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^Ci5>d.i scourses
ON OCCASION OF
THE DEDICATION
OF
HOPE-STREET NEW CHURCH,
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LIVERPOOL,
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 18, AND SUNDAY, OCTOBER 21, 1849.
*
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BY
REV. THOMAS MADGE.
REV. JAMES MARTINEAU.
REV. CHARLES WICKSTEED.
LONDON:
JOHN CHAPMAN, 142, STRAND.
MDCCCXLIX.
PRICE ONE SHILLING AND SIXPENCE.
��DISCOURSES
ON OCCASION OF
THE DEDICATION
HOPE-STREET NEW CHURCH,
LIVERPOOL,
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 18, AND SUNDAY, OCTOBER 21, 1849.
BY
REV. THOMAS MADGE.
REV. JAMES MARTINEAU.
REV. CHARLES WICKSTEED.
LONDON:
JOHN CHAPMAN, 142, STRAND.
MDCCCXLIX.
�LONDON:
PRINTED BY RICHARD KINDER,
GREEN ARBOUR COURT, OLD BAILEY.
�PREFACE.
The occasion of the following Discourses was naturally
one of great interest to the Society in whose service they
were prepared.
At the entrance of a new era in its con
gregational history, it seemed fit that some comprehensive
expression should be given to the aims which it proposes
to realise, and the views of life which distinguish its in
terpretation of Christianity.
The immediate request for
the publication of the Sermons justifies the hope that they
fairly represent the state of mind and purpose with which
the new Church is entered by its possessors; and that
they may stand as a record of the time and connexion to
which they belong.
This circumstance gives to them a
value not due to any intrinsic qualities of their own; and
induces the preachers to consign them to a permanent
form, less as original expressions of divine truth, than as
marks in the ever-changing course of human sentiment.
November 14, 1849.
a2
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�THE DEDICATION OF THE CHRISTIAN TEMPLE TO THE
WORSHIP AND SERVICE OF GOD.
A SERMON,
PREACHED ON THURSDAY, OCTOBER 18th, 1849,
By THOMAS MADGE,
MINISTER OF ESSEX STREET CHAPEE.
�LONDON:
PRINTED BY RICHARD KINDER,
GREEN ARBOUR COURT, OLD BAILEY.
�A SERMON.
Already, my brethren, as it was meet that it should be
so, has the voice which has so often given utterance to
the devout sentiments of your hearts, and to which, after
a period of silence, you must rejoice again to listen, —
*
already, I say, has that voice breathed forth the prayer of
thanksgiving and the prayer of supplication becoming the
occasion on which we are now assembled. Nevertheless, I
cannot enter upon that part which has been allotted to
me of this day’s service without once more beseeching
Him whose favour is the primal source of all illumination,
of all truth, and goodness, and happiness, to look merci
fully upon us at this time, and graciously accept our
humble endeavours to glorify his holy name. The words
which I have chosen as introductory to the observations
which I have now to address to you are taken from
Acts i. 13, 14.
“ And when they were come in, they went up into an upper
room, where abode both Peter, and James, and John, with
the other apostles. These all continued with one accord
in prayer and supplication, with the women, and Mary the
mother of Jesus, and with his brethren?'
* The devotional services were introduced by the Rev. James Mar
tineau, the Minister of the Church, who, since his return from the con
tinent after an absence of more than a year, had now, for the first time,
presented himself to his congregation.
B 2
�Most interesting and affecting must this first meeting
of the apostles and their companions have been after the
trying scenes through which they had lately passed, and
the dispersion of that cloud of doubts, and fears, and
anxieties, which had so heavily hung over them. From
the deep depression into which their minds had sunk as
they fled from the garden of Gethsemane and the tragedy
of the Cross, they had now risen into a state of hopeful,
joyful expectation. For a brief season they had given up
all as lost. They disappeared from the public eye, and
it seemed, for a moment, as if a life of privacy and retire
ment were henceforth the life most fitting for them to
lead. But the sudden re-appearance among them of their
risen and now ascended Lord dispelled their growing
despondency, revived their expiring hopes, brought them
again upon the open stage of life, and imparted to them
fortitude and courage, patience and perseverance, untiring
and unconquerable, in testifying to the truth of what they
had seen and heard. It was when their hearts were thus
re-assured, and their confidence was more than restored,
that they assembled together in the upper room men
tioned in the text, to call to mind those words and deeds
of power and of love of which they had recently been the
admiring witnesses,—to bow down in grateful acknow
ledgements before God for the glorious issue of their Mas
*
ter’s labours and sufferings in his triumphant resurrection
from the dead,—and to invoke the divine blessing upon
their own future labours in the Christian cause. Here
they had met to commune with one another on the new
and important relation into which they had just entered,
and the obligations and duties to which it summoned
them. Hitherto, for the purposes of religious worship
and instruction, they had assembled with their Jewish
�5
brethren in the temple or the synagogue. Now they
were associated together, expressly and purposely, as
Christians, to dwell upon their Christian blessings and
privileges, and to present unto God their thanksgivings
and supplications in the name and as the disciples of
Christ. This meeting, therefore, may be regarded as the
type of all future churches, as indicating the purpose for
which they were designed, and the end to which they
should be subservient. It teaches us that, in entering
the Christian temple, we should enter there to sit at the
feet of Christ and learn of him; to meditate with the
men of Galilee on mortality and immortality; and to
unite our voices, in one blended song of praise and
thanksgiving, that so they may go up in accepted chorus
to the throne of God. Honourable alike is it, my friends,
to your feelings and principles that it was in your heart,
as it has been in your power, to raise up this beautiful
structure for yourselves and families to worship in—de
voting it, not to the interests and fashion of a world that
passeth away, but to the interests and welfare of that
higher life which shall not pass away.
In this place, then, we have nothing to do with the
wisdom of the schools, with the doctrines of human phi
losophy, or the speculations of human ingenuity. I deny
not that in other places, and at other times, they may
well and properly occupy some share of your thoughts and
attention, but here we have greater and more important
topics to dwell upon, higher questions to resolve, a nobler
science to learn, more grave and solemn lessons to attend
to.
The first and greatest truth with which we are here
concerned is the existence and government of God. That
he is, and that he is the rewarder of all who truly and
�diligently seek him, is a proposition of momentous import,
upon the reception or rejection of which awful and mo
mentous consequences are made to depend. But with
the nature of God we must necessarily be totally unac
quainted. It is a subject embracing heights which we
cannot ascend, and depths which we cannot fathom.
What the divine essence is,' or in what manner God
exists, is one of those things which are properly termed
mysterious. It is hidden from our sight. It belongs not
to us to inquire into it. It forms no part of our know
ledge or of our belief. It lies completely out of the sphere
of our understandings. But there is one truth concern
ing the divine existence which it is not difficult for us to
conceive of, nor unimportant for us to believe. It is a
truth for which reason and revelation both earnestly
plead ; and it is a truth which the history of the world
shows to be intimately associated with the virtue and the
happiness of man. That God is one; that he has no
equal, no rival, but reigns absolute and alone, power
above all powers, is the great pervading doctrine both of
the Old Testament and the New.
We, therefore, dedicate this Church to the worship of
one only God.
With the doctrine of the Divine Unity there is closely
connected in the gospel of Christ that of God’s paternal
character. It tells us that as we came from him we are
dear to him ; that as he is our Father, so we are his chil
dren. It assures us that he has not only given us all
things richly to enjoy, causing his sun to shine and his
rain to descend, that the earth might give her increase
and bring forth food for the service of man, but that even
darkness, and storms, and tempests, are his messengers
for good, that his afflictions are in kindness sent, and that
�7
he chastens us for our benefit. It speaks of God as our
almighty friend who ever careth for us, and who, in call
ing us into the ways of piety and virtue, calls us to the
nearer and more perfect enjoyment of himself. It assures
us that as in love God made us, so in love he sent Jesus
Christ to redeem us, that with him there is no respect of
persons, that what he demands of one he demands of
all, that he pities our infirmities and hath compassion
upon them that love him, and that all who sincerely
repent of their sins will be equally the objects of his for
giving mercy. These are glorious, delightful revelations
of Almighty God, well fitted to cheer and encourage the
good, to reclaim the bad from the error of their ways, and
to melt the hard and obdurate heart into penitence and
submission.
We dedicate this Church to the service of God the
Father, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
In accordance with the view presented to us by our
Saviour of the character of God, is the representation
made by him of the duty of man. When asked what
was necessary to be done in order to, secure the gift of
eternal life, he answered plainly and distinctly, “ Keep
the commandments • love the Lord thy God with all thy
heart, and mind, and strength, and thy neighbour as
thyself; this do, and thou shalt live.” And when the
Scribe acquiesced in this declaration, and acknowledged
that there was no God but one, and that He alone was
entitled to the supreme homage and affection of his
creatures, Jesus turned to him and said, “ Thou art not
far from the kingdom of heaven.” In like manner, when
he gave to his followers a test of true discipleship, it was
not subscription to an unmeaning creed, the adoption
of some mysterious dogma, but it was the practical
�8
application of the precept, Love one another. “ By this,”
said he, “ shall all men know that ye are my disciples if
ye have love one to another.’* Wherever he saw piety
associated with charity, there he recognised the only
bond by which man is connected with heaven, “ the only
step or link for intercourse with God.” “ Blessed are the
meek, for they shall inherit the earth, Blessed are the
merciful, for they shall obtain mercy, Blessed are the
pure in heart, for they shall see God.” Impressive and
beautiful, however, as these words of our Lord are, it is
in his life still more than in his words that we see and
feel the power and the beauty of the doctrines which he
taught. Thus explained and illustrated, they become
clothed with a touching sense of reality and truth. They
speak to the soul with a voice of power to which all its
purer feelings beat responsive. When I see how he went
about doing good, healing all manner of sickness and
ministering to the sorrows of the sorrowful, how he pitied
the erring and sought to reclaim the wandering, what
compassion he had on the multitude and what sympathy
he felt for their distresses,—when I see him mingling
with the despised and neglected of his race, and braving
the misrepresentations and calumnies of his enemies in
his efforts to raise up the fallen and to comfort the miser
able,—when I look at the treatment which he observed
towards the penitent, and perceive how gentle and merci
ful it was, and that to the contrite spirit he ever turned
an eye of encouragement and hope,—when I thus con
template the conduct of Jesus, and remember that he
appeared on earth as the image and representative of the
Most High, I feel that his life is, indeed, the best of
teachers and instructors, that it leaves upon the mind an
impression of what God is, and man should be, such as
�9
even his own gracious words would alone have failed to
impart. Our duty, then, as it respects our Maker, our
fellow-creatures, and ourselves, lies clearly and plainly
before us. The gospel relieves us of all difficulty and
dissipates all doubt. From its pages may be heard the
voice of Jesus, saying to us, Hither come, this is the way
of truth and righteousness. Whosoever folioweth me shall
not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.
We dedicate this Church to a righteous and holy God,
wTho sent his Son Jesus Christ to redeem us from all
iniquity, and to purify unto himself a peculiar people
zealous of good works.
From what has now been said you will perceive that
Christianity does not present us with cold and comfort
less abstractions, fitted to the entertainment of the spe
culative understanding, but that it brings before us those
relations which connect us immediately with God, and the
contemplation of which is adapted to touch and engage
our hearts, to warm and enliven our affections, to awaken
virtuous emotions, and to prompt to virtuous actions. It
does not send us to struggle with conceptions too mighty
for our grasp, but it places before us those sublime and
simple truths, which, while they are intelligible to the
humblest understanding, interest and delight the loftiest
mind. To refine and elevate our souls, to lift us above
the meannesses and littlenesses of earth, and to give us
longings for the glories and satisfactions of heaven, our
eyes have been opened to see the things which the wisest
of ancient days desired to see, but were not able. Jesus
Christ has torn away the veil by which the human mind
was once shrouded in darkness and doubt, and let in upon
our souls the discovery not only of that which will inform
and instruct our understandings, but of that also which
�10
will lighten the pressure of grief and relax the bondage
of despair.
Much as on this account it becomes us to prize the
gospel, we have yet still more reason to prize it for the
clear and explicit assurance which it contains, and for the
confirmation which that assurance receives in the resur
rection of Christ, that we shall live again, that this world
is not the last stage of our existence, but one to prepare
us for another and a better. Were I asked what, more
than anything else, is needed to make man what he
should be, to give him courage in the profession of what
is true, and firmness in the practice of what is right; to
make him, in all his ways and doings, pure-minded and
single-hearted, uncorruptible by temptation and uncon
querable by sin,—my answer would be, the doctrine of a
future everlasting life, such as is brought before us in
the revelation of Jesus Christ. No man who truly admits it
into his thoughts, but must feel its great, its inestimable
value. In all states and conditions of our being, whether
we are cast down by misfortune, or whether sorrowing
for the loss of friends, what more blessed source of peace
and consolation can be opened to us than the anticipa
tion of that rest which remaineth for the people of God.
And when we ourselves are stretched on the bed of death,
—when the last dark hour of mortality approaches, and
weeping friends gather around us to take their solemn
farewell,—what is the doctrine we value then ? What
is the hope to which we then cling,—what the prospect
upon which we then dwell ? At such a moment, do we
concern ourselves with questions about the divine essence,
or with distinctions in the divine nature ? Oh ! no. To
the one only question then in our minds, “ When man
dieth and giveth up the ghost, where is he ?” the answer
�11
of Jesus, “ I am the resurrection and the life; whosoever
believeth in me shall never die,” is all sufficient. This,
—this satisfies the heart and gives rest to the soul.
With glad and grateful spirits, therefore, we dedicate
this Church to the Author and Giver of Eternal Life, to
Him who hath given us the victory over death and the
grave through our Lord Jesus Christ.
The views of which I have now presented to you the
merest outline, constitute the common faith of Christians;
and to those who cordially embrace them, they afford
every help and every encouragement that can be given to
the mind of man when struggling with the evils and ad
versities that here assail him. Some of the wisest and
best men that have ever lived have been distinguished
for their attachment to this common faith. Yes, among
Christian professors of this enlarged and liberal school
are to be found those wTho have daily and hourly walked
with God; the consciousness of whose presence has been
to them the sanctifier of their inward thoughts and the
guardian of their outward actions; men, whom the se
ductions of pleasure could not tempt, nor the terrors of
suffering drive from the path of duty; men, whose great
object in life was to do the will of God, and who, for this
purpose, pressed right on in spite of every advancing dif
ficulty and every surrounding danger, and who, when
the summons of death arrived, fixed their thoughts upon
that heaven, the promised inheritance of the wise and
good, and so departed in peace and hope. Many are the
men of this stamp and character who have been found in
all churches. Take, I would say, Eenelon from the Roman
Catholics; Jeremy Taylor, and Barrow, and Tillotson
from the Church of England; Locke, and Newton, and
Hartley from among the ranks of Christian philosophers;
�12
and Doddridge, and Foster, and Price, and Priestley from
the various classes of Dissenters ; and you will find that
the great principles which they most valued and cherished
—those principles which were the actuating motives of
their conduct, and which shed upon their souls refreshing
dews of joy and of hope—were the principles which they
held in common, that is, were the principles by which
we, as a Christian body, are emphatically distinguished.
Now these principles we are desirous of upholding in
their simplicity and integrity ; of preserving in their sin
gleness and purity, apart from all admixture with foreign
ingredients. We look upon the vital, essential truths of
Christianity to be those which are possessed, not by any
one sect exclusively, but which belong to the church of
Christ universally. Our peculiarity therefore—if so it
may be called—that which separates us from other bodies
of professing Christians, consists mainly in this, in the
prominence and distinction which we give to these truths ;
in regarding them as of supreme and paramount import
ance ; as, in fact, the be-all and the end-all of the Chris
tian dispensation. We hold the catholic or universal
faith to be the true genuine Christian faith, and the only
one that should be made a condition of Christian com
munion. It is upon this broad ground that we take our
stand as a Christian society. It is upon this wide foun
dation that the fellowship of our churches is based.
Ever sacred be this temple to the cause of religious free
dom, of piety, peace, and charity !
Of all the bonds by which man is connected with man,
the first and the greatest is that which unites them all to
the Creator. If there be anything more than another
which belongs to us in common, in which we are all one,
it is that of being the creatures of God, subsisting by his
�13
will, depending upon his bounty, daily witnesses of his
majesty and might, daily partakers of his kindness and
care. Receiving common mercies, it is reasonable that
we should unite in common acknowledgements. With
the same reasons for thankfulness and praise, it becomes
us to mingle our songs with the songs of our brethren,
and in sacred union and fellowship to pour out our prayers
and supplications together. Like the good men of old,
it becomes us to go to the house of God in company,
and, with the purest influences of heaven, to mingle the
dearest sanctities of earth. For this let us welcome the
return of each Sabbath morn, inviting us to suspend for
a while the chase after worldly gains and pleasures, and
opening to our inward sight the vision of an immortal
heaven.
There are, I know, those who say that they need not
the ministriations of the sanctuary to remind them of their
relation to God and eternity, to silence the clamour of
worldly passions and pursuits, and to beget in them a
genuine religious thoughtfulness. They can commune
with their own hearts, they tell us, in the stillness of their
chamber, or go forth, like the patriarch Isaac, to meditate
in the fields at even-tide. I believe, however, that for
the most part they who talk in this way do neither the
one nor the other. Gallio-like, they are careless about
these things, and make their objection to time and place
which has its deeper foundation in their own indifference.
This observation, I willingly grant, may not be applicable
to all of the class of whom I am now speaking. There
are instances among them, I doubt not, where the spirit,
in its moments of high-wrought emotion, may think that
it can safely dispense with all external helps and sup
ports,—may even regard them as suited only to ignorant
�14
and feeble minds,—may imagine that its piety need not
be poured forth in words,—that human language only
restrains, cramps, and confines it,—that time and place
are but hindrances and barriers to its exercise, and that
“ wrapt into still communion with God, it will rise far
above all the imperfect offices of prayer and praise.”
Now admitting that there are a few gifted minds capable
of rising by the force of their own wills into the high re
gions of pure spirituality, and that occasionally inclina
tions and desires, looking in the same direction, may be
partially felt by a few more, it is not to be believed, I
think, that such a state of feeling can be either general
or lasting. On the contrary, I am persuaded that most
men’s experience will convince them that in the cultiva
tion and exercise of their religious principles and affec
tions thev must have recourse to much the same means
of exciting and improving them that are employed in the
formation and exercise of their affections and habits ge
nerally.
Humanity does not become changed, is not stripped of
the attributes by which it is usually characterised and dis
tinguished the moment it touches the ground of religion.
It still possesses the same tendencies and is subject to the
same laws by which it is commonly influenced and go
verned. As we feel the value, the comfort, and the hap
piness of the social affections in all other things, I cannot
understand the wisdom or the propriety of refusing their
aid and co-operation in the concerns of religion. We are
sustained, strengthened and cheered in our convictions
and attachments by the presence and communion of our
fellow-men. In the midst of the animating associations
of the church and the radiating sympathies of other
minds, we gather encouragement, confidence, and assur
�15
ance. It is therefore a great error to suppose that a dif
ferent process must be pursued in building up in our
minds the fabric of religion from that which is adopted
in raising any other of our intellectual and moral struc
tures. It is not in enthusiastic sentiments and fervid
emotions that we must place our trust. Suddenly may
they come, and as suddenly may they depart. Our chief
reliance must be founded on the diligent and faithful use
of all those appliances by which the heart of man is
usually impressed and affected. The dread of supersti
tion and the contempt of vain and idle ceremonies have,
I am persuaded, led many to an undue depreciation and
disparagement of the outward means and instruments of
exciting and elevating our religious sensibilities. There
is no doubt that abundance of mischief has been done by
overloading religion with rites and observances. There
is no doubt that the external garb and covering has been
too often mistaken for the genuine inward grace, and that
dead, inanimate forms have been substituted for the living
spiritual substance. Too much care and caution, there
fore, cannot be used to guard against such a perversion
as this. But when that care has been taken and that
caution has been exercised, let us beware of falling into
the error, less pernicious, perhaps, but still an error to be
deplored, of supposing that the religious principle can be
built up and firmly maintained in the soul under a total
disregard and neglect of those assistances and supports of
which, upon other occasions, we are glad to avail our
selves.
We read of the prophet Daniel that, during the time
of his captivity in Babylon, when he prayed and gave
thanks before his God, his mind seems to have been im
pressed by the circumstance that the windows of his
�16
chamber opened towards Jerusalem. Now this is an in
stance of the manner in which we are sometimes affected
by little things,—by things, in themselves considered, of
no importance, but which derive all their interest and in
fluence from the thoughts and feelings associated with
them. He whom Daniel worshipped was the same God
and as ready to listen to the prayer of his servant
whether his eyes were bent on Babylon’s plains, or
turned towards Judea’s hills. Apart from the feelings
called forth by them, it mattered not which of these it
was. But who does not perceive that, with the thought
of Jerusalem and the tender and solemn recollections
which that thought would awaken, there would neces
sarily come over the mind of Daniel a more intense and
vivid feeling of God’s presence and power, of his pre
sence to cheer and his power to save ? Tell me not that
such a feeling betokens a state of pitiable weakness.
For, if it be a weakness, it is one which God has attach
ed to the very constitution of our nature, and above
which the proudest pretender to philosophy, falsely so
called, cannot exalt himself. Will he say that no pecu
liar interest hangs around the spot where he has played
in his childhood or sported in his youth ? Has no place
ever become endeared to his thoughts and consecrated in
his imagination by friendship and affection ? Can you
visit the tomb where a parent sleeps, or walk over the
ashes of the child you loved, with the same emotions with
which you would tread on common ground ? Then times
and places do exercise a power over our thoughts and feel
ings to which we are all of us, in some measure, subject and
obedient. It is a law of our very being, and resistance to
it would be as impotent in its efforts, as it is vain and fool
ish in its aim. And why, we may ask, why should man be
�17
treated in his religious capacity in a manner totally diffe
rent from that which is observed towards him in all his
other relations? From the reasoning and conduct of
some people in this matter it might be inferred that with
reference to the subject of religion they contemplated
man as a being who had neither senses to be exercised,
nor imaginations to be affected, nor feelings to be
touched, nor hearts to be impressed. They would take
him out of the circle of all those influences which, in
other respects, so powerfully move and govern him.
They would deprive him of the benefit of those associa
tions which, on all ordinary occasions, form one of the
chief sources of interest and attraction. Such a proceed
ing I cannot but deprecate as both unnatural and unrea
sonable ; implying equally a forgetfulness of what the
real condition of man is, and of what is taught us in the
lessons of experience. If the love of country will grow
stronger and warmer when standing before the shrine of
her illustrious dead, or when gazing upon the scenes of
her former greatness and glory, why should we not admit
that the feelings of devotion may also be raised and
strengthened in a similar manner, by going to the house
of God in company, and uniting with our brethren in
those sacred services which impressively speak to us of
the glories of creating power and the riches of redeeming
love ? Let not Religion be deprived of all those accom
paniments which are calculated to enliven her sentiments
and to render her services more beautiful and attractive.
Let us view ourselves on all sides. Let us consider what
is due to us as thinking, reflecting beings, and what may
be needful for us as sensitive and imaginative creatures.
And when we feel inclined to treat as superfluous and
vain all outward aids and influences to further the ends
c
�18
of religion,—to think that all regard to times and places
may be utterly discarded, and that our minds are strong
enough to elevate and sustain themselves without such
instrumentalities ; when we are disposed to reason in this
manner, it would be well for us to remember the words
of Christ, “ the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak,”
and instead of presumptuously relying on our own imagined strength, to feel more humbly concerning ourselves,
and to be careful to put on the whole armour of God, so
that in the day of trial we may be able to stand, to be
firm and faithful, enduring to the end.
Our failure in duty, our neglect of the things belong
ing to our eternal peace, arises, generally speaking, far
more from insensibility and thoughtlessness than from
absolute ignorance. We need, therefore, to be told, not
so much of what we do not know, as to be reminded
of what we do; to have the dormant energies of our
souls roused from their degrading, destructive torpor,
into watchfulness and vigour; to have the genuine feel
ings and principles of our nature called into activity
and exertion, and those truths which lie, as it were, upon
the surface of our minds, impressed deeply upon our
hearts, and wrought into the web of our affections. One
of our greatest aims should be to rescue admitted truths
from the neglect caused by the very circumstance of their
universal admission. Truths, says Coleridge, of all others
the most awful and interesting, are too often considered
as so true, that they lose all the power of truth, and
lie bed-ridden in the dormitory of the soul, side by side
with the most despised and exploded errors. If the
principles which we hold, fail of prompting to virtuous
conduct, of generating kind and devout affections, of
making the life pure and holy, it is not because they
�19
are intrinsically unfitted to produce these effects, but it is
because they are not sufficiently rooted and grounded in
the mind to be capable of sending forth strong, vigorous
shoots of morality and piety. It cannot be, that while
our faith exists thus loosely in the head without drawing
the least nourishment from the fountains of the heart,—
while it is a mere chance outward profession, and not a
real inward conviction, a cold abstract speculation, into
which there does not enter a single warm affection of the
soul,—it cannot be, that, while it exists in such a form
and under such a condition as this, any very valuable or
precious fruits should be gathered from it. The fault,
however, lies not in the principles which we profess to
believe, but in not truly and heartily believing the prin
ciples which we profess. Now the design and tendency
of the services of this place is to excite within us those
recollections of God and of Christ, of our duty and destiny,
of our condition as men, and of our hopes as Christians,
which cannot come frequently before the mind without
rendering it, in some degree, purer and better and
happier.
I am not ignorant that complaints are sometimes
made that the range of topics to which the preacher re
stricts himself is too narrow and circumscribed to satisfy
the thoughtful and inquiring. Hence there are those
who seem to be desirous that other questions should be
introduced here than those of a strictly religious character.
Now while I admit that, in many cases, there is just
ground for complaining that the discourses of the pulpit
are trite and uninteresting, I must, at the same time,
contend that this is owing, not to the nature of the sub
jects treated of, but to the manner in which they are
treated. Bring to their treatment judgement and imagic 2
�20
nation, genius and sensibility,—such, my friends, as you
are no strangers to,—or, to say nothing of rare endow
ments, let the speaker, if he be possessed only of ordi
nary qualifications, give forth what is in him with simpli
city and earnestness, and with a heart penetrated with
the love of God and goodness, and it will, I think, no
longer be found wanting in interest or impressiveness. I
cannot agree, therefore, with those who are for including
among the themes to be discoursed of here, questions of
government and politics, of literature and science. I
know well the exciting nature of these topics, and the
resources which they supply for strong impression and
immediate effect. But we assemble within these walls
for other purposes than amusement and excitement. We
have a more momentous and solemn end to answer, that
of awakening the soul to its obligations and its hopes, as
the creature of God and the child of eternity. With so
many means and opportunities around us for acquiring
all kinds of information, literary, scientific, and political,
it were, as it seems to me, a wanton desecration of the
purpose for which this temple is reared, to divert and
alienate the little portion of time to be spent in it from its
directly religious ministration. Considering the absorb
ing nature of the things that press upon our senses, and
the almost constant immersion of our minds in the cares
and pursuits of this world, it surely is not too much to
ask that our thoughts and affections should, for a few
moments in the week, be withdrawn from these solici
tudes and engagements, and be devoted exclusively to the
spiritual and immortal concerns of our being. Of course
I am taking it for granted that we have spiritual and
immortal concerns; that out of and beyond this world
lie treasures of knowledge and stores of enjoyment, with
�21
which the wisdom and the gladness of the present mo
ment are not worthy to be compared. If it be so, most
fitting and reasonable is it that we should be awakened
from our dreams of vanity, and be made to feel that
earth is not all, nor man the mere tenant of an hour,
but that when the night of the grave is past, the dawn
of an endless day shall burst upon him, and he shall
spring forth the denizen of a new and nobler community.
We come here to think of these things, to meditate on
this- high and holy destination of our being, and upon
the feelings, purposes and actions which are its required
and appropriate accompaniments. We come here to
listen to the voice which speaks to us of a better and
more enduring substance than meets our bodily eyes; of
hopes which are unfading, and of joys which are imperish
able ; of communions and friendships which time will not
impair and which death will not interrupt. We come
here to have our minds enlightened with the wisdom
which is profitable to direct; to have our hearts touched,
as it were, with a live coal from the altar of God, that
even when we quit the precincts of the temple, a purify
ing and invigorating warmth may still be felt glowing
within us. We come here to break that continuity of
little and low cares in which the world almost necessarily
involves us, and to fasten upon our souls the links of a
chain which embraces in its circuit wider views and loftier
interests. In a word, we come here as weak, dependent,
sinful, dying creatures, to be reminded of what, as such,
it becomes us to be and to do; to be reminded of the
power that made us, of the goodness that supports us,
of the mercy that saves us, and of the heaven that awaits
us. We come, the weak to be strengthened, the careless
to be warned, the erring to be corrected, the sorrowful to
�be comforted, the penitent to be soothed and encouraged,
and all to have the spirit of their minds renewed, and to
receive fresh impulse to run with patience the race that
is set before us. The object for which we assemble on
the “ day of the Lord” is not to pamper the appetite,
ever greedy for something new, for something that may
play around the head, but which comes not near the
heart. It is rather to call attention to truths already
acknowledged, but not sufficiently dwelt upon, not suffi
ciently admitted into the homes and intimacies of our
spiritual nature. It is to draw near and make bright to
the inward eye, views and prospects which lie clouded in
the distance. It is to make that felt within us as a
warm and living reality which too often dwells without
us as a cold and lifeless abstraction. It is to assist us in
lifting up our hearts unto God, and to make us feel that
in his favour there is life, and that his loving-kindness is
better than life. It is, that seeing we may see, and
hearing we may hear, what God hath done for our souls,
and that the glad tidings of the gospel may not lie before
us as a dead letter, but may be “ felt in the blood and
felt along the heart, and passing into our purer minds
with tranquil restoration.”
I repeat then,—it is not for the gratification of the spe
culative understanding that we are to assemble here as a
congregation of Christian worshippers, but the lighting up
in our souls of desires and aspirations which may lead us,
when we retire from this place, to commune with our own
spirits, and to make diligent search whether they are in the
state in which they ought to be,—in the state becoming
their distinguished privileges, worthy of their high descent,
and befitting their heavenly destination. If the result of
our weekly communion should be to send us away in
�23
quiring within ourselves what shall we do to be saved, a
real and substantial good will be obtained by it, a bless
ing conferred infinitely surpassing any other which it
could be the means of imparting. Let me observe also
that, important as I consider just views and correct
opinions on the subject of religion to be, more especially
those which relate to the character and will of God, I
must, nevertheless, not omit to remind you that it is of
more consequence to feel right than even to think right;
to do well than to reason well; that the best orthodoxy
is the orthodoxy of the heart, and that while sentiments
and creeds and systems perish, the best and purest feel
ings of the human soul remain unchanged; the same in
all countries, sects and generations, and so will continue
to remain as long as the relations of man to God and of
God to man have any existence. Doing righteously,
living virtuously, carrying into the world a pure and a
gentle and an elevated spirit, this is the beauty of holi
ness, and the excellence of faith, this is the bright con
summate flower, the end, the crown, and the ornament
of the whole.
Peeling it, then, to be our duty to gather ourselves
together for the pure and spiritual worship of God, let
us gratefully remember the blessed and benignant cha
racter under which the object of our worship is brought
before us in the generous and merciful dispensation of
the New Testament. Let us be thankful that we have a
religion so pure, benevolent and holy; so glorious in its
doctrines, so precious in its promises, so beautiful in its
hopes. Let us rejoice that we are ever in the sight of
God, and that the same Lord over all is rich unto all
that call upon him. Let us cheer and comfort ourselves
with the welcome assurance that all who do his com
�24
mandments shall eat of the tree of life, and live for ever;
that there is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth;
and that no humble contrite spirit shall go forsaken of
its God. In the presence of such a being let there be
banished from our minds all desponding and despairing
thoughts. Let us come and kneel before the Lord our
Maker in the spirit of filial affection and in the confidence
of filial trust. In deep submission let us bend before
Him in whose hands our life is, and whose are all our
ways. Humbly and meekly let us adore Him joyfully
and reverently let us praise Him; making melody in our
hearts as well as with our tongues. And since we have
all one Father, let us bear in mind that we are one family,
bound to render to each other mutual assistance and
comfort. To our piety, therefore, there must be added
charity—to the love of God there must be joined the love
of man. Let these be the offerings with which we ap
proach the altar of the Lord. Let us consecrate this
house of prayer by the humble mind, the worshipping
spirit, the devout heart, the grateful thanksgiving which
we bring to it; and then peace within and hope in the
favour of heaven will sweeten the days of our earthly
pilgrimage, till, fit for a purer world of love and blessed
ness, we pass on from this perishable temple to that eter
nal temple not made with hands, where at a nobler altar
we shall offer up to God a nobler worship, where we shall
unite our feeble voices to those of adoring millions, and
sing his praises everlastingly.
To you, the members of this congregation, and to him
whom you have chosen to be here the leader of your de
votions and the expounder of Christian duty, I would
now offer my cordial congratulations at the completion
of that work and labour of love which stands before us,
�25
together with my earnest wishes that you may long be
spared to assemble under this roof, mutual helpers of
each other’s joy. On the one hand, may you, my
brethren, rejoice in the privilege of possessing a Teacher
so richly endowed and so thoroughly accomplished to
instruct you in all things pertaining to the kingdom of
heaven ; and, on the other, may my friend, your valued
and beloved minister, have the happiness of seeing that
the work of the Lord prospers in his hands, and that
through his instrumentality many have been made wise
to the salvation of their souls. So may you both have
reason to be thankful that you came up hither to keep
the holy day, and may the intercourses in which you have
delighted here be renewed and perfected in that land
where dwell for ever the spirits of the just.
�•
• J*
'
*
�THE
WATCH-NIGHT
LAMPS.
A DISCOURSE,
PREACHED ON THE FIRST SUNDAY OF PUBLIC WORSHIP,
(OCTOBER 21, 1849,)
HOPE-STREET NEW CHURCH,
LIVERPOOL.
BY
JAMES MARTINEAU,
MINISTER OF THE CHURCH.
�ZfW.k
• KA«
‘
I T ' :•
*
-I'
�THE WATCH-NIGHT LAMPS.
Now does the Heavenly Mercy rebuke all my fears. The
long-imagined moment is really come; God restores us
to each other. Beneath his eye we parted, and before
his face we meet; and that Infinite Light scatters the
lingering shadows of misgiving which have hung around
the forecast of this hour. We have not hoped in vain
that He would remove with us to the shrine we have
devoutly raised; and now in his eternal memory he sets
the vows and prayers by which this new opportunity is
to be consecrated or condemned. In distant lands,
through waiting months, my eye has rested upon this
day; which has appeared as a star of hope behind the
perspective of every scene, and looked down, with a clear
and guiding sanctity, on intervening tracts that had
sometimes no other, and never a diviner, ray. Standing
here at length, and looking round on this strange mix
ture of the new and old,—the outward structure new
and beautiful, the living temple of faithful hearts both
old and dearer far,—First, I greet you with all the
warmth of my affection and the fresh devotion of all my
powers; consecrating myself anew to the service, not in
deed of your will,—but of your faith and highest hope,
your love and conscience, your remorse and aspiration,—
E
�30
which you know to be interpreters of a Will that must
be monarch of your own. Next, I remember some, whom
we had thought to have with us as sharers of our joy,
but whom the voice of our salutation can no longer reach.
Those close-filled ranks cannot hide from me the vacancies
in their midst; and I miss here the sweet attentive look
of maidenly docility,—there the dear and venerable form
of one from whose eyes age had exhausted the vision
but not the tears, and whose features were quickened
and kindled by the light within. Greeting to others,
Farewell to them ! and to Him, with whom we and thev
alike live; from whose presence no pathless sea, no
Alpine height, no gulph of death, can e’er divide ; who
spares us for his work, or calls us to his rest; who makes
sweet the memory of dreadful hours, and turns our
tremblings into joy;—to Him, the assuager of care, the
reviver of hope, the giver of opportunity, I render for
this hour a glad thanksgiving, and renew my vow to bear
again his glorious yoke.
My purpose this morning is very simple. I ask you
only to think what you have done in raising this building,
and to find for your own act its true ground of thought.
That you have built this house at all, places you at once
in the great commonwealth of Christendom, and detaches
you from all faiths or ^faiths that would destroy it.
That you have joined together to build it, proclaims that
through your religion there runs a common consciousness
which blends and organises your individual wills into a
higher unity, and makes a Church. The forms you have
given to its outline, and the memorials embodied in its
stones, speak everywhere the sentiments of Worship, and
promise here, not the severity of teaching, but the mel
lowed tones of meditation and prayer. That you throw
�31
open its gates on this sacred day, and ever, when a week
is gone, think to come back to it again, is a confession
that you cannot make your every day a Sabbath, and
would not turn your Sabbath into an every day; but
would still intersect the time with holy lines, and help
to prolong that ladder of heaven which climbs as yet
through all Christian duration, the favourite pathway of
saintly souls. These cardinal points I silently assume
as fixed upon the very face of your design; and what
further may be the function of a Church, and ought to
be the function of this Church, in the present age of the
world, I would explain from the words of the parable,
Matthew xxv. 4.
“ The wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps?’
And then, presuming on their supplies, they took their
ease, like the foolish, and while the bridegroom tarried
they all slumbered and slept. So must it not be in that
great watch-night,—that solemn eve of an eternal day,—
which we call Human Life. The spirit that sits sentinel
through its hours, intent for the Master’s voice and ex
pectant of his approach, cannot, however rich her stores,
set the lamp of duty idly on the ground, while she
dreams away beneath the stars; and then hope, by a
sudden start, at the last knock, to refit the neglected
fires and join the pomp and mingle with the everlasting
train. The watch-lights which we must burn before
God are no outward thing, no ritual adornment, but,
like the glow-worm’s, the intensest kindling of our own
life, rising and sinking with the tone of our energies;
and the oil that feeds them is too ethereal to be set by;
it exists only by being ever used and ever re-distilled.
To keep the heart awake,—to resist all collapse of the
e 2
�will and the affections,—to bring the angels of our nature
to a mood not merely less heedless than the foolish virgins,
but more faithful -than the wise; this is the disciple’s
great thought, ever ringing like a midnight bell upon his
ear, from the Master’s awful word, “ Watch ! ” A Church
is a fraternity for accomplishing this thought; an asso
ciation for realising the Christian life, creating the Chris
tian mind, and guarding from deterioration the pure type
of Christian perfection; and its agency is designed for
keeping to their vigils the several Graces of the soul com
missioned to wait upon their Lord; for trimming the
lamps they severally bear, and screening them from the
winds and damps of this world’s night. Let us number
these Graces as they stand. Till their lamps were lighted
they were themselves invisible, dark negations on the
grand summit of human nature, looking into the dark:
but since the glory of Christ has caught them, they shine
afar, and we see in their forms the distinctive spirits of
our religion. First, I discern the Spirit of
Endeavour.—Foremost among the elements of the
Christian consciousness do I place this,—that we must
strive and wrestle to achieve the Will of God, and that
only he who faints can fail. What else means the deep
doctrine of self-denial, which it has ever been the lowest
impertinence of philosophy to doubt, and the last degra
dation of human nature to reject? How else can we
read the contempt we feel for those who evade martyr
dom with a lie,—the throbbing of our hearts as we watch
the tempted in the crisis of his trial,—and their leap of
exultation when he decides, “Better perish than be false”?
These sentiments, than which none are more ineradicable
in man, and none more intensely stamped into Christian
history, would be absurd illusions, if we were not en-
�33
Jdowcd with a knowledge, placed under a law, and in
vested with a power, of right and wrong : they are founded
on the conception of life as an Obedience due, and of mere
Self-will as an insurrection against authority infinitely
venerable. This faith which assigns a moral basis to all
religion, touches, I believe, the ultimate point of all cer
tainty : older than this or newer, more authentic, more
infallible, no revelation can ever be. Its very contra
rieties, which offend the one-sidedness of logicians and
enthusiasts, constitute its truth, and accurately represent
man’s balanced position; whom you can neither turn
into the mere realm of nature nor invest with the dignity
of a God; who is at once bound, yet free to slip his bonds,
and strangely finds in his thraldom a true liberty, in
escape a wretched slavery; and is conscious of divine and
infinite prerogatives immersed and struggling in finite
conditions. All religion is Christian in proportion as it
takes up into its very substance this law of conscience,
and resolves itself a consecration of Duty. It is the great
glory of the Catholic religion, that it adopts and pro
claims this principle : to this one deep root, which pene
trates through the soil and very structure of our human
world, far beyond the reach of ecclesiastic storms, does
it owe the width of its branches and the richness of its
shade. Conscience, indeed, in reference to the universe
of Persons, like Reason in relation to the universe of
Things, is the Catholic faculty of human nature ; and no
faith which does not interpret and sanctify it can take as
its motto, “ Quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab omni
bus.” I am not forgetful of St. Paul’s depreciation of
legal religion, and of the triumphs, asserted in all the
churches of the reformation, of a Gospel of Love over a
System of Law. This also I embrace with all my soul,
�34
and chime in with the hymn of Grace led by Luther’s
mighty voice. But this truth is only the other’s second
half, and without it could no more exist than the comple
ment without the primal arc, or the joy of convalescence
without the lassitude of illness. Did not Conscience pro
pose the awful problem, and the Will struggle into its
midst, Faith and Affection could never bring the relief of
solution. Law and Love are but the strophe and anti
strophe of the great chorus of redemption; and without
both the opening and the answering voices, the thought
and melody must alike be broken. The moral law of
God then, and the moral freedom of man, constituting
life a theatre of endeavour, we lay as the granite pillars
of an everlasting faith,—the Kock on which we build our
Church; and whoever, in the partial spirit of one age,
builds on any more inflammable material,—on the wood,
hay, stubble, of a disenthralled enthusiasm,—shall find,
when his work is tried by fire, that, however poised for
awhile on the upward pressure of elastic heats, it will
lean and totter as the temperature declines, and either
drop on to some more primitive foundation, or collapse
among the ruins of the past.
Is Christianity, then, a mere Ethical System ? and do
we identify religion and morality ? Shall we say that
the man who commits no fraud, or violence, or excess, is
forthwith a denizen of the Kingdom of Heaven ? God
forbid ! as soon might we say that every scribbler who
makes no slip in scanning his metres and tuning his
rhymes is a great Poet. Morality speaks like the defiance
of the hero to his foe,—“ DepartReligion like the
summons of the leader to his impatient host,—“ Arise,
come on !” As a prison-task to an Olympic race, so is
the duty copied from a code to the service inspired by a
�35
faith. So long as moral restraints and obligations are
urged upon us we hardly know how, by usage, by opi
nion, by taste, by good sense and regard to consequences,
they appear to lie within a very moderate and definable
compass, and to be matters of dry necessity included in
the conditions of respectability. But when the voice of
Christ has opened our spirit to their true nature, and
from utterances of human police they become tones,
stealing through the foliage of the soul, from enshadowed
oracles of God, their whole character and proportion are
as much changed as if the dull guest had turned into an
angel, and the stifling tent expanded to the midnight
skies. From the drowsy figure emerges the sleepless im
mortal ; upon the heavy body grow the glorious wings;
and the sheet which seemed a tiresome limit to our head,
passes into the deep of stars open for an everlasting flight.
The feeling of duty, no longer negative, ceases to act like
an external hindrance and prohibition, and becomes a
positive internal power of endless aspiration. Yes, of
endless aspiration; for if the suggestions of conscience
are breathings from the Holiest, they are no finite whole,
but parts of an infinite Thought, the surface movements
of a boundless deep. When we have brought ourselves
to be at one with them, when they are no longer dashed
and broken by the resistance of our spirits, but carry
harmoniously with them all the movements of our nature,
still all is not over; God will now try us with a quicker
time: wave after wave of impulse will roll in with in
tenser speed from the tides of his eternal Will; till the
undulations reach the limits of a new element, and our
thrilling spirits burst into an immortal light. To whom
soever God is Holy, to him is Duty Infinite. The good
habits, in which others abide content, give him no rest;
�36
they are but half his world, and that not the illumined
half: by the rotatory law of all custom, they have gone
off into the dark, and make now but the negative
hemisphere of his obligations; and this must be com
pleted by another, where the morning light of thought
is fresh, and the genial warmth of love yet glows. To
such a mind is revealed the depth of that word, “ There
is none good save One •” and of that other, “ I must work
the work of Him that sent me, while it is day
and life
appears simply as the appointed scene of holy Endeavour.
Now, to awaken this consciousness of infinite obliga
tion, to draw forth and interpret its solemn intimations ;
to resist and expose, as a Satanic delusion, every slug
gish doubt or mean doctrine which denies it,—and to
sustain it in its noblest resolves,—is the first function
of a Christian Church. The great antagonist to it is that
corruption of ease, that poisonous notion of enjoyment
as the end of life, which in so many men absolutely stifles
the higher soul, and suppresses in them the belief in
its existence. In that lowest condition of human nature,
man enjoys a certain unity with himself, because all
powers above his animal and intellectual being are fast
asleep, and give him no contradiction in his unworthy
career. In its highest condition, his nature reaches again
a unity with itself, because faith and conscience have
carried their demands, and rule without dispute what
ever is below. It is the aim of the Church to urge him
through the vast interval between these two limits;,
during the whole of which he is at variance with himself‘
and cries out for deliverance from that “ body of death,”
which at first made up his entire consciousness and is no
other than his unawakened self. When that fatal sleep
is once broken, it is the business of a Church to suggest,
�37
perhaps even to provide, a discipline of voluntary self
denial, without which the incipient insight will not last,
but relapse into the darkness which it is so difficult to
dispel from the infinite. It is wonderful how faithful
endeavour withdraws the curtain from before the opening
eye of the late slumbering soul. As one who just turns
on his pillow,—with another folding of the hands to
sleep,—-feels without recognising the dazzling light, and
it only passes through into his dreams to paint anew
their empty phantasies;—so the mind, just stirring from
the dead repose of self, does not yet treat as real the
dawning glow of a diviner consciousness; which, stopping there, will only glide as a bewildering spectrum
over the scenery which the man takes to be the world.
But let him spring up and break the bands of sleep; let
him move about among the objects which the new light
shows, and do the things which it requires; and anon
he finds what’s true, and feels how he is transferred from
the subterranean den of dreams into the open and lus
trous universe. Effort is the condition of the commonest
intellectual knowledge; much more, of insight into things
moral and divine. Is there a poem or a landscape which
you are anxious to remember? So long as you only
look at it and take it in, though with attention ever so
fixed, its hold upon you will be slight and transient:
but invert the mental order, begin at the active instead
of the passive end, and force yourself to reproduce it by
pencil or by word; and it becomes a part of yourself,
incorporated with the very fabric of your mind. So with
the whispers of the holiest spirit; while they only pass
across the still—though it be listening—ear of the soul,
they are evanescent as the traceless wind; but act on
them, and you will believe in them ; produce their issue,
�38
and you shall know their source; and he with whom
God’s presence has quieted a passion or subdued a grief
is surprised by the nearness of his reality. Such
deavour, such earnestness of life, do the members of a
Church undertake to preserve in one another’s remem
brance.
But next to this high Angel of the Soul, I observe a
downcast spirit, bearing in her hand the lamp of Humi
liation : and she too must never cease from her sorrow
ing watch.
Endeavour has its seat in the Will. If there were no
sense of difficulty in the exercise of Will, if all resistance
crumbled away at the first touch of purpose, and thought
could fly off into instant execution, failure, shame, re
morse would be unknown; conscience would realise
whatever it conceived; and though the infinite character
of holy obligation would leave an ineffaceable interval
between our position and our aspirations, the one would
for ever tend to overtake the other; and the chase, al
beit without a goal, would be inspired by the joy of an
eternal success. No deeper shade than the mild sense of
imperfection would fall upon the spirit. But our actual
condition is very different. The suggestions of God are
ever fresh and his enterprises always new, demanding, if
not new matter, at least a new spirit: and it is hard to
our Will to quit the old track, to snap the old restraints,
to lash itself into a higher speed. And thus, with a
sentient nature that loves the easiest, and a conscience
that reveres the lest, we feel that Epicurus and Christ
meet face to face within our soul; which becomes at
once the theatre, the stake, the arbiter, of the most
solemn of all conflicts. The pleasant pleadings, so perl
suasive to our languid strength, make our Temptation 1
�39
and their triumph plunges us into the Sense of Guilt.
This utterly changes the relations of the mind to God;
breaks the springs of Endeavour; turns every blessed
sanctity from a life within the heart to a load upon it;
and condenses the infinite heaven of duty into a leaden
universe of nightmare on the breast. So sinks in sad
ness the pure enthusiasm that had flung itself upon the
godlike track; and the wing that had soared so high
hangs drooping and broken down. It is less the anguish
of this fallen state, than its weakness, that makes it awful.
Who shall remove this burden of sin, which paralyses the
soul’s native strength and restrains it in terror from seek
ing God’s ? Could the immediate remorse be banished
or outlived, yet who can resume an infinite race with a
lowered hope, or faith abashed ? This crisis is the turn
ing point of many a life. By either fall or rise may the
mind escape from it; in the one case relapsing by the
gravitation of the world into the stupor of indifference
and the old belief in the dreams of sense : in the other,
lifted once more into a light of heaven, milder perhaps, ‘
but less precarious. Lifted,—I say; for sure it is that
the fallen, though he may hold his place and fall no more,
has crippled his power to lift himself. Even an arch
angel’s wing cannot rise without an atmosphere; and
the human will (in things divine) is ineffectual with its
mightiest strokes, unless surrounded by a certain air of
pure and clear affection,—which recent sin exhausts and
spoils. While the sweet element of love and hope
and self-reverence is lost to the mind, the spasms of reso
lution are but pitiable distortions,—cramps of uneasiness
and fear, not the progressive action of a vigorous health.
It is the awful punishment of all unfaithfulness, that it
turns the mind in upon itself; makes it look at its dis
�40
ease, and put forth a writhing movement to escape it,
with no effect but to renew the anguish, to feel all the
weakness, and sink down again in faintness and despair.
The intense power which conscious evil gives to con
siderations of Interest, the tumult of anxiety and alarm
it induces, is in itself the most fatal obstacle to recovery :
on which however, with the delusion common to all em
pirics, the mere moralist rests all his hopes. There are
no terms in God’s universe on which the selfish can be
saved; no,—not if a thousand Calvaries were to repeat
to him the divine tragedy of the world. And the more
you set upon him with fists of unanswerable reasons, the
more do you make him the sharp-witted alien from God.
What opening then is there for the offender prostrate
under the sense of sin ? Shall I be told that expiation
must be made by another, who will bear the burden for
him ? Doubtless, with the low mood to which guilt has
brought him, he is just in the state to accept that mer
cantile view of sin, and reckon it as a debt against him
on the ledger of the universe, which the overflowing
wealth of some perfect nature might gratuitously wipe
off. And if you can then convince him that such free
sacrifice has actually been made, that for him in his de
gradation a heavenly nature has been moved with pity,
taken up the conditions of sorrow, laid down the im
mortal prerogative and died; I do not deny that you
may touch the springs of wonder and delight, and that a
burst of thankfulness may break his ice-bound spirit and
set it free. Gratitude for an immense personal benefit
is the first affection of which a low and selfish mind is
susceptible; its very selfishness rendering an act of
generosity in another the more surprising. The pas
sionate emotion thus awakened may certainly tear him
�41
from his prison; and as the object to which your fiction
conducts him is the Jesus Christ of sacred history, that
sublime and holy being, the gentle and winning type of
God’s own perfectness, it will be strange if the false and
immoral grounds of his first homage are not insensibly
exchanged for a veneration purer and more disinterested.
As it is sometimes easiest at the moment to cure a mor
bid patient by a trick, the immediate case of many souls
may be met by this disenchanting legerdemain ; but not
without the cost inseparable from untruth. The great
doctrine of mediation is here corrupted by a complete
inversion of its truth. There are two parts of our nature
essential to our first approaches to God; the Imagination
places him before us as an object of conception external
to the mind ; the Conscience interprets his personal rela
tions of communion with ourselves. The first of these
emphatically needs a mediator; the function of the
second perishes, the moment he appears. We cannot trust
the representative faculty of our nature whose pencil
of design varies with the scope of Reason, and whose
colours change with the moods and lights of Passion, to
go direct to the sheet of heaven, and show us the Al
mighty there: else, what watery ghost, or what glaring
image, might we not have of the Eternal Providence ?
Only through what has been upon earth can we safely
look to what is in heaven, through historical to divine
perfection; and by keeping the eye intently fixed on the
highest and most majestic forms in which living minds
have ever actually revealed their thoughts and ways, we
have a steady type, with hues that do not change or fly, of
the great source of souls. Jesus of Nazareth, the centre of
the scattered moral possibilities of history, is thus media
tor to our imagination between God and man. On the
�other hand, we cannot allow the Conscience to resign for
an instant its native right of immediate contact and au
dience with God: to delegate the privilege is treason;
and to quit his eye is death. Yet the current theology
reverses this. The imagination of the offender, at the
very instant that it is throwing out the fire and smoke
of conscious guilt, is invited to paint its own unmediated
image of the Most High, and rely upon the terrible pic
ture with unquestioning faith; and while the corrupted
fancy is thus sustained in its audacity, the shuddering
Conscience is encouraged in its cowardice, and allowed
to hand over its burthen to a mediator, under pretence
of forfeited approach. Who says, that the sinner must
fly the terror of the Lord? I say, he must face the
terror of the Lord, and instead of blasting it will only
melt him then. You say, he dares not tell his tale and
cannot pray ? Then, I answer, not yet is he true and
contrite; and it is not his humility, but the little speck
of insincerity still spoiling it, that asks for a mediator.
He must accept his whole abasement; must desire, not
to escape, but to endure, his woe •, must not even hang
the head and veil the face before God; but look full up
into the eye of infinite Purity, and, as he disburthens
himself, seek its most piercing glance, that nothing may
escape. Nothing but truth can appear before God ; but
the truth always can appear, and loses its very nature in
parting with its rights to an intercessor. And, as dread
ed duties are apt in the performance to surprise us by
their lightness, so the moment the soul lies thus exposed
and transparent before God, he appears terrible no more a
the dark reserve thrown from the heart seems to sweep
away the cloud from him; and he shines upon us, not
indeed with the sudden blaze of clearance after storm,
�43
but with the affectionateness of an eternal constancy.
We have trusted him, and he is distant no more; we
are emancipated into sympathy with his pure nature;
the old aspirations find way again ; and instead of look
ing at him with outside recoil, we go up into his glory,
losing ourselves once more in those positive admirations
and desires for perfection, which are the very glow of his
spirit, and which, far more than any passionate gratitude
for personal benefits, are fitted to restore our union with
him. And in this crisis it is that the repentant eye, now
purified by tears, turns with infinite refreshment from the
false forms that have beguiled it, to rest on Christ, as the
divine depositary of the sanctity we have lost and seek
again ; and that the ear feels the deep sweetness of that
call, “ Come unto me, ye weary and heavy-laden, and I
will give you rest.”
Now to give this humiliating self-knowledge, to open
the sources of remorse, to prevent its lingering into
morbid and credulous woe, to cause every film of pride
and fear to drop away, and bring the penitent to make
a clear heart before God, is the proper aim and function
of a Church; which thus humanises, while it sanctifies,
and uses our own sins as ground for pity to others, not
others’ as excuses for our own. In the early Christian
societies, penitents were recognised and distinguished as
a class,—a practice which, however needed in evil times
as a check to apostacy, could have no place now, without
drawing fines of classification not truly distinguishing
the characters of men. In later times, the still more
dangerous practice of confession to a human—yet hardly
human, because a sacerdotal—ear, bears witness to the
boundless power of repentance in the heart of Christen
dom. Perhaps the reaction into the jealous individuality
�44
of modern times, in which each soul not only repels the
intrusion, but declines the sympathy of another, has been
carried beyond the point of natural equilibrium. At
least it is not natural that, in fraternities under common
vows of Christian obligation, flourishing selfishness should
often hold a higher place than humble sanctity; and un
repaired, therefore impenitent, injustice should lift its
head unabashed amid indulgent worshippers. Surely the
power of rebuke is too much lost in an easy indifference;
the estimates of the world,—ranging greatly by outward
fortune and condition,—have extravagantly encroached
on those of the Church, which can look only to internal
soundness and affluence of soul. That is not a true com
munity of disciples, in which a collective Christian opinion
does not make itself felt by at least some silent and sig
nificant expression. So long as the trumpet gives an
uncertain sound, who will prepare himself for the battle ?
By its revelations of self-knowledge, its echo to the voice
of self-reproach; by its suggestion of a restorative dis
cipline ; by its appeal to that faith in infinite possi
bilities which alone sustains the burthen of penitential
self-denial; by leading the soul at once to suffer, to
aspire, and to love much,—must every Church of Christ
pour into the energy of endeavour, the lowly spirit of
humiliation.
Side by side with this sad Angel of the Soul stands
another, with look of equal meekness, only clear of shame :
and the small fair light in her hand, shining a few steps
into the dark around, is the lamp of
Trust.—The companion Spirits of which we have
hitherto spoken preside over the work and temper of
the Conscience in its relation to God; and they would
still have to stand upon their watch, though the soul
�45
(were such a thing possible) lived in empty space, in
mere private audience with its Creator. But now comes
before it another object, forcing it to look a different
way, and pressing for some orderly interpretation;—
viz., Nature or the outward Universe. To a mind that,
through moral experience, has already begun its life with
God, the glorious spectacle of the heavens and the earth
will instantly appear divine: the voice of the waters and
the winds, the procession of the sun and stars, the moun
tain’s everlasting slopes, smiling upwards with pastures
till they frown in storms,—will seem the expressions of
Eternal Thought. Well would it be if this first absorp
tion of nature into the substance of faith enabled them
permanently to grow harmoniously together. But the
universe, which ought to be the abode, becomes to us the
rival, of the living and indwelling God. Its inflexible
steadiness, its relentless march, so often crushing beneath
the wheels of a blind law the fairest flowers of beauty and
the unripened fruits of patient hope, look so unlike the
free movements of a living and loving mind, that the
decrees impressed on finite matter begin to contest the
sway of the Infinite Spirit. Other sorrows than any
mentioned yet,—sorrows not merited or self-incurred,—
and which even fancy cannot plausibly link with any sin,
come upon us; and as we cannot sincerely meet them
with humiliation, we need some other guide from infidel
despair. The order of Cause and Effect crosses and con
flicts with the order of Moral Law. This is plainly seen
in the history of the physical sciences-; whose exclusive
pursuit first lowers the conception of God to that of the
primal force, or at best the scientific director of creation;
and then lapses, consistently enough, into a fatalistic
atheism. And the same thing is keenly felt in that in
�46
explicable distribution of suffering in human life, which,
in every age, has perplexed the faith and saddened the
love, of hearts not alien to God. How must this contro
versy be ended in our souls, between the physical God
omnipotent in nature, and the holy God who reveals himself in Conscience ? I will not say here what may be the
solution which the thoughtful may draw from a devout
Philosophy; only that it must be one which charges no
evil upon God. Whatever cannot be glorified into good,
let it be referred, so far as it is not from the human
will, to that negative datum, that shapeless assemblage
of conditions, which constitute the ground of the Creator’s
work; but it must be withheld on any terms from him
who is the perfectly and only Good. He must be ever
worshipped, not as the source, but as the antagonist, of
ill; the august and ever-living check to its desolating
power, who never rides upon the whirlwind, but that he
may curb the storm. It is only in this view that He can
have pity on our sorrows; for who could pity the sufferings
which he himself, without the least necessity, invents and
executes ? That cry on Calvary, “ My God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me?”—was it not a cry for rescue,
■—rescue as from a foreign foe, from a power ^divine ?
And did it not then burst from One who felt the anguish
of that hour as the inrush of a tide from which the barrier
of God’s volition had withdrawn ? And so the faith
which gave way in that momentary cry is just the oppo
site of this; a faith that no evil is let loose without his
will; that he knows the utmost it can do, keeps it ever
in his eye, and will yield to it no portion of his holy and
affectionate designs; that he has considered all our case,
and will not fail to bring it out clear, if we are true to
him. Trust has no other bearable meaning than this; for
�47
else it would only say that God, being the unquestionable
cause of evil, is not malicious in producing it, and would
thus merely silence a doubt impossible in a Christian,
aud scarcely pardonable in the grossest heathenism.
Trust therefore in the ascendancy of divine Thought and
Affection in the universe, serene confidence in their per
fect victory, I take to be the essence of the Christian faith
respecting nature. The particular thought of God that
may be hid amid events, moulding their forms and pre
paring their tissues for some growth of incomparable
beauty, it may be impossible to trace; but He is there
and never leaves his everlasting work; which is the same
in the shrine of conscience, in the mind of Christ, and
through the sphere of universal nature.
Now to interpret life and all visible things in the spirit
of this Trust; to raise the mind oppressed by the sense
of material necessity: to meet the tendencies towards
passiveness and despair, and, for the consolation of
memory and the kindling of hope, show where the order,
not of a hard mechanism, but of beauty, love and good
ness is everywhere enthroned;—this also is the duty of a
Church. In this relation we must contradict the doc
trine of mere science, which proclaims Force, rather than
Thought, as the source of all: we must counteract its
purely causal and fatalistic explanations -, must detain in
the living present, that God whom it would allow to re
cede indefinitely into the Past, and must lean upon Him
as the nearest to us in our weakness, the most loving in our
sadness, and the Rock beneath our feet in our alarms.
We agree together to sustain each other in this sacred
trust; to withstand the godless doubts and grievings
suggested by our lower mind; to defy nature’s inexorable
Laws to disguise for us the supernatural light and love
f 2
�48
within; and to feel the hardest matter of life, as well as
the severest work of conscience, burning at heart with his
dear spirit.
This triple group, however, of Endeavour, Humiliation,
and Trust, are never found apart from a sister Spirit, in
whose features you trace more human lineaments, and in
whose hand is borne the lamp of
Service.—An individual mind, alone in the universe
with God, might hold the latent germs of all that is
human, and yet, in that solitude, could hardly enter,
perhaps, on the real experience of endeavour, humiliation,
or trust. It is only amid other minds, in the reflection
of eye upon eye and soul upon soul, that we so read our
impulses, and decipher our inspirations, as to be really
capable of the religious life. Society, which opens the
sphere of mutual sympathy, touches also the springs of
reverence and worship. And I entreat you to notice
how it is that the companionship of our fellows operates
to bring out these individual affections. We hear much
in this connexion about the natural equality of souls, implied in their common source and common work and
common end, and are referred to this evident brother
hood as the true basis of both fraternal love to one
another and filial acknowledgment of God. And, no
doubt, this identity of spiritual nature is indispensable to
all sympathy and all devotion ;—not, however, as their
positive and exciting cause, but only as their negative
condition. Like only can comprehend like: and if the
being next me had not the same nature and the same
kces with myself, I should have no key by which
\ him; he would belong to an unintelligible
id fellow-feeling could have no place. But the
here required is not in the minds as they are,
�49
only as they might be. Their circles of possibility must
coalesce; the same capacities must sleep within them,
and the same Law must rule over them. This similitude
of kind, the silent assumption of which lies in all our
affections, merely expresses an ultimate and unrealized
tendency, to which present and actual facts will continually
approximate. Meanwhile, these facts present a very dif
ferent picture;—not of resemblance between man and
man, but of variety so vast and contrast so startling, as
almost to perplex our faith in the unity of nature. Now
it is precisely this inequality of souls which is the positive
awakener of all our higher affections. No man could love
or venerate in a universe stocked with mere repetitions of
himself; the endless portrait would be a barren weari
ness. He pities what is below him in happiness : he re
veres what is above him in excellence: he loves what is
different from him in beauty. His affections rest on
those whom he blesses and those who bless him,—on his
clients and his God. At the shock of lower lives and the
startling spectacle of higher, he is driven to moral recoil
and drawn to moral aspiration; in the one case invested
with armour for the resistance of evil, in the other
equipped with wings to soar after the good. Whatever
is purer and nobler in another than in ourselves opens to
us a new possibility, and wields over us a new authority;
and thus it is that, ascending through the gradations of
souls which culminate in Christ, we find ourselves carried
thence at a bound over the chasm between finite and in
finite, and present at the feet of the Most High, saying,
“ Just and true are Thy ways, Thou King of Saints; who
shall not fear Thee, 0 Lord, and glorify thy name, for
Thou only art holy ! ”
It is therefore precisely through the diversity of minds
�50
that the unity of the Divine law reveals and asserts itself
within us; and the common end of life to all is felt. And
it is on this same inequality of souls that Christianity, as
a religion of love and mutual aid, builds all its work. On
the one hand, the strong must bend to the weak; and on
the other, the weak look up to the strong. In both
cases there is self-denial,—self-renunciation from pity, in
the former,—from obedience, in the other. In both there
is reverence for what is divine ■ with the one, for a god
like capacity in the low; with the other, for a godlike
reality in the lofty. When the differing ranks of minds
read off their relations in these opposite directions, the
whole compass of Christian service is given. Within the
Church therefore the eye must be trained to discern this
rank, the affections to own it, the will to obey it. Dis
guised under a like exterior of life are souls divided by
immeasureable intervals; and it is strange and even ter
rible to think what secret differences lurk beneath the
common gloss and gaiety of the same assembled numbers.
How superficial is the kindred of the utterly earthly, who
sees no reality but in the means of ease, the course of
material interests, and the colours thrown up by the
shifting game of external life; with the saintly sufferer,
before whom these flit as unsubstantial shadows, and
nothing is real but the spirit-drama that is enacting in
the midst and the great Will that plays the everlasting
part. Yet we often move about where both of them are
found, and speak with them face to face, and believe them
much alike. Can we not catch from our Lord, who
looked with divine perception straight into the heart of
the widow and the Samaritan, some portion of that in
sight which detects the heroes and despises the impostors
of the present ? Why should we leave it to history to
�51
find out and glorify the good? If they are with us, they
are the most precious of all God’s gifts; let us know
them ere they die, and feel that the earth is sacred where
they tread. Above all, in every Church, the only classi
fication known should be of character and age : and in
using these as grounds of mutual service, provision should
be made for teaching the child, for lifting the suffering,
for confirming the weak, and for supplying duties pro
portioned to the strength of the strong.
And while this angel of Service stands to her watch, a
glorious Spirit is at her side and closes the train; with
an undying flame from her lamp of
Communion.—The relations of service are far from
being limited to the present and its intercourses. Our
life is but the focus of living light into which the Past
and the Future condense their interests. The ranks of
minds by which we help each other, run up both the di
rections of time, and cover the two worlds of mortals and
immortals. We are ourselves disciples of an ancient and
a foreign prophet; and as we pronounce the word
“ Christian,” we feel the spark of his transmitted inspi
ration uniting us with a long chain of generations, and
fusing Christendom into one life and one Church. We
are disciples also of an ascended prophet; nor is it pos
sible for any one to bow down in soul before the divine
law of which he has made us conscious, to burn with the
aspirations which it kindles, and touch upon the peace of
entire surrender, without feeling assured that he is created
on the scale of immortality, and that the risen Christ is
indeed, as the Scripture saith, the head of an immortal
host. It is a faith which fails chiefly to those, who, in
looking at human fife, miss its grandest elements, and
are little familiar with the highest and characteristic
�52
features of our nature. Ask the confidants of great
souls,—the bosom-friends of the holy,—and they will tell
you that life eternal is the only lot at all natural to the
children of the Highest. And the more you grow faith
ful to your own most solemn experience, and learn to
trust your noblest love, the more will that amazing pros
pect assume proportion to the terms of your daily thought.
The happy instinct of purified affections is ever one of
hope and ready faith. And when I simply remember
what faculties, what conceptions, what insight, are im
plied in a being to whom a Church is possible at all; when
I think what a scene in the universe must be opened to
a mind ere it can pray; when I reflect how the Infinite
God must estimate one whom He thinks it worth while to
put on trial amid the theatre of free souls;—all sense of
difficulty recedes from the Christian doctrine of an here
after ; all rules drawn from other races of creatures sink
absolutely away; and man appears no less ennobled
above them than if, like the Angel of the “ Revelations,”
he were standing in the sun. Under the influence of
this truth, the natural kindred of souls is infinitely
extended and deepened; exalted into independence of
change ; and glorified by the hope of sympathy and con
nexions ever fresh. The blessed family of God colonises,
not only the banks of the time-stream that passes by, but
the Alpine heights from which it flows, and the blessed
isles of the ocean to which it tends.
This sense of Communion between all ages and both
worlds, it is the business of a Church to cherish. Within
its walls, and by its ways, must the mind be surrounded
by the atmosphere in which this faith may thrive and
grow,—this family tradition of noble souls be guarded
and handed down. For this end, neither the mediation
�53
of argument nor the directness of authority will avail so
much as the just and holy discipline of the conscience
and affections. To nurture the love of greatness and
goodness in the past; to awaken confidence in the intui
tive estimates of the pure and pious heart; to glorify the
dark places of the world with some light of thought and
love; to vindicate the sanctity of death against the pre
tensions of its physical features, and penetrate its awful
spaces with the glow of prayer and hope;—is the true
method of clearing away the mists from holy expectation,
and realising the communion of Saints.
See then in complete array, the five wise Spirits of the
soul that must stand through the night of the Bride
groom’s tarrying, with their ever-constant lights of En
deavour, Humiliation, Trust, Service, and Communion.
To maintain them at their vigils is the proper end of
every Church that would maintain the Christian attitude
of life. Am I asked, by some theologic wanderer, what
then is special to this Church ? I say, chiefly this, that
these five lamps, and these alone, we believe to be held
in angel hands, and fed with the eternal aliment of truth;
nor will they ever give of their oil to nurture the emptied
lamps, which many foolish servitors of the bridegroom
have brought, and which now are flickering with their
last flame, and expiring in the smoke of error. A pretty
late hour in the watches of this world has struck: many
of the interests and controversies that once dazzled with
their flame have been self-consumed: and when, to find
how the night rolls, we look up to heaven and observe
the altered place and half-inverted form of the eternal
constellations, we know that a morning hour is drawing
on. It behoves every Christian Church to be awake and
set itself in order for a coming age, in which, as I beG
�54
heve, the strife will be something very different from that
whence existing churches obtain their several names. It
is not without some view to that Future of the Church
that I have called the five Spirits, spirits of the soul, and
have shown them to you as they rise from our nature
itself. I might with equal truth have called them cha
racteristics of Christianity, and have evoked them by
appeal to Scripture, and the analysis of Christian history.
But we are on the verge of a time, when the mere use
of an external authority, however just and moderate its
application, will cease to be of much hearty avail; and
only those elements either of Scripture or of Christian
history will have any chance of reverent preservation,
which find interpretation and response in the deeper ex
perience of Man. Whoever keeps fearlessly true to these
may feel secure; but none can say what else will survive
the perils of the present and the coming time. What mean
the strange movements of Catholicism on the one side,
and a pantheistic Socialism on the other, between which
every form of mere Protestantism is growing weaker, day
by day? Are they not a reaction against the extreme
individuality, the disintegrating tendency, of modern
Christianity ; whose unions, born in the transient enthu
siasm of reformation, cannot maintain themselves against
the habits of freedom they have created, or live upon the
dogmas they refuse to change ? Are they not both an
attempt, only prosecuted in opposite directions, to re
cover some centre of human cohesion, more powerful
than interest or judgment, around which the scattered
sympathies and dissipated energies of society may be
collected? In this common quest, the one reproduces
an authority dear to the Memory of Christendom, the
other pours out prophecies dazzling to the Hopes of all
�55
men; the one adorns the old earth, the other paints a
new. The field seems clearing fast to make room for
these great rivals; and in their mutual position the signs
are not few, that they portend a mightier contest than
Europe has seen for many an age. The hosts are already
visibly mustering. On the one hand the venerable
Genius of a Divine Past goes round with cowl and Cro
zier ; and from the Halls of Oxford and the Cathedrals
of Europe gathers, by the aspect of ancient sanctity and
the music of a sweet eloquence and the praises of conse
crated Art, a vast multitude of devoted crusaders to fight
with him for the ashes of the Fathers and the sepulchres
of the first centuries. On the other, the young Genius
of a Godless Future, with the serene intensity of meta
physic enthusiasm on his brow, and the burning songs
of liberty upon his lips, wanders through the great cities
of our world, and in toiling workshops and restless col
leges preaches the promise of a golden age, when priests
and kings shall be hurled from their oppressive seat, and
freed humanity, relieved from the incubus of worship,
shall start itself to the proportions of a God. Who shall
abide in peace the crash and conflict of this war ? He
only, I believe, whose allegiance is neither to the anti
quated Past, nor to the speculative Future; but to the
imperishable, the ever-present Soul of man as it is; who
keeps close, amid every change, to the reality of human
nature which changes not; and who, following chiefly
the revelations of the Divine will to the open and con
scious mind, and reading Scripture, history, and life, by
their interpreting light, feels the serenity and rests on
the stability of God.
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�THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY AND CHURCH OE THE
EIRST-BORN.
A SERMON,
PREACHED IN
HOPE-STREET NEW CHURCH,
LIVERPOOL,
ON
SUNDAY EVENING, OCTOBER 21, 1849.
By CHARLES WICKSTEED, B.A.,
MINISTER OF MILL-HILL CHAPEL, LEEDS.
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�A
SERMON.
Hebrews xii. 22-24.
“ But ye are come unto Mount Sion, and unto the city
of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innu
merable company of angels, to the general assembly and
church of the first-born, which are written in heaven,
and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just
men made perfect, and to Jesus the Mediator of the new
covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh
better things than that of Abel
Of all the desires of the present time, there is no one
more profound and general than the desire for Christian
unity, communion, and fellowship. Indeed, the craving
for agreement, for, as it were, spiritual identity, for the
support in conviction, and the comfort from conviction,
that according numbers seem to imparty has characterised
the history of Christianity through it^whole extent. On
this has been founded the determination of the Roman
Catholic Church, to preserve at all costs, at costs often
most painful to itself, its spiritual and formal unity : and
in this have originated the imitative efforts of the various
protesting churches which have sprung from it.
h 2
�60
But taught by the experience of ages, taught by the
resolute and the ever-recurring intellectual differences
of mankind, the unity at which, for the most part, the
present age is aiming, is a unity of feeling, a fellowship
of labour, a communion of love. The old desire for
unity took the form of Proselytism. Each Church sup
posing itself to be constructed especially and exclusively
after the heavenly type, it could realise no other and no
better unity than the conversion of all mankind to its
standards, and the introduction of the whole race within
the veil of its Temple. Much of this aim and expecta
tion is to be met with still. The Roman Catholic Priest
goes about, hoping to bring his Protestant neighbours
back into the true faith, and rejoicing in the prospect
which he thinks begins to dawn, that unity may be yet
achieved in England, by the return of the Church and
the nation into spiritual submission to the Papal See.
The clergyman of the English Church may still be found,
ignoring the existence of Dissent in his parish, talking of
the number of souls under his care, of spiritual destitu
tion, of there being only one church or two churches,
one school or two schools, in such and such a population,
while there may be an equal number of other churches
and other schools maintained for Eke holy purposes, but
to whose very existence, as they are not within his spiri
tual precincts, he chooses to be blind.
But though these are very important phenomena, and
show that the old dream of the outward comprehension
of all the inhabitants of a country under the same forms
and symbols, in the bosom of the same outward Church,
is being dreamed among us still; yet such is not the
tendency of the general and independent elements of
society. The liberal churchman is beginning to regard
�61
his Church as a religious community among religious
communities, and only desires permission for it to take
and keep its ground, as others are to take and keep theirs
too. The Wesleyan probably never did regard his con
ference or association as the ultimate or general form of
Christian government and fellowship, but if he ever did
so he must now be taught, by the rapid course of events,
to regard this view of it as untenable. The Independent
earnestly struggles for his theory of Congregationalism;
but so far is that theory from tending to a comprehen
sion within the limits of one outward Church and For
mulary, that it rests upon the basis of the independence
of each society. Added to these signs of hopelessness of,
or indifference to, universal dominion on the part of the
separate bodies, is the increasing desire to unite on prin
ciples which are sufficiently wide, and for purposes which
are sufficiently general, to allow each body to retain its
own peculiar standing-point.
The modern desire of union and of fellowship, then,
takes the form, not so much of proselytism as of com
prehension ; is founded, not so much on the expectation
of bringing all communions into one Church, as of bring
ing all Churches into one communion. It is distinguished
by the effort, while seeing the points of difference, to
discover the points of agreement, and, while recognising
the right of intellectual and theological variety, to bring
out into practical relief the reality of a moral harmony.
The organisations by which it has been attempted to
combine parties otherwise differing, for the expression of
some common feeling or the achievement of some common
object, however imperfect in their conception, or incom
plete in their accomplishment, are indications of the ex
istence of this desire. Contemplated in this light, the
�62
Evangelical Alliance itself is not without its interest!
For, whatever may be its exclusions, and whatever its
narrowness, it yet at least attempts to penetrate through
the mere Episcopalianism of the Churchman, the mere
Congregationalism of the Independent, the mere Me
thodism of the Wesleyan, to a common Christianity,
deeper and more vital than anything involved in these
points (important as in themselves they may be), and so
far even this, in many respects exclusive and limited,
association bears witness to the growing desire of our
times for peace combined with liberty, independence
combined with concord, and the love of truth combined
with the love of each other.
But besides this tendency towards a larger compre
hension and wider terms of union, there is a growing
dislike in most bodies, of denunciation and virulence.
The firm adhesion of a man to that Church or that Body
which is to him the depository of the purest forms of
truth, is a subject of genuine respect. But there is
less and less disposition to approve of the peculiari
ties of that division being made all-important, and
theological intolerance has now to be combined with
some striking practical excellence or moral power to
be itself tolerated. The working classes of our large
towns especially look upon the struggles and animosi
ties of sects with indifference, and even with disgust,
regarding that man as the best man who lives the best
life, and that man as the purest Christian who most re
sembles his Lord.
Two things have principally contributed to this ten
dency : First, the growing disposition to ask what are
the essentials of Christianity, and to separate from these
the adjuncts or modifications which the convictions of
�each body require it, in its own case, to make. Accord
ing to the breadth or narrowness, the grandeur or petti
ness, of our estimate of these essentials, will be the cha^
racter for comprehensiveness or exclusiveness of the
Church we found upon them. Thus, if to submit to the
authority of a particular Church be necessary to the right
reception of the Christian faith, then the essential element
of unity is conformity. If the essentials of Christianity
be a set of theological propositions laid down in a special
ecclesiastical symbol, then there is no such thing as a
Christian Church comprehending all, but only a Christian
sect requiring that all shall belong to her. But if the
essentials of Christianity are found out to be not in the
things which distinguish Churches so much as in that
which is common to all, then we may worship with a
liturgy or without a liturgy, under the ceiling of a meet
ing-house or the roof of a church, under the ministry of
clergymen ordained by Bishops, or ordained by Presby
ters, or ordained bv the voice of God in their own consciences, and in their people’s choice; the essentials of
Christianity will be alike within the reach of us all: and
there may on earth be found such a thing as free thought
combined with a common heart, individual liberty with
universal charity, and Christ may say unto us all, “ I am
the vine, ye are the branches.”
The second thing which has contributed to this desire
for Christian union, and a perception of its possibility, is
the influence of good men; the natural, catholicising
tendency of their Christian tempers, and their holy-lives.
Persons who have been in the habit of supposing belief
in certain doctrines essential to Christian character and
Christian salvation, are startled from their position by the
discovery that certain men, whose lives and characters
�64
they venerate for their purity and goodness, and about
whose salvation it is impossible for them to doubt, do
not believe all these supposed essentials. These truly
good men rise up before them in every branch of the
Church; live long, holy, and beneficent lives ; manifest
the fruits of sincere truth-loving and heavenly hearts;
and they cannot possibly conceive of such men being
driven from the presence of their God, and living in the
eternal sorrows of his displeasure.
In asking, then, who are the true Church below, we
find a very good guidance in the light reflected from this
other question, who are the true Church above ? In in
quiring whom we should consider our brethren and fellowChristians here, our greatest help will be found in the
answer of our hearts to the question, who are likely to be
of the general assembly and church of the first-born
hereafter ?
Thus there grows up, almost unconsciously, within
every man whose heart is open to the signs of human
excellence wherever discerned, a sort of Church of the
Soul, very different in its filling up and in its limitations
from any of the fixed ecclesiastical divisions around us,
which we exclusively call Churches. And we find our
selves anticipating as it were the conditions of heaven
and the judgment of God, in settling (not indeed to the
satisfaction of the logician, but in obedience to the
yearnings of our own hearts) what are the essentials of
Christian Faith and Life on earth, and who are the chil
dren of the kingdom here.
It will be my object, then, to-night, with a single eye
to the end I have in view, and without scrupling to
employ any plainness of statement which I may find
necessary to my purpose—to bring this test before your
�good sense, your conscience, and your affections, in the
most palpable form I can command.
Let us, then, vary the ordinary tenor of address, and the
customary appeals of argument and demonstration, and
inquire for Christianity by inquiring for our fellowChristians, and for the essential faith of Jesus Christ by
inquiring for the general assembly and church of the
first-born in heaven.
Towards the end of the seventeenth century, a young
French ecclesiastic of extraordinary piety and virtue com
menced his career of public duty with the charge of a
seminary devoted to those who had been newly converted
to that branch of the Christian Church of which he was
himself a conscientious member. Subsequently, he went
into an unhealthy and desolate district where the greatest
cruelties had been practised against those whom he was
now desired to convert. The first demand he made of
the king was, that all armies should be removed from
the district, and that all persecution and oppression
should immediately cease. He then set himself to the
task of recovering the wanderers by kindness and per
suasion to the bosom of that Church from which they had
strayed. He lived a long life, but when removed from
that district, he watched over it and all others similarly
circumstanced, and whenever he heard of harshness and
severity sent his remonstrance to the seat of power.
From this post of duty he was removed to the most
fascinating and brilliant court of Europe. He was made
tutor to a boy of great ability, but almost ungovernable
pride and passion, but of whom it was important to the
world that he should create an accomplished man and a
virtuous Christian, for he was heir to one of the greatest
monarchies of the earth. Here, amidst his pupil’s bursts
�66
of passion, he maintained an unbending dignity, and the
proud boy soon learned to weep before him for his sins,
to drink in his instructions with eagerness, to delight in
him and to love him. Here royalty, too, received his
calm but intrepid rebuke, and power acknowledged his
sincere independence.
He was raised, but by no arts or efforts of his own, to
an archbishopric. Here the still piety, which was part
of his nature, was misapprehended. His principles and
his doctrines were misinterpreted and condemned. A
storm of calumny gathered round him. The smile of
royalty was converted into a frown, the arm of patronage
was changed into a weapon of offence—friendship turned
away from him—that Church which he had so sincerely
served, began to regard him as her enemy—and the re
vered head of it slowly and unwillingly pronounced his
condemnation. In the midst of all this (gentle, suscep
tible, modest as was his nature), he held fast to his in
tegrity. Immersed in a wearisome, protracted contro
versy, he preserved throughout his courage undaunted,
and his charity unchilled. “ God, who is the witness
of my thoughts,” says he to one of his greatest adver
saries, “ knows that, though differing with you in opi
nion, I still continue to revere you, to preserve unceas
ingly my respect, and to deplore the bitterness of this
contention.”
In the midst, and in the pauses of this storm, he was
performing the duties of his See with exemplary fidelity.
A peace-maker among the divided, a rebuker of the
dissolute, an encourager of the deserving, a father to the
poor: surrounded by the pomp of a princedom, he lived
the life of simplicity. The humblest village pulpit in his
diocese knew the sound of his voice, and the presence of
�67
his care. He would sit down in his walks with the
rustic on the grass, and utter his pure words of counsel.
He would daily have his almoners around him, to mi
nister to the necessitous; and when the evening hour
set in, he was found with his household in prayer.
Throughout all these labours, sorrows, and painful re
membrances, his only recreation was to walk. His con
versation was directed to instruction. “ I have still fresh
in my recollection,” says one, “ all the serious and im
portant subjects which were the topics of our discourse;
my ear caught with eagerness every word that issued
from his lips: his letters are still before me, and they
bespeak the purity of his sentiments, and the wisdom of
his principles. I preserve them among my papers, as
the most precious treasure which I have in the world.”
His sense of friendship was intense and pure. “ Good
friends,” says he, “ are a dangerous treasure in life; in
losing them we lose too much. I dread the charms of
friendship. Oh 1 how happy shall we be, if, hereafter,
we are together before God, loving each other in his
love, and rejoicing only in his joy, and no longer exposed
to separation.” At length the hour of death approached
him. He lay thinking of his friends, his flock, and his
Church; receiving the consolations of his faith—hearing
the selected words of the Scripture, and saying, “ Repeat
—repeat to me those holy words again.” He died as he
had lived, in sanctity—all his goods given to his stu
dents, to his clergy, to his guests, to works of piety, and
to the poor.
This man was a Roman Catholic—his name was
Fenelon.
In our own country, and nearer our own time, at the be
ginning of the present century, in a county bordering on
�68
the Principality of Wales, there resided, in a not ignoble
condition of life, a true servant of God, who took under
his care the spiritual and the temporal wants of an ex
tensive but humble neighbourhood. Diligent in busi
ness, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord, he watched with
anxiety over the morals, the faith, and the happiness of
those about him. Frank and cheerful in his manners
and habits, he was full of an earnest piety. He thought
that the strictness which made no distinction between
things absolutely immoral, and things that were innocent,
or blameable only in their abuse, was prejudicial to the
interests of sincerity and religion. He was so absolutely
simple and good-natured, from the innocence of his own
heart, so little prone to consider how others might view
him, when he saw and meant no evil—that people who
were accustomed to judge of seriousness of character by
habitual length of countenance, scarcely appreciated the
religiousness of his soul, as it really lay deeply within him.
From a child he was devout. When in circumstances
of danger his mother was in alarm, the infant monitor
beside her said, “ Be still, mother; God will protect us.”
The generous liberality which compelled his parents,
when sending him to school, to sew up his money in his
pocket, lest he should give it all away upon the road,
tempered with the wiser judgment of the man, continued
with him in maturity. When the poor came to speak
to him, he always, if possible, went out to them immediately, for he said, “ the time of the poor is very valu
able to them; besides, they are more sensitive to any
apparent inattentions.”
In the midst of all this simplicity and goodness, he
was courted by the great for his talents, and for the fas
cination of his company, and his connexions opened out
�69
to him the prospect of a brilliant and distinguished
career. But there was one subject which pre-eminently
engaged his interests, away from the engagements im
mediately around him. He thought much of the super
stitions, ignorance, neglect and misery in which lands at
a distance lay under the reign of Heathenism. He heard
of a Brahmin who had gone to die on the banks of his
sacred river—but to whom a British officer had given
nourishment, and whom he had thus saved. The Brah
min lost caste by this occurrence, was avoided by his
own countrymen, became dependent on the British offi
cer, and each day, as he came for his subsistence, cursed
the hand that had saved his miserable life. “ Now,”
said he, “ if I could only rescue one such miserable crea
ture from this wretched superstition, I should think
myself repaid for any sacrifice.”
The dear claims of neighbourhood, friendship, old
family associations, and old familiar habits—the still
dearer claims of his relationship, as father, husband, bro
ther, son—made him pause for a moment, but at length he
accepted the arduous and honourable post that was as
signed him in the eastern continent. Bor three or four
years he laboured in that fatal clime, travelling from
region to region, initiating and confirming in the mild
faith of the Gospel, raising the character, and stimu
lating the zeal, of the Christian population, elevating the
condition of the natives, noticing and remonstrating
against their oppression or neglect, founding schools for
their instruction, and endeavouring to bring the blessings
of justice in their own tongue into their own neighbour
hoods, till at length he killed himself by the labours that
were too great for his strength, and left a Church in
India sorrowing as for a father.
�70
That man was a Bishop of the English Church
—his name was Reginald Heber.
An upholsterer in London had an only son. Having
been successful in his business he left him considerable
property. With this the son greatly enlarged an origi
nally small estate, lived among his tenantry, and devoted
himself to their good. The neighbourhood being un
healthy, he drained it—the cottages being badly con
structed, he rebuilt them—the people being ignorant, he
opened and supported schools. He encouraged the habit
of attending religious instructions, and warned all those
about him from places of intemperate or dissolute resort.
His health being delicate, from the commencement of
manhood he had often travelled for its improvement.
On one of these occasions, attracted by the mournful in
cident which had left Lisbon in the ruins of an earth
quake, his course was directed to the shores of Portugal.
He was seized, when on the waters, flung into captivity,
and confined in the nauseous dungeon of a jail in France.
Here, meat was flung to himself and his fellow-captives
as to dogs; they had no instruments wherewith to cut it,
and they gnawed it off the bone in the ravenousness of
their hunger. In the midst of the horrors of this capti
vity, he excited a most remarkable feeling of reliance
on his honour—was presently permitted to be at large
upon his word—and finally was sent home on the express
condition that he would return to his confinement in
France, if the English government refused to liberate a
French naval officer in his place. This promise he would
have fulfilled, if the government of his own country had
not, by their compliance with the conditions, rendered
his return unnecessary.
Years rolled by, and his life was marked by the same
�attributes of sobriety, virtue, religiousness and benevo
lence, with the addition of great efforts on behalf of cap
tives of war, with whose fate and sufferings he could now
so acutely sympathize—till he was made High Sheriff of
his county. In this official capacity he was, at Assize
time, to be met with in the prison, examining into the
condition and government of its every part, even to its
inmost cell. “ The distress of prisoners,” he says, “ of
which there are few who have not some imperfect idea,
came more immediately under any notice, when I was
Sheriff of the county of Bedford; and the circumstance
which excited me to activity in their behalf was, the see
ing some, who by the verdict of juries were declared not
guilty; some, in whom the grand jury did not find such
an appearance of guilt as subjected them to trial; and
some, whose prosecutors did not appear against them;
after having been confined for months, dragged back to
jail, and locked up again till they should pay sundry fees
to the jailer, the clerk of assize, &c. In order to re
dress this hardship, I applied to the justices of the
county, for a salary to the jailer in lieu of his fees. The
Bench were properly affected with the grievance, and
willing to grant the relief desired; but they wanted a
precedent for charging the county with the expense. I
therefore rode into several neighbouring counties in
search of a precedent; but I soon learned that the same
injustice was practised in them; and looking into the
prisons, I beheld scenes of calamity, which I grew daily
more and more anxious to alleviate.”
You know the rest—you know the heroic career of
philanthropy which filled every town and county of Great
Britain, and every country of the world, with the name
of this great social benefactor. Devotedly attached to his
�72
own views of Christian truth, in the work of Christian
benevolence, to him Christian, Mussulman and Hindoo
were all alike ; he would have risked his life to save any.
In a remote province of Russia, stricken by a fever caught
by attendance on another, lay at length the philanthropist,
at the goal of all his earthly labours. In his memoran
dum book he had been writing, “ May I not look on
present difficulties or think of future ones in this world,
as I am but a pilgrim or wayfaring man that tarries but a
night; this is not my home; but may I think what God
has done for me, and rely on his power and grace.”—
“ My soul, remember how often God has sent an answer
of Peace, Mercies in the most seasonable times—how
often better than thy fears, exceeded thy expectations.
Oh! why should I distrust this good and faithful God ?
In His word, He hath said, ‘ In all my ways acknowledge
Him, and He will direct thy path.’ But, Lord! leave me
not to my own wisdom, which is folly, nor to my own
strength, which is weakness. Help me to glorify Thee
on earth, and finish the work Thou givest me to do.”
“ Suffer,” he said to his friends as he was dying, “ suffer
no pomp to be used at my funeral, nor any monument,
nor any monumental inscription whatsoever, to mark
where I am laid: lay me quietly in the earth, place a sun
dial over my grave, and let me be forgotten.” This man
was a Calvinistic Dissenter—his name was Howard.
More than a hundred years ago a pious boy left a
country parsonage, the abode of his father, and entered
the Charter-house school in London. From thence he
went to Christ Church College, Oxford. There he ad
vanced, not only in the learning of the place, but in
habits of Christian seriousness and piety, which were not
of the place. Associating himself with a few others like
�73
minded with himself, they devoted a portion of their
time to a study of the Scriptures and to serious reading.
Always of a moral and religious disposition, he might be
said to have obeyed the commandments from his youth.
But this he soon began to feel was not enough. He
began to visit the sick in prison and the poor in their
homes,- prayed and exhorted; avoided all trifling ac
quaintance ; and commenced the religious observance of
the ancient fasts of the Church, keeping Wednesdays
and Fridays with a distinct religiousness. In the midst
of all this he had much heaviness and fear—was often
weak in his new faith, and of doubtful mind. Yet keep
ing his eye upon his object, he practised abstemiousness—
underwent exposure to sudden changes of climate, heat
and cold, fatigue and dangers, which were, under Pro
vidence, to prepare him for his work. Presently he
stepped forth to awaken a drowsy, careless world, sunk
in sin and sensuality. The conventionalism of society
was shocked.
Though a clergyman of the English
Church, the door of the English Church was shut against
him. But Newgate was open to him; the hill-side, and
the high-way, and the market-place, were free to him;
and submitting to be made thus vile, as he expressed it,
against his own natural taste and liking, he preached
with ardour the word of warning; and while he created
great disquietude of heart in those who heard him, at the
dreadful nature of sin and the just wages of it, he spake
again to the storm and tempest of these souls, and im
mediately there was a great calm.
All these services were not rendered without great
contradiction of sinners. The brutal people rose up
against their benefactor; thereby showing what need
they had of him. Alluding to the gradual growth of
�74
these outrages, he says, “ By how gentle degrees does
God prepare us for his will! Two years ago a piece of
brick grazed my shoulders. It was a year after that a
stone struck me between the eyes. Last month I received
one blow, and this evening two; one before we came
into the town, and one after we were gone out; but both
were as nothing; for though one man struck me on the
breast with all his might, and the other on the mouth
with such a force that the blood gushed out immediately,
I felt no more pain from either of the blows than if they
had touched me with a straw.” At length he was sur
rounded with fellow-labourers in this cause, in this great
and good cause of the conversion of the heathens at home.
He made rules, he organised a society, he appointed dis
tricts, and preachers, and meetings. And he nobly says,
“ The thing which I was greatly afraid of all this time,
and which I resolved to use every possible method of
preventing, was a narrowness of spirit, a party zeal, a
being straitened in our own bowels; that miserable
bigotry which makes many so unready to believe that
there is any work of God but among themselves. I
thought it might be a help against this frequently to read
to all who were willing to hear, the accounts I received
from time to time of the work which God is carrying on
in the earth, both in our own and other countries; not
among us alone, but among those of various opinions and
denominations. For this I allotted one evening in every
month; and I find no cause to repent of my labour: it
is generally a time of strong consolation to those who
love God, and all mankind for his sake, as well as a means
of breaking down the partition-wall which either the craft
of the devil or the folly of men has built up, and of en-<
couraging every child of God to say, ‘ Whosoever doth
�the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my
brother, and sister, and mother.’ ”
No doubt in all this a strong will was manifested, and
was accompanied by the exercise of no little authority.
Considerable means poured in upon him to help him in
the accomplishment of his extensive work. Selfish men
were not slow to attribute to him the baseness which
would have characterised themselves. But death, the
great earthly judge, vindicated his character from this
calumny, for he died possessed of nothing but his
books.
This man, the spiritual father and regenerator of
many thousand souls, was unwillingly the greatest
Schismatic the Church of England has ever known—his
name was Wesley.
I must touch upon two characters I wish still to call
to your remembrance with much less detail. One there
is, the record of whose life must have recently passed
through the hands of many now present, who was worthy
of being enrolled among those women who followed our
Lord unto his death, and ministered to his last necessi
ties. The gentle woman who could throw off the allure
ments of a life of refinement—who could submit to the
distressing demands of public duty upon a shrinking
nature—who could go with her spotless purity into the
midst of the most abandoned of her sex, and appease
the anger and calm the passions of guilty men—to
whom the coarse ribaldry, the loathsome filth, and the
tomb-like uncleanness of soul, which characterised the
inmates of a jail, were no barrier to the sun-like beams
of her penetrating Christian love—that woman—the
observer of no ordinances, the acknowledger of neither
Bishop nor Presbyter, member of neither Protestant
i 2
�76
nor Catholic Church—could not have stood the test of
any of the Churches. She was a Quaker—and her name
was Elizabeth Ery.
It is difficult sometimes to return in memory to the pre
judices, the indifference, and the doubt with which great
works have been regarded in their commencement: it is
difficult to realise the state of feeling which made a given
labour necessary, but which now no longer exists, the very
labour which it called forth having driven it away almost
from our recollections. But the corn of wheat, which
first fell into the ground, abiding now no longer alone,
but bringing forth much fruit, must not be forgotten.
Not many years has the tomb closed over the remains
of a humbler and less known labourer in the vineyard
of God, than any that I have mentioned. Placed in
early life upon one of those streams of social good, the
channels of which Society scoops out for herself, and in
which the majority of her sons are content, and wisely
content, to bear their portion of the freight of human
duty,—he of whom I speak devoted himself to the service
of the Christian ministry. Eor many years he was happy
and content to do the work of an evangelist among his
neighbours and parishioners, shedding the light of a pure
heart upon their daily Eves, healing the bitterness of
their sorrows by the overflowing balsam of his sympathy,
and each week assembling them together to point out to
them again the brightening way of truth and heaven.
At length his heart was smitten with the thought of
those who never saw him, and whom he never saw. Be
hind the goodly array of pure young faces, of sober man
hood, and reverend old age, that stood before him in the
Church—behind the attentive countenances, the cleanly
robes and the decorous manners which the Lord’s day
�weekly called before him—his mind’s eye saw a gather
ing group of guilt, intemperance, and crime—of sorrow
ing, sinning men and women, and of children, with
their tears of pain drying upon their unwashed cheeks.
In the very midst of those who came to him to hear the
sounds of peace and holiness in that happy temple, his
soul filled with the thoughts of those who never came. As
he stood upon the steps of the doors which at his touch
were to throw open to him homes of cheerful innocence
and competence, radiant with a welcome to himself, his
heart grew full and heavy with the remembrance of those
at whose door he never stopped, and who never sat at
good men’s feasts. He thought of those great cities in
his own young country, of those greater cities in other
lands, older in sorrows, and more crowded with crime.
His own more limited range among the poor of his
prosperous, healthy village-town, satisfied not the craving
of his sympathy with the wide-spread humanity that
pined in neglected sorrow, and uncombatted vice. He
threw up his easy, happy charge, he went to the nearest
great city, to study and to alleviate its unseen woes, and
to stir up the heart of philanthropy and religion to the
obligation and necessity of this work. Now that Bishops
organise large companies of Missionaries for this very
work; now that Town Missions send forth their hun
dreds of labourers; now that almost every considerable
society of Christians in our large towns bears a part in
this holy undertaking, as an obvious and indispensable
part of their Christian duty,—it is difficult to believe how
new and strange this very work appeared, even to the
best of men, twenty years ago—and how this apostle of
the neglected, this remembrancer of the forgotten, toiled
to convince men’s judgments, and to satisfy their hearts
�78
of the possibility of taking religion and hope into the
very homes of the poor.
Yes ! I remember him when he landed on these
shores, with that countenance, the light whereof was a
divine charity. I remember him when he came among
us, new from the actual personal fulfilment of his own
scheme, and about to return to it again, to die in it.
Yes ! I remember him, with his thrilling tones, and his
overflowing heart, and his consecrated life, and I re
member, too, that at that time there was no such thing
in this country as a Domestic Mission to the outcast of
society, and the neglected and forgotten of Christian, as
semblies, and that most men thought that there never
could be!
This man, so full of purity, so rich in human tenderness,
so affluent in divine forbearance—this man, the friend of
the heroic Follen, the spiritual brother of the high-souled
Channing, and yet the daily companion of the hardest
and most neglected beings in the streets of Boston—was
a Unitarian, and his name was Tuckerman.
Now to which of all these men wTill even the Bigot
venture to deny a place within the Infinite Bather’s all
comprehending mercy ?—a place in the reverent regards
of the great human family ? a place in the heaven of the
just made perfect ?—which of all these will he ven
ture, in any assembly of the good and wise on earth, to
declare unfit to share in the inheritance he anticipates
for himself? Whichsoever of these sainted men is the
object of his intolerant presumption, there is not one
high soul in the world that will cry Amen to his ana
thema. And yet to the Roman Catholic I say, here, in
this group, is to be found almost every possible form of
schism from the unity of your Church ! To the Church
�79
of England man, I say, here are a Quaker and a Uni
tarian ! To the Unitarian, I say, here is the professor
of what you call the stern and gloomy faith of Calvin,
here the submissive subject of the See of Rome ! Not
withstanding, as surely as our Lord said of the little
children, “ of such is the kingdom of heaven,” we may
say of these men, of such is the general assembly and
church of the first-born, whose names are writ in heaven 1
When you ask me, then, for the essentials of Christianity,
I point you to the belief these men had in common ! When
you ask me for the Holy Catholic faith, I tell you, it is
there ! It was not the belief in transubstantiation in one,
or the belief in episcopal ordination in another, or a be
lief in vicarious sacrifice in another, or the neglect of
public religious ordinances in another, or the mental
adoption of the doctrine of the divine unity in another—
that made of him a child of God, and a true follower of
Jesus Christ; but it was that which each had in addi
tion, that which each had, I will say, in superiority, to
these special characteristics of his individual faith—first,
a hearty sincerity in the belief he did profess; and, se
condly, an actual incorporation into his own spiritual
being, of the life and mind of Jesus Christ.
There is one possible conclusion, however, from these
considerations, against which I would earnestly warn you;
it is the adoption, as any result of this survey, of that in
fidel and worldly latitudinarianism, which proclaims it as
indifferent, what mode of faith the individual mind adopts
or professes. The survey of the lives of these great and
good men teaches us nothing of the kind. Each one of
these men commenced, as the very basis of his spiritual
existence, with being earnest and sincere in his own pro
fessions and belief. Each one of them laid the founda
�80
tion of his character in serious thought, and in honest
confession.
We are not to stand before this noble army of holy
men, and, as a result of the contemplation of their excel
lency and their glory, say, “ then it is indifferent what
form of Christianity we shall profess—any is sufficient, all
are good.” Do we suppose that was the spirit in which
they formed their faith ? On the contrary, these men
wrought out their faith with the profoundest anxiety, and
took reverently to their souls every word of God. Fenelon
would have been no Fenelon had he been merely a con
forming Catholic, and not a true and earnest man. Re
ginald Heber would have been no confessor had he been
in heart a Unitarian or a Congregationalist.
These things cannot be. Nothing great or good is
ever founded on a lie. These men were sincere; and
though we may not be able to see how the specialities of
their belief influenced their characters, they were without
a doubt wrought deeply into the tissue of their souls,
were not put on as a garment in which to go forth to
meet the world, or in an easy indifference as to what
profession they should make, but formed a genuine part
of their individual religious being. It was this very
earnestness, this profoundness and sincerity of individual
conviction, that made Christianity to them so intense and
vital an influence. They received the faith of Jesus
Christ under that form which appeared to them, after
grave reflection, to be the purest and the best; and
henceforth it could exist as a personal influence in no
other form whatever to their hearts. When will men see
that he to whom all faiths are alike has no earnest faith
at all ? It is the very lesson of these men’s lives that they
had convictions, determinate convictions, convictions that
�81
made them what they were, and that they were faithful
to them.
It is indeed a holy and delightful thought, that we
may also conclude, (without denying the reality, and to
the men the necessity, of those special and distinctive
peculiarities in which the common faith of Christ ap
proved itself respectively to their consciences,) that the
great saving power of their faith consisted, not in that
which distinguished them from one another, but in that
common treasure which lay at the foundation of all their
differences, in that obedience to God, that love to Christ,
that charity to man, that hope of heaven, in which they
all rejoiced together; that carefulness of mind with which
they sought the truth; that conscientious fidelity with
which they maintained it; that vigilant self-discipline
with which they applied its lessons : and that joyful hope
with which they rested on its promises.
It is not for me, my friends, to speak of the holy
lessons to which this temple shall, from week to week,
be devoted, in the building up of human souls for the
conflicts of earth, and the inheritance of heaven. But I
believe I may with certainty specify two general objects
in its erection; that it stands as an offering to since
rity, to the sacredness of the individual conscience, and
as the provision of an altar for an honest and truthful
sacrifice, such as they who come here may truthfully and
earnestly offer: and that, in the next place, it stands in
determined Protest against those accretions and additions
which Churches too generally enforce upon Christian
belief, as essential to salvation, and in restoration of that
old and only catholic Christianity which is common to all
Churches, though obscured and weakened in so many.
Por we, too, in common with all the holy men whose
�lives and characters we have been considering—we, too,
believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of Hea
ven and Earth—we, too, in common with all these holy
men, believe that he hath, in his merciful providence, sent
Jesus Christ to turn away every one of us from his ini
quities, and to be the way, the truth, and the life to us
—and we, too, in common with all these holy men, look
forward to a life beyond the valley of the shadow, where
our sins and our sorrows shall be lost in the light of the
benign presence of God; and trusting in the mercy of
Him who forgiveth, we long, with them, to be prepared,
by pureness, by knowledge, by long-suffering, by kind
ness, by the holy spirit, and by love unfeigned, to join
that blest assembly and church of the first-born, which
are written in Heaven.—Amen.
�NOTE.
In the above Sermon—designed to promote a feeling of
eatholic charity, in an audience consisting of a variety of de
nominations—the question remains unsolved, and indeed
unattempted, Does any one of these forms of Christian doc
trine accord more than the rest with the teachings of the
New Testament, and is any one more conducive than the
rest to the realization of Christian life and character ? That
this must be the case with some one or other of them, no one
can doubt, for no one can pay attention to their several cha
racteristics, and believe them to be identical in their essence
or in their influence. That any one of them actually reaches
the ideal standard which these two tests imply, is more than,
the writer at least is able to assert. He is much more
disposed to believe that each of these forms of Faith contains
a portion—and the purest and most vital portion—of Christian
truth and influence ; but that in actual development, that
portion in each Church suffers from a relative exaggeration,
or a relative neglect—the exaggeration leading to an exclu
sion of other important principles, necessary to be associated
with it in an integral Faith—and the neglect leading to a
gradual and half unconscious admission of other and inferior
principles, which ultimately predominate and overwhelm it.
The apparent result of this view is Eclecticism. But Eclec
ticism is an artificial and critical process, landing us in a
result which is usually destitute of all homogeneity, a collec
tion from without, under the guidance of the judgment,
�rather than a natural integral production of the soul within.
It is a kind of Peripateticism among the sects—alternately
assimilating and rejecting the elements of actually existing
Churches. Surely the old, but rarely realized, idea, of a recur
rence to the New Testament itself, as containing the spirit of
Christianity in its purest form, and to the life of Jesus Christ,
as affording the only perfect instance of that spirit exemplified
in humanity, involves a far sounder principle. It is a truth
often overlooked in these discussions, but nevertheless to be
borne carefully in mind, that no human being can tell on
what proportion the peculiarities, the differentia of the Roman
Catholic form of Christianity, entered into the composition of
the mind and character of Fenelon—any more than he can
tell in what proportion Calvinism entered into the spiritual
fabric of Howard, or Unitarianism into that of Tuckerman.
It may be—and this is probably nearer the truth—that the
distinctive peculiarities of their special forms of faith were in
each case the subordinate parts of their spiritual system—
that the common essential Christian truth excluded from
none of their systems, but, lying at the base of all, was the
great element in their personal and actuating faith; and
that this fact was precisely the influence which made them the
excellent men they were—as it is probably the fact which
seems to make men of the highest spiritual excellence almost
always of one interior family and creed.
A great mind is able to penetrate beyond the outworks of
its creed, and lay hold of the citadel. But ordinary minds
rest in those very outworks. With them the accretions are
the great thing : and therefore it is, that the purification
of popular belief is a work of great necessity still, for in the
subordinate and comparatively uninfluential elements of the
various prevailing forms of Christian belief, pressed upon the
notice of the general mind, as they are, by the very differences
and antagonism they create, the ordinary mind takes its chief
position, and of these it takes the firmest hold. The doc
trine, then, of this Sermon—the salvability of all these good
and great men of every Church, does not alter the duty of
�85
preventing the saving truth, which they were able to discern
and make their own through all that surrounded it, from
being overwhelmed and paralyzed by accretions—preventing
in fact the saving truth from being saving to the hearts of
the multitude.
The truth appears therefore to stand thus : Each Christian
Church contains within itself the means of salvation, and the
essentials of Truth—but each contains them in various
degrees of development, some having them more perfect in
one direction, others in another. By the first of these posi
tions, we are bound to a universal charity—by the second, to
mutual help, correction and enlightenment. Far from mono
polizing all Christian truth—still less all Christian excellence—
and less still, all Christian salvation—for that religious body to
which the writer belongs—he yet should say, if by so vague
a word he could denote his own version of the Christian
Faith, that among prevailing systems the theory of Unitarianism appears to him to be in itself the purest, the
highest, and the most enduring; and when it shall have
engaged in its development and application a larger number
of the best minds of the community, and the attention of its
adherents shall not be engrossed in its dogmatical defence
(as by the necessity of its position is too much now the case),
it must necessarily produce loftier and more extended spi
ritual results than the world has ever yet witnessed—that it
must necessarily produce the highest characters, and the
greatest number of them: that is to say, the belief in one
undivided and infinite God, our Father, is in itself, and in its
influences, necessarily higher and holier than the present
scholastic division of that unity into natures and persons;—
the belief that God was as fully manifested in J esus Christ,
as the Divine can be in the Human, affords a better support
and guide to our spiritual nature, than the dogma that Christ
himself was the Infinite God;—the desire to partake of the
divine nature in Christ, and to grow up into a resemblance
in all things unto him which is our Head, is a more holy and
influential desire for the heart of man, than a reception of
�86
the doctrine of a vicarious sacrifice, a substituted righteous
ness and a substituted punishment;—and, finally, a prospect
of futurity, in which the fruits of the seeds sown in this life,
whether they be good or whether they be evil, shall be reaped
by each man in a world of greater light and higher progress
beyond the grave, is in itself truer, and in its influences more
efficient, than a belief in the ordinary twofold division of an
everlasting Heaven and an everlasting Hell, into one or other
of which each man is to depart at his resurrection.
This form of Christianity, then, which is at present distinguishedfrom others bythe designation “Unitarianism,” is still,
in the writer’s opinion, a very noble thing to avow—a very
righteous and holy cause for which to labour and to suffer
reproach.
THE END.
Printed by Richard Kinder, Green Arbour Court, Old Bailey.
�May be had of John Chapman, 142, Strand, and all Booksellers,
Price 6d.,
PAUSE AND RETROSPECT;
The Last Discourse preached in Paradise-street Chapel, Liverpool.
BY
JAMES
MARTINEAU.
With an Address on occasion of laying the Foundation-stone of the New Church in
Hope-street.
BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
In two volumes 12mo, price 7s. 6d. each,
ENDEAVOURS AFTER THE CHRISTIAN LIFE.
Each Volume may be had separately.
ALSO, THIRD EDITION,
Price 4s. paper cover; 4s. 6d., cloth,
THE RATIONALE OF RELIGIOUS INQUIRY;
OB.
THE QUESTION STATED,
OF
REASON, THE BIBLE, AND THE CHURCH.
In one vol. 8vo, price 7s. 6d.,
LECTURES IN THE LIVERPOOL CONTROVERSY.
1. THE BIBLE, WHAT IT IS, AND WHAT IT IS NOT;
2. THE DEITY OF CHRIST.
3. THE ATONEMENT.
4. CHRISTIAN VIEW OF MORAL EVIL.
5. CHRISTIANITY WITHOUT PRIEST AND WITHOUT RITUAL.
WITH INTRODUCTION, AND PRELIMINARY CORRESPONDENCE.
Bach Lecture may be had separately.
�In 12mo, price 3s. 6d.,—to Congregations, 2s. 6d.,—bound in cloth,
HYMNS FOR THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH AND HOME.
COLLECTED AND EDITED
BY
JAMES
MARTINEAU.
SIXTH EDITION.
Congregations requiring a supply should make application to the Editor, Liverpool.
.a
Price 21s.,
THIRD EDITION.
HOLY SONGS AND MUSICAL PRAYERS.
*
Composed or adapted, and harmonized for Four Voices, with separate
accompaniments for the Pianoforte and Organ.
By J. R. OGDEN, Esa.
EDITED BY
JAMES MARTINEAU.
A set of Sixty-two Compositions, of which three-fourths are original, expressly designed for
Hymns in the above Collection.
The Supplement to the former Editions may be had separately, price 7s.
Price 6d.,
IRELAND AND HER FAMINE.
A DISCOURSE.
Price 6d.,
THE BIBLE AND THE CHILD.
A DISCOURSE.
On the 1st of February, May, August, and November,
Price 2s. 6d.,
THE PROSPECTIVE REVIEW.
EDITED BY
Messrs. J. J, TAYLER.
J. H. THOM.
C. WICKSTEED.
J. MARTINEAU.
Respice, Aspice, Prospice.
St. Bernard
�
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Victorian Blogging
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Discourses on occasion of the dedication of Hope-Street New Church, Liverpool, Thursday, October 18, and Sunday, October 21, 1849
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Place of Publication: London
Collation: 86, [2] p. ; 21 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Contents: The dedication of the Christian temple to the worship and service of God: a sermon preached on Thursday, October 18th, 1849 / Thomas Madge -- The Watch-night lamps: a discourse preached on the first Sunday of public worship, October 21, 1849, in Hope-Street New Church, Liverpool / James Martineau -- The General Assembly and Church of the First-Born: a sermon preached in Hope-Street New Church, Liverpool on Sunday evening, October 21, 1849 / Charles Wicksteed. A selection of related titles from the publisher's lists on unnumbered pages at the end. Printed by Richard Kinder, London. Date given in Roman numerals.
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Madge, Thomas
Martineau, James
Wicksteed, Charles
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1849
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John Chapman
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Sermons
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Conway Tracts
Sermons
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Text
INAUGURAL DISCOURSE
AT
ST. GEORGE’S HALL,
ON SUNDAY, 1st OCTOBER, 1871.
BY
REV. CHARLES VOYSEY, B.A.,
ST. EDMUND HALL, OXFORD, LATE VICAR OF HEALAUGH.
LONDON:
To be obtained of the Author at
ST. GEORGE’S HALL.
1871.
Price Fourpence.
��SERMON.
c< Let us not be weary in well-doing; for in due season
roe shall reap if we faint not.”
Q&LKTlkKS
vi. 9.
I have chosen this text as a motto on this very
interesting occasion of our assembling here to-day,
rather than as a special subject of our meditation.
It would be unnecessary, and even unprofitable, to
occupy our thoughts with an essay on the duty of
perseverance, or with a string of common-places
about success being the reward of patient and
well-sustained exertion. We are too much men of
the world not to know by experience that if we wish
to succeed in our present undertaking, we must
bring to bear upon it our best and wisest thought—
our undaunted courage under, apparent failure—and
our most patient and self-denying exertions.
It seems more fitting to the circumstances of the
hour that we should begin our work with a brief and
comprehensive review of what we have undertaken
�4
to do, so as to get, if possible, in plain words, a
definite statement of the objects which have drawn,
and are still drawing, together from all parts of the
world so important an organization as that which
we profess to represent.
Our first work—that indeed which has been the
key note of this organization — is to undermine,
assail, and, if possible, to destroy that part of the
prevailing religious belief which we deem to be false.
We make no secret of our antagonism. We
frankly state our denials, and are ready to give our
reasons for the denial of any doctrine which we de
nounce. We are in open warfare against much of
what goes by the name of Christianity. We repu
diate at the outset the tacit or avowed assumptions
which are almost universally accepted as the basis
of religious belief.
To be more explicit, we deny the doctrines of the
fall of man from original righteousness; of the curse
of God against our race, and of his supposed sen
tence of any of his creatures to everlasting woe;
therefore we deny not merely the doctrine of the
atonement, but the necessity for any method what
ever of appeasing the imaginary wrath of God. For
every one of these doctrines involves a flaw in the
moral perfection of God, and violates our instinctive
perception of His goodness. The fall of man, e.g.,
involves an admission that God was either unable or
unwilling to keep His creature as good as He had at
first made him ; and that, contrary to the conclusions
of science, God’s work is not progressive, that the
�5
first man was a paragon of perfection, instead of
being in the lowest rank of savages. The doctrine
of God’s curse against our race in consequence of
the first man’s sin involves a still greater blemish on
the moral perfection of God; it is contrary to all
sense of justice that one man should be an object of
wrath in consequence of another man’s sin, much
more that a whole world of countless millions should
be deemed accursed and sentenced to everlasting
perdition through the sole faults of their first parents.
This doctrine we discard, because it is morally de
grading to God. For the same reason, only with
immeasurably greater indignation, we reject the
doctrine that God withdrew the curse and sentence
from the heads of a few of our race in consequence
of the death of Jesus, by which, orthodoxy tells us,
the Father was reconciled to men. The remedy was
worse than the disease. The compromise more dis
honourable than the injustice which it was intended
to amend. These are only a few, but they are the
most prominent of the doctrines which nearly all socalled Christians deem to be essential; and our first
work, I say, is to hasten their coming downfall—to
rid the world of ideas which, though once were good
and useful in comparison with the ideas which they
supplanted, have now become both poisonous and
loathsome—full of injury to the human heart and
mind, and blasphemous in the ears of the most
High.
Gathering round these abjured doctrines are others
of only less noxious character, such as the belief in
�6
a Devil, the doctrine of the Trinity, the Godhead,
and even the superhuman Divinity of Jesus Christ—
the expectation of His return to earth as the Judge
and King of men—the doctrine of the Church as a
spiritual and authoritative power—the doctrines of
sacraments, of holy orders, of priestly interference
and control in every shape, and of the necessity for
priestly intervention at the burial of the dead. All
these topics are suggestive of many protests, which
it will be our duty to make.
There is one, however, which I have not yet men
tioned, reserving it for a paragraph by itself. We
shall be met at the onset of our attack by the
warning, that we have no right to form about any
of God’s dealings an opinion which may be con
trary to the revealed religion contained in the
Bible, or in the Church, or in both. This is
where the conflict will be hottest. We must bring
all our forces to bear against this insidious and
plausible plea. We shall have not merely to defend
our own right to use the Light of Nature within us,
but to show up the weak points in our enemies’
armour—to challenge them to a defence of those
glaring immoralities and absurdities in the Bible, or
in the £‘ revealed ” religion, which none of them as yet
have had the courage to defend—to exhibit also un
sparingly the numberless fallacies which abound in
their theories of a Church, and to make them show
cause why any claimant for our obedience should be
accepted more than his rivals. We must repeat and
repeat the fact, that so-called revelations abound in
�7
all the earth, each one being believed by its ad
herents to be the only true one; and that Chris
tendom itself is divided piecemeal into separate and
antagonistic Churches, each of which in turn is, of
course, the only true Church.
To the world outside, who may watch the struggle,
we may appeal with confidence, knowing that all the
Churches, all the priests, all the Bibles, and all the
Catechisms, have never yet been able to quench the
spark of Divine justice, and love of truth, which the
Almighty God has kindled in the human breast.
The time will come when, if our orthodox opponents
shall have succeeded in proving that the Bible or
the Church teach authoritatively doctrines against
which the mind and ■ heart and conscience of men
rebel, men will make answer—“ So much the worse
for the Church—so much the worse for the Bible;”
and what is bad in both will be cast away to the
moles and to the bats—to the dust and darkness
appointed for all falsehood.
To pave the way for even this preliminary work of
necessary destruction, we must first of all persuade
the timorous to enter upon the work of religious
enquiry without any dread of being punished for
honest conviction. The Churches hold all their
power at this moment through the superstitious fears
of men and women. From first to last the cry is,
“Flee from the wrath to come,” “Believe this, and
thou shalt be saved and as nothing is so catching
as fear, the multitude run hither and thither, to seek
shelter from impending doom.
�A great part of our work, then, must be to pro
claim the perfect safety of the path of enquiry. To
tell men and women that even if they go wrong in
opinion, even if they miss much precious truth and
embrace much mischievous error, the Lord of all will
not damn them for it for ever. The Father’s love
will not shrivel up or grow cold because, in our
blindness or twilight, we have missed the path of
truth, or made but slow progress therein. We must
teach them that, wrong or right, they are equally safe
from the absurd horrors which have hitherto scared
them; and that all the ill-consequences of error which
Divine goodness has ordained, are only ordained to
teach us to correct our mistakes, and to improve our
method of search after His truth. 1 sometimes fear
that—as regards this country at all events—most of
us will not live to see the false doctrines of Christianity
utterly rooted out, but we may well hope to have set
free our countrymen in a few short years from this
insane and ridiculous fear of damnation as the penalty
for error in opinion. We can do nothing with the
religious masses till we have set them free to think
without trembling at every step. Let us do this with
all our might, and let us not be weary in this piece
of well-doing, for in due season we shall reap if we
faint not.
But our work does not rest here. I believe I am
only echoing the thoughts of every heart which has
sympathised with us, when I say we should be both
distressed and ashamed if all our work were only
destructive, if all our energies were to be exhausted
�9
in pulling down even false belief and only in under
mining erroneous doctrine. So far from that, we
only pull down that we may build up, we only de
sire to eradicate false beliefs that we may be able to
plant true beliefs in their place. Though I am only
an insignificant unit in the great brotherhood of free
thinkers and enemies of orthodoxy, I may point with
an honest pride to those published works for which
I have been expelled from my benefice, and ask, Are
not those writings full of positive beliefs ? Can you
find a sermon amongst them all which does not pro
claim as much my anxiety that we should believe and
teach what is true, as that we should give up and de
nounce what is false ? Had this not been so, I
should certainly not deserve to stand here to-day as
the mouthpiece of so many earnest and devout men.
But we must be prepared for every form of reproach
and every degree of misrepresentation. When
people can deliberately say of a man, “ He is only a
Theist,” assuming that, in their own minds, and in
that of their hearers, contempt need go no further,
it proves that they know nothing whatever of Theism
and that they have never taken the pains even to
ascertain what we really believe, or why we believe
it; still less why we should have willingly suffered
for it.
It will be our chief duty and our highest delight
to proclaim our real convictions — to contrast our
own faith with the faith we have so gladly aban
doned, and to try to teach those who may be halting
between two opinions, and others who may have
�10
no faith at all, to embrace the views which our own
hearts, as God made them, have taught us to ap
prove.
It will delight us to tell how we have learnt to
call God our Father—to trust Him unseen—to look
to Him for guidance in difficulty, and for strength in
duty—to feel that He is about our path and about
our bed, near to us at every moment of our lives,
ready to give all the light and knowledge which our
narrow souls can receive—to console us under every
disappointment and sorrow—and to give us hope
when everything else is gone. It will be our joy to
show that this faith in our Father is the natural
outcome of the possession and exercise of loving
virtues; that—if there be a God at all—He must
for ever be above, and never below, the moral beauty
of the best of His creatures; that as we grow in
friendliness, and brotherliness, and fatherliness to
our fellow-men, we learn more and more of the ex
ceeding and unspeakable love of God ; that we give
to Him the best name we know to-day, ready to ex
change it for a better and truer one on the morrow,
if human life and its relations rise higher still.
Contrasting this with the miserable narrow estimate
of God’s love as given us in Christianity, we gladly
proclaim that all that God is to ourselves, He is also
that to every one of our fellow-men. He has no
favourites, and the best and happiest one amongst us
all, in this world or in the world to come, is only the
type of what every other soul shall be when his turn
come. Meeting with the objection against His love,
�11
drawn from the sufferings and moral degradation of
many of our race, we can either explain it by
thoughtful reference to pains and sins we have our
selves once experienced, and found them to be preg
nant with eternal blessing, or we take refuge in the
thought that our goodness—small as it is—would
not allow us to inflict one grain of pain or shame
without a purpose of lasting good, nor to withhold
any amount of painful discipline that was necessary
to secure the ultimate happiness and virtue of the
individual exposed to it; and then we ask ourselves,
“ Shall mortal man be more just than God ? Shall
the creature be more loving than the Creator ?”
We shall have to confront those who believe too
little as well as those who believe too much. We
know that if an unspoken Atheism be rife in this
land, it must be laid at the door of those who painted
man worse than a worm, and God blacker than a
fiend.
The creed of Christendom is the cradle—nay, the
mother of Atheism ; and the Churches may thank
themselves for degrading not only the name and work
of Jesus—one of the world’s best men—but also the
principles of mankind and the honour of God. If
we would do any successful work amongst those who
are exiles from the regions of faith, we must come to
them to learn, not to teach—to learn every bit of
truth and duty which they have valued, while, per
haps, we have under-valued it. We must come to
them, honouring them for their protest against a foul
caricature of the Most High and His dealings, and
�12
only desiring to impart to them what is so precious
to ourselves by the legitimate process of argument,
and the still more efficient agency of a well-ordered
example. If they make their just boast that they
are all for mankind—to raise their kindred and their
race, to un-loose the heavy burdens, to let the op
pressed go free, and to break every yoke—let us
meet them, at all events, on their own ground as
brothers of humanity, and as setting the highest
possible value on services rendered to man as the
only true service acceptable to God.
Amongst the beliefs which it will be our duty to
proclaim, stands next in order our hope for the life to
come. We do not dogmatise on this or on any other
point, but it will devolve upon us to multiply and
strengthen all the evidences on which our hopes are
based. We all feel that our future life is bound up in
the very existence of God; the two must stand or fall
together; and while we are careful never to allow our
hopes and longings for immortal bliss to clog our foot
steps in the path of duty upon earth; while we are
most scrupulous to avoid turning it into a bribe for
the performance of duties which are their own reward,
we should do all in our power to deepen the roots of
our belief in the world to come, as the only solace
under the bitter pangs of bereavement, and as a
wholesome stimulus to our efforts after holiness,
which can never be adequately satisfied in the world
below.
To all this, which we may call our public work,
we must add the far more important business of
�131
cultivating in our lives the spirit of truth, integrity,
purity, and brotherly love. In our own homes, and
in the pursuit of our daily toil, we must find the
great field of self-culture and discipline, without
which all our public exertions in the service of truth
and liberty will be thrown away. If we find our
honour growing more sensitive, our thoughts more
elevated, our speech more refined and exact, our
tempers more placid and enduring, our consciences
more tender, and our affections more wide and deep,
we shall find, also, that our public and social influence for good will grow at the same time, and men
will learn to love us in spite of our creed, and will
pardon us for spurning their own. And above all,
if, in our desire to know more of God, and to be
convinced of His goodness, where we only doubted
before, we seem only to become more confused, more
bewildered by the strife of tongues, our only chance
of rest, and peace, and joy in believing, will be found
in our own efforts to be good and to do good. There
is no other avenue to the Throne of God’s majesty
on high; no other means of rending the veil which
hides the glory of His love, but what is to be found
in the goodness of each man’s own heart. “ Blessed
are the pure in heart for they only shall see God.”
Time would fail me were I to attempt to enume
rate the many collateral duties which will belong to
us as an association. We must only resolve to meet
them as they arise, in the same sincerity, and with
the same activity, as that in which we desire to
regulate our lives.
�141
Of the service in which we have all united to-day,
it becomes me not to speak but in terms of humility
and hope. It has been prepared in distressing haste.
At best it is only an experiment, and time alone will
enable us to test its value and to correct its faults.
I only ask you—and that with perfect confidence—
for your patient trial of it.
One word more upon my text and I have done.
“Let us not be weary in well-doing, for in due
season we shall reap if we faint not.”
For my own part, I have taken up my share in this
great work without any sanguine expectation of my
own success. But I mean to work at it body and
soul, day and night, if need be, in spite of any
amount of opposition and discouragement. I do not
mean to let it go till I am beaten off it, as it were,
lifeless. As long as I have a voice left me, it shall
be raised to magnify the loving kindness of the Lord,
and to speak good of His name. No terror shall
shut my lips—no bribes shall tamper with the utter
ance of my heart’s thoughts. So help me God ! But
in saying this for myself, I know I am speaking for
the thousands who have hitherto supported me, and
for those who are gathered here to-day. If we fight
shoulder to shoulder, turning neither to the right
hand nor to the left, we shall in time disarm all
opposition, win over to our ranks the wavering and
fashion-fearing multitude, and plant our banner of
truth, and liberty, and love, where no foe can reach
it. Thank God, the cause to which we have pledged
ourselves is not our cause only but His—does not
�15
depend on my life or fidelity, or feeble powers—no,
nor on all of us put together——it must prevail in the
end, conquering every obstacle, and rising over every
wave of seeming failure, because it is devoted, first
to God’s truth, then to God’s honour, and last, but
not least, to the true welfare of man. u Our help
standeth in the name of the Lord who hath made
heaven and earth I ”
��
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Inaugural discourse at St. George's Hall, on Sunday 1st October, 1871
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Voysey, Charles
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 15 p. ; 21 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Text of sermon from Galatians vi. 9 "Let us not be weary in well-doing; for in due season we shall reap if we faint not".
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<23'2 >(=>
THE
RELIGIOUS ASPECTS OF HEALTH.
A DISCOURSE GIVEN AT
SOUTH PLACE CHAPEL,
LONDON,
NOVEMBER 20th, 1881,
Dr. ANDREW WILSON,
OF EDINBURGH.
LONDON :
11,
SOUTH
PRICE
PLACE FINSBURY.
TWOPENCE.
�FREDERICK G. HICKSON & Co.,
257, High Holbokn,
Rondon, W.C.
�THE RELIGIOUS ASPECTS OF HEALTH.
T T would be hard to find a truer allegory than the
“ Vision of Mirza,” in which Addison, under a
poetic guise, sought to teach the nature and incidents of
the journey of life. The long series of arches, threescore-years-and-ten entire, and several broken, in the
bridge of life ; the hidden trap-doors that were plentiful
at the entrance of life’s journey, and that again increased
towards life’s close ; the busy multitudes thronging life’s
highway ; the thinning of their ranks as their pilgrimage
progressed ; and the disappearance of unit after unit into
the dark river below as the journey’s stages lengthened,
are features of the allegory which form part of childhood’s
more serious tales. But beneath the clouds of allegory
and metaphor, lie the serious facts of human existence.
Wrap up these facts as you will, disguise them under
what 'simile you choose, their stern realities will still
face us, as we turn from the ideal to survey the fields of
human culture that are spread out everywhere around us.
There are few of these fields more impressive in the pic
ture they present to view than the special aspects which
meet the eye of the physician, the sanitaiy lefoimei, the
scientific man, the statistician himself. Of all the couises
�( 4 )
and phases of human life, none possess for us all such an
interest as those which deal with the chances of life, or
with the possibilities and probabilities of death. It is a
study, this, of the course life has to run, of the best course
which can be run, of the highest goal physical develop
ment can attain. It is a topic, this of health, which presents
for the nation an interest not exceeded by questions of the
deepest political importance. You may applaud the
statesman who introduces amid, it may be, violent oppo
sition, some measure of political reform. You may
admire and reverence the reformer in religion and theo
logy who, with the ardour of a Paul and the eloquence of
a Chrysostom, enunciates a new creed, and, having the
courage of his opinions, seeks to make that creed a life.
You may pause breathless over the work of a general or
commander who has redeemed the fortune of a war which
seemed hopeless before he brought well-nigh superhuman
bravery and promptitude into the field of action. All
these varied aims and excellencies are the stepping-stones
of humanity’s march to better things. But I make bold
to say, your interest will be deeper still, when you listen
to the recital which deals with the labours of science to
prolong life; which recounts the dangers that surround
nations, communities and individuals alike; and which
endeavours to show how, in the newer lights
research is throwing on human existence, there is .to be
found a crown’of years and a length of days. Humanity,
at least, in its thinking and cultured side, is now contented
�(
5
)
and willing to be instructed in the things that constitute
our physical salvation. What science has to say concern
ing the prolongation of human life and of human opportu
nities through attention to the laws of health, is listened
to with increased attention as the years roll on. But there
is yet need that the high morality of the subject be recog
nized. There exists the need that the religious aspects of
the health question should be driven home anew to our
minds in the light of the freer and fuller atmosphere into
which we have passed. There is, above all, an urgent neces
sity that we should assist those who have not yet attained
to a high level of thought, who still linger in theological
Egypts with a Canaan before them wherein is safety and
peace, to realize how closely, nay, how inseparably bound
up with a man’s religion and creed, is his doctrine of
health and its attainment. It is in order to lay before you
this morning a few plain thoughts on its religious aspects,
that I have chosen such a subject as “ health.”
And it may tend in some measure to assist us in the
■work of bodily care and in the enjoyment of life, if we can
realize how closely and inseparably health and its concerns
merge into any rational creed of life and conduct that man
may construct.
It may not be out of place, if, by way of an introduction
to our thoughts, you briefly glance with me at a few facts
typical of the need that exists for health-knowledge.
Begin with the early stages of human life—with the
period of the dim awakening of the child to consciousness
�(
6
)
of a life and of a world external to itself. Statistics on thetruth of which you may rely, prove the verity of that
part of the vision of Mirza, wherein the early arches ofthebridge were studded with pitfalls innumerable. For,
out of every 1,000 children{born, no fewer than 149 die ere
the first year of life is attained. Before the fifth year of
life, 263 will have disappeared from the 1,000, like the
fleeting shadows of cloud-land. Let 25 years of age beattained, and no fewer than 366 of the 1,000 units will havedisappeared. At 45 years of age, exactly 500 remain ;
ten years later only 421 are to the fore. But 309 reach
65 years of age : and 75 years sees a remnant of 161.
About 38 of the 1,000 may see 85 years of age; only 2:
survive till 95 years ; and only 1 in every 1,000 born, lives
through an entire century. But few foofalls re-echo over
the later arches of the bridge of life ; and the longest
livers have but a solitary journey as life wanes to its.
close.
There is much food for reflection in such an exact
account of the fashion in which human units appear on,
and disappear from, the stage of time. How can we
estimate the value of the lives that are cut short, often
through unforeseen circumstances, but as often through,
human ignorance and through human inattention to the
laws of health. Who 'shall conceive the possibilities of
good, of work, of faith in humanity’s highest aims, to
which the lost units might have attained ? Who shall
say anything of the extinction of genius and mind which
�we owe every hour to the fate that is as often as not of
our own making ? What potential Raphaels, or Shakqspeares, or Newtons, have disappeared, and are
disappearing hour by hour from the world’s light through
the trap doors in life’s bridge that lead to Lethe’s dark
silent stream below ? Even viewed as a simple fact of
life, the death of the units as revealed by science causes a
strong sense of rebellious melancholy to arise in the mind.
For science warns us that a very large proportion of the
losses which humanity sustains are preventive losses. They
are the bad debts for which human life has literally nothing
to show. They are the dead losses which weight the profits,
of life so heavily for the survivors, and which leave behind
it may be, the sorrow and poverty, and the desolation and
misery, that know no alleviation while life lasts for the
survivors. If that be true which sanitarians tell us, thaf
120,000 lives are annually sacrificed in our midst by preventible diseases ; that these thousands are sent to an early
grave by the pestilence that stalks abroad at noonday,
when care and attention should have long ago imprisoned
and executed it, the morality of the health-question is no
longer a debatable theme. But, last and best of all, when
we come to know the great and saving truth, worth in its
way, the concentrated culture of centuries, that man literally
holds in his own hands, the power to work weal to his
physical self, it seems high time that our religious teacheis
should have something to say on the morals of health.
I think I make a perfectly just remark when I say that
�(
8
)
to convential theology, with its absurd and inane theories
of the nature and origin of disease, we owe a vast amount
of the stolid indifference and ignorance that prevail in
matters relating to health. If I am able to show that a
foolish and fossilized theology naturally tends to encourage
the spread of disease through its ideas of the causation of
illness, I may claim to thereby furnish the surest ground
for the converse view, namely, that a rational theology
should be the first step towards health-reform. Consider,
for a single moment, the prevalent conceptions of disease
and its origin. The mysticism of the middle ages still
invests the minds of the people, by giving to disease a
purely supernatural and occult origin. The epileptic fit
is the gift of God, equally with the typhoid fever. “ The
Lord chastens whom he loves,” and the fall of a bank which
lands you in beggary, and the scarlet fever that strips your
hearth of its child-tenants and hushes for ever the prattle
that made music in your ear, are equally the means
according to theology, whereby you are to be purified
through trials. No matter that common-sense may
whisper that God’s procedure is hard—unjustifiably,
cruelly hard on the innocent victims, and that a milder
discipline would have been more likely to have won your
heart to righteousness. You are not permitted to inquire at
all into the “ways of Providence;” you are simply to fold the
hands, when every sinew and fibre in your frame feels fit to
start out and to hew down the impious lie that you deserved
the blow which ew your heart’s blood through the death
�( 9
)
of the wife or child you loved so well. You are to say,
“ Thy will be done,” when you know the phrase is, under
the circumstances, but a devil’s shibboleth after all. You
are to go on knowing nothing, seeking no light; only
believing that somehow or other things will right them
selves, when, in your heart, you know that hope is crushed
out of you, and that your life henceforth is but a vain
dream. And so many'a weary soul whose dead is buried,
but whose sorrows are just born, awakens to find life for
a time—it may be till its end—a dismal blank; and the
pulses of humanity, which should throb with hope, but the
muffled drums that herald a march to the grave.
I say then, that the popular theology is a dread enemy
of health-reform. It is plainly so, because it recognises
but one source of disease, and that the capricious fiat of an
anthropomorphic deity, who afflicts the children of men
to-day in as erratic and varied a fashion as when, with the
varied nosology of a celestial college of physicians at com
mand, he rained plagues on Egypt, or afflicted Job in the
manner familiar to all interested in patriarchal troubles
and perplexities. If you reply that even popular theo
logy recognises the newer dispensation, I will answer
“ No thanks to the theologians.” If the pulpit now adopts
less of the tone which bids the pews simply to suffer and
recognise the theoretical hand of the avengei, that is be
cause rationalism is beginning to touch the people s heai t
and head, through the people’s health, and through the
plain lessons of disease. Even those advanced theologians,
�(
IO
)
the “ peculiar people,” who found their medical practice
on the learned dictum of the Apostle Tames, do not trust
to prayer entirely, but utilize oil inunction—itself a form
of respectable medical treatment—in the cure of disease.
But even James is far ahead of the popular theology, which
in its spirit and in its practice likewise, bids you cultivate
the resignation of fatalism. “ The Lord gave, and the Lord
taketh away ” is the cant phrase that to honest ears sounds
like the cry of a savage to his fetish. When you reflect
that the typhoid fever that has cost you a life you ill
could spare to be snatched away from you, had its origin in
the bad drainage that could so readily be avoided or cured
—when you know that this epidemic might have been
avoided, or that disease arrested by early care—when you
begin to learn that the proper regulation of life means
life’s prolongation, and that we largely hold our lives in
our own hands—then, and only then, can you realise how
hollow the mockery, how utterly base and irreligious the
words that bid you regard as a gift and sign from heaven,
the disease that is of the earth earthy, and that you might
through the exercise of knowledge have avoided, or per
chance have cured. The stumble that ends in a broken
limb, is, not as a rule, regarded even by theology as having
originated in the clouds. The material cause of your
accident is, of course, as plain to demonstration, as is the
origin of the railway disaster that arises from the careless
ness of a pointsman or the defect of a signal. And the
same reasoning applies to the fever. To glorify the Deity
�li
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that afflicts you with typhus fever, and to condemn the
pointsman that kills you, or the coachman who maims you
by careless driving, are two examples of prevalent incon
sistencies, which are as much the product of a primitive
theology as is the cant expression of the coroner’s jury
concerning “ the will of God.” There is an undercurrent
of strong common sense in the lines of Dryden which
found their contention on the natural nature of disease
and its cure : —
“ Better to hunt in fields for health unbought,
Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught;
The wise for cure on exercise depend,
God never made his work for man to mend.”
If the dicta and ideas of theology may be credited with
having tinctured the minds of men with the belief that in
the presence of disease they were literally at the mercy
of a capricious Deity, we may now profitably turn to the
consideration of those newer and higher opinions concern
ing health which the advance of culture—and of religious
culture especially—have evolved.
The growth of national opinions in the matter of health
has been perhaps slow, but the advance has been made with
the slowness of surety. When we reflect that the laws against
witchcraft were exercised little more than a hundred years
ago, it will not surprise us to learn that, as recently as
1853, the Presbytery of Edinburgh sustained a severe
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mental shock by the reply of Lord Palmerston (the then
Home Secretary) in answer to a request that he would
appoint a day of national humiliation and prayer as a means
of averting a threatened visitation of cholera. The Pres
bytery of the Scottish metropolis possessed at that time
but one idea of the nature of disease, and that was
evidently the idea of its being sent from heaven. The
lelations of cholera to the Deity were clear enough to the
minds of Lord Palmerston’s petitioners, if that relationship
might be scarcely apparent to other people. The know
ledge that cholera—which, as I speak, is killing off
Mahommedan pilgrims at the rate of five hundred a day
at Mecca—is the offspring of bad drainage and an infected
water-supply, was an old story in 1853 to sanitary
reformers, but it appeared to be knowledge unattainable
by the theological mind. The facts that, firstly, cholera,
like every other epidemic, depends for diffusion on certain
insanitary conditions, and that, secondly, by improving
these conditions we may stamp out the disease, did not
seem to lie within the knowledge of the Edinburgh
theologians in 1853, as, unfortunately, it seems to be
unknown information to multitudes around us to-day.
Steeped in sanitary and scientific ignorance, can we wonder
then, that theology should collectively ask the Home
Secretary to appoint a day for the express and practical
purpose of asking the Deity to perform a veritable miracle.
By prayer and “humiliation”—I confess, even as a Scotch
man, to be entirely ignorant of the presence or working
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of this latter tendency on “ fast days ” or at any other
periods—the Deity was to be asked to suspend the laws
which regulate the production of the fever-poison and
spread of the cholera-virus. For the sake of “ much
speaking/’ and in the face of filth, bad drainage, and
other conditions then rampant over the face of the
land, the angel of death was actually expected, as in
another Egypt, to spare the chosen from the scourge.
But the sound common-sense of Lord Palmerston gave the
death-blow to the impiety of the wish. “It did not
appear,” said his lordship, “ that a national fast would be
suitable to the circumstances of the present moment.”
And then, in a few scathing sentences, the Presbytery of
Edinburgh was “hoist with its own petard.” “The Maker
of the Universe,” said Lord Palmerston’s letter, “has
established certain laws of nature for the planet in which
we live, and the weal or woe of mankind depends upon
the observance or neglect of these laws. One of those
laws connects health with the absence of those gaseous
exhalations which proceed from overcrowded human
beings, or from decomposing substances, whether animal
or vegetable ; and those same laws render sickness the
almost inevitable consequence of exposure to those noxious
influences. But it has, at the same time, pleased Providence
to place it within the power of man to make such arrange
ments as will prevent or will disperse such exhalations as
to render them harmless, and it is the duty of man to
attend to those laws of nature, and to exert the facilities
�which Providence has thus given to man for his own
welfare.”
In words like these which deserve to be “writ large”
in every school, Lord Palmerston rebuked the folly of his
petitioners. He further told them that the cholera visita
tion for which the Presbytery proposed the remedy of
prayer, was simply “ an awful warning given to the people of
this realm that they had too much neglected their duty in
this respect, and that those persons with whom it rested to
purify towns and cities, and to prevent or remove the
causes of disease, had not been sufficiently active in regard
to such matters.” He added that if the causes of con
tagion were “ allowed to remain,” they would “ infallibly
breed pestilence and be fruitful in death, in spite of all the
prayers and fastings of a united but inactive nation.”
It is indeed cheering for rational minds to read words
like these, not merely because they breathe the spirit of
the soundest scientific policy of health, but because they
are impregnated with what I take’ to be the spirit of true
religion, which ever enforces the precept that man is the
minister of his own salvation, and which render more true
the poet's words—
“ There’s life alone in duty done,
And rest alone in striving.”
The standpoint of the rational mind in regard to
health is simply this—that its preservation is the
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highest duty of mankind. This much and nothing less,
will satisfy the mind that contemplates the phases
of modern life and that longs for a better world
through the improvement of the environments of
human life in the present one. Look abroad for a moment
on the seething tides of humanity that ebb and flow with
ceaseless activity in your great city. Contemplate, as
casually as you will, the course of life to the men and
women we know, and from them extend your thoughts to
the toilers and moilers whose health is, at once, their only
possession and their best stock-in-trade. Observe how,
on every hand, you see the results of wasted 'existences
and broken lives. There, it is the ruin of a home which
might* have resounded with the laughter of children, or
have been blest with the love of wife or husband, bereft
of its sunshine, through, it may be, the gross carelessness
of the builder, or the combined ignorance and dishonesty
of the artisan who fabricated its drainage-works. Tell
the mind, however orthodox, that all is well with it, when
it has just been taught the bitter lesson that the deadly
poison that crept into its home and blighted a life, was,
like the escaped felon, an intruder which demanded con
tinual confinement through ordinary precautions, and do
not wonder if such a mind throws back your consolation
in your teeth, as but the vainest mockery that ever sprung
om a lie. There, again, is an individual constitution
which, born into the world weakly and undermined,
carries to an early grave the legacy of disease it
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inherited from parents who should never have been
allowed to bear that holy name. Here, it is another,
who, starting life in the full flush of vigour, under
mines health by excess. Knowing no laws of conduct
save those which made the enjoyment of the hour the
raison d'etre of life, the powers of that life have been sapped
and undermined by the vicious and insensible folly of halfa-dozen years. Or, again, you witness women and men
bowing before the Moloch of Fashion, and prostrating
themselves beneath the wheels of a fate that will crush
them as surely as the car of Juggernaut demolishes the
votaries who willingly bestrew its path. Is there any
need to emphasize from this pulpit what every pulpit
should denounce, namely, the wholesale bartering of
health for fashion ; the seeking of living bread amongst
the stones and the dust; the expecting to gather the pure
fruit of a healthy life from the foul weeds and thistles that
fringe the waysides of modern life ? Is there any require
ment that I should tell you what you know as well as I
do, that for vanity of figure, the human race will distort its
spine and flatten its chest; will convert the glorious
symmetry of the human body into a living museum of
pathological specimens ; and will cramp its feet until the
extremes of Chinese barbarity and western civilization
meet in amicable proximity ? There is no need to con
tinue the list of social and personal enormities which as a
nation we daily perpetrate. There might be added to the
indictment, crimes against health in the shape of luxurious
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living that is certain to bring a not over-hardy reward in
a shortened life ; and I could emphasize, if need be, the
still greater crime of sins of wilful neglect and omission
in that we have failed to know the great laws of health,
and knowing these laws, to follow and obey them. But
the facts of ill-health are every day facts : they meet us in
our homes; they teach us often in the persons of our
dearest and nearest ones, the baneful effects of carelessness,
and the often irreparable result of a wanton trifling with
health. Nay, still worse, the facts of unsound bodies and
of careless living, face you, and face me as to-day we meet
here to renew the forces of our mental and religious life.
The wasted opportunity of discharging life’s duty ; the
failure of our duty to our neighbour, to our kinsman,
and to ourselves ; the taxation of others for our
helplessness ; the falling short of every ideal, the hopes of
attaining which made life’s start so bright—in a word the
moral and religious wreck of thousands of lives, is a matter
at first of simple health, and indeed may be throughout all,
the consequence of the first shipwreck on the quicksands
of easily avoided disease. My friends, if there be a personal
Deity, who, with a pitying mind, or with some emotion akin
to that which forces the tear of sympathy to the human
eye, looks down from His mercy seat on the wrecked lives
of His children, there can be no pain, no emotion, no
feeling, half so strong in all the range of the divine com
passion, as that which the sight of the human misery, of
ill-health must invoke. Fighting here, and struggling there,
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with the conditions of disease, how ghastly must the con
test seem. How true and how applicable to such a phase
of life as related to a knowledge of health laws, are the
words of the Nazarene, “ If ye know these things, happy
are ye if ye do them."
The duties of the rational mind and of true religion in the
matter of health may be summed up in the one great con
tention that a knowledge of the laws of the universe
should be in the possession of every man or woman with a
life to live, and who boasts of the heaven-born desire to
live that life well. This is not the first time that from this
pulpit I have urged the duty of acquainting ourselves with
at least as much scientific knowledge as will enable us to
understand the constitution of things under which we live,
and of which we ourselves are part. The duty moral, and
the duty religious, exactly parallel in this case the duty
political. ■ You esteem it a bounden duty that for the
furtherance of individual and national interests you should
take a side in politics. And you adopt a side ; but you do
not choose it without weighing the pros and cons of the
matter; without comparing one policy with another ;
without taking a historical review of how or why things
political have come to exhibit their existing phases. Now
what you do in politics as a duty to yourselves, to your
children, and to the State, I imagine becomes a far more
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important matter when the subject is one of health.
The mistakes of a political leader are, as a rule, remedi
able. The genius of his opponent may make that a suc
cess, which otherwise would have proved a disaster. But
you cannot so remedy the mistakes, which, as a nation or
as individuals, we may commit in our health-science. The
grave, like the sea, holds its dead ; there is no erasing
from the statute-book of health the ghastly records of this
crime of indolence that brought the cholera, or of that
crime of ignorance that sent typhoid fever broadcast.
One duty, and one duty alone, lie before us. To it we
are called by the clarion-voice of truth itself, and that
duty is the task of learning the laws of health ; of know
ing that truth which, when we follow it, so surely shall
make us, in'the veriest sense, free.
How powerfully does Mr. Spencer put the case in those
admirable words of his on “ Education.” Listen to his
scathing denunciation of the fashionable know-nothing
ness that everywhere abounds. “ Seriously,” asks Mr.
Spencer, “ is it not an astonishing fact that though on the
treatment of offspring depend their lives or deaths, and
their moral welfare or ruin, yet not one word of instruc
tion on the treatment of offspring is ever given to those
who will bye-and-bye be parents ? Is it not monstrous,” he
adds, <( that the fate of a new generation should be left to
the chances of unreasoning custom, impulse, fancy, joined
with the suggestions of ignorant nurses and the preju
diced counsel of grandmothers?” Again, Mr. Spencer
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says most forcibly : “ When sons and daughters grow up
sickly and feeble, parents commonly regard the event as a
misfortune ; as a visitation of Providence. Thinking after
the prevalent chaotic fashion, they assume that these evils
come without causes, or that the causes are supernatural.
Nothing of the kind. In some cases the causes are doubt
less inherited, but in most cases foolish regulations are
the causes. Very generally parents themselves are
responsible for all this pain, this debility, this depression,
this misery.” And when comparing the inestimable value
of a knowledge of the laws of health over all other know
ledge, his words tell most truly : “ When a mother is
mourning over a first-born that has sunk under the
sequelae of scarlet fever (when perhaps, a candid
medical man has confirmed her suspicion that her
child would have recovered had not its system been
enfeebled by over study), when she is prostrate under
the pangs of combined grief and remorse ; it is but small
consolation that she can read Dante in the original.” Is
there a mother’s heart which does not appeal to her head
on hearing these words ? or is it needful to attempt to add
to their suggestive force ? The duty of each one of us,
then, seems clear enough as this first head, namely, that if
the conservation of life, the perfect discharge of life’s
duties, the happiness of ourselves, of those we love, and
of our neighbours, be aims which make " life worth living,”
then, you cannot, -with this admission, escape from the
inevitable conclusion that it is a crime against the best
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morality and the purest religion, to remain ignorant of the
laws of health, and of physical salvation.
But let me add, that the duty of knowing and doing
these things, is above all,an individual duty. It is the part
of the individual, which gives to the work of health
reform its character and its strength. Without individual
intelligence and appreciation of health-laws and of health’s
value, there can be no true health-reform at all. Nay,
more, the sacred duty we owe to our neighbour, in virtue
of which duty we expect and demand the mutual con
sideration that makes life pleasant'and society a possibility,
is perhaps better illustrated by the question of health
science than by any other phase of social existence.
Suppose that I live up to every law and rule of health
-which science lays down for the guidance of the race ;
grant that in my dwelling I observe, along with my
household, every requirement of sanitation ; imagine that
I and mine live the truly healthy life, of what avail, let me
ask, will all this care be, if my neighbour is a sloven in
health matters ? Of what advantage is my care; when his
carelessness floods me with sewer-gas, when his fever
spreads, through his ignorance of health-laws, to me ?
It is clear that in the complex warf and woop of
civilization, I must, perforce, even were I less willing
than morality makes me, consider my neighbours
interests as my own.
I must, if I am to
live safely, see
that
other individuals acquire
a like culture to mine. Every health-reformer, then,
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in addition to acquiring knowledge of the laws of
health, must see that his neighbour acquires know
ledge of a similar character. In the matter of health,
society must stand or fall as a whole. There can be no
education of one set of its units, leaving another set in
the ignorance which may, through its dire results, kill
educated and uneducated alike. Thus a second aspect of
our religious and moral duty in reference to health
becomes clear. It is the question of the lawyer put to
the Nazarene, “ Who is my neighbour ? ” only put with
infinite force in the light;of nineteenth century life and
exigency. And the parable of the Samaritan with his
kindly aid can never be better illustrated to-day, than when
we ourselves, having found the true way of life, guide the
footsteps of others into the paths that lead to where the
shadows linger lovingly and long at the close of life’s short
day.
To accomplish all this reformation requires time, requires
strength, requires industry and energy, and, above all, a
strong belief in the holiness of the work. But these things
are added unto them who believe in the physical salvation,
as the means come to the earnest worker in the direction of
moral culture or of a truly religious life of any kind. Once
let us believe in the righteousness of living well, and we
shall live well; let us but convince ourselves that as we
live now, we too often live wrongly and badly, and we
shall soon strive after the ideal that science is prepared to
set before them, who look to the possibilities of human
�life becoming a happier thing for all than it is now, even
for the best amongst us. Is there, let us ask, any higher
aim which you who worship here, or which those whose
spirits are attuned to yours can set before their waiting
eyes than the bettering of the race through the work of
health-reform ? Here is a something to live for and to
hope for—a perfectly possible Utopia to dream of lovingly,
and to assist practically by every means in our power.
For us, to whom the concerns of life are destitute of the
mawkish sentimentalism that environs a well-nigh obsolete
theology, there seems something solid, something attainable
in their idea of a well-nigh perfect state. To-day, Euthanasia
is only purchaseable by death; only the “dim beyond” is the
abode of painless existence, extinction, or what you will.
But think of a living, moving world, with a minimum of pain
and wretchedness, and theri turn to the prospects which
health-science and its successful pursuit hold out of
realising your dream. Do not imagine I am simply
indulging in a romance. I do not mean you to infer that
I regard the health-future of the race as a thing easily
attainable. Human nature is proverbially weak; it is
actually lazy ; it is difficult to rouse to energy, let alone
enthusiasm ; it likes to fold the hands to rest and to still
the eyes to sleep, provided to-day is undisturbed, even if
to-morrow’s prospect be stormy. But humanity, heie
and there, has its ideals and the strength of will
to work towards them. And I can discern in
the signs of the times the evidences that the
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health-ideal is assuming a well-defined shape ; that its
■outlines are not so misty as many suppose; and that
earnest minds are already shaping the course of their
thoughts to the attainable end of a long, a healthy, and a
happy hfe. Look around you and see what may be done,
what has been accomplished within your own experienced
We have left the valley of the grim shadow and are
already on the mountain-slope, when we have for ever
discarded the notion that disease is sent ^bv a Deity to
afflict and to chasten. We are already half-way up the
mountain, and we are coming to the blue azure itself,
when we learn that disease is, as often as not, the off—
spring of an ignorance of the conditions that make it
and produce it. Everywhere around you science
is up and doing. There are active minds hard at
work wresting the secrets of infection from the silent
tissues, or poring over the microscope to watch
how the disease-germ buds forth into full vigour, and
where, when, and how that germ may be seized and
destioyed, or at least purged of its noxious properties
and powers. Already the out-look is cheering; byand-by, with fuller knowledge we shall attain a stan
dard compared with which the possibilities of to
day seem but a vain show. Think of one solid
fact alone in the saving of human life, which comes to
you from a great northern city, but which finds a paral
lel elsewhere.
“When Glasgow,” says Professor
Corfield, “ was supplied with impure water from the river
�■L
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Clyde, the number of deaths in cholera years varied from
S over 2,800 in 1832, to nearly 3,900 in 1854. After a supply
I of pure water had been obtained for the city from Loch
I Katrine, the number of cholera deaths in 1S66, the next
I cholera year, was only 68.” If ever the old declaration
1 that the people perish, and that human happiness is blotted
B out for lack of knowledge, received a practical application,
1 it surely finds such application in
such a statement as that
1 first made. If even the adage that “ knowledge is power”
| requires an illustration, you may find such illustration
I best and clearest in the saving of human life by the culture
| of the laws of health.
j
Take a mental retrospect of health-matters, and you will
not been speeding “ down the
ringing groves of change ” for nought during the last two
hundred years or so. If, as orthodox theology tells us,
this orb of ours has an existence and development, simply
as a prelude to a symphony of flames and torrents, that pre
lude and the development of human culture have together
produced a choice subject for the holocaust. Two hundred
years ago ague was rife, bred and fostered by the damp and
malaria which were developed in the swamps that environed London itself, and that were broadcast over the
land. Jail fever more recently decimated the miserable
populations of our prisons, until the benevolence of a
Howard struck the keynote of reform. Disease and death,
I discern that the world has
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�being esteemed supernatural things were regarded beyond
man’s reach in the way of bettering or avoidance. The
life of the past periods was coarse; the morality was
universally low ; and we wonder to-day that the purer
spirits which even the worst of epochs behold, found
any circumstances which at all favoured the develop
ment of the higher life. To-day how changed the
piospect ! Ague has vanished; fevers are known to
be preventive ; men are being taught wisdom over the
graves of their grandparents ; morality is at least to-day
something more than a name ; and the fears of the night
of grim terrorism of the supernatural are fast vanishing
beneath the increasing radiance of the sun of truth.
What future awaits us, who can tell ? But one thing
is clear, that there are possibilities looming before us,
which even the careless cannot afford to neglect. The
religion of the future will very largely, I think, be a
religion of health. It will be a religion wherein the
causes of pauperism and crime will be known and dis
cussed, and alleviated or banished. Its higher develop
ment will have
“--------------- lent
The pulse of hope to discontent.”
It will aim at making rational minds through wellnourished and healthy bodies. It will leave the “ sanc
tity of dirt ” as a watchword for those who think more of
their souls than their bodies, and it will elevate the race
through the development of heal th with a power comparabe
�to that of an Archimedean lever, that literally can move
a world. Best of all, this religion, which founds itself on
an appreciation of the physical wants and requirements of
man’s nature, will serve as the most efficient corrective to
the false ideals upon which men to-day lavish the service
of a life. It will teach mankind that this earth is their
best and purest heaven ; that in healthy frames, in pure
affections, and in the enjoyment of a rational existence,
there are pleasures beyond those dreamt of by ancient
seer or religious devotee. It will make this earth the
happy home of a contented race, a fit heaven for
the life that ought to be all happiness and health.
It will make the world a scene which, at the close of a wellspent life, man may leave without a pang of remorse,
surrendering his days to the unknown and unknowable,
in the fearless knowledge of a wisely used existence
without so much as the shadow of a teai.
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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The religious aspects of health: a discourse given at South Place Chapel, London, November 20th 1881
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Wilson, Andrew
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 27 p. ; 15 cm.
Series title: South Place Discourses
Notes: Printed by Frederick G. Hickson & Co., 257 High Holborn, London. Part of Morris Miscellaneous Tracts 2.
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[South Place Chapel]
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G3358
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Sermons
Health
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Health-Religious Aspects
Morris Tracts
Sermons
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NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
“THE DYER’S HAND:”
A DISCOURSE
PRECEDED BY
THE WAY TO GOD:
A MEDITATION,
DELIVERED AT
SOUTH PLACE CHAPEL,
SUNDAY, 5TH MAY, 1872,
AND REPEATED BY ESPECIAL DESIRE
SUNDAY, 1 8th MAY, 1873.
BY
ALEXANDER J. ELLIS,
B.A.. F.R.S., F.S.A., F.C.P.S., F.C.P.,
Vice-President formerly President) of the Philological Society, &
c
*.
CHIEFLY AS ARRANGED FOR THE SECOND
DELIVERY WITH THE READINGS
THEN USED.
Price 2d,
�ORDER OF THE SERVICE
HYMN 12—Words by Dyer..
“ Greatest of beings, source of life !”
READINGS—
I. “ Love,” from Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, in
modem language, as follows, p. 3.
II. “Design,” from Paley’s Natural Theology, as follows,
p. 4.
HYMN 5— Words by Wreford.
“ God of the Ocean, Earth and Sky !”
MEDITATION, “The Way to God,” as follows, p. 9.
ANTHEM 74—From the fourth Gospel.
“ God is a Spirit.”
DISCOURSE, “The Dyer’s Hand,” as follows, p. 13.
HYMN 91—Words by Mrs. Barbauld.
“ As once upon Athenian ground.”
DISMISSAL, as follows, p. 44-
�READINGS.
I.—LOVE.
In listening to an extremely familiar passage rom the first
letter of Paul the Apostle to his Corinthian congregation, which
I shall purposely put into extremely unfamiliar words, in order
to divert your minds from the mere sound to the sense conveyed,
it is as well to recall the context Much confusion, as was
natural, prevailed in all the early Christian congregations as soon
as the founder’s back was turned, and the necessity of correcting
it gave rise to those letters which are the earliest and most
authentic records of the Christian movement that we possess.
Among other troubles in Corinth, every man seems to have
thought himself as good a teacher as any other, save of course the
founder Paul, who therefore strove in his first letter to convince
them of their mistake and induce them to work as parts of a
commonwealth of which there was only one real head, Jesus
himself, in whose ideal image Paul always sank his own per
sonality.
For this purpose, he first applied the well-known
analogy of the body and its members, and then went on to the
Allowing purport (i. Cor. xii., 27, to xiii., 13) :—
“You form collectively Christ’s body upon earth, and each of you
Individually is one of its members. Some of us by God’s disposition
are apostles, others preachers, teachers, sign-workers, healers,
Birectors, speakers in various tongues. Are all apostles, or all
preachers, or all teachers, or all sign-workers, or all healers ?
Can all speak in various tongues, or can all interpret what is
spoken in unknown tongues ? It is certainly the duty of each
individual to do his best to be fitted for the best offices, but I will
shew you a far superior method.
“If I were to speak all human and divine languages, and had
not love, my words would be worthless tinkling. If I had the
highest powers of preaching, if I understood all mysteries, had
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gained all knowledge, or had mountain-moving faith, but had not
lave, I should be a mere nothing. I might bestow all my gorJMI
feed the hungry, or deliver my body to the torturer, yet withoB
love, I should have done nothing. Love is long-suffering and
kind. Love knows neither envy nor jealousy, makes no display nor
boasting, behaves decently, insists not on rights, checks anger,,
suspects not evil, has no sympathy with injustice but much with
truth; hides, believes, hopes, endures everything.
“ Love is never wanting. Preachings shall fail, languages shall
cease, knowledge shall die out; (our knowledge is partial and
cur preaching power is partial, and their partial character will not
cease till perfection appears. When I was a child, I spake, I
thought, I reasoned as a child, but when I became a man I put
aside my childish ways. In the same way our vision now is an
enigmatical reflection, but hereafter we shall see face to face.
That is to say, my knowledge is now partial, but hereafter I shall
know as I am known). The power that we now possess, then,
will pass away, but whatever else fails, three things abide, belied
hope, love. And the greatest of these is love}'
IL—DESIGN.
Brief extracts from the three first chapters of Dr. William
Paley’s “ Natural Theology,” (originally published in 1802)
for the purpose of shewing the nature of his argument. fcM
large quantity of intermediate matter has been omitted for
brevity, but nothing is added.
“ In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a
sione, and were asked how the stone came to be there : I mighf
possibly answer, that, for anything I knew to the contrary, it had
lain there for ever ; nor would it perhaps be very easy to shew
the absurdity of this answer. But suppose I had found a ivatek
upon the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch hap
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pened to be in that place : I should hardly think of the answer
I had before given—that, for anything I knew, the watch might
have been always there. Yet why should not this answer serve
for the watch as well as for the stone ? Why is it not as admis
sible in the second case as in the first ? For this reason, and for
Ho other, namely, that, when we come to inspect the watch, we
perceive (what we could not discover in the stone) that its
several parts are framed and put together for a purpose ; for ex
ample, that they are so formed and adjusted as to produce
motion, and that motion so regulated as to point out the hour of
the day ; that if the different parts had been differently shaped
from what they are, of a different size to what they are, or placed
in any other order than that in which they are placed, either no
Riotion at all would have been carried on in the machine, or
none which would have answered the use that is now served by
it. This mechanism being observed, (it requires indeed an ex
amination of the instrument, and perhaps some previous know
ledge of the subject to perceive and understand it; but being
once, as we have said, observed and understood,) the inference,
We think, is inevitable, that the watch must have had a maker:
Hiat there must have existed, at some time, and at some place
or other, an artificer or artificers who formed it for the purpose
>hich we find it actually to answer ; who comprehended its con
struction, and designedits use.
Nor would it, I apprehend, weaken the conclusion, that we
had never seen a watch made ; that we had never known an
artist capable of making one ; that we were altogether incapable
of executing such a piece of workmanship ourselves, or of under
standing in what manner it was performed; all this being no
Riore than what is true of some exquisite remains of ancient art,
of some lost arts, and, to the generality of mankind, of the more
£tjrious productions of modern manufacture.
Neither, secondly, would it invalidate our conclusion, that the.
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watch sometimes went wrong, or that it seldom went exactly
right. The purpose of the machinery, the design, and the
designer, might be evident, and in the case supposed would
be evident, in whatever way we accounted for the irregu
larity of the movement, or whether we could account for
it or not. It is not necessary that a machine be perfect, in
•order to shew with what design it was made : still less necessary,
where the only question is, whether it was made with any design
at all.
Neither, lastly, would our observer be driven out of his con
clusion, or from his confidence in its truth, by being told that he
knew nothing at all about the matter. He knows enough for
his argument: he knows the utility of the end : he knows the
subserviency and adaptation of the means to the end. These
points being known, his ignorance of other points, his doubts
concerning other points, affect not the certainty of his reasoning.
The consciousness of knowing little need not beget a distrust of
that which he does know.
Suppose, in the next place, that the person who found the
watch should, after some time, discover that, in addition to all
the properties which he had hitherto observed in it, it possessed
the unexpected property of producing in the course of its move
ment, another watch like itself (the thing is conceivable); that it
contained within it a mechanism, a system of parts, a mould for
instance, or a complex adjustment of lathes, files, and other tools
evidently and separately calculated for this purpose.
The conclusion which the first examination of the watch, of
its works, construction, and movements, suggested was, that it
must have had, for the cause and author of that construction an
artificer, whojjunderstood its mechanism and designed its use.
This conclusion is invincible. A second examination presents us
with a new discovery. The watch is found, in the course of its
movement, to produce another watch, similar to itself; and riot
�7
only so, but we perceive in it a system or organisation, separately
calculated for that purpose. What effect would this discovery
have, or ought it to have, upon our former inference ? What,
but to increase, beyond measure, our admiration of the skill
which had been employed in the formation of such a machine!
Or shall it, instead of this, all at once turn us round to an oppo
site conclusion—namely, that no art or skill whatever has been
concerned in the business, although all other evidences of art and
skill remain as they were, and this last and supreme piece of art
be now added to the rest ? Can this be maintained without
absurdity ?
Yet this is atheism.
This is atheism ; for every indication of contrivance, every
manifestation of design which existed in the watch exists in the
works of nature; with the difference on the side of nature of
being greater and more, and that in a degree which exceeds all
computation. I mean that the contrivances of nature surpass the
contrivances of art in the complexity, subtlety, and curiosity of
the mechanism ; and still more, if possible, do they go beyond
them in number and variety; yet, in a multitude of cases, are not
less evidently mechanical, not less evidently contrivances, not less
evidently accommodated to their end, or suited to their office,
than are the most perfect productions of human ingenuity.
��THE WAY TO GOD.
A MEDITATION.
“ Little children !” said the dying Elder, “ Little
children ! Love one another.” “ If a man say, I love
God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar; for he that
loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he
love God whom he hath not seen ? And this com
mandment have we from him, That he who loveth
God love his brother also.” (i John iv., 20, 21.)
The way to God is through the heart of man!
Not by metaphysical subtleties, where man turneth
his eye inwards to see outwards, can he hope to reach
God.
Not by theological subtleties, where man vainly
strives to fix in words what his mind has failed to
grasp, can he hope to reach God.
Not by creeds and anathemas, where the empty
words of theology are crystallised into a charm or a
curse, can man hope to reach God.
Not by fasting and penance, where man would fain
purchase future bliss by present pain, and mount to
heaven by trampling down earth, can he hope to reach
God.
�IO
Not by fervent prayer, where man vainly beseeches
God to modify eternal laws for temporary ends, can
he hope to reach God.
Not by deep and persistent scientific research, where
the head is awake but the heart sleeps, can man hope
to reach God.
The way to God is through the heart of man!
By mixing with his fellow-men; by learning the
wants of all; by working within his limited circle
towards the general well-being; by identifying him
self with his race ; by feeling that he is above all, and
through all, a man, manly, and is only as a man capable
of effecting aught; by gathering into a focus those
scattered beams of human sympathy which we know
as love; by giving practical direction to vague aspira
tions for improvement; by living for himself but as a
part of others, and for others as for himself; by reach
ing the heart of his fellow-men; thus only can man
hope to reach God.
If man look beyond the present life and indulge in
dreams of a future eternity of well-being, let him not
think of saving his own soul without his brother’s, let
him not expect to enter heaven by a password, let him
not contemplate for a moment the revellers at the
lightsome feast within, and the teeth-gnashers in the
darksome pit without. The heart of man rejects the
contrast, and through the heart of man alone can man
reach God.
�II
Let not man seek to know the counsels of God.
Man is of the earth, earthy ; it is at once his badge
-and his star. What future may be in reserve for our
race none can forecast. If those who have searched
most widely are to be followed most readily, we have
been evolved from very humble beginnings, and may
have a much nobler hereafter. But the future depends
on the present as the present on the past. No nobler
hereafter is possible, if the present fail in its part.
That part is to develop present man ; not to despise
him as worthless, and fix all thought on the super
human. Here is our work, and through it our future.
The heart of man, is man’s noblest organ on earth.
Through the heart of man alone, can he hope to reach
God.
“ Little children !” said the dying Elder, “ Love one
another!”
��“THE DYER’S HAND.”
Walking through a street in Kensington some time
ago, I saw a man without his coat, and with his shirt
sleeves tucked up to the elbows, talking quietly with
another man, now putting one hand in his pocket,
now stroking his chin with the other, evidently in
utter unconsciousness or forgetfulness that his exposed
hands and arms were different from other men’s. But
to me at a distance there was something frightful in
seeing such ordinary living motions performed by
hands and arms which had that green tinge we learn
to associate with putridity. That shiny green arm,
those dead-like fingers that moved with such un
natural life, were a shock to all my sense of the fitness
of things. As I came near, the mystery cleared itself
up in the most prosaic fashion—as all mysteries are
apt to do. I passed before a dye-house, and had
been watching the dyer.
Instantly there came full on my mind that (hundred
and eleventh) sonnet of Shakspere, of which a few
�14
words are so familiar, though the context is little
known. Shakspere laments and excuses his “ public
manners ” as due to the “ public means ” by which
Fortune had provided for his life, and exclaims :—
Thence comes it that my name receives a brand,
And almost, thence, my nature is subdued
To what it works in, like the dyer’s hand.
That dyer’s hand, tinged with the most ghastly and
inhuman hue, generated by the dye-vat in which it
had worked, and yet moving all unconsciously as if
nothing ailed it, was by a single stroke of Shakspere’s
pen raised into being the most significant symbol of
men’s thoughts and feelings, “ subdued to what they
work in,” the inherited environment, the geographical
environment, the social environment, which colour
them so completely that they live in total uncon
sciousness of their own peculiarity, though they are
acutely conscious of the different tinge imparted by
a neighbouring dye-vat.
Oh, how few are there among us—are there indeed
any among us ?—I don’t mean among tne handful of
people here assembled, but among the whole circle of
humanity,—who can say, as Shakspere said, that their
nature is only “ almost ” subdued ! How many of us
can from our own hearts, from our own knowledge
that we are dyed and must be cleansed, echo the
fervent wish of the poet, and exclaim : —
�i5
Pity me then and wish I were renewed ,
Whilst like a willing patient, I will drink
Potions of eisel ’gainst my strong infection ;
*
No bitterness that I will bitter think,
Nor double penance, to correct correction !
No! dyed through and through, green-blooded to
the heart’s core, and not merely on the surface of
our skin; we persist in thinking green-blood to be
the only blood, and are shocked at the unnatural
redness of another’s. We may laugh at that lady in
the story who was struck with the remarkable fact
that wherever she went, whatever society she entered,
whatever subject she discussed, no one was in the
right but herself; yet the only difference between her
and most of us is, that she ventured to say so; we
are silent, but only think the more steadfastly with the
Mahometan carpenter, who replied to Francis New* Also spelled esile and eysell, meaning vinegar, a common dis
infectant. Old French aisil, aissil, aizil, arzil, esil. The form
aisil has even crept into Anglo-Saxon, which, however, has the
older form, eced. All are supposed to come from the Latin
aceium (vinegar). Shakspere puts “ drinking eisel ” among
practical impossibilities. See Hamlet, Act 5, scene 1, speech
106,
Shew me what thou’It do !
Woo’t weep? woo’t fight? woo’tfast? woo’t tear thyself ?
Woo’t drink up eisel ? eat a crocodile ?
I’ll do’t.
�i6
man’s attempts at conversion: “ God has given you
to know much, but not the true faith.”*
The dye which tinges qur every thought and feel
ing is most general and most “fast,” hardest to be
discharged by argument, or to assume a different hue,
when it is rooted in the language which we speak,
and has thus become ingrained in thought. We learn
then inevitably to think under its influence. The
whole inheritance of preceding human thought comes
to us tinged with the same dye. The very threads by
which we would weave the tissue of our own medita
tions, instead of being susceptible of every hue, so
* The story thus reduced to an allusion, is worth giving at
length : “ While we were at Aleppo I one day got into religious
discourse with a Mohammedan carpenter, which left on me a
lasting impression. Among other matters I was peculiarly
desirous of disabusing him of the current notion of his people
that our Gospels are spurious narratives of late date. I found
great difficulty of expression, but the man listened to me with
much attention, and I was encouraged to exert myself. He
waited patiently till I had done, and then spoke to the following
effect :—‘I will tell you, sir, how the case stands. God has
given to you English a great many good gifts. You make fine
ships and sharp penknives, and good cloth and cottons; and you
have rich nobles and brave soldiers ; and you write and print
many learned books : (dictionaries and grammars :) all this is of
God. But there is one thing which God has withheld from you
■and has revealed to us, and that is the knowledge of the true
religion, by which one may be saved.’ When he thus ignored
my argument (which was probably quite unintelligible to him),
�17
that the pattern may shine bright and pure, beautiful
and true, as we conceived it was conceived, are so
dulled by their previous dye, that the result, true as
it may look to our jaundiced eye, is false to every one
whose vision is truer. The few, the very few, who,
conscious of the radical unfitness of their material for
the effect they would produce, seek to mould it by
limiting the signification of current words, or inventing
new to embody their new thoughts, preach too often
to the winds, or worse,—not understood at all, or
misunderstood,—so that the thinker soon finds rea
son to wonder, not that man knows so little, but that
he knows anything, not that a man so often miscon
ceives another’s thoughts, but that he ever approaches
to a conception of what they really are. I am using
no hyperbole, I am stating a sober conclusion which
and delivered his simple protest, I was silenced, and at the
same time amused. But the more I thought it over the more in
struction I saw in the case. His position towards me was exactly
that of a humble Christian towards an unbelieving philosopher;
nay, that of the early Apostles or Jewish prophets towards the
proud, cultivated, worldly-wise, and powerful heathen. This
not only showed the vanity of any argument to him, except one
purely addressed to his moral and spiritual faculties; but it also
indicated to me that ignorance has its spiritual self-sufficiency as
well as erudition ; and that if there is a Pride of Reason, so there
is a Pride of Unreason.”—Phases of Faith ; or Passages from
the History of My Creed. By Francis William Newman.
Sixth edition, i860, /. 32.
�i8
years of thought and observation have forced upon
me, and which, having often previously stated I find
as I live, only more reason to adopt,—when I say
that probably no man does understand any other man.
The vision of our mind’s eye is too deeply affected,
the dye upon our mind’s hand is too ingrained, our
language is clothed with too patched a harlequin suit,
for us clearly to express or clearly to seize what is
expressed. Only those who have aimed at precision,
and have hopelessly failed, or have laboured con
scientiously but vainly to enter into the thoughts of
one who himself has aimed at precision, can fully
comprehend how utterly our nature is subdued to
what it works in, like the dyer’s hand !
Our first observations, as children, are directed to
objects of sensation. It is only by storing up our
hazy memories of individual impressions that we, in
course of time, very clumsily and defectively group
together the immediate results of sensation into aggre
gates, which seem to us the same as those indicated
by the words we hear from others. Subsequent know
ledge, which in its full force is the lot of but a few
special observers, teaches us that every one of those
individual sensations is altogether vague and wanting
in precision; and that we cannot thoroughly depend
even upon regaining the same sensations in ourselves,
—nay, I may almost say, that we can only thoroughly
depend upon never regaining them. All natural
�i9
philosophers know,—I am saying nothing new, I am
merely repeating the very alphabet of science,—that
sensations do not repeat themselves, that when they
are registered by the most cunning devices of man,
each registration differs from its fellow, and that
we can deal only with averages and not with in
dividuals. There are some of the fixed stars, whose
position it is so important for science to de
termine, that they have been observed by hosts
of the most competent men through many years.
Yet we know that it would be more surprising
for any two determinations to agree than for all to
differ, and that what we conventionally assign as their
real place is only an average drawn by most refined
methods of calculation from an examination of dis
crepant data, and though assumed to be true for the
present, is acknowledged to be liable to subsequent
correction. By means of these positions thus assigned,
an observer learns to determine his own personal
liability to error, and knows that that liability itself
*
fluctuates with the state of his health; nay, with the
length of time since he was roused from sleep, or
since his last meal; and he then contrives to allow
for such errors in subsequent observations. Yet
merely seeing a point of light, like a fixed star, dis
appear behind an opaque bar, such as a telescopic
cobweb, is an observation of extreme simplicity com* Known as his “personal equation.
�20
pared with those by- which we obtain the most ordinary
notions of external objects in common life. And if
each observer is known to differ from others, and
even from himself in a matter of such extreme sim-,
plicity, what trust can we have that our individual
sensations are comparable with our neighbours, and
still more that our groupings of those sensations accu
rately, or even approximately, correspond to those of our
neighbours, in the extremely complex determination of
the commonest objects which form our environment?
But these are only starting points. The greater
part of our thoughts and reasonings are occupied with
matters which cannot be made the subject of direct
observation. It is only in its rudest condition, there
fore, that our language consists of mere names of
groups of sensations, such as man, tree, house, land,
water, give, take, black, white, light, heavy, and so
forth. To give some sort of vent to our bursting
thoughts, to convey them however vaguely and inde
terminately, we are forced to resort to those half-felt,
imperfect, often wholly inadequate, misleading analo
gies, which we call metaphors. A term used in our
own individual sense, according to our own individual
experience for some object or act appreciable by direct
sensation, is transferred to another merely meditational
object or act, some inward feeling, which we know to
have no real connection with the first, but which
we vaguely connect with it, as we vaguely see human
�21
features in a bright coal fire. And then we boldly
use that term when speaking to others without any
security either that their sensations derived from the
external objects were originally the same as ours, or
that their inward connection of those sensations with
the thought and feeling which we desire to excite in
them, may, will, or can have any resemblance to our
own. And thus the maze of language goes on to
confusion worse confounded, the dye in our vats be
comes more and more muddy, and the hand that stirs
them more and more hopelessly bemessed.
When the Elohist or Jehovist spake of God’s eye,
God’s hand, God’s outstretched arm, God’s image, he
had in his mind, no doubt, a real tangible, living eye,
hand, arm, and image. The God of the Jehovist
really walked in the garden of Eden in the cool of the
day, and Adam and Eve could really hear his voice,
and attempt to hide—to hide !—from him among the
trees (Gen. iii. 8). When the God of the Elohist
created man in his own image (Gen. i. 27), the Elohist
himself, as has been truly said, created God in the
image of man, and so thoroughly in that image, that
the God of his creation was, like a man, weary with his
own work of creation, and had to rest on the seventh
day from all the work which he had made (Gen. ii. 2).
To us, now and here, and to the more intelligent
preachers throughout Christendom, such words are
mere transparent metaphors, by which we vainly
�22
endeavour—how vainly but few consider—to prefigure
the unfigurable. But they are all dangerous. They
are so thoroughly human that they unconsciously
sway the mind to accept God as a mere exaggerated
man. The pygmy that can barely descry the giant’s
toes seeks to dogmatise on the giant’s whole structure.
The dyer’s hand finds its own colour in what the
dyer wantonly dares to term a hand. The finite
raises its own mental scale to gauge the Infinite !
The Infinite 1 How easy to say ; how hard to
conceive ! On this day, in thousands of pulpits
throughout our own land, and in other thousands of
Christian congregations, men will be standing up and
telling of God’s infinitude, arguing from his infinite
power, his infinite wrath, his infinite mercy in allow
ing his infinite wrath to be infinitely appeased by the
infinite sacrifice of himself in a finite form at the
hands of Roman soldiers instigated by Jewish priests
and a Jewish rabble, before his own infinite self, and
running over the other changes of infinity which fall
so glibly from their tongue, but which have abso
lutely no root in their intellect. Nay, of that they
are proud. They can know all about the powers, the
acts, the results of infinity. They can tell you what
infinity, so far forth as being infinity, can, will, and
must do, without having even the shadow of a con
ception to put behind the word. The mathematician
and the natural philosopher have to deal constantly
�23
with the ever-increasing and the ever-diminishing, and
many of our preachers (very far from all) have had to
bend their minds when- young to such considerations.
But with most of them it has been mere cram, stuff to
be blurted out in an examination, and then forgotten.
Yet here, and here only, have we the least hope of
arriving at any practical conceptions of a matter which
all religious teachers are apt to treat with easy, selfcomplacent confidence. The course of my own
studies during many years, from opening manhood to
the present day, has often brought me face to face
with this problem of infinity, so well known to all
real mathematicians, in the simplest of all relations,
number and space. I have been compelled to give
it long, continuous, and reiterated consideration; to
ponder over it for weeks and months at a time; to
read and study what the best heads had written of it;
to endeavour by every means in my power to catch
some clue to its real nature; to render my thoughts
precise by writing and re-writing ; to see how, at
least, the effects of infinity might be safely inferred,
or its laws partly divined; to comprehend, if it be
possible, the infinite in the finite, the description of
an endlessly increasing path with an endlessly in
creasing velocity in a strictly limited time; to see in
my mind’s eye the relations of various orders of the
infinitely great and the infinitely small; in short, to
bridge the great gulf between the discontinuous and
�24
the continuous. I need scarcely tell you that I have
not done what I have found no other man has done,
but I have had a deep conviction of the limits of
human power forced upon myself. The matters with
which I dealt were not those highly complex, illdefined, worse comprehended conceptions which form
the staple of theology. They were the very simplest
conceptions which the human mind can form with any
approach to precision. And the result ? Did I seem
to come nearer to the goal ? Nay, was I not rather
like the voyager who day after day sees the same hard
circle of horizon limiting his vision, till he misdoubts
the very motion of his ship ? Or like the mountaineer
who briskly begins his route to top the crest before
him, and, that reached, finds only another and steeper
there he had not previously divined, and, topping
that, another and another, till poor “Excelsior ” falls ex
hausted by the way? And this, where the road has been
marked out with so much skill by minds far above my
own, minds which are the very guiding stars of all
human thought.
*
What, then, of matters where all
is guess, where no road is known, where the trackless
ocean spreads without a compass, where the traveller
is involved in the deepest gorges without power to
see or to divine how to scale their precipitous cliffs ?
When shall we learn the lesson of the Titans, and
• Such as Newton and Leibnitz.
�25
know the fate of those who would scale heaven by
piling the Pelion of presumption on the Ossa of
ignorance ?
*
But while we all, at least I hope all whom I address,
acutely feel the purely metaphorical application of
terms implying human form, or any part of the human
form, to the inapproachable object of all human
thought, yet we, are apt, even the wisest and best of
all mankind are apt, to be led astray by human lan
guage,—the inheritance derived from men who held
to a literally humanesque personality of the Deity,—
when the terms do not imply bodily form, but the
best and least corporeal functions of humanity,—
thought, will, love. We may be, I believe we are,
speaking the highest and noblest thing which man
can say of God, when we declare that God is Love;
but let us never forget that such language is purely
anthropomorphic in its origin, and must be held
purely metaphorical in its application. If we seek to
drive it home, to make God Love as we alone know
love, we do not raise man to God, but degrade God
* The Titans are here, as usual, confounded with the Giants
who were said to have scaled heaven. “Thrice,” says Virgil,
Georgies, book I., vv. 281-3, “thrice they endeavoured to pile
Mount Ossa on to Pelion, and roll the woody Olympus on to
Ossa ; thrice father Jove with his lightning threw down the
mountains they had reared.” See also Ovid’s Metamorphoses,
book 1., vv. 152-5.
�26
to man. What is the love we know, the love which
alone we can have in mind when we apply the term,
as the outcome of all the best we can conceive, to the
Inconceivable itself? Turn to that glowing descrip
tion of love by the noble Paul, that passage to which
every heart instinctively reverts which has once
beaten at its sound, and see how thoroughly human,
how utterly un-Godlike, it is in its every part. Reject
the negatives, which constitute the main portion of
the description, as the painter cannot suggest light
but by the accumulation of shade, and see with what
reality we can say that God, like love, suffereth long
and is kind, rejoiceth in or with the truth, beareth all,
believeth all, hopeth all, endureth all (i Cor. xiii. 4,
6, 7.) Aman, dependent man, may do this. But how
can we even magnify long-suffering, kindliness, delight
at the discovery of truth, endurance, belief, hope,
into any conception of God which is not purely
human ? Let us know that it is only our own help
lessness which leads us to say that God is Love ! and
that these words are but the faintest possible glimmer
of that far-off light which we hope we may forefeel,
but certainly can never actually perceive. Let us
beware of pushing home an analogy which has already
led to the revolting conception of a devil, of a power
antagonistic to the Unassailable, to account for what
our human conception of love cannot contain. Mark
how limited is that conception I Strong between one
�27
man and another, love weakens as the circle widens.
In the family and clan it often mixes up with feelings
of merely personal dignity. Towards the nation, even
when strongest and purest, its character is wholly and
completely changed. And when extended to the whole
of mankind, it dwindles down to a very faint glow
indeed. Often mixed with this love is the strongest
antipathy, the haughtiest contempt, the most trans
parent selfishness. Look at the international re
lations which have convulsed Europe and America,
even within the memory of the youngest adult here
present! But extend your heart to the lower ani
mals, to the living but insentient vegetable, to the
inorganic kingdom, and, by slow degrees, love dwindles
to nonentity. Then think what part the whole of
this earth, with all that it contains, plays in that great
hniverse of bodies which the telescope reveals, com
pared to many of which our whole solar system is as
nothing, nay, perhaps, our whole stellar system but
insignificant. But all these are God’s; all these may,
Ike the earth, swarm with a life, an intelligence, a
love, unlike the earth’s indeed, but, if any twilight
motion we can form of God be even remotely correct,
as much bound up with God as our own puny selves.
And then, straining our minds to grasp this mighty
conception, let us again ask ourselves what resem
blance can that Love which we call God, have to
|hat human conception which alone fills our minds
�28
when we utter the word Love on earth ? It is not to
disparage, but to appreciate, not to lower, but to
elevate, not to put aside God as a loveless, emotion
less stone of an Epicurean deity, but to widen our
minds and hearts to some vague panting hope that
the Ineffable may warm us into some power of feeling
what we can neither conceive nor utter, that I ven
ture to call your attention to the utter inadequacy
of man’s noblest formula : God is Love !
But the dyer’s hand is still more apparent in
the moulding of another conception, which it was
my principal object to bring before your notice,
and which will occupy the rest of the time for
which I can venture to claim your attention.
Every lip is ready to speak of God’s “ design; ” of
God’s will, purpose, intention, final cause, motive;
of the reasons which induce him to make things as
they are; of the plan of the universe and the changes
or amendments (f£ new dispensations ” is the favourite
term) which he has introduced into it; of his scheme
of redemption (which, by-the-bye, seems to be con
ceived as occasionally thwartable); of his contrivances
to produce certain effects; of his elaborate system of
rewards and punishments to keep the world in order
(which, however, altogether fails because he has not
succeeded in keeping the Devil in order); of his
mechanical knowledge in availing himself of the pro
perties of bones and tissues in organisation; and so
�29
on, and so on, from the philosopher to the clown,
from Darwin, whom the necessities of language oblige
to speak of the purpose, intention, use of certain
organs, to the poet’s “ pampered goose,” who finds man
created to feed him. Now, before we proceed to
consider this preposterous nonsense, which would not
be worth a moment’s thought if it had not such a
profoundly distorting effect on our mental vision when
directed to the greatest of all subjects, let us inquire
what is the human meaning of the principal word
throughout this Babel, which I have placed first in
order, because it is the key to all the rest. What is
the human meaning of “ design ” ? Clearly, it is only
by knowing human design that we can infer creative
design, and a little consideration will shew that there
cannot be even a remote analogy between the two.
To design was originally to mark out, to trace out, as
the boundary of a city was traced out by a plough,
put it very early acquired in Rome, where the word
is indigenous, that metaphorical meaning in which it
is generally employed. A man designs a machine—
Paley’s watch, for example—what has he done ? He
has himself, or through his predecessors, discovered
“the laws of geometry, the properties of circles, the
Power exerted by a metal spring in uncoiling, the
difference of that power according to the thickness
and length of the spring, and the kind of metal com
posing it, especially the tempering of the metal, and
�3°
the isochronous vibrations of thin and highly tempered
springs, with various other properties of toothed
wheels and levers, which I need not stay to describe.
Now observe, he has discovered all this, he has invented
nothing as yet. What he wants to do is to make a
rod, the hand of his watch, move round in a circle
at a rate bearing an exact relation to the rate at which the
earth revolves on its axis, which revolution he has also
discovered, not invented. Seizing, then, on the fact of
the isochronous vibration of a hair-spring when
properly weighted and properly jogged, he puts these
parts together so that these properties (which he did
not make, nor invent, but only discovered), acting
according to the laws of geometry and mechanics
(which again he did not make, nor invent, but only
discovered), may really produce the required result.
Observe, too, that his knowledge of the laws of this
action is imperfect; there are certain properties of ex
pansion and contraction with heat, which he has not
become sufficiently familiar with, or known how to bring
into destructive opposition; there are certain difficulties
in cutting geometrical figures truly in metal which he
cannot entirely overcome; so that his watch is at best
a very imperfect affair requiring daily correction by
observations—themselves more or less imperfect—on
the presumably invariable motion of the earth. This
is human design. All man's part is to find the
materials, the laws of their action, and the laws by
�3i
which they can be connected; nothing else whatever.
He puts them together, and we say that that grand
abstraction, “nature,” does the rest. Now, if we
apply this to God, we see that some other god must
have made the materials, and their laws, and the laws
of their connection, and that he merely puts them
together ! What a degrading conception ! The great
God, the expression of utter boundlessness, a
mechanical drudge, a piecer of other gods’ goods!
Shame on man that he ever inculcated such a doctrine I
Shame on those natural theologians who would found
our very reason for believing in the existence of God
on such transparent fallacies, which can be knocked
down like nine-pins by the first bowl of a cunning
atheist!
But the conception recurs again and again. Even
natural philosophers, as distinct from natural
theologers, become occasionally involved in its
meshes. Professor Tyndall, in the second of his
series of lectures on Heat and Light, which he de
livered at the Royal Institution in 1872, brought
forward a notable instance, widely accepted, and
hesitatingly admitted by even the founder of that In
stitution, Count Rumford, for the purpose of shewing
pjiow utterly fallacious and presumptuous it is, like
Phaethon to guide the horses of the Sun. Water, as
every one who has learned anything about its prois aware, is liquid at ordinary temperatures, and
�32
as it is cooled down to about 40 deg. Fahrenheit,
regularly and gradually contracts like the column of
mercury in the thermometer. But then a change ensues.
Increase the cold towards freezing and the mercury
continues to contract, but the water expands, till at
freezing it becomes solid ice, occupying much more
space than the water whence it was generated, as most
householders have learned from broken water-pipes.
Hence, as the water cools to 40 deg., it sinks to the
bottom of any pond, lake or river, because it is
heavier, but after 40 deg., and up to and after its be
coming ice, it is lighter and floats on the top, pre
senting a pad against the cold, and hence keeping
the water liquid below, and preventing the whole mass
from becoming one solid lump, destroying all possi
bility of life within it. The importance of this pro
perty to the inhabitants of temperate and arctic
regions is manifest. Without it these climes could not
be inhabited by man or any other animal, as now con
stituted. No other liquid was known to possess the
same properties. What so natural, then, as to say that
God in his providence designed this solitary exception
from the universal law of contractility by cold, for the
benefit and preservation of man ? And men have said
so one after another. The fact is so striking, the re
lation to man, in regions where ice can form, so cleail
that the boldest denier of God’s providence—gene
rally somebody extremely ignorant—would be shaken
�33
when its bearing was made clear. But in the first
place, the fact clearly could not affect those parts of the
world where ice never forms, and in the second place,
at a time when the present arctic and temperate
regions bore tropical vegetation, this law also did not
affect them, though as yet man was not to be found on
the face of the earth j and, lastly, this is not a solitary
exception. When bismuth is sufficiently heated it be
comes fluid, and as heat is withdrawn that fluid also
first contracts and then expands, although no relations
between this phenomenon and the life of man can
be traced. The whole argument was, therefore, one
from ignorance to ignorance, and its present value is
to shew how dangerous, nay, how illogical, how
thoughtless it is, from an isolated circumstance, which
could only have local value, to infer a general propo
sition of a totally different character about a totally
unknown relation. The preacher who is reported to
have found a special providence in the fact (which he
deemed universal) that great rivers flowed by great
cities, did not more burlesque the ways of God to
man than he who founded an argument for God’s
special care of our race on that other remarkable and
more real property of water.
The proof of design is now generally sought for in
organisation, and not in the inanimate world. Paley
“ pitched his foot ” unconcernedly against the ££ stone ”
he found on the heath; for anything he knew, as he
�34
says, it might have lain there for ever. When he was
writing this, at the beginning of the nineteenth cerH
tury, geology was practically an unknown science, or
he might have found a history in the stone which
would have led him to the conception of epochs of
creation preparing the way for man, gravel collected
here to be subsequently dug up, coal gathered there
storing up the sun’s heat for man’s benefit hereafter,
perhaps the very mammoths would have been found
made to yield ivory or bone manure for future genera
tions. Again he was no chemist, or he might have
dwelled much on the chemical constitution of his stone,
and its remarkable adaptation for man’s future habita
tions. He was no natural philosopher, or he might
have dwelled on its specific gravity, and the wonder
ful contrivance by which, though water is lighter and
more mobile than rock, the dry land could appear for
man’s existence. In short, he was only a not very
learned theologian, who, recommended by his bishop
to turn his thoughts to the argument from design,
crammed up his subjects, and, more or less correctly-J
never with the grasp of real knowledge—wove them
into a treatise, with the valuable assistance, as we
have lately learned, of a French book on the same
*
subject.
He was a good plain writer, and, his half
* This last piece of information has been added since this
discourse was delivered. The information was given in the Academy
or Athenceum at the end of 1875 or beginning of 1876, butunfor*
�35
faawledge enabling him to skim over all difficulties, he
has produced a seductive book, which has done an
immense amount of harm in deteriorating our concep
tions of God, and in leading Englishmen to notions
thoroughly anthropomorphic in content, though avoid
ing anthropomorphism in appearance. But the pro
blem of design in older times, when organisation was
less understood, was treated with especial reference to
the subordination of the inorganic to the use of man.
The Elohist, ignorant that rain was formed in clouds
but slightly distant from our earth, placed the
“ extension,” (as the Hebrew word means which we
translate “firmament”) called “heaven,” to divide
the seas from the rain ; and put the sun above us in
this same firmament to rule the day, and the moon to
rule the night (when it was visible), and that wondrous
multitude of other suns, among which our own is
only a third or fourth rate body, he brought in paren
thetically, as “the stars also,” their chief “use ” being,
course, “ for signs and for seasons, for days and for
years,” that is, for man to reckon seed time and harvest
by. The continual addition that God saw that it was
“ good,” naturally implies that it was effected for a
tunately I neglected to make a note at the time, and have been
unable to recover the reference. It was stated, however, that
the resemblance between the French work and Paley’s was
very close, and that even the incident of the ‘ ‘ watch ” is due to
the French original. August, 1876.
�3<S
certain purpose or design beneficial to man (Gen.
chap, i.) All this has gradually gone out. Coperni
can astronomy dissipated the reference of all celestial
bodies to man.
Geology and natural philosophy
ousted design from inanimate objects. But organisa
tion remained, and remains a stronghold.
Who can regard the human eye, the lens, the retina,
the chamber through which the beams pass, the
diaphragm of the iris, the varying aperture of the
pupil, without, in these photographic days especially,
being forcibly reminded of the object glass, the
sensitised plate, the camera, the movable diaphragm ?
And as all these latter are known to be the works of
design, based upon laws of light as regards its refrac
tion through glass, and its chemical action, what is
more natural for the mind just receiving the idea, than
to jump to the conclusion, that, as man adapted the
camera, so God adapted the eye to the laws of light ?
True ; but for the laws of light the eye would not see.
We might almost feel inclined to say that light was
invented for the eye. But the Elohist having placed
light at the earliest epoch (before the sun and the
stars, indeed, whence comes all the light, even the
so-called artificial light that we know}, no theologer
would hit upon this conception, which is not a bit
more extravagant than that the sun was made to rule
the day, which, therefore, must have existed before
the sun. But here, as in the moral government of
�37
the world (which religion had to supplement by a
devil), we run great danger, if we press the argument
home, of imagining the Unerring to be as great a
bungler as poor, designing, fractionally informed man.
If the eye was “designed” for sight, why should so many
exquisite “ contrivances ” exist for defeating that
object? Why should this man be born blind, why
should an Egyptian sun make that man sightless, why
should the focal power of the lens be often—generally,
I may say—so ill adapted to the position of the
retina, that no distinct image can be formed till man’s
knowledge of the laws of optics has taught him the
effect of lenses of glass, and how to grind them ? The
man is yet alive who first found what form of lens
should Ibe given to remedy a not uncommon, but
hitherto unsuspected defect existing in his own eye,
and now generally known to oculists. If the Jews
could ask, in order to explain a certain man’s blind
ness, “ Who did sin, this man or his parents, that he
was born blind ? ” are we right in parodying the
answer, and replying, “ Neither has the AstronomerRoyal sinned, nor his parents; but he was born with
astigmatic vision, that the works of God should be made
*
* A point of light is seen in correct vision as a single point,
but in astigmatic vision not, stigma, a point), it is seen as a
line of very perceptible length. If any one looks at himself in the
hollow or projection of a bright silver table-spoon he sees the
effect of astigmatism, which prolongs or shortens objects, as his
�3§
manifest in him?” (John ix., 2, 3.) Do not such
phrases grate on every soul attuned to God-like har
mony ? And what shall we say of the colour-blind for
whom no cure has been devised, but who as railway
porters on land, or as the look-out at sea, may
imperil or destroy hundreds of lives in a moment
by confusing green with red? The man most capable
*
own face, according to the position in which the spoon is held.
The Astronomer-Royal, Sir George Biddell Airy, when a pro
fessor at Cambridge, used to relate to his class (of which I was a
member) how he detected the nature of the error in his own
eyes, and calculated the proper shape of the lenses (cylindrical
and not spherical) for his spectacles to correct the defect, and
how he found it impossible for years to get any optician who
would undertake to grind them. Now the malformation is well
known and studied, and several oculists (as Liebreich, Bowman,
&c.) are prepared to measure the error, often very complicated,
and order the construction of proper lenses. It is also found that
many eyes, with correct vision when young, became astigmatic
with age. Dr. Liebreich considers this to have been the cause
of the extraordinary vertical lengthening in the drawing of objects
introduced into Turner’s latest pictures.
* See ‘ ‘ Researches on Colour-blindness, with a supplement on
the danger attending the Present System of Railway and Marine
Coloured Signals,” by the late Prof. George Wilson, of Edin
burgh, 1855. “ The great majority of the colour-blind distin
guish two of the primary colours, yellow and blue, but they err
with the third red, which they confound with green, with brown,
with grey, with drab, and occasionally with other colours; and
not. unfrequently red is invisible to them, or appears black”
�39
of passing an opinion on any point of physiological,
optics, the great physiologist, physicist, and mathe
matician, Helmholtz, who had devoted many years
of study to this special subject, and written a classical
work upon it, says, of the human eye, as Professor
Clifford has told us (Macmillan!s Magazine, October,
1872, p. 507, col. 2) : “If an optician sent me that
as an instrument, I should send it back to him with
grave reproaches for the carelessness of his work, and
demand the return of my money.” * Is there, indeed,
a single organ in the human body ordinarily so perfect
that it needs no help from man ? On what do our
physicians and surgeons live ? Was disease part of
God’s design for the doctor’s benefit, or was it a
punishment for the patient’s sin ? And how can we
avoid that last old Judaic notion if we see design in
everything ? Aye, but to give up design is to throw
p. 129. It is now not usual to consider blue a primary colour
a colour-blind friend of my own could not distinguish red from
dark blue ; I have known others who could not distinguish red
from green. “There is every reason to believe that the number
of males in this country who are subject in some degree to thisaffection of vision, is not less than one in twenty, and that the
number markedly colour-blind, that is, given to mistake red
for green, brown for green, purple for blue, and occasionally
red for black, is not less than one in fifty,” p. 130.
* This sentence was added for the second delivery, 18th May,.
‘873-
�4°
everything into the power of chance. Who is this
grim goddess Chance that can assume the reins of the
world because one man differs from another in
opinion ? When the Pope and Cardinals condemned
Galileo for affirming the world’s motion, they were, as
it has been happily said, at that instant whirling round
with it. Our views of the world and its constitution
cannot alter the macrocosm without, but may materially
affect the microcosm within. Let us face this Chance,
and ask again, who art thou ? And in ultimate resort
all the best philosophy of the day replies : Chance is
the sum of all those laws which we have still to
■learn. To say that the world is what it is, bating the
laws we know, through the laws we know not, is surely
nothing terrible, is the merest truism of modern science.
But by all means avoid a name which conjures up a
foul Python that it would need another Phoebus to
destroy.
What, then, can we mean by God’s design, or rather
by that which we humanly call design ? Again, all
the best philosophy has its answer ready: we mean
solely the conditions of existence, that without
which—or that which changed—things would not be
what they are.
*
Stated baldly thus, it seems a most
* It will be at once objected that there is nothing even
approaching to the conception of human design in such a
■statement. Quite true. If we attempted to introduce anything
-approaching to human design, we should have to suppose that
�4i
barren proposition. Most laws of primary importance
have that appearance till their consequences are traced.
As long as we conceive that God meant every particular
state to be what it is, it remains a sin to touch it. We
have even now among us a “ peculiar people,” as they
call themselves, who decline to summon a physician
in case of illness. I have not heard that they insisted
on eating grains of wild wheat instead of bread artfully
prepared with unholy leaven from the bruised com.
Directly we look upon things as being what they are,
owing to certain conditions of existence, we inquire
are these modifiable ? and if so, with what result ?
We experiment, we modify. As the peculiar people—
an “unconditioned” Creator fell into a profound study resulting
in his devising not merely materials, but their laws, all fitting
into some vast and complicated machine, embracing the whole
universe, and having some distinct object which, as w’ell as all
the incidents accompanying its action, (the “evil” as well as
the “good,”) was conceived and intended beforehand, and
which he preferred to effect in this way instead of by a single
hat. Not venturing to claim that intimate acquaintance w'ith
God’s mind, which most preachers practically assert themselves
to possess, I cannot put forward such an hypothesis. It does
not appear to be a particularly edifying conception, and on closer
inspection I find it totally incomprehensible. But “conditions of
existence ” imply no hypothesis. They are a mere statement of
what we find, without superadding any imaginary cause, and
may be, or rather must be, accepted, whatever cause may be
Assigned to them.
�42
and others by no means peculiar, I am sorry to say—
might declare, we dare to correct God’s handiwork.
Think of the sheer blasphemy of such a notion ! Think
how deep that dye must be which could thus obliterate
-every trace of all that is true and beautiful and good I
During an expedition to study the effects of a total
•eclipse of the sun a few years ago, as the astronomers
were preparing to make those observations which tend
•so greatly to establish oneness amidst the diversity of
the universe, some ignorant natives lighted a fire to
frighten off the dragon that was consuming the sun,
and the whole observations would have been nullified
by the smoke had not some English officer seen and
bravely stamped it out. And we here, here in England,
*
here in London, here in the largest city of the world,
speaking a language more widely spoken than any in
the world, need a brave officer like him to stamp out
the fumes which would thwart the only means we have
of even vaguely forefeeling that Being whom no epithet
■Can describe, but which an ignorant crowd believes to
be succumbing to the serpent knowledge.
The dye of humanity is on our hand. Wash it
as we may, either in the Abana and Pharpar of stately
theology that arrogates to itself universal
priort
* So far as I can recollect, this refers to the total eclipse of
the sun on the 12th December, 1871, and the incident mentioned
is illustrated by a drawing in the Illustrated London News of
the time. August, 1876.
�43
knowledge, or in the Jordan of lowly science
(2 Kings, v. 10, 12), that lays down as its first principle,
ignorance of all not yet discovered—wash it as we may,
we cannot wash it clean—but we can know that it A
dyed, and we can lift it up with a clear conscience,
that while panting after God as the hart for the water
brooks (Ps. xlii. 1), we have never knowingly let a
single drop of the dye fall on our shapeless conception
of the Inconceivable. Let us take a lesson from the
Greek myth of Semele. As we can only converse with
the Deity through human conceptions, let us be
content that they are human, and not entreat a
presence which no man can see and live. And, in
*
order that our nature may not be more than “ almost”
subdued to what it works in, let us wear in our “ heart
of heart,”f never to be forgotten, cherished as a
constant warning, as a safeguard against presumption,
as the token of self-knowledge, Shakspeare’s badge of
the Dyer’s Hand 1
* Semele “ was beloved by Zeus (Jupiter), and Here (Juno),
stimulated by jealousy, appeared to her in the form of her aged
nurse Beroe, and induced her to pray Zeus to visit her in the
same splendour and majesty with which he appeared to Here.
Zeus, who had promised that he would grant her every request,
did as she desired. He appeared to her as the god of thunder,
and Semele was consumed by the fire of lightning.” (W.
Smith’s Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and
Mythology.)
f {Hamlet, act 3, scene 2, speech 14.)
�44
DISMISSAL.
May we each ponder in private, and shew forth in
public, that the way to God is through the heart of
man I
�
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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"The dyer's hand": a discourse preceded by The way to God: a meditation, delivered at South Place Chapel, Sunday 5th May 1872, and repeated by especial desire Sunday, 19th May 1873
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Ellis, Alexander John [1814-1890]
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Place of publication: [London]
Collation: 44 p. ; 15 cm.
Series title: South Place Discourses
Notes: Includes bibliographical references. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
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[South Place Chapel]
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[1873]
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T340
N206
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Sermons
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work ("The dyer's hand": a discourse preceded by The way to God: a meditation, delivered at South Place Chapel, Sunday 5th May 1872, and repeated by especial desire Sunday, 19th May 1873), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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Sermons
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THE LIFE AND DEATH OF GARFIELD
A DISCOURSE
BEFORE THE SOUTH PLACE RELIGIOUS SOCIETY,
SEPTEMBER 25, 1881,
' BY
MONCURE D. CONWAY.
LONDON :
II, SOUTH
PLACE,
FINSBURY.
PRICE TWOPENCE
�FREDERIC
G. HICKSON & Co.
257, High Ho lb o ku,
Lohdoh, W.C.
�THE LIFE AND DEATH OF GARFIELD.
~jp|~ OW good-hearted is this much abused old world
fr>
of ours-—this great world of men, women and
children! Theologians have pronounced it depraved.
VZ
wrote—
Even poets have called it hard and unfeeling ; as one
“ Man’s inhumanity to man
Makes countless thousands mourn.”
Yet, even in his indictment, the poet suggests the
fundamental goodness of human nature, since he calls
its reverse ‘ inhumanity.’ Were human nature bad,
to be humane would be also bad ; the more humanity,
the more depravity. The race records in its language
the simple verdict on itself, that to be human is to be
good-hearted; the evil heart is inhuman.
Really it is
man’s ignorance of man that makes countless thousands
mourn.
The great world moves on its daily round of
toils and joys, self-centred as its planet, and heeds
little, because it sees little, the agonies of those crushed
ec beneath its wheels. But when it does see such, when
st its unheeding rush and roar is arrested by some salient
tragedy; when its innumerable eyes are fixed upon a
deed in which all the evil powers of nature are seen
�(
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venting their triumphant cruelty upon innocence and
excellence; then the human race has but one heart,
purely good: under it the depraved is shown to be not
man, but monster; the excellent is immortalised.
The great crime against humanity, consummated in
the death of the President, has moved the heart of
humanity.
The Court in mourning reflects a sorrow
felt in every cottage and hall.
The money-changers
turn from their speculations to bow their heads before
a poor man carried to his grave four thousand miles
away. ’Tis a tragedy all can comprehend. There
have been cases where crowned assassins of men and
women have felt in their own hearts the weapon they
had used against others.
Though it be deplorable
that any man of the people should degrade himself
to the foul -weapon of tyrants, we must sometimes say
that, if despots dislike assassination, they should avoid
setting the example.
But in this case there is nothing
to confuse the judgment of mankind.
The eye of the
world is brought face to face with an infrahuman
spirit acting through forces of the human form, and
sees beside the fallen man the real Satan with which
all real saviours have to measure their strength.
The universal cry of horror, sympathy, indignation,
is really a protest of the human heart against the
cruelties of brute nature, and, however unconsciously,
brands the creeds that deify the destructive powers of
�Etf
It '
’<!
nature.
“ Vengeance is mine,” says the Lord of the
creeds; “Vengeance is mine,” says the assassin of the
President. How does the reciter of the creeds like
deified vengeance when mirrored in the crime of a
vindictive man ?
poet—•
Their real faith is rather that of the
“ A loving worm within its sod
Were cliviner than a loveless God
Amid His worlds.”
Man cannot worship the ancient images of elemental
force. Those old dogmas have left phrases upon our
EiJ lips about the inscrutable dispensations of Providence;
rd but they have no root in the millions of hearts that
now rise in grief and wrath against a great wrong and
oh
calamity.
The ancient sacerdotal theology regarded calamities
of this kind, falling upon eminent men or families, as
the carrying out of fatal decrees of the gods. The
victims might be quite innocent, but they had to suffer
vicariously for the offence of some remote ancestor.
Nor was this notion merely ‘pagan.’
In Christian
theology, all pain and death are the doom of ancestral
sin, and there are instances in the Bible where Jehovah
rh strikes the innocent for the sin of the guilty (Exod. xi.,
2 Sam. xii.), just as the house of Atreus is divinely
hunted down for a remote ancestral offence.
That pitiful providence (if we may so speak of a-
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)
phantasy of the primitive brain) measuring its strength
against the innocence unsuspecting its malice,—too
weak to punish justly, strong only in cruelty, power
less to protect,—is a providence no longer believed in.
We only know that it was once believed in, by a
bequest of cant phrases, which, if they meant any
thing to-day, would mean that the murderer Guiteau
belongs to the divine administration. Of course, these
dogmatic anachronisms -will survive for a long time
yet, on paper, and in conventional rites and forms.
A great many interests will see to that.
They are
not amenable to reason, because not products of
reason. In a sense, therefore, they are unanswerable.
The Prince of Wales was very ill.
The churches and
chapels all prayed for him, and he recovered.
It was
claimed as an answer to prayer. The President lay long
in agony and peril, which even his assassin pitied. The
churches and chapels of
a hundred millions of
Christians, the very synagogues of Palestine, prayed for
his recovery. He died. (The whole human world, with
one voice, supplicated its God for this one life j and he
who could raise his personal friends out of their graves
in Palestine would not answer the prayer of all man-
kind in behalf of his devout worshipper in A m erica!)
This, of course, is said to be a mysterious dispensation
of God.
assailable.
Whatever the event, Theology is thus un
Common-sense may ask whethei' God cares
�more for Prince than for President ; whether typhoid
fevers and assassins are heavenly ministers, and, if so,
whether physicians should resist the one or judges
sentence the other.
But common-sense will ask in
vain. Theology will go on with its days of thanks
giving or of humiliation, because its appeal now is
to those who do not think, nor inquire (whether from
incompetence or fear) ; and who so cannot realise that
their creeds are the stultification of their true hearts
and sincerest lives.
But let us be of
good cheer!
Amid these
hereditary euphemisms about evil, now and then the
real heart of mankind speaks, and we recognise that
it does not regard wrong and cruelty as divine in any
sense.
It has an unsophisticated answer to the
widow’s cry, “ Oh, why am I made to suffer this cruel
blow ! ” It resents the blow, providential or not. It
hates the villainy and the baseness with loathing.
It loves mercy and justice.
This is the feeling that
lies deep down in all—even in those who pay lip-
service to a God of Wrath and Vengeance. This is the
-divinely human sentiment which has been brought out
legibly, as if on every man’s forehead, by the tragedy
at Washington; and it is a prophecy of the coming
•of the true son of man.
In this passionate sympathy
with goodness and horror of evil, lies the hope of
man’s salvation from all evil.
�(
s
)
The heart of humanity is man’s time providence.
It is that which ever brings good out of evil.
It has
been my lot to witness, and study, the effect of the
dastardly assassination of two of the noblest American
Presidents. Many of you will remember the dismay
spread by the tidings that Abraham Lincoln, liberator
of his country from slavery, had fallen.
The bullet
that pierced his heart evoked all that was best in the
heart of his country and of England.
There had been
up to that time a large number of persons in this
country utterly deceived as to the spirit of slavery,
who still sympathised with the lost cause of the south,
because they did not recognise that those valiant
defenders of slavery were its chief victims.
The
murderous bullet that slew Lincoln slew that party
here.
There was also a spirit of mistaken clemency in
America, which, respecting a brave foe fallen, was
about to make concessions which, it is now seen, might
have repaired the evil system that had engendered
civil strife.
President Lincoln shared that spirit.
But his death revealed to the people the irrecoverable
nature of slavery, and they extirpated it.
So did the
providential human heart educe good out of evih
And it will do so again in this case.
done so.
Already it has
This terrible tragedy has not only revealed
to the peoples on both sides the Atlantic in how
profound a sense they are of one blood—that their
�(
9
)
•common blood is thicker than the ocean of water that
divides them—but it has united the North and the
South in America in a feeling that has not before
■existed between them for two generations.
They are
gathered to-day in the unity of sorrow around their
dead President. The spirit of faction, too, which had
raised
its head
in the North,
some
of
whose
venom the murderer had caught, has received its
check. And all these benefits following a great crime
lay not in that crime at all, but in the good sense and
just heart of the people. They represent in a swift
and startling way the process which, in slow ways, is
always going on.
It is that which has thus far
civilised the earth. The steady pressure of the good
against the evil in the world; the gradual turning of
experience into wisdom, the lessons of suffering
teaching the laws of well-being, shadows of error
pointing to the light of truth—these make the law of
human progress and the evolution of a true man upon
the earth.
The subject that had been named for to-day’s dis
course was, “ Our life estate.”
By that I meant that
to each man his life is an estate which he inherits ; in
which he has a life interest; which even for the poorest
holds many treasures; an estate necessarily transmitted
by each, improved or unimproved, to be the inheritance
of others. The tremendous event which has super
�(
10
)
seded that topic, has, beyond its startling voice, a still
small voice that may well impress upon us this lesson
concerning a man’s life estate, and the way it goes on
after he has died out of it.
Behold the dead President lying in the Rotunda of
the Capitol, where the sympathy of a world surges
around him and breaks into tears!
Prom poor and
honest parents he received his life estate.
It was in
a small corner of the world—a lowly estate—but
all sound and honest, and large enough to give
play to the greatest principles
and activities of
man’s nature. The father came of one of those old
English families that crossed the ocean to build a new
England where conscience might be free. He was a
pioneer of civilisation in the forests of Ohio, and died
of a disease caught while defending his fields from a
forest fire.
The harvest was saved, though the farmer
died. The brave mother and her children struggled on,
and their courage and energy prevailed. The boy had
a strong constitution, a love of work, and a thirst for
knowledge. He earned money by driving the mules that
drew canal boats. There was nothing noble about that;
he was neither proud of it or ashamed of it. It was his
lot in life, and he fulfilled its duties.
to a larger lot.
He studied
But he aspired
hard.
He and his
mother laid up money enough for him to go to
college.
He climbed to
his degree; he climbed
�(
11
)
f
beyond it,
)
3
difficulties.
There was no sleight-of-hand in his
culture. He became a scholar, afterwards a College
I,
President. As with every healthy young man, his
religious sentiment began to develop. The region
around him was now populous, even fashionable, and
all the great sects were there. This youth selected to
I
li'
fij
ft
■>»
step by step, without any leaps over
take his place among a very humble circle, who called
themselves “ Disciples of Christ.” They have no
creed. They are generally believers in the super
natural character of Christ, but refuse to use the word
“Trinity,” or in any way to bind themselves with any
to . of the hereditary formulas called creeds.
This gave
ft them freedom to grow with the mind of their country.
T They are the youngest of the denominations, founded
ii| in 1827, but they have grown fairly well in culture
J
Tfl
and influence. A telegram in the London Times says
the funeral to-morrow will be conducted by the late
President’s chaplain. But the President never had
any chaplain. Such an office does not exist; and, if
fj ‘ it did, the late President would have abhorred it.
H He used to gather the students of his college in the
rfe
chapel, and lecture to them on many different sub
©j jects,—sometimes on writings of Tennyson, Carlyle,
Emerson, Darwin, and other contemporary authors.
B His spirit was thoroughly liberal. He had not in him
a drop of sectarian blood ; his Christianity consisted
�(
12
)
in a sincere desire to make the love and heroism and
gentleness of Christ an influence upon the life of
himself and others.
As he had not taken the side of the conventional
and powerful in religion, but associated himself with
humble, creedless, “Disciples of Christ,” so, in politics,
he joined himself to the small band of constitutional
opponents of slavery who knew nothing but defeat.
The republican (then “free-soil”) party which now
rules the United States was laughed at as a feeble
fanaticism when Garfield began speaking and working
for it. It had nothing to offer or to promise him.
Few could have then dreamed that this century would
witness its success.
But slavery had the keen instinct
to foresee its doom in that small concert of free hearts,
and met its slow though steady growth with a mad
blow at the Union.
Then the College President sprang forward to his
country’s rescue. With a hundred students from the
college over which he had presided, to begin with, he
formed, his regiment.
They marched to the front and
won the first Union victory in that war.
When he
had faithfully served his country through the war. his
neighbours sent him to Congress, where he did much
to save the harvest of the battle-field—namely
emancipation, and the constitutional equality of races
which alone could secure it.
For slavery, foiled in
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13
)
battle, was aiming to gain political control of the
slaves it had lost.
So did this man bravely and faithfully improve the
life estate he had received from the past—from his
English ancestor who helped to found the freedom of
New England, from his father who cleared forests in
Ohio. ’Tis said there will be sung over Garfield’s grave
his favourite hymn, <£ Ho, reapers of Life’s harvest! ”
Possibly when he used to sing it he remembered how
his father died from trying to save his harvest—the
bread of his family—from a forest-fire.
They who
now sing it will remember that it was while protecting
the great national field from an encroaching evil that
the President received his death-wound.
The reapers
of the harvest of his life will bitterly feel the grief
that he cannot share their harvest-home.
of his own harvest-home?
But what
What becomes of the
faithful servant’s life estate? < Does that die too? Is
that shrunken form of the powerful man, which his
friends shudder to look upon,— is that the end of
James Abram Garfield?
The symbols that surrounded him as he lay in state
in the Capitol, reveal the compassionate longing of
the human heart that the great wrong shall be
righted, and to him personally.
It seems too bad,
too cruel, that one who from the tow-path had
climbed by patient, honest steps up to the White
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)
House, should have all his honours and joys snatched
away, ere tasted—his highest success turned to dust,
his happiness to agony, his great opportunity made
his death ! So beside him a shaft built of roses has
on its broken top, nestling amid immortelles, the dove
that mourns, with downbent head; while on his
pillow is the dove with uplifted eye and wing, about
to fly away
emblem of his soul.
Over him is sus
pended the crown of righteousness gleaming against
the black draped canopy of the dome.
All these are
symbols of the faith that the late President’s personal
possession of his life-estate has not ended. In earlier
ages such enthusiasms have given rise to beliefs
among men that their heroes were not dead—could
not die—but lived like Arthur in happy valleys, or
invisibly walked the earth like St. John, or led armies
like St. James.
Such beliefs still mould for many
their conception of immortality; but they who confess
their eyes too weak to pierce the veil beyond the
grave, do not the less believe in the actual im
mortality of the life which a good man bequeaths to
the world. A right and true man may be defrauded
of his share in his own estate of life, but mankind
cannot be robbed of it.
For them he will go on
living, and his life will expand in influence as much
as if he were personally alive.
Nay, more !
The
dead will elevate the policy of the living President.
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)
He binds together nations that were estranged, and
sections which were at strife.
He is not dead, nor
does he sleep.
But there is a life that casts its shadow athwart theworld. Crouched in his ceil is the wretched criminal
who has caused all this agony. Perhaps in all history
■no two lives were ever brought into contact more-
representative severally of the best and the worst
forces that can control human life. The whole life of
that miserable murderer has been tracked, and it has
been found that he has for years been going through
the country like a sort of mad dog, leaving in many
regions traces of his disastrous march. Licentiousness,
fraud, falsehood, faithlessness to woman and to man,,
appear to have been the footprints of his career. And
during all this horrible career he has been possessed
[with the belief that he is a specially religious man.
i. Bor years, and up to the very hour of the murder,
Charles Guiteau was a lecturer against infidelity. HeI was celebrated for his prayers in the meetings of'
Mr. Moodey.
He went about the country defrauding
hotels at the very time that he was denouncing the
wickedness of the Hon. Bobert Ingersoll for dis
believing in Christianity.
Even since the murder,
and in his prison, Guiteau has continually read his
j Bible, is eager to talk theology with the officials,
I fiercely denounces infidelity, and argues for orthodoxy.
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)
These things I gather from reports that seem unbiassed
and uncontradicted.
I have no disposition to base
upon them any theory against Christians. Orthodox
people generally have as much horror of crime as any
•others. Nay, so long as Protestant orthodoxy was
able to unite morality and religion, and convince men
that crime was punished by a burning hell, it was able
to do something towards restraining the hell of human
passions. But gradually it has developed a theology
which necessarily and logically maintained that the
blood of Jesus could cleanse from all sin.
“ While the lamp holds out to burn
The vilest sinner may return.”
‘The majority of criminals have accepted the blood of
Jesus, after the law had clutched them, and believed
that they were ascending from the gallows to
Abraham’s bosom.
It is not often that a man of
Guiteau’s education is found so utterly demoralised
by a self-righteous theology.
And, although it is
logical for him to stand on his dogmas, and say “ I
the chief of sinners am, yet Jesus died for me,”—it
amounts to moral lunacy.
His combination of piety
and criminality make him a monster.
Goethe said,
“ Nature reveals her secrets in monsters.” And one
may hope that Christians will study this theological
assassin as a specimen showing what certain natures
may deduce from the dogma of salvation by faith
�(
without works.
17
)
Happily that is not the tendency of
Christians, which is less and less characterised by
dogmatism, more and more by imitation of the
benevolence and charity of Christ.
But there is a
tendency of the old dogmas as they are deserted by
the best minds to gravitate downward among the least
educated and least restrained regions of society, and
to make their vulgar visionaries depend more on
abjectness before God than on rectitude before man
for security after death.
It may be that Guiteau will find no defender on his
trial.
No lawyer may be willing to take on himself
the stigma of having been the counsel of such a
creature.
Yet, I can imagine, a day may come of
calmer judgment when a plea in palliation might be
[ made even for him.
It would show that there was
j bequeathed him as his life estate a morbid temperament which exaggerated all the worst teachings of
morbid dogmas impressed on his mind in early life.
I He was taught that the supreme object of existence
was to save his own soul—that first lesson in selfish
ness taught to millions of children (which only the
j restraining grace of human nature prevents from
I making them soul-less!) He was taught that with
God human goodness availed nothing—neither justice,
| nor pity, nor gentleness, nor sympathy, nor unselfish| ness, nor purity of life.
All these amounted to just
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)
nothing in the work of bringing man to his highest
joy.
was taught that morality could save nobody,
and good works but filthy rags in the sight of God.
He was taught that death was a small affair, and to a
Christian great gain ‘ passage from an accursed world
to a blissful paradise.
The only fatally wicked thing
was to him unbelief.
These dogmas were given him
ns the guides of his life; they were not merely put on
his lips, as in most cases, but seem to have taken deep
root in him, insomuch that even in prison they were
his meditation day and night, if one may judge by
some reports of his interest in theology.
This is a perilous kind of teaching.
This is the
second time in the last few years that America has
been brought face to face with some of the possible
results of preserving the forms and phrases of
barbarian religion.
One was the case of the Massa
chusetts preacher Freeman, who believed himself
called, like Abraham, to sacrifice his beloved child.
He plunged a dagger in her breast.
The little victim
is in her grave; the father is in a lunatic asylum.
Probably, if the murderer of Garfield could be
thoroughly tried, he also would go to the asylum;
but, as it is, he will probably rest in a nameless and
execrated grave.
But what will theology have to say of this victim
of an enthusiasm for faith without the deeds of the
�(
law?
19
)
Will the potent blood of Jesus in which he
fervently trusts carry him among the angels with the
blood of Garfield on his hands ?
Or are there limits
to the efficacy of Christ’s blood? That is a problem
we may leave to the theology which has raised it.
For us a more serious question is, What shall be the
result of that evil-doer’s career on earth ? What is
the life estate which he will part from and transmit ?
Has it a vitality, a permanence equal to that of the
President he has slam ? Will his evil career go on
widening into further and larger evil, as the good life
survives in expanding influences of good ? I believe
not.
I find nothing in history or experience to justify
that half-pessimistic view of nature which holds that,
evil in this world has a force co-extensive with that of
goodness. It must be admitted that evil now with
stands good in a passive, obstructive way; but it
must also be admitted that, since the reign of man
began, the good is selected and developed, the evil
steadily diminished and exterminated.
As from the
woods and fields of these islands the wolves and vipers
have nearly disappeared before human culture, so in
the world at large the wolfish and venomous passions
are steadily driven towards their strata of extinction.
The cumulative worth and excellence of the whole
: world form the life estate of the good, and at their
; death is consigned and preserved as a sacred trust to
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right and true men, who will not willingly let die one
benefit transmitted, or one example of excellence.
President Garfield was never so great and strong-
an influence in his life as he now is when borne to his
grave on the shore of Lake Erie.
When he was a
candidate for the highest office in America, partisan
charges were urged against him.
they clung to him.
After his election
Death has dissipated them all.
While he was on his death-bed every secret thing
concerning him was brought to light, and few records
in history have ever come forth from such a search
with such enhanced clearness and brilliancy.
Eact
after fact has been remembered and elicited; and it
has been shown that his life from childhood to death
is one whose heroism had never been recognised. It
never would have been recognised but for this fearful
tragedy, and but for the essential justice of mankind.
He fell a Republican President; he rises as an
exemplar
for the world.
However beneficial his
administration might have been had he lived, he could
nevei' have hoped to unite the sections of his country
as much as his death has united them ; and whatever
his foreign policy, he could never have hoped to bring
together England and America in such close alliance
of affection as they have been brought by sorrow and
sympathy at his grave. This last benefit, indeed, he
partly saw before death, and he was sustained by it
�through, the long agony.
And we may hope that
the wonderful serenity amid pain—the patient, un
complaining sufferance of the terrible eleven weeks—
were those of a mind visited by happy visions of his
country united, North and South—and of an AngloAmerican unity—secured and cemented by his blood
that at first seemed so idly shed.
Let all good men and women try to make that
vision a reality !
Let us remember that the life estate
of all who die falls as a bequest to those who are
living,—to be terminated if it be evil, to be enlarged
and improved if it be good.
The dead President has
TO bequeathed to each and all of us a benefit and a hope
which we little suspected was so near us.
tjI and tragical
His life
death have stirred the hearts of the
two greatest nations of the world,—representing nearly
a hundred millions of people standing in the vanguard
of civilisation,—nations which seventy years ago were
at war, and sixteen years ago
were quarrelling.
It has been the belief of great thinkers that it
would be a token of higher civilisation if these
two great nations could recover their ancient unity on
the broad basis of liberty,—if instead of an extinct
Anglo-Saxon race there could be formed an Anglo-
American race.
The pulses of sympathy and sorrow
every hour beating towards America are far grander
as an expression of civilisation than the mastered
�(
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magnetism that is their messenger.
Old fables tell
of a magical music that built the walls of cities ;
but the ocean cable that vibrates with the love
of nation for nation is a harp-string of earth’s
heart whose music builds ideal civilisation.
This
day the fifty millions of that stricken land behold
on the darkness a star of brightness ; it is a wreath of
flowers laid by the Queen upon the President’s bier,
fragrant with the sympathy and bedewed with the
tears of her people.
Those flowers must live.
It is
for all good men and women to cherish them that they
may never fade.
Their fragrance is more potent than
armies and navies. They are blossoms of a springtide
of civilisation such as our poor blood-stained earth has
vainly sighed foi' through the centuries.
Ah! I know that they will never fade; they will
be cherished in the hearts of children’s children, and
they will still expand in the happy sunshine when all
the battle-flags that ever floated between America and
England are furled and forgotten.
That is General Garfield’s bequest to you and me,—
to help keep fresh those flowers that mean the hopes
of nations. He bequeathes us also the story of his
life.
To every Anglo-American child shall be told the
brave story of how a poor western lad toiled and
studied, and nourished his mind and heart with pure
and patriotic aims, until he rose to greatness and
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rfc the highest power,—then, dying, clasped together the
CU
[0
'ii
hands that had smitten, the hearts that had been
estranged, and bequeathed to humanity the grandest
estate it could have, a heart-union of the two nations
which mainly hold the destinies of the world and
must mould the future of mankind.
So much could one poor lad achieve.
young Englishmen.
Think of it,
Do not suppose that such ascent
and success is peculiarly American. It was English
long centuries before it was American. The German,
Goethe, said to a youth who proposed going to seek
his fortune in America, “Your America is here or
nowhere.”
The science of England and its welfare
are largely forwarded by men who were once poor
lads.
Before enterprise and endeavour, barriers will
yield here as elsewhere.
Your aim is not title or
ostentation; it is to become fully possessed of your
life estate, to make the most and best of all your
powers for the good of mankind, so that no mischance,
no blow of fate, can destroy your work, but it shall
rise on grandly over your grave as by the labours of
your life.
�SOUTH _PLACE_ CHAPEL.
WORKS TO BE OBTAINED IN THE LIBRARY.
BY M. D. CONWAY, M.A.
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Report of the Conference of Liberal Thinkers 1878,1
�LAUREATE DESPAIR
A DISCOURSE GIVEN AT
SOUTH PLACE CHAPEL
DECEMBER nth 1S81.
BY
Moncure D. Conway, M.A.
LONDON
II,
SOUTH PLACE FINSBURY.
PRICE
TWOPENCE.
�FREDERICK G. HICKSON & Co.
257, High Holborn,
London, W.c.
�LAUREATE DESPAIR.
1T ET me say at once that I am glad the Poet Laureate
J—4 has written the poem called “ Despair/’ which I
((propose to criticise. It is a cry out of the heart of an
1 earnest man; it utters the sorrow with which many
^people in our time see their old dreams fading, and no
Anew ones rising in their place; and it reminds free■fthinkers that theirs is a heavy responsibility and duty.
IThey have to meet and respond to that need and pain
•|which thousands feel wrhere one can give it expression.
AMen of science and philosophers do not always under
stand this. The most eminent of them are pursuing
©deals far more beautiful to them than those that have set.
iThey have special knowledge, or special aims, which
Ikindle into pillars of fire before their enthusiasm, and can
Jnot see how to those of other studies and pursuits their
rfguiding splendour is a pillar of smoke rising from a fair
■world slowly consumed. The 'man of science, hourly
^occupied with discoveries which blaze upon him, star by
Mar, till his reason is as a vault sown with eternal lights,
<eels that he is in the presence of conceptions beside
Which the visions of Dante and Milton are frescoes of a
iime-darkened dome. The enthusiast of Humanity holds
�( 4 )
in his eye a latter-day glory of which history is the pro
phecy and developed man the fulfilment. Such enthu
siasms imply continual studies, occupations, duties, which,
leave little room for attention to the shadows these lights;
cast upon the old world of dreams—each shadow a dogma
or its phantom. Nevertheless, that world of dreams,
shades, phantoms, is still real to many. It is real not
only to the ignorant, whom it terrifies, and to the selfish,
whose power rests on it, but to spiritual invalids, whoneed sympathy. And, beyond this reality, the phantasmson which religion and society wereflfounded possess a
quasi-reality even for robust minds. You mav recall the
saying of Madame de Stael, that “ she did not believe in.
ghosts, but was afraid of them.” After dogmas are dead
their ghosts walk the earth ; and even some who nolonger believe in the ghosts are still afraid of them.
When their intellects are no longer haunted their nerves;
are.
There are others, again, for whose vision or nerves the
pleasant dogmas alone survive in this attenuated, ghostly
form. They no longer believe in the ghosts, but still love
them. Of this class is the literary artist. To the pictorial
artist a ruin is more picturesque than the most comfort
able dwelling. ’Tis said of an eminent art-critic that,
being invited to visit America, he replied that he could
not think of visiting a country where’there were no ruins..
Alfred Tennyson is the consummate artist in poetry. We
all know with what tender sentiment Tennyson has.
�a
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)
painted the scenery of Arthur’s time, with what felicity
described many other reliques of human antiquity.
“ His eye will not look upon a bad colour.” He sees
the mouldering ruins in their picturesque aspects, leaving
out of sight the noxious weeds and vermin that infest
them. Where these loathsome things appear no man
more recoils from them. If the White Ladies of Super
stition haunt them, these he admires ; but he impales the
gnomes and vampyres.
In this, his latest poem, “ Despair,” he shows a childlike
simplicity of desire to retain all the pleasant and reject all
the unpleasant consequences of the same principles. His
�( 6
)
Till you flung us back on ourselves, and the human heart, and.
the Age.
But pity—that Pagan held it a vice—was in her and in me,
Helpless, taking the place of the pitying God that should be I
Pity for all that aches in the grasp of an idiot power,
And pity for our own selves on an earth that bore not a
flower.
Again he says :
Were there a God, as you say,
His Love would have power over hell till it utterly vanish’d
away.
Ah, yet—I have had some glimmer at times, in my gloomiest
woe,
Of a God behind all—after all—the Great God, for aught that
I know :
But the God of Love and of Hell together — they cannot ibe
Tr ?h(,U?ht ■
cwM
It there be such a God, may the Great God curse him and
bring him to nought!
This is what the Poet Laureate thinks of the God of every
creed in Christendom, for every creed maintains an
eternal hell.
But the agnostic, the know-nothing sceptic, is summoned
to bear his share in this tragedy of hopelessness and
suicide, fl he poet does not suggest that disbelief in a
future life or in a Deity would alone lead to suicide. In
his imaginary case unbelief is only a factor. The man
and wife were in terrible trouble. One of their two sons
had died ; the eldest had fled after committing forgery on
his own father, bringing him to ruin. It is under such
fearful circumstances that, without faith or hope, they sink
into despair. The man says :
Why should we bear with an hour of torture, a moment of
pain,
If every man die for ever, if all his griefs are in vain,
�And the homeless planet at length will be wheeled thro’ thesilence of space,
Motherless evermore of an ever-vanishing race ?
*
*
*
*
*
*
For these are the new dark ages, you see, of the popular press,
When the bat comes out of his cave, and the owls are
whooping at noon,
And Doubt is the lord of this dunghill, and crows to the sun
and moon,
Till the Sun and Moon of our science are both of them turned
to blood,
And Hope will have broken her heart, running after a shadow
of good.
It is a striking fact, in our sceptical age, that such
lamentations as these are not heard from among the poor
and the drudges of society. They who are asking whether
life be worth living without the old faith in immortality,
and they who say it is not, are persons of position and
wealth. Any one who has taken the pains to observe the
crowds of working people who attend the lectures of
secularists, or to read their journals, will know they are
cheery enough. We never hear any of them bemoaning
the vanished faith. In truth the more important fact is
not that the belief in immortality is gone, or the belief in
Deity, but that belief in a desirable immortality and a
desirable Deity has gone out of the hearts of many. In
one of his humourous pieces Lucian, describing his ima
ginary journey through Hades, says he could recognise
those who had been kings or rich people on earth by theii
loud lamentations. They had parted with so much.
Those who on earth had been poor and wretched were
quiet enough. "We may observe similai phenomena in
�( 8
)
this psychological Hades, or realm of the Unseen and
Unknown, into which modern thought has entered. Those
to whom God has allotted palaces, plenty, culture, beauty,
can eas ly believe Him a God of Love ,• and it were to
them heaven enough to wake from the grave to a continu
ance of the same. But they who have known hunger,
cold, drudgery, ignorance, have no such reason to say
God is Love. Such may naturally say, “ If we have
waked up in this world in dens of misery, why, under the
same providence, may we not wake up to a future of
misery ?” The old creeds met that difficulty. They
showed a miraculous revelation on the subject, by which
God had established an insurance against future misery,
an assurance of future luxury. It was all to be super
natural. By miraculous might poverty was to be changed
to wealth, the hovel to a palace, rags to fine raiment,
ignorance to knowledge, folly to wisdom, and scarlet sin
to snow-pure virtue. Without such tremendous trans
formations the masses of the miserable could have no
interest in immortality. But gradually the comfortable
scholarship and theology of our time, in trying to prove a
God of nature, have done away with the God of super
nature. Their deity of design is loaded with all the bad
designs under which men suffer. Fifty years ago Carlyle
groaned because he could not believe in a Devil any more.
Philosophy had reasoned a Devil out of existence. The
result was to make the remaining power responsible for
all the evils in the world, and ultimately bling him into
�1
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( 9 X
a ioubt and disgrace too. Dismssing the Devil out of faith
iiias not dismissed evil, the mad work of earthquake, hurri
cane and fire. As we think of the shores with their wrecks,
^is we think of those people in Vienna gathered around the
iiharre .1 remains of their families and friends, must we not
Sisk if this is providential work what would be diabolical
jivork ? Reason says to Theology, “ At least you can be
iKilent, and not malign the spirit of good within us by
Asking us to call that without good which we know to be
lad ! ”
. I Similarly theologians .in trying to rationalise the idea of
Immortality have naturalised it. They have tacked it on
to evolution. But what the miserable suffer by is evolu4ion : unless they can be assured of a supernatural change,
jjf a heaven, they do not want to be evolved any more.
Only a miraculous revelation could promise them that
;.jniraculous heaven ; and the. only alleged revelation is
Rejected by the culture and the charity of our age. It is
[fcenied by Culture, because it reveals some impossibilities ;
my Charity, because it reveals a God capable of torturing
leople more than they are tortured here. What are eight
hundred people burned swiftly in a theatre compared to
millions burning in hell for ages, if not for ever, as Revela
tion declares ? Our Poet Laureate is a man of both
Culture and charity ; he cannot sing of a revelation which
Includes Hell, however he may cling to hopes that came
Ly the sanae revelation, or mourn at thought of pai ting
from a world so fair.
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Candour compels us to admit that there is as yet no
certainty of a future life for the individual consciousness.
The surviving seed of the human organism if it exist has
not been discovered. There is nothing unnatural in the
theory. It would not be more miraculous to find our
selves in another world than to find ourselves in this. If
two atoms of the primeval nebula, thrown together, had
been for one instant capable of speculation, how little
could they have imagined a company of men and women
gathered to meditate on life and eternity 1 All this is
very marvellous if we conceive it contemplated from a
point of non-existence. For all we know there are more
marvels beyond.
But suppose there are none ; suppose death be the end
of us; is there any reason for despair ? Even for the
man and woman on whom life had brought dire
calamities, was there any reason for suicide ? Just the
reverse, I should say. Belief that this life was all were
reason for making the most of it. Belief that their ruin
would not be repaired hereafter were reason for trying to
repair it here, as well as they could. Has Tennyson
evolved his man and woman out of his inner con
sciousness ? It is doubtful if in the annals of freethought
such a case can be pointed out; though many instances
may be shown where believers in a future world slew
themselves to get there. Suicide was a mania in some
old convents until the church fixed its ‘ canon ’gainst self
slaughter.’
�?! ' • However, it may be that instances of the kind Tennyson
& -describes may occur. We are but on the threshold of the
is age when men are to live and work without certainty
S of future rewards and payments. The doubts now in the
t .head must presently reach the heart, then influence the
II hand ; if people have built their houses on the sand of
K mythology, and they fall, it may be that some will not
t have the heart to begin new buildings on the rock.
F-: What then ? It will be only the continuation of the old
1 law—survival of the fittest. Suicides at least do not live
t to increase their race. Only those tend to prevail in
nature who can 'adapt themselves to the conditions ofnature. If nature has arrived at a period of culture when
•supernaturalism passes out of the human faith, then they
"who sink into despair or death, on that account, show
themselves no longer adapted to nature. There will be a
survival of those more adapted to the new ideas ; who
prefer them ; who do not aspire to live for ever, but have
.a heart for any fate, and a religion whose forces and joys
are concentrated in the life that now is. If natuie and
humanity need such a race for their furtherance, such a
race will be produced ; and they will read poems like
this “ Despair,” with a curiosity mixed with compassion,
wondering how their ancestors could have been troubled,
about such a matter.
. Something like this has occurred in the past in several
id instances.
While Christians find fullest expression of
[j their joyful emotions in the psalmody and prophecy of the
�(
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)
Hebrews they often forget that those glowing hymns say
no word about a future life. There is no clear affirmation
of immortality in the Old Testament, but much to the
contrary.
Buddhism also, which has awakened the
enthusiasm of a third of a human race, arose as a protest
against theism and immortality. In such instances there
would appear to have been reactions against previous,
theologies, which had so absorbed mankind in metaphysics
and' speculations about the future as to belittle this life and
cause neglect of this world. Despised and degraded nature
avenged this wrong by making asceticism its own
destruction, and worldliness a source of strength and
*
survival.
Some such Nemesis seems to be following
the extreme other-worldliness which, for so many Christian
centuries, has bestowed the fruits of human toil upon
supposed supernatural interests. This earthward swing of
the slow pendulum of faith is not likely to be arrested
until religion has been thoroughly humanised. As a
brave clergyman (Rev. Harry Jones) warned the Church
Congress at York, the Church will never conquer
Secularism, except by doing more for mankind than
Secularism does.
■ '
We must almost remember that no oscillations of the
pendulum between theology and humanity, no reactions,
determine the question. As Old Testament Secularism
* As it is said in Ecclesiasticus: “ He has also set worldli
ness in their heart, which man cannot understand the works
that God does, from beginning to end.”—Dr. Kalisch’s
Translation.
�(
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)
followed Egyptian Mysticism, Talmudic visions of heaven
} succeeded. Every ebb alternates with a flow in the tides
I of human feeling; and these tides are the generations which
I nature successively creates to fufil successive conditions,
and to find their joy in such fufilment, whatever be the
despair of the ebbing at faith of the flowing tide.
: But, no doubt, these rising and falling ages of speculation
| and religion will show calmer and happiei' phenomena in
the future than in the past. There are traces in the earth
i of tremendous operations in the past, which geology
I was unable to account for by any forces now acting,
until Astronomy discovered that the Moon had been
[ steadily receding from the earth, its mother. The moon
i is now 240,000 miles away, but is proved to have bien
t once only 40,000 miles distant. At that period the tides
were to the tides of our time as 216 to 1. This country
1 and many others must then have been flooded with every
tide, and the enormous geologic results are now under
stood. There would appear to be some correspindence in
I all this with mental and moral phenomena. In religious
! geology also there are traces of convulsions and huge
formations which it has been difficult to account for,—
mighty religious wars, massacres, whole races committing
I slow suicide for the sake of their Gods. Comparative
I studies now show that the lunar theology was much nearer
J to mankind then than now, and the tides more furious.
« The extraneous influence is withdrawing more and more.
] Where theologians used to burn each other they now fight
j combats with pens. Where heretics were massacred they
1
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are now only visited with dislike. Instead of crusades,,
with Richard and Saladin, we have young poets singingon the crest of a sparkling tide, and their elder, from
refluent waves, murmuring rhythmic Despair. There isa vast difference between the emotions awakened
by belief in a deity near at hand, pressing down upon the
life, and those awakened by a hypothetical deity of
philosophy or ethics. When men attributed their every
hourly hap, good or bad, to the personal favour or to the
anger of their deity, their feeling at any supposed affront
to their deity, mingled with selfishness and terror, rose to
a pitch very different from any now known when few
men refer any event to supernatural intervention. Yet
do the great movements of the universe go on, the cycles
and the periods fufil themselves, the planets roll on new
orbits with changed revolutions; and, whatever be the
corresponding changes in human opinion, they cannot alter
the eternal fact.
If immortality be the law of the universe, it will be
reached by believers and disbelievers alike. But, could
the world be made absolutely certain of it beforehand, by
the only means of certainty—scientific proof—what were
the advantage ? It would no longer be a miraculous thing
promising all a leap from earthly sorrow to heavenly
bliss, but merely a law of nature—mere continuance—the
millions rising from their graves to go on with existence,
just as they will rise from their beds to-morrow. There
would be no further note of despair from the Laureates ;
but how would it be with the general world ? One of the
�most powerful poems of our time has been written by a
French lady, Louise Ackermann. It is entitled “Les
Malheueux”—the Unhappy. The last day has come ; the
trumpet has sounded. A great angel descends ; uncovers
all the graves of the dead, and bids them come forth for
everlasting life. Some eagerly come forth, but a large
number refuse. To the divine command that they shall
emerge, their voice is heard in one utterance. They tell
him they have had enough of life in His creation ; they
have passed through thorns, and over flinty paths—from
agony to agony. To such an existence He called them—
they suffered it; and now they will forgive Him only if
He will let them rest, and forget that they have lived.
Such is the despair with which one half of the world,
might answer the joy of the other should a mere natural
immortality be proved.
A great deal of the poetry of the world has invested
with glory man’s visions of heaven and heavenly beings.
The very greatest poets have invested nature and theearth with glory, and set the pulses of the human heart
to music. This has been the greatness of Homer, Shake
speare, Goethe. But the majority have given the world
visions of heaven, divine dramas, and hymns of immor
tality ; and it is these that have been taught to earth’s
millions in their infancy. These happy hymns have for
ages soothed sorrowing hearts, and helped the masses of
mankind to bear the burthens of life—this not only in
Christendom, but in so-called Pagan lands and ages.These have been as the songs of Israfel in Eastern faith.
�(
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They said a sweet singer among the angels left heaven to
go forth over the suffering world and soothe mortals with
his heavenly lyre and his hymns, until all were able to
Tear the griefs of life because of the joys beyond,
rehearsed by Israfel. But once—while this angel was
.singing with his celestial seven-stringed lyre—one string
of it snapped. No one could be found to mend the string
-or supply its place; and, every time Israfel tried to make
music, it was all jangling discords, through that broken
string. So Israfel took his flight, and never returned to
the world. The tale sounds like a foreboding of what has
in these last days befallen the sacred poetry which so long
made the world forget its griefs. The lyre of Israfel is
the human heart, and the snapped string is its faith in a
supernatural heaven. It has been snapped by the
development of nature ; it therefore cannot be restored
unless by a further development: and so Sacred Poetry
has taken its flight from the world—its last great song
being of a Paradise Lost. In other words, the hope of
immortality has ceased to have power to soothe and
uplift those who most needed it, because the recognized
reign of law forbids belief that such life—should it come
—would be very different from the life that uow is.
*
But there is another story of a broken string, with a
■different ending. It comes from Greece (Browning
has finely told it in The Two Poets of Croisic), the land
of Art and of the Beauty that adorns the earth. It is of
a bard who came with his lyre to sing for a prize. He
-came with other competitors before the solemn judges.
�The others had all sung their poems ; now came our youth,
with his. His theme rose high and higher, till at length
he came to the great theme of his song—Love. Just then
he felt beneath his finger that one string of his lyre had
snapt, a string that presently must do its part, or else his
song be put to shame. On, on, his strain went, as if to
its death ; but just as he drew near his note’ of Despair,
lo, a cricket chirped loud, chimed in with just that needed
note ! Saved, he went on, and ever as he returned to this
broken string the cricket duly made good the snapt string,
and thus the judges missed no note of the music, which
won the crown. On the poet’s statue was carved the
cricket which contributed from the lowly hearth the
needed note in that hymn of Love, when the old string
had broken. That tale too, I doubt not, came out of that
truest of all poets, the human heart. For the heart of our
race is aged in such experiences as those which elicit
rhymes of Despair. It has seen beautiful symbols fade in
myriads ; symbols of heavens innumerable, every one
clung to by suffering Egyptians, Persians, Greeks, as
much as any Christian clings to their successors. It has
seen troops of bright gods and goddesses perish, nymphs
and fairies leaving wood and vale desolate ; and yet, just
as its gladdest heart-string has snapt, its faith in heaven
given way, some cheery note from the earth has come to
remind it of the love near at hand, of the divine joy van
ished from its ancient heavens only to be revealed at the
hearth.
A cricket-chirp ! That is all. While our great Laureate
�(
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is employing his art to sing of despair, and other poets
aspire to ambitious themes, the notes are as yet but few
and humble, which cheer man with a trust in the love that
is near him. But there are such notes making up for the
•creed’s snapt string. Nor are they near only the happy.
The cricket sings from many an overshadowed hearth. It
tells the heart to be brave, and never count life lost so
long as courage remain. It bids man cease thinking so
much about himself—whether he be likely to die next year,
or die for ever—and go fall in love with something, an
out-self; to dispel morbid meditations. It warns us not to
worry over what may never happen, or, if it happen, may
be for the best, but turn to make what paradise we can on
•earth ; nor admit into it the destroyer of every paradise,
■care about the morrow, or about the far future. All these
spiritual despairs are diseases of the imagination. In a
sense, it is hereditary disease. For many generations our
ancestors employed their imaginations for little else than
to realise the charnal-house and picture happiness or
horrors beyond it. So their children have inherited a
morbid tendency of imagination, whereby they may turn
from the happiness they have and make themselves
miserable with dreams about its vanishing. Such work of
the imagination is illegitimate. Imagination is the
brightest angel of the head, as Love is of the heart; they
are twin angels and their office is to make life rich and
beautiful. And they can so enrich and adorn life, though
passed in a hovel, though amid pain, though destined to
end for ever, provided they be not dismissed from their
�(
W )
d post of present duty and sent wandering through clouds
c# to find love’s objects, or digging into graves to find life’s
ul fountain. I love and admire our Laureate for his great
heart and his beautiful art, but will not follow his muse,
nJ singing of Despaii, except with a hope that it is his way
i of writing its epitaph. I will follow the happy minstrel.
That poet who shows life to be environed with beauty,
makes deserts blossom in his song, whose poem is a
fountain of joy for all the living, bringing forgetfulness
to pain, and a sweet lullaby for the dying—that shall be
J my poet. And if, among the minstrels of our time, such
sihappy ones connot be found, because some string of faith
.for heart is snapped, then let us listen to the cheery
if cricket, to the voices of children, to the gentle words of
..S affection, to the unbroken song of the merry hearts in
..1 nature that remember only its loveliness. We will listen
eg to these until the new Poetry shall arise—as arise it will
I-with fresh songs, to bid all spirits rejoice in that which
) the old brought despair. That is the task of Poetry
ad Art. Every new thing destroying the old brings
espair; none brought more than Christianity—shatterlg the fair gods, and Protestantism—over whose havoc of
rayers and pieties Luther’s poor wife wept; but Poetry
id Art did their work, and none now long for restoration
f Aphrodite or Madonna. So also shall our age of
:ience find its poets and artists, and our children shall no
ore long for a buried faith than we for the holy dolls of
•umbled altars, whose power to charm has fled.
�SOUTH PLACE CHAPEL
WORKS TO BE OBTAINED IN THE LIBRARY.
BY M. D. CONWAY, M.A.
Prices.
s. d.
Demonology and Devil-lore............................
The Wandering Jew ...
Thomas Carlyle
........................................ .
The Sacred Anthology : A Book of Ethnical Scriptures
Idols and Ideals
The Earthward Pilgrimage ...
Republican Superstitions
............................
Christianity ....
Human Sacrifices in England
Sterling and Maurice...
Intellectual Suicide.........................................
The First Love Again
...
................
...
Entering Society
.........................................
The Religion of Children
The Criminal’s Ascension
The Religion of Humanity ...
• ••
The Rising Generation
A Last Word
Thomas Carlyle
The Oath and its Ethics
.............................
...£1 3 4
...
5 0
...
5 0
... 10 0
...
6 0
..
5 0
...
2 6
...
1 6
1 0
0 2
...
0 2
...
0 2
...
0 2
...
0 2
0 2
..
0 2
...
0 2
...
0 2
...
0 2
... .02
BY Mr. FREDERIC
“ Pantheism and Cosmic Emotion ”...
...
0 2
..
0 2
HARRISON
BY Dr. ANDREW WILSON.
The Religious Aspects of Health ................
BY A J. ELLIS, B.A., F.R.S., &c.,
Salvation
......................................................
Truth...................................................................
Speculation......................................................
Duty...................................................................
The Dyer’s Hand
.........................................
Comte’s Religion of Humanity
................
...
...
...
...
...
...
BY W. C. COUPLAND, M.A.
...
The Conduct of Life ...
Hymns and Anthems
............................
&C.
...
...
2
2
2
2
2
4
...
...
...
0
0
0
0
0
0
...
0 2
Is., 2s., 3s-
REPORT OF THE CONFERENCE OF LIBERAL THINKERS,
1878
...............................................................................
1 0
�
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Victorian Blogging
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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The life and death of Garfield: a discourse before the South Place Religious Society, September 25 1881
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Conway, Moncure Daniel, 1832-1907 [1832-1907]
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Place of publication: London
Collation: 23 p. ; 15 cm.
Series title: South Place Discourses
Notes: Printed by Frederic G. Hickson & Co., London. List of works to be obtained in the Lending Library of South Place Chapel at end of pamphlet. Part of Morris Miscellaneous Tracts 2.
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[South Place Religious Society]
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[1881]
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T341
G4887
G3351
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James A. Garfield
Sermons
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The life and death of Garfield: a discourse before the South Place Religious Society, September 25 1881), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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English
Assassination
Conway Hall Ethical Society
James Abram Garfield
Morris Tracts
Sermons
South Place Chapel
-
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3b
A DISCOURSE
ON THE
PRESENCE OF GOD,
DELIVERED BY
Professor F. W. NEWMAN,
AT THE
FREE CHRISTIAN CHURCH, CROYDON, LONDON.
PUBLISHED
BY THOMAS
SCOTT,
11 THE TERRACE, FARQUHAR ROAD, UPPER NORWOOD,
LONDON, S.E.
1875.
Price Threepence.
�LONDON:
PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE IHLTENEY STREET,
HAYMARKET, W.
�THE
PRESENCE
OF
GOD.
“Thus saith the high and. lofty One that inhabiteth eternity,
whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with
him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the
spirit of the humble and the heart of those that are contrite. ”
—Isaiah lvii. 15.
O undervalue knowledge and learning never can
be wise; nor do we undervalue them in saying
that moral qualities and strong common sense are of
more avail for religious wisdom than any special or
scholastic attainments. How indeed could religion
be an affair for all men on any other condition ?
Nevertheless, as the mind of nations has grown, so
has the grandeur of their ideas concerning God. The
eye of man takes in at a glance the vast interval from
this earth to a brilliant star; hence it is easy for a
savage to conceive of God as sitting- in the heavens,
and yet seeing and watching the deeds of mankind.
The early Hebrews had not reached the idea that God
is present here, and everywhere on earth, as much as
in heaven. They certainly supposed him to have a
peculiar dwelling-place in the sky. But the master
of a house, who sits in the principal chair and can
give orders to all who sit or stand in the same room,
may be said to be present in every part of that roopi,
in which nothing escapes his eye or his authority. In
the same manner, ancient men represented to them
selves the universal presence of God, without resign
ing the imagination that he has a local throne and is
surrounded by a special circle of ministering spirits.
The moral effect of such belief is nearly the same as
that which we now regard as more correct. If the
T
�6
'
The Presence of God.
Supreme Spirit knows everything that goes on every
where—if, also, his power (or, as the ancients called
it, his hand) reaches to every spot, the result to us is
just that of his universal presence.
All ancient peoples imagined the Heaven in which
God dwelt to be uZo/Z, over our heads. Locally, as
well as morally, he was to them the High and Lofty
One. The grosser idea that he had some definite shape
was at an earlier period effaced among the Hebrews
by the belief that he was ever shrouded in a luminous
cloud. To this the Apostle Paul alludes, when he
entitles God “ the Blessed and Only Potentate, who
only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no
man can approach unto ; whom no man hath seen,
nor can see.” This is a splendid advance on the mean
ideas of God set forth in Genesis and Exodus, and in
every moral aspect is as noble and pure a representa
tion as any that we can now attain. Yet a modifica
tion has been made inevitable by the discoveries of
modern science. We know, beyond contradiction,
that we are living on the surface of a globe; that,
when a ship sails from England to the Cape of Good
Hope, the stars overhead change, week by week; the
mid-day sun rises higher and higher, being at first to
the south, but at length right overhead, and afterwards
is left to the north ; also, that if the voyage be con
tinued to Australia and New Zealand, the opposite
side of our globe is at length reached. The stars
which are above our head are beneath their feet. If
Tartarus, or the region of the Dead, were, as the
ancients supposed, immeasurably deep, then our Tar
tarus would be to the dwellers in New Zealand Heaven,
and their Heaven would be our Tartarus. Thus, to
mankind at large, no one direction is up or down, and
it becomes an arbitrary fancy to fix the divine abode
in one part of the heavenly vault rather than in
another. Moreover, science has discovered that the
stars are at distances from us vastly diverse ; that the
�The Presence tfGod.
7
nearest star is prodigiously more remote from us than
is our own sun; and that the idea of a blue crystal
vault in which sun and stars are fixed is a mere illu
sion of the eye. We now understand that God is
not more immediately present in one point of space
than in another, but, wherever we are—in this chapel
or in a private chamber—we are for ever in God’s
immediate presence, for ever in God’s own Heaven.
There are many who speak with shuddering of
Death, as a passing into the immediate presence of
God. Dear friends, the shudder is certainly need
less. Solemn the thought must be, happy it ought
to be, that God is here, and that you cannot get
nearer to him by dying. Many talk of the flesh as
a curtain that hides him from us. Only in so far as
the flesh is able to distract, to dull, to defile the spirit,
can that statement be true. But God certainly is not
the less present when our eyes are blinded to the fact
of his presence. Man differs from man, and each of
us differs from himself, in vividness of conception that
God is present; and on this vividness largely depends
the energy of spiritual life. In the Sermon on the
Mount, according to Matthew, Jesus is reported to
say, “ Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see
God; ” but in the Arabic translation (which of all
modern tongues comes nearest in genius to the
Hebrew in which he spoke), the verb is in the pre
sent tense : “ Blessed are the pure in heart, for they
have vision (or insight) of God; ” and to me this
carries conviction.
Akin to this thought, though
not identical, are the epithets in the passage with
which I opened, where the prophet makes the High
and Holy One say, “ I dwell with him who is of a
contrite and humble spirit.” Moral conditions are
primarily needed by those who believe in a Holy God,
that they may be able to live in a realization of his
presence. The Hebrew prophet seems to have be
lieved, on the one hand, that God sympathizes with
�8
The Presence of God.
those who are crushed in body or soul, and, on the
other hand, that the consciousness of his presence is
not a terror, but a comfort, to the afflicted. It
revives their heart. And, without further discussing
what he meant by contrite, we may from this point of
view examine the subject.
What makes the thought of a Holy God terrible ?
Perhaps it will be replied, The consciousness of sin.
That is partly true, yet it is not the whole truth. If
sin mean only moral imperfection, sin is our state for
ever. “ God putteth no trust in his servants, and
his angels he chargeth with folly”—says the poet in
the Book of Job. Surely it is not a sense of imper
fection, but a sense of hostility, that makes the near
ness of a mighty superior painful. The humble man
may perhaps think himself not only lower than the
lowest of all saints, but guiltier than many a pro
fligate ; nevertheless, if he be contrite in heart, he
hates his own iniquity, he longs for holiness, while
he knows himself unholy; hence the thought of the
Holy God revives his heart, and the consciousness of
that purifying presence is a delight. With this har
monizes that utterance of Jesus, “ The pure of heart
have vision of God.” We see most distinctly that
for which we look eagerly.
The life of religion is not opposed to nature;
rather, it is in fullest accordance with our best nor
mal state. Yet it certainly is not natural, in the
sense of coming easily or without effort to the
individual or to the race. Mankind through long
ages had a dim perception of the superior Power in
which it unhesitatingly believed, and went through
various forms of absurd opinion and wild fancy, the
vulgar through ignorance, or the poets through
wilfulness, spoiling the best thoughts of more earnest
meditators.
Thus numerous fantastic religions,
which we now call Pagan, arose, some with many
noble elements predominant; but in most the baser
�Phe Presence of God,
9
•and sillier fancies swamped the better thoughts.
Very slowly indeed has mankind collectively moved
towards more reasonable notions of the divine exist
ence and character. Moreover a constant tendency
displays itself to degeneracy and retrogression into
old error, so that the latest stages of each creed are
apt to be the worst. These facts have occurred on a
very wide scale, and scarcely can be mistaken.
Maturity of mind, which combines sobriety with active
thought, is needed as an intellectual condition for a
reasonable theology; also, if national morals be in a
degraded state, the same degradation will appear in
the religious notions. We now inherit the net results
of at least four thousand years’ mental history; yet
not very many among us can wholly avoid the puerile
errors of the past. At the same time, individuals
often pass through a special history of their own,
ere they can attain for themselves practical results
from the notions which they theoretically receive. I
do not speak of those who are content with a reli
gion that rests in the head ; nor may I digress con
cerning others who are disquieted by superstitious
error. But, apart from all these, some of us are
strongly impressed with the conviction, that, if man
alone of earthly beings has a discernment of God, man
cannot be without moral relations to God. Then follows
the question, What are those moral relations ? and
the individual perhaps asks, “Wherein does my per
ception that Grod is my Crod, affect my life ? ” I call
your close attention to this deeply practical question.
No two human minds are quite alike, and the
richer the soil the more various is the plant. But
though the course by which religion is developed and
practically established probably differs in all, yet all
these have in common a deep sense that religion is
not a mere theory of the intellect, but is a state of
heart pervading the whole life. Many go through a
process which the old divines call, “ Seeking after
�io
The Presence of God.
God,” while the heart is inwardly striving to ascer
tain its due moral relation to him, and keep up a
happy perception of his near presence. Each of us
can but guess at the pains or pleasures in other souls;
nevertheless it is reasonable to believe, that, unless
some moral frailty darken and distort the inward
actions, this solemn seeking after God will have its
appropriate delight. A Hebrew Psalm seems to
allude to it with beautiful simplicity. “ O Lord,
when thou saidst, ‘ Seek ye my face,’ my heart
replied, ‘ Thy face, Lord ! will I seek.’ ” How child
like and straightforward! No artificial straining,
no distraction by bashfulness, no alarm at God’s
immeasurable grandeur; but, as the philosopher
believes that Man has natural relations to Infinite
Truth, and that the universe (as it were), calls aloud,
inviting us to the study, so the practical worshipper of
the Most High believes that man has natural rela
tions with him, and that the Infinite One virtually
invites his finite creature to fellowship and intimacy.
This is that, which religious people call the Spirit
of God moving witbin them. They know not what
impels them, some day, to address the Unseen Pre
sence as a child speaks to a father. It appears an
impulse not their own. When innocent instinct per
vades an entire race, we do not ascribe it to the
individuals of the race, but to the Author of their
nature: much more then the nobler movements of
the soul, so far as they are normal to man, may not
unreasonably be called the workings of God within
us. Hence, says Paul, God has sent forth the spirit
of sonship into our hearts. Ordinarily this is the
result of the heart’s full surrender to God as the
centre of all righteousness. When we deliberately
judge that the highest virtue is man’s best portion
and that all sin is shameful and miserable, then the
law of the Spirit is to us perfect freedom; a righteous
God becomes a lovely object, and our'earnest aspira
�The Presence of God.
Ii
tion is that his holy fire may burn out all our unholi
ness. This desire is the germ of perfect peace; for,
our will being subdued to God’s will, the sense of his
nearness is delightful; and inevitably with it the
faith springs up, that the holy will of God must
triumph over human sin. No one who is conscious
that his will is on God’s side, can dread the thought
of God’s immediate presence; and the belief of our
direct moral relations with him is likely to grow up
into gradually increasing strength with inward exer
cises of the heart in this communion.
Does any one present say, that such thoughts are
too lofty,—are mystical,—are fanciful ? If I could
for a moment'believe them fanciful, if I did not deem
them to be words of entire soberness, I could not
utter them here ; but that they are mystical, I freely
concede. Spiritual religion is nothing, if it be not
mystical. To walk as seeing him who is invisible, to
be conscious that God is in us, and that we have our
life in him, is essentially mystical and mysterious ;
yet not the less true and certain. Of God himself
we can only speak by metaphor and analogy, because
our primitive vocabulary is made for things of sense,
and is only gradually added to, as experience in things
supersensible accumulates. If any one wants a reli
gion which is developed out of, and measured by,
Physical Science, he can get it; but it will have no
element of spirituality, no relation to human morals,
and will be of no concern whatever for daily life, any
more than a theory concerning Gravitation or Elec
tricity. But if Religion is to be a universal and
moral bond, its very nature is inward, spiritual, mys
tical; but not the less,—nay, so much the more,
accessible and important to every human soul. If
we were to allege that “ Religion is the true poetry
of life,” we should misrepresent it; yet in common
with poetry and all high Art it must have a mystical
element.
�12
The Presence of God.
Sound religion never can delude us into the immo
ralities of fanaticism: for it does not prescribe and
dominate the law of morals, but is dominated thereby.
Moral law rests on the universal reason of mankind,
and prescribes to religion. True religion submits to
this law, not accounting i't a yoke or a burden, but a
basis, and a purpose for which we are made and live.
On this critical point depends its perfect sobriety.
The very idea of a Holy God (whether primitively
Egyptian or Hebrew or Persian or Buddhist, let an
tiquarians settle), distinguishes the noble tradition
which Christians, Jews, Mohammedans, andBrahmoes
honour, from the defective counterfeit. “ Thus saith
the high and lofty One whose name is Holy.” Neither
to the Pagan nor to the mere Physical philosopher is
the supreme Power a Holy Spirit. But when we
cannot conceive of God himself but as in harmony
with moral law, much more do we regard subjection
to moral law as our own noblest and best state ; and
this is the fit interpretation of the words: “ Be ye
holy, for I am holy.” No inward impressions, ima
gined to be divine, must be adduced as dictating to
us right and wrong. Only when we know our in
ward suggestions to be intrinsically good, can we
presume to attribute them to the Father of Lights,
from whom cometh down every good and perfect gift.
Such is the sufficient reply to those who dread lest
spiritual impetus dictate some new and false morality.
A vivid sense of God’s presence cannot alter our
tranquil estimate of the right and the wrong in
human action. It leaves our code of morals wholly
undisturbed. It does but stimulate us to act up to
our highest convictions of right, and brace us up
(where needful) to brave self-sacrifice.
In this
respect it is comparable to the presence of a revered
and elder friend: at least the comparison makes it
easy to understand the moral influence of this sub
lime faith. If our creed no longer comprizes many
�The Presence of God.
i3
matters believed by pious men of old, still for us as
for them remains the truth, that a life of religion is a
life of faith. Still, as ever, it conduces to the eleva
tion of man by exercising him in the noblest sorrows
and the loftiest joys, while it tends also to maintain
him in that imperturbable state which Stoicism ad
mired, without any danger of losing tenderness. A
hitter and painfully true complaint has of late been
uttered against certain physical and metaphysical phi
losophers, that with Reverence towards God they had
lost Mercy towards Brutes, even while maintaining that
the human race is derived from brute progenitors.
But if we love and'trust in a glorious and holy God,
who, though he be the lofty One that inhabiteth
eternity, yet by his in-dwelling revives every contrite
and weak soul of man,—how can we but feel tenderly
towards those who are weaker than ourselves ? Nay,
love to the Unseen and Mighty One is so much harder
than compassion to those whom we see, that the
higher attainment pre-supposes the lower; insomuch
that John the Elder asks, How shall a man who loves
not his brother whom he hath seen, love God whom
he hath not seen ?
Let no one then suppose that religion is or ever
could be an affair of opinions and notions, whether
concerning historical facts, physics, or metaphysics,
any more than it can consist in the endless genea
logies and old wives’ fables at which good Paul scoffs.
What we need is a heart harmonized to our highest
attainable morality, devoted to justice and mercy, and
thereby to tenderness and purity; a heart thus pre
pared to rejoice in the belief of a holy God, and
esteeming his approbation more than all worldly
objects. Through all the devotional Hebrew litera
ture which has been esteemed sacred, and equally in
the Christian Scriptures, a remarkable metaphor is
stereotyped. The light of God's countenance is identi
fied with the highest spiritual joy. That which the
�14
The Presence of God.
eye cannot' see, faith alone sees. Thus, to behold the
face of God is the bliss of Heaven itself, and is sup
posed to have a transforming effect on the beholder.
“We shall be like him ; for we shall see him as he
is.” “I shall behold thy face in righteousness: I
shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness.”
So deep, fervent, and continuous for more than 2000
years has been the conviction, that mentally to see and?
know God is both the highest bliss and the. most
purifying influence. Have we not here an instructive
assurance that my present topic is one of sober reality,
not of flighty and personal fantasy F Brethren andi
sisters of my own age, we have not long to abide in
this tabernacle of flesh ; we are ripe for the supremacy
of the spirit. It is high time for us to stay our souls
on the thought of the Eternal. And oh ye who areeither in full maturity or in the dawn of life, receive
kindly the word of exhortation. We have inherited
a vast series of noble and instructive experiences,
chiefly of Jews and Christians, most diverse in detail,,
but agreeing notably in the simple faith that God isholy, just, and tender, and that to live in a daily sense
of his presence is to walk by faith, and enter into
intimate relation with him. Such communion cannot
be long together conscious, nor would that be health
ful ; for it would impede our practical duties, to man,
which (in my judgment) are the end for which we
exist. But the remembrance of God ought to be the
happy home, to which the secret heart naturally falls
back in the intervals of duty and business. Ourstrength for self-sacrifice and our buoyancy on the
waves of life, the soundness of our moral judgments
and the nobleness of our characters, can hardly fail of
being increased, when we habitually take delight in a
tranquil sense that God is within us and around us..
Cultivate this heavenly intimacy in your secret
moments, and your reward from it will be great. A
�The Presence of God.
15
Hebrew Psalmist of old, in his own peculiar dialect,
expressed this thought energetically :—
“ Justice and Judgment are the habitation of thy throne:
Mercy and Truth go before thy face.
Blessed is the people that know this joyful tiding :
They shall walk, 0 Lord, in the light of thy countenance.
In thy name shall they rejoice all the day,
And in thy righteousness shall they be exalted.”
Let me, in conclusion, quote side by side the words
of our poet Cowper, where he speaks, not as a sec
tarian Christian, but as uttering the essence of
Christianity:—
“ But oh! Thou bounteous giver of all good,
Thou art of all thy gifts thyself the crown.
Give what thou wilt, without thee we are poor,
And with thee rich, take what thou wilt away.”
Such, in my vehement conviction, is to be the Reli
gion of the Future.
PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREET, HAYMARKET.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Pamphlet
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Title
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A discourse on the presence of God
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Newman, Francis William [1805-1897]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 15 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Delivered by Professor F.W. Newman, at the Free Christian Church, Croydon, London. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Printed by C.W. Reynell.
Publisher
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Thomas Scott
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1875
Identifier
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CT132
Subject
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Sermons
God
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (A discourse on the presence of God), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
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Text
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English
Conway Tracts
Metaphysics
Spiritual Life
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Text
CT Iq
RELIGIOUS DIFFERENCES:
A SERMON PREACHED AT
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GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET,
AND AFTERWARDS READ AS A PAPER ^BEFORE
THE
LONDON DIALECTICAL SOCIETY,
BY THE
EEV. MAURICE DAVIES, D.D.,
Author of “Orthodox,” “Unorthodox,” and “Heterodox London,” &c.,&c.
MEDIO TUTI88IMUS IBIS.
KENSINGTON:
JAMES WAKEHAM, BEDFORD TERRACE, CHURCH STREET.
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St. Luke xii. 51.
“ Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth ? I
tell you nay, but rather division.”
For those who are disposed to take a sentimental
view of religion, it must be infinitely distressing to find
that the revelation of Jesus Christ has not proved that
complete panacea for all evils social and theological
which their own a priori principles laid down that it
ought to be. Peace on earth was the anticipatory
announcement of the Coming Man. Not Peace, but a
Sword, his own account of his mission, more than
borne out by the event. Before he came there was
that stagnation which men artificially make and mis
name Peace. Since that time they have ever been
ready to fight and slay one another for their religion.
Every new era of Reformation has been a fresh
development of odium theologicum, until the old
encomium is quite reversed, and people cry out “ See
how these Christians hate one another;” and on the
Augustinian principle, but with a new meaning, the
seed of every evolution in Church development has
been the blood of martyrs. Every Reformer from
�Christ himself to the Wesleys has realised this. The
method and measure only of their misery has differed :
the principle that inflicted it was identical. The
Scribes and Pharisees crucified Christ. The Bishop of
Lincoln erases from the tombstome of a dead child the
title which courtesy awarded to its Wesleyan father.
In proportion to the purity of their faith have men
been prone to
Prove their doctrines orthodox
By apostolic blows and knocks ;
and to
Call fire, and sword, and desolation,
A godly, thorough Reformation.
Along with general progress, religious stagnation
has had the tendency to pass into its violent antithesis,
and in both cases, general and special, has humanity
been the gainer. Only in proportion as it has caught
the contagion has religion in any degree seemed not
to deserve the stigma cast upon it by Mr. Buckle of
being the static as opposed to the dynamic force in
SocietyIt may be edifying, and certainly will not be unin
teresting to trace in one or two typical cases this con
dition of human stagnation met by what we are bold
to call the genuine revulsion of Christian Faith and
Energy, and collaterally to notice some of those Com-
�5
promises by which the ingenuity of man tries to over
ride the great principle “ Not Peace but Division ” —
the quieta non movere method which is characteristic of
so great a portion of modern orthodoxy.
In the Jewish Synagogue ■ t the date of the
Christian era, degenerated though it was held to be
from the perfect centralisation of the Temple pure and
simple, we have an admirable picture of full-blown
Sacerdotalism, which the recent lectures of Dr.
Benisch, at St. George’s Hall, only amplified in more
minute details without questioning the vraisemblance o^
the New Testament account. The result was, to a great
extent, the stagnation we spoke of. True, the Pharisees
were disposed to carry things with a high hand; they
were the Ritualists of' the hour; while Broad Church
men in the shape of Sadducees spread into the very
highest quarters doctrines which seemed to spiritualise
away a good deal of the antique Faith and olden dis
cipline. But on the whole the Jewish Church repre
sented to a very satisfactory extent that artificial Peace
which the Sacerdotalism of every age creates and pro
nounces “Very good; ” and, in complete opposition to
this came the system of Christ. Aiming in the Judaean
Ministry at being nothing more than a reformation
and expansion of Judaism to meet the growing needs
of humanity, it was driven by the fulminations of the
Sanhedrim into fierce revolution out among the
�G
Galilaean hills, and finally culminated in the fatal
mistake of Calvary.
Here we have the two poles in extreme opposition.
On one side the established faith, with its prestige of
centuries, its delicate nuances of theological opinion
just to relieve the monotony of Infallibility—on tlie
other the levelling* doctrines of Nazareth branded with
the stigma of Golgotha.
Between these two came the accommodations and
compromises which some pretend to find even in St.
Paul himself—in the anathemas hurled at the Corin
thian Church, and at those who questioned his personal
apostleship; and which certainly were discernible in the
constant efforts of well-meaning heretics to drag the
Christian schism back into the respectable position of a
Jewish sect.
And so History repeats itself. Sown in the blood
of martyrs, established by the policy of Constantine,
developed in the east and west by the finesse of
Patriarchs and Popes, the Christian Church stood
after fifteen centuries curiously in the same position
as the Jewish Synagogue had done—and just as that
had developed, in a precisely similar period, out of the
simple institutions of Sinai. The so-called Catholic
Church stood supreme in Western Europe, until Luther,
like a second Baptist, sounded his note of defiance
“ Repent,” “ Reformand again the reformation was
refused, the reformers were persecuted, and, in Eng-
�7
land, like another Galilee, the battle of Faith and Free
Thought seemed likely to be fought to the very knife.
When, lo! another compromise.
The Anglican
Church, under Royal Supremacy, threw herself into
the breach. It is no sort of disrespect to speak of
her thus as the result of a compromise. The fact
stands recorded in the very structure of her formularies
and articles, just as the successive changes in the
structure of the globe are written in the solemn letters
of the igneous and the stratified rocks. A fresh totality
was formed by the superposition of the new doctrines
on the antique faith. We can concede thus much with
out joining Mr. Froude to attribute all the cardinal
virtues to Henry VIII., as Head of the Church, or
wailing with the Church Times about “ the lamentable
schism of the sixteenth century.”
The Anglican
Church first, and the Protestant sects afterwards,
were efforts more or less respectable, more or less
graceful, more or less successful, to graft the new
opinions on the old trunk.
Our position as ministers and members of the Church
of England shows that we hold the Anglican Commun
ion to have a logical locus standi. What else counteracts
the centrifugal force which would otherwise drive us
off into the abysses of theological space, until we
reached the position of the Dialectical Society itself,
and accepted nothing save as the conclusion of a
syllogism ?
�8
But is not the same apparently inevitable mistake
being made over again,—the mistake of High Priest
and Sanhedrim as opposed to Christ, of Pope and
Cardinal as opposed to the Reformers ? Do not the
words of the Founder still stand good, “Nay, but
rather division
“ Not peace but a sword ?’’ We are
always trying to do away with Divisions—to wreathe,
prematurely and precociously, the Sword with the
Olive Branch.
On one side stereotyped Faith, on the other crude
Reason. On both sides Intolerance; on neither Con
ciliation—is not that a fair statement of what we see
around us ?
What shall we do then ? Try to eliminate either of
these opposed elements—the static or the dynamic?
As well seek for the Philosopher’s Stone or the Elixir
Vitae. As wisely think to ensure peace by suspending
either the centripetal or the centrifugal in the balanced
forces of the universe. From the collision of these
forces results the well-being of humanity, as the
symmetry of our planetary orbits.
Shall we, on the contrary, drift into an Epicurean
optimism, and say, Whatever is is best ? The alterna
tive would seem scarcely necessary. It is surely pos
sible to agree to differ. The endeavour to develope
Pure Faith is the Idol of the Churchman : to excise
Faith the Idol of the Philosopher (if we may borrow a
�9
Baconian term.) The supreme mistake is to carry into
science the dogmatisms of theology. The opposite
error, though not so fatal, palpably is erroneous, to
import into theology, which claims to be in some
degree a matter of d priori revelation, the purely
inductive method of science.
Is there no via media—no spicy equatorial zone
between these poles of Pure Faith and utter Free
Thought ? That is the problem we set ourselves so
wearily to solve in our Churches, Communities, and
Parties. The pervading error is that we all claim
finality. Each assumes to have ultimated truth : and,
worse than all, wants to call down fire from Heaven on
those who differ.
Surely here come in the words of the Master, “ Ye
know not what Spirit ye are of.”
Can any Christian read the posthumous work of
John Stuart Mill, or the recent utterances of Professor
Tyndall at Belfast, and say there is nothing in common
between true Theism and self-styled Materialism ?
On the other hand will those who make of the works
of the Philosophers what they accuse the Christians of
making of the Bible—will they deny the existence of a
missing link in science—a failure of Philosophy to
cover all the knowable ? Is it necessary to assume a
sort of mental emasculation in every one who accepts
anything on trust ? Is that not what Lord Lytton
�10
called “the most stubborn of all bigotries—the fanati
cism of unbelief? ” Such was scarcely the doctrine of
him who wrote on the Scientific use of the Imao-inao
tion thus :—“ The clergy of England—at all events the
clergy of London—have nerve enough to listen to the
strongest views which any one amongst us would care
to utter; and they invite, if they do not challenge,
men of the most decided opinions to state and stand
by those opinions in open court. No theory upsets
them. Let the most destructive hypothesis be stated
only in the language current among gentlemen, and
they look it in the face * * smiting the theory, if
they do not like it, with honest secular strength. In
fact the greatest cowards of the present dag are not to he
found among the clergy but within the pale of science
itself.”
The question of questions at the present hour is
whether it be not possible to elaborate something like
a Christian Positivism—the terms are not contradic
tory—which, accepting the broad basis of the Christian
Revelation, and leaving its extent undefined, should
range—not below, not above, but co-ordinately there
with the great demonstrations of science; making of
the revelations of faith and the facts of science, not
two discrepant books, but simply two volumes in the
Great Book of Nature—each, in the truest sense, a
Revelation, neither of the two (in the words of the
�11
Athanasian Creed) before or after the other, greater
or less than, the other. Is it chimerical to look for
such an issue of our divisions ?
Is it not, at all events more hopeful to seek thus to
utilise those inevitable divisions than to try to drill
men into an artificial and unreal unity either on the
side of implicit Faith or licensed Scepticism ?
Such utilitarianism is not—need it be said?—the
present tendency on either side. On the one hand
there stand the Dogma of Infallibility and the Vatican
Decrees which no special pleading in the world will
ever convince men to be anything like an extension of
Magna Charta; on the other there is what has been
clearly defined by its promulgator as not the atheistic
position which reluctantly doubts the existence of God,
but the antitheistic which dogmatically, and in the very
spirit of the Vatican Decrees, denies such existence—■
and still between these poles any number of com
promises good, bad, and indifferent, temperate,
tropical, and frigid.
It is for some such compromise we plead; and
therefore would not indiscriminately condemn all or
any, though neither would we lose sight of the fact
that they are compromises and accommodations. The
grand mistake is not the putting the new wine into
the old bottles (though that is proverbially a delicate
and dangerous experiment), but the insisting that the
�12
wineskins are intact when the wine is palpably spilt
before our eyes.
In all things charity: agreement to differ: the
simple logical processes of abstraction and generalisa
tion—are not these the methods by which we may get
at the essence of the Christian Faith and Morals ?
What, on the contrary, do we do ? Pass a Bill,
nominally to “ put down Ritualism,” but which will
certainly “ put down ” defects as well as excess of
rubrical orthodoxy, even if the “ putting down ” any
thing or anybody were not as much an anachronism in
the Reformed Church, as the excommunication of an
offender by Paul was alien from the spirit of him who
raised the sinful woman from the ground, and bade her
go and sin no more when none of her accusers were
found capable of casting a stone at her.
The infallibility which we look for in a Vatican
Decree, comes incongruously enough from Fulham or
Lambeth : and whereas the Catholic only holds infal
lible the decisions of Pius IX. given ex cathedra, we—
some of us—are disposed to accept as final all the
utterances of our Episcopate—the Fulham Code of
Morals—the Canterbury Standard of Faith (each no
doubt of the very purest kind),—the diatribes of Dr.
Wordsworth against race-horses, Wesleyan Ministers,
and Cremation ’
The cardinal clerical virtue at the present moment is
�13
holding one’s tongue—Tacere tutum est—the being
content to keep quiet: not to have “ views ” either in
the direction of Dr. Pusey or Bishop Colenso. What
a commentary on the elasticity of our Establishment is
the simultaneous presence of each of these dignitaries
within its comprehensive fold! Whoever gravitates
towards either of those poles is labelled in the Index
Expurgatorius of episcopal regards a “ dangerous man.”
But it is too late; there are others equally high in
dignity to those just mentioned, who have set the
fashion of speaking out, and the Muscular Christians
among our clergy are taking up the old battle cry from
Marmion :—
“ On, Stanley, on !”
And as with the priests, so with the people. They
are beginning to see that the assumption of authority
in a body whose very raison d'etre is the emancipation
of its adherents from Jewish and Roman bondage is
an incongruity and an anachronism. If they like
genuflexions and a full band in church, they feel they
have a right to them ; if moral essays and a shortened
service, who shall say them nay ? The question of
establishment or disestablishment is one more likely to
come from without than within; but already the myster
ious words of Mr. Miall, with reference to possibly
uncongenial allies of the Liberationist, point towards a
very novel reproduction of the junction between the
Pharisees and Herodians.
�14
Recognising, then, as we are taught on highest
authority to do, the supreme authority of the individual
conscience, we may still discern a work for the com
bined consciences of the many fused into sympathetic
union in churches, just as the individual duties and
rights of men run up into their social rights and duties
as citizens of a State; but we see no reason for churches
any more than nations claiming to represent mankind
exhaustively; and a judicious balance of power stands
far above any supremacy of one faith over another.
Our lots as Englishmen, whether in Church or State,
will, we venture to think, well bear comparison with
any; but it would be the poorest insularity to deem
that we exhaust excellence in either capacity. To
assume authority in a system which, whether we like it
or not, is the outcome of that schism of the sixteenth
century as well as the previous schism of the first, is as
incongruous as that aping of national supremacy which
too often renders our countrymen ridiculous when they
come into contact with other and more cosmopolitan
people.
It is thus I feel that without sacrificing one iota of
our individual convictions we may still comport our
selves courteously towards those forms of faith or
systems of discipline that differ even most widely from
our own, whether in the direction of sacerdotalism or
scepticism.
�15
The very fact—so travellers tell us—that at the
equator the sun is all the year overhead, and that
at the poles there is the wearisome monotony of the
one long day and dreary night, makes more enjoyable
the changes of our temperate climate—the long summer
days, the short grey winter evenings, the alternate
sunshine and rain—which things ” surely “ are an
allegory.”
Jaines Wakebam, Printer,4, Bedford Terrace, Church Street, Kensington.
�‘Wj
�
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The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Religious differences: A sermon preached at St. John the Baptist's, Great Marlborough Street, and afterwards read as a paper before the London Dialectical Society
Creator
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Davies, Maurice [Rev.]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: London
Collation: 15 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: Extensive annotations in pencil written upside down on title page and last printed page and blank page at the end. From the library of Dr Moncure Conway.
Publisher
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James Wakeham
Date
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[n.d.]
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CT5
Subject
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Sermons
Religion
Rights
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (Religious differences: A sermon preached at St. John the Baptist's, Great Marlborough Street, and afterwards read as a paper before the London Dialectical Society), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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Text
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English
Conway Tracts
Religion
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1f4e83b72db45fa16e3ad1bf523b3cfc
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Text
��*
A PIONEER CHURCH—A Sermon preached in Pioneer Hall, February 7, 1869, by REV. H.
W. BROWN, Minister of the First Unitarian Church of Sacramento.
Let us congratulate one another, friends, upon a new year of
our church. Let us be thankful that the “ lines are fallen unto ”
us in such “pleasant places?’ We may feel at home in Pioneer
Hall, for we are a Pioneer Church.
We are organized upon a principle which is in advance of the
practice of churches in general; the principle of union in the
spirit of religion without any formal expression of belief. We
are a church without a creed. The principle itself is not a new
one. We are not the first church to organize upon this basis,
but we are among the first; we are of those who have caught
the sound of the evangel before the main body, and who go
forward to prepare the way. It is pioneer work to remove ob
structions, to prepare the way for others. We remove the creed
from the threshold of the temple of worship, where we feel that
it has too long been an obstruction to fellowship in the spirit.
This will be called negative work. Is it negative work when
the pioneer cuts down and digs away, that there may be free
entrance to fair fields and broad rivers, so that willing multi
tudes may settle in the rich domain? Here are the “green
pastures” and “still waters” of Beligion—of reverent adora
tion and trust and communion, of kindly sympathy and humane
activity—-and many are kept from entering in and dwelling
joyously in company with their brethren and friends, by the re
quirement of assent to doctrinal statements of belief. Por our
selves, and for others so far as they choose to avail themselves
of our efforts, we do away with the obstacle. We found our
church on the basis of the religious purpose. We say to all : Do
you wish to unite with men and women to worship God and to
serve men ? we welcome you to our fellowship; to full fellow
ship, with all the privileges which any of us enjoy. We do not
ask what your beliefs are. We shall try to have the truth
preached among us from week to week, and we think you will
�believe that when you hear it; will very likely find it just what
you already believe, though you may not have admitted it to
yourself, or acted upon it.
Be it understood, however, that in doing away with creed we
are not doing away with belief. We are not saying that we
have no belief as individuals or as a church; we are not saying
that we think belief of no consequence. We think the belief of
the individual of so much consequence that we will not ask him
to surrender it, to limit it, to trim it in any manner, in order to
avail himself of the benefit of our fellowship or to give us the
advantage of his company. We thus recognize, we thus help
men to feel, the importance and the responsibility of individual
conviction. And as a church we have beliefs, beliefs implied in
the very purpose on which we are founded. We are united for
the Worship of God and the Service of Men. The worship of
God implies belief in God. And although it is impossible for
any one to express his whole thought about God, and none can
give satisfactory expression to the thought of others, it would
not be difficult, probably, to make some general statement about
the Divine Being and Character in which we should all agree.
That God is One, with various manifestations in nature and in
humanity; that His Spirit is in our minds and consciences and
hearts, and may be communed with there so as to be the strength
and joy of our lives; that He is good, too good to create any
being that shall by any possibility come to suffer eternal tor
ment; that the best names we can give him are Light, and Life,
and Truth, and Righteousness, and Love, and Father—I sup
pose all of us believe this about God. Why should we not say
so in a formal statement, and make it a platform on which all
who join us shall stand ? Because the platform is already under
us and does not require to be laid down; and because the laying
it down would give to belief a prominence which we wish, in a
religious organization, to give to religious purpose. We want
to emphasize the religious purpose as the main thing in a church.'
A belief may be a dead thing, but a purpose is a live thing. And
so we ask not Do you believe in God ? but Do you want to
worship Him ? If you do, we know you believe in him.
And the purpose to serve Men implies belief in men; belief
that men are worth serving. We believe in men as spiritual
beings; and we want to serve them as such by ministering to
�[3]
their spiritual nature. To that end we have prayer, and sing
ing, and preaching, and try to have it of a spiritual sort, such
as will do spiritual service to those who join in it. We believe
in men as moral beings; and we try to serve them as such by
moral education, by appealing to the sense of Eight in them, by
urging them to cultivate the conscience, by applying the laws
of Justice to practical affairs, and by pointing out the way of
Duty. We believe in men as social beings, and we try to serve
them as such by cherishing the social sentiment, in its deeper
and its lighter forms; by proclaiming Brotherhood and acting it
out as far as we can, by sympathy and help for one another and
for all within our range, and even by providing amusement and
entertainment of an innocent kind. And wTe believe in men as
rational beings, and we try to serve them as such by addressing
their reason, not endeavoring to exercise religious dominion
over them or authority upon them, which would be like the
princes of the Gentiles, though done by those who would be
great among the Christians. We believe in men after this fash
ion j that they are not so good but they need to be better, and
not so bad but they'may become good by the help of God and
men. But we have no dogma about their “ Fall,” or about their
rise and progress, which one must agree to before he can take
hold with us to keep them up and on. And so we enquire not
Do you believe in the Depravity of men, or their Regeneration
but do you want to serve them ? If you do, you believe enough,
at least to begin with.
We apply no test of character as a condition of membership
in our church, but we do not thereby imply that character is of
little consequence. If there is anything we are agreed on, I
suppose it is that character is of first consequence; that it is
more than belief, more than action. Belief is what a man thinks?
action what a man does, character what a man is. One may be
saved by “faith,” if his faith be such as to transform his char
acter ; one may be saved by “ works,” if his works induce in
him the righteousness of heart which did not spring up till he
forsook his bad ways and began to do right ; faith or works may
thus lead to salvation, but character is salvation. We do not
make it a condition of fellowship in our church, however, be
cause of the impossibility of our judging it accurately. We
can’t undertake to divide men into saints and sinners. We
�[4]
think if men are very bad they will not feel much at home with
us until they change for the better; and we are very sure that
if they resolve to do that, and try to do it, we can put up with
them if they can put up with us; for we all need that change*
As an organization we stand simply on the ground of the reli
gious purpose. That is the thread on which we are all strung;
not for us to say who of us are precious stones, who only beads
of glass; not to be determined by any profession of faith or
performance of ceremonial, but by the Lord of the hosts of
men, in the day when He makes up His jewels.
What makes us a pioneer church is that we organize the re
ligious spirit in its two-fold relation toward God and toward
men, without the ordinary obstacles of fellowship. We believe
a great deal—a great deal more than we could put into any
creed; but if people want to know what it is, we ask them to
come and hear oui’ preaching, or to talk with us as individuals.
We lay great stress on character, but whether our character is
good or not, people will judge for themselves.
We feel that we are really organizing religion by the method
we adopt. It seems to us that to lay down tests such as are
employed in most of the churches is, as has been well said, to
organize not religion but the negation of religion, viz -: “ exclu
siveness, limitation, privilege.” The profession of belief in cer
tain doctrines unites those, doubtless, who agree in those doc
trines and in professing them, but it separates them from others;
marks them off as distinct: and' all that “ union” can mean in
a Church which insists on belief in these doctrines as a condi
tion of fellowship is a union of those who thus believe, with
separation from those who believe differently. And the inevi
table differences of opinion must forever prevent the union
which Christians are so much desiring to secure. Opinion is
divisive; theological opinion as much as any. It makes sects,
that is, portions cut off from a main body. Religion means
“binding together.” The religious spirit would bind together
all who share it, and the church which would organize that
spirit should welcome all in w'hom that spirit moves. It is true
that, practically, differences of theological opinion, when they
are great, will prevent men from working together in a religious
organization; that, in fact, the members of any church will
agree in the main, and those who do not believe as they do will
�[5]
remain apart from them. But this very fact makes it unneces
sary to enact any exclusion. The centrifugal force of opinion
is strong enough without our pushing one another away in the
name of religion. Differences of political opinion often prevent
men from worshipping together, but would it be wise to make
a man’s politics a test of church membership ? Is that a very
different matter? Not so different, when the fact is that what
is called political opinion is sometimes a moral judgment, far
more intimately connected with religion than a question of
mere speculative theology or religious history. So also differ
ences of social position, of wealth, or of general culture, will
work in religious bodies, and people will be brought in or kept
out more or less by facts of this nature; but would it be the
part of religion to insist on any special degree or rank in such
matters ? It cannot be said that these are unimportant; they
are of more consequence than theological notions ovei’ which
churches have sometimes quarreled to the death. There are
circumstances in which it is of far more consequence to us what
a man’s tastes, habits, manners arc, than what arc his religious
professions. It is for those who would organize religion not to
encourage any of these divisive-tendencies, but to unite in the
central purpose of religion. This holds them together and does
not cut them off from others. Others may not come to them,
but the door is not shut against any, and none will be or will
feel excluded. The Church likes to be figured as an ark, in
which alone is safety in the flood of divine retribution that
sweeps over the earth. Is it for those who see men struggling
in the waters to say to them : “ Come in hither I This is your
only chance; but before you can be taken aboard you must
believe as we do; must believe that this ark was made by a
different process from anything else in the world, and out of
different timber, grown by miracle and put together by miracle.’’
And if those in the ark do act thus, is it strange, that the strong
swimmers say irreverently : “Go along with your old ark;
there won’t be much of a shower I”—while the weak and
struggling feel that such offers have very little “ grace” in them.
Is it not the part of the Church to say, Welcome to such shelter
as we can give ! we will do all we can to save you. You want
to .come—that is enough. Such a church is not exclusive, but
reaches out its hands to all with a free invitation. It is not in
�[6]
an attitude of separation from other churches, on the one hand,
or from the multitude who are outside the churches on the
other. We may feel that we are with the other churches in
this city, not- against them; we stand for religion, as they do,
against irreligion; for morality, as they do, against vice and.
iniquity. If they shut us out by any test of belief, we do not
put up any barrier against them; there will never be more than
one wall between us—the one they erect. And, on the other
hand, we are with the multitudes of people who do not belong
to the churches. We are with ^those who do not and cannot
assent to creeds and ceremonies which have no truth or interest
for them, but who desire a fresh interpretation of the everlasting
gospel of Truth and Righteousness, of the Divine in Humanity,
of the Kingdom of God on Earth. We know, indeed, that
there are many outside the churches who do not care for this
gospel or any other; who are utterly indifferent to spiritual
growth and health, given over to sensual and wicked living.
We are with these, not to encourage them in their wrong but to
help them to the right; we are for them, to help and rescue
them, and we wish we could make them feel that if they have
any earnest desire to forsake evil courses, and to lead a better
life, they may find with us tender reception and sympathy,
encouragement and aid. Peace and Good Will to churched and
unchurched 1 these are in the principle of our organization. If
we Will live up to the principle we shall get religious union
embodied in our Church.
Is it a cold intellectualism, this religion we are undertaking to
organize? It means a piety so genuine that it can employ no
forms which are not the natural expression and furtherance of
its own spirit of devotion; it means a sympathy so deep and
tender that it will reach out after the lowly, though in order to
save them it must let go the hand and lose the company of the
high. It means devout aspiration, consecration, holiness of
heart and life; it means kindly feeling and helpful deed. It
means Love to God and to Man; it means “doing justly, and
loving mercy, and walking humbly with God;” it means “visit*
ing the fatherless and widows in their affliction and keeping one’s
self unspotted from the world.”
Is it not Christian ? Then so much the worse for Christianity,
For this is the divinest religion yet revealed to man. But we
�[7]
think it is the very sum and substance of the religion of Jesus of
glazareth, as it is also of the Hebrew Law and the Prophets.
Some may question the need of a church like ours, on the
ground that the free thought and the liberal opinions which are
recognized and entertained by us make their way of themselves,
without the aid of special organizations to promote them. There
would be force in this if free thought and liberal opinion were
the chief need of society, and the only or the main purpose of
our union. Society wants freedom of thought, will have it;
and does not ask any church to give it, having learned to get it
in spite of the Church and to regard the Church as an adversary
of it. But society needs also religious impulse and inspiration,
needs moral instruction and education, needs humane develop
ment. It is the office of a church to give these, but the churches
in general give them in connection with a creed and a discipline
which repel free-thinkers, liberal minds. Hence the need of a
church which will do its religious work without limiting freedom
of thought. And it is for the lack of such a church that many
people are outside of all religious and moral influence whatever,
and others, who will have these in some shape for themselves
and their children, feel their common sense, and their inalien
able right to liberty of thought, attacked Sunday after Sunday,
and see their children taught doctrines which will be a burden to
them in mature years. We are not undertaking to organize
freedom of thought; we believe that might do very well without
a church, might get along by itself, or by the agency of the
press, or by a system of lecturing. We are trying to organize
Religion, allowing freedom. We want to impart vigor to the
sense of the Divine in men; to educate the conscience, and to
stimulate the sentiment of humanity; and to dok it without
infringing in the least upon the natural and sacred rights of the
mind, and we feel that the need of doing this is great. There is
a demand for the religious pioneering which we propose to do.
People might get along somehow in the ways of the spirit, but
with stumbling and delay; we want to make the road easy and
inviting, to bring low the mountains and hills and to bring up
the valleys; “ to make straight in the desert a highway ” for
religious progress.
Some will tell us that we cannot succeed, that we cannot hold
together without a common profession, of belief, and distinctions
�[8]
between godly and ungodly among us. But jve think that a
union in the religious spirit will bind us more firmly than a
profession of faith, by as much as sympathy is more than agree
ment. There is no need of laying down a platform of theolog
ical opinion. A platform does not hold together the people who
are standing on it. What holds them together is the purpose
with which they stepped upon it. And as to distinction between
“ converted” and “ unconverted,” they are no more essential in
a religious society than the distinctions of noble and commoner,
patrician and plebeian, in civil society. Our forefathers were
told that their community would go to pieces because they left
out these things. But they thought not; they thought these
divisions were divisive, that partitions kept people apart, and
that the best hope of union was in having no upstairs and down
stairs, no parlor and kitchen, built into the national mansion,
but in living on the same floor and meeting in a common room.
Differences would come, no doubt; the less need of enforcing
them; better keep as clear of them as possible. Is there less
union, less strength of cohesion, in the United States than in
governments that recognize and sanction differences of rank and
quality ? Differences will exist in a church ; noble and villain ;
no criterion of professed religious experience will avail to
prevent them; the spiritual peerage is not pure in any of the
churches about us, and among those not admittted to it there
are many nobly born ; but a stronger union is probable where
no artificial division is wrought into the ecclesiastical constitu
tion.
Of course there is question of every experiment so long as
it is an experiment. Pioneering is work that calls for trust and
energy and endurance. The main question of our success is
whether we have it in us. There is going to be outward
growth enough in this city to ensure the stability of our organ
ization, if we can answer for its inward growth. We must
not be easily discouraged. We are trying to raise the religious
grade of this city, which some think is as low as the natural
level of the soil. We are a corporation to effect just that. We
want to to make healthful and clean and convenient the ways of
social and moral life for this community; to get rid of theo
logical sloughs, and to lift men out of the mud of sensuality.
It will cost us money and labor, and it will be hard to get all
♦
�[9]
we want of both, and it will take time. And to make a good
road we may have to be put to inconvenience, and the new way
for a while way seem not so pleasant as the old; and it may
have a bad odor, as of tar and asphaltum in the nostrils of some
of the community; and some of the work may be poorly done
and need to be done over again ; and those for whom we work
may be dissatisfied with our survey and our plans, and our
execution of them, and we rnay sometimes be dissatisfied
ourselves. But we are doing a good work and one which
the city will yet bless us for.
It is work we are put
into the world, into our generation, for.If we can realize
that, we shall do it cheerfully; shall not be surprised that
it grows upon us, but shall expect it to make more and
more demand upon us, and only desire that our ability and
our will may increase with our opportunities. We need some
thing more than belief in the ends we propose ; we need devo
tion to them; as in order to be a California Pioneei’ it was not
enough to believe in California, but to go there, and to go early.
If we are content to forget our own comfort and convenience
in consecration to the common good, we shall not be discour
aged, and we shall succeed.
When I say we are a pioneel’ church, I do not claim that we
are discoverers of any new or unknown country of the spirit.
We are merely taking possession of the region of religious
faith and humane work which has been heard of from the
earliest times, and where the great leaders of religion have al
ways pitched their tents. There may be truth which we have
not yet come up with even in our belief, to say nothing of our
practice. Let us always keep an open ear for that! But we
propose to camp on what seems to us the most advanced
ground; to settle down here into some sort of orderly living—to
become a religious community. There is a respectable number
of us already; we are not scattered so much as to be out of
hail of one another’s homes, and we want to make society. We
want to concentrate and organize our religious sentiment and
conviction, that they may be more efficient, may make better
way. And we invite and welcome the fellowship and assistance
of all, though we depend mainly on ourselves—on the Div ine
Spirit in us which leads into all Truth and Right if we only
follow.
��
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Victorian Blogging
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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A pioneer church: a sermon preached in Pioneer Hall, February 7 1869
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Brown, H.W.
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Place of publication: Sacramento
Collation: 9 p. ; 22 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. By Rev. H.W. Brown, minister of the First Unitarian Church of Sacramento. Printed by request.
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H.S. Crocker & Co.
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1869
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Unitarianism
Sermons
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Conway Tracts
Unitarianism
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to Bi due.
Vtut Religion an
A SERMON,
PREACHED AT ST. GEORGE’S HALL, LANGHAM PLACE,
JULY 27th, 1873,
by the
REV. CHARLES VOYSEY.
[From the Eastern Post, August 2nd, 1873.]
On Sunday (July 27th) at St. George’s Hall, the Rev. Charles
Voysey took his text from Psalm xvi., 9, “ I have set God always
before me. He is on my right hand; therefore I shall not fall.”
He said—Our meditations on the supremacy of virtue would
hardly be complete without an effort to discern more clearly the
relation between morality and religion. One of the most important
questions that can be asked is, “ What is the help which Religion
gives to true Virtue ?” I do not say that Religion ought to be
abandoned if it could be proved to be of no value in the promotion
of virtue, because Religion has other functions to fulfil in the
economy of man; but it must be owned that Religion would lose
nine-tenths of its value if it were of no moral use; and our duty
would be to abandon it altogether if it were found to be a hindrance
to morality. I am here forced to stand on the threshold of our
enquiry in order to explain what is meant in this discourse by the
word Religion. One is quite overwhelmed at the mass of different
senses in which this and kindred terms are used, and it is positively
alarming to think of the confusion that must overtake posterity
in trying to understand the theological productions of this age.
One can hardly take up a book or a magazine, or a weekly news
paper, without perceiving the perfect Babel we are in through our
use of ambiguous terms, without any effort at definition. Contro
versy will one day come to a full stop, being choked by its own
jargon. Theological polemic will at length fall into disuse when
the light of day shall reveal every belligerent in the act of “beating
the air,” and thrusting at shadows.
�2
To pass over the long list of senses in which the term religion
is used, I will briefly repeat the definition, or rather the explana
tion, of it which I have often already given. Of course I do not
give this as arbitrary and dogmatic, but only in order to leave no
mistake as to my meaning.
Religion, as I understand and use the term, is the consciousness
of a supreme God and of our relation to Him. It is the conviction
of the heart that there is an invisible One who is Source and
Ruler of the whole universe, and is especially the Lord of our
hearts and lives; whose will is always good and must be obeyed ;
whose purpose is always kind, and may, therefore, be implicitly
trusted; to whom we may turn for guidance, and on whom we
may rest all our hope—in the words of my text, “ I have set God
always before me; He is on my right hand, &c.” To have this
conviction is to be religious. To be destitute of all sense of God,
so as to doubt gravely whether there be a God or not, is to be
irreligious. Again, Religion is not merely an intellectual assent to
the proposition, “ There is a God, and He is good,” for a man may
arrive at this conclusion in various ways, and yet not have any
feeling of loyalty, or trust, or love towards God in his heart.
Religion is intensely, but not exclusively, a matter of emotion.
Observe further, that Religion is much more than mere awe and
reverence. The Pantheist and even the Atheist may feel the
emotions of awe and reverence excited by the contemplation of the
grandeur and beauty of Nature; but while it is regarded as
unconscious, and therefore irresponsive to human aspiration and
devotion, it is impossible to regard it with religious feelings. The
laws of Nature, which is the God of the Pantheist, are regarded
by him as supreme, and nobly loyal to them he endeavours to
become ; but he owns that Nature does not know nor care whether
he obeys her laws or not—that is his own business—nor is she
conscious in the least degree of his loyalty or admiration. The
Pantheist may be ravished with the sight of Nature’s beauty, but
there is no return of his loving gaze, no gratified sense on her part
of having filled her worshipper with bliss. The Pantheist may
also be a very optimist of content and hope, abiding in the immu
tability and certainty of Nature’s operations; but he can never
feel that rest and peace which those souls feel who know what it
�is “to cast their burden on the Lord.” In the Pantheist’s God
there is no consciousness, no individual will, no heart. But
Religion recognises in God all these. It is the characteristic of
religion to attribute to God more than all else—next to righteous
ness—tender sympathy and affection.
I am willing to admit that some of this, which I have called
Religion, may be erroneous, and must be defective. We know how
religion hitherto has been mixed up with errors and falsehood too
patent to remain for ever rooted in men’s minds. But Religion
has outlived all primseval superstitions, and seems to have a
vitality of its own by which it rises from the ashes of burned and
buried creeds. In spite of the thousands who are just now destitute
of all religion whatever, owing to the solemn mockery of maintain
ing a creed no longer credible, and owing in other cases to the
intense disgust at having been so long the dupe of groundless
superstitions; in spite of these, I say, Religion is taking fresh and
stronger root than ever, and is putting forth new leaves, and even
already bearing fresh and wholesome fruit for the healing of the
nations. While morality owes scarcely a single thread of its
binding power to the dying religions of modern Christendom, the
true essence of religion, set free by the destruction of the tissue of
creeds, is filling the air with its fragrance, and making glad the
hearts of those who wept when their idols were shattered.
A modern wit has immortalised himself by describing the present
State of religious feeling—if feeling it may be called—-throughout
orthodox Europe, in these terms : “To believe implicitly what one
knows to be false.” Let us hope that the time will come when it
may be truly described thus : “ To deny openly what one knows
to be false,” and when this stage is reached, “To know certainly what
one believes to be true.” Till this blessed change is consummated,
we have but one duty in regard to, religion. To be utterly true to
the convictions of the hour, and to be honest enough as well as
brave enough to abandon any position proved to be untenable. It
is impossible on this, the deepest and highest of all themes, to
attain the certainty of demonstration ; to have such knowledge of
God as would enable us, or warrant us, to teach with authority, as
if it were scientifically verified, what we feel in our hearts to be
true about God. It is alike impossible for the irreligious to know
�4
that our convictions are false, or our feelings groundless, and it is
unbecoming to dogmatise in the negative, as the orthodox have
dogmatised in the affirmative. Time alone will show who is right
and where lies the truth. Both , of us are on the side of virtue;
both alike regard it as supreme; both of us measure the worth or
the worthlessness of any religion by its influence on the culture of
morals. What better task could we pursue than to investigate to
the very foundation the claim made for religion, that in so far as
it approximates to the truth, or is set free from false admixtures,
it is . a very powerfu laid to virtue1?
Between the orthodox God, whose system is one of bribes and
threats, and the God of Matthew Arnold, who is a “ Power that
makes for righteousness,” and yet has no faculties for knowing
when we are righteous and when we are not; who does not even
know what righteousness is and has no power to think about any
thing—between these two—there is the God of pure Theism, who
“ thinks, and knows, and lovesand is present to the soul as the
most Holy One, the searcher of hearts, the Divine Father who
loves to see His child willingly good—good from choice; a God
who uses no coercion or enticement; who only whispers “ Do this,
because it is right.” “ Do not that, because it is wrong.” Now,
whether this be or be not a delusion of the mind which transfigures
the human conscience into a Divine voice, at all events, it gives a
sanction to the moral sense far more weighty than any other sup
position yet known. It is only natural and human in the highest
degree to attach unspeakable importance to what we believe to be
mandates of the Eternal Will. Every thought, word, or deed,
becomes magnified for good or ill, beyond all calculation, when it
is regarded as conforming to, or rebelling against, the law of the
most Holy One. And this part of religion—our recognition of a
Divine Law-giver, an accuser and a judge—would never fail of its
moral power were we always to 'realise what we profess to believe,
were we “ to set God always before us.” We fail, not because it
is for one instant a matter of indifference to us whether we obey
God or not; but because we cannot, in the presence of temptation,
and under pressure of physical allurements, realize to ourselves
that God Himself is warning us from temptation, or urging us to
perform some arduous duty. Indeed, we are religious in exact
�5
proportion as we do realise His right of control, and in the same
proportion is our religion a help to our virtue.
But, passing from the sense of Divine authority we come to the
still higher conviction of the Divine friendliness—God’s will that
we should be good, joined with God’s willingness to help us to
become good; not by miracle, not by invariable answei' to prayer,
not by uniform rescue from temptation; but by the whole and
mingled method of His discipline. Sometimes we are helped to
virtue by being suffered to taste the bitter fruits of disobedience,
oi’ to be stung by the remorse which belongs to it. But to feel
sure from first to last that One above, the most Holy, has devised
all our past, present, and future as a means for the perfecting of
our natures and the reproduction in ourselves of His own spotless
image, must, without doubt, be a tremendous moral force, because
it adds hope and encouragement of the highest order to the sense
of solemn obligation. I know nothing more terrible than the
weight of sin which used to be heaped upon our young heads by
the reiterated falsehood that we had broken the whole of God’s
law if we were guilty in only one point. It was simple agony to
be assured that a Perfect God demanded, and would be satisfied
with, nothing less than a perfect obedience from man, which we
knew could not possibly be rendered; and one only wonders why
more brains did not give way under the never-to-be-forgotten
weight of sin and doom. It made matters worse; resistance of
temptation more difficult; hope of renewal impossible. One’s only
refuge was in atonement and substitution and imputed righteous
ness ; leaving one no better than before and only an ungrateful
slave. But now, what a change ! Over again we can calmly
repeat, but with an infinitely higher meaning, the old orthodox
formula, “ a Perfect God requires perfect obedience from man,”
Yes, indeed! But when? Not until he can render it. Notone
moment sooner than all his faculties and surroundings shall have
made it possible to him. But what does a “Perfect God” mean, but
one perfectly just, and therefore requiring of us no more than we
can render; so that perfect obedience is only doing our very best
under our circumstances. A Perfect God can require no more;
but He can require no less. Here the burdened sinner is pacified
and encouraged; assured that God does not blame him one grain
�mor© than he Must blame himself; and consoled by the hope that
his present exertions, and even failures, shall work in at length
to the purification of his soul. It is something to be virtuous for,
if one knows that virtue in one little thing will lead to being
virtuous in many great things; and that the more one tries the
sooner one will succeed. It is some encouragement to be as
virtuous us we can be now, to beheve that we shall be perfectly
virtuous hereafter. And this hope and encouragement, I say, are
the direct fruits of true religion. Perfect trust in God’s good
purposes does provide this invaluable aid to virtue. Just, in fact,
as the old falsehood paralysed moral effort through utter despair
of success, and then sent conscience to slumber by saying, “ All
your righteousness is as filthy ragsso the new truth stimulates
to an enthusiasm of virtuous effort, and comforts the soul, not only
by assurances of Divine approval, but by promise of entire success.
Moreover, a religion like this which recognises the universal and
impartial love of God for all mankind is a powerful aid to virtue,
by inspiring affection between man and man. It was, perhaps,
excusable under the old creed to hate those whom God was supposed
to hate, and to count them our enemies; but it is impossible to
feel the same animosity towards anyone in v horn at the time we
recognise one who is very dear to God, and who, like ourselves, is
destined to perfect holiness. The mere fact of our common
relationship to one Divine Father, and our common hope of being
thoroughly cleansed from all sin and cured of all defects, must have
its influence in softening down our asperity, and in awakening our
mercy and forbearance. Whatever helps to kindle affection between
man and man is a real help to virtue. It would be an evil day for
mankind, if a mere sense of duty—invaluable as that is—only re
mained as a spur to right conduct; if our motives for doing good
were to be stripped of the lovely adornments of tender feeling and
sympathy, and our lives were only regulated by the cut and dried
rules of mechanical morals. In truth, it seems to me, though I say
it with all diffidence, that love is the real root of all virtue, and
not its tardy fruit. Men have begun by acting from tender
emotions and kind feelings, and then have discovered that their
conduct was beneficial. Even Utilitarianism must fall back on
love and kindness and the desire to do good, as the root of all
�7
morality. For why should it be right to promote the greatest
happiness of the greatest number, instead of promoting the greatest
happiness of the few who are best able to enjoy and appreciate
happiness 1 Because, behind and beneath it lies the native kindli
ness of the human heart, the instinct of generosity, the longing
that all may share in our happiness, which, when wisely directed
and organised, is called morality or virtue. Most true it is that
we need, the help of reason in the discovery of the best method of
showing kindness j and our defective reasoning requires the cor
rection of experience that we may learn how to select, and how to
perform, what is really best for the common good. But, in general,
the impulses of a kind heart go straight to the point, and are, in
nine cases out of ten, infallibly virtuous.
It is through his affections chiefly that man has ever attained a
true morality, and it is by his’affections mainly that the standard
of morals is kept steadily rising, Love deepens and widens
sympathy, sympathy thus enlarged reveals to us wants and wrongs
and sorrows of others to which we had before been blind, and this
revelation is followed instantly by fresh calls upon our sense of
duty, by new demands of the conscience. If I am my brother’s
keeper, and try to behave accordingly, the longer I keep him, the
more faithfully I watch over'his needs and perils, the morel shall
have to do for him, and the greater will be the claims made upon
my love and sympathy. It is notorious how we grow to love
more those to whom we have shown kindness. In this sense also
it is true that “it is more blessed to give than to receive.” The
love born out of bounty is far greater than the love born of
gratitude.
If love then be rightly regarded as the proper root of virtue,
and a religion be found which tends to inspire love between man
and man, that religion must be a powerful auxiliary in promoting
virtue. It is on this ground that we must admire those precepts
of Christianity, and of all other religions, which inculcate “love to
the brethren,” and also detest and abjure those principles, beliefs,
and precepts which inculcate first exclusiveness, and then hatred,
malice and all uneharitableness towards those who are not theolo
gically “ brethren.” As a religion, Christianity—as developed in
Europe and America—has been nearly as much a source of strife
�8
and hatred and selfish ambition, as a source of peace, charity, and
good-will. It has hitherto, therefore, been nearly as great a
hindrance to true virtue as a help to it. By its fruits it can be
known; and by its fruits it must be judged. And in so far as it
has taught what is true, it has blessed mankind; in so far as it has
taught what is false, Christianity has been its bane.
The same sifting will be applied to the Religion of which I have
spoken to-day. Its faults will show its truth and its falsehood ;
will disclose its weakness while declaring its power. Meanwhile, it
is a comfort to know that in the long run truth alone is friend to
mankind, while every falsehood is its foe.
*
EASTERN
Post
Steam Printing Works, 89, Worship Street, Finsbury E.CJ
�
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True religion an aid to virtue: a sermon, preached at St. George's Hall, Langham Place, July 27th 1873
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Voysey, Charles [1828-1912]
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Place of publication: [London]
Collation: 8 p. ; 19 cm.
Notes: Part of Morris Miscellaneous Tracts 6. Printed by Eastern Post: August 2nd 1873.
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Morris Tracts
Virtue
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THE CHURCH OF THE PRESENT, AND
THE CHURCH OF THE FUTURE.
AN ADDRESS,
DELIVERED IN THE
CONGREGATIONAL CHAPEL, MOSELEY ROAD,
-
.>.•
BIRMINGHAM,
8th MAY, 1870.
BY
MATTHEW MACFIE,
ON THE OCCASION OF HIS RESIGNING THE CONGREGATIONAL MINISTRY,
AFTER FIFTEEN YEARS' SERVICE.
PUBLISHED BY REQUEST.
“Our little systems have their day,
They have their day and cease to be,
They are but broken lights of Thee,
And Thou, O Lord, art more than they.”—In Memoriam.
BIRMINGHAM : E. C. OSBORNE, 84, NEW STREET.
LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL & Co.
1870.
PRICE SIXPENCE,
�Those who heard the following Address will observe several passages
introduced in its printed form which were omitted, for want of time, in its
delivery. A few sentences here and there, too, are cast in a different
mould.
�AN ADDRESS, &c.
Matthew 6-10.—“Thy kingdom come."
A distinguished foreigner, himself a true Christian, a few
years since said, in a select circle : “ I begin to doubt whether
Christianity has a future in the world.” EWhyso?” asked
one present, in surprise at so dark a saying from such a
quarter. “ Because,’! he replied, neither in India, nor in
America, nor anywhere in all Europe, does any of the govern
ments called ‘ Christian’—I do not say do what is right—but
even affect and pretend to take the Right as the law of
action. Whatever it was once, Christianity is now, in all the
great concerns of nations, a mere ecclesiasticism, powerful for
mischief, but helpless and useless for good. Therefore I begin
to doubt whether it has a future; for if it cannot become
anything better than it is, it has no right to a future in God’s
world.”*
These grave words of one so wise and devout should, perhaps,
be taken “with a grain of salt.” But many a thoughtful and
earnest Englishman will feel bound to admit that, to a certain
extent, they are too true, and hit a blot in our practical religious
life as a professedly Christian community. As far as consis
tency is concerned in the application of our sacred writings to
the affairs of national life, do we not present a striking contrast
even to some semi-barbarous nations ? The religious traditions
of India teach that the Brahmins were born from the head of
their god, and the Sudras from his feet; and caste, with all its
cruel exclusiveness, is the logical outcome of this doctrine. The
Buddhists revolted from this article of Hindoo faith, and we
are not surprised, therefore, to find prevailing in China a sort
of Social Democracy. The Mussulman believes the Koran to be
* From an article by F. W, Newman on “the weakness of Protestantism,”
�4
his moral and spiritual guide for this life and the next, and the
laws and usages of Turkey are consistently enough framed on
the prophet’s model. It is otherwise with the Christian nations
of the West. They boast a higher civilization than that of the
despised Orientals. They possess a faith (I speak of the mass
of Europeans) which they hold to be the only true Revelation
of religious truth and duty to the world; and yet the moral
teaching of the New Testament—zealously contended for in
our orthodox churches—is strangely ignored in our political
and social life. Think, for instance, of the incongruous pro
ceedings of the British legislature. With one hand it upholds,
from professed zeal for the spiritual and moral good of the
nation, a costly Established Church, and with the other hand
it mutilates every just and noble measure brought before
it; so that if ever a good bill passes into law at all, it usually
comes to the people an emasculated thing—the mangled off
spring of compromise and expediency. Is not our English
common law .borrowed from Pagan Rome ? And up to this
nineteenth century of the Christian era, it is notorious that
the international disputes of Christian states, glorying, theore
tically, in the forgiving and peaceful principles of Jesus, can
not, as a rule, be settled, without the slaughter of millions to
propitiate mutual hatred and jealousy. We should accuse our
preachers of heresy, if they did not tell us that all men are to
be loved and cherished as brethren; and yet in the very
House of Prayer, as well as in our every day life, we file off
into classes, and raise up the unhallowed distinctions of rank
and wealth, extremely attentive to those in least need of our
sympathy and help, and standing quietly by while untold
numbers of our fellow-countrymen perish in misfortune, igno
rance, and shame.
Well, then, in this strange state of national contradictions
the Christian church stands forth, reiterating her claims as the
one divinely-appointed agent for applying the balm of truth
and love to the social wounds of Humanity, ever ready to take
credit for all the spiritual and moral good effected among men
under this Dispensation. Many, quite competent to judge, and
with no wish to disparage the efforts of the church, take leave
to doubt whether that credit is always due. But at any rate
�5
it is to be feared that the sects of Christendom, have not always
been careful to reflect fairly the spirit and essence of Christ’s
religion. Divisions about trifles of dogma have drained off the
strength that ought to have been given to the improvement of
the masses, physically, intellectually and morally, and have
driven the higher intellect of the country beyond the pale of
modern churches. The most enlightened of the population
have ceased to take the least interest in Sunday services, and
every year witnesses secessions from the sects, and brings more
powerful opposition from the enemy. Different schools of
church theology wax more and more bitter in their jealousy
toward each other. Dr. Pusey accuses Bishop Bickersteth of
holding unworthy views of the "sawfamentsjthese two
“brethren in Christ” unite in charging Bishop Temple with
deadly error, and in denouncingyDissenters from the established
church as unauthorised religious <g^ides. Nor is forbearing
charity between members of evangelica^n.©.mcon|prmist churches
always so conspicuous as to call forth th^exclamftion, “ Behold,
how these Christians love one anotlie$ ! ”
This, then, is the strange spectacle the avowed disciples of
Christ present to the world, each sect believing their church
the true one, all vying in their reverence for one book as the
perfect source of religious truth, equally earnest in asking
Divine guidance in the study of it, and yet all intensely differ
ing from each other about its meaning; and this difference not
confined to what they deem secondary points, but touching
the very essentials of salvation. , One naturally asks: Can
this incoherent mass of sects, with their endless and conflicting
metaphysical dogmas and varieties of ritual and ill-disguised
jealousies of one another, be the church of Him who did
not strive or cry—“the meek and lowly Jesus ” ? I rejoice to
believe that multitudes of His true followers—like the seven
thousand in the time of Elijah who had not bent the knee to
the idol—are included in the institutions of organized Christi
anity now. But the institutions themselves, as a whole, in the
judgment of many, are relics of superstitious times, and are
fast losing their hold on the talent and culture of mankind—
powerless to leaven the mind and life of civilized nations.
The “ secular ” press, as a teacher, has a vastly larger and more
�6
enlightened audience than the pulpit. The strongest spirits,
if they frequent Sabbath assemblies at all, do so mostly for
the sake of setting an example to the weak and the ignorant,
who are always more impressed by priestly authority and
church ordinances than by abstract principles, religious or
moral. What then is the goal to which events are tending ?
Must we share the fears of the distinguished foreigner I have
referred to, that Christianity is dying out and has no future;
and that religion and morality are doomed to the same grave
with itself? Or will there be a resurrection out of this threatened
decay of the Christian faith, of all that is real and vital in it ?
I believe that when a system or an organization has done its
work, it is the will of God that it should give place to another
more suited to the genius and wants of the times, and this, in
the opinion of many great thinkers, is to be the fate of existing
churches. Most certainly history strongly favours that opinion.
But I have no fear about the future of Christianity as taught
by Jesus, and as distinguished from the myths that have crept
into the record of His life, and from the metaphysical theology
over which his name is profanely called. I believe it is
destined, in its essence, sooner or later, to be the religion of the
whole world, because it is written, in characters more indelible
than those in any book, however “ sacredit is written in the
very nature of man. There is much in the present state of the
church to cause pain, but nothing to discourage our hopes in
reference to the future of “ pure and undefiled religion.” The
laws of the universe are laws of progress, and so far from the
sun of religious development having reached its meridian, we
are only as yet in the grey dawn of a brighter day. Humanity
is still in its intellectual and moral childhood. Organic life has
from the beginning been shaping itself into higher types
under laws of progress. The advance of civilization is marked
by the strides made by men from the age of flint to the age of
gold, and still its course is onward. From the period of the
Magna Charta our political institutions have developed into
their present freeness, and will continue to expand till even
the most liberal Reformers of to-day will be looked back upon
as the fossils of a slower and a duller time. Why, then, should
we despair of the future of religious thought and life ? It
�7
were ungrateful to reproach the church of the past or of the
present. All great systems of thought and activity are the
creatures of their age, and cannot reasonably be expected to
rise above the level of those outward conditions for which they
are adapted and prepared. They have no mission to the future.
But the history of Religion clearly proves that it always has
been controlled by thefllaw of progress, and so it will ever
continue to be#-. From the worship of
men haw risen to
the worship of One Pw^on, and the religion of Monotheism
has developed from the grim conception of God as a ruler
which prevailed uncte® Mosaism, into that more tender and
*
worthy conception of Him as a great and loving JWAer under
Christianity. Early contact with Hearf^aMm- m8I State-craft
marred the original beauty and^eajMaed the natiwqpower of
the Christian God, and fb^cemuri^^ we kmvaJjltopffitianity
lay like a corpse,—the only beautiful thing about i^ibeing the
embroidered winding sheet
But the. Reform
ation of the sixteenth century fewied. therfmMllectual and
spiritual life of Europe a step»MmMmii^Mit- was before; and
again the fulness of time has come, I venture to think, for a
second Reformation. Let us look and labour
Let us
hail the jubilant note® l^sdKDn every side which “ ring in the
Christ that is to be.” Old churches are fast breaking up in
decay, with their effete theologies and formal observances.
Many minds already descry the di® morning twilight that
will usher in the Church 0/ tAe Fufru/re.
In what remains of this discourse
to say a few words
on the Church of the Present, as compared with the
Church of the Futu^MI
I. The sources of religious thought will be wider in the
Church of the Future $han they are Mj the Church of the
Present.
Before the days of Luther the Bible was hardly known to
the laity, or even to the- clergy of Europ® as ajbody. So that
whatever theories have b<Wffi held by Christians as to its
Inspiration and Infallibility are mainly jgonfined to the past
three centuries. Me®» previously believed in the Infallibility
of a church, and driven from that shelter, but still clinging to
�8
the fancy that they must have some human symbol of Divine
authority to cling to, the second generation from the Reformers
betook themselves to faith in the infallibility of a book. And
with the pronounced followers of Calvin, Knox, and the Puri
tans the battle cry still is, “ The Bible and the Bible alone the
Religion of Protestants.” They hold this book to be the sole
authoritative, certain and final Revelation of the moral char
acter and will of God bearing on the eternal interests of His
creatures. They believe that God chose one nation from the
beginning and “made known his ways” to them, mysteriously
leaving all other nations in hopeless darkness and death. They
believe that to the Jews this revelation was made in symbol
and prophecy, and that it was reserved to our era to receive
that more perfect substance of spiritual truth of which
Judaism was but the appointed type and shadow. They
believe that in the life, teaching, death and resurrection of
Jesus, and in the alleged writings of certain of his apostles,
we have a miraculous unveiling of all that was needed to
“ make us wise unto salvation.” It is not wonderful, there
fore, that this collection of writings, affirmed to have so vital
a significance to us, should be diligently and prayerfully
studied by theologians and private Christians; and that, how
ever ignorant English children may be of the history of
Greece and Rome, China and America, most of them should
know something of the history of that ancient people to whom
God is believed to have been related by a special supernatural
Revelation. The kernel of critical inquiry however, in regard
to the credibility and authority of the Bible as a Revelation lies
in the history of the Canon. On this I would fain speak at
large, but may not in the limited space of time allotted to a
sermon. But be our views on this topic what they may,
that man would betray not only ignorance but impiety who
could think or speak without reverence of the “ sacred books ’
of any nation, especially of the Bible. Whatever mistakes
may be in it affecting matters of science, history, and of the
Divine government, it contains an interesting record of the
religious thought and life of a people who attained a loftier
idea of God than the surrounding nations of their time. The
noble aspirations of Hebrew patriarchs, seers and poets, as
�9
breathed in their lives and their utterances, will stir the
spiritual instincts of true souls for ever. And what shall we
say of Him who is the central figure in the Book,—the grandest
man, whose teaching swept all the keys of moral thought and
spiritual feeling, like the fingers of a God, and struck chords
of love and peace in sincere hearts, and notes of terror and
self-condemnation in those that were hollow and base ? What
shall we say of His life, so rich beyond that of ordinary lives
in meek wisdom, in unconscious self-denial, in holy patience,
and in humility, unsullied even by the shadow of that most
subtle and impalpable vice of the mind, spiritual pride ? What
shall we say of His death, that purest and most triumphant
sacrifice to Truth and the world’s highest good ? Who can read
the sketches the New Testament affords of the first planting of
Christianity, without feeling that it marks the passage of man
kind into a new stage of religious developmenwaccount for the
origin of the movement as you may ? gfflfen we have the
Epistles to the early churches, abounding in allusions seen to
be very apt if read in the light of the circumstances of those
*
to whom they were addressed, but utterly bewildering and
mischievous if interpreted literally throughout, and applied, as
they still too often are, without discrimination, to men of all
ages and climes. But stripping these letters, semi-Jewish in
great part, of their local and figurative dress, we shall find in
them thoughts and counsels that will be earnestly pondered
and cherished even in the days of the world’s maturest man
hood. It is not surprising, then, that the Bible should have
so conspicuous a place assigned it in our homes and churches,
and that it should be introduced to sanctify all the great
events of our lives.
But, while the Church of the Future will not fail to show
becoming respect to the Bible, as setting forth certain sublime
conceptions of the government of the world, as the cause of
the greatest religious movement the world has yet witnessed,
the Church of the Future will feel that it honours God more
by lovingly, but strictly, bringing to the tribunal of reason
every word in that book, than by blindly accepting any
part of it as necessarily infallible. The Church of the Future
will take a wider view of the range of Revelation than the
�10
Church of the Present usually does. It will appreciate more
intelligently physical laws as lying at the root of the effectual
elevation of the race, and as, in a most solemn sense, revealing
the will of God. What progressive mind can think without
a blush of the suspicion and bitterness with which the
Church of the Past, to say nothing of the Church of the
Present, was accustomed to look upon scientific discoveries,
almost as if they revealed the ubiquitous demon of Christian
mythology, instead of the good and glorious God ? It has been
common for a large class of Christians to view the world in a
sort of Gnostic light, as if it were a waste, howling wilderness,
and to think of the chemical elements composing it as saturated
by sin and cursed by Divine anger, in consequence of that
tragic scene in the history of our traditional mother—the
eating of an apple ! Many a discourse has been preached to
show that any strong interest in the affairs of the present life,
scientific or commercial, is the sure mark of a godless heart,
and that the truest proof of godliness is to be ever dwelling
in the atmosphere of hymns and prayers, and devout medita
tions, and I white robes,” and “ crowns,” or groaning over the
hundreds of millions of our fellow beings whom a morbid faith
is always thinking of as falling into a burning lake. I need
hardly say that those who come after us will have worthier
ideas of the possibilities of the world, and of the individual
and collective happiness to be derived from discovering and
obeying physical laws. Then religion will consist less in that
imagined super natural contact of God with the’human spirit
—the visions and nervous raptures, for which good orthodox
people so often pray now. It will consist more of being loyal
to material laws, improving the health and strengthening the
frame, increasing brain-power, laying to heart every form of
responsibility, giving to the race a noble organization, and a
more rational idea of how to control body and mind as
mutually dependent on each other, in the forming of a great
and noble character.
Without slighting the importance of God’s dealings with
the Jews, and with the members of the first Christian Churches,
the Church of the Future will recognise the wing of God’s
equal love and care spread over all nations, and His Providence
�11
as truly visible in the guidance and discipline of one as of
another of them. Every nation will be seen contributing its
share to the world’s culture, and revealing forms of thought
and life all needful to the complete culture of humanity.
The Church of the Future will see, in the mechanism of the
individual mind, and in the economy of family and social life,
a true Revelation of God, unclouded by the “original sin” of a
gloomy theology. The reason and the affections will be
revered as a medium of that Revelation. The conscience will
be more solemnly listened to as the accredited voice of God,
enforcing His moral and spiritual claims.
The domestic
constitution will be more honoured than at present, not merely
as of His wise appointment, but because it was intended to
mirror the all-embracing love of His own Fatherhood to the
whole human family; and so far from politics being deemed
unholy, it will be held to be a grave defect in the character of
a religious man not to take part in all political schemes for
the raising of the suffering and the oppressed.
All great and good men who increase the stock of human
knowledge, purity, and happiness, will be venerated as Godsent revealers of Himself, born to unveil to us the endlessly
varied phenomena of material and spiritual law.
God’s
Revelation will then be no longer viewed as exhausted in one
book, or as confined to any favoured people. Never was there
anything good, or true, or wise, written or spoken, without the
inspiration of God, and in reading words clothed with these
attributes, you read a Revelation of Him. One servant will
not be exalted to the disparagement of other servants. God’s
will, in what is vaguely called the spiritual sphere, will not
absorb attention to the neglect of his Revelation in morals and
aesthetics. All things are spiritual to the good. The reign of
law will be owned uniform and universal, and its claims in
one department will not be allowed to over-ride its appeals to
our nature in another; and every man gifted with a seer’s
insight in the manifold realms of law, will be hailed as a
messenger of the Most High. The Newtons to the Church
of the Future will be revealers of God in the science of the
stars, the Murchisons in the system of the rocks, the Turners
in the beauties of the canvas, the Miltons in the ideal charms
�of poetry, the Shakspeares in the philosophy of character, the
Watts and the Faradays in the latent forces and functions of
nature, and the true prophets of all countries and times, with
Jesus at their head, in the glories of moral and spiritual truth.
Blessed period! When the lingering shadows of superstition,
fanaticism, bigotry, and sectarian heart-burning shall be chased
away by the light of universal knowledge and rational religion,
when the tendrils of religious feeling shall not be found, as
now, chiefly entwining around Gothic and Grecian piles—
symbols of intense and beautiful religious sentiment though
these may be; when semi-Jewish restraint shall no longer
make British Christian life so sombre on that day consecrated
to rest which our Continental neighbours twit us with turn
ing into a “ Himalaya of wearinesswhen holiness shall not
consist so much in an extended countenance, in exclusive
devotion to books of an unctuously pious type, and in the
mere round of little | denominational ” activities, often to the
neglect of personal culture and the claims of home; but when
the sincere and truth-loving heart shall be held the most sacred
thing on earth when the craft we ply for our daily bread,
and the friendly circle in which we regale the social affections,
and the sunny hillside on which we bask in holiday time;
when all that ministers to the expansion of true thought and
unselfish sympathy, to purity of conscience, and to the music of
innocent joy, shall be regarded as most holy and suggestive of
God. No words could more fully express my sentiment than
those of Tom Hood :—
“ Thrice blessed is the man with whom
The gracious prodigality of nature—
The balm, the bliss, the beauty and the bloom,
The bounteous providence in every feature,
Recall the good Creator to his creature,
Making all earth a fane, all heaven its dome.
Each cloud-capt mountain is a holy altar,
An organ breathes in every grove,
And the full heart’s a psalter
Rich in deep hymns of gratitude and love.”
Then the Revelation of God will be treated not as a distant
thing of the past, when He is believed by many to have startled
the world with a cannonade of miracles, and afterwards retreated
�13
from direct contact with His creatures. To the Church of the
Future God will he an ever-present Being, as near the soul that
loves and does His will in the work, joy, and rest of life, as He
could possibly be in any imagined supernatural age. His
Revelation will then appear in its true light—perennial, and
needing no theological creed and priestly commonplace to help
us to understand it.
II. The scope of teaching in the Church of the Future will
be freer than it is in the Church of the Present.
The sects of our time, whether Established by law or Non
conformist, are fettered by creeds. I say fettered by creeds.
And yet creeds of some sort, implicit or expressed, would seem
to be necessary as a basis of religious union and action. That
is freely admitted. It is stereotyped, minute, dogmatic creeds,
that I object to, as these are found in Evangelical Christen
dom. I hold that a religious sect has no more right to bind
all coming generations to believe the metaphysical dogmas
which it now believes, and in the same form, than any body of
scientific men in one age have a right to make exact agreement
with them a condition of their successors enjoying the honours
and privileges of the Royal Institution. We complain of the
disabilities placed upon us as Dissenters by the unjust ecclesi
astical and doctrinal tests that, till lately, have shut us out
from the National Universities. But what authority have we
to insert clauses in the Trust Deeds of our so-called “ Free
Churches,” permitting only those to preach in our pulpits who
can subscribe certain non-essential articles of belief which we in
our wisdom think essential ? A ncient creeds have always
savoured of an intolerant spirit, and modern creeds, to say the
least, bear a strong family lilceness to their ancestral relations.
I have always found that the more narrow, minute and elabo
rate a man’s creed, if he follow it logically, the more bitter and
uncharitable is his temper towards those who differ from him.
No matter how superior they may be to him in earnestness,
talent, and attainment, he is accustomed to treat their honest
difference from him almost as a personal offence, if not a sin.
We should never forget that while some men are worse, others
are better than their creed; but all the difference I can see
�14<
between the exclusiveness of the Evangelical Protestant and
that of the Catholic is in the mode of persecuting heretics. The
Romanist, informer times, treating freedom of thought in
religion as a fearful crime, burned offenders ; and even now he
consistently enough stands aloof from other professing Christ
ians as schismatics, because he believes his church to be infal
lible, his priesthood to be alone endowed with the grace of
apostolical succession, and his way of salvation to be the only
true one. But the Evangelical Protestant rejoices in the “ right
of private judgment ” and of free inquiry, and yet will only
tolerate as his teacher one who falls in with a certain stereotyped
theological system. No matter how single-hearted and truthloving, if he should happen to diverge from what are called “ the
cardinal doctrines,” he is cast as a leper outside the camp.
Fixed creeds are opposed to the spirit of progress. Any
Church that exists in order to perpetuate a tabulated set of
opinions, which they have sworn never to change, must sooner
or later be swamped by the advancing tide of free thought,
and deserted by the intellectual strength and liberal culture
of the age. No Church is worthy of support which does not
exist to teach truth as its prime object, and which is not
eager to hear what every competent earnest teacher has to say,
whose soul burns with his message. His accord with the creed
is a trifling consideration.
*
The captain of a ship may use
his quadrant and record his bearings at midday to-day, but
surely, as his vessel is still sailing towards a foreign port, he
will not think that he can dispense with reckoning his longitude
and latitude to-morrow, and so on to the end of the voyage.
But the meaning of a traditional creed is this : “ The doctrines
our fathers have handed down to us include the alpha and the
omega of truth, absolute and unchangeable, and we insist on
posterity accepting it as we have done, and will inflict penal
disabilities on those who refuse to think as we do. We have
squared the theological circle, and anybody who presumes to
differ from us is either profane, foolish, or mad.” Now just
apply the same criterion to science and see how it would
* Carlyle in his life of Sterling relates that once his friend objected to some
opinions he had offered, by saying, “That’s flat Pantheism.” “What matters it,”
Carlyle replied, “if it were flat Poftheism, if it’s truth?”
/
�15
stand. Suppose Mr. Huxley were to endow a professor’s chair
at Oxford, and enact that no candidate was eligible for the
position unless he gravely affirmed that the founder had
learned and taught all that could be known about comparative
anatomy; why, men of science, with one voice, would laugh to
scorn the conceit of the proposal. And what is this but the
ridiculous attitude of a theological creed ? It outrages reason
by undertaking to solve religious problems for all time, and so
impiously affects to have already all the light which ever can
be thrown on such themes. Precisely in this spirit most of
the fathers of the (Ecumenical Council condemn the whole
circle of modern science,—including discoveries that have
immortalized the names of Laplace, Herschel and others, as
only a renewal and reproduction of errors that have been a
thousand times refuted by the Church
*
But there has been a change in the religious beliefs of the
past, and why should we arrogantly fancy that the Church of
the Future must subscribe the creed which prevails among
Evangelical Christians now ? Mr. Leckyf powerfully shows
that formulated doctrines, like all animated things, accom
plish the end of their existence, expend their force and die
out, and are followed by others which, in their turn, expire at
length in like fashion. As a matter of fact, take that doctrine
which, above all others, is popularly regarded, in this country,
as essential to salvation—I mean the atonement of Christ for
sin. It has passed through so many transformations, that it is
simply impossible for any one intelligently acquainted with its
history to show what theologians would have us believe about
it, that we may be saved. Not a single trace of proof can be
*Well may we ponder the words of Richard Hooker on this subject. “Au
thority is the greatest and most irreconcilable enemy to truth and rational argu
ment that this world ever furnished out since it was in being ; against it there is
no defence ; it is authority alone that keeps up the grossest and most abominable
errors in the countries around us ; it was authority that would have prevented all
reformation where it is, and which has put a barrier against it where it is not.
Tor man to be tied and led by authority, as it were with a kind of captivity of
judgment, and though there be reason to the contrary, not to listen to it, but to
follow, like beasts, the first in the herd, they know not, nor care whither_ this
were brutish.”
f History of Rationalism. Vol. I.
�16
adduced in the apostolic or post-apostolic fathers in support of
the theory held by many now, that Jesus suffered as a judicial
substitute and offered himself a sacrifice for the punishment due
to our sins. Allusions do occur in some of the early Christian
writings to the world being under bondage to the Evil Spirit,
and bought off by the holy life and martyrdom of Christ; but
they are only figurative, and point to self-denying efforts of
the Saviour to deliver men, by his revelation of God’s truth
and love, from the influence of error, ignorance, formality,
lust, pride, and all sin. The ideas of the first Christians
imprinted themselves on their simple works of art, even more
distinctly than in their writings, and though in the Catacombs
touching references to the rest of the departed in Christ
often occur, the emblem of Christ on the Cross never does.
The idea of the mental and physical sufferings of Jesus, as
a literal satisfaction or propitiation to Divine justice, was not
developed till the outbreak of Mahometanism in the sixth
century, when a superstitious priesthood spread the opinion
among the credulous masses that God could no longer have
patience with so wicked a world; and religion, as taught by
the Church, began to assume throughout a dismal aspect, from
which it has not yet quite recovered. It was then for the first
time that paintings and sculptures of Christ on the Cross
appeared. It was then that the theory first took wing, that
the multitude must be scorched eternally in consequence of
their sins, and that only the few who viewed Jesus as having
paid the bloody price which Divine justice demanded could
be saved. It was then that all the dreary machinery of
penance and the Inquisition actively began.
But with all a convert’s wish to trust the vicarious efficacy
of the atoning sacrifice, the difficulty of exactly knowing that
special point in the doctrine on which his soul was to rest,
became more embarrassing to him from the disputes of polemi
cal divines. Under Pope Homisdas and some of his successors,
there was a fierce strife as to whether we ought to say “ one,
of the Trinity suffered in the flesh,” or “ one Person of the
Trinity suffered in the flesh; ” and the two parties in this
controversy went on damning each other most zealously, till
the displacement of this crotchet, by another equally important,
�17 .
revived the same process, which has been so general in the
Christian Church in all ages. In our own time, the thought
ful enquirer after salvation, through the atonement, is almost as
much at a loss. For some learnedly argue that the virtue of
the “ saving work ” lies in the death of Christ; others, that it
is in the shedding of His blood; others, in His obedience from
the cradle to the grave; some have written to prove that He
died only for the elect; others, that He died for the world, but
His sufferings only avail for the elect. Some of us, too, can
remember the countless distinctions of faith so finely drawn
by preachers, that a sensitive mind felt bound to hesitate
which was the right one. Then there were the varied and
perplexing definitions of predestination, “sublapsarian,” “supralapsarian,” and “ subter-superlapsarian.” 0, Christianity, what
follies have been perpetrated in thy name! Even as late as
the days of John Wesley, to deny the existence of witchcraft
was branded an impiety, equal to rejecting the Bible. Here
are the venerable man’s own words: “ It is true that the English
in general, and indeed most of the men of learning in Europe,
have given up all accounts of witches and apparitions, as mere
old wives’ fables. I am sorry for it. . . . The giving up
of witchcraft is in effect giving up the Bible. . . . 1
cannot give up to all the Deists of Great Britain the
existence of witchcraft, till I give up the credit of all history,
sacred and profane ” Well, these, with many more theological
speculations and superstitions equally interesting, that once
stirred up much bitterness among the followers of Jesus, have
been consigned to the limbo of dead credulities. And with
such exploded errors once believed by well-meaning men, not
very distant from our own times, it is only bigotry that can
prevent us from seeing that the Church of the Future will
recall many of the opinions, eloquently defended now by
Evangelical teachers, as the debris of a theological period,
which only the curious student of antiquity will take the
trouble to look into. As from the beginning, the “extreme
views ” of to-day will be the moderate views of the coming
age; and men who think only at the level of their times, are
taking a sure path to speedy oblivion.
But not only do creeds proscribe inquiry; they give oppor*
B
i
�18
tunities for hypocrisy. There are thousands of clergymen in
the English church who, in common with no small number of
excellent laymen, cannot think on any subject very deeply,
and are content to take their creed ready made; and the same
class of minds make up the vast proportion of adherents to
every system. But there are clergymen of a higher order.
They signed the “ articles ” before they had time thoroughly
to examine the mysteries they contain. These men become
committed to their position and dependent on preaching for
their support. As always must 'be the case with independent
thinkers brought up in strict orthodoxy, and who are thrown
in the way of argument on the opposite side, the convictions
of these men deviate eventually from the “ old paths.” What
is the result ? They sigh for freedom of thought and speech,
but while there are institutions to take in the criminal and the
vicious who want to break away from their evil ways, there are
none that seem to offer refuge for the honest clergyman who
desires to be true to his conscience, but fears lest destitution
should overtake his family. The barometer of his moral cour
age, perhaps, is not naturally high, and the miserable man stays
where he is, doing daily violence to the most holy part of his
nature, quenching; because perverting, the only light within
him appointed for his moral and spiritual guidance, proclaiming
to others what his conscience is ever telling him is untrue.
Is it surprising that the same tendency should exist, though
perhaps to a smaller extent, among Nonconformists ? A young
man entering a Dissenting college is obliged to profess his faith
in a list of dogmatic statements which his youth and inexpe
rience preclude the possibility of his having gravely examined.
At the close of his preparatory course he is expected to have
read and thought much, but those who guide his studies take
care that his reading and thought shall be in the direction of
confirming him in the doctrines of his denomination.
*
When
he is ordained to the ministry, the repetition of an unchanged
statement of his belief is again demanded from him. The
doctrinal provisions in the Trust Deed of the chapel in which
* In my college days, by desire of one of the tutors, the Westminster Review
was excluded from the House,
�he preaches are an additional chain to bind his intellect. I
challenge any man of average mind to let the thought-currents
of this age have free access to his soul, and conscientiously
endorse many dogmatic articles of belief framed in the six
teenth century and still prevalent in many quarters. To throw
in the way of any minister, therefore, the temptation, to which
I fear not a few are exposed, of being untrue to their convic
tions, is an iniquity that must, sooner or later, bring Divine
retribution upon us, in the form of a heartless ministry and a
hollow church. If such deceitful “ things be done in the green
tree ”—in that institution which claims to be the very ark of
the New Covenant—what must be the effect “in the dry”—
in the paths of politics and commerce ?
Christ lays down no creed, or any form of church govern
ment; whatsoever. He came to declare what Moses and the
prophets had done before Him,—judgment, mercy, faith,—only
with the motive-power of a higher and more tender conception
of God. He came to emancipate men from the slavery of forms
and ceremonies, and to enforce earnestness in knowing, and
sincerity in doing, the will of God. Nothing could be more
catholic and beautiful than religion as He taught it before
brangling theological doctors had done for Christianity what
the Masoretic Rabbis did for the original and essential princi
ples of the Hebrew faith. “ God is a spirit,” He said, “ and
they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit, and in
truth.” The apostle, Peter, on escaping from the despotism of
Jewish forms, announced a similar doctrine. “Of a truth I
perceive that God is no respecter of persons; but in every
nation he that feareth Him and worketh righteousness is
accepted with him.” “Let us therefore stand fast in the
liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not
entangled again in the yoke of bondage.” If your heart be
under pure, lowly, and sincere impulse^ your mind may be
safely trusted to roam in the joys of intellectual freedom.
If the church is to keep pace with the world in energy for
good, honouring the devoted efforts of men of every name to
receive and spread the truth; if Christians are to prevent
enlightened and benevolent enterprise from passing wholly from
themselves to men of the world, many of whom are nothing in
�20
the eyes of the sects because they cannot embrace their dogmas
(nevertheless as truly saved before God as those who sit in
judgment on them), then they must combine firmness of
present conviction with perfect freedom of enquiry into the
opinions of all seekers after truth, and be ready to follow
wherever the light of evidence leads. This will be a prominent
characteristic of the Church of the Future. That church
will elect its teachers, not because of their agreement with
any one set of dogmatic views, but because of their pos
sessing that mysterious gift of insight, which, in a certain high
and genuine order of minds, lets in the rays of beauty and
truth. It will despise those teachers who waste their strength,
and the time of their hearers, in expositions of useless
metaphysics. It will supplicate those who minister, thus:
“ Preach not simply what we believe, if it be not in perfect
accord with your own conscience. We encourage you to
think closely, deeply, and clearly, and tell us, without
the least reserve, all that is in your heart about the great
interests of religion, and we will respect your loyalty to
conscience.” Methinks the members of the future church
will look back from the heights of their calm intelligence with
mingled grief and pity on the things we now generally call
religion and theology, and on the unreal and unprofitable
utterances called sermons, that pour even from eloquent lips
throughout Evangelical England to fill up two half-hours
every Sunday. The Church of the Future will consist of
voluntary associations of unselfish seekers after truth, without
a distinct professionally-trained ministry of any kind. All
the members of the church will have sufficient education to
develop their powers, if' they have any powers to develop,
each will hold the culture and use of his special talents sacred,
and devote a fair share of his time to the study needful to
increase intellectual and moral strength. Business and wealth
will be made subservient- to the pursuit of truth and goodness,
and of the bliss which these precious qualities bring, and all the
“pomps and vanities” of the fashionable world will be pitied as
signs of ignorance and barbarism. Thus the future church will
be able to “edify” itself in the best sense. It will not depend
for instruction and impulse on what is now called “the
�21
regular ministry,” or any one man, or class of men, toiling
their weary round, week by week, in the narrow circle of
orthodoxy. Each of the ministers will possess something that
a century of devoted application to academic study could
never give. They will be inspired, gifted with a sort of clair
voyant perception of the true and the right, which can never
be acquired—intuition, insight; and so their minds will be to
the church like so many windows opening out upon the mani
fold glories of the universe. They will not see eye to eye, but,
coming before the people in rotation, they will be able, alto
gether, to cover the wants of the congregation. Each of them
will be “a law unto himself,” and his teaching will be
approved, not because it happens to agree with what somebody
believes, but because it is a true effluence from an earnest and
gifted man.
III. Terms of membership in the Church of the Future will
be simpler, than they mostly are in the Church of the Present.
There is an anomalous section of the Protestant Church in
this country which has expended immense ingenuity in its
creeds, parties and bearing, and with great success, in making
the Christian religion look ridiculous. I refer to the body that
makes residence in the parish the one title to church com
munion, and yet every Sunday hurls anathemas at those
respectable parishioners, its legal members, who do not believe
the incomprehensible doctrine of Three Persons in One Person.
I except therefore the Church of England from this comparison.
But Evangelical Nonconformists, while they would shrink from
applying the damnatory clauses of the Athanasian Creed,
would, I suppose, reject any applicant for membership who did
not receive the teaching of that Creed. What authority have
you from reason or from your Master for shutting out any God
fearing man, who as conscientiously believes that he is honour
ing God by denying your views of the Godhead, as you believe
that you are doing the same thing by holding those views ?
Never did Jesus require any test of discipleship but thinking
and doing what one believed to be right. “ He that doeth the
will of my Father who is in Heaven, the same is my mother,
my sister, and my brother.” Nor did Paul place any meta-
�22
physical barrier in the way of anybody entering the church at
Rome. In his Epistle to that church he says: “ God shall
render to every man according to his deeds; to them who by
patient continuance in well-doing seek for glory, honour, and
immortality, eternal life; but to them that are contentious and
do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation
and wrath, tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man
that doeth evil; but glory, honour, and peace to every man
that worketh good. . . . For there is no respect of persons
with God.” As a matter of fact we know that there were
members in the church at Corinth who did not even accept the
doctrine of the resurrection, and yet there is no record of their
expulsion.
In the Reformed Church of the yet distant future, when a
higher secular training will have braced the powers of men to
grapple with such questions, I believe the doctrinal terms of
membership will be reduced to two : the Fatherhood of God,
and the Brotherhood of man. These are the grand central be
liefs to which men of soul and light in all countries are rapidly
tending, as they gradually uncoil from their souls the chains
of churchism and creedism, and we need no other principles
to live and die by. Most of the discords and divisions of
Christendom about “ points of faith ” will be viewed by the
Church of the Future as very much of the same importance as
Milton, in his History of England, gives to the battles of the
Kings of the Heptarchy. He passes them over, as if they
had only been “fights of crows in the air.”
Upon the two doctrines I have named, the Church of the
Future will peacefully rest. And are they not strikingly
simple and intelligible ? They need no miracle to reveal
them, and no learning to expound them. They are written
upon our nature, and directly revealed to the whole race.
They cannot create religious strife, but wherever honestly
realised, they must bind all men together in one happy and
holy family, and bring all into blissful relation to God. A
man must belie his being not io feel their truth the very moment
they are presented to him. They are moral intuitions. Four
and twenty years have I been a student of theology and a
preacher, and now when life is more than half gone, it pours
�23
a terrible mockery on one’s past intellectual toil, to be obliged
to unlearn the vague, shifting and clashing theological theories
with which my intellectual and moral' growth has been
cramped. But with humility, joy, and faith, I return, like a
little child, to the guidance of those two natural sentiments,
which the true prophets and teachers of all times have but
repeated and confirmed, but which dogmatic theology has
tended so much to mystify. They are the core of Christ’s
teaching, and the pillars of the future church.
A twofold rule of duty and discipline to be imposed on
applicants to the new church, will form inevitable counterparts
of these two fundamental principles. The one test of fitness
for fellowship will consist in a true effort to keep those com
mandments, on which hang the law and the prophets : “ Thou
shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul, strength,
and mind, and thy neighbour as thyself;” commandments
which embrace immutable morality, and are the most exhaus
tive expressions of practical and eternal religion ever uttered.
In these two precepts are to be found the substance of all
the guiding laws and dispensations of God. Blessed is he who
fulfils them. The man who candidly does his best to conform
to them, will be welcome to the coming Church of God. In
our love to God we have the motive-power to aim without
ceasing at perfection. In our love to man—the sequel of our
love to God—there is a pledge that all bitterness and hatred
between man and man shall perish. If we understand our
true relations to God and to each other, brotherly love, a
virtue not conspicuously developed by Evangelicism, will be
evoked ; all the benevolent feelings of our nature, patriotism,
philanthropy, charity, compassion, forgiveness, and the do
mestic affections. Movements will be encouraged, fitted to
promote the material, intellectual, social, and moral improve
ment of mankind. All nlalevolent propensities, all attempts
to harm the temporal and spiritual interests of society will be
checked. In the bonds of real human brotherhood, as distin
guished from the artificial ties of creed and sect, all oppression,
tyranny, pride, envy, ingratitude, and deceit, must disappear.
Such an ideal of brotherhood will become a fact in the Church
of the Future. Then the wise and the unlearned, the rich and
�24
the poor, the strong and the weak, shall dwell together in the
holy tabernacle of God, rendering mutual services under the
inviolable covenant of love, and sharing far more warmly than
at present, the blessing conferred by the common Father; and
the hope of humanity shall approach realization: “ Peace on
earth, and goodwill toward men.” Those who accept these two
principles of faith, and strive to keep these two great command
ments, whether they come from the East or from the West, the
North or the South, will sit at the banquet of this glorious
Catholic Church fellowship. No “ deputation from the breth
ren ” will need to be appointed to examine the faith of the
candidate for membership, for the satisfaction of the church.
There will be no occasion for imposing dogmatic tests. If
the life be right that will be accepted as a sufficient proof of
the reality of the faith. The new church will not be a self
constituted heaven only for those who fancy themselves saints,
but rather a hospital for the moral cure of all who honestly
wish to be healed,. None will then, as now, be found stand
ing aloof from the church, because the terms of commun
ion are thought to be too strict. The society of the church
will be so pure, truthful, and noble, that the bigot, the back
biter, the vain, the mean, will feel rebuked and repelled under
the consciousness of their own unworthiness. Family distinc
tion, wealthy ignorance, and bustling conceit, will have no
favour shewn them in that serene and enlightened community
Those Divine graces, now so much at a discount, if not decked
out in golden attire in the Church of the Present, will be the
all in all of qualification for admission to the Church of the
Future.
IV. The objects and aims of the Church of the Future will
be more practical than those of the Church of the Present.
The object and aim in which the prayers, preachipg, teach
ing, and all other kind of Evangelical effort, at home and
abroad, avowedly centre, is a work which is described as “ the
salvation of souls.” It is the keeping of this work ever in
view that is, with orthodox Christians, the chief signs in the
individual and in the church, of spiritual life. It is this
that kindles the passionate zeal of the young disciple in
�25
dedicating himself to the toils of the ministry. It is the
shaping of a sermon to this, that is supposed to give it its
true value.
Take away the animating doctrine of “ the
salvation of sinners” from Evangelical theology and organiza
tion, and the speeches delivered in Exeter Hall, at the present
season, would be extremely tame, the peculiar “unction”
which is so indispensable an element of ministerial power with
the faithful, would be sadly wanting, and the decline of “ the
prayer meeting,” of the “Tract Society,” and of application for
“ fellowship with the church,” would be even more lamented
than it is. What then is the nature of this solemn business,
that so inflames the zeal and the liberality of popular
churches ? There are very different ways of looking at the
matter, according to the stratum of Evangelical society to
which people belong.
The Primitive Methodist preacher
presents the orthodox view of “ salvation through the blood of
the cross,” in its most naked and consistent form. There can
be no mistaking his meaning when he cries aloud about the
eternal destruction of the sinner. Without ceremony he pitches
his camp in the street, and states the case between sinners and
God, plainly and honestly, according to the Evangelical theory
of the universe. It is strangely otherwise, in most instances,
with Evangelical ministers of the middle class. They profess
just the same doctrine on this subject as the untutored “local
preacher.” But out of an unwarrantable and expedient regard
to their somewhat more intelligent congregations, they illogically—I might be pardoned if I were to use even a more severe
term—allude to the disagreeable articles of their creed, in a
subdued and reserved tone, as if they thought it vulgar to be
only, after all, doing exactly the same kind of work as their
more ranting brethren. Why should the quieter clergyman or
congregationalist smile at the excited methodist, for manifesting
an earnestness, which, believing as he does, would surely
not be too intense in himself? This is a discrepancy of
orthodox Protestantism, which might afford scope for an
interesting paper, at the next meeting of the “ Evangelical
Alliance.” The common notion among orthodox sects is, that
in consequence of sin,—either committed by the first man and
imputed to his race, or committed by both him and them
�26
together—a dread abyss has been prepared to engulf human
beings ; that, in order to avert this fate, the second person of
the Godhead was slain by a Divine decree, so that, in some
variously .defined, and consequently unintelligible way, the
attribute of God’s t( official justice ” might seem not to be
compromised in the salvation of men. It is gravely affirmed
that Jesus must be lacerated, exposed, and crucified, like the
worst Roman malefactor, and that only by trusting in the
efficacy of this awful transaction, as meeting the imperious
demands of a dishonoured law, and as substituted for our own
individual and everlasting punishment, can any one escape
certain material and moral torments in the next life. Is it
wonderful that, with these conceptions of God’s character and
dealings, many a parent has been driven to distraction about the
deliverance of his children from this “ blackness of darkness,”
and that not a few strong minds have lost their balance in
following out the doctrine to its logical issues ? It is some
consolation, however, to the poor sotds that, Sunday after
Sunday, are consigned, either to the woe of eternal conscious
suffering, or of annihilation, to know that ma^iy of those
ministers who are most impassioned in their pulpit speculations
about the horrors of the lost, do not allow these things to
spoil their relish for the comforts, and, where they can afford
them, for the luxuries of life. In private friendship they are
usually most vivacious and humorous. By a mysterious but
happy contradiction, the crushing agony we might naturally
expect them to feel for the millions they tell us are ever
falling into “ eternal destruction,” does not impair their interest
in the Exhibition of the Royal Academy, or Tennyson’s last
poem.
What is the inference from this fortunate incongruity be
tween professional phrase and the common sense of every-day
life ? Certainly not that Evangelical preachers practise deceit.
I believe that, as a body, they are free from the remotest
shadow of wilful insincerity. But how, with the facts before
us, can we avoid the suspicion that they deceive themselves ;
that what they fancy to be a belief is merely a sentiment, a
“ tradition of the elders,” with which reason may not inter
meddle, and which, consequently, has never really entered into
�27
them as a practical conviction ? If it be so, the reaction of this
self-delusion upon the conscience cannot be favourable. How
could any religious man believe that nineteen-twentieths of the
world’s population have for countless ages been going to perdi
tion, in spite of their possible deliverance through the preaching
of the gospel, and yet retain his sanity ? Indeed, if he took
the subject to heart, he would be just as likely to go mad over
the apathy of the church as over the doom of the world.
Suppose we were told that out of a thousand British subjects
in Greece five hundred had been captured by brigands, and
subjected to a slow and an incessant process of torture which
they had resolved to continue through an indefinite number of
years, and that the remaining five hundred were in imminent
risk of being taken also; to say nothing of Christianity,
would not common humanity impel all civilized governments
to combine and rush to the rescue of our countrymen ? Then
I hold it to be contrary to all the laws of mind for any rational
being to believe in the eternal destruction of “ unbelievers,” in
any form, and go about the duties of a citizen like other men.
But most orthodox people, clerical as well as lay, seem quite
at home in secular affairs, and thus demonstrate the revolt of
their better nature from this figment of semi-Pagan theology.
But, again, the Evangelical way of salvation offers a motive
to the impenitent which cannot but render their faith and
obedience specially unacceptable to God. He seeks our love,
and whoever turns to Him from the mere dread of punishment,
or from the selfish desire to get behind the walls of a city im
pregnable to flames, and without the breathing of the heart
supremely after the pure, the truthful, the just and the good,
must be an object of the Divine pity, if not contempt. What
noble-minded man does not shrink from the servility of a
creature who affects esteem only because he is afraid of punish
ment ? And shall the holy God be placed beneath the level
of imperfect men ? What I have known of the tendency of
the Evangelical system—all elaborate repudiations of the fact
notwithstanding—leads me to , believe that it never can and
never does produce a high type of character where it is con
sistently followed. But to the credit of thousands be it said,
that it is not always consistently followed. It exalts escape
I
�28
from future punishment and the attainment of future happi
ness into the chief end of religion. That is its gospel, and a
most selfish gospel it is. I tremble at the thought of the
grievous and degrading perversions of the relations between
God and man for which it is responsible. No wonder there is
such unavailing complaint on the part of preachers that, as a
rule, religious progress usually ceases with converts at the point
of their admission to the circle of communicants. They were
taught to “ flee from the wrath to comethey were made un
happy by the burden of real or, as is quite as often the case, of
imaginary sins. Their grand inquiry is “ How are we to get
forgiveness and peace, and release of the fear of endless woe ?”
The judicial notion of Christ’s mission is set before them, and
whatever idea they may have of the desirableness of becoming
God-like, the necessity of being insured against the dreaded
forensic penalty of sin is presented to them in a light so ab
sorbing, that any distinct conception of Christianity as aiming
chiefly at the moral elevation of our nature, and at the recovery
of our powers to harmony with each other and with God’s
will, is kept in the background. Evangelical congregations
may hear God referred to as a Father, but the corner-stone of
their theology is that He is an inflexible Ruler, whose official
anger is to be appeased. The spectral representation of a
magistrate who may be approached only through a propitia
tory sacrifice is the backbone of orthodoxy. How then is it
possible to love, in any rational sense, this governmental ab
straction ? How can a Ruler be other than a cold embodiment
of law ? You may fear and reverence such a Being, but to let
your heart go out in passionate love for His character, to be
inspired with a longing desire to be like Him, to delight in the
thought of His presence, would necessitate a revolution in the
laws of being. That gospel, then, which interprets the salva
tion of souls according to legal analogies, and gives such
towering prominence to escape from punishment as a motive
power, and turns the life and death of Christ into a substi
tutionary sacrifice, cannot fail to produce in the subject of
Evangelical faith, either spiritual stagnation, oi' fanatical illu
sion which will be mistaken for sound religious progress.
I might, did time permit, prove that the whole Evangelical
�29
fabric rests in a confusion of Pagan and Jewish traditions with
literal facts. I might trace back with you the prevailing idea of.
future torment to its true source in Babylon, where the Jews
found it during their captivity, and afterwards brought it
with them to their own land, and incorporated it with their
t national theology, I might easily prove that, as a poetical
figure has been confounded with an absolute truth respecting
penalty, so allusions to ancient Jewish ceremonial laws have
been confounded with literal facts respecting redemption
through Christ. But I must leave this train of thought
to be pursued by you at leisure. What I am most anxious
to say is, that the supreme object of the Church of the Future
will be to teach and spread a salvation not material, but moral,
intellectual, and spiritual; present, too, as well as future.
“ The Kingdom of Heaven is not meat and drink, but right
eousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.” So the kingdom
of wrath is not fire and brimstone, but envy, pride, idolatry,
lust, uncharitableness, ignorance, superstition, and bigotry.
And it will be the aim of the Church of the Future to heal
minds by applying the salve of truth, in all its adapted forms
and bearings, in order to cure these ruinous diseases. That
was the work Christ, the Great Spiritual Physician, set
Himself to accomplish. He found one faculty out of joint,
another bruised, another bleeding, and another cumbered
with a loathsome excrescence, and lie brought to bear
His spiritual surgery to heal all. While recognising the
necessity of a turning-point in a character that was previously
under some dominant wrong influence, the Church of the
Future will reject most of the sensational experiences which
are now described as gathering around Evangelical “ con
version.” In that golden age of religion to which our hopes
reach' forth; the beginning of Divine life in the soul will consist
in free moral decision to escape from the thraldom of error and
, wrong-doing, and to be governed by those pure and changeless
principles laid down by a loving Father for the control and the
guidance of His children. Worthier impulses than the terrors
of woe, or the safety of Heaven, will be urged to bring men
into sympathy with truth and righteousness. The justice of
God will not then be degraded into a bugaboo to frighten
�30
sinners. It will be delighted in as a manifestation of holy love.
No miserable Jewish modes of seeking reconciliation with God
will then be acknowledged. The intrinsic charms of harmony
with His appointments in our being, and in the universe at large,
will eclipse all inferior considerations. Love to God, the essential
transforming power, will not then spring from some one sup
posed judicial contrivance to “deliver from going down to the
pit,” or from some morbid emotionalism supposed to be of super
natural origin, but really a sympathetic and nervous affection.
Love to God will then spring from an adoring view of all His
endless contrivances to promote the happiness of men, and the
full development of all their powers. The labours of the Future
Church will be directed to improve everything within its
reach, capable of improvement. Its teaching and work will be
eminently practical. Instead of strumming ad nauseam, as is
now done, upon a few doctrines or duties supposed to contain
the essence of saving truth, but which often leave those who hear
them as dead in their besetting sins of temper, ignorance, and
covetousness as they found them, the Church of the Future
will deem all truth equally sacred, and in its place necessary
to be unfolded for the illumination and the advancement of
mankind, for the hastening of the period of which the seer of
olden time spake, when “ the wilderness and the solitary place
shall become glad, and the desert rejoice-and blossom as the
rose.”
Moreover, the efforts of the Church of the Future will ever
be encouraged by the assured faith that the antidote of truth,
love, joy and peace will yet perfectly neutralize the bane of
error, hatred, misery, and care. It will have risen out of the
heartless, useless, tiresome debates of minds struggling with
creed-bonds, as to whether conscious agony or final extinction
of being awaits the sinner. The Church of the Future will
be able to work without the feverishness and gloom that
generally mark the movements of the Church of the Present.
It will be able to work calmly and joyfully in the confidence that
the chasm which still exists between God’s ideal of the world
and the realization of that ideal will be bridged over, arid that
not a soul created will ever fail of being lifted up into holy and
blessed fellowship with Himself. What earthly parent would
�31
ever dream of making the punishment of his child an end ?
The object of all intelligent parental correction is to subdue
wrong habits and bring the chastised one into the orbit of
obedience ? Is it not one of the plainest signs of advancing
civilization too, that criminal discipline is made subservient to
the reformation of the offender?. It is not so easy now as it
once was to induce juries to find a verdict that will necessitate
punishment by death; nor are judges so ready, as they once
were, to sentence men to the gibbet. All ranks of society are
becoming increasingly permeated with the idea of the improve
ability of the race under conformity to physical and moral law.
And the principle which is only dawning upon our age as a
discovery has been acted upon by God from all eternity, and
He will never swerve from it. So when the church becomes
a more instructed medium of God’s revelation, she will labour
in every sphere of the useful, the beautiful, and the good, in
the unfaltering hope that all rebels and all revolted provinces
in the universe will be finally restored.
Now, in my capacity as your minister, I say Farewell. I
thank you for your kindness toward me, during the four and
a half years of my ministry among you. I have not inten
tionally offended anyone. I have tried under somewhat difficult conditions, in a congregation, made up of all beliefs, and
of marked differences in intelligence, to impel and guide, by
God’s help, your religious life. My own convictions have
expanded of late, and I should have been glad to lead you,
as I believe I have been led, into upward paths, which the
Church of the Future will not fear to tread, but I may not.
In my retirement from the Congregational ministry, I mean
no attitude of antagonism to Evangelical bodies. They are,
I doubt not, suited to the felt spiritual wants of the masses
of worshippers in this country at present, or they would not
be so numerous and influential as they are. The character
of their teaching has changed in a measure, in the past,
and it will gradually become - vastly more modified still, ere
another half century go by. But the ideal church we have
been contemplating to-night is not, I think, to result from
the transformation of any existing church. Each of the
present sects has a history and a mission, and when the
�32
forces of its doctrines and discipline are expended, it will no
longer dovetail into the necessities of the age; it will die.
But out of the ruins of the Church of the Present, the New
Church of our aspirations will rise.
It will embrace, as I
have already remarked, many bright souls that are now as
“ proselytes of the gate,” conscientiously standing outside all
orthodox communions, because these have ceased to be true to
their consciences. The Church of the Future will also take
up into itself what of light and life may remain in the churches
it is destined to displace. I am among those who seek the
intellectual and religious freedom that, at present, lies beyond
the walls of sectarianism. I will honour the well-intentioned
efforts of all orthodox bodies, and am willing to preach in their
pulpits, and join in their worship, and help in their good
works, and rejoice in all that is true in them. But the call of
God to me is to cease from the salaried pastorate of an
Evangelical Church, and I dare not disobey. My future in
another sphere is full of care and uncertainty.
But for
conscience’ sake I must not hesitate to take the uninviting
road. God will provide, and should He see fit to provide
adequately for ‘my temporal wants, I shall not abandon the
hope of some years hence, being able to preach what I believe,
without fear of creed or of man, in true apostolic fashion, in
the happiest sense, an “ Independent ” minister, because an
independent man. I shall delight in your peace and prosperity
throughout all the organizations of the Church, and shall never
cease to think kindly of you all, and long for your growth in
the spirit and truth of Jesus Christ.
E. . C. OSBORNE, PRINTER, NEW STREET, BIRMINGHAM.
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Victorian Blogging
Description
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A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
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Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
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2018
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Conway Hall Ethical Society
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Pamphlet
Dublin Core
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Title
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The church of the present, and the church of the future: an address, delivered in the Congregational Chapel, Moseley Road, Birmingham, 5th May 1870
Creator
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Macfie, Matthew
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: Birmingham; London
Collation: 32 p. ; 23 cm.
Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. "Published by request". Sermon preached on the occasion of Macfie resigning the Congregational ministry after fifteen years' service. Text of sermon from Matthew 6-10 'Thy kingdom come'.
Publisher
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E.C. Osborne; Simpkin Marshall & Co.
Date
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1876
Identifier
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G5370
Subject
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Sermons
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<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The church of the present, and the church of the future: an address, delivered in the Congregational Chapel, Moseley Road, Birmingham, 5th May 1870), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
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application/pdf
Type
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Text
Language
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English
Conway Tracts
Sermons