By
Theodore Parker
Delivered at the
Ordination of Rev. Charles C. Shackford in the Hawes Place Church,
Boston on May 19, 1841.
Luke xxi.33. "Heaven and earth shall pass away: but my word shall not pass away."
[01] In this sentence
we have a very clear indication that Jesus of Nazareth believed
the religion he taught would be eternal, that the substance of
it would last forever. Yet there are some, who are affrighted
by the faintest rustle which a heretic makes among the dry leaves
of theology; they tremble lest Christianity it self should perish
without hope. Ever and anon the cry is raised, "The Philistines
be upon us, and Christianity is in danger." The least doubt
respecting the popular theology, or the existing machinery of
the church; the least sign of distrust in the Religion of the
Pulpit, or the Religion of the Street, is by some good men supposed
to be at enmity with faith in Christ, and capable of shaking Christianity
itself. On the other hand, a few bad men and a few pious men,
it is said, on both sides of the water, tell us the day of Christianity
is past. The latter—it is alleged—would persuade us
that, hereafter, Piety must take a new form; the teachings of
Jesus are to be passed by; that Religion is to wing her way sublime,
above the flight of Christianity, far away, toward heaven, as
the fledged eaglet leaves forever the nest which sheltered his
callow youth. Let us, therefore, devote a few moments to this
subject, and consider what is TRANSIENT in Christianity, and what
is PERMANENT therein. The topic seems not inappropriate to the
times in which we live, or the occasion that calls us together.
[02]
Christ says, his Word shall never pass away. Yet at first sight
nothing seems more fleeting than a word. It is an evanescent impulse
of the most fickle element. It leaves no track where it went through
the air. Yet to this, and this only did Jesus entrust the truth
wherewith he came laden, to the earth; truth for the salvation
of the world. He took no pains to perpetuate hiss thoughts; they
were poured fourth where occasion found him an audience,—by
the side of the lake, or a well; in a cottage, or the temple;
in a fisher's boat, or the synagogue of the Jews. He founds no
institution as a monument of his words. He appoints no order of
men to preserve his bright and glad revelations. He only bids
his friends give freely the truth they had freely received. He
did not even write his words in a book. With a noble confidence,
the result of his abiding faith, he scattered them broad-cast
on the world, leaving the seed to its own vitality. He knew, that
is of God cannot fail, for God keeps his own. He sowed his seed
in the heart, and left it there, to be watered and warmed by the
dew and the un which heaven sends. He felt his words were for
eternity. So he trusted them to the uncertain air; and for eighteen
hundred years that faithful element has held them good,—distinct
as when first warm from his lips. Now they are translated into
every human speech, and murmured in all earth's thousand tongues,
from the pine forests of the North to the palm groves of eastern
Ind. They mingle, as it were, with the roar of a populous city,
and join the chime of the desert sea. Of a Sabbath morn they are
repeated from church to church, from isle to isle, and land to
land, till their music goes round the world. Those words have
become the breath of the good, the hope of the wise, the joy of
the pious, and that for many millions of hearts. They are the
prayers of our churches; our better devotions by fireside and
fieldside; the enchantment of our hearts. It is these words, that
still work wonders, to which the first recorded miracles were
nothing in grandeur and utility. It is these, which build our
temples and beautify our homes. They raise our thoughts of sublimity;
they purify our ideal of purity: they hallow our prayer for truth
and love. The make beauteous and divine the life which plain men
lead. The give wings to our aspirations. What charmers they are!
Sorrow is lulled at their bidding. They take the sting out of
disease, and rob adversity of his power to disappoint. They give
health and wings to the pious soul, broken-hearted and shipwrecked
in his voyage of life, and encourage him to tempt the perilous
way once more. The make all things ours: Christ our brother; Time
our servant; Death our ally and the witness of our triumph. They
reveal to us the presence of God, which else we might not have
seen so clearly, in the first wind-flower of spring; in the falling
of a sparrow; in the distress of a nation; in the sorrow or the
rapture of the world. Silence the voice of Christianity, and the
world is well nigh dumb, for gone is that sweet music which kept
in awe the rulers and the people, which cheers the poor widow
in her lonely toil, and comes like light through the windows of
morning, to men who sit stooping and feeble, with failing eyes
and a hungering heart. It is gone—all gone! only the cold,
bleak world left before them.
[03]
Such is the life of these Words; such the empire they have won
for themselves over men's minds since they were spoken first.
In the mean time, the words of great men and mighty, whose name
shook whole continents, though graven in metal and stone, though
stamped in institutions and defended by whole tribes of priest
and troops of followers—their words have gone to the ground,
and the world gives back no echo of their voice. Meanwhile the
great works also of old times, castle and tower and town, their
cities and their empires, have perished, and left scarce a mark
on the bosom of the earth to show they once have been. The philosophy
of the wise, the art of the accomplished, the song of the poet,
the ritual of the priest, though honored as divine in their day,
have gone down, a prey to oblivion. Silence has closed over them;
only their spectres now haunt the earth. A deluge of blood has
swept over the nations; a night of darkness, more deep than the
fabled darkness of Egypt, has lowered down upon that flood, to
destroy or to hide what the deluge had spared. But through all
this, the words of Christianity have come down to us from the
lips of that Hebrew youth, gentle and beautiful as the light of
a star, not spent by their journey through time and through space.
They have built up a new civilization, which the wisest Gentile
never hoped for; which the most pious Hebrew never foretold. Through
centuries of wasting, these words have flown on like a dove in
the storm, and now wait to descend on hearts pure and earnest,
as the Father's spirit, we are told, came on his lowly Son. The
old heavens and the old earth are indeed passed away, but the
Word stands. Nothing shows clearer than this, how fleeting is
what man calls great; how lasting what God pronounces true.
[04]
Looking at the Word of Jesus, at real Christianity, the pure religion
he taught, nothing appears more fixed and certain. Its influence
widens as light extends; it deepens as the nations grow more wise.
But, looking at the history of what men call Christianity, nothing
seems more uncertain and perishable. While true religion is always
the same thing, in each century and every land, in each man that
feels it, the Christianity of the Pulpit, which is the religion
taught; the Christianity of the People, which is the religion
that is accepted and lived out; has never been the same thing
in any two centuries or lands, except only in name. The difference
between what is called Christianity by the Unitarians in our times,
and that of some ages past, is greater than the difference between
Mahomet and the messiah. The difference at this day between opposing
classes of Christians; the difference between the Christianity
of some sects, and that of Christ himself; is deeper and more
vital than that between Jesus and Plato, Pagan as we call him.
The Christianity of the seventh century has passed away. We recognize
only the ghost of Superstition in its faded features, as it comes
up at our call. It is one of the things which has been, and can
be no more, for neither God nor the world goes back. Its terrors
do not frighten, nor its hopes allure us. We rejoice that it has
gone. But how do we know that our Christianity shall not share
the same fate? Is there that difference between the nineteenth
century, and some seventeen that have gone before it, since Jesus,
to warrant the belief that our notion of Christianity shall last
forever? The stream of time has already beat down Philosophies
and Theologies, Temple and Church, though never so old and revered.
How do we know there is not a perishing element in what we call
Christianity? Jesus tells us, HIS Word is the word of God, and
so shall never pass away. But who tells us, that OUR word shall
never pass away? that OUR NOTION of his Word shall stand forever?
[05]
Let us look at this matter a little more closely. In actual Christianity—that
is, in that portion of Christianity which is preached and believed—there
seem to have been, ever since the time of its earthly founder,
two elements, the one transient, the other permanent. The one
is the thought, the folly, the uncertain wisdom, the theological
notions, the impiety of man; the other, the eternal truth of God.
These two bear perhaps the same relation to each other that the
phenomena of outward nature, such as sunshine and cloud, growth,
decay, and reproduction, bear to the great law of nature, which
underlies and supports them all. As in that case, more attention
is commonly paid tot he particular phenomena than to the general
law; so in this case, more is generally given to the Transient
in Christianity than to the Permanent therein.
[06]
It must be confessed, though with sorrow, that transient things
form a great part of what is commonly taught as Religion. An undue
place has often been assigned to forms and doctrines, while too
little stress has been laid on the divine life of the soul, love
to God, and love to man. Religious forms may be useful and beautiful.
They are so, whenever they speak to the soul, and answer a want
thereof. In our present state some forms are perhaps necessary.
But they are only the accident of Christianity; not its substance.
They are the robe, not the angel, who may take another robe, quite
as becoming and useful. One sect has many forms; another none.
Yet both may be equally Christian, in spite of the redundance
or the deficiency. They are a par of the language in which religion
speaks, and exist, with few exceptions, wherever man is found.
In our calculating nation, in our rationalizing sect, we have
retained but two of the rites so numerous in the early Christian
church, and even these we have attenuated to the last degree,
leaving them little more than a spectre of the ancient form. Another
age may continue or forsake both; may revive old forms, or invent
new ones to suit the altered circumstance of the times, and yet
be Christians quite as good as we, or our fathers of the dark
ages. Whether the Apostles designed these rites to be perpetual,
seems a question which belongs to scholars and antiquarians; not
to us, as Christian men and women. So long as they satisfy or
help the pious heart, so long they are good. Looking behind, or
around us, we see that the forms and rites of the Christians are
quite as fluctuating as those of the heathens; from whom some
of them have been, not unwisely, adopted by the earlier church.
[07]
Again, the doctrines that have been connected with Christianity,
and taught in its name, are quite as changeable as the form. This
also takes place unavoidably. If observations be made upon Nature,—which
must take place so long as man has sense and understanding,—there
will be a philosophy of Nature, and philosophical doctrines. These
will differ as the observations are just or inaccurate, and as
the deductions from observed facts are true or false. Hence there
will be different schools of natural philosophy, so long as men
have eyes and understandings of different clearness and strength.
And if men observe and reflect upon Religion,—which will
be done so long as man is a religious and reflective being,—there
must also be a philosophy of religion, a theology and theological
doctrines. These will differ, as men have felt much or little
religion, as they analyze their sentiments correctly or otherwise,
and as they have reasoned right or wrong. Now the true system
of Nature which exists in the outward facts, whether discovered
our not, is always the same thing, though the philosophy of Nature,
which men invent, changes every month, and be one thing at London
and the opposite at Berlin. Thus there but one system of Nature
as it exits in fact, though many theories, which exist in our
imperfect notion of that system, and by which we may approximate
and at length reach it. Now there can be but one Religion which
is absolutely true, existing in the facts of human nature, and
the ideas of Infinite God. That. whether acknowledged or not,
is always the same thing and never changes. So far as a man has
any real religion—either the principle or the sentiment thereof—so
far he has that, by whatever name he may call it. For, strictly
speaking, there is but one kind of religion, as there is but one
kind of love, though the manifestations of this religion, in forms,
doctrine, and life, be never so diverse. It is through these,
men approximate to the true expression of this religion. Now while
this religion is one and always the same thing, there may be numerous
system of theology or philosophies of religion. These with their
creeds, confessions, and collections of doctrines, deduced by
reasoning upon the facts observed, may be baseless and false,
either because the observation was too narrow in extent, or otherwise
defective in point of accuracy, or because the reasoning was illogical,
and therefore the deduction spurious. Each of these three faults
is conspicuous in the systems of theology. Now the solar system
as it exists in fact is permanent, though the notions of Thales
and Ptolemy, of Copernicus and Descartes about this system, prove
transient, imperfect approximations to the true expression. So
the Christianity of Jesus is permanent, though what passes for
Christianity with Popes and catechisms, with sects and churches,
in the first century or in the nineteenth century, prove transient
also. Now it has sometimes happened that a man took his philosophy
of Nature at second hand, and then attempted to make his observations
conform to his theory, and Nature ride in his panniers. Thus some
philosophers refused to look at the Moon through Galileo's telescope,
for, according to their theory of vision, such an instrument would
not aid the sight. Thus their preconceived notions stood up between
them and Nature. Now it has often happened that men took their
theology thus at second hand, and distorted the history of the
world an man's nature besides, to make Religion conform to their
notions. Their theology stood between them and God. Those obstinate
philosophers have disciples in no small number.
[08]
What another has said of false systems of science, will apply
equally to the popular theology: "It is barren in effects,
fruitful in questions, slow and languid in its improvement, exhibiting
in it generality the counterfeit of perfection, but ill filled
up in its details, popular in its choice, but suspected by its
very promoters, and therefore bolstered up and countenanced with
artifices. Even those who have been determined to try for themselves,
to add their support to earning, and to enlarge its limits, have
not dared entirely to desert received opinions, nor to seek the
spring-head of things. But they think they have done a great thing
if they intersperse and contribute something of their own; prudently
considering, that by their assent they can save their modesty,
and by their contributions, their liberty. Neither is there, nor
ever will be, an end or limit to these things. One snatches at
one thing, another is pleased with another; there is no dry nor
clear sight of anything. Every one plays the philosopher out of
the small treasures of his own fancy. The more sublime wits more
acutely and with better success; the duller with less success
but equal obstinacy, and, by the discipline of some learned men,
sciences are bounded within the limits of some certain authors
which they have set down, imposing them upon old men and instilling
them into young. So that now (as Tully cavilled upon CÊsar's
consulship) the star Lyra riseth by an edict, and authority is
taken for truth and not truth for authority; which kind of order
and discipline is very convenient for our present use, but banisheth
those which are better."
[09]
Any one, who traces the history of what is called Christianity,
will see that nothing changes more from age to age than the doctrines
taught as Christian, and insisted on as essential to Christianity
and personal salvation. What is falsehood in one province passes
for truth in another. The heresy of one age is the orthodox belief
and "only infallible rule" of the next. Now Arius, and
now Athanasius is Lord of the ascendant. Both were excommunicated
in their turn, each for affirming what the other denied. Men are
burned for professing what men are burned for denying. For centuries
the doctrines of the Christians were no better, to say the least,
than those of their contemporary pagans. The theological doctrines
derived from our fathers seem to have come from Judaism, Heathenism,
and the caprice of philosophers, far more than they have come
from the principle and sentiment of Christianity. The doctrine
of the Trinity, the very Achilles of theological dogmas, belongs
to philosophy and not religion; its subtleties cannot even be
expressed in our tongue. As old religions became superannuated
and died out, they left to the rising faith, as to a residuary
legatee, their forms and their doctrines; or rather, as the giant
in the fable left his poisoned garment to work the overthrow of
his conqueror. Many tenets, that pass current in our theology,
seem to be the refuse of idol temples; the off-scourings of Jewish
and heathen cities, rather than the sands of virgin gold, which
the stream of Christianity has worn off from the rock of ages,
and brought in it bosom for us. It is wood, hay, an stubble, wherewith
men have built on the corner stone Christ laid. What wonder the
fabric is in peril when tried by fire? The stream of Christianity,
as men receive it, has caught a stain from every soil it has filtered
through, so that now it is not the pure water from the well of
Life, which is offered to our lips, but streams troubled and polluted
by man with mire and dirt. If Paul and Jesus could read our books
of theological doctrines, would they accept as their teaching,
what men have vented in their name? Never till the letters of
Paul had faded out of his memory; never till the words of Jesus
had been torn out from the Book of Life. It is their notions about
Christianity men have taught as the only living word of God. They
have piled their own rubbish against the temple of Truth where
Piety comes to worship; what wonder the pile seems unshapely and
like to fall? But these theological doctrines are fleeting as
the leaves on the trees. They—
"Are found
Now green in youth, now withered on the ground;
Another race the following spring supplies;
They fall successive and successive rise."
[10] Like clouds
of the sky, they are here to-day; to-morrow, all swept off and
vanished; while Christianity itself, like the heaven above, with
its sun, and moon, and uncounted stars, is always over our head,
though the cloud sometimes debars us of the needed light. It must
of necessity be the case that our reasonings, and therefore our
theological doctrines, are imperfect, and so perishing. It is
only gradually that we approach to the true system of Nature by
observation and reasoning, and work out our philosophy and theology
by the toil of the brain. But meantime, it we are faithful, the
great truths of morality and religion, the deep sentiment of love
to man and love to God, are perceived intuitively, and by instinct,
as it were, though our theology be imperfect and miserable. The
theological notions of Abraham, to take the story as it stands,
were exceedingly gross, yet a great than Abraham has told us Abraham
desired to see my day, saw it, and was glad. Since these notions
are so fleeting, why need we accept the commandment of men, as
the doctrine of God?
[11]
This transitoriness of doctrines appears, in many instances, of
which two may be selected for a more attentive consideration.
First, the doctrine respecting the origin and authority of the
Old and New Testament. There has been a time when men were burned
for asserting doctrines of natural philosophy, which rested on
evidence the most incontestable, because those doctrines conflicted
with sentences in the Old Testament. Every word of that Jewish
record was regarded as miraculously inspired, and therefore as
infallibly true. It was believed that the Christian religion itself
rested thereon, and must stand or fall with the immaculate Hebrew
text. He was deemed no small sinner who found mistakes in manuscripts.
On the authority of the written Word, man was taught to believe
impossible legends, conflicting assertions; to take fiction for
fact; a dream for a miraculous revelation of God; an oriental
poem for a grave history of miraculous events; a collection of
amatory idyls for a serious discourse "touching the mutual
love of Christ and the Church;" they have been taught to
accept a picture sketched by some glowing eastern imagination,
never intended to be taken for reality, as proof that the Infinite
God spoke in human words, appeared in the shape of a cloud, a
flaming bush, or a man who ate, and drank, and vanished into smoke;
that he gave counsels today, and the opposite tomorrow; that he
violated his own laws; was angry, and was only dissuaded by a
mortal man from destroying at once a whole nation—millions
of men who rebelled against their leader in a moment of anguish.
Questions in philosophy, questions in the Christian religion,
have been settled by an appeal to that book. The inspiration of
its authors has been assumed as infallible. Every fact in the
early Jewish history has been taken as a type of some analogous
fact in Christian history. The most distant events, even such
as are still in the arms of time, were supposed to be clearly
foreseen and foretold by pious Hebrews several centuries before
Christ. It has been assumed at the outset, with no shadow of evidence,
that those writers held a miraculous communication with God, such
as he has granted to no other man. What was originally a presumption
of bigoted Jews became an article of faith, which Christians were
burned for not believing. This has been for centuries the general
opinion of the Christian church, both Catholic and Protestant,
though the former never accepted the Bible as the only
source or religious truth. It has been so. Still worse, it is
now the general opinion of religious sects at this day. Hence
the attempt, which always fails, to reconcile the philosophy or
our times with the poems in Genesis writ a thousand years before
Christ; hence the attempt to conceal the contradictions in the
record itself. Matters have come to such a pass, that even now
he is deemed an infidel, if not by implication an atheist, whose
reverence for the Most High forbids him to believe that God commanded
Abraham to sacrifice his Son, a thought at which the flesh creeps
with horror; to believe it solely on the authority of an oriental
story, written down nobody know when or by whom, or for what purpose;
which may be a poem, but cannot be the record of a fact, unless
God is the author of confusion and a lie.
[11]
Now this idolatry of the Old Testament has not always existed.
Jesus says that none born of a woman is greater than John the
Baptist, yet the least in the kingdom of heaven was greater than
John. Paul tells us the Law—the very crown of the old Hebrew
revelation—is a shadow of good things, which have now come,
that we are no longer under the schoolmaster; that it was a law
of sin and death, from which we are made free by the Law of the
spirit of Life. Christian teachers themselves have differed so
widely in their notion of the doctrines and meaning of those books,
that it makes one weep to think of the follies deduced therefrom.
But modern Criticism is fast breaking to pieces this idol which
men have made out of the Scriptures. It has show that here are
the most different works thrown together. That their authors,
wise as they sometimes were; pious as we feel often their spirit
to have been, had only that inspiration which is common to other
men equally pious and wise; that they were by no means infallible;
but were mistaken in facts or in reasoning; uttered predictions
which time has not fulfilled; men who in some measure partook
of the darkness and limited notions of their age, and where not
always above its mistakes or its corruptions.
[12]
The history of opinions on the New Testament is quite similar.
It has been assumed at the outset, it would seem with no sufficient
reason, without the smallest pretence on its writers' part, that
all of its authors were infallibly and miraculously inspired,
so that they could commit no error of doctrine or fact. Men have
been bid to close their eyes at the obvious difference between
Luke and John; the serious disagreement between Paul and Peter;
to believe, on the smallest evidence, accounts which shock the
moral sense and revolt the reason, and tend to place Jesus in
the same series with Hercules, and Apollonius of Tyana; accounts
which Paul in the Epistles never mentions, thought he also had
a vein of the miraculous running quite through him. Men have been
told that all these things must be taken as part of Christianity,
and if they accepted the religion, they must take all these accessories
along with it; that the living spirit could not be had without
the killing letter. All the books, which caprice or accident had
brought together between the lids of the Bible, were declared
to be the infallible word of God; the only certain rule of religious
faith and practice. Thus the Bible was made not a single channel,
but the only certain rule of religious faith and practice.
To disbelieve any of its statements, or even the common interpretation
put upon those statements by the particular age or church in which
the man belonged, was held to be infidelity if not atheism. In
the name of him who forbid us to judge our brother, good men and
pious men have applied these terms to others, good and pious as
themselves. That state of things has by no means passed away.
Men, who cry down the absurdities of Paganism in the worst spirit
of the French "free- thinkers," call others infidels
and atheists, who point out, though reverently, other absurdities
which men have piled upon Christianity. so the world goes. An
idolatrous regard for the imperfect scripture of God's word, is
the apple of Atalanta, which defeats theologians running for the
hand of divine truth.
[13]
But the current notions respecting the infallible inspiration
of the Bible have no foundation in the Bible itself. Which Evangelist,
which Apostle of the New Testament, what Prophet or Psalmist of
the Old Testament, ever claims infallible authority for himself
or for others? Which of them does not in his own writings show
that he was finite, and with all his zeal and piety, possessed
but a limited inspiration, the bound whereof we can sometimes
discover? Did Christ ever demand that men should assent to the
doctrines of the Old Testament, credit its stories, and take its
poems for histories, and believe equally two accounts that contradict
one another? Has he ever told you that all the truths of his religion,
all the beauty of a Christian life should be contained in the
writings of those men, who, even after his resurrection, expected
him to be a Jewish king; of men who were sometimes at variance
with one another and misunderstood his divine teachings? Would
not those modest writers themselves be confounded at the idolatry
we pay them? Opinions may change on these points, as thy have
often changed—changed greatly and for the worse since the
days of Paul. They are changing now, and we may hope for the better;
for God makes man's folly as well as his wrath to praise Him,
and continually brings good out of evil.
[14]
Another instance of the transitoriness of doctrines, taught as
Christian, is found in those which relate to the nature and authority
of Christ. One ancient party has told us, that he is the infinite
God; another, that he is both God and man; a third, that he was
a man, the son of Joseph and Mary,—born as we are; tempted
like ourselves; inspired , as we may be, if we will pay the price.
Each of the former parties believed its doctrine on this head
was infallibly true, and formed the very substance of Christianity,
and was one of the essential conditions of salvation, though scarce
any two distinguished teachers, of ancient or modern times, agree
in their expression of this truth.
[15]
Almost every sect, that has ever been, makes Christianity rest
on the personal authority of Jesus, and not the immutable truth
of the doctrines themselves, or the authority of God, who sent
him into the world. Yet it seems difficult to conceive any reason,
why moral and religious truths should rest for their support on
the personal authority of their revealer, any more than the truths
of science on that of him who makes them known first or most clearly,
It is hard to see why the great truths of Christianity rest on
the personal authority of Jesus, more than the axioms of geometry
rest on the personal authority of Euclid, or Archimedes. The authority
of Jesus, as of all teachers, one would naturally think, must
rest on the truth of his words, and not their truth on his authority.
[16]
Opinions respecting the nature of Christ seem to be constantly
changing. In the three first centuries after Christ, it appears,
great latitude of speculation prevailed. Some said he was God,
with nothing of human nature, his body only an illusion; others,
that he was man, with nothing of the divine nature, his miraculous
birth having not foundation in fact. In a few centuries it was
decreed by councils that he was God, thus honoring the divine
element; next, that he was man also, thus admitting the human
side. For some ages the Catholic Church seems to have dwelt chiefly
on the divine nature that was in him, leaving the human element
to mystics and other heretical persons, whose bodies served to
flesh the swords of orthodox believers. The stream of Christianity
has come to us in two channels—one within the Church, the
other without the Church—and it is not hazarding too much
to say, that since the fourth century the true Christian life
has been out of the established Church, and not in it, but rather
in the ranks of dissenters. From the Reformation till the latter
part of the last century, we are told, the Protestant Church dwelt
chiefly on the human side of Christ, and since that time many
works have been written to show how the to - perfect Deity and
perfect manhood—were united in his character. But, all this
time, scarce any two eminent teachers agree on these points, however
orthodox they may be called. What a difference between the Christ
of John Gerson and John Calvin, - - yet were both accepted teachers
and pious men. What a difference between the Christ of Unitarians
and the Methodists—yet may men of both sects be true Christians
and acceptable with God. What a difference between the Christ
of Matthew and John—yet both were disciples, and their influence
is wide as Christendom and deep as the heart of man. But on this
there is not time to enlarge.
[17]
Now it seems clear, that the notion men form about the origin
and nature of the scriptures; respecting the nature and authority
of Christ, having nothing to do with Christianity except as it
aids or its adversaries; they are not the foundation of its truths.
These are theological questions; not religious questions. Their
connection with Christianity appears accidental; for if Jesus
had taught at Athens, and not a Jerusalem if he had wrought no
miracle, and none but the human nature had ever been ascribed
to him; if the Old Testament had forever been perished at his
birth,—Christianity would still have been the Word of God;
it would have lost none of its truths. It would be just as true,
just as beautiful, just as lasting, as now it is; though we should
have lost so many a blessed word, and the work of Christianity
itself would have been, perhaps, a long time retarded.
[18]
To judge the future by the past, the former authority of the Old
Testament can never return. Its present authority cannot stand.
It must be taken for what it is worth. The occasional folly and
impiety of its authors must pass for no more than their value;—while
the religion, the wisdom, the love, which make fragrant its leaves,
will still speak to the best hearts as hitherto, and in accents
even more divine, when Reason is allowed her rights. The ancient
belief in the infallible inspiration of each sentence of the New
Testament is fast changing; very fast. One writer, not a skeptic,
but a Christian of unquestioned piety, sweeps off the beginning
of Matthew; another, of a different church and equally religious,
the end of John. Numerous critics strike off several epistles.
The Apocalypse itself it not spared, notwithstanding its concluding
curse. Who shall tell us the work of retrenchment is to stop here;
that others will not demonstrate, what some pious hearts have
long felt, that errors of doctrine and errors of fact may be found
in many parts of the record, here and there, from the beginning
of Matthew to the end of Acts? We see how opinions have changed
ever since the apostles' time; and who shall assure us that they
were not sometimes mistaken in historical, as well as doctrinal
matters; did not sometimes confound the actual with the imaginary;
and that the fancy of these pious writers never stood in the place
of their recollection?
[19]
But what if this should take place? Is Christianity then to perish
out of the heart of the nations, and vanish from the memory of
the world, like the religions that were before Abraham? It must
be so, if it rest on a foundation which a scoffer may shake, and
a score of pious critics shake down. But this is the foundation
of a theology, not of Christianity. That does not rest on the
decision of Councils. It is not to stand or fall with the infallible
inspiration of a few Jewish fishermen, who have writ their names
in characters of light all over the world. It does not continue
to stand through the forbearance of some critic, who can cut,
when he will, the thread on which its life depends. Christianity
does not rest on the infallible authority of the New Testament,
It depends o this collection of books for the historical statement
of its facts. In this we do not require infallible inspiration
on the part of the writers, more than in the record of other historical
facts. To me it seems as presumptuous, on the one hand, for the
believer to claim this evidence for the truth of Christianity,
as it is absurd, on the other hand, for the skeptic to demand
such evidence to support these historical statements. I cannot
see that it depends on the personal authority of Jesus. He was
the organ through which the Infinite spoke. It is God that was
manifested in the flesh by him, on whom rests the truth which
Jesus brought to light and made clear and beautiful in his life;
and if Christianity be true, it seems useless to look for any
other authority to uphold it, as for some one to support Almighty
God. So if it could be proved,—as it cannot,—in opposition
to the greatest amount of historical evidence ever collected on
any similar point, that the gospels were the fabrication of designing
and artful men, that Jesus of Nazareth had never lived, still
Christianity would stand firm, and fear no evil. None of the doctrines
of that religion would fall to the ground; for if true, they stand
by themselves. But we should lose,—oh, irreparable loss!—the
example of that character, so beautiful, so divine, that no human
genius could have conceived it, as none, after all the progress
and refinement of eighteen centuries, seems fully to have comprehended
its lustrous life. If Christianity were true, we should still
think it was so, not because its record was written by infallible
pens; nor because it was lived out by an infallible teacher,—but
that it is true, like the axioms of geometry, because it is true,
and is to be tried by the oracle God places in the breast. If
it rest on the personal authority of Jesus alone, then there is
no certainty of its truth, if he were ever mistake in the smallest
matter, as some Christians have thought he was, in predicting
his second coming.
[20]
These doctrines respecting the scriptures have often changed,
and are but fleeting. Yet men lay much stress on them. Some cling
to these notions as if they were Christianity itself. It is about
these and similar points that theological battles are fought from
age to age. Men sometimes use worst the choicest treasure God
bestows. This is especially true of the use men make of the Bible.
Some men have regarded it as the heathen their idol, or the savage
his fetish. They have subordinated Reason, Conscience, and Religion
to this. Thus have they lost half the treasure it bears in its
boom. No doubt the time will come when its true character shall
be felt. Then it will be seen, that, amid all the contradictions
of the Old Testament; its legends so beautiful as fictions, so
appalling as facts; amid its predictions that have never been
fulfilled; amid the puerile conceptions of God, which sometimes
occur, and the cruel denunciations that disfigure both Psalm and
Prophecy, there is a reverence for man's nature, a sublime trust
in God, and a depth of piety rarely felt in these cold northern
hearts of ours. Then the devotion of is authors, the loftiness
of their aim, and the majesty of their life, will appear doubly
fair, and Prophet and Psalmist will warm our hearts as never before.
Their voice will cheer the young and sanctify the gray-headed;
will charm us in the toil of life, and sweeten the cup Death gives
us, when he comes to shake off this mantle of flesh. Then will
it be seen, that the words of Jesus are music of heaven, sung
in an earthy voice, and the echo of these words in John and Paul
owe their efficacy to their truth and their depth, and to no accidental
matter connected therewith. Then can the Word,—which was
in the beginning and now is,—find access to the innermost
heart of man, and speak these as now it seldom speaks. Then shall
the Bible,—which is a whole library of the deepest and most
earnest thoughts and feelings an piety and love, ever recorded
in human speech,—be read oftener than ever before, not with
Superstition, but with Reason, Conscience, and Faith fully active.
Then shall it sustain men bowed down with many sorrows; rebuke
sin; encourage virtue; sow the world broad-cast and quick with
the seed of love, that man may reap a harvest for life everlasting.
[21]
With all the obstacles men have thrown in its path, how much has
the Bible done for mankind. No abuse has deprived us of all its
blessings. You trace its path across the world from the day of
Pentecost to this day. As a river springs up in the heart of a
sandy continent, having its father in the skies and its birth-
place in distant, unknown mountains; as the stream rolls on, enlarging
itself, making in that arid waste a belt of verdure, wherever
it turns its way; creating palm groves and fertile plains, where
the smoke of the cottager curls up at even-tide, and marble cities
send the gleam of their splendor far into the sky;—such has
been the course of the Bible on the earth. Despite of idolaters
bowing to the dust before it, it has made a deeper mark on the
world than the rich and beautiful literature of all the heathen.
The first book of the Old Testament tells man he is made in the
image of God; the first of the New Testament gives us the motto,
Be perfect as your Father in heaven. Higher words were never spoken.
How the truths of the Bible have blest us. There is not a boy
on all the hills of New England; not a girl born in the filthiest
cellar which disgraces a capital in Europe, and cries to God against
the barbarism of modern civilization; not a boy or a girl all
Christendom through, but their lot is made better by that great
book.
[22]
Doubtless the time will come when men shall see Christ also as
he is. Well might he still say: "Have I been so long with
you, and yet hast thou not known me?" No! we have made him
an idol, have bowed the knee before him, saying, "Hail, king
of the Jews;" called him "Lord, Lord!" but done
not he things which he said. The history of the Christian world
might well be summed up in one word of the evangelist—"and
there they crucified him," for there has never been an age
when men did not crucify the Son of God afresh. But if error prevail
for a time and grow old in the world, truth will triumph at the
last, and then we shall see the Son of God as he is. Lifted up
he shall draw all nations unto him. Then will men understand the
Word of Jesus, which shall not pass away. Then shall we see and
love the divine life that he lived. How vast has his influence
been. How his spirit wrought in the hearts of his disciples, rude,
selfish, bigoted, as at first they were. How it has wrought in
the world. His words judge the nations. The wisest son of man
has not measured their height. They speak to what is deepest in
profound men; what is holiest in good men; what is divinest in
religious men. They kindle anew the flame of devotion in hearts
long cold. They are Spirit and Life. His truth was not derived
from Moses and Solomon; but the light of God shone through him,
not colored, not bent aside. His life is the perpetual rebuke
of all time since. It condemns ancient civilization; it condemns
modern civilization. Wise men we have since had, and good men;
but this Galilean youth strode before the world whole thousands
of years,—so much of Divinity was in him. His words solve
the questions of the present age. In him the Godlike and the Human
met and embraced, and a divine Life was born. Measure him by the
world's greatest sons;—how poor they are. Try him by the
best of men,—how little and low hey appear. Exalt him as
much as we may, we shall yet, perhaps, come short of the mark.
But still was he not our brother; the son of man, as we are; the
Son of God, like ourselves? His excellence, was it not human excellence?
His wisdom, love, piety,—sweet and celestial as they were,—are
they not what we also may attain? In him, as in mirror, we may
se the image of God, and go on from glory to glory, till we are
changed into the same image, led by the spirit which enlightens
the humble. Viewed in this way, how beautiful is the life of Jesus.
Heaven has come down to earth, or rather, earth has become heaven.
The Son of God, come of age, has taken possession of his birthright.
The brightest revelation is this,—of what is possible for
all men, if not now at least hereafter. How pure is his spirit,
and how encouraging its words. "Lowly sufferer," he
seems to say, "see how I bore the cross. Patient laborer,
be strong; see how I toiled for the unthankful and the merciless.
Mistaken sinner, see of what thou art capable. Rise up, and be
blessed."
[23]
But if, as some early Christians began to do, you take a heathen
view, and make him a God, the Son of God in a peculiar and exclusive
sense—much of the significance of his character is gone.
His virtue has no merit; his love no feeling; his cross no burthen;
his agony no pain. His death is an illusion; his resurrection
but a show. For if he were not a man, but a god, what are all
these thing; what his words, his life, his excellence of achievement?—It
is all nothing, weighed against the illimitable greatness of Him
who created the worlds and fills up all time and space! Then his
resignation is no lesson; his life not model; his death no triumph
to you or me,—who are not gods, but mortal men, that know
not what a day shall bring forth, and walk by faith "dim
sounding on our perilous way." Alas, we have despaired of
man, and so cut off his brightest hope.
[24]
In respect of doctrines as well as forms we see all is transitory.
"Every where is instability and insecurity." Opinions
have changed most, on points deemed most vital. Could we bring
up a Christian teacher of any age,—from the sixth to the
fourteenth century, for example, though a teacher of undoubted
soundness of faith, whose word filled the churches of Christendom,
clergymen would scarce allow him to kneel at their altar, or sit
down with them at the Lord's table. His notions of Christianity
could not be expressed in our forms; nor could our notions be
made intelligible to his ears. The questions of his age, those
on which Christianity was thought to depend,—questions which
perplexed and divided the subtle doctors,—are no questions
to us. The quarrels which then drove wise men mad, now only excite
a smile or a tear, as we are disposed to laugh or weep at the
frailty of man. We have other straws of our own to quarrel for.
Their ancient books of devotion do not speak to us; their theology
is a vain word. To look back but a short period, the theological
speculations of our fathers during the last two centuries; their
"practical divinity;" even the sermons written by genius
and piety, are, with rare exceptions, found unreadable; such a
change is there in the doctrines.
[25]
Now who shall tell us that the change is to stop here? That this
sect or that, or even all sects united, have exhausted the river
of life, and received it all in their canonized urns, so that
we need draw no more out of the eternal well, but get refreshment
nearer at hand? Who shall tell us that another age will not smile
at our doctrines, disputes, and unchristian quarrels about Christianity,
and make wide the mouth at men who walked brave in orthodox raiment,
delighting to blacken the names of heretics, and repeat again
the old charge "he hath blasphemed"? Who shall tell
us they will not weep at the folly of all such as fancied Truth
shone only into the contracted nook of their school, or sect,
or coterie? Men of other times may look down equally on the heresy-hunters,
and men hunted for heresy, and wonder at both. The men of all
ages before us, were quite as confident as we, that their opinion
was truth; that their notion was Christianity and the whole thereof.
The men who lit the fires of persecution, from the first martyr
to Christian bigotry down to the last murder of the innocents,
had no doubt their opinion was divine. The contest about transubstantiation,
and the immaculate purity of the Hebrew and Greek texts of the
scriptures, was waged with a bitterness unequalled in these days.
The Protestant smiles at one, the Catholic at the other, and men
of sense wonder at both. It might teach us a lesson, at least
of forbearance. No doubt, an age will come, in which ours shall
be reckoned a period of darkness—like the sixth century—when
men groped for the wall but stumbled and fell, because they trust
a transient notion, not an eternal truth; an age when temples
were full of idols, set up by human folly, an age in which Christian
light had scarce begun to shine into men's hearts. But while this
changed goes on; while one generation of opinions passes away,
and another rises up; Christianity itself, that pure Religion,
which exists eternal in the constitution of the soul and the mind
of God, is always the same. The Word that was before Abraham,
in the very beginning, will not change, for that word is Truth.
From this Jesus subtracted nothing; to this he added nothing.
But he came to reveal it as the secret of God, that cunning men
could not understand, but which filled the souls of men meek and
lowly of heart. This truth we owe to God; the revelation thereof
to Jesus, our elder brother, God's chosen son.
[26]
To turn away from the disputes of the Catholics and the Protestants,
of the Unitarian and the Trinitarian, of Old School and New School,
and come to the plain words of Jesus of Nazareth, Christianity
is a simple thing; very simple. It is absolute, pure Morality;
absolute, pure Religion; the love of man; the love of God acting
without let or hindrance. The only creed it lays down is the great
truth which springs up spontaneous in the holy heart—there
is a God. Its watchword is, be perfect as your Father in Heaven.
The only form it demands is a divine life; doing the best thing,
in the best way, from the highest motives; perfect obedience to
the great law of God. Its sanction is the voice of God in your
heart; the perpetual presence of Him, who made us and the stars
over our head; Christ and the Father abiding within us. All this
is very simple; a little child can understand it; very beautiful,
the loftiest mind can find nothing so lovely. Try it by Reason,
Conscience, and Faith—things highest in man's nature—we
see no redundance, we feel no deficiency. Examine the particular
duties it enjoins; humility, reverence, sobriety, gentleness,
charity, forgiveness, fortitude, resignation, faith, and active
love; try the whole extent of Christianity so well summed up in
the command, "Thou shalt love he Lord they God with all thy
heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind—thou
shalt love thy neighbor as thyself;" and is there anything
therein that can perish? No, the very opponents of Christianity
have rarely found fault with the teachings of Jesus. The end of
Christianity seems to be to make all men one with God as Christ
was one with Him; to bring them to such a state of obedience and
goodness, that we shall think divine thoughts and feel divine
sentiments, and so keep the law of God by living a life of truth
and love. Its means are Purity and Prayer; getting strength from
God and using it for our fellow men as well as ourselves. It allows
perfect freedom. It does not demand all men to think alike,
but to think uprightly, and get as near as possible to the truth;
not all men to live alike, but to live holy, and get as
near as possible to a life perfectly divine. Christ set up no
pillars of Hercules, beyond which men must not sail the sea in
quest of truth. He says, "I have many things to say unto
you, but ye cannot bear them now ... Greater works than these
shall ye do." Christianity lays no rude hand on the sacred
peculiarity of individual genius and character. But there is no
Christian sect which does not fetter a man. It would make all
men think alike, or smother their conviction in silence. Were
all men Quakers or Catholics, Unitarians or Baptists, there would
be much less diversity of thought, character, and life; less of
truth active in the world than now. But Christianity gives us
the largest liberty of the sons of God, and were all men Christians
after the fashion of Jesus, this variety would be a thousand times
greater than now; for Christianity is not a system of doctrines,
but rather a method of attaining oneness with God. It demands,
therefore, a good life of piety within, of purity without, and
gives the promise that who does God's `will, shall know of God's
doctrine.
[27]
In an age of corruption, as all ages are, Jesus stood and looked
up to God. There was nothing between him and the Father of all;
no old word, be it of Moses or Esaias, of a living Rabbi or Sanhedrin
of Rabbis; no sin or perverseness of the finite will. As the result
of this virgin purity of soul and perfect obedience, the light
of God shone down into the very deeps of his soul, bringing all
of the Godhead which flesh can receive. He would have us do the
same; worship with nothing between us and God; act, think feel,
live, in perfect obedience to Him; and we never are Christians
as he was the Christ, until we worship, as Jesus did, with
no mediator, with nothing between us and the Father of all. He
felt that God's word was in him; that he was one with God. He
told what he saw—the Truth; he lived what he felt—a
life of Love. The truth he brought to light must have been always
the same before the eyes of all-seeing God, nineteen centuries
before Christ, or nineteen centuries after him. A life supported
by the principle and quickened by the sentiment of religion, if
true to both, is always the same thing in Nazareth or New England.
Now that divine man received these truths from God; was illumined
more clearly by "the light that lighteneth every man";
combined or involved all the truths of Religion and Morality in
his doctrine, and made them manifest in his life. Then his words
and example passed into the world, and can no more perish than
the stars be wiped out of the sky. The truths he taught; his doctrines
respecting man and God; the relation between man and man, and
man and God, with the duties that grow out of that relation, are
always the same, and can never change till man ceases to be man,
and creation vanishes into nothing. No; forms and opinions change
and perish; but the Word of God cannot fail. The form Religion
takes, the doctrines wherewith she is girded, can never be the
same in any two centuries or two men; for since the sum of religious
doctrines is both the result and the measure of a man's total
growth in wisdom, virtue, and piety, and since men will always
differ in these respects, so religious doctrines and forms
will always differ, always be transient, as Christianity goes
forth and scatters the seed she bears in her hand. But the Christianity
holy men feel in the heart—the Christ that is born within
us, is always the same thing to each soul that feels it. This
differs only in degree and not in kind, from age to age and man
to man; there is something in Christianity which no sect from
the "Ebionites" to the "latter day saints"
ever entirely overlooked. This is that common Christianity, which
burns in the hearts of pious men.
[28]
Real Christianity gives men new life. It is the growth and perfect
action of the Holy Spirit God puts into the sons of men. It makes
us outgrow any form, or any system of doctrines we have devised,
and approach still closer to the truth. It would lead us to take
what help we can find. It would make the Bible our servant, not
our master. It would teach us to profit by the wisdom and piety
of David and Solomon; but not to sin their sins, nor bow to their
idols. it would make us revere the holy words spoken by "godly
men of old," but revere still more the word of God spoken
through Conscience, Reason, and Faith, as the holiest of all.
It would not make Christ the despot of the soul, but the brother
of all men. It would not tell us, that even he had exhausted the
fulness of God, so that He could create none greater; for with
Him "all things are possible," and neither Old Testament
or New Testament ever hints that creation exhausts the creator.
Still less would it tell us, the wisdom, the piety the love, the
manly excellence of Jesus, was the result of miraculous agency
alone, but, that it was won, like the excellence of humbler men,
by faithful obedience to Him who gave his Son such ample heritage.
It would point to him as our brother, who went before, like he
good shepherd, to charm us with the music of his words, and with
he beauty of his life to tempt us up the steeps of mortal toil,
within the gate of Heaven. It would have us make the kingdom of
God on earth, and enter more fittingly the kingdom on high. It
would lead us to form Christ in the heart, on which Paul laid
such stress, and work out our salvation by this. For it is not
so much by the Christ who lived so blameless and beautiful eighteen
centuries ago, that we are saved directly, but by the Christ we
form in our hearts and live out in our daily life, that we save
ourselves, God working with us, both to will and to do.
[29]
Compare the simpleness of Christianity, as Christ sets it forth
on the Mount, with what is sometimes taught and accepted in that
honored name; and what a difference. One is of God; one is of
man. There is something in Christianity which sects have not reached;
something that will not be won, we fear, by theological battles,
or the quarrels of pious men; still we may rejoice that Christ
is preached in any way. The Christianity of sects, of the pulpit,
of society, is ephemeral—a transitory fly. It will pass off
and be forgot. Some new form will take its place, suited to the
aspect of the changing times. Each will represent something of
the truth; but no one the whole. It seems the whole race of man
is needed to do justice to the whole of truth, as "the whole
church, to preach the whole gospel." Truth is entrusted for
the time to a perishable Ark of human contrivance. Though often
shipwrecked, she always comes safe to land, and is not changed
by her mishap. That pure ideal Religion which Jesus saw on the
mount of his vision, and lived out in the lowly life of a Galilean
peasant; which transforms his cross into an emblem of all that
is holiest on earth; which makes sacred the ground he trod, and
is dearest to the best of men, most true to what is truest in
them, cannot pass away. Let men improve never so far in civilization,
or soar never so high on the wings of Religion and Love, they
can never outgo the flight of truth and Christianity. It will
always be above them. It is as if we were to fly towards a Star,
which becomes larger and more bright the nearer we approach, till
we enter and are absorbed in its glory.
[30]
If we look carelessly on the ages that have gone by, or only on
the surfaces of things as they come up before us, there is reason
to fear; for we confound the truth of God with the word of man.
So at a distance the cloud and the mountain seem the same. When
the drift changes with he passing wind, an unpractised eye might
fancy the mountain itself was gone. But the mountain stands to
catch the clouds, to win the blessing they bear, and send it down
to moisten the fainting violet, to form streams which gladden
valley and meadow, and sweep on at last to the sea in deep channels,
laden with fleets. Thus the forms of the church, the creeds of
sects, the conflicting opinions of teachers, float round the sides
of the Christian mount, and swell and toss, and rise and fall,
and dart their lightening, and roll their thunder, but they neither
make nor mar the mount itself. Is loft summit far transcends the
tumult; knows nothing of the storm which roars below; but burns
with rosy light at evening and at morn; gleams in the splendors
of the midday sun; sees his light when the long shadows creep
over plain and moorland, and all night long has its head in the
heavens, and is visited by troops of stars which never set, nor
veil their face to ought so pure and high.
[31]
Let then the Transient pass, fleet as it will, and may God send
us some new manifestation of the Christian faith, that shall stir
men's hearts as they were never stirred; some new Word, which
shall teach us what we are, and renew us all in the image of God;
some better life, that shall fulfill the Hebrew prophecy, and
pour out the spirit of God on young men and maidens, and old men
and children; which shall realize the Word of Christ, and give
us the comforter, who shall reveal all needed things. There are
Simeons enough in the cottages and Churches of New England, plain
men and pious women, who wait for the Consolation, and would die
in gladness, if their expiring breath could stir quicker the wings
that bear him on. There are men enough, sick and "bowed down,
in no wise able to lift up themselves," who would be healed
could they kiss the hand of their Saviour, or touch but the hem
of his garment; men who look up and are not fed, because they
ask bread from heaven and water from the rock, not traditions
or fancies, Jewish or heathen, or new or old; men enough who,
with throbbing hearts, pray for the spirit of healing to come
upon the waters, which other than angels have long kept in trouble;
men enough who have lain long time sick of theology, nothing bettered
by man physicians, and are now dead, too dead to bury their dead,
who would come out of their graves at the glad tidings. God send
us a real religious life, which shall pluck blindness out of the
heart, and make us better fathers, mothers, and children; a religious
life, that shall go with us where we go, and make every home the
house of God, every act acceptable as a pray. We would work for
this, and pray for it, though we wept tears of blood while we
prayed.
[32]
Such, then, is the Transient, and such the Permanent in Christianity.
What is of absolute value never changes; we may cling round it
and grow to it forever. No one can say his notions shall stand.
But we may all say, the Truth, as it is in Jesus, shall never
pass away. Yet there are lays some even religious men, who do
not see the permanent element, so they rely on the fleeting; and,
what is also an evil, condemn others for not doing the same. They
mistake a defence of the Truth for an attack upon the Holy of
Holiest; the removal of a theological error for the destruction
of all religion. Already men of the same sect eye one another
with suspicion, and lowering brows that indicate a storm, and,
like children who have fallen out in their play, call hard names.
Now, as always, there is a collision between these two elements.
The question puts itself to each man, "Will you cling to
what is perishing, or embrace what is eternal?" This question
each must answer for himself.
[33]
My friends, if you receive the notions about Christianity, which
chance to be current in your sect or church, solely because they
are current, and thus accept the commandment of men instead of
God's truth—there will always be enough to commend you for
soundness of judgment, prudence, and good sense; enough to call
you Christian for that reason. But it this is all you rely upon,
alas for you. The ground will shake under your feet if you attempt
to walk uprightly and like men. You will be afraid of very new
opinion, lets it shake down your church; you will fear "lest
if a fox go up, he will break down your stone wall." The
smallest contradiction in the New Testament or Old Testament;
the least disagreement between the Law and the Gospel; any mistake
of the Apostles, will weaken your faith. It shall be with you
"as when a hungry man dreameth, and behold, he eateth; but
he awaketh, and his soul is empty."
[34]
If, on the other hand, you take the true Word of God, and live
out this, nothing shall harm you. Men may mock, but their mouthfuls
of wind shall be blown back upon their own face. If the master
of the house were called Beelzebub, it matters little what name
is given to the household. The name Christian, given in mockery,
will last till the world go down. He that loves God and man, and
lives in accordance with that love, needs not fear what man can
do to him. His Religion comes to him in his hour of sadness, it
lays its hand on him when he has fallen among thieves, and raise
him up, heals, and comforts him. If he is crucified, he shall
rise again.
[35]
My friends, you this day receive, with the usual formalities,
the man you have chosen to speak to you on the highest of all
themes,—what concerns your life on earth; you lie in heave.
It is a work for which no talents, no prayerful diligence, no
piety, is too great; an office, that would dignify angels, if
worthily filled. In the eyes of this man be holden, that he cannot
discern between the perishing and the true, you will hold him
guiltless of all sin in this; but look for light where it can
be had; for his office will then be of no use to you. But if he
sees the truth, and is scared by worldly motives, and will
not tell it, alas for him! If the watchman see the foe coming
and blow not the trumpet, the blood of the innocent is on him.
[36]
Your own conduct and character, the treatment you offer this young
man, will is some measure influence him. The hearer affects the
speaker. There were some places where even Jesus "did not
many mighty works, because of their unbelief." Worldly motives—not
seeming such—sometimes deter good men from their duty. Gold
and Ease have, before now, enervated noble minds. Daily contact
with men of low aims takes down the ideal of life, which a bright
spirit casts out of itself. Terror has sometimes palsied tongues
that, before, were eloquent as the voice of Persuasion. But thereby
Truth is not holden. She speaks in a thousand tongues, and with
a pen of iron graves her sentence on the rock forever. You may
prevent the freedom of speech in this pulpit if you will. You
may hire you servants to preach as you bid; to spare your vices
and flatter your follies; to prophecy smooth things, and say,
It is peace, when there is no peace. Yet is so doing you weaken
and enthrall yourselves. And alas for that man who consents to
think one thing in his closet, and preach another in his pulpit.
God shall judge him in his mercy not man in his wrath. But over
his study and over his pulpit might be writ—EMPTINESS; on
his canonical robes, on his forehead and right hand—DECEIT,
DECEIT.
[37]
But, on the other hand, you may encourage you brother to tell
you the truth. Your affection will then be precious to him; your
prayers of great price. Every evidence of your sympathy will go
to baptize him anew to Holiness and Truth. You will then have
his best words, his brightest thoughts, and his most hearty prayers.
He may grow old in your service, blessing and blest. He will have
"The sweetest, best of consolation,
The thought, that he has given,
To serve the cause of Heaven,
The freshness of his early inspiration."
[38] Choose as you will choose; but weal or woe depends upon your choice.