There are many serious and sincere Christians who have not attained to
a fulness of knowledge and insight, but are well and judiciously
employed in preparing for it. Even these may study the master-works of
our elder Divines with safety and advantage, if they will accustom
themselves to translate the theological terms into their _moral_
equivalents; saying to themselves--This may not be _all_ that is
meant, but this _is_ meant, and it is that portion of the meaning,
which belongs to _me_ in the present stage of my progress. For
example: render the words, sanctification of the Spirit, or the
sanctifying influences of the Spirit, by Purity in Life and Action
from a pure Principle.
We need only reflect on our own experience to be convinced, that the
man makes the _motive_, and not the motive the man. What is a strong
motive to one man, is no motive at all to another. If, then, the man
determines the motive, what determines the man--to a good and worthy
act, we will say, or a virtuous Course of Conduct? The intelligent
Will, or the self-determining Power? True, _in part_ it is; and
therefore the Will is pre-eminently the _spiritual_ Constituent in our
Being. But will any reflecting man admit, that his own Will is the
only and sufficient determinant of all he _is_, and all he does? Is
nothing to be attributed to the harmony of the system to which he
belongs, and to the pre-established Fitness of the Objects and Agents,
known and unknown, that surround him, as acting _on_ the will, though,
doubtless, _with_ it likewise? a process, which the co-instantaneous
yet reciprocal action of the air and the vital energy of the lungs in
breathing may help to render intelligible.
Again: in the world we see every where evidences of a Unity, which the
component parts are so far from explaining, that they necessarily
pre-suppose it as the cause and condition of their existing _as_ those
parts; or even of their existing at all. This antecedent Unity, or
Cause and Principle of each Union, it has since the time of Bacon and
Kepler been customary to call a law. This crocus, for instance: or any
other flower the reader may have in sight or choose to bring before
his fancy. That the root, stem, leaves, petals, &c. cohere to one
plant, is owing to an antecedent Power or Principle in the Seed, which
existed before a single particle of the matters that constitute the
_size_ and visibility of the crocus, had been attracted from the
surrounding soil, air, and moisture. Shall we turn to the seed? Here
too the same necessity meets us. An antecedent Unity (I speak not of
the parent plant, but of an agency antecedent in the order of
operance, yet remaining present as the conservative and reproductive
Power) must here too be supposed. Analyze the seed with the finest
tools, and let the Solar Microscope come in aid of your senses, what
do you find? Means and instruments, a wondrous Fairy-tale of Nature,
magazines of food, stores of various sorts, pipes, spiracles,
defences--a house of many chambers, and the owner and inhabitant
invisible! Reflect further on the countless millions of seeds of the
same name, each more than numerically differenced from every other:
and further yet, reflect on the requisite harmony of all surrounding
things, each of which necessitates the same process of thought, and
the coherence of all of which to a System, a World, demands its own
adequate Antecedent Unity, which must therefore of necessity be
present _to_ all and _in_ all, yet in no wise excluding or suspending
the individual Law or Principle of Union in each. Now will Reason,
will common Sense, endure the assumption, that in the material and
visible system, it is highly reasonable to believe a Universal Power,
as the cause and pre-condition of the harmony of all particular
Wholes, each of which involves the working Principle of its own
Union--that it is reasonable, I say, to believe this respecting the
Aggregate of _Objects_, which without a _Subject_ (that is, a sentient
and intelligent Existence) would be purposeless; and yet unreasonable
and even superstitious or enthusiastic to entertain a similar Belief
in relation to the System of intelligent and self-conscious Beings, to
the moral and personal World? But if in _this_ too, in the great
Community of _Persons_, it is rational to infer a One universal
Presence, a One present to all and in all, is it not most irrational
to suppose that a finite Will can exclude it?
Whenever, therefore, the man is determined (that is, impelled and
directed) to act in harmony of inter-communion, must not something be
attributed to this all-present power as acting _in_ the Will? and by
what fitter names can we call this than the LAW, as empowering; THE
WORD, as informing; and THE SPIRIT, as actuating?
What has been here said amounts (I am aware) only to a negative
conception; but this is all that is required for a mind at that period
of its growth which we are now supposing, and as long as Religion is
contemplated under the form of Morality. A _positive_ insight belongs
to a more advanced stage; for spiritual truths can only spiritually be
discerned. This we know from Revelation, and (the existence of
spiritual truths being granted) Philosophy is compelled to draw the
same conclusion. But though merely negative, it is sufficient to
render the union of Religion and Morality _conceivable_; sufficient to
satisfy an unprejudiced inquirer, that the spiritual Doctrines of the
Christian Religion are not at war with the reasoning Faculty, and that
if they do not run on the same Line (or Radius) with the
Understanding, yet neither do they cut or cross it. It is sufficient,
in short, to prove, that some distinct and consistent meaning may be
attached to the assertion of the learned and philosophic Apostle, that
"the Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit"[42]--that is, with
_the Will_, as the supernatural in man and the Principle of our
Personality--of that, I mean, by which we are responsible Agents;
_Persons_, and not merely living _Things_.[43]
It will suffice to satisfy a reflecting mind, that even at the porch
and threshold of Revealed Truth there is a great and worthy sense in
which we may believe the Apostle's assurance, that not only doth "the
Spirit aid our infirmities;"[44] that is, _act on_ the Will by a
predisposing influence _from without_, as it were, though in a
spiritual manner, and without suspending or destroying its freedom
(the possibility of which is proved to us in the influences of
education, of providential occurrences, and, above all, of example)
but that in regenerate souls it may act _in_ the will; that uniting
and becoming one[45] with our will or spirit, it may make
"intercession for us;"[46] nay, in this intimate union taking upon
itself the form of our infirmities, may intercede for us "with
groanings that cannot be uttered." Nor is there any danger of
Fanaticism or Enthusiasm as the consequence of such a belief, if only
the attention be carefully and earnestly drawn to the concluding words
of the sentence (Romans viii. 26); if only the due force and _full_
import be given to the term _unutterable_ or _incommunicable_, in St.
Paul's use of it. In this, the strictest and most proper use of the
term, it signifies, that the subject, of which it is predicated, is
something which I _cannot_, which from the nature of the thing it is
impossible that I should, communicate to any human mind (even of a
person under the same conditions with myself) so as to make it _in
itself_ the object of his direct and immediate consciousness. It
cannot be the object of _my own_ direct and immediate Consciousness;
but must be _inferred_. Inferred it may be _from_ its workings; it
cannot be perceived _in_ them. And, thanks to God! in all points in
which the knowledge is of high and necessary concern to our moral and
religious welfare, from the _Effects_ it may safely be inferred by us,
from the Workings it may be assuredly known; and the Scriptures
furnish the clear and unfailing Rules for directing the inquiry, and
for drawing the conclusion.
If any reflecting mind be surprised that the aids of the Divine Spirit
should be deeper than our Consciousness can reach, it must arise from
the not having attended sufficiently to the nature and necessary
limits of human Consciousness. For the same impossibility exists as to
the first acts and movements of our own will--the farthest distance
our recollection can follow back the traces, never leads us to the
first foot-mark--the lowest depth that the light of our Consciousness
can visit even with a doubtful glimmering, is still at an unknown
distance from the ground: and so, indeed, must it be with all Truths,
and all modes of Being that can neither be counted, coloured, or
delineated. Before and After, when applied to such Subjects, are but
allegories, which the Sense or Imagination supplies to the
Understanding. The Position of the Aristotelians, _nihil in intellectu
quod non prius in sensu_, on which Mr. Locke's Essay is grounded, is
irrefragable: Locke erred only in taking half the Truth for a whole
Truth. Conception is consequent on Perception. What we cannot
_imagine_, we cannot, in the proper sense of the word, conceive.
I have already given one definition of Nature. Another, and differing
from the former in words only, is this: Whatever is representable in
the forms of Time and Space, is Nature. But whatever is comprehended
in Time and Space, is included in the Mechanism of Cause and Effect.
And conversely, whatever, by whatever means, has its principle in
itself, so far as to _originate_ its actions, cannot be contemplated
in any of the forms of Space and Time; it must, therefore, be
considered as _Spirit_ or _Spiritual_ by a mind in that stage of its
developement which is here supposed, and which we have agreed to
understand under the name of Morality, or the Moral State: for in this
stage we are concerned only with the forming of _negative_
conceptions, _negative_ convictions; and by _spiritual_ I do not
pretend to determine _what_ the Will _is_, but what it is
_not_--namely, that it is not Nature. And as no man who admits a Will
at all, (for we may safely presume that no man not meaning to speak
figuratively, would call the shifting current of a stream the WILL[47]
of the river), will suppose it _below_ Nature, we may safely add, that
it is super-natural; and this without the least pretence to any
positive Notion or Insight.
Now Morality accompanied with Convictions like these, I have ventured
to call _Religious_ Morality. Of the importance I attach to the state
of mind implied in these convictions, for its own sake, and as the
natural preparation for a yet higher state and a more substantive
knowledge, proof more than sufficient, perhaps, has been given in the
length and minuteness of this introductory Discussion, and in the
foreseen risk which I run of exposing the volume at large to the
censure which every work, or rather which every writer, must be
prepared to undergo, who, treating of subjects that cannot be seen,
touched, or in any other way made matters of outward sense, is yet
anxious both to attach to, and to convey a distinct meaning by, the
words he makes use of--the censure of being dry, abstract, and (of all
qualities most scaring and opprobrious to the ears of the present
generation) _metaphysical_; though how it is possible that a work not
_physical_, that is, employed on objects known or believed on the
evidence of the senses, should be other than _meta_physical, that is,
treating on Subjects, the evidence of which is not derived from the
senses, is a problem which critics of this order find it convenient to
leave unsolved.
The author of the present volume will, indeed, have reason to think
himself fortunate, if this be all the charge!--How many smart
quotations, which (duly cemented by personal allusions to the author's
supposed pursuits, attachments, and infirmities), would of themselves
make up "a review" of the volume, might be supplied from the works of
Butler, Swift, and Warburton. For instance: "It may not be amiss to
inform the Public, that the Compiler of the Aids to Reflection, and
Commenter on a Scotch Bishop's Platonico-Calvinistic commentary on St.
Peter, belongs to the sect of the _Æolists_, whose fruitful
imaginations lead them into certain notions, which, although in
appearance _very unaccountable, are not without their mysteries and
their meanings_; furnishing plenty of matter for such, _whose
converting Imaginations dispose them to reduce all things into TYPES;
who can make SHADOWS, no thanks to the Sun; and then mould them into
SUBSTANCES, no thanks to Philosophy: whose peculiar Talent lies in
fixing TROPES and ALLEGORIES to the LETTER, and refining what is
LITERAL into FIGURE and MYSTERY._"--_Tale of the Tub_, Sect. xi.
And would it were my lot to meet with a Critic, who, in the might of
his own Convictions, and with arms of equal point and efficiency from
his own forge, would come forth as my assailant; or who, as a friend
to my purpose, would set forth the objections to the matter and
pervading Spirit of these Aphorisms, and the accompanying
Elucidations. Were it my task to form the mind of a young man of
talent, desirous to establish his opinions and belief on solid
principles, and in the light of distinct understanding,--I would
commence his theological studies, or, at least, that most important
part of them respecting the aids which Religion promises in our
attempts to realize the ideas of Morality, by bringing together all
the passages scattered throughout the writings of Swift and Butler,
that bear on Enthusiasm, Spiritual Operations, and pretences to the
Gifts of the Spirit, with the whole train of New Lights, Raptures,
Experiences, and the like. For all that the richest Wit, in intimate
union with profound Sense and steady Observation, can supply on these
topics, is to be found in the works of these satirists; though
unhappily alloyed with much that can only tend to pollute the
imagination.
Without stopping to estimate the degree of caricature in the portraits
sketched by these bold masters, and without attempting to determine in
how many of the Enthusiasts, brought forward by them in proof of the
influence of false Doctrines, a constitutional Insanity that would
probably have shown itself in some other form, would be the truer
solution, I would direct my pupil's attention to one feature common to
the whole group--the pretence, namely, of possessing, or a Belief and
Expectation grounded on other men's assurances of their possessing, an
immediate Consciousness, a sensible Experience, of the Spirit in and
during its operation on the soul. It is not enough that you grant them
a consciousness of the Gifts and Graces infused, or an assurance of
the Spiritual Origin of the same, grounded on their correspondence to
the Scripture _promises_, and their conformity with the _idea_ of the
Divine Giver. No! they all alike, it will be found, lay claim (or at
least look forward), to an inward perception of the Spirit itself and
of its operating.
Whatever must be misrepresented in order to be ridiculed, is in fact
_not_ ridiculed; but the thing substituted for it. It is a satire on
something else, coupled with a lie on the part of the satirist, who
knowing, or having the means of knowing the truth, chose to call one
thing by the name of another. The Pretensions to the Supernatural,
_pilloried_ by Butler, sent to Bedlam by Swift, and (on their
re-appearance in public) _gibbetted_ by Warburton, and _anatomized_ by
Bishop Lavington, one and all have _this_ for their essential
character, that the Spirit is made the immediate Object of Sense or
Sensation. Whether the spiritual Presence and Agency are supposed
cognizable by indescribable Feeling or unimaginable Vision by some
specific visual energy; whether seen, or heard, or touched, smelt and
tasted--for in those vast Store-houses of fanatical assertion, the
volumes of Ecclesiastical History and religious Auto-biography,
instances are not wanting even of the three latter extravagancies;--this
variety in the mode may render the several pretensions more or less
offensive to the _taste_; but with the same absurdity for the
_reason_, this being derived from a contradiction in terms common and
radical to them all alike,--the assumption of a something essentially
supersensual, that is nevertheless the object of Sense, that is, _not_
supersensual.
Well then!--for let me be allowed still to suppose the Reader present
to me, and that I am addressing him in the character of Companion and
Guide--the positions recommended for your examination not only do not
involve, but they exclude, this inconsistency. And for aught that
hitherto appears, we may see with complacency the arrows of satire
feathered with Wit, weighted with Sense, and discharged by a strong
arm, fly home to their mark. Our conceptions of a possible Spiritual
Communion, though they are but negative and only preparatory to a
faith in its actual existence, stand neither in the level or in the
direction of the shafts.
If it be objected, that Swift and Warburton did not choose openly to
set up the interpretations of later and more rational divines against
the decisions of their own Church, and from _prudential_
considerations did not attack the doctrine _in toto_: that is _their_
concern (I would answer), and it is more charitable to think
otherwise. But we are in the silent school of Reflection, in the
secret confessional of Thought. Should we _lie for God_, and that to
our own thoughts? They, indeed, who dare do the one, will soon be able
to do the other.--So did the Comforters of Job: and to the divines,
who resemble Job's Comforters, we will leave both attempts.
But, (it may be said), a possible Conception is not necessarily a true
one; nor even a probable one, where the Facts can be otherwise
explained. In the name of the supposed pupil I would reply--That is
the very question I am preparing myself to examine; and am now seeking
the Vantage-ground where I may best command the Facts. In my own
person, I would ask the Objector, whether he counted the Declarations
of Scripture among the Facts to be explained. But both for myself and
my pupil, and in behalf of all rational inquiry, I would demand that
the decision should not be such, in itself or in its effects, as would
prevent our becoming acquainted with the most important of these
Facts; nay, such as would, for the mind of the decider, preclude their
very existence.--_Unless ye believe_, says the prophet, _ye cannot
understand_. Suppose (what is at least possible) that the facts should
be consequent on the belief, it is clear that without the belief the
materials, on which the understanding is to exert itself, would be
wanting.
The reflections that naturally arise out of this last remark, are
those that best suit the stage at which we last halted, and from which
we now recommence our progress--the state of a _Moral_ Man, who has
already welcomed certain truths of Religion, and is inquiring after
other and more special doctrines: still however as a Moralist,
desirous indeed to receive them into combination with Morality, but to
receive them as its Aid, not as its Substitute. Now, to such a man I
say; Before you reject the Opinions and Doctrines asserted and
enforced in the following extract from Leighton, and before you give
way to the Emotions of Distaste or Ridicule, which the Prejudices of
the circle in which you move, or your own familiarity with the mad
perversions of the doctrine by fanatics in all ages, have connected
with the very words, Spirit, Grace, Gifts, Operations, &c., re-examine
the arguments advanced in the first pages of this Introductory
Comment, and the simple and sober view of the doctrine, contemplated
in the first instance as a mere idea of the reason, flowing naturally
from the admission of an infinite omnipresent Mind as the Ground of
the Universe. Reflect again and again, and be sure that you
_understand_ the doctrine before you determine on rejecting it. That
no false judgments, no extravagant conceits, no practical
ill-consequences need arise out of the Belief of the Spirit, and its
possible communion with the Spiritual Principle in man, _can_ arise
out of the _right_ Belief, or are compatible with the doctrine truly
and scripturally explained, Leighton, and almost every single period
in the passage here transcribed from him, will suffice to convince
you.
On the other hand, reflect on the consequences of rejecting it. For
surely it is not the act of a reflecting mind, nor the part of a man
of sense to disown and cast out one tenet, and yet persevere in
admitting and clinging to another that has neither sense nor purpose,
that does not _suppose_ and rest on the truth and reality of the
former! If you have resolved that all belief of a divine Comforter
present to our inmost Being and aiding our infirmities, is fond and
fanatical--if the Scriptures promising and asserting such communion
are to be explained away into the action of circumstances, and the
necessary movements of the vast machine, in one of the circulating
chains of which the human Will is a petty Link--in what better light
can Prayer appear to you, than the groans of a wounded lion in his
solitary den, or the howl of a dog with his eyes on the moon? At the
best, you can regard it only as a transient bewilderment of the Social
Instinct, as a social Habit misapplied! Unless indeed you should adopt
the theory which I remember to have read in the writings of the late
Dr. Jebb, and for some supposed beneficial re-action of praying on the
prayer's own mind, should practise it as a species of _Animal-Magnetism_
to be brought about by a wilful eclipse of the reason, and a temporary
_make-believe_ on the part of the self-magnetizer!
At all events, do not pre-judge a Doctrine, the utter rejection of
which must oppose a formidable obstacle to your acceptance of
Christianity itself, when the books, from which alone we can learn
what Christianity is and what it teaches, are so strangely written,
that in a series of the most concerning points, including (historical
facts excepted) all the _peculiar_ Tenets of the Religion, the plain
and obvious meaning of the words, that in which they were understood
by learned and simple, for at least sixteen centuries, during the far
larger part of which the language was a living language, is no
sufficient guide to their actual sense or to the writer's own meaning!
And this, too, where the literal and received Sense involves nothing
impossible, or immoral, or contrary to reason. With such a persuasion,
Deism would be a more consistent creed. But, alas! even this will fail
you. The utter rejection of all present and living communion with the
Universal Spirit impoverishes Deism itself, and renders it as
cheerless as Atheism, from which indeed it would differ only by an
obscure impersonation of what the Atheist receives unpersonified,
under the name of Fate or Nature.
[41] Romans viii. 9.--ED.
[42] Romans viii. 16.--ED.
[43] Whatever is comprised in the Chain and Mechanism of Cause and
Effect, of course _necessitated_, and having its necessity in some
other thing, antecedent or concurrent--this is said to be _Natural_;
and the Aggregate and System of all such things is NATURE. It is,
therefore, a contradiction in terms to include in this the Free-will,
of which the verbal definition is--that which _originates_ an act or
state of Being. In this sense, therefore, which is the sense of St.
Paul, and indeed of the New Testament throughout, Spiritual and
Supernatural are synonymous.
[44] Romans viii. 26.--ED.
[45] Some distant and faint _similitude_ of this, that merely as a
similitude may be innocently used to quiet the Fancy, provided it be
not imposed on the understanding as an analogous fact or as identical
in kind, is presented to us in the power of the Magnet to awaken and
strengthen the magnetic power in a bar of Iron, and (in the instance
of the compound Magnet) acting in and with the latter.
[46] Romans viii. 26.--ED.
[47]
"The river windeth[48] at his own sweet will."
_Wordsworth's exquisite Sonnet on Westminster-bridge at Sun-rise._
But who does not see that here the poetic charm arises from the known
and felt _impropriety_ of the expression, in the technical sense of
the word _impropriety_, among grammarians?
[48] The latest editions of Wordsworth have "glideth" for
"windeth."--ED.