Among the books which in my younger day were in some orthodox publication
lists--I think in the list of the Christian Knowledge Society, but I am not
sure--was Locke's [301] "Reasonableness of Christianity." It seems to have
come down from the eighteenth century, when the battle was belief in Christ
against unbelief, _simpliciter_, as the {143} logicians say. Now, if ever
there was a Socinian[302] book in the world, it is this work of Locke.
"These two," says Locke, "faith and repentance, i.e., believing Jesus to be
the Messiah, and a good life, are the indispensable conditions of the new
covenant, to be performed by all those who would obtain eternal life." All
the book is amplification of this doctrine. Locke, in this and many other
things, followed Hobbes, whose doctrine, in the Leviathan, is _fidem,
quanta ad salutem necessaria est, contineri in hoc articulo, Jesus est
Christus_.[303] For this Hobbes was called an atheist, which {144} many
still believe him to have been: some of his contemporaries called him,
rightly, a Socinian. Locke was known for a Socinian as soon as his work
appeared: Dr. John Edwards,[304] his assailant, says he is "Socinianized
all over." Locke, in his reply, says "there is not one word of Socinianism
in it:" and he was right: the positive Socinian doctrine has _not one word
of Socinianism in it_; Socinianism consists in omissions. Locke and Hobbes
did not dare _deny_ the Trinity: for such a thing Hobbes might have been
roasted, and Locke might have been strangled. Accordingly, the well-known
way of teaching Unitarian doctrine was the collection of the asserted
essentials of Christianity, without naming the Trinity, etc. This is the
plan Newton followed, in the papers which have at last been published.[305]
So I, for one, thought little about the general tendency of orthodox
writers to claim Bacon by means of the Paradoxes. I knew that, in his
"Confession of Faith"[306] he is a Trinitarian of a heterodox stamp. His
second Person takes human nature before he took flesh, not for redemption,
but as a condition precedent of creation. "God is so holy, pure, and
jealous, that it is impossible for him to be pleased in any creature,
though the work of his own hands.... [Gen. i. 10, 12, 18, 21, 25, 31,
freely rendered]. But--purposing to become a Creator, and to communicate to
his creatures, he ordained in his eternal counsel that one person of the
Godhead should be united to one nature, and to one particular of his
creatures; that so, in the person of the Mediator, the true ladder might be
fixed, whereby God might {145} descend to his creatures and his creatures
might ascend to God...."
This is republished by the Religious Tract Society, and seems to suit their
theology, for they confess to having omitted some things of which they
disapprove.
In 1864, Mr. Grosart published his discovery that the Paradoxes are by
Herbert Palmer; that they were first published surreptitiously, and
immediately afterwards by himself, both in 1645; that the "Remains" of
Bacon did not appear until 1648; that from 1645 to 1708, thirteen editions
of the "Memorials" were published, all containing the Paradoxes. In spite
of this, the Paradoxes were introduced into Bacon's works in 1730, where
they have remained.
Herbert Palmer was of good descent, and educated as a Puritan. He was an
accomplished man, one of the few of his day who could speak French as well
as English. He went into the Church, and was beneficed by Laud,[307] in
spite of his puritanism; he sat in the Assembly of Divines, and was finally
President of Queens' College, Cambridge, in which post he died, August 13,
1647, in the 46th year of his age.
Mr. Grosart says, speaking of Bacon's "Remains," "All who have had occasion
to examine our early literature are aware that it was a common trick to
issue imperfect, false, and unauthorized writings under any recently
deceased name that might be expected to take. The Puritans, down to John
Bunyan, were perpetually expostulating and protesting against such
procedure." I have met with instances of all this; but I did not know that
there was so much of it: a good collection would be very useful. The work
of 1728, attributed to Newton, is likely enough to be one of the class.
{146}
Demonstration de l'immobilitez de la Terre.... Par M. de la
Jonchere,[308] Ingenieur Francais. Londres, 1728, 8vo.
A synopsis which is of a line of argument belonging to the beginning of the
preceding century.