1 10 17 https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/41fa78c743611bcef99ebed2b35d3fc8.pdf?Expires=1785369600&Signature=tb0QvDgGoZRyTHoMym-NJUh7Cw%7EeJR6zd%7E61cnExkMM3zyIFm55dUwxSQCPjy3YulEH-B3c1Ac75RinDHwINReJaf5qzYIEmuD3JEnnzysvAMDadJzvBFI89kr59SVOAbJlT5k3igzvA-TLo0cSGOKa98tXvJ4nMxUy3u0CWuFZnS%7EFNW7OOO%7EGHBdvPfwvePEaYTctmnrjCLrCQtoGe2UFZK3ZuDC43GbHVSGc6pHRGLm4I99VXcCBr4Xt79BpTNQbOA3IfryeoUX1xITFdXCpgaJrbDF0lBsI%7EmCvnNITXVSH-QC7cwjyO3FwI8JCPxeYu0%7EBIyEekgTkSsF2M1Q__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 15f83dad9d64cf22ec8b34b55326b43d PDF Text Text B3l7° KT62.8 NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY No. 1] BLOWS AT THE BIBLE, [i«. BY JOSEPH SYMES. ---------------------------------- ----------------------- - -------------------------------------------- ---------------------------- >. ♦ THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. Who was its author, when and where it was delivered, before what audience, I do not care; the value of the discourse is no greater though a great man uttered it; is no less, though the production of a booby. If it descended or ascended from heaven, it is no better or worse for that; if it sprung from earth, or Purgatory, or Hell, that makes it no worse. If God preached it, it is just as it is ; and you must admit no more nor less, if the preacher was the Devil. If a Holy Ghost inspired it, that does not enhance its value ; if a foul or filthy spirit instigated its utterance, the sermon is no fouler or cleaner for that. We may estimate the qualities' of' the Author by those of the sermon ; but not those of the sermon by those of the author. Blessed are the poor in spirit (Matt, v., 3.) Poverty of purse is bad enough; poverty of spirit is the condition of fools, slaves, lunatics and idiots.—For theirs is the kingclo^ of heaven. What a blessed set, therefore, constitutes tm kingdom of heaven! Wise men are excluded—by their own choice, of course. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted (v. 4). Common Sense says, Blessed are they who do not need to be comforted, word translated “blessed” all through these “ beatitudes,” as they were piously and lacka­ daisically denominated, should be rendered “ happy.’* The *-Devised Version,” however, from which I quote, keeps the old translation. Perhaps the revisionists did not like to expose their good book to ridicule. “ Happy are they that mourn! ” To which I reply, Tall are they that are short ! 7- at are they that are lean I Amen. It requires much grace and divine enlightenment to understand a sermon, my Brethren, and Sisters, specially when, like this on the Mount �2 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. it abounds in absurdities. Not one of those who heard it asked any questions ; discussion was not invited. And if they had demanded an explanation, no doubt the good-natured Jesus (if he was the preacher) would have mercifully damned them for their impertinence. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth (v. 5), History abounds with proofs of this truth. The meek Israelites expelled and murdered all the Canaanites they could, and took possession of all their victims had owned. The meek Romans conquered the world, or a great part of it; and the exceedingly meek Danes, Jutes, Saxons, and others con­ quered and peopled England. The meek English stole India and other countries, as the meek Spaniards stole South and Central America. Jesus did not understand history. Gentleness is the characteristic of a strong man who has strength enough to be self-controlled and goodness sufficient to direct his power to worthy ends ; but meekness is mental and moral paralysis. Gentleness is a virtue, meekness a vice. • The former is independence, the latter absolute slavery to the priesthood. Blessed^re they that hunger and thirst after righteousness (v. 6). Nonsense! Blessed are the righteous is the proper thing to say. People who hunger and thirst after righteous­ ness usually do nothing else, poor things ; their double appe­ tite feeds upon themselves, and they are weak and miserable as children.with worms. Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy (v. 7). It is so sometimes, though very often the contrary happens. After all, the just are better than the merciful, though both are good. Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God (v. 8). The pure in heart are good, though not always happy. They will never see God, though. 1. If God is infinite, he can never be seen, for there is no place where we could stand to see him. 2. If . seen, he is not infinite. The pure in heart have their own reward, and no more need a sight of God than I do a sight of the Queen. Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the sons of God (v. 9), This is a joke equal to another I will perpe­ trate : Blessed are the members of the Peace Society: for they shall be called the sons of Alexander the Great, Juljps Casar, Napoleon, Bismarck, Beaconsfield, or Bartie Frty. When �SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 3 did God ever make peace or prevent war ? When was there ever a war his servants did not ascribe to him ? Blessed are they that have been persecuted for righteousness' sake ; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven (v. 10). Then perse­ cution also is a good thing ? If so, the persecutors ought to be blessed too. To be persecuted is a nuisance, a great evil, a shame, a disgrace to civilisation. And if the persecuted have no compensation except the kingdom of heaven, their case is more hopeless than that of the followers of Don Carlos or of Jefferson Davis. As for people now-a-days being persecuted and slandered for the sake of Jesus, the conception is too grotesque for dis­ cussion. It is his pretended and pretentious followers who do all the persecution; and the kingdom of heaven consists, not of victims, but of stupid and brutal persecutors. If the “persecuted for righteousness’ sake” are to obtain a great reward for their endurance, Hurrah 1 I mean, Hallelujah ! we shall get the prize, and our Christian persecutors will go------ . I do not know what will become of them. Jesus says, “They so persecuted the prophets” (v. 11). What prophets ? This preacher must have referred to a different Old Testament from ours. The old Israelitish pro­ phets were bitter persecutors when opportunity occurred; but none of them suffered persecution, strictly so named. To encourage persecution itself is not much worse than to encourage its endurance by calling the persecuted happy. The good teacher does his best to inculcate manliness and justice, which will, in time, render persecution impossible. , Matt. v.— Ye are the salt of the earth (v. 13). If Christians ever were the salt of the earth, they must soon have lost "their savor : as far as we can trace them back they have been the world’s “ bitters,” witjtOut being anywise its tonics. Or ■—let me see ! Salt of the earth ! In large quantities salt renders soil absolutely barren. And wherever Christianity has reigned in unchecked sway, there has been a general dearth of all good things. Ye are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hid(y. 14). This was no doubt intended to produce modesty, Those poor illiterate disciples of an equally ignorant master were the light of the world! Look at the Science, Philosophy and Art of the world, and ask how much of it all is due to Jesus and his followers. �4 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. Christianity never shed a ray of light upon anything. Its lantern is a dark one, having neither wick nor oil. No let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your father which is in heaven (v. 16). Let your rushlights shine, that men may honor the sun. Amen. What nonsense, to call upon twelve boobies to confer honor upon an infinite being! If the Father in heaven knew the rubbish his only begotten son was spouting on earth, he would have shown his good sense to have corrected him. It says little for that parent’s fatherly qualities that his children behave so badly as they do. Worse behaved beings than sons and daughters of God there never were—ignorance, insolence and brutality are their usual characteristics; and they are just like their father. Think not that I came to destroy the law or theprophets(v. 17).—No, no, Jesus, youhadnot the power, your countrymen still cling to them and leave your doctrines and religion alone.—I came not to destroy, but to fulfil. How fulfil ? To keep, do you mean ? To obey ? If so, the Christian Church sorely misunderstands you. What Jesus says about heaven and earth passing away is nonsense; but what he says about those who disobey Moses and the prophets shows him to be a Jew, not a Christian, and puts all Christians in the wrong—if he was right. Jesus knew no other law than that of Moses, no other inspired book than the Jewish Scriptures, he never hinted that any other was needed or would be written ; yet his professed followers have almost superseded the Old Testament by the New, as they supersede the New Testament by their creeds, confessions, catechisms, and theological writings. Jesus next proceeds to improve upon Moses, though he above said he came only to fulfil. “ Thou shalt not kill,” said Moses—though he was frightfully fond himself of killing. Thou shalt nof be angry with thy brother, says Jesus; to be so, thou shalt be in danger of the Judgment, or local petty court. 2/ thou say, Haca to thy brother, thou shalt be in danger of the Council, the Sanhedrim, or the highest Jewish court; and to call thy brother a fool, shall expose thee to hell fire ! (v. 21, 22). Thus, it is bad to be angry, worse to say Baca, but a damnable thing to call a brother a fool. Yet Jesus and Paul did not hesitate to call people fools. I hope they are not damned. If your brother is a fool, and gives you good reason to tell him so, do it. It may open his eyes and lead to �SERMON ON THE MOUNT. a improvement. The clergy usually try to give the word “fool ” here some deep and mysterious and dreadful meaning, in order to justify Jesus in his absurd denunciation of it; but it means nothing worse than fool. It may be an impropriety to call a foolish brother, or even a neighbor, a fool, but it is not a crime. As to offering gifts at the altar (v. 23, 24), had Jesus been wise, he would not have sanctioned but condemned the miserable superstition. Gifts are offered at the altar which ought frequently to be paid as just debts to debtors ; in every case it is disgraceful to waste upon gods what men, women and children so much need for their life. Agree with thine adversary quickly, etc. (v. 25). Surely this ought to depend upon the justice of the case. If men can honestly avoid law and lawyers, they are great fools to have any connexion with them ; but there are many cases when a man must be a coward and a fool to agree with his adversary. Though if Jesus had agreed with his adversaries, or even had made any rational defence before Pilate, he pro­ bably would not have gone to the cross. The 27th and 28th verses are simply atrocious, for they condemn every healthy man that ever lived, and would, if they could be obeyed, depopulate the earth. Licentiousness is bad ; asceticism is a thousand times worse. Verses 29 and 31 are most brutal, and their moral tendency debasing in the extreme. To fear hell at all is barbaric, to fear it to the extent of mutilating oneself or its equivalent is brutalising. Had Jesus been a married man he might have spoken (v. 32) with some authority on the subject of divorce. None of his utterances on the sexual relationships are at all edifying. There are just causes of divorce ; a divorce which is not a perfect divorce ought never to be effected ; when once effected, the parties ought to be as free to marry again as bachelors and spinsters. What Jesus says respecting perjury and swearing (v. 33— 37) I entirely endorse, except that about the Evil One. To swear is folly. A man that cannot be bound by a promise, cannot be bound by an oath. But it is amusing to note how Christians send Jesus to Coventry when it suits them. Their conduct and teaching on oaths are the most perfect hypocrisy that could be conceived. In most respects they are to-day, as the result of purely secular influences, immeasurably superior �6 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. to their Master ; in respect to the oath business they are as far behind him. In that respect they are false, hypocritical and brutal. If they had their way, they would depopulate the world for the sake of their superstitions. Resist not evil (Matt. v. 39). What must we resist then ? Must we resist good ? Jesus seems to have been unable to run from one extreme without rushing to the opppsite. Re­ taliation, in most cases, may be foolish and wrong ; no general rule can cover all cases. But non-resistance of evil is the best way to encourage it. There is “a law in our members,” much older and much more potent, which tells us to resist evil with all our might—viz., the law of self-preservation. And Jesus was as much under the force of that law as other people. He nevei' turned the other cheek (v. 39), but gave cheek for cheek whenever opportunity occurred. So did his disciples. And his followers have always been more ready to smite than be smitten. Let him have thy cloak also (v. 40). Jesus was too poor to know the value of clothes, hence this stupid rule of life. Here, too, we have a most direct and thorough encouragement to dishonesty. People are too fond of law as it is ; what would be the state of society if every rogue who stole a coat could get the owner’s cloak too by simply suing him ? Verses 39—42 of this Sermon on the Mount are amply sufficient, if put into practice, to destroy civilisation and reduce mankind to a state of anarchy and violence. For­ tunately, professing Christians have always, with an exception or two, been more ready to steal than to throw away their property, more ready to compel others to walk the “miles ” than do it themselves. Bad as this is, it is better than what Jesus taught. Love your enemies (v. 44)—that you may be the children of your Father which is in heaven (v. 45). No man can love his enemy. The father in heaven cannot do it, or he would long since have hugged and caressed the Devil. Jesus did not do it, or he would have turned those stones into bread, as the Devil requested him when they met in the wilderness. “' Do good to them that hate you ! ” By what law ? It is con­ trary to reason and nature both. Someone asked Confucius what he had to say “ Concerning the principle that injury should be recompensed with kindness ? ”—It was a very old superstition, evidently—Confucius replied, “With what then �SERMON ON THE MOUNT. will you recompense kindness ? Recompense injury with justice, and kindness with kindness.” That is good philo­ sophy ; the language of Jesus is babyish. He maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust (v. 45). He does nothing of the sort. The sun doesn’t rise ; it is the earth that spins round in front of him, like a leg of mutton before the fire. And if God did this work, he also makes his sun scorch good and bad alike, and sends rains or drought indis­ criminately. If we followed the heavenly father’s example, no day would pass without our doing much mischief and murdering more or fewer persons. Better leave him alone. What reward have ge ? (v. 46—47). Just so. Jesus was enslaved to the barbarous philosophy of rewards and punish­ ments, and his followers have never grown out of it. The Christian is taught to expect a reward for everything. If he gives away money in charity, it is to get riches in heaven ; if he spends his money upon church and chapel building, it is to get an endless annuity in the New Jerusalem, or to be insured against the unquenchable fire ; and those who hangfire at parting with their cash are gravely assured that they will be “ recom­ pensed at the resurrection of the just ”—the date of which will be about the time the sky falls. Take heed that ye do not your alms before men (Matt, vi., 1). Christians read this the other way, viz. : Take heed to do your alms before men, to be seen of them. They boast of what they give out of their abundance and taunt us with not giving what we do not possess. They accept challenges to debate at times, on condition that the proceeds shall go to some charity, not at all caring if we should be compelled to apply for charity as a consequence of having to work for nothing. If Christians were half as good as they pretend, they would be too good to pretend at all; and if Christians would leave off wasting, and robbing, and swindling, all would have enough, and charity would no longer be needed. When thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites (Note, Hypocrites meant originally an actor) ; for they love to pray, standing in churches and chapels and in the corners of the sti eets, that they may be seen of men (v. o). Here I improve both the translation and the original. How many cf the parsons would ever pray if no man or woman were by to hear ? J �BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. Verily, I say unto you, They have their reward. True! True! ranging from £50 per aunum to £15,000 and per­ quisites. Not bad renumeration for actors in religious theatres. But when ye pray, do not jabber like foreigners, etc. (v. 7). I make the orthodox commentators a present of this rendering ; it exactly gives the sense. A paraphrase is:—Don’t jabber away like foreigners landed on a strange coast, who utter a multitude of words in the hope of being able to make the natives understand them. All the orthodox commentators have missed the point of the advice. And most parsons have a sort of regulation time for prayer, hoping that their God will answer a long prayer, though he won’t a short one. In fact, they treat their deity exactly like dishonest beggars do their victims—they try the virtues of unlimited blarney. Were I a god, I would much more readily relieve the Atheist who never asks for anything than those who make a trade of prayer—that is, begging. There are laws against begging, but none against praying; which shows that Christian states respect the public more than their God. Your father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him (v. 8). He is a poor father, then, to wait to be prayed to before doing his duty. It is a father’s duty to see that his children have their wants supplied whether they ask or not. The great father in heaven should spend a fortnight at some well-conducted house to learn the ways of civilised people. If he did this, he would burn the Bible and order a new one, this time not written by his amanuenses, but by men who could teach him more than all eternity has been able to do. The prayer that follows as a model, the Lord’s prayer, has about all the faults a prayer can have, probably, except length. There the pious pray for a kingdom to come. All just government grows. We don’t want foreign rule, though we can have no objection to God’s will being done on earth as in heaven, because it is not done there at all. Men should work for their daily bread, not pray for it. Forgive our debts, as we forgive our debtors. If Christians believed in “ a prayer­ answering god,” they would be afraid to pray thus : for they do not forgive, and so, in effect, they ask not to be forgiven. They are the most unforgiving of all people, being inspired perhaps by the great father who will burn his enemies with unquenchable fire. To pray not to be led into temptation, is �SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 9 wise, if the Bible be true; for God tempted Abram to murder his son, David to number Israel, etc. But to ask to be de­ livered from the Evil One, is like a frightened child begging his father to keep away the black man the nurse has been speaking of. Your father will forgive you, if you forgive others ; he won’t if you don’t. Good example. Sublime morality! You are to be perfect as your father (chap, v., 48), and he threatens to be imperfect if you are so ! That is, you can make him just what you will, forgiving or malicious, good or bad; for his conduct is regulated by yours This is the very highest point in New Testament morality!. The directions Jesus gives (Matt, vi., 16—18) for fasting are good enough, supposing fasting were itself of any conceivable use. The only parties who ought to fast are they who have eaten too much or whose health may probably be improved by a short period of abstinence. Fasting as now practised in Christendom is sheer hypocrisy. And as Christians do not now honestly practise it, no more need be said, but that •Christians would get far greater good by a little healthy honesty than by all “the means of grace ” they employ. The rest of Matthew vi., 19—34, is so openly antagonistic both to civilisation and to clerical conduct, that the wonder is modern Christians have not long since repudiated it as •contrary to their religion :— 1. Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth (v. 19). The best of Christians obey this by laying up all they can upon earth. 2. But lay up............. treasures in heaven (v. 20). Many Christians would do this too, but they know not where heaven is. They would not object to treasures here and hereafter both ; but having no prospect of heaven, and being wedded as closely to the earth as any misers, they make sure of earthly treasures, and trust in providence for the others. 3. For where your treasure is there will your heart be also (v. 21). No people love the world more fully than Christians ; and the “ love of the father,” of course, “ is not in them.” What Jesus says of the single eye and the light of the body (v. 22—23) may be ignored : he understood neither physiology nor optics, nor was he any better instructed in moral rights and obligations. He uttered rules, proverbs and commands, which his followers are ever praising and ever �10 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. deliberately breaking, and must break, or renounce civilisa­ tion. No man can serve two masters............. God and Mammon, for example (v. 24). Another blunder. The clergy can serve God and Mammon first rate. The first step is, perhaps, Hie most difficult. You renounce the world in your baptism, that is, your godfathers and godmothers do it for you, as theirs did for them. This is all you need to do. Henceforth you are safe ; your baptism regenerates you, and the “ new man ” serves Mammon and God with the most perfect assiduity for all the rest of life. If in any case God should grumble at the rivalry of Mr. Mammon, he is politely kicked out of doors, and Mammon reigns supreme. Jesus was not half so clever as his followers ; the parsons could put him up to many a dodge were he now on earth. Take no thought for your life—neither for food nor raiment (v. 25). This is the language of a pure barbarian or maniac. The commentators say, “anxious thought,” “undue thought,” etc. There is nothing in the gospels to authorise them. Jesus never inculcates the duty of industry ; but here he enjoins an absolute indifference for all worldly pursuits. The fowls (26) are to be your model as regards providing food— and they neither sow nor reap nor garner: but your heavenly father feedeth them and will much more feed you, for you are much better. And why care about clothes ? The lilies are clothed by providence ; how much more will he clothe you ? To all except perverse divines this language is so plain that one wonders even at their temerity in trying to reconcile it with common sense. But Jesus points it still more :—Can you, by taking thought, add a cubit to your height? The answer is obvious. Neither can you get food or clothes by “ taking thought.” “ Therefore take no thoughtetc. (v. 31). The Gentiles take thought; they seek food and clothes. But you have a heavenly father who knows all about what you need ; and if you only seek his kingdom and righteousness, he will see to it that all your wants are supplied. Good father!—How is it nobody trusts him ? I should like to see a community founded on the principles of the Sermon on the Mount. The bishops might take the lead in such an undertaking. They have the best security. They have a father who is all-good and almighty. He says he will supply all their needs if they will seek first his kingdom, etc. �SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 11 Their is neither bishop nor pastor who believes it. In that they show their scepticism and good sense. They are infidels—that is, unfaithful to their own professed principles; we are infidels in a better sense—viz., we.no more believe the truth and wisdom of Jesus’s teaching than they do, and we say so'much. For our honesty we shall be damned, while they will be saved for their hypocrisy. So be it. Take therefore no thought for the morrow; for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself (v. 34). Confucius said : “ If a man takes no thought about what is distant, he will find sorrow near at hand.” If Jesus had taken thought for the morrow he would have had a place “to lay his head he would not have been poorer than foxes, as he admitted, nor would he have gone hunger-bitten to the fig-tree and cursed it for bearing no figs out of season. Still there is in the world to-day something much worse than even the fanaticism of Jesus or his poor insanity, and that is the miserable cant, found even amongst Unitarians and a few Freethinkers, which affects to admire and eulogise the character and wisdom of the teachings of Jesus ! If those panegyrists are honest they do not understand what they do; if they understand, they xare veritable hypocrites. Every enlightened man does habitually, and as a consequence of his enlightenment, the very things Jesus condemned. He never more plainly condemned adultery or murder than he did social prudence and industry. The early Christians understood their master as I now do, and it was only the stern reality of life which showed them how false and pernicious his doctrines are. Cave, in • his “ Primitive Christianity,” p. 230, says : “ They never met with opportunities to have advanced and enriched themselves, but they declined and turned them off with a noble scorn.” Origen, he says, obeyed the precept not to have two coats, to wear shoes, nor to be (anxiously) careful for the morrow ” (p. 242). Cave invents “anxiously ” here. “Nay,” says he, “ so little kindness had they for this world, that they cared not how little they stayed in it; and, therefore, readily offered themselves for martyrdom at every turn ” (p. 246-7). This agrees with Tertullian : Calamities, etc., “ injure us not; ing the first place, because we have no further concern with th? world than how we may most quickly depart from it ’ (“Apology,” c. xii.) �12 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. When modem Christians exchange cant and hypocrisy for truth and honesty they will either follow and obey Jesus in reality or else openly renounce him. Which will they do ? Judge not that ye be not judged. For with what judgment 7 e judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye J mete, it shall be measured to you again. (Matt, vii., 1).__ Harsh judgments and censorious comments ought to be avoided ; but honest judgment is one of the best means of moral education, and moral education cannot be obtained without it. Besides, no one ever violated this rule more than Jesus himself. He judged and condemned in many cases ; nor did he ever. make it appear that he understood the im­ portance or the justice of a fair and open trial. Had he been wise and good, he would have given some hint, at least, respecting the forms and administration of justice. The codes of civilised nations owe nothing to Jesus or to his religion. His conceptions of justice and law were those of any petty Oriental despot. The mote and the shaft—spear-shaft—in the eyes consti­ tute a figure of speech grotesquely overdone, and ridiculous into the bargain. Who with a mote in his eye would wait for some one to ask to extract or remove it ?—while a spear­ shaft in the eye means the destruction of the organ and the death of the owner. It was not charity, but bitter and coarse satire, which inspired what he says about giving holy things to dogs and casting pearls before swine (v. 6, 7). If men are dogs and swine, it must be because God made them so, that is Jesus, if he was God. Why sneer at his own handiwork ? Why not make them better ? Ask and it shall be given you (v. 7, 8). If this were true, how rich and prosperous and powerful the Church would be 1 How soon the world would be converted! How quickly they would hear and see the last of the Freethinker and its wicked crew. All the prayers in the world—I mean the Church— cannot stop these Atheistic sermons, nor confound the preacher. Let them try. Ask and receive ! The parson prays to God and receives from men. Their prayers, indeed, are mostly intended for human ears; and those that do not reach human ears are never answered. The Church has never been ashamed to beg, and it has got a million-fold more than it has deserved. When the orthodox confess themselves un �SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 13 worthy, we agree with them, and when most of them confess themselves “miserable offenders,” we cannot but admit the justice of the plea. The contrast (v. 9—12) between earthly fathers and the heavenly one is all in favor of the former. Most earthly parents do something for their children ; the heavenly father does nothing. By the way, how can a man have two fathers, unless one is merely grandfather or father in a merely legal or social sense ? If, then, we have earthly fathers, we have no heavenly one. Beware offalse prophets (v. 15). Amen. Amen. All pro­ phets are false prophets. Truth is found only by experience, not revelation. All pretenders to revelation are false prophets: beware of them and their sermons and gospels and predictions. All those who follow them only repeat the original lies. And revelation lies have filled the world with confusion, bitterness and blood. They come in sheep’s clothing—good broad-cloth made of wool; but they dress in many ways. Ye shall know them bu their fruits (v. 16). Yes, yes ! What has revelation, what have its prophets, done for man ? All the world’s science, government, philosophy, sanitation, medicine, are due to the prophet’s enemies. No prophet ever revealed a pregnant truth that enriched or enlightened the world. To prophets we owe persecution and darkness ; to secular workers and thinkers we owe all the knowledge and all the wealth of the world. By their fruits ye shall know them—if they bear any. The bishops are barren, the Church is a desert, and the parsons ever cry, “ Give, give !” We hope Jesus’ prophecy is correct, that the useless trees shall be hewn down and cast into the fire. Then the churches are doomed. They bear no good fruit; they cumber the ground and produce poison. If none but those who do the will of the father (v. 21—-24) enter into the kingdom of heaven, there are few destined to enter. There is no parson or priest now existing that con­ forms his life to the Bible, and that is generally called the will oi’ word of God. Who, then, will people the kingdom of heaven ? I fancy the standard will have to be altered or the kingdom will never be anything but a kingdom on paper. And those who don’t go to that kingdom must, if popular theology is correct, people the Devil’s kingdom. I have no respect for the Devil, or his empire ; but he is going to beat �14 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. the other gentleman. Not only most people belong to him, bnt all the best are his. The parsons cannot question this, for they belong to the Devil as much as I do, and they serve him as heartily too. In face of existing facts, the kingdom of heaven must be pronounced a complete failure, and its effects are not worthy of a sale by auction. You, Jesus, need not make the gate so narrow. Nobody will enter even if you make a large gap in the fence. The peroration (v. 24—29) of the Sermon on the Mount is a splendid one. It fairly rises to the height of true oratory. But it is awfully selfish and egoistic, besides being maliciously unjust and severe. Who can do those sayings of thine, Jesus ? Who can love his enemies ? Who can follow the example of fowls and lilies ? Who can turn the other cheek, or give his cloak to the thief who steals his coat ? If thine own rule is to be the law, thou thyself art hopelessly condemned. There.' is nought but destruction and ruin in store for thyself and thy hearers and readers, if thy sermon is the standard of judg­ ment. That sermon would damn all men, women and chil­ dren ; all angels, archangels, seraphs, and cherubs ; and God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost will be damned with the rest; for there is not a being in the world who does or ever did obey what it enjoins. And yet the orthodox belaud what must damn them and all. I wonder if they’ll boast of that sermon when it has damned them ? THE LORD’S MERCIES. “ The Lord is good to all; and his tender mercies are over all his works.”—Psalm cxlv., 9. This, be it remembered, is not an empty boast. The Psalmist understood the matter well, being inspired by the Holy Spirit. He did not, as sceptical and profane persons would have done, look at the world and carnally survey the deeds and vicissi­ tudes of life ; he piously closed his eyes, and thus saw plainly that the Lord was “ good to all, and that his tender mercies were over all his works.” The pious king—when have kings not been pious?—adopted the only possible method of dis­ covering that the Lord was good to all, etc., he saw it by faith, as any one may who has faith enough. �THE LORD’S MERCIES. 15 But this sdfelime and salutary and universally comforting truth may be .proved to a demonstration. I. The Lord is almighty, and can do whatsoever he will. He can make two and two to be seven, or turn a summer­ sault, or turn himself inside out, if you give him time enough to do it in—that is, all time. He made all things in six days the very first time he ever tried, and could no doubt do it in six minutes now, were he so inclined. I mention these facts to show that the Lord is quite able to do everything. II. He is all-knowing too ; and so, in point of knowledge, as well as power, perfectly competent to execute goodness and extend his tender mercies to all. III. Historical proofs may now be given of the above truth ; and these are so numerous that we can merely select a few out of an almost infinite miscellany. 1. He made a man and woman and put them into a garden, where there was a^iree they were not to eat of on pain of death. He also made a “ subtil ” serpent who tempted the two to eat, and they did eat.” For this the Lord cursed the pair, the serpent, and the very earth. All the posterity of this couple were involved in their parents’ fate, and are to this day doomed to pain, toil, want, sickness, misery, and death for that old crime of eating forbidden fruit! This is the first proof of divine goodness and tender mercies. 2. Less than 2,000 years later, when men were numerous and not over good in their conduct, the Lord resolved to show how far he could excel them all in criminality and cruelty. There was not a man then living who would, if he could, have drowned the whole world. But the Lord showed his goodness by pouring down 1,000,000,000 (one thousand million) cubic miles of water upon the earth, or two thirds of a cubic mile for every man, woman, and child now in the world ! So abundantly plentiful was the supply that each man might have truly said with the grateful Psalmist, My cup runneth over ”—if he could have spoken after being drowned. It is true, the story says that eight persons were saved in this universal deluge ; but they might just as well have been drowned for any good we know of them. The water, by the way, was so plentiful that it seems to have dis­ gusted Mr. Noah, who broke the pledge and went out on the spree as soon as he could get anything to tipple upon. 3. Not to confine his exhibition of tender mercies to a �No. 5 ] BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. ; BY JOSEPH SYMES, . . [W. _■ 3 /' V?' JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS, And Noah . . . drank of the wine and was drunken (Gen. lx., 20-21).—(1) Teetotallers pretend that some Bible wines were not intoxicating ; but most were, or people might have drunk them with impunity. The Bible was not written by abstainers, nor was total abstinence ever contemplated by God, except for a few peculiar people. (2) Noah was a saint, and so it was no disgrace for him to get drunk and expose himself as he did. (8) The verses of this chapter numbered twentytwo—twenty-seven are a curiosity. Ham, Noah’s youngest son, saw the beastly conduct of the old man ; and Noah, when he found it out, vented his curses upon Canaan, Ham’s son ! This was written by some unscrupulous Israelite to justify his countrymen in exterminating the Canaanites. The roguery is too transparent to be misunderstood—it is the assassin endeavoring to stand well before those who know of his crime. Suppose Noah had cursed Canaan for what Ham did! That would stamp him an idiot. Besides, when did this happen ? There were only eight human beings in the ark (1 Peter iii-,, 20). Canaajn was Ham’s fourth son, and could not have been . old enough to have mocked or insulted his grandfather till many years after the flood, though the story implies that it . was not long after that event. What an ill-tempered old grandfather Noah must have been to vent his spleen upon his grandson, if he really did thus; and how much more illtempered and diobolical God must have been to execute Noah’s curse upon Canaan’s innocent posterity so many hundreds of years after the death of Noah ! No gods were ever much to boast of; but the Jewish-Christian idol is worse than all the others rolled into one. Besides, how stupid of him to save �66 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE such a paltry lot as Noah, and his family when drowning the world! Any sensible god would have made a clean sweep both, of animals and men, if he had proceeded as far as Genesis describes, and then have started de novo with better races, fashioned on an improved plan and made of better materials. But this God is par excellence the God of blunders and blunderers. Still, the Bible is anything but “ a comedy of errors it is a tragedy in which few but mad gods, mad pro­ phets, mad angels, fools and helpless wretches bear their parts. Homer’s Iliad turns upon the wrath of Achilles, and the Bible upon the fury, the very fermented wine or expressed juice of, the wrath of God. Genesis x. and its pretended pedigrees of the nations may be jumped over, for no doubt the writer, some very late scribe, invented the names. Anybody could invent pedigrees, I presume. Noah, I just this moment learn by inspiration, had other sons in the ark with him. One of them ate a man for his dinner, and they called him Man Chew. Was he not the father of all those who dwell in Manchuria unto this day ? A nd the whole earth was of one language and of one speech (Genesis xi., 1). Just so. This is a precious fragment of the word of God. “ Read, mark, learn,” my reader, -‘and digest.” .Men would build a tower—(why not?)—whose top should reach to heaven—(well, Jacob’s ladder did)—so that should there be another flood, they might climb the tower and escape drowning ! Very sensible project I should say ; but God viewed it in a totally different light. What! not allow him to drown them when he felt disposed to have a little sport that way ! Imagine, my reader, the feelings of an angler, if all fishes united to wear wire respirator-things or mouth screens, to defend them against hooks ! Fancy the feelings of butchers, were sheep and oxen to adopt invulner­ able armor that no weapon could pierce! Conceive the chagrin of fowlers and sportsmen, were all birds to use shot­ proof dresses! Then you may comprehend in some faint degree the chagrin, the fury of God when his creature man, whom he had made for his own private and exclusive sport, proved daring enough to unite to defeat his ends by building a tower whose top should reach to heaven ! If the earth had exploded like a modern bombshell, it would not have startled and amazed him half as much! �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 67 And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower (Genesis xi., 5).—In those days the Lord had no angels to go and come for him, and so he went on his own errands. Later he made angels; and then he hit upon a better expedient still—he expanded himself until he filled all space. The Christians still entreat him to come down into their temples and dwellings, but he never heeds them. On this occasion he went to see the wonderful city and tower, just as you might go to the Fisheries Exhibition. But the sight alarmed him 1 And he exclaimed, when he saw the works, “Now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do 1” In plain words, that means that Jehovah was really afraid that men would raise the tower to heaven, and so secure themselves against another flood! How extremely childish this is must be apparent to all. The Lord is and always has been in his dotage. Therefore all must be children who would go and dwell with him, “ for of such is the kingdom of heaven.” Strong-minded men and women are not wanted there. The Lord having no engines by which to destroy the tower —thunderbolts and earthquakes not having been invented— undertook to confound the language of men, so that they should not understand each other. The results were awful. “Mortar!” shouted a bricklayer; and up came a hod of bricks. “Bricks!” cried another, and up went a hod of mortar. “Bring up that plank!” shouted a third; and up went a can of tea. A mason dubbed his man a blockhead, and the man felt delighted at the compliment, and fully expected higher wages on Saturday. The architect gave orders to push on as fast as possible with the building, for the sky seemed threatening rain. Therefore, the master mason gave instructions to his men to pull down the left wing and rebuild it better. The men misunderstood him, and walled up several of the windows. No two men spoke alike. If a man said “Good morning,” to his fellow, his fellow thought he called him names. Then they fought to assist their mutual understanding. Things went on like this for two days, when the whole world dissolved partnership, and supposing the tower and its vicinity bewitched, all spontaneously left it, rushing away to every point of the compass, some of them never stopping till they met on the opposite side of the world. The Lord and his party went back to heaven, climbing the �68 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. unfinished tower, and stepping from its walls into paradise, where they laughed till the universe shook again, at the wonderful success of their joke. And the Lord played a worse joke still some 1,800 to 1,900 years ago. He gave the world a revelation of his supreme will, throwing together scraps of his autobiography, history, romance, poetry, mythology, statistics, ritual, law, agriculture, cosmogony, ethics, politics, criminal jurisprudence, lies,nonsense, pointless jokes, puns, platitudes, false philosophy. This he put together in a book called the Bible, and would have printed if he had known how. And the result ? The churches have been fighting about the meaning of this book ever since—“ they rest not day and night ” praising the book and quarrelling about its teachings. In this contest reason is never allowed to intrude. Theological language is always at sixes and sevens. Millions upon millions of human lives have been destroyed to prove how divine and precious is the Bible ; it has perverted the best and noblest sentiments of human nature and social life ; it has confounded all those who have endeavored to follow its lead ; it is a will-o’-the-wisp, an ignis fatuus—a maze, a labyrinth, a whirlpool, in the midst of which men neither understand themselves nor their neighbors. Another leap, and we find ourselves in the company of Abram or Abraham, son of Terah and friend of God. The very best parts of Abram’s biography are not in the Bible. I beg to suggest that the gentlemen who meet in the Jerusalem Chamber, Westminster Abbey, to improve the Bible, should insert the Rabbinical stories of Abram and other saints, for such additions, even if much that is now in the book should be omitted to make room for them, will enhance the value of the word of God a hundredfold. Abram’s father was Terah and also Azer or the planet Mars ; likewise Zarah and Athar. It is not every man who can boast of five or six fathers. Abram’s father—(I relate the story from memory)—lived in high honor at the court of Nimrod ; and a prophecy went forth that a son of Terah should dethrone the king. Therefore his wife, reflecting that Nimrod would destroy their new child, should it be a boy, removed out of the town and took up her residence for safety in a cave. There Abram was born. To make doubly sure, his mother did not mention the event even to her hus­ �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS 6fl band ; and she spent as little time in the cave as possible, to avoid suspicion. Abram was a remarkable boy for his age, and grew wonderfully fast. At fifteen months old he was as big as an ordinary boy of fifteen years. And “ on what meats did this our Abram feed, that he was grown so great ?” There lies the point of the whole case. He merely sucked— his thumbs or his fingers ! Don’t be sceptical; the Lord was in those digits of Abram, just as he was in the burning bush of Moses, as he is in a salvation drum, or the hallelujah beer sold at the Eagle.” Things turning out so unexpectedly, Mrs. Terah thought it time to tell her husband ; and one evening she conducted him to the cave on a visit to their extremely interesting son. Lest any should doubt the divine truth I am relating, I will mention an incident that took place a few months back at Euston Station. I was in the waiting-room waiting for the midnight train to Birmingham, my companions being a young lady, and a gentleman with a little boy, apparently of four or five years. He was running about the room. And his father remarked to the young lady, “ That’s a wonderful child. How old do you think he is ?” She said, “ Four years, per­ haps.” “ He is only four months old,” replied the father ; I am just come from Canada with him. Don’t you think he is a wonderful child ?” I asked him if he had not made a mistake ; and he solemnly assured me that the child was only four months old. I gave in, thinking this child, like some in Palestine in former days, might have been filled with the Holy Ghost from his birth. Besides I reflected that I had no means of proving that he was more than four months old ; and if he had said four weeks, I should have been equally silenced. Your fathers dwelt on the other side oj the flood in old time, even Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nachor : and they served other gods (Joshua xxiv., 2).—It is a long jump from Genesis xi. to Joshua xxiv., no doubt, but the subject is the same. The child Abraham, as previously reported, grew at a marvellous rate ; and his mother took his father to see the prodigy. Terah was a courtier, a class of men often enough very cunning, but rarely remarkable for knowledge or wisdom. Now when Terah saw his son he deemed it best to present him at court, for although he knew there was some danger in that step, he thought there would be much more �BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. should Nimrod discover that he was hiding such a child from him. So he and his wife resolved to take him home at once. Terah soon found that his son was intellectually no less wonderful than he was physically. On the road home the precocious youth bored his father about the nature of the gods, and which was the right and the true one. Terah’s answers were anything but satisfactory, for Abraham seemed determined to probe matters to the utmost. How he had learnt to talk and reason the story does not say ; perhaps the Holy Ghost could tell you if he would. However, he spoke with such good effect that his poor father was thrown into quite a perspiration, and foresaw trouble at the court of Nimrod. Abraham was no courtier, and had no modesty to check his impertinence; and Terah plainly foresaw that he would as soon dispute with Nimrod as a chimney-sweep. Arti­ ficial distinctions were unknown to this overgrown child, and he was no more abashed in the presence of Nimrod than a sensible man would be before the shadow of monarchy remain­ ing in this country. Nimrod was as much confounded Abraham as the Jewish rabbis were at a later date by the twelve-year-old Jesus. And, of course, the king resolved on vengeance, especially as Abraham scouted his gods. But here I am met by a difficulty. There is no sort of doubt at all that Nimrod did his uttermost to win the crown of martyrdom for Abraham, and would have succeeded, had not a miracle most inopportunely sprung up to rob him of that eternal honor. But for that untoward miracle, Abraham would have had the honor of figuring in the calendar as the young martyr of only fifteen months old, who was put to death by Nimrod because he could not withstand the wisdom with which he spake. But it is not very clear why Abraham was to be martyred; whether it was for confounding the king before his whole court, or for another reason, does not clearly appear. The better account of the two is this, substantially. Terah was either a manufacturer of idols oi’ else he had charge of Nimrod’s pantheon, where all the principal idols were kept and taken care of. One day, some great national feast day. all the city went out to the Ninevite Champ de Mars to enjoy themselves. Abraham scorning to take any part in the heathen festival, stayed away, and explored the city. In the course o-f his investigations he stumbled into the chief temple (some say it was his father’s workshop or warehouse), �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 71 and looked with not a spark of reverence upon the idols great and small there set up. No more abashed before gods than he had been before the court, he took an axe, and with most sacrilegious hands proceeded to demolish the gods whose wor­ shippers were too far away to defend them. He had destroyed them all except the largest in the place, when a most happy thought arrested the blow he was about to deal him. Instead of demolishing that one he put it to a remarkably good pur­ pose. He took a piece of cord and tied the axe around the neck of the only surviving god, and then calmly awaited the return of the people from the festival. The first to arrive in the temple was his own father, who for several seconds failed to realise where he was ; the chips and rubbish about rather puzzled him. When he had fairly taken in the situation he was horror-struck, and demanded who had been guilty of this sacrilege. In almost the same breath he accused his incomprehensible son, who, however, pretended to be innocent. “ The fact is, my revered parent,” said he, “ a woman came to the temple with an offering of fine flour; and the gods all scrambled for it in so rude a manner that it came to a deadly fight; and at last that big one there took his axe and destroyed all the rest, as you see. In proof of my veracity, behold the very axe still suspended round the neck of the murderous god1” This story only made Terah more furious. It was absurd, he said, to suppose that idols, gods of wood, could quarrel about an offering, or that one of them should destroy the rest. Abraham did not forget the sarcastic and obvious remark that it must be exceedingly absurd to worship gods that could not do as he averred. But Terah was in no mood to argue; his blood was up ; his piety—like that of Judge North—was boiling over; and he resolved to bring his wicked son to con­ dign punishment. So he dragged him before Nimrod and told the mighty hunter how his son had treated the national gods. Nimrod and his whole court were almost speechless with horror and indignation. The fury of Jehovah himself when his breath was hot enough to kindle coals (see Psalm xviii., 8), scarcely exceeded it. So Nimrod ordered immediate preparations to be set on foot for the execution of the culprit. A large meadow was filled up with wood to a great height, and, at the suggestion of the Devil, they constructed a large engine, a kind of lithobolus or balista, or catapult, sufficient to �72 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. hurl a man to a great distance. This was needed for special reasons. The fire was to be so tremendous in size, and they wished to light it and let it blaze up a little before flinging the victim into it; and how, without' an engine of this sort,, were they to get him into the midst of the fire ? When the fire was just hot enough and the court and people were expect­ ing eagerly the grand holiday sight of a heretic roasting, they fastened poor Abraham to the engine and fired him off ! And now, behold a wonder! The aim was correctly enough taken, and the victim flew along the parabolic projectile-curve right into the midst of—not the fire, not the pile of wood. The whole pile, fire and all, disappeared in a twinkling. A flash of lightning nevei’ came and went faster. And the young saint fell upon a bed of flowers in the very midst of a beauti­ ful meadow! I do not know how Nimrod endured the disappointment ;• though no doubt he learnt the lesson never to hunt saints again or try to kill them. What became of Abraham imme­ diately after I cannot say ; though I doubt not he thoroughly enjoyed the day’s sport and fun, as much as some of us enjoy the smashing of gods in these degenerate tunes. Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father s house, unto a land that I will show thee: and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing; and I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed (G-en. xii., 1-3).—Having delivered Abram from the fell designs of Nimrod and the Devil, we may now resume his history in the Bible. The pious reader will not fail to note (1) the unsocial nature of the Lord’s religion, which begins by sending Abram from home, (2) the low and vulgar promises held out to his ambi­ tion, (3) the vengeful spirit of the Lord, who threatens to curse the man that curses his favorite. This is a very appropriate start for the Jewish-Ohristian religion—the Lord seems never yet to have won a single follower except by means of bribery or intimidation. He never will; and now those old weapons are almost out of date. This story of Abram’s leaving home is a good specimen of Bible history. In chapter xi., 31, we are told it was Terah who left his native place, Ur of the Chaldees, taking Abram �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 73 and Lot with him ; and they went forth to go to Canaan. There is nothing here about leaving “ his father’s house that house went with him. But the text quoted above from chapter xii. says God told Abram to go out from his kindred and his father’s house. Where Ur was, or Haran of Oharran, cannot be ascertained—somewhere near New Jerusalem perhaps. And Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed out of Haran (Gen. xii., 4).—Is it possible the Lord would send a poor old fellow of that age on a long journey into an un­ known land ? And did he talk to an old fogey of that age about leaving lens, father s house, etc. ? If his poor old father was still living, Abram should at least have stayed and buried him before setting out. And if Terah was dead when God told this youth to quit, as the last verse of chapter xi. says, what sense was there in God talking to him about “his father’s house ?” And there was a famine in the land (Gen. xii., 10).—Ah I if the Lord had only told the saint how to prevent famines, and the saint had imparted the secret to the world, then he would have made him a blessing to mankind; as it is, the world does not owe anything good to Abram yet, and I fear it never will. Abram’s example is instructive. In consequence of the famine he went to Egypt. His wife, only ten years younger than himself, is so fair that he fears the Egyptians will kill him for her sake ; so he bids her tell a lie and pass as his sister. This was a most ungodly saint, for. he had no faith in the Lord to protect him in Egypt. What wonder if so many saints to-day follow the example of this ancient infidel, the father of the faithful, and trust in anything rather than Jehovah ? The Egyptians must have had a plague, we sup­ pose, just previous to this visit, in which nearly all the women had been swept off. It is impossible otherwise to account for Pharaoh’s selecting so old a woman for his harem. Is this a story that Sarah herself told, when she returned from Egypt, to some of her gossips over a cup of tea with a little reviving spirit in it ? Anyhow, why did the Holy Ghost pen or dictate so stupid and indecent a tale ? And Abram was very rich in cattle, in silver and in yold (Gen. xiii., 2).—He does not appear to have had anything when he went to Egypt: he returned a very rich man. Sarah is said to have been beautiful; and Abram, friend of the �74 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. most high God, enriched himself in the most unmanly and immoral fashion to be conceived. Why had not the Holy Ghost the decency to throw a veil over this part of the saint’s life ? Yea, why did he ever mention such a man at all ? Abram’s treatment of Lot is described by an Israelite so as to redound to the glory of the former ; had one of Lot’s descendants written Genesis xiii., no doubt Abram would have been exhibited as the more selfish man. I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth, so that ifa man can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered (xiii., 16).—This is a good specimen of Bible pro­ mises, preposterously impossible of fulfilment. The dust caught up by one gust of wind, in what the Scotch call a “ stoury day,” contains more particles than all the people that have ever lived, most likely. Abram’s descendants, if he has any at all, are not even among the most numerous of mankind. Both Abram and his God are mere names, no doubt of beings that never existed, except as Jupiter and Juno existed. And Melchizcdek, king of Salem, brought forth bread and wine : and he was the priest of the most high God (Gen. xiv., 18).—Here is a delightful source of theological speculation! Who was Melchizedek ? The Jews said he was Shem, son of Noah. Some of the fathers'said he was an angel; some heretics (that is, unfashionable Christians) held that he was a Power, a Virtue, or Influence of God; others regarded him as being the Holy Ghost. Some Christians thought he was the son of God ; and some Jews their Messiah. The Epistle to the Hebrews (v. and vii.) clears up the whole difficulty in a style which leaves nothing to be desired: Melchizedek, according to this, was not Shem, not on angel, not the Holy Ghost, not the son of God, not the Messiah ; he was “ without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days nor end of life !” Here all difficulties vanish in an outburst of faith ; and I have no doubt the sceptical commentators who attempt to explain things beyond this will be damned for their pains. For my part, I cannot prove that he had parents ; they are not necessary for gods and high priests. Those beings have the powei’ to create themselves, and their ancestors also, when they care to indulge in such luxuries. And he gave him tithes of all (xiv., 20). Mobal and Practical Reflexions.—(1) How wonderfully �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 75 kind was our heavenly father thus to invent this lying story for the sake of his servants the priests, who always take tithes when they cannot get more ! (2) How marvellous are the ways of God, to inspire one of the priests themselves to write this story in his blessed book! (3) Note the marvellous success that has followed this divine fraud. Had it originated with a mere man it must have failed : but it has robbed the dupes of the Bible of untold millions ; and this grand success is a standing miracle calculated to show to all, except unde­ ceivable sceptics, that the Bible is the word of God. There are only two or three fatal points in the story, which we must note:— 1. Salem is an unknown place, and divines don’t know where to locate it. I may tell them from my own knowledge that it is in the very middle of Utopia, and within a few miles of the Garden of Paradise on the one side, and New Jerusalem on the other. To the north is the mountain, from the top of which the Devil showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. Other interesting topo­ graphical points might be mentioned; but these are amply sufficient to lead any explorers to the very spot where Mel­ chizedek still reigns and deals in bread and wine. 2. The god for whom Melchizedek was priest creates some difficulty. It was Eliun, an old Phoenician god, who knew nothing more of Jehovah than Jehovah did of him. They are both with Melchizedek to this day, though he does not recognise the difference between them. 3. .Abram swore by Eliun (v. 22) along with Jehovah ; showing that he, too, was a polytheist, though Christians absurdly claim him as a monotheist and a champion of that cause. I should note, further, that in the third century there arose a sect of Melchizedekians, who held that he was the Holy Ghost, and thus superior to Jesus Christ; for, said they, Mel­ chizedek. was the intercessor and mediator for angels, Jesus being only such for man. The priesthood of the latter, they add, was a mere copy of the former. The latter point, I must say, is purely scriptural. See the passages in Hebrews above referred to. The Cocceians (disciples of Cocceius, a Dutchman of the seventeenth century) and the Hutchinsonians generally still believe that Jesus and Melchizedek were one and the same. So do I. Jack-o’-the-Lantem, Will-o’-the- �76 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. Wisp, Apollo, Baldur and Prester John are only other names of the same individual. He is rarely seen now, and the reason is, that the churches have neither faith nor grace enough to induce him to visit them. He has retired in dis­ gust, carrying his lantern and his bread and wine with him ; and will never return until the churches renounce the world, and parsons live upon charity begged from door to door. Problem.—What will be the date of his reappearance ? Abraham is called the Friend of God (2 Ohron. xx., 7 ; Isaiah xli., 8; James ii., 23.) There is not much in the Bible to warrant or suggest the relationship ; besides it is ridiculous, if God be infinite. The Mahommedans have a very good story on the subject, much better than any in the Bible. In a time of dearth, say they, Abram sent to a- friend in Egypt for meal. The friend refused, for he knew that Abram would give it away instead of keeping it for his own family. His servants being ashamed to be seen returning with empty sacks filled them, for appearance sake, with a very fine sand, closely resembling flour. They told Abram, but not Sarah, of their failure to get meal, and the old man was so overcome that he soon fell asleep. Sarah, finding the sacks full of flour, as she supposed, set to make some cakes; and the smell of the new bread awoke her husband, who demanded whetever she had obtained the meal. “ Why, your friend in Egypt sent it,” replied she. “Nay,” said he, “it is not my friend in Egypt who sent itj but my friend God Almighty.” Now such’a story is far more to Abram’s credit as a believer than almost any in the Bible; and if it were inserted to the exclusion of several others, the Bible would gain by it— though the new editors might be damned for improving God’s word. I sometimes think I will bring out a Bible of my own, retaining all the good in the old one (not very much), and improving it by a few genuine new revelations. I am quite qualified, having as much Holy Ghost as any man that ever lived. And when the sun was going down a deep sleep fell upon Abraham; andlo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him. (Genesis xv., 12).—Bead the context. Abram killed a heifer, a she-goat, a ram, a turtle dove and a young pigeon, and divided them all in pieces, except the birds. And when it was dark he saw a fiery furnace, and a lamp that went �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 77 between the pieces. The cresset was, I presume, God the father; the lamp, the son—the Holy Ghost not then being born, perhaps. The Mahommedan account of this transaction has the merit of making a complete story of it, which the Bible does not. They say Abram was in doubt or perplexity respecting the mode in which God would raise the dead. Abram, at the command of God, took an eagle (some say, dove), a peacock, a raven and a cock, cut them up and pounded their flesh, bones and feathers all up together in one mass, merely keep­ ing their heads intact. Then he called them all by their names, and the parts came together again, and the birds resumed life as if nothing had happened. That is as true as any miracle you ever heard or read of; and I do not for a moment doubt that a sausage maker could obtain like results any day, if he only had faith enough. For fear of revelations of too startling a nature, however, it may be as well not to suggest that to the fraternity. Genesis xvi. and xvii. have not much quotable matter in them. Verse 17 of the later tells us how Abram (in this chapter his name grows one syllable longer) laughed when God told him he and Sarah should have a son when their respective ages were 100 and 90. In this matter all the world now joins with the saint to laugh at God’s amusing promises! And God went up from Abraham (Genesis xvii., 22). This must have been a very small god. The infinite one cannot move ; he fills all spac’e, and has no room to move in. He is an absolute solid, and that is the only quality he has—a per­ fect block, but he does not know it. If Christians only read and studied the Bible, instead of wilfully perverting some of its words to fit them into others, and all its teachings to fit them to their own views, how soon they would discover how ridiculous the old book is, and how opposed to their creeds. I suppose their God has given them the spirit of slumber to prevent their understanding the defects of his word. And he lift up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood by him; and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed himself towards the ground, etc. (Genesis xviii., 2).—This story of Abraham' feeding God with veal and bread (mustard, peper, salt and other condiments not men­ tioned) is a puzzle to the orthodox. They believe their God �78 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. to be almighty, and yet cannot understand how he could make himself so very small; nor do they quite understand how he managed to eat and digest Abraham's calf. It is a bit puzzling, even to me, though I have the gift of the Holy Ghost to guide me into all truth. However, let us hope God’s teeth were sound, that his liver was in good order; though I fear me, that badly-cooked veal sadly disagreed with him, for immediately after his hasty dinner he went and destroyed bodom and Gomorrah with fire ! No man could do that—no god could—whose digestion was good. Good diges­ tion when it waits on appetite, brings us into harmony with all around, and we almost love our enemies—at least those that are too weak to be able to harm us. If God had enjoyed his dinner and readily digested it, Sodom and Gomorrah would not have been so ruthlessly destroyed. Modal.—When you invite God Almighty to dine with you,, be sure to get good meat, well killed, well cooked, and well' served; for if he does not digest it well and readily, he may, under the influence of the internal burden and torment, go and burn up a few more cities. Better never invite him than produce such frightful results. My own view of the story is this, that three young fellows, good looking and well dressed, who knew that poor old Abraham was near-sighted and immensely credulous, played pranks with him, one of them pretending to be God the father, and the other two the son and the Holy Ghost. When they appeared before him and audaciously began to play their role, Abraham, too conceited to doubt if God would visit him, too delighted at the honor to be at all suspicious, assisted the young fellows to gammon him. They found the old man dying for an heir, and promised him one, at which Sarah laughed till her aged sides shook again. (It was the custom with saints in those days to laugh at God; familiarity bred contempt. For fear of like treatment from saints, he never appears now-a-days.) Those young fellows by bribes and flattery, enlisted Sarah in the plot and instructed her in the part she was to play. At the time appointed they secretly sent a new-born babe, which Sarah, to content the poor old man, told him was her own. Thus the divine pro­ mise of Isaac was fulfilled; thus prophets and apostles were sold : and thus the Jewish and the Christian communities became the victims of a practical joke, and the world’s laugh­ �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 70 ing-stock unto this day! This view of the case makes every­ thing plain ; the orthodox opinion leads only to a cluster of absurdities. The story of Sodom reflects little credit upon any of the parties concerned in it. The Sodomites were bad enough; Lot was worse ; and God worst of all. To commit wholesale and indiscriminate murdei' is certainly the worst of crimes. And stories of brutal punishment only brutalise those who read and approve them. When I believed the Bible I was barbarian enough to approve of capital punishment and even hell torments; in growing out of superstition I grew more humane. But his ivife looked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt (Gen. xix., 26).—Some people, alas! treat this story as a myth. “Is anything too hard for the Lord?” But if anybody doubts the transformation of Lot’s wife, let him read some Classical Dictionary or Ovid’s Metamorphoses. There he will find Daphne was turned into a laurel and Io into a heifer; Actaeon was turned to a stag, and tom to pieces by his own dogs; and Atlas was transformed, not into a paltry pillar of salt, but into a mountain. If the Bible had only said that this unfortunate lady had been turned into mount Lebanon, of course all the world would have aagarded the story as of divine origin; but, a pillar of salt! W hat God would work a whole miracle for such a trifle ? And# came to pass that God did tempt Abraham (Gen. xxii., 1),__ This is fully confirmed by James, who assures us that God tempteth no man (James i., 13). “Lead us not into temptation” is a very appropriate prayer for Christians. Had Abraham known the character of his God he might have used the prayer and so have escaped the temptation. Can anyone distinguish this temptation from a practical joke played by one man upon another on April 1? I cannot—except it be that here the fun is entirely absent, though that redeeming feature is sometimes quite evident in a joke perpetrated by man. I believe, however, that this transaction really did occur on April 1, a time when deity considered himself at liberty to unbend, to resolve the monarch into the clown. So he sent Abraham to Moriah to murder his son; and when there, and about to do it, he cried, “ Stop! it is a ram you have to kill, not Isaac!” Thereupon his courts rang with the laughter of his flatterers, while Abraham felt himself deceived. �80 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. And Abraham gave up the ghost (Genesis xxv., 8).—He had lived 175 years, so the Bible says, and all the good recorded of him might have been easily performed in 175 minutes. There is nothing said about immortality in connexion with the old patriarchs. Indeed, there can be no doubt the writer made them live so long because he never expected, sensible man that he was, that they would ever live a second time. Had he expected his heroes to live again, he never would have stretched them so long “upon the rack of this rude world.” And Isaac loved Esau because he did eat his venison; but Rebekah loved Jacob (Genesis xxv., 28).—“All scripture is profitable,” says an apostle—chiefly, I should say, in teaching you how you ought not to act. This family was a saintly one. The husband and wife, equally pious, are at sixes and sevens; the old father prefers one son before the other for the sake of his venison, which he was ’too old to catch for him­ self ; and his wife loved the other son only, it appears, because his father made a favorite of his brother. Between the brothers the most deadly hatred existed. Esau was a “'muff;” Jacob was a swindler, a coward, a cheat—a very picture of his God. and his special favorite. He robbed his brother of his birth­ right, though nobody can exactly define how much or little that meant. Jacob, of course,'was too clever a swindler to plot and scheme for a trifle ; and no doubt he got at least a million per cent, for his “mess of pottage,” bread Sind lentils (verse 34). The twenty-fourth chapter of Genesis may be skipped at a bound, for it is false from end to end, a mere repetition of the story .of Abraham’s sojourn in Gerar. (To fee conclutZecJ in No. 6). Printed and Published by Bamsey and Foote, at 28 Stonecutter Street, E.C. �NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY ¥o. 4.] BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. [id. BY JOSEPH SYMES. JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. In verse 14, Cain is made to complain that he is driven from the face of the Lord! Where did he wander ? And from, thy face, says he, I shall be hid! And the Lord does not correct him, therefore he must, I suppose, have been right. The Lord was confined to some spot in those days ; to-day he is nowhere. Cain also feared he should be murdered ; and the Lord set a mark upon him to prevent that, and threatened seven-fold vengeance on whoever should slay him! This is curious. The writer of this was evidently an Arab, a son of the desert, where the kinsmen of a murdered man were bound to slay the murderer. He has, in this romantic tale, supposed that this method of punishing murcer was in vogue in the first family. If the Holy Ghost inspired this, he too fell into the same inno­ cent blunder. But of whom was Cain afraid ? This question had better not be pressed, if you wish to believe that Adam and Eve were the first of living men and women. The story of Cain implies that the earth was pretty well stocked with people ; and that shows how fabulous is the tale of Adam and Eve. The fact is, we are here dealing with nursery tales, which the orthodox blasphemously ascribe to the inspiration of an almighty and all-wise God. And the tales are so miserably edited or compiled that all the learning of 1600 years has been expended upon them in vain—they are as confused and irrational as ever. It may not be amiss to put the question here : How could the murderer of Cain be punished seven-fold? Was it intended to kill him seven times over, or what ? Besides, �52 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. It repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart (vi., 6).—The Lord is unchangeable ; here is one of the scripture proofs. He is the first to repent; the conclusion is that he must have been the first sinner. His repentance, however, did not do much good to anybody. Instead of laying the blame where it all honestly fell, upon himself, he blamed his creatures for being just what he made them. So God resolved to commit indiscriminate murder because his creatures did not please him—a grand example for all kings, rulers, parents, slaveholders and cattle-owners for all time ! Any civilised deity would have made a distinction between the good and the bad, and punished only the latter. Any rational ruler, god or otherwise, would never have per­ mitted his kingdom to become corrupt. In this case “ all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth —from man down to the microscopic monad; there were only a handful of saints left—viz., Noah and his family, and such other sacred things as they had about their dwellings and persons. Those shall be saved in the ark, along with others yet to be named. So Noah, being warned in time, set to building his ark. By the way, they have just found the timbers, half-buried in the snow, on Mount Ararat. No doubt they will discover the stalls and cabinets, all labelled and numbered, in which Noah kept the menagerie during the flood. Pity we can t bring mountain and all to Great Britain; then sceptics must become saints in no time at all. The dimensions of the ark were as follows :—300 cubits iong, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high. Altogether the area was 15,000 square cubits, and the solid content 450,000 cubical cubits. A cubit originally was the length of the fore­ arm from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger, and it varied at different times and places. The Jewish cubit was sometimes 18 inches, at others 21. Suppose we take the larger value. Then the ark measured 525ft. long. 87tt. bin. wide and 52ft. 6in. high. This ship was the largest ever built— except the “ Great Eastern.” Of course Noah found no difficulty in its construction. He merely had to get the wood, cut it into shape, fasten it together in the desired fashion, pitch it within and without, and lo ! it was prepared for the storm. Anyone who questions the patriarch’s ability in so trifling a patter had better lay down this book never to read it again. Of ail �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS 53 people in the world, sceptics and unbelievers are my dread. You believe in the “Great Eastern,” why not believe in the ark ? Must we bring its remains from Mount Ararat to con­ vince you ? Must we resurrect Noah and his family, and repeat the experiment of the flood to excite your faith ? Into this ark Noah was ordered to collect two and two of all animals in the world (vi., 19, 20). Some priest or Levite added to the story later, and gave Noah orders to take clean animals by sevens (vii., 2). “ If you have faith prepare to use it now !” To build the ark would have been no trifle to a man not inspired; but to collect pairs of all the animals in the world ! and no natural history book, no collection of specimens to guide him ! Ah, Noah! much better had it been for thee hadst thou but died prematurely at the age of 599 years, instead of lingering on to 600 and having a task like this imposed upon thee ! Prythee, good Patriarch, how many fly­ catchers, bird-catchers, hunters, microscopists, animal tamers, and others didst thou employ ? And how long did they take to finish their work? And how didst thou knew when all the animals were in ? Art sure that no species was omitted ? How didst thou feed them when in ? Art perfectly sure the pail’s were all rightly adjusted ? Art perfectly sure, good Noah that, thou wast sober when thou toldest this tale of the flood ? Couldst thou do the like again, thinkest thou ? For my part, let me be set to drain the ocean with a sieve, rather than have thy task to do! There are said to be 400,000 different species of insects now in the museums of civilised nations ; those have been collected and classified by the labor of over a century, by people who know their way about the world, and who have means of transit such as modem times only can boast of. They are not impeded by forests and marshes and the total want of roads, as man must have been in the days of Noah. There can harly be more species now than in ancient times, if orthodoxy and not Darwinism be true, though there may be fewer. And into the ark, if the story is true, all insects must have found their way, except such as spend their whole time in water. A few details will now be given which will doubtless tend to raise admiration for the divine wisdom and goodness, and to show how totally God’s ways and thoughts differ from ours. �54 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark (Gen. vi., 19).—My readers! I am puzzled and bewildered, for I do not see how Noah did what he was commanded. Some blasphemous parsons will tell you that the flood was not universal; but such men are “ clouds without water, cariied about of winds ; trees whose fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots; raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of dark­ ness for ever,” because they contradict the Bible, which says plainly that the flood should “ destroy all flesh from under heaven ; and everything that is in the earth shall die ” (Gen. vi., 17); “ and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth ” (vii., 4). Read the whole of the seventh chapter, and you will find it stated that this threat was executed to the letter—no living thing remaining except those in the ark! By-the-bye, it seems rather unfair that all land animals should have been drowned, while those in the sea were not hurt, as verse 22 implies. Perhaps the “ finny monsters of the deep ” had not sinned, though, and corrupted their way. That is an interesting point for orthodox com­ mentators to clear up. They have the holy ghost to guide them into all truth ; he never assists me. Noah took into the ark two and two of all flesh, and suit­ able food for them all; a stock of provisions for a year or more. (1) Butterflies.—For the cabbage butterflies (Pieridi) he must have planted a kitchen-garden in the ark ; nettles would be needed for the vanessoe ; the white admiral lives on honey­ suckles when a caterpillar; the poplar butterfly must have horse-droppings ; the purple emperor would require an oak tree or a gooseberry bush ; the satyridi live upon grasses, elms and hawthorns. Noah must have embarked a whole country for butterflies alone. I have mentioned only a few. (2) Moths would be equally difficult to manage. The bee­ shaped sesia lays its eggs on the bark of poplars, and the catterpillars eat into the tree. They remain catterpillars for two years, by the way ; others must have flowers, the honey of which they sip while on the wing ; another moth needs the euphorbia to feed upon; others, oleanders, though fuchsias are not refused on occasion ; the squeaking death’s-head moth needs the potatoe plant or the jasmine, though it does not �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 55 object to a hive of honey ; to satisfy another moth, Noah must have brought in a Banksia bush from Australia; the lasiocampa is said to live on heather ; the lockey moth is fond of apple-tree leaves ; the goat moth needs old trunks of elms or willows to excavate into galleries ; the catterpillars of the acronycta are fond of the mosses and lichens which grow on trees, walls, etc. ; one kind of tortridna feeds on green peas in the pods ; another gets into apples and pears; another into plums; others into acorns and beech-nuts, chestnuts, etc.; some of the tineidce moths are the pests that destroy garments. (3) Among hymenopterci. some of the saw-flies want rosetrees for their eggs, etc. ; others turnips ; others firs and pines ; the gall-flies (Cynipsidas) need trees to puncture in order that galls may grow and protect their eggs and larv®. Ants are among the most interesting beings in the world. It would probably be of little or no use to take two of them into the ark. You need at least three to carry on the affairs of an ant-nest. The male and female of the common ants have wings, the workers none. The latter do all the work, con­ struct the nest and keep it in repair, take special care of the eggs, removing them from spot to spot to keep them at the right temperature, rip them open to let the larvae out at the right time, and nurse the young ones till able to do for them­ selves. Two of them could not construct a nest. Moses and the Holy Ghost did not know that. The mason ants and the miner ants would be as helpless in pairs as the little red ones. The formica fuliginosa lives in old trunks of trees, which it tunnels in a most marvellous manner. Others get into the beams of houses and hollow them out. What Noah would have done with a few of those in his ark it is easy to imagine: he and his whole menagerie would have gone to the bottom, for they would have riddled his ship for him till it was no stronger than a bandbox. The polyergus rufens is a warrior ant. They are only males and females and do no work. They make war upon the nests of the black ants, steal their larvae, and carry them off to their nests, where the prisoners are reared as slaves and compelled to work for their masters. Certain American ants, also, are said to follow this trade. Noah might have been at his wit’s end with the Driver ants of West Africa. They range about in large armies �56 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. having, like the ancient saints, no certain dwelling place. They march by night. The army is divided into three groups, soldiers to attack and disable the prey, assistants to divide the prey into portable portions, and the laborers. They are terrible things, and few animals can resist them. They have been known to kill the python, the largest serpent in the country. When they enter a dwelling, rats, mice, lizards, and cockroaches get out as fast as possible. They visit all dirty houses and towns where scavengering is needed. A few of those would have emptied the ark in a short timn. The excavating insects would have given Noah no little trouble. When adult they are strict vegetarians, and yet they have to provide for flesh-eating offspring. There are four species of them, which differ somewhat amongst them­ selves. The mother digs a hole in the earth, a tree, or wall. Having prepared the nest, she attacks caterpillars, spiders, etc.. These she stings, so as to disable and paralyse, but not to kill. The prey is placed in the nest and the eggs deposited. The young larvae find ready for them living food as soon as they are ready to eat it, and the victim, though stung and half eaten, still lives till his enemy has had enough of bim. Such is one of the ways of divine providence, though the writer of Genesis did not know of it. The scolia goes to even less trouble, for it finds a larva of a beetle in the ground, digs down to it, stings it so as to render it helpless and torpid without killing it; and then deposits its eggs under the skin of its victim, which is by and by devoured by the young scolia. How did Noah manage for all these ? Neither he nor his God knew anything of these matters. If they had they would never have undertaken to save the twos and twos of all flesh! Need I mention the fact that bees also could not have been preserved without more than a pair of each species ? I must pass over beetles, spiders, and other insects, and merely men­ tion the fact that most insects have parasites, as well as many larger animals. Besides, why were some of them preserved at all ? Fleas and bugs, the itch-insect, mosquitoes, pediculi capitis, locusts, ticks, phylloxera, the tsetses, etc. ? And why were the tapeworm and the trichina preserved ? Trichina usually enters the human system in underdone pork ; I pre­ sume it entered the ark in Ham. �JUMPING- COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 57 More than half of the insects taken into the ark might well have been excluded, and many of them would have been if there had been an enlightened superintendent appointed to oversee the embarkation. As it was, they were all taken in, and Noah must have provided them with sufficient food for a whole year and more. Those who know anything of natural history can well enough perceive that he must have carried in a slice of every country in the world, and must have had some means of reproducing all the world’s various climates to keep his freight alive and well. This must have been a heavy task, for we must remember that during the whole year the ark was floating five miles above the old sea-level, for the flood was more than five miles deep, as we shall see later on ; and though the rigors of this arctic temperature may have been slightly modified by the general rise of what then was the earth’s surface, yet the cold must have been intense ; and the wonder is that the whole concern did not get crushed amongst the myriads of icebergs which must have abounded. Of course, nothing is too hard for the Lord—except to do a sensible thing. If Noah felt difficulty with the insects, what must he have felt respecting the largest of the beasts ? There were giants on the earth in those days, and giantesses too, and they had to be got into the ark some way or other. Horses, cows, camels and elephants were not easily disposed of. Some of the giant birds might have exercised his skill—the moa, for example, or other extinct monsters. Besides, the celebrated phoenix—in whom the fathers believed as devoutly as they did in the holy pigeon, alias Holy Ghost—could have been embarked only as a unit, for a pair of them never existed. The dinotherium is estimated to have been eighteen feet long. He was probably fond of marshy ground, or may have spent his time much in the way the hippopotamus does. A pair of these, standing end to end, would reach thirty-six feet—about half-way across the ark. Themselves and their food and accommodation would require no trifling portion of the space available for the whole menagerie. Perhaps, however, like Milton’s devils in Pandemonium, the animals in those days were not so rigid and exacting as now, and may have accommodated themselves to the space allotted them— �58 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. “ . . . the signal given, Behold a wonder! they but now who seemed In bigness to surpa-s earth’s giant sons, Now less than smallest dwarfs, in narrow room, Throng numberless like that Pygmean race Bejonu the Indian mount.” There is, at any rate, nothing in the world so handy as a miracle to help one out of a fix ; and as Noah must have sorely needed a few of those accommodating events, of course piety suggests that we suppose them, though we cannot prove them. Anything is better than common sense in expounding the Bible. No truly devout man ever tries that as a key to unlock its secrets and mysteries. God forbid ! The megatherium was an animal from 12 to 18 feet long, 8 or 9 feet high, and 5 to 6 feet wide behind. His tail, stout and strong in proportion as a kangaroo’s, was six feet long, and his foot about a yard from heel to toe. It is supposed that he lived upon roots which he dug out of ground, or else upon twigs of trees. I should like to know how Noah found him employment for claws and jaws during the voyage. It would have been nothing to him to have scratched a few holes through the bottom of the ark. The mylodon (11 feet long) and the glyptodon (9 feet long) must also have been preserved. The mammoth, which makes the elephant look like a good-sized calf in comparison, must have taken a large space ; and he did not live upon nothing. A pair of these must have devoured many tons of vegetables during the year. How did the patriarch manage the megalosaurus, a land lizard about 40 feet long, which very likely fed upon such smaller lizards as crocodiles ? Authorities differ as to the length of the iguanodon. Mantell thought it must have been 70 feet long ; Professor Owen brings it down to 30 feet. But its thigh-bone is 4 feet 8 inches long. Fancy four of those tremendous lizards (mega­ losaurus and iguanodon), beasts 15 to 20 feet high, and more than double that length, and broad in proportion—fancy them, I say, having a fight in the ark, or running about to catch such prey as crocodiles and alligators—scores of tons of flesh and bones bouncing about on the floor of Noah’s box 1 And how would elephants, tigers, lions, behave when such a row was forward ? �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. .59 It is all very well, of course, for divines to assume that the giants above named were extinct before Noah’s day. They may say so if they will; but what extinguished them ? I will give my own inspired opinion ; and whoever shall receive it shall save his soul alive. My own view is this : That when Noah undertook to get pairs of all the animals into his ark he assumed obligations he never contemplated. When he blew his whistle as a signal for them all to appear, away they came, each pair bringing a full year’s provisions with them—the elephants had theirs packed in then’ trunks, of course, and the kangaroos came with their pouches full ; the rest brought their stock upon then’ backs. But when Noah saw the number of animals approaching, the hundreds—where he had bargained, as he thought, for twos—when he beheld the enormous sizes of those above named he cried out: “ 0 Lord, thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived (Jeremiah xx., 7). I will back out of the bargain. It would take fifty arks to stow away all this rabble ; and who, I should like to know, would risk his life in a box for a year—for ten minutes even—with all these ferocious beasts ?” And it came to pass that the Lord answered and said unto Noah : “ I also am greatly amazed at the multitude of living things and at the greatness of them. Go to, therefore, shut the giants out and let them drown, for it repenteth me that I made mammoth, and megalonyx, and mastodon, and megalosaurus, and iguanodon upon the earth. Lo, I will even put my hook in their nose and my bridle in their jaws if I can, and lead them back by the way they came, and thou shalt see them no more for ever.” So Noah was comforted. Is it not written in the book of Jasher and in the visions of Iddo the seer ? And thus those enormous animals became extinct, and their carcases were buried in the strata of the earth as a warning to all beasts, lest they also should eat and drink and grow too large, and thus provoke the Lord to cut them off from the face of the ground. “ He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.” I have no wish, my reader, like commentators in general, to bore you with further remarks tending to expose the abso­ lute absurdity of the flood; though the subject might be pursued to a very great length, and every step would only tend to show how totally false or mythological is the narrative. Even Christians themselves are beginning to throw ridicule upon �60 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. it. Just recently they have spread reports of the finding of the ark on Ararat; and one American journal has discovered that it was insured in a New York office as a vessel to convey pas­ sengers and animals, owned by Noah and Sons. Whether the menagerie was insured has not yet been ascertained. When sacred subjects such as this can be so treated in common newspapers, honest men may rejoice to think that malice and stupidity will not much longer send men to gaol for doing what their Christian neighbors do,—viz., ridiculing the holy and ever-blessed revelation God gave to the world to enlighten and save mankind. Pray don’t forget that the flood was universal; the earth was encased in a shell of water, like an orange With its rind, like the fruit with paste in an apple-dumpling. This shell of water covered all the mountains, and they are over five miles in perpendicular height. We will now inquire into the quantity of water required to drown the world, and speculate a little on the wisdom of so expensive and clumsy a method of gratifying vengeance. The earth is a globe (nearly so) 25,000 miles in circum­ ference ; and the area of its whole surface equals about 200,000,000 square miles. Its highest mountains rise more than 5 miles above the level of the sea ; the flood rose about 26 feet above the top of the highest of them. Therefore, the earth must have been encased in a shell of extra water about 5-|- to 6 miles deep, the highest peak in the world being over 28,000 feet high. This equals an ocean 25,000 miles long, by 8,000 wide, and 5^ to 6 miles deep, measuring down to the ordinary sea-level. The solid content of this new and universal ocean could not be less than about 1,000,000,000 cubic miles of water, or about l-80th of the solid contents of the whole earth as it now is. If this water could be formed into a river 1 mile wide and 10 yards in depth, it would stretch out to the enormous length of 176,000,000,000 miles, almost 2,000 times the distance from the earth to the sun ! If the water of that river flowed by at 7 miles per hour, it would take 2,878,188 years to run away ! Whence did all this water come ? From heaven, and down through its windows ? It must have been very many millions of years on the road. And when it is remembered that the earth is totally invisible from heaven, we must conclude that he who fired or squirted all that water from his syringe must �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 61 have been a most excellent marksman indeed, not to have hit the sun instead of so tiny a mark as the earth, and so abso­ lutely invisible as it must have been. We cannot, I am sorry to confess, sufficiently admire the goodness and wisdom of God in this transaction, especially when we consider that he must have shot the water from his syringe many millions of years before either earth or sun was created! Now this shows divine skill in its most transcendant phase. Imagine, my reader, a marksman who could fire his rifle, and while the shot was flying could go and create the target and then coolly wait for the flying bullet to hit the bull’s-eye! Jehovah, the war-God, was the very best marksman evei’ yet known. How carefully he calculated the time and the posi­ tion of the moving target! Remember, this earth is flying through space at the rate of about 65,000 miles an hour! How clever of him to hit the mark under such conditions ! Then, how kind of him to arrange for drowning the world so many millions of years before it was created! What an exhibition of foresight and providence ! Who would not worship thee, 0 Jehovah! after this display of thy goodness and wisdom? What became of the water aftei’ it had done all the drown­ ing, I am not able to say. Nor can I explain how it was that so large a mass of water, falling from heaven with a velocity some hundreds of times greater than a cannon ball has, did not bear the earth before it as a falling drop of rain does an invisible grain of dust. These are mysteries we had better leave alone. Divine wisdom has thrown a veil over them. Who shall dare to lift it now ? There are many other incidents connected with the flood that prudence bids us not to meddle with, if we would retain our faith. Therefore, let them remain buried in the divine oblivion which shrouds them. When Noah escaped from his box he murdered one or more of all the clean beasts and fowls he had with him, and burnt them for Jehovah’s dinner. The Lord had kept Lent for over a year, poor fellow ; and never had been so delighted in all his days as he was with this sacrifice. He smelled but does not seemed to have eaten it. So delighted was he, that he promised never to drown the world again. Perhaps he feared he might lose all the animals in another flood, and so get no more smoke of burning flesh as long as he lived. How extremely �62 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. condescending, my friend, it was of the infinite God, who fills all space, to stoop so low as to bring his nose near enough to sniff up the reek of Noah’s sacrifice ! One might have thought that he would have been above such conduct. But no ; the Bible reveals God as having nothing better to do just then than to enjoy himself smelling the burning animals. Of course he has been wonderfully civilised since. The bishops have taken him to task over a good many things, and you wouldn’t know it was the same god now, so great a transfor­ mation has there been in him. Indeed, the incident of Noah’s sacrifice is now never mentioned in his presence. The slightest allusion to it would produce an earthquake. And surely your blood of your lives will 1 require; at the hand of every beast, will I require it. and at the hand of every man . . . whoso sheddeth mans blood, by man shall his blood be shed (Gen. ix., >5-6).—The Bible has been translated into many languages, but not into all. Why are the poor beasts forgotten ? They shed men’s blood, some of them ; and God will require it at their hands. To this clay the beasts have never been warned. How shocking ! Lions and tigers, mad bulls and wolves have shed many a man’s blood because they did not know the risk they ran. Why does not some pious divine go and tell them that they will be damned if they shed human gore ? Alas! to think of the many serpents and ravenous beasts that might be tamed and converted by this Bible text if they only knew it! And how hard-hearted are the worshippers of God, that they don’t go and tell them. Put up this text in all places where men and beasts meet, in the languages of all the animal species of a dangerous nature ; let them know the real price of human blood ; and neither beast of prey, nor flea, nor bug will ever shed another drop as long as the world shall last. The latter part of the text is the stronghold of the public executioner. But for the Bible the death-penalty would pro­ bably disappear. In obedience to divine commands men have burnt witches and heretics, and still hang murderers to glut their taste for vengeance. What good is done to anybody by hanging a man ? Does it restore his victim to life ? Does it deter from crime ? Not at all. It is the result'of superstition, and merely multiplies murder. Behold I establish my covenant with you, and with your seed after you ; and with every living creature that is with you, ofthe �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 63 fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you (Gen. ix., 9-10).—Here Jehovah enters into a covenant with Noah and all the beasts of the earth, pledging himself never to drown the whole earth again for the term of his natural life. What better evidence could we have that the writer was demented ? The flood seems to have affected what little brain he had ; and so he invents a treaty between the animals and the extraordinary deity who first makes, then destroys, and then makes a covenant with the animals ! I wonder if he took them in the lump or canvassed them one by one ! And what could the animals think of him ? He who had gone to such pains to destroy their fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters and playfellows—with what delight they must have welcomed his advances ! How readily they must have fallen in with his proposals ! No prudent animal or man could enter into covenant with such a God as Jehovah, so soon, too, after his general massacre. They may not have uttered all they felt when he was canvassing them ; but we can realise it all notwithstanding their silence. Enter into covenant with the universal destroyer ! The Bible writers had no conception of a joke—unless the whole .book is to be regarded as a grim and ghastly jest at the expense of the Jewish-Ohristian religion. Certainly, whether the writer meant it or not, few jokes ever equalled this story of the covenant; and the few stories that do rival it are found in the Bible. He would not drown the whole world again, so he would not! How kind of him ! Does he think we can’t see through it ? The fact is, all the water was gone, and he had no means of drowning the world any more. At least, it would take him several millions of years to do it, and he was not pre­ pared to undertake the task a second time. So he made a virtue of necessity ; pretended to Noah and the beasts that he could if he would drown the world just as often as he pleased, but he would not do so because the smoke of the sacrifice had so delighted him. And then he proceeds to indicate the sign, token, or proof of the covenant. No deed was drawn up; neither God nor Noah could write their names; they and the rest of the animals could only make their marks. The rainbow, therefore, is made the sign, the signature of the covenant; but only one of the parties signifies adhesion to it—viz., God. And his signature turns out to be a sham. The rainbow is as old as �€4 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. rain and sunshine in unison. Ever since rain fell and sunbeams flashed upon the falling drops, there the rainbow has lighted up and beautified the scene. It not only skirts the rain-cloud; it dances (or its sisters do) upon the spray of fountains and of dashing breakers. And how could Noah be so hoodwinked ? He had lived 600 years and more : could you persuade him that he had never seen a rainbow before the flood ? Well, the bow had been no guarantee" that God would behave himself before the flood, and how could it be after ( For well nigh 600 years he had seen the bow crossing the cloud when he happened to be between the sun and the shower ; and yet in his 601st year there was the universal deluge! How, then, was it possible for Noah, or his sons, or his daughters, or his wife, or his cattle, or anything that was with him in the ark, to put any dependence on this covenant, ratified by a well-known natural pheenomenon as old as the nature which produced it ? Who would take the rainbow as a receipt to a bill ? And I will remember my covenant (Gen. ix„ 15).—Yes, God will remember! He will look upon the bow to refresh his memory, as he adds in the following verse. He who remembers and refreshes his memory with a sign, may and does forget. Other texts of scripture show this beyond doubt. “ Forget not the humble ” (Psalm x., 12)—the very parties most likely to be forgotten. “ How long wilt thou forget me, O Lord ?” (Psalm xiii., 1). “Forget not the congregation of thy poor for ever ” (Psalm lxxiv,, 19). “ Forget not the voice of thine enemies ” (lxxiv., 23). Manifestly the Bible maligns God, or he is liable to forget. I prefer the latter alternative. Of course he can’t remember everything—the strongest-minded man needs to keep a diary, how much more a God ! (To be conbimraed in No. 5). Printed arid Published by Ramsey and Eoote, at 28 Stonecutter Street, E.C. �NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY No. 8.] BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. [W BY JOSEPH SYMES. _________ . __ . .. Mi HOW A FAIRY WAS TRANSFORMED. Thebe once lived many ages ago a fairy king, named Mihole. He dwelt in a far-away land, and was ruler over a very large kingdom. Mihole was skilled in magic, and could work the most astonishing wonders ; out of nothing he made worlds, and living beings like men and women out of clay. But this great king was wayward, cruel, jealous, headstrong; and de­ lighted in nothing so much as shedding blood and inflicting misery. So cruel was he that he even exerted his magic to create living things for the sole purpose of tormenting them. At one time he made a world of pretty large size, just like the earth. Then he made all sorts of plants and animals grow in it : and even made a pair in his own likeness, who could talk and reason like men. This pair he put into a palace where there was a room locked, which they were commanded not to open on pain of death. He then gave them the key and departed. On leaving he chuckled with glee at the thought that they would disobey him, as he knew perfectly well they would. To be sure, they were mere babies, without experience to guide them. Now Mihole, in order to make sure that Madab and Biba (for those were the names of the unfortunate pair) should unlock the fatal door, sent a sort of monkey, named Jocko, to them, who amused them exceedingly by his antics. This monkey could talk, and was a clever, gay, sprightly fellow, of endless fun and frolic. He was at once a favorite with Madab and Biba, and they could not bear him to be out of their com­ pany. One day Jocko snatched away the key from Madab and began to examine it with pretended surprise ; and after a time he fitted it into the lock of the room they were forbidden to enter. Both Madab and Biba ran to him in alarm and tried to persuade and coax him not to open the door, telling • �34 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. him that Mihole would kill them if they did. At this Jocko laughed till the Palace rung again, saying, “Are you such babies as to believe that Mihole was in earnest when he bade you not to enter this room. Booh! He was only joking. Come on ; we will see what is inside.” He opened the door and entered, Madab aud Biba reluc­ tantly and timidly following. When they were in they were delighted beyond measure. Here were all things rich and rare that Fairyland could ever produce, in the greatest pro­ fusion too. In this room the three friends enjoyed themselves the whole afternoon, and paid no heed to the waning of the day. Before thev knew how late it was, they heard a loud fierce voice, shouting. “ Madab! where the ------ are you ? Here, I have been running all over the Palace looking for you the last half-hour. What! ” he continned, seeing the door of his secret room open, “ What! have you broken into my treasury ? You shall pay for this, I promise you! ” Madab and Biba, in dire confusion, and blank with terror, excused themselves by throwing the blame upon poor Jocko. And Mihole at once made a great dark pit full of fire and brimstone, and there he shut up Jocko for ever. He would have died, of course, from the fire and the stifling vapors, but the cruel king magically kept him alive for the purpose of inflicting pain and misery upon him. When he had dis­ posed of Jocko, he turned to Madab and Biba, and told them they would have to die. But here, too, he tortured before killing. You shall die,” said he, “ but not just yet. You shall live and people this world with your miserable brood, who shall suffer want, cold, hunger, cancers, coughs, rheu­ matics, and a thousand horrible tortures. They shall die of famine, flood, pestilence, earthquake, war, murder: and after they have died once they shall live again, and be cast with Jocko into the unquenchable fire, where they shall gnash their teeth and yell with anguish and despair for ever and ever.” Then he drove them out of the Palace to the open field, fastened the door, put the key in his pocket, and went away in a mighty rage. All the evils he had threatened to Madab and Biba, and their poor children, came trooping one after another, or alto­ gether at times, so that their life was dreadfully bitter ; and they cursed the day that Mihole had made them, as well they might; for he meant them nothing but mischief from the first, �HOW A FAIRY WAS TRANSFORMED. 35 and had even planned and incited their disobedience for the sake of gratifying his own malignity in seeing them and their children suffer every variety of torture. Now fairies are not like men and women, for they live for millions of years. Madab and Biba, after their disgrace, lived on to old age, and then died, leaving their country to their children, and they to theirs for thousands of years. In the meantime poor Jocko was burning in his hell, with now and then a holiday granted him by Mihole, who let him out for nothing in the world but sheer mischief ; so that he might have an excuse for punishing him yet more, and also have the gratification of seeing multitudes of the children of Madab and Biba enticed into his own lake of fire. Indeed the wickedness of Mihole knew no bounds, and the older he became the more and more malignant he grew, as the following will show. He had an only begotten son, whose mother was unknown even to his best friends. There was a mystery about this son ; though, being the only one, he was made much of. Now a grand and awful scheme entered into the head of Mihole. He bethought himself thus :—“ Those beings I made, Madab and Biba, have deeply offended me, and I will never forgive them. Of course, I planned it all; but I shall not forego the gratification of punishing them on that account. I can do what I will with my own. Still, I will not send the whole race of their children into that fire; I will select a few and bring them to my Palace to live with me. They will make good sport fox’ me no doubt; and the craven-spirited wretches will sing my praises and honor me, though they are well aware that I am roasting their own flesh and blood in the lake of fire. Yes! I will do it. But I must have satisfaction. I am not going to save them from the fire for nothing. I must and will have some equivalent. If I forego the pleasure of damning them, I must and will have an equivalent of pleasure in • another way. “Now this is what I will do. I will take my only son Jessah, and will transform him by magic into one of the de­ scendants of Madab and Biba; and then I will get him crucified ; and on the cross he shall suffer the most excrucia­ ting tortures that even a fairy can endure. Bah !—never mind the pain. I shall not feel it. I shall glory in it. And t �ss BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. thus I will redeem to myself a few of the doomed race. This is my will, and it shall be, it must be done.” “ Jessah ! ” shouted he to his son. His son came and paid him his respects. “ My son, you know I love you tenderly, do you not ? ’ said Mihole. “ Yes, sire,” replied the son, with no great enthusiasm. “ Well, my boy, I have some work for you to do. You remember how Madab and Biba disobeyed me about 4,000 years ago, and how I have had no good will towards the race of them from that time till now. You know how I have punished them, and how I have merely made a favourite now and again of one or other of them whose crimes or stupidity served to amuse me. Now I intend to save a few of them from entering that fiery pit below there, and bring them hither to live in this palace. But I must have an equivalent »f suffering in another direction for the pain I am going to remit to them. Do you understand me, my son ?” l-1 believe I do, sire,” replied Jessah. •'•' And I am glad you are going to show them mercy ; though I wish you would forgive the whole race and Jocko, too, and not trouble about any equivalent of pain.” ••Ah’, ah! Just like the child you are. You do not understand business, my boy,” replied the old fairy. ••' Give up a privilege without compensation ! No! No! I have spent many a year of pleasure in hearing their groans, and do you suppose I am going to forgive them and stop their yelling ! I had rather give up all I have and die myself than put out hell-fire or release a prisoner without compensation! So no more on that point, my son ! No more ! Now listen to me. You go at once to the world where the race of Madab live, and by a trick I will show you you can transform yourself into a baby and be bom of one of the the same race. I may tell you beforehand that I am going to make you a sin-offering for that cursed race : and you willX be crucified and die in awful agony to gratify mj fierce wrath and justice. Then I will raise you up to life again, you will return to the palace none the worse for your journey, and be followed by a select number of the children of Madab.” Poor Jessah was wild with amazement, and begged and prayed his cruel father to forego his design. But in vain. �, HOW A FAIRY WAS TRANSFORMED. 37 You will do as I bid you, boy,” said be, “ or—do you see yonder lake of fire ?—I’ll hurl you into that and roast you there as long as I live. Take your choice. It is all one io me.” So the son yielded to the mad father’s whim, and became incarnate ; lived a miserable life; was crucified by enemies instigated thereto by his awful father, who heaped upon hint all the agony in his power while dying. Three days after death he restored his son to life and took him home. And there was an end of the farce. Mihole was no more satisfied than before. He resolved next to send his son again to the world of Madab to call all its inhabitants to judgment; then to bum up the world with fire, and to shut up most of the unfortunate race in Jocko’s hell for- ever. But the son, sick and disgusted, fled from his father’s den for ever, to escape the misery and humiliation of executing his father’s mad schemes and infernal wishes. ****** ‘■ Which things are an allegory.” My Fahy Tale is the Christian Scheme of Redemption, stript of its pious trappings, writ as it ought to be writ, and exhibited in its gory features • and its diabolic qualities. I hope it may help to throw comtempt upon the pious tomfooleries of Christmas-tide, and expose to ridicule the farce of the incarnation of the Son of God. �38 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. No matter, for my present purpose, who wrote the Biblenor how old it may be. My jumping, skipping comments relate only to the contents of the book, and will be just what the title indicates, for I shall jump from one text to another, instead of wasting time in noticing the intervening passages. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.— Genesis i., 1. Beginning of what ? Time? Time never had a beginning. Of the world ? It could not have been made in its beginning, for it existed exactly the same moment it began to be. Then what does it mean ? The beginning of God’s work ? \ If so, he must have been a lazy fellow to idle away in doing nothing at all the inmeasurable time or eternity which pre­ ceded the moment he began to work. And what made him begin just then, I wonder ? Had he been all his life before making up his mind whether to create or not ? . I think it is a pity that it should have taken him so long and not a little longer. Surely a god who could do without a plaything dur­ ing his early life might have done without one for ever. The world seems to be his shuttlecock, created for this own amuse­ ment ; and his sport involves the misery and death of his creatures. It is no credit to a god to have made a world like this. It is not the work of a good god! The heaven!—That is a purely fictitious place. The firmament or heaven is only an optical illusion, the mere boundary of vision, larger or smaller in proportion to the power of the eyes of the world. Modern astronomy shows beyond the possibility of doubt that the heaven, or heavens, do not exist, and never did. So the Bible opens with a blunder which shows that the writer, instead of being inspired by a being who knew everything, drew his inspiration from his own narrow experience, and egregiously blundered in the first sentence he wrote. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep.—i., 2. More nonsense. The earth always had a form, pretty much the one it has now, too. As �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 39 for the darkness on the face of the deep, we will comment upon that when we know what deep is meant. Does any one know ? The spirit of god or of the gods—if it means anything, it is the wind. That need not have been mentioned, surely. Let there be light—i., 3. Did God say that ? In what language ? To whom ? Why did he say it ? If he had his tinder-box by him, he need not have said anything about it ; for flint and steel work no better for being spoken to. And God divided the light from the darkness—i., 4. I am sure he never did, for light and darkness never were mingled. Light is the positive state ; darkness the negative. Darkness is but the absence of light. How absurd, to talk of dividing light from darkness ! You need inspiration to commit folly like that. And God made the firmament or heaven—i., 7. Why, he made that in the beginning, and here the next day he makes it again ! Did the first not please him ? Did he pull it down and build it up again the next day ? Poor architect! Oh ! I forgot, he had no one to guide him, had no experience in world-building. Were he to try now with all the advantages human science could give him, perhaps he would make a much better job of the whole affair. He could scarcely do worse. And the earth brought forth grass—i., 12. In the next chapter (ii., 3-8) we are told that he made every plant and herb before they grew and then “ planted ” them—no doubt using a dibble and watering-pot, after digging the soil with a fork or spade, as a regular ordained gardener would do to-day. The reader had better believe both accounts. He is not bound to understand either—better not try. The less you know about God and his ways the better you like him. Lights in the firmament—i., 14. There is no firmament. Therefore no lights were placed in it. Two great lights—i., 16. The sun is a light, the moon is no more a light than the earth. It merely reflects the sun­ light. The author of Genesis did not know that. To him sun and moon seem to have been about equal; in reality the sun is about 60,000,000 times larger than the moon. Besides, for about one-half of its time the moon is next to useless for lighting purposes, without reckoning wet and cloudy weather. He made the stars also—i., 16. A mere fleabite, the �40 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. making of the stars, evidently. They are so small. No doubt god made them of the sparks struck out by his flint when lighting the sun. Why, the nearest of them all is so distant that light takes three years and seven months to travel from it to the earth: while others seen in the telescope are so far away that light spends many thousands of years upon the journey. And some of them must be at least hun­ dreds of times larger than the sun! Had the author of Genesis understood astronomy, he would not have written this nonsense about the creation. A nd god made the beasts of the earth .... and everything that creepeth upon the earth—i., 25. He might have found better employment than making serpents and snakes, hyaenas, wolves, tigers, etc. And what was he thinking about when he made parasites, such as trichina and tape-worms ? But Darwinism shows that the vegetables and animals, good or bad, were not manufactured in this sudden manner ; but were gradually evolved or developed from older forms of life—a subject too large to entei- upon here. So god created man in his own image . . . . male and female created he them—i., 27. In the Hebrew it is “gods ” not god—the Elohim—that made man. They were evidently male and female themselves, as all respectable deities were. And Adam and Eve were made in their image ; in fact if you had seen the creators and the created together you could not tell which was which—stature and build, color, hair, and everything were just alike. The only difficulty one meets with is this; how could Adam and Eve be the parents of snch diversified tribes and families of men as now people the earth ? Black and white, of various shades ; short and tall; fat and lean; round heads and long heads; Caucasians and Negroes ; and all the endless variety existing to-day ? Which of all these descendants are most like the first pair ? I should say that most likely the lowest, ugliest and most degraded couple to be found are just the very image of the first pair, and they were exactly like their creator’s. Tut! tut! I don’t wish you to worship such a pair of deities. Everyone to his taste. But if you can worship the creator of a world like this, you need not pretend to be squeamish. Every seed-bearing herb and fruit-bearing tree ... to you shall it be for meat (Gen. i., 29).—All herbs and trees bear seed, and therefore all herbs and trees were for human food. �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 41 according to this. Poor first pair! Look through some “Family Herald,” my reader, and see what those poor things had set before them for food! There is no discrimination exercised by the nurse ; but those two full-blown babies, who had never sucked nor had pap given them, are just left to themselves to select their food as best they may from a universal Botanical Garden, teeming to excess with every plant and weed that ever grew! The trees are included in the stock. And no cookery yet invented! How .sickly they must have been the first week or two! The marvel is they did not get poisoned before the first sunset. And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good (i., 31).—The man who wrote that had never been chased by lion or tiger, nor bitten by a snake or serpent; white ants had never destroyed his dwelling, nor moths spoilt his wardrobe ; fleas and bugs had never teased him, nor mosquitoes driven him mad ; thorns and thistles had never pricked and-lacerated his flesh, nor miasma laid him down with yellow fever ; tropical heat had never roasted him, nor Arctic cold frozen his extremities. The world he describes is not the one we live in ; he but echoes the dreams of the golden age of poets and mythologists, and tells a tale of the past that never was present. Geology tells the blunt truth about it, and shows that this world has always been the scene of strife, pain, misery and death almost ever since life itself existed in it. If this world is a manufactured article, then he who made it must have been the essence of folly and bar­ barity. As we never hear anything of him now, I presume he has had what the Scotch call “ a cast of grace ”—has committed suicide to escape the wretched sight of his own infernal handiwork. Pity he did not commit suicide before creating the world! Genesis ii.—The first three verses of this chapter belong neither to the first nor the second properly. They were added to the ancient story by some priest who wished to impose the Sabbath upon the people beneath his charge, and who knew that that could not be done without a good round lie. He says :— The heaven and the earth icere finished (ii., 1).—The heavens, of course, neverjfexisted, any more than the Greek Olympus or the Scandinavian Valhalla. But the earth never has been finished yet. Geology teaches that the earth is just �42 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. as much in course of creation now as ever it was. Coral zoophytes, globigerinse, many plants ; all waves, streams, rain-showers, frosts and snows, volcanoes and earthquakes, are engaged in reconstructing and re-arranging the strata of the earth. The process never was finished and never can be. The earth, like every other material thing, except probably ether and atoms, is a growth, not a manufactured thing, as the Bible falsely teaches. And he rested on the seventh dag, etc. (ii., 2).—‘‘ Behold I show you a mystery!” An almighty god spent a whole eternity in doing absolutely nothing ; five or six thousand years ago he built the world, at which he worked six days ; the putting of these few atoms together so exhausted him that he rested the whole of the seventh day !—and has done next to nothing since. To doubt this is blasphemy; to believe it is piety ! If you ridicule it, the bishops and their creatures will send you into solitary confinement for at least nine months, and allow you nothing to read but this stupidest of books! These are the generations of the heavens and oj the earth, when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens (ii., 4).—Here beginneth an entirely new account of the creation by a writer who worshipped Jehovah not the Elohim. It was the Elohim who created all things in six days according to Genesis i. This chapter says Jehovah Elohim did the work in one day—“ in the day that the lord god made,” etc. Each of the stories is true ; divinely so, though they so flatly contradict each other, and both equally contradict known facts. Never mind. Believe both. Con­ tradictions and lies constitute nine-tenths of the whole stock of revealed truth. What then ? It is the fashion to pretend at least to believe it all, and if you find a flaw, “ mum ” is the word. To mention it might have the effect of damaging the interests of spiritual policemen and tyrants “ set over you in the lord ” and elsewhere, who rob the poor and the starving to build temples and palaces for their own glory and amusement. The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (ii., 7).—This, my reader, is very sublime language, praise the lord! Man’s body consists, then, of dust of the ground ; and his soul is nothing but a mixture of atmospheric air, carbonic acid and �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 43 water-vapor, breathed out of the lungs of his maker into his own I A man’s first breath would expel most of what the lord breathed into him, and a few subsequent acts of respira­ tion would get rid of it all. He was soon without any soul, except the constant inrush and outrush of air, etc., to and from his lung. The tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it, etc. (ii., 17).—As divines long since gave up as hopeless the task of trying to find where the Garden of Eden was, I shall not notice it, except to remark that in the first chapter man had all trees given him without exception; here he is forbidden the tree of knowledge—almost the only one worth eating of; and, by implication, he was forbidden to eat of the tree of life also (iii.. 22). The first man was exceedingly wise, however, without eating of the tree of knowledge, for he gave names to all cattle and fowls and beasts of the field ; and he seems to have been no time about it either. A very precocious youth, cer­ tainly ! The Lord could no faster make animals than Adam gave them appropriate names. What language he used is not said. Some contend it was Welsh, and I shall not dispute it. Adam’s wife was made of one of his own ribs; and yet he calls her “ bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh (ii., 21—23). But she was only bone of his bone. Besides, if he was asleep when that surgical operation was performed upon him, how did he know that his rib had been extracted and used in this way ? He preferred Eve to all the animals he had seen and labelled, as any fool might have done ; but how did he know that she was like himself, never having seen his own shape in a mirror ? Oh1 I forgot! God was just like him, and no doubt told Adam so, and thus he knew his own shape from his maker’s ! I may say that that bold, bad, blasphemous man, Bishop Ellicott, in a new commentary on the Bible, has the audacity to. affirm, in flat contradiction to God’s blessed and most holy word, that Eve was not made out of a rib of Adam 1 He is too respectable to send to Holloway Gaol; but wait till he is dead; then he will go down to Dante’s Inferno, where so many blaspheming bishops and popes are already “ suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.” The second chapter of Genesis closes with the confession �44 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. that the Elohim or Jahveh had not the decency to clothe the pair they had made. We need not be surprised. Gods and goddesses have never been civilised enough to clothe them­ selves. All the garments they have ever worn have been woven and made by mythologists, painters and sculptors. Not being clad themselves, the Elohim, including gods and goddesses, never once thought that the human beings they had made, just like themselves, had any need of garments. Dr. Watts, in a hymn many of us learnt in childhood, seems to regret that civilisation should have effected what God had left undone. The hymn is both pious and edifying__ “ The art of dress did ne’er begin Till Eve, our mother, learnt to sin ; When first she put the covering on Her robe of innocence was gone; And yet her children vainly boast Of those sad marks of glory lost!” John Milton also, in "Paradise Lost," has something to say upon the subject. That magnificent Zoroastrian or Mani­ chaean poem should be read by all worshippers of orthodoxy. Milton e real hero is Satan; his God is a pitiable thing. Genesis iii.—The serpent was more subtle (sly) than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made (iii., 1).— Yes, the serpent was always an emblem or symbol of wisdom ; though it required very little of that quality to out-wit the Lord God and the first pair. Of course the story is a " mystery ” in the old-fashioned sense of that word. The language is emblematical, and intended to show that all gin and evil, misery and death, spring from the union of the sexes. It was written by some vile ascetic. By the way, how is it all clothiers and manufacturers of textile fabrics do not adopt the serpent as their symbol or as their arms or trade mark ? The whole of their art is due to the action of the serpent. Had he not been wiser than the gods, clothes had never been adopted. Lest anyone should be bold enough to question if the serpent ever held the reported conversation with the woman, let it be remembered that in " ASsop’s Fables ” nothing is more common than for animals to talk; and nursery tales and folklore abound with similar incidents. "Be not faith­ less, but believing.” " Ye believe in AEsop, believe also in Genesis.'5 If you doubt the speaking of the serpent, re­ �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 45 member Balaam’s donkey ; if you are tempted to doubt the donkey-tale, remember that of the serpent. By thus com­ paring scripture with scripture you may assure yourself of the truth of one absurdity by reflecting upon another equally bad. If you should still be tempted to doubt, remember that all doubters will be damned; reflect upon the flames of hell until the conception drives you half mad. You will be able to believe anything then. And Adam and Eve hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden (iii., 8).—You need not wonder now how the serpent dodged the Lord God and got into the garden unknown to its owner ! They were out of his presence ! He could not see them ; and had to call them to find out where they were! If I wrote here that I hid from the Lord God, and got out of his presence, I might go to Holloway Gaol for blasphemy ; and if I pretended it was revelation I was writing, and raised the late Archbishop of Canterbury from the dead to prove my mission, Dr. Benson and his party would give me an extra twelvemonths’ of soli­ tary confinement for disturbing existing arrangements, while the resurrected defunct would have to be disposed of or " removed ” as fast as possible. God could not see far in those early days, evidently ; and his presence was no more extensive than Adam’s. In process of time he grew in bulk till he became infinite—that is, ruptured and destroyed him­ self like jEsop’s ambitious frog; and now men can no more find God than God could find Adam and Eve. He is dis­ sipated, like the gas of a ruptured balloon, or, rather, like the vital spirit of the torn and tattered creeds. With a kangaroo bound I leap over the other incidents of the story, and alight plump upon the upshot of the first sin. “ Behold the man (literally the Adam—that is, both the man and the woman) is became as one of us, to know good and evil (iii., 22).—I told you the creators were more than one. They speak in the plural—one of us. The volumes of learned rubbish written to explain this would surprise one, if he did not reflect that twenty useless books are written for every good one, and that for every great book you might find a waggon-load of literary rubbish. This mystery is usually explained by means of the trinity in unity—a mystery that will clear up almost everything in theology. One of the three is spoken to by the Elohim 1 That is, the unity speaks �46 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. to one of the trinity, or to all three. That is, one of them at least talks to himself—a sign of weak intellect generally. That is, they all three speak with one voice, so lodged that all can use it at once, or one of them alone. Where the said voice was placed, or how it was managed I know not; I was not there. As this communistic or socialistic voice uttered what all three equally thought, each of the three heard with his own pair of ears what he himself and his two companions uttered; and thus each of the triad came to understand for himself what all three knew equally well before all three combined in this co-operative manner to pronounce it for the benefit of himself and two companions. Ah, me! My last sentence, I fear, is a bit mixed; so am I. It is that trinity that has done it. I feel as poor Captain Webb did. probably, in the Niagara whirlpools, so I’ll make for the shore. So he drove out the man (literally, the Adam) iii., 24.__ This was an act of vengeance blind and cruel. It was an act of jealousy. For the three, that is the one, felt afraid of Adam and Eve. They knew too much. So they persecuted them, just as the bigots persecute now. The gods and bigots have always claimed a monopoly of knowledge: being densely stupid themselves, they have always done their worst to pre­ vent other people growing wise. To claim a monopoly of knowledge is merely to wall up your windows with the object of shutting in all the sunlight, and to find yourself in absolute darkness as the result of such folly. Had gods and bigots (they are both of the same species) been successful, the world would never have emerged from brutal savagery. The act of expulsion from Eden was one of mere spite—“ test he put, forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat and live for ever.v These wicked gods begrudgpd man knowledge. The serpent assisted him, and he won it in spite of them * Then they deprived him of immortality. Here, too, the monopoly proved fruitless. Men die; but the race of man still subsists. The gods die, and leave no successors. Most of them are dead. The Bible gods are as dead as the dead languages that record their deeds. When the horse was gone God shut the stable-door, and set cherubs with a flaming sword to guard it! That is a specimen of divine wisdom. Had he but set that guard at first the serpent might never have got in ; had he not made the serpent he could never have tempted Eve. Inexperience �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 47 and folly mark the whole of this story of the creation and fall. Nothing to equal it in these particulars can be found elsewhere. Most other nursery tales have some sense and some humanity in them ; this is destitute of both, And yet this silliest of stories is taught still as divine truth even in Board schools, at the expense of the ratepayers. And those who laugh at it are sent to prison, for the gratification of bishops and other humbugs who fatten upon falsehoods and grow rich out of the credulity of the poor. Genesis IV.—This chapter gives an account of Cain and Abel. The former seems to have been a vegetarian and a sort of Buddhist, who refused to kill animals, lienee he offered the lord the fruits of the ground, which were scorn­ fully refused. Abel offered him some fine fat rams, which delighted him. I presume the story was invented' to throw discredit upon agriculture, inasmuch as ploughing or digging the soil disarranges the order of divine providence f while the mere cattle-breeder was supposed to be living in a state of friendship with the deities, only because he lived in a state of nature. The writer or inventor of the story was in favor of the nomad life of the desert, and so represented his god to be of the same sentiments. Cain, the farmer, should have had nothing to do with the shepard’s god; he should have invented an agricultural god for his own particular ■ benefit. And so to-day, Atheists and heretics can never please the gods that now exist; if they ever please any at all, they must make gods for themselves, as others have done. By the way, it is easier to invent a whole pantheon of gods than even one priest. A priest must be a man of some kind ; a mere name or epithet will do for a god. The writer of Hebrews (xi., 2) says that faith was the element that made Abel’s sacrifice acceptable to the Lord • while the want of it led to the rejection of Cain’s. That is sheer nonsense. The Lord wanted his breakfast, and a few good fat lambs were just what his appetite required. Besides, the way this writer puts it would lead to the conclusion that Cain, the man of no faith, persecuted to the death Abel, who had plenty of it! That is absurd. If Cain really did kill Abel in this religious quarrel, he must have been the more fanatical—that is, the better believer; and Abel the worse. It never has been otherwise ; the man of no faith could not persecute a believer. He might punish any other fault, bu �* 4 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. not his religion, unless the religion led to open or secret acts of violence, and then not the religion, but the acts of violence would be punished. Beloved reader, the lesson we learn from the story of those ancient brothers is one of deep significance. It will be observed that they quarrelled merely about religion, a thing neither of them understood. Before this we may suppose they had lived as became brothers. Now in their full manhood they fell out. Up to this time they seem to have had no religion; consequently all went merry as a marriage-bell with them. No sooner did they betake themselves to religion than they differed, grew warm, because the thing intoxicated them. They fought, and the stronger killed the, weaker! It is a significant fact that the first time religion is introduced in the Bible it leads to fractricide. From that day till now the history of the Jewish-Christian religion is a history of quarrels, lies and blood. Therefore, have nothing to do with it. And the Lord said unto Cain, Where is Abel, thy brother ? —iv., 9. Ah! If the Lord had only been present at the quarrel, he might have prevented the murder ! But provi­ dence and policemen are generally out of the way when most needed. They are always at hand when sacrifices, offerings, and rewards are to be presented. The sentence pronounced upon Cain is full of nonsense. The earth was cursing him (verse 11) ; would refuse to yield him her strength when tilled! Why, land saturated with blood, animal or human, is enriched thereby, and produces better crops for being so manured! Nor does it know the difference between a brother’s blood and that of a dog. Scarcely can you take a step in the Bible without stumbling upon some gross superstition. So far is the earth from cursing those who saturate it with blood, that it yields better crops, for the murderer and anyone else for it. (To be continued in No. 4). Printed and Published bv Ramsey and Eootei, at 2S-Stonecutter Street, E.C< V YTVR&’T"UllXl Ill AA'iiU'XA IRK �NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY No. 2 ] blows AT THE BIBLE, [id BY JOSEPH SYMES. •«'. t This gentleman was the first that ever lived ; his father’s -name was God (Luke iii., 38), and his mother was the earth or the ground (Genesis ii., 7). Adam was made, or begotten, or manufactured, or born, or produced twice at least. In the first instance he was made the saline day with his wife, viz., on the first Saturday that ever dawned ; and after this gigantic effort the creator dropped work, “ rested and was refreshed” (Exodus xxxi., 17) during • the first of Sundays, and has, we belUye, done no work to speak of since. his first creation Adam found the world prepared for him. As Hood, one of his late descendants sung, he came ----------- “ tenderly ushered in ' To a prospect all bright and burnished * No tenant he for life s back slums----He comes to the world as a gentleman comes To a lodging ready furnished.” -5 y ; r There was the earth, in all its vastness of glory, furnished with a crystalline roof (time, alas! has destroyed it long since), in which were fixed the sun, moon, and stars—now, sad to say, left to wander through space as best they can, with no firmament to hold them fast 1 What would the astronomer of to-day give to gaze upon the world as our first fathei’ saw it 1 Overhead that beautiful sapphire vault, roof at once of the lower world and floor of the musicians of the gods ! What a pity it was ever permitted to decay I Had it been kept in proper repair the theologian might confound his sceptical foes by merely pointing upwards, and dramatically crying, “Behold!” �18 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. When Adam first opened his eyes upon the vegetable world no parasites were found anywhere, and a fungus had never a chance to grow. The leaves of the tree grew, but never de­ cayed ; the blossoms consolidated into fruit, the fruit ripened, but it never fell. The animals, too, were in a most extra­ ordinary state. The lion played with the lamb, and the cat with the mouse; if the hawk chased the sparrow it was merely in fun ; and the veriest cormorant to be found would as soon have dreamt of swallowing a crow-bar as a fish. In those days all beasts of prey browsed in the meadows ; and the whales and sharks grew fat upon nought but sea-weeds. Then it was that tigers had neither fangs nor claws, the wasps no stings, the serpents no poison ; mosquitoes had not vet left their eggs, the locusts had never begun to devour, and phylloxera and the Colorado beetle had never cast mur­ derous eyes upon vine, grape or potato. These were delightful times when our first parents sunned hemselves in “Eden’s bonny yard,” untroubled by the nought of debt or danger, untrammelled with skirts or pan­ taloons, big romping babies that they were, the very image of their father I But Adam’s second Advent was different. In the first in­ stance he was made, but of what material we know not: when he was made the second time it was of dust (Genesis ii., 7). Whether the dust was moistened and worked up with water, like plaster of Paris, is not said. A modem man consists chiefly of water ?• Adam’s one element was dust. Whether it was stone dust, or clay dust, or saw dust, or gold dust, or diamond dust, or brick dust, or coal dust, or a mingling of them, we cannot say. Divine wisdom has not seen fit to en­ lighten us further than to condescend to inform us that our first father was made of the dust of the ground ; and as the dust of the ground differs so in different regions, we must leave the solution of this interesting problem till the Great Day, when the whole of his descendants will, no doubt, rush to him simultaneously and exclaim, “ Oh 1 Reverend sire, of what dust did thy creator form thee ?” Adam s reply must, I am sorry to add, be postponed sine die. As Adam consisted of dust, and as sons and fathers are usually of the same material. I presume it is but logical to infer that Adam’s father—or God—was also of the dust. One thing is certain, he has been turned to dust or something �THE LIFE OF ADAM. 19 less substantial for many ages ; and his worshippers can no more find a relic of his than they can one of Eve’s hair­ pins. When Adam was made on this second occasion, and the dust was worked up into its required form, proportions, sym­ metry, and consistency, his maker “ breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man (Adam) became a living soul.” The result must be pronounced wonderful and altogether different from what might have been expected. It must be re­ membered that he breathed into Adam, that is, the creator breathed out of himself or expired his own breath ; and that breath would have poisoned Adam if he had been previously alive, for it must have been highly charged with carbonic acid. So it appears that what would kill a live man will make a dead man live. Of course, we should not believe this story if we found it in Homer—unless we had been coaxed to believe it by a promise of heaven, or frightened to it by a threat of hell ; but seeing it is in the Bible, and reflecting that we must be damned if we doubt it, it seems safest to believe it. When God the second time created Adam, he certainly did not improve upon his work ; for this time Adam found the earth bare ; he himself was the very first living thing created. When he awoke to life there was nothing to eat, no one to speak to. A little later he saw a garden rise suddenly around him, and then beasts, and birds, and insects crowded into life. But none of them suited him, though the creator seems to have tempted him to amalgamate with beasts. The Lord God thought it not good for Adam to be alone, and so gave him a sleeping draught of extra power, and while he lay in deep repose, proceeded to vivisect him. Opening the side of the sleeper, the surgeon-creator extracted a rib, and then stitched up the wound, leaving Adam a lighter if not a wiser man. Of the extracted rib the creator now made a woman. When Adam’s skeleton is dug up it may easily be identified by being a rib short. Here we face a decided difficulty. If Adam was an ordinary man, a rib of his would make but a very small woman, and merely a bone woman after all. A woman so small must have been a very poor “ help meet ” for Adam, even if con­ sisting of bones and flesh and all things human; and a woman of bone, whatever hpr size or shape, must have been �20 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. of far less value than one of ivory, not to mention marble or the precious metals. This, however, is merely a sceptical difficulty, and decidedly dangerous. We prefer sticking to God’s holy word, though we cannot tell how a rib, no more than a pound or so in weight, could become a woman, weighing 140 lbs. For if the rest of the material was taken from some other place, then manifestly only one hundred-and-fortieth part of Eve was due to that rib; and, therefore, the Lord God did not make that extracted rib a woman, as the story avers. It would have required all Adam’s ribs and nearly all the rest of him to make a woman of respectable proportions as compared with himself. Still it is better to believe than be damned. After his second creation, as just related, Adam—in com­ pany with Eve and the animals which he had named (if not baptised) before he lost his rib—lived very pleasantly in Paradise. This was a garden, as every Sunday scholar knows, “planted ” in Eden, where grew the tree of life, of which if one ate he would never die (Genesis iii., 22), and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, of which the happy couple were forbidden to eat on pain of death. Thus says holy writ. But the sceptic will be sure to ask what sort of a tree it was ? 'Why they were forbidden to eat of it ? and how they could be awed by a threat they could not understand ? These deep questions are far too profound for finite minds to solve, and we must leave them beneath the dark veil divine revelation has seen fit to shroud them in. Alas! “ The best laid schemes o’ mice and gods Gang aft agley.” In stocking the world with animals the creator or creators had manufactured the serpent, and the “ serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field,” so much so that he began to talk; and soon he showed himself a more powerful and successful orator, reasoner and commander than all the creators together. The creator told Adam and Eve not to eat the tree or touch it, lest they should die. The serpent said, “Pooh! pooh. It’s the best tree in all the garden—is good for food, is pleasant and agreeable; and, besides, it possesses the most astonishing educational properties ; for you no sooner eat this fruit than you open your eyes, and know �THE LIFE OF ADAM. 21 good and evil; in a word, Sir, Madam, yon no sooner swallow a little of this delicious fruit than you become like the gods themselves, who, out of jealousy, have forbidden you to touch it.” No pedlar ever succeeded better, no quack doctor ever gained an easier victory. Before this, Eve would not have touched that tree for the world; now she felt that she could eat every apple it bore. The serpent’s eloquence and subtlety prevailed ; Eve ate two apples on the spot, and ran off with one in each hand to her husband, whom she speedily induced to follow her example and eat of this marvellous fruit. The serpent now chuckled with delight at the success of his exploit; and Adam and Eve felt no worse, nor very much better for the new food. Their deity, however, who had probably seen the serpent enter Paradise, suspected something wrong. He descended in haste, and began to look about among the trees and bushes for the disobedient pair. Adam heard him rustling through the long grass, and hid himself among the bushes, rightly judging that his maker was not in the sweetest of tempers. At length in desperation he cried, “ Adam, where art thou ? Hast thou eaten of that tree ?” Not daring to hide longer, Adam now slowly crawled out of his hiding-place, begging his majesty not to be so angry with him, as in truth, the woman had pressed him to eat the fruit in question. Still, the deity was not pacified, and he pronounced a curse upon Adam and his descendants, upon the ground, upon the pool’ woman, and upon the serpent that had deceived them ; and then went back again to his mansion, his wrath still burning as it will do for ever and ever. This story, gentle reader, is extremely instructive. You know that there are thorns in the world ; they are the results of the above crime. Mothers, as you know, bear their off­ springs in pain and sorrow; it is because Eve ate an apple or two. All serpents go upon their belly; that is because the first serpent, who, no doubt, crawled upon his back, temptec. Eve to sin. Before that date pain and death were known only by name ; since then there has been little else. Hell, at that date, was peopled only by devils, and even they were not regular denizens, but merely occasional visitors; ever since about that date, men and women, and children have been dropping into it in ever increasing numbers, whereas, not �22 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. a human being would ever have sniffed so much as a whiff of its sulphur, if Eve and Adam had not sinned. All which shows what sort of a thing divine justice is, and demonstrates that, of all beings known, none need so much to be civilised as the gods. Adam and Eve were next driven out of Paradise to prevent their becoming gods, the older gods being afraid of the possible consequences. They knew that the serpent was too subtle for the best of them, and they, no doubt, feared that under his tuition Adam and Eve, should they eat of the Tree of Life, would be more than a match for them. Therefore, driving the unfortunate couple out, they guarded the gate of Paradise by cherubs with a flaming sword. Whether this was a Damascus blade or Toledo, I cannot say; antiquaries having never yet lighted upon ii. Perhaps Dr. Schliemann, when he has finished Troy, Mycene, and other classical sites, may take a trip to Paradise to explore that region. Some little time before this expulsion, the guilty pair took to vestments. They had been created naked ; nor did their maker see the necessity of clothing them. Taking the hint, no doubt, from the “ aprons ” he saw them wearing on the day he cursed them, the creator next turned butcher, and killed two beasts and flayed them (we hope he did not flay them alive); then becoming a tailor, he made the skins into two coats d la mode, no doubt, for the man and woman. Clothes had not yet become “ differentiated,” and both sexes dressed alike; coats, then, were all-sufficient; it was a later civilisation that first demanded skirts and pantaloons. After leaving Paradise, this interesting pair were blessed with a family of sons and daughters, who intermarried with each other, and came to but little good. The eldest son murdered the second, and then became a vagabond. Of the rest we know nothing; though to judge from their descendants, they were little to boast of. Adam himself lived no more than 930 years and then died. If any should fancy that he lived too long, let them reflect upon the misery he might have inflicted upon the world if he had never eaten the apple! In that case he would have lived for ever and have been an endless nuisance to mankind. Eve, I presume, never did die, for the Bible does not record any such event in �---- 5,--t——*--------------------- L~------ THE LIFE OF ADAM. 23 her history ; and I should not like to incur the “ plagues ” that will fall on those who “ add to ” the Word of God. Such gentle reader, is a summary of the life of Adam (and Eve in part) as given in the Bible. It is very interesting and instructive, is it not ? The lessons we learn are : never to listen to a talking, garrulous serpent; never to eat forbidden fruit, nor too much of what is lawful; and if we should ever have a chance to eat the fruit of the “ Tree of the knowledge of good and evil,” and also of the “ Tree of life,” the fate of Adam and Eve suggests that we should eat of the latter first, for that, it seems, will ensure our immortality, eat of the other while we may. LOVE NOT THE WORLD. Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the father is not in him.”—1 John ii., 15. The apostle John, or indeed, all the apostles together, might utter this cry on any Exchange in the world, from morning to night, and from January to December, but he would make no impression. The assembled merchants, traders, stock­ brokers, and what-not would vote him a nuisance, laugh at his fanaticism, chaff him and quiz him, or send for a policeman to take him in charge. The most pious present as well as the profane would all concur that the apostle was out of place ; that he should keep his sermon for Sunday, a day specially set apart in Protestant lands for hearing denunciations of the week’s transactions and for forming resolutions and pious resolves—to be—more worldly during the week to come. And if our Exchanges and emporia are not the appropriate places for such sermons, where shall they be preached. In the churches, of course : where, no doubt, the preacher would be listened to with profound and prayerful attention; his words would sink deep into the hearts of the clergy, who would confess their sins, bewail their worldly-mindedness, acknowledge themselves “ miserable sinners,” as they really are, and declare that they desired only to hold the world with a slack hand, that they really valued nothing so little as the �24 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. dung and dross which constituted the world’s wealth, that they cared only for the wealth that did not fade, the riches of the kingdom of heaven ; and would pour out volumes of twaddle and heartless excuses, and resolutions never to be kept. Tell the Archbishop of Canterbury that he will be shut out of heaven or be cl apt into hell, and you hardly impress him. Tell him his palace is on fire, or his bank broken, his railway and other shares rendered useless through some com­ mercial disaster, and he would turn white as a sheet and be ready to give up the ghost. Of course his grace does not really love the world and the things in it; but then it looks so much as if he did that neither you nor I, the Father, Son, nor Holy Ghost, nor all together, with the Archbishop to assist us, could tell the difference between real worldly love and his grace’s counterfeit. If you and I, having none of the grace of God, had a splendid palace to live in, and £15,000 per annum to live upon, and great titles and huge honors into the bargain, we should almost certainly love them. But an archbishop has divine grace sufficient for his very trying 'position, and his strength is just sufficient to his day, and so exactly balances his income, perquisites and privileges, that- this! Bight g,ev. Father in God can love the world and the Father (?.e., himself) both at once and about equally. And besides God the Father is not quite so particular now-a-days. In olden time, when he, like the Pope, ruled mtteh of the world, he -insisted upon all his rights and monopolies; bow he has to beg a favor where he could formerly command ; and, on the principle that half a loaf is better than no bread, he accepts what he can get—just as all his followers do. In dwelling profoundly upon this text, andhwith the assist­ ance of the Holy Ghost who or which inspired it, I note that it is entirely out of harmony with, I won^ say the world, but the churches of to-day; and, therefore, either the text or the churches must be faulty. The question is, Which? It cannot be supposed that so many churches are at fault ; they would enlighten each other, and naturally criticise each other to so great an extent that - any serious deviation from the truth amongst Christians is next to impossible, especially on so plain a subject as loving the world or the Father. �LOVE NOT THE WORLD. 25 I presume it would be next to impossible for a person to have a strong liking for anything and yet not know it. If the Christians love the world, its wealth and pleasures, its pomps and vanities, they can hardly be ignorant of the fact. And if they love the Father to any great extent, they must know it, whether lie does or not. It is also very unlikely that Christians could hide their preferences from their neighbors. If they love the Father and despise the world, people must know it; if they loved the world and despised the Father, they could not hide it. A tree is known by its fruits ; and people’s likes and dislikes are ascertained by their conduct. Well, I know of no church that does not love the world most intensely ; I know of no people who love it more than those who pretend to renounce it. And the text says the love of the father is not in such people. No doubt the text is a blunder. The Holy Ghost and John were but babies compared with the Christians of to-day. They thought that religion was to be distinguished from the world ; the moderns have discovered that God and the world are both one, and that to love the Father is to love the world, and to renounce the world would amount to renouncing the Father, so they stick jb both. Bravo ! this is a grand discovery. And the Church was not long in making it when once those stupid apostles, who crucified the flesh, were dead and out of the way. Christians to-day crucify the flesh of others and spare their own—another great modern improvement. To be sure, profane and illogical persons will say that if Christian conduct is right, the Bible must be wrong. Not at all. You must not understand either'party seriously. When the Bible bids you not to love the world, it means the other world, not this ; and when Christians to-day profess to think lightly of the world, they mean “ the world to come.” Christianity is a huge, grim, practical joke. The Church started by renouncing the world, and culminated in •the possession of most of it; then the civil power had forcibly to wring from her her ill-gotten gains. Churchmen still roll in riches and bedeck themselves with honors, though they profess to be followers of that Jesus who for their sakes became poor, and to be the spiritual descendants of men who voluntarily went about in sheep-skins and goat­ skins. In their baptism, by godfathers and godmothers, they �26 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. renounce the world with its pomps and vanities, the flesh and the devil. This serves them for life. It is a wholesale con­ fession, followed by plenary absolution for all the sins they will ever commit. Having thus hoodwinked the blessed Trinity, they ever after love the world with all their heart, and with all their mind, and with all their soul, and with all their strength, and their neighbor, the flesh, as themselves. I feel no doubt that Christianity and the churches’ hypocrisy will some day stand exposed before all men, and become the world’s laughing-stock. But the people are so blind and priest-ridden that it must take long to accomplish the work. In the meantime our duty is plain—to expose, to ridicule this greatest of shams with all our might. THE MYSTERY OF SALVATION. •• Ye worship ge know not what: we know what we worship: for salvation is of the Jews."—John iv., 22. Here is a text of three clauses, two false and one true. Salvation is of the Jews !” This is absolutely contrary to fact. The Jews are a lost race themselves, and never afforded salvation to anybody. For well nigh 1,500 years they lived, if their chronology can be trusted, in Palestine. But during that long period they produced no philosopher, no great general, no architect, no discoverer, no scientist, no statesman, an indifferent poet or two, no inventor. From what, then, have the Jews contributed to save the world ? The ancient Jews are remembered for almost nothing else than sundry superstitions ; and superstitions are the curse, not the salvation of man. Had the Jews never existed, the Bible never been written, what would the world miss ? That Jews in modern times have distinguished themselves I readily admit; but never except in the midst of Gentilism and under its inspiration. Thus the last third of the text is disposed of as an empty boast. ‘•We know what we worship.” This also is absolutely untrue. No Jew then, no Jew nor Christian since, ever �THE MYSTERY OF SALVATION. 27 knew what he worshipped. The only persons who really do know their god or gods are those that worship tangible or visible objects. The worshippers of the golden calf, sun .and fire worshippers, the devotees of stocks and blocks, of trees and running streams, knew something of their deities, though not much ; for had they known the truth they would not, could not have worshipped. This, too, is purely an empty boast, though quite worthy of the man who told people he lived before Abraham (Jolrn viii., 58), that he “ came down from heaven ” (John vi., 38), that “ all power was given unto him in heaven and in earth” (Matt, xxviii., 18), and that he could raise the dead again to life (John xi., 25—27). His was just the spirit of every fanatic : “ I am right, you are wrong. I am divine, you are stupid. I shall be saved, you will be damned—unless you submit to me and adopt my creed.” It is a thousand pities there was no Freethinker present when Jesus and the woman of Samaria were conversing ; for he could very soon have confounded both parties, and have exposed the pretended knowledge of deity which Mary’s son was boasting of. Though probably the world might have had one more martyr to enroll in the “ noble army ;” for Jesus and his disciples (as soon as they arrived) would no doubt have flung the sceptic into “Jacob’s well.” Finding no shred of truth in the second and third clauses, let us turn to the first. Every Christian will inform you that he worships “God,” and all the sects of Christendom would have you believe that they all in common worship one and the same God ; but of this they can have no proof whatso­ ever, and facts are against them, I. Jews, Mahommedans, and Unitarians have a God who is one and indivisible. But that is only one section of the orthodox God. This God is the father of all, be it remem­ bered—The Father. He is the father of the earth and heavens, the sun, planets, comets, stars ; the father of sun­ shine and storm, of flood and fire, of earthquake, volcano, epidemic and famine ; the father of health and of all diseases; the father of vampires, serpents, snakes, fleas, bugs, mosquitos, Colorado beetles, locusts, sharks, lions, tigers, jackals, hyaenas, trichina, and tape-worms; the father of murderers, robbers, pirates, popes, persecutors, and devils! What a family! And every one of them all is the very image of his dad. �r ” ■! ! » iW.rw-'-5 i 28 i --------------- .1. lW— < K BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. What a father! What a God ! What an object of worship ! Verily I do not wonder that persons who can worship such a deity call Atheists fools—it is the very highest compliment they could pay us. No doubt the inmates of Bedlam, in like manner, regard all outsiders as idiots. And we cannot help it. We need never wonder that this God’s worshippers behaved so idiotically and cruelly while in power. II. Most Christians add two or more extra wings or sections to their deity, and increase him, at least by about two-thirds. They have the father, of course, and the Catholics very logically supply a fourth wing or section called the “ Mother,” while Protestants half acknowledge and half repudiate this addition. All, however, agree, except Unitarians, to accept the Son and Holy Ghost. The fathei’ is, they say, such from all eternity. But the son is of exactly the same age as his father, and of the same size, and never was any smaller. He was begotten, though never bom, from all eternity. These two never began to be, yet one of them is father of the other; and, as far as a profane Atheist can perceive, either of them might equally well be the father or the son of the other. One wonders if the divine two ever get confused over the matter themselves! Possibly: they are both alike, both of an age, height, complexion, and it is not known how the one dis­ tinguishes himself from the other. They have never seen themselves, for certain, for they are both infinite, both occupy exactly the same space, they cannot move an inch out of each other’s way, and no looking-glass could be large enough to reflect them, either singly or together. That is to be regretted. It is a pity they cannot see themselves. Then, in addition to the two just named, there is the Holy Ghost. He, she, or it, is also infinite and eternal, and also occupies the same same space exactly that the Father and Son fill so absolutely. The three are most unfortunate. They are each infinite, and there is but one infinite room for them to occupy. Three infinite persons in one infinite room must be awfully uncomfortable, especially in hot weather. I suspect they suffocated each other long ago, or died of unen­ durable pressure. To make things themselves a little more pleasant in their infi­ nitely overcrowded one-roomed house, about 2,000 years ago it was decided that the Son should “ be born again,” and this time become a baby of 17 lbs. or so. It was done. This time he L,! �THE MYSTERY OF SALVATION. 29 had a different father, too. Tired of his old dad, he chose the Holy Ghost as his father this time, and the Holy Ghost chose a mother for him. The reader will not ask me to ex­ plain—I cannot. And all Christian divines, commentators, and gods are as helpless as I am in the matter. However, here we are, face to face, and at the same time back to back, with the Christian God ! How beautifully simple the Gospel is ! “A wayfaring man, though a fool (provided he is a fool, that is), need not err therein.” “ He that runneth may read ”—the posters are so large. 1st. A Father infinite and eternal; 2nd, a Son, ditto ; 3rd, a Holy Ghost ditto; 4th, a woman finite and rather young ; 5th, the Son of this woman and the Holy Ghost, formerly the infinite and eternal son of the father only, begotten but not bom. These five or six persons are the two God the Fathers, the two God the Sons, and the Holy Ghost and Mary. Here we have a double Trinity in Unity ; and thus the Christians are twice as well off in gods as they have ever directly let the world know. Verily “great is the mystery of godliness ! ” “Who can know it?” The Christian God is the most unmitigated sham ever palmed off upon a credulous world. In fact, when they do not pay their devotions to Mammon, to sensuous pleasures, or other physical deities, all their worship is directed to they “ know not what.” I would offer them a reward of £1,000,000 sterling, if I had it, on condition that they told me what their God is. They much need the money, but could never get it, for they “ worship they know not what.” And if men were wise enough to see how they are duped, they would pay not a farthing more for or to the Gospel until its priests in­ formed the public who or what it is they worship. In that case Christianity would be starved out in a few weeks. That fate awaits it. ANANIAS AND S A P P H I R A. “And great fear came upon all the church, and upon as many as heard these things.”—Acts v., 11. No doubt! No doubt! Peter was now in power : the Church was at his feet. Peter, who always had a keen eye for the main chance; who gave up nothing himself for or to his �30 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. master except under promise of one hundredfold more in the time that then was, and in the world to come life ever­ lasting (Matt, xix., 28, 29). The most unconscionable money­ lender or bill-discounter in the world never excelled that. Peter was determined to do his best, while the new converts were at the white heat of their “first love” and religious excitement, to realise the promise of Jesus and secure the one-hundredfold here, at any rate, whatever might be his fate in the “ life to come! ” In this respect, the followers of St. Peter, whether at Rome or elsewhere, have closely copied his meritorious example, and done their utmost to win the one-hundredfold, or the millionfold, if that were possible. Of course Peter soon saw that it would be highly impolitic to allow these two, Ananias and his wife Sapphira, to give in just what they pleased to the exchequer of the Church— others might follow the example, and thus much wealth be diverted from the proper channel. Besides, something bold and terrible needed to be done to impress the rabble, inside and outside the Church, with the power of this new movement, and especially the power of the leaders. It was not legitimate power they were con­ tent to wield, but the power of superstition. The Church started life without a single grain of objective truth; and to support itself was compelled to have constant recourse tothe supernatural—that is, to fraud, to tricks, and to jugglery. Now, if Peter could only make away with Ananias and Sapphira, and give it out that the Holy Ghost had done it, what a deep and horrible impression it would create ! and how effectually it would prevent anyone follow­ ing the example of these two! So the deed was done. I now proceed to give definite reasons for holding the opinion that the Holy Ghost did not kill these two, nor any other person of the Trinity :— 1. Those divine persons never hated lying—most of what they themselves are reported to have said is of that stamp. 2. They not only indulged in this weakness themselves, but had friends who did the same. Abraham told lies about Sarah ; Jacob deceived his poor old blind father; Jesus said he came down from heaven—a manifest falsehood; Peter swore he did not know Jesus! Now, if the Holy Ghost wanted to make an example of any person why not of one �of those ? ’Tis tree, Jesus and Peter, if reports are to be credited, did die violent deaths. Is that to be regarded as proof that the Holy Ghost killed them for lying ? 3. It has never been the practice of the Holy Ghost, Father, or Son to kill people for lying. If it had been, in what age of the church would there have been half-a-dozen saints left alive ? Why, there never could have been a church without wholesale lying. The worst thing that could happen to any Church is the dissemination of truth. Lying! In it the Trinity, the church, and all other shams * live and move, and have their being.” What! let the Holy Ghost go through the church to-day and slay all that preach false doctrine, and that do little else than teach conscious and un­ conscious lies, and. the churches would be in the condition of Sennacherib’s army—they would waken up next morning to ‘■'find that they were all dead corpses !” (Isaiah xxxvii., 36). No, my brethren, the Holy Ghost never did kill liars ; they are his very best friends. But if the Holy Ghost did not kill Ananias and Sapphira, ' who did ? That is the question. There can be only one answer, and that is—Peter was their murderer. Look at the facts. They had offended Peter. He was furious with them. Both these persons died suddenly in a place where Peter and the officials of the Church were assembled. There were certain “ young men ” who at once disposed of the bodies. And that was the end of it. 1. Are Christians satisfied with the story and the cOTiduct of reter ? 2. Could Peter possibly stand forth in a worse light ? 3. How was it he did not challenge investigation ? Why were the corpses so suddenly, and without the least examina­ tion, buried ? 4. Would not an honest man or church have done some­ thing to clear themselves of suspicion in such a case ? 5. What would a few able detectives and an honest coroner’s jury have brought to light, had they investigated the Petro-Ananias and Sapphira case ? It is a fortunate event for Christianity that it rose in an age and time when coroner’s inquests were unknown, for in modern London the killing of these two would have resulted in the sudden death of the Church as well. And this double murder will even­ tually help to kill the Church. Murder will out; and the �-r * r BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. blood of those two cries, not to heaven, but to common sense, for vengeance, and vengeance it will have. There is nothing in the character of Peter to warrant or even suggest his innocence; and fanaticism and crime Jjave generally gone hand in hand. Witness the bloodthirsty temper of Moses, of Joshua, of Abraham, of Jephtha, of the Jews who murdered Jesus, and of Jesus who threatened worse than murder against all who disbelieved and opposed * him ; witness the wholesale and horrible persecutions of they- * Ghurch in all ages. Let any candid man weigh the matter, as if he were on a jury trying the case, and say whether,b.. having regard to the whole circumstances and the. almost invariable character of apostles, prophets, and religious leaders in all countries and ages, the chances are not a thousand to one that ■ Peter, the first of Popes, did what Popes have rarely hesitated to do—committed murder for the sake of the Church’s peace, and covered his crime by a dread- o ful falsehood in the interest of truth? 1 yLastly. I care not much who murdered Ananias and Sapphira—they were murdered, whether Peter or the Holy Ghost did it: the one had as a good right to kill as the other. And even if either had possessed that right, the two -I offenders should, in common justice, have had a fail’ and open trial. Instead of which, they were murdered, without the least chance of self-defence. We $eed not wonder that Christians to-day keep Mr. Brad­ laugh from his seat by brute force ; they have never been friends of justice—except for themselves. Their divine book i gives no example of an honest criminal trial ; the highest judicial proceedings known to the Bible and the blessed » Trinity are just those of the barbarians or of the “ unspeak- \ able Turk,” when he exhibits himself in his worst possible fashion. Reader, instead of “ remembering Lot’s wife,” Remember Ananias and Sapphira, who, whatever their character, were murdered for the good of the infant Church, as millions of innocent people have been for the same institution and prin­ ciples in later centuries. Printed and PublisE& by jfctasey-and Foote, at 2S Stonecutter Street, E.C. �No. 6.] BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. [11. BT JOSEPH SYMES. JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. '^v.1 And Jacob said unto his father, I am Esau thy first-born (Genesis xxvii., 19).—Ananias and his wife were struck dead for lying; Jacob was protected and favored by the Lord im­ mediately after this atrocious lie. As Jacob bamboozled his earthly father, so most Christians to-day treat their father who is in heaven. He is too blind to detect the fraud, or he would soon make short work of the bishops, who rob the poor Esaus of their birthright. Every priesthood lives by imitating Jacob. That is why the patriarch is so popular with them. And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it (Genesis xxviii., 12).—This must have been a divine dream, or it would not have been recorded. A ladder reaching to heaven ! How preposterous 1 Angels running up and down! This was probably before they were fledged, or, as someone has suggested, it may have been at the season when they were moulting, their wings then being too tattered for a lengthy flight. And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely the Lord is in this place ; and I knew it not (Genesis xxviii., 16). —The saint did not know that his God was where he slept! He had evidently not said his prayers before going to sleep. He had left home without taking his God with him, and was startled to find him going on the same journey. And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven (verse 17). Ay ! ay ! it is always so. There is no place, except one, that saints find so dreadful as the gate of heaven, and that is the gate of its antipodes. If a saint ever needs comfort it is when in sight of the heavenly city. Then he sends for the doctor �82 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. —or two or three doctors, if he is rich enough—to kill the messenger, the disease, God has sent to call him home. If the doctors succeed, there is rejoicing; if they fail, the poor saint shuffles off his mortal coil as reluctantly as he would strip off his clothes in the Arctic regions; and he enters heaven (that is, exits from life) with a face as long as he would wear were he going to prison or the workhouse ! Ah! yes—the gate of heaven is a dreadful spot, and I should not be surprised to find it worse inside than out. And he took the stone that he had put for the pillows, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it (verse 18).— Here we land in absolute and widespread idolatry. Jacob was a phallic worshipper, and he consecrated this stone in the usual manner, his God, of course, being quite delighted with the act. He anointed it, and so made a Christ of it, that is, an anointed, greased, or smeared one. And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me, and will keep (that is, protect) me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father s house in peace ; then shall the Lord be my God: and this stone, ivhich I have set for a pillar, shall be God's house ; and of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee (verses 20-22),—This text is full of the mar­ row of divinity. 1. Jacob enters into a bargain with God and puts him to the test. He will have nothing to do with a God that will do nothing for him. In that he was right. Neither will I. 2. The vow shows that Jacob had not yet received Jehovah into his pantheon, and was resolved to experiment upon him before he did. Eight again. 3. If the God did his duty, he should have that stone for his house 1 Very kind of Jacob; and the God did not object. Perhaps the stone had a hole in it. 4. He will pay God ten per cent, of all that God gives him ! That must have been very tempt­ ing to Jehovah; and we must suppose he at once fell in with the proposal and accepted the bargain. Note.—We are often told of the disinterested love of God and his saints. But the article cannot be found in anything except words. The Bible exhibits no love but what expects a reward. We shall see in the sequel that, whatever the Lord did, Jacob never performed his part of this vow. It was the off­ spring of panic, as most vows are, never meant to be kept, but �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 83 only to appease the present wrath of the deity and ward off a supposed or real danger. Religion, when dissected, is found to be selfishness consecrated. The story of Jacob and his married life had better be left where it is—in the Bible, one of the few places really fit for it. Comment is both unnecessary and impossible. The way in which Jacob contrived to grow rich at Laban’s expense was clever, ay, miraculous—which shows that God was with the rogue all the way through. Honest men never get nor need his assistance. To judge from what the Bible teaches, especially in connexion with Jacob, Moses, Joshua and Elijah, Jehovah was the patron God of cut-throats, swindlers and thieves. And Jacob stole away unawares to Laban the Syrian (Genesis xxxi., 20).—Exactly so. Moses did the same from Egypt; and delivered the Israelites from slavery under pre­ tence of going out for a holiday—that is, to worship. But God was with them. Jaco& was Ze/ii a/one; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day (Genesis xxxii., 24).—The context shows that the man was a god, whom Jacob saw “face to face.” The struggle between the almighty and his servant Jacob, at that time nearly one hundred years old, if Bible chronology can be trusted, was a very severe and protracted one ; and for a long period it was doubtful which would win. If I knew the language of the ring I would describe the scene; but I fear me that would prove as great a task for me as God found it to defend himself against Jacob. After several throws on each side—angels, no doubt, being seconds and bottle-holders—God gave in and acknowledged that Jacob was too many for him. He thereupon surrendered the belt, and begged Jacob to permit him to retire. When he got back to heaven, I have been told, nobody knew him. His wig, like John Gilpin’s, was “upon the road,” and his person was all bespattered and covered with dust and per­ spiration. However, a hot bath and a week s rest put him all right again. It may be remarked that Jehovah rested only one day after the week he spent in creating all things. If I am rightly informed, he needed seven times the repose after this wrestling bout. True, he was 2,000 years older at the time he entered the ring with Jacob, though even then he had not reached the years of discretion. t �84 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. Genesis xxxiv. must be passed over with the remark that Jacob’s sons were chips of the old block in cunning, as may­ be seen in their murders and plunder of Hamor and his son. Jacob chid them, it is true, but only because he feared the revenge of his neighbors. Saints usually love the Lord their God, alias themselves, with all their heart, and so have no love left for other people. And Jacob hid them under the oak which was by Shechem (Genesis xxxv., 4).—Jacob had been in Canaan now for a long period, and yet had not paid his vow to God; and the latter reminded him that the debt was still standing, and ordered him to the place where he had seen the ladder reaching up into heaven. Though Jacob had conquered Jehovah in the ring, he still deemed it best to be on good terms with him. So he packed up to go to Bethel to worship, and he told his house­ hold to put away the other gods they had. Those were handed over to Jacob, and he merely buried them along with certain jewels and trinkets under the tree. This was merely a com­ promise ; the other gods were merely put out of the way while Jehovah was being attended to—just as people to-day go to churches and chapels, where they pretend to worship God; though they are merely enduring the “ service ” until they can rush back again to the pleasures and riches they left behind them. Jacob built his altar to God and offered sacrifice ; but he did not give the tenth of all he had, as he had promised when he had nothing at all to give. Of course not. Whoever thinks of keeping his word with Jehovah ? With whom does Jehovah keep his pledges ? And these are the kings that reigned in the land of Edom, before there reigned any king over the children of Israel (Genesis xxxvi. 31 .—This is genuine revelation, and shows us that Moses did not write Genesis. It must have been written after Saul and David, for kings of Israel are mentioned as having reigned at the time the writer lived. We know not who did write Genesis. We know Moses did not; unless his book has been largely interpolated and < orrupted. Though it matters not the least who wrote it; one man is as likely to be inspired as any other. How Israel loved Joseph more than all his children (Genesis xxxvii., 3).—Gods and saints usually have favorites; and nothing better exhibits their weakness. Jacob loved Joseph, �JUMPING COMMENTS ON GENESIS. 85 made a regular guy of him with a harlequin’s coat; he became a spy upon his brothers, and reported what he saw to his father. His brothers hated him, and sold him ; and that was as good as he deserved. Joseph in Egypt turned out a full­ blown professor of dreams, as his brothers had sneeringly called him (xxxvii., 19) ; married the daughter of a priest of On, or Heliopolis, a heathen; became grand vizier of Pharaoh (a purely fabulous title, by the way), gathered up the corn during the years of plenty, sold it out during the famine for the people’s money, cattle, land, and themselves, thus making all the people absolute slaves to the king. No doubt the writer thought he was sketching a splendid and saintly character; in truth he has presented us with one of the very worst tools of despotism. He never interfered with the lands of the priesthood (a priest wrote the story); their organisation was too prwerful, and Joseph was too closely allied to that guild to interfere with their possessions. And Joseph fell upon his father s face, and wept upon him, and kissed him (Genesis 1., 1).—Joseph was very affectionate. For many years he enjoyed himself in Egypt without ever inquiring for his friends, and would probably never have sought them again if the famine had not thrown them in his way; yet he makes an awful fuss now when he finds them and afterwards when his father was dead ! My jumping, capering comments have now run quite through the book of Genesis. I may just remark that many people will regard my comments as altogether inadequate, and even positively faulty in all respects. Well! I have written as I thought best under the circumstances, and for the end I had in view; as I have consulted my own whims and fancies in writing, I should be sorry not to allow the reader the same liberty. My comments, faulty as they may be, are quite worthy of the Bible, regarded as a divine revelation; considered as an antiquity, no comment can be too good for it. My object is not to damage the Bible, but to render it impossible for men to damage themselves by worshipping it or its wornout God. Still I must say, my comment is more honest and straightforward than any orthodox one ever written upon the Bible; for I have not perverted a single text to support fore­ gone conclusions; while orthodox commentaries consist of little else than perversions of that nature. �THE GOSPEL OF THE HOLY GHOST. The following true and faithful history of Jesus has just been handed to me by the Holy Ghost for publication. This is true, as true as the Bible. If any wicked sceptic disbelieves it, I will not send him to hell—I would scorn to do such a mean trick—but I will prove by a miracle that “ my record is true.” I will even do this—Let a bishop or Tyler drink enough strychnine to kill him; and when he is dead, I will restore him to life. If Christians will not submit to so simple and safe a test, let them doubt as they will; I will not waste time in arguing with such idiotic people. The story I have to relate is so evidently penned by the Holy Ghost—its morals are so pure, its tone so serious and grand, its revelations so far beyond the reach of mere reason, so immensely transcending all that science or even romance ever wrote—that any person with the least pretence to spiritual insight must at once acknowledge that it could not have been written by a mere man. Therefore, let all who value their credit for intelligence, and who do not wish to be regarded as lunatics, acknowledge at once that the following history is of divine inspiration. The Holy Ghost told me, as he handed over the manuscript, that he supposed few would believe it. He had never been very successful since intelligence and science got abroad; but still he thought it his duty to do what he could. “ At all events,” said he, “ publish it. I give you carte, blanche as to what you shall give to the world and what omit. You under­ stand the ways of the world better than I, and I am bound to say I am delighted to have secured you as my editor and literary executor. This is my last work ; and I wish you to render it as attractive as you can. A little embellishment, I presume, will not be amiss ; and, of course, you are at liberty to expand the miracles a little if you do not think them striking enough for popular taste. I am told that sensation is now the order of the day, especially with the churches ; so do not be over-scrupulous.” I promised to do my best, and the Holy Ghost left. All . this, reader, is teue !—as true, I am bound to say, as that �THE GOSPEL OF THE HOLY GHOST. 87 , Moses saw the western side of God; as true as that the walls of Jericho fell at the blast of rains’ horns ; as true as that Jesus came down from heaven ; as true as that Paul was caught up to the third heaven ; as true as that Tyler is honest or sensible. And thou knowest, thou sceptical reader, thou! that nothing can be truer than these. If the wicked infidel wants further proof still that this gospel is true, be it known unto him that I once went up to the sixty-fifth heaven, and saw Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob there, carrying on their old tricks as upon earth. There I saw the beasts full of eyes before and behind; and one of them calved while I was there. In fact, there is a whole menagerie of curious beasts there now; and they are getting so numerous that they wished me to buy up a number for exportation. But it was not in my line. I was told that they made Jacob the head overseer of all the animals, with all the young beasts of a certain color that might be born as his wages. Jacob, true to his character, increased his own share artificially as he did when under Laban (Gen. xxx., 37). When caught he denied it, but truthful Peter gave evidence against him ; and “immediately the cock crew.” Then they sent Jacob for twenty years to hell; but the Lord was with him. Thou foolish sceptic, dost thou now believe ? If thou, believest not me who have been to the sixty-fifth heaven, how canst thou believe Paul, who rose no higher than the third ? Wilt thou compel me to boast yet further ? Be it so. I will conquer thy unbelief. Once on a time, about three thousand years before I was born (John viii., 58), I was on tramp ; and coming to a mountain that stood in my way I bade it be gone, and it skipped away like a sky-rocket, and I saw it no more. Where the mountain stood there remained a hole of immense size. Into that hole ran the river Jordan; and that hole is the Dead Sea ! Dost thou now believe that I am inspired by the Holy Ghost ? If not, I leave thee to thy hardness of heart. Go thy way. Read this new gospel. And may it open thine eyes! Amen. The Gospel. Now the birth of Jesus was on this wise : His mother Mary had been a nun, and her cousin Elizabeth had been one also. Now Elizabeth was gay, and her husband Zacharias was old and well-stricken in years. And, behold, an angel of the , , . . �88 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. Lord, about twenty-five, who served the Lord day and night as a monk in a convent near her dwelling, came unto her by night, and prophesied that she should have a son. * And in process of time his prophecy was fulfilled. Now it came to pass that for many days the husband of Elizabeth, even the aged Zacharias, who was not ignorant of the ways of the Lord’s angels, was dumb, and spake not unto his wife either good or bad, for he perceived that she was too subtil for him. Nor yet did he open his mouth when her cousin Mary came to commune with her. Now Mary, being young and well-favored, was betrothed unto a man named Joseph, by trade a carpenter. And lo, he was good-natured and gentle, one that feared God and his espoused wife, believing all things, hoping all things. But when he perceived that Mary was as became her not, he was perplexed. Although he was aware that Gabriel, another angel of the Lord, who was also a monk, had visited her, saying, All hail, beau ideal of women! The Lord hath chosen thee to be his friend1” Mary not comprehending the salutation, the angel explained, and went his way. Now it came to pass as Joseph was sore perplexed and in desperation, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him by night and pleasantly greeted him, and bade him be of good cheer f .... And the angel said, moreover, forasmuch as thou art poor, behold, the Lord hath sent thee one hundred pieces of silver to cheer thy heart withal. And Joseph was content, and took his espoused wife unto himself. Now when Jesus was born, there came twenty-five venerable handmaidens of the Lord to commune with the young child and his mother, for he was filled with marvellous wisdom even before he was born, and could even speak “ as never man spake ” before he could suck ; that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet—“ Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise.” Now the first words that Jesus uttered were these : “ Bring hither those mine enemies, and slay them before me !” And Joseph, being astonished at the miracle, even took his axe, and slew fifty thousand and three-score and ten of the old women, as * Using my discretion, I omit a few sentences here from the Holy Ghost’s narrative, which are scarcely fit for ears polite. f Here again I am compelled to omit a few sentences from the Holy Ghost’s narrative. �THE GOSPEL OF THE HOLY GHOST. 89 it is written in the book of Samuel the prophet concering the men of Beth-shemesh. * And all that heard thereof were amazed, and gave glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace and good will towards men. But when the king heard thereof he was wrath, and sought to kill Joseph and Mary and the young child. But Gabriel came to Joseph by night, saying, “ Up ! Why tarriest thou ? Take the baby and his mother, and get thee into the land of Egypt, and dwell there till I send thee word; for the king seeks the young child’s life.” Then Joseph arose and took the young child and Mary his mother, and fled to the land of Egypt; and there they remained until the death of the king, which was accelerated by Gabriel, who was even the king’s confessor ; and he gave unto him the sacrament, and the king was sick, and lay down upon his bed, and gave up the ghost. Then did Gabriel send to Joseph, saying, “Up, return to thine own land, and bring the young child and his mother with thee, for thine enemy is dead. Blessed be the name of the Lord.” But, behold, or ever the message came Joseph was ready, knowing that the king was dead. For it came to pass that as the king gave up the ghost, even in that self-same moment, Jesus rose in his cradle and cried, “Return to thy own land, for thine enemy is dead!” And immediately he turned his ■cradle into an ass, ready saddled for the journey ! And all that heard it did marvel beyond measure, saying, “ Why should a child of so great power and wisdom flee .from his enemies ?” But all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying, “ Behold, I will confound the wisdom of the wise ; and fools and folly shall be exalted !” And when Jesus was about fifteen months old he went into the temple, even into the place where the scribes and elders and bishops and all the Levites were diligently reading the word of the Lord, and religiously quarrelling about the meaning and interpretation thereof. And one said on this wise, and another on that; and there was no wisdom nor agreement amongst them, for the Lord had confounded them giving a revelation which no man in heaven or earth could * 1 Samuel vi., 19. �90 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. understand. And behold, they did chide, and foam at the mouth, and gnash with their teeth, and curse every man. his fellow because of the multitude of opinions that prevailed. Then Jesus stood in the midst of them and asked them ques­ tions, and gave them answers which astounded all those that heard him. And his fame spread abroad throughout, the whole region and to every nation which is under heaven, inso­ much that the newspapers reported nothing else but the sayings of Jesus for weeks thereafter. Then did Mary and her husband suddenly rush into the temple, and when they found the child they took him away to their home ; and Mary said, “ Why hast thou done thus unto us ?” Then answered Jesus and said unto her, “Woman, what have I to do with thee ? I’ll tell the old man of Gabriel’s visits, if you don’t mind.” And Mary kept that saying, and treasured it up in her heart. After these things Jesus went out to the river Jordan, wh ere his cousin John was conducting Salvation Army work and dipping the people into the river to wash away their sins. And Jesus, feeling his need of cleansing, prevailed upon John to dip him. He stayed in the water too long, and caught a violent chill. This brought on a fever and delirium, during which he raved about a spirit (t was not I, certainly) driving i * him into the wilderness to be tempted by the Devil. And, behold, Jesus, as he lay in his fever, . did rave exceedingly, and said that the Devil had come to him in the wilderness, where he had fasted forty days and forty nights, and was very hungry. The Devil brought unto him a. pig and tempted him to eat it; but he repelled the temptation, with horror. Then the Devil caught him up and flew with him to a battlement of the temple and hurled him over ; but an angel caught him before he fell to the earth. Then the Devil took him away to a mountain exceedingly high, and showed him all the cities and kingdoms of the world, even in both hemispheres at one view ; and promised to make him the ruler of them all, if he would only worship him. This he refused to do. And the Devil left him there upon the mountain, cold . and hungry, and not knowing which way to turn to road home. Then an army of angels, as soon as the Devil was out of sight, and they were no longer afraid of him, took * Parenthesis by the Holy Ghost. �THE GOSPEL OF THE HOLY GHOST. 91 Jesus up and bore him home to his bed in a moment of time. And behold, he awoke and told his vision to his Mother Mary ; and she perceived thereby that hei’ son would be great, and that divine wisdom dwelt in him more than in all the prophets that were before him. And Jesus, when the fever had left him chose twelve disciples, and their names were these : Simon alias Peter; Andrew (Peter’s brother); James and John Zebedee (also brothers) ; Philip ; Bartholomew ; Thomas alias Didymus ; Matthew alias Levi; James Alphseus; Lebbaeus alias Thaddaeus ; Simon the Canaanite ; and Judas Iscariot. These he sent out to preach his Gospel. They were bidden not to meddle with Gentiles, but only Jews; and to cry as they went, “ The kingdom of heaven is at hand 1” They were commanded to heal the sick and to cast out devils : for Jesus would never forgive the king of the devils for tempting him to eat pork. Therefore, would he have wai’ with him and his angels for ever. And he commanded them, moreover, to raise the dead to life. They were forbidden to take any gold, silver, or brass with them he commanded them not to have two coats ; and to wear sandals instead of shoes. Then the disciples went everywhere shouting their cry “The kingdom of heaven is at hand 1” and healing the sick and raising the dead in multitudes ; insomuch that the doctors and undertakers and the parsons were deprived of their occu­ pation and their burial fees ; and they cried out against the disciples with an exceeding bitter cry. And all as many as held property under their fathers’ wills, when they found their parents and ancestors rising up to life again, did gnash their teeth with rage against the disciples of Jesus. And it came to pass that all the devils whom they had cast out did unite with the physicians, and the undertakers, and those whom their fathers had disturbed and dispossessed, and the parsons who had lost their fees : and they set upon the disciples, and drove them out of their cities. And all men wondered at that which they beheld, and said, “ Why could not those men who raised the dead defend themselves against the living?” After these things Jesus and his disciples and his mother went to a wedding, so that the wine ran short. But Jesus turned a large cistern full of water into prime old port; and then “ the fun grew fast and furious and many good toasts were drunk and good songs were sung. And they all sang a �92 BLOWS AT THB BIBLE. new song, even the song of Moses and of the lamb, in honor of Jesus, saying, “For he’s a jolly good fellow! For he’s a jolly good fellow! For he’s a jolly good fellow ! Which nobody can deny,” etc. And passing on from thence Jesus met one thousand old women, very decrepid, withered and toothless. And when they asked alms of him, he said, “ What will ye that I should do unto you ?” And they say unto him, “ Lord, that we may be restored to our youth and beauty.” And he healed them all, insomuch that they became the most beautiful women upon earth. Some of them remain even unto this day “ to witness if I lie.” And when this was noised abroad, behold, all that had old and decrepid wives and sisters besought him to heal them also. But he passed by and hid himself in a desert place. And his disciples went into a ship to cross over the sea; and lo, a great wind arose, and the ship was in danger of being overwhelmed in the midst of the sea. And the disciples, as becometh good Christians, were sore afraid, saying, “ Alas! must we enter into the New Jerusalem before our time ?” And Jesus breathed upon the sea and it dried up; and he turned the ship into a chariot, and six sharks into horses, and thus rode, he and his disciples to their own home. And all men, as many as heard it, did marvel greatly at those things that were done. And going on from thence he met a man who had fifty million devils in him. And he cast them all out, and the man was empty. < And the devils he sent into a herd of swine ; and behold, the pigs began to fly like eagles, until they were over the sea. And then did they all tumble into the water, and were drowned, they and the devils also. And when the owners of the pigs heard thereof, they ran out, they and their neighbors, and chased Jesus out of that region. And when he came to a fig-tree, he went to see if there were any figs thereupon ; for he was very hungry, But the •season for figs was not yet come, and he found nothing on it but leaves. Then he began to curse and to swear, and the fig­ tree turned as pale as death with fright, and entreated Jesus not to curse it so, fori was unreasonable to expect figs out �THE GOSPEL OF THE HOLY GHOST. 93 of season. But Jesus gave no heed to its entreaty, but he answered and said, ‘ ‘ Because thou hast not borne figs to feed me when I am in need, henceforth let no figs grow on thee for ever! Selah!” And it came to pass that the fig-tree, being condemned in his own conscience, suddenly fell down and gave up the ghost, and became a pillar of salt, as it is written in the book of Moses concerning Lot’s wife. And behold the man whose fig-tree it was did weep and lament exceeding sore, both he and his -wife and family, for that which had befallen their tree. And going on from thence, there encountered them certain of the Pharisees and Sadducees. And it came to pass that as they chid him and mocked him, behold he performed a miracle and turned them all into cabbages; and when the sun shone hot upon them, having no root, they withered away. And all men wondered at that which had come to pass. Then began Jesus to say unto his disciples and to the multitude, “Behold, I came down from heaven.” And they said unto him, “' When didst thou descend from heaven ? Lo, wast thou not born in Bethlehem ? Didst thou come from heaven before thou wast born ? Or hast thou been up to heaven and returned therefrom ? Tell us, we pray thee, what explanation thou canst give.” And Jesus was wrath, and 3aid, “ He that believeth not shall be damned. It shall be worse for you that doubt my words than for Sodom and Gomorrah.” And he shook off the dust of his feet against them, and went his way. And in those days when work was disagreeable and alms were hard to get, Jesus and his disciples went a-fishing ; but Jesus himself remained upon the shore. And, behold., as they rowed and toiled the fish would not enter into their net, and the disciples knew not what to do, being sore perplexed. Then Jesus, who was skilled in magic, waved his hands over the sea, and the spirit of God descended upon the fishes like a mighty rushing wind ; and the disciples caught three thousand of them in the twinkling of an eye. And when they drew the net to land the fishes fell down before him and worshipped him, saying, “Verily, thou art the Son of God.”* Then Jesus began to say unto the twelve, “Whosoever he * One version reads, “ Verily, thou art a son of a gun.” But this is most probably spurious; for guns were unknown in those ctays. �96 BLOWS AT THE BIBLE. third part of the sea became bloodand a third of all fishes and ships were destroyed. Then he smote the sun, moon, and stars, and darkened one third of them. And he opened the door of the bottomless pit, and let out the fiery locusts which were shut up there; and they destroyed one-third of mankind. Then he mounted a white horse which came from heaven, and called himself King of. Kings and Lord of Lords; and he led his armies to war, all riding upon white horses, and there was an exceedingly great slaughter, so that the blood rose even unto the horse-bridles for the space of 200 miles ! Then did he invite the beasts and birds of prey to come and feast them­ selves upon the flesh of the millions who had fallen in battle, for he refused them decent burial because of his hatred of them. It came to pass after these things that Judas, one of his disciples, betrayed him into the hands of his enemies. He did it on this wise. Finding his master asleep, he took awav his magic wand, and cut off his hair, wherein resided his great power. .Then he became powerless and like another man. Then did Judas conduct his enemies to him, and they caught him and bound him, and led him away captive, and they carried him to Egypt and there crucified him (Rev. xi., 8). Then one of his followers, Mary by name, whose character was not the best, and out of whom Jesus had cast seven devils, pretended to have seen him after his death. But even his disciples treated the tale as a ghost story. They, howe\ er, believed that, like Hercules and Adonis and Osiris, he had been raised to heaven ; and some there are who believe it even unto this day. He that testifieth these things saith true. And if he had written all that Jesus said and did. the world itself would be too small to hold the books that would be written. He that BELIEVETH SHALL BE TAKEN INTO THE HEAVENLY ASYLUM, New Jerusalem ; he that believeth not shall be condemned to wander with the wise ones of the earth, and be at large and at liberty all the days of his life. Amen! even the Printed and Published by Ramsey and Foote, at 28 Stonecutter Street, E.C. � 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 &amp; 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 An entity primarily responsible for making the resource 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 The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data 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 A name given to the resource Blows at the Bible Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Symes, Joseph [1841-1906] Description An account of the resource Place of publication: [London] Collation: 6 v. (96 p.) ; 19 cm. Notes: Contents: No. 1: The sermon on the mount.--No. 2: The life of Adam. Love not the world. The mystery of salvation.--No. 3: How a fairy was transformed. Jumping comments on Genesis.-- Nos. 4, 5: Jumping comments on Genesis.--No. 6: Jumping comments on Genesis. The gospel of the Holy Ghost. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available [Ramsey and Foote] Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [n.d.] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N628 Subject The topic of the resource Bible Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <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 (Blows at the Bible), 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> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Authority Bible-Criticism Bible-Evidences NSS https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/adb141f9d0c06bbbc858be9f8969d22e.pdf?Expires=1785369600&Signature=cgZvD%7ElDwYCVRh49uY2nmv3Tv6%7E7691ZutjSkL53N2GQl%7E1AQrgr5vP2mTbvlDVdbKx1pSFJdJ-DG7c9uog6UFfwieBbMnCq%7E12gP2G0dkL6sfM2YLJyunrPYsXQwko6gRrpDiR0o73pr9fm6N116xHF6k%7EJapQeO4%7ES9XXabMnmGAc4RAKidsS4%7EMyh4PWaFnUzADq9mJmFtYclDoGK023O6e54eP5m6emVtPcxnXb4qc-8fxj%7EaC43hJWUbm7fKmqvPQI3lWszx728ZibmsXEDrT9V%7EGXgtRTUFpiflNfsDdfN0Z6k4fFJ0NHkdjF3DEPbmPwuv4xRGqGHnXSfVQ__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM f4254be29345b037c88e43618625e1f2 PDF Text Text NATIONAL secular society FREETIIOUGHT PUBLISHING COMPANY'S EPTTfO^. 80, PICCADILLY, HANLEY COL. R. G. INGERSOLL? l' Apart from moral conduct, all that man thinks himself able to do, in order to become acceptable to God, is mere superstition and religious folly, Kant. Several months ago, The North, American Review asked me to write an article, sayiDg that it would be published if some one would furnish a reply I wrote the article that appeared in the August number, and by me it was entitled “ Is All of the Bible Inspired ? ”1 Not until the article was written did I know who was expected to answer. I make this explanation for the purpose of dissipating the impression that Mr. Black had been challenged by me. To have struck his shield with my lance might have given birth to the impression that I was some­ what doubtful as to the correctness of my position. I naturally expected an answer from some professional theologian, and was sur­ prised to find that a reply had been written by a “policeman, ” who imagined that he had answered my arguments by simply telling me that my statements were false. It is somewhat unfortunate that in a discussion like this anyone should resort to the slightest personal detraction. The theme is great enough to engage the highest faculties of the human mind, and in the investigation of such a subject vituper­ ation is singularly and vulgarly out of place. Arguments cannot be answered with insults. It is unfortunate that the intellectual arena should be entered by a “ policeman” who has more confidence in con­ cussion than discussion. Kindness is strength. Good nature is often mistaken for virtue, and good health sometimes passes for genius. Anger blows out the lamp of the mind. In the examination of a great and important question, every one should be serene, slow-pulsed, and calm. Intelligence is not the foundation of arrogance. Insolence is not logic. Epithets are the arguments of malice. Candor is the courage of the soul. Leaving the objectionable portions of Mr. Black’s reply, feeling that so grand a subject should not be blown and tainted with malicious words, I proceed to answer as best I may the arguments he has urged. . I am made to say that “ the universe is natural ; that “ it came into , being of its own accord ” ; that “ it made its own laws at the start, and afterward improved itself considerably by spontaneous evolution. I did say that “ the universe is natural,” but I did not say that “ it came into being of its own accord” ; neither did I say that “it made its own laws and afterward improved itself.” The universe, according to my idea, is, always was, and for ever will be. It did not “come into 1 Published in this series under its later title, “ The Christian Religion.” That article was answered by a Mr. Black, to whom the present is a reply. �being,” it is the one eternal being,—the only thing that ever did, does, or can exist. It did not “ make its own laws.” We know nothing of what we call the laws of nature except as we gather the idea of law from the uniformity of phenomena springing from like conditions. To make myself clear. Water always runs down-hill. The theist says that this happens because there is behind the phenomenon an active law. As a matter of fact, law is this side of the phenomenon. Law does not cause the phenomenon, but the phenomenon causes the idea of law in our minds; and this idea is produced from the fact that under like circumstances the same phenomenon always happens. Mr. Black probably thinks that the difference in the weight of rocks and clouds was created by law; that parallel lines fail to unite only because it is illegal; that diameter and circumference could have been so made that it would be a greater distance across than around a circle; that a straight line could inclose a triangle if not prevented by law, and that a little legislation could make it possible for two bodies to occupy the same space at the same time. It seems to me that law cannot be the cause of phsenomena, but is an effect produced in our minds by their succes­ sion and resemblance. To put a God back of the universe, compels us to admit that there.was a time when nothing existed except this God : that this God had lived from eternity in an infinite vacuum, and in absolute idleness. The mind of every thoughtful man is forced to one of these two conclusions; either that the universe is self-existent, or that it was created by a self-existent being. To my mind, there are far more difficulties in the second hypothesis than in the firstr Of course, upon a question like this, nothing can be absolutely know’n. We live on an atom called Earth, and what we know of the infinite is almost infinitely limited; but, little as we know, all have an equal right to give their honest thought. Life is a shadowy, strange, and winding road on which we travel for a little way—a few short steps—just from the cradle, with its lullaby of love, to the low and quiet way-side inn, where all at last must sleep, and where the only salutation is—Good night. I know as little as any one else about the “ plan ” of the universe ; and as to the “design,” I know juBt as little. It will not do to say ibat the universe waB designed, and therefore there must be a designer. There must first be proof that it was “ designed.” It will not do to say that the universe has a “plan,” and then assert that there must have been an infinite maker. The idea that a design must have a beginning and that a designer need not, is a sinople expression of human ignorance. We find a watch, and we say : “ So curious and wonderful a thing must have had a maker.” We find the watch-maker, and we say: “ So curious and wonderful a thing as man must have had a maker.” We find God, and we then say : “ He is so wonderful that he must not have had a maker. ” In other words, all things a little wonderful must have been created, but it is possible for a something to be so wonder­ ful that it always existed. One would suppose that just as the wonder increased the necessity for a creator increased, because it is the wonder of the thing that suggests the idea of creation. Is it possible that a designer exist from all eternity without design ? Was there no design in having an infinite designer ? For me, it is hard to see the plan or design in earthquakes and pestilences. It is somewhat difficult to dis­ cern the design or the benevolence in so makins' the world that billions of animals live only on the agonies of others. The justice of God is not visible to me in the history of this world. When I think �of the suffering and death, of the poverty and crime, of the cruelty and malice, of the heartlessness of this “ design” and “plan,” where beak and claw and tooth tear and rend the quivering flesh of weakness and despair, I cannot convince myself that it is the result of infinite wisdom, benevolence, and justice. Most Christians have seen and recognised this difficulty, and have endeavored to avoid it by giving God an opportunity in another world to rectify the seeming mistakes of this. Mr. Black, however, avoids the entire question by saying: “We have neither jurisdiction nor ca­ pacity to re judge the justice of God.” In other words, we have no right to think upon this subject, no right to examine the questions most vitally affecting human kind. We are simply to accept the ignor­ ant statements of barbarian dead. This question cannot be settled by saying that “ it would be a mere waste of time and space to enumerate the proofs which show that the Universe was created by a preexistent and self-conscious Being.” The time and space should have been “ wasted,” and the proofs should have been enumerated. These “proofs” are what the wisestand greatest are trying to find. Logic is not satisfied with assertion. It cares nothing for the opinions of the “ great ”—nothing for the prejudices of the many, and least of all for the superstitions of the dead. In the world of science a fact is a legal tender. Assertions and miracles are base and spurious coins. We have the right to rejudge the justice even of a god. No one should throw away his reason—the fruit of all experience. It is the intellectual capi­ tal of the soul, the only light, the only guide, and without it the brain becomes the palace of an idiot king, attended by a retinue of thieves and hypocrites. Of course it is admitted that most of the Ten Commandments are wise and just. In passing, it may be well enough to say, that the com­ mandment, “ Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth,” was the absolute death of Art, and that not until after the destruction of Jerusalem was there a Hebrew painter or sculptor. Surely a commandment is not inspired that drives from earth the living canvas and the breathing stone—leaves all walls bare and all the niches desolate. In the Tenth Commandment we find woman placed on an exact equality with other property, which, to say the least of it, has never tended to the amelior­ ation of her condition. A very curious thing about these Commandments is that their sup­ posed author violated nearly every one. From Sinai, according to the account, he said : “ Thou shalt not kill,” and yet he ordered the murder of millions; “ Thou shalt not commit adultery,” and yet he gave captured maidens to gratify the lust of captors; “ Thou shalt not steal,” and yet he gave to Jewish marauders the flocks and herds of others; “ Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house, nor his wife,” and yet he allowed his chosen people to destroy the homes of neighbors and to steal their wives; “ Honor thy father and thy mother,” and yet this same God had thousands of fathers butchered, and with the sword of war killed children yet unborn ; “ Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor,” and yet he sent abroad “ lying spirits” to de­ ceive his own prophets, and in a hundred ways paid tribute to deceit. So far as we know, Jehovah kept only one of these Commandments— he worshipped no other god. The religious intolerance of the Old Testament is justified upon the �100 ground that “blasphemy was a breach of political allegiance,” that “ idolatry was an act of overt treason,” and that “ to worship the gods of the hostile heathen was deserting to the public enemy, and giving him aid and comfort.” According to Mr. Black, we should all have liberty of conscience except when directly governed by God. In that country where God is king, liberty cannot exist. In this position, I admit that he is upheld and fortified by the “ sacred ” text. Within the Old Testament there is no such thing as religious toleration. With­ in that volume can be found no mercy for an unbeliever. For*all who think for themselves, there are threatenings, curses, and anathemas. Think of an infinite being who is so cruel, so unjust, that he will not allow one of his own children the liberty of thought! Think of an in­ finite God acting as the direct governor of a people, and yet not able to command their love! Think of the author of all mercy imbruing his hands in the blood of helpless men, women, and children, simply be­ cause he did not furnish them with intelligence enough to understand his law! An earthly father who cannot govern by affection is not fit to be a father ; what, then, shall we say of an infinite being who resorts to violence, to pestilence, to disease, and famine, in the vain effort to obtain even the respect of a savage ? Read this passage, red from the heart of cruelty: “ If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying. Lot us go and serve other gods which thou hast not known, thou nor thy fathers, . . . thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him, neither shalt thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him. but thou shalt'surely kill him; thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards tho hand of all the people ; and thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die.” . . . This is the religious liberty of the Bible. If you had lived in Pales­ tine, and if the wife of your bosom, dearer to you than your own soul, had said: “ I like the religion of India better than that of Palestine/’ it would have been your duty to kill her, “ Your eye must not pity her, your hand must be first upon her, and afterwards the hand of all the people.” If she had said: “ Let us worship the sun—the sun that clothes the earth in garments of green—the sun, the great fireside of the world—the sun that covers the hills and valleys with flowers—that gave me your face, and made it possible for me to look into the eyes of my babe—let us worship the sun,” it was your duty to kill her. You must throw the first stone, and when against her bosom—a bosom filled with love for you—you had thrown the jagged and cruel rock, and had seen the red stream of her life oozing from the dumb lips of death, you could then look up and receive the congratulations of the God whose commandment you had obeyed. Is it possible that a being of infinite mercy ordered a husband to kill his wife for the crime of having expressed an opinion on the subject of religion ? Has there been found upon the records of the savage world anything more per­ fectly fiendish than this commandment of Jehovah ? This is justified on the ground that “ blasphemy was a breach of political allegiance, and idolatry an act of overt treason.” We can understand how a human king stands in need of the service of his people. We can understand how the desertion of any of his soldiers weakens his army ; but were the king infinite in power, his strength would still remain the same, and under no conceivable circumstances could the enemy triumph. �101 I insist that, if there is an infinitely good and wise God, he beholds with pity the misfortunes of his children. I insist that such a God would know the mists, the clouds, the darkness enveloping the human mind. He would know how few stars are visible in the intellectual sky. His pity, not his wrath, would be excited by the efforts of his blind children, groping in the night to find the cause of things, and endea­ voring, through their tears, to see some dawn of hope. Filled with awe by their surroundings, by fear of the unknown, he would know that when, kneeling, they poured out their, gratitude to some unseen power, even to a visible idol, it was, in fact, intended for him. An infinitely good being, had he the power, would answer the reasonable prayer of an honest savage,, even when addressed to wood and stone. The atrocities of the Old Testament, the threatenings, maledictions, and curses of the “ inspired book,” are defended on the ground that the Jews had a right to treat their enemies as their enemies treated them ; and in this connexion is this remarkable statement: “In your treatment of hostile barbarians you not only may lawfully, you must necessarily, adopt their mode of warfare. If they come to conquer you, they may be conquered by you; if they give no quarter, they are entitled to Done ; if the death of your whole population be their pur­ pose, you may defeat it by exterminating theirs.” For a man who is a “ Christian policeman,” and has taken upon him­ self to defend the Christian religion; for one who follows the Master who said that when smitten on one cheek you must turn the other, and who again and again enforced the idea that you must overcome evil with good, it is hardly consistent to declare that a civilized nation must of necessity adopt the warfare of savages. Is it possible that in fight­ ing, for instance, the Indians of America, if they scalp our soldiers we should scalp theirs? If they ravish, murder, and mutilate our wives, must we treat theirs in the same manner ? If they kill the babes in our cradles, must we brain theirs ? If they take our captives, bind them to trees, and if their squaws fill their quivering flesh with shar­ pened faggots and set them on fire, that they may die clothed with flame, must our wives, our mothers, and our daughters follow the fiendish example ? Is this the conclusion of the most enlightened Christianity ? Will the pulpits of the United States adopt the arguments of this “ policeman ” ? Is this the last and most beautiful blossom of the Ser­ mon on the Mount? Is this the echo of “ Father, forgive them; they know not what they do ? ” Mr..Black justifies the wars of extermination and conquest because the American people fought for the integrity of their own country ; fought to do away with the infamous institution of slavery ; fought to preserve the jewels of liberty and justice for themselves and for their children. Is it possible that his mind is so clouded by political and religious prejudice, by the recollections of an unfortunate administra­ tion, that he sees no difference between a war of extermination and one of self-preservation ? that he sees no choice between the murder of helpless age, of weeping women and of sleeping babes, and the defence of liberty and nationality ? The soldiers of the Republic did not wage a war of extermination. They did not seek to enslave their fellow-men. They did not mur­ der trembling age. They did not sheathe their swords in women’s breasts. They gave the old men bread, and let the mothers rock their babes in peace. They fought to save the world’s great hope—to free •a race and put the humblest hut beneath the canopy of liberty and law. �102 Claiming neither praise nor dispraise for the part taken by me in the civil war, for the purposes of this argument, it is sufficient to say that I am perfectly willing that my record, poor and barren as it is, should be compared with his. Never for an instant did I suppose that any respectable American citizen could be found willing at this day to defend the institution of slavery; and never was I more astonished than when I found Mr. Black denying that civilized countries passionately assert that slavery is and always was a hideous crime. I was amazed when he declared that “ the doctrine that slavery is a crime under all circumstances and at all times was first started by the adherents of a political faction in this country less than forty years ago.” He tells us that “ they denounced God and Christ for not agreeing with them,” but that “they did not constitute the civilized world; nor were they, if the truth must be told, a very respectable portion of it. Politically they were successful; I need not say by what means, or with what effect upon the morals of the country.” Slavery held both branches of Congress, filled the chair of the Exe­ cutive, sat upon the supreme bench, had in its hands all rewards, all offices; knelt in the pew, occupied the pulpit, stole human beings in the name of God, robbed the trundle-bed for love of Christ; incited mobs, led ignorance, ruled colleges, sat in the chairs of professors, dominated the public press, closed the lips of free speech, and polluted with its leprous hand every source and spring of power.: -The abo­ litionists attacked this monster. They were the bravest, grandest men of their country and their century. Denounced by thieves, hated by hypocrites, mobbed by cowards, slandered by priests, shunned by poli­ ticians, abhorred by the seekers of office—these men “ of whom the world was not worthy,” in spite of all opposition, in spite of poverty and want, conquered innumerable obstacles, never faltering for one moment, never dismayed—accepting defeat with a smile born of infinite hope—knowing that they were right—insisted and persisted until every chain was broken, until slavepens became school-houses, and three millions of slaves became free men, women, and children. They did not measure with “ the golden metewand of God,” but with “ the elas­ tic cord of human feeling.” They were men the latchets of whose shoes no believer in human slavery was ever worthy to unloose. And yet we are told by this modern defender of the slavery of Jehovah that they were not even respectable ; and this slander is justified be­ cause the writer is assured “ that the infallible God proceeded upon good grounds when he authorised slavery in Judea.” Not satisfied with having slavery in this world, Mr. Black assures us that it will last through all eternity, and that for ever and for ever inferiors must be subordinated to superiors. Who is the superior man? According to Mr. Black he is superior who lives upon the unpaid labor of the inferior. With me the superior man is the one who uses his superiority in bettering the condition of the inferior. The superior man is strength for the weak, eyes for the blind, brains for the simple he is the one who helps carry the burden that nature has put upon the inferior. Any man who helps another to gain and retain his liberty is superior to any infallible God who authorised slavery in Judea. For my part I would rather be the slave than the master. It is better to be robbed than to be a robber. I had rather bd stolen from than be a thief. According to Mr. Black there will be slavery in heaven, and fast by �103 the throne of God will be the auction-block, and the streets of the New Jerusalem will be adorned with the whipping-post, while the music of the harp will be supplemented by the crack of the driver s whip. If some good Republican would catch Mr. Black, “ incorporate him into his family, tame him, teach him to think, and give him a knowledge of the true principles of human liberty and government, he would confer upon him a most beneficent boon.” Slavery includes all other crimes. It is the joint product of the kid­ napper, pirate, thief, murderer, and hypocrite. It degrades labor and corrupts leisure. To lacerate the naked back, to sell wives, to steal babes, to breed blood-hounds, to debauch your own soul—this is slavery. This is what Jehovah “authorised in Judea.” This is what Mr. Black believes in still. He “ measures with the golden metewand of God.” I abhor slavery. With me liberty is not merely a means—it is an end. Without that word all other words are empty sounds. Mr. Black is too late with his protest against the freedom of his fellow-man. Liberty is making the tour of the world. Russia has emancipated her serfs; the slave trade is prosecuted only by thieves and pirates; Spain feels upon her cheek the burning blush of shame ; Brazil, with proud and happy eyes, is looking for the dawn of freedom s day ; the people of the South rejoice that slavery is no more, and every good and honest man (excepting Mr. Black), of every land and clime, hopes that the limbs of men will never feel again the weary weight of chains. We are informed by Mr. Black that polygamy is neither commanded nor prohibited in the Old Testament—that it is only “ discouraged. ’ It seems to me that a little legislation on that subject might have tended to its “discouragement.” But where is the legislation? In the moral code, which Mr. Black assures us “ consists of certain immutable rules to govern the conduct of all men at all times and at all places in their private and personal relation with others,” not one word is found on the subject of polygamy. There is nothing “discouraging ” in the Ten Commandments, nor in the records of any conversation Jehovah is claimed to have had with Moses upon Sinai. The life of Abraham, the story of Jacob and Laban, the duty of a brother to be the husband of the widow of his deceased brother, tne life of David, taken in con­ nexion with the practice of one who is claimed to have been the wisest of men—all these things are probably relied on to show that polygamy was at least “ discouraged.” Certainly, Jehovah had time to instruct Moses as to the infamy of polygamy. He could have spared a few moments from a description of the patterns of tongs and basins, for a subject so important as this. A few words in favor of the one wife and the one husband—in favor of the virtuous and loving home—might have taken the place of instructions as to cutting the garments of priests and fashioning candlesticks and ouches of gold. If he had left out simply the order that rams’ skins should be dyed red, and in its place had said, “ A man shall have but one wife, and the wife but one hus­ band,” how much better it would have been. All the languages of the world are not sufficient to express the filth of polygamy. It makes man a beast, and woman a slave. It destroys the fireside and makes virtue an outcast. It takes us back to the bar­ barism of animals, and leaves the heart a den in which crawl and hiss the slimy serpents of most loathsome lust. And yet Mr. Black insists that we owe to the Bible the present elevation of woman. Where will he find in the Old Testament the rights of wife, and mother, and �104 daughter defined? Even in the New Testament she is told to “learn in silence with all subjection ” ; that she “ is not suffered to teach, nor to usurp any authority over the man, but to be in silence.” She is told that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God.” In other words, there is the same difference between the wife and husband that there is between the husband and Christ. z The reasons given for this infamous doctrine are that “ Adam was first formed, and then Eve that “ Adam was not deceived,” but that the woman being deceived, was in tbe transgression.” These childish reasons are the only ones given by the inspired writers. We are also told that “ a man, indeed, ought to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God”; but that “the woman is the glory of the man, and this is justified from the fact, and the remarkable fact, set forth in the very next verse— that “ the man is not of the woman, but the woman of the man.” And the same gallant Apostle says: Neither was the man created for the woman, but the woman for the man ; “ Wives, submit, yourselves unto your husbands, as unto the ^ord;/or the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christis the r pknrch, and he is the savior of the body. Therefore, as the Church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be subject to their own husbands m everything.” These are the passages that have liber­ ated woman! . According to the Old Testament, woman had to ask pardon, and had to be purified, for the crime of having borne sons and daughters. If in this world there is a figure of perfect purity, it is a mother holding in her thrilled and happy arms her child. The doctrine that woman is the slave, or serf, of man—whether it comes from heaven or from hell from God or a demon, from the golden streets of the New Jerusalem or from the very Sodom of perdition—is savagery, pure and simple. In no country in the world had women less liberty than in the Holy Land, and no monarch held in less esteem the rights of wives and mothers than Jehovah of the Jews. The position of woman was far better in Egypt than in Palestine. Before the pyramids were built, ihe sacred songs of Isis were sung by women, and women with pure >ands had offered sacrifices to the gods. Before Moses was born, women had sat upon the Egyptian throne. Upon ancient tombs the husband and wife are represented as seated in the same chair. In Persia women were priests, and in some of the oldest civilisations “ they were reverenced on earth, and worshipped afterward as god­ desses in heaven.” At the advent of Christianity, in all Pagan countries, women officiated at the sacred altars. They guarded the eternal fire. They kept the sacred books. From their lips came the oracles of fate. Under the domination of the Christian church, woman became the merest slave for at least a thousand years. It was claimed that through woman the race had fallen, and that her loving kiss had poisoned all the springs of life. Christian priests asserted that but for her crime, the world would have been an Eden still. The ancient fathers ex­ hausted their eloquence in the denunciation of woman, and repeated again and again the slander of St. Paul. The condition of woman has improved just in proportion that man has lost confidence in the inspi­ ration of the Bible. For the purpose of defending the character of his infallible God, Mr. Black is forced to defend religious intolerance, wars of extermination, human slavery, and almost polygamy. He admits that God established �slavery; that he commanded his chosen people to buy the children of the heathen ; that heathen fathers and mothers did right to sell their girls and boys; that God ordered the Jews to wage wars of extermi­ nation and conquest; that it was right to kill the old and young ; that God forged manacles for the human brain; that he commanded hus­ bands to murder their wives for suggesting the worship of the sun or moon ; and that every cruel, savage passage in the Old Testament was inspired by him. Such is a “ policeman’s ” view of God. Will Mr. Black have the kindness to state a few of his objections to the devil ? Mr. Black should have answered my arguments, instead of calling me “blasphemous” and “scurrilous.” In the discussion of these questions I have nothing to do with the reputation of my opponent. His character throws no light on the subject, and is to me a matter of per­ fect indifference. Neither will it do for one who enters the lists as the champion of revealed religion to say that “ we have no right to rejudge the justice of God.” Such a statement is a white flag. The warrior eludes the combat when he cries out that it is a “ metaphysical ques­ tion.” He deserts the field and throws down his arms when he admits that “no revelation has lifted the veil between time and eternity.” Again I ask, why were the Jewish people as wicked, cruel, and igno­ rant with a revelation from God, as other nations were without? Why were the worshippers of false deities as brave, as kind, and generous as those who knew the only true and living God ? How do you explain the fact that while Jehovah was waging wars of extermination, establishing slavery, and persecuting for opinions’ sake, heathen philosophers were teaching that all men are brothers, equally entitled to liberty and life ? You inBist that Jehovah believed in slavery and yet punished the Egyptians for enslaving the Jews. Was your God once an abolitionist? Did he at that time “denounce Christ for not agreeing with him ” ? If slavery was a crime in Egypt, was it a virtue in Palestine? Did God treat the Canaanites better than Pharaoh did the Jews ? Was it right for Jehovah to kill the children of the people because of Pharaoh’s sin ? Should the peasant be punished for the king’s crime ? Do you not know that the worst thing that can be said of Nero, Caligula, and Commodus is that they resembled the Jehovah of the Jews? Will you tell me why God failed to give his Bible to the whole world? Why did he not give the Scriptures to the Hindu, the Greek, and Roman ? Why did he fail to enlighten the wor­ shipers of “ Mammon ” and Moloch, of Belial and Baal, of Bacchus and Venus? After all, was not Bacchus as good as Jehovah? Is it not better to drink wine than to shed blood ? Was there anything in the worship of Venus worfie than giving captured maidens to satisfy the victor’s lust? Did “Mammon ” or Moloch do anything more infamous than to establish slavery ? Did they order their soldiers to kill men, women and children, and to save alive nothing that had breath ? Do not answer these questions by saying that “ no veil has been lifted between time and eternity,” and that “we have no right forejudge the justice of God.” If Jehovah was in fact God, he knew the end from the beginning. He knew that his Bible would be a breastwork behind which tyranny and hypocrisy would crouch ; that it would be quoted by tyrants; that it would be the defence of robbers called kings, and of hypo­ crites called priests. He knew that he had taught the Jewish people but little of importance. He knew that he found them free and left �106 them captives. He knew that he had never fulfilled the promises made to them. He knew that while other nations had advanced in art and science, his chosen people were savage still. He promised them the world, and gave them a desert. He promised them liberty, and he made them slaves. He promised them victory, and he gave them defeat. He said they should be kings, and he made them serfs. He promised them universal empire, and gave them exile. When one finishes the Old Testament, he is compelled to say: Nothing can add to the misery of a nation whose king is Jehovah! And here I take occasion to thank Mr. Black for having admitted that Jehovah gave no commandment against the practice of polygamy, that he established slavery, waged wars of extermination, and perse­ cuted for opinions’ sake even unto death. Most theologians endeavor to putty, patch, and paint the wretched record of inspired crime, but Mr. Black has been bold enough and honeBt enough to admit the truth. In this age of fact and demonstration it is refreshing to find a man who believes so thoroughly in the monstrous and miraculous, the im­ possible and immoral—who still clings lovingly to the legends of the bib and rattle—who through the bitter experiences of a wicked world has kept the credulity of the cradle, and finds comfort and joy in thinking about the Garden of Eden, the subtil serpent, the flood, and Babel’s tower, stopped by the jargon of a thousand tongues—who reads with happy eyes the story of the burning brimstone storm that fell upon the cities of the plain, and Bmilingly explains the transforma­ tion of the retrospective Mrs. Lot—who laughs at Egypt’s plagues and Pharaoh’s whelmed and drowning hosts—eats manna with the wander­ ing Jews, warms himself at the burning bush, sees Korah’s company by the hungry earth devoured, claps his wrinkled hands with glee above the heathens’ butchered babes, and longingly looks back to the patriar­ chal days of concubines and slaves. How touching when the learned and wise crawl back in cribs and ask to hear the rhymes and fables once again ! How charming in these hard and scientific times to see old age in Superstition’s lap, with eager lips upon her withered breast. Mr. Black comes to the conclusion that the Hebrew Bible is in exact harmony with the New Testament, and that the two are “connected together ” ; and “that if one is true the other cannot be false.” If this is so, then he must admit that if one is false the other cannot be true; and it hardly seems possible to me that there is a right-minded, sane man, except Mr. Black, who now believes that a God of infinite kindness and justice ever commanded one nation to exterminate another; ever ordered his soldiers to destroy men, women, and babes; ever established the institution of human slavery; ever regarded the auction-block as an altar, or a blood-hound a3 an apostle. Mr. Black contends (after having answered my indictment against the Old Testament by admitting the allegations to be true) that the rapidity with which Christianity spread “proves the supernatural origin of the Gospel, or that it was propagated by the direct aid of the Divine Being himself.” Let us see. In his efforts to show that the “infallible God estab­ lished slavery in Judea,” he takes occasion to say that “ the doctrine that slavery is a crime under all circumstances was first started by the adherents of a political faction in this country less than forty years ago ’’; that “ they denounced God and Christ for not agreeing with them ”; but that “they did not constitute the civilized world; nor were they, if the truth must be told, a very respectable portion of it.” / �107 Let it be remembered that this was only forty years ago ; and yet, according to Mr. Black, a few disreputable men changed the ideas of nearly fifty millions of people, changed the Constitution of the United States, liberated a race from slavery, clothed three millions of people with political rights, took possession of the Government, managed its affairs for more than twenty years, and have compelled the admiration of the civilized world. Is it Mr. Black’s idea that this happened by chance ? If not, then, according to him, there are but two ways to account for it: either the rapidity with which Republicanism spread proves its supernatural origin, “ or else its propagation was provided for and carried on by the direct aid of the Divine Being himself.” Between these two, Mr. Black may make his choice. He will at once see that the rapid rise and spread of any doctrine does not even tend to show that it was divinely revealed. This argument is applicable to all religions. Mohammedans can use it as well (as Christians. Mohammed was a poor man, a driver of camels. He was without education, without influence and without wealth, and yet in a few years he consolidated thousands of tribes, and made millions of men confess that there is “ one God, and Mohammed is his prophet.” His success was a thousand times greater during his life than that of Christ. He was not crucified; he was a conqueror. “ Of all men, he exercised the greatest influence upon the human race.” Never in the world’s history did a religion spread with the rapidity of his. It burst like a storm over the fairest portions of the globe. If Mr. Black is right in his position that rapidity is secured only by the direct aid of the Divine Being, then Mohammed was most certainly the prophet of God. As to wars of extermination and slavery, Mo­ hammed agreed with Mr. Black, and upon polygamy with Jehovab. As to religious toleration, he was great enough to say that “ men holding to any form of faith might be saved, provided they were virtuous.” In this, he was far in advance both of Jehovah and Mr. Black. It will not do to take the ground that the rapid rise and spread of a religion demonstrates its divine character. Years before Gautama died, his religion was established, and his disciples were numbered by mil­ lions. His doctrines were not enforced by the sword, but by an appeal to the hopes, the fears, and the reason of mankind ; and more than one-third of the human race are to-day the followers of Gautama. His religion has outlived all that existed in his time ; and according to Dr. Draper, “there is no other country in the world, except India, that has the religion to-day it had at the birth of Jesus Christ.” Gautama be­ lieved in the equality of all men, abhorred the spirit of caste, and pro­ claimed justice, mercy, and education for all. Imagine a Mohammedan answering an infidel; would he not use the argument of Mr. Black, simply substituting Mohammed for Christ, just as effectually as it has been used against me ? There was a time when India was the foremost nation of the world. Would not your argument, Mr. Black, have been just as good in the mouth of a Brahmin then, as it is in yours now? Egypt, the mysterious mother of mankind, with her pyramids built thirty-four hundred years before Christ, was once the first in all the earth, and gave to us our trinity, and our symbol of the cross. Could not a priest of Isis and Osiris have used your arguments to prove that his religion was divine, and could he not have closed by saying: “ From the facts established by this evi•dence it follows irresistibly that our religion came to us from God ” ? �108 Do you not see that your argument proves too much, and that it is equally applicable to all the religions of the world ? Again, it is urged that “the acceptance of Christianity by a large portion of the generation contemporary with its founder and his apostles was, under the circumstances, an adjudication as solemn and authoritative as mortal intelligence could pronounce.” If this is true, then “ the acceptance of Buddhism by a large portion of the generation contemporary with its founder was an adjudication as solemn and authoritative as mortal intelligence could pronounce.” The same could be said of Mohammedanism, and, in fact, of every religion that has ever benefited or cursed this world. This argument, when reduced to its simplest form, is this: All that succeeds is inspired. The old argument that if Christianity is a human fabrication its authors must have been either good men or bad men, takes it for granted that there are but two classes of persons—the good and the bad. There is, at least, one other class—the mistaken, and both of the other classes may belong to this. Thousands of most excellent people have been deceived, and the history of the world is filled with instances where men have honestly supposed that they had received communi­ cations from angels and gods. In thousands of instances these pretended communications contained the purest and highest thoughts, together with the most important truths ; yet it will not do to say that these accounts are true ; neither can they be proved by saying that the men who claimed to be inspired were good. What we must say is, that being good men, they were mistaken; and it is the charitable mantle of a mistake that I throw over Mr. Black, when I find him defending the institution of slavery. He seems to think it utterly incredible that any “combination of knaves, however base, would fraudulently concoct a religious system to de­ nounce themselves, and to invoke the curse of God upon their own conduct.” How did religions other than Christianity and Judaism arise ? Were they all “ concocted by a combination of knaves” ? The religion of Gautama is filled with most beautiful and tender thoughts, with most excellent laws, and hundreds of sentences urging mankind to deeds of love and self-denial. Was Gautama inspired ? Does not Mr. Black know that thousands of people charged with witchcraft actually confessed in open court their guilt ? Does he not know that they admitted that they had spoken face to face with Satan, and had sold their souls for gold and power? Does he not know that these admissions were made in the presence and expectation of death? Does he not know that hundreds of judges, some of them as great as the late lamented Gibson, believed in the existence of an impossible crime ? We are told that “ there is no good reason to doubt that the state­ ments of the Evangelists, as we have them now, are genuine.” The fact is, no one knows who made the “ statements of the Evangelists.” There are three important manuscripts upon which the Christian world relies. “ The first appeared in the catalogue of the Vatican, in 1475. This contains the Old Testament. Of the New, it contains the four gospels—the Acts, the seven Catholic Epistles, nine of the Pauline Epistles, and the Epistle to the Hebrews, as far as the fourteenth verse of the ninth chapter ”—and nothing more. This is known as the Vati­ can Codex. “ The second, the Alexandrine, was presented to King Charles the First, in 1628. It contains the Old and New Testaments, with some exceptions; passages are wanting in Matthew, in John, and �109 in II. Corinthians. It also contains the epistle of Clemens Romanus, a letter of Athanasius, and the treatise of Eusebius on the Psalms.” The last is the Sinaitic Codex, discovered about 1850, at the Convent of St. Catherine’s on Mount Sinai. “ It contains the Old and New Testaments, and in addition the entire Epistle of Barnabas, and a portion of the Shepherd of Hermas—two books which, up to the be­ ginning of the fourth century, were looked upon by many as Scrip­ ture.” In this manuscript, or codex, the gospel of St. Mark concludes with the eighth verse of the sixteenth chapter, leaving out the frightful passage: “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved ; but he that believeth not shall be damned.” In matters of the utmost importance these manuscripts disagree, but even if they all agreed it would not furnish the slightest evidence of their truth. It will not do to call the statements made in the gospels “ depositions,” until it is absolutely established who made them, and the circumstances under which they were made. Neither can we say that “ they were made in the immediate prospect of death,” until we know who made them. It is absurd to say that “ the witnesses could not have been mistaken, because the nature of the facts precluded the possibility of any delusion about them.” Can it be pretended that the witnesses could not have been mistaken about the relation the Holy Ghost is alleged to have sustained to Jesus Christ ? Is there no possi­ bility of delusion about a circumstance of that kind ? Did the writers of the four gospels have “ ‘ the sensible and true avouch of their own eyes ’ and ears ” in that behalf ? How was it possible for any one of the four Evangelists to know that Christ was the Son of God, or that he was God ? His mother wrote nothing on the subject. Matthew says that an angel of the Lord told Joseph in a dream, but Joseph never wrote an account of this wonderful vision. Luke tells us that the angel had a conversation with Mary, and that Mary told Elizabeth, but Elizabeth never wrote a word. There is no account of Mary, or Joseph, or Elizabeth, or the angel, having had any conversation with Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John, in which one word was said about the miraculous origin of Jesus Christ. The persons who knew did not write, so that the account is nothing but hearsay. Does Mr. Black pretend that such statements would be admitted as evidence in any court? But how do we know that the disciples of Christ wrote a word of the gospels ? ' How did it happen that Christ wrote nothing ? How do we know that the writers of the gospels “were men of unimpeach­ able character ” ? All this is answered by saying “that nothing was said by the most virulent enemies against the personal honesty of the Evangelists.” How is this known ? If Christ performed the miracles recorded in the New Testament, why would the Jews put to death a man able to raise their dead ? Why should they attempt to kill the Master of Death ? How did it happen that a man who had done so many miracles was so obscure, so unknown, that one of his disciples had to be bribed to point him out ? Is it not strange that the ones he had cured were not his disciples ? Can we believe, upon the testimony of those about whose character we know nothing, that Lazarus was raised from the dead? What became of Lazarus? We never hear of him again. It seems to me that he would have been an object of great interest. People would have said: “ He is the man who was once dead.” Thousands would have inquired of him about the other world ; would �r v’ 110 have asked him where he was when he received the information that he was wanted on the earth. His experience would have been vastly more interesting than everything else in the New Testament. A returned traveller from the shores of Eternity—one who had walked twice through the valley of the shadow—would have been the most interesting of human beings. When he came to die again, people would have said: “ He is not afraid ; he has had experience ; he knows what death is.” But, strangely enough, this Lazarus fades into obscurity with “ the wise men of the East,” and with the dead who came out of their graves on the night of the crucifixion. How is it known that it was claimed, during the life of Christ, that he had wrought a miracle ? And if the claim was made, how is it known that it was not denied ? Did the Jews believe that Christ was clothed with miraculous power ? Would they have dared to crucify a man who ‘had the power to clothe the dead with life ? Is it not wonderful that no one at the trial of Christ said one word about the miracles he had wrought? Nothing about the sick he had healed, nor the dead he had raised ? Is it not wonderful that Josephus, the best historian the Hebrews produced, says nothing about the life or death of Christ; nothing about the massacre of the infants by Herod; not one word about the wonderful star that visited the sky at the birth of Christ; nothing about the darkness that fell upon the world for several hours in the midst of day; and failed entirely to mention that hundreds of graves were opened, and that multitudes of Jews arose from the dead, and visited the Holy City? Is it not wonderful that no historian ever mentioned any of these prodigies? and is it not more amazing than all the rest that Christ himself concealed from Matthew, Mark, and Luke the dogma of the atonement, the necessity of belief, and the mvsterv of the second birth ? J J Of course I know that two letters were said to have been written by Pilate to Tiberius, concerning the execution of Christ, but they have been shown to be forgeries. I also know that “various letters were circulated attributed to Jesus Christ,” and that one letter is said to have been written by him to Abgarus, King of Edessa; but as there was no king of Edessa at that time this letter is admitted to have been a forgery. 1 also admit that a correspondence between Seneca and St. Paul was forged. Here in our own country, only a few years ago, men claimed to have found golden plates upon which was written a revelation from God. They founded a new religion, and, according to their statement, did many miracles. They were treated as outcasts, and their leader was murdered. These men made their “ depositions ” “ in the immediate prospect of death ” They were mobbed, persecuted, derided, and yet they insisted that their prophet had miraculous power, and that he, too, could swing back the hingeless door of death. The followers of these men have increased in these few years, so that now the murdered prophet has at least two hundred thousand disciples. It will be hard to find a contradiction of these pretended miracles, although this is an age filled with papers, magazines, and books. As a matter of fact, the claims of Joseph Smith were so preposterous that sensible people did not take the pains to write and print denials. When we remem­ ber that eighteen hundred years ago there were but few people who could write, and that a manuscript did not become public in any modern sense, it was possible for the gospels to have been written with -all the foolish claims in reference to miracles without exciting comment �Ill or denial. There is not, in all the contemporaneous literature of the | - world a single word about Christ or his apostles. The paragraph in Josephus is admitted to be an interpolation, and the letters, the account of the trial, and several other documents forged by the zeal of the early fathers, are now admitted to be false. Neither will it do to say that “ the statements made by the evange­ lists are alike upon every important point.” if there is anything of importance in the New Testament, from the theological stand-point, it is the ascension of Jesus Christ. If that happened it was a miracle great enough to surfeit wonder. Are the statements of the inspired witnesses alike on this important point? Let us see. Matthew says nothing upon the subject. Either Matthew was not there, had never heard of the ascension—or, having heard of it, did not believe it, or, having seen it, thought it too unimportant to record. To this wonder of wonders Mark devotes one verse : “So then, after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.’’ Can we believe that this verse was written by one who witnessed the ascension of Jesus Christ; by one who watched his Master slowly rising through the air till distance reft him from his tearful sight? Luke, another of the witnesses, says: “ And it came to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted from them, and carried up into heaven.” John corroborates Matthew by saying nothing on the subject. Now we find that the last chapter of Mark, after the eighth verse, is an interpolation; so that Mark really says nothing about the occurrence. Either the ascension of Christ must be given up, or it must be admitted that the witnesses do not agree, and ' that three of them never heard of that most stupendous event. Again, if anything could have left its “ form and pressure ” on the brain, it must have been the last words of Jesus Christ. The last words, according to Matthew, are: “Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you : and lo, 1 am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.” The last words, according to the inspired witness known as Mark, are : “And these signs shall follow them that believe : in my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.” Luke tells us that the last words uttered by Christ, with the exception of a blessing, were : “ And behold, I send forth the promise of my Father upon you; but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with power from on high.” The last words, according to John, were: “ Peter, seeing Him, saith to Jesus : Lord, and what shall this man do ? Jesus saith unto him, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? follow thou me.” An account of the ascension is also given in the Acts of the Apostles; and the last words of Christ, according to that inspired witness, are : “ But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you; and ye shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jeru­ salem and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.” In this account of the ascension we find that two men stood by the disciples in white apparel, and asked them : “Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven ? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.” Matthew says nothing of the two �112 men. Mark never saw them. Luke may have forgotten them when writing his gospel, and John may have regarded them as optical illusions. , • Luke testifies that Christ ascended on the very day of his resurrec­ tion. John deposes that eight days after the resurrection Christ ap­ peared to the disciples and convinced Thomas. In the Acts we are told that Christ remained on earth for forty days after his resurrection. These “depositions” do not. agree. Neither do Matthew and Luke-i agree in their histories of the infancy of Christ. It is impossible for both to be true. One of these “witnesses” must have been mistaken. The most wonderful miracle recorded in the New Testament, as having been wrought by Christ, is the resurrection of Lazarug. While all the writers of the gospels, in many instances^ record the same won­ ders and the same conversations, is it not remarkable that the greatest miracle is mentioned alone by John? Two of the, witnesses, Matthew and Luke, give the genealogy of Christ. Matthew says that there were forty-two generations from Abraham to Christ. Luke insists that there were forty-two from Christ to David, while Matthew gives the number as twenty-eight. It may be said that this is an' old objection*. An objection remains young until it has been answered. Is it not wonderful that Luke and Matthew do not agree on a single name of Christ’s ancestors for thirty-seven generations? There is a difference of opinion among the “witnesses" as to what the gospel of Christ is. If we take the “depositions” of Matthew,. Mark, and Luke, then the gospel of Christ amounts simply to this: That God will forgive the forgiving, aDd that he will be merciful to the merciful. According to three witnesses, Christ knew nothing of the doctrine of the atonement; never heard of the second birth ; and did not base salvation, in whole nor in part, on belief. In the “ deposi­ tion ” of John, we find that we must be born again; that we must believe on the Lord Jesus Christ; and that an atonement was made for us. If Christ ever said theqe things to, or in the hearing of, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, they forgot to mention them. To my mind, the failur^/of the evangelists to agree as to what is necessary for man to do in order to insure the salvation of his soul, is a demonstration that they were not inspired. Neither do the witnesses agree as to the last words of Christ when he was crucified. Matthew says that he cried: “ My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Mark agrees with Matthew. Luke testifies that his last words were: “Father, into thy hands T com­ mend my spirit.” John states that he cried : “ It is finished?’* Luke says that Christ said of his murderers: “ Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” Matthew, Mark, and John do not record these touching words. John says that Christ, on the day of his resurrection, said to his disciples: “ Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained.” The other disciples do not record this monstrous passage. They did not hear the abdication of God. They were not present when Christ placed in their hands the keys of heaven and hell, and put a world beneath the feet of priests. PRICE ONE PENNY. London: Printed by Annie Besant and Charles Bradlaugh, 63, Fleet Street, E.C.—1883. � 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 &amp; 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 An entity primarily responsible for making the resource 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 The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data 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 A name given to the resource Is all of the Bible inspired? Part I Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Ingersoll, Robert Green [1833-1899] Description An account of the resource Place of publication: London Collation: [97]-112 p. ; 19 cm. Notes: Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. First published [1882] in the North American Review. At head of title: 'Freethought Publishing Company's edition'. On last page: 'Printed by Annie Besant and Charles Bradlaugh'. No. 9i in Stein checklist. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Freethought Publishing Company Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1883 Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N363 Subject The topic of the resource Bible Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <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 (Is all of the Bible inspired? Part I), 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> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Bible-Criticism Christianity-Controversial Literature NSS https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/7350d239f753092f2825d94edb82404f.pdf?Expires=1785369600&Signature=quO%7EPfFJJZghkED4w3gs3fs8vEZYnjhysCMrltd%7E3a3j969uQ02NDgZn0mSAGstkl-N99ZWWGGbchayNta7X-sK0%7EfxZ5IkV0Y7n83DSeVMe77HwWoH%7EPMVWSEPUNvwMV2K8HBqyGgoEXw-Z3sUzeBbTTMDR46a45vAIe1vMekXhJW8azXRgUYyUIuTU48DpUz-IqYG0wOXPHuQ5g7VfoHWDvsBliw3CBqSAbTXiXYM31K-114aeFPsQR7t4T3gnO8GQ-%7EB2FX9FAjoKW6aTsLk7YhW5O8%7EtBziZRMyR3ArRDq5p4bwxZ8Lyv%7EaOdt0gtBTlFO6WIOOVK28qv4UynA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 37f382eb8f173c1b1dc1fe8ae5668afb PDF Text Text C( 2z5? SACRED HISTORY AS A BRANCH OF ELEMENTARY EDUCATION. PART I. ITS INFLUENCE ON THE INTELLECT. PUBLISHED BY THOMAS SCOTT, MOUNT PLEASANT, RAMSGATE. Price, Sixpence. �I �SACRED HISTORY AS A BRANCH OF ELEMENTARY EDUCATION. UGHT the teaching of Sacred History, in its tra­ ditional and biblical form, to be approved of or maintained in the primary schools of a free and pro­ gressive people 1 Such is the question which I propose to discuss. Thus stated, it does not address itself exclusively to any one nation, nor to any one Church. It is not a criticism of one denomination, nor of one school-system more than of another. It has no special reference to the religious instruction of Catholics or Protestants as such. Important and interesting for all sects and parties alike, it is addressed alike to all, and the dis­ cussion of it ought to be entirely free from party spirit and sectarian prejudice. To avoid misunderstanding, it may be well, here, at the outset, clearly to define and to circumscribe the subject proposed for consideration. The position which I am to maintain would be utterly absurd, if it were extended beyond the limits which are assigned to it by the very title of this essay. There is no question, there can be no question here, of any but the popular Sacred History,—of Biblical History as it is commonly taught O �6 Sacred History : in schools, and as we have all learned it in onr child­ hood. I declare formally that I am not to treat of the Bible, nor of Biblical History, as viewed in relation to the science of Religion, as studied in our universities, in our theological halls, and generally in the higher walks of learning, by the light of comparative philology,, of archaeology, and of all the other sciences which are now made subservient to the science of history. I most expressly restrict my subject to the now pre­ vailing popular primary teaching of Biblical History; and I shall accordingly take for reference, not this or that learned work of historical, critical, or exegetical interpretation of the Bible, but only the authorized translation of it, which every one possesses, and which is used in our schools. It will be seen that this question, though bearing closely upon the highest theological doctrines, presents itself here in a totally different relation; for it turns, in the first place and chiefly, upon a practical problem of popular education. The discussion of such a question, however various may be the opinions held regarding it, ought to be cordially welcomed by every man in a free country such as this, where true progress is universally desired. It is not difficult to discern and to state the principles by which we ought to be guided in this discussion; and there can scarcely be any dispute about these principles when stated. All must agree that education, in every stage from the lowest to the highest, ought to have a twofold purpose—the culture of the intelligence, and that of the moral conscience. Such ought especially to be the design and the aim of the primary education which addresses itself to the children of the people, among whom, in the majority of cases, it is not likely to be followed up by any other regular instruction. Before these children, who can scarcely be expected to have afterwards either the time or the means for completing �Its Influence on the Intellect. 7 or correcting the ideas which have once been inculcated on their minds, a teacher ought to say nothing, do nothing, inculcate nothing, which may not have a good effect npon the intellect or upon the heart,—nothing but what may contribute to teach them either to think aright or to act aright. To make men:-—\his is the glorious task of the teacher in modern society. To make men, is to develop, in the youths committed to his care, enlightened intellects and upright consciences. It is from this twofold point of view that we propose to consider the study of Sacred History; it is by its effects upon our two essential faculties, the intellect and the conscience, that we propose to judge it. I. The influence of Sacred History upon the DEVELOPMENT OF THE INTELLECT. Let us put ourselves in the position of a child who is being taught sacred history, and endeavour to realize and explain to ourselves the ideas of Humanity, of Nature, and of God, which will thus be conveyed to the mind of the child, in these three great depart­ ments which complete the cycle of human thought. Let us see, first, how the modern idea of humanity will harmonize with that of a sacred history. What is the meaning of this expression, sacred history ? Wherefore sacred 2 In what respect is it more sacred than other histories ? Is it that it will present to us the ideal of sanctity or holiness in action? Is it a history of the purest, the best, the most virtuous men ? This title of sacred history would be intelligi­ ble, if applied to a book which should present to our view a gallery of portraits worthy to serve as models to humanity, a series of biographies, such as those of Joseph and of Moses among the Hebrews, of Aristides, and of Socrates among the Greeks, of Cakyamouni in Hindostan, of the great Roman Stoics, of the Christian �8 Sacred History: martyrs and missionaries, of a Spinoza, of a Luther, of a Vincent de Paul, of all those in short who have lived and died for the defence of their faith, their reason, their conscience, their earnest convictions. We might thus have an admirable collection of the benefactors of the human race, of men devoted to their duty, taken impartially from all periods, from all peoples, and from all creeds. But these exalted and noble lessons are not what men call sacred history. This history is thus named, not on account of the holiness of the precepts, or of the examples which it contains, but because it is the history of a people who were not, like others, left to their own resources, of a people who received, from God himself, revelations, promises, supernatural lights, who were, in a word, the “people of God.” What idea is the child to derive from this title alone ? His first impression, if left to himself, will be that God, like men, has His favourites, His proteges; that, by an entirely unmerited choice, He honoured with a special affection and care one nation to the exclusion of all others. The child, with his simple, direct, and wholesome logic, will say exactly what Calvin said. “ Certainly,” wrote the great Reformer in his energetic freedom, “ in that God of old adopted the seed of Abraham, He has given a sufficiently clear proof that He did not love the whole human race equally. Having rejected all other nations, He loved one alone. He restricted His special love to a small number, whom He was pleased to choose from among the rest.” It is well known that, up to our own time, this theory has been frankly accepted by the theologians called orthodox. In these days, however, when it is clearly becoming impossible to maintain such a theory, a peculiar explanation has been adopted. The doctrine of absolute predestination, which Calvin consistently made the chief corner stone of the orthodox system, is now rejected by many theologians as incompatible with �Its Influence on the Intellect. 9 morality: and it is said that all nations and all men have an equal share in the love of God,—that the ■provisional and exceptional election of the Jews is not a privilege,—that Israel is chosen only as an instru­ ment, not for himself, but for the benefit of the whole human race,—as a monitor whom God employs for the general instruction of all His children. Supposing this latter interpretation to be the true one, it would in some degree be a reply to the moral objection of the Divine partiality, which we shall repeatedly find again; but it does not at all remove the historical objection, which is that the sacred history causes the child to conceive a thoroughly false idea of humanity, by the very fact that it teaches him to divide human history into two parts, the one sacred, the other profane ; the one, in which God speaks, acts, and shows Himself directly or personally on every page; and the other, in which He does not thus interfere, and in which He acts only by the operation of natural laws. Until recently, it was considered orthodox to see in ancient history, the reign of God in Israel, and the reign of the devil everywhere else; but it is now more generally thought correct to recognise a negative pre­ paration among the Gentiles, as well as a positive pre­ paration in Israel. It is thus assumed that there have been two distinct kinds of divine revelation, all the other nations having been enlightened only by the dim and indirect rays of natural light; while the Jews, on the contrary, were alone privileged to be in constant and immediate communication with God himself. See how much is implied in the mere expression—sacred history. I do not at present inquire whether this notion can be reconciled with that of divine equity; but I ask whether it can be for a moment maintained in the face of history. History now enables us to say with full assurance, that humanity is one, in all the diversity of its families; and that God, who is also One, has �io Sacred History : spoken to man always and everywhere by the same means, and in the same forms. He is the Father of all men and of all nations, and has not shown himself to some, nor concealed himself from others, any more three thousand years ago than to-day. The Jews, indeed, affirm that they received, from God himself, revelations of an entirely special and supernatural kind, which are recorded in the Bible. But the Brahmins, the Budhists, the Parsees, and I may say all the nations of the east, are no less positive in affirming the same pretension. There is not a single nation of Asia, ancient or modern, which has not its Bible, or which does not declare that it is the holy people—the chosen people of God; not one which, in support of this exceptional “ calling and election,” does not appeal to miracles, to numerous interventions of the Deity, to the testimony of thousands of their best men, and finally to books divinely inspired. When among so many Bibles, among so many Words of God, you take that of the Jews as absolutely true, and declare those of all other nations absolutely false, can you say, in all sincerity, that you have investi­ gated, with equal attention, patience, and seriousness, the claims of all these nations to this pretended revela­ tion—to this pretended office of “ special instrument ” of the Deity? Especially with reference to primary instruction, is it not manifest that neither the pupils nor the teachers are in a position to make this com­ parison between the Hebrew Bible, the Veda of India, the Avesta of Persia, the Koran of the Arabs, and the other sacred books of the East ? They are virtually forced to regard the Bible as an isolated monument, without even dreaming of the possibility of tracing the connection between the sacred codes of the various ancient religions. The children do not know, and, according to the present system, nine-tenths of them will never know, that there are as many sacred histories, and as many chosen peoples, and as many divine revela- �Its Influence on the Intellect. 11 tions, as there have been, nations in the east, and almost in all antiquity. By far the greater number, thanks to this early instruction, will probably remain, all through life, ignorant or misinformed regarding the fundamen­ tal idea of human history—the natural progressive development of all the human races, a development which each of them attributes in the first place to a miraculous revelation, but which the comparative his­ tory of civilizations shows to be governed by law's common to all, according to a general plan of divine providence. But how can the immense religious superiority of the Jews, over all other ancient nations, be explained on historical and natural grounds ? In the first place, this superiority is neither so decided nor so manifest, except to minds which are unacquainted with the study of the ancient civiliza­ tions. It is quite superfluous to say that, if we select the most beautiful of the Psalms, or the purest and most admirable pages of the Prophets, to be compared with some gross form of fetichism, or of primitive idolatry, if the Jehovah of Isaiah be opposed to the Jupiter of Lucian, our minds may well be impressed with the contrast. But take a wider view. Compare the moral precepts of the Mosaic law with those of Zoroaster, or of Manu,—the Hebrew poems with those of the Big Veda; trace and remark the analogies of almost all the prescriptions relating to manners, to legal defilements, to ablutions, to the whole system of ritual, among the Persians for example, and among the Hebrews. It will then be found that the imaginary abyss of separa­ tion has been nearly levelled up; and, instead of an immense contrast, there will remain only inequalities of various degrees. The Hebrews will have the advan­ tage upon one point, the Persians upon another, and upon a third the Hindoos, or the Egyptians. Let us, however, forget for a moment that the mono­ theism of Zoroaster is as real, if not as precise, as that �12 Sacred History: of the Hebrews; that the Persians and Parsees, no less than the Hebrews, have had a horror of any sensible representation of the Deity; that charity was recognized and preached in India at an earlier date than in Judea; that the appreciation and esteem of purity, of holiness, and of labour, were more ancient, and pro­ bably also more complete, among the Persians than among the Jews ; and that numerous passages can be quoted from the Vedas, or from the Yatpias, which would sustain, in moral sublimity, a parallel with the most admirable pages of the Bible. Let us forget for a moment all these patent facts, and many others similar, which might be noted, and let us suppose that, in religion, the Jews have had, over the rest of humanity, a clear superiority, equal to that, for example, which the Greeks have had in the domain of aesthetics. Would it be absolutely necessary, in order to explain such a difference, to place that nation out­ side of the common conditions of humanity, or to intro­ duce for them alone the supernatural into history 1 If you can explain, without any miracle, the genius of a Homer, or of a Phidias, as well as that of a Zoroaster, of a Budha, or of a Confucius, why should the same explanation not apply to the genius of a Moses or of an Isaiah ? Seriously, whether we consult our own common sense, or whether we examine the past, can we believe that this same God, who now speaks to all men in the same language, employed a few centuries ago extra­ ordinary means, to make himself known exclusively to a small Semitic tribe dwelling in Palestine, while, over all the rest of the globe, the thousands and millions of human creatures, whom He had there brought into existence, were left by Him to grope in darkness 1 If we desire to give to our children our cherished modern idea of the unity, equality, and fraternity of men of every race, and of every time, of every colour, and of every clime, is it wise or right to teach them to behold �Its Influence on the Intellect. 13 in the past some nations abandoned by God, and others enlightened by Him, a handful of elect specially sur­ rounded with miraculous cares, and all the rest,—that is to say almost the totality of the human generations, —deprived by God of these exceptional favours ? Confining ourselves to this general criticism of the dualistic character, which sacred history introduces into the notion of humanity ; let us now see whether it will give to our children better instruction upon the subject of nature, and whether it will impart to them a more correct idea of the physical than of the human world. I shall not here formally enter upon the question of the supernatural. Although perfectly convinced, for my own part, that there have never been, in any time nor in any place, more miracles than are now to be seen in our daily life, I respect and would not unneces­ sarily offend those persons who still to some extent believe in the supernatural. Thank God, history shows us, with sufficient clearness, the progress of humanity in this question. From age to age, the supernatural steadily loses ground. At the commence­ ment of civilization all is prodigy,—the thunder, the wind, an eclipse, a comet, the smallest meteor. By degrees, in proportion as men come to understand a little better the causes or the nature of such phenomena, the circle of miracle becomes narrower; until at length, as among Christians of the present day, men feel them­ selves compelled to refer miracles to a remote period of legendary antiquity, there to wait until another step of progress be accomplished, which shall cause them to be entirely renounced. Let us patiently and hopefully await, from the force of events and the development of humanity, the final fall of the few, frail, and ruinous refuges of supernaturalism which still survive. Hu­ manity moves, and is now again stirring itself; but God guides the movement, and, notwithstanding every obstacle, He will assuredly cause yet another stride on­ �14 Sacred History: wards to be taken in due time. It is only a question of time, and it is useless for us to struggle passionately against it. But, without pausing to inquire what degree of belief still generally retains its hold upon the minds of men, and judging it more useful to regard the matter from the believers’ point of view, let us seek to ascer­ tain what part ought to be assigned to miracles in education, especially in that of the children of the people. However much you may believe in miracles, I would say to a believer, yet you regard them only as exceptions. You of course acknowledge that in general the world is guided by invariable, inflexible, universal laws. Would it not be well to maintain the same position in the instruction of childhood ? Is it not necessary to insist infinitely more upon the rule than upon the exception ? In the first place, thoroughly impress upon the child that there are laws of nature; and let his mind, which is so readily inclined to fantasy, be familiarized with those laws, and accustomed to seek everywhere and always the physical explanation of phenomena. After this has been done, it will be soon enough to teach him, if you think it right to do so, that in a very small number of extraordinary cases, two or three thousand years ago, some revocations of or de­ partures from those immutable laws have taken place. If, on the contrary, at the age when his reason is still so tender, so pliant, and so unsteady, you speak to him continually of miracles and of prodigies, there must be great danger of reversing the parts, of making him take the exception for the rule, and, worst of all, of banish­ ing from his mind the idea of seeking for the rule. It ought to be borne in mind that reflection has to be learned by the child. His spontaneous conception of everything is under the figure of a material image ; and, “as he has not yet any notion of the true condi­ tions of knowledge and of certainty, his faith is in �Its Influence on the Intellect. J5 proportion to the effect produced upon his imagination, and not in proportion to the evidence. He believes in what is marvellous more easily than in what is simple. The extraordinary is not only most interesting, but also most convincing to the mind of a child. Miracle is the thing which he most readily comprehends. It is sufficient to make a strong impression upon his imagina­ tion in order to convince him. The more brilliant the colours, the more readily will his young genius be captivated therewith. Nurses know this instinctively, and hence their incredible stories often remain graven in the memories of children, while reasonable and probable narratives make little or no impression. Phantoms have a much stronger hold than realities upon the minds of children; ghosts are to them much more formidable than living men; and fantastic pic­ tures make a far stronger impression than the clear and distinct reality.” These reflections of a great modern philosopher explain how very difficult it is for a child to acquire the idea of a Nature governed by regular laws, and not by miraculous caprice. Such being the instinctive propensity of a child, must it not be injurious to the development of his reason to implant in his mind at first, as the basis of intelligence, a thick stratum of the marvellous, which cannot but tend strongly to stifle the faculty of rational reflection, of which the culture and the growth are already so difficult and so slow 1 This is precisely the danger which, in my opinion, is presented by sacred history. Taking possession, as it does, before any other history, of the still vacant mind, it widely diffuses and plants therein a taste for the miraculous, instead of furnishing an antidote to that taste already by nature so strong. Recall to mind the impressions of your childhood,— your first lessons of sacred history. You will find that these fall into two great classes, both belonging to the �i6 Sacred History: marvellous ; on the one hand legends, and on the other miracles properly so called. By legends, I mean narratives which believers them­ selves can no longer take in the literal sense, but are now constrained to regard as allegorical, while attribut­ ing to them a symbolism as profound as they may wish. Bor example, Adam and Eve are placed naked and innocent, in a delightful garden, at the centre of which two mysterious trees spread their boughs. Do you remember their magical peculiarities ? The one is the tree of life, the other gives the knowledge of good and evil. All at once a reptile, the serpent (for, do not forget, Genesis does not say that this serpent was the devil,—a personage who does not make his appearance in the Jewish religion until a very much later time;— it says merely that it was “more subtile than any of the field,” Gen. iii. 1),—the serpent, then, caused our first parents to eat the fruit of one of these trees. It was the tree of knowledge ; and you know that, as soon as they had eaten that fruit, it had indeed the effect of making them know what they had till then been ignorant of. Then, says the Bible :— Gen. iii. 22-24.—“ The Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever; therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken. So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.” Surely it cannot wound the religious feelings of my readers to enquire simply, whether any of them can here believe the Bible in the literal sense. Who can now be found to maintain that there really did exist two trees of which the magical fruits had these virtues, the one to make man think, and the other to render him immortal ? Who ever imagines now that the �Its Influence on the Intellect. 17 knowledge of good and evil, which we all in some degree possess, is actually derived, as Genesis says it is, from a certain fruit eaten by our first parents 1 Who can believe that God drove man out of Eden, for fear that he should steal for himself immortality, as he had already stolen knowledge ?—No one, assuredly. It is so little believed, that, among modern theologians, it is now generally thought necessary to apply a fanciful interpretation to the whole of this primitive legend. It has also been argued by some that it is impossible to determine clearly what portion of this picture ought to be taken literally, and what in a figurative sense. Perhaps so; but that is precisely the character of a myth. The phrase magical fruit, as here employed, may be objected to, because there is no such expression in the Bible; but then is not this one tree called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and that other the tree of life ? These words must either signify nothing, or else they suppose qualities very different from those of ordinary trees. Doubtless you may spiritualize all this •, but then, who hinders you from doing the same with all the analogous myths of the Vedas and of the Avesta? If you were to give this story to the children, as you in reality take it your­ selves,—as a beautiful myth,—as an ancient and simple legend, enveloping a great moral truth, it might then be all right and proper. But was it necessary that God should intervene to dictate only myths ? If so, what difference, of any value, can you establish between the Word of God and mythology1? Among two neighbouring nations you find the same cosmogonic allegory under different forms more or less poetic : in the one case it shall be only an imposture, while in the other case it is celestial truth ! Is this reasonable? Without insisting upon a crowd of other myths, to which the same or similar reflections would apply, let us come to the miracles properly so called. May it not be said that the most important function B �18 Sacred History: and aim of instruction ought to be, to make children early practise the habit of putting to themselves always these two questions,—WHY ? and HOW ? It is only thus that they can acquire the knowledge that the things which they learn from their teachers or from their books, are truths and realities; and this alone is true knowledge. It is only thus that they can be educa­ tionally inspired with that thirst for the knowledge of all things real and true, which is the mainspring of human progress. It is only thus that their reasoning powers, the highest faculties of their minds, can be exercised, disciplined, trained, and developed. But will a history composed of miracles, that is to say, of things which cannot be explained—of which it is impossible to know the why and the how ;—will such a history tend to encourage or to extinguish the scien­ tific curiosity of a child ? It has, to all his questions, a stereotyped reply, which cuts short the spirit of investigation:— Why.?—Because God willed it. How? —As God willed it. It is the peculiar character of the Semitic peoples, and especially of the Jewish race, to disdain secondary causes, and to prefer always, overleaping all intermedi­ ate steps, to ascend at once to first principles, or to the great First Cause. The necessary consequence of this is a general want of relish for the detailed study of facts, for the scientific observation of nature, for comparative criticism and analysis. Ask an Arab how the grass grows, how the stream flows, what produces earth­ quakes, famines, or epidemics,-—a thousand similar questions; and he will reply to you, astonished at your ignorant curiosity,—Allah is Allah. Is not the reason and cause of everything a decree of God ? What is the use of climbing step by step in the series of secondary causes ? Why not accept the will of God as a univer­ sally sufficient explanation ? This is exactly the effect which sacred history inevi­ tably produces upon the intellect of childhood. It �Its Influence on the Intellect. J9 accustoms the mind to dispense with the laborious investigation of the how and the why, causing it to refer things directly to God without any other explana­ tion. Instead of being trained to see God in all those secondary causes and natural laws, by which He con­ stantly manifests himself to us,—instead of being made to perceive that every pathway of science leads straight up to the Author of all, the child is led, through the irregular eross-roads and by-ways of miracle, to seek God chiefly by imagination, and is hindered from learning that He is rather to be found by reason on the one hand, and by conscience on the other. Suppose that a pupil were to ask the question,— Why and how could there be a universal deluge 1—■ Instead of having imparted to him a few scientific notions as to the natural character and physical causes of the great changes and revolutions of the globe, his legitimate and wholesome curiosity will be snubbed and repulsed, and he will be instructed to behold and to wonder at the act of God, whereby “the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened,” (Gen. vii. 11). Will not that child be very much enlightened ? When the account of the appearance of the rainbow after the deluge is the Bible-lesson for the day; this might be a favourable opportunity for making the chil­ dren understand, in opposition to their natural propen­ sity for seeing miracles everywhere, that there is absolutely nothing at all supernatural about the rain­ bow, and that it was quite in the nature of things that a rainbow should be produced at the time, for example, when the rains of the deluge ceased. But listen to the explanation of the matter which they will be required to accept:— Gen. viii. 13.—“ And it came to pass in the six hundredth and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the earth.” Gen. ix. 8-17.—“ And God spake unto Noah, and to his �20 Sacred History: sons with him, saying, And I, behold, I establish my cove­ nant with you, and with your seed after you; and with every living creature that is with you: . . . neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth. And God said, This is the token of the covenant. ... I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant be­ tween me and the earth : and it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud; . . . and I will look upon it that I may remem­ ber the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.” I do not insist upon the significance of this latter clause, which, taken in its literal sense, as it must be taken by children, will represent to them God looking upon His bow in order that He may remember His covenant. The myth, which is here put in the place of natural causes, is of small importance for wellinformed persons, but the truly important consideration is that it is presented to children as an absolute fact, and that they are thus taught and accustomed to rest satisfied with merely chimerical explanations of natural phenomena. What must be the influence of a primary education, which turns thus continually upon an inexhaustible stock of marvels 1 How can we expect the intellectual faculties of our children to be awakened, confirmed and developed, if, to all their questions about the nature of things, the only reply is this,—God is God, and He is omnipotent. Master, the child will say, is it really true that there have been men who lived more than 900 years ? Is it really true that one or two men have ascended up to heaven in a chariot of fire ? That two or three others, being actually dead, have come to life again ?—What presumption to ask if these things are true ! How can you be so wicked as to doubt it ?—They are written in the Bible. Master, how can a she-ass speak?—Everything is possible to God. �Its Influence on the Intellect. 21 But that cruse of oil which never failed nor was exhausted, how was that?—God is all-powerful. And how could Jonah have been able to live three days and three nights in the belly of a fish?—My child, if the Bible said that Jonah swallowed the whale, instead of being swallowed by it, it would still be necessary to believe it. It is thus that, while wishing to teach our children to honour God, and to believe His Word, they are in reality taught to learn nothing, but to bend their minds in passive submission to this modern and Protestant form of the worst feature of Popery,—the Bible says so, or the Bible does not say so. I have often heard it said that there is nothing which children learn more willingly than sacred history. I can easily believe it ; for, excepting fairy tales, there is nothing better suited to please their childish minds : it is so full of prodigies ! But will the recounting of prodigies convey genuine instruction to the children? Will they thus be taught to think, to reflect, to observe, and to search always for truth and reality ? Or will the influence of such teaching be exactly the reverse ? You see it is a practical question, demanding the most serious consideration. The teacher of a primary school is in the presence of children, by far the greater number of whom cannot be expected to acquire in after life any regular knowledge of the natural, physical, or mathematical sciences. It must certainly be injurious to make such children believe that one day, at the end of a battle between two Asiatic tribes, in order to con­ fer upon a Jewish captain the signal advantage of slaughtering a few more fugitives, God actually caused the sun to halt in its diurnal motion through the sky, and to stand still for “ about a whole day,” and that He moreover set to work, (for the Bible says so, and the children will take it in the most literal sense,) to “cast dozen great stones from heaven,” (hailstones) whereby more of the fugitives died than those who �22 Sacred History: were slain by the victorious Israelites. (Josh. x. 11-13.) To confirm the impression of this prodigious miracle as a literal fact upon their minds, the children will probably be reminded of another occasion, when, touched by the prayers and tears of a sick king who had been told that he was about to die, God relented so far as to promise him a supplement of fifteen years of life, and, as a sign that the promise would be ful­ filled, “ He brought the shadow ten degrees backward, by which it had gone down in the dial of Ahaz,” (2 Kings xx. 11); “So the sun returned ten degrees, by which it was gone down,” (Isaiah xxxviii. 8). What man of common sense, if he will only give the matter a serious thought, can ever be persuaded that this profusion of miracles, bidding defiance to all the conclusions of human reason, and even to the laws of mathematics, is a wholesome education for the minds of children, ignorant, credulous, imaginative, and con­ fiding, who will probably never afterwards be in a position to acquire a scientific notion of the laws of nature, and to whom therefore and henceforth, it will seem, as it did to the primitive peoples, quite natural that a miracle should, at any moment, interfere with and upset the regular course of nature ? There are, however, some teachers who, on the con­ trary, maintain that nothing is better fitted to form the intellect and to improve the mind of a child, than the study of miracles. The miraculous is, according to them, one of the best means of culture. Such a thesis can only be maintained by those who do not properly understand what a miracle is. If a child sets himself to reflect upon the miracle of Isaiah or of Joshua, how­ ever little he may have been taught of the elements of cosmography, it will immediately occur to him that, if the Sun (or the Earth) had stood still or gone backwards in space, there must have thence resulted, in instant succession, throughout vast systems of worlds, endless perturbations, huge catastrophes, universal destruction ; �Its Influence on the Intellect. 23 and, rather than, suppose such impossibilities to serve no purpose but to favour a petty Jewish king, or to complete the massacre of a troop of Amorites, a child who has been truly taught to reflect will think of these miracles exactly what you think of those of all re­ ligions, except your own. It is impossible to find any mode but one, of recon­ ciling the miraculous with good instruction ; and that is to explain it, or, in other words, to deny it; and this is what even the believers are now, in some measure, forced to do. In these days, for example, even among the orthodox, you will find very few persons who believe in the plagues of Egypt. It is not now uncommon to hear even fervent defenders of miracle explaining, that these plagues arose from natural causes which occur in Egypt every year but in smaller proportions; that frogs, lice, locusts, water resembling blood, etc., are well known there; and that the Bible narrative only shows us God giving to these facts a proportion and a fitness, which raised them to the sphere of the miraculous. Well, be it so ; but having once entered upon this path, how far are we to go ? With regard to the passage of the Red sea, the physical possibility of this famous miracle may be explained to the children by the action of the tides combined with violent winds. As to the manna and the quails it may be said that in winter innumerable flocks of quails reach the warm countries, and that the manna appears to have been the savoury fruit of a shrub which grows abundantly in thedesert of Arabia. Elsewhere, the teacher may explain to his pupils that the art of discover­ ing springs of water, and of rendering the water drink­ able, still continues to be a requisite qualification for the guide of an army or of a tribe in the sands of Arabia, etc. It is thus that some of our Protestant theologians are now disposed to treat sacred history, while others, more conservative, are ready to exclaim,—Take care what you do, to explain a miracle is to reject it, and �24 Sacred History: all the miracles hang together, so that if you reject one of them, you reject them all. Very true; and, likewise, if you adopt one of them, you adopt all the others. Human history is one great book, of which every page is full of miracles. How can the supernatural be preserved whole and entire in a single one of these pages, when it is banished with­ out hesitation from all the others? Tf God has performed miracles among the Jews, why deny that He may have done the same among the Hindoos and among the Persians, among the Celts and among the Germans, as the ancient writings of all these peoples abundantly affirm that He did ? Then you had better say at once that, in the name of science and through hatred of the supernatural, you mean to deprive us of the whole Bible, Old and New Testaments. No, this discussion has no tendency whatever to deprive you of the Bible, but only of the superstition of the Bible. Even you who profess so absolutely to revere the Bible as the “Word of God,” do you think it would be difficult to make you confess that you reject many passages of it as containing indefensible errors? Do you believe, for example, that the hare and the rabbit are ruminants ? It is not merely Moses however, it is God himself who, according to two formal texts of the Bible (I speak always of the Bible which is in every hand), directly affirms that both these animals chew the cud, (Lev. xi. 4-6; Deut. xiv. 7). If there be one single error in the Bible, there may be two, there may he ten, and we thenceforth differ from one another only about a question of number; which amounts to saying that no person can any longer maintain the absolute infallibility of the Bible; and, if it contains errors, then there is nothing, even from the believers’ point of view, to hinder us or them from regarding the supernatural as one of these errors. Upon the third point, it is often affirmed that sacred �Its Influence on the Intellect. 25 history abundantly compensates, in precious advan­ tages, for all the objections which can otherwise be brought against it. There are many who admit that it presents deficiencies and inaccuracies with regard to the knowledge of humanity and of nature, while main­ taining its entire perfection with regard to the know­ ledge of God. I do not forget that Biblical history, suitably treated from the Christian point of view, often serves admir­ ably to impress upon the children these two grand ideas, —that of the one God, and that of the living God. Even here, however, is there not some illusion ? Among the men of three or four thousand years ago, the notion of God evidently was not, could not be, that which it has become with the progress of humanity. In the earliest times of which the vestiges have been preserved to us in certain books of the Bible, it bore the stamp of a rude anthropomorphism. But, however rude it may have been, it is not we who shall forget that, in its time, anthropomorphism was a progress, and that it marked the first dawn of religious and philosophical thought. We do not at all wonder to see God humanized in the most ancient pages of this same Bible, in the later portions of which we shall find the purest and highest expression of the religious sentiment, precisely because we know that the Bible is neither an exceptional book, nor even the work of one single period ; but merely a collection of Hebrew literature from its first attempts to its highest development. In the earliest portions, everything bears the trace of a primitive social state, everything there has, so to say, the tone and the aspect of childhood; but by degrees the images change, the symbols are purified, and the worship, as well as the literature of the nation, becomes more elevated and more spiritual. If this development be taken into account, the differences which appear between Genesis, for example, and the �q.6 Sacred History: poetic writings of the later period, are not greater nor more surprising than the interval which separates the Niebelungen from Klopstock and from Goethe, or than the contrast between the “ legends of the round table ” and the works of our modern historians. If, on the contrary, this successive and progressive character be abstracted from the books of the Bible, then sacred history becomes a chaotic mixture of sublime and of rude ideas, and then it must tend, upon many points, to mislead the mind of a child. If the Bible is a human book, its anthropomorphism is not only no reproach, but must even be admired, as it is admired in the commencements of other ancient religions. When I read therein, God repents, God is angry, God forgets, and God remembers, God is glad, and God is grieved, when I read on every page, God speaks, or God appears, I easily reduce to their true value these various symbols, while fully appreciating their ingenuity or simplicity, and the beauty or the truth which they may contain. But when you give these same symbols to a child, as so many supernatural facts, derived from a book which not only is true, but which is the very Word of God, then the danger com­ mences, and it is necessary to protest against this sub­ stitution of ancient Hebrew anthropomorphism for eternal and pure truth. God is not only thus humanly personified in the Bible, but He is therein sometimes materialized to an extent which is now almost inconceivable to us, who are accustomed to contemplate Jehovah only through the light of Gospel times. For example, when Noah came out of the Ark, he offered a burnt-offering of many animals to God ; “ and the Lord smelled a sweet savour “ and the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more,” (Gen. viii. 21). Would the most fervent imitators of the Biblical style now venture to employ such an expression, even under the pretext of symbolism ? �Its Influence on the Intellect. 27 It would be more than wearisome to collect here all the traces of a similar materialism, all the texts in which corporeal forms are attributed to God. Think of the burning bush; think of Sinai, where, from the midst of cloudsand of thunders, with “the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud,” God gives, with his own hand, to Moses, two tables, written, says Exodus, “with the finger of God,” (xxxi. 18 ; xxxii. 16). Think especially of the prominence given to this idea,— majestic, if its poetic symbolism be understood, but extremely rude if taken literally as given in the Bible: —no man can see or hear God without instantly dying: one single people has been able to hear him, one single man has been able to see him—without perishing. Would it be easy to explain the following passages, so that they shall not have, at least for children, a sense decidedly too material ? Exod. xix. 18-24.—“And Mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly. And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice. And the Lord came down upon Mount Sinai, on the top of the mount; and the Lord called Moses up to the top of the mount; and Moses went up. And the Lord said unto Moses, Go down, charge the people, lest they break through unto the Lord to gaze, and many of them perish. And let the priests also, which come near unto the Lord, sanctify themselves, lest the Lord break forth upon them........... Thou shalt come up, thou and Aaron with thee; but let not the priests and the people break through to come up unto the Lord, lest he break forth upon them.” Exod. xx. 18-21.—“And all the people saw the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking: and when the people saw it, they removed, and stood afar off. And they said unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear; but let not God speak with us lest we die..............And the people stood afar �Sacred History: off: and Moses drew near unto the thick darkness where God was." Deut. v. 24-26.—“Behold, the Lord onr God hath shewed us his glory and his greatness, and we have heard his voice out of the midst of the fire: we have seen this day that God doth talk with man, and he liveth. Now, therefore, why should we die ? for this great fire will con­ sume us : if we hear the voice of the Lord our God any more, then we shall die. For who is there of all flesh that hath heard the voice of the living God speaking out of the midst of the fire, AS WE have, and lived? ” And, as a commentary upon this scene, as grand and imposing, as it is possible for an exhibition of symbols to be, addressed only to the senses through the imagination, let us see how Moses afterwards sums it up and estimates its importance:— Deut. iv. 32-36.—“ Ask now of the days that are past, which were before thee, since the day that God created man upon the earth, and ask from the one side of heaven unto the other, whether there hath been any such thing as this great thing is, or hath been heard like it. . Did ever people hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as thou hast heard, and live? .... Out of heaven he made thee to hear his voice, that he might instruct thee : and upon earth he shewed thee his great fire; and thou heardest his words out of the midst of the fire.” Elsewhere it is not the voice, it is the sight of God which kills. It is said to have happened, in a small number of quite exceptional cases, that God has con­ sented to let himself be seen, and seen by the eyes of the flesh. These miracles are accordingly narrated to us with the greatest solemnity. One day, the seventy elders of Israel followed Moses up into “ the Mount of God.” Moses, however, alone went up to God in the mount, but the elders went up so far, that, according to the text,— Exod. xxiv. 10. 11.—“ They saw the God of Israel: and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in his �Its Influence on the Intellect. 29 clearness. And upon the nobles of the children of Israel he laid not his hand : also they saw God and did eat and drink." Moses alone,—and it was this which gave him in the eyes of his people a supernatural character,-—was able to penetrate into that cloud where resided “ the glory of God,” and out of which God appeared like a con­ suming fire. God himself renders to him this testimony, that He would speak with him “ mouth to mouth" even apparently, and not in dark speeches,” (Num. xii. 8.) This peculiar privilege is repeatedly described —“The Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as -a man speaketh unto his friend,” (Exod. xxxiii. 11; Deut. xxxiv. 10, &c.). Such declarations as these, and many more such might be quoted, have a character thoroughly and undeniably materialistic, if regarded as records of literal facts, and not as poetic fictions; but even these are Dot the worst. The material conception or representa­ tion of God has been carried to a degree of still more astounding grossness. Witness that passage which equals, in primitive rudeness, anything which the most barbarous nations have written about the nature of their, gods. Moses had long conversed with God, but hitherto he had not seen him. He said to God one day, “ I beseech thee, show me thy glory! ” God did not reply that his essence being incorporeal cannot be seen ; but, on the contrary, He consented to pass before Moses, and to let him hear his voice: but, added He,— Exod. xxxiii. 20-23.—“ Thou canst not see my face; for there shall no man see me and five. And the Lord said, Behold, there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon a rock: and it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a clift of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by : And I will take away mine hand, and thou shalt see my back parts; but my face shall not be seen.” Would it not be highly irreverent and even profane to regard this passage as a literal, and divinely inspired, �30 Sacred History: and therefore infallible record of facts ? What would be said of such a story, if it were found anywhere else than in “ the Holy Bible I ” When people and teachers come to see, in all these pretended miracles of Horeb and of Sinai, only their true character of tragic and sombre poetry, there will no longer be any question about the propriety of putting them into the hands and heads of children, any more than there is at present about the ‘ Prometheus ’ of TEschylus, or the 1 Inferno ’ of Dante, or Milton’s ‘ Paradise Lost.’ But, once more, do you not perceive what an abyss there is between admiring myths as myths, and accepting them as supernatural facts dic­ tated by God himself? Elsewhere, God is represented as a man obliged to make personal inquiry as to whether a rumour which has reached him is correct or not:— Gen. xviii. 20, 21.—“ And the Lord said, Because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrha is great, and because their sin is very grievous; I will go down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is come unto me; and if not, I will know.” Again, men began to build a tower, whose top should reach unto heaven :— Gen. xi. 5-7.—“ And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language.” And it is thus that the famous confusion of languages is explained ! Surely the specimens which I have quoted, though the series might easily be largely extended, are amply sufficient to show, to those who require such proof, that not everything in the Bible is fitted to convey to �Its Influence on the Intellect. 31 our children such a pure and spiritual notion of God as it has been customary to believe. Some one will hasten to reply:—11 But we never read these passages in the schools, we suppress them, or we suitably modify them in our lesson-hooks.”—I am fain to believe that in many cases it is so; but, whether you teach these things or not, they are never­ theless in the Bible, and are there by the same title as the most admirable passages; so that they suffice to show to us clearly, in its true aspect, the degree of civilization and of enlightenment, to which the books containing them belong. And then, although you may, in some measure, suppress such passages as bear too visibly their date upon them, you do not suppress those innumerable revelations, apparitions, or manifestations of God, of which the Bible is full, and you cannot deny that they all (excepting perhaps some of the prophecies which, moreover, do not come under the denomination of sacred history) address themselves to the senses through the imagination. From one end of the Bible to the other, God speaks to patriarchs, to judges, to kings, to warriors, to priests. Is it by the voice of conscience 1 No, it is by a vision, a “ sign,” by a miracle, by a dream. When He speaks to all his people, it is by blessings or cursings of a temporal kind. It is not from within, it is from without that He governs : it is not by love, it is by fear. Ah ! my readers, is there not still a necessity, even after so many centuries of Christianity, for a fresh and vigorous effort to extirpate that superstitious instinct, which even now makes so many people tremble at the noise of thunder and at the flash of lightning, as if God were then either more present or more to be feared than when the sun shines clearly in a serene sky ? Must we still continue to propagate, in our families or in our schools, that false idea which is the very soul of the primitive history of every nation, and of the- Jews �32 Sacred History: as of the others :—if you suffer, God is punishing you : if you prosper, God is blessing you: if an epidemic, a famine, or an earthquake ravages a country, God is angry : if the harvest is double, God is favourable : you have been victorious, then the Eternal has fought upon your side : vanquished, it is because He has abandoned you 1 One of the masterpieces of Semitic literature, which has been and must ever be in all ages admired,—the poem of Job,—presents to us the first recorded protest of the human conscience against this idea. Job is struck with plagues and afflictions, and his friends thence infer, according to the custom, that God is thus punishing him for his sin. But Job replies with indignant eloquence—“ No, I am not guilty. No, my suffering is not an expiation.” Job xiii. 15-18.—“ Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him ; but I will maintain (in the margin, prove or argue) mine own ways before him. He also shall be my salvation ; for an hypocrite shall not come before him..............Behold now, I have ordered my cause: I know that I shall be jus­ tified.” (Read also ch. xxxi. &c.). Every one knows that, at the end of the poem, God declares to the three friends that they have been wrong, and that Job’s view of the matter is correct :— Job xlii. 7.—“For ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job bath.'''' This is manifestly the chief signification and purport of the book ■, and it is to this that the attention of our children ought chiefly to be directed, if we would have them to understand what they read; instead of insisting precisely upon the one circumstance which weakens the lesson, by shewing them that, in the end, God restores to Job all his possessions, and by thus teaching them, here also, to regard material prosperity as a criterium of the divine favour. �Its Influence on the Intellect. 33 Plato, wishing to make us understand how entirely the moral life is independent of external conditions, shows to us the just man overwhelmed with sufferings, with contempt, with calumnies, and with afflictions of every kind; in the midst of which, and even upon the cross where he dies, we are taught to recognize in him the just man, the teacher of truth, the friend of God, the pattern for our imitation, and, at the same time, the most truly happy of men ! Would not this sublime lesson be worth more than hundreds of Biblical miracles for teaching our children to realize that they are more or less near to God, not in proportion to the success of their enterprises, not according to external indications of prosperity or adversity, popularity or contempt, but according to the internal testimony of their own con­ science, according to their degree of obedience to duty ? It would be absurd to look for this profound intelli­ gence of the spiritual sense of religion, in a nation or tribe at the commencement of its social development. But it is none the less absurd that, three or four thou­ sand years afterwards, it should still be imagined that we have only to reproduce, without any change, the first lispings of human thought, and to regard this reproduction as an infallible revelation. Where the notion of the Bather Almighty, revealing himself to the reason and to the conscience, has not yet acquired all its fulness, we need not wonder to find that the relations between God and man are often pre­ sented in a very imperfect fashion. Take, for example, prayer or blessing, as it appears in the first books of the Old Testament, and try to discover in these a spiritual and moral character. You will not find it any more than you will find there the God who is purely spirit and purely love. Prayer* is there, as among all the peoples of that period, a mystic spell, a sort of magic power, a cabal* And Imprecation. See the history of Balaam, Num. xxiii. 25, 26. �^4 Sacred History: istic formula. Let us look at a single specimen. It is at the crisis of a battle : Moses has not taken part in the fight, but has withdrawn to an adjoining hill, armed with his rod, and there he intercedes for his people. Exod. xvii. 11-14.—“And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed; and when he let down his hand Amalek prevailed. But Moses’ hands were heavy ; and they took a stone and put it under him, and he sat thereon : and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side, and the other on the other side : and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. And Joshua discomfited Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword. And the Lord said unto Moses, Write this for a memorial in a book.” Here again I would be the first to recognise a beauti­ ful poetic image, if the story is to be understood in the same manner as the analogous stories, which we may read in the Vedas, or elsewhere. But those who desire to make us and our children believe that the thing has actually taken place, ought to see that, if such virtue must be literally attributed to this mechanical prayer of Moses, they have no longer any right to ridicule the prayer-mills of the Budhists, or the rosaries of the Roman Catholics. But, it is said by some, this is a type, an emblem, an allegory, which we must “interpret spiritually.” Be it so, but who hinders you from interpreting spiritually all the similar imagery, which abounds in the other religious and mythological books of antiquity? If you have so much indulgence for the rudest allegories of Hebrew legend, whence comes your severity or con­ tempt for the most beautiful and symbolical stories of Greek, Hindoo, or Scandinavian legend ? God speaks, God appears in person, God dictates a book ! and that book contains pages which, in order to be accepted by reason, require to be “ spiritualized,” neither more nor less than those of Hesiod, of the Vedas, or of the Eddas! �Its Influence on the Intellect. 35 The truth, is that, among all primitive peoples, prayer, blessing, and cursing have a peculiar virtue, a mysterious influence, a magic power. Of this the history of Isaac is one of the clearest examples. The old man, wishing and intending to bless Esau, is the dupe of a coarse imposition; and the words which, in his thought, he addresses to Esau, fall, unknown to him, upon the ears of Jacob. When Esau returns from his hunting, to which he had been sent by his father himself, Isaac, astonished and trembling, says to him :— Gen. xxvii. 33-37.—“ Thy brother came with subtilty, and hath taken away thy blessing........... I have blessed him, yea, and he shall be blessed............ I have made him thy lord, and all his brethren have I given to him for servants; and with corn and wine have I sustained him: and what shall I do now unto thee, my son ? ” Can it be denied in presence of words so clear, that, for the Isaac of Genesis, the blessing was a kind of talisman or spell, an enchanted formula, consisting in the words, not in the thought, and having a virtue equally independent of the intention of him who gave it, and of the merit of him who received it 1 A stolen blessing was not on that account the less valid I How can all this be explained to children 1 But an explanation is not withheld, we have often heard and read it, as follows :—Isaac knew very well that, before the birth of the twin brothers, God had said to Rebecca, “ the elder shall serve the younger.” Moreover, when the blessing had been given to Jacob, Isaac felt that it was, notwithstanding the imposture of his son, an accomplished fact, which he did not feel himself at liberty to undo, and which had acquired, by its very accomplishment, a providential character. The whole was the result of a divine decree, and this was perceived by the conscience of Isaac at the very moment when the act of blessing was consummated. �36 Sacred History: We frankly confess that, in morality no less than in good sense, this incredible theory, of an accomplished fact which acquires by its very accomplishment a provi­ dential character, appears to us even more deficient, if that be possible, than the explanation of the biblical Isaac. “ Thy brother hath come with subtilty, and hath taken away thy blessing, I have blessed him, yea, and he shall be blessed.” Samson is again another example, among a thousand, of these false and rude ideas, regarding the relations between God and man. Here it is neither a prayer nor a blessing, but a vow, in virtue of which the hair of Samson’s head (orthodox theologians believe it still), was the thing, the charm, or the talisman, wherein his supernatural strength lay ! Samson keeps company with a woman of loose character, (Judges xvi.); but that does not in the smallest degree deprive him of the divine favour attached to his hair. His head being cropped, he loses the distinctive blessing of God; but his hair grows again, and with it comes back the divine bless­ ing. It is impossible to see anything else in the text, unless it be put there by force; for, immediately before narrating the last exploit of Samson, the Bible explains to us how he has regained his strength by telling us :— Judges xvi. 22.—“ Howbeit the hair of his head began to grow again after he was shaven.” What is the profound religious idea which we may hope, without sophistry, to derive from this lesson, for the improvement of the minds or the hearts of our children ? Explain it as you may, Samson will always be for them only the Jewish Hercules ; and, I confess it, I greatly prefer for their instruction the Hercules of the Greeks. The latter, at least, will not now teach them to think that God—the true God, the God whom they themselves ought to worship—has actually figured �Its Influence on the Intellect. y] in scenes and anecdotes, which, like those about Samson, are trifling, superstitious, and absurd. In conclusion :—To excite, to over-excite, in children the taste for the extraordinary, to make them seek God, not where He is ever to he found, not in the laws of the physical or moral world, not in the eternal har­ mony of the stars, not in the marvellous organisation of the flower or of the insect, not in the sublime spec­ tacle of unity and design presented by the Universe, but in all sorts of disorders and capricious interferences which, if they had taken place, would have proved nothing but the divine instability, improvidence, and weakness ; thus greatly to exaggerate and to confirm, instead of counteracting, in their young minds, their naturally fantastic and chimerical notions of things, their ignorance of causes, their disregard of rule, fear instead of thought, credulity instead of knowledge ; and then to seal the whole with this disastrous idea, that, if they have the misfortune to contest the absolute truth of even the most absurd narratives, doctrines, or miracles attested by a pretended Word of God, they are guilty of blasphemous sacrilege, and doomed therefore to eternal damnation, unless they repent and learn at least to say, that the whole book is a divine revelation of truth:—behold and consider the kind of influence which the teaching of sacred history always inevitably exerts, only in greater or less degree according to the absence or presence of various antidotes, upon the cul­ ture of our children’s intelligence, and upon the forma­ tion of their ideas of humanity, of nature, and of God. Ere long we will publish the second and the more important division of the subject; and therein we will strive to show how this kind of teaching acts upon the conscience, and upon the moral direction of life. � 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 &amp; 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 An entity primarily responsible for making the resource 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 The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data 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 A name given to the resource Sacred history as a branch elementary education. Part I. Its influence on the intellect Description An account of the resource Place of publication: Ramsgate Collation: 37 p. ; 18 cm. Notes: From the library of Dr Moncure Conway. Date of publication from British Library catalogue. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Thomas Scott Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1870] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context CT208 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource [Unknown] Subject The topic of the resource Education Bible Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <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 (Sacred history as a branch elementary education. Part I. Its influence on the intellect), 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> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Bible-Criticism Conway Tracts Education Religious Education https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/2862b427f7490e9e75f83b759bf37454.pdf?Expires=1785369600&Signature=r8ntDluTZi8cQ9iVYWilS4%7E2CEm-D%7E3lXVgfcrkxBvJDVzI3%7Ejdf3AJvVaUkzKdnb97nDSS%7EB1QKqWs0R7CahbuRumMkirEzFsox7isUSU1gOBsH-95SYlnaptXG8oGu0GShaT5TA2uUX4jOAFxAYHuMVkhkUzf0QBZaLX8lUSzR%7EgoBmfQRvJVwjAxinpdw2GSM%7ExGb6r40RWaYFh9nhN3IEqNX6gAdaxH-%7EXSTiFi-Lsm4bxJk4GqXhTZlnKAQY33OqieklqjtqNMzmhuaEXZCVXsGruBTjlqnGd7hPKPcvvKJqUUu9VvpeR0dJXk5S6XH1sHX1pnql-orlUq8eA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM ef7ddc38e5b576601c1c75ab00115e9a PDF Text Text NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY ABOUT THE HOLY BIBLE. A LECTURE BY ROBERT G. INGERSOLL. In the nature of things there can be no evidence to establish the claim of inspiration. LONDON : R. FORDER, 28 STONECUTTER STREET, E.C. 1894. �LONDON : PRINTED BY G. W. FOOTE, AT 28 STONECUTTER STREET, E.C. �CONTENTS. About the Holy Bible—Introductory The Origin of the Bible Is the Old Testament Inspired ? The Ten Commandments What is it all Was Jehovah a Worth ? God of Love ? Jehovah’s Administration The New Testament The Philosophy of Christ Is .Christ our Example ? Why should we Place Christ at the Top and Summit of the Human Race ? Inspiration The Real Bible 5 7 io 15 20 30 32 34 44 48 5° 53 58 �5 B’ �ABOUT THE HOLY BIBLE. There are many millions of people who believe the Bible to be the inspired word of God—millions who think that this book is staff and guide, counsellor and consoler; that it fills the present with peace and the future with hope— millions who believe that it is the fountain of law, justice and mercy, and that to its wise and benign teachings the world is indebted for its liberty, wealth, and civilisation— millions who imagine that this book is a revelation from the wisdom and love of God to the brain and heart of man— millions who regard this book as a torch that conquers the darkness of death, and pours its radiance on another world —a world without a tear. They forget its ignorance and savagery, its hatred of liberty, its religious persecution; they remember heaven, but they forget the dungeon of eternal pain. ��Aboîit the Holy Bible. 1 I. THE ORIGIN OF THE BIBLE. A few wandering families—poor, wretched ; without educa­ tion, art, or power; descendants of those who had been enslaved for four hundred years; ignorant as the inhabitants of Central Africa—had just escaped from their masters to the desert of Sinai. Their leader was Moses, a man who had been raised in the family of Pharaoh, and had been taught the law and mythology of Egypt. For the purpose of controlling his followers he pretended that he was instructed and assisted by Jehovah, the god of these wanderers. Everything that happened was attributed to the inter­ ference of this god. Moses declared that he met this god face to face; that on Sinai’s top from the hands of this god he had received the tables of stone on which, by the finger of this god, the Ten Commandments had been written, and that, in addition to this, Jehovah had made known the sacrifices and ceremonies that were pleasing to him, and the laws by which the people should be governed. In this way the Jewish religion and the Mosaic Code were established. It is now claimed that this religion and these laws were, and are, revealed and established for all mankind. At that time these wanderers had no commerce with other nations—they had no written language—they could neither read nor write. They had no means by which they could make this revelation known to other nations, and so it �Abolit the Holy Bible. remained buried in the jargon of a few ignorant, impoverished, and unknown tribes for more than two thousand years. Many centuries after Moses, the leader, was dead—many centuries after all his followers had passed away—the Pen­ tateuch was written, the work of many writers ; and, to give it force and authority, it was claimed that Moses was the author. We now know that the Pentateuch was not written by Moses. Towns are mentioned that were not in existence when Moses lived. Money, not coined until centuries after his death, is mentioned. So, many of the laws were not applicable to wanderers on the desert—laws about agriculture, about the sacrifice of oxen, sheep, and doves, about the weaving of cloth, about ornaments of gold and silver, about the cultivation of land, about harvest, about the threshing of grain, about houses and temples, about cities of refuge, and about many other subjects of no possible application to a few starving wan­ derers over the sands and rocks. It is now not only admitted by intelligent and honest theologians that Moses was not the author of the Pentateuch, but they all admit that no one knows who the authors were, or who wrote any one of these books, or a chapter or a line. We know that the books were not written in the same generation; that they were not all written by one person ; that they are filled with mistakes and contradictions. It is also admitted that Joshua did not write the book that bears his name, because it refers to events that did not happen until long after his death. No one knows, or pretends to know, the author of Judges ; �About the Holy Bible. 9 all we know is that it was written centuries after all the judges had ceased to exist. No one knows the author of Ruth, nor of First and Second Samuel; all we know is that Samuel did not write the books that bear his name. In the 25 th chapter of First Samuel is an account of Samuel’s death, and in the 27 th chapter is an account of the raising of Samuel by the Witch of Endor. No one knows the author of the First and Second Kings, or First and Second Chronicles; all we' know is that these books are of no value. We know that the Psalms were not written by David. In the Psalms the Captivity is spoken of, and that did not happen until about five hundred years after David slept with his fathers. We know that Solomon did not write the Proverbs or the Song ; that Isaiah was not the author of the book that bears his name ; that no one knows the author of Job, Ecclesiastes, or Esther, or of any book in the Old Testament, with the exception of Ezra. We know that God is not mentioned or in any way referred to in the book of Esther. We know, too, that the book is cruel, absurd, and impossible. God is not mentioned in the Song of Solomon, the best book in the Old Testament. And we know that Ecclesiastes was written by an un­ believer. We know, too, that the Jews themselves had not decided as to what books were inspired—were authentic—until the second century after Christ. We know that the idea of inspiration was of slow growth, and that the inspiration was determined by those who had certain ends to accomplish. �IO Abotit the Holy Bible. II. IS THE OLD TESTAMENT INSPIRED ? If it is, it should be a book that no man—no number of men—could produce. It should contain the perfection of philosophy. It should perfectly accord with every fact in nature. There should be no mistakes in astronomy, geology, or as to any subject or science. Its morality should be the highest, the purest. Its laws and regulations for the control of conduct should be just, wise, perfect, and perfectly adapted to the accom­ plishment of the ends desired. It should contain nothing calculated to make man cruel, revengeful, vindictive, or infamous. It should be filled with intelligence, justice, purity, honesty, mercy, and the spirit of liberty. It should be opposed to strife and war, to slavery and lust, to ignorance, credulity, and superstition. It should develop the brain and civilise the heart. It should satisfy the heart and brain of the best and wisest. It should be true. Does the Old Testament satisfy this standard? Is there anything in the Old Testament—in history, in theory, in law, in government, in morality, in science—above and beyond the ideas, the beliefs, the customs and prejudices of its authors and the people among whom they lived ? Is there one ray of light from any supernatural source ? �About the Holy Bible. 11 The ancient Hebrews believed that this earth was the centre of the universe, and that the sun, moon, and stars were specks in the sky. With this the Bible agrees. They thought the earth was flat, with four corners; that the sky, the firmament, was solid—the floor of Jehovah’s house. The Bible teaches the same. They imagined that the sun journeyed about the earth, and that by stopping the sun the day could be lengthened. The Bible agrees with this. They believed that Adam and Eve were the first man and woman; that they had been created but a few years before, and that they, the Hebrews, were their direct descendants. This the Bible teaches. If anything is, or can be, certain, the writers of the Bible were mistaken about creation, astronomy, geology; about the causes of phenomena, the origin of evil, and the cause of death. Now, it must be admitted that if an Infinite Being is the author of the Bible, he knew all sciences, all facts, and could not have made a mistake. If, then, there are mistakes, misconceptions, false theories, ignorant myths, and blunders in the Bible, it must have been written by finite beings; that is to say, by ignorant and mistaken men. Nothing can be clearer than this. For centuries the Church insisted that the Bible was absolutely true; that it contained no mistakes; that the story of creation was true; that its astronomy and geology �12 About the Holy Bible. were in accord with the facts ; that the scientists who differed with the Old Testament were infidels and Atheists. Now this has changed. The educated Christians admit that the writers of the Bible were not inspired as to any science. They now say that God, or Jehovah, did not inspire the writers of his book for the purpose of instructing the world about astronomy, geology, or any science. They now admit that the inspired men who wrote the Old Testa­ ment knew nothing about any science, and that they wrote about the earth and stars, the sun and moon, in accordance with the general ignorance of the time. It required many centuries to force the theologians to this admission. Reluctantly, full of malice and hatred, the priests retired from the field, leaving the victory with science. They took another position : They declared that the authors, or rather the writers, of the Bible were inspired in spiritual and moral things ; that Jehovah wanted to make known to his children his will and his infinite love for his children ; that Jehovah, seeing his people wicked, ignorant, and depraved, wished to make them merciful and just, wise and spiritual, and that the Bible is inspired in its laws, in the religion it teaches, and in its ideas of government. This is the issue now. Is the Bible any nearer right in its ideas of justice, of mercy, of morality, or of religion than in its conception of the sciences ? Is it moral ? It upholds slavery—it sanctions polygamy. Could a devil have done worse ? Is it merciful ? In war it raised the black flag ; it commanded the destruc­ �About the Holy Bible. 13 tion, the massacre, of all—of the old, infirm, and helpless —of wives and babes. Were its laws inspired ? Hundreds of offences were punished with death. To pick up sticks on Sunday, to murder your father on Monday, were equal crimes. There is in the literature of the world no bloodier code. The law of revenge—of retaliation—was the law of Jehovah. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a limb for a limb. This is savagery—not philosophy. Is it just and reasonable ? The Bible is opposed to religious toleration—to religious liberty. Whoever differed with the majority was stoned to death. Investigation was a crime. Husbands were ordered to denounce and to assist in killing their unbelieving wives. It is the enemy of Art. “ Thou shalt make no graven image.” This was the death of Art. Palestine never produced a painter or a sculptor. Is the Bible civilised ? It upholds lying, larceny, robbery, murder, the selling of diseased meat to strangers, and even the sacrifice of human beings to Jehovah. Is it philosophical ? It teaches that the sins of a people can be transferred to an animal—to a goat. It makes maternity an offence, for which a sin offering had to be made. It was wicked to give birth to a boy, and twice as wicked to give birth to a girl. To make hair-oil like that used by the priests was an offence punishable with death. The blood of a bird killed over running water was regarded as medicine. �r4 About the Holy Bible. Would a civilised God daub his altars with the blood of oxen, lambs, and doves ? Would he make all his priests butchers ? Would he delight in the smell of burning flesh ? �About the Holy Bible. 15 III. THE TEN COMMANDMENTS. Some Christian lawyers—some eminent and stupid judges— have said, and still say, that the Ten Commandments are the foundation of all law. Nothing could be more absurd. Long before these Commandments were given there were codes of laws in India and Egypt—laws against murder, perjury, larceny, adultery, and fraud. Such laws are as old as human society ; as old as the love of life; as old as industry; as the idea of prosperity; as old as human love. All of the Ten Commandments that are good were old; all that were new are foolish. If Jehovah had been civilised, he would have left out the commandment about keeping the Sabbath, and in its place would have said : “ Thou shalt not enslave thy fellow-men.” He would have omitted the one about swearing, and said : “ The man shall have but one wife, and the woman but one husband.” He would have left out the one about graven images, and in its stead would have said: “ Thou shalt not wage wars of extermination, and thou. shalt not unsheathe the sword except in selfdefence.” If Jehovah had been civilised, how much grander the Ten Commandments would have been. All that we call progress—the enfranchisement of man, of labor, the substitution of imprisonment for death, of fine for imprisonment, the destruction of polygamy, the establishing of free speech, of the rights of conscience ; in short, all that �*6 About the Holy Bible. has tended to the development and civilisation of man; all the results of investigation, observation, experience, and free thought; all that man has accomplished for the benefit of man since the close of the Dark Ages—has been done in spite of the Old Testament. Let me further illustrate the morality, the mercy, the philosophy and goodness of the Old Testament. THE STORY OF ACHAN. Joshua took the city of Jericho. Before the fall of the city he declared that all the spoil taken should be given to the Lord. In spite of this order, Achan secreted a garment, some silver and gold. Afterwards Joshua tried to take the city of Ai. He failed, and many of his soldiers were slain. Joshua sought for the cause of his defeat, and he found that Achan had secreted a garment, two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold. To this Achan confessed. And thereupon Joshua took Achan, his sons and his daughters, his oxen and his sheep—stoned them all to death and burned their bodies. There is nothing to show that the sons and daughters had committed any crime. Certainly the oxen and sheep should not have been stoned to death for the crime of their owner. This was the justice, the mercy, of Jehovah! After Joshua had committed this crime, with the help of Jehovah he captured the city of Ai. THE STORY OF ELISHA. “ And he went up thence unto Bethel, and as he was going up by the way there came forth little children out of �About the Holy Bible. i7 the city and mocked him, and said unto him, 1 Go up, thou baldhead.’ “ And he turned back and looked at them, and cursed them in the name of the Lord. And there came forth two she-bears out of the wood, and tore forty and two children of them.” This was the work of the good God—the merciful Jehovah! THE STORY OF DANIEL. King Darius had honored and exalted LDaniel, and the native princes were jealous. So they induced the King to sign a decree to the effect that any man who should make a petition to any god or man except to King Darius, for thirty days, should be cast into the den of lions. Afterwards these men found that Daniel, with his face toward Jerusalem, prayed three times a day to Jehovah. Thereupon Daniel was cast into the den of lions j a stone was placed at the mouth of the den and sealed with the King’s seal. The King passed a bad night. Tbe next morning he went to the den and cried out to Daniel. Daniel answered and told the King that God had sent his angel and shut the mouths of the lions. Daniel was taken out alive and well, and the King was converted and believed in Daniel’s god. Darius, being then a believer in the true God, sent for the men who had accused Daniel, and for their wives and their children, and cast them all into the lions’ den. “ And the lions had the mastery of them, and brake all their bones in pieces, or ever they came at the bottom of the pit.” B �i8 About the Holy Bible. What had the wives and little children done ? How had they offended King Darius, the believer in Jehovah ? Who protected Daniel? Jehovah! Who failed to protect the innocent wives and children ? Jehovah ! THE STORY OF JOSEPH. Pharaoh had a dream, and this dream was interpreted by Joseph. According to this interpretation, there was to be in Egypt seven years of plenty, followed by seven years of famine. Joseph advised Pharaoh to buy all the surplus of the seven plentiful years, and store it up against the years of famine. Pharaoh appointed Joseph as his minister or agent, and ordered him to buy the grain of the plentiful years. Then came the famine. The people came to the King for help. He told them to go to Joseph and do as he said. Joseph sold corn to the Egyptians until all their money was gone—until he had it all. When the money was gone the people said: “ Give us corn, and we will give you our cattle.” Joseph let them have corn until all their cattle, their horses, and their flocks had been given to him. Then the people said : “ Give us corn, and we will give you our lands.” So Joseph let them have corn until all their lands were gone. But the famine continued, and so the poor wretches sold themselves, and they became the servants of Pharaoh. Then Joseph gave them seed, and made an agreement with them that they should forever give one-fifth of all they raised to Pharaoh. Who enabled Joseph to interpret the dream of Pharaoh ? �About the Holy Bible. 19 Jehovah ! Did he know at the time that Joseph would use the information thus given to rob and enslave the people of Egypt? Yes. Who produced the famine? Jehovah! It is perfectly apparent that the Jews did not think of Jehovah as the God of Egypt—the God of all the world. He was their God, and theirs alone. Other nations had gods, but Jehovah was the greatest of all. He hated other nations and other gods, and abhorred all religions except the worship of himself, �20 About the Holy Bible. IV. WHAT IS IT ALL WORTH? Will some Christian scholar tell us the value of Genesis ? We know that it is not true—that it contradicts itself. There are two accounts of the creation in the first and second chapters. In the first account birds and beasts were created before man. In the second, man was created before the birds and beasts. In the first, fowls are made out of the water. In the second, fowls are made out of the ground. In the first, Adam and Eve are created together. In the second, Adam is made; then the beasts and birds, and then Eve is created from one of Adam’s ribs. These stories are far older than the Pentateuch. Persian : God created the world in six days, a man called Adama, a woman called Evah, and then rested. The Etruscan, Babylonian, Phoenician, Chaldean, and the Egyptian stories are much the same. The Persians, Greeks, Egyptians, Chinese, and Hindus have their Garden of Eden and the Tree of Life. So the Persians, the Babylonians, the Nubians, the people of Southern India, all had the story of the Fall of Man and the subtle serpent. The Chinese say that sin came into the world by the disobedience of woman. And even the Tahitians tell us that man was created from the earth, and the first woman from one of his bones. �About the Holy Bible. 21 All these stories are equally authentic and of equal value to the world, and all the authors were equally inspired. We know also that the story of the Flood is much older than the book of Genesis, and we know besides that it is not true. We know that this story in Genesis was copied from the Chaldean. There you find all about the rain, the ark, the .animals, the dove that was sent out three times, and the mountain on which the ark rested. So the Hindus, Chinese, Parsees, Persians, Greeks, Mexicans, and Scandinavians have substantially the same story. We also know that the account of the Tower of Babel is an ignorant and childish fable. What, then, is left in this inspired book of Genesis ? Is there a word calculated to develop the heart or brain ? Is there an elevated thought—any great principle—any­ thing poetic—any word that bursts into blossom ? Is there anything except a dreary and detailed statement •of things that never happened ? Is there anything in Exodus calculated to make men generous, loving, and noble ? Is it well to teach children that God tortured the innocent cattle of the Egyptians—bruised them to death with hailstones—on account of the sins of Pharaoh ? Does it make us merciful to believe that God killed the firstborn of the Egyptians—the firstborn of the poor and suffering people—of the poor girl working at the mill— because of the wickedness of the King ? Can we believe that the gods of Egypt worked miracles ? Did they change water into blood, and sticks into ser­ pents ? �22 About the Holy Bible. In Exodus there is not one original thought or line of value. We know, if we know anything, that this book was written by savages—savages who believed in slavery, polygamy, and wars of extermination. We know that the story told is impossible, and that the miracles were never performed. This book admits that there are other gods besides Jehovah. In the 17 th chapter is this verse : “ Now I know that the Lord is greater than all gods, for, in the thing wherein they dealt proudly, he was above them.” So, in this blessed book is taught the duty of human sacrifice—the sacrifice of babes. In the 22nd chapter is this command : “Thou shalt not delay to offer the first of thy ripe fruits and of thy liquors : the firstborn of thy sons thou shalt give unto me.” Has Exodus been a help or a hindrance to the human race? Take from Exodus the laws common to all nations, and is there anything of value left ? Is there anything in Leviticus of importance ? Is there a chapter worth reading ? What interest have we in the clothes of priests, the curtains and caudles of the tabernacle, the tongs and shovels of the altar, or the hair-oil used by the Levites? Of what use the cruel code, the frightful punishments, the curses, the falsehoods, and the miracles of this ignorant and infamous book ? And what is there in the book of Numbers—with its sacrifices and water of jealousy, with its shew-bread and spoons, its kids and fine flour, its oil and candlesticks, its cucumbers, onions, and manna—to assist and instruct man­ kind? What interest have we in the rebellion of Korah, �About the Holy Bible. 23 the water of separation, the ashes of a red heifer, the brazen serpent, the water that followed the people uphill and down for forty years, and the inspired donkey of the prophet Balaam ? Have these absurdities and cruelties—these childish, savage superstitions—helped to civilise the world ? Is there anything in Joshua—with its wars, its murders and massacres, its swords dripping with the blood of mothers and babes, its tortures, maimings, and mutilations, its fraud and fury, its hatred and revenge—calculated to improve the world ? Does not every chapter shock the heart of a good man ? Is it a book to be read by children ? The book of Joshua is as merciless as famine, as ferocious as the heart of a wild beast. It is a history—a justification—• a sanctification of nearly every crime. The book of Judges is about the same, nothing but war and bloodshed; the horrible story of Jael and Sisera; of Gideon and his trumpets and pitchers ; of Jephtha and his daughter, whom he murdered to please Jehovah. Here we find the story of Samson, in which a sun-god is changed to a Hebrew giant. Read this book of Joshua—read of the slaughter of women, of wives, of mothers and babes—read its impossible miracles, its ruthless crimes, and all done according to the commands of Jehovah, and tell me whether this book is calculated to make us forgiving, generous, and loving. I admit that the history of Ruth is, in some respects, a beautiful and touching story; that it is naturally told, and that her love for Naomi was deep and pure. But in the matter of courtship we would hardly advise our daughters to follow the example of Ruth. Still, we must remember that Ruth was a widow. �24 About the Holy Bible. Is there anything worth reading in the first and second books of Samuel? Ought a prophet of God to hew a captured king in pieces ? Is the story of the ark, its capture and return, of importance to us ? Is it possible that it was right, just, and merciful to kill fifty thousand men because they had looked into a box ? Of what use to us are the wars of Saul and David, the stories of Goliath and the Witch of Endor ? Why should Jehovah have killed Uzzah for putting forth his hand to steady the ark, and forgiven David for murdering Uriah and stealing his wife ? According to “Samuel,” David took a census of the people. This excited the wrath of Jehovah, and, as a punishment, he allowed David to choose seven years of famine, a flight of three months from pursuing enemies, or three days of pestilence. David, having confidence in God, chose the three days of pestilence ; and, thereupon, God, the compassionate, on account of the sin of David, killed seventy thousand innocent men ! Under the same circumstances, what would a devil have done ? Is there anything in First and Second Kings that suggests the idea of inspiration ? When David is dying he tells his son Solomon to murder joab—not to let his hoar head go down to the grave in peace. With his last breath he commands his son to bring down the hoar head of Shimei to the grave with blood. Having uttered these merciful words, the good David, the man after God’s heart, slept with his fathers. Was it necessary to inspire the man who wrote the history of the building of the temple, the story of the visit of the Queen of Sheba, or to tell the number of Solomon’s wives ? �About the Holy Bible. 25 What care we for the withering of Jeroboam’s hand, the prophecy of Jehu, or the story of Elijah and the ravens ? Can we believe that Elijah brought flames from heaven, or that he went at last to Paradise in a chariot of fire ? Can we believe in the multiplication of the widow’s oil by Elisha, that an army was smitten with blindness, or that an axe floated in the water ? Does it civilise us to read about the beheading of the seventy sons of Ahab, the putting out of the eyes of Zedekiah and the murder of his sons ? Is there one word in First and Second Kings calculated to make men better ? First and Second Chronicles is but a re-telling of what is told in First and Second Kings. The same old stories—a little left out, a little added, but in no respect made better or worseThe book of Ezra is of no importance. He tells us that Cyrus, King of Persia, issued a proclamation for building a temple at Jerusalem, and that he declared Jehovah to be the real and only God. Nothing could be more absurd. Ezra tells us about the return from captivity, the building of the temple, the dedication, a few prayers, and this is all. This book is of no importance, of no use. Nehemiah is about the same, only it tells of the building of the wall, the complaints of the people about taxes, a list of those who returned from Babylon, a catalogue of those who dwelt at Jerusalem, and the dedication of the walls. Not a word in Nehemiah worth reading. Then comes the book of Esther : In this we are told that King Ahasuerus was intoxicated ; that he sent for his Queen, Vashti, to come and show her­ self to him and his guests. Vashti refused to appear. This maddened the King, and he ordered that from �26 About the Holy Bible. every province the most beautiful girls should be brought before him that he might choose one in place of Vashti. Among others was brought Esther, a Jewess. She was chosen, and became the wife of the King. Then a gentle­ man, by the name of Haman, wanted to have all the Jews killed, and the King, not knowing that Esther was of that race, signed a decree that all the Jews should be killed. Through the efforts of Mordecai and Esther the decree was annulled, and the Jews were saved. Haman prepared a gallows on which to have Mordecai hanged, but the good Esther so managed matters that Haman and his ten sons were hanged on the gallows that Haman had built, and the Jews were allowed to murder more than seventy-five thousand of the King’s subjects. This is the inspired story of Esther. In the book of Job we find some elevated sentiments, some sublime and foolish thoughts, something of the wonder and sublimity of nature, the joys and sorrows of life; but the story is infamous. Some of the Psalms are good, many are indifferent, and a few are infamous. In them are mingled the vices and virtues. There are verses that elevate ; verses that degrade. There are prayers for forgiveness and revenge. In the literature of the world there is nothing more heartless, more infamous, than the 109th Psalm. In the Proverbs there is much shrewdness, many pithy and prudent maxims, many wise sayings. The same ideas are expressed in many ways—the wisdom of economy and silence, the dangers of vanity and idleness. Some are trivial, some are foolish, and many are wise. These pro­ verbs are not generous—not altruistic. Sayings to the same effect are found among all nations. �About the Holy Bible. 27 Ecclesiastes is the most thoughtful book in the Bible. It was written by an unbeliever—a philosopher—an agnostic. Take out the interpolations, and it is in accordance with the thought of the nineteenth century. In this book are found the most philosophic and poetic passages in the Bible. After crossing the desert of death and crime—after read­ ing the Pentateuch, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles—it is delightful to reach this grove of palms, called the “Song of Solomon.” A drama of love—of human love; a poem without Jehovah—a poem born of the heart, and true to the divine instincts of the soul. “ I sleep, but my heart waketh.” Isaiah is the work of several. Its swollen words, its vague imagery, its prophesies and curses, its ravings against kings and nations, its laughter at the wisdom of man, its hatred of joy, have not the slightest tendency to increase the well-being of man. In this book is recorded the absurdest of all miracles. The shadow on the dial is turned back ten degrees, in order to satisfy Hezekiah that Jehovah will add fifteen years to his life. In this miracle the world, turning from west to east at the rate of more than a thousand miles an hour, is not only stopped, but made to turn the other way until the shadow on the dial went back ten degrees ! Is there in the whole world an intelligent man or woman who believes this impossible falsehood ? Jeremiah contains nothing of importance—-no facts of value; nothing but fault-finding, lamentations, croakings, wailings, curses, and promises; nothing but famine and prayer, the prosperity of the wicked, the ruin of the Jews, �28 About the Holy Bible. the captivity and return, and, at last, Jeremiah, the traitor, in the stocks and in prison. And Lamentations is simply a continuance of the ravings of the same insane pessimist; nothing but dust and sack­ cloth and ashes, tears and howls, railings and revilings. And Ezekiel—eating manuscripts, prophesying siege and desolation, with visions of coals of fire, and cherubim, and wheels with eyes, and the type and figure of the boiling pot, and the resurrection of dry bones—is of no use, of no possible value. With Voltaire, I say that anyone who admires Ezekiel should be compelled to dine with him. Daniel is a disordered dream—a nightmare. What can be made of this book with its image with a golden head, with breast and arms of silver, with belly and thighs of brass, with legs of iron, and with feet of iron and clay; with its writing on the wall, its den of lions, and its vision of the ram and goat ? Is there anything to be learned from Hosea and his wife? Is there anything of use in Joel, in Amos, in Obadiah? Can we get any good from Jonah and his gourd ? Is it possible that God is the real author of Micah and Nahum, of Habakkuk and Zephaniah, of Haggai and Malachi and Zechariah, with his red horses, his four horns, his four carpenters, his flying roll, his mountains of brass, and the stone with four eyes ? Is there anything in these “inspired” books that has been of benefit to man? Have they taught us how to cultivate the earth, to build houses, to weave cloth, to prepare food ? Have they taught us to paint pictures, to chisel statues, to build bridges, or ships, or anything of beauty or of use ? Did we get our �About the Holy Bible. 29 ideas of government, of religious freedom, of the liberty of thought, from the Old Testament ? Did we get from any of these books a hint of any science? Is there in the “ sacred volume ” a word, a line, that has added to the wealth, the intelligence, and the happiness of mankind? Is there one of the books of the Old Testament as enter­ taining as Robinson Crusoe, the Travels of Gulliver, or Peter Wilkins and his Flying Wife? Did the author of Genesis know as much about nature as Humboldt, or Darwin, or Haeckel ? Is what is called the Mosaic Code as wise or as merciful as the code of any civilised nation ? Were the writers of Kings and Chronicles as great his­ torians, as great writers, as Gibbon and Draper ? Is Jeremiah or Habakkuk equal to Dickens or Thackeray ? Can the authors of Job and the Psalms be compared with Shakespeare? Why should we attribute the best to man and the worst to God ? �3° About the Holy Bible. N. WAS JEHOVAH A GOD OF LOVE ? Did these words come from the heart of love ?— “When the Lord thy God shall drive them before thee, thou shalt smite them and utterly destroy them ; thou shalt make no covenant with them, or show mercy unto them.” 111 will heap mischief upon them. I will send mine arrows upon them ; they shall be burned with hunger and devoured with burning heat and with bitter destruction.” “ I will send the tooth of beasts upon them, with the poison of serpents of the dust.” “ The sword without, and terror within, shall destroy both the young man and the virgin; the suckling also with the man of gray hairs.” “ Let his children be fatherless and his wife a widow; let his children be continually vagabonds and beg; let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places; let the extortioner catch all that he hath, and let the stranger spoil his labor; let there be none to extend mercy unto him, neither let there be any to favor his fatherless children.” “ And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body—the flesh of thy sons and daughters.” “ And the heaven that is over thee shall be brass, and the earth that is under thee shall be iron.” “ Cursed shalt thou be in the city, and cursed shalt thou be in the field.” “ I will make my arrows drunk with blood.” “ I will laugh at their calamity.” �About the Holy Bible. 3i • Did these curses, these threats, come from the heart of love or from the mouth of savagery ? Was Jehovah god or devil ? Why should we place Jehovah above all the gods ? Has man in his ignorance and fear ever imagined a greater monster ? Have the barbarians of any land, in any time, worshipped a more heartless god ? Brahma was a thousand times nobler, and so were Osiris and Zeus and Jupiter. So was the supreme god of the Aztecs, to whom they offered only the perfume of flowers. The worst god of the Hindus, with his necklace of skulls and his bracelets of living snakes, was kind and merciful compared with Jehovah. Compared with Marcus Aurelius, how small Jehovah seems. Compared with Abraham Lincoln, how cruel, how contemptible, is this god. �32 About the Holy Bible. VI. jehovah’s administration. He created the world, the hosts of heaven, a man and woman—placed them in a garden. Then the serpent deceived them, and they were cast out and made to earn their bread. Jehovah had been thwarted. Then he tried again. He went on for about sixteen hundred years trying to civilise the people. No schools, no churches, no Bible, no tracts—nobody taught to read or write. No Ten Commandments. The people grew worse and worse, until the merciful Jehovah sent the flood and drowned all the people except Noah and his family, eight in all. Then he started again, and changed their diet. At first Adam and Eve were vegetarians. After the flood Jehovah said : “ Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you ”—snakes and buzzards. Then he failed again, and at the Tower of Babel he dispersed and scattered the people. Finding that he could not succeed with all the people, he thought he would try a few, so he selected Abraham and his descendants. Again he failed, and his chosen people were captured by the Egyptians and enslaved for four hundred years. Then he tried again—rescued them from Pharaoh and started for Palestine. Then he changed their diet, allowing them to eat only �About the Holy Bible. 33 the beasts that parted the hoof and chewed the cud. Again he failed. The people hated him, and preferred the slavery of Egypt to the freedom of Jehovah. So he kept them wandering until nearly all who came from Egypt had died. Then he tried again—took them into Palestine, and had them governed by judges. This, too, was a failure—no schools, no Bible. Then he tried kings, and the kings were mostly idolaters. Then the chosen people were conquered and carried into captivity by the Babylonians. Another failure. Then they returned, and Jehovah tried prophets—howlers and waiters—but the people grew worse and worse. No schools, no sciences, no arts, no commerce. Then Jehovah took upon himself flesh, was born of a woman, and lived among the people that he had been trying to civilise for several thousand years. Then these people, following the law that Jehovah had given them in the wilderness, charged this Jehovah-man—this Christ—with blasphemy; tried, con­ victed, and killed him. Jehovah had failed again. Then he deserted the Jews and turned his attention to the rest of the world. And now the Jews, deserted by Jehovah, persecuted by Christians, are the most prosperous people on the earth. Again has Jehovah failed. What an administration ! �34 About the Holy Bible VII. THE NEW TESTAMENT. Who wrote the New Testament ? Christian scholars admit that they do not know. 1 hey admit that, if the four gospels were written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, they must have been written in Hebrew. And yet a Hebrew manuscript of any one of these gospels has never been found. All have been, and are, in Greek. So, educated theologians admit that the Epistles, James and Jude, were written by persons who had never seen one of the four gospels. In these Epistles in James and Jude—no reference is made to any of the gospels, nor to any miracle recorded in them. The first mention that has been found of one of our gospels was made about one hundred and eighty years after the birth of Christ, and the four gospels were first named and quoted from at the beginning of the third century, about one hundred and seventy years after the death of Christ. We now know that there were many other gospels besides our four, some of which have been lost. There were the gospels of Paul, of the Egyptians, of the Hebrews, of Perfection, of Judas, of Thaddeus, of the Infancy, of Thomas, of Mary, of Andrew, of Nicodemus, of Marcion, and several others. So there were the Acts of Pilate, of Andrew, of Mary, of Paul and Thecla, and of many others. Another book called the Shepherd of Hermes. �About the Holy Bible. 35 At first not one of all the books was considered as inspired. The Old Testament was regarded as divine; but the books that now constitute the New Testament were regarded as human productions. We now know that we do not know who wrote the four gospels. ■ The question is, Were the authors of these four gospels inspired ? If they were inspired, then the four gospels must be true. If they are true, they must agree. The four gospels do not agree. Matthew, Mark, and Luke knew nothing of the Atone­ ment, nothing of salvation by faith. They knew only the gospel of good deeds—of charity. They teach that if we forgive others God will forgive us. With this the gospel of John does not agree. In that gospel we are taught that we must believe on the Lord Jesus Christ; that we must be born again; that we must drink the blood and eat the flesh of Christ. In this gospel we find the doctrine of the Atonement, and that Christ died for us and suffered in our place. This gospel is utterly at variance with the other three. If the other three are true, the gospel of John is false. If the gospel of John was written by an in­ spired man, the writers of the other three were un­ inspired. From this there is no possible escape. The four cannot be true. It is evident that there are many interpolations in the four gospels. For instance, in the 28th chapter of Matthew is an account to the effect that the soldiers at the tomb of Christ were bribed to say that the disciples of Jesus stole away his body while they, the soldiers, slept. �36 About the Holy Bible. This is clearly an interpolation. It is a break in the narrative. The 10th verse should be followed by the 16th. The 10th verse is as follows : “Then Jesus said unto them, ‘Be not afraid ; go tell my brethren that they go into Galilee, and there shall they see me.’ ” The 16th verse : “ Then the eleven disciples went away unto Galilee into a mountain, where Jesus had appointed them.” The story about the soldiers contained in the nth, 12th, 13th, 14th, and 15 th verses is an interpolation—an afterthought—long after. The 15th verse demonstrates this. Fifteenth verse : “ So they took the money and did as they were taught. And this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day.” Certainly, this account was not in the original gospel, and certainly the 15th verse was not written by a Jew. No Jew could have written this: “And this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day.” Mark, John, and Luke never heard that the soldiers had been bribed by the priests; or, if they had, did not think it worth while recording. So the accounts of the Ascension of Jesus Christ in Mark and Luke are interpolations. Matthew says nothing about the Ascension. Certainly there never was a greater miracle, and yet Matthew, who was present—who saw the Lord rise, ascend, and disappear—did not think it worth mentioning. On the other hand, the last words of Christ, according to Matthew, contradict the Ascension : “ Lo I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.” �About the Holy Bible. 37 John, who was present, if Christ really ascended, says not one word on the subject. As to the Ascension, the gospels do not agree. Mark gives the last conversation that Christ had with his disciples, as follows : “ Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptised shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned. And these signs shall follow them that believe : In my name shall they cast out devils ; they shall speak with new tongues. They shall take up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt them ; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover. So, then, after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.” Is it possible that this description was written by one who witnessed this miracle ? This miracle is described by Luke as follows: “ And it came to pass while he blessed them he was parted from them, and carried up into heaven.” “ Brevity is the soul of wit.” In the Acts we are told that: “ When he had spoken, while they beheld, he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight.” Neither Luke, nor Matthew, nor John, nor the writer of the Acts, heard one word of the conversation attributed to Christ by Mark. The fact is that the Ascension of Christ was not claimed by his disciples. At first Christ was a man—nothing more. Mary was his mother, Joseph his father. The genealogy of his father, Joseph, was given to show that he was of the blood of David. Then the claim was made that he was the son of God, �38 About the Holy Bible. and that his mother was a virgin, and that she remained a virgin until her death. Then the claim was made that Christ rose from the dead, and ascended bodily to heaven. It required many years for these absurdities to take pos­ session of the minds of men. If Christ rose from the dead, why did he not appear to his enemies ? Why did he not call on Caiphas, the high priest ? Why did he not make another triumphal entry into Jerusalem ? If he really ascended, why did he not do so in public, in the presence of his persecutors ? Why should this, the greatest of miracles, be done in secret in a corner ? It was a miracle that could have been seen by a vast multitude—a miracle that could not be simulated—one that would have convinced hundreds of thousands. After the story of the Resurrection, the Ascension became a necessity. They had to dispose of the body. So there are many other interpolations in the gospels and epistles. Again I ask : Is the New Testament true ? Does any body now believe that at the birth of Christ there was a celestial greeting; that a star led the Wise Men of the East; that Herod slew the babes of Bethlehem of two years old and under ? The gospels are filled with accounts of miracles. Were they ever performed ? Matthew gives the particulars of about twenty-two miracles, Mark of about nineteen, Luke of about eighteen, and John of about seven. According to the gospels, Christ healed diseases, cast out devils, rebuked the sea, cured the blind, fed multitudes with �About the Holy Bible. 39 five loaves and two fishes, walked on the sea, cursed a fig tree, turned water into wine, and raised the dead. Matthew is the only one that tells about the Star and the Wise Men—the only one that tells about the murder of babes. John is the only one who says anything about the resur­ rection of Lazarus, and Luke is the only one giving an account of the raising from the dead the widow of Nain’s son. How is it possible to substantiate these miracles ? The Jews, among whom they were said to have been performed, did not believe them. The diseased, thè palsied, the leprous, the blind who were cured, did not become followers of Christ. Those that were raised from the dead were never heard of again. Does any intelligent man believe in the existence of devils ? The writer of three of the gospels certainly did. John says nothing about Christ having cast out devils, but Matthew, Mark, and Luke give many instances. Does any natural man now believe that Christ cast out devils? If his disciples said he did, they were mistaken. If Christ said he did, he was insane, or an impostor. If the accounts of casting out devils are false, then the writers were ignorant or dishonest. If they wrote through ignorance, then they were not inspired. If they wrote what they knew to be false, they were not inspired. If what they wrote is untrue, whether they knew it or not, they were not inspired. At that time it was believed that palsy, epilepsy, deafness, insanity, and many other diseases, were caused by devils ; that devils took possession of, and lived in, the bodies of men and women. Christ believed this, taught this belief to �4° About the Holy Bible. others, and pretended to cure diseases by casting devils out of the sick and insane. We know now, if we know anything, that diseases are not caused by the presence of devils. We know, if we know anything, that devils do not reside in the bodies of men. If Christ said and did what the writers of the three gospels say he said and did, then Christ was mistaken. If he was mistaken, certainly he was not God. And if he was mis­ taken, certainly he was not inspired. Is it a fact that the Devil tried to bribe Christ ? Is it a fact that the Devil carried Christ to the top of the temple, and tried to induce him to leap to the ground ? How can these miracles be established ? The principals have written nothing, Christ has written nothing, and the Devil has remained silent. How can we know that the Devil tried to bribe Christ ? Who wrote the account ? We do not know. How did the writer get his information ? We do not know. Somebody, some seventeen hundred years ago, said that the Devil tried to bribe God; that the Devil carried God to the top of the temple, and tried to induce him to leap to the earth, and that God was intellectually too keen for the Devil. This is all the evidence we have. Is there anything in the literature of the world more per­ fectly idiotic ? Intelligent people no longer believe in witches, wizards, spooks, and devils, and they are perfectly satisfied that every word in the New Testament about casting out devils is utterly false. Can we believe that Christ raised the dead ? A widow living in Nain is following the body of her son to the tomb. Christ halts the funeral procession, and raises �About the Holy Bible. 4i the young man from the dead, and gives him back to the arms of his mother. This young man disappears. He is never heard of again. No one takes the slightest interest in the man who returned from the realm of death. Luke is the only one who tells the story. Maybe Matthew, Mark, and John never heard of it, or did not believe it, and so failed to record it. John says that Lazarus was raised from the dead; Matthew, Mark, and Luke say nothing about it. It was more wonderful than the raising of the widow’s son. He had not been laid in the tomb for days. He was only on his way to the grave, but Lazarus was actually dead. He had begun to decay. Lazarus did not excite the least interest. No one asked him about the other world. No one inquired of him about their dead friends. When he died the second time no one said : “ He is not afraid. He has travelled that road twice, and knows just where he is going.” We do not believe in the miracles of Mohammed, and yet they are as well attested as this. We have no confidence in the miracles performed by Joseph Smith, and yet the evi­ dence is far greater, far better. If a man should go about now pretending to raise the dead, pretending to cast out devils, we would regard him as insane; What, then, can we say of Christ ? If we wish to save his reputation, we are compelled to say that he never pretended to raise the dead; that he never claimed to have cast out devils. We must take the ground that these ignorant and im­ possible things were invented by zealous disciples, who sought to deify their leader. �42 About the Holy Bible. In those ignorant days these falsehoods added to the fame of Christ. But now they put his character in peril and belittle the authors of the gospels. Can we now believe that water was changed into wine ? John tells of this childish miracle, and says that the other disciples were present; yet Matthew, Mark, and Luke say nothing about it. Take the miracle of the man cured by the pool of Bethesda. John says that an angel troubled the waters of the pool of Bethesda, and that whoever got into the pool first after the waters were troubled was healed. Does anybody now believe that an angel went into the pool and troubled the waters ? Does anybody now think that the poor wretch who got in first was healed? Yet the author of the Gospel according to John believed and asserted these absurdities. If he was mistaken about that, he may have been about all the miracles he records. John is the only one who tells about this pool of Bethesda. Possibly the other disciples did not believe the story. How can we account for these pretended miracles ? In the days of the disciples, and for many centuries after, the world was filled with the supernatural. Nearly every­ thing that happened was regarded as miraculous. God was the immediate governor of the world. If the people were good, God sent seed time and harvest; but if they were bad, he sent flood and hail, frost and famine. If anything wonderful happened, it was exaggerated until it became a miracle. Of the order of events—of the unbroken and the unbreak­ able chain of causes and effects—the people had no know­ ledge and no thought. �About the Holy Bible. 43 A miracle is the badge and brand of fraud. No miracle ever was performed. No intelligent, honest man ever pre­ tended to perform a miracle, and never will. If Christ had wrought the miracles attributed to him; if he had cured the palsied and insane; if he had given hearing to the deaf, vision to the blind ; if he had cleansed the leper with a word, and with a touch had given life and feeling to the withered limb; if he had given pulse and motion, warmth and thought, to cold and breathless clay; if he had conquered death and rescued from the grave its pallid prey, no word would have been uttered, no hand raised, except in praise and honor. In his presence all heads would have been uncovered—all knees upon the ground. Is it not strange that at the trial of Christ no one was found to say a word in his favor ? No man stood forth and said : “ I was a leper, and this man cured me with a touch.” No woman said : “ I am a widow of Nain, and this is my son whom this man raised from the dead.” No man said: “ I was blind, and this man gave me sight.” All silent. �44 About the Holy Bible. VIII. THE PHILOSOPHY OF CHRIST. Millions assert that the philosophy of Christ is perfect— that he was the wisest that ever uttered speech. Let us see : Resist not evil. If smitten on one cheek, turn the other. Is there any philosophy, any wisdom in this ? Christ takes from goodness, from virtue, from the truth, the right of self-defence. Vice becomes the master of the world, and the good become the victims of the infamous. No man has the right to protect himself, his property, his wife and children. Government becomes impossible, and the world is at the mercy of criminals. Is there any absurdity beyond this ? Love your enemies. Is this possible ? Did any human being ever love his enemies ? Did Christ love his when he denounced them as whited sepulchres, hypocrites, and vipers ? We cannot love those who hate us. Hatred in the hearts of others does not breed love in ours. Not to resist evil is absurd ; to love your enemies is impossible. Take no thought for the morrow. The idea was that God would take care of us as he did of sparrows and lilies. Is there the least sense in that belief? Does God take care of anybody ? Can we live without taking thought for the morrow ? To plough, to sow, to cultivate, to harvest, is to take thought for �About the Holy Bible. 45 the morrow. We plan and work for the future, for our children, for the unborn generations to come. Without this forethought there could be no progress, no civilisation. The world would go back to the caves and dens of savagery. If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out. If thy right hand offend thee, cut it off. Why? Because it is better that one of our members should perish than that the whole body should be cast into hell. Is there any wisdom in putting out your eyes or cutting off your hands ? Is it possible to extract from these extrava­ gant sayings the smallest grain of common sense ? Swear not at all; neither by Heaven, for it is God s throne ; nor by the Earth, for it is his footstool: nor by ferusalem, for it is his holy city. Here we find the astronomy and geology of Christ. Heaven is the throne of God, the monarch ; the earth is his footstool. A footstool that turns over at the rate of a thousand miles an hour, and sweeps through space at the rate of over a thousand miles a minute ! Where did Christ think heaven was ? Why was Jerusalem a holy city? Was it because the inhabitants were ignorant, cruel, and superstitious,? Ifa man sue thee at law and take away your coat, give him your cloak also. Is there any philosophy, any good sense, in that com­ mandment ? Would it not be just as sensible to say : “ If a man obtains a judgment against you for one hundred dollars, give him two hundred ” ? Only the insane could give or follow this advice. Think not I am come to send peace on earth. I came not to �46 About the Holy Bible. send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother. If this is true, how much better it would have been had he remained away. Is it possible that he who said, “ Resist not evil,” came to bring a sword ? That he who said, “ Love your enemies,” came to destroy the peace of the world ? To set father against son, and daughter against father—what a glorious mission ! He did bring a sword, and the sword was wet for a thousand years with innocent blood. In millions of hearts he sowed the seeds of hatred and revenge. He divided nations and families, put out the light of reason, and petrified the hearts of men. And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an .hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life. According to the writer of Matthew, Christ, the com­ passionate, the merciful, uttered these terrible words. Is it possible that Christ offered the bribe of eternal joy to those who would desert their fathers, their mothers, their wives and children ? Are we to win the happiness of heaven by deserting the ones we love ? Is a home to be ruined here for the sake of a mansion there ? And yet it is said that Christ is an example for all the world. Did he desert his father and mother ? He said, speaking to his mother : “ Woman, what have I to do with thee ?” The Pharisees said unto Christ: Is it lawful to pay tribute unto Caesar ? �About the Holy Bible. 47 Christ said : “ Show me the tribute money. They brought him a penny. And he saith unto them : “ Whose is the image and the superscription ?” They said: “ Caesar’s.” And Christ said : “ Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s.” Did Christ think that the money belonged to Caesar because his image and superscription were stamped upon it ? Did the penny belong to Caesar, or to the man who had earned it ? Had Caesar the right to demand it because it was adorned with his image ? Does it appear from this conversation that Christ under­ stood the real nature and use of money ? Can we now say that Christ was the greatest of philosophers ? �About the Holy Bible. IX. IS CHRIST OUR EXAMPLE? He never said a word in favor of education. He never even hinted at the existence of any science. He never uttered a word in favor of industry, economy, or of any effort to better our condition in this world. He was the enemy of the successful, of the wealthy. Dives was sent to hell, not because he was bad, but because he was rich. Lazarus went to heaven, not because he was good, but because he was poor. Christ cared nothing for painting, for sculpture, for music —nothing for any art. He said nothing about the duties of nation to nation, of king to subject; nothing about the rights of man; nothing about intellectual liberty or the freedom of speech. He said nothing about the sacredness of home; not one word for the fireside ; not a word in favor of marriage, in honor of maternity. He never married. He wandered homeless from place to place with a few disciples. None of them seem to have been engaged in any useful business, and they seem to have lived on alms. All human ties were held in contempt; this world was sacrificed for the next; all human effort was discouraged. God would support and protect. At last, in the dusk of death, Christ, finding that he was mistaken, cried out: “ My God! My God! Why hast thou forsaken me ?” We have found that man must depend on himself. �About the Holy Bible. 49 Île must clear the land; he must build the home; he must plough and plant ; he must invent ; he must work with hand and brain; he must overcome the difficulties and obstructions ; he must conquer and enslave the forces of nature to the end that they may do the work of the world. �5° About the Holy Bible, X. WHY SHOULD WE PLACE CHRIST AT THE TOP AND SUMMIT OF THE HUMAN RACE ? Was he kinder, more forgiving, more self-sacrificing than Buddha? Was he wiser, did he meet death with more perfect calmness, than Socrates ? Was he more patient, more charitable, than Epictetus? Was he a greater philosopher, a deeper thinker, than Epicurus? In what respect was he the superior of Zoroaster ? Was he gentler than Laotse, more universal than Confucius ? Were his ideas of human rights and duties superior to those of Zeno ? Did he express grander truths than Cicero ? Was his mind subtler than Spinoza’s ? Was his brain equal to Kepler’s or Newton’s? Was‘he grander in death—a sublimer martyr than Bruno ? Was he in intelligence, in the force and beauty of expression, in breadth and scope of thought, in wealth of illustration, in aptness of comparison, in knowledge of the human brain and heart, of all passions, hopes, and fears, the equal of Shakespeare, the greatest of the human race ? If Christ was in fact God, he knew all the future. Before him like a panorama moved the history yet to be. He knew how his words would be interpreted. He knew what crimes, what horrors, what infamies, would be committed in his name. He knew that the hungry flames of persecution would climb around the limbs of countless martyrs. He knew that thousands and thousands of brave men and women would languish in dungeons in darkness, filled with �About the Holy Bible. 5i pain. He knew that his Church would invent and use instruments of torture ; that his followers would appeal to whip and fagot, to chain and rack. He saw the horizon of the future lurid with the flames of the auto da fé. He knew what creeds would spring like poisonous fungi from every text. He saw the ignorant sects waging war against each other. He saw thousands of men, under the orders of priests, building prisons for their fellow-men. He saw thousands of scaffolds dripping with the best and bravest blood. He saw his followers using the instruments of pain. He heard the groans—saw the faces white with agony. He heard the shrieks and sobs and cries of all the moaning, martyred multitudes. He knew that commentaries would be written on his words with swords, to be read by the light of fagots. He knew that the Inquisition would be born of the teachings attributed to him. He saw the interpolations and falsehoods that hypocrisy would write and tell. He saw all wars that would be waged, and he knew that above these fields of death, these dungeons, these rackings, these burnings, these executions, for a thousand years would float the dripping banner of the cross. He knew that hypocrisy would be robed and crowned— that cruelty and credulity would rule the world ; knew that liberty would perish from the earth ; knew that popes and kings in his name would enslave the souls and bodies of men ; knew that they would persecute and destroy the dis­ coverers, thinkers, and inventors ; knew that his Church would extinguish reason’s holy light, and leave the world without a star. He saw his disciples extinguishing the eyes of men, flay­ ing them alive, cutting out their tongues, seaching for all the nerves of pain. �52 About the Holy Bible. He knew that in his name his followers would trade in human flesh; that cradles would be robbed and women’s breasts unbabed for gold. And yet he died with voiceless lips. Why did he fail to speak? Why did he not tell his disciples, and through them the world: “You shall not burn, imprison, and torture in my name. You shall not persecute your fellow-men.” Why did he not plainly say “ I am the Son of God,” or “lam God ” ? Why did he not explain the Trinity ? Why did he not tell the mode of baptism that was pleasing to him ? Why did he not write a creed ? Why did he not break the chains of slaves ? Why did he not say that the Old Testament was or was not the inspired word of God ? Why did he not write the New Testament himself? Why did he leave his words to ignorance, hypocrisy, and chance ? Why did he not say something positive, definite, and satisfactory about another world ? Why did he not turn the tear-stained hope of heaven into the glad knowledge of another life ? Why did he not tell us something of the rights of man, of the liberty of hand and brain ? Why did he go dumbly to his death, leaving the world to misery and to doubt ? I will tell you why. He was a man, and did not know. �About the Holy Bible. 53 XI. INSPIRATION. Not before about the third century was it claimed or believed that the books composing the New Testament were inspired. It will be remembered that there were a great number of books, of Gospels, Epistles, and Acts, and that from these the “ inspired ” ones were selected by “ uninspired ” men. Between the “Fathers” there were great differences of opinion as to which books were inspired; much discussion and plenty of hatred. Many of the books now deemed spurious were by many of the “ Fathers ” regarded as divine, and some now regarded as inspired were believed to be spurious. Many of the early Christians and some of the “Fathers” repudiated the gospel of John, the Epistle to the Hebrews, Jude, James, Peter, and the Revelation of St. John. On phe other hand, many of them regarded the Gospel of the Hebrews, of the Egyptians, the Preaching of Peter, the Shepherd of Hermas, the Epistle of Barnabus, the Pastor of Hermas, the Revelation of Peter, the Revelation of Paul, the Epistle of Clement, the Gospel of Nicodemus, inspired books, equal to the very best. From all these books, and many others, the Christians selected the inspired ones. The men who did the selecting were ignorant and superstitious. They were firm believers in the miraculous. They thought that diseases had been cured by the aprons and handkerchiefs of the apostles, by the bones of the �54 About the Holy Bible. dead. They believed in the fable of the Phoenix, and that the hyenas changed their sex every year. Were the men who through many centuries made the selections inspired ? Were they—ignorant, credulous, stupid, and malicious—as well qualified to judge of “ in­ spiration ” as the students of our time ? How are we bound by their opinion ? Have we not the right to judge for ourselves? Erasmus, one of the leaders of the Reformation, declared that the Epistle to the Hebrews was not written by Paul, and he denied the inspiration of Second and Third John, and also of Revelation. Luther was of the same opinion. He declared James to be an epistle of straw, and denied the inspiration of Revelation. Zwinglius rejected the book of Revelation, and even Calvin denied that Paul was the author of Hebrews. The truth is that the Protestants did not agree as to what books are inspired until 1647, by the Assembly of West­ minster. To prove that a book is inspired you must prove the existence of God. You must also prove that this God thinks, acts, has objects, ends, and aims. This is somewhat difficult. It is impossible to conceive of an infinite being. Having no conception of an infinite being, it is impossible to tell whether all the facts we know tend to prove or disprove the existence of such a being. God is a guess. If the existence of God is admitted, how are we to prove that he inspired the writers of the books of the Bible ? How can one man establish the inspiration of another ? How can an inspired man prove that he is inspired ? How �About the Holy Bible. 55 can he know himself that he is inspired ? There is no way to prove the fact of inspiration. The only evidence is the word of some man who could by no possibility know any­ thing on the subject. What is inspiration ? Did God use men as instruments ? Did he cause them to write his thoughts ? Did he take possession of their minds and destroy their wills ? Were these writers only partly controlled, so that their mistakes, their ignorance, and their prejudices were mingled with the wisdom of God? How are we to separate the mistakes of men from the thoughts of God ? Can we do this without being inspired ourselves ? If the original writers were inspired, then the translators should have been, and so should be the men who tell us what the Bible means. How is it possible for a human being to know that he is inspired by an infinite being ? But of one thing we may be certain : An inspired book should certainly excel all the books produced by uninspired men. It should, above all, be true, filled with wisdom, blossoming in beauty—perfect. Ministers wonder how I can be wicked enough to attack the Bible. I will tell them : This book, the Bible, has persecuted, even unto death, the wisest and the best. This book stayed and stopped the onward movement of the human race. This book poisoned the fountains of learning and misdirected the energies of man. This book is the enemy of freedom, the support of slavery. This book sowed the seeds of hatred in families and nations, fed the flames of war, and impoverished the �56 About the Holy Bible. world. This book is the breastwork of kings and tyrants— the enslaver of women and children. This book has corrupted parliaments and courts. This book has made colleges and universities the teachers of error and the haters of science. This book has filled Christendom with hateful, cruel, ignorant, and warring sects. This book taught men to kill their fellows for religion’s sake. This book founded the inquisition, invented the instruments of torture, built the dungeons in which the good and loving languished, forged the chains that rusted in their flesh, erected the scaffolds whereon they died. This book piled fagots about the feet of the just. This book drove reason from the'minds of millions, and filled the asylums with the insane. This book has caused fathers and mothers to shed the blood of their babes. This book was the auction block on which the slave-mother stood when she was sold from her child. This book filled the sails of the slave-trader, and made merchandise of human flesh. This book lighted the fires that burned “witches” and “wizards.” This book filled the darkness with ghouls and ghosts, and the bodies of men and women with devils. This book polluted the souls of men with the infamous dogma of eternal pain. This book made credulity the greatest of virtues, and investigation [the greatest of crimes. This book filled nations with hermits, monks, and nuns—with the pious and the useless. This book placed the ignorant and unclean saint above the philosopher and philanthropist. This book taught man to despise the joys of this life, that he might be happy in another—to waste this world for the sake of the next. I attack this book because it is the enemy of human �About the Holy Bible. 57 liberty—the greatest obstruction across the highway of human progress. Let me ask the ministers one question : How can you be wicked enough to defend this book ? �58 About the Holy Bible. XII. THE REAL BIBLE. For thousands of years men have been writing the real Bible, and it is being written from day to day, and it will never be finished while man has life. All the facts that we know, all the truly recorded events, all the discoveries and inventions, all the wonderful machines whose wheels and levers seem to think, all the poems, crystals from the brain, flowers from the heart, all the songs of love and joy, of smiles and tears, the great dramas of Imagination’s world, the wondrous paintings, miracles of form and color, of light and shade, the marvellous marbles that seem to live and breathe, the secrets told by rock and star, by dust and flower, by rain and snow, by frost and flame, by winding stream and desert sand, by mountain range and billowed sea. All the wisdom that lengthens and ennobles life—all that avoids or cures disease, or conquers pain—all just and perfect laws and rules that guide and shape our lives, all thoughts that feed the flames of love, the music that trans­ figures, enraptures, and enthralls, the victories of heart and brain, the miracles that hands have wrought, the deft and cunning hands of those who worked for wife and child, the histories of noble deeds, of brave and useful men, of faithful loving wives, of quenchless mother­ love, of conflicts for the right, of sufferings for the truth, of all the best that all the men and women of the �About the Holy Bible. 59 world have said, and thought, and done through all the years. These treasures of the heart and brain—these are the Sacred Scriptures of the human race. ��Works by Colonel R. G. Ingersoll. hy am Some Mistakes of Moses. WPart I. 2d. I The only complete edition in England. Accurate as Colenso, Why am I an Agnostic ? an Agnostic? Part II. 2d. and fascinating as a novel. ^3'2pp. Is. Superior paper, cloth is. od. Faith and Fact. Reply to Defence of Freethought. Dr. Field. 2d. A Five Hours’ Speech at the Trial God and Man. Second reply to Dr. Field. 2d. of C. B. Reynolds for Blasphemy. The Dying Creed. 2d. 6d. The Limits of Toleration. The Gods. 6d. Reply to Gladstone. With, A Discussion with the Hon. F. D. Coudert and Gov. S. L. Woodford. a Biography by J. M. Wheeler. 2d. Rome or Reason? A Reply The Household of Faith. to Cardinal Manning. 4d. 2d. _ Crimes against Criminals. Art and Morality. 2d. Do I Blaspheme? 2d. 3d. Oration on Walt Whitman. The Clergy and Common 3d. , Sense. 2d. Oration on Voltaire. 3d. Social Salvation. 2d. Abraham Lincoln. 3d. Marriage and Divorce. An Paine the Pioneer. 2d. Agnostic’s View. 2d. Humanity’s Debt to Thomas Skulls. 2d. Paine. 2d. The Great Mistake. Id. Ernest Renan and Jesus Live Topics. Id. Christ. 2d. Myth and Miracle. Id. True Religion. 2d. . Id. The Three Philanthropists. Real Blasphemydols. Id. Repairing the I 2d. Christ and Miracles. Id. Love the Redeemer. 2d. Creeds & Spirituality. Id. God and the State. 2d. London : R. Forder, 28 Stonecutter-street, E.C. THOMAS PAINE’S WORKS. The Age of Reason. New edition, with Preface by G, W. Foote. Is. Miscellaneous Theological Works, is. Complete Theological Works. (Including the Age of Reason.) Cloth, 2s. 6d. The Rights of Man. Centenary edition. With a Political Biography by J. 1VE. Wheeler. Is. j bound in cloth., 2s. London : R. Forder, 28 Stonecutter-street, E.C. �Vol. I., cloth gilt, 216 pp., 2s. 6d., post free, CRIMES OF CHRISTIANITY. BY G. W. FOOTE AND J. M. WHEELER. Hundreds of exact References to Standard Authorities. No pains spared to make it a complete, trustworthy, final, unanswerable Indictment of Christianity. Chapters :—1, Christ to Constantine; 2, Constantine to Hypatia; 3, Monkery; Pious Forgeries; 5, Pious Frauds ; 6, Rise of the Papacy 7, Crimes of the Popes ; 8, Persecution of the Jews; 9, The Crusades. “ The book is very carefully compiled, the references are given with exactitude, and the work is calculated to be of the greatest use to the opponents of Christianity.”—0. Bradlaugh, in National Reformer. “The book is worth reading. It is fair, and, on the whole, correct.” — Weekly Times. „ book has a purpose, and is entitled to a fair hearing.”—Hudders­ field, Examiner. “The work should be scattered like autumn leaves.”—Ironclad Aqe (U.S.A.). u London : R. Forder, 28 Stonecutter-street, E.C. 221 pp., bound in cloth, 2s. 6d., post free, FLOWERS OF FREETHOUGHT (FIRST SERIES) BY G. Old Nick Fire ! ! ! Sky Pilots Devil Dodgers Fighting Spooks Damned Sinners Where is Hell ? 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READ THE FREETHINKER. Edited by G. W. FOOTE. Published every Thursday. Price Twopence London : R. Forder, 28 Stonecutter-street, E.C. � 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 &amp; 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 An entity primarily responsible for making the resource 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 The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data 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 A name given to the resource About the Holy Bible : a lecture Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Ingersoll, Robert Green [1833-1899] Description An account of the resource Place of publication: London Collation: 59, [4] p. ; 18 cm. Notes: Publisher's advertisements on unnumbered pages at the end. No. 1b in Stein checklist. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available R. Forder Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1894 Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N322 Subject The topic of the resource Bible Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <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 (About the Holy Bible : a lecture), 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> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Agnosticism Bible-Criticism NSS https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/bcab6b895a4a8eab5f7f64944f998c37.pdf?Expires=1785369600&Signature=Wu%7E4bbF7W1b5YMfwbDNIDdRmRzKm5JcRNt2E7IPUpYIjt1MgXG90Ur7dS-hBK%7EWSlrJDJGp8L8u3Tr20Y-h-lBxJBVv35RlqCZvkf0QZ64jeJjJzh-NJ%7EWtb3VQAHGRos9ALdhiwVMrHIjpFS5ddZUZOUFezTw3zxShUa5Yujcb-VOyC5iC3jYgKpD8gNI2a2371g2Y6X6JTYEX-bkysUcCq-O9jO5zhbNx2RhRDP1uvI8kf47nd352ZldxDujBL-mXZpRDvEi6s-9DaRAvYwLuSnZfuDf%7EhfrZ5jL6wbGlh60Ignx%7EC52QT40BE70KfvNrO9z876QfPcHwKPBF%7EGA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 128b957a49e97ef1e33f2b57d45cc97a PDF Text Text NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE: A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. BY SALADIN. Being a Paper read at the Cassadaga Conference, Neu< York, by S. P. Putnam, Secretary, American Liberal League. [reprinted from “the secular review.”] London: W. STEWART & Co., 41, FARRINGDON St., E.C. ��NS£3 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE. Where the currents of human thought and destiny are now drifting to the wisest of us cannot determine with any degree of precision. We search in vain for a precedent in the form and pressure of the present age over all the past annals of the world. It may be that history repeats itself; but wre have now reached a juncture of social, political, moral, and intellectual forces which we look for in vain back through the dim corridors of time; and how history is to repeat itself speculation is overwhelmed in the attempt to decide, and vaticination is dumb. Never in that tract of the world nominally Christian did aggressive and defiant “ Infidelity ” close and grapple with the legions of the Cross as she does to-day; and never since the Reformation era did the Scarlet Woman flaunt her skirts so proudly in the great cities of both the Eastern and Western Hemisphere. Protestantism has no geographical area that she did not win by the zealous fanaticism of her first rush. The Protestant countries of the sixteenth cen­ tury are the Protestant countries of to-day, and no new ones have been added thereto. Nay, and the old ones are rent and riven; and the seed sown by Luther and Spalatin, by Huss and Calvin, by Wycliffe and Sawtre, by Knox and Melville, has grown up almost choked with Romish weeds �4 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE : and Rational tares. The mentation and the aspiration of the fifteenth century were not identical with those that actuate the nineteenth. The floods of human folly have worn other channels, the currents of human tendency have torn their way through other rocks and over other shoals. The old battle-fields are deserted, and only through the mists of departed time can we descry them, with their rank grasses, broken and shapeless weapons, half-obliterated trenches, and dull mounds marking more or less dishonoured graves. The battalions have reeled and surged into other fields, and there, with other weapons and other battle-cries, the often-changing but never-ending tide of human conflict ebbs and flows. Guns are yet planted on the roof, and there is a rattle and blaze of musketry from the windows, of the old half-way house between Rome and Rationalism; but the shot and shell fall wide of the mark. Formerly, the old house was in the centre of operations ; now it is on the extreme left flank, and miles away the real conflict rages. The half-way house is tottering to its fall. The emergency to meet which it was built has passed away. Its giants are dead, its heroes are no more ; its prestige is over, and Ichabod is inscribed over its gateway. A shabby despotism, three centuries ago, it modified a terrible despotism, and thereby justified its existence; but now, Why cumbereth it the ground ? Hardly taking it into account in military strategy, up on the side of the windy hill the banners wave and the troops are ranking, the forces of Rationalism and Rome, and with them and no other rests the balance between victory and defeat in the Armageddon of these latter ages. Everywhere now Ecclesiasticism howls against “the spread of Infidelity,” and everywhere Romanism is active, frcm �A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. 5 New York to Birmingham. In the latter town, the other day, a church dedicated to St. Anne was opened by his Eminence, Cardinal Manning, with all the august ceremonial of pontifical High Mass. In his subtle and able dedicatory address, his Eminence is reported to have said : “ They believed all that God had revealed, unwritten and written, the old Divine traditions of the Church from the beginning —every jot and every tittle. But why did they believe this? The ‘ Word ’ in the text did not mean the Book, and they who would draw their Christianity out of the written Scrip­ ture had proved for centuries the inefficiency of that rule of faith by the multitudinous contradictions and ever-increasing diversity of the interpretation that had been put upon that Word. Without Divine certainty they could not have Divine faith, and, therefore, the wisest human critic could give him no definite certainty of the meaning of the Holy Scripture; the most learned scientific historian could not fix for him the meaning of the Word of God. No one, however pious or good; no minister of religion or priest of the Church, apart from the Divine authority of the Church itself, could venture to interpret that written word by his own light or his own discernment.” I am a soldier in the ranks of those who would face un­ told fatigue and peril to flesh their blades in the heart of Rome; but I heartily endorse the utterance of his Eminence in regard to the “wisest human critic” being unable to express any “ definite certainty of the meaning of the Holy Scripture.” So far, I, a Rationalist, am in exact accord with a Romish Cardinal. But when the learned Cardinal pro­ ceeds to say that, although the esoterics of Holy Writ are too deep for human learning, too mystical for human wisdom, they can be infallibly interpreted by “ the Divine authority �6 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE : of the Church itself,” I join issue with him, and oppose him foot to foot and hilt to hilt. I positively and emphatically deny that the Church has, in the past, shown that it could interpret Scripture more successfully than the mere “human critic” could. Nay, my Lord Cardinal, I will refer you to only one example—e.g., of how your Church interpreted a certain Scripture passage; but the example I will give is such a striking, picturesque, and conclusive one as should be able to explode forever your Church’s monstrous preten­ sions to divinely-inspired hermeneutics. It is unfortunate, your Eminence, for you and yours that our more modern times have laid the intellectual wealth of the world’s yester­ day at the feet of men who have neither post nor pension from your Church. It is unfortunate for you and yours that there are men of my type, who will read and study for many years in obscurity, anxious only to find out what is true, and never once asking what is profitable; studying for no pro­ fession, hoping for no preferment; poor, but aspiring to no gain, no crozier, no cardinal’s hat; but freely giving learning and time and life to the most thankless of all causes—to a cause that for independence gives you poverty, for celebrity gives you infamy. What a pity you have not still your Index Expurgatorius to prevent such as I from misusing the best years of their life in toiling over volumes the perusal of which can only be inimical to your hierarchy! How lament­ able that you cannot now arrest pens like mine by giving those who wield them a twinge of the thumbscrew, or make the blazing fagots at the stake reduce the hand of the writer to ashes ! Like its God, your Church is the same yesterday, to day, and forever. Among the calcined bones of the mighty you would honour me by mingling those of thi humble Scottish heretic and rebel, but that Protestantism �A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. 7 held you at bay till the party that I in some imperfect way represent grew strong; and now an enemy infinitely more terrible than Protestantism confronts you. Your Church, my Lord Cardinal, has alone the true in­ terpretation of Holy Scripture, has it? We shall see. You should have ceased to make such assertions when it became possible for men like me to unearth and decipher the works of such writers as Glaber, Abbo of Fleury, Gennadius, and Corodi. You will, no doubt, my Lord Cardinal, have heard of the Millenarian insanity of the tenth century, although you would undoubtedly rather that such as I had never heard of it. How excellently the “ Divine authority of the Church ” interpreted Revelation xx. 2-3 ! The binding of Satan for a thousand years your Church alleged began at the birth of Christ; so, of course, at the expiry of a thousand years from that date, Satan was to be let loose, and unutter­ able calamity, if not absolute annihilation, be visited upon the world. In the tenth century your Church was in full swing, with its Divine interpretations and all the rest of its monstrous jugglery; and not even one solitary bark of a heretic dog resounded through the caverns of your ecclesias­ tical Avernus. You had, or your annalists belie you, a perfect plethora of dirt and piety and plague and pestilenceLike rotten sheep, your ignorant and filthy dupes died off in tens of thousands ; while the half-naked, vermin-eaten, and nasty—but ignorant and holy—survivors crowded into your abbeys and churches and implored God to have mercy upon them; but he would not. You showed them relics, and they wanted a bath ; you treated them to the Mass, and they wanted soap ; you incited them to godliness, and they wanted cleanliness. So much attention was given to dying and to seeking the kingdom of God that the wheat and com �8 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE : and barley remained unsown, or were allowed to be destroyed by blight and mildew; and the survivors of the plague, for wild roots, had to burrow in the ground like pigs, eat rats and other vermin, and regale themselves upon diseased human flesh from the corpses of their plague-stricken dead. In this state of affairs what did your Divine and Scripture­ interpreting Church do ? What wine and oil and bread and consolation did it give to the scared and famished remnant plague and pestilence had left ? Your holy Bernhardt of Thuringia turned to the twentieth chapter of Revelation and preached the immediate end of the world. As the clock struck midnight on December 31st, 1000, the Devil would break his chains, and, with blood and fire and misery, make a prelude to the Day of Judgment. The clergy of your Church took up the cry of Bernhardt. It was howled from every abbey; it was thundered from every cathedral; and frantic monks, with cope and stole and cord, appealed in town and village and hamlet to a still more frantic populace. Portent and miracle, wraith and apparition, dark shadows on earth and blood-red signs in heaven, bore evidence to the near advent of the Day of Doom. Europe was all but ruined, but what mattered that ?—your “ divine Church ” was enriched. Kings and nobles rushed to the sanctuary to endow it with lands and wealth which they had won by carnage and fire. With the sword they had gained place and power by doing the work of the Devil, and now they devoted all to the service of God, since they should have to part with everything, anyhow, by the time the clock struck twelve, ringing in the awful millennium and usher­ ing in the end of the world. Kings and nobles, whose pastime was slaughter, as regarded men, and lust as regarded women, in spite of the dominance of the Church, grew �A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. suddenly penitent, and flung away the sword for the missal and abandoned the couch of the voluptuary for the monk’sshirt of hair. William of the Long Sword, Duke of Nor­ mandy, was fain to abandon his ducal rank and take shelter in the monkish cell. Hugh, Duke of Burgundy, was anxious to throw up all to find shelter in the monastery against the terrors of the Day of Doom; and Hugh, Count of Arles, was like-minded. The Emperor, Henry II., crownless and unkinged, presented himself at the abbey gate of St. Vanne, howling piously from the psalms : “ This shall be my rest forever; here will I dwell, for I have a delight therein.”’ Numbers of nobles left lands and castles and all to the Church and hastened to the Holy Land, bare-footed, ragged, and penniless, in the cunningly Church-inspired hope that those who, at the crack of doom, were found in the sainted clime in which the Redeemer had died would have certain immunities from the horrors and terrors about to be wrecked upon the rest of the human race. Others stubbornly and desperately remained in their doomed castles and on their estates, left to barrenness and weeds, and did not impiously attempt to propitiate the vengeance of God. But the altars were loaded with, and the church floors strewn with, legal instruments, venerable parchment, and dusty vellum, repre­ senting gifts to the Church of some of the noblest estates in Europe, and thousands upon thousands of serfs and vassals. The Church took them all, just as if the Day of Judgment had not been so close at hand. The monks, Cardinal Manning, were themselves the conveyancers, and the deeds of convey­ ance began with the stereotyped words : “ Seeing that the end of the world is now approaching, and that every day accu­ mulates fresh miseries, I, Baron--------- , for the good of my soul, give to the monastery of--------- ,” etc. The last day of �IO THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE: the world was the harvest-day of the Church, and the twen­ tieth chapter of Revelation was, for the time being, worth more than all the remainder of the Book of God. And gloriously your Church interpreted it, my Lord Cardinal, in the interests of your order. The nobles you had under your thumb by this divine gift the Church has for putting the correct meaning upon Scripture texts; and, as for the common people, they forgot all the instincts of human nature in their abject terror. They wallowed in ignorance, filth, and vermin. An eclipse of the sun became visible to the Emperor Otho’s army on their march. They at once recognised in it one of the apocalyptic “ signs in the sun.” They were paralysed with fear. They dropped their weapons, broke their ranks, and such of the screaming and disorganised rabble as terror did not render motionless fled to the mountains, literally calling to the rocks to hide them and the hills to fall upon them. On dragged the awful weeks—coming nearer and still nearer to the instant when heaven and earth should pass away. At length, at the end of the most terrible December the world has ever seen, came the last week of the year 1000 a.d. Then there were such agonising suspense, such paralysing fear, and such abandoned phrenzy as never before or since have cursed such masses of the race of man. Your Church, my Lord Cardinal, had indeed vindi­ cated its claim to be “ the divine interpreter of Scripture.” You took up the twentieth chapter of Revelation, and, by your interpretation thereof, exalted the hierarchy and well nigh ruined the world. During this terrible week the work of the world was utterly suspended. For the ring of the anvil there was the yell of the maniac; for the whirr of the shuttle there was the shriek of the madman. Drearily rose �A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. 11 the sun, and drearily set in the last few wintry days before his light was to be extinguished forever. Men held their very breath in terror. Blanched white were the dark-brown locks that so lately shaded the smooth and open brow of youth. In the halls of luxury, where the arras was of the richest, where the patines were of gold, and where the air was heavy with odours, now lay the dead and dying com­ mingled, no sexton to bury, and no thief to steal the vessels of gold, and where the air had been heavy with odours were now the filth of the living and the putrescence of the dead. Beauty was beautiful no longer, heroism was extinct, and valour was no more. The deer and the boar roamed in the greenwood unscathed. No household fires were lighted to shed a warmth through the wintry air. The wine cask wTas unbroached and meals were no longer pre­ pared. Men, women, and children, of all ranks and classes, lay huddled together, clutching each other convulsively in imminent expectation of the crashing of chains that would herald the release of Satan and of the trumpet blast that should signal the end of the world. Love was banished, hate was forgotten, and terror was master of all. The thread upon the distiff remained unwound, and the sword lay rustling on the floor. Revelation xx. 3-4 had con­ quered. Your divine-interpreting Church, Cardinal Man­ ning, had driven Europe frantic that her riches might be purloined as she lay in delirium. All vocations were dead, save that of the priest. With husky voice, haggard mien, and supernatural wildness of gesticulation, the monk harangued in the market-place, and around him surged all that Terror and Death had spared. Nearer, nearer, and nearer came the end of the year, till only a few hours intervened between mankind and the Day �I2 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE : of Judgment. Then the remnant of human beings crushed into the churches till they were filled to suffocation. Thou­ sands clamoured in vain for admission at the gate of convent, cathedral, and abbey. Resolved that it would be better for their souls should they perish among the ruins of the house of God, they who could not obtain admission scrambled up to the roof, and mingled their chants and wails with the roll of the organ which ascended from within. Midnight on the 31st of December was the utmost limit given for the release of Satan ; but it was held that the release might take place an hour or two before night’s solemn noon. The great candles of the cathedral shone under groined arch and by fluted column over the pale and upturned faces of a con­ vulsed and motley multitude. There were no clocks; but,, at regular intervals, on the great candles metal balls were fixed by inflammable strings, and as, hour after hour, the flame reached each string in succession, the ball fell into a basin-shaped gong below, with a clang that, in the breath­ less suspense which waited upon the burning of each string, resounded to the loftiest turret, and reverberated among the graves under the flag-stones in the aisle. One by one, an eternity of suspense between them, fell the balls into the gong, and yet the end of the world did not come, and the winter morning dawned of the 1st of January, in the year 1001. The Holy Catholic Church had indeed interpreted the Scripture—interpreted it to replenish her own coffers and augment her own power. The world slowly slunk back into its old work-a-day ways, but without taking pains to resent its having been duped and hoaxed by the unscru­ pulous cunning of Rome. Shame, my Lord Cardinal 1 Remember, you are not addressing the illiterate vassalageof the Dark Ages. Your words reach those who can criti- �A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. 13 rise them without favour and reject them without fear. When you would speak of your Church being the only divine interpreter of Scripture, remember the twentieth chapter of Revelation and the year 1000 a.d., and be forever dumb. Nay, my Lord Cardinal; the pretensions of your Church are going the way of all the earth. You yet manage to hobble along on two crutches—the mental apathy and moral credulity of mankind. But the earth swings round, and the gnome casts another shadow upon the dial of Time. A race arises that cares neither for your book nor your infallible interpretation thereof. Address, if you will, the present-day spawn of the bats and owls of medievalism ; but the beams of the true sun of righteousness have now broken through the gloom of your censor smoke and your windows, dim with the effigies of saints. The perdition which has overtaken Zeus and Isis is overtaking you. Untold opulence, the romance of history, the wealth of erudition, and the subtlety of intellect are yet on your side; and I admit that even I, the “ Infidel,” immeasurably more pronounced than ten thousand “ Infidels ” you have tortured and burnt, have some feeling of sympathy with you as, girt with the cestus of the mighty memories of two thousand years of the irrevocable Past, you stand confronting your inevitable doom from the fiat of the merciless Future. Hater as I am of tyrants and tyranny, the tears have coursed down my face as I have figured my fathers at Culloden amid ruin and rout, riven tartan and shivered claymore, perishing in the whirlwind that swept away the “divine right of kings.” Like sympathy I extend to you and your Church, Cardinal Manning, standing between the sunset of the world’s yesterday and the dawn of the world’s to-morrow, �14 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE. defending the divine right of priests. But, like a spectre of the Brocken, your towers and citadels melt away into the viewless air. You have made a darkly-interesting chapter in anthropology; but the race rises to the level of new developments and new seons, and, ere a long time pass, your censor will smoke no more, your Jesus will have taken his place with the obsolete gods, and the candles upon your altar shall burn no more forever. The same sun in the heavens that has looked down upon the waning altar-fires of the faiths of the world’s hoary yesterday shall yet look down upon your altars, cold, deserted, and desolate. The altar of the future will be the concave of the sky overarching in glory the everlasting hills. The -worship of the future, irrespective of teleological dogma, will be the reaching forward to stronger brain, purer morals, and a happier world. To further the advent, my Lord Cardinal, of that nobler altar and grander worship, the Freethinkers of America are met to-day on the Cassadaga heights, and they permit me thus to shake hands with them over the “ misty and mourn­ ful Atlantic,” and add my feeble spark to the splendour of the coming day in a land where Romanism never had the mastery—on a continent of which your Jesus never heard. �Post Free Three-Halfpence. JE rice One Fenny. FROM THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH. By SALADIN. IN BRUNO MEMORIAL STEWART ROSS, Died igth November, 1882, aged two years and five weeks. London : W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C Recently Published. Post free Twopence-halfpenny. WITCHCRAFT IN CHRISTIAN COUNTRIES. By SALADIN. Being an Address delivered at the Inauguration of the Secular Society at Stockport, November 19th, 1882—the Marquis of Queensberry in the Chair. London : W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C. Price 2s. post free. Elegantly printed in colours. SONGS BY THE WAYSIDE OP AN AGNOSTICS LIFE. By Himself. “It is not an irreverent Agnosticism that is uttered in these pages, although, without doubt, it is terribly heterodox ; but the author evidently feels and think, which is more than can be said of some of our versifiers.’ —Scotsman, July 21st, 1883. London: W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C. �Every Thursday. Price Twopence. THE SECULAR REVIEW: . », A JOURNAL OF AGNOSTICISM. ‘EDITED BY SALADIN, The Secular Review is the recognised organ of cultured Freethought in England, and its contributors comprise some of the leading scholars and foremost thinkers of the country. ... Subscription ... 2s. Zp^d. per Quarter. Publishing Office : 84, Fleet Street, London, E.C. In Limp Cloth. Price 2s. Post Free POEMS: GENERAL, SECULARISTIC, AND SATIRICAL. By LARA. Dedicated to Saladin. “ Contains specimens of the most biting satire penned since the days of Pope.” London: W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C. ’ Recently Published. Price is. 6d. Post Free. AN EXAMINATION OF THE , HYL0-IDEALIST1C PHILOSOPHY demonstrating the true basis of AGNOSTICISM. By WILLIAM BELL McTAGGART. London: W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C. � 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 &amp; 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 An entity primarily responsible for making the resource 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 The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data 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 A name given to the resource The divine interpretation of scripture : a reply to Cardinal Manning Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Ross, William Stewart [1844-1906] Description An account of the resource Place of publication: London Collation: 14, [2] p. ; 18 cm. Notes: "Being a paper read at the Cassadaga Conference, New York, by S.P. Putnam, Secretary, American Liberal League." Publisher's advertisements on unnumbered page at the end and back page. "By Saladin" [title page], the pseudonym of William Stewart Ross. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available W. Stewart & Co. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [188?] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N583 Subject The topic of the resource Bible Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <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 divine interpretation of scripture : a reply to Cardinal Manning), 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> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Bible-Criticism Henry Edward Manning Interpretation NSS https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/2a5c20e4b76146a2f9580b9a341c924e.pdf?Expires=1785369600&Signature=CAHWlOLtOA0Vam7FWg0kCkn2I1nq%7ErSnmS5oDx7f2xEWOZi4o5a-h%7EFo3VSfJVWV5rI7zyGrRcex4-V-9ngtiXkTpLJgdM6O0fJilaHk4i2a3VOShjQWERqf6ScHrDtjNIiODm4QJ7sfIMsVcs4bGPx0qRWQGRtTe1q2PrnyvTiPTtITO54pEcsH6cVINuudOVVMzGkCTBpmVhR2vMcJXjaXy%7ElbzvBj%7E-V1VhwXlz9V-as596AUjCrBYoMP3038egC8FCH9og6NCHYYOsow0dDFEiF%7E3hQ1l91z%7ETM8w7kCuw5cuwS0YRLEaM8QTfdBUa-DvnsTtFDSjiTLCxro0Q__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM d74a0c8484344feb5986ea5e68dd6eb4 PDF Text Text THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF I SCRIPTURE: A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. BY Being a Paper read at the Cassadaga Conference, New York, by S. P. Putnam, Secretary, American Liberal League. SECOND EDITION. London : W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C. �4 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE : and Rational tares. The mentation and the aspiration of the fifteenth century were not identical with those that actuate the nineteenth. The floods of human folly have worn other channels, the currents of human tendency have torn their way through other rocks and over other shoals. The old battle-fields are deserted, and only through the mists of departed time can we descry them, with their rank grasses, broken and shapeless weapons, half-obliterated trenches, and dull mounds marking more or less dishonoured graves. The battalions have reeled and surged into other fields, and there, with other weapons and other battle-cries,, the often-changing but never-ending tide of human conflict ebbs and flows. Guns are yet planted on the roof, and there is a rattle and blaze of musketry from the windows of the old half-way house between Rome and Rationalism but the shot and shell fall wide of the mark. Formerly, the old house was in the centre of operations ; now it is on the extreme left flank, and miles away the real conflict rages. The half-way house is tottering to its fall. The emergency to meet which it was built has passed away. Its giants are dead, its heroes are no more; its prestige is over, and Ichabod is inscribed over its gateway. A shabby despotism, three centuries ago, it modified a terrible despotism, and thereby justified its existence ; but now, Why cumbereth it the ground? Hardly taking it into account in military strategy, up on the side of the windy hill the banners wave and the troops are ranking, the forces of Rationalism and Rome, and with them and no other rests the balance between victory and defeat in the Armageddon of these latter ages. Everywhere now Ecclesiasticism howls against “the spread of Infidelity,” and everywhere Romanism is active, from �A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. 5 New York to Birmingham. In the latter town, the other day, a church dedicated to St. Anne was opened by his Eminence, Cardinal Manning, with all the august ceremonial of pontifical High Mass. In his subtle and able dedicatory address, his Eminence is reported to have said: “ They believed all that God had revealed, unwritten and written, the old Divine traditions of the Church from the beginning —every jot and every tittle. But why did they believe this ? The ‘Word’ in the text did not mean the Book, and they who would draw their Christianity out of the written Scrip­ ture had proved for centuries the inefficiency of that rule of faith by the multitudinous contradictions and ever-increasing ■diversity of the interpretation that had been put upon that Word. Without Divine certainty they could not have Divine faith, and, therefore, the wisest human critic could give him no definite certainty of the meaning of the Holy Scripture; the most learned scientific historian could not fix for him the meaning of the Word of God. No one, however pious ■or good ; no minister of religion or priest of the Church, apart from the Divine authority of the Church itself, could venture to interpret that written word by his own light or his own discernment.” I am a soldier in the ranks of those who would face un­ told fatigue and peril to flesh their blades in the heart of Rome ; but I heartily endorse the utterance of his Eminence in regard to the “wisest human critic” being unable to express any “definite certainty of the meaning of the Holy Scripture.” So far, I, a Rationalist, am in exact accord with .a Romish Cardinal. But when the learned Cardinal pro­ ceeds to say that, although the esoterics of Holy Writ are .too deep for human learning, too mystical for human wisdom, they can be infallibly interpreted by “ the Divine authority �6 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE : of the Church itself,” I join issue with him, and oppose himfoot to foot and hilt to hilt. I positively and emphatically deny that the Church has, in the past, shown that it could' interpret Scripture more successfully than the mere “ human critic ” could. Nay, my Lord Cardinal, I will refer you toonly one example—e.g., of how your Church interpreted a certain Scripture passage ; but the example I will give is such a striking, picturesque, and conclusive one as should be able to explode forever your Church’s monstrous preten­ sions to divinely-inspired hermeneutics. It is unfortunate, your Eminence, for you and yours that our more modern­ times have laid the intellectual wealth of the world’s yester­ day at the feet of men who have neither post nor pension from your Church. It is unfortunate for you and yours that there are men of my type, who will read and study for many years in obscurity, anxious only to find out what is true, and. never once asking what is profitable; studying for no pro­ fession, hoping for no preferment; poor, but aspiring to no­ gain, no crozier, no cardinal’s hat ; but freely giving learning and time and life to the most thankless of all causes—to a cause that for independence gives you poverty, for celebrity gives you infamy. What a pity you have not still your Index Expurgatorius to prevent such as I from misusing the best years of their life in toiling over volumes the perusal of which can only be inimical to your hierarchy ! How lament­ able that you cannot now arrest pens like mine by giving those who wield them a twinge of the thumbscrew, or make the blazing fagots at the stake reduce the hand of the writer to ashes I Like its God, your Church is the same yesterday, to-day, and forever. Among the calcined bones of the mighty you would honour me by mingling those of this humble Scottish heretic and rebel, but that Protestantism �A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. 7 held you at bay till the party that I in some imperfect way represent grew strong ; and now an enemy infinitely more terrible than Protestantism confronts you. Your Church, my Lord Cardinal, has alone the true in­ terpretation of Holy Scripture, has it ? We shall see. You should have ceased to make such assertions when it became possible for men like me to unearth and decipher the works of such writers as Glaber, Abbo of Fleury, Gennadius, and Corodi. You will, no doubt, my Lord Cardinal, have heard of the Millenarian insanity of the tenth century, although you would undoubtedly rather that such as I had never heard of it. How excellently the “ Divine authority of the Church ” interpreted Revelation xx. 2-3 ! The binding of Satan for a thousand years your Church alleged began at the birth of Christ ; so, of course, at the expiry of a thousand years from that date, Satan was to be let loose, and unutter­ able calamity, if not absolute annihilation, be visited upon the world. In the tenth century your Church was in full swing, with its Divine interpretations and all the rest of its monstrous jugglery ; and not even one solitary bark of a heretic dog resounded through the caverns of your ecclesias­ tical Avernus. You had, or your annalists belie you, a perfect plethora of dirt and piety and plague and pestilence. Like rotten sheep, your ignorant and filthy dupes died off in tens of thousands ; while the half-naked, vermin-eaten, and nasty—but ignorant and holy—survivors crowded into your abbeys and churches and implored God to have mercy upon them ; but he would not. You showed them relics, and they wanted a bath; you treated them to the Mass, and they wanted soap ; you incited them to godliness, and they wanted cleanliness. So much attention was given to dying and to seeking the kingdom of God that the wheat and corn �8 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE : and barley remained unsown, or were allowed to be destroyed by blight and mildew; and the survivors of the plague, for wild roots, had to burrow in the ground like pigs, eat rats and other vermin, and regale themselves upon diseased human flesh from the corpses of their plague-stricken dead. In this state of affairs what did your Divine and Scripture­ interpreting Church do ? What wine and oil and bread and consolation did it give to the scared and famished remnant plague and pestilence had left ? Your holy Bernhardt of Thuringia turned to the twentieth chapter of Revelation and preached the immediate end of the world. As the clock struck midnight on December 31st, 1000, the Devil would break his chains, and, with blood and fire and misery, make a prelude to the Day of Judgment. The clergy of your Church took up the cry of Bernhardt. It was howled from every abbey : it was thundered from every cathedral; and frantic monks, with cope and stole and cord, appealed in town and village and hamlet to a still more frantic populace. Portent and miracle, wraith and apparition, dark shadows on earth and blood-red signs in heaven, bore evidence to the near advent of the Day of Doom. Europe was all but ruined ; but what mattered that ?—your “divine Church” was enriched. Kings and nobles rushed to the sanctuary to endow it with lands and wealth which they had won by carnage and fire. With the sword they had gained place and power by doing the work of the Devil, and now they devoted all to the service of God, since they should have to part with everything, anyhow, by the time the clock struck twelve, ringing in the awful millennium and usher­ ing in the end of the world. Kings and nobles, whose pastime was slaughter as regarded men and lust as regarded women, in spite of the dominance of the Church, grew �A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. 9 suddenly penitent, and flung away the sword for the missal and abandoned the couch of the voluptuary for the monk s shirt of air. William of the Long Sword, Duke of Nor­ mandy, was fain to abandon his ducal rank and take shelter in the monkish cell. Hugh, Duke of Burgundy, was anxious to throw up all to find shelter in the monastery against the terrors of the Day of Doom ; and Hugh, Count of Arles, was like-minded. The Emperor, Henry II., crownless and unkinged, presented himself at the abbey gate of St. Vanne, howling piously from the psalms: “ This shall be my rest forever; here will I dwell, for I have a delight therein.” Numbers of nobles left lands and castles and all to the Church and hastened to the Holy Land, barefooted, ragged, and penniless, in the cunningly Church-inspired hope that those who, at the crack of doom, were found in the sainted clime in which the Redeemer had died would have certain immunities from the horrors and terrors about to be wrecked upon the rest of the human race. Others stubbornly and desperately remained in their doomed castles and on their estates, left to barrenness and weeds, and did not impiously attempt to propitiate the vengeance of God. But the altars were loaded with, and the church floors strewn with, legal instruments, venerable parchment, and dusty vellum, repre­ senting gifts to the Church of some of the noblest estates in Europe, and thousands upon thousands of serfs and vassals. The Church took them all, just as if the Day of Judgment had not been so close at hand. The monks, Cardinal Manning, •were themselves the conveyancers, and the deeds of convey­ ance began with the stereotyped words : “ Seeing that the end of the world is now approaching, and that every day accu­ mulates fresh miseries, I, Baron--------- , for the good of my soul, give to the monastery of---------,” etc. 1 he last day of �IO THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE: the world was the harvest-day of the Church, and the twen­ tieth chapter of Revelation was, for the time being, worth more than all the remainder of the Book of God. And gloriously your Church interpreted it, my Lord Cardinal, in the interests of your order. The nobles you had under your thumb by this divine gift the Church has for putting the correct meaning upon Scripture texts; and, as for the common people, they forgot all the instincts of human nature in their abject terror. They wallowed in ignorance, filth, and vermin. An eclipse of the sun became visible to the Emperor Otho’s army on their march. They at once recognised in it one of the apocalyptic “ signs in the sun.” T hey were paralysed with fear. They dropped their weapons, broke their ranks, and such of the screaming and disorganised rabble as terror did not render motionless fled to the mountains, literally calling to the rocks to hide them and the hills to fall upon them. On dragged the awful weeks—coming nearer and still nearer to the instant when heaven and earth should pass away. At length, at the end of the most terrible December the world has ever seen, came the last week of the year ioco a.d. Then there were such agonising suspense, such paralysing fear, and such abandoned phrenzy as never before or since have cursed such masses of the race of man. Your Church, my Lord Cardinal, had indeed vindi­ cated its claim to be “the divine interpreter of Scripture.” You took up the twentieth chapter of Revelation, and, by your interpretation thereof, exalted the hierarchy and well nigh ruined the world. During this terrible week the work of the world was utterly suspended. For the ring of the anvil there was the yell of the maniac; for the whirr of the shuttle there was the shriek of the madman. Drearily rose �A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. II the sun, and drearily set in the last few wintry days before his light was to be extinguished forever. Men held their very breath in terror. Blanched white were the dark-brown locks that so lately shaded the smooth and open brow of youth. In the halls of luxury, where the arras was of the richest, where the patines were of gold, and where the air was heavy with odours, now lay the dead and dying com­ mingled, no sexton to bury, and no thief to steal the vessels of gold, and where the air had been heavy with odours were now the filth of the living and the putrescence of the dead. Beauty was beautiful no longer, heroism was extinct, and valour was no more. The deer and the boar roamed in the greenwood unscathed. No household fires were lighted to shed a warmth through the wintry air. The wine cask was unbroached and meals were no longer pre­ pared. Men, women, and children, of all ranks and classes, lay huddled together, clutching each other convulsively in imminent expectation of the crashing of chains that would herald the release of Satan and of the trumpet blast that should signal the end of the world. Love was banished, hate was forgotten, and terror was master of all. The thread upon the distiff remained unwound, and the sword lay rustling on the floor. Revelation xx. 3-4 had con­ quered. Your divine-interpreting Church, Cardinal Man­ ning, had driven Europe frantic that her riches might be purloined as she lay in delirium. All vocations were dead, save that of the priest. With husky voice, haggard mien, and supernatural wildness of gesticulation, the monk harangued in the market place, and around him surged all that Terror and Death had spared. Nearer, nearer, and nearer came the end of the year, till only a few hours intervened between mankind and the Day �12 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE: Judgment. Then the remnant of human beings crushed into the churches till they were filled to suffocation. Thou­ sands clamoured in vain for admission at the gate of convent, cathedral, and abbey. Resolved that it would be better for their souls should they perish among the ruins of the house of God, they who could not obtain admission scrambled up to the roof, and mingled their chants and wails with the roll of the organ which ascended from within. Midnight on the 31st of December was the utmost limit given for the release of Satan; but it was held that the release might take place an hour or two before night’s solemn noon. The great candles of the cathedral shone under groined arch and by fluted column over the pale and upturned faces of a con­ vulsed and motley multitude. There were no clocks; but, at regular intervals, on the great candles metal balls were fixed by inflammable strings, and as, hour after hour, the flame reached each string in succession, the ball fell into a basin-shaped gong below, with a clang that, in the breath­ less suspense which waited upon the burning of each string, resounded to the loftiest turret, and reverberated among the graves under the flag-stones in the aisle. One by one, an eternity of suspense between them, fell the balls into the gong, and yet the end of the world did not come, and the winter morning dawned of the 1st of January, in the year ioci. The Holy Catholic Church had indeed interpreted the Scripture—interpreted it to replenish her own coffers and augment her own power. The world slowly slunk back into its old work-a-day ways, but without taking pains to resent its having been duped and hoaxed by the unscru­ pulous cunning of Rome. Shame, my Lord Cardinal ! Remember, you are not addressing the illiterate vassalage of the Dark Ages. Your words reach those who can criti­ �A REPLY TO CARDINAL MANNING. 13. cise them without favour and reject them without fear. When you would speak of your Church being the only divine interpreter of Scripture, remember the twentieth chapter of Revelation and the year 1000 a.d., and be forever dumb. Nay, my Lord Cardinal; the pretensions of your Churchare going the way of all the earth. You yet manage to hobble along on two crutches—the mental apathy and moral credulity of mankind. But the earth swings round, and the gnome casts another shadow upon the dial of Time. A race arises that cares neither for your book nor your infallible interpretation thereof. Address, if you will, the present-day spawn of the bats and owls of mediaevalism ; but the beams of the true sun of righteousness have now broken through the gloom of your censor smoke and your windows, dim with the effigies of saints. The perdition which has overtaken Zeus and Isis is overtaking you. Untold opulence, the romance of history, the wealth of erudition, and the subtlety of intellect are yet on your side ; and I admit that even I, the “ Infidel,” immeasurably more pronounced than ten thousand “ Infidels” you have tortured and burnt, have some feeling of sympathy with you as, girt with the cestus of the mighty memories of two thousand years of the irrevocable Past, you stand confronting your inevitable doom from the fiat of the merciless Future. Hater as I am of tyrants and tyranny, the tears have coursed down my face as I have figured my fathers at Culloden, amid ruin and rout, riven tartan and shivered claymore, perishing in the whirlwind that swept away the “ divine right of kings.” Like sympathy I extend to you and your Church, Cardinal Manning, standing between the sunset of the world’s yesterday and the dawn of the world’s to-morrow,. �14 THE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE. defending the divine right of priests. But, like a spectre of the Brocken, your towers and citadels melt away into the viewless air. You have made a darkly-interesting chapter in anthropology ; but the race rises to the level of new developments and new aeons, and, ere a long time pass, your censor will smoke no more, your Jesus will have taken his place with the obsolete gods, and the candles upon your altar shall burn no more forever. The same sun in the heavens that has looked down upon the waning altar-fires of the faiths of the world’s hoary yesterday shall yet look down upon your altars, cold, deserted, and desolate. The altar of the future will be the concave of the sky overarch­ ing in glory the everlasting hills. The worship of the future, irrespective of teleological dogma, will be the reaching forward to stronger brain, purer morals, and a happier world. To further the advent, my Lord Cardinal, of that nobler .altar and grander worship, the Freethinkers of America are ■met to-day on the Cassadaga heights, and they permit me ■thus to shake hands with them over the “ misty and mourn­ ful Atlantic,” and add my feeble spark to the splendour of the coming day in a land where Romanism never had the .mastery—on a continent of which your Jesus never heard. �Just Issued, 64 pp. in wrapper, post free 7d. Part I. of GOD AND HIS BOOK, By SALADIN. Being an Examination of the Origin and History of the Bible. 64 pp, crown 8vo, price 6d, post free 7d, SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF SALADIN By RICHARD B. HITHERSAY & GEORGE ERNEST. With Portrait of Saladin and Fac-Simile of Handwriting. “ The Life of Saladin” is a deeply interesting and striking sketch of the life of the editor of the Secular Review. Saladin is a man of great learning, fearless and noble spirit, and who wields a graceful _ though trenchant pern There is marked genius, rich culture, and real power in all that he writes. ■Oldham Chronicle. , ,, , r 1 n This is a sketch of the life ot one who is, undoubtedly, a characterful and highlv-rffted man............ That he should waste his enormous learning (if not in the suialy academical, at least in a far higher sense) and brilliant talents on the bleak and barren field of Secularism demonstrates that he has only a dim •notion of the power that is in him.—Beaconsfield standard. With a different early training, Saladin might have used his talents to aid the Christian cause and we cannot but regret that the over-zealous and crue^ action of his guardians should have been the means of losing to the ChnsUan ■brotherhood a writer who mignt have been one of its brightest ornaments. North Western Gazette. Altogether Mr. W. Stewart Ross is an extraordinary character. He has pro­ duced some beautiful poetical pieces ; he writes with a glowing pen, both in prose and poetry. When speaking from the platform in advocacy of his negative .creed he rises to the zenith of impassioned oratory.... He is the author of the .noble prize poem on the Dumfries statue of Burns.—Dnmjncs Standard. Price is, post free is id, THE CONFESSIONAL- ROMISH AND ANGLICAN. An Expose. By Saladin. Contents :—Introduction—Licentiousness of the Pre-Reformation Church—Lechery of the Confessional—Ritualism : “The Priest in Absolution’’—The Anglican Confessional—Ineffectual Efforts to Suppress Romanising Tendencies in the Anglican Church —Confessions of an Escaped Nun—Extracts from Dens and Liguori _ Examination of the Church s Claim to have fostered Learning. Her Attempts at Continency even more Ruinous than her Self-lndulgence—The Relative Criminal Statistics of Catholicism and Protestantism—Appendix. London: W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C. �HISTORICAL PAMPHLETS. BY SALADIN. HpHE DIVINE INTERPRETATION OF SCRIPTURE A ReP1)? t0 Cardinal ManninS- 16 PP> price id., post free npHE CRUSADES. A post free l%d. 16 pp, with Illustration, price id., post E CHR/dTI^N PERSECUTION. he flagellants. T iie iconoclasts. T he covenanters. T he inquisition. T he inquisition. T T free ij^d. free i%d. free ij^d. I%d. I%d. 16 pp, price id., post free In neat wrapper, price id., post In neat wrapper, price id., post In neat wrapper, price id., post Part L, 16 pp, price id., post free Part II., 16 pp, price id., post free HE DANCERS, SHAKERS, AND JUMPERS. 16 pp., price id., post free ij^d. THE DANCERS, SHAKERS, AND JUMPERS. 16 pp , price id., post free ijjd. Part I ’* Part IL HE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS. price id., post free ij^d. Part I., 16 pp. rT HE PERSECUTION OF THE JEWS. price id., post free Ij^d. Part II., 16 PP., T T E R ELIGIOUS EDUCATION. A Letter to Cardinal Manning;.. Fart I., 16 pp., price id , post free l%d. ELIGIOUS EDUCATION, a Letter to Cardinal ManningPart II., 16 pp., price id., post free ij^d. EDUCATION. A Letter to Cardinal Manning. XJ",.Part J11 >with Addenda, “The Christian Heaven” and. Chivalry. 16 pp., price id., post free ijjd. London : W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C. � 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 &amp; 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 An entity primarily responsible for making the resource 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 The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data 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 A name given to the resource The divine interpretation of scripture : a reply to Cardinal Manning Description An account of the resource Edition: 2nd ed. Place of publication: London Collation: 14, [2] p. ; 18 cm. Notes: "Being a paper read at the Cassadaga Conference, New York, by S.P. Putnam, Secretary, American Liberal League." Publisher's advertisements on unnumbered page at the end. Other works by Saladin published by W. Stewart on back page. "By Saladin" [title page], the pseudonym of William Stewart Ross. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Ross, William Stewart [1844-1906] Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available W. Stewart & Co. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [188?] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N584 Subject The topic of the resource Bible Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <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 divine interpretation of scripture : a reply to Cardinal Manning), 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> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Bible-Criticism Henry Edward Manning NSS https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/09a0642b957d63b4cb554644071a1819.pdf?Expires=1785369600&Signature=jYeqd2qOURzTTXBSwMvbUxwkerH1XJQjKxS6tlwVoryBWlRqbJ4IWZ13Wr4Bn-CjjI80FO5DDt5cukn0ZjVi4hZk1drT5HYcApDxxAwo05EMBDkblGX-3X73EISM8pHzN4hbd9CpvvqLYq0M18JxXmFRVexvtoVsQWnn9Pfw437nEdAVJs%7EVlkGV8apJf27uCR7tMKZiwY0OMOnGdx5xY9wtDl0zsGmHh-Qdks6kB%7E7gxszVr9KLb9xZ8y7NmYxwjInoiqOKZq7BryI21wl24qZGheuzjaWL47rKyNiWjeGWevQHZopglQ54pii9ntA37T%7E9W0JdwaEC-X59rg8sLg__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 5187f80bf0035313cf8b14ed8f138322 PDF Text Text B ^55 4. , h —7 (3 •Mjzz) ~T. i^CWALSECULARSOCIErai THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL CONCLUSIONS EMBODIED IN THE “ENCYCLOPAEDIA BIBLICA” Once upon a time there was a system of Christian Theology. It was a wonderful though a highly artificial structure, composed of fine old crusted dogmas which no one could prove, but very few dared to dispute. There was the “ magnified man ” in the sky, the Infallible Bible, dictated by the Holy Spirit, the Trinity, the Fall, the Atonement, Predestination and Grace, Justification by Faith, a Chosen People, a practically omnipotent Devil, myriads of Evil Spirits, an eternity of bliss to be obtained for nothing, and endless torment for those who did not avail themselves of the offer. Now, the house of cards has tumbled to pieces, or rather it is slowly dissolving, as Shakespeare says, “ like the baseless fabric of a. vision.” The Biblical chronology, history, ethics, all are alike found to be defective and doubtful. Divine Revelation has become discredited ; a Human Record takes its place. What has brought about this start­ ling change ? The answer is, Knowledge. Thought, research, criticism, have shown that the traditional theories of the Bible can no longer be maintained. The logic of facts has confirmed the reasonings of the independent thinker, and placed the dogmatist in a dilemma which grows ever more acute. The result is not pleasant for the believer but it is well that the real state of things should be known, that the kernel of truth should be separated from the overgrown husk of tradition. During the last few years a work has been issued which sums up the conclusions of modern criticism better than any other book. It is called the Encyclopaedia Biblica, and its four volumes tersely and ably set forth the new views, and support them by a mass of learning which deserves serious consideration. And the most significant thing about it is not merely that the entire doctrinal system of Christianity hasundergone a radical change, but that this change has largely been brought about by Christian scholars themselves. A rapid glance at �2 THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY this store-house of heresy will give the reader some idea of the extent of the surrender which Christianity has made to the forces of Rationalism. It must be premised that space will permit of the conclusions only being given, without the detailed evidence by which they are supported. THE CREATION MYTH. Let us begin with our supposed first parents. Is the story of Adam and Eve a true story ? There are, we are told, decisive reasons why we cannot regard it as historical, and probably the writer himself never supposed that he was relating history. It is not a mere myth, but an idealistic narrative, containing moral as well as mythical elements. This means that it is simply an imaginative reflection of what the original author or authors believed—-a very different thing from a Divine revelation. The Creation story originated in a stock of primitive myths common to the Semitic races, and passed through a long period of development before it was incorporated in the book of Genesis. Its coincidences with the Babylonian myth are so numerous that it is impossible to doubt there was a real historical connection between them. The legend was not taken over as it stands from the earlier account, but many important features in it cannot be explained except on the supposition that they were borrowed from the Babylonian myth. The latter gives the key to understanding the Biblical story by revealing the principal source from which it was drawn. Its differences are due to its independent development; its striking resemblances to the Chaldean legend prove its origin. The Amarna tablets furnish evidence that Babylonian influence had penetrated to the shores of the Mediter­ ranean by the fifteenth century b.c.; but even if the Biblical account originated so early it could not have assumed its final form till very much later—in fact, many indications show that not till after the Exile in the sixth century did the story take its present shape. If, then, it is the fact, as Christian scholars assert, that this story of the Creation originated in a pagan myth, and was shaped and altered by unknown hands for nearly a thousand years, it is nothing more nor less than superstition to hold that it is divinely true. THE PATRIARCHS. As for the Old Testament patriarchs, we now learn that their very existence is uncertain. The tradition concerning Abraham is, as it stands, inadmissible ; he is not so much a historical personage as an ideal type of character, whose actual existence is as doubtful as that of other heroes. All the stories of the patriarchs are legendary ; they may contain some truth, though how much will probably never be known; �THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY 3 to suppose them entirely true is to throw historical criticism overboard altogether, HISTORY OR LEGEND ? The whole book of Genesis, in fact, is not history at all, as we understand history. It is a composite narrative, based on older records long since lost, and the parts of which it is made up can be separated in such a way that each reads as a consecutive story. Many indications of later date are found in this book, such as the Egyptian names appearing in the story of Joseph, which point to its having been compiled in the seventh century b.c. The welding together of the two main narratives appears to have been effected about the same period, though both accounts were added to at still later dates. The story of the Deluge is, of course, a Hebrew version of the Babylonian epic. I The book of Exodus is another composite legend which has long been mistaken for history. Vast ingenuity has been expended in attempts to reconcile the narrative with known facts, but the particulars of the supposed exodus, and the route followed by the Israelites, remain in hopeless obscurity. The tradition is inconsistent; the element of legend is predominant; sober history gives no warrant for supposing that the signs and wonders wrought by Moses ever occurred, that the first-born of Egypt were ever slain, or that Pharaoh was ever drowned in the Red Sea. MOSES. The historical character of Moses has not been established, and it is doubtful whether the name is that of an individual or that of a clan. The story of his being exposed in an ark of bulrushes is a myth probably derived from the similar and much earlier myth of Sargon. Quite possibly some elements of truth underlie the account of Moses, for, if the Israelites were really delivered from Egypt, they had no doubt a leader, but who he was and what he did cannot be ascertained with certainty. The alleged origin of the Ten Commandments is purely traditional; it is probable that they were framed not earlier than the time of Amos, on the basis of the old laws of the tribe, which we find embodied in the later chapters of Exodus. It is admitted by even conservative critics that the original worship of the Israelites was not of an ethical character. The popular opinion that the book of Deuteronomy was written by Moses is at variance with both internal and external evidence. The work has many signs of later date, and appears to have been unknown before the seventh century b.c. Originally it may have consisted merely of the long speech attributed to Moses, and this may have been the book which was “ found ” in the temple in the reign of Josiah, the �4 THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY rest of the work being added shortly afterwards. As it is difficult to believe that such a work would have remained in the temple undis­ covered for 800 years, it is reasonable to conclude that the book was placed there by men who thought the time ripe for religious reforms—in fact, that a “pious fraud” was perpetrated. Evidence of every kind concurs to prove that in its original form it was a product of the seventh, not of the fifteenth, century b.c. In its present form Deuteronomy is a composite and considerably modified version of the older work. THE PSALMS A COMPOSITE BOOK. The fond illusion that all the Psalms were written by David except where otherwise stated has been entirely dispelled. The book of Psalms is really the hymn-book of the second temple, some of its parts possibly ancient, others clearly indicating an origin as late as the time of the Maccabees in the second century b.c. After the victories of the patriot Judas Maccabteus, the national worship was restored, and the dedication of the Temple in the year 165 was accompanied with hymns and music; and it is probable that several of the Psalms in the existing collection were among those sung on that occasion. According to modern criticism, it is doubtful whether David wrote any of the Psalms. It used to be gravely questioned whether any of them were written after the Exile ; it is now a question whether any were written before it. One critic goes so far as to consider that the oldest Psalm of all (No. 137) was only written during the Exile, and that even that one was afterwards put into its present shape. As to Proverbs, it is impossible to suppose that Solomon was the author of the book, though it is not denied that he might have collected or written proverbs of some sort. The book may date from the fourth and third centuries b.c. POETRY AND PROPHETIC LITERATURE. The book of Job has sometimes been thought the oldest book in the world. Criticism will not admit the claim. It is, we are told, impossible to place it very early; it is best understood as representing special influences which existed after the Exile, and at no other time. The book is not a literary unity, nor was it written with any particular purpose ; it is not a manufacture, but a growth. The romance of Esther is a very late production, written probably after the time of Alexander the Great, and is without even a kernel of historical truth. Jeremiah is a composite work, containing spurious passages, some written as late as the second century; while Ezekiel, though probably in the main a genuine production of the prophet, contains numerous errors, additions, and changes of the text. Ecclesiastes dates from the third century b.c., �THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY while Jonah is a Jewish midrash or tradition, like the histories of Tobit and Susanna, and was certainly written after the Exile. The great book of Isaiah is the work of several authors, some of them probably disciples of Isaiah, though it is doubtful whether Isaiah himself wrote any of it. Some parts appear to have been written during the Exile, and the earlier portion edited during the third century b.c. Later criticism, we are assured, deepens our sense of the gulf between the first and second portions of Isaiah. The book of Daniel was once assumed to be the most definitely prophetical of the Old Testament writings—a notion which is seriously discounted by the discovery that it was beyond question written in the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, after or during the happening of the events which were supposed to be foretold, and nearly 500 years after the time of its supposed author. It is questionable whether such a person as Daniel ever existed; but it is certain that his adventure in the den of lions, and that of Shadrach and his companions in the fiery furnace, are as fabulous as if they formed part of the collection of zEsop. In the very first verse a subsequent origin is indicated by the name of the king of Babylon being given in a late and inaccurate form. In a historical sense the book i$ utterly unreliable. The prophetical literature generally cannot be accepted as having the character of literal accuracy. NEW TESTAMENT CHRONOLOGY. Turning to the New Testament, we find that modern critical research only brings out more clearly than ever the extraordinary vagueness and uncertainty which enshroud every detail of the narrative. From the article on ‘‘Chronology ” we learn that everything in the Gospels is too uncertain to be accepted as historical fact. There are numerous questions which it is “ wholly impossible to decide.” We do not know when Jesus was born, or when he died, or who was his father, or what was the duration of his ministry. As these are matters on which the Gospel writers purport to give information, the fact of their failure to do so settles the question of their competency as historians. As to the birth of Jesus, the only account which claims to give indications of date rests on a series of mistakes. No census was possible under Herod, and none took place under “Cyrenius” until a.d. 7. The tradition as to the age of Jesus is meagre, and leaves the question undecided. With regard to the Crucifixion, we may assume any date between the years 26 and 35 without making any approach to certainty. The narrative of Matthew in particular is full of “ suspicious circumstances,” and the only results which have a high degree of probability are the date 30 a.d. for the death of Jesus, and the period of about one year for the length of his public ministry. �6 THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY THE VIRGIN BIRTH. The supposed supernatural birth of Jesus has of late exercised the minds of theologians. It is not surprising that some of them should reject the notion, for it is one without a shred of evidence in its favour. Setting aside the well-known fact that many other religions assume a similar origin for their founders, we may note that the New Testament accounts are in such hopeless conflict with each other that reconciliation is impossible. The Gospels themselves afford the amplest justification for a criticism of their narratives. It is of little avail for Luke to tell us that Jesus was born of a virgin when, in other parts of the same book, his natural relationship to his father and mother is explicitly recognised. Jesus himself made no appeal to his supposed miraculous birth, and it is clear that it is excluded by the subsequent bestowal of the holy spirit at his baptism. The only two verses in the first chapter of Luke which clearly express the idea of a supernatural birth so disturb the connection that we are compelled to regard them as an interpolation. As to the date, there is a discrepancy between Matthew and Luke of at least ten years, the one placing the event at about 4 b.c., the other not earlier than 6 a.d. There is ample evidence that the belief in the divinity of Jesus was a growth which went on during a long period. This develop­ ing belief led to a desire to bring him into closer relationship with God, and out of such anxiety arose the story of the nativity. Among the Jews the notion of supernatural birth did not attach to their conception of the Messiah. It is therefore probable that the idea was originally absent from both Matthew’s and Luke’s Gospels. The genealogy of Joseph, given in the first Gospel, is prior in date to the story of the virgin birth, and could have been drawn up only while he was regarded as the real father of Jesus. Luke so frequently coincides with Matthew that he probably had the latter’s Gospel before him; but, on the other hand, his differences as to the birth and genealogy are so marked that it is unlikely these particulars then formed part of Matthew’s work. Paul’s statement also, that Jesus was born of the seed of David according to the flesh, cannot be reconciled with the account of his having been born of a virgin. It is clear that there was an endeavour to invest the birth and childhood of Jesus with a miraculous halo. It must be added, finally, that “ for the whole birth and childhood story of Matthew, in its every detail, it is possible to trace a pagan substratum.” Further comment is unnecessary. JESUS. The article on “Jesus,” by Professor A. B. Bruce, shows a cautiously critical tendency, but points out that, while the Gospels may be regarded as in the main a trustworthy tradition, they are unreliable �THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY 7 in many of their details. They raise so many perplexing questions, to which they afford no solution, that anything like a dogmatic tone is inadmissible. The account of the Temptation is a symbolic represen­ tation of a spiritual experience. The story of the Crucifixion, even in its most historic form, is not pure truth, but truth mixed with doubtful legend. The bare facts of the betrayal, the desertion, the sentence, the crucifixion and death, are regarded as historical, while the picturesque accessories, such as the night-trial, the mocking, the incident of Barabbas, the two thieves, and the preternatural concomitants of the death, are of doubtful authenticity. We may discover in the Gospels many indications that Jesus was the product of his time and nation. His conception of Messiahship was greatly influenced by the later Isaiah ; but the ideal he had formed was not in harmony with that of the Jewish teachers of his day. In fact, “ his attitude towards the whole circle of ideas associated with conventional religion was without doubt that of a radical sceptic ” : while his language concerning the Father shows limitation of vision, his spiritual intuitions are pure truth, valid for all ages. His acts of healing are considered to have been real, though it does not follow that they were miraculous. It is assumed by the writer of the article that these beneficent deeds must have taken place, or the family of Jesus would' not have thought him mad—surely a very slender ground on which to assume that the works of healing actually occurred. Referring to the strange statement that Jesus declined to expound his parables to the people, lest they should be converted, we are assured that it is not credible that Jesus would either cherish or avow such an inhuman intention, though it is possible that in his disappointment he may have expressed himself in such a way as to be misunderstood. It is pointed out that, while in the Gospel of Luke Jesus is called “the Lord ” about a dozen times, the earlier Gospels of Matthew and Mark refer to him simply as “Jesus”—a fact which seems to indicate the gradual evolution of the belief in his divinity. THE RESURRECTION. The important subject of the “ Resurrection ” is treated by Professor P. W. Schmiedel, of Zurich, who tells us that the Gospel accounts “exhibit contradictions of the most glaring kind.” Referring to the contention that, in spite of these discrepancies, the event may have really happened, it is pointed out that the actuality of the resurrection depends for its establishment upon these very narratives, and in such a case unimpeachable witnesses are naturally demanded. Such unim­ peachable witnesses, of course, do not exist. In view of these contra­ dictions, we cannot avoid the conclusion that the Gospel writers were �8 THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY far removed from the events they describe. Another, point to notice is that the canonical accounts do not actually describe any resurrection; they merely treat it as having already occurred. It is inferred from the statements that Jesus appeared to his disciples after his death ; but the reality of the appearances has ever since been in dispute. The first of these appearances, it is held, must have been believed to have taken place in Galilee. There were strong reasons for placing them in Jerusalem, where the Crucifixion had taken place; there must, there­ fore, have been stronger reasons for stating that they occurred at a distance. The account of the watch at the sepulchre and the sealing of the tomb is now given up as unhistorical even by those who accept the story as a whole. It is entirely excluded by the question of the women, “Who shall roll away the stone?” The many attempts which have been made to explain the disappearance of the body become superfluous on the adoption of the view that the statements as to the empty sepulchre are unhistorical. Moreover, the silence of Paul with regard to these details is unaccountable, if the story of the Resurrection is true. An apologetic tendency is perceptible in the Gospel accounts, and this may help to explain the rise of unhistorical elements. It is probable that, in the absence of knowledge, conjectures were freely made, and many questions asked, the replies to which were afterwards assumed to be facts. PAUL’S BELIEF IN THE RESURRECTION. Paul’s statements regarding the appearances of the risen Jesus are in themselves fairly consistent; the difficulty is that they do not agree with the Gospel accounts, though Paul purports to give a categorical relation. It must be remembered that he wrote, so far as we are aware, long before any of our present Gospels were in existence, and, as the Resurrection was the cornerstone of his theology, his testimony is of particular interest. For him nothing less than the truth of Christianity rested on the actuality of the resurrection of Jesus. As he had found it hard to believe, he must have sought the more carefully to inform himself of all that could be said in favour of such an astounding event. During his visit to Jerusalem he had had opportunities of acquiring knowledge relating to it, and it may naturally be assumed that, when endeavouring to prove to the Corinthians the truth of the Resurrection, he would state fully and clearly all that he knew about it. Paul, however, does not say that he ever saw the risen Jesus in bodily form. It is admitted on all hands that the appearance recorded by him was in the nature of a vision—in other words, a purely subjective experience. It is not even clear that he heard the words supposed to have been addressed to him by Jesus, for we must put on one side the �THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY 9 accounts recorded in the Acts, which are so contradictory that no reliance can be placed upon them. And it is well known that Paul uses the same Greek word to describe both the appearance to himself and the appearances to the original disciples, thereby implying the possibility that the latter also were of a subjective or visionary character. THE GOSPELS. The article on the Gospels by Dr. E. A. Abbott and Professor Schmiedel is crammed with criticism of a kind most damaging to every form of the orthodox faith. The view hitherto current, that the four Gospels were written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and appeared thirty or forty years after the death of Jesus, can, it is stated, no longer be maintained. In a matter of this sort, where the whole of the material is not merely scanty, but deeply tinged with superstition, criticism is compelled to be mainly of a negative character, and modern research, far from clearing up the admitted difficulties, has only brought them into greater prominence, and removed their solution to an immeasurable distance. The idea that we are at liberty to treat as true everything in the Gospels which cannot be proved false is wholly fallacious. Some of their statements of fact are quite erroneous, and the data often in direct contradiction to one another. The element of miracle cannot fail to give rise to doubts, and the evangelists made it clear that they wrote with a lack of concern for historical precision, while the chronological framework of the Gospels must be classed among their most untrustworthy features. Several of the reported sayings of Jesus clearly bear the impress of a time which he did not live to see ; in plain English, they were put into his mouth by later writers. All the Gospels are marked by “ tendencies ”—that is, they reveal traces of the special purpose for which they were compiled; each Evangelist is influenced by, and seeks to serve, an apologetic interest. It need hardly be said that, if these general conclusions can be supported by a reasonable amount of evidence (and it is not to be supposed that Christian scholars would recklessly proclaim them), they entirely do away with the idea that the Gospels are credible and trustworthy narratives. A few brief references to details will serve to illustrate the main conclusions of this article. With regard to the Virgin Birth, it is pointed out that, in the school of thought of which Philo was the head, there were traditions that every child of promise was born of a virgin. The genealogies were written first, and implicitly deny the miraculous conception which the Gospels themselves affirm. The alleged eclipse of the sun at the Crucifixion is impossible. One of the orthodox shifts respecting this phenomenon is �10 THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY that it was an eclipse of the moon ! Matthew’s statement as to the empty sepulchre must be rejected as a later innovation, while his account of a watch being placed over the tomb was inserted merely to exclude the charge that the body had been removed. The saying of Jesus in Matthew xvi. n as to spiritual bread is unaccountable if the previous miracles of feeding the multitudes had been actual occurrences. The only sense in which the words could have been understood at the time was that of the material bread which had been provided. The deduction, therefore, is that the feeding of the four or five thousand was a parable which had been misunderstood. Only if the term “ bread ” represents spiritual truth (and Jesus actually employed the word in this sense) can we understand more being left over than was originally used, since truth is not consumed by being made known. Both Matthew and Mark, in fact, seem to have read into the utterances of Jesus details borrowed from subsequent facts or controversies. The third Gospel is also untrustworthy, its historical value beinglowered by evidence of the writer’s errors and misunderstandings. It is the most beautiful and picturesque of the four, but in point of bald fact probably the least authoritative. It has been widely assumed that it was written by the physician Luke, and that Luke was a companion of Paul. This view of its Pauline character, however, can now be; maintained only in a very limited sense. It is clear that the third Gospel and the Acts are by the same author, but that author was not Luke. The silence of Papias, who lived at the end of the first century,, with regard to the third and fourth Gospels, implies that either he did not know them at all, or that he did not regard them as of equal authority with Matthew and Mark. In the fourth Gospel we find more ambiguities than in all the other three together. The story of the raising of Lazarus cannot beadmitted as historical; it is not a pure myth, but a poetic development, an allegory intended to illustrate man’s conversion from spiritual death to spiritual life. An incident is referred to of a youth who was converted by one of the Apostles, and thereafter regarded as a “trophy of the resurrection.” In an age which appears to have been very prone to' misunderstand metaphor and to materialise inner experiences, it is more than probable that expressions indicating spiritual death were assumed to imply physical death, and the growth of new feelings to imply a return to material life. We may reasonably suspect that this peculiarity influenced the belief in the resurrection of Jesus himself. It is important to note that Justin Martyr, who lived about the middle of the second century, and was the most famous Christian writer of that time, makes no clear reference to the fourth Gospel, though it would have added great weight to his arguments if he could �THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY 11 have quoted it as a genuine apostolic writing. Up to the time of Justin there is nothing to prove, or even to suggest, that the fourth Gospel was recognised in this sense by the early Church, and Justin markedly abstains from employing it as an authority. This is unaccountable if it was then in existence and believed to be the work of an Apostle. The allusions which Justin is supposed to have made to it are really references to the Old Testament, the Gospel of Barnabas, or the general Christian tradition. We are plainly warned that “ it is vain to look to the Church fathers for trustworthy information on the subject of the origin of the Gospels.” The imperfection of the Gospel accounts is everywhere manifest. An extremely small proportion of the actual words of Jesus can have come down to us. His longest discourse would occupy only about five minutes to deliver, even if uttered as it stands, which is a most unlikely supposition. Even if his ministry lasted only a few months, he must have said a thousand-fold more, and repeated his sayings with many variations. And the text must not be taken as a trustworthy guide to its original meaning. It merely shows us what the Evangelists, or their predecessors, believed it to mean. The situations in which the words of Jesus are said to have been spoken cannot be implicitly accepted. We are left in doubt whether the Lord’s Prayer was uttered in response to the request of the disciples or voluntarily to the public in the Sermon on the Mount. The announcement that, whatsoever the disciples should bind or loose, their decision would be ratified could not have been made either to them or to Peter. The Trinitarian formula of baptism put into the mouth of Jesus is of later date, not having come into use till the time of Justin Martyr. If Jesus had enjoined the mission to the Gentiles upon his Apostles, it is simply incredible that they could have hotly disputed with Paul on that very point. The names of the women at the cross, and even the names of the Twelve Apostles, are not given in two places alike. Matthew xxii. 7 clearly pre-supposes the destruction of Jerusalem as already past. The Gospel incidents are often grouped together for purely arbitrary reasons, sometimes even for the sake of a word, such as “salt,” “light,” “ fire,” where it is impossible to suppose that Jesus uttered such disconnected sayings together. Sometimes the statements are in direct contradiction, sometimes they are inconsistent, as when we come across a prohibition of making deeds of healing known, though crowds of people are stated to have just been healed. Even the least supernatural of the writers, we are told, is not to be considered as entitled to credibility because he has less of the miraculous element. The Lord’s Prayer affords a significant example of the scantiness and incompleteness of the Gospel tradition. It is not found in the second Gospel, which is probably the �12 THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY oldest, and the others give it in slightly different forms. The narrative of Nicodemus is stamped as unhistorical by the expression attributed to the Jews : “ Out of Galilee ariseth no prophet.” It is impossible that Jews could have used it, as they well knew that several of the prophets were Galileans. Among the few statements that may be accepted with some confidence are those which place the first appear­ ances of the risen Jesus in Galilee, whither the disciples had already fled. But even these indicate the belief that he had appeared there, rather than the fact that he did so appear, and they, of course, conflict with the statement that the first appearances occurred at Jerusalem, where the disciples remained. Considering that it was a duty to bring forward convincing evidence of the resurrection, the inadequacy of the Gospel accounts is the more striking, and it becomes necessary to withhold belief from what the writers actually do say. The account of Jesus having eaten and been touched is incredible. It is suggested that the story of the betrayal by Judas may have been invented to account for the ease with which Jesus was captured, and the ignorance of the real circumstances on the part of his followers. THE SLENDER BASIS OF FACT. We thus find that modern criticism decides that no confidence whatever can be placed in the reliability of the Gospels as historical narratives, or in the chronology of the events which they relate. It may even seem to justify a doubt whether any credible elements at all are to be found in them. Yet it is believed that some such credible elements do exist. Five passages prove by their character that Jesus was a real person, and that we have some trustworthy facts about him. These passages are : Matthew xii. 31, Markx. 17, Mark iii. 21, Mark xiii. 32, and Mark xv. 34, and the corresponding passage in Matthew xxvii. 46, though these last two are not found in Luke. Four other passages have a high degree of probability—viz., Mark viii. 12, Mark vi. 5, Mark viii. 14-21, and Matthew xi. 5, with the corresponding passage in Luke vii. 22. These texts, however, disclose nothing of a preternatural character. They merely prove that in Jesus we have to do with a completely human being, and that the divine is to be sought in him only in the form in which it is capable of being found in all men. The four Gospels were compiled from earlier materials which have perished, and the dates when they first appeared in their present form are given as follows :—Mark, certainly after the destruction of Jerusalem in the year 70; Matthew’, about 119 a.d.; Luke, between 100 and no; and John, between 132 and 140. But even if they appeared about a.d. 50, that would not, of course, affect the conclusions of criticism as to their contents. �THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. The sections of this book in which the narrative is written in the first person plural may (says Professor Schmiedel) be implicitly accepted, but it is equally certain that they are not by the same hand as the rest of the book. The writer purposely wrote as if the whole work was from the pen of an eye-witness, when it was not. Nor can he be absolved from the “ tendency ” of writing in order to justify to himself and to his time a form of Christianity which was already on the way to Catholicism. This is the only view which reconciles the numerous discrepancies and inaccuracies of the work. Apart from the “ we ” sections, no statement merits immediate acceptance on the mere ground of its presence in the book. All that contradicts the Pauline Epistles must be absolutely given up, unless the latter are to be regarded as spurious. Positive proofs of the trustworthiness of Acts must be tested with the greatest caution. The speeches are constructed by the author in accordance with his own conceptions. The book does not come from a companion of Paul; its date may be set down as between a.d. 105 and 130. THE EPISTLES OF PAUL. The question just alluded to, of the genuineness of the Pauline Epistles, is now far from being so clear as was once universally supposed. Advanced criticism, Professor van Manen tells us in his elaborate article on “ Paul,” has learned to recognise that none of these Epistles are by him, not even the four generally regarded as unassailable. They are not letters to individuals, but books or pamphlets emanating from a particular school. We know little, in reality, of the facts of Paul’s life, or of his death : all is uncertain. The unmistakable tracesof late origin indicate that the Epistles probably did not appear till the second century. MINOR EPISTLES. The Epistles of Peter, James, and Jude are none of them held to be the work of the Apostles. They probably first saw the light in thesecond century ; the second Epistle of Peter may even belong to the latter half of that period. It is well known that they were not received into the Canon without considerable opposition. THE APOCALYPSE. The strange book of Revelation is not of purely Christian origin.. Criticism has clearly shown that it can no longer be regarded as a literary unit, but is an admixture of Jewish with Christian ideas and speculations. Ancient testimony, that of Papias in particular, assumed the Presbyter John, and not the Apostle, as its author or redactor. �]4 THE TRANSFORMATION OF CHRISTIANITY DOCTRINAL CHRISTIANITY ABANDONED. All the above conclusions are summarised, as nearly as may be, in the words of the authors of the respective articles. Their significance is surely enormous. Right or wrong, eminent Christian scholars here proclaim results in complete antagonism to the ideas usually accepted as forming the true basis of the Christian faith. They amount, in fact, to a complete and unconditional surrender of the whole dogmatic framework which has hitherto been held as divinely revealed, and therefore divinely true. Charles T. Gorham.* * Author of “ The First Easter Dawn,” etc. Cloth, xii.-32O pp., 4s. 6d. net, by post 4s. iod. THE FIRST EASTER DAWN: AN INQUIRY INTO THE EVIDENCE FOR THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS By Charles T. Gorham. “In writing this book Mr. Gorham has performed a great service to the cause of Rationalism, and he has performed it well. The First Easter Dawn fills a gap in Rationalist literature. No other English work deals with the subject of the Resur­ rection in a fashion so exhaustive and complete. Mr. Gorham always writes in a clear and interesting style, and his book is a model of calm and cogent reasoning. It deserves to be placed in the. hands of Christian believers, and it should be pressed upon the attention of Christian advocates. Let them answer it if they can. But, whatever may be their attitude, Mr. Gorham’s book will hold its own as a full and powerful statement of the Rationalist case against the central doctrine of the Christian religion—that Jesus Christ rose from the dead.”—The Literary Guide. “To what shifts of intellectual controversy apologists have been driven has been •exposed over and over again by Rationalist writers, but seldom, if ever, more patiently or with more persuasive effect than in this erudite and lucidly argued volume.”— Scotsman. “The book is well written, is marked by conscientious study, and takes a wide survey of the field.”—Edinburgh Evening News. “The weakness of the evidence for the resurrection of Jesus has often been exposed, and never more dispassionately than by Mr. Gorham.”—Clarion. . “The book bristles with arguments of fine temper, and is written in a judicial spirit, weighing the evidence on both sides impartially.”—Winnipeg Telegram. London : Watts & Co., 17, Johnson’s Court, Fleet Street, E.C. �GET “THE DETAILED EVIDENCE” FROM THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA BIBLICA. Before you decide for YOURSELF on this, the most important, the most vital matter upon which anyone can have to make a decision, get “ the detailed evidence ” upon which the conclusions given in this booklet are based—THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA BIBLICA itself. THE ENCYCLOP/EDIA BIBLICA is unique. It is the most complete Bible Dictionary ever compiled. But it is a great deal more than this. It is an international “forum” from which the greatest of the world’s Biblical students expound their opinions on controversial Biblical matters, each giving the evidence which has ybrf^Yhim to take up the attitude he has. All shades of opinion are represented in its pages, the Editors— Professor T. K. CHEYNE, M.A., D.D., and J. SUTHERLAND BLACK, M.A.— having thrown open its columns to all existing schools of thought. The careful study of the work will enable you to separate the wheat from the chaff; authentic history from mere legend ; fact from myth. No other work on this allimportant subject can be properly understood without the ENCYCLOPAEDIA BIBLICA at hand for reference. It should be in every thoughtful man’s library. SOME OF THE 102 CONTRIBUTORS. Col. Conder, R.E. Prof. A. B. Bruee. Prof. W. Ridgeway. T. G. Pinches. D.D. Prof. G. B. Gray. Prof. A. R. S. Kennedy. Prof. G. A. Smith. Prof. W. C. van Rev. W. C. Addis. Manen. Maurice A. Canney,M.A. Prof. P. W. SehmieProf. R. H. Charles. H. W. Hogg, M.A. del. Sir W. T. ThistletonProf. C. P. Tiele. Prof. W. H. Kosters. Prof. Noldeke. Dyer. Prof. G. F. Moore. Prof. A. A. Bevan. Prof. S. R. Driver. Canon J. A. Robinson. Prin. O. C. Whitehouse. Prof. W. Max Muller. James G. Fraser, D. C.L., LL.D., Litt. D. Dr. E. A. Abbott. The “ make-up ” of a book of reference of so great a scope is of the utmost importance, therefore the Publishers have taken care to ensure that in matters of type, white margins, and binding the ENCYCLOPAEDIA BIBLICA should compare more than favourably with any other work. There are two styles of binding, both very strong, and calculated to stand hard and constant use—half morocco at ^5 net, and cloth f4 net. NOW WITHIN THE REACH OF ALL RATIONALISTS. Hitherto this work has been unobtainable by all but the most affluent. Now, however, we have made arrangements with the Publishers to supply the complete work, carriage paid on receipt of 8s., the balance of the price being forwarded by nine further monthly payments of the same small sum. Note that there is no increase in price. The work is offered on these exceptional terms at the cash price. SEND THE ORDER FORM AND P.O. NOW. MESSES. WATTS CO., 17, Johnson's Court, Fleet Street, London, E.C. Please supply me with a copy of ENCYCLOPAEDIA BIBLICA, in four volumes, Cloth (or Leather), carriage paid, for which I enclose herewith Eight Shillings, and agree to remit to you, or whomsoever you depute, a similar sum each month until net price, ¿4 Cloth (or Leather), is paid. Name............................................................ Profession........................................... Address........................................................................................................ [Ort foreign orders the difference between English and foreign postage will be charged. in most cases cover this extra.] Eight shillings will �LIST OF R.P.A. SIXPENNY PUBLICATION Cheap i 1. HUXLEY’S LECTURES AND ESSAYS. (A ¿selection.) With Autobiography. 2. THE PIONEERS OF EVOLUTION. By Edward Clodd. 3. MODERN SCIENCE & MODERN THOUGHT. By Samuel Laing. With Illustrations. 18. AN INTRODUCTION TO THE OF HERBERT SPENCER. B.-”r Hudson. 19. THREE ESSAYS ON RELIG1C Stuart Mill. 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E.C. this il � 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 &amp; 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 An entity primarily responsible for making the resource 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 The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data 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 A name given to the resource The transformation of Christianity : a summary of the principal conclusions embodied in the "Encyclopaedia Biblica" Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Gorham, Charles Turner [1856-1933] Cheyne, T. K. (Thomas Kelly) [1841-1915] (ed) Description An account of the resource Place of publication: London Collation: 14 p. ; 22 cm. Notes: Publisher's advertisements, p.14, inside and on back cover. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Watts & Co. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1908] Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N287 Subject The topic of the resource Christianity Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <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 transformation of Christianity : a summary of the principal conclusions embodied in the "Encyclopaedia Biblica"), 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> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Bible-Criticism Christianity Encyclopaedia Biblica NSS https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/4de95d18e0a4de2a7b980bdf5aa7b4f5.pdf?Expires=1785369600&Signature=XQk6Er3f-J7RLa4DHfg%7ElLCY52t6-HykzLiDScoNsgSHzmL7VkcOglBPhVmvEXz5fyngyZGYHcG3nSgz2GvWdWUN5ctHYRj3lbhNQ3T-csG9Mltunj8RJQuorhM7MCutMCrG8bLVG9mXh8qN0NAI15O2N8KryB1QobJpKkukMw5wPdXXbupCsK36-jUrKf2kjE%7EMNDcAfQggv8VKjJ82t%7EADKGzR2OKkZBWFTsttMIVPuVWd935koforbrW6T6lHHgJbb8XAgdCmJx2D1oeZsVXZLt4OvEGF8XQoOhbOJ2FkE%7ENU2QaIrSmB9YXLtLxn9FTNG3IkpqQsOumu%7EjkkOA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 237bec9701913ee069df33a99299ddfd PDF Text Text / NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY LITERATURE & DOGMA �‘ La tendance a Tordre ne peut-elle faire tine partie essentielle de nos inclinations, de notre instinct, coniine la tendance a la conservation, d la reproduction V Senancour. (‘May not the tendency to conduct form an essential part of our inclinations, of our instinct, like the tendency to self­ preservation, to the reproduction of the species?’) �LITERATURE & DOGMA AN ESSAY TOWARDS A BETTER APPREHENSION OF THE BIBLE BY MATTHEW ARNOLD FORMERLY PROFESSOR OF POETP.Y IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD AND FELLOW OF ORIEL COLLEGE [PUBLISHED FOR THE RATIONALIST PRESS ASSOCIATION, LIMITED] LONDON WATTS & CO. 17 JOHNSON'S COURT, FLEET STREET 1902 [All rights reserved] ��PREFACE TO POPULAR When I praise cheap books and insist on the need for them, people turn round upon me and say, '■Physician, heal thyself! nobody’s books are dearer than your own.’ Whether his books shall be cheap or not, does not depend wholly upon the author; and I might urge, besides, that in fore­ telling a success for cheap books, I was thinking of books by authors more popular than I am. A volume of my verse, how­ ever, at a comparatively cheap price, has been in circulation for some time, and I have long had the wish to try the experiment of bringing out one of my prose books at a price yet cheaper. That wish I fulfil by the publication of the present volume. The book chosen has been more in demand than any other of my prose writings, and it lent itself to my purpose, further, by admitting of consider­ able condensation. The argument of the work is more readily followed, and for the general reader it probably gains in force, by the suppression of a good deal of the apparatus of citation and illustration from Scripture which originally accompanied it. The public to which the book was in the first instance addressed was one which expects, with a work of this kind, such an apparatus. But to the general public its fulness is not so well suited, and, for them, its reduction probably improves the book at the same time that it shortens it. I do not, however, choose for the experiment of a popular edition this book, merely because it admits of being EDITION (1883) shortened, or because it has been much in demand. I choose it far more for the reason that I think it, of all my books in prose, the one most important (if I may say so) and most capable of being useful. Ten years ago, when it was first published, I explained my design in writing it. No one who has had experience of the inattention and random judgments of mankind will be very quick to cry out because a serious design is not fairly and fully apprehended. Literature and Dogma, however, has perhaps had more than its due share of misrepresentation. The sole notion of Literature and Dogma, with many people, is that it is a book containing an abominable illustra­ tion, and attacking Christianity. It may be regretted that an illustration likely to be torn from its context, to be improperly used, and to give pain, should ever have been adopted. But it was not employed aggressively or bitterly; on the contrary, it was part of a plea for treating popular religion with gentleness and indulgence. Many of those who have most violently protested against the illustration resent it, no doubt, because it directs attention to that extreme licence of affirmation about God which prevails in our popular re­ ligion ; and one is not the easier forgiven for directing attention to error, because one marks it as an object for indulgence. To protesters of this sort I owe no de­ ference and make no concessions. But the illustration has given pain, I am told, �6 LITERATURE AND DOGMA in a quarter where my deference, and the deference of all who can appreciate one of the purest careers and noblest characters of our time, is indeed due • and finding that in that quarter pain has been given by the illustration, I do not hesitate to expunge it. The illustration, then, disappears; let me add a word or two as to the notion that Literature and Dogma is an attack upon Christianity. It is not even an attack upon the errors of popular Chris­ tianity. Those errors are very open to attack; they are much attacked already, and in a fashion, often, which I dislike and condemn; they will certainly be at­ tacked more and more, until they perish. But it is not the object of Literature and Dogma to attack them. Neither, on the other hand, is it the object of Literature and Dogma to contend with the enemies and deniers of Christianity, and to con­ vince them of their error. Sooner or later, indeed, they will be convinced of it, but by other agencies and through a quite other force than mine ; it is not the object of Literature and Dogma to confute them. The object of Literature and Dogma is to re-assure those who feel attachment to Christianity, to the Bible, but who recognise the growing discredit befalling miracles and the supernatural. Such persons are to be re-assured, not by dis­ guising or extenuating the discredit which has befallen miracles and the supernatural, but by insisting on the natural truth of Christianity. That miracles have fallen into discredit is to be frankly admitted ; that they have fallen into discredit justly and necessarily, and through the very Same natural and salutary process which had previously extinguished our belief in witchcraft, is to be frankly admitted also. Even ten years ago, when Literature and Dogma was first published, lucidity on his matter was, on the whole, not danger­ ous but expedient; it is even yet more expedient to-day. It has become even yet more manifest that by the sanction of miracles Christianity can no longer stand; it can stand only by its natural truth. Of course, to pass from a Christianity relying on its miracles to a Christianity relying on its natural truth is a great change. It can only be brought about by those whose attachment to Christianity is such, that they cannot part with it, and yet cannot but deal with it sincerely. This was the case with the Germanic nations who brought about that former great change, the Reformation. Probably the abandonment of the tie wfith Rome was hardly less of a change to the Christendom of the sixteenth century, than the abandonment of the proof from miracles is to the Christendom of to-day. Yet the Germanic nations broke the tie with Rome, because they loved Chris­ tianity well enough to deal sincerely with themselves as to clericalism and tradition. The Latin nations did not break their tie with Rome. This was not because they loved Rome more, or because they less saw the truth as to clericalism or tradition —a truth which had become evident enough then, as the truth about miracles has become now. But they did not really care enough about Christianity (I speak of the nations, not, of course, of individuals) to feel compelled to deal sincerely with themselves about it. The heretical Germanic nations, who re­ nounced clericalism and tradition, proved their attachment to Christianity by so doing, and preserved for it that serious hold upon men’s minds which is a great and beneficent force to-day, and the force to which Literature and Dogma makes appeal. Miracles have to go the same way as clericalism and tradition ; and the important thing is, not that the world should be acute enough to see this �PREFACE TO POPULAR EDITION 7 (there needs, indeed, no remarkable the subject of the New, Righteousness by acuteness to see it), but that a great and Jesus Christ, are, in positive strict truth, progressive part of the world should be man’s most momentous matters of concern. capable of seeing this and of yet holding The command of the Old Testament, ‘Fear God and keep his commandments,’ fast to Christianity. To assist those called to such an put into other words, what is it but this : endeavour, is the object, I repeat, of ‘Reverently obey the eternal power moving Literature and Dogma. It is not an us to fulfil the true law of our being ; ’—• attack upon miracles and the super­ and when shall that command be done natural. It unreservedly admits, indeed, away ? The command of the New Testa­ that the belief in them has given way ment : ‘ Watch that ye may be counted and cannot be restored, it recommends worthy to stand before the Son of Man,’ entire lucidity of mind on this subject, put into other words, what is it ? It is it points out certain characters of weak­ this : ‘ So live, as to be worthy of that ness in the sanction drawn from miracles, high and true ideal of man and of man’s even while the belief in them lasted. Its life, which shall be at last victorious.’ real concern, however, is not with miracles, All the future is there. Jesus himself, as he appears in the but with the natural truth of Christianity. It is after this that, among the more Gospels, and for the very reason that he serious races of the world, the hearts of is so manifestly above the heads of his men are really feeling; and what really reporters there, is, in the jargon of modern furthers them is to establish it. At philosophy, an absolute ; we cannot explain present, reformers in religion are far too him, cannot get behind him and above negative, spending their labour, some of him, cannot command him. He is there­ them, in inveighing against false beliefs fore the perfection of an ideal, and it is as which are doomed, others, in contending an ideal that the divine has its best worth about matters of discipline and ritual which and reality. The unerring and consum­ are indifferent. Popular Christianity de­ mate felicity of Jesus, his prepossessing­ rived its power from the characters of ness, his grace and truth, are, moreover, certainty and of grandeur which it wore ; at the same time the law for right perform­ these characters do actually belong to ance on all man’s great lines of endeavour, Christianity in its natural truth, and to although the Bible deals with the line of show them there should be our object. conduct only. Even those corrections, and they are This alone is really important. And shown they can be. Certainty and many and grave, which will have to be grandeur are really and truly characters applied to popular Christianity, are to of Christianity. Theologians and popular be drawn from Christianity itself. The religion have given a wrong turn to it all, materialistic future state, the materialistic and present it to us in a form which is kingdom of God, of our popular religion, fantastic and false ; but the firm founda­ will dissolve ‘ like some insubstantial tion for human life is to be found in it, vision faded.’ But they will dissolve and the true source for us of strength, through the action, through the gradually joy, and peace. Sine vid non itur, and increasing influence, of other and pro­ Christianity can be shown to be mankind’s founder texts of Scripture than the indispensable way. The subject of the popular texts on which they base them­ Old Testament, Salvation by righteousness, selves. Using the language of accom-^ �8 LITERATURE AND DOGMA modation to the ideas current amongst his hearers, Jesus talked of drinking wine and sitting on thrones in the kingdom of God; and texts of this kind are what popular religion promptly seized and built upon. But other profounder texts mean­ while there were, which remained, one may say, in shadow. ‘This is life eternal, to know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent;’— ‘The kingdom of God is righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.’ These deeper texts will gradually come more and more into notice and prominence and use, as it becomes evident that the future state built on the language of accommodation has no reality. The teachers of religion will more and more bring these texts forward and develop them. And as, from being everywhere preached and believed, the illusory future state gained power and apparent substance, so, too, by coming to be more and more dwelt upon and to possess men’s minds more and more, the true ideal will ac­ quire, in its turn, a fulness and force which no isolated endeavours can give to it. This is but another way of saying, what is perfectly true, that not only is Christianity necessary, but the Church also. The Church is necessary, the clergy are necessary; the future of Christianity is hardly conceivable without them. But as lucidity is a condition from which the Christianity of the future cannot escape, so is it a condition from which the Church and the clergy cannot escape either. At present they seem scarcely to comprehend this. Archdeacon Norris labours with all his might to clear the so-called Athanasian Creed from the reproach of over-harshness, not seeing that the really fatal defect of that docu­ ment is not its over-harshness but its futility. The Guardian proclaims ‘ the miracle of the Incarnation ’ to be ‘ the fundamental truth ’ for Christians. How strange that on me should devolve the office of instructing the Guardian that the fundamental thing for Christians is not the incarnation but the imitation of Christ 1 In insisting on ‘ the miracle of the Incarnation,’ the Guardian insists on just that side of Christianity which is perishing. Christianity is immortal; it has eternal truth, inexhaustible value, a boundless future. But our popular religion at present conceives the birth, ministry, and death of Christ, as alto­ gether steeped in prodigy, brimful of miracle ;—and miracles do not happen. �PREFACE (■S73) An inevitable revolution, of which we all recognise the beginnings and signs, but which has already spread, perhaps, farther than most of us think, is befalling the religion in which we have been brought up. In those countries where religion has been most loved, this revolution will be felt the most keenly; felt through all its stages and in all its incidents. In no country will it be more felt than in England. This cannot be otherwise. It cannot be but that the revolution should come, and that it should be here felt passionately, profoundly, painfully. In regard to it, how’ever, there is incumbent on everyone the utmost duty of con­ siderateness and caution. There can be no surer proof of a narrow and illinstructed mind, than to think and up­ hold that what a man takes to be the truth on religious matters is always to be proclaimed. Our truth on these matters, and likewise the error of others, is some­ thing so relative, that the good or harm likely to be done by speaking ought always to be taken into account. ‘ I keep silence at many things,’ says Goethe, ‘ for I would not mislead men, and am well content if others can find satisfaction in what gives me offence.’ The man who believes that his truth on religious matters is so absolutely the truth, that say it when, and where, and to whom he will, he cannot but do good with it, is in our day almost always a man whose truth is half blunder, and wholly useless. To be convinced therefore that our current theology is false, is not necessarily a reason for publishing that conviction. The theology may be false, and yet one may do more harm in attacking it than by keeping silence and waiting. To judge rightly the time and its conditions is the great thing; there is a time, as the Preacher says, to speak, and a time to keep silence. If the present time is a time to speak, there must be a reason why it is so. And there A a reason; and it is this. Clergymen and ministers of religion are full of lamentations over what they call the spread of scepticism, and because of the little hold which religion now has on the masses of the people—the lapsed masses, as some call them. Practical hold on them it never, perhaps, had very much, but they did not question its truth, and they held it in considerable awe. As the best of them raised themselves up out of a merely animal life, religion attracted and engaged them. But now they seem to have hardly any awe of it at all, and they freely question its truth. And many of the most successful, energetic, and ingenious of the artisan class, who are steady and rise, are now found either of themselves rejecting the Bible altogether, or following teachers who tell them that the Bible is an exploded superstition. Let me quote from the letter of a working­ man—a man, himself, of no common intelligence and temper—a passage that �IO LITERATURE AND DOGMA sets this forth very clearly. ‘ Despite the efforts of the churches,’ he says, ‘ the speculations of the day are working their way down among the people, many of whom are asking for the reason and authority for the things they have been taught to believe. Questions of this kind, too, mostly reach them through doubtful channels ; and owing to this, and to their lack of culture, a discovery of imperfection and fallibility in the Bible leads to its contemptuous rejection as a great priestly imposture. And thus those among the working class, who eschew the teachings of the orthodox, slide off towards, not the late Mr. Maurice, nor yet Professor Huxley, but towards Mr. Bradlaugh.’ Despite the efforts of the churches, the writer tells us, this contemptuous rejection of the Bible happens. And we regret the rejection as much as the clergy and ministers of religion do. There may be others who do not regret it, but we do. All that the churches can say about the importance of the Bible and its religion, we concur in. And it is the religion of the Bible that is professedly in question with all the churches, when they talk of religion and lament its pro­ spects. With Catholics as well as Protes­ tants, and with all the sects of Protestant­ ism, this is so ; and from the nature of the case it must be so. What the religion of the Bible is, how it is to be got at, they may not agree ; but that it is the religion of the Bible for which they contend, they all aver. ‘The Bible,’ says Cardinal Newman, ‘ is the record of the whole revealed faith ; so far all parties agree.’ Now, this religion of the Bible we say they cannot value more than we do. If we hesitate to adopt strictly their language about its aZZ-importance, that is only because we take an uncommonly large view of human perfection, and say, speak­ ing strictly, that there go to this certain things—art, for instance, and science— which the Bible hardly meddles with. The difference between us and them, however, is more a difference of theoretical statement than of practical conclusion. Speaking practically, and looking at the very large part of human life engaged by the Bible, at the comparatively small part unengaged by it, we are quite willing, like the churches, to call the Bible and its religion aZZ-important. All this agreement there is, both in words and in things, between us and the churches. And yet, when we behold the clergy and ministers of religion lament the neglect of religion and aspire to restore it, how must we feel that to restore religion as they understand it, to re-inthrone the Bible as explained by our current theology, whether learned or popu­ lar, is absolutely and for ever impossible ! —as impossible as to restore the feudal system, or the belief in witches. Let us admit that the Bible cannot possibly die; but then the churches cannot even con­ ceive the Bible without the gloss which they at present put upon it, and this gloss, as certainly, cannot possibly live. And it is not a gloss which one church or one sect puts upon the Bible and another does not; it is the gloss they all put upon it, calling it the substratum of belief common to all Christian churches, and largely shared with them even by natural religion. It is this so-called axiomatic basis which must go, and it supports all the rest. If the Bible were really inseparable from this and depended upon it, then Mr. Bradlaugh would have his way and the Bible would go too ; since this basis is inevitably doomed. For whatever is to stand must rest upon something which is verifiable, not unverifiable. Now, the assumption with which all the churches and sects set out—that there is ‘ a Great Personal First Cause, the moral and �PREFACE intelligent Governor of the universe,’ and that from him the Bible derives its authority—cannot, at present, at any rate, be verified. Those who ‘ ask for the reason and authority for the things that they have been taught to believe,’ as the people, we are told, are now doing, will begin at the beginning. Rude and hard reasoners as they are, they will never consent to admit, as a self-evident axiom, the preliminary assumption with which the churches start. So, if the people are to receive a religion of the Bible, we must find for the Bible some other basis than that which the churches assign to it, a verifiable basis and not an assumption. This new reli­ gion of the Bible the people may receive ; the version now current of the religion of the Bible they will not receive. Here, then, is the problem ; to find, for the Bible, for Christianity, for our religion, a basis in something which can be verified, instead of in something which has to be assumed. So true and prophetic are Vinet’s words: ‘ We must] he said, ‘make it our business to bring forward the rational side of Christianity, and to show that for thinkers, too, it has a right to be an authority.’ Yes, and the pro­ blem we have stated must be the first stage in the business. With this problem unsolved, all other religious discussion is idle trifling. This is why Dissent, as a religious movement of our day, would be almost droll, if it were not, from the tempers and actions it excites, so extremely irreligious. But what is to be said for men, aspiring to deal with the cause of religion, who either cannot see that what the people now require is a religion of the Bible quite different from that which any of the churches or sects supply ; or who, seeing this, spend their energies in fiercely bat­ tling as to whether the Church should be ii a national institution or no ? The ques­ tion, at the present juncture, is in itself so absolutely unimportant! The thing is, to recast religion. If this is done, the new religion will be the national one; if it is not done, the separating the nation, in its collective and corporate character, from religion, will not do it. It is as if men’s minds were much unsettled about mineralogy, and the teachers of it were at variance, and no teacher was convincing, and many people, therefore, were disposed to throw the study of mineralogy over­ board altogether. What would naturally be the first business for every friend of the study? Surely, to establish on safe grounds the value of the study, and to put its claims in a new light where they could no longer be denied. But if he acted as our Dissenters act in religion, what would he do ? - Give himself, heart and soul, to a furious crusade against keeping the Government School of Mines 1 Meanwhile, however, there is now an end to all fear of doing harm by gainsay­ ing the received theology of the churches and sects. For this theology is itself now a hindrance to the Bible rather than a help. Nay, to abandon it, to put some other construction on the Bible than this theology puts, to find some other basis for the Bible than this theology finds, is indispensable, if we would have the Bible reach the people. And this is the aim of the following essay: to show that, when we come to put the right construction on the Bible, -we give to the Bible a real experimental basis, and keep on this basis throughout; instead of any basis of unverifiable assumption to start with, followed by a string of other unverifiable assump­ tions of the like kind, such as the re­ ceived theology necessitates. And this aim we cannot seek without coming in sight of another aim too, which we have often and often pointed out, and �12 LITERATURE AND DOGMA tried to recommend: culture, the acquaint­ ing ourselves with the best that has been known and said in the world, and thus with the history of the human spirit. One cannot go far in the attempt to bring in, for the Bible, a right construction, without seeing how necessary is some­ thing of culture to its being admitted and used. The correspondent whom we have above quoted notices how the lack of culture disposes the masses to conclude at once, from any imperfection or falli­ bility in the Bible, that it is a priestly imposture. To a certain extent this is the fault, not of the people’s want of culture, but of the priests and theologians themselves, who for centuries have kept assuring men that perfect and infallible the Bible is. Still, even without this con­ fusion added by his theological instruc­ tors, the homo unius libri, the man of no range in his reading, must almost inevita­ bly misunderstand the Bible, cannot treat it largely enough, must be inclined to treat it all alike, and to press every word. To understand that the language of the Bible is fluid, passing, and literary, not rigid, fixed, and scientific, is the first step towards a right understanding of the Bible. But to take this very first step, some experience of how me n have thought and expressed themselves, and some flexi­ bility of spirit, are necessary ; and this is culture. After all, the Bible is not a talisman, to be taken and used literally; neither is any existing Church a talisman, whatever pretensions of the sort it may make, for giving the right interpretation of the Bible. But only true culture can give us this interpretation; so that if con­ duct is, as it is, inextricably bound up with the Bible and the right interpretation of it, then the importance of culture becomes unspeakable. For if conduct is necessary (and there is nothing so neces­ sary), culture is necessary. And the poor require it as much as the rich; and at present their education, even when they get education, gives them hardly anything of it. Yet hardly less of it, perhaps, than the education of the rich gives to the rich. For when we say that culture is, To know the best that has been thought and said in the world, we imply that, for culture, a system directly tending to this end is necessary in our reading. Now, there is no such system yet present to guide the reading of the rich any more than of the poor. Such a system is hardly even thought of; a man who wants it must make it for himself. And our reading being so without purpose as it is, nothing can be truer than what Butler says, that really, in general, no part of our time is more idly spent than the time spent in reading. Still, culture is indispensably neces­ sary, and culture is reading', but reading with a purpose to guide it, and with system. He does a good work who does anything to help this; indeed, it is the one essential service now to be rendered to education. And the plea, that this or that man has no time for culture, will vanish as soon as we desire culture so much that we begin to examine seriously our present use of our time. It has often been said, and cannot be said too often: Give to any man all the time that he now wastes, not only on his vices (when he has them), but on useless business, weari­ some or deteriorating amusements, trivial letter-writing, random reading, and he will have plenty of time for culture. ‘ Die Zeit ist unendlich lang,' says Goethe; and so it really is. Some of us waste all of it, most of us waste much, but all of us waste some. �CONTENTS FAGS CHAPTER INTRODUCTION I. . RELIGION GIVEN . s, . . , . ................................................................. 15 ..............................................................................................................................18 II. ABERGLAUBE INVADING..................................................................................................................... 35 III. RELIGION NEW-GIVEN............................................................................................................................ 41 IV. THE PROOF FROM PROPHECY............................................................................................................ 50 V. THE PROOF FROM MIRACLES............................................................................................................... 53 VI. THE NEW TESTAMENT RECORD.......................................................................................................... 64 VII. THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS TO HIMSELF................................................................................ 70 VIII. IX. FAITH IN CHRIST ................................................................................................................................ 77 ABERGLAUBE RE-INVADING....................................................................................................... 81 X. OUR ‘MASSES’ AND THE BIBLE............................................................................................... 93 XI. THE TRUE GREATNESS OF THE OLDTESTAMENT.........................................................103 XII. THE TRUE GREATNESS OF CHRISTIANITY.................................................................................. Ill CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................................................ 117 ��LITERATURE & DOGMA INTROD UCTION Lord Beaconsfield, treating Hellenic things with the scornful negligence natural to a Hebrew, said in a well-known book that our aristocratic class, the polite flower of the nation, were truly Hellenic in this respect among others,—that they cared nothing for letters and never read. Now, there seems to be here some in­ accuracy, if we take our standard of what is Hellenic from Hellas at its highest pitch of development. For the latest historian of Greece, Dr. Curtius, tells us that in the Athens of Pericles ‘read­ ing was universally diffused ; ’ and again, that ‘what more than anything distin­ guishes the Greeks from the Barba­ rians of ancient and modern times, is the idea of a culture comprehending body and soul in an equal measure.’ And I have myself called our aristocratic class Barbarians, which is the contrary of Hellenes, from this very reason : because, with all their fine, fresh appearance, their open-air life, and their love of field-sports, for reading and thinking they have in general no great turn. But no doubt Lord Beaconsfield was thinking of the primitive Hellenes of North-Western Greece, from among whom the Dorians of Peloponnesus originally came, but who •themselves remained in their old seats and did not migrate and develop like their more famous brethren. And of these primitive Hellenes, of Greeks like the Chaonians and Molossians, it is probably a very just account to give, that they lived in the open air, loved field-sports, and never read. And, explained in this way, Lord Beaconsfield’s parallel of our aristocratic class with what he somewhat misleadingly calls the old Hellenic race appears ingenious and sound. To those lusty northerners, the Molossian or Chaonian Greeks,—Greeks untouched by the development which contradistinguishes the Hellene from the Barbarian,—our aristocratic class, as he exhibits it, has a strong resemblance. At any rate, this class,—which from its great possessions, its beauty and attractiveness, the admira­ tion felt for it by the Philistines or middle­ class, its actual power in the nation, and the still more considerable destinies to which its politeness, in Mr. Carlyle’s opinion, entitles it, cannot but attract our notice, pre-eminently,—shows at present a great and genuine disregard for letters. And perhaps, if there is any other body of men which strikes one, even after look­ ing at our aristocratic class, as being in the sunshine, as exercising great attraction, as. being admired by the Philistines or middle-class, and as having before it a future still more brilliant than its present, it is the friends of physical science. Now, their revolt against the tyranny of letters is notorious. To deprive letters of the too great place they have hitherto filled in men’s estimation, and to substitute other studies for these, is the object of a sort of crusade with a body of people impor­ tant in itself, but still more important because of the gifted leaders who march at its head. Religion has always hitherto been a great power in England; and on this account, perhaps, whatever humiliations may be in store for religion in the future, the friends of physical science will not object to our saying, that, after them and �i6 LITERATURE AND DOGMA the aristocracy, the leaders of the religious world fill a prominent place in the public eye even now, and one cannot help noticing what their opinions and likings are. And it is curious how the feeling of the chief people in the religious world, too, seems to be just now against letters, which they slight as the vague and inexact instrument of shallow essayists and magazine-writers ; and in favour of dogma, of a scientific and exact presentment of religious things, instead of a literary presentment of them. ‘ Dogmatic theology,’ says the Guardian, speaking of our existing dogmatic theo­ logy,—‘ Dogmatic theology, that is, precision and definiteness of religious thought.’ ‘ Maudlin sentimentalism,’ says the Dean of Norwich, ‘ with its miserable disparagements of any definite doctrine ; a nerveless religion, without the sinew and bone of doctrine.’ The distinguished Chancellor of the University of Oxford thought it needful to tell us on a public occasion lately, that ‘ religion is no more to be severed from dogma than light from the sun.’ .Everyone, again, remembers the Bishops of Winchester 1 and Glouces­ ter making in Convocation their remark­ able effort ‘ to do something,’ as they said, ‘ for the honour of Our Lord’s God­ head,’ and to mark their sense of ‘that infinite separation for time and for eternity which is involved in rejecting the Godhead of the Eternal Son.’ In the same way: ‘To no teaching,’says one champion of dogma, ‘ can the appellation of Christian be truly given which does not involve the idea of a Personal God.’ Another lays like stress on correct ideas about the Personality of the Holy Ghost. ‘ Our Lord unquestionably,’ says a third, ‘ an­ nexes eternal life to a right knowledge of the Godhead,’—that is, to a right speculative, dogmatic knowledge of it. A fourth appeals to history and human nature for proof that ‘an undogmatic Church can no more satisfy the hunger of the soul, than a snowball, painted to look like fruit, •would stay the hunger of the stomach.’ And all these friends of theological science are, lil^ the friends of physical science, though from another 1 The late Bishop Wilberforce. cause, severe upon letters. Attempts made at a literary treatment of religious history and ideas they call ‘ a subverting of the faith once delivered to the saints.’ Those who make them they speak of as ‘ those who have made shipwreck of the' faith ; ’ and when they talk of ‘ the poison openly disseminated by infidels,’ and de­ scribe the ‘progress of infidelity,’ which more and more, according to their account, ‘ denies God, rejects Christ, and lets loose every human passion,’ though they have the audaciousness of physical science most in their eye, yet they have a direct aim, too, at the looseness and dangerous temerity of letters. Keeping in remembrance what Scrip­ ture says about the young man who had great possessions, to be able to work a change of mind in our aristocratic class we never have pretended, we never shall pretend. But to the friends of physical science and to the friends of dogma we do feel emboldened, after giving our best consideration to the matter, to say a few words on behalf of letters, and in depre­ cation of the slight which, on different grounds, they both put upon them. But particularly in reply to the friends of dogma do we wish to insist on the case for letters, because of the great issues which seem to us to be here involved. Therefore of the relation of letters to religion we are going now to speak ; of their effect upon dogma, and of the con­ sequences of this to religion. And so the subject of the present volume will be literature and dogma. 2. It is clear that dogmatists love religion; for else why do they occupy themselves with it so much, and make it, most of them, the business, even the professional business, of their lives ? And clearly religion seeks man’s salvation. How dis­ tressing, therefore, must it be to them to think that ‘salvation is unquestionably annexed to a right knowledge of the God­ head,’ and that a right knowledge of the Godhead depends upon reasoning, for �INTRODUCTION which so many people have not much aptitude ; and upon reasoning from ideas or terms such as substance, idehtity, causation, design, about which there is endless disagreement! It is true, a right knowledge of geometry also depends upon reasoning, and many people never get it ; but then, in the first place, salva­ tion is not annexed to a right knowledge of geometry ; and in the second, the ideas or terms such as point, line, angle, from which we reason in geometry, are terms about which there is no ambiguity or disagreement. But as to the demonstra­ tions and terms of theology we cannot comfort ourselves in this manner. How must this thought mar the Archbishop of York's enjoyment of such a solemnity as that in which, to uphold and renovate religion, he lectured lately to Lord Harrowby, Dean Payne Smith, and other kindred souls, upon the theory of causa­ tion ! And what a consolation to us, who are so perpetually being taunted with our known inaptitude for abstruse reason­ ing, if we can find that for this great concern of religion, at any rate, abstruse reasoning does not seem to be the ap­ pointed help ; and that as good or better a help—for indeed there can hardly, to judge by the present state of things, be a worse—may be something which is in an ordinary man’s power ! For the good of letters is, that they require no extraordinary acuteness such as is required to handle the theory of causation like the Archbishop of York, or the doctrine of the Godhead of the Eternal Son like the Bishops of Win­ chester and Gloucester. The good of letters maybe had without skill in arguing, or that formidable logical apparatus, not unlike a guillotine, which Professor Huxley speaks of somewhere as the young man’s best companion ;—and so it would be his best companion, no doubt, if all wisdom were come at by hard reasoning. In that case, all who could not manage this apparatus (and only a few picked crafts­ men can manage it) would be in a pitiable condition. But the valuable thing in letters—that J7 is, in the acquainting oneself with the best which has been thought and said in the world—is, as we have often remarked, the judgment which forms itself insensibly in a fair mind along with fresh knowledge; and this judgment almost anyone with a fair mind, who will but trouble himself to try and make acquaintance with the best which has been thought and uttered in the world, may, if he is lucky, hope to attain to. For this judgment comes almost of itself, and what it displaces it displaces easily and naturally, and without any turmoil of controversial reasonings. The thing comes to look differently to us, as we look at it by the light of fresh knowledge. We are not beaten from our old opinion by logic, we are not driven off our ground; our ground itself changes with us. Far more of our mistakes come from want of fresh knowledge than from want of correct reasoning; and, therefore, letters meet a greater want in us than does logic. The idea of a triangle is a definite and ascertained thing, and to deduce the properties of a triangle from it is an affair of reasoning. There are heads unapt for this sort of work, and some of the blun­ dering to be found in the world is from this cause. But how far more of the blundering to be found in the world comes from people fancying that some idea is a definite and ascertained thing, like the idea of a triangle, when it is not; and proceeding to deduce properties from it, and to do battle about them, when their first start was a mistake ! And how liable are people with a talent for hard, abstruse reasoning, to be tempted to this mistake I And what can clear up such a mistake except a wide and familiar acquaintance with the human spirit and its productions, showing how ideas and terms arose, and what is their character? and this is letters and history, not logic. So that minds w’ith small aptitude for abstruse reasoning may yet, through letters, gain some hold on sound judgment and useful knowledge, and may even clear up blunders committed, out of their very excess of talent, by the athletes of logic. B �18 LITERATURE AND DOGMA CHAPTER I RELIGION GIVEN I have said elsewhere1 how much it has contributed to the misunderstanding of St. Paul, that terms like grace, new birth, justification —which he used in a fluid and passing way, as men use terms in common discourse or in eloquence and poetry, to describe approximately, but only approxi­ mately, what they have present before their mind but do not profess that their mind does or can grasp exactly or ade­ quately—that such terms people have blunderingly taken in a fixed and rigid manner, as if they were symbols with as definite and fully grasped a meaning as the names line or angle, and proceeded to use them on this supposition. Terms, in short, which with St. Paul are literary terms, theologians have employed as if they were scientific terms. But if one desires to deal with this mistake thoroughly, one must observe it in that supreme term with which religion is filled—the term God. The seemingly incurable ambiguity in the mode of em­ ploying this word is at the root of all our religious differences and difficulties. People use it as if it stood for a perfectly definite and ascertained idea, from which we might, without more ado, extract propositions and draw inferences, just as we should from any other definite and ascertained idea. For instance, I open a book which controverts what its author thinks dangerous views about religion, and I read : ‘Our sense of morality tells us so-and-so; our sense of God, on the other hand, tells us so-and-so.’ And again, ‘ the impulse in man to seek God ’ is distinguished, as if the distinction were self-evident and explained itself, from ‘ the impulse in man to seek his highest perfec­ tion.’ Now, morality represents for every­ body a thoroughly definite and ascertained idea—the idea of human conduct regu­ lated in a certain manner. Everybody, again, understands distinctly enough what 1 Culture and Anarchy, p. 160. is meant by man’s perfection—his reach­ ing the best which his powers and circumstances allow him to reach. And the word ‘ God ’ is used, in connection with both these words, morality and perfection, as if it stood for just as definite and ascertained an idea as they do; an idea drawn from experience, just as the ideas are which they stand for; an idea about which everyone was agreed, and from which we might proceed to argue and to make inferences, with the certainty that, as in the case of morality and perfection, the basis on which we were going every­ one knew and granted. But, in truth, the word ‘ God ’ is used in most cases as by no means a term of science or exact knowledge, but a term of poetry and eloquence, a term thrown out, so to speak, at a not fully grasped object of the speaker’s consciousness, a literary term, in short; and mankind mean different things by it as their consciousness differs. The first question, then, is, how people are using the word; whether in this literary way, or in a scientific way. The second question is, what, supposing them to use the term as one of poetry and eloquence, and to import into it, therefore, a great deal of their own individual feelings and character, is yet the common substratum of idea on which, in using it, they all rest. For this will then be for them, and for us in dealing with them, the real sense of the word ; the sense in which we can use it for purposes of argument and inference without ambiguity. Strictly and formally the word ‘ God,’ so some philologists tell us, means, like its kindred Aryan words, Theos, Deus, and Deva, simply shining or brilliant. In a certain narrow way, therefore, this would be (if the etymology is right) the one exact and scientific sense of the word. It was long thought, however, to mean good, and so Luther took it to mean the best that man knows or can know ; and in this sense, as a matter of fact and history, �RELIGION GIVEN mankind constantly use the word. This is the common substratum of idea on which men in general, when they use the word God, rest; and we can take this as the word’s real sense fairly enough, only it does not give us anything very precise. But then there is also the scientific sense held by theologians, deduced from the ideas of substance, identity, causation, design, and so on ; hut taught, they say, or at least implied, in the Bible, and on which all the Bible rests. According to this scientific and theological sense—which has all the outward appearances, at any rate, of great precision—God is an infinite and eternal substance, and at the same time a person, the great first cause, the moral and intelligent governor of the universe; Jesus Christ is consubstantial with him; and the Holy Ghost is a person proceeding from the other two. This is the sense for which, or for portions of which, the Bishops of Winchester and Gloucester are so zealous to do some­ thing. Other people, however, who fail to perceive the force of such a deduction from the abstract ideas above mentioned, who indeed think it quite hollow, but who are told that this sense is in the Bible, and that they must receive it if they receive the Bible, conclude that in that case they had better receive neither the one nor the other. Something of this sort, it was, no doubt, which made Professor Huxley tell the London School Board lately, that ‘if these islands had no religion at all, it would not enter into his mind to introduce the religious idea by the agency of the Bible.’ Of such people there are now a great many ; and indeed there could hardly, for those who value the Bible, be a greater example of the sacrifices one is sometimes called upon to make for the truth, than to find that for the truth as held by the Bishops of Winchester and Gloucester, if it is the truth, one must sacrifice the allegiance of so many people to the Bible. But surely, if there be anything with which metaphysics have nothing to do, and where a plain man, without skill to walk in the arduous paths of abstruse 19 reasoning, may yet find himself at home, it is religion. For the object of religion is conduct; and conduct is really, however men may overlay it with philosophical disquisitions, the simplest thing in the world. That is to say, it is the simplest thing in the world as far as tinderstanding is concerned; as regards doing, it is the hardest thing in the world. Here is the difficulty,—to do what we very well know ought to be done ; and instead of facing this, men have searched out another with which they occupy themselves by pre­ ference,—the origin of what is called the moral sense, the genesis and physio­ logy of conscience, and so on. No one denies that here, too, is difficulty, or that the difficulty is a proper object for the human faculties to be exercised upon ; but the difficulty here is speculative. It is not the difficulty of religion, which is a practical one; and it often tends to divert the attention from this. Yet surely the difficulty of religion' is great enough by itself, if men would but consider it, to satisfy the most voracious appetite for difficulties. It extends to rightness in the whole range of what we call conduct; in three-fourths, therefore, at the very lowest computation, of human life. The only doubt is whether we ought not to make the range of conduct wider still, and to say it is four-fifths of human life, or five-sixths. But it is better to be under the mark than over it; so let us be con­ tent with reckoning conduct as threefourths of human life. And to recognise in what way conduct is this, let us eschew all school-terms, like moral sense, and volitional, and altruistic, which philosophers employ, and let us help ourselves by the most palpable and plain examples. When the rich man in the Bible-parable says : ‘ Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years ; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry ! ’1— those goods which he thus assigns as the stuff with which human life is mainly concerned (and so in practice it really is), —those goods and our dealings with them,—our taking our ease, eating, drink1 Luke, xii, 19. B2 �20 LITERATURE AND DOGMA ing, being merry, are the matter of conduct, true or false, there the impulses con­ the range where it is exercised. Eating, fessedly now are, and the business of drinking, ease, pleasure, money, the inter­ conduct is to deal with them. But it is course of the sexes, the giving free swing evident, if conduct deals with these, both to one’s temper and instincts—these are how important a thing conduct is, and the matters with which conduct is con­ how simple a thing. Important, because cerned, and with which all mankind know it covers so large a portion of human life, and the portion common to all sorts of and feel it to be concerned. Or, when Protagoras points out of what people; simple, because, though there things we are, from childhood till we die, needs perpetual admonition to form con­ being taught and admonished, and says duct, the admonition is needed not to (but it is lamentable that here we have determine what we ought to do, but to not at hand Mr. Jowett, who so excellently make us do it. And as to this simplicity, all moralists introduces the enchanter Plato and his personages, but must use our own w’ords) : are agreed. ‘ Let any plain honest man,’ ‘ From the time he can understand what says Bishop Butler, ‘ before he engages in is said to him, nurse, and mother, and any course of action ’ (he means action of teacher, and father too, are bending their the very kind we call conduct}, ‘ask him­ efforts to this end—to make the child self : Is this I am going about right or is good; teaching and showing him, as to it wrong ? is it good or is it evil ? I do not everything he has to do or say, how this in the least doubt but that this question is right and that not right, and this is would be answered agreeably to truth and honourable and that vile, and this is holy virtue by almost any fair man in almost and that unholy, and this do and that do any circumstance.' And Bishop Wilson not; ’ Protagoras, also, when he says this, says : ‘ Look up to God ’ (by which he bears his testimony to the scope and means just this : Consult your conscience) nature of conduct, tellg us what conduct is. ‘ at all times, and you will, as in a glass, Or, once more, when M. Littre (and we discover what is fit to be done.’ And the hope to make our peace with the Comtists Preacher’s well-known sentence is exactly by quoting an author of theirs in pre­ to the same effect : ‘ God made man up­ ference to those authors whom all the right; but they have sought out many British public is now reading and quoting) inventions,’1—or, as it more correctly is, —when M. Littrd in a most ingenious ‘ many abstruse reasonings.' Let us hold essay on the origin of morals, traces up, fast to this, and we shall find we have a better, perhaps, than anyone else, all our stay by the help of which even poor weak impulses into two elementary instincts, the men, with no pretensions to be logical instinct of self-preservation and the repro­ athletes, may stand firmly. ductive instinct—then we take his theory And so, when we are asked, what is the and we say, that all the impulses which object of religion ?—let us reply : Con­ can be conceived as derivable from the duct. And when we are asked further, instinct of self-preservation in us and what is conduct ?—let us answer : Threefrom the reproductive instinct, these terms fourths of life. being applied in their ordinary sense, are the matter of conduct. It is evident this 2. includes, to say no more, every impulse And certainly we need not go far about relating to temper, every impulse relating to prove that conduct, or ‘ righteousness,’ to sensuality; and we all know how which is the object of religion, is in much that is. a special manner the object of Bible­ How we deal with these impulses is religion. The word ‘ righteousness ’ is the matter of conduct,—how we obey, the master-word of the Old Testament. regulate, or restrain them ; that, and Keep judgment and do righteousness! nothing else. Not whether M. Littr^’s 1 Ecclesiastes, vii, 29. theory is true or false; for whether it be �RELIGION GIVEN Cease to do evil, learn to do well! 1 these words being taken in their plainest sense of conduct. Offer the sacrifice, not of victims and ceremonies, as the way of the world in religion then was, but: Offer the sacrifice of righteousness I2 The great concern of the New Testament is likewise righteousness, but righteousness reached through particular means, righteousness by the means of Jesus Christ. A sen­ tence which sums up the New Testament and assigns the ground whereon the Christian Church stands, is, as we have elsewhere said,3 this : Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity !4 If we are to take a sentence which in like manner sums up the Old Testament, such a sentence is this : O ye that love the Eternal, see that ye hate the thing which is evilI to him that ordereth his conversation right shall be shown the salvation of GodP But instantly there will be raised the objection that this is morality, not religion; morality, ethics, conduct, being by many people, and above all by theologians, carefully contradistinguished from religion, which is supposed in some special way to be connected with propositions about the Godhead of the Eternal Son, or proposi­ tions about the personality of God, or about election, or justification. Religion, however, means simply either a binding to righteousness, or else a serious attending to righteousness and dwelling upon it. Which of these two it most nearly means, depends upon the view we take of the word’s derivation; but it means one of them, and they are really much the same. And the antithesis between ethical and religious is thus quite a false one. Ethical means practical, it relates to practice or conduct passing into habit or disposition. Reli­ gious also means practical, but practical in a still higher degree; and the right anti­ thesis to both ethical and religious, is the same as the right antithesis to practical: namely, theoretical. 1 Isaiah, lvi, I ; i, l6, 17. 2 Psalm iv, 5. 8 St. Paul and Protestantism, p. 159. 4 II Timothy, ii, 19. 5 Ps. xcvii, 10; 1, 23. 21 Now, propositions about the Godhead of the Eternal Son are theoretical, and they therefore are very properly opposed to propositions which are moral or ethical; but they are with equal propriety opposed to propositions which are religious. They differ in kind from what is religious, while what is ethical agrees in kind with it. But is there, therefore, no difference between what is ethical or morality, and religion ? There is a difference; a difference of degree. Religion, if we follow the inten­ tion of human thought and human lan­ guage in the use of the word, is ethics heightened, enkindled, lit up by feeling ; the passage from morality to religion is made when to morality is applied emo­ tion. And the true meaning of re­ ligion is thus, not simply morality, but morality touched by emotion. And this new elevation and inspiration of morality is well marked by the word ‘righteous­ ness.’ Conduct is the word of common life, morality is the word of philosophical disquisition, righteousness is the word of religion. Some people, indeed, arc for calling all high thought and feeling by the name of religion; according to that saying of Goethe : ‘ He who has art and science, has also religion.’ But let us use words as mankind generally use them. We may call art and science touched by emotion religion, if we will; as we may make the instinct of self-preservation, into which M. Littrd traces up all our private affec-l tions, include the perfecting ourselves by the study of what is beautiful in art ; and the reproductive instinct, into which he traces up all our social affections, include the perfecting mankind by political science. But men have not yet got to that stage, when we think much of either their private or their social affections at all, except as exercising themselves in conduct; neither do we yet think of religion as otherwise exercising itself. When mankind speak of religion, they have before their mind an activity en-l gaged, not with the whole of life, but with that three-fourths of life which is conduct. This is wide enough range for one word, surely; but at any rate, let us at present �22 LITERATURE AND DOGMA limit ourselves in the use of the word religion as mankind do. And if some one now asks: But what is this application of emotion to morality, and by what marks may we know it ?—we can quite easily satisfy him; not, indeed, by any disquisition of our own, but in a much better way, by examples. ‘ By the dispensation of Providence to mankind,’ says Quintilian, ‘ goodness gives men most satisfaction.’1 That is morality. ‘ The path of the just is as the shining light which shineth more and more unto the perfect day.’1 That is morality touched 2 with emotion, or religion. ‘ Hold off from sensuality,’ says Cicero; ‘for, if you have given yourself up to it, you will find yourself unable to think of anything else.’ 3 That is morality. ‘ Blessed are the pure in heart,’ says Jesus Christ; ‘for they shall see God.’4 That is religion. ‘We all want to live honestly, but cannot,’ says the Greek maxim-maker.5 That is moral­ ity. ‘ O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death ? ’ says St. Paul.6 That is religion. ‘Would thou wert of as good conversa­ tion in deed as in word ! ’7 is morality. ‘ Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of Heaven, but he that doeth the will of my lather which is in Heaven,’8 is religion. | Live as you were meant to live ! ’9 is morality. ‘ Lay hold on eternal life ! ’10 is religion. Or we may take the contrast within the bounds of the Bible itself. ‘Love not sleep, lest thou come to poverty,’ is morality. But : ‘ My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work,’ is religion.11 Or we may even 1 Dedit hoc Providentia' hominibus munus, ut honesta magis juvarent. 2 Proverbs, iv, 18. 3 Sis a venereis amoribus aversus ; quibus si te dedideris, non aliud quidquam possis cogitare quam illud quod diligis. 4 Matthew, v, 8. 5 ©eAojUtr xaXws tfjv travres, aXA’ ov SuvapeOa. 6 Romans, vii, 24. 5 Etfl’ 4tr0a epya rois Xbyois ftra. 8 Matthew, vii, 21. 9 Zijtrop Kara <bv<w>, 10 I Tim., vi, 12. n Prov., xx. 13 ; John, iv, 34. observe a third stage between these two stages, which shows to us the transition from one to the other. ‘ If thou givest thy soul the desires that please her, she will make thee a laughing stock to thine enemies ; ’ 1—that is morality. ‘ He that resisteth pleasure crowneth his life ; ’2— that is morality with the tone heightened, passing, or trying to pass, into religion. ‘ Flesh and blood cannot inherit the king­ dom of God ; ’3—there the passage is made, and we have religion. Our religious examples are here all taken from the Bible, and from the Bible such examples can best be taken ; but we might also find them elsewhere. ‘Oh that my lot might lead me in the path of holy inno­ cence of thought and deed, the path which august laws ordain, laws which in the highest heaven had their birth, neither did the race of mortal man beget them, nor shall oblivion ever put them to sleep; the power of God is mighty in them, and groweth not old 1 ’ That is from So­ phocles, but it is as much religion as any of the things which we have quoted as religious. Like them, it is not the mere enjoining of conduct, but it is this enjoin­ ing, touched, strengthened, and almost transformed, by the addition of feeling. So what is meant by the application of emotion to morality has now, it is to be hoped, been made clear. The next ques­ tion will probably be : But how does one get the application made? Why, how does one get to feel much about any matter whatever? By dwelling upon it, by staying our thoughts upon it, by having it perpetually in our mind. The very words mind, memory, remain, come, probably, all from the same root, from the notion of staying, attending. Pos­ sibly even the word man comes from the same; so entirely does the idea of humanity, of intelligence, of looking before and after, of raising oneself out of the flux of things, rest upon the idea of steadying oneself, concentrating one­ self, making order in the chaos of one’s impressions, by attending to one impres’ Ecclesiasticus, xviii, 31, 2 Ecclesiasticus, xix, 5. * I Corinthians, xv, 50. �RELIGION GIVEN 23 to his own death ; ’ ‘ The way of trans­ gressors is hard ; ’ nobody will deny that those texts may stand for the fundamental and ever-recurring idea of the Old Testa­ ment.1 No people ever felt so strongly as the people of the Old Testament, the Hebrew people, that conduct is threefourths of our life and its largest concern. No people ever felt so strongly that suc­ ceeding, going right, hitting the mark in this great concern, was the way of peace, the highest possible satisfaction. ‘ He that keepeth the law, happy is he ; its ways are ways of pleasantness, and all its paths are peace ; if thou hadst walked in its ways thou shouldst have dwelt in peace for ever ! ’2 Jeshurun, one of the ideal names of their race, is the upright; Israel, the other and greater, is the wrestler with God, he who has known the conten­ tion and strain it costs to stand upright. That mysterious personage by whom their history first touches the hill of Sion, is Melchisedek, the righteous king. Their holy city, Jerusalem, is the foundation, or vision, or inheritance, of that which right­ eousness achieves—peace. The law of righteousness was such an object of atten­ tion to them, that its words were to ‘ be in their heart, and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.’3 That they might keep them ever in mind, they wore them, went about with them, made talismans of them: ‘ Bind them upon thy fingers, bind them about thy neck; write them upon the table of thine heart! ’4 ‘ Take fast hold of her,’ they said of the doctrine of con-] duct, or righteousness, ‘ let her not go keep her, for she is thy life ! ’ 5 3People who thus spoke of righteousness Only with one people—the people from could not but have had their minds long whom we get the Bible—these distractions and deeply engaged with it; much more than the generality of mankind, who have did not so much happen. The Old Testament, nobody will ever nevertheless, as we saw, got as far as the deny, is filled with the word and thought ’ Prov., xii, 28 ; xi, 19; xiii, 15. of righteousness. ‘ Ip the way of right­ 2 Prov., xxix, 18; iii, 17. Baruch, iii, 13. eousness is life, and in the pathway thereof 8 Deuteronomy, vi, 6, 7. is no death ; ’ ‘ Righteousness tendeth to 4 Prov., vii, 3 ; iii, 3. 4 Prov., iv, 13. life; ’ ‘ He that pursueth evil pursueth it sion rather than the other. The rules of conduct, of morality, were themselves, philosophers suppose, reached in this way ;—the notion of a whole self as op­ posed to a partial self, a best self to an inferior self, to a momentary self a per­ manent self requiring the restraint of impulses a man would naturally have in­ dulged ;—because, by attending to his life, man found it had a scope beyond the wants of the present moment. Suppose it was so ; then the first man who, as ‘ a being,’ comparatively, ‘ of a large dis­ course, looking before and after,’ con­ trolled the native, instantaneous, me­ chanical impulses of the instinct of self­ preservation, controlled the native, instan­ taneous, mechanical impulses of the re­ productive instinct, had morality revealed to him. But there is a long way from this to that habitual dwelling on the rules thus reached, that constant turning them over in the mind, that near and lively experi­ mental sense of their beneficence, which communicates emotion to our thought of them, and thus incalculably heightens their power. And the more mankind attended to the claims of that part of our nature which does not belong to conduct or morality, properly so called (and we have seen that, after all, about one-fourth of our nature is in this case), the more they would have distractions to take off their thoughts from those moral conclu­ sions which all races of men, one may say, seem to have reached, and to prevent these moral conclusions from being quick­ ened by emotion, and thus becoming religious. �24 LITERATURE AND DOGMA notion of morals or conduct. And, if live.’1 And we may well give ourselves, they were so deeply attentive to it, one in grateful and devout self-surrender, to thing could not fail to strike them. It is that by which we are thus visited. So this : the very great part in righteousness much is there incalculable, so much that which belongs, we may say, to not our­ belongs to not ourselves, in conduct ; and selves. In the first place, we did not the more we attend to conduct, and the make ourselves and our nature, or con­ more we value it, the more we shall feel duct as the object of three-fourths of that this. The not ourselves, which is in us and in nature; we did not provide that happi­ ness should follow conduct, as it unde­ the world around us, has almost every­ niably does; that the sense of succeeding, where, as far as we can see, struck the going right, hitting the mark, in conduct, minds of men as they awoke to conscious­ should give satisfaction, and a very high ness, and has inspired them with awe. satisfaction, just as really as the sense of Everyone knows how the mighty natural doing well in his work gives pleasure to a objects which most took their regards poet or painter, or accomplishing what became the objects to which this awe he tries gives pleasure to a man who is addressed itself. Our very word God is, per­ learning to ride or to shoot; or as satisfy­ haps, a reminiscence of these times, when ing his hunger, also, gives pleasure to a men invoked ‘ The Brilliant on high,’ sublime hoc candens quod invocent omnes man who is hungry. All this we did not make; and, in the Jovem, as the power representing to them next place, our dealing with it at all, when that which transcended the limits of their it is made, is not wholly, or even nearly narrow selves, and by which they lived wholly, in our own power. Our conduct and moved and had their being. Every­ is capable, irrespective of what we can one knows of what differences of opera­ ourselves certainly answer for, of almost tion men’s dealing with this power has in infinitely different degrees of force and different places and times shown itself energy in the performance of it, of lucidity capable ; how here they have been moved and vividness in the perception of it, of by the not ourselves to a cruel terror, there fulness in the satisfaction from it; and to a timid religiosity, there again to a play these degrees may vary from day to day, of imagination ; almost always, however, and quite incalculably. Facilities and connecting with it, by some string or other, felicities—whence do they come ? sugges­ conduct. But we are not writing a history of tions and stimulations—where do they tend? hardly a day passes but we have religion ; we are only tracing its effect on some experience of them. And so Henry the language of the men from whom we More was led to say, that ‘there was get the Bible. At the time they produced something about us that knew better, those documents which give to the Old often, what we would be at than we our­ Testament its power and its true character, selves.’ For instance : everyone can under­ the not ourselves which weighed upon the stand bow health and freedom from pain mind of Israel, and engaged its awe, was may give energy for conduct, and how a the not ourselves by which we get the sense neuralgia, suppose, may diminish it. It for righteousness, and whence we find the does not depend on ourselves, indeed, help to do right. This conception was whether we have the neuralgia or not, but indubitably what lay at the bottom of that we can understand its impairing our spirit. remarkable change which under Moses, at But the strange thing is, that with the same a certain stage of their religious history, neuralgia we may find ourselves one day befell the Hebrew people’s mode of nam­ without spirit and energy for conduct, and ing God.2 This was what they intended another day with them. So that we may in that name, which we wrongly convey, most truly say, with the author of the ’ Relicti mergimur et perimus, visitati vero Imitation : ‘ Left to ourselves, we sink and erigimur et vivimus. perish ; visited, we lift up our heads and * See Exodus, iii, 14. �RELIGION GIVEN 25 Eternal; the Eternal wliatl The Eternal cause ? Alas, these poor people were not Archbishops of York. They meant the Eternal righteous, who loveth righteous­ ness. They had dwelt upon the thought of conduct, and of right and wrong, until the not ourselves, which is in us and all around us, became to them adorable eminently and altogether as a power which makes for righteousness ; which makes for it unchangeably and eternally, and is there­ fore called The Eternal. There is not a particle of metaphysics in their use of this name, any more than in their conception of the not ourselves to which they attached it. Both came to them not from abstruse reasoning but from experience, and from experience in the plain region of conduct. Theologians with metaphysical heads render Israel’s Eternal by the selfexistent, and Israel’s not ourselves by the absolute, and attribute to Israel their own subtleties. According to them, Israel had his head full of the necessity of a first cause, and therefore said, The Eternal; as, again, they imagine him looking out into the world, noting everywhere the marks of design and adap­ tation to his wants, and reasoning out and inferring thence the fatherhood of God. All these fancies come from an excessive turn for reasoning, and from a neglect of observing men’s actual course of thinking and way of using words. Israel, at this stage when The Eternal was revealed to him, inferred nothing, reasoned out no­ thing ; he felt and experienced. When he begins to speculate, in the schools of Rabbinism, he quickly shows how much less native talent than the Bishops of Win­ chester and Gloucester he has for this perilous business. Happily, when The Eternal was revealed to him, he had not yet begun to speculate. Israel personified, indeed, his Eternal, for he was strongly moved, he was an orator and poet. Man never knows how anthropomorphic he is, says Goethe; and so man tends always to represent every­ thing under his own figure. In poetry and eloquence man may and must follow 1 ‘ Qu’est-ce que la nature ?’ says Pascal; ‘pentetre une premitre coutume, comme la coutume est this tendency, but in science it often leads him astray. Israel, however, did not une seconde nature.’ either without translation, by Jehovah, which gives us the notion of a mere mythological deity, or by a wrong transla­ tion, Lord, which gives us the notion of a magnified and non-natural man. The name they used was : The Eternal. Philosophers dispute whether moral ideas, as they call them, the simplest ideas of conduct and righteousness which now seem instinctive, did not all grow, were not once inchoate, embryo, dubious, un­ formed.1 That may have been so; the question is an interesting one for science. But the interesting question for conduct is whether those ideas are unformed or formed now. They are formed now ; and they were formed when the Hebrews named the power, not of their own mak­ ing, which pressed upon their spirit : The Eternal. Probably the life of Abraham, the friend of God, however imperfectly the Bible traditions by themselves convey it to us, was a decisive step forwards in the development of these ideas of righteous­ ness. Probably this was the moment when such ideas became fixed and ruling for the Hebrew people, and marked it permanently off from all other peoples who had not made the same step. But long before the first beginnings of recorded history, long before the oldest word of Bible literature, these ideas must have been at work. We know it by the result, although they may have for a long while been but rudimentary. In Israel’s earliest history and earliest utterances, under the name of Eloah, Elohim, The Mighty, there may have lain and matured, there did lie and mature, ideas of God more as a moral power, more as a power connected, above everything, with conduct and right­ eousness, than were entertained by other races. Not only can we judge by the result that this must have been so, but we can see that it w'as so. Still their name, The Mighty, does not in itself involve any 41 true and deep religious ideas, any more than our Aryan name, Deva, Deus, The Shining. With The Eternal it is other­ wise. For what did they mean by the �LITERATURE AND DOGMA 26 scientifically predicate personality of God; he would not even have had a notion what was meant by it. He called him the maker of all things, who gives drink to all out of his pleasures as out of a river; but he was led to this by no theory of a first cause. The grandeur of the spectacle given by the world, the grandeur of the sense of its all being not ourselves, being above and beyond ourselves and immeasurably dwarf­ ing us, a man of imagination instinctively personifies as a single, mighty, living and productive power; as Goethe tells us that the words which rose naturally to his lips, when he stood on the top of the Brocken, were: ‘Lord, what is man, that thou mindest him, or the son of man, that thou makest account of him ? ’1 But Israel’s confessing and extolling of this power came not even from his imaginative feel­ ing, but came first from his gratitude for righteousness. To one who knows what conduct is, it is a joy to be alive; and the not ourselves, which by bringing forth for us righteousness makes our happiness, working just in the same sense, brings forth this glorious world to be righteous in. That is the notion at the bottom of a Hebrew’s praise of a Creator; and if we attend, we can see this quite clearly. Wisdom and understanding mean, for Israel, the love of order, of righteousness. Righteousness, order, conduct, is for Israel at once the source of all man’s happiness and at the same time the very essence of The Eternal. The great work of the Eternal is the foundation of this order in man, the implanting in mankind of his own love of righteousness, his own spirit, his own wisdom and understanding; and it is only as a farther and natural working of this energy that Israel con­ ceives the establishment of order in the world, or creation. ‘To depart from evil, that is understanding ! Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding ! The Eternal by wisdom hath founded the earth, by under­ standing hath he established the heavens', ’2 and so the Bible-writer passes into the account of creation. It all comes to him from the idea of righteousness. 1 Ps. cxlix, 3. 2 Prov., iii, 13-20. I And it is the same with all the language our Hebrew religionist uses. God is a father, because the power in and around us, which makes for righteousness, is indeed best described by the name of this authoritative but yet tender and protect­ ing relation. So, too, with the intense fear and abhorrence of idolatry. Conduct, righteousness, is, above all, a matter of inward motion and rule. No sensible forms can represent it, or help us to it ; such attempts at representation can only distract us from it. So, too, with the sense of the oneness of God. ‘ Hear, O Israel 1 The Lord our God is one Lord.’1 People think that in this unity of God,—this monotheistic idea, as they call it,—they have certainly got metaphysics at last. They have got nothing of the kind. The monotheistic idea of Israel is simply seriousness. There are, indeed, many aspects of the not our­ selves ; but Israel regarded one aspect of it only, that by which it makes for righteous­ ness. He had the advantage, to be sure, that with this aspect three-fourths of human life is concerned. But there are other aspects which may be set in view. ‘ Frail and striving mortality,’ says the elder Pliny in a noble passage, ‘mindful of its own weakness, has distinguished these aspects severally, so as for each man to be able to attach himself to the divine by this or that part, according as he has most need.’2 That is an apology for polytheism, as answering to man’s many-sidedness. But Israel felt that being thus many-sided degenerates into an imaginative play, and bewilders what Israel recognised as our sole religious consciousness,—the consciousness of right. ‘ Let thine eyelids look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before thee; turn not to the right hand nor to the left; remove thy foot from evil! ’3 For does not Ovid say,4 in excuse for 1 Deut., vi, 4. 2 Fragilis et laboriosa mortalitas in partes ista digessit, infirmitatis suae memor, ut portionibus coleret quisque, quo maxime indigeret. Nat. Hist., ii, 5. 3 Prov., iv, 25, 27. 4 Tristia, ii. 287 :— Quis locus est templis augustior ? haec quoque vitet, In culpam si qua est ingeniosa suam. See the whole passage. �RELIGION GIVEN 27 the immorality of his verses, that the sight and mention of the gods themselves,—the rulers of human life,—often raised im­ moral thoughts? And so the sight and mention of all aspects of the not ourselves must. Yet how tempting are many of these aspects ! Even at this time of day the grave authorities of the University of Cambridge are so struck by one of them, that of pleasure, life and fecundity,—of the hominum divomque voluptas, alma Venus, —that they set it publicly up as an object for their scholars to fix their minds upon, and to compose verses in honour of. That is all very well at present; but with this natural bent in the authorities of the University of Cambridge, and in the IndoEuropean race to which they belong, where would they be now if it had not been for Israel, and for the stern check which Israel put upon the glorification and divinisation of this natural bent of man­ kind, this attractive aspect of the not our­ selves! Perhaps going in procession, Vice-Chancellor, bedels, masters, scholars, and all, in spite of their Professor of Moral Philosophy, to the temple of Aphrodite! Nay, and very likely Mr. Birks himself, his brows crowned with myrtle and scarcely a shade of melancholy on his counte­ nance, would have been going along with them ! It is Israel and his seriousness that have saved the authorities of the University of Cambridge from carrying their divinisation of pleasure to these lengths, or from making more of it, indeed, than a mere passing intellectual play; and even this play Israel would have beheld with displeasure, saying : O turn away mine eyes lest they behold vanity, but quicken Thou me in Thy way! 1 So earnestly and exclusively were Israel’s regards bent on one aspect of the not ourselves : its aspect as a power making for conduct, for righteousness. Israel’s Eternal was the Eternal which says : ‘ Be ye holy,-fox I am holy 1 ’ Now, as righte­ ousness is but a heightened conduct, so holiness is but a heightened righteous­ ness; a more finished, entire, and awefilled righteousness. It was such a righteousness which was Israel’s ideal; and therefore it was that Israel said, not indeed what our Bibles make him say, but this: ‘Hear, O Israel! The Eternal is our God, The Eternal alone.' And in spite of his turn for personifi­ cation, his want of a clear boundary-line between poetry and science, his inaptitude to express even abstract notions by other than highly concrete terms,—in spite of these scientific disadvantages, or rather, perhaps, because of them, because he had no talent for abstruse reasoning to lead him astray,—the spirit and tongue of Israel kept a propriety, a reserve, a sense of the inadequacy of language in convey­ ing man’s ideas of God, which contrast strongly with the licence of affirmation in our Western theology. ‘The high and holy One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is holy,’1 is far more proper and felicitous language than ‘ the moral and intelligent Governor of the universe,’ just because it far less attempts to be precise, but keeps to the language of poetry and does not essay the language of science. As he had developed his idea of God from personal experience, Israel knew what we, who have developed our idea from his words about it, so often are ignorant of: that his words were but thrown out at a /vast object of conscious­ ness, which he could not fully grasp, and which he apprehended clearly by one point alone,—that it made for the great concern of life, conduct. How little we know of it besides, how impenetrable is the course of its ways with us, how we are baffled in our attempts to name and describe it, how, when we personify it and call it ‘ the moral and intelligent Governor of the universe,’ we presently find it not to be a person as man conceives of per­ sons, nor moral as man conceives of moral, nor intelligent as man conceives of intelligent, nor a governor as man conceives of governors,—all this, which scientific theology loses sight of, Israel, who had but poetry and eloquence, and no system, and who did not mind contradicting him­ self, knew. ‘ Is it any pleasure to the 1 Ps. cxix, 37. ’ Ps., lvii, 15. �28 LITERATURE AND DOGMA Almighty, that thou art righteous?’1 What a blow to our ideal of that magnified and non-natural man, ‘ the moral and in­ telligent Governor’ ! Say what we can about God, say our best, we have yet, Israel knew, to add instantly : ‘ Lo, these are fringes of his ways ; but how little a portion is heard of him !’2 Yes, indeed, Israel remembered that, far better than our bishops do. ‘ Canst thou by search­ ing find out God; canst thou find out the perfection of the Almighty? It is more high than heaven, what canst thou do ? deeper than hell, what canst thou know ? ’3 Will it be said, experience might also have shown to Israel a not ourselves which did not make for his happiness, but rather made against it, baffled his claims to it? But'no man, as I have elsewhere re­ marked,4 who simply follows his own consciousness, is aware of any claims, any rights, whatever ; what he gets of good makes him thankful, what he gets of ill seems to him natural. His simple spon­ taneous feeling is well expressed by that saying of Izaak Walton: ‘ Every misery that I miss is a new mercy, and therefore let us be thankful.’ It is true, the not ourselves of which we are thankfully con­ scious we inevitably speak of and speak to as a man ; for ‘ man never knows how anthropomorphic he is.’ And as time proceeds, imagination and reasoning keep working upon this substructure, and build from it a magnified and non-natural man. Attention is then drawn, afterwards, to causes outside ourselves which seem to make for sin and suffering; and then either these causes have to be reconciled by some highly ingenious scheme with the magnified and non-natural man’s power, or a second magnified and non-natural man has to be supposed, who pulls the contrary way to the first. So arise Satan and his angels. But all this is secondary, and comes much later. Israel, the founder of our religion, did not begin with this. He began with experience. He knew from thankful experience the not our­ 1 Job, xxii, 3. 2 Job, xxvi, 14. 8 Job, xi, 7. 4 Culture and Anarchy, p. 192. selves which makes for righteousness, and knew how little we know about God besides. 4. The language of the Bible, then, is literary, not scientific language; language thrown out at an object of consciousness not fully grasped, which inspired emotion. Evidently, if the object be one not fully to be grasped, and one to inspire emotion, the language of figure and feeling will satisfy us better about it, will cover more of what we seek to express, than the language of literal fact and science. The language of science about it will be below what we feel to be the truth. The question however has risen and confronts us : what was the scientific basis of fact for this consciousness ? When we have once satisfied ourselves both a? to the tentative, poetic way in which the Bible-authors used language, and also as to their having no pretensions to metaphysics at all, let us, therefore, when there is this question raised as to the scientific account of what they had before their minds, be content with a very unpretending answer. And in this way such a phrase as that which I have formerly used concerning God, and have been much blamed for using,—the phrase, namely, that, ‘for science, God is simply the stream of tendency by which all things seek to fulfil the law of their being]—may be allowed, and may even prove useful. Certainly it is inadequate; certainly it is a less proper phrase than, for instance : ‘Clouds and darkness are round about him, righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his seat.’1 But then it is, in however humble a degree and with 1 Ps. xcvii, 2. It has been urged that if the personifying mode of expression is more proper, it must, also, be more scientifically exact. But surely it will on reflection appear that this is by no means so. Wordsworth calls the earth ‘ the mighty mother of mankind,’ and the geographers call her ‘ an oblate spheroid ; ’ Wordsworth’s ex­ pression is more proper and adequate to convey what men feel about the earth, but it is not therefore the more scientifically exact. �RELIGION GIVEN however narrow a reach, a scientific defini­ tion, which the other is not. 1 he phrase, ‘A personal First Cause, the moral,and intelligent Governor of the universe,’ has also, when applied to God, the character, no doubt, of a scientific definition. But then it goes far beyond what is admittedly certain and verifiable, which is what we mean by scientific. It attempts far too much. If we want here, as we do want, to have what is admittedly certain and verifiable, we must content ourselves with very little. No one will say, that it is admittedly certain and verifiable, that there is a personal first cause, the .moral and intelligent governor of the universe, whom we may call God if we will. But that all things seem to us to have what we call a law of their being, and to tend to fulfil it, is certain and admitted ; though whether we will call this God or not, is a matter of choice. Suppose, however, we call it God, we then give the name of God to a certain admitted reality; this, at least, is an advantage. And the notion of our definition does, in fact, enter into the term God, in men’s common use of it. To please God, to serve God, to obey God’s will, means- to follow a law of things which is found in conscience, and w’hich is an indication, irrespective of our arbitrary wish and fancy, of what we ought to do. There is, then, a real power which makes for righteous­ ness ; and it is the greatest of realities for us.1 When St. Paul says, that our business is ‘ to serve the spirit of God,’ ‘ to serve the living and true God ; ’1 and when 2 Epictetus says: ‘What do I want?—to acquaint myself with the natural order of things, and comply with it,’3 they both 1 Prayer, about which so much has often been said unadvisedly and ill, deals with this reality. All good and beneficial prayer is in truth, how­ ever men may describe it, at bottom nothing else than an energy of aspiration towards the eternal not ourselves that makes for righteousness,—of aspiration towards it, and of co-operation with it. Nothing, therefore, can be more efficacious, more right, and more real. • 2 Philippians, iii, 3 (in the r.eadin.g of the Vatican manuscript) ; I Thessalonians, i, 9. , 3 t( £ovAojuai; KaTajuaflui' /cat ravry Cirtaflai. 29 mean, so far, the same, in that they both mean we should obey a tendency, which is not ourselves, but which appears in our consciousness, by which we and other things fulfil the real law of our being. It is true, the not ourselves, by which things fulfil the real law of their being, extends a great deal beyond that sphere where alone we usually think of it. That is, a man may disserve God, disobey indications, not of our own making, but which appear, if we attend, in our con­ sciousness—he may disobey, I say, such indications of the real law of our being, in other spheres besides the sphere of conduct. He does disobey them, when he sings a hymn like : My Jesus to know, and feel his blood flow—ox, indeed, like nine-tenths of our hymns—or when he frames and maintains a blundering and miserable, constitution of society, as well as when he commits some plain breach of the moral law. That is, he may disobey them in art and science as well as in con­ duct. But he attends, and the generality of men attend, almost solely to the indi­ cations of a true law of our being as to conduct 5 and hardly at all to indications, though they as really exist, of a true law of our being on its aesthetic and intelligential side. The reason is, that the moral side, though not more real, is so much larger; taking in, as we have said, at least three-fourths of life. Now, the indications on this moral side of that tendency, not of our making, by which things fulfil the law of their being, we do very much mean to denote and to sum up when we speak of the will of God, pleasing God, serving God. Let us keep firm footing on this basis of plain fact, narrow though it may be. To feel that one is fulfilling in any way the law of one’s being, that one is succeeding and hitting the mark, bring’, as we know, happiness ; to feel this in regard to so great a thing as conduct, brings, of course, happiness proportionate to the thing’s greatness. We have already had Quintilian’s witness, how right con­ duct gives joy. Who could value know­ ledge more than Goethe ? but he marks it as being without question a lesser source �30 LITERATURE AND DOGMA of joy than conduct. Conduct he ranks with health as beyond all compare primary. ‘Nothing, after health and •virtue,1 he says, ‘can give so much satisfaction as learning and knowing.’ Nay, and Bishop Butler, at the view of the happiness from conduct, breaks free from all that hesi­ tancy and depression which so commonly hangs on his masterly thinking. ‘Selflove, methinks, should be alarmed 1 May she not pass over greater pleasures than those she is so wholly taken up with ? ’ And Bishop Wilson, always hitting the right nail on the head in matters of this sort, remarks that, ‘ if it were not for the practical difficulties attending it, virtue zvould hardly be distinguishable from a kind of sensuality.1 The practical difficulties are, indeed, exceeding great. Plain as is the course and high the prize, we all find ourselves daily led to say.with the Imitation-. ‘Would that for one single day we had lived in this world as we ought! ’ Yet the course is so evidently plain, and the prize so high, that the same Imitation cries out presently : ‘ If a man would but take notice, what peace he brings to himself, and what joy to others, merely by managing himself right!’ And for such happiness, since certainly we ourselves did not make it, we instinc­ tively feel grateful; according to that remark of one of the wholesomest and truest of moralists, Barrow : ‘ He is not a man, who doth not delight to make some returns thither whence he hath found great kindness.’ And this sense of gratitude, again, is itself an addition to our happiness ! So strong, altogether, is the witness and sanction happiness gives to going right in conduct, to fulfilling, so far as conduct is concerned, the law indicated to us of our being. Now, there can be no sanction to compare, for force, with the strong sanction of happiness, if it be true what Bishop Butler, who is here but the mouthpiece of humanity itself, says so irresistibly : ‘ It is manifest that nothing can be of consequence to mankind, or any creature, but happiness.’ But we English are taunted with our proneness to an unworthy eudaemonism, and an Anglican bishop may perhaps be a suspected witness. Let us call, then, a glorious father of the Catholic Church, the great Augustine himself. Says St. Augustine : ‘ Act we must in pursuance of what .gives us most delight; quod amplius nos delectat, secundum id operemur necesse est.’ And now let us see how exactly Israel’s perceptions about God follow and confirm this simple line, which we have here reached quite independently. First: ‘ It is joy to the just to do judgment.’1 Then: ‘It becometh well the just to be thankful.1* Finally : ‘ A pleasant thing it is to be thankful.’3 What can be simpler than this, and at the same time more solid? But again : ‘ The statutes of the Eternal rejoice the heart.’4 And then: ‘I will give thanks unto thee, O Eternal, with my whole heart; at midnight will I rise to give thanks unto thee because of thy righteous judgments I ’5 And lastly : ‘ It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Eternal; it is a good thing to sing praises unto our God 1 ’6 Why, these are the very same propositions as the pre­ ceding, only with a power and depth of emotion added ! Emotion has been applied to morality. God or Eternal'^ here really, at bottom, nothing but a deeply moved way of saying ‘ the power that makes for conduct or. righteousness.1 ‘Trust in God1 is, in a deeply moved way of expression, the trust in the law of conduct ; ‘ delight in the Eternal1 is, in a deeply moved way of expression, the happiness we all feel to spring from conduct. Attending to con­ duct, to judgment, makes the attender feel that it is joy to do it. Attending to it more still, makes him feel that it is the commandment of the Eternal, and that the joy got from it is joy from fulfilling the commandment of the Eternal. The thankfulness for this joy is thankfulness to the Eternal ; and to the Eternal, again, is due that further joy which comes from this thankfulness. ‘ The fear of the Eternal, that is wisdom; and to depart 1 Prov., xxi, 15. 2 Ps. xxxiii, I. 8 Ps. cxlvii, 1. 4 Ps. xix, 8. 8 Ps. cxxxviii, I ; cxix, 62. 6 Ps. xcii, 1 ; cxlvii, 1. �RELIGION GIVEN from evil, that is understanding.’1 ‘ The fear of the Eternal' and ‘ To depart from evil' here mean, and are put to mean, and by the very laws of Hebrew composition which make the second phrase in a parallelism repeat the first in other words, they must mean, just the same thing. Yet, what man of soul, after he had once risen to feel that to depart from evil was to walk in awful observance of an endur­ ing clue, within us and without us, which leads to happiness, but would prefer to say, instead of ‘ to depart from evil,’ ‘ the fear of the Eternal ’ ? Henceforth, then, Israel transferred to this Eternal all his obligations. Instead of saying: ‘ Whoso keepeth the com­ mandment keepeth his own soul,’2 he • rather said, ‘ My soul, wait thou only upon God, for of him cometh my salva­ tion ! ’ 3 Instead of saying : ‘ Bind them (the laws of righteousness) continually upon thine heart, and tie them about thy neck!’4 he rather said, ‘Have I not remembered Thee on my bed, and thought upon Thee when I was waking?’5 The obligation of a grateful and devout self-surrender to the Eternal replaced all sense of obligation to one’s own better self, one’s own permanent interest. The moralist’s rule : ‘ Take thought for your permanent, not your momentary, well­ being,’ became now: ‘ Honour the Eternal, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words.’6 That is, with Israel religion replaced morality. It is true, out of the humble yet divine ground of attention to conduct, of care for what in conduct is right and good, grew morality and religion both; but, from the time when the soul felt the motive of religion, it dropped and could not but drop the other. And the motive of doing right, to a sincere soul, is now really no longer his own welfare, but to please God; and it bewilders his consciousness if you tell him that he does right out of self-love. So that, as we have said that the first man who, as ‘a being of a large discourse, 1 Job, xxviii, 28. s Ps. lxii, 5, 1. 4 Ps. lxiii, 7. 2 Prov., xix, 16. 4 Prov., vi, 2. 6 Is. lviii, 13. 3i looking before and after,’ controlled the blind momentary impulses of the instinct of self-preservation, and controlled the blind momentary impulses of the sexual instinct, had morality revealed to him ; so in like manner we may say, that the first man who was thrilled with gratitude, devotion, and awe, at the sense of joy and peace, not of his own making, which followed the exercise of this self-control, had religion revealed to him. And, for us at least, this man was Israel. Now here, as we have already pointed out the falseness of the common antithesis between ethical and religious, let us an­ ticipate the objection that the religion here spoken of is but natural religion, by pointing out the falseness of the common antithesis, also, between natural and revealed. For that in us which is really natural is, in truth, revealed. We awake to the consciousness of it, we are aware of it coming forth in our mind; but we feel that we did not make it, that it is dis­ covered to us, that it is what it is whether we will or no. If we are little concerned about it, we say it is natural; if much, we say it is revealed. But the difference between the two is not one of kind, only of degree. The real antithesis, to natural and revealed alike, is invented, artificial. Religion springing out of an experience of the power, the grandeur, the necessity of righteousness, is revealed religion, whether we find it in Sophocles or in Isaiah. ‘The will of mortal men did not beget it, neither shall oblivion ever put it to sleep.’ A system of theological notions about personality, essence, existence, consubstantiality, is artificial religion, and is the proper opposite to revealed; since it is a religion which comes forth in no one’s consciousness, but is invented by theo­ logians—able men with uncommon talents for abstruse reasoning. This religion is in no sense revealed, just because it is in no sense natural. And revealed religion is properly so named, just in propor­ tion as it is in a pre-eminent degree natural. The religion of the Bible, therefore, is well said to be revealed, because the great natural truth, that ‘ righteousness �LITERATURE AND DOGMA 33 tendeth to life'1 is seized and exhibited there with such incomparable force and efficacy. All, or very nearly all, the nations of mankind have recognised the import­ ance of conduct, and have attributed to it a natural obligation. They, however, looked at conduct, not as something full of happiness and joy, but as something one could not manage to do without. But : ‘ Sion heard of it and rejoiced, and the daughters of Judah were glad, because of thy judgments, O Eternal ! ’ 2 Happi­ ness is our being’s end and aim, and no one has ever come near Israel in feeling, and in making others feel, that to righteousness belongs happiness ! The prodigies and the marvellous of Bible-religion are com­ mon . to it with all religions ; the love of righteousness, in this eminency, is its own. 5The real germ of religious conscious­ ness, therefore, out of which sprang Israel’s name for God, to which the records of his history adapted themselves, and which came to be clothed upon, in time, with a mighty growth of poetry and tradition, was a consciousness of the not ourselves which makes for righteousness. And the way to convince oneself of this is by studying the Bible with a fair mind, and with the tact which letters, surely, alone can give. For the thing turns upon under­ standing the manner in which men have thought, their way of using words, and what they mean by them. And by know­ ing letters, by becoming conversant with the best that has been thought and said in the world, we become acquainted not only with the history, but also with the scope and powers, of the instruments which men employ in thinking and speak­ ing. And this is just what is sought for. And with the sort of experience thus gained of the history of the human spirit, objections, as we have said, will be found not so much to be refuted by reasoning as to fall away of themselves. It is objected : ‘ Why, if the Hebrews of the 1 Prov., xi, 19. 2 Ps. xcvii, 8. Bible had thus eminently the sense for righteousness, does it not equally dis­ tinguish the Jews now?’ But does not experience show us, how entirely a change of circumstances may change a people’s character; and have the modern Jews lost more of what distinguished their ancestors, or even so much, as the modern Greeks of what distinguished theirs? Where is now, among the Greeks, the dignity of life of Pericles, the dignity of thought and of art of Phidias and Plato ? It is objected that the Jews’ God was not the enduring power that makes for righteousness, but only their tribal God, who gave them the victory in the battle and plagued them that hated them. But how, then, comes their literature to be full of such things as : ‘ Show me thy ways, O Eternal, and teach me thy paths; let integrity and uprightness preserve me, for I put my trust in thee ! if I incline unto wickedness with my heart, the Eternal will not hear me.’1 From the sense that with men thus guided and going right in goodness it could not but be well, that their leaf could not wither and that whatsoever they did must prosper,2 would naturally come the sense that in their wars with an enemy the enemy should be put to con­ fusion and they should triumph. But how, out of the mere sense that their enemy should be put to confusion and they should triumph, could the desire for goodness come ? It is objected, again, that their ‘ law of the Lord ’ was a positive traditionary code to the Hebrews, standing as a mechanical rule which held them in awe; that their ‘fear of the Lord’ was super­ stitious dread of an assumed magnified and non-natural man. But why, then, are they always saying ‘ Teach me thy statutes, Teach me thy way, Show thou me the way that I shall walk in, Open mine eyes, Make me to understand wisdom secretly !’3 if all the law they were think­ ing of stood, stark and written, before their eyes already ? And what could they mean by : ‘ I will love thee, O Eternal, 1 Ps. xxv, 4, 21 ; lxvi, 18. 2 Ps. i, 3. 3 Ps. cxix, 12 ; lxxxvi, Il ; cxliii, 8 ; cxix, 18 ; li, 6. v �RELIGION GIVEN 33 rfty strength ! ’1 if the fear they meant the reality and naturalness of that sense was not the awe-filled observance from Clearly, unless a sense or endowment of deep attachment, but a servile terror ? It human nature, however in itself real and is objected, that their conception of beneficent, has some signal representative righteousness was a narrow and rigid one, among mankind, it tends to be pressed centring mainly in what they called judg­ upon by other senses and endowments, to ment : ‘ Hate the evil and love the good, suffer from its own want of energy, and to and establish judgment in the gate ! ’2 so be more and more pushed out of sight. that ‘ evil,’ for them, did not take in all Anyone, for instance, who will go to the faults whatever of heart and conduct, but Potteries, and will look at the tawdry, meant chiefly oppression, graspingness, glaring, ill-proportioned ware which is a violent, mendacious tongue, insolent being made there for certain American and riotous excess. True; their con­ and colonial markets, will easily convince ception of righteousness was much of himself how, in our people and kindred, this kind, and it was narrow. But who­ the sense for the arts of design, though ever sincerely attends to conduct, along it is certainly planted in human nature, however limited a line, is on his way to might dwindle and sink to almost nothing, bring under the eye of conscience all if it were not for the witness borne to this conduct whatever; and already, in the sense, and the protest offered against its Old Testament, the somewhat monotonous extinction, by the brilliant aesthetic endow­ inculcation of the social virtues of judg­ ment and artistic work of ancient Greece. ment and justice is continually broken And one cannot look out over the world through by deeper movements of personal without seeing that the same sort of thing­ religion. Every time that the words con­ might very well befall conduct, too, if it were trition or humility drop from the lips of not for the signal witness borne by Israel. Then there is the practical force of their prophet or psalmist, Christianity appears. It is objected, finally, that even their example ; and this is even more important. own narrow conception of righteousness Everyone is aware how those, who want this people could not follow, but were to cultivate any sense or endowment in perpetually oppressive, grasping, slander­ themselves, must be habitually conversant ous, sensual. Why, the very interest and with the works of people who have been importance of their witness to righteous­ eminent for that sense, must study them, ness lies in their having felt so deeply the catch inspiration from them. Only in this necessity of what they were so little able way, indeed, can progress be made. And to accomplish ! They had the strongest as long as the world lasts, all who want to impulses in the world to violence and make progress in righteousness will come excess, the keenest pleasure in gratifying to Israel for inspiration, as to the people these impulses. And yet they had such who have had the sense for righteousness a sense of the natural necessary connexion most glowing and strongest ; and in hear­ between conduct and happiness, that they ing and reading the words Israel has kept always saying, in spite of themselves : uttered for us, carers for conduct will find a To him that ordereth his conversation right glow and a force they could find nowhere else. As well imagine a man with a sense shall be shown the salvation of God!3 Now manifestly this sense of theirs has for sculpture not cultivating it by the help a double force for the rest of mankind,— of the remains of Greek art, or a man with an evidential force and a practical force. a sense for poetry not cultivating it by the Its evidential force is in keeping before help of Homer and Shakespeare, as a man men’s view, by the example of the signal with a sense for conduct not cultivating apparition, in one branch of our race, of it by the help of the Bible 1 And this the sense for conduct and righteousness, sense, in the satisfying of which we come naturally to the Bible, is a sense which the generality of men have far more 1 Ps. xviii, I. 4 Amos, v, 15. decidedly than they have the sense for 3 Ps. 1, 23. c �34 LITERATURE AND DOGMA art or for science. At any rate, whether this or that man has it decidedly or not, it is the sense which has to do with threefourths of human life. This does truly constitute for Israel a most extraordinary distinction. In spite of all which in them and in their character is unattractive, nay, repellent,—in spite of their shortcomings even in righteousness itself and their insignificance in everything else,—this petty, unsuccessful, unamiable people, without politics, without science, without art, without charm, deserve their great place in the world’s regard, and are likely to have it more, as the -world goes on, rather than less. It is secured to them by the facts of human nature, and by the unalterable constitution of things. ‘ God hath given commandment to bless, and he hath blessed, and we cannot reverse it ; he hath not seen iniquity in Jacob, and he hath not seen perverseness in Israel; the Eternal, his God, is with him ! ’1 Anyone does a good deed who removes stumbling blocks out of the way of our feeling and profiting by the witness left by this people. And so, instead of making our Hebrew speakers mean, in their use of the word God, a scientific affirmation which never entered into their heads, and about which many will dispute, let us content ourselves with making them mean, as a matter of scientific fact and experience, what they really did mean as such, and what is unchallengeable. Let us put into their ‘ Eternal ’ and ‘ God ’ no more science than they did :—the enduring power, not ourselves, which makes for righteousness. They meant more by these names, but they meant this; and this they grasped fully. And the sense which this will give us for their words is at least solid ; so that we may find it of use as a guide to steady us, and to give us a constant clue in following what they say. And is it so unworthy? It is true, unless we can fill it with as much feeling as they did, the mere possessing it will not carry us far. But matters are not at all mended by taking their language of approximate figure and turning it into the language of scientific definition ; or by crediting them with our own dubious science, deduced from metaphysical ideas which ‘they never had. A better way than this, surely, is to take their fact of experi­ ence, to keep it steadily for our basis in using their language, and to see whether from using their language with the ground of this real and firm sense to it, as they themselves did, somewhat of their feeling, too, may not grow upon us. At least we shall know what we are saying ; and that what we are saying is true, however in­ adequate. But is this confessed inadequateness of our speech, concerning that which we will not call by the negative name of the unknown and unknowable, but rather by the name of the unexplored and inex­ pressible, and of which the Hebrews themselves said : It is more high than heaven, what canst thou dot deeper than hell, what canst thou knowT—is this reservedness of affirmation about God less worthy of him, than the astounding particularity and licence of affirmation of our dogmatists, as if he were, a man in the next street ? Nay, and nearly all the difficulties which torment theology,—as the reconciling God’s justice with his mercy and so on,—come from this licence and particularity ; theologians having pre­ cisely, as it would often seem, built up a wall first, in order afterwards to run their own heads against it. This, we say, is what comes of too much talent for abstract reasoning. One cannot help seeing the theory of causation and such things, when one should only see a far simpler matter : the power, the grandeur, the necessity of righteousness. To be sure, a perception of these is at the bottom of popular religion, under­ neath all the extravagances theologians have taught people to utter, and makes the whole value of it. For the sake of this true practical perception one might be quite content to leave at rest a matter where practice, after all, is everything, and theory nothing. Only, when religion is called in question because of the ex- 1 Numbers, xxiii, 20, 21. 1 Job, xi, 7. �ABERGLAUBE INVADING travagances of theology being passed off as religion, one disengages and helps religion by showing their utter delusive­ ness. They arose out of the talents of able men for reasoning, and their want (not through lack of talent, for the thing needs none: it needs only time, trouble, good fortune, and a fair mind; but through their being taken up with their reasoning power), their want of literary experience. By a sad mishap for them, 35 the sphere where they show their talents is one for literary experience rather than for reasoning. This mishap has at the very outset,—in the dealings of theologians with that starting-point in our religion, the experience of Israel as set forth in the O d Testament,—been the cause, we have seen, of great confusion. Naturally, as we shall hereafter see, the confusion becomes worse confounded as they pro­ ceed. CHAPTER II ABERGLAUBE INVADING When people ask for our attention be­ plain, solid, and experimental sense they cause of what has passed, they say, ‘in attached to them at bottom; and in the Council of the Trinity,’ and been pro­ attaching it they were on sure ground of mulgated, for our direction, by ‘a Personal fact, where we can all go with them. First Cause, the moral and intelligent Their words, we shall find, taken in this Governor of the universe,’ it is certainly sense, have quite a new force for us, and open to any man to refuse to hear them, an indisputable one. It is worth while on the plea that the very thing they start accustoming ourselves to use them thus, with they have no means of proving. in order to bring out this force and to see And we see that many do so refuse their how real it is, limited though it be, and attention; and that the breach there is, insignificant as it may appear. The very for instance, between popular religion and substitution of the word Eternal for the what is called science, comes from this word Lord is something gained in this cause. But it is altogether different when direction. The word Eternal has less of people ask for our attention on the particularity and palpability for the imagi­ strength of this other first principle : ‘To nation, but what it does affirm is some­ righteousness belongs happiness;’ or this: thing real and verifiable. Let us fix firmly in our minds, with this ‘ There is an enduring power, not our­ selves, which makes for righteousness.’ limited but real sense to the words we The more we meditate on this starting­ employ, the connexion of ideas which was ground of theirs, the more we shall find ever present to the spirit of the Hebrew that there is solidity in it, and the more people. In the way of righteousness is life, we shall be inclined to go along with and in the pathway thereof is no death ; as righteousness tendeth to life, so he that them and to see what will come of it. And herein is the advantage of giving pursueth evil, pursueth it to his own death; this plain, though restricted, sense to the as the whirlwind passeth, so is the wicked Bible-phrases : ‘ Blessed is the man that no more, but the righteous is an everlasting feareth the Eternal!’and : ‘Whoso trusteth foundation;—here is the ground idea.1 in the Eternal, happy is he ! ’1 By tradi­ Yet there are continual momentary sug­ tion, emotion, imagination, the Hebrews, gestions which make for gratifying our no doubt, came to attach more than this apparent self, for unrighteousness ; never­ plain sense to these phrases. But this theless, what makes for our real self, for 1 Ps. cxii, I; Prov., xvi, 20. 1 Prov., xii, 28 ; xi, 19 ; x, 25. C 2 �LITERATURE AND DOGMA righteousness, is lasting, and holds good in the end. Therefore : Twist in the Eternal with all thine heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding ; there is no wisdom, nor understanding, nor counsel against the Eternal; there is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death; there are many devices in a man's heart, nevertheless, the counsel of the Eternal, that shall standi To follow this counsel of the Eternal is the only true wisdom and understanding. The fear of the Eternal, that is wisdom, and to depart from evil, that is understand­ ing? It is also happiness. Blessed is everyone that feareth the Eternal, that walketh in his ways; happy shall he be, and it shall be well with him ! 3 O taste and see how gracious the Eternal is 1 blessed is the man that trusteth in him? Blessed is the man whose delight is in the law of the Eternal; his leaf shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth, it shall prosper? And the more a man walks in this way of righteousness, the more he feels himself borne by a power not his own : Not by might and not by power, but by my spirit, saith the Eternal? O Eternal, I know that the way of man is not in himself! all things come of thee ; in thy light do we see light; man's goings are of the Eternal; the Eternal ordereth a good man's going, and maketh his way acceptable to himself.1 But man feels, too, how far he always is from fulfilling or even from fully perceiving this true law of his being, these indications of the Eternal, the way of righteousness. He says, and must say: I am a stranger upon earth, Oh, hide not thy commandments from me! Enter not into judgment with thy servant, O Eternal, for in thy sight shall no man living be justified!3 Nevertheless, as a man holds on to practice as well as he can, and avoids, at any rate, ‘presump­ tuous sins,’ courses he can clearly see to1 3 2 1 Prov., iii, 5 ; xxi, 30; xiv, 12; xix, 21. 2 Job, xxviii, 28. 3 Ps. cxxviii, 1. 4 Ps. xxxiv, 8. 5 Ps. i, 1, 2, 3. 6 Zechariah, iv, 6. 2 Jeremiah, x, 23 ; I Chronicles, xxix, 14; Ps. Xxxvi, 9 ; Prov., xx, 24 ; Ps. xxxvii, 23. 8 cxix, 89; exliii, 2. be wrong, films fall away from his eyes, the indications of the Eternal come out more and more fully, we are cleansed from faults which were hitherto secret to us. Examine me, O God, and prove me, try out my reins and my heart; look well if there be any way of wickedness in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!1 O cleanse thou me from my secretfaults ! thou hast proved my heart, thou hast visited me in the night, thou hast tried me and shalt find nothing? And the more we thus get to keep innocency, the more we wonder­ fully find joy and peace. O how plentiful is thy goodness which thou hast laid up for them that far thee! thou shalt hide them in the secret of thy presence from the pro­ voking of men? Thou wilt show me the path of life, in thy presence is the fulness of joy, at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore? More and more this dwell­ ing oruthejoyand peace from righteous­ ness, and on the power which makes for righteousness, becomes a man’s consola­ tion and refuge. Thou art my hiding­ place, thou shalt preserve me from trouble ; if my delight had not been in thy law, 1 should have perished in my trouble? In the day of my trouble I sought the Eternal; a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat!3 O lead me to the rock that is higher than I! 7 The name of the Eternal is as a strong tower, the righteous runneth into it and is safe? And the more we experience this shelter, the more we come to feel that it is protecting even to tender­ ness. Like as a father pitieth his own children, even so is the Eternal merciful unto them that fear him? Nay, every other support, we at last find, every other attachment may fail us ; this alone fails not. Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb I Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee ! 10 All this, we say, rests originally upon 1 Ps. 2 Ps. 8 Ps. 5 Ps. e Ps. ’ Ps. 8 Ps. xix, 13 ; cxxxix, 23, 24. xix, 12 ; xvii, 3. xxxi, 19, 20. 4 Ps. xvi, II. xxxii, 7 ; cxix, 92. lxxvii, 2 ; Is., xxv, 4. lxi, 2. 8 Prov., xviii, IO. ciii, 13. ” Is., x'.ix, 15, �ABERGLAUBE INVADING *• the simple but solid experience : ‘ Con­ duct brings happiness] or, ‘ Righteousness tendeth to life]1 And, by making it again rest there, we bring out in a new but most real and sure way its truth and its power. For it has not always continued to rest there, and in popular religion now, as we manifestly see, it rests there no longer. It is important to follow the way in which this change gradually happened, and the thing ceased to rest there. Israel’s original perception was true : Righteousness tendeth to life! 2 It was true, that the workers*of righteousness have a covenant with the Eternal, that their work shall be blessed and blessing, and shall endure for ever. But what apparent contradictions was this true original perception destined to meet with I What vast delays, at any rate, were to be interposed before its truth could become manifest! And how in­ structively the successive documents of the Bible, which popular religion treats as if it were all of one piece, one time, and one mind, bring out the effect on Israel of these delays and contradictions I What a distance between the eighteenth Psalm and the eighty-ninth ; between the Book of Proverbs and the Book of Ecclesiastes! A time some thousand years before Christ, the golden age of Israel, is the date to which the eighteenth Psalm and the chief part of the Book of Proverbs belong. This is the time in which the sense of the necessary connexion between righteous­ ness and happiness appears with its full simplicity and force. The ughteous shall be recompensed in the earth, much more the wicked and the sinner! is the constant burden of the Book of Proverbs ; the evil bow before the good, and the wicked at the gates of the righteous !3 And David, in the eighteenth Psalm, expresses his con­ viction of the intimate dependence of happiness upon conduct, in terms which, though they are not without a certain crudity, are yet far more edifying in their truth and naturalness than those morbid sentimentalities of Protestantism about 1 Prov., xi, 19. 2 Prov., xi, 19. • Prov., xi. 31 ; Pr;v., xiv, 19. 37 man’s natural vileness and Christ’s imputed righteousness, to which they are dia­ metrically opposed. ‘ I have kept the ways of the Eternal,’ he says; ‘ I wa| also upright before him, and I kept my­ self from mine iniquity ; therefore hath the Eternal rewarded me according to my righteousness, according to the clean­ ness of my hands hath he recompensed me; great prosperity showreth he unto his king, and showeth lovingkindness unto David his anointed, and unto his seed for evermore.’ That may be called a classic passage for the covenant Israel always thinks and speaks of as made by God with his servant David, Israel’s second founder. And this covenant was but a re­ newal of the covenant made with Israel’s first founder, God’s servant Abraham, that ‘ righteousness shall inherit a blessing] and that ‘ in thy seed all nations of the earth shall be blessed] 1 But what a change in the eighty-ninth Psalm, a few hundred years later ! ‘ Eter­ nal, where are thy former lovingkindnesses which thou swarest unto David ? thou hast abhorred and forsaken thine an­ ointed, thou hast made void the cove­ nant ; O remember how short my time is ! ’2 ‘ The righteous shall be recompensed in the earth ! the speaker means ; ‘ my death is near, and death ends all; where, Eternal, is thy promise ? ’ Most remarkable, indeed, is the inward travail to which, in the six hundred years that followed the age of David and Solo­ mon, the many and rude shocks befalling Israel’s fundamental idea, Righteousness tendeth to life and he that pursueth evil pursueth it to his own death, gave occasion. ‘ Wherefore do the wicked live,’ asks Job, ‘become old, yea, are mighty in power? their houses are safe from fear, neither is the rod of God upon them.’3 Job him­ self is righteous, and yet: ‘ On mine eye­ lids is the shadow of death, not for any injustice in mine hands.’4 All through the Book of Job the question, how this can be, is over and over again asked and never answered ; inadequate solutions are 1 I Peter, iii, 9; Genesis, xxvi, 4. 2 Ps. lxxxix, 49, 38, 39, 47. * Job, xxi, 7, 9. 4 Job, xvi, i6, 17. �38 LITERATURE AND DOGMA offered and repelled, but an adequate solution is never reached. The only solution reached is that of silence before the insoluble : ‘ I will lay mine hand upon my mouth.’1 The two perceptions, Righteousness tendeth to life, and, ‘ The ungodly prosper in the world] are left confronting one another like Kantian antinomies.1 ‘ The earth is given unto the 2 hand of the wicked ! ’ and yet: ‘ The coun­ sel of the wicked is far from me ; God rewardeth him and he shall know it! ’ 3 And this last, the original perception, remains indestructible. The Book of Ecclesiastes has been called sceptical, epicurean; it is certainly without the glow and hope which animate the Bible in general. It belongs, probably, to the fourth century before Christ, to the latter and worse days of the Persian rule ; with difficulties pressing the Jewish community on all sides, with a Persian governor lord­ ing it in Jerusalem, with resources light and taxes heavy, with the cancer of poverty eating into the mass of the people, with the rich estranged from the poor and from the national traditions, with the priesthood slack, insincere and worthless. Composed under such circumstances, the book has been said, and with justice, to breathe resignation at the grave of Israel. Its author sees ‘the tears of the oppressed, and they had no comforter, and on the side of their oppressors there was power; wherefore I praised the dead which are already dead more than the living which are yet alive.’4 He sees ‘ all things come alike to all, there is one event to the righteous and to the wicked.’5 Attempts at a philosophic indifference appear, at a sceptical suspension of judgment, at an easy ne quid nimis : ‘Be not righteous overmuch, neither make thyself overwise ! why shouldst thou destroy thyself?’6 Vain attempts, even at a moment which favoured them ! shows of scepticism, van­ ishing as soon as uttered before the in­ tractable conscientiousness of Israel 1 For 1 Job, xl, 4. 2 Prov., xi, 19; Ps. Ixxiii, 12. 8 Job, ix, 24 ; xxi, 16, 19. 4 'Eccles., iv, I, 2. 8 Eccles., ix, 2. 6 Eccles., vii, 16. the Preacher makes answer against him­ self : ‘ Though a sinner do evil a hundred times and his days be prolonged, yet surely I know that it shall be well with them that fear God; but it shall not be well with the wicked, because he feareth not before God.’1 _ Malachi, probably almost contemporary with the Preacher, felt the pressure of the same circumstances, had the same occasions of despondency. All around him people were saying : ‘ Everyone that doeth evil is good in the sight of the Eternal, and he delighteth in them ; w’here is the God of judgment? it is vain to serve God, and what profit is it that we have kept his ordinance?’2 What a change from the clear certitude of the golden age : ‘As the whirlwind passeth, so is the wicked no more ; but the righteous is an everlasting foundation 1 ’3 But yet, wi.th all the certitude of this happier past, Malachi answers on behalf of the Eternal: ‘Unto you that fear my name shall the sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings I’4 Many there were, no doubt, who had lost all living sense that the promises w’ere made to righteousness; wrho took them mechanically, as made to them andassured to them because they were the seed of Abra­ ham, because they were, in St. Paul’s words: ‘Israelites, to whom pertain the adop­ tion and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the law and the service of God, and whose are the fathers.’5 These people were perplexed and indignant when the privileged seed became unprosperous; and they looked for some great change to be wrought in the fallen fortunes of Israel, wrought miraculously and materially. And these were, no doubt, the great majority ; and of the mass of Jewish expectation concerning the future they stamped the character. With them, however, our in­ terest does not so much lie ; it lies rather with the prophets and those whom the prophets represent. It lies with the con­ tinued depositaries of the original revela1 Eccles., viii, 12, 13. 2 Malachi, ii, 17 ; iii, 14. 8 Prov., x, 25. 4 Malachi, iv, 2. * Roni., ix, 4, 5. �ABERGLA UBE INVADING tion to Israel, Righteousness tendeth to life-, who saw clearly.enough that the promises were to righteousness, and that what tend­ eth to life was not the seed of Abraham taken in itself, but righteousness. With this minority, and with its noble repre­ sentatives the prophets, our present inter­ est lies ; the further development of their conviction about righteousness is what it here imports us to trace. An indestructi­ ble faith that the righteous is an everlasting foundation they had : yet they too, as we have seen, could not but notice, as time went on, many things which seemed ap­ parently to contradict this their belief. In private life, there was the frequent pro­ sperity of the sinner. In the life of nations there was the rise and power of the great unrighteous kingdoms of the heathen, the unsuccessfulness of Israel ; although Israel was undoubtedly, as compared with the heathen, the depositary and upholder .of the idea of righteousness. Therefore prophets and righteous men also, like the unspiritual crowd, could not but look ardently and expectantly to the future, to some great change and redress in store. At the same time, although their ex­ perience that the righteous were often afflicted, and the wicked often pro­ sperous, could not but perplex pious Hebrews ; although their conscience felt, and could not but feel, that, compared with the other nations with whom they came in contact, they themselves and their fathers had a concern for righteous­ ness, and an unremitting sense of its necessity, which put them in covenant with the Eternal who makes for righteous­ ness, and which rendered the triumph of other nations over them a triumph of people who cared little for righteousness over people who cared for it much, and a cause of perplexity, therefore, to men’s trust in the Eternal,—though their con­ science told them this, yet of their own shortcomings and perversities it told them louder still, and that their sins had in truth been enough to break their cove­ nant with the Eternal a thousand times over, and to bring justly upon them all the miseries which they suffered. To enable them to meet the terrible day, 39 when the Eternal would avenge him -of his enemies and make up his jewels, they themselves needed, they knew, the voice of a second Elijah, a change of the inner man, repentance.1 2. And then, with Malachi’s testimony on its lips to the truth of Israel’s ruling idea, Righteousness tendeth to life! died prophecy. Through some four hundred years the mind of Israel revolved those wonderful utterances, which, even now, on the ear of even those who only half understand them and who do not at all believe them, strike with such strange, incomparable power—the promises of prophecy. Through four hundred years, amid distress and humiliation, the Hebrew race pondered those magnificent assur­ ances that ‘ the Eternals arm is not shortened,' that ‘ righteousness shall be for ever] 2 and that the future would prove this, even if the present did not. ‘The Eternal fainteth not, neither is weary ; he giveth power to the faint.3 They that wait on the Eternal shall renew their strength ; the redeemed of the Eternal shall return and come with singing to Zion, and everlasting joy shall be upon their head; they shall repair the old wastes, the desolations of many genera­ tions; and I, the Eternal, will make an everlasting covenant with them.4 The Eternal shall be thine everlasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be ended; the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising, and my salvation shall be for ever, and my righteousness shall not be abolished.’5 The prophets themselves, speaking when the ruin of their country was im-j pending, or soon after it had happened/ had for the most part had in prospect the actual restoration of Jerusalem, the sub-j 1 Mai., iii, 17 ; iv, 5. 2 Is., lix, I; li, 8. 3 Is., xl, 28, 29. 4 Is., xl, 31; xxxv, 10; lxi, 4, 8. 6 Is., lx, 20, 3 ; li, 6. �40 LITERATURE AND DOGMA mission of the nations around, and the empire of David and Solomon renewed. But as time went on, and Israel’s return from captivity and resettlement of Jeru­ salem by no means answered his glowing anticipations from them, these anticipa­ tions had more and more a construction put upon them which set at defiance the unworthiness and infelicities of the actual present, which filled up what prophecy left in outline, and which embraced the world. The Hebrew Amos, of the eighth century before Christ, promises to his hearers a recovery from their ruin in which they shall possess the remnant of Edom ; the Greek or Aramaic Amos of the Christian era, whose words St. James produces in the conference at Jerusalem, promises a recovery for Israel in which the residue of men shall seek the Eternal.1 This is but a specimen of what went forward on a large scale. The redeemer, whom the unknown prophet of the captivity foretold to -Zion,2 has, a few hundred years later, for the writer whom we call Daniel and for his contemporaries, be­ come the miraculous agent of Israel’s new restoration, the heaven-sent executor of the Eternal’s judgment, and the bringerin of the kingdom of righteousness—the Messiah, in short, of our popular religion. ‘ One like the Son of Man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and there was given him do­ minion and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages should serve him; and the kingdom and do­ minion shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High.’3 An impar­ tial criticism will hardly find in the Old Testament writers before the times of the Maccabees (and certainly not in the passages usually quoted to prove it) the set doctrine of the immortality of the soul or of the resurrection of the dead. But by the time of the Maccabees, when this passage of the Book of Daniel was written, in the second century before Christ, the Jews have undoubtedly become familiar, not indeed with the idea of the immortality 1 Am., ix, 12; Acts, xv. ’72 Is., lix, 20. ’ Paq., yii, 13, 14, 27. of the soul as philosophers like Plato con­ ceived it, but with the rjotion of a resur­ rection of the dead to take their trial for acceptance or rejection in the Most High’s judgment and kingdom. To this, then, has swelled Israel’s original and fruitful thesis :—Righteous­ ness tendeth to life! as the whirlwind passeth, so is the wicked no more, but the righteous is an everlasting foundation ! 1 The phantasmagories of more prodigal and wild imaginations have mingled with the product of Israel’s own austere spirit; Babylon, Persia, Egypt, even Greece, have left their trace there; but the unchange­ able substructure remains, and on that substructure is everything built which comes after. In one sense, the lofty Messianic idea of ‘ the great and notable day of the Eternal,’ ‘ the consolation of Israel,’ ‘ the restitution of all things,’ 2 are even more important than the solid but humbler idea, righteousness tend­ eth to life, out of which they arose. In another sense they are much less important. They are more important, because they are the development of this idea and prove its strength. It might have been crushed and baffled by the falsification events seemed to delight in giving it; that instead of being crushed and baffled, it took this magnificent flight, shows its innate power. And they also in a wonderful manner attract emotion to the ideas of conduct and morality, attract it to them and combine it with them. On the other hand, the idea that righteousness tendeth to life has a firm, experimental ground, which the Messianic ideas have not. And the day comes when the pos­ session of such a ground is invaluable. That the spirit of man should entertain hopes and anticipations, beyond what it actually knows and can verify, is quite natural. Human life could not have the scope, and depth, and progress it has, were this otherwise. It is natural, too, to make these hopes and anticipations give in their turn support to the simple and * Prov., xi, 19 ; x, 25. 2 Acts, ii, 2Q 5 Lqke, ji, 25; Acts, iii, �RELIGION NEW-GIVEN humble experience which was their original ground. Israel, therefore, who originally followed righteousness because he felt that it tended to life, might and did naturally come at last to follow it because it would enable him to stand before the Son of Man at his coming, and to share in the triumph of the saints of the Most High. But this latter belief has not the same character as the belief which it is thus set to confirm. It is a kind of fairy-tale, which a man tells himself, which no one, we grant, can prove impossible to turn out true, but which no one also can prove certain to turn out true. It is exactly what is expressed by the German word ‘ Aberglaube,’ extra-belief, belief beyond what is certain and verifiable. Our word ‘superstition’ had by its derivation this same meaning, but it has come to be used 4i in a merely bad sense, and to mean a childish and craven religiosity. With the German word it is not so; therefore Goethe can say with propriety and truth : ‘ Aberglaube is the poetry of life—der Aberglaube ist die Poesie des lebensl It is so. Extra-belief, that which we hope, augur, imagine, is the poetry of life, and has the rights of poetry. But it is not science; and yet it tends always to imagine itself science, to substitute itself for science, to make itself the ground of the very science out of which it has grown. The Messianic ideas, which were the poetry of life to Israel in the age when Jesus Christ came, did this ; and it is the more important to mark that they did it, because similar ideas have so signally done the same thing with popular Christianity. CHAPTER III RELIGION NEW-GIVEN Jesus Christ was undoubtedly the very last sort of Messiah that the Jews expected. Christian theologians say confidently that the characters of humility, obscureness, and depression, were commonly attributed to the Jewish Messiah ; and even Bishop Butler, in general the most severely exact of writers, gives countenance to this error. What is true is, that we find these characters attributed to some one by the prophets ; that we attribute them to Jesus Christ ; that Jesus is for us the Messiah, and that Jesus they suit. But for the prophets themselves, and for the Jews who heard and read them, these characters of lowliness and depression belonged to God’s chastened servant, the idealised Israel. When Israel had been purged and renewed by these, the Messiah was to appear ; but with glory and power for his attributes, not humility and weakness. It is impossible to resist acknowledging this, if we read the Bible to find from it what really those who wrote it intended to think and say, and not to put into it what we wish them to have thought and said. To find in Jesus the genuine Jewish Messiah, or to find in him the Son of Man of Daniel, one coming with the clouds of heaven and having universal daminion given him, must certainly, to a Jew, have been extremely difficult. Nevertheless, there is undoubtedly in the Old Testament the germ of Christianity. In developing this germ lay the future of righteousness itself, of Israel’s primary and immortal concern ; and the incom­ parable greatness of the religion founded by Jesus Christ comes from his having developed it. Jesus Christ is not the Messiah to whom the hopes of his nation pointed; and yet Christendom with perfect justice has made him the Messiah, because he alone took, when his nation was on another and a false track, a way obscurely indicated in the Old Testament, and the �42 LITERATURE AND DOGMA one only possible and successful way, for the accomplishment of the Messiah’s function—to bring in everlasting righteous­ ness.1 Let us see how this was so. Religion in the Old Testament is a matter of national and social conduct mainly. First, it consists in devotion to Israel’s God, the Eternal who loveth right­ eousness, and of separation from other nations whose concern for righteousness was less fervent than Israel’s—of abhor­ rence of their idolatries which were sure to bewilder and diminish this fervent concern. Secondly, it consists in doing justice, hating all wrong, robbery and oppression, abstaining from insolence, lying, and slandering. The Jews’ polity, their theocracy, was of such immense importance, because religion, when con­ ceived as having its existence in these national and social duties mainly, requires a polity to put itself forth in ; and the Jews’ polity was adapted to religion so conceived. But this religion, as it de­ veloped itself, was by no means fully worthy of the intuition cut of which it had grown. We have seen how, in its intuition of God—of that ‘ not ourselves ’ of which all mankind form some concep­ tion or other—as the Eternal that makesfor righteousness, the Hebrew race found the revelation needed to breathe emotion into the laws of morality, and to make morality, religion. This revelation is the capital fact of the Old Testament, and the source cf its grandeur and power. But it is evident that this revelation lost, as time went on, its nearness and clearness ; and that for the mass of the Hebrews their God came to be a mere magnified and non-natural man, like the God of our popular religion now, who has commanded certain courses of conduct and attached certain sanctions to them. And though prophets and righteous men, among the Hebrews, might preserve always the immediate and truer appre­ hension of their God as the Eternal zvho makes for righteousness, they in vain tried to communicate this apprehension to the mass of their countrymen. They had, 1 Dan., ix, 24. indeed, special difficulty to contend with in communicating it; and the difficulty was this. Those courses of conduct which Israel’s intuition of the Eternal had originally touched with emotion and made religion, lay chiefly, we have seen, in the line of national and social duties. By reason of the stage of their own growth and the world’s, at which this revelation found the Hebrews, the thing could not well be otherwise. And national and social duties are peculiarly capable of a mechani­ cal exterior performance, in which the heart has no share. One may observe rites and ceremonies, hate idolatry, abstain from murder and theft and false witness, and yet have one’s inward thoughts bad, callous and disordered. Then even the admitted duties themselves come to be ill-discharged or set at nought, because the emotion which was the only certain security for their good discharge is want­ ing. The very power of religion, as we have seen, lies in its bringing emotion to bear On our rules of conduct, and thus making us care for them so much, consider them so deeply and reverentially, that we sur­ mount the great practical difficulty of acting in obedience to them, and follow them heartily and easily. Therefore the Israelites, when they lost their primary intuition and the deep feeling which went with it, were perpetually idolatrous, per­ petually slack or niggardly in the service of Jehovah, perpetually violators of judg­ ment and justice. The prophets earnestly reminded their nation of the superiority of judgment and justice to any exterior ceremony like sacrifice. But judgment and justice them­ selves, as Israel in general conceived them, have something exterior in them ; now, what was wanted was more inwardness, more feeling. This was given by adding mercy and humbleness to judgment and justice. Mercy and humbleness are some­ thing inward, they are affections of the heart. And even in the Proverbs these appear : ‘ The merciful man doeth good to his own soul; ’ ‘ He that hath mercy on the poor, happy is he ; ’ ‘ Honour shall uphold the humble in spirit; ’ ‘ When • pride cometh, shame cometh, but with �RELIGION NEW-GIVEN 43 the lowly is wisdom.’1 And the prophet the development and of the cardinal Micah asked his nation : ‘ What doth the points of his teaching we shall have to Eternal require of thee, but to do justly, speak more at length by-and-by; all we and to love mercy, and to walk humbly have to do here is to pass them in a rapid with thy God ? ’—adding mercy and preliminary review. Israel had said : ‘ To humility to the old judgment and justice.1 him that ordereth his conversation right 2 But a farther development is given to shall be shown the salvation of God.’1 humbleness, when the second Isaiah adds And Jesus said : ‘ Except your righteous­ contrition to it: ‘ I ’ (the Eternal) ‘ dwell ness exceed the righteousness of the with him that is of a contrite and humble Scribes and Pharisees,’—that is of the spirit ; ’3 or when the Psalmist says, very people who then passed for caring ‘ The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit-, .most about righteousness and practising a broken and a conirite heart, O God, it most rigidly,—‘ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven.’2 But thou wilt not despise ! ’4 This is personal religion ; religion con­ righteousness had by Jesus Christ’s time sisting in the inward feeling and disposition lost, in great measure, the mighty impulse of the individual himself, rather than in which emotion gives; and in losing this, the performance of outward acts towards had lost also the mighty sanction which religion or society. It is the essence of happiness gives. ‘The whole head was Christianity, it is what the Jews needed, sick and the whole heart faint ; ’3 the it is the line in which their religion was glad and immediate sense of being in the ripe for development. And it appears right way, in the way of peace, was gone; in the Old Testament. Still in the Old the sense of being wrong and astray, of Testament it by no means comes out sin, and of helplessness under sin, was fully. The leaning, there, is to make oppressive. The thing was, by giving a religion social rather than personal, an fuller idea of righteousness, to re-apply affair of outward duties rather than of emotion to it, and by thus re-applying inward dispositions. Soon after the very emotion, to disperse the feeling of being words wre have just quoted from him, amiss and helpless, to give the sense of the second Isaiah adds: ‘ If thou take being right and effective ; to restore, in away from the midst of thee the yoke, short, to righteousness the sanction of the putting forth of the finger and speak­ happiness. But this could only be done by attend­ ing vanity, and if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted ing to that inward world of feelings and soul, then shall thy light rise in obscurity dispositions which Judaism had too much and thy darkness be as the noonday, and neglected. The first need, therefore, for the Eternal shall guide thee continually Israel at that time, was to make religion and make fat thy bones.’5 This stands, cease to be mainly a national and social or at least appears to stand, as a full matter, and become mainly a personal description of righteousness; and as such, matter. ‘ Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first the inside of the cup, that the outside it is unsatisfying. may be clean also ! ’4—this was the very ground-principle in Jesus Christ’s teach­ £• ing. Instead of attending so much to What was wanted, then, was a fuller your outward acts, attend, he said, first description of righteousness. Now, it is of all to your inward thoughts, to the state clear that righteousness, the central ob­ of your heart and feelings. This doctrine ject of Israel’s concern, was the central has perhaps been overstrained and mis­ object of Jesus Christ’s concern also. Of applied by certain people since; but it was the lesson which at that timewas above 1 Prov., xi, 17 ; xiv, 21 ; xxix, 23 ; xi, 2. 2 Micah, vi, 8. 3 Is., lvii, 15. 4 Ps. li, 17. 8 Is., Iviii, 9-11. 1 Ps. 1, 23. 8 Is., i, 5. 2 Matth., v, 20. 4 Matth., xxiii, 26. �44 LITERATURE AND DOGMA all needed. It is a great progress beyond even that advanced maxim of pious Jews : ‘To do justice and judgment is more acceptable than sacrifice.’1 For to do justice and judgment is still, as we have remarked, something external, and may leave the feelings untouched, uncleared, dead. What was wanted was to plough up, clear, and quicken the feelings them­ selves. And this is what Jesus Christ did. ‘ My son, give me thy heart!'1 says the teacher of righteousness in the golden age of Israel.2 And when Israel had the Eternal revealed to him, and founded our religion, he gave his heart. But the time came when this direct vision ceased, and Israel’s religion was a mere affair of tradition, and of doctrines and rules received from without. Then it might be truly said of this professed servant of the Eternal : ‘ This people honour me with their lips, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men.’3 With little or no power of distinguishing between what was rule of ceremonial and what was rule of conduct, they followed the prescriptions of their religion with a servile and sullen mind, ‘ precept upon precept, line upon line, here a little and there a little,’4 and no end to it all. What a change since the days when it was joy to the just to do judgment!5 The prophets saw clearly enough the evil, nay, they could even point to the springs which must be touched in order to work a cure. But they could not press these springs steadily enough or skilfully enough to work the cure themselves. Jesus Christ’s new and different way of putting things was the secret of his succeed­ ing where the prophets failed. And this new way he had of putting things is what is indicated by the expression epieikeia,— an expression best rendered, as I have elsewhere said,6 by the phrase : ‘ sweet reasonableness.’ For that which is epieikes is that which has an air of truth and like1 Prov., xxi, 3. 2 Prov., xxiii, 26. 3 Is., xxix, 13. 4 Is., xxviii, 13. 4 Prov., xxi, 15. 6 St. Paul and Protestantism, preface, p. xix. Jihood ; and that which has an air of truth and likelihood is prepossessing. Now, never were there utterances concerningconduct and righteousness,—Israel’s master­ concern, and the master topic of the New Testament as well as of the Old,—which so carried with them an air of consummate truth and likelihood as Jesus Christ’s did ; and never, therefore, were any utterances so irresistibly prepossessing. He put things in such a way that his hearer was led to take each rule or fact of conduct by its inward side, its effect on the heart and character; then the reason of the thing, the meaning of what had been mere matter of blind rule, flashed upon him. The hearer could distinguish between what was only ceremony, and what was conduct-, and the hardest rule of conduct came to appear to him infinitely reasonable and natural, and therefore infinitely prepossessing. A return upon themselves, and a consequent intuition of the truth and reason of the matter of conduct in question, gave to men for right action the clearness, spirit, energy, happiness, they had lost. This power of returning upon them­ selves, and seeing by a flash the truth and reason of things, his disciples learnt of Jesus. They learnt too, from observing him and his example, much which, with­ out perhaps any conscious process of being apprehended in its reason, was dis­ cerned instinctively to be true and life­ giving as soon as it was recommended in Christ’s words and illustrated by Christ’s example. Two lessons in particular they learnt in this way, and added them to the great lesson of self-examination and appeal to the inner man, with which they started. ‘ Whoever will come after me, let him renounce himself and take up his cross daily and follow me ! he that will save his life shall lose it, he that will lose his life shall save it? 1 This was one of the two. ‘ Learn of me that I am mild and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls ! ’2 was the other. Jesus made his followers first look within and examine themselves ; he made them feel that they 1 Luke, ix, 23, 24. 2 Matth., xi, 29. �RELIGION NEW-GIVEN had a best and real self as opposed to their ordinary and apparent one, and that their happiness depended on saving this best self from being overborne. Then to find his own soul,' his true and permanent self, became set up in man’s view as his chief concern, as the secret of happiness ; and so it really is. ‘ How is a man ad­ vantaged if he gain the whole world and forfeit himself I''1 was the searching ques­ tion which Jesus made men ask them­ selves. And by recommending, and still more by himself exemplifying in his own practice, by showing active in himself, with the most prepossessing pureness, clearness, and beauty, the two qualities by which our ordinary self is indeed most essentially counteracted, self-renouncement and mildness, he made his followers feel that in these qualities lay the secret of their best self ; that to attain them was in the highest degree requisite and natural, and that a man’s whole happiness depended upon it. Self-examination, self-renouncement, and mildness, were, therefore, the great means by which Jesus Christ renewed righteousness and religion. All these means are indicated in the Old Testa­ ment. : God requireth truth in the inzvard parts ! Not doing thine own ways, norfind­ ing thine own pleasure! Seek meekness ! 3 But how far more strongly are they forced upon the attention in the New Testament, and set up clearly as the central mark for our endeavours! Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first the inside of the cup that the outside may be clean also!4 Whoever will come after me, let him renounce himself and take up his cross daily and follow me !5 Learn of me that I am mild and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls /6 So that, although personal re­ ligion is clearly recommended in the Old Testament, nevertheless these injunctions of the New Testament effect so much more for the extrication and establish­ ment of personal religion than the general exhortations in the Old to offer the sacn' 2 ♦ • Matth., xvi, 25. 2 Luke, ix, 25. Ps. li, 6; Is., lviii, 13 ; Zephaniah, ii, 3. Matth., xxiii, 26. 4 Luke, ix, 23. Matth., xi, 29. 45 fice of righteousness, to do judgment4 that, comparatively with the Old, the New Testament may be said to have really founded inward and personal religion. While the Old Testament says : Attend to conduct! the New Testament says : Attend to the feelings and dispositions whence conduct proceeds ! And as attending to conduct had very much degenerated into deadness and formality, attending to the springs of conduct was a revelation, a revival of intuitive and fresh perceptions, a touching of morals with emotion, a discovering of religion, similar to that which had been effected when Israel, struck with the abiding power not of man’s causing which makes for righteous­ ness, and filled with joy and awe by it, had in the old days named God the Eternal. Man came under a new dis­ pensation, and made with God a second covenant. 3- To rivet the attention on the indications of personal religion furnished by the Old Testament; to take the humble, inward, and suffering ‘ servant of God ’ of the prophets, and to elevate this as the Messiah, the seed of Abraham and of David, in whom all nations should be blessed, whose throne should be as the days of heaven, who should redeem his people and restore the kingdom to Israel —was a work of the highest originality. It cannot, as we have seen, be said, that by the suffering servant of God, and by the triumphant Messiah, the prophets themselves meant one and the same person. But language of hope and as­ piration, such as theirs, is in its very nature malleable. Criticism may and must determine what the original speakers seem to have directly meant. But the very nature of their language justifies any powerful and fruitful application of it; and every such application may be said, in the words of popular religion, to have been lodged there from the first by the spirit of God. Certainly it was a some1 Ps. iv. 5; Is., h i, 1. �46 LITERATURE AND DOGMA. what violent exegetical proceeding, to fuse together into one personage Daniel’s Son of Man coming with the clouds of heaven, the first Isaiah’s ‘ Branch out of the root of Jesse,’ who should smite the earth with the rod of his mouth and reign in glory and peace and righteousness, and the second Isaiah’s meek and afflicted Servant of God charged with the precious message of a golden future—to fuse together in one these three by no means identical personages ; to add to them the sacrificial lamb of the passover and of the temple-service, which was constantly before a Jew’s eyes ; to add, besides, the Prophet like to himself whom Moses promised to the children of Israel; to add, further, the Holy One of Israel and Redeemer, who for the prophets was the Eternal himself; and then to say, that the combination thence resulting was the Messiah or Christ whom all the prophets had meant and predicted, and that Jesus was this Messiah. To us, who have been formed and fashioned by a theology whose set purpose is to efface all the difficulties in such a combination, and to make it received easily and unhesitatingly, it may appear natural. In itself, and with the elements of which it is composed viewed singly and impartially, it cannot but be pronounced violent. But the elements in question have their chief use and value, wTe repeat, not as objects of criticism ; they belong of right to whoever can best possess himself of them for practice and edification. Simply of the Son of Man coming in the clouds, of the branch of Jesse smiting the earth with the rod of his mouth, slaying the wicked with his breath, and re-establishing in un­ exampled splendour David's kingdom, nothing could be made. With such a Messiah filling men’s-thoughts and hopes, the real defects of Israel still remained, because these chiefly proceeded from Israel’s making his religion too much a national and social affair, too little a personal affair. But a Messiah who did not strive nor cry, who was oppressed and afflicted without opening his mouth, who worked inwardly, obscurely, and patiently, yet failed not nor was discouraged until his doctrine made its way and transformed the world—this was the Messiah whom Israel needed, and in whom the lost great­ ness of Israel could be restored and culminate. For the true greatness of Israel was righteousness ; and only by an inward personal religion could the sense revive of what righteousness really was— revive in Israel and bear fruit for the world. Instead, then, of ‘the Root of Jesse who should set up an ensign for the nations and assemble the outcasts of Israel,’1 Jesus Christ took from prophecy and made pre-eminent ‘the Servant whom man despiseth and the people abhorreth,’ but ‘ who bringeth good tidings, who publisheth peace, publisheth salvation.’2 And instead of saying like the prophets : ‘ This people must mend, this nation must do so and so, Israel must follow such and such ways,’ Jesus took the individual Israelite by himself apart, made him listen for the voice of his conscience, and said to him in effect: ‘ If every one would mend one, we should have a new world.’ So vital for the Jews was this change of character in their religion, that the Old Testament abounds, as we have said, in pointings and approximations to it; and most truly might Jesus Christ say to his followers, that many prophets and righteous men had desired, though unavailingly, to see the things which they, the disciples, saw and heard.3 The desire felt by pious Israelites for some new aspect of religion such as Jesus Christ presented, is, undoubtedly, the best proof of its timeliness and salutari­ ness. Perhaps New Testament evidence to prove the workings of this desire may be received with suspicion, as having arisen after the event and when the new ideal of the Christ had become estab­ lished. Otherwise, John the Baptist’s characterisation of the Messiah as ‘the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the w’orld,’4 and the bold Messianic turn given in the twelfth chapter of St. Matthew to the prophecy there quoted from rhe 1 Is., xi, IO, 12. 8 Matth., xiii, 17. 2 Is., xlix, 7 ; lii, 7. 4 John, i, 29. �RELIGION NEW-GIVEN forty-second chapter of Isaiah, would be evidence of the highest importance. ‘A bruised reed breaketh he not,’ says Isaiah of the meek servant and messenger of God, ‘ and a glimmering wick quencheth he not; he declareth judgment with truth; far lands wait for his doctrine.’1 ‘A bruised reed shall he not break,’ runs the passage in St. Matthew, ‘and smoking flax shall he not quench, until he send forth judgment unto victory: in his name shall the Gentiles trust.’2 The words, until he send forth judgment unto victory, words giving a clear Messianic stamp to the personage described, are neither in the original Hebrew nor in the Greek of the Septuagint. Where did the Gospel­ writer find them ? If, as is possible, they were in some version then extant, they prove in a striking way the existence and strength of the aspiration which Jesus Christ satisfied by transforming the old popular ideal of the Messiah. But there are in any case signs of the existence of such an aspiration, since a Jewish com' mentator, contemporary, probably, with the Christian era, but not himself a Christian, assigns to this very prophecy a Messianic intention. And, indeed, the rendering of the final words, in his name shall the Gentiles trustj which is in the Greek of the Septuagint as well as in that of St. Matthew, shows a similar leaning in the Jews of Alexandria some two centuries before Christ. Signs there are then, without doubt, of others, besides Jesus Christ, trying to identify the Messiah of popular Jewish hope—the triumphant Root of David, the mystic son of man—with an ideal of meekness, inwardness, patience, and self­ denial. And well might reformers try to effect this identification, for the true line of Israel’s progress lay through it! But not he who tries makes an epoch, but he who effects ; and the identification which was needed Jesus Christ effected. Hence­ 1 Is., xlii, 3, 4. 2 Matth., xii, 20, 21. 3 These words are imported from an un­ doubtedly Messianic passage, the famous pre­ diction of the ‘rod out of the stem of Jesse’ in the eleventh chapter of Isaiah. Compare, in the Septuagint, Is., xi, 10, with Is., xlii, 4. 47 forth the true Israelite was, undoubtedly, he who allied himself with this identifica­ tion ; who perceived its incomparable fruitfulness, its continuance of the real tradition of Israel, its correspondence with the ruling idea of the Hebrew spirit: Through righteousness to happiness! or, in Bible-words: To him that ordereth his conversation right shall be shown the salva­ tion of God!1 That the Jewish nation at large, and its rulers, refused to accept the identification, shows simply that want of power to penetrate through wraps and appearances to the essence of things, which the majority of mankind always display. The national and social character of their theocracy was everything to the Jews, and they could see no blessings in a revolution which annulled it. It has often been remarked that the Puritans are like the Jews of the Old Testament; and Mr. Froude thinks he defends the Puritans by saying that they, like the Jews of the Old Testament, had their hearts set on a theocracy, on a fashioning of politics and society to suit the government of God. How strange that he does not perceive that he thus passes, and with justice, the gravest con­ demnation on the Puritans as followers of Jesus Christ ! At the Christian era the time had passed, in religion, for outward adaptations of this kind, and for all care about establishing or abolishing them. The time had come for inwardness and self-reconstruction,—a time to last till the self-reconstruction is fully achieved. It was the error of the Jews that they did not perceive this; and the old error of the Jews the Puritans, without the Jews’ excuse, faithfully repeated. And the blun­ der of both had the same cause,—a want of tact to perceive what is really most wanted for the attainment of their own professed ideal, the reign of righteousness. When Jesus appeared, his disciples were those who did not make this blunder. They were, in general, simple souls, with­ out pretensions which Jesus Christ’s new religious ideal cut short, or self-conse­ quence which it mortified. And any 1 Ps. 1, 23. �LITERATURE AND DOGMA Israelite who was, on the one hand, not warped by personal pretensions and self­ consequence, and on the other, not dull of feeling and gross of life like the com­ mon multitude, might well be open to the spell which, after all, was the great con­ firmation of Christ’s religion, as it was the great confirmation of the original religion of Israel—the spell of its happiness. ‘ Be glad, O ye righteous, and rejoice in the Eternal,’—the old and lost prerogative of Israel,—Christianity offered to make again a living and true word to him.1 happy again. The prophets all point to such a saviour, and he is the Messiah, and the promised happiness to Israel is in him and in his reign. He is, in the exalted language of prophecy, the holy one of God, the son of God, the beloved of God, the chosen of Godj the anointed of God, the son of man in an eminent and unique sense, the Messiah and Christ. In plainer language he is ‘a man who tells you the truth which he has heard of God; ’ who came not of himself and speaks not of himself, but who ‘came forth from God,’—from the original God of Israel’s worship, the God of righteous­ ness, and of happiness joined to righteous­ 4ness,—‘and is come to you.’1 Israelis For we have already remarked how it perpetually talking of God and calling is the great achievement of the Israel of him his Father ; and ‘ everyone,’ says the Old Testament, happiness being man­ Jesus Christ, ‘who hears the Father, kind’s confessed end and aim, to have comes to me, for I know him, and know more than anyone else felt, and more His will, and utter His word.’2 God’s than anyone else succeeded in making will and word, in the Old Testament, was others feel, that to righteousness belongs righteousness. In the New Testament, it happiness. Now, it will be denied by no is righteousness explained to have its one that Jesus, in his turn, was eminently essence in inwardness, mildness, and self­ characterised by professing to bring, and renouncement. This is, in substance, the by being felt to bring, happiness. All the word of Jesus which he who hears ‘ shall words that belong to his mission,—gospel, never see death; ’ of which he who follows kingdom of God, saviour, grace, peace, living it ‘ shall know by experience whether it be 'water, bread oflife,—are brimful of promise of God.’ 3 and of joy. ‘ I am come,’ he said, ‘ that But as the Israel of the Old Testament ye might have life, and that ye might have did not say or feel that he followed it more abundantly ; ’ ‘ Come to me, and righteousness by his own power, or out ye shall find rest unto your souls; ’ ‘ I of self-interest and self-love, but said and speak, that my disciples may have my joy felt that he followed it in thankful self­ fulfilled in themselves? 2 surrender to ‘ the Eternal who loveth You can see, says Jesus to his followers, righteousness,’ and that ‘ the Eternal you can see the leading religionists of the ordereth a good man’s going and maketh Jewish nation, with the current notions his way acceptable to Himself—so, in the about righteousness, God’s will, and the restoration effected by Jesus, the motive meaning of prophecy, you can see them which is of force is not the moral motive saying and not doing, full of fierce temper, that inwardness, mildness, and self-re­ pride, and sensuality;—this shows they nouncement make for man’s happiness, can be but blind guides for you. The but a far stronger motive, full of ardent saviour of Israel is he who makes Israel affection and gratitude, and which, though use his conscience simply and sincerely, it really has its ground and confirmation who makes him change and sweeten his in the fact that inwardness, mildness, and temper, conquer and annul his sensuality. self-renouncement do make for man’s Such a saviour will make unhappy Israel 1 Ps. xxxii, 11 ; xcvii, 12. 2 John, x, io; Matth., xi, 28, 29 ; John, xvii, 13- 1 * • 4 John, viii, 40, 42 ; xvi, 27, 28. John, vi, 45 ; viii, 29, 16. John, viii, 51 ; vii, 17. Ps. xi, 7; xxxvii, 23. �RELIGION NEW-GIVEN happiness, yet keeps no consciousness of this as its ground. For it acquired a far surer ground in personal devotion to Jesus Christ, who brought the doctrine to his disciples and made a passage for it into their hearts ; in believing that he was indeed the Christ come from God; in following him, loving him, And in the happiness which thus believing in Jesus Christ, following him, and loving him, gives, it found the mightiest of sanctions. 5- And thus was the great doctrine of the Old Testament: To righteousness belongs happiness I made a true and potent word again. Jesus Christ was the Messiah to restore the all things of Israel,1—righteous­ ness, and happiness with righteousness; to bring light and recovery after long days of darkness and ruin, and to make good the belief written on Israel’s heart: The righteous is an everlasting foundation ! 1 2 But we have seen how in the hopes of the nation and in the promises of prophecy this true and vital belief of Israel was mixed with a, quantity of what we have called Aberglaube or extra-belief, adding all manner of shape and circumstance to the original thought. The kingdom of David and Solomon was to be restored on a grander scale, the enemies of Israel were to lick the dust, kings were to bring gifts ; there was to be the Son of Man coming in the clouds, judgment given to the saints of the Most High, and an eternal reign of the saints afterwards. Now, most of this has a poetical value, some of it has a moral value. All of it is, in truth, a testimony to the strength of Israel’s idea of righteousness. For the order of its growth is, as we have seen, this : ‘ To righteousness belongs happiness ; but this sure rule is often broken in the state of things which now is; there must, therefore, be in store for us, in the future, a state of things where it will hold good.’ But none of it has a scientific value, a 1 Matth., xvji, II ; Acts, iii, 21. 2 Prov., x, 25. 49 certitude arising from proof and experi­ ence. And indeed it cannot have this, for it professes to be an anticipation of a state of things not yet actually experienced. But human nature is such, that the mind easily dwells on an anticipation of this kind until we come to forget the order in which it arose, place it first when it is by rights second, and make it support that by which it is in truth supported. And so there had come to be many Israelites,—most likely they were the great majority of their nation,—who supposed that righteousness was to be followed, not out of thankful self-surrender to ‘ the Eternal who loveth righteousness,’1 but because the Ancient of Days was to sit before long, and judgment was to be given to the saints, and they were to possess the kingdom, and from the kingdom those who did not follow righteousness were to be excluded. From this way of conceiving religion came naturally the religious con­ dition of the Jews as Jesus at his coming found it; and from which, by his new and living way of presenting the Messiah, he sought to extricate the whole nation, and did extricate his disciples. He did extricate these, in that he fixed their thoughts upon himself and upon an ideal of inwardness, mildness, and self-renounce­ ment, instead of a phantasmagory of out­ ward grandeur and self-assertion. But at the same time the whole train of an extra-belief, or Aberglaube, which had attached itself to Israel’s old creed : The righteous is an everlasting foundation! transferred itself to the new creed brought by Jesus. And there arose, accordingly, a new Aberglaube like the old. The mild, inward, self-renouncing and sacrificed Servant of the Eternal, the new and better Messiah, was yet, before the present generation passed, to come on the clouds of heaven in power and glory like the Messiah of Daniel, to gather by trumpetcall his elect from the four winds, and to set his apostles on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. The motive of Christianity,—which was, in truth, that pure souls ‘knew the voice’2 of Jesus as 1 Ps. xi, 7. * John, x, 4. D �5° LITERATURE AND DOGMA sheep know the voice of their shepherd, and felt, after seeing and hearing him, that his doctrine and ideal was what they wanted, that he was ‘indeed the saviour of the world,’1—this simple motive became a mixed motive, adding to its first contents a vast extra-belief of a phan­ tasmagorical advent of Jesus Christ, a resurrection and judgment, Christ’s ad­ herents glorified, his rejectors punished everlastingly. And when the generation, for which this advent was first fixed, had passed away without it, Christians discovered by a process of criticism common enough in popular theology, but by which, as Bishop Butler says of a like kind of process, ‘anything may be made out of anything,’ —they discovered that the advent had never really been fixed for that first generation by the writers of the New Testament, but that it was foretold, and certainly in store, for a later time. So the Aberglaube was perpetuated, placed out of reach of all practical tests, and made stronger than ever. With the multitude, this Aberglatibe, or extra-belief, inevitably came soon to surpass the original conviction itself in attractiveness and seeming certitude. The future and the miraculous engaged the chief atten­ tion of Christians; and, in accordance with this strain of thought, they more and more rested the proof of Christianity, not on its internal evidence, but on prophecy and miracle. CHAPTER IV THE PROOF FROM PROPHECY 1Abergla ube is the poetry of life.’ That himself in his conduct by taking an object men should, by help of their imagination, of hope and presentiment as if it were an take short cuts to what they ardently object of certainty, he may even be said desire, whether the triumph of Israel or to gain thereby an advantage. the triumph of Christianity, should tell And yet there is always a drawback to themselves fairy-tales about it, should make a man’s advantage in thus treating, when these fairy tales the basis for what is far he deals with religion and conduct, what more sure and solid than the fairy-tales, is extra-belief and not certain as if it were the desire itself—all this has in it, we matter of certainty, and in making it his repeat, nothing which is not natural, no­ ground of action. He pays for it. The thing blameable. Nay, the region of our time comes when he discovers that it is hopes and presentiments extends, as we not certain ; and then the whole certainty have also said, far beyond the region of of religion seems discredited, and the what we can know with certainty. What basis of conduct gone. This danger at­ we reach but by hope and presentiment tends the reliance on prediction and may yet be true ; and he would be a miracle as evidences of Christianity. narrow reasoner who denied, for instance, They have been attacked as a part of all validity to the idea of immortality, the ‘ cheat ’ or ‘ imposture ’ of religion and because this idea rests on presentiment of Christianity. For us, religion is the mainly, and does not admit of certain solidest of realities, and Christianity the demonstration. In religion, above all, greatest and happiest stroke ever yet made extra-belief is in itself no matter, as­ for human perfection. Prediction and suredly, for blame. The object of re­ miracle were attributed to it as its sup­ ligion is conduct; and if a man helps ports because of its grandeur, and because of the awe and admiration which it in­ 1 John, iv, 42. spired. Generations of men have helped �THE PROOF FROM PROPHECY 51 themselves to hold firmer to it, helped themselves in conduct, by the aid of these supports. ‘ Miracles prove] men have said and thought, ‘ that the order of physical nature is not fate, nor a mere material constitution of things, but the subject of a free, omnipotent Master. Prophecy fulfilled proves that neither fate nor man are masters of the world.’1 And to take prophecy first. ‘ The con­ ditions,’ it is said, ‘ which form the true conclusive standard of a prophetic inspira­ tion are these : That the prediction be known to have been promulgated before the event; that the event be such as could not have been foreseen, when it was predicted, by an effort of human reason; and that the event and the pre­ diction correspond together in a clear accomplishment. There are prophecies in Scripture answering to the standard of an absolute proof. Their publication, their fulfilment, their supernatural pre­ science, are fully ascertained.’1 On this 2 sort of ground men came to rest the proof of Christianity. tions and that they must be in the Bible, enhanced, certainly, this look; but the look, even without these aids, was suffi­ ciently striking. Yes, that Jacob on his death-bed should two thousand years before Christ have ‘been enabled,’ as the phrase is, to fore­ tell to his son Judah that ‘the sceptre shall not depart from Judah until Shiloh (or the Messiah) come, and unto him shall the gathering of the people be,’1 does seem, when the explanation is put with it that the Jewish kingdom lasted till the Christian era and then perished, a miracle of prediction in favour of our current Christian theology. That Jeremiah should during the captivity have ‘ been enabled | to foretell, in Jehovah’s name : ‘ The days come that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch; in his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely; and this is his name whereby he shall be called, the lord our righteous­ ness ! ’2—does seem a prodigy of predic­ tion in favour of that tenet of the Godhead of the Eternal Son, for which the Bishops of Winchester and Gloucester are so anxious to do something. For unquesJ 2. tionably, in the prophecy here given, the Branch of David, the future Saviour of Now, it may be said, indeed, that a Israel, who was Jesus Christ, appears to prediction fulfilled, an exhibition of super­ be expressly identified with the Lord God, natural prescience, proves nothing for or with Jehovah. Again, that David should against the truth and necessity of conduct say : ‘ The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit and righteousness. But it must be allowed, thou on my right hand until I make thine notwithstanding, that while human nature enemies thy footstool,’3 does seem a pro­ is what it is, the mass of men are likely digy of prediction to the same effect. to listen more to a teacher of righteous­ And so long as these prophecies stand as ness, if he accompanies his teaching by they are here given, they no doubt bring an exhibition of supernatural prescience. to Christianity all the support (and with And what were called the ‘ signal predic­ the mass of mankind this is by no means tions ’ concerning the Christ of popular inconsiderable) which it can derive from theology, as they stand in our Bibles, had the display of supernatural prescience. and have undoubtedly a look of super­ But who will dispute that it more and natural prescience. The employment of more becomes known, that these pro­ capital letters, and other aids, such as the phecies 4 cannot stand as we have here constant use of the future tense, naturally and innocently adopted by interpreters 1 Gen., xlix, 10. 2 Jen, xxiii, 5, 6. who were profoundly convinced that * Ps. ex, 1. 4 A real predicti'on of Jesus Christ’s Godhead, of Christianity needed these express predic­ 1 Davison’s Discourses course ii, Part 2. 2 Discourses ix and xii. on Prophecy; Dis­ the kind that popular religion desires, is to be found in Benjamin’s prophecy of the coming, in the last days, of the King of Heaven to judge I Israel, ‘ because when God came to them in the d 2 �52 LITERATURE AND DOGMA given them ? Manifestly, it more and more becomes known, that the passage from Genesis, with its mysterious Shiloh and the gathering of the people to him, is rightly to be rendered as follows : ‘ The pre-eminence shall not depart from Judah so long as the people resort to Shiloh (the national sanctuary before Jerusalem was won) ; and the nations (the heathen Canaanites) shall obey him? We here purposely leave out of sight any such consideration as that our actual books of the Old Testament came first together through the instrumentality of the house of Judah, and when the destiny of Judah was already traced; and that to say roundly and confidently : '‘Jacob was enabled to foretell, The sceptre shall not depart from Judah,’ is wholly inadmissible. For this consideration is of force, indeed, but it is a consideration drawn from the rules of literary history and criticism, and not likely to have weight with the mass of mankind. Palpable error and mistrans­ lation are what will have weight with them. And what, then, will they say as they come to know (and do not and must not more and more of them come to know it every day ?) that Jeremiah’s supposed signal identification of Jesus Christ with the Lord God of Israel : ‘ I will raise to David a righteous Branch, and this is the name whereby he shall be called, the Lord our righteousness,’ runs really: ‘ I will raise to David a righteous branch ; in his days Judah shall be saved and Israel shall dwell safely ; and this is the name whereby they shall call themselves : The Eternal is our righteousness ! ’ The prophecy thus becomes simply one of the many promises of a successor to David under whom the Hebrew people should trust in the Eternal and follow righteous­ ness ; just as the prophecy from Genesis is one of the many prophecies of the enduring continuance of the greatness flesh they did not believe in him as their deliverer.’ But this prediction occurs in an apocryphal Christian writing of the end of the first century, the 7iestaments op the Twelve Patriarchs. See Fabricius, Codex Pseudep-'grafhus Veteris Testavienti, vol. ii, p. 745. of Judah. ‘The Lord said unto my Lord,’ in like manner ;—will not people be startled when they find that it ought instead to run as follows : ‘ The Eternal said unto my lord the king,’—a simple promise of victory to a royal leader of God’s chosen people ? 3Leslie, in his once famous Short and Easy Methods with the Deists, speaks of the impugners of the current evidences of Christianity as men who consider the Scripture histories and the Christian religion ‘ cheats and impositions of cun­ ning and designing men upon the cre­ dulity of simple people.’ Collins, and the whole array of writers at whom Leslie aims this, greatly need to be re-surveyed from the point of view of our own age. Nevertheless, we may grant that some of them, at any rate, conduct their attacks on the current evidences for Christianity in such a manner as to give the notion that in their opinion Christianity itself, and religion, is a cheat and an imposture. But how far more prone will the mass of mankind be to hearken to this opinion, if they have been kept intent on predictions such as those of which we have just given specimens; if they have been kept full of the great importance of this line of mechanical evidence, and then suddenly find that this line of evidence gives way at all points ? It can hardly be gainsaid, that, to a delicate and penetrating criti­ cism, it has long been manifest that the chief literal fulfilment by Jesus Christ of things said by the prophets was the fulfil­ ment such as would naturally be given by one who nourished his spirit on the prophets, and on living and acting their words. The great prophecies of Isaiah and Jeremiah are, critics can easily see, not strictly predictions at all; and predic­ tions which are strictly meant as such, like those in the Book of Daniel, are an embarrassment to the Bible rather than a main element of it. The ‘Zeit-Geist,’ and the mere spread of what is called enlightenment, superficial and barren as �THE PROOF FROM MIRACLES 53 this often is, will inevitably, before long, power to promise and to threaten by rising make this conviction of criticism a popular from the dead and ascending into heaven, opinion, held far and wide. And then, is certainly not the guide whom lovers of what will be their case, who have been Christianity, if they could discern what it so long and sedulously taught to rely is that he really expects and aims at, and on supernatural predictions as a main­ what it is which they themselves really desire, would think it wise to follow. stay? But the subject of miracles is a very The same must be said of miracles. The substitution of some other proof of great one; it includes within itself, indeed, Christianity for this accustomed proof is the whole question about ‘ supernatural now to be desired most by those who prescience,’ which meets us when we deal most think Christianity of importance. with prophecy. And this great subject That old friend of ours on whom we requires, in order that we may deal with have formerly commented,1 who insists it properly, some little recapitulation of upon it that Christianity is and shall be our original design in this essay, and of nothing else but this, ‘ that Christ promised the circumstances in which the cause of Paradise to the saint and threatened the religion and of the Bible seems to be at worldly man with hell-fire, and proved his this moment placed. CHAPTER V THE PROOF FROM MIRACLES We have seen that some new treatment or other the religion of the Bible certainly seems to require, for it is attacked on all sides, and the theologians are not so suc­ cessful as one might wish in defending it. One critic says, that if these islands had no religion at all it would not enter into his mind to introduce the religious and ethical idea by the agency of the Bible. Another, that though certain common­ places are common to all systems of morality, yet the Bible-way of enunciating these commonplaces no longer suits us. And we may rest assured, he adds, that by saying what we think in some other, more congenial, language, we shall really be taking the shortest road to discovering the new doctrines which will satisfy at once our reason and our imagination. Another critic goes farther still, and calls Bible-religion not only destitute of a modern and congenial way of stating its commonplaces of morality, but a defacer and disfigurer of moral treasures which were once in better keeping. The more 1 See St. Paul and Protestantism, p. 157. one studies, the more, says he, orie is convinced that the religion which calls itself revealed contains, in the way of what is good, nothing which is not the incoherent and ill-digested residue of the wisdom of the ancients. To the same effect the Duke of Somerset—who has been affording proof to the world that our aristocratic class are not, as has been said, inaccessible to ideas and merely polite, but that they are familiar, on the con­ trary, with modern criticism of the most advanced kind—the Duke of Somerset finds very much to condemn in the Bible and its teaching; although the soul, he says, has (outside the Bible, apparently) one unassailable fortress to which she may retire—faith in God. All this seems to threaten to push Bible-religion from the place it has long held in our affections. And even what the most modern criticism of all some­ times does to save it and to set it up again, can hardly be called very flattering to it. For whereas the Hebrew race imagined that to them were committed the oracles of God, and that their God, �54 LITERATURE AND DOGMA ‘ the Eternal who loveth righteousness,’1 was the God to whom ‘ every knee shall bow and every tongue shall swear,’2 there now comes M. Emile Burnouf, the accomplished kinsman of the gifted orientalist Eugene Burnouf, and will prove to us in a thick volume3 that the oracles of God wrere not committed to a Semitic race at all, but to the Aryan; that the true God is not Israel’s God at all, but is ‘the idea of the absolute’ which Israel could never properly master. This ‘ sacred theory of the Aryas,’ it seems, passed into Palestine from Persia and India, and got possession of the founder of Christianity and of his greatest apostles St. Paul and St. John ; becoming more perfect, and returning more and more to its true character of a ‘ transcen­ dent metaphysic,’ as the doctors of the Christian Church developed it. So that we Christians, who are Aryas, may have the satisfaction of thinking that ‘ the religion of Christ has not come to us from the Semites,’ and that ‘ it is in the hymns of the Veda, and not in the Bible, that we are to look for the primordial source of our religion.’ The theory of Christ is accordingly the theory of the Vedic Agni, or fire. The Incarnation represents the Vedic solemnity of the production of fire, symbol of force' of every kind, of all movement, life, and thought. The Trinity of Father, Son, and Spirit is the Vedic Trinity of Sun, Fire, and Wind ; and God, finally, is ‘ a cosmic unity.’ Such speculations almost take away the breath of a mere man of letters. What one is inclined to say of them is this. Undoubtedly these exploits of the Aryan genius must be gratifying to us members of the Aryan race. The original God of the Hebrews, M. Burnouf says expressly, ‘ was not a cosmic unity; ’ the religion of the Hebrews ‘had not that transcendent metaphysic which the genius of the Aryas requires; ’ and, ‘ in passing from the Aryan race to the inferior races, religion under­ went a deterioration due to the physical . Rs. xi, 7. * Is., xlv, 23. La Science des Religions-, Paris, 1872. and moral constitution of these races.’ For religion, it must be remembered, is, in M. Burnouf’s view, fundamentally a science; ‘a metaphysical conception, a theory, a synthetic explanation of the universe.’ Now, ‘the perfect Arya is capable of a great deal of science; the Semite is in­ ferior to him.’ As Aryas or Aryans, then, wTe ought to be pleased at having vindi­ cated the greatness of our race, and having not borrowed a Semitic religion as it stood, but transformed it by importing our own metaphysics into it. And this seems to harmonise very well with what the Bishops of Winchester and Gloucester say about ‘doing something for the honour of Our Lord’s Godhead,’ and about ‘ the infinite separation for time and for eternity which is involved in rejecting the Godhead of the Eternal Son, Very God of Very God, Light of Light;’ and also with the Athanasian Creed gene­ rally, and with what the clergy write to the Guardian about ‘ eternal life being unquestionably annexed to a right know­ ledge of the Godhead.’ For all these have in view high science and meta­ physics, worthy of the Aryas. But to Bible-religion, in the plain sense of the w’ord, it is not flattering; for it throws overboard almost entirely the Old Testa­ ment, and makes the essence of the New to consist in an esoteric doctrine not very visible there, but more fully developed outside of it. The metaphysical element is made the fundamental element in reli­ gion. But, ‘ the Bible-books, especially the more ancient of them, are destitute of metaphysics, and consequently of method and classification in their ideas.’ Israel, therefore, instead of being a light of the Gentiles and a salvation to the ends of the earth, falls to a place in the world’s reli­ gious history behind the Arya. He is dismissed as ranking anthropologically between the Aryas and the yellow men ; as having frizzled hair, thick lips, small calves, flat feet, and belonging, above all, to those ‘ occipital races ’ whose brain cannot grow above the age of sixteen ; whereas the brain of a theological Arya, such as one of our bishops, may go on growing all his life. �THE PROOF FROM MIRACLES But we, who think that the Old Testa­ ment leads surely up to the New, who believe that, indeed, ‘ salvation is of the Jews,’1 and that, for what concerns con­ duct or righteousness (that is, for what concerns three-fourths of human life), they and their documents can no more be neglected by whoever would make proficiency in it, than Greece can be neglected by anyone who would make proficiency in art, or Newton’s discoveries by whoever would comprehend the world’s physical laws,—we are naturally not satis­ fied with this treatment of Israel and the Bible. And admitting that Israel shows no talent for metaphysics, we say that his religious greatness is just this, that he does not found religion on metaphysics, but on moral experience, which is a much simpler matter; and that, ever since the apparition of Israel and the Bible, religion is no longer what, according to M. Burnouf, to our Aryan forefathers in the valley of the Oxus it was,—and what perhaps it really was to them,—metaphysical theory, but is what Israel has made it. And what Israel made, and how he made it, we seek to show from the Bible itself. Thus we hope to win for the Bible and its religion, which seem to us so in­ dispensable to the world, an access to many of those who now neglect them. For there is this to be said against M. Burnouf’s metaphysics : no one can allege that the Bible has failed to win access for want of metaphysics being applied to it. Metaphysics are just what all our theology runs up into, and our bishops, as we know, are here particularly strong. But we see every day that the making religion into metaphysics is the weakening of religion ; now, M. Burnouf makes religion into metaphysics more than ever. Yet evidently the metaphysical method lacks power for laying hold on people, and compelling them to receive the Bible from it; it is felt to be inconclusive as thus employed, and its inconclusiveness tells against the Bible. This is the case with the old metaphysics of our bishops, and it will be the case with M. Burnouf’s ’-John, iv, 22. 55 new metaphysics also. They will be found, we fear, to have an inconclusive­ ness in their recommendation of Chris­ tianity. To very many persons, indeed to the great majority, such a method, in such a matter, must be inconclusive. 2. Therefore we would not allow ourselves to start with any metaphysical conception at all, not with the monotheistic idea, as it is styled, any more than with the pan­ theistic idea ; and, indeed, we are quite sure that Israel himself began with no­ thing of the kind. The idea of God, as it is given us in the Bible, rests, we say, not on a metaphysical conception of the necessity of certain deductions from our ideas of cause, existence, identity, and the like ; but on a moral perception of a rule of conduct not of our own making, into which we are born, and which exists whether we will or no; of awe at its grandeur and necessity, and of gratitude at its beneficence. This is the great original revelation made to Israel, this is his ‘ Eternal.’ Man, however, as Goethe says, never knows how anthropomorphic he is. Israel described his Eternal in the language of poetry and emotion, and could not thus describe him but with the characters of a man. Scientifically he never attempted to describe him at all. But still the Eternal was ever at last reducible, for Israel, to the reality of experience out of which the revelation sprang ; he was ‘ the righteous Eternal who loveth righteous­ ness.’ They who ‘ seek the Eternal,’ and they who ‘ follow after righteousness,’ were identical; just as, conversely, they who ‘fear the Eternal,’and they who ‘depart from evil,’ were identical.1 Above all: '■Blessed is the man that feareth the Eternal; ’ ‘ it is joy to the just to do judgment; ’ ‘ righteousness tendeth to life-,' ‘the righteous is an everlasting foundation.'2 1 Is., li, I ; Prov., iii, 7. 2 Ps. cxii, I; Prov., xxi, 15 ; xi, 19; x, 25. �LITERATURE AND DOGMA 56 But, as time went on, facts seemed, we saw, to contradict this fundamental belief, to refute this faith in the Eternal; material forces prevailed, and God appeared, as they say, to be on the side of the big battalions. The great unrighteous king­ doms of the world, kingdoms which cared far less than Israel for righteousness and for the Eternal who makes for righteous­ ness, overpowered Israel. Prophecy as­ sured him that the triumph of the Eternal’s cause and people was certain : Behold the Eternal's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save.1 The triumph was but adjourned through Israel’s own sins : Your iniquities have separated between you and your God.2 Prophecy directed its hearers to the future, and promised them a new, everlasting kingdom, under a heaven-sent leader. The characters of this kingdom and leader were more spiritualised by one prophet, more ma­ terialised by another. As time went on, in the last centuries before our era, they became increasingly turbid and phantasmagorical. In addition to his original experimental belief in the Almighty Eternal who makes for right­ eousness, Israel had now a vast Aber­ glaube, an after or extra-belief, not ex­ perimental, in an approaching kingdom of the saints, to be established by an Anointed, a Messiah, or by ‘one like the Son of Man,’ commissioned from the Ancient of Days and coming in the clouds of heaven. Jesus came, calling himself the Messiah, the Son of Man, the Son of God ; and the question is, what is the true meaning of these assertions of his, and of all his teaching ? It is the same question we had about the Old Testament. Is the language scientific, or is it, as we say, literary!—that is, the language of poetry and emotion, approximative language, thrown out, as it were, at certain great objects which the human mind augurs and feels after, but not language accurately defining them? Popular religion says, we know, that the language is scientific ; that the God of the Old Testament is a * Is., lix, I. » Is., ix, 2. great Personal First Cause, who thinks and loves (for this too, it seems, we ought to have added), the moral and intelligent Governor of the universe. Learned re­ ligion, the metaphysical theology of our bishops, proves or confirms the existence of this personal God by abstruse reason­ ing from our ideas of cause, design, existence, identity, and so on. Popular religion rests it altogether on revelation and miracle. The God of Israel, for popular religion, is a magnified and nonnatural man who has really worked stupendous miracles, whereas the Gods of the heathen were vainly imagined to be able to work them, but could not, and had therefore no real existence. Of this God, Jesus for popular religion is the Son. He came to appease God’s wrath against sinful men by the sacrifice of himself; and he proved his Sonship by a course of stupendous miracles, and by the wonder­ ful accomplishment in him of the super­ natural Messianic predictions of prophecy. Here, again, learned religion elucidates and develops the relation of the Son to the Father by a copious exhibition of metaphysics; but for popular religion the relationship, and the authority of Jesus which derives from it, is altogether estab­ lished by miracle. Now, we have seen that our bishops and their metaphysics are so little con­ vincing, that many people throw the Bible quite aside and will not attend to it, because they are given to understand that the metaphysics go necessarily along with it, and that one cannot be taken without the other. So far, then, the talents of the Bishops of Winchester and Gloucester, and their zeal to do something for the honour of the Eternal Son’s Godhead, may be said to be actual obstacles to the receiving and studying of the Bible. But the same may now be also said of the popular theology which rests the Bible’s authority and the Christian religion on miracle. To a great many persons this is tantamount to stopping their use of the Bible and of the Christian religion ; for they have made up their minds that what is popularly called miracle never does really happen, and that the belief in it �THE PROOF FROM MIRACLES arises out of either ignorance or mistake. To these persons we restore the use of the Bible, if, while showing them that the Bible-language is not scientific, but the language of common speech or of poetry and eloquence, approximative language thrown out at certain great objects of consciousness which it does not pretend to define fully, we convince them at the same time that this language deals with facts of positive experience, most moment­ ous and real. We have sought to do this for the Old Testament first, and we now seek to do it for the New. But our attempt has in view those who are incredulous about the Bible and inclined to throw it aside, not those who at present receive it on the grounds supplied either by popular theology or by metaphysical theology. For persons of this kind, what we say neither will have, nor seeks to have, any constraining force at all ; only it is ren­ dered necessary by the want of constrain­ ing force, for others than themselves, in their own theology. How little constrain­ ing force metaphysical dogma has, we all see. And we have shown, too, how the proof from the fulfilment in Jesus Christ of a number of detailed predictions, supposed to have been made with super­ natural prescience about him long before­ hand, is losing, and seems likely more and more to lose, its constraining force. It is found that the predictions and their fulfilment are not what they are said to be. Now we come to miracles, more specially so called. And we have to see whether the constraining force of this proof, too, must not be admitted to be far less than it used to be, and whether some other source of authority for the Bible is not much to be desired. 3- That miracles, when fully believed, are felt by men in general to be a source of authority, it is absurd to deny. One may say, indeed: Suppose I could change the pen with which I write this into a pen­ 57 wiper, I should not thus make what I write any the truer or more convincing. That may be so in reality, but the mass of mankind feel differently. In the judg­ ment of the mass of mankind, could I visibly and undeniably change the pen with which I write this into a penwiper, not only would this which I write acquire a claim to be held perfectly true and convincing, but I should even be entitled to affirm, and to be believed in affirming, propositions the most palpably at war with common fact and experience. It is almost impossible to exaggerate the prone­ ness of the human mind to take miracles as evidence, and to seek for miracles as evidence ; or the extent to which religion, and religion of a true and admirable kind, has been, and is still, held in connection with a reliance upon miracles. This reliance will long outlast the reliance on the supernatural prescience of prophecy, for it is not exposed to the same tests. To pick Scripture miracles one by one to pieces is an odious and repulsive task ; it is also an unprofitable one, for what­ ever we may think of the affirmative demonstrations of them, a negative demonstration of them is, from the cir­ cumstances of the case, impossible. And yet the human mind is assuredly passing away, however slowly, from this hold of reliance also; and those who make it their stay will more and more find it fail them, will more and more feel them­ selves disturbed, shaken, distressed, and bewildered. For it is what we call the Time- Spirit which is sapping the proof from miracles —it is the ‘Zeit-Geist’ itself. Whether we attack them, or whether we defend them, does not much matter. The human mind, as its experience widens, is turning away from them. And for this reason : it sees, as its experience widens, how they arise. It sees that under certain circumstances, they always do arise ; and that they have not more solidity in one case than another. Under certain cir| cumstances, wherever men are found, there is, as Shakespeare says :— No natural exhalation in the sky, No scape of nature, no distemper’d day, �58 LITERATURE AND DOGMA No common wind, no customed event, But they will pluck away his natural cause, And call them meteors, prodigies, and signs, Abortives, presages, and tongues of heaven. Imposture is so far from being the general rule in these cases that it is the rare exception. Signs and wonders men’s minds will have, and they create them honestly and naturally ; yet not so but that we can see how they create them. Roman Catholics fancy that Bible­ miracles and the miracles of their Church form a class by themselves; Protestants fancy that Bible-miracles, alone, form a class by themselves. This was eminently the posture of mind of the late Archbishop Whately :—he held that all other miracles would turn out to be impostures, or capable of a natural explanation, but that Bible-miracles would stand sifting by a London special jury or by a committee of scientific men. No acuteness can save such notions, as our knowledge widens, from being seen to be mere extravagances, and the Protestant notion is doomed to an earlier ruin than the Catholic. For the Catholic notion admits miracles—so far as Christianity, at least, is concerned—in the mass; the Protestant notion invites to a criticism by which it must before long itself perish. When Stephen was martyred, he looked up into heaven, and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing on the right hand of God. That, says the Protestant, is solid fact. At the martyrdom of St. Fructuosus the Christian servants of the Roman governor, Babylas and Mygdone, saw the heavens open, and the saint and his deacon Eulogius carried up on high with crowns on their heads. That is, says the Protestant, imposture or else illusion. St. Paul hears on his way to Damascus the voice of Jesus say to him : ‘Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me ? ’ That is solid fact. The companion of St. Thomas Aquinas hears a voice from the crucifix say to the praying saint: ‘ Thou hast written well of me, Thomas ; what recompence dost thou desire ? ’ That is impos­ ture or else illusion. Why ? It is im­ possible to find any criterion by which one of these incidents may establish its claim to a solidity which we refuse to the others. One of two things must be made out in order to place either the Bible-miracles alone, or the Bible-miracles and the miracles of the Catholic Church with them, in a class by themselves. Either they must be shown to have arisen in a time eminently unfavourable to such a process as Shakespeare describes, to ampli­ fication and the production of legend ; or they must be shown to be recorded in documents of an eminently historical mode of birth and publication. But surely it is manifest that the Bible­ miracles fulfil neither of these condi­ tions. It was said that the waters of the Pamphylian Sea miraculously opened a passage for the army of Alexander the Great. Admiral Beaufort, however, tells us that, ‘ though there are no tides in this part of the Mediterranean, a considerable depression of the sea is caused by longcontinued north winds, and Alexander, taking advantage of such a moment, may have dashed on without impediment.’1 And we accept the explanation as a matter of course. But the waters of the Red Sea are said to have miraculously opened a passage for the children of Israel; and we insist on the literal truth of this story, and reject natural explana­ tions as impious. Yet the time and cir­ cumstances of the flight from Egypt were a thousand times more favourable to the rise of some natural incident into a miracle, than the age of Alexander. They were a time and circumstances of less broad daylight. It was said, again, that during the battle of Leuctra the gates of the Heracleum at Thebes sud­ denly opened, and the armour of Hercules vanished from the temple, to enable the god to take part with the Thebans in the battle. Probably there was some real circumstance, however slight, which gave a foundation for the story. But this is the utmost we think of saying in its favour ; the literal story it never even occurs to one of us to believe. But that the walls of Jericho literally fell down at 1 Beaufort’s Karamania, p. n6. �THE PROOF FROM MIRACLES the sound of the trumpets of Joshua, we are asked to believe, told that it is im­ pious to disbelieve it. Yet which place and time were most likely to generate a miraculous story with ease—Hellas and the days of Epaminondas, cr Palestine and the days of Joshua? And of docu­ mentary records, which are the most historical in their way of being generated and propagated, which the most favour­ able for the admission of legend and miracle of all kinds—the Old Testa­ ment narratives with their incubation of centuries, and the New Testament narra­ tives with their incubation of a century (and tradition active all the while), or the narratives, say, of Herodotus or Plutarch ? None of them are what we call critical. Experience of the history of the human mind, and of men’s habits of seeing, sifting, and relating, convinces us that the miraculous stories of Herodotus or Plu­ tarch do grow out of the process described by Shakespeare. But we shall find our­ selves inevitably led, sooner or later, to extend the same rule to all miraculous stories; nay, the considerations which apply in other cases, apply, we shall most surely discover, with even greater force in the case of Bible miracles. 4- This being so, there is nothing one would more desire for a person or docu­ ment one greatly values, than to make them independent of miracles. And with regard to the Old Testament we have done this ; for we have shown that the essential matter in the Old Testament is the revelation to Israel of the immeasur­ able grandeur, the eternal necessity, the priceless blessing of that with which not less than three-fourths of human life is indeed concerned—-righteousness. Ar.d it makes no difference to the preciousness of this revelation, whether we believe that the Red Sea miraculously opened a passage to the Israelites, and the walls of Jericho miraculously fell down at the blast of Joshua’s trumpet, or that these stories arose in the same way as other stories of 59 the kind. Eut in the New Testament the essential thing is the revelation of Jesus Christ. For this too, then, if one values it, one’s great wish must in like manner be to make it independent of miracle, if miracle is a stay which one perceives, as more and more we are all coming to per­ ceive it, to be not solid. Now, it may look at first sight a strange thing to say, but it is a truth which we will make abundantly clear as we go on, that one of the very best helps to prepare the way for valuing the Bible and be­ lieving in Jesus Christ, is to convince oneself of the liability to mistake in the Bible writers. Our popular theology sup­ poses that the Old Testament writers were miraculously inspired, and could make no mistakes; that the New Testament writers were miraculously inspired, and could make no mistakes ; and that there this miraculous inspiration stopped, and all writers on religion have been liable to make mistakes ever since. It is as if a hand had been put out of the sky pre­ senting us with the Bible, and the rules of criticism which apply to other books did not apply to the Bible. Now, the fatal thing for this supposition is, that its owners stab it to the heart the moment they use any palliation or explaining away, however small, of the literal words of the Bible; and some they always use. For instance, it is said in the eighteenth Psalm that a consuming fire went out of the mouth of God, so that coals were kindled at it. The veriest literalist will cry out: Everyone knows that this is not to be taken literally ! The truth is, even he knows that this is not to be taken literally ; but others know that a great deal more is not to be taken literally. He knows very little; but, as far as his little knowledge goes, he gives up his theory, which is, of course, palpably hollow. For indeed jt is only by applying to the Bible a criticism, such as it is, that such a man makes out that criticism does not apply to the Bible. There has grown up an irresistible sense that the belief in miracles was due to man’s want of experience, to his igno­ rance, agitation, and helplessness. And �6o LITERATURE AND DOGMA it will not do to stake all truth and value of the Bible upon its having been put out of the sky, upon its being guaran­ teed by miracles, and upon their being true. If we present the Bible in this fashion, then the cry, Imposture / will more and more, in spite of all we can do, gather strength, and the book will be thrown aside more and more. But when men come to see, that, both in the New Testament and in the Old, what is given us is words thrown out at an immense reality not fully or half fully grasped by the writers, but, even thus, able to affect us with indescribable force; when we convince ourselves that, as in the Old Testament we have Israel’s inadequate yet inexhaustibly fruitful testimony to the Eternal that makes for righteousness, so we have in the New Testament a report inadequate, indeed, but the only report we have, and therefore priceless, by men, some more able and clear, others less able and clear, but all full of the influences of their time and condition, partakers of some of its simple or its learned ig­ norance—inevitably, in fine, expecting miracles and demanding them—a report, I say, by these men of that immense reality not fully or half fully grasped by them, the mind of Christ—then we shall be drawn to the Gospels with a new zest and as by a fresh spell. We shall throw ourselves upon their narratives with an ardour answering to the value of the pearl of great price they hold, and to the diffi­ culty of reaching it. So, to profit fully by the New Testa­ ment, the first thing to be done is to make it perfectly clear to oneself that its reporters both could err and did err. For a plain person, an incident in the report of St. Paul’s conversion—which comes into our minds the more naturally as this incident has been turned against some­ thing we have ourselves said 1 —would, one would think, be enough. We had spoken of the notion that St. Paul’s mi­ raculous vision at his conversion proved the truth of his doctrine. We related a vision which converted Sampson Stani1 St. Paul and Protestantism, p. 54. forth, one of the early Methodists; and we said that just so much proving force and no more, as Sampson Staniforth’s vision had to confirm the truth of anything he might afterwards teach, St. Paul’s vision had to establish his subsequent doctrine. It was eagerly rejoined that Staniforth’s vision was but a fancy of his own, whereas the reality of Paul’s was proved by his companions hearing the voice that spoke to him. And so in one place of the Acts we are told they did; but in another plaze of the Acts we are told by Paul himself just the contrary : that his companions did not hear the voice that spoke to him. Need we say that the two statements have been ‘ reconciled ’ ? They have over and over again ; but by one of those processes which are the opprobrium of our Bible­ criticism, and by which, as Bishop Butler says, anything can be made to mean any­ thing. There is between the two state­ ments a contradiction as clear as can be. The contradiction proves nothing against the good faith of the reporter, and St. Paul undoubtedly had his vision ; he had it as Sampson Staniforth had his. What the contradiction proves is the incurable looseness with which the circumstances of what is called and thought a miracle are related; and that this looseness the Bible relaters of a miracle exhibit, just like other people. And the moral is : what an unsure stay, then, must miracles be ! But, after all, that there is here any contradiction or mistake, some do deny; so let us choose a case where the mistake is quite undeniably clear. Such a case we find in the confident expectation and assertion, on the part of the New Testa­ ment writers, of the approaching end of the world. Even this mistake people try to explain away; but it is so palpable that no words can cloud our perception of it. The time is short. The Lord is at hand. The end of all things is at hand. Little children, it is the final time. The Lord's coming is at hand; behold, the judge standeth before the door.x Nothing can 1 1 Cor., vii, 29 ; Philibp.,ve, 5 : 1 Pet., iv, 7 ; I John, ii, 18 ; Tames, v, 8, 9. We have here the express declarations of St. Paul, St. Peter, St. John, and St. James. �THE PROOF FROM MIRACLES 61 really obscure the evidence furnished by argument of the same kind. Habit makes such sayings as these. When Paul told us so lend ourselves to their way of speak­ the Thessalonians that they and he, at ing, that commonly nothing checks us; the approaching coming of Christ, should but, the moment we begin to attend, we have their turn after, not before, the faith­ perceive how much there is which ought ful dead :—‘ For the Lord himself shall to check us. Take the famous allegation descend from heaven with a shout, with of the parted clothes but lot-assigned coat the voice of the archangel and with the of Christ, as fulfilment of the supposed trump of God, and the dead in Christ shall prophecy in the Psalms : ‘ They parted rise first, then we which are alive and re­ my garments among them, and for my main shall be caught up together with vesture did they cast lots.’1 The words them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in of the Psalm are taken to mean contrast, the air,’1—when he said this, St. Paul was when they do in truth mean identity. in truth simply mistaken in his notion of According to the rules of Hebrew poetry, what was going to happen. This is as for my vesture they did cast lots is merely a repetition, in different words, of they parted clear as anything can be. And not only were the New Testament my garments among them, not an antithesis writers thus demonstrably liable to com­ to it. The alleged ‘prophecy’ is, there­ mit, like other men, mistakes in fact; they fore, due to a dealing with the Psalmist’s were also demonstrably liable to commit words which is arbitrary and erroneous. mistakes in argument. As before, let us So, again, to call the words, a bone of him take a case which will be manifest and shall not be brokenp a prophecy of Christ, palpable to everyone. St. Paul, arguing fulfilled by his legs not being broken on to the Galatians that salvation was not by the cross, is evidently, the moment one the Jewish law but by Jesus Christ, proves considers it, a playing with words which his point from the promise to Abraham nowadays we should account childish. having been made to him and his seed, not For what do the words, taken, as alone seeds. The words are not, he says, ‘ seeds, words can rationally be taken, along with as of many, but as of one; to thy seed, their context, really prophesy? The which is Christ.’2 Now, as to the point entire safety of the righteous, not his to he proved, we all agree with St. Paul; death. Many are the troubles of the right­ but his argument is that of a Jewish eous, but the Eternal delivereth him out Rabbi, and is clearly both fanciful and of all; he keepeth all his bones, so that not false. The writer in Genesis never in­ one of them is broken? Worse words, tended to draw any distinction between therefore, could hardly have been chosen one of Abraham’s seed, and Abraham’s from the Old Testament to apply in that seed general. And even if he had ex­ connexion where they come ; for they pressly meant, what Paul says he did not are really contradicted by the death of mean, Abraham’s seed in general, he Christ, not fulfilled by it. It is true, this verbal and unintelligent would still have said seed, and not seeds. This is a good instance to take, because use of Scripture is just what was to be the Apostle’s substantial doctrine is here expected from the circumstances of the not at all concerned. As to the root of New Testament writers. It was inevita­ the matter in question, we are all at one ble for them; it was the sort of trifling with St. Paul. But it is evident how he which then, in common Jewish theology, could, like the rest of us, bring forward a passed for grave argument and made a quite false argument in support of a quite serious impression, as it has in common Christian theology ever since. But this true thesis. And the use of prophecy by the writers does not make it the less really trifling ; of the New Testament furnishes really, or hinder one nowadays from seeing it to almost at every turn, instances of false 1 I Thess., iv, 16, 17. 2 GW., iii, 16. 1 Ps. xxii, 18. 1 See John, xix, 36. 8 Ps. xxxiv, 19, 20. �62 LITERATURE AND DOGMA be trifling, directly we examine it. The mistake made will strike some people more forcibly in one of the cases cited, some in another, but in one or other of the cases the mistake will be visible to everybody. Now, this recognition of the liability of the New Testament writers to make mis­ takes, both of fact and of argument, will certainly, as we have said, more and more gain strength, and spread wider and wider. The futility of their mode of demonstration from prophecy, of which we have just given examples, will be more and more felt. The fallibility of that demonstration from miracles to which they and all about them attached such preponderating weight, which made the disciples of Jesus believe in him, which made the people believe in him, will be . more and more recognised. Reverence for all, who in those first dubious days of Christianity, chose the better part, and resolutely cast in their lot with ‘the despised and rejected of men ’ 1 Gratitude to all, who, while the tradition was yet fresh, helped by their writings to preserve and set clear the precious record of the words and life of Jesus ! And honour, eternal honour, to the great and profound qualities of soul and mind which some of these writers display ! But the writers are admirable for what they are, not for what, by the nature of things, they could not be. It was superiority enough in them to attach themselves firmly to Jesus; to feel to the bottom of their hearts that power of his words, which alone held permanently— held, when the miracles, in which the multitude believed as well as the disciples, failed to hold. The good faith of the Bible-writers is above all question, it speaks for itself; and the very same criticism, which shows us the defects of their exegesis and of their demonstrations from miracles, establishes their good faith. But this could not, and did not, prevent them from arguing in the methods by which everyone around them argued, and from expecting miracles where everybody else expected them. In one respect alone have the miracles recorded by them a more real ground than the mass of miracles of which we have the relation. Medical science has never gauged—never, perhaps, enough set itself to gauge—the intimate con­ nexion between moral fault and disease. To what extent, or in how many cases, what is called illness is due to moral springs having been used amiss—whether by being over-used or by not being used sufficiently—we hardly at all know, and we far too little inquire. Certainly it is due to this very much more than we commonly think; and the more it is due to this, the more do moral therapeutics rise in possibility and importance.1 The bringer of light and happiness, the calmer and pacifier, or invigorator and stimulator, is one of the chiefest of doctors. Such a doctor was Jesus; such an operator, by an efficacious and real, though little observed and little employed agency, upon what we, in the language of popular superstition, call the unclean spirits, but which are to be designated more literally and more correctly as the uncleared, unpurified spirits, which came raging and madding before him. This his own language shows, if we know how to read it. ‘ What does it matter whether I say, Thy sins are forgiven thee I or whether I say, Arise and zvalkV2 And again: ‘ Thou art made whole; sin no more, lest a worse thing befall thee.'3 His reporters, we must remember, are men who saw thau­ maturgy in all that Jesus did, and who saw in all sickness and disaster visitations from God, and they bend his language accordingly. But indications enough re­ main to show the line of the Master, his perception of the large part of moral cause in many kinds of disease, and his method of addressing to this part his cure. It would never have done, indeed, to have men pronouncing right and left that this and that was a judgment, and how, and for what, and on whom. And so, 1 Consult the Charmides of Plato (cap. v.) for a remarkable account of the theory of such a treat­ ment, attributed by Socrates to Zamolxis, the godking of the Thracians. 2 Matth., ix, 5. 8 John, v, 14.. �THE PROOF FROM MIRACLES 63 when the disciples, seeing an afflicted ever have thought differently. Discre­ person, asked whether this man had done pancies which we now labour with such sin or his parents, Jesus checked them honest pains and by such astonishing and said : ‘ Neither the one nor the other, methods to explain away,—the voice at but that the works of God might be made Paul’s conversion, heard by the bystanders manifest in him.’1 Not the less clear is according to one account, not heard by his own belief in the moral root of much them according to another ; the Holy physical disease, and in moral therapeu­ Dove at Christ’s baptism, visible to John tics; and it is important to note well the the Baptist in one narrative, in two others instances of miracles where this belief to Jesus himself, in another, finally, to all comes in. For the action of Jesus in the people as well; the single blind man these instances, however it may be ampli­ in one relation, growing into two blind fied in the reports, was real; but it is men in another ; the speaking with not, therefore, as popular religion fancies, tongues, according to St. Paul a sound thaumaturgy,—it is not what people are without meaning, according to the Acts fond of calling the supernatural, but what an intelligent and intelligible utterance,— is better called the non-natural. It is, on all this will be felt to require really no the contrary, like the grace of Raphael, explanation at all, to explain itself, to be or the grand style of Phidias, eminently natural to the whole class of incidents to natural ; but it is above common, low’- w’hich these miracles belong, and the pitched nature. It is a line of nature not inevitable result of the looseness with yet mastered or followed out. which the stories of them arise and are Its significance us a guarantee of the propagated. authenticity of Christ’s mission is trivial, And the more the miraculousness of however, compared with the guarantee the story deepens, as after the death of furnished by his sayings. Its importance Jesus, the more does the texture of the is in its necessary effect upon the incidents become loose and floating, the beholders and reporters. This element more does the very air and aspect of of what was really wonderful, unprece­ things seem to tell us we are in wonder­ dented, and unaccountable, they had land. Jesus after his resurrection not actually before them ; and we may known by Mary Magdalene, taken by her estimate how it must have helped and for the gardener; appearing in another seemed to sanction that tendency which form, and not known by the two disciples in any case would have carried them, going with him to Emmaus and at supper circumstanced as they were, to find all with him there; not known by his most the performances and career of Jesus intimate apostles on the borders of the miraculous. Sea of Galilee ;—and presently, out of But, except for this, the miracles related these vague beginnings, the recognitions in the Gospels will appear to us more and getting asserted, then the ocular demon­ more, the more our . experience and strations, the final commissions, the knowledge increases, to have but the ascension;—one hardly knows which of same ground which is common to all the two to call the most evident here, miracles, the ground indicated by Shake­ the perfect simplicity and good faith of speare ; to have been generated under the narrators, or the plainness with which the same kind of conditions as other they themselves really say to us: Behold miracles, and to follow the same laws. a legend growing under your eyes ! When once the ‘Zeit-Geist’ has made us And suggestions of this sort, with entertain the notion of this, a thousand respect to the whole miraculous side of things in the manner of relating will the New Testament, will meet us at every strike us which never struck us before, turn; we here but give a sample of them. and will make us wonder how we could It is neither our wish nor our design to accumulate them, to marshal them, to 1 John, ix, 3. insist upon them, to make their force felt. �64 LITERATURE AND DOGMA Let those who desire to keep. them at arm’s length continue to do so, if they can, and go on placing the sanction of the Christian religion in its miracles. Our point is that the objections to miracles do, and more and more will, without insistence, without attack, with­ out controversy, make their own force felt; and that the sanction of Chris­ tianity, if Christianity is not to be lost along with its miracles, must be found elsewhere. CHAPTER VI THE NEW TESTAMENT RECORD Now, then, will be perceived the bearing phecy : The Eternal keepeth all the hones and gravity of what I some little way back of the righteous, so that not one of them is said, that the more we convince ourselves broken;1 who proves salvation to be by of the liability of the New Testament Christ alone, from the promise to Abra­ writers to mistake, the more we really ham being made to seed in the singular bring out the greatness and worth of the number, not the plural. If, therefore, the New Testament. For the more the re­ human mind is now drawing away from porters were fallible and prone to delusion, reliance on miracles, coming to perceive the more does Jesus become independent the community of character which per­ of the mistakes they made, and unaffected vades them all, to understand their natural by them. We have plain proof that here laws, so to speak—their loose mode of was a very great spirit; and the greater he origination and their untrustworthiness— was, the more certain were his disciples to and is inclined rather to distrust the dealer misunderstand him. The depth of their in them than to pin its faith upon him; misunderstanding of him is really a kind then it is good for the authority of Jesus, of measure of the height of his superiority. that his reporters are evidently liable to And this superiority is what interests us ignorance and error. He is reported to in the records of the New Testament; for deal in miracles, to be above all a thauthe New Testament exists to reveal Jesus maturgist. But the more his reporters Christ, not to establish the immunity of were intellectually men of their nation and its writers from error. time, and of its current beliefs—the more, Jesus himself is not a New Testament that is, they were open to mistakes—the writer ; he is the object of description and more certain they were to impute miracles comment to the New Testament writers. to a wonderful and half-understood per­ As the Old Testament speaks about the sonage like Jesus, whether he would or Eternal and bears an invaluable witness to no. He himself may, at the same time, him, without yet ever adequately in words have had quite other notions as to what defining and expressing him ; so, and even he was doing and intending. yet more, do the New Testament writers Again, the mistake of imagining that speak about Jesus and give a priceless the world was to end, as St. Paul an­ record of him, without adequately and nounces, within the lifetime of the first accurately comprehending him. They are Christian generation, is palpable. But the altogether on another plane from Jesus, reporters of Jesus make him announcing and their mistakes are not his. It is not just the same thing: ‘This generation Jesus himself who relates his own miracles shall not pass away till they shall see the to us; who tells us of his own apparitions Son of Man coming in the clouds with after his death; who alleges his crucifixion and sufferings as a fulfilment cf the pro­ 1 Ps. xxxiv, 20. �THE NEW TESTAMENT RECORD great power and glory, and then shall he send his angels and gather his elect from the four winds.’1 Popular theology can put a plain satisfactory sense upon this, but, as usual, through that process de­ scribed by Butler by which anything can be made to mean anything; and from this sort of process the human mind is beginning to shrink. A more plausible theology will say that the words are an accommodation; that the speaker lends himself to the fancies and expectations of his hearers. A good deal of such accom­ modation there is in this and other say­ ings of Jesus; but accommodation to the full extent here supposed would surely have been impossible. To suppose it, is most violent and unsatisfactory. Either, then, the words were, like St. Paul’s an­ nouncement, a mistake, or they are not really the very words Jesus said, just as he said them. That is, the reporters have given them a turn, however slight, a tone and a colour, a connexion, to make them comply with a fixed idea in their own minds, which they unfeignedly believed was a fixed idea with Jesus also. Now, the more we regard the reporters of Jesus as men liable to err, full of the turbid Jewish fancies about ‘ the grand consum­ mation ’ which were then current, the easier we can understand these men in­ evitably putting their own eschatology into the mouth of Jesus, when they had to report his discourse about the kingdom of God and the troubles in store for the Jewish nation, and the less need have we to make Jesus a co-partner in their escha­ tology. Again, the futility of such demonstrations from prophecy as those of which I have quoted examples, and generally of all that Jewish exegesis, based on a mere unintel­ ligent catching at the letter of the Old Testament, isolated from its context and real meaning, of which the New Testament writers give us so much, begins to discon­ cert attentive readers of the Bible more and more, and to be felt by them as an embarrassment to the cause of Jesus, not a support. Well, then, it is good for the 1 Matth., xxiv, 30, 31, 34. 65 authority of Jesus, that those who esta­ blish it by arguments of this sort should be clearly men of their race and time, not above its futile methods of reasoning and demonstration. The more they were this, and the more they were sure to mix up much futile logic and exegesis with their presentation of Jesus, the less is Jesus himself responsible for such logic and exegesis, or at all dependent upon it. He may himself have rated such argumentation at precisely its true value, and have based his mission and authority upon nogrounds but solid ones. Whether he did so or not, his hearers and reporters were sure to base it on their own fantastic grounds also, and to credit Jesus with doing the same. In short, the more w« conceive Jesus as almost as much over the heads of his dis­ ciples and reporters then, as he is over the heads of the mass of so-called Christians now, and the more we see his disciples to have been, as they were, men raised by a truer moral susceptiveness above their countrymen, but in intellectual conceptions and habits much on a par with them, all the more do we make room, so to speak, for Jesus to be a personage immensely great and wonderful; as wonderful as any­ thing his reporters imagined him to be, though in a different manner. 2. We make room for him to be this, and through the inadequate reporting of his followers there breaks and shines, and will more and more break and shine the more the matter is examined, abundant evidence that he was this. It is most remarkable, and the best proof of the simplicity, seri­ ousness, and good faith, which intercourse with Jesus Christ inspired, that witnesses with a fixed prepossession, and having no doubt at all as to the interpretation to be put on his acts and career, should yet admit so much of what makes against themselves and their own power of inter­ preting. For them, it was a thing beyond all doubt, that by miracles Jesus mani­ fested forth his glory, and induced the faithful to believe in him. Yet what E �66 LITERATURE AND DOGMA checks to this paramount and all-governing lyptic pictures of the Book of Daniel and belief of theirs do they report from Jesus the Book of Enoch, and a transference of himself! Everybody will be able to them to Jesus Christ and his kingdom. recall such checks, although he may never It is not surprising, certainly, that men yet have been accustomed to consider with the mental range of their time, and their full significance. Except ye see signs with so little flexibility of thought, that, and wonders, ye will not believe ! 1—as when Jesus told them to beware of ‘the much as to say: ‘ Believe on right leaven of the Pharisees,’1 or when he grounds you cannot, and you must needs called himself ‘ the bread of life ’ and believe on wrong!’ And again : ‘Believe said, He that eateth me shall live by me,2 me that I am in the Father and the Father they stuck hopelessly fast in the literal in me ; or else believe for the very works' meaning of the words, and were accordingly sake ! ’2—as much as to say : ‘ Acknow­ puzzled or else offended by them,—it is ledge me on the ground of my healing not surprising that these men should have and restoring acts being miraculous, if been incapable of dealing in a large spirit you must; but it is not the right ground.’ with prophecies like those of Daniel, that No, not the right ground; and when they should have applied them to Jesus Nicodemus came and would put belief in narrowly and literally, and should there­ Christ on this ground (‘We know that fore have conceived his kingdom uninthou art a teacher come from God, for no telligently. This is not remarkable; what one can do the miracles that thou doest is remarkable is, that they should them­ except God be’with him'), Jesus rejoined : selves supply us with their Master’s blame ‘ Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a of their too literal criticism, his famous man be born from above, he cannot see the sentence : ‘ The kingdom of God is within kingdom of God ! ’ thus tacitly changing you ! ’3 Such an account of the kingdom his disciple’s ground and correcting him.3 of God has more right, even if recorded Even distress and impatience at this false only once, to pass with us for Jesus Christ’s ground being taken is visible sometimes : own account, than the common materialis­ ‘ Jesus groaned in his spirit and said, Why ing accounts, if repeated twenty times; doth this generation ask for a sign? for it was manifestly quite foreign to the Verily I say unto you, there shall no sign disciples’ own notions, and they could be given to this generation !’4 Who does never have invented it. Evidence of the not see what double and treble import­ same kind, again,—evidence borne by the ance these checks from Jesus to the reporters themselves against their own reliance on miracles gain, through their power of rightly understanding what their being reported by those who relied on Master, on this topic of the kingdom of miracles devoutly? Who does not see God and its coming, meant to say,—is what a clue they offer as to the real mind Christ’s warning to his Apostles, that the of Jesus? To convey at all to such subject of final things was one where they hearers of him that there was any objec­ were all out of their depth : ‘ It is not for tion to miracles, his own sense of the you to know the times and seasons which objection must have been profound ; and the Father hath put in his own power.’4 to get them, who neither shared nor' So, too, with the use of prophecy and understood it, to repeat it a few times, he of the Old Testament generally. A very must have repeated it many times. small experience of Jewish exegesis will Take, again, the eschatology of the convince us that, in the disciples, their disciples, their notion of the final things, catching at the letter of the Scriptures, Of the approaching great judgment and and mistaking this play with words for end of the world. This consisted mainly serious argument, was nothing extraordi­ in a literal appropriation of the apoca­ nary. The extraordinary thing is that 1 John, iv, 48. 1 John, iii, 2, 3. 2 John, xiv, 11. 4 Mark, viii, 12. * Matth., xvi, 6-12. 3 Luke, xvii, 21. 2 John, vi, 48, 57. 4 Ads, i, 7. �The new testament record Jesus, even in the report of these critics, uses Scripture in a totally different manner; he wields it as an instrument of which he truly possesses the use. Either he puts prophecy into act, and by the startling point thus made he engages the popular imagination on his side, makes the popu­ lar familiarity with prophecy serve him; as when he rides into Jerusalem on an ass, or clears the Temple of buyers and sellers. Or else he applies Scripture in what is called ‘a superior spirit,’ to make it yield to narrow-minded hearers a lesson of wisdom ; as, for instance, to rebuke a superstitious observance of the Sabbath he employs the incident of David’s taking the shewbread. His reporters, in short, are the servants’ of the Scripture­ letter, Jesus is its master; and it is from the very men who were servants to it themselves, that we learn that he was master of it. How signal, therefore, must this mastery have been ! how emi­ nently and strikingly different from the treatment known and practised by the disciples themselves ! Finally, for the reporters of Jesus the rule was, undoubtedly, that men ‘ believed on Jesus when they saw the miracles which he did.’1 Miracles were in these re­ porters’ eyes, beyond question, the evi­ dence of the Christian religion. And yet these same reporters indicate another and a totally different evidence offered for the Christian religion by Jesus Christ himself. Every one that heareth and learneth from the Father, cometh unto me.2 As the Father hath taught me, so I speak ; 3 he that is of God heareth the words of God; 4 if God was your Father, ye would have loved me 1 5 This is inward evidence, direct evidence. From that previous knowledge of God, as ‘the Eternal that loveth righteousness,’ which Israel pos­ sessed, the hearers of Jesus could and should have concluded irresistibly, when they heard his words, that he came from God. Now miracles are outward evidence, indirect evidence, not conclusive in this fashion. To walk on the sea cannot 1 John, ii, 23. 2 John, vi, 45. * John, viii, 28. 4 John, viii, 47. 5 John, viii, 42. 67 really prove a man to proceed from the Eternal that loveth righteousness; although undoubtedly, as we have said, a man who walks on the sea will be able to make the mass of mankind believe about him almost anything he chooses to say. But there is, after all, no necessary connexion between walking on the sea and proceed­ ing from the Eternal that loveth righteous­ ness. Jesus propounds, on the other hand, an evidence of which the whole force lies in the necessary connexion between the proving matterand the power that makes for righteousness. This is his evidence for the Christian religion. His disciples felt the force of the evidence, indeed. Peter’s answer to the question, ‘ Will ye also go away ? ’—‘ To whom should we go ? thou hast the words of eternal life ! ’1 proves it. But feeling the force of a thing is very different from understanding and possessing it. The evidence, which the disciples were con­ scious of understanding and possessing, was the evidence from miracles. And yet, in their report, Jesus is plainly shown to us insisting on a different evidence, an internal one. The character of the re­ porters gives to this indication a para­ mount importance. That they should indicate this internal evidence once, as the evidence on which Jesus insisted, is more significant, we say, than their indicating, twenty times, the evidence from miracles as the evidence naturally convincingto mankind, and recommended, as they thought, by Jesus. The notion of the one evidence they would have of themselves; the notion of the other they could only get from a superior mind. This mind must have been full of it to induce them to feel it at all; and their exhibition of it, even then, must of necessity be inadequate and broken. But is it possible to overrate the value of the ground thus gained for showing the riches of the New Testament to those who, sick of the popular, arguments from prophecy, sick of the popular arguments from miracles, are for casting the New Testament aside altogether? The book 1 John, vi, 68. E2 �LITERATURE AND DOGMA contains all that we know of a wonderful spirit, far above the heads of his reporters, still farther above the head of our popular theology, which has added its own mis­ understanding of the reporters to the reporters’ misunderstanding of Jesus. And it was quite inevitable that anything so superior and so profound should be imperfectly understood by those amongst whom it first appeared, and for a very long time afterwards ; and that it should come at last gradually to stand out clearer only by time,—Time, as the Greek maxim says, the wisest of all things, for he is the unfailing discoverer. Yet, however much is discovered, the object of our scrutiny must still be beyond us, must still transcend our adequate knowledge, if for no other reason, because of the character of the first and only records of him. But in the view now taken we have,—even at the point to which we have already come,—at least a wonderful figure transcending his time, transcending his disciples, attaching them but transcending them; in very much that he uttered going far above their heads, treating Scripture and prophecy like a master while they treated it like children, resting his doctrine on internal evidence while they rested it on miracles; and yet, by his incomparable lucidity and penetrativeness, planting his profound veins of thought in their memory along with their own notions and prepossessions, to come out all mixed up together, but still distinguishable one day and separable —and leaving his word thus to bear fruit for the future. 3Truly, then, some one will exclaim, we may say with the Imitation : Magna ars est scire conversari cum fesu 1 And so it is. To extract from his reporters the true Jesus entire, is even impossible ; to extract him in considerable part is one of the highest conceivable tasks of criticism. And it is vain to use that favourite argu­ ment of popular theology that man could never have been left by Providence in difficulty and obscurity about a matter of so much importance to him. Such an argument we are not bound to notice. For the cardinal rule of our present in­ quiry is that rule of Newton’s : Hypotheses non fingo-, and this argument of popular theology rests on the eternal hypothesis of a magnified and non-natural man at the head of mankind’s and the world’s affairs. And as to the argument itself, even if we deal with it, we may say that the course of things, so far as we can see, is not so ; things do not proceed in this fashion. Because a man has frequently to make sea-passages, he is not gifted with an immunity from sea-sickness; because a thing is of the highest interest and im­ portance to know, it is not, therefore, easy to know; on the contrary, in general, in proportion to its magnitude it is difficult, and requires time. But the right commentary on the sen­ tence of the Imitation is given by the Imitation itself in the sentence following: Esto humilis etpacificus eterit tecum Jesus! What men could take at the hands of Jesus, what they could use, what could save them, he made as clear as light; and Christians have never been able, even if they would, to miss seeing it. No,never; but still they have superadded to it a vast Aberglaube, an after or extra-belief of their own ; and the Aberglaube has pushed on one side, for very many, the saving doc­ trine of Jesus, has hindered attention from being riveted on this and on its line of growth and working, has nearly effaced it, has developed all sorts of faults contrary to it. This Aberglaube has sprung out of a false criticism of the literary records in which the doctrine is conveyed ; what is called ‘ orthodox divinity’ is, in fact, an immense literary misapprehension. Hav­ ing caused the saving doctrines enshrined in these records to be neglected, and having credited the records with existing for the sake of its own Aberglaube, this blunder now threatens to cause the records themselves to be neglected by all those (and their numbers are fast increas­ ing) whom its own Aberglaube fills with impatience and aversion. Therefore it is needful to show the line of growth of this �THE NEW TESTAMENT RECORD Aberglaube, and its delusiveness ; to show, and with more detail than we have admitted hitherto, the line of growth of Jesus Christ’s doctrine, and the farreaching sanctions, the inexhaustible attractiveness, the grace and truth, with which he invested it. The doctrine itself is essentially simple ; and what is difficult, —the literary criticism of the documents containing the doctrine,—is not the doctrine. This literary criticism, however, is ex­ tremely difficult. It calls into play the highest requisites for the study of letters ; great and wide acquaintance with the history of the human mind, knowledge of the manner in which men have thought, of their way of using words and of what they mean by them, delicacy of perception and quick tact, and besides all these, a favourable moment and the ‘ Zeit-Geist.’ And yet everyone among us criticises the Bible, and thinks it is‘of the essence of the Bible that it can be thus criticised with success ! And the Four Gospels, the part of the Bible to which this sort of criticism is most applied and most con­ fidently, are just the part which for literary criticism is infinitely the hardest, however simple they may look, and how­ ever simple the saving doctrine they con­ tain really is. For Prophets and Epistlers speak for themselves : but in the Four Gospels reporters are speaking for Jesus, who is far above them. Now, we all know what the literary criticism of the mass of mankind is. To be worth anything, literary and scientific criticism require, both of them, the finest heads and the most sure tact; and they require, besides, that the world and the world’s experience shall have come some considerable way. But, ever since this last condition has been fulfilled, the finest heads for letters and science, the surest tact for these, have turned themselves in general to other departments of work than criticism of the Bible, this department being occupied already in such force of numbers and hands, if not of heads, and there being so many annoyances and even dangers in freely approaching it. As our Reformers were to Shakespeare and Bacon 69 in tact for letters and science, or as Luther, even, was to Goethe in this respect, such almost has on the whole been, since the Renascence, the general proportion in rate of power for criticism between those who have given themselves to secular letters and science, and those who have given themselves to interpreting the Bible, and who, in conjunction with the popular interpretation of it both traditional and contemporary, have made what is called ‘ orthodox theology.’ It is as if some simple and saving doctrines, essential for men to know, were enshrined in Shake­ speare’s Hamlet or in Newton’s Principia (though the Gospels are really a far more complex and difficult object of criticism than either); and a host of second-rate critics, and official critics, and what is called ‘ the popular mind ’ as well, threw themselves upon Hamlet and the Prin­ cipia, with the notion that they could and should extract from these documents, and impose on us for our belief, not only the saving doctrines enshrined there, but also the right literary and scientific criticism of the entire documents. A pretty mess they would make of it! and just this sort of mess is our so-called orthodox theo­ logy. And its professors are nevertheless bold, overweening, and even abusive, in maintaining their criticism against all questioners ; although really, if one thinks seriously of it, it was a kind of imper­ tinence in such professors to attempt any such criticism at all. Happily, the faith that saves is attached to the saving doctrines in the Bible, which are very simple; not to its literary and scientific criticism, which is very hard. And no man is to be called ‘ infidel ’ for his bad literary and scientific criticism of the Bible; but if he were, how dreadful would the state of our orthodox theo­ logians be ! They themselves freely fling about this word infidel at all those who reject their literary and scientific criticism, which turns out to be quite false. It would be but just to mete to them with their own measure, and to condemn them by their own rule; and, when they air their unsound criticism in public, to cry indignantly : The Bishop of So-and-so, tht �LITERATURE AND DOGMA 70 Dean of So-and-so, and other infidel lec­ turers of the presen t day ! or : That ram­ pant infidel, the Archdeacon of So-and-so, in his recent letter on the Athanasian Creed! or: ‘The Rock,’.‘The Church Times,’ and the rest of the infidel press / or : The torrent of infidelity which pours every Sunday from otir pulpits ! Just would this be, and by no means inurbane; but hardly, perhaps, Christian. Therefore we will not permit ourselves to say it; but it is only kind to point out, in pass­ ing, to these loud and rash people, to what they expose themselves at the hands of adversaries less scrupulous than we are. CHAPTER VII THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS TO HIMSELF In our third chapter we passed in brief review the teaching of Jesus. But there the objection met us, that what attested Jesus Christ was miracles, and the preter­ natural fulfilment in him of certain detailed predictions made about him long before. We had to pause and deal with this objection. And now, as it disperses, we come in full view of our old point again :— that what did attest Jesus Christ, was his restoration of the intuition. Jesus Christ found Israel all astray, with an endless talk about God, the law, righteousness, the kingdom, everlasting life,—and no real hold upon any one of them. Israel’s old, sure proof of being in the right way, his test which anybody could at once apply,—the sanction of joy and peace,—was plainly wanting. ‘ O Eternal, blessed is the man that putteth his trust in thee,’1 was a corner-stone of Israel’s religion. Now, the Jewish people, however they might talk about putting their trust in the Eternal, were evidently, as they stood there before Jesus, not blessed at all; and they knew it themselves as well as he did. ‘ Great peace have they who love thy law,’2 was another corner-stone. But the Jewish people had at that time in its soul as little peace as it had joy and blessedness ; it was seething with inward unrest, irritation, and trouble. Yet the way of the Eternal was most indubitably a way of peace and joy; so, if Israel felt no peace and no joy, Israel could not be walking in the * Ps, Ixxxiv, jj. 2 Ps. cxix, 165. way of the Eternal. Here we have the firm, unchanging ground, on which the operations of Jesus both began and always proceeded. And it is to be observed that Jesus by no means gave a new, more precise, scientific definition of God, but took up this term just as Israel used it, to stand for the Eternal that loveth righteousness. If therefore this term was, in Israel’s use of it, not a term of science, but, as we say, a term of common speech, of poetry and eloquence, thrown out at a vast object of consciousness not fully covered by it, so it was in Jesus Christ’s use of it also. And if the substratum of real affirmation in the term was, with Israel, not the affirmation of ‘ a great Personal First Cause, the moral and intelligent Governor of the universe,’ but the affirmation of ‘an enduring Power, not ourselves, that makes for righteousness,’ so it remained with Jesus Christ likewise. He set going a great process of searching and sifting; but this process had for its direct object the idea of righteousness, and only touched the idea of God through this, and not independently of this and immediately. If the idea of righteousness was changed, this implied, undoubtedly, a correspond­ ing change in the idea of the Power that makes for righteousness; but in this manner only, and to this extent, does the teaching of Jesus re-define the idea of God. But search and sift and renew the idea of righteousness Jesus did. And though �THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS TO HIMSELF the work of Jesus, like the name of God, calls up in the believer a multitude of emotions and associations far more than any brief definition can cover, yet, remem­ bering Jeremy Taylor’s advice to avoid exhortations to get Christ, to be in Christ, and to seek some more distinct and practi­ cal way of speaking of him, we shall not do ill, perhaps, if we summarise to our own minds his work by saying, that he restored the intuition of God through transforming the idea of righteousness ; and that, to do this, he brought a method, and he brought a secret. And of those two great words which fill such a place in his gospel, repentance and peace,—as we see that his Apostles, when they preached his gospel, preached ‘Repentance unto life’1 and ‘Peace through Jesus Christ,’2—of these two great words, one, repentance, attaches itself, we shall find, to his method, and the other, peace, to his secret. There was no question between Jesus Christ and the Jews as to the object to aim at. ‘ If thou wouldst enter into life, keep the commandments,’ said Jesus.3 And Israel, too, on his part, said: ‘ He that keepeth the commandments keepeth his own soul.’4 But what command­ ments ? The commandments of God ; about this, too, there was no question. But: ‘ Leaving the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men; ye make the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition ; ’ said Jesus.5 Therefore the commandments which Israel followed were not those commandments of God by which a man keeps his own soul, enters into life. And the practical proof of this was, that Israel stood before the eyes of the world manifestly neither blessed nor at peace ; yet these characters of bliss and peace the following of the real commandments of God was confessed to give. So a rule, or method, was wanted, by which to determine on what the keeping of the real commandments of God depended. And Jesus gave one: ‘ The things that 1 Acts, xi, 18. 2 Acts, x, 36. 8 Matth., xix, 17. 4 Prov., xix, 16. 4 Mark, vii, 9, 13. 7l come from within a man's heart, they it is which defile him ! ’1 We have seen what an immense matter conduct is;—that it is three-fourths of life. We have seen how plain and simple a matter it is, so far as knowledge is concerned. We have seen how, more­ over, philosophers are for referring all conduct to one or other of man’s two elementary instincts,—the instinct of self­ preservation and the reproductive instinct. It is the suggestions of one or other of these instincts, philosophers say, which call forth all cases in which there is scope for exercising morality, or conduct. And this does, we saw, cover the facts well enough. For we can run up nearly all faults of conduct into two classes,—faults of temper and faults of sensuality; to be referred, all of them, to one or other of these two instincts. Now, Jesus not only says that things coming from within a man’s heart defile him, he adds expressly what these things that, coming from within a man, defile him, are. And what he enumerates are the following : ‘ Evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, stealings, greeds, viciousnesses, fraud, dis­ soluteness, envy, evil-speaking, pride, folly.’2 These fall into two groups: one, of faults of self-assertion, graspingness and violence, all of which we may call faults of temper; and the other, of faults of sensuality. And the two groups, between them, do for practical purposes cover all the range of faults proceeding from these two sources, and therefore all the range of conduct. So the motions or impulses to faults of conduct were what Jesus said the real commandments of God are con­ cerned with. And it was plain what such faults are; but, to make assurance more sure, he went farther and said what they are. But no outward observances were conduct, were that keeping of the com­ mandments of God which was the keeping of a man’s own soul and made him enter into life. To have the A?ar/and thoughts in order as to certain matters, was conduct. 1 Matth., xv, 18 ; Mark, vii, 20, 21. 2 Mark, vii, 21, 22. �LITERATURE AND DOGMA 72 This was the ‘method’ of Jesus: the setting up a great unceasing inward move­ ment of attention and verification in matters which are three-fourths of human life, where to see true and to verify is not difficult, the difficult thing is to care and to attend. And the inducement to attend was because joy and peace, missed on every other line, were to be reached on this. 2. bined stress of evidence for it, and may be taken as so eminently his. And no wonder. For the maxim contains his secret, the secret by which, emphatically, his gospel ‘brought life and immortality to light.’1 Christ’s method directed the disciple’s eye inward, and set his con­ sciousness to work; and the first thing his consciousness told him was, that he had two selves pulling him different ways. Till we attend, till the method is set at work, it seems as if ‘ the wishes of the flesh and of the current thoughts ’2 were to be followed as a matter of course ; as if an impulse to do a thing must mean that we should do it. But when we attend, we find that an impulse to do a thing is really in itself no reason at all why we should do it; because impulses proceed from two sources, quite different, and of quite different degrees of authority. St. Paul contrasts them as the inward man, and the man in our members ; the mind of the flesh, and the spiritual mind.3 Jesus contrasts them as life, properly so named, and life in this world.* And the moment we seriously attend to conscience, to the suggestions which concern practice and conduct, we can see plainly enough from which source a suggestion comes, and that the suggestions from one source are to overrule those from the other. But this is a negative state of things, a reign of check and constraint, a reign, merely, of morality. Jesus changed it into what was positive and attractive, lighted it up, made it religion, by the idea of two lives. One of them life, properly so called, full of light, endur­ ance, felicity, in connexion with the higher and permanent self; and the other of them life improperly so called, in con­ nexion with the lower and transient self. The first kind of life was already a che­ rished ideal with Israel (‘ Thou wilt show But for this world of busy inward move­ ment created by the method of Jesus, a rule of action was wanted; and this rule was found in his secret. It was this of which the Apostle Paul afterwards possessed himself with such energy, and called it ‘ the word of the cross,’ 1 or, necrosis, ‘ dying.’ The rule of action St. Paul gave was : ‘ Always bearing about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in our body 1 ’2 In the popular theurgy, these words are commonly referred to what is called ‘ pleading the blood of the covenant,’—relying on the death and merits of Christ (in pursuance of the contract originally passed in the Council of the Trinity) to satisfy God’s wrath against sinners and to redeem us. But they do really refer to words of Jesus, often and often repeated, and of which the following may very well stand as pre­ eminently representative : ‘ He that will save his life shall lose it; he that will lose his life shall save it. He that loveth his life shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal. Whosoever will come after me, let him renounce himself and take up his cross daily, and follow me.' 3 These words, or words like them, were repeated again and again, so that no reporter could miss them. No reporter did miss them. We find them, as we 1 II Tim., i, 10. find the method of conscience, in all the 2 Ta fleA^/xara ttjs capKbs Kai rwv Siavoiwv.— four Gospels. Perhaps there is no other Ephesians, ii, 3. 3 Rom., chap. viii. maxim of Jesus which has such a com* 'O XJ-yos 6 rov ffravpov.—I Cor., i, 18. 2 II Cor., iv, io. • Luke, ix, 24; John, xii, 25; Luke, ix, 23. 4 John, xii, 25. The strict grammatical and logical connexion of the words iv rip Kiirp.<p rovrtp is with 0 p.i<rwv, but the sense and effect is as given above. �THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS TO HIMSELF 73 'me the path of life ! ’);1 and a man person of the Trinity approving the might be placed in it, Jesus said, by dy­ Second, because he stands to the con­ ing to the second. For it is to be noted tract already in the Council of the Trinity that our common expression, ‘ deny him­ passed. But what it really means is, that self,’ is an inadequate and misleading the joy of Jesus, of this ‘ Son of Peace,’1 version of the words used by Jesus. the ‘joy’ he was so desirous that his To deny one’s self is commonly under­ disciples should find ‘fulfilled in them­ stood to mean that one refuses one’s self selves,’ 2 was due to his having himself something. But what Jesus says is : ‘ Let followed his own secret. And the great a man disown himself, renounce himself, counterpart to : A life-giving change of the die as regards his old self, and so live.’ inner man,—the promise : Peace through Himself the old man, the life in this world, Jesus Christ!3—his peace through this meant following those ‘ wishes of the flesh secret of his. and of the current thoughts ’ which Jesus Now, the value of this rule that one had, by his method, already put his dis­ should die to one’s apparent self, live to ciples in the way of sifting and scrutinis­ one’s real self, depends upon whether it is ing, and of trying by the standard of true. And true it certainly is;—a pro­ conformity to conscience. found truth of what our scientific friends, Thus, after putting him by his method who have a systematic philosophy and a in the way to find what doing righteous­ nomenclature to match, and who talk of ness was, by his secret Jesus put his Egoism and Altruism, would call, per­ disciple in the way of doing it. For the haps, psycho-physiology. And we may breaking the sway of what is commonly trace men’s experience affirming and con­ called one's self, ceasing our concern with firming it, from a very plain and level it and leaving it to perish, is not, Jesus account of it to an account almost as said, being thwarted or crossed, but living. high and solemn as that of Jesus. That And the proof of this is that it has the an opposition there is, in all matter of characters of life in the highest degree,— what we call conduct, between a man’s the sense of going right, hitting the mark, first impulses and what he ultimately succeeding. That is, it has the characters finds to be the real law of his being; that of happiness; and happiness is, for Israel, a man accomplishes his right function as the same thing as having the Eternal with a man, fulfils his end, hits the mark, in us, seeing the salvation of God. ‘The giving effect to the real law of his being ; tree,’ as Jesus said, and as men’s common and that happiness attends his thus hitting sense and proverbial speech say with him, the mark,—all good observers report. No ‘is known by its fruits2 and Jesus, statement of this general experience can then, was to be received by Israel as be simpler or more faithful than one given sent from God, because the secret of us by that great naturalist, Aristotle.4 ‘ In Jesus leads to the salvation of God, all wholes made up of parts,’ says he, which is what Israel most desired. The ‘ there is a ruler and a ruled; throughout word of the cross, in short, turned out to nature this is so; we see it even in things be at the same time the word of the king­ without life, they have their harmony or dom? And to this experimental sanction law. The living being is composed of of his secret, this sense it gives of having soul and body, whereof the one is the Eternal on our side and approving us, naturally ruler and the other ruled. Now Jesus appealed when he said of himself: what is natural we are to learn from what ‘ Therefore doth my Father love me, be­ fulfils the law of its nature most, and not cause I lay down my life, that I may take from what is depraved. So we ought to it again.’4 This, again, in our popular take the man who has the best disposition theurgy, is materialised into the First of body and soul; and in him we shall 1 Ps. xvi, II. 2 Matth., xii, 33. 8 'O AJyos ttjs PacriXtias.—Matth., xiii, 19. 4 John, x, 17. 1 Luke, x, 6. 8 Acts, xi, 18; x, 36. 2 John, xvii, 13. 4 Politics, i, 5. �LITERATURE AND DOGMA 74 find that this is so ; for in people that are grievous both to others and to themselves the body may often appear ruling the soul, because such people are poor creatures and false to nature.’ And Aristotle goes on to distinguish between the body, over which, he says, the rule of the soul is absolute, and the movement of thought and desire, over which reason has, says he, ‘a constitutional rule,’ in words which exactly recall St. Paul’s phrase for our double enemy : ‘ the flesh and the current thoughts.' So entirely are we here on ground of general ex­ perience. And if we go on and take this maxim from Stobaeus : ‘ All fine acquirement implies a foregoing effort of self-control; ’1 or this from Horace: ‘ Rule your current self or it will rule>wz 1 bridle it in and chain it down ! ’1 or this 2 from Goethe’s autobiography: ‘ Every­ thing cries out to us that we must re­ nounce ; ’3 or still more this from his Faust: ‘ Thou must go without, go with­ out \ that is the everlasting song which every hour, all our life through, hoarsely sings to us ! ’4—then we have testimony not only to the necessity of this natural law of rule and suppression, but also to the strain and labour and suffering which attend it. But when we come a little further and take a sentence like this of Plato : ‘ Of sufferings and pains cometh help, for it is not possible by any other way to be ridded of our iniquity ; ’5 then we get a higher strain, a strain like St. Peter’s : ‘ He that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin ; ’6 and we are brought to see, not only the necessity of the law of rule and suppression, not only the pain and suffering in it, but also its 1 nwrbs koAou KTf]/j.aTOS irAvos ‘irpoyyeirai i tear' eyicpdreiav. 2 . . . Animum rege, qui nisi paret Imperat; hunc fraenis, hunc tu compesce catcnis. 3 Alles ruft uns zu, dass wir entsagen sollen. 4 Ensbehren sollst du ! sollst entbehren I Das ist der ewige G esang, Den unser ganzes Lebcn lang Uns heiser jede Stunde singt. 5 A? a\yr]3dv<av Kai o^vvSiv yiyyerai i) utplXtta, ov yap oT6y re &X\ais aSinlas wrraK\d.TTeff9ai. 6 I Pet., iv, I. beneficence. And this positive sense of beneficence, salutariness, and hope, come out yet more strongly when Wordsworth says to Duty : ‘ Nor know we anything so fair as is the smile upon thy face;’ or when Bishop Wilson says: ‘ They that deny themselves will be sure to find their strength increased, their affections raised, and their inward peace continually aug­ mented ; ’ and most of all, perhaps, when we hear from Goethe : ‘ Die and come to life ! for so long as this is not accom­ plished thou art but a troubled guest upon an earth of gloom ! ’1 But this is evidently borrowed from Jesus, and by one whose testimony is of all the more weight, because he certainly would not have become thus a borrower from Jesus, unless the truth had compelled him. And never certainly was the joy, which in self-renouncement underlies the pain, so brought out as when Jesus boldly called the suppression of our first impulses and current thoughts : life, real life, eternal life. So that Jesus not only saw this great necessary truth of there being, as Aristotle says, in human nature a part to rule and a part to be ruled ; he saw it so thoroughly, that he saw through the suffer­ ing at its surface to the joy at its centre, filled it with promise and hope, and made it infinitely attractive. As Israel, there­ fore, is ‘the people of righteousness,’ because, though others have perceived the importance of righteousness, Israel, above everyone, perceived the happiness of it; so self-renouncement, the main factor in conduct or righteousness, is ‘ the secret of Jesus,’ because, although others have seen that it was necessary, Jesus, above everyone, saw that it was peace, joy, life. Now, we may observe, that even Aristotle (and it is a mark of his greatness) does not, in the passage we have quoted from him, begin with a complete system of psycho-physiology, and show us where and how and why in this system the rule of renouncement comes in, and draw out 1 Stirb und werde ! Denn, so lang du das nicht hast, Bist du nur ein triiber Gast Auf der dunkeln Erde ! �THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS TO HIMSELF for us definitively the law of our being towards which this rule leads up. He says that the rule exists, that it is ancillary to the law of our being, and that we are to study the best men, in whom it most exists, to make us see that it is thus ancillary. He here appeals throughout to a verifying sense, such as we have said that everyone in this great but plain matter of conduct really has; he does not appeal to a speculative theory of the system of things, and deduce conclusions from it. And he shows his greatness in this, because the law of our being is not something which is already definitively known and can be exhibited as part of a speculative theory of the system of things ; it is something which discovers itself and becomes, as we follow (among other things) the rule of renouncement. What we can say with most certainty about the law of our being is, that we find the rule of renouncement practically lead up to it. In matters of practice and conduct, there­ fore, an experience like this is really a far safer ground to insist on than any specu­ lative theory of the system of things. And to a theory of such sort Jesus never ap­ peals. Here is what characterises his teach­ ing, and distinguishes him, for instance, from the author of the Fourth Gospel. This author handles what we may call theosophical speculation in a beautiful and impressive manner; the introduction to his Gospel is undoubtedly in a very noble and profound strain. But it is theory; externally it seems, at any rate, to deliver, with the forms of science, a theosophy not controllable by experience. And therefore it is impossible even to conceive Jesus himself uttering the intro­ duction to the Fourth Gospel; because theory Jesus never touches, but bases himself invariably on experience. True, the experience must, for philosophy, have its place in a theory of the system of human nature, when the theory is at last ready and perfect; but the point is, that the experience is ripe and solid, and fit to be used safely, long before the theory. And it was the experience which Jesus always used. Undoubtedly, however, attempts may 75 not improperly be made, even now,—by those, at least, who have a talent for these matters,—to exhibit the experience, with what leads to it and what derives from it, in a system of psycho-physiology. And then, perhaps, it will be found to be con­ nected with other truths of psycho-physio­ logy, such as the unity of life, as it is called, and the impersonality of reasonj Only, thus exhibited, it will be philosophy, mental exercitation, and will concern us as a matter of science, not of conduct. And, as the discipline of conduct is threefourths of life, for our aesthetic and intel­ lectual disciplines, real as these are, there is but one-fourth of life left; and if we let art and science divide this one-fourth fairly between them, they will have just oneeighth of life each. So the exhibition of the truth : ‘ He that loveth his life shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal,' in its order and place as a truth of psycho-physiology, concerns one-eighth of our life and no more. But Jesus, we say, exhibited nothing for the benefit of this one-eighth of us; this is what distinguishes him from all moralists and philosophers, and even from the greatest of his own disciples. How he reached a doctrine we cannot say; but he always exhibited it as an intuition and practical rule, and a practical rule which, if adopted, would have the force of an intuition for its adopter also. This is why none of his doctrines are of the character of that favourite doctrine of our theologians, ‘ the blessed truth that the God of the universe is a Person; ’ because this doctrine is incapable of application as a practical rule, and can never come to have the force of an intuition. But what we call the secret of Jesus: ‘He that loveth his life shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal,' was a truth of which he could say: ‘ It is so; try it yourself and you will see it is so, by the sense of going right, hitting the mark, succeeding, living, which you will get.’ And the same with the commandment, ‘ Love one another]1 which is the positive 1 John, xiii, 34. �76 LITERATURE AND DOGMA side of the commandment, '■Renounce thy­ self' 1 and, like this, can be drawn out as a truth of psycho-physiology. Jesus ex­ hibited it as an intuition and a practical rule; and as what, by being practised, would, through giving happiness, prove its own truth as a rule of life. This, we say, is of the very essence of his secret of self­ renouncement, as of his method of inward­ ness ;—that its truth will be found to com­ mend itself by happiness, to prove itself by happiness. And of the secret more especially is this true. And as we have said, that though there gathers round the word ‘God’ very much besides, yet we shall in general, in reading the Bible, get the surest hold on the word ‘God’ by giving it the sense of the Eternal Power, not ourselves, which makes for righteous­ ness, so we shall get the best hold on many expressions of Jesus by referring them, though they include more, yet primarily and pointedly to his ‘ secret ’ and to the happiness which this contained. Bread of life, living water, these are, in general, Jesus, Jesus in his whole being and in his total effect; but in especial they are Jesus as offering his secret. And when Jesus says: ‘ He that eateth me shall live by me! ’2 we shall understand the words best if we think of his secret. And so again with the famous words to the woman by the well in Samaria: ‘Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again, but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst, but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a spring of water welling up unto everlasting life.’3 These words, how are we to take them, so as to reach their meaning best? What distinctly is this ‘water that I shall give him’? Jesus himself and his word no doubt; yet so we come but to that very notion, which Jeremy Taylor warns us against as vague, of getting Christ. The Bishop of Glou­ cester will tell us, perhaps, that it is ‘ the blessed truth that the Creator of the uni­ verse is a Person,’ or the doctrine of the 1 ‘ We know that we have passed from death to life,’—how? ' because we love the brethren.''—See I John, iii, 14. 2 John, vi, 57. * John, iv, 13, 14.. consubstantiality of the Eternal Son. But surely it would be a strong figure of speech to say of these doctrines, that a man, after receiving them, could never again feel thirsty ? See, on the contrary, how the words suit the secret: ‘ He that loveth his life shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.’ This ‘ secret of Jesus,’ as we call it, will be found applicable to all the thousand problems which the exercise of conduct daily offers ; it alone can solve them all happily, and may indeed be called ‘ a spring of water welling up unto everlasting life.’ And, in general, wherever the words life and death are used by Jesus, we shall do well to have his ‘ secret ’ at hand; for in his thoughts, on these occasions, it is never far off. And now, too, we can see why it is a mistake, and may lead to much error, to exhibit any series of maxims, like those of the Sermon on the Mount, as the ulti­ mate sum and formula into which Chris­ tianity may be run up. Maxims of this kind are but applications of the method and the secret of Jesus; and the method and secret are capable of yet an infinite number more of such applications. Chris­ tianity is a source-, no one supply of water and refreshment that comes from it can be called the sum of Christianity. 3- A method of inwardness, a secret of self-renouncement;—but can any statement of what Jesus brought be complete, which does not include that temper of mildness and sweetness in which both of these worked ? To the representative texts already given there is certainly to be added this other : ‘ Learn of me that lam wild and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls ! ’1 Shall we attach mildness to the method, because, without it, a clear and limpid view inwards is impossible ? Or shall we attach it to the secret"}—the dying to faults of temper is • Matth,, xi, 29. �FAITH IN CHRIST a. part, certainly, of dying to one’s ordinary self, one’s life in this world. Mildness, however, is rather an element in which, in Jesus, both method and secret worked; the medium through which both the method and the secret were exhibited. We may think of it as perfectly illustrated and exemplified in his answer to the foolish question, Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven 1—when, taking a little child and setting him in the midst, he said: ‘ Whosoever receives the kingdom of God as a little child,the same is the greatest in it.’1 Here are both inward appraisal and self-renouncement; but what is most ad­ mirable is the sweet reasonableness, the exquisite, mild, winning felicity, with which the renouncement and the inward appraisal are applied and conveyed. And the conjunction of the three in Jesus,—the method of inwardness, and the secret of self-renouncement, working in and through this element of mildness, — produced the total impression of his ‘ epieikeia,’ or sweet reasonableness ; a total impression ineffable and inde­ scribable for the disciples, as also it was irresistible for them, but at which their descriptive words, words like this ‘ sweet reasonableness,1 and like '‘full of grace and truth,' are thrown out and aimed.1 2 And this total stamp of ‘grace and truth,’ this exquisite conjunction and balance, in an element of mildness, of a method of inwardness perfectly handled and a self-renouncement perfectly kept, 77 was found in Jesus alone. What are the method of inwardness and the secret of self-renouncement without the sure balance of Jesus, without his epieikeial Much, but very far indeed from what he showed or what he meant; they come to be used blindly, used mechanically, used amiss, and lead to the strangest aberrations. St. Simeon Stylites on his column, Pascal girdled with spikes, Lacordaire flogging himself on his death-bed, are what the secret by itself produces. The method by itself gives us our political Dissenter, pluming himself on some irrational ‘ con­ scientious objections,’ and not knowing, that with conscience he has done nothing until he has got to the bottom of con­ science, and made it tell him right. Therefore the disciples of Jesus were not told to believe in his method, or to believe in his secret, but to believe in him ; they were not told to follow the method or to follow the secret, but they were told: ‘ Follow me ! ’ For it was only by fixing their heart and mind on Jesus that they could learn to use the method and secret right; by '•believing in him,’ 'feeding on him ; ’ by, as he often said, ‘ remaining in him.’ But this is just what Israel had been told to do as regards the Eternal himself. ‘ I have set the Eternal always before me; ’ ‘ Mine eyes are ever tozvard the Eternal; ’ ‘ The Eternal is the strength of my life; ’ ‘ Wait, I say, on the Eternal ’1 Now, then, let us go back again for a little to Israel, and to Israel’s belief. CHAPTER VIII FAITH IN CHRIST As the Jews were always talking about the Messiah, so they were always talking, we know, about God. And they believed in God’s Messiah after their notion of him, 1 Matth., xviii, 1-4 ; Mark, ix, 15. 2 Bossuet calls him le debonnaire fesus ; Cowper speaks of his questioning the disciples going to Emmaus ‘ with a kind, engaging air.’ because they believed in God after their notion of him-,—but both notions were wrong. All their aspirations were now turned towards the Messiah; whoever would do them good, must first change their ideal of the Messiah. But their Ps. xvi, 8; xxv, 15 ; xxvii, I, 14. �?8 LITERATURE AND DOGMA ideal of God’s Messiah depended upon their notion of God. This notion was now false, like their ideal of the Messiah ; but once it had been true, or, at least, true comparatively;—once Israel had had the intuition of God as the Eternal that loveth righteousness. And the intuition had never been so lost but that it was capable of be­ ing revived. To change their dangerous and misleading ideal of God’s Messiah, therefore, and to make the Jews believe in the true Messiah, could only be accom­ plished by bringing them back to a truer notion of God and his righteousness. By this it could, perhaps, be accomplished, but by this only. And this is what Jesus sought to do. He sought to do it in the way we have seen, by his ‘ method ’ and his ‘ secret.’ First, by his ‘ method ’ of a change of the inner man. ‘ Do not be all abroad, do not be in the air,'1 he said to his nation. ‘ You look for the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is the reign of righteous­ ness, God’s will done by all mankind. Well, then, seek the kingdom of God ! the kingdom of God is within you ! ’2 And, next, by his ‘secret’ of peace. ‘ Renounce thyself, and take up thy cross daily and follow me!3 He that loveth his life shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.'4 And the revolution thus made was so immense, that the least in this new kingdom of heaven, this realm of the ‘ method ’ and the ‘ secret,’ was greater, Jesus said, than one who, like John the Baptist, was even greatest in the old realm of Jewish re­ ligion.5 And those who obeyed the gospel of this new kingdom came to the light p they had joy -f they entered into peace p they ceased to thirst-, the word became in them a spring of water welling up unto everlasting life? But these were the admitted tests of righteousness, of obeying the voice of the Eternal who loveth righteousness. ‘ There ariseth light for the righteous, and gladness for the 1 2 4 6 8 Luke, xvii, 21. John, xii, 25. John, iii, 21. John, xvi, 33. Luke, xii, 29. 3 Luke, ix, 23. 8 Matth., xi, 11. 7 John, xvii, 13. 8 John, iv, 14. upright in heart;1 he that feareth the Eternal, blessed is he 1 ’2 Now, the special value of the Fourth Gospel is, not that it exhibits the method and secret of Jesus,—for all the Gospels exhibit them,—but that it exhibits the establishment of them by means of Israel’s own idea of God, cleared and re-awakened. The argument is : ‘ You arealways talking about God, God’s word, righteousness; always saying that God is your Father, and will send his Messiah for your salva­ tion. Well, he who receives me shows that he talks about God with a knowledge of what he is saying ; he sets to his seal that God is true.3 He who is of God heareth the words of God p every one that heareth and learneth of the Father cometh unto mep andye have not his word abiding in you, because, whom he hath sent, him ye believe not; 6 if any one will do God's will he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God.'7 This, therefore, is what Jesus said :—‘ I, whose message of salvation is : If a man keep my word he shall never see death !8 am sent of God ; because he, who obeys my saying : Renounce thyself and follow me ! 9 shall feel that he truly lives, and that he is following, therefore, Israel’s God of whom it is said: Thou wilt show me the path of life.'10 The doctrine therefore is double :— Renounce thyself, the secret of Jesus, in­ volving a foregoing exercise of his method ; and, Follow me, who am sent from God ! That is the favourite expression :—Sent from God. ‘ I come forth from the Father; the Father hath sent me : God hath sent me.’11 Now this identified Jesus and his salvation with the Messiah whom, with his salvation, the Jews were expecting. For his disciples therefore, and for Christendom after them, Jesus was and is the Messiah or Christ. Meanwhile, as with the word God, so with the word Christ. Jesus did not give 1 Ps. xcvii, 11. 2 Ps. cxii, 1. 4 John, viii, 47. 8 John, iii, 33. 8 John, v, 38. 8 John, vi, 45. 8 John, viii, 51. 7 John, vii, 17. 10 Ps. xvi, II. 9 Matth., xvi, 24. 11 John, xvi, 27, 23, 30; vi, 57; vii, 29; viii, 42; xvii, 8. �FAITH IN CHRIST any scientific definition of it,—such as, for instance, that Christ was the Logos. He took the word Christ as the Jews used it, as he took the word God as the Jews used it. And as he amended their notion of God, the Eternal who loveth righteous­ ness, by showing what righteousness really was, so he amended their notion of the Messiah, the chosen bringer of God's salva­ tion, by showing what salvation really was. And though his own application of terms to designate himself is not a matter where we can perfectly trust his reporters (as it is clear, for instance, that the writer of the Fourth Gospel was more metaphysical than Jesus himself),1 yet there is no difficulty in supposing him to have applied to himself each and all of the terms which the Jews in any way used to describe the Messiah, — Messiah or Christ, God’s Chosen or Beloved or Consecrated or Glorified One, the Son of God, the Son of Man ; because his concern, as we have said, was with his countrymen’s idea of salvation, not with their terms for desig­ nating the bringer of it. But the simplest term, the term which gives least open­ ing into theosophy,—Son of Man,—he certainly preferred. So, too, he loved the simple expressions, ‘ God sent me,’ ‘The Father hath sent me;’ and he chose so often to say, in a general manner, ‘ I am Hefi* rather than to say positively, ‘ I am the Christ.' And evidently this mode of speaking struck his hearers. We find the Jews saying : ‘ How long dost thou make us to doubt! if thou be the Christ, tell us plainly.’3 And even then Jesus does not answer point-blank, but prefers to say : ‘I have told you, and ye believe not.’ Yet this does not imply that he had the least doubt or hesitation in naming himself the 1 It is to be remembered too, that whereas Jesus spoke in Aramaic, the most concrete and unmetaphysical of languages, he is reported in Greek, the most metaphysical. What, in the mouth of Jesus, was the word which comes to us as fjLovoyevIjs {only begotten} ? Probably the simple Aramaic word for unique, only. And yet, in the Greek record, even the word p.ovoyevi)s is not, like only begotten in our translation, reserved for Christ; see Luke, vii, 12 ; viii, 42 ; ix, 38. 2 John, iv, 26 ; viii, 24, 28. 3 John, x, 24. Messiah, the Son of God ; but only that his concern was, as we have said, with God’s righteousness and Christ’s salvation, and that he avoided all use of the names God and Christ, which might give an opening into mere theosophical specula­ tion. And this is shown, moreover, by the largeness and freedom,—almost, one may say, indifference,—of his treatment of both names ; as names, in using which, his hearers were always in danger of going off into a theosophy that did them no good and had better occupy them as little as possible. ‘ I and my Father are one !'1 he w’ould say at one time; and, ‘ My Father is greater than I!'1 at another. 2 When the Jew’s were offended at his call­ ing himself the Son of God, he quotes Scripture to show that even mere men were in Scripture called Gods; and for you, he says, who go by the letter of Scripture, surely this is sanction enough for calling anyone, whom God sends, the Son of God ! 3 He did not at all mean, that the Messiah was a son of God merely in the sense in which any great man might be so called ; but he meant that these questions of theosophy were useless for his hearers, and that they puzzled themselves with them in vain. All they were concerned with was, that he was the Messiah they expected, sent to them with salvation from God. It is the same when Jesus says: ‘Before Abraham was, lam!’4 He was baffling his countrymen’s theosophy, showing them how little his doctrine was meant to offer a field for it. ‘Life,’ he means, ‘the life of him who lays down his life that he may take it again? is not what you suppose. Your notions of life and death are all false, and with your present notions you cannot discuss theology with me ; follow me ! ’ So, again, to the Jews in the rut of their traditional theology, and haggling about the Son of DavidJesus, they insisted, could not be the Christ, because the Christ was the Son of David. Jesus answers them by the objection that in the Psalms (and the Scripture cannot be 1 John, x, 30. 2 John, xiv, 28. » John, x, 34-36. 4 John, viii, 58. 5 John, x, 17. �8o LITERATURE AND DOGMA broken !) David calls the Christ his Lord ; and ‘ if he call him Lord, how is he then his son ? ’1 The argument as a serious argument is perfectly futile. The king of God’s chosen people is going out to war, and what the Psalmist really sings is : ‘The Eternal saith unto the king’s majesty, Thou shalt conquer!’ St. Peter in the Acts gravely uses the same verse to prove Jesus to be Christ: ‘ God,’ says he, ‘tells my Lord, Sit thou tipon my right hand! Yet David never went up into heaven.’2 Now, this is exactly of a piece with St. Paul’s proving salvation to be by Christ alone, from seed, in the promise to Abra­ ham, being in the singular not the plural.3 It is merely false criticism of the Old Testament, such as the Jews were full of, and of which the Apostles retained far too much. But the Jews were full of it, and therefore the objection of Jesus was just such an objection as the Jews would think weighty. He used it as he might have used a crux about personality or consubstantiality with the Bishops of Win­ chester or Gloucester ;—to baffle and put to rout their false dogmatic theology, to disenchant them with it and make them cast it aside and come simply to him. ‘See,’ he says to the Jewish doctors, ‘ what a mess you make of it with your learning, and evidences, and orthodox theology ; with the wisdom of your wise men and the understanding ofyour prudent men! You can do nothing with them, your arms break in your hands. Fling the rubbish away, cease from your own wisdom? and throw yourselves upon my method and secret,—upon me ! Believe that the Father hath sent me; he that receiveth me receiveth Him that sent me. Jf any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God, or whether I have invented it 1 ’5 And no grand performance or discovery of a man’s own to bring him thus to joy and peace, but an attachment ! the in­ fluence of One full of grace and truth ! An influence, which we feel we know not how, and which subdues us we know 1 Matth., xxii, 42-45. 2 Acts, ii, 34. 8 Gat., iii, 16. 4 Prov., xxiii, 4. 8 John, xii, 44; xiii, 20; vii, 17. not when ; which, like the wind, breathes where it lists, passes here, and does not pass there 1 Once more, then, we come to that root and ground of religion, that element of awe and gratitude which fills religion with emotion, and makes it other and greater than morality,—the not our­ selves. We did not make the order of conduct, or provide that happiness should belong to it, or dispose our hearts to it. Man's goings are of the Eternal, as Israel said • Eternal, I know that the way of man is not in himself! Neither did we invent Jesus, or make the ‘grace and truth’ of Jesus, or provide that happiness should belong to feeling them, or dispose our hearts to feel them. No man can come to me, as Jesus said, except the Father which sent me draw him! So the revela­ tion of Jesus Christ in the New Testament is like the revelation of the God of Israel in the Old, in being the revelation of ‘the Eternal not ourselves which makes for righteousness.’ It is like it, and has the same power of religion in it. 2. Thus, then, did Jesus seek to transform the immense materialising Aberglaube, into which the religion of Israel had fallen, and to spiritualise it at all points ; while in his method and secret he supplied a sure basis for practice. But to follow him entirely there was needed an epieikeia, an unfailing sweetness and unerring per­ ception, like his own. It was much if his disciples got firm hold on his method and his secret; and if they transmitted fragments enough of his lofty spiritualism to make it in the fulness of time dis­ cernible, and to make it at once and from the first in a large degree serviceable. Who can read in% the Gospels the com­ ments preserved to us, both of disciples and of others, on what he said, and not feel that Jesus must have known, while he nevertheless persevered in saying them, how things like: ‘ Before Abraham was, Iam] 3 or : 11 will not leave you comfort1 Prov., xx, 24; Jer., x, 23. 2 John, vi, 44. 8 John, viii, 58. �ABERGLAUBE RE-INVADING less, I will come unto you,'1 would be misapprehended by those who heard them ? But, indeed, Jesus himself tells us that he knew and foresaw this. With the promise of the Spirit of truth which should, after his departure, work in his disciples first, then in the world, and which should convince the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment, and finally transform it, we are all familiar. But we do not enough remark the impres­ sive words, uttered to the crowd around him only a little while before, and of far wider application than the reporter imagined. ‘ Yet a little while is the light with you; walk while ye have the light, lest the darkness overtake you unawares !' 2 The real application cannot have been to the unconverted only ; a call to the un­ converted to make haste because their chance of conversion would soon, with Christ’s departure, be gone. No, converts 81 came in far thicker after Christ’s depar­ ture than in his life. The words are for the converted also. It is as if Jesus fore­ saw the want of his sweet reasonableness, which he could not leave, to help his method and his secret, which he could leave ; as if he foresaw his words mis­ construed, his rising to eternal life turned into a physical miracle, the advent of the Spirit of truth turned into a scene of thaumaturgy, Peter proving his Master’s Messiahship from a Psalm that does not prove it, the great Apostle of the Gentiles word-splitting like a pedantic Rabbi, the most beautiful soul among his own re­ porters saddling him with metaphysics ; —foresaw the growth of creeds, the growth of dogma, and so through all the confusion worse confounded of councils, schoolmen, and confessions of faith, down to our own two bishops bent on ‘doing something’ for the honour of the Godhead of the Eternal Son ! CHAPTER IX ABERGLAUBE RE-INVADING Miracles, and, above all, the crowning miracles of the Resurrection and Ascen­ sion to be followed by the second Advent, were from the first firmly fixed as parts of the disciples’ belief. ‘ Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him, and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him / ’3 As time went on, and Chris­ tianity spread wider and wider among the multitudes, and with less and less of con­ trol from the personal influence of Jesus, Christianity developed more and more its side of miracle and legend; until to believe Jesus to be the Son of God meant to believe the points of the legend,—his preternatural conception and birth, his miracles, his descent into hell, his bodily resurrection, his ascent into heaven, and his future triumphant return to judgment. 1 John, xiv, 18. 2 John, xii, 35. ’ Revelation, i, 7. And these and like matters are what popular religion drew forth from the re­ cords of Jesus as the essentials of belief, These essentials got embodied in a short formulary; and so the creed which is called the Apostles’ Creed came together. It is not the apostles’ creed, for it took more than five hundred years to grow to maturity. It was not the creed of any single doctor or body of doctors, but it was a sort of summary of Christiauity which the people, the Church at large, would naturally develop; it is the popular science of Christianity. Given the alleged charge : ‘ Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,’1 and the candidate for baptism would naturally come to have a profession of faith to make respecting that whereinto he was baptized ; f , *■ 1 Matth., xxviii, 19. r �82 LITERATURE AND DOGMA this profession of faith would naturally become just such a summary as the Apostles’ Creed. It contains no mention of either the ‘ method ’ or the ‘ secret,’ it is occupied entirely with external facts ; and it may be safely said, not only that such a summary of religious faith could never have been delivered by Jesus, but it could never have been adopted as ade­ quate by any of his principal Apostles, by Peter, or Paul, or John. But it is, as we have said, the popular science of Chris­ tianity. Years proceeded. The world came in to Christianity ; the world, and the world’s educated people, and the educated peo­ ple’s Aryan genius with its turn for making religion a metaphysical conception; and all this in a time of declining criticism, a time when the possibility of true scientific criticism, in any direction whatever, was lessening rather than increasing. The popular science was found not elaborate enough to satisfy. Ingenious men took its terms and its data, and applied to them, not an historical criticism showing how they arose, but abstruse metaphysical conceptions. And so we have the socalled Nicene Creed, which is the learned science of Christianity, as the Apostles’ Creed is the popular science. Now, how this sort of learned science is related to the Bible we shall feel, if we compare the religious utterances of its doctors with the religious utterances of the Bible. Suppose, for instance, we compare with the Psalms the Soliloquies of St. Augustine, a truly great and religious man ; and of St. Augustine, not in school and controversy, but in religious soliloquy. St. Augustine prays : ‘ Come to my help, thou one God, one eternal true substance, where is no discrepancy, no confusion, no transience, no indigency, no death ; where is supreme concord, supreme evidence, supreme constancy, supreme plenitude, supreme life; where nothing is lacking, nothing is over and above ; where he who begets and he who is begotten of him are one; God, above whom is nothing, outside whom is nothing, without whom is nothing ; God, beneath whom is the whole, in whom is the whole, with whom is the whole ! ’ And a further Book of Soliloquies, popularly ascribed to St. Augustine and printed with his works, but probably of a later date and author, shows the full-blown development of all this, shows the inevitable results of bring­ ing to the idea of God this play of intel­ lectual fancy so alien to the Bible. The passages we will quote take evidently their inspiration from the words of St. Augustine just given, and even retain in some degree his forms of expression : ‘ Holy Trinity, superadmirable Trinity, and superinenarrable, and superinscrutable, and superinaccessible, superincomprehensible, su­ perin telligible, superessential, superessentially surpassing all sense, all reason, all intellect, all intelligence, all essence of supercelestial minds; which can neithei be said, nor thought, nor understood, noi known even by the eyes of angels 1 ’ And again, more practically, but still in the same style : ‘ O three co-equal and co­ eternal Persons, one and true God, Father and Son and Holy Ghost, who by thyself inhabitest eternity and light inaccessible, who hast founded the earth in thy power, and rulest the world by thy prudence, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Sabaoth, terrible and strong, just and merciful, admirable, laudable, amiable, one God, three persons, one essence, power, wisdom, goodness, one and undivided Trinity, open unto me that cry unto Thee the gates of righteousness 1 ’ And now compare this with the Bible:—• Teach me to do the thing thatpleaseth thee, for thou art my God! let thy loving spirit lead me forth into the land of righteous­ ness ! 1 That is Israel’s way of praying 1 that is how a poor ill-endowed Semite, belonging to the occipital races, unhelped by the Aryan genius and ignorant that religion is a metaphysical conception, talks religion ! and we see what a different thing he makes of it. But, finally, the original Semite fell more and more into the shade. The Aryans came to the front, the notion of religion being a metaphysical conception prevailed. But the doctors differed in 1 Ps. exliii, io. �ABERGLAUBE RE-INVADING their metaphysics ; and the doctors who conquered enshrined their victorious form of metaphysics in a creed, the so-called Creed of St. Athanasius, which is learned science like the Nicene Creed, but learned science which has fought and got ruffled by fighting, and is fiercely dictatorial now that it has won; learned science with a strong dash of violent and vindictive temper. Thus we have the three Creeds : the so-called Apostles’ Creed, popular science; the Nicene Creed, learned science; the Athanasian Creed, learned science with a strong dash of temper. And the two latter are founded on the first, taking its data just as they stand, but dressing them metaphysically. Now this first Creed is founded on a supposed final charge from Jesus to his Apostles: ‘ Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost 1 ’1 It ex­ plains and expands what Jesus here told his Apostles to baptize the world into. But we have already remarked the differ­ ence in character between the narrative, in the Gospels, of what happened before Christ’s death, and the narrative of what happened after it. For all words of Jesus placed after his death, the internal evi­ dence becomes pre-eminently important. He may well have said words attributed to him, but not then. So the speech to Thomas, ‘ Because thou hast seen me thou hast believed ; blessed are they who have not seen and yet have believed 1 ’2 may quite well have been a speech of Jesus uttered on some occasion during his life, and then transferred to the story of the days after his resurrection and made the centre of this incident of the doubt of Thomas. On the other hand, again, the prophecy of the details of Peter’s death 3 is almost certainly an addition after the event, because it is not at all in the man­ ner of Jesus. What is in his manner, and what he had probably at some time said, are the words given elsewhere : ‘ Whither I go thou canst not follow me now, but thou shalt follow me afterwards.’4 So, 1 Matth., xxviii, 19. 8 John, xxi, 18. 2 John, xx, 29. 4 John, xiji, 36. 83 too, it is extremely improbable that Jesus should have ever charged his Apostles to ‘ baptize all nations in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.’ There is no improbability in his investing them with a very high commission. He may perfectly well have said : ‘ Whose-I soever sins ye remit, they are remitted J whosesoever sins ye retain, they are re­ tained.’ 1 But it is almost impossible he can have given this charge to baptize in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; it is by far too systematic and what people are fond of calling an anachronism. It is not the least like what Jesus was in the habit of saying, and it is just like what would be attributed to him as baptism and its formula grew in importance. The genuine charge of Jesus to his Apostles was, almost certainly : ‘ As my Father sent me, even so send I you,’2 and not this. So that our three Creeds, and with them the whole of our so-called orthodox theology, are founded upon words which Jesus in all probability never uttered. 2. We may leave all questions about the Church, its rise, and its organisation, out of sight altogether. Much as is made of them, they are comparatively unimportant, Jesus never troubled himself with what are called Church matters at all ; his attention was fixed solely upon the individual. His Apostles did what was necessary, as such matters came to require a practical notice and arrangement but to the Apostles, too, they were still quite secondary. The Church grew into some­ thing quite different from what they or" Jesus had, or could have had, any thought of. But this was of no importance in itself; and how believers should organise their society as circumstances changed, circumstances themselves might very well decide. The one important question was and is, how believers laid and kept hold on the revelations contained in the Bible I * John, xx, 23. 2 John, xx, 22. F 2 �84 LITERATURE AND DOGMA because for the sake of these it con­ logical, will mean merely, that, having fessedly is, that every church exists. accustomed ourselves to look at things Even the apostles, we have seen, did not through a glass of a certain colour, we see lay hold on them perfectly. In their them always of that colour. What the attachment to miracles, in the prominence science of Bible-criticism, like all other they gave to the crowning miracles of science, needs, is a very wide experience Christ’s bodily resurrection and second from comparative observation in many advent, they went aside from the saving directions, and a very slowly acquired habit doctrine of Jesus themselves, and were of mind. All studies have the benefit of sure,—which was worse,—to make others these guides, when they exist, and one go aside from it ten thousand times more. isolated study can never have the benefit But they were too near to Jesus not to have of them by itself. There is a common been able to preserve the main lines of his order, a general level, a uniform possibility, teaching, to preserve his way of using words; for these things. As were the geography, history, physiology, cosmology, of the men and they did, in fact, preserve them. But at their death the immediate who developed dogma, so was also their remembrance of Jesus faded away, and faculty for a scientific Bible-criticism, such whatever Aberglaube the Apostles them­ as dogma pretends to be. Now we know selves had had and sanctioned was left what their geography, history, physiology, to w’ork without check. And, at the cosmology, were. Cosmas Indicopleustes, same time, the world and society pre­ a Christian navigator of Justinian’s time, sented conditions constantly less and less denies that the earth is spherical, and asserts favourable to sane criticism. And it was it to be a flat surface with the sky put over then, and under these conditions, that it like a dish-cover. The Christian meta­ the dogma which is now called orthodox, physics of the same age applying the ideas and which our dogmatic friends imagine of substance and identity to what the to be purely a methodical arrangement of Bible says about God, Jesus, and the the admitted facts of Christianity, grew Holy Spirit, are on a par with this natural up. We have shown from the thing itself, philosophy. And again, as one part of their scientific by putting the dogma in comparison with the genuine teaching of Jesus, how little Bible-criticism, so the rest. We have it is this; but it is well to make clear to seen in the Bible-writers themselves a oneself, also (for one can), from the quite uncritical use of the Old Testament circumstances of the case, that it could and of prophecy. Now, does this become less in the authors of our dogmatic not be this. For dogmatic theology is, in fact, an theology,—a far more pretentious effort attempt at both literary and scientific of criticism than the Bible-writers ever criticism of the highest order ; and the made,—or does it become greater? It age which developed dogma had neither becomes a thousand times greater. Not the resources nor the faculty for such a only are definite predictions found where criticism. It is idle to talk of the they do not exist,—as, for example, in theological instinct, the analogy of faith, Isaiah’s I will restore thy judges as at the as if by the mere occupation with a limited first,x is found a definite foretelling of the subject-matter one could reach the truth Apostles,—but in the whole Bible a secret about it. It is as if one imagined that allegorical sense is supposed, higher than by the mere study of Greek we could the natural sense; so that Jerome calls reach the truth about the origin of Greek tracing the natural sense an eating dust words, and dogmatise about them ; and like the serpent, in rnodum serpentis terram could appeal to our supposed possession, comedere. Therefore, for one expounder, through our labours, of the philological Isaiah’s prophecy against Egypt : The instinct, the analogy of language, to make Eternal rideth upon a light cloud, and our dogmatism go down. In general such shall come into Egyptp is the flight into an instinct, whether theological or philo­ 1 Is., i, 26. 2 Js., xix, 1. �ABERGLAUBE RE-INVADING Egypt of the Holy Family, and the light cloud is the virgin-born body of Jesus; for another, The government shall be ztpon his shoulder,1 is Christ’s carrying upon his shoulder the cross; for another, The lion shall eat straw like the ox,2 is the faithful and the wicked alike receiving the body of Christ in the Eucharist. These are the men, this is the critical faculty, from which our so-called orthodox dogma proceeded. The worth of all the productions of such a critical faculty is easy to estimate, for the worth is nearly uniform. When the Rabbinical ex­ pounders interpret: Woe unto them that lay field to field / 3 as a prophetic curse on the accumulation of Church property, or: Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning that they may follow strong drink /4 as a prediction of the profligacy of the Church clergy, or: Woe unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity / 5 as God’s malediction on Church bells, we say at once that such critics thus give their measure as interpreters of the true sense of the Bible. The moment we think seriously and fairly, we must see that the patristic interpretations of prophecy give, in like manner, their authors’ measure as interpreters of the true sense of the Bible. Yet this is what the dogma of the Nicene and Athanasian. Creeds professes to be, and must be if it is to be worth anything,—the true sense xtracted from the Bible; for, ‘ the Bible is the record of the whole revealed faith,’ says Cardinal Newman. But we see how impossible it is that this true sense the dogma of these Creeds should be. Therefore it is, that it is useful to give signal instances of the futility of patristic and mediaeval criticism ; not to raise an idle laugh, but because our whole dog­ matic theology has a patristic and mediaeval source, and from the nullity of the deliverances of this criticism, where it can be brought manifestly to book, may be inferred the nullity of its deliverances, where, from the impalpable and incognisable character of the subjects 1 Is., ix, 6. * Is., v, 8. 2 Is., lxv, 25. 4 Is., v, 11. * Is., v, 18. 85 treated, to bring it manifestly to book is impossible. In the account of the Creation, in the first chapter of Genesis, ‘ the greater light to rule the day,’ is the priesthood ; ‘ the lesser light to rule the night,’1 borrowing its beams from the greater, is the Holy Roman Empire. When the disciples of Jesus produced two swords and Jesus said: ‘It is enough,’2 he meant, .we are told, the temporal and the spiritual power, and that both were necessary and both at the disposal of the Church ; but by saying afterwards to Peter, after he had cut off the ear of Malchus : ‘ Put- up thy sword into the sheath,’3 he meant that the Church was not to wield the temporal power itself, but to employ the secular government to wield it. Now, this is the very same force of criticism which in the Athanasian Creed ‘ arranged, sentence after sen­ tence,’ that doctrine of the Godhead of the Eternal Son for which the Bishops of Winchester and Gloucester are so anxious to ‘ do something.’ The Schoolmen themselves are but the same false criticism developed, and clad in an apparatus of logic and system. In that grand and instructive repertory founded by the Benedictines, the Histoire Litteraire de la France, we read that in; the theological faculty of the University of Paris, the leading mediaeval university, it was seriously discussed whether Jesus at his ascension had his clothes on or not... If he had not, did he appear before his Apostles naked ? if he had, what became of the clothes ? Monstrous / everyone will say.4 Yes, but the very same criti-j cism, Only full-blown, which produced: ‘Neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the Substance.’ The very same criticism, which originally treated terms as scientific which were not scientific! which, instead of applying literary and 1 Gen., i, 16. 2 Luke, xxii, 38. 8 John, xviii, 11. 4 Be it observed, however, that there is an honest scientific effort in the Schoolmen, and that to this sort of thing one really does come, when one fairly sets oneself to treat miracles literally and exactly; but most of us are content to leave them in a half light. �86 LITERATURE AND DOGMA historical criticism to the data of popular Aberglaube, took these data just as they stood and merely dressed them scien­ tifically. Cataolic dogma itself is true, urges, however, Cardinal Newman, because inf telligent Catholics have dropped errors and absurdities like the False Decretals or the works of the pretended Dionysius the Areopagite, but have not dropped dogma. This is only saying that men drop the more palpable blunder before the less palpable. The adequate criticism of the Bible is extremely difficult, and slowly does the ‘Zeit-Geist’ unveil it. Meanwhile, of the premature and false criticism to which we are accustomed, we drop the evidently weak parts first; we retain the rest, to drop it gradually and piece by piece as it loosens and breaks up. But it is all of one order, and in time it will all go. Not the Athanasian Creed’s damnatory clauses only, but the whole Creed; not this one Creed only, but the three Creeds,—our whole received appli­ cation of science, popular or learned, to the Bible. For it was an inadequate and false science, and could not, from the nature of the case, be otherwise. 3And now we see how much that clergy­ man deceives himself, who writes to the Guardian: ‘ The objectors to the Atha­ nasian Creed at any rate admit, that its doctrinal portions are truly the carefully distilled essence of the scattered intima­ tions of Holy Scripture on the deep mysteries in question,—priceless dis­ coveries made in that field.’ When one has travelled to the Athanasian Creed along the gradual line of the historical development of Christianity, instead of living stationary all one’s life with this Creed blocking up the view, one is really tempted to say, when one reads a deliver­ ance like that of this clergyman : Sancta simplicitas / It is just because the Athanasian Creed pretends to be, in its doctrine, ‘the carefully distilled essence of the scattered intimations of Holy Scripture,’ and is so very far from it, that it is worthless. It is ‘ the carefully dis­ tilled essence of the scattered intimations of Holy Scripture ’ just as that allegory of the two swords was. It is really a mixture,—for true criticism, as it ripens, it is even a grotesque mixture,—of learned pseudo-science with popular Aberglaube. But it cannot be too carefully borne in mind that the real ‘essence of Holy Scripture,’ its saving truth, is no such criticism at all as the so-called orthodox dogma attempts and attempts unsuccess­ fully. No, the real essence of Scripture is a much simpler matter. It is, for the Old Testament : To him that ordereth his conversation right shall be shozvn the salva­ tion of God I—and for the New Testament: Follow Jesus ! This is Bible-dogma, as opposed to the dogma of our formularies. On this Bible-dogma if Churches were founded, and to preach this Bible-dogma if ministers were ordained, Churches and ministers would have all the dogma to which the Bible attaches eternal life. Plain and precise enough it is, in all conscience; with the advantage of being precisely right, whereas the dogma of our formularies is precisely wrong. And if anyone finds it too simple, let him remember that its hardness is practical, not speculative. It is a rule of conduct-, let him act it, and he will find it hard enough. Utinarn per unum diem bene essemtis conversati in hoc mtindo ! But as a matter of mere knowledge it is very simple, it lies on the surface of the Bible and cannot be missed. And the holders of ecclesiastical dogma havealways, we must repeat and remember, held and professed this Bible-dogma too. Their ecclesiastical dogma may have pre­ vented their attending closely enough to the Bible-dogma, may have led them often to act false to it; but they have always held it. The method and the secret of Jesus have been always prized. The Catholic Church from the first held aloft the secret of Jesus ; the monastic orders were founded, we may say, in homage to it. And from time to time, through the course of ages, there have arisen men who threw themselves on the method and �ABERGLAURE RE-INVADING secret of Jesus with extraordinary force, with intuitive sense that here was salvation; and who really cared for nothing else, though ecclesiastical dogma, too, they professed to believe, and sincerely thought they did believe,—but their heart was elsewhere. These are they who ‘ received the kingdom of God as a little child,’ who perceived how simple a thing Christianity was, though so inexhaustible, and who are therefore ‘ the greatest in the kingdom of God.’ And they, not the theological doctors, are the true lights of the Christian Church ; not Augustine, Luther, Bossuet, Butler, but the nameless author of the Imitation, but Tauler, but St. Francis of Sales, Wilson of Sodor and Man. Yet not only these men, but the whole body of Christian churches and sects always, have all at least professed the method and secret of Jesus, and to some extent used them. And whenever these were used, they have borne their natural fruits of joy and life ; and this joy and this life have been taken to flow from the ecclesiastical dogma held along with them, and to sanction and prove it. And people, eager to praise the bridge which carried them over from death to life, have taken this dogma for the bridge, or part of the bridge, that carried them over, and have eagerly praised it. Thus religion has been made to stand on its apex instead of its base. Righteousness is supported on eccle­ siastical dogma, instead of ecclesiastical dogma being supported on righteousness. But in the beginning it was not so. Because righteousness is eternal, necessary, life-giving, therefore the mighty ‘ not our­ selves which makes for righteousness ’ was the Eternal, Israel’s God; was all-powerful, all-merciful; sends his Messiah, elects his people, establishes his kingdom, re­ ceives into everlasting habitations. But gradually this petrifies, gradually it is more and more added to; until at last, because righteousness was originally per­ ceived to be eternal, necessary, life-giving, we find ourselves ‘ worshipping One God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the Substance.’ And then the original order is reversed. Because there is One God 87 in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, who receives into everlasting habitations, establishes his kingdom, elects his people, sends his Messiah, is all-merciful, allpowerful, Israel’s God, the Eternal,— therefore righteousness is eternal, neces­ sary, life-giving. And shake the belief in the One God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity, the belief in righteousness is shaken, it is thought, also. Whereas righteousness and the God of righteous­ ness, the God of the Bible, are in truth quite independent of the God of eccle­ siastical dogma, the work of critics of the Bible,—critics understanding neither what they say nor whereof they affirm. 4- Nor did even the Reformation and Protestantism much mend the work of these critics; the time was not yet ripe for it. Protestantism, nevertheless, was a strenuous and noble effort at improve­ ment ; for it was an effort of return to the ‘method’ of Jesus,—that leaven which never, since he set it in the world, has ceased or can cease to work. Catholicism, we have said, laid hold on the ‘ secret ’ of Jesus, and strenuously, however blindly, employed it; this is the grandeur and the glory of Catholicism. In like manner Protestantism laid hold on his ‘ method,’ and strenuously, however blindly, em­ ployed it; and herein is the greatness of Protestantism. The preliminary labour of inwardness and sincerity in the con­ science of each individual man, which was the method of Jesus and his indis­ pensable discipline for learning to employ his secret aright, had fallen too much out o.f view; obedience had in a manner superseded it. Protestantism drew it into light and prominence again ; was even, one may say, over absorbed by it, so as to leave too much out of view the ‘ secret.’ This, if one would be just both to Catholicism and to Protestantism, is the thing to bear in mind :—Protestantism had hold of Jesus Christ’s ‘ method ’ of inwardness and sin­ cerity, Catholicism had hold of his ‘ secret ’ of self-renouncement. The chief word �88 LITERATURE AND DOGMA with Protestantism is the word of the Joseph de Maistre calls it, is in truth but method : repentance, conversion. The chief the necessary ‘method,’ the eternally word with Catholicism is the word of the incumbent duty, imposed by Jesus him­ secret: peace, joy. self, when he said : ‘Judge righteous And since, though the method and the judgment.’1 ‘ Judge righteous judgment ’ secret are equally indispensable, the is, however, the duty imposed ; and the secret may be said to have in it more of duty is not, whatever many Protestants practice and conduct, Catholicism may may seem to think, fulfilled if the judg­ claim perhaps to have more of religion. ment be wrong. But the duty of in­ On the other hand, Protestantism has wardly judging is the very entrance into more light: and, as the method of in­ the way and walk of Jesus. wardness and sincerity, once gained, is of Luther, then, made an inward verifying general application, and a power for all movement, the individual conscience, the purposes of life, Protestantism, we once more the base of operations; and can see, has been accompanied by most he was right. But he did so to the prosperity. And here is the answer to following extent only. When he found Mr. Buckle’s famous parallel between the priest coming between the individual Spain and Scotland, that parallel which believer and his conscience, standing to everyone feels to be a sophism. Scotland him in the stead of conscience, he has had, to make her different from pushed the priest aside and brought the Spain, the ‘method’ of Jesus; and believer face to face with his conscience though, in theology, Scotland may have again. This explains, of course, his turned it to no great account, she has battle against the sale of indulgences and found her account in it in almost every­ other abuses of the like kind ; but it ex­ thing else. Catholicism, again, has had, plains also his treatment of that cardinal perhaps, most happiness. When one point in the Catholic religious system, the thinks of the bitter and contentious mass. He substituted for it, as the car­ temper of Puritanism,—temper being, dinal point in the Protestant system, justifi­ nevertheless, such a vast part of conduct,— cation by faith. The miracle of Jesus Christ’s and then thinks of St. Theresa and her atoning sacrifice, satisfying God’s wrath, sweetness, her never-sleeping hatred of and taking off the curse from mankind, is ‘ detraction,’ one is tempted almost to say, the foundation both of the mass and of the that there was more of Jesus in St. famous Lutheran tenet. But, in the mass, Theresa’s little finger than in John Knox’s the priest makes the miracle over again, whole body. Protestantism has the and applies its benefits to the believer. method of Jesus with his secret too much In the tenet of justification, the believer left out of mind; Catholicism has his is himself in contact with the miracle of secret with his method too much left Christ’s atonement, and applies Christ’s out of mind. Neither has his unerring merits to himself. The conscience is thus balance, his intuition, his sweet reasonable­ brought into direct communication with ness. But both have hold of a great truth, Christ’s saving act; but this saving act is and get from it a great power. still taken,—just as popular religion con­ And many of the reproaches cast by ceived it, and as formal theology adopted one on the other are idle. If Catholicism it from popular religion,—as a miracle, the is reproached with being indifferent to miracle of the Atonement. This popular much that is called civilisation, it must be and imperfect conception of the sense of answered: So was Jesus. If Protestantism, Christ’s death, and in general the whole with its private judgment, is accused of inadequate criticism of the Bible involved opening a wide field for individual fancies in the Creeds, underwent at the Reforma­ and mistakes, it must be answered : So tion no scrutiny and no change. Luther’s did Jesus when he introduced his method. actual application, therefore, of the Private judgment, 1 the fundamental and ‘ method ’ of Jesus to that inner body of insensate doctrine of Protestantism? as 1 John, vii, 24. �ABERGLAUBE RE-INVADING dogma, developed as we have seen, which he found regnant, proceeded no farther than this. And justification by faith., our being saved by ‘giving our hearty consent to Christ’s atoning work on our behalf/ by ‘ pleading simply the blood of the covenant/ Luther made the essential matter not only of his own religious system but of the entire New Testament. We must be enabled, he said, and we are enabled, to distinguish among the books of the Bible those which are the best; now, those are the best which show Christ, and teach what would be enough for us to know even if no other parts of the Bible existed. And this evangelical element, as it has been called, this funda­ mental thought of the Gospel, is, for Luther, our ‘ being justified by the alone merits of Christ.’ This is the doctrine of ‘ passive or Christian righteousness/ as Luther is fond of naming it, which con­ sists in ‘ doing nothing, but simply know­ ing and believing that Christ is gone to the Father and we see him no more ! that he sits in Heaven at the right hand of the Father, not as our judge, but made unto us by God wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption ;1 in sum, that he is our high-priest making inter­ cession for us.’ Everyone will recognise the consecrated watchwords of Protestant theology. Such is Luther’s criticism of the New Testament, of its fundamental thought. And he picks out, as the kernel and marrow of the New Testament, the Fourth Gospel and the First Epistle by the author of this Gospel, St. Paul’s Epistles,—in especial those to the Romans, Galatians, and Ephesians,—and the First Epistle of St. Peter. Now, the common complaint against Luther is on the score of his audacity in thus venturing to. make a table of precedence for the equally inspired books of the New Testa­ ment. Yet in this he was quite right, and was but following the method of Jesus, if the good news conveyed in the whole New Testament is, as it is, some­ thing definite, and all parts do not convey 1 I Cor., i, 30. 89 it equally. Where he was wrong, was in his delineation of this fundamental thought of the New Testament, in his description of the good news; and few, probably, who have followed us thus far, will have difficulty in admitting that he was wrong here, and quite wrong. And this has been the fault of Protestantism generally : not its presumption in inter­ preting Scripture for itself,—for the Church interpreted it no better, and Jesus has thrown on each individual the duty of interpreting it for himself,—but that it has interpreted it wrong, and no better than the Church. ‘ Calvinism has borne ever an inflexible front to illusion and mendacity/ says Mr. Froude. Surely this is but a flourish of rhetoric ! for the Calvinistic doctrine is in itself, like the Lutheran doctrine, and like Catholic dogma, a false criticism of the Bible, an illusion. And the Calvinistic and Lutheran doctrines both of them sin in the same way; not by using a method which, after all, is the method of Jesus, but by not using the method enough, by not applying it to the Bible thoroughly, by keeping too much of what the tradi­ tions of men chose to tell them. 5- The time was not then ripe for doing more; and we, if we can do more, have the fulness of time to thank for it, not ourselves. Yet it needs all one’s sense of the not ourselves in these things, to make us understand how doctrines, supposed to be the essence of the Bible by great Catholics and by great Pro­ testants, should ever have been supposed to be so, and by such men. To take that chief stronghold of ecclesiasticism and sacerdotalism, the insti­ tution of the Eucharist. As Catholics present it, it makes the Church indis­ pensable, with all her apparatus of an apostolical succession, an authorised priesthood, a power of absolution. Yet, as Jesus founded it, it is the most antiecclesiastical of institutions, pulverising alike the historic churches in their beauty �90 LITERATURE AND DOGMA and the dissenting sects in their unloveli­ ness ;—it is the consecration of absolute in­ dividualism. ‘ This cup is the new covenant in my blood which is shed for you.’1 When Jesus so spoke, what did he mean, what was in his mind? Undoubtedly these words of the prophet Jeremiah : ‘Behold the days come, saith the Eternal, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, not according to the covenant that I made w’ith their fathers, which covenant they brake; but this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel: After those days, saith the Eternal, I will put my law in their irewardparts, and write it in their hearts, and they shall teach no more every man his neighbour and every man his brother, say­ ing : Know the Eternal! for they shall all know me, from the least to the greatest.’2 No more scribes, no more doctors, no more priests ! the crowning act in the ‘secret’of Jesus seals at the same time his ‘ method,’—his method of pure inwardness, individual responsibility, personal religion. Take, again, the Protestant doctrine of Justification; of trusting in the alone merits of Christ, pleading the Blood of the Covenant, imputed righteousness. In our railway stations are hung up, as every­ one knows, sheets of Bible-texts to catch the passer’s eye; and very profitable admonitions to him they in general are. It is said that the thought of thus exhi­ biting them occurred to Dr. Marsh, a venerable leader of the so-called Evan­ gelical party in our Church, the party which specially clings to the special Protestant doctrine of justification ; and that he arranged the texts which we daily see. And there is one which we may all remember to have often seen. Dr. Marsh asks the prophet Micah’s question: ‘Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before the high God ? ’3 and he answers it with one short sentence from the New Testament: ‘ With the precious blood of Christ.’ This is pre­ cisely the popular Protestant notion of the Gospel; and we are all so used to it that Dr. Marsh’s application of the text has probably surprised no one. And yet, if one thinks of it, how astonishing an application it is! For even the Hebrew Micah, some seven or eight centuries before Christ, had seen that this sort of gospel, or good news, was none at all; for even he suggests this always popular notion of atoning blood, only to reject it, and ends: ‘ He hath showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Eternal require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God ? ’ So that the Hebrew Micah, nearly three thousand years ago, under the old dispensation, was far in advance of this venerable and amiable coryphaeus of our Evangelical party now, under the Christian dispensation ! Dr. Marsh and his school go wrong, it will be said, through their false criticism of the New Testament, and we have our­ selves admitted that the perfect criticism of the New Testament is extremely difficult. True, the perfect criticism; but not such an elementary criticism of it as shows the gospel of Dr. Marsh and of our so called Evangelical Protestants to be a false one. For great as their literary inexperience may be, and unpractised as is their tact for perceiving the manner in which men use words and what they mean by them, one would think they could understand such a plain caution against mistaking Christ’s death for a miraculous atonement as St. Paul has actually given them. For St. Paul, who so admirably seized the secret of Jesus, who preached Christ Crucified,1 but who placed salvation in being able to say, I am crucified with Christ !2—St. Paul warns us clearly, that this word of the cross, as he calls it, is so simple, being neither miracle nor meta­ physics, that it would be thought foolish­ ness. The Jews want miracle, he says, and the Greeks want metaphysics, but I preach Christ crucified 13—that is, the ‘secret ’ of Jesus, as we call it. The Jews want miracle !—that is a warning against * Luke, xxii, 20. 2 Jer., xxxi, 31, 2 Micah, vi, 6. 1 I Cor., i, 23. 2 Gal., ii, 20. 8 I Cor., i, 23. �ABERGLAUBE RE-INVADING Dr. Marsh’s or Mr. Spurgeon’s doctrine, against Evangelical Protestantism’s phantasmagories of the ‘ Contract in the Council of the Trinity,’ the ‘Atoning Blood,’ and ‘ Imputed Righteousness.’ The Greeks want metaphysics /—that is a warning against the Bishops of Winches­ ter and Gloucester, with their Aryan genius (if so ill-sounding a word as Aryan, spell it how one may, can ever be pro­ perly applied to our bishops, and one ought not rather to say Indo-European), dressing the popular doctrine out with fine speculations about the Godhead of the Eternal Son, his Consubstantiality with the Father, and so on. But we preach, says St. Paul, Christ crucified !— to Mr. Spurgeon and to popular religion a stumbling-block, to the bishops and to learned religion foolishness ; but, to them that are called, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. That is, we preach a doctrine, not thaumaturgical and not speculative, but practical and experi­ mental ; a doctrine which has no meaning except in positive application to conduct, but in this application is inexhaustible. 6. So false, so astoundingly false (thus one is inclined to say by the light which the ‘ Zeit-Geist ’ is beginning to throw over them) are both popular and learned science in their criticism of the Bible. And for the learned science one feels no tenderness, because it has gone wrong with a great parade of exactitude and philosophy ; whereas all it really did was to take the magnified and non-natural Man of popular religion as God, and to take Jesus as his son, and then to state the relations between them metaphysically. No difficulties suggested by the popular science of religion has this learned science ever removed, and it has created plenty of its own. But for the popular science of religion one has, or ought to have, an infinite tenderness. It is the spontaneous work of nature. It is the travail of the human mind to adapt to its grasp and employ­ ment great ideas of which it feels the 91 attraction, but for which, except as given to it by this travail, it would have been immature. The imperfect science of the Bible, formulated in the so-called Apostles’ Creed, was the only vehicle by which, to generation after generation of men, the method and secret of Jesus could gain any access; and in this sense we may even call it, taking the point of view of popular theology, providential. And this rude criticism is full of poetry, and in this poetry we have been all nursed. To call it, as many of our philosophical Liberal friends are fond of calling it, ‘a degrading superstition,’ is as untrue, as it is a poor compliment to human nature, which produced this criti­ cism and used it. It is an Aberglaube, or extra-belief and fairy-tale, produced by taking certain great names and great pro­ mises too literally and materially; but it is not a degrading superstition. Protestants, on their part, have no difficulty in calling the Catholic doctrine of the mass ‘ a degrading superstition.’ It is indeed a rude and blind criticism of Jesus Christ’s words: He that eateth me shall live by me. But once admit the miracle of the ‘atoning sacrifice,’ once move in this order of ideas, and what can be more natural and beautiful than to imagine this miracle every day repeated, Christ offered in thousands of places, everywhere the believer enabled to enact the work of redemption and unite himself with the Body whose sacrifice saves him ? And the effect of this belief has been no more degrading than the belief itself. The fourth book of the Imitation, which treats of The Sacrament of the Altar, is of later date and lesser merit than the three books which precede it; but it is worth while to quote from it a few words for the sake of the testimony they bear to the practical operation, in many cases at any rate, of this belief. ‘To us in our weakness thou hast given, for the refreshment of mind and body, thy sacred Body. The devout communicant thou, my God, raisest from the depth of his own dejection to the hope of thy protection, and with a hitherto unknown grace renewest him and enlightenest him within; so that they who �LITERATURE AND DOGMA 92 at first, before this Communion, had felt themselves distrest and affectionless, after the refreshment of this meat and drink from heaven find themselves changed to a new and better man. For this most high and worthy Sacrament is the saving health of soul and body, the medicine of all spiritual languor; by it my vices are cured, my passions bridled, temptations are conquered or diminished, a larger grace is infused, the beginnings of virtue are made to grow, faith is confirmed, hope strength­ ened, and charity takes fire and dilates into flame? So little is the doctrine of the mass to be hastily called ‘ a degrading superstition,’ either in its character or in its working. But it is false ! sternly breaks in the Evangelical Protestant. O Evangelical Protestant, is thine own doctrine, then, so true? As the Romish doctrine of the mass, ‘the Real Presence,’ is a rude and blind criticism of, TA that eateth me shall live by me f so the Protestant tenet of justification, ‘pleading the blood of the Covenant,’ is a rude and blind criticism of, The Son of Man came to give his life a ransom for many.2 It is a taking of the words of Scripture literally and unintelligently. And our friends, the philosophical Liberals, are not slow to call this, too, a degrading superstition, just as Protest­ ants call the doctrine of the mass a degrading superstition. We say, on the contrary, that a degrading superstition neither the one nor the other is. In imagining a sort of supernatural man, a man infinitely magnified and improved, with a race of vile offenders to deal with, whom his natural goodness would incline him to let off, only his sense of justice will not allow it; then a younger super­ natural man, his son, on the scale of his father and very dear to him, who might live in grandeur and splendour if he liked, but who prefers to leave his home, to go and live among the race of offenders, and to be put to an ignominious death, on condition that his merits shall be counted against their demerits, and that his father’s goodness shall be restrained no longer 1 John, vi, 57. * Matth., xx, 28. from taking effect, but any offender shall be admitted to the benefit of it on simply pleading the satisfaction made by the son ; —and then, finally, a third supernatural man, still on the same high scale, who keeps very much in the background, and works in a very occult manner, but very efficaciously nevertheless, and who is busy in applying everywhere the benefits of the son’s satisfaction, and the father’s goodness ;—in an imagination, I say, such as this, there is nothing degrading, and this is precisely the Protestant story of Justification. And how awe of the first of these supernatural persons, gratitude and love towards the second, and earnest co­ operation with the third, may fill and rule men’s hearts so as to transform their con­ duct, we need not go about to show, for we have all seen it with our eyes. Therefore in the practical working of this tenet there is nothing degrading; any more than there is anything degrading in the tenet as an imaginative conception. And looking to the infinite importance of getting right conduct,—three-fourths of human life,— established, and to the inevitable anthro­ pomorphism and extra-belief of men in dealing with ideas, one might well hesitate to attack an anthropomorphism or an extra-belief by which men helped them­ selves in conduct, merely because an anthropomorphism or an extra-belief it is, so long as it served its purpose, so long as it was firmly and undoubtingly held, and almost universally prevailing. But, after all, the question sooner or later arises in respect to a matter taken for granted, like the Catholic doctrine of the Mass or the Protestant doctrine of Justification : Is it sure ? can what is here assumed be verified! And this is the real objection both to the Catholic and to the Protestant doctrine as a basis for conduct; —not that it is a degrading superstition, but that it is not sure; that it assumes what cannot be verified. For a long time this objection occurred to scarcely anybody. And there are still, and for a long time yet there will be, many to whom it does not occur. In particular, on those ‘ devout women ’ who in the history of religion have continually played �OUR ‘MASSES’ AND THE BIBLE a part in many respects so beautiful but in some respects so mischievous,—on them, and on a certain number of men like them, it has and can as yet have, so far as one can see, no effect at all. Who that watches the energumens during the celebration of the Communion in some Ritualistic church, their gestures and behaviour, the floor of the church strewn with what seem to be the dying and the dead, progress to the altar almost barred by forms suddenly dropping as if they were shot in battle,—who that observes this de­ lighted adoption of vehement rites, till yesterday unknown, adopted and prac­ tised now with all that absence of tact, measure, and correct perception in things of form and manner, all that slowness to see when they are making themselves ridiculous, which belongs to the people of our English race,—who, I say, that marks this can doubt, that for a not small portion of our religious community a difficulty to 93 the intelligence will for a long time yet be no difficulty at all? With their mental condition and habits, given a story to which their religious emotions can attach themselves, and the famous Credo quia ineptum will hold good with them still. To think they know what passed in the Council of the Trinity is not hard to them ; they could easily think they even knew what were the hangings of the Trinity’s council-chamber. Arbitrary and unsupported, however, as the story they have taken up with may be, yet it puts them in connexion with the Bible and the religion of the Bible,—that is, with righteousness and with the method and secret of Jesus. These are so clear in the Bible that no one who uses it can help seeing them there; and of these they do take for their use something, though on a wrong ground. But these, so far as they are taken into use, are saving. CHAPTER X OUR ‘ MASSES ’ AND THE BIBLE Many, however, and of a much stronger and more important sort, there now are, who will not thus take on trust the story which is made the reason for putting our­ selves in connexion with the Bible and learning to use its religion; be it the story of the divine authority of the Chui vh, as in Catholic countries, or,—as generally with us,—the story of the three super­ natural persons standing on its own merits. Is what this story asserts true, they are beginning to ask ; can it be verified ?— since experience proves, they add, that what­ ever for man is true, man can verify. And certainly the fairy-tale of the three super­ natural persons no man can verify. They find this to be so, and then they say : The Bible takes for granted this story and depends on the truth of it; what, then, can rational people have to do with the Bible ? So they get rid, to be sure, of a false ground for using the Bible, but they at the same time lose the Bible itself, and the true religion of the Bible : righteousness, and the method and secret of Jesus. And those who lose this are the masses, as they are called; or rather they are what is most strenuous, intelligent, and alive among the masses, and what will give the signal for the rest to follow. This is what everyone sees to constitute the special moral feature of our times : the masses are losing the Bible and its religion. At the Renascence, many culti­ vated wits lost it; but the great solid mass of the common people kept it, and brought the world back to it after a start had seemed to be made in quite another direction. But now it is the people which is getting detached from the Bible. The masses can no longer be relied on to �LITERATURE AND DOGMA 94 counteract what the cultivated wits are doing, and stubbornly to make clever men’s extravagances and aberrations, if about the Bible they commit them, of no avail. When our philosophical Liberal friends say, that by universal suffrage, public meetings, Church-disestablishment, marrying one’s deceased wife’s sister, secular schools, industrial development, man can very well live; and that if he studies the writings, say, of Mr. Herbert Spencer into the bargain, he will be perfect, he ‘ will have in modern and con­ genial language the truisms common to all systems of morality,’ and the Bible is become quite old-fashioned and super­ fluous for him;—when our philosophical friends now say this, the masses, far from checking them, are disposed to applaud them to the echo. Yet assuredly, of conduct, which is more than three-fourths of human life, the Bible, whatever people may thus think and say, is the great inspirer; so that from the great inspirer of more than three-fourths of human life the masses of our society seem now to be cutting themselves off. This promises, certainly, if it does not already constitute, a very unsettled condition of things. And the cause of it lies in the Bible being made to depend on a story, or set of asserted facts, which it is impossible to verify; and which hard-headed people, therefore, treat as either an imposture, or a fairy-tale that discredits all which is found in connexion with it. • 2. Now if we look attentively at the story, or set of asserted but unverified and unverifiable facts, which we have summarised in popular language above, and which is alleged as the basis of the Bible, we shall find that the difficulty really lies all in one point. The whole difficulty is with the infinitely magnified man who is the first of the three super­ natural persons of our story. If he could be verified, the data we have are, possibly, enough to warrant our admitting the truth of the rest of the story. It is singular how few people seem to see this, though it is really quite clear. The Bible is supposed to assume a great Personal First Cause, who thinks and loves, the moral and intelligent Governor of the Universe. This is the God, also, of natural religion, as people call it; and this supposed certainty learned reasoners take, and render it more certain still by considerations of causality, identity, exist­ ence, and so on. These, however, are not found to help the certainty much; but a certainty in itself the Great Personal First Cause, the God of both natural and revealed religion, is supposed to be. Then, to this given beginning, all that the Bible delivers has to fit itself on. And so arises the account of the God of the Old Testament, and of Christ and of the Holy Ghost, and of the incarnation and atonement, and of the sacraments, and of inspiration, and of the church, and of eternal punishment and eternal bliss, as theology presents them. But difficul­ ties strike people in this or that of these doctrines. The incarnation seems incred­ ible to one, the vicarious atonement to another, the real presence to a third, inspiration to a fourth, eternal punishment to a fifth, and so on. And they set to work to make religion more pure and rational, as they suppose, by pointing out that this or that of these doctrines is false, that it must be a mistake of theologians ; and by interpreting the Bible so as to show that the doctrine is not really there. The Unitarians are, perhaps, the great people for this sort of partial and local rationalis­ ing of religion ; for taking what here and there on the surface seems to conflict most with common sense, arguing that it cannot be in the Bible and getting rid of it, and professing to have thus relieved religion of its difficulties. And now, when there is much loosening of authority and tradition, much impatience of what con­ flicts with common sense, the Unitarians are beginning confidently to give them­ selves out as the Church of the Future. But in all this there is in reality a good deal of what we must call intellectual shallowness. For, granted that there are things in a system which are puzzling, yet �OUR ‘MASSES’ AND THE BIBLE they belong to a system ; and it is childish to pick them out by themselves and re­ proach them with error, when you leave untouched the basis of the system where they occur, and indeed admit it for sound yourself. The Unitarians are very loud about the unreasonableness and unscripturalness of the common doctrine of the Atonement. But in the Socinian Catech­ ism it stands written : ‘ It is necessary for salvation to know that God is; and to know that God is, is to be firmly persuaded that there exists in reality some One, who has supreme dominion over all things.’ Presently afterwards it stands written, that among the testimonies to Christ are, ‘ miracles very great and immense,’ miracula admodum magna et immensa. Now, with the One Supreme Governor, and miracles, given to start with, it may fairly be urged that that construction put by common theology on the Bible-data, which we call the story of the three supernatural men, and in which the Atonement fills a pro­ minent place, is the natural and legitimate construction to put on them, and not unscriptural at all. Neither is it unreason­ able ; in a system of things, that is, where the Supreme Governor and miracles, or even where the Supreme Governor with­ out miracles, are already given. And this is Butler’s great argument in the Analogy. You all concede, he says to his deistical adversaries, a Supreme Personal First Cause, the almighty and intelligent Governor of the universe; this, you and I both agree, is the system and order of nature. But you are offended at certain things in revelation ;—that is, at I things, Butler means, like a future life with rewards and punishments, or like the doc­ trine of the Trinity as theology collects it from the Bible. Well, I will show you, he says, that in your and my admitted system of nature there are just as great difficulties as in the system of revelation. And he does show it; and by adversaries such as his, who grant what the Deist or Socinian grants, he never has been an­ swered, he never can be answered. The spear of Butler’s reasoning will even follow and transfix the Duke of Somerset, who finds so much to condemn in the Bible, 95 but ‘ retires into one unassailable fortress, —faith in God.’ The only question, perhaps, is, whether Butler, as an Anglican bishop, puts an adequate construction upon what Bible­ revelation, this basis of the Supreme Personal First Cause being supposed, may be allowed to be ; whether Catholic dogma is not the truer construction to put upon it. Cardinal Newman urges, fairly enough: Butler admits, analogy is in some sort violated by the fact of revela­ tion ; only, with the precedent of natural religion given, we have to own that the difficulties against revelation are not greater than against this precedent, and therefore the admission of this precedent of natural religion may well be taken to clear them. And must we not go farther in the same way, asks Cardinal Newman, and own that the precedent of revelation, too, may be taken to cover more than itself; and that as, the Supreme Governor being given, it is credible that the Incarna­ tion is true, so, the Incarnation being true, it is credible that God should not have left the world to itself after Christ and his Apostles disappeared, but should have lodged divine insight in the Church and its visible head ? So pleads Cardi­ nal Newman ; and if it be said that facts are against the infallibility of the Church, or that Scripture is against it, yet to wide, immense things, like facts and Scripture, a turn may easily be given which makes them favour it; and so an endless field for discussion is opened, and no certain conclusion is possible. For, once launched on this line of hypothesis and inference, with a Supreme Governor assumed, and the task thrown upon us of making out what he means us to infer and what we may suppose him to do and to intend, one of us may infer one thing and another of us another, and neither can possibly prove himself to be right or his adversary to be wrong. Only, there may come some one, who says that the basis of all our inference, the Supreme Personal First Cause, the moral and intelligent Governor, is not the order of nature, is an assumption, and not a fact; and then, if this is so, our whole �96 LITERATURE AND DOGMA superstructure falls to pieces like a house of cards. And this is just what is happening at present. The masses, with their rude practical instinct, go straight to the heart of the matter. They are told there is a great Personal First Cause, who thinks and loves, the moral and intelligent Author and Governor of the universe; and that the Bible and Bible­ righteousness come to us from him. Now, they do not begin by asking, with the intelligent Unitarian, whether the doctrine of the Atonement is worthy of this moral and intelligent Ruler; they begin by asking what proof we have of him at all. Moreover, they require proof which is clear and certain ; demonstration, or else plain experimental proof, such as that fire burns them if they touch it. If they are to study and obey the Bible because it comes from the Personal First Cause who is Governor of the universe, they require to be able to ascertain that there A this Governor, just as they are able to ascer­ tain that the angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles, or that fire burns. And if they cannot ascertain it, they will let the intelligent Unitarian perorate for ever about the Atonement if he likes, but they themselves pitch the whole Bible to the winds. Now, it is remarkable what a resting on mere probabilities, or even on less than probabilities, the proof for religion comes, in the hands of its great apologist, Butler, to be, even after he has started with the assumption of his moral and intelligent Governor. And no wonder ; for in the primary assumption itself there is and can be nothing demonstrable or experimental, and therefore clearly known. So that of Christianity, as Butler grounds it, the natural criticism would really be in these words of his own : ‘ Suppositions are not to be looked upon as true, because not incredible.’ However, Butler maintains that in matters of practice, such as religion, this is not so. In them it is prudent, he says, to act on even a supposition, if it is not incredible. Even the doubting about religion implies, he argues, that it may be true. Now, in matters of practice we are bound in prudence, he says, to act upon what may be a low degree of evidence; yes, ‘ even though it be so low as to leave the mind in very great doubt what is the truth.'. Was there ever such a way of establish­ ing righteousness heard of? And suppose we tried this with rude, hard, downright people, with the masses, who for what is told them want, above all, a plain ex­ perimental proof, such as that fire will burn you if you touch it. Whether in prudence they ought to take the Bible and religion on a low degree of evidence, or not, it is quite certain that on this ground they never will take them. And it is quite certain, moreover, that never on this ground did Israel, from whom we derive our religion, take it himself or recommend it. He did not take it in prudence, because he found at any rate a low degree of evidence for it; he took it in rapture, because he found for it an evi­ dence irresistible. But his own words are the best: ‘ Thou, O Eternal, art the thing that I long for, thou art my hope even from my youth : through thee have I been holden up ever since I was born.1 The statutes of the Eternal rejoice the heart; more desirable they are than gold, sweeter than honey; in keeping of them there is great reward.2 The Eternal is my strength, my heart hath trusted in him and I am helped ; therefore my heart danceth for joy, and in my song will I praise him.’3 That is why Israel took his religion. 3- But if Israel spoke of the Eternal thus, it was, we say, because he had a plain experimental proof of him. God was to Israel neither an assumption nor a meta­ physical idea; he was a power that can be verified as much as the power of fire to burn or of bread to nourish : the power, not ourselves, that makes for righteousness. And the greatness of Israel in religion, the reason why he is said to have had religion revealed to him, to have been entrusted with the oracles of God, is because he had 1 Ps. Ixxi, 5, 6. 2 Ps. xix, 8, io, ii, s Ps. xxviii, 7. �OUR ‘MASSES’ AND THE BIBLE 97 in such extraordinary force and vividness gives to the famous argument from design the perception of this power. And he or to the doctrine of creation as opposed communicates it irresistibly because he to evolution. And it is none at all. feels it irresistibly; that is why the Bible Free as is his use of anthropomorphic is not as other books that inculcate language, Israel had, as we have remarked righteousness. Israel speaks of his in­ already, far too keen a sense of reality not tuition still feeling it to be an intuition, to shrink, when he comes anywhere near an experience ; not as something which to the notion of exact speaking about God, others have delivered to him, nor yet as from affirmation, from professing to know a piece of metaphysical notion-building. a whit more than he does know. ‘ Lo, Anthropomorphic he is, for all men are, these are skirts of his ways,’ he says of and especially men not endowed with the what he has experienced, ‘ but how little a Aryan genius for abstraction; but he portion is known of him ! ’1 And again : does not make arbitrary assertions which ‘ The secret things belong unto the Eternal can never be verified, like our popular our God-, but the revealed things belong religion, nor is he ever pseudo-scientific, unto us and to our children for ever : that we may do all the words of this law.’2 like our learned religion. He is credited with the metaphysical How different from our licence of full and ideas of the personality of God, of the particular statement: ‘ A Personal First unity of God, and of creation as opposed Cause, who thinks and loves, the moral to evolution ; ideas depending, the first and intelligent Governor of the universe 1 ’ two of them, on notions of essence, Israel knew, concerning the eternal not existence, and identity, the last of them ourselves, that it was ‘ a power that made on the notion of cause and design. But for righteousness.’ This was revealed to he is credited with them falsely.. All the Israel and his children, and through them countenance he gives to the metaphysical to the world; all the rest about the idea of the personality of God is given by eternal not ourselves was this power’s own his anthropomorphic language, in which, secret. And all Israel’s language about being a man himself, he naturally speaks this power, except that it makes for right­ of the Power, with which he is concerned, eousness, is approximate language,—the as a man also. So he says that Moses language of poetry and eloquence, thrown saw God’s hinder parts;1 and he gives out at a vast object of our consciousness just as much countenance to the scientific not fully apprehended by it, but extending assertion that God has hinder parts, as to infinitely beyond it. 77/A, however, was ‘a revealed thing,’ the scientific assertion of God’s personality. That is, he gives no countenance at all to Israel said, to him and to his children: either. As to his asserting the unity of God ‘ the Eternal not ourselves that makes for the case is the same. He would give, righteousness.’ And now, then, let us go indeed, his heart and his worship to no to the masses with what Israel really did manifestation of power, except of the power say, instead of what our popular and our which makes for righteousness ; but he learned religion may choose to make him affords to the metaphysical idea of the unity say. Let us announce, not: ‘ There rules a of God no more countenance than this, and Great Personal First Cause, who thinks and this is none at all. Then, lastly, as to the loves, the moral and intelligent Governor idea of creation. He viewed, indeed, all of the universe, and therefore study your order as depending on the supreme order Bible and learn to obey this ! ’ No ; but of righteousness, and all the fulness and let us announce : ‘ There rules an enduring beauty of the world as a boon added to Power, not ourselves, which makes for the stock of that holder of the greatest of righteousness, and therefore study your all boons already, the righteous. This, Bible and learn to obey this.’ For if we however, is as much countenance as he announce the other instead, and they 1 Ex., xxxiii, 23. 1 Job, xxvi, 14. 2 Deut., xxix, 29. G �98 literature and dogma reply: ‘ First let us verify that there rules a Great Personal First Cause, who thinks and loves, the moral and intelligent Governor of the universe,’—what are we to answer? We cannot answer. But if, on the other hand, they ask : ‘ How are we to verify that there rules an enduring Power, not ourselves, which makes for righteousness?’—we may an­ swer at once : ‘How? why as you verify that fire burns,—by experience 1 It is so ; try it! you can try it; every case of conduct, of that which is more than threefourths of your own life and of the life of all mankind, will prove it to you ! Dis­ believe it, and you will find out your mistake as surely as, if you disbelieve that fire burns and put your hand into the fire you will find out your mistake 1 Believe it, and you will find the benefit of it 1 ’ This is the first experience. But then the masses may go on, and say : ‘ Why, however, even if there is an enduring Power, not ourselves, that makes for righteousness, should we study the Bible that we may learn to obey him ?— will not other teachers or books do as well ? ’ And here again the answer is : ‘ Why ?—why, because this Power is revealed in Israel and the Bible, and not by other teachers and books ! that is, there is infinitely more of him there, he is plainer and easier to come at, and in­ comparably more impressive. If you want to know plastic art, you go to the Greeks; if you want to know science, you go to the Aryan genius. And why ? Because they have the specialty for these things ; for making us feel what they are and giving us an enthusiasm for them. Well, and so have Israel and the Bible a specialty for righteousness, for making us feel what it is and giving us an enthusiasm for it. And here again it is experience that we invoke : try it 1 Having convinced yourself that there is an enduring Power, not ourselves, that makes for righteous­ ness, set yourself next to try to learn more about this Power, and to feel an enthu­ siasm for it. And to this end, take a course of the Bible first, and then a course of Benjamin Franklin, Horace Greeley, Jeremy Bentham, and Mr. Herbert Spencer; see which has most effect, which satisfies you most, which gives you most moral force. Why, the Bible is of such avail for teaching righteousness, that even to those who come to it with all sorts of false notions about the God of the Bible, it yet does teach righteousness, and fills them with the love of it; how much more those who come to it with a notion about the God of the Bible ! ’ And this is the second experience. Now here, at the beginning of things, is the point, we say, where to apply correction to our current theology, if we are to bring the religion of the Bible home to the masses. It is of no use beginning lower down, and amending this or that ramification, such as the Atonement, or the Real Presence, or Eternal Punishment, when the root from which all springs is unsound. Those whom it most concerns us to teach will never interest themselves at all in our amended religion, so long as the whole thing appears to them unsupported and in the air. Yet that original conception of God, on which all our religion is and must be grounded, has been very little examined, and very few of the controversies which arise in religion go near it. Religious people say solemnly, as if we doubted it, that ‘ he that cometh to God must believe that He A, and that He is a rewarder of them that seek him; ’1 and that ‘a man who preaches that Jesus Christ is not God is virtually out of the pale of Christian communion.’ We entirely agree with them ; but we want to know what they mean by God. Now on this matter the state of their thoughts is, to say the truth, extremely vague; but what they really do at bottom mean by God is, in general : the best one knows. And this is the soundest definition they will ever attain ; yet scientifically it is not a satisfying definition, for clearly the best 1 Heb.) xi, 6. I | I I » I I | | | I | g | I i 1 f I | I | I I [ | I f I I. | 1 I. | . li I; | 1. I. | | i fr �OUR 1 MASSES' AND THE BIBLE 99 one knows differs for everybody. So they lator, suggests that the Hebrew religion have to be more precise ; and when they was so unlike that of any other Semitic collect themselves a little, they find that people because of the simple and austere they mean by God a magnified and non- life led by the Beni-Israel as nomads of natural man. But this, again, they can the desert; or because they did not, like hardly say in so many words. Therefore other Semitic people, put a feminine at last, when they are pressed, they divinity alongside of their masculine collect themselves all they can, and make divinity, and thus open the way to all a great effort, and out they come with sorts of immorality. But many other their piece of science : God is a Great tribes have had the simple and austere Personal First Cause, who thinks and life of nomads of the desert, without its loves, the moral and intelligent Governor bringing them to the religion of Israel. of the universe. But this piece of science And, if the Hebrews did not put a femi­ of theirs we will have nothing to say to, nine divinity alongside of their masculine for we account it quite hollow; and we divinity, while other Semitic people did, say, and have shown (we think), that the surely there must have been something to Bible, rightly read, will have nothing to cause this difference ! and what we want say to it either. Yet the whole pinch of to know is this something. the matter is here; and till we are agreed And to this something, we say, the as to what we mean by God, we can ‘ Zeit-Geist,’ and a prolonged and large never, in discussing religious questions, experience of men’s expressions and how understand one another or discuss they employ them, leads us. It was be­ seriously. Yet, as we have said, hardly cause, while other people, in the operation any of the discussions which arise in of that mighty not ourselves which is in us religion turn upon this cardinal point. and around us, saw this thing and that This is what cannot but strike one in that thing and many things, Israel saw in it torrent of petitiones principii (for so we one thing only :—that it made for conduct, really must call them) in the shape of for righteousness. And it docs ; and con­ theological letters from clergymen, which duct is the main part of human life. And pours itself every week through the hence, therefore, the extraordinary reality columns of the Guardian. They all and power of Israel’s God and of Israel’s employ the word God with such extra­ religion. And the more we strictly limit ordinary confidence! as if ‘a Great ourselves, in attempting to give a scientific Personal First Cause, who thinks and account of God, to Israel’s authentic in­ loves, the moral and intelligent Governor tuition of him, and say that he is ‘the of the universe,’ were a verifiable fact Eternal Power, not ourselves, that makes given beyond all question; and we had for righteousness,’ the more real and pro­ now only to discuss what such a Being found will Israel’s words about God be­ would naturally think about Church vest­ come to us, for we can then verify his ments and the use of the Athanasian words as we use them. Eternal, thou hast been our refuge from Creed. But everything people say, under these conditions, is in truth quite in the one generation to another !x If we define air. the Eternal to ourselves, ‘ a Great Personal Even those who have treated Israel First Cause, who thinks and loves, the and his religion the most philosophically, moral and intelligent Governor of the seem not to have enough considered that universe,’ we can never verify that this so wonderful an effect must have had has from age to age been a refuge to men. some cause to account for it, other than But if we define the Eternal, ‘ the endur­ any which they assign. Professor Kuenen, ing Power, not ourselves, that makes for whose excellent History of the Religion righteousness,’ then we can know and of Israel1 ought to find an English trans- till the Downfall of the Jewish State) ; Haarlem. 1 De Godsdienst van Israel tot den Ordergang Van den foodschen Staat (The Religion of Israel An English translation has now appeared. 1 Ps. xc, I. G2 �ICO literature am> dogma feel the truth of what we say when we declare : Eternal^ thou hast been our refuge from one generation to another 1 For in all the history of man we can verify it. Righteousness has been salvation ; and to verify the God of Israel in man’s long history is the most animating, the most exalting and the most pure of delights. Blessed is the nation whose God is the Eternal /1 is a text, indeed, of which the world offers to us the most inexhaustible and the most marvellous illustration. Nor is the change here proposed, in itself, any difficult or startling change in our habits of religious thought, but a very simple one. Nevertheless, simple as may be this change which is to be made high up and at the outset, it undeniably governs everything farther down. Jesus is the Son of God; the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth that proceeds from God. What God? ‘A Great Personal First Cause, who thinks and loves, the moral and intelligent Governor of the Universe? ’ —to whom Jesus and the Holy Spirit are related in the way described in the Athana­ sian Creed, so that the operations of the three together produce what the West­ minster divines call ‘ the Contract passed in the Council of the Trinity,’ and what we, for plainness, describe as the fairy-tale of the three supernatural men ? This is all in the air, but in the air it all hangs together. There stand the Bible words! how you construe them depends entirely on what definition of God you start with. If Jesus is the Son of ‘a Great Personal First Cause,’ then the words of the Bible, literally taken, may well enough lend themselves to a story like that of the three supernatural men. The story can never be verified; but it may nevertheless be what the Bible has to say, if the Bible have started, as theology starts, with the ‘ Great Personal First Cause.’ And the story may, when it comes to be examined, have many minor difficulties, have things to baffle us, things to shock us; but still it may be what the Bible has to say. However, the masses will get rid of all minor difficulties in the simplest manner, 1 Ts. xxxiii, 12. by rejecting the Bible altogether on ac­ count of the major difficulty,—its starting with an assumption which cannot possibly be verified. But suppose the Bible is discovered, when its expressions are rightly understood, to start with an assertion which can be verified : the assertion, namely, not of ‘ a Great Personal First Cause,’ but of ‘an enduring Power, not ourselves, that makes for righteousness.’ Then by the light of this discovery we read and under­ stand all the expressions that follow. Jesus comes forth from this enduring Power that makes for righteousness, is sent by this Power, is this Power’s Son; the Holy Spirit proceeds from this same Power, and so on. Now, from the innumerable minor difficulties which attend the story of the three supernatural men, this right con­ struction, put on what the Bible says of Jesus, of the Father, and of the Holy Spirit, is free. But it is free from the major difficulty also; for it neither de­ pends upon what is unverifiable, nor is it unverifiable itself. That Jesus is the Son of a Great Personal First Cause is itself unverifiable; and that there is a Great Personal First Cause is unverifiable too. But that there is an enduring Power, not ourselves, which makes for righteous­ ness, is verifiable, as we have seen, by experience; and that Jesus is the off­ spring of this Power is verifiable from experience also. For God is the author of righteousness; now, Jesus is the Son of God because he gives the method and secret by which alone is righteousness possible. And that he does give this, we can verify, again, from experience. It is so! try, and you will find it to be so 1 Try all the ways to righteousness you can think of, and you will find that no way brings you to it except the way of Jesus, but that this way does bring you to it! And, therefore, as we found we could say to the masses: ‘Attempt to do without Israel’s God that makes for righteousness, and you will find out your mistake ! ’ so we find we can now proceed farther, and say : ‘ Attempt to reach righteousness by any way except that of Jesus, and you will �OUR 1 MASSES' AND THE BIBLE find out your mistake ! ’ This is a thing that can prove itself, if it is so ; and it will prove itself, because it is so. Thus, we have the authority of both Old and New Testament placed on just the same solid basis as the authority of the injunction to take food and rest: namely, that experience proves we cannot do without them. And we have neglect of the Bible punished just as putting one’s hand into the fire is punished : namely, by finding we are the worse for it. Only, to attend to this experience about the Bible, needs more steadiness than to attend to the momentary impressions of hunger, fatigue, and pain; therefore it is called faith, and counted a virtue. But the appeal is to experience in this case just as much as in the other; only to ex­ perience of a far deeper and greater kind. ioi for us to make out ours,—is by reason and experience. ‘ Even such as are readiest,’! says Hooker very well, ‘ to cite for one thing five hundred sentences of Scripture, what warrant have they that any one of them doth mean the thing for which it is alleged ? ’ They can have none, he replies, but reasoning and collection ; and to the same effect Butler says of reason, that ‘ it is indeed the only faculty we have wherewith to judge concerning anything, even revelation itself.’ Now it is simply from experience of the human spirit and its productions, from observing as widely as we can the manner in which men have thought, their way of using words and what they mean by them, and from reasoning upon this observation and experience, that we conclude the construction theo­ logians put upon the Bible to be false, and ours to be the truer one. In the first place, from Israel’s master­ feeling, the feeling for righteousness, the 5predominant sense that men are, as St. So there is no doubt that we get a Paul says, ‘created unto good works much firmer, nay an impregnable, ground which God hath prepared beforehand that for the Bible, and for recommending it to we should walk in them,’1 we collect the the world, if we put the construction on it origin of Israel’s conception of God,—of which we propose. The only question that mighty ‘not ourselves’ which more is: Is this the right construction to put or less engages all men’s attention,—as the on it ? is it the construction which properly Eternal Power that makes for righteous­ belongs to the Bible? And here, again, ness. This we do, because the more we our appeal is to the same test which we come to know how ideas and terms arise, have employed throughout, the only and what is their character, the more this possible test for man to employ,—the test explanation of Israel’s use of the word of reason and experience. Given the ‘ God ’ seems the true and natural one. Bible-documents, what, it is inquired, is Again, the construction we put upon the the right construction to put upon them ? doctrine and work of Jesus is collected in Is it the construction we propose ? or is the same way. From the data we have, it- the construction of the theologians, and from comparison of these data with according to which the dogmas of the what we have besides of the history of Trinity, the Incarnation, the Atonement, ideas and expressions, this construction and so on, are presupposed all through seems to us the true and natural one. the Bible, are sometimes latent, sometimes The Gospel-narratives are just that sort of come more visibly to the surface, but are account of such a work and teaching as always there ; and to them every word in the work and teaching of Jesus Christ, according to our construction of it, was, the Bible has reference, plain or figured ? Now, the Bible does not and cannot which would naturally have been given by tell us itself, in black and white, what is devoted followers who did not fully the right construction to put upon it; we understand it. And understand it fully have to make this out. And the only they then could not, it was so very new, possible way to make it out,—for the dog­ ii, IQ, matists to make out their construction, or �102 LITERATURE AND DOGMA great, and profound; only time gradually brings its lines out more clear. On the other hand, the theologians’ notion of dogmas presupposed in the Bible, and of a constant latent reference to them, we reject, because experience is against it. The more we know of the history of ideas and expressions, the more we are convinced that this account is not and cannot be the true one; that the theologians have credited the Bible with this presupposition of dogmas and this constant latent reference to them, but that they are not really there. ‘The Fathers recognised] says Cardinal New­ man, ‘ a certain truth lying hid under the tenor of the sacred text as a whole, and showing itself more or less in this verse or that, as it might be. The Fathers might have traditionary information of the general drift of the inspired text which we have not.’ Born into the world twenty years later, and touched with the breath of the ‘ Zeit-Geist,’ how would this exquisite and delicate genius have been himself the first to feel the unsoundness of all this ! that we have heard the like about other books before, and that it always turns out to be not so, that the right interpretation of a document, such as the Bible, is not in this fashion. Homer’s poetry was the Bible of the Greeks, however strange a one ; and just in the same way there grew up the notion of a mystical and inner sense in the poetry of Homer, underlying the apparent sense, but brought to light by the commen­ tators ; perhaps, even, they might have traditionary information of the drift of the Homeric poetry which we have not; —who knows ? But, once for all, as our literary experience widens, this notion of a secret sense in Homer proves to be a mere dream. So, too, is the notion of a secret sense in the Bible, and of the Fathers’ disengagement of it. Demonstration in these matters is im­ possible. It is a maintainable thesis that the allegorising of the Fathers is right, and that this is the true sense of the Bible. It is a maintainable thesis that the theological dogmas of the Trinity, the Incarnation, and the Atonement, underlie the whole Bible. It is a maintainable thesis, also, that Jesus was himself immersed in the Aberglaube of his nation and time, and that his disciples have reported him with absolute fidelity; in this case we should have, in our estimate of Jesus, to make deductions for his Aberglaube, and to admire him for the insight he displayed in spite of it. This thesis, we repeat, or that thesis, or another thesis is maintainable, as to the construc­ tion to be put on such a document as the Bible. Absolute demonstration is im­ possible, and the only question is : Does experience, as it widens and deepens, make for this or that thesis, or make against it? And the great thing against any such thesis as either of the two wTe have just mentioned is, that the more we know of the history of- the human spirit and its deliverances, the more we have reason to think such a thesis improbable, and it loses its hold on our assent more. On the other hand, the great thing, as we believe, in favour of such a construction as we put upon the Bible is, that experience, as it increases, constantly confirms it; and that, though it cannot command assent, it will be found to win assent more and more. �THE TRUE GREATNESS QF THE OLD TESTAMENT CHAPTER XI THE TRUE GREATNESS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT Win assent in the end the new construction will, but not at once ; and there will be a passage-time of confusion first. It is not for nothing, as we have said, that people take short cuts and tell themselves fairy­ tales, because the immense scale of the history of ‘ bringing in everlasting right­ eousness,’ is too much for their narrow minds. It is not for nothing; they pay for it. It is not for nothing that they found religion on prediction and miracle, guarantee it by preternatural interventions and the coming of the Son of Man in the clouds, consummate Jt by a banquet with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, in a city shining with gold and precious stones. They are like people who have fed their minds on novels or their stomachs on opium; the reality of things is flat and insipid to them, although it is in truth far grander than the phantasmagorical world of novels and of opium. But it is long before the novel-reader or the opium-eater can rid himself of his bad habits, and brace his nerves, and recover the tone of his mind enough to perceive it. Distress and despair at the loss of his accustomed stimulant are his first sensations. Miracles, the mainstay of popular religion, are touched by Ithuriel’s spear. They are beginning to dissolve ; but what are we to expect during the process of dissolution ? Probably, amongst many religious people, vehement efforts at re­ action, a recrudescence of superstition ; the passionate resolve to keep hold on what is slipping away from them by giving up more and more the use of reason in religion, and by resting more and more on authority. The Church of Rome is the great upholder of authority as against reason in religion; and it will be strange if in the coming time of transition the Church of Rome does not gain. But for many more than those whom Rome attracts there will be an interval, between the time when men accepted the religion of the Bible as a thaumaturgy and the time when they perceive it to be some­ thing different, in which they will be prone to throw aside the religion of the Bible altogether as a delusion. And this, again, will be mainly the fault,—if fault that can be called which was an inevitable error, —3 of the religious people themselves, who, from the time of the Apostles downwards, have insisted upon it that religion shall be a thaumaturgy or nothing. For very many, therefore, when it cannot be a thaumaturgy, it will be nothing. And very likely there will come a day when there will be less religion than even now] For the religion of the Bible is so simple and powerful, that even those who make the Bible a thaumaturgy get hold of the religion, because they read the Bible | but, if men do not read the Bible, they cannot get hold of it. And then will be fulfilled the saying of the prophet Amos 1 ‘ Behold, the days come, saith the Eternal, that I will send a famine in the land, not’ a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Eternal; and they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east they shall run to and fro to seek the word of the Eternal, and shall not find it.’1 Nevertheless, as after this mournful prophecy the herdsman of Tekoah goes on to say: ‘ There shall yet not the least grain of Israel fall to the earth / ’2 To the Bible men will return; and why? Because they cannot do without it. Because happiness is our being’s end and aim, and happiness belongs to righteous­ ness, and righteousness is revealed in the Bible. For this simple reason men will return to the Bible, just as a man who tried to give up food, thinking it was a vain thing and he could do without it, would return to * Am., viii, II, 12. 2 Am., ix, 9. �io4 LITERATURE AND DOGMA food ; or a man who tried to give up sleep, thinking it was a vain thing and he could do without it, would return to sleep. Then there will come a time of recon­ struction ; and then, perhaps, will be the moment for labours, like this attempt of ours, to be found useful. For though everyone must read the Bible for himself, and the perfect criticism of it is an immense matter, and it may be possible to go much beyond what we here achieve or can achieve, yet the method for reading the Bible we, as we hope and believe, here give. And although, in this or that detail, the construction we put upon the Bible may be wrong, yet the main lines of the construction will be found, we hope and believe, right ; and the reader who has the main lines may easily amend the details for himself. instance. The non-Christian religions are not to the wise man mere monsters ; he knows they have much good and truth in them. He knows that Mahometanism, and Brahminism, and Buddhism, are not what the missionaries call them; and he knows, too, how really unfit the mission­ aries are to cope with them. For any­ one who weighs the matter well, the mis­ sionary in clerical coat and gaiters whom one sees in wood-cuts preaching to a group of picturesque Orientals, is, from the inadequacy of his criticism both of his hearers’ religion and of his own, and his signal misunderstanding of the very Volume he holds in his hand, a hardly less grotesque object in his intellectual equipment for his task than in his outward attire. Yet everyone allows that this strange figure carries something of what is called European civilisation with him, and a good part of this is due to Chris­ 2. tianity. But even the Christianity itself that he preaches, imbedded in a false Meanwhile to popular Christianity, theology though it be, cannot but contain, from those who can see its errors, is due in a greater or lesser measure as it may an indulgence inexhaustible, except where happen, these three things: the all-im­ limits are required to it for the good of ! portance of righteousness, the method of religion itself. Two considerations make Jesus, the secret of Jesus. No Chris­ this indulgence right. One is, that the tianity that is ever preached but manages language of the Bible being,—which is to carry something of these along with it. the great point a sound criticism establishes And if it carries them to Mahometan­ against dogmatic theology,—approximate, ism, they are carried where of the all­ not scientific, in all expressions of religious importance of righteousness there is a feeling approximate language is lawful, knowledge, but of the method and secret and indeed is all we can attain to. It of Jesus, by which alone is righteousness cannot be adequate, more or less proper possible, hardly any sense at all. If it it can be ; but, in general, approximate carries them to Brahminism, they are language consecrated by use and religious carried where of the all-importance of feeling acquires therefrom a propriety of righteousness, the foundation of the whole its own. This is the first consideration. matter, there is a wholly insufficient The second is, that on both the ‘method’ sense; and where religion is, above all, and the ‘ secret ’ of Jesus popular Chris­ that metaphysical conception, or meta­ tianity in no contemptible measure both physical play, so dear to the Aryan genius can and does, as we have said, lay hold, and to M. Emile Burnouf. If it carries in spite of its inadequate criticism of the them to Buddhism, they are carried Bible. Now, to lay hold on the method to a religion to be saluted with respect, and secret of Jesus is a very great thing; indeed; for it has not only the sense for an inadequate criticism of the Bible is a righteousness, it has, even, the secret of comparatively small one. Jesus. But it employs the secret ill, Certainly this consideration should because greatly wanting in the method, govern our way of regarding many things because utterly wanting in the sweet in popular Christianity;—its missions, for reasonableness, the unerring balance, the �THE TRUE GREATNESS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT epieikeia. Therefore to all wfiom it visits, the Christianity of our missions, inade­ quate as may be its criticism of the Bible, brings what may do them good. And if it brings the Bible itself, it brings what may not only help the good preached, but may also with time dissipate the erroneous criticism which accompanies this and impairs it. All this is to be said for popular religion; and it all makes in favour of treating popular religion ten­ derly, of sparing it as much as possible, of trusting to time and indirect means to transform it, rather than to sudden, violent changes. 3- Learned religion, however, the pseudo­ science of dogmatic theology, merits no such indulgence. It is a separable ac­ cretion, which never had any business to be attached to Christianity, never did it any good, and now does it great harm, and thickens an hundredfold the religious confusion in which we live. Attempts to adopt it, to put a new sense into it, to make it plausible, are the most misspent labour in the world. Certainly no reli­ gious reformer who tries it, or has tried it, will find his work live. Nothing is more common, indeed, than for religious writers, who have a strong sense of the genuine and moral side of Christianity, and who much en­ large on the pre-eminence of this, to put themselves right, as it were, with dogmatic theology, by a passing sentence expressing profound belief in its dogmas, though in discussing them, it is implied, there is little profit. So Mr. Erskine of Linlathen, that unwearying and much-revered ex­ ponent of the moral side of the Bible: ‘ It seems difficult,’ he says, ‘ to conceive that any man should read through the New Testament candidly and attentively, without being convinced that the doctrine of the Trinity is essential to and implied in every part of the system.’ Even already many readers of Mr. Erskine feel, when they come across such a sentence as that, as if they had suddenly taken gravel or 105 sand into their mouth. Twenty years hence this feeling will be far stronger ; the reader will drop the book, saying that certainly it can avail him nothing. So, also, Bunsen was fond of maintaining, putting some peculiar meaning of his own into the words, that the whole of Christianity was in the Lutheran doctrine of justification by faith. Thus, too, the Bishop of Exeter chooses to say that his main objection to keeping the Athanasian Creed is, that it endangers the doctrine of the Trinity, which is so important. Mr. Maurice, again, that pure and devout spirit,—of whom, however, the truth must at last be told, that in theology he passed his life beating the bush with deep emotion and never starting the hare,— Mr. Maurice declared that by reading between the lines he saw in the Thirtynine Articles and the Athanasian Creed the altogether perfect expression of the Christian faith. But all this is mischievous as well as vain. It is vain, because it is meant to conciliate the so-called orthodox, and it does not conciliate them. Of his attach­ ment to the doctrine of the Trinity the Bishop of Exeter may make what pro­ testations he will, Archdeacon Denison will still smell a rat in them ; and the time has passed when Bunsen’s Evangeli­ cal phrases could fascinate the Evangeli­ cals. Such language, however, does also actual harm, because it proceeds from a misunderstanding and prolongs it. For it may be well to read between the lines of a man labouring with an experience he cannot utter ; but to read between the lines of a notion-work is absurd, for it is of the essence of a notion-work not to need it. And the Athanasian Creed is a notion-work, of which the fault is that its basis is a chimaera. It is an applica­ tion of the terms of Greek logic to a chimaera, its own notion of the Trinity, a notion unestablished, not resting on observation and experience, but assumed to be given in Scripture, yet not really given there. Indeed the very expression, the Trinity, jars with the whole idea and character of Bible-religion. But, lest the Unitarian should be unduly elated at �ip6 LITERATURE AND DOGMA hearing this, let us hasten to add that so too, and just as much, does the ex­ pression, a Great Personal First Cause. Learned pseudo-science applied to the data of the Bible is best called plainly what it is,—utter blunder; criticism of the same order, and of which the futility will one day be just as visible, as that criticism about the two swords which some way back we quoted. To try to tinker such criticism only makes matters worse. The best way is to throw it aside altogether, and forget it as fast as possible. This is Avhat the good of religion demands, and what all the enemies of religion would most deprecate. The hour for softening down, and explaining away, is passed ; the whole false notion-work has to go. Mild de­ fences of it leave on the mind a sense of the defender’s hopeless inability to perceive our actual situation ; violent de­ fences read, alas ! only like ‘ a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.' 4- But the great work to be done for the better time which will arrive, and for the time of transition which will precede it, is not a work of destruction, but to show that the truth is really, as it is, incomparably higher, grander, more wide and deep­ reaching, than the Aberglaube and false science which it displaces. The propounders of ‘The Great Per­ sonal First Cause, who thinks and loves,’ are too modest when they sometimes say, taking their lesson from the Bible, that, after all, man can know next to nothing of the Divine nature. They do them­ selves signal injustice; they themselves know, according to their own statements, a great deal, far too much. They know so much, that they make of God a magnified and non-natural man; and when this leads them into difficulties, and they think to escape from these by saying that God’s ways are not man’s ways, they do not succeed in making their God cease to resemble a man, they only make him re­ semble a man puzzled. But the truth is, that one may have a great respect for man, i and yet be permitted, even however much he be magnified, to imagine something far beyond him. And this is the good of such an unpretending definition of God as ours : the Eternal Power, not ourselves, that. makes for righteousness;—it leaves the infinite to the imagination, and to the gradual efforts of countless ages of men, slowly feeling after more of it and finding it. Ages and ages hence, no such ade­ quate definition of the infinite not our­ selves will yet be possible, as any sciolist of a theologian will now pretend to rattle you off in a moment. But on one point of the operation of this not ourselves we are clear: that it makes for conduct, for righteousness. So far we know God, that he is ‘the Eternal that lovcth righteous­ ness ; ’ and the farther we go in righteous­ ness, the more we shall know him. And as this true and authentic God of Israel is far grander than the God of popular religion, so is his real affirmation of himself in human affairs far grander than that poor machinery of prediction and miracle, by which popular religion imagines that he affirms himself. The greatness of the scale on which he operates makes it hard for men to follow him; but the greatness of the scale, too, makes the grandeur of the operation. Take the Scripture-promises and their accomplish­ ment. As the whirlwind passeth, so is the wicked no more; but the righteous is an everlastingfoundation.1 And again : They shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Eternal, and all the nations shall be gathered unto it.'2. It is objected that this is not fulfilled. It is not fulfilled yet, because the whole career of the human race has to bring out its fulfilment, and this career is still going forward. ‘ Men are impatient, and for precipitating things,’ says Butler; and Davison, whom on a former occasion I quoted to differ from him,—Davison, not the least memorable of that Oriel group, whose reputation I, above most people, am bound to cherish, —says withaweighty and noble simplicity worthy of Butler: ‘ Conscience and the present constitution of things are not 1 Prov., x, 25. 2 Jer. iii, 17. �TIIEHRUE GREATNESS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT corresponding terms; it is conscience and the issue of things which go together.’ It is so ; and this is what makes the spectacle of human affairs so edifying and so sublime. Give time enough for the experience, and experimentally and demonstrably it is true, that ‘the path of the just is as the shining light which shineth more and more unto the perfect day.’1 Only, the limits for the experience are wider than people commonly think. ‘Yet a little while, and the ungodly shall be clean gone 1 ’2 but ‘ a little while ’ according to the scope and working of that mighty Power to which a thousand years are as one day. The world goes on, nations and men arrive and depart, with varying fortune, as it might seem, with time and chance happening unto all. Look a little deeper, and you will see that one strain runs through it all: nations and men, whoever is shipwrecked, is ship­ wrecked on conduct. It is the God of Israel steadily and irresistibly asserting himself; the Eternal that loveth righteous­ ness. In this sense we should read the Hebrew prophets. They did not foresee and foretell curious coincidences, but they foresaw and foretold this inevitable triumph of righteousness. First, they foretold it for all the men and nations of their own day, and especially for those colossal unrighteous kingdoms of the heathen world, which looked everlasting ; then, for all time. ‘ As the whirlwind passeth, so is the wicked no more; ’—• sooner or later it is, it must be, so. Hebrew prophecy is never read aright until it is read in this sense, which indeed of itself it cries out for; it is, as Davison, again, finely says, impatient for the larger scope. How often, throughout the ages, how often, even, by the Hebrew prophets themselves, has some immediate visible interposition been looked for ! ‘I looked,’ they make God say, ‘ and there was no man to help, and I wondered that there was none to uphold; therefore mine own arm brought salvation unto me. The day of vengeance is in mine heart, the year of 1 Prov., iv, 18. 2 Ps. xxxvii, IO. IOfl my redeemed is come.’1 O long-delaying arm of might, will the Eternal never put thee forth, to smite these sinners who go on as if righteousness mattered nothing ? There is no need ; they are smitten. Down they come, one after another; Assyria falls, Babylon, Rome; they all fall for want of condzict, righteousness. ‘ The heathen make much ado, and the kingdoms are moved; but God hath showed his voice, and the earth doth melt away.’2 Nay, but Judaea itself, the Holy Land, the land of God’s Israel, perishes too,— and perishes for want of righteousness Yes, Israel’s visible Jerusalem is in ruins ; and how, then, shall men ‘call Jerusalem the throne of the Eternal, and all the nations shall be gathered unto it ’ ? But the true Israel was Israel the bringer in and defender of the idea of conduct, Israel the lifter-up to the nations of the banner of righteousness. The true Jerusalem was the city of this ideal Israel. And this ideal Israel could not and cannot perish, so long as its idea, righteousness and its necessity, does not perish, but prevails. Now, that it does prevail, the whole course of the world proves, and the fall of the actual Israel is of itself witness. Thus, therefore, the ideal Israel for ever lives and prospers; and its city is the city whereunto all nations and languages, after endless trials of everything else except conduct, after incessantly attempting to do without righteousness and failing, are slowly but surely gathered. To this Israel are the promises, and to this Israel they are fulfilled. ‘ The nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish, yea, those nations shall( be utterly wasted.’3 It is so; since all history is an accumulation of experiences that what men and nations fall by is want of conduct. To call it by this plain name is often not amiss, for the thing is never more great than when it is looked at in its simplicity and reality. Yet the true name to touch the soul is the name Israel gave : righteousness. And to Israel, as the representative of this imperishable and saving idea of righteousness, all the 1 Is., lxiii, 4, 5. - Ps. xlvi, 6. 3 Is., lx, 12. �108 LITERATURE AND DOGMA promises come true, and the language of none of them is pitched too high. The Eternal, Israel says truly, is on my sidel ‘ Fear not, thou worm Jacob, and thou handful Israel 1 I will help thee, saith the Eternal. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands, thy walls are continually before me. The Eternal hath chosen Zion ; O pray for the peace of Jerusalem ! they shall prosper that love thee. Men shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Eternal, and all the nations shall be gathered unto it. And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people, and the veil that is spread over all nations ; he will swallow up death in victory. And it shall be said in that day : Lo, this is our God I this is the Eternal, we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation.’2 5And if Assyria and Babylon seem too remote, let us look nearer home for tes­ timonies to the inexhaustible grandeur and significance of the Old Testament revelation, according to that construction which we here put upon it. Every educated man loves Greece, owes grati­ tude to Greece. Greece was the lifter-up to the nations of the banner of art and science, as Israel was the lifter-up of the banner of righteousness. Now, the world cannot do without art and science. And the lifter-up of the banner of art and science was naturally much occupied with them, and conduct was a homely plain matter. Not enough heed, therefore, was given by him to conduct. But conduct, plain matter as it is, is six-eighths of life, while art and science are only two-eighths. And this brilliant Greece perished for lack of attention enough to conduct; for want of conduct, steadiness, character. And there is this difference between Greece and Judaea : both were custodians of a revelation, and both perished ; but Greece perished of iwr-fidelity to her 1 Ps. cxviii, 6. 2 Is., xli, 14; xlix, 16; Ps. cxxxii, 13 ; cxxii, 6 ; Jer., iii, 17 ; Is., xxv, 7, 8, 9. revelation, and Judaea perished of underfidelity to hers. Nay, and the victorious revelation now, even now,—in this age when more of beauty and more of know­ ledge are so much needed, and knowledge, at any rate, is so highly esteemed,—the revelation which rules the world even now, is not Greece’s revelation, but Judaea’s; not the pre-eminence of art and science, but the pre-eminence of righteousness. It reminds one of what is recorded of Abraham, before the true inheritor of the promises, the humble and homely Isaac, was born. Abraham looked upon the vigorous, bold, brilliant young Ishmael, and said appealingly to God : ‘ Oh that Ishmael might live before thee 1 ’1 But it cannot be; the promises are to conduct, conduct only. And so, again, we in like manner behold, long after Greece has perished, a brilliant successor of Greece, the Renascence, present herself with high hapes. The preachers of righteousness, blunderers as they often were, had for centuries had it all their own way. Art and science had been forgotten, men’s minds had been enslaved, their bodies macerated. But the gloomy, oppressive dream is now over. ‘ Let us return to Nature ! ’ And all the world salutes with pride and joy the Renascence, and prays to Heaven : ‘ Oh that Ishmael might live before thee 1 ’ Surely the future belongs to this brilliant new-comer, with his animating maxim: Let us return to Nature! Ah, what pitfalls are in that word Nature ! Let us return to art and science, which are a part of Nature ; yes. Let us return to a proper conception of righteousness, to a true use of the method and secret of Jesus, which have been all denaturalised ; yes. But, ‘ Let us return to Nature; ’—do you mean that we are to give full swing to our inclinations, to throw the reins on the neck of our senses, of those sirens whom Paul the Israelite called ‘ the deceiving lusts,’2 and of following whom he s^id, ‘ Let no man beguile you with vain words, for because of these things cometh the wrath of God 1 Gen., xvij, 18. a Epli., iv, 22. �THE TRUE GREATNESS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT upon the children of disobedience ’ ? 1 Do you mean that conduct is not threefourths of life, and that the secret of Jesus has no use? And the Renascence did mean this, or half meant this; so disgusted was it with the cowled and tonsured Middle Age. And it died of it, this brilliant Ishmael died of it 1 it died of provoking a conflict with the homely Isaac, righteousness. On the Continent came the Catholic re-action ; in England, as we have said elsewhere, ‘ the great middle class, the kernel of the nation, entered the prison of Puritanism, and had the key turned upon its spirit there for two hundred years.’ After too much glorification of art, science, and culture, too little ; after Rabelais, George Fox. France, again, how often and how impetuously for France has the prayer gone up to Heaven : ‘ Oh that Ishmael might live before thee ! ’ It is not enough perceived what it is which gives to France her attractiveness for everybody, and her success, and her repeated disasters. France is Phomme sensuel moyen, the average sensual man; Paris is the city of Phomme sensuel moyen. This has an attraction for all of us. We all have in us this homme sensuel, the man of the ‘ wishes of the flesh and of the current thoughts;’ but we develop^him under checks and doubts, and unsystematically and often grossly. France, on the other hand, develops him confidently and harmoniously. She makes the most of him, because she knows what she is about and keeps in a mean, as her climate is in a mean, and her situation. She does not develop him with madness, into a mon­ strosity, as the Italy of the Renascence did; she develops him equably and systematically. And hence she does not shock people with him but attracts them; she names herself the France of tact and measure, good sense, logic. In a way, this is true. As she develops the senses, the apparent self, all round, in good faith, without misgivings, without violence, she has much reasonableness and clearness in all her notions and 1 Ep>h , v, 6. 109 arrangements; a sort of balance even in conduct ; as much art and science, and it is not a little, as goes with the ideal of I'homme sensuel moyen. And from her ideal of the average sensual man France has deduced her famous gospel of the Rights of Man, which she preaches with such an infinite crowing and self-admira­ tion. France takes ‘the wishes of the flesh and of the current thoughts ’ for a man’s rights ; and human happiness, and the perfection of society, she places in everybody’s being enabled to gratify these wishes, to get these rights, as equally as possible and as much as possible. In Italy, as in ancient Greece, the satisfying development of this ideal of the average sensual man is broken by the imperious ideal of art and science disparaging it; in the Germanic nations, by the ideal of morality disparaging it. Still, whenever, as often happens, the pursuers of these higher ideals are a little weary of them, or unsuccessful with them, they turn with a sort of envy and admiration to the ideal set up by France,—so positive, intelligible, and, up to a certain point, satisfying. They are inclined to try it instead of their own, although they can never bring them­ selves to try it thoroughly, and therefore well. But this explains the great attrac­ tion France exercises upon the world. AU of us feel, at some time or other in our lives, a hankering after the French ideal, a disposition to try it. More particularly is this true of the Latin nations; and there­ fore everywhere, among these nations, you see the old indigenous type of city dis­ appearing, and the type of modern Paris, the city of Phomme sensuel moyen, re­ placing it. La Boheme, the ideal, free, pleasurable life of Paris, is a kind of Paradise of Ishmaels. And all this assent from every quarter, and the clearness and apparent reasonableness of their ideal besides, fill the French with a kind of ecstatic faith in it, a zeal almost fanatical for propagating what they call French civilisation everywhere, for establishing its predominance, and their own predomi­ nance along with it, as of the people entrusted with an oracle so showy and taking. Oh that Ishmael might live before �literature and dogma I IO thee! Since everybody has something which conspires with this -Ishmael, his success, again and again, seems to be certain. And again and again he seems drawing near to a worldwide success, nay, to have succeeded 1—but always, at this point, disaster overtakes him, he sig­ nally breaks down. At this crowning moment, when all seems triumphant with him, comes what the Bible calls a crisis or judgment. Now is the judgment of this world ! now shall the prince of this world he cast out!1 Cast out he is, and always must be, because his ideal, which is also that of France in general, however she may have noble spirits who contend against it and seek a better, is after all a false one. Plausible and attractive as it may be, the constitution of things turns out to be somehow or other against it. And why ? Because the free development of our senses all round, of our apparent self, has to undergo a profound modifica­ tion from the law of our higher real self, the law of righteousness; because he, whose ideal is the free development of the senses all round, serves the senses, is a servant. But the servant abideth not in the house for ever; the son abideth for ever? Is it possible to imagine a grander testimony to the truth of the revelation committed to Israel? What miracle of making an iron axe-head float on water, what successful prediction that a thing should happen just so many years and months and days hence, could be really half so impressive ? 6. So that the whole history of the world to this day is in truth one continual establishing of the Old Testament revela­ tion : ‘ O ye that love the Eternal, see that ye hate the thing that is evil! to him that ordereth his conversation right, shall be shown the salvation of GodM And whether we consider this revelation in respect to human affairs at large, or in respect to ’ John, xii, 31. 2 John, viii, 35. 3 Ps. xcvii, 10; 1, 23. individual happiness, in either case its importance is so immense, that the people to whom it was given, and whose record is in the Bible, deserve fully to be singled out as the Bible singles them. ‘ Behold, darkness doth cover the earth, and gross darkness the nations; but the Eternal shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee ! ’1 For, while other nations had the misleading idea that this or that, other than righteousness, is saving, and it is not; that this or that, other than conduct, brings happiness, and it does not; Israel had the true idea that right­ eousness is saving, that to conduct belongs happiness. Nor let it be said that other nations, too, had at least something of this idea. They had, but they were not possessed with it; now, to feel it enough to make the world feel it, it was necessary to be possessed with it. It is not sufficient to have been visited by such an idea at times, to have had it forced occasionally on one’s mind by the teaching of ex­ perience. No ; he that hath the bride is the bridegroom;2 the idea belongs to him who has most loved it. Common prudence can say : Honesty is the best policy; morality can say : To conduct belongs happiness. But Israel and the Bible are filled with religious joy, and rise higher and say : ‘ Righteousness is salva­ tion !’—and this is what is inspiring. ‘ I have 5/zzcZ’unto thy testimonies 1 Eternal, what love have I unto thy law ! all the day long is my study in it. Thy testimonies have I claimed as mine heritage for ever, and why? they are the very joy of my heart !’ 3 This is why the testimonies of righteousness are Israel’s heritage for ever, because they were the very joy of his heart. Herein Israel stood alone, the friend and elect of the Eternal. 1 He showeth his word unto facob, his statutes and ordi­ nances unto Israel. He hath not dealt so with any nation, neither have the heathen knowledge of his laws.’ 4 Poor Israel ! poor ancient people !5 It was revealed to thee that righteousness is 1 Is., lx, 2. 2 John, iii, 29. 8 Ps. cxix, 31, 97, III. 4 Ps. cxlvii, 19, 20. 5 Is., xliv, 7. �TttE TRUE GREATNESS OF CHRISTIANITY salvation ;the question, what righteousness is, was thy stumbling-stone. Seer of the vision of peace, that yet couldst not see the things which belong unto thy peace 1 with that blindness thy solitary pre-eminence ended, and the new Israel, made up out of all nations and languages, took thy room. But, thy visitation complete, thy temple in ruins, thy reign over, thine office done, thy children dispersed, thy teeth drawn, thy shekels of silver and gold plundered, did there yet stay with thee any remem­ brance of thy primitive intuition, simple and sublime, of the Eternal that loveth righteousness ? Perhaps not; the Tal­ mudists were fully as well able to efface it as the Fathers. But if there did, what punishment can have been to thee like the Hi punishment of watching the performances of the Aryan genius upon the foundation which thou hadst given to it ?—to behold this terrible and triumphant philosopher, with his monotheistic idea and his meta­ physical Trinity, ‘ neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the Substance ’ ? Like! the torture for a poet to hear people laying down the law about poetry who have not the sense of what poetry is,—a sense with which he was born ! like the affliction to a man of science to hear people talk of things as proved who do not even know what constitutes a fact! From the Council of Nicaea down to Convocation and our two bishops ‘ doing something | for the Godhead of the Eternal Son, what must thou have had to suffer ! CHAPTER XII THE TRUE GREATNESS OF CHRISTIANITY No ; the mystery hidden from ages and generations,1 which none of the rulers of this world knew,2 the mystery revealed finally by Jesus Christ and rejected by the Jews, was not the doctrine of the Trinity, gior anything speculative. It was the method and the secret of Jesus. Jesus did not change the object for men,—righteousness. He made clear what it was, and that it was for all men, and that it was this :— his method and his secret, in union with his temper. This was the mystery, and the Apostles had still the consciousness that it was. To ‘ learn Christ,’ to ‘ be taught the truth as it is in Jesus,’ was not, with them, to acquire certain tenets about One God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity. It was, 'to be renewed in the spirit ofyour mind, and to put on the new man which after God is Treated in righteousness and true holiness? 3 And this exactly amounts to the method and secret of Jesus. For Catholic and for Protestant theo­ Col., i, 26. 2 I Cor., ii, 8. 3 Eph., v, 23, 24. logy alike this consciousness, which the Apostles had still preserved, was lost. For Catholic and Protestant theology alike, the truth as it is in Jesus, the mystery revealed in Christ, meant some­ thing totally different from his method and secret. But they recognised, and indeed the thing was so plain that they could not well miss it, they recognised that on all Christians the method and secret of Jesus were enjoined. So to this extent the method and secret of Jesus were preached and had their effect. To this extent true Christianity has been known, and to the extent before stated it has been neglected.] Now, as we say that the truth and gran­ deur of the Old Testament most comes out experimentally,—that is, by the whole course of the world establishing it, and confuting what is opposed to it—so it is with Christianity. Its grandeur and truth are far best brought out experimentally', and the thing is, to make people see this. But there is this difference between the religion of the Old Testament and Christianity. Of the religion of the Old �LITERATURE AND DOGMA 113 Testament we can pretty well see to the end, we can trace fully enough the experi­ mental proof of it in history. But of Christianity the future is as yet almost unknown. For that the world cannot get on without righteousness we have the clear experience, and a grand and admirable experience it is. But what the world will become by the thorough use of that which is really righteousness, the method and the secret and the sweet reasonableness of Jesus, we have as yet hardly any experience at all. Therefore we, who in this essay limit ourselves to experience, shall speak here of Christianity and of its greatness very soberly. Yet Christianity is really all the grander for that very reason which makes us speak about it in this sober manner, —that it has such an immense development still before it, and that it has as yet so little shown all it contains, all it can do. Indeed, that Christianity has already done so much as it has, is a wit­ ness to it; and that it has not yet done more, is a witness to it too. Let us observe how this is so. 2. Few things are more melancholy than to observe Christian apologists taunting the Jews with the failure of Hebraism to fulfil the splendid promises of prophecy, and Jewish apologists taunting Christen­ dom with the like failure on the part of Christianity. Neither has yet fulfilled them, or could yet have fulfilled them. Certainly the restoration by Cyrus, the Second Temple, the Maccabean victories, are hardly more than the shadows of a fulfilment of the magnificent words: ‘The sons of them that afflicted thee shall come bending unto thee, and all they that despised thee shall bow themselves down at the soles of thy feet; thy gates shall not be shut day nor night, that men may bring unto thee the treasures of the Gentiles, and that their kings may be brought.’1 The Christianisation of all the leading nations of the world is, it is 1 Is., lx, 14, ii. said, a much better fulfilment of that promise. Be it so. Yet does Christen­ dom, let us ask, offer more than a shadow of the fulfilment of this: ‘ Violence shall no more be heard in thy land; the vile person shall no more be called noble, nor the worker of mischief worthy; thy people shall be all righteous; they shall all know me, from the least to the greatest; I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; the Eternal shall be thine everlasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be ended ’ ? 1 Mani­ festly it does not. Yet the two promises hang together: one of them is not truly fulfilled unless the other is. The promises were made to righteous­ ness, with all which the idea of righteousness involves. And it involves Christianity. They were made on the immediate pro­ spect of a small triumph for righteous­ ness, the restoration of the Jews after the captivity in Babylon : but they are not satisfied by that triumph. The prevalence of the profession of Christianity is a larger triumph: yet in itself it hardly satisfies them any better. What satisfies them is the prevailing of that which righteousness really is, and nothing else satisfies them. Now, Christianity is that which righteousness really is. Therefore, if something called Christianity prevails, and yet the promises are not satisfied, the inference is that this something is not that which righteousness really is, and therefore not really Christianity. And as the course of the world is perpetually establishing the pre-eminence of righteous­ ness, and confounding whatever denies this pre-eminence, so, too, the course of the world is for ever establishing what righteousness really is,—that is to say, true Christianity,—and confounding what­ ever pretends to be true Christianity and is not. Now, just as the constitution of things turned out to be against the great un­ righteous kingdoms of the heathen world, and against all the brilliant Ishmaels we have seen since, so the constitution of things turns out to be against all false 1 Is., lx, 18 ; xxxii, 5; lx, 21; Jcr., xxxi, 33> 34 5 Is-, Ix, 20. �THE TRUE GREATNESS OF CHRISTIANITY | ;I j I la » |i presentations of Christianity, such as the theology of the Fathers or Protestant theology. They do not work successfully, they do not reach the aim, they do not bring the w°rid to the fruition of the promises made to righteousness. And the reason is, because they substitute for what is really righteousness something else. Catholic dogma or Lutheran justi- 1 fication by faith they substitute for the I method and secret and temper of Jesus. Nevertheless, as all Christian Churches do recommend the method and the secret of Jesus, though not in the right way or in the right eminency, still the world is | made partially acquainted with what righteousness really is, and the doctrine produces some effect, although the full effect is much thwarted and deadened by I the false way in which the doctrine is I presented. However, the effect produced i is great. For instance, the sum of individual happiness that has been caused by Christianity is, anyone can see, enormous. But let us take the effect of Christianity on the world. And if we look at the ■ thing closely, we shall find that its effect has been this: Christianity has brought the world, or at any rate all the leading part of the world, to regard righteousness as only the Jews regarded it before the coming of Christ. The world has accepted, so far as profession goes, that original revelation made to Israel: the pre-eminence of righteousness. The infinite truth and attractiveness of the method and secret and character of Jesus, however falsely surrounded, have prevailed with the world so far as this. And this is an immense gain, and a signal witness to Christianity. The world does homage to the pre-emi­ nence of righteousness; and here we have one of those fulfilments of prophecy which are so real and so glorious. ‘Glorious things are spoken of thee, O City of God ! I will make mention of Egypt and Babylon as of them that know ■ me! behold, the Philistines also, and ”3 writeth up the people : This man was born there / ’1 That prophecy is at the present day abundantly fulfilled. The world’s chief nations have now all come, we see, to reckon and profess themselves born in Zion,—born, that is, in the religion of Zion, the city of righteousness. But there remains the question : what righteousness really is. The method and secret and sweet reasonableness of Jesus. But the world does not see this ; for it puts, as righteousness, something else first and this second. So that here, too, as to seeing what righteousness really is, the world now is much in the same position in which the Jews, when Jesus Christ came, were. It is often said : ‘ If Jesus Christ came now, his religion would be rejected.’ And this is only another way of saying that the world now, as the Jewish people formerly, has something which thwarts and confuses its perception of what righteousness really is. It is so; and the thwarting cause is the same now as then :—the dogmatic system current, the so-called orthodox theology. This prevents now, as it did then, that which righteousness really is, the method and secret and temper of Jesus, from being rightly received, from operating fully, and from accomplishing its due effect. So true is this, that we have only to look at our own community to see the almost precise parallel, so far as religion is concerned, to the state of things pre­ sented in Judaea when Jesus Christ came. The multitudes are the same everywhere. The chief priests and elders of the people, and the scribes, are our bishops and dogmatists, with their pseudo-science of learned theology blinding their eyes, and always,—whenever simple souls are dis­ posed to think that the method and secret of Jesus is true religion, and that the Great Personal First Cause and the God­ head of the Eternal Son have nothing to do with it,—eager to cry out: This people that knoweth not the law are cursed! 2 The Pharisees, with their genuine concern for religion, but total want of perception of what religion really is, and by their 1 Ps. Ixxxvii, 3-6. 2 John, vii, 49. H �LITERATURE AND DOGMA U4 temper, attitude, and aims doing their best to make religion impossible, are the Protestant Dissenters. The Sadducees are our friends the philosophical Liberals, who believe neither in angel nor spirit but in Mr. Herbert Spencer. Even the Roman governor has his close parallel in bur celebrated aristocracy, with its super­ ficial good sense and good nature, its complete inaptitude for ideas, its profound helplessness in presence of all great spiri­ tual movements. And the result is, that the splendid promises to righteousness made by the Hebrew prophets, claimed by the Jews as the property of Judaism, claimed by us as the property of Chris­ tianity, are almost as ludicrously inappli­ cable to our religious state now, as to theirs then. And this, we say, is again a signal witness to Christianity. Jesus Christ came to reveal what righteousness, to which the promises belong, really is; and so long as this, though shown by Jesus, is not recognised by us, we may call ourselves Christendom as much as we please, the true character of a Christen­ dom will be wanting to us, because the great promises of prophecy will be still without their fulfilment. Nothing will do, except righteousness ; and no other conception of righteousness will do, ex­ cept Jesus Christ’s conception of it :— his method, his secret, and his temper. 3- Yes, the grandeur of Christianity and the imposing and impressive attestation of it, if we could but worthily bring the thing out, is here : in that immense ex­ perimental proof of the necessity of it, which the whole course of the world has steadily accumulated, and indicates to us as still continuing and extending. Men will not admit assumptions, the popular legend they call a fairy-tale, the metaphy­ sical demonstrations do not demonstrate, nothing but experimental proof will go down ; and here is an experimental proof which never fails, and which at the same time is infinitely grander, by the vastness of its scale, the scope of its duration, the gravity of its results, than the machinery, of the popular fairy-tale. Walking on the water, multiplying loaves, raising corpses, a heavenly judge appearing with trumpets in the clouds while we are yet alive,—■ what is this compared to the real expe-* rience offered as witness to us by Christi­ anity? It is like the difference between the grandeur of an extravaganza and the grandeur of the sea or the sky,—immense objects which dwarf us, but where we are in contact with reality, and a reality of which we can gradually, though very slowly, trace the laws. The more we trace the real law of Christianity’s action the grander it willseem. Certainly in the Gospels there is plenty of matter to call out our feelings. But perhaps this has been somewhat over­ used and mis-used, applied, as it has been, chiefly so as to be subservient to what wre call the fairy-tale of the three supernatural men,—a story which we do not deny to have, like other products of the popular imagination, its pathos and power, but which we have seen to be no solid foun­ dation to rest our faith in the Bible on. And perhaps, too, we do wrong, and inevitably fall into what is artificial and unnatural, in labouring so much to pro­ duce in ourselves now, as the one impulse determining us to use the method and secret and temper of Jesus, that conscious ardent sensation of personal love to him, which we find the first generation of Christians feeling and professing, and which was the natural motor for those who were with him or near him, and, so to speak, touched him ; and in making this our first object. At any rate, mis­ employed as this motor has often been, it might be well to forego or at least sus­ pend its use for ourselves and others for a time, and to fix our minds exclusively on the recommendation given to the method and secret of Jesus by their being true, and by the whole course of things proving this. Now, just as the best recommendation of the oracle committed to Israel, Righted ousness is salvation, is found in our more and more discovering, in our own history �THE TRUE GREATNESS OF CHRISTIANITY and in the whole history of the world, that it is so, so we shall find it to be with the method and secret of Jesus. That this is the righteousness which is salvation, that the method and secret of Jesus, that is to say, conscience and self-renounce­ ment, with the temper of Jesus, are righteousness, bring about the kingdom of God or the reign of righteousness,— this, which is the Christian revelation and what Jesus came to establish, is best impressed, for the present at any rate, by experiencing and showing again and again, in ourselves and in the course of the world, that it is so ; that this is the righteousness which is saving, and that none other saves. Let us but well observe what comes, in ourselves or the world, of trying any other, of not being convinced that this is righteousness, and this only; and we shall find ourselves more and more, as by irresistible viewless hands, caught and drawn towards the Christian revelation, and made to desire more and more to serve it. No proof can be so solid as this experimental proof; and none, again, can be so grand, so fitted to fill us with awe, admiration, and gratitude. So that feeling and emotion will now well come in after it, though not before it. For the whole course of human things is really, accord­ ing to this experience, leading up to the fulfilment of Jesus Christ’s promise to his disciples : Fear not, little flock / for it is wour Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom? And thus that comes out, after all, to be true, which St. Paul announced prematurely to the first genera­ tion of Christians : When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with hint in glory.2 And the author of the Apocalypse, in like manner, foretold : The kingdom of the world is become the kingdom of our Lord and his Christ? The kingdom of the Lord the world is already become, by its chief nations professing the religion of righteous­ ness. The kingdom of Christ the world will have to become, it is on its way to become, because the profession of 1 Luke, xii, 32. 2 Cot., iii, 4. 3 Rev., xi, 15. The Alexandrian manuscript is followed. ”5 righteousness, except as Jesus Christ interpreted righteousness, is vain. We can see the process, we are ourselves part of it, and can in our measure help forward or keep back its completion. When the prophet, indeed, says to Israel, on the point of being restored by Cyrus: ‘ The nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish ! ’1 the promise, applied literally, fails. But ex­ tended to that idea of righteousness, of which Israel was the depositary and in which the real life of Israel lay, the promise is true, and we can see it fulfilled. In like manner, when the Apostle says to the Corinthians or to the Colossians, instructed that the second advent would come in their own generation : ‘ We must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christi'2—1 When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory ! ’3 the promise, applied literally as the Apostle meant it and his converts understood it, fails. But divested of this Aberglaube or extra-belief, it is true; if indeed the world can be shown,—■ and it can,—to be moving necessarily towards the triumph of that Christ in whom the Corinthian and Colossian disciples lived, and whose triumph is the triumph of all his disciples also. 4- Let us keep hold of this same experi­ mental process in dealing yvith the promise of immortality; although here, if anywhere, Aberglaube, extra-belief, hope, anticipa­ tion, may well be permitted to come in. Still, what we need for our foundation is not Aberglaube, but Glaube ; not extra­ belief in what is beyond the range of possible experience, but belief in what can and should be known to be true. By what futilities the demonstration of our immortality may be attempted, is to be seen in Plato’s Phcedo. Man’s natural desire for continuance, however little it may be worth as a scientific proof of our immortality, is at least a proof a 1 Is., Ix, 12. * II Cor., v, 10. * Col., iii, 4. H 2 �116 J J LITERATURE AND DOGMA thousand times stronger than any such demonstration. The want of solidity in such argument is so palpable, that one scarcely cares to turn a steady regard upon it at all. And even of the common Christian conception of immortality the want of solidity is, perhaps, most con­ clusively shown, by the impossibility of so framing it as that it will at all support a steady regard turned upon it. In our English popular religion, for instance, the common conception of a future state of bliss is just that of the Vision of Mirza : ‘Persons dressed in glorious habits with garlands on their heads, passing among the trees, lying down by the fountains, or resting on beds of flowers, amid a con­ fused harmony of singing birds, falling waters, human voices, and musical instru­ ments.’ Or, even, with many, it is that of a kind of perfected middle-class home, with labour ended, the table spread, good­ ness all around, the lost ones restored, hymnody incessant. ‘ Poor fragments all of this low earth U Keble might well say. That this conception of immortality cannot possibly be true, we feel, the moment we consider it seriously. And yet who can devise any conception of a future state of "bliss, which shall bear close examination better? Here, again, it is far best to take what is experimentally true, and nothing else, as our foundation, and afterwards to let hope and aspiration grow, if so it may be, out of this. Israel had said : ‘ In the way of righteousness is life, and in the pathway thereof there is no death.’1 He had said : ‘The righteous hath hope in his death.’2 He had cried to his Eternal that loveth righteousness : ‘ Thou wilt not leave my soul in the grave, neither wilt thou suffer thy faithful servant to see cor­ ruption ! thou wilt show me the path of life ! ’3 And by a kind of short cut to the conclusion thus laid down, the Jews constructed their fairy-tale of an advent, judgment, and resurrection, as wre find it in the Book of Daniel. Jesus, again, had said : ‘ If a man keep my word, he shall 1 Prov., xii, 28. 2 Prov., xiv, 32. * Ps. xvi, 10, 11. never see death.’1 And by a kind of short cut to the conclusion thus laid down, Christians constructed their fairy-tale of the second advent, the resurrection of the body, the New Jerusalem. But instead of fairy-tales, let us begin, at least, with certainties. And a certainty is the sense of life, of being truly alive, which accompanies righte­ ousness. If this experimental sense does not rise to be stronger in us, does not rise to the sense of being inextinguishable, that is probably because our experience of righteousness is really so very small. Here, therefore, we may well permit ourselves to trust Jesus, whose practice and intuition both of them went, in these matters, so far deeper than ours. At any rate, we have in our experience this strong sense of Zyfc from righteousness to start with; capable of being developed, apparently, by pro­ gress in righteousness into something im­ measurably stronger. Here is the true basis for all religious aspiration after im­ mortality. And it is an experimental basis; and therefore, as to grandeur, it is again, when compared with the popular Aberglaube, grand with all the superior grandeur, on a subject of the highest seriousness, of reality over fantasy. At present, the fantasy hides the grandeur of the reality. But when all the Aberglaube of the second advent, with its signs in the sky, sounding trumpets and opening graves, is cleared away, then and not till then will come out the pro­ found truth and grandeur of words of Jesus like these: ‘The hour is coming, when they that are in the graves shall hear the voice of the Son of God ; and they that hear shall live.'2 5- Finally, and above all. As, for the right inculcation of righteousness, we need the inspiring words of Israel’s love for it, that is, we need the Bible ; so, for the right inculcation of the method and secret of Jesus, we need the efieikeia, the 1 John, viii, 51. 2 John, v, 25. �the true greatness of Christianity sweetBreasonableness, of Jesus. That is, in other words again, we need the Bible; for only through the Bible-records of Jesus can we get at his epieikeia. Even in these records, it is and can be presented but imperfectly ; but only by reading and re-reading the Bible can we get at it at all. Now, greatly as the failure, from the stress laid upon the pseudo-science of Church-dogma, to lay enough stress upon the method and secret of Jesus, has kept Christianity back from showing itself in its full power, it is probable that the failure to apply to the method and secret of Jesus, so far as these have at any rate been used, his sweet reasonableness or epieikeia.,—his temper,—has kept it back even more. And the infinite of the religion of Jesus, —its immense capacity for ceaseless progress and farther development,—lies principally, perhaps, in the line of dis­ engaging and keeping before our minds, more and more, his temper, and applying it to our use of his method and secret. For it is obvious from experience how much our use of Jesus Christ’s method and secret requires to be guided and governed by his temper of epieikeia. Indeed, without this, his method and secret seem of almost no use at all. The Flagellants imagined that they were employing his secret; and the Dissenters, with their ‘spirit of watchful jealousy,’ imagine that they are employing his method. To be sure, Mr. Bradlaugh imagines that the method and the secret of Jesus, nay, and Jesus himself too, are all baneful, and that the sooner we get rid of them the better. So far, then, the Flagellants and the Dissenters are in advance of Mr. Bradlaugh: they value Christianity, and they profess the method and secret of Jesus. But they employ them so ill, that one is tempted to say they might nearly as well be without them. And this is because they are wholly without his temper of sweet reasonable­ ness, or epieikeia. Now this can only be got, first, by knowing that it is in the Bible, and looking for it there ; and then, by reading and re-reading the Gospels continually, until we catch something of it. This, again, is an experimental process. That the epieikeia or sweet reasonableness of Jesus may be brought to govern our use of his method and secret, and that it can and will make our use of his method and secret quite a different thing, is proved by our actually finding this to be so when we try. So that the culmination of Christian righteousness, in the applying, to guide our use of the method and secret of Jesus, his sweet reasonableness or epieikeia, is proved from experience. We end, therefore, as we began,—by ex­ perience. And the whole series of experiences, of which the survey is thus completed, rests, primarily, upon one fundamental fact,—itself, eminently, a fact of experience: the necessity of righte­ ousness. CONCLUSION. But now, after all we have been saying of the pre-eminency of righteousness, we remember what we have said formerly in praise of culture and of Hellenism, and against too much Hebraism, too exclusive a pursuit of the ‘ one thing needful,’ as people call it. And we cannot help wondering whether we shall not be reproached with inconsistency, and told that we ought at least to sing, as the Greeks said, a palinode ; and whether it may not really be so, and we ought. And, certainly, if we had ever said that Hellen­ ism was three-fourths of human life, and conduct or righteousness but one-fourth, a palinode, as well as an unmusical man may, we would sing. But we have never said it. In praising culture, we have �n8 LITERATURE ANU UOGMA never denied that conduct, not culture, is three-fourths of human life. Only it certainly appears, when the thing is examined, that conduct comes to have relations of a very close kind with culture. And the reason seems to be given by some words of our Bible, which, though they may not be exactly the right rendering of the original in that place, yet in themselves they explain the connexion of culture with conduct very well. ‘ I have seen the travail,’ says the Preacher, ‘which God hath given to the sons of men to be exercised in it; he hath made everything beautiful in his time ; also, he hath set the world in their heart.’1 He hath set the world in their heart!—that is why art and science, and what we call culture, are necessary. They may be only one-fourth of man’s life, but they are there, as well as the three-fourths which conduct occupies. ‘He hath set the world in their heart.’ And, really, the reason which we hence gather for the close connexion between culture and conduct, is so simple and natural that we are almost ashamed to give it; but we have offered so many simple and natural explanations in place of the abstruse ones which are current, that our hesitation is foolish. Let us suggest then, that, having this one fourth of their nature concerned with art and science, men cannot but somehow employ it. If they think that the threefourths of their nature concerned with conduct are the whole of their nature, and that this is all they have to attend to, still the neglected one-fourth is there, it ferments, it breaks wildly out, it employs itself all at random and amiss. And hence, no doubt, our hymns and our dogmatic theology. What is our dog­ matic theology, except the mis-attribution to the Bible,—the Book of conduct,—of a science and an abstruse metaphysic which is not there, because our theologians have in themselves a faculty for science, for it makes one-eighth of them ? But they do not employ it on its proper objects ; so it invades the Bible, and tries to make the 1 Ecclesiastes, iii, io, 11. Bible what it is not, and to put into it what is not there. And this prevents their attending enough to what is in the Bible, and makes them battle for what is not in the Bible, but they have put it there!—battle for it in a manner clean contrary, often, to the teaching of the Bible. So has arisen, for in­ stance, all religious persecution. And thus, we say, has conduct itself become impaired. So that conduct is impaired by the want of science and culture; and our theologians really suffer, not from having too much science, but from having too little. Whereas, if they had turned their faculty for abstruse reasoning towards the proper objects, and had given them­ selves, in addition, a wide and large acquaintance with the productions of the human spirit and with men’s way of think­ ing and of using words, then, on the one hand, they would not have been tempted to misemploy on the Bible their faculty for abstruse reasoning, for they would have had plenty of other exercise for it; and, on the other hand, they would have escaped that literary inexperience which now makes them fancy that the Bible­ language is scientific, and fit matter for the application of their powers of abstruse reasoning to it, when it is no such thing. Then they would have seen the fallacy of confounding the obscurity attaching to the idea of God,—that vast not ourselves which transcends us,—with the obscurity attaching to the idea of their Trinity, a confused metaphysical speculation which puzzles us. The one, they would have perceived, is the obscurity of the im­ measurable depth of air, the other is the obscurity of a fog. And fog, they would have known, has no proper place in our conceptions of God ; since whatever our minds can possess of God they know clearly, for no man, as Goethe says, possesses what he does not understand; but they can possess of Him but a very little. All this our dogmatic theologians would have known, if they had had more science and more literature. And there­ fore, simple as the Bible and conduct are, still culture seems to be required for them, �CONCLUSION k—required *to prevent our mis-handling and sophisticating them. 2. Culture, then, and science and litera­ ture are requisite, in the interest of religion itself, even when, taking nothing but conduct into account, we rightly make the God of the Bible, as Israel made him, to be simply and solely ‘ the Eternal Power, not ourselves, that makes for righteousness} For we are not to forget, that, grand as this conception of God is, and well as it meets the wants of far the largest part of our being, of three-fourths of it, yet there is one-fourth of our being of which it does not strictly meet the wants, the part which is concerned with art and science ; or, in other wrords, with beauty and exact knowledge. For the total man, therefore, the truer conception of God is as ‘the Eternal Power, not ourselves, by which all things fulfil the law of their being ; ’ by which, therefore, we fulfil the law of our being so far as our being is aesthetic and intellective, as well as so far as it is moral. And it is evident, as we have before now remarked, that in this wider sense God is displeased and disserved by many things which be said, except by putting a strain displease and disserve him ghteousness. He is disby men uttering as : Sing glory, glory, I Triune ! and : Out glory to Til raise ! and : of my , and feel his blood flora, My Jesus 'tis "life everlasting, 'Us heaven below !—■ or by theologians uttering such pseudo­ science as their blessed truth that the God of the universe is a person. But it would be harsh to give, at present, this turn to our employment of the phrases, pleasing God, displeasing God. And yet, as man makes progress, we shall surely come to doing this. For, the clearer our conceptions in science and art become, the more will they assimilate themselves to the conceptions of duty in conduct, will become practically stringent H9 like rules of conduct, and will invite the same sort of language in dealing with them. And so far let us venture to poach on M. Emile Burnouf’s manor, and to talk about the Aryan genius, as to say, that the love of art and science, and the energy and honesty in the pursuit of art and science, in the best of the Aryan races do seem to correspond in a remarkable way to the love of conduct, and the energy and honesty in the pursuit of conduct, in the best of the Semitic. To treat science and art with the same kind of seriousness as conduct, does seem, therefore, to be a not impossible thing for the Aryan genius to come to. But for all this, however, man is hardly yet ripe. For our race, as we see it now and as ourselves we form a part of it, the true God is and must be pre­ eminently the God of the Bible, the Eternal who makes for righteousness, from whom Jesus came forth, and whose Spirit governs the course of humanity. Only, we see that even for apprehending this God of the Bible rightly and not wrongly, science, and what so many people now disparage, letters, and what we call, in general, culture, seem to be necessary. And meanwhile, to prevent our at all pluming ourselves on having apprehended what so much baffles our dogmatic friends (although indeed it is not so much we who apprehend it as the ‘ Zeit-Geist ’ who discovers it to us), what a chastening and wholesome reflexion for us it is, that it if only to our natural inferiority to the^. ingenious men that we are indebted for our advantage over them ! For while they were born with talents for metaphysical speculation and abstruse reasoning, we are so notoriously deficient in everything of that kind, that our adversaries often taunt us with our weakness, and have held us up to public ridicule as being ‘ without a system of philosophy based on principles interdependent, subordinate, and co­ herent.’ And so we were thrown on letters; thrown upon reading this and that,—which anybody can do,—and thus gradually getting a notion of the history of the human mind, which enables us (the ‘Zeit-Geist’ favouring) to correct, in �120 Literature reading the Bible, some of the mistakes into which men of more metaphysical talents than literary experience have fallen. Cripples in like manner have been known, now and then, to be cast by their very infirmity upon some mental pursuit which has turned out happily for them; and a good fortune of this kind has perhaps been ours. But we do not forget that this good fortune we owe to our weakness, and that the natural superiority remains with our adversaries. And some- day, perhaps, the and dogma nature of God may be as well known as the nature of a cone or a triangle ; and then our two bishops may deduce its pro­ perties with success, and make their brilliant logical play about it,—rightly, instead of as now, wrongly; and will resume all their advantage. But this will hardly be in our time. So that the superiority of this pair of distinguished metaphysicians will never perhaps, after all, be of any real advantage to them, but they will be deluded and bemocked by it until they die. /attaching to At not ourselves nth the obscurity jjkjI their Trinity, a ( speculatiqs _ they w >Yity printed ev SFOTTISWOODE AND CO. LTD., NE'.V STREET SQUARE LONDON 1 � 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 &amp; 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 An entity primarily responsible for making the resource 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 The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data 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 A name given to the resource Literature & dogma : an essay towards a better apprehension of the Bible Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Arnold, Matthew [1822-1888] Description An account of the resource Place of publication: London Collation: 6-120 p. ; 22 cm. Notes: Printed in double columns. Published for the Rationalist Press Association. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Watts & Co. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1902 Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RA1566 N048 RA1804 Subject The topic of the resource Bible Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /><br /><span>This work (Literature &amp; dogma : an essay towards a better apprehension of the Bible), identified by </span><span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk">Humanist Library and Archives</a></span><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Bible as Literature Bible-Criticism NSS https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/eed73d169804ea269ab3f0d58b1bda8f.pdf?Expires=1785369600&Signature=qgjxEWV1KiHoNlIZ3kV5TWGB%7Ea-AxmTEtIS808RA5-iGpMfYKUncMXrL2adnHuC22y8G8n%7ER-4OlHS7XimwBtzdtc-HVeQ9kpo4A-6uHNJcEvQkbS2A1YN6vSIAz5Tl9lWpc70kUhgLR8EmgDSJuyhTmj28e5RogDqun0pxPCTWxMCwqZSN3Fe99CSQdV70bLQRZxuyFDT4TbuiPHK-pWa5BqMetfq3hz67Tvfag7q0BwdHSLUF0XwluzxWmJnPhy77JANYTBt0PUsB1L0lkqtOjk4LNv1GOrZzhNpXT-v1asmVkvmFwRMu8F89qDM6xToYhjeayqJ-9jVxGvNEa0w__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM ea8e27add8dfd9323bd1f0600d67822e PDF Text Text kv6Uj Coo?&^- , 's.ulftuXi g •xi'71 WIS,O «>v=Uij£JSX< NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY INTRODUCTORY SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF ROBERT COOPER. I first became acquainted with R bert Cooper when he was editing the London Investigator in 1861, and the following sketch, is compiled from an autobiographic* < statement written by Mr. Cooper about two months before h death, and sent to me by his son for publication in the Nation I Reformer. Robert Cooper was born on th 29 th December, 1819, at Barton-upon-Wevell, near Mauches r. His father was an old Yorkshire Radical, with experience >f Peterloo. At his father’s house young Cooper had occasio illy to read aloud to the collected guests from “Godwin’s P itical Justice,” and heard Lancashire men discuss theviews of Voltaire, Paine, Washington, Cartwright, Horne Tooke, Cobbe* , Hunt, Richard Carlile, Robert Owen, Henry Brougham, G orge Combe, Godwin, and other advanced thinkers. When about twelve years of age Robert Cooper became a clerk in a A lanchester house, where he remained for nine years. When foe ■ceen he was also appointed teacher in the Salford Co-operatr Evening Schools, where James Rigby and Joseph Smith, w<- i known disciples of Robert Owen, were then assistants. Before he was fifteen Robert C< > per was elected Hon.. Sec. to the School, and soon after delivei d his first lecture, on “ the necessity of free schools for the wo ting classes ”. About this time Robert Owen, then in the heych ' of his socialistic agitation, lectured at Salford, in the first insti ition erected in England by To use Robert Cooper’s the promoters of English Socialise own words, this event “ constitute! an epoch in my life”. Of Robert Owen, he writes: “ His mil and gentle, yet impressive and commanding bearing producer profound effect upon me. It determined my future career. To io day of his death I revered him as a father, and he treated me s a son. During the latter portion of his extraordinary labor* ie spent much of his time with my family in London. When is eyesight began to fail I accompanied him on the platform t< > •sist in reading his lectures. His hearing, too, grew weak, and 1 , idertook the task of recapitulating the questions and speeche from the audience close to his ear.” In 1836, Robert Cooper tened a debate on “ Secularism”—“a term just then coi i ”—before the, debating Shortly after, the young society of the Manchester Athen feu and eloquent Socialist advocate he his first public discussion with the Rev. J. Bromley, in the C. penter’s Hall, Manchester, �2 SKETCH OE THE LIFE OF ROBERT COOPER. and now, on Sundays, lectured through, the towns and villages of Lancashire on the “ Social System ”. When scarcely eighteen he published a pamphlet on “ Original Sin ” ; and the present little work, which was attacked in Parliament, was issued when Robert Cooper was only twenty years of age. His prominence as a Socialist led to his dismissal from his situation, and Robert Cooper then became one of the paid Social Missionaries, and was first stationed at Hull, whence he was sent North, passing the greater part of 1842 and 1843 in lecturing in Scot­ land. Coming South, in 1843, to Derby, he went thence to Stockport, again to Scotland, and lastly to the West Riding of Yorkshire, which was his final appointment as “ Social Mis­ sionary”. 1846, which witnessed the dissolution of the Eng­ lish Socialistic organisation, found Mr. Cooper conducting some excellent educational classes at Huddersfield. The break-up of the Socialistic Mission drove him to London, where he became a familiar Freethought lecturer at the Old John Street Institution, and, at intervals, carried on the plat­ form work in the West and North of England. While editing the London Investigator, Mr. Cooper’s health, which had been undermined by many hardships in his early lecturing career, gave way, and, in 1856, he was compelled to abandon some of his work. Fainting more than once on the platform, his lecturing was brought to a close at John Street Institution, in 1858 : his medical advisers insisting on abstinence from the excitement of public speaking. Fortunately, a legacy by Samuel Fletcher, who died in 1856, came in time to furnish the means for recruiting lost strength, and Mr. Cooper lived quietly in Man­ chester until the breaking out of the Reform agitation in 1866, when he became Honorary Secretary to the Manchester Reform Union. The new work, and consequent excite­ ment, brought on a fresh attack of the old disease, and after lingering through 1867, he died on the 3rd May, 1868, only forty-eight years of age. Writing just before he died, when misfortune had swept away his resources, he penned the following touching lines : “ I now rest for succor on the affections of my children, strengthened by the noble devotion of a wife who has ever been, through a marriage of twenty-nine years, an adviser in my struggles, a partner in my successes, and a companion in my vicissitudes ”; and he adds, “Should my health not be restored and the couch upon which I repose be my death-bed, I can leave the world with the assurance that those who are dearest to me and know me best, love me most In editing this work some of the quotations have been abridged, some slight corrections have been made, and some new matter inserted between brackets. CHARLES BRADLAUGH. �A VINDICATION, WRITTEN FOR THE SECOND EDITION AFTER THE WORK HAD BEEN SPECIALLY ATTACKED BY THE BISHOP OF EXETER IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS. At a period like the present, when the voice of reason and free inquiry is rousing the intellectual faculties of the people from their dormancy and enslavement; when the luminary of true knowledge is diffusing its ennobling and enlightening influence among mankind, giving, at once, a vitality and intensity to their highest and noblest aspirations ; when, indeed, men are becoming intelligent and reflective, instead of ignorant and credulous beings, it is not to be wondered at that the priest­ hood and their abettors should feel so distressingly alarmed, and have recourse to all kinds of expedients in order to the maintenance of their power and influence. Knowing as they do, that priestcraft and enlightenment cannot eventually co­ exist or co-operate—they that are at irreconcilable variance— that there is no affinity between them—that the one must necessarily stultify and annihilate the other; and, seeing as they do, the extraordinary developments of mind—the rapid advances in intelligence and rationality which are every day taking place, they are almost driven to desperation. They are beginning to apprehend their case is hopeless, the days of their domination and ascendancy are over; that they have passed the meridian of their glory, and must now retire into utter and permanent obscurity. But being valiant and per­ severing men, at least when their own interests are concerned, they are determined that they will not die without a struggle —a fearless and desperate struggle. And, therefore, they have organised all the means at their command, and com­ menced a most furious onslaught upon all who have presumed or will still continue to presume, to advocate views prejudicial to their own. In this display of clerical zeal and intolerance, I was not in the least surprised that this work, amongst the rest, should fall in for its due quantum of abuse. Indeed, I fully expected it. I anticipated they would make an attack upon it, not indeed with the weapons of reason and argument by any means, as they are altogether unaccustomed to the use of them, but with those of anathema and denunciation. Notwithstanding, however, that this was my decided expecta­ tion, I certainly did not suppose that it would have been �4 A VINDICATION. deemed requisite for so august a personage as the Lord Bishop of Exeter to have opened the attack. Great as my presump­ tion may be, impious as my audacity certainly is in their estimation, it is yet not so great, so impious as to have emboldened me to have presumed that so sacred and immacu** late a being as a Bishop would have deigned to have noticed it. Yet so it was. Not only did he honor it with an observation, but he even took the trouble to denounce and anathematize it, not in a private company, not in any of the churches of his diocese, but in the highest judicature in the realm. The weight of his mitre, however, could not crush it. Since that time to the present the clergy and their partisanShave endeavored to produce an unfavorable impression upon the public mind as to its object and tendency. Th® most malicious misrepresentations have been circulated, and in consequence considerable misapprehension prevails upon the subject. It is, therefore, to disabuse the public of these mis­ apprehensions, and to rebut the charges which have been brought against it, that this Vindication is written. One of the most common, and yet, at the same time, one of the most singular, statements which are made respecting this work, is that it is a blasphemous publication—-vilifies the Almighty. Now, so far from its being blasphemous, it is just the reverse. So far from its impugning, it vindicates the Divinity. Indeed, the work is written for the avowed purpose of exposing the blasphemy pronounced against the Deity by the priesthood and their abettors in saying that such a book as the Bible originated from him—is His .re­ vealed word—His only and especial organ. To attribute tothe Almighty such revolting atrocities, such shameless indecen­ cies, such outrageous indignities as are recorded, and directly ascribed to Him in the Scriptures, is, I contend, one of the foulest and most monstrous blasphemies that could possibly be perpetrated. And to denominate a work as blasphemous whose only and express object is to repudiate such practices, is a paradox which I am almost at a loss to explain. Had I not an idea that the priesthood, being conscious of their own blasphemy were desirous of concealing it by accusing others of the crime, it would, to me at least, be utterly inexplicable. To affix the stigma of blasphemy to a work having such objects in view is precisely as absurd and inconsistent as to apply the epithet of dishonesty to a man whose invariable wish had been, through the whole of his career, to pursue an honorable and straightforward course. This policy of the priesthood, however, cannot be adopted with success much longer. The intellect of society is awakening. The long night of ignorance and credulity is passing away, and the eyes of the people are opening upon that awful mass of cant and corruption which is secreted within the strongholds of the clergy. Let but a few short years roll over, and the old dilapidated tower of priestcraft, which already totters to its basement, will fall with a crash that will loudly and �A VINDICATION. 5 ■emphatically proclaim the annihilation of superstition and intolerance. It is next affirmed that this is an irreligious work. This •charge is as false as it is unjust. That it is opposed, however, to the religion of priestcraft—to a religion that would allow a selfish and arbitrary priesthood to lord over their fellow­ creatures, to trample down their moral and intellectual capa­ bilities, and divest them of all that adds purity and dignity to ■ their existence—to a religion that would allow one child of humanity to drink of the fountain of felicity, and compel another to perish in the wilderness of sorrow and despair—to a religion, in short, that would make this world “ a hell to gain a heaven ”—I freely and unhesitatingly admit; but that it is inimical to the religion of charity and free inquiry—to the religion that would infuse the balm of benevolence and love into the bosom of every human creature, and allow all, of every Sect, country and color, to express their honest and sincere opinions without let or hindrance, I distinctly and broadly deny. No; let it not be imagined that I am averse to an enlarged, an enlightened religion, for as the poet felicitously •observed:— “ My religion is love—’tis the noblest and purest; My temple the universe—widest and surest; I worship my God through his works which are fair, And the joy of my thoughts is perpetual prayer.” There is no word which has been more abused than that of religion. It has frequently been made the pretext for the accomplishment of the most selfish, malignant, and degrading purposes. In the hands of the priesthood it has teen the bane of human existence—the poison that has vitiated the virtues of humanity—the monster that has sought to strangle its intel­ lectuality. It has been religion, under the auspices of the priesthood, which has fomented that awful storm of an­ tagonism and cruelty which has from generation to generation afflicted the human race; which has harrowed up the most implacable asperities and antipathies of their nature, and almost shipwrecked their moral sensibilities and aspirations. Wherever we observe its operations, whether in ancient or modern times, whether in our own or foreign nations, in Ancient Chaldea, Egypt, Greece, or Rome, or modern Spain, Italy, France, or Great Britain, its object and tendency has been invariably the same—the subjection of human reason—the contraction of human thought—the paralysation of the human faculties. On looking into the pages of history we find that the brightest, noblest, and best of men of every clime—those who have been the master spirits of the age in which they flourished—all, indeed, whose exertions have tended to the enlightenment and emancipation of man, if they have not fallen actual sacrifices at the altar of bigotry, they have been necessitated to fly from its scourge, or succumb, more or less, to its arbitrary domination. If this assertion needs proof, �6 A VINDICATION. arise, ye departed spirits of Anaxagoras, Socrates, Pythagoras, Aristotle, Locke, and a Lawrence, and bear witness! Oh I when we think of the barbarities and indignities to which these men were subjected, we cannot but exclaim of religion, as Madame Poland did of liberty, “ O! Religion, what crimes are committed in thy name! No, let it not be conceived, that this work is inimical to “pure religion, and undefiled before God ”; it can only be destructive to the cupidity and intolerance, superstition and delusion practised and perpetuated under its assumed sanction. It is next said by these “Ambassadors of God” and their deluded votaries, that I have endeavored to bring the ‘ ‘ Holy Scriptures” into contempt by unfair and dishonest means— that I have entirely disregarded the immense mass of external evidence in favor of the genuineness and authenticity of the Bible, and contented myself by merely examining its internal evidence; and to cap the climax of their rage and denuncia­ tion, they state that a work like this ought not, for a single moment, to be tolerated, but the strong arm of the law should exert its supremacy and immediately stop it. Now, as to my having endeavored “ to bring the Holy Scriptures into con­ tempt by unfair and dishonest means ”, I most unhesitatingly and fearlessly deny the charge. What are the means which I have adopted ? They are these. In the first place I stated if the Bible was the word of God, if he either wrote, or inspired, men to write it, it could not by any possibility contain anything absurd, contradictory, or demoralising, but every chapter, every verse, every sentence, every line would be perfectly true, consistent, and ennobling. To suppose that such would not be the case, is to suppose that which is not only ridiculous and inconsistent, but truly impious and blas­ phemous.. Well, this position being established, I proceeded to ascertain whether the Bible contained passages of an absurd, contradictory, or demoralising character. On examining it I found it did contain such passages—that it abounded in them, that the whole of the books from Genesis to Revelation were replete with them; and that passages of a rational, consistent and ameliorating character were very rarely to be met with— were, like “angels’ visits, few and far between”. Finding this to be the case, I naturally and reasonably deduced the infer­ ence that the Bible could not be the word of God, and therefore could be nothing more than a mere imposition. Some of the passages showing it could not be of divine origin I published in the order in which they are arranged in these pages, and to obviate any confusion or misunderstanding I affixed the chapter and verse to each passage. Now, I ask, are not these means honest, just, and straightforward ? True it is I have not wasted my time in discussing the external evidence, in en­ deavoring to inflict elaborate, erudite and labored dissertationsupon the reader, in order to invalidate the boasted testimony of Josephus, Tacitus, Pliny, Strabo and others, as I conceive such is not necessary or advisable when it can be clearly proved. �A VINDICATION'. 7 from the internal evidence of the book, from his own words, as it were, that it cannot possibly have originated, directly or indirectly, from the alleged Cause of all things. No matter what amount of external evidence might be adduced in favor of its genuineness and authenticity, if its internal evidence is invalidated and exploded, it goes for nothing. In this opinion I do not stand alone. Dr. Conyers Middleton, a celebrated writer and divine, says: “ Examining the external evidence is certainly losing time and beginning at the wrong end, since it is allowed on all hands that if any narration can be shown to be false, any doctrine irrational and immoral, ’tis not all the external evidence in the world that can or ought to convince us that such a doctrine came from God.” And that I have proved it contains narrations that “ can be shown to be false”, and “ doctrines irrational and immoral”, I presume the follow­ ing extracts fully demonstrate. As to the statement that this work ought not to be tolerated, and the strong arm of the law should instantly suppress it, I, of course, was duly prepared to hear it. Invariably has it been the modus operandi of the priesthood, whenever they have been forced from the field of reason and argument, whenever they have found that they were incapable of sustaining their position on anything like reasonable grounds, to resort to calumny, foul and virulent, and to persecution brutal and unjust. The Law ! the Law! ! has always been one of their most obliging and Constant friends. Indeed, the old musty enactments in our statute books are the only prop left to support the declining fatme of priestcraft. Take these away, and the poor sickly thing will fall upon the earth, helpless and dismembered. It has been well observed by Fielding : “ Let a man abuse a phy­ sician, he makes another physician his friend: let him rail at a lawyer another pleads his cause gratis; if he libels this courtier, that courtier receives him into his bosom ; but let him once attack a hornet’s nest, or a priest, both nests are instantly sure to be upon him ”, The history of the world, from the most remote ages of antiquity, amply proves how dangerous it is to attack the priesthood. There have occasionally been found a few bold spirits who have presumed to encounter the monster, but they have generally suffered, more or less, for their audacity; and all who are determined to follow their steps—who are resolved to struggle for the mental emancipation of man from the thraldom of priestcraft—may rest assured, they will have to experience annoyances, and submit to privation of no trivial or transitory character. Let them remember, however, that no great abuse has ever been remedied, no glorious object ever been attained, without considerable sacrifices. Let them re­ member, that should they fall victims to the idol of superstition and intolerance, still posterity will be free—posterity will bless them. When the cold hand of death shall have passed over them, when they are quietly entombed in the bosom of their mother earth, and the green herbage waves over their graves, their memories will be revered with grateful and unfeigned �8 A VINDICATION. esteem. Oh! one tear* of sympathy and gratitude dropped upon the grave of a martyr to truth is infinitely more precious than a thousand diadems placed on the head of a political despot, or a thousand miti es grasped in the hand of a religious bigot. Mosheim, the gr-at ecclesiastical writer, says: “It generally happens that when danger attends the discovery and profession of truth, the prudent are silent, the multitude believe, and impostors triumph ”. But shall this be any longer ? Shall the impostors triumph ? Shall the demon of bigotry and cant any longer devour the moral and intellectual vitals of man? Truth, justice, humanity cry, No ; and every honest and inde­ pendent mind must respond to the determination. Delightful and cheering is the thought, that the career of this nuisance is coming to a termination. A mighty movement is commencing in society, which will speedily stultify so foul and deleterious a pestilence. Already has the bright star of reason and free inquiry dawned upon humanity, and soon by its illuminating influence will the world be converted from a slaughter-house of intolerance, persecution, and domination, into an arena of equity, enlightenment, and peace. To close, in the sublime words of one of the finest ft male writers that ever graced the field of literature and moral philosophy— “ Long have the nations slept—hark to that sound: The sleep is ended, and the wo Id awakes : Man rises in his strength, and looks around, While on his sight ti e dawn of reason breaks. Lo ! knowledge draws the curtain from his mind, Quells fancy’s vision, and his spirit tames Deep in his breast, that law to seek and find, Which kings would write in blood, and priests in flames. Shout, Earth ! the creature man, till now the foe Of thee, and all who tread thy parent breast, Henceforth shall learn himself and thee to know, And in that knowledge shall be wise and blest.” Manchester, July, 1840. ROBERT COOPER. �THE HOLY SCRIPTUBES ANALYSED. .Passages inconsistent with the Attributes generally ascribed to the Deity by the Christian world. I.—IMMATERIALITY. “ God is a spirit.”—John iv., 24. [Christians allege “that the terms employed are terms of condescending comparison with the acts and effects of the thus mentioned organs of the human body, to convey, especially to unpolished men, a conception of those properties and actions of God which, to our feeble ideas, have a resemblance, and that they were so understood —Dr. J. Pye Smith’s “ First lines of Christian Theology”, p. 129]. 1. —“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.” Gen. i., 27. [“And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.” Gen. iii., 8.] 2. —“ The eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding the •evil and the good.” Prov. xv. 3. 3. —“So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth.” Isaiah lv., 11. 4. —“ These are smoke in my nose, a fire that burneth all the day.” Isaiah lxv. 5. 5. —“ His lips are full of indignation, and his tongue as a •devouring fire.” Isaiah xxx., 27. 6. —“ The Lord heard our voice, and looked on our affliction, and our labor, and our oppression.” Deut. xxvi, 7. 7. —“ Lord, bow down thine ear, and hear; open Lord, thine eyes and see.” 2 Kings xix., 16. 8. —“And he said unto me, Son of man, the place of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet where I will ■dwell.” Ezekiel xliii., 7. 9. —“And I myself will fight against you with an out­ stretched hand, and with a strong arm.” Jer. xxi., 5. 10. —“The Lord hath made bare his holy arm.” Isaiah lii., 10. 11. —“ When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers.” Ps. viii., 3. 12. —“And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end ■of communing with him upon Mount Sinai, two tables of �10 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES testimony, two tables of stone, written with the finger of God.” Exod. xxxi., 18. 13. —“ And I saw as the color of amber, as the appearance of fire round about within it, from the appearance of his loins even upward, and from the appearance of his loins even down­ ward.” Ezekiel i., 27. 14. —“And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.” Genesis vi., 6. 15. —[“Let a little water, I pray you, be fetched, and wash your feet .... and he took butter, and milk, and the calf which he had dressed, and set it before them : and he stood by them under the tree and they did eat. And they said unto him, Where is Sarah thy wife . . . And he said, I will certainly return unto thee according to the time of life, and lo ! Sarah thy wife shall have a son . . . And the Lord said unto Abra­ ham. wherefore did Sarah laugh ? ... Is anything too hard for the Lord ? At the time appointed I will return unto thee.” Gen. xviii., 4—14]. 16. —“And with the blast of thy nostrils the waters were gathered together. ” Exod. xv. 2. 17. —“And it shall come to pass while my glory passeth by that I will put thee in a clift of the rock, and will cover theewith my hand while I pass by. And I will take away mine hand, and thou shalt see my back parts, but my face shall not be seen.” Exod. xxxiii., 22, 23. 18. —“ Then the Lord put forth his hand, and touched my mouth.” Jeremiah i., 9. 19. —“ Behold the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it can­ not save ; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear.” Isaiah lix., 1. 20. —■“ Mine hand also hath laid the foundation of the earth, and my right hand hath spanned the heavens.” Isaiah xlviii., 13. 21. —“I will also smite mine hands together, and I will cause my fury to rest: I the Lord have said it.” Exekiel xxi. ,17. 22. —“ And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying.” Numbers xxv., 16. 23. —“ And God spake unto Noah, saying.” Genesis viii., 15. 24. —“ And the Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.” Jonah ii., 10. 25. —“ And Abram fell on his face; and God talked with him saying.” Genesis xvii., 3. 26. —“And the Lord smelled a sweet savor, and the Lord said in his heart.” Genesis viii.. 21. 27. —“And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life : and man became a living soul.” Genesis ii., 7. 28. —“ By the breath of God frost is given; and the breadth of the waters is straitened.” Job xxxvii., 10. 29. —“ So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord. And he buried him in a valley in the land of Moab, over against Beth- �ANALYSED. 11 peor; but no wan knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day,’* Dent. xxxiv., 5, 6. 30.—“ They shall walk after the Lord; he shall roar like a lion; when he shall roar, then the children shall tremble from, the west.” Hosea xi., 10. Also 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 40, 45, 47, 58, 59, 60, 61, 110, 125, 126, 128. _____ II.—OMNIPRESENCE. “ One God and father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.” Ephesians iv., 6. “Whither shall I go from thy spirit ? Or whither shall I flee from thy presence ? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there; if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost part of the sea ; even there shall thy hand lead me ; and thy right hand shall hold me.” Psalms cxxxix., 7—10. 31. —“ Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus; who being in the form of God thought it not robbery to be equal with God.” Philippians ii., 5, 6. 32. —“And the Lord came down upon Mount Sinai on the top of the Mount; and the Lord called Moses up to the top of the Mount, and Moses went up.” Exodus xix., 20. 33. —“ And the Lord came down in a cloud and spake unto him, and took of the spirit that was upon him.” Num. xi., 25. 34. —“ And the Lord came down in the pillar of the cloud, and stood in the door of the tabernacle.” Num. xii., 5. 35. —“I will gather all nations and tongues, and they shall Come and see my glory.” Isaiah lxvi., 18. 36. —“ And come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name.” Jeremiah vii., 10. 37. —“ And the Lord said unto Moses. Come up to me into the Mount, and be there.” Exodus xxiv., 12. 38. —“And he left off talking with him, and God went up from Abraham.” Gen. xvii., 22. 39. —“And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded.” Gen. xi., 5. 40. —“ And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven which said, Thou art my beloved son.” Luke iii., 22. 41. —“ For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first.” 1 Thess. iv., 16. 42. —“Thus saith the Lord, I am returned unto Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem.” Zechariah viii., 3. 43. —“ And I will return amongst the children of Israel, and will be their God.” Exodus xxix., 45. 44. —“ And God met Balaam.” Num. xxiii., 4. 45. —“For the Lord thy God walketh in the midst of thy camp .... therefore shall thy camp be holy, that he see no �12 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES unclean thing in thee, and turn away from thee.” Dent, xxiii., 14. 46. —“They shall be carried to Babylon, and there shall they be until the day that I visit them, saith the Lord.” Jer. xxvii., 22. 47. —“I saw the Lord standing upon the altar.” Amos ix., 1. 48. —“ God that made the world, and all things therein, seeing that he is the Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands.” Acts xvii., 24. 49. —“ Moreover the word of the Lord came to me, saying.” Jer. ii., 1. 50. —“ God came from Teman, and the Holy One from Mount Paran.” Habakkuk iii., 3. Also 1, 59, 62, 65, 320. III.—OMNIPOTENCE. “With God all things are possible.” Matt, xix., 26. 51. —“And the Lord was with Judah, and he drave out the inhabitants of the mountain, but could not drive out the inhabi­ tants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron.” Judges i., 19. 52. —“ Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.” 1 Cor. i., 25. 53. — “A noise shall come even to the ends of the earth, for the Lord hath a controversy with the nations; he will plead with all flesh.” Jeremiah xxv., 31. 54. —“ Hear the word of the Lord, ye children of Israel, for the Lord hath a controversy with the inhabitants of the land.” Hosea iv., 1. 55. —“I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat; and will plead with them there for my people, and for my heritage Israel.” Joel iii., 2. 56. —“ Now, therefore, let me alone that my wrath may wax hot against them, and that I may consume them.” Exodus xxxii., 10. 57. —“ In six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.” Exodus xxxi., 17. 58. —“For God created man to be immortal, and made him to be an image of his own eternity. Nevertheless, through the envy of the Devil, came death into the world; and they that do hold of his side do find it.” Wisdom of Solomon, ii., 23, 24. 59. —“And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh ; and the hollow of Jacob’s thigh was out of joint, as he wrestled with him. And he said, Let me go, for the day breaketh; and he said, I will not let thee go except thou bless me. And he said unto him, What is thy name ? And he said Jacob. And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel; for as a prince hast thou power with God, and with �ANALYSED. 13; menj and hath prevailed.” .... “ And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.” Genesis xxxii., 24-30. IV.—OMNISCIENCE. “Thou Lord which knowest the hearts of all men.” Acts i.r 24. *• But God hath revealed them unto us by his spirit: for the spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.” 1 Cor. ii. 10. “ No thought escaped him, neither any word is hidden from him ” Ecclesiasticus xlii., 20. “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and know­ ledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! ” Romans xi., 33. 60. —“ And the Lord God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou ? ” Genesis iii. 9. 61. —“And he said, Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat?” Genesis iii., 11. 62. —“ And God came unto Balaam, and said, What men are these with thee ?” Numbers xxii., 9. 63. —“ And the Lord said, Who shall entice Ahab, king of Israel, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-gilead ? ” 2 Chron. xviii., 19. 64. —“Thus saith the Lord, What iniquity have your fathers found in me, that they are gone far from me, and have walked after vanity and are become vain ? ” Jeremiah ii., 5. 65. —“Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold I will rain bread from heaven for you, and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them whether they will walk in my law or no.” Exodus xvi., 4. 66. —“ When therefore the Lord knew how the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptised more disciples than John.” John iv., 1. 67. —“ Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men.” 1 Cor. i., 25. 68. —“Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another, and the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name.” Malachi iii., 16. 69. —“ The Lord your God, which goeth before you, he shall fight for you, according to all that he did for you in Egypt before your eyes.” Deuteronomy i., 30. 70. —“And the Lord came down to.see the city, and the tower which the children of men builded.” Genesis xi., 5. 71. —“I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it. . . . and if not, I will know.” Genesis xviii., 21. Also 59, 117, 140, 143, 307. �14 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES V.—MUNIFICENCE. “He that loveth not, knoweth not God: for God is love.” 1 John iv., 8. “ The Lord is good, a strong hold in the day of trouble, and he knoweth them that trust in him.” Nahum i., 7. ‘ ‘ All the works of the Lord are good; and he will give every needful thing in due season.” Ecclesiasticus xxxix., 33. 72. —“ For the Lord thy God is a consuming fire, even a jealous God.” Deuteronomy iv., 24. 73. —“God is jealous, and the Lord revengeth; the Lord revengeth and is furious: the Lord will take vengeance on his adversaries; and he reserveth wrath for his enemies.” Nahum i., 2. 74. —“ It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” Hebrews x., 31. 75. —“ For thou shalt worship no other God : for the Lord, whose name is jealous, is a jealous God.” Exodus xxxiv., 14. 76. —“ They have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; they have provoked me to anger with their vanities; and I will move them to jealousy with those which are not a people, I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.” Deuteronomy xxxii., 21. 77. —“I am the Lord, that is my name ; and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images.” Isa. lxii., 8. 78. —“Turn, O backsliding children, saith the Lord; for I am married unto you; and I will take you one of a city, and two of a family, and I will bring you to Zion.” Jeremiah iii., 14. 79. —“The Lord is a man of war; the Lord is his name.” Exodus xv., 3. 80. —“The Lord shall go forth as a mighty man; he shall stir up jealousy like a man of war.” Isaiah xlii., 13. 81. —“ The Lord hath opened his armory, and hath brought forth the weapons of his indignation.” Jer. 1., 25. 82. —“ Thus saith the Lord God of Israel. Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbor. And the children of Levi did according to the word of Moses ; and there fell of the people that day about three thousand men.” Exodus xxxii., 27, 28. 83. —“ For a fire is kindled in my anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains. I will heap mischiefs upon them, I will spend mine arrows upon them. They shall be burnt with anger, and devoured with burning heat, and with bitter destruction. I will also send the teeth of beasts upon them, with the poison of serpents of the dust. The sword without, and terror within, shall destroy both the young �ANALYSED. 15 man, and the virgin, the suckling also with the man of grey Itrafs.” Deuteronomy xxxii., 22, 23, 24, 25. 84. -—** Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them; for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God ; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me.” Exodus xx., 5. 85. —“The Lord hath made all things for himself ; yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.” Proverbs xvi., 4. 86. —“I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace and create evil; I the Lord do all these things.” Isaiah xlv., 7. 87. —“ And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt. But Pharaoh shall not hearken unto you, that I may lay my hand upon Egypt, and bring forth mine armies and my people the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt, by great judgments.” Exod. vii., 3, 4. 88. —“ And it came to pass that at midnight the Lord smote all the first-born in the land of Egypt, from the first-born of Pharaoh, that sat on his throne, unto the first-born of the captive that was in the dungeon; and all the first-born of cattle.” Exod. xii., 29. 89. —“ And my wrath shall wax hot, and I will kill you with the sword ; and your wives shall be widows, and your children fatherless.” Exod. xxii., 24. 90. —-“And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Vex the Midianites, and smite them.” Numbers xxv., 16, 17. 91. —“ And the Lord’s anger was kindled the same time, and he sware, saying: Surely none of the men that came up out of Egypt from twenty years old and upwards, shall see the land which I sware unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob ; be­ cause they have not wholly followed me.” Num. xxxii., 10, 11. 92. —“Now go, and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.” 1 Samuel xv., 3. 93. «*“ The nations which thou hast removed and placed in the cities of Samaria, know not the manner of the God of the land; therefore, he hath sent lions among them, and behold, they slay them, because they know not the manner of the God of the land.” 2 Kings xvii., 26. 94. —“For the indignation of the Lord is upon all nations, and his fury upon all their armies; he hath utterly destroyed them, he hath delivered them to the slaughter.” Isaiah xxxiv., 2. 95. —“Then the angel of the Lord went forth, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and four score and five thousand.” Isaiah xxxvii., 36. 96. —“Therefore thus saith the Lord, Behold I will bring evil upon them, which they shall not be able to escape, and though they shall cry unto me, I will not hearken unto them.” Jeremiah xi., 11. 97. —“ The fierce anger of the Lord shall not return until he �16 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES have done it, and until he have performed the intents of hi® heart; in the latter days ye shall consider it.” Jer. xxx., 24. 98. —“ They come to fight with the Chaldeans, but it is to fill them with the dead bodies of men whom I have slain in mine anger, and in my fury, and for all whose wickedness I have hid my face from this city.” Jer. xxxiii., 5. 99. —“ And he hath violently taken away his tabernacle as if if it were of a garden; he hath destroyed his places of the assembly; the Lord hath caused the solemn feasts and Sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion, and hath despised in the indignation of his anger the king and the priest.” Lam. of Jer. ii., 6. 100. —“The young and the old lie on the ground in the streets: my virgins and my young men are fallen by the sword; thou hast slain them in the day of thine anger; thou hast killed and not pitied.” Lam. of Jer. ii., 21. 101. —“ Therefore the fathers shall eat the sons in the midst of thee, and the sons shall eat their fathers; and I will execute judgments in thee, and the whole remnant of thee will I scatter into all the winds. Wherefore as I live, saith the Lord God, surely because thou hast defiled my sanctuary with all thy de­ testable things, and with all thine abominations, therefore will I also diminish thee, neither shall mine eye spare, neither will I have any pity.” Ezek. v., 10, 11. 102. —“So the Lord sent pestilence upon Israel; and there fell of Israel seventy thousand men.” 1 Chronicles xxi., 14. 103. —“ He that is far off shall die of the pestilence, and he that is near shall fall by the sword, and he that remaineth and is besieged shall die by the famine; and thus will I accomplish my fury upon them.” Ezek. vi., 12. 104. —“ Samaria shall become desolate, for she hath rebelled against her God; they shall fall by the sword; their infants shall be dashed in pieces, and their women with child shall be ripped up.” Hosea xiii., 16. Also 53, 70, 113, 114, 117, 122, 138, 141, 186. VI.—IMPARTIALITY. “ God is no respecter of persons.” Acts x., 34. “ For there is no respect of persons with God.” Rom. ii., 11. 105. —“Therefore I endure all things for the elects’ sakes, that they may also obtain the salvation.” 2 Timothy ii., 10. 106. —“For thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God; the Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth.” Deuteronomy vii., 6. 107. —“And I will dwell among the children of Israel, and will be their God.” Exodus xxix., 45. 108. —“ I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehosophat, and will plead with them there for my people, and for my heritage Israel, whom �ANALYSED. 17 they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.” Joel iii., 2. 109. —“Lo, I have given thee a wise and understanding heart, so that there was none like thee before thee, neither after thee shall any arise like unto thee.” 1 Kings iii., 12. 110. —“ I have loved you, saith the Lord ; yet ye say, Where­ in hast thou loved us ? Was not Esau Jacob’s brother, saith the Lord ; yet I loved Jacob, and I hated Esau, and laid his moun­ tains and his heritage waste, for the dragons of the wilderness.” Malachi i., 2, 3. 111. —“ As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.” Rom. ix., 13. 112. —“ Now God had brought Daniel into favor and tender love with the prince of the eunuchs.” Daniel i., 9. 113. —“ For God loveth none but him that dwelleth with wisdom.” Wisdom of Solomon vii., 28. 114. —“ The Lord maketh poor and maketh rich, he bringeth low, and lifteth up.” 1 Samuel ii., 7. 115. —“The rich and poor meet together: the Lord is the maker of them all.” Proverbs xxii., 2. 116. —“ For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.” Homans ix., 15. Also 87. VII—IMMUTABILITY. “For I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.” Malachi iii., 6. “Every good gift, and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” James i., 17. ‘ ‘ God is not a man, that he should lie, neither the son of man that he should repent; hath he said, and shall he not do it ? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good ? ” Numbers xxiii., 19. _____ 117. —“ And the Lord said, I will destroy man, whom I have created, from the face of the earth, both man and beast, and the creeping thing, and tbe fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.” Gen. vi., 7. 118. —“ And the Lord repented of the evil which he thought to do unto his people.” Exodus xxxii., 14. 119. —“ It repenteth me that I have set up Saul to be king.” 1 Samuel xv., 11. • 120. —“And when the angel stretched out his hand upon Jerusalem to destroy it, the Lord repented him of the evil, and said to the angel that destroyed the people, it is enough; stay now thine hand.” 2 Samuel xxiv., 16. 121. -—“ If that nation against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them.”—“ If it do evil in my sight, that it obey not my �18 THE HOEY SCRIPTUBES voice, then I will repent of the good wherewith I said I would benefit them.” Jeremiah xviii., 8, 10. 122. —“For thus saith the Lord, Like as I have brought all this great evil upon this people, so will I bring upon them all the good that I have promised them.” Jeremiah xxxii., 42. 123. —“ Turn unto the Lord your God: for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil.” Joel ii., 13. 124. —“ And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil that he had said that he would do unto them, and he did it not.” Jonah iii., 10. 125. —“ Thou hast forsaken me, saith the Lord, thou art gone backward; therefore will I stretch out my hand against thee, and destroy thee; I am weary with repenting. ’ ’ Jeremiah xv., 6. Also 14 and 26. VIII.—INCOMPREHENSIBILITY. “ Who is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of every creature.” Coloss, i., 15. “ O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and know­ ledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out I ” Romans xi., 33. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.” Isaiah lv., 8. 126.—“And the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend.” Exodus xxxiii., 11. . 127.—“Then went up Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel. And they saw the God of Israel; and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in his clearness.” Exodus xxiv., 9, 10. 128. —“ And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel; for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.” Genesis xxxii., 30. 129. —“I sawtheLord standing upon the altar,” Amos ix., 1. 130. —“And Jesus when he was baptised went up straight­ way out of the water: and lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him.” Matthew iii., 16. 131. —“ And the Lord appeared unto him (Isaac), and said, Go not down into Egypt; dwell in the land which I shall tell thee of.” Genesis xxvi., 2. 132. —“ And the Lord appeared in the tabernacle in a pillar of a cloud; and the pillar of the cloud stood over the door of the tabernacle.” Deuteronomy xxxi., 15. 133. —“ Seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near.” Isaiah lv., 6. 134. —“And ye shall seek me and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.” Jeremiah xxix., 13. 135. —“Beloved, let us love one another; for love is of God; �analysed. 19 'and everyone that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.” 1 John iv., 7. 136.—“This, then, is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.” 1 John i., 5. Also 1, 17, 34, 72, 79. PASSAGES IMMORAL AND OBSCENE. [We feel so strongly the harm that may be done by printing at full length the obscene passages from the Bible, that we only give the references to them. This book is meant for general circulation, and we cannot reconcile it with secular morality to print foul and disgusting language, conveying no useful instruction, and so to aid the Christian Church to “ corrupt the morals as well of youth as of divers other liege subjects”, and to “ incite and encourage the said liege sub­ jects to indecent, obscene, unnatural, and immoral practices.”] GOD. 137. —Matthew i., 18, 19, and 20. 138. —“ And I will give this people favor in the sight of the Egyptians; and it shall come to pass, that, when ye go, ye shall not go empty. But every woman shall borrow of her neighbor, and of her that sojourneth in her house, jewels of silver and j ewels of gold, and raiment; and ye shall put them upon your sons, and upon your daughters; and ye shall spoil the Egyptians.” Exodus iii., 21, 22. 139. —“ So Jehu slew all that remained in the house of Ahab in Jezreel, and all his great men, and his kinsfolks, and his priests, until he left him none remaining.”—“ And the Lord Said unto Jehu, Because thou hast done well in executing that which is right in mine eyes, and hast done unto the house of Ahab according to all that was in mine heart, thy children of the fourth generation shall sit on the throne of Israel.” 2 Kings x., 11 and 30. 140. —“And the Lord said unto Samuel, How long wilt thou mourn for Saul, seeing I have rejected him from reigning over Israel ? Fill thine horn with oil, and go, I will send thee to Jesse the Beth-lehemite : for I have provided me a king among his sons. And Samuel said, How can I go ? If Saul hear it he will kill me. And the Lord said, Take an heifer with thee, and say I am come to sacrifice to the Lord.” 1 Samuel xvi.» 1, 2. 141. —“Wherefore I gave them also statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they should not live.” Ezekiel xx., 25. 142. -—-“And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish: because they receive not the love of the truth that they might be saved. And for this cause, God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie.” 2 Thess. ii., 10, 11. 143. —“ And the Lord said, Who shall entice Ahab king of �20 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES Israel, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-gilead ? And one spake saying after this manner, and another saying after that manner. Then their came out a spirit and stood before the Lord, and said, I will entice him. And the Lord said unto him Wherewith ? And he said, I will go out and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets. And the Lord said, Thou shalt entice him, and thou shalt also prevail; go out, and do even so.” 2 Chron. xviii., 19, 20, 21. 144. —“ And if the prophet be deceived when he have spoken a thing, I the Lord have deceived that prophet, and I will stretch out mine hand upon him, and will destroy him from the midst of my people Israel.” Ezek. xiv., 9. 145. —“And I will make drunk her princes, and her wise men, her captains, and her rulers, and her mighty men: and they shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, saith the king whose name is the Lord of Hosts.” Jer. li., 57. 146. —“ Therefore thou shalt say unto them, Thus saith the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, Drink ye and be drunken, and spue, and fall, and rise no more, because of the sword which I will send apiong you.” Jer. xxv., 27. 147. —“And thou shalt bestow that money for whatsoever thy soul lusteth after, for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, or for strong drink, or for whatsoever thy soul desireth; and thou shalt eat there before the Lord thy God, and thou shalt rejoice, thou and thine household.” Deut. xiv., 26. 148. —“ Behold I will corrupt your seed and spread dung upon your faces, even the dung of your solemn feasts.” Mai. ii., 3. MOSES. 149. —“ And it came to pass in those days, when Moses was grown, that he went out unto his brethren, and looked on their burdens; and he spied an Egyptian smiting an Hebrew, one of his brethren. And he looked this way and that way, and when he saw that there was no man, he slew the Egyptian, and hid him in the sand.” Exodus ii., 11, 12. 150. —Numbers xxxi., 17, 18. 151. —“And Moses spake unto the people, saying, Arm some of yourselves unto the war, and let them go against the Midianites, and avenge the Lord of Midiah.”—“And Moses sent them to the war, a thousand of every tribe, them and Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest to the war, with the holy instruments, and the trumpets to blow in his hand.” Num. xxxi., 3, 6. DAVID. 152. —2 Sam. xi., 2—25. 153. —“ And David laid up these words in his heart, and was sore afraid of Achish the King of Gath. And he changed his behavior before them, and feigned himself mad in their hands, and scrabbled on the doors of the gate, and let his spittle fall down upon his beard.” 1 Samuel xxi., 12, 13. 154. —Psalms xxxviii., 5, 7, 11. �ANALYSED. 21 155. —1 Samuel xviii., 27. 156. —1 Kings i., 1 to 4. 157. —“ And David gathered all the people together, and went to Kabbah, and fought against it, and took it. And he took their king’s crown from off his head the weight whereof was a talent of gold, with the precious stones, and it was set on David’s head. And he brought forth the spoil of the city in great abundance. And he brought forth the people that were therein, and put them under saws and under harrows of iron, and under axes of iron, and made them pass through the brick-kiln; and thus did he unto all the cities of the children of Ammon. So David and all the people returned unto Jerusalem.” 2 Samuel xii., 29 to 31. 158. —“ And behold (says David in his dying moments to his son Solomon), thou hast with thee Shimei the son of Gera, a Benjamite of Bahurim, which cursed me with a grievous curse, in the day when I went to Mahanaim : but he came down to meet me at Jordan, and I sware to him by the Lord, saying I will not put thee to death by the sword. Now therefore hold him not guiltless ; for thou art a wise man and knowest what thou oughtest to do unto him ; but his hoar head bring thou down to the grave with blood.” 1 Kings ii., 8, 9. [ “Thou hast not been as my servant David, who kept my ■commandments and who followed me with all his heart, to do only that which was right in mine eyes.” 1 Kings xiv., 8.] SOLOMON. 159. —“ And he had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines: and his wives turned away his heart.” 1 Kings xi., 3. 160. —Solomon’s Song vii., 1 to 4. JOSHUA. 161. —“And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the edge of the sword.” Joshua vi., 21. 162. —“And it was told Joshua saying, the five kings are found hid in a cave at Makkedah. And Joshua said, Roll great stones upon the mouth of the cave, and set men by it for to keep them. And stay ye not but pursue after your enemies, and smite the hindmost of them, suffer them not to enter into their cities: for the Lord your God hath delivered them into your hand. Then said Joshua, Open the mouth of the cave, and bring out those five kings unto me out of the cave. And afterwards Joshua smote them, and slew them, and hanged them on five trees and they were hanging upon the trees until the evening.” Joshua x., 17, 18, 19, 22, 26. . EZEKIEL. 163. —Ezekiel iv., 12 to 15. ABRAHAM. 164.—“ And Abraham journeyed from thence towards the �22 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES south country, and dwelled between Kadqsh and Shur and sojourned in Gerar. And Abraham said of Sarah, his wife, She is my sister; and Abimelech king of Gerar sent and took Sarah. But God came to Abimelech in a dream by night, and said to him, Behold thou art but a dead man for the woman which thou hast taken; for she is a man’s wife. But Abime­ lech had not come near her, and he said, Lord wilt thou slay also a righteous nation ? Said he not unto me, She is my sister ? and she, even she herself, said, He is my brother: in the integrity of my heart and innocency of my hands have I done this.” Genesis xx., 1-5. 165. —“And Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, which she had bom unto Abraham, mocking. Wherefore she said unto Abraham, cast out this bondwoman, and her son; for the son of this bondwoman shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac. And Abraham rose up early in the morning and took bread and a bottle of water, and gave it unto Hagar, putting it on her shoulder, and the child, and sent her away; and she departed and wandered in the wilderness of Beersheba.” Genesis xxi., 9, 10, 14. ISAAC. 166. —“ And the men of the place asked him of his wife : and he said, She is my sister, for he feared to say, She is my wife; lest, said he, the men of the place should kill me for Rebekah : because she was fair to look upon. And it came to pass when he had been there a long time, that Abimelech king of the Philistines looked out at a window, and saw, and, behold, Isaac was sporting with Rebekah his wife. And Abimelech called Isaac, and said, Behold of a surety she is thy wife; and how sayest thou, She is my sister ? And Isaac said unto him because I said, Lest I die for her.” Genesis xxvi., 7, 8, 9. NOAH. • 167.—Genesis ix., 21, 22. SAMSON. 168. —Judges xvi., 1. JUDAH. 169. —Genesis xxxviii., 1 to 3. I 171.—Gen. xxxviii., 13 to 30. 170. —Genesis xxxviii., 8 to 9. | LOT. 172. —Genesis xix., 30 to 36. RUTH. 173. —Ruth iii., 3, 4, 7, "8, 9, 10, 11. ^RACHEL. 174. —Genesis xxx., 1 to 5. | 1,75.—Genesis xxxi., 33 to 35. �ANALYSED, 23 POTIPHAR’S WIFE. 176. —Genesis xxxix., 7 to 20. REUBEN. 177. —Genesis xxxv., 22. | 178.—Genesis xlix., 3, 4. AMNON. 179. —2 Sam. xiii., 10 to 14. ABSALOM. 180. —2 Sam. xvi., 21, 22. SHECHEM. 181. —Genesis xxxiv., 1, 2. CHRIST. 182. —“ If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke xiv., 26. 183. —“ I am come to send fire on the earth ; and that will I, if it be already kindled ? Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth ? I tell you, Nay; but rather division.” Luke xii., 49, 51. 184. —“Think not that I am come to send peace on earth; I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in law against her mother-inlaw.” Matthew x., 34, 35. 185. —“Then said he unto them, But now, hethat hatha purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip; and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.” Luke xxii., 36. 186. —“But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.” Luke xix., 27. | 187. —“He that believeth, and is baptised, shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.” Mark xvi., 16. 188. —“ And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house, or city, shake off the dust of your feet. Verily, I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah, in the day of judgment, than for that city.” Matthew x., 14, 15. 189. —“And he said unto him, Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God, but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables; That seeing they may see, and not perceive, and hearing they may hear, and not understand ; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them.” Mark iv., 11, 12. 190. —“ And when they came nigh to Jerusalem, unto Bethphage, and Bethany, at the Mount of Olives, he sendeth forth two of his disciples. And saith unto them, Go your way into, the village over against you; and, as soon as ye be entered into �24 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES it, ye shall find a colt tied, whereon, never man sat; loose him, and bring him. And if any man say unto you, Why do ye this ? Say ye that the Lord hath need of him; and straight­ way he will send him hither.” Mark xi., 1 to 3. 191. —“Now there was there, nigh unto the mountain, a great herd of swine feeding. And all the devils besought him, saying, Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them. And forthwith Jesus gave them leave. And the unclean spirits went out and entered into the swine ; and the herd ran violently down a steep place into the sea (they were about two thousand) and were choked in the sea.” Mark v., 11, 12, 13. 192. —“And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry. And seeing a fig-tree afar off, having leaves, he came if haply he might find anything thereon : and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves ; for the time of figs was not yet. And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it. And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig-tree dried up from the roots. And Peter, calling to remem­ brance, saith unto him, Master, behold, the fig-tree which thou cursedst is withered away.” Mark xi., 12, 13, 14, 20, 21. PETER. 193. —“Then Simon Peter, having a sword, drew it, and smote the high priest’s servant, and cut off his right ear. The servant’s name was Malchus.” John xviii., 10. 194. —Peter says “ And it shall come to pass that every soul which will not hear that prophet shall be destroyed from among the people.” Acts iii., 23. 195. —“ Then took they him (Christ) and led him and brought him into the high priest’s house, and Peter followed afar off. And when they had kindled a fire in the midst of the hall, and were set down together, Peter sat down among them. But a certain maid beheld him, as he sat by the fire, and earnestly feoked upon him, and said, This man was also with him. And he denied him, saying, Woman, I know him not. And after a little while another saw him, and said, Thou art also of them. And Peter said, Man, I am not.” Luke xxii., 54 to 58. PAUL. 196. —“ I robbed other churches, taking wages of them, to do you service.” 2 Corinthians xi., 8. 197. —“ For if the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie unto his glory, why yet am I also judged as a sinner.” Romans iii., 7. 198. —“ But if any man be ignorant let him be ignorant.” 1 Corinthians xiv., 38. 199. —“ Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.” Colossians ii., 8. 200. —“ As we said before, so say I now again, If any man �ANALYSED. 25 / preach any other gospel unto you, than that ye have received, let him be accursed.” Galatians i., 9. 201. —“ If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maran-atha.” 1 Corinthians xvi., 22. 202. —“ A man that is an heretic, after the first and second admonition reject.” Titus iii., 10. 203. —“ I would they were even cut off which trouble you.” Galatians v., 12. 204. —“ But be it so, I did not burden you: nevertheless, be­ ing crafty, I caught you with guile.” 2 Corinthians xii., 16. 205. —“ But Elymas the sorcerer (for so is his name by inter­ pretation) withstood- them, seeking to turn away the deputy from the faith. Then Saul (who also is called Paul) filled with the Holy Ghost, set his eyes on him, and said, O full of all sub­ tlety and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord. And now, behold, the hand of the Lord is upon thee, and thou shalt be blind, not seeing the sun for a season. And immediately there fell on him a mist and a darkness; and he went about seeking some to lead him by the hand.” Acts xiii., 8 to 11. BARNABAS AND PAUL. 206. —“ And, some days after, Paul said unto Barnabas, Let us go again and visit our brethren in every city where we have preached the word of the Lord, and see how they do. And Barnabas determined to take with them John, whose surname was Mark. But Paul thought not good to take him with them, who departed from them from Pamphylia, and went not with them to the work. And the contention was so sharp between them, that they departed asunder, one from the other; and so Barnabas took Mark, and sailed unto Cyprus. And Paul chose Silas, and departed, being recommended by the brethren unto the grace of God.” Acts xv., 36 to 40. JOHN. • 207.—“ If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed.” 2 John, 10. GENERAL. 217. —Ezekiel xxiii. 208. —Isaiah xx., 4. 209. —Jeremiah iii., 9. 218. —2 Kings xviii., 27. 219. —1 Kings xiv., 10. 210. —Job xl., 17. 220. —Isaiah xvi., 11. 211. —Isaiah xlvii., 1, 2, 3. 221. —Isaiah xxvi., 18. 212. —Jeremiah xxx., 6. 222. —Judges iii., 21, 22. 213. —Isaiah xxxvi., 12. 223. —Deut. xxiii , 1. 214. —Isaiah xxxii., 11. 215. —1 Kings xiv., 24. 224. —1 Samuel xxv., 22. 216. —Ezekiel xvi., 4 to 58. 225. —Deut.-xxiii., 13. 226.—“Hethat is unjust, let him be unjust still; and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still; and he that is righteous, �26 THE HOLY SCRIPTUBES let him be righteous still; and he that is holy, let him be holy still.” Rev. xxii., 11. 227. ---Leviticus xi., 16, 17, IS, 24, 25, 32, 33. 228. —Leviticus xv., 2 to 13, 16 to 28, 32, 33. 229. —Leviticus xviii., 6 to 23. 230. —Leviticus xx., 10 to 21. 231. —Genesis xxv., 21 to 26. 232. —Deuteronomy xxviii., 57. 233. —Deuteronomy xxii., 15, 20, 21. 234. —Romans i., 26,- 27. 235. —2 Samuel xii., 11. 236. —Revelation xvii., 1 to 4. 237. —“ And there was war in heaven : Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels.” Revelation xii., 7. 238. —“ And he was clothed in a vesture dipt in blood: and his name is called, The Word of God. And the armies which were in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean.” Revelation xix., 13, 14. PASSAGES ABSURD AND UNNATURAL. 239. —“ Then spake Joshua unto the Lord, in the day when the Lord delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said, in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon, and thou, moon, in the valley of Ajalon. And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher ? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.” Joshua x., 12, 13. 240. —“ The sun and moon stood still in their habitation ; at the light of thine arrows they went, and at the shining of thy glittering spear.” Habakkuk iii., 11. 241. —“ And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided. And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground ; and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and on their left.” Exodus xiv., 21, 22. 242. —“ And Moses answered and said, But, behold, they will not believe me, nor hearken unto my voice : for they will say, The Lord hath not appeared unto thee. And the Lord said unto him, What is that in thine hand ? And he said, A rod. And he said, Cast it on the ground; and he cast it on the ground and it became a serpent; and Moses fled from before it. And the Lord said unto Moses, Put forth thine hand, and take it by the tail; and he put forth his hand, and caught it, and it be­ came a rod in his hand.” Exodus iv., 1, 2, 3, 4. 243. —“And the Lord said unto Moses, say unto Aaron, stretch out thy rod, and smite the dust of the land, that it may become lice throughout all the land of Egypt. And they did so; for Aaron stretched out his hand with his rod, and smote �ANALYSED. the dust of the earth, and it became lice in man and in beast: all the dust of the land became lice throughout all the land of Egypt. And the magicians did so with their enchantments to bring forth lice, but they could not; so there were lice upon man and upon beast.” Exodus viii., 16—-18. 244. —“Make thee an ark of gopher-wood : rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without, with pitch. And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of; the length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits. A window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it. And behold I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh wherein is the breath of life from under heaven; and everything that is in the earth shall die. But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt come into the ark; thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy sons’ wives with thee. And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep them alive with thee ; they shall be male and female. Of fowls after their kind, and of cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing on the earth after his kind; two of every sort shall come unto thee •to keep them alive. And take thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee; • and it shall be for food for thee, and for them. Thus did Noah ; according to all that God commanded him, so did he.” Genesis vi., 14—22. 245. —“ And the flood was forty days upon the earth ; and the waters increased, and bare up the ark, and it was lift up above the earth. And the waters prevailed, and were increased greatly upon the earth; and the ark went upon the face of the waters. And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered. Fifteen cubits upwards did the waters prevail, and the mountains were covered.” Genesis vii., 17—20. 246. —“ Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months.” James v., 17. 247. —“ And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” Genesis ii., 7. 248. —“ And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept; and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof. And the rib which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.” Genesis ii., 21, 22. 249. —“Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven. And he over­ threw those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground. But his �28 THE HOLY .SCRIPTURES (Lot’s) wife looked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt.” Genesis xix., 24, 25, 26. 250. —“And he (Jacob) dreamed, and behold a ladder set upon the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven; and • behold, the angels of God ascending and descending on it. And behold, the Lord stood above it, and said, I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac; the land whereon thou liest to thee will I give it, and to thy seed.” Genesis xxviii., 12, 13. 251. —“And it came to pass, as they still went on and talked, that behold there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder: and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven.” 2 Kings ii., 11. 252. —“Now the Lord had prepared a great fish [which Christ tells us in Matthew xii., 45, was a whale] to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God out of the fish’s belly. And the Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.” Jonah i., 17, and ii., 1 and 10. 253. —“And he found a new jawbone of an ass, and put forth his hand and took it, and slew a thousand men therewith. And Samson said, With the jawbone of an ass, heaps upon heaps, with the jawbone of an ass, have I slain a thousand men.” Judges xv., 15,*16. 254. —“ And it came to pass, when she (Delilah) pressed him (Samson) daily with her words, and urged him, so that his soul was vexed unto death : that he told her all his heart, and said unto her, There hath not come a razor upon mine head, for I have been a Nazarite unto God from my mother’s womb; if I be shaven, then my strength will go from me, and I shall become weak, and be like any other man.” The story then proceeds to represent Delilah as betraying Samson into the hands of his enemies the Philistines, who shave off the hair of his head, and afterwards put out his eyes and imprison him. In course of time his hair begins to grow again, when his strength returns. The Philistines then take him to their temple, that he may make sport for them, and Samson then says unto the lad that held him by the hand, “ Suffer me that I may feel the pillars whereupon the house standeth, that I may lean upon them. Now the house was full of men and women, and all the lords of the Philistines were there; and there were upon the roof about three thousand men and women that beheld while Samson made sport............ And Samson took hold of the two middle pillars, upon which the house stood, and on which it was borne up, of the one with his right hand and the other with his left. And Samson said, Let me die with the Philistines, and he bowed himself with all his might; and the house fell upon the lords, and upon all the people that were therein; so the dead which he slew at his death were more than they which he slew in his life.” Judges xvi., 16—30. 255. —“And these three men,Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed- �ANALYSED. 29 nego, fell down bound in the midst of the burning fiery furnace. Then Nebuchadnezzar came near to the mouth of the burning fiery furnace, and spake and said, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, ye servants of the most high God, come forth and come hither. Then Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego came forth of the midst of the fire. And princes, governors, and captains, and the king’s counsellors being gathered together, saw these men upon whose bodies the fire had no power, nor was a hair of their head singed, neither were their coats changed, nor the smell of fire had passed on them.” Daniel iii., 23, 26, 27. 256. —“ Then the king commanded and they brought Daniel, and cast him into the den of lions. Now the king spake and said unto Daniel, Thy God whom thou servest continually, he will deliver thee. Then the king arose very early in the morn­ ing, and went in haste unto the den of lions. And when he came to the den, he cried with a lamentable voice unto Daniel: and the king spake and said to Daniel, O Daniel servant of the living God, is thy God, whom thou servest continually, able to deliver thee from the lions ? Then said Daniel unto the king, O king live for ever. My God hath sent his angel and hath shut the lion’s mouths that they have not hurt me, forasmuch as before him innocency was found in me ; and also before thee, O king, have I done no hurt.” Daniel vi., 16, 19, 20, 21, 22. 257. —“And God saw the light that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness.” Genesis i., 4. 258. —“ And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth.” Genesis i., 16, 17. 259. —“ And there shall be upon every high mountain, and upon every high hill, rivers and streams of waters, in the day of the great slaughter when the towers fall. Moreover, the light Of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day that the Lord bindeth up the breach of his people, and healeth the stroke of their wound.” Isaiah xxx., 25, 26. 260. —“ Again, the Devil taketh him (Christ) up into an ex­ ceeding high mountain, and showeth him all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them.” Matthew iv., 8. 261. —“ The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones, and caused me to pass by them round about; and behold, there were very many in the open valley; and lo, they were very dry. And he said unto me, Son of Man, can these bones live ? And I answered, O Lord God thou knowest. Again he said unto me prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones, Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you and ye shall live. And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you; and ye shall live, and ye �30 THE HOLY SCBIFTITRES shall know that I am the Lord. So I prophesied as I was com­ manded ; and as I prophesied there was a noise, and behold a shaking and the bones came together bone to his bone. And, when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came upon them, and the skin covered them above : but there was no breath in them. Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, Son of Man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord God, Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live. So I prophesied as he commanded me, and. the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood upon their feet, an exceeding great army.” Ezekiel xxxvii., 1—10. 262. —“And it came to pass as they were burying a man, that behold, they spied a band of men, and they cast the man into the sepulchre of Elisha, and when the man was let down and touched the bones of Elisha he revived, and stood up on his feet.” 2 Kings xiii., 21. 263. —“Marvel not at this, for the hour is coming in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice.” John v., 28. 264. —“In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump; for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” 1 Cor. xv., 52. 265. —“ Eor the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we, which are alive and remain, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” 1 Thessalonians iv., 16, 17. 266. —“And I saw the dead small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened, and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them; and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.” Revelation xx., 12—14. 267. —“ I am he that liveth and was dead; and behold I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.” Revelation i., 18. 268. —“But Mary stood without at the sepulchre, weeping; and as she wept she stood down, and looked into the sepulchre. And seeth two angels in white, sitting the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. And they say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou ? She saith unto them, Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him. And when she had thus said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou ? She supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. Jesus �analysed. 31 saith unto her, Mary; she turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni, which is to say Master.” John xx., 11—16. 269. —But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore saith unto him, We have seen the Lord. But he said unto them, Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side I will not believe. And after eight days again his dis­ ciples were within, and Thomas with them; then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands ; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side ; and be not faithless but believing.” John xx., 24—27. 270. —“Jesus saith unto them, Come and dine. And none of his disciples durst ask him, Who art thou ? knowing that it was the Lord. Jesus then cometh, and taketh bread, and giveth them, and fish likewise. This is now the third time that Jesus showed himself to his disciples, after that he was risen from the dead.” Johnxxi., 12, 13, 14. 271—“And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they looked steadily toward heaven, as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven ? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.” Acts i., 9, 10, 11. 272. —“ Then the Spirit took me up, and I heard behind me a voice of a great rushing, saying, Blessed be the glory of the Lord from his place. So the Spirit lifted me up, and took me away, and I went in bitterness, in the heat of my spirit; but the hand of the Lord was strong upon me.” Ezekiel iii., 12, 14. 273. —“ And he put forth the form of an hand, and took me by a lock of mine head; and the Spirit lifted me up between the earth and the heaven, and brought me in the visions of God to Jerusalem to the door of the inner gate, that looketh toward the north, where was the seat of the image of jealousy, which provoketh to jealousy.” Ezekiel viii., 3. 274. —“And Habbakuk said, Lord I never saw Babylon; neither do I know where the den is. Then the angel of the Lord took him by the crown, and bare him by the hair of his head, and through the vehemency of spirit, set him in Babylon over the den. And Habbakuk cried, saying, O Daniel, Daniel, take the dinner which God hath sent thee.” Bel and the Dragon, 35—37. 275. —“Then the high priest rose up, and all they that were with him (which is the sect of the Sadduces) and were filled with indignation. And laid their hands on the apostles, and put them in the common prison. But the angel of the Lord by night opened the prison doors, and brought them forth, and said �32 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES Go, stand and speak in the temple to the people, all the words of this life.” Acts v., 17—20. 276. —“And behold, there was a great earthquake: for the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it.” Matthew xxviii., 2. 277. —“And the angel of the Lord came again the second time, and touched him, and said, Arise and eat, because thy journey is too great for thee.” 1 Kings xix., 7. 278. —“Then the angel of the Lord put forth the end of the staff that was in his hand, and touched the flesh, and the un­ leavened cakes; and there rose up fire out of the rock, and consumed the flesh, and the unleavened cakes. Then the angel of the Lord departed out of his sight.” Judges vi., 21. 279. —“ Then Tobit called his son Tobias, and said unto him, My son, see that the man have his wages which went with thee, and thou must give him more. So he called the angel, and he said unto him, Take half of all that ye have brought, and go away in safety.” Tobit xii., 1, 5. 280. —“ Then the woman came and told her husband, saying, A man of God came unto me, and his countenance was like the countenance of an angel of God, very terrible; but I asked him not whence he was, neither told he me his name.” Judges xiii., 6. 281. —“ Whose throne is inestimable, whose glory may not be comprehended, before whom the hosts of angels stand with trembling.” 2 Esdras viii., 21. 282. —“ Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” Exod. xxii., 18. 283. —“A man also, or woman that hath a familiar spirit, er that is a wizard, shall surely be put to death; they shall stone them with stones : their blood shall be upon them.” Lev. xx., 27. 284. —“ And the woman said unto him, Behold thou knowest what Saul hath done, how he hath cut off those who have familiar spirits, and the wizards out of the land : wherefore, then layest thou a snare for my life, to cause me to die ? ” 1 Sam. xxviii., 9. 285. —“Jesus saith unto them, Eill the water pots with water. And they filled them up to the brim. And he saith unto them, Draw one now, and bear unto the governor of the feast. And they bare it. When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was made wine, and knew not whence it was (but the servants which drew the water knew), the governor of the feast called the bridegroom, and saith unto him, Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine ; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse; but thou hast kept the good wine until now. This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth his glory; and his disciples believed on him.” Johnii., 7 to 11. 286. —“And Jesus said unto the centurion, Go thy way; and as thou hast believed, so be it done unto thee. And his �ANALYSED. 33 servant was healed in the selfsame hour. And when Jesus was come into Peter’s house, he saw his wife’s mother laid, and sick of a fever. And he touched her hand, and the fever left her; and she arose, and ministered unto them.” Matt, viii., 13, 14, 15. 28*7.—“And when he was entered into a ship, his disciples followed him. And behold, there arose a great tempest in the sea, insomuch that the ship was covered with the waves; but he was asleep. And his disciples came to him, and awoke him, saying, Lord, save us, we perish. And he saith unto them, Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith ? Then he arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a great calm.” Matt, viii., 23 to 26. 288. —“And in the fourth watch of the night Jesus went unto them, walking on the sea. And when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were, troubled, saying, It is a spirit; and they cried out for fear. But straightway Jesus spake unto them, saying, Be of good cheer! it is I; be not afraid. And Peter answered him, and said, Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the water. And he said, Come. And when Peter was come down out of the ship, he walked on the water, to go to Jesus.” Matt, xiv., 25 to 29. 289. —“ And Jesus arose and followed him, and so did his disciples. And when Jesus came into the ruler’s house, and saw the minstrels and the people making a noise, he said unto them, Give place, for the maid is not dead, but sleepeth; and they laughed him to scorn. But when the people were put forth, he went in, and took her by the hand, and the maid arose.” Matt, ix., 19, 23, 24, 25. 290. —“ And behold, a woman, which was diseased with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind him, and touched the hem of his garment. For she said within herself, if I may but touch his garment, I shall be whole. But Jesus turned him about, and when he saw her he said, Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole. And the woman was made whole from that hour.” Matt, ix., 20, 21, 22. 291. —“ And when he had thus spoken, he cried with a loud, voice, Lazarus, come forth. And he that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot with grave-clothes, and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them, Loose him and let him go.” John xi., 43, 44. 292. —“And when the day began to wear away, then came the twelve and said unto him, Send the multitude away, that they may go into the towns and country round about, and lodge, and get victuals; for we are here in a desert place. But he said unto them, give ye them to eat; and they said, we have no more but five loaves and two fishes; except we should go and buy meat for all this people. For they were about five thousand men. And he said to his disciples, make them sit down by fifties in a company. And they did so, and made them all sit down. Then he took the five loaves and two fishes, and looking up to heaven he blessed them, and brake, and �34 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES gave to the disciples to set before the multitude. And they did eat and were all filled, and there were taken up of frag­ ments that remained to them twelve baskets.” Luke ix., 12 to 17. 293. —“And, when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues, like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak, with other tongues, as the spirit gave them utterance.” Acts ii., 1 to 4. 294. —“ And he (Moses) was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he did neither eat bread nor drink water; and he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the ten commandments.” Exodus xxxiv., 28. 295. —“ And the angel of the Lord came again the second time, and touched him, and said, Arise and eat, because the journey is too great for thee. And he arose, and did eat and drink, and went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights, unto Horeb the mount of God.” 1 Kings xix., 7, 8. 296. —“Moreover he said unto me, Son of man, eat that thou findest; eat this roll (of a book), and go speak unto the house of Israel. So I opened my mouth, and he caused me to eat that roll. And he said unto me, Son of man, cause thy belly to eat, and fill thy bowels with this roll that I give thee. Then did I eat it, and it was in my mouth as honey for sweetness.” Ezekiel iii., 1 to 3. 297. —“And when the ass saw the angel of the Lord, she fell down under Balaam; and Balaam’s anger was kindled, and he smote the ass with a staff. And the Lord opened the mouth of the ass, and she said unto Balaam, What have I done unto thee, that thou hast smitten me these three times ? ” Num, xxii., 27, 28. 298. —“ And I beheld, and lo, the eagle rose upon her talons, and spake to her feathers, saying, Watch not all at once: sleep every one in his own place, and watch by course. Then 1 heard a voice, which said unto me, Look before thee, and consider the thing that thou seest. And I beheld, and lo, as it were a roaring lion chased out of the wood ; and I saw that he sent out a man’s voice unto the eagle, and said, Hear thou, I will talk with thee, and the highest shall say unto thee,” etc. 2 Esdras xi., 7, 8, and 36, 37, 38. 299. —“ But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God; yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.” Jonah iii., 8. 300. —“ And I took it and drank; and when I had drank of it, my heart uttered understanding, and wisdom grew in my breast, for my spirit strengthened my memory.” 2 Esdras xiv., 40. SOI.—“ In the lips of him that hath understanding wisdom is �ANALYSED. 35 found; but a rod is for the back of him that is void of under­ standing.” Proverbs x., 13. 302. —“ Jesus answered and said unto them, Verily I say unto you, if ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also, if ye shall say unto this mountain, be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea, it shall be done.” Matthew xxi., 21. 303. —“And the Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye might say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea; and it should obey you.” Luke xvii., 6. 304. —“Therefore I say unto you, what things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.” Mark xi., 24. 305. —“ Who is the image of the invisible God, the first-born •of every creature.” Colossians i., 15. 306. —“ While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are ceen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.” 2 Corinthians iv., 18. 307. —“And it came to pass, as he was alone praying, his disciples were with, him; and he asked them, saying, Whom •say the people that I am ? ” Luke ix., 18. 308. —“ I and my father are one.” John x., 30. 308 [2],—“For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one.” 1 John v., 7. 309. —“And David danced before the Lord with all his might; and David was girded with a linen ephod.” 2 Samuel vi., 14. 310. —“ And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll; and all their host shall fall down as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig tree.” Isaiah xxxiv., 4. 311. —“ And I saw a new heaven and a new earth ; for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.” Revelation xxi., 1. 312. —-“Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law or no. And they gathered it every morning, every man according to his eating; and when the Sun waxed hot it melted.” Exodus, xvi., 4, 21. 313. —“And it came to pass as they fled from before Israel, and were in the going down to Beth-horon, that the Lord cast down great stones from heaven upon them unto Azekah, and they died; they were more which died with hail-stones than they whom the children of Israel slew with the sword.” Joshua x., 11. 314. —“Then the Lord rained upon Sodom, andupon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven.” Genesisxix., 24. 315. —“ And Elijah answered and said to the captain of fifty, if I be a man of God, then let fire come down from heaven, and �36 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES consume thee and thy fifty, and there came down fire from heaven and consumed him and his fifty.” 2 Kings i., 10. 316. —“And then the Lord’s wrath be kindled against you, and he shut up the heaven that there be no rain, and that the land yield not her fruit, and lest ye perish quickly from off the good land which the Lord giveth you.” Deuteronomy xi., 17. 317. —“ When heaven is shut up, and there is no rain, because they have sinned against thee; if they pray towards this place, and confess thy name, and turn from their sin, when thou afflictest them.” 1 Kings viii., 35. 318. —“I knew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell; God knoweth) such an one caught up to the third heaven.” 2 Corinthians xii., 2. 319. —“ And when he had opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour.” Lev. viii., 1. 320. —“ After this I looked; and behold, a door was opened in heaven ; and the first voice which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me ; which said, come up hither, and I will show the things which must be hereafter. And immediately I was in the spirit; and behold a throne was set in heaven, and one sat on the throne; and he that sat was to look upon like a jasper, and a sardine stone ; and there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald. And round about the throne were four-and-twenty seats ; and upon the seats I saw four-and-twenty elders sitting, clothed in white raiment, and they had on their heads crowns of gold. And out of the throne proceeded lightnings, and thunderings, and voices, and there were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the spirits of God. And before the throne there was a sea of glass like unto crystal: and in the midst of the throne, and round about the throne, were four beasts full of eyes before . and behind. And the first beast was like a lion, and the second beast like a calf, and the third beast had a face as a man, and the fourth beast was like a flying eagle. And the four beasts had each of them six wings about him, and they were full of eyes within; and they rest not day and night saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come.” Revelation iv., 1—8. 321. —“And, when they shall have finished their testimony the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them.” Revelation xi., 7. Also 30. PASSAGES CONTRADICTORY. 322.—“ And he shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nationshall �ANALYSED. 37 not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.” Micah iv., 3. 323.—‘ ‘ Beat your ploughshares into swords, and your pruning -hooks into spears; let the weak say I am strong.” Joel iii., 10. 324. —“ Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tink­ ling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.” 1 Corinthians xiii., 1, 2. 325. —“ As we said before, so say I now again, if any man preach any other gospel unto you, than that ye have received, let him be accursed.” Galatians i., 9. 326. —“ Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer; and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.” 1 John iii., 15. 327. —“ If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke xiv., 26. 328. —“ Then said Jesus unto them, put up again thy sword into its place ; for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.” Matthew xxvi., 52. 329. —“ Then he said unto them, but now he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip; and he that hath no sword let him sell his garment and buy one.” Luke xxii., 36. 330. —“ But I say unto you, that ye resist not evil; but who­ soever shall smite thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” Matthey v., 39. 331. —“ Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God made he man.” Gen. ix., 6. 332. —“But I say unto you, love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you, and persecute you.” Matthew v., 44. 333. —“Then said he unto the disciples, it is impossible but that offences will come; but woe unto him through whom they come.” Luke xvii., 1. 334. —“ And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house, or city, shake off the dust of your feet.” Matthew x., 14. 335. —Christ says, “ Whosoever shall say, thou fool, shall be in danger of hell-fire.” Matthew v., 22. 336. —And yet he exclaims, “ Ye fools and blind, for whether is greater, the gold, or the temple that sanctifieth the gold.” Matthew xxiii., 17. �38 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES 337. —“Thou shalt have no other gods before me.” Exodus xx., 3. 338. —“ And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.” Genesis i., 26. 339. “ Thou shalt not bow down thyself to the-m, nor serve them; for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me.” Exodus xx., 5. 340. “The soul that sinneth it shall die; the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son ; the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.” Ezekiel xviii., 20. 341. —“ But the children of the murderers he slew not ac­ cording unto that which is written in the book of the law of Moses, wherein the Lord commanded saying, The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, nor the children be put to death for the fathers; but every man shall be put to death for his own sin.” 2 Kings xiv., 6. 342. —“ Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt tnou labor, and do all thy work. But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work, thou nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor the stranger that is within thy gate.” Exodus xx., 8, 9, 10. 343. —“ And he entered again into the synagogue; and therewas a man there which had a withered hand. And they watched him, whether he would heal him on the sabbath day: that they might accuse him. And he saith unto the man which had the withered hand, Stand forth. And he saith unto them, Is it law­ ful to do good on the sabbath days, or to do evil ? to save life or to kill ? but they held their peace. And when he had looked round about on them with anger, being grieved for the hard­ ness of their hearts, he saith unto the man, Stretch forth thine hand. And he stretched it out, and his hand was restored whole as the other.” Mark iii., 1—5. 344. —“ Honor thy father and thy mother; that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.” Exodus xx., 12. 345. —“ If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and his mother, and wife, and children, and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he- cannot be my disciple.” Luke xiv., 26. 346.—“ Thou shalt not kill.” Exodus xx., 13. �ANALYSED. 39 347. —“ But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither and slay them before me.” Luke xix., 27. 348. —“ And he said unto them, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbor.” Exodus xxxii., 27. 349. —“ Thou shalt not commit adultery.” Exodus xx., 14. 350. —“Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise; when as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost.” Matthew i., 18. 351. —“Thou shalt not steal.” Exodus xx., 15. 352. —“And I will give this people favor in the sight of the Egyptians; and it shall come to pass, that when ye go, ye shall not go empty. But every woman shall borrow of her neigh­ bor, and of her that sojourneth in her house, jewels of silver and jevels of gold, and raiment; and ye shall put them upon your sons and upon your daughters; and ye shall spoil the Egyptians.” Exodus iii., 21, 22. Vide Note 137. 353. —“The Lord is good to all; and his tender mercies are over al his works.” Psalms cxlv., 9. 354. —“ Thus saith the Lord of hosts, I remember that which Amalel did to Israel, how he laid wait for him in the way when le came up from Egypt. Now go and smite Amalek, and uterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but sla; both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, <amel and ass.” 1 Samuel xv., 2, 3. 355. —“ The Lord is gracious and full of compassion; slow to ange* and of great mercy.” Psalms cxlv., 8. 356. —“ And he smote the men of Beth-Shemesh, because they hal looked into the ark of the Lord, even he smote of the people ifty thousand and three score and ten men: and the people amented, because the Lord had smitten many of the people nth a great slaughter.” 1 Samuel vi., 19. v • ------- " 357. —“ Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and paseth by the transgression of the remnant of his heri­ tage ? h retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mere}” Micah vii., 18. 358. —‘And when the Lord thy God shall deliver them be­ fore the; thou shalt smite them and utterly destroy them; thou shalt maeno covenant with them, nor show mercy unto them.” Deut. vi, 2. �40 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES 359. “The Lord is slow to anger and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked; the Lord hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.” Nahum i., 3. 360. —“So shall it be at the end of the world : the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just, and shall cast them into the furnace of fire : there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.” Matthew xiii., 49, 50. 361. —“ And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord ; for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord : for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” Jeremiah xxxi., 34. 362. —“ Behold, all souls are mine, as the soul of the father, so also. the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sinneth it shall die.” Ezekiel xviii., 4. 363. —“And rend your heart and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your God ; for he is gracious and nerciful, siow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth bin of the evil.” Joel ii., 13. 364. —“ And I will bring distress upon men, that they shall walk like blind men, because they have sinned against the Lord; and their blood shall be poured out as dust, and their flesh as the dung.” Zephaniah i., 17. .—------- — / 365. —“ The Lord is not slack concerning his pronise (as some men count slackness), but is long-suffering to is-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” 2 Peter iii., 9. 366. —“ The Lord hath made all things for himsel ; yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.” Proverbs xvi., 4. 367. —“ For thou lovest all the things that are, and a&horrest nothing which thou hast made; for never wouldst thi>u have made anything if thou hadst hated it.” Wisdom of Solomon xi., 24. 368. —“ For God loveth none but him that dwelljth with wisdom.” Wisdom of Solomon vii., 28. 369. —“For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior. Who will have all men to be saved, andto come unto the knowledge of the truth.” 1 Timothy ii., 3, 4 370. —“ And for this cause God shall send then strong delusion, that they should believe a lie.” 2 Thessalonians ii., 11. I 371.—“Yet saith the house of Israel, the way of tl Lord is not equal, O house of Israel, are not my ways equal are not your ways unequal ? ” Ezekiel xviii., 29. �ANALYSED. 41 372. —“ For thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God: the Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself above all people that are upon the face of the earth.” Deuteronomy vii., 6. 373. —“Lying lips are abominations to the Lord; but they that deal truly are his delight.” Proverbs xii., 22. 374. —“ Now, therefore, behold, the Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these thy prophets, and the Lord hath spoken evil concerning thee.” 1 Kings xxii., 23. 375. —“For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.” John iii., 17. 376. —“ Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-inlaw.” Matthew x., 34, 35. Also 182 and 183. 377. —“Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom; and with all thy getting, get understanding.” Proverbs vi., 7. 378. —“For in much wisdom is much grief; and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.” Ecclesiastes i., 18. 379. —“Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves; be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.” Matthew x., 16. 380. —“For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.” 1 Cor. i., 19. 381. —“The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree; he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon.” Psalms xcii., 12. 382. —“The righteous perisheth, and no man layeth it to heart; and merciful men are taken away, none considering that the righteous is taken away from the evil to come.” Isaiah lvii., 1. 383. —“As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one.” Romans iii., 10. 384. —“ Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” James v., 16. 385. —“ Pray without ceasing.” 1 Thessalonians v., 17. 386. —“ And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you; yea, when ye make many prayers I will not hear; your hands are full of blood.” Isaiah i., 15. 387. —“Therefore we conclude, that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.” Romans iii., 28. �42 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES 388. —“ Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.” James ii., 24. 389. —“ For by grace are ye saved, through faith, and that not of yourselves ; it is the gift of God.” Ephesians ii., 8. 390. —“But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead.” James ii., 20. 391. —“ As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away; so he that goeth down to the grave shall come up no more.” Jobvii., 9. 392. —“And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, and came out of the graves after his resurrection and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.” Matthew xxvii., 52, 53. Also 268, 269, 270 and 271. 393. —“In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.” Genesis i., 1. 394. —And the earth was without form and void.” Genesis i., 2. 395. —“ And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness.” Genesis i., 4. (This was on the first day.) 396. —“ And God made two great lights ; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; he made the stars also.” Genesis i., 16. (This was on the fourth day.) 397. —“ And God saw everything that he had made, and behold it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.” Genesis i., 31. 398. —“ The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled without violence.” Genesis vi., 11. 399. —“Behold, he putteth no trust in his saints; yea, the heavens are not clean in his sight.” Job xv., 15. 400. —“ All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made.” John i., 3. 401. —“ For by him were all things created that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers; all things were created by him, and for him.” Colossians i., 16. 402. —“For God made not death; neither hath he pleasure in the destruction of the living.” Wisdom of Solomon i., 13. 403. —“ For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.” 1 Corinthians xiv., 33. 404. —“ One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh; but the earth abideth for ever.” Ecclesiasticus i., 4. 405. —“All these things live and remain for ever, for all uses, and they are all obedient.” Ecclesiasticus xiii., 23. �ANALYSED. 43 406. —“So shall it be at the end of the world; the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just.” Matthew xiii., 49. 407. —“But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also, and the works that are therein shall be burnt up.” 2 Peter iii., 10. Also 311. 408. —“ For his anger endureth but a moment; in his favor is life ; weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.” Psalms xxx., 5. 409. —“ And the Lord’s anger was kindled against Israel, and he made them wander in the wilderness forty years, until all the generation that had done evil in the sight of the Lord was consumed.” Numbers xxxii., 13. 410. —“Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God; for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man.” James i., 13. 411. —“ And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham, and he said, Behold, here I am.” Genesis xxii., 1. 412. —“ And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: for thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.” Matthew vi., 13. 413. —“ And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of Man which is in heaven.” John iii., 13. 414. —“And it came to pass, as they still went on and talked, that behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirl­ wind into heaven.” 2 Kings ii., 11. 415-—“ And I (Jesus) say unto you, my friends, be not afraid • of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do.” Luke xii., 4. 416.—“ After these things Jesus walked in Galilee; for he would not walk in Jewry, because the Jews sought to kill him ” John vii., 1. 417. —“ For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one.” lJohnv.,7. 418. “ And the Lord God said, Behold the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil; and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever.” Genesis iii,, 22. 419. —“There is one body, and one spirit, even as ye are �44 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES called in one hope of your calling; One Lord, one faith, one baptism; One God and father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.” Ephesians iv., 4—6. 420. —“For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.” 1 Timothy ii., 5. 421. —“Remember the former things of old ; for I am God, and there is none else; I am God; and there is none like me.” Isaiah xlvi., 9. 422. —“ I and my father are one.” John x., 30. 423. —“ But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works; that we may know and believe that the Father is in me and I in him.” John x., 38. 424. —“I am the true vine, and my Father is the husband­ man.” John xv., 1. 425. —-“And the father himself, which hath sent me, hath borne witness of me. Ye have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape.” John v., 37. 426. —“ The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand.” John iii., 35. 427. —■“ No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.” Johni., 18. 428. —“Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto, whom no man hath seen, nor can see; to whom be honor and power everlasting.” 1 Tim. vi., 16. 429. —“And the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend.” Exodus xxxiii., 11. 430. —“Then went up Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel: And they saw the God of Israel; and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire-stone, and as it were the body of heaven in In's clearness.” Exodus xxiv., 9, 10. Also 17, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132. 431. —“ And he said, Thou canst not see my face; for there shall no man see me, and live.” Exodus xxxiii., 20. 432. —“ And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel; for I have see God face to face, and my life is preserved.” Genesis xxxii., 30. Also 429. 433. —“Marvel not at this, for the hour is coming in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth, they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil unto the resurrection of damnation.” John v., 28, 29. 434. —“And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened; and another book was opened, �ANALYSED. 45 which is the book of life; and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.” Rev. xx., 12. 435,—“ For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them; as the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no pre-eminence above a beast: for all is vanity. All go unto one place : all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth ! Where­ fore I perceive that there is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his own works, for that is his portion ; for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him ? ” Eccles, iii., 19—22. Also 391. 436. —“ The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand.” John iii., 35. 437. —“ For though he (the Son) was crucified through weak­ ness, yet he liveth by the power of God. For we also are weak in him, but we shall live with him by the power of God toward you.” 2 Corinthians xiii., 4. 438. —“ And he (Judas) cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed, and went and hanged himself.” Mat­ thew xxvii., 5. 439. —“Now this man (Judas) purchased a field with the re­ ward of iniquity; and falling headlong, he burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels gushed out.” Acts i., 18. 440. —“And Jesus saith unto them, How many loaves have ye ? and they said, Seven, and a few little fishes. And he took the seven loaves and the fishes and gave thanks, and brake them, and gave to his disciples, and the disciples to the multi­ tude. And they did all eat, and were filled ; and they took up of the broken meat that was left seven baskets full. And they that did eat were four thousand men, beside women and children.” Matthew xv., 34, 36, 37, 38. 441. —“But he said unto .them, Give ye them to eat. And they said, We have no more but five loaves and two fishes; except we should go and buy meat for all this people. For they were about five thousand men. And he said to his dis­ ciples, Make them sit down by fifties in a company. Then he took the five loaves and the two fishes, and looking up to heaven, he blessed them, and brake, and gave to the disciples to set before the multitude. And they did eat, and were all filled; and there was taken up of fragments that remained to them twelve baskets.” Luke ix., 13, 14, 16, 17. Vide 292. �46 THE HOLY SCBIPTURES 442. —“ And set np over his head, his accusation written, This is Jesus the King of the Jews.” Matthew xxvii., 37. 443. —“ And the superscription of his accusation was written over, The King of the Jews.” Mark xv., 26. 444. —“And a superscription also was written over him, in letters of Greek, and Latin, and Hebrew, This is the King of the Jews.” Luke xxiii., 28. 445. —“And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was, Jesus of Nazareth the King of the Jews.” John xix., 19. 446.—“ But while he thought on these things, behold the angel of the Lord appeared unto him (Joseph) in a dream, say­ ing, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife; for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.” Matthew i., 20. In 448 the angel is represented not as appearing unto Joseph, but unto Mary, his wife. 448.—“And the angel said unto her, fear not, Mary; for thou hast found favor with God. And behold, thou shalt con­ ceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus. Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man. And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee; therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.” Luke i., 30, 31, 34, 35. 449.—“ In the end of the sabbath, as it began to dawn to­ wards the first day of the week, came Mary Magdelene, and the other Mary, to see the sepulchre.” Matthew xxviii., 1. 450—“ And when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, had bought sweet spices, that they might come and anoint him. And very early in the morning of the first day of the week they came into the sepulchre at the rising of the sun.” Mark xvi., 1, 2. 451.—“The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken away from the sepulchre.” John xx., 1. 452.—“Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared and certain others with them. ” Luke xxiv., 1. The individuals coming to the sepulchre are Mary Magda­ lene, and Joanna, and Mary the mother of James, and other women. Verse 10. In 450 it was Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Salome that came; in 449 it was only Mary Magdalene and the other Mary; and in 451 it was only Mary Magdalene. 453.—“And, behold, there was a great earthquake; for the �ANALYSED. 47 angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door and sat upon it.” Matthew xxviii., 2. 454.—“And they said among themselves, Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulchre ? And when they looked they saw that the stone was rolled away, for it was very great. And entering into the sepulchre, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, clothed in a long white garment; and they were affrighted.” Mark xvi., 3, 4, 5. In 453 the angel is represented as sitting outside the sepulchre upon the stone which he rolled from the door, and in 454 as sitting within the sepulchre on the right side. 455.—“ And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus. And it came to pass, as they were much perplexed thereabout, behold, two men stood by them in shining** ments.” Luke xxiv., 3, 4. 1 In 453, 454, and 456, the angels are represented nc standing, but as sitting. 1 456.—“But Mary stood without at the sepulchre, weepl and as she wept she stooped down, and looked into the sepull and seeth two angels in white, sitting, the one at the ha and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lai John xx., 11, 12. I In this and 455 there are represented as being two angl while according to 453, 454, there was only one. In this Ml merely looked into the sepulchre; while in 454 she and thl who accompanied her went into it. 457. —“And the angel answered and said unto the womtW Fear not ye ; for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucifkfig He is not here ; for he is risen, as he said : Come, see the plaM where the Lord lay.” Matthew xxviii., 5, 6. k 458. —“ And when she had thus said, she turned herself bac® and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. JesiB saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou ? whom seekestthouB She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, B thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid hinl and I will take him away. Jesus saith unto her, Mary. Shi turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to sal Master. Jesus saith unto her; Touch me not; for I am not y 1 ascended to my Father; but go to my brethren, and say un B them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father, and to ml God and your God.” John xx., 14-17. 1 In 457 the angel is represented as telling the women or] woman of Christ’s rising from the dead; in 458 Christ is re-' presented as telling them himself. j �48 THE HOLY SCRIPTURES ANALYSED. 4a9.—“ And go quickly, and tell his disciples that he is risen fropa the dead; and, behold, he goeth before you into Galilee ; there shall ye see him; lo, I have told you. Then the eleven disciples went away into Gallilee, into a mountain where Jesus had appointed them. And when they saw him, they worshipped him ; but some doubted.” Matthew xxviii., 7, 16, 17. 460. “And they rose up the same hour, and returned to Jerusalem, and found the eleven gathered together and them that were with them, saying, The Lord is risen indeed, and hath appeared to Simon. And they told what things were done in the way, and how he was known of them in breaking of bread. And as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.” Luke xxiv 33-36. ’ • / --------- ( In 459 the eleven disciples went to Galilee to meet Jesus according to appointment, where they saw him and worshipped 460 they did no such thing> but Jesus appeared unto ' „ quite unexpectedly, as they were assembled together at thou salem. ceive _____ nami he, sll>—“So then after the Lord had spoken unto them (the said en apostles that were sat at meat), he was received up to powven, and sat on the right hand of God.” Mark xvi., 19. thaf62.—“ And he led them (the eleven apostles) out as far as to Sonluiny; and he lifted up his hands and blessed them. And lame to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted from 4<m, and carried up into heaven.” Luke xxiv., 50, 51. Christ ascended into heaven from the place where the the08?!68 were sa4 a4 meat, after he had done speaking to them; 4d in 462 he first led them out to Bethany, and then hisascenan(jn took place. spi in sei ea st' n tl k W' a iijb � 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 &amp; 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 An entity primarily responsible for making the resource 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 The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data 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 A name given to the resource The Holy scriptures analysed or: Passages inconsistent with the attributes generally ascribed to the Deity by the Christian world Description An account of the resource Edition: [2nd ed.] Place of publication: [Manchester] Collation: 48 p. ; 18 cm. Notes: Last page torn. Introductory sketch of the life of Robert Cooper / Charles Bradlaugh (p.[1]-2) -- A vindication written for the second edition after the work had been specially attacked by the Bishop of Exeter in the House of Lords / Robert Cooper (p.[3]-8) -- The Holy Scriptures analysed (p.[9]-48). Publisher and place of publication from British Library. "Vindication" dated Manchester, July 1840. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Cooper, Robert [1819-1868] Bradlaugh, Charles [1833-1891] Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available [Published by Jas. Cooper] Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1840 Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context N180 Subject The topic of the resource Bible Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <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 Holy scriptures analysed or: Passages inconsistent with the attributes generally ascribed to the Deity by the Christian world), 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> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Bible-Criticism NSS https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/a1d870aed2cadc8f1456cec1b93840a4.pdf?Expires=1785369600&Signature=hUCoQ98XO7w06vk1aiYBH2JGVE9LZhBhSZgiIJbJaX7Ee0MvPZKvPHjZBI6pvSfcYYbjOwwa32dU6Gn2fZ6sDj92kudQAoDg7uvFFDFjfNT1iMkh6h7gbG%7EtwLwmBhnigl7JPMEP4hduSVH7SupTc8ZT27tWBLwz-L4NnBVeli0df2jwkBnCNiFhIo-3ZrNx76FzgbwbdFWyVprADRXe9jv0WcFdERyWNBgR2zFmRHYkWqK62HxjJmXAFa9aNvB1y%7EEkVyUo5OyKh3-ydbP8adKHTeRhPKy2Xy8mxcupxbBsHttj3CHnh4LpVK1OZSS4Ges7kNv8raaIp-kN1F02%7EA__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM 31c9fc833aeb5ef6fdffaf6c14aa38d6 PDF Text Text NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY THE CREED OF CHRISTENDOM: ITS FOUNDATIONS CONTRASTED WITH ITS SUPERSTRUCTURE BY WILLIAM RATHBONE GREG “The Prayer of Ajax was for Light.” With a Preface by W. R. Washington Sullivan, Author of “Morality as a Religionf “Ethical Interpretationsf etc> [issued for the rationalist press association, limited] WATTS & CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C. 1905 �“ I should, perhaps, be a happier, at all events a more useful, man, if my mind were otherwise constituted. But so it is : and even with regard to Christianity itself, like certain plants, I creep towards the light, even though it draw me away from the more nourishing warmth. Yea, I should do so, even if the light made its way through a rent in the wall of the Temple.”—Coleridge. “ Perplex’d in faith, but pure in deeds, At last he beat his music out; There lives more faith in honest doubt, Believe me, than in half the creeds. “ He fought his doubts and gather’d strength ; He would not make his judgment blind ; He faced the spectres of the mind, And laid them : thus he came at length “ To find a stronger faith his own ; And Power was with him in the night, Which makes the darkness and the light, And dwells not in the light alone, “ But in the darkness and the cloud.” —Tennyson. “ No inquirer can fix a direct and clear-sighted gaze towards Truth who is casting side glances all the while on the prospects of his soul.”—Martineau. “ What hope of answer or redress? Behind the veil, behind the veil.” —Tennyson. �PREFACE A few explanatory words may be deemed necessary to a new and revised edition of a work which aroused so much interest, and earned the generous approval of all competent to offer an unbiassed opinion, when it appeared over half a century ago. The Creed of Christendom, in spite of the damaging character of its analysis of the historic documents and of the ethos of popular Christianity; in spite, too, of the comparatively expensive price at which it was issued, has passed through nine editions—no mean tribute to its excellence. Its success was not due to the novelty of the method or the arguments of its author: as he himself candidly admits, it is the work of a man with the ordinary education of an English gentleman, deeply interested in the religious problem, and perplexed by the difficulties besetting the traditional Belief. Nothing he advances was new to the serious student of Religion, even in the fifties ; his masters are, in the main, such well-known Con­ tinental authorities as De Wette and Baur; but he presents the results of their labours with a freshness and a force; in a spirit at once so manly and modest, so sincere, high-minded and devout, as to compel the attention of unprejudiced, truth-loving men. In the half-century that has elapsed the critical positions, both as regards the Old and the New Testament, have been very notably advanced, but the author has nothing to disavow. No conclusion of his has been invalidated by subsequent inquiry; the progress of research has but confirmed his judgment where it has not enlarged its scope and extended his criticisms beyond his original purview. It has, therefore, been thought advisable to allow the text to stand as he left it in his ninth edition, and merely to add an occasional note, within parentheses, indicating the main advances in Critical Knowledge tending to modify his conclusions on such matters as the date of the Gospels and some of the Epistles. Space, however, has made it necessary to compress the ample material of his two volumes, and even to omit some entire chapters, such as that on the modern refinements of the doctrine of inspiration; on miracles; on the limits of reliance to be placed on Apostolic authority, and the �PREFACE 4 problem of the Future Life, which, it may be mentioned, he confesses his inability to solve. Mr. Greg is interesting and suggestive as usual in handling these subjects, but their omission does not, it is believed,, impair the general effectiveness of his argument. Nothing wttlly necessary to it is sacrificed, and more than enough is retained to substantiate his main conclusion, that the Scriptures of the Old and the New Testament are inadequate to the controversial burden, placed on them by the Reformers, of guaranteeing the credibility of the incomprehensible tenets of orthodoxy. The increased interest now generally felt in Biblical studies in England, coupled with the growing consciousness of the unsettled and thoroughly unsatisfactory condition of the religious problem, seems to promise a still wider popularity for so admirably lucid, temperate, and reverent a statement of the case against the popular Creed. Such a book should prove for many a valuable introduction to the rational study of Religion, and notably contribute to the cause of genuine reformation by the exposure of the untenable nature of the traditional teaching. The path of enlightenment is most effectually barred by the common assumption of the inerrancy of the Scripture record in all matters of belief and conduct. This work is designedly re published as a compendious refutation of the claims of Religion built on authority, Biblical or ecclesiastical; as an incentive to the study of the religious question, and an encouragement to the cultivation of habits of thought and selfreliance in matters of belief. The moral of the book is that a man should learn to think for himself. “ He,” says Zschokke, “ who does not like living in the furnished lodgings of tradition must build his own house, his own system of thought and faith, for himself.” W. R. Washington Sullivan. January, iQOg. �CONTENTS Preface to the Present Edition PAce 3 ..... .... 7 ..... 13 Author’s Preface to the First Edition Introduction to Third Edition CHAPTER I. Inspiration of the Scriptures 35 ..... CHAPTER II. Authorship and Authority of the Pentateuch and the Old Testament Canon Generally. • • ' 46 • CHAPTER III. 53 The Prophecies ........ CHAPTER IV. Theism of the Jews Impure and Progressive . . 60 . CHAPTER V. Origin of the Gospels ...... 64 CHAPTER VI. Fidelity of the Gospel History—Nature and Limits 71 CHAPTER VII. . Fidelity of the Gospel History Continued—Matthew . 80 CHAPTER VIII. Same Subject Continued—Mark and Luke . . . 87 . . . 91 CHAPTER IX. Same Subject Continued—Gospel of John. �CONTENTS 6 CHAPTER X. Results of the Foregoing Criticism CHAPTER XI. Resurrection of Jesus. ..... 103 CHAPTER XII. Is Christianity a Revealed Religion? 112 CHAPTER XIII. Christian Eclecticism . . 119 �PREFACE THIS work was commenced in the year 1845, and was finished in 1848. Thus much it is necessary to state, that I may not be sup­ posed to have borrowed without acknow­ ledgment from works which have preceded mine in order of publication. It is now given to the world after long hesitation, with much diffidence, and with some misgiving. For some time I was in doubt as to the propriety of publishing a work which, if it might correct and elevate the views of some, might also unsettle and destroy the faith of many. But three con­ siderations have finally decided me. First. I reflected that, if I were right in believing that I had discerned some frag­ ments or gleams of truth which had been missed by others, I should be acting a criminal and selfish part if I allowed personal considerations to withhold me from promulgating them ; that I was not entitled to take upon myself the privilege Of judging what amount of new light the world could bear, nor what would be the effect of that light upon individual minds ; that sound views are formed and estab­ lished by the contribution, generation after generation, of widows’ mites ; that, if my small quota were of any value, it would spread and fructify, and, if worthless, would come to naught. Secondly. Much observation of the con­ versation and controversy of the religious world had wrought the conviction that the evil resulting from the received notions as to Scriptural authority has been immensely under-estimated. I was compelled to see that there is scarcely a low and dishonour­ ing conception of God current among men, scarcely a narrow and malignant passion of the human heart, scarcely a moral obliquity, scarcely a political error or misdeed, which Biblical texts are not, and may not be, without any violence to their obvious signi­ fication, adduced to countenance and justify. On the other hand, I was com­ pelled to see how many clear, honest, and aspiring minds have been hampered and baffled in their struggles after truth and light, how many tender, pure, and loving hearts have been hardened, perverted, and forced to a denial of their nobler nature and their better instincts, by the ruthless influence of some passages of Scripture which seemed in the clearest language to condemn the good and to denounce the true. No work contributed more than Mr. Newman’s Phases of Faith to force upon me the conviction that little progress can be hoped for, either for religious science or charitable feeling, till the question of Bibli­ cal authority shall have been placed upon a sounder footing, and viewed in a very dif­ ferent light. Thirdly. I called to mind the probability that there were many other minds like my own pursuing the same inquiries, and grop­ ing towards the same light; and that to all such the knowledge that they have fellow­ labourers where they least expected it must be a cheering and sustaining in­ fluence. It was also clear to me that this work must be performed by laymen. Clergymen of all denominations are, from the very nature of their position, incapacitated from pursuing this subject with a perfect freedom from all ulterior considerations. They are restrained and shackled at once by their previous confession of Faith, and by the �8 PREFACE consequences to them of possible conclu­ sions. It remained, therefore, too see what could be done by an unfettered layman, endowed with no learning, but bringing to the investigation the ordinary education of an English gentleman, and a logical faculty exercised in other walks. The three conclusions which I have chiefly endeavoured to make clear are these : that the tenet of the Inspiration of the Scriptures is baseless and un­ tenable under any form or modification which leaves to it a dogmatic value ; that the Gospels are not textually faithful records of the sayings and actions of Jesus, but, occasionally at least, ascribe to Him words which He never uttered and deeds which He never did ; and that the Apostles only partially comprehended, and imper­ fectly transmitted, the teaching of their Great Master. The establishment of these points is the contribution to the progress of religious science which I have attempted to render. I trust it will not be supposed that I regard this work in any other light than as a pioneering one. A treatise on religion that is chiefly negative and critical can never be other than incomplete, partial, and preparatory. But the clearing of the ground is a necessary preliminary to the growing of the seed ; the removal of super­ incumbent rubbish is indispensable to the discovery and extraction of the buried and mtermingled ore ; and the liberation of the mind from forestalling misconceptions, misguiding prejudices, and hampering and distracting fears must precede its setting forth, with any chance of success, in the pursuit of Truth. Nor, I earnestly hope, will the book be regarded as antagonistic to the Faith of Christ. It is with a strong conviction that popular Christianity is not the religion of Jesus that I have resolved to publish my views. What Jesus really did and taught, and whether his doctrines were perfect or superhuman, are questions which afford ample matter for an independent work. There is probably no position more safe and certain than that our religious views must, of necessity, be essentially imperfect and incorrect ; that at best they can only form a remote approximation to the truth, while the amount of error they contain must be large and varying, and niay be almost unlimited. And this must be alike, though not equally, the case, whether these views are taught us by reason or by revela­ tion—that is, whether we arrive at them by the diligent and honest use of those facul­ ties with which God has endowed us, or by listening to those prophets whom he may have ordained to teach us. The difference cannot be more than this: that in the latter case our views will contain that fragment, or that human disguise, of positive truth which God knows our minds are alone cap­ able of receiving, or which he sees to be fitted for their guidance ; while in the former case they will contain that form or fragment of the same positive truth which he framed our minds with the capability of achieving. In the one case they will con­ tain as much truth as we can take in, in the other as much as we can discover ; but in both cases this truth must necessarily not only be greatly limited, but greatly alloyed, to bring it within the competence of finite human intelligences. Being finite, we can form no correct or adequate idea of the Infinite ; being material, we can form no clear conception of the Spiritual. The question of a Revelation can in no way affect this conclusion, since even the omni­ potence of God cannot infuse infinite con­ ceptions into finite minds—cannot, with­ out an entire change of the conditions of our being, pour a just and full knowledge of his nature into the bounded capacity of a mortal’s soul. Human intelligence could not grasp it; human language could not express it. “The consciousness of the individual [says Fichte] reveals itself alone; his know­ ledge cannot pass beyond the limits of his own being. His conceptions of other things and other beings are only his con­ ceptions; they are not those things or beings themselves. The living principle of a living Universe must be infinite, while all our ideas and conceptions are finite, and �PREFACE ^applicable only to finite beings. The Deity is thus not an object of knowledge, but of faith, not to be approached by the under­ standing, but by the moral sense ; not to be conceived, but to be felt. All attempts to embrace the infinite in the conception of the finite are, and must be, only accom­ modations to the frailty of man........ “Atheism is a charge which the common understanding has repeatedly brought against the finer speculations of philosophy, when, in endeavouring to solve the riddle of existence, they have approached, albeit with reverence and humility, the source from which all existence proceeds. Shrouded from human comprehension in an obscurity from which chastened imagination is awed back, and thought retreats in conscious weakness, the Divine nature is surely a theme on which man is little entitled to dogmatise. Accordingly, it is here that the philosophic intellect becomes most painfully aware of its own insufficiency........But the common understanding has no such humility; its God is an Incarnate Divinity; imperfection imposes its own limitations on the Illimitable, and clothes the inconceiv­ able Spirit of the Universe in sensuous and intelligible forms derived from finite nature 1” This conviction once gained, the whole rational basis for intolerance is cut away. We are all of us, though not equally, mis­ taken, and the cherished dogmas of each of us are not, as we had fondly supposed, the pure truth of God, but simply our own special form of error—the fragmentary and refracted ray of light which has fallen on our own minds.1 But are we, therefore, to relax in our pursuit of truth, or to acquiesce contentedly in error ? By no means. The obligation still lies upon us as much as ever to press forward in the search; for, though absolute truth is unattainable, yet the amount of error in our views is capable of progressive * “ 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. 9 and perpetual diminution, and it is not to be supposed that all errors are equally in­ nocuous. To rest satisfied with a lower degree of truth than our faculties are cap­ able of attaining, to acquiesce in errors which we might eliminate, to lie down con­ sciously and contentedly in unworthy con­ ceptions of the Nature and Providence of God, is treason alike to him and to our own soul. It is true that all our ideas con­ cerning the Eternal Spirit must, considered objectively, be erroneous, and that no revelation can make them otherwise ; all, therefore, that we require, or can obtain, is such an image or idea of him as shall satisfy our souls and meet our needs, as shall (we may say) be to us subjectively true. But this conception, in order to become to us such satisfying and subjective truth, must, of course, be the highest and noblest that our minds are capable of form­ ing;1 every man’s conception of God must consequently vary with his mental cultiva­ tion and mental powers. If he content himself with any lower image than his intel­ lect can grasp, he contents himself with that which is false to him, as well as false in fact—one which, being lower than he could reach, he must ipso facto feel to be false. The peasant’s idea of God—true to him—would be false to me, because I should feel it to be unworthy and inadequate. If the nineteenth century after Christ adopts the conceptions of the nineteenth century before him, if cultivated and chastened Christians adopt the conceptions of the ignorant, narrow, and vindictive Israelite, they are guilty of thinking worse of God, of taking a lower, meaner, more limited view of his nature, than the faculties he has bestowed are capable of inspiring ; and, as the highest view we are capable of forming must necessarily be the nearest to the truth, they are wilfully acquiescing in a lie—they are guilty of what Bacon calls “ the apothe­ osis of error,” stereotyping and canonising one particular stage of the blunders through which thought passes on its way to truth. 1 Religious truth is therefore necessarily pro­ gressive, because our powers are progressive—a position fatal to positive dogma. �IO PREFACE Now, to think (or speak) ill of God is to incur the guilt of blasphemy. It is surpris­ ing that this view of the matter should so rarely have struck the orthodox ; but they are so intently occupied with the peril on one side that they have become blind or careless to the, at least, equal peril that lies on the other. If, as they deem, erroneous belief be dangerous and criminal, it must be so whether it err on the side of deficiency or of excess. They are sensitively and morbidly alive to the peril and the sin of not believing everything which Revelation has announced, yet they are utterly blind to what should be regarded as the deeper peril and the darker guilt of believing that Revelation has announced doctrines dis­ honouring to the pure majesty of God. If it be wrong and dangerous to doubt what God has told us of Himself, it must surely be equally so, or more so, to believe, on inadequate evidence, or on no evidence at all, that He ever taught doctrines so derogatory to His attributes as many which orthodox theology ascribes to Him. To believe that he is cruel, short-sighted, capricious, and unjust is an affront, an in­ dignity, which (on the orthodox supposition that God takes judicial cognisance of such errors) must be immeasurably more guilty and more perilous than to believe that the Jews were mistaken in imagining that He spoke through Moses, or the Christians in imagining he spoke through Paul. He is affirmed to be a jealous God, an angry God, a capricious God, punishing the innocent for the sins of the guilty, punishing with infinite and endless torture men whom He had created weak, finite, and ephemeral—nay, whom He had fore-ordained to sin—a God who came down from heaven, walked among men, feasted at their tables, endured their insults, died by their hands. Is there no peril in all this, no sin in believing all these unworthy puerilities of a Creator who has given us Reason and Nature to teach us better things ? Yet countless Christians accept them all with hasty and trembling dismay as if afraid that God will punish them for being slow to believe evil of Him. I We have seen that the highest views of religion which we can attain here must, from the imperfection of our faculties, be necessarily inaccurate and impure; but we may go further than this. It is more than probable that religion, in order to obtain currency and influence with the great mass of mankind, must be alloyed with an amount of error which places it far below the standard attainable by human capa­ cities. A pure religion—by which we mean one as pure as the loftiest and most culti­ vated earthly reason can discern—would probably not be comprehended by, or effective over, the less-educated portion of mankind. What is truth to the philosopher would not be truth, nor have the effect of truth, to the peasant. The religion of the many must necessarily be more incorrect than that of the refined and reflective few, not so much in its essence as in its forms, not so much in the spiritual idea which lies latent at the bottom of it as in the symbols and dogmas in which that idea is embodied. In many points true religion would not be comprehensible by the ignorant, nor con­ solatory to them, nor guiding and support­ ing for them. Nay, true religion would not be true to them—that is, the effect it would produce on their mind would not be the right one, would not be the same it would produce on the mind of one fitted to receive it and competent to grasp it. To undisciplined minds, as to children, it is probable that coarser images and broader views are necessary to excite and sustain the efforts of virtue. The belief in an zz®* mediate heaven of sensible delight and glory will enable an uneducated man to dare the stake in the cause of faith or free­ dom ; the idea of Heaven as a distant scene of slow, patient, and perpetual pro­ gress in intellectual and spiritual being would be inadequate to fire his imagination or to steel his nerves. Again, to be grasped by, and suitable to, such minds, the views presented them of God must be anthropo­ morphic, not spiritual, and in proportion as they are so they are false; the views of His government must be special, not universal, and in proportion as they are so they will �PREFACE il livered it, where would it now have been ? Would it have reached our times as a sub­ amid clouds and thunder, and attested by stantive religion ? Would truth have physical prodigies, are of a nature to attract floated down to us without borrowing the and impress the rudest and most ignorant wings of error ? These are interesting, minds, perhaps in proportion to their rude­ though purely speculative, questions. ness and their ignorance. The sanctions One word in conclusion. Let it not be derived from accordance with the breath­ ings of Nature and the dictates of the soul supposed that the conclusions sought to be are appreciable in their full strength by the established in this book have been arrived at eagerly, or without pain and reluctance. trained and nurtured intelligence alone.1 The rapid spread and general reception The pursuit of truth is easy to a man who of any religion may unquestionably be has no human sympathies, whose vision is accepted as proof that it contains some vital impaired by no fond partialities, whose truth; it may be regarded also as an equally heart is torn by no divided allegiance. To certain proof that it contains a large ad­ him the renunciation of error presents few mixture of error—of error, that is, cognis­ difficulties; for the moment it is recognised able and detectable by the higher human as error its charm ceases. But the case is minds of the age. A perfectly pure faith very different with the searcher whose would find too little preparation for it in affections are strong, whose associations the common mind and heart to admit of are quick, whose hold upon the past is prompt reception. The Christian religion clinging and tenacious. He may love truth would hardly have spread as rapidly as it with an earnest and paramount devotion, did had it remained as pure as it came but he loves much else also. He loves from the lips of Jesus. It owes its success errors which were once the cherished con­ probably at least as much to the corrup­ victions of his soul. He loves dogmas tions which speedily encrusted it, and to which were once full of strength and beauty the errors which were early incorporated to his thoughts, though now perceived to with it, as to the ingredient of pure and be baseless or fallacious. He loves the sublime truth which it contained. Its pro­ church where he worshipped in his happy gress among the Jews was owing to the childhood, where his friends and his family doctrine of the Messiahship, which they worship still, where his grey-haired parents erroneously believed to be fulfilled in Jesus. await the resurrection of the just, but where Its rapid progress among the Pagans was he can worship and await no more. He greatly attributable to its metaphysical loves the simple old creed which was the accretions and its heathen corruptions. creed of his earlier and brighter days, Had it retained its original purity and which is the creed of his wife and children simplicity, had it been kept free from all still, but which inquiry has compelled him extraneous admixtures, a system of noble to abandon. The past and the familiar Theism and lofty morality, as Christ de- have chains and talismans which hold him back in his career, till every fresh step for­ * All who have come much into contact with ward becomes an effort and an agony, the minds of children or of the uneducated every fresh error discovered is a fresh bond doses are fully aware how unfitted to their snapped asunder, every new glimpse of mental condition are the more wide, catholic, light is like a fresh flood of pain poured in and comprehensive views of religion, which yet We hold to be the true ones, and how essential upon the soul. To such a man the pursuit tt is to them to have a well-defined, positive, of truth is a daily martyrdom—how hard Somewhat dogmatic, and, above all, a divinely- and bitter let the martyr tell. Shame altested and authoritative creed, deriving its Sanctions from without. Such are best dealt to those who make it doubly so; honour to with by rather narrow, decided, and undoubting those who encounter it saddened, weeping, minds. trembling, but unflinching still. be false. The sanctions which a faith derives from being announced from Heaven �12 PREFACE To this martyrdom, however, we believe there is an end ; for this unswerving in­ tegrity there is a rich and sure reward. Those who flinch from inquiry because they dread the possible conclusion ; who turn aside from the path as soon as they catch a glimpse of art unwelcome goal ; who hold their dearest hopes only on the tenure of a closed eye and a repudiating mind—will, sooner or later, have to en­ counter that inevitable hour when doubt will not be silenced, and inquiry can no longer be put by ; when the spectres of old misgivings which have been rudely repulsed, and of questionings which have been sent empty away, will return “ to haunt, to startle, to waylay”; and will then find their faith crumbling away at the moment of greatest need, not because it is false, but because they, half-wilfully, half fearfully, grounded it on false foundations. But the man whose faith in God and futurity has survived an inquiry pursued with that “ single eye ” to which alone light is promised has attained a serenity of soul possible only to the fearless and the just. For him the progress of science is fraught with no dark possibilities of ruin ; no dreaded discoveries lie in wait for him round the corner ; since he is indebted for his short and simple creed, not to shelter­ ing darkness, but to conquered light. �INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION This book was originally published nearly a quarter of a century ago. Its sale, since then, though by no means large, has been singularly continuous and regular—the number of copies taken by the public having scarcely varied from year to year ; and the second edition was disposed of somewhat more rapidly than the first. It is, therefore, fair to conclude that the work met a permanent want felt by many of my countrymen which no other writings at the time accessible to them could furnish, and at least temporarily filled a gap in our literature which, so far as I am aware, has not since been otherwise supplied. During the period that has elapsed since its publi­ cation, moreover, I have received many gratifying and even touching testimonies both from friends and strangers as to the assistance which it rendered them and the comfort which it suggested to them, when their minds were perplexed and agitated by the doubts and the questions which had disturbed my own. Under these circum­ stances I have acceded without demur to the wish of my publisher to issue a new and revised edition. I have re-perused every chapter with great care, but I have added little and altered less. Here and there I have modified a phrase where I thought I had expressed myself too confidently or too harshly, or where I appeared to have fallen into incor­ rectness or exaggeration; but the changes introduced have been few and slight. On the whole, I thought it wisest and fairest to leave the text as it originally stood, bearing distinct marks of the date at which it was written, when the topics discussed were comparatively new to English readers, and when the several authors who have since handled them, and thrown so much light upon them, had not yet put their views before the world. But I have re-considered every point with caution, and I am sure with candour ; I have read with attention and respect, and with a real desire to profit, the various criticisms and replies which the book on its first publication called forth ; and I am bound to say that I see no reason to believe that I was in error as to any essential point. The progress made in Biblical criticism and historical science during the last five-and-twenty years has furnished abundant confirmation, but I think refutation in no single instance. It is in no spirit of elation or self-applause that I say this—even if with some unfeigned surprise ; for I know better than most with how little learning the book was written, and how much learning—to say nothing of genius and insight—has since been brought to bear on the subject. Strauss’s great work had, indeed, been published and translated into English before my work appeared ; but Bishop Colenso’s Inquiry into the Pentateuch, Ecce Homo, Renan’s Vie de Jésus and his Apostolic volumes, The Jesus oj History, by Sir H. D. Hanson, Chief Justice of South Australia—à work well worth perusal, as having in some degree a special standpoint of its own, and showing the impression made by the evidence adducible on a trained legal mind—and Arnold’s Literature and Dogma, are all of much later date. ***** It was remarked by a friendly critic of my first edition that, in approaching the question of the resurrection of Christ from �14 INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION the side of the Gospels instead of from that of the Epistles, I had thrown away the main strength of the case. The criticism is just, and in deference to it I have since reconsidered the subject from the point of view suggested. The Epistles were of prior date to the Gospels;1 the earliest statement, therefore, that we possess of the fact of the resurrection, as well as the only one whose author we know for certain, is that contained in Paul’s first Epistle to the Corinthians xv. 3-8. Leaving out of view the Gospels, then, the evidence of the great foundation doctrine of the Christian creed consists in these two indisputable points— that all the Apostles and disciples believed it, had no doubt about it, held it with a con­ viction so absolute that it inspired them with zeal and courage to live as missionaries, and to die as martyrs ; and that Paul, fiveand-twenty years after the event, wrote of it thus : “For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins, according to the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures,1 and that he was seen of 2 Cephas, then of the Twelve ; after that he was seen of above five hundred brethren at 1 The date of the Gospels is at best conjec­ tural. No authority, however, we believe, would place even the earliest of them before a.d. 60 or 65, many much later. Now, the Epistle to the Corinthians was written almost certainly about a.d. 57, and the other Pauline writings between 52 and 68. (See Conybeare and Howson. ) [This note reflects the judgment of the author’s time. For a compendious statement of the latest views on the date of the Gospels, and of the Epistles bearing the name of Paul, see the Encyclopaedia Bíblica under “Gospels” and “ Paul,” and the several epistles. See also Mr. Whittaker’s Origins of Christianity (Watts)]. 2 Our readers will not fail to notice the shadow of doubt which the expression “according to the Scriptures” throws over even this direct testimony. “According to the Scriptures” simply means, whenever it occurs, “in supposed fulfilment of the erroneous interpretation of the Old Testament Psalms and Prophecies then cur­ rent.” Paul, moreover, it should be observed, here merely speaks at second-hand, and declares what he had been told by others, “ that which I also received.” I once, of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep. After that he was seen of James, then of all the Apostles. And, last of all, he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due season.” Now, if this were all, if we had no further testimony to the resurrection of Jesus from the dead than that it was believed by the whole original Christian Church, that the Apostles and personal followers of Christ, who must be supposed to have had the best means of knowing it, clung to the convic­ tion enthusiastically, and witnessed to it by their preaching and their death ; and that Paul, not a personal follower, but in con­ stant communication with those who were, made the above assertions in a letter addressed to one of the principal Churches, and published while most of the eye­ witnesses to whom he appeals were still alive to confirm or to contradict his state­ ments ; if the case rested on this only, and terminated here, every one, I think, would feel that our grounds for accepting the re­ surrection as an historical fact in its naked simplicity would be far stronger than they actually are. In truth, they would appear to be nearly unassailable and irresistible, except by those who can imagine some probable mode in which such a positive and vivifying conviction could have grown up without the actual occurrence having taken place to create it. Such explanation has been offered by many writers—by Strauss, by Renan, by Arnold, by Hanson, and others. I have considered them all, I think, dispassionately ; and, ingenious as they are (especially the detailed one of M. Renan), I am bound to say they do not satisfy my mind— they do not convince me, I mean, that the belief arose as they suggest. They are very skilful, they are even probable enough; but they do not make me feel that the true solution of the mystery has been reached. Nor can I, with any confidence, offer one of my own, though I can conceive one more simple and inherently likely than those propounded. But the real difficulty lies in the Gospel narratives. The evangelists contradict the �INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION apostle. Nay, more ; they show that the i5 received him out of their sight, fl his view belief of the Christian Church was not may be said, moreover, to be countenanced simple, uniform, and self-consistent, as Paul’s statement would lead us to suppose, but that it was singularly v^gue, various, and self-contradictory. Nay, worse still; they not only show in how many fluctuating shapes it existed, but they suggest how the belief may have formed itself by specifying a number of the circumstantial details around which it grew and solidified so rapidly. In the Epistles and the Acts we find simply the assertion of the fact, and evidence to the universal conviction. In the Gospels we read the several traditions accepted in the Christian community, thirty Of more years after the event, as to the nature and surrounding context of that ©vent. Now, here commences our serious embarrassment ; and the embarrassment consists in this, that the new witnesses called —possibly very incompetent ones—make it impossible to arrive at any clear or definite Conclusion as to the what or the how. That is to say, we cannot frame any theory whatever as to the resurrection, which is not distinctly negatived by one or the other of the evangelical accounts. If the occurrence were to rest only on the Gospel narratives, rational belief would be almost out of the question. If the belief in the early Church had been based upon these' narratives (which it was not), that belief could carry with it only the faintest authority. Let us follow out this view a little in detail. Some have imagined that the reappear­ ance of the risen Jesus to his disciples was ©f the nature of those apparitions of departed friends as to the occurrence of which there exists such a mass of overwhelming testi­ mony ; and the related mode of his appear­ ances and disappearances give some primcl facie colouring to the idea. He vanished out of the sight of the companions at Emmaus ; he ceased to be seen of them. When the disciples were assembled at Jerusalem, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them (John adds in two passages, that the doors were shut?) “While he blessed them he was parted from them, and carried Up into heaven.” In the Acts, a cloud by the language of Paul himself, who classes the appearance of Jesus to himself, along with his appearances to others; yet his, we know, was an apparition (rather an audition, for he speaks of hearing him, not of seeing him). But, then, this theory is distinctly negatived by the assertions that Jesus assured the affrighted disciples (who had imagined him to be an apparition) that he was actually thus present inflesh and bones, his real old self, with hands and feet, and bodily organs, and able and desirous to eat. In fact, Jesus seems positively to have refused to be considered in the light of the supernatural being his startled followers would at once have made of him, and did make of him shortly after. Others, again, adopt the supposition that Jesus did not actually die on the cross, but merely swooned and revived naturally, or by the aid of Joseph of Arimathea, when taken down and laid in a temporary sepulchre. And this theory has many con­ siderations in its favour, all of which are dis­ cussed by Strauss and Renan. It appears, though the several accounts do not tally very closely, that he was not more than six hours, or perhaps not more than_/hzzr, upon the cross (how long in the grave we do not know—perhaps not an hour); and that, though so highly-wrought and delicate an organisation as that of Jesus must have been might well have succumbed to even that brief period of agony, yet that such speedy death from crucifixion was most unusual, and excited the surprise of Pilate. On this supposition, the subsequent appear­ ances narrated in Luke and Matthew are simple and natural enough, nor need we trouble ourselves to speculate on his after­ history and final disappearance from the scene ; but, then, this theory neutralises entirely the religious value of the occurrence, besides being irreconcilable with the “non­ recognition ” feature of the narratives, to which I now proceed. This feature is, in truth, the terrible em­ barrassment which the Gospel narratives present to those who hold the common �r6 INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION creed on the subject of the resurrection. Those narratives relate that many of the■ it is m the fourth Gospel that the non-recogi nition feature becomes most marked. Mary disciples who saw him after he rose from Magdalene, after Jesus had spoken to her the dead did not recognise him. They and she had turned to look at him, still 1 elate this of three or four of his most supposed him to be the gardener.” His remarkable appearances. Those who had most intimate disciples, when they saw him lived with him for years, and who had m Galilee, “knew not that it was Jesus” parted from him on the Friday, did not even though he spoke to them ; and eve’n know him again on the Sunday. If, then, he was so changed, so entirely not his John himself only inferred the presence of his master in consequence of the miraculous foimer self, that they could not recognise diaught of fishes, and Peter only accepted him, how could they know, or how can we the inference on John’s authority. “There­ know, that the person assumed to be Jesus fore, that disciple whom Jesus loved saith was actually their risen Lord? Does not this non-recognition almost irresistibly sug­ unto Peter, ‘It is the Lord.’ Now, when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he gest the inferences, that the excited imagi­ girt on his fisher’s coat and did cast himself nations of his more susceptible disciples mto the sea.” assumed some stranger to be Jesus, when One more difficulty—a very grave one_ they learned that his body had disappeared raised by the traditional accounts trans­ from the sepulchre, and that angels had affirmed that he was risen, and that those mitted to us in the Gospels, must be indi­ “ whose eyes were holden,” who “doubted,” cated, but needs nothing beyond indication. or “did not believe for joy and wonder,” These accounts all insist, in the strongest were the more prosaic and less impressible 1manner, upon the detailed demonstration that it was Jesus in bodily shape, in the same of the beholders ? The difficulty is obvi­ ously tremendous : let us look at the par­ actual form, with the same hands and feet and the same digestive organs and human ticulars. needs, whom they had known three days Matthew relates two appearances, in before, and had seen nailed to the cross, very general terms. Of the second he who now again came among them and says, “ but some doubted.” Mark — the conversed with them. Jesus himself is genuine Gospel of Mark, which, as we know, terminates with the Sth verse of the made to assure them that he was not a 16th chapter-says nothing of any appear­ spirit, but flesh and bones that could be handled. In this well-known presence, ances ; but, in the spurious addition, with these bodily organs and this earthly repeats twice that those who asserted that they had seen him were disbelieved, and frame, he is said to have been seen to ascend that Christ, when he appeared himself to into heaven. Can flesh and blood inherit the eleven, “upbraided them with their un­ the spiritual kingdom, or where was the belief.” Luke narrates two appearances, body dropped, and when was the transmuta­ tion carried out ? and incidentally mentions that “the eleven” But, now, instead of taking the Gospel reported a third “to Simon.” With refer­ ence to the first, he says of the two dis­ narratives as they stand promiscuously and ciples, Cleophas and a friend, who walked as a whole, let us discard those portions talked, and ate with Jesus at Emmaus for which are certainly or most probably unseveral hours, “their eyes were holden that genuine or spurious,and take into considera­ they should not know him.” With refer­ tion only that residue which may be fairly ence to the second appearance (“ to the assumed to embody the earliest traditions eleven it is said, first, “ that they were of the Christian community, and we shall affrighted, thinking they had seen a spirit” find most of the difficulties we have just men­ and, shortly afterwards, that “they yet tioned either vastly mitigated or quite dis­ believed not for joy, and wondered.” But persed. In fact—and I would draw par­ ticular attention to this conclusion—we who �| Wi bi tW '-?a tiq W| JftI qfe qs¡ foil nd sM; 713 to*' IS’ÍKJ l.-JEM ac-isa. i’ di INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION show that tibe Gospels are rather traditional than strictly historical narratives, absolutely authoritative and correct, are the persons who do special service to the doctrine of the resurrection by removing obstacles to its credibility. The whole of the accounts in the fourth Gospel then fall away and cease to embarrass us at all. At most, they only serve to indicate how tradition had been at work, and grown between the first and the second century—at least one generation, possibly two. Mark, probably the earliest writer of all, never presented any embarrass­ ment at all—unless, indeed, a negative one —for he says not a word of post-sepulchral appearances, and merely mentions the appearance of “ a young man ” at the tomb, who tells the disciples simply, and as a message, that Jesus is no longer there, but has gone before them into Galilee.1 Matthew, again, deals in general terms, and gives an account almost identical with that of Paul, though even less full and particular.3 Luke, alone, remains to trouble us ; Luke, who probably wrote when apparitional accounts had begun to multiply and magnify ; whose perplexing narrative about Emmaus is not even alluded to by any of the other evangelists, and must almost certainly have been unknown to them; and who directly contradicts Matthew as to the alleged command of Jesus that they should go into Galilee to meet him. Matthew says, “go into Galilee.” Luke says, “tarry in Jerusalem.” Looking, then, at the matter in this light, we may not unfairly accept Paul’s statement as embodying the whole of the recognised and authorised tradition of the early Church on the subject of the 'appearances of the crucified and risen Jesus. This assertion, and the general and absolute conviction of the apostolic com­ munity, remain as our warrant for believing 17 in the miraculous resurrection of our Lord. Are they adequate? This is prac­ tically the residual question calling for decision. It is perhaps far less important than is commonly fancied. I have already (Chapter XIII.) given my reasons for holding that, except it be regarded as establishing, and as needed to establish, the authority of the teaching of Christ, his resurrection has no bearing—certainly no favourable or con­ firmatory bearing—on the question of our future life. Just as the confident conviction of the earliest Christians, and the mighty influ­ ence that conviction exercised over their character and actions, constitute the chief evidence of the resurrection of Christ, so the existence of the Christian faith, its vast mark in history, and its establishment over the most powerful, progressive, and intel­ lectual races of mankind, constitute the strongest testimony we possess to its value and its truth. This may, or may not, be sufficient to prove its divine origin and its absolute correctness, but it is the best we have, and is more cogent by far than any documentary evidence could be. Chris­ tianity, as it prevails over all Europe and America, constituting the cherished creed, and at least the professed and reverenced moral guide of probably two hundred millions of the foremost nations upon earth, is a marvellous fact which requires account­ ing for, a mighty effect indicating a cause or causes of corresponding efficacy. What­ ever we may conclude as to its origin, that origin must, in one way or other, have been adequate to the subsequent growth. In some sense, in some form, the victory of the Christian religion must be due to some inherent energy, excellence, vitality, suit­ ability to the wants and character of man. F * The word he uses, moreover, is significant : Mere circumstances could not explain this he says, “he is risen,” not draoratrei, victory. We may safely go a step further, he is risen from the dead. and say that this vital force, this inherent 3 Moreover, it is the opinion of some very com­ excellence, this appropriateness, must have petent critics that the concluding portion of the last chapter of Matthew is not entitled to the been somethingstrange,subtle,unexampled. same character of indisputable genuineness as Those who conclude it, in consequence, to the rest of the Gospel. have been a special divine revelation offer 0 �18 INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION what we must admit to be -prime), facie the simplest and easiest solution. But the argument, as just stated, must not be pushed too far. Three considerations serve to indicate with how much caution, with what a large survey of history, with what a wide grasp and deep analysis of the phenomena of mind in various times and among various races, the problem must be approached. Christianity is not the most widely spread of the religions of mankind. Buddhism is of earlier date, and counts more millions among its votaries. Islam­ ism took its rise later, was diffused more rapidly, and rules over a larger area of the earth’s surface. At one time it seemed as if Christianity would go down before its triumphant career. Some readers of his­ tory may even be disposed to argue that but for two men and two battles—possibly but for a special charge of cavalry, or it may be a sudden inspiration of the leading generals—it might have done so. The spread of Buddhism, the spread of Islam­ ism, must have had an adequate cause, as well as the spread of Christianity. Again, the enthroned position and com­ manding influence of our religion testify, with power which we make no pretence of resisting, to its truth and its surpassing excellences. So much no sceptic, we fancy, would wish, or would venture, to deny. But this testimony is borne to Chris­ tianity, not any dogma of the creed care­ lessly called by that name ; to something inherent and essential in the religion—not to any particular thing which this or that sect chooses to specify as its essence. It does not testify at all—at least, the orthodox are not entitled to assume that it does—to the divinity of our Lord, to his miraculous resurrection, to his atoning blood, to the Trinitarian mystery, or to any one of the scholastic problems into which the Athanasian Creed has endeavoured to condense the faith of Christendom ; it may testify only, we believe it does, to that apocalypse and exemplification of the possibilities of holiness and lovableness latent in humanity, which was embodied in the unique life and character of Jesus, And, thirdly, it must be admitted without recalcitration, though the admission carries with it some vague and startling alarm of danger, that Christianity, with all its un­ approached truth and beauty, owes its rapid progress, and, in some vast degree, its wide and firm dominion, at least as distinctly, if not as much, to the errors which were early mingled with it as to the central and fault­ less ideas those errors overlaid. On one point, at least, all—even the thinking minds among thé most orthodox—will agree : that the mightiest and most inspiring con­ viction among the earliest Christians, that which vivified their zeal, warmed their elo­ quence, made death easy, and fear impos­ sible—that which, in fact, more than any other influence, caused their victories—was their unhesitating belief in the approaching end of the world and the speedy coming of their Lord in glory. That this was an entire delusion we now all acknowledge. Many of us go much further. Few will doubt that the doctrine of the Messiahship of Jesus aided most powerfully the triumph of his religion among the Jews, and that of his proper deity among the Gentiles (not to mention other scholastic and pagan accretions) ; and many now hold that these are as indisputable delusions as the other. In a word, truth has floated down to us upon the wings of error, treasured up and borne along in an ark built of perishable materials, and by human hands ; some devotees, therefore, still cling to the ark and the error as sacred agencies worthy of all reverence and worship, confounding what they have done with what they are. But we do not read that Noah thought it incumbent upon him to continue out of gratitude living in the ark when the water® had subsided. On the contrary, as soon as there was dry firm ground for the sole of his feet, he came forth from his preserving prison-house, and gave thanks and offered sacrifices to the Lord. “Are we yet Christians?” is the momen­ tous question of the day, which is being asked everywhere in a variety of forms. It is the question asked, and answered in �INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION 19 the negative, in the last remarkable and less conventional, but assuredly a more unsatisfactory volume of Strauss. “ Der correct and etymological, signification. 1 alte und der neue Glaube.” It is the ques­ tion asked, but not answered, in a striking monograph so entitled, which appeared in a recent number of the Fortnightly Review.1 It is the question which is forcing itself Upon the minds of all students of the tone and temper of the times, who cannot fail to recognise, with anxious speculation as to the results, that a vast proportion of the higher and stronger intellect of the age in nearly all branches of science and thought, as well as large bodies, if not the mass, of the most energetic section of the working Classes, is, day by day, more and more decidedly and avowedly shaking itself free from every form and variety of established Creeds. It is the question, finally, which is implied, rather than openly asked, in the various uneasy and spasmodic, perhaps somewhat blind, attempts on the part of the clergy, in the shape of “Speaker’s Com­ mentaries,” new churches, open-air preach­ ings, Pan-Anglican Synods, and the like, to meet a danger which they perceive through the mist, but of which they have scarcely yet measured the full significance and bear- ingAre we, then, ceasing to be Christians ? Is Christianity as a religion in very truth dying out from among us amid the con­ flicting or converging influences of this fermenting age ? Most observers, seeing Christianity only in the popular shape, and the recognised formularies, feel that there Ctth be little doubt about the matter. Strauss, accepting the “ Apostles’ Creed ” as the received and correct representation of the Christian faith, is just as distinct in his reply : “ If, then, we are to seek no subterfuges, if we are not to halt between two opinions, if our yea is to be yea, and our nay, nay, if we are to speak as honourable and straight­ forward men, then we must recognise the fact that we are no longer Christians ?” I should give a different reply, but only because I attach to the principal word a 1 March, 1873. entirely refuse to recognise the Apostles’ Creed, or the Nicene Creed, or the West­ minster Confession, or the Longer or Shorter Catechism, or the formularies of any Church, whether Catholic, Lutheran, Calvinistic, or United, as faithful embodiments or authoritative representations of Chris­ tianity. Rightly regarded, the very shape, character, purport, and title of these several documents negative their claims to be accepted as such. Christianity was not, in its origin, a series of sententious propo­ sitions, nor a code of laws, nor a system of doctrine, nor a “ scheme” of salvation,1 but 1 The very phrase, “scheme of salvation,” as applied to Christianity (like a somewhat analo­ gous one often employed, “ making our peace with God”), strikes us as offensive, and, when considered in relation to the details of the imagined scheme, almost monstrous. To those who have been brought up to this scheme from infancy of course it is not so (to such nothing would be); but as describing the impression made upon those who come to it later in life, and who look at it from the outside, the word is not too strong. A scheme is a “contrivance”—a contrivance for attaining an object, or getting out of a difficulty; and in the popular orthodox view the Christian dispensation is in plain words—and putting it in plain words will per­ haps be found its best and sufficient refutation and dissolvent—a “contrivance” concocted between God and his Son, between the first and second persons of the Trinity (or, as we should say, between the Creator of all worlds and Jesus of Nazareth, “ a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief”), for enabling the human race to escape from a doom and a curse which certain scholastic theologians fancy (as an inference from particular texts of Scripture) to have been in some way incurred, either from the offences of each individual or from the offence of a remote ancestor. The “scheme” first assumes that the original sin of our first parents (to say nothing of our own) cannot be forgiven, nor the taint inherited by their innocent descendants wiped out, without the rigid exaction of a penalty (“damnation,” eternal fire, and the like), altogether disproportioned to the offence—that the attributes of the Deity imply and involve this ‘ ‘ cannot. ” Then, since this doom is too horrible and the doctrine laid down in the above assump­ tion too repellent, alike in its basis and its con­ sequences, to be endured or accepted, the “scheme” then imagines the only Son of God (one hour’s pain of whom, as a partaker of the divine nature, is an equivalent to the eternal �20 INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION the outcome and combination of a holy life, a noble death, a wonderfully pure and perfect character and nature, a teaching at once self-proving and sublime—the whole absolutely unique in their impressive love­ ableness. I cannot but remember—what is so strangely though so habitually for­ gotten by all Christian sects—that this life was lived, this death consummated, this character displayed, this devotion exem­ plified and inspired, this righteousness preached and embodied, and this impression made, years before any convert or disciple conceived the fatal idea of formalising it all into a “creed.” Nay, more, I cannot but remember that it was not till long after the elevating,spiritualising, restraininginfluence of the actual presence and the daily example of Jesus was withdrawn, that anything fairly to be called “dogma” began to grow up among that apostolic society, whose best leaders even, as is obvious from the Gospel narrative, stood on a moral and intellectual level so far below their Master’s.1 I recognise more and more—what I believe will be generally admitted now—that the articles of faith, the sententious dogmas, the “scheme ” of salvation, which have usurped the name of “Christianity” and “the Christian religion,” originated almost wholly with Paul and that not only did they not form the substance of the teaching of Jesus, but that they are not to be found in, nor can obtain anythingbeyond the most casual, apparent, and questionable countenance from, his genuine and authentic words. And, finally, I remember and wish to recall to the reflection of my readers that this Paul, who thus transformed the pure, grand religion of his crucified Master, was dis­ tinguished by a character of intellect, subtle, metaphysical, and cultured, and therefore singularly discrepant, from that of Jesus ; that, moreover, he never knew Jesus upon earth, had never come under his influence, or been sobered by his saintly spirit and his clear, practical conceptions ; had never seen him in the flesh, nor heard sufferings of all human beings) agreeing to bear this doom instead of the myriads of the offending race. An impossible debt is first invented, necessitating the invention of an inconceivable coin in which to pay it. A God is imagined bent on a design and entertaining sentiments which it seems simple blasphemy and contradiction to ascribe to the father in heaven, whom Jesus of Nazareth came to reveal to us—and then he is represented as abandoning that design in con­ sideration of a sacrifice, in which it is impossible to recognise one gleam of appropriateness or of human equity. What looks very like a legal fiction, purely gratuitous, is got rid of by what looks very like a legal chicanery, purely fanciful. To use a terse simile of Macaulay, the scheme “resembles nothing so much as a forged bond, with a forged release endorsed on the back of it.” But the essential point to bear in mind is that not only do none of the genuine, authentic, indisputable words of Christ contain or counte­ nance this “scheme,” but the entire tone and context of his teaching distinctly ignore it, and are at variance with its fundamental concep­ tions. everything that was formal and therefore unessen­ tial in religion and morality, and preached the fulfilment of the moral element of the law and the prophets, and who, instead of laying down rules for the moral life of man, insisted upon principles and change of heart—was he, who, of all that Israel considered holy in the Scriptures, retained as essential no more than love to God and to one’s neighbour, and preached as the rule of life, ‘ Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them, for this is the law and the prophets ’—was he a dogmatist, a propounder of articles ? Was he, who made the true moral life of love as independent of Jewish doctrines as of the forms of the Jewish theocracy, who gave its tone to genuine humanity everywhere, even in the Samaritan and the heathen—nay, even placed the humane Samaritan above the orthodox priest and Levite—was he, who, without appealing to any ecclesiastical authority of tradition or of Scripture, found his witnesses in the common sense and in the con­ science of mankind, and recognised the true prophet by the moral power he displayed—was he a dogmatist ? Surely Christianity in its original form was not a confession nor a symbol; and to pass judgment on it as such is logically inadmis­ sible.”—Dr. Scholten, Theol. Review, April, 1 “ Is the Apostles’ Creed the original Chris­ tianity? we ask. Was it the mission of Jesus to draw up a confession and to give currency to a formulated doctrine, rather than to wake up fresh religious life and to lay down principles which must always hold good in matters of religion for every doctrinal system ? Was he, who dropped 1873. 1 [Or rather with Paulinism, it not being possible to ascribe the elaborated dogmatism of the longer epistles to the Apostle himself. See note above.] �INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION ¡his voice save m trance, in noonday visions, and ecstatic desert communings. It was the sincere and earnest, if some­ what ambitious, purpose of this book to dis­ entangle and disencumber the religion taught and lived by Jesus from the miscon­ ceptionsand accretions which have gathered round it, obscured it, overlaid it, often actu­ ally transmuted it, and which began to gather round it almost as soon as its founder had disappeared from the scene of his ministry. I shall have failed if I have not vindicated our right, and shown it to be our duty, to seek that pure original of devotional spirit and righteous life in the authentic words and deeds of Christ, and in these alone; and, in the prosecution of this search, to put aside respectfully but courage­ ously, whenever we see warrant for it, what­ ever, whether in the Gospels or the Epistles, confuses, obscures, blots, or conflicts with this spirit and this life. I conceive that I have vindicated this right, and established this obligation by showing that even the immediate personal disciples of our Lord misconceived him ; that the chief of the Apostles never was a companion or follower of Jesus in any sense, but claimed and gloried in what he declared to be a special, separate, and post-mortem revelation ; and that even the Gospels contain some things certainly, and several things probably, which did not emanate from Christ. I am disposed, therefore, to give an entirely opposite answer to Strauss’s ques­ tion to that which Strauss himself has given, and to believe that when we have really penetrated to the actual teaching of Christ, and fairly disinterred that religion of Jesus which preceded all creeds and schemes and formulas, and which we trust will survive them all, we shall find that, so far from this, the true essence of Christianity, being re­ nounced or outgrown by the progressive intelligence of the age, its rescue, re­ discovery, purification, and re-enthronement as a guide of life, a fountain of truth, an Object of faith, a law written on the heart, will be recognised as the grandest and most beneficent achievement of that intelligence. It may well prove its slowest as its hardest 2Î achievement, for it is proverbially more difficult to restore than to build up afresh. To renovate without destroying is of all functions that which requires the most delicate perceptions, the finest intuition, the most reverent and subtle penetration into the spirit of the original structure, as well as manipulation at once the most skilful and the most courageous. And the task imposed upon the thought and piety of the coming time is to perform this function on the faith and creed of centuries and nations —and to perform it amid the bewildering cries of interests and orders whom you will have rooted out of their comfortable and venerable nests ; of age, which you will have disturbed in its most cherished pre­ judices ; of affections, which you will have wounded in their tenderest points ; of massive multitudes whom you will have disturbed in what they fancied were con­ victions and ideas ; of worshippers whose idol only you will have overthrown, but who will cry out that you have desecrated and unshrined their God ; of craftsmen of the Ephesian type, who “know that by this craft they have their wealth and of cynical and faithless statesmen whose unpaid policemen and detectives (the more efficient and more feared because unseen), and whose self-supporting penal settlement elsewhere (the more dreaded by malefactors because remotely placed, invisible, and undefined), you will be supposed to have abolished. Another cognate question has been much discussed of late, and maybe answered, we think, nearly in the same way. It is asked, not only, “ Are we Christians ?” but “ Can a Christian life be lived out in modern days ?” “ Can we, and ought we to, regulate our personal and social life according to the precepts of Christ ?” “ Is Christianity, in very deed and as nakedly preached and ordinarily taught, applicable to modern society and extant civilisation ?” “ Is it possible, would it be permitted, can it be wise or right, to obey and act out the Christian rule of life in the British Isles and in 1873?” — No question can be more vital, none more urgent, none more �22 INTRODUCTION TO THE TH1RD EDITION essential to our peace of conscience. None, we may add, is more sedulously and scandalously shirked. There is no courage and no sincerity or downrightness among us in this natter. We half say one thing and half believe another. We preach and profess what we do not think of practising; what we should be scouted and probably punished if we did practise; what in our hearts and our dim, fled-from thoughts we suspect it would be wrong to practise. Wherein lies the explanation of this de­ moralising and disreputable untruthfulness of spirit? Are the principles we profess mistaken ? Is the rule of life we hold up as a guide erroneous, impracticable, or in­ applicable to the altered conditions of the age; or is it our conduct that is cowardly, feeble, self-indulgent, and disloyal? Is it our standard that is wrong, or merely our actions that are culpable and rebellious ? Is Christianity a code to b^,lived up to, or is it a delusion, a mockery, and a snare? The specialities for the conduct of life prescribed by Christ’s precepts and ex­ ample, as gathered from the Gospels and the proceedings of his first disciples, which current civilisation does trammel and oppose, and which current thought does question and controvert, are five in number: non-resistance to violence, the duty of almsgiving, the impropriety of providence and forethought, the condemnation of riches, and the communism which was sup­ posed to be inculcated, and which certainly was practised, by the earliest Christians. How far and under what modifications were these special precepts wise and sound at that time, and are they obligatory, permis­ sible, or noxious now ? I. The precepts commanding non-resist­ ance and submission to violence are too distinct and specific to allow us to pare them away to anything at all reconcilable with modern sentiments and practice, even by the most extreme use of the plea of oriental and hyperbolic language.1 They 1 “ I say unto you, that ye resist not evil; but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, go far beyond a prohibition of mere retalia­ tion or blame of hasty resentment or vindic­ tive memory. They distinctly command unresisting endurance of violence and wrong, whether directed against person or property. Now, can this precept be carried out, and would it be well that it should be? The first consideration that occurs to us is that obedience to it has never been seriously attempted. The common sense or the common instinct of Christians, in all ages and in all lands, has quietly but per­ emptorily put it aside as not meant for use. Indeed, Christians have habitually fought from the earliest times just as savagely as Pagans. They have seldom dreamed even of confining themselves to self-defence— self-defence, indeed, being condemned just as decidedly as aggression. Nay, they have habitually fought in the name, and, as they firmly believed, in the cause of Christ, have gloried in the title of “good soldiers of Christ,” have died with priestly blessing and absolution amid the rage of conflict, confident that their reward was sure, and that angels would bear them straightway to the bosom of the beloved Master whose orders they had so strangely set at naught. One sect, indeed, among Christians have professed to take this precept of Jesus literally—and what precept is to be so taken if this is not ?—and have professed to obey it to the letter. But, in the first place, the Society of Friends never pretended to carry out more than one-half of it. They never went the length commanded in the turn to him the other also. And if any man....... take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. And whomsoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.” “Put up thy sword, for all they that take the sword shall perish by the sword.” “ Blessed are the Meek, for they shall inherit the Earth.” It is true that in one of the Evangelists, just before his arrest, Jesus is reported to have said to the twelve : “ He that hath no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one.” But the passage is so unintelligible, and so entirely out of keeping with the context, that it is almost certainly a case of misreporting, or misconception, or wholly unwarranted tradition. A few hours later Jesus said: “ My kingdom is not of this world ; else would my servants fight.” �introduction to the third edition 23 act, must restrain and retribute. Who They »ever, we believe, denied themselves among us would for a moment advocate the luxury of passive resistance in its most their abolition? Who that deems it right tesolute and ingenious devices. They did to maintain them can pretend that the not return a blow ; but they did not make Christian precept of non-resistance is obey­ the first so easy or so pleasant as to invite able in these days, or that he is endeavour­ a second. And they have nearly died out. ing to obey it? His mind may be penetrated In the next place, they tried the experiment with the spirit of patience, humanity, and under circumstances which practically made consideration for his fellow-men which led non-resistance comparatively safe and easy Jesus to utter that command ; but the com­ •—namely, under the aegis of police and mand itself he simplyrepudiates and evades. There is still another view of the subject law. It is but seldom that any of us now have actually to ward off a blow, or by force to be taken. The worst ill-service you can to resist an attempt at robbery, because, do to the violent is to show them that they theoretically and potentially at least, the may work their wicked will unpunished and assailant knows and we know that the unchecked by the natural instincts of accredited guardians of order are there to humanity. It is to make them “ masters do it for us. In fact, the daily routine of of the situation,” to encourage them by Civilised life is organised on the assumption success and impunity, to enthrone them as that the necessity for self-defence and re­ mon archs of the world. It is to put good­ sistance to evil is taken off our hands. ness under the foot of evil, and so to drive Obedience to Christ’s precept becomes back the progress of Humanity, to retard wonderfully simplified — or rather it is the coming of “ the Kingdom of Heaven.” dexterously evaded—when we have only to It is, too, to harden the sinner in his wrong, hand over our enemy to the nearest con­ the criminal in his crime, the brute in his stable. We, in fact, do resist, and resist brutality ; to teach him to proceed in out­ like the merest Pagan—only we resist by rages and iniquities that pay so well; to deputy — disobeying vicariously, that we make him heap up wrath against the day of wrath. Hundreds, who would have been may be in a condition to obey in person. The truth is, that the whole of our crimi­ stopped at the outset of their criminal nal law and our police arrangements are career by prompt and timely'resistance, based upon a systematic repudiation of the are led on by the impunity which sub­ precepts in question; and the order of mission secures, till habits of crime are modern society and the security of modern formed and recovery becomes hopeless. life could not otherwise exist. In savage Non-resistance, then, becomes connivance Communities and in disordered times every and complicity in wrong. The orthodox reply to these common­ man must succumb to violence or must sense representations is well known, but defend himself. In such times obedience to the Christian precept would simply has never been convincing. The wrong-, mean the extermination or enslavement of doer, it is said, will be so amazed and all Christians, the supremacy of the violent melted by the calm acquiescence of his by the self-suppression of the gentle. In victim that his heart will be touched and our days division of labour is in the his conscience awakened by the unexpected - ascendant; and we delegate the duties of issue. He will be taken unawares, as it resisting violence and evil to a professional were—approached on an unguarded side ; Class. If bad men abound — and where and thus be disarmed in place of being would be the meaning of Christian precepts baffled, and converted instead of being and exhortations to a Christian life if they defeated. But, we apprehend, this antici­ did not?—then, if the criminal class are pation assumes one or two postulates fatal not to prosper and to reign, police and the to its realisation, and somewhat contradic­ repressive and punitive law must exist and tory. It assumes that resistance and text, of facilitating assault and coercion. �24 INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION retaliation are the rule—else there would be nothing in the attitude of meek endur­ ance to surprise the violent man into reflec­ tion and repentance. It implies, moreover, a susceptibility on the part of the violent which the habit of violence soon destroys. It seems, too, to pre-suppose a moral atmosphere that could only be created by a community of non-resisting Christians, or a world at least in which the wrong-doers were so comparatively few that they did not suffice to form a public opinion and class-sympathies of their own. It imagines the criminal, the oppressor, and the selfseeker, recoiling from the very facility and completeness of their success, and at the very moment when the prospect of its joys most radiantly dawns upon them. It expects them to be “ touched by grace ” just when the career of wrong looks most inviting and most full of promise. Such things may be—such things have been in isolated instances; but can they ever become normal? Can they be counted upon so as to form a safe or rational guide for conduct ? There is, however, one case in which the non-resistance doctrine is so obviously in­ applicable that no one, we believe, has ever dreamed of practising it—namely, in the case of quarrels between nations. For one country to submit to outrage and wrong at the hands of another, wffien the means of resistance lay in its power, has never been held right or obligatory. The ques­ tion has never seriously been brought under discussion ; it being perfectly clear that the relative position of different nations from the earliest times even to our own having always been that of jealous rivalry, ceaseless controversy either smouldering or flagrant, and hostility latent or avowed, any people that habitually and notoriously submitted to violence would simply be over-run, enslaved, or trampled out. The doctrine of non-resistance would mean nothing but the destruction of the gentler and finer races, and the rampant tyranny of the stronger ; the reign of violence, not of peace ; the triumph of Satan, not of Christ ; in a word, the suicide of all meek and truly Christian peoples. It is plain, then, that we have here one of three or four instances in which true Christianity must be held to require a dis­ regard of its own precepts in favour of its own principles, in which Christ’s exhorta­ tions are a guide to the spirit we must cherish, not to the conduct we must pursue. We must cultivate the temper which will effectually prevent us from being quick to resent or prone to retaliate, or severe to punish ; but without abnegating those natural instincts which are sometimes our safest guides, or ceasing to maintain that firm attitude of self-protection which, under the governance of good feeling and good sense, is the best antagonist to the preva­ lence of violence upon earth. II. Alms-giving.1—Scarcely any precept in the Gospel is more distinct or reiterated than this. No duty has been more peremp­ torily insisted upon by the Church in all times and in all countries. It was one of the chief functions of the monastic institu­ tions in the Middle Ages. It was made a legal obligation in the days which suc­ ceeded them. It is periodically inculcated from Protestant pulpits, and the Catholics are still more positive in enforcing it on all the faithful. Our own country swarms with proofs how literally and widely, genera­ tion after generation, the obligation has been acknowledged and fulfilled. The Reports of the Charity Commission, in countless volumes, bear testimony to the innumerable charities that exist, and explain a little what they have done. The recog­ nition of the obligation of alms-giving is, to this day, nearly as prevalent and as influ­ ential as ever. It is of all Christian pre­ cepts that which is most strictly obeyed— 1 “ Give to him that asketh of thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.” “Sell that thou hast and give alms.” “ Let thine alms be in secret, and thy Father, who seeth thee in secret, himself shall reward thee openly.” “He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none.” “Give alms of such things as ye have ; and behold all things are clean unto you. �INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION obedience to it being easier than to any other. A pious man and a tender-hearted woman do not feel comfortable or good unless they habitually give to beggars, or Spend a given portion of their income in succouring the poor, or those who seem such. Yet nothing can be more certain than that all this is very wrong and does infinite mischief. The more literally the precept [“give to him that asketh of thee”] is obeyed, the more harm does it do. No conclusion has been more distinctly or definitely proved than that nearly all charity, popularly so called—-more espe­ cially all indiscriminate alms-giving—is simply and singularly noxious. It is noxious, most of all, to the objects of it— whom it fosters in all mean and unchristian vices, in idleness, self-indulgence, and falsehood. It is noxious, in the next place, to the deserving and industrious poor, from whom it diverts sympathy. It is noxious, also, to the entire community, among whom it creates and cherishes a class of most pernicious citizens. The form which charity has a tendency to assume in societies so complicated as all civilised societies are growing now, is such as to drain the practice of nearly all its inciden­ tal good, and aggravate its peculiar mis­ chiefs. The alms-giver has not his kindly feelings called forth by personal intercourse with the poor.; he subscribes, he does not give; and charitable endowments and bequests are ingenious contrivances for diffusing the most widespread pauperism. Paupers become sneaks and vagrants; and vagrants soon grow into criminals. It is needless to dwell on this; the consentaneous voice of modern benevolence and states­ manship alike is crying out against alms­ giving as a mischief and a sin—as anything but philanthropy or charity—as a senti­ mental self-indulgence, and the very reverse of a Christian virtue, a distinct, and now nearly always a conscious, complicity in imposture, fraud, laziness, and sensuality. Everyone conversant with the question, all true lovers of their fellow-men, all earnest and practical labourers in the field of social 25 improvement, in the precise measure of their experience agree that, in all schemes and efforts for rectifying the terrible evils of our crowded civilisation, the most ubiquitous and insurmountable impedi­ ments arise out of the practice of indis­ criminate alms-giving and systematic charity. One of the most pernicious and objectionable of our daily habits is in strict obedience to one of the clearest and most positive of Christian precepts. Nor is it in England only that alms-giving is bad. It is bad everywhere; it is bad even in the East; it is very bad in Italy; it is worst of all perhaps in Spain. Everywhere it creates a special class of the worthless and the vicious, who soon become the criminal. It is of its essence to do this. The antagonism between the Christian precept and what ought to be the conduct of really Christian men is direct, complete, undeni­ able, and all but universal. The mischief has arisen out of the timehonoured practice—a practice which surely now-a-days would be more honoured in the breach than the observance—of looking into the Gospel as a code of conduct instead of a well-spring of spiritual influence, and picking out texts to act by and to judge by, as a French judge opens chapter and verse of the Code Napoleon, instead of imbuing ourselves with “the same mind that was in Christ,” and letting our behaviour after­ wards flow freely therefrom. Christ directed us “to do good” to our fellow-men, especially to the poor and helpless among them. In our stupid literalism we have taken this as a command to do them all the harm we can. “ He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none ”—read as an exhorta­ tion to use our abundance and our advan­ tages to succour the needy and assist the less fortunate, is conceived in a beautiful and righteous spirit. But how, when the second coat has been provided to meet next year’s exigencies at the cost of much diffi­ cult self-denial, and when the coat of the coatless man has been pawned for drink, and when the one which I give him is sure to follow its predecessor up the spout ? Is thrift to be discouraged and sodden �26 INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION sensuality to be fostered, in the name of a discharge of which more vitally concerns Christian duty ? The solution of the diffi­ their future welfare and their present peace. culty is very plain. Jesus put the abstract It is their improvidence that condemns principle in a parable or a concrete shape— them to squalor, to indigence, to depen­ as he always did: He commanded a dence, to wretched habitations, to unwhole­ benevolent frame of mind in the form of a some surroundings, and to all those moral precept to the simplest action to which that evils and dangers which follow in the wake frame of mind would instinctively lead in x)f these things. Few things can be more' b circumstances when reflection would sug­ i certain than that, if our working classes are [ gest nothing to control the impulse. Pro­ lever to emerge from their present most 1 bably he never reflected on the danger of Unsatisfactory condition, if they are to creating a whole tribe of begging impostors.. ^become respectable citizens and true Chris­ Perhaps the danger did not exist in that tians, they must learn to save for to-morrow’s , day. In any case, what he really designed (’needs, and to regard it as something very and desired was to produce a spirit of like a sin to leave to-morrow to take care boundless compassion and love which of itself. To spend all their gains when > should inspire his disciples with anxiety to those gains are ample, as they so habitually do all the good possible, to render all do, is obviously not only a folly, but some­ the aid possible to those who were in thing very like a fraud, inasmuch as it is distress or want; his aim was to elevate, wasting their own substance, in reliance not to degrade, to foster the Christian that when it fails they will be fed out of the virtues, not the selfish vices ; and the very substance of others. It is the conduct so texts that we read as enjoining alms-giving distinctly condemned in the case of the are really those which, interpreted aright, foolish virgins—with an aggravation. They most distinctly prohibit it. Here it is not do not forget to bring their oil; they de­ that a Christian life is not feasible in our liberately waste it, knowing that they may days ; it is only that it has become more say to their wiser neighbours, “ Give difficult because less simple ; and that in us of your oil, for our lamps are gone order to disentangle its dictates from its out.” The workman who, in receipt of dicta, and to pierce to its inner significance, good wages, saves nothing out of those demands more intellectual effort and more wages is wilfully improvident, relying on intellectual freedom than we are prone to the providence of others; for what is the exercise. Here, if anywhere, it is “ the property from which charitable funds are letter that killeth, and the spirit that giveth derived and on which poor rates are levied life.” What we have to ask ourselves is, but the accumulated savings of the provi­ “What would Christ, with all the circum­ dent and thoughtful ? What is all invested stances before him, have directed in these wealth, indeed, but the steadily augmented times ?” economies of those who, generation after generation, have taken thought for the III. Improvidence.—There is scarcely morrow? It is not too much to say that, i/ any exhortation in the line of social morality our artisan classes would for two genera­ more incessantly or more unanimously tions—perhaps even for one—be as frugal addressed to the people of this country than and as hoarding as the French peasant is, that which urges them to provide for the and as the better portion of the Scotch and future, “ to lay by for a rainy day”; to store Swiss once were, the whole face of the up something of their daily earnings against country would be changed ; they would be the time when those earnings may fail or menof property instead of being Proletaires; be interrupted. Assuredly there is no ex­ they could live in comfortable dwellings in hortation of which they stand more in need, place of wretched hovels and crowded nor one which they more habitually neglect. alleys ; they might be men of comparative Manifestly there is no duty the sedulous leisure instead of mere toilers all day and �INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION every day, from childhood to old age; education would be as much within their teach as it is within the reach of their betters now ; and the soil would be pre­ pared in which all the Christian virtues a»d most civilised enjoyments could easily take root and flourish. With providence ‘would come sobriety, with property would come independence, and all the facilities for a worthy and a happy life would grow up around them. In a word, providence, if not the very first duty of the social man, ranks very high among his duties, and is the sine qua non of any decided and perma­ nent improvement in either his social or his moral state. About this there can be no doubt. As to this there is no difference Of opinion. Yet it is not to be denied that this prime duty, this imperative obligation, this indis­ pensable condition of human advancement, JS not only deprecated, but actually de­ nounced and prohibited, in that Sermon on the Mount which we are accustomed to look to as the embodiment of the Christian r rule of life.1 I The words of Christ, and the exhorta’ tions of Christians, statesmen, economists, \ and moralists, are, then, directly at variance I —-and the latter are undeniably in the right. rlow is the difficulty to be met ? How must the discrepancy be reconciled ? Why HOt meet the question honestly and boldly, 1 Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink, nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on........ Behold the fowls of the air, for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not better than they ?...... And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they Spin ; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore if God so clothe the grass of the field...... shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith ?...... Take, therefore, no thought, saying what shall we eat ? or what shall we drink ? or wherewithal shall we be clothed? But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you........ Take, therefore, no thought for the morrow : for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. 27 and avow that Jesus was addressing hearers in a very different position and state of mind from the labourers and artisans of England—hearers who were wont to be not too careless, but too anxious, about the morrow; whose climate rendered com­ paratively little necessary, and yielded that little to very moderate toil; the conditions of whose civilisation were incomparably simpler than ours, and the obligations of_ whose labour less onerous.1 It may well ' be, then, that the exhortations which were * sound and appropriate to them are inapplic­ able to us. But we may probably, with perfect safety and with no irreverence, go a step further, and observe that Jesus, as was natural and customary, not only spoke with that Oriental picturesqueness of style which is almost inevitably exaggeration, but fixed his own thought and directed that of his hearers upon the one side and phase of truth with which he was at the moment dealing, to the exclusion of all qualifying considerations which must be taken into account as soon as we begin to frame a code of conduct or a system of action out of one isolated discourse addressed to one fraction of a great problem.2 Here, as elsewhere, the idea which lies at the root of the teaching is undeniably correct, for that idea deprecates and assails the inor­ dinate worldliness which constituted one of the most insurmountable obstacles to the reception of Christ’s doctrine. The error is ours, not Christ’s—and consists in per­ versely applying an exhortation addressed to a congregation among whom a particular quality of mind and temper was in excess to a congregation with whom it is most lamentably deficient. Had Jesus preached to English artizans, we may feel certain that 1 See Renan, Vie de Jesus, ch. x., for a vivid delineation of the entirely different surroundings and features of the life of the Galilean fishermen and peasants to whom these exhortations were originally addressed. 2 It must be remembered, too, that all these exhortations to lay up treasures in heaven, and not on earth, were delivered under the prevail­ ing impression that the Kingdom of Heaven, where all things would be differently ordered, was close at hand. �28 INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION he would have chosen a different theme, and used far other language. But that is by no means all that needs to be said. Not a word of Christ’s rebuke to those who were eaten up by excessive care for the good things of the world, and were led thereby to neglect treasures immeasurably more precious, can be pleaded in justification of those who are so far from undervaluing these good things that they insist upon their instan­ taneous enjoyment and their immediate ex­ haustion ; who lay by nothing for to-morrow only because, like the brutes that perish, they choose to eat up everything to-day; who, if they follow the letter of the law in laying up no treasure upon earth, utterly flout its spirit, inasmuch as they certainly lay up no treasure in heaven either. To eschew over-anxiety for future comfort and well-being, in order that we may be the freer for the work of righteousness, is the part of all true followers of Jesus; to “take no thought for the morrow ” that we may indulge the more unrestrainedly in the indo­ lence and sensualities of to-day, and toplead Gospel warrant for the sin, is to “wrest Scripture to our own destruction.” It would be well that divines should make this more clear. The form which Christ’s teaching would take were he to come on earth now, without the least real change in its essential spirit, would probably be : Take thought for to-morrow, and provide for its neces­ sities, in order that, when to-morrow comes, you may be free enough from sordid wants and gnawing cares to have some moments to spare for the things that belong unto your peace. do further to secure eternal life, is told to despoil himself of all his great possessions and give them to the poor. He is reluctant to do so, and Jesus thereupon observes that “ a rich man shall hardly enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.” According to Luke, he said : “ Blessed are the poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God. Woe unto you that are rich, for you have received your consolation.” “ Lay not up for your­ selves treasures upon earth.” In the parable of Dives and Lazarus, the rich man, with­ out the faintest intimation that he had any other fault than wealth, is relegated to the place of torment ; while the beggar, without the faintest intimation that he had any other merit but his indigence and his sores, is carried by angels into Abraham’s bosom ; and the startling and sole reason assigned for the award is that now it is the turn of Lazarus to be made comfortable. It is true that in one passage the harshness of Christ’s denunciation is modified into the phrase, “ How hard it is for them that trust in uncertain riches to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven”; and when his disciples are horrified at hearing that hard sentence about the needle’s eye, and exclaim, “ Who, then, can be saved?” he holds out a mysterious hope that in the infinite resources of the Most High some way of escape from the sweeping condemnation may be found. Still the prevailing tone and teaching of the Gospel cannot be gainsaid or veiled. It is to the effect that the poor are the more especial favourites of God; that wealth is a thing to be shunned, not to be sought ; that it distinctly stands in the way of salva­ tion, and will probably have to be atoned IV. Denunciation of Wealth.—There is for hereafter by terrific compensation. > no line of conduct so emphatically con­ Yet in spite of this emphatic warning, demned by Christ, and so eagerly pursued riches have been the most general pursuit by Christians, as the pursuit of riches. of Christians in all ages and among all, There is no mistake about either fact. classes, with rare exceptions in the monkish Throughout the Gospels riches are spoken ages; among real and earnest, as well as of not only as a peril and temptation to the among merely professing Christians ; among soul, but as something evil in themselves, the accredited teachers of the Gospel (to a something to be atoned for, something to be considerable extent), as well as among the singled out for condemnation. The young mere following flock of lay disciples. Nay man who has kept all the Commandments more, the most really Christian nations from his youth up, and asks what he must I have been, and still are, the most devoted �INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION to the pursuit of gain ; the most rigidly and ostentatiously Christian sections of those nations—shall we say the Quakers and the Scotch?—have been among the steadiest and most quietly successful in the search. •Nor do they even affect to fancy that they are wrong or disobedient in thus eagerly striving for that wealth which their Master so distinctly ordered them to eschew and dread ; they put aside or pass by his teach­ ing with a sort of staring unconsciousness, as if it in no way concerned them ; with a curious unanimity they vote his exhorta­ tions obsolete,. abstract, or inapplicable ; the most respectable of the religious world give one day to their Saviour and six days to their ledger ; the most pious banker, the purest liver, the most benevolent nobleman, never dreams of “despising riches,” or of casting from him his superfluous possessions as a snare to his feet and a peril to his soul. On the contrary, he is grateful to God for them ; he returns thanks for the favour which has so blessed his poor efforts to grow affluent; he resolves that he will use his wealth for the glory of God. Now, which is wrong—Christ in denoun­ cing riches, or Christians in cherishing them? Our Master in exhorting us to shun them, or his disciples .in seeking them so eagerly? Will modern society permit us to despise them ? And would it be well for modern society that we should ? The answer, if we dare to state it plainly, does not seem to be doubtful, or very recondite. We must imbue ourselves with the spirit of Christ’s teaching as enduring and sur­ viving, ever extant through all forms and all times ; and then we may safely ignore the letter as simply the accidental and temporary garment in which he clothed his meaning. This is probably the unper­ verted impulse of every true man, if he be a reflective man as well. Perhaps, indeed, the discrepancy between what Jesus preached, and that which every good and wise man would echo now, lies rather in the phraseology than in the essence of the doctrine. Jesus—living among the poor, cognisant of their “ sacred patience ” and their humble virtues, bent upon startling 29 his world out of the self-indulgent ease into which it had sunk, and profoundly impressed with the terrible influence which the abundance and the love of earthly possessions exercise in enervating the soul, incapacitating it for all high enterprise, all self-denying effort, all difficult achievement, seeing with a clearness which excluded for the moment all modifying considerations, the benumbing power of that fatal torpor and apathy which creeps over even nobler natures when this life is too luxurious and too joyful—-saw that absolute renunciation would be easier and safer than the righteous use of wealth. We, on the other hand, who know—what was invisible in those simpler days—how necessary is the accumulation of capital to those great undertakings which carry on the progress and the civilisation of our complex modern communities—naturally and rightly regard the employment of affluence, and not its pursuit or its possession, as the fit subject of our moral judgments. It was in the grave of a rich disciple that Jesus was laid after the crucifixion ; and in the parable of the talents he praised and recompensed the men who had doubled their capital by honest trading, while condemning and despoiling the feckless and unprofitable idler. And the wise and right-minded of our day would denounce as unmercifully as Christ himself the rich man whose riches blind him to the far higher value of spiritual aims and intellectual enjoyments ; whose luxury and lavish expenditure make life difficult for all around him ; whose ostenta­ tion is an evil and a temptation to those who take him as their model ; to whom opulence is not a grand means, a solemn trust, and a grave responsibility, but merely a source of sensual indulgence and of vacant worthlessness ; or who passes his youth and manhood in adding house to house and field to field, wasting life without what alone renders life worth having. We see, too, perhaps more clearly than could be seen in earlier times, that poverty has its own special and terrible temptations and obstacles to virtue, as well as wealth ; and that with us, at least, not affluence �30 INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION indeed, but assuredly competence, smooths the way, for the weaker brethren, to a crowd of Christian excellences. And finally, we recognise now, what was not known—perhaps was not the case—then, that though a rich man may use his wealth righteously and well, it is scarcely possible for him to get rid of it without doing mischief, and therefore doing wrong. V. Communism.—It cannot be said that the Gospel anywhere distinctly preaches a community of goods, though it may be felt that the general tone of Christ’s exhortations tends in that direction, But there can be no doubt that the earliest body of disciples, those who constituted what is termed the Church of Jerusalem,” did so interpret -the teaching of their Master, and “had all things in common,andsold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all, as every man had need.” The same statement is repeated still more fully and distinctly in the fourth chapter of the Acts : “ There was no one among them that lacked”; “ lands and houses were sold, and the produce laid at the Apostles’ feet for distri­ bution”; “neither said any man that aught of the things which he possessed was his own, but they had all things common.” It is difficult to describe the sinking of all private property in a common fund in plainer language ; and the strange story of Ananias and Sapphira, though the words are peculiar, can scarcely be held to invali­ date the conclusion. We can scarcely deny, then, that Com­ munism is in some sort a corollary of Christ’s teaching, though not a positively commanded part of Christianity. It has been held to be such by reforming sects and theorists in many ages, and various are the attempts recorded in history to reduce it to practice. The notion has been constantly reappearing during the last century, now in France, now in America. Many minds of no ordinary power have spoken in favour of the conception. Even Mr. J. S. Mill—who would have been a great Christian if he had not been a great thinker—has said that the idea at the root of it was irrefragably sound, “that every man should 'work according to his capaci­ ties, and should receive according to his wants.” Yet nothing is more certain than that every endeavour to carry out the scheme in practice has always failed, and, as the eminent man just named has admit­ ted, must always fail, being constantly ship­ wrecked on the same rock. The character­ istics of human nature forbid success. As men are constituted, if they receive accord­ ing to their wants, they never will work according to their capacities. If they are fed and provided with all they need, they will, as a rule, work as little as they can. As regards masses of men, it is only their regard for self that will compel them to do their duty by the community. The institution of private property, the conviction that “ if any man will not work, neither shall he eat,” alone calls forth adequate exertions, alone controls indefinite multiplications, alone counteracts inveterate laziness, alone raises nations out of squalor and barbarism, alone lifts man above the condition of the beasts that perish. Where communism prevails, nine men out of every ten try to get as much and to do as little as they can ; and the system, therefore, is found to be simply suicidal. It encounters, too, whenever attempted, another fatal difficulty. It is impossible for any external authority to determine what are each man’s capacities,or each man’s needs. Practically, therefore, communism is fatal to civilisation, fatal to order, fatal to freedom, fatal to progress ; and if Christianity commands, favours, or indicates communism, Chris­ tianity is fatal to all these good things. But the dim idea, the sound nucleus, which lies latent in the communistic creed—-the con­ ception, namely, that all our possessions, as well as all our gifts, are to be held in trust for the general good of all—is eminently aud distinctively Christian. It will be answered that Christianity aims, and professes, so to remould men’s natures, and to eliminate their vices, and to neutralise their selfishness, as to make a community of goods feasible, and not only compatible with, but conducive to, the �INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION highest and surest advance of the species. But we are dealing with the practical question: “ Is a Christian life liveable in our day?” And if communism be only possible and safe when all men are moulded in Christ’s image and permeated by his spirit, and is noxious and fatal to the best interests of humanity under all other con[ditions, then, if a community of goods be [Implied in a Christian life, that life indis­ putably is not practicable now. It is found in actual fact, and has been found in all lands and in all times, that the institution of private property, with all the selfishness it involves and all the selfishness it fosters, is alor.e capable of drawing forth from our imperfect natures that strenuous and en­ during exertion from which all progress springs. And this experience is the one sufficing, and perhaps the only unanswer­ able, justification of that often-assailed and .questioned institution. To sum up the results of our inquiry. It may be safely pronounced that non-resist­ ance, almsgiving, improvidence, and comImunism are not practicable in these days, and would be decidedly noxious, and there­ fore obviously wrong ; while contempt of Inches, if stopping short of that naked condemnation of them conveyed in the bald letter of the Gospel teaching, would be feasible enough. But the spirit and temper which Oriental imagination, hasty generalisation, unreflecting intelligence, unacquainted with the requirements of Complex civilisation, and habitually hyper­ bolic phraseology, would naturally embody in those four exhortations, are as obligatory and as feasible as ever. The thought—the nucleus of the inner meaning—is sacred Still and of enduring truth. It is only the casual and separable shell of words in which that thought was once conveyed that Wft must regard as having passed away, or possibly as never having been more than figuratively or exceptionally appropriate. And we may use our freedom of pene­ trating to the true spirit and meaning of ¡Christ’s teaching through its casual or dis­ guising letter, with the more boldness that 3i it is only this spirit as to which we can feel absolutely certain. Jesus spoke in Aramaic, while his sayings are recorded for us in Greek; and they must, therefore, have passed through the process of translation from one language into another; and, moreover, from one language into another whose genius is as singularly distinct as that of the German from that of the French. The record, too, it is pretty certain, did not take shape till at least half a century, or about a generation and a half, after the date of the events recorded—ample time for those events (whether facts or words) to have been moulded and modified, by the invariable practice of tradition, into the conceptions of the human intermediaries by whose agency they were handed down —a time so ample that this process of modification could not fail to have operated largely. And, finally, the Gospels them­ selves abound in indications that both the disciples who heard and repeated Christ’s sayings, and the evangelists who recorded them in a foreign language, did not always conceive them rightly or comprehend them fully. Thus, what our English Testament practically contains is simply the form which the precepts of a great prophet and Master, orally delivered, have definitely assumed after having passed for a space of fifty years or more, by the process of oral tradition, through a succession of uncritical and imaginative minds, none of which grasped or understood them in their fulness or their pure simplicity; and after being subsequently exposed to the double risk of transfusion, first from a Semitic into an Aryan, and then from a classic into a Teutonic, tongue. It would seem, there­ fore, self-evident that this is a case in which reliance on special phrases and expressions, as well as on particular narrative details, must be singularly unsafe and unwise; and, as a fact, we find that even theologians who most loudly deprecate and repudiate this conclusion, when formalised in words, do practically recognise its truth, by putting their own gloss and interpretation on the bare language of Scripture wherever they find it necessary to do so; and that the �32 INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION extent to which they use this liberty is merely a question of degree. Only then, we may fairly conclude—indeed, are forced to conclude—only that “ mind which was in Christ,” that spirit, temper, enduring and inspiring character ; that life, in fine, which shone through all his actions and permeated all his sayings, and which was so vital, so essential, so omnipresent, and so unmistakeable, as to have survived through all the channels and processes of transmission we have described, and defied their perils, can safely be taken or followed as his real teaching. Doubts and disputes among Christians have been infinite as ’to the “doctrine” of Christ—as to the “par­ ticulars ” of what he said and did. None, we believe, ever truly differed as to the tone and temper of his mind or of his teaching, as to the essential features of his character, as to what he meant by “ Me” when he said “ Follow me,” “ Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find rest to your souls.” We may see now, too, how shallow and how groundless are the fallacies of those who jump to the conclusion that, in order to realise and carry out a truly Christian life, it is necessary to upset society, to abolish the hierarchy of ranks, and introduce a forced equality of position and possessions. The Gospel, rightly read, gives no counte­ nance to those wild theories of ignorance, thoughtlessness, and envy. The New Testament contains many precepts as to our behaviour in those relations which spring out of that very inequality of con­ ditions which Christianity, in the view of Communists, is supposed to discountenance. Some of the more distinctively Christian virtues, such as obedience and humility, would seem to be especially appropriate to a social organisation where rank, if not “ caste,” holds sway. Certainly, as we have learned by experience, some of the most un-Christian vices, such as envy, lie deep at the root of the passion for equality, and have been seen to flourish with malignant strength where that passion has been most clamorous. Assuredly, too, we should say that a system of civilisation in | which masters and servants, rulers and subjects, rich and poor, the humble and the great, are recognised and established, appears to offer field and scope for a wider range and a greater variety of Christian excellencies than a community in which a dead level of uniformity should prevail. Nor can we conceive any single form or manifestation of “the mind which was in Christ ” that may not thrive in fullest vitality in society as now constituted, and find ample work in purging its evils and developing its capabilities, without seeking to disturb its foundations. If Christianity cannot flourish under any phase of social and political organisation, if the seed of its more peculiar qualities can only germinate and fructify in soil enriched with the ruins of ancient orders and ancestral institutions, and flattened down by the hard grinding steam-roller of democracy, it can scarcely be the mighty or divine moral agency we have hitherto conceived it. Our conclusion, then, is, that we are and may remain Christians, and that we can and ought to obey the Christian rule of life; but that in order to do either we must deal with the kernel, not the husk; we must penetrate to the true mind and temper of Jesus through the accretions which have overlaid it, the literalism which has dis­ figured it, and (be it said with all reverence) the Orientalism and the incompleteness, if not the imperfection, which mingled with and coloured it. Holding this, the utmost possible conquests of intelligence and learning are divested of their terrors. It is not with Christianity that science can ever be at issue; only with theology calling itself Christian. And now, having reached a time of life when most subjects are grave, and when some have grown very solemn—when the angry passions of the controversialist can find no breath or aliment in the thin, calm atmosphere of fading years ; when egotism has little left to gather round it; and when few sentiments survive in pristine vividness but the love of nature and the reverence for �INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION truth—I may be allowed one parting word, which, though personal, will scarcely be deemed obtrusive. I not only disclaim any position or feeling of antagonism to Chris­ tianity ; I claim to have written this book on behalf, and in the cause, of the religion of Jesus, rightly understood. I entirely repudiate the pretensions of those whom I hold to have especially misconceived and obscured that religion, to be its exclusive or rightful representatives. I hold that thou­ sands of the truest servants of our Lord are to be found among those who decline to wear what it is the fashion to pronounce his livery, with the grotesque and hideous facings of each successive age. I resent as an arrogant assumption the habitual practice of refusing the name of Christian to all who shrink away from or assail the errors and corruptions with which its official defenders have overlaid the faith of Christ. And I can find no words of adequate condemnation for the shallow insolence of men who are not ashamed to fling the name of “ atheist ” on all whose conceptions of the Deity are purer, loftier, more Christian, than their own. Those who dare to dogmatise about his nature or his purposes, prove by that very daring their hopeless incapacity even to grasp the skirts or comprehend the conditions of that mighty problem.1 Even if the human intellect could reach the truth about him, human language would hardly be adequate to give expression to the transcendent 1 “ It must be that the light divine, That on your soul is pleased to shine, Is other than what falls on mine : “ For you can fix and formalise The Power on which you raise your eyes, And trace him in his palace-skies. “You can perceive and almost touch His attributes, as such and such— Almost familiar over much. “ You can his thoughts and ends display, In fair historical array, From Adam to the judgment-day. “ I cannot think him here or there— I think him ever everywhere—• Unfading light, unstifled air.” — The Tivo Theologies: Palm Leaves, by Lord Houghton. 33 thought. Meanwhile, recognising and realising this with an unfeigned humbleness which yet has nothing disheartening in its spirit, my own conception—perhaps from early mental habit, perhaps from incurable and very conscious metaphysical inaptitude —approaches far nearer to the old current image of a personal God than to any of the sublimated substitutes of modern thought. Strauss’s Universum, Comte’s Humanity, even Mr. Arnold’s Stream of Tendency that Makes for Righteousness, excite in me no enthusiasm, command from me no worship. I cannot pray to the Immensities and the Eternities of Carlyle. They proffer me no help ; they vouchsafe no sympathy ; they suggest no comfort. It may be that such a Personal God is a mere anthropomorphic creation. It maybe—as philosophers with far finer instruments of thought than mine affirm—that the conception of such a being, duly analysed, is demonstrably a self-con­ tradictory one. But at least in resting in it, I rest in something I almost seem to realise ; at least I share the view which Jesus indisputably held of the Father whom he obeyed, communed with, and wor­ shipped; at least I escape the indecent familiarity and the perilous rashness, stum­ bling now into the grotesque, now into the blasphemous, of the infallible creed-concocters who stand confidently ready with their two-foot rule to measure the Im­ measurable, to define the Infinite, to describe in precise scholastic phraseology the nature of the Incomprehensible and the substance of the great Spirit of the universe. I have but one word more to say—and that is an expression of unfeigned amaze­ ment—so strong as almost to throw into the shade every other sentiment, and in­ creasing with every year of reflection, and every renewed perusal of the genuine words and life of Jesus—that, out of anything so simple, so beautiful, so just, so loving, and so grand, could have grown up or been extracted anything so marvellously unlike its original as the current creeds of Christendom ; that so turbid a torrent could have flowed from so pure a fountain, and �34 INTRODUCTION TO THE THIRD EDITION yet persist in claiming that fountain as its source; that any combination of human passion, perversity, and misconception could have reared such a superstructure upon such foundations. Out of the teach­ ing of perhaps the most sternly anti-sacerdotal prophet who ever inaugurated a new religion, has been built up (among the Catholics and their feeble imitators here) about the most pretentious and oppressive priesthood that ever weighed down the enterprise and the energy of the human mind. Out of the life and words of a Master, whose every act and accent breathed love and mercy and confiding hope to the whole race of man, has been distilled (among Calvinists and their cog­ nates) a creed of general damnation and of black despair. Christ set at naught “observances,” and trampled upon those prescribed with a rudeness that bordered on contempt:—Christian worship, in its most prevailing form, has been made al­ most to consist in rites and ceremonies, in sacraments and feasts and fasts and periodic prayers. Christ preached per­ sonal righteousness, with its roots going deep down into the inner nature, as the one thing needful:—his accredited messen­ gers and professed followers say No! purity and virtue are filthy rags ; salvation is to be purchased only through vicarious merits and “imputed” holiness. Jesus taught his disciples to trust in and to worship a tender Father, long-suffering and plenteous in mercy:—those who speak in his name in these later days tell us rather of a relentless Judge, in whose picture, as they draw it, it is hard to recognise either justice or compassion. In Christ’s grand and simple creed, expressed in his plainest words, “eternal life” was the assured in­ heritance of those who loved God with all their hearts, who loved their neighbours as themselves, and who walked purely, humbly, and beneficently while on earth:— in their Christian sects and churches of to-day, in their recognised formularies and their elaborate creeds, all this is repudiated as infantine and obsolete; the official means and purchase-money of salvation are altogether changed; eternal life is re­ served for those, and for those only, who accept or profess a string of metaphysical propositions conceived in a scholastic brain and put into scholastic phraseology; and, to crown the whole, a Hell is conceived so horrible as to make Heaven an impossi­ bility,—for what must be the temper of the Elect Few who could taste an hour’s felicity, while the immeasurable myriads of their dearest fellow-beings—their husbands and wives, their mothers, their children — were writhing in eternal torments within sight and hearing of their paradise? Theo­ logians transmogrify the pure precepts and devotion of Jesus into a religion as nearly as possible their opposite, and then decree that, whoever will not adopt their travesty, “ without doubt shall perish everlastingly.” It is the old spectacle which so disturbed Jeremiah, reproduced in our own days:— “ A wonderful and a horrible thing is com­ mitted in the land ; the prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule through their means; and the people love to have it so : and what will be the end thereof �THE CREED OF CHRISTENDOM Chapter I. INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES two modes of stating the same doctrine —a doctine incapable of being defined or expressed with philosophical precision, from our ignorance of the modus operandi of divine influences on the mind of man. Both propositions mean, if they have any distinct meaning at all, this affirmation :—that every statement of fact contained in the Scriptures is true, as being information communicated by the Holy Spirit—that every dogma of Religion, every idea of Duty, every conception of Deity, therein asserted, came from God, in the natural and un­ equivocal sense of that expression. That this is the acknowledged and accepted doctrine of Protestant Christendom at least is proved by the circumstance that all controversies among Christian sects turn upon the interpretation, not the authority, of the Scriptures; insomuch, that we constantly hear disputants make use of this language : “ Only show me such or such a doctrine in the Bible, and I am silenced.”—It is proved, too, by the pains taken, the humiliating subterfuges so often resorted to, by men of science to show that their discoveries are not at variance with any text of Scripture;— pains and subterfuges now happily dis­ carded by nearly all, as unworthy alike of the dignity of Science and the rights of controversy, and as no longer required amid the increasing enlightenment of the When an Inquirer, brought up in the popular Theology of England, questions his teachers as to the foundations and evidence of the doctrines he has im­ bibed, he is referred at once to the Bible as the source and proof of all: “ The Bible, and the Bible only, is the religion of Protestants.” The Bible, he is told, is a sacred book of supreme and un­ questionable authority, being the pro­ duction of writers directly inspired by God to teach us truth—being, in the ordinary phrase, The Word of God. This view of the Bible he finds to be universal among all religious sects, and nearly all religious teachers; all at least of whom, in this country, he is likely to hear. This belief in the Inspiration of the Scriptures is, indeed, stated with some slight variations, by modern Divines; some affirming that every statement and word was immediately dictated from on high; these are the advocates of Plenary or Verbal Inspira­ tion ;—others holding merely that the Scriptural writers were divinely informed and authorised Teachers of truth and narrators of fact, thoroughly imbued with, and guided by, the Spirit of God, but that the words, the earthly form in which they clothed the ideas, were their own. These are the believers in the essential Inspiration of the Bible. It is obvious that the above are only 35 �36 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES age.—It is proved by the observation, so constantly forced upon us, of theolo­ gians who have been compelled to abandon the theory of Scriptural Inspira­ tion or to modify it into a negation, still retaining, as tenaciously as ever, the consequences and corollaries of the doc­ trine; phrases which sprung out of it, and have no meaning apart from it; and deductions which could flow from it alone.-—It is proved, moreover, by the indiscriminate and peremptory manner in which texts are habitually quoted from every part of the Bible, to enforce a precept, to settle a doctrine, or to silence an antagonist.—It is proved, finally, by the infinite efforts made by commentators and divines to explain discrepancies and reconcile contradic­ tions which, independently of this doc­ trine, could have no importance or significance whatever. This, accordingly, is the first doctrine for which our Inquirer demands evidence and proof. It does not occur to him to doubt the correctness of so prevalent a belief: he is only anxious to discover its genesis and its foundation. He imme­ diately perceives that the Sacred Scrip­ tures consists of two separate series of writings, wholly distinct in their character, chronology, and language—the one con­ taining the sacred books of the Jews, the other those of the Christians. We will commence with the former. Most of our readers who share the popular belief in the divine origin and authority of the Jewish Scriptures would probably be much perplexed when called upon to assign grounds to justify the conviction which they entertain from habit. All that they could discover may be classed under the following heads :—I. That these books were received as sacred, authoritative, and inspired Writ­ ings by the Jews themselves. II. That they repeatedly and habitually represent themselves as dictated by God, and containing His ipsissima verba. III. That their contents proclaim their origin and parentage, as displaying a purer morality, a loftier religion, and altogether a holier tone, than the unas­ sisted, uninspired human faculties could, at that period, have attained. IV. That the authority of the Writers, as directly commissioned from on High, was in many cases attested by mira­ culous powers, either of act or prophecy. V. That Christ and His Apostles decided their sacred character, by refer­ ring to them, quoting them, and assum­ ing or affirming them to be inspired. Let us examine each of these grounds separately. I. It is unquestionably true that the Jews received the Hebrew Canon, or what wre call the Old Testament, as a collection of divinely-inspired writings, and that Christians, on their authority, have generally adopted the same belief. —Now, even if the Jews had held the same views of inspiration that now pre­ vail, and attached the modern meaning to the word; even if they had known accurately who were the Authors of the sacred books, and on what authority such and such writings were admitted into the Canon, and such others rejected;—we do not see why their opinion should be regarded as a sufficient guide and basis for ours; especially when we remember that they rejected as an Impostor the very Prophet whom we conceive to have been inspired beyond all others. What rational or consistent ground can we assign for disregarding the decision of the Jews in the case of Jesus, and ac­ cepting it submissively in the case of Moses, David, and Isaiah ? But, on a closer examination, it is dis­ covered that the Jews cannot tell us when, nor by whom, nor on what principle of selection, this collection of books was formed. All these questions are matters of pure conjecture, or of difficult and doubtful historic inference; —and the ablest critics agree only in the opinion that no safe opinion can be pro­ nounced. One ancient Jewish legend attributes the formation of the Canon to the Great Synagogue, an imagined “ com­ pany of Scribes,” o-waywyi; ypap-fjcarewv, �INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES presided over by Ezra.—Another legend, equally destitute of authority, relates that the collection already existed, but had become much corrupted, and that Ezra was inspired for the purpose of correcting and purifying it:—that is, was inspired for the purpose of ascertaining, Correcting, and affirming the inspiration of his Predecessors. A third legend mentions Nehemiah as the Author of the Canon. The opinion of De Wette —probably the first authority on these subjects—an opinion founded on minute historical and critical investigations, is, that the different portions of the Old Testament were collected or brought into their present form, at various periods, and that the whole body of it “ came gradually into existence, and, as it were, of itself and by force of custom and public use, acquired a sort of sanction.” He conceives the Pentateuch to have been completed about the time of Josiah, the collection of Prophets soon after Nehemiah, and the devotional writings not till the age of the Maccabees.1 His view of the grounds which led to the reception of the various books into the sacred Canon, is as follows“ The writings attributed to Moses, David, and the Prophets were considered inspired on account of the personal character of their authors. But the other writings, which are in part anonymous, derive their title to inspiration sometimes from their contents and sometimes from the cloud of antiquity which rests on them. Some of the writings which were composed after the exile—such, for example, as the song of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, and Daniel—were put on this list on account of the ancient authors to whom they were ascribed; others—for example, Chronicles and Esther—on account of their contents; and others again, as Ezra and Nehemiah, on account of the distinguished merit of their authors in restoring the Law and worship of God.”1 2 1 Introduction to the Critical Study of the Old Testament (by Parker), i. 26-35. 2 De Wette, i. 40. 37 Again: the books of the Hebrew Canon were customarily classed among the Jews into three several divisions— the Books of the Law, the Prophets, and the other sacred writings, or Hagiographa, as they are termed—and it is especially worthy of remark that Philo, Josephus, and all the Jewish authorities ascribed different degrees of inspiration to each class, and moreover did not con­ ceive such inspiration to be exclusively confined to the Canonical writers, but to be shared, though in a scantier degree, by others;—Philo extending it even to the Greek translators of the Old Testa­ ment ; Josephus hinting that he was not wholly destitute of it himself; and both maintaining that even in their day the gifts of prophecy and inspiration were not extinct, though limited to few.1 The Talmudists held the same opinion ; and went so far as to say that a man might derive a certain kind or degree of inspiration from the study of the Law and the Prophets. In the Gospel of John xi. 51 we have an intimation that the High Priest had a kind ’of ex officio inspiration or prophetic power.—It seems clear, therefore, that the Jews, on whose authority we accept the Old Testament as inspired, attached a very different meaning to the word from that in which our Theologians employ it; in their conception it approaches (except in the case of Moses) much more nearly to the divine afflatus which the Greeks attri­ buted to their Poets.—“ Between the Mosaic and the Prophetic Inspiration, the Jewish Church asserted such a dif­ ference as amounts to a diversity. . . . To Moses and to Moses alone—to Moses, in the recording, no less than in the receiving of the law—and to every part of the five books called the books of Moses, the Jewish Doctors of the generation before and coeval with the 1 De Wette, i. '39-43. A marked confirma­ tion of the idea of graduated inspiration is to be found in Numbers xii. 6-8. Maimonides (De Wette, ii. 361) distinguishes eleven degrees of inspiration, besides that which was granted to Moses. Abarbanel (De Wette, i. 14) makes a similar distinction. �38 INSPIRA T10N OF THE SCRIPTURES Apostles, assigned that unmodified and absolute 0eo7nzeuo-Tta, which our divines, in words at least, attribute to the Canon collectively.”1 The Samaritans, we know, carried this distinction so far that they received the Pentateuch alone as of divine authority, and did not believe the other books to be inspired at all. It will, then, be readily conceded that the divine authority, or proper inspira­ tion (using the word in our modern, plain, ordinary, theological sense), of a series of writings of which we know neither the date, nor the authors, nor the collectors, nor the principle of selec­ tion, cannot derive much support or probability from the mere opinion of the Jews ;—especially when the same Jews did not confine the quality of inspiration to these writings exclusively;—when a large section of them ascribed this at­ tribute to five books only out of thirtynine ;—and when they assigned to dif­ ferent portions of the collection different degrees of inspiration—an idea quite in­ consistent with the modern one of infal­ libility.—“ In infallibility there can be no degrees.”2 II. The second ground alleged for the popular belief in the Inspiration of the Jewish Scriptures appears to involve both a confusion of reasoning and a miscon­ ception of fact. These writings, I believe I am correct in stating, nowhere affirm their own inspiration, divine origin, or infallible authority. They frequently, indeed, use the expressions, “ Thus saith Jehovah,” and “the Word of the Lord came to Moses,” &c., which seem to imply that in these instances they con­ sider themselves as recording the very words of the Most High; but they do not declare that they are as a whole dictated by God, nor even that in these instances they are enabled to record His words with infallible accuracy. But even if these writings did contain the most solemn and explicit assertion of their own inspiration, that assertion ought not to have, and in the eye of reason could not have, any weight whatever, till that inspiration is proved from independent sources—after which it becomes super­ fluous. It is simply the testimony1 of a witness to himself—a testimony which the falsest witness can bear as well as the truest. To take for granted the attributes of a writer from his own declaration of those attributes is, one would imaginé, too coarse and too obvious a logical blunder not to be abandoned as soon as it is stated in plain language. Yet, in the singular work which I have already quoted— singular and sadly remarkable, as dis­ playing the strange inconsistencies into which a craven terror of heresy (or the imputation of it) can betray even the acutest thinkers—Coleridge says, first “that he cannot find any such claim (to supernatural inspiration) made by the writers in question, explicitly or by implication” (p. 16);—secondly, that where the passages asserting such a claim are supposed to be found, “ the conclusion drawn from them involves obviously &petitio principii—namely, the supernatural dictation, word by word, of the book in which the assertion is found; for until this is established the utmost such a text can prove is the current belief of the Writer’s age and country ” (p. 17);—and, thirdly, that, “whatever is referred by the sacred penman to a direct communication from God ; and whenever it is recorded that the subject of the history had asserted himself to have received this or that command, information, or assurance, from a super­ human intelligence; or where the Writer, in his own person, and in the character of an historian, relates that the word of God came to Priest, Prophet, Chieftain, or other Individual ; I receive the same with full belief, and admit its inappellable authority” (p. 27).—What is this, but to say, at p. 27, that he receives as “in­ appellable” that which, at p. 17, he 1 Coleridge, “Confessions of an Enquiring Spirit,” p. 19. 2 Coleridge, p. 18. 1 “ If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true” (i.e., is not to be regarded), John vi. 3i- �INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES declares to involve an obvious petitio principal—that any self-asserted infalli­ bility—any distinct affirmation of divine communication or command, however improbable, contradictory, or revolting — made in any one of a collection of books, “ the dates, selectors, and com­ pilers of which ” he avers to be “ un­ known, or recorded by known fabulists ” (p. 18)—must be received as of supreme authority, without question, and without appeal ?—What would such a reasoner as Coleridge think of such reasoning as this, on any other than a Biblical question ? III. The argument for the inspiration of the Old Testament Scriptures derived from the character of their contents, will bear no examination. It is true that many parts of them contain views of Duty, of God, and of Man’s relation to Him, which are among the purest and loftiest that the human intellect can grasp;—but it is no less true that other passages, at least as numerous and characteristic, depict feelings and opinions on these topics as low, meagre, and unworthy as ever took their rise in savage and uncultured minds. These passages, as is well known, have long been the opprobrium of orthodoxy and the despair of Theologians; and so far are they from being confirmatory of the doctrine of scriptural inspiration, that nothing but the inconsiderate and absolute reception of this doctrine has withheld men from regarding and representing them in their true light. The contents of the Hebrew Canon as a whole form the most fatal and convinc­ ing argument against inspiration as a whole. By the popular creed as it now stands, the nobler portions are compelled to bear the mighty burden of the lower and less worthy ;—and often sink under their weight. IV. The argument for the Inspiration of the Old Testament Writers, drawn from the supposed miraculous or pro­ phetic powers conferred upon the writers, admits of a very brief refutation. In the first place, as we do not know who the Writers were, nor at what date 39 the books were written, we cannot possibly decide whether they were en­ dowed with any such powers or not.— Secondly, as the only evidence we have for the reality of the miracles rests upon the divine authority, and consequent unfailing accuracy, of the books in which they are recorded, they cannot, without a violation of all principles of reasoning, be adduced to prove that authority and accuracy.—-Thirdly, in those days, as is well known, superhuman powers were not supposed to be confined to the direct and infallible organs of the divine commands, nor necessarily to imply the possession of the delegated authority of God ;—as we learn from the Magicians of Pharaoh, who could perform many, though not all, of the miracles of Moses from the case of Aaron, who, though miraculously gifted, and God’s chosen High Priest, yet helped the Israelites to desert Jehovah and bow down before the Golden Calf •—and from the history of Balaam, who, though in daily communication with God and specially inspired by Him, yet accepted a bribe from His enemies to curse His people, and pertinaciously endeavoured to perform his part of the contract.—• And, finally, as the dogmatic or cre­ dential value of prophecy depends on our being able to ascertain the date at which it was uttered, and the precise events which it was intended to predict, and the impossibility of foreseeing such events by mere human sagacity, and, moreover, upon the original language in which the prophecy was uttered not having been altered by any subsequent recorder or transcriber to match the fulfilment more exactly;—and as in the case of the prophetical books of the Hebrew Canon (as will be seen in a subsequent chapter), great doubt rests upon almost all these points ; and as, moreover, for one prediction which was justified, it is easy to point to two which were falsified, by the event;—the pro­ phecies, even if occasionally fulfilled, can assuredly, in the present stage of our inquiry, afford us no adequate foundation �40 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES on which to build the inspiration of the library (for such it is) of which they form a part. V. But the great majority of Christians would, if questioned, rest their belief in the Inspiration of the Old Testament Scriptures upon the supposed sanction or affirmation of this view by Christ and his Apostles.—Now, as Coleridge has well argued in a passage already cited, until we know that the words of Christ conveying this doctrine have been faith­ fully recorded, so that we are actually in possession of his view—and that the apostolic writings conveying this doctrine were the production of inspired men— “ the utmost such texts can prove is the current belief of the Writer’s age and country concerning the character of the books then called the Scriptures.”—The inspiration of the Old Testament, in this point of view, therefore, rests upon the inspiration of the New—a matter to be presently considered. But let us here ascertain what is the actual amount of divine authority attributed to the Old, by the writers of the New Testament. It is unquestionable that these Scrip­ tures are constantly referred to and quoted, by the Apostles and Evangelists, as authentic and veracious histories. It is unquestionable, also, that the pro­ phetic writings were considered by them to be prophecies—to contain predictions of future events, and especially of events relating to Christ. They received them submissively; but misquoted, misunder­ stood, and misapplied them, as will hereafter be shown.—Further, however incorrectly we may believe the words of Christ to have been reported, his references to the Scriptures are too numerous, too consistent, and too probable, not to bring us to the con­ clusion that he quoted them as having, and deserving to have, unquestioned authority over the Jewish mind. On this point, however, the opinions of Christ, as recorded in the Gospel, pre­ sent remarkable discrepancies, and even contradictions. On the one hand, we read of His saying, “ Think not that I am come to destroy the Law or the Prophets : I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till Heaven and Earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the Law till all be fulfilled.”1 He quotes the Decalogue as “from God”; and he says that “ God spake to Moses.” 2 It is true that he nowhere affirms the inspira­ tion of the Scriptures, but he quotes the prophecies, and even is said to represent them as of prophesying of him.3 He quotes the Psalms controversially, to put down antagonists, and adds the remark, “ the Scriptures cannot be broken.”4 He is represented as declaring once positively, and once incidentally,5 that “ Moses wrote of him.”6 On the other hand, he contradicted Moses, and abrogated his ordinances in an authoritative and peremptory manner, which precludes the idea that he sup­ posed himself dealing with the direct commands of God.7 This is done in many points specified in Matt. v. 34-44 ;—in the case of divorce, in the most positive and naked manner (Matt, v. 31, 32; xix. 8. Luke xvi. 18; Mark x. 4-12);—in the case of the woman taken in adultery, who would have been punished with a cruel death by the Mosaic law but whom Jesus dismissed with—-“ Neither do I condemn thee : go and sin no more’’(John viii. 5-11);— 1 Matt. v. 17, 18. Luke xvi. 17. 2 Matt. xv. 4-6; xxii. 31. Mark vii. 9-13 ; xii. 26. 3 Matt. xv. 7; xxiv. 15. Luke iv. 17-21; xxiv. 27. 4 John x. 35. 5 John v. 46. Luke xxiv. 44. 6 It seems more than doubtful whether any passages in the Pentateuch can fairly be con­ sidered as having reference to Christ. But passing over this, if it shall appear that what we now call “the Books of Moses” were not written by Moses, it will follow, either that Christ referred to Mosaic writings which we do not possess; or that, like the contemporary Jews and modern Christians, he erroneously ascribed to Moses books which Moses did not write. 7 “Ye have heard that it has been said of old time;”-—“Moses, for the hardness of your hearts, suffered you to put away your wives,” &c., &c. �INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES in the case of clean and unclean meats, as to which the Mosaic law is rigorous in the extreme, but which Christ puts aside as trivial, affirming that unclean meats cannot defile a man, though Moses declared that it “made them abomin­ able.” ’(Matt. xv. ii ; Mark vii. 15.) Christ even supersedes in the same manner one of the commands of the Decalogue—that as to the observance of the Sabbath, his views and teaching as to which no ingenuity can reconcile with the Mosaic law.1 Finally, we have the assertion in Paul’s Second Epistle to Timothy (iii. 16), which, though certainly translatable two ways,1 either affirms the inspiration 2 of the Hebrew Canon as a whole, or assumes the inspiration of certain por­ tions of it.—On the whole, there can, I think, be little doubt that Christ and his Apostles received the Jewish Scriptures, as they then were, as sacred and authori­ tative. But till their divine authority is established, it is evident that this, the fifffi ground for believing the inspiration of the Old Testament, merges in the first, i.e.) the belief of the Jews. So far, then, it appears that the only evidence for the Inspiration of the Hebrew Canon is the fact that the Jews believed in it.—But we know that they also believed in the Inspiration of other writings ■)—that their meaning of the word “ Inspiration ” differed essentially from that which now prevails;—that their theocratic polity had so interwoven 1 See this whole question most ably treated in the notes to Norton, Genuineness of the Gospels, ii. § 7. 2 The English, Dutch, and other versions render it, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for teaching,” &c., &c. (an obviously incorrect rendering, unless it can be shown that ypa<p7] is always used by Paul in reference to the Jewish Canon exclusively). The Vulgate, Luther, Calmet, the Spanish and Arabic versions, and most of the Fathers, trans­ late it thus : “ All divinely inspired writings are also profitable for teachings,” &c. This is little more than a truism. But Paul probably meant, “Do not despise the Old Testament, because you have the Spirit; since you know it was inspired, you ought to be able to make it profitable,” &c. 41 itself with all their ideas, and modified their whole mode of thinking, that almost every mental suggestion, and every act of power, was referred by them directly to a superhuman origin.1— “If” (says Mr. Coleridge) “we take into account the habit, universal with the Hebrew Doctors, of referring all excellent or extraordinary things to the Great First Cause, without mention of the proximate and instrumental causes —a striking illustration of which may be obtained by comparing the narratives of the same event in the Psalms and the Historical Books;—and if we further reflect that the distinction of the Provi­ dential and the Miraculous did not enter into their forms of thinking—at all events not into their mode of conveying their thoughts ;—the language of the Jews respecting the Hagiographa will be found to differ little, if at all, from that of religious persons among ourselves, when speaking of an author abounding in gifts, stirred up by the Holy Spirit, writing under the influence of special grace and the like.”2—We know, more­ over, that the Mahometans believe in the direct inspiration of the Koran as firmly as ever did the Hebrews in that of their sacred books; and that in matters of such mighty import the belief of a special nation can be no safe or adequate foundation for our own.—The result of this investigation, therefore, is, that the popular doctrine of the inspira­ tion, divine origin, and consequent unimpeachable accuracy and infallible authority of the Old Testament Scrip­ tures, rests on no foundation whatever— unless it shall subsequently appear that Christ and his Apostles affirmed it, and had means of knowing it and judging of it, superior to and independent of those possessed by the Jews of their time. I have purposely abstained in this place from noticing those considerations which directly negative the doctrine in question; both because many of these will be more suitably introduced in 1 De Wette, i. 39. 2 Letters of Inspiration, p. 21. �42 INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES subsequent chapters, and because, if a doctrine is shown to be without foundation or zzzzproved, disproof is superfluous.—In conclusion, let us care­ fully note that this inquiry has related solely to the divine origin and infallible authority of the Sacred Writings, and is entirely distinct from the question as to the substantial truth of the narratives and the correctness of the doctrine they contain—a question to be decided by a different method of inquiry. Though wholly uninspired, they may transmit narratives, faithful in the main, of God’s dealings with man, and may be records of a real and authentic revelation.—All we have yet made out is this : that the mere fact of finding any statement or dogma in the Hebrew Scriptures is no sufficient proof or adequate warranty that it came from God. attested by the miracles they wrought, or had the power of working. I. The writings which compose the volume called by us the New Testa­ ment had assumed their present collec­ tive form, and were generally received throughout the Christian Churches, about the end of the second century. They were selected out of a number of others ; but by whom they were selected, or what principle guided the selection, history leaves in doubt. We have reason to believe that in several instances writings were selected or rejected, not from a consideration of the external or traditional evidence of their genuineness or antiquity, but from the supposed heresy or orthodoxy of the doctrines they contained. We find, moreover, that the early Fathers dis­ agreed among themselves in theii estimate of the genuineness and authority of many of the books;1 that some of them received books which we exclude, and excluded others which we admit;—while we have good reason to believe that some of the rejected writings, as the Gospel of the Hebrews, and that for the Egyptians, and the Epistles of Clement and Barnabas, have at least as much title to be placed in the sacred Canon as some already there—the Epistle to the Hebrews, the second of Peter, and that of Jude, for example. It is true that several of the Christian Fathers who lived about the end of the second century, as Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Clement of Alexandria, distinctly affirm the inspiration of the Sacred Writings, as those writings were received, and as that word was understood, by them.2 But we find that they were in It is not easy to discover the grounds on which the popular belief in the inspiration, or divine origin, of the New Testament Canon, as a whole, is based. Probably, when analysed, they will be found to be the following. I. That the Canonical Books were selected from the uncanonical or apocry­ phal by the early Christian Fathers, who must be supposed to have had ample means of judging; and that the inspiration of these writings is affirmed by them. II. That it is natural to imagine that God, in sending into the World a Revelation intended for all times and all lands, should provide for its faithful record and transmission by inspiring the transmitters and recorders. III. That the Apostles, whose un­ questioned writings form a large portion of the Canon, distinctly affirm their own inspiration ; and that this inspiration 1 See the celebrated account of the Canon was distinctly promised them by Christ. given by Eusebius, where five of our epistles IV. That the Contents of the New are “disputed”;—the Apocalypse, which, we Testament are their own credentials, receive, is by many considered “spurious” ; and and by their sublime tone and character, the Gospel of the Hebrews, which we reject, is stated to have been by many, especially of the proclaim their superhuman origin. Palestinian Christians, placed among the “ ac­ V. That the inspiration of most of knowledged writings.” De Wette, i. 76. the writers may be considered as 2 De Wette, i. 63-66. �INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES 43 the habit of referring to and quoting in­ discriminately the Apocryphal as well as the Canonical Scriptures. Instances of this kind occur in Clement of Rome (a.d. ioo), Clement of Alexandria (a.d. 200), and, according to Jerome, in Ignatius also, who lived about a.d. 107.1 Their testimony, therefore, if valid to prove the inspiration of the Canonical Scriptures, proves the inspiration of the rejected Scriptures likewise; and by necessary sequence, proves the error and incompetency of the compilers of the Canon, who rejected them. No one, however, well acquainted with the writings of the Fathers will be of opinion that their judgment in these matters, or in any matters, ought to guide our own.2 II. The second argument certainly carries with it, at first sight, an ap­ pearance of much weight; and is, we believe, with most minds, however un­ consciously, the argument which (as Paley expresses it) “does the business.” The idea of Gospel inspiration is re­ ceived, not from any proof that it is so, but from an opinion, or feeling, that it ought to be so. The doctrine arose, not because it was provable, but because it was wanted. Divines can produce no stronger reason for believing in the in­ spiration of the Gospel narratives than their own opinion that it is not likely God should have left so important a series of facts to the ordinary chances of History. But on a little reflection it will be obvious that we have no ground whatever for presuming that God will act in this or in that manner under any given circumstances, beyond what pre­ vious analogies may furnish ; and in this case no analogy exists. We cannot even form a probable guess a priori of His mode of operation;—but we find that generally, and indeed in all cases of which we have any certain knowledge, He leaves things to the ordinary action of natural laws;—and if, therefore, it is “natural” to presume anything at all in this instance, that presumption should be that God did not inspire the New Testament writers, but left them to convey what they saw, heard, or believed, as their intellectual powers and moral qualities enabled them. The Gospels, as professed records of Christ’s deeds and words, will be allowed to form the most important portion of the New Testament Collection.—Now, the idea of God having inspired four different men to write a history of the same transactions—or rather of many different men having undertaken to write such a history, of whom God in­ spired four only to write correctly, leaving the others to their own unaided resources, and giving us no test by which to distinguish the inspired from the uninspired—certainly appears self-con­ futing and anything but “natural.” If the accounts of the same transactions agree, where was the necessity for more than one? If they differ (as they notoriously do), it is certain that only one can be inspiredand which is that one? In all other religions claiming a divine origin, this incongruity is avoided. Further, the Gospels nowhere affirm, or even intimate, their own inspiration 1 —a claim to credence, which, had they possessed it, they assuredly would not have failed to put forth. Luke, it is clear from his exordium, had no notion of his own inspiration, but founds his title to take his place among the an­ nalists, and to be listened to as at least equally competent with any of his com­ petitors, on his having been from the first cognisant of the transactions he was about to relate. Nor do the Apostolic writings bear any such testimony to them; nor could they well do so, having (with the exception of the Epistles of 1 De Wette, p. 54, &c. 2 See “ Ancient Christianity,” by Isaac Taylor, passim, for an exposition of what these Fathers could write and believe. See also “Literature and Dogma,” by Matthew Arnold, p. 283, for a few curious specimens. 1 Dr. Arnold, “ Christian Life,” &c., p. 487,— “ I must acknowledge that the Scriptural narra­ tives do not claim this inspiration for them­ selves.” Coleridge, “ Confessions,” p. 16,—“I cannot find any such claim made by these writers, either explicitly or by implication.” �44 INSPIRA PION OF THE SCRIPTURES John) been composed previous to them. III. When we come to the considera­ tion of the Apostolic writings, the case is different. There are, scattered through these, apparent claims to superhuman guidance and teaching, though not direct assertion of inspiration. It is, however, worthy, of remark that none of these occur in the writings of any of the Apostles who were contemporary with Jesus, and who attended his ministry;— in whom, if in any, might inspiration be expected; to whom, if to any, was in­ spiration promised. It is true that we find in John1 much dogmatic assertion of being the sole teacher of truth, and much denunciation of all who did not listen submissively to him ; but neither in his epistles nor in those of Peter, James, nor Jude, do we find any claim to special knowledge of truth, or guarantee from error by direct spiritual aid. All assertions of inspiration are, we believe, confined to the epistles of Paul, and may be found in i Cor. ii. 10—16. Gal. i. 11, 12. i Thess. iv. 8. 1 Tim. ii. 7. Now, on these passages we have to remark, first, that “having the Holy Spirit,” in the parlance of that day, by no means implied our modern idea of inspiration, or anything approaching to it; for Paul often affirms that it was given to many, nay, to most, of the believers, and in different degrees? Moreover, it is probable that a man who believed he was inspired by God would have been more dogmatic and less argu­ mentative. He would scarcely have run the risk of weakening his revelation by a presumptuous endeavour to prove it; still less by adducing in its behalf argu­ ments which are often far from being irrefragable.3 Secondly. In two or three passages 1 1st Epistle iv. 6. “ We are of God ; he that knoweth God heareth us ; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.” 2 1 Cor. xii. 8 ; and xiv., passim. 3 Gal. iii. 16, for example. See Arnold’s “ Literature and Dogma,” p. 140. he makes a marked distinction between what he delivers as his own opinion, and what he speaks by authority “ The Lord says, not I; ”—“ I, not the Lord;”—“This I give by permission, not by commandment,” &c., &c. Hence Dr. Arnold infers,1 that we are to con­ sider Paul as speaking from inspiration wherever he does not warn us that he “ speaks as a man.” But unfortunately for this argument the Apostle expressly declares himself to be “speaking by the word of the Lord,” in at least one case where he is manifestly and admittedly in error, viz., in 1 Thess. iv. 15;2 of which we shall speak further in the following chapter. Thirdly. The Apostles, all of whom are supposed to be alike inspired, dif­ fered among themselves, contradicted, depreciated, and “withstood” one another.3 Fourthly. As we showed before in the case of the Old Testament writers, the Apostles’ assertion of their own in­ spiration, even were it ten times more clear and explicit than it is, being their testimony to themselves, could have no weight or validity as evidence. But, it will be urged, the Gospels re­ cord that Christ promised inspiration to his apostles.—In the first place, Paul was not included in this promise. In the next place, we have already seen that the divine origin of these books is a doctrine for which no ground can be shown; and their correctness, as records of Christ’s words, is still to be established. When, however, we shall have clearly made out that the words promising inspiration were really uttered by Christ, and meant what we interpret them to mean, we shall have brought ourselves into the singular and em­ barrassing position of maintaining that Christ promised them that which in result they did not possess ; since there can be no degrees of inspiration, in the ordinary 1 ‘ ‘ Christian Course and Character,”pp. 488-9. 2 See also 1 Cor. vii. 29. Philip, iv. 5. 3 Gal. ii. 11-14. 2 Peter iii. 16. Acts xv. 6-39. Compare Rom. iii., and Gal. ii. and iii., with James ii. �INSPIRATION OF THE SCRIPTURES 45 and dogmatic sense of the word; and since the Apostles clearly were not alto­ gether inspired, inasmuch as they fell into mistakes,1 disputed, and disagreed among themselves. The only one of the New Testament writings which contains a clear affirma­ tion of its own inspiration is the one which in all ages has been regarded as of the most doubtful authenticity—viz., the Apocalypse. It was rejected by many of the earliest Christian authorities. It is rejected by most of the ablest Biblical critics of to-day. Luther, in the preface to his translation inserted a protest against the inspiration of the Apocalypse, which protest he solemnly charged every one to prefix who chose to publish the translation. In this pro­ test one of his chief grounds for the rejection is the suspicious fact that this writer alone blazons forth his own in­ spiration. IV. The common impression seems to be that the contents of the New Testa­ ment are their own credentials—that their superhuman excellence attests their divine origin. This may be perfectly true in substance without affecting the present question ; since it is evident that the excellence of particular passages, or even of the great mass of passages, in a book can prove nothing for the divine origin of the whole—-unless it can be shown that all the portions of it are indissolubly connected. This or that portion of its contents may attest by its nature that this or that special portion came from God, but not that the book itself, including everything in it, had a divine source. A truth, or a doctrine, may be divinely revealed, but humanly recorded, or transmitted by tradition ; and may be mixed up with other things that are erroneous ; else the passages of scriptural truth contained in a modern sermon would prove the whole sermon inspired and infallible. V. The argument for Inspiration, drawn from the miraculous gifts of the alleged recipients of inspiration—a matter to which we shall refer when treating of miracles—is thus conclu­ sively met by a recent author : “ Shall we say that miracles are an evidence of inspiration in the person who per­ forms them ? And must we accept as infallible every combination of ideas which may exist in his mind ? If we look at this question abstractedly, it is not easy to perceive the necessary con­ nection between superhuman power and superhuman wisdom................ And when we look more closely to the fact, did not the minds of the Apostles retain some errors, long after they had been gifted with supernatural power ? Did they not believe in demons occupying the bodies of men and swine ? Did they not ex­ pect Christ to assume a worldly sway ? Did not their Master strongly rebuke the moral notions and feelings of two of them, who were for calling down fire from Heaven on an offending village ? It is often said that where a man’s asse­ veration of his infallibility is combined with the support of miracles, his inspira­ tion is satisfactorily proved; and this statement is made on the assumption that God would never confer super­ natural power on one who could be guilty of a falsehood. What, then, are we to say respecting Judas and Peter, both of whom had been furnished with the gifts of miracle, and employed them during a mission planned by Christ, and of whom, nevertheless, one became the traitor of the garden, and the otheruttered against his Lord three falsehoods in one hour? ” 1 So far, then, our inquiry has brought us to this negative conclusion: that we 1 The error of Paul about the approaching end of the world was shared by all the Apostles. James v. 8. i Peter iv. 7. 2 Peter iii. 12. 1 John ii. 18. Jude, verse 18. [It may be added that there is no reason to believe that any of these epistles were the com­ position of Apostles.] 1 “ Rationale of Religious Inquiry,” p. 30. Moreover the law of Moses directs that a false prophet, even though he work miracles in attestation, shall be put to death,—and St. Paul says that if “an angel from Heaven” preaches any doctrine that conflicts with his, “ let him be accursed.” Deut. xiii. Galatians i. 8. �46 A UTHORSHIP OF THE OLD TESTAMENT CANON can discover no ground for believing that the Scriptures—z>., either the Hebrew or the Christian Canonical Writings—are inspired, taking that word in its ordinary acceptation—viz., that they “came from God;” were dictated or suggested by Him ; were supernaturally preserved from error, both as to fact and doctrine ; and must there­ fore be received in all their parts as authoritative and infallible. This con­ clusion is perfectly compatible with the belief that they contain a human record, and in substance a faithful record, of a divine revelation—-a human history, and, in the main, a true history, of the deal­ ings of God with man. But they have become to us, by this conclusion, records, not revelations ;—histories to be investi­ gated like other histories ;—documents of which the date, the authorship, the genuineness, the accuracy of the text, are to be ascertained by the same prin­ ciples of investigation as we apply to other documents. In a word, we are to examine them and regard them, not as the Mahometans regard the Koran, but as Niebuhr regarded Livy, and as Arnold regarded Thucydides—documents out of which the good, the true, the sound, is to be educed. discusses the somewhat nebulous and obso­ lete speculations of Coleridge and Arnold ; men who were incapable of subscribing the popular view, and yet loth to compendi­ ously reject it. Mr. Greg points out that their evasiveness amounts to repudiation ; but a repetition of his reasoning does not seem to be called for, and we may content ourselves with a simple reproduction of the concluding words' of his second chapter, which are as true to-day as in 1850. The present position of this question in the public mind of Christendom is singularly anomalous, fluctuating, and unsound. The doctrine of Biblical In­ spiration still obtains general credence, as part and parcel of the popular theo­ logy ; and is retained as a sort of tacit assumption, by the great mass of the religious world, though abandoned as untenable by their leading thinkers and learned men ;—many of whom, however, retain it in name, while surrendering it in substance ; and do not scruple, while admitting it to be an error, to continue the use of language justifiable only on the supposition of its. truth. Nay, further ; — with a deplorable and mis­ chievous inconsistency, they abandon the doctrine, but retain the deductions and corollaries which flowed from it, and from it alone. They insist upon making the superstructure survive the Addendum. foundation. They refuse to give up possession of the property, though the The Author devotes a further chapter title by which they hold it has been io the question of Inspiration, in which he I proved and is admitted to be invalid. Chapter II. AUTHORSHIP AND AUTHORITY OF THE PENTATEUCH AND THE OLD TESTAMENT CANON GENERALLY The next comprehensive position which our Inquirer finds at the root of the popular theology, commanding a tacit and almost unquestioned assent, is this That the Old Testament narra­ tives contain an authentic and faithful �AUTHORSHIP OF THE OLD TESTAMENT CANON History of the actual dealings of God with man —that the events which they relate took place as therein related, and were recorded by well-informed and veracious writers ;—that wherever God is represented as visiting and speaking to Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Samuel, and others, He did. really so appear and communicate His will to them that the ark, as built by Noah, was constructed under the detailed direc­ tions of the Architect of all Worlds; that the Law, as contained in the Penta­ teuch, was delivered to Moses and written down by him under the imme­ diate dictation of Jehovah, and the pro­ ceedings of the Israelites minutely and specifically directed by him ; that, in a word, the Old Testament is a literal and veracious history, not merely a national legend or tradition. This fundamental branch of the popular theology also in­ cludes the belief that the Books of Moses were written by Moses, the book of Joshua by Joshua, and so on; and further that the Prophetical Books, and the predictions contained in Historical Books, are bond fide Prophecies—genuine oracles from the mouth of God, uttered through the medium of His servants, whom at various times He instructed to make known His will and institutions to His chosen People. That this is the popular belief in which we are all brought up, and on the assumption of which the ordinary lan­ guage of Divines and the whole tone of current religious literature proceeds, no one will entertain a doubt ; and that it has not been often broadly laid down or much defended is attributable to the circumstance, that, among Christians, it has rarely till of late been directly ques­ tioned or openly attacked. The pro­ position seems to have been assumed on the one side and conceded on the other, with equally inconsiderate ease. Now, be it observed that if the Hebrew Narratives bore, on the face of them, an historical rather than a legendary cha­ racter, and were in themselves probable, natural, and consistent, we might accept 47 them as substantially true without much extraneous testimony, on the ground of their antiquity alone. And if the con­ ceptions of the Deity therein developed were pure, worthy, and consistent with what we learn of Him from reason and experience, we might not feel disposed to doubt the reality of the words and acts attributed to Him. But so far is this from being the case, that the narra­ tives, eminently legendary in their tone, are full of the most astounding, impro­ bable, and perplexing statements; and the representations of God which the Books contain are often monstrous, and utterly at variance with the teachings of Nature and Christianity. Under these circumstances, wre, of course, require some sufficient reason for acceding to such difficult propositions and receiving the Hebrew Narratives as authentic and veracious Histories; and the only reason offered to us is that the Jews believed themJ But we remember that the Greeks believed the Legends in Herodotus, and the Romans the figments in Livy—and the Jews were at least as credulous and as nationally vain as either. We need, therefore, some better sponsors for our creed. If, indeed, we were only required to accept the authority of the Jews for the belief that they sprung from Abraham, were captives in Egypt, received a com1 Even this, however, must be taken cum grano. The Jews do not seem to have invari­ ably accepted the historical narratives in the same precise and literal sense as we do. Josephus, or the traditions which were current among his countrymen, took strange liberties with the Mosaic accounts. There is a remark­ able difference between his account of Abraham’s dissimulation with regard to his wife, and the same translation in Genesis xx.—Moreover, he explains the passage of the Red Sea as a natural, not a miraculous event; and many similar dis­ crepancies might be mentioned. See De Wette, ii. 42. Observe, also, the liberty which Ezekiel considered himself warranted in taking with the Mosaic doctrine that God will visit the sins oí the fathers upon the children (c. xviii. passim), a liberty scarcely compatible with a belief on his part that such doctrine was, as alleged, divinely announced. �48 AUTHORSHIP OF THE OLD TESTAMENT CANON píete code of Laws and system of theocratic polity from Moses, conquered Canaan, and committed manifold follies, frauds, and cruelties in their national career—we might accede to the demand without much recalcitration. But we are called on to admit something very different from this. We are required to believe that Jehovah, the Ruler of all Worlds, the Pure, Spiritual, Supreme, Ineffable Creator of the Universe—Our Father who is in Heaven—so blundered in the creation of man, as to repent and grieve, and find it necessary to destroy His own work—selected one favoured people from the rest of His children— sanctioned fraud—commanded cruelty —contended, and for a while in vain, with the magic of other Gods—wrestled bodily with one patriarch—ate cakes and veal with another—sympathised with and shared in human passions—and mani­ fested “scarcely one untainted moral excellence ” and we are required to do this painful violence to our feelings and our understandings, simply because these coarse conceptions prevailed some thousand years ago among a People whose history, as written by themselves, is certainly not of a nature to inspire us with any extraordinary confidence in their virtues or their intellect. They were the conceptions prevalent among the Scribes and Pharisees, whom Jesus denounced as dishonourers of religion and corrupters of the Law, and who crucified Him for endeavouring to elevate them to a purer faith. It is obvious, then, that we must seek for some other ground for accepting the earlier Scriptural narratives as genuine histories ;—and we are met in our search by the assertion that the Books contain­ ing the statements which have staggered us, and the theism which has shocked us, were written by the great Law-giver of the Jews—by the very man whom God commissioned to liberate and organise His peculiar People. If in­ deed the Pentateuch was written by that same Moses whose doings it records, the case is materially altered ; —it is no longer a traditional or legendary narrative, but a history by an actor and a contemporary, that we have before us. Even this statement, however, were it made out, would not cast its aegis over the Book of Genesis, which records events from four to twenty-five centuries before the time of Moses. But when we proceed to the investi­ gation of this point, we discover, cer­ tainly much to our surprise, not only that there is no independent evidence for the assertion that Moses wrote the books which bear his name, but that we have nearly all the proof which the case admits of, that he did not write them,1 and that they were not composed —at all events did not attain their present form—till some hundreds of years after his death. It is extremely difficult to lay the grounds of this pro­ position before general readers—espe­ cially English readers—in a form at once concise and clear; as they depend upon the results of a species of scientific criticism with which, though it proceeds on established and certain principles, very few in this country, even of our educated classes, are at all acquainted. In the conclusions arrived at by this scientific process, unlearned students must acquiesce as they do in those of Astronomy, or Philology, or Geology;— and all that can be done is to give them a very brief glimpse of the mode of inquiry adopted, and the kind of proof 1 “After coming to these results,” says De Wette, ii. 160, “ we find no ground and no evidence to show that the books of the Penta­ teuch were composed by Moses. Some con­ sider him their author merely from traditional custom, because the Jews were of their opinion ; though it is not certain that the more ancient Jews shared it; for the expressions ‘ the Book of the Law of Moses,’ ‘ the Book of the Law of Jehovah by the hand of Moses,’ only designate him as the author or mediator of the Law, not as the author of the Book.—The Law is ascribed to the ‘ Prophets’ in 2 Kings xvii. 13, and in Ezra ix. 11. The opinion that Moses composed these books is not only opposed by all the signs of a later date which occur in the Book itself, but also by the entire analogy of the history of the Hebrew literature and language.” �A UTHORSHIP OF THE OLD TESTAMENT CANON adduced: this we shall do as concisely and as intelligibly as we can; and we will endeavour to state nothing which is not considered as established by men of the highest eminence in this very difficult branch of intellectual re­ search. The discovery in the Temple of the Book of the Law, in the reign of King Josiah, about B.c. 624, as related in 2 Kings xxii., is the first certain trace of the existence of the Pentateuch in its present form.1 That if this, the Book of the Law of Moses, existed before this time, it was generally unknown, or had been quite forgotten, appears from the extraordinary sensation the discovery excited, and from the sudden and tremendous reformation immediately commenced by the pious and alarmed Monarch, with a view of carrying into effect the ordinances of this law.—Now we find that when the Temple was built and consecrated by Solomon, and the Ark placed therein (about B.c. 1000), this “ Book of the Law ” was not there— for it is said (1 Kings viii. 9), “There was nothing in the Ark save the two Tables of Stone which Moses put there at Horeb.”1 Yet on turning to Deuter­ 2 onomy xxxi. 24-26, we are told that when Moses had made an end of writing the words of the Law in a book, he said to the Levites, “Take this Book of the Law and put it in the side of the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there to witness against you,” &c., &c. This “ Book of the Law ” which was found in the Temple in the reign of Josiah (b.c. 624), which was not there in the time of Solomon (b.c. 1000), and which is stated to have been written and placed in the Ark by Moses (b.c. 1450), is almost certainly the one ever after­ wards referred to and received as the “Law of God,” the “Law of Moses,” and quoted as such by Ezra and Nehe1 De Wette, ii. 153. 2 The same positive statement is repeated 2 Chrop. v. JQ. 49 miah.1 And the only evidence we have that Moses was the author of the books found by Josiah appears to be the passage in Deuteronomy xxxi., above cited. But how did it happen that a book of such immeasurable value to the Israelites, on their obedience to which depended all their temporal blessings, which was placed in the sanctuary by Moses, and found there by Josiah, was not there in the time of Solomon ?—Must it not have been found there by Solomon, if really placed there by Moses? for Solomon was as anxious as Josiah to honour Jehovah and enforce His Law.2 In a word, have we any reason for believing that Moses really wrote the Book of Deuteronomy, and placed it in the Ark, as stated therein ?—Critical science answers in the negative. In the first place, Hebrew scholars assure us that the style and language of the Book forbids us to entertain the idea that it was written either by Moses, or near his time; as they resemble too closely those of the later writers of the Old Testament to admit the supposition that the former belonged to the 15th, and the latter to the 5th century before Christ. To imagine that the Hebrew language underwent no change, or a very slight one, during a period of two thousand years—in which the nation underwent vast political, social, and moral changes, with a very great admix­ ture of foreign blood—is an idea ante­ cedently improbable, and is con­ tradicted by all analogy. The same remark applies, though with somewhat 1 Subsequent references seem especially to refer to Deuteronomy. 2 Conclusive evidence on this point may, we think, be gathered from Deut. xxxi. 10, where it is commanded that the law shall be publicly read every seventh year to the people assembled at the Feast of Tabernacles ; and from xvii. 18, where it is ordained that eadh king on his acces­ sion shall write out a copy of the Law. It is impossible to believe that this command, had it existed, would have been neglected by all the pious and good kings who sat on the throne of Palestine. It is clear that they had never heard of such a command. li �5o AUTHORSHIP OF THE OLD TESTAMENT CANON less force, to the other four books of the Pentateuch.1 Secondly. It is certain that Moses cannot have been the author of the whole of the Book of Deuteronomy, because it records his own death, c. xxxiv. It is obvious also that the last chapter must have been written, not only after the death of Moses, but a long period after, as appears from verse io. “And there arose not another prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face.” Now, there are no critical signs of style or language which would justify the assumption that the last chapter was the production of a different pen, or a later age, than the rest of the Book. Thirdly. There are several passages scattered through the book which speak in the past tense of events which occurred after the Israelites obtained possession of the land of Canaan, and which must therefore have been written subsequently -—probably long subsequently—to that period. For example: “The Horims also dwelt in Seir beforetime, but the children of Esau succeeded them, when they had destroyed them from before them, and dwelt in their stead; as Israel did unto the land of his possession, which the Lord gave unto them.” Deut. ii. 12. Many other anachronisms occur, as throughout c. iii., especially verse 14; xix. 14 ; xxiv. 1-3 ; ii. 20-23. Finally, as we have seen, at xxxi. 26, is a command to place the book of the Law in the Ark, and a statement that it was so placed. Now as it was notin the Ark at the time when the Temple was consecrated, this passage must have been written subsequent to that event. See also verses 9-13. Now either all these passages must have been subsequent interpolations, or they decide the date of the whole book. But they are too closely interwoven, and too harmoniously coalesce, with the rest to justify the former supposition. We are therefore driven to adopt the conclusion of De Wette and other 1 De Wette, ii. 161. critics, that the Book of Deuteronomy was written about the time of Josiah, shortly before, and with a view to, the discovery of the Pentateuch in the Temple.1 With regard to the other four books attributed to Moses, scientific investiga­ tion has succeeded in making it quite clear, not only that they were written long after ,his time, but that they are a compilation from, or rather an imperfect fusion of, two principal original docu­ ments, easily distinguishable throughout by those accustomed to this species of research, and appearing to have been a sort of legendary or traditionary his­ tories, current among the earlier Hebrews. These two documents (or classes of documents) are called the Elohistic, and Jehovistic, from the different Hebrew names they employ in speaking of the Supreme Being;—the one using habitually the word Elohim, which our translation renders God, but which, being plural in the original, would be more correctly rendered The Gods;— the other using the word Jehovah, or Jehovah Elohim, The God of Gods— rendered in our translation The Lord God.2 The existence of two such docu­ ments, or of two distinct and often con­ flicting narratives, running side by side, will be obvious on a very cursory perusal of the Pentateuch, more especially of the Book of Genesis; and the constant recurrence of these duplicate and dis­ crepant statements renders it astonishing that the books in question could ever have been regarded as one original his­ tory, proceeding from one pen. At the very commencement we have separate and varying accounts of the Creation : — the Elohistic one, extending from Gen. i.-ii. 3, magnificent, simple, and sublime, describing the form of the animate and 1 It is worthy of remark that the Book of Joshua (x. 13) quotes the Book of Jashar, which must have been written as late as the time of David (2 Samuel i. 18). See De Wette, ii. 187. 2 There are, however, other distinctive marks. De Wette, ii. 77. Bauer, Theol. des Alt. Test, c. ii. § I. �AUTHORSHIP OF THE OLD TESTAMENT CANON inanimate world by the fiat of the Almighty, and the making of man, male and female, in the image of God—but preserving a total silence respecting the serpent, the apple, and the expulsion from the Garden of Eden;—the other, or Jehovistic, extending from Gen. ii. 4 to iii. 24, giving a different account of the formation of man and woman— describing the Garden of Eden with its four rivers, one flowing into the Persian Gulf and another surrounding Ethiopia1 —narrating the temptation, the sin, and the curse, and adding a number of minute and puerile details, bespeaking the conceptions of a rude and early age, such as God teaching Adam and Eve to make coats of skin in lieu of the gar­ ments of fig leaves they had contrived for themselves. The next comparison of the two docu­ ments presents discrepancies almost equally great. The document' Elohim, Gen. v. 1-32, gives simply the Genealogy from Adam to Noah, giving Seth as the name of Adam’s first-born son ;—whereas the document Jehovah, Gen. iv. 1-26, gives Cain as the name of Adam’s first­ born and Seth as that of his last.2 Shortly after we have two slightly-varying accounts 3 of the flood; one being con­ tained in vi. 9-22 ; vii. 11-16, 18-22; 1 Cush, or “the land of swarthy men.” 2 “There is,” says Theodore Parker, “a striking similarity between the names of the alleged descendants of Adam and Enos (accord­ ing to the Elohim document, the grandson of Adam). It is to be remembered that both names signify Man. I. II. I. Adam. I. Enos. 2. Cain. 2. Cainan. 3- Enoch. 3- Mahalaleel. 4- Irad. 4- Jared. 5- Mehujael. 5- Enoch. 6. Methusael. 6. Methusaleh. 7- Lamech (Gen. 7- Lamech (Gen. iv. 17-19). v. 9-25).” The reader may draw his own inferences from this, or see those of Buttmann, in his “ Mythologus,” 1. c. vii. p. 171. See also on this matter, Kenrick on “Primeval Plistory,” p. 59- 3 One account affirms that seven specimens of clean beasts went into the ark ; the other that only two so entered. 51 viii. 1-19 ; the other comprising vi. 1-8 ; vii. 7-10, 17, 23. We will specify only one more instance of the same event twice related with obvious and irreconcilable discrepancies, viz., the seizure of Sarah in consequence of Abraham’s timid falsehood. The document Elohim (Gen. xx.) places the occurrence in Gerar and makes Abimelech the offender—the document Jehovah (xii. 10-19) places it in Egypt, and makes Pharaoh the offender ; whilst the same document again (xxvi. 1-11) narrates the same occurrence, represent­ ing Abimelech as the offender and Gerar as the locality, but changing the persons of the deceivers from Abraham and Sarah to Isaac and Rebekah. Examples of this kind might be multiplied without end; which clearly prove the existence of at least two historical documents blended, or rather bound together, in the Pentateuch. We will now proceed to point out a few of the passages and considerations which negative the idea of either of them having been composed in the age or by the hand of Moses.1 The Elohim document must have been written after the expulsion of the Canaanites and the settlement of the Israelites in the Promised Land, as appears from the following passages {inter aliaP) — “Defile not ye yourselves in any of these things . . . that the land vomit not you out also, as it vomited forth the nations which -were beforeyou ” (Lev. xviii. 24, 27, 28). “For I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews” (Gen. xl. 15). Palestine would not be called the land 1 The formula, “ unto this day,” is frequently found under circumstances indicating that the writer lived long subsequent to the events he relates (Gen. xix. 38; xxvi. 33; xxxiii. 32). We find frequent archaeological explanations, as Ex. xvi. 36: “ Now an omer (an ancient measure) is the tenth part of an ephah” (a modern measure).—Explanations of old names, and additions of the modern ones which had superseded them, repeatedly occur, as at Gen. xiv. 2, 7, 8, 17 ; xxiii. 2 ; xxxv. 19. �52 A UTHORSHIP OF THE OLD TESTAMENT CANON of the Hebrews till after the settlement of the Hebrews therein. “And Sarah died in Kirjatharba; the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan ” (Gen. xxiii. 2). “And Rachel died and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem” (yaxx. 19). “And Jacob came unto the city of Arba, which is Hebron” (xxxv. 27). These passages indicate a time subsequent to the erec­ tion of the Israelitish cities. The document must have been written in the time of the Kings; for it says, Gen. xxxvi. 31, “These are the Kings that reigned in the land of Edom, before there reigned any King over the children of Israel.” Yet it must have been written before the end of the reign of David, since Edom, which David subdued, is repre­ sented in ch. xxxvi. as still independent. The conclusion, therefore, which critical Science has drawn from these and other points of evidence is, that the Elohim documents were composed in the time of Saul, or about b.c. 1055, four hundred years after Moses. The Jehovistic documents are con­ sidered to have had a still later origin, and to date from about the reign of Solomon, b.c. 1000. For they were written after the expulsion of the Canaan­ ites, as is shown from Gen. xii. 6 and xiii. 7 : “ The Canaanite was then in the land.” “ The Canaanite and Perizzite dwelt then in the land.” They appear to have been written after the time of the Judges, since the exploits of Jair the Gileadite, one of the Judges (x. 4), are mentioned in Numb, xxxii. 41; after Saul’s victory over Agag, King of the Amalekites, who is mentioned there— “ and his King shall be higher than Agag ” (Numb. xxiv. 7);—and if, as De Wette thinks, the Temple of Jeru­ salem is signified by the two ex­ pressions (Exod. xxiii. 19; xv. 13), “ The House of Jehovah,” and the “ habitation of thy holiness,”—they must have been composed after the erection of that edifice. This, however, we consider as inconclusive. On the other hand, it is thought that they must have been written before the time of Hezekiah, because (in Numb. xxi. 6-9) they record the wonders wrought by the Brazen Serpent, which that King de­ stroyed as a provocative to Idolatry (2 Kings xviii. 4). We are aware that many persons endeavour to avoid these conclusions by assuming that the pas­ sages in question are later interpolations.But—not to comment upon the wide door which would thus be opened to other and less scrupulous interpreters— this assumption is entirely unwarranted by evidence, and proceeds on the pre­ vious assumption—equally destitute of proof—that the Books in question were written in the time of Moses—the very point under discussion. To prove the Books to be written by Moses by re­ jecting as interpolations all passages which show that they could not have been written by him—is a very clerical, but a very inadmissible, mode of rea­ soning. It results from this inquiry that the Pentateuch assumed its present form about the reign of King Josiah, b.c. 624, eight hundred years after Moses;—that the Book of Deuteronomy was probably composed about the same date;—that the other four books, or rather the sepa­ rate documents of which they consist, were written between the time of Samuel and Solomon, or from four to five hun­ dred years after Moses;—that they record the traditions respecting the early history of the Israelites and the Law delivered by Moses then current among the Priest­ hood and the people, with such material additions as it seemed good to the Priests of that period to introduce;— and that there is not the slightest reason to conclude that the historical narratives they contain were anything more than a collection of the national traditions then in vogue.1 [The concluding portion of the chapter deals with the “reconcilers of science and theology,” such as Whewell and Buckland, but their speculations are now 1 De Wette and other critics are of opinion that both the Elohistic and Jehovistic authors �THE PROPHECIES quite obsolete, and we may content our­ selves with listening to the author’s parting words :—] It will not do for Geologists and Astronomers, who wish to retain some rags of orthodoxy, however soiled and torn, to argue, as most do, ‘ that the Bible was not intended as a revelation of physical science, but only of moral and religious truth.’ This does not meet the difficulty; for the Bible does not merely use the common language, and so assume the common errors, on these points—it gives a distinct account of the Creation, in the same style, in the same narrative, in the same book, in which it narrates the Fall of Man, the Deluge, the Revelation to Abraham, the history of Jacob and Joseph. The writer evidently had no conception that when he related the Creation of the Earth, the Sea, and the Sun he was inventing or perpetuating a monstrous error; and that when he related the Fall he was revealing a mighty and mysterious truth; 53 and when he narrated the promise to Abraham he was recording a wondrous prophecy. The Bible professes to give information on all these points alike : and we have precisely the same'Scriptural ground for believing that God first made the Earth and then the Sun for the especial benefit of the Earth; that the globe was submerged by rain which lasted forty days; and that everything was destroyed except the animals which Noah packed into his Ark—as we have for believing that Adam and Eve were driven out of Paradise for a transgression; that God promised Abraham to redeem the world through his progeny; and that Jacob and Moses were the subjects of the divine communications recorded as being made to them. All the statements are made in the same affirmative style and on the same authority. The Bible equally professes to teach us fact on all these matters. There is no escape by any quibble from the grasp of this conclusion. Chapter III THE PROPHECIES A prophecy, in the ordinary accepta­ tion of the term, signifies a prediction of future events which could not have been foreseen by human sagacity, and the knowledge of which was supernaturally communicated to the prophet. It is of the Pentateuch had access to more ancient documents extant in their times, and think it probable that some of these materials may have been Mosaic (De Wette, ii. 139). [Kuenen places the Jehovistic document about 800 B. C. and the Elohistic about 750 B.C. The four earlier books of the Hexateuch assumed their present form about 450 B.C., and Deutero­ nomy, as Mr. Greg states, about 600 B.c.] clear, therefore, that in order to establish the claim of any anticipatory statement, promise, or denunciation to the rank and title of a prophecy, four points must be ascertained with precision—viz., what the event was to which the alleged pre­ diction was intended to refer; that the prediction was uttered in specific, not vague, language before the event; that the event took place specifically, not loosely, as predicted; and that it could not have been foreseen by human sagacity. Now, there is no portion of the sacred �54 THE PROPHECIES writings over which hangs a veil of such dim obscurity, or regarding the meaning of which such hopeless discrepancies have prevailed among Christian divines, as the Prophetical Books of the Hebrew Canon. The difficulties to which the English reader is exposed by the extreme defects of the received translation, its confused order, and erroneous divisions are at present nearly insuperable. No chronology is observed; the earlier and the later, the genuine and the spurious are mixed together; and sometimes the prophecies of two individuals of different epochs are given us under the same name. In the case of some of the more important of them we are in doubt as to the date, the author, and the interpreta­ tion ; and on the question whether the predictions related exclusively to Jewish or to general history, to Cyrus or to Jesus, to Zerubbabel or to Christ, to Antiochus Epiphanes, to Titus or to Napoleon; to events long past, or to events still in the remote future—the most conflicting opinions have been held with equal confidence by men of equal learning. It would carry us too far, and prove too unprofitable an occupation, to enumerate these contradictory interpre­ tations ; we shall in preference content ourselves with a brief statement of some considerations which will show how far removed we are on this subject from the possession of that clear certainty, or even that moderate verisimilitude of knowledge, on which alone any reason­ ings, such as have been based on Hebrew prophecy, can securely rest. There is no department of theology in which divines have so universally assumed their conclusions and modified their premises to suit them as in this. I. In the first place, it is not uninstructive to remind ourselves of a few of the indications scattered throughout the Scriptures of what the conduct and state of mind of the Prophets often were. They seem, like the utterers of Pagan oracles, to have been worked up before giving forth their prophecies into a species of religious frenzy, produced or aided by various means, especially by music and dancing.1 Philo says, “ The mark of true prophecy is the rapture of its utterance; in order to attain divine wisdom the soul must go out of itself, and become drunk with divine frenzy.” 2 The same word in Hebrew (and Plato thought in Greek also) signifies “ to pro­ phecy ” and “ to be mad ”;3 and even among themselves the prophets were often regarded as madmen 4—an idea to which their frequent habit of going about naked5 and the performance occasion­ ally of still more disgusting ceremonies greatly contributed. That many of them were splendid poets and noble-minded men there can be no doubt; but we see in conduct like this little earnest of sobriety or divine inspiration, and far too much that reminds us of the fanatics of eastern countries and of ancient times. II. Many, probably most, of the socalled prophecies were not intended as predictions in the proper meaning of the word, but were simply promises of prosperity or denunciations of ven­ geance contingent upon certain lines of conduct. The principle of the Hebrew theocracy was that of temporal rewards or punishments consequent upon obedi­ ence to, or deviation from, the divine ordinances ; and in the great proportion of cases the prophetic language seems to have been nothing more than a reminder or fresh renunciation of the principle. This is clearly shown by the circum­ stances that several of the prophecies, though originally given, not in the con­ tingent, but in the positive form,, were rescinded, or contradicted by later pro­ phetical denunciations, as in the case of Eli, David, Hezekiah, and Jonah. The rescinding of prophecy in i Sam. ii. 30 is very remarkable, and shows how little 1 I Sam. xviii. 10; x. 5 ; 2 Kings iii. 15, 16. 2 Quoted in Mackay’s Progress of the Intel­ lect,” ii. 192. 3 Newman, “Heb. Mon.”p. 34. Platoderived p.a.vrvs from p.aive<r0ai. 4 2 Kings ix. Ii ; Jeremiah xxix. 26. 5 2 Sam. vi. 16, 20; 1 Sam. xix. 24 ; Is. xx. 3 ; Ezek. iv. 4, 6, 8, 12, 15 ; 1 Kings xx. 3533. �THE PROPHECIES these enunciations were regarded by the Israelites from our modern point of view. Compare 2 Sam. vii. 10, where the Israelites are promised that they shall not be moved out of Canaan nor afflicted any more, with the subsequent denun­ ciations of defeat and captivity in a strange land. Compare, also, 2 Sam. vii. 12-16, where the permanent pos­ session of the throne is promised to David, and that the lineal descendant shall not fail him to sit upon the throne of Judah, with the curse pronounced on his last royal descendant, Coniah—-“Thus saith the Lord, Write ye this man child­ less, a man that shall not prosper in his days ; for no man of his seed shall prosper, sitting upon the throne of David, and ruling any more in Judah” (Jer. xxii. 30 ; xxxvii. 30). See, also, the curious argument as to the liability of prophecy to be rescinded, in the same book (Jer. xxxiii. 17-26). The re­ scinding of the prediction or denuncia­ tion in the case of Hezekiah is recorded in Isaiah xxxviii. 1-5, and that of Jonah in the Book which bears his name, iii. 4-10. III. It is now clearly ascertained, and generally admitted among critics, that several of the most remarkable and specific prophecies were never fulfilled at all, or only very partially and loosely fulfilled. Among these may be specified the denunciation of Jeremiah (xxii. 18, 19; xxxvi. 30), against Jehoiakim, as may be seen by comparing 2 Kings xxiv. 6 ;—and the denunciation of Amos against Jeroboam II. (vii. n), as may be seen by comparing 2 Kings xiv. 23-29. The remarkable, distinct, and positive prophecies in Ezekiel (xxvi., xxvii.), relating to the conquest, plunder, and destruction of Tyre by Nebuchadnezzar, we can now state on the highest authorities,1 were not ful­ filled. Indeed (in ch. xxix. 18) is a confession that he failed, at least so far as spoil went. The same may be said of the equally clear and positive pro­ phecies of the conquest and desolation 1 Heeren’s “ Researches, ” ii. 11. 439- Grote, iii. 55 of Egypt by Nebuchadnezzar (Jer. xliii. 10-13 ; Ezek. xxix. ; xxx. 1-19), as Dr. Arnold, in his Sermons on Prophecy (p. 48) fully admits.1 Jeremiah’s pro­ phecy of the Captivity of Seventy years, and the destruction of Babylon (xxv.) have generally been appealed to as instances of clear prophecy exactly and indisputably fulfilled. But in the first place, at the time this prediction was delivered, the success of Nebuchad­ nezzar against Jerusalem was scarcely doubtful; in the second place, the Cap­ tivity cannot, by any fair calculation, be lengthened out to seventy years ;2 and in the third place, the desolation of Babylon (“ perpetual desolation ” is the emphatic phrase) which was to take place at the end of the seventy years, as a punishment for the pride of Nebuchadnezzar, did not take place till long after. Babylon was still a flourishing city under Alexander the Great; and, as Mr. Newman observed, “it is absurd to present the emptiness of modern Babylon as a punishment for the pride of Nebuchadnezzar,” or as a fulfilment of Jeremiah’s prophecy.— Gen. xlix. 10, must also be considered to present a specimen of prophecy signally falsified by the event, and being composed in the palmiest days of Judah, was probably little more than a hyper­ bolical expression of the writer’s con­ fidence in the permanence of her grandeur. Finally, in Hosea we have a remarkable instance of self-contradic­ tion, or virtual acknowledgment of the non-fulfilment of prophecy. In viii. 13 and ix. 3, it is affirmed, “ Ephraim shall return to Egypt ”; while in xi. 5, it is said, “ Ephraim shall not return to I 1 Grote, ubi supra.—“Hebrew Monarchy,” p.363. 2 The chronologies of Kings and Chronicles do not quite tally; but taking that of Jeremiah himself, the desolation begun in the seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar, B.C. 599, was continued in B.C. 588, and concluded in B.c. 583.—The exile ended some say 538, some 536. The longest date that can be made out is 66 years, and the shortest only 43. To make out 70 years fairly, we must date from B. C. 606; the first year of Nebuchadnezzar. �56 THE PROPHECIES Egypt.” Isaiah (xvii. i) pronounces on Damascus a threat of ruin as emphatic as any that was pronounced against Tyre, Egypt, or Babylon. “It is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.” Yet Damascus is to this day the most flourishing city in those countries. IV. We find from numberless pas­ sages both in the prophetical and the historical books, that for a considerable period the Hebrew nation was inundated with false prophets,1 whom it was diffi­ cult and often impossible to distinguish from the true, although we have both prophetical and sacerdotal tests given for this express purpose. It even ap­ pears that some of those whom we con­ sider as true prophets were by their contemporaries charged with being, and even punished for being, the contrary. In Deut. xviii. 20-22, the decision of the prophet’s character is made to de­ pend upon the fulfilment or non-fulfil­ ment of his prophecy. In Deut. xiii. 1-5, this test is rejected, and the de­ cision is made to rest upon the doctrine which he teaches: if this be false he is to be stoned, whatever miraculous proofs of his mission he may give.2 From Jer. xxix. 26, 27, it appears that the High Priest assumed the right of judg­ ing whether a man was a false or a true prophet; though Jeremiah himself does not seem to have been willing to abide by this authority, but to have denounced priests and the prophets who supported them (Jer. v. 31). Pashur the priest, we learn (xx. 1-7), put Jeremiah in the stocks . for his false prophecies; and Shemaiah reproves the Priest Jehoiada for not having repeated the punishment, and is violently denounced by the pro­ phet in consequence (xxix. 24-32.). V. In the case of nearly all the prophets we have little external or in­ dependent evidence as to the date at which their prophecies were uttered, and 1 Jeremiah v. 31; xxiii, 16-34. Ezekiel xiv. 9-11. 2 ,§ee a^so whole remarkable chapter, Jer. xxviii. none as to the period at which they were written down /1 while the internal evi­ dence on these points is dubious, con­ flicting, and, in the opinions of the best critics, generally unfavourable to the popular conceptions.—The Books of Kings and Chronicles, in which many of these prophecies are mentioned, and the events to which they are supposed to refer, are related, were written, or compiled in their present form, the former near the termination of the Babylonian Exile, or somewhere about the year b.c. 530, i.e., from 50 to 200 years2 after the period at which the prophecies were supposed to have been deliveredwhile the latter appear to have been a much later compilation, some critics dating them about 260, and others about 400 before Christ.3 It is probably not too much to affirm that we have no instance in the pro­ phetical Books of the Old Testament of a prediction, in the case of which we possess, at once and combined, clear and unsuspicious proof of the date, the precise event predicted, the exact cir­ cumstances of that event, and the in­ ability of human sagacity to foresee it. There is no case in which we can say with certainty—even where it is reason­ able to suppose that the prediction was uttered before the event—that the nar­ rative has not been tampered with to suit the prediction, or the prediction modified to correspond with the event.4 1 “Hebrew Monarchy,” p. 352 (note.) 2 Amos and Hosea flourished probably about 790 B.c. Jeremiah about 600. Zechariah about 520. De Wette, ii. 436. [Kuenen and Wellhausen think, however, that Kings was substantially completed before the Exile, i.e., about B.C. 600, a few short passages imply­ ing an exilic standpoint being introduced afterward.] 3 Such at least is the most probable result at which critical science has yet arrived. De Wette, ii. 248, 265. [Driver, Intro., p. 486, thinks. B.c. 332, the earliest date to which Chronicles can be assigned. Most critics agree, though Noldeke puts it as late as B.c. 200.] 4 De Wette and other theologians consider that in many cases where the prophecy is unusually definite, this has certainly been done. E 357, 363- �THE PROPHECIES The following remarks will show how little certain is our knowledge, even in the case of the principal prophets. Isaiah, as we learn in the first and the sixth chapters of his Book, appeared as a Prophet in the last year of the reign of King Uzziah (b.c. 759), and prophesied till the fourteenth year of Hezekiah (b.c. 710). We hear of him in the 2nd Book of Kings and Chronicles, but not till the reign of Hezekiah; except that he is referred to in 2 Chron. xxvi. 22, as having written a history of Uzziah. The prophecies which have come down to us bearing his name extend to sixty-six chapters, of the date of which (either of their composition or compilation) we hare no certain knowledge ; but of which the last twenty-seven are confidently de­ cided by competent judges to be the production of a different Writer, and a later-age; and were doubtless composed during the Babylonish Captivity, later therefore than the year b.c. 600, or about 150 years after Isaiah. The grounds of this decision are given at length in De Wette.1 They are found partly in the marked difference of style between the two portions of the Book, but still more in the obvious and per­ vading fact that the Writer of the latter portion takes his stand in the period of the Captivity, speaks of the Captivity as an existing circumstance or condition, and comforts his captive Countrymen with hopes of deliverance at the hand of Cyrus. It appears as the general sum­ mary result of critical research, that our present collection consists of a number of promises, denunciations, and exhort­ ations, actually uttered by Isaiah, and brought together by command, probably of Hezekiah, greatly enlarged and inter­ polated by writings upwards of a century later than his time, which the ignorance or unfair intentions of subsequent col­ lectors and commentators have not 1 De Wette, ii. 364-390. [Several other sections of the Book are not the work of Isaiah, such as chaps, xiii., xv., xvi. 1-12, and probably others. The entire compilation cannot be earlier than b.c. 536.] 57 scrupled to consecrate by affixing to them his venerable name. Jeremiah appears to have prophesied from about b.c. 630-580, or before and at the commencement of the Captivity at Babylon, and the chief portion of his writings refer to that event, which in his time was rapidly and manifestly ap­ proaching. The prophecies appear to have been written down by Baruch, a scribe, from the dictation of Jeremiah (xxxvi.) and to have been collected soon after the return from exile,1 but by whom and at what precise time is unknown ;—and commentators discover several pas­ sages in which the original text appears to have been interpolated, or worked over again. Still, the text seems to be far more pure, and the real, much nearer to the professed, date, than in the case of Isaiah. The genuineness of the Book of Ezekiel is less doubtful than that of any other of the Prophets. His prophecies relate chiefly to the destruction of Jeru­ salem, which happened during his time. He appears to have been carried into exile by the victorious Chaldteans about eleven years before they finally con­ summated the ruin of the Jewish Nation by the destruction of their Capital. His prophecies appear to have continued many years after the Captivity—sixteen according to De Wette.2 Of all the prophetical writings, the Book of Daniel has been the subject of the fiercest contest. Divines have con­ sidered it . of paramount importance, both on account of the definiteness and precision of its predictions, and the supposed reference of many of them to Christ. Critics, on the other hand, have considered the genuineness of the Book to be peculiarly questionable; and few now, of any note or name, venture to defend it. In all probability we have no remains of the real prophecies of the actual Daniel—for that such a person, famed for his wisdom and virtue, did exist, appears from Ezek. xiv. and xxxviii, 1 De Wette, ii. 416 and 396. 2 De Wette, ii. 426. �58 THE PROPHECIES He must have lived about 570 years before Christ, whereas the Book which bears his name was almost certainly written in the time of Antiochus' Epiphanes, no years b.c. -Some English Commentators1 and Divines have endea­ voured to escape from the obvious and manifold difficulties of the Book, by conceiving part of it to be genuine and part spurious.—But De Wette has shown2 that we have no reason for believing it not to be the work of one hand. It is full of historical inaccuracies and fanciful legends; and the opening statement is an obvious error, showing that the Writer was imperfectly acquainted with the chronology or details of the period in which he takes his stand. The first chapter begins by informing us.that in the third year of King Jehoiakim, Nebu­ chadnezzar, King of Babylon, besieged and took Jerusalem, and carried the King (and Daniel) away captive. Where­ as, we learn from Jeremiah that Nebu­ chadnezzar was not King of Babylon till the fourth year of Jehoiakim, and did not take Jerusalem till seveiz years later.3 It would be out of place to adduce all the marks which betray the late origin of this Book;—they may be seen at length in De Wette. It is here sufficient that we have no froof whatever of its early date, and that the most eminent critics have abandoned the opinion of its genuineness as indefensible. III. Thirdly, We have already had ample proof that the Jewish Writers 1 “I have long thought that the greater part of the book of Daniel is most certainly a very late work, of the time of the Maccabees; and the pretended prophecy about the Kings of Greece and Persia, and of the North and Scuth, is mere history, like the poetical prophecies in Virgil and elsewhere. In fact you can trace distinctly the date when it was written, because the events up to that date are given with historical minute­ ness, totally unlike the character of real pro­ phecy; and beyond that date all is imaginary.” —Again, he thinks that criticism “proves the non-authenticity of great part of Daniel: that there may be genuine fragments in it is very likely.”—“Arnold’s Life and Cor.” ii. 188. 2 De Wette, ii. 499. 3 See the whole argument in De Wette, ii. 484 (note). not only did not scruple to narrate past events as if predicting future ones—to present History in the form of Prophecy —but that they habitually did so. The instances are far too numerous to quote; —we will specify only a few of the most remarkable :—Gen. xxv. 23 ; xxvii. 28, 29, 39, 4° J xlix. passim ; Numb, xxiv.; Deut. iv. 27 ; xxviii. 25, 36, 37, 64. We anticipate that these remarks will be met by the reply—“ Whatever may be established as to the uncertainty which hangs over the date of those pro­ phecies which refer to the ■ temporal fortunes of the Hebrew Nation, no doubt can exist that all the prophecies relating to the Messiah were extant in their present form long previous to the advent of Him in whose person the Christian world agrees to acknowledge their fulfilment.” This is true, and the argument would have all the force which is attributed to it, were the objectors able to lay their finger on a single Old Testament Prediction clearly referring to Jesus Christ, intended by the utterers of it to relate to him, prefiguring his character and career, and manifestly ful­ filled in his appearance on earth. This they cannot do. Most of the passages usually adduced as complying with these conditions, referred, and were clearly intended to refer,1 to eminent indi­ viduals in Israelitish History ;—many are not prophecies at all ;2—the Messiah, 1 “ We find throughout the New Testament,” says Dr. Arnold, “references made to various passages in the Old Testament, which are alleged as prophetic of Christ, or of some particulars of the Christian dispensation. Now if we turn to the context of these passages, and so endeavour to discover their meaning, according to the only sound principles of interpretation, it will often appear that they do not relate to the Messiah, or to Christian times, but are either expressions of religious affections generally, such as submission, love, hope, &c., or else refer to some particular circumstances in the life and condition of the writer, or of the Jewish nation, and do not at all show that anything more remote, or any events of a more universal and spiritual character, were designed to be prophesied.”—“Sermons on the Interpretation of Prophecy.” Preface, p. I. 2 “The great prophecies of Isaiah and Jeremiah are, critics can now see, not strictly �i THE PROPHECIES the Anointed Deliverer, expected by the Jews, hoped for and called for by their Poets and Prophets, was of a character so different, and a career so opposite, to those of the meek, lowly, long-suffering Jesus, that the passages describing the one never could have been applied to the other, without a perversion of in­ genuity, and a disloyal treatment of their obvious signification, which, if employed in any other field than that of Theology, would have met with the prompt discredit and derision they deserve.1 There are, no doubt, scattered predictions at all; and predictions which are strictly meant as such, like those in the Book of Daniel, are an embarrassment to the Bible rather than a main element of it.”—Literature and Dogma, p. 114, by Matthew Arnold. 1 This disingenuousness is obvious in one point especially : the Messianic Prophecies are interpreted literally or figuratively, as may best suit their adaptation to the received history of Jesus. Thus that “ the wolf shall lie down with the lamb, and the lion eat grass like an ox,” is taken figuratively : that the Messiah should ride into Jerusalem on an ass, is taken literally. The following passage, written five and twenty years subsequent to the text of this volume, may be quoted in confirmation. “And what were called the ‘ signal predictions ’ concerning the Christ of popular theology, as they stand in our Bibles, had and have undoubtedly a look of supernatural prescience. The employment of capital letters, and other aids, such as the constant use of the future tense, naturally and innocently adopted by interpreters who were profoundly convinced that Christianity needed these express predictions and that they must be in the Bible, enhanced, certainly, this look ; but the look, even without these aids, was sufficiently striking. That Jacob on his death-bed should two thousand years before Christ have 1 been enabled,’ as the phrase is, to foretell to his son Judah that ‘the sceptre shall not depart from Judah until Shiloh (or the Messiah) come, and to him shall the gathering of the people be,’ does seem, when the ex­ planation is put with it that the Jewish kingdom lasted till the Christian era and then perished, a miracle of prediction in favour of our current Christian theology. That Jeremiah should have ‘ been enabled ’ to foretell, in the name of Jehovah ; ‘The days come when I will raise to David a righteous Branch ; in his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely; and this is the name whereby he shall be called, THE lord our righteousness!’—does seem a wonder of prediction in favour of that tenet of the Godhead of the Eternal Son, for which the Bishops of Winchester and Gloucester are so 59 verses in the Prophetic and Poetical Books of the Hebrew Canon, which, as quotations, are apt and applicable enough to particular points in Christ’s character and story;—but of what equally volu­ minous collection of poems or rheto­ rical compositions may the same not be anxious to do something. For unquestionably Jehovah is often spoken of as the saviour of Judah and Israel: ‘All flesh shall know that I the Eternal am thy saviour and thy redeemer, the mighty one of Jacob’; and in- the prophecy given above as Jeremiah’s, the Branch of David is clearly identified with Jehovah. Again, that David should say : ‘ The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand until I make thy foes thy footstool,’—does seem a prodigy of prediction to the same effect. That he should say : ‘ Kiss the Son, lest he be angry and so ye perish,’ does seem a supernaturally prescient assertion of the Eternal Sonship. And so long as these prophecies stand as they are here given, they no doubt bring to Christianity all the support (and with the mass of mankind this is by no means inconsiderable) which it can derive from the display of supernatural prescience. But who will dispute that it more and more becomes known that these prophecies cannot stand as we have here given them ? Manifestly, it more and more becomes known, that the passage from Genesis, with its mysterious Shiloh and the gathering of these people to him, is rightly to be rendered as follows : ‘ The pre­ eminence shall not depart from Judah so long as the people resort to Shiloh (the national sanctuary before Jerusalem was won); and the nations (the heathen Canaanites) shall obey himd We here purposely leave out of sight any such con­ sideration as that our actual books of the Old Testament came first together through the piety of the house of Judah, and when the destiny of Judah was already traced; and that to say roundly : ‘Jacob was enabled to foretell, The sceptre shall not depart from Judah,’ as if he were speaking of a prophecy preached and published by Dr. Cumming, is wholly inad­ missible. For this consideration is of force, indeed, but it is a consideration drawn from the rules of literary history and criticism, and not likely to have weight with the mass of mankind. Palpable error and mistranslation are what And what, will have weight with them. then, will they say as they come to know (and do not and must not more and more of them come to know it every day ?) that Jeremiah’s supposed signal identification of Christ with the God of Israel : ‘ I will raise to David a righteous Branch, and this is the name whereby he shall be called, the lord our righteousness,’ runs really : I will raise to David a righteous branch; in his days Judah shall be saved and �6o THEISM OF THÈ JEWS IMPURE AND PROGRESSIVE said ?1 Of the references made by the Evangelists to such passages, we shall speak hereafter. The state of the case appears to be this: —That all the Old Testament Prophecies have been assumed -to be genuine, inspired predictions; and when falsified in their obvious meaning and received interpretation by the event, have received immediately a new inter­ pretation, and been supposed to refer to Israel shall dwell safely; and this is the name whereby they shall call themselves : The Eternal is our righteousness The prophecy thus be­ comes simply one of the many promises of a successor to David under whom the Hebrew people should trust in the Eternal and follow righteousness ; just as the prophecy from Genesis is one of the many prophecies of the enduring continuance of the greatness of Judah. ‘The Lord said unto my Lord,’ in like manner—will not people be startled when they find that it ought to run instead : ‘ the Eternal said unto my lord the king,’—a simple promise of victory to a prince of God’s chosen people?—and that: ‘ Kiss the Son,’ is in reality, ‘ Be warned,’ or ‘ be instructed ;’ ‘layhold,’ according to the Septuagint, ‘ on instruction’?”—Lite? attire and Dogma, pp. 110-113. See also pp. 91-106. 1 Perhaps none of the Old Testament prophe­ cies are more clearly Messianic than the following passage from Plato :—Ovtw fiiaKet/j.evos & Alxaios /j.a<TTiyái(reTai, SeStjaerai, ¿xicavfMltrerai Tuuf>0aXp.(¿, re\evrS>v irávra xana iradcóv ava<rxitd)v\evd-r¡ffeTai. Plato, de República, 1. ii. p. 361, E. Speaking of this teacher of Mankind whom he expected, he says, “This just man will scarcely be endured by them—but probably will be scourged, racked, tormented, have his eyes burnt out and at last, having suffered all manner of evils, shall be impaled”— or as the original term will signify, “Crucified.” some other event. When the result has disappointed expectation, the conclusion has been, not that the prophecy was false, but that the interpretation was erroneous. It is obvious that a mode of reasoning like this is peculiar to Theo­ logical Inquirers. From this habit of assuming that Prophecy was Prediction, and must have its fulfilment—which was perhaps preva­ lent among the Jews as among modern Divines—appears to have arisen the national expectation of a Messiah.— A Deliverer was hoped for, expected, prophesied, in the time of Jewish misery (and Cyrus was perhaps the first referred to); but as no one appeared who did what the Messiah, according to Pro­ phecy, should do, they went on degrading each successive Conqueror and Hero from the Messianic dignity, and are still expecting the true Deliverer. —Hebrew and Christian Divines both start from the same assumed and un­ proven premises, viz.:—that a Messiah having been foretold, must appear;— but there they diverge, and the Jews show themselves to be the sounder logicians of the two :—the Christians, assuming that Jesus was the Messiah intended (though not the one expected}, wrest the obvious meaning of the Pro­ phecies to show that they were fulfilled in him •—while the Jews, assuming the obvious meaning of the Prophecies to be their real meaning, argue that they were not fulfilled in Christ, and therefore that the Messiah is yet to come. Chapter IV THEISM OF THE JEWS IMPURE AND PROGRESSIVE It is an assumption of the popular theology, and an almost universal belief in the popular mind, that the Jewish nation was selected by the Almighty to preserve and carry down to later ages a knowledge of the One true Godthat the Patriarchs possessed this know­ ledge ;—that Moses delivered and en­ �THEISM OF THE JEWS IMPURE AND PROGRESSIVE forced this doctrine as the fundamental tenet of the national creed;—and that it was, in fact, the received and distinctive dogma of the Hebrew people. This alleged possession of the true faith by one only people, while all surrounding tribes were lost in Polytheism, or some­ thing worse, has been adduced by divines in general as a proof of the truth of the. sacred history, and of the divine origin of the Mosaic dispensation, and forms, indeed, one of the standard arguments of Theologians in the present day. Paley, the actual text-book of one of our Universities, writes of it thus :— “ Undoubtedly our Saviour assumes the divine origin of the Mosaic Institu­ tion ; and independently of his authority, I conceive it to be very difficult to assign any other cause for the commencement or existence of that Institution; especially for the singular circumstance of the Jews adhering to the Unity, when every other people slid into polytheism ; for their being men in religion, children in everything else ; behind other nations in the arts of peace and war, superior to the most improved in their sentiments and doctrines relating to the Deity. ”x Milman2 speaks of the pure mono­ theism of the Jews in a similar strain : “ The religious history of this people is no less singular. In the narrow slip of land inhabited by their tribes the worship of one Almighty Creator of the Universe subsists, as in its only sanctuary. In every stage of society, under the pastoral tent of Abraham, and in the sumptuous Temple of Solomon, the same creed maintains its inviolable simplicity. . . . Nor is this merely a sublime specu­ lative tenet; it is the basis of their civil constitution, and of their national cha­ racter. As there is but one Almighty God so there is but one People under his special protection, the descendants of Abraham.” Now, the passage we have italicised is surely an extraordinary over-statement of the case. Without going so far as Bauer 1 Paley’s Evidences of Christianity. 2 History of the Jews, i, 4. 61 (Theol. des Alt. Test. i. 4) who thinks that the Jews as a nation scarcely became true monotheists till after the Captivity, it seems difficult not to recognise that they did not believe in the exclusive existence of one sole God in the earlier times—perhaps not till a comparatively late period of their history;—that their early and popular notions of the Deity were eminently coarse, low, and un­ worthy ;—that among them, as among all other nations, the conceptions of God formed by individuals varied according to their intellectual and spiritual capa­ cities, being poor and anthropomorphic among the ignorant and coarse-minded, pure and lofty among the virtuous and richly-gifted;—and, finally, that these conceptions gradually improved and be­ came purified and ennobled, as the Hebrews advanced in civilisation—be­ ing, generally speaking, lowest in the Historical Books, amended in the Pro­ phetical Writings, and reaching their highest elevation among the Poets of the Nation. In its progress from Fetichism to pure Theism, the human mind generally passes through three stages—or to speak more correctly, man’s idea of God passes through three forms of development. We have him represented first as the God of the individual or family; then as the God of the nation ; lastly as the God of the human race.—Now we find all these three views of Deity in the Old Testa­ ment—sometimes, it is true, strangely jumbled together, as might be expected in books written by different persons at different times—but on the whole bearing pretty distinct marks of the periods at which they respectively pre vailed. The representations of God in the history of Abraham appear to imply that the God whom he worshipped was a family God, selected, probably, by him for some reason unknown to us, out of a number of others who were worshipped by his fathers and his tribe. We are expressly told that the father and grand­ father of Abraham “ worshipped other �Ó2 THEISM OF THE JEWS IMPURE AND PROGRESSIVE Gods ” ;—and the representations given of the God of Abraham, and of his proceedings during the lives of the three Patriarchs, are so mean and material that it is difficult to conceive how a knowledge of the One true God, Maker of Heaven and Earth, could have been ascribed to them. God appears to Abraham with two angels in the form of men—(they are spoken of as “three men ”)—sits at the door of his tent— partakes of his repast—is angry at the laughter of Sarah, and an altercation takes place between them ; after which He discusses with him the case of Sodom and Gomorrah, and informs him that He is going down thither to see whether the reports which have reached him are correct. “ Your fathers dwelt on the other side of the flood in old time, even Terah, the father of Abraham and the father of Nachor: and they served other GodsT (Joshua xxiv. 2). “ The God of Abraham and the God of Nachor, the God of their father, judge betwixt us ” (Gen. xxxi. 53). There are not wanting traces of Polytheism in the earlier portions of Hebrew History. The expression Jehovah Elohim, 11 The God of Gods, ” may, perhaps, be taken as an indication. Bauer thinks that “the Elohim, who were probably at one time worshipped as equal Gods, are in Genesis recognised as subordinate deities, with whom Jehovah, the highest Eloah, enters into council” (Theol. des Alt. Test. i. 3). It will be remem­ bered that Laban, a near relative of Abraham, whose sister he had expressly selected as his son Isaac’s wife, pursued Jacob for having “ stolen his Gods” (Gen. xxxi. 30). He therefore worshipped fetiches. In Gen. xxxv. 2-4, we find Jacob collecting the strange Gods wor­ shipped by his household, and hiding them under an oak. It is certainly remarkable that both Abraham and Isaac should insist upon their, sons marrying into an idolatrous family, if they had really believed their own God to be the only one. Jacob’s ideas of God are, as might be expected from his mean and tricky character, even lower than those of Abraham. He makes a condition, on which he will select Jehovah to be his God, and will give Him a tithe of all his possessions (Gen. xxviii. 20) ;—he re­ presents Him as his confidant in cheat­ ing Laban, and wrestles with Him bodily to extort a blessing. Who, after reading such passages can for a moment accept the belief that Jacob and Job entertained the same conceptions of God. In process of time the descendants of Abraham multiplied and became a numerous people, and naturally con­ tinued the worship of that God who had done so much for their forefathers. Thus the Jamily God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob gradually enlarged into the national God of the Israelites, to whose worship they adhered with greater or less tenacity, with greater or less ex­ clusiveness, during their residence in Egypt. As the history proceeds the conceptions of this God seem to be­ come purer and loftier, till, in the mind of Moses, an intellectual and highlyeducated man, versed in all the learning of the Egyptians, they often (as far as we can guess what came from him) reached to a sublime simplicity of ex­ pression rarely surpassed. Still, there is no distinct proof that Moses dis­ believed in the existence of other Gods : —the God whom he serves is still “ the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob”;— He is not asserted to be the only God; the existence and power of rival Deities is not denied, but is even admitted by implication. All that Moses claims for Jehovah is, not that he is the Sole God. but that he is superior to all Others, “Who is like unto Thee, Jehovah, among the Gods ? ” (Ex. xv. 111). And he represents him to Pharaoh, by Jehovah’s own command, as the “God of the Hebrews,” not as the Supreme Lord of Eleaven and Earth. Even in 1 Jethro says ; “Now I know that Jehovah is greater than all gods : for in the thing wherein they dealt proudly, he was above them all.”— (Exod. xviii. 11.) �THEISM OF THE JEWS IMPURE AND PROGRESSIVE the delivery of the Commandments, the great foundation of the Law, it is not said, “There is no God but Jehovah,” but only “I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the House of Bondage; thou shalt haw no other Gods beside Me (or before Me).” The whole of the xxivth chapter of Joshua confirms this view : he there urges the Israelites to choose Jehovah, not as the only God, whom to desert would be to become Atheists, but as a God whose bounties to them had been so great that it would be black ingratitude not to prefer Him to all others. The whole history of the lapses of the Jewish Nation into idolatry also discourages the idea of their having been really monotheists. The worship of the golden calf and the Canaanitish gods was quite natural on the supposition of Jehovah being merely a paramount and preferred God:—monstrous, if they had believed Him to be the only one. Moreover, their idolatry is always spoken of as infidelity, not as atheism. As civilisation advanced, prophets, sages, and poets arose among the Hebrews, to whom the limited and anthropomorphic conceptions of the Deity, prevalent among the people, were painfully inadequate and revolt­ ing;—and they endeavoured by nobler representations of the object of their worship to convert the national religion into a pure theism ; in which, however, it is thought by many that they did not succeed till after the Captivity. After this idea had once taken root, the nation never showed any disposition to relapse into idolatry. And even to the latest period of the Canonical writings we find representations both of the nature and attributes of Jehovah so utterly discre­ pant as to leave no doubt that among the Jews, as among all other nations, the God of the wise and the God of the ignorant—the God of the Priests and the God of the Prophets—were the embodiment of two very different classes of ideas. Let anyone compare the partial, unstable, revengeful, and deceit­ 63 ful God of Exodus and Numbers with the sublime and unique Deity of Job and the nobler Psalms, or even the God of Isaiah with the God of Ezekiel and Daniel—and he can scarcely fail' to admit that the conception of the One living and true God was a plant of slow and gradual growth in the Hebrew mind, and was due far less to Moses, the Patriarchs, or the Priests, than to the superiority of individual minds at various periods of their history. Compare the following representations which we have arranged in parallel columns. And Jehovah spake to Moses, saying—Let them make me a sanc­ tuary, that I may dwell among them—And thou shalt put the mercy-seat above upon the ark, . . . and there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee.— Exod. xxv. 8, 21-22. But will God in very deed dwell on the earth ? Behold the Heaven, and the Flea­ ven of Heavens, cannot contain Thee; how much less this House that I have builded ! — 1 Kings viii. 27. Whither shall I go from thy Spirit ? or whither shall I flee from thy presence ?— Ps. cxxxix. 7-10. And it came to pass, as Moses entered into the tabernacle, that the cloudy pillar descended, and stood at the door of the tabernacle : and Jehovah talked with Moses.—And Jehovah spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto a friend.—Exod. xxxiii. 9, II. For they have heard that thou Jehovah art among this people, that thou Jehovah art seen face to face.—Numbers xiv. 14. Lo, he goeth by me, and I see him not; he passeth on also, but I perceive him not.—Job ix. 11. Behold, I go forward, but he is not there ; and backward, but I cannot perceive him: on the left hand, where he doth work, but I can­ not behold him: he hideth himself on the right hand, that I can­ not see him. —Tob xxiii. 8, 9. And Jehovah said, Behold there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon a rock. And it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a clift of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by ! And I will take away mine O Jehovah my God, thou art very great; thou art clothed with honour and majesty: Who coverest thyself with light as with a gar­ ment ; who stretchest out the Heavens like a curtain; who layeth the beams of his cham­ bers in the waters; who maketh the clouds �ORIGIN OF THE GOSPELS 64 hand, and thou shalt see my back parts ; but my face shall not be seen —Exod. xxxiii. 21-24. And Moses returned to the Lord, and said, Lord, wherefore hast thou so evil entreated this 'people ? Why is it that thou hast sent me? For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in thy name, he hath done evil to this people; neither hast thou de­ livered thy people at all.—Exod. v. 22, 23. his chariot; who walketh on the wings of the wind.—Psalm civ. i-3Then Job answered and said, I know it is so of a truth ; but how should man be just with God ? If he will contend with him, he cannot answer him one of a thousand. For he is not a man, as I am, that I should answer him, and we should come together in judgment.—Job ix. 2, 3, 32- And Jehovah said, Who shall persuade Ahab, that he may go up and fall at RamothGilead ? And one said on this manner, and another said on that manner. And there came forth a spirit, and stood before the Lord, and said, I will per­ suade him. And Jeho­ vah said unto him, Wherewith ? And he said, I will go forth, and I will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets. And he said, Thou shalt persuade him, and pre­ vail also : go forth, and do so.—I Kings xxii. 20-23. For the word of the Lord is right, and all his works are done in truth. He loveth right­ eousness and judg­ ment.—Ps. xxxiii. 4, 5. Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord: but they that deal truly are his • de­ light.—Prov. xii. 22. and the tower which all the sons of men.— the children of men Psalm xxxiii. 13. builded.—Gen. xi. 5. And Noah built an altar unto the Lord, and offered burnt offer­ ings on the altar. And the Lord smelled a sweet savour; and the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake.—Gen. viii. 20, 21. I will take no bul­ lock out of thy house, nor he-goats out of thy folds. For every beast of the forest is mine and the cattle upon a thou­ sand hills. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee ; for the world is mine, and the ful­ ness thereof. Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats ? Offer unto God thanksgiving.—Ps. 1. 9-14. But ye shall offer the burnt-offering for a sweet savour unto the Lord.—Num. xxviii. 27And ye shall offer a burnt-offering, a sacri­ fice made by fire, of a sweet savour, unto the Lord, thirteen bullocks, two rams, and fourteen lambs of the first year ; they shall be without blemish.—Num. xxix. I3> 36. For thou desirest not sacrifice, else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt-offering.— Ps. li. 16. Wherewith shall I come before Jehovah, and bow myself before the high God ? Shall I come before him with burnt - offering, with calves of a year old ? Will -the Lord be pleased with thou­ sands of rams, or with ten thousand rivers of oil ? Shall I give my first-born for my trans­ gressions, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul ? He hath showed thee, O man, what is good ; and what doth Jehovah require of thee, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God ?—Micah vi. 6-8. The eyes of the Lord And they went in unto Noah in the ark, are in every place, be­ and the Lord shut him holding the evil and the good.—Prov. xv. 3. in.—G&x. vii. 16. And Jehovah came Jehovah looketh from down to see the city Heaven: he beholdeth Chapter V ORIGIN OF THE GOSPELS The current idea respecting the nature of the Gospel History is, that the four Evangelists were eye-witnesses (or the amanuenses of eye-witnesses) of the events which they relate; and that we have, in fact, embodied in their narra­ tives, four independent and corroborative testimonies tp the words and deeds of �ORIGIN OF THE GOSPELS Christ. Their substantial agreement is appealed to in proof of their fidelity, and their numerous and circumstantial dis­ crepancies are accepted as proof of their independence.1 Let us examine what foundation can be discovered for this current opinion. Have we any reason to believe that all the Evangelists, or that any of them, were companions of Christ—eye- and ear-witnesses of his career? And if not, what does critical Science teach us of the probable origin of the four gospels ? The first Gospel has come down to us under the title of the Gospel of, or accord­ ing to, St. Matthew : and the tradition of the Church is that it was written (probably about a.d. 68) by Matthew the publican, one of the twelve apostles, the same who was called by Jesus while “ sitting at the receipt of custom.” This is distinctly stated by several of the Early Fathers, as the received opinion or tradi­ tion—as by Papias (a.d. 116), Irenæus (a.d. 178), Origen (a.d. 230), Epiphanius (A.D.368), and Jerome (a.d. 392).1 All 2 these fathers, however, without exception, expressly affirm that Matthew wrote his Gospel in the Hebrew language, whereas the Gospel which we receive as Matthew’s 1 Thus, Lardner says, “ I hîve all my days read and admired the first three Evangelists, as independent witnesses, and I know not how to forbear ranking the other opinion among those bold as well as groundless assertions in which critics too often indulge without considering the consequences!—Dr. Lardner, like many other divines, required to be reminded that critics have nothing to do with consequences, but only with truths, and that (to use the language of Algernon Sydney), “a consequence cannot destroy a truth.” 2 Papias, whose information on this as on other matters seems to have been derived from John, whois called “the Presbyter,” an elder of the Church at Ephesus, simply says, “Mat­ thew wrote the divine oracles (ra Aoyia) in the Hebrew tongue, and every man interpreted them as he was able.”—Irenæus says, “ Matthew, then, among the Jews, wrote a Gospel in their own language, while Peter and Paul were preaching the Gospel at Rome.”—Origen and Jerome both state that (according to the tradi­ tion come down to them) the first Gospel was written by Matthew the publican in Hebrew. 65 is written in Greek; and not only have we no account of its having been trans­ lated, and no guarantee of such transla­ tion being a faithful one, but learned men are satisfied from internal evidence that it is not a translation at all, but must have been originally written in Greek.1 Our present Gospel, therefore, cannot be the Gospel to which the fathers above cited refer. It would appear simply that Matthew did write a history, or rather memorabilia, of Christ (for the ex­ pression ra. \oyta says no more), but that this was something quite different from our Gospel.2 This notion is confirmed by the fact that the Ebionites and Nazarenes, two Christian sects, pos­ sessed a Hebrew Gospel, which they considered to be the only genuine one, and which they called the Gospel accord­ ing to Matthew.3 It appears, however, to have been so materially different from our first Gospel as entirely to negative the supposition of the latter being a translation from it. The only external testimony, then, which exists to show that Matthew the apostle wrote a gospel, shows at the same time that our first Gospel is not the one which Matthew wrote. External evidence, therefore, gives us no reason 1 Hug, in a most luminous and learned essay, has succeeded in rendering this, if not certain, at least in the highest degree probable ; and his views are supported by Erasmus, Webster, Paulus, and De Wette.—The only critic or equal eminence who adopts the opposite opinion is Eichhorn. 2 It seems to us very probable, however, as Hennell suggests, “that someone after Matthew wrote the Greek Gospel which has come down to us, incorporating these Hebrew Koyia (and perhaps mainly framed out of them), whence it was called the Gospel according to Matthew, and in the second century came to be considered as the work of the Apostle.”—Hennell’s Origin or Christianity, p. 124. [Schmiedel, art. Gospels, Ency. Bib., bluntly says that “for the author­ ship of the first Gospel the Apostle Matthew musíbe given up.”] 3 Hug, Introd, part ii. § 7, pp. 317, 320, 392. —Jerome allows that many considered it to have been the genuine original Gospel of Matthew.—Thirlwall’s Introd, to Schleierrnacher, 48-50, and notes. �66 ORIGIN OF THE GOSPELS to believe that it was the production of an eye-witness; and it is worthy of re­ mark that the author nowhere names himself, nor claims the authority of an eye-witness. Internal evidence goes further, and we think effectually nega­ tives the notion. 1. In the first place, many events are recorded at which we know from the record that Matthew was not present— some, indeed, at which none of the disciples were present; and yet alb these are narrated in the same tone and with the same particularity as the other por­ tions of the narrative—sometimes even with more minute circumstantiality. Such are the Incarnation (c. i.), the story of the Magi (ii.), the Temptation (iv.), the Transfiguration (xvii.), the Agony and the prayer in Gethsemane (xxvi.), the denial of Peter (xxvi.), the dream of Pilate’s wife (xxvii.), the con­ versation between Judas and the Priests, and that between Pilate and the Priests (xxvii.), and, finally, that between the Priests and the Soldiers about the miss­ ing body of Jesus (xxviii.). It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that if the writer was not present at the colloquy of Pilate with the Chief Priests about the security of the grave of Jesus, neither was he present at the feeding of the five thousand, or the calming of the waves. 2. Secondly, the abruptness of the transitions, the fragmentary style of the narrative, and the entire absence of all those details as to the mode and object of the frequent journeys indicated,1 which we should expect from a com­ panion, and which we find in Luke’s account of Paul’s travels—all point to the conclusion that the writer was a compiler, not an eye-witness. 3. The same conclusion is drawn from the circumstance that his frequent double, narratives of the same events indicate the confusion of a man who was com­ piling from fragmentary materials, rather than the fulness and clearness of personal 1 Hennell, p. 121. recollection.1 De Wette and Credner dwell much upon this argument. 4- If, as the great majority of critics imagine, Mark and Luke had Matthew’s Gospel before them .when they wrote their own, it is certain that they could not have regarded him as either an eye­ witness or a very accurate authority, as they do not hesitate both to retrench, to deviate from, and to contradict him. Moreover, the proem to Luke’s Gospel must, we think, by all unbiassed minds be regarded as fatal to the hypothesis of the authors of any of the gospels then in existence having been either disciples or eye-witnesses. It is clear from that, that although many histories of Christ were then extant, none of them had any peculiar or paramount authority. 5. The author of the first Gospel scarcely appears to have been acquainted with any portion of Christ’s Ministry, except that of which Galilee was the scene. The second Gospel, like the first, bears no author’s name; but by Papias, and Irenaeus,2 and (following them) by the 1 Ex. gr., the cure of the blind men—the feedings—the demand of a sign—the accusation regarding Beelzebub. 2 Papias, our parliest source of information on the matter, was Bishop of Hieropolis, and must have been intimate with many contemporaries of the Apostles, and perhaps had conversed with the Apostle John. His works are now lost, with the exception of a few fragments preserved by Eusebius. “Nothing (says Dr. Middleton) more effectually demonstrates the uncertainty of all tradition, than what is delivered to us by antiquity concerning this very Papias. Irenaeus declares him to have been the companion of Polycarp, and the disciple of St. John the Apostle. But Eusebius tells us that he was not a disciple of St. John the Apostle but of John the Presbyter, who was a companion only of the Apostle, but whom Irenaeus mistook for the Apostle. Now from Papias, through Irenaeus, came most of the early traditions, some of them relating to the millennium, of the most mon­ strous character, which Irenaeus does not scruple to ascribe to our Saviour, and which fully dis­ pose us to credit the account of Eusebius, who says, ‘ Papias was a weak man, of very shallow understanding, as appears from his writings; and by mistaking the meaning of the Apostles, imposed these silly traditions upon Irenaeus and �ORIGIN OF THE GOSPELS universal tradition of the Church, is attributed to Mark, a friend and fellowtraveller of Peter, Barnabas, and Paul, who is several time's mentioned in the New Testament.1 Papias says expressly that he was neither a hearer nor a follower of Christ, but compiled his Gospel from information obtained from Peter, whose “interpreter”2 he is said to have been. Papias gives “ the Pres­ byter John,” supposed to have been an elder of the Ephesian Church, as his authority. Mark, then, it is certain, was not an eye-witness. Nor have we any reason, beyond the similarity of name, to believe that the writer of the second Gospel was the same Mark who is menthe greatest part of the ecclesiastical writers who, reflecting on the age of man, and his near approach to the Apostles, were drawn by him into the same opinions.” In another passage, indeed, Eusebius speaks of Papias in a much more respectful manner, as remarkable for eloquence and Scriptural knowledge; but this passage is not found in the older copies, and is supposed to be spurious. It is obvious, there­ fore, that little reliance can be placed on any traditions which are traced to Papias. Irenaeus, our next earliest authority, derives weight from his antiquity alone. His extreme childishness goes far to discredit many of his statements, and no reliance can be placed upon such of them as are at variance with the conclusions of critical science. His traditions of what John had related to the elders regarding the millennium are worse than anything in the Koran, yet he gives them as “testified by Papias.” The following passage will induce us to receive with great caution any evidence he gives regarding the origin and authenticity of the Gospels:—-“As there are four quarters of the world in which we live, and four chief winds, and the Church is spread over all the earth, but the pillar and support of the Church is the Gospel and its breath of life, plainly the Church, must have four columns, and from them must come forth four blasts,” &c., &c.—Adv. Hceres. c. iii. It would be melancholy to reflect that through such sources our only surviving testimony on these matters is derived, had these matters the supreme importance usually ascribed to them. 1 Acts xii. 12, 25 ; xiii. 5-13 ; xv. 37. Col. iv. 10. Phil. 24. 1 Peter v. 13. 3 What this could mean, as applied to a man who “spoke with tongues,” it is for the Church to explain. [“All that can be said to be certain is this, that it is vain to look to the Church fathers for trustworthy information on the origin of the Gospels ”—Schmiedel, loc. cit.\ &7 tioned in the Acts as the companion of Paul and Barnabas {not of Peter, by the way), nor the same who is mentioned in 1 Peter v. 13 as his son. Mark was one of the commonest of Roman names; and it is probable that the idea of the identity of the three Marks was an imagination of Papias merely. Neither was the author of the third Gospel an eye-witness. His proem merely claims to set forth faithfully that which he had heard from eye-witnesses. Irenaeus is the first person who distinctly mentions Luke as the author of this Gospel; but little doubt appears to exist that he wrote both the Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles, and was the com­ panion of Paul in many of his voyages.1 The authorship of the fourth Gospel has been the subject of much learned and anxious controversy among theolo­ gians. The earliest, and only very im­ portant, external testimony we have is that of Irenaeus (a.d. 178), who says, that after Luke wrote, “ John, the disciple of the Lord, who also leaned upon his breast, likewise published a Gospel while he dwelt at Ephesus in Asia.” The last chapter of the Gospel contains an attesta­ tion of its having been written by John (verse 24); but as this attestation obviously does not proceed from John himself,2 and as we do not know from whom it does proceed, its authority can have little weight. It is generally be­ lieved that the Gospel and the first epistle proceed from the same pen, but if the second and third epistles are genuine,3 it is very questionable whether this pen was that of John the Apostle ; for though, in the first chapter of the first epistle, the writer declares himself 1 [The author’s opinion must be set aside in the light of recent research: “If Luke cannot have been the author of Acts, neither can he have been the author of the third Gospel.” Schmiedel, loc. cit.\ 2 De Wette doubts the genuineness of the whole chapter, and internal evidence is certainly against it. 3 Their genuineness, however, is doubted both by Eusebius and Origen.—See De Wette, i. §§ 23, 24. �68 ORIGIN OF THE GOSPELS to have been personally acquainted with Jesus, yet in the second and third epistles he calls himself “ the Elder.” Now there was a John at Ephesus (from whom Papias derived all his information, and who, he says, -was also a disciple of Jesus), to whom the title of “Elder” (irpeo-^ilTcpos) was given, to distinguish him from the Apostle John. The balancing of the internal evidence for and against the supposition that the Apostle John was the author of the Gospel, is a matter of extreme difficulty. The reasons adduced in behalf of each opinion are very strong. Hug enter­ tains no doubt that the decision should be in the affirmative ;—Bretschneider almost proves the negative ;—De Wette finds it impossible to decide;—while Strauss, who in his earlier editions had expressed himself satisfied that the Gospel was not genuine, writes thus in the preface to the third edition : “With De Wette and Neander in my hand, I have recommenced the examination of the fourth Gospel, and this renewed investigation has shaken the doubts. I had conceived against its authenticity and credibility ;—not that I am con­ vinced that it is authentic, but neither am I convinced that it is not.” In his New Life of Jesus, however, written thirty years after his first great book, he finally and confidently decides against its authenticity. Renan, in the first edition of his Vie de Jésus, accepted the fourth Gospel as genuine, and largely maimed the completeness and beauty of his estimate of Christ by doing so. In the thirteenth edition (1867) he entirely discards his previous assump­ tion, and decides after long investiga­ tion that it was not the work of the Apostle John. In the same year was published Mr. J. J. Tayler’s Character of the Fourth Gospel, . in which the writer, after an exhaustive examination of the whole question, indisputably, as it seenis to us, establishes the same negative conclusion.1 1 [Unquestionably the trend of present-day criticism is on the negative side.] One argument against the supposition of John having been the author of the fourth Gospel has impressed my mind very forcibly. It is this : that several of the most remarkable events recorded by the other Evangelists, at which we are told by them that only Peter, James, and John were present, and of which, there­ fore, John alone of all the evangelists could have spoken with the distinctness and authority of an eye-witness, are entirely omitted—we may say, ignored— by him. Such are the raising of Jairus’s daughter, the Transfiguration, the agony in Gethsemane. Now, on the assump­ tion that John was the author of the fourth Gospel,—either he had not seen the works of the other Evangelists, in which case he would certainly not have omitted to record narratives of such interest and beauty, especially that of the Transfiguration; or he had seen them, and omitted all notice of them because he could not confirm the state­ ments : for we cannot imagine that he did not record them in consequence of finding them already recorded, and see­ ing nothing to alter in the relation ;—as an eye-witness, he would certainly, had they been true, have given them at least a passing word of confirmation, and we find that he does, on more than one occasion, relate events of less moment already recorded in the other Gospels, as the feeding of the five thousand, the anointing of Jesus’s feet, &c.. But all the events said to have been witnessed by John alone, are omitted by John alone ! This fact seems fatal either to the reality of the events in question, or to the genuineness of the fourth Gospel.— Thus much, however, seems certain, and admittedthat, if the Gospel in ques­ tion were the genuine composition of the Apostle John, it must have been written when he was at least ninety years of age—when his recollections of events and conversations which had passed sixty years before had become faint and fluctuating—when . ill-digested Grecian learning had overlaid the sim­ plicity of his fisherman’s character, and �ORIGIN OE THE GOSPELS his Judaic education—and the scenes and associations of Ionia had over­ powered and obscured the recollections of Palestine. It therefore becomes, as we shall see hereafter, an inquiry of only secondary moment. An almost identical conclusion has been expressed many years later by a critic incomparably more competent than I can pretend to be. Renan says:—“L’esprit de Jésus n’est pas là ; et si le fils de Zébédée a vraiment tracé ces pages, il avait certes bien oublié en les écrivant le lac de Génésareth et les charmants entretiens qu’il avait entendus sur ses bords.”—Vie de Jésus, Introd. xxxi. Of the first three (or, as they are commonly termed, the Synoptical) Gospels, we knozv that two, and we believe that all three, were not the pro­ ductions of eye-witnesses.1 The question then arises, in what manner, and from what materials, were they composed ? This subject has for a long period exer­ cised the minds of the most acute and learned divines of Germany, as Eichhorn, Credner, Bretschneider, De Wette, Hug, Schleiermacher, and Strauss ; and the results of their investigations may be thus briefly summed up. The numerous and irreconcilable dis­ crepancies observable in the three Evangelists preclude the supposition of their having all drawn their information from one and the same source—while the still more remarkable points of similarity and agreement, often extend­ ing to the most minute verbal peculiari­ ties, entirely forbid the idea of their having derived their materials from independent, and therefore mutually confirmatory, sources. Three different hypotheses have been formed by competent judges to account for those marked characteristics of the first three Evangelists. Eichhorn (and, following him, Dr. Marsh) adopted the idea of an original document, now lost, written in the Hebrew or Syro-Chaldaic 1 [As we have seen, none of the Gospels are the work of eye-witnesses.] 69 language (the Aramaic Gospel, as it is called by some), from which all three Evangelists copied their accounts, with additions and omissions peculiar to themselves. With many divines this hypothesis is still the favourite one;— but, in addition to the difficulty arising from the fact that we can nowhere find any allusion to the existence of such a document, more minute criticism dis­ covered so many peculiarities inexplic­ able on this theory that its credit was much shaken, and its principal sup­ porter, Eichhorn, was driven, in order to maintain it, to admit modifications which have made it almost unintelligible. The hypothesis appears to us to have been since completely demolished by the reasonings of Hug, Thirlwall, and Schleiermacher.1 An ingenious modi fication of this theory by Giesler, who substitutes an oral for a written original, is explained and controverted by Dr. Thirlwall, in the admirable treatise we have already quoted (p. cxvi). The proem to Luke’s Gospel, moreover, tacitly, but effectually, negatives the supposition that he was acquainted with any such original and paramountly authoritative document. The second hypothesis is the prevalent one—that one of the Evangelists wrote first, and that the others copied him, with alterations, additions, and omissions, dictated by their own judgment or by extraneous sources of information. Matthew is generally considered to have been the earliest writer ; but critics differ in the relative order they assign to Mark and Luke—some, as Mill, Hug, and Wetstein, conceiving that Luke copied both from Mark and Matthew; and others, as De Wette and Griesbach, 1 “For my part (says this latter) I find it quite enough to prevent me from conceiving the origin of the Gospel according to Eichhorn’s theory, that I am to figure to myself our good Evangelists surrounded by five or six open rolls or books, and that too in different languages, looking by turns from one into another, and writing a com­ pilation from them. I fancy myself in a German study of the 19th century, rather than in the primitive age of Christianity.”—Schleiermacher, “ Crit. Essay on Luke,” Intr. p. 6. �7° ORIGIN OF THE GOSPELS arguing that Mark was the latest in order of time, and made use of both his pre­ decessors. Mr. Kenrick, in a masterly analysis fProsp. Rev. xxi.), has, however, we think, succeeded in making it more than probable that Mark’s Gospel was both first in order of time and in fidelity of narration.1 This theory has been much and minutely examined, and to our minds it appears unsatisfactory. It accounts for the agreements, but not for the discrepancies, of the Gospels; and Dr. Thirlwall, in his translation of Schleiermacher, has succeeded in show­ ing that it is highly improbable, if not wholly inadmissible. The third hypothesis, which was first propounded by Lessing, and has since been revived and elaborated by Schleier­ macher (one of the highest theological authorities of Germany), seems to us to have both critical evidence and a priori likelihood in its favour. These writers presume the existence of a number of fragmentary narratives, some oral, some written, of the actions and sayings of Christ, such as would naturally be pre­ served and transmitted by persons who had witnessed those wonderful words and deeds. Sometimes there would be two or more narratives of the same event, proceeding from different witnesses; sometimes the same original narrative in its transmission would receive inten­ tional or accidental variations, and thus come slightly modified into the hands of different Evangelists. Sometimes detached sayings would be preserved without the context, and the Evangelists would locate them where they thought them most appropriate, or provide a context for them, instances of which are numberless in the Gospels.2 But all these materials would be fragmentary. Each witness 1 [The priority of Mark is now ‘generally recognised. On this question and the inter­ dependence of the gospel writers the best authority is Abbott in his article Gospels, in the Ency. Brit.] 2 “The verbal agreement is generally greater in reports of the discourses of Christ than in relations of events; and the speeches of other would retain and transmit that portion of a discourse which had impressed him most forcibly, and two witnesses would retain the same expressions with varying degrees of accuracy.1 One witness heard one discourse, or was present at one trans­ action only, and recorded that one by writing or verbally, as he best might. Of these fragments some fell into the hands of all the Evangelists—some only into the hands of one, or of two:2 and in some cases different narratives of the same event, expression, or discourse would fall into the hands of different Evangelists, which would account for their discrepancies—sometimes into the hands of one Evangelist, in which case he would select that one which his judgment (or information from other sources) prompted, or would compile an account from them jointly. In any case, the evangelical narratives would be compilations from a series of fragments of varying accuracy and completeness. The correctness of this theory of the origin of the Gospels seems to be not so much confirmed as distinctly asserted by Luke : “ Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us, even as they delivered them unto us which from the beginning were eye-witnesses and ministers of the wordP “The first step (says Schleiermacher) 3 towards a Christian History was a natural and reasonable desire on the part of those who had believed on Jesus, without having a knowledge of his person. These persons are often given in the same terms, though the circumstances which led to them are differently described.”—Thirlwall, cxvi. 1 The habit of retaining and transmitting dis­ courses orally was much more common then than now, and the practice carried to great perfection. The learning of the Jews was transmitted exclu­ sively by oral tradition from one generation to another, and we entertain little doubt that the fragments both of narratives and discourses which formed the materials of our Evangelists were almost entirely oral.—(See Thirlwall, cxviii. Norton, i. 287.) 2 Thus the materials of the first three Evange­ lists were evidently collected chiefly in Galilee ; those of the fourth came principally from Judsea. 3 “ Grit. Essay on Luke,” Introd. 12-14. �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY individuals would undoubtedly be glad were more anxiously sought for, when the to learn some particulars of his life, in great body of the original companions order to place themselves as nearly as and friends of Christ was dispersed by possible on an equality with their elder persecutions, and still more when that and more fortunate brethren. In the first generation began to die away. It public assemblies of the Christians this would, however, have been singular if, desire was of course only incidentally and even before this, the inquirers who took sparingly gratified, when a teacher hap­ those notes had possessed only detached pened to refer to memorable sayings of passages; on the contrary, they, and Christ which could only be _ related still more their immediate copiers, had together with the occasion which had undoubtedly become collectors also, each called them forth : more copious and according to his peculiar turn of mind : detailed accounts they could only pro­ and thus one, perhaps, collected only cure in familiar intercourse upon express accounts of miracles; another, only inquiry. And in this way many par­ discourses; a third, perhaps, attached ticulars were told and heard, most of exclusive importance to the last days of them, probably, without being committed Christ, or even to the scenes of his to writing; but, assuredly, much was very resurrection. Others, without any such soon written down, partly by the narrators particular predilection, collected all that themselves, as each of them happened to fell in their way from good authority.” The work from which the above is a be pressed by a multiplicity of questions on a particular occurrence, respecting quotation is a masterly analysis of Luke’s which he was peculiarly qualified to give gospel, with a view to test the correctness information. Still more, however, must of the author’s hypothesis as to the origin have been committed to writing by of the evangelical histories; and the His the inquirers, especially by such as did success is, we think, complete. not remain constantly in the neighbour­ conclusion is as follows (p. 313) :— “The main position is firmly estab­ hood of the narrators, and were glad to communicate the narrative again to many lished, that Luke is neither an indepen­ others, who, perhaps, were never able to dent writer, nor has made a compilation consult an eye-witness. In this way from works which extended over the detached incidents and discourses were whole course of the life of Jesus. He noted down. Notes of this kind were at is from beginning to end no moré than first, no doubt, less frequently met with the compiler and arranger of documents, among the Christians settled in Palestine, which he found in existence, and which and passed immediately into more distant he allows to pass unaltered through his parts, to which the pure oral tradition hands. His merit in this capacity is flowed more scantily. They, however, twofold—that of arrangement and of appeared everywhere more frequently, and judicious selection.”1 Chapter VI FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY.—NATURE AND LIMITS Having in our last chapter arrived at the conclusion that the Gospels are com­ pilations from a variety of fragmentary narratives, and reports of discourses and conversations, oral or written, which 1 [The synoptical problem is a very compli­ cated one, and none of the hypotheses, taken apart, affords a satisfactory solution. They must �72 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY were current in Palestine from thirty to forty years after the death of Jesus—we now come to the very interesting and momentous inquiry, how far these narra­ tives and discourses can be accepted as accurate and faithful records of what was actually said and done ?—whether they can be regarded as thoroughly and minutely correct ?—and, if not, in what respects and to what extent do they deviate from that thorough and minute correctness ? It is clear at first view that the same absolute reliance cannot be placed upon a narrative compounded from traditionary fragments, as upon a consecutive history related by an eye-witness. Conceding to both faithful intention and good, though imperfect, powers of memory, there are obvious elements of inaccuracy in the one case which do not appertain to the other. To the corruptions, lapses, and alterations inseparable from trans­ mission, especially when oral, is added the uncertainty arising from the number of the original sources of the tradition, whose character, capacity, and oppor­ tunities of knowledge are unknown to us. If Luke had recorded only what he had seen, or Mark only what he had heard from Peter, we should have com­ paratively ample means of forming a decision as to the amount of reliance to be placed upon their narrations; but when they record what they learned from perhaps a dozen different narrators — some original, others only second-hand, and all wholly unknown—it becomes obvious that causes of inaccuracy are introduced, the extent of the actual operation of which on the histories that have come down to us, it is both ex­ tremely important and singularly difficult to estimate. This inquiry we consider as of paramount interest to every other question of criticism; for on the con­ clusion to which it leads us depends the whole—not of Christianity, which, be combined, the sources-hypothesis and the borrowing-hypothesis, supported by an oral tradition prior to them both.] - as we view it, is unassailable, but—of textual or dogmatic Christianity, i.e., the Christianity of nine-tenths of nominal Christendom. We proceed, therefore, to ask what evidence we possess for assuming or impugning the minute fidelity of the Gospel history. There are certain portions of the Synoptical Gospels the genuineness of which has been much disputed, viz., the first two chapters of Matthew—the first two of Luke—and the last twelve verses of the xvith chapter of Mark.1 Into this discussion we cannot enter, but must refer such of our readers as wish to know the grounds of decision to Norton, Hug, De Wette, Eichhorn, and Griesbach. The result of critical inquiry seems to be, that the only solid ground for supposing the questioned portions of Luke and Matthew not to be by the same hand as the rest of their respective gospels, is the obviously insufficient one of the extra­ ordinary character of their contents ;2— while the spuriousness of the last twelve verses of Mark is established beyond question •—the real Gospel of Mark (all of it, at least, that has come down to us) ends with the 8 th verse of the xvith chapter. In our subsequent remarks we shall therefore treat the whole of the acknowledged text of these gospels as genuine, with the exception of the con­ clusion of Mark ;—and we now proceed to inquire into the nature and limits of the fidelity of Matthew’s record. In the first place, while admitting to the fullest extent the general clearness and fulness with which the character of Jesus is depicted in the first Gospel, it is important to bear in mind that—as Hug has clearly3 proved—it was written with a 1 See Norton, i. 16, 17.' 2 Strauss, i. 117, 142. Hug, 469-479. See also Schleiermacher. Norton, however, gives some reasons to the contrary, which deserve con­ sideration, i. 209. 3 “All Matthew’s reflections are of one kind. He shows us, as to everything that Jesus did and taught, that it was characteristic of the Messiah. On occasion of remarkable events, or a recital of parts of the discourses of Jesus, he refers us to the ancient scriptures of the Jews �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY 73 special, we might almost say a polemical, object. It was composed, less to give a continuance and complete history of Jesus, than to prove that he was the expected Messiah; and those passages were therefore selected out of the author’s materials which appeared most strongly to bear upon and enforce this conclusion. The remembrance of this object of Matthew’s will aid us in forming our judgment as to his fidelity. According to the universal expectation, the Messiah was to be born of the seed of Abraham, and the lineage and tribe of David. Accordingly, the Gospel opens with an elaborate genealogy of Jesus, tracing him through David to Abraham. Now, in the first place, this genealogy is not correct:—secondly, if the remainder of the chapter is to be received as true, it is in no sense the genealogy of Jesus ; and, thirdly, it is wholly and irreconcil­ ably at variance with that given by Luke. i. In verse 17, Matthew sums up the genealogy thus :—“ So all thegenerations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; and from David until the carrying away into Babylon are fourteen generations ; and from the carrying away into Babylon until Christ are fourteen generations.”—Now (passing over as un­ necessarily minute and harsh the criticism of Strauss, that by no way of counting can we make out fourteen generations in the last series, without disturbing the count of the others), we must call atten­ tion to the fact that the number fourteen in the second series is only obtained by the deliberate omission offour generations, viz., three between Joram and Ozias, and one between Josiah and Jeconiah—as may be seen by referring to 1 Chron. iii. There is also (at verse 4-6) another apparent, and we think, certain, error. Only four generations are reckoned between Naasson, who lived in the time of Moses, and David, a period of four hundred years. (Compare Num. i. 7, Ruth v. 20). 2. The genealogy here given, correct or incorrect, is the genealogy of Joseph, who was in no sense whatever the father (or any relation at all) of Jesus, since this last, we are assured (verses 18 to 25), was in his mother’s womb before she and her husband came together. The story of the Incarnation and the gene­ alogy are obviously at variance ; and no ingenuity, unscrupulously as it has been applied, can produce even the shadow of an agreement; and when the flat contra­ diction given to each other by the 1st and 18th verses are considered, it is difficult for an unprejudiced mind not to feel convinced that the author of the genealogy (both in the first and third Gospels) was ignorant of the story of the Incarnation, though the carelessness and uncritical temper of the evangelist—a carelessness partially avoided in the cases of Luke, by an interpolation1— has united the two into one compilation. 3. The genealogy of Jesus given by Luke is wholly different from that of Matthew; and the most desperate efforts of divines have been unable to effect even the semblance of a reconciliation. Not only does Matthew give 26 genera­ tions between David and Joseph where Luke has 41, but they trace the descent through an entirely different line of ancestry. According to Matthew, the father of Joseph was named Jacob— according to Luke, Heli. In Matthew, the son of David through whom Joseph descended is Solomon ;—in Luke it is Nathan. Thence the genealogy of Mat­ thew descends through the known royal line—the genealogy of Luke through an obscure collateral branch. The two lines only join in Salathiel and Zoro- in which this coming Saviour is delineated, and shows in detail that the great ideal which flitted before the minds of the Prophets was realised in Jesus.” Hug, Introd. 312. These references are twelve in Matthew, two in Mark, and three in Luke. Again, he says (p. 384), “Matthew is an historical deduction ; Mark is history. ” 1 Luke iii. 23, “Jesus . . . being, as was supposed (¿s ero/xi^ero), the son of Joseph,”—a parenthesis which renders nugatory the whole of the following genealogy, and cannot have originally formed a part of it.-—-The 16th verse of Matthew also bears indications of a similar emendation. �74 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY babel; and even here they differ as to the father of Salathiel and the son of Zorobabel. Many ingenious hypotheses have been broached to explain and har­ monise these singular discrepancies, but wholly in vain. One critic supposes that one evangelist gives the pedigree of the adoptive, the other of the real father of Joseph. Another assumes that one is the genealogy of Joseph, and the other that of Mary-—a most convenient idea, but entirely gratuitous, and positively contradicted by the language of the text. The circumstance that any man could suppose that Matthew, when he' said “Jacob begat Joseph,” or Luke, when he said “Joseph was the son of Heli,” could refer to the wife of the one, or the daughter-in-law of the other, shows to what desperate stratagems polemical orthodoxy will resort in order to defend an untenable position. The discrepancy between Matthew and Luke in their narratives of the miraculous conception affords no ground for suspecting the fidelity of the former. Putting aside the extraordinary nature of the whole transaction—a consideration which does not at present concern us— the relation in Matthew is simple, natu­ ral, and probable ; the surprise of Joseph at the pregnancy of his wife (or his betrothed, as the words may mean) ; his anxiety to avoid scandal and exposure; his satisfaction through the means of a dream (for among the Jews dreams were habitually regarded as means of commu­ nication from heaven); and his absti­ nence from all conjugal connection with Mary till after the birth of the miracu­ lous infant,—present precisely the line of conduct we should expect from a simple, pious, and confiding Jew. But when we remember the dogmatic object which, as already mentioned, Mat­ thew had in view, and in connection with that remembrance read the 22ndand23rd verses, the whole story at once becomes apocryphal, and its origin at once clear. “All these things were done,” says Mat­ thew, “ that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the Prophet, say­ ing, Behold a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son,” &c., &c. Now this is one of the many instances which we shall have to notice in which this evangelist quotes prophecies as in­ tended for Jesus, and as fulfilled in him, which have not the slightest relation to him or his career. The adduced pro­ phecy 1 is simply an assurance sent to the unbelieving Ahaz, that before the child, which the wife of Isaiah would shortly conceive (see Isa. viii. 2-4), was old enough to speak, or to know good from evil, the conspiracy of Syria and Ephraim against the King of Judsea should be dissolved ; and had manifestly no more reference to Jesus than to Na­ poleon. The conclusion, therefore, is unavoidable, that the events said to have occurred in fulfilment of a prophecy, which Matthew wrongly supposed to have reference to them, were by him imagined, or modified into accordance with the supposed prophecy; since it is certain that they did not, as he affirms, take place, “ in order that the prophecy might be fulfilled.” Pursuing this line of inquiry, we shall find many instances in which this ten­ dency of Matthew to find in Jesus the fulfilment of prophecies, which he erro­ neously conceived to refer to him, has led him to narrate circumstances respect­ ing which the other evangelists are silent, as well as to give, with material (but AztentionaT) variations, relations which are 1 “Therefore the Lord spake unto Ahaz, saying, . . . Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Im­ manuel. ... Before the child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings.”—Isa. vii. 10-16. “And I went unto the prophetess, and she conceived and bare a son. Then said the Lord unto me . . . before the child shall have know­ ledge to cry, My father and my mother, the riches of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria shall be taken away before the King of Assyria.” —viii. 3, 4. No divine of character will now, we believe, maintain that this prophecy had any reference to Jesus ; nor ever would have imagined it to have, without Matthew’s intimation.—See “ Hebrew Monarchy,” p. 262. �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY common t o them all—a peculiarity which throws great suspicion over several pas­ sages. Thus in ii. 13-15, we are told that immediately after the visit of the Magi, Joseph took Mary and the child, and fled into Egypt, remaining there till the death of Herod, “that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of- the Lord by the prophet, saying, Out of Egypt have I called my son.” The passage in question occurs in Hosea, xi. 1, and has not the slightest reference to Christ. It is as follows :—“ When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt.” Here is an event related, very improbable in itself, flatly contra­ dicted by Luke’s history1 and which occurred, we are told, that a prophecy might be fulfilled to which it had no re­ ference, of which it was no fulfilment, and which, in fact, was no prophecy at all. A similar instance occurs immediately afterwards in the same chapter. We are told that Herod, when he found “ that he was mocked of the wise men, was ex­ ceeding wroth, and sent forth and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, from two years old and under an act which, whether suitable or not to the known character of Herod (who was cruel and tyrannical, but at the same time crafty and politic, not silly nor insane 2)—must, if it had occurred, have created a prodi­ gious sensation, and made one of the most prominent points in Herod’s his­ tory3—yet of which none of the other 1 Luke’s account entirely precludes the sojourn in Egypt. He says that eight days after the birth of Jesus he was circumcised, forty days after was presented in the temple, and that when these legal ceremonies were accomplished, he went with his parents to Nazareth. 2 Neander argues very ably that such a deed is precisely what we should expect from Herod’s character. But Sir ,W. Jones gives reason for believing that the whole story may be of Hindoo origin.-—“ Christian Theism,” p. 84, where the passage is quoted. 3 Mr. Milman (“Hist. Jews,” b. xii.), how­ ever, thinks differently, and argues that, among Herod’s manifold barbarities, “ the murder of a few children in an obscure village ” would easily escape notice. The story is at least 75 evangelists, nor any historian of the day, nor Josephus (though he devoted a con­ siderable portion of his history to the reign of Herod, and does not spare his reputation), makes any mention. But this also, according to Matthew’s notion, was the fulfilment of a prophecy. “ Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the prophet, saying, In Rama there was a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not.”— Here, again, the adduced prophecy was quite irrelevant, being simply a descrip­ tion of the grief of Judea for the capti­ vity of her children, accompanied by a promise of their return.1 A still more unfortunate instance is found at the 23rd verse, where we are told that Joseph abandoned his intention of returning into Judea, and turned aside into Galilee, and came and dwelt at Nazareth, “that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, He shall be called a Nazarene.” Now, in the first place, the name Nazarene was not in use till long afterwards ;—secondly, there is no such prophecy in the Old Testament. The evangelist, perhaps, had in his mind the words that were spoken to the mother of Samson (Judg. xiii. 5) respecting her son : “ The child shall be a Nazarite (z'.e. one bound by a vow, whose hair was forbidden to be cut, which never was the case with Jesus 2) to God from the womb.” In this place we must notice the marked discrepancy between Matthew and Luke, as to the original residence of highly improbable, • for had Herod wished to secure the death of Jesus, so cunning a prince would have sent his messengers along with the Magi, not awaited their doubtful return. 1 The passage is as follows :—“A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weep­ ing ; Rachel weeping for her children, refused to be comforted for her children, because they were not. Thus saith the Lord, Refrain thy voice from weeping, and thine eyes from tears ; for thy work shall be rewarded, saith the Lord ; and they shall come again from the land of the enemy.”—Jer. xxxi. 15, 16. 2 See Num. vi. 2-76. �76 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY the parents of Jesus. Luke speaks of them as living at Nazareth before the birth of Jesus : Matthew as having left Bethlehem, the birth-place of their child, to go to Nazareth, only after that event, and from peculiar considerations. Critics, however, are disposed to think Matthew right on this occasion. There are, however, several passages in different parts of the Evangelists which suggest serious doubts as to whether Jesus were really born at Bethlehem, and were really a lineal descendant of David, and whether both these statements were not unfounded inventions of his followers to prove his title to the Messiahship. In the first place, the Jews are frequently represented as urging that Jesus could not be the Messiah, because he was not born at Bethlehem; and neither Jesus nor his followers ever set them right upon this point. If he were really born at Bethlehem, the circumstance was generally unknown, and though its being unknown presented an obvious and valid objection to the admission of his claim to the Messianic character, no effort was made either by Christ or his disciples to remove this objection, which might have been done by a single word. (John vii. 4I_43> 52 1 i- 46.) “ Others said, This is the Christ. But some said, Shall Christ come out of Galilee? Hath not the Scripture said that Christ cometh of the seed of David, and out of the town of Bethlehem, where David was ? So there was a division among the people because of him.”—Again, the Pharisees object to Nicodemus, when arguing on Jesus’ behalf—“ Search and look, for out of Galilee ariseth no prophet.” The three Synoptical evangelists (Matt, xxii. 41; Mark xii. 35 ; Luke xx. 41) all record an argument of Christ addressed to the Pharisees, the purport of which is to show that the Messiah need not be, and could not be, the Son of David. “ While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them, saying, What think ye of Christ? whose son is he ? They say unto him, The son of David. He saith unto them, How then doth David in spirit call him Lord, saying, the Lord saith unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool ! If David then call him Lord, how is he his son ? ” Now,—passing by the consideration that, as Mr. Arnold informs us, “ the transla­ tion ought to run, ‘The Eternal said unto my lord the king,’ and was a simple promise of victory to a prince of God’s chosen people,”—is it conceiv­ able that Jesus should have brought for­ ward the passage as an argument if he were really a descendant of David? Must not his intention have been to argue that, though not a son of David, he might still be the Christ ? In xxi. 2-4, 6, 7, the entry into Jeru­ salem is thus described : “ Then sent Jesus two disciples, saying unto them, Go into the village over against you, and straightway ye shall find an ass tied, and a colt with her: loose them and bring them to me. . . . And the disciples went and did as Jesus commanded them, and brought the ass and the colt, and put on them their clothes, and set him thereon ” (literally “ upon themf ¿7ravw avrwv). Now, though two animals may well have been ■brought, the foal naturally accompanying its mother, yet the description (in ver. 16), representing Jesus as sitting upon both animals, is absurd; and, again, Mark, Luke, and John, who all mention the same occurrence, agree in speaking of one animal only. But the liberty which Matthew has taken with both fact and probability is at once explained, when we read in the 4th verse : “ All this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying, Tell ye the daughter of Zion, Behold thy King cometh unto thee, meek, and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal of an ass.”1 As a final example, we may instance 1 The quotation is from Zechariah ix. 9 ; the passage has reference to the writer’s own time, and the second animal is obviously a mere common poetical reduplication, such as is met with in every page of Hebrew poetry. But Matthew thought a literal similitude essential. “ And ” ought to have been translated “ even.” �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY the treachery of Judas. The other evan­ gelists simply narrate that Judas cove­ nanted with the chief priests to betray Jesus. Matthew, however, relates the conversation between the traitor and his fellow-conspirators as minutely as if he had been present, specifies the exact sum of money that was given, and the use to which it was put by the priests (the purchase of the Potter’s field), when returned to them by the repentant Judas.1 Here, as usual, the discrepancy between Matthew and his fellow-evangelists is explained by a prophecy which Matthew conceived to apply to the case before him, and thought necessary therefore should be literally fulfilled; but which, on examination, appears to have had no allusion to any times but those in which it was uttered, and which, moreover, is not found in the prophet whom Matthew quotes from, but in another.2 The pas­ sage as quoted by Matthew is as fol­ lows :—“ And they took the thirty pieces of silver; the price of him that was valued, whom they of the children of Israel did value, and gave them for the Potter’s field, as the Lord appointed me. ” The original passage in Zechariah is given in a note. To pass from this ground of want of confidence in Matthew’s fidelity, we may specify two others -.—first, we find several discrepancies between him and the other evangelists, in which there is reason to 1 Luke, however, in the Acts (i. 18), states that Judas himself purchased the field with the money he had received, and died accidentally therein. Matthew says he returned the money, and went and hanged himself. 2 Matthew quotes Jeremiah, but the passage is contained in Zechariah xi. 12, 13. Some people, however, imagine that the latter chapters of Zechariah do really belong to Jeremiah. Others conceive the passage to be contained in some lost book of Jeremiah. “ And I said unto them, If ye think good, give me my price ; and if not, forbear. So they weighed for my price thirty pieces of silver. And the Lord said unto me, Cast it unto the potter : a goodly price that I was prized at of them. And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the Lord.” The word “potter” is a translation made to accommodate Matthew. The LXX. has “treasury” or “ foundry,” as it were our “mint.” 77 believe that he was wrong ; and, secondly, we find words and parts of discourses put by him into Jesus’ mouth, which there is ample reason to believe that Jesus never uttered. I. The second chapter opens with an account (peculiar to Matthew) of the visit of the wise men of the East to Bethlehem, whither they were guided by a star which went before them, and stood over the house in which the infant Jesus lay. The general legendary character of the narrative—its similarity in style with those contained in the apocryphal gospels—and more especially its con­ formity with those astrological notions which, though prevalent in the time of Matthew, have been exploded by the sounder scientific knowledge of our days —all unite to stamp upon the story the impress of poetic or mythic fiction ; and its admission into his history is not cre­ ditable to Matthew’s judgment, though it may not impugn his fidelity; as it may have been among his materials, and he had no critical acumen which should lead him to reject it. In Matt. viii. 28-34, we have an account of the healing of two de­ moniacs, whose diseases (or whose devils, according to the evangelist) were communicated to an adjacent herd of swine. Now, putting aside the great improbability of two madmen, as fierce as these are described to be, living together, Mark and Luke.1 who both relate the same occurrence, state that there was one demoniac, obviously a much preferable version of the narrative. In the same manner, in chap. xx. 3034, Matthew relates the cure of two blind men near Jericho. Mark and Luke 2 narrate the same occurrence, but speak of only one blind man. This story affords also an example of the evangelist’s carelessness as a compiler, for (in chap, ix. 27) he has already given the same 1 Mark v. 1 ; Luke viii. 26. There are other discrepancies between the three narratives, both in this and the following case, but they are beside our present purpose. 2 Mark x. 46 ; Luke xviii. 35. �78 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY narrative, but has assigned to it a dif­ ferent locality. A still more remarkable instance of Matthew’s tendency to amplification, or rather to multiplication and repetition, is found in xiv. 16, et seq., and xv. 32, et seq.,1 where the two miraculous feedings of the multitude are described. The feeding of the five thousand is related by all four evangelists; but the repetition of the miracle, with a slight variation in the number of the multitude and of the loaves and fragments, is peculiar to Matthew and to Mark.2 Now, that both these narratives are merely varying ac­ counts of the same event (the variation arising from the mode in which the ma­ terials of the gospel history were col­ lected, as explained in our preceding chapter), and that only one feeding was originally recorded, is now admitted by all competent critics,3 and appears clearly from several considerations.—First, Luke and John relate only one feeding; in the next place, the two narratives in Matthew are given with the same accompaniments, in a similar, probably in the very same, locality; thirdly, the particulars of the occurrence and the remarks of the parties are almost identically the same on each occasion; and, finally (what is perfectly conclusive), in the second narration, the language and conduct both of Jesus and his disciples show a per­ fect unconsciousness of any previous occurrence of the same nature. Is it credible, that if the disciples had, a few days before, witnessed the miraculous feeding of the “five thousand” with “ five loaves and two fishes,” they should on the second occasion, when they had “seven loaves and a few small fishes,” have replied to the suggestion of Jesus 1 The parallel passages are Mark vi. 35; Luke ix. 12 ; John vi. 5. 2 See Mark viii. 1, et seq. The language of the two evangelists is here so precisely similar, as to leave no doubt that one copied the other, or both a common document. The word baskets is it6<l>ivoi in the first case, and airvlSpes in the second, in both evangelists. 3 See also Schleiermacher, p. 144, who does not hesitate to express his full disbelief in the second feeding. that the fasting multitude should again be fed, “ whence should we have so much bread in the wilderness as to fill so great a multitude ? ” It is certain that the idea of two feedings having really taken place, could only have found acceptance in minds preoccupied with the doctrine of the plenary inspiration and infallibility of Scripture. It is now entirely abandoned by all divines except the English, and by the few thinkers even among them. A con­ firmatory argument, were any needed, might be drawn from observing that the narrative of the fourth evangelist agrees in some points with Matthew’s first, and in some with his second account. The story contained in xvii. 17, et seq., of Jesus commanding Peter to catch a fish in whose mouth he should find the tribute money, has a most pagan and unworthy character about it, harmonises admirably with the puerile narratives which abound in the apocryphal gospels, and is ignored by all the other evan­ gelists. In xxvii. 24, we find this narrative: “ When Pilate saw that he could prevail nothing, but rather that a tumult was made, he took water and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, I am innocent of the blood of this just person; see ye to it.” Now, in the first place, this symbolic action was a Jewish, not a Roman, ceremony,3 and as such most unsuitable and improbable in a Roman governor, one of a nation noted for their contempt of the habits and opinions of their subject nations. In the second place, it is inconceivable that Pilate should so emphatically have pronounced his own condemnation, by declaring Jesus to be a “just man” at the very moment when he was about to scourge him, and deliver him over to the most cruel tortures. 1 It appears from Deut. xxi. 1-9, that the washing of the hands was a specially-appointed Mosaic rite, by which the authorities of any city in which murder had been committed were to avow their innocence of the crime and ignorance of the criminal. �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY In Matthew’s account of the last moments of Jesus, we have the following remarkable statements (xxvii. 50-53):— “Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost. And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent; and the graves were opened, and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, and came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.” _ Now, first, this extraordinary fact, if it be a fact (and it is said to have been a public one—“they appeared unto many”), is ignored by the other evangelists; nor do we find any reference to it in the Acts or the Epistles, nor any reason to believe that any of the apostles were aware of the occurrence—one, certainly, to excite the deepest interest and wonder. Secondly, the statement is a confused, if not a self-contradictory, one. The asser­ tion in ver. 52, clearly is, that the open­ ing of the graves, and the rising of the bodies of saints, formed a portion of that series of convulsions of nature which is said to have occurred at the moment when Jesus expired; whereas the following verse speaks of it as occur­ ring “after his resurrection.” To sup­ pose, as believers in verbal accuracy do, and must do, that the bodies were re­ animated on the Friday, and not allowed to come out of their graves till the Sunday, is clearly too monstrous to be seriously entertained. If, to avoid this difficulty, we adopt Griesbach’s reading, and translate the passage thus : “ And coming out of their graves, went into the holy city after the resurrection ”— the question still recurs, “ Where did they remain between Friday and Sunday? And did they, after three days’ emanci­ pation, resume their sepulchral habili­ ments, and return to their narrow prison-house, and their former state of dust?” Again, when we refer to the original, we find that it was the bodies (o-^ara) which “arose”; but, if we suppose that the evangelist wrote gram­ 79 matically, it could not have been the bodies which “came out of the graves,” or he would have written eifXOovra, not e&Xflovres. Whence Bush 1 assumes that the bodies arose (or were raised, ■yfipfbfi at the time of the crucifixion, but lay down again,2 and that it was the souls which came out of the graves after the resurrection of Christ and appeared unto many ! We cannot, however, admit that souls inhabit graves. There can, we think, remain little doubt in unprepossessed minds that the whole legend (it is greatly augmented in the apocryphal gospels3) was one of those intended to magnify and honour Christ,4 which were current in great numbers at the time when Matthew wrote, and which he, with the usual want of discrimination and somewhat omni­ vorous tendency which distinguished him as a compiler, admitted into his gospel;—and that the confusing phrase, “ after his resurrection,” was added either by him or by some previous transmitter, or later copier, to prevent the apparent want of deference and decorum involved in a resurrection which should have preceded that of Jesus. In chap, xxvii. 62-66, and xxviii. 1 See a very elaborate work of Professor Bush, entitled “Anastasis, or the Resurrection of the Body” (p. 210), the object of which is to prove that the resurrection of the body is neither a rational nor a scriptural doctrine. 2 The Professor’s notion appears to be that the rising of the bodies on the Friday was a mere mechanical effect of the earthquake, and that re-animation did not take place till the Sunday, and that even then it was not the bodies which arose. 3 The Gospel of the Hebrews says that a portion of the temple was thrown down. See also the Gospel of Nicodemus. 4 Similar prodigies were said, or supposed to accompany, the deaths of many great men in former days, as in the case of Caesar (Virgil, Gorg. i. 463, etseq.). Shakespeare has embalmed some traditions of the kind, exactly analogous to the present case. See Julius Caesar, Act ii. Sc. 2. Again he says : Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 1. “ In the most high and palmy state of Rome, A little ere the mightiest Julius fell, The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets.” �8o FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—MATTHEW 11-15, we find a record of two conver­ sations most minutely given—one be­ tween the chief priests and Pilate, and the other between the priests and the guards of the sepulchre—at which it is impossible the evangelist, and most im­ probable that any informant of his, could have been present;—and which, to our minds, bear evident marks of being subsequent fictions supposed in order to complete and render more in­ vulnerable the history of Jesus’ resurrec­ tion. It is extremely unlikely that the chief priests and Pharisees should have thought of taking precautions before­ hand against a fraudulent resurrection. We have no reason to believe that they had ever heard of the prophecy to which they allude,1 for it had been uttered only to his own disciples, the twelve, and to them generally with more or less secrecy ;2 and we know that by them it was so entirely disregarded,3 or had been so completely forgotten, that the resurrection of their Lord was not only not expected, but took them completely by surprise. Were the enemies of Christ more attentive to, and believing on, his predictions than his own followers ? 1 It is true that John (ii. 19) relates that Jesus said publicly in answer to the Jews’ demand for a sign, “ Destroy this temple, and in three days I will build it up again.” This John con­ siders to have reference to his resurrection, but we know that the Jews attach no such meaning to it, from ver. 20, and also from Matt. xxvi. 61. 2 Matt. xvi. 21, xx. 19 ; Mark viii. 31, x. 32 ; Luke ix. 22, xviii. 33. 3 This is distinctly stated, John xx. 9 : “For as yet they knew not the Scripture, that he must rise again from the dead,” and indeed it is clear from all the evangelical narratives. The improbability of the sequel of the story is equally striking. That the guard placed by the Sanhedrim at the tomb should, all trembling with affright from the apparition (xxviii. 4), have been at once, and so easily, persuaded to deny the vision, and propagate a lie;—that the Sanhedrim, instead of angrily and contemptuously scouting the story of the soldiers, charging them with having slept, and threatening them with punishment, should have believed their statement, and, at the same time, in full conclave, resolved to bribe them to silence and falsehood;—that Roman soldiers, as it is generally assumed they were, who could scarcely commit a more heinous offence against discipline than to sleep upon their post, should so willingly have accepted money to accuse themselves of such a breach of duty;—are all too improbable suppositions to be readily allowed; especially when the 13th verse indicates a subsequent Jewish rumour as the foundation of the story, and when the utter silence of all the other evan­ gelists and apostles respecting a narrative which, if true, would be so essential a feature in their preaching of the resur­ rection, is duly borne in mind. Many minor instances in which Mat­ thew has retrenched or added to the accounts of Mark, according as retrench­ ment or omission would, in his view, most exalt the character of Jesus, are specified in the article already re­ ferred to (Prosp. Rev. xxi.), which we recommend to the perusal of all our readers as a perfect pattern of critical reasoning. Chapter VII FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY CON­ TINUED—MATTHEW In pursuing our inquiry as to the degree of reliance to be placed on Matthew’s narrative, we now come to the considera­ tion of those passages in which there is reason to believe that the conversations and discourses of Christ have been in­ �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—MATTHEW 81 correctly reported : and that words have been attributed to him which he did not utter, or at least did not utter in the form and context in which they have been transmitted to us. That this should be so, is no more than we ought to expect a priori ; for, of all things, discourses and remarks are the most likely to be imperfectly heard, inaccurately reported, and materially altered and corrupted in the course of transmission from mouth to mouth. Indeed, as we do not know, and have no reason to believe, that the discourses of Christ were written down by those who heard them immediately after their delivery, or indeed much be­ fore they reached the hands of the evan­ gelists, nothing less than a miracle per­ petually renewed for many years could have preserved these traditions perfectly pore and genuine. In admitting the be­ lief, therefore, that they are in several points imperfect and inaccurate, we are throwing no discredit upon the sincerity or capacity, either of the evangelists or their informants, or the original reporters of the sayings of Christ;—we are simply acquiescing in the alleged operation of natural causes.1 In some cases, it is true, we shall find reason to believe that the published discourses of Christ have been intentionally altered and arti­ ficially elaborated by some of the parties through whose hands they passed; but in those days when the very idea of historical criticism was yet unborn, this might have been done without any un­ fairness of purpose. We know that at that period, historians of far loftier pre­ tensions and more scientific character, writing in countries of far greater literary advancement, seldom scrupled to fill up and round off the harangues of their orators and statesmen with whatever they thought appropriate for them to have said—nay, even to elaborate for them long orations out of the most meagre hearsay fragments.1 A general view of Matthew, and still more a comparison of his narrative with that of the other three gospels, brings into clear light his entire indifference to chronological or contextual arrangement in his record of the discourses of Christ. Thus in ch. v., vi., vii., we have crowded into one sermon the teachings and aphor­ isms which in the other evangelists are spread over the whole of Christ’s minis­ try. In ch. xiii. we find collected to­ gether no less than six parables of simili­ tudes for the kingdom of heaven. In ch. x. Matthew compresses into one occa­ sion (the sending of the twelve, where many of them are strikingly out of place) a variety of instructions and reflections which must have belonged to a subse­ quent part of the career of Jesus, where indeed they are placed by the other evangelists. In c. xxiv., in the same manner, all the prophecies relating to the destruction of Jerusalem and the end of the world are grouped together; while, in many instances, remarks of Jesus are introduced in the midst of others with which they have no connection, and where they are obviously out of place ; as xi. 28-30, and xiii. 12, which evidently belongs to xxv. 29. 1 This seems to be admitted even by orthodox writers. Thus Abp. Trench says :—“The most earnest oral tradition will in a little while lose its distinctness, undergo essential though in­ sensible modifications. Apart from all desire to vitiate the committed word, yet, little by little, the subjective condition of those to whom it is entrusted, through whom it passes, will infallibly make itself felt; and in such treacherous keeping is all which remains merely in the memories of men, after a very little while, rival schools of disciples will begin to contend not merely how their Master’s words were to be accepted, but what those very words were.” — Trench’s “ JIulsean Lectures,” p. 15. 1 This in fact was the custom of antiquity— the rule, not the exception :—See Thucydides, Livy, Sallust, &c. passim. We find also (see Acts v. 34-39), that Luke himself did not scruple to adopt this common practice, for he gives us a verbatim speech of Gamaliel delivered in the Sanhedrim, after the apostles had been expressly excluded, and which therefore he could have known only by hearsay report. Moreover, it is certain that this speech must have been Luke’s, and not Gamaliel’s, since it represents Gamaliel in the year A.D. 34 or 35, as speaking in the past tense of an agitator, Theudas, who did not appear, as we learn from Josephus, till after the year a.d. 44. �82 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—MATTHEW In c. xi. 12 is the following expression : “ And from the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of Heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by storm.” Now, though the meaning of the passage is difficult to ascertain with precision, yet the expression, “ from the days of John the Baptist until now,” clearly implies that the speaker lived at a considerable distance of time from John ; and though appropriate enough in a man who wrote in the year a.d. 65, or 30 years after John, could not have been used by one who spoke in the year a.d. 30 or 33, while John was yet alive. This passage, therefore, must be regarded as coming from Matthew, not from Jesus. The passage at c. xvi. 15-19 bears obvious marks of being either an addi­ tion to the words of Christ, or a corrup­ tion of them. “ He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in Heaven. And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” The confession by Simon Peter of his belief in the Messiahship of Jesus is given by all the four evangelists, and there is no reason to question the accuracy of this part of the narrative. Mark and John, as well as Matthew, relate that Jesus bestowed on Simon the surname of Peter, and this part, there­ fore, may also be admitted. The re­ mainder of the narrative corresponds almost exactly with the equivalent pas­ sages in the other evangelists; but the 18th verse has no parallel in any of them. Moreover, the word “church” betrays its later origin. The word ¿KKhycria was used by the disciples to signify those assemblies and organisations into which they formed themselves after the death of Jesus, and is met with frequently in the epistles, but nowhere in the gospels,, except in the passage under considera­ tion, and one other, which is equally, or even more, contestable.1 It was in use when the gospel was written, but not when the discourse of Jesus was delivered. It must be taken as belong­ ing, therefore, to Matthew, not to Jesus. The following verse, conferring spiritual authority, or, as it is commonly called, “ the power of the keys,” upon Peter, is repeated by Matthew in connection with another discourse (in c. xviii. 18); and a similar passage is found in John (c. xx. 23), who, however, places the promise after the resurrection, and represents it as made to the apostles generally, subsequent to the descent of the Holy Spirit. But there are considerations which effectually forbid our receiving this promise, at least as given by Mat­ thew, as having really emanated from Christ. In the frst place, in both pas­ sages it occurs in connection with the suspicious word “church,”and indicates an ecclesiastical as opposed to a Chris­ tian origin. Secondly, Mark, who nar­ rates the previous conversation, omits this promise so honourable and distin­ guishing to Peter, which it is impossible for those who consider him as Peter’s mouthpiece, or amanuensis, to believe he would have done, had any such promise been actually made.2 Luke, the companion and intimate of Paul and other apostles, equally omits all mention of this singular conversation. Thirdly, not only do we know Peter’s utter unfit­ ness to be the depositary of such a fearful power, from his impetuosity and instability of character, and Christ’s 1 C. xviii. 17. “If he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church ; but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as a heathen man and a publican.” The whole pas­ sage with its context, betokens an ecclesiastical, not a Christian spirit. 2 See Thirl wall, cvii., “ Introd, to Schleiermacher.” �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—MATTHEW 83 There are two other classes of dis­ thorough perception of this unfitness, but we find that immediately after it is courses attributed to Jesus both in this said to have been conferred upon him, and in the other gospels, over the char­ his Lord addresses him indignantly by acter of which much obscurity hangs— the epithet of Satan, and rebukes him those in which he is said to have fore­ for his presumption and unspirituality ; told his own death and resurrection; and shortly afterwards this very man and those in which he is represented as thrice denied his Master. Can anyone speaking of his second advent. The maintain it to be conceivable that Jesus instances of the first are in Matthew should have conferred the awful power five in number, in Mark four, in Luke of deciding the salvation or damnation four, and in John three! Now we will at once concede that it is of his fellow-men upon one so frail, so faulty, and so fallible ? Does anyone extremely probable that Christ might believe that he did I We cannot, there­ easily have foreseen that a career and fore, regard the 19th verse otherwise conduct like his could, in such a time than as an unwarranted addition to the and country,-terminate only in a violent words of Jesus, and painfully indica­ and cruel death ; and that indications of tive of the growing pretensions of the such an impending fate thickened fast Church at the time the gospel was com­ around him as his ministry drew nearer to a close. It is even possible, though piled. In c. xxviii. 19 is another passage in the highest degree unlikely,2 that his which we may say with almost certainty study of the prophets might have led never came from the mouth of Christ: him to the conclusion that the expected “ Go ye therefore and teach all nations, Messiah, whose functions he believed baptising them in the name of the Father, himself sent to fulfil, was to be a suffer­ and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” ing and dying Prince. We will not even That this definite form of baptism pro­ dispute that he might have been so ceeded from Jesus, is opposed by the amply endowed with the spirit of pro­ fact that such an allocation of the Father, phecy as distinctly to foresee his ap­ Son, and Spirit does not elsewhere ap­ proaching crucifixion and resurrection. pear, except as a form of salutation in But we find in the Evangelists them­ the epistles ; while as a definite form of selves insuperable difficulties in the way baptism it is nowhere met with through­ of admitting the belief that he actually out the New Testament. Moreover, it did predict these events, in the language, was not the form used, and could scarcely or with anything of the precision, which therefore have been the form commanded ; is there ascribed to him. for in the apostolic epistles, and even in In the fourth gospel, these predictions the Acts, the form always is “ baptising are three in number,3 and in all the into Christ Jesus,” or, “into the name 1 Matt. xii. 40; xvi. 21 ; xvii. 9, 22, 23 ; xx. of the Lord Jesus ” j1 while the threefold 17-19 ; xxvi. 3. Mark viii. 31 ; ix. 10, 31 ; x. reference to God, Jesus, and the Holy 33 ; xiv. 28. Luke ix. 22, 44; xviii. 32, 33 ; xxii. 15. John ii. 20-22; iii. 14; xii. 32, 33: Ghost is only found in ecclesiastical all very questionable. writers, as Justin. Indeed, the formula 2 It was in the highest degree unlikely, in Matthew sounds so exactly as if it-had because this was neither the interpretation put been borrowed from the ecclesiastical upon the prophecies among the Jews of that ritual, that it is difficult to avoid the sup­ time, nor their natural signification, but it was an interpretation of the disciples ex eventu. position that it was transferred thence 3 We pass over those touching intimations of into the mouth of Jesus. Many critics, approaching separation contained in the parting in consequence, regard it as a subsequent discourses of Jesus during and immediately pre­ ceding the last supper, us there can be little doubt interpolation. 1 Rom. vi. 3. Gal. iii. 27. 16 ; x. 48 ; xix, 5. Acts ii. 38; viii. that at that time his fate was so imminent as to have become evident to any acute observer, with­ out the supposition of supernatural information. �84 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—MATTHEW language is doubtful, mysterious, and obscure, and the interpretation com­ monly put upon them is not that sug­ gested by the words themselves, nor that which suggested itself to those who heard them ; but is one affixed to them by the Evangelist after the event sup­ posed to be referred to; it is an interpretatio ex eventuP In the three synop­ tical gospels, however, the predictions are numerous, precise, and conveyed in language which it was impossible to mistake. Thus (in Matt. xx. 18, 19, and parallel passages), “ Behold, wre go up to Jerusalem, and the Son of man shall be betrayed unto the chief priests, and unto the scribes, and they shall condemn him to death, and shall deliver him to the Gentiles to mock, and to scourge, and to crucify him : and the third day he shall rise again.” Language such as this, definite, positive, explicit, and circumstantial, if really uttered, could not have been misunderstood, but must have made a deep and ineradicable impression on all who heard it, especially when repeated, as it is stated to have been, on several distinct occasions. Yet we find ample proof that no such im­ pression was made ;—that the disciples had no conception of their Lord’s ap­ proaching death—still less of his resur­ rection ;—and that so far from their expecting either of these events, both, when they occurred, took them entirely by surprise;—they were utterly con1 In the case of the first of these predictions —“ Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up,”—we can scarcely admit that the words were used by Jesus (if uttered by him at all) in the sense ascribed to them by John; since the words were spoken in the temple, and in answer to the demand for a sign, and could therefore only have conveyed, and have been intended to convey, the meaning which we know they actually did convey to the inquiring Jews. In the two other cases (or three, if we reckon viii. 28 as one), the language of Jesus is too indefinite for us to know what meaning he intended it to convey. The expression “ to be lifted up ” is thrice used, and may mean exalta­ tion, glorification (its natural signification), or, artificially and figuratively, might be intended tp refer to his crucifixion. founded by the one, and could not be­ lieve the other. We find them shortly after (nay, in one instance instantly after) these pre­ dictions were uttered, disputing which among them should be greatest in their coming dominion (Matt. xx. 24; Mark ix. 35 ; Luke xxii. 25) ■—glorying in the idea of thrones, and asking for seats on his right hand and on his left, in his Messianic kingdom (Matt. xix. 28, xx. 21 ; Mark x.»37 ; Luke xxii. 30); which, when he approached Jerusalem, they thought “ would immediately appear ” (Luke xix. 11, xxiv. 21). When Jesus was arrested in the garden of Geth­ semane, they first attempted resistance, and then “ forsook him and fled ” ; and so completely were they scattered, that it was left for one of the Sanhedrim, Joseph of Arimathaea, to provide even for his decent burial;—while the women who “watched afar off,” and were still faithful to his memory, brought spices to embalm the body—a sure sign, were any needed, that the idea of his resur­ rection had never entered into their minds. Further, when the women re­ ported his resurrection to the disciples, “ their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not” (Luke xxiv. 11). The conversation, moreover, of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus is sufficient proof that the resurrection of their Lord was a con­ ception which had never crossed their thoughts;—and, finally, according to John, when Mary found the body gone, her only notion was that it must have been removed by the gardener (xx. 15). All this shows, beyond, we think, the possibility of question, that the cruci­ fixion and resurrection of Jesus were wholly unexpected by his disciples. If further proof were wanted, we find it in the words of the evangelists, who re­ peatedly intimate (as if struck by the incongruity we have pointed out) that they “knew not,” or “understood not,” these sayings. (Mark ix. 31; Luke ix. 45, xviii. 34; John xx. 9). Here, then, we have two distinct �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—MAtTHÉW «5 Another argument may be adduced, statements, which mutually exclude and contradict each other. If Jesus really strongly confirmatory of this view. Jesus foretold his death and resurrection in is repeatedly represented as affirming the terms recorded in the gospels, it is that his expected sufferings and their inconceivable that the disciples should glorious termination must take place, have misunderstood him; for no words in order that the prophecies might be could be more positive, precise, or in­ fulfilled. (Matt. xxvi. 24, 54; Mark ix. telligible than those which he is said 12, xiv. 49; Luke xiii. 33, xviii. 31, to have repeatedly addressed to them. xxii. 37, xxiv; 27.) Now, the passion Neither could they have forgotten what of the disciples for representing every­ had been so strongly urged upon their thing connected with Jesus as the fulfil­ memory by their Master, as completely ment of prophecy, explains why they as it is evident from their subsequent should have sought, after his death, for conduct they actually did.1 They might, passages which might be supposed to indeed, have disbelieved his prediction prefigure it,1—and why these accommo­ (as Peter appears in the first instance to dations of prophecy should, in process have done), but in that case his cruci­ of time, and of transmission, have been fixion would have led them to expect attributed to Jesus himself. But if we his resurrection, or, at all events, to think assume, as is commonly done, that of it:—which it did not. The fulfilment these references to prophecy really pro­ of one prophecy would necessarily have ceeded from Christ in the first instance, we are landed in the inadmissible, or at recalled the other to their minds. The conclusion, therefore, is inevitable least the embarrassing and unorthodox, —that the predictions were ascribed to conclusion that he interpreted the pro­ Jesus after the event, not really uttered phets erroneously. To confine ourselves by him. It is, indeed, very probable to the principal passages only, a profound that, as gloomy anticipations of his own grammatical and historical exposition has death pressed upon his mind, and be­ convincingly shown, to all who are in a came stronger and more confirmed as condition to liberate themselves from the danger came nearer, he endeavoured dogmatic presuppositions, that in none to communicate these apprehensions to of these is there any allusion to the his followers, in order to prepare them sufferings of Christ.2 One of these references to prophecy for an event so fatal to their worldly hopes. That he did so, we think the in Matthew has evident marks of being conversations during, and previous to, an addition to the traditional words of the last supper afford ample proof. Christ by the Evangelist himself. In These vague intimations of coming evil 1 “ There were sufficient motives for the —intermingled and relieved, doubtless, by Christian legend thus to put into the mouth of strongly expressed convictions of a future Jesus, after the event, a prediction of the parti­ existence of reunion and reward, dis­ cular features of his passion, especially of the a Christ believed or disregarded by the disciples ignominious crucifixion.the The morestumblingcrucified became ‘to Jews a at the time—recurred to their minds block, and to the Greeks foolishness ’ (1 Cor. i. after all was over; and gathering strength, 23), the more need was there to remove the and expanding in definiteness and fulness offence by every possible means ; and as, among during constant repetition for nearly the subsequent events, the resurrection espe­ cially served as a retrospective cancelling of that forty years, had, at the period when the shameful death, so it must have been earnestly Evangelists wrote, become consolidated desired to take the sting from that offensive into the fixed prophetic form in which catastrophe beforehand also ; and this could not be done more effectually than by such a minute they have been transmitted to us. 1 Moreover, if they had so completely for­ gotten these predictions, whence did the evan­ gelists derive them ? prediction.”—Strauss, iii. 54, where this idea is fully developed. 2 Even Dr. Arnold admitted this fully. (“ Ser­ mons on Interpretations of Prophecy,” Preface.) �86 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—MATTHEW Matt. xvi. 4, we have the following: “A wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it but the sign of the prophet Jonas.” The same expres­ sion precisely is recorded by Luke (xi. 29), with this addition, showing what the reference to Jonas really meant: “For as Jonas was a sign to the Ninevites, so also shall the Son of man be to this generation. The men of Nineveh shall rise up in judgment against this generation, and shall condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here.” But when Matthew repeats the same answer of Jesus in response to the same demand for a sign (xii. 40), he adds the explanation of the reference, “for as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly, so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights [which Jesus was not, but only one day and two nightsin the heart of the earth ” ;—and he then proceeds with the same context as Luke. The prophecies of the second coming of Christ (Matt, xxiv.; Mark xiii.; Luke xvii. 22-37 ; xxi. 5-36) are mixed up with those of the destruction of Jeru­ salem by Titus in a manner which has long been the perplexity and despair of orthodox commentators. The obvious meaning of the passages which contain these predictions—the sense in which they were evidently understood by the Evangelists who wrote them down— the sense which we know from many sources1 they conveyed to the minds 2 of the early Christians—clearly is, that the coming of Christ to judge the world should follow immediately 3 (“ im­ 1 Nay : possibly only a few hours. 2 See 1 Cor. x. 11; xv. 51. Phil. iv. 5. 1 Thess. iv. 15. James v. 8. 1 Peter iv. 7. I John ii. 18. Rev. i. 1, 3 ; xxii. 7, 10, 12, 20. 3 An apparent contradiction to this is pre­ sented by Matt. xxiv. 14; Matt. xiii. 10, where we are told that “ the gospel must be first preached to all nations.” It appears, however, from Col. i. 5, 6, 23 (see also Romans x. 18), that St. Paul considered this to have been already accomplished in his time. mediately,” “ in those days ”) the des­ truction of the Holy City, and should take place during the lifetime of the then existing generation. “ Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away till all these things be fulfilled ” (Matt. xxiv. 34; Mark xiii. 30; Luke xxi. 32). “There be some standing here that shall not taste of death till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom” (Matt. xvi. 28). “Verily I say unto you, Ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel, till the Son of man be come” (Matt. x. 23). “If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee?” (John xxi. 23). Now if these predictions really pro­ ceeded from Jesus, he was entirely in error on the subject, and the prophetic spirit was not in him ; for not only did his advent not follow close on the destruction of Jerusalem, but 1800 years have since elapsed, and neither he nor the preliminary signs which were to announce *him have yet appeared. If these predictions did not proceed from him, then the Evangelist has taken the liberty of putting into the mouth of Christ words and announcements which Christ never uttered. Much desperate ingenuity has been exerted to separate the predictions relating to Jerusalem from those relating to the Advent: but these exertions have been neither creditable nor successful; and they have already been examined and refuted at great length. Moreover, they are rendered necessary only by two previous assumptions: first, that Jesus cannot have been mistaken as to the future; and, secondly, that he really uttered these predictions. Now, neither of these assumptions is capable of proof. The first we shall not dispute, because we have no adequate means of coming to a conclusion on the subject. But as to the second assumption, we think there are several indications that, though the predictions in question were current among the Christians when the gospels were composed, yet that they did not, at least as handed down to us, proceed �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—MARK AND LUKE from the lips of Christ ; but were, as far as related to the second advent, the unauthorised anticipations of the dis­ ciples; and, as far as related to the destruc­ tion of the city, partly gathered from the denunciations of Old Testament pro­ phecy, and partly from actual knowledge of the events which passed under their eyes. In the first place, it is not admissible that Jesus could have been so true a prophet as to one part of the prediction, and so entirely in error as to the other, both parts referring equally to future events. Secondly, the three gospels in which these predictions occur are allowed to have been written between the years 65 and 72 a.d., or during the war which ended in the destruction of Jerusalem1; that is, they were written during and 87 after the events which they predict. They may, therefore, either have been entirely drawn from the events, or have been vaguely in existence before, but have derived their definiteness and pre­ cision from the events. And we have already seen in the case of the first evangelist, that he, at least, did not scruple to eke out and modify the pre­ dictions he recorded, from his own experience of their fulfilment. Thirdly, the parallel passages, both in Matthew and Mark, contain an expression twice repeated—“ the elect”—which we can say almost with certainty was unknown in the time of Christ, though frequently found in the epistles, and used, at the time the gospels were composed, to designate the members of the Christian Church. Chapter VIII SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED—MARK AND LUKE Many of the criticisms contained in the last chapter—tending to prove that Matthew’s Gospel contains several state­ ments not strictly accurate, and attributes to Jesus several expressions and dis­ courses which were not really uttered by him—are equally applicable both to Mark and Luke. The similarity—not to say identity—of the greater portion of Mark’s narrative with that of Matthew leaves no room for doubt either that one evangelist copied from the other, or that both employed the same documents, or oral narratives, in the compilation of their histories. Our own clear conviction is that Mark was the earliest in time, and far the most correct in fact. 1 The war began by Vespasian’s entering Galilee in the beginning of the year a.d. 67, and the city was taken in the autumn of a.d. 70. As we have already stated, we attach little weight to the tradition of the second century, that the second gospel was written by Mark, the companion of Peter. It originated with Papias, whose works are now lost, but who was stated to be a “ weak man ” by Eusebius, who records a few fragments of his writings. But if the tradition be correct, the omissions in this gospel, as compared with the first, are significant enough. It omits entirely the genealogies, the miraculous concep­ tion, several matters relating to Peter (especially his walking on the water, and the commission of the keys), and every­ thing miraculous or improbable relating to the resurrection1—everything, in fact, but the simple statement that the body 1 We must not forget that the real genuine Gospel of Mark terminates with the 8th verse of the 16th chapter. �88 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY-MARK AND LUKE was missing, and that a “young man” assured the visitors that Christ was risen. In addition to these, there are two or three peculiarities in the discourses of Jesus, as recorded by Mark, which in­ dicate that the evangelist thought it necessary and allowable slightly to modify the language of them, in order to suit them to the ideas or the feelings of the Gentile converts; if, as is com­ monly supposed, it was principally designed for them. We copy a few instances of these, though resting little upon them. Matthew, who wrote for the Jews, has the following passage, in the injunctions pronounced by Jesus on the sending forth of the twelve apostles : “ Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not. But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (x. 5). Mark, who wrote for the Gentiles, omits entirely this unpalatable charge (v. 7—13). Matthew (xv. 24), in the story of the Canaanitish woman, makes Jesus say, “I am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” Mark (vii. 26) omits this expression entirely, and modi­ fies the subsequent remark. In Matthew it is thus :—“ It is not meet to take the children’s bread and cast it unto the dogs.” In Mark it is softened by the preliminary, “ Let the children first be filled? &c. Matthew (xxiv. 20), “But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the Sabbath day.” Mark omits the last clause, which would have had no meaning for any but the Jews, whose Sabbath day’s journey was by law restricted to a small distance. In the promise given to the disciples, in answer to Peter’s question, “Behold we have forsaken all, and followed thee; what shall we have therefore ? ” The following verse, given by Matthew (xix. 28), is omitted by Mark (x. 28):— “ Verily I say unto you, That ye which have followed me, in the regeneration, when the Son of Man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.” The Gospel of Luke, which is a work in some respects of more pretension, and unquestionably of more literary merit, than the two first, will require a few additional observations. The re­ marks we have made on the prophecies of his own sufferings and resurrection, alleged by Matthew and Mark to have been uttered by Jesus, apply equally to Luke’s narrative, in which similar- pas­ sages occur; and in these, therefore, we must admit that the third evangelist, like the other two, ascribed to Jesus dis­ courses which never really proceeded from him. But besides these, there are several passages in Luke which bear an equally apocryphal character, some of which it will be interesting to notice. The first chapter, from verse 5-80, contains the account of the annunciation and birth of John the Baptist, with all the marvellous circumstances attending it, and also the annunciation to Mary, and the miraculous conception of Jesus —an account exhibiting many remark­ able discrepancies with rhe correspond­ ing narrative in Matthew. We are spared the necessity of a detailed inves­ tigation of this chapter by the agreement of the most learned critics, both of the orthodox and sceptical schools, in con­ sidering the narrative as poetical and legendary.1 It is examined at great length by Strauss, who is at the head of the most daring class of the Biblical Commentators of Germany, and by Schleiermacher, who ranks first among the learned divines of that country. The latter (in the work translated by one of our most erudite and liberal Prelates, and already often referred to), writes thus, PP- 25-7 “ Thus, then, we begin by detaching the first chapter as an originally inde­ pendent composition. If we consider it in this light somewhat more closely, we 1 [The recent repudiation of the “Virgin­ birth ” by modern divines will be in the memory of all.] �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—MARK AND LUKE cannot resist the impression that it was originally rather a little poetical work than a properly-historical narrative. The latter supposition, in its strictest sense at all events, no one will adopt, or con­ tend that the angel Gabriel announced the advent of the Messiah in figures so purely Jewish, and in expressions taken mostly from the Old Testament ; or that the alternate song between Elizabeth and Mary actually took place in the manner described ; or that Zacharias, at the instant of recovering his speech, made use of it to utter the hymn, with­ out being disturbed by the joy and sur­ prise of the company, by which the narrator himself allows his description to be interrupted. At all events we should then be obliged to suppose that the author made additions of his own, and enriched the historical narrative by the lyrical effusions of his own genius.” ... “ If we consider the whole group­ ing of the narrative, there naturally presents itself to us a pleasing little composition, completely in the style and manner of several Jewish poems, still extant among our apocryphal writings, written in all probability originally in Aramaic by a Christian of the more liberal Judaising school.” . . . “There are many other statements which I should not venture to pronounce historical, but would rather explain by the occasion the poet had for them. To these belongs, in the first place, John’s being a lateborn child, which is evidently only imagined for the sake of analogy with several heroes of Hebrew antiquity ; and, in the next place, the relation between the ages of John and Christ, and likewise the consanguinity of Mary and Elizabeth, which besides, it is diffi­ cult to reconcile with the assertion of John (John, i, 33), that he did not know Christ before his baptism.” In the second chapter we have the account of the birth of Jesus, and the accompanying apparition of a multitude of angels to shepherds in the fields near Bethlehem—as to the historical founda­ tion of which Strauss and Schleierma- 89 cher are at variance; the former regard­ ing it as wholly mythical, and the latter as based upon an actual occurrence, im­ perfectly remembered in after times, when the celebrity of Jesus caused every con­ tribution to the history of his birth and infancy to be eagerly sought for. All that we can say on the subject with any cer­ tainty is, that the tone of the narrative is legendary. The poetical rhapsody of Simeon when Jesus was presented in the temple may be passed over with the same remark ;—but the 33rd verse, where we are told that “ Joseph and his mother marvelled at those things which were spoken of him,” proves clearly one of two things : — either the unhistorical character of the Song of Simeon, and of the consequent astonishment of the parents of Jesus—or the unreality of the miraculous annunciation and conception. It is impossible, if an angel had actually announced to Mary the birth of the di­ vine child in the language, or in anything resembling the language, recorded in Luke i. 31-35 ; and if, in accordance with that announcement, Mary had found herself with child before she had any natural possibility of being so—that she should have felt any astonishment what­ ever at the prophetic announcement of Simeon, so consonant with the angelic promise, especially when occurring after the miraculous vision of the Shepherds, which, we are told, “ she pondered in her heart.” Schleiermacher has felt this diffi­ culty, and endeavours to evade it by considering the first and second chapters to be two monographs originally by dif­ ferent hands, which Luke incorporated into his gospel. This was very probably the case ; but it does not avoid the diffi­ culty, as it involves giving up ii. 33 as an unauthorised and incorrect statement. The genealogy of Jesus, as given in the third chapter, may be in the main cor­ rect, though there are some perplexities in one portion of it; but if the previous narrative be correct, it is not the genear logy of Jesus at all, but only of Joseph, who was no relation to him whatever, but simply his guardian. On the other �90 FIDELITY OF THF GOSPEL HISTORY—MARK AND LUKE hand, if the preparer of the genealogy, or the evangelist who records it, knew or believed the story of the miraculous conception, we can conceive no reason for his admitting a pedigree which is either wholly meaningless, or destructive of his previous statements. The inser­ tion in verse 23, “as was supposed,” whether by the evangelist or a subsequent copyist, merely shows that whoever made it perceived the incongruity, but preferred neutralising the genealogy to omitting it.1 In all the synoptical gospels we find in­ stances of the cure of demoniacs by Jesus early in his career, in which the demons, promptly, spontaneously, and loudly, bear testimony to his Messiahship. These statements occur once in Matthew (viii. 29)—four times in Mark (i. 24, 34 ; iii. 11 ; v. 7); and three times in Luke (iv. 33,41; viii. 28).2 Now, two points are evident to common sense, and are fully admitted by honest criticism: —first, that these demoniacs were lunatic and epileptic patients ; and secondly, that Jesus (or the narrators who framed the language of Jesus throughout the synop­ tical gospels) shared the common belief that these maladies were caused by evil spirits inhabiting the bodies of the suf­ ferers. We are then landed in this con­ clusion—certainly not a probable one, nor the one intended to be conveyed by the narrators—that the idea of Jesus being the Messiah was adopted by mad­ men before it had found entrance into the public mind, apparently even before it was received by his immediate disci­ ples—was in fact first suggested by mad­ men ;—in other words,-that it was an idea which originated with insane brains 1 The whole story of the Incarnation, how­ ever, is effectually discredited by the fact that none of the Apostles or sacred Historians make any subsequent reference to it, or indicate any knowledge of it. 2 It is worthy of remark that no narrative of the healing of demoniacs, stated as such, occurs in the fourth gospel. This would intimate it to be the work of a man who had outgrown, or had never entertained, the idea of maladies arising from possession. It is one of many indications in this evangelist of a Greek rather than a Jewish mind. —which presented itself to, and found acceptance with, insane brains more readily than sane ones. The conception of the evangelists clearly was that Jesus derived honour (and his mission confir­ mation) from this early recognition of his Messianic character by hostile spirits of a superior order of Intelligences; but to us, who know that these supposed superior Intelligences were really un­ happy men whose natural intellect had been perverted or impaired, the effect of the narrative becomes absolutely re­ versed ;—and if they are to be accepted as historical, they lead inevitably to the conclusion that the idea of the Messiahship of Jesus was originally formed in disordered brains, and spread thence among the mass of the disciples. The only rescue from this conclusion lies in the admission, that these narratives are not historical, but mythic, and belong to that class of additions which early grew up in the Christian Church, out of the desire to honour and aggrandise the memory of its Founder, and which our uncritical evangelists embodied as they found them. Passing over a few minor passages of doubtful authenticity or accuracy, we come to one near the close of the gospel, which we have no scruple in pronouncing to be an unwarranted interpolation. In xxii. 36-38, Jesus is reported, after the last Supper, to have said to his disciples, “ He that hath no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one. And they said, Lord, behold, here are two swords. And he said, It is enough.” Christ never could have uttered such a command, nor, we should imagine, anything which could have been mistaken for it. The very idea is contradicted by his whole character, and utterly precluded by the narratives of the other evangelists ; — for when Peter did use the sword, he met with a severe rebuke from his Master:—“Put up thy sword into the sheath : the cup which my Father hath given me shall I not drink it ? ”—according to John “ Put up again thy sword into its place; for all they that take the sword shall perish by �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—GOSPEL OF JOHN the sword,”—according to Matthew. The passage we conceive to be a clumsy in­ vention of some early .narrator, to account for the remarkable fact of Peter having a sword at the time of Christ’s appre­ hension ; and it is inconceivable to us how a sensible compiler like Luke could have admitted into his history such an apocryphal and unharmonising fragment. In conclusion, then, it appears certain that in all the synoptical gospels we have events related which did not really occur, 1 91 and words ascribed to Jesus which Jesus did not utter; and that many of these words and events are of great significance. In the great majority of these instances, however, this incorrectness does not imply any want of honesty on the part of the Evangelists, but merely indicates that they adopted and embodied, with­ out much scrutiny or critical acumen, whatever probable and honourable nar­ ratives they found current in the Christian community. Chapter IX SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED—GOSPEL OF JOHN In the examination of the fourth Gospel a different mode of criticism from that hitherto pursued is required. Here we do not find, so frequently as in the other Evangelists, particular passages which pronounce their own condemnation, by anachronisms, peculiarity of language, or incompatibility with others more ob­ viously historical \ but the whole tone of the delineations, the tenor of the discourses, and the general course of the narrative, are utterly different from those contained in the synoptical gospels, and also from what we should expect from a Jew speaking to Jews, writing of Jews, imbued with the spirit and living in the land of Judaism. By the common admission of all recent critics, this gospel is rather to be regarded as a polemic, than an historic composi­ tion.1 It was written less with the in­ tention of giving a complete and con­ tinuous view of Christ’s character and career, than to meet and confute certain heresies which had sprung up in the Christian church near the close of the first century, by selecting, from the 1 See Hug, Strauss, Hennell, De Wette. Also Dr. Tait’s “ Suggestions.” memory of the author, or the tradi­ tions then current among believers, such narratives and discourses as were conceived to be most opposed to the heresies in question. Now these heresies related almost exclusively to the person and nature of Jesus; on which points we have many indications that great difference of opinion existed, even during the apostolic period. The obnoxious doctrines especially pointed at in the gospel appear, both from internal evi­ dence and external testimony,1 to be those held by Cerinthus and the Nico­ lai tans, which, according to Hug, were as follows :—The one Eternal God is too pure, perfect, and pervading an essence to be able to operate on matter; but from him emanated a number of in­ ferior and gradually degenerating spiritual natures, one of whom was the Creator of the world,—hence its imperfections. Jesus was simply and truly a man, though an eminently great and virtuous one; but one of the above spiritual 1 Irenaeus, Jerome, Epiphanius. See Hug, § 51. See also a very detailed account of the Gnostics in Norton’s “Genuineness of the Gospels,” ii. c. 1, 2. �92 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY-GOSPEL OF JOHN natures—the Christ, the Son of Godunited itself to Jesus at his baptism, and thus conferred upon him super­ human power. “This Christ, as an immaterial Being of exalted origin, one of the purer kinds of spirits, was from his nature unsusceptible of material affec­ tions, of suffering and pain. He, there­ fore, at the commencement of the Pas­ sion, resumed his separate existence, abandoned Jesus to pain and death, and soared upwards to his native heaven. Cerinthus distinguished Jesus and Christ, Jesus and the Son of God, as beings of different nature and dignity.1 The Nicolaitans held similar doctrines in regard to the Supreme Deity and his relation to mankind, and an inferior spirit who was the Creator of the world. Among the subaltern orders of spirits they con­ sidered the most distinguished to be the only-begotten, the /xovoyei/^s (whose existence, however, had a beginning), and the Xoyos, the Word, who was an immediate descendant of the onlybegotten.” 1 2 These, then, were the opinions which the author of the fourth gospel wrote to controvert; in confirmation of which being his object we have his own state­ ment (xx. 31): “These are written” (not that ye may know the life and under­ stand the character of our great Teacher, but that ye may believe his nature to be what I affirm) “ that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God ; and that believing, ye might have life through his name.” Now, a narrative written with a controversial aim—a nar­ rative, more especially, consisting of re­ collected or selected circumstances and discourses—carries within it, as everyone will admit, from the very nature of fallible humanity, an obvious element of inac­ curacy. A man who writes a history to prove a doctrine must be something more than a man, if he writes that history with 1 Several critics contend that the original reading of 1 John iv. 3 was, “ Every spirit that separateth Jesus (from the Christ) is not of God.”—See Hug, p. 423. 2 Hug, § 51. a scrupulous fidelity of fact and colour­ ing. Accordingly, we find that the public discourses of Jesus in this gospel turn almost exclusively upon the dignity of his own person, which topic is brought forward in a manner and with a fre­ quency which it is impossible to regard as historical. The prominent feature in the character of Jesus, as here de­ picted, is an overweening tendency to self-glorification. We see no longer, as in the other gospels, a prophet eager to bring men to God, and to instruct them in righteousness, but one whose whole mind seems occupied with the grandeur of his own nature and mission. In the first three gospels we have the message ; in the fourth we have comparatively little but the messenger. If any of our readers will peruse the gospel with this observa­ tion in their minds, we are persuaded the result will be a very strong and prob­ ably painful impression that they cannot here be dealing with the genuine lan­ guage of Jesus, but simply with a com­ position arising out of deep conviction of his superior nature, left in the mind of the writer by the contemplation of his splendid genius and his noble and lovely character. The difference of style and subject between the discourses of Jesus in the fourth gospel and in the synoptical ones has been much dwelt upon, and we think by no means too much, as proving the greater or less unauthenticity of the former. This objection has been met by the supposition that the finer intellect and more spiritual character of John in­ duced him to select, and enabled him to record, the more subtle and specu­ lative discourses of his Master, which were unacceptable or unintelligible to the more practical and homely minds of the other disciples; and reference is made to the parallel case of Xenophon and Plato, whose reports of the conver­ sations of Socrates are so different in tone and matter as to render it very difficult to believe that both sat at the feet of the same master, and listened to the same teaching. But the citation �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—GOSPEL OF JOHN is an unfortunate one; for in this case, also, it is more than suspected that the more simple recorder was the more cor­ rect one, and that the sublimer and subtler peculiarities in the discourses reported by Plato belong rather to the disciple than to the teacher. Had John merely superadded some more refined and mystical discourses omitted by his predecessors, the supposition in question might have been admitted; but it is im­ possible not to perceive that here the whole tone of the mind delineated is new and discrepant, though often eminently beautiful. Another argument, which may be con­ sidered as conclusive against the histori­ cal fidelity of the discourses of Jesus in the fourth gospel is, that not only they, but the discourses of John the Baptist likewise, are entirely in the style of the evangelist himself, where he introduces his own remarks, both in the gospel and in the first epistle. He makes both Jesus and the Baptist speak exactly as he himself speaks. Compare the follow­ ing passages:— John iii. 31-36. (Baptist loquitur.) He that cometh from above is above all: he that is of the earth is earthly, and speaketh of the earth: he that cometh from heaven is above all. And what he hath seen and heard, that he testifieth; and no man receiveth his testimony. He that receiveth his testimony hath set to his seal that God is true. For he whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God; for God giveth not the spirit by measure. The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand. He that believeth on the Son hath ever­ lasting life, and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him. 93 that the Father had given all things into his hands. vi. 47. (Jesus loq.) He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.—(See also I Epistle v. 10-13, and Gospel iii. 18, where the Evangelist or Jesus speaks.) vi. 40. (Jesus loq.) And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seetli the Son, and believeth on him, may have ever­ lasting life. Another indication that in a great part of the fourth gospel we have not the genuine discourses of Jesus, is found in the mystical and enigmatical nature of the language. This peculiarity, of which we have scarcely a trace in the other Evangelists, beyond the few parables which they did not at first understand, but which Jesus immediately explained to them, pervades the fourth gospel. The great Teacher is here represented as absolutely labouring to be unintelligible, John viii. 23. (Jesus to soar out of the reach of his hearers, loquitur.) Ye are from and at once perplex and disgust them. beneath, I am from “ It is the constant method of this Evan­ above ; ye are of this gelist, in detailing the conversation of world ; I am not of this world. Jesus, to form the knot and progress of iii. II. (Jesus loq.) the discussions, by making the inter­ We speak that we do locutors understand literally what Jesus know, and testify that intended figuratively. The type of the we have seen; and ye receive not our testidialogue is that in which language in­ mony. tended spiritually is understood car­ nally.” The instances of this are incon­ ceivably frequent and unnatural. We have the conversation with the Jews about “ the temple of his body ” (ii. 21); viii. 26. (Jesus loq.) the mystification of Nicodemus on the I speak to the world subject of regeneration (iii. 3-10); the those things which I have heard of him.— conversation with the Samaritan woman (See also vii. 16-18; (iv. 10-15) ; his disciples about “ the xiv. 24.) food which ye know not of” (iv. 32); v. 20. (Jesus loq.) with the people about the “ bread from The Father loveth the Son, and showeth him heaven” (vi. 31-35); with the Jews all things that himself about giving them his flesh to eat (vi. doeth. 48-66); with the Pharisees about his xiii. 3. (Evangelist disappearance (vii. 33-39, and viii. 21, loq.) Jesus knowing �94 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY-GOSPEL OF JOHN 22); again about his heavenly origin and pre-existence (viii. 37, 34, and 5658); and with his disciples about the sleep of Lazarus (xi. 11-14). Now, in the first place, it is very improbable that Jesus, who came to preach the gospel to the poor, should so constantly have spoken in a style which his hearers could not understand; and in the next place, it is equally improbable that an Oriental people, so accustomed to figurative lan­ guage,1 and whose literature was so eminently metaphorical, should have misapprehended the words of Jesus so stupidly and so incessantly as the Evan­ gelist represents them to have done. But perhaps the most conclusive argument against the historical character of the discourses in the fourth gospel is to be found in the fact that, whether dialogues or monologues, they are com­ plete and continuous, resembling com­ positions rather than recollections, and of a length which it is next to impossible could have been accurately retained— even if we adopt Bertholdt’s improbable hypothesis, that the apostle took notes of Jesus’ discourses at the time of their delivery. Notwithstanding all that has been said as to the possible extent to which the powers of memory may go, it is difficult for an unprepossessed mind to believe that discourses such as that contained in the 14th, 15 th, and 16th chapters could have been accurately retained and reported unless by a short­ hand writer, or by one favoured with supernatural assistance. “ We hold it therefore to be established ” (says Strauss,2 and in the main we agree with him) “that the discourses of Jesus in the fourth gospel are mainly free compositions of the Evangelist; but we have admitted that he has culled several sayings of Jesus . 1 See the remarks of Strauss on the conversa­ tion with Nicodemus, from which it appears that the image of a new birth was a current one among the Jews, and cozild not have been so misunderstood by a master in Israel, and in fact that the whole conversation is almost certainly fictitious.—ii. 153. 3 “ Leben Jesu,” ii. 187. from an authentic tradition, and hence we do not extend this proposition to those passages which are countenanced by parallels in the syn opti cal gospels. In these latter compilations we have an example of the vicissitudes which befall discourses that are preserved only in the memory, of a second party. Severed from their original connection, and broken up into smaller and smaller fragments, they present, when reassembled, the appearance of a mosaic, in which the connection of the parts is a purely external one, and every transition an artificial juncture. The discourses in John present just the opposite appear­ ance. Their gradual transitions, only occasionally rendered obscure by the mystical depths of meaning in which they lie—transitions in which one thought develops itself out of another, and a succeeding proposition is frequently but an explanatory amplification of the pre­ ceding one—are indicative of a pliable, unresisting mass, such as is never pre­ sented to a writer by the traditional sayings of another, but by such only as proceeds from the stores of his own thought, which he moulds according to his will. For this reason the contribu­ tions of tradition to these stores of thought were not so likely to have been particular independent sayings of Jesus, as rather certain ideas which formed the basis of many of his discourses, and which were modified and developed according to the bent of a mind of Greek or Alexandrian culture.”1 .Another peculiarity of this gospel­ arising, probably, out of its controversial origin—is its exaltation of dogma over morality—of belief over spiritual affection. 1 See also Hennell, p. 200. “The picture of Jesus bequeathing his parting benedictions to the disciples, seems fully to warrant the idea that the author was one whose imagination and affections had received an impress from real scenes and real attachments. The few relics of the words, looks, and acts of Jesus, which friend­ ship itself could at that time preserve unmixed, he expands into a complete record of his own and the disciples’ sentiments ; what they felt, he makes Jesus speak.” �FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—GOSPEL OF JOHN In the other gospels, piety, charity, for­ giveness of injuries, purity of life, are preached by Christ as the titles to his kingdom and his Father’s favour. Whereas, in John’s gospel, as in his epistles, belief in Jesus as the Son of God, the Messiah, the Logos—belief, in fact, in the evangelist’s view of his nature—is constantly represented as the one thing needful. The whole tone of the history bears token of a time when the message was beginning to be for­ gotten in the Messenger ; when meta­ physical and fruitless discussions as to the nature of Christ had superseded devotion to his spirit, and attention to the sublime piety and simple self-sacrificing holiness which formed the essence of his own teaching. The discourses are often touchingly eloquent and tender, the nar­ rative is full of beauty, pathos, and nature; but we miss the simple and intelligible truth, the noble, yet practicable, morality of the other histories ; we find in it more of Christ than of Christianity, and more of John than of Jesus. If the work of an apostle at all, it was of an apostle who had caught but a fragment of his Master’s mantle, or in whom the good original seed had been choked by the long bad habit of subtle and scholastic contro­ versies. We cannot but regard this gospel as decidedly inferior in moral sublimity and purity to the other repre­ sentations of Christ’s teaching which have come down to us; its religion is more of a dogmatic creed, and its very philanthropy has a narrower and more restricted character. There are several minor peculiarities which distinguish this gospel from the preceding ones, which we can do no more than indicate. We find here little about the Kingdom of Heaven—nothing about Christ’s mission being confined to the Israelites—nothing about the casting out of devils—nothing about the destruc­ tion of Jerusalem -nothing a,bout the struggle between the law and gospel— topics which occupy so large a space in the pictureof Christ’s ministry given in the synoptical gospels; and the omission of 95 which seems to refer the composition of this narrative to a later period, when the Gentiles were admitted into the Church —when the idea of demoniacal posses­ sion had given way before a higher cul­ ture—when Jerusalem had been long destroyed—and when Judaism had quite retired before Christianity, at least within the pale of the Church.1 1 Modern criticism has detected several slight errors and inaccuracies in the fourth gospel, such as Sychar for Sichem, Siloam erroneously interpreted sent, &c., &c., from which it has been argued that the writer could not haye been a native of Palestine, and by consequence not the Apostle John. These, however, are insignificant in comparison with the discrepancy as to the date of the Last Supper in the different Evangelists, the Synoptists fixing it on the Feast of the Passover and the Fourth Gospel on the previous day. This discrepancy gave rise to the famous ‘ ‘ Quartodeciman Controversy,” as it is called, which so long agitated the early Church, and was at last only quelled by an authoritative decree of the Emperor Constantine. Those who wish to understand the question, and the light which its details throw upon the probable authorship of the fourth Gospel, will find an exhaustive a.ccount in Section ix. of Mr. Tayler’s learned inquiry already referred to.—The remarkable points are that the early controversialists, who took the view and held to the practice of the Synoptists, appealed to the Apostle John as their strongest authority on their side;—while it was not till very late in the discussion that their adversaries seem to have thought of quoting the fourth Gospel in their favour;—that this Gospel en­ tirely ignores the institution of the Eucharist in its account of the last days of Jesus, though apparently alluding to it in some earlier chapters ; —and that the object of the author appears to have been to represent, by implication at least, Christ as being himself the Paschal Lamb, not as partaking of it. If the fourth gospel were really the work of the Apostle John, it would seem impossible to avoid the inference that the institution of “the Sacrament ” of bread and wine as recorded by the other Evangelists is entirely unhistorical, and then all the stupendous ecclesiastical corollaries flowing from it fall to the ground. It is impossible that John could have forgotten such commands or assertions as are supposed to be involved in the words, “Take eat; this is my body,” &c.—It is equally impossible that, if they were ever spoken, and signified what Christians in general believe to be their signifi­ cance, the disciple who leaned on the bosom of Jesus while they were uttered could have so under-valued their meaning as to have omitted to record them. The dilemma, then, seems to �96 FIDELITY OF THE GOSPEL HISTORY—GOSPEL OF JOHN Though we have seen ample reason their own countrymen. They would to conclude that nearly all the discourses have said, the People, or, the Pharisees. of Jesus in the fourth gospel are mainly The same observation applies to xiii. 33, the composition of the evangelist from and also probably to xviii. 36. memory or tradition, rather than the Ch. xvii. 3. “ And this is life eternal, genuine utterances of ' our great Teacher, that they might know Thee the only true it may be satisfactory, as further con­ God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast firmation, to select a few single passages sent.” This would be a natural expres­ and expressions, as to the unauthentic sion for the evangelist, but scarcely for character of which there can be no ques­ his Master. tion. Thus at ch. iii. n, Jesus is repre­ As before observed, great doubt hangs sented as saying to Nicodemus, in the over the whole story of the testimony midst of his discourse about regenera­ borne by the Baptist to Jesus at his tion, “We speak that we do know, and baptism. In the fourth evangelist, this testify that which we have seen; and ye testimony is represented as most em­ receive not our witness,”—expressions phatic, public, and repeated—so that it wholly unmeaning and out of place in could have left no doubt in the minds the mouth of Jesus on an occasion of any of his followers, either as to the where he is testifying nothing at all, but grandeur of the mission of Jesus, or as merely propounding a mystical dogma to to his own subordinate character and an auditor dull of comprehension—but position (i. 29-36; iii. 26-36). Yet expressions which are the evangelist’s we find, from Acts xviii. 25, and again habitual form of asseveration and com­ xix. 3, circles of John the Baptist’s dis­ plaint. ciples, who appear never even to have It is not clear whether the writer­ heard of Jesus—a statement which we intended verses 16-21 to form part of think is justly held irreconcilable with the discourse of Jesus, or merely a com­ the statements above referred to in the mentary of his own. If the former, fourth gospel. they are clearly unwarrantable; their The question of miracles will be con­ point of view is that of a period when sidered in a future chapter, and several the teaching of Christ had been known of those related in this Gospel— and rejected, and they could not have significantly seven in number, and in cul­ been uttered with any justice or appro­ minating order—have special character­ priateness at the very commencement of istics of their own; but there is one his ministry. miracle, peculiar to John, of so singular Ch. xi. 8. “ His disciples say unto and apocryphal a character as to call him, Master, the Jews of late sought to for notice here. The turning of water stone thee: and goest thou thither into wine at the marriage feast in Cana again ? ” The Jews is an expression of Galilee has long formed the oppro­ which would be natural to Ephesians or brium and perplexity of theologians, and other foreigners when speaking of the must continue to do so as long as they inhabitants of Palestine, but could not persist in regarding it as an accurate have been used by Jews speaking of historical relation. None of the number­ less attempts to give anything like a be inescapable :—Either John did not write the fourth Gospel—in which case we have the direct probable explanation of the narrative testimony of no eye-witness to the facts and has been attended with the least success. sayings of Christ’s ministry ;—-Or the Sacrament They are for the most part melancholy of the Lord’s supper, as deduced from the Synoptical accounts, with the special doctrines specimens of ingenuity misapplied, and of Sacramental grace to partakers of it, and of plain honesty perverted by an originally the Atonement (as far as it is warranted or false assumption. No portion of the originally was suggested by those words of Christ), becomes “the baseless fabric of a gospel history, scarcely any portion of Old Testament, or even of apocryphal, vision.” �RESULTS OF THE FOREGOING CRITICISM narratives, bears such unmistakable marks of fiction. It is a story which, if found in any other volume, would at once have been dismissed as a clumsy and manifest invention. In the first place, it is a miracle wrought to supply more wine to men who had already drunk much—a deed which has no suit­ ability to the character of Jesus, and no analogy to any other of his miracles. Secondly, though it was, as we are told, the first of his miracles, his mother is represented as expecting him to work a miracle, and to commence his public career with so unfit and improbable a one. Thirdly, Jesus is said to have spoken harshly1 to his mother, asking her what they had in common, and tell­ ing her that “ his hour (for working miracles) was not yet come,” when he 97 knew that it was come. Fourthly, in spite of this rebuff, Mary is represented as still expecting a miracle, and this particular one, and as making preparation for it: “ She saith to the servants, What­ soever he saith unto you, do it ”; and accordingly Jesus immediately began to give orders to them. Fifthly, the superior quality of the wine, and the enormous quantity produced (135 gallons, or in our language, above 43 dozen *) are obviously fabulous. And those who are familiar with the apocryphal gospels will have no difficulty in recognising the close consanguinity between the whole narra­ tive and the stories of miracles with which they abound. It is perfectly hopeless, as well as mischievous, to endeavour to retain it as a portion of authentic history. Chapter X RESULTS OF THE FOREGOING CRITICISM The conclusion at which we have arrived in the foregoing chapters is of vital mo­ ment, and deserves to be fully developed. When duly wrought out, it will be found the means of extricating Religion from Orthodoxy—of rescuing Christianity from Calvinism. We have seen that the Gos­ pels, while they give a fair and faithful outline of Christ’s character and teaching (the Synoptical gospels at least) fill up that outline with much that is not authentic ; that many of the statements therein re­ lated are not historical, but mystical or legendary ; and that portions at least of the language ascribed to Jesus were never uttered by him, but originated either with the Evangelists themselves, or more frequently in the traditional stores from which they drew their materials. 1 All attempts at explanation have failed to remove this character from the expression— •yvvai ri Kai trol. We cannot, indeed, say in all cases, nor even in most cases, with certainty— in many we cannot even pronounce with any very strong probability—that such and such particular expressions or discourses are, or are not, the genuine utterances of Christ. With respect to some, we can say with confidence that they are not from him; with respect to others, we can say with almost equal confidence that they are his actual words; but with regard to the majority of pas­ sages this certainty is not attainable. But as we know that much did not pro­ ceed from Jesus —that much is unhistorical and ungenuine—we are entitled 1 See the calculation in Hennell, and in Strauss, ii. 432. The is supposed to correspond to the Hebrew bath, which was equal to i| Roman amphora, or 87 gallons; the whole quantity would therefore be from 104 to 156 gallons. H �98 RESULTS OF THE FOREGOING CRITICISM to conclude—we are even forced, by the very instinct of our reasoning faculty, to conclude that the unhistorical and ungenuine passages are those in which Jesus is represented as speaking and acting in a manner uncomformable to his character as otherwise delineated, irreconcilable with the tenour of his teaching as elsewhere described, and at variance with those grand moral and spiritual truths which have com­ manded the assent of all disciplined and comprehensive minds, and which could scarcely have escaped an intellect so just, wide,- penetrating, and profound as that of our great Teacher. Most reflecting minds rise from a perusal of the gospel history with a clear, broad, vivid conception of the character and mission of Christ, notwithstanding the many passages at which they have stumbled, and which they have felt— perhaps with needless alarm and selfreproach—to be incongruous and unhar­ monising with the great whole. The question naturally arises, Did these in­ congruities and inconsistencies really exist in Christ himself? or, are they the result of the imperfect and unhistorical condition in which his biography has been transmitted to us ? The answer, it seems to us, ought to be this -We can­ not prove, it is true, that some of these unsuitabilities did not exist in Christ himself, but we have shown that many of them belong to the history, not to the subject of the history, and it is only fair, therefore, in the absence of contrary evi­ dence, to conclude that the others also are due to the same origin. Now the peculiar, startling, perplexing, revolting, and contradictory doctrines of modern orthodoxy—so far as they have originated from or are justified by the gospels at all—have originated from, or are justified by, not the general tenour of Christ’s character and preaching, but those single unharmonising, discrepant, texts of which we have been speaking. Doctrines, which unsophisticated men feel to be inadmissible and repellent and which those who hold them most devotedly secretly admit to be fearful and perplexing, are founded on particular passages which contradict the generality of Christ’s teaching, but which, being attributed to him by the evangelists, have been regarded as endowed with an authority which it would be profane and dangerous to resist. In showing, therefore, that several of these passages did not emanate from Christ, and that in all probability none of them did, we conceive that we shall have rendered a vast service to the cause of true religion, and to those numerous individuals in whose tortured minds sense and con­ science have long struggled for the mastery. We will elucidate this matter by a few specifications.1 One of the most untenable, unphilosophical, uncharitable doctrines of the orthodox creed—one most peculiarly stamped with the impress of the bad passions of humanity—is, that belief (by which is generally signified belief in Jesus as the Son of God, the promised Messiah, a Teacher sent down from Heaven on a special mission to redeem mankind) is essential, and the one thing essential, to Salvation. The source of this doctrine must doubtless be sought for in that intolerance of opposition un­ happily so common among men, and in that tendency to ascribe bad motives to those who arrive at different conclusions from themselves, which prevails so gene­ rally among unchastened minds. But it cannot be denied that the gospels contain many texts which clearly affirm or fully imply a doctrine so untenable and harsh. Let us turn to a few of these and inquire into the degree of authenti­ city to which they are probably entitled. The most specific assertion of the 1 It is true that many of the doctrines in question had not a scriptural origin at all, but an ecclesiastical one; and, when originated, were defended by texts from the epistles, rather than the gospels. The authority of the epistles we shall consider in a subsequent chapter, but if in the meantime we can show that those doctrines have no foundation in the language of Christ, the chief obstacle to the renunciation of them is removed. �RESULTS OF THE FOREGOING CRITICISM tenet in question, couched in that posi­ tive, terse, sententious damnatory lan­ guage so dear to orthodox divines, is found in the spurious portion of the gospel of Mark (c. xvi. 16),1 and is there by the writer, whoever he was, unscrupulously put into the mouth of Jesus after his resurrection. In the synoptical gospels may be found a few texts which may be wrested to support the doctrine, but there are none which teach it. But when we come to the fourth gospel we find several passages similar to that in Mark,2 proclaiming Salvation to believers, but all in the peculiar style and spirit of the author of the first Epistle ofJohn, which abounds in denunciations precisely similar 3 (but directed, it is remarkable, apparently against heretics, not against infidels, against those who believe amiss, not against those who do not believe at all)— all, too, redolent of the temper of that Apostle who wished to call down fire from heaven on an unbelieving vil­ lage, and who was rebuked by Jesus for the savage and presumptuous suggestion. In the last chapter we have shown that the style of these passages is of a nature to point to John, and not to Jesus, as their author, and that the spirit of them is entirely hostile and incom­ patible with the language of Jesus in other parts more obviously faithful. It appears, therefore, that the passages confirmatory of the doctrine in question are found exclusively in a portion of the synoptists which is certainly spurious, and in portions of the fourth gospel which are almost certainly unhistorical; and that they are contradicted by other passages in all the gospels. It only remains to show that as the doctrine is at variance with the spirit of the mild 1 “ He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved ; but he that believeth not shall be damned,” a passage which, were it not happily spurious, would suffice to “damn” the book which contains it. 2 John iii. 16, 18, 36; v. 24 ; vi. 29, 40, 47 ; xi. 25, 26; xx. 31. 3 1 John ii. 19, 22, 23 ; iv. 2, 3, 6, 15 ; v, I, 5, IO, 12, 13. 99 and benevolent Jesus, so it is too obviously unsound not to have been recognised as such by one whose clear and grand intelligence was informed and enlightened by so pure a heart. In the first place, Christ must have known that the same doctrine will be presented in a very different manner, and with very different degrees of evidence for its truth, by different preachers; so much so that to resist the arguments of one preacher would imply either dulness of comprehension or obstinate and wilful blindness, while to yield to the arguments of his colleague would imply weakness of understanding or instability of purpose. The same doctrine may be presented and defended by one preacher so clearly, rationally, and forcibly that all sensible men (idiosyncrasies apart) must accept it, and by another preacher so feebly, cor­ ruptly, and confusedly, that all sensible men must reject it. The rejection of the Christianity preached by Luther, and of the Christianity preached by Tetzel, of the Christianity preached by Loyola and Dunstan, and of the Christ­ ianity preached by Oberlin and Pascal, cannot be worthy of the same con­ demnation. Few Protestants, and no Catholics, will deny that Christianity has been so presented to men as to make it a simple affair both of sense and virtue to reject it. To represent, therefore, the reception of a doctrine as a . matter of merit, or its rejection as a matter of blame, without reference to the considera­ tion how and by whom it is preached, is to leave out the main element of judg­ ment—an error which could not have been committed by the just and wise Jesus. Further. The doctrine and the pas­ sages in question ascribe to “belief” the highest degree of merit, and the sublimest conceivable reward—“eternal life”; and to “disbelief,” the deepest wickedness, and the most fearful penalty, “damnation,” and “the wrath of God.” Now, here we have a logical error, betraying a confusion of intellect which �IOO RESULTS OF THE FOREGOING CRITICISM we may well scruple to ascribe to Jesus. Belief is an effect produced by a cause. It is a condition of the mind induced by the operation of evidence presented. Being, therefore, an. effect, and not an act, it cannot be, or have, a merit. The moment it becomes a distinctly voluntary act (and therefore a thing of which merit can be predicated} it ceases to be genuine —it is then brought about (if it be not an abuse of language to name this state “belief”) by the will of the individual, not by the bond fide operation of evidence upon his mind—which brings us to the reductio ad absurdum, that belief can only become meritorious by ceasing to be honest. In sane and competent minds, if the evidence presented is sufficient, belief will follow as a necessary consequence— if it does not follow, this can only arise from the evidence adduced being in­ sufficient—and in such case to pretend belief, or to attempt belief, would be a forfeiture of mental integrity; and can­ not therefore be meritorious, but the reverse. To disbelieve, in spite of adequate proof is impossible—to believe without adequate proof is weak or dishonest. Belief, therefore, can only become meritorious by becoming sinful —can only become a fit subject for reward by becoming a fit subject for punishment. Such is the sophism in­ volved in the dogma which theologians have dared to put into Christ’s mouth, and to announce on his authority. But, it will be urged, the disbelief which Christ blamed and menaced with punishment was (as appears from John iii. 19) the disbelief implied in a wilful rejection of his claims, or a refusal to examine them—a love of darkness in preference to light. If so, the language employed is incorrect and deceptive, and the blame is predicated of an effect instead of a cause—it is meant of a voluntary action, but it is predicated of a specified and denounced consequence wffiich is no natural or logical indication of that voluntary action, but may arise from independent causes. The moralist who should denounce gout as a sin, meaning the sinfulness to apply to the excesses of which gout is often, but by no means always, a consequence and an indication, would be held to be a very confused teacher and inaccurate logician. Moreover, this is not the sense attached to the doctrine by orthodox divines in common parlance. And the fact still remains that Christ is represented as rewarding by eternal felicity a state of mind which, if honestly attained, is in­ evitable, involuntary, and therefore in no way a fitting subject for reward, and which, if not honestly attained, is hollow, fallacious, and deserving of punishment rather than of recompense. We are aware that the orthodox seek to escape from the dilemma, by asserting that belief results from the state of the heart, and that if this be right belief will inevitably follow. This is simply false in fact, How many excellent, virtuous, and humble minds, in all ages, have been anxious but unable to believe—have prayed earnestly for belief, and suffered bitterly for disbelief—in vain ! The dogma of the Divinity, or, as it is called in the technical language of polemics, the proper Deity, of Christ, though historically provable to have had an ecclesiastical, not an evangelical, origin 1—though clearly negatived by the whole tenour of the synoptical gospels, and even by some passages in the fourth gospel [and though it is difficult to read the narrative of his career with an un­ forestalled mind without being clear that Jesus had no notion of such a belief himself, and would have repudiated it with horror]—can yet appeal to several isolated portions and texts, as suggesting and confirming, if not asserting it. On close examination, however, it will be seen that all these passages are to be found either in the fourth gospel—which we have already shown reason to con­ clude is throughout an unscrupulous and 1 “ The Unscriptural Origin and Ecclesiastical History of the Doctrine of the Trinity,” by the Rev. J. Hamilton Thom. �RESULTS OF THE FOREGOING CRITICISM IOI of which we have already shown to be of very questionable genuineness,-—and the voice from heaven said to have been and from independent trains of argu­ heard at the baptism and the transfigura­ ment, have been selected as at least of tion, saying, “ This is my beloved Son/* But, besides that, as shown in questionable authenticity. It is true &c. that the doctrine in question is now chapter vi., considerable doubt rests on chiefly defended by reference to the the accuracy of the first of these relations : Epistles; but at the same time it would the testimony borne by the heavenly scarcely be held so tenaciously by voice to Jesus can in no sense mean that the orthodox if it were found to be he was physically the Son of God, or a wholly destitute of evangelical support. partaker of the divine nature, inasmuch Now, the passages which appear most as the very same expression was fre­ confirmatory of Christ’s Deity, or Divine quently applied to others, and as indeed Nature, are, in the first place, the narra­ a “Son of God” was, in the common tives of the Incarnation, or the miracu­ parlance of the Jews, simply a prophet, lous Conception, as given by Matthew a man whom God had sent, or to whom and Luke. We have already entered he had spoken.1 But when we come to the fourth gospel, pretty fully into the consideration of the authenticity of these portions of Scrip­ especially to those portions of it whose ture, and have seen that we may almost peculiar style betrays that they came with certainty pronounce them to be from John, and not from Jesus, the case fabulous, or mythical. The two narra­ is very different. We find here many tives do not harmonise with each other ; passages evidently intended to convey they neutralise and negative the gene­ the impression that Jesus was endowed alogies on which depended so large a with a superhuman nature, but nearly all portion of the proof of Jesus being the expressed in language savouring less of Messiah ;1—the marvellous statement Christian simplicity than of Alexandrian they contain is not referred to in any philosophy. The Evangelist commences subsequent portion of the two gospels, his gospel with a confused statement of ».nd is tacitly but positively negatived by the Platonic doctrine as modified in several passages—it is never mentioned Alexandria, and that the Logos was a in the Acts or in the Epistles, and was evi­ partaker of the Divine Nature, and was dently unknown to all the Apostles—and, the Creator of the world ; on which he finally, the tone of the narrative, espe­ proceeds to engraft his own notion, that cially in Luke, is poetical and legendary, Jesus was this Logos—that the Logos or and bears a marked similarity to the stories the divine wisdom, the second person in Plato’s Trinity, became flesh in the per­ contained in the apocryphal gospels. The only other expressions in the son of the Prophet of Nazareth. Now, can first three gospels which lend the slightest anyone read the epistles, or the first three countenance to the doctrine in ques­ gospels—or even the whole of the fourth tion are the acknowledgments of the dis­ —and not at once repudiate the notion ciples, the centurion, and the demoniacs that Jesus was, and knew himself to be, that Jesus was the Son of God,2—some the Creator of the World ?—which J ohn most inexact paraphrase of Christ’s teach­ ing—or in those portions of the first three gospels which, on other accounts 1 The Messiah must, according to Jewish prophecy, be a lineal descendant of David : this Christ was, according to the genealogies ; this he was not, if the miraculous conception be a fact. If, therefore, Jesus came into being as Matthew and Luke affirm, we do not see how he could have been the Messiah. 2 An expression here merely signifying a prophet or the Messiah. 1 “The Lord hath said unto me [David], Thou art my son; this day have I begotten thee.”—(Ps. ii. 7.) Jehovah says of Solomon, “ I will be his father, and he shall be my son.” —(2 Sam. vii. 14.) The same expression is applied to Israel (Exod. iv. 22, Hos. xi. 1), and to David (Ps. lxxxix. 27). “I have said, Ye are gods, and all of you are children of the Most High.”—(Ps. lxxxii. 6.) �102 RESULTS OF THE FOREGOING CRITICISM affirms him to have been. Throughout this gospel we find constant repetitions of the same endeavour to make out a superhuman nature for Christ; but the ungenuineness of these passages has already been fully considered. . Take, again, the doctrine of the Eter­ nity of future punishments—the most impossible of the tenets included in the popular creed. It rests upon and is affirmed by one single Gospel text, Matt, xxv. 46 ;—for, though “hell fire,” “ ever­ lasting fire ”—i.e., the fire that was kept perpetually burning in the adjacent valley of Gehenna for the consumption of the city refuse—is often spoken of as typify­ ing the fate of the wicked, yet the ex­ pression distinctly implies, not everlast­ ing life in fire, but the precise opposite,— namely, death, annihilation, total destruc­ tion, in a fire ever at hand and never extinguished. The doctrine is not only in diametric antagonism to all that we can conceive or accept of the attributes of the God of Jesus, but to the whole spirit and teaching of our great Master. It is at variance with other texts and with the general view 1 gathered from authentic Scripture, which teaches the “perishing,” the “death ” of the wicked, not their everlasting life in torment. And finally, the isolated text in question occurs in one only of the gospels,—and occurs there (as will be seen by compar­ ing Matt. xxv. 31 with xxiv. 30) in im­ mediate connection with the prophecy as to the coming of the end of the world within the lifetime of the then existing generation,—a prophecy the erroneous­ ness of which is now demonstrated, and which there is (to say the least) no need for believing ever to have come out of the mouth of Christ. What are called the “eschatological” discourses are notoriously among the passages in the gospels of most questionable genuineness. 1 See countless arguments from the pens, not of unbelievers, but of qualified divines—among later ones, “ Harmony of Scripture on Future Punishments,” by the Rev. S. Minton, and a paper by ‘ ‘ Anglicanus ” in the Contemporary Review for May, 1872. Yet it is on the authority of a single verse, so suspiciously located, so re­ peatedly contradicted elsewhere either distinctly or by implication, and so flagrantly out of harmony with the spirit both of Theism and of Christianity, that we are summoned to accept a dogma revolting alike to our purer instincts and our saner reason ! Once more : the doctrine of the Atone­ ment, of Christ’s death having been a sacrifice in expiation of the sins of man­ kind, is the keystone of the common form of modern orthodoxy. It takes its origin from the epistles, and we believe can only appeal to three texts in the Evangelists for even partial confirmation. In Matt. xx. 28 it is said : “The Son of man came, not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many,”—an expression which may countenance the doctrine, but as­ suredly does not contain it. Again, in Matt. xxvi. 28 we find: “ This is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.” Mark (xiv. 24) and Luke (xxi. io), how­ ever, who gave the same sentence, both omit the significant expression; while John omits, not only the expression, but the entire narrative of the institution of the Eucharist, which is said elsewhere to have been the occasion of it. In the fourth gospel, John the Baptist is repre­ sented as saying of Jesus (i. 29), “Be­ hold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world,” an expression which may possibly be intended to convey the doctrine, but which occurs in what we have already shown to be about the most apocryphal portion of the whole gospel. In fine, then, we arrive at this irresist­ ible conclusion ; that—knowing several passages in the Evangelists to be unauthentic, and having reason to suspect the authenticity of many others, and scarcely being able with absolute cer­ tainty to point to any which are perfectly and indubitably authentic—the proba­ bility in favour of the fidelity of any of �RESURRECTION OF JESUS the texts relied on to prove the peculiar and perplexing doctrines of modern orthodoxy, is far inferior to the proba­ bility against the truth of those doctrines. A doctrine perplexing to our reason and painful to our feelings may be from God ; but in this case the proof of its being from God must be proportionally clear and irrefragable ; the assertion of it in a narrative which does not scruple to attribute to God’s messenger words which he never uttered, is not only no proof, but scarcely even amounts to a presump­ tion. There is no text in the Evangelists, the divine (or Christian) origin of which is sufficiently unquestionable to enable it to serve as the foundation of doctrines repugnant to natural feeling or to common Sense. But, it will be objected, if these con­ clusions are sound, absolute uncertainty is thrown over the whole gospel history, and all over Christ’s teaching. To this we reply, in limine, in the language of Algernon Sydney, “ No consequence can destroy any truth ”; the sole matter for consideration is, Are our arguments correct? not, Do they lead to a result which is embarrassing and unwelcome ? But the inference is excessive; the premises do not reach so far. The uncertainty thrown is not over the main 103 points of Christ’s history, which, after all its retrenchments, still stands out an intelligible though a skeleton account—not over the grand features, the pervading tone, of his doctrines or his character, which still present to us a clear, con­ sistent, and splendid delineation; but over those individual statements, pas­ sages, and discourses which mar this delineation, which break its unity, which destroy its consistency, which cloud its clearness, which tarnish its beauty. The gain to us seems immense. It is true, we have no longer absolute certainty with regard to any one especial text or scene : such is neither necessary nor attainable; it is true that, instead of passively accept­ ing the whole heterogeneous and indigest­ ible mass, we must, by the careful and con­ scientious exercise of those faculties with which we are endowed, by ratiocination and moral tact, separate what Christ did from what he did not teach, as best we may. But the task will be difficult to those only who look in the gospels for a minute, dogmatic, and sententious creed —not to those who seek only to learn Christ’s spirit, that they may imbibe it, and to comprehend his views of virtue and of God, that they may draw strength and consolation from those fountains of living water.1 Chapter XI RESURRECTION OF JESUS We are now arrived at the most vitally important, and the most intensely interest­ ing, portion of the Christian records— the Resurrection of Jesus. This is the great fact to which the affections of Christians turn with the most cherished eagerness, the grand foundation on which their hopes depend, on which their faith is fixed. If, in consequence of our inquiries, the ordinary doctrine of Scriptural Inspiration be relinquished, we have reason to rejoice that Religion is relieved from a burden often too great for it to bear. If the complete verbal accuracy of the Gospel narratives is dis1 “The character of the record is such that I see not how any great stress can be laid on particu­ lar actions attributed to Jesus. That he lived a divine life, suffered a violent death, taught and lived a most beautiful religion—this seems the great fact about which a mass of truth and error has been collected.”—Theodore Parker, “ Dis­ course,” p. 188. �104 resurrection OF JESUS proved, orthodoxy and not Christianity is a sufferer by the change, since it is only the more minute and embarrassing tenets of our creed that find their foundation swept away. If investigation shows the miracles of the Bible to be untenable, or at least unobligatory upon our belief, theologians are comforted by feeling that they have one weak and vulnerable out­ post the less to defend. But if the resurrection of our Lord should prove, on closer scrutiny, to rest on no adequate evidence, and mental integrity should compel us to expunge it from our creed, the generality of Christians will feel that the whole basis of their faith and hope is gone, and their Christianity will vanish with the foundation on which, perhaps half-unconsciously, theyrested it. Whether this ought to be so is a point for future consideration. All that we have now to do is to remember that truth must be investigated without any side­ glance to the consequences which that investigation may have upon our hopes. Our faith is sure to fail us in the hour of trial if we have based it on consciously or suspectedly fallacious grounds, and maintained it by wilfully closing our eyes to the flaws in its foundations. The belief in the resurrection of our Lord, when based upon reflection at all, and not a mere mental habit, will be found to rest on two grounds : Jirst, the direct testimony of the Scripture narra­ tives ; and secondly, the evidence deriv­ able from the subsequent conduct of the Apostles. I. The narratives of the resurrection contained in the four Gospels present many remarkable discrepancies. But discrepancies in the accounts of an event given by different narrators, whether themselves witnesses, or merely his­ torians, by no means necessarily impugn the reality of the event narrated, but simply those accessories of the event to which the discrepancies relate. Thus, when one Evangelist tells us that the two malefactors, who were crucified along with Jesus, reviled him, and another Evange- | list relates that only one of them reviled him, and was rebuked by the other for so doing, though the contradiction is direct and positive, no one feels that the least doubt is thereby thrown upon the fact of two malefactors having been crucified with Jesus, nor of some reviling having passed on the occasion. There­ fore the variations in the narratives of the resurrection given by the four Evan­ gelists do not, of themselves, impugn the fact of the resurrection. Even were they (which they are not) the first-hand accounts of eye-witnesses, instead of be­ ing merely derived from such, still it is characteristic of the honest testimony of eye-witnesses to be discrepant in collateral minutise. But, on a closer examination of these accounts, several peculiarities present themselves for more detailed consideration. 1. We have already seen reason for concluding that, of the four Gospels, three at least were certainly not the production of eye-witnesses, but were compilations from oral or documentary narratives current among the Christian community at the time of their com­ position, and derived doubtless for the most part from very high authority. With regard to the fourth Gospel the opinions of the best critics are so much divided, that all we can pronounce upon the subject with any certainty is, that if it were the production of the Apostle John, it was written at a time when, either from defect of memory, redun­ dancy of imagination, or laxity in his notions of an historian’s duty, he allowed himself to take strange liberties with fact.1 All, therefore, that the Gospels now present to us is the narrative of the Resurrection, not as it actually occurred, but in the form it had assumed among the disciples thirty years or more after the death of Jesus. Now, the discrepancies which we notice in the various accounts are not greater than might have been expected in historians recording an event, or rather traditions of an event, which oc1 See chap. ix. �RESURRECTION OF JESUS curred from thirty to sixty years before they wrote. These records, therefore, discrepant as they are, are, we think, quite sufficient to prove that something of the kind occurred, i.e., that some occur­ rence took place which gave rise to the belief and traditions;—-but no more. The agreement of the several accounts shows that something of the kind oc­ curred :—their discrepancies show that this occurrence was not exactly such as it is related to have been. Something of the kind occurred which formed the groundwork for the belief and the narrative. What, then, was this something—this basis—this nucleus of fact? The Gospel of Mark appears to contain this nucleus, and this alone.1 It contains nothing but what all the other accounts contain, and nothing that is not simple, credible, and natural, but it contains enough to have formed a foundation for the whole subsequent superstructure. Mark informs us that when the women went early to the Sepulchre, they found it open, the body of Jesus gone, and someone in white garments who assured them that he was risen. This all the four narratives agree in :—and they agree in nothing else. The disappearance of the body, then, was cer­ tain;—the information that Jesus was risen came from the women alone, who believed it because they were told it, and who were also the first to affirm that they had seen their Lord. In the excited state of mind in which all the disciples must have been at this time, were not these three unquestioned circumstances —that the body was gone ;—that a figure dressed in white told the women that their Lord was risen;—and that the same women saw someone whom they be­ lieved to be him;—amply sufficient to make a belief in his resurrection spread with the force and rapidity of a con­ tagion ? 1 We must bear in mind that the genuine Gospel of Mark ends with the 8th verse of chapter xvi. ; and that there is good reason to believe that Mark’s Gospel was, if not the original one, at least the earliest. 105 2. It is clear that to prove such- a miracle as the reappearance in life of a man who had been publicly slain, the direct and concurrent testimony of eye­ witnesses would be necessary ;—that two or more should state that they saw him at such a time and place, and knew him ; —and that this clear testimony should be recorded and handed down to us in an authentic document. This degree of evidence we might have had :—this we have not. We have epistles from Peter, James, John, and Jude—all of whom are said by the Evangelists to have seen Jesus after he rose from the dead, in none of which epistles is the fact of the resurrection even stated, much less that Jesus was seen by the writer after his resurrection. This point deserves weighty consideration. We have ample evidence that the belief in Christ’s re­ surrection 1 was very early and very general among the disciples, but we have not the direct testimony of any one of the twelve, nor any eye-witness at all, that they saw him on earth after his death. Many writers say, was seen ” ;—no one says, “Z saw him alive in the flesh.” There are three apparent exceptions to this, which, however, when examined, will prove rather confirmatory of our statement than otherwise. If the last chapter of the fourth Gospel were written by the Apostle John, it would contain the direct testimony of an eye-witness to the appearance of Jesus upon earth after his crucifixion. But its genuineness has long been a matter of question among learned men,2 and few can read it critically and retain the belief that it is a real relic of the beloved Apostle, or even that it originally formed part of the Gospel to which it is appended. In 1 The belief in a general resurrection was, we know, prevalent among the Jews in general, and the disciples of Christ especially ; and it appears from several passages that the opinion was that the resurrection would be immediate upon death (Luke xx. 38 ; xxiii. 43). In this case the belief that Christ was risen would follow im­ mediately on the knowledge of his death. 2 See Hug, 484. �io6 RESURRECTION OE JESUS the first place, the closing verse of the preceding chapter unmistakably indicates the termination of a history. Then, the general tone of the twenty-first chapter—its particularity as to the dis­ tance of the bark from shore, and the exact number of fishes taken—the fire ready made when the disciples came to land—the contradiction between the fourth verse and the seventh and twelfth, as to the recognition of Jesus—all par­ take strongly of the legendary character, as does likewise the conversation between Jesus and Peter. Again, the miraculous draught of fishes which is here placed after the resurrection of Christ, is by Luke related as happening at the very commencement of his ministry. And finally, the last two verses, it is clear, cannot be from the pen of John, and we have no grounds for supposing them to be less genuine than the rest of the chapter. On a review of the whole question we entertain no doubt that the whole chapter was an addition of later date, perhaps by some elder of the Ephesian Church. In the first Epistle of Peter (iii. 21, 22), the resurrection and existence in heaven of Jesus are distinctly affirmed ; but when we remember that the Jews at that time believed in a future life, and apparently in an immediate trans­ ference of the spirit from this world to the next, and that this belief had been especially enforced on the • disciples of Jesus (Matt. xvii. 1-4; xxii. 32. Luke xvi. 23-31 ; xxiii. 43), this will appear very different from an assertion that Jesus had actually risen to an earthly life, and that Peter had seen him. Indeed, the peculiar expression that is made use of at ver. 18, in affirming the doctrine (“being slain in flesh, but made alive again in spirit ”) indicates, in the true meaning of the original, not a fleshly, but a spiritual revivification. There remains the statement of Paul (1 Cor. xv; 8), “And last of all, he was seen of me also.” This assertion, taken with the context, negatives rather than affirms the reappearance of Christ upon the earth to the bodily eye of his dis­ ciples. The whole statement is a some­ what rambling one, and not altogether consistent with the Gospel narratives ; but the chief point to be attended to here is that Paul places the appearance of Jesus to the other disciples on the same footing as his appearance to him­ self. Now, we know that his appearance to Paul was in a vision—a vision visible to Paul alone of all the bystanders, and, therefore, subjective or mental merely. Moreover, strictly speaking, there was no vision at all;—no one was seen; there was a bright light, and a voice was heard. In this all the accounts agree. In a subsequent verse, indeed (xxii. 18) Paul says that, when “ in a trance in the Temple at Jerusalem,” he “saw, him (the Lord) saying to him,” &c. But .this expression, again, seems to imply hear­ ing, not sight. The conclusion to be drawn from the language of Paul would, therefore, be that the appearance of Jesus to the other disciples was visionary likewise. Our original statement, there­ fore, remains unqualified :—We might have had, and should have expected to have, the direct assertion of four Apos­ tles, that they had seen Jesus on earth and in the flesh after his death :—we have not this assertion from any one of them. 3. The statements which have come down to us as to when, where, by whom, and'how often Jesus was seen after his death, present such serious and irre­ concilable variations as to prove beyond question that they are not the original statements of eye-witnesses, but merely the form which the original statements had assumed, after much transmission, thirty or forty years after the event to which they relate. Let us examine them more particularly. It will be seen that they agree in everything that is natural and probable, and disagree in everything that is supernatural and difficult of credence. All the accounts agree that the women, on their matutinal visit to the sepulchre, found the body gone, and saw some one in white raiment who �RESURRECTION OF JESUS spoke to them. else. They agree in nothing (1.) They differ as to the number of the women. John mentions only one, Mary Magdalene; Matthew two, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary;—Mark three, the two Marys and Salome;— Luke several, the two Marys, Joanna, and “ certain others with them.” (2.) They differ as to the number of persons in white raiment who appeared to the women. Mark speaks of one “ young man ; ”—Matthew of one “ angel; ”—Luke of two “ men ; ”— John of two “angels.”—According to John, also, the appearance of the two angels was not till Mary’s second visit to the tomb, after Peter and John had been there. (3.) They differ as to the words spoken by the apparitions. According to Matthew and Mark they asserted the resurrection of Jesus, and his departure into Galilee, and sent a message to his disciples enjoining them to follow him thither. According to Luke they simply stated that he was risen, and referred to a, former prediction of his to this effect. According to John they only asked Mary, “Woman ! why weepest thou?” (4.) They differ in another point. According to Matthew, Luke, and John, the women carried the information as to what they had seen at once to the disciples. According to Mark “they said nothing to any man.” (5.) They differ as to the parties to whom Jesus appeared.—According to Mark it was to no one. According to Matthew it was first to the two women, then to the eleven. According to John it was first to one woman then twice to the assembled Apostles. According to Luke it was first to no woman, but to Oeopas and his companion, then to Peter,1 and then to the assembled eleven. (6.) They differ as to the locality. 1 This appearance to Peter is also mentioned by Paul (1 Cor. xv. 7), from whom probably Luke received it. We have nowhere else any trace of it. 107 According to Mark it was nowhere. According to Matthew it was first at Jerusalem and then at Galilee, whither the disciples went in obedience to the angelic command. According to Luke it was in Jerusalem and its vicinity, and there alone, where the disciples remained in obedience to the reiterated command of Jesus himself.1 According to the genuine part of John, also, the appear­ ances were confined to Jerusalem. The account of Paul differs slightly from all the others; it must have been second-hand; and is valuable'only as showing the accounts which were current in the Christian Church at the time at which he wrote, and how much these varied from the evangelic documents, which were, in fact, a selection out of these current accounts. The epistle of Paul was written, probably, about the year a.d. 57; the first three Gospels between the years a.d. 60 and 70. The appearance to James, which Paul mentions, was taken from the Gospel to the Hebrews, now lost.2 Now, we put it to any candid man whether the discrepancies in these accounts are not of a nature, and to an extent, entirely to disqualify them from being received as evidence of anything, except the currency and credit of such stories among Christians thirty years after the death of Christ ? 4. A marked and most significant peculiarity in these accounts, which has not received the attention it deserves, is, 1 Luke xxiv. 49, 53 ; Acts i. 4. Luke and Matthew thus contradict each other past all possibility of reconciliation. Matthew tells us that Jesus commanded them to go into Galilee, and that they went thither Luke tells us that he positively commanded them “not to depart from Jerusalem,” and that they remained there (xxiv. 53). But Luke contradicts himself quite as flatly on another point. In the Gospel he represents the ascension as taking place on the evening of the third day after the crucifixion : such is the clear meaning of the text (as may be seen from verses 21, 33, 36, 50):—in the Acts he places the ascension forty days after the resurrection, and says that Jesus was seen by his disciples during the whole interval. 2 The passage, however, is preserved by Jerome (See Hennell, p< 227). �108 RESURRECTION OF JESUS that scarcely any of those who are said to have seen Jesus after his resurrection recognised him, though long and in­ timately acquainted with his person. According to Matthew (xxviii. 17), when Jesus appeared to the eleven in Galilee by his own appointment, some, even of them, “ doubted ”; which could not have been the case had his identity been clearly recognisable. According to Luke, the two disciples, with whom he held a long conversation, and who passed many hours in his company, did not recognise him. “ Their eyes were holden, that they should not know him ”x And even after the disciples had been in­ formed, both of this reappearance and of that to Peter (xxiv. 34-37), yet when Jesus appeared to them, they were affrighted, and supposed that they saw a spirit. According to John, even Mary Magdalene, after Jesus had spoken to her, and she had turned to look at him, still did not recognise him, but supposed him to be the gardener. In the spurious part of John (xxi. 4-6) the same want of recognition is observ­ able. In the spurious part of Mark we see traces of a belief that Jesus assumed various forms after his resurrection, to account, doubtless, for the non-recog­ nition of some and the disbelief of others (xvi. 11, 12, 13) : “After that he appeared in another form unto two of them.” Now, if it really were Jesus who appeared to these various parties, would this want of recognition have been possible? If it were Jesus, he was so changed that his most intimate friends 1 Here another interesting point comes in for consideration. The conversation between Jesus and his two companions turned upon the Messianic prophecies, which the disciples held to have been disappointed by the death of Jesus, but which Jesus assured them related to and were fulfilled in him. Now, if the conclusion at which we arrived in a previous chapter (iii.) be correct, viz., that the Old Testament pro­ phecies contain no real reference to a suffering Messiah, or to Jesus at all, it follows that at least half the story of Cleopas must be fabulous, unless, indeed, we adopt the supposition that Jesus held the same erroneous views respecting these prophecies as his disciples. did not know him. How then can we know that it was himself? We will not attempt to construct, as several have endeavoured to do, out of these conflicting traditions, a narrative of the real original occurrence which gave rise to them, and of the process by which they attained the form and con­ sistency at which they have arrived in the evangelical documents. Three dif­ ferent suppositions may be adopted, each of which has found favour in the eyes of some writers. We may either imagine that Jesus was not really and entirely dead when taken down from the cross, a supposition which Paulus and others show to be far from destitute of pro­ bability :1 or we may imagine that the apparition of Jesus to his disciples be­ longs to that class of appearances of departed spirits for which so much staggering and bewildering evidence is on record;2 or, lastly, we may believe that the minds of the disciples, excited by the disappearance of the body, and the announcement by the women of his resurrection, mistook some passing in­ dividual for their crucified Lord, and that from such an origin multiplied rumours of his reappearance arose and spread. We do not, ourselves, defini­ tively adopt any of these hypotheses: we wish simply to call attention to the circumstance that we have no clear, con­ sistent, credible account of the resurrec­ tion ; that the only elements of the narrative which are retained and remain uniform in all its forms—viz., the dis­ appearance of the body, and the appear­ ance of someone in white at the tomb, are simple and probable, and in no way necessitate, or clearly point to, the sur­ mise of a bodily resurrection at all. Christ may have risen from the dead and appeared to his disciples; but it is cer­ tain that if he did, the Gospels do not contain a correct account of such resurrec­ tion and reappearance. II. The conduct of the Apostles sub­ sequent to the death of Jesus—the 1 Strauss, iii. 288. 2 See Bush’s Anastasis, 156. �RESURRECTION OF JESUS marked change in their character from timidity to boldness, and in their feel­ ings from deep depression and dismay to satisfaction and triumph—as depicted in the Acts, affords far stronger evidence in favour of the bodily resurrection of their Lord, than any of the narratives which have recorded the event. It seems to us certain that the Apostles believed in the resurrection of Jesus with absolute conviction. Nothing short of such a belief could have sustained them through what they had to endure, or given them enthusiasm for what they had to do; the question, therefore, which remains for our decision is, whether the Apostles could have be­ lieved it, had it not been fact; whether their reception of the doctrine of a general resurrection, or rather of a future life,1 coupled with the disappearance of the body of Jesus from the sepulchre in which he had been laid, and the report of the women regarding the statement of the angelic vision, be sufficient . to account for so vivid and actuating a faith, without the supposition of his actual appearance to themselves; whether, in fact, the Apostles, excited by the report that he was risen, could have believed that they had seen him if they had not really done so. This question will be differently answered by different minds ; nor do we know that any argument will weigh more on either side than the simple statement of the problem to be resolved.1 2 1 The current belief in those days appears to have been not in an immediate liberation of the soul to a spiritual existence but in an ultimate resurrection of all at the great day of account. John xi. 24; Luke xx. 33 ; Mark xii. 23. 2 It is certain that we, in these days,, could not believe in the resurrection of an individual to an earthly life unless we had ascertained his death, and ourselves seen him afterwards alive. But we cannot justly apply this reasoning to the early followers of Christ; they were not men of critical, inquiring, or doubting minds, nor accustomed to sift or scrutinise testimony, but, on the contrary, inured to marvels, and trained to regard the supernatural as almost an ordinary part of the natural, given moreover to see visions, and unhesitatingly to accept them as divine communications. 109 Certainly, the bold faith of the Apostles, if sufficient, is the only sufficient evid­ ence for the occurrence; the narra­ tive testimony would be inadequate to prove a far more credible event. All we can say is this, that a belief in the resurrection and bodily reappearance of Jesus early prevailed.and rapidly obtained currency in the Christian community; that the Apostles shared the belief in the resurrection, and did not discourage that in the bodily reappearance; that, how­ ever, none of them (the fourth Gospel not having been written by John) has left us his own testimony to having him­ self seen Jesus alive after his death ; and that some of the disciples doubted, and others long after disbelieved the fact.1 In order to mitigate our pain at finding that the fact of Christ’s resurrection has been handed down to us on such in­ adequate testimony as to render it at best a doubtful inference, it is desirable to inquire whether, in reality, it has the doctrinal value which it has been the habit of theologians to attribute to it. We have been taught to regard it not only as the chief and crowning proof of the divinity of our Saviour’s mission, but as the type, earnest, and assurance of our own translation to a life beyond the grave. It is very questionable, how­ ever, whether either of these views of it is fully justified by reason. There can be no doubt that the fact of an individual having been miracu­ lously restored to life is a signal proof of divine interposition in his behalf. Such restoration may be viewed in three lights—either as a reward for a life of extraordinary virtue, or as an intimation that his mission upon earth had been prematurely cut short, and that his re1 See I Cor. xv. 12. The whole argument of Paul respecting the resurrection is remarkable— it is simply this, there must be a resurrection from the dead because Christ “ is preached” to have risen; and that if there were no resurrection, then Christ could not be risen. It would seem as if he considered the truth of the -resurrection of Christ to depend upon the correctness of the doctrine of the general resurrection (verse 13). �no RESURRECTION OF JESUS animation was necessary for its fulfil­ ment, or as an announcement to the world that he was in a peculiar manner the object of. divine regard and the subject of divine influence. The first point of view is evidently irrational, and the offspring of unregenerate and uncul­ tivated thought. It is prompted either by the inconsiderate instincts of the natural man, or by disbelief in a future life. It implies either that there is no future world, or that this world is preferable to it, since no man, believing in another and a better state of exist­ ence, would regard it as an appropriate reward for distinguished excellence to be reduced to this. The second point of view is, if possible, still more un­ reasonable, since it assumes that G'od had permitted such an interference with and defeat of his plans, that he was obliged, to interpose for their renewal. The third aspect in which such a fact is to be regarded alone remains, and is in effect the one in which it is commonly viewed throughout Christendom, viz., as a public announcement from the Most High, “This is my beloved Son, hear ye him.” But this point of view is attended with many difficulties. In the first place, if the Gospel narra­ tives are to be taken as our standing­ ground (and they are as valid for the one case as for the other), the restora­ tion of the dead to life did not neces­ sarily imply any such peculiar favour, or contain any such high announcement. The evangelists record three instances of such miraculous resuscitation, in none of which have we any reason for believ­ ing the subject of the miracle to be peculiarly an object of divine love or approbation, in all of which the miracle was simply one of mercy to mourning friends. The resuscitated parties were all obscure individuals, and only one of them appears to have been a follower of Christ. Secondly, this point of view was not the one taken by the Apostles. To them the value of Christ’s resurrec­ tion consisted in its enabling them still to retain, or rather to resume, that belief in the Messiahship of Jesus which his death had shaken. If restored to life, he might yet be, and probably was, that Great Deliverer whom, as Jews, they watched and waited and prayed for; if he were dead, then that cherished notion was struck dead with him. How, if we are right in the conclusion at which we arrived in an earlier chapter, viz., that Jesus had nothing in common with that liberating and triumphant conqueror predicted by the Jewish prophets and expected by the Jewish nation: it follows that the especial effect which the resurrection of Christ produced upon the minds of his disciples was to confirm them in an error. This, to them, was its dogmatic value, the ground on which they hailed the announcement and cherished the belief. Thirdly, it will admit of question whether, in the eye of pure reason, the resurrection of Christ, considered as an attestation to the celestial origin of his religion, be not superfluous —whether it be not human weakness, rather than human reason, which needs external miracle as sanction and buttress of a system which may well rely upon its own innate strength, whether the internal does not surpass and supersede the external testi­ mony to its character, whether the divine truths which Christ taught should not be to us the all-sufficient attestation of his divine mission. We have seen in the preceding chapter that miraculous power in any individual is no guarantee for the correctness of his teaching. We have seen that if the doctrines which Jesus taught approve themselves to the en­ lightened understanding and the uncor­ rupted heart, they are equally binding on our allegiance whether he wrought miracles in the course of his career or not. And if the truth that God is a loving father, and the precept, “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself,” derive no corroboration from the resur­ rection of Lazarus or the Youth of Nain, neither can they from that of Christ himself. Doubtless we should sit with more prostrate submission and a deeper �RESURRECTION OF JESUS reverence at the feet of a teacher who came to us from the grave, but it is probably only the infirmity of our faith and reason which would cause us to do so.1 Rationally considered, Christ’s resurrection cannot prove doctrines true that would else be false, nor certain that would else be doubtful. There­ fore, considered as a reward, it is con­ tradictory and absurd; considered as the renewal of an interrupted mission, it involves an unworthy and monstrous Conception of God’s providence; con­ sidered as an attestation to the Messiahghip of Jesus, it is an attestation to an error ; considered as a sanction and corroboration of his doctrines, it is, or Ought to be, superfluous. Is the other view which we have been accustomed to take of Christ’s resur­ rection—viz., as the type, pledge, and foretelling of our own,—more consonant to sound reason ? We believe the reverse will prove nearer to the truth. That it was regarded in this view by the Apostles is here no argument for us. For they looked for the coming of their Lord and the end of the world, if not in their own lifetime, at least in that of the existing generation,—when they who were alive would be caught up into the clouds, and those who were dead would come forth out of their graves, and join together the glorious company of the redeemed. They looked for a bodily resurrection for them­ selves—which on their supposition of the date might appear possible—a resurrec­ tion, therefore, of which that of Jesus was a prototype—a pattern—a cognate occurrence. But in our position the case is not only altered, but reversed. Christ’s resurrection was believed, and is affirmed to have been, a réanimation of the body which he wore in life; it could, there­ fore, be an earnest of the resurrection of those only whose bodies still remained to be reanimated ; it was an exceptional case ; it refers not to us ; it conveys no 1 Jesus seems to intimate as much when he says, “If they hear not Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead.” in hope to us ;—we are not of those whose resurrection it could typify or asstire ; for our bodies, like those of the countless generations who have lived and passed away since Christ trod our earth, will have crumbled info dust, and passed into other combinations, and become in turn the bodies of myriads of other animated beings before the great ex­ pected day of the resurrection of the just. To us a bodily resurrection is impossible. If, therefore, Christ’s resur­ rection were spiritual—independent of his buried body—it might be a type and foreshadowing of our own ;—if, on the other hand, as the evangelists relate, it was corporeal—if his body left the grave undecayed, and appeared on earth, and ascended into glory,—then its value as a pledge belonged to the men of that time alone,—we have neither part nor lot in its signification;—it is rather an extinguisher than a confirmation of our hopes. It will be seen that we make no scruple in negativing a doctrine held verbally by the Church, viz., “ the resurrection of the body ” ; since, whatever was intended by the authors of this phrase1—the mean­ ing of which is by no means clear to us, and was probably no clearer to them­ selves,—thus much is certain, that our “resurrection of the body” can bear no similarity to Christ’s resurrection of the body ;—for his body remained only a few hours in the grave, and, we are expressly told, “ did not see corruption,” and ours, we know, remains there for untold years, and moulders away into the original elements of its marvellous chemistry. We conclude, then, as before :—that as we cannot hope to rise, as Christ is said to have done, with our own present uncorrupted body, his resurrection, if it were a réanimation of his earthly frame, can be no argument, proof, pledge, 1 “We can,” says Pearson, “no otherwise expound this article teaching the resurrection of the body, than by asserting that the same bodies which have lived and died shall live again ; that the same flesh which is corrupted shall be restored. ”—Pearson on the Creed, art. xi. �112 /S CHRISTIANITY A REVEALED RELIGION? pattern, or foreshadowing of our own. If, on the contrary, his resurrection were spiritual, and his appearances to his disciples mental and apparitionary only, they would, pro tanto, countenance the idea of a future state. Our interest, therefore, as waiters and hopers for an immortality, would appear to lie in ^believing the letter of the Scripture narratives, Chapter XII IS CHRISTIANITY A REVEALED RELIGION? Having now arrived at this point of our inquiry, let us pause and cast a summary glance on the ground over which we have travelled, and the conclusions at which we have arrived. We have found that the popular doctrine of Scriptural Inspiration rests on no foundation what­ ever, but is a gratuitous as well as an untenable assumption. We have seen that neither the books of Moses nor the laws of Moses, as we have them, were (at least as a whole) the production of the great Leader and Lawgiver whose name they bear. We have seen ample reason for concluding that a belief in One only supreme God was not the primary religion either of the Hebrew nation or the Hebrew priests ; but that their Theism—originally limited and impure— was gradually elevated and purified into perfect and exclusive monotheism by the influence of their Poets and Sages and the progressive advance of the people in intelligence and civilisation. We have discovered that their Prophets were Poets and Statesmen, not Predictors— and that none of their writings contain a single prediction which was originally designed by them, or can be honestly interpreted by us, to foretell the appear­ ance and career of Jesus of Nazareth. What have been commonly regarded as such are happy and applicable quotations : but no more. We have seen further that none of the four histories of Christ which have come down to us are completely genuine and faithful ; -that while they are ample and adequate for showing us what Christ was. and what was the essence and spirit of his teaching, we yet do not possess sufficient certainty that they record, in any special instance, the precise words or actions of Christ, to warrant us in building upon those words or actions doctrines revolting to our uncorrupted instincts and our cultivated sense. We have found, moreover, that the Apostles —zealous and devout men as they were —were yet most imperfect and fallible expounders of the mind of their departed Lord. We have seen that miracles— even where the record of them is ade­ quate and above suspicion, if any such case there be—are no sufficient guarantee of the truth of the doctrines preached by the worker of those wonders. And finally we have been compelled to conclude that not only is the resurrection of our Lord, as narrated in the Gospels, encumbered with too many difficulties and contra­ dictions to be received as unquestion­ able, but that it is far from having the dogmatic value usually attached to it, as a pledge and foreshowing of our own. But however imperfect may be the re­ cords we possess of Christ’s ministry, this imperfection does not affect the nature or authority of his mission. Another great question, therefore, here opens before us:—“Was Christ a divinely-commis­ sioned Teacher of Truth ? ” In other words, “ Is Christianity to be regarded as a Religion revealed by God to man through Christ ? ” What is the meaning which, in ordi­ nary theological parlance, we attach to �ZS CHRISTIANITY A REVEALED RELIGION? the words, “ Divine Revelation ? ” What do we intend to signify when we say that “ God spoke ” to this Prophet or to that saint ? We are all of us conscious of thoughts which come to us—which are not, pro­ perly speaking, our own—which we do not create, do not elaborate ;—flashes of light, glimpses of truth, or of what seems to us such, brighter and sublimer than commonly dwell in our minds, which we are not conscious of having wrought out by any process of inquiry or meditation. These are frequent and brilliant in pro­ portion to the intellectual gifts and spiritual elevation of the individual : they may well be termed inspirations— revelations; but it is not such as these that we mean when we speak of the Revelation by Christ. Those who look upon God as a Moral Governor, as well as an original Creator, —a God at hand, not a God. afar off in the distance of infinite space, and in the remoteness of past or future eternity,— who conceive of him as taking a watch­ ful and .presiding interest in the affairs of the world, and as influencing the hearts and actions of men,—believe that through the workings of the Spirit He has spoken to many, has whispered His will to them, has breathed great and true thoughts into their minds, has “wrought mightily” within them, has in their secret communings and the deep visions of the night caused His Spirit to move over the troubled waters of their souls, and educed light and order from the mental chaos. These are the views of many religious minds ; but these are not what We mean when we speak of the Revela­ tion made by God to Christ. Those, again, who look upon God as the great artificer of the world of life and matter, and upon man, with his wonder­ ful corporeal and mental frame, as His direct work, conceive the same idea in a somewhat modified and more material form. They believe that He has made men with different intellectual capa­ cities ; and has endowed some with brains so much larger and fiper 113 than those of ordinary men as to enable them to see and originate truths which are hidden from the mass; and that when it is His will that Mankind should make some great step forward, should achieve some pregnant discovery, He calls into being some cerebral organi­ sation of more than ordinary magnitude and power, as that of David, Isaiah, Plato, Shakespeare, Bacon, Newton, Luther, Pascal, which gives birth to new ideas and grander conceptions of the truths vital to humanity. But we mean something essentially distinct from this when we speak of Christ as the Teacher of a Religion revealed to him by his Father. When a Christian affirms Christianity to be a “ revealed religion,” he intends simply and without artifice to declare his belief that the doctrines and precepts which Christ taught were not the produc­ tion of his own (human) mind, either in its ordinary operations or in its flights of sublimest contemplation; but were directly and supernaturally communicated to him from on high.1 He means this, or he means nothing that is definable and distinctive. What grounds have we, then, for adopting such an opinion ? It is evident that, if the conclusions to which our previous investigations have led us be correct, our only arguments for believing Christianity to be a divine revelation in contradistinction to a human conception must be drawn from the steperhumanity of its nature and contents. What human intellect could ascertain it would be superfluous for God to reveal. The belief of Christ himself, that his teaching “was not his, but his Father’s,” —even if we were certain that he used these precise words, and intended them to convey precisely the meaning we attach to them,—could not suffice us, for the reasons assigned in the first chapter of this work. The belief in communi­ cations with the Deity has in all ages 1 Those who believe that Christ was God— if any such really exist—-must, of course, hold everything he taught was, ipso facto, a divine revelation. With such all argument and inquiry is necessarily superseded. �114 ZS CHRISTIANITY A REVEALED RELIGION? been common to the most exalted and dowments, in the common acceptation poetical order of religious minds. The fact of the word. The Old Testament con­ that Christ held a conviction which he tained his teaching ; it was reserved for shared with the great and good of other him to elicit, publish, and enforce it. A times can be no argument for ascribing thoughtful perusal of Job, the Psalms, to him divine communications distinct Ecclesiastes, and Isaiah will show beyond from those granted to the great and good question the germs of those views which of other times. It remains, therefore, in the purer and sublimer genius of a simple question for our consideration, Christ rose to so high an elevation.1 whether the doctrines and precepts The doctrine of a future world, though taught by Jesus are so new, so profound, not enforced, perhaps probably not so perfect, so distinctive, so above and found, in the Old Testament, was, we beyond parallel, that they could not have know, currently believed among the Jews emanated naturally from a clear, simple, before the time of Jesus, and must have unsoiled, unwarped, powerful, meditative been familiar to him from his infancy. mind,—living four hundred years after We have no hesitation in concluding Socrates and Plato—brought up among that a pure and powerful mind, filled the pure Essenes, nourished on the with warm affections and devotional wisdom of Solomon, the piety of David, feelings, and studying the Hebrew the poetry of Isaiah—elevated by the Scriptures discriminatively, appropriating knowledge and illuminated by the love and assimilating what was good and of the one true God. noble, and rejecting what was mean Now on this subject we hope our con­ and low, could and might naturally fession of faith will be acceptable to all arrive at the conclusion which Jesus save the narrowly orthodox. It is diffi­ reached, as to the duties of men, the cult, without exhausting superlatives, attributes of God, and the relation of even to unexpressive and wearisome man to God. Christianity is distin­ satiety, to do justice to our intense love, guished from Judaism rather by what reverence, and admiration for the char­ it excluded than by what it added. It acter and teaching of Jesus. We regard is an eclecticism and an expansion of him not as the perfection of the intel­ the best elements of its predecessor. It lectual or philosophic mind, but as the selects the grand and beautiful, the perfection of the spiritual character,— tender, the true, and ignores or sup­ as surpassing all men of all times in the presses the exclusive, the narrow, the closeness and depth of his communion corrupt, the coarse, and the vindictive. with the Father. In reading his sayings, It is Moses, David, Solomon, Isaiah we feel that we are holding converse purified, sublimated and developed. If with the wisest, purest, noblest Being this be so, then the supposition that that ever clothed thought in the poor Christianity was supernaturally commu­ language of humanity. In studying his nicated falls to the ground as needless life we feel that we are following the and therefore inadmissible. What man footsteps of the highest ideal yet pre­ could discover naturally God would not sented to us upon earth. “ Blessed be communicate supernaturally. God that so much manliness has been But we may go further. Not only is lived out, and stands there yet, a lasting there no. necessity for supposing that monument to mark how high the tides of Christ’s views as to God and duty were divine life haverisenin the world of man!” 1 A quotation of‘texts is scarcely the right But these convictions—strong, deep- mode of proving this. See Hennell for an ex­ seated, and well-grounded as they are— position of how much of Christianity was already do not bring us to the conclusion that extant in Jewish teaching; also Mackay’s “Progress of Intellect,” [Em. either the rare moral or mental supe­ Deutch’s paper the the Talmud, ii. 376. Review, on Quart. riorities of Jesus were supernatural en­ No- 246, and Renan, “Vie de Jesus,” ch. v.J. �IS CHRISTIANITY A REVEALED RELIGION? supernaturally revealed to him, but there is almost a necessity for adopting an opposite conclusion. If they were the elaboration of his own mind we may well imagine that they may contain some admixture of error and imperfection. If they were revealed to him by God this Could not be the case. If, therefore, we find that Jesus was in error in any point either of his practical or his speculative teaching, our conclusion, hitherto a pro­ bability, becomes a certainty. It is evi­ dent that we could treat of this point with far more satisfaction if we were in a position to pronounce with perfect pre­ cision what Christ did, and what he did not, teach. But as we have seen that many words are put into his mouth which he never uttered, we cannot ascer­ tain this as undoubtedly as is desirable. There must still remain some degree of doubt as to whether the errors and im­ perfections which we detect originated with or were shared by Christ, or whether they were wholly attributable to his followers and historians. There are, however, some matters on which thegeneralconcurrence of theevangelical histories and their undesigned and incidental intimations lead us to conclude that Jesus did share the mis­ takes which prevailed among his dis­ ciples, though, in going even so far as this, we speak with great diffidence. He appears to have held erroneous views respecting demoniacal possession, the interpretation of Scripture,1 his own Messiahship, his second coming, and the approaching end of the world. At least, if he held the views ascribed to him (and the preponderance of evidence is in favour of the assumption that he 1 Perhaps the most singular instance of this #iisinterpretation of Scripture is in the sophisti­ cal argument ascribed to Christ, concerning the supposed address of David to the Messiah. The Lord said unto my Lord,” &c. (Matth. xxii. 41, and parallel passage). It appears clear that this Psalm was not composed by David, but was addressed to David by Nathan, or some Court Prophet, on the occasion of some of his signal victories.—-See “ Hebrew Monarchy,” p. 92. David did not call the Messiah “ Lord ” ; It was the Poet that called David “ Lord.” IIS did), we know that on these topics he was mistaken. Now if he was so in error his teaching could not have been an infallible revelation from the God of truth, in the sense in which Christendom employs that phrase. But we now come upon another ques­ tion, which, if answered in the negative, at once closes the inquiry to which this chapter is devoted. “ Is the revelation of an undiscoverable truth possible ? ” That is, “ Can any doctrine be taught by God to man—be supernaturally in­ fused, that is, into his mind, which he might not by the employment of his own faculties have discerned or elicited ? ” In other words, “ Can the human mind receive an idea which it could not origi­ nate ? ” We think it plain that it cannot ; though the subject is one which may be better illuminated by reflection than by discussion. At least it is difficult to con­ ceive the nature and formation of that intellect which can comprehend and grasp a truth when presented to it, and perceive that it is a truth, and which yet could not, in the course of time and under favourable conditions, work out that truth by the ordinary operation of its own powers. It appears to us that, by the very nature of the statement, the faculties necessary for the one mental process must be competent to the other.1 If an idea (and a truth is only an idea, or a combination of ideas, which ap­ proves itself to us) can find entrance into the mind and take up its abode there, does not this very fact show a fitness for the residence of that idea 1—a fitness, therefore, which would have ensured admittance to the idea if sug­ gested in any of those mental processes which we call thought, or by any of those 1 It may be objected that external facts may be revealed which could not be discovered. We may be assured by revelation that the inhabitants of Saturn have wings or have no heads, but then, we do not recognise the truth of the assurance, We may be assured by revelation of the exist­ ence of a future world; but could we receive the assurance unless our minds were already so prepared for it, or so constituted, that it would naturally have occurred to them ? �ii6 /S CHRISTIANITY A REVEALED RELIGION? combinations of occurrences which we call accident—a fitness, therefore, which, as the course of time and the occurrence of a thousand such possible suggesting ac­ cidents must almost necessarily have ensured the presentation of the idea, would also have ensured its reception ? If, on the other hand, the idea, from its strangeness, its immensity, its want of harmony with the nature and existing furniture of the mind, could never have presented itself naturally, would not the same strangeness, the same vastness, the same incompatibility of essence inca­ pacitate the mind from receiving it if presented supernaturally ? Further, we are at a loss to imagine how a man can distinguish between an idea revealed to him and an idea con­ ceived by him. In what manner and by what sure token can it be made clear to him that a thought came to him from without, not arose within; he may per­ ceive that it is resplendently bright, un­ questionably new; he may be quite unconscious of any process of ratio­ cination or meditation J>y which it can have been originated; but this is no more than may be said of half the ideas of profound and contemplative genius. Shall we say that it was breathed into him “in a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falleth upon man ” ; and that, therefore, he assumes that it is not his, but God’s? Yet what is this but to declare that God chooses for his communications with the mind of man the period of its most unquestion­ able imperfection, when the phantasy is ascendant and the judgment is torpid and in abeyance ? Shall we say that the thought was spoken to him aloud, in the ordinary language of humanity, and that, therefore, he knows it to have been a divine communication, not a human conception ! But what singular logic is this ! Is the voice of God, then, only, or then most, recognisable when it borrows the language of man ? Is that unprecise and feeble instrument of thought and utterance, invented by man’s faulty faculties, God’s best and surest mode of communication with the spirit he has created? Nay, is not imperfect lan­ guage an impossible m edium for the convey­ ance of absolute and infinite truth ? And do we really mean that we feel certain it is God’s voice which we hear from the clouds, and doubtful that it is his which speaks to us silently, and in the deep and sacred musings of the Soul ? We cannot intend to maintain this monstrous thesis. Our reflections, then, bring us to this conclusion :—that the only certain proof we can have of a revelation must lie in the truths it teaches being such as are inaccessible to, and therefore incom­ prehensible by, the mind of man; that if they are such as he can conceive and grasp and accept, they are such as he might have discovered, and he has no means of knowing that he has not dis­ covered them ; if they are such as he could not have discovered, they are such as he cannot receive, such as he could not recognise or ascertain to be truth. Since, then, we can find no adequate reason for believing Jesus to be the Son of God, nor his doctrines to be a direct and special revelation to him from the Most High—using these phrases in their ordinary signification—in what light do we regard Christ and Christianity ? We do not believe that Christianity contains anything which a genius like Christ’s, brought up and nourished as his had been, might not have disen­ tangled for itself. We hold that God has so arranged matters in this beautiful and well-ordered, but mysteriouslygoverned universe, that one great mind after another will arise from time to time, as such are needed, to discover and flash forth before the eyes of men the truths that are wanted, and the amount of truth that can be borne. We con­ ceive that this is effected by endowing them, or (for we pretend to no scholastic nicety of expression) by having arranged that Nature and the course of events shall send them into the world endowed with that superior mental and moral organisation, in which grand truths, sub­ �AS CHRISTIANITY A REVEALED RELIGION? lime gleams of spiritual light, will spon­ taneously and inevitably arise. Such a one we believe was Jesus of Nazareth, the most exalted religious genius whom God ever sent upon the earth ; in him­ self an embodied revelation; humanity in its divinest phase, “ God manifest in the flesh,” according to Eastern hyper­ bole ; an exemplar vouchsafed, in an early age of the World, of what man may and should become, in the course of ages, in his progress towards the realisation of his destiny ; an individual gifted with a grand clear intellect, a noble soul, a fine organisation, marvel­ lous moral intuitions, and a perfectly balanced moral being; and who, by virtue of these endowments, saw further than all other men— “ Beyond the verge of that blue sky Where God’s sublimest secrets lie ” ; an earnest, not only of what humanity may be, but of what it will be, when the most perfected races shall bear the same relation to the finest minds of existing times, as these now bear to the Bushmen or the Esquimaux. He was, as Parker beautifully expresses it, “ the possibility of the race made real.” He was a sublime poet, prophet, moralist, and hero ; and had the usual fate of such— misrepresented by his enemies,—mis­ construed by his friends ; unhappy in this, that his nearest intimates and followers were not of a calibre to understand him ; happy in this, that his words contained such undying seeds of truth as could survive even the media through which they passed. Like the wheat found in the Egyptian Catacombs, they retain the power of germinating undiminished, whenever their appropriate soil is found. They have been preserved essentially almost pure, notwithstanding the Judaic narrowness of Peter, the orthodox passions of John, the metaphysical subtleties of Paul. Everything seems to us to confirm the conclusion that we have in the Christianity of Scripture, not a code of law, still less a system of dogma, but a mass of beautiful, simple, sublime, pro­ found, not perfect truths, obscured by ii7 having come down to us through the inter­ vention of minds far inferior to that of its Author—narrowed by their uncultivation —marred by their misapprehensions— and tarnished by their foreign admixtures. It is a collection of grand truths, trans­ mitted to us by men who only half comprehended their grandeur, and imperfectly grasped their truth. In grasping after a certainty, which can be but a shadow, ordinary Christianity has lost the substance—it has sacrificed in practical more than it has gained in dogmatic value. In making Christ the miraculous Son of God, it has destroyed Jesus as a human exemplar. If he were in a peculiar manner “the only begotten of the Father,” a partaker in his essential nature, then he is immeasurably removed from us; we may revere, we cannot imitate him. We listen to his precepts with submission, perhaps even greater than before. We dwell upon the excel­ lence of his character, no longer for imitation, but for worship. We read with the deepest love and admiration of his genius, his gentleness, his mercy, his unwearying activity in doing good, his patience with the stupid, his compassion for the afflicted, his courage in facing torture, his meekness in enduring wrong; and then we turn away and say, “ Ah ! he was a God; such virtue was not for humanity, nor for us.” It is useless by honeyed words to disguise the truth. If Christ were a man, he is our pattern; “the possibility of our race made real.” If he were God-—a partaker of God’s nature, as the orthodox maintain—then they are guilty of a cruel mockery in speaking of him as a type and model of human excellence. How can one en­ dowed with the perfections of a God be an example to beings encumbered with the weaknesses of humanity? Adieu, then, to Jesus as anything but a Propounder of doctrines, an Utterer of precepts ! The vital portion of Christianity is swept away. His Character—that from which so many in all ages have drawn their moral life and strength—that which so irresistibly enlists our deepest sympathies, �n8 ZS CHRISTIANITY A REVEALED RELIGION ? and rouses our highest aspirations—it becomes an irreverence to speak of. The character, the conduct, the virtues of a God!—these are felt to be indecent expressions. Verily, orthodoxy has slain the life of Christianity. In the pre­ sumptuous endeavour to exalt Jesus, it has shut him up in the Holy of Holies, and hid him from the gaze of humanity. It has displaced him from an object of imitation into an object of worship. It has made his life barren, that his essence might be called divine. “But,” it will be objected, “what, on this system, becomes of the religion of the poor and ignorant, the uneducated and the busy ? If Christianity is not a divine revelation, and therefore entirely and infallibly true—if the Gospels are not perfectly faithful and accurate ex­ positors of Christ’s teaching and of God’s will,—what a fearful loss to those who have neither the leisure, the learning, nor the logical habits of thought requisite to construct out of the relics that remain to them and the nature that lies before them a faith for themselves ! ” To this objection we reply that the more religion can be shown to consist in the realisation of great moral and spiritual truths, rather than in the recep­ tion of distinct dogmas, the more the position of these classes is altered for the better. In no respect is it altered for the worse. Their creeds, i.e., their collec­ tion of dogmas, those who do not or cannot think for themselves must always take on the authority of others. They do so now : they have always done so. They have hitherto believed certain doc­ trines because wise and good men assure them that these doctrines were revealed by Christ, and that Christ was a Teacher sent from God. They will in future believe them because wise and good men assure them of their truth, and their own hearts confirm the assurance. The only difference lies in this,—that, in the one case, the authority on which they lean vouches for the truth; in the other, for the Teacher who proclaimed it. Moreover, the Bible still remains; though no longer as an inspired and infallible record. Though not the word of God, it contains the words of the wisest, the most excellent, the most devout men, who have ever held com­ munion with him. The poor, the ignorant, the busy, need not, do not, will not, read it critically. To each of them it will still, through all time, pre­ sent the Gospels and the Psalms,—the glorious purity of Jesus, the sublime piety of David and of Job. Those who read it for its spirit, not for its dogmas— as the poor, the ignorant the busy, if unperverted, will do—will still find in it all that is necessary for their guidance in life, their support in death, their consola­ tion in sorrow, their rule of duty, and their trust in God. A more genuine and important objection to the consequences of our views is felt by indolent minds on their own account. They shrink from the toil of working out truth for themselves, out of the materials which Providence has placed before them. They long for the precious metal, but loathe the rude ore out of which it has to be extricated by the laborious alchemy of thought. A ready-made creed is the Paradise of their lazy dreams. A string of authoritative dog­ matic propositions comprises the whole mental wealth which they desire. The volume of nature, the volume of history, the volume of life, appal and terrify them. Such men are the materials out of whom good Catholics—of all sects—are made. They form the uninquiring and sub­ missive flocks which rejoice the hearts of all Priests. Let such cling to the faith of their forefathers—if they can. But men whose minds are cast in a nobler mould and are instinct with a diviner ife, who love truth more than rest, and the peace of Heaven rather than the peace of Eden, to whom “a loftier being brings severer cares,”— “ Who know Man does not live by joy alone But by the presence of the power of God,”— such must cast behind them the hope of any repose or tranquillity save that which �CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM is the last reward of long agonies of they must relinquish all prospect of any Heaven save that of which tribulation is the avenue and portal; they must gird up their loins and trim their lamp for a work which thought; . 119 cannot be put by, and which must not be negligently done. “ He,’’ says Zschokke, “ who does not like living in furnished lodgings of tradition, must build his own house, his own system of thought and faith, for himself.”1 Chapter XIII CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM Christianity, then, not being a revela­ tion, but a conception—the Gospels not • being either inspired or accurate, but fallible and imperfect human records— the practical conclusion from such premises must be obvious to all. Every doctrine and every proposition which the Scriptures contain, whether or not we believe it to have come to us un­ mutilated and unmarred from the mouth of Christ, is open, and must be subjected, to the scrutiny of reason. Some tenets we shall at once accept as the most perfect truth that can be received by the human intellect and heart;—others we shall reject as contradicting our instincts and offending our understand­ ings ;—others, again, of a more mixed nature, we must analyse, that so we may extricate the seed of truth from the husk of error, and elicit “the divine idea that lies at the bottom of appearance.”1 • I. I value the Religion of Jesus, not O being absolute and perfect truth, but aS containing more truth, purer truth, higher truth, stronger truth, than has ever yet been given to man. Much of his teaching I unhesitatingly receive as, to the best of my judgment, unimprovable and unsurpassable—fitted, if obeyed, to make earth all that a finite and material scene can be, and man only a little lower than the angels. The worthlessness ofceremonial observances, and the necessity of essential righteousness—“ Not every one that saith unto me, Lord 1 Lord 1 1 Fichte. but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in Heaven ; ” “ By their fruits ye shall know them; ” “I will have mercy, and not. sacrifice ; ”—The enforce­ ment ofpurity of heart as the security for purity of life, and of the government of the thoughts as the originators and fore­ runners of action—“ He that looketh on a woman, to lust after her, hath com­ mitted adultery with her already in his heart; ” “ Out of the heart proceed murders, adulteries, thefts, false witness, blasphemies : these are the things which defile a man ; ” — Universal good-will towards men—“ Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself;” “whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, that do ye also unto them, for this is the Law and the Prophets : ”—Forgiveness of injuries “ Love your enemies; do good to them that hate you ; pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you —“ If ye love them only that love you, what reward have ye ? do not even publicans the same ? ”—The necessity of selfsacrifice in the cause of duty—“Blessed are they which are persecuted for .righteousness’ sake; ” “ If any man will be my disciple, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me ; ” “ If thy right hand offend thee cut it off and cast it from thee ; ” “ No man having put his hand to the plough and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God ; ”—Humility—“ Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth ; ” 1 Zschokke’s “Autobiography,” p. 29. whole section is most deeply interesting. The �ffio ■ CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM “He that humbleth himself shall be exalted ; ” “ He that is greatest among you, let him be your servant; ”—Genuine sincerity: being, not seeming—“ Take heed that ye do not your alms before men to be seen of them ; ” “ When thou prayest enter into thy closet and shut thy door; ” “ When thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face, that thou appear not unto men to fast; ” —all these sublime precepts need no miracle, no voice from the clouds, to recommend them to our allegiance, or to assure us of their divinity; they command obedience by virtue of their inherent rectitude and beauty, and vindicate their author as himself the one towering perpetual miracle of history. II. Next in perfection come the views which Christianity unfolds to us of God in his relation to man, which were probably as near the truth as the minds of men could in that age receive. God is represented as Our Father in Heaven —to be whose especial children is the best reward of the peace-makers—to see whose face is the highest hope of the pure in heart—who is ever at hand to strengthen his true worshippers—to whom is due our heartiest love, our humblest submission—whose most acceptable worship is righteous conduct and a holy heart—in whose constant presence our life is passed—to whose merciful disposal we are resigned by death. It is remarkable that, throughout the Gospels, with the exception, I believe, of a single passage,1 nothing is said as to the nature of the Deity:—his relation to us is alone insisted on :—all that is needed for our consolation, our strength, our guidance, is assured to us : —the purely speculative is passed over and ignored. Thus, in the two great points essential to our practical life—viz., our feelings towards God and our conduct towards man—the Gospels, relieved of their unauthentic portions, and read in an under­ standing spirit, not with a slavish and 1 God is a spirit. unintelligent adherence to the naked letter, contain little about which men may differ—little from which they can dissent. He is our Father, we are all brethren^ This much lies open to the most ignorant and busy, as fully as to the most leisurely and learned. This needs no Priest to teach it—no authority to endorse it. The rest is Speculation—intensely interesting, indeed, but of no practical necessity. III. There are, however, other tenets taught in Scripture and professed by Christians, in which reflective minds of all ages have found it difficult to acquiesce. Thus :—however far we may stretch the plea for a liberal interpreta­ tion of Oriental speech, it is impossible to disguise from ourselves that the New Testament teaches, in the most unre­ served manner and in the strongest language, the doctrine of the efficacy of Prayer in modifying the divine purposes and in obtaining the boons asked for at the throne of grace. It is true that one passage (John xi. 42) would seem to in­ dicate that prayer was a form which Jesus adopted for the sake of others; it is also remarkable that the model of prayer which he taught to his disciples contains only one simple and modest request for personal and temporal good 1; yet not only are we told that he prayed earnestly and for specific mercies (though with a most submissive will) on occasions of peculiar suffering and trial, but few of his exhortations to his disciples occur more frequently than that to constant prayer, and no promises are more distinct or reiterated than that their prayers shall be heard and answered. “ Watch and pray ; ” “ What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye shall re­ ceive them, and ye shall have them; ” “Verily, verily, I say unto you, whatso­ ever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he will give it you ; ” “ Ask, and it shall be given you.” 1 “ It is a curious fact that the Lord’s prayer may be reconstructed,” says Wetstein, “ almost verbatim out of the Talmud, which also contains a prophetic intimation that all prayer will one day cease, except the prayer of Thanksgiving.” (Mackay’s “ Progress of the Intellect,” ii. 379.) �CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM No one can read such passages, and the numberless others of a'similar char­ acter with which both Testaments abound, and doubt that the opinion held both by Christ and his disciples was that “ Jeho­ vah is a God that heareth and answereth prayer ; ”—that favours are to be obtained from Him by earnest and reiterated entreaty; that whatever good thing His sincere worshippers petition for, with instance and with faith, shall be granted to them, if consonant to his purposes, and shall be granted in consequence of their petition; that, in fact and truth, apart from all metaphysical subtleties and subterfuges the designs of God can be modified and swayed, like those of an earthly father, by the entreaties of His children. This doctrine is set forth throughout the Jewish Scriptures in its coarsest and nakedest form and it reap­ pears in the Christian Scriptures in a form only slightly modified and refined. Now, this doctrine has in all ages been a stumbling-block to the thoughtful. It is obviously irreconcilable with all that reason and revelation teach us of the divine nature; and the inconsistency has been felt by the ablest of the Scrip­ ture writers themselves.1 Various and desperate have been the expedients and suppositions resorted to, in order to re­ concile the conception of an immutable, all-wise, all foreseeing God, with that of a father who is turned from his course by the prayers of his creatures. But all such efforts are, and are felt to be, hope­ less failures. They involve the assertion and negation of the same proposition in one breath. The problem remains still insoluble ; and we must either be con­ tent to have it so, or we must abandon one or other of the hostile premises. The religious man, who believes that all events, mental as well as physical, are pre-ordered and arranged according to the decrees of infinite wisdom, and the philosopher, who knows that, by the wise and eternal laws of the universe, cause and effect are indissolubly chained to1 “ God is not a man that he should lie, nor the son of man, that he should repent.” lit gether, and that one follows the other in inevitable succession,—equally feel that this ordination—this chain—cannot be changeable at the cry of man. To sup­ pose that it can is to place the whole harmonious system of nature at the mercy of the weak reason and the selfish wishes of humanity. If the purpose of God were not wise, they would not be formed:—if wise, they cannot be changed, for then they would become unwise. To suppose that an all-wise Being would alter his designs and modes of proceed­ ing at the entreaty of an unknowing creature, is to believe that compassion would change his wisdom into foolish­ ness. It has been urged that prayer may render a favour wise, which would else be unwise ; but this is to imagine that events are not foreseen and pre-ordered, but are arranged and decided pro re nata : it is also to ignore utterly the unquestionable fact, that no event in life or in nature is isolated, and that none can be changed without entailing endless and universal alterations. If the universe is governed by fixed laws, or (which is the same pro­ position in different language) if all events are pre-ordained by the foreseeing wisdom of an infinite God, then the prayers of thousands of years and genera­ tions of martyrs and saints cannot change or modify one iota of our destiny. The proposition is unassailable by the subtlest logic. The weak, fond affections of humanity struggle in vain against the unwelcome conclusion. It is a conclusion from which the feel­ ings of almost all of us shrink and revolt. The strongest sentiment of our nature, perhaps, is that of our helplessness in the hands of fate, and against this help­ lessness we seek for a resource in the belief of our dependence on a Higher Power, which can control and will inter­ fere with fate. And though our reason tells us that it is inconceivable that the entreaties of creatures as erring and as blind as we are can influence the all­ wise purposes of God, yet we feel an internal voice, more potent and per­ suasive than reason, which assures us �122 CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM that to pray to him in trouble is an irre­ pressible instinct of our nature—an in­ stinct which precedes teaching—which survives experience—which defies philo­ sophy. “ For sorrow oft the cry of faith In bitter need will borrow.” It would be an unspeakable consola­ tion to our human infirmity could we, in this case, believe our reason to be erroneous and our instinct true ; but we greatly fear that the latter is the result, partly of that anthropomorphism which pervades all our religious conceptions, which our limited faculties suggest, and which education and habit have rooted so fixedly in our mental constitution, and partly of that fond weakness which recoils from the idea of irreversible and inescapable decree. The conception of subjection to a law without exception, without remission, without appeal, crush­ ing, absolute, and universal, is truly an appalling one; and, most mercifully, can rarely be perceived in all its overwhelm­ ing force, except by minds which, through stern and lofty intellectual training, have in some degree become qualified to bear it. Communion with God, we must ever bear in mind, is something very different from prayer for specific blessings, and often confers the submissive strength of soul for which we pray; and we believe it will be found that the higher our souls rise in their spiritual progress, the more does entreaty merge into thanksgiving, the more does petition become absorbed in communion with the “ Father of the spirits of all flesh.” That the piety of Christ was fast tending to this end is, we think, indicated by his instructions to his disciples (Matt. vi. 8, 9): “ When ye pray, use not vain repetitions, for your father knoweth what things ye have need of before ye ask him. After this manner, therefore, _ pray ye,” &c.; and by that last sublime sentence in Gethsemane, uttered when the agonising struggle of the spirit with the flesh had terminated in the complete and final victory of the first, “ Father, if this cup may not pass from me except I drink it, thy will be done.” Prayer may be regarded as the form which devotion naturally takes in ordinary minds, and even in the most enlightened minds in their less spiritual moods. The highest intellectual efforts, the loftiest religious contemplations, dispose to de­ votion, but check the impulses of prayer. The devout philosopher, trained to the investigation of universal system —the serene astronomer, fresh from the study of the changeless laws which govern innumerable worlds—shrinks from the monstrous irrationality of ask­ ing the great Architect and Governor of all to work a miracle in his behalf—to interfere, for the sake of his convenience, wc his plans, with the sublime order con­ ceived by the Ancient of Days in the far Eternity of the Past; for what is a special providence but an interference with established laws ? And what is such interference but a miracle ? _ IV. Remotely connected with the doc­ trine of an interposing and influencible Providence is the fallacy, or rather the imperfection, which lies' at the root of the ordinary Christian view of Resigna­ tion as a duty and a virtue. Submission, cheerful acquiescence in the dispensa­ tions of Providence, is enjoined upon us, not because these dispensations are just and wise—not because they are the ordinances of His will who cannot err,— but because they are ordained for our benefit, and because He promised that “ all things shall work together for good to them that love Him.” We are assured that every trial and affliction is designed solely for. our good, for our discipline, and will issue in a blessing, though we see not how; and that therefore we must bow to it with unmurmuring resignation. These grounds, it is obvious, are purely self-regarding; and resignation, thus re­ presented and thus motived, is no virtue, but a simple calculation of self-interest. This narrow view results from that in­ corrigible egotism of the human heart which makes man prone to regard him­ �.CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM self as the special object of divine con­ sideration, and the centre round which the universe revolves. Yet it is unques­ tionably the view most prominently and frequently presented in the new Testa­ ment and by all modern divines.1' It may be that the prospect of “ an ex­ ceeding, even an eternal weight of glory,” may be needed to support our frail pur­ poses under the crushing afflictions of our lot; it may be that, by the perfect arrangements of omnipotence, the suf­ ferings of all may be made to work out the ultimate and supreme good of each ; but this is not, cannot be, the reason why we should submit with resignation to whatever God ordains. His will must be wise, righteous, and wre believe bene­ ficent, whether it allot to us happiness or misery : it zk His will; we need inquire no further. Job, who had no vision of a future compensatory world, had in this attained a sublimer point of religion than St. Paul:—“ Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” “What 1 shall we receive good at the hands of God, and shall we not receive evil?” (Job xiii. 15 ; ii. 10.) To the orthodox Christian, who fully believes all he professes, cheerful re­ signation to the divine will is compara­ tively a natural, an easy, a simple thing. To the religious philosopher, it is the highest exercise of intellect and virtue. The man who has realised the faith that his own lot, in all its minutest particu­ lars, is not only directly regulated by God,—but is so regulated by God as unerringly to work for his highest good,— with an express view to his highest good— with such a man, resignation, patience, 1 The sublimest and purest genius among modern divines goes so far as to maintain that, apart from the hope of future recompense, ‘ ‘ a deviation from rectitude would become the part of wisdom, and should the path of virtue be obstructed by disgrace, torment, or death, to persevere would be madness and folly.” (“Modern Infidelity,” p. 20, by Robert Hall.) It is sad to reflect how mercenary a thing duty has become in the hands of theologians. Were their belief in a future retribution once shaken, they would become, on their own showing, the lowest of sensualists, the worst of sinners. 123 nay, cheerful acquiescence in all suffer­ ing and sorrow appears to be in fact only the simple and practical expression of his belief. If, believing all this, he still murmurs and rebels at the trials and contrarieties of his lot, he is guilty of the childishness of the infant which quarrels with the medicine that is to lead it back to health and ease. But the religious Philosopher,—who, sin­ cerely holding that a Supreme God created and governed this world, holds also that He governs it by laws which, though wise, just, and beneficent, are yet steady, unwavering, inexorable;— who believe that his agonies and sorrows are not specially ordained for his chas­ tening, his strengthening, his elaboration and development,—but are incidental and necessary results of the operation of laws the best that could be devised for the happiness and purification of the species,—or perhaps not even that, but the best adapted to work out the vast, awful, glorious, eternal designs of the Great Spirit of the universe; who believes that he ordained operations of Nature, which have brought misery to him, have, from the very unswerving tranquillity of their career, showered blessing and sunshine upon every other path,—that the unrelenting chariot of Time, which has crushed or maimed him in its allotted course, is pressing onward to the accomplishment of those serene and mighty purposes, to have contributed to which—even as a victim —is an honour and a recompense :— he who takes this view of Time, and Nature, and God, and yet bears his lot without murmur or distrust, because it is portion of a system, the best possible, because ordained by God,—has achieved a point of virtue, the highest, amid pas­ sive excellence, which humanity can reach;—and his reward and support must be found in the reflection that he is an unreluctant and self-sacrificing co-operator with the Creator of the universe, and in the noble consciousness of being worthy and capable of so sublime a conception, yet so sad a destiny. �1^4 CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM In a comparison of the two resignations, the patience of secrecy and silence, to there is no measure of their respective bring about some political or social grandeurs. The orthodox sufferer fights change which they felt convinced would the battle only on condition of surviving ultimately prove o'f vast service to to reap the fruits of victory :—the other humanity, may live to see the change fights on, knowing that he must fall effected, or the anticipated good flow early in the battle, but content that his from it. Fewer still of them will be able body should form a stepping-stone for to pronounce what appreciable weight the future conquests of humanity. their several efforts contributed to the Somewhat similar remarks may be achievement of the change desired. And made with reference to the virtues of discouraging doubts will therefore often action as to those of endurance. It is creep in upon minds in which egotism a matter suggestive of much reflection, is not wholly swallowed up by earnest­ that, throughout the New Testament, ness, as to whether, in truth, their the loftiest and purest motive to action— exertions had any influence whatever— love of duty, as duty, obedience to the whether in sad and sober fact they have will of God because it is His will—is not been the mere fly upon the wheel. rarely appealed to; one or two expres­ With many men these doubts are fatal sions of Christ and the 14th chapter of to active effort. To counteract them John forming the only exceptions. The we must labour to elevate and purify almost invariable language—pitched to our motives, as well as sedulously cherish the level of ordinary humanity—is, “ Do the conviction—assuredly a true one— your duty at all hazards, for your Father that in this world there is no such thing which seeth in secret shall reward you as effort thrown away—that “ in all labour openly.” “ Verily, I say unto you, ye there is profit ”—that all sincere exertion shall in no wise lose your reward.” in a righteous and unselfish cause is Yet this is scarcely the right view of necessarily followed, in spite of all ap­ things. The hope of success, not the pearance to the contrary, by an appro­ hope of reward, should be our stimulat­ priate and proportionate success—that ing and sustaining might. Our object, no bread cast upon the waters can be not ourselves, should be our inspiring wholly lost—that no good seed planted thought. The labours of philanthropy in the ground can fail to fructify in due are comparatively easy, when the effect time and measure; and that, however of them, and their recoil upon ourselves, we may in moments of despondency be is immediate and apparent. But this it apt to doubt, not only whether our cause can rarely be, unless where the field of will triumph, but whether we shall have our exertions is narrow, and ourselves contributed to its triumph,—there is the only or the chief labourers. In the One who has not only seen every exer­ more frequent cases where we have to tion we have made, but who can assign join our efforts to those of thousands of the exact degree in which each soldier others to contribute to the carrying for­ has assisted to gain the great victory ward of a great cause, merely to till over social evil. The Augean stables the ground or sow the seed for a of the world—the accumulated unclean­ very distant harvest, or to prepare the ness and misery of centuries—require a way for the future advent of some mighty river to cleanse them thoroughly great amendment; the amount which away : every drop we contribute aids to each man has contributed to the achieve­ swell that river and augment its force, in ment of ultimate success, the portion of a degree appreciable by God, though not the prize which justice should assign to by man;—and he whose zeal is deep each as his especial production, can and earnest will not be over anxious never be accurately ascertained. Per­ that his individual drop should be dis­ haps few of those who have laboured, in tinguishable amid the mighty mass of �CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM cleansing and fertilising waters, far less that, for the sake of distinction it should flow in effective singleness away. He will not be careful that his name should be inscribed upon the mite which he casts into the treasury of God. It should suffice each of us to know that, if we have laboured, with purity of purpose, in any good cause, we must have con­ tributed to its success; that the degree in which we have contributed is a matter of infinitely small concern; and still more, that the consciousness of having so contributed, however obscurely and unnoticed, should be our sufficient, if our sole, reward. Let us cherish this faith ; it is a duty. He who sows and reaps is a good labourer, and worthy of his hire. But he who sows what shall be reaped by others who know not and reck not of the sower, is a labourer of a nobler order, and worthy of a loftier guerdon. V. The common Christian conception Of the pardon of sin upon repentance and conversion seems to us to embody a very transparent and pernicious fallacy. “Who can forgive sins but God only? ” asked the Pharisees. There is great con­ fusion and contradiction in our ideas on this subject. God is the only being who Can not forgive sins. “ Forgiveness of sins” means one of two things :—it either means saving a man from the con­ sequences of his sins, that is, interposing between cause and effect, in which case it is working a miracle (which God no f doubt can do, but which we have no right to expect that He will do, or ask that He shall do); or it means an engage­ ment to forbear retaliation, a suppression pf the natural anger felt against the offender by the offended party, a fore­ going of vengeance on the part of the in­ jured—in which meaning it is obviously quite inapplicable to a Being exempt and aloof from human passions. When we entreat a fellow-creature to forgive the offences we have committed against him, we mean to entreat that he will not, by any act of his, punish us for them, that he will not revenge nor repay them, that he will retain no rancour in his breast 125 against us on account of them; and such a prayer addressed to a being of like passions to ourselves is rational and intelligible, because we know that it is natural for him to feel anger at our in­ juries, and that, unless moved to the contrary, he will probably retaliate. But when we pray to our Heavenly Father to “ forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us,” we over­ look the want of parallelism of the two cases, and show that our notions on the subject are altogether misty and con­ fused ; for God cannot be injured by our sins, and He is inaccessible to the passions of anger and revenge. Yet the plain expression of the Book of Common Prayer—“ Neither take Thou vengeance of our sins ”—embodies the real signifi­ cation attached to the prayer for forgive­ ness, by all who attach any definite signi­ fication to their prayers. Now, this ex­ pression is an Old Testament or a Pagan expression, and can only be consistently and intelligibly used by those who enter­ tain the same low ideas of God as the ancient Greeks and Hebrews entertained —that is, who think of Him as an irrit­ able, jealous, and avenging Potentate. If, from this inconsistency, we take refuge in the other meaning of the Prayer for forgiveness, and assume that it is a prayer to God that he will exempt us from the natural and appointed conse­ quences of our misdeeds, it is important that we should clearly define to our minds what it is that we are asking for. In our view of the matter, punishment for sins by the divine law is a wholly different thing and process from punishment for violations of human laws. It is not an infliction for crime, imposed by an ex­ ternal authority and artificially executed by external force, but a natural and in­ evitable result of the offence—a child generated by a parent—a sequence fol­ lowing an antecedent—a consequence arising out of a cause. The punishment of sin consists in the consequences of sin. These form a penalty most adequately heavy. A sin without its punishment is as impossible, �126 CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM as complete a contradiction in terms, as and entreaty; a belief consistent and intel­ a cause without an effect. ligible among the Greeks, inconsistent To pray that God will forgive our sins, and irrational among Christians, appro­ therefore, appears in all logical accuracy priate as applied to Jupiter, unmean­ to involve either a most unworthy con­ ing or blasphemous as applied to Jehovah. ception of His character, or an entreaty We have, in fact, come to regard sin, of incredible audacity—viz., that He not as an injury done to our own nature, wih work daily miracles in our behalf. an offence against our own souls, a dis­ It is either beseeching Him to renounce figuring of the image of the Beautiful feelings and intentions which it is and Good, but as a personal affront impossible that a Nature like His should offered to a powerful and avenging Bein<q entertain : or it is asking Him to violate which, unless apologised for, will be chas­ the eternal and harmonious order of the tised as such. We have come to regard universe, for the comfort of one out of it as an injury to another party, for which the infinite myriads of its inhabitants. atonement and reparation can be made It may, perhaps, be objected, that and satisfaction can be given; not as a Punishment of sins may be viewed, not deed which cannot be undone, eternal as a vengeance taken for injury or insult in its consequences; an act which, once committed, nor yet as the simple and committed,- is numbered with the irre­ necessary sequence of a cause—but as vocable past. In a word, Sin contains chastisement, inflicted to work repentance its own retributive penalty as surely, and and amendment. But, even when con­ as naturally, as the acorn contains the sidered in this light, prayer for forgive­ oak. Its consequence is its punishment, ness remains still a marvellous incon­ it needs no other, and can have no sistency. It then becomes the entreaty heavier : and its consequence is involved of the. sick man to his Physician not to in its commission, and cannot be heal him. “ Forgive us our sins,” then separated from it. Punishment (let us means, “ Let us continue in our iniquity.” fix this in our minds) is not the execution It is clear, however, that the first mean­ of a sentence, but the occurrence ofan effect. ing we have mentioned, as attached to It is ordained to follow guilt by God, the prayer for forgiveness of sins, is both not as a Judge, but as the Creator and the original and the prevailing one; and Legislator of the Universe. This con­ that it arises from an entire misconcep­ viction once settled in our understand­ tion of the character of the Deity, and of ings, will wonderfully clear up our views the feelings with which He may be on the subject of pardon and redemption. supposed to regard sin—a misconception Redemption becomes then, of necessity, inherited from our Pagan and Jewish not a saving but a regenerating process. predecessors ; it is a prayer to deprecate We can be saved from the punishment of the just resentment of a Potentate whom sin only by being saved from its com­ we have offended—a petition which mission. Neither can there be any such would be more suitably addressed to an thing as a vicarious atonement or punish­ earthly foe or master than to a Heavenly ment (which, again, is a relic of heathen Father. The misconception is natural conceptions of an angered Deity, to be to a rude state of civilisation and of propitiated by offerings and sacrifices). theology. It is the same notion from Punishment, being not the penalty, but which arose sacrifices (z’.e., offerings to the result of sin, being not an arbitrary appease wrath), and which caused their and artificial annexation, but an ordinary universality in early ages and among and logical consequence, cannot be borne barbarous nations. It is a relic of by other than the sinner. anthropomorphism ; a belief that God, It is curious that the votaries of the like man, is enraged by neglect or disobe­ doctrines of the Atonement admit the dience, andean be pacified by submission correctness of much of the above reason- �CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM ing, saying (see “ Guesses at Truth,” by J. and A. Hare), that Christ had to suffer for the sins of men, because God could could not forgive sin ; He must punish in some way. Thus holding the strangely inconsistent doctrine that God is so just that He could not let sin go unpunished, yet so unjust that He could punish it in the person of the innocent. It is for orthodox dialects to explain how Divine Justice can be impugned by pardoning the guilty, and yet vindicated^ punishing the innocent 1 If the foregoing reflections are sound, the awful, yet wholesome, conviction presses upon our minds, that there can be no forgiveness of sins; that is, no inter­ ference with, or remittance of, or pro­ tection from their natural effects; that God will not interpose between the cause and its consequence1 :—that 11 whatso­ ever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” An awful consideration this; yet all reflection, all experience, confirm its truth. The sin which has debased Our soul may be repented of, may be turned from, but the injury is done : the debasement may be redeemed by after efforts, the stain may be obliterated by bitterer struggles and severer sufferings, by faith in God’s love and communion with His Spirit; but the efforts and the endurance which might have raised the soul to the loftiest heights are now exhausted in merely regaining what it has lost. “There must always be a wide difference (as one of our divines has said) between him who only ceases to do evil, and him who has always done well ; between the man who began to serve his God as soon as he knew that he had a God to serve, and the man who only turns to Heaven after he has exhausted all the indulgences of Earth.” 1 Refer to Matt. ix. 2-6. “Whether it is easier to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee ! or to say, Arise, take up thy bed and walk? ” Jesus seems here clearly to intimate that the view taken above (of forgiveness of sins, namely, involving an interference with the natural order of sequence, and being therefore a miracle} is correct. He places the two side by side, as equally difficult. 127 Again, in the case of sin of which you have induced another to partake. You may repent—-you may, after agonising struggles, regain the path of virtue— your spirit may re-achieve its purity through much anguish, and after many stripes; but the weaker fellow-creature whom you led astray, whom you made a sharer in your guilt, but whom you can­ not make a sharer in your repentance and amendment, whose downward course (the first step of which you taught) you cannot check, but are compelled to witness, what “ forgiveness ” of sins can avail you there ? There is your per­ petual, your inevitable punishment, which no repentance can alleviate and no mercy can remit. This doctrine, that sins may be for­ given, and the consequences of them averted, has in all ages been a fertile source of mischief. Perhaps few of our intellectual errors have fructified in a vaster harvest of evil, or operated more powerfully to impede the moral progress of our race. While it has been a source of unspeakable comfort to the penitent, a healing balm to the wounded spirit, while it has saved many from hopeless­ ness, and enabled those to recover them­ selves who would otherwise have flung away the remnant of their virtue in despair; yet, on the other hand, it has encoura ged millions, feeling tvhat a safety was in store for them in ultimate resort, to persevere ' in their career of folly or crime, to ignore or despise those natural laws which God has laid down to be the guides and beacons of our conduct, to continue to do “ that which was pleasant in their own eyes,”convinced that nothing was irrevocable, that however dearly they might have to pay for re-integration, repentance could at any time redeem their punishment, and undo the past. The doctrine has been noxious in exact ratio to the baldness and nakedness with which it has been propounded. In the Catholic Church of the middle ages we see it perhaps in its greatest form, when pardon was sold, bargained for, rated at a fixed price; when one hoary sinner, �128 CHRISTIAN ECLECTICISM on the bed of sickness, refused to repent, because he was not certain that death was close at hand, and he did not wish for the trouble of going through the process twice, and was loth, by a prema­ ture amendment, to lose a chance of any of the indulgences of sin. Men would have been far more scrupulous watchers over conduct, far more careful of their deeds, had they believed that those deeds would inevitably bear their natural consequences, exempt from after inter­ vention, than when they held that peni­ tence and pardon could at any time unlink the chain of sequences; just as now they are little scrupulous of indulg­ ing in hurtful excess, when medical aid is at hand to remedy the mischief they have voluntarily encountered. But were they on a desert island, apart from the remotest hope of a doctor or a drug, how far more closely would they consider the consequences of each indulgence, how earnestly would they study the laws of Nature, how comparatively unswerving would be their endeavours to steer their course by those laws, obedience to which brings health, peace, and safety in its train! Let any one look back upon his past career—look inward on his daily life— and then say what effect would be pro­ duced upon him, were the conviction once fixedly embedded in his soul, that everything done is done irrevocably— that even the Omnipotence of God can­ not uncommit a deed—cannot make that undone which has been done ; that every act must bear its allotted fruit according to the everlasting laws—must remain for ever ineffaceably inscribed on the tablets of universal Nature. And then let him consider what would have been the result upon the moral condition of our race, had all men ever held this convic­ tion. Perhaps you have led a youth of dis­ sipation and excess which has under­ mined and enfeebled your constitution, and you have transmitted this injured and enfeebled constitution to your children. They suffer, in consequence, through life; suffering, perhaps even sin, is entailed upon them ; your repentance, were it in sackcloth and ashes, cannot help you or them. Your punishment is tremendous, but it is legitimate and inevitable. You have broken Nature’s laws, or you have ignored them; and no one violates or neglects them with impunity. What a lesson for timely reflection and obedience is here ! Again,—You have broken the seventh commandment. You grieve, you repent, you resolutely determine against any such weakness in future. It is well. But “you know that God is merciful, you feel that he will forgive you.” You are comforted. But no—there is no for­ giveness of sins : the injured party may forgive you, your accomplice or victim may forgive you, according to the mean­ ing of human language; but the deed is done, and all the powers of Nature, were they to conspire in your behalf, could not make it undone: the consequences to the body, the consequences to the soul, though no man may perceive them, are there, are written in the annals of the Past, and must reverberate through all time. But all this, let it be understood, in no degree militates against the value or the necessity of repentance. Repentance, contrition of soul, bears, like every other act, its own fruit, the fruit of purifying the heart, of amending the future, not, as man has hitherto conceived, of effacing the Past. The commission of sin is an irrevocable act, but it does not incapaci­ tate the soul for virtue. Its consequences cannot be expunged, but its course need not be pursued. Sin, though it is in­ effaceable, calls for no despair, but for efforts more energetic than before. Re­ pentance is still as valid as ever ; but it is valid to secure the future, not to obliterate the past. PRINTED BY WATTS AND CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C. �Now Ready, X.-117 large pages (with cover • illustrated by Walter Crane), price 6d., by post 8d. (five or more copies post free at published price). THE CHILDREN’S BOOK OF MORAL LESSONS. First Series: “SELF-CONTROL” and “TRUTHFULNESS.” ’ By F. J. GOULD. (A Suitable Reading-Book for the Third or Fourth Standard.) 'AUTHOR’S PREFACE. The highest end of home and school education is to mould the child’s character as a moral being; and to attain this end we must discipline the child’s natural good feeling by systematic lessons in the interpretation of personal and civic conduct. The lessons in this book are rather “ lessons ” in the teacher’s or parent’s sense, but to the children themselves (so the author hopes) the idea of “ lesson ” will yield to the dramatic interest of the 'stories and illustrations which form the vehicles of the moral instruction. It would be a truly noble issue out of the present educational crisis if persons of all schools of thought could unite in- the establishment of a sound and practical moral teaching detached from controversial doctrines. The lessons are intended for children aged 10 to 14. F. J. G. Uniform with the R. P. A. Reprints. 160 pp., price 6d., by post 8d.; cloth is., by post is. 3d. INGERSOLL’S What LECTURES AND ESSAYS. Contents of First Series:— The Truth. The Gods. About the Holy Bible. Must We Do to be Saved? Liberty of Man, Woman, and Child. A Thanksgiving Sermon. The Ghosts. How to Reform Mankind. Art and Morality. Withfine Portrait of Author, and Introduction by Charles T. Gorham. ; The Second Series (ready shortly) will contain “The Mistakes of Moses” (complete edition), Lecture on “ Shakespeare,” etc., etc. WATTS & CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C. �NOW READY, Cloth, 4s. net, by post 4s. 4d. The Cosmos and the Creeds. ELEMENTARY NOTES ON THE ALLEGED FINALITY OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. By Captain W. USBORNE MOORE. Some Press Opinions:— “ The author does not offer any new facts, but he succeeds in his effort to clear the way for profitable discussion.”—Birmingham Gazette. suitable text-book for the commencement of their studies upon the 4 Riddle of the Universe 5 ”_ Reynolds's Newspaper. “The reader will find many orthodox beliefs “ The author has made a painstaking effort to vigorously assailed in these pages, but the collate and present in a tangible and concrete argument is well sustained in a lofty spirit.”_ form the varied facts brought to light by recent Leicester Daily Mercury* research. In this respect it is a much more readable and convincing book than some that 44 It is an able rationalistic argument for freethought as against sacerdotal dogmas, and gives have been written on the subject, and, whether the. reader agrees or not with the conclusions a suggestive review of many points in which the arrived at, a careful perusal of the facts and teachings of physical science and modern philo­ arguments cannot fail to broaden the mind and sophy run counter to the authority of the Bible enlarge the understanding.”—Oxford Review. as history. While not a book to be read with­ out shock by people who do not know how far “ Captain Moore popularises current know­ rationalist criticism has advanced, it is both an ledge on this all-important subject—knowledge, earnest and a thoughtful work, which will be scattered through many publicai ons inaccessible read with interest and profit by anyone in search to the general reader. Those interested in the j of arguments against the more reactionary great problem of existence would find this a : powers of priestcraft.”—Scotsman. J Monthly, 2d., by post 2%d., or with Supplement (January, April, July, and October) 3d. Annual Subscription, 2s. 8d. post free. The Literary Guide AND RATIONALIST REVIEW. In addition to reviews of the best books on Religion, Ethics, Science, and Philosophy, each number of the Literary Guide contains articles expository of Rationalism, frequently from the pens of prominent writers. SPECIMEN COPY POST FREE. WATTS & CO., 17, JOHNSON’S COURT, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C. � 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 &amp; 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 An entity primarily responsible for making the resource 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 The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data 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 A name given to the resource The creed of Christendom : its foundations contrasted with its superstructure Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Greg, William R. (William Rathbone) [1809-1881] Sullivan, W. R. Washington Description An account of the resource Place of publication: London Collation: 128 p. ; 22 cm. Series title: R.P.A. Cheap Reprints Series number: 20 Notes: Issued for the Rationalist Press Association. Includes bibliographical references. Printed in double columns. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection. Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Watts & Co. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1905 Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RA509 RA1670 N292 Subject The topic of the resource Christianity Bible Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <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 creed of Christendom : its foundations contrasted with its superstructure), 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> Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Language A language of the resource English Apologetics Bible-Controversial literature Bible-Criticism Christianity Free Thought NSS