward nature is so ad- 
 justed to interior consciousness as with it to constitute 
 an unfolding and progressive law of conduct, involving 
 the conditions of well-being, and even of being at all so 
 far as our bodily organization is concerned. 
 
 A law of life is such in contradistinction to everything 
 negative or injurious to life in whatever degree. The law 
 of life is a law to which nothing is indifferent. Whatever 
 is not for life is for not-life, — that is, for death. No meas- 
 ure of anything is indifferent to the law of life ; though 
 what is conducive to life, may be far from ensuring im- 
 mortality, and what makes for death need not reach the 
 ultimate effect in a minor degree of its application. 
 
 The elements, earth, air, fire and water, are related to 
 life ; and this relation is regulated by law. * Pass the 
 limit within which either of these elements is condu- 
 cive to life, and instantly you are in the realm of death. 
 Earth is good. It affords us a theatre of action, pro- 
 ductive fields and gardens for the nourishment of life ; 
 but do not let yourself be thrown upon the earth in any 
 rash or accidental way, lest you fall under the law of 
 death. Water is an element of life; but disregard 
 
DEVELOPMENT UNDER LAW. 85 
 
 the law and measure of its use, and at once it shows 
 itself the minister of death. The floods can exact a 
 heavy tribute of us, can even dismiss our breath to the 
 common air, whose law we must also obey for our lives. 
 And fire ? How genial and vital in serviceable relations ! 
 But how sharply it warns us of its fatal power, if we so 
 much as touch it in an unlawful way ! In its large in- 
 tention it is good as the beneficent sun. Transgress that 
 intention — it becomes deadly as Moloch or Gehenna. 
 Only, here as elsewhere, the creative intention reaches 
 beyond the incidental suffering and loss incurred by 
 transgression, and contemplates the paramount and per- 
 manent good of obedience. 
 
 Eelatively to conscious well-being at any moment, 
 therefore, we find in our world-elements a limit of good 
 and a possible beginning of evil. Nor do we look to find 
 any product of these elements that shall not exhibit the 
 same distinction. To everything that can nourish or 
 protect life there is the measure of its wholesome use ; 
 while too much or too little is a divergence from the 
 perfect law. There is no fruit which is not forbidden 
 fruit, when one transgresses the proper mode and degree 
 of its use ; no tree of life whose fruit does not hold out 
 the possible knowledge of good and evil. Life itself is 
 at stake, not only upon our having the things provided 
 for its nourishment, but upon our treating them accord- 
 ing to the kindly intention which has adapted them to 
 our service. There may be that which to us is wholly 
 forbidden. Good for something, it is not good for us. 
 It is on this account that life is developed under strict 
 guardianship. Obedience to parents is first a law of 
 existence, that it may be afterwards a commandment 
 with promise. 
 
86 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 Beset with dangers, humanity knows good, and remains 
 in happy ignorance of evil by checking the motions of 
 a meddlesome or ambitious curiosity, and cheerfully 
 consenting not to judge for itself as to what is advan- 
 tageous or otherwise in advance of trustworthy informa- 
 tion. The law of truth is laid up in the things that 
 are made. It is a law that can be marked and learned, 
 so that the hidden wisdom shall more and more disclose 
 itself. But our law of learning is, to think divine thoughts 
 under divine guidance, not of ourselves to be as gods, 
 knowing good and evil. It is the beginning of death to 
 pluck and eat presumptuously ; for so we overstep the 
 boundary of good in order to acquire a disastrous knowl- 
 of good and evil. To know all things in their true rela- 
 tion to the satisfaction of right desires, — this is iadeed 
 the wisdom by which the earth is founded, and the un- 
 derstanding by which the heavens are established. This 
 wisdom " is a tree of life to them that lay hold upon her." ^ 
 But this wisdom is laid hold of by docile obedience. It 
 lays hold of the self-confident and disobedient through 
 disappointment and correction. Kature brings home to 
 us the consequences of disregarding her law ; and so the 
 spiritual judgment is developed and fortified by motives 
 of action and means of discipline drawn from the distinc- 
 tion of good and evil in what pertains to the physical 
 life. 
 
 He by whose wisdom the earth is founded, and by 
 whose understanding the heavens are established, knows 
 the best way of bringing his wisdom and understanding 
 to bear upon finite faculties ; what can be done by warn- 
 ing, what can be done by correction. But he to whom 
 anything is forbidden upon pain of death, by necessary 
 
 1 Prov. iii. 18. 
 
DEVELOPMENT UNDER LAW. 87 
 
 implication is both mortal and ignorant. He is a crea- 
 ture liable to prove his mortality by the mistake of a 
 moment ; a creature of moral judgment, however, on 
 whom the thought of dying, as a consequence of trans- 
 gression, is designed to operate in favor of obedience. 
 Instruction avails little without experience. But if the 
 most inexperienced person not only does what is prejudi- 
 cial to physical Hfe, but what is contrary to spiritual duty 
 at the same time, the physical injury is complicated with 
 the moral defection. It is the worst kind of fall, if it 
 be the least degree of it. The fault of the free agent is 
 judged in the fatality of physical law. Something is lost 
 that cannot be regained. The tree of life, conceived as 
 the largest possibility of well-being in the nature of 
 things is interdicted ; and probation falls by a wise 
 arrangement to worse physical conditions for the sake of 
 better spiritual training. 
 
 So far, at least, the Scripture drama of the fall is the 
 drama of universal experience. All men have occasion 
 to verify the representation in themselves and in others. 
 All men make their appearance in the world not having 
 sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression ; aU 
 are occupied about natural things before coming to the 
 consciousness of spiritual relations ; all have, by and by, 
 broken a command in partaking of what they were natu- 
 rally, and it may be formally, forbidden to touch; all 
 fall into worse conditions, whether as respects what they 
 do or what they suffer, than might have been theirs 
 under the good providence of the Father ; all know what 
 it means to hear the voice of God within saying, " Where 
 art thou ? " " What is this that thou hast done ? " AU 
 are warned that there is no return to original innocency, 
 as by the sword of the cherubim flashing upon an awak- 
 
/ 
 
 88 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 ened moral vision. To all there is the lot of mortality ; 
 but to those who have knowingly sinned death is armed 
 with a peculiar sting, so that physical death has a darker 
 significance as the wages of sin, and life is no longer the 
 fulness of life when the law of life has been broken. To 
 all there is hope in that Seed of promise, whose is the 
 victory over temptation ; and for all there is conceivably 
 the possibility of a new access to the tree of life, in the 
 spiritual paradise of God. 
 
 But is this simple truth of nature really what is con- 
 templated in the Scripture narrative ? The question is 
 not insignificant, for the reason, among others, that this 
 truth of nature has been allowed to fall very much into 
 the background, that men might picture to themselves 
 unearthly and preternatural things : a tree of knowledge 
 and a tree of life, — not in an allegorical, but in a literal 
 sense; a personal enemy of great power and cunning 
 speaking in a serpent ; and the Creator himself holding 
 sensible intercourse with man, notwithstanding the uni- 
 form representation of Scripture to the effect that God 
 cannot be recognized by the senses, but is to be known 
 and worshipped in the spirit. If a Scripture contain 
 truth for all ages, then the cast and coloring of its own 
 date should not contradict the revelation of later times. 
 Accordingly, while the Pentateuch is marked with the 
 early tendency of mankind to interpret the inward voice 
 as proceeding from outward things, and to think of the di- 
 vine power as so enshrined in sensible objects as to point 
 out some objects for special manifestations of the divine 
 Presence, this' tendency is not left to utter itself without 
 restraint, but is carefully guarded, that it may not inter- 
 fere with a purely spiritual conception of the Supreme 
 Being. No image — no likeness of anything in heaven 
 
DEVELOPMENT UNDER LAW. 89 
 
 above or in the earth beneath — conld so much as sym- 
 bolize to the worshipper the infinite One, whose attributes 
 the created universe could but inadequately shadow forth. 
 This transcendent and inscrutable Godhead was guarded 
 by special legislation in the Decalogue itself, besides being 
 vindicated by the rebuke of all gratuitous attempts on 
 the part of prophetic souls to penetrate the secret things 
 of the Eternal. Any but the most simply spiritual ren- 
 dering of the Mosaic Genesis will have the effect of con- 
 forming the story to the type of ordinary mythology. 
 Whj not, then, allow ourselves to see in the story at 
 once, if not a history, then at least a conception of some- 
 thing possible in history ? Let us therefore inquire what 
 elements of thought, if any, inspiration can be supposed 
 to have given us in the original discipline of law, that 
 are not identical with those given us in common experi- 
 ence. What is there in the ancient way of thinking that 
 is essentially different from the modern wisdom ? And 
 what hinders the truth of old time from being recognized 
 and fulfilled in the truth of the latest days ? Doubtful 
 constructions of Scripture cannot appropriate the au- 
 thority of inspiration. Hence it is well that sacred 
 words should mark for us, if they will, a certain meas- 
 ure of distinct reality. 
 
 In what words, then, do we find the law of life before 
 the fall summed up ? " And the Lord God commanded 
 the man, saying, ' Of every tree of the garden thou mayest 
 freely eat [eating thou shalt eat] : But of the tree of the 
 knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: 
 for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely 
 die [dying thou shalt die].' " Here is certainly the com- 
 mon law of physical life raised to the dignity of a moral 
 requirement by being conceived as the command of the 
 
90 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 Creator himself for man's preservation and welfare. It 
 says to man, in effect : You are of a mortal nature ; your 
 life, such as it is, has its proper nourishment, and you 
 may freely partake of it; but there are limits within 
 which good things are good for you, and beyond which 
 you are liable to know them not simply as good, but as 
 evil also. Be content with knowing things as good ; and 
 do not push your indulgence to that forbidden degree 
 where the knowledge of good passes into the knowledge 
 of evil ; for that is the beginning and the way of death. 
 A law this, indisputably divine, adapted to a nature that 
 is of the earth earthy, sweet and wholesome, but very 
 liable to be transgressed through the serpent-like mov- 
 ings of sense, appetite, and curiosity ; yet to be faithfully 
 administered withal, that man may lay up the treasure 
 of moral teaching even at the cost of physical suffering 
 and decay. 
 
 The common law of mortality, recognized in the divine 
 command as in the universal experience, is incompatible 
 with the idea that " the tree of the life," so called, implied 
 any assurance or possibility that there was originally 
 open to man a way of escape from physical death in the 
 simple eating of its fruit. "Lest he reach forth his 
 hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat and live 
 forever," is, to be sure, in our version, the reason as- 
 signed for man's expulsion from the garden. But the 
 expression rendered " forever " has the law of its mean- 
 ing in a Hebrew word corresponding to the Greek aion ; 
 and this word, according to Gesenius, does not stand for 
 duration without limits, but for duration whose limit in 
 the future "is to be determined by, the nature of the 
 subject." We are thus referred to reality for the mean- 
 ing of a phrase; and certainly the phrase in question, 
 
DEVELOPMENT UNDER LAW. 91 
 
 referred to reality, cannot justify the idea that man's 
 original aeon of physical life was "forever," or might 
 have been " forever," in the absolute sense. " Forever," 
 according to the measure of a man, is not forever in the 
 absolute sense ; and our English Bible, however it may 
 suggest, certainly refuses to corroborate-, such a sense in 
 its customary use of the expression. We have " forever " 
 used again and again where the duration referring to no 
 assignable limits is nevertheless limited in the nature of 
 the enduring thing. Thus, " a servant forever '* ^ means 
 simply that the servant is not to be set free during his 
 life-time ; and that " the earth abideth forever," ^ is noth- 
 ing against the teaching that the earth may at some 
 period be dissolved. A man's " forever " of earthly exist- 
 ence is the unknown but not infinite period of physical 
 life ; and if that " forever " is to be lived to the utmost 
 of its natural possibility, it is plain that the relation of 
 life to the elements that support and nourish it should 
 be wholly in accordance with the organic law of being. 
 Disturb this relation, and a man will not live out all the 
 days of his "forever," limited as the number of those 
 days may be. When the life itself is deteriorated, the 
 life-period is prejudiced. The negation of life — that is, 
 death — enters at the point where the law of life is trans- 
 gressed ; and the crisis of death will not fail to sum up 
 all transgressions of life's law. 
 
 By the same compulsion of reality we have a natural 
 interpretation of what is said about the trees of the gar- 
 den. When St. Paul would make use of persons under- 
 stood to be historical in a representative and mystical 
 way, he takes occasion to say : " "V\Tiich things are an 
 allegory." But there are things which are marked as 
 1 Deut. XV. 17. 2 EccL I 4. 
 
92 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 allegorical by their very names, of which things it would 
 be superfluous to say either that they are allegorical or 
 that they are not realistic. Thus the distinction between 
 the natural and the metaphorical trees of Eden is boldly 
 indicated, — the realistic detail including all the natural 
 resources of life contemplated, namely, " every tree that 
 is pleasant to the sight and good for food." It would 
 appear, then, that the metaphorical detail could not be 
 reckoned as an addition to the realistic inventory ; for, if 
 one has included every object of a given kind, no more 
 objects of that kind are in the account. Hence the 
 metaphorical detail may sum up all the resources of 
 life in their relation to man's duty and destiny as a 
 rational creature, conscious of being under law. As in 
 the paradise of the Apocalypse the tree of life stands for 
 the various resources of life in their unity, — though there 
 are twelve manner of fruits, the yield of every month, 
 with leaves of healing virtue, — so in the earthly paradise 
 " the tree of the life " may stand for all the natural re- 
 sources of the garden, in their unity of relation to the 
 healthy nourishment of man in the world. Similarly, 
 " the tree of the knowledge of good and evil " may stand 
 for the same resources of life, however various, in one 
 relation — the relation to their possible misuse. Trans- 
 gress that measure of use within which they bring the 
 knowledge of good, and you pass into that abuse of good 
 which brings the knowledge of evil in addition to the 
 knowledge of good, — good and evil. 
 
 And this construction does not appear foreign to the 
 Hebrew manner of speaking. For, as we may grant 
 that we should not be grammatically forbidden to regard 
 the two spiritually named trees as real objects, com- 
 ing in for special mention by means of the conjunction 
 
DEVELOPMENT UNDER LAW. 93 
 
 rendered *' also," so it may be urged that the same con- 
 junction is used to connect words strictly in apposition, 
 or to connect clauses when the latter expression resumes 
 the former by way of explanation.^ Thus we might 
 read : " And out of the ground made the Lord God to 
 grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for 
 food ; even the tree of the life, and the tree of the knowl- 
 edge of good and evil ; " all the trees being taken con- 
 cretely as one tree in their relation to the support of 
 life, all being taken as one, also, in their common liabil- 
 ity to pass into the service of death. 
 
 But the truth is always too true, too essential and 
 deeply interfused, to be very dependent upon literary 
 form or verbal criticism. Conceive " the tree of life " 
 and " the tree of the knowledge of good and evil " to be 
 nominal, or conceive them to be real, they are equally 
 allegorical. They are signs of a reality that does not 
 belong to the signs alone. They symbolize potencies 
 that inhere in whatever can properly minister to the 
 nourishment of human life. As man's trial cannot be 
 confined to one act, so neither can it be limited to one 
 object, but is co-extensive with the vast environment and 
 diversified productions that describe the range of his act- 
 ual experience. If Adam and Eve transgressed a special 
 command about a special object, that typical transaction is 
 blended with common experience, the veil of universal na- 
 ture is thrown over it, and it becomes the figure of man's 
 natural history from age to age. A particular tree for- 
 bidden to man's touch, by an audible voice, upon pain of 
 death, — this could imply no higher authority than that 
 
 1 See the examples of this use referred to "by Gesenius : 1 Sam. 
 xxviii. 3, ** in Ramah, even in his own city ; " Dan. iv. 13, ** a watcher, 
 even a holy one ; " Is. Ivii. 11, " have I not held my peace, even of old ? " 
 
94 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 of the Creator. The gradually maturing conviction of a 
 forbidden use of anything in nature, working upward from 
 instinct through observation and experience, till it reaches 
 the moral sense and becomes a law in conscience, — this 
 can imply no lower authority than that of the Creator. 
 The signal and exemplary thing shows what is inherent 
 in all things. Of all real elements and objects it may 
 be said, " which things are an allegory." Our Lord took 
 the allegories by which he illustrated the realities of 
 the spiritual realm from every realm of nature. He 
 himself is the bread, water, wine, — all the nourishment 
 which the spirit needs. Yet he is the source of knowl- 
 edge to men, — not of good simply, but of good and evil 
 possibly ; since he puts men on trial with respect to the 
 spiritual life, as nature puts men on trial with respect to 
 the physical life. Hence St. Paul's anxiety about the 
 Corinthian Church. For, he says, " I fear lest by any 
 means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, 
 so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity 
 that is in Christ." The higher the revelation of right- 
 eousness, the lower the fall of men, if they are seduced 
 into disobedience. From the revelation of physical life 
 and common mortality in primitive man to the revelation 
 of spiritual life and immortality in the man Christ Jesus, 
 the principle of trial is one. It is inseparable from man's 
 constitutional freedom and responsibility, as related to 
 the divine revelation at every conceivable stage of its 
 progress. 
 
 But in the Scripture relating to man's earliest error, 
 we have not only the law which he transgressed, with 
 the penalty annexed, but the judicial construction and 
 application of the same. God's law is the truth. In the 
 Eden administration the truth contemplated is the or- 
 
DEVELOPMENT UNDER LAW. 95 
 
 ganic law, — the law which reaches its fulfilment in the 
 subjects of it by the ordinance of universal nature, 
 within no definite limits of time, and with no need of 
 ministerial interference. It is a divine judgment and a 
 divine execution, when the deterioration of life and the 
 deterioration of outward things are made to ensue by 
 a process of inscrutable change, as a testimony against 
 the transgression of law. Man was warned of the 
 natural hability of unsuspecting innocency and inex- 
 perience to go astray, was advised of the penalty to 
 ensue upon disregarding the dictates of a wisdom above 
 his own, a wisdom available only on condition of docility 
 and obedience ; what, then, in effect, was the judgment 
 and the penalty meted out to the self-excusing, but dis- 
 enchanted pair ? It was that disturbance of natural 
 harmony, that painful exercise of life's functions, by 
 which we mark the change from the unconsciousness 
 of infancy to the struggle of life, — a change which im- 
 ports nothing less than that the struggle will inevita- 
 bly end in physical death. Man having misused the 
 elements of life, the elements of life are at odds with 
 man. Outward nature is divided, according as it takes 
 the side of the spirit or of the flesh in human nature. 
 " Cursed above all cattle " is the serpent, as the type of 
 that animal seduction which, in the complex constitution 
 of man, can move stealthily to the violation of spiritual 
 order. Now natural processes are become punitive in 
 a degree. The labor of woman, and the toil of man, the 
 social mastership of the strong, the social subjection of 
 the weak, the common compulsion of natural conditions, 
 all are more stringent and coercive than a free and 
 deliberate dutifulness would require them to be. The 
 products of the ground are distributed into symbols of 
 
96 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 a beneficent Providence, and symbols of a corrective 
 discipline. The hope of mankind is in offspring, in the 
 progress of the race toward a manhood that can tread 
 temptation under foot ; yet this higher humanity will be 
 developed by the suffering and death of the lower, whose 
 destiny is to return to the dust whence it was taken, — 
 the natural process of decay becoming obtrusive, and 
 possibly abrupt, as a consequence of wrong-doing. In fine, 
 the Eden life, the tree of life conceived as bringing the 
 knowledge of good simply, is wholly withdrawn ; while 
 the tree of a dualistic experience, the tree of the knowl- 
 edge of goodi-ancl evil, may be found in any wilderness of 
 the world to which man's character may conduct him. 
 
 Forbidden as we are to affect a final judgment as to 
 personal character by outward semblances, would it not 
 become us especially to heed the silence of Scripture as 
 respects man in that mysterious remoteness, when no 
 prophet of his own race has uttered a word for his direc- 
 tion ? Is it not significant that a certain construction 
 of the fall, which has been conspicuous by its presence 
 in speculative divinity, is equally conspicuous by its 
 absence in the original story? Here is no "covenant 
 of life," but life itself; no promise of impeccability to 
 ensue upon a temporary or particular obedience ; no hiat 
 of how much the character of posterity might be involved 
 in a single error of the first parents ; no invasion of a 
 mighty spiritual foe, or war of wiles to compass the ruia 
 of an unsuspecting race in its " federal head ; " no de- 
 nunciation of death, except as the law of death is insep- 
 arable from the law of life ; no infliction of death but in 
 the order of nature, and as a means of saving man from 
 that other death, which takes place, according to St. 
 Augustine, when God abandons the soul, as natural 
 
DEVELOPMENT UNDER LAW. 97 
 
 death takes place when the soul leaves the body.^ We 
 cannot conceive that God is deserting the souls of his 
 offspriag, when to moral discipline he adds a provident 
 tenderness for their bodily welfare. What, then, is the 
 natural and Scriptural conception of the fall ? Is it a 
 spiritual catastrophe, or a moral espisode? Is it the 
 total negation of man's communion with his Maker, or 
 a practical warning that an undeveloped potency of holy 
 character is not incompatible with a natural liability to 
 sin? Is it the prelude of a human society without 
 hope, or of a divine revelation wherein reproof and 
 correction are the infalHble sign both of the children's 
 birthright and of the Father's faithfulness ? Does it in- 
 volve the condemnation and casting away of human na- 
 ture, or does it mean that man was originally constituted 
 to realize spiritual righteousness, not as punctual atten- 
 tion to specific injunctions, important as such attention 
 must be held to be, but rather as personal integrity and 
 habitual loyalty, depending upon faith in the guidance 
 from above ? 
 
 ^ Mors igitur animae fit, cum earn deserit Deus ; sicut corporis, cum 
 id deserit anima. — De Civitate Dei, lib, xiii. c. 2. 
 
PART THIRD. 
 
 THE PRINCIPLE OF JUSTIFICATION. 
 
" Is the law then against the promises of God? God forbid: for 
 if there had been a law given which could make alive, verily right- 
 eousness should have been by the law. ... So that the law hath 
 been our tutor unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith." 
 
 Galatians iii. 21-24. 
 
 "Cum vero Apostolus dicit justificari hominem per fidem, et 
 gratis; ea verba in eo sensu intelligenda sunt, quern perpetuus 
 Ecclesise Catholicae consensus tenuit, et expressit ; ut scilicet per 
 fidem ideo justificari dicamur, quia fides est humanse salutis in- 
 itium, fundamentum, et radix omnis justificationis, sine qua impos- 
 sibile est placere Deo, et ad filiorum ejus consortium pervenire." 
 
 Council of Trent : Decretum de Justificatione, caput viii. 
 
 " Fides in Christum est pars et species, qu«e continetur sub no- 
 tione generali fidei." 
 
 Feancisco Turretino: Institutio Theologiae Elencticae, vol. i. p. 616. 
 
 " Certainly I have always considered that obedience, even to 
 an erring conscience, was the way to gain light, and that it mat- 
 tered not where a man began, so that he began on what came to 
 hand and in faith ; and that anything might become a divine 
 method of truth ; that to the pure all things are pure, and have a 
 self-correcting virtue and a power of germinating." 
 
 John Henry Newman : Apologia pro Vita Sua, p. 206. 
 
PART THIRD. 
 
 THE PRINCIPLE OF JUSTIFICATION. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 OF FAITH AS RELATED TO MAN'S DEPENDENCE AND 
 PROGRESS. 
 
 TT THAT we are taught in Scripture of man's first dis- 
 ^ ' obedience, as a spiritual fact in the order of nature, 
 may be included within two negative statements : namely, 
 first, man's original righteousness did not preclude his 
 original sin ; and, secondly, man's original sin did not 
 preclude a future progress in righteousness. 
 
 Between these two negative terms we conceive the 
 movement of living and progressive humanity, — what- 
 ever may have been the nature of the primitive error. 
 
 Exactly at this point there opens upon us the question 
 of man's possible justification: what palliations of his 
 fault; what law of righteousness applicable to him, 
 things being as they are ; what hope in the discipline 
 of divine judgments ; what redeeming quality in his own 
 being ? The act of disobedience cannot be justified. Can 
 the man from whom that act came be made just, and be 
 recognized as righteous, — not according to some legal fic- 
 tion, but because he is really acceptable to God, approved 
 of men, and not without testimony to his inward har- 
 mony with the universe in the peace of his own spirit ? 
 
 There is an error, as we have already seen, which the 
 fall logically disposes of, and puts aside forever. Man 
 
102 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 is not to be as God in knowing good and evil. He is to 
 know good and evil relatively, not absolutely. The abso- 
 lute law of his perfection is in his Creator, not in himsell 
 He cannot act independently. Therefore it is for him to 
 be loyally dependent, to be persuaded of the care and 
 guidance of his Maker, to be persuaded of the divine 
 wisdom and authority ruling in his life, in order that 
 this persuasion, or faith, may make him attentive and 
 obedient to the communications of truth, and be ever- 
 more the vital principle of right conduct. 
 
 But faith is a spiritual energy, that comes by listening 
 to truth, and grows with experience of life. Faith is 
 imparted to the human spirit from above, and comes with 
 the spiritual revelation of God, and with the spiritual 
 growth of man. The physical constitution may enclose 
 the spiritual germ, it cannot at first exhibit the full 
 strength of spiritual character. The principle of right- 
 eousness grows, or ought to grow, with the practical 
 demands of righteousness. " Touch not, taste not," may 
 be a divine command, a very salutary physical regulation, 
 to be observed by the law of faith disposing to all right 
 observance ; but faith would be the spiritual element of 
 righteousness in the case, and without faith it would be 
 impossible to please the Lawgiver, though the command 
 were outwardly obeyed. But to fail in the specific act 
 of faith is not of necessity to lose faith ; while " touch 
 not, taste not, handle not," is possibly a very partial ex- 
 pression even of outward requirement. Taking man for 
 what he is, a creature to be developed according to his 
 organic law, we can trust the divine Father to bring him 
 up to righteousness in his own way and time ; and if 
 so, we cannot believe that man becomes wholly alien to 
 righteousness through the first unfaithful act 
 
FAITH, DEPENDENCE, AND PROGRESS, 103 
 
 For, grant what we may as to possible deterioration or 
 improvement of nature, we know that either the one or 
 the other must go on according to the law of existence. 
 No instant's action can take place or be judged alone. 
 It belongs to a series. Only in the judgment of all that 
 went before and all that shall come after in the individ- 
 ual life, can the instant's action have the record of its 
 true character. In the larger sphere of humanity as a 
 whole, the same continuity and solidarity of development 
 is observable through all the conflicts of history. The 
 unripened fruit is not satisfying to the taste. But it is 
 changing both in quantity and quality by the law of its 
 creation ; and, if the fruit be good at last, there was no 
 point in its progress when it was not good. So spiritual 
 and moral manhood is ever passing through a transfor- 
 mation ; while the vital flavor of any period in personal 
 or collective human existence carries with it the divine 
 judgment in the creative law, which determines its rela- 
 tion to both the quahties that shall be revealed and the 
 qualities that shall disappear. The Creator says : This is 
 not your rest, as it is not your perfection. What has 
 not reached its consummation has not reached the full 
 demonstration of what it is. 
 
 It is thus we conclude the seen or life-time to be essen- 
 tial to the life-quality ; exactly as the revelation of truth, 
 natural or supernatural, by which experience is condi- 
 tioned and character ripened, is essential to it. The de- 
 tails of outward conduct are by no means unimportant. 
 Eequirements and regulations that concern outward con- 
 duct have their proper season and necessary use. But 
 they do not give life. Justification is of life ; and life is 
 of faith, — the spiritual source and energy of real virtue, 
 the principle of genuine obedience to the law of truth. 
 
104 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 Hence, faith appropriates, as the ground of assurance 
 in action and of hope as to the results of action, not only 
 the powers of the universe, but the persistency and dura- 
 tion of those powers. A man's faith associates him not 
 merely with the known, but with the unknown ; and so 
 he prosecutes the trial of existence in a docile way, loyal 
 not only to all that is known, but to all that is. 
 
 The personal life is a profound mystery. One cannot 
 know the difference between himself in this instant and 
 himself in the next instant. We are in the process of 
 creation. The mysterious differential element of quan- 
 tity and quality does not define and measure itself in 
 consciousness. Suppose a whole foregoing life to be 
 summed up in a single practical expression ; the vital pro- 
 cess does not pause. Other critical actions and other 
 judgments are to come. And the judgments, so far as 
 they are divine, will have in evidence not only the pre- 
 vious trial, motive, and stress of circumstances, under 
 which an action came to birth, but also the actor's reac- 
 tion with regard to it. If the act be blameworthy, does it 
 signify anything that the doer of the act looks back upon 
 it with remorse and self-accusation ? If the offence be 
 condemned, and the punitive woe overtake the offender, 
 is it in his favor that he by and by recognizes and hon- 
 ors the unfolding law of Goodness under which he suf- 
 fers ? Moral discrimination may be slow, through the 
 infirmity of our nature; and may for that reason be 
 quickened by terrifying examples of things permitted 
 to take place only that they may be the more effectually 
 and permanently disallowed. But to take the side of 
 demonstrated evil is a self-destructive experiment, and 
 man arrives at mature and suicidal wickedness, if at all, 
 only through long and stern conflict with benevolent 
 
FAITH, DEPENDENCE, AND PROGRESS, 105 
 
 admonition and just authority. In history as we know 
 it, this obdurate and malignant quality of disobedience is 
 never, and in reason never can be, the sudden catastro- 
 phe of an unschooled nature. As little, on the other 
 hand, can a spiritual and final justification be realized on 
 the ground of obedience in a single particular of lawful 
 requirement, — or in all particulars of lawful require- 
 ment during a period of discipline shorter than the actual 
 maturing of personal character into its ultimate moral 
 relation with the highest Authority may require. 
 
 The law of faith cannot contemplate duty as capable 
 of being adequately expressed by literal requirements, or 
 duly guarded by literal prohibitions. When all the 
 things that must be done, and all the things that must 
 not be done, have been officially defined and enacted, 
 this law is only a shadow of life. Life itself is the 
 reality and revelation of law. The outward economy 
 and discipline of government, in state or church, makes 
 use of signs and sacraments wisely accommodated to the 
 actions and relations of time, because these actions and 
 relations furnish both the exercise and assurance of eter- 
 nal life. All temporary judgment refers to the tribunal 
 of last appeal. We may look upon actions as well-in- 
 tentioned, or otherwise. We may insist that some things 
 were worse done than we were entitled to demand, that 
 other things were better done than anybody was entitled 
 to expect ; though, whether we blame, justify, or applaud, 
 we are sure that it is not in us to judge perfectly, either 
 the actor or the act. Thus the faith which receives law 
 from the Creator in the revelations of life is one with the 
 faith which judges nothing before the time. Forbidden 
 to set ourselves up as judges of our fellow-men, we are 
 equally incompetent to judge ourselves. St. Paul, refer- 
 
106 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 ring to faithfulness in his stewardship, not only counts 
 it a small thing that he should be brought to any day or 
 to any decision of men, but also declines to assume his 
 justification on the ground that he is not conscious of 
 wi'ong-doing. He is not his own final judge, but must 
 await with others the coming Lord and Master of life ; at 
 whose appearing the mature manifestation of personal 
 character shall bring to each man his proper sentence 
 from God.^ 
 
 This is in accord with all the teaching about justification 
 in human experience. It is not only of faith as regards 
 the reign of G-od, to whom all homage and obedience are 
 due ; it is also of faith, as distinguished from demonstra- 
 tion, in respect to the actions and efforts in w^hich the 
 signs of obedience and homage are made. The rule of 
 what to do or what not to do outwardly cannot be a per- 
 fect test of man's inward Hfe. The law that undertakes 
 to regulate conduct enters because of transgression, and 
 brings with it the knowledge of sin, both as a matter of 
 positive experience and of recognized human liability. 
 But the justification of life passes by the evidence of for- 
 mal obedience or formal transgression, in order to reach 
 its true basis in the loyal mind and will, — faith working 
 by love. Faith appeals in humility and penitence from 
 all finite judgments to the All-judging ; faith accepts pres- 
 ently and by anticipation all divine testimonies, however 
 adverse to details of personal conduct, and so affirms 
 and maintains the spirit, though not the absolute expres- 
 sion, of perfect obedience. Hence, he is the just man 
 who confides himself to God as the universal Justice ; 
 not he who only says, " I have not knowingly broken 
 the divine commands." To avoid the forbidden thing 
 
 1 1 Cor. iv. 3-5. 
 
 I 
 
FAITH, DEPENDENCE, AND PROGRESS. 107 
 
 shall make for your welfare, possibly save you from sud- 
 den or premature death. To believe in God shall make 
 for your righteousness, though it be the righteousness 
 which condemns your past doings and acquiesces in death 
 as their just due. The man called perfect and upright, 
 fearing God and eschewing evil, must not flatter himself 
 that he is free from sin. The malefactor confessing 
 his crimes and enduring their punishment must not de- 
 spair of justification. For justification under the reign 
 of God goes beyond the present range of human relations 
 and actions, is administered by the Judge of all, and is 
 available to each one through the faith in God which 
 is the denial of self. In fine, the justification of man 
 implies on the part of God not only the acts of pardon 
 and grace by which human confidence is awakened and 
 sustained, but also the eternal administration of law in 
 the spiritual creation from which all such acts proceed ; 
 while, as regards man, the process of his renewal in right- 
 eousness contemplates all the elements of life, — the nat- 
 ural conditions of being, the seon of development, the 
 Almighty and Eternal as Source of nature and Object of 
 faith. He alone who causes his mind and will to be 
 faintly apprehended in a growing human consciousness, 
 who knows all his works, whose ordinance it is that the 
 communication of Heaven's gift must condescend to 
 earth's necessity, and the pursuit of glory, honor, and im- 
 mortality, be complicated with the struggle for physical 
 life, — He alone can conduct life to its final harmony 
 and complete justification. 
 
 The general history of man's spiritual development 
 will, of course, be a history of faith, in the different 
 phases of its manifestation. Faith, taking hold of the 
 parts of the Creator's ways, brings to conception and 
 
108 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 action the rational creature's calling. Faith is the tap- 
 root of our whole spiritual growth. If faith decays, 
 manhood decays. If faith grows, manhood grows. Faith 
 sees no perfection in past efforts, but accuses or excuses 
 them as a medley of evil and good. Faith does not place 
 personal perfection in the order of nature, but presses 
 toward the mark for the prize of a high calling made 
 known in the revelation of God. God, as conceived by 
 faith, is the germ of truth springing up out of the earth. 
 God, as the Word of revelation, is the Sun of Eighteous- 
 ness looking down from heaven. Men must feel after 
 God in the things that are made, if haply they may find 
 him. But God is not far from every one of us, since in 
 him we live and move and have our being. The blind 
 groping of the past is ignorance, unbelief, sin, death. 
 The docile pressing on toward the future is knowledge, 
 faith, righteousness, life. Sensuous forms of worship 
 have to be condemned as idolatries at length, that the 
 image of the invisible God may be revealed in the hu- 
 man spirit. The righteousness of faith is loyalty to the 
 revelation of truth. 
 
 Of course, faith is not an affair of formal logic, any 
 more than of formal ethics. Faith has its conflicts of 
 argument, and often the argument is pressed with a heat 
 akin to the vital character of the question in debate. 
 But faith combines the opposing forces of thought in a 
 line of movement, which is the ruling persuasion of life. 
 The limits of finite intelhgence cannot defeat the evi- 
 dence of an infinite Spirit. Would all the manifesta- 
 tions of energy through boundless space and absolute 
 duration be only equal to the demonstration of the in- 
 finite Power ? How, then, shall Power, which is forever 
 proving itself, be said ever to have been proved ? But 
 
 ( 
 
FAITH, DEPENDENCE, AND PROGRESS. 109 
 
 the argument which excludes the quantitative demon- 
 stration is essential to the qualitative demonstration; 
 and between the two faith finds the idea of Divinity. 
 So in all the feeling after God, as indicated in objects 
 and processes wherein men are persuaded that haply 
 they have found him, there are contrarieties of thought, 
 thesis and antithesis ; while the reconciliation of con- 
 trarieties, the synthesis of different movements, marks 
 the progress of revelation. 
 
 What is, in short, the natural history of religion 
 among men ? "I have found my God," says the 
 credulous fetich- worshipper. "No," says the advanced 
 thinker, "you are worshipping what is infinitely less 
 divine than yourself. You are the image of your 
 Maker." But by the law of nature each is moving in 
 the way of divine revelation; for is there not a sign 
 of the Creator in the rudest lump of matter, in order 
 that the Creator may be unfailingly signified in the low- 
 est order of mind ? There is also the idol of the tribe, 
 and nations find their own gods ; but the better inspira- 
 tion grasps the unity of things, and declares that God is 
 one. Yet is there not a teaching and symbol of God in 
 the parts of his ways, in order that man may at length 
 adore the undivided Power he cannot comprehend ? 
 
 If, then, God be one, where is he ? In what heaven 
 does he reside ? On what mountain does he hold his 
 earthly court ? " Here ! " exclaims one. " There I " points 
 out another. But revelation satisfies both in deny- 
 ing both. The reign of God does not disclose itself to 
 geographical research, or even to celestial observation, 
 but to the spirit in man : it is within, and it is every- 
 where. What is the character of God's reign ? " Good ! " 
 chants one part, "He has loaded us with benefits." 
 
 L... 
 
 z*^. 
 
110 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 "Evil," wails another part, "He has overwhelmed us 
 with distresses." But both notes are harmonized in the 
 revelation of righteousness as the aim of all divine judg- 
 ments. Thus, while knowledge is increasing in opposite 
 directions of thought, faith is the abiding loyalty to uni- 
 versal Truth, the growing persuasion of absolute Good- 
 ness. Yet, notwithstanding the continuous proofs of 
 divine guidance in history, of eternal Power and God- 
 head in things made, the fullest light of revealed truth, 
 like the rising sun, shows ever a retreating world in 
 such shadow and darkness, that it is described as rela- 
 tively " without God and without hope." For God is 
 light, and in Him is no darkness at all. 
 
 No age is without its own feeling after God. No age 
 is without its own trial of faith. As in the world of 
 matter, so in the spiritual world, not only does day utter 
 speech unto day, but night unto night showeth knowl- 
 edge. There are those who sleep in the day-time for the 
 purpose of consulting the stars. There are those who 
 shut their eyes upon the light of theological systems that 
 they may make investigations in the twilight of nature. 
 Especially, when the professed representatives of spiritual 
 reality become conventional, theatrical, dogmatic, then 
 the devotees of physical science have their innings in 
 the struggle for truth, and appear fresh, earnest, and 
 aggressive. They may even insist that speculation and 
 faith have no business outside the limits of induction, 
 and that the organ of mental vision, like the bodily eye, 
 has no vocation to inspect itself. The latest philosophy, 
 however materialistic, does not, indeed, worship rude 
 images, nor dote on refined ritualism, nor stand in awe 
 of official parade. What Bacon calls idols, — " idols of 
 the cave, of the tribe, of the palace, of the theatre," — 
 
FAITH, DEPENDENCE, AND PROGRESS. Ill 
 
 scientific philosophy looks down upon. It is feeling 
 after the genuine force, the ruling law of the world- 
 movement, in a word, God. What it shall find, how- 
 ever, it will call by a name of its own. One philosophic 
 seer finds that the setting forth of world-phenomena, 
 as summed up in the experience of life, implies a per- 
 sistent energy, to be called " Will." But it is will 
 of such wily malignity that all attractions of life are 
 merely the ruse by which the living are lured to suffer- 
 ing and death. The " Will " of Schopenhauer is an idol 
 of hideous features, to be superseded in less time than it 
 took to set it up. It may be likened to King Stork. Its 
 antithesis in the same line of thought is King Log, " the 
 Unconscious " by name. The order of succession is an 
 improvement upon the fable of the frogs. The features 
 of the new idol can be seen in different lights, somewhat 
 in accordance with the will of the observer. One does 
 not quite despair by reason of " the Unconscious." But 
 cannot criticism combine the arrangements of nature 
 that indicate thought, and the vital energy of nature 
 that affirms will, in a higher conception that shall de- 
 clare a moral purpose? Yes. There is "the not our- 
 selves that makes for righteousness." If this is not the 
 true Divinity, it is something well found in the search 
 for him. Indeed, the ablest and best-instructed criticism 
 coming from the party of reputed opposition is destined 
 to quicken the sense of reality in the party of a ruling 
 faith, by the contribution it makes to the knowledge of 
 the things that are made, and thus to the conception of 
 the invisible Maker. On the other hand, a strong flavor 
 of reality must rule in any system of religious doctrine, 
 or else the altars of worship will seem to have been 
 built to " the unknown " and " the unknowable." Still, 
 
112 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 the known is of a piece with the unknown. The Ee- 
 vealed is also the Incommunicable. Whom men igno- 
 rantly worship, he is evermore to be declared. 
 
 But are there proofs of man's spiritual progress ? Is 
 there hope of his reaching the goal ? What most deeply 
 concerns our faith is the fact that the swing of human na- 
 ture, this way and that way, in the struggle of thought and 
 action, is not for its own sake. It is for the sake of the 
 progress of humanity. It belongs to an onward move- 
 ment, and develops in process of time the antithesis, not 
 of this momentary tendency and that, but of the natural 
 man and the spiritual man, the first man and the final 
 man, the ages of darkness and the ages of light, times of 
 ignorance and times of consummation. It is a mark of 
 the Scriptures in their unity that they regard and inter- 
 pret history with equal fidelity to the struggle of the 
 hour and the consummation of the age. They place the 
 hope of man's justification and acceptance with his Ma- 
 ker, not in outward acts, but in the living spirit ; not in 
 what a man is doing or going to do, but in what he is 
 becoming or going on to be. It is this which consti- 
 tutes them the classic and canon of man's moral develop- 
 ment. The fifteenth chapter of First Corinthians depicts 
 the spiritual glory of the second Adam on the dark 
 background of mortal manhood as represented by Adam 
 the first. It is in the relation of these two men that 
 history through all ages is summed up in the Scriptures. 
 If it had been distinctly revealed that the first man had 
 personally reappeared on earth to be justified and glori- 
 fied as the spiritually first-begotten of God, and Saviour 
 of his race, it would have afforded no clearer assur- 
 ance than we possess of the creative intention. For 
 Christ's gospel is the gospel that was given to Adam as 
 
FAITH, DEPENDENCE, AND PROGRESS. 113 
 
 well as to Abraham, — the gospel of promised blessing 
 in the development of a promised Seed. As the elect 
 man, the divine man, the First-begotten of the Father, 
 is connected by natural descent with man as originally 
 created by God ; so the man of the earliest creation and 
 making of the race is bound by the law of faith to that 
 course of spiritual development in his offspring which 
 brought the spiritual man into the world to enthrone 
 him as Head of the human brotherhood. The drama 
 of justification opens with the drama of transgression. 
 In the experience of the race, as of the individual, the 
 outward man is perishing that the inward man may be 
 renewed day by day. 
 
 Having studied somewhat carefully the Scripture 
 teaching as to man's natural insufficiency, as indicated 
 in his first disobedience, together with the discipline of 
 law for his reproof and correction, we have now, at the 
 risk of some repetition, to study the same testimony in 
 its bearing upon the inward law and discipline of faith 
 for man's ultimate righteousness. For the first man 
 made, no more than the last man born, can know what 
 he is in himself, except by knowing what he is in rela- 
 tion to the history of his race. 
 
CHAPTEE II. 
 
 AGAIKST TRANSCENDENTAL NOTIONS OF PRIMITIVE 
 RESPONSIBILITY. 
 
 T ET me remind my reader again, by way of apology 
 •*— ' for what may seem a needless discussion, that we 
 are concerned with human nature as exhibited in Scrip- 
 ture ; not with the same as depicted by speculatists or 
 as formulated in dogma. We want to understand what 
 the story of the primitive pair as given in Genesis would 
 naturally teach us, not only as to the real measure of 
 their fault, but as to the hope of their recovery to recti- 
 tude and favor. If their error required that they should 
 be kept in hand by a tutor, by the constraints and cor- 
 rections of law, was there an appeal at the same time 
 addressed to their faith, looking to the inward revelation 
 of paternal goodness in a spiritual sonship, which should 
 honor the legal schooling by evincing its serviceableness 
 to the eternal life ? 
 
 In the training of immature natures a systematic ex- 
 asTSferation of childish errors and faults is found to make 
 against the development of a perfect character. The 
 perfecting of mankind, as involving a divine governance 
 of physical law and spiritual inspiration, would neces- 
 sarily demand that candor of practical procedure on the 
 part of the Creator which would naturally foster a sense 
 of justice, and fortify the assurance of receiving just 
 
PRIMITIVE RESPONSIBILITY. 115 
 
 treatment on the part of the moral creature. On the 
 other hand, the finite apprehension of illimitable au- 
 thority and immeasurable power is naturally timid ; the 
 reaction of wrong-doing often quickens this moral tim- 
 idity into a servile prostration, which needs to be pa- 
 tiently and condescendingly corrected ; while systematic 
 theologians, setting up for augurs and prophets of hu- 
 man nature in its relations with Divinity, have been 
 prone to take the auspices from their fears or ambi- 
 tions rather than their faith, and even to make a virtue 
 of regarding universal humanity as justly doomed to 
 endless perdition by its first offence — for the greater 
 glory of God in the redemption of the elect. 
 
 Hence the inestimable value of our right of appeal 
 We can appeal from ourselves to our Maker ; from in- 
 ferential and overwrought opinions and forebodings, 
 whether of disinterested or designing judges, to the 
 simple conceptions and hopeful predictions which are 
 commended to us as bearing the marks of divine teach- 
 ing and primitive procedure. We may interrogate the 
 Scripture record with a pointedness and particularity 
 comporting with the importance of the facts recorded, 
 and so possibly leari; something of how we are defended 
 by our Advocate in the heavenly court. 
 
 We seek a response from a recognized oracle of truth, 
 on a question fundamental, long disputed, and still in 
 debate. Did man fall " from the estate wherein he was 
 created " by the first disobedience ; or, was " the estate 
 wherein he was created " one involving the natural lia- 
 bility to mistakes and sins, and placing the hope of 
 coming to spiritual wisdom and goodness in the lessons 
 of experience and the development of life ? More par- 
 ticularly, was the first disobedience a catastrophe of the 
 
116 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 human race, — an act of so fatal an importance as to 
 change radically the whole plan for the discipline of 
 mankind, — or was it an immature act, the mark of 
 undeveloped character under conditions of necessary- 
 trial, with simply that bearing upon human destiny, for 
 evil or good, wliich is involved in the organic law of life 
 and liberty asserted in every moral act ? Was the origi- 
 nal sin of a character unique and transcendent, or was it 
 personal, typical, the constitutional liability of the last 
 earth-born man as of the first, and of the first in the 
 same sense as of any other ? . 
 
 Our inquiry is not one of personal curiosity, but one 
 which has appealed to the Source of light in the devout 
 worship and anxious sacrifices of unnumbered genera- 
 tions. If, then, the oracle is reticent or ambiguous, it is 
 not for us to break through its reserve or to make its 
 responses more clear. But if the oracle be charged with 
 a judicial sentence of transcendent terror, then unmis- 
 takable explicitness in the terms of the sentence becomes 
 an indispensable element of justice. If the Scripture 
 record lends itself reluctantly to an extreme construc- 
 tion, — especially if such a construction can be referred 
 to a change in mental parallax, or in the prevailing me- 
 dium of thought, — we cannot throw the burden of later 
 philosophies and figures of speech upon first statements ; 
 nor can we support unnatural conceptions by an appeal 
 to supernatural authority. If there be that in the reve- 
 lation of Jesus Christ of which TertuUian could say : " It 
 is credible, because it is foolish ; it is certain, because 
 it is impossible," we are to remember that not every- 
 thing foolish is credible, and the impossible is not com- 
 monly the true. 
 
 As a matter of fact, however, our primitive Scripture 
 
PRIMITIVE RESPONSIBILITY. Ill 
 
 meets us upon the ground of common sense and common 
 faith. Eead the third chapter of Genesis for the sake of 
 what is plainly said, though not without a parable. The 
 sacred writer speaks to us as the prophet of God only 
 by being " Nature's priest," rendering the realities of life 
 in the name of the Author of life. The nature shown 
 us is that nature of which we are a part ; the experience 
 represented is the experience in which we all share, — 
 the struggle of life and the certainty of death, the kindly 
 fruits and the stinging thorns, the discipline of sorrow, 
 the rewards of effort, the encouragement of hope. The 
 harmony conceived as belonging to the constitution of 
 things has given place to the disciplinary working of 
 undeveloped powers, and the heaven that lies about in- 
 fancy has faded into the light of common day. The trial 
 which has evinced the capacity to receive instruction 
 has proved, also, the proneness to error which needs 
 instruction. Especially the law given for the control 
 of piquant and dangerous physical solicitation, — the 
 calm, remote, authoritative command, exacting faith, 
 watchfulness, loyalty, — has not found due reverence. 
 As respects the qualities bom not of the will of the flesh 
 nor of the will of man, but of God, man has proved 
 himself in the spiritual nonage of flesh and blood, un- 
 prepared to exemplify the reign of God as overruling 
 sensual and social mstincts. His rank in the order of 
 nature corresponds with his place in the order of time ; 
 he is the first, the natural, the earthly man, falling into 
 the first, natural, earthly error ; the type of a universal 
 spiritual nonage. 
 
 What is the act recorded which determines this con- 
 ception of original humanity ? Here it is : " And when 
 the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that 
 
118 NATURE IN SCIUPTUBE. 
 
 it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to 
 make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof and did eat ; 
 and gave also unto her husband with her, and he did 
 eat. And the eyes of them both were opened, and they 
 knew that they were naked : and they sewed fig-leaves 
 together, and made themselves aprons."^ 
 
 Considered in itself, and as literally taking place, this 
 act has no peculiar mystery or conclusiveness. It is 
 exactly what the sensual appetite is always prompting 
 the children of nature to do, before they are disciplined 
 to higher considerations. As a parable, its applica- 
 tion is as broad as the truth that natural temptation 
 leading to moral disobedience opens the eyes to con- 
 sequences which disclose themselves according to an 
 unknown law, — consequences totally distinct from the 
 gratification sought, whether the gratification sought be 
 conceived as sensual or intellectual. 
 
 But a moral act cannot be so trivial in itself as not to 
 be magnificent in its relations. Each moral act takes its 
 place in an organic series, and thus marks a point of 
 view from which the mind may look over seonian reaches 
 of life before and after. Ages of the divine providence 
 presiding over human destiny in favor of reasonable and 
 loyal living, are continually imparting their gracious 
 movement to the mind of well-instructed childhood in 
 its earliest moral actions. The physical law which 
 makes something seem desirable, but does not prescribe 
 the season and measure in which it may be safely en- 
 joyed, is ever under the premonitions and reproofs of 
 benevolent wisdom, seeking to adjust ignorance and in- 
 experience to the laws of life, and appealing to faith and 
 obedience against danger and death. To see tempting 
 
 1 Gen. iii. 6, 7. 
 
PRIMITIVE RESPONSIBILITY. 119 
 
 fruit and be forbidden to touch it is the characteristic 
 trial of well-protected childhood. That the child may 
 not know evil, nor incur death, is the characteristic mo- 
 tive of parental restraints. "Lest ye die," "that thy 
 days may be long," — here is the appeal for docility and 
 subjection; but to suffer for disobedience, not to live out 
 all one's days, and finally to die, yet withal to say, 
 " Good is the word of the Lord," — this is a triumph of 
 faith and a mark of righteousness. 
 
 There is laid down for us, in our mental and moral 
 constitution, a law of correlative proportions, of maxima 
 and minima, to regulate our judgments. For example, 
 the lowest degree of knowledge and experience in any 
 human being goes with the highest degree of necessary 
 dependence upon outward support and control. Again, 
 the highest degree of necessary dependence upon out- 
 ward support and control is the lowest degree of moral 
 responsibility. Again, the lowest degree of moral re- 
 sponsibility, grounded upon knowledge and experience, 
 implies the highest degree of natural liability that 
 grave physical evils may ensue upon immature acts 
 of disobedience. The same law is applicable to two 
 parties in their relations with each other: the greatest 
 weakness of the child not only implies the greatest de- 
 pendence upon its guardians, but tolerates the least 
 neglect or exaction on their part; while the smallest 
 spiritual capacity in the erring creature furnishes the 
 largest excuse for his errors in the estimation of his 
 judge. In short, as is the actor, so is the act in its 
 moral relations ; while in the order of physical conse- 
 quences judgment is meted out to acts by physical law, 
 with no definite adjustment to their moral quality. 
 
 What man was in his first estate, we know in part 
 
120 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 from the law on which his bodily life was conditioned, 
 and under which it passed away. The charter of a life 
 to be nourished on the products of the earth is not with- 
 out its limiting clause. Things allowed to be eaten im- 
 ply things forbidden to be eaten ; and the Hebrew idiom, 
 " to eat thou shalt eat," or " eating thou shalt eat," has 
 no more distinct reference to the common necessity of 
 life than " to die thou shalt die," or " dying thou shalt 
 die," has to the sure though possibly slow progress of 
 death as a consequence of eating forbidden things. No 
 sharp note of martial law or military execution here, 
 but only the premonition of dying in the process of 
 natural causation. 
 
 Further, we know in part what man was in the begin- 
 ning from the fact that, while the preservation of his 
 physical life demanded care first in the order of time, it 
 was apparent at no very distant day that his chief dan- 
 ger was moral; that his chief woe was not natural death, 
 but the violation of spiritual loyalty ; and that the re- 
 actions of a mortal destiny were fitted to quicken at- 
 tention to admonitions ministered from above,. through 
 reason and conscience, for the right conduct of life. 
 Accordingly the command which man first disobeyed 
 made its appeal expressly to the fear of physical harm, 
 not to the dread of moral apostasy, — the finest indica- 
 tion of how spiritual training waits upon and appropri- 
 ates the discipline of outward things. 
 
 As man's justification cannot prosper by covering his 
 original infirmity or transgression, so neither can it pros- 
 per by any exaggeration of either. It is precisely at the 
 point where physical law touches moral discipline in the 
 history of the first transgression that our knowledge ut- 
 terly fails; and at this point, also, men have always 
 
PRIMITIVE RESPONSIBILITY. 121 
 
 summoned poetry and speculation to their aid. The 
 command laid upon our first parents as a simple epi- 
 tome of physical law, a parable of life and death as 
 pertaining to the bodily organization, we can well under- 
 stand. The resources of life had so thoroughly devel- 
 oped their relation to the experience of death before the 
 book of Genesis was written, that the law of nature, 
 under which man must originally have received^ life from 
 the Creator, could be set forth, certainly not with scien- 
 tific exactness, but in a manner true to common sense 
 and religious imagination. What we need to know, 
 however, in order to appreciate, after the manner even 
 of our poor judgments, the moral quality of "eating 
 the forbidden fruit," is what only the Omniscient can 
 know, namely, What did the first pair know? What 
 sense had they of natural law and spiritual obligation ? 
 What were their thoughts of their Creator ? What light 
 had they upon their duty and destiny as keeping the 
 first gateway through which their descendants would 
 enter into life? When we weigh such questions as 
 these, and think how slenderly we are furnished for 
 judging even ourselves, is it strange if, on the one 
 hand, we run into wild and extravagant guesses; or, 
 on the other hand, conclude at length that our most 
 impressive lesson is derived from the silence of our best 
 Teacher ? 
 
 Was Adam formed out of the dust of the ground and 
 inspired with the breath of life to be presently taught 
 that not only his own loyalty, but the spiritual life of 
 all his posterity, was at stake on his obedience in one 
 particular of duty ? Was his religious sense awakened, 
 and was he made to own his allegiance as a freely con- 
 senting party to the sovereign determination which 
 
122 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 placed him under such a responsibility ? Was he taught, 
 with more than the Sinaitic majesty and terror, that 
 dying was not merely returning to the ground whence 
 he was taken, but a spiritual experience of rebellion and 
 coercion, relentless, persistent, unending ? No such ele- 
 ments are found in the Scripture testimony. The sacred 
 writer does not seem to "palter with us in a double 
 sense" about dying; nor does he bring life and immor- 
 tahty to light for the purpose of extending the signifi- 
 cance and perpetuating the reign of death. 
 
 But such elements have entered into structures of 
 thought that men have built on the Scripture founda- 
 tion ; and, there are theories of human nature that would 
 in justice require such a character of divine teaching and 
 procedure : notably the Augustinian dualism, which has 
 so deeply colored religious thinking in later times, even 
 to our day. The consequence is that our minds cannot 
 take the story of Adam and Eve in its simplicity and 
 sincerity, without asking if the vital tissue of fact can 
 by possibility be made to assimilate the ordinary mysti- 
 cal interpretation of its poetic symbols. That man was 
 made in the image of God, the symbolical serpent, the 
 symbolical trees, the cherubim and the flaming sword, — 
 all these elements combine in a significant penumbra to 
 the verifiable elements of reahty, on the simple condition 
 of not being so interpreted as to destroy the reality. On 
 the other hand, the constitution and calling of mankind, 
 as known in consciousness and experience, cannot rea- 
 sonably be contradicted by the figures of speech in which 
 any part of human history is set forth. 
 
 What, then, had the Creator for the first human pair 
 to do ? For what calling in life were they well consti- 
 tuted and very good ? To dress the garden or to till the 
 
PRIMITIVE RESPONSIBILITY. 123 
 
 ground, to know and to produce the means of life and 
 to guard against life's dangers, to become the parents of 
 children to be educated, as they themselves were to 
 be educated, under the spiritual guardianship of their 
 Creator : here is a calling for which man was originally- 
 gifted, for which he has always been gifted in some de- 
 gree. For "the gifts and calling of God are without 
 repentance." ^ Also, to learn what is genuine law and 
 to act accordingly, to receive with joy the tokens of good, 
 to respond with a dutiful faith to conscientious convic- 
 tions of the divine teaching, though the teaching should 
 point out errors and reprove sins: here is a calling of 
 man as constituted for spiritual development under the 
 influences of the creative Spirit. There has been no re- 
 pentance of this calling. It survives, having reached its 
 fulness in the man Christ Jesus. 
 
 But this calling contemplates " knowledge, righteous- 
 ness, and holiness " as the fruit of experience and the 
 attainment of life, — not as the original endowment of 
 nature. What of that hypothetical calling which con- 
 strues "knowledge, righteousness, and holiness" as the 
 possession of undeveloped manhood, the spiritual image 
 of God to be lost before the actual moral development 
 of the race, as we know it, was to begin ? Was Adam 
 the first called to exhibit the sinlessness, the virtue, the 
 victorious efficiency, of the last Adam, — to save his own 
 soul and the souls of his unborn generations, — by not eat- 
 ing the forbidden fruit ? Then it was a calling for which 
 the first man was ill fitted, as was shown by his failure ; 
 a calling to be speedily repented of ; a calling in which 
 the magnificent imbecility of the first man is conceived 
 as atoned for at the immeasurable cost of the final man- 
 
 1 Eom. xi. 29. 
 
124 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 while the infinite disaster is conceived as to be repaired 
 only in part. 
 
 But no. By the law of being, one's calling is in one's 
 gifts. The calling for wliich a man has no adequate gifts 
 is the calling wherewith he is not called. Either Adam 
 could have had no such calling as has been supposed, or 
 his gifts must have comported with the calling. But if 
 the calling was repented of and taken away, then the 
 gifts must logically have been first repented of and taken 
 away : in other words, Adam of the mystical image of 
 God, "in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness," is 
 undone before his eating of the forbidden fruit, or his 
 eating would have been morally impossible. 
 
 Yet to make and straight unmake is as impossible 
 with God as "to say and straight unsay." Therefore 
 Adam was not undone. His gifts and calling remained, 
 and he transmitted the same to his children. 
 
 But if we can believe that a divine economy trans- 
 cending our knowledge might announce the seemingly 
 impossible to be true ; yet, in the sphere of our natural 
 and necessary knowledge, the demonstrably untrue be- 
 comes, in its turn, impossible as an element of divine 
 teaching. The Author of nature cannot contradict the 
 truth of nature. Therefore the Scripture testimony 
 about the first man and his calling in the world must 
 be interpreted with due regard to the well-known ele- 
 ments and tendencies of human nature considered by 
 themselves. 
 
 Assume the mystical calling, — the calling that trans- 
 cends our knowledge and experience. Suppose an intel- 
 lectual and moral endowment of the first man equal 
 to a unique and incomprehensible responsibility. Forti- 
 fied with " knowledge, righteousness, and holiness," he is 
 
PRIMITIVE RESPONSIBILITY, 125 
 
 required to do homage for himself and his posterity in 
 one small matter of formal obedience, that concerns his 
 physical welfare. Head of his race, his obedience is not 
 merely in form, but much more in the homage and 
 fealty he is asked to signify and seal. If he rebels, he 
 gains no earthly advantage, but the reverse ; while faith, 
 hope, and love, the very elements of spiritual life, are 
 definitively abjured. Will he, or will he not, be the loyal 
 vassal of God for the physical and moral dominion of 
 the world ? Ask such a question about the Christ, the 
 man of prophetic promise, the real image of the invisi- 
 ble Divinity ; and let his temptation answer it. What 
 is to be thought of millions of human beings who do 
 not call themselves Christians, and yet habitually resist 
 greater outward seductions, with no very exalted spirit- 
 ual motives, and without feeling themselves in a critical 
 position ? Approximate the primitive man to the char- 
 acter of the spiritual man even in a moderate degree, — 
 lift him to the range of ordinary Christian virtue, — and 
 the story of the fall becomes at once incredible. It 
 exhibits the mythical reason and the mythical unreason : 
 it becomes a myth. The man of high intelligence and 
 holy character, the spiritual image of God not in germ 
 but in mature consciousness, does not fall into trivial 
 acts of insubordination against infinite motives of duty 
 and prudence. 
 
 Or, if it be conceived as within the possibility of per- 
 sonal determination that the creature of "knowledge, 
 righteousness, and holiness " should do some distinctly 
 forbidden thing with the deliberate and intelligent 
 purpose of initiating a struggle with the law of the 
 universe for his own independence; in other words, 
 if a rebel is conceived as having wholly denied his 
 
126 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 original character and done the morally impossible 
 thing, — he "falls like Lucifer, never to hope again." 
 As ignorance and unconsciousness account for incidental 
 errors, so they are incompatible with desperate trans- 
 gressions. That sin which has no palliation of ignorance 
 or unconsciousness is the sin which has no sequel of 
 repentance and forgiveness. The sin which carries in it 
 the potency of moral reprobation to a race is the sin 
 which admits no benediction of fruitfulness, no commis- 
 sion to people and organize a world, no seed of promise, 
 no hope of redemption. " For it is impossible for those 
 who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heav- 
 enly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, 
 and have tasted the good word of God, and the powers 
 of the world to come, if they shall fall away, to re- 
 new them again unto repentance." ^ But though he 
 thus wrote, the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews 
 entertained^ he assures us, a very different persuasion as 
 to their character and prospects ; and we are entitled 
 to entertain a very different persuasion as to mankind, 
 especially mankind in its earliest experience. 
 
 1 Heb. vi. 4. 5. 6. 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 ORIGINAL MAN AND HISTORIC MAN. 
 
 WHEN we have tried in vain to accept a transcen- 
 dental hypothesis as accounting for a given order 
 of facts in the Bible, we come back to nature, and are con- 
 tent to inquire how far a simple nucleus of well-known 
 reality will harmonize the facts in question, and sustain 
 the scriptural ideals of life and history. 
 
 To the author of Genesis, God only is great. All 
 being, law, and discipline are from him. Man, though 
 constituted to be chief of the visible works of God, is a 
 very humble image of his Maker. No occasion is found 
 to exalt him before his disobedience or to disparage him 
 afterwards. He is introduced to us in terms of touching 
 simplicity and candor. " A living soul," he is not sharply 
 distinguished to himself from other creatures who also 
 have " a soul of life," till by observation and comparison 
 his pre-eminence is made to appear. Ha\dng known and 
 named the lower species, he becomes aware that help 
 and companionship suited to him must be found in his 
 own species. Still, the infancy of all creatures is con- 
 ceived as the absence of those antagonistic dispositions 
 that are developed in the struggle of life ; for to all, the 
 vegetable products of the earth are given for food.^ And 
 when, on the presentation of Eve, Adam was awakened 
 
 1 Gen. i. 29, 30. 
 
128 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 to apprehend the physical nature, that approximated him 
 to other animals, as the enshrinement of a social and 
 spiritual capacity in which he was unique, "naked and 
 not ashamed"^ comes in as the mark of undeveloped 
 nature not less than of undeveloped art. 
 
 Did, then, the clear knowledge of God antedate the 
 acquaintance with God's creatures ? This is impossible 
 by the testimony ; for not only is the distinction between 
 man and beast faint, even after study and comparison, — 
 the distinction between the serpent's temptation and the 
 command of the Lord God is fainter still ; and, what in- 
 dicates the deepest ignorance, it is the suggestion of the 
 beast which is preferred. At least, on the part of the 
 woman the decision was in favor of the serpent; on 
 the part of the man, it was in favor of the woman ; and 
 on the part of both, it was in favor of the fruit, — against 
 the authority of God. As between the natural and the 
 spiritual in human development, which is first and which 
 afterwards, in our day ? What was the commandment 
 given ? Did it regulate worship, or define social and civil 
 obligations ? Did it touch the standard of the Decalogue ? 
 No. The commandment did not unavailingly anticipate 
 the progress of mankind. It was intended to aid that 
 progress, touching the moral sensibility in due time. 
 
 We have brought before us in Eden, not the man of 
 " knowledge, righteousness, and holiness," but the human 
 creature enfolding the germ of spiritual life: native 
 instincts and appetites to be directed from above, and a 
 mind for prophetic and practical teaching, that appeals 
 to faith. Exactly the being to fall a victim for a time 
 to tempting fruit and subtle self-suggestion. Just the 
 man, moreover, to hear by and by the reproving voice of 
 
 1 Gen. ii. 18-25. 
 
ORIGINAL MAN AND HISTORIC MAN 129 
 
 God, to be corrected, to learn faith, hope, duty. Such a 
 man can fulfil a natural calling, and come at length to 
 his spiritual heritage in accordance with his personal 
 improvement of the Father's gifts. 
 
 And what was the sequel of his sin ? The great 
 practical problem of justification at once burdened his 
 awakened conscience. How to be righteous, how not to 
 disobey God, the inquiry of all ages, to which all revela- 
 tion is addressed, suddenly emerged in its mysterious 
 infinitude, as it emerges sooner or later in every personal 
 experience. 
 
 But the first sign of something wrong is a changed 
 action of man's mind. Having tried the experiment of 
 judging for himself, he has become naturally sensitive 
 and fearful at finding how poorly he is fitted to take his 
 welfare into his own keeping. And since he has dis- 
 obeyed the voice that was seeking to guide him, he is 
 afraid of that voice, as well as afraid of himself. He 
 has been rash, broken faith, and awakened a conscientious 
 self-reproach. Still, what is done cannot be undone. And 
 what is done ? Something certainly quite different from 
 the childish anticipation of the doers, — something to be 
 justly appreciated only under the divine teaching. Hence 
 God is represented as putting the question, in pursuance 
 of his teaching. These children must learn how fatal is 
 that self-assertion in which a man affects to be as a god ; 
 and that real godlikeness can only come with the spirit 
 of dutiful submission, whose language is : '•' I am a 
 stranger in the earth ; hide not thy commandments from 
 me." For already God had not hidden his command- 
 ment, but man had failed to keep it. Man had shown 
 the tottering step that deviates to the right hand and the 
 left from the straight line of progress, and still moves 
 
 9 
 
130 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 on. Man stumbled and fell. But was it that man should 
 fall forever ; or, rather, through the first fall did there 
 not come to the first pair and to their children a disci- 
 pline of righteousness and redemption ? 
 
 Mark the sudden appearance and painful prominence 
 of the moral man as distinguished from the physical 
 man, after the fall. It is as if the moral man had been 
 prematurely brought into the world by his own act; 
 but having been once born to responsibility by the rash 
 assumption of liberty, there is nothing for it but to give 
 him a training appropriate to the high prerogative of 
 freedom. The child's unfaithfulness is not to make the 
 faith of the Father of none effect. Man is not abandoned 
 to sensual suggestion and self-will ; but in the adminis- 
 tration of physical and moral law God comes to his aid. 
 The command was to save man from physical harm ; but, 
 the command transgressed, all physical consequences are 
 summoned to serve the end of man's moral correction and 
 renovation. Every malediction is for man's sake ; that 
 the free spirit may be taught to distinguish and assert 
 its true character by even the pain and decay of the 
 lower nature. 
 
 Notice the gradation of inquiry on the part of God, 
 with the corresponding gradation in the judgments pro- 
 nounced. The investigation begins with the man, passes 
 on to the woman, and ends with finding the source of 
 temptation in the beast. Having thus passed downward 
 from the highest to the lowest in its inquiry, the divine 
 judgment passes upward from the lowest to the highest, 
 — from the seducing serpent to the beguiled woman, that 
 it may end with the more faultily consenting man. At 
 the turning-point, where inquiry changes to judgment, 
 the eternal discrimination is made between the serpent 
 
ORIGINAL MAN AND HISTORIC MAN. 131 
 
 instinct and the moral law. No question is asked of the 
 serpent. The serpent is judged as a beast, not as a moral 
 agent. The malediction upon the serpent is the male- 
 diction appropriate to the most stealthy and venomous 
 of beastly natures. It is the curse of enmity, deadly 
 and enduring, between the animal seduction and the 
 deceived humanity, between the serpent's seed and the 
 woman's seed ; the curse of bad pre-eminence among all 
 cattle as the type of cunning and treacherous solicita- 
 tion ; the curse of utter destruction in the consummation 
 of man's victory over the powers of temptation. For 
 the conflict prophetically portrayed is not a doubtful 
 one. The beast may injure, but is not to destroy the 
 man ; the man is to destroy the beast. 
 
 After this assurance of hope addressed to man's faith, 
 comes the practical discipline for its fulfilment. It is a 
 discipline of organic law pervading all the functions of 
 life. Nothing here of "knowledge, righteousness, and 
 holiness," as consciously repudiated by the sinning pair. 
 They had confessed feebly and timidly, but upon the 
 whole not disingenuously. They are not reproved for 
 uncandid evasion or disloyal intention, but faithfully 
 instructed and paternally chastened as the beloved of 
 God. They had played with a delusive fancy for divine 
 knowledge. They must learn how serious a teacher 
 divine Wisdom really is ; how careful of the spiritual 
 law; how disenchanting and consuming to the desire 
 of the flesh. No longer mere animal harmony, no more 
 the living soul without the ruling spirit ; but henceforth 
 struggle with nature — pains, toils, conflicts, decay, dis- 
 solution — for the sake of the spirit now awakened, how- 
 ever abruptly, to the recognition of itself. 
 
 There is not a word to tell us that our first parents 
 
132 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 committed any error foreign to the necessary liabilities 
 of our experience in the world ; not a word to tell us 
 that the necessary liability of mankind to evil in con- 
 nection with the earthly trial was fatally enhanced by 
 the first transgression. It is not said that the gifts and 
 calling of mankind underwent any revision to mankind's 
 immense disadvantage. On the contrary, it is simply 
 shown that the very inception of human history devel- 
 oped the identical tendencies that have belonged to it 
 ever since. The revelation of Jesus Christ and the era 
 of the regeneration pay the highest honor to physical 
 tendency as well as to legal training in the development 
 of our race, by admitting their primordial necessity and 
 pointing out the limit of their claims. No animal nature, 
 then no breed of men. No spiritual birth, then no Son 
 of God. 
 
 First, that which is natural, — the man of the garden 
 and of the living creatures ; afterward, that which is 
 spiritual, — the man of the divine Word and of the world 
 discipline. First, the man of predominant physical mo- 
 tive, disobeying commands and not knowing what he 
 does; afterward, the man of open eyes, salutary fears, 
 and second thought. First, the man under special re- 
 straints for his physical good; afterward, the man 
 enduring physical inflictions for his spiritual good. 
 First, the man of greatest self-confidence and least faith ; 
 afterward, the man of greatest faith and least self-con- 
 fidence. First, the man who is " of the earth, earthy ; " 
 afterward, the man who is "the Lord from heaven." 
 The antithesis implies the progress from the first char- 
 acter to the last, and, of course, the contradictory moral 
 phenomena resulting from the temporary struggle for 
 ascendency between the two. 
 
ORIGINAL MAN AND HISTORIC MAN. 133 
 
 We are to consider, also, that to an undeveloped and 
 uninformed nature confirmed unrighteousness is as im- 
 possible as confirmed righteousness. Infancy is not 
 exposed to great spiritual dangers. The mistake of an 
 initial trial cannot be a final crisis of character. No 
 moral catastrophe is to be looked for in the cradle. 
 But the discipline of life, guarding against physical dan- 
 ger, takes, of necessity, a moral risk. It is not enough 
 that forbidden fruit should be kept out of sight. The 
 natural appetites must be brought under control of a 
 free spiritual loyalty. But spiritual loyalty is of faith, 
 something quite distinct from physical tendency or grav- 
 itation. " Faith Cometh by hearing, and hearing by the 
 word of God." And since man's life is '*' not by bread 
 alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the 
 mouth of God," shall not faith come, and come again, 
 by hearing, and hearing as often by the word of God, 
 until the prophetic soul shall take its proper attitude 
 of attention and obedience, saying, "Speak, Lord, for 
 thy servant heareth " ? 
 
 The testimony of Irenseus is of interest in this con- 
 nection as showing what understanding of the Scriptures 
 was in the mind of a great defender of the Christian 
 faith, whose writings were held by Eusebius to have 
 made it clear that he stood in immediate relation with 
 the Apostles. Far from allowing that moral character 
 was bestowed upon man in his original constitution, 
 Irenseus holds that "God made him free from the be- 
 ginning," and adds: "But if some had been made by 
 nature bad, and others good, these latter would not be 
 deserving of praise for being good, for such they were 
 created ; nor would the former be reprehensible, for thus 
 they were made [originally]. But since all men are of 
 
134 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 the same nature, able both to hold fast and to do what 
 is good, and, on the other hand, having also the power 
 to cast it from them and not to do it, some do justly 
 receive praise even among men who are under the con- 
 trol of good laws (and much more from God), and ob- 
 tain deserved testimony of their choice of good in general 
 and of persevering therein ; but the others are blamed, 
 and receive a just condemnation because of their rejec- 
 tion of what is fair and good." ^ 
 
 Let any one free his mind from the bias of system, 
 allowing the Scriptures to speak in their own simple 
 way, and see how clearly throughout their whole ex- 
 tent the free yet imperfect nature of man is held to 
 the guidance of divine truth by faith as the principle of 
 obedience. The revelation of God comes down to the 
 conditions of our trial, violates no requirement of reason, 
 but awakens conscience in order to satisfy law. 
 
 1 Against Heresies, book iv. ch. xxxvii. 1, 2, Ante-Nicene Christian 
 Library, T. & T. Clark, Edinburgh. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE PERFECT FAITH AND THE APPROYED MAN. 
 
 "XT 7E are given to understand, in the later Scriptures, 
 ^ ^ that no law of outward conduct can be the ra- 
 tional measure or final test of righteousness ; in fact, that 
 no "law of commandments contained in ordinances"^ 
 was ever intended to serve more than a provisional pur- 
 pose. The law of commandments is the instrument of 
 instruction. Faith in God is the element of righteous- 
 ness. The law of commandments is "line upon line 
 and precept upon precept," — a thing of imperfect defini- 
 tions and partial degrees. Faith is a permanent prin- 
 ciple, that proves its quality both by fulfilling and by 
 surviving the successive dispensations of law. It is 
 good to keep the commandments of God as they are 
 made known : now, " Eat not ; " again, " Make no graven 
 image ; " again, " Do judgment, and relieve the oppressed." 
 But it is better to go beyond these to other and nobler 
 requirements of the perfect life by the law of faith. 
 Faith is eternal, of the very essence of the perfect life, 
 " the substance of things hoped for, the proving of things 
 not seen." Faith gains a good report in spite of judg- 
 ments adverse to many details of conduct, because it is 
 working by love and working with God. Without faith 
 1 Eph. ii. 15. 
 
136 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 it is impossible to please God. With faith it is impossi- 
 ble not to please God according to the measure of faith, 
 for faith is pleasing to God.^ A deficiency of faith on 
 the part of a being who has had little or no discipliae 
 for the development of faith is not a deficiency to be 
 mortally resented, since faith is born of the divine Word 
 and Spirit, nurtured by gracious discipline, consummated 
 in holy character. 
 
 As commands and instructions are given that we may 
 not go astray in particulars of conduct, so faith is min- 
 istered to us that we may be justified from all things 
 brought against us; even those things from which we 
 could not be justified by formal law. Literal obedience 
 to express directions can conclude nothing in our favor 
 beyond those parts of conduct to which the directions 
 refer. Faith in the higher authority may qualify actions 
 mistaken and regrettable in themselves with the spirit 
 of loyalty. Obedience to special commands does not of 
 necessity prove a man to be sound in faith. A man 
 sound in faith is in that very fact disposed to la^vful 
 obedience ; and faith is what makes any act of obedience 
 whole and acceptable to the authority obeyed. 
 
 Was there any other principle of obedience and Hfe 
 for Adam than faith in God ? Law could be known to 
 him only in parts, and the parts could be known but 
 imperfectly. The whole law cannot be formulated in 
 details. Law is the truth of God, to be communicated 
 in the Word and received by faith. Faith builds up 
 law as it builds up obedience and manhood. Eevelation 
 never says, " Obey in this particular, and you shall be 
 perfect throughout your generations." But from Alpha 
 to Omega we are called upon, as moving in a course of 
 free development, to believe in God, to advance by his 
 
THE APPROVED MAN. 137 
 
 inspiration, and to be perfected. Yea, the principle of 
 faith excludes justification on the ground of any particu- 
 lars of obedience whatever. To seek righteousness '' by 
 the deeds of the law " is to lose it. If we find perfection 
 in what we have done and are now doing, we give up 
 seeking perfection in the better and ever better, which 
 is our possibility by the law of faith. " He that seeketh 
 findeth," by the law of faith. He will go on seeking 
 and finding. But he that hath sought and hath found, 
 by the law of works, no more seeketh, and findeth no 
 more. Hence, though we have gifts and works, no 
 matter to what heights and depths of achievement and 
 sacrifice, if we have not love ever surviving, and still 
 going on in faith and hope to more and better service, 
 where is our justification ? I do not say merely our jus- 
 tification for the past, but our justification for the present 
 and the future. The principle of our justification must 
 be a principle of eternal life, or our justification will fall 
 into the decay, degradation, and death of transient ages. 
 Through all dispensations the principle of our justifica- 
 tion is one. Earlier than Moses or Abraham, later than 
 Paul or " Lutl er, faith abideth, like Jesus Christ the su- 
 preme Examp 'e of faith, " the same yesterday and to-day 
 and forever." 
 
 Is it possibl} because we hear so much of Jesus Christ 
 as the Object of faith, that we fail to give him due honor 
 as the Example of faith? We are taught to think of 
 htm as the Mediator of all spiritual benediction and 
 grace; yet we frustrate the grace of God, unless we 
 learn to think of Him also as the Leader of the war- 
 worn hosts of faith, from the foundation of the world. 
 It is only by bearing his cross and achieving the perfect 
 example of faith and of the righteousness which is by 
 
138 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 faith, that our Lord passes mto his glory and becomes 
 Head over all things to his church, Chief of men as born 
 to personal sonship in the holy family of God. Only 
 by becoming the Son of man, born of a woman, made 
 under law, subject to trial, learning obedience by the 
 things that he suffered, fulfilling all righteousness, could 
 he become known to us as Son of God and Saviour of 
 the world. Having come mto the house of our physical 
 and social bondage, it was for him to lead captivity cap- 
 tive, and through the eternal Spirit to vindicate the 
 faith in which he offered himself without spot to God, 
 that he might open the way of redemption for mankind. 
 The prophetic mystery and the Messianic revelation of 
 godliness is summed up in these words : " He who was 
 manifested in the flesh, justified in the spirit." ^ Here is 
 an antithesis that rules in the earthly life, and is ever- 
 more a mystery. "Manifested in the flesh." Why? 
 Was it that he might be justified in the flesh ? Was the 
 aim to exhibit the pattern and circumstances of the 
 best earthly life, as if men were made for a terrestrial 
 paradise and nothing better ? Was the divine humanity 
 to show an accurate conformity to moral precepts 
 according to the limits of the average conscience and the 
 requirements of existing institutions and authorities? 
 Nothing of the kind. Manifested but not justified, in 
 the flesh; manifested that he might be "judged. accord- 
 ing to men in the flesh," while living " according to God 
 in the spirit ; " manifested to declare not only the right- 
 eousness, but also the long-suffering of God ; manifested 
 to endure the contradiction of sinners, to be bruised and 
 put to grief, to make his life an offering for sin, — above 
 all, manifested that he might win the faith of those 
 
 1 1 Tim. iii. 16. 
 
THE APPROVED MAN, 139 
 
 witnesses and messengers, who would bear his testimony 
 to all nations, that he might be believed on in the world, 
 having been received up into glory. 
 
 "Justified in the spirit," but not manifested in the 
 spirit. " For who among men knoweth the things of a 
 man, save the spirit of the man, which is in him ? Even 
 so the things of God none knoweth, save the Spirit of 
 God." 1 The justification of Jesus Christ in the human 
 conscience is of faith. The disciple believes in the right- 
 eousness of Jesus. He cannot demonstrate it by stand- 
 ards of law applicable to details of conduct. So our 
 Lord ever stands before us as greater than the law, as 
 justified in his own conscience by demonstration of the 
 Spirit, not by demonstration of the Decalogue. It is by 
 faith — by an assured persuasion of speaking the truth, 
 doing the works, and suffering according to the will of 
 the Father — that our Lord is righteous. He fulfilled 
 the law and the prophets not by striking coincidences 
 of the letter, but by believing in them so as to act out 
 their perfect meaning. 
 
 Finally, on what principle or ground shall we con- 
 ceive that the Incarnate Son is justified by the Eternal 
 Father? Is it on the ground of his having fulfilled 
 a certain prescribed work of self-sacrifice, until with 
 respect to certain definite limits of that work, he can 
 say, " It is finished " ? Is it " after the law of a carnal 
 commandment " requiring the Son of God to be put to 
 death in the flesh, that the reclamations of divine justice 
 might receive a formal or quantitative satisfaction, and 
 sinners be saved from receiving the due reward of their 
 deeds? Hear the Prophet. "When thou shalt make 
 his soul an offering for sin " — what then ? How is the 
 
 1 1 Cor. ii. 11. 
 
140 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 Atonement to be atoned for ? — "He shall see his seed, 
 he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord 
 shall prosper in his hands." Of what avail to bear sins, 
 if he could not save his people from their sins? Of 
 what avail to experience the terrors of vindictive law, 
 if he could not become the minister of peace, the medi- 
 ator and pledge of regeneration ? Is it punishment, and 
 not sin, that is the evil and bitter thing ? How does the 
 Son himself vindicate the Father's government and his 
 own submission ? " Except a corn of wheat fall into the 
 ground and die, it abideth alone ; but if it die, it bring- 
 eth forth much fruit." Here is the faith of Jesus in the 
 law of the spiritual creation. After his resurrection his 
 word is, "Ought not Christ to have suffered, and to 
 enter into his glory ? " The testimony of the Gospel is, 
 that " for the joy that was set before him he endured 
 the cross," — and, " thus it behooved the Christ to suffer," 
 that the majestic purpose of Love might be fulfilled 
 through the ages of ages in bringing many sons unto 
 glory. 
 
 But take away the shield of faith, wherewith the 
 Saviour is able to quench the fiery darts of the adver- 
 sary, and what becomes of the sword of the Spirit, — 
 the word of God ? What becomes of the armor of 
 righteousness on the right hand and on the left, — his 
 active obedience ? What becomes of the helmet of sal- 
 vation, — his assurance of success ? Nay ; take away 
 the persuasion of his resurrection and endless life, of 
 the ages to come, of his all-subduing and all-reconciling 
 reign, of the kingdom to be delivered up to th-e Father, 
 that God may be all in all, — and is Jesus justified with 
 God, or are the ways of God justified to man ? On the 
 contrary, we are simply brought to the unique demon- 
 
THE APPROVED MAN. 14X 
 
 stration of a pessimist world : the worst fate to the best 
 man. If the Christ crucified be not the Christ risen 
 and glorified, then of all men his followers are the most 
 miserable — and most miserable are all men. If there 
 be no resurrection of the dead, and no revelation of God 
 and of the sons of God in an immortal life, then what 
 is there to make good the word of promise, on which all 
 righteous laws, all prophetic anticipations and benevolent 
 sacrifices, have reposed ? But grant that faith is the rec- 
 ognition, however feeble, of a divine reality and an eter- 
 nal revelation, wherein faith has its own justification and 
 guidance, and then faith will sustain and justify the 
 human spirit in doing what faith demands. Thus faith, 
 working by love, purifying the heart, and overcoming 
 the world, becomes the organic law of citizenship and 
 service under the government of God. 
 
 On this ground, it is true, faith cannot be confined to 
 a critical act, in which, for example, a man takes it for 
 granted that a mystical fall has its compensation in a mys- 
 tical atonement. Such an act can, in any case, be only 
 an incident of faith. Faith abideth, — a permanent prin- 
 ciple of action, a vital relation of the finite soul with the 
 eternal Spirit, or there is no faith and no justification. 
 Faith is not only in itself the spiritual element of right- 
 eousness ; it makes for righteousness also in the way of 
 " good works, which God hath before ordained that we 
 should walk in them." 
 
 Faith, in fine, determines its own antithesis, — unbe- 
 lief. Unbelief expresses the evil that is in the world in 
 its unity. Men, alike unknowing and unbelieving with 
 respect to God and the ages of his revelation, are thrown 
 back upon partial aspects of things. They find develop- 
 ment and dissolution, immanent energy coming out in 
 
142 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 current consciousness, consciousness changeful, illusive, 
 evanescent, lighting fools the way to dusty death, and 
 opening the eyes of philosophers to the blackness of 
 speculative despair. But while the struggle of faith and 
 unbelief is ever bringing with it the comparative knowl- 
 edge of good and evil, the revelation of God sets the bow 
 of promise in the cloud, affirms the divine intention to 
 be simply good, makes periods of darkness tributary 
 to ages of light, gathers together in one all things in 
 Christ,^ and through the fashion of this world that pass- 
 eth away 2 discloses the ever living universe to which 
 we belong : — 
 
 " One God, one law, one element, 
 And one far-off divine event, 
 To which the whole creation moves." 
 
 1 Eph. 1. 10. 2 1 Cor. vii. 31. 
 
PAET FOURTH. 
 
 THE MANIFESTATION OF EVIL. 
 
" He that believeth not hath been judged already, because he 
 
 hath not believed on the name of the only begotten Son of God. 
 
 And this is the judgment, that light is come into the world, and 
 
 men loved the darkness rather than the light, for their works were 
 
 evil." 
 
 Gospel of St. John, iii. 18, 19. 
 
 "The highest enhancement of sin, the blasphemy against the 
 Holy Ghost, is conditioned by the highest revelation of God ; only 
 through Christ and the efficiency of the Holy Ghost proceeding 
 from Him has it become possible." 
 
 Dr. Julius Muller: Christian Doctrine of Sin, vol. ii. p. 480. 
 
 " DASS dem menschen nichts vollkommnes wird, 
 Empfind' ich nun. Du gabst zu dieser wonne, 
 Die mich den gottern nah' und naher bringt, 
 Mir den geiahrten, den ich schon nicht mehr 
 Entbehren kann, wenn er gleich, kalt und frech, 
 Mich vor mir selbst erniedrigt, und zu nichts, 
 Mit einem worthauch, deine gaben wandelt." 
 
 Goethe : Faust. 
 
PART FOURTH. 
 
 THE MANIFESTATION OF EVIL. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 OF SPECULATIONS ON ORIGINAL SIN. 
 
 IN the preceding study we found faith to be the prin- 
 ciple not only of spiritual rectitude, but of spiritual 
 progress; since righteousness is revealed in nature and 
 represented in Scripture not as practical conformity with 
 outward regulations, but as the development of personal 
 life according to the revelation of God. 
 
 The Council of Trent was true to the principle of 
 growth, if not to the economy of reformation, in what 
 it declared concerning the increase of justification : " So, 
 therefore, those justified, and made God's friends and ser- 
 vants, going from strength to strength, are renewed, as 
 saith the Apostle, ' day by day ; ' that is, by mortifying 
 the members of their flesh and presenting them as in- 
 struments of justice unto sanctification, by observing 
 the commandments of God and of the Church, faith co- 
 operating with good works, they grow in that righteous- 
 ness received through the grace of Christ, and are justified 
 more and more. Holy Church seeks this increase of 
 righteousness when she prays, ' Grant us, O Lord, an in- 
 crease of faith, hope, and charity.' " ^ 
 
 ^ Decretum de Justificatione, caput x. 
 10 
 
146 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 This progress in faith and righteousness, depending 
 upon the revelation of God, is always shaded in human 
 history by manifestations of unbelief and unrighteous- 
 ness, that affirm the animal appetites, childish judg- 
 ments, and selfish wills of men. As there is the struggle 
 of physical Hfe, so above and beyond this there is the 
 fight of faith, the conflict for spiritual enlargement, the 
 effort to give reason and the will of God their proper 
 persuasiveness and just ascendency in the dealings of 
 men. 
 
 The advancing spiritual conviction has ever reflected 
 with severe reproach upon our immature and complex 
 nature for its proclivity to immediate enjoyment in pref- 
 erence to prospective improvement, and its obstinate ad- 
 hesion to low habits in spite of noble ideals or moving 
 examples that appeal for efforts and sacrifices in pursu- 
 ance of the greatest good for all creatures. 
 
 What has been dogmatically laid down upon this 
 subject in the creeds of Christendom need not be exhib- 
 ited here. But in the reasoning of eminent thinkers 
 we sometimes find a whole aspect of history in a few 
 words, and so have an effective introduction to what we 
 desire to examine for ourselves. The Duke of Argyle, 
 through a series of elaborate studies in the " Contempo- 
 rary Eeview," finds at length in man the solitary ex- 
 ception to " the Unity of Nature." ^ In the number for 
 February, 1881, he says: "That which is really excep- 
 tional, and indeed absolutely singular, in man is the 
 persistent tendency of his development to take a wrong 
 direction." Such a tendency, according to him, "can- 
 not be reconciled with the ordinary course of nature or 
 
 1 See also "The Unity of Nature," G. P. Putnam's Sons, pp. 355, 
 367, 372, 373, 544. 
 
ORIGINAL SIN. 147 
 
 with the general law under which all other creatures 
 fulfil the conditions of their being;" and this by rea- 
 son of the general fact, "first, that man is prone to 
 set up and to invent standards of obligation which are 
 low, false, mischievous, and even ruinous ; and, secondly, 
 that when he has become possessed of standards of 
 obligation which are high and true and beneficent, he is 
 prone first to fall short in the observance of them, and 
 next to suffer them, through various processes of decay, to 
 be obscured and lost." The corruption of religion, as well 
 as the corruption of morals, becomes intelligible, in his 
 view, "on the supposition of wilful disobedience with 
 all its tendencies and consequences having become 'in- 
 herited and organized in the race.' " 
 
 Cardinal Newman develops the same argument with 
 intenser feeling.^ " To consider the world in its length 
 and breadth, its various history, the many races of man, 
 their starts, their fortunes, their mutual alienations, their 
 conflicts; and then their ways, habits, governments, 
 forms of worship ; their enterprises, their aimless courses, 
 their random achievements and acquirements, the im- 
 potent conclusion of long-standing facts, the tokens, so 
 faint and broken, of a superintending design, the blind 
 evolution of what turn out to be powers or truths, the 
 progress of things, as if from uur^asoning elements, not 
 towards final causes, the greatness anu ""ittleness of man, 
 his far-reaching aims, his short duration, the curtain 
 hung over his futurity, the disappointments of life, the 
 defeat of good, the success of evil, physical pain, mental 
 anguish, the prevalence and intensity of sin, the pervad- 
 ing idolatries, the corruptions, the dreary, hopeless irre- 
 ligion, that condition of the whole race so fearfully yet 
 
 1 Apologia pro Vita sua, pp. 241, 242. 
 
148 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 exactly described in the Apostle's words, 'having no 
 hope and without God in the world/ — all this is a 
 vision to dizzy and appall, and inflicts upon the mind 
 the sense of a profound mystery which is absolutely 
 beyond human solution. What shall be said to this 
 heart-piercing, reason-bewildering fact? I can only 
 answer, that either there is no Creator, or this living 
 society of men is in a true sense discarded from his 
 presence." 
 
 But since there is a Creator, Cardinal Newman argues 
 that " the human race is implicated in some terrible 
 aboriginal calamity. It is out of joint with the purposes 
 of its Creator." " This," he insists, " is a fact, — a fact as 
 true as the fact of its existence ; and thus," he continues, 
 "the doctrine of what is theologically called 'original 
 sin ' becomes to me almost as certain as that the world 
 exists, and as the existence of God." 
 
 What is matter of inference in these quotations is 
 introduced simply for the emphasis it gives to what 
 is matter of induction. To highly developed and in- 
 structed intellects, to spirits trained in all the doctrine 
 and discipline of religion, and characters ripened to 
 pious susceptibility and devoutness, the facts of our 
 mortal history are so fearful, the color of our fate is 
 so sombre, that the passing generations, being plainly 
 insufficient for their own burdens or their own duties, 
 must needs refer their evils through unknown lines of 
 natural descent back to " some terrible aboriginal calam- 
 ity," some "wilful disobedience," on account of which 
 God discarded man from his presence, and man was left 
 as a race to inherit and organize the consequences of his 
 transgression. 
 
 As the purpose of the present study is not to resolve 
 
ORIGINAL SIN, 149 
 
 any mystery, but simply to deal with what is made 
 known to us in nature for the clearer understanding of 
 what we are taught in Scripture, and as we have 
 already considered the beginning of man's history, we 
 have now nothing to do with grounding man's present 
 aberrations upon an original catastrophe ; nor can we 
 properly infer that man is discarded from God's pres- 
 ence from an induction of facts about man's sin and 
 misery, without due regard to God's revelation for 
 reconcihng the world unto himself. That man does 
 inherit and organize the consequences of his errors is 
 true. That God does bear testimony against man's 
 errors in the sufferiags they entail may be taken as 
 equally true. But as man's righteousness is simply his 
 persistent progress in knowledge and obedience through 
 faith in God's revelation, so man's sin has its develop- 
 ment and aggravation through his continued resistance 
 to the persuasions of the same revelation. Hence 
 man's physical and intellectual error, inherited and 
 organized through ages of comparative ignorance, sup- 
 ports his appeal to compassion; while man's moral 
 inertia, or wilful reluctance to good under increasing 
 Ijfght from above, opens the question of personal blame- 
 worthuiess. First and last the spiritual movement of 
 humanity refers wilful disobedience and judicial con- 
 demnation to the period of final decisions, not to the 
 period of initial communications between God and man. 
 The sin of ignorance is easily forgiven, however mon- 
 strous in its external aspect. The sin against light 
 is promptly judged according to its inward quality, 
 though it should violate none of the decencies of out- 
 ward life. A " terrible aboriginal calamity " (if that be 
 not a contradiction in terms), even though it were a 
 
150 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 " wilful disobedience," so its consequences be " inherited 
 and organized in the race/' would justly be pleaded by 
 all the heirs of such an inheritance as a palliation of 
 personal guilt, in just so far as it should constitute 
 a native proclivity to evil. We are therefore to take 
 nature as we find it, and to study the manifestation 
 of evil in the concrete; that is, to study the so-called 
 evil of life as related to the good. For it is evil as mark- 
 ing the whole course of nature, not as something per- 
 fectly definable in itself, that the Bible is persistently 
 holding up to our attention. It follows that for us to 
 attend to this, much as we may be baffled by the in- 
 tricacies of the subject, is the way to throw the light of 
 experience upon Scripture, and the light of Scripture 
 upon experience. 
 
CHAPTEE II. 
 
 01 SPIRITUAL LAW OVERRULING PHYSICAL TENDENCY. 
 
 TTUMAN nature is complex. The animal part of 
 -■- -^ man has laws of its own, which are distinct from 
 the laws of his spiritual obligation. In itself considered, 
 tie law of animal nature is very good. It wisely and 
 Mndly adapts and moves mankind to the fulfilment of a 
 physical destiny. Equally certain is it that the animal 
 nature indispensable to the fulfilment of our physical 
 destiny is itself destined to pass away when its work is 
 done. But if a mortal race is employed in the produc- 
 tion and education of immortal men, then our physical 
 organs, like other material objects, must come under the 
 sway of spiritual law so long as there shall be any need 
 of them as means and instruments of spiritual service. 
 
 Our bodily development is so vitally related to the 
 quality and discipline of our spirits, however, that the 
 race can ill afford a feeble physical organization. The 
 physical motive has need to be vigorous, lest the strug- 
 gle of life should be made uncertain or abortive by pre- 
 mature and overpowering spiritual demands. Infant 
 saiuts are not thought of usually as hopeful candidates 
 for earthly honors. If the child after the flesh is to die 
 at an early day, the human race cannot be much in- 
 debted to him ; and as for his own spiritual development 
 
152 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 on so faint and feeble a trial, what can it be but a 
 precocious and puny product ? The teaching of nature 
 reduced to a proverb is a law of not too much on either 
 hand: "Be not righteous overmuch, neither make thy- 
 self overwise ; why shouldst thou destroy thyself ? Be 
 not over wicked, neither be thou foolish ; why shouldst 
 thou die before thy time ? " ^ The way is narrow. There 
 is danger on the side of excessive spiritual exertion, as 
 well as on the side of excessive physical indulgence. To 
 wrong the lower nature is to wrong the higher also. 
 But first in the order of time Comes that which is ph^^i- 
 cal, — to be handled at short range, to be wisely indul^d 
 or restrained, not under moral precepts, but according :o 
 natural law. To foster and develop the energy whidi 
 in its various functions the spiritual man will by ani 
 by responsibly employ, meanwhile waiting to salute the 
 youthful spirit for the purpose of introducing it gently 
 to its appropriate moral lessons, — this is what it means 
 to bring men forward in the world. 
 
 But while there is a period to which moral training is 
 inappropriate, and nature is its own law, there is still a 
 higher nature to which law is to be communicated from 
 above, and the word of the Lord comes by and by in 
 a peculiar sense. A command authoritative, prophetic, 
 divine, — not less so for being famiharly uttered by pa- 
 rental ministry, — requires the child to abstain freely 
 from some natural pleasure because the indulgence, or 
 too much of it, would be injurious. The well-known 
 conditions of life, the laws of nature as long experience 
 has taught society to apprehend them, become matter 
 of moral discipline to the untaught and the unwary. 
 What cautious and watchful guardianship about f orbid- 
 
 1 Eccl. vii. 16, 17. 
 
SPIRITUAL LAW AND PHYSICAL TENDENCY, 153 
 
 den fruits ! And how much instruction has to be given 
 before the child of nature can be counted upon as having 
 grown to such spiritual faith as will insure a moral 
 obedience! Efforts and actions that are perfectly and 
 innocently spontaneous, yet contrary to the superior 
 judgment, have to be reproved and corrected, as a means 
 of awakening the conscientious feeling and confirming 
 a conscientious habit. At the first the natural aliena- 
 tion of childhood from this kind of training is total. 
 Why ? Simply because the child has its law of spon- 
 taneous movement in the line of physical motives. Is 
 this law sin ? Certainly not in the moral sense, though 
 it may express the natural inheritance of morbid ten- 
 dencies. But when the higher law comes, then comes 
 the demand for faith; then comes proof of a practical 
 potency of foolishness and impiety bound up in the 
 child's constitution. The child seems a creature of mere 
 animal desire in opposition to the divine word opening 
 the way to new obedience. Infantile rebellion is out- 
 spoken and unscrupulous just in proportion as it is igno- 
 rant, unapprehensive, and irresponsible. The will of the 
 flesh is not informed as to the higher range of man's life, 
 until the very teaching that begins to point it out is 
 understood and felt as overruhng the law of the lower 
 nature. When the commandment comes in this sense, 
 the natural motives, in proportion as they are thrown into 
 practical opposition to the law of faith, begin to take a 
 relative character of unbelief and unrighteousness. That 
 which was innocent and excellent as the original creation 
 of God, and which is still innocent and excellent, so only 
 it be kept in just subordination to every spiritual word 
 of God, imports evil, and liability to more and more of 
 evil, when it is allowed to assert itself as so much mind 
 
154 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 of the flesh — so much prejudice of animal habit and 
 desire — against the higher ruUng. That physical ten- 
 dency which is not in itself subject to the spiritual law 
 of God, neither indeed can be, is to be subjugated by the 
 spirit of faith in man. For by faith man is subject to 
 the spiritual reign of God, and can become subject to 
 the same more and more. Low down in our career we 
 are all in innocent unbelief, in the notliingness and 
 vanity of our ignorance, by no will of our own. Our 
 destiny for good depends upon the commandment that 
 shall come, upon the word of truth and grace that shall 
 visit all ; albeit why some are so tractable, and others 
 so intractable, seemingly, to the heavenly guidance is a 
 secret that merges in the mystery of being, while the 
 fact revealed in experience is that " all we, like sheep, 
 have gone astray." 
 
 But the new commandment demanding faith, — does 
 this throw us from the track of obedience to our destruc- 
 tion, because it acts as a brake to check and regulate a 
 native tendency liable to unconscious and fatal excess ? 
 By no means. For this very reason the new command- 
 ment is good. It comes forth from a perfect law, and 
 ministers to a divine order; it is not opposed to the 
 physical tendencies as such, but only to their transgres- 
 sion of salutary limits. The higher law enters not only 
 for its own sake and for the sake of the higher man, but 
 because of a dangerous liability to transgression even in 
 the lower sphere of physical requirement. The Crea- 
 tor declares himself as the Guide of the human soul for 
 the sake of the body; and by that means he becomes 
 the Saviour of the body for the sake of the soul. He 
 points out our natural weakness, appeals to a wholesome 
 fear, solicits faith as the principle of obedience, and hence 
 
SPIRITUAL LAW AND PHYSICAL TENDENCY. 155 
 
 the condition of all blessings he desires to bestow. All 
 the contents and endeavors of our being are continually 
 coming to judgment in accordance with the progressive 
 demands of the truth as apprehended by faith. It 
 matters not what the requirement may be, — does it 
 express a claim of supreme law ? Then to believe and 
 to obey is good. Unbelief in all conceivable degrees of 
 disobedience is relatively evil. Hesitation, reluctance, 
 delay, resistance, — all that is not of faith is of evil. 
 This antagonism of unbelief and faith holds through all 
 gradations of intellectual and moral development, and 
 is quite distinct from any judgment as to degrees of per- 
 sonal responsibility. Granted that the supreme Wisdom 
 is moving men with counsels or commands, — then, as 
 certainly as faith and obedience are their only right- 
 eousness, so certainly unbelief and disobedience are the 
 measure of their unrighteousness. The common aspect of 
 evil, in individuals and in society, is the aspect of some- 
 thing negative to the best suggestion, to the wisest 
 teaching, to the most beneficent example, — something 
 negative, in a word, to the divine inspiration. For if a 
 little advance in knowledge and experience is enough 
 to bring a person into a critical attitude of mind towards 
 whatever is behind, so that to excuse is also to accuse 
 the more ignorant, how should not that all-searching 
 inspiration of God, which ministers instruction in right- 
 eousness to the human spirit, cause even the fine gold 
 of natural virtue to grow dim by comparison with the 
 virtue that excelleth, — to say nothing of those grosser 
 exhibitions, wherein animal appetites and lawless pas- 
 sions conspire with headstrong self-will against admoni- 
 tions of authority and persuasions of conscience ? 
 
 Infancy does not grow to a spontaneous fulfilment 
 
156 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 of the tasks and graces of childhood; nor is the child 
 invariably met with a discipline to charm it into per- 
 fect action. Youth, maturity, old age, — each period 
 has its peculiar tendencies that are distinctly against the 
 best thought and hope; though they are as distinctly 
 of nature under the existing stress of conditions and 
 motives in the lower sphere of life. Always, however, 
 there is the law and mastership of Life calling men 
 onward and upward. Prophecies of intellectual, social, 
 and spiritual attainments utter themselves in the soul. 
 Yet there is ever a preoccupation, some concrete ex- 
 pression of unbelief, by reason of which, if it may 
 be deemed that some are excusably late in reaching the 
 land of promise, it must be confessed that there are 
 others who do not for the present appear to enter in at 
 all. And who can be sure of having exerted his powers 
 to the best practicable effect ? 
 
 As one man's lack of faith in life's promises and possi- 
 bilities makes its contribution to a general average of 
 failure, which becomes a mode of social existence, so 
 the manner of living in society becomes a clog, or pro- 
 hibition, or bias, to individual progress and influence ; 
 though the need of reformation may be to prophetic 
 souls as a very fire in the bones. The illuminated, the 
 elect, through whom the higher calling is brought to the 
 knowledge of meaner men, are apt to become jealous 
 for the Lord their God, but incommunicative, severe, 
 condemnatory, toward their fellow-men. They make 
 a virtue of despising the very conditions of virtue. 
 That the higher law should respect and vindicate the 
 claims of the lower law seems too great a condescension ; 
 and so the lower law is disparaged and denounced as 
 interfering with the demands of the higher. The earth- 
 
SPIRITUAL LA W AND PHYSICAL TENDENCY, 157 
 
 ward gravitation is accused of hindering the heavenward 
 motion. The man of lofty contemplations, who cannot 
 take others upon his flights, conceives their heaviness 
 as infinitely more odious to their Maker than burden- 
 some to him, and finds it the part of piety to construe 
 the universal trial as universal apostasy from the very 
 beginning. In this way he thinks to give God glory for 
 all aspects of good, while to man he assigns the respon- 
 sibility for all aspects of evil. 
 
 But the Creator does not reveal himself as wholly on 
 the side of those who seem called to take his part. If 
 error besets the lower functions of our nature, does it not 
 beset the higher also? Has not man erred as disas- 
 trously in the over-assertion of spiritual prerogatives 
 as in the over-indulgence of animal tendencies ? Is it 
 not the part of the infinite Judge to correct error in all 
 and for all? How shall the prophet of improvement 
 even in art be ever recognized as such, if he have no 
 patience with the cool stare of unbelief or the active 
 persecution of vested interests ? What, then, shall the 
 prophet of enlightened conscience and of moral law 
 expect ? Eelatively to each other it is not the prophet, 
 but the world, that is lying in wickedness. But the 
 prophet is also of the world, and the world is prophetic 
 with the prophet, however it may seem to be against 
 him ; while prophet and world, the whole race of men, 
 are in that error and faultiness out of which slowly and 
 painfully the way is opening toward the world that is 
 to come. As this progress in its very nature implies 
 the better thoughts and nobler faith that lead the way 
 to unseen good, so by a necessary correlation it implies 
 the lower habits and short-sighted affections that are 
 judged as evil and doomed to pass away. 
 
158 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 The absolute good is not in creatures. But given the 
 absolute good in the Creator as the Object of faith, and 
 the absolute evil is impossible in the creation. Evil 
 comes out as a mistaken or perverse determination 
 of life, — to be corrected by the further discipline of life 
 lest it should defeat the consummation of life. This 
 is not theory ; it is history, — the divine teaching in the 
 facts of existence. As faith embraces the divine motive 
 and guidance in nature, and thus stands for life in rela- 
 tion to its possible good, better, and best, under the 
 inspiration of supreme Wisdom and Benevolence; so 
 unbelief, indifferent or oppugnant to the light and lead- 
 ing from above, because seeking good in obedience 
 to animal instincts or personal calculations, stands for 
 life in relation to its possible progress in error and the 
 natural consequences of error, — the bad, worse, and worst 
 of illusion, abortion, and destruction, which are the his- 
 toric mark of works not wrought in the spirit of faith 
 and obedience. As the way of wisdom is the way of 
 peace and pleasantness, no matter with what incidental 
 sufferings, so the way of indocility is the way of prohibi- 
 tory and punitive discipline, — the hard way, no matter 
 with what incidental pleasures or. advantages. Unbelief, 
 as the error of immature intelligence, is corrected by 
 larger experience. No one is allowed to commit himself 
 finally to a wrong choice without trial of that servile 
 apprenticeship to transgression which opens the eyes to 
 the majesty and freedom of law. The " evil, be thou 
 my good," of unconscious, inconsiderate, and ignorant 
 preference, cannot grow in personal development to the 
 " evil, be thou my good," of ultimate spiritual determi- 
 nation, except the person travel all the pathway of con- 
 tradiction under the lightnings of divine law, which 
 
SPIRITUAL LAW AND PHYSICAL TENDENCY, 159 
 
 measures tlie moral distance between an infantile devia- 
 tion from the truth of life, when as yet the inspiration 
 of Wisdom has hardly indicated its motion in the soul, 
 and a dehberate alienation from God after the most per- 
 suasive proof of his goodness has been brought to bear 
 upon the spirit. It is in multitudes, as flocks and herds, 
 that men try the first stages of the broad way leading 
 to destruction; but one by one, as spiritual persons 
 admonished and taught of God, are they turned into the 
 way of eternal life. 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 
 OF PAINS AND PENALTIES AS BELATED TO CONDUCT. 
 
 npHE sketch just given of " unbelief and evil among 
 -*- men stands for a condition of things that antedates 
 all generations of historic humanity; a condition of 
 things, consequently, with respect to which no man 
 holds himself to be personally responsible, except for his 
 own contribution to the general result. 
 
 The world presses upon every human being different 
 objects and aims, which, appealing to different orders of 
 motives not of equal authority, demand of every one 
 in the exercisfe of his constitutional freedom to choose 
 wisely for himself and for others. In this way we come 
 to our type of personal responsibility. Other men, 
 who by their conduct have helped to make the world 
 what it is of good or bad, must personally answer for 
 themselves, as we in our place and order shall answer 
 for ourselves ; and when every individual of the human 
 race shall bear his full personal responsibility, there is 
 much reason to think that speculation about sin will 
 be out of date. The good or evil of our history will have 
 been personally accounted for, with perfect honor to the 
 wisdom and benevolence of the Creator. 
 
 In the mean time we need to study the evil conse- 
 quent upon our manifold errors in its relation to the 
 
PAINS AND PENALTIES. 161 
 
 development of individual and social responsibility. 
 We have seen that the elements of our trial are brought 
 slowly and prudently to our apprehension. Nature 
 shields us at first by our very feebleness from the possi- 
 bility of precipitate determination to wrong-doing. The 
 creative teaching takes advantage of our growing moral 
 sense to point out to us that we cannot be made the 
 victims of any inherited depravation except by a volun- 
 tary surrender of our better selves. As long as the 
 apprehension of truth is childishly feeble, and practical 
 mistakes are the only way out of intellectual and moral 
 limitations, it is clear that there can be no decisive trial 
 of faith, no fatal unbelief, no final determination of the 
 spiritual career. 
 
 But while faith in all its degrees is an element of 
 personal responsibility, unbelief grounded in ignorance 
 is of a nature to excuse a certain bondage to practical 
 error. Faith and unbelief refer to motives of conduct, 
 not to specific and mutually exclusive moral qualities. 
 The men of unbelief and the men of faith are only 
 relatively distinguished; they are not separate hosts 
 under different colors. A man's faith is nothing less 
 than his spiritual relation to universal reality on the 
 side of knowledge, suggestion, inspiration : it is all that 
 makes for personal progress in harmony with divine law. 
 A man's unbelief, on the contrary, is his spiritual rela- 
 tion to universal reality on the side of ignorance, doubt, 
 contradiction: it makes for degradation and failure, 
 from mistaken devotion to partial views in opposition 
 to universal truth. In the struggle of opposing argu- 
 ments, a man passes, it may be, from an action having 
 the mark of unbelief to an action having the mark of 
 faith by simply modifying his conduct in accordance 
 
 11 
 
162 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 with new convictions as to the grounds of his responsi- 
 bility. He shifts the line, so to speak, between what 
 he takes to be true and what he takes to be not true, 
 just as one changes the limits of one's horizon by moving 
 to a higher point of view. There is no faith without a 
 correlated unbelief, no unbelief that does not assert 
 itself as a limitation of an existing faith. Faith and 
 unbehef, like positive and negative electricity, are devel- 
 oped at the same instant and in the same action ; are 
 indeed opposite polarities of the same voluntary effort. 
 Faith and unbelief, in the normal action of the spirit, 
 determine that necessary mental oscillation which is 
 the note of progress. The evil unbehef is that general 
 distrust which finds oscillation disagreeable because the 
 onward movement is held to be undesirable, and the alter- 
 native of rest, at whatever risk, is voluntarily preferred. 
 The whole development of personal responsibility turns 
 upon what a man takes to be true as distinguished from 
 what he decides to treat as untrustworthy; while the 
 consequences that naturally ensue upon one's determina- 
 tions are simply testimonies of the universal Governor 
 as to the merits of the belief, or of the denial, that is 
 brought into judgment. 
 
 Is it likely, then, that man was ever intended to pass 
 from the ignorance and helplessness, which would be 
 speedy destruction were it not atoned for by parental 
 love, to freedom and security as a prince in the house- 
 hold of God, without the excitement and discipline of 
 pain, whether physical or spiritual ? Would it be good, 
 I do not say for the economy and success of Hfe in 
 general, but for the conscious animation and pleasure 
 of the hour, — would it be good that no bitter herbs 
 should flavor the feast of existence ; that, come what 
 
 I 
 
PAINS AND PENALTIES. 163 
 
 might, there should be no sensible discords to awaken and 
 remand us to the concords of being ? Such insensibility 
 is the mark of death, — the way of inorganic matter. 
 
 To rational life, on the contrary, in a universe vital 
 and infinite, wherein all parts and syllables of truth are 
 precious by reason of their relation to truth as a whole, 
 pain is the magisterial expression of Goodness, bidding 
 us to pause when we falsely think we ought to go 
 farther, or to move on when we falsely think that our 
 rest is gained. What is precious must be costly in order 
 that we may appreciate it as precious. If man is com- 
 pelled to rally his invention, to combine the resources 
 of many individuals in the struggle of life against 
 animals of superior physical energy and agility, until, 
 at no trifling expense, he becomes what Aristotle defined 
 him, — "a political animal," — will he win his proper 
 degree in the spiritual kingdom of God without danger, 
 by mere social assent or listless submission ? To know 
 in order to believe, to believe and make trial in order 
 to know, — is this, or ought it to be, an easy and painless 
 endeavor ? To say so would be to deny to our spiritual 
 calling the character of an exciting and honorable 
 career. 
 
 Experience teaches us that faith has its faults and 
 misdoings, which originate in the very action of faith as 
 related to its limitations. Faith, therefore, is under 
 correction to the wisdom and love of the Father as 
 manifested in the government of things ; and the very 
 leaders of faith, the heroic exemplars of virtue, submit 
 joyfully to a discipline of pains and penalties comport- 
 ing with the majesty of the divine service contrasted 
 with the poor results of the best human effort. The 
 cost of wisdom must be paid, whether in the chastise- 
 
164 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 ments of sloth or in the pains of effort ; and even the 
 well-authenticated dictates of knowledge, " thou shalt " 
 and " thou shalt not," do not become a firm persuasion 
 in the miuds of the ignorant without more or less of 
 bitter experience in the hard way of transgression. 
 
 It is not merely that the real faith has at times to 
 substantiate its claims against an unbelief that inherits 
 the effects, wears the regalia, and rules in the name of 
 an elder faith; but the apostles of truth are brought 
 by varied experiences of suffering out of dangers incident 
 to their own interior progress in the experience which 
 is their peculiar glory. Faith does not enable a man 
 to demonstrate the ultimate patterns of duty ; it inspires 
 him to divine and to enter upon the immediate efforts 
 of duty. But faith, as it implies limitation of intelli- 
 gence, so it does not reach the safe standard of divina- 
 tion, except as it shares in the divine motive of love. 
 Too often the intellectual assurance and practical zeal 
 of faith are in the inverse ratio, both of instruction 
 and of charity; while, on the other hand, at whatever 
 height of attainment a man presumes to think that he 
 has nothing further to gain, in that very fact he denies 
 faith, and according to that denial the infinite truth is 
 not in him. To be self-satisfied in view of what we 
 know, is so far to be unready for the new word of faith. 
 To run credulously after every novel teachiug, is to indi- 
 cate no trustworthy appreciation of the truth already 
 given us in charge. 
 
 The illusiveness of finite knowledge, the indetermi- 
 nateness as to practical form of relative duties, the lia- 
 bility of all good qualities in human nature to run into 
 bad qualities by unconscious transgression of their proper 
 limits, — how would not this constitute a relative mani- 
 
PAINS AND PENALTIES. 165 
 
 festation of evil and a necessity of corrective discipline 
 even in the experience of the elect of the race, no matter 
 how much time might he allowed for attaining and 
 manifesting the hest type of character possible to each 
 individual? But when we consider that the elect are 
 chosen in order that others may be called ; that lio char- 
 acter reaches its ideal glory here, for the reason that 
 spiritual development on this side immortality is arrested 
 by physical decay ; that the heavenly vision of the seer 
 is simply his commission to struggle with the earthly 
 vision of the multitude, and learn by trial how great 
 things he must suffer in the name of the truth, which 
 other men have as much need to appreciate as he has: 
 when we weigh all this, I say, are we not prepared for a 
 manifestation of evil on a scale commensurate with the 
 development of good, — evil of a force and color in no 
 faint contrast with good? For, as there is no power, 
 motive, or passion in the race which has not its counter- 
 part in every well-constituted individual of the race, so 
 there is no array of embattled hosts that is not deter- 
 mined by personal tendencies. If the heavenly vision 
 of faith is liable to sin by over-exaltation against its 
 commission of service, and to suffer accordingly, cer- 
 tainly there is danger that the earthly confidence and the 
 earthly struggle may sin by sensual indifference against 
 the heavenly gift, and suffer accordingly. 
 
 Indeed, so important is suffering in the discipline and 
 struggle of life, that men are continually inflicting it 
 upon themselves and upon those they love, as well as 
 upon others whom they dislike or desire to overcome. 
 In this way they accumulate figures in which they not 
 only represent, but misrepresent, the divine chastise- 
 ments. The inflictions that come unbidden of personal 
 
166 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 wills and by the secret dispensation of God in nature, 
 compared with the pains and penalties referrible to posi- 
 tive enactments and settled administrations of men, are 
 as the common law of a remote imperial government 
 compared with the petty tyi-anny of an officious and 
 mercenary police. The man who proposes to govern 
 himself according to a high aim makes light of pains. 
 It is his dehght to " scorn delights." He toils for the 
 present, that he may live more strenuously laborious 
 days in the future. He keeps his body under severe 
 training and brings it into subjection. St. Francis called 
 his body " the ass," and confessed at last that he had 
 treated the creature harshly. Those who construe them- 
 selves, not as man and beast, but as two men — the 
 spiritual man and the carnal man — in like manner 
 lord it over the subject nature ; and, while taking moral 
 responsibility and blame as appropriate to the master, 
 accuse the servant of fatuous dereliction in not helping 
 them to do the things that they desire to do. 
 
 Meanwhile the ascetic virtue has fallen as far short 
 of perfect spiritual manhood as of doing full justice to 
 physical demands. Childhood cannot seize maturity 
 by violence, and there is a force by which the kingdom 
 of heaven is not taken. Conscientious faith has juris- 
 diction, but not supreme jurisdiction. The most sensi- 
 tively conscientious man, feeling how much error abounds 
 in his best endeavors, how it needs repression and correc- 
 tion in order that grace may much more abound in the 
 way of free forgiveness and new obedience, will be led 
 to appeal from his conscience to his Judge, and to rejoice 
 most of all that the distinction of right and wrong is too 
 vital and sacred to have its claims finally adjudicated, 
 even as respects the most common details of conduct, by 
 
PAINS AND PENALTIES. 167 
 
 any but the highest Authority. And if the good man 
 cannot do justice to himself, still less can he estimate 
 justly, except in a very general sense, the man who 
 exhibits according to his natural gifts, his period of life, 
 or the society by which he is moulded, a manner of liv- 
 ing very different from his own. Only of this we are 
 sure, — that the pre-eminently good man, finding evil in 
 himself and in those like himself, will find evil abound- 
 ing much more in the world. He will deem himself the 
 organ of the divine truth, commissioned by the indwell- 
 ing Spirit of God to "convince the world of sin, of 
 righteousness, and of judgment." 
 
 But the world, — the world that stands for vast so- 
 cieties knowing little of righteousness and sin because 
 believing little in Grod and truth, the world that being 
 already unchristian only awaits the revelation of the 
 Christ to find itself antichristian in its habits and ten- 
 dencies, the world that dismisses souls of men by death 
 that new bodies of men may have a chance in life, — is 
 it a world to take easily, and without any violent reaction, 
 a spiritual discipline, wherein every untrained nature is 
 " a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke " ? 
 
 If, again, the physical foundations of society are given 
 to decay, what is to become of the best political and 
 religious structures erected upon them ? Must they not 
 be evermore shaken, transformed, and superseded in the 
 progress of new operations ? How is the Master-builder 
 conducting his work here ? This present world at any 
 moment contains a vast accumulation of things vener- 
 able for age, that stand in the way of new outlines and 
 inspirations in which required improvements are set 
 forth. It is not only the world of the usurping beast, 
 but the world of the usurping prince, prophet, or priest, 
 
168 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 as well ; a world not to accept easily and peacefully the 
 reforming legislation of the true King. Usurpations 
 fortified by habit are likely not to be thought of as 
 usurpations, and the man who simply bears testimony 
 to the truth is not at once recognized as supreme 
 authority. The world made only to be changed is of 
 necessity distinguished from the Power and ruling that 
 are to change it. It is ever the "present evil world" 
 from which souls and societies are to be redeemed to 
 ages of peace and immortality. 
 
 How vast the range of evil! It is vast as the range 
 of the human mind, — vast as the possibility of human 
 error. If man is exceptional and singular in his ap- 
 prehensions of reahty as compared with other animal 
 natures, he is equally so in his liability to error and 
 transgression, with all their consequences. The most 
 awe-inspiring apprehensions that can visit the human 
 mind have given birth to the most mistaken and hideous 
 practices. The mystery of religious fear, devotion, godli- 
 ness, works through errors of authority and errors of 
 submission which no outward word, but only the inward 
 revelation of God, can correct. From the barbarian of 
 the barbarians, who thinks to appease his divinity and 
 escape punishment by human sacrifices, to the Hebrew 
 of the Hebrews, verily thinking he ought to do many 
 things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth, against 
 the lives of his followers, and on to the Christian of the 
 Christians, who in the name of Jesus of Nazareth per- 
 secutes unto the death the disciples whose confession 
 of faith is not in accord with his own, we have the same 
 story of partial enlightenment, spiritual assumption, 
 illusive expectation, and practical zeal not according to 
 knowledge. 
 
PAINS AND PENALTIES. 169 
 
 Grant that the world grows better in parts, that there 
 are ever coming down out of heaven from God the 
 working plans of a heavenly city ; still the world grows 
 worse in parts, — qnarries and workshops are not the 
 city. The polished stones in the eternal mansions rear 
 themselves to other music than the sound of our ham- 
 mers. There is one clear voice, that of sublime prohi- 
 bition to all fulfilment of human hopes and possibiHties 
 in the present order of nature; but in other respects 
 the triumph of death is full of mysterious uncertainty. 
 Now premature, quenching the kindling dawn of exist- 
 ence with a touch ; again, languid and late, compelling 
 the active powers to lie in cold obstruction and refusing 
 the stroke of grace, the conqueror rules with a capricious 
 and tyrannic terror. Under the reign of mortality good 
 is ever eluding our grasp, evil is ever seizing upon our 
 possessions. Good disappears in the past, hurries for- 
 ward to the future, hides m the darkness of fate and 
 in the mystery of God ; while in the same degree evil 
 thrusts itself with obtrusive violence into the present 
 sensation and consciousness, — a harpy to pollute the 
 feast of life. Evil is of experience: good is of faith. 
 Evil is a palpable precipitate: good is an invisible re- 
 agent. Evil salutes us at our birth : good withdraws 
 by the gate of death. But neither good nor evil reaches 
 any final definition or conclusion. Evil discovers itself 
 in what seems to be good : good is latent in what pre- 
 sents the aspect of evil. The knowledge of good and 
 evil inextricably mixed, as we naturally know good and 
 evil, involves a discipline of bodily suffering in the ratio 
 of individual and collective error. Again, to know good 
 and evil as we are spiritually learning to know them, 
 involves a discipline of spiritual pain in the ratio of 
 
170 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 responsible disregard of personal obligation in view of 
 recognized truth. The secret of life and immortality 
 is for those who, having paid their physical penalties 
 and having realized the love which is the perfection 
 of responsibility and the fulfilling of law, no longer need 
 the monitions of pain, — no longer learn obedience by 
 suffering. 
 
 But it must be admitted that if the manifold afflictions 
 of the present life are part of a necessary discipline for 
 the correction of human error and the development of 
 personal responsibility, they are also a trial of faith, and 
 are appealed to in the conflicts of thought as arguments 
 and apologies of unbelief. 
 
 It is not that the plagues of humanity are specially 
 mysterious in detail, — whether they come by the arbi- 
 trary dealings of men or according to the unvarying laws 
 of nature. "The curse causeless does not come;" and 
 the law of its administration may be traced in part, or 
 its teaching could not be rationally appropriated. Hu- 
 man conduct is ordinarily something to be understood 
 and appreciated, both as to its motives and its results. 
 A low nature is not mysterious by being low. A sen- 
 sual man is not a mystery in so far as he is indiff'erent 
 to spiritual aims ; nor is worldly ambition a mystery in 
 being alien to the revelation of divine law. The wars 
 and tumults of men are on a different scale from those 
 of insect nations ; but they can be just as clearly ac- 
 counted for. They increase the variety within the unity 
 of nature. 
 
 On the contrary, mystery is the source and the refuge 
 of faith. Absolute truth is absolute mystery. God is 
 the mystery of the universe. Life is the mystery of 
 creation. The eternal revelation of God in the progress 
 
PAINS AND PENALTIES. 171 
 
 and consummation of his intelligent offspring is the 
 mystery of redemption. There is no series of growths 
 wherein every part is not bound in the vital chain of 
 organic law to the Source of being. No interweaving 
 of voluntary efforts, no combination or movement of 
 political powers, no determination of successive events, 
 wherein both the law of personal agency and the law 
 of physical limitation do not lead directly up to the 
 Centre of government. But we know only in part. 
 Our judgments, too little instructed as to the nature and 
 meaning of facts, are also biassed by a strong feeling for 
 ourselves. Then, too, imagination revels in poetic group- 
 ing and coloring, — representations tragic and comic, 
 that confuse the sense of reality. We are prone to 
 morbid brooding over what we call "the mystery of 
 evil;" by which is usually signified certain kinds and 
 aggregates of human misery, — visitations of destruc- 
 tion, reigns of terror, agonies of pity, tortures of oppres- 
 sion, outbreaks of crime, — blended into massive horror 
 without reference to law, and spread as a pall over the 
 cheerful day that is uttering its speech about the mystery 
 of good. Notwithstanding so much that is cheerful in 
 life, not only the passionate soul but the much-enduring 
 race of man is restlessly heaving to and fro, its thoughts 
 running this way and that way in anxious suspicions 
 and sacrificial inquiries as to why the Power that rules 
 in the world should mark his administration with such 
 and so many tokens of opposition and displeasure 
 towards his utterly dependent subjects. 
 
 Is it that the Demon of the world is malignant or 
 envious, and will not tolerate happiness among men 
 without a tribute of blood in purchase of his forbear- 
 ance? We can point to plenty of sinister conceptions 
 
172 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 for divinity, whose names and worship support no better 
 meaning. But this will not do. Man may be an object 
 of pity, but a divinity must not be an object of reproach 
 under a form of homage. 
 
 Then, may it not be that while God is good and just, 
 man is unconsciously and immeasurably rebellious ? We 
 in our ignorance have wrecked the creation ; and the 
 Spirit that moved upon the face of the waters at first 
 with the fiat of all-animating order, is left to brood over 
 the chaos come again, the moral ruin of the world, with 
 the forlorn hope of saving with infinite difficulty a 
 remnant from destruction. 
 
 But is not this to defend the divine goodness at the 
 expense of the divine power ? The world must be still in 
 the hands of its Creator. He is equal to whatever he may 
 desire or determine as respects the destiny of mankind. 
 Must we not infer, ' therefore, with St. Augustine, that 
 his purpose is to make use of our already condemned 
 race for the practical exhibition of two phases of the 
 divine character and government, — namely, the phase of 
 vindictive justice in the majority as a manifestation 
 of what all deserved, and the phase of gratuitous mercy 
 in a considerable number as a proof of what grace he 
 was able to bestow ;i and that this life is simply the 
 
 1 Hinc est universa geDeris hiimani massa damnata : quoniam qui lioc 
 primitus admisit, cum ea quae in illo fuerat radicata sua stirpe punitus 
 est, ut nullus ab hoc justo debitoque supplicio, nisi misericordia et 
 indebita gratia liberetur ; atque ita dispertiatur genus humanum, ut in 
 quibusdara demonstretur quid valeat misericors gratia, in cseteris justa 
 vindicta. Neque enim utrumque demonstraretur in omnibus : quia si 
 omnes remanerent in poenis istae damnationis, in nullo appareret miseri- 
 cors gratia redimentis : rursum si omnes a tenebris transferrentur in 
 lucem, in nullo appareret severitas ultionis. In qua propterea multo 
 Xdures quam in ilia sunt, ut sic ostendatur quid omnibus deberetur. — 
 De Civitate Dei, lib. xxi. c. 12. 
 
PAINS AND PENALTIES. 173 
 
 preparation for these unchangeable distinctions of the 
 endless future ? 
 
 But this dogmatic distribution of human destiny in 
 the unknown future is an affair of limited knowledge 
 and feeble judgment. It assumes that the divine attri- 
 butes are to realize their eternal satisfaction in separate- 
 ness and distinction, not in reconciliation and oneness. 
 What, then, is the glory of just punishment conceived 
 as an end in itself, if it be not the glory of a final and 
 magnificent failure in disciplinary moral government? 
 Eather than distinguish the moral perfections of the 
 Creator by such contradictory issues of his tutelary 
 administration, how much more natural and less terrible 
 to suppose that having made the worlds he has left them 
 to go very much their own way; and that man, with all 
 his intelligence, is to work out his own little measure 
 of life and enjoyment as simply the head of the great 
 family of beasts that perish ! 
 
 These alternative extremes of thought, it must be 
 confessed, are extremely forbidding. They are, all and 
 several, open to the objection of representing the whole 
 system of government to which we belong as an im- 
 measurably worse thing than the little province with 
 which we are acquainted. Either on the one hand we 
 are filled with foreboding of lasting evils that we know 
 not of, which make the ills we have seem trivial except 
 as premonitions of our doom ; or, on the other hand, the 
 unknown but not unhoped-for career of personal service 
 and enjoyment, in which the ills we have might be ac- 
 counted for and compensated, is taken away. 
 
 But the alternatives from which we recoil have their 
 rational significance with reference to that middle way 
 on which we go forward in the experience of life. Find- 
 
174 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 ing physical pain to serve as sentinel warning us against 
 greater pains to which we are liable, we learn at length 
 to construe all our sufferings according to a law of benev- 
 olence. We infer that our liability to error and conse- 
 quent correction, as individuals and as a race, is related 
 to the measureless orbit in which we are moving ; accord- 
 ing to the expression of Origen that " God governs souls 
 not with reference to the fifty years of the present life, 
 but with reference to an illimitable age." ^ 
 
 1 Origen, De Principiis, lib. iii. c. i. 13. Ante-Nicene Christian 
 Library, T. & T. Clark, Edinburgh. 
 
 1 
 
CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 OF PHYSICAL DEATH AS EELATED TO SPIRITUAL 
 DEVELOPMENT. 
 
 OF late we have become familiar with the thought 
 that throughout the whole range of animated 
 nature on our planet the war for subsistence would be 
 waged only the more violently, other things being as 
 they are, were a longer lease of life given to the various 
 species by their organic law. From the cosmical admin- 
 istration which supports life with life and gives scope 
 to reproductive energy by cancelling outworn organisms, 
 there is no appeal. If all generations, animal and vege- 
 table, for so many ages have gone "the way of dusty 
 death" that the creatures of to-day might have their 
 turn in the ^'jht and air, the creatures of to-day have 
 no choice but to follow their predecessors when the 
 signal shall be given. 
 
 Death has been called " the debt of nature " and " the 
 wages of sin." These allegorical phrases are plain enough 
 in their general significance. It is their particular appli- 
 cation that brings us into difficulty. Why should nature 
 exact her debt from myriads who have had no time to 
 contract personal obligations ? Why should the wages 
 of sin be paid to myriads who have had no opportunity 
 to sin after the similitude of any moral transgression ? 
 
176 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 A difficulty in the application of a figure of speech will 
 lead some- minds to construe nature according to the 
 figure, while it will constrain other minds to accommo- 
 date the figure to nature. 
 
 Whatever debts contracted or transgressions commit- 
 ted may come to judgment in the dymg of individuals, 
 it is certainly proper to look at death as first of all some- 
 thing in the physical order. A man may be more or less 
 responsible with respect to many misdoings whose effect 
 is to hasten or imbitter his dying; yet for his dying 
 itself, as a physical claim enforced by physical process, 
 he is no more responsible than for his birth. 
 
 Our physical economy has a sphere of its own distinct 
 from the sphere of moral deterininations. Intellectual 
 efforts and agitations of feeling have their effects upon 
 the body in accordance with physical law; and these 
 effects are not at once distinguished or measured by 
 moral motives. The noblest intention cannot save a 
 man from the physical cost of his zeal. The basest 
 motive has no immediate and characteristic tendency 
 to cripple or exhaust the physical resources. Whether 
 a man is serving righteousness or sin, he serves with 
 a certain expenditure of natural force which is never 
 mistaken for the exaction of moral law. And even when 
 vice inflicts in process of time a characteristic stigma 
 upon the body, this only indicates in what way moral 
 delinquency has connected itself with the transgression 
 of physical law without in the least identifying physical 
 suffering with moral retribution. In fact, so sharp does 
 the distinction at length become between one's moral 
 personality and one's bodily organization, that the latter 
 is looked upon as merely a possession and instrument of 
 the former. The flesh is not only heir to natural shocks, 
 
DEATH AS CONDUCIVE TO LIFE. ■ 111 
 
 it is brought into peril and suffering in all commercial, 
 political, and moral struggles ; while death is defied as 
 aiming its shafts, according to the saying of Epictetus, 
 at " not you, but that insignificant body of yours." 
 
 The general fact of our history as part of the animal 
 creation is this : since the life of the race depends upon 
 the life of individuals, while the life of individuals is 
 conditioned on the persistency of the race, it follows 
 that death is indispensable to the general economy of 
 earthly existence in order that the function of the indi- 
 vidual and the function of the race may be attempered 
 to each other. If, therefore, we see mankind wisely and 
 benevolently constituted with respect to their environ- 
 ment and all the natural resources on which organic 
 existence depends, how can we reasonably doubt that 
 the laws which limit organic existence are adjusted and 
 administered with equal wisdom and kindness ? Do we 
 not take social order, the absence of prevailing violence, 
 as proof of how far individuals and parties are held in 
 check so as neither to tower threateningly above, nor to 
 linger fatally below, their serviceableness to the general 
 welfare ? On the other hand, we interpret the agitations 
 that afiirm prevailing discontent as evidence that the 
 social mass is seeking to throw off some incubus of per- 
 sonal power. But everywhere and always men are held 
 together in mutual helpfulness and common welfare 
 by the practical working of -the law which takes all 
 in succession away from the present struggle. By the 
 teaching of this universal mortality the personal being 
 is consecrated as a mystery of faith and sacrifice which 
 can give no adequate account of itself except as destined 
 to survive the physical dissolution and to move onward 
 in a career of its own. 
 
 12 
 
178 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 One's earthly life is precious because there is so little 
 of it. Life could not be the spiritual reality that it is, 
 without death ; and death ceases to awaken fear, when 
 faith has grown strong in the rational conception of life. 
 Indeed, the natural dread of death is the negative testi- 
 mony to the value of life. If the loss of life is looked 
 upon as the symbol of all evil, what can life be but the 
 essence of all good? If the common consciousness of 
 mankind * contemplates physical life as a boon worthy 
 of being distributed through a race, is it something other 
 than a boon because individuals cannot have it forever ? 
 And then, why judge of death without experience of 
 what it is, not merely in relation to what is agreeable 
 to us now, but in relation to what may concern us here- 
 after ? If the anticipation of death makes for our higher 
 personal life, why not assume that our personal hfe shall 
 be much more indebted to the experience of death ? At 
 any rate, we are not merely entitled to put the best 
 rational construction upon what we know, in the interest 
 of the present as well as the future ; we are bound to 
 do it. We cannot, without violence to reason, adopt a 
 working hypothesis which discredits and discourages the 
 noblest efforts we are constituted to put forth, not less 
 than the best hopes we are constituted to entertain. 
 
 It is certainly remarkable that all the proneness of 
 human nature to the animal life has never been able 
 to nullify the spiritual suggestion of personal existence 
 after death. This appears in the animism of " primitive 
 culture " as set forth by Mr. Tylor not less distinctly 
 than in the philosophy of Plato and Cicero, or in the 
 forecast of religious faith among historic peoples. Every- 
 where there is the deep human longing for redemption 
 from the power of the grave, the instinctive persuasion 
 
DEATH AS CONDUCIVE TO LIFE. 179 
 
 growing into rational conviction that man shall some- 
 how, under new conditions of life, find indemnity for 
 the darkness and deprivation that settle down upon the 
 senses in death. 
 
 Equally significant is the testimony of experience that, 
 as the belief that death belongs to an economy of univer- 
 sal good-will justifies itself by its practical tendency 
 to raise life to its utmost value while correspondingly 
 reducing the fear of evil in dying, so the contrary 
 assumption, that death is of a malignant intention, is 
 set to demonstrate its own absurdity by its necessary 
 tendency to wither the joys and aggravate the troubles 
 of existence, till life under the shadow of death is appre- 
 hended as the evil of nature, while relapse into nothing- 
 ness represents the fulness of hope. 
 
 Nature with infinite patience is evermore vindicating 
 the intention of the Author of nature: holding up to 
 the wise a good toward which they are to aspire, in con- 
 tradistinction to the relative not good, or evil, from which 
 the foolish are called upon to escape. In the physical 
 economy pain cannot do its work as an instant admoni- 
 tion for the preservation of life without the instinctive 
 fear of something in which bodily injuries may end. 
 But this really means that it is our spiritual career 
 which is most deeply indebted to the admonitions ad- 
 dressed to us by the suffering and dissolution of the 
 body. Our physical organization is not only in the inter- 
 est of the race, — designed for the propagation and dis- 
 tribution of life, and constituted to pass away lest life 
 should exceed the limits of common well-being; but it 
 is also and equally the servant of the individual, — 
 suited to the working out of a spiritual intention, and 
 dispensed with when it can no longer answer that pur- 
 
180 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 pose. We do not have our personal progress here, which 
 is life, without something to change and pass away, 
 which is death. We are given something to sacrifice, 
 something with which to pay our entrance-fee to the 
 higher departments of experience and effort, something 
 outward to he at stake upon our inward determinations. 
 The Power that exacts the fee or the sacrifice may well 
 be trusted as to the reason and usefulness of his law. 
 
 But although to mistrust and to misconstrue the good 
 is the real evil as well as the aggravation of all inciden- 
 tal aspects of evil, certainly the outward semblance of 
 evil in the development of mankind is something not 
 to be argued down. If faith cannot penetrate the secret 
 of good, neither is unbelief wholly without reason as to 
 the signs of evil. What but immortality revealed in the 
 Christ and in humanity can put any one into the right 
 relation with that vicarious suffering in which the race 
 serves the individual and the individual serves the race ? 
 How many have to die before they are born, or very soon 
 after, — *' martyrs in deed though not in will ** to the 
 truth that mankind must study and obey the laws of life, 
 in order that other generations may come forth under 
 better conditions ! How many have their days shortened 
 or their strength weakened, in order that they may be 
 pricked on intellectually and morally to the duty they 
 owe to even the physical well-being of themselves and 
 others ! 
 
 In human nature the physical organisation is aU the 
 time addressing itself to a conscious intelligence and 
 moral sense. It is by physical nourishment and stimu- 
 lus that there grows up gradually a responsible agent, 
 with spiritual relations and under spiritual law. The 
 human creature, child and heir of its race, moves toward 
 
DEATH AS CONDUCIVE TO LIFE. 181 
 
 the fulness of being as the child and heir of the Creator. 
 The process is the development of personality. Human- 
 ity exists, works, longs, and suffers for the personal man. 
 The personal man is held to the payment of a reciprocal 
 debt to humanity, whether in the use of powers or in 
 the surrender of life. He must read Scriptures, consult 
 oracles, offer prayers, and not decline the benevolent 
 demand for sacrifice. He cannot have his capital of 
 truth all at once, nor duly estimate his obhgation in the 
 use even of what is given him. Gradually he must win 
 his way, invent his apparatus, prosecute his experiments, 
 and accumulate his gains. It is for him to move in 
 the direction of the hint, suggestion, or premonition of 
 truth, — that is, to move by faith ; or else, missing the 
 alchemy that transmutes all things to gold, he is in dan- 
 ger of falling into the error of unbelief, which, disregard- 
 ful of commanding motives, is unequal to successful 
 experiment, allowing the choicest elements to be lost 
 in dross and slag. 
 
 Turn the horse's attention towards the precipice by 
 the wayside, and he will be stimulated to avoid it. In 
 like manner the immediate sense of personal duty is 
 quickened by vague apprehensions of remote catastro- 
 phes that beset the path of life, until as life approaches 
 its end the prudential shrinking from danger is no longer 
 needed. The law of the Creator, under which we are 
 trained to our responsible activity, " is perfect, converting 
 the soul." Thought is occupied with reasons more or less 
 convincing, for this way or that way. Different pleas 
 are presented to the judgment. Persuasion and dissua- 
 sion end in one determination and one action. Personal 
 autonomy, self-direction, under the law which governs 
 all, — this is the great distinction of man, and, in connec- 
 
182 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 tion with limited knowledge and imperfect character, 
 his primal danger. Law regulates the alternatives to be 
 presented : the free soul makes choice of the alternative 
 to be accepted. Law points out the steps by which men 
 go up or go do-svn, — the degrees and means of advance- 
 ment or degradation: the free will determines the 
 attention, zeal, and effort of personal progress. More 
 and more the personal sovereignty asserts itself in each 
 separate man. He possesses and uses not only his own 
 body but material nature in general ; and, though sub- 
 ject in a way to both, is not of necessity servile to either. 
 But do something he must. Either as a man of faith, 
 finding life limited and death certain, he shall subordi- 
 nate physical existence to spiritual law, and make both 
 his living and dying a testimony to supreme reality ; or 
 else he shall have his ruling interest in the physical and 
 worldly life to the disparagement of spiritual considera- 
 tions, despite the certainty that his coveted happiuess 
 will be cut short, and his expectation for the future 
 darkened. Benevolent, impartial death is the angel of 
 redemption to both the faithful and the unbelieving. 
 It is death, whose unmistakable nearness and steady 
 approach makes the self-sacrifice of enlightened and 
 prophetic spirits not too great for their virtue ; and it is 
 death that limits the temptation to disloyalty and apos- 
 tasy, since, though any should be williug to deny their 
 souls for the sake of their bodies, it can avail but little. 
 Death is still certain and still near. 
 
 In short, man in the body is like the lamb in the 
 fable, that fled iuto the temple to escape the wolf. The 
 lamb's blood was sure to flow ; and so the lamb might 
 choose, not indeed between living and dying, but between 
 giving his blood upon the altar of divine service and 
 
DEATH AS CONDUCIVE TO LIFE. 183 
 
 giving it to feed the hunger of his natural foe. To die 
 is the common lot. To yield up the spirit piously is the 
 free choice of the faithful. To fall into the jaws of the 
 devourer is the fatal alternative of unbelief. To reach 
 the end of sufferings incident to the processes by 
 which death is reached, is the constitutional privilege 
 which faith cannot dispense with and unbelief cannot 
 forfeit. 
 
 We find, therefore, that use of our resources and 
 opportunities under correction of natural law is to teach 
 us how not to abuse them. Our first trials are most 
 prone to error, while our later conduct is usually ordered 
 with more prudence. The whole period of mortal exist- 
 ence is employed in starting the personal being, which 
 can attain to completeness only by being transplanted. 
 The revelation of God in man's spirit must needs tran- 
 scend the present weakness of nature, or come short of 
 its rational fulfilment. 
 
 Meanwhile, when it is considered that individual and 
 social habits form themselves in advance of the ripening 
 judgment ; that veterans in the experience of life cannot 
 so instruct raw recruits as that they will not have to 
 learn their duty through error and suffering ; that the 
 physical struggle, the momentum of material interests 
 and national enterprises, implies a necessary preoccu- 
 pation of powers intended ultimately for better things, — 
 it may well be feared that man will not soon escape 
 from what seems " the persistent tendency of his develop- 
 ment to take a wrong direction," however " exceptional *' 
 or " singular " the tendency may be regarded as compared 
 with the way in which other orders of living things 
 "fulfil the conditions of their being." 
 
 But when we come to the marks of a wronsj direction 
 
184 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 in man's development and find that they are manifold 
 and repulsive, is it for us to ask: Why are so many 
 products of human intelligence and energy given over 
 to destruction ? Why is personal discipline so severe ? 
 Why is the world always travailing in pain that the 
 world to come may be brought forth ? Why so much 
 evil in the endeavor to realize good? Should we not 
 inquire more wisely if o,ur questions were guided by 
 religious confidence rather than by natural distrust ? 
 How is it that human societies, imperfect as they are, 
 rule without ruining the individual destiny ? By what 
 genial spirit of law are conflicting interests and strug- 
 gling powers held in a certain equilibrium, so as to 
 secure a constant trial rather than a mere foregone con- 
 clusion of personal conduct and character ? Wliat is the 
 check upon the strong man's usurpati'ons, when he has 
 become the idol of his tribe, if it be not the limitation 
 of individual life and the development of the popular 
 power? What adequate restraint upon the insolent 
 demands or ignorant aspirations of a populace as against 
 the necessary personal offices of sober government, if 
 there be no death to dissolve adventurous compacts 
 before they can be completely formed, while society is 
 renewing itself according to a traditional and necessary 
 order? How otherwise shall the true leader have his 
 opportunity and influence with the people, and the peo- 
 ple have their trial in appreciating the serviceable man ? 
 How otherwise shall so much good be realized with so 
 little evil ? 
 
 Seeing that death and destruction enter so effectively 
 into the economy of nature, men learn to appeal to them 
 as motives. They combine, that they may wield more 
 effectively the power of death. They develop organs 
 
DEATH AS CONDUCIVE TO LIFE. 185 
 
 and engines of destruction to be employed in the conduct 
 of affairs. Opposing forces are discharged, not in the 
 quiet order of nature, but in the shock of battle, that 
 the forces remaining -may rearrange themselves under 
 new conditions. The divine Providence is often con- 
 strued, not with reference to a universal intention, but 
 as on the side of the strongest party. But then, the cost 
 of war calls attention to both the prudential and moral 
 considerations that forbid the appeal to arms except as 
 a measure of last resort ; and thus violence without law 
 and without religion becomes the part of savages and 
 enemies of their kind. The hero is known by his risking 
 his life for those who need defence against the giants of 
 arbitrary cruelty. The moral rank not only of an indi- 
 vidual but of a people is marked by the manner of 
 reducing death to the service of life. Death and destruc- 
 tion never say. It is enough, — so long as there is wicked- 
 ness to be punished, unbelief to be convinced, faith to be 
 tried, or virtue to be glorified, upon earth. Grant that 
 the sacrifice of life imbitters the experience while it 
 chastens the characters of men, — who can say that it is 
 not also for the relief of man's estate in provisionally 
 adjusting or seasonably adjourning the conflicts that 
 signalize the progress of society ? How else could old 
 prejudice and prescription be so safely withdrawn, giving 
 to untried disciples of Truth and Love a sober and 
 moderate success befitting the state of discipline, where- 
 in the struggle of faith and loyalty against appetite and 
 ambition is ever to open anew ? 
 
 We are not, therefore, to contemplate death as having 
 exclusive reference to man's cosmical conditions, and to 
 the ceon of man as one of the animal races in the strug- 
 gle of physical life. It has a bearing of the utmost 
 
186 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 importance upon his spiritual discipline. If the present 
 life is childhood and schooling, how needful that the 
 days of this tutelage should be shortened to such a 
 period as would not forbid man to bring the elements 
 of his training within the compass of his intellectual 
 faculties and moral sensibilities. Life being short at the 
 longest, man feels the demand for prudence and diligence 
 in the conduct of life with a view to its immediate value 
 and longer continuance. An apprehension of the near- 
 ness of death reacts in favor of good personal aims and 
 efforts ; while, as the passing days dimiuish the body's 
 time and deteriorate its functions, the temptation to sac- 
 rifice conscience and faith — the tokens of endless Hfe — 
 for the sake of a poor remnant of animal existence, is 
 losing its power. 
 
 Let us imagine now, instead of our common experience 
 of nonage and decay, an experiment of vastly greater 
 persistency and accumulation in all the powers and 
 products of life. Let the organic law be capable of 
 bearing a very great strain. No fruit inflicts immediate 
 pain or suggests remote danger. No ordinary violence 
 shows any tendency to snap the thread of life. No 
 pressing appeal is made for prudence or science in 
 observing or ascertaining the conditions of health ; and 
 hence there is no immediately effective check upon the 
 struggles of selfishness and ambition. The demigods 
 of former generations — dii majorum gentium — keep a 
 mighty hold upon their sceptres. More and more the 
 new life is compelled to take the shape and motion of 
 the old. Society becomes a thiag of conditions and 
 fatahties, into which it is the more a misfortune to be 
 born the remoter is the prospect of escape by the door 
 of death. And if the patriarchal power is ever to be 
 
DEATH AS CONDUCIVE TO LIFE. 187 
 
 checked, if the party of more recent generations is ever 
 to bear sway, how should such a revolution come but by 
 terrific explosion, by calling upon death through all 
 conceivable energies of destruction as a release from the 
 stricture of unrelenting time ? If we were to take the 
 life-periods of the antediluvian patriarchs as exactly 
 expressed in terms of our modern reckoning, and withal 
 as wisely adapted to the world-work of their age, would 
 it not give a vivid and terrible meaning to the statements 
 that ** there were giants in the earth in those days," that 
 " the wickedness of man was great," that the earth was 
 " filled with violence through them ; " — a meaning such 
 as would make the Deluge appear a mercy not less than 
 a judgment, and the shortening of man's life the note 
 of a new and more hopeful era ? 
 
CHAPTEE V. 
 
 DETERRENT CONSEQUENCES OF DELIBERATE UNBELIEF. 
 
 '\'\ 7HAT is essential to peace and hope as respects the 
 ' ^ manifestation of so-called evil is to distinguish 
 between evil as the error and misconduct incident to 
 moral development, and evil as the unhappy experience 
 naturally ensuiug upon such error and misconduct. 
 
 Evil of the latter kind, being fitted to convey salutary 
 rebuke and warning, is transferred by the law of reason 
 and faith to the account of good. It is held to be good 
 in the creative purpose, and good in its bearing upon 
 human destiny as a whole. 
 
 Unbelief — indifference to ideal truth through pre- 
 occupation in common affairs, distrust of the infinite 
 unknown, treating inspired prophecies as a deceptive 
 mirage, and stubborn facts as the unchangeable type of 
 reality — can neither do nor suffer nobly. It involves 
 a voluntary predetermination not to take advantage 
 of life's disciplinary purpose in its highest sense. A 
 weakness for scepticism, a mood of mind and habit 
 of argumentation which refuses to entertain, and of 
 course does not keep pace with, the rational intimations 
 of personal immortality in communion with the Author 
 of being, ought to bring the unbelieving man in the 
 process of his experience to a sense of his self-imposed 
 
CONSEQUENCES OF UNBELIEF. 189 
 
 limitations. How can he avoid coming at length to 
 regard his material organization, not as a tent to be 
 struck on the march to higher destinies, but as a prison 
 to shrink and fall, burying the nobler manhood in its 
 ruins ? As personal consciousness becomes more and 
 more the centre of a distinct and unique interest, how 
 should it not, in that very fabt, more and more abhor 
 the prejudgment which dooms it to destruction under 
 the pressure of physical change ? For such a prejudg- 
 ment imports more than the loss of personal conscious- 
 ness in the measure of one's present capacities ; it is 
 the negation of an infinite progress, in which the ideal 
 of man is conceived as fulfilled through the operation 
 of God. 
 
 To disregard the boundless possibilities of being in 
 attempting to define a certain nucleus of knowledge is, 
 of course, to impose upon knowledge a character and 
 meaning according to the limits defined. Deny all ideal 
 fulfilments of things, and the partial elements of reality 
 have nothing to atone for their repulsive features. Un- 
 belief in this way can make for itself not only a bad 
 world, but the worst. It can prostitute all the beneficent 
 correlations of the cosmos, — infinite skill and infinite 
 kindness, — to support the hypothesis of a world- will 
 carrying on the poor play of life through an illusive and 
 tantalizing consciousness, that acts its personal part only 
 because it is the victim of false visions of faith and 
 hope. It can construe all success as being only in order 
 to realize the more astounding collapse and failure,— 
 turning the triumphs of mind into trophies of decay. That 
 which is ideally the best becomes a fascinating dream ; 
 that which is practically the worst, a frightful reality. 
 The anticipated lapse into unconsciousness is soothing to 
 
190 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 fraud and violence in the enjoyment of ill-gotten gains ; 
 for judgment to come is their dread. On the other 
 hand, self-sacrificing virtue intent upon the welfare of 
 mankind bears its last testimony against an adverse 
 judgment here, and is denied the life to come. "One 
 soweth and another reapeth," — the saying is as true of 
 ages as of individual men; but the empty eternity of 
 unbelief has no season of common fruition, when " both 
 he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together." 
 The incarnate humanity is dissolving day by day; it 
 never fulfils its spiritual promises. Unbelief is positive 
 about dissolution, negative as to the spiritual . consumma- 
 tion which is the higher meaning of life. The fathers 
 cannot reach perfection without the children, nor the 
 children without the fathers. Unbelief sees a race con- 
 tinuing for the sake of individuals, and individuals 
 consecrated to the service of a race ; but either cannot 
 admit, or sets itself to deny, the spiritual ages, when 
 they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but have 
 come to a personal equality with the ideal angels, as 
 children of God and of the resurrection. All this viola- 
 tion of the essential proprieties of thought is on the way 
 to a last contradiction of reason, when it comes to the 
 necessary idea of* oneness, — oneness of cause and one- 
 ness of intention, — accredited in the constitution of 
 things. 
 
 Unbelief in its moral sense cannot exist without some 
 degree of personal responsibility with respect to the 
 revelation of rational truth. That absence of belief, 
 which is the absence of knowledge, power, experience, 
 responsibility, while as yet the personal embryo has not 
 come to self-consciousness, is a condition privative with 
 respect equally to both the evil and the good of moral 
 
CONSEQUENCES OF UNBELIEF. 191 
 
 agency. Not till the polarities of thought begin to be 
 developed by contact with reality, does unbelief become 
 the name for all our moral evil in contradistinction from 
 faith, the principle of all our righteousness. Only as the 
 antithesis of faith, — as the reluctant and disobedient 
 action with respect to what is giving proof of itself as 
 the true personal calhng, — does unbelief sum up our 
 moral delinquency, so as to stand for the spiiitual 
 man neglecting his spiritual duty in a wilful addiction 
 to something else as more gratifying or advantageous 
 for the moment. The unbeliever is aware of his birth- 
 right; and for that reason alone is he profane in his 
 exclusive regard for the mess of pottage. The simple 
 animal is not the partisan of the animal nature, for that 
 comprises its whole motive of life. To the animal there 
 is death, but no exasperated ghost to trouble it with the 
 dread of something after death. Only the inner dark- 
 ness of partiality, indocility, and deeds that shrink from 
 light has for its necessary correlate the outer darkness, 
 the eternal negation of true life, from which the spirit 
 recoils. 
 
 Indeed, it is because unbelief is negative to truth pos- 
 sessed, as well as negative to the truth to be imparted, 
 that it is so positive in its personal manifestation. Often 
 it acts with an arbitrary intensity which indicates the 
 force of argument and persuasion against it. There may 
 be a natural disinclination to take the next lesson ; but 
 it requires an energy of will to resist the demand of 
 faith when it comes with the authority of a teacher. 
 Yet as faith is free or it is not faith, so coercive processes 
 for the propagation of faith may provoke a violent re- 
 sistance to the sway of truth. The promulgation of 
 truth rouses human nature, not only in so far as there 
 
192 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 is in human nature an affinity for truth, but in its whole 
 range of motives. All interests have to assert themselves 
 in order that all may have their due consideration ; for 
 so only can patient reason do its perfect work. 
 
 The prophet of new and nobler things is the man who 
 proposes to move the universal human life, not merely 
 to readjust a few practical details. He intends to awaken 
 the higher energies and to shatter the popular idols, — to 
 cleanse the very temple of -God. If heavenly thought 
 is higher than earthly habit, for that very reason shall 
 the children of light be found awkward and unequal to 
 their tasks, while the children of a commonplace world 
 are wise and accomplished in their affairs. If men are 
 startled from their religious repose, their first impulse 
 is to appeal from the quickening teacher to their holy 
 books. If a moral reformation is the demand, men make 
 haste and delay not to take counsel of their material 
 interests. 
 
 In the higher ranges of disciplined thought, least of 
 all is progress by unquestioning assent. Philosophers 
 debate in order that prophets may divine ; and statesmen 
 know not how to salute the new doctor till he has tri- 
 umphed over the old doctrine. The forces of criticism 
 and contradiction rally promptly, that the power of 
 truth may bring the argument to a more decisive 
 conclusion. 
 
CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 T'/IL AS SET FORTH IN THE CHRIST'S TEACHING. 
 
 npHE Scriptural rendering of human history as respects 
 -*- the distinction of good and evil is through human 
 nature. It is supernatural only as it involves the divine 
 suggestion and energy moving in nature for such a 
 progress and consummation as shall fulfil the creative 
 purpose. The divine witness against the manifestation 
 of evil is through the correlative manifestation of good. 
 The whole revelation of God in the world, including 
 those aspects of it which are regarded as miraculous, 
 is through nature — not outside of nature; while the 
 eminent expression of a creative reason is found in those 
 inspirations, instructions, examples, and vital influences, 
 that make for the harmony and perfection of mankind. 
 
 Inasmuch as the Scriptures are found to exhibit an 
 historical testimony to one only Creator, conceived as 
 moving in universal nature, but declaring himself as a 
 personal Euler and Providence in the convictions of 
 mankind, and finally speaking through one man as the 
 Word of God, — it is evident that their claim to universal 
 acceptance and authority is in the reality which they 
 represent. Whether they be counted true or untrue, the 
 spiritual intention apparent in them, which construes 
 them sacred Scriptures in distinction from ordinary 
 
 13 
 
194 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 writings, cannot be denied. As the faith in God, which 
 the Scriptures illustrate, rests upon the evidence of 
 universal reality, so the faith of Jesus Christ, in which 
 they culminate, rests upon the absolute fidelity of Christ's 
 testimony to the divine working in human nature. Al- 
 ways it is the universal reality which governs faith, — 
 not faith which constitutes any reality but its own. If 
 the sense of reahty be weak, faith is feeble. If the sense 
 of reahty be limited, faith is limited. The miracle which 
 accredits the commission of a prophet, or the striking 
 object in nature which excites imagination as the en- 
 shrinement of a god, — what is either compared with 
 the miracle of universal nature which affirms the one 
 God ? 1 Those are not justly called the ages of faith 
 which exhibit great credulity, and equal error. Not that 
 they are without faith, but their faith is as meagre and 
 vague as is their knowledge of the truth. The times of 
 ignorance are times of necessary and excusable unbelief. 
 But when the personal Eevelation of truth appears, then 
 comes the command that all men everywhere should 
 change their thoughts and become his disciples.^ 
 
 There was faith and there was unbelief under the old 
 dispensation ; and the distinction between personal right- 
 eousness and personal unrighteousness was ever inwardly 
 the distinction between faith and unbelief, as principles 
 of conduct.^ But the world-history was cut in twain by 
 the coming of our Lord. He introduced the new age 
 of faith, which was the day of judgment to a whole 
 seon of unbelief. The world that " knew him not," his 
 own that "received him not," the empire and the hier- 
 archy that combined to resist and crucify him, — all are 
 thrown by the crisis of his revelation into the era of 
 
 1 Pwom. i. 20. 2 Acts xvii. 22-31. 3 Heb. xL 
 
CHRIST S TEACHING. 195 
 
 ignorance. They are shadows of a by-gone history. The 
 great mass of mankind was found to be in the darkness 
 not merely of partial knowledge, but of unfaithfulness 
 in some degree to the light that is in every man. The 
 world was wise in its conceits, accomplishments, routine, 
 — not wise in faith, foresight, hope. While, therefore, 
 Jesus was setting himself to fulfil the law and the pro- 
 phets, as to their divine intention and positive meaning, 
 the world was set chiefly upon that literal and conven- 
 tional obedience which is prone, by making void the law 
 of good, to fulfil the prophecy of evil. 
 
 As important as was the coming of our Lord to the 
 revelation of the Father, so important was it, according 
 to the New Testament, in the history of all his human 
 children. It is conceived as that turning-point of uni- 
 versal experience which, by perfectly marking the differ- 
 ence between humanity in its initial imperfection and 
 humanity as partaking completely of the divine Spirit, 
 marked also, and just as perfectly, the necessity, possi- 
 bility, and method, of man's reconciliation, whether with 
 his Creator, his race, or himself. Only through the rev- 
 elation of God in man is it held to be possible for man 
 to fulfil the law of his being. 
 
 But inasmuch as our Lord's mission was to draw all 
 men unto himself, — not to pronounce at that day a final 
 sentence upon any, — the arraignment of men was pro- 
 visional and disciplinary. The judgment against them 
 was that, light having come into the world, " men loved 
 darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil." 
 Men of the world would go on according to their worldly 
 momentum, and fill up the measure of their iniquity 
 before apprehending the immeasurable condescension 
 and patience of God, on which their eternal redemption 
 
196 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 was depending. Yet this moral condemnation takes just 
 account of palliating considerations in its estimate of 
 sin. It tones down the blood-red hue of most fearful 
 crime to the duller complexion of pervading unbelief. 
 " Of sin because they believe not on me," — what other 
 conviction need the Spirit of truth beget in the spirits 
 of men, in order to save them from their sins ? " Father, 
 forgive them, for they know not what they do, " — 
 infinite considerateness for the blind offender, that he 
 may not despair of pardon when he shall come to the 
 sense of righteousness ! Such is the revelation of grace 
 and truth as conceived in Scripture, through which the 
 Prince of life judges and casts out the power that is 
 contrary to life, and introduces the reign of God to the 
 knowledge and faith of mankind. 
 
 But the dividing of the old world-age from the Chris- 
 tian era implies no sudden revolution, to be recognized 
 on the day when it occurred. Our Lord describes the 
 reign of God as not coming with observation. It is too 
 vital, too deep within. Like the leaven, like the seed, 
 its progress is according to its own law. The reign of 
 God distinguishes eras only because it distinguishes 
 society, — yea, divides asunder the very soul and spirit 
 of the individual man. The point which indicates the 
 line of distinction between the spiritual reign of God and 
 what is negative to it, whether in general history or in 
 personal experience, is the point where the action of faith 
 meets the counteraction of unbelief, as respects the move- 
 ment of divine revelation. No geographical, political, 
 or family demarcation is of any permanent significance. 
 The kingdom of God is all-comprehending as well as all- 
 discerning. The Word of truth is for every creature. 
 But as certainly as faith is the law of human fellowship 
 
CHRISrS TEACHING, 197 
 
 with the Lord's mind, will, effort, suffering, and success, 
 so certainly is unbelief the correlative measure of aliena- 
 tion from his spirit and work. Faith brings men from 
 the four quarters of the globe and gives them seats with 
 Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of God. 
 Unbelief keeps the so-called children of the kingdom in 
 outer darkness, though they should inhabit the very 
 penetralia of the visible sanctuary. Faith is assured 
 " that in every nation he that feareth God and worketh 
 righteousness is accepted with him." Unbelief has 
 respect of persons and prescriptions: "Except ye be 
 circumcised and keep the law of Moses, ye cannot be 
 saved." Jews as such continue to require signs, and 
 Greeks before the coming of the new faith are seeking 
 after wisdom, — neither ' at first finding anything but 
 scandal or folly in the cross; but to every one that 
 believeth, whether Jew or Greek, Christ the crucified is 
 " the power of God and the wisdom of God." 
 
 Thus, according to the New Testament, the new world- 
 age takes color gradually from the truth of Christ, while 
 gradually the old dispensation is thrown into a back- 
 ground of darkness; and not until the new times are 
 fulfilled can the distinction between the old and the new 
 have been exhibited in full historic detail. As the dis- 
 pensation of law was prophetic, so is now the dispensa- 
 tion of the Word and Spirit. Young men see visions, 
 and old men dream dreams. But the ruling fact declared 
 is that the Seed of promise has been approved and glori- 
 fied of God. And now, to call on the name of the Lord, 
 to make the appeal of faith according to the inward reve- 
 lation of truth, — this is the eternal law of salvation. 
 
 If, however, we look to the Scriptures for Christ's 
 estimate of human behavior under divine discipline, we 
 
198 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 find that the grosser elements of man's nature, which 
 stand for unbelief, are recognized as in necessary correla- 
 tion with the higher faculties concerned in the actions 
 of faith. We may figure this correlation by the wave 
 that rises not only before but also against the wind that 
 is moving upon the face of the waters. The Word that 
 is spirit and life discerns the thoughts and intents of the 
 heart, and brings out their polarities. " Follow me," says 
 Jesus ; but did any disciple so follow as to indicate no 
 contrary tendency ? "I will follow thee whithersoever 
 thou goest," says a man of forward faith, without waiting 
 to be specially called. But Jesus bids him pause. It be- 
 hooves to consider what that following means : " Foxes 
 have holes, and the birds of the air have nests ; but 
 the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head." 
 
 To enter upon the discipline of faith, is that to reach 
 the end of discipleship ? On the contrary, every pulsa- 
 tion of faith has its natural reaction of unbelief ; and the 
 most confident profession of fidelity may be to the deeper 
 moral insight a natural premonition of failure. " Blessed 
 art thou, Simon Bar-jona ; for flesh and blood hath not re- 
 vealed it unto thee, but my Father who is in heaven," — 
 ample recognition of faith ! " Get thee behind me, Satan. 
 Thou art an offence unto me. For thou savorest not 
 the things that be of God, but the things that be of 
 men," — prompt rebuke of unbehef ! " Though I should 
 die with thee, yet will I never deny thee in any wise," — 
 free intent of faith! But he began to curse and to 
 swear, saying, " I know not this man of whom ye speak," 
 — fearful recoil of unbelief ! But there cannot be these 
 opposite extremes without the constant antagonism of 
 spiritual and carnal principles. " Thou canst not follow 
 me now," — the moment is too critical, the trial too 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING. 
 
 hard, — " but thou shalt follow me afterwards." For, 
 not until Peter shall have taken the last lesson of his 
 Master's passion will there have been given him the full 
 victory which as disciple and apostle he was invited 
 to win. 
 
 Thus it is that Jesus appears chief of the many to 
 whom the Scriptures bear testimony that they " wrought 
 righteousness/' in the fact that of him alone it is affirmed 
 that he " did no sin." His oneness in spirit with the 
 Father is held to assure the perfect consecration of 
 physical life. Acting under the guidance of universal 
 love, he does not fall under the bondage of animal 
 instincts nor into any complicity with selfish habits. 
 In his estimate of the practical alienation of mankind 
 from the Father, he is conceived as the truth itself. Of 
 course, his teaching in this regard would naturally be as 
 unique as his character, and supremely important. 
 
 It is remarkable that the great Teacher nowhere refers 
 us back to the first man, by way of accounting for the 
 evil that is in the world. On the contrary, he points us 
 to the paradise of infancy for our instruction as to the 
 reign of God. He blesses little children. " Of such is 
 the kingdom of heaven." " Except ye be converted and 
 become as little children, ye shall not enter into the 
 kingdom of heaven." " Whosoever shall humble himself 
 as this little child, the same shall be greatest in the 
 kingdom of heaven." " I thank thee, Father, Lord of 
 heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from 
 the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto 
 babes." " Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings 
 thou hast perfected praise." Yet the paradise of child- 
 hood is not without its dangers. It is beset with evils. 
 Not only are little ones, exposed in their weakness, liable 
 
200 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 to be despised and led into sin ; they are in danger of 
 destruction. They are lost, without protection and guid- 
 ance. Hence that gracious teaching in the eighteenth 
 chapter of Matthew, of " their angels " that behold the 
 face of the Father, — and of the Son, higher than all 
 angels, coming to seek and to save them, since it is not 
 the will of the Father " that one of these little ones 
 should perish." 
 
 The great Teacher brings Eden to every household. 
 The story of Genesis alleges the perversion of man's 
 action, while affirming the goodness of his original 
 nature. It has been a fashion of later times to affirm 
 the corruption of man's original nature, in order to 
 account for the perversion of his action. The teaching 
 of Jesus is in harmony with the teaching of Genesis. 
 No spiritual corruption is charged upon the fontal crea- 
 tion. " That which is born of the flesh is flesh." The 
 animal nature can neither transgress nor obey in the 
 moral sense. " That which is born of the Spirit is spirit." 
 The spiritual man, born from above but conditioned in 
 the flesh, is recognized as not only liable to be more or 
 less involuntarily subdued to the lower elements in which 
 he works, but as in danger also of being more or less 
 wilfully addicted to the same. Jesus would convert the 
 man of low experience from the sophistries of the world 
 to the sincerity of his original nature, in order to his 
 receiving continual inspirations of divine truth, and 
 so coming into spiritual communion with the Father. 
 The Prodigal comes to himself that he may go to his 
 Father. The Sun of righteousness pierces the blinding 
 fogs that enshroud society, that the single-eyed and 
 simple-minded child of humanity may awake to the 
 fulness of light. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING. 201 
 
 Always in our Lord's ministry the appeal of the mira- 
 cle, of the parable, of the exposition, allusion, action, 
 is to faith, against unbelief as summing up all that is 
 adverse to truth and goodness. By this sharp point 
 of distinction, as it moves on from moment to moment 
 in personal trial, is generated the line of separation 
 between the predominance of light and the power of 
 darkness, between godliness and worldliness, between 
 the foregleams of immortality and the shadow of death. 
 Christ makes nothing of old scores, except as past history 
 enters into the present determination of duty or danger. 
 Setting forth the conduct of his relentless adversaries, 
 he says: "If I had not come and spoken unto them, 
 they had not had sin." There can be no responsibility 
 accruing from revelation that does not imply the plea 
 of ignorance in palliation of temporary unbelief. That 
 sin is exceeding sinful which declares itself as a volun- 
 tary persistence in wrong, despite the persuasions of 
 Truth and Love in behalf of the right. 
 
 The Apostles, taking up the testimony of their Lord 
 after his departure, were left in no doubt as to how 
 far-reaching was His authority whose commission they 
 bore. There were distinctions that had had their day. 
 It was now declared that God was not the God of the 
 Jews only, but of the Gentiles also. The Word of God 
 was addressed to all nations, was to be proclaimed to 
 every creature. All were called to be disciples. The elect 
 were those who voluntarily obeyed the call and thus 
 distinguished themselves from the unbelieving world, no 
 matter from what nation, family, or caste, they might 
 come. The reprobate people were the knowingly un- 
 believing and disobedient, — no matter what worldly 
 distinctions might be theirs. The King, who was the 
 
202 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 personal enshrinement of divine law, could recognize only 
 this antithesis in the relations of men to himself. But 
 the antithesis was not as yet absolute. There was no 
 personal faith without its alloy of unbelief ; no personal 
 unbelief without a potency of faith. Men were changing 
 moment by moment. Society was changing. The dis- 
 tinction of believers and unbelievers was not marked 
 by any hard and fast line, but was moving according to 
 free personal determinations. The process of change was 
 invisible. The remote issues of the great regeneration 
 were inscrutable. They were referred with equal awe 
 and confidence to depths and riches of divine wisdom 
 and knowledge — judgments unsearchable and ways past 
 finding out. 
 
 What the Apostles saw before them was simply the 
 world, — the humanity of past efforts and accumulations, 
 — out of which was slowly to be moulded the better 
 world that was looming up in inspired imaginations and 
 benevolent desires. They discriminated between the 
 fashion of things that is passing away, even while claim- 
 ing to hold out, and the law of things that is growing 
 strong, even in the very souls that seem to resist it. 
 They apprehended the difference between the natural 
 man, coming by ordinary generation, and the spiritual 
 man, child of the life-giving Word ; and, consequently, 
 the difference between universal humanity on the side 
 of a common mortal nature, represented in Adam, and 
 universal humanity on the side of its spiritual responsi- 
 bility and personal heirship of God, represented by the 
 Christ 
 
 It is impossible to hold up to view the better without 
 accusing the worse; impossible to call men to their 
 Christian discipleship as the supreme good, without 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING. 203 
 
 exposing the evil and danger of going on in old ways ; 
 and it is important to remark that this was in fact the 
 Apostolic way of finding fault with men and with the 
 world. The Apostles addressed themselves to society 
 as it was. They were not metaphysical or dogmatic; 
 did not busy themselves with speculations tending to 
 ground human error and transgression in a transcen- 
 dental original sin; did not set themselves to nice 
 discriminations of different degrees of personal responsi- 
 bility or different shades of personal guiltiness ; but with 
 magnificent comprehensiveness and impartiality they ap- 
 pealed to the revelation of God's goodness, made more dis- 
 tinct by the tokens of his severity, and represented the 
 future apocalypse of evil as having its whole secret in 
 misappreciation and resistance of offered blessings. 
 
 St. Paul could account on natural principles for the 
 first man's falling into sin, because he himself, under far 
 greater light, and delighting in the law of God after 
 the inward man, still found a law in his members war- 
 ring against the law of his mind, which in kind is exactly 
 what Adam was conceived to have found. But with a 
 conscience more disciplined than that of humanity in its 
 earliest moral experiment, St. Paul was learning not 
 to confer with flesh and blood as to what concerns the 
 fulfilling of a requirement which is above the sphere 
 of physical law. As a spiritual man, he owned allegiance 
 to the spiritual Word, and set himself to bring his body 
 into subjection. 
 
 As it was in the beginning, so now in St. Paul's day 
 God's judgment upon man's conduct is conceived as 
 inseparable from knowledge of the truth brought effec- 
 tively to bear upon conscience for man's spiritual direc- 
 tion. It was the prerogative of God to overlook the sin 
 
204 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 of ignorance that he might correct it by the unfolding 
 of law, and to watch the effect of unfolding law in order 
 to vindicate it against unbelief and transgression by- 
 proper tokens of his displeasure. Hence the postulate 
 of the Epistle to the Eomans is that God can do no 
 wrong. He judges the world and is judged of no power. 
 Let God be true, though every man be found a liar. The 
 gospel, in its application to men, was simply the expres- 
 sion of a divine intention whose fulfilment had never 
 lingered for one languid instant on the part of God. 
 God's righteousness, the moral development of human 
 nature, which God was seeking to realize through his 
 Son, was from faith to faith, — from the faith of the 
 past to the faith of the future ; according to the Scrip- 
 ture which declares, " The just shall live by faith." Here 
 is St. Paul's impregnable position and line of defence : 
 "no replying against God." Impossible to understand 
 or demonstratively to justify his ways ? It matters not. 
 The revelation of his Son is the Father's vindication, 
 whether as regards his economy of mercy or his edicts 
 of judgment. Eefer everything to the Sovereign in so 
 far as his dealings are beyond the range of the human 
 understanding. Say that he hath mercy on whom he 
 wiU ; say that whom he will he hardeneth, — since no 
 moral reaction is independent of his law, — but let not 
 the thing made call in question the Maker. Faith, not 
 fatalism, however, is the element of reason with regard 
 to the unsearchable things of God. Though the calling 
 and election of God, as determining temporary distinc- 
 tions among men and nations, cannot be accounted for 
 on the ground of individual merit, yet, as to the great 
 future, judgment does not anticipate trial. For all men 
 the day is a day of salvation. 
 
CHRIST* S TEACHING. 205 
 
 The defensive motive and action in the Epistle to the 
 Eomans is incidental. It comes out sharply in the fifth 
 and sixth verses of the third chapter. It pervades the 
 ninth, tenth, and eleventh chapters, where the appeal 
 is to faith in the sovereign Wisdom, that the dangerous 
 partialities and groundless pride, whether of Jews or 
 Gentiles, may give way to a common submission and 
 pious awe. But St. Paul would have no such occasion 
 for a defensive vindication of the divine rectitude, were 
 it not for the "sword of the Spirit," — the invading 
 Wcrd, which declares God's benevolent hostility to man's 
 unrighteousness. The gospel of salvation is not with- 
 out a necessary note of aggression ; and this meets us at 
 the eighteenth verse of the first chapter : " For the wrath 
 of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness 
 and unrighteousness of men who hold down the truth 
 in unrighteousness." And then follows, as far as to the 
 twenty-first verse of the third chapter, a bold sketch 
 of the evil to be overcome, in its actual details. 
 
 The truth of God, affirmed in nature but turned into 
 a lie in the popular idolatries, the shameful crimes, the 
 odious sensualities, the unnatural and destructive self- 
 abuse, the malignant dispositions of men in relation to 
 their fellow-men, — these were not sins of ignorance 
 alone ; they were offences against the natural conscience 
 in every man, insults to the better sort of people who in 
 a greater or less degree were showing the effect of God's 
 law written in their hearts, outrages against precepts, 
 laws, institutions, that contemplated the punishment of 
 evil-doers and the honor of those that did well. In a word, 
 the crying sins of the time were such as men would judge 
 and condemn in others without even stopping to think how 
 far they might themselves be implicated in the same. 
 
206 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 If the Gentiles were in a bad way, how was it with 
 the Jews ? The Jews boasted of their law, and thought 
 themselves able to instruct the unwise world. But 
 what things their law said, it said to them that were 
 under the law. Had the law no fault to find with Jews ? 
 When had not the name of God been blasphemed among 
 the Gentiles by reason of Jews ? Of Jews no more than 
 of Gentiles could it be said that their moral habits were 
 good enough, and should be let alone. It was plain, on 
 the contrary, with regard to both, that the rudimentary 
 moral discipline under which they had lived, far from 
 leading them to the maturity of virtue, had brought 
 them to the knowledge, if not to the acknowledgment, 
 of sin. And if they were judged of their own consciences 
 and their own laws as transgressors, much more must 
 they find themselves to have come short of the moral 
 glory of God revealed in Jesus Christ for the obedience 
 of faith and the perfecting of life. On the other hand, 
 supposing all men to have faithfully fulfilled the law of 
 their being thus far, of what avail would be this foregone 
 personal righteousness, if instead of perpetuating itself 
 in more abundant fruits of good living, it should wither 
 like a flower before the rising sun of a brighter day ? 
 
 Therefore, unless the whole Apostolic persuasion about 
 the Lord Jesus were a mistaken one, he, the Christ, was 
 the end of law for the attainment of righteousness, 
 whether as regards spiritual evil to be overcome or 
 spiritual good to be realized. This simple issue the 
 Apostles were pressing to a historic trial at every sacri- 
 fice, even to that of life itself ; and the banner of their 
 Leader was to be their sign of conquest in all the world, 
 even to the end of the world-ages. To all men without 
 distinction they said, Man's spiritual consummation was 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING. 207 
 
 in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, not in a more 
 or less scrupulous fulfilment of limited conceptions of 
 law, that are themselves shadowy and transitory, but in 
 spiritual communion with the Father, through whose 
 only-begotten Son there is mediated a constant teaching 
 of the eternal Spirit. This is the " living way ; " and, 
 since the Word made man is the fulfilment of all previ- 
 ous laws and prophecies, it is, relatively to the old dis- 
 pensation, the " new [or recent] way." You, Jews, who 
 would not receive your own proper Prince, you of the 
 Gentile world, who have not recognized as yet the Lord 
 and Master of life, — you have all come to that moral 
 test according to which the divine government is pro- 
 ceeding, and under which every man shall work out the 
 practical demonstration of his own character, whether 
 for weal or woe. 
 
 There is no avoiding the significance of a standard. 
 God's law is the truth. The truth of manhood cannot 
 help vindicating the divine reality against the counterfeit 
 presentment. The reign of divine law would cease were 
 it to make terms with falsehoods and illusions. The 
 whole world presents of necessity a relatively darker 
 aspect of evil, the moment the heavenly reality con- 
 ceived as salvation — development of life in communion 
 with God — is held up to view. Then it begins to appear 
 what unworthy contentment there is in men with things 
 as they are, what powerful interests array themselves 
 against changes that make for ultimate good but involve 
 immediate suffering, and what violent resistance abound- 
 ing sin offers to superabounding grace. The sign of the 
 Son of Man is that all aspects of evil, all energies of 
 self-will, all shades of prejudice, are for a time quickened 
 in the human consciousness when he comes. He is 
 
208 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 content with no easy and barren victory. It is for him 
 to struggle with the unbehef that dates from his testi- 
 mony, — an unbelief more violent and more blameworthy 
 than any which could meet an inferior witness. Yet 
 divine justice recognizes the condition of unbelief as 
 a plea in excuse for acts of unbelief. St. Paul is 
 permitted to say, in view of his persecution of the 
 church, "But I obtained mercy because I did it igno- 
 rantly, in unbelief;" and St. Peter, speaking to men 
 whom he charges with denying and killing the Prince 
 of life, adds : " And now, brethren, I know that through 
 ignorance ye did it, as did also your rulers. But those 
 things which God before had showed by the mouth of 
 all his prophets that Christ should suffer, he hath so 
 fulfilled." 
 
 Thus the faith of Christ is not only an ever-living 
 persuasion of God as working in nature, but an ever-en- 
 larging apprehension and deepening impression of uni- 
 versal nature as God's workmanship. To this faith, as 
 it speaks in the Scriptures, moral evil appears as an 
 irrational factor, unavoidably incident to the voluntary 
 working of imperfect moral agents in a process of devel- 
 opment under stress of life's struggle, but disappearing 
 when the consummation of personal being is reached. 
 The disregard of right moral suggestion, through per- 
 sonal ignorance or slowness of faith, is ever proving 
 itself at length to be as foreign to the meaning and pur- 
 pose of man's nature as it is to the teaching of inspired 
 seers and prophets of God, who best interpret for their 
 day the divine intention to which nature is evermore 
 giving utterance. 
 
 It might seem, at a moment of sudden conviction, 
 as if the personal revelation of truth and love, in the 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING. 209 
 
 very fact of its divine authority, could admit of no 
 deliberation or delay, and must drive men at once from 
 the intermediary degrees of moral sentiment and ac- 
 tion either to the utmost of devotion or to the extreme 
 of revolt. But, foolish and slow of heart, man does 
 not so learn the meekness and gentleness of the Christ. 
 The human dulness and inertia are not forgotten by 
 him to whom the ages belong, and " who willeth that all 
 men should be saved, and come to the knowledge of the 
 truth." Our weakness of apprehension, our immaturity 
 of judgment, our lack of spiritual susceptibility, our pre- 
 occupation with earthly things, our blindness to heavenly 
 realities, — all these have to do not only with the dura- 
 tion of our trial, but also with the thoroughness of our 
 moral discipline. Our spiritual transformation is not 
 held up as the miracle of an instant, but as the continu- 
 ous experience in which we are of our own choice work- 
 ers together with God. 
 
 The principles of the animal and worldly life are ever 
 in our mortal nature. The long-suffering of God, which 
 we are taught to count as our salvation, takes into part- 
 nership with itself the patient working, waiting, and 
 suffering of man. The Scriptural conception of the 
 world-history holds out no prospect of peace on earth 
 except in the maintenance of the Christian warfare; 
 calls to no sitting together in heavenly places but 
 through the riches of a victorious yet still militant 
 grace; predicts no Christian civilization that shall be 
 proof against the inroads of barbaric rudeness and sen- 
 suality ; announces no holy church that is not liable to 
 degenerate into a practical denial of the Christ; and 
 foreshadows no period of triumphant virtue that shall 
 render impossible the outbreak of bold wickedness. In 
 
 14 
 
210 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 the process of development the forms of good and evil 
 are modified, but the relation of good and evil does not 
 disappear. The historic world has many ages, but is of 
 one kind. 
 
 The reconciliation of all things in Christ is for the 
 spiritual ages of divine revelation. Enough for those 
 who bear the image of the earthly humanity, if with the 
 Lord from heaven they can contribute their personal 
 efforts and sacrifices to the consummation and bliss of 
 the eternal society, according to the divine Law of 
 Atonement. 
 
PAET FIFTH. 
 
 THE LAW OF ATONEMENT. 
 
" Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall 
 believe on me through their word: that they all may be one, as 
 thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one 
 in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me." 
 
 John xvii. 20, 21. 
 
 " Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and fill up on 
 my part that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ in my 
 flesh for his body's sake, which is the church." 
 
 COLOSSIANS i. 24. 
 
 " Quod homo est, esse Christus voluit, ut homo possit esse quod 
 Christus est." 
 
 Cypeian, quoted by Hagenbach, History of Doctrines, vol. i. p. 177. 
 
 " As there is one end to many things, so there spring from one 
 
 begianing many differences and varieties, which again, through the 
 
 goodness of God, and by subjection to Christ, and through the 
 
 unity of the Holy Spirit, are recalled to one end, which is like 
 
 unto the beginning." 
 
 Oeigen, De Principiis, lib. i. c vi. 
 
PAKT FIFTH. 
 
 THE LAW OF ATONEMENT. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 RECAPITULATION AND TRANSITION. 
 
 npHE Scripture teaching, so far as we have been able 
 -^ to verify it, contemplates nature as one whole, and 
 as partly known to us in coi;iscious experience, while 
 with our common knowledge is joined a movement of 
 rational faith; namely, the faith in one God, — the 
 Cause of nature and the Source of man's moral disci- 
 pline in the world. 
 
 Without this faith, the suggestions, demands, and pro- 
 phetic assurances of nature cannot be combined in a 
 rational system of thought. But with this faith, not 
 only can the teachings of nature be systematized, but 
 the infinite Reason working through nature is brought 
 more and more into finite apprehension and action ; and 
 in this way there can be a practical revelation of God in 
 man. 
 
 God's revelation of himself in man is found to be not 
 only through primitive suggestions of divine agency and 
 authority, but through continually renewed examples of 
 personal faith and service, such as mark the progress of 
 a spiritual creation in the history of our race, and point 
 
214 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 to one personal Eevelation, the Object and End of Scrip- 
 ture testimony. 
 
 Though the Scriptures have to do with the world's 
 history as one whole, under one eternal direction, yet 
 their representations are accommodated to the conscious 
 moment and limited apprehension of the human mind. 
 Indeed, that divine teaching is grounded in universal re- 
 ality is proved by its finding expression in special facts ; 
 for particular facts cannot be disengaged or dissected 
 away from the organic whole to which they belong, nor 
 can they be understood in ah isolated or abstract con- 
 ception of them. 
 
 For example, the world's schooling is fact and experi- 
 ence of the instant, and so is fact and experience of the 
 ages. The error attributed to primitive humanity is rec- 
 ognized as real and natural, because it is the error of 
 mankind under all phases of tutelage. The righteous- 
 ness of faith is ratified, reasonable, and acceptable for 
 the moment, because it goes on to fulfil itself without 
 limits of time. The sin of unbelief, on the other hand, is 
 pardonable, curable, and temporal, as springing from the 
 imperfect knowledge, partial judgment, and sensual appe- 
 tite of the moment, which the order of nature is consti- 
 tuted to overrule according to the creative intention. 
 
 The elements of thought thus briefly recapitulated are 
 elements of life. It is impossible to consider them with 
 any degree of attention and not come to an awakening 
 of the spirit with respect to some divine purpose and 
 rational consummation towards which man is working 
 his way. As the spontaneous development of nature is 
 evermore asserting differences and antagonisms, so the 
 universal government of nature is evermore composing 
 these differences and antagonisms in a higher order. It 
 
RECAPITULATION AND TRANSITION. 215 
 
 is in this way that the process of personal development 
 on the part of man is made the medium of a personal 
 revelation on the part of God, and that in the practical 
 progress of revelation there appear tokens of a purpose, 
 not only to overrule, but to rule out whatever obstructs 
 man's communion with his Maker, and to make man 
 perfect in faith, love, and practical loyalty. It is 
 the working out of this reconciling purpose in history 
 which gives expression to what we may call the law of 
 atonement. 
 
 A hard fate has befallen the word " atonement." It 
 has fared worse, if possible, than " justification." It has 
 been not only warped in the struggles of opinion, but 
 colored according to vagaries of imagination ; while the 
 more it has been bandied by parties, the more it has 
 incurred the odium of a shibboleth with thinkers who 
 prided themselves upon either their indifference or their 
 catholicity. In the Eevised New Testament the word 
 does not appear ; but it cannot be made to disappear 
 from the records of religious thought. It deserves, 
 therefore, to be redeemed from unnatural bondage and 
 brought back to its original service. 
 
 Eeconciliation, as between the Creator and his rational 
 creatures, may signify a moral relation to be preserved, 
 or a moral relation to be attained. In either case it can 
 demand nothing more than perfect faith and obedience, 
 and can be realized by nothing less. Milton's seraph 
 Abdiel, " faithful found among the faithless," ^ is rep- 
 resented as preserving his loyalty, and his peace with 
 God, by continually renewed acts of duty in a career of 
 unbroken communion. The Christ of the New Testa- 
 ment stands forth as the Apostle and High Priest of 
 
 1 Paradise Lost, b. v. 1. 896 et seq. 
 
216 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 universal reconciliation, by preserving his own spiritual 
 oneness with the Father, in that unswerving devotion 
 which is the proper obedience of the Son. There can 
 be no expiatory suffering incident to creaturely devotion 
 that does not find its place in the infinitude of divine 
 requirement ; as there can be no divine requirement of 
 sacrifice, which is not first of all proof of the Father's 
 long-suffering in the creation and government of the 
 worlds. It is He, who, through all the ritual of sacri- 
 fice in nature is reconciling his worlds unto himself, — 
 lifting the struggles of life under low and transitory 
 conditions up into the higher service of spiritual eman- 
 cipation. 
 
 The word atonement contemplates the condition not of 
 perfect beings, but of beings to be perfected. Not only 
 in systematic teaching but in ordinary speech it refers, 
 if I am not mistaken, to motive, means, efforts, for the 
 attainment of an end ; and this end, whether conceived 
 as attained or to be attained, is reconciliation with God, 
 the Supreme Father, in a possible perfection and univer- 
 sal harmony. In the applications of detail, atonement 
 refers especially to pains and sacrifices in the way of 
 duty ; reconciliation, to joy and triumph in the approval 
 and success of service done : atonement stands for the 
 economy of the divine Goodness in subordinating uni- 
 versal nature to the motive and service of love ; recon- 
 ciliation is the harmony of spiritual beings in whom 
 love is the fulfilling of law : atonement implies the 
 necessary discipline of finite agents, in bringing them 
 to be, intelligently and voluntarily, at one with God in 
 his universal aim ; reconciliation implies the result of 
 discipline which the Father aims to achieve in his whole 
 family. In fine, atonement declares that the world is 
 
RECAPITULATION AND TRANSITION. 217 
 
 constituted for the development and trial of personal 
 virtue, not for the exhibition of constitutional impecca- 
 bility ; ^ while reconciliation holds out the promise that 
 even material nature shall share in, and show forth, the 
 glory of humanity redeemed from the bondage of error, 
 and made free in the service of the Father. 
 
 The law of atonement involves of necessity the rela- 
 tion of moral agents to all law ; and is grounded in the 
 eternal rectitude which forbids that one jot or tittle 
 should in anywise pass from law until all be fulfilled. 
 But there is the mark or sign of atonement, which 
 brings to our rational recognition a universal method of 
 the divine working; and it is this which must deter- 
 mine and guide the inquiry before us. 
 
 1 Turretin, following St. Augustine, says: " Lihertas Adami fuii 
 posse non peccare." [Institutio Theologise Elencticse, vol. 1. p. 515.] 
 Kelatively to some limits of action unmistakably defined this may be ad- 
 mitted ; but beyond such limits, and according to the notion that takes 
 law to be nothing less than the divine intention for the entire moral 
 contents and spiritual development of human nature, posse non peccare is 
 not predicable of man's immature agency any more than is non posse 
 peccare. The case admits of brief discussion with respect to its rational 
 elements. Non posse peccare is properly- predicated of the mere animal 
 basis of human life, before the beginning of moral agency; and then it is 
 practically identical with j^osse non peccare. Either of the two phrases 
 can stand for no more and no less than the other. Again, personal de- 
 velopment under divine direction may be conceived as going on until the 
 human spirit is brought into perfect communion with the divine Spirit ; 
 and then posse non peccare is morally identical with non posse peccare. 
 But between these two extremes there is logically an '* excluded middle." 
 From the point where the merely physical non posse peccare ceases to 
 the point where the perfect spiritual posse non peccare begins, neither 
 phrase, in any other than a relative sense, is a verifiable predicate of 
 human agency. What is verifiable of man in this middle region, on the 
 score both of his moral energy and of his spiritual imperfection, is given 
 in the clear confession of St. Paul : "To will is present with me ; but 
 to work out the good is not " (Rom, vii. 18). 
 
218 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 What redemptive and reconciling process is realized 
 in nature ? What is the law of thought and teaching 
 concerning the same in Scripture ? 
 
 We have not to seek any detail of analogies, such as 
 might show the teaching of Scripture to be open only to 
 objections that could be urged with equal force against the 
 system of nature. What our inquiry seeks is evidence 
 of a universal intention and process of reconciliation re- 
 vealed in nature and witnessed to in Scripture — a point 
 of view from which things seemingly objectionable in 
 detail should much rather appear to be indispensable 
 upon the whole. All finite quantities are mathemati- 
 cally zero in comparison with infinity. How then should 
 anything be anything by itself, when actually the thing 
 has no existence as it is separately conceived, and is 
 real only as merging in the infinite reality to which it 
 belongs ? Indeed it is only as we learn to know what 
 addresses itself pointedly to our confined observation 
 and momentary judgment as belonging to the unity of 
 things, without limits of space or time, that we win our 
 way in the faith of one eternal Word — God, with one 
 qualitative equivalent — Love. 
 
 Nor, again, have we anything to do with those govern- 
 mental schemes which represent to us a reign of God 
 under the image and superscription of Caesar. Our 
 movement is not in a sphere of limited legal judgments 
 and compensatory legal fictions. " Imputation," " sub- 
 stitution," " satisfaction," in the sphere of law, are signs 
 which are liable to import what is essentially false, 
 though intended to signify what is relatively true. For 
 the present we will drop the pontifical phrases, leaving 
 to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, in order that we 
 may apprehend in their simplicity and sincerity the 
 
RECAPITULATION AND TRANSITION. 219 
 
 tilings that are God's. Is not thought constituted to 
 move in that universal realm, which is physical creation 
 and moral government in one ? Is it not in the unity 
 of revelation that we are to find the wisdom of God, 
 which can rebuke partial criticism and silence petty 
 apology? Is it for us to take care that the divine 
 government receive no detriment, in case the sins and 
 sufferings of human beings are made subservient to the 
 development of personal virtue, which is itself the sur- 
 cease at length of sin and sorrow ? And what puerility 
 of logical pleading is so depressingly trivial, as the fami- 
 liar one of pointing out that the difficulty as regards a 
 government of absolute perfection is one and the same, 
 whether evil be the disciplinary bitterness of a day, or 
 the war and wail of endless duration ? It must be dis- 
 tinctly premised, therefore, that, for the purpose of the 
 present study, punishment is the expression of divine dis- 
 pleasure against the guilty, — not legal satisfaction for 
 guilt. On the other hand, suffering in the divine econ- 
 omy, far fi'om having any necessarily punitive character, 
 may be the unavoidable incident of an effort that is to 
 achieve an infinitely preponderating good. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE LAW OF ATONEMENT IN ITS PHYSICAL TYPE. 
 
 /^UR first effort shall be to get a clear conception of 
 ^^ the law of atonement in its physical type. 
 
 The whole order of material nature is one whose har- 
 mony is in the reconciliation of differences and the 
 adjournment of conflicts. We are often told of an ob- 
 trusive contrast between the physical economy and the 
 spiritual economy, as regards the reconciliation of dis- 
 cords. Material nature is held up as the realm of unre- 
 lenting law, equally remote from any thought of pity or 
 hint of hope to the transgressor, whether his offence be 
 wilful or accidental. In the pulpit and through relig- 
 ious publications, how often have high authorities used 
 all their eloquence to impress upon the popular imagi- 
 nation and judgment the idea that physical nature is the 
 antithesis rather than the type of redeeming effort, such 
 as is revealed in the gospel of our spiritual salvation. 
 It is amply set forth that if we suffer shipwreck we shall 
 be drowned ; if we are caught asleep in a burning house 
 or amidst the fumes of charcoal, we shall suffer the natu- 
 ral consequences ; if we take poison, we can count upon 
 the poison to work on in its ordinary way ; if we fall 
 from a height, or if something falls from a height upon 
 us, we cannot escape our exact due of injury. For the 
 
ATONEMENT IN ITS PHYSICAL TYPE, 221 
 
 sake of a special argument, all-reviving and all-restoring 
 nature, which the sentient creation loves, is ungraciously- 
 construed in a sense exactly contrary to the general ten- 
 dency of things. Nature is charged with being as mer- 
 ciless to transgressors, irrespective of their intentions, as 
 she is propitious to those who obey her laws, irrespec- 
 tive of their intentions; and it is not always added 
 that the seeming cruelty is in order to the greater 
 kindness. 
 
 But because nature rebukes lawlessness, are we un- 
 reconciled to nature? Because nature taxes life in 
 detail for the salvation of life in general, do we put our- 
 selves in permanent conflict with nature ? On the con- 
 trary, we try to be reconciled to nature in active obe- 
 dience ; and so far as this is found to be impossible we 
 submit to be reconciled in suffering. As a rule, we do 
 not suffer shipwreck, or perish in burning houses, or 
 come to our death by the sudden action of poison ; or, if 
 we do, our suffering is for the safety of all who know 
 how to take warning from our fate. The faith in which 
 we are rationally reconciled to nature is that the infinite 
 firmness of law in the constitution of things is one with 
 the infinite fervor of love in the administration of things. 
 If the service which matter and motion fulfil in the 
 physical order are too important to yield to the momen- 
 tary comfort and convenience of individuals, and so inju- 
 ries take place which, with all her pains, nature is not 
 constituted to heal except by the panacea of death ; is it 
 according to the higher nature of man to grudge the sac- 
 rifice and rebel against necessity ? Or, rather, seeing the 
 body quietly reassimilated to the congenial earth, does 
 not the spirit of man tend to the persuasion that it shall 
 prolong its days in higher recognition and enjoyment of 
 
222 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 the divine economy that can so graciously use and dis- 
 tribute the sufferings inseparable from the attainment of 
 infinite good ? 
 
 At any rate, the simple fact is that we are members 
 one of another. We live and die, not unto ourselves 
 alone, but unto our kind and unto our Creator. Nature 
 is constituted to exact the sacrifice of atonement in the 
 temporary efforts and sufferings of the few, that the life 
 of reconciliation and harmony may be more abundantly 
 enjoyed by the many. In the persistency of this sacri- 
 ficial law we find the security and conservation of all 
 life here below. Because the laws of nature are too sure 
 of their meaning to remit their appropriate exactions, the 
 pupils of nature become studiously obedient. They not 
 only work out their salvation from natural evils, but, 
 what is much more important, they do this in a way 
 to develop just such habits of attention and loyalty as 
 will avail them in working out their welfare under the 
 spiritual economy. 
 
 Nor in this subjection to the law of sacrifice is life to 
 be looked upon as for the most part servile and passive. 
 If the creative hand reaches through nature in order to 
 mould men to their proper obedience, the same power 
 reaches equally through men in order to mould material 
 nature into closer conformity with man's developed 
 thought and desire. Nature endows man with the lib- 
 erty of her laws ; and so the laws of nature become the 
 charter under which man rules and redeems those parts 
 of nature over which he presides. Docility and intelli- 
 gence on our part win nature to our will, so that nature 
 yields herself to our service in regenerate forms and 
 richer products. 
 
 Knowing that • we are to try conclusions with the 
 
ATONEMENT IN ITS PHYSICAL TYPE. 223 
 
 storm, we learn how to build our ships. Aware that we 
 must be ruled by compass and chart, or else ruled by- 
 rocks and shoals, we master the laws and catch the 
 auguries of navigation. The conquest of vast and resist- 
 less elements is grand and stimulating in proportion to 
 the risks taken in seemingly blind paroxysms of fury 
 into which the elements are sometimes thrown. And 
 when physically conquered, there is a certain inspiration 
 of his Maker in man, by which he looks beyond nature 
 as if the supernatural were ever his real home. He 
 seems to be overcome indeed, but only by the restless- 
 ness of matter under the divine energy, through which 
 all nature exists, — and exists for the sake of man as 
 heir and ruler of the realm. 
 
 Is it the decree of nature that the unsightly and 
 unhealthy marsh shall forever resist the progress of hus- 
 bandry, and mar the beauty of its neighborhood ? On 
 the contrary, nature shall yield the offending part to the 
 service and to the taste of man, as soon as man shall 
 make the sacrifice necessary for its redemption. To 
 drain, grub, burn, plough, and fertilize, — this is the toil 
 and sacrifice of atonement. By this means the displeas- 
 ing locality is reconciled. The intractable becomes the 
 genial ; the foul is turned into the beautiful ; the injuri- 
 ous and obstructive is changed to the harmonious and 
 useful. 
 
 Whenever the experience of man opens his mind to 
 those respects in which he can mould nature into har- 
 mony with himself, and man takes up the instruments 
 of intelligent toil to subdue the earth, the earth's reac- 
 tion is in the way of reconcihation. Eesistance is over- 
 come. The wilderness and the solitary place are glad. 
 Deserts rejoice and blossom as the rose. Pastures are 
 
224 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 clothed with flocks, and valleys are covered over with 
 corn. The mountains and hills break forth into singing, 
 and the trees of the field clap their hands. 
 
 Inaccessible heights, everlasting snows, and the most 
 dangerous seas are gradually brought into the unity and 
 harmony of thought. It is ascertained in what way they 
 are necessary and serviceable, as well as sublime or 
 beautiful. They are found to exist according to a con- 
 stitution of the globe in mysterious harmony with the 
 constitution of its inhabitants. The more deeply the 
 elements of nature are penetrated, the more thorough 
 and comprehensive is the reconciliation of thought and 
 things. The jury of finite intelligences to which the 
 Creator has entrusted a certain trial of his works is 
 ever rendering a spontaneous verdict of faith in their 
 goodness, though ever remote from the comprehension of 
 their infinite design. 
 
 In what concerns the economy of life in the physical 
 sense, the law of sacrifice in a process of reconciliation 
 and redemption is at once striking and universal. There 
 is no preservation of life but at the cost of life. In 
 earth, air, and water, the redemption of all living things 
 from cunning and violence in quest of blood is at the 
 price of blood. Life pays for life. The destruction of 
 a few, comparatively, in every species secures for the 
 moment immunity from death to the many ; at the same 
 time enforcing the instinctive caution and activity that 
 make up the enjoyment of existence during its natural 
 term. One species preys upon another ; but there is the 
 enormous vegetable growth offered from year to year for 
 the support of animal life, and so the hostile tribes abide 
 in a comparatively peaceful society. Always animal life 
 is immensely in excess of the consumption of animal life. 
 
ATONEMENT IN ITS PHYSICAL TYPE. 225 
 
 The ever-recurring pursuit and flight does not threaten 
 the survival of kinds, in a vast preponderance of living 
 specimens as compared with the slain ; while only by a 
 continual sacrifice is the equilibrium preserved between 
 different orders of living things and their natural re- 
 sources of nourishment. Instincts of parents and off- 
 spring, natural economies of protection, all efforts that 
 make us recognize the patterns of intellectual and moral 
 action in the brute creation, are due to the struggle as well 
 as to the constitution of life. To enjoy life is to expend 
 life. Throughout the innumerable ranks of sentient 
 creatures, the truth holds that to save existence in slug- 
 gish or cowardly retirement is to lose life. One moment 
 of awakening terror is ecstasy of life, compared with hn- 
 gering decay. If life be good, then is death also good, 
 which, by limiting individual existence, secures collec- 
 tive persistence. Be it active destruction or natural de- 
 cay that works out the beneficent result, the orders of 
 living things are made to be at one with each other, — 
 to be at one with inanimate nature, in a common posses- 
 sion of life, only through death. 
 
 The same law is most strongly marked in the relation 
 of man to the lower animals. To distinguish, to name, 
 to subjugate, the creatures of brute intelHgence, is a 
 work of danger and sacrifice proportioned to its interest 
 and importance. The triumph and rule of man is not 
 without cost both to himself and the subject races. To 
 live and let live is a law of reconciliation which is never 
 administered except with the incidental offering up of 
 life. Peace is at the price of war. Offence and defence 
 afford the temporary exercise which will ensure the suc- 
 ceeding repose. For men to combine against wild beasts 
 is to enter upon the labors of peace and civil order with 
 
 15 
 
226 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 respect to each other. Take away resistance, and prog- 
 ress is no more. 
 
 And then, in domestication, animals become the wil- 
 ling servants and companions of man. They profit by 
 their dependence, as man profits by his control. They 
 are slain for food; they are sacrificed in witness of a 
 spiritual faith, and thus denote the homage paid to the 
 Creator of all ; yet, upon the whole, their life is made 
 better by being subjected to higher life. The choice victim 
 predestined to secure by its own death the exemption of 
 others of its race from the claim of sacrifice, is for its day 
 the most cherished of the flock. So, too, the kinds that 
 furnish man not only nourishment for the body, but means 
 of expressing his spiritual desire to honor and propitiate 
 the Lord of all, are most highly prized. It is remarkable 
 that the law of eating and drinking among men has 
 held a permanent relation to the law of sacrifice in the 
 offices of worship, exactly as the law of physical nourish- 
 ment holds a constant relation to the law of spiritual 
 duty. What is necessary and most agreeable in the 
 economy of man's hfe seems most fit to determine his 
 offerings to the Author of life, — on whom all depend, 
 but whom man alone of creatures, on behalf of all, is 
 moved to thank and to supplicate. 
 
 Indeed, we cannot forget the extreme to which hu- 
 manity has been carried in the sacrifice of human 
 victims on behalf of the collective life. It required 
 the recoil from mistaken immolation to teach that 
 obedience, involving its necessary sacrifices, — not sac- 
 rifice irrespective of obedience, — is the way of spiritual 
 reconciliation to supreme authority. But what won- 
 der, if, in the midst of a universal economy of sacrifice, 
 no creature, living or dying in its own interest merely. 
 
ATONEMENT IN ITS PHYSICAL TYPE. 221 
 
 man should think it a not unpromising service to wor- 
 ship the Source of life in an exemplary surrender of 
 life ? How could it be certain that a more satisfactory 
 career for survivors might not be purchased at a vica- 
 rious cost, and the rights of the victim be safe with the 
 Divinity to whom the victim was devoted ? At any rate, 
 the law of atonement in its physical type is clear, terri- 
 bly as man may have erred in attempting to interpret 
 the divine requirement of which it is the expression. 
 Nature is right in what God intends her to teach ; but 
 it is a long work for man, through nature, to be taught 
 of God. 
 
 One thing appears indisputable, namely, that through- 
 out the course of nature there rules a law of atonement, 
 in the continual reconciliation of differences by means 
 of appropriate sacrifices. The inanimate earth is re- 
 deemed to the service of living beings at a sacrifice. 
 Living beings are adjusted to their natural term of life 
 by spontaneous efforts that have by and by exhausted 
 the vital energy. Life in lower species pays tribute to 
 life in higher species. In fine, all creatures, up to man 
 himself, live and die in unconscious but necessary hom- 
 age to one creative Power, — who is in all, through all, 
 over all. The reconciliation of all beings with each 
 other is their common subjection to creation's law. The 
 bringing of things into harmony and oneness by service 
 and sacrifice, voluntary or involuntary, is the rule of 
 nature, — not the exception. It is not a mystery of 
 detail to be referred to a system; it is the note of a 
 universal system accounting for all difficulties of detail, 
 '— the law by which all things consist. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE LAW OF ATONEMENT IN GENERAL HISTORY. 
 
 ^ I ^HE physical law of atonement is the type of a spir- 
 -*■ itual procedure. 
 
 How shall man, as the rational representative of sub- 
 ject nature, conceive and express the subjection of his 
 own mind and will to the Author of being ? The dif- 
 ference between Grod, the absolute Truth and Love, and 
 man, ignorant and self-seeking, — by what sacrifice can it 
 give place to an assured communion and oneness of man 
 with God ? The Example and Legislator of man's spir- 
 itual reconciliation with the infinite Spirit, — has he 
 appeared ? What is his word ? 
 
 Material nature is outward, of the senses. Revelation 
 is inward, of the spirit. But the outward and the in- 
 ward exist as one ; and the revelation of God makes use 
 of material nature in order to have its way in the human 
 spirit. We may say, generally, that in creation the 
 Revealer determines organic laws and sensible limits of 
 outward phenomena, in order to furnish the medium 
 and symbols of an interior communication. God, the 
 Prime-mover, is thus the Supernatural by relation with 
 the natural, the divine by relation with the human, — 
 the Revealer, the Redeemer, the Saviour, in virtue of a 
 spiritual effort and causation in man's history, such as 
 
ATONEMENT IN GENERAL HISTORY. 229 
 
 lese appellations indicate. The postulate of revelation 
 is that the Creator subjects spirits to their outward con- 
 ditions in order to complete his work by making out- 
 ward conditions the means of teaching, strengthening, 
 and perfecting spirits in the communion of divine truth 
 and life. No kingdoms of this world but for the sake 
 of the spiritual reign of God. No ages of vanity and 
 dissolution, but that they may furnish some elements 
 of immortality to powers whom their Creator will not 
 leave to decay. No antithesis of God and the adversary 
 of God, of God and the world, or of God and man, which 
 does not signify a synthesis — a reconciliation ; as ap- 
 pears from the fact that divine revelation is effectively 
 carried on only by causing the reason and will of God to 
 prevail over the limitations and misdoings of ignorant 
 men. 
 
 Therefore, whatever the revelation of God may by and 
 by have done with nature, we know the revelation now 
 only as having to do with nature. The divine Spirit is 
 working in- human history, and passing into ever-new 
 expression through the decay and regeneration of soci- 
 ety. It is only because God is working through nature 
 that he can be apprehended in nature. No particle of 
 the outward universe can be taken away from the divine 
 Spirit, whose living temple is man. The divine testi- 
 mony is not confined to any cycle of miracles ; it is in 
 the whole course of nature. But the distinguishing 
 mark of revelation is in the spiritual law which governs 
 its special organs, through which they become guides 
 and judges of their fellow-men. 
 
 • It is evident that there is no sacred history, so called, 
 which is not part and parcel of a larger reality, — uni- 
 versal history. There is no holy nation which does not 
 
 -I 
 
230 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 emerge from, hold commerce with, work for, and pass 
 into, the common humanity. There is no elect agent or 
 typical epoch of divine teaching but appears in natural 
 relation both with the common order and the universal 
 aim of God's creation. If the human family, needing a 
 man chosen and called of God, be naturally employed 
 in bringing such a man into bounds of time and condi- 
 tions of being, the man of God shall not fail to make his 
 calling and election sure, by impressing his own spiritual 
 motive and character upon the men of his day for a tes- 
 timony to those who shall come after them. If the man 
 of the divine idea and spirit be conceived as the first- 
 begotten of the Father, the mediatorial Prince, the per- 
 sonal type of human perfection, and as such the organ 
 and prophecy of universal regeneration ; then it follows, 
 from the very postulate of his pre-eminence, that other 
 men are but imperfectly prepared to understand him or 
 to believe in him. The difficulties he shall surmount 
 are one measure of the triumph he shall achieve. The 
 fulfilment of his office, — the reconciliation of all to 
 the truth, mediation ending in universal communion, — 
 this implies not merely the service of the Teacher, but 
 the discipline of every learner in the school of personal 
 responsibility. 
 
 Looking at the history of mankind with reference to 
 its spiritual facts, as distinguished from its physical phe- 
 nomena, we find that the law of reconciliation by means 
 of sacrifice pervades the whole domain ; while the Scrip- 
 ture testimony is concerned with that advancing light, 
 culminating in a fulness of personal revelation, in which 
 the same law is pre-eminently magnified and made hon- 
 orable. Hence, the whole spiritual progress of our race, 
 quite irrespective of any specially inspired interpretation 
 
ATONEMENT IN GENERAL HISTORY. 231 
 
 of the same, is tlie proper field of inquiry as to the law 
 of our redemption from error, and our sanctification in 
 the truth. One would willingly know if there is any 
 canon of reason or of art that can give a human being 
 the nimbus of the saint, except in consideration of his 
 having personally borne, in his own degree, the cross of 
 %e martyr. 
 
 The unity of history depends upon the development 
 of differences for the sake of reconciliation upon a higher 
 basis of mutual service and general harmony. Physical 
 law, as we have already seen, is a law of atonement, 
 not without sacrifice. But the cosmical rule deals very 
 gently with our sensibilities. The tree absorbs its own 
 elements from earth and air ; and not until leaves and 
 fruit fall to the ground are we reminded of what the tree 
 has to pay back. Inorganic matter and the grower's art 
 must have their dues. But when we contemplate all 
 the units of personal intelligence, conscience, and will, 
 that are summed up in the world's moral movement, we 
 are instantly impressed with a sense of cost and pains 
 in the composition and reconciliation of numberless indi- 
 vidual energies, every one being constitutionally deter- 
 mined to take its own line. 
 
 To reconcile growing spirits to the vast intention of 
 their Creator would seem to involve no slight outlay on 
 their part, Were eacli one treated with reference to him- 
 self alone. As we are made, the least part of the cost 
 of personal progress is the exhaustion of physical re- 
 sources, — - the whole organism through which sensation 
 is brought in for the training of judgment being destined 
 to expend its resources in due proportion whether to 
 their use or their abuse. This would simply enforce 
 the costly spiritual endeavor to apprehend the genuine 
 
232 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 object for which all sacrifices should properly avail. It 
 is not an easy and spontaneous action so to use the 
 tilings that are passing out of hand as to secure the 
 qualities most worthy of continued being, in merely a 
 personal, experience. But we are creatures of a complex 
 society. There is a vaster if not superior life, — a col- 
 lective, pre-existent, and surviving humanity, which is 
 constituted not only to produce, but also to control and 
 dispose of, individual existence. Our Creator has deter- 
 mined our dependence upon our kind, and required our 
 service to the race. A man is an effect with reference 
 to his becoming a cause. 
 
 Inasmuch, therefore, as the individual man is of 
 society, and through society, and to society, he becomes 
 a possession and, if need be, a sacrifice to the family, the 
 tribe, the nation, the race, and finally to the Creator of 
 all, in working out the universal glory and joy. His 
 faculties are made up with due regard to his relations. 
 Personal duty, no matter how costly, is of infinite prom- 
 ise to the personal agent, with respect both to his own 
 possible survival of all sufferings, and to the unending 
 efficiency of his conduct in the being of others. The 
 personal career and interest of every one enters into the 
 idea of any one's moral accountability and retributive 
 experience. Let a man live or die for his kind, let 
 a patriot fight or perish for king and country, let a 
 martyr sacrifice himself for his testimony, — is the 
 loss on the part of the sufferer alone, and not on the 
 part of the humanity and Divinity for whom he suffers ? 
 And the gain, — is that for those who inherit the im- 
 mediate or remote effects of sacrifice under the govern- 
 ment of God, to the exclusion of the vicarious sufferers, 
 through whose good offices the gain ensues ? Break the 
 
ATONEMENT IN GENERAL HISTORY. 233 
 
 vital connection of men with one another and with the 
 Father of all, and the bond of human obligation is bro- 
 ken. But grant us to be members in particular of a 
 universal family, and the inevitable effect is that, if one 
 member suffer, all the members suffer with it ; or if one 
 member be honored, all the members rejoice with it. 
 Not that this effect is of necessity a matter of immediate 
 consciousness ; it ensues in the administration of eternal 
 law. 
 
 Is there wonder, then, at the abounding expenditure 
 of life, and not much more wonder at the superabound- 
 ing development and improvement of life, in which the 
 cost is accounted for ? Is there scandal and complaint 
 on the score of savage violence, desolating wars, barba- 
 rous civil and military punishments, and fiendish perse- 
 cutions of religious faith ; and may we not rationally 
 ask if that system of sacrifice can be denounced as upon 
 the whole practically excessive, which comes to a neces- 
 sary mitigation of its horrors exactly in proportion as 
 man is brought on to better principles and nobler habits 
 of living ? Is the cost too great of redeeming society 
 from its primitive rudeness to its better soul ? Not to 
 redeem it is the greater cost ; and the price of well- 
 being must needs have been paid, or how should we 
 appreciate the good to which we have attained ? 
 
 Not by beautiful reasons and fine phrases, but through 
 the actual struggles out of which speech is struck, must 
 the ignorant g^ their schooling from the better in- 
 structed. A pains-taking master must lift up to the 
 level of his own efforts a pains-taking pupil. The strong 
 can help the weak, not chiefly by an eloquent and pleas- 
 ing address, but by bearing the burdens and feeling the 
 resistance of the weak ; till the weak are made strong 
 
234 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 with much trouble to themselves, and the strong are 
 made stronger, not only by trial of their own powers, 
 but by the strength they have treasured up in those 
 who before were unable to help themselves. With what 
 infinite patience, then, must God bear the burdens of all 
 finite beings, while educating them to be workers to- 
 gether with him! 
 
 Is there any exchange of services, however small, but 
 implies an overcoming of obstacles and a reconciling of 
 differences in effecting the exchange ? The commerce of 
 neighbors and friends, — is it carried on without a cer- 
 tain degree of cautious self-interest, a little conflict of 
 personal judgments ? But how shall strange or hostile 
 peoples become neighbors and friends, when each is hold- 
 ing out a temptation to the ambition or cupidity of the 
 other, and neither likes the difficulty and delay of nego- 
 tiation when an affair can be more neatly accomplished 
 by force ? The intellectual and moral assimilation of 
 masses is apt to be preceded by violent collisions. Ex- 
 ternal conditions and prejudices of habit have to be 
 shaken by wasteful warfare, that the combatants may 
 rise to higher things through a preliminary trial — short, 
 sharp, and decisive. Tribes that own a certain affinity 
 of blood do not come to their sense of spiritual oneness 
 so long as they are fighting out their natural differences. 
 But when the opinionated and predetermined fight of 
 seeming good has been fought, it remains to fight the 
 good fight of faith according to the actual situation. 
 Material weapons are laid aside, that the spiritual strug- 
 gle may have freer play and reach a more satisfactory 
 result. 
 
 The great chapters of history, which we learn to read 
 by their titles, — do they give us any ages of culture 
 
ATONEMENT IN GENERAL HISTORY. 235 
 
 and refinement that were not proud to own their in- 
 debtedness to times of heroism and suffering ? And 
 how long is poetic art or philosophic reflection allowed 
 to hold its own against invaders ready to disperse the 
 treasures accumulated, if society be unready for new sac- 
 rifices in their defence ? Alexander cannot master the 
 world without Aristotle ; nor Aristotle without Alexan- 
 der. But when Greek thought marches in the might 
 of conquering armies, enters the gates of captured cities, 
 founds new seats of empire and of learning, dictates the 
 language of enlightened policy and superior culture, then 
 the wisdom of the West combines with the faith of the 
 East. The Hebrew Scriptures in the Greek language 
 become the riches of the world. Moses and the proph- 
 ets had to take gifts from the Greeks in preparing the 
 way of the living Word ; while Koman aggression and 
 domination made the way into a highway with incalcula- 
 ble expenditure of life, before the supreme Pontiff and 
 Prince of Peace could proceed upon his career of sacrifice 
 and triumph. 
 
 Human experience is a ritual of sacrifice, voluntary 
 and involuntary, through which conflicting interests and 
 powers are brought into accord under one divine control. 
 The ritual is determined, sustained, directed, by the crea- 
 tive governance. Nothing can be offered to the Author 
 of being which Ls not already his. All victims are pro- 
 vided by him, whether for the nourishment of bodies 
 or the redemption of souls; and his are the sufferings 
 through which his children pass from blind conflicts of 
 error to the reign of righteousness, peace, and joy. The 
 kingdom of common intelligence, commerce, and law is 
 a kingdom that suffereth violence ; and the violent take 
 it by force. Conflict is before order. The more impor- 
 
236 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 tant the interests at stake in the apprehension of con- 
 tending parties, the more fierce the struggle, the more 
 bloody the sacrifice by which the final composition will 
 be bought ; and, presumably, the last ruling will be upon 
 the whole beneficent in proportion to the cost of arriving 
 at it. Men force their way from anarchy to liberty by 
 contending stoutly for what they hold to be right ; and 
 any custom or statute long held in respect will be un- 
 settled at much risk, even for the purpose of fulfilling its 
 original spirit. The literal law is most nervously exact- 
 ing, whether as regards observance or penalty, just before 
 it is to pass away ; and then the prophet of fulfilment 
 has his great hour, if he be ready to sacrifice himself for 
 the real law, against erroneous constructions. All ages 
 are to him who is wanting to no claim, whether of the 
 future or of the past. 
 
 Besides, the fulfilling of law does not avoid the con- 
 flict of laws. The motives of duty are complex. There 
 are claims, each seemingly authoritative in itself, that 
 are not easily reconciled with each other. The consci- 
 entious judgment oscillates sensitively, and cannot settle 
 itself to one direction except by a determination, possibly 
 very painful, to sacrifice the lower to the higher require- 
 ment. The claims of family, of country, of humanity, of 
 Divinity, — who is sufiicient for such a hierarchy of ob- 
 ligations, if the lower appear to be not in practical 
 coincidence with the higher ? The supreme Love is 
 indeed the whole law ; but the sacrifice of faith in God, 
 obedience to divine inspiration as the fulfilment of all 
 devotion, is not easy, when the self-surrender implies the 
 denial of all that common affection holds dear. Yet 
 God's perfect revelation in man is possible a priori only 
 in conjunction with man's perfect faith in God. Given a 
 
ATONEMENT IN GENERAL HISTORY. 237 
 
 man perfectly receptive, and God, by the perfection of 
 his being, is perfectly communicative. In such a man the 
 divine and human are not in antithesis, but in synthesis, 
 — the divine possessing the human, the human possessed 
 of the divine. In such a man there could be no distrac- 
 tion of duties ; since the supreme Love would be in him 
 the reconciliation and satisfaction of aU claims. Heir of 
 the eternal Eectitude he could submit to no limitation 
 of his moral authority, as he could know no decay of 
 spiritual life. Temporary obstruction could import to 
 him no permanent failure, premature and formal sub- 
 mission no genuine success. As the example of right- 
 eousness calling all to his standard, yet declining to be 
 hailed as chief by men as yet alien to his rule, it would 
 be for him to move in the majesty of his moral testi- 
 mony and in the energy of his spiritual influence, till 
 all men should be his willing disciples and subjects. 
 Meanwhile how could he achieve this progress and tri- 
 umph among men, but by bearing their ignorance and 
 perversity, and so revealing, as teacher, priest, ruler, the 
 perfection of truth and power in the perfection of pa- 
 tience and mercy? How, in a word, should not the 
 perfect service offer the perfect sacrifice ? 
 
 Now, apart from the Scriptures, in which the gospel 
 is specifically proclaimed, we have a testimony to Jesus 
 in the natural progress of human society. The sign of 
 the Christ in history, his attribute in art, his ideal in 
 thought, his appeal to emotion, — these belong to him 
 naturally, because he came into the course of nature. 
 No special testimony could avail without this natural 
 corroboration. The man Jesus has an eminence and 
 authority in the world not scrupulously configured to 
 the testimony of his apostles, or to the teaching of his 
 
238 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 church, — an attention and veneration freely accorded 
 to him, through whatever medium he may present him- 
 self to men's minds. That he was a man unhesitating 
 in his persuasion and utterance of the truth ; that he 
 evinced his faith in God through the power of an 
 obedient and submissive piety, speaking and doing thQ 
 things of the Father ; that he shed upon the world a 
 light too pure for selfish policy or conventional success ; 
 that still he atoned for the transcendent character of his 
 ministry by freely subjecting his claims to laws and 
 judgments of the world's routine, thus sanctioning tem- 
 porary condescensions and just sacrifices as an indispen- 
 sable feature in the method of reconciling the lower to 
 the higher purpose ; that he became the Exemplar and 
 Founder of a faith through which alone the personal 
 communion and consummation of mankind was held by 
 him to be possible ; and that this faith contemplated 
 nothing less than the regeneration of humanity, and in- 
 cidentally the regeneration of outward nature, through 
 a spiritual ministration mediated by its Author from 
 age to age, — all this has entered into the dismterested 
 thought and sentiment of many generations, and become 
 matter of recognition and representation on the part of 
 thousands upon thousands, who were not careful to call 
 themselves Christians, or whose discipleship was an affair 
 of ordinary discipline rather than of high spiritual aspi- 
 ration. Literature, art, philanthropy, civil government, 
 military enterprise and administration, professional eth- 
 ics, habits of society and personal conscience, have been 
 so quietly penetrated and colored by the influence of 
 Jesus, that vast multitudes are by no means ready in 
 referring his qualities and conceptions to their source ; 
 or, possibly, the remote example is disowned out of an 
 
ATONEMENT IN GENERAL HISTORY. 239 
 
 regard for self-development. The force 
 that, according to the New Testament, invades and over- 
 comes the world in "the incarnate Word," is resolved 
 into a general potency of creative thought moving in the 
 direction of fine ideals, without reference to any authen- 
 tic image of the Father as the pattern of our ultimate 
 glory and virtue. 
 
 This spiritual infiltration of Christianity, which, pass- 
 ing beyond those who have owned their allegiance to 
 Jesus as King of men, penetrates the whole movement 
 of society, is important as showing the intellectual and 
 moral vicinage of his more effective supremacy. It in- 
 structs us as to what elements and proportions of the 
 Christ's teaching are suited to take possession of society, 
 without much force of outward authority or special prop- 
 agandism. Nay, it even intimates to us what law of 
 faith prevails by the very constitution of the human 
 mind, in spite of the often injudicious and injurious 
 zeal of those who profess and call themselves Christians. 
 The constitutional sway of Jesus among men not his 
 declared adherents is indicated in a general uplifting of 
 thought, effort, and hope, above the necessities and grati- 
 fications of the moment ; in a changed conception and 
 treatment of the present existence, growing out of a be- 
 lief or doubt inseparable from the very idea of a future 
 life. We are here to work out what we justly desire, 
 not to receive it otherwise, not to attain it at once. 
 We are here, not to be always saving our individual 
 lives, but to accept and encourage the bestowment of 
 life that cannot be saved in the interest of life that 
 ought not to be lost. It is ours, not to grudge the sac- 
 rifices we are called upon to make, but to rejoice in the 
 good our offerings may win ; not to despair of those no 
 
240 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 longer seen, but to await the manifestation of the sons 
 of God ; not to be forever chanting a tedious threnody- 
 over human mortality and sorrow, but rather to cheer 
 the march and fight of transitory existence with songs of 
 hope, in anticipation of life that shall turn the sufferings 
 of a day into permanent peace and joy. This elevation 
 of life, belonging to. the whole world of mankind, as the 
 tidal wave belongs to the ocean, is the natural response 
 of human society to ideas and motives that find their 
 highest expression in the Christ. 
 
 In passing, the thought suggests itself that it is partly 
 because the spiritual Revelation is through nature, and 
 according to the law of nature, that many have supposed 
 it to be of nature. They have their apology. They pre- 
 fer to construe nature as including the unknowable en- 
 ergy, rather than to believe that a personal Creator is, or 
 can be, accredited in nature. This is one mode of the 
 antithesis of partial knowledge and universal reason. It 
 represents the attitude of an unsatisfied agnosticism, as 
 against the rational conception of faith. Faith takes in 
 a range of hfe from the infinite Father to the flowers of 
 the field, and insists that a uniyersal moral order cannot 
 be physically developed from below, unless it be ration- 
 ally determined and constituted from above. The tes- 
 timony of the historic church, despite the conflicts of de- 
 tail, is that creation is of God, through the divine Word, 
 the Christ of the Scriptures, unto all men, to the end 
 that all men joined together in the faith of the Christ, 
 and living unto God in love, may be turned betimes 
 from unreasonable absorption in lower objects of desire, 
 to find their eternal satisfaction in Him from whom they 
 came. Here is the circle, not of a vicious logic, but of 
 a real creation, wherein nature is evermore proceeding 
 
ATONEMENT IN GENERAL HISTORY. 241 
 
 from and returning to its Author ; only in such a way 
 that physical necessities and social obligations are made 
 to serve the ends of personal education. The church in 
 all ages is properly against the rest of the world only in 
 order that all men may be brought into peaceful com- 
 munion with their Maker ; and the Scriptures of the 
 church are distinguished from other honest records of 
 human experience, not by the intrusion of any power 
 or principle foreign to nature, but by the clearer and 
 mightier expression, through all stages of divine commu- 
 nication, till we come to the divine Man, of what is the 
 meaning and law of universal being. 
 
 The method of divine teaching is practical. The 
 Scriptures have the ground of their coherency in a 
 real history, their complete significance in a real man. 
 They are the revised, re-edited, and strikingly illustrated 
 teachings wherein nature is set forth as universally 
 moved by the divine Spirit ; they culminate in a human 
 enshrinement of the divine character; they record a 
 unique and perfect crisis of personal condescension, de- 
 votion, and self-sacrifice ; they testify to the consummate 
 filial obedience of One who is Son of God and Son of 
 man, to the service which is all-satisfying and all-avail- 
 ing, to righteousness without fiction and without flaw, 
 to a human perfection which cannot be more and can- 
 not be less, — a qualitative completeness in the love of 
 the Father. If the Scriptures bear witness in such sort 
 to the love of God, we look to find them true to the 
 inmost and utmost reality of nature. 
 
 16 
 
CHAPTEE IV. 
 
 THE LAW OF ATONEMENT IN SCRIPTURE HISTORY. 
 PRIMITIVE AND PATRIARCHAL SACRIFICE. 
 
 'T^HE Scriptures do not advise us that we have great 
 -*- need of collateral testimonies in our efforts to un- 
 derstand them. On the contrary, they set up a per- 
 emptory claim to speak for themselves. Happily, we 
 can hardly mistake their general drift, however great 
 may be our lack of particular knowledge. 
 
 Especially as regards the law of atonement we have 
 to do, not with any clever handling of symbols or lucky 
 coincidences of phraseology, but with successive exam- 
 ples from life, whether the type of experience repre- 
 sented to us belong to the antediluvian, patriarchal, or 
 national period. Our appeal is " to the law and to the 
 testimony." ^ 
 
 Again, happily, the Scriptures represent, not an in- 
 spiration holding itself aloof from the feeble initiative 
 and restricted action of primitive faith, but an inspira- 
 tion working through the efforts of faith from the very 
 beginning. Even the great prophetic burdens are not 
 made up chiefly of apocalyptic foreshadowings, but are 
 brought home to men's business and bosoms in realistic 
 and historic expression. The canon of Scripture has not 
 
 1 Is. viii. 20. 
 
PRIMITIVE AND PATRIARCHAL SACRIFICE. 243 
 
 provided for its own verification by outward criteria, — 
 and for the very good reason that the practical discipline 
 of reconciliation with God through the sacrifices of faith 
 and obedience is the canon of the canon; the organic 
 law of revelation brings its own elements into vital 
 unity, and disowns what is foreign to its purpose. 
 Higher than the heights, deeper than the depths, the 
 divine Eeason, like the air we breathe, finds us in the 
 very centre of conscious life, and is never needing to be 
 brought from far. The note of revelation is this : " The 
 word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy 
 heart, that thou mayest do it." ^ 
 
 The offering of gifts and sacrifices to an unseen Power, 
 as represented either in the holy Scriptures or in general 
 history, is the worship of primitive culture. Tentative 
 at first, this worship is expanded and systematized with 
 the progress of thought and experience, until the original 
 faith and motive are analyzed into various elements, 
 and these elements are noted by variations of ritual 
 in accordance with an essential unity of purpose. But 
 the germinal idea of all sacrifice is worship ; and since 
 this idea, even as a germ, involves man's whole moral 
 constitution, we are sure that in its fullest growth it can- 
 not surpass the essential quality of its vital beginning. 
 Hence the original simplicity of motive and thought in 
 sacrifice is the clue to guide us through any labyrinth of 
 ceremonies in a sacrificial economy. An action, speak- 
 ing more plainly than words, gives a simple, solid sense ; 
 while words and phrases may divide and diffuse the 
 same sense in a lore of details, that have their oneness 
 and life in the original action. To go back to the earli- 
 est and simplest rite of worship is to gain a starting- 
 
 1 Deut. XXX. 11-13. Rom. x. 6-9. 
 
244 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 point for appreciating the whole order and movement of 
 spiritual facts. 
 
 Let us turn to the fourth chapter of Genesis, and be- 
 ginning at the third verse read on through the seventh. 
 We are held to read simply what is there stated, the 
 body and pressure of the time, not the constructions and 
 inferences of subsequent ages and systems of thought. 
 Two men of one family, heirs of a fresh world that has 
 rewarded their several industries, each bringing an offer- 
 ing of such things as he has to the unseen Power, Life 
 of all life and Kuler of all being, — what does it mean ? 
 There is only one sphere of thought in which the dif- 
 ferent parts of their action can be combined. It is 
 worship. The language is: "Thou, Source of life, art 
 sovereign and sufficient ; I am tributary and dependent. 
 Thou hast ordained the lower orders of living things for 
 the service of the higher, and through us dost summon 
 all things to the acknowledgment and service of thy- 
 self, who art the Highest. I offer thee of what is thine, 
 as I am thine. Let me be at one with thee in the way 
 of homage and obedience." Could the act of sacrifice 
 properly signify less than this, however darkly under- 
 stood ? And, with whatever distinctions and develop- 
 ments of the conception, could it possibly mean more ? 
 Nay, the day of righteousness is signified in the dawn 
 of faith, and the first true devotion is fulfilled in the 
 final reconciliation. 
 
 But insincerity in the expression of homage is not 
 worship. It is the contradiction of worship. The spirit 
 must give validity to the form, if the form is not to be- 
 lie the spirit. No harmony with divine truth, but only 
 consciousness of rebuke and remorse, while the sin of 
 hypocrisy is lying at the door. By the steadfast faith 
 
PRIMITIVE AND PATRIARCHAL SACRIFICE. 245 
 
 of the doer, is the character and significance of the thing 
 done; and so "by faith," not otherwise, "Abel offered 
 unto Grod a more excellent sacrifice than Cain." ^ And 
 by the same faith Abel had in himself the testimony of 
 his righteousness, while Cain had the conviction of sin 
 and the sense of divine displeasure, as inseparable from 
 his unbelief and formality. 
 
 Could any rational being suppose that the Maker of 
 all things would respect an offering for what it was in 
 itself, and not for what it was in the intention of him 
 who brought it ? The offering was an instrument of 
 communication, a bond of attention, a testimony of de- 
 sire and trustful expectation, a pledge of loyalty, that 
 might be interpreted as the sign and seal of a mutual 
 covenant, by the divine response in the faithful soul sup- 
 ported by the divine goodness in the ordering of the 
 world. Thus, while recognizing faith as the one princi- 
 ple of man's communion with his Creator, the story of 
 this primitive sacrifice conveys the correlative truth of 
 the Creator's disciplinary judgment declared in the con- 
 science of man. 
 
 Life devoted to the service of life, life passing by 
 death into higher life, — this, as we have seen, is the 
 law by which all orders of living things are adjusted to 
 each other and to their common end in the physical 
 domain. And now, as the spiritual manhood rises above 
 its physical necessities, it is held under the same law. 
 We see man tributary to the divine government, called 
 to a spiritual homage in the very fact of being open to 
 suggestions from above, and moved to express that hom- 
 age in the consecration and sacrifice of physical life, ani- 
 mal or vegetable, in accordance with its demands. The 
 
 1 Heb. xi. 4. 
 
246 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 sacrifice is practically a recognition of physical death as 
 entering into the divine economy of life, not, indeed, for 
 the sake of death, but for the sake of more and better 
 life to come. The worship of sacrifice is of a nature to 
 combine ideally with all experience and history, to ab- 
 sorb meaning from the divine dealings, and to sustain 
 the faltering steps of man as he follows his invisible 
 Guide in a way of ever-new life, whose end he cannot 
 make out. 
 
 Accordingly, when the flood had swept away a violent 
 and intractable race, and in the silence that ensued there 
 was the hushed submission of one redeemed family, the 
 head of that family was not without a deep conviction 
 of what the judgment signified. As the sacrifice of faith 
 was burning upon Noah's altar,^ a covenant of new life 
 and hope was defining its great promise in his souL The 
 race was saved. Creation was risen out of the deluge. 
 In a world of waters and of clouds there was to be 
 henceforth the all-ruling sun, and the bow in the cloud ; 
 instead of the present devastation, seasons and harvests, 
 unfailing proof of the divine bounty and forbearance, 
 though the imagination of man's heart be evil from his 
 youth. 
 
 Here is sacrifice of identical yet developed significance. 
 ■ The expression of personal homage and devotion is made 
 the vehicle of a divine interpretation of history. A signal 
 advance is announced in the reconciling process, as a 
 mighty impact of divine thought and energy has taken 
 effect upon the course of nature. Henceforth worship 
 shall have such meaning, and law such sanction for 
 mankind, that the exceptional piety of one family shall 
 not be vindicated in a general destruction. Rather the 
 
 1 Gen. viii. 20. 
 
PRIMITIVE AND PATRIARCHAL SACRIFICE. 247 
 
 sacrifices of personal righteousness shall avail for the 
 salvation of successive generations. The persistency of 
 human society, being compatible with the progressive 
 revelation of the divine character, becomes subservient to 
 the propagation of a rational faith. 
 
 The simple and majestic personality of Abraham ^ ap- 
 propriately sums up the trials and successes of patri- 
 archal faith. His is a character not merely dutiful as 
 respects the daily intimations of a higher Will ; he is a 
 man of far-reaching forecast, of watchful and prophetic 
 devotion, — a man to enter, by such sacrificial offices as 
 the wisdom of the time and his own inspiration pointed 
 out, into a covenanted co-operation with God for bring- 
 ing to pass the future of mankind. A man of God, for 
 the reason among others that he was a man to command 
 his children and his household after him, Abraham was 
 not unfit to receive circumcision as the sign and seal of 
 a family consecration to the divine service. Still he was 
 by no means shut up to personal and family considera- 
 tions, but gladly paid the homage of tithes to Melchize- 
 deck, regarding simply the priest's eternal function, no 
 matter from whom inherited or to whom transmitted. 
 He was more than the father of a faithful progeny in 
 the ordinary sense — a father of the faithful in a tran- 
 scendent sense. From him in the order of nature was 
 to come the consummate Example of faith, in whom all 
 families of the earth should be blessed. ^ 
 
 Sacrificial worship, that makes its appearance with no 
 explanatory reference to how it originated, that becomes 
 the note of a sharp moral distinction between Abel and 
 Cain, that, after the Deluge, serves Noah as a sign of the 
 Creator's reconciliation with man, in view of his future 
 
 1 Gen. XV. * Gen, xii. 3 and xxviii. 14. 
 
248 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 trial, — this same worship not only served in the experi- 
 ence of Abraham as the medium through which he made 
 and received the ratification of his covenant with God, 
 much as men were accustomed to ratify covenants with 
 each other, but gave its outward form to the severest 
 test of the patriarch's faith. ^ 
 
 The spirit of Abraham was too active and aspiring 
 for religious routine ; nor could he yield his judgment to 
 the fiction that by any outward measure of sacrifices his 
 due to God could be definitively paid. The choice trib- 
 ute from herd and flock, or from the products of the 
 ground, what was this but the pledge of endless personal 
 devotion, of unlimited practical surrender ? Whatever 
 God could ask, that it should be his joy to yield. And 
 what could God ask? Might he not — did he not — 
 demand a return of his best gifts ? Could any offering 
 bespeak more confidence than the Creator of all things 
 deserved? Could even the child of promise be with- 
 held ? Might not this lamb also have been provided for 
 a sacrifice ? Impossible, did it seem ? For that very 
 reason why might it not be true ? Shall faith confine 
 itself to what is possible with men, and do no honor 
 to what is possible only with God ? 
 
 Whatever example, suggestion, or argument may have 
 wrought in the patriarch's mind, all is summed up in 
 his persuasion that the strange and terrible thought was 
 not his own but his Maker's ; while at the same time he 
 was strong in the belief that no part of the divine prom- 
 ise as to him and his seed should fail. " In the mount 
 of the Lord it shall be seen." ^ Supported by his trust 
 the father of the faithful took his journey to the mount 
 of the Lord, and made ready for the sacrifice. Then, 
 
 1 Gen. xxii. ^ Gen. xxii. 14. 
 
PRIMITIVE AND PATRIARCHAL SACRIFICE. 249 
 
 indeed, and there, it was seen- — seen in the light of 
 a conclusive experience — that obedience, unconditional 
 confidence and devotion of spirit, the very essence of 
 acceptable service, was the reality desired by God. But 
 the literal offeriag up of a child upon the altar was 
 by no means permitted, could not have been the divine 
 intention, as it was not when human sacrifices were 
 forbidden under the Law. Abraham offered a living 
 sacrifice, a reasonable service. He surrendered himself 
 to God as a willing organ of the divine thought; and 
 so was made to understand, not how far the sacrifice 
 of self could go, but how far the sacrifice of another 
 could not go. 
 
 But, though the high priest of self-sacrifice was yet to 
 come ; though the way, the truth, and the life, of per- 
 sonal consecration to the Father on behalf of the breth- 
 ren, was not fully revealed; yet, was not all sacrifice 
 properly self-sacrifice ? Was it the victim and not him- 
 self, — the victim instead of himself, — the offeriag, of 
 whatever kind, as a commutation for self-surrender, that 
 was the meaning of sacrificial worship ? If tribute how- 
 ever small signifies subjection and loyalty to human 
 authorities, must not tribute to the Supreme mean un- 
 conditional submission on man's part, — even in the 
 very fact of making appeal for protection or forgive- 
 ness ? When the patriarch's loyalty is well proved, a 
 sacrifice is provided to express it, not to oppress it ; 
 and Isaac is reserved to offer himself a living sacrifice, 
 as the way shall be opened to his devotion and service. 
 
 It is thus, through tentative and typical stages, that 
 the law of sacrifice moves on to its fulfilment in the 
 Christ ; when it becomes universal, not as the offering up 
 of victims at all, but as the consecration of personal life. 
 
250 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 The gospel preached before unto Abraham ^ was the 
 same in effect which became afterwards the Word of 
 God to all the world : " He that taketh not his cross 
 and foUoweth after me, is not worthy of me." ^ 
 
 But, though the ritual of sacrifice, — the form of 
 worship in which man pays his voluntary tribute of sub- 
 mission to the divine ordering of life, — may begin and 
 change, and as to some of its features pass away, the 
 real sacrifice, the actual submission of life to the divine 
 disposal, in the course of nature and in the administra- 
 tion of moral government, dates from the foundation of 
 the world, and cannot pass away till all the law of it be 
 fulfilled. All that a man hath as a creature of the cos- 
 mos shall he give for that life which is his as heir of 
 God and of eternity. The sweat of his brow, the pro- 
 ducts of his toil, the fruit of his body, yea, his very 
 flesh and blood, shall denote simply his tribute to a 
 spiritual creation and an immortal life. The first offer- 
 ing is fulfilled in the final offering. The gifts of God 
 are duly acknowledged only as they all pass, in dutiful 
 submission to his law, through all forms of sacrifice by 
 which the consummation of being can be subserved. 
 
 This is what people before the flood are conceived as 
 slow to learn. The preponderance of a lusty animal 
 force was the relative suppression of spiritual virtue. 
 Yet the divine law of atonement did not leave them 
 out. If they were not ready then to come to terms with 
 their Maker, by presenting their bodies a living sacrifice 
 in a reasonable service, their Maker had the alternative 
 of asserting his claim in a judgment which could not be 
 resisted. The divine administration simply adjusted its 
 procedure to the eternal righteousness, — and made the 
 
 1 Gal. iii. 8. « Matt. x. 38. 
 
PRIMITIVE AND PATRIARCHAL SACRIFICE. 251 
 
 disobedient generation an involuntary sacrifice for the 
 redemption of human society, in anticipation of that 
 just One, who, having freely tasted death for every man, 
 is represented by his Apostle as bearing the good news 
 of spiritual refuge and reconciliation to those very ante- 
 diluvians, who sought no escape from impending ruin, 
 when the typical ark was preparing. ^ Thus the long- 
 suffering of God is salvation in universal history. The 
 sacrifice of a day may seem exorbitant to the children of 
 a day ; but the economy of sacrifice, in its infinite range, 
 can mean neither less nor more than the greatest good 
 at the least expense. 
 
 Good, not evil, is the vital energy and rational sug- 
 gestion of history at every period. The process of recon- 
 ciling mankind to the Father involves the proof of 
 divine sympathy with suffering, — even suffering in- 
 curred by sin, — and of divine satisfaction in view of 
 all evil giving way, through the struggle of faith, to the 
 peace of obedience; a divine sympathy and satisfac- 
 tion least understood when a world is given over to 
 physical destruction for the moral rescue of mankind in 
 a single family, — most persuasively revealed when One 
 like the Son of man endures the last physical agony, for 
 the spiritual redemption of all the families of the earth. 
 1 1 Peter iu. 18-20. . 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 SACRIFICE UNDER THE LAW. 
 
 'T^HE movement of patriarclial life is toward national 
 -*• life. There is a corresponding advance in sacrifi- 
 cial worship. 
 
 So long as the household lives the life of its head, the 
 patriarch fulfils all mediatorial offices on behalf of his 
 family. He is prophet, priest, and king. He presents a 
 striking type of the one Mediator, through whom the 
 universal Father deals with the whole household of faith 
 through all generations. But when patriarchal pre-emi- 
 nence gives way to the national spirit and authority, 
 then a redeemed and consecrated society becomes in 
 Scripture the comprehensive imity, type of universal hu- 
 manity, conceived as under the moral discipline of the 
 Father and object of his redeeming love, while the func- 
 tion of mediating the divine teaching and direction for 
 the government of all is specialized in different official 
 persons, — the prophet, the priest, the king. 
 
 The patriarchal experience was clearly to the effect 
 that exemplary sacrifices could be a source of no satis- 
 faction to the Eternal, except as the genuine token of 
 submission and duty on the part of man. It was by his 
 faith, not by sacrifice as an outward ceremonial, that 
 Abraham came into his communion with divine truth 
 
SACRIFICE UNDER THE LAW. 253 
 
 and goodness, and to his consequent separation from the 
 sensuality and superstition of the time. This faith, com- 
 ing down by spiritual descent, was illustrated anew 
 when the children of Abraham and of Israel were 
 brought out of Egypt to be planted, as a holy nation 
 and heir of God, in their promised inheritance. 
 
 The story needs to be recalled only in its moral fea- 
 tures, by way of keeping up the connection of our argu- 
 ment. The ruler of Egypt, usurping the prerogatives of 
 God, had enslaved the people of God, and so was alien- 
 ating them from the divine service. Israel, the real 
 prince in the earthly household, was to be rehabilitated. 
 The spirit of religion was to call into action the feeling 
 of nationality, and patriotic zeal was to be enlisted in 
 working out the divine intention on behalf of all man- 
 kind. In the name of Jehovah the Israelites asked per- 
 mission to leave their burdens for three days, that they 
 might worship in the wilderness. But Egypt did not 
 recognize the God of Israel, and paid him no willing 
 tribute of obedience. Therefore Israel was redeemed 
 from bondage at greater cost, and especially at greater 
 cost to Egypt. Israel was called the chosen son of Jeho- 
 vah, his first-born. Should not the Egyptians be made to 
 feel Jehovah's displeasure at their offence, even at the 
 sacrifice of their own first-born sons if other chastise- 
 ments should fail?* 
 
 With Israel, also, the crisis was one of life and death. 
 They saw themselves in an evil case. For not only had 
 they roused the tyranny and violence of the Egyptians, 
 but their God, so they thought, might bring pestilence 
 upon them, if they failed of paying due honor to his call. 
 Their faith and obedience were appealed to as the ground 
 
 1 Exodus iv. 22, 23. 
 
254 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 of a difference to be put between them and their op- 
 pressors. In the emergency the Passover celebration 
 was instituted, as a token of their fellowship in the di- 
 vine counsels, and as a pledge of their exemption from 
 the signal infliction which Egypt's obstinacy had at last 
 made necessary. The Passover was thereafter a per- 
 petual memorial, not only of a popular redemption and 
 national birth, but of a divine ministration of life, 
 strength, and joy. 
 
 Here, again, the ruling idea of sacrifice is not wanton 
 waste or uncalled-for surrender; it is much rather the 
 levying of a wise and discriminating tax upon physical 
 life for the correction and conservation of spiritual hu- 
 manity as a whole. The flesh prepared and eaten in 
 strenuous haste, as the nourishment of sudden resolve 
 and urgent enterprise, becomes a sacramental element, — 
 the sign and pledge of seasonable succor evermore minis- 
 tered by unchangeable Goodness ; though the blood upon 
 the lintel told of unoffending human victims prematurely 
 taken out of a genial existence in the cause of Israel's 
 emancipation. How could Israel's debt to such victims 
 be paid, unless for them also Israel, the Son of God, was 
 was to offer himself freely in working out a universal 
 redemption ? 
 
 The transition from patriarchal to national religion, 
 marked by the Passover institution,^ involved no change 
 of principle, great as was the change of political and 
 social economy which it contemplated. Under the lead- 
 ership of Moses, the man of God, the national organiza- 
 tion is set forth as distinctively that of the people of 
 God. In the Hebrew political economy not only educa- 
 tional interests, but the moral and sanitary regulation of 
 
 ^ Exodus xii. 
 
SACRIFICE UNDER THE LAW. 255 
 
 society was inseparably linked with the public service of 
 God in the national worship. The worship of the na- 
 tion claimed the devoted and exclusive attention of a 
 tribe, while the priestly functions were still further 
 specialized in a family, and came to their consumma- 
 tion in a single man. Thus not only the rights and 
 privileges of citizenship, but the national charters and 
 hopes were guaranteed under an elaborate system of 
 religious observances, wherein all personal obligations 
 were determined with a scrupulous regard to the uni- 
 ties of time, place, and action. 
 
 Oneness of national worship required not only that 
 the priests be separated from other pursuits and conse- 
 crated to one service, but also that all objects belonging 
 to the holy place, or utensils employed in the sacred 
 ceremonies, should likewise be separated from common 
 uses, and devoted to their peculiar purpose. To make 
 holy, to set apart any object from common relations to a 
 sacred function or to a religious use, implied the two 
 correlative ideas of separation and atonement, — separa- 
 tion from all common applications, atonement to one 
 spiritual aim. Thus on behalf of the whole nation was 
 to be presented one unadulterated worship, one grateful 
 tribute of the best to the Giver of all, the homage in 
 which every loyal soul should have his personal offering 
 more worthily presented. 
 
 To the same purpose, also, the blood ^ taken as the 
 unity of physical life was made the sacrificial symbol of 
 a higher unity, the oneness of spiritual reconciliation. 
 It was evident then as now that there could be no unity 
 of spiritual devotion unless all physical life were in 
 
 1 Lev. viii., xvL, xvii. 11-14; Deut. xii. 23; Heb. ix. 22-28; 
 xiii. 12. 
 
256 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 effect laid upon the altar. To live physically might 
 mean to die spiritually, while to live spiritually would 
 assuredly demand, sooner or later, the giving up to death 
 of the flesh. And so, living or dying, it was for the 
 people of Jehovah to he his. They were to find in him 
 their inheritance and their home for the time present 
 and forever. The blood of the sacrifice was the token of 
 sanctification, not only for all inanimate things, but also 
 for the priests, and through them for the people. They 
 were a peculiar people, set apart from foreign entangle- 
 ments, united in the same spiritual motive and obedi- 
 ence. Their sacrifice meant, not that they were asking 
 to be exempted from physical death and moral correc- 
 tion, but that they were held to surrender their animal 
 and worldly existence, with its warring lusts, to the law 
 and Spirit of Jehovah — One in All. 
 
 As has been already intimated, distinctions of form in 
 sacrificial worship, while they may set in clearer light 
 interior relations of thought, cannot add to what is 
 essentially involved in the primitive burnt-offering. 
 Growth develops only what the germ contains. But 
 what seems at first concrete and simple, may push its 
 substance out into many branches. To make an offer- 
 ing by fire, to pay the tribute of life to the Giver of 
 life, is to express worship in its complete or undivided 
 sense, — submission with respect to whatever may be 
 feared, dependence as to all that can be desired or hoped 
 for. Such worship has its natural reaction in the loyal 
 spirit. There ensues the peace of faith, the persuasion 
 that what was well-meant on the worshipper's part must 
 be " blessed, approved, ratified, reasonable, and accepta- 
 ble," on the part of the Being adored. The peace of sub- 
 mission passes into the joy of communion; and this, 
 
 i 
 
SACRIFICE UNDER THE LAW. 257 
 
 again, suggests a new phase of the same worship. A 
 peace-offering may be brought, a festive, eucharistic wor- 
 ship, part of the victim going up by fire to the Source of 
 being, part eaten by the worshippers in thankful assur- 
 ance of harmony with their God and with one another. 
 Yet the original worship includes all, both the act of 
 surrender and the peace of submission. To trust in 
 Goodness is to enter into the inheritance of joy. The 
 thank-offering may be allowed a place and order of its 
 own. This is only to enrich the language of worship, 
 not to transcend its necessary sense. 
 
 In this way the spiritual oneness of worship deter- 
 mines a significant variation of forms. The vague sense 
 of ignorance, error, and possible offence, if not the clear 
 conviction of wrong-doing, is essential to worship of the 
 rudest type, as it is original in man. But with law comes 
 the clear knowledge of sin, which finds a specific expres- 
 sion in the sin-offering. The duller and darker appeal, 
 of a stranger in the earth seeking direction from above, 
 grows to the quickened moral perception and penitential 
 desire expressed in the expiatory sacrifice, — a form of 
 worship which requires confession, and perhaps restitu- 
 tion, in consequence of actual disobedience, after the 
 divine command has been distinctly given. 
 
 The law points out the practical conditions on which 
 the divine favor is pledged. It sets forth the terms on 
 which it is sought to bring the chosen people more and 
 more into spiritual accord with their Protector and 
 Prince. How can one share in a common worship un- 
 der the law when one is not careful to cherish an hab- 
 itual reverence for the law ? A citizen must hold to the 
 compact if he is not to be cut off from the covenant- 
 keeping people. But if he has violated the covenant, 
 
 17 
 
258 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 however ignorantly, then in penitence, absolution, and 
 reconciliation is his hope. The moral discipline and the 
 visible symbols by means of which the atoning process 
 is practically administered, so as to legitimate and fortify 
 the sense of reconciliation, are essential to the effective- 
 ness and perpetuity of the theocratic idea. If a loyal 
 spirit can be begotten and sustained, then the law of the 
 Lord, which is perfect, converting the soul, can work in 
 accordance with its infinite intention ; then the King of 
 Israel can teach and guide his people, opening their way 
 out of errors and sufferings into virtue and peace. 
 
 But a law that is to impress its spirit upon un- 
 schooled subjects must make provision for a becoming 
 patience and considerateness of discipline. It must 
 avoid the extremes both of penalty and of indulgence ; 
 or else, instead of reconciling and governing the trans- 
 gressor, it may precipitate a fatal event. Hence, while 
 the theocratic economy is ever intent upon reconciling 
 transgressors, the atonement is not without sacrifice. If 
 the way of transgressors is hard, the grace of reconcili- 
 ation, though free, is not allowed to be held cheap. 
 Something must set forth the offence, and mark the 
 repentance ; that the offender may be treated without 
 untruth or illusion. But once the offender is reconciled 
 to law he is in no equivocal position. He belongs to 
 the loyal society without protest or suspicion. To him, 
 as to all the true Israel, pertain " the adoption, and the 
 glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and 
 the service of God, and the promises." ^ He has only to 
 be willing and obedient ; he shall be taken gradually into 
 the fellowship and service of the supreme Euler. 
 
 In the atonement here contemplated a vital process is 
 
 1 Rom. ix. 4. 
 
SACRIFICE UNDER THE LAW. 259 
 
 carried on by means of specific acts. The specific acts of 
 atonement have to be repeated, in order that the spiritual 
 work of atonement may be completed. The law sustains 
 an economy of practical discipline in the interest of 
 spiritual reconciliation ; but does not bring to pass 
 the final oneness of God and his children. That all 
 change may have reference to one end, all effort to one 
 motive, all conduct to one principle, all possessions to 
 one purpose, all words to one thought, all notes to one 
 harmony, — just as all life, circulating in the veins of all 
 flesh, is referred to one living and immortal Creator, — 
 such is the atonement in its larger import, of which the 
 blood of the consecrated victim is made a sign. Physi- 
 cal sohdarity is laid under tribute in the cause of spirit- 
 ual unification. Life is poured forth from its physical 
 channels, that it may return to God in testimony of 
 loyal spirits, who have been taught betimes that all pro- 
 visional organization is to be offered up in the divine 
 service. 
 
 The worship of Israel under the law is therefore iden- 
 tical with the patriarchal and primitive sacrifice, — only 
 it is accommodated in details of ritual to new conditions. 
 To be at one with the Eternal is what the popular wor- 
 ship seeks in the daily sacrifice. That transgressors may 
 not fatally break away from the law, so as to forfeit 
 their personal interest in the constant offices and spirit- 
 ual comforts of the national worship, but be kept in 
 wholesome allegiance and perpetual peace, — such is the 
 atonement which the sin-offering and the kindred tres- 
 pass-offering are designed to signify and secure. Take 
 away from the altar service the idea of national and per- 
 sonal consecration, — the idea of bringing human spirits to 
 harmony and oneness according to the divine thought, — 
 
260 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 and what is left is not worship, but the contradiction of 
 worship. To confess, to repudiate and to forsake sin, 
 and so to find the promised mercy and relief ; to submit 
 one's life to the divine disposal, to accept the wUl of God 
 both in action and suffering at whatever cost, and so to 
 be at one with him ; what else can all the symbols of 
 purgation and devotion signify ? Communion with the 
 Wisdom that makes for righteousness, through truth as 
 at present ministered, in hope of higher communion 
 with the same Wisdom, through truth yet to be dis- 
 closed, is the only guaranty, as it is the universal law, 
 of man's spiritual development and moral harmony. 
 
 The law was not to be satisfied with perfunctory 
 ritual. It demanded that men should really live and 
 learn. No regulation diligence, no prescriptive decen- 
 cies, could avail without sincerity of soul. If sacrifices 
 and offerings did not signify worship, they could not but 
 falsify worship. The faculties and forms of religion, set 
 free from the service of rational faith, would be prompt 
 to find a career of worldly profit in a popular and cere- 
 monious superstition. So deep was the concern for spir- 
 itual reality, that the calendar of seasonable religious 
 observances was not rounded without a day of positive 
 and painful reflection upon by-gone experiences. To 
 afflict the soul in view of past errors was deemed essen- 
 tial in girding up the loins of the mind for coming 
 trial, — that spirits might rise with new vigor and hope, 
 law be established in new honor and obedience, through 
 a sense of the Goodness that would not allow even the 
 disobedient and unthankful to be without the tokens 
 of continued subjection and reconciliation to the law's 
 control. 
 
 Not whenever he might choose, not with ordinary 
 
SACRIFICE UNDER THE LAW. 261 
 
 preparation or any easy presumption of official purity, 
 was even the high-priest to present himself in the 
 presence-chamber of the Eternal.^ One day in the year, 
 with one series of sacrifices, wherein the sins of the 
 people are not only confessed and repudiated, but borne 
 away in a figure from the habitable earth, so that the 
 abodes of men may become one with the sanctuary of 
 God, — one high-priest, of one consecrated line, on behalf 
 of one holy nation, in one holiest of holy places, presents 
 one universal devotion, the concord of penitential desire 
 and pious resolve, referring all existence to one Creator, 
 and all law to one Authority. 
 
 It cannot be that we are to dissolve and destroy this 
 unity of divine service, by any extreme construction of 
 language that represents the high-priest as acting " for 
 the people." 
 
 To be the vicar of any power implies the responsible 
 action of that power, — not its non-recognition or efiace- 
 ment. The vicar is the substitute, only in being the 
 agent, of those for whom he stands. He is not their 
 substitute as distinguished from their organ. He does 
 not act that they may do nothing, but that they may 
 do more worthily. The high-priest passed within the 
 veil, not that the people might be left outside the hal- 
 lowed precinct, but that they might enter the sacred 
 court with due order and solemnity. He was not serv- 
 ing God in the place of the people because the people 
 were not serving, but because they were serving. He 
 stood for a kingdom of priests and a holy nation in its 
 unity, — for all as at one with the mediating priest ; as 
 the priest, in utter submission and devotion, was at one 
 with God. 
 
 1 Lev. xyi.; xxiii. 27; rxv. 9. He"b. x. 
 
262 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 The term "atonement," as employed in the law, is 
 neither mystical nor ambiguous. It has its practical ap- 
 plications in a religious economy which contemplates the 
 setting apart of things to the highest and holiest service. 
 If men are to be consecrated to God's service, atonement 
 refers to means and ministries to this end. A subject, 
 alienated in a particular way from his proper obedience 
 to law, may give new proof of personal allegiance, may be 
 reconciled to his permanent obligations and reinstated in 
 forfeited privileges, by means .of a particular act of con- 
 fession and submission for the past, and loyalty for the 
 future ; and such an act is called an atonement. The 
 law and the offender are by this means made to be, for 
 a hopeful instant certainly, at one. So in all acts of 
 pious obedience and submission, the divine mind and 
 will are conceived as coming into the motions of human- 
 ity, while, reciprocally, the human is drawing towards 
 its consummation in the divine. The real work of rec- 
 onciliation is nothing less than the eternal revelation of 
 the Father in his children. 
 
 In carrying on this revelation the service of the priest 
 cannot dispense with the service of the prophet ; and 
 both services must be united and fulfilled in the theo- 
 cratic "King, in order that the reign of God may be ap- 
 prehended as not the discipline of a peculiar people 
 alone, but of aU mankind. 
 
CHAPTEE VI 
 SACRIFICE ACCORDING TO THE PROPHETS. 
 
 AS the priest acts in communion with the people, or 
 - else his ministry falls into hopeless neglect, so 
 the sacrifice is recognized as the act of the worshipper 
 who brings it, or else sacrifice sinks into helpless rou- 
 tine. A devoted soul must speak through the devoted 
 thing : the devoted thing cannot make amends for the 
 lack of a devoted soul. Indeed, how should a man 
 alienate himself from the service of God, if not by pay- 
 ing its outward dues as a means of avoiding its inward 
 discipline ? Or, how should a man think to escape the 
 consequences of disloyalty, but by shifting his personal 
 liability to the shoulders of a victim ? But the fresh, 
 constant, popular inspiration, from which worship origi- 
 nally springs, will look for no escape from punishment, 
 under a just government, but in getting rid of that 
 which deserves and entails punishment. Take joyfully 
 your duty in the service of Truth, Goodness, God ; or, 
 expect the prompt and persistent retribution of disaster 
 and sorrow, which God will send as his testimony 
 against your sin, — such is the moral burden of the 
 prophets. 
 
 In all crises of the commonwealth, especially, with 
 what vivid and cogent appeals to conscience do they 
 
264 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 insist that outward ordinances must have their fulfilment 
 in spiritual fidelity, as the condition of their not being 
 profaned by carelessness and hypocrisy. So long as 
 the ritual of the altar was the proof of godliness in the 
 nation, it was also the promise of peace and prosperity ; 
 but when piety was discredited, then ceremonial sacri- 
 fices became flagrant offences, to be succeeded by con- 
 dign correction. 
 
 " I will go into thy house with burnt-offerings : I will 
 offer unto thee burnt-sacrifices of fatlings with the in- 
 cense of rams ; I will offer bullocks with goats." ^ Such 
 was the resolution of one who had called upon Jehovah 
 in trouble and desired to pay the tribute of pious thank- 
 fulness in the day of his deliverance. " Then shall the 
 cities of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem go, and 
 cry unto the gods unto whom they offer incense ; but 
 they shall not save them at all in the time of their 
 trouble." ^ " And if ye offer the blind for sacrifice, is it 
 not evil ? And if ye offer the lame and sick, is it not 
 evil ? Offer it now to thy governor, will he be pleased 
 with thee, or accept thy person ? " ^ These are typical 
 passages of prophetic reproof and warning. What are 
 the pictures of national dignity and prosperity, with 
 which prophetic faith fills up the future of a repentant 
 and restored Israel ? They are pictures that contem- 
 plate the universal prevalence of piety, according to the 
 familiar type of divine service at the Jewish altar. 
 " And they shall come from the cities of Judah and 
 from the places about Jerusalem, and from the land of 
 Benjamin, and from the plain, and from the mountains, 
 and from the South, bringing burnt-offerings, and sacri- 
 fices, and meat-offerings, and incense, and bringing sacri- 
 
 1 Ps. Ixvi. 13, 15. 2 jer. xi. 12. " Mai. i. 8. 
 
SACRIFICE ACCORDING TO THE PROPHETS. 265 
 
 fices of praise, unto the house of the Lord." ^ " For thus 
 saith the Lord, David shall not want a man to sit upon 
 the throne of the house of Israel ; neither shall the priests 
 and the Levites want a man before me to offer burnt- 
 offerings, and to kindle meat-offerings, and to do sacrifice 
 continually." 2 "And the Gentiles shall come to thy 
 light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising. . , . All 
 the flocks of Kedar shall be gathered together unto thee : 
 they shall come up with acceptance upon mine altar, 
 and I will glorify the house of my glory." ^ « And the 
 Lord shall be known to Egypt, and Egypt shall know 
 the Lord in that day, and they shall do sacrifice and 
 oblation ; yea, they shall vow a vow unto the Lord, and 
 perform it." * Such predictions are looked upon as re- 
 ferring ultimately to the Messianic era, though clothed 
 in the conventional drapery proper to the worship of 
 the day. 
 
 But, natural or unavoidable as it may be, that antici- 
 pations of the future should be set forth in imagery of 
 the present, too much should not be made of mere 
 imagery. How unnatural, if the prophetic teaching 
 were chargeable with a lack of lively testimony against 
 the weakness and unprofitableness of empty ritual. As 
 a matter of fact, however, when they maintain the valid- 
 ity of the rehgious spirit irrespective of outward observ- 
 ances, or inveigh against moral decadence dressed in the 
 robes of sanctity, or point out the mean shifts of a time- 
 serving priestcraft to throw off even the ritualistic re- 
 straints of a serious worship, it is then that the prophets 
 awaken us to a sense of something greater than moral 
 disgust at hypocrisies and oppressions of the time, — 
 
 1 Jer. xvii. 26. 2 jer. xxxiii. 17, 18. 
 
 3 Is. Ix. 3-7. * Is. xix. 21. 
 
266 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 even an original and eternal conviction possessing them 
 and bearing them on. They speak according to an un- 
 changeable law of divine revelation, — a law from which 
 one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass, till all be 
 fulfilled. They are as modern as the nineteenth century 
 of our Lord; while the faith of our time is not less 
 ancient than theirs, it being essentially the same yes- 
 terday, and to-day, and forever. 
 
 The venerable Samuel appears as the typical prophet 
 in his business-like expostulation with King Saul : " Hath 
 the Lord as great delight in burnt-offerings and sacrifices 
 as in obeying the voice of the Lord ? Behold, to obey 
 is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of 
 rams."^ The same moral inculcation is set forth in a 
 proverb by a wiser king than Saul : " To do justice and 
 judgment is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice." ^ 
 The immortal truth becomes the argument of deep per- 
 sonal experience in the Psalms : " Sacrifice and offering 
 thou didst not desire; mine ears hast thou opened; 
 burnt-offering and sin-offering hast thou not required. 
 Then said I, Lo, I come ; in the volume of the book it is 
 written of me, I delight to do thy will, my God : yea, 
 thy law is within my heart." ^ "0 Lord, open thou my 
 lips, and my mouth shall show forth thy praise. For 
 thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou 
 delightest not in burnt-offering. The sacrifices of God 
 are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, 
 God, thou wilt not despise." * Isaiah reproves the apos- 
 tasy of his people in the same strain : " Hear the word 
 of the Lord, ye rulers of Sodom : give ear unto the law 
 of our God, ye people of Gomorrah. To what purpose is 
 
 1 1 Sam. XV. 22. « Prov. xxi. 3. 
 
 3 Ps. xL 6-8 ; Heb. x. 5-9. * Ps. U. 15-17. 
 
SACRIFICE ACCORDING TO THE PROPHETS. 267 
 
 the multitude of your sacrifices unto me ? saith the 
 Lord : I am full of the burnt-ofiferings of rams, and the 
 fat of fed beasts ; and I delight not in the blood of bul- 
 locks, or of lambs, or of he-goats. When ye come to 
 appear before me, who hath required this at your hand, 
 to tread my courts ? Bring no more vain oblations ; in- 
 cense is an abomination unto me; the new-moons and 
 sabbaths, the calling of assemblies I cannot away with ; 
 it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting. Your new- 
 moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth ; they 
 are a trouble unto me ; I am weary to bear them. And 
 when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes 
 from you ; yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not 
 hear ; your hands are full of blood." ^ 
 
 Is there then no call to repentance, no hope of reconcil- 
 iation ? If the sublime service of the altar has sunk to a 
 sordid ritual of the shambles, is there not a law of atone- 
 ment, vital and spiritual, such as might restore signifi- 
 cance to signs, in giving reality to service ? No sacrifices 
 with which God would be well pleased ? Hear the re- 
 sponse : " Wash you, make you clean ; put away the evil 
 of your doings from before mine eyes ; cease to do evil ; 
 learn to do well ; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, 
 judge the fatherless, plead for the widow." ^ Again: 
 *' But to this man will I look, even to him that is poor, 
 and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word. He 
 that killeth an ox is as if he slew a man ; he that sacri- 
 ficeth a lamb, as if he cut off a dog's neck ; he that offer- 
 eth an oblation, as if he offered swine's blood ; he that 
 burneth incense, as if he blessed an idol. Yea, they 
 have chosen their own ways, and their soul delighteth 
 in their abominations." ^ All the prophets are moved 
 1 Is. i. 10-15. 2 Is. i. 16, 17. 8 Is. ixvi. 2, 3. 
 
268 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 by the same moral conviction : " To what purpose cometh 
 there to me incense from Sheba, and the sweet cane from 
 a far country ? Your burnt-offerings are not acceptable, 
 nor your sacrifices sweet unto me." ^ " Thus saith the 
 Lord of hosts, the God of Israel; put your burnt-offerings 
 unto your sacrifices, and eat flesh. For I spake not unto 
 your fathers, in the day that I brought them out of Egypt, 
 concerning burnt-offerings or sacrifices; but this thing 
 commanded I them, saying : Obey my voice, and I will be 
 your God, and ye shall be my people : and walk ye in 
 all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be 
 well unto you." ^ " For I desired mercy and not sacrifice ; 
 and the knowledge of God more than burnt-offerings." ^ 
 " I hate, I despise your feast-days, and I will not smell 
 in your solemn assemblies. Though ye offer me burnt- 
 offerings and your meat-offerings, I will not accept them ; 
 neither will I regard the peace-offerings of your fat beasts. 
 Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs ; for I 
 will not hear the melody of thy viols. But let judgment 
 run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty 
 stream." * 
 
 In this characteristic testimony of the prophets there 
 seems to be more than a burning zeal for the restoration 
 of a degraded ritual The indignant conscience of pro- 
 phetic souls is outgrowing its respect for the old cere- 
 monies, and is growing into a longing to live in a simple 
 moral rectitude, that should be equal to originating its 
 own practical expression. The sacrificing of beasts as an 
 order of worship was doomed to pass away. It was at best 
 but a grotesque shadow. Hence the spirit of prophecy 
 in its highest flight declined to use the altar language, 
 
 1 Jer. vi. 20. » jer. vii. 21-23. 
 
 " Hosea vi. 6. * Amos v. 21-24. 
 
SACRIFICE ACCORDING TO THE PROPHETS. 269 
 
 and rejoiced in anticipations of " a new covenant." " Be- 
 hold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a 
 new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the 
 house of Judah; not according to the covenant that I 
 made with their fathers, in the day that I took them by 
 the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, which 
 covenant they break, although I was an husband unto 
 them, saith the Lord; but this shall be the covenant 
 that I will make with the house of Israel: After those 
 days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward 
 parts, and write it in their hearts ; and will be their 
 God, and they shall be my people. And they shall 
 teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man 
 his brother, saying, know the Lord; for they shall all 
 know me from the least of them unto the greatest of 
 them, saith the Lord : for I wiU forgive their iniquity, 
 and I will remember their sin no more." ^ The outward 
 and exemplary teaching can have its meaning only in 
 the inward revelation. There are no atonements that 
 can atone, no humiliations that can move the divine 
 clemency, or satisfactions that can appease the divine 
 displeasure, apart from inward obedience. " The law of 
 the Lord is perfect, converting the soul." Our spiritual 
 progress and our spiritual consummation are in obedi- 
 ence. The maledictions of Mount Ebal are not cancelled 
 by the ministrations of a worldly sanctuary, but are kept 
 in salutary remembrance rather. Eternal oneness with 
 Eternal Eighteousness, and this alone, will perfectly su- 
 persede their application. The absolute Being must be 
 known as possessing and moving dependent natures. 
 
 The law and the prophets and the psalms know only 
 one principle of progressive virtue and ultimate peace, 
 
 1 Jer. xxxi. 31-34 j Heb. x. 15-18. 
 
270 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 namely, faith moving in obedience to the revelation of 
 God. No canonized experience gives any principle but 
 faith, or any method but obedience, for superseding the 
 sacrifices of alienation — tears and blood — with the sac- 
 rifices of righteousness — joy, praise, thanks. On the con- 
 trary, all indulgence of distrust and opposition on the 
 part of moral beings with reference to the Creator is 
 under an unchangeable law of pain and loss, to the end 
 that correction may result in reconciliation. In other 
 words, there is a spiritual regeneration for which nature 
 was originally made, and for which the long-suffering of 
 God is engaged. All messengers and ministers of good- 
 will are workers together with God ; and in this holy 
 service the faultless personal consecration consists in 
 perfect obedience to divine inspiration moving on to a 
 perfection of self-sacrifice in benevolent conflict with 
 powers of darkness. 
 
 Accordingly, the Scriptures of the New Covenant 
 bring us to one Mediator between God and man, the 
 man Christ Jesus,^ in whom the Law and the Prophets, 
 all symbols and functions of atonement, are fulfilled for 
 all ages and for all men. 
 
 1 1 Tim. ii. 5. 
 
CHAPTEE VII. 
 
 THE LAW OF ATONEMENT FULFILLED IN THE CHRIST. 
 
 TT is to be noted that the typical portraiture in which 
 -*- the Scriptures point our regards to the Man of prom- 
 ise and perfection, has reference to his unique personal 
 calling in relation to his fellow-men. All good service 
 is shadow to his substance. He is the Eedeemer of his 
 people, saves them from their sins, is the Mediator of 
 a new covenant, — the eternal compact of peace and 
 communion between God and man. His are the days 
 wherein the Son of man is glorified as the Son of God. 
 The First-begotten and Well-beloved of the Father is 
 announced as Teacher and Guide of the human family. 
 In him first God's spiritual adoption of his natural off- 
 spring has come to its perfect and authoritative realiza- 
 tion. God's reign in humanity is personally revealed. 
 The way of perfection is opened to all. The last times 
 and the best, the times of restitution and consumma- 
 tion, have succeeded to the darker dispensation. The 
 promised Prince of the house of Israel is also the desire 
 of all nations, the universal Keconciler and Kuler. Di- 
 vine truth in his heart is to move the utterance of 
 human lips till mutual exhortation shall cease in a 
 universal sway of truth, and the remembrance of sins 
 shall pass away in the endless celebration of forgiveness 
 and righteousness. 
 
272 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 This divine ideal fills all the moments of our Lord's 
 life, and is owned by him, whether consciously or uncon- 
 sciously, as the law and inspiration of his career. His 
 ministry is represented by those who could not perfectly 
 appreciate it ; and still it is distinctly conceived as that 
 of a man whose spiritual powers were ever at one with. 
 the divine thought, in an unshaken constancy of obedi- 
 ence to clear convictions of what the Father would have 
 him to do, — all natural motions and involuntary impulses 
 held in timely check and reasonable subordination. The 
 energies and orbit of personal duty are regarded as con- 
 tinually reaching their practical demonstration and just 
 definition in his conduct, in order, not that the result 
 may be expressed in a scientific formula or poetic delin- 
 eation, but that the spiritual action may communicate 
 itself through faith, and so pass into the movement of 
 individual life, into the habits of society, into the history 
 of the world. 
 
 In fine, the Saviour was to save his people from their 
 sins by bringing them to the life of righteousness ; and 
 this, not according to formal prescriptions and rules out- 
 worn, but by a renovation of being which should make 
 them ultimately perfect even as the Father in heaven is 
 perfect. God and man, the Father and the Son, in the 
 unity of the same Spirit, — this is the revelation of the 
 Christ ; this is the fulfilment of law and prophecy ; for 
 the reason that it is the original and eternal conception 
 of the Creator coming through gradual and mysterious 
 processes in nature to its first realization in a perfect 
 man. And this bringing of the First-begotten into the 
 world, this revelation of one man with the unlimited 
 anointing of the divine Spirit, was expressly to the end 
 that all men in like manner might become partakers of 
 
LAW FULFILLED IN THE CHRIST. 273 
 
 the divine nature. To make this reconciliation of the 
 divine and human universal at whatever personal sacri- 
 fice determines the Christian law of atonement, the law 
 which the Christ magnified and made honorable through 
 his Cross. This law is one of spiritual causation, and 
 contemplates the necessary cost of overcoming moral 
 inertia and active resistance, so as to vindicate all the 
 outlay of history in a glory of the Father and a consum- 
 mation of mankind to be ultimately revealed. 
 
 But this simple appreciation of the historic reality, — 
 does it truly sum up the Redeemer's most spiritual and 
 solemn conception of his own ministry ? Could any 
 words surpass in depth and comprehensiveness those of 
 his supplication to the Father on the eve of his cruci- 
 fixion ? " Neither pray I for these alone, but for them 
 also which shall believe on me through their word, that 
 they all may be one ; as thou. Father, art in me, and I in 
 thee, that they also may be one in us : that the world 
 may believe that thou hast sent me." ^ Wliat could he 
 add to this intercession that would enlarge its scope? 
 What could he take away from it without dissolving its 
 completeness ? If this prayer be not the assurance of 
 what the Christ sought and hoped on our behalf, of what 
 subordinate desire or less comprehensive travail of soul 
 could he promise us the fulfilment ? Again, if this prayer 
 be the worship of his life, and express the spiritual ser- 
 vice to which he consecrated himself in death, it must 
 interpret and co-ordinate all details of his ministry. 
 
 At any rate, the unique priesthood and worship in 
 which the Christ approaches the consummation of his 
 earthly sacrifice raises humanity above all conventional 
 boundaries of time or space, and presents it as moving 
 
 1 John xvii. 20, 21. 
 18 
 
274 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 in an eternal order of the universe. Judea and Galilee, 
 Jews and Gentiles, ages of local phenomena and pedan- 
 tic annals, — how they fade and vanish away in the 
 eternal reign ! The kingdom of God the Father includes 
 the whole development of man the Son ; it includes 
 man in the thought of the Creator before all worlds, 
 man coming in the order of nature and time, man eter- 
 nally begotten, the spiritual offspring and immortal heir 
 of the Father, for whose sake the earthly family both 
 lives and dies. The spiritual household of the Father 
 begotten and bom from being to being, not of Jews only 
 but of Gentiles also, — is not this the one reality and 
 realm, to which all creatures and all creations, according 
 to our knowledge, are pointing and serving ? 
 
 This infinite domain of life and power is brought to 
 the consciousness and attention of infantile and way- 
 ward members of the universal society, through that 
 spiritual inspiration which determines a physical and 
 moral resistance ; and in struggling with resistance men 
 are trained for their high destiny. To animate inertness, 
 to overrule contradiction, to reconcile opposition, to con- 
 summate personal loyalty in perfect freedom, in a word, 
 to make God's strength perfect in man's weakness, — 
 such is indeed the type of spiritual causation wherein 
 our present experience is involved ; but by faith we see 
 the conflict atoned for in the righteousness, peace, and 
 joy, toward which it tends. 
 
 Accordingly, the Christ did not open communication 
 with men from a serene seclusion, as example of an 
 ideal aloofness of divine life from the struggles of hu- 
 manity ; nor did he propose to realize an ordinary peace 
 on earth. He came to inaugurate division, to lead an 
 invading force, to discipline the hosts of faith in practi- 
 
LA W FULFILLED IN THE CHRIST. 275 
 
 cal obedience to the universal Spirit of Love. Trium- 
 phal repose was reserved for an ulterior revelation. The 
 miracle of his ministry is that it shows a man of perfect 
 simplicity and intuitive penetration, — one working for 
 God and man, for body and soul, for past and future, 
 yet betrayed by no contrariety of appeals into confusion 
 of thought or vacillation in conduct. Having all counsel 
 and might from within, he acts in perfect faith ; and it 
 is the absolute sovereignty of truth in him that wins 
 the confidence and devotion of the faithful, — marking, 
 with an adverse judgment no matter what power or pre- 
 ponderance of unbelief in the present evil world. Eman- 
 uel, God with us, — there is no other name for eternal 
 life. Prophet, priest, king, — all are one in the divine 
 Man ; and he fulfils all functions of divine service in a 
 daily liturgy of simple action, wherein the supreme dig- 
 nity is not divorced from the lowliest beneficence, and 
 the immaculate holiness reaches out a hand to bless the 
 penitent, no matter how polluted. His moral impact is 
 so mighty that the world's massive and inveterate habit 
 gives promise, in its resisting shock, of the new move- 
 ment that shall pervade it. All things are not brought 
 in a moment to their ultimate perfection, but nothing 
 can continue in one stay : no law can abide in its old 
 construction, no prophecy but surpasses its formal limi- 
 tations, no personal virtue but needs to be bom again, 
 no accumulations of ancient wisdom in social order but 
 must dissolve and be reorganized in the age to come. 
 Eternal Eeason, in the fulness of an all-loving and all- 
 inspiring zeal, will not allow even a provisional and 
 relative rectitude to limit the law of ultimate perfection ; 
 but dutiful Devotion, owning the aptitude for godliness 
 already evinced by man, is calling forward, — saving the 
 
276 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 very elect from a false appreciation of that whereto they 
 have already attained, and vindicating for the most rep- 
 robate the prerogative of entering voluntarily into the 
 calling and election of the divine Love. 
 
 If we ask what is the essential element of the glad 
 tidings of God brought by the Christ, the answer meets 
 us everywhere in one word, — Love. The eternal Word 
 of nature becomes the final utterance of Scripture. But 
 the Scriptures give us no conception of Love incarnate, 
 — Love conditioned in human nature and human society 
 for the sake of their regeneration, — without the sign of 
 self-sacrifice. The gospel is a gospel of triumph, under 
 the banner of the cross : " In hoc signo vinces.*' As the 
 ministry of Jesus was one of love in strenuous conflict 
 with forces of unscrupulous self-will, it was accompa- 
 nied by a growing sense of the way in which alone it 
 could naturally end. 
 
 Was he sent to bring the unchangeable Eeason into 
 active contact with mankind ? Did he represent the 
 eternal Father as ever rendering the testimony practi- 
 cally due to his own perfections in the treatment of his 
 offspring ? Was he the hierophant, also, of the world's 
 proper worship — of what man should render unto God 
 for all his benefits ? Then must this man have some- 
 what to ofifer.^ A priest forever, it is for him to offer 
 the human homage, not according to the sentiment and 
 custom of a passing day, but according to the eternal 
 spirit and truth of worship. 
 
 Hence, as we study the notices given in the New 
 Testament, of what was said and done by the Christ, we 
 find all rational suggestions and necessary ideas of duty 
 fulfilled in him. He is the organ and expression of uni- 
 
 1 Heb. viii. 4. 
 
LAW FULFILLED IN THE CHRIST. 277 
 
 versal righteousness, — the absolute righteousness of God 
 as well as the reciprocal duty of man. The well-beloved 
 Son, given from everlasting by the Father for love of his 
 world, consecrating himself to the Father in the unity of 
 the eternal Spirit, for the work that was given him to 
 do, he comes in the fulness of time, as at once the ex- 
 press image of the Father's character and the supreme 
 example of filial devotion. Who could convince him of 
 sin ? In what relation did his obedience fail ? To what 
 institution of man did he not render due honor for the 
 Father's sake? To what requirement of divine Love was 
 he wanting on behalf of the children ? What burden of 
 proof or persuasion was he not ready to assume in his tes- 
 timony to the truth ? What fruit of good living was not to 
 grow, and is not still to grow, from the seed he planted ? 
 
 Each stage in the proper development of a human 
 being, from the incipient energy of natural existence to 
 spiritual completeness of life in communion with the 
 Father, is marked in the history of Jesus; only, the 
 crises of his career are indicated, not by any reluctance 
 with respect to the new initiative, but by prompt as well 
 as deliberate action. We see one epoch rounding itself to 
 fulness in a new sense of duty that governs the succeed- 
 ing movement, — in a course of unbroken obedience. 
 
 The law of atonement through sacrifice appears in the 
 earliest reconciliation of the inward and the outward 
 life. The submission of childhood to its appointed con- 
 ditions is not without foretaste of what the higher ser- 
 vice will cost. The age of twelve years, the visit to the 
 temple, the exciting contact with grave teachers of the 
 law, the turning of his thought away from customary 
 dependence upon those who had cherished his Hfe as 
 one with theirs, and who now sought him sorrowing, — 
 
278 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 what was this but the premonition of a unique Sonship, 
 which, though schooled for about thirty years ^ in sub- 
 jection to all authorities and institutions that could rep- 
 resent to him the will of the Father, would by and by 
 set him apart from his kindred, in the fact of his being 
 about the Father's business on their behalf ? ^ His way 
 was prepared. Crooked places were made straight, and 
 rough places plain. Yet the last and greatest of the 
 servants sent before the advancing Prince could not 
 cause the wilderness to disappear, or make perfect the 
 highway which it was reserved for him alone to open. 
 That lonely trial in the wilderness, wherein the distinc- 
 tion between the divine method of moral influence, and 
 conventional methods of worldly success was brought 
 out in its genuine character, proved the Prince's loyalty 
 to the reign of God, and proved, also, what that loyalty 
 would have to contend with in subduing all things.^ 
 Then came the strenuous public ministry, brief as stren- 
 uous, — vindicating the law and the prophets by the 
 setting forth of their full vigor and reach in word and 
 deed, — the training of apostles, the general yet secret 
 working of truth, popular docility, and consequent oppo- 
 sition of menaced authority, culminating in the crucifix- 
 ion ; and thereafter endless reconciliation and triumph, 
 — the resurrection, the re-animation of the faithful, the 
 great commission, the dispensation of the Holy Spirit, 
 the proclamation of the glad tidings, the exaltation of 
 the Christ, not merely in the glory that was before the 
 foundation of the world, essential and eternal, but in the 
 glory that was ensuing and evermore to foUow increas- 
 ingly, till creation, providence, and redemption should 
 be fulfilled according to one purpose of the Eternal. 
 
 1 Luke iil 23. 2 Luke ii. 41-52. » Matt. iv. 1-11. 
 
LAW FULFILLED IN THE CHRIST. 279 
 
 The Evangelists point to the divine Word as uttering 
 itself in syllables and moments, yet so as to signify the 
 absolute truth. The peculiar character of Christ's work 
 is conceived to be in the fact that, as he is addressing 
 himself to men, his teaching reaches its aim with effec- 
 tive precision and authority, and there is no just appeal 
 from faith, nor rational need of argument. 
 
 The great Teacher was not a doctrinaire. He did not 
 set himself first of all to correct the intellectual systems 
 or the popular theories of his day. He was the Eevealer 
 of spiritual life, not the scribe conventionally instructed 
 in the law. His intuitive faith and devotion recognized 
 the infinite thought and energy in nature, exactly at the 
 point where the grosser medium seems to limit or resist 
 the controlling Will. To teach implies limitation and 
 resistance. To make disciples implies an overcoming 
 influence and constant progress. To be the vital Truth 
 and the quickening Word, to inspire in mankind the 
 assurance that the Father's eternal universe includes 
 and governs the child's passing world, — this implies the 
 regeneration and the world to come. It means, not that 
 the pangs of birth or the dangers of growth are super- 
 seded by any magical method, at variance with the law 
 of spiritual creation as already made known, but rather 
 that the same creative process moves on to its highest 
 ends, — in spite of animalism, ignorance, prejudice, — in 
 spite of selfish prepossessions and wilful ambitions, 
 which are permitted to declare themselves without dis- 
 guise, that the new order may win its way in no illusive 
 success. 
 
 It is apparently because ultimate success, in spite of 
 initial resistance, is a necessary mark of divine revela- 
 tion, that so much is made in Scripture of the oppor- 
 
280 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 tuneness of the Christ's coming. The Light shining in 
 darkness prevails within a certain range, or it would not 
 shine at all. Its period is not that of impenetrable 
 chaos. When the preparation was fulfilled, then the 
 ruling order began to be manifest. The Saviour appeared 
 in the company of the expectant, the people of alternat- 
 ing hope and fear, who looked for " the acceptable year 
 of the Lord," yet dreaded "the day of vengeance" of 
 their God. Unobtrusively, he entered, not at the mas- 
 sive gates of Jerusalem, but into the lowly tents of 
 the wilderness. His disciples were gathered, not from 
 those whose worldly fortunes perplexed them with fear 
 of change, but from simple people, whose aspirations, if 
 not very intelligent or very high, were at least so genu-« 
 ine as to admit of correction in the progress of their 
 faith. His beatitudes were not for those most flatter- 
 ingly circumstanced, but for those even under the great- 
 est outward adversities, who were ready for the most 
 devoted co-operation with the reign of God. For, as the 
 kind of work in which Jesus and his disciples were to 
 be engaged implied the kind of suffering their faithful- 
 ness would encounter, — so those were the blessed, in 
 comparison with others, who were already disciplined in 
 the common schooling of patience and fortitude. Such, 
 having some preparation for their Christian conflict, would 
 be apt to accept just pains, while shrinking with a true 
 instinct from precipitate and bootless sacrifices. 
 
 The few docile spirits whom the Forerunner's words 
 had pointed to the new Teacher, found a ready access to 
 his intimacy, and were very soon made partners of his 
 more general ministry. They became his personal fol- 
 lowers, his family and school, chosen and trained that 
 they might duly apprehend the moving principle and 
 
LAW FULFILLED IN THE CHRIST. 281 
 
 ultimate aim of his work, so as to bear a sufficiently ample 
 and undiluted testimony of him to the world. For their 
 sakes he sanctified himself that they also might be sanc- 
 tified through the truth. As the Father sent him into 
 the world, so he sent them. Meanwhile he took them 
 with him as he went about doing good, that they might 
 know what it would be to follow after him ; and taught 
 them to see in his works of power and charity signs of 
 greater works, that should mark the progress of his reign 
 in all the world. There was in him a mystery of per- 
 sonal force to quell opposition and to command observ- 
 ance, and an equal mystery of moderation and meekness 
 in appealing only to the reasonable confidence of men. 
 " If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. 
 But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works : 
 that ye may know and believe that the Father is in me, 
 and I in him." ^ The day's sights and the day's employ- 
 ments were transfigured in his parables. Common things 
 began to glow with a light from heaven, until the very 
 senses, as well as the consciences, of men, were quickened 
 to appreciate the economy of divine Goodness underneath 
 what seemed before the dull routine of existence. But 
 if contemporary processes and aspects of the divine reign 
 were familiarly illustrated in parables, the fulfilment of 
 law and the perfection of life found expression in the 
 Sermon on the Mount. Life was to reach its fulness 
 according to no worldly ideal, but simply in the com- 
 munion of infinite Love. " Be ye therefore perfect, even 
 as your Father which is in heaven is perfect ; " ^ this is 
 real perfection — the eternal life. 
 
 The imperfection of the passing existence then, as now, 
 was not shown in a lack of time-honored maxims and 
 
 1 John X. 37, 38. 2 Matt. v. 48. 
 
282 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 wholesome regulations, but rather in false distinctions 
 and inadequate conceptions. Sayings handed down from 
 elder times were perversely employed to limit or to sup- 
 press the active moral inspiration of living men. The 
 spirit of law was sacrificed to an arbitrary construction 
 of particular commandments. "Thou shalt not kill;" 
 " thou shalt not commit adultery ; " " thou shalt not for- 
 swear thyself," — did such requirements signify that the 
 avoidance of crime is the sum total of moral duty, and 
 so make void the fundamental law on which all special 
 prohibitions depend ? Is not the law of divine benevo- 
 lence abrogated when the demand that man should love 
 his neighbor is held to imply the distinction of for- 
 eigners or enemies whom it is lawful to hate ? Can man 
 be perfect in the love of God, who is not at one with 
 Him in hating nothing that He hath made? But let 
 men apprehend the universal Love as working from the 
 very beginning in all human experience, throwing up 
 betimes certain legal ramparts to guide and restrain the 
 individual action in its progress toward an end; and 
 then they might the more readily apprehend the end 
 contemplated, might see the law fulfilled in the Christ. 
 Could the inspiration of righteousness proceed from any 
 source, or know any end, but the creative Goodness ? 
 Could rational worship contemplate anything less than 
 harmony of spirit and action with the divine character ; 
 or, aspire to anything more ? Was the righteousness of 
 the Father the poor forensic ruling that could know 
 only the literal bond ? Was it not the unity of all di- 
 vine attributes, transcending all temporary judgments, 
 extending tokens of good-will to the evil and the un- 
 thankful, that evil might be overcome with good, and 
 disappear in the fulness of life ? 
 
LAW FULFILLED IN THE CHRIST. 283 
 
 At any rate, the Son of God kindled in his disciples a 
 zeal for human beings according to what he declared to 
 be possible with God in their eternal life. He recog- 
 nized the ideal end of life in life's beginning. To him 
 the Alpha and Omega of human development were in- 
 dissolubly bound together in one organic whole. He 
 apprehended the consummation sought as involving the 
 progress to be achieved, the instant motive and act as 
 having their integrity in the end to which they were 
 subservient. He sought to mould human efforts by the 
 faith of a divine purpose, which solicited and made use 
 of them. In this way he animated society with a virtue 
 superior to traditions, and called to sacrifices that were 
 more than symbols, — the very actions and proofs of 
 devotion. The so-called administration of justice, which 
 seeks the protection of society by the punishment of 
 offences according to special outward definitions, neces- 
 sary as it may be, is an administration by which justice 
 is missed even in the fulfilment of law. The divine law 
 has a nobler purpose, if not a costlier method : — " But I 
 say unto you, love your enemies, bless them that curse 
 you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them 
 which despitefuUy use you and persecute you, that ye 
 may be the children of your Father which is in heaven ; 
 for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the 
 good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust." ^ 
 This is the law which holds eternally to its moral end. 
 It brings the goal of perfection into the method of devo- 
 tion. It contemplates the triumph of justice as depend- 
 ing upon the sufferings of the faithful more than upon 
 punishment of the disobedient ; and supersedes the mere 
 pain even of punitive infliction, by a sense of fatherly 
 
 1 Matt. V. 44, 45. 
 
284 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 discipline for the sake of complete reconciliation. The 
 Spirit of holiness in possession of a consecrated body, — 
 here at last is the living Temple and the hving Sacrifice. 
 To preach righteousness in the great congregation, to 
 find supreme delight in doing the Father's will, to reveal 
 the infinite Love in a service which lays all finite re- 
 sources upon its altar, to proclaim the glad tidings, — 
 all that God can promise and all that man can enjoy, 
 " not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after 
 the power of indissoluble life," ^ — such was the Messi- 
 anic calling. The High Priest of universal nature was 
 to realize the fulness of truth in the fulness of grace, the 
 fulness of peace in the fulness of righteousness. 
 
 Of course, in the atoning struggle it was not for the 
 Christ or for his followers to doubt the efficiency of their 
 spiritual testimony because it encountered a natural 
 opposition, nor to be diverted from the fight of faith in 
 order to take up the arms of a worldly warfare. Eather 
 let them welcome afflictions in the fiesh, — turning the 
 other cheek to the smiter, outdoing in benevolence the 
 measure even of unjust exactions, communicating in 
 good things with such as are disposed to render only 
 evil things in return ; that they may overcome evil with 
 good. It is the glory of the end that demands and sus- 
 tains the self-devotion of the service. Not poHtical 
 economy, not social equity by standards of common law, 
 not how perfect beings will live together when there is 
 no more knowledge of evil, — the teaching of the Christ 
 is how to redeem the world from the bondage of its own 
 traditions and habits, that men may come to the service 
 which is perfect freedom. 
 
 It was the Christ's self-devotion that gave practical 
 
 1 Heb. viL 16. 
 
LAW FULFILLED IN THE CHRIST. 285 
 
 embodiment and efficiency to his doctrine, and proved 
 him the perfect Mediator of all needed changes in the 
 convictions and conduct of mankind. The motions of 
 life began to be referred to the true centre and law 
 of spiritual attraction. Attention to matters of every- 
 day existence was both humbled and exalted by being 
 brought into just dependence upon the Father, who in 
 his righteousness was ruling the spiritual orbit of hu- 
 manity with its unknown times and seasons. Physical 
 suffering and death fell into nothingness by comparison 
 with the glory and triumph of the immortal Man. But 
 as making for this glory and triumph, suffering rose to a 
 significance comporting with the majesty of Truth, and 
 testimony reached its consummation in martyrdom. As 
 the Eevelation, most needed on account of its necessary 
 superiority to natural tendencies, would, for the same 
 reason, excite the most violent reaction on the part of 
 the unenlightened ; so the chief witness in such a reve- 
 lation was the predestined victim, that he might become 
 the all-sufficient illuminator of mankind. From the 
 very foundation of the world, there was before him a 
 baptism of suffering. From the very beginning of his 
 earthly ministry, he labored under a sense of how slight 
 was the testimony of word and act, how faint were the 
 successive scintillations of light and heat from within, 
 compared with the final apocalypse of Love, — his dying 
 for the world. If he had not stirred the world to mor- 
 tal resistance, had he sufficiently vindicated the change 
 which divine Love would work in the world's ways? 
 Must he not suffer as it behooved that the Christ should 
 suffer, that he might enter into his glory ? 
 
 Hence that very striking representation of the Evan- 
 gelists, that the Saviour was ever counting upon his 
 
286 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 cross as the indispensable medium of his revelation in 
 the souls of men. As the faithful of the old dispensa- 
 tion could not fully know what their own lives meant 
 till the promised Messiah had fulfilled his cycle in the 
 flesh, so the most intimate disciple of the Christ had to 
 watch the mystery of his incarnation to its close, in 
 order to apprehend its secret. Whither will he finally 
 lead ? This is the question which concerns a faith that 
 shall be loyal to the end. The sovereign Eeality must 
 be discovered in order that faith may consciously hold 
 its own. Assurances most simply phrased are realized 
 only in the events to which they refer; and germs of 
 grace lie hid in the comparative sterility of nature, till 
 the chill and darkness are dispersed, and the spiritual 
 atmosphere is pervaded with the regenerating power. 
 
 The chosen disciples cannot come to the fulness of their 
 apostleship while the Master is laying restrictions upon 
 their speech, lest by unauthorized outgivings they should 
 hinder the just impression of his own ministry. It re- 
 quires all their patience and submission to wait for what 
 they are taught to feel they cannot know at present; 
 and no personal sympathy can restrain the words of 
 rebuke and disenchantment which the faithful Teacher 
 addresses to those who are flattering themselves with a 
 mistaken notion of what the way of perfection is. How 
 shall disciples learn that pre-eminence in his kingly court 
 is no prize of vulgar ambition ? The serious young ruler, 
 coming in the charm of moral aspiration and prosperous 
 virtue, willing to know what is yet lacking to his des- 
 tiny, how shall he overcome a natural reluctance at 
 parting with great possessions for the sake of the poor, 
 and at taking up the cross for the sake of his Leader, 
 before that Leader shall by his own example have trans- 
 
LAW FULFILLED IN THE CHRIST. 287 
 
 figured the ruggeduess of sacrificial experience in the 
 light of eternal life ? Or Peter himself, can he follow 
 his Lord in the final trial, before he has been taught by 
 what manner of dying he is to glorify God ? 
 
 There is one law of self-sacrifice in reconciling the 
 world to the Father, — the law of the Father's love. " It 
 is enough for the disciple that he be as his Master, and 
 the servant as his Lord." ^ But what is enough for the 
 Master ? What but that majestic condescension, which 
 is sufficient to make disciples of all nations? If the 
 faithful need to see their perfection in a practical exam- 
 ple of goodness upon earth, what shall determine the 
 nature of that example, if not the purpose of penetrat- 
 ing the darkness, and subduing the unbelief, that rejects 
 the just One, repudiates his Sonship and his reign, and 
 owns no king but Csesar? Is it not in the nature of 
 things that the power of darkness should have its hour ? 
 Is it not of temporary necessity that the established un- 
 behef, rather than the infirm faith, should measure the 
 difficulty, and graduate the cost of bringing men to ac- 
 knowledge the truth ? Must there not come the critical 
 conflict, the decisive moment, in the Father's struggle 
 with his erring children ? They know neither the Father 
 nor the Son. "They know not what they do." But 
 when their deed is done, its character shall forevermore 
 be recognized. As a general, intent upon victory such 
 as shall be followed by final peace, tries the strength 
 of his antagonist, compelling him to unmask his posi- 
 tions and deploy his forces, that the conclusive action 
 may take place, so the Captain of salvation, with equal 
 prudence and courage, tried the thoughts, dispositions, 
 and tempers of men, conciliating the simple and candid 
 
 * Matt. X. 25. 
 
288 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 people, and in that very fact exciting the envy and con- 
 solidating the opposition of the hypocritical and design- 
 ing, until the contradiction of sinners against himself 
 was uttered in the desperate fervor of embattled hostil- 
 ity. Then he said : " Father, the hour is come ; glorify 
 thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee." 
 
 To save the King from his suffering was to save him 
 from his glory. What remained, therefore, but that 
 spiritual power and worldly forces should do their re- 
 spective works, according to that historic economy of 
 moral freedom and responsibility in which the will of 
 the Father had unchangeably declared itself? It was 
 for the injustice that proved the extremity of man's 
 spiritual need to dictate the suffering that should prove 
 the sufficiency of the Father's love. It is this reconcil- 
 ing condescension of God to man in the person of his 
 Son, which is the motive and assurance of man's recon- 
 ciliation with God. This is called the Atonement, by way 
 of eminence. For until the love of the Father be brought 
 to one focus of revelation ; until the world is lighted up 
 with truth and righteousness, with the certainty that 
 every man shall in the long account receive according to 
 what he hath done, yet with an equal assurance of pa- 
 tience, pity, pardon, persuading to what man ought to do, 
 — the universal gospel is not announced. Faith can only 
 linger expectantly about the old altars till the supreme 
 sacrifice is offered. But once it is offered, the offering 
 is once for all : the " right, reasonable, ratified, and ac- 
 ceptable " reality of God's possession of man and man's 
 communion with God, for all ages of redemptive effort, 
 as well as the assurance of immortal felicity in the heav- 
 enly reign. The central fact of Christian remembrance 
 embodies the ruling idea of Christian worship, according 
 
LAW FULFILLED IN THE CHRIST. 289 
 
 to a collect in the Eoman Missal : " Almighty, everlast- 
 ing God, who hast ordained thine only-begotten Son to 
 be the Kedeemer of the world, and wast pleased to be 
 reconciled unto us in his blood ; grant unto us, we be- 
 seech thee, so to venerate with solemn rite the price of 
 our redemption, and to be on earth so defended by its 
 power from the evils of the present life, that we may 
 rejoice in its perpetual fruit in heaven."^ 
 
 * Collect for Friday after the fourth Sunday in Lent. 
 
 19 
 
CHAPTEE VIII. 
 
 IMMEDIATE SEQUEL OF THE CHRIST'S INCARNATE 
 MINISTRY. 
 
 TT remains to notice briefly what, according to the 
 -L New Testament, immediately followed the fulfilment 
 of the redeeming ministry which has been sketched. 
 
 If the Word of regeneration had been uttered, what 
 proofs of new life disclosed themselves ? If with their 
 Master's resurrection his prophetic testimony with re- 
 spect to his personal pre-eminence and effective media- 
 tion came to completeness and coherency in the minds 
 of the disciples, — did the same testimony begin to ver- 
 ify itself in the convictions and experience of society in 
 general ? 
 
 The apostolic witnesses regard the world from one 
 point of view, — that of its redemption by the Christ. 
 The new faith at once evinced a majesty of moral pur- 
 pose and a clearness of intellectual outline to awe the 
 world. In spite of infirmities of the flesh and limita- 
 tions of the letter, in spite of apparent odds against 
 them, the apostles gave a testimony to their Master, 
 which is the very spirit and ideal of prophecy in man. 
 
 The oneness of space, the unity of creation, the fact 
 that every house is builded by some man, inferring the 
 transcendent fact that the cosmical dweUing-place is the 
 
IMMEDIATE SEQUEL OF CHRIST'S MINISTRY. 291 
 
 building of God, — ideas common to both scientific and 
 theological thought, — afforded a natural ground for the 
 moral argument that men should be of one mind in the 
 great house ; in fine, that God was reconciling the world 
 unto himself, through a discipline of free personal devo- 
 tion, whose great Apostle and High Priest had passed 
 into the heavens to appear in the presence of the Father 
 on behalf of mankind. In his light men saw light. 
 Atonement was seen to be the law of life, the cross the 
 banner of redemption, resurrection the type of immortal- 
 ity, sacraments and formulas of faith the symbols of sac- 
 rifice ending in triumph. The war-worn hosts of faith, 
 from first to last, were thus at one with their Leader in 
 welcoming the afflictions of a life that cannot endure, as 
 working out for them the incomparable glory of life that 
 cannot decay. ^ 
 
 If there were anticipations of an early and sensible 
 reappearance of the risen Christ in power and great 
 glory, there was nevertheless an assurance that the reign 
 of God was deep within, — that it was righteousness, 
 peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. This interior reign, 
 inspiring the hopes and directing the movements of the 
 faithful servants and soldiers of the Christ, made them 
 at the same time mighty, for the pulling down of 
 strongholds. Things that could be shaken began to 
 disappear, in order that realities which could not be 
 shaken might abide. The phenomenal world was merely 
 the shifting scenery of a spiritual drama, whose succes- 
 sive actions were to illustrate the creative Keason. 
 
 Man's sonship, man's filial relation to God, as revealed 
 in the well-beloved Son, and affirmed in the regenerate 
 experience of his disciples, was the reality that overruled 
 
 1 2 Cor. iv. 17, 18. 
 
292 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 all diversities of race, nationality, culture, or condition. 
 With the faithful there was neither Greek nor Jew, cir- 
 cumcision nor uncircumcision. Barbarian, Scythian, bond 
 nor free ; but Christ was all and in all. This spiritual 
 indissolubleness of humanity as a whole, in virtue of 
 which the Eedeemer had tasted death for every man, 
 demanded the same devotion and vicariousness in suf- 
 fering on the part of all his followers. If the sinless 
 One had suffered for the unrighteous, that he might rec- 
 oncile them to God, with what self-abandonment, yea, 
 with what revenge toward themselves, might not those 
 once sinners, but now reconciled, give their testimony of 
 sacrifice to the Prince of Martyrs, who had won them to 
 his devotion ? Were they incorporate in the church, the 
 very body of their head, — for what was this growing 
 body intended, but for the long passion, wherein the 
 body that is broken and disappears is given for the life 
 and nourishment of the body that shall be ? How other- 
 wise could they know the fellowship of the Christ's suf- 
 ferings, or come to the fulness of his joy ? Yet, as the 
 passion of the Lord, by being the perfect consecration in 
 the fulness of times, reached the most decisive testimony 
 to the truth in the shortest period of suffering, so in the 
 feebler and longer self-sacrifice of his church there was 
 the assurance of faith that the best obedience and devo- 
 tion was the way of least pain and loss. 
 
 The reign of God, as revealed in the Christ and appre- 
 hended by the faithful, showed the past and the future 
 of human history under the same prophetic illumina- 
 tion. Every development of good owned its debt to a 
 previous struggle with evil ; and every struggle with evil 
 could count with assurance upon an ensuing develop- 
 ment of good. Heaven was no longer merely the anti- 
 
IMMEDIATE SEQUEL OF CHRIST'S MINISTRY. 293 
 
 thesis of earth ; nor was the eternal life exclusive of 
 temporal existence. The finite was pervaded by the In- 
 finite. They sat together in heavenly places and in 
 heavenly seasons, who came into vivid communion of 
 spirit with the glorified Christ. On the other hand, 
 omens of destruction were evermore relaxing the ener- 
 gies of wickedness, and gehennas of fire were quench- 
 lessly active in consuming the elements that deserved to 
 perish. Whatever the Captain of salvation was fighting 
 against with the sword of his mouth, that he would 
 infallibly destroy at last with the brightness of his 
 presence. • 
 
 Indeed, the process of reconciliation could not but 
 imply a correlative process of judgment. Amnesty, to 
 be sure, was universal through the forbearance of God, 
 that pardon might become personal and particular ac- 
 cording to the dispositions of men. But the day was 
 also one of judgment in righteousness. There was a dis- 
 cerning of the thoughts and intents of the heart. There 
 was a discrimination between the ignorant word against 
 the Son of man — the sin against an outward majesty in 
 humility, that might be condoned under a general econ- 
 omy of condescension — and the blasphemy against the 
 Holy Spirit, the sin against the clear inward evidence of 
 truth and goodness, which, unrepented of, is eternally 
 incompatible with forgiveness and reconciliation. Thus 
 the true discipleship was not in word, not in dogmatic or 
 ritualistic profession, but in sincerity of spirit, — inward 
 conviction being the organic law of outward expression ; 
 and the unity of the church was the unity of one body 
 and one spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God 
 and Father of all, who is above all, through all, in all.^ 
 
 1 Eph. iv. 3-6. 
 
294 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 The Christian faith, as it apprehended the way of uni- 
 versal consecration, so it repudiated all trust in merely 
 conventional sanctities. Life's resources, nature, works, 
 days, were not to be divided between God and rival 
 claimants; but were all summed up in the tribute of 
 thankful praise to the giver of all. If " holiness to the 
 Lord" was not written upon the bells of the horses 
 according to the letter of the old prophecy, it had no 
 need to be literally written anywhere. The meaning of 
 the prophecy was fulfilled in. the Christian service. The 
 worship of God was ever passing into the service of man ; 
 the service of man into the worship of God. The high- 
 est spiritual function was not alien to the lowliest of 
 household offices ; and the humblest Christian was joined 
 with his Lord in the universal priesthood of humanity. 
 The service of God on earth was one with the service 
 of God in heaven. The veil before the face of all peo- 
 ples, hiding from them the inner sanctuary which 
 they desired to enter, was withdrawn, and through 
 the Christ the way into the holiest of all was made 
 manifest. 
 
 The Epistle to the Hebrews is the account of how 
 Judaism was transfigured in Christianity: Jesus, the 
 High Priest, not of a nation or of an age, but of humanity 
 forever ; the cross his altar ; his own body the victim of 
 his perfect devotion ; his flesh the veil, withdrawn when 
 he passed once for all from the holy tabernacle of his 
 earthly ministry to the most holy sanctuary of his in- 
 visible service ; his blood the redemption from the bond- 
 age of the old dispensation; his intercession the assurance 
 of eternal life and peace under the new covenant; his 
 complete revelation the antitype and fulfilment of all 
 that had been foreshadowed in the law, or in the prophets. 
 
IMMEDIATE SEQUEL OF CHRIST'S MINISTRY. 295 
 
 With Jesus the altar-language rose from the dead. It 
 too, was henceforth spirit and Ufe. 
 
 And now the faithful of the Gentiles were fellow- 
 citizens and fellow-heirs with the believing Jews in one 
 household of God. All religions had given token of cer- 
 tain common elements of faith and hope; and all had 
 made their sign in a sacrificial cipher which they could 
 not adequately interpret. For all the cross of the Ee- 
 deemer was the key to the cipher, and his religion its 
 final interpretation. The apostle to the Gentiles was 
 determined to know nothing among them but the Christ 
 — crucified and risen from the dead. 
 
 Finally, as the era of consummation had set in, and 
 the reign of God in man was without assignable limits 
 of duration, whether in the past or in the future, it was 
 natural for faith to prefigure the glory to be revealed. 
 The prophetic promise of consummation was that the Ke- 
 deemer should " see of the travail of his soul," and should 
 "be satisfied." ^ The unity and universality of the 
 Father's law — what but that could be the satisfaction 
 of the Son ? Accordingly, St. Paul sums up his ultimate 
 anticipation in these words : " Then cometh the end, 
 when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, 
 even the Father, when he shall have put down all rule, 
 and all authority and power. For he must reign until 
 he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy 
 that shall be destroyed is death. And when all things 
 shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also him- 
 self be subject unto him that put all things under him, 
 that God may be all in alL" ^ 
 
 1 Isa. liii. 11. 2 1 Cor. xv. 24-28. 
 
PART SIXTH. 
 
 CRISES IN THE PEOCESS OF REDEMPTION. 
 
" Now is the judgment Icrisis] of this world." 
 
 John xii. 31. 
 
 *' The times of ignorance, therefore, God overlooked ; but now 
 he commandeth men that they should all everywhere repent : in- 
 asmuch as he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the 
 world (rrjv oiKovfievr^v) in righteousness, by the man whom he hath 
 ordained, whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that 
 
 he hath raised him from the dead." 
 
 The Acts, xvii. 30, 31. 
 
 " That but this blow 
 Might be the be-all and the end-all here. 
 But here, upon this bank and shoal of time, — 
 We 'd jump the life to come. But, in these cases, 
 We still have judgment here." 
 
 Shakspeare : Macbeth, Act i. Scene 7. 
 
 A 
 
PART SIXTH. 
 
 CRISES IN THE PROCESS OF REDEMPTION. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 OF JUSTICE AND JUDGMENT. 
 
 THE justice of God towards mankind is very com- 
 monly contemplated in its relation to the punish- 
 ment of sin. The revelation of divine justice in nature, 
 on the other hand, evinces a primary and persistent 
 reference to the development of virtue. 
 
 Whatever the uneasy conscience may at any time 
 forebode, — the fact is that the Creator is apprehended 
 as a just God, because he reveals himself as Eedeemer 
 and Saviour. Moreover, he reveals himself as Eedeemer 
 and Saviour in the judicial determinations, as well as 
 in the reconciling efforts of his government. By his 
 judgments he enforces the just appeals of self-sacrificing 
 condescension in favor of righteousness; while conde- 
 scension, patience, pardon, inasmuch as they are notes 
 of a redemptive process, give unmistakable assurance of 
 judgments that are to ensue with reference to the prac- 
 tical workings of a dispensation of grace. Grant that all 
 man's faculties shall move, without fret or friction, in 
 obedience to divine inspiration as soon as man is made 
 perfect in love ; such a spiritual consummation does not 
 
300 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 depend alone upon the law of atonement, but just as 
 really upon crises of individual and collective experience. 
 These crises are judgments of God, evermore abroad in the 
 creation, by which the people learn what is right. The 
 official effort and legal apparatus of advanced society for 
 the protection of rights and the punishment of crimes is 
 simply proof of the deeper administration of justice per- 
 vading our world-ages, by the law of nature, for man's 
 moral development. 
 
 Parts of divine revelation require the whole. The 
 depths of self-sacrifice in the crisis of atonement can- 
 not dispense with the heights of dignity and authority 
 in the crisis of judgment. The former may be spoken 
 of as the depths of mercy, the latter as the heights of 
 justice ; but mercy is not mercy apart from justice, and 
 justice is not justice apart from mercy. The quahty of 
 the part cannot be grounded or constituted except in the 
 character of the whole. 
 
 Atonement and judgment are actions contemplating 
 the same end. Therefore, if the consummate effort of 
 atonement fail of its proper effect in any upon whose 
 attention it is pressed, what follows for them ? Not a 
 greater sacrifice for sin ; not another incarnation and 
 passion of the Christ, but " a certain, fearful expectation 
 of judgment." ^ The fatherly grace, that keeps the door 
 of reconciliation and righteousness eternally open to 
 the repentant offender, does not shrink from the use 
 of wholesome severity; but awakens to repentance by 
 making betimes a judicial distinction between opposing 
 moral dispositions. 
 
 Hence it is that the judicial aspects of the world's re- 
 demption — the crises wherein the judgments of God 
 1 Heb. X. 26, 27. 
 
• JUSTICE AND JUDGMENT, 301 
 
 disclose themselves in nature, so as to find a record 
 and interpretation in Scripture, — demand a distinct 
 consideration. 
 
 To believe that the judgments of God ensue eternally 
 upon things done according to their innermost spirit and 
 total quahty is to renounce our own interested partiali- 
 ties and illusive forecastings in favor of those larger and 
 better conceptions, that are gauged for us by words 
 which stand for the most devout human insight put to 
 service in the administration of revered law. The word 
 judgment stands for a sacred function in which man 
 becomes the sworn and consecrated minister of God. 
 But the word judgment, as the expression for a personal 
 function, is affiliated with the word crisis, which contem- 
 plates a judicial decision, to be sure, but with special ref- 
 erence, in our language, not to personal function, but to 
 general and immanent law. Thus, when it is said of a 
 sick man that he must certainly- die, or that he is very 
 likely to recover, the saying may have special reference 
 to the judgment of the physician, or to the crisis of the 
 disease. But the professional judgment is held to de- 
 pend upon the immanent law in the case ; and the two 
 combine in one conviction of truth. A catastrophe in 
 nature, or revolution in history, is possibly pointed out 
 as a crisis with respect to the laws according to which 
 interior forces have acted together in producing a sud- 
 den result ; but when referred to the divine thought and 
 governance conceived as laying up the possibility or cer- 
 tainty of such a result in the constitution of things, the 
 same fact is called Si judgment. It depends simply upon 
 the relation of thought designed to be made prominent, 
 whether we speak of our late civil war as a crisis in the 
 national history or as a jitdgment of the universal Euler. 
 
302 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 Similarly in the New Testament Greek, the word crisis is 
 so penetrated with the faith of God's personal intention 
 as to be generally rendered judgment in the New Tes- 
 tament English: and this though the reference be ex- 
 pressly to transactions, not as belonging in any peculiar 
 sense to the high court of heaven, but as taking place in 
 the natural order of events here below. 
 
 The judgment of God is conceived as determining the 
 crisis of events, the crisis of events as expressing the 
 judgment of God. We do not disengage the elements of 
 thought, or dissolve the reality of things, by the differ- 
 ent terms we employ. We have simply a rational free- 
 dom in the use of terms, that the various phases of one 
 ever-unfolding Providence may be represented with more 
 accurate shading. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 CRISES UNDER LAWS OF PHYSICAL CHANGE. 
 
 'T^HE two words, crisis and judgment, with their 
 -'- substantial oneness of meaning, suggest what ex- 
 perience confirms, namely, that vicissitudes, even the 
 most sudden and unlooked-for, are due to imperceptible 
 processes of change, in which all finite and arbitrary- 
 intention is merged and overruled. Personal existence 
 is embarked upon the stream of general being. The 
 individual life, that seems to have a current of its own, 
 is shooting through the larger current of society. The 
 general tendencies or sudden checks of a nation's career 
 affect each citizen ; and still the citizens go their several 
 ways, occupy themselves with their own affairs, antici- 
 pating, it may be, in a passive and helpless way, the 
 crises that are coming to impress a new movement and 
 character, as upon the mass so upon every atom compos- 
 ing the mass. 
 
 Men trust themselves to general tendencies, though 
 aware that tendency means vicissitude also. Nature 
 shows us many movements that run a certain round ; 
 but the round is a round of changes. Gradual prepa- 
 ration is often turning to precipitate conclusion. Quiet 
 evaporation from a world of waters, and clouds that 
 float in air make their report in drops or crystals that 
 
304 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 of a sudden begin to fall upon the earth. And, again, 
 a silent change of temperature makes its sign in the 
 sudden turning of water into ice. Strange that, by- 
 change of temperature or possibly by mere evaporation, 
 an apparently homogeneous fluid should by and by un- 
 dergo a sudden reconstitution according to mysterious 
 affinities and mathematical definitions ; as if the creative 
 spirit were moving in the turbid waters of the chemist's 
 laboratory, exactly as the Spirit of God is said to have 
 moved upon the face of the weltering world in the be- 
 ginning ! The laws of crystallization are mysterious ; 
 but the crisis of crystallization is unmistakable. At the 
 end of the process the fiat is pronounced. 
 
 The crust of our globe gives distinct chapters of its 
 own history, written out in successive geological forma- 
 tions. Each chapter records the progress to its comple- 
 tion of a definite cosmical movement. The story becomes 
 peculiarly impressive, we are told, when it reaches the 
 period of organic remains. As the earth is moulded and 
 tempered to fitness for living things, a vast populace of 
 plants and animals swarms into possession. But the 
 work of creation, complete as to certain ends, had still 
 other ends in view ; and, moving on toward those ends, 
 nature is found by and by to have passed the fatal 
 bourn for the primitive orders of animated existence. 
 They had had their day, and were doomed to disappear. 
 It only remained to give them a worthy burial while 
 compassing their gradual but necessary extinction. 
 
 Yet the change was not so gradual as to fail of indi- 
 cating a crisis. We are even assured of a marked dis- 
 tinction between the earlier and the later stone age. The 
 palaeolithic man was a very different creature from the 
 neolithic man ; and the two inhabited different worlds. 
 
CRISES OF PHYSICAL CHANGE. 305 
 
 It is asserted that the palaeolithic inhabitant made his 
 mark in art ; that carved representations distinguish his 
 career, such as are entirely wanting among all discovered 
 relics of his neolithic successors. The art of that early 
 race was buried with it ; and the next human etfort was 
 put forth with reference to new conditions of life. Thus 
 a crisis — something to be called the end or consumma- 
 tion of an age, a last judgment of the world as respects 
 a clearly distinguishable phase of its history — is recog- 
 nized as a recurring fact, and has passed into a scientific 
 conception, from dateless depositions that have been 
 only recently deciphered. 
 
 We judge of what shall be from what has been. In- 
 ductions shape and color anticipations. The human 
 mind is constituted to discredit prophesyings that are 
 alien to the logic of history. There is nothing, however, 
 in which men believe more easily, in a theoretical way, 
 than in judgments to come. The sun is still, rejoicing 
 " as a giant to run his course ; " but it is easy to believe 
 that his strength is not infinite. The winds and waters 
 that carry on the distribution of our shifting soil are 
 never still. The volcanic energy that has buttressed the 
 globe may be counted upon for new activities. Atlantis 
 may rise again from the bosom of the deep, and conti- 
 nents be invaded by the ocean. 
 
 " There rolls the deep where grew the 'tree. 
 O earth, what changes hast thou seen ! 
 There where the long street roars hath been 
 The stillness of the central sea." 
 
 The crisis of a measureless prehistoric period is a mat- 
 ter of rational inference from subsequent observations. 
 The same slow movement of material nature goes on 
 
 20 
 
306 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 through all historic ages, and only gives vague hints of 
 change to the watchers of a passing day. The solar sys- 
 tem might pass from original star-dust to star-dust again, 
 and the agitations be so tempered and distributed that 
 the human race should come forth to life, fulfil its phys- 
 sical cycle, and be consummated in personal immortality, 
 with a prevailing experience of order and quietness in 
 nature. As human annals do not reach back to the 
 begmning of geological history, so, it may be presumed, 
 they cannot reach forward to the end. Earth's mortal 
 pangs, the denouement and dissolution of matter, are 
 likely to outlast the drama of man's mortal history.' In 
 the mean time occasional floods and fiery storms, a few 
 formidable earthquakes, exceptional instances of brusque 
 fatality, readily compose themselves to the common 
 course of things, and exert but a moderate influeuce 
 upon the thoughts of men. Yet the immovable fact 
 remains, that the law of change is deeply interfused and 
 all-pervading, and that Hving things must go as well as 
 come in subordination to vast economies of existence, 
 throughout a duration that has no assignable limits. 
 The great globe itself, so generously submitted for their 
 time to the ruling of its temporary occupants, is reserved 
 and remade for other generations, who will take it in 
 their turn ; and this consideration is one of moment in 
 the intellectual and moral discipline of those who are 
 stewards of their children's estates. That a natural 
 crisis is rationally anticipated as likely to come upon 
 descendants is evidence that the distributive justice of 
 the universe will not fail to bring home a moral judg- 
 ment to the fathers. 
 
 Tell men, as some prophets do, that they are spoiling 
 streams, filling up harbors, making their sea-coasts and 
 
CRISES OF PHYSICAL CHANGE. 307 
 
 river-valleys malarious, — by foul debris lazily washed 
 away, which ought to be prudently disinfected, and re- 
 stored as a fertilizing substance to the ground, — and how 
 do they, act ? Possibly they smile at impracticable ideal- 
 ism ; more probably they deprecate the evil tendency in 
 a calm persuasion of their personal inability to with- 
 stand it ; certainly they mak^ themselves welcome to 
 any solace derivable from " after us the deluge." How 
 should the prophetic soul not take some hope from inter- 
 mediate stages of trial, if a fatal conclusion cannot be 
 reached to-day ? But rational forecast is not without 
 assurance that the crisis which announces chaos come 
 again, as well as the crisis of a new creation, will appear 
 when due, and sum up all the elements of the case, 
 whether for past or future, according to law. 
 
 But man's effective discipline with respect to remote 
 liabilities depends very much upon recurring experiences 
 wherein the crisis of natural retribution follows close 
 upon a crisis of personal effort. Seed-time . and harvest 
 are correlative crises separated by no inappreciable dura- 
 tion. The duty of the first cannot be distributed over 
 many days ; and the retribution of the second is not so 
 far off that men can forget their accounts, or presume 
 that the fruitful earth will not render to every man 
 according to his works. When the harvest reckoning 
 is complete the judgment of the year is declared. The 
 crisis may be one of joy or distress ; but either way 
 it is the ruling fact. Be it great Eome herself that is 
 anxiously awaiting the corn-ships from Alexandria, the 
 ships can bring only so much corn as the year's produc- 
 tion allows. 
 
 Who shall tell what man's prudence, promptitude, and 
 co-operation owe to the order of material nature ? The 
 
308 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 assurance that mother Earth will pay her dehts to human 
 endeavor, as well as exact her penalties for neghgence 
 and misdoing, with peremptory and critical exactness, 
 what does it signify — or, rather, what does it not sig- 
 nify — in relation to that credit accorded to promises of 
 payment by which men facilitate the exchange of ser- 
 vices with one another ? All promises to pay are distin- 
 guished from promises to pay nothing, by contemplating 
 a crisis of maturity, — a day of decisive judgment as to 
 how much the promise is worth. 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 
 CRISES UNDER LAWS OF SPIRITUAL DEVELOPMENT. 
 
 A S in the material world ultimate atoms and occult 
 •^^^ energies are making continual contributions, to be 
 summed up in ulterior consummations, so the secret and 
 momentary actions of the human spirit become apprecia 
 ble in successive crises of personal and social experience. 
 The most sudden and radical change in history, — what 
 is it but the summing up under creative superintendence 
 of instantaneous personal impulses and efforts, whose 
 result is at length registered so — and not otherwise. 
 
 Grant that matter and spirit are as different in kind 
 as fixed fate and free-will ; yet the world of spiritual 
 powers is like the world of physical forces in this : there 
 is no possible escape of particular elements from the 
 sway of universal law. Hence it is that personal will, 
 though constituted to be the very type of freedom as of 
 power, is practically checked and restrained, until by 
 means of intelligent judgment and loyalty to moral con- 
 victions it makes its way to the liberty of law. Ulti- 
 mate freedom of will is in that orbit of movement which 
 never violates the harmony of the spiritual universe. 
 Only in the lowest phase of spiritual development do 
 we find those capricious oscillations of conduct that are 
 made up from the two extremes of wilfulness and con- 
 
310 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 straint, which always accompany each other. Not that 
 we are to charge the fits and starts of an unschooled 
 nature to the account of the will alone. Why blame the 
 executive power especially for capricious and tentative 
 movements that accuse the immaturity of the legislative 
 and judicial faculties ? 
 
 Childhood's inadequacy to self-government is general. 
 A similar inadequacy belongs to the childhood of peoples. 
 The less endowed and less disciplined races meet the 
 crisis of their fate in the touch of a potent civilization. 
 Populations that can neither resist successfully the force 
 brought to bear upon them, nor accommodate them- 
 selves kindly to novel situations that arise under the 
 control of their superiors, are judged accordingly. There 
 must be an irresistible logic in history, if history is to be 
 the vehicle of a teaching not to be mistaken. The trial 
 and decision of to-day must lead on to the trial and 
 decision of to-morrow. Some ruling motive that is sim- 
 ple and universal must prove that political and military 
 combinations are not fortuitous, and teach us to refer 
 provisional arrangements to a permanent principle of 
 human action. 
 
 The crises of nations are in general too limited in 
 spiritual scope to exhibit, in the broadest light, the 
 reality of a universal judgment in the history of man- 
 kind. For proof of this we need to look at the general 
 progress of society, and to see the course of the common 
 life as irrespective of national boundaries, in a history 
 well understood and easily sketched; and yet, a his- 
 tory wherein a common faith in divine government, 
 the deep religious tendency of the race is recognized 
 as determining the plans of statesmen and the struggle 
 of armies. 
 
CRISES OF SPIRITUAL DEVELOPMENT. 311 
 
 What grand movement of the modern world gives a 
 clearer account of itself than "the Eeformation of the 
 sixteenth century " ? Define the movement as we may 
 in space or time, we know that it surpasses our defini- 
 tions ; while, on the other hand, the infinite complexity of 
 personal aims and party interests cannot hide the simple 
 issue in law that was on trial, nor nullify our sense of a ju- 
 dicial direction that governed the procedure as a whole. 
 
 The church of Luther's day was universal, in distinc- 
 tion from national, — not universal as being adequate to 
 the spiritual guidance of all men. Yet the church, ac- 
 cording to her charter, contemplated a spiritual empire 
 absolutely universal ; and was proudly conscious of the 
 recognition accorded to her claims by the leading secular 
 powers. But the real potency of the faith was held in 
 check by a lifeless crust of ecclesiastical tradition and 
 routine. In spite of all restraints, however, there was a 
 stirring of thought, an awakening of inquiry, a musing 
 about what were the realities the church had so long 
 been undertaking to represent ; and this mental motion 
 was not without heat. The fire burned in the heart of 
 Luther while he was musing. Then he spake with his 
 lips — with his pen; and the secret was out. There was 
 a remarkable response to his testimony. That fresh 
 plant of righteousness named "justification by faith," — 
 faith implying the certainty of sincere obedience to the 
 truth embraced, — found a spiritual climate in which it 
 could live and bear fruit. The old stalk of justification 
 by pious works, on the contrary, as such works were 
 understood and practised in the Roman routine, was 
 seen to be dried up and dying down to the ground. 
 
 To the poor novice, in his convent of the Augustines, 
 there came a crisis hardly less marked and decisive than 
 
312 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 that which overtook Saul of Tarsus on the road to Da- 
 mascus. Luther knew the letter of his New Testament 
 better than almost anybody else ; for he had found its 
 solid contents in the university, while clergy and laity as 
 a rule were familiar with only fragments delivered in 
 church. He had become a monk under the impulse 
 of superstitious terror, and in defiance of his father's 
 authority. Set to menial services, suffering insolence 
 from the brotherhood, confessing every day, persecuted 
 with penances, the submissive disciple treated the rough 
 monastic tyranny as a kind of counter-irritant to the 
 more tormenting trouble of his spirit about his relations 
 with God. Naturally, he fell sick in body also. In the 
 repose of weakness, soothed by the wise counsels of the 
 good Staupitz, he beheld the dawn. The sun arose with 
 healing. Martin Luther found himself the elect of a 
 fresh revelation. He became a man of God, with a mis- 
 sion to the world. With God he was in the majority 
 against any power that needed to be called in question. 
 
 The monk's new initiative was as bold as his previous 
 temper had been diffident. Ordained priest, he appealed 
 to the Scriptures for the correction of the church ; made 
 professor at Wittenberg, he threw off the shackles of 
 scholastic philosophy; sent to Eome on business for his 
 order, he brought the judgment of an unsophisticated 
 conscience to bear upon that holy city, and gave warn- 
 ing of the wrath to come ; unable to get redress for mani- 
 fold abuses connected with the sale of indulgences, he 
 nailed his ninety-five propositions to the Wittenberg 
 church-door; his writings burnt and himself excom- 
 municated, he burned the bull of excommunication with 
 retorted scorn ; summoned to the Diet of Worms, he 
 stood unquailing before princes and emperor, and an- 
 
 J 
 
CRISES OF SPIRITUAL DEVELOPMENT. 313 
 
 swered with such conscientious and uncompromising 
 fidelity to his faith, that the muse of history delights to 
 depict him in lowly garb before that tinselled and mag- 
 nificent assembly, — the incomparable spiritual magnate 
 of the hour. 
 
 From the crisis in the monk's cell at Erfurth, we date 
 the orderly and dramatic evolution of the reforming 
 energy. That was a crisis of individual initiative, with 
 respect to the characteristic spiritual movement of the 
 time. 
 
 As Luther's personal experience was not unconnected 
 with a general awakening of thought and revival of learn- 
 ing, — for there were reformers before the Eeformation, — 
 so, when the Eeformation was fairly inaugurated, it was 
 to combine of necessity with all the thought and ten- 
 dency of the age. Especially, the reformation in religion 
 was to quicken the national spirit that in various coun- 
 tries was feeling its way towards the emancipation 
 of secular authority from ecclesiastical domination. 
 Eichelieu, for example, as prince of the church, should 
 have been a leading power in the Catholic league; 
 but, as statesman and prime minister of France, he 
 actually became an important ally of the Protestant 
 cause. 
 
 So it came to pass, exactly one hundred years after 
 the nailing of Luther's theses to the church-door, that 
 the Eeformation was on the eve of a general crisis, — the 
 great military trial of its history. For thirty years 
 (1618-1648) there raged a desultory but destructive 
 warfare, that left Germany devastated through its whole 
 extent. The question at issue was, not which league 
 should win a permanent ascendency over the other ; but 
 rather, whether both Catholics and Protestants should 
 
314 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 agree to live and let live. The decision was upon the 
 whole in favor of the modern spirit, — in favor of the 
 right to think, to speak, and so to seek the reforma- 
 tion of the church, in its head or in its members, as well 
 as the reformation of political institutions, in a sense 
 favorable to populations in distinction from princes. 
 
 This tedious struggle was far enough from exhibiting 
 a dramatic unity of action, as has been intimated. But, 
 on the other hand, it was not so incoherent that we may 
 not reasonably point to the battle of Liitzen as the crisis 
 of the war ; and certainly the death of Gustavus Adol- 
 phus marked the crisis of Liitzen when, in the words of 
 Schiller, " the battle already half lost was won over the 
 king's corpse." 
 
 Thus, without going beyond the proper range of the 
 word, we find that one crisis in human experience is 
 related to another. The crisis of personal conviction, 
 of individual initiative, when the world's teaching is 
 brought to a focus in the judgment of a single epoch- 
 making man, looks forward to the crisis of a general 
 movement, in which extensive combinations and persist- 
 ent struggles submit to .a decision that is for the time 
 without appeal. AVe have only to generalize this dis- 
 tinction, to remember that the epoch-making man, so 
 called, is like every other human being ; that the world's 
 teaching is brought to a focus, and determines an initi- 
 ative, in every soul, according to the nature of the 
 teaching and the nature of the soul ; and we rationally 
 conclude, what we actually find to be the case, that the 
 general judgment, the overruling determination in hu- 
 man affairs, is the opening of a new trial, with further 
 opportunities for men in detail. The government of the 
 universal Euler is made to subserve, with perfect dis- 
 
CRISES OF SPIRITUAL DEVELOPMENT. 315 
 
 crimination, the discipline of the universal Father tow- 
 ard each one of his children in particular ; that every 
 child may become in turn a loyal subject to the Sover- 
 eign and Judge of all. 
 
 Nor, as human society improves, does the work of re- 
 generation cease. Personal determinations may grow 
 more rational and less heated; general judgments may 
 become less frequent and more significant. Yet even 
 the apocalyptic millennium is not proof against the re- 
 crudescence of evil. Peace on earth degenerating into 
 careless security is the opportunity of adventurous wrong- 
 doing. But when the strange challenge of evil awakens 
 peaceful virtue to martial ardor, the struggle is brief 
 and victory decisive. The judgment is most conclusive 
 which has the greatest disciplinary effect. The infinite 
 law works its way eternally in the limited powers of 
 rational creatures, — cancelling errors and compensating 
 pains. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 CRISES ACCORDING TO THE OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING. 
 
 T TISTOEY may be figured as the outer court, and 
 -*- -*- worship as the inner sanctuary, of universal real- 
 ity. It is much that Anaxagoras or Hegel should ground 
 philosophy on the assurance that the reason which we 
 bring to the study of creation is a reflex of the Eeason 
 according to which creation is carried on. But is it not 
 much more that the same truth should Live in the 
 devout faith of mankind in general, a worshipful, though 
 indefinable persuasion of one God, Author of all things ? 
 It must be remembered, however, that religious convic- 
 tion, as well as speculative assurance is realized through 
 discipline; only the discipline of faith is in a much 
 sterner school than that of philosophy. 
 
 The Old Testament sets before us the career of a peo- 
 ple raised to an express and incontestable primacy in the 
 knowledge of God and the service of faith. In their 
 history the oneness of God stood for the unity of nature. 
 If there was one only Creator of things visible and in- 
 visible, then from Him was the supernatural governance 
 of nature as well as the original constitution of nature. 
 Hence the gods of the heathen — the nature gods — fell 
 down into the order of nature, and became no gods, — 
 rather vanity and a lie. Jehovah, who made the heavens, 
 
CRISES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 317 
 
 was Euler and Judge of all the earth; and the faith 
 of his chosen people was to be ultimately the faith of 
 mankind. 
 
 But the unique service to which Israel was called of 
 God, though a service of great^ dignity, mvolving the 
 spiritual welfare of men in all ages, was* no easy service. 
 On the contrary, it seemed easy for the servants of Jeho- 
 vah to be drawn aside into unprincipled complications 
 with their idolatrous neighbors ; and their seducing 
 neighbors became in turn the rod of Jehovah, when he 
 awoke to judgment, and punished his people's unfaith- 
 fulness to the covenant between him and them. Still, 
 though often cast down, Israel was not destroyed. 
 Though triumphant for a season, the hostile nations 
 were by and by judged. The banner of hope was held 
 up before the wayward and afflicted servants of Jehovah 
 in the name of "Emanuel, God with us." When the 
 lesson taught by the execution of judgment had been 
 learned, then humiliating captivity gave way before a 
 new fervor of faith, in the remnant that lived to see the 
 day of deliverance. And so was made good the word 
 of promise, that evermore pointed the moral and tem- 
 ]iered the severity of prophetic denunciation : " Al- 
 though I have cast them far ofif among the heathen, 
 and although I have scattered them among the coun- 
 tries, yet will I be to them a little sanctuary in the 
 countries where they shall come." " I will even gather 
 you from the people, and assemble you out of the coun- 
 tries where ye have been scattered, and I will give you 
 the land of Israel. And they shall come thither, and 
 they shall take away all the detestable things thereof, 
 and all the abominations thereof, from thence. And I 
 will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit 
 
318 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 within you ; and I will take the stony heart out of their 
 flesh, and give them an heart of flesh : that they may 
 walk in my statutes, and keep mine ordinances, and do 
 them : and they shall be my people, and I will be their 
 God." 1 
 
 1 Ez. xi. 16-20 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 CRISES INTERPRETED BY THE CHRIST. 
 
 npHE New Testament opens to us the new era. It 
 -*- announces the dispensation of the last times, the 
 period of personal faith made free from external bonds, 
 — the ultimate type of worship in the whole family of 
 the Father. 
 
 The doctrine of one God cannot, according to its own 
 idea, be the permanent peculiarity of a single people, still 
 less the mark of an intellectual class, — the contempla- 
 tive and philosophic few. It is set forth in the New 
 Testament as passing into the possession of all nations 
 and all men, without respect of national or personal 
 distinctions, through the revelation of one Mediator 
 between God and man, namely, the Christ. The rude 
 and magisterial ways of messengers and ministers that 
 went before are held to have been judged and super- 
 seded by the condescension and brotherliness of the well- 
 beloved Son. His function is unique. He can have no 
 rival and no vicar. " One is your master, even the 
 Christ, " — this is the note of universal discipleship, — 
 "and all ye are brethren." Principalities and powers, 
 visible or invisible, are held to do homage of right to 
 the redeeming Word of God. 
 
 Here was announced, a crisis of the world. Now was 
 opening a new opportunity and a new trial of faith, — 
 
320 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 not for the Jews only. The personal mitiative of the 
 great Teacher was to be followed by personal determina- 
 tions of men in all nations ; and general judgments were 
 to declare themselves, that should herald the consumma- 
 tion, not of that age only, but of all world-ages. What, 
 then, is the Christ's conception of crises in history ? 
 What is his doctrine and administration of judgment, as 
 set forth by evangelists and apostles from his own lips ? 
 
 The crises and judgments of this world are contem- 
 plated in the New Testament as belonging to an eternal 
 reign of righteousness. They have their appointed days, 
 times, and seasons, — not to be known of men, because 
 they are in the power of the Father. But they come in 
 the process of divine revelation. God's ways are everlast- 
 ing. The living Word, summing up all truth that has 
 been or shall be in human experience, comes into contact 
 with individual minds through a spiritual operation. 
 Judgment begins in human consciousness at the house 
 of God, in convictions of sin and righteousness that take 
 possession of believers in the Christ; but the absolute 
 spiritual Authority moving the responsible action of en- 
 lightened men, at length brings to pass a change, — a 
 re-arrangement of human society, which points to what 
 the relative end must be of those who obey not the 
 gospel. 
 
 As faith draws men into fellowship with the Christ's 
 voluntary sufferings, so judgment, the vindication of 
 faith, dooms the men of unbelief, who repudiate the law 
 of self-sacrifice, to the punitive consequences of their 
 voluntary doings. To Israel of old the faith of one God 
 involved a life-long national discipline. So the faith of 
 one Lord Jesus Christ involves a life-long personal, as 
 well as social, discipline, to the spiritual Israel of God. 
 
CRISES INTERPRETED BY THE CHRIST. 321 
 
 The work of redeeming mankind from original earthly 
 tendencies to the best spiritual possibilities, is one in 
 which children in experience are taught to know the 
 Father's patience and forgiveness, in the fact of his set- 
 ting before them " an open door." None who desire it 
 are ever excluded from the work and discipline of faith 
 on account of past misdoings. But faith signifies work 
 and discipline, — by no means a far-oflf felicity, having 
 no respect to conduct. First and last, here and hereaf- 
 ter, the judgment of God is '' to every man according to 
 his works." 
 
 Yet in what utterance or action of the great Teacher 
 does it appear that he ever looked for any change of per- 
 sonal determination, or for any new cast of the world's 
 moral drama, except under the law of universal reality ; 
 that is, the will of the Father expressed in the constitu- 
 tion of things ? Did redemption mean, in his thought, 
 that established institutions and authorities would of a 
 sudden lose all their original energy, and quietly abdi- 
 cate theu' time-honored pretensions, as soon as a pro- 
 phetic judgment should find them wanting, and doom 
 them to pass away ? On the contrary, he counted upon 
 their very falsities and oppressions to call into action 
 the new spirit of righteousness, that should shatter the 
 legality of the letter, when its measure of absurdity and 
 iniquity should be full. He proposed to train his disciples 
 in a struggle wherein the ideal energy would find both 
 strength and correction from resistance of actual powers, 
 that also had in them rudiments of divine wisdom, the 
 guarantees of their provisional authority. The advanc- 
 ing spiritual reign contemplated a method of change that, 
 from age to age, was turning to practical account the 
 dispositions and habits already contracted among men. 
 
 21 
 
322 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 Man's original constitution is recognized as including 
 the subjective law of his transformation. Hence Jesus 
 Christ, as the prophet of regeneration for all mankind, 
 points out, according to strictly natural principles, the 
 persons in whom the new life must come to conscious 
 action earliest ; and through whom, consequently, it must 
 make its initial effort on behalf of other men. Even the 
 divine disclosure of personal perfection and universal 
 hope does not abruptly overpower the natural motives 
 in possession of human beings; does not initiate the 
 most far-reaching renovations of society, through men 
 whose natural instincts as to what concerns their imme- 
 diate interests render them distrustful of any change. 
 
 The Sermon on the Mount is very explicit in this re- 
 gard. The reign of God belongs effectively to those to 
 whom it comes, in its higher aims, as a greater relief and 
 refreshment than to others, — to those, in a word, who 
 naturally feel the need of it, in consequence of the disci- 
 pline through which they have already passed in their 
 training for it. The candidates for immediate disci- 
 pleship are not the rich, the self-satisfied, the men of 
 the world, whose portion in this life has intoxicated 
 them with ambitions and pleasures of a day, and dulled 
 them to spiritual needs and immortal hopes. To such 
 the reign of God announces no immediate blessedness. 
 Prosperous selfishness has for its correction the judicial 
 menace of woe, — the threat of loss and unwilling sacri- 
 fice, in those judgments that shall dissolve the world 
 that is, for the sake of the world that is to come. Mean- 
 while, the meek, the merciful, the peace-making men, 
 those hungering and thirsting after righteousness, those 
 who have already realized what righteousness means, 
 enough to be persecuted on account of it, — are the 
 
CRISES INTERPRETED BY THE CHRIST. 323 
 
 characters to whom the reign of God, with its voluntary 
 sacrifices and eternal rewards, appropriately appeals. 
 
 Yet, though as a ,rule the wise, mighty, or noble of 
 the world were not at first effectually appealed to, but 
 rather rebuked and repelled ; though the particular peo- 
 ple for whom the great supper was prepared began with 
 one consent to make excuse ; though a young man, as 
 candid and lovable as he was rich, must needs go sor- 
 rowfully away from the good Teacher, before he could 
 learn that eternal life is not in exclusive possession, but 
 in communicating love and redeeming service; though it 
 is natural for the poor, to rejoice in that he is exalted, 
 and not so natural for the rich to rejoice in that he is 
 made low ; nevertheless, what is impossible with men is 
 not impossible with God, and what seems unnatural with 
 men may simply indicate the quality to be developed 
 in human nature, — as men become spiritually inspired 
 and practically taught of God. 
 
 If natural motives were recognized as of critical sig- 
 nificance in the Sermon on the Mount, with respect to 
 that initial discipleship, which waited upon the humble 
 teaching of the Christ, — the same motives do not lose 
 their importance, as the truth moves on towards uni- 
 versal supremacy, while the Son of man sits upon the 
 throne of his glory, and all nations are gathered before 
 him. Accordingly, the judgment scene in the twenty-fifth 
 chapter of Matthew sets before us, in grand classifications 
 of character, and appropriate retributive distinctions, how 
 the original struggles of the faith are to be regarded 
 among men in the crises of its triumph. 
 
 The history of redemption is an ideal assize. Sponta- 
 neous choices, personal decisions that took form in acts 
 when the actors knew not what they did, claims of di- 
 
324 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 vine justice and compassion listened to or rejected in the 
 appeals of a common humanity, — all come up together 
 for adjudication, according to the sum total of responsi- 
 ble activity with respect to the divine revelation. " I 
 was an hungered," says the exalted Christ, in the judicial 
 majesty of human sympathy, " I was thirsty," " I was a 
 stranger," " I was naked," " I was sick, and in prison ; " 
 and such, or so different, was the treatment accorded to 
 me. What but the judgment of times and ages can de- 
 clare the essential quality and limitless reach of personal 
 conduct ? What but the seonian retributions can bring 
 home to the conscious experience of men the spiritual 
 reign, which they dimly recognize or carelessly deny, 
 but which it behooves them at any cost to appreciate 
 and own ? 
 
 To work with the Christ as one of his disciples and 
 messengers, to share in the gracious efforts and glorious 
 results of redemption ; or to array one's self with the 
 adverse power, and partake of what is prepared for, as it 
 is prepared by, the adversary and his angels, — such is 
 the alternative before which the spiritual development of 
 every man comes to its real significance. Human con- 
 duct not only moves outward, to take effect upon the 
 existing world of space, and to be affected in its turn ; it 
 moves onward, also, to affect the successive ages of his- 
 tory, and to be affected by them. The actions of men 
 make or mar the aeons ; but cannot defeat the seonian 
 judgments, through which the works of men, in general 
 and in particular, become their own inheritance. Per- 
 sonal conviction carries within it the certainty of general 
 judgment. Truth spoken in the ear and in closets is proof 
 that the mighty secret shall come to Hght and publicity. 
 The day when the universal church is born in the person 
 
CRISES INTERPRETED BY THE CHRIST. 325 
 
 of her Head, is the day when the ancient world is judged ; 
 albeit the world is unconscious of the divine determina- 
 tion, and will pass away not without a great noise. 
 
 The spiritual crises contemplated in the New Test- 
 ament impart their moral and coloring to outward 
 conceptions, and help themselves to physical symbols. 
 Apocalyptic visions are given for the encouragement and 
 warning of the persecuted church. The pangs of earth 
 draw attention and service from the armies of heaven. 
 What seems a forlorn hope to the eye of sense becomes 
 an assurance of victory to the eye of faith. The seer of 
 Patmos apparently intended that it should be impossible 
 to verify in detail the significance of his imposing and 
 mysterious symbolism, and equally impossible to mis- 
 take its general purport. The awe-inspiring crises that 
 successively present themselves have one unmistakable 
 meaning, — the vindication of righteousness in the pain- 
 ful coercion of hostile forces, until all the perverse moral 
 energy that enters into the power and state of the arch- 
 adversary is defeated, and destructions come to a perpet- 
 ual end, according to the universal justice of the great 
 white throne, and Him that sat upon it.^ No martial 
 imagery, no colors of blood and flame can blind the 
 prophet to the inner reality of history, that men are 
 judged, collectively and severally, "according to their 
 works." 
 
 St. Peter has his apocalypse, as well as St. John. He 
 foresaw the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly 
 men, as coming like a thief, in a fiery deluge, for which 
 the heavens and the earth were kept in store, in antici- 
 pation of new heavens and a new earth, — the abode of 
 righteousness. This is his appeal to the faithful : " See- 
 
 1 Rev. XX. 11-15. 
 
326 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 ing that these things are thus all to he dissolved, what 
 manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy living and 
 godliness, looking for and earnestly desiring the coming 
 of the day of God, by reason of which the heavens being 
 on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt 
 with fervent heat? But, according to his promise, we 
 look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth 
 righteousness." ^ 
 
 This deluge of destruction to the ungodly, and of 
 deliverance to the faithful, however, like its prototype 
 in the days of Noah, is a judgment " according to men 
 in the flesh," — a judgment not of necessity to destroy, 
 but possibly to emancipate and purify the life, " accord- 
 ing to God in the spirit." ^ 
 
 Whether it be the spiritual reign within or the natu- 
 ral government without that chiefly fastens attention, 
 each is inseparable from the other. Material nature has 
 ever its highest significance as the theatre and property 
 of moral agents. But outward representations of com- 
 ing crises are pictures upon a flat surface. They are so 
 foreshortened that the prompt imagination cannot at all 
 appreciate the historical perspective, and takes the whole 
 as being at hand. It Is St. Paul who sets himself to 
 correct the habit, apparently too prevalent in the early 
 church, of looking for a speedy consummation of the 
 Christ's militant reign in a final triumph. Especially 
 the Epistles to the Thessalonians are addressed, in part, 
 to a certain disquieting pre-occupation about times and 
 seasons ; and the faithful are exhorted to the watchful- 
 ness and sobriety appropriate to children of the light, — 
 forewarned and forearmed.^ Again, they are told not to 
 
 1 2 Peter iii. 1-13. 2 i Peter iv. 6 ; and iii. 19, 20. 
 
 8 1 Thess. V. 1-11. 
 
CRISES INTERPRETED BY THE CHRIST. 327 
 
 be quickly shaken or troubled in mind, as that tlie day 
 of the Lord is present.^ The prophetic soul of the 
 Apostle to the Gentiles is expanding to the spiritual 
 proportions of the Christian conflict : such mighty pow- 
 ers of opposition are holding in restraint the ultimate 
 revelation, — when the last enemy shall be destroyed, 
 and through the complete subjection of all things to 
 the mediatorial King, God shall be all in all.^ Still, St. 
 Paul draws his picture of the day of the Lord rather 
 from circumstances of triumph than from incidents of 
 destruction. That presence (parousia), which sustains 
 the disciples in their personal conflicts, will change to 
 a triumphal revelation of the Leader's person, when 
 the war shall end. Meanwhile no one is to wait idly 
 for the Lord's appearance. No one is to fancy that those 
 who are remaining in the body at the final day will 
 have any advantage or precedence as compared with 
 those who have fallen asleep in death. For, says the 
 apostle, " the Lord himself shall descend from heaven 
 with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with 
 the trump of God : and the dead in Christ shall rise 
 first : then we that are alive, that are left, shall, together 
 with them, be caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord 
 in the air ; and so shall we ever be with the Lord." ^ 
 
 Diverging rays of thought in the writings of apostles 
 lead back to their source in the Lord's teaching. It was 
 the Christ who, knowing the import of his own initia- 
 tive, appreciated the crisis in history which would soon 
 declare itself as an inevitable sequel. The more men's 
 characters and tendencies were made manifest through 
 his ministry, the more the hour drew on, to the appre- 
 hension of Jesus, when his own crucifixion would be 
 
 1 2 Thess. ii. 1-12. 2 i Cor. xv. 25-28. » 1 Thess. iv. 16, 17. 
 
328 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 reached. But it was not his crucifixion, so much as the 
 portentous judgment that would ensue upon it, that 
 weighed upon his spirit. A judgment of such awful 
 finality, of such condemnatory severity, — a crisis in- 
 volving such destruction and dispersion of his own 
 people, when as their spiritual Prince he would have 
 led them in the way of peace, — how could he endure 
 the anticipation of it, — especially the thought that 
 they would bring it upon themselves by a tumultuary 
 and defiant overruling of Caesar's representative, upon 
 the hypocritical pretence of loyalty to Caesar, and in 
 blind rejection of the reign of God? But if the Jews 
 neither rendered to Caesar the things that were Caesar's 
 nor to God the things that were God's, surely Eome's 
 stern reckoning with provincial tempers of this sort was 
 neither doubtful nor distant; and it was in effect the 
 reckoning, not of Caesar alone, but of the universal 
 Judge. 
 
 The cities of Galilee were warned. Their day of judg- 
 ment would overwhelm them in a catastrophe less toler- 
 able than even the most exemplary calamities of other 
 cities, — so much more flagrantly had they offended, 
 against far mightier persuasions of truth and goodness. 
 The repentance of the men of Nineveh, the docility of the 
 queen of the South, — these were examples to rise up in 
 the judgment and condemn the men of that generation. 
 Upon Jerusalem woe, as unparalleled as her wickedness ! 
 " Jerusalem, Jerusalem, which killest the prophets, and 
 stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would 
 I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen 
 gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would 
 not. Behold, your house is left unto you desolate." ^ 
 
 1 Matt, xxiii. 37, 38. 
 
CRISES INTERPRETED BY THE CHRIST. 329 
 
 "And when he drew nigh he saw the city, and wept 
 over it, saying, If thou hadst known in this day, even 
 thou, the things that belong unto peace ! But now they 
 are hid from thine eyes. For the days shall come upon 
 thee, when thine enemies shall cast up a bank about 
 thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee in on every 
 side, and shall dash thee to the ground, and thy children 
 within thee; and they shall not leave in thee one stone 
 upon another ; because thou knewest not the time of thy 
 visitation." ^ 
 
 The disciples, far from exhibiting any anxiety at first 
 about their personal fortunes, seem to have taken the 
 part of advocates, — making appeal to their Master oh 
 behalf of the city unconscious of her doom, pointing as 
 they passed, with affectionate pride, to the well-laid 
 stones of the temple-buildings, — so worthy to be spared, 
 if not likely to resist assault. But when the unwelcome 
 prediction was repeated, and Jesus, with his group of 
 followers, had reached the Mount of Olives, there were 
 some that sought private instruction, as if for their per- 
 sonal guidance in the trials before them. The interview 
 is given by three evangelists, with remarkable harmony 
 of coloring and distinctness of detail.^ It opens with 
 the request : " Tell us when shall these things be ? and 
 what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of 
 the world ? " — the end of the world being, as we have 
 seen, the consummation of the ccon, or world-period. 
 
 Far from rebuking them for an unavailing curiosity 
 about what was beyond their range, our Lord ministers 
 to their practical prudence out of his own prophetic in- 
 tuition ; and though the prophetic imagery, as usual, is 
 of a kind to suggest the infinite dominion to which our 
 
 1 Luke xix. 41-44. 2 Matt. xxiv. ; Mark xiii. ; Luke xxi. 
 
330 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 earthly existence belongs, the immediate application of 
 his words is governed by the emphatic declaration: 
 " Verily I say unto you, this generation shall not pass 
 away, till all these things be accomplished." The Leader 
 sets before his followers the trials they will encounter, 
 
 — the earlier premonitions, which need give them no im- 
 mediate trouble ; the later warnings, pointing to instant 
 flight ; the supreme tribulation, " such as hath not 
 been from the beginning of the world until now ; no, nor 
 ever shall be." The acme of judicial terror and destruc- 
 tion in the world's history was near ; and the parable of 
 the fig-tree was added, that they might be on the watch ; 
 because the day and hour could not be noted in the cal- 
 endar, but were in the power of God, according to the 
 law of things. 
 
 If the crisis of the ante-Christian world was to be one 
 of unexampled tribulation, what did the faith of the 
 Christ hold forth as to the character and consummation 
 of the new world-movement ? The new dispensation 
 was conceived as that of the " last days " and the " last 
 times." It contemplated seasons of refreshing from the 
 presence of the Lord ; " whom the heaven must receive 
 until the times of restitution of all things, whereof God 
 spake by the mouth of his holy prophets which have 
 been since the world began." ^ It was to have a con- 
 summation in direct contrast with that of the old world, 
 — not the destruction of a desecrated Jerusalem, but 
 " the new Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from 
 God ; " not even the dissolution of the physical order, 
 as anything more than an incident of spiritual history, 
 which would demand " new heavens and a new earth," 
 
 — fit scene for "the revelation of the sons of God." 
 
 1 Acts iii. 19-21. 
 
CRISES INTERPRETED BY THE CHRIST. 331 
 
 Yet the two world-movements, represented by such 
 contrasted consummations, are one. The latter grows 
 out of the former. No quality in either is wholly want- 
 ing to the other. If the first is stronger in corporate 
 constraint, it is not because there is no individual initi- 
 ative, — rather because personal caprices have special 
 need of being reduced to general order. If the last 
 movement is stronger in individual initiative, it is not 
 because corporate inertia does not offer a resisting me- 
 dium to personal endeavor, but that, under the highest 
 example and inspiration, the social body becomes sympa- 
 thetic and apt in the appreciation of prophets of the 
 day. Similarly, if the first world-period was one of 
 waste and destruction, it was not without its creative 
 processes ; and if the last is a period of production and 
 conservation, there are nevertheless destructions which 
 it cannot dispense with. If the crisis of divine forbear- 
 ance and condescension was when Jesus said, " Father, 
 forgive them, for they know not what they do ; " ^ then 
 the crisis of triumph and glory shall be when, all things 
 having been subjected unto him, '' the Son also himself 
 shall be subjected to him that did subject all things 
 unto him, that God may be all in all." ^ This is the crisis 
 of resurrection, when destruction itself is destroyed ; for, 
 " the last enemy that shall be abolished is death." ^ 
 
 But, meanwhile, how many an appointed day, in which 
 God will judge the inhabitants of earth in righteousness, 
 by the man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath 
 given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised 
 him from the dead.* How many nations shall pass 
 before his judgment-seat ; and he shall discern between 
 
 1 Luke xxiii. 34. 2 j Cor. xv. 28. 
 
 8 1 Cor. XV. 26. * Acts xvii. 31. 
 
332 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 the righteous and the wicked, — setting them apart from 
 one another spiritually, as a shepherd divideth his sheep 
 from the goats, — in order that each character may enter 
 upon an ?eonian retribution, according to the disposition 
 declared and the discipline required. The government 
 of mankind is not physical at first in order to he moral 
 by and by; it is a moral government from the begin- 
 ning, that it may by and by bring men to spiritual 
 maturity beyond the present order of nature. 
 
 One germ, one principle of growth, one end and aim 
 of being, one solid society, whether in the body or out of 
 the body, one age of ages pervading things visible and 
 things invisible, — such is the Scriptural conception of 
 history. It is a conception unspeakably majestic, — so 
 essentially simple as to reconcile all diversities of expe- 
 rience. The physical and moral transformations which 
 seonian life contemplates cannot be carried on without 
 the reciprocal service of society and individuals, of ages 
 and ages. The spiritual creation of God is subjected to 
 earthly conditions and temporary struggles, till the time 
 of change, the crisis of victory and freedom is reached. 
 Nothing is for itself alone. If the experience of the past 
 has been of service as to the experience of the future, 
 shall not the men of the future pay their debt to the 
 men of the past ? Had the ages of the prophets nothing 
 to hope from the ages of the Christ? But, according 
 to St. Peter, the prophets had the assurance- of minis- 
 tering to other times than theirs, and of ministering to 
 the knowledge of things which were to be preached in 
 the Gospel of Christ, "by the Holy Ghost sent down 
 from heaven, — which things angels desire to look 
 into."^ 
 
 1 1 Pet. i. 10-12. 
 
CRISES INTERPRETED BY THE CHRIST. 333 
 
 " But I say unto you, love your enemies, and pray for 
 them that persecute you ; that ye may be the sons of 
 your Father which is in heaven : for he maketh his sun 
 to rise on the evil and the good, and sendeth rain on the 
 just and the unjust." On whom, then, does the Sun of 
 righteousness rise ? The spiritual light of the world, — 
 how long shall it shine ? Certainly upon all who are 
 judged in righteousness ; and so long as they shall be so 
 judged. Judgment is teaching, — the application of law, 
 which is perfect, converting the soul. There is no reve- 
 lation without it. The reign of God and righteousness is 
 for none but free spirits ; and to free spirits the privilege 
 of obedience is implied in the demand of law. The 
 great Teacher appears as the considerate apologist and 
 just advocate of those who err through natural inability 
 or ignorance, the uncompromising antagonist and stern 
 censor of such as knowingly resist the call of duty, hav- 
 ing ample resources for fulfilhng it. Men are warned of 
 catastrophes, which their inertness, egoism, and obstinacy 
 may precipitate, of consequences that propagate them- 
 selves from age to age ; yet never are they warned that 
 the law of rational responsibility, according to which 
 every recorded judgment becomes a basis for the recon- 
 sideration and rearrangement of moral relations, can be 
 abrogated. While, therefore, the divine Father is re- 
 vealed as ever favorable to those who follow after right- 
 eousness, he is equally gracious and faithful in his 
 judgments upon those who choose the ways of trans- 
 gression. A creature of God cannot come to the latest 
 judgment upon practical disobedience without reaching 
 the latest degree of voluntary alienation from duty; 
 while in all, — -^hose who are reconciled to the Father 
 through the revelation of the Christ or those who are 
 
334 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 not, — the reign of universal love is eternally determin- 
 ing the awards of distributive justice, — " to every man 
 according to his works." 
 
 In fine, whatever intimations we have in Scripture 
 touching a " last judgment " and a " last day," — chiefly 
 that pregnant saying of the great Teacher, "He that 
 rejecteth me, and receiveth not my sayings, hath one 
 that judgeth him : the word that I spake, the same shall 
 judge him in the last day," ^ — must not be made to 
 contradict the majesty of divine government by a petty 
 literalism in the construction of words and figures. 
 How can a transcendent idea be accommodated to our 
 thoughts but in the language of common life ? Are not 
 all judgments of God last judgments in the sense of 
 being ultimate — without appeal and without revision ? 
 But Christian faith has pictured a " last judgment " for 
 a " last day," — the closing up of a governmental econ- 
 omy in the consummation of a world-history. Here, of 
 course, as elsewhere, " last " is last in a given order of 
 things. According to St. Augustine the last judgment 
 is not only judicium ultimum, hwi judicium novissimum^ 
 the latest judgment in a known order of divine revela- 
 tion. But this known order of divine revelation in the 
 Scripture rendering of it is vital in every part with 
 the teaching that justice and judgment do not begin 
 or end with world-ages. They are enthroned with the 
 Eternal. 
 
 1 John xii. 48. ^ De Civitate Dei, lib. xx. c. 1. 
 
CONCLUSION, 
 
" Let your moderation be known unto all men." 
 
 Philippians iv. 5. 
 
 " That you o'erstep not the modesty of nature." 
 
 Shakspeake: Hamlet, Act iii. Scene 2. 
 
CONCLUSIOK 
 
 TF the study now brought to an end could convey even 
 -^ to a few minds a sober impression of what is the 
 difference between searching the Scriptures with a con- 
 scientious reference to the real life and movement of 
 which they speak, and searching the Scriptures with an 
 equally conscientious regard to a system of abstract doc- 
 trines, deduced, or to be deduced, from a careful dissec- 
 tion and microscopic examination of their literal tissue, 
 — it would not be a trivial result. But this result is 
 not to be gained without some apprehension of divine 
 revelation in its organic unity and boundless scope ; and 
 with this apprehension all interest begins to be turned 
 to the reality and spirit of revelation, as distinguished 
 from the record and letter of the same. We begin to see 
 that it is not about otherwise unknowable or secret 
 things that we are invited to consult the "lively ora- 
 cles." Our inquiry is about things of the common and 
 familiar creation, things of nature, " these things," — 
 whether they are so or otherwise. "Within this range we 
 can form some judgment as to what responses are true 
 to reality, and what are marked with the ambiguity and 
 incoherency of conventional or perfunctory divination. 
 
 We have been contemplating one reality under vari- 
 ous relations of thought, intending that each succeeding 
 aspect or movement of inquiry should take up and carry 
 
 22 
 
338 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE, 
 
 on the truth of all that preceded it toward one general 
 impression. But in such a progress something is of 
 necessity left behind. Special impressions and argu- 
 ments of detail are lost to recollection. Hence, when 
 the matter under consideration is the most important in 
 kind, it is well perhaps not to take abrupt leave of one's 
 work, but to sum up briefly what has appeared to be 
 true, in a way to indicate the logical connection and 
 practical bearings of the argument as a whole. 
 
 Nature in Scripture is not only nature according to 
 common sense, but universal nature, — the sum total of 
 dependent existence, without assignable limits in space 
 or time. 
 
 Man, as part of nature, is represented in Scripture as 
 having his discipline in space and time, under conditions 
 that are determined for him, rather than by him, — con- 
 ditions, however, which he is constituted to interpret 
 rationally and to treat responsibly, as bringing into per- 
 sonal experience more and more the divine ruhng. 
 
 The divine ruling becomes effective in the movement 
 of human society through the faith and conduct of the 
 better inspired of men ; and is represented in the New 
 Testament as reaching a rounded and complete revela- 
 tion in one Man, announced in the fulness of time as the 
 first-begotten Son of the divine Father, — Teacher, and 
 Euler, in a unique sense, — in fine, the personal Wisdom 
 and practical Word of God for universal humanity. 
 
 The revelation of God is conceived in Scripture as 
 not incidental to the course of nature, but the ground 
 of it; and, similarly, the revelation of God in man is 
 regarded, not as contingent upon any particular action 
 of any individual, but as that for which generic man was 
 originally constituted in the order of nature. In other 
 
CONCLUSION. 339 
 
 words, the divine revelation is inclusive of nature, and 
 nature is penetrated with the purpose of God ; while man 
 in particular is taught to apprehend himself not only as 
 the creature of tlie Creator, but as the ward and pupil, 
 so to speak, of the divine Eeason in the process of reve- 
 lation ; and thus the divine Word is the expression of 
 patient Love " from the foundation of the world," that 
 it may be the utterance of regenerating Goodness in " the 
 consummation of the age." 
 
 Accordingly, the Scriptures set before us certain in- 
 separable parts or aspects of the divine procedure, pro- 
 vided for in the constitution of things and verifiable in 
 the common experience of men. In these we are pre- 
 sented with a series of moral, not to say mathematical, 
 equations, namely, — 
 
 First, a personal manhood, animal and spiritual, started, 
 in ignorance and dependence, upon a career involved 
 in an infinite creative purpose, is equal only to a man- 
 hood whose moral development will be one involving 
 difficulty and danger, wherein personal righteousness will 
 depend of necessity upon faith in a direction afforded, 
 and not, in the beginning at any rate, upon recognized 
 perfection in things done. 
 
 Secondly, the same manhood developed in a race, 
 whose complex constitution is ever determining a dis- 
 tinction of better and worse in the aims and examples 
 of society, yet ever sustaining a personal freedom of 
 choice respecting the objects to be immediately pursued, 
 is equal only to a moral discipline, wherein the effort 
 to realize a positive good will determine the knowledge 
 of relative evil^ and spiritual law will exact free personal 
 sacrifices as a method of reconciling provisional efforts 
 with the demands of ideal and ulterior life. 
 
340 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 Thirdly, the moral government which exacts free sac- 
 rifices of personal loyalty for spiritual ends, while not 
 forcibly arresting the wilful pursuit of selfish satisfac- 
 tions, is identical with the moral government which 
 determines crises, — wherein the communion of self- 
 sacrifice for the universal good is to be recognized 
 by all as "the cup of blessing," in contrast with the 
 " poisoned chalice " of selfish enjoyment at the common 
 cost. 
 
 Thus, the fact that " the law of the Eternal is perfect, 
 converting the soul," implies the fact that the soul of 
 man is in a process of growth and discipline, passing 
 through its conversions. But human progress is recog- 
 nized in Scripture as not one of pure physical determin- 
 ism, and not one of unembarrassed spiritual freedom. 
 Consequently, man is treated, not as a being whose be- 
 havior on earth can be justly appreciated in the order 
 of purely scientific thought, or in the order of purely 
 moral judgments, but as a being who must reach his 
 maturity of character, find the just significance of his 
 actions, and give account of himself to God, in an order 
 of spiritual relations beyond the range of a transitory 
 physical economy. 
 
 As, however, the consummation of mankind is held to 
 depend upon the revelation of the Father, so spiritual 
 changes are set forth in Scripture as having their intel- 
 lectual preparations and their voluntary crises in the 
 development of human nature. Hence there is con- 
 ceived a turning-point to be called the conversion: in 
 the individual, it is when spirit and truth are defini- 
 tively affirmed as the dominant and enduring reality; 
 in the race, it is when the Christ supersedes the reli- 
 gious ruling of the tribe, the worship of places and of 
 
CONCLUSION. 341 
 
 forms, "by the loyal faith of the personal child of the 
 Father, the worship "in spirit and in truth." 
 
 Accordingly, in personal experience as well as in 
 prophetic teaching, the efficiency of the Christ, as Mes- 
 senger of the Father, is properly apprehended in relation 
 to universal history. His service is not summed up in 
 spiritual phenomena of detail, not confined to the church 
 as distiQguished from the world, not for men of faith to 
 the exclusion of unbelievers ; but embraces the whole 
 movement of human history as related to the whole 
 revelation of God. The saying of Pascal, " without 
 Jesus Christ we know neither what life is, nor what 
 death is, nor what God is, nor what we ourselves are," ^ 
 is the negative expression of what is stated positively 
 by St. John, that Jesus Christ was the true light " which 
 lighteth every man." 
 
 That communication of truth and life called regenera- 
 tion, and conceived in the teaching of the Christ as iden- 
 tical with the spiritual reign of God, is for man as man ; 
 while the normal and clear manifestation of it is in man 
 as receptive of the truth and faithful to conscientious 
 conviction, in order that, working together with the 
 divine Spirit, he may be led on from his birth as the 
 offspring of the Creator to his birth as the spiritual 
 child and heir of the Father. Eegeneration reaches its 
 perfect type and revelation in the Christ, Son of man 
 and Son of God ; and the note or exemplary affirmation 
 of this, according to the Scripture testimony, is the bap- 
 tism of water and of the spirit, which signalizes the 
 Son's deliberate devotion to the Father and the Father's 
 reciprocal recognition of the Son.^ 
 
 1 Pensees, vol. ii. p. 317. 
 
 2 Matt. iii. 13-17 ; Mark i. 9-11 ; Luke iiL 21, 22. 
 
342 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 The reign of God in man, by virtue of its being " re- 
 generation," is set forth as "salvation" also. Not only 
 those who allow the Word of God to have free course 
 and to be glorified in their spirits are saved from sins 
 and sufferings into which they might otherwise fall ; 
 but those also who, through disloyalty and disobedience 
 to salutary teaching from above have fallen into error 
 and blindness wherein they are lost to the rational faith 
 and peaceful enjoyment of the divine goodness, — even 
 they can be saved from their sins by the efficiency of 
 the Father's love in the Son's condescension. Man's 
 unbelief cannot make the faith of God of none effect. 
 
 Jesus Christ, as Minister of the regeneration, is also 
 Master, as respects the method of man's discipleship. 
 His address to the Father in prayer for his disciples is : 
 " I have given unto them the words which thou gavest 
 me." ^ So his disciples are required to learn of him that 
 they may teach others ; while none are permitted to be 
 masters in the Christian school, as having authority to 
 check or limit teaching and learning by a personal judg- 
 ment still liable to error. Thus the effort of thought in 
 Christian disciples is clearly recognized as relative, not 
 only to the powers of the thinker, but to nature environ- 
 ing the thinker. Its praise is sincerity, not infallibility. 
 
 Progress in truth depends upon one's not pretending 
 to know, when one only believes ; and progress in faith 
 depends upon one's not pretending to believe, when one 
 only assents. The expression of common Christian in- 
 tegrity, whether in teaching or learning, is : " We having 
 the same spirit of faith according as it is written, I 
 believed, and therefore have I spoken : we also believe 
 .and therefore speak." ^ 
 
 1 John zviL 8. 2 2 Cor. iv. 13. 
 
CONCLUSION. 343 
 
 As, however, there is a constitution of material nature 
 which holds through all physical changes, and a consti- 
 tution of the human mind the same through all spiritual 
 transformations, this constitution of things material and 
 spiritual becomes the basis and law of scientific, philo- 
 sophic, and moral verification; or, what is the same 
 thing, it ensures to man the possibility of making prog- 
 ress in truth, notwithstanding his liability of falling into 
 error. 
 
 By one constitution of nature men are ever drawn 
 towards unity of thought and knowledge, through end- 
 less contradictions of scientific opinion. By one Lord 
 and Master of the spiritual life men are likewise drawn 
 towards unity of faith and obedience, through the more 
 passionate contradictions of metaphysical speculation and 
 dogmatic dicta. No wonder, therefore, that our Lord 
 took care to teach that men might have to seize upon 
 the comfortable hopes of the Father's reign by faith in 
 the Father, — and not without what might be called 
 " violence " with respect to established authorities and 
 conventional constructions of holy texts. 
 
 But in Scripture as elsewhere " the truth itself " ^ of 
 St. Augustine, — that is, reality, the law of nature unmis- 
 takably verifying itself in common experience, — assumes 
 a predominance in the domain of faith on the ground of 
 its unimpeachable quality of certitude. And this is as 
 much as to say that testimonies and representations 
 naturally unverifiable, though accepted as standing for 
 what is true, cannot rule in human conviction with the 
 authority of self-evidence. Such elements in the Bible, 
 as in other literature, are open to doubt and discussion 
 by the very law of our human faculties, — on the ground, 
 
 1 " Sed loquitur [Deus] ipsa veritate." 
 
344 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 at least, that the lack of known example or rational 
 proof of what exactly was meant by the sacred writer is 
 equivalent to the liability of misunderstanding on the 
 part of even the most believing reader. While, how- 
 ever, things imperfectly understood, and carrying, possi- 
 bly, no proof of historic exactness in detail, have often 
 great importance and effectiveness in the general picture 
 of reality, they cannot properly derogate at all, even in 
 minds that assent to no pretension of canonicity, from 
 the rational claim of the Scriptures to stand for the 
 teaching of God, m so far as they are true to the nature 
 of things. 
 
 But, again, if sacred books have become such by a real 
 relation to the process of God's teaching, then the per- 
 sistency of God's teaching may be relied upon to sustain 
 their authority. Therefore, over-anxious restriction of 
 thought, certainly not less than over-confident freedom 
 of inquiry, is a sign of dulness and decay in religious 
 faith. Faith requires that in the free play of conflicting 
 ideas, men should devoutly own a common allegiance to 
 the truth as one.' But the oneness of truth is the unity 
 of nature. It is nature that saves Scriptures of what- 
 ever class from private judgments and one-sided inter- 
 pretations. It is the law of nature in Scripture which 
 forbids us to press opposite representations of detail to 
 their logical extremes, till they contradict, not only each 
 other, but the postulates of universal reason. It is 
 taught that God is with the faithful as he is not with 
 the unfaithful ; that the disciples of Christ are " not of 
 the world," inasmuch as their leader has " chosen them out 
 of the world ; " that the idolatrous nations were '' dead 
 in trespasses and sins " relatively to that peculiar quick- 
 ening contemplated in the Christian life ; that " having 
 
CONCLUSION. 345 
 
 no hope and without God [atheists] in the world" ex- 
 presses a genuine contrast between the degradation of 
 popular paganism and the faith in God, the " reasonable, 
 religious, and holy hope," of sincere Christians; that 
 sacraments become a channel of grace to the faithful, 
 above and beyond the ministrations of divine Goodness 
 to men as children of nature. But if all this is to be 
 affirmed, something else must not be denied. There is 
 grace in nature; there is light and hope from life's 
 Source for every man ; there is faith in the East and the 
 West, in the North and in the South, to shame the unbe- 
 lief of an ecclesiastical elect ; there is a gospel of quicken- 
 ing and resurrection for the unrighteous as well as for the 
 just ; God is not far from every one of us, " for in him we 
 hve, and move, and have our being ; " the divine effort to 
 regenerate society demands recognition and co-operation 
 from all men without exception and according to reason. 
 
 -As Christian faith passes into practical endeavor, the 
 transformation of moral activity through the renewing 
 of the mind becomes the ruling idea of life. To realize 
 by faithful trials " the good, the acceptable, the perfect, 
 the will of God," — not to accommodate one's ways to the 
 fashion of a passing world, — is the effort proper to man. 
 For so the perishable body becomes a living sacrifice to 
 the Father through the constant devotion of the spirit.^ 
 The tribute of the instant, required " according to that 
 a man hath and not according to that he hath not," 
 becomes the type of an eternal service, wherein " to him 
 that hath shall more be given," that he may have and 
 give abundantly. 
 
 Similarly, when the Christian calling is conceived as 
 the working out of salvation from evil habits and the 
 
 1 Eom. xii. 1, 2. 
 
346 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 bondage of error, albeit " with fear and trembling," it is 
 still a reasonable service ; because " it is God who work- 
 eth in us both to will and to do of his good pleasure." 
 Man's co-operation with God is nowhere set forth in 
 Scripture, according to the type of that more or less 
 fantastic theurgy, which construes the divine Spirit as 
 making no sign, the divine operations as inadequate or 
 behind their time, appropriate results as not realized, the 
 kingdom of God as here or there rather than within, — 
 and the universal Presence as "in a journey," to be sum- 
 moned, to be stayed, to be entreated not to pass by. 
 
 Especially does the great Teacher guard childhood 
 against any such phrasing of rehgious experience as 
 would discredit what the unsophisticated "little one" 
 has done, or discourage the undertaking of what remains 
 to do. The expectation of a special and conspicuous 
 interposition of God for bringing to pass such a crisis 
 and change as shall stand a monumental boundary be- 
 tween an assumed predominance of adverse instincts and 
 the voluntary acknowledgment of spiritual authority, 
 is corrected by the Saviour's habit of referring moral 
 conduct, at every period of life, to its proper principle, 
 and by his never treating it as a foregone conclusion, or 
 matter of course. No temporary resolution or emotion 
 was treated by him as proof of determined character, 
 apart from the practical trial of every-day duty. He 
 laid his hands on little children and blessed them, 
 warned his disciples to take heed and not cause them 
 to stumble, recognized the relation of infantile simpli- 
 city to permanent discipleship as well as to present dan- 
 gers, declared that it was not the will of the Father that 
 one of these little ones should come to the ruin of life, 
 — and all this without any express reference to a crit- 
 
CONCLUSION. 347 
 
 ical standard of experience which at some particular 
 time, sooner or later, they might be expected to exhibit. 
 So, finally, in regard to the remote issues of human 
 conduct, — men conceived as reaching a clear determina- 
 tion of mind and will, either for or against whatsoever 
 things are true, venerable, just, pure, lovely, and of good 
 report, not without the discipline and tests of experi- 
 ence, are necessarily conceived as reaching also the gen- 
 eral types of destiny appropriate to opposing courses of 
 conduct, not abruptly, but by a gradual effort, and 
 through a thorough trial of personal preferences. No 
 forebodings of terror are commissioned to disturb the 
 sane and trustful souls, whose is " the peace of God that 
 passeth all understanding ; " and no promises of felicity 
 can bring solace to the remorseful spirit, till Nemesis 
 shall have wrought well in her moral teaching. Con- 
 scious guilt cannot " pronounce amen " to any benedic- 
 tion. Conscious virtue need not " fear the might of any 
 adversary." "The speech of mortals is pliant," says 
 Homer, "the range of words wide, this way and that 
 way." 1 Neither the sacred writers nor their interpret- 
 ers constitute an exception to the rule. St. Augustine 
 finds the reign of God figured in Scripture as a militant 
 state, and takes the highest exhibition of Eoman majesty 
 
 — " to spare the vanquished and to coerce the proud " ^ 
 
 — as the changeless type of the heavenly empire. But 
 Greek philosophy is as significant as Eoman imperial- 
 ism in the interpretation of the divine Word. Origen 
 will have it that a result which might indeed be " impos- 
 sible to those who are still in the body," is " not so to 
 those who are released from it." " Our belief is," he 
 
 1 Iliad, b. XX. 1. 248, 249. 
 
 2 "Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos." 
 
348 NATURE IN SCRIPTURE. 
 
 writes, "that the Word shall prevail over the eiitire 
 rational creation, and change every soul into his own 
 perfection." " For," he adds, " stronger than all the evils 
 in the soul is the Word, and the healing power that 
 dwells in Him ; and this healing He applies, according 
 to the will of God, to every man." ^ Origen and Augus- 
 tine stand for alternations of thought in the prophetic 
 soul of humanity ; and these alternations, like the swing- 
 ing of the pendulum, are both sustained and checked by 
 one universal law. Under this law the future of man- 
 kind is something to be wrought out ; and we are called 
 upon to win our modest successes in the moral struggle 
 of life on the plain assurance that every actual contribu- 
 tion to individual and collective history shall take due 
 effect, without limits of time, upon subsequent experi- 
 ence ; while the consummation of aeons will record only 
 decisions of the creative Keason, that rules from age to 
 age as the fundamental law of the human spirit. 
 
 1 Against Celsus, b. viii. ch. 72. Ante-Nicene Christian Library, 
 T. & T. Clark. 
 
INDEX, 
 
INDEX, 
 
 Abkaham, example of faith, 247- 
 249. 
 
 Act, man's first, of disobedience, 
 117-119. 
 
 Action, of the instant, judged from 
 the series to which it belongs, 103. 
 
 ,zEon, in distinction from cosmos, 
 10, 11 ; not abstract, but concrete, 
 12, 13. 
 
 Ionian, New Testament use of, 14- 
 17. 
 
 Afflictions, a trial of faith, 170; not 
 in any peculiar sense mj'sterious, 
 170. 
 
 Ages, of faith or of unbelief, 194. 
 
 Alternative, giving life its moral 
 significance, 324. 
 
 Apostles, continuing the testimony 
 of their Master, 201, 202 ; now re- 
 garding the world, 202. 
 
 Assurance, on three points, 51, 52. 
 
 Atonement, hard fate of the word, 
 215; comparison of it with recon- 
 ciliation, 216 ; law of, involving all 
 law, 217; as a spiritual procedure, 
 228; as providentially adminis- 
 tered, 250, 251; use of term in the 
 Mosaic law, 262; law of, in succes- 
 sive epochs of Christ's ministry, 
 277, 278 ; the, by way of eminence, 
 288; implies judgment, 300. 
 
 Augustine, St., process of moral 
 defection, 72; how God speaks 
 and man is to hear, 73 ; creation 
 of angels, 79; interpretation of 
 primitive apostas}', 83; spiritual 
 death, 96, 97; man's desert, God's 
 justice and mercy, 172, note; 
 judicium uUiraum, judicium novis- 
 
 simum, 334; "the truth itself," 
 343, note; conception of God's 
 reign compared with Origen's, 
 347, 348. 
 
 Bacon, on words, 6. 
 Bible, studied in different ways, iii. 
 Butler, Bishop, life a state of proba- 
 tion, 24. 
 
 Caltjng, of the first human pair, 
 122, 123; discussed on different 
 hypotheses, 124-126. 
 
 Childhood, guarded by Christ's 
 teaching, 346. 
 
 Christ, in all things pre-eminent, 
 48, 49 ; Interpreter of histor}', 49- 
 51; to whom revealed, 50, 51; 
 Example of faith, 137-141; mani- 
 fested in the flesh, 138; justified 
 in the spirit, 139; justified by the 
 Father, 139-141; interprets death 
 as related to life, 180; how "claim- 
 ing faith, 194; divisive effect of 
 his coming, 194, 195; arraignment 
 of men provisional and disci- 
 plinar}', 195, 196; appreciation of 
 infancy, 199, 200; in relation to 
 human responsibility, 201 ; end of 
 law for righteousness, 200, 207; 
 as a personal standard, 207, 208; 
 in history, 237; typical portraiture 
 of, 271 ; ideal of his own career, 
 272; Saviour, 272, 273; unique 
 priesthood, 273, 274 ; awakening 
 resistance, 274; how opening com- 
 munications, 274; ministry, 275; 
 
352 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 the glad tidings, 276; self-sac- 
 rifice proving moral perfection, 
 276, 277; exemplified the law of 
 atonement, 277, 278 ; not a doc- 
 trinaire, 279; opportuneness of his 
 coming, 279, 280; beatitudes, for 
 whom, 280; disciples, and their 
 training, 281-287; correction of 
 time-honored maxims, 281, 282; 
 taught love of man with reference 
 to eternal life, 283; distinguished 
 between justice as divine, and hu- 
 man administrations of it, 283, 
 284; counted on the efficiency of 
 spiritual testimony, 284; referred 
 the motions of life to their true 
 centre, 285; raised suffering and 
 death to tlieir highest moral sig- 
 nificance, 285; anticipated and 
 counted upon the cross, 285, 286; 
 
 ' aware that the Master must be 
 glorified before the disciples could 
 become apostles, 286 ; fulfilling 
 the Father's law, 287; Captain of 
 salvation, 287, 288; anticipations 
 of his reappearance, 291; revealed 
 man's sonship, 291, 292; source 
 and unity of divergent tendencies 
 in apostolic thought, 327, 328; 
 judgment to follow his death, 
 328-330; warnings of a coming 
 day, 328, 329; special instructions 
 to the disciples, 329, 330 ; minister 
 of the regeneration, 342. 
 
 Christianity, spiritual infiltration of, 
 239. 
 
 Church, unable to compose conflicts 
 and consecrate society, 37 ; at vari- 
 ance Avith the state, 37, 38; of Lu- 
 ther's day, 311. 
 
 Conscience, developed by trials of 
 good and evil, 69. 
 
 Consequences, a source of instruc- 
 tion, 84. 
 
 Conversion, conditioned upon divine 
 revelation and human progress, 
 340, 341. 
 
 Conviction, religious, realized 
 through discipline, 316. 
 
 Cosmos, primitive and ultimate sig- 
 nificance of, 8, 9. 
 
 Council of Trent, justification, 145. 
 
 Creator, superior to partisanship, 
 157. 
 
 Crises, of personal and social ex- 
 perience, 309-315; spiritual, take 
 physical symbols, 325. 
 
 Crisis, in nature, foreshadowing a 
 moral judgment, 306, 307; of natu- 
 ral retribution following personal 
 trial, 307, 308; of the thirty years' 
 war, Liitzen, 313, 314; of indi- 
 vidual initiative, and of general 
 movement. 314. 
 
 Danger, of life, in transgressing the 
 law of life, 61. 
 
 Death, as affecting ideas of good and 
 evil, 169 ; set forth in two phrases, 
 175, 176; making for better life, 
 178; cannot efface the idea of per- 
 sonal survival, 178; as belonging 
 to an economy of universal good- 
 will, 179; as affecting man's choice 
 of alternatives presented to him, 
 182; power of, Avielded by man, 
 184, 185 ; made serviceable to life 
 and proving the moral rank of a 
 people, 185; bearing upon man's 
 spiritual discipline, 185, 186; use 
 of, illustrated by antediluvian ex- 
 perience, 186, 187. 
 
 Destiny, the individual as a factor 
 in his own, 57; of mankind on 
 earth, as betokening the divine 
 dealings, 171-174 ; how wrought 
 out, 347. 
 
 Development, man's normal, its di- 
 rection and ruling purpose, 27; 
 its relation to cosmical environ- 
 ment, 28; its teaching as to hu- 
 man ability, 29; its suggestion as 
 to the source of created things, 
 30; its dependence upon social 
 environment, 31-38. 
 
 Discipleship, under Christ's teach- 
 ing, its progressive character, 198, 
 199. 
 
 Discipline, of the child, dependent 
 on progress of the race, 32; pro- 
 visional, its purpose, 43. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 353 
 
 Disobedience, the first, palliations 
 of, 67, 68; relation to moral prog- 
 ress, 68. 
 
 Drama, of the Fall, type of universal 
 experience, 87; verifiable in the 
 natural sense, 88-96. 
 
 Duke of Argyle, man an exception 
 to the unity of nature, 146, 147. 
 
 Duties, waiting upon one another, 
 33. 
 
 Duty, conception of, grows with dis- 
 cipline, 42. 
 
 Economy, physical in distinction 
 from moral, 176; alleged contrast 
 of the physical and the spiritual, 
 220, 221. ' 
 
 Eden, conceived according to his- 
 toric experience, 58; law of life 
 in, 89 ; naturally construed, 90-94. 
 
 Elements, cosmical, their relation to 
 life, 84, 85. 
 
 Epictetus, on personality, 177. 
 
 Equations, moral series of, 339, 340. 
 
 Era, Christian, its sign not sudden 
 revolution, 196, 197; of consum- 
 mation, 295. 
 
 Error, primitive, in the light of long 
 experience, 57; inherited and or- 
 ganized, lavs claim to pity, 149, 
 150. 
 
 Evangelists, how conceiving Christ's 
 work, 279. 
 
 Evil, moral, common aspect of, 155; 
 in different periods, 156; exciting 
 animosity in prophetic spirits, 
 156, 157; range of, 168; as error 
 and misconduct incident to moral 
 development, 188. 
 
 Experience, determines the growth 
 and pla}' of ideas, 42, 43; human, 
 a ritual of sacrifice, 235. 
 
 Failuke, primitive liability to, 64, 
 65. 
 
 Faith, growing by experience, 102; 
 the essential element of righteous- 
 ness, 102; what it lays hold of, 
 104; law of, respecting duty, 105; 
 
 respecting judgment, 105, 106; as 
 indicated in man's spiritual his- 
 tory, 107, 108; not an affair of 
 formal logic, 108, 109 ; essential to 
 perfect life, 135, 136; principle of 
 obedience, 136, 137; not consum- 
 mated in one critical act, 141; 
 antithesis of, 141; vital element 
 in divine revelation, 142; with 
 respect to the lower tendencies of 
 human nature, 146; its necessary 
 correlation with unbelief, 161, 162 ; 
 faults and discipline of, 163, 164; 
 careless of conventional sanctities, 
 294. 
 
 Fall, of man, due to the quality of 
 his nature, 71, 72 ; its consequences 
 naturally conceived, 81; different 
 conceptions of it, 97. 
 
 Flood, spiritual lesson of, 246. 
 
 Fruit, forbidden, beyond the just 
 measure of its use, 85. 
 
 Functions, of society, distinguished 
 and specialized, 33, 34. 
 
 Genesis, two accounts, and a dis- 
 tinction between them, 74, 75; of 
 the cosmos, 75, 76; of the aeon, 76, 
 77 ; cosmical, scenery and prelude 
 of an seonian revelation, 79; con- 
 ception of God and man, 127. 
 
 Gentiles, fellow-heirs with the Jews, 
 295. 
 
 Gifts, and sacrifices, the worship of 
 primitive culture, 243 ; example of, 
 in the fourth chapter of Genesis, 
 244; why Abel's sacrifice was more 
 excellent than Cain's, 244, 245. 
 
 Globe, crust of, keeping record of its 
 own changes, 304; indicating cri- 
 ses, 304, 305. 
 
 God, thought of, how coming to 
 man, 32; reign of, revealed in 
 Christ, 292, 293; to whom first 
 making appeal, 322, 323; attach- 
 ing importance to natural motives, 
 323. 
 
 Good, absolute in the Creator, what 
 this implies, 158; and evil, uncer- 
 tain apprehension of, 169, 170; 
 
354 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 distinction of, according to human 
 nature, 193. 
 
 Goodness, creative, proof of, 43. 
 
 Gospel, to whom given, 112, 113. 
 
 Government, divine, different inter- 
 pretations of, 171-174. 
 
 High Priest, of Israel, in what 
 sense acting for the people, 261. 
 
 History, sacred, universal, 229, 2;30; 
 pervaded by a law of reconciliation 
 through sacrifice, 230 ; tinity of, on 
 what depending, 231 ; great chap- 
 ters of, 234, 235; scriptural con- 
 ception of, 332. 
 
 Homer, on speech and woi-ds, 347. 
 
 Idols, referred to by Bacon, 110; of 
 
 Schopenhauer and others. 111. . 
 Inductions, shape anticipations, 305., 
 Initiation, man's moral, pictured 
 
 from life, and so verifiable, 58. 
 Irenseus, holds that God made man 
 
 free from the beginning, 13,3., . 
 Israel, called out of Egypt, 253, 254; 
 
 called to high service and hard 
 
 discipline, 317. 
 
 Judaism, transfigured, 294. 
 
 Judge, the divine, corrects error in 
 all and for all, 157. 
 
 Judgment, crisis, how the two words 
 are related, 301, 302; has regard to 
 disciplinary effects, 315; contrasted 
 crises in one spiritual movement, 
 331; day of, one but recurrin?, 
 331, 332; application of law, 333; 
 last, and "last day," 334. 
 
 Justice, of God, how commonly con- 
 templated, how actually revealed, 
 299, 300. 
 
 Justification, of man, starting-point 
 and reach of the idea, 101; in what 
 respects it is of faith, 106, 107; of 
 our first parents, as related to 
 knowledge, 121, 122; increase of, 
 Council of Trent, 145. 
 
 ELnowledge, of primitive man con- 
 cerning God, 128. 
 
 Lakguage, organic structure of, 6. 
 
 Law, vital and progressive, 69; of 
 life, forbids what is negative to 
 life in any degree, 84; of physical 
 deterioration as related to the life- 
 time, 90, 91; of correlative propor- 
 tions, maxima and minima, 119; 
 outward, not the test or measure 
 of righteousness, 135 ; as related to 
 conflict of laws, 236 ; of Israel, as 
 setting forth conditions on which 
 the divine favor is pledged, 257, 
 258; as providing for patience and 
 considerateness in its administra- 
 tion, 258; specific acts of atone- 
 ment conducive to a vital process, 
 259 ; governing man's moral strug- 
 gle, 348. 
 
 Leader, the perfect, an object of de- 
 sire, 47; his forerunners, how 
 chosen, 47. 
 
 Leadership, creative, shown in any 
 genuine leader, 46. 
 
 Liberty, keeping pace with law, 41; 
 under the banner of religion, 41, 
 42; instinct of, in earliest life, 44; 
 transformation and mature type 
 of, 44; consummation of, impos- 
 sible to the mortal existence, 45. 
 
 Life, a schooling, 23; personal, its 
 myster}'-, 104; phA'sical, demand- 
 ing care first in the order of time, 
 120; of individuals and of the 
 race, 177; why so precious, 178; 
 expenditure of, 233; devoted to the 
 service of life, 245, 246. 
 
 Luther, crisis in his experience, 311, 
 312; his new initiative, 312; his 
 movement not independent of a 
 general one, 313. 
 
 IMan, how conceived by the author 
 of Genesis, 127; natural and spirit- 
 ual, 132, 133; as respects the unity 
 of nature, 146; his original consti- 
 tution as including a law of trans- 
 
INDEX. 
 
 355 
 
 formation, 322; as a part of 
 nature, 338. 
 
 Manhood, in a process of transfor- 
 mation, 103. 
 
 Miracle, of universal nature, 194. 
 
 Mortality, universal, its practical 
 teaching, 177. 
 
 Motives, reaching their predomi- 
 nance in an order of time, 33. 
 
 Mystery, iu relation to faith, 170, 
 171. 
 
 Name, how suggested and enlarged, 
 4, 5; its relation to mind and ob- 
 ject, 5. 
 
 Nature, as set forth in Scripture, iv ; 
 and Scripture, witnesses for each 
 other, 19 ; creation in distinction 
 from the Creator, 81, 82 ; of man, 
 to be divinely guided through na- 
 ture, 82 ; human, its. complexity, 
 151; bodily development as related 
 to spiritual discipline, 151, . 152 ; 
 vindicating the intention . , of , its 
 author, 179 ; determining the con- 
 struction of Scriptures, 344, 345. 
 
 Newman, Cardinal, argument as to 
 original sin, 147, 148. 
 
 New Testament, opens a new era, 
 339; doctrine of one God and one 
 Mediator, 319; announced a new 
 opportunity and trial, 319, 320; 
 how contemplating the world's 
 crises, 320, 321; how setting forth 
 Christ's method of redemption, 
 321. 
 
 Noah, meaning of his sacrifice, 246, 
 247. 
 
 Old Testament, Israel in relation 
 to mankind, 316, 317. 
 
 Organization, physical, its relation 
 to conscious personality, 180, 181. 
 
 Origen, on the "days" in Genesis 
 i., 76; relation of earthh' experi- 
 ence to an illimitable age, 174 ; 
 and Augustine, stand for alterna- 
 tions of thought, 348. 
 
 Pain, discipline of, 162, 163. 
 
 Passover, its ruling idea, 254; note 
 of transition from patriarchal to 
 national religion, 254, 255. 
 
 Patriarch, as forerunner of the 
 nation, 252, 253. 
 
 Paul, St., judgment of sin depending 
 on the revelation of righteousness, 
 203-208; defensive and offensive 
 teaching, 204, 205; consummation 
 of Christ's militant reign, 295; 
 Christ's constant presence, and 
 triumphal appearing, 327. 
 
 Penalty, ensuing upon the first trans- 
 gression, 94-96. 
 
 Perfection, law of man's, not in him- 
 self, 102. 
 
 Peter, St., his apocalypse, 325, 326. 
 
 Phrases, for different aspects of 
 death, 175, 176. ■-- ■ 
 
 Poles, of thooght," in "the' sphere of 
 morals,' 70. ■ '<■• ' -« 
 
 Priest, and sacrifice," in poptilar wor- 
 ^ship, 263. . . ' . ' ■' 
 
 Principle, of progressive virtue and 
 final peace, 269,» 270. 
 
 Probation, sourcfe and limits of the 
 
 • idea, 24-26 ; inclusive of i-etribu- 
 tion — hot excluded from retri- 
 bution, 25, 26; common experi- 
 ence, 27. 
 
 Progress, human, evils incident to, 
 36, 37; in truth, on what depend- 
 ing, 342. 
 
 Prophets, charged with fresh moral 
 inspiration, 263, 264; how predict- 
 ing the general prevalence of piety, 
 264, 265; possessed of an original 
 conviction, 265, 266 ; Samuel, 266 ; 
 Isaiah, 266, 267; Jeremiah, and 
 others, 268; characteristic testi- 
 mony of, 268, 269. 
 
 Reconciliation, of all things in 
 Christ, 210; its complete signifi- 
 cance, 215; and atonement, mutual 
 relation of the words, 216; and 
 redemption, scope of inquiry, 
 218, 219; of spirits to the inten- 
 tion of their Creator, 231, 232; 
 
356 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 and to society, 232, 233; of dififer- 
 ences between individuals and 
 masses, 234; process of, implying 
 a correlative process of judgment, 
 293. 
 
 Redemption, . history of, an ideal 
 assize, 323, 324. 
 
 Reformation, of the sixteenth cen- 
 tury, 311-314. 
 
 Regeneration, for man as man, 341; 
 its perfect type, 341; vital element 
 of salvation, 342. 
 
 Religion, first in dignity, latest in 
 reaching its perfect reality, 35; 
 abuse of its authority, 35; natural 
 history of, 109-111. 
 
 Responsibility, as related to the 
 sense of failure or fault, 67; de- 
 grees of, 119 ; reached in the exer- 
 cise of free choice, 160. 
 
 Revelation, in the Scriptures, vi, 
 vii; response to man's seeking 
 after God, 109, 110; in the di- 
 vine man, 112, 113 ; through na- 
 ture, 193 ; spiritual, 228 ; postulate 
 of, as to spirits and their con- 
 ditions, 229; moves in the whole 
 course of nature, 229; how pos- 
 sible to man, 236, 237; through 
 nature, but not of nature, 240, 241 ; 
 its parts require the whole, 300; 
 how conceived in Scripture, 338. 
 
 Righteousness, as realized in human 
 ■ nature and represented in Scrip- 
 ture, 145. 
 
 Ruling, the divine, how becoming 
 effective in human society, 338. 
 
 Sacrifice, exacted by nature, 222; 
 accepted by man, 222, 223; indis- 
 pensable in enterprise and im- 
 provements, 222-224; a law of 
 physical life, 224, 225; in the 
 progress of civilization and re- 
 ligion, 225, 226 ; of human victims, 
 226, 227 ; law by which all things 
 consist, 227; of self, type of all 
 true obedience and worship, 249; 
 ritual changing, law abiding, 250. 
 
 Salvation, working out of, 345, 346. 
 
 Schooling, in the world, its grand 
 aspects, 33; through mistakes, 
 61-63; legal, whereto it serves, 
 114. 
 
 Scripture or Scriptures, as related to 
 nature and defined in history, 
 iv; grand distinction of, 46; their 
 fulfilment in Christ, 48, 49 ; truth 
 to nature, 73 ; silence of, 96 ; true 
 to the struggle of the hour and 
 the consummation of the age, 112 ; 
 why appealed to, 115; to be con- 
 strued with reason and reverence, 
 116; meet us on the ground of 
 common sense and common faith, 
 117; their claim to credence, 193; 
 testimony to Christ's estimate of 
 human behavior, 197, 198; teach- 
 ing gi-ounded in universal reality, 
 yet accommodated to particular 
 facts, 214; claim to speak for 
 themselves, 242 ; proof of their in- 
 spiration, 242, 243 ; searching and 
 verification of, 337; set forth a 
 series of moral equations, 339, 
 340; their unverifiable elements, 
 343, 344; authority, how acquired 
 and sustained, 344. 
 
 Sin, Adam's, sequel of, 129, 130; in- 
 quiry and judgment upon, 130, 
 131; ensuing discipline, 131. 
 
 Speech, genesis of, 3, 4. 
 
 Suffering, in the voluntary discipline 
 of life, 165, 166. 
 
 Teachers, compared with those 
 taught, 24. 
 
 Teaching, divine, its necessary con- 
 descension, 59, 60; its practical 
 method, 241. 
 
 Temptation, the first, naturally con- 
 ceived, 79, 80. 
 
 Tendency, of man's development, 
 183, 184. 
 
 Terms, that suggest governmental 
 schemes, 218. 
 
 Time, image of etemitj'-, Plato, 12; 
 in the concrete, life-time, 78. 
 
 Training, should not exaggerate 
 childish errors, 114, 115; moral, 
 
INDEX. 
 
 357 
 
 its period, 152 ; for the manifesta- 
 tion and maturing of character, 
 153-155. 
 
 Transformation, of moral activity, 
 345. 
 
 Trees, of Eden, 91-93. 
 
 Trial, human, nature of, 52; reach- 
 ing back to original man, 53; its 
 social character, 60; primitive, its 
 peculiar liability, 64. 
 
 Turretin, Lihertas AdamL 217, note. 
 
 Unbelief, error of immature intel- 
 lig-ence, 158, 159; against man's 
 best thought or persuasion, 188, 
 189; its spiritual character, 188- 
 190; related to personal responsi- 
 bility, 190, 191; negative to truth, 
 positive in personal energy, 191, 
 192; stimulus of resistance to the 
 argument of faith, 192. 
 
 Unity, of thought, how men are 
 drawn toward it, 343. 
 
 Verification, two kinds of, v; of 
 any writing according to its own 
 order of thought, 79. 
 
 Vicissitudes, sudden, from impercep- 
 tible processes of change, 303, 304. 
 
 Victims, by whom provided, why 
 offered, 235, 236. 
 
 Virtue, not perfected in its ascetic 
 type, 166. 
 
 War, for subsistence, 175. 
 
 Wisdom, *'a tree of life," 86; how 
 imparted to mortals, 86, 87. 
 
 Witnesses, apostolic, how they re- 
 garded the world, 290, 291. 
 
 Words, what like, 6. 
 
 World, import of the word, growth 
 of its meaning, 7 ; conceived as con- 
 tinuing, 9; cosmical and aeonian, 
 18 ; necessity and cost of its trans- 
 formation, 167, 168. 
 
 World-history, how affected by the 
 coming of Christ, 194, 195; Scrip- 
 tural conception of, 209, 210. 
 
 Worship, of Israel, its oneness, 255, 
 256; use of blood as a sacrificial 
 symbol, 255, 256 ; distinctions of 
 form, 256, 257; identical in sub- 
 stance however accommodated in 
 ritual, 259, 260; concern for spirit- 
 ual reality, 260, 261. 
 
 rniversity Press : John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 
 
/i 
 
Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
 Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
 Treatment Date: July 2005 
 
 PreservationTechnolog 
 
 A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 
 
 1 1 1 Thomson Park Dnve 
 Cranberry Townshrp. PA 16066 
 (724)779-2111