SECTION VIII.—THE NEW TESTAMENT.

Since a considerable portion of the New Testament has already been

dealt with in the life of Jesus, we have only, in the present section,

to consider the remaining works of which it is composed. These will

not require a very elaborate treatment. They consist of one historical

book, continuing the history of the Christian community from the death

of its founder till the imprisonment of Paul at Rome, of letters,

partly genuine, partly spurious, bearing the names of eminent apostles

as their authors, and of one composition somewhat akin in its nature

to the writings of the Hebrew prophets. Of these several parts of the

New Testament (excluding the Gospels) some of the Epistles are probably

the most ancient; but as it would be difficult to establish any precise

chronological sequence among the several books, it will be most

convenient to begin with that which stands first in actual order.

SUBDIVISION 1.—_The Acts of the Apostles._

The author of the third gospel, having written the life of Jesus,

proceeded to compose, in addition to it, a history of the proceedings

of his apostles after his decease. We are greatly indebted to him for

having done so, for this book is, notwithstanding some extravagances,

of considerable value, and is the most trustworthy of the five

historical books in the New Testament. It brought the narrative of

events nearer to the date at which it was written than the gospel could

do, and it dealt with events concerning which better evidence was

accessible to the writer. There was thus not the same scope for fiction

as there had been in the life of Christ. Nevertheless the story of the

Acts of the Apostles is by no means free from legendary admixture.

Beginning with the ascension, which has been already noticed in

connection with the gospel, it proceeds to relate the choice of a new

apostle in place of the unfaithful Judas. The ceremony by which the

choice was made evinces a singular superstition on the part of the

apostles. Having selected two men, Joseph and Matthias, they simply

prayed that God would show which he had chosen. They then drew lots,

and the lot fell upon Matthias (Acts i. 15-26).

The next important event in the history of the Church thus recruited,

was the reception of the Holy Ghost on the day of Pentecost. On this

occasion the Christians were all assembled, when suddenly there was a

sound like that of strong wind; cloven tongues appeared and sat upon

them; they were filled with the Holy Ghost, and suddenly acquired the

power of speaking foreign languages (Acts ii. 1-13). Since the "gift

of tongues" has not been unknown in certain communities in recent

times, we might perhaps form a tolerably correct notion from the

reports of modern observers as to what the scene among the disciples

was like. Even, however, without this modern experience, we should not

be altogether in the dark as to the character of the phenomenon of

which the author of the Acts makes mention. For although it is indeed

stated that some of the strangers who were present heard each his own

language spoken by the disciples, it is added that the conviction

produced upon others was that the Christians were drunk. It must have

been a wild and singular exhibition which could lead to the formation

of such an opinion. But if we wanted further explanation we should find

it in the words of Paul, whose strong practical judgment led him to

depreciate the value of the gift of tongues as compared with that of

preaching. Had this gift consisted in the power of speaking their own

languages to foreign nations, there is none to whom it would have been

of greater service than the apostle of the Gentiles. Yet it is he who

tells us that at a meeting he would rather speak five words with his

understanding, that he might teach others also, than ten thousand in

a tongue. So that the words spoken "in tongues" were not spoken with

the understanding; they were mere sounds without a meaning to him who

uttered them. Equally clear is the evidence of Paul to the fact that

they were without a meaning to him who heard them. His reason for

desiring his correspondents to cultivate the gift of prophesying (or

preaching) rather than that of tongues is that "he that speaks in a

tongue speaks not to men, but to God, for _nobody_ understands him, but

in the spirit he speaks mysteries. But he that preaches speaks to men

edification, and exhortation, and comfort. He that speaks in a tongue

edifies himself; but he that preaches edifies the Church" (1 Cor. xiv.

2-4). Tongues, he says further on, are for a sign to unbelievers; that

is, they are of use merely to impress the senses of those whose minds

cannot yet be appealed to. But if the unbelieving or unlearned should

happen to enter a meeting where the disciples were all speaking with

tongues, they would consider them mad: a striking testimony to the

tumultuous character of scenes like that presented by the enthusiastic

assembly of the Christians at Pentecost. Hence Paul desires that two,

or at most three, should speak with tongues at a time, and that there

should always be somebody to interpret, in other words, to translate

nonsense into sense. Without an interpreter, he would not sanction any

exercise of this peculiar faculty on the part of the inspired linguist

(1 Cor. xiv. 1-28).

To satisfy the doubts of those who attributed the sudden attainments

of the apostles to intoxicating drinks, Peter delivered a discourse,

which ended in the addition of 3,000 members to the rising sect. It

is remarkable that these new members at once became communists, both

they and all the disciples having all things in common; a noteworthy

indication of what was required by the religion of Christ as understood

by his immediate disciples (Acts ii. 14-47). Further evidence, if any

were needed, of the communistic character of the Church is contained

at the end of the fourth chapter, while the fifth informs us of the

tolerably severe measures taken to enforce it. "There was one heart and

one soul among the multitude of those who believed, nor did a single

one say that any of the things he possessed was his own; but they had

all things common." Unhappily the one heart and one mind did not extend

to Ananias or to his wife Sapphira, for this naughty couple "sold a

possession and kept back part of the price." But Peter was not thus to

be taken in. It does not appear from the account that Ananias was asked

whether the sum he produced was the whole price of the land, or that he

told any falsehood regarding it. However, Peter remarked that he might

have kept either the property or its price, had he thought proper, and

charged him with lying to God; whereupon the poor man fell down dead.

About three hours later, Sapphira came in; and she distinctly stated

that the sum produced by Ananias was the full price. Peter told her

that the feet of those who had buried her husband were at the door, and

would carry her out too. She then fell down at his feet, and expired in

her turn (Acts. iv. 31-v. 11).

No wonder that "great fear came upon all the Church" when they heard

these things. Peter's proceedings were indeed alarming, and could we

for a moment accept the account of his historian, we should have no

option but to hold him guilty of the wilful murder of Sapphira. He

knew, according to his own statement, what the effect of his words upon

this woman would be, and he should have abstained from any expression

that could bring about so terrible a catastrophe. Happily, we may

reject the whole story as either a fiction or a perversion of fact.

Had it been true, it would have called for very much sterner measures

than those taken by the Sanhedrim, who, having already desired Peter

and John to keep silence about the new religion, now merely imprisoned

the apostles, and afterwards, on the prudent advice of Gamaliel,

determined to release them; not indeed till after they had beaten them

and again prohibited their propagandist efforts (Acts v. 17-42). It

is interesting to observe that Luke effects the deliverance of the

apostles from prison by the intervention of an angel, and that at a

later period, when Peter had been imprisoned by Herod, he again gets

him out by means of an angel who appears to him while sleeping, and at

whose presence his chains fall off (Acts xii. 1-19). This is quite in

accordance with the proceedings of the same author in the gospel, where

his partiality for angels as part of his theatrical machinery has been

shown to be characteristic.

The infant community was now increasing in numbers, and along with

this increase there arose the customary consequences—dissension and

mutual distrust. We are fortunate in possessing in the Acts an account

of the very first quarrel in the Church; the earliest symptom of those

discords and hostilities, which, since that time, have so incessantly

raged within her limits. It was on a question of money; the Greeks

murmuring against the Hebrews, because they thought their widows were

neglected in the daily ministration. The apostles tided over the

immediate difficulty by appointing subordinate officers to attend to

matters of business. The plan succeeded; but their peace was soon to be

disturbed again by graver questions (Acts vi. 1-8).

Among those appointed to superintend the pecuniary interests of the

Church was one named Stephen. This man is reported to have performed

great wonders and miracles, but some of the Jews accused him of

blasphemy, and after an eloquent defense, which to Jewish ears amounted

to an admission of the charge, he was sentenced to death by stoning.

Foremost in the execution of the sentence was a man named Saul, who

was conspicuous at this time for the bitterness with which he pursued

the Christians, entering their private houses, and causing them to be

imprisoned (Acts vi. 9-viii. 3).

If any proof were needed of the entire conscientiousness of the

Jewish persecutors of Christianity at this time we should find it in

the character of Saul. Of the honesty of his religious zeal, of the

single-minded sense of duty from which he acted in his anti-Christian

period, his subsequent career makes it impossible to entertain a doubt.

Men like the apostle Paul are not made out of selfish, dishonest, or

cruel natures. He was at the martyrdom of Stephen as honorable and

fearless an upholder of the ancient faith as he was afterwards to the

new. He himself several times refers in his writings to his persecution

of the Church, and always in the tone of a man who had nothing to be

ashamed of but a mistake in judgment. As touching the righteousness

which is in the law, he tells us he was blameless (Phil. iii. 6). And

although in intellectual power he was doubtless above the average of

his class, in point of genuine devotion to his creed, he may fairly be

taken as a type of the men with whom he consented to act.

Saul had probably been impressed by the conduct of the Christians, whom

he had so ruthlessly delivered up to justice. At any rate the subject

of the Christian religion had taken great hold upon his mind, for on

his way to Damascus he saw a vision which induced him to become himself

a follower of Jesus. It is unfortunate that we have no detailed account

of the nature of the event which led to his conversion from Paul

himself. He often alludes to it, but nowhere describes it.

The most important passage bearing upon the subject is in the Second

Epistle to the Corinthians, where he thus mysteriously refers to his

experience on this occasion: "I knew a man in Christ above fourteen

years ago (whether in the body I do not know, whether out of the body

I do not know) such an one caught up to the third heaven. And I knew

such a man (whether in the body, whether out of the body, God knows),

that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which

it is not lawful for a man to utter" (2 Cor. xii. 2-4). So far as it

goes, this account does not very well agree with that of the Acts,

since there we are told exactly what were the words Paul heard, and

what he answered. We are left in doubt then whether the conversation

between Christ and the apostle there related rests on the authority of

Paul himself, or represents merely the imagination of others as to what

might have passed between them. But that Paul saw some kind of vision,

which he himself believed to be a vision of Christ, there can be no

doubt.

From Luke we have two versions of this incident, one in the form of

historical narrative, the other in that of a speech put into the mouth

of Paul. According to these he saw a light, and heard a voice saying,

"Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?" On inquiry, he learnt that the

voice emanated from Jesus, and he was desired to proceed to Damascus,

where further instructions would be given him. Luke has not taken

sufficient pains to make his two versions harmonize, for in the first

we are told that his companions heard a voice, but saw no man; in the

second that they saw the light, but did not hear the voice of him that

spoke (Acts ix. 7, and xxii. 9). At Damascus a man named Ananias,

directed also by a vision, went to Saul to restore his sight, which had

been destroyed for the moment by the brilliancy of the celestial light.

After this, Saul, subsequently called Paul, escaping from the pursuit

of the Jews who had designs upon his life, began to preach in the name

of Jesus (Acts ix. 1-31).

Another convert of some consideration, from his official position and

from the fact that he was a heathen, was added to the community about

this time. This was Cornelius, the Centurion of the Italian band.

Cornelius was a religious man, much given to prayer. Tired perhaps of

visions, of which there had been two in the last chapter and was to be

another in this, Luke introduces his angel—a sort of supernumerary ever

ready to appear when wanted—to effect the conversion of Cornelius. The

angel told him to apply to Peter, now at Joppa, for further advice as

to what he should do. Meanwhile Peter had on his part been prepared

by a vision of unclean beasts, which he was desired to eat, for the

reception of the Gentile embassy, and the admission of Gentiles to

the flock. He accordingly proceeded to Cæsarea, where Cornelius was,

and baptized both him and other heathens, upon whom, to the great

astonishment of the Jews, the Holy Ghost was poured out and the gift

of tongues conferred. Thus did the Church of Christ begin, timidly

and feeling her way with caution, to extend her boundaries beyond the

limits of the Hebrew people (Acts x).

Some scandal was created in the congregation at Jerusalem by Peter's

violation of Jewish rules in dining with uncircumcised people, but

there was no gainsaying a vision like that which he produced in reply.

Shortly after these events the apostle James, one of those two brothers

whose mother had petitioned that they might sit on two thrones, one

on each side of Jesus, when his kingdom came, was executed by Herod,

the tetrarch; who also imprisoned Peter, but was unable to keep him on

account of the angelic intervention mentioned above. The death of this

monarch from a painful internal disease, is curiously perverted by the

writer into a sudden judgment of God, inflicted upon him because he

accepted divine honors at the hands of his flatterers (Acts xi. xii).

The history now proceeds to follow the fortunes of Paul. It is stated

that there were at Antioch certain prophets and teachers, who were

inspired by the Holy Ghost to appoint Barnabas and Saul to the work

whereunto they were called. Having laid their hands upon them, they

sent them away. Paul now began to travel from place to place, making

converts among the heathen. At Paphos he met with a Jewish sorcerer

named Elymas, who he caused to be blind for a season, thereby inducing

the Roman proconsul Sergius Paulus to believe in Christianity, which

had thus shown itself able to produce more powerful sorcerers than the

rival creed (Acts xiii. 1-12).

It is a striking proof of the liberality of the Jews at this period

that when Paul and his companions had gone into the synagogue of

Antioch in Pisidia, the rulers of the synagogue invited them to speak;

a freedom which even in the present day would scarcely be granted in

any Christian Church to those who were regarded as heretics. Paul took

advantage of the proffered opportunity to deliver a speech which ended

in the conversion of some of the Jews. On the following Sabbath great

crowds came to hear Paul, but the Jews, as was natural, opposed him

and contradicted him. After this they stirred up pious women and the

principal men of the city against Paul and Barnabas, and (it is stated)

expelled them from their coasts (Acts xiii. 50). These apostles having

already determined to go (Acts xiii. 46), it was not a severe treatment

that was thus inflicted on them. They, however, left Antioch in no very

charitable frame of mind, for they shook off the dust of their feet

against its inhabitants (Acts xiii. 14-52).

The cure of an impotent man at Lystra led the multitude of that place

to adore Paul and Barnabas as gods. Paul, as the orator, they called

Hermes, and Barnabas, Zeus. The priest of Zeus brought oxen and

garlands, and intended to sacrifice to them, an intention which the

people were barely prevented, by the indignant protests of the two

apostles, from carrying into effect (Acts xiv. 8-18). This was not

the only occasion on which Paul was taken for a god; for when he was

cast by shipwreck on the island of Melita, his escape from injury by

a venomous reptile which had fastened on his hand was regarded by the

savages of that island as a proof of divinity (Acts xxviii. 1-6).

Extremely similar to these incidents, especially to the first, is

a circumstance recounted by Sir Francis Drake in his voyage of

circumnavigation. His vessel having sprung a leak, while he was

exploring the coast of North America, was brought to anchor to be

repaired, and the sailors landed to build tents and make a fort for

purposes of defense. The natives approached them in companies, armed,

and as if designing an attack, but it appeared that they had "no

hostile meaning or intent;" for when they came near, they stood "as men

ravished in their minds, with the sight of such things as they never

had seen or heard of before that time: their errand being rather with

submission and feare to worship us as gods, than to have any warre

with us as with mortall men. Which thing, as it did partly show itself

at that instant, so did it more and more manifest itself afterwards,

during the whole time of our abode amongst them." The General gave

them materials for clothing, "withall signifying unto them we were no

gods, but men, and had neede of such things to cover our own shame;

teaching them to use them for the same ends, for which cause wee did

eate and drinke in their presence, giving them to understand that

without that wee could not live, and therefore were but men as well as

they" ("we also are men of like passions with you") (Acts xiv. 15).

"Notwithstanding nothing could persuade them, nor remove that opinion

which they had conceived of us, that wee should be gods" (W. E., p.

120).

And, as the heathens of Lystra were eager to sacrifice to Barnabas

and Paul, so those of this country actually conferred this mark of

divinity upon some of the white men in the company of Drake, nor were

the utmost protests of the travelers of avail to put a stop to what

appeared to them, just as it did to the apostles, an impious rite,

derogating from the honor due to the true God. The people had come in

a large body, accompanied by their king, to make a formal presentation

of the sovereignty to him, and the king had made over into his hands

the insignia of the royal office, when the scene now described by Sir

Francis took place.

"The ceremonies of this resigning and receiving of the Kingdome being

thus performed," says Sir Francis, "the common sort, both of men and

women, leaving the king and his guard about him, with our Generall,

dispersed themselves among our people, taking a diligent view or

survey of every man; and finding such as pleased their fancies (which

commonly were the youngest of us), they presently enclosing them about

offred their sacrifices unto them crying out with lamentable shreekes

and moanes, weeping and scratching and tearing their very flesh off

their faces with their nails; neither were it the women alone which

did this, but even old men, roaring and crying out, were as violent as

the women were.

"We groaned in spirit to see the power of Sathan so farre prevaile in

seducing these, so harmlesse soules, and labored by all meanes, both

by shewing our great dislike, and when that served not, by violent

withholding of their hands from that madnesse, directing them (by

our eyes and hands lift up towards heaven) to the living God whom

they ought to serve; but so mad were they upon their Idolatry, that

forcible withholding them would not prevaile (for as soon as they

could get liberty to their hands againe, they would be as violent as

they were before) till such time, as they whom they worshiped were

conveyed from them into the tents, whom yet as men besides themselves,

they would with fury and outrage seeke to have again" (W. E., p. 129).

We are again reminded of the Acts: "And with these sayings scarce

restrained they the people, that they had not done sacrifice unto them"

(Acts xiv. 18).

An unfortunate change in the popular mind soon occurred; for on the

arrival of some Jews who stirred them up to hostility against the

Apostles, they flew from one extravagance to another, and stoned Paul

so severely that he was left by them for dead. But as the disciples

stood about him he rose, and was able to continue his journey on the

next day.

The Christians at Jerusalem were now required to consider the difficult

question of the circumcision of the Gentiles; their decision upon which

has already been discussed. After the council Paul (who had returned

to Antioch) proposed to revisit the places where he had formerly

preached, and Barnabas intended to go with him. But a difference of

opinion as to whether they should take Mark with them led to a violent

quarrel between these two apostles; as the result of which Paul chose

Silas as his companion, and left Barnabas to pursue his own course with

his friend Mark (Acts xv).

The writer now follows the fortunes of Paul in his missionary work in

various countries, and it is remarkable that in the sixteenth chapter

he drops the third person, and begins to speak in the first person

plural, implying that he himself was one of the company. The fact that

from this point onwards the book becomes practically not the Acts of

the Apostles, but the Acts of Paul, who is evidently the hero of the

story, indicates an author who belonged to the Pauline section of

the Church, and to whom Paul was the chief living embodiment of the

Christian faith. Who this author was—whether Silas, or some other

companion—it would be hard to say, but he seems to have written under

the direct inspiration of Paul himself.

Increased by the addition of Timotheus, the party, guided by a vision

seen by Paul of a Macedonian entreating them to come, went into

Macedonia. At Philippi they met with some success among women, making

particular friends with a purple-seller named Lydia. But the conversion

of a divining girl who was a source of profit to her employers, led to

the imprisonment of Paul and Silas, from which, however, an opportune

earthquake set them free (Acts xvi).

At Athens Paul made a speech on the Areopagos, in which he ingeniously

availed himself of an altar he had noticed, inscribed "To an Unknown

God," to maintain that this unknown God was no other than the Jehovah

of the Jews (Acts xvii. 16-34). At Corinth he was allowed to preach

every Sabbath in the synagogue (as he had done at Thessalonica, and did

again at Ephesus), another evidence of the tolerant spirit of the Jews

as compared with Christians. Not, of course, that the Jews were not

bigoted adherents of their narrow creed, or that they had any scruple

about supporting it by physical force; but they were willing to allow

those who had a reformation to propose to be heard in the synagogues.

The effect, as might be expected, was to embitter those who remained

orthodox against Paul. But an attempt on their part to bring him under

the jurisdiction of the civil tribunals failed, and after remaining a

long time at Corinth, he went on to Ephesus, and thence continued his

course through Galatia and Phrygia (Acts xviii. 1-23). An eloquent and

able Alexandrian, Apollos by name, came to Ephesus, after Paul had left

it. He was a believer in John the Baptist, and was received into the

Church by Paul's friends, Aquila and Priscilla, whom he had left behind.

A singular incident occurred on a subsequent visit of Paul's to

Ephesus. He found some disciples there and asked them whether they

had received the Holy Ghost. They replied that they did not even

know whether there was a Holy Ghost. Such crass ignorance must have

astonished Paul, who inquired into what they had been baptized. They

said, into John's baptism, and the apostle accordingly baptized them

in the name of Jesus, with the striking result that they immediately

received the Holy Ghost and began to speak in tongues (Acts xix. 1-7).

Curious incidental evidence is thus supplied by the case of Apollos

and by that of these Ephesians of the existence of a Johannine sect

which Christianity superseded and swept into oblivion; and it is

remarkable, as affording a presumption that the Baptist did not regard

himself as the mere precursor of Christ, that these Johannists do not

appear to have been looking forward to any further development of their

principles such as the religion of Jesus supplied.

At Ephesus Paul preached for three months in the synagogue, and then,

meeting with much opposition, betook himself to a public room, where he

disputed daily. But after he had taught two years, a dangerous riot was

excited by the tradesmen who dealt in silver shrines for the Ephesian

Artemis, and Paul, after the disturbance had been quelled, determined

to go into Macedonia (Acts xix. 8-xx. 1). While he was preaching at

Troas, a young man, who had fallen asleep, fell from the window at

which he was sitting, and was supposed to have been killed. Paul,

however, declared that he was still alive, and told them not to be

disturbed. This opinion proved to be correct. To this simple incident

the historian, by stating that he was "taken up dead," has contrived to

give the aspect of a miracle. The case exactly resembles the supposed

miracle of Jesus, discussed above (Supra, vol. i. p. 320-323), and is

another illustration of the facility with which natural occurrences

may, by the turn of a phrase, be converted into marvels (Acts xx. 7-12).

No arguments were now availing to dissuade the apostle from visiting

Jerusalem, where it was well known that peril awaited him. Arrived at

the centre of Judaism, his first business was to clear himself from

the suspicions entertained of his rationalistic tendencies by taking

a vow according to the Mosaic ritual. After this the Asiatic Jews

raised a clamor against him which ended in a dangerous tumult. From

the violent death which threatened him at the hands of the enraged

multitude he was rescued by the Roman troops, under cover of whose

protection he made his defense before the people (Acts xxi. 27-xxii.

21). It naturally did not conciliate the Jews; and the Roman officer

who had made him prisoner, having been deterred from the application of

torture by Paul's Roman citizenship, desired his accusers to appear in

court to prefer their charges on the following day (Acts xxii. 22-30).

But when the case came on, Paul ingeniously contrived to set the

Pharisees against the Sadducees by the assertion that he himself was

a Pharisee, and that he was charged with believing in a future state.

By this not very candid shift he obtained the support of the Pharisaic

party, and produced among his prosecutors a scene of clamor and discord

from which it was thought expedient to remove him. Defeated in the

courts of law, the more embittered of his enemies formed a scheme of

private assassination which was revealed to the captain of the guard

by Paul's nephew, and from which he was rescued by being sent by night

under a strong military escort to the governor of the province, a man

named Felix (Acts xxiii). Ananias, the high priest, and others of the

prosecutors, followed Paul to Cæsarea in five days, but the nature of

their charges was such that they made little impression upon the mind

of the governor. He nevertheless kept Paul in confinement, perhaps

hoping (as the narrator suggests) that he would receive a bribe to

set him free (Acts xxiv). After two years Festus succeeded Felix, and

when this governor visited Jerusalem he was entreated by the priests

to send for Paul, which, however, he refused to do, and required the

prosecutors to come to him at Cæsarea. They went, and charged Paul

with offenses which it is said they could not prove. When Festus asked

him whether he would go to Jerusalem to be tried by him, Paul replied

that he ought to be tried at Cæsar's judgment-seat, as he had done the

Jews no wrong, and that he appealed to Cæsar. The policy of this appeal

was questionable, for after a time Festus was visited by King Agrippa,

to whom he related the facts of the case; and the king, having heard

the statement of the prisoner himself, declared that he might have been

set at liberty had he not appealed to Cæsar (Acts xxv., xxvi).

Paul therefore was now sent with a gang of prisoners to Rome, on

the way to which the ship he was in was wrecked off the island of

Melita, where the winter months were accordingly passed. Here he

cured numerous inhabitants of diseases, and received high honors in

consequence. After three months an Alexandrine vessel conveyed the

shipwrecked company to the capital. Arrived at Rome, Paul summoned the

Jews to come to the house where, guarded by a soldier, he was allowed

to live, and endeavored to convert them. Meeting with indifferent

success, he dismissed them with insulting words drawn from Isaiah, and

roundly informed them that the salvation of God was now sent to the

Gentiles, and that these would hear it (Acts xxvii., xxviii). What was

the ultimate fate of this great teacher of Christianity, whether his

case was ever heard, and if so, how it was decided; whether he lived

a prisoner, or was set free, or died a martyr, we have no historical

information, and it is useless, in the absence of evidence, to attempt

to conjecture.

SUBDIVISION 2.—_The Epistles._

In the epistles which have been preserved to us, and which are no doubt

but a few rescued from a much larger correspondence, the apostolic

authors enforce upon their respective converts or congregations

the doctrines of Christianity as understood by them. They explain

the relation of Jesus to the Jewish law; they inculcate morality;

they reply to objections; they hold out the prospect of the speedy

revolution which they expect. Since their opinions on all the topics

upon which they touch cannot, within the limits of a general treatise,

be discussed in detail, all that is necessary now is to glance rapidly

at the more general characteristics of the several writers.

A letter addressed to the twelve tribes scattered abroad, and

traditionally ascribed to the apostle James, may best be taken in

connection with an anonymous epistle addressed to the Hebrews. They

have these two features in common, that they are written to Jewish

Christians, and that they discuss the relation of faith to works. It

is true that this question is treated by their authors from opposite

points of view. Theological controversy began early in the history

of the Christian Church, and its first controversial treatises have

been embodied in the Canon of its Sacred Books. It appears, moreover,

to be highly probable, not only that the two epistles were written

on opposite sides of a disputed question, but that the chapter in

the one dealing with that question was designed as an answer to the

corresponding chapter in the other. It may be difficult to say which

was the original statement, which the reply; but when we find the very

same examples chosen by both, the one maintaining that Abraham and

Rahab were justified by faith, the other that they were justified by

works, it is not easy to believe that so exact a coincidence in the

mode of treating their subject was accidental. The more argumentative

tone taken by James—as of one answering an opponent—induces me to

believe that his epistle was the later of the two. The author of the

Hebrews insists upon the paramount necessity of faith; showing by a

number of historical examples that the conduct of the great heroes of

the Hebrew race, besides that of many inferior models of excellence,

was wholly due to this cause. The author of James, on the contrary,

strenuously maintains that faith is of no value without works, and,

as if endeavoring to set aside the force of the examples produced

on the other side, selects for his consideration the history of two

persons who had been held up as illustrations of the doctrine that we

are justified by faith. Abraham, he says, was not justified by faith

only, but by works; for he offered Isaac on the altar, which was a very

practical illustration of his faith (James ii. 21-23). Rahab again,

who according to you was saved from destruction with the unbelievers

by faith, was in reality justified by works, for it was a work to

receive the messengers and send them out another way (James ii. 25).

Not that we deny the importance of faith altogether; but we do deny the

exclusive position which you, in your Epistle to the Hebrews, assign

to it. Without works faith is a dead, unproductive thing; like a body

without its animating spirit. Indeed a man may say to him who relies

upon his faith alone, Show me your faith without works, and I will

show you mine by my works. What is the use of a faith unaccompanied by

works? can it save any one by itself? Certainly not, answers James;

Certainly, says the author of the Hebrews. The whole question turns

on those hair-splitting distinctions in which theologians have ever

delighted; for while the one party considers faith as the producing

cause of good actions, the other treats good actions as the evidence

of faith. Neither the one nor the other really meant to question the

necessity of either element in the combination.

In other respects there is a broad difference between the two epistles.

That to the Hebrews is Judaic in tone and spirit; its main object being

to prove that Christ is a sort of high-priest, endowed with authority

to set aside the old Jewish institutions and substitute something

better. James is more catholic and more practical. He insists upon the

necessity of not only hearing, but doing the word; of keeping the whole

moral law; of bridling the tongue, and of showing no respect to persons

on account of their worldly position. He is extremely hostile to the

rich, and draws a very unfavorable picture of their conduct (James

ii. 6, 7, and v. 1-6). He encourages the poor Christians to endure

patiently till Christ comes, which will be very soon (James v. 7, 8).

Lastly, he emphatically urges the duty of proselytism upon his flock;

remarking that one who converts another when wandering from the truth,

both saves the soul of the wanderer and hides a multitude of his own

sins (James v. 19, 20).

Two epistles are attributed to the apostle Peter, the first of which,

addressed to the strangers in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and

Bithynia, purports to be written from Babylon. He holds out to his

correspondents the hope of salvation which they have through Jesus,

which is a source of joy, notwithstanding their present troubles.

Among other precepts he counsels husbands and wives as to their

mutual behavior; exhorting wives to be obedient, and not to care too

much for dress; and requiring husbands to honor their wives as the

weaker vessels (1 Pet. iii. 1-7). The Second Epistle of Peter would

appear to be by a rather later author, for he has read the epistles of

Paul. He is troubled about "false teachers," who introduce "heresies

of destruction," and denounces them in no measured terms (2 Pet. ii).

Having, as above described, comforted the Christians for the long delay

in the second coming of the Savior, he exhorts them not to be led away

by the error of the wicked, but to grow in grace and in the knowledge

of their Lord (2 Pet. iii. 17, 18).

Of the three epistles bearing the name of John, the first only is of

any considerable length. The style of this epistle is extremely simple,

and it reads like the kindly talk of an old man to children. He tells

his flock not to sin, not to love the world, and to love one another.

So much does he keep to these purely general maxims, that it would be

difficult to gather any really useful instruction from his benevolent

garrulity. It is characteristic of him to insist again and again upon

love as the cardinal virtue of a Christian. Besides this, perhaps the

most definite advice he gives is to pray for anything desired, and to

entreat of God the forgiveness of a brother who has committed a sin not

unto death (1 John v. 14-16). With great self-complacency he calmly

asserts that he and his friends are of God, and that the whole world

lies in wickedness (1 John v. 19); a pleasant mode of putting those

towards whom it was impossible to practice the love about which he

spoke outside of the pale of brotherhood.

The writer of John's second epistle, addressed to a lady and her

children, illustrates the kind of charity resulting from such views

as this, when he tells them not to receive into their house, nor bid

"farewell" to any one who does not hold correct doctrines (2 John

10). The third epistle, written to Gaius, contains little beyond

matters of purely personal interest. The Epistle of Jude, who calls

himself brother of James, denounces certain "ungodly men," who have

"crept in unawares," and are doing great mischief in the Church. It is

principally interesting from its reference to the legend of the contest

of Michael the archangel with the devil for the body of Moses, which

popular tale the writer seems to accept as unquestionably authentic

(Jude 9).

Having thus referred to the writings which bear, whether correctly

or not, the names of the original apostles of Jesus, we come to

those of one who was far greater than any of these—the apostle who

was not converted until after the death of his Master. Paul, to whom

the great majority of the epistles preserved in the New Testament

are ascribed, and by whom many of them were undoubtedly written, is

the central figure of the apostolic age, and the one who redeems it

from the somewhat unintellectual character it would otherwise have

had. Through him it principally was that Christianity passed from the

condition of a Jewish sect to that of a comprehensive religion. What

Christ himself had been unable to do, he did. What the apostles of

Christ shrunk from attempting, he accomplished. He himself was not

unconscious of the magnitude of his labors. Hence there is noticeable

now and then in his writings, though veiled under respectful phrases,

a sort of intellectual contempt for the older apostles, who were not

always prepared for the thorough-going measures which appeared to him

so obviously expedient. He is extremely anxious not to be thought one

whit inferior to them by reason of his comparatively late appointment

to the apostleship. He carefully rebuts the suspicion that he acted

in subordination to them, or even in conjunction with them, after

his conversion. His course, he is anxious to let every one know, was

taken in entire independence of the Church at Jerusalem. Moreover, he

insists emphatically upon his personal qualifications. Was any one a

Hebrew? so was he. Had others received visions or revelations? so had

he. Had others been persecuted? so had he. He is fond of dwelling upon

his individual history in order to support his claims. Thus he tells

us that in former times he persecuted the Church of God, and that he

was more Jewish than the Jews, being even more zealous than they of

the traditions of his fathers. It was therefore entirely by special

revelation from God, and not by any human agency whatever, that he

was consecrated to his present work. Indeed his revelations were so

abundant that it needed a "thorn in the flesh" to prevent him from

being too proud of them—a work, however, in which the thorn was not

entirely successful. His sufferings for the sake of the gospel afforded

him another and more legitimate cause of satisfaction. He says of these

that he received thirty-nine stripes from the Jews on five occasions;

that he was thrice beaten with rods; once stoned; thrice shipwrecked;

a day and night in the deep (in an open boat?); often in all sorts of

perils, in watchings, cold and thirst, hunger and nakedness. Once too

he escaped from arrest at Damascus, which does not seem a very serious

calamity (2 Cor. xi. 22-28.—Gal. i. 11-24).

Now the object of all these autobiographical statements is evidently to

place himself on a level with other apostles who might seem at first

to be more highly privileged than he was. Not so, he contends; if they

are ministers of Christ, I am quite as much so; if they saw Christ

before his death, I have seen him after it; if they have labored in his

cause, I have labored more; if they have suffered for his sake, I have

suffered more. Hence my authority is in every respect equal to theirs,

and should there be a difference of opinion between us you must believe

me, your pastor, rather than them. Nay, even if an angel from heaven

should preach any other gospel than that which I have preached, you

must not believe him; much more then must you disbelieve an apostle.

Besides, appearances are deceptive, and as Satan may appear in the

character of an angel of light, so the ministers of Satan may, and do

appear in the character of apostles of Christ (2 Cor. xi. 13-15.—Gal.

i. 8). There was therefore a section of the Church—probably the Judaic

section, under the guidance of one of the original apostles—with whom

Paul was at issue, and whom he considered it incumbent upon him to

oppose by every argument in his power. These are they whom he refers to

as "troubling" the Galatians, and perverting the Gospel of Christ (Gal.

i. 7).

Such was the view taken by Paul of his function in the rising sect.

Whatever may have been its logical justification, it was fully

justified by facts. In power of reasoning, in grasp of principles,

in comprehensiveness of view, he was not only "not a whit behind the

chiefest apostles," but far before them. His letters are by far the

most remarkable of the writings which the New Testament contains. They

evince a mind almost overburdened by the mass of feelings struggling

for expression. He is profoundly penetrated with the new truth he has

discovered, or rather which Christ has discovered to him, and he seems

to have scarcely time to consider how he may best express it. His mind,

though wealthy in ideas and fertile in applying them to practice, is

not always clear. It seems rather to struggle with its thoughts than

to command them. Hence a certain confusedness in style, a crowding

together of notions in a single sentence, and a want of logical

arrangement in his presentation of a subject, which render his epistles

not altogether easy reading. It may have been those characteristics

which caused another apostle (or one who wrote in that apostle's name)

to say that there were some things in the writings of his beloved

brother Paul that were "hard to be understood" (2 Pet. iii. 16).

When, however, the uncouth style is surmounted, the thought will be

found well worthy of consideration. Of all the writers in the New

Testament Paul is the one who presents the largest materials for

intellectual reflection. Whether or not we agree in his views, we can

scarcely refuse to consider his arguments. And herein he is peculiar

among his associates. He is the only one of the canonical writers who

has any notion of presenting arguments for consideration at all. While

others dogmatize, he reasons. He may reason badly, but he has at least

the merit of being able to enter in some degree into the views of his

opponents, and of attempting to reply to them on rational grounds.

Another striking feature of the mind of Paul is its robustness.

Brought up a Pharisee, a sect devoted to extending the regulations of

the law to the utmost minutiæ, he nevertheless rose completely above

the domination of trifles. Even matters which in most religions are

regarded as of capital importance, he treated as of little moment in

themselves. Ceremonies, observances, outward forms of every kind he

held in slight esteem in comparison with moral conduct. Not the mere

knowledge of the Jewish law or the power of teaching it to others, is

of any avail, but the observance of its ethical precepts (Rom. ii.

17-23). Uncircumcision is just as good as circumcision, provided the

uncircumcised man keep the law. The true Jew is not he who is a Jew

outwardly, nor true circumcision that performed upon the flesh. He is

the true Jew who is one inwardly, and that is true circumcision which

is in the heart (Rom. ii. 24-29). Indeed, in the renovated condition

which is effected by Christianity, there is neither Greek nor Jew;

neither circumcision nor uncircumcision; neither barbarian, Scythian,

slave, nor freeman; but Christ is everything and in everything (Col.

iii. 11.—Gal. iii. 28). In the same rationalistic spirit he lays down

the admirable rule that external forms are valuable only to those

who think them so. One man believes he may eat everything; another

eats only herbs. One man esteems all days alike; another esteems

one day above another. The freethinker must not despise the one who

holds himself bound by such things, nor must this latter condemn the

freethinker. The really important matter is that every one should have

a complete conviction of his own. In that case, whatever conduct he

pursues in these trivialities, being dictated by his conscience, is

religious conduct. On the one side, the more scrupulous must not pass

judgment on the less scrupulous, that being the office of Christ;

but, on the other side, the less scrupulous must endeavor not to give

offense to the more scrupulous. In illustration of this doctrine

Paul confesses that to him personally the Jewish distinction between

clean and unclean meat is totally unmeaning; yet if his brother were

grieved by his eating the so-called unclean meats, he would rather

give up the practice than destroy by his meat ones for whom Christ had

died. All things, indeed, are pure in themselves, yet it is not well

to eat flesh or drink wine if another is scandalized thereby. We who

are strong-minded, and have surmounted these childish scruples of our

forefathers, must bear the infirmities of the weak rather than please

ourselves (Rom. xiv., xv. 1).

Certainly when the things are in themselves totally indifferent, the

principle of concession to the superstitions of minds governed by

traditional beliefs may sometimes be advantageously adopted. But the

importance of protesting against the bondage exercised by such beliefs

over human life is also not to be underrated, and Paul seems scarcely

to give it sufficient weight in the preceding argument. No doubt on the

ground of policy, and in reference to the desirability of keeping the

members of the nascent sect from internal quarrels, Paul was right;

but a principle which in certain cases may be expedient for a given

end, is not to be set up as a universal rule of ethics. Nor is it

obvious that Paul intended to do this. He himself, if questioned, would

probably have admitted that there were limits beyond which concession

ought not to go, those limits being fixed by the consideration

that such concession, if pushed too far, must end in the perpetual

subordination of the whole of the Christian body to the weaknesses of

its least enlightened members. The morality expressed in the lines

"Leave thou thy sister when she prays

Her early heaven, her happy views,

Nor thou with shadowed hint confuse

A life that leads melodious days,"

is good morality under certain conditions, but there is too great a

tendency on the part of those who retain their "early heaven" to press

this conduct upon those whose "faith has centre everywhere, nor cares

to fix itself to form." It ought not to be forgotten that but for the

Christian disregard of forms, persevered in in despite of the scandal

to the Jews, Christianity must always have remained a branch of Judaism.

A peculiar merit to be set to Paul's account is, that he is the only

one of all the writers in the New Testament who treats the supremely

important question of the relations of the sexes, a subject so

remarkably overlooked by Christ himself. Whether the guidance he

affords his converts on this head is good guidance or not, he does at

least attempt to guide them. Let us notice first what he considers

abnormal relations, and then proceed to what he lays down as a

normal one. In the first Epistle to the Corinthians he is loud in

his denunciations of a man who cohabited with his father's wife, the

father being, I presume, deceased. Whether the son had married his

stepmother, or merely lived with her, is not altogether clear, since,

in either case, the apostle might brand their connection with the title

of fornication. However, he condemns it utterly and without reference

to any accompanying circumstances, desiring the Corinthian community to

deliver up the man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, in the

name and with the power of their Lord Jesus, in order that his spirit

might be saved at the day of judgment (1 Cor. v). Here then we have an

early example of excommunication, accompanied by the formula to be used

in performing the solemnity.

That the severe reproof bestowed by Paul upon the Corinthians for

permitting such conduct greatly affected them, we gather from the

tenderer language employed in the subsequent epistle, where he admits

having at one moment repented that he had caused them so much sorrow,

though he soon saw that it had been for their good (2 Cor. vii. 8-13).

It is gratifying, also, to find that his tone towards the unfortunate

individual who had been excommunicated at his desire is greatly

softened, and that he desires the Corinthians to forgive him, and

receive him back into their body, lest he should be swallowed up with

too much sorrow (2 Cor. ii. 6, 7). It would have been interesting had

he informed us why he considered cohabitation with a stepmother so

terrible a crime, but such a recurrence to first principles was not to

be expected. He, no doubt, acted on a purely instinctive sentiment of

repugnance to such an arrangement.

A second kind of relation between the sexes which the apostle condemns

is that of prostitution. Here he has not left us equally in the dark

as to the grounds upon which his condemnation is founded. Not only

does he prohibit prostitution to the Christians, but he tells them

exactly why they ought not to indulge in it; and his argument upon this

subject is sufficiently curious to merit a moment's examination. In the

first place, then, he tells his disciples that neither fornicators,

nor adulterers, nor Sodomites, nor practicers of various other vices

not of a sexual nature, will inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. vi.

9, 10; Eph. v. 5). Fornication should not even be named among the

Christians (Eph. v. 3). They must mortify their members upon earth,

for impure connections and sexual license bring down the wrath of God

(Col. iii. 5, 6). They must exclude from their society any one who is

guilty of such irregularities (1 Cor. v. 9-11). "The body is not for

prostitution, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body." The bodies

of Christians are the members of Christ: "Shall I then take the members

of Christ, and make them the members of a prostitute? God forbid. What!

do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute is one body? for

the two [he says] shall be one flesh" (1 Cor. vi. 13-16). It was surely

a very original notion of Paul's to extend to the casual connections

formed by the temporary passion the solemn sanction bestowed upon the

permanent union of man and wife. It is said in Genesis that a man and

his wife are to be one flesh, and this is obviously an emphatic mode

of expressing the closeness and binding character of the alliance

into which they enter. But what may appropriately be said of married

persons cannot of necessity be said of persons linked together only

by the most fleeting and mercenary kind of ties. The very evil of

prostitution is, that the prostitute and her companion are _not_ one

flesh in the allegorical sense in which husband and wife are so; and to

condemn it on account of the presence of the very circumstance which

is conspicuously absent, is to cut the ground from under our feet. But

let us hear the apostle further. "But he that is joined to the Lord is

one spirit. Flee prostitution. Every sin that a man commits is outside

of the body [what can this mean?], but the fornicator sins against his

own body. What! do you not know that your body is the temple of the

Holy Spirit in you? which you have of God, and you are not your own" (1

Cor. vi. 17-19). Now in this singular argument it is noticeable that

the ground taken up is entirely theological. Destroy the theological

foundation, and the ethical superstructure is involved in its ruin.

Thus, if we do not believe that our bodies are the members of Christ,

nor the temples of the Holy Spirit, Paul has no moral reason to give us

against the most unlimited indulgence in prostitution. While, even if

we admit his premises, it is not very easy to see how his conclusion

follows. For why should we not make the members of Christ those of a

prostitute, unless it be previously shown that it would in any case

be wrong to do so with our own members? It would not (according to

Paul himself) be wrong to make the members of Christ members of a

wife; why, then, should it be wrong to make them members of any other

woman whatever? Clearly this question could not be answered without

an attempt to prove, on independent grounds, the evil of promiscuous

indulgence of the sexual passion. But no such attempt is made by Paul.

He has therefore failed completely to make out a case against even

the most unbridled license. Not that his conclusion need therefore be

rejected. On the contrary, the danger of his arguments is not that

his view of morals is fundamentally erroneous, but that he rests an

important precept upon a dangerously narrow basis.

Pass we now to that which he considers as the normal relation between

the sexes. The subject may be divided into three heads: that of the

formation of such relations, that of their character when formed, and

that of their disruption. Upon all of these the apostle has advice to

give.

In the first place it appears that the Corinthians had applied to him

for a solution of some question that had been raised among them as to

the propriety of entering at all into the matrimonial state. In answer

to their inquiries he begins by informing them that it is good for a

man not to touch a woman. He would prefer it if every one were like

himself unmarried. To unmarried people and widows he says that they had

better remain as they are. Concerning virgins of either sex he delivers

his private opinion that their condition is a good one for the present

necessity. A married man indeed should not endeavor to get rid of his

wife; but neither should an unmarried man endeavor to obtain a wife.

The time is so short till the final judgment of the world that it makes

little difference; before long both married and unmarried will be in

the same position. Meantime, however, celibacy is the preferable state;

and that because celibates care for the things of the Lord, how they

may please the Lord; but married people care for one another, and study

to please one another (1 Cor. vii. 1-34). Why Paul should suppose that

married people, even while studying one another's happiness, might not

also endeavor to please the Lord, it is hard to understand. He seems in

this passage to lend his sanction to the very dangerous doctrine that

a due discharge of the ordinary duties of life is incompatible with

attention to the service of God. As if the highest type of Christian

life was not precisely that in which both were combined in such a

manner that neither should be sacrificed to the other. But, apart from

this fundamental objection to his theory it is liable to the remark

that the assumptions on which it rests are untrue. Unmarried persons,

unless the whole literature of fiction, dramatic and novelistic,

utterly belies them, care at least as much to become married as married

persons care to promote one another's comfort. Indeed, it would be no

less true to nature to say, that the unmarried in general take more

pains to please some persons of the opposite sex than husbands take

to please their wives, or wives their husbands. Not to dwell upon the

fact that courtship involves a greater effort, mental and physical,

than the mere continuance of love assured of being returned, there

is the obvious consideration that the mere outward circumstances of

the unmarried are far less favorable than those of the married to the

enjoyment of their mutual society without considerable sacrifice of

time. Hence the estimate made by Paul of the relative advantages of

the two states is untrue to facts, except in the rare cases of those

who have firmly resolved upon a life of celibacy, and who, in addition

to this, have so perfect a control over their passions, or so little

passion at all, as to be untroubled by sexual imaginations.

That these objections are well founded might be proved by reference to

a picture (drawn either by Paul himself or by some one who assumed his

name) of the conduct of young widows. Having to consider the question

what widows may properly be supported by the charity of the Church,

this writer refuses to admit any of them to the number of pensioners

until they are sixty years old, apparently on the ground that they

cannot be trusted to give up flirting altogether before they have

reached that age. Young widows are to be rejected, for when they have

begun to wax wanton against Christ, they wish to marry; a damnable

tendency, but one which it is so hopeless to get rid of, that the best

thing they can do is to marry, to have children, and manage their

households. Otherwise they will gad about gossiping and tale-bearing

from house to house; not only idle, but mischievous (1 Tim. v. 9-15).

So that the ideal conception of unmarried persons caring only to please

the Lord had at least no application to Christian widows.

While recommending celibacy, Paul is careful not to encourage breach

of promise of marriage. If a man thinks he is behaving unhandsomely

towards his betrothed, who is passing the flower of her age, he

may marry her: he is not doing wrong. Nevertheless, if he feel no

necessity for a sexual relation, and resolve to keep her a virgin, he

does well. So then marriage is good, but celibacy is better (1 Cor.

vii. 36-38).

Notwithstanding these views, Paul, or at least the Pauline Christian

who wrote the first Epistle to Timothy, by no means contemplates a

celibate clergy. It is specially enumerated among the qualifications

of a bishop that he is to be a good manager of his household, keeping

his children well in order; for (it is argued) if a man cannot rule

his own house, how will he be able to take care of the Church of God?

The only limitation placed upon the bishops is that they are not to be

polygamists. They, as well as the deacons, are to keep to a single wife

(1 Tim. iii. 1-5).

Notwithstanding his general preference for celibacy, Paul recognizes

certain reasons as sufficing to excuse the establishment of a sexual

relation, and it is important to note what, in the apostle's judgment,

these reasons are. Now it is remarkable that he seems to perceive no

consideration whatever in favor of the matrimonial condition but its

ability to satisfy the sexual appetite. To avoid fornication a man

is to have his own wife; if people cannot restrain themselves, they

should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn. Those who marry

are not guilty of sin, although they will have trouble in the flesh

(1 Cor. vii. 2, 9, 28). Such a view of the functions of matrimony

as this is simply degrading. It treats it as exactly equivalent

to prostitution in the uses it fulfills, and as differing only in

the durability of the connection. But if the whole object of the

connection is merely to gratify passion, its greater durability is but

a questionable advantage. For exactly as marriage is recommended "to

avoid fornication," so divorce might often be recommended to avoid

adultery. A union of which the main purpose is to give a convenient

outlet to desire, had better be broken when it ceases to fulfill that

office to the satisfaction of both the parties. It is strange that

Paul should seem to have no conception whatever of the intellectual or

moral advantages to be derived from the sympathetic companionship of

one of the opposite sex. Perhaps his age presented him with scarcely

any examples of marriages in which that companionship was carried into

the higher fields of human thought or action. Yet he might still have

acknowledged something more in the emotion of love than a special

condition of the human body. Christianity has done much to raise the

character of marriage, but not one of its achievements in that respect

can be credited to the writings of its chief apostle.

Such being the grounds on which the matrimonial bond was to be

contracted, it was natural that when contracted, the relation of the

parties to each other should not be one of a very exalted order. Paul

has, in fact, little of moment to recommend under the second head

(that of the character of these relations) except the subjection of

women, and on this he is certainly emphatic enough. Wives are to submit

themselves to their own husbands: husbands are to love their wives

(Col. iii. 18, 19.—Eph. v. 22, 25). An extraordinary reason is given

in one epistle (possibly indeed not written by Paul) for requiring

women to learn with subjection, and forbidding them to teach, or usurp

authority over men. It is that Adam was formed first, and Eve after

him, and that Adam was not deceived, but Eve was (1 Tim. ii. 11-14).

Scarcely less absurd than this is the argument (and again I must note

that it occurs in an epistle of doubtful authenticity) that the husband

is the head of the wife, as Christ is of the Church, and that just as

the Church is subject to Christ, so must wives be subject to their

husbands. And as Christ loved the Church, so are husbands to love their

wives, considering them as equivalent to their own bodies, which they

cannot hate (Eph. v. 22-33)—although it did not appear that when man

became "one body" with a prostitute he was therefore to love her. These

views of the duty of submission on the part of wives are not indeed

surprising in that early age, for they have continued to the present

day. The writer of these epistles is only chargeable with not being in

advance of his fellow-men. It required all the genius of Plato, whom

not even the greatest apostle could approach, to foreshadow for women a

position of equality which they are but now beginning to attain.

Besides these rules there is another laid down by Paul for the conduct

of married parties which evinces his strong common sense. Husbands

and wives are mutually to render one another their "due." They have

not absolute power over their own bodies. They must not therefore

defraud one another of conjugal rights, unless for a short time with a

view to fasting and prayer, and then only with mutual consent (1 Cor.

vii. 3-5). Paul therefore would have given no sanction to that very

questionable form of asceticism in which husbands deserted their wives,

or wives their husbands, to pursue their own salvation, regardless

of the happiness of their unfortunate consorts. All such persons he

would have bidden to return to the more indisputable duties of the

marriage-bed.

Such a doctrine, however, to make it properly applicable to practice,

would require to be supplemented by a doctrine of divorce; otherwise

there is no provision for the case of an invincible repugnance arising

in one of the parties towards the other, or in both towards each other.

And this brings me to the third head of the apostle's teaching; his

views on the disruption of the marriage-tie. Here he has little to

say except that the wife is not to quit her husband, or that, if she

do, she must remain unmarried or be reconciled to her husband; and

that the husband is not to put away his wife. In cases where one is a

Christian and the other not, they are not absolutely under bondage:

they may separate, though it does not appear that they may marry

again. But the apostle strongly advises them to keep together, in the

hope that the believing member of the couple may save the other (1

Cor. vii. 10-16). It is plain from this summary that the apostle, no

more than his Master, faces the real difficulties of the question of

divorce. For the case of unhappy unions, except in the single instance

of the one party being a Christian, he has no provision whatever. It

is remarkable, however, that he several times intimates in the course

of this chapter that he is not speaking with the authority of Christ,

but simply expressing his personal opinions; a proviso which looks as

if he himself were unwilling to invest these views with full force of

the sanction they would otherwise have derived from his apostolical

commission.

There is another subject on which the opinions expressed by Paul are

open to considerable comment—the resurrection of the dead. In a chapter

which for its beauty and its eloquence is unparalleled in the New

Testament, he discusses the Christian prospect of another life. Had he

confined himself to rhetoric I should have been contented simply to

admire, but he has unfortunately mingled argument with poetic vision

in a very unsatisfactory manner. In the first place, he attempts to

deduce the resurrection of the dead from the resurrection of Christ.

If, he contends, there be no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is

not risen; our preaching is vain, and so also is your faith (1 Cor.

xv. 12-20). He fails to perceive that the resurrection of Christ—a man

whose whole life, according to him, was full of prodigies—could be

no guarantee for the resurrection of any other individual whatever.

Christ had already been restored to life in a manner in which no other

person had ever been restored. His body had been reanimated after two

days, before it had had time to suffer decomposition, and that without

the intervention of any other person, competent like Christ himself,

to perform a miracle. How then could so unprecedented an occurrence

warrant the expectation of the reanimation of those who had been long

dead, and whose bodies had suffered decomposition? Plainly there is

here a palpable _non sequitur_. Christ might be raised without this

fact involving a general resurrection; and a general resurrection

might happen without Christ having been raised. Further on he makes

a still more amazing blunder. Answering a supposed antagonist, who

puts the natural question, "With what body are the dead raised?" he

exclaims, "Fool! that which thou sowest is not quickened except it

die;" (1 Cor. xv. 36.) implying that he conceived the change undergone

by seed dropped into the ground to resemble the death of the human

body. Now it is needless to point out that the organic processes

constituting physical life do not cease in the grain which (as he says)

grows up into wheat or some other corn; and that if they did cease,

that "body that shall be," which he compares to the bodies of men in

their expected resurrection, never would appear at all. The grain, in

short, would not grow. An adversary, had he been on the alert, might

have retorted upon Paul (borrowing his own courteous phraseology):

"Idiot! that which thou sowest is not quickened _if_ it die." Such a

retort would have been completely crushing. Another very fatal mistake

of Paul's is the contention that if the dead do not rise, we have no

reason to do anything but enjoy the passing hour. "Let us eat and

drink, for to-morrow we die" (1 Cor. xv. 32). Nothing can be more

dangerous than such language as this; for if a man bases his moral

system upon the belief in a future life, the destruction of that belief

will involve the destruction of his moral system. It is founding the

more certain upon the less so; universal conceptions upon special ones;

that which is essential to human existence upon the doctrines of a

particular creed held only by a portion of the human race. The argument

is a favorite one with theologians, because it enlists in favor of the

doctrine of a future state all the strong attachment by which we cling

to principles of morals. None the less is it illegitimate, and it ought

to be sternly rejected.

Next in beauty to this eloquent description of the future state of man

may be reckoned the extremely fine chapter on brotherly love in the

same epistle. Brotherly love, according to Paul, never fails, though

intellectual gifts, such as prophecies, tongues, and knowledge, will

pass away. Hope, faith, and brotherly love are joined together by him

as a trinity of virtues which "now abide;" but the greatest of these is

brotherly love (1 Cor. xiii).

Scattered about in the writings of this apostle there are also some

admirable maxims of conduct, extremely similar in tone to those of

Jesus. Thus, he tells his fellow-Christians to be kindly affectioned

one to another; to bless those that persecute them—to bless and not to

curse; to return no man evil for evil; give food to a hungry enemy and

drink to a thirsty one; and generally, not to be overcome by evil, but

to overcome evil by good (Rom. xii. 10-21.—1 Thess. v. 15). It were

much to be wished that he himself had remembered these beneficent rules

of conduct in the case of Alexander the coppersmith, who he says did

him "much evil," and concerning whom he utters the significant prayer

that the Lord may reward him according to his works (2 Tim. iv. 14).

SUBDIVISION 3.—_The Apocalypse._

The author of the Apocalypse, or Book of Revelation, who professes

to have seen the vision he describes at Patmos, gives himself the

name of John; a circumstance which led in former times to the belief

that the work was the composition of John the disciple of Jesus. It

is a rather late production, having been written subsequently to the

establishment by Paul of Gentile Christian communities in various parts

of Asia. It also presupposes the existence of a sect of heretics termed

Nicolaitanes, who had arisen in some places, and was therefore probably

not written until some time after the foundation of these churches by

the great apostle.

The author endeavors to add lustre to his work by proclaiming at its

outset that it was committed to writing under the direct inspiration

of Jesus Christ himself, who dictated it to him, or rather showed it

to him, when he was "in the Spirit on the Lord's day." Notwithstanding

this exalted authorship, it is a production of very inferior merits

indeed. It is conceived in that style of overloaded allegory of

which the art consists in concealing the thought of the writer under

images decipherable only by an initiated few. The Book of Daniel is

an example of the same kind of thing. A false interest is excited by

this style from the mere difficulty of comprehending the meaning. How

widely it differs from that mode of allegory which possesses a real

literary justification, may be shown by comparing the Apocalypse with

the "Pilgrim's Progress." In Bunyan, the thought is revealed under

clear and transparent images; in John, it is concealed under obscure

and turbid ones. Hence there have been endless interpretations of the

Apocalypse; there has been only one of the "Pilgrim's Progress." That

characteristic which Holy Writ has been shown to possess of calling

forth a multitude of comments and speculations upon its meaning belongs

in a preëminent degree to the Revelation of John.

After writing by the instructions of Christ a letter to each of the

Seven Churches, the author proceeds to describe his vision. There was

a throne in heaven, upon which God himself was seated. He had the

singular appearance of a jasper and a sardine stone. Beasts, elders,

angels, saints, and a promiscuous company besides were around the

throne, engaged in performing the ceremonies of the celestial court.

Various works were executed according to orders by the attendant

angels. A beast then arises out of the sea, and is worshiped by those

whose names are not in Christ's book. "Babylon the Great," under the

form of a harlot, is judged and put an end to. An angel comes down from

heaven and binds "that old serpent, which is the Devil and Satan,"

for a thousand years. During this millennium Christ reigns on earth,

and all who have been martyrs for his sake, or have not worshiped the

beast, rise from the dead to reign with him. After the thousand years

are over Satan is unfortunately released from prison, and does a great

deal of mischief, but is ultimately recaptured again and cast into a

lake of fire and brimstone. A second resurrection, for the unprivileged

multitude, now takes place. All the dead stand before God, and are

judged by reference to the records which have been carefully kept in

heaven in books provided for the purpose. All who are not in the book

of life are thrown into the lake of fire, to which death and hell are

consigned also. The inspired seer is now shown a new heaven, a new

earth, and a new Jerusalem which comes down from heaven. For a moment

he rises from the extremely commonplace level upon which he usually

moves to an eloquent picture of that happier world in which "God shall

wipe away all tears from" the eyes of men; when "there shall be no more

death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more

pain." The book concludes with a curse upon any one who shall in any

manner tamper with it, either by way of addition or erasure, and with a

promise from Jesus that he will come quickly.

SUBDIVISION 4.—_The God of Christendom._

Although the God whom Jesus thought himself commissioned to represent,

and in whom his disciples believed, is the historical continuation of

the Jehovah of Hebrew Scripture, yet his character is in many important

aspects widely different. No longer the arbitrary and irascible

personage who continually interfered with the current of human affairs,

rewarding here, punishing there; now overthrowing a monarch, now

destroying a nation; he exercises a calmer and more equitable sway over

the destinies of the world. As the servile occupants of the bench in

former days too often combined the functions of prosecutors with those

of judges, so Jehovah in the ancient times of Israel had sometimes

thrown off the judicial dignity to act with all the _animus_ of a party

to the cause. This was natural perhaps where the subject-matter of

the inquiry was the worship and honor to be paid to himself. It was

natural that he should take a strong personal interest in such cases;

but as all opposition (among the Jews at least) had passed away, and

he remained in exclusive possession of the throne, he could afford to

treat the charges with which he had now to deal—mere infractions of

morality, for example—in a much more impartial spirit.

In addition to this cause of transformation, the natural growth of

religious feeling had tended to replace the older deity by a modified

conception, and Jesus, falling in in this respect with the course of

thought already in progress, contributed to effect a still further

modification in the same direction. Hence, although there is nowhere

an absolute break between the old and the new conceptions, the God of

the New Testament is practically a very different person from the God

of the Old. We cannot conceive him doing the same things. The worst

action, in the way of interference in mundane matters, of which the

God of the New Testament is guilty, is, perhaps, the sudden slaughter

of Ananias and Sapphira. But what is this to such enormities as the

deluge, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, or the commission of

bears to devour little children who had ridiculed the baldness of a

prophet? Horrors like these, so consistent with the general mode of

procedure of the ancient Jehovah, are wholly incompatible with the

characteristics so often ascribed to the more recent God. According

to the theories of the New Testament, the crime committed by the Jews

in executing Jesus was at least as great as the crimes for which the

antediluvians and the Sodomites had been so ruthlessly exterminated.

Yet we cannot imagine Jesus as even wishing for the extermination

of his contemporaries by water or by fire. The God whose love for

mankind he had been teaching could not for a moment be thought of as

consenting to such a course. While Elijah the Tishbite is represented

as positively praying for the instant death of one hundred men who

came to him with a message from his king, Jesus, on the contrary, is

depicted as actually healing the only one of his enemies who had been

in any way injured in effecting his arrest. Plainly when the conduct of

the prophets is thus dissimilar, the deity whom they represent on earth

is dissimilar also.

Another very marked alteration to be observed in passing from the

character of Jehovah to that of God, is the emancipation of the object

of worship from the limits of race. Jehovah was altogether a Jew.

He kept the Sabbath-day; he loved fasts and festivals; he believed

strongly in the virtue of circumcision; he was interested not so much

in the general well-being of the human species, as in the success of

the single people of whom he was the true leader in battle and the

ultimate sovereign at home. What happened to all the remainder of

mankind was to him a matter of trivial moment, although it might suit

him occasionally to use them as instruments either for the chastisement

or the restoration to favor of his beloved Israel. But God in the New

Testament has largely cast off the special features of his race, and

although he sometimes betrays his Judaic origin, he is in the main

cosmopolite in his sympathies and impartial in his behavior. Though

by no means catholic in religion, but holding exclusively to a single

faith, he receives all who embrace that faith, of whatever nation,

within the range of his favor. This great and deeply important change,

though begun by Jesus, was in the main the work of Paul. If it was

Jesus who constructed the tabernacle, it was Paul who built the temple.

While, however, there is an enormous improvement if we compare the

administration of human affairs by Jehovah and by God, there is

nevertheless a blot upon the character of God which suffices, if

rigorously balanced against the failings of Jehovah, to outweigh them

all. It is the eternity of the punishment which he inflicts in a future

life. No amount of sophistry can ever justify the creation of beings

whose lives are to terminate in endless suffering. But while the

_reality_ of condemnation to such endless suffering would be a far more

gigantic crime than any of the merely terrestrial penalties inflicted

by the Hebrew Jehovah, the _belief_ in such endless suffering is quite

consistent with a much higher general conception of the divinity than

the one that coëxisted with the belief in those terrestrial penalties.

The explanation of this apparent paradox is to be found in the fact

that the necessary injustice of eternal punishment is not very easily

perceived; that, in fact, it is not understood at all in the ruder

stages of social evolution, and not by every individual even in so

advanced a society as our own. Some degree of punishment for offenses

is felt to be requisite; and it is not observed without considerable

reflection that that punishment in order to be just must needs be

finite; must needs, if imposed by absolute power, aim at the ultimate

reformation of the criminal, not at his ultimate misery. And it takes

a far higher degree of mental cultivation to feel this than it takes

to feel the injustice of the violent outbursts attributed in the Old

Testament to Jehovah. Tradition and custom alone could have prevented

Jesus and his disciples from feeling shocked at these; while it was

intellectual capacity which was needed to enable them to reject eternal

punishment as incompatible with justice. Add to these considerations

the very important fact that the conduct conducing to salvation, and

avoiding condemnation in the future state, was supposed to be known

to all men beforehand, being fixed by unalterable rules; while the

conduct necessary to ensure the terrestrial rewards, and escape the

terrestrial penalties of the Old Testament, was not known till the

occasion arose; sometimes not till after it had arisen. Thus, Jesus

lays down in his teaching both the rules to be observed by human

beings if they would obtain the approbation of his Father, and the

exact manner in which the violation of those rules will be visited

upon them if they fail to repent and obtain forgiveness. But Jehovah

only made his rules from time to time, and never announced beforehand

what his punishments would be. Who, for instance, could tell what he

would do to the Israelites for worshiping the golden calf? who could

say whether he would treat gathering sticks on the Sabbath, as to

which there was as yet no law, as a capital crime? still more, who

could imagine that he would visit the action of a monarch in taking a

census of Israel by a pestilence inflicted on the unoffending people?

Plainly it was a very rude notion of deity indeed which was satisfied

to suppose an arbitrary interposition in all such cases. The God of the

New Testament may be more cruel, but he is also more consistent. If I

may venture on a homely comparison, I should say that the Jehovah of

the Israelites is like a capricious Oriental despot, whose subjects'

lives are in his hand, while the God of Christendom rather resembles

a judge administering a Draconian code in which there should be no

gradations between capital punishment and entire acquittal. The laws

may in fact demand more bloodshed than the tyrant; but their existence

and administration by fixed rules would undoubtedly imply that a people

had reached a higher grade of civilization. Moreover, exactly as

government conducted by laws is capable of improvement by modification

of the legislative enactments, while despotic government is essentially

vicious, so the character of God admits of easy adaptation to the needs

of a more cultivated state, while that of Jehovah can by no possibility

be rendered consistent with a high ideal of divinity.

Such adaptation of the Christian God has actually taken place to

a very large extent. The doctrine of Purgatory, leaving only the

most incorrigible offenders to be consigned to hell, was already a

considerable step in advance of the teaching of the New Testament.

It got rid of the fundamental weakness in the conception of Jesus,

wherein there was no proportion of punishment to offense; every sin,

small or great, was either absolutely forgiven or punished to the

uttermost extent. It effected the same beneficent change as Romilly

effected in the English law. Precisely as our former code punished

even trifling crimes with death or not at all, so the God of Jesus

punished sin either eternally or not at all. Precisely as the excessive

severity of English law led to the entire acquittal of many criminals

who should have received some degree of punishment, so the excessive

severity of God led to the belief and hope that many sinners would be

entirely pardoned who should in justice have received some measure

of correction. Thus, in both these cases, the undue harshness of the

threatened penalty tended to defeat the very object in view.

But the character of the God of Christendom admits of a much more

thorough reformation than that effected by the Catholic Church. Tender

spirits, offended, like Uncle Toby, at the notion that even the worst

of beings should be damned to all eternity, have simply refused to

accept the notion of endless torture. Thinkers, aiming at a system

of abstract justice, have sought to prove that it could not be.

Theologians have contrived all sorts of shifts to dispense with the

necessity of believing it. Modern feeling, whether on grounds of logic

or of sentiment, has gradually come to suppress it more and more as an

inconvenient article in the nominal creed, to be, if not consciously

rejected, at least instinctively thrust as much as possible out of

sight. There has resulted an idea of the Deity in which the harsher

elements are swept away, and the gentler ones, such as his fatherhood,

his care, and his love, are left behind. Such writers as Theodore

Parker, Francis W. Newman, and Frances Power Cobb, have carried this

ideal to the highest point of perfection of which it appears to be

capable. Their God is still the God of Christendom, but refined,

purified and exalted. The work which the Jewish prophets began, which

Jesus carried on, at which all the nations of Christendom have labored,

they have most worthily completed. Whether the ideal thus attained

is destined to be final, whether it really represents the ultimate

possibilities of religious thought that can remain as the corner-stone

of a universal faith, are questions that can be answered only when

we have undertaken the complete analysis of those most general

constituents of all theological systems which the foregoing examination

has disclosed. On that last analysis we are about to enter.

"Ach, mein Kindchen, schon als Knabe,

Als ich sass auf Mutters Schoss,

Glaubte ich an Gott den Vater,

Der da waltet gut und gross.

"Der die schöne Erd' erschaffen,

Und die schönen Menschen d'rauf,

Der den Sonnen, Monden, Sternen,

Vorgezeichnet ihren Lauf.

"Als ich grösser wurde, Kindchen,

Noch vielmehr begriff ich schon,

Und begriff, und ward vernünftig,

Und ich glaub' auch an den Sohn;

"An den lieben Sohn, der liebend

Uns die Liebe offenbart,

Und zum Lohne, wie gebräuchlich,

Von dem Volk gekreuzigt ward.

"Jetzo, da ich ausgewachsen,

Viel gelesen, viel gereist,

Schwillt mein Herz, und ganz von Herzen

Glaub ich an den heil'gen Geist."

—HEINE.

THE

RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT ITSELF.

CHAPTER VII.

THE ULTIMATE ELEMENTS.

We have now examined and classified the various phenomena manifested

by the religious sentiment throughout the world. We have found these

phenomena to have been in all ages of history, and to be now among

all races of men, fundamentally alike. Diverse as the several creeds

existing on the face of the earth appear to a superficial observer,

yet the rites, the practices, the dogmas they contain, admit of being

ranged under certain definite categories and deduced from certain

invariable assumptions. The two leading ideas of consecration and of

sanctity pervade them all, and while the mode of consecration, the

objects consecrated, the things, places, men, or books regarded as

sacred, differ in every quarter of the globe, the feelings of the

religious man remain the same.

Let us take a rapid survey, before proceeding further, of the ground we

have already traversed. Wherever any religion exists at all, we have

found consecrated _actions_: that is, actions devoted to the service

of God. Such actions, it is assumed, have some kind of validity or

force, either in bringing from the deities addressed by the worshipers

some species of temporal blessing, or in ensuring happiness in a

future state, or in improving his moral character in this. Secondly,

we no sooner rise above the very rudest forms of religion, than we

find _places_ set apart for worship, and entirely abstracted from all

profaner uses. Thirdly, we find that it is a universal practice to

dedicate certain _objects_ to the special use of the divine beings

received in the country; such objects being various in their nature,

but very frequently consisting of gifts to the accredited ministers

of the God for whom they are intended. Fourthly, we find in all

the greater religions—the Confucians possibly excepted—a number of

_persons_ who have devoted themselves to a mode of life supposed to be

especially pleasing to God, and carrying with it in their minds the

notion of superior sanctity. Lastly, we have in almost every form of

faith a special _class_, generally of male persons only, who are set

apart, by some distinctive rite, to the performance of the consecrated

actions required by the community to be done on their behalf; these

actions thus acquiring a double consecration, derived primarily from

their own nature, and secondarily from the character of those by whom

they are performed.

Passing to the second of our main divisions, we found the conception

of sanctity applied generally where that of consecration had been

applied, the distinction being that while the latter was imparted by

man, the former was the gift of God. Thus, in the first place, just as

human beings consecrate some of their actions to the service of God, so

he, in his turn, sanctifies certain _events_ to the enlightenment of

mankind. It is the same in the second case, that of _places_; for here

the deity sometimes points out a holy spot by some special mark of his

presence, sometimes (and more commonly) condescends to sanctify those

which man has devoted to his worship. And, thirdly, as men set apart

some of their property for him, so he imparts to some of the _objects_

in their possession a holy character, which endows them with peculiar

powers, either over external nature, or over the mind and conscience

of those who see, touch, or otherwise use them. Fourthly, he endows

the _class_ who perform the ceremonies of religion with his peculiar

grace; a grace commonly evinced in their power to consecrate places,

things, and men, to forgive sins, to convey the apostolic succession,

to administer sacraments, and so forth; but occasionally manifested in

the shape of supernatural endowments. And fifthly, as there are many of

both sexes who give themselves to him, so there have been a few _men_

to whom he may be said to have given himself, having invested them

with authority to teach infallible truth, and found religions called

after their names. Sixthly, he has revealed himself in a way to which

there is nothing corresponding on the human side, by means of _books_

composed by authors whom he inspired with the words he desired them to

write.

Viewed in the gross, as we have viewed them now, these several

manifestations of religious feeling cancel one another. That feeling

has indeed expressed itself in the same general manner, but with

differences in detail which render all its expressions equally

unimportant in the eyes of science. For, to take the simplest instance,

nothing can be said by a Christian, on behalf of the inspiration of his

Scriptures, which might not be said by the Buddhist, the Confucian, or

the Mussulman on behalf of the inspiration of theirs. If his appear to

him more beautiful, more perfect, more sublime, so do theirs to them;

and even if we concede his claims, the difference is one of degree,

and not of kind. So it is in reference to miracles. Christianity can

point to no miracles tending to establish its truth, which may not be

matched by others tending to establish the truth of rival creeds. And

if we find believers of every kind in every clime, attaching the most

profound importance to the exact performance of religious rites in

certain exact ways, while, nevertheless, those ways differ from age to

age and from place to place, we cannot but conclude that every form of

worship is equally good and equally indifferent; and that the faith

of the Christian who drinks the blood of Christ on the banks of the

Thames, stands on the same intellectual level with that of the Brahman

who quaffs the juice of the Soma on the banks of the Ganges.

But this line of argument seems to tend to nothing short of the

absolute annihilation of religion. Under the touch of a comparative

anatomy of creeds, all that was imposing and magnificent in the

edifice of theology crumbles into dust. Systems of thought piled up

with elaborate care, philosophies evolved by centuries of toilsome

preparation, fall into shapeless ruins at our feet. And all this by

the simple process of putting them side by side.

Can we, however, rest content in the assumption that so vast a

superstructure as that of religion has no solid foundation in the mind

of man? And is it destined, like the theologies it has evolved in the

course of its existence to disappear entirely from a world enlightened

by scientific knowledge?

Two questions must be carefully distinguished from one another in

replying to the doubt thus suggested. The first is whether religion,

although it may contain no objective truth, or no objective truth

ascertainable by us, nevertheless possesses, from some circumstance

in its own nature, or in the nature of the world we live in, a hold

upon the human race, of which it cannot by any advance of knowledge

be deprived. Is there, in short, if not an everlasting truth, yet an

everlasting dream from which there is to be no awakening, and in which

spectral shapes do duty for external realities? An affirmative reply

would admit the existence of religious sentiment to be a necessary

result of the constitution of the human mind, but would not concede

the inference that conclusions reached by means of that sentiment

had any objective validity, or any intellectual worth beyond that

which they derive from the imagination of those who believe them. The

second question is whether there are in the fundamental composition

of religious sentiment any elements not only necessary, but true;

and if so, what those elements are, and what is the proof of their

credibility, if proof there be.

As a preliminary to answering either of these questions, it is needful

to ascertain whether in the midst of the variety we have passed in

review, there is any fundamental unity; in other words, whether the

varied _forms_ of religion are all we can ever know of it, or whether

underlying those forms there is a permanent _structure_ upon which

they are superposed. For only when we know whether there is in all the

creeds of the world a common element, can we proceed to inquire whether

there is an element which is a necessary result of the constitution of

our minds. If the phenomena evinced by the several religions to which

we have referred in the previous book have no common source in human

nature; if, while they differ in every article of their theology,

there is nothing beyond theology in which they agree; then religion

is a mere superficial product of circumstances, having no more solid

guarantee than the authority of the particular teachers of each special

variety. There is in fact no religion; there are only religions. There

is no universal Faith; there is only particular Belief.

These, then, are the queries to which our attention must be addressed:—

1. Are there in the several religions of mankind any common elements?

2. If so, are those common elements a necessary, and therefore

permanent, portion of our mental furniture?

3. If so, are those elements the correlatives of any actual truths, or

not?

It may have been observed that all the phenomena we have examined

in the previous Book imply one assumption, and cannot be understood

without that assumption. All of them imply some kind of power or powers

either behind, beyond, or external to the material world and the human

beings who inhabit it, or at least involved in and manifested through

that world and its inhabitants; some power whose nature is not clear

to us, but whose effects are perceptible to our senses; some power

to which we ourselves and the material world are equally subject.

Sometimes indeed the power which religion thus assumes is broken up

into several minor forces, and instead of a single deity we have

several deities controlling the operations of nature. But, without

dwelling now upon the fact that polytheistic creeds often look above

the lesser beings whom they commonly put forward to a more mysterious

and greater God, it may be observed that these minor forces are no

more than forms of the one great force from which they are parted off

by an imaginative subdivision. To place the ocean under one divinity,

the winds under another, and the sun under a third, is practically a

mental process of the same kind as to place them all under a single

divinity; and the existence of some such cause of material phenomena

being granted, it is a mere question of less or greater representative

capacity whether we range them under numerous chiefs or comprehend them

all under one. In either case we assume extra-mundane and superhuman

power, and this is the essential assumption of all religion. The least

assumption a religion can make is that of a single such power, and this

(or more than this) it always must assume. For without this we should

remain within the boundaries of science; we should examine and classify

phenomena, but we could never pass beyond the phenomena themselves to

their mysterious origin or their hidden cause.

But this is not the only assumption involved in every possible

religion. Every religion assumes also that there is in human nature

something equally hyperphysical with the power which it worships,

whether we call this something soul, or mind, or spirit. And between

this human essence and the divine power there is held to be a singular

correspondence, their relationship finding its concrete expression in

religious worship on the one side and theological dogma on the other.

All the practices and all the doctrines of every positive religion are

but the modes in which men have sought to give body to their idea of

this relationship.

We have then, strictly speaking, three fundamental postulates involved

in the religious idea:—

First, that of a hyperphysical power in the universe.

Secondly, that of a hyperphysical entity in man.

Thirdly, that of a relation between the two.

The power assumed in the first postulate we may term the objective

element in religion; the entity assumed in the second postulate we may

term the subjective element. In the following chapter we shall deal

with the objective element in the religious idea.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE OBJECTIVE ELEMENT.

The general result which has thus been reached by the decomposition

of religion into its ultimate constituents must now be rendered

somewhat more specific by illustrative examples tending to explain

the character of the power the idea of whose existence forms the

foundation of the religious sentiment, and such examples will tend to

throw light upon the question whether the admission of such a power

is or is not a necessity of thought. For the proof of necessity is

twofold; _a posteriori_ and _a priori_. We may show by the first mode

that certain assumptions are always made under certain conditions as a

matter of fact; not that they are always made by every human being, but

that given the appropriate grade of culture, the beliefs in question

arise. And we may show by the second that no effort of ours is able

to separate certain ideas which have become associated in our minds;

that the association persists under every strain we can put upon it,

and that the resulting belief is therefore a necessary part of the

constitution of the mind. Both modes of proof must be attempted here.

Now, in the first place, it must be remarked that few, if any, of the

nations of the world are wholly destitute of some religious creed; and

that those which have been supposed, rightly or wrongly, to be without

it, have generally been savage tribes of the lowest grade of culture.

So slender is the evidence of the presence of a people without some

theological conception that it may be doubted whether the travelers who

have reported such facts have not been misled, either by inability to

comprehend the language, or unfamiliarity with the order of thought, of

those with whom they conversed.

Sometimes the absence of religion seems to be predicated of a people

which does not present an example of the kind of belief which the

European observer has been accustomed to consider as religious. An

instance of this is afforded in Angas' account of "Savage Life in

Australia." Of the Australians he states that "they appear to have no

religious observances whatever. They acknowledge no Supreme Being,

worship no idols, and believe only in the existence of a spirit whom

they consider as the author of ill, and regard with superstitious

dread." So that in the very act of denying a religion to these people

he practically ascribes one to them. They, like Christians, appear to

acknowledge a powerful spirit; and if they dwell upon the evil side

of his works more than upon the good side, it is to be remembered

that Christians too consider their deity "as the author of ill" by

his action in cursing Adam with all his posterity; and that they too

regard him "with superstitious dread" as a being who will send them to

eternal torture if they fail to worship, to think, and to act as he

enjoins them. Immediately after this, the author informs us that the

Australians constantly carry firesticks at night, to repel malignant

spirits, and that they place great faith in sorcerers who profess to

"counteract the influence of the spirits" (S. L. A., vol. i. p. 88).

So that their destitution of "religious observances" is in like manner

merely comparative.

Very little, if any, belief in deity appears to exist in Kamtschatka.

Steller, who has described the creed of its inhabitants, states that

they believe in no providence, and hold that they have nothing to do

with God, nor he with them (Kamtschatka, p. 269). Whether this amounts

to a denial of his existence I cannot say. They have, however, another

element of religion, belief in a future state, as will afterwards

appear.

In primitive religions the abstract form of Deity is often filled

up with the concrete figures of departed relatives. Indeed this is

one of the modes in which that form acquires definiteness, becoming

comprehensible to the savage mind from this limitation of its

generality. Thus in Fiji, although a supreme God and various other gods

exist, the ancestors appear to be the most popular objects of worship.

Deceased relations of the Fijians (according to Seemann) take their

place at once among the family gods (Viti, p. 389-391). Another author

confirms this testimony. In Sandwich Island, in the Fijian group, he

states that there are no idols. "The people worship the spirits of

their ancestors" (N. Y., p. 394). In Savage Island again they pay

their forefathers similar homage, and remark that they once had an

image which they worshiped, but that they broke it in pieces during an

epidemic which they ascribed to its influence (Ib., p. 470). Among the

Kafirs the spirits of the dead are believed to possess considerable

power for good and evil; "they are elevated in fact to the rank of

deities, and (except where the Great-Great is worshiped concurrently

with them) they are the only objects of a Kafir's adoration" (K. N., p.

161).

Similar evidence is given by Acosta in reference to Peru. In that

country there existed a highly-developed and elaborated worship of the

dead. The bodies of the Incas, or governors of Peru, were kept and

worshiped. Regular ministers were devoted to their service. Living

Incas had images of themselves constructed, termed brothers, to which,

both during the life-time of their original and after his death, as

much honor was shown as to the Incas themselves. These images were

carried in procession designed to obtain rain, and fair weather, and in

time of war. They were also the objects of feasting and of sacrifices

(H. I., b. 5, ch. vi). But the adoration of the dead was not of such

exclusive importance in Peru as in some countries of inferior culture,

and the most prominent positions in their system were occupied by

the Sun and the soul of the world, Pachacamac, who was in fact their

highest God (C. R. b. 2, ch. iii).

These last examples introduce us to the more general conception of

deity which, in all religions but the very lowest, is found along with

the belief in supernatural beings of an inferior class, and in some

of them overshadows and expels it. The Peruvians, as just stated,

assigned the first rank to him whom they conceived to have created and

to animate the universe. The Fijians adored a supreme Being Degei or

Tangaroa. Lastly, the "Great-Great," mentioned in the above quotation

from Shooter, is a being who seems from the somewhat contradictory

evidence of travelers to have been regarded as God by some of the

Kafirs, but to have been wholly neglected by others. Thus, in a

passage quoted from a work of Captain Gardiner's by Canon Callaway, we

find a conversation of the writer's with a native, in which the latter

denies all knowledge of deity whatever, and expresses a vague notion

that the things in the world may "come of themselves." Of another tribe

the same writer asserts that "they acknowledged, indeed, a traditionary

account of a Supreme Being, whom they called Ookoolukoolu (literally

the Great-Great), but knew nothing further respecting him, than that he

originally issued from the reeds, created men and cattle, and taught

them the use of the assagai." Canon Callaway is apparently of opinion

that the word Unkulunkulu was not in use among the natives of South

Africa in the sense of God until it was introduced by Captain Gardiner

(R. S. A., vol. i. pp. 54, 55). Considerable suspicion is thus thrown

upon any statements in which this name is employed for the Creator. If,

however, we may accept a statement of Shooter's, "the Kafirs of Natal

have preserved the tradition of a Being whom they call the Great-Great

and the First Appearer or Exister." According to this writer "he is

represented as having made all things," but this tradition "is not

universally known among the people." A chief who was asked about

Unkulunkulu, the Great-Great, knew nothing about him, but one of his

old men, when a child, "had been told by women stooping with age that

there was a great being above." There is also "a tribe in Natal which

still worships the Great-Great, though its recollection of him is

very dim." This tribe calls upon Unkulunkulu in the act of sacrifice

and in sickness (K. N., pp. 159, 160). While this testimony leaves it

doubtful whether Unkulunkulu is worshiped at all, except by this single

tribe, the traditions collected by Canon Callaway in the first volume

of his valuable work point to the presence of a well-marked legend

of creation in which that deity figures as the originator of human

life. True, he is also spoken of as the first man, and in this fact

we have the probable reconciliation of the view which treats him as

the Supreme Being, with that which denies that his name was used with

this signification. Unkulunkulu was the primæval ancestor of mankind,

but he was also the Creator. Ancestor-worship finds its culmination in

him. But he has been much neglected in comparison with minor deities,

and the word Unkulunkulu has been applied to the ancestor of special

tribes instead of to the ancestor of all mankind.

The general result seems to be that some, though not all of the Zulus,

have in their minds a more or less definite idea of a First Cause

of existence, but that this First Cause is not worshiped and is but

little spoken of. Thus, an old woman questioned by an emissary of Canon

Callaway's related this:—

"When we spoke of the origin of corn, asking, 'Whence came this?' the

old people said, 'It came from the Creator who created all things. But

we do not know him.' When we asked continually, 'Where is the Creator?

for our chiefs we see?' the old men denied, saying, 'And those chiefs

too whom we see, they were created by the Creator.' And when we asked,

'Where is he? for he is not visible at all. Where is he then?' we heard

our fathers pointing towards heaven and saying, 'The Creator of all

things is in heaven. And there is a nation of people there too'" (R. S.

A., vol. i. p. 52).

But while Unkulunkulu is generally considered as the Creator by the

Zulus, it would appear that a neighboring people, called the Amakxosa,

had heard of a "lord in heaven" even greater than him, whom they called

Utikxo. According to the evidence of an old native the word Utikxo is

not of foreign origin. Utikxo was appealed to when a man sneezed, and

"as regards the use of Utikxo, we used to say it when it thundered, and

we thus knew that there is a power which is in heaven; and at length

we adopted the custom of saying, Utikxo is he who is above all. But

it was not said that he was in a certain place in heaven; it was said

he filled the whole heaven. No distinction of place was made" (Ib.,

vol. i. p. 65). In the opinion of this authority, Utikxo had been in a

manner superseded by Unkulunkulu, who, because he was visible while the

original power was invisible, was mistaken for the Creator and for God

(Ib., vol. i. p. 67).

Testimony of a similar nature is given in regard to other regions of

Africa. In Juda it is stated that the most intellectual of the great

men had a confused idea of the existence and unity of a God (V. G.,

vol. ii. p. 160). Oldendorp states broadly that "all negro peoples

believe that there is a God, whom they represent to themselves as very

powerful and beneficent." He adds that among all the black nations

he has known, there is none that has not this belief in God and that

does not regard him as the author of the world. They call him by the

same name as heaven, and it is even doubtful whether they do not take

heaven for the supreme Being. "But perhaps," he adds, "they do not even

think so definitely" (G. d. M., p. 318). So that the conception of the

Highest God in the regions visited by this missionary is still vague

and indefinite, like that we have found in Juda and in Natal.

If now we turn to another quarter of the globe we find the peculiarly

degraded and ignorant Greenlanders asserting that, although they knew

nothing of God before the arrival of the missionaries, yet that those

of them who had reflected on the subject had perceived the necessity

of creative power, and had inferred that there must be a being far

superior to the cleverest man. They had, in fact, used the argument

from design, and thus prepared, they had gladly believed in the God

preached by the missionaries, for they found that it was he whom

they had in their hearts desired to know (H. G., p. 240). A similar

conviction of the existence of a supreme God prevailed in the new world

when it was discovered by Europeans. Such a God was acknowledged in

Mexico and Peru, as also in the less civilized regions of the North.

Speaking of the American Indians, Charlevoix observes that nothing

is more certain, yet nothing more obscure, than the idea which these

savages have of a primæval Being. All agree in regarding him as

the first Spirit, the Ruler and the Creator of the world; but when

further pressed, they have nothing to offer but grotesque fancies,

ill-considered fables, and undigested systems. Nearly all the Algonquin

nations (he adds) call the first Spirit the Great Hare; some term him

Michabou, and others Atahocan. He was apparently supposed by some to

have been a kind of quadruped, and to have created the earth from a

grain of sand drawn from the bottom of the ocean, and men from the dead

bodies of animals (N. F., vol. iii. p. 343).

The great religions of the world have all of them (Buddhism alone

excepted) acknowledged a God, whom they pictured to their minds in

various ways according to the degree of their development and their

powers of abstract thought. Dimly shadowed forth in the Confucian

system under the title of Heaven, plainly acknowledged, yet mystically

described by the Hindoos under many titles, whereof Brahma is one

of the most usual, celebrated in plainer language by the classical

heathens as Zeus or Jupiter, this great being appears in the three

kindred creeds of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity, as Jehovah, as

Allah, and as God. In Buddhism, however, there is no article of faith

corresponding to the belief in God. The Buddha is himself the most

exalted being in the universe, and he is neither almighty nor eternal.

The creation of matter as also of man appears to be unaccounted for.

There is no single being who can be regarded as the ruler of all

things, and the highest object of Buddhist worship. But it must not

be supposed that Buddhism has escaped the universal necessity of

admitting spiritual powers superior to human beings. In the first place

it retained the Indian deities, such as Brahma, Indra, and others,

and though, subordinating all of them to Buddha, yet left them in

possession of enormous capacities. In the second place, the Buddha in

fact, though not in name, assumed the rank of a God. Practically, he is

far more than human. He himself determines the place, time, and manner

of his incarnation. He delivers infallible doctrine. He becomes an

object of adoration, receiving divine honors from his followers. And

although the reigning Buddha (having entered Nirvâna) is non-existent,

and cannot aid his disciples, the future Buddha, or Bodhisattva, can

do so, and he is addressed in prayer for the same purposes for which

a Christian would invoke the intercession of his Savior. Thirdly, it

is to be remarked that Buddhism, free from the single idea of God, is

not free from the multitudinous idea of supernatural essences. Its

theology, so to speak, is quite full of celestial beings of various

ranks and functions, who swarm around the terrestrial believers and

perform all kinds of wonders. To these remarks it may be added that in

Nepaul, one of the countries where Buddhism prevails, the non-theistic

form has been superseded by a theistic form, in which there are divine

Buddhas corresponding to the human Buddhas; the highest of these,

Adi-Buddha, being equivalent to the highest God of other creeds. And

it is at least noteworthy, that in Ceylon, where the non-theistic form

prevails in all its purity, the people have a habit of invoking demons

to their aid, and of employing the priests of these demons, in all the

more important emergencies of their domestic lives.

It must not be imagined, however, that I wish to undervalue the

importance of the exception which Buddhism presents to the general

rule. Far from it. It ought, in my opinion, to be always borne in mind

as a refutation of the statement that belief in a personal God is a

necessary element of all religion. Europeans are apt to carry with them

throughout the world their clear-cut notions of deity as a powerful

being who created the world, put man into it, governs it in a certain

manner, and assigns punishments and rewards to the souls of men in a

future state. This belief appears to them so necessary and so natural

that they expect to find it universally prevailing, and regard it as

the indispensable foundation on which all religion must be built.

Buddhism, however, the creed which, after Christianity, has probably

exerted the greatest and most wide-spread influence on human affairs,

knows no such article of faith; and our general ideas of the universal

constituents of religion must needs be modified to embrace this fact.

Some superhuman power must, however, be recognized in every religion,

and it is the manner in which this superhuman power is described,

the qualities ascribed to it, its unity or plurality, its relation

towards man, and similar distinctions, which serve to differentiate

one form of religion from another. The degree of definiteness is one

of the most important features in this differentiation. Generally

speaking, the definiteness of this idea and the development of the

religion vary inversely as one another. This law, however, is obscured

by the continual tendency to put forward, to worship, and to speak

about in ordinary cases, some inferior deity or deities, while there

is lurking behind the vague idea of a higher entity who is seldom

mentioned, little or never worshiped, and who possibly has no name in

the language. So that the gods or idols who are worshiped by the people

must not be taken as embodying the best expression of their religious

thoughts. Some instances of the occurrence of this phenomenon will

serve as illustrations of the foregoing statement.

On the coast of Guinea the people "have a faint idea of the true

God, and ascribe to him the attributes Almighty and Omnipresent; they

believe he created the universe, and therefore vastly prefer him

before their idol-gods; but yet they do not pray to him, or offer any

sacrifices to him; for which they give the following reasons. God,

they say, is too highly exalted above us and too great to condescend

so much as to trouble himself, or think of mankind: wherefore he

commits the government of the world to their idols" (C. G., p. 348).

The manner in which Utikxo, the highest God, is thrown into the shade

by the more intelligible and human Unkulunkulu (as shown in a previous

extract) is another example of the operation of this law. And it is

especially noteworthy that the Amazulu have also a "lord of heaven,"

with attributes corresponding to those of Utikxo, for whom they have

no name. Anonymity, or if not absolute anonymity, the absence of any

name commonly employed in the popular language is, as we shall see, one

of the most usual features of this most exalted Being. Other travelers

give similar accounts of other regions of Africa. Winterbottom, who

was especially acquainted with Sierra Leone and its neighborhood, says

that "the Africans all acknowledge a supreme Being, the creator of the

universe; but they suppose him to be endowed with too much benevolence

to do harm to mankind, and therefore think it unnecessary to offer him

any homage" (S. L., vol. i. p. 222). Of Dahomey we learn from Winwood

Reade (a writer not likely to be partial to theism, or to discover it

where it does not exist), that the natives erect temples to snakes,

but "have also the unknown, unseen God, whose name they seldom dare

to mention" (S. A., p. 49). In another country in Africa the same

writer found that the natives worshiped numerous spirits, and believed

also in an evil Genius and a good Spirit. The former they were in the

habit of propitiating by religious service; but the latter "they do

not deem it necessary to pray to in a regular way, because he will not

harm them. The word by which they express this supreme Being answers

exactly to our word God. Like the Jehovah of the Hebrews, like that

word in masonry which is only known to masters and never pronounced but

in a whisper and in full lodge, this word they seldom dare to speak;

and they display uneasiness if it is uttered before them." The writer

states that he only heard it on two occasions; once when his men

cried it out in a dangerous storm, and once when having asked a slave

the name for God, the man "raised his eyes, and pointing to heaven,

said in a soft voice _Njambi_" (Ib., p. 250). Again, in a lecture on

the Ashantees, Mr. Reade informed his hearers that "the Oji people,"

although believing in a supreme Being, do not worship him: while they

do worship "a number of inferior gods or demons," to whom they believe

the superior God, offended with mankind, has left the management of

terrestrial affairs.

Strange to say, the peculiarity thus observed in the old world is

precisely repeated in the new. Of the Mexicans it is stated that "they

never offered sacrifices to" Tonacatecotle who was "God, Lord, Creator,

Governor of the Universe," and whom "they painted alone with a crown,

as lord of all." As their explanation of this conduct "they said that

he did not regard them. All the others to whom they sacrificed were

men once on a time, or demons" (A. M., vol. vi. p. 107, plate 1).

Concerning the Peruvians, Acosta tells us that they give their deity

a name of great excellence, Pachacamac, or Pachayachacic (creator of

heaven and earth), and Usapu (admirable). He remarks, however, with

much surprise, that they had no proper (or perhaps general) name in

their language for God. There was nothing in the language of Cuzco

or Mexico answering to "Deus," and the Spaniards used their own word

"Dios." Whence he concludes, somewhat hastily, that they had but a

slight and superficial knowledge of God (H. I., b. 5, ch. iii).

In reference to Peru, however, we have still more trustworthy evidence

from a member of the governing family, or Incas. From his statements

it appears that the name applied to the Highest was pronounced only

on rare occasions, and then with extremest reverence. This name was

Pachacamac, a word signifying "he who animates the whole world," or

the Universal Soul, as it would be termed in Indian philosophy. Like

other creeds that of Peru had its secondary deity, the Sun, in whose

honor sacrifices were offered and festivals held, while no temples

were erected, and no sacrifices offered to Pachacamac, although the

Peruvians adored him in their hearts and looked upon him as the unknown

God (C. R., b. 2, ch. iii).

Ancient religion presents similar facts. In his exhaustive work on

Sabaeism, Chwolsohn observes that the fundamental idea of that form of

faith was not, as is often supposed, astrolatry. To Shahrastani (the

Arabian scholar), and many others who followed him, Sabaeism expressed

the idea "that God is too sublime and too great to occupy himself

with the immediate management of this world; that he has therefore

transferred the government thereof to the gods, and retained only the

most important affairs for himself; that further, man is too weak to

be able to apply immediately to the Highest; that he must therefore

address his prayers and sacrifices to the intermediate divinities, to

whom the management of the world has been intrusted by the Highest."

Further on, the author asks himself whether this conception was

peculiar to the Harranian Sabaeans, and replies, "Certainly not. This

fundamental idea is tolerably old, and in later times found admission

to some extent even among the strictly monotheistic Jews.... In the

heathen world this view was universally shared by the cultivated

classes, at least in the first centuries of the Christian era"

(Ssabismus, vol. i. p. 725).

Indian theology teems with the conception of a sublime but unknowable

deity far superior to the deities of popular adoration, who has no

name and whose greatness cannot be adequately expressed in human

language. Indian philosophy loses itself in a sea of mystic terms when

it endeavors to speak of this all-pervading and preëminent Being. Take,

for example, the following from the Chândogya Upanishad, one of the

treatises appended to the Sâma Veda. A father is instructing his son:—

"'Dissolve this salt in water, and appear before me to-morrow morning.'

He did so. Unto him said (the father), 'My child, find out the

salt that you put in that water last night.' The salt, having been

dissolved, could not be made out. (Unto Swetaketu said his father),

'Child, do you taste a little from the top of that water.' (The child

did so. After a while the father inquired), 'How tastes it?' 'It is

saltish' (said Swetaketu)." The same result followed with water taken

from the middle and the bottom. "'If so (throwing it away), wash your

mouth and grieve not.' Verily he did so (and said to his father), 'The

salt that I put in the water exists for ever; (though I perceive it

not by my eyes it is felt by my tongue).' (Unto him) said (his father),

'Verily, such is the case with the Truth, my child. Though you perceive

it not, it nevertheless pervades this (body). That particle which is

the soul of all this is Truth; it is the Universal Soul. O Swetaketu,

Thou art that'" (Ch. Up., ch. vi. sec. 13, p. 113).

Similar notions of an all-pervading and infinite Being are found in

the Bhagavat-Gíta, a theological episode inserted in the great epical

poem known as the Mahâbhârata. There Vishnu is not merely the ordinary

god Vishnu of Indian theology; but the universe itself is expressed as

an incarnation of that deity who is seen in everything and himself is

everything. "I am the soul, O Arjuna," thus he addresses his mortal

pupil, "which exists in the heart of all beings, and I am the beginning

and the middle and also the end of existing things" (Bh. G., ch. x. p.

71).

Again, Vishnu thus describes himself in language which translated into

ordinary prose, would serve to convey the idea embodied in Mr. Herbert

Spencer's Unknowable:—

"Know that that brilliance which enters the sun and illumines the whole

earth, and which is in the moon, and in fire, is of me. And I enter the

ground and support all living things by my vigor; and I nourish all

herbs, becoming that moisture of which the peculiar property is taste.

And becoming fire, I enter the body of the living, and being associated

with their inspiration and expiration, cause food of the four kinds to

digest. And I enter the heart of each one, and from me come memory,

knowledge, and reason" (Ib., ch. xv. p. 100).

Nor did the writers of the Veda and the commentaries thereupon omit to

look above the concrete forms of the mythological gods who people their

Pantheon to a more comprehensive and less comprehensible primordial

Source. The gods were unfitted to serve as explanations of the origin

of the universe by reason of the theory that they were not eternal,

and that they came into existence subsequently to the creation of the

world. The writer of a hymn in the tenth book of the Rig-Veda asserted

that "the One, which in the beginning breathed calmly, self-sustained,

is developed by ... its own inherent heat, or by rigorous and intense

abstraction." But this Rishi avowed himself unable to say anything of

creation, or even to know whether there was a creator. "Even its ruler

in the highest heaven may not be in possession of the great secret."

Explaining this passage, a commentator, writing at a much later date,

observes that "the last verse of the hymn declares that the ruler of

the universe knows, or that even he does not know, from what material

cause this visible world arose, and whether that material cause exists

in any definite form or not. That is to say, the declaration that 'he

knows,' is made from the stand-point of that popular conception which

distinguishes between the ruler of the universe and the creatures

over whom he rules; while the proposition that 'he does not know' is

asserted on the ground of that highest principle which, transcending

all popular conceptions, affirms the identity of all things with the

supreme Soul, which cannot see any other existence as distinct from

itself" (O. S. T., vol. v. pp. 363, 364).

In this sentence the commentator correctly points out the distinction

between the Unknown Cause of philosophic thought and the gods of

popular theology, the latter being limited, and having the universe

outside of and objective to them, the former comprehending it within

itself, and having nothing objective whatever. And he perceives

apparently that these are but different modes of conceiving the same

Ultimate Essence, dependent on the varying representative capacities of

those by whom they are employed.

In India, as elsewhere, this Ultimate Essence had no proper name.

Sometimes it is spoken of as "That." Thus, in a passage quoted by

Dr. Muir from the Taittirīya Brâhmana we find the following: "This

[universe] was not originally anything. There was neither heaven, nor

earth, nor atmosphere. That being non-existent (asat) resolved 'Let

me be.' That became fervent," and so forth. Hereupon the commentator

states that "the Supreme Spirit was non-existent only in respect of

name and form, but that nevertheless it was really existing (sat)" (O.

S. T., vol. v. p. 366).

Prof. Max Müller, in his essay on the Veda, has observed that after

naming the several powers of nature, and worshiping them as gods,

the ancient Hindu found that there was yet another power within him

and around him for which he had no name. This he termed in the first

instance "Brahman," force, will, wish. But when Brahman too had become

a person, he called the mysterious and impersonal power "âtman,"

originally meaning breath or spirit, subsequently Self. "Atman remained

always free from myth and worship, differing in this from Brahman

(neuter), who has his temples in India even now and is worshiped as

Brahman (masculine), together with Vishnu and Siva and other popular

gods" (Chips, vol. i. pp. 70, 71). Distinguishing these two deities,

for the convenience of English readers, as Brahm, the neuter, and

Brahma, the masculine God, it is to be observed that even the latter,

who holds in theology the function of Creator, is but little worshiped

in India, and holds no conspicuous place in the popular mind. Thus

Wilson says, "It is doubtful if Brahma was ever worshiped. Indications

of local adoration of him at Pushkara, near Ajmir, are found in one

Purana, the Brahma Purana, but in no other part of India is there the

slightest vestige of his worship" (W. W., vol. ii. p. 63). Elsewhere

the same most competent authority states "it might be difficult to meet

with" any Brahma-worshipers now; "exclusive adorers of this deity,

and temples dedicated to him, do not now occur perhaps in any part of

India; at the same time it is an error to suppose that public homage is

never paid to him." Hereupon he mentions a few places where Brahma is

particularly reverenced. While, however, there may be discovered some

faint traces of the worship of Brahma the Creator, and first member of

the Hindu Trinity, there does not appear to be any worship whatever

of the more impersonal and abstract Brahm. Brahm is related to Brahma

much as the Absolute or the Unknowable of philosophy is related to

the God of the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures. In the conception of

Brahm the idea of deity is pushed to the utmost limits of which human

thought is capable, and we have a being whose very exaltation above the

mythological personages who pass for gods among the people precludes

him from receiving the adoration of any but philosophic minds. When

therefore Professor Max Müller speaks of temples dedicated to Brahm I

presume that he is speaking of the temples of Brahma, the corporeal

form of this unembodied idea. For Brahm is stated to be "immaterial,

invisible, unborn, uncreated, without beginning or end;" to be

"inapprehensible by the understanding, at least until that is freed

from the film of mortal blindness;" to be devoid of attributes, or to

have only purity, and to be "susceptible of no interest in the acts of

man or the administration of the affairs of the universe." Conformably

to these views, adds Wilson, "no temples are erected, no prayers are

even addressed to the Supreme" (W. W., vol. ii. p. 91). Thus Brahma,

the God, is but little worshiped; Brahm, the infinite being, and

âtman, spirit, are not worshiped at all. Now Brahma, the creative and

formative power, corresponds to God the Father; while Brahm and âtman,

especially the latter, bear more resemblance to the Holy Ghost; a fact

to be especially noted in reference to the comparison hereafter to be

made between the positions occupied by the more and the less spiritual

members of the Christian Trinity.

Thus we have this singular neglect of the Supreme Divinity prevailing

among ancient heathens, among modern Africans, among Hindus of all

ages, and among pre-Christian Mexicans and Peruvians. Do Judaism, and

its offshoot, Christianity, offer no sign of a similar relegation of

the highest to an invisible background? I think they do. The evidence

is not indeed quite so simple as in the other cases. But it is

deserving of remark that the ordinary name for God in Hebrew, Elohim,

is plural, and must at one time have signified gods; while the word

which is sometimes used alone, but more commonly in combination with

it, is regarded as so sacred that the Jews in reading the Scriptures

never pronounce it, but substitute Adonai, my lord, in its place.

Owing to this ancient custom the very sound of the word יהוה has been

absolutely forgotten, and Jehovah, by which we commonly render it,

has been merely constructed by supplying the vowels from Adonai. Now

the existence of a most holy name, but rarely used, and then only

with great reverence, is a manifestation of religious feeling exactly

corresponding to that related by Reade concerning the African name

Njambi. Suppose that with the progress of theological dogmas and

ecclesiastical usages the use of the word Njambi should be entirely

dropped, its pronunciation might then be entirely lost (if, as in

Hebrew, its vowel sounds were never written). And with the adoption

of a monotheistic creed some name, now belonging to an idol, might be

used as synonymous with Njambi. Now something of this kind may have

happened with the Hebrews. There can be little doubt that the Elohim

were originally gods accepted by the Hebrews as part of a polytheistic

system. Deep in the minds of Hebrew thinkers lay the more abstract

notion of a single God, more powerful and more mysterious than the

Elohim. They called him Jahveh, or whatever else may have been the

name expressed by יהוה. But as the monotheistic view triumphed over

the polytheistic, the Elohim were adopted into the framework of the

new religion, and in a manner subordinated to Jahveh by a process of

fusion. The name of Jahveh, which must once have been in common use,

was now treated as too holy to be ever uttered by mortal lips. The

ancient God who had stood at the head of the system of his party, was

in a certain sense withdrawn from active life, but retained as the

nominal occupant of supreme authority. Whether this account is probable

or not, must be left to better judges to decide, but it tends at least

to bring the history of the Jewish faith into harmony with that of

other religions.

Moreover, it is interesting to observe that a process extremely similar

to that here imagined as occurring in the development of Judaism, was

actually passed through by its younger rival. Christianity, arising

in the midst of a people who had arrived at highly abstract views of

deity, proceeded at once to do what so many other creeds have done,

to embody the conception of divine power in a concrete object. This

concrete object was in the Christian theology a man. And as generally

happens in these cases, the more abstract idea was overshadowed and to

some extent driven from the field by the more concrete. Christ occupies

a larger place both in authorized Christian worship and in the popular

Christian imagination than does his Father. The creed no doubt treats

them both with equal reverence, as persons in a single God; but to

understand what is truly felt and believed by the people, we must look

not to the letter of their creeds, but to their actual, and above all

their unconscious practice. Doing this we find first an entire absence

of any special festival in honor of the Father.[97] Look at the large

place occupied by the history of Jesus in ecclesiastical fast-days and

feast-days. We have the Annunciation, the Nativity, the forty days of

Lent, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection, the Ascension, all referring

to him. But we have quite forgotten to celebrate the creation of the

human species, the expulsion from Eden, the deluge, the destruction

of Sodom and Gomorrah, and other mighty works due to his Father. The

weekly holiday, originally a memorial of his repose on the seventh day,

has indeed been retained from Judaism; yet even here its reference has

been changed from the history of the first person to that of the second

by its transfer from the last day of the week to the first. But this

is not all. Didron remarks that in early works of art Jesus is made to

take the place of his Father in creation and in similar labors, just

as in heathen religions an inferior divinity does the work under a

superior one. Dishonorable and even ridiculous positions were assigned

to God the Father. The more ancient artists were reluctant to paint the

whole of the First Person, just as Africans, Peruvians and Hebrews were

reluctant to speak his name. A mere hand or an arm is held sufficient

to represent him. But in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, God

the Father begins to manifest his figure; at first his bust only, and

then his whole person. In the fourteenth century we take part in the

birth and development of the figure of the eternal Father. At first

equal to his Son in age and station, he begins in process of time to

become slightly different, until, towards 1360, the notion of paternity

is attached irrevocably to him; he is thenceforth uniformly older than

his Son, and assumes the first place in the Trinity. The middle age

may be divided (according to Didron) into two periods. In the first,

preceding the fourteenth century, we have the Father in the image and

similitude of the Son. In the second, after the thirteenth century

until the sixteenth, Jesus Christ loses his iconographic distinctness,

and is conquered by his Father. He in his turn puts on the likeness of

the Father, becoming old and wrinkled like him (Ic. Ch., p. 148-203).

Basing his conclusions on these remarkable disclosures, Michelet,

in his "History of France," observes with considerable reason that

from the first century until the twelfth God was not worshiped by

Christians. Nay, even for fifteen centuries not a temple, not an altar

was erected to him. And when he did venture to appear beside his Son

in Christian art, he remained neglected and solitary. Nobody made an

offering to him, or caused a mass to be said in his honor (Michelet,

"Histoire de France," vol. vii. p. xlix).

But while the first Person of the Trinity has now obtained, especially

in Protestant countries, a degree of recognition which he did not

always enjoy, there remains behind another Person, who is more

abstract, more spiritual, more undefinable than either the Father or

the Son. Formally included in the liturgies of the Church, having an

office established in his honor, churches dedicated to his name, this

member of the Trinity has nevertheless been strangely neglected by

all Christian nations. Nobody practically worships the Holy Ghost;

nobody pays him especial attention; nobody appears to be much concerned

about his proceedings. Artists have treated him with a degree of

indifference which they have never manifested towards Jesus Christ.

Not only have they sometimes forgotten to include the Holy Ghost in

their representations of the Godhead, but they have omitted him even

from a scene where he had the best possible claim to figure, namely,

the reception of the Spirit by the apostles at the feast of Pentecost.

Elsewhere they have not completely left him out, but have placed him in

an attitude of subordination and indignity, evincing but scant respect,

as where an artist had depicted an angel as apparently restraining the

impetuosity of the dove by holding its tail in both his hands. While in

the Catacombs it was the Father who was suppressed, in the Trinities of

the twelfth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries it is the Holy Ghost

who is found to be missing. "Thus," observes the Roman Catholic author

to whom I am indebted for these facts, "the Holy Ghost has sometimes

had reason to complain of the artists" (Ic. Ch., p. 489-495).

Were this Person, in fact, disposed to be punctilious, it is not only

artists, mere reflectors of the general sentiment, but the whole

Christian world of whom he would have reason to complain. So little

does he occupy the ordinary thoughts of Christians, that Abailard

gave the greatest offense by naming a monastery after him, and this

procedure of the great theologian remains, I believe, a solitary

example in ecclesiastical history of such an honor being paid to the

Paraclete. Yet surely he who bears the great office of the Comforter is

deserving of some more express recognition than he now receives! What

is the cause of this universal oblivion? I suspect it is that which

leads to the neglect by the Africans of their highest god, namely, his

entire innocuousness. We saw that various tribes, while omitting to

worship a benevolent deity, who will never do them any kind of harm,

address their prayers to a class of gods who are described by travelers

as demons, or evil spirits, but whom they no doubt regard as mixtures

of good qualities with bad; capable of propitiation by prayer, but

resentful of irreverence. Now the Father and the Son correspond in some

degree to these inferior gods. Not that they are actively malevolent,

but they have certain characteristics of a terrifying order. God

the Father is throughout the Bible the author of chastisements and

scourges. God the son, merciful though he be, yet intimates that he

will return to judge the world, and that he will disavow those who are

not truly his disciples, thus consigning them to the secular arm of

God the Father, who will condemn them to eternal punishment. But God

the Spirit has no share in these horrors. Whenever he appears upon

the scene, he is quiet, gentle, and inoffensive; and these qualities,

combined with the absence of the more definite personality possessed by

his colleagues, have effectually ensured his comparative insignificance

in Christian worship and in Christian thought.

While this has been the course of affairs in reference to the persons

in the Trinity—who, though dogmatically one, are popularly and

practically three—a simultaneous displacement of all its members by

still more comprehensible objects of worship has been going on. First

in rank among these stands the Virgin Mary, so universally worshiped

in Catholic countries. After her come the mass of saints, some of

general, some of local celebrity; but who, no doubt, receive, each

from his or her particular devotees, a far larger share of devotional

attention than the Father or the Son themselves. For they are requested

to intercede with these more exalted potentates; and we naturally pay

more regard to our intercessors, show them more assiduous respect,

feel towards them more gratitude, than we do to those with whom they

intercede, and who stand too far above us to be approached directly

by us. Keightley, in his "History of England," expresses himself as

shocked by the far larger share of the offerings of the pious received

at Canterbury by the altar of Thomas-à-Becket than was received by the

altars of the Virgin and of the Son. The proportion is as follows:—In

one year St. Thomas received £832, 12s. 3d.; the Virgin £63, 5s. 6d.;

Christ only £3, 2s. 6d. Next year the martyr had £954, 6s. 3d.; Mary

£4, 1s. 8d.; and Christ nothing at all. This relation is perfectly

natural. Thomas-à-Becket was the local saint. He stood nearer to the

people, was more intelligible to their minds, than the Virgin Mary;

and the latter, again, was more intelligible to them than Jesus

Christ, whose mystic attributes she did not share. This fact does but

illustrate the common tendency of mankind to neglect the worship of

the highest deity recognized in their formal creed, and to offer their

prayers and their sacrifices to idols of lower pretensions and more

human proportions.

That which, as the upshot of these speculations, we are chiefly

concerned to note, is that religion everywhere contains, as its most

essential ingredient, the conception of an unknown power; which power,

thus offered by religion to the adoration of mankind, becomes the

object of a double tendency: a tendency on the one hand to preserve it

as a dim idea, represented to the mind under highly abstract forms; a

tendency on the other hand, to bring it down to common comprehension

by presenting it to the senses under concrete symbols. But under all

images, however material; under all embodiments, however gross; the

central thought of a power hidden behind sensible phenomena, unknown

and unknowable, still remains.

So far then as historical inquiry throws light upon the answer to the

second question in the previous chapter, that answer will be in the

affirmative. It renders it at least highly probable that the common

elements of religion are, from their universal or all but universal

prevalence, "a necessary and therefore permanent portion of our mental

furniture." Nor is this conclusion invalidated by the hypothetical

objection that there are races without a religion at all. Granting

the fact, it admits of an explanation quite consistent with this view.

For the races which are destitute of the religious idea may be so, not

because they are superior to it, and can do without it, but because

they are inferior to it, and have not yet perceived it. Thus, the

savage nations who cannot count beyond their fingers, prove nothing

against the necessity of numerical relations. Even though they cannot

add their ten toes to their ten fingers, and thus make twenty, yet

the moment we perceive that ten plus ten equals twenty, we perceive

also that this relation is an absolute necessity, and it remains an

unalterable fact in our intellectual treasury. No inability on the part

of the savage to understand us can shake our conviction. Now the same

thing may hold good of the ultimate elements of religious feeling.

These also, when once the conditions are realized in thought, may

prove necessary beliefs. Whether they are so or not is a question for

philosophy. To the examination of that question we must now proceed.

* * * * *

Religion, as the foregoing analysis has shown, puts forward as its

cardinal truth the conception of a power which is neither perceptible

by the senses nor definable by the intellect. For sensible perception

requires a material object and a material organ; and intellectual

definition requires an object which can be compared with other objects

that are like it, discriminated from others that are unlike it, and

classified according to that likeness and that unlikeness. In either

case therefore the object must be a phenomenon having its place among

phenomena, whether those of the sensible or those of the intelligible

sphere. But if the power accepted by religion be neither perceptible

nor definable, are we obliged to believe in the existence of so

abstract an entity at all, or may we reject it as a figment of the

human brain?

Perhaps we shall best be able to discover whether such a belief

is necessary or not by endeavoring to do without it, and to frame

a consistent conception of the universe from which it is entirely

excluded.

There are various ways in which such a conception might be attempted.

We may regard the world from the platform of Realism or from that of

Idealism, and the nature of our Realism or of our Idealism may vary

with the special school of thought to which we may belong. Realism in

the first instance admits of two main subdivisions: into Common, or as

Mr. Spencer calls it, Crude Realism, and into Metaphysical Realism; and

these two forms of it require separate treatment.

Common Realism is the primitive opinion of uneducated and of

unreflecting persons, and is in fact simply the absence of any genuine

opinion at all. They, I imagine, regard the external objects by which

they are surrounded as so many actual entities, not only having an

independent existence of their own, but an existence like that which

they possess in our consciousness. Thus, an egg they would take to

be in reality a white, brittle, hard thing on the outside, having a

certain shape, size, and weight, and containing inside the shell a

quantity of soft whitish and yellowish substance with a given taste.

These qualities, not excepting the taste, taken along with any other

qualities that may be disclosed by more careful inquiry, they would

conceive to constitute the whole of the egg. It is the same with other

objects. What we perceive by our senses is thought by them to be a copy

of the real things as they exist in nature, much as the retina of the

eye, regarded from without, is seen to contain a copy in miniature of

the surrounding scene. Common Realism, however, while it tacitly takes

for granted an infinite number of separate entities, cannot account

either for the origin of those entities or for their nature. Nor has

it any account to give of the origin of life, for material things are

in this system utterly destitute of life, and indeed opposed to it.

They are precisely what our senses inform us of, and nothing more.

Hence they furnish no answers to the questions: How did this world come

into being, and how did it reach its present shape? How do men come to

exist in it; for matter contains no vitality and no power of infusing

vitality into itself? Therefore it is that the adherents of Common

Realism are invariably driven back upon a superior being, whom they

term a Creator, and who supplies the motive impulse which is wanting in

their world.