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 »0000®«S999SSS9SS99SSSSS«S«9SS^SSSSSSVSS9999««i 
 
 rHFlOLOCICAL UNK^N 
 
 LECTURES 
 
 HAMILTON CONl'liRI'NCl';, iSqd. iSg?. 
 
 BY 
 
 RKV. 13. W SNIDIOK, 
 
 A N I > 
 
 RKV. TIIKO, ). 1*.\KR, H..\. 
 
 It )K ONTO 
 
 WILLIAM HKKjCS, 
 wfcsi.Ev iu;ii.i)iN<, . 
 Wontrkal: C. VV. CoAiKs. Hai.ikax; S. K. Hti-Mii. 
 
'm 
 
 
 * 
 
"€■ 
 
 THEOLOGICAL UNION 
 
 LECTURES 
 
 HAMILTON CONFKRKNCE, 1896, 189?. 
 
 BY 
 
 *. 
 
 REV. D. W. SNIDER, 
 
 .yti 
 
 AND 
 
 REV. THEO. J. PARR. B.A. 
 
 TORONTO 
 WILLIAM BRIGGS, 
 
 WESLEY BUILDINGS. 
 
 Montreal : C. W. Coaxes. Halifax : S. F. Huestis. 
 
 c 
 
^ 
 
( i 
 
 WHY THIS SUBJECT AND 
 NOT THAT?" 
 
 By rev. 1). W. SNIDER. 
 
 firail lit'/nrr flu Thcdloijirnl Union nf IlninlHon Cniifrrruce, 
 (l<tll, Out., J mil, /.S'.W. 
 
 A LECTURER once prefaced his discourse upon 
 the rhinoceros as follows : " I must beg of 
 you, ladies and j^entlenien, to give me your 
 undivided attention. Indeed, it is absolutely impos- 
 sible that you can form a true idea of the hideous 
 animal of which I speal nless you keep your eyes 
 fixed upon me." 
 
 It is after a similarly painful fashion that I must 
 introduce to you the nature of my remarks this after- 
 noon. What rhetoricians are pleased to call the 
 exordium, I must make, with your kind permission, 
 personal or autobiographical. When, a year ago, the 
 generous unwisdom of the brethren laid upon me the 
 task of this lectureship for 180G, I asked that wit' 
 the appointment they would also assign the subject, 
 urging that half the difficulty of my obligation would 
 thereby be avoided. The requisite mental alertness 
 was not available at a late hour in an extremely hot 
 afternoon, and there was no virtue in sweating the 
 brain when at every pore of the body there was the 
 liquid evidence of internal suffering, and I went home 
 without a subject. As the poet would say, "Time fled 
 
4 "WHV Tilts SITRIECT AffD NOT THAT?" 
 
 in his co«sclc.ss course," Imt his p,,.etical llyinrr nro- 
 
 ^aul tlmt to. many weeks a.ij m„ntl,s I did not roach 
 tor l„s t„relocl<, call a halt, and demand a s u , ec 
 But there came a day when this Conference and iht 
 partieular occasion climbe.l lai-o above the hori'on 
 
 a .;.:t' ":,'"' ''I ''" '"""".'« «'-tness,it po ted 
 at nie its merciless hn<;er, sayhf', " At it von' v„., 
 
 -.".^^t find a subject." Trembling I'y, but ob^edientlv I 
 
 :X Zf^ ' """"^I" "' "'^' ''^"''y and sranieu 
 mv i I :™ " ";"'"■ '"""^o "f "'« subjects chosen by 
 i"> III istnous predecessors-how they were ontolo-T 
 ea and theolo.ncal and teleolo.ical, and the rest o> t 
 -III til there was no spirit in me, I thought of the 
 
 wha't t2 ""'' .?Pir'""''>' >=' ""■« lectureship and 
 what those attondinjf ought in fairness to expect 
 
 "om ll im" I I e " "7 ^''^'""u°^ ''" """'-" ""'»«; 
 somethiior i,|,e Isaiah upon the eve of his nroi.hetic 
 
 commission. I thought of the times and he^p r t of 
 the times ,„ which we live, and of the n-reat un 'n t") 
 problems awaiting the application of rediscovered 
 tru h which .shall bring them, solved, under the IWt 
 ot Jesus, as a further portion of the golden floor for 
 H. r,ump,,„ march through succeeding a"e, bu 
 while I found that the times are overarched with 
 many a glorious rainbow, no golden cun fell Tn n 
 :iZr' "'^ ^•'•^''- -'^ -v^rieTclS ':lihout 
 
 a .hjrt° i^"^^^^ 
 
 not severally dismissprl fr»*. +u^ -^ were 
 
 „ •/ '^"'^"Ji'^'ica lor tne same rpnsnn TK<^ 
 
 ceding of my cranial cabin was too low for "ome to 
 
 entei and m disgust they passed from me! Xle ? 
 
WHY THIS SUHJE(T AND SOT THAT/' 
 
 5 
 
 >n^ pro- 
 luust he 
 ot reach 
 suhject. 
 md this 
 horizon, 
 pointed 
 .' You 
 ently, I 
 randeur 
 osen hy 
 itologi- 
 ist of it 
 of the 
 ip, and 
 expect, 
 fcleness, 
 3phetic 
 lirit of 
 Lsolved 
 overod 
 he feet 
 'or for 
 s; but 
 
 I with 
 
 II into 
 ithout 
 
 ess of 
 forced 
 object 
 ocked 
 ^er or 
 were 
 The 
 me to 
 iile I 
 
 was left to niouni my insufficiency. To some I firmly 
 bade dismissal, for small as the cabin mi<:fht bo, it was 
 sacred, and not to be polluted by their unwelcome 
 entrance, M ui^' a i;ood-i()okin<j thin<; is verminou-i. 
 A good many tlu'mes I S()u<j[ht to bar<j;ain with and 
 obtain their secret, as they lifted their snnlinj^ faces 
 for a cordial ^reetinj;, but sa<l was the revelation of 
 their hypocrisy, liehind their parte*! lips, which 
 evermore utteriMl the j)hilosophical cant of some 
 moribund school or the incoherent twaddle of some 
 infantile panacea for the social woes of men, there 
 leaked the unheroic sawdust of their seemly pro- 
 portions, until, ashamed of their company, I said, 
 "Adieu," and closed the cabin door. 
 
 Concretely, the case is this , Some subjects I 
 would have liked to hand!»% but I could not for 
 one reason or another, such as the limit of time for 
 investij^aticm at my disposal, or delicient scholarship. 
 Likewise, for certain reasons, sucli as inappropri- 
 ateness or triteness, there were some subjects I could 
 have handled, but would not. Now, rising irom 
 the piie of rejected subjects — first, because I could 
 not handle them ; and, secondly, because 1 would 
 not handle ihem — there came an iiupirative some- 
 thing demanding to know, " Why not : " While the 
 imperative " Why not ?" thundered at the citadel of 
 the will, each rejected subject seemed to be given 
 voice, and in one way or another made its appeal to 
 conscience — one flatteringly, another threateningly, 
 another soberly. One said, " You reject me at the 
 peril of your reputation"; another said, "You are 
 afraid of the truth if you refuse me " ; one cried, 
 "I know the majority will be satisfied with me"; 
 another insinuatingly whispered, "I carry the polish "; 
 while yet another plaintively spake like one in im- 
 portuning prayer, "I am the way." Why thw suhject 
 and not that ? What has been the conflict in ten 
 
"WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?" 
 
 
 thousand studies this week before ten thousand men 
 enter tlieir pulpits and announce their texts to-morrow 
 morning ? I propose to traverse the reasons which 
 cufjht or ought not to control the preacher of the 
 glorious Gospel of the blesyed God in the choice of 
 his subjects from week to week while this century 
 darkens for the dawn of another. 
 
 We shall learn what these reasons are and the 
 nature of them by a somewhat elastic classification of 
 subjects under the following heads : First, Pernicious ; 
 secondly, Prudential; and thirdly, Proper. It is a 
 sad thing to have to confess that there is some con- 
 siderable proportion of the opportunity of the pulpit 
 which is sold to the devil. That this is true requires 
 no denionstrati(m. The pure minded and godly 
 preacher understands it by the subtle temptations 
 that many a time have sha-ned his spirit, and by 
 the sorrow with which he remembers the day when 
 he toned his sermon down to something else, at least 
 to something less than the message God save him. 
 It is from the view-point of the sermon as a message 
 that I speak of the Pernicious subject, and I call that 
 theme pernicious which becomes, either in substance 
 or spirit, the purchase of the devil by the success cf 
 any seductive appeal to the preacher's self-interest. 
 
 There is a cheap way by which one may satisfy 
 a superficial consideration of the mischievous and 
 harmful in the preacher's choice of a subject. Most 
 of the splenetic scorn which is levelled against the 
 sensational titles of sermons is of this shallow variety. 
 It is easy to anathematize as ministerial mountebanks 
 those whc^ in the announcement of their matters of 
 discourse, give evidence of the fact that some ' depart- 
 mental ' store has lost an eloquent agent. I am not 
 here, just now, either as the apologist or the prose- 
 cutor of the sensational title-monger. He is unworthy 
 of either. The silence of shame is best when the eyes 
 
 
"WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?" 
 
 im. 
 
 are made hot by the reading of such thenies as 
 "Moses in Muskoka," "The Religious Mule," "Pull on 
 your Bootstrap," or " Your Trolley's Off." But to go 
 no further than this in the treatment of the Pernicious 
 subject is to shrink into a contemptible littleness in 
 the salving of conscience. The Pernicious subject is 
 the offspring of the preacher's self-interest, and is the 
 darling of his lust for position or praise or power. 
 It is not necessary to enter into a humiliating incjuiry 
 to ascertain how great the ' apany is of so-called 
 preachers, whose ministry beais the awful evidence of 
 such prostitution. I prefer, if possible, to believe 
 that the terrible charges of it sometimes made, come 
 rather from a knowledge of the temptation, than from 
 a knowledge, however obtained, of the fall. It is 
 preferable to endure the sting of a libellous accusation, 
 and prove its falseness by the antitheses of a God- 
 fearing life and ministry, than to resent it and de- 
 mand the facts, only to bring the total flow of sewer- 
 like nastiness to the surface. We learn sufficient for 
 our warning and guidance by looking into the man- 
 holes of temptation and reflecting upon some sad 
 relics of historic conduits. 
 
 Self-interest, when yielded to under the seductive 
 appeal of position or praise or power, produces in 
 the preacher, broadly speaking, some one of three 
 false notions, as to his relation to the people. The 
 type of his ministry will be fashioned by that notion, 
 and the notion being false, the trend of his preaching 
 will be pernicious. Not to be psychological, let me 
 say at once that he becomes either, (a) a flatterer of 
 the people ; or, QS) fearful of the people ; or, (c) official 
 towards the people. 
 
 It is said that a woman who had been getting her 
 photograph taken, upon looking at the proof and 
 seeing her nose, angrily said to the artist, " See here ; 
 do you mean to tell me I have got such an ugly look- 
 
8 
 
 WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT^' 
 
 ing nose as that ? " He meekly replied, " But my 
 apparatus cannot lie ; " whereupon she indignantly 
 retorted, " Then, for goodness sake, go and get one 
 that can." Now, no ugly feature need ever fear 
 exposure, at the hands of the preacher who flatters. 
 He makes a clever adjustment of his apparatus, to 
 suit the community and the occasion. A minister had 
 recently entered upon his work at a city appointment. 
 He had come from a charge in a community that 
 could be referred to by a term of no greater dignity 
 than " town." With the habit of two or three years 
 upon him, his first prayers and addresses in his new 
 field, were in the interests of the town: He asked for 
 God's blessing upon the "town"; he desired his con- 
 gregation to help him in his work, in behalf of the 
 " town." An official called his attention to it, assuring 
 him that the people would resent the calling of their 
 place of residence anything less than a " city." Now, 
 the preacher who flatters could never have so be- 
 trayed the size of his old charge while face to face 
 with the urban character of the new. Forthwith, it 
 would be neither " this town " nor " this city," but 
 " this great city," ""this vast centre of population," 
 " this flourishing hive of industry," " this magnificent 
 city, world-famous for its commerce, and the enter- 
 prising and noble character of >ts citizens." It will 
 be admitted that there is a wide chasm of insincerity 
 between the seemly prudence or ready courtesy which 
 bestows the proper title, upon an}'^ person or place, 
 and that flattery which is designed to inflate the pride, 
 or to tickle the vanity, of either ; but this is the point, 
 — the truth-telling and message- bearing subject is too 
 tame for the preacher who has taught himself to ride 
 into the good graces of his hearers by such a method. 
 He may be esteemed for a time by the unsophisticated 
 as a shrewd judge of human nature, and as a 'iiaster 
 mind in the quick discernment cf the thoughts and 
 needs of men, but soon he becomes unsaddled, to fall 
 
'vr 
 
 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THATf 
 
 9 
 
 as prone as a dismounted politician. What are the 
 subjects that tit into the character oF such a preacher ? 
 What can God say through such an one to tlie peopled 
 While patriotic themes hold out it may be thought he 
 has something to say for, multiplied, indeed, by the 
 possibilities of a jingo imagination, he knows posi- 
 tively the vast resources of the empire, and the full 
 (rlories of the Hag, and the total combination that their 
 united virtue can be put to ignominious tlight. This 
 preacher, too, may be expected to treat on the inspira- 
 tion of Isaiali and Paul versus Shakspeare and kindred 
 themes ; wherein, having imbibed freely at the foun- 
 tains of literature, he may show the superlative merits 
 of sacred history over profane, of Biblical psalmody 
 over modern, of Scripture parables over others, that 
 is to say, which are not scriptural. He will deal, to 
 use the language of the newspaper, to which he sends 
 the report of his services, " with an eloquence which 
 now irresistibly moves his audience to laughter, and 
 anon melts them to tears"— he will deal in his pastoral 
 term with the whole catalogue of the mummeries of 
 pedantry. Anyone may take unbounded comfort in 
 inviting his most worldly friend, to hear this flattering 
 preacher, for he is warranted never to aim, and if, 
 through some unfortunate blunder, anyone mistakenly 
 thinks he was hit, he may be assured of a glittering 
 and silvery apology. 
 
 " The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed, 
 But swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw." 
 
 This preacher, instead of " by the manifestation of the 
 truth commending himself to every man's conscience 
 in the sight of God," exempUHes a perversion of the 
 apostle's words as parodical as this: And ho 
 gave some philosophers and some scientists, and 
 some litterateurs, and some savants and simjdetons, 
 for the confusion of the saints, for the somnolence of 
 the ministry, for the petrifying of the body of Christ. 
 
10 
 
 WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?" 
 
 r 
 
 r'^v- 
 
 A cartoon which appeared not long since thus pictures 
 this fiatterinj^ preacher in search of material and 
 a subject. He is seated with pen in hand. In a 
 pensively desperate mood, his eyes are fixed upon the 
 wall. His late efibrts hang in manuscript splendor 
 from the side of his desk with their titles exposed, 
 such as these, " Esthetic Worship," '• Elijah's Joke " 
 and " The Color of David's Hair." The volumes which 
 adorn his revolving bookcase, or which lie where the 
 disgust of his inetFective search has thrown them, 
 are scientific, philosophical, rhetorical, humorous and 
 sensational — Shakespeare and Artemus Ward, Darwin 
 and Bill Nye, Spencer and a guide to oratory, Huxley 
 and effective gestures, a homiletical encyclopedia and 
 one of wit and humor are side by side. Volumes of 
 Star sermons, quotations, illustrations and similes are 
 at his command, while in careless profusion about his 
 feet may be seen, with the world's great news, the 
 total trash of the daily reportorial muck rake in 
 Heralds and Tribunes galore. Amid it all his heart 
 is inspirationlese, his brain is barren and his pen is 
 still. The artist — that noble cartoonist-preacher of 
 righteousness, Frank Beard — shows us in the picture 
 what he would have this world-fettered preacher do 
 in the agony of his preparation. He would have him 
 turn in his chair to look where the finger of a com- 
 manding Joshua points, and see the neglected Bible 
 behind him on the curtained shelf, befriended by the 
 cobwebs, while yet it is vibrant and electric with life 
 and wisdom and power. 
 
 " We search the world for truth ; we cull 
 The good, the pure, the beautiful 
 From graven stone and written scroll, 
 From all old flower-fields of the soul ; 
 And weary seekers of the best 
 We come back laden from our quest, 
 To find that all the sages said 
 Is in the Book our mothers read." 
 
 — Whittiek. 
 
"WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?" H 
 
 From this pernicious prophet who looks upon the 
 people as weaklinrrs to bo entertained, or as world- 
 linjTs to be cajoled, or as purse-proud Pharisees to be 
 chloroformed and bled, let us pass to a consi(leration 
 of that ministerial character whose work is alike 
 mischievous, because, proceeding upon his estimate of 
 the people as critics to be satisfied, or as the creatures 
 of passion and prejudice to be watched and won, he 
 fears them. However he may seek to persuade him- 
 self otherwise, the reason why he takes one subject 
 and not another is decided by bis fear. 
 
 In justice to this preacher, I propose before pro- 
 ceeding, to shield him from any censure, which infer- 
 entially means that the man who swings the pulpit 
 shillalah should be praised. There are those who 
 make no distinction between a true prophet-like 
 fearlessness and offensive bravado, which is often the 
 compound of a coarse-grained nature and undecern- 
 ing zeal. You remember the story of the refined and 
 Christian soldier who, marching into the battle with 
 blanched cheeks and nervous step, was twitted for his 
 fear by an unthinking and brutal comrade, when he 
 answered, "Sir, I am afraid, but you with half my fear 
 would run " ; and likewise there are preachers whose 
 struttings and loud-mouthed bravery, has an awful 
 substratum of cowardice. It is very easy to hurl 
 firebrands into the brush-heap or to throw dirt into 
 the sewer ; but to untangle the live wires of our in- 
 tellectual and commercial and social existence from 
 which death-Hames leap, and make a safe passage 
 through them for the prodigal children of God, 
 demands another and a deeper and a thorouf^hly 
 circumspect sort of heroism. But the pernicious 
 nature of the subject chosen by the preacher of 
 whom I de^ re to speak just now, arises from the fact 
 that when he has chosen it, he cannot fit it. If, as 
 Phillips Brooks asserted, " preaching is the communi- 
 
12 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?" 
 
 cation of truth throunrh personality," the preacher 
 who fears the people fails because of the destruction 
 of his personality ; for the first, and second, and 
 third thinc^ he does is to imitate another. He is a 
 copyist, with })roperIy unsuccessful results. He 
 desires a popular flow of success to attend liis min- 
 istry, and he is ever on the stretch to learn of the 
 successful man and his method. While, perhaps, he 
 would not surrender the truth, or compromise the 
 truth, he is anxious — of course, for the general ^ood, 
 as well as his own— to learn how to parcel it out so 
 that worldly officials may rejoice over laro-e collec- 
 tions, and spasmodic Christians over great revivals, 
 and social aristocrats over oratorical excellence. He 
 would have the old people comforted, and the younp- 
 people encourafjed. He travels note-book in hand 
 to hear the oreat preacher, and to acquaint himself 
 with the machinery of the thrivinrj church, and then 
 goes home to try. Of course, he has done it before ; 
 but the experiment failed. He came to think that 
 in some way he had missed the point that he fondly 
 dreamed he had got, for certainly there was a point. 
 It was a trick of voice, or of gesture, or of facial 
 expression; but he could not work it. It was a 
 method of finance, or a mode of entertainment, or a 
 suggestive lire of topics; but, somehow, the condi- 
 tions were not favorable. But, once more, he has 
 discovered the newest and the latest thing from the 
 freshest and brainiest sources, and he proposes to try 
 again. So-and-so did it, and his church was thronged. 
 fJo-and-so did it, and had an immense revival 'So- 
 and-so did it, and had to hire t secretary to decline 
 his invitations. This man, swaying to the various 
 moods o^' widely-different people, and measuring suc- 
 cess by popular applause, under the delusion that the 
 voice of the people is the voice of God, makes a 
 pitiful spectacle and blunder. Success attends the 
 
"WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?" 13 
 
 ucrht seizure of the rip^ht truth; until, transt'ormed 
 by it, the preacher pours it at white heat, and molten, 
 upon the hearts of men. It may attract, and ids task 
 is easy. It may repel, and his confidence must be in 
 
 God. 
 
 There is no greater wickedness of which a church 
 may be guilty than the hurling of numerical, or com- 
 mercial, or literary javelins of unsuccess at the man 
 whom God sends to them as his messenger, to crowd 
 him into the conviction that for them he is a failure. 
 " Noah, when the people would not listen, and whose 
 congregations were swept off in the deep waters, was 
 as successful for his purpose as Moses, to whom all the 
 multitudes of Moab listened; Paul, whoso personal 
 magnetism in oratory was small, more successful than 
 Apollos, who attracted the people; Jeremiah, disre- 
 garded at the gate of the Lord's house, accomplishing 
 the end of preaching as truly as Ezra, in the throng 
 of the water-gate ; John, intense, loving, retiring, as 
 truly as Peter, energetic, devoted, outspoken." — (Rev. 
 Chas. E. Knox.) 
 
 There is little that can be more fully historically 
 proven than that the rejected doctrine of to-day 
 becomes the accepted and applauded belief of to-mor- 
 row. If a welcome awaits Jesus at Gadara to-day 
 we are glad, for only yesterday the people of that 
 place bade him depart from their coast. " This Moses 
 whom they refused, saying, Who made thee a ruler 
 and a judge ? him hath God sent to be both a ruler 
 and a deliverer, with the hand of the angel which 
 appeared to him in the bush." O preacher, fearful of 
 the people, forsake not the hand of the angel ! Mak- 
 ing experiments in the methods by which others 
 achieve appa^-ent, and very possibly real, success, is 
 to fall from the dignity of a messenger of God. 
 Masks are mischievous. Misfits are unbecoming and 
 ridiculous. Fruit from the note-book of your obser- 
 
14 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?" 
 
 yation, and tied to your branches, may rot before it 
 is plucked. Grow your own. It is to be noted that 
 the record of great sermons and great deeds, both by 
 Jesus and the Apostles, are generally preceded by 
 the statement, " Being full of the Holy Ghost." 
 
 Among those whose preaching is pernicious in its 
 
 results, because of a false notion as to his relation to 
 
 the people, is that one who, in the choice of his 
 
 subjects and in the trend of his ministry, is official 
 
 towards them. I ask you, therefore, to turn your 
 
 attention from the man who is fearful of the people 
 
 and trying to reach success by an attempt to wear 
 
 the successful man's clothes, and to look with me at 
 
 this other species. He is fully and always frocked 
 
 and cravated, and does " his holy, oily best." It may 
 
 not be universally true in speaking of this class to 
 
 say that they are 
 
 ♦* Of such as, for their bellies' sake, creep and intrude 
 and climb into the fold ; " 
 
 but it must be so painfully near the truth that the 
 minority need our intensest sympathy. Having said 
 this, and made this worst of all charges acrainst any 
 set of men presuming to be " the ambassadors for 
 Christ, I say another *hing to which every honest 
 preacher will bear witness : That the mightiest and 
 most frequently urgent cry to God that the averao-e 
 minister needs to utter is, that he may be saved from 
 tailing into the perfunctory and official in the per- 
 tormance of his duties. In the attempt to flee this 
 temptation, some have gone to the other and equally 
 sad extreme, and we know them as flippant and 
 sportive, and irreverent, and but a few removes from 
 dudes or ward-heelers or jockeys. The ministry is an 
 othce There is something radically wrong when the 
 preacher forgets it, or when the people never feel it 
 
 M 
 
 
 la 
 
 -.1 
 
fc before ifc 
 loted that 
 s, both by 
 3ceded by 
 
 )St." 
 
 ous in its 
 elation to 
 ce of his 
 is official 
 urn your 
 he people 
 ' to wear 
 ith me at 
 5 frocked 
 It may 
 1 class to 
 
 itrude 
 
 that the 
 'ing said 
 inst any 
 dors for 
 Y honest 
 )iest and 
 
 average 
 '^ed from 
 the per- 
 flee this 
 
 equally 
 ant and 
 ^es from 
 :ry is an 
 'hen the 
 
 feel it. 
 
 ^m 
 
 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?' 
 
 15 
 
 He is in a peculiar sense God's man. It is for him to 
 realize and manifest it. It should be the privilege of 
 the world to see it. 
 
 But to return to the character under consideration. 
 The preacher who regards the people officially and 
 en masse, and not sympathetically and individually, 
 as dunderheads to be religiously crammed, and not as 
 intelligences to be spiritually inspired and developed : 
 as the" contributors to a system, and not as the dis- 
 ciples of a person ; as tine insects, buzzing for a day, 
 and not as immortals crowding the gates of judg- 
 ment ; such a preacher makes the task of his subject 
 selecting methodical and easy. 
 
 He does not ask himself, " Why this subject, and 
 not that?" He simply J^ays, "It is this subject, 
 because last time it was that." Last time it was out 
 of the Old Testament, this time it must be out of the 
 New ; last time it was out of Matthew, this time it 
 must be Mark ; last time he took it topically from his 
 scrap cabinet, letter A, this time, therefore, it must 
 come from his scrap cabinet, letter B. His congre- 
 gation hearing the droning announcement, meekly 
 nod submissive acquiescence, for they know it is 
 
 to be. 
 
 Possibly this official brother has a more spicy 
 method of arriving at a subject— a method, in which 
 his children, forbidden many sports, find an imitative 
 opportunity for a little game of chance. Shutting 
 the Bible, and then letting it fly open, according to a 
 mental covenant, he is to choose that text upon which 
 his eyes first alight ; or, as Phillips Brooks suggests, 
 he floats over the whole sea of truth, and plunges 
 here and there, like a gull, on any subject that suits 
 his mood ; putting one in r-dnd of the old click on 
 the slate, as with eyes shui e sought to ■ -rop on the 
 space with the largest number : 
 
 " Tick, tack, toe, here I go ; 
 If I miss, I'll hit on this." 
 
16 
 
 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?" 
 
 7*nother official representative of the Pernicious 
 subject, though of a slightly superior grade, to fill 
 out the round of his duties towards his patient flock, 
 takes a walk through the standards and rubrics of 
 his Church to faithfully dispeni^e the doctrines in 
 uniform doses, from the being of God and the 
 creation of man to the final judgment and the second 
 death. Pernicious oflicialism ! It gives birth to 
 cant. It sucks out the sap of experience, and injects 
 the name of Christianity with the dry rot of 
 literalism. Instead of the preacher standing before 
 the people as the pulsating, vigorous, urgent, thrilling 
 ambassador or living messenger, the character of 
 which I have spoken, represents him as a nicklc-in- 
 the-slot phonograph, into which you drop your 
 penny, place the tubes to your ears, and listen to a 
 time-worn song. 
 
 In traversing the reasons, or methods, or motives 
 which ought or ought not to control the preacher in 
 the choice of his subject, I come now to speak of that 
 class of subjects which I named " Prudential." They 
 are chosen because they are said to be timely, suitable, 
 adaptive. It is urged that it is fatal to usefulness to 
 preach above the people, or over their heads. It is 
 claimed that no good can be accomplished by going 
 faster than the people are willing to go, or further. 
 It is affirmed that it is by no means wise to antago- 
 nize them or throw yourself in the way of their 
 cherished opinions. You must stay with them. You 
 must treat with them on their own ground, and be 
 content to lure and coax them to higher and nobler 
 things. You must ever be under the burden of the 
 Master when He said to His followers : " I have yet 
 many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear 
 them now." 
 
 Prudential ! And I am not bold enough to demand 
 that all that discreet advice be thrown away. The 
 
"WHY THIS SUIUECr AND NOT THAT 
 
 ' r 
 
 17 
 
 'ernicious 
 le, to fill 
 ent flock, 
 ubrics of 
 jtrinea in 
 
 and the 
 be second 
 
 birth to 
 id injects 
 J rot of 
 ng before 
 
 thrilling 
 racter of 
 licklo-in- 
 op your 
 )ten to a 
 
 motives 
 3acher in 
 k of that 
 ." They 
 .suitable, 
 ulness to 
 Is. It is 
 )y going 
 
 further. 
 ► antago- 
 
 of their 
 m. You 
 , and be 
 id nobler 
 n of the 
 have yet 
 not bear 
 
 demand 
 ly. The 
 
 average preacher does not need it, however. Ho 
 heeds it too thoroughly. Ho follows it too meekly. 
 It is too large an article in his faith. I propose to 
 qualify and minify that advice, until the one that 
 befriends it will take it away lest we look upon its 
 nakedness. 
 
 In spite of the proud and covetous and pk,asure- 
 loving nature of men, I resent the insinuation that 
 the preacher of righteousness lias to deal with them 
 as the mountain drivers in Spain deal with their 
 mules. It is said that these mules are fond of onions, 
 and that, to get them to climb the mountain roads, 
 the drivers skilfully suspend from a pole, fastened at 
 ^ the girth and reaching above the head, a bunch of 
 ^si incentive onions, so that it temptingly dangles before 
 , g the animal's nose "just so near and yet so far." Thus 
 Vl lured by the pleasurable, the mule travels. Yes, 
 there are people like that. And there are preachers 
 who prudentially carry the onions ; but I refuse to 
 make whatever basis of truth there is in the com- 
 parison a reason for always carrying onions. After 
 all, and queer a thing as human nature may be, men 
 are not Spanish mules. Men are creatures of reason, 
 and conscience and will, capable of seeing the right 
 when unwilling to act it ; capable of knowicg the 
 good, while choosing the evil ; capable of understanding 
 the truth, while openly hating and opposing it; 
 capable of love to God and holiness, while evermore 
 plunging deeper into the snares of the Devil and sin. 
 It is the preacher's business to suit his subject to 
 man's capability, and not to man's whim ; to fashion 
 it according to what man ought to be, and not 
 according to what n.an is. In a real and in an 
 exalted sense the preacher ought to be able to say 
 concerning the people : " If I had not come and 
 spoken unto them, they had not had sin ; but now 
 they have no cloak for their sin " (John xv. 22). Or, 
 

 18 
 
 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT TIIAT^" 
 
 III 
 
 those other word.s, " And now I have told you before it 
 come to puss, that, wlien it is come to pass, ye might 
 believe" (John xiv, 29). That is the measure of 
 adaptation for which to strive. Let me call attention 
 to two or three things. 
 
 First. — The great principles of righteousness and 
 love which are unfolded in the biblical record of the 
 moral government of God, pre-eminently set forth in 
 the revelation of the nature of God in the work and 
 Spirit of Jeaus Christ, are unchangeable. The kingdom 
 of God is founded upon these principles. I want to 
 say that, inasmuch as these principles make their 
 appeal to the conscience jf men, irrespective of the 
 age in which they live, or any peculiar environment 
 therewith, those principles, therefore, are always level 
 to the times. The one who preaches the Gospel of 
 God, needs to employ no prudential expedients to 
 keep to the level of his time. It fits and always has 
 fitted the nature of every man. It is like the engineer's 
 level. " Engineers surveying for a railwaj^ lay down 
 the line level, or as nearly level as the configuration 
 of the surface will permit; but an enginp^ -'s level is 
 not a .straight line ; it is t'e segment of a eircl ^ that 
 circle being the circumference of the glonr ; \\ :,at a 
 fool-engineer that fellow would be who tried to get 
 the right kink in his tool by bringing the pressure of 
 hi^ muscular blundering to bear upon it ? Not less 
 pi;. ''\\[ has been the spectacle of men, posing as the 
 piC;... .U of Cbd, who have tried to twist the unalter- 
 ab e 1' fE.ipies of righteousnes.s, which have been 
 fitted l- the natures of men, in order to make them 
 prudentially meet the so-called exigencies of the 
 times. Two unfortunate classes of preachers, how- 
 ever, may be discovered at the business. One to keep 
 up to the times, and having by his shrewdness, ascer- 
 tained that the devil has shifted his quarters, hunts 
 out his textual mask for such changed condition, and 
 
^m 
 
 ('ou before it 
 
 ss, ye might 
 
 measure of 
 
 ill attention 
 
 )usnesa and 
 cord of the 
 set forth in 
 le work and 
 he kingdom 
 I want to 
 make their 
 3tive of the 
 nvironment 
 ilways level 
 e Gospel of 
 pedients to 
 always has 
 e engineer's 
 y lay down 
 ^figuration 
 ^ "'s level is 
 :^irci'^ that 
 ." Viiata 
 ried to get 
 pressure of 
 ? Not less 
 )sing as the 
 ihe unalter- 
 have been 
 make them 
 ies of the 
 2hers, how- 
 )ne to keep 
 ness, ascer- 
 fters, hunts 
 idition, and 
 
 "WHY THIS KUIUKCT AND NOT THAT'" 
 
 10 
 
 u at one hot on the chase. He makes the liohhyist. 
 whose ministerial history, some one says, " is made up 
 o: he record of the dynasties of successive expedients, 
 following each other like the later emperors, each 
 murdering his predecessor and murdered in his turn." 
 The other' character tliscovered in the attempt to bend 
 the Gospel to the age is that one who, in a day of 
 power, stains the pulpit by his witless and tim ;- 
 serving defence of systems and policies and creeds - 
 popular but damned, such as, the divine right of 
 kings, or the justice of slavery, or the wisdom or" 
 persecution, or the protection of license. 
 
 Again : As a further qualification of the advice 
 whicii persuades the preacher to the choice of the 
 prudential subject it is to be noticed that the emptiest 
 of all success is that which is measured by the 
 respondent ring of applause. It costs a good deal, to 
 acknowledjje this and to act on it, for — 
 
 "Thougli ffitne in smoke, 
 Its fumes are frankincense to human thought." 
 
 I was rtruck very forcibly by this remark, which was 
 made to me by one of the best political orators in this 
 Province. Said he, " I can step upon any platform in 
 this country and in five minutes time secure a cheer 
 from the crowd." I asked upon what basis of fact he 
 dared to make such an assertion ^ His reply was in 
 effect that men never applaud the speaker, and he was 
 not vain enough to think so, they cheer themselves. 
 Touch their vanity, though they would call it by 
 another name; touch graciously their b^^-alty or their 
 patriotism, to the strain of which everj lan's bosom 
 swells if you but catch his conception of it, and you 
 have your cheer. A man cheers his conception and 
 not your logic. It is his argument he applauds and 
 not your array of facts. I have been astonished since 
 learning that succinct philosophy of applause to find 
 
20 
 
 WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?" 
 
 how fully the history of great speeches, and of great 
 parliamentary debates, and of popular campaigns 
 bears it out. Justin McCarthy's cleverly written 
 " History of Our Own Times " reveals it frequently. 
 Lord Palmerston blurted out in the English House of 
 Commons, in the presence of landlords who formed 
 such a large percentage of the members, when there 
 was an a<ntation on foot for an increase of rights for 
 Irish tenants. "Tenant right," said he, "tenant 
 right is landlord's wrong," and he was cheered to the 
 echo ; and for a further season, " right was on the 
 scatfold while wrong was on the throne." During the 
 discussion of the Reform Bill of 1866, a Mr. Lowe 
 turned against his former political friends, and hurled 
 invective against the extension of the franchise, de- 
 nouncing and satirizing demagogues, and democrative 
 governments, and extolling the idea of government 
 by the wise and good ; and such was the composition 
 of the House that, for the time, Mr. Lowe rose to a 
 splendor of fame in comparison with which that of 
 Bright and Gladstone, with their vastly superior 
 endowments of oratory, almost went out. The Bill 
 was killed, while landlords and plutocrats and pedants 
 cheered like madmen. But the words with which 
 Gladstone closed the debate were prophetic, while 
 scant was the applause that greeted them. Said he, 
 " You cannot fight against the future. Time is on our 
 side. The great social forces which move on in their 
 might and majesty, and which the tumult of our 
 debates does not for a moment impede or disturb, 
 those great social f(jrces are against you ; they are 
 marshalled on our side, and the banner which we now 
 carry though perhaps at this moment it may droo}) 
 over our sinking heads, yet soon again will tloat in 
 the eye of heaven, and it will be bor. e by the firm 
 hands of the united people of the three kingdoms, 
 perhaps not to an easy, but to a certain and not 
 
 4 
 
lT? 
 
 "WHY THIS SUIUECT AVD NOT THAT?' 
 
 21 
 
 id of great 
 
 campaigns 
 ■ly written 
 frequently, 
 ih House of 
 rho formed 
 kvhen there 
 
 rights for 
 e, " tenant 
 ired to the 
 A^as on the 
 During the 
 
 Mr. Lowe 
 
 and hurled 
 ^nchise, de- 
 lemoerative 
 government 
 composition 
 e rose to a 
 lich that of 
 y superior 
 }. The Bill 
 md pedants 
 A^ith which 
 letic, while 
 I. Said he, 
 ne is on our 
 
 on in their 
 lult of our 
 
 or disturb, 
 ] ; they are 
 lich we now 
 
 may droo}) 
 will tloat in 
 by the firm 
 ! kingdoms, 
 in and not 
 
 distant victory." My ({uestion is, "What is the place 
 of the preacher?" Is it where lie may win selMsh 
 and ephemeral prai>e, or where he carries the banner 
 of a cause, " though for the moment it may droop 
 over his sinking head ? " Ought he to espouse and 
 proclaim the truth that '\some would strangle and 
 some would starve," until it is " welcomed by all who 
 cursed its hour of birth," or should he continue 
 to eloquently parrot the pleasing platitudes of a 
 comfortable seltishness ? Your lecturer of to-day 
 is not foolish enough to underrate applause nor to say 
 he doesn't like it. He does not forget that men are 
 imitative, and that to secure the cheer of the one, you 
 may win the conviction of two. But there is the short 
 road or, perhaps rather, the broad road to it, and there 
 is the narrow road to it, for this is a discussion of the 
 Prudential subject, not as opposed to the Unwise or 
 the Indiscreet subject, but as opposed to the Proper, 
 the Fundamental, the Foundational subject. What 
 would Frederick W. Robertson say just now ? I 
 know not what he would say, but this he once wrote : 
 "Of one thing I have become distinctly conscious, 
 that my motto for life, my whole heart's expression 
 is, ' None but Christ ' — the mind of Christ ; to feel as 
 He felt; to judge the world and to estimate the 
 world's maxims as He judged and estimated. That 
 is the one thing worth living for. To realize that is 
 to feel, ' none but Christ.' But then in proportion as 
 a man does that, he is stripping himself of garment 
 after garment, till his soul becomes naked of that 
 which once seemed part of himself ; he is not only 
 giving up prejudice after prejudice, but also renounc- 
 ing sympathy after sympathy with friends, whose 
 smile and approbation was once his life, till he begins 
 to suspect that he will be very soon alone with Christ. 
 To believe that and still press on is what I mean by 
 the sentence, 'none but Christ.' I do not know that 
 
22 
 
 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?* 
 
 I express all I mean, but some times it is to me a 
 sense almost unsupportable of silence, and stillness, 
 and solitariness." 
 
 Again : As a further qualification of the advice 
 which wouM persuade the preacher to the choice of 
 the Prudential subject, it is to be noticed that the 
 frequent effect of the preaching of Jesus and of the 
 apostle upon their congregations was that of anger, 
 or fear, or unutterable awe. Not to enumerate the 
 examples which will readily reward your search, let 
 me direct you to examine specifically the times when 
 it is said, at the close of the sermons of Jesus, " And 
 the people were astonished at his doctrine." It is so 
 stated with reference to the Sermon on the Mount. 
 The people stood rooted to the spot like men in the 
 fright of nightmare, silenced, gagged, astonished. The 
 object of the Prudential subject differs widely from 
 any such effect ; it takes a more superficial way ; it 
 reaches after more pleasurable results ; it seeks to 
 leave the hearer in the mood of approval or applause, 
 or in an emotional flow of tears. Perhaps it touches 
 the deep, strong feelings of patriotism and sets them 
 ablaze, or perhaps it sounds the tocsin of a party until 
 the mad passions of men leap within them and find 
 vent in wild and mighty vociferation. Perhaps, by 
 the cheap tricks of oratory, it endeavors to reach a 
 climax by a wanton puncture of the fountains of 
 affection, with which it brings forth afresh the sym- 
 pathy and grief, sacred to the graves of our children 
 or the hallowed resting-places of our fathers; and 
 from it all retires in triumph, for was it not blessed 
 by the presence of sobs and tears, or the waving of 
 handkerchiefs and the flourish of hats and the tumult 
 of applause ? Now, no man is swayed until his feel- 
 ings are aroused ; no man is convinced and won until 
 that to which he gives his adherence can command his 
 emotions, and it cannot be claimed, therefore, that it 
 
AT?" 
 
 is to me a 
 
 [id stillness, 
 
 the advice 
 le choice of 
 ed that the 
 
 and of the 
 ,t of anger, 
 imerate the 
 ' search, let 
 times when 
 l^esus, " And 
 ." It is so 
 the Mount, 
 men in the 
 lished. The 
 ndely from 
 ial way ; it 
 
 it seeks to 
 dv applause, 
 1 it touches 
 i sets them 
 
 party until 
 m and find 
 Perhaps, by 
 
 to reach a 
 )untains of 
 h the sym- 
 )ur children 
 ithers; and 
 not blessed 
 
 waving of 
 
 the tumult 
 til his feel- 
 i won until 
 )mmand his 
 'ore, that it 
 
 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AKD NOT THAT T 
 
 23 
 
 is unlawful or improper, or that it may not be essen- 
 tial to appeal to them ; but, in the view of the re- 
 peated ertect of the preaching of Jesus, as already 
 su<4gested, and which was designedly, by the direct 
 assault of the conscience through the reason and the 
 will, I submit the question : If the preacher must 
 answer as between two subjects, " Why this one and 
 not the other r ought not the balance of his judgment 
 to fall upon that one which carries a truth from the 
 reason and the will to the possible and likely comiuest 
 of the emotions, rather than upon the one that drags 
 the emotions, weepingly or hilariously, within the 
 remote sight of a truth that may command the reason 
 and will ? I believe that Jesus always took the former 
 and despised the latter. He chose the Proper and 
 despised the Prudential. His was the manly voice 
 which gave utterance to these words, suggestive ot 
 the manly method, " If ye continue in my word, then 
 are ye my disciples indeed ; and ye shall know the 
 truth, and the truth shall make you free." (John 
 
 viii. 31, 32.) 
 
 We come, lastly, to the consideration of those sub- 
 jects which, in traversing the reasons which ought or 
 ought not to control the preacher in his choice, I have 
 called " Proper." At an early stage in this lecture I 
 ventured to say that the most godly preacher would 
 understand, by the subtle temptations that shamed 
 his spirit, that through the choice of unworthy sub- 
 jects some considerable proportion of the opportunity 
 of the pulpit was sold to the devil. It is my privilege 
 just now to balance that statement by another. It is, 
 that the majority of preachers know by the princely 
 thrill of their right-doing in spite of temptation that 
 the larger proportion of the opportunity of the pulpit 
 is laid in confidence at the feet of God. Who can 
 describe the regal satisfaction and joy of that soul 
 when, full of obedient love to God and of tender 
 
u 
 
 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?'* 
 
 heart-yearning for the good of men, he conies to the 
 pulpit and faces the people with his message — a mes- 
 sage strong as the eternal throne, bright as the light 
 of heaven and as sympathetic as the bosom of Jesus, 
 though given to him amid the thunders and lightnings 
 of Sinai, or in the judgment-covered darkness of 
 Calvary, or upon the hillsides resonant with angelic 
 song ; whether at the mount of beatitudes, or in the 
 courts of persecution, or from the portals of an ever- 
 revealing apocalypse ? 
 
 Much of what I have said has, to that extent, 
 anticipated what might enter into a consideration 
 of the proper subject, that the further tax I must 
 lay upon your patience will not be great. It remains 
 for me to say, first, that the proper subject is 
 always Biblical. This may sound coumionplace and 
 trite, indeed, but there is nothing that has been said, 
 or that can be said, of more vital importance. It is 
 not that a text is filched from the Bible and a sermon 
 hooked on to it ; it is not that an oration, or thesis, 
 or essay has been prepared, and then married to 
 some Bible passage because no one could forbid it 
 on account of blood relationship ; it is in no such 
 fraudulent way that the proper subject claims to be 
 biblical. No. As a Yale lecturer on preaching cays, 
 " Every sermon must have a solid rest on Scripture ; 
 every exhortation to a good life that would seize and 
 hold the conscience, must have behind it some truth 
 as deep as eternity." This has been the secret of 
 power, if secret it is, with all the epoch-making 
 preachers of history. It was so with Origen and 
 Augustine. It was so with Chrysostom and Savona- 
 rola. The same is true of Luther and Wycliffe and 
 Wesley, They were biblical preachers — exegetical, 
 expository ; anxious to preach the preaching they 
 v/ere bidden, content to preach the living Word, 
 satisfied to aim God's lightning for the destruction 
 
 1 i 
 
 .. V 
 
les to the 
 3 — a mes- 
 the lit^ht 
 of Jesus, 
 ightnings 
 rkness of 
 bh angelic 
 or in the 
 [' an ever- 
 
 ,t extent, 
 sideration 
 X I must 
 t remains 
 iubject is 
 place and 
 Deen said, 
 ce. It is 
 
 a sermon 
 
 or thesis, 
 arried to 
 
 forbid it 
 I no such 
 ims to be 
 liing cays, 
 Scripture ; 
 
 seize and 
 )me truth 
 
 secret of 
 h-making 
 rigen and 
 d Savona- 
 cliffe and 
 ixegetical, 
 ling they 
 ng Word, 
 estruction 
 
 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?' 
 
 25 
 
 of sin and to carry God's medicine for the eternal 
 cure of the broken-hearted. And that preaching, 
 which is the unfolding of a Scripture germ, showing 
 its possibilities of application, or, which is the split- 
 tinn- of a Scripture boulder, revealing its lining ot 
 most beautiful crystals aflame with glory, is the 
 demand of this age and of this hour. It is demarided 
 because of the expectancy which has been created by 
 the marvellous results of such exposition in times 
 
 past. 
 
 Criticism, whether high or low, has not touched it, 
 for both alike claim to foster the deeply-rooted con- 
 victions of the people as to the inexhaustible riches 
 of the Bible, and they continually look to the preacher 
 for its nuggets. No other book could so hold the 
 people irts its one great seal of authority, its one 
 crreat stamp of divinity. God has so Htted it to 
 the nature of man that evermore his heart burns 
 within him when some messenger by the way talks 
 with him and opens to him the Scripture. " Heaven 
 and earth shall pass away, but my word shall not 
 pass away." " As they have lived and wrought, so 
 they will live and work. From the teacher's chair, 
 and from the pastor's pulpit, in the humblest hymn 
 that ever mounted to the ear of God from beneath a 
 cottacre roof, and in the rich, melodious choir ot the 
 noblelt cathedral, ' their sound is gone into all ands, 
 and their words into the jnds of the world. — 
 
 (Gladstone.) . 
 
 Secondly.— The proper subject centres in, and 
 radiates from, Jesus Christ. It reveals a Person, and 
 itself stands clear, four-square in the light of that 
 person, even of Jesus Christ. The proper subject, 
 therefore, is always definite. It proceeds upon the 
 lines of radiant facts to its application of inevitable 
 conclusion and doctrine. Like Paul's letter to the 
 Romans, which is a supreme example of his masterly 
 
26 
 
 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT?" 
 
 method, and that may be said to be a sermon on the 
 interrogatory subject, " How can a sinful man be 
 made holy ? " — the proper subject starts with an 
 exhibit of the historic relation of the case in point to 
 God, as manifested in Jesus Christ, fixes that relation 
 and, findinf^ it wrong, shows what it ought to be and 
 what, by the grace of God, it can be ; and then, as in 
 Romans, the 12th chapter, fastens upon the hearer its 
 irresistible appeal and catalogue of duties. The pro- 
 per subject, therefore, is not theoretic but historic, 
 not apologetic but aggressive. It does not philoso- 
 phise, it proclaims. " If Christ hath not been raised, 
 then is our preaching vain : your faith is also vain." 
 " Ye are yet in your sins." (1 Cor. xv. 14, 17.) With 
 the proper subject, all theories and creeds and systems 
 are but " broken lights " of Him. He is the light, 
 and, in the Holy Ghost, the one radiant centre of all 
 and any spiritual illumination. He is the one great 
 harmony. All spiritual and eternal music is the 
 joyous antiphonal of that harmony as it breaks into 
 adoring song from the souls of the redeemed. (Rev. 
 xiv. 2, 3.) 
 
 I think enough has been said to indicate my mean- 
 ing here as to the relation of the proper subject to 
 the person and work of Jesus Christ. One is tempted 
 to linger and tell of that sweet name, and try to add 
 his tribute to the long roll of those who gladly pro- 
 claim Him " the holiest among the mighty, and the 
 mightiest among the holy." He is, in the eyes of all 
 men to-day, " the realized ideal of humanity." You 
 and I love Him as the incarnation of God — as God 
 incarnate. We believe that God was in Christ recon- 
 ciling the world anto Himself." (2 Cor. v. 19.) We 
 therefore bring our preaching to the test of His 
 approval, as our prophet, and priest, and king. 
 
 Lastly. — The proper subject is not only Biblical, it 
 not only centres in and radiates from Jesus Christ, 
 
LT?" 
 
 mon on the 
 ul man be 
 ;s with an 
 in point to 
 tiat relation 
 b to be and 
 then, as in 
 e hearer its 
 The pro- 
 ut historic, 
 ot philoso- 
 Deen raised, 
 also vain." 
 17.) With 
 ,nd systems 
 s the light, 
 entre of all 
 ! one great 
 sic is the 
 )reaks into 
 led. (Rev. 
 
 ! my mean- 
 subject to 
 is tempted 
 try to add 
 gladly pro- 
 ty, and the 
 eyes of all 
 lity." You 
 3d — as God 
 irist recoii- 
 ^ 19.) We 
 est of His 
 ing. 
 
 Biblical, it 
 sus Christ, 
 
 "WHY THIS SUnJECT ANO NOT THAT?" 27 
 
 but it is also Prophetic. It is the forthtelling of a 
 present and imperative message. It is the cJirect 
 application to the hearts of men under existing con- 
 ditions and with environments, however peculiar, ot 
 biblical truth made luminous by t^e^ evidence and 
 endorsation of Je.us Christ. It is at this point that 
 the ministry can most surely discover its strength or 
 weakness, its success or failure ; for every conscien- 
 Uous preacher must satisfy himself as to three things 
 concerning this necessary and vital prophetic require- 
 ment of the proper subject: (1) Have I an ^"t^! [^^ 
 and truthful and sufficient conception of the wi I and 
 purpose of God, as set forth in Holy Scripture (2) 
 Have I an intelligent and truthful and sufficient con- 
 ception of the present moral and spiritual needs ot 
 men, as they are affected by the multifarious influ- 
 ences of life ? (8) Have I a character of sufficient 
 integrity and sympathy to manifest the fusion ot 
 these conceptions in an intelligent and Christ-l.ke 
 experience ? (1) John vii. 17 ; Eph i 9 ; 2 Peter i. 21 
 (2) Luke iv. 18, 19 ; Phil. i. 19. (3) 2 Timothy i. 12 , 
 1 John i. 1-3. 
 
 " What we have felt and seen, 
 
 With confidence we tell ; ^ 
 
 And publish to the sons of men 
 The signs infallible." 
 
 Now, the man in whom these questions meet their 
 satisfactory answer is fltted to be a prophet tor his 
 time. God can use him as His messenger. Ihe Holy 
 Ghost always has a message for such lips, definite as 
 Isaiah, or Jeremiah, or Paul ever uttered. Such an one 
 was Luther, who, as Adolf Harnack says, " in the 
 midst of the night of his conventual life, rediscovered 
 the knowledge of God in the Gospels," and went 
 forth to a world unconsciously awaiting it, with the 
 Truth, " that dawned on him like the sun, ' The just 
 
28 
 
 "WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT^" 
 
 shall live by faith.' " Such an one wan Wesley when 
 atter weary years of seeking, he caught the fire divine 
 at the humble altars of the Moravians, and went forth 
 to a world unconsciously awaiting it, as the livinir 
 fiaming herald of the witnessing Spirit to an 
 inwrought work of Holiness. It was simply a 
 rediscovered or vitalized truth ; but as he laid it 
 hot upon the hearts of men, it fiashed and burned 
 and struck with all the voltage and amperage of a 
 new revelation. 
 
 What is the truth for which men are waiting 
 to-day ? or, Is there to be no other and grande? 
 reformation to overtake and consecrate this opulent 
 age ? Said Rev. W. L. Watkinson at Cleveland " We 
 be leve that we have a faith that can direct science • 
 a taith thatcan spiritualize commerce ; a faith that 
 will hallow gold ; a faith that will create equitable 
 and just government; a faith that will' keep the 
 roses ot pleasure as pure as are the roses of a garden " 
 But how shall the preacher apply it, and what is its 
 conquering word i The ministry that fails to seize it 
 tails short of the prophetic element which is essential 
 m the proper subject. Having indicated this, my 
 work in this lecture is done, though I stop at the gate 
 of a tempting and fruitful field. I look over the 
 gate just long enough to remark that, while others 
 hang growing upon the spreading boughs of our 
 complex civilization, the most fastly-ripening problem 
 awaiting prophetic solution to-day is, " How are men 
 who are the sons of God to live together in one 
 human brotherhood ? " In this connection, I thank 
 brod that the American pulpit, not many months aero 
 silenced the oud batteries of jingoism, and stilfed 
 the dishonorable passion that the message of the 
 I'residerit had inflamed, by prophetic voice, unani- 
 mous and strong. 
 
WHY THIS SUBJECT AND NOT THAT^ 
 
 29 
 
 The pulpit (in the sober use 
 Of its logitinmte, i)eculi;u' powers) 
 Must stand acknowledged while the world shall stand, 
 The most important and efluctual guard, 
 Support, and ornament of virtue's cause. 
 
 There stands the messenger of truth ; there stands 
 The Legate of the skies ! His theme divine. 
 His office sacred, his credentials clear. 
 By him the violated law speaks out 
 His thunders, and by him, in strains as sweet 
 As angels use, the Gospel whisi)ers peace. 
 He establishes the strong, restores the weak. 
 Reclaims the wanderer, binds the broken heart. 
 And, arm'd himself in panoply complete 
 Of heavenly temper, furnishes with arms 
 Bright as his own, and trains, by every rule 
 Of holy discipline, to glorious war, 
 The sacramental host of Ood's elect I 
 Are all such teachers ? Would to heaven all were. 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL BASLS OF 
 
 CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
ii'i 
 
 -Communion l.etueen God and man fs of the essence of 
 religion. The knowledge of man, therefore, not less tlmn the 
 knowledge of (iod, is necessary to the right understanding of 
 religious truth." 
 
 " We believe in a spiritual world as the sphere and environ- 
 ment of our spiritual energies, just as we believe in the natural 
 world as the sphere and environment of our physical energies. 
 Man knowing himself as nature and spirit, knows himself con- 
 nected with both spheres, and finds the powers of both these 
 grand systems of the universe meeting i« and sweeping through 
 hi8 being. "-Harkis, "Philosophical Basis of Theism " 
 
 In the preparation of the lecture the writer is indebted to 
 the following, among others, i„ some instances the exact 
 language being preserved : Delitzsch, '-Biblical PsychoWy" • 
 Heard, - Tripartite Nature of Man"; Pope, "Christian 
 Theology " ; Newman Smyth, " Christian Ethics " 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL BASLS OF 
 CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 A Lecture delivered before the Throlmjical Union of the Hamilton 
 Conference, June r>th, 18l>7, 
 
 By iHK REV. THEO. J. PARR, B.A., 
 
 Ami jyuhliiihed liii reiiuest of the Union, 
 
 THE ethical problem has come into great prominence 
 in these days. The old foundations are attacked 
 from certain quarters, and we are told that the dogmas 
 of Christianity are unsuitable as a basis of ethics. 
 Organizations have been formed, the outcome of 
 whose investigations tend to completely overthrow 
 the accepted tenets that underlie Christian morality. 
 It cannot be said that this attack is anything new ; 
 for it is only a renewal of the conflict between science 
 and religion, which, begun in the days of Plato and 
 Aristotle, resumed after an interval of hundreds of 
 years, about the beginning of the fifteenth century, 
 and continued unremittingl}^ in some form or another, 
 up to the present hour. 
 
 We are told by some of these thinkers that dog- 
 matic religion can no longer serve as a foundation for 
 ethics ; that a new and more satisfactory basis must 
 be sought, and that the very corner-stone of the new 
 ethical movement must be this new basis, a new 
 
34 PSYCHOLOCaCAL BASIS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 reason why man must regulate his conduct in a 
 certain way. 
 
 When we hear such statements as these from pro- 
 fessedly scholarly men, which, indeed, may indicate a 
 sincere doubt and an earnest desire for truth, we are 
 led to consider again, and more carefully than hereto- 
 fore, the ground upon which Christian ethics rests, 
 and to show that that ground, if dogmatic, still 
 appeals to reason, and will bear the strongest search- 
 light of honest scientitic criticism. And while takino- 
 this review of the basis of Christian ethics, we may 
 be urged by the results of scientific research, espe- 
 cially in the department of psychology, not to chano-e, 
 but to recast the prevailing views of ethics as held by 
 the Christian world. For we are willing to grant in 
 this modern day, that, eternal as are the essentials 
 of the Christian faith, the garb in which these tenets 
 are presented may change, even as the language in 
 which they are framed alters from age to age. We 
 may say, with Temple, that it is intended that religion 
 should use the aid of science in clearing her own 
 conceptions. Our knowledge of the true meaning of 
 the Bible has gained by the increase of other know- 
 ledge. Science makes clearer than anything else 
 could have made it the higher level on which the 
 Bible puts what is spiritual over what is material. 
 The physical and the spiritual worlds are one whole, 
 and neither is complete without the other. Science 
 enters into religion and is its counterpart, has its 
 share to take in the solution of many religious prob- 
 lems, and the wise man is bound to recognize its value 
 and make use of its services. 
 
 By proceeding in this spirit, we may be able to 
 make clear, in the face of arguments to the contrary, 
 that Christian ethics, while a part of revealed religion, 
 and hence supernatural; and, based upon fundamental 
 Christian doctrine, and hence dogmatic, has still a 
 
Hies. 
 
 PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OF CHIUSTIAN ETHICS. 35 
 
 luct in a 
 
 from pro- 
 indicate a 
 h, we are 
 111 hereto- 
 lics rests, 
 atic, still 
 st search- 
 ile taking 
 !, we may 
 rch, espe- 
 .0 change, 
 s held by 
 ) grant in 
 essentials 
 3se tenets 
 guage in 
 age. We 
 t religion 
 her own 
 eaning of 
 er know- 
 hing else 
 ^hich the 
 material, 
 ne whole, 
 Science 
 b, has its 
 3US prob- 
 its value 
 
 » able to 
 contrary, 
 i religion, 
 damental 
 IS still a 
 
 scientific basis properly so called, and runs counter 
 to none of the great laws of psychology, but rather 
 harmonizes with those laws in such a way as to 
 demonstrate the divine origin of both Christian othics 
 on the one hand, and the basal laws of the human 
 mind upon the other. Internal experience comes to 
 confirm external authority, and we are convinced that 
 the teachings of Christian morality are not only theo- 
 logically, but also psj^chologically true as well. 
 
 Likeness of God in Man. 
 
 There is ade(iuate ground for the assertion that the 
 origin of matter, lil'e, and soul are properly traced to 
 a divine source. We have but to regard with critical 
 observation the opening chapters of the Book of 
 Genesis to conclude that such origin is not the result 
 of development, but the outcome of creation, repre- 
 senting the power and wisdom of a personal God,, 
 Man's material organism, animal life, mental and 
 spiritual constitution, have their f^oitrce in God, and, 
 in the last analysis, cannot be explained by the doc- 
 trine of Evolution, great as that doctrine may be as 
 a process of development, adec^uate materials being 
 presupposed. . 
 
 Scripture nowhere says of any one of the visible 
 creatures that surround us that it is created in the 
 image of God. They are works of divine wisdom, 
 and therefore realized thoughts of God.^ The nightly 
 heaven of stars rays forth bright characters of the 
 divine name. The sun manifests and proclaims God's 
 glory. But although in Scripture God is compared 
 to the sun, and His spiritual operation to the light of 
 the sun, yet we read nowhere that God created the 
 sun in His image. Scripture declares " God created 
 man in His own image." It makes this statement 
 
 1 Prov. iii. 19 ; Fs. xcii. 5. 
 
36 
 
 PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 only oi man. llns is a matter of the deepest psy- 
 chological importance. For it follows, if man be 
 created in the image of God, that the imaLre of God 
 in man refers primarily to his invisible nature. God 
 being incorporeal and purely spiritual, the divine 
 hkeness in man is referred primarily to his spirit. 
 Ihe hkeness of God," says Sell, "is concentrated in 
 the spirit, as the deepest foundation of the human 
 lite, and is expanded in the soul and body into opera- 
 tions which exercise a transformincr power " 
 
 Image (Heb. l^elem) is the specific, as"opposed to 
 the architectural form of a thing ; that which inimmlly 
 n.akes a thing what it is, as opposed to that external 
 conhguration which it actually possesses.^ The word 
 thus applies to the spiritual nature of man. To use a 
 physical illustration, man is like God as a candle is 
 like the sun which kindles it from its own lio-ht 
 
 bn.i f ' n' ^I'^'^^^i' *¥*^ ™^" «^ay trace his origin 
 back to God and find in his own spiritual constitu 
 tion the attributes ot personality^ which are akin to 
 the attributes of personality revealed in the Deity 
 It would be right to say, however, with Delitzsch, that 
 personality IS only the basis of the substance o 
 the divine likeness, but it is not this likeness itself 
 Personality IS only the unity of consciousness which 
 comprehends the entire condition of the bein. in the 
 likeness of God, and which is appropriate to it! 
 
 ^ Tayhn- Lewis. 
 
psychological liasis of christian ethics. 87 
 
 The Tripartite Constitution of Man. 
 
 The mode of man's appearance on the stage of 
 existence corresponds to the personality of his nature, 
 as that of the brutes to the impersonality of theirs. 
 For while, in respect of his corporeity, man comes 
 into being like the brutes by means of a distribution 
 of existing materials,^ still in respect of his mterwd 
 nature, his origination is absolutely and wholly, not 
 by means of the distribution of the entire natural life 
 already existing, but by a direct act of (}od's breath- 
 in(»-. He comes forth in a twofold relation since the 
 divine tiat took the form of an utterance of God in 
 words of self-determination, by means of a directly 
 personal self-operation of God, by which on both, 
 sides of his natural condition, man is constituted () 
 priori into a moral relation of personal kinship with 
 God, and fellowship with God. 
 
 Thus man was created otherwise than the living 
 beings inferior to him. In Gon. ii. 7 we find the 
 foundation of all true anthropology and psychology. 
 1. The process of the creation of man began wnth 
 the constitution of the human body, as the regenera- 
 tion of man shall one day end with the re-constitution 
 of the body. God first formed the human ^ body, 
 which organically combined came into existence 
 prior to the soul. But an organism living in itself 
 it did not become till Jehovah-Elohim breathed into 
 it the breath of life. 2. We are not to infer that 
 God, externally to himself, created a br^iath and con- 
 veyed it into man. God breathes forth into the 
 bodily form; and he who breathes, breathes forth 
 from himself. Tht Creator creates out of himself 
 that which man was to have of spirit in common with 
 himself, comprises it into an individual life, and thus 
 
 1 " if man's body lias been evolved from some biimbler form, yet 
 a liijiher life was breathed into that fully developed form."— Bkkt. 
 
38 
 
 PSYCHOLOGICAL BASLS OK CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 creates the hunican spirit. The spirit of man is, there- 
 fore, an inspiration inniiediately passing over from 
 God tlie personal into the bodily form, and by tliat 
 very means constituting it a person. 3. As the breath 
 of life proceeding from CJod, or the spirit of life, is 
 now associated with the body, which is pervaded by 
 living powers as yet without unity, man becomes a 
 living soul, tliat is, a soul-enlivened nature. The 
 spirit in man is the source of life. The soul is also 
 living in itself but not by itself; it is that which 
 iives in a derived and conditioned manner The 
 created breath of life is the power of man's life 
 immediately constituted by God ; and the soul is the 
 lite which proceeds from this power of life and is 
 therefore life mediately constituted. The endowment 
 with soul appears as a result of the endowment 
 with spirit; and spirit and soul are therefore in 
 Scripture, actually distinguished. Revelation apiDro- 
 priates to the spirit and to the soul distinct functions 
 and often speaks of the two in juxtaposition. The 
 spirit IS superior to the soul. The soul is its product 
 Its manifestation; so that we may say that the soul of 
 man is a manifestation of a .^piritus vltae, peculiar to 
 him and breathed into him immediately from the 
 personal God.^ To speak as the biologist rather than 
 the psychologist, the spirit, surrounded by the soul 
 which originates from it, is enthroned within the 
 body : for the soul, as Tertullian says, is the body of 
 the spirit, and the flesh is the body of the soul We 
 may therefore see, shadowed forth from the Book of 
 Beginnings, trichotomy— a division into three parts as 
 to the nature of man ; not indeed three natures for 
 tne soul is of one nature with the spirit ; but three 
 essential elements, a threefold function. To this 
 reference will be made at greater length in a subse- 
 quent part of the discussion. 
 
 * Delitzsch. 
 
 t^ 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL 15ASTS OK CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 39 
 
 Man's Nature and CJcmVs Hevklation. 
 
 God, in whose spiritual image man was create cl as 
 we have seen, has made a Revelation of himself in lis 
 relation to man. That Revelation is accommodated to 
 man's nature. He has issued a moral law tor the 
 well-bein- of man. And the moral law as an exter- 
 nal injunction has its counterpart in the moral con.sti- 
 tutionof man. So that God is both the author ot 
 the moral law as an obligation, and the moral consti- 
 tution of man as the recipient of the law 1 he One 
 Great Mind gave to man both his personality and the 
 moral law for the regulation of the activity of that 
 personality. Consecjuently the nature of man and 
 the external moral law are adapted perfectly one to 
 the other, are intended primarily and always one tor 
 the other. The ethical requirements, therefore, ot the 
 Bible are not external enactments forced upon beings 
 unprepared and unconstituted for those requirements 
 Rather, moral law is but the expression of the moral 
 possibilities of the creatures to whom it is addressed. 
 It is idle for men to say, " I am not bound by the 
 moral law." As well might they say, "I am not 
 bound by the laws of my own being. For in the last 
 analysis these two are one and the same, /he len 
 Commandments would have had no force when hrst 
 delivered, notwithstanding all the pomp and majesty 
 which accompanied their proclamation.and would have 
 no force now, whoever might enjoin them, were it not 
 for the fact that the moral obligations they contain 
 were written on the "human heart" before they were 
 inscribed on tables of stone. The Decalogue was but 
 a reiteration of the moral law already in the nature 
 of man which responded to the external voice utter- 
 ino- its 'own message. And this message within, by 
 reason of the voice without, which it recognized, 
 became clearer, more distinct, more obligatory than it 
 
40 PSYCHOLOGICAL 13ASIS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 ever had been But while the voice without made 
 
 w1 Z' ^itfho. l""" T^^ orujmated the message 
 witn 1. Kather, the external presentation of the law 
 
 man, n.orally con.stitutecl, preceded 'the formal ter 
 ance^oi the moral law an,'l the obligator," dai:l*"f 
 
 and .„ the perfected life both are nude one Th.' 
 
 snW ual 71 t-T Tu'' "^P^-^''^ of °"« unfoldin" 
 sp ritual life which, although thns lo<ricaIlv .Pn, ° 
 
 Bciolne":" An 1 '" «'« -''y "f the pSarn-' 
 sciousneft,. And further, religion and ethics rennirs 
 a similar transcendental postulate. Ma rrSnl 
 consciousness, alike on its' moral and i , re^s 
 
 oiChTr ^"'^"^^«,^vi^ient where the origin and ?>a.i. 
 ot Christian morality are found. Its oric^in is God 
 
 There is then a psychological basis of nhil,i:„.. 
 eth,cs-a p,sychologicaf foundation rChn^tiy^S" 
 
I'SYCHOLOGICAL HASIS Of CHRISTIAN KTIIICS. 41 
 
 and all legitimate advances in the science ()t' psy- 
 chology — the investigation of the constitution an<l 
 laws "of the human mind -are but the discovery of 
 additional facts to show, not only the wonders of the 
 human mind, but the perfect adaptation of the <livin«i 
 law and the divine revelation to the constitution of 
 that mind : until we begin to see the force of Sir 
 William Hamilton's dictum : 
 
 " In the world there is nothing great but man ; 
 In man there is nothing great but mind." 
 
 The science of psychology and the revelation of the 
 moral law clasp hands as they did originally before 
 they emanated from the one Eternal Mind, whence 
 comes all truth — truth mathematical, truth philo- 
 sophical, truth theological. 
 
 " They are but broken lights of Thee, 
 And Thou, <) Lord, art more than tliey." 
 
 Christian Ethics Independent. 
 
 It must be maintained that the principles of Chris- 
 tian ethics are inseparably connected with, and exclu- 
 sively derived from, the revelation of Jesus Christ; 
 that is to say, the morals of Christianity are not the 
 conclusions ' of philosophical ethics, but are inde- 
 pendent of them, although it will be found that there 
 is a substantial agreement between the two — the 
 utterances of revealed truth on the one side, and the 
 utterances of the moral nature of man upon the other. 
 For, to quote Newman Smyth again, while Christian 
 ethics finds its immediate source and special .sphere in 
 the moral c )nsciousness of tliat humanity which is 
 created anew in Christ Jesus after the Spirit, it also 
 includes the facts of man's natural moral life, and 
 should not fall into contradiction with the reasonable 
 
42 
 
 PSYCllOLOQICAL lU.SIS Of CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 conclusions of iiliilosophical fitlnVe i,' ^u 
 
 "n-1 the on,l o ^raeo , L 1^'' ""'' *'"" '"•^•''«°". 
 
 perfect i,Te,t is t ,e natu>, nf , ""'" ?'"^™<:ter in its 
 tl.ro„gh the in Iweilt^o"/ r.CSf 1'/ ??'«'-'' 
 claims power to conserve nn.l tn i > /^'',7»'""'>ty 
 ?oo.l in tl,e KingJon, of Hoav«n ""j^f'^^f ""f™! 
 '"story of nmn an<l the si f 1 j ,■"" "'" "itural 
 
 I'thics will be t ssn„ • '=°"<='™!»n>' of seientiKe 
 
 Cliristian .no.alit TheZlT, fl!'^ ''"''*'"'''^' «f 
 ju Jjjes the former ' "^' ^""^ Pfesupposes and 
 
 re,^^nTArtafphil'o1onifJr l"""' '"''li^'i™ forbi,! „s to 
 
 CInistian Ethics tT„ra\t'n?rVf''""",°',"''''^'' 
 ;» supreme, the etln'cs i^hlhTow, fromTt*^ t?? 
 
 l>».na., ethical concl^ln 'I ! t^;t^ ^^ ™«-ly 
 
 i^ bere ;,a;d d as the mor" ,'""'"' 'P'"^'^ '^ 
 truest life of ma,^ com to se'l""" "•'' '''S'"^-^' ''"'' 
 tl'orefore, he can be Tul dL no mT^'H ™''''- T^' 
 IS to receive its fina fnrm U ?^"^ ."™«'^' ethics 
 
 tbe moral consc ousnes of the sn T'^1'^ •"'"'<^"'-' '" 
 is no further appeal fr,l ?L ' '?'"'"«' •«»"• There 
 
 ■"inrl of huma'n'^ ;' 'Te tse"rtTh™' t ""^ '^P'"'"^' 
 of Christian etln'cs above ^11.1 "' """ ^P^emacy 
 surely is only a meet t ibu e 1 % '^''^'"''' ""^ this 
 the Gospel of Chdst uh LbV' '°, ""-' P'-''-'^'"i''enee of 
 
 purely scientific eearcl. that f'T^ """"'"S *''-°'» 
 .-,atleas,indepe^]eti?otaltatriy7hVoSh'': 
 Bible Psychology 
 
 heM apir' "J^Jhiif^ftCt'"" ^'M'y -■'''ed to be 
 eions is -impossibiLt;:l°rciffiSir;S 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL 15ASIS OF CHIIISTIAN KTHICS. 4:3 
 
 from its foundation in the human mind is arbitrary 
 and meanini^les.s. There is no moral treatise which is 
 not permeated through and through l)y the psyeliol()<;y 
 which the writer consciously or unc(msciously lias 
 adopted and holds. And the lUble, when dt'alinj,' 
 with morality, and it ndght be said in general, has 
 also its psycholoj^y sometimes expressed, sometimes 
 understood, but always present. And this is just 
 what might be expected from the foregoing conclu- 
 sions. We must then endeavor to discover further 
 what this psychology of the Bible is, and iiow it forms 
 the foundation of the Christian system of morality. 
 Attempts of this kind are not confined to modern 
 times. Biblical psychology is one of the oldest sciences 
 of the Church. From the period of Melito of Sardis, 
 as early as the second century, followed by Tertudian, 
 in the beginning of the third, on through the Middle 
 Ages and the Reformation to the time of Bengel, the 
 father of Biblical criticism, on to the days of Schubert 
 and Goschel and Delitzsch in the latter half of the 
 nineteenth, the science has engaged the attention of 
 the most profound theologians. It would be a matter 
 for surprise if such a science had not appeared ; for 
 it is the outcome of a desire to bring out the views of 
 Scripture on the nature, the life, and the life-destinies 
 of man, as they are defined with a view to the history 
 of salvation, and to reduce them to systematic har- 
 mony. So that Biblical psychology may be detined 
 to be a scientific presentation of the doctrine of Scrip- 
 ture on the psychical constitution of man as it was 
 created, and the ways in which this constitution has 
 been affected by sin and redemption through the new 
 relations of God to humanity in Christ. 
 
 The Method. 
 
 Our method will consist of the examination of 
 psychological terms used in the Sciiptures and the 
 
44 
 
 PSYCHOLOGICAL lUSIS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 determination of the lueaninnr of these terms. Then 
 the consideration of the jrivai underlyincr truths of 
 Revehition whicli may be said to be at The basis of 
 Christian morality— the Fall, the Redemption, the 
 Jutiire. Further, the discovery of the relation of 
 these great doctrines to nian psychologically con- 
 sidered, and finally, how there issues on this psy- 
 chological foundation the solid structure of Christian 
 -bthics. 
 
 Dichotomy oh Tjiichotomv. 
 
 We find in the Nev Testament the terms, Trvetnux 
 fvv,, o-o.;/..,— spirit, soul, body. J)o these terms 
 indicate dichotomy or trichotomy ? That is do they 
 imply a division into two parts, or a division into 
 three parts, as to the nature of man ? We have 
 already determined our view as to the ineanino- of 
 (jrenesis ii. 7, the conclusion being that this passa<>-e 
 mdicates a system of psychology, and implies the 
 trichotomy of spirit, soul and body. It lays down 
 the two natures of man, the animal and the spiritual 
 and then (iescribes the soul (Heb. Nephesh); as the 
 union point between the two. Man became "a living 
 soul in the sense that his nephesh or soul is the 
 terhumquid of the two natures, body and spirit 
 Ihe trichotomy which we adopt from this Scripture 
 does not mean three natures in man, but three life- 
 elements— a threefold function in man. And this 
 conclusion, reached from the consideration of the 
 indications of psychology in the Old Testament, we 
 carry over to the New Testament and find the same 
 to hold good. nv£v,.ia, while it does become ilnjxu in 
 man, nevertheless remains Ttvev^ia in nature and pos- 
 sibilities Dr. Arnold has well expressed the nature of 
 man as three aspects of the one individual man. The 
 tollowing extract from one of his sermons will illus- 
 trate this: "When the threefold division of our 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OF CUIUSTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 45 
 
 nature is mentioned, the term hodi, expresses those 
 appetites which we have in common with the brutes 
 the term ,^onl denotes out uioral and intellectual 
 faculties directed only towards objects of tlie worM, 
 and not exalted l.y the hope ot immortality ; and the 
 Lrm spirit takes these same faculties when direc ed 
 towards (lod and heavenly tinners and from the 
 purity, the greatness, ami the pertect goodness ot 
 ?Iim whoislheir object, transformed in o Uio sanu 
 imacTc from glory to glory, even as by the Spu it ot 
 the Lord " ''^hese words would imply that the inner 
 and immortal man is considered in two relations, like 
 the face of Janus looking two ways The inner man 
 n (lod ward relation, in its view ot heavenly things, 
 is nyevHc^i and in earthward relation, in its connec- 
 tion with the world of sense, is fPAV- 
 
 We must ever remember, however, that in a mixed 
 nature like ours, while the lower may act without the 
 higher, the higher requires the co-operation ot the 
 Tower the body may I e called, for the sake ot con- 
 veTi ence, the vehicle of the soul, the soul the vehicle 
 of the spirit. Thus, as the soul or intel ectual part 
 (speaking generally) cannot work without some 
 activity of the brain, so the spirit or devotional 
 Tart equires the service and help of the intellect 
 Mystics who dream of a state of ecstasy in which the 
 spirit sees God by its own light, apai-t from the intel- 
 Let seem to transcend the laws ot human nature. 
 A there is no act of pure intellect without the co- 
 operation of the brain, so the spirit does not appea 
 to be able to act in the state without the reason. It 
 is a ronsortiiim, or rather a connubiiom, ot two 
 
 ^"T^tdu^e!^^^^^^^ on this point, that a fair inter- 
 pretation of Scripture lai^guage will warrant us in 
 accepting dichotomy of nature and trichotomy ot 
 ?uXn ; and three distinguishing terms will be 
 
40 I'SYCIIOI-OCilOAL BASIS OF (UltlSTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 required to express this— tt ye v/ia (spirit), f/vx'} (soul), 
 (Tcdf((K (body). Heard, from wliom we have (luoted' 
 above, calls the body sense-consciousness, the soul 
 self-consciousness, tlie spirit (lod-consciousness— an 
 apt teriuinolooy which, properly considered, will 
 throw additional li<,dit on the conclusion just reached. 
 We do not confound body and soul, so we must not 
 confound ,soul and spirit, as if there were no tlistine- 
 tion, because their union is essential to life. Yet the 
 union constitutes one persoi\ 
 
 New Testament Psy(hol()(jical Terms. 
 
 Scripture considers man not merely under the point 
 of view of redemption, Ijut also under that of creation 
 And thus we tind the doctrines of salvation inter- 
 woven with expressions relatino- to the natural con- 
 dition of human existence, and materials for knowledc^e 
 m reference to the inner constitution of man. This 
 psychology of Scripture, which, as we have seen, is 
 distinct from philosophical psychology, and yet not 
 inconsistent with its conclusions, may be traced by an 
 examination of the psychological terms used in Scrip- 
 ture thought and language. We lind the terms aai/m 
 (body), and //jrj-// (soul) clearly distinguished • " Fear 
 not them that kill the body (aod^ia), but are not able 
 to kill the soul ('/^x^^), but rather fear him which is 
 able to destroy both body and soul in hell." (Matt. 
 X. 28.) Body and soul are not here represented as one 
 but as two elements in the nature of man. Scrip- 
 tures of similar import may be found in 2 Peter i 14 
 and 2 Cor. v. 1 
 
 Paul distinguishes clearly the three essential ele- 
 ments of man, to every one of which the work of 
 sanctifying grace extends. " I pray God your whole 
 spirit, and soul, and body may be preserved blameless 
 unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ," (1 Thess 
 
PSY(;UOI,(JOICAL basis of CHUISTIAN KTIIICS. 4-7 
 
 V 23) Paul luul prayed that tlie very (lo.l of poaco 
 should sanctify tbem wholly, oAorfAf />. This won), 
 which occurs nowhere else in the New 'restanient. is 
 clearly contrasted wi^i the followin*,', nAo;rA///>nr, and 
 the contrast is that between tofus and nihujer. In 
 the one case the apostle prays that tlieir salvation 
 may be complete as a wholr (totus); and in the other 
 case that their salvation may he entire (inte<,'er) in 
 every part. The apostle strikin<,dy analyzes the 
 human condition into Ttyer^i^^t, '/"A'/, ti^l o^)//o' ,• he 
 moreover re<;ardH every o.ie of these three elements 
 as beincr in itself airain many-sided, inasmuch as lie 
 refers the expression oAo«A;//Jor to every one ot them 
 The TfAr).- in the first compound sumrests the end 
 which is our whole sancttfication ; the J(\t/f)<>^, ot the 
 second suggests the means, that we may be sancti- 
 fied in every part. Sanctitication thus rests on these 
 two conditions, that the Holy Spirit shall possess 
 each of the three parts of our nature, and possess 
 
 them entirely.' , , , .1 .n 
 
 This Scripture teaches, in the hrst placr, that there 
 are three ^^arts in man, and not two only, and th»it 
 these parts are distinguished one from the other. It 
 also confirms a truth, which will appear m a subse- 
 quent part of the treatise, that the indwelling ot the 
 Holy Spirit is not confined to the human spirit alone, 
 but extended as well to the soul and body. Ihe 
 outer courts of the Jewish temple were holy as well 
 as the priests' court, and the innermost court ot all in 
 which the Shekinah immediately dwelt. So it is 
 with the body and soul. If sanctification is entire it 
 must enter everywhere. It must sanctify nian as a 
 whole by wholly occupying every part. The Divine 
 Spirit enters and dwells in the spirit ot man ; trom 
 thence he gets the mastery over the thoughts ot the 
 
 1 Heard : "Tripartite Natvire of Man." 
 
48 PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 mind, and then over the desires of the flesh. When 
 this begins sanctifieation is begun ; when this is com- 
 plete sanctification is entire. But of this more sub- 
 sequently. 
 
 Activity of the Ego. 
 
 We shall again return to a further consideration of 
 the psychological terms in Scripture and their bearing 
 on our problem. In the meantime we will present 
 the phenomena of the Ego, the spiritual agent acting 
 through spirit, soul, and body, the three elements of 
 his nature. This classification of the phenomena of 
 lite will be wider than that of mental phenomena 
 merely, inasmuch as it includes the latter and much 
 more. The ancient division of Aristotlo into Thoucrht 
 ( yovs), and Desire (6fj€^is), surviving in the classifi- 
 cation of Read into Intellectual Powers and Active 
 Powers, will not answer our present purpose,as we must 
 take into account the activity of the spirit as affected 
 by divine revelation. For the same reason the tripartite 
 • division introduced by German psychologists, and 
 made prominent by Kant, resting on the essential and 
 radical dissimilarity of the three orders of mental 
 phenomena, Knowing, Feeling, Willing, is scarcely 
 adequate. We prefer to use, for completeness of 
 treatment, the classification which regards the E^^o as 
 threefold in its manifestation, Apprehending, Regu- 
 lating and Acting, each manifestation representing 
 certain activities of the elements of personality, spirit 
 soul and body—a classification indicated by Delitzsch 
 in the words : " The essential condition of man sub- 
 sists in three concentric circles. The innermost was 
 his spirit; the inner, his soul; and the external, his 
 body. With his spirit man lived and moved in the 
 love of God. 1 While spiritual and mental activity is 
 
 ^ Delitzsch, "Biblical Psychology," p. 147, 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL HASIS OF CHRISTLVN ETHICS. 
 
 40 
 
 very imperfectly represented in the form ot a geo- 
 metrical figure, yet it will make our meanin- clear to 
 resort to this method. Thus the ticrure given helow 
 will represent the foregoing classification, which wc 
 here present for psychological purposes.! 
 
 1 In regard to the 6ci}.ia (body) it will be observed 
 that the scheme represents a threefold activity— 
 
 T ^GULAXmO 
 
 Apprehending, Rcgidating and Acting The appve^ 
 hending life is in the senses. The body apprehends 
 (used in a limited sense) by means of stimuli which 
 are followed by sensations. The regidating lite is in 
 the nerves and nerve-centres. For, as Bain says, 
 nerves exist for two distinct ends, viz., for causing 
 
 1 Adapted with some suggestions from an admirably ;;;;;';;• '^•^icle 
 on "Anthropology underlying Redemption, l.y Dr. ( ouitice. 
 
 4 
 

 50 PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OF CHRLSTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 action and for causing feeling. For action, the inHu- 
 enee must proceed outwards from the cent.-s to the 
 active organs For feeling, the influence must pro- 
 ceed inwards from the sensitive surface to the centre 
 Hence there is the double provision, the one for appre- 
 ^67l6^^7^y/ the other for regtdating. The actim/vxU 
 ot the body IS m a mechanical combination of 
 muscles, bones, joints and vital organs. The veqidat- 
 mg nerves and nerve centres control this livino- 
 machinery, and action becomes possible 
 
 ih.^'^A *^-'^ ^T^!l *^^^ inference readily comes that 
 the body IS not the corpse ; it is the living body, 
 tion ^t7 7t possessing life, capacity and func- 
 therefore thine eye be single thy whole body shall be 
 
 hi f\^ ^f?'"-^' ^!'^'' '''' 22-) A body with 
 light must be a living body; and a body capable of 
 appreciating darkness cannot be dead. 
 
 2. ff'vxf/ (soul) is now to be considered. It is a 
 
 ^ephesh (Heb. soul) is used in the Old Testament to 
 distinguish the animal from the intellectual. It is a 
 general term denoting life. Everything living has a 
 soul ; whether It has conscious personality or not, it has 
 a soul in so far as it is an individual This lower 
 
 -?X"5 ""l^l'^'^t^PP'^'^ also in the New Testament. 
 
 lake no thought for your life OhvYn) what ve shall 
 eat or what ye shall drink." (Jasus^MaU vi.^25 ) 
 
 In the higher meaning, y-r,^,; designates the inner 
 the immaterial rational self, the individual life of 
 man, and as such, the object of the saving facts of 
 redemption. "Fear not them which kill the body 
 
 X 2sT Th ' r- ^ll^\' T^ ^'''''^''') • • • " (Matt. 
 X. 280 The soul in this higher sense has a threefold 
 
 inanifes ation of its life, AppvehemUng, Recmlatinn 
 
 Acting (see figure), in the forms oi petptl^ 21 
 
 ment and emotion. Perception is an apprehending 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL lUSIS OF ClIllISTIAN ETHICS. 51 
 
 nowei- hi"lier than sensation ; ju.ljrnient is a reiiulat- 
 Im power hi-^er than automatic nerve control; 
 :^tL is an 2ctiny ^pK^wer higher than -PP;; ^t.^-;;* 
 instincts. Thus V''M'V i« ^^^^^^\^r m na ure ^d iun - 
 tion than o-al/m-. The ./'»M''/ i« ;l^'h"«'^ ^0' « )«ne t he 
 the sum-total of man s natnral powers ; the hje as 
 born into the world, and all that it contains, or can 
 
 ^'tVysv^u. (spirit) designates the im.nortal man in 
 its direct relation and possible communion with (,od. 
 Tt iTthus a hi-her form of life than V'M''/- l'\>^^« 
 New Testn,«-Mio, where the testimonies and operations 
 of God V . are a<ldres«ed to our seU-consciousness 
 are spok... wi, we nowhere find //<nj'/ named, (l/or. 
 H m God manifests himself, rc^ rryu^^ian muo. 
 (Kom: viii,16) and we become renewed ^;.--/-- 
 
 i;::rr::^^niSthlch^torLtheinlerco^ 
 the personarman with God, and has in view l e 
 entir^e condition of man's nature. The object ot ^he 
 savincr facts of redemption is called >tvX'h tor this 
 term "indicates the individual life ot man; bu e 
 object of the internal operations of grace, completing 
 Temselves in the H^ht of the selt-consci.usncss am^ 
 the self-determination, is called ^\''^J'^'\,^'\}'\^ 
 realm of the Ttvev^a also is found the threelold 
 
 Ac Una Apprehension is seen in Intuition , Hegula 
 UoiTseenTn Conscience; and Action is seen in he 
 Will And each of these manifestations is higher than 
 the corresponding manifestation in the realm ot the 
 
 ''^'t hSr^'vi^ that the object of the internal 
 operations of grace is rr.^viu.. It is the intiuUon 
 tha glps th^e revelation of God as truth; the .0..- 
 ^Je that receives the revelation as duty ; and the 
 u'ilaiiat puts into execution the truth that has been 
 translated into duty. 
 
 Pi 
 
 *! 
 
 V 
 
52 
 
 I'SVCilOLOUICAL BASIS OF OHRISTUN ETHICS. 
 
 forme l' W» ^ w I? "."!' '" ,''^'''"' ""^«« "■"" «<^-' 
 aZtroihl ' n"f , ^r"^'-''«k forth in that famous 
 
 wondrous thouj^ht, that workest noitlier l.y f„nj 
 msmua ,o„, Mattery, nor by any threat, bu ^merely 
 
 eLnnTi:?^ "T,"f<''' ■''^ i" tl^« soul, andl^ 
 extortino tor thyself always reverence if not n.Kv„v. 
 
 etrrcTeUv th " "I'T "k^'"''"'^ ^roC.^lZ 
 e\ei secretly .they rebel,— whence thy orio-i„al ? An.] 
 where hnd we the root of thy august d^escent thu 
 
 to be in hke manner descended from which root i. 
 the unchanging condition of that worth whicirman 
 kind can alone impart to themselves?"! UtZ 'A^" 
 philasopher fail to answer, whence thy or' inal^tt: 
 humble Christian can reply-God, /Z.L^L^ (""l^. ^^' 
 
 The Pvschological Basis Appears. 
 
 nf pf" •'.•^''"' T^ ^^-^" *^ «^^ ^''ic pyscholocrieal basis 
 of Christian ethics in the realm of the ttk.", !,? _fche 
 Intmtion grasps God as truth to be appended 
 
 and the Will puts into execution the truth thus 
 
 tZ Ttf''^'':^ '''" ^"^^^^^'^ '-'- .norri obir- 
 
 ^" ^ X ^^, '"' *^'^ revelation of God is both truth 
 and duty both doctrine and ethics-doctrine to be 
 
 L'Xt'anI '"' Y''^''' ' ^^^^^'^ ^« be concTiv^i o 
 as duty, and ca-ried over into conduct. 
 
 cluirons wlT;""' '^'f r''''^ '" '""'y ^'^^^^ ^^^^ con- 
 clusions we have reached as presented in the foreo-oincr 
 
 paragraphs, and indicated in the figure • '''''^-^'"^ 
 ihJht"^"' ^'^'''^^ "'^'^-^ *^^ '^^^"^« potentiality in 
 
 1 Kant, "Metaphysics of Ktliics." 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL lUSIS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 5n 
 
 ,H>X'I («oiil) marks the liuman in<livulu.ility m the 
 person as related to tlie earthly sphere, and the frjV 
 elements are Perception, .Judi^ment, Kmotion 
 ■ Ga>ucx (body) marks the livin^r human tabernacle, 
 and the ac^^ia elements are senses, nerves, muscles, 
 bones, and vital organs. • u «^« 
 
 The psychological basis of ethics is seen in the con- 
 stitution of man, as thus presented, to receive spirit- 
 ual life and truth, to apprehend it as duty, am to 
 cause it to appear in a practical form in the conduct 
 of human life. " The life of the spirit attaining > 
 constantly increasing intensity, is to make the so 1, 
 and bv its means the body, the retlections ot itselt , 
 so-that the twofold life of man, as it nas tne sou. .w. 
 its connecting link, so in an ethical and spontaneous 
 way might receive the spirit as its all-determinmg 
 and all-pervading principle." 
 
 Man One Personality. 
 
 But let us emphasize that, although we have been 
 showing the constituents of man's composite nature, 
 .yeUhere is one personality beldnd all. We may dis- 
 tinguish in idea between tbe body, tbe soul an the 
 spirit- but to suppose that any can act without the 
 other or to suppose, for instance, that the unsou ed 
 body or Uie disembodied soul, or the pure unsouled 
 .spirit can act by itself, is to assume ^o.nething which 
 neither reason nor revelation warrants. We can 
 l^deally divide body, soul, and spirit f-m each othei^, 
 and set them apart, as we do the cornea, lens and 
 lachrymal humor of the eye, tor separate consideration^ 
 But the oidy trichotomy which will stand the test ot 
 modern psychology is this : that the bodily organism 
 rlnteUectual faculties, and that higher spiritual 
 consciousness by which we know and serve (.od, are 
 not separable natures, but separate manifestations ii^ 
 
 ^1 
 
54 PSYCHOLOGICAL HASIS OF CHRfSTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 the one nature. . The Ectq, the personality, may be 
 aaid to have three forms of consciousnes.s— sense- 
 cciseiousness, self-consciousness and God-conscious^ 
 ness. Yet man has not three lives, but 07ie life • he 
 IS not three persons, but erne person. The personality 
 ot nian is r^ne, whether that personality acts throucrh 
 the body, the soul or the spirit, or throu.rh any or t\\ 
 ot them. "^ 
 
 A similar oneness is ^iven to the Ego by Green in 
 his "Prolegomena to Ethics": "The will is simply 
 the man. Any act of will is the expression of the 
 man as he at the time is. The motive issuing in his 
 act, the object of his will, the idea which for the time 
 he sets hin.self to realize, are but the same th'ingln 
 different wordj.. Each is the reflex of what for the 
 time, as at once feeling, desiring and thinkino the 
 man is. In willing he carries with him, so to .speak 
 his whole self to the realization of the given idea." 
 
 Spiritual Man, Carnal Man, What? 
 
 God is spirit; but man is spirit, and soul, and body 
 W e have to penetrate through the two outer courts 
 and to enter into the shrine of man's being before we 
 come to that which is the proper and priniliry habita- 
 tion of the Spirit of God in man. Man becomes 
 o7riev!uaTiKoz~hQ that is spiritual, only through 
 his spirit being inhabited by the Divine Spirit. And 
 when this has taken place, the regenerate man 
 >^^omeB 7trev^aTiH6^ av6pco7to?, the spiritual man. 
 ^Ihis saving, spiritual communication by the TJyevua 
 Ayioif (the Holy Spirit), cannot be received by the 
 fvxy^ (soul), primarily and alone. llvevj^ia C-Jeov 
 (fepirit of God) communicates primarily with to- 
 nvevf^ux tov arHpc^Trov (the spirit of man). Paul 
 makes this clear in his letter to the Corinthians 
 (1 Cor. 11. 14, 15): "The natural man (if^vxixos 
 
PBYCHOLOUIOAL lUSlS OF CHUISTIAN F/rUK'S. 
 
 55 
 
 e ; he 
 
 things of the SFr.t . t UoA^v.iUn^ ^^^^__^_^^^ 
 by the »l).nt ot "'^"....['''^'^le of receiving and 
 ition. Oon.c.ence and ^ 1 *;«, ^ucation. But the 
 ?,^F™^^:Sst;:d''%'. element, are not eapaUe, 
 prarilTand directly, of tins tanct.on. 
 
 PsvcHOLoaicAL Kkkects of Sin. 
 
 ,.i,i„,i tv,o ,.»vi.hnloffical constitution 
 Having tnus uuiom... "- ■'■^crintures, and l.avmg 
 of man as revealed in *<>, .^"^ 'P'"uieh the divine 
 :hown the W«. operand^ by wLch^t^ 
 
 revelation is l^'"'''""^ ^^^ZeiW^- facts of Revela- 
 to study the three great °nd«"yjj t„ i„ajeate their 
 
 tion (or at east, t''" °« .*;7' tC and of Christian 
 essential relation to Ch™Uan ei ^^^^ ^^^^^^ 
 
 ethics tothem-the l»;l',the K«d« P ^^^^ p^„ 
 
 The question presents »w« *'J" psychologically 
 Sin done in this h^grge' t DeUi-cl the fnswer 
 considered? I"*''V*"|"st created man, spirit and 
 is well given. 1" *"J^4VL means of the soul to 
 body were first oi all ""fi'-^y x ^ whose own dec- 
 a self-living nature ('^.^«l.r;«)j»° I itself to be 
 sion it was left ^hether it w^W a ^^^^^^^j^^ 
 
 aetermined according to Gods mind, ^^_^^^ ,j,^^ 
 
 conclude against God in ^ts OF ,^^ ^^ ^ 
 
 soul was <;"'. 0' ^ ;( "^'a/to become the personal 
 nature ; but the jm( wa ^ ^^^^ ^^^^ personifying 
 
 power, i.e., the "^''J'B. " ^y Man was created 
 power, of the entire P^^*'""^'^^^;^,, t^e destination 
 
 ?5e'.^:ing fp'tf GoTleft^othing wanting to man 
 
56 
 
 rSYCHOLOO'OAL lUSlS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 which could make him capable of glorification • bnf 
 
 o mai"r„in r"^\"^t«J^"n«elf. The destination 
 tin \r^ i' intended was a spiritual destina- 
 
 God^P fl^'l-'^^' ^^ ^' '"^^^ ^y <^he Spirit of 
 God Lut this object was frustrated; Suspicion of 
 
 Ihe spirit oi man, instead of proving? itself 
 ^r^w^owvr ,..e., an alLpervading power of life in 
 
 rerrfenT^l energy /^and with' ever-extendin" 
 result fell under the bondacre of the lower nature 
 in- such a way that, altho.rrrb ff. nJZZ!lu\f'^ 
 
 ouenr. T.'^^""^'^ '^^^^^' its"God:;es;;bH;g'E ;^' 
 
 Ood «f " . ^^ 'P\"^- I^^Parture from the love of 
 tion ot a selhshly-appointed end, rather than of the 
 
 the pHmal^L'P?t'"'' "^^ '""^ ^«-^-" "'^^-e o 
 bflife dl. '^ • ^^"'"^"^^y- The ^rsvMa failed to 
 thii t"n T'""'"^ according to its destination. In 
 W •fTl.*^^^^^'^>"^ i« dead. The ;r^.^.," had 
 
 ^ •?/,', ^""^ *^'® ^^>"^^ against the 0^'// When tC 
 
 ruled Tl,!i rP'"?- •^"""•"hy instead of order 
 of fLJ^ «« f (««» m man failed to hold the truth 
 tru^h Wn 7; """ rr*^"^" ^■''"^d t» i-t'^rpret T 
 fin, I ,11^- """^ ""^ *"*« ^"l«'l the mail out of 
 'ewilf thU '".'."f^^ <'^«"<"' *" ^ aprodoc o 
 fhc^Ai h !! ' ■>"" °°' °f C!od and again.t God 
 ththih' '^ "'""" "°«' determine themselves 
 
 .^ tead „7 . ""'' -"'^'"^ '"''^"'^'^•^ 'o '^°- Thus man 
 Z!!? ) ■^oco'B'ng 'r''ff/'«r<«o; (spiritual) ,;' 
 directed on all sides by the snirit thnt li„„ V 
 
 inovpii in tho n„,i u •' . ^pirii mat lives and 
 rnsv^hi^ 'he God who was it source, became d-vy,H6s 
 (psychic, natural), and d «p»«o.- (fleshly, carnd)! 
 
m 
 
 PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 57 
 
 The result is the (f(^9^< 
 
 carnal iniiul 
 
 iuo> (iii'fipMrroT', 
 
 >^, the carnal 
 
 man, havinc; the 
 
 \ which I'aul describes 
 
 in 
 
 Rom. viii. 7 : " The min 
 
 tl of the tlesh is enmity 
 
 !:!,ah"s God foVit not sul.ject to the law of Uod 
 'S^ h.deed is it able to be, and «»■.;, t^-'--'" '- 
 Hesh are notable to please God. (.iven tins one 
 let that man was intended to become spir.tua and 
 has Med of this en<l, all that eomes under the head 
 ot' •• orisinal sin " is not dilKeuU of explanation. 
 
 <r«p,a«o,- liydftamosCrHE Caunal Man). 
 
 ™ .„,!„! fl,>..li in itself can neither experience, 
 
 nor iiUXeVnor desire. All these things, a though 
 efeted by means of the body, are yet nnposs.ble acts 
 without a psychical background. This meaning ot 
 ^^L- (tlesh) therefore, without any moral force 
 rot ^be_ it^s --in, - the expression ^...«oj 
 
 :;r;;r.r,/.^: Vr of .. ^^^;-^ 
 
 tTeTd^a of ^«,/cannot be satisfied with he mean 
 inc- of the tangible flesh. 2a /jg is the entire nature 
 „"Cn sinful and subject to death, so called because 
 
 he has fallen absolutely into the PO^ thecal e 
 potentialities of his nature. Hence the ethical re 
 suits as dascribed by Paul in his letter to the Gala- 
 trans "Now the lorks of the fle.sh are manifest, 
 wh"ch are these, fornication, uncleanness, lasc.vious- 
 Tss idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousies, 
 Taihs, factio'^Is, divisions,heresies, envy ings drunken^ 
 
 ness revellings, and such like." C^^]- \^l-^}> ■ " 
 wlube noticed that these works of the flesh (<r«pg) 
 Tre of various kinds, some mental, some religious, 
 
 ■ Revised Version «nd Young's Translation. 
 
68 PSYCHOLOGICAL HASLS OF CHRLSTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 some social, some sensual. For the reason, then, that 
 the Eoo of man, as he is from birth, hcis fallen under 
 the superior authority of the Hosh {Gap^,), the natural 
 man is called aixpnuu)^ (Heshly). And of the Hesh in 
 this ethical sense, Paul says: '' t) aapt', iTtL^vf^n-i 
 KiXTiic rov 7ry£i>i.u\iTo>" the Hesh lustoth against the 
 spirit. (Gal. v. 17.) It is right, therefore, to say that 
 (JivIM^ (flesh) is not an entity or essence in the liuman 
 nature to be eradicated, but a condition of the whole 
 human nature to be changed. And this condition 
 can only be remedied by regeneration. Man has 
 fallen. His TrvEvf^ux (spiri't) is dead in the sense of 
 being life-determininnr. His if-vxt'l (sou!) and Gcdf.ia 
 
 (body) have fallen away from the Trrsv/^ta and became 
 GapHiHo? f fleshly). This carnal condition of man 
 constitutes human depravity.^ 
 
 Thus we reach the conclusion already attained, but. 
 by a different path. We see in what sense the human 
 spirit is dead. Yet, although dead as just explained, 
 it has not lost all fear of God, all sense of dependence 
 upon Him, or all sense that His law is the supreme 
 standard of right. Tliere are remains, so to speak, of 
 the nyev^a in fallen man, and this we identify with 
 conscience. Conscience or the dormant Trvevj^ta still 
 witnesses for God. To this Christ appealed ;- to this 
 spiritual truth appeals. But the government is not 
 in its hands. It has the authority but not the power 
 to enforce its authority. So the character is formed 
 with the fleshly {(TapHiHos) tendency which nothing 
 will ever afterwards break down ; till God's convert" 
 ing grace stirs our stagnant being to the depths, and 
 
 ^ But, as miglit be inferred from our argument, deeper than the 
 depraritji of man is the divinity of man. 
 
 2 Every discour.se that he uttered proved that, even more than 
 the prophet.s of old time, tiie Son of (Jod and Son of man achhessed 
 liimself to the conscience, and l<ne\v that His words would find an 
 echo there.— Davison, "The Christian Conscience. 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OF CIIUISTIAN ETHICS. 50 
 
 beginnini;- with awakoiiin*,' tlie nyev^^ia, makes all 
 things new. 
 
 Recapitulation at this point will tend to clear- 
 ness. Sin is psychological in its radical nature — it 
 is in the rryet'ita, and therefore spiritual ; it is the 
 failure of the Ttrfv/^ia to be life-detennining ; it is 
 death to the Ttrev^ttv, because it is out of proper and 
 designed relation with God, the source of its life. The 
 effect was not only o psychologieal but an ethical 
 disorder. Without the control of the living Tn'n'yKv, 
 human nature deteriorates tlirough lawless life in a 
 depraved and inf(»rior moral condition. It is the 
 depraved condition that renders Redemption neces- 
 sary ; and it is the lawless life that renders ethics 
 necessary. The recovery from this chaotic condition 
 is the restoration of order through the ascendency of 
 the new spirit of life, a new relation to God, which 
 regulates without violating the laws of human nature. 
 Indeed, Christianity lays the foundation of its ithics 
 amidst the ruins of our fallen dignity, raising a 
 superstructure, which is at once a new creation and a 
 reconstruction, building its new temple out of the 
 fragments of the old, but "upon the foundation of 
 the"apostles and prophets, Jesus Chrif^t h^nself being 
 the chief corner-stone. In whom all the bcMlding fitly 
 framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the 
 Lord : In whom ye also are builded together for an 
 habitation of God through the Spirit." 
 
 Psychological Results of Redemi'tiox. 
 
 Having viewed the Fall, or Sin, psychologically 
 and in its relation to ethics, we shall now consider 
 Redemption, the second great biblical doctrine per- 
 taining to the subject in hand, in a .similar way, that 
 is, psychologically and ethically. What has Red<Mup- 
 tion to do in the human constitution thus disturbed 
 
 „ ! 
 
60 
 
 PSYCHOLOOICAL RASIS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 by sin ^ Speakinnr nrenerally, Hodeinption in Christ 
 Jesus throuj^h tlio Holy Spirit is the divine remedy 
 for sin, and it is a complete remedy, both in the 
 e>^trangement of man from God and all its conse- 
 (juences — spiritual and ethical. 
 
 The Fountain of Ethical Life. 
 
 Sin be^an in the ny£vf«v; restoration from sin 
 also begins in the 7r/'£i}//ri'. The TTi-fvi^u^ oi iDan is 
 acted upon by the divine Tryevj^ta and quickened 
 ("born from above"— John iii. 3; Eph. ii. 5). The 
 "new birth " is therefore the reviving of the rn'tv^ia 
 by the divine 7tyevi.uv,i\\Q Lord and Giver of Life. 
 The (juickened Ego now bears in himself a funda- 
 mentally new life, and he now determines himself by 
 this new life-principle. He has received the Spirit 
 of Christ, the God-resembling life-principle which is 
 exalted above sin and death, in which he dwells -^nr] 
 takes root, as the power by which he is impelled and 
 empowered to rule over sin and to act in a way that 
 shall be pleasing to God. It means an opened 
 intuition of God, a (quickened conscience, and a 
 surrendered will. This is Regeneration, and plainly, 
 is psychological rather than ethical, and constitutes 
 the ground of the subsecjuent ethical life. 
 
 Regeneration is described in various ways^ in 
 Scripture, presenting in various forms the wonders 
 of the work, its radical character, and its future 
 ethical possibilities. 
 
 The spiritual birth is tlue leading term, (a) 
 The regenerate are born of God, ehtov deov ; they 
 are horn again or from above, avoo Sev ^ they 
 are children of God, Ttuva Oecw. These expres- 
 sions indicate the bestowment of a n^w life ac- 
 cording to the original idea of man in the divine 
 
 1 Pope, " Christian Theology." 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OK CHIUSTIAN ETHICS. 01 
 
 min<l. (h) It is a rt'surrrctioii I'rom a stato of 
 death ("dead in trcspassoa and sins") {r) It is the 
 introduction into u new vvoild. Tlie subjects ot 
 rerrenoration arc (|uici<ened or rais.'d into newn«'.ss ot 
 life. They have new tastt- ■appetites, dispositions 
 adapted t*o a new state ct thii'-s whicli find their 
 outcome in a new ethici.l life. " 01<1 thinors are 
 pa.ssed away, behold all th'v. .;:•} her )ine new. ' (</) It 
 is shariniT the life of Cniris. lu is nnion with the 
 Son of (Jol. "I am the vine, ye are th'- branches. 
 "I am come that they ini<,dit have life, an.l that they 
 mifdit have it more {nfiniUfny):' And this mwar.l 
 life is to have an external form in morality consistent 
 with its source, {e) It is a new law established in 
 the heart. " I will put my laws into their hearts, 
 and in their minds will 1 write them." And the law 
 set up within is executed both within and without as 
 the standard of ethical conduct, if) U is the re- 
 newal of man into the divine inianre (Col. ni. 10, 1 1 ). 
 The rec^enerating act is the restoration of that iman;e, 
 but it Ts implied that the renewal is a /^rocf.ss ever 
 aom^y on towards completion. This nev .uiagc is 
 gradually retrieve.! ; the Holy Si)iiit is filling up an. 
 deepening the outline continually, and the regenerated 
 life has its final issue in periection. The one re- 
 o-eneration leads to a continuous renewal ; the one 
 ?raage-engraven leads to a continuous transformation. 
 " Be ye transformed by the renewing of your minds.' 
 And ethics finds its legitimate place in this result. 
 
 It is of great moment for our argument to note 
 that the object of this change, the subject of this 
 renewal, is 'the whole nature of man— the nvevf-uy 
 as the initial recipient of regeneration; the //'rr'/ as 
 transformed by the new life-principle: the o-&7/^ ' (not 
 as being relieved from the penalty of death, for this 
 it musr undergo) but as the instrument of the re- 
 newed spiritual nature, laid on the altar of service 
 for the present and of hope for the future. 
 
 
62 
 
 PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OF CHUISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 The Ethical Outcome. 
 
 When the new or pneumatical nature begins to stir 
 under the old or psychical nature, it asserts its rights 
 and claims our whole being, as we have seen, spirit, 
 soul, and body as the temple of the living God, 
 affectins: the whole man viewed in all the constituents 
 of his nature. Redemption thus proceeds at once 
 into the depraved ethical or moral condition for its 
 renovation. 
 
 The fvx^'l (soul) and (T(^/.i(y (body) are purified and 
 elevated just as they are controlled by the regener- 
 ated spirit, and the regenerated spirit grows in power 
 as it exercises control — a result which we have ex- 
 pressed in another form in the foregoing. There is 
 in the regenerate TtvEvjAa a striving after the ethical 
 life as well as a desire for God. When the Holy 
 Spirit quickens the spirit in man and draws its 
 desires upward towards God, then the conflict begins 
 — the conflict of a regenerated spiritual nature with 
 the yet unsubdued portion which is in the lawless 
 and sarkic condition. This disorderly condition is to 
 be changed. It is to be reversed and annulled by tlie 
 work of the Holy Spirit, and ^he regenerated human 
 spirit. The fallen 'I'vxt'f and ac^i.ia are to be made 
 law-abiding by the Ttvev^iuTiKo?: avSpcoTTo^ (spirit- 
 ual man). This is sanctification, and carries us into 
 the territor}'^ of Christian ethics, so that we may view 
 the entire field. Sanctification is regeneration con- 
 tinued, as regeneration is sanctification begun. The 
 advance of sancf'Hcation is marked by a growth of 
 tlie quickened 7ryevf.ia. It asserts its supremacy and 
 compels the psychical >nd animal parts of the nature 
 to know their place, .wid own their subjection to it 
 as the governor .supreme i nder God. The more sanc- 
 tification advances the more marked is the supremacy 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OF CFIUISTLVN ETHICS. 
 
 fi;? 
 
 of the 7ryi:i'/.u^. Thus it is that the character is 
 formed for God, and the Ego, the man, becomes pneu- 
 matical in the full sense of the word. When tins 
 mastery of the spirit over the soul, and the soul over 
 the body, is comptete, then sanctification is coujpiete 
 also, and the praver of the Apostle Paul is rilized: 
 "And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; 
 and I pray God your whole spirit, and soul, and body 
 be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord 
 Jesus Christ." "This sanctiHcation is ethical and 
 procrressive, not psychological. It does not ertect a 
 radfcal change in the constitution of human nature, 
 but a reversal of conditions and a strengthening an 
 elevation of the whole manhood. Whatever ra.lical 
 disorder of faculties was caused by sin is remedied in 
 the quickening of regeneration ; and whatever de- 
 pravity of nature in the way of defect or moral 
 disease or lawless action resulting from sin is reme- 
 died by sanctification." . . 
 
 The limits of this discussion do not retjuire tlie 
 treatment of sanctification in principle, but in process, 
 for this latter alone is properly ethical. In principle, 
 however, it is, negatively, purification from sin ; posi- 
 tively, consecration of love to God, both being the 
 direJt and sole work of the Holy Spirit. Ihe unity 
 of the two is holiness, and in holiness we hnd the 
 proqressivG ethical life. The goal of sanctification is 
 the end of a process in wliich the Divine Spirit 
 requires the co-operation of the regenerate man. 
 (a) The removal of sin is described as a process. 
 " Mortify therefore your members." " Make not pro- 
 vision for the fiesh to fulfil the lusts therftof." " They 
 that are Christ's have crucified the tlesh." Crucifixion 
 is of the whole body, mortification is of each member. 
 From these passages we learn that the general char- 
 acter of the regenerate Ego becomes positively more 
 and more alienated from evil and set upon good. 
 
64 
 
 PSYCHOLOGK.'AL BASIS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 E 
 
 active and 
 
 every passive grace or virtue stead- 
 ily advances, and sin gradually fades out of the nature. 
 Hal)its of evil are unwound from the life, until at 
 length the " new man " can say, like his Master, "The 
 prince of this world conieth and ha<jh nothing in me." 
 (h) The consecration of the spirit of love is also a 
 gradual process. The shedding abroad of the love of 
 God by the Holy Spirit admits of increase — " That 
 your love may abound yet more and more." (Phil. i. 9.) 
 See also Eph. iii. 18, 19. (c) Holiness as an estate is 
 also described as progressive — first, as a goal to be 
 attained ; second, to be attained through human 
 efibrt ; but, lastly, only as the bestowment of the 
 Holy Spirit, the Supreme Agent of all good. " The 
 very God of peace sanctify you wholly." Here the 
 gradual perfecting of body, soul, and spirit is obvious- 
 ly referred to. " Sanctify them through thy truth : 
 thy word is truth" — truth, however, which the Lord 
 always speaks of as gradually imparted : " He will 
 guide you into all truth " ; and of which He says, "If 
 ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples 
 indeed." 
 
 The process of sanctitication keeps pace with the 
 fulfilment of certain conditions ; in other words, is 
 conditional on the effort of man, clearly an ethical 
 consideration. Chri tians are exhorted to " cleanse 
 themselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit"; 
 " to put off the old man and to put on the new man." 
 The real import of these and like passages is not 
 understood aright unless we see that they all hang 
 upon one principle, that the Spirit's work in us is 
 made our own, and by it w^e rise to the perfecting 
 of holiness, to the attainment of the virtues, to which 
 regenerate men are habitually required to bend their 
 effort. It is the righteousness of God, who is the 
 only law-giver according to His Word, which is the 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL BASIS OF CH1USTL\N ETHICS. 65 
 
 only rule of faith and practice/ appropriated by the 
 nature of man in its tlueefoM life—" tili we all attain 
 unto the unity of the faith, and of the knowledi^e of 
 the Son of God unto a full-<irown niai., unk the 
 measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ. 
 (Paul,Eph. iv. i:i, R.V.) . . 
 
 Thus redemption is full of signiricance in its rela- 
 tion to the ethics of Christianity. The preliminary 
 grace, with its psycholoj.dcal effects, may he re<,nirded 
 as the tirst-fruits of the Redeemer's intervention for 
 the race, explains the secret ileHur, of man to bo 
 restored, and thus li-lits up the whole sphere of 
 ethical endeavor. The forgiveness it seals on the con- 
 science takes away the barrier to moral etlort, and 
 gives it its strongest incentive. It imparts deliver- 
 ance from the power of evil through the supply to 
 the secret springs of human action of the power of an 
 indwelling God. The Spirit of regeneration literally 
 throws open to human aspiration and attainment the 
 whole compass of ethical perfection. Redemption is 
 the central idea: the Fall flanks it on one side, Res- 
 toration on the other, a conception expressed in Paul's 
 last ethical compendium which, perhaps, contains the 
 largest and most comprehensive statement of the 
 thr"e fundamental principles of Christian morality : 
 " For the grace of God hath appeared bringing salva- 
 tion to all men, instructing us to the intent that 
 denying ungodline.ss and worldly lust.s, we should 
 live soberly, and righteously, and godly in this pres- 
 ent world ; looking for the blessed hope and appear- 
 ing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus 
 Christ: who gave himself for us, that he might re- 
 deem us from all ip.i(iuity, and purify unto himself a 
 people for his own pos.session, zealous of good works." 
 (Paul to Titus, ii. 11-14, R.V.) 
 
 > The objective staiulanl of duty is the will and Word of (JimI 
 appealing to the suhjeitivo standard of the being made in the nnage 
 of (iod. 
 
66 
 
 PSYCHOLOGICAL HASIS OF CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 
 
 Now, looking over our entire argument, we see 
 (Christian ethics as to its psychological foundation 
 and practical working. The final outcome is most 
 satisfying and glorious. It is, as expressed by Godet, 
 holiness in Christ, holiness without the law, and 
 holiness by the Holy Spirit ! It is " holiness to the 
 Lord," a conception known only to supernatural re- 
 ligion. This .«icred phrase contains the three ethical 
 requisites : Virtue, Duty and Sitmmuvi Boniun-. — 
 the Virtue is in the " Holiness," which is separa- 
 tion from evil; the Duti/ is in 'to the Lord," which 
 is the ground of obligation ; and the Swinmuin 
 Bonum is the union with divinity, which the expres- 
 sion graciously implies. 
 
 There is a sense, indeed, to quote again from Pope, 
 in which Christianity may be boldly said to have 
 originated moral science as such. It has created a 
 d ^ctrinal system as its basis, and given ethics a dis- 
 tir^jt and definite character which it had not before. 
 In every .system which has appeared, apart from the 
 New Law, there has been a marked absence of some 
 of the first conditions of science properly so called. 
 All was tentative, empirical and uncertain. Ancient 
 philosophy never pretended to include in its discus- 
 sion of ethics more than a very limited range of 
 obligations. Why there was any obligation at all 
 it could never clearly define. It was exceedingly 
 elaborate in its treatment of certain cardinal virtues 
 and vices, but there its philosophy ended. ^ 
 
 > " Scripture will not suffer us to rest upon the lower level of 
 reason and philosophy, of our perceptions of human relations and 
 our personal place in a moral order, hut brings us directly into the 
 light of Ood's countenance, under the sway of His will, within the 
 serene radiance of His word of truth."— Davison. 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL BASLS OF CHRISTIAN ETHI(;s. 
 
 67 
 
 On the other hand, the Cliriistian teaching; may lay 
 claim to be in the deepest sense a Moral Philosophy. 
 It gives a full account of the moral nature of man ; 
 it explains Christianity as a life from above ; but a 
 life that is to be conducted accordin*^ to the constitu- 
 tion of man ; it establishes the ground of ethical ob- 
 ligation ; it provides for the renewal of the spirit and 
 tiie appeasing of conscience ; it sets the ethical life 
 before the hope of all; and it shows to what con- 
 summation that ethical life finally leads. 
 
 The fundamental revelation on which all this is 
 based may be rejected ; and then, of course, the whole 
 superstructure may be thought to fall. 
 
 But it still remains that there is no other to take 
 its place, and that it is the only philosophy of ethics 
 that challenges the judgment of man, and appeals to 
 his conscience, and speaks to his heart. It literally 
 has no rival, nor has ever had one. And with this 
 revelation, complete in itself, and perfect in its adap- 
 tation to the human mind, the believer may possess 
 his soul in peace, 
 
 " Ami hear at times !», sentinel, 
 
 That moves about froni place to place, 
 And whispers through the worlds of space. 
 In the still night, that all is well."