Part 8 (1/2)
[Footnote 16: The verse so often quoted from Terence, ”h.o.m.o sum; humani nihil a me alienum puto,” will probably occur to many as inconsistent with my statement. The sentiment of this verse is, indeed, as it stands by itself, truly Christian; but in the Comedy from which it is quoted, so far from having a philanthropic significance, it is merely a busy-body's apology for impertinent interference with the concerns of his neighbor.]
The fraternity of our entire race--even without involving the mooted question of a common human parentage--is through Christianity established, not only by the Divine fatherhood so constantly proclaimed and so luculently manifested by Jesus, but equally by the unifying ministry of his death as a sacrifice for all, and by his parting commitment of ”all the world” and ”every creature” to the propagandism of his disciples. Though the spirit of this revelation has not yet been embodied in any community, it has inspired the life-work of many in every age; it has moulded reform and guided progress in social ethics throughout Christendom; it has twice swept the civilized world clean from domestic slavery; it has shaken every throne, is condemning every form of despotism, monopoly, and exclusiveness, and gives clear presage of a condition in which the old pre-Christian division of society into the preying and the preyed-upon will be totally obliterated.
2. _The immortality of the soul_, also, casts a light, at once broad and penetrating, upon and into every department of duty; for it is obvious, without detailed statement, that the fitnesses, needs, and obligations of a terrestrial being of brief duration, and those of a being in the nursery and initial stage of an endless existence, are very wide apart,--that the latter may find it fitting to do, seek, shun, omit, endure, resign, many things which to the former are very properly matters of indifference. Immortality was, indeed, in a certain sense believed before Christ, but with feeble a.s.surance, and with the utmost vagueness of conception; so that this belief can hardly be said to have existed either as a criterion of duty or as a motive power. How small a part it bore in the ethics of the Stoic school may be seen, when we remember that Epictetus, than whom there was no better man, denied the life beyond death; and in Marcus Antoninus immortality was rather a devout aspiration than a fixed belief. In the Christian revelation, on the other hand, the eternal life is so placed in the most intimate connection with the life and character in this world as to cast its reflex lights and shadows on all earthly scenes and experiences.
Christianity, in the next place, makes to us an ethical revelation in the person and character of its Founder, exhibiting in him the very fitnesses which it prescribes, showing us, as it could not by mere precepts, the proportions and harmonies of the virtues, and manifesting the unapproached beauty, nay, majesty, of the gentler virtues,--_virtutes leniores_, as Cicero calls them,--which in pre-Christian ages were sometimes made secondary, sometimes repudiated with contempt and derision.
It is, I know, among the commonplaces of the rationalism and secularism of our time, that the moral precepts of the Gospel were not original, but had all been antic.i.p.ated by Greek or Eastern sages. This is not literally and wholly true; for in some of the most striking of the alleged instances there is precisely the same difference between the heathen and the Christian precept that there is between the Old Testament and the New. The former says, ”Thou shalt not;” the latter, ”Thou shalt.” The former forbids; the latter commands. The former prescribes abstinence from overt evil; the latter has for its sum of duty, ”Be thou perfect, as thy Father in heaven is perfect.” But the statement which I have quoted has more of truth in it than has been usually conceded by zealous champions of the Christian faith; and I would gladly admit its full and entire truth, could I see sufficient evidence of it. The unqualified admission does not in the least detract from the pre-eminent worth of Him who alone has been the Living Law. So far is this antic.i.p.ation of his precepts by wise and good men before him from casting doubts on the divinity of his mission upon earth, that it only confirms his claims upon our confidence. For the great laws of morality are, as we have seen, as old as the throne of G.o.d; and strange indeed were it, had there been no intimation of them till the era of their perfect embodiment and full promulgation. The Divine Spirit, breathing always and everywhere, could not have remained, without witness of right, duty, and obligation in the outward universe and in the human conscience. So, struggling through the mists of weltering chaos, were many errant light-beams; yet none the less glorious and benignant was the sun, when in the clear firmament he first shone, all-illumining and all-guiding.
But in practical ethics a revelation of duty is but a small part of man's need. According to a Chinese legend, the founders of the three princ.i.p.al religious sects in the Celestial Empire, lamenting in the spirit-land the imperfect success which had attended the promulgation of their doctrines, agreed to return to the earth, and see if they could not find some right-minded person by whose agency they might convert mankind to the integrity and purity which they had taught. They came in their wanderings to an old man, sitting by a fountain as its guardian.
He recalled to them the high moral tone of their several systems, and reproached them for the unworthy lives of their adherents. They agreed that he was the very apostle they sought. But when they made the proposal to him, he replied, ”It is the upper part of me only that is flesh and blood: the lower part is stone. I can talk about virtue, but cannot follow its teachings.” The sages saw in this man, half of stone, the type of their race, and returned in despair to the spirit-land.
There is profound truth in this legend. It indicates at once the mental receptivity and the moral inability of man, as to mere precepts of virtue. It is not enough that we know the right. We know much better than we do. The words which Ovid puts into the mouth of Medea, _Video meliora, proboque, deteriora sequor_ (”I see and approve the better, I pursue the worse”), are the formula of universal experience. We, most of all, need enabling power. This we have through Christianity alone. We have it: 1. In the Divine fatherhood, as exhibited in those genial, winning traits, in which Jesus verifies his saying, ”He that hath seen me hath seen the Father,”--a fatherhood to feel which is to render glad and loving obedience to the Father's will and word; 2. In the adaptation of the love, sacrifice, and death of Christ to awaken the whole power of loving in the heart, and thus by the most cogent of motives to urge man to live no longer for himself, but for him who died for him; 3. In the a.s.surance of forgiveness for past wrongs and omissions, without which there could be little courage for future well-doing; 4. In the promise and realization of Divine aid in every right purpose and worthy endeavor; 5. In inst.i.tutions and observances designed and adapted to perpetuate the memory of the salient facts, and to renew at frequent intervals the recognition of the essential truths, which give to our religion its name, character, and efficacy.
Thus, while right and obligation exist independently of revelation, and even of natural religion, Christianity alone enables us to discern the right in its entireness and its due proportions; and it alone supplies the strength which we need, to make and keep us true to our obligations, under the stress of appet.i.te and pa.s.sion, cupidity and selfishness, human fear and favor.
Morality and religion, potentially separable, are yet inseparable in the will of G.o.d, under the culture of Christ. It used to be common to place the legal and the evangelical element in mutual antagonism. Nothing can be more profane or absurd than this. That which is not legal is evangelical only in name and pretence. That which is not evangelical is legal to no purpose. The religious belief or teaching, which lays not supreme stress on the whole moral law, is an outrage on the Gospel and the Saviour. The morality, which rests on any other foundation than Jesus Christ and his religion, is built on the sand, the prey of the first onrush or inrush of wind or wave. ”What therefore G.o.d hath joined together, let not man put asunder.”
CHRISTIANITY:
WHAT IT IS NOT, AND WHAT IT IS.
By G. VANCE SMITH.
I.
In looking back upon the past history of Christianity, it is easy to trace the existence of two very different ideas of the nature of that religion. Their influence is discernible in what may be termed its incipient form, in perhaps the earliest period to which we can ascend, while it has been especially felt during the last three hundred years, as also it materially affects the position and relations of churches and sects at the present moment. From obvious characteristics of each, these ideas may be respectively designated as the _ritualistic_, or sacerdotal, and the _dogmatic_, or doctrinal. It is scarcely necessary to add, that the two have been constantly intermingled and blended together, acting and reacting upon each other, and either supporting or else thwarting each other with singular pertinacity. Neither of them is found, in any instance of importance, existing wholly apart from the other, so as to be the sole animating principle of a great religious organization. The nature of the case renders this impossible.
Ritualistic observances cannot be rationally followed without dogmatic beliefs. The former are the natural exponents of the latter, which indeed they are supposed to represent and to symbolize. Nor can doctrinal creeds, again, wholly dispense with outward rites and forms.
Even the most spiritual religion requires some outward medium of expression, if it is to influence strongly either communities or individuals. It must, therefore, tacitly or avowedly adopt something of the dogmatic, if not of the ritualistic, idea, although this may not be put into express words, much less formed into a definite creed or test of orthodoxy.
A common factor of the greatest importance enters into the two conceptions of Christianity just referred to, though not perhaps in equal measure. I allude to the moral element, which may also be denoted as the sense of duty,--duty towards G.o.d and towards man. It may, indeed, be said to be a distinguis.h.i.+ng glory of Christianity, that it can hardly exist at all, under whatever outward form, without being more or less strongly pervaded by the moral spirit of which the ministry of Christ affords so rich and varied an expression. It is true, however, that the ritualistic idea has constantly a tendency to degenerate into a mere care for church observances, devoid of any high tone of uprightness and purity in the practical concerns of ordinary life. It is a common thing, in that great religious communion of Western and Southern Europe which is so strongly animated by this idea, to see people in the churches ceremoniously kneeling in the act of prayer, while all the time they are busy, with eager eyes, to follow every movement in the crowd around them. In certain countries, many of the ritualistically devout, it is well known, have no scruple in practising the grossest impositions upon strangers; a statement which is especially true of those lands that in modern times have been governed and demoralized beyond others by the influence of the priestly cla.s.s, with their religion of material externalities. A Greek or an Italian brigand, it is said, will rob and murder his captive with a peaceful conscience, provided only that he duly confesses to the priest, and obtains his absolution. This last is a gross and, happily, a rare case. But, equally with the more innocent acts, it ill.u.s.trates the natural tendencies of ritualistic Christianity among various cla.s.ses of persons. In ordinary civilized society, such tendencies are kept powerfully in check by other influences. Hence it is not to be denied that, throughout the Christian world, devotional feeling and the sense of duty are usually deep and active in their influence, and that the practical teachings of Christ, directly or indirectly, exercise a potent control, whatever may be the ritualistic or the dogmatic idea with which they are a.s.sociated.
The ritualistic conception now spoken of offers us a Christianity which secures ”salvation,” by the intervention of a priest,--a man who, though, to all outward appearance, but a human being among human beings, yet alleges, and finds people to believe, that he can exercise supernatural functions, and has the power of opening or closing the gates of heaven to his fellow-men. It is needless to say how large a portion of Christendom is still under the influence of this kind of superst.i.tion, or how pertinaciously the same unspiritual form of religion is, at this moment, struggling to establish itself, even in the midst of the most enlightened modern nations.
Nor is it necessary here to argue, with any detail, against the notion of its being either inculcated upon us within the pages of the New Testament, or enforced by any legitimate authority whatever. Probably no one who cares to hear or to read these words would seriously maintain that the Gospel of Christ consists, in any essential way, in submission to a priesthood, fallible or infallible, in the observance of rites and ceremonies or times and seasons, or in a particular mode or form of church government, whatever doctrines these may be supposed to embody or to symbolize. Such things have, indeed, variously prevailed among the Christian communities from the beginning. Generation after generation has seen priests, and Popes, and patriarchs, and presbyters, without number. These personages have decked themselves out in sacred garments, a.s.sumed ecclesiastical dignities and powers, and sought, many of them, to heighten the charm and the efficacy of their wors.h.i.+p by the aid of altars and sacrifices, so called, of prostrations, incense, lamps and candles, and many other such outward accessories. But are such things to be reckoned among the essentials of Christian faith or Christian righteousness? Does the presence or the blessing of the Spirit of G.o.d, to the humble, penitent, waiting soul of man, depend upon any thing which one calling himself a priest can do or say for us? Will any one, whose opinion is worth listening to, say that it does?
The teaching of Christ and his Apostles is, in truth, remarkably devoid of every idea of this kind. So much is this the case, that it may well be matter of astonishment to find men who profess to follow and to speak for them holding that in such matters there can be only one just and adequate Christian course,--that, namely, which commends itself to _their_ judgment! It is evident, on the contrary,--too evident to be in need of serious argument,--that the very diversities of opinion and practice which prevail in the world--as expressed by such names as Catholic and Protestant, Greek Church and Latin Church, Church of England and Church of Scotland, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Congregational--prove conclusively that nothing imperative has been transmitted to us. The great Christian brotherhood, in its various sections and diverse conditions, has manifestly been left, in these things, to its own sense of what it is good and right to follow. Thus, too, if we will not close our eyes to the plainest lessons of His Providence, the Almighty Father gives us to understand that He only asks from us the service of heart and life that is ”in spirit and in truth;”
and, consequently, that we may each give utterance to our thoughts of praise and thanksgiving, to penitence for sin, to our prayer for the divine help and blessing, in whatever form of words, through whatever personal agency, and with whatever accompaniment of outward rite and ceremony we may ourselves deem it most becoming to employ.
The second, or dogmatic, conception of the Gospel has been less generally prevalent than that of which I have been speaking. Yet, ever since the days of Luther, not to recall the older times of Nicene or Athanasian controversy, it has been possessed of great influence in some of the most important Christian nations. Protestant Christianity is predominantly dogmatic. Under various forms of expression, it makes the Gospel to consist in a very definite system of _doctrines_ to be believed; or, if not actually to consist in this, at least to include it, as its most prominent and indispensable element. We are informed, accordingly, that a man is not a Christian, cannot be a Christian, and perhaps it will be added, cannot be ”saved,” unless he receives certain long established doctrines, or reputed doctrines, of Christian faith.
What these are, it is not necessary here minutely to inquire. It is well, however, to note with care that there would be considerable differences of opinion in regard to them, among those who would yet be agreed as to the necessity of holding firmly to the dogmatic idea referred to. A Roman Catholic, of competent intelligence, would not by any means agree with an ordinary member of the Anglican church equally qualified. Both of these would differ in essential points from a member of the Greek church; and the three would be almost equally at variance with an average representative of Scotch Presbyterian Calvinism, as also with one whose standard of orthodoxy is contained in the Sermons, and the notes on the New Testament, of the founder of Methodism. Nay, it is well known, even within the limits of the same ecclesiastical communion, differences so serious may be found as are denoted, in common phrase, by the terms _ritualistic_ and _evangelical_, and by other familiar words of kindred import.
Among the great Protestant sects the want of harmony under notice is, doubtless, confined within comparatively narrow limits. But there is diversity, not to say discord, even here. No one will dispute the fact who has any knowledge of the history of Protestant theology, or who is even acquainted with certain discussions, a few years ago, among well-known members of the English Episcopal Church, or with others, of more recent date, among English Independents,--in both cases on so weighty a subject as the nature of the Atonement.[17] Moreover, in the same quarters, varieties of opinion are notorious on such topics as Baptismal regeneration, the authority of the Priesthood, the inspiration of Scripture, eternal punishment,--all of them questions of the most vital importance, in one or other of the popular schemes of the doctrine.
[Footnote 17: Between Archbishop Thomson, in _Aids to Faith_, and some of the writers of _Tracts for Priests and People_; also between several eminent Independent Ministers, in the _English Independent_ newspaper (August, 1871).]