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profligacy abound, there are more exemplary holy people than ever were found in the best ages of the heathen world.

8. Our relation to heaven while upon earth is likewise represented as a powerful motive to holy obedience. Our conversation, or citizenship is in heaven (Phil. iii. 20.); and because we are only strangers and pilgrims upon earth, we must abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the peace, the purity, and dignity of the soul. (1 Pet. ii. 11.) We are moreover put in mind that we are only sojourners here, and have no continuing city, but seek one to come (Heb. xi. 13. xiii. 14.); that we may not seek our rest in this world, nor be too solicitous about the things of it, but may always keep our heavenly country in view, and make it our greatest concern to arrive safely there.

9. Lastly, the rewards and punishments which the Gospel proposes to obedience or disobedience, are a motive perfectly agreeable to the natural hopes and fears of men, and worthy of God to make known by express revelation: for, by the certain knowledge of these things, is the practice of virtue established upon a sure foundation; men have sufficient to support them in their choice of virtue, and to enable them to conquer all the temptations of the world, and to despise even death itself. Paul concludes a large catalogue of flagrant sins with this just but terrible sentence; Of which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. (Gal. v. 21.) On the contrary, the Gospel recommends the practice of Christian humility, by ensuring to it the kingdom of heaven (Mat. v. 3.); of meekness, because it is in the sight of God of great price (1 Pet. iii. 4.); of mercifulness, as the means of obtaining mercy (Matt. v. 7.); of temperance, as necessary in order to run our Christian race with success (1 Cor. ix. 24. Heb. xii. 1.); of purity, as a necessary preparation to the seeing of God (Matt. v. 8.); and of patience and perseverance in the Christian life, because our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh out for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we look, not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen, because the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are ETERNAL. (2 Cor. iv. 17, 18.)

Such is a faint outline of the purity and excellence of the morality of the Gospel, and of the motives by which it is enforced.

All the

1 The reader, who is desirous of prosecuting the investigation of Christian morality, will find it ably delineated in Mr. Gisborne's Sermons on Christian Morality. There is also an excellent discourse entitled 'The Gospel the only foundation of religious and moral Duty,' in the first volume of Bp. Mant's Sermons, which in many topics coincides with Mr. Gisborne's first discourse. The various branches of the Christian temper are well pourtrayed by Dr. Evans in two volumes of discourses on that subject, which (though rather prolix) have been often and deservedly reprinted. See also Mr. Leifchild's Lectures on the Christian Temper, (London, 1822. 8vo.), and especially Mr. Hoare's Sermons on the Christian Character. (London, 1821. 8vo.) The Christian Morals, Essay on the Character and Writings of St. Paul, and Moral Sketches, of Mrs. More, likewise illustrate the leading topics of Christian morality with equal elegance and fidelity: and the chief part of the second volume of Mr. Warden's system of Revealed Religion contains a digest of Scripture morality, expressed in the very words of the sacred writings.

charms of the divine goodness, grace, mercy, and love, are here represented to our view, in terms the most clear, explicit, and engaging that can possibly be conceived. How the writers of the New Testament should be able to draw up a system of morals, which the world, after the lapse of eighteen centuries cannot improve, while it perceives numberless faults in those of the philosophers of India, Greece and Rome, and of the opposers of revelation, is a question of fact, for which the candid deist is concerned to account in a rational way. The Christian is able to do it with ease. The evangelists and the apostles of Jesus Christ spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.

4. ON THE OBJECTIONS OF UNBELIEVERS TO THE DOCTRINES AND

MORALITY OF THE BIble.

1. Mysteries, no ground for rejecting the Scriptures.-II. The Scripture doctrine of redemption not inconsistent with the generally received ideas concerning the magnitude of creation. III. The doctrine of a future judgment not improbable, and the twofold sanction of rewards and punishments not of human invention. —ÏV. Christianity does not establish a system of priestcraft and despotism over the minds and consciences of mankind.-V. Does not prohibit free inquiry but invites it. VI. The objection, that its morality is too strict, obviated. — VII. Christianity does not produce a timid spirit, nor overlook the sentiments of friendship or patriotism. — VIII. The assertion, that the Bible is the most immoral book in the world, disproved by the evidence of facts. ·IX. Intolerance and persecution not inculcated in the Scriptures.

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SUCH is the unhappy obliquity of the mind of fallen man, that there never yet was proposed to it any thing, however excellent in itself, which has not been the subject of cavil, censure, or reproach. This has been the lot of the Scriptures in particular, which have been arraigned by the antagonists of divine revelation as a tissue of absurdity, fraud, and immorality. On the one hand it has been objected that some of the doctrines which they propound to our belief, such as the Trinity, the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, &c.—are mysterious and contrary to reason, and that where mystery begins religion ends; that the Scripture doctrine of redemption is inconsistent with the ideas at present entertained concerning the magnitude of creation; that the Scripture doctrine of a future judgment is improbable; that it establishes a system of priestcraft and spiritual tyranny over the minds and consciences of men: and that Christianity debars its professors from all inquiries concerning religious truths, and demands of them a full and implicit assent, without a previous examination of the ground on which they are to build that assent. And, on the other hand, it is objected that the morality of the Bible is too strict, bears too hard upon mankind, and lays us under too severe restraints; that it generates a timid, passive spirit, and also entirely overlooks the generous sentiments of friendship and patriotism; that the Bible is the most immoral book extant in the world; and that it inculcates intolerance

and persecution. Such are the principal objections which have, at various times, been made against the doctrines and precepts contained in the Bible: the contradictions involved in some of them cannot fail to strike the mind of the attentive reader. It might be a sufficient answer to most of them, to appeal to the facts and statements already exhibited in the course of this work, and especially to the foregoing section but as these objections have lately been re-asserted and clothed in the garb of novelty, in order to impose on the unwary, (though most of them have long since been refuted), they demand a distinct consideration.1

I. OBJECTION 1.-Some of the peculiar doctrines, which the Scriptures propound to our belief, are mysterious and contrary to reason; and where mystery begins religion ends.

ANSWER. This assertion is erroneous; for nothing is so mysterious as the eternity and self-existence of God: yet, to believe that God exists is the foundation of all religion. Above our reason these attributes of Deity unquestionably are. For, who can conceive what eternity is? A duration without beginning, or succession of parts or time! Who can so much as imagine or frame any idea of a Being, neither made by itself nor by any other? Of omnipresence, of omniscience, and of immensity! How, indeed, can a finite capacity, like ours, comprehend an Infinite Being, whom heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain. Vain mortal! dost thou presume to scrutinise the nature and to comprehend all the ways of the incomprehensible God? Canst thou, by searching, find out God! Canst thou find out the Almighty to perfection? It is high as heaven, what canst thou do? Deeper than hell, what canst thou know? He holdeth back the face of his throne, and spreadeth his cloud upon it. How little a portion is heard of Him! The thunder of his power, who can understand? Such knowledge is too wonderful for us, we cannot attain unto it. But though the existence of God be a mystery to us, and above our limited reason to comprehend, yet it is not contrary to reason: because the wisdom, order, and harmony, which are observable in the universe, the admirable and exquisite adaptation of every part to produce the end for which it was designed, and the providential care displayed in preserving and governing the whole, are all so many proofs of the existence of a first great cause; and reason assures us that no effect can exist without a cause.

1 "Impudence and ignorance may ask a question in three lines, which it will cost learning and ingenuity thirty pages to answer; and, when this is done, the same question shall be triumphantly asked again the next year, as if nothing had ever been written on the subject." (Bp. Horne's Letters on Infidelity.) Dr. Young (author of the Night Thoughts,) speaking of Lord Bolingbroke's arguments against the authority of the Scriptures, remarks that they "have been long since answered. But he is not without precedent in this point. His repetition of already refuted arguments seems to be a deistical privilege, from which few of them are free. Even echoes of echoes are to be found among them, which evidently shows that they write not to discover truth but to spread infection; which old poison re-administered will do as well as new, and it will be struck deeper into the constitution, by repeating the same dose. Besides, new writers will have new readers. The book may fall into hands untainted before, or the already infected may swallow it more greedily in a new vehicle, or they that were disgusted with it in one vehicle may relish it in another." (Young's Centaur not fabulous. Letter on Infidelity.)

But our ignorance is not confined to heavenly mysteries; we cannot comprehend the common operations of nature. Every thing around us is full of mysteries. Who can tell, why, of two seeds similar in appearance, one produces a large tree, and the other a small shrub? Or, how the origin of so large a body should be contained in so narrow a space? The growth of the meanest plant, the structure of a grain of sand, is as much above our comprehension as the mysteries of religion. Bodies act on each other by different forces, which are known to us only by some of their effects. The natural philosopher observes these effects, and the mathematician calculates them. But neither of them has the slightest knowledge whatever of the causes of these effects. The natural philosopher observes an infinite number of motions in nature: he is acquainted with the general laws of motion, and also with the particular laws that regulate the motions of certain bodies: on these laws, the mathematician erects theories, that embrace alike the smallest particles of air or light, as well as Saturn and his moons. But neither the natural philosopher, nor the mathematician, has the least knowledge of the real nature of motion. We know that all bodies are composed of elements or primitive particles, and also that there are different orders of elements; and we likewise know, at least by reasoning, that from nature, from the arrangement or combination of elements, result the various compounds of which the chemical nomenclatures furnish us with a long catalogue: but what do we know concerning the real nature of those elements, or concerning their arrangement or combinations? Nothing at all.1

If from the general works of nature, we ascend to the consideration of animated creatures, and particularly of man, we shall find mysteries prevail there also. We cannot comprehend the structure of a worm, or of a hair of our heads, nor can we understand the combination of instinct with brute forms. We cannot tell how our bodies were formed, or in what manner they are nourished. Who can tell why the offspring resemble their parents; or why part resemble one, and part the other? Or why, as often happens, resemblances are transmitted from the first to the third generation, while the intermediate presents no traces of it? How many philosophers have theorised in vain on the mode in which the impressions of the senses are conveyed to the sensorium, and on the way in which they produce thoughts and passions! Yet the manner, in which the brain operates in these instances, is as much a mystery now as it was in the days of Plato and Aristotle; and so will continue to be to the end of the world. We cannot explain the nature of the human soul, nor in what manner it is united to the body: and yet, that such an union does exist, we are convinced by daily experience. There is nothing, of which we are more intimately conscious, than human liberty and free agency, or which is of greater importance to the foundations of government and morality, and yet, if we consider it metaphysically, no subject is attended with greater difficulties, as the

1 See numerous additional instances of mysteries in the natural world in the twelfth and thirteenth parts of M. Bonnet's Palingenèsie Philosophique (Oeuvres, tom. vii. pp. 329-370. 4to. edit.); and on the subject of mysteries in religion, in general, the reader will find a valuable dissertation of Bp. Newton's, in the fourth volume of his works. Diss. 35. pp. 220-233.

ablest metaphysicians and philosophers in all ages have acknowledged. Wherefore, until we can comprehend ourselves, it is absurd to object to mysteries in those things which relate to the Self-existing, Eternal, and Infinite God.

For

Further, if from the consideration of ourselves we ascend to the higher departments of science, even to the science of demonstration itself the mathematics, - we shall find that mysteries exist there, and that there are many principles or facts in that science, as well as in the works of nature, which are above our reason, but which no person in his senses would ever venture to dispute. instance, though we acquire the first principles of mathematics, and learn to digest the idea of a point without parts, of a line without breadth, and a surface without thickness, yet we shall find ourselves at a loss to comprehend the perpetual approximation of lines which can never meet; the doctrine of incommensurables, and of an infinity of infinities, each infinitely less, not only in any infinite quantity, but than each other. Yet all these are matters of fact; from which consideration we are led to infer, that it is not consistent with true philosophy to deny the reality of a thing merely because it is mysterious. Hence, before we can consistently act the sceptic concerning the incomprehensible doctrines contained in the scheme of Christianity, we must renounce the name of philosophers, and reject the system of nature for the book of nature has its incomprehensibles, as well as the book of revelation. The former, not even the genius

of a Newton could explore: the latter, not even an angel's. Both, with intense desire, desire to look into them; - both are lost in depths unfathomable; both desist, believe, love, wonder, and adore!

Indeed, "if the subject be duly considered, so far from its appearing suspicious that there should be mysteries in the Christian religion, it will rather be regarded as a proof of its divine origin. If nothing more was contained in the New Testament, than we knew before; or nothing more than we could easily comprehend, we might justly doubt if it came from God, and whether it was not rather a work of man's device. Were there mysteries in the duties of Christianity, an objection might be justly raised, but not so with respect to the doctrines. That there will be some things respecting the nature and government of God, which are not fully revealed; some things, which are merely hinted at, on account of their connection with other parts of divine truth; and some things which are just mentioned, but not explained, because they exceed the grasp of the human understanding, it is natural for us to expect: and what just ground is there of complaint? In a word, if, in the phenomena of nature, and in the moral government of the Deity, there are many things confessedly mysterious, is it not more than probable that this will be the case in a revelation of His will, where the subject is equally vast and far more comprehensive? Without mysteries, the Gospel would not be like the works of God."

991

Further, the mysteries, which appear most contrary to reason, are closely connected with the truths and facts of which reason is convinced. For instance, the mysterious doctrine of the Trinity, which is so inconceivable to reason, is necessarily connected with the work

1 Bogue's Essay on the Divine Authority of the New Testament, p. 349.

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