THE GOSPEL ADVOCATE
T. FANNING AND W. LIPSCOMB, EDITORS
VOL. VI.
NASHVILLE, OCTOBER, 1860.
NO. 10.
RATIONALISM IN THE CHURCHES
We trust that our caption will not deter our readers from examining carefully the following extracts from the “North British Review” for August, 1860. They will see that the people of the Old World are troubled by the identical speculations which are thrusting themselves into the churches of this country.
We wish also to suggest to our friends, that we feel conscious it is the duty of all men who would know the truth to thoroughly investigate the religion of the New Testament in contrast with the many forms of rationalism which have long threatened the very existence of the Christian religion and which have done and are doing more to subvert the truth of Revelation than all other influences combined.
Indeed, we owe it to ourselves, to our contemporaries and to posterity, to understand and to be able to refute all systems calculated in the least to contravene the Word of Life. This becomes more apparent from the fact, that the churches of the age are the fostering mothers of every speculative and infidel school throughout the world.
With enemies from without, we have had no trouble; compared to our controversies with men in the church. The devil can accomplish but little by agents who profess not grace. Hence his efforts at ruin are mainly through the church. Tom Payne’s bold exertions against the church were feeble compared with those of Theodore Parker. The former was a man of the world—a drunkard, but the latter was a preacher of something he called “absolute religion.”
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Our attention has been called to this subject by a very able review of a volume of “Essays and Reviews” recently published in England, as the labor of seven clergymen of the English church, all professing to be “Responsible for their own articles only, and that they have written in entire independence of each other, and without concert or comparison.”
The first essay is by Dr. Temple, on “The education of the world” and, in the language of the editor of the Review, “Is an ingenious but fanciful attempt, such as has been frequently made, to establish some kind of parallelism between the advancement of the individual from childhood to manhood, and the development of the world in intellectual and spiritual culture. There are three stages in this training, each suited to its time, but each becoming obsolete and being superseded when it passes into the stage in advance of itself.
The childhood of the world, as of the individual, is adapted to positive rules, and can be trained only by external restraints; and hence in the early ages of our race the revelation of an outward system of commandments and ordinances. In youth, with the race as with the man, we are taught by example rather than by rule, and break loose from all external commandments not illustrated and recommended by example; and therefore, in the progress of God’s dealings with this world, the time came when a former and outward dispensation became obsolete and passed away, and Christ appeared, the embodiment and example of all that had been revealed before.
In the manhood of the Church, as in the maturity of the individual, there is more freedom still: as regards our intellectual and moral education, we are emancipated from all restraint, whether of positive rules or authoritative examples, and are left to be our own instructors; and hence, in the last and highest stage of the advancement of the Church, God has handed us over to the teaching within. The bearing of such a theory on the question of the standing and authority of an external revelation, given partly in the childhood and partly in the immature youth of our race, and then closed, is sufficiently apparent, and indeed is not indistinctly hinted at.
And again: “First came Rules, then Examples, then Principles. First comes the Law, then the Son of Man, then the gift of the Spirit. The world was once a child, under tutors and governors until the time appointed by the Father. Then, when the fit season had arrived, the Example, to which all ages should turn, was sent to teach men what they ought to be. There the human race was left to teach, to be guided by the teaching of the Spirit within.”
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Dr. Williams wrote an essay against the Historical validity of the scripture.
“It is no wonder that, with such views as to the nature of revelation and the place of the Old Testament, he should be led to deny not only its supernatural authority, but also its historical veracity. Books which, like the Pentateuch, profess to narrate the beginning of creation in the past, or, like the Prophets, the course of human affairs in the future, can be true only on the supposition that they are revelations in the special and supernatural sense of the word; and if not revelations, they must fail to be regarded as destitute, considered as narratives, even of that everyday historical veracity which we ascribe to the genuine accounts of contemporaries, or of those who drew their information from contemporaries. Nothing but the fact of their being supernatural revelations from God could redeem the narrative of Genesis or the prophecies of Isaiah, in the greater portion of them, from the charge of being unsubstantial dreams or conscious frauds.”
Dr. Alden Powell is author of an essay, professedly on “The evidences of Christianity” but is in fact, a broadside attack upon supernatural revelation:
“Looking at a miracle as it is commonly understood, or, as he expresses it, in ‘the old theological sense,’ it is an event which no kind or amount of evidence, whether in the shape of testimony or otherwise, can possibly substantiate; the very notion of it is inconsistent with the views which science and modern discovery have taught us most firmly to believe in regard to the universal order and inviolable continuity of physical nature; and revelation cannot be understood as being, in this sense, miraculous in its origin, in its historical narratives, or in its outward credentials.
“The gist,” says Professor Powell, “of the antecedent argument of miracles is very clear, however little some are inclined to perceive it. In nature, and from nature, by science and by reason, we neither have nor can possibly have, any evidence of a Deity working miracles; for that we must go out of nature and beyond reason.”
“No one denies revelation in this sense” (a non-miraculous sense); “the philosophy of the age does not discredit the inspiration of prophets and apostles, though it may sometimes believe it in poets, legislators, and philosophers, and others gifted with high genius. At all events, the revelation of civilization does not involve the question of external miracles, which is here the sole point in dispute.”
“Mr. Hume, at the close of his anti-miracle discussion, in which he demonstrates the impossibility of the supernatural in any form or con…
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Connection, still comforts us with the assurance that “our holy religion is founded not on reason, but on faith.” And in the same spirit, and to the same effect, we are informed by Mr. Powell, that a miracle wrought in connection with religious doctrine ceases to be capable of investigation by reason, or to own its dominion; it is accepted on religious grounds, and can appeal only to the principle and influence of faith. Thus miraculous narratives become invested with the character of articles of faith, if they be accepted in a less positive and certain light, or perhaps as involving more or less of the parabolic and mystic character; or, at any rate, as received in connection with, and for the sake of, the doctrine included.
The fourth and sixth essays are against the “Supreme and supernatural authority of scripture as an outward and infallible standard of truth.”
“The Fifth Essay, by Mr. Goodwin, is an attempt to seize upon the geological difficulties connected with the Mosaic account of the creation, and to turn them to account as an argument against the historic veracity of Scripture. It is in no sense noticeable, except as an illustration of the anxiety displayed throughout these Essays to lay hold upon the most popular of the recent objections against Christianity, and to use them as instruments for overturning the common belief in the authority of the inspired record.
“The last, and perhaps the most important Essay in the volume, is that by Mr. Jowett, ‘on the Interpretation of Scripture,’ which appropriately follows up the previous reasonings of his coadjutors in this remarkable enterprise, and crowns the argument.
“But while Mr. Jowett is clear and decided in his rejection of the doctrine of a plenary inspiration as ‘a condition of thought,’ under which, as a ruling principle, the interpretation of Scripture is to be conducted, he is not equally explicit as to what kind of inspiration he would substitute in its place.
He holds that the Bible, in some sense or other, is the fruit of inspiration. He tells us that all Christians agree in the words which use and tradition have consecrated to express the reverence which they truly feel for the Old and New Testament. But his veneration is not less real because it is not necessary to attribute it to miraculous causes. It is an inspiration which, whatever influence it might have in directing the parties who possessed it, was of a supernatural kind. If we understand Mr. Jowett aright, it was an influence of the Spirit of God identical in character and effect with that which Christians…
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now enjoy, leaving them liable not less certainly to error in thought and word; and the Scripture which is the fruit of that inspiration, is not different in kind from writings of the present time which contain the embodied beliefs and feelings of the wise and good. He announces, and apparently with approbation, that theory of inspiration which is explicitly adopted by some of his coadjutors in this volume, and which is commonly advocated by a certain school of rationalist theologians in the present day—that ‘the apostles and evangelists were equally inspired in their writings and their lives, and in both received the guidance of the Spirit of Truth in a manner not different in kind, but only in degree, from ordinary Christians.’
To our readers familiar with modern rationalism, these extracts are quite sufficient to give a satisfactory view of the doctrines maintained in the volume; but to others not intimately acquainted with metaphysical speculations, the following arguments can but prove valuable:
“According to these Essays, the Scripture doctrine of creation out of nothing by a Creator, is contrary to the principles and discoveries of modern science. Organic life is to be accounted for by spontaneous generation, or the transmutation of species by the law of selection. The Bible account of the origin of the world is not only, as yet, not reconciled to the discoveries of modern geology, but irreconcilable. The story of the descent of mankind from Adam and Eve is traditional, and not historical; and the facts may all be conserved if men are regarded as placed on the earth in many pairs, or in distinct centres of creation. The inspired narrative of the age of man on the earth is contradicted by the belief of all competent archaeologists, founded both on the monuments of ancient history and on the conclusions of ethnology.
There was a Bible before our Bible, out of the fragments of which this sacred history has been manufactured. The patriarchal narrative of our race is half ideal and half traditional, having in it no chronological element. Revelation is neither supernatural nor historical, free neither from error in fact, nor defect in doctrine; but the Bible is before all things the written voice of the congregation. Inspiration is not confined to prophets and evangelists, but is co-extensive with the action of the everywhere present Spirit, the same as good men in all ages enjoy. Prophecy is not to be understood in the sense of the declaration or prognostication of the future.
The types and symbols of Scripture have no meaning secondary or spiritual, or representative of future truth. The historical reality of Scripture facts is a matter of no importance, and it need not trouble us to apply both an ideal origin and…
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an ideal meaning to them. Such opinions as these are not only scattered up and down the pages of the Essays, but naturally grow out of the principles advocated. It would not be difficult to add largely to this catalogue of anti-beliefs.
It were impossible within our limits, and indeed endless, to attempt to follow our authors through the numerous and very miscellaneous topics embraced in their discussions—most of them turned into objections against the commonly received beliefs as to the standing and authority of Scriptures. But there are certain preliminary or higher questions raised by their argument, which it may be important to advert to.
In former times, the controversy with those outside the pale of belief has been very much one as to the relevancy and sufficiency of the evidence by which the fact of a supernatural revelation of truth from God was held to be made good. The tendency of recent discussions, and more especially the character and scope of the objections urged in this volume, raise the preliminary question as to the nature of a revelation itself; and the possibility of it in the sense in which it has been commonly or universally understood.
Is an external revelation of truth from God to man, in the sense of a presentation of it to him from without, and not in the way of quickening thought and feeling within, a possible thing at all? And is it the actual revelation which we possess in Scripture? Is this revelation, in its own nature or in its credentials, really supernatural; and is a miracle, in the common and strict sense of the word, either possible or credible? And, finally, is the record of this revelation properly inspired—that is to say, marked by the infallible truth and supreme authority which must belong to anything which is truly the utterance of the Divine mind?
These are the preliminary questions that are raised by the topics of this volume, and the settlement of which, one way or another, must to a large extent rule the tenor and secondary discussions spread out in detail over its pages.
As to the first point, or as to the nature of a revelation, it has not been until recent times that the question of its being external and not internal, from without man and not from within him, could have been moved within the pale of the Church. The English Deists, indeed, a century and a half ago, strongly maintained the doctrine, that the light within man, guided by the common influence of that Spirit of God which has given and sustains his understanding, was the only revelation necessary or competent to our present state; and that an external and supernatural revelation, such as Scripture contains, was both un-
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True and impossible. They had not conceived the idea, that Scripture itself claims to be regarded, not as an external and superhuman revelation at all, but really as the result and product from its human authors of that very light within, transferred from their own hearts to its pages. The idea of a positive external revelation of some kind or other, apart from man himself, and coming to him from a higher source, lies at the very foundation of all systems of Christian belief hitherto known.
It is the doctrine of the Romanists, which, recognizing the twofold revelation of Scripture and tradition, equally coming, although in different ways, from God, and the Church as the living and infallible interpreter of both, teaches man to look not to the light within, but to the grade without, for Divine instruction. It is the doctrine of all the Churches of Protestantism, which, whatever differences they may exhibit as to the grounds of religious belief, have none as to the source of it, teaching with one voice, that the revelation we enjoy was supernaturally emitted by God once for all, and has been permanently recorded; and that the teachings in the pages of it differ not only in the degree of light, and in the fullness of their wisdom, from the teachings of man, but are really a supernatural presentation of truth from the mind of God to the understanding of the creature.
Between this doctrine and the doctrine maintained or asserted by one and all of the authors of the volume before us, there is an extreme, and indeed irreconcilable difference. They explicitly talk of the ‘faith of an external revelation,’ and of the belief of it as one of the fatal sources of the disease of our times. They regard the Bible not as a record of thought transferred from the mind of God to the mind of the prophets who received it, but as a record of their thoughts in the page which they wrote—an expression of the devout reason of man, apart from knowledge given him from without; not a discovery made to them of the ideas of the Eternal Wisdom, coming directly from Himself, but discoveries of truth and wisdom in divine things which, in the exercise of their own faculties, guided by the teaching which all Christians enjoy from the Spirit, they have met with for themselves, and written down for the benefit of others.
But the second branch of the alternative is hardly less untenable than the first. It is difficult to imagine how it can be seriously asserted, that if an ‘external revelation’ is possible, it is nevertheless not adapted to the condition of man, and inconsistent with the essential principles of his being, or with their free development and natural exercise.
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“Throughout the whole of the representations of our essayists on this subject there is a strong opposition, asserted or implied, between an external revelation on the one hand, and the exercises of conscience on the other, as if the homage or obedience due to the former were inconsistent with the claims of the latter; or as if, to borrow the emphatic language of one of their number, such ‘a deference to external authority’ must inevitably ‘quench the principles of reason and right’ in the human mind.
Now it cannot be denied that an external revelation, because a communication from God, must carry with it His claims to authority over the conscience, and must constitute a law, with right to rule not only the actions of the outward life, but also the feelings and beliefs of the heart. But it is plain that it is not because the revelation is external, and embodied in the form of an outward standard of belief and practice, that this objection can be taken against it, but rather because of the absolute and supreme authority which it claims; and that any other organ of authority equally comprehensive, and sovereign, although its utterances were from within and not from without, would be as much exposed to the same charge.
The objection, if of any force at all, is one not to the shape in which revelation is expressed, but to the claim it makes to hold man responsible for his opinions and beliefs, as well as for his outward obedience, and would, if urged to its legitimate issues, go to deny that responsibility altogether.
“We believe that the revelation of God found in Scripture embodies an image of His own eternal wisdom and perfection, and must therefore be in harmony with the intellectual and moral nature of the creature made at first in His likeness. The authority, therefore, which gives to that revelation a sovereign right to rule our beliefs and conduct, so far from tending to contradict or overbear the principles of our rational and moral being, must be fitted rather to develop their healthy growth, and strengthen and regulate their rightful action; the faith that is called into existence by the truth revealed, and the obedience summoned forth by the command given by God, will be the very exercises of our nature best adapted to ennoble and exalt, and ultimately perfect it: and a feeling of responsibility in opinion and practice to the declarations of His Word will be an influence tending to advance rather than hinder the progress of both our intellectual and religious life.
Will not truth be most firmly held and fully realized in our spiritual being when it is believed on the authority of God? And will not a life of holiness be most steadily pursued and the farthest attained when it is followed as a duty done to Him?
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“But apart altogether from the existence in Scripture of mysteries of supernatural doctrine and fact, which no revelations of the religious consciousness from within could have reached, there are other considerations which point decisively to the same conclusion. Putting out of view that large portion of Scripture which embodies truths undiscoverable or undiscovered by man, it may be questioned whether there can be a discovery of truth at all in which the teaching from without does not combine with the apprehension from within; and influences external are as intimately connected with, and necessary to, the knowledge received, as the power of knowing in the mind itself.
The capacity of apprehending truth, of whatever kind, is very different from the apprehensions of the truth itself; and while philosophy and experience alike combine in assuring us that the capacity is native to the mind, they also tell that in order to the truth being apprehended, this capacity must be awakened and called forth by external influences. All ideas received, realized, and appropriated, are thus founded upon a true and necessary antithesis between the power to perceive and know within, and the objective truth presented to it from without; and the seclusion of the mind from the influences of this external teaching would leave its powers shut up in the germ, and its consciousness no better than a blank.
Such seems undoubtedly to be the law of man’s development both as to his perception of the visible world and his knowledge of the intellectual. The power of perception would remain forever dormant and the eye as its organ would be without vision, unless an outward world, by the presentation to it of its sensible objects, awakened the capacity to life and exercise; and, in like manner, the mind itself would remain a tabula rasa, with all its noble faculties wrapped in slumber, and its opulence of thought unknown, unless the external conditions of knowledge necessary to develop it were present, and became its teacher from without.
And the same conditions that are necessary to the acquisition of ideas, whether in the sensible or in the intellectual world, are no less necessary to the apprehension of truth of a moral and spiritual kind. An outward teaching of spiritual truth would never indeed lodge the apprehension of it in the understanding and heart, unless there were previously existing there the innate capacities for apprehending it; but it is no less certain that the powers of thinking and feeling within would of themselves never conduct to truth, unless there were outward teaching, which is an indispensable condition for their exercise and development.
“But there is a further and important consideration that must not…”
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be lost sight of in this argument. It may be questioned whether faith,
in the true and Scripture sense of the word, and as the mighty instrument
that quickens the soul out of the depth of sin, and justifies and
saves it before God, can exist at all on the supposition that there is no
Divine and supernatural word to be believed, but only truth, the re-
velation and discovery of human thoughts and feelings from within. Faith
is not a believing of any doctrine which is in itself true, or of any truth
at all which man’s own reason or religious consciousness has discovered.
In such a case, it would be an homage paid to our own understanding,
or to the influence of truth itself—a submission yielded to the force of
our own reason in its investigation into the department of spiritual
knowledge, or a conviction wrought out by the evidence belonging to
the discovery made. It would be a belief of truths, the same indeed
as those which God had revealed, but without any reference to God as
having revealed them, and having no respect whatever to His authority,
which had appointed them as necessary, or to His testimony, which
made them worthy to be believed.
It would be a faith which would
bring us into no conscious or immediate communion with God, as re-
ceiving truth because He commanded it, and on the ground that He
had declared it, thereby rendering an homage at once to His authority
and veracity; but rather a faith which, being founded upon our
discovery of religious truth for ourselves, was in reality a tribute to
our own powers in discovering it to be true, or a tribute to the force
of truth itself.
Such a faith would be without God rather than with
Him—a belief of man’s truth rather than of His.
Scriptural faith,
on the contrary, is one which brings us immediately into personal con-
tact and intercourse with a personal God, because, in the very act of
believing, we recognise both His sovereign authority and His in-
fallibility; testimony as the occasion and the ground of our belief—our
faith being yielded not to the influence of truth so much as the au-
thority of God, and resting not upon the certainty of our own dis-
covery or apprehensions of it, but upon His word who hath said it.
In the acceptance of the truth believed, the understanding is brought
consciously to submit itself to the authority of Him who has a right
to rule our opinions and belief; while the heart in embracing the same
truth, is relying, not upon its own apprehensions of what is true, but
upon the testimony and the veracity of Him who cannot lie.
Scriptural faith thus brings us into confidence with a supernatural word
and Him who has spoken; if there is a true and vital union effected,
through the medium of the word, between the believing spirit and the
God whose word, and because of whose word, it believes.
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“A Bible constructed upon the theory and lowered to the standard of a revelation that has come from within, gives no room or opportunity for faith in the true and Scripture sense of the phrase.”
The question as to whether or not a supernatural and external revelation of truth has actually been given by God to man, is one to be decided by other evidence. It is one of historical fact, and only to be dealt with as other questions of historical fact are dealt with. We are not to be frightened from this position by any sneers or insinuations, that, in adopting it, we are identifying ourselves with the obsolete school, now in so much disrepute, of ‘miracle-mongers.’ If we inquire whether God did or did not, eighteen hundred years ago, give to certain men a supernatural communication of His mind and will, and empower them, by miraculous signs, to verify their commission in the sight and to the satisfaction of others, we inquire as to a matter of fact which, whether true or untrue, can be proved or disproved only in the way and by the methods by which other allegations of fact are disposed of. Unless we are prepared to commit ourselves to the extravagant position, that an external revelation is impossible, the only competent or sufficient way to deal with the affirmation of it, is to try it by the tests that other matters of fact, alleged to be true, are tried by.
But, passing from the topic of an ‘external revelation,’ we must advert to another question of a preliminary and fundamental kind, raised by this volume—that, namely, of the possibility and credibility of the supernatural.
What is the proper place or character of miracles in connection with a revelation?
Are they to be reckoned among the credentials or the credenda of Christianity—the evidences or the objects of our faith—helps to our belief, or difficulties that must be believed? The answer to that question is given by the modern school of theology, when they discard the supernatural as evidence, and either reject it as incredible, or receive it, not on the ground of reason, but of faith, as something which, though worse than the Athanasian creed, must, in one sense or other, natural or non-natural, be put up with. They relegate the import of our Lord’s miracles, and, instead of believing Him for His works’ sake, believe the works, if at all, for His sake.
But is this the proper order of things in the established connection between revelation and miracles that accompany it, and are embodied in its record? We do not deny that miracles are, in their own nature, and when embraced in the narratives of revelations, matters to be…
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Believed, forming part of the creed of Christianity. But we must, at the same time, strenuously maintain that they have, in addition, another character and office; and that, both from the manner in which on numerous occasions they are represented in Scripture, and from their own nature, we are warranted in regarding them as the confirmations and credentials, or, if we must use the obnoxious word, evidences of Christianity.
We confess that we look with suspicion and distaste on those theories of religious belief which hand over Divine truth, in order that it may be believed, to some separate and special organ or faculty of the mind, distinct and apart from every other, called faith or spiritual intuition; and deny to our rational and intellectual powers any share at all in the apprehension of it, such as they undoubtedly have in the case of all other truths. We have no space for entering upon the discussion of such a subject, although we cannot pass it by without a protest.
In the first place, we believe that there is nothing in the observed phenomena of our nature giving warrant to assert the existence of such a spiritual organ, standing alone and acting apart from every other, and having nothing to do, in its relation to religious truth, with the logical faculty.
And, in the second place, the very nature of religious truth, combining itself and holding in vital connection logical as well as spiritual elements, and given us to be known as well as to be believed, renders it utterly impossible that the apprehension of it can be referred to the spiritual faculty alone, apart from the understanding.
There is one other question, of a general and preliminary kind, raised by the volume before us, to which we wish briefly to advert before we close. We refer to the question of inspiration, more or less touched upon by Mr. Jowett in his elaborate essay on the Interpretation of Scripture, but not formally stated or deliberately discussed. As we have already hinted, his position in regard to it is negative rather than positive, being dogmatical and elaborate in telling what it is not, rather than what it is.
He informs us, indeed, that the word is ‘incapable of being defined in an exact manner,’—the only thing about it of which he is carefully certain being, that for any of the higher or supernatural views of inspiration there is not any foundation in the Gospels or Epistles.
Now, it is not our intention to enter upon an exhibition of the grounds of evidence and argument upon which the inspiration of Scripture, in the sense of its being a book infallibly true in all its parts,
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and divinely authoritative in all its announcements, has been maintained.
“There can be no right or scriptural view of inspiration which does not afford room in it for the twofold element of the Divine power and the human, and each in its own integrity and freedom. The denial of the one or the other of these would equally contradict the statements of Scripture in regard to its own character and place, as a book distinguished from all others by the combination in it of the features of infallible truth, and yet of human authorship. If the Divine element in Scripture inspiration were denied, if there was the presence in the Bible of no supernatural power, guarding its authors from error, and guiding them in what they wrote into Divine wisdom, we could have no security for our faith, such as the veracity of God speaking to us in His Word furnishes, or beyond what spiritual truth, discovered and apprehended by ourselves or others, might supply; and there would be no obligation upon the conscience to believe it, such as the authority of God, when addressing us, imparts, or other than natural and not revealed truth may in any circumstances lay upon us.
The refusal to acknowledge the supernatural element in inspired Scripture must indeed reduce very much of its teachings far below the level of natural truth, and deprive them of their claim to be regarded as authentic and credible in the sense in which even a human composition may be authentic and credible.
The narrative of creation and the fall can be nothing more than a fiction, written with all the pretensions of truth, if Moses did not divinely receive it, and was not supernaturally qualified to record it; there is no possibility of its being authentic and credible even as a piece of human history. The documents of the miraculous conception, of the resurrection, the whole announcements of prophecy, cannot by possibility be human discoveries of truth, and can be nothing better than dreams and undevout fables simulating the authority and aspects of Divine truths, if they are not authenticated by supernatural revelation, and are not the utterance of that voice which spake to apostles and evangelists out of heaven.
But, on the other hand, the denial of the human element as present in all its integrity and freedom, equally with the Divine, in Scripture, would be to contradict its own both express and implied declarations, and to make it a book severed by the peculiarity of its character from human sympathies, and incapable of appealing to man’s understanding and heart.
We can but suggest in conclusion, that we wonder how it is pos-
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It is a common saying amongst religious and especially philosophical professors and party builders, that “It matter not as to our faith, so the life is correct,” but upon a more careful examination of the faith, we become satisfied, it is not only the foundation of all correct morality, but where it exists in the heart, it fails not to produce a pure life. If it was through the faith the heart was made pure in the days of the Apostles, we can see no valid reason why it should not have the same effect through all time.
From the fact that the religious orders of the world have greatly erred as to “the faith, once for all delivered to the saints,” and that even those who regard the Bible as the only correct measure of belief may have not yet learned its whole province, we deem it in place to treat the subject in these remarks somewhat systematically.
In the first place, it should have a definite meaning, while it is employed to express any and every emotion of the heart, there is no satisfactory thought connected with it; and it is equally fatal to employ faith as equivalent to knowledge. Hence, it may be useful to inquire into what is not the faith. There is no error more fatal to intelligence than the supposition that faith is any opinion or notion we may entertain.
The Apostle exhorts the brethren at Rome to receive each other without regard to differences of opinion; and faith from the beginning was a unit and upon its profession eternal life depended. For an opinion, a man was never condemned; neither is he culpable if destitute of all opinions. Hence in reference to questions untaught, such as holy days, Christians are at liberty to enjoy their speculations. Paul says, “One man esteemeth one day above another, another esteemeth every day alike, let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.” Romans xiv. 5.
But such latitude was never encouraged when the honor of the law was at stake. When God speaks, men are to be silent. An opinion is a mere notion, impression or opinion, which exists without any reliable testimony. It is no doubt the opinion of…
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of some that the moons of Jupiter, are worlds something like our little planet, and inhabited by beings similar to ourselves, and of others, that our moon is peopled by giants; but for such conclusions, there is no testimony from observation, or historical records, and however harmless the speculations, they amount not to faith in any sense whatever.
No witness is permitted to give an opinion in a court of justice, and yet it is surpassing strange, that regarding heavenly matters, the wildest opinions are not only tolerated, but received as divine revelations. Every dream, impression, impulse, or feeling is, in the nineteenth century, considered of divine authority. Old Judge Edmonds has sold his “great work” as he called it, upon some feeling that one night laid siege to his nether extremities, for which he could not account, and even Mr. Wesley’s conversion, under the instruction of Peter Bohler, was a mere impulse for which he could not give a reason. Neither did he or his friends ever suppose it was produced from the word of life. It was such a feeling, though excited by the superstition of a Dutch necromancer, as was unusual, and if it was not direct conversion—a thing always impossible in the very nature of things—he knew not what it was, and therefore, to the day of his death, he honestly cherished the opinion that he had “got religion.” Still it is an opinion, there is nothing concerning it, would be heard by any tribunal authorized to investigate truth. But the world has run after the phantom, and will not be satisfied. “He that has a dream” is authorized to “tell a dream” of course as a dream, but religion is above dreams and impulses.
There is no error, perhaps more fatal to truth and genuine piety, than the oft repeated Protestant dogma, that “private judgment”—any vagary that may trouble the brain, is the “right of religious.” Man was never considered safe, in following his own thoughts. Then indeed, God could not be honored as his teacher and director.
Neither are we entitled even to private interpretations, if interpretations at all. But the main point is to disabuse the public mind touching the authority of opinions in any sense. We are not entitled to them. “When God speaks, let all the earth hear and consider.”
In the second place, we are not to confound faith with knowledge. This word in the demonstrative or mathematical sense, not only precludes speculation and all doubtful matters, but also belief upon testimony. Religion is not a subject of demonstration—of positive certainty, and never can be. No one can intelligently affirm, that he
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Knows, in any correct sense of the word, there is a God in this universe, there will be a resurrection of just and unjust, and that we will meet our friends after death. These are not matters of science, and therefore, such as look for God and heaven from scientific investigations, faint by the way.
While the leading of the world rejects Jesus of Nazareth, it is to be regretted that men of science often conclude that by their calculations they have reached the ne plus ultra of truth, without finding God. Science and the supernatural have no connection, and all religious subjects are above nature, above calculation, and the learned must find a different way to a better state than the wisdom of the world affords.
The strong expressions of the Scriptures “I know that my Redeemer lives.” “We know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens,” are to be understood as expressing the very strong assurances which good men entertain concerning things divine; but there is nothing of mathematical certainty in them. On this subject, as indeed upon all others, the Apostle Paul is most clear. “We walk by faith,” said he, “not by sight.” No sight, or feeling is argued in religion. Hence we conclude with Luther, that Christianity is a subject of faith only. That is, as we have endeavored in various ways to show, it is not a matter of opinion, speculation, or calculation, but of simple belief upon good and sufficient testimony.
I. This leads us to consider the meaning of the word faith.
Paul says, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Heb. xi. 1. Perhaps a better reading of the Greek text is, “Now faith is the confident persuasion of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” This needs no explication. We are confident in our persuasion that there is a world of happiness, a state of rest beyond the boundary of trouble, and it is our firm conviction the invisible God exists, and that we shall see him as he is.
These are not items of knowledge, yet our confidence affords us joy, and we press along the mark for the reward at the end of our journey. We know not that Jesus Christ or George Washington lived, yet our belief upon the report of witnesses is such as to leave really no doubt as to the truth of the propositions. The Apostles suffered martyrdom, not because of their strong persuasion that Jesus was the Saviour, a good man or the Son of God, but for testifying that they knew him, saw him crucified, were with him about forty days after his resurrection, and stood by his side on Mount Olivet when he ascended.
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e<1 to heaven. In such circumstances, we are satisfied men could not lie, therefore, we receive their testimony and are ranked with the faithful. Yet no one is to conclude it is possible for faith to exist, in the absence of a knowledge of the testimony—the facts in the case.
2. This leads us to ask, how does faith come?
The Apostle answers, “Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God,” Rom. 10, 17. About a quarter of a century ago, a Presbyterian preacher of some eminence preached a sermon in Nashville, taking this passage for his text; and he seemed not to know how it was possible for faith to reach the human heart, except by hearing the word of God, but his brethren were much displeased at his orthodoxy, and called a brother more sound as to spiritual influence, (if we mistake not he recently met a drunkard,) to correct the statements of their preacher and particularly those of Paul the aged. In his reply he said, “Brethren, every one knows that faith comes by feeling, and feeling by the operation of the Holy Ghost.” This was sufficient—the controversy ended. While so many of our erring race are laboring under the impression that they are to stand still, and wait for faith to enter their souls, we cannot be too particular on this point. Indeed, we cannot hope for conversions to God, unless we can first influence our contemporaries to read, hear and examine the life-giving word.
Salvation, religious feeling, or remission of sins, without the faith is an impossibility; and consequently, unless the people can be turned from fables to the word of God they must be lost. We do not recollect a single instance of a person’s examining carefully, and in a proper manner, the Scriptures of truth, that he did not become a believer in Christ. The Savior said, “Go teach the nations,” “Go into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature, he that believes and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believes not shall be damned.” So should the Gospel be preached at this day, in the confidence that they alone who hear, have it in their power to become the heirs of God.
The Power of Faith
We gravely ask if men can receive “the good seed into honest and understanding-good hearts”—and not be influenced by it? We admit that persons may hear parts, as Felix the governor and King Agrippa, who trembled at the word but cast it from them, and not be affected by it, only momentarily; yet we are confident “the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believes.” This conclusion, forever establishes the doctrine that “all men have not”
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Faith and that the masses of the world, unconcerned in regard to the Christian religion, are really in profound ignorance of the truth, believe nothing about it, and consequently feel mad care nothing for the salvation of their souls. Anciently the moment men and women believed they ran into the city crying “Come see a man who told us all the deeds of life,” “is not this the Christ?” Men and brethren what shall we do? and we read of no one who believed that could depart with indifference. Faith led the Philippian Jailor at the hour of midnight to submission, and we doubt if it has failed in moving to obedience since.
4. Faith is One
Paul says there is “One faith,” and hence, we must conclude that all who believe through the Apostles’ words believe the same thing. Men cannot differ who receive the same testimony. But if these things are true, the thousands of speculations, denominated faiths, possess no relationship whatever to the faith of the Scriptures. Nothing which is not plainly revealed amounts to belief. Total depravity is not even suggested in the Scriptures, and consequently, no one really believes it; yet it is an opinion which has long been entertained. Trinity is also a speculation, and not a subject of belief. No one believes that sprinkling or pouring is baptism, in the proper use of the words. If they mean anything, each denotes a specific action, and they cannot be employed interchangeably. Sprinkling cannot mean to pour, and if Baptizo means to immerse, as “All Lexicographers and critics of any note agree” in the words of Moses Stewart, then it cannot mean to sprinkle or pour, and it would be fully in the extreme for one to assert that to sprinkle is to immerse. Hence we repeat that no one can really believe that sprinkling or pouring is baptism. It is true, many think to sprinkle or pour will answer, but this is not belief.
But the different human inventions of the world have no connection with the faith, and we may renounce them all, and still be sound in our views. The fact is, that no one can really believe God aright till he renounces all systems of men and looks at the Father alone through his own divine appointments. When we do so, all see eye to eye, speak the same thing, and find it impossible to differ. Calvinism and Arminianism are speculations, which have no connection with the belief of the Bible; and all other systems are foreign from the faith which brings us to God.
In conclusion, we desire to give it as our candid judgment, that all…
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who believe the word of life at all, are one in the faith in spite of themselves. The Scriptures authorize but one faith which overcomes the world.
T. F.
“Unity of the Human Race Disproved by the Hebrew Bible.”
By Dr. Samuel A. Cartwright, of New Orleans.
An article under the above caption in DeBow’s Review for August 1860, is well calculated to make a strong impression. Our attention has been called to it by a student, who asks our judgment of the matter.
In the first place, the very dogmatical style of a gentleman of Dr. Cartwright’s high position before the Medical world, can but have influence on the public mind; and in the second place, when one who reads Hebrew makes such unqualified assertions, it is difficult for the people generally to arrive at any satisfactory conclusion. We will let the Doctor speak for himself.
He says:
“The Bible positively affirms that there were at least two races of intellectual creatures, with immortal souls, created at different times. Thus in the 24th verse of the 1st chapter of Genesis, ‘The Lord said let the earth bring forth intellectual creatures with immortal souls after their kind.’ In our English version,” he says, “instead of intellectual creatures with immortal souls we have only the words, living creatures as representing the Hebrew words, nephesh chayah. The last word means living creature, and the nephesh which invests chayah, or living creature, with intellectuality and immortality is not translated at all. But there it stands more jumbled than brass or granite, inviting us to look at the Negro and Indian and then we can understand it. The translator surely thought there must be some mistake in regard to the intellectuality and immortality of any earthly being created before Adam, and hence, omitted to express the idea of intellectuality and immortality which the original attached to such beings. After the inferior races, or inferior nephesh chayah were created, God said ‘Let us make Adam (or a superior race of nephesh chayah) in our own image, and after our likeness and let them have dominion over all things on the earth;’ including the negroes of course, and chapter 21 verse 7, says that ‘Adam became a living soul, nephesh chayah.’
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understand by living soul a creature with intellect and an immortal mind. If the same words had been translated the same way in the 24th verse of the 1st chapter, we should have recognized two creations of intellectual and immortal beings at different times.
These extracts express fully Dr. Cartwright’s doctrine concerning the two creations of intellectual and immortal beings. Are these things so? We think not, and will submit a few plain reasons for our dissent.
In the first place, Dr. Cartwright finds a Hebrew word which expresses an idea that could never be applied to a superior or inferior creation of human beings. The Apostle says, we “Seek immortality.” “This mortal shall put on immortality” and “God only hath immortality.” If these things are so, the doctrine of Negroes, Indians, or Whites possessing immortality, on this earth, is without the least foundation in truth.
Secondly, his declaration that the Hebrew word נֶפֶשׁ (Naphesh) denotes a being with intellectuality and immortality is not correct. The first occurrence of the word is in Genesis 1:20, and reads, “And God said, let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, (נֶפֶשׁ חַיָּה) and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.” No one can doubt the words here refer to the creation of the animals in the waters, and such as have neither intellectuality nor immortality.
It will be noted, in the third place, that while Dr. Cartwright asserts that Naphesh is not translated in the 24th verse of the 1st chapter of Genesis, and that חַי (chai) denotes living creature, he admits that both the words are rightly translated in chapter 31 verse 7, and applied to one being. The verse reads, “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and he became (נֶפֶשׁ חַיָּה) a living soul.” The reader may correctly conclude that both words were required to express “A living soul” as applied to man.
It may be proper in conclusion to notice with care, the meaning of the two Hebrew words used by Dr. Cartwright, חַיָּה (chaiyah), or as we prefer to spell it in English letters, Hahyah is the verb in Hebrew which is translated to live, and the noun which is employed over 400 times denotes life. It was used to denote the soul, the animal existence, or anything that had life. Hence it was applied to both man and beast.
נֶפֶשׁ (Naphesh), according to the lexicographer Gesenius, primarily signifies to breathe, and hence, to live: and the two words to…
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Together may he properly translated, The breathing creature of life.
The translation we think is sufficiently plain, and consequently, we hesitate not to say that the theory of our critic, which makes either or both words denote an intellectual being of immortality is, to say the least of it.
Our conclusion is that God made man,—of one blood all nations to dwell on the earth; and yet we pretend not to say that the color of the negro race has been produced by climate. At present, we care not to offer an argument as to any characteristic view of the races, but we give it as our conviction, founded upon what we regard sufficient examination, that the negro is the direct descendant of Him who was cursed by the Almighty with a black skin, kinky hair, flat nose, and all that distinguishes him from them, father of the red race of Eastern and Southern Asia or Japheth, the father of the Northern and Western white race.
T. F.
THE MISSION OF THE CHURCH
While each sect is exerting its power to find the best means to secure success—to increase its numbers, gain influence, and occupy each missionary field to advantage—we have thought it would not be amiss to offer, for the consideration of our readers, what we consider the best missionary scheme ever addressed to man. The mission of the church is to last of earth, and the purpose of its founder is to convert men to God, qualify them for holy living and dying, and for the enjoyment of the society of heaven.
We might inquire, if she possesses the ability to accomplish so great labor? If we are not mistaken, the church of Christ is “the pillar and support of the truth,” “the bride, the Lamb’s wife,” “The Heavenly Jerusalem, the mother of us all”—”Mount Zion,” “the city of the Living God” that is to cover the whole earth.
We gravely ask where is there a moral institution of earth, independent of the church? What secret lodge, Temperance association, missionary or other society possesses a single new feature; a single principle of least value, that was not taken from the church? Odd Fellows, Masons and others tell us, their “purpose is to take care of the orphan and widow.” This is “pure and undefiled religion,” but why not practice the heavenly virtues as Christians, and give God all the honor?
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The purpose of the church, we repeat, is to turn men from the error of their way to the service of the living God, and to educate them for immortality.
Has she the ability? If so, she occupies the entire field of moral labor, and if we are correctly instructed in spiritual matters, no other institution accomplishes the work designed.
We have been told that we are “radical” in our views, that it is impossible to convince the people of this age that the church is sufficient to occupy all our time, talents, and fortunes, and therefore, we must conform so far to those without as to cooperate with them in their schemes.
Unless we are crazy, this is plainly admitting that the cause of the Redeemer is a failure; the sooner we abandon it, the better, and we should betake ourselves to the advocacy of human organizations to bless the world, and secure our own passport to a better country.
We draw much nigher to God in His own appointments than those of men, and in our judgment, the sooner all God-fearing men stand together on the foundation of the Apostles and prophets, the better for all concerned. If the church covers all the ground which Christians should occupy, the sooner the brethren dismiss the institutions of men the better.
T. F.
HOW SHALL THE WORLD BE CONVERTED?
Who can answer this question in a manner that will be satisfactory to all? No subject, for eighteen hundred years, has been so perplexing, and the solution of the problem doth not yet appear to the masses.
Denominations have met in councils, associations, synods, and conferences to know how the world is to be saved, if saved it can be; and to this hour, the leaders of the people are holding up their hands and asking God, “How can men be brought into the fold?”
Shall we not raise up an educated and eloquent ministry, to charm the world by their fascinations? Would not a few more such men as Spurgeon be able to convert England? And may we not expect a few more Whitfields, Wesleys, and Beechers to arise in their zeal to convert America to God?
We answer in the style of Mr. Wesley when preaching to Americans, “Little did he think,” he said when preaching salvation to the Indians of Georgia, “that he himself needed conversion,” and we are…
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Persuaded were all now made like Spurgeon, Beecher or Whitfield, it would require greater efforts to turn them to the meek and lowly Redeemer, than if they had never heard of preachers. Human beings, bewitched by any of the modern enchantments, whether it is the oratory of an Apollos, a Maffit, or more recent revivalists at the altar, are much more difficult to convince that Jesus is the Christ, than others who have stood aloof. The mantle of error has blinded their eyes and stopped their ears to the words of the Spirit, and it must be taken from them—in a word they must unlearn all they have been taught—before it will be possible for them to calmly and considerately listen to the words of the Spirit.
But we wish our suggestions to have a more direct reference to the disciples. How shall we brethren, be enabled to accomplish the greatest amount of good in our generation? We answer, “Like the true good and the fruit will also be good.” Let us get sight ourselves, “that others seeing our good words may glorify our Father who is in heaven.”
Should not the church be as a city placed upon a hill, to give light to all in sight? Let the churches of Jesus Christ become pure, let them purge out the old leaven of sectarianism, and become a new lump—let all the members according to their ability, become the earnest and humble advocates of the Christian religion, and Zion will rise from the dust.
We must look for no foreign aid—hired or purchased eloquence to give us respectability, but hasten ourselves in view of the judgment, and lost sinners will hear and turn to God. We lack faith in the cause—in the means offered in the Gospel, when we resort to anything to save men from death except the plain words of truth and the pious examples of the saints. Let the brethren, the churches everywhere, consider that the entire labor of converting the world devolves upon them, and we will hear no more inquiries as to how our friends shall be saved.
When the members grow up to the Lord in all things, each will willingly labor in his proper sphere for his Master, all become helpers in the work, and the cause triumphs. All can be useful. Brethren, let us labor in the sphere to which we are called.
T. F.
Brother Daniel Williams, of Columbus, Miss., writes that Bro. M. Hackworth has added several soldiers recently near that place.
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PROSPECTS OF FRANKLIN COLLEGE
We are much gratified to be authorized to say to the brethren and friends of education generally, that Franklin College has opened the session for 1860-61, with fair prospects. President Carnes and Co-adjutors are devoted to their profession, and we feel confident nothing will be lacking on their part to make the institution everything that its warmest friends could desire.
By a mild and yet firm course, the Faculty cannot fail to govern the school in such a manner as will preserve students from idleness and vice, and give the highest confidence to patrons.
We know the meaning and particularly the danger of “paws” but we think we have a right to know also something in relation to what is due to properly conducted schools, and when we see an institution worthy, we consider it our duty to say so frankly, and recommend it to our friends.
We are assured, that the friends of the present Educational movement in Tennessee, are determined not to be discouraged till success shall crown their efforts. Their purpose is to give the very best advantages, and thereby make it the interest of all to become deeply interested parties to the great work of training the youth of the country for usefulness.
T. F.
QUERIES AND ANSWERS
Bro. R. L. Brown, of Lewis county, Tennessee, wishes to know if having our likeness taken and sending it to our friends, is not a transgression of the second commandment. The passage reads, “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in the heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down to them, nor serve them.” Exodus xx. 4-5. The crime in this case, seems to consist in bowing to and worshipping the image.
We presume not that it is wrong, to have the picture of ourself or friend taken; but it is fatal to worship an image. The making of the image, in the Scriptures, was forbidden, because the purpose was idolatrous.
T. F.
We are asked, where did Mr. Wesley say that “Baptism takes away the guilt or original sin?”
Answer: In the Doctrinal tracts under the caption Baptism. Who has a copy of this work? Will not our Methodist friends South publish a new edition? We will take fifty copies.
T. F.
THE GOSPEL ADVOCATE
EDUCATIONAL NOTICE
At a meeting of the Board of Managers of the Educational Company in Franklin, Williamson County, Tennessee, in September, John Hill of Lavergne, was elected Treasurer. A call was ordered by the Board for the 1st installment of one fifth or Twenty Dollars per share, to be paid to the Treasurer by the 1st of January 1861.
O. T. Craig of Franklin, is authorised by the Treasurer to receive and receipt for any moneys that may be paid to him on this call. John W. Hall, of Murfreesboro’, was elected a member of the Board of Managers.
R. B. Trimble, F. M. Carmack, Tolbert Fanning and David Lipscomb, were appointed Special Agents for soliciting subscriptions of Stock, and presenting the claims of the Society to the public.
By order of the Board,
DAVID LIPSCOMB, Sec.
CHEERING PROSPECTS
Reports of Evangelists east, west, north and south, in the old world as well as in the new, are of the most cheering character. In no previous year have so many additions been made to the Lord, and so far as we have been able to learn, the churches are generally increasing, in knowledge and all the graces of the Christian religion.
So soon as all the congregations shall all be found walking in the light, thousands will turn to the Lord where one now will stop to listen. The people are generally doubtful in reference to sectarian religions, are weary of them, or disgusted at them, and desire something more pure, spiritual and ennobling. They want to find greater certainty than mere impulses can give.
Nothing short of a firm faith through what is written can satisfy, and when the faith is presented to a perishing world in the full light of a Gospel church, the people will press into it.
T. F.
Bro. John F. Fuller, of McLemoresville, Tenn., informs us that Bro. Samuel Kelly, of Cacyville, Ky., though quite a young man, held a meeting of several days in August for the brethren of his church, had four additions and made an excellent impression on many.
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OPPOSITION IN ARKANSAS
Dear Brethren—Bennoni Stinson, in a Baptist Association effort, in his circumnavigant ramblings, and his effort to circumnavigate the Gospel by abstract divinity, and to circumvent the slow of heart, has circulated this giant proclamation in printed form! (We have not read it, but we know what it is.—T. P.) One object of this discourse is to prove, that Jesus Christ was wrong when he enunciated the commission, by placing salvation as the result of two conditions: “He that believes and is baptized shall be saved.”
Stinson wants salvation by faith only! He has not been improved, even by the just, agent, and Ceremonial campaign, to which Lord said later. Here is one of Lord’s laws, which Bennoni would do well to heed: “Where salvation is promised, or affirmed, on certain named conditions, though salvation may depend on more conditions than those named, it can never depend on less.”
Stinson, in order to dodge the Over Act (baptism), gives us a profound exegesis of Acts 16:31. He summoned Paul to prove Jesus wrong. He attempts to bribe the Apostle to swear in favor of his (S.’s) dream! He asked the Apostle to affirm, that faith only is necessary to re-assurance. The Apostle refused, and then Stinson swore that Paul did affirm salvation as the result of one condition—faith! Here, Stinson resorts to the figure Apostrophe, which shows that, when the speaker or writer breaks off his speech or essay before it is ended. Bennoni forces Paul to break off his speech before it is ended!
But, we have taken an appeal from the Baptist Association to the Supreme Court at Jerusalem, where the whole evidence is brought out. Hear it. Paul and Silas said: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou, and thy house shall be saved.” And they spoke unto him the word of the Lord.
What is this word? “He that believes and is baptized shall be saved.” And the same hour of the night, the Jailor and his were immersed. This fills the bill. So, Bennoni, is hereby notified, that the commission limits immersion to faith. And what God has joined, let not, even Bro. Sever. Let this C—ite killer put his special pleading by the side of Gospel facts, and blush for shame, and audacity!
And be thy cheeks ashamed, at thy returning fate! God is not to be confronted by infidel man. Church infidelity is the blackest of all unbelief! No marvel, that the world refuse to believe the Gospel, when those Ambassadors accredited from the court of party, show such disinclination to abide the word.
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It is related of an athlete, that while running for a prize, a golden apple was cast across the stadium, just before him, and that he turned aside to pick it up, and lost the crown; and so of thousands now, they turn aside! Earth’s charms are
“Like damned fruits that tempt the eye,
And turn to ashes on the lips!”
O, sacred charter of man’s salvation! Will infidels thrust the hand of accorded charity into thy sacred pages to bring out metaphysical chains to bind man’s soul?
As well compare painted flames to true fire, as your Credal attractions to the Gospel. But, well do I know, that “to reason against tradition and party divinity, is to reason against first love.” I never heard one of these Egyptian preachers, but that the curious verse of Cowper whispers to my mind:
“A rarer man than you
In pulpit none shall hear;
But, ye, methinks to tell you true,
You call it Plaguey dear.”
If many in this age don’t pay Plaguey dear for the few crumbs of “gospel grace,” they now and then catch, from the pulpit there, there is no truth in Cowper’s verse.
But, Benoni vaunts it true, “That he who believes on the Son has everlasting life.” (John iii. 36). This is a soul charmer against Christ’s commission!
“For here the verb (has) is in the present tense.”
“Now, in possession of everlasting life!”
Sage and learned critics!
“Unto us a child is born, a Son is given.”
This Isaiah prophesied about seven hundred years before the event. But the verb indicates the present tense, though used as a conditional to the future—unto us a son will be born, etc.
Paul says, “Seek for honor, glory, immortality—Eternal life.” This injunction is to Christians. But, Benoni says, nay, verily, they were at the time of this exhortation in possession of eternal life! Seek for that which you already have!
“How can one hope for what he has?”
Jesus says, “Then the righteous shall go away into everlasting life.”
“O, no. They have it already.”
Then, there are two everlasting lives. One now and one then.
“Well, the wicked shall go into everlasting punishment.”
“No, no,” says Brother Universalist, “Everlasting punishment means present punishment.”
But, do you believe this?
“Yes.”
Well, then you don’t believe your own hypothesis, or supposition.
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But, what does D’s text mean? Who so believes in Jesus has a title deed to Eternal life, and when the last payment of our present sojourn is paid, then these shall go away into life everlasting. Yes, when the Christian is dismissed from earth, Christ will deliver him to the Father, and the Father will invest him with everlasting life. But at present, “Ye (Christians) are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God, and when he, who is our life shall appear, then shall we appear with him in glory.”
Our eternal life is prospective, as the minor heir’s patrimony is prospective, but while a minor, he differs nothing from a servant. But, by and by, he shall be a free man, to enjoy the full estate. Brethren, stand to your post—quit yourselves like men—the war-hoop is around Zion’s borders; The Indian with his tomahawk is in the skirmish; The open field fight is nearly abandoned; and those few under open sky, have a handful of their weapons of honorable warfare, and betook themselves to savage bow and quiver! (See Crenshaw’s communications to Franklin of recent date;) and weep tears of blood for fallen humanity!
Where is James Collinsworth? Why does he play the invisible? We held sweet communion through the media of written exchange, for a time, in days that were. I remember well, that the last letter which I received from him, I showed to an impulsive, sharp brother—Wash Hanly. He slices in his speech, not quite a stutter. He drew a bead on the document, and said, “if you don’t heap up a good pile for him, he will slip the noose, and bolt the track!” Has he bolted? He has been sold to the Cumberlands, to abuse the cause of Christ. -Eu.
I have chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil! If the Gospel net save eleven out of twelve, it will equal its power in the hands of Jesus. Bro. F. A few more moons with you and me, then—vale, vale to mortality and its ilk.
J. A. BUTLER.
WHAT THINK YE.
“I never sought sympathy at the hands of any sub rosa society, nor never shall. My Bible and the laws of my country suffice. If I cannot pass the rapids with these life preservers, then let my bark sink.”
J. A. BUTLER.
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THE CO-OPERATION OF GILES AND LAWRENCE
We attended during a part of the third week in September, the Co-operation meeting of the brethren from two or three of the counties on our southern border, at Lynville, and were much pleased at the harmony that prevailed. Brethren Barrett, Lock, Speer and others are doing a good work. Most of the churches as reported meet on the first day of the week to break bread, attend to the fellowship and rejoice in hope of the life to come. The brethren in attendance seemed determined to increase their evangelizing force. Success attend their efforts.
T. F.
CASE OF DISCIPLINE
Report of delegates from various congregations of disciples, assembled in Franklin, Williamson county, Tennessee, upon the facts connected with the action of the congregation at Franklin College, in reference to Elder S. E. Jones.
Owing to the fact that serious misunderstandings and dissatisfaction were known to exist among a portion of the brotherhood in regard to the course pursued by the congregation at Franklin College, toward Elder S. E. Jones; the disciples at Franklin, Tennessee, having obtained the consent of the parties to look into the matter, invited the brethren of different congregations to send delegates to cooperate with the committee appointed by themselves, in an examination of all the facts that have contributed to bring about the present unpleasant state of things; and if possible to correct these misunderstandings, and promote the peace and harmony of the brotherhood.
Accordingly, brethren from Boston, Beech Grove, Thompson’s Station, Owen’s Station, Rock Spring, Murfreesboro’, and Union assembled with the committee of the Franklin congregation, at their meeting house in the town of Franklin, on Thursday, Sept. 27, 1860. The committee of delegates was organized by the appointment of Elder E. Thompson Chairman, and brethren O. T. Craig and W. M. Moss Secretaries.
Brethren from the congregation at Franklin College were requested to lay before the committee the charges alleged against Elder S. E. Jones, with the testimony upon which they had been sustained; and
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Elder S. E. Jones was allowed to present such defense as he might think proper.
After thorough investigation and mature deliberation, the committee desire to submit to the brotherhood, as their unanimous judgment upon all the premises, the following report:
- That the five distinct charges preferred by the congregation of Franklin College against Elder S. E. Jones, seriously involving his Christian character, and upon which their action in withdrawing from him was based, are fully sustained by the testimony, in every important particular.
- That the course pursued by him while under censure of the congregation, and in disregard of their authority, and even after they had withdrawn their fellowship from him, in going abroad preaching, and in making ex-parte statements in reference to the difficulties in which he was involved; was well calculated to create strifes and divisions among the brotherhood; and the committee are convinced that, unfortunately, in many instances, this has been the result.
- The committee feel that, in justice to the congregation at Franklin College, it is their duty to state that they are convinced that the brethren acted with great forbearance and long suffering toward Elder S. E. Jones, in that, after they had arrived at their final conclusion on all the premises in the trial, they deferred their final action for months, with the hope that he would take counsel with friends and brethren of other congregations, confess his wrongs, and be restored to fellowship.
It appears, however, fully in evidence, that he disregarded the advice of faithful and disinterested brethren, who, with strong sympathies in his favor, interposed their efforts to bring about his reconciliation.
- In his complicity in a disgraceful affair (now of public notoriety) of an individual, whose name, in charity, we forbear to mention; and his course in encouraging him to impose himself upon the brethren as a preacher of righteousness, while he well knew that said individual was guilty of crimes which rendered him unworthy of Christian regard; he manifested a want of Christian integrity, and an utter disregard for truth.
Therefore, with all the facts before us, we cannot see how the brethren, being a knowledge of these facts, can recognize him as a brother in fair standing, and as a minister of the Gospel of Christ. Thus much we have thought proper to present for the consideration of an intelligent and candid brotherhood. Gladly would we draw a…
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Veil over the dark picture, were it consistent with the solemn obligations we owe to the cause of our Redeemer; but we feel that the cause is suffering from a want of some such exposition as we have endeavored to give.
That cause—the best of all causes, the hope of a ruined world—must be sustained, whatever may be the consequences to individuals. Yet we deeply sympathize with Elder S. K. Jones. His former labors as an energetic and efficient teacher of the Christian religion, we know and appreciate; and may the Lord grant that he may yet be brought to sincere repentance of his grievous sins, and be restored to his former position and usefulness.
Signatories:
- E. THOMPSON, Chairman, Thompson’s Station, Tennessee.
- D. HAMILTON,
- O. T. CRAIG, Franklin
- A. W. MOSS,
- SETH SPARKMAN, Boston
- THOMAS M. SPARKMAN,
- JAS. C. OWEN, Owen’s Station
- LEWIS COOK,
- JNO. W. HALL, Murfreesboro
- JNO. HILT, Rock Spring
- JNO. C. ALEXANDER, Beech Grove
- J. J. ROUNTREE,
- F. M. CARMACK, Union
Dear Brethren:
I have been evangelizing in Franklin, Lauderdale, Marion and Fayette counties of Alabama, and Itawamba county, Mississippi, devoting my whole time to the work; and thinking probably a short history of my operations would prove interesting to the readers of the Advocate, I have concluded to give it to you, and you can publish it or not as you may deem best.
I attend the congregation at Stoney Point, in Lauderdale once a month, and have thus far made fourteen additions. This congregation now numbers over one hundred, meets every Lord’s day, and are in a prosperous condition—and they expect brother Fanning to spend a week with them during the present fall.
I also visit the congregation at Russellville, once a month, generally spending two days with them. This congregation was reorganized last winter, and has since had four additions. It now consists of about…
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Thirty members—doing tolerably well. They meet every first day of the week.
The next congregation is on Buttaln1.tchie, in Marion county, known as the “Union” congregation. They number about one hundred and are in a flourishing condition. They have a very efficient preacher in the congregation in the person of G. M. Haley. Through the labors of myself and brother Haley there have been during this year, I will say (as I do not now remember the exact number) about thirty additions made to this congregation.
At Berea, on New River, in Fayette county, there is a congregation organized the second Sunday in March last, with eight members. It now numbers fifty-eight members; the greater number has been added by immersion—some fifty of the increase are from the Missionary Baptists. They now meet every Lord’s day. They have quite an efficient Bishop in the person of brother Thos. Thornton. The prospect for a still further increase is very flattering. On the fourth Lord’s day in October next, we have appointed a cooperation meeting to commence at this place, on Friday before said Lord’s day, and through the Advocate, we request the attendance of all the proclaiming brethren that can possibly get there.
I also attend every fifth Sunday in the month a congregation at Vanburen, in Itawamba county, Miss. The congregation at this point was organized the fifth Sunday in April last, with thirteen members. On the fifth Sunday in July, I attended and labored with this congregation, and the result was nine additions—one from the Baptists, and eight by immersion. I appointed brother N. King, Bishop of the church. They meet every first day of the week. In all the bounds of my labors this year, I have had ninety-one additions, mostly by confession and immersion.
Should you, brother Fanning, or any of the preaching brethren pass here or any of the points above mentioned, please give them a call. I received the Advocate, your valuable paper, and I and the brethren are highly pleased with it. But it does not get here until about the tenth of the month; can you tell us the reason?
Your Brother in Christ,
JOHN TAYLOR
Frankfort, Ala., September 5, 1860.
Is there no plan by which we can secure the weekly visits of Bro. Reece Jones’ paper?