§ 1. The Principle of Orthodoxy defined.
The principle of Orthodoxy is, that there is one true system of Christian
doctrine, and that all others are false; that this system can be, and has
been, so stated in words as to distinguish it from all the false systems
or heresies; and that this true system of doctrine is the one which is now
held, and always has been held, by the majority of Christians; and,
finally, that the belief of this system is, as a rule, essential to
salvation—so that those who may be saved, while not accepting it, will be
saved (if at all) by way of exception, and not according to rule.
§ 2. Logical Genesis of the Principle of Orthodoxy.
The principle of Orthodoxy seems to have arisen, and to have maintained
itself in the Church, in some such way as this. Jesus Christ, it is
assumed, came to save the soul from sin and evil. He saves the soul by the
word of truth. In order that this truth shall become saving truth, it must
be believed, and so strongly believed as to have a practical influence on
life and action. We are therefore saved by believing the truth taught by
Christ. But in order to be believed, it must be expressed in some definite
statement, or in what we call Christian doctrine. But truth is one, and
therefore the doctrine which expresses it must also be one.
Therefore there must be one system of Christian doctrine, containing in
itself the substance of Christian truth, and constituting the object of
Christian faith. This system, though it may vary in its unessential parts,
must in its essence be unchangeable. In proportion as any system of belief
varies from it, such system is heterodox and dangerous, while this system
alone is orthodox and safe.
Another form of this argument would be as follows: Christ came to _reveal_
something to men. If revealed, it must be made known. If made known, it
must be capable of being so expressed that there can be no reasonable
doubt concerning it. Otherwise, Christianity would not be a revelation.
But if expressed so as to enter the human mind, it must be expressed in
human language. A verbal revelation, therefore, is essential for the
purposes of Christianity. Such a revelation is nothing else than a system
of doctrine, or that which can be systematized into doctrine. And this
system must be one and the same from age to age, or it is not a permanent
divine revelation, but only a transient human seeking for such a
revelation.
§ 3. Orthodoxy assumed to be the Belief of the Majority.
The natural test of Orthodoxy is assumed to be the belief of the majority
of Christians; for if Christianity be a revelation of truth, its essential
contents must be easy to apprehend, and when apprehended, they must be
generally accepted. The revelations of God in nature are seen and accepted
by the human intellect, and so become matters of science. Orthodox science
is that which the great majority of scientific men have accepted as such;
and Orthodox _Christianity_, in like manner, must be that which the
majority of Christian believers accept as such. Hence it is taken for
granted, as regards Orthodox doctrine, that it meets the test, “_Quod
semper, quod ubique, quod ab omnibus_.”
§ 4. Heterodoxy thus becomes sinful.
But if the essential truth of Christianity be thus plain, those who do not
receive it must be either stupid or wilful. Its rejection argues a want of
intellect or a bad heart. Heretics, therefore, ought logically to become
to the Orthodox objects either of contempt or hatred. If they cannot see
what is so plain, they must be intellectually imbecile. If they will not
see it, they must be morally depraved. Therefore intelligent people who
accept and teach heresies ought to be considered wicked people by logical
Orthodox minds. Moreover, they are the most dangerous persons in the
community, because, by denying that truth by which the soul is to be
saved, they endanger not merely the temporal, but also the eternal,
welfare of those whom they seduce. And if we have a right to abate a
nuisance which only interferes with the earthly comfort and peace of
society, how much more one which attacks its spiritual peace and eternal
welfare! Have not the majority a right to protect themselves, their
children, and society from that which they not merely believe, but know,
to be evil? For Orthodoxy assumes to be not merely opinion, but knowledge.
Hence Orthodoxy legitimates persecution.(5) Persecution is only the
judicious repression of criminal attempts to pervert and injure society.
Moreover, Orthodoxy, according to its principle, ought to discourage
inquiry in relation to its own fundamental principles. For why continue to
discuss and debate about that which is known? Progress consists in
advancing from the known to the unknown. The unknown, and not the known,
is the proper subject for inquiry. The system of Orthodoxy, therefore,
according to its own principle, should be withdrawn from further
examination. Intellectual advance requires us to take for granted
something—to forget that which is behind in order to press forward to that
which is before. The doctrines of Orthodoxy therefore, when once
established, should afterwards be assumed, and need not be proved. We do
not call a scientific man a bigot because he refuses to discuss
fundamental principles. If Orthodoxy be science, why accuse it of bigotry
when it follows the same course?
§ 5. The Doctrine of Essentials and Non-essentials leads to Rome.
If Orthodoxy consists in a statement of opinions the belief of which is
essential to salvation, the question arises, Are _all_ these opinions
essential, or only a part? It is generally admitted that the great system
called Orthodoxy contains some things not essential to salvation. How
shall these be distinguished? Moreover, some variation of statement is
judged allowable. No Orthodox creed is assumed to be inspired as to its
language. The same essential truth may be expressed in different terms.
How, then, are we to define the limits of expression so as to know what
error of opinion is venial, and what vital? Orthodoxy assures us that our
salvation depends on accepting its statements. In which particular form,
then, must we accept them? In so important a matter as this, where
salvation is assumed to depend on accepting the right form of doctrine,
one surely ought to be able to know which the right form is. Now, the rule
of Orthodoxy, as given above, is, that nothing is Orthodox, as essential
doctrine, which has not been believed “always, everywhere, and by all.”
But this raises an historical question, and one of no little difficulty.
For since heresies have always existed, and some one has always been found
somewhere to deny the most essential doctrines of Orthodoxy, the question
is somewhat intricate who these “all” are who have never disbelieved the
Orthodox system. It is plain that the majority of Christians have neither
time nor ability for these investigations. The historical inquiry must be
conducted for them by others. And here seems to come in the law of Church
authority as against private judgment. And so the principle of Orthodoxy,
carried out to its legitimate results, appears to land us at last in the
Roman Catholic Church, to set aside the right of private judgment, and to
justify intolerance and the forcible suppression of heresy. But as these
results are not accepted by those who yet accept the principles of
Orthodoxy, it is necessary to see if there is a fallacy anywhere in our
course of thought, and at what precise point the fallacy has come in.
§ 6. Fallacy in this Orthodox Argument.
The fallacy in all this argument lies here—that faith is confounded with
belief; knowledge with opinion; the sight of truth with its intellectual
statement in the form of doctrine. Undoubtedly there is only one faith,
but there may be many ways of stating it in the form of opinion. Moreover,
no man, no church, no age, sees the whole of truth. Truth is multilateral,
but men’s minds are unilateral. They are mirrors which reflect, and that
imperfectly, the side of the object which is towards them. Therefore even
knowledge in any finite mind is partial, consequently imperfect; and
consequently needs other knowledge to complete it.
This, apparently, is what the apostle Paul means (1 Cor. 13:8-12) in his
statement concerning the relation between knowledge and love. Knowledge
(Gnosis) “shall pass away.” The word here used is elsewhere translated by
“destroyed,” “brought to nought,” “abolished,” “made of none effect.”
“Knowledge” here probably refers to definite and systematic statements of
real insights. It is something more than opinion, but something less than
faith. Faith abides, but knowledge passes away. Faith abides, because it
is a positive sight of truth. It is an experience of the soul, by which it
opens itself in trust, and becomes receptive of spiritual influence.
Faith, therefore, remains, and its results are permanent in the soul. They
make the substance of our knowledge as regards the spiritual world. This
substance becomes a part of the soul itself, and constitutes a basis of
self-consciousness as real as is its experience of the external world. But
_Gnosis_ is this faith, translated by the intellect into systematic form.
Such systems embody real experience, and are necessary for mental and
moral progress. They are the bodies of thought. But all bodies must die,
sooner or later; and so all systems of knowledge must pass away. The body,
at first, helps the growth of thought, helps the growth of the soul; but
afterwards it hinders it. The new wine must be put into new bottles.
Therefore the apostle Paul, the great teacher of doctrinal theology in the
Christian Church, distinctly recognizes here, that every system of
doctrine, no matter how much truth it contains, is partial, and therefore
transient. He makes no exception in favor even of inspired statements—he
does not except his own. All bodies must die; all forms are fugitive;
nothing continues but the substance of knowledge, which is faith; the
inward sight of God’s goodness producing that endless expectation which is
called hope; and the large spiritual communion with God and his creatures,
here called Agape, or love. The apostle speaks in the first person when he
says that knowledge passes away—“_We_ know in part, and _we_ prophesy [or
teach] in part.” He speaks for himself and his fellow-apostles.
We see, therefore, that the great master and head of Orthodoxy in the
Church has himself declared every form of Orthodoxy to be transient.
We conclude, therefore, that the apostle Paul, in this famous passage,
overturns the whole principle of verbal Orthodoxy. He takes away its
foundation. Not denying the reality and permanence of religious
experience, not denying the saving power of truth, he declares that no
expressed system of truth is permanent. The basis of doctrinal Orthodoxy
is the assumption that its own particular form of belief is essential to
salvation. But the apostle declares that _all_ forms are transient, and,
therefore, _none_ essential. All statement is a limitation, and the moment
that we make a definition, we say something which is incomplete. When Paul
says, “We know in part,” he says the same thing which is said by Kant, by
Sir William Hamilton, by Auguste Comte, by Mr. Mansell, and most modern
thinkers, when they declare the relativity of knowledge. All thinking is
limitation. “To think,” says Sir William Hamilton, “is to condition.” We
only know a thing, says this school, by its being different from something
else. The school of Kant declares all knowledge to be phenomenal, and that
all phenomenal knowledge consists of two parts—the part given by the
thing, and the part added by the mind. Herbert Spencer (in “First
Principles”) insists on the certainty of the existence of things in
themselves, but also on their absolute and eternal unknowableness.
According to John Stuart Mill, the same view of the unknowableness of
Noumena is taken by M. Auguste Comte.
These modern philosophers, it will be seen, go much farther than Paul, and
lay down positions which inaugurate a universal scepticism. According to
them there is nothing certain and nothing fixed. Mr. Mansell virtually
teaches us that we cannot know anything of God, duty, or immortality; and
that faith means, taking for granted on some outward authority. To use a
striking expression of President James Walker, “We are not to believe, but
to make believe.” That is, we are not to believe with our intellect, but
with our will. Or, in other words, we are to believe not what is true, but
what is expedient. This he calls regulative truth, as opposed to
speculative truth.
But this is by no means the doctrine of the apostle Paul. He teaches the
certainty of substantive knowledge, but the fallibility of formal
knowledge. He thus avoids the two extremes of dogmatism on the one side,
and scepticism on the other. The substance of Gnosis, which is the sight
of truth, is a reality, and, like all that is real, has its root in God,
and shares his eternity. The form of Gnosis is subjective, relative, and
transient. Everything which is seen is temporal; only that which is not
seen is eternal. All that takes outward, visible form, comes under the law
of change; the roots of our knowledge, fixed in God, are unchangeable.
§ 7. The three Tendencies in the Church.
The human soul, a unit, indivisible, and without parts, nevertheless acts
in three directions—of will, affection, intellect. These are
distinguishable, though not divisible. Every one knows the difference
between an _act_; an _emotion_ of anger, pity, sorrow, love; and a process
of logic, or an intellectual argument. These are the three primary states
of the mind, evidently distinct. It is impossible to mistake either for
the other. I may direct my mind towards action, towards thought, or
towards emotion. The first of these, action, is the most within my own
power, depends chiefly on myself, lies nearest the will. _Will_ passes
instantaneously into action. I will to lift my arm, and it is done. On the
other hand, feeling or emotion lies the farthest from this centre of will,
depends least of all on my own choice, and in it I am most passive. But
the sphere of intellect is intermediate. I am more free when I think than
when I feel; less free than when I act. In the domain of will, I act upon
external things; in the domain of feeling, I am acted upon by external
things; in the domain of intellect, I neither act nor am acted upon, but I
_see_ them. In all thinking, in proportion as it is pure thought, both
will and emotion are excluded. We are neither actors nor sufferers, but
spectators. Things seen pass into our life through the intellect, and
become sources of emotion and action. Love of truth causes us to desire to
know it; this desire leads us to put our mind in the presence of truth,
but when there, the functions of emotion and will cease, and all we have
to do is to look.
Now, there have always been in the Church three parties, or at least three
tendencies, in regard to the basis of religion. One of these makes the
basis of the religious life to consist in thought, one posits it in
feeling, the third in action. With one, the intellect must take the
initiative; with the second, the heart; with the third, the will, or power
of determination. The three parties in the Church, based on these three
tendencies, may be characterized as the Orthodoxists, the Emotionalists,
and the party of Works. The first says, “We are saved by faith;” the
second says, “We are saved by love;” the third says, “We are saved by
obedience.” The first assumes that the sight of truth must take the lead
in all Christian experience; the second believes that love for goodness is
the true basis in religion; the third maintains that the first thing to be
done, in order to become a religious man, is to obey the law of duty. It
is evidently very important to decide which of these answers is the true
one. What are we to do first, if we wish to become Christian men or women?
Are we to study, read, reflect, in order to know the truth? Are we to go
to church and listen to sermons, join Bible classes and study the
Scriptures, read compends of doctrine and books of Christian evidence? Or
are we to seek for emotion, to pray for a change of heart, to put
ourselves under exciting influences, to go where a revival is in progress,
to attend protracted meetings, to be influenced through sympathy till we
are filled full of emotions of anxiety, fear, remorse, followed by
emotions of hope, trust, gratitude, pardon, peace, joy? Or are we to do
neither of these things, but to begin by obedience, trying to _do_ right
in order to _be_ right, beginning by the performance of the humblest
duties, the nearest duties, letting fidelity in the least open the way to
more? Shall we _know_ the truth in order to love it and do it? Or shall we
_love_ the truth in order to see it and do it? Or shall we _do_ right in
order to know it and love it?
Large numbers in the Church have followed each of these three methods, and
made each the basis of its action. One has said, “We are saved by works;”
a second, “We are saved by faith;” a third, “We are saved by love.”
§ 8. The Party of Works.
Two tendencies have joined in teaching salvation by works, or, more
strictly, in teaching _the initiative of the will in religion_. These are
the Church-tendency and the Moral-tendency in Christianity. The Church
party in Christianity teaches that the first duty towards a child is to
make it a member of the Christian Church by baptism, and that the first
duty of every baptized person is to obey the commands of the Church. The
Church thus becomes a school, in which baptized persons are educated as
Christians. The Church of Rome, and the High Church party in the Church of
England and in the Episcopal Church of the United States, teach this
doctrine of salvation by works. This system by no means dispenses with
Christian belief or Christian feeling, but makes them both subordinate.
The Church says to its faithful, We do not require you to believe or to
feel, but to obey. If we said, “Believe,” or “Feel,” you might justly
reply, “We cannot believe or feel when we choose, and you have therefore
no right to ask us to do so.” Therefore the Church only demands obedience,
which it is in the power of all to render. It, indeed, requires an assent
to its creed, and forbids heresy. But this only means, “Receive the creed
as true until you are able to see _how_ it is true.” The Church also
insists greatly on love, and its saints have been filled with the highest
raptures of piety. But it never _requires_ feeling. It says, “Use the
means we put into your hands, and feeling will come. Pray, as we command
you to do, whether you feel deeply or not. Feeling will come by and by.”
Discipline, therefore, and not illumination, has been the method of the
Church of Rome, and is also the method of all other Churches, so far as
they are ecclesiastical Churches. All such Churches teach that by a
faithful conformity to their ritual, methods, sacraments, services,
discipline, the Christian life will surely come. The one thing needful and
primary with them all is obedience, and the result of obedience is
knowledge and love.
Essentially the same view is taken by the Ethical party, or Moralists, in
Christianity. Their statement, also, of the foundation of religion is,
that it lies in obedience. They differ only from the Church party as
regards the authority to be obeyed. With them it is not the Church, but
the Moral Law, as made known to men in revelation, or in the natural
instincts of conscience. The foundation of all goodness and religion is
right doing. This leads to right thinking and right feeling; or, when it
does not lead to these, it is still sufficient, and is satisfactory to
God. “What doth the Lord require of thee,” say they, “but to do justly,
and love mercy, and walk humbly with thy God?” At this point the extremes
meet, and the Roman Catholic Church, or the extreme right, offers its hand
to the Liberal Christians, or the extreme left. This is the point of
contact between the two, which sometimes, also, becomes a bridge by which
proselytes pass either way, from one to the other. But the practical
question is, Is this answer sound? _Does_ the will lead the way in
religion? Is obedience the first step to be taken at every point of the
way? Is the initiative in the religious life always an action? Are we
saved by works?
The objection to this view is, that a religious action, without a
religious thought and a religious affection behind it, is not in any sense
religious. It has in it nothing of the essence of religion. Religion,
regarded merely as obedience to God, implies the knowledge of God. We must
know God in order to obey him; we must know God in order to love him.
Knowledge, therefore, must precede obedience, and not the contrary.
Otherwise obedience is an empty form, having no religious character.
Unless we see the truth and justice of obedience, we are only yielding to
human persuasion, to human authority, and not to the authority of God. It
may be well, or it may be ill, to yield to such human authority; but there
is no religion in it, or only a religion of dead works.
§ 9. The Party of Emotion in Christianity.
There are those, and always have been those, who have placed the substance
of religion in love, in which they have, perhaps, not been mistaken. But
they have often taken another step, by degrading love into mere emotion.
They have considered that feeling was the basis of religion; not thought,
nor action. They too have texts to quote in support of their view. They
say that “with the _heart_ men believe unto righteousness;” that we must
“be rooted and grounded in _love_;” that the _first_ commandment is to
“_love_ God with all the heart.” As with them religious emotion
constitutes the essence of religion, they make use of all means of
producing it, and especially the excitement which comes from sympathy. The
Methodist Church has, perhaps, gone farther than any other towards making
this a principle. This great and noble body has done its vast work for
Christianity by making prominent the love-principle in all its operations.
If the Church party stands at one extreme, Methodism, in all its forms,
stands at the other. The Roman Catholic Church sums up all the
inspirations of the past, collects in its large _repertoire_ all ancient
liturgies, all saintly lives, all sacred customs, and so brings an
imposing authority, a reverend antiquity, made up of the best history of
man. Methodism drops the past, and finds God in the present—in present
inspirations, in the newly-converted soul, born out of darkness into
light, by the immediate coming of the Spirit of God. According to the
Catholic Church the Christian life commences with an outward act,—that of
baptism,—and is carried on by outward sacraments; according to Methodism,
the Christian life begins with an inward emotional experience,—the
spiritual new birth,—and is carried on by successive emotions of
penitence, faith, hope, joy, and pious devotion. According to Catholicism,
the one thing needful is the outward sacramental union with the Church;
according to Methodism, the one thing needful is the inward emotional
union with the Holy Spirit.
§ 10. The Faith Party in Religion.
If Churchism and Moralism place the essence of Christianity in action, and
Emotionalism puts it in feeling, Orthodoxy places it in something
intellectual, which it calls faith. All the sects of Christendom do,
indeed, place faith at the root of the Christian life; but some make it
essentially an intellectual act, others essentially affectionate, and
others an act of will. Orthodoxy makes it, in substance, a sight of faith,
or an act of looking at spiritual realities. Sometimes it is called a
realizing sense of spiritual things. But, at all events, the sight of
truth is considered the beginning and root of religion by the Orthodox
party in the Church. We are saved by the word of truth; and the Saviour
himself is called “the Word,”—belief in whom constitutes eternal life.
Rationally, it is argued that the essential difference between the
Christian and the unbeliever, or the unchristian, must lie in seeing
Christ or not seeing him. The first step in the religious life always
consists in looking at the truth.
§ 11. Truth in the Orthodox Idea.
Admitting, then, what all these systems and parties in the Church unite in
asserting,—that an act of faith is always at the foundation of every
Christian state and of all Christian experience,—we ask, Which is the most
essential element in faith—will, intellect, or affection? Is an act of
faith chiefly an act of the will, a determination, or is it a loving
desire, or a state of knowledge, a looking at truth? Suppose we call it a
state of love, for this reason, that in order to be good, the first thing
requisite is to wish to be good. A longing for goodness, it may be said,
must precede everything else. But what makes us long for goodness, if we
_do_ desire it? What shall produce that longing, if it does not exist? The
only answer must be, The sight of truth. The sight of God’s holiness and
of God’s tenderness, the sight of law and gospel, whatever shows us the
beauty of goodness and the meanness of sin, must come first to awaken this
desire. Or suppose it be said that the essential thing in faith is the
active element, because it is submitting to God’s law, trusting in his
help, coming to the truth, opening the heart to the Holy Spirit,—all of
which are determinations of the will. We must reply, True; but these
determinations will never be taken unless we first _see_ the will of God
to which we submit, see the salvation of God on which we lean, know that
there is a truth to which we may come, know that there is a Holy Spirit,
in order to ask for it.
So that, on the whole, we may say that Orthodoxy is right in making the
sight of truth the beginning of the Christian life, and the beginning of
every Christian state, act, or experience. All human goodness is the
reflection of God’s goodness; it all has its source in the sight of a
divine holiness, truth, beauty. This is the fundamental idea of Orthodoxy,
and in this Orthodoxy is right.
It is no answer to this to say that man has an instinctive longing for
goodness, which causes him to feel after God before he finds him. For what
are these instincts themselves, as soon as they begin to act, but the
voice of God speaking in the soul, showing it some glimpses of a divine
truth? The longing in the soul must be aroused by the sight or knowledge
of something better than that which one has or is. Consequently, we say
again, that the sight of truth is that which saves the soul, and first
creates in it a better life.
If we make Christianity to be essentially obedience, we make of it, at
last, an oppressive form. If we consider it as essentially an emotional
experience, we destroy its moral character; for emotion is both passive
and blind, while the definition of morality is the freely choosing what we
see to be right. Ecclesiasticism and Emotionalism both tend to demoralize
Christianity. They remove from it the element of moral freedom in the
interest either of Church authority or of mystical piety. Then
Christianity must come anew, in the form of truth, to purify the air, and
renew the moral life of society.
Protestantism arose in this way, to salt the corrupting Church.
Ecclesiasticism, in its well-meant efforts at training men, by a complete
discipline, to a perfect virtue, had suppressed the individual love of
truth to such an extent, that religion had become a mere surface, without
substance. Jesuitism abolished the distinction between things right and
wrong in themselves, and made right to consist solely in the intention;
that is, made it wholly subjective. The Lutheran reformation was the
revival of the intellect in regard to religion—the demand for conviction
instead of assent; for the sight of God in place of obedience to the
Church. It repeated, with an emphasis adapted to the needs of the
sixteenth century, the words of Jesus, “This is life eternal, to _know_
thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.” In these
words is the sufficient defence of Protestantism. It was the cry of the
soul to _know_ God, and not merely to assent to what the Church taught
concerning him; it was the longing to _know_ Christ, and not to repeat by
rote the creeds of the first centuries, and the definitions of mediæval
doctors in regard to him. In a subsequent chapter we shall consider the
truth and error in the Protestant principle of justification by faith. Our
purpose here is to show that the truth in Orthodoxy is identical with the
truth in Protestantism. Both place, as the root of all religion, an
individual personal sight of God and truth. To this, freedom of thought is
an essential means. Right thinking involves free thinking. If to know the
truth makes us free, freedom, again, is the condition of knowing the
truth. Protestantism and Orthodoxy have often attempted to limit the
application of this principle. Protestants, as well as Catholics, have
persecuted heretics. But while Catholics, in doing this, have been
faithful to their own idea, and have therefore made of persecution a
system, Protestants have been vacillating and undecided persecutors. They
have been drawn in opposite directions by antagonist principles.
Fundamentally, Protestantism, as such, claims for all the rights of
private judgment, and is, therefore, in its whole stress and influence,
opposed to persecution, and in favor of religious liberty. It has
conquered the Catholic Church on this point so far as to compel it to
renounce the practice of persecution, if it has not relinquished the
theory. During three centuries Protestantism has been, more and more,
emancipating the human mind—making it the duty, and consequently the
right, of every human being to see truth for himself. It has been drawn
into inconsistencies by its belief in the saving power of certain
doctrines, and the supreme importance of believing them. On one hand it
has claimed, with a trumpet voice, the freedom of conscience and opinion
for all, and then has cried out against those who freely came to opinions
differing from its own.
But, notwithstanding these inconsistencies, Protestantism has steadily
given freedom of spirit to mankind. And with the awakened and emancipated
intellect all the elements of progress have shown themselves in Protestant
lands. In 1517, when Luther nailed his theses to the church door, Italy,
Spain, and Portugal were far in advance of Northern Europe in
civilization. In commerce, art, and literature, Italy was the queen of
Europe. In military force, extent of possessions, and unbounded wealth,
Spain was the leading power of the world. The Portuguese mariners had
ransacked every sea, and discovered new continents and islands in every
zone. How insignificant, in comparison with these great nations, were
England, Holland, and Germany! But England, Holland, and Germany became
Protestant; Italy, Spain, and Portugal remained Catholic; while France and
Austria adopted a half-way Catholicism.
The result has been, in the course of three centuries, a complete reversal
of the position. The last have become first, and the first last. What now
has become of the terrible power of Spain, the enterprise of Portugal, the
art and literature of Italy? When the element of Protestantism was crushed
out of these nations by the Inquisition, the principle of national
progress was also destroyed. But the northern powers who accepted the
Lutheran reform received with it the germs of progress. Holland, Denmark,
Norway, Sweden, Prussia, Saxony, England, and Scotland, have, by a steady
progress in civilization, wealth, knowledge, and morality, conclusively
demonstrated the impulse of progress contained in the Protestant idea.
So far, therefore, as this great experiment, continued during three
hundred years, can prove anything, it proves the truth of the central idea
of Protestantism and Orthodoxy, namely, that saving faith is essentially
not emotional nor volitional, but intellectual.
§ 12. Error in the Orthodox Principle.
We are well aware of the reply which might be made, from the stand-point
of Ecclesiasticism, to the historical argument just given. The Roman
Catholic might answer thus: “We admit that the tree must be known by its
fruits; but the tree of true Christianity is known by bearing the fruits
of Christianity, not those of worldly civilization. Suppose that England
is to-day richer than Italy, more powerful than Spain; is she _better_?
Are there more piety and more morality in Protestant than in Catholic
countries? In which communities do you find the most humility, simplicity,
religious faith, reverence for religious institutions, fear of God? In
which do you find most of sympathy, kindliness, good will from man to man?
The fierce civilization of Protestantism is hard, cold, and cruel. It
tramples under its feet the weak. It accumulates wealth and power; but are
these Christianity? Is London or Rome the best model of a Christian city?
Is it London, with its terrible contrasts of enormous wealth and naked
want, its proud aristocracy and brutalized mob, its empty churches and
illuminated gin-shops? or is it not rather Rome, poorer in material wealth
and luxury, but rich in grace—Rome, with its odor of sanctity about it;
its numerous churches, on which art has lavished her resources to make
them worthy to be the temples of God—Rome, with its priests and monks; its
religious houses, the centres of the great religious orders, whose
missions have been known in the four quarters of the earth? Protestant
countries may have a higher worldly civilization, more education and
intelligence, more manufactures and commerce; but Catholic countries have
more humility and reverence, a more habitual piety, more gentle manners.
If Protestants have more _knowledge_, Catholics have more _love_.”
And we, though Protestants of the Protestants, must admit that there is
some truth in this. The discipline of Romanism has repressed some amount
of evil which the liberty of Protestant lands has allowed to appear. But
repressed evil is none the less evil, and often works a greater inward
corruption than when it is allowed to show itself as it is. We may also
admit that while in Protestantism there is more of TRUTH, and all the
virtues which go therewith,—such as honesty, manliness, self-respect,
conscientiousness,—in Catholic countries there is more of LOVE, and all
the virtues which follow it,—as kindly, genial manners, ready sympathy
with suffering, a spirit of dependence and trust. Still, this does not
prove that there is more real Christianity among Catholics; for love which
does not grow out of the sight of truth is not genuine nor healthy. Its
life is weak. Protestant Christianity is an immature fruit, harsh because
not quite ripe. Catholic Christianity is a fruit over-ripe, and so rotten.
Therefore we still contend that Protestantism and Orthodoxy are right in
making the free and independent sight of truth the root of all religion.
But the mistake of Orthodoxy has been in confounding truth with
doctrine—the sight of the thing with the theory about that sight. From
hence come the hardness and coldness of Orthodoxy. Pure thought is always
cold, and ought to be. The sight of spiritual things is truth and love in
one; but when we begin to reflect on that sight, the love drops out, and
the truth becomes cold.
The defect of the Orthodox principle, therefore, is the confusion of truth
with belief. Out of this mistake come dogmatism, bigotry, and all their
natural consequences. It is therefore well, before going farther, to
explain more fully this distinction and its importance.
§ 13. Faith, Knowledge, Belief, Opinion.
Religion originates at every moment, from looking at truth. Now, there are
four kinds of looking; _faith_, which is intuitive looking; _knowledge_,
which is the intuition itself looked at by reflection, and so brought to
consciousness; third, _belief_, which arranges the products of knowledge
in systematic form, and makes them congruous with each other; and lastly
comes _opinion_, which does not deal at all with things, but only with
thoughts about things. By faith we see God; by knowledge we become
conscious that we see God; by belief we arrange in order what we see; and
by opinion we feel and grope among our thoughts, seeking what we may find
of his works and ways. Every act of faith brings us into the presence of
God himself, and makes us partakers of the divine nature. Thus faith is
strictly and literally the substance of things hoped for, or the substance
of hope.(6) Substance here has its etymological sense, and is the same
word in Greek and English, meaning basis, foundation, support, or
substruction. It is the inward experience by which we come in contact with
invisible things, as perception is the experience by which we come in
contact with visible things.
These steps of intellectual activity may be called by other names than
these. What we (with Jacobi) call faith,(7) may be denominated “intuition”
(with the transcendentalists), reason (with Coleridge), God-consciousness
(with Schleiermacher), or anschauungs-vermögen (with Schelling and
others). But, by whatever name we call this power, we say there _is_ a
power in man by which he can see spiritual facts, as with his earthly
senses he can perceive sensible facts. If he has no such power, he is
incapable of knowing God, but can only have an opinion that there is a
God. But if he can know God, this knowledge rests on something back of
reasoning or reflection; it must rest on an intuition or spiritual
perception. And this, for our present purpose, we call faith. By means of
it we know the spiritual world, just as we know the material world through
sight, touch, and hearing. The senses are the organs by which we perceive
material things; intuition, or faith, the organ by which we perceive
spiritual things. He who denies the existence of such a power in man,
falls necessarily into dogmatism on the one hand, or rationalism on the
other. But as these words also take a very different sense on different
lips, we explain ourselves by saying that he puts either a theory or an
inference in the place of God. If orthodox, he puts a theory; if
sceptical, an inference. Mr. Mansell does the first, Herbert Spencer the
other. Neither of them believes that we can _know_ God’s existence. So
dogmatism and scepticism join hands. All the consequences described in the
beginning of this chapter follow as a matter of course when an opinion or
theory is put in the place of truth. Then come the inflexible narrowness
of bigotry, the hot zeal of the persecutor, the sectarian strife which has
torn the Church in twain. The remedy and prevention for these are to
recognize that the basis of religion is in faith, in a living sight of
God, the soul, duty, immortality, which are always and forever the same.
The best definitions of faith, by theologians of all schools, include the
notion of insight, will, and affection. It is an act of the soul by which
it looks at truth. But this act implies a desire to see and know the
truth. Now, such an act as this lies at the root of all our knowledge,
both of the material and spiritual world. How do I know the outward world?
The passive exercise of sensation would never give such knowledge. The
sights which enter the passive eye, the sounds which fill the passive ear,
the feelings which affect the passive sense, give no real knowledge of
outward things. That comes, not from sensation merely, but from sensation
changed into experience by a voluntary activity. We must not only see, but
_look_; not only hear, but _listen_; not only feel, but _touch_, in order
to know. _Life_, therefore, the constant synthesis of these three
elements,—life which, in every act, at once thinks, feels, and does,—alone
gives us knowledge. Divorce _thought_ from affection and will, and let it
act by itself, and it does not give knowledge; it only gives belief or
opinion. Knowledge comes only from experience—and experience means
communion. Communion with Nature by thought, desire, and action gives us
the knowledge of Nature; communion with God by thought, desire, and act,
gives us the knowledge of God. The organ by which we commune with God is
faith; it includes the desire of knowing God, and the act of looking to
him in order to know him.
KNOWLEDGE of God, of immortality, and of spiritual things does not come
from any process of reasoning on the one hand, nor from any single
intuition of reason. Just so we do not know the material world by a
process of reasoning on the one hand, or any single sensible perception on
the other. _All knowledge comes from life_; or, as the apostle John
expresses it, “Life is the light of man.” We become acquainted with
outward nature by living processes—by repeated acts of sight, hearing,
touch, taste. So we become acquainted with the spiritual world by repeated
spiritual acts; by repeated processes of faith; by continued steps of
devotion, submission, obedience, trust, love, prayer. In this way we come
to _know_ God just as certainly, and just in the same way, as we know
things visible or things audible.
But knowledge is not belief. Knowledge is the rooted conviction of the
reality of certain facts or persons, derived from communing with those
facts or persons. Belief is the intellectual assent to a proposition—a
proposition formed by analytic and synthetic methods. We analyze our
notion concerning any subject, and then arrange the results of this
analysis in order, and deduce from them a proposition, a law. This we call
our belief, or creed, concerning it. The substance of this belief is given
us in life; the form of it comes from thinking or reasoning. But it is
evident that such a belief differs in each individual according to his
experience, and according to his habits of reasoning, and even according
to his facility in expression. Moreover, knowledge and belief differ also
in this, that knowledge places us in the presence of the reality, belief
only in the presence of a proposition concerning it.
Thus John and James are friends. John _knows_ James through a long
intercourse. He is just as certain in regard to the essential character of
James as he is about his own. But if he tries to express this knowledge of
James in the form of belief, he may evidently express it badly. He may
fail from a defective analysis, or from imperfect powers of language.
On the other hand John may not know James at all. He may never have seen
him. But he has heard about him from a mutual friend, in whose judgment he
trusts, or from several persons, and so he has formed a very decided
belief in regard to James. He has a creed about him, though he has never
known him.
In the same way those who _know_ God truly and well, by the experience of
obedience and prayer, may have a very erroneous belief concerning him.
Those who do not know him at all, by any personal experience, may have a
very correct belief concerning him. But which saves the soul? Which
governs the life? Which affects the heart? Evidently not the belief, but
the knowledge.
We are not saved by any belief whatsoever concerning God or Christ,
concerning sin or salvation, concerning duty or destiny. Belief brings us
into contact with the images of things, not the things themselves. Belief
has no saving power. But knowledge has. “This is life eternal, to KNOW
thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.”
It is therefore a great mistake when Orthodoxy or Rationalism reverses the
axiom of John, and instead of saying, “Life is the light of man,” tells us
that “Light is the life of man.” Knowledge comes from life. Belief comes
from knowledge, and not the contrary.
The PRINCIPLE of Orthodoxy, as stated at the commencement of this chapter
(in § 1), is, that there is one true system of Christian doctrine, and
that all others are false. The IDEA of Orthodoxy, as stated in § 10 of
this chapter, is, that the soul is saved by the sight of truth. The idea
of Orthodoxy is true—its principle is false. The sight of truth—that is,
of the great spiritual realities—saves us, for only by that sight are we
lifted above our feeble and imperfect selves, and enabled to partake of
the nature of God. But while truth is ever one and the same, doctrine
varies from age to age, varies from man to man. Each man’s statement is
limited by his position, his mode of thought, his power of speech. Nor can
any council, assembly, conference, synod escape from similar limitations.
Let the distinction be once clearly recognized between truth as seen and
truth as stated,—between knowledge and belief,—and we see the end of
dogmatism, bigotry, intolerance, and superstition. We shall then see that
religion is one thing and theology quite another, and that the test and
evidence of a sound religious experience are not what a man says, but what
he is. The sight of truth remains, as always, the source of our moral and
spiritual life, but this sight of truth must pass into knowledge, by means
of life, in order to renew the soul. FAITH, or the act by which the soul,
desirous of good, puts itself in the presence of truth, is always the
beginning of each spiritual state. KNOWLEDGE, born of this faith, through
repeated acts of conscience, love, obedience, prayer, is the next step,
and that which fixes the truth in the soul. BELIEF comes afterwards,
resulting from the knowledge thus obtained, analyzed, and arranged by the
systematizing intellect. And theory, or opinion, goes forward, like the
skirmishers before an army, examining the route and opening the way, but
incapable of resisting any attack, or holding permanently any position.