FAITH AND INFIDELITY CONTRASTED.
FAITH AND SCIENCE HARMONIOUS--GREAT MEN, BELIEVERS--THE SAFETY
OF SOCIETY DEMANDS RELIGION--THE GOSPEL THE BASIS OF TRUE
CIVILIZATION--WHO ARE THE CREDULOUS--CONCLUSION.
We repeat it: there is no antagonism between philosophy and faith.
Whatever the seeming oppositions of the present, all in the end will be
perfect harmony. The gospel not merely overwhelms but comprehends all
philosophy.
The star of science shines very beautifully indeed in its own sphere;
but its light at best is a {211} borrowed light, and its beams grow
pale and vanish before the glorious sun of righteousness.
Often as the comparison has been made the result has been uniform--the
sun outshines the star. Astronomy tried it. When the old Ptolemaic
system was exploded by Copernicus, the vaunted wisdom of men proclaimed
that the Bible also was exploded. But the Star-Maker triumphed over the
star-gazers.
The gospel may indeed be likened to a splendid palace which the
Great Builder founded on a rock, digging deep and bolting it to the
solid granite; and false religion to a building of fair appearance,
but founded upon the sand, which, when the floods come and storms
beat, falls into irretrievable ruin. False religion cannot endure
investigation; but the gospel, though tried by the severest tests that
science can devise, only reveals more fully its beauty and solidity.
Instead of astronomy undermining the temple of gospel truth, it has led
the greatest of astronomers to unite with Herschel in the exclamation,
"The infidel astronomer is mad."
Geology tried it. She came forth boasting her discoveries, and
declaring that she had been among the rocks and deep down in the
caves of the earth, and that she had found the teachings of the Bible
contradicted by the strata of pre-Adamic ages, and had read its epitaph
deeply chiseled by Nature herself in everlasting stone. But now the
geologists admit that we have no rule for the measurement of geologic
time.
{212} The fact is, we are not so far out of the dust, and chaos, and
barbarism of antiquity as we had supposed. Geologically speaking, the
very beginnings of our race are still almost in sight. The most eminent
geologists admit that the total age of our race is not of necessity
greater than indicated by the Mosaic history of primeval times.
Anatomy also tried it. By all the appliances of modern science every
bone, muscle and tissue of the human body has been examined; yet no
one has discovered the secret springs of action of the human soul. The
power of vision, the source of muscular action, the fountain of life,
have all eluded the skill of man. These mysteries belong to Him whose
goings forth are from everlasting, and whose ways are past finding out.
Man with all his learning and skill cannot solve the problem of his own
being.
And so with all other sciences. Many a wild hurricane has spent its
force on this tree of life, but has only caused it to strike its
roots deeper. The day is hastening when men of science will be the
very first to recognize the authority of God. Already it is largely
so. What infidel names can be placed over against Raphael, Reynolds,
Rubens, Trumbull, West and Cole as painters, or what against Canova
or Thorwaldsen in sculpture, or Christopher Wren in architecture, or
Michael Angelo in all three? In poetry, Milton, Young, Shakespeare,
Dryden, Pope, Montgomery, Cowper, Watts, Wesley, Scott, Beattie,
Goldsmith, Wordsworth, Tennyson, Bryant, Longfellow, Whittier, Hemans,
{213} the Careys and hundreds of others who were all believers in
inspiration. As if religion only was entitled to sing, infidelity
has never produced a Handel, a Haydn, a Mozart, a Beethoven or a
Spohr. Where can infidelity find such a galaxy of peerless judges as
Grotius, Selden, Blackstone, Hale, Mansfield, Wirt, Story, Kent and
Frelinghuysen. Among physicians, none can outrank Harvey, Sydenham,
Boerhave, Gregory, Goode, Cooper and Rush; yet these all reverenced the
name of God. Infidel philosophy can boast no names like Bacon, Newton,
Locke, Stewart, Davy, Herschel, Cuvier, Whately, Hamilton, Proctor,
Winchell or Le Conte. Jesus was in His appropriate place when among the
doctors; and the wise men of the east were never wiser than when they
brought their royal gifts to Him.
If the Being who made man has not had consideration enough for him to
reveal to him His will, then he is not of the slightest consequence.
These horrible wars which drown nations in sorrow, are the mere
squabbles of a crowd of insects too insignificant for the divine
notice. These dreams of moral purity, these aspirations after a higher
life, these hopes of immortality, these out-reachings toward the
everlasting Father, the assumption that we have a nature higher than
the horse we drive or the dog we caress, are all miserable mistakes. If
there is no authoritative revelation from God, what better are we than
the brute creation? When we have set revelation aside and renounced our
hope of immortality and {214} thrown off all our moral and religious
obligations, and relinquished the leadership of the Savior, what shall
we do for a restraining power to keep society together at all?
If men should be convinced that they are only animals, and that God
takes no notice of them, whose property would be safe? Whose life would
be sacred? Who would be secure from the unrestrained ravages of every
base passion that finds its home in the human heart? When Christ, as
a Divine Being, or as a man divinely commissioned, dies out of the
popular faith, what then? Who shall comfort the hearts that mourn? Who
shall assure us that virtue has a reward, or that there is any such
thing as virtue? Who shall stimulate the love of brotherhood, and move
men to works of benevolence? Who then would strive to raise the world
out of its beastly degradation?
No candid observer will deny that whatever of good there is in our
civilization is the product of the gospel. The very government under
which we live was organized and established by men who were the
instruments of God.
That which gives us protection by day and night--the dwellings we
live in, the clothes we wear, the institutions of mental, social and
moral culture--all these are the direct results of the revelations of
God. A faith in God is the very fountain head of everything that is
desirable in our civilization, and this civilization is the flower of
time. Humanity has reached its noblest thrift, its highwater mark, its
loftiest flight of excellence through the influence of this faith.
{215} And now we are told by infidels, in the most complacent language
that the gospel is a myth, and that the Old Testament, which holds a
relation to the New Testament and all other divine records as the blade
holds to the ear, the bud to the flower, is a huge batch of absurdities
with no valid claim to our respectful faith. We are told in effect that
out of an ingenious lie, out of a cunning delusion, out of a baseless
myth, out of a systematized falsehood has sprung all that there is in
this life worth living for--the grandest motive of human progress in
purity and power! We are, in effect, told that by means of a stupendous
cheat, men are trained to goodness, purified of their passions, filled
with love to one another, prompted to the highest heroism, inspired
to sacrifices of life and fortune for the public good, and are built
up into a civilization which is immeasurably superior to all that
human nature, assisted merely by human reason and false religion, ever
dreamed of!
We are, in effect, told all this; and we now ask reasonable men what
they think of it. Who are the credulous men--those who believe in a
divine power and personage, out of whose life has flown into humanity
those pure principles and elevating and purifying motives--or those who
believe that a lie has wrought those marvels?
Of all the credulous idiots that the age has produced, we know of none
so pitiable as those who, in the full blaze of such a civilization as
ours, soberly talk of the gospel as a myth and its Author as a cheat.
{216}
CONCLUSION.
And now, dear reader, if you have diligently read the preceding
pages, you can understand how carefully the various objections to our
religion have been examined and how thoroughly answered. During the
last twenty-five years human intellect has made advances which have
astonished even students of science. Scientific positions which were
deemed impregnable a generation ago, have been swept away by a storm
of new ideas; and the sunshine of examination has melted many an
iceberg of prejudice, and dissipated many an intellectual fog. True
it is that in advance of us are "Banks of cloud darkly bounding the
horizon, and loftier Alps of thought which remain to be scaled." Yet
Faith penetrates the vail and sees the glorious land of promise--the
inheritance of our race. Even to those who have not faith, the
victories of God's truth over the vagaries of men is an earnest of
future triumph. When men shall understand what is the true gospel and
what is true science then will come not conflict, but the peace of
mutual recognition and mutual understanding. Oh, let us be calm, and
wait reverently for God to vindicate His own everlasting TRUTH.
"It breaks--it comes--the misty shadows fly;
A rosy radiance gleams upon the sky;
The mountain tops reflect it calm and clear,
_the plain is yet in shade but day is near_."
Transcriber's Notes:
The Table of Contents was not present in the original edition, but
was added by the transcriber for the HTML edition, and reproduced in
the text edition for consistency.
Many cases of archaic spelling have been preserved. However, the
following have been judged to be errors in printing, and have been
corrected as indicated:
On page 13, where the original reads "ninty," this edition reads
"ninety."
On page 42, where the original reads "destribution," this edition reads
"distribution."
On page 81, where the original reads "Eygptian," this edition reads
"Egyptian."
On page 100, where the original reads "doeth," this edition reads
"doth."
On page 118, where the original reads "Pasover," this edition reads
"Passover."
On page 120, where the original reads "diciple," this edition reads
"disciple."
On page 120, where the original reads "Messiaic," this edition reads
"Messianic."
On page 160, where the original reads "evelasting," this edition reads
"everlasting."
On page 163, where the original reads "orginal," this edition reads
"original."
On page 164, where the original reads "philospher," this edition reads
"philosopher."
On page 177, one of a set of duplicated words (be be) was deleted.
On page 198, where the original reads "enornous," this edition reads
"enormous."
On page 211, where the original reads "spendid," this edition reads
"splendid."